Meaning of Suluk and Salik

You shall most certainly journey from stage to stage.
- Al Quran, [8]4:19

Those who attain faith and do righteous work: blessedness is for them, and a beauteous station will be their journey's end. - [13]:29

.. between them We had appointed stages of journey in due proportion: travel therein, secure, by night and by day.  - [34]:18 

Sulook or Suluk, as a noun, means pathway, and specifically refers to a spiritual pathway. As a verb, it means to walk or journey upon a pathway, to travel on road.

The term Suluk when related to Islam and Sufism means to walk a (spiritual) path (to God). Suluk involves following both the outer path (exoterism /shariah) and the inner path (esoterism/haqiqa) of Islam virtuously. Suluk also involves being ardent (passionately eager) in the search for God or said in another way, to attune with Divine Will, to decipher The Signs of God, the Ultimate Truth, understanding the self, and understanding the essential meaning of life, particularly of one's own life.

The word Sulook is derived from the Qur'anic term "Faslooki" in chapter 16, An-Nahl (The Bees), verse 69: Faslooki subula rabbiki zululan (engage in the paths of your Lord made easy [for you]). A person who is engaged in this spiritual path is called salik.

The terms Sulook and salik are usually found in relation to Sufism. The term salik is also used for the member of a particular Sufi order or tariqah.

In his writing, The Hundred Steps, Shaikh 'Abd al-Qadir as-Sufi ad-Darqawi wrote:

Suluk is the science of all the internal elements of the Way. The salik is the one who cements himself in the knowledge necessary to prevent madness. When the time comes that the Heart moves and Love is awakened in it, and the center of the creature is possesed by the winds of desire and the torments of yearning.

When the world and all of its things are converted to torment and test for the seeker, suluk guides the walker to wisdom, so that he can avoid rushing when it is necessary to restrain himself, and make possible a valiant action when it is tempting to abandon oneself. Suluk is the means through which it is possible to benefit from Yadhb (attraction) without turning into a Majdhub; mad for Allah: that is: there is attraction - that is essential - but one avoids defenseless attraction. This means that one can have the experience without being condemned to the station.

Our Way is to be salik-majdhub. Externally sane and internally mad for Allah. Externally sober and internally intoxicated. Externally suluk is to change bad words for good words, bad actions for good actions, bad intentions for good intentions, until one lives in correct and straight words, actions and intentions. The sign of the salik is that he is safe from his own hand and his own tongue.

Suluk permits one to benefit from the state by the absorption of the doctrine and to leave the station with the expectation of further gifts from the Merciful Lord. Its ending is to have its renewed confirmation by the seekers and avoid pretensions except by the tongue of the real.

(http://www.mysticsaint.info/2010/10/stages-of-stations-of-suluk.html)