1. Clothe yourself in sky, gag your greedy mouth, and with a stick brush the barren dust you walk lest you tread on a single creature of mine for thence you tread on me. (The world, let it be said, is not your oyster.)
2. Partake of wandering as truth-seeking such that you come to realise you have no place here.
3. Cut away the heart-strings and look upon your loved ones as you would a stranger. (Go on. Snip-snip. Remember: other people’s children are always less appealing.)
4. Share food—what of your thankless appetite?—but not your blood. Your soul must endure all in isolation beneath your skin.
5. Worship me with difficulty. Starve yourself, lacerate yourself, torch yourself, such that I know that you know the pain of desiring me.
6. Offer no resistance should your enemies smack your cheek or nail you to a tree. (Death should begin to—if it has not already—look advantageous.)
7. Seek out the mountain pass to heaven—an icy bridge, sun-seared and razor-thin—observable only at soaring altitudes.
8. If you fail to find the promised land, you must not under any circumstances forge your own. (To be frank, the theme of 7 was endurance.)
9. Wait patiently until I, in the guise of death, choose to release you from your wretched yearning.
Disclaimer: In the end you may find yourself back at the beginning.