Course XV - Teaching 3: Invocation

In affective meditation there are five steps, namely, Invocation, imaginative picture, sensitive picture, purposes and consequences.
Seemingly it is a contradiction that one must invoke superior forces for an exercise like meditation, where personal effort of the person that prays is mainly important; but this first step is indispensable and must be taken for a true meditation.
Certainly, invocation moves the practitioner away from his ordinary state, by raising his vibration and placing him at the necessary soul state.
Through invocation, the practitioner leaves the mental circle where his thoughts commonly revolve, for entering and placing his soul a higher and more select circle.
So, his mind and affection are not united as usual, but amalgamated by a higher vibration. If is as if to change certain portion of the usual soul substance, it should subject it to heat by means of the invocation, which eventually shall transform it.
Internalization is a “must” for meditating, and this introversion is acquired only by contacting the soul with the higher circle invoked. Just then the soul enters his tabernacle, his sancta sanctorum, and just there the soul does his best to start the exercise.
Invocation is not to utter beautiful words addressed to the Divine or to the Masters, because this is just a means to express the invocation.
In fact, this step of the exercise consists in raising the soul and immersing it into the state of meditation by means of this elevation. There must be a real soul movement a soul toward to end invoked, not a mere verbal formulation with entreaties or requests.
The step of the invocation must last as much as the meditator takes to achieve this state. Certain souls enter easily the meditation, and others require time and exercise to move their sensibility to higher plane.
You must invoke the form of the Divine, Entities or Masters in which the soul believes. The whole exercise of meditation must be developed as if on a tense rope between the soul and the fixed point.
Invocation must begin with a simple exposition about the need of the soul to get certain purpose related to the subject of meditation. In natural and sincere terms, the soul has to say to the Mother why and for what the subject of meditation has been chosen, what evils must be corrected or what spiritual bliss is expected. But this exposition should not be for long; otherwise the soul runs the risk of a long discourse and of spoiling the desired state of meditation.
As soon as the meditator deems that his invocation is sufficiently founded or posed, must close at once the circle by means of a short entreaty. He must summarize his request with some few words, by praying as carefully as possible.
So he shall complete this step, by establishing and fixing the vibration or the state for a total development of the exercise.
We may add that even the entreaty is not question of words, but a posture of the soul, a humiliation, a minimization of the soul before the superiority of the point invoked.
It is as if through entreaty, the minimized soul could induce the Divine to enter the soul and to fill it with the necessary vibration for a perfect achievement of meditation; or also it is as if the soul, projected after much prayer, finally could lean on the selected superior point, establishing the connection or contact to plunge it into the state of meditation.
A good meditation cannot be achieved without a good invocation.