Hazrat Inayat Khan continues his explanation of the way in which life makes an impression on places and objects. The previous post is here.

In all things there is God; but the object is the instrument, and the person is life, itself. Into the object the person puts life. When a certain thing is being made, it is at that time that a life is put into it, which goes on and on as a breath in a body. This also gives us a hint that, when we take flowers to a patient and we have a healing thought with them, the flowers convey the thought of healing. As the patient looks at the flowers, he will receive from them the healing that was put there. Any eatable or sweet, anything that we take to a friend with a thought of love – its use must create a harmonious, happy result for him. Therefore, every little thing given and taken in love, with a harmonious and good thought, has a greater value than the object, itself; for it is not the object, but what is behind the object. Does this not teach us that it is not always doing or preparing things in our everyday life that counts, but that it is giving these things a life with a harmonious, constructive thought so that our work may become a thousand times greater in effect and real value?

This also teaches us that while doing a small thing we should be accomplishing something very great, and doing it with this attitude, with this idea at the back of it: that we are not only making a thing, but we are making it living. Does this not open before us a vast field of work that we could do easily without much cost or effort? In its result, that work could be of a much greater importance than anyone could think of or imagine. Is it not, at the same time, a great blessing to be able to do a thing of great importance without any outward pretense?

Even while writing a letter, a person sometimes puts in it what words cannot explain – and yet the letter conveys it. There may be one word written with a living thought behind it; that word will have a greater effect than a thousand pages. Do we not almost hear a letter speaking? It is not always what is written in it; the letter brings the one who wrote it to us, what mood he was in, his evolution, his pleasure, his displeasure, his joy and his sorrow. The letter conveys more than what was written in it.

Consider the great souls who have come on earth at different times. Conditions opposed them, and they found difficulties at every move in accomplishing what they wanted to. Yet they have produced the voice, a living voice. That living voice continued long after they had left; and in time, it spread throughout the whole universe, accomplishing what they had once wished. The effect of their one moment of thought took perhaps centuries to build something, but it was something worthwhile, something beyond man’s comprehension.

If we could only understand what spirit is, we would esteem the human being much more than we do now. We trust man so little, we believe in man so little, we respect man so little, we esteem the possibilities he has so little. If we only knew what was at the back of every strong and weak soul, we should know that there is every possibility, and we should never underestimate anyone, or fail to respect people in spite of all they may lack. We should recognize that it is the Creator who creates through all the different forms. But it is one Creator; and all that is built, prepared, made and composed is all made by that one Being working through this world of variety.

Question: Does the life and influence put into things decrease with the passing of time?

Answer: Its life is according to the intensity of the feeling. A note resounds according to the intensity with which you strike it. You may strike a note on the piano and it will continue to resound for so long. If you strike it with less intensity, it resounds for a shorter time. But it is, at the same time, according to the strength with which you strike it and according to the instrument on which you strike. There may be one instrument, the string of which will continue to vibrate for a very long time, and there may be another instrument whose string will vibrate for not very long and then will quiet down. So it is also according to the medium that you take in striking vibrations that the effect is created.

Question: Is the thought attached to things a vibratory power?

Answer: It is a life power, but in order to define it I would call it a vibratory power. From a mystical conception, vibrations may be considered to have three aspects: audible, visible and perceptible. Now the vibrations put into an object are neither audible nor visible, they are only perceptible. Perceptible to what? To the intuitive faculty of man. But it is not meant by this that the one who lacks intuitive faculty does not perceive it. He perceives it, too, but unconsciously.

To be continued…