Reality of Tasawwuf

Tasawwuf, tariqat, sulook, Ihsan are different names conveying the same sense. The basic aim of tasawwuf is not simply zikr (remembrance or mention of Allah) so that some people are under the impression that zikr is the sole aim of tasawwuf. They imagine that when they offer a bay'ah (allegiance) to a Shaykh, he will teach them the waza'if ( a rota of religious exercises inclusive of supplication, zikr, etc). There are some people who take tasawwuf to embrace certain practices and spiritual healing which they expect a Shaykh would prescribe for them together with amulets. We must understand it well that tasawwuf has nothing to do with these things. We must also know that even zikr is not the real objective of tasawwuf though it is a means to the real objective. There are some people, again, who suppose that tasawwuf calls upon them to seclude themselves in meditation, to shut themselves up for forty days or to engage in extraordinary effort. All these things are not the real objective of tasawwuf but different means and paths to it.