The first is responsiveness to beauty of all kinds, in music, in poetry, in color or line.
The second is one's exaltation by beauty, the feeling of ecstasy.
The third step is tolerance and forgiveness, when these come naturally without striving for them.
The fourth is that one accepts as if they were a pleasure things one dislikes and cannot stand: in the place of a bowl of wine, the bowl of poison.
And the fifth step is taken when one feels the rein of one's mind in one's hand; for then one begins to feel tranquillity and peace at will. This is just like riding on a very vigorous and lively horse, yet holding the reins firmly and making it walk at the speed one desires. When this step is taken the mureed becomes a master.

The time of initiation is meant to be a time for clearing away all the sins of the past. The cleansing of sins is like a bath in the Ganges. It is the bath of the spirit in the light of knowledge. From this day the page is turned.

The mureed makes his vow to the murshid that

he will treasure the teachings of the masters in the past and keep them secret,
that he will make good use of the teachings and of the powers gained by them,
and that he will try to crush his Nafs, his ego.
He vows that he will respect all the masters of humanity as the one embodiment of the ideal man,
and will consider himself the brother not only of all the Sufis in the Order to which he belongs, but also outside that order of all those who are Sufis in spirit although they may call themselves differently, and of all mankind, without distinction of caste, creed, race, nation, or religion.

Sufis engage in Halka, a circle of Sufis sitting and practicing Zikr and Fikr so that the power of the one helps the other. Furthermore they practice Tawajjeh, a method of receiving knowledge and power from the teacher in silence. This way is considered by Sufis to be the most essential and desirable.

Sometimes a receptive mureed attains in a moment greater perfection than he might attain in many years by study or practice, because it is not only his own knowledge and power that the murshid imparts, but sometimes it is the knowledge and power of Rasul; and sometimes even of God. It all depends upon the time and upon how the expressive and receptive souls are focused.

The task of the Sufi teacher is not to force a belief on a mureed, but to train him so that he may become illuminated enough to receive revelations himself.