The summer solstice is the time in the physical world of greatest light.  The winter solstice is the time of the greatest darkness, if you will.  The equinoxes are equal day and equal night in the fall and spring.  But while this is occurring in a physical sense, in the physical universe, in the inner universe, meaning in other dimensional planes, something else is happening at that same time also.  The manifestation may be more sunlight or less sunlight or half and half in the physical world, but in the subtle planes there are doorways and powers that open and come into view.  And if we can hook ourselves onto those powers, they can carry us a long way.

Occultists are intrinsically lazy like everyone else.  We would much rather hitch a ride than walk - unless we just are in the mood to walk.  The way we accomplish things is by hooking ourselves to powers, to forces, to energies.  And we focus on these energies, we blend our aura, we extend our luminous selves psychically into those forces and powers and we hitch a ride.

It's a time when it's easier to change, to erase personal history, to do what I call a "transit".  It's an astrological term, to go through a transit - that is to say, to shift yourself, to adjust the foreground and the background of your mind, to take aspects of yourself that you don't find interesting, that drain your power, that are just a pain or that are boring and put them in the background, and to bring other things into the foreground.

- "Solstices and Equinoxes", Tantric Buddhism

You only become immortal when you feel the suffering of others and become one with it, and you feel the joy of others and become one with it, and yet step beyond both into mortality itself and dissolve in Eternity.  And yet that tear remains even after enlightenment, even though it is invisible.  It is only visible to those who know.  And there is no way to will that.  It will come when it will through the grace of God. 

And therefore, to be so absurd or so knowledgeable, or even as a teacher, autocratic, or to assume anything at almost any time seems to forget that there is a tear in the eye of the Buddha and that we are all Buddha, and we all have that tear.  But because we are so caught up in the illusions of Self Realization that we forget that our Self Realization is of little importance, and that what matters is the welfare of others.  And when you forget that, you forget what matters, and only when you remember that will enlightenment occur. 

When you become totally concerned with the welfare of others without any sense of self-importance - it is only with that complete commitment and simplicity and humility and humor that is engendered by taking on the impossible task of selfless giving, and doing it anyway - perfectly - without any sense of self - that real progress begins to occur.  That is the preparation for the higher enlightenment.  It is a noble endeavor. 

-Rama