I AM THE WORD P. 46-53

In our exploration Sunday there were quite a few references to patterns of behavior---having them, releasing them, transforming them, and of course going back to them, even though we don't think we want them.

  I loved our laughter when we all related to: "If you clear something, if you divorce something, you still have the choice of reclaiming it, or remarrying it, or at least going on a little date with your ex to see how it feels." 
It's like seeing a "Wet Paint" sign and just having to check it out--we've all got sticky fingers.


                                 😛😛😛😛😛

So I go back to an old pattern of behavior--and I might really have to to do some work to get there, and I discover (again), "Yes, this still sucks." 
Now why did I do that? Am I that nuts? Am I that self-destructive?


  I don't think so.
 What has happened here is that we have fallen asleep again. We have begun to identify with that little separate ego-self, and when that happens all the old self-centered and addictive mind-recordings start to kick in. The phrase that is often used in addiction recovery is "euphoric recall."   That's a fancy way of saying that all we think about is the rewards or the good things from that old pattern of behavior(and even that thinking is very distorted). So we find ourselves almost hypnotized by the siren song of those old attitudes, behaviors and beliefs, and before we know it we are ensnared in the web AGAIN!


  We are not bad, or evil or crazy or stupid, we just forgot. We became unaware; we fell asleep.

I could not help be reminded of Paul's desperate cry in  Romans 7:15 "I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do."

  I believe Paul struggled his whole life to try and make a distinction between the ego(self) and the soul(spiritual self). He was finally able to put it into words, but nobody really got it. Religion still translated it with a sense of separation. ("I live now, not I, but Christ liveth in me"). There was just no common language for that distinction of ego and soul, so the "self" was always portrayed in conflict, or was viewed as being weak at best, evil at worst, and somehow separate from God.

  We have inherited the legacy of this language gap and misunderstanding, and what we are doing right now is creating a new language and a new understanding. But as we have found, it is so easy to fall back into that old "separateness" style of thinking and all the guilt, fear, shame, anger, frustration, and attempts to control that goes with it.

I would encourage all of us to go back to the prayers on those pages  46-51. They are very, very powerful, and by praying them over and over we reinforce the energy of our willingness and intention, and our AWARENESS.

                                 💢💢💢💢💢

This is a great prayer to use when you find yourself falling back into an old behaviors or thought patterns that you realize no longer serve you. Memories can seem to be very fleeting, but those thoughts that have not yet been healed  can carry quite a bit of emotional baggage. So when you discover you have been caught up in an old way of thinking:

“I am Word through this memory, and I am Word through any manifestations and any belief systems that were created through this memory that are no longer in alignment with my highest good. I am now choosing to release any patterns of failure or ridicule or belief in comfort to be attained through ridicule or failure that may have been created through this situation and through this time. I am Word through this memory and all that it has begotten me. Word I am Word through this intention. Word I am Word.”

What we have done here is to "let go of the mold." We become aware and we consciously and intentionally release this pattern of thought/behavior that no longer serves us.
The "mold" still exists. It's like getting rid of a headache--you know you don't have it anymore, but it's still "hanging around."


Then we get to the next level of commitment and choice. I'm reminded of a computer scenario wherein you want to delete something, and you press all the proper buttons, and the prompt comes up "Do you want to delete...?" and you respond in the affirmative, and the prompt now comes up, "Are you sure you want to delete...?"

Yes, I want to get rid of this pattern. Are you sure you want to get rid of this? It's like throwing away your "blankie." Perhaps it has served you well over all these years, but now it is stinky, moldy, and just gets in the way. (simply put, even if we want to, letting go of old stuff that has been around for some time requires work and practice.)

Here is the prayer for breaking the mold:

“I am now making the choice to have this cleared once and for all and I intend now to release any unconscious behavior that would have me reclaim this pattern that I have stated I am now free of. Word I am Word through this intention. Word I am Word.”

           
                                💤💤💤💤💤💤

OK. I let go of the mold; I broke the mold; I sent it to the city dump. Why would "possess" me to recreate it?

The behavior might have gotten dumped, but the thinking and thought patterns behind it might still be lurking in the shadows. 
We concentrate on changing patterns of behavior, but even more important are the patterns of thought that create the pattern of behavior.
Just a for instance: one of my "demons" is "not-enoughness" thinking, and then that triggers all sorts of victim consciousness, and then that in turn produces a whole parade of negative thoughts which then begin to express themselves with anger, fear, irritability,  isolation, self-pity.  After that I am wide open to all my old stuff---my blankie, or my collection of blankies now seem quite attractive and perhaps even necessary again.

Please keep in mind what I am paraphrasing from NTI: "When you awaken (become Aware again) after being asleep/unaware it is NOT time to beat yourself up or even figure out why you fell asleep. It is time to be grateful that you are awake. 
Then we go to praying the prayer again, and again...

As my buddy Ram Dass says, "Once you are awake, you can never really go to sleep again. You can doze, but we never really go backwards."


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Nature abhors a vacuum, and there is a similar metaphysical principle. When I rid myself of a pattern that no longer serves me, I want to put a new pattern in its place.

Jesus alludes to this in a very graphic way in Luke 11: 24 “When a demon is cast out of a man, it goes to the deserts, searching there for rest; but finding none, it returns to the person it left,  and finds that its former home is all swept and clean. Then it goes and gets seven other demons more evil than itself, and they all enter the man. And so the poor fellow is seven times worse off than he was before.”

Please don't get scared off by the "demon" talk. This is not about demons or devils or anything outside of us. These are patterns that no longer serve us, and need to be replaced. 
Here is the "Prayer of Replacement":

“I am now in dominion over my thinking. I am now realizing myself fully as the one in control of my thinking. I am now choosing to think only those thoughts that will bring me benefit and anchor in this new way of thinking fully into my consciousness. I am Word through this intention. Word I am Word.”
“I am now choosing to think only those thoughts which will bring me peace and will align me to a higher consciousness. I am doing this easily and through my own intention to know myself as Word. Word I am Word through this intention. Word I am Word.”


And then as the icing on the Spiritual cake, we are reaching into that sense of fear and separateness from which all of this stuff came, and we are consciously releasing that as well: 

“I am now choosing to release the pattern of worry that has created these problems and I do this fully on all levels: past, present, future, and align myself to the new thought that I have put forth. I am Word through this intention. Word I am Word.”

                                           👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀



For each and every one of these prayers and intentions a continuing basic requirement is practice. These are not one shot deals. It took us time, effort, energy, and repetition to acquire this stuff and so it is going to take some practice to let it go and break the mold.
It's the old "How do you get to Carnegie Hall? practice, practice, practice.
Notice both the understanding and the resistance!

I'm not sure how or why but many of us have acquired the mistaken notion that spiritual matters happen in all at once. Maybe it was too much Disney, "Bippity, bobitty, boo" growing up.
It would be ridiculous to think, "Well, I ate dinner yesterday, why do I need to do it again today?" Yet in matters of Spirit, I find myself thinking: "Well, I prayed about that yesterday. Why hasn't it changed?" Or "I set my intention yesterday to be kind and loving towards myself, how come it's not working today?" 

Yeah, I know that's why they call it Spiritual Practice!

Thank you all for joining in this journey. We are truly blessed.

May all beings be at Peace; 
May all beings be free of suffering.

Gerry

Chapter One p. 40-46

Last week we explored an essential element of this book “I Am Word through my being.” etc.

At least two huge events are happening here: what we are doing through this kind of affirmation is we are 1) acknowledging a Truth that already exists AND 2) we are raising our own frequency/vibrational level to resonate with this Truth.

We are literally and energetically changing our thinking and therefore changing the results of our thinking.

I think some people were a little freaked out with that prayer/directive on p. 44.

I came across an article that went into this idea in more detail, and I feel it made the teaching more gentle and natural.

The body is a miracle of organization and intelligence in which life is continually renewed and energy continually replenished so that the total organism can continue to live.

Sleeping involves part of this renewal, and is a process through which the higher vibrations of light are permitted greater access to the physical body because the emotional and mental components of personality that are often limiting factors in the awake state are no longer present while one sleeps. Although dreaming produces mental and emotional content and therefore creates emotional states, the content of these is part of the sleep state itself and not a barrier to the energies that would restore, heal, and rejuvenate.

The quality of sleeping has a great deal to do with the amount of restoration that can take place. Deep sleep produces not only different brainwave patterns, but also permits a greater influx of light energy into the cells and tissues so that toxins can be removed and greater energy can be infused on a cellular level. This does not happen in any kind of conscious way. It happens because of the nature of the human body which has never truly been separated from the higher realms of light, despite one's waking experience. At night, this body rejoins its higher counterparts that are the non-physical energy bodies, and a more seamless union of different aspects of one's being takes place than can normally occur during daytime functioning.

The infusion of light is not the only thing that can occur during sleep, however. It is also possible for a soul to decide to continue their experiences with other realms while they sleep or to receive teachings from Beings with whom they have had an ongoing soul relationship. Such nighttime experiences are not unusual even if not recalled, and many people benefit during the daytime from learning acquired at night which is unknown to them, but which occurs to their conscious mind as insight or inspiration later on. Much of this insight has taken place during the sleep state, when access to one's own higher intelligence as well as to the help and teachings of others, can infuse the mind and the understanding and be held there till such time as the conscious mind can retrieve the information or inspiration.

Much healing is possible at night, including healing of sleep disturbances as well. If there is a possibility for one in need of healing to relax, and instead of trying to sleep, rather to try to enter an intermediate 'twilight' zone of being partly asleep and partly awake, it is possible to rest in this state and to gain much of the nourishment from the upper realms that one would normally gain during deeper sleep. Healing of other kinds is also possible, for the relationship with the spiritual realms continues whether one perceives it to be so or not, indeed, whether one seeks it or not, and helpers of all kinds are available when called upon to help address problems, both emotional and physical, that may be troubling during the day.

The capacity to enter a deeper state of sleep is one that needs to be appreciated as part of the extraordinary complexity and beauty of the way the human body has been fashioned, for there is a self-maintaining function built into the body itself which renews itself, heals itself, and restores a sufficient amount of energy after it has been depleted so that the body can remain in a viable state for experiencing life within the physical realm for many years. As more light becomes present on earth and infuses the cellular structure of people's bodies, this capacity for renewal and sustenance will become much more available, and many of the ailments that are currently produced by insufficient energy or insufficient life-force will disappear in the presence of greater light.     from Julie Redstone

http://www.worldblessings.com

Please know, nothing is done without your choosing. This text is never suggesting that you are giving your power away in any form. AND choices are not always made consciously. This shouldn't be a surprise. Just take a look at all the unconscious choices, the automatic ones, you make everyday.

As you are walking this path you can also begin to become aware of the spiritual choices you are making—again, not always conscious. You might find yourself avoiding an activity that might have produced anger or fear. You might find yourself shifting your focus from judgment to compassion. These are choices your soul/your Spirit are making, and as we become more ware of our soul’s power we can begin to make those choices more conscious.

More than anything else this text is encouraging us to realize the power of our choices, open up our consciousness and to work with and accept help when offered.

In an older language we would have called this “cooperation with grace.” 

A few years ago, I think I would have been more skeptical and cynical, but I truly believe today that we do have the opportunity to transform in some remarkable ways.

In a few sermons I’ve asked the question, “Would you ever speak to another present he way you speak to yourself?” and , of course, most of us would answer with a resounding “NO!”

So here is one the lessons in last week's reading. 

Your words to yourself create energy, and that energy affects you in all areas of your life—physical, metal, emotional, spiritual, and relational.

When you take a feeling/idea/belief/life situation, and say, "I am Word through (this feeling, etc.)" I am doing both those actions mentioned above: (1) acknowledging a Truth that already exists AND 2) we are raising our own frequency/vibrational level to resonate with this Truth.)

EXAMPLE: If I was to realize I am angry, and I were to consciously say to myself:

“Word I am Word through the anger I am feeling.” Even though it sounds a little nuts—here is what is happening: 1) I am acknowledging and taking responsibility for my feeling; 2) by “Wording” it I am literally changing the frequency of my anger so that it it might transform—into compassion, love, peace, etc.

Again we are claiming the power of the Christ Consciousness to  transform any form of negativity or lack into something positive. 

Now this last section for this week is wonderfully powerful. It would almost be like a magician showing up at your door and asking you if you would like to change the past. and this is what we are doing.

I would encourage you to make a copy of this prayer, make it available and say it again and again and again.

“I am Word through this memory, and I am Word through any manifestations and any belief systems that were created through this memory that are no longer in alignment with my highest good. I am now choosing to release any patterns of failure or ridicule or belief in comfort to be attained through ridicule or failure that may have been created through this situation and through this time. I am Word through this memory and all that it has begotten me. Word I am Word through this intention. Word I am Word.”

We will continue on this theme of healing the past next week.

Be well

Stay well

May all beings be at peace

May all being she free of suffering

Gerry

CHAPTER 0NE p. 36-42

A major theme here is that as we grow, as our frequency/vibrational** level rises, old ideas, behaviors, beliefs and patterns of thought and action begin to fall away.

You don’t have to DO anything to make this happen. It’s not like forcing or pushing something away. As you continue to allow yourself to be consciously aware of THE LOVE THAT YOU ARE, fear, anger, judgment, are no longer compatible with your energy. The old stuff is like a coat that no long fits. It might be a fine coat for someone else, but it no long fits you. 

Just imagine yourself putting on a shirt you and when you are eight years old. Just doesn’t fit anymore. 

(Addictions are somewhat similar in speaking of this energy. For instance, I am still addicted to nicotine, even though I have not used that drug in years. The addiction is still here, but the attraction and compulsion is not. It no longer "fits." Now this is an interesting one for me (I've got lots of addictions, and stories for all of them) but let's stick with smoking. I found that the more I pushed against this addiction (e.g. trying to quit) the more energy the addiction seemed to have. The more I focused on loving my body, even its cravings, and taking positive, gentle care of my physical being, then the less and less hold this addiction and on me, until one day, the attraction/compulsion was no longer there.
With alcohol it was a different process. For me, I had to quit drinking before anything else was going to happen, but I found that through prayer and willingness, I was relieved of the compulsion, and once that was gone recovery became much more a flow--not always easy, but better.)

The book suggests that the whole world is being offered the opportunity to “wake up.” This book is simply one of the vehicles for this awakening.

You can note this for yourselves both consciously and unconsciously. You have all  begun to let go of the structure of religion, whatever form that might have taken for you, and you have allowed yourself to be drawn into deeper sense of Spirituality, a sense of Oneness with God-The Source.

You no longer buy into the idea of separation. (I realize we all slip back into separateness thinking, but we also realize the fallacy in that thinking and we realize no matter how much we might have gotten lost in those thoughts, that they are not who I am.

The following is a beautiful statement from the book:

The Word is the vibration of God in action. Word is action. It is creation. When we say to you, “I Am Word,” we are decreeing ourselves as the Creator in action. When you decree, “I Am Word,” you summon to you your own anchoring as the Christed Self and begin to make this manifest in form. The journey of how to become this energy in a way that you can feel, receive, understand, accept, believe, inhabit in truth is what we are intending for you. This is the freedom of the time. This is the freedom of the time. This is the freedom of the time. (pp. 39-40)

And as a final piece to this section, we are introduced to a core teaching that will be repeated throughout this book. You can even use it as a mantra for moving yourself forward: (I’ve taken the liberty to arrange this information a little differently than the book):

When you affirm, “Word I am Word,” you give to yourself the Word vibration as Self in manifestation and you bring about a process, an alchemical process, that aligns your frequency to the vibration of Word.

(please keep in mind here, “Word” doesn't’ mean just a word—As I mentioned in class “WORD” in the Greek is Logos—in modern day terminology Logos means Christ-Consciousness, an expression of our Oneness with God.

By pronouncing our identity with Word/Logos we are not attempting to create something, we are simply affirming what is lardy true

Here are the steps we take to attune people to the frequency of the Word: 1. I am Word through my being. Word I am Word. 

THIS IS THE INITIAL decree to bring the body into alignment with the vibration of the Creator.

2. I am Word through my vibration. Word I am Word. 

3. I am Word through my knowing of myself as Word. Word I am Word.

“I am Word through my knowing” very simply says, “I am Word through my consciousness .” We will also say to you, “I am Word through my consciousness” intends you to understand that “I Am Word” signifies itself as consciousness. And so consequently your consciousness frequency becomes Word, or the Creator in consciousness. “I am Word through my understanding of myself.” “I am Word through my belief systems.” “I am Word through all that I know to be true.” All of these affirmations herald information implanting into your energy field that will then realign your energy field to the Christ frequency and to the frequency of the Word. (pp. 41-42).

and so as the book would say, “Thank you and good night!”

∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞

**to keep this very simple. Notice within yourself what it feels like to be loving. When you do that you are in the vibration, the frequency of love. It is not any emotion so much as it is a sensation and a knowing.

Now notice within yourself what it feels like to be fearful. Now you are experiencing the vibration, the frequency of fear. 

The best way I can put this into words is that the vibration of fear is denser, heavier than that of love, and if we were to continue to use that language, then the heavier/denser vibrations are those that weigh us down, keep us stuck. The higher vibrations, like those of love are lighter, freer more open.

The denser vibrations of anger, fear, judgment are very “sticky” like velcro and attract all kinds of nasty stuff. The lighter vibrations are more like Teflon. There becomes less and less attachment, less and less need for control.

Chapter One The Word 1

Most of us have heard that “we create our own reality,” that you created whatever is showing up in your life.

I had a real problem with that one. I realize some of  resistance was from my ever-active ego(who wants to take all the credit, but none of the responsibility). The ego would always like to find someone or something else to blame. Remember Laurel and Hardy: “Here’s another fine mess you gotten me into.”

BUT there was also my confusion that could not understand why I would ever create, fear, shame, stuckness and situations in my life that would reflect those things.

I greatly appreciated the text exploring this idea in a thoughtful way that both makes sense and presents me with an opportunity to make changes without having to go on another cosmic guilt trip.

First we have: “a combination of things going on: your life as you intend it and your life as you undermine it through your unconscious patternings. And the two things fight all the time. “I want a lover, why don’t I have a lover?” “I want more money, I can’t seem to keep more money.” “I want a friend, but I don’t have a friend.” You can ask all these questions and we will give you the same answer anytime: that when you have a pattern that sabotages your own life’s intentions, you have unconscious patterning that needs to be cleared. Now this is one level of understanding and we will say that this is number one.” (pp. 29-30)

This brief paragraph allowed me to understand the whole concept of “self-sabatoge” in an entirely different light. I’m not doing anything on purpose to screw myself up; what is happening is that I am attempting to hold onto two conflicting thoughts at the same time without realizing it. So in essence what is happening is that my thoughts are canceling one another out! 

I had never perceived it that clearly before.

The second piece is that we are also under the influence of global and cultural beliefs that have been with us for millennia, and we don’t even realize these systems or structures are there. This includes the unconscious beliefs we have that can also influence our behavior and our choices.

Then lastly we have the imposed limitations or “ceilings” as the text calls them.

“This as far as I can go. This is as far as I am “allowed to go. 

My suggestion here and many other places as well is to LISTEN TO YOUR HEART.

You will know when to rest and when to climb, and you will also know, because of your intention and willingness, growth is always taking place. 

Perhaps “growth” is a misnomer. What I am speaking of here is becoming more and more aware of our Oneness with God.

“The beginning of it is the hard part. The understanding that you are the Christ and that it can be made manifest is the key. Once the key is in the lock, the door is open and you are on the run, because the energetic configurations that are required to bring this into form can be brought to you with your intention to require it. 

If you say to the universe, “I want to manifest myself as my own Divine Being, as my Christed Self, as my Higher Self embodied,” however you want to decree it, you have to understand that you set in motion a process and once this process is begun, this process continues. You may pause . You may break. You may wander away and you may wander back, but the evolution of your soul cannot stop itself from forward motion and your soul already knows that this is the key to your growth.” (pp. 32-33)

I love that piece. Ram Dass said
“Once you are awake (on the path), you cannot fall asleep again. You can doze (forget) once in awhile, but you will always be back..”

As the text states: “the beginning is the hard part.” A metaphor for our movement here: It’s like trying to roll a heavy stone or push open a door that has been stuck shut for a long time. At first we push and push and push and nothing seems to be happening. Many people give up at this point. The whole thing just seems too hard, pointless—“I’m working and working and nothing is happening.”

But if you keep at it you will begin to feel a slight bit of movement, now it might seem that the stone or the door go right back to where they were, but that is not the case, because if you push now, you will get a little more movement, and a little more. 

“So we will say to you this : Once the key is in the lock and you have said , “Yes , I am on this journey,” your own soul will manifest itself and the opportunities you require to bring this growth into achievement will present themselves one day at a time.” p.33

Here is a simple/profound description of what this text and this journey are all about.

To be the Christ simply means to be yourself in full realization of your power as a piece of God in action. p. 33

I realize there are all sorts of questions that arise here, but notice to as it suggests on p. 34 all those mind questions can be ways of just slowing down the process.

I’m reminded of the original Karate Kid movie (and there are similar scenes in Star Wars with Luke Skywalker and Yoda). 

Part of the deal that Mr. Miagi made was that Daniel would not question his teaching or his tactics, and it was not until much later on that Daniel was able to recognize how much he had learned from seemingly pointless tasks. 

(wax on/wax off)

I’m not suggesting we become brainless automatons—I’ve had my share of that role. The difference here is that we are not trying to figure something out with our heads, as I mentioned before. We are learning more and more to listen to our hearts.

When you rise, your landscape changes. How it feels to see the world, how it feels to see the self from a higher vibration, is markedly different from what you can imagine.

The old self walks away and does not come back, because the old self was never truly there. It was always illusion that you were separate from God. It was always illusion that you were not loved by your fellow man. It was always illusion that there was war.

Very Important!!!! Please notice how the text follows this up

Now we are not discounting physical experience. Physical experience is very real. And you turn on the television and there is famine and there is war and there are all these “strifes” that preclude people from believing that such things, the things that we speak about, can be so. But we will tell you this. On one dimension, these things exist and they are teachers, if you will learn from them and they will release. On a higher level, we say they are illusion because the physical reality that you exist in is illusion as well.

Not to debate the real/illusion thing, but what this is saying is anything that is changeable, is illusion on the highest level. As soon as you think you’ve got “it” its changed! So what have you got? You don’t have what you thought it was because it isn’t that anymore!!!!!!

The following embraces and embodies the energy of HOPE. I would encourage us all to be willing to believe it.

One man cannot war with his fellow and that brings peace, and that peace will resonate. One man can ascend into his Christ consciousness and change the world. And this has been done on a singular level many times in this history of this plane. It is going to be done now in many, many, many, many people as the planet begins its ascension into the new millennium of peace and understanding and truth. That has the promise. It is the promise . And those illusions that will continue to present themselves, the self-loathing, the fear, the war, may continue in a lower frequency for those who require it, but it will not be the case as you ascend in consciousness. We said earlier the view changes, everything changes, everything is changed. (pp. 35-36)

Thank you for your willingness and dedication.

We will pick up on page 38 on Sunday.

Bring questions/comments/ areas too explore.

PEACE

finishing up the Prologue

Alrighty, then. Here is where it begins—out of the head and into the heart. Out of preconceived ideas and forms; out of our limited ego consciousness, and into the Truth of Who You Are.

This is a step we are all going to take. Many of us are choosing to take it now, but as the Course and many other spiritual teachings remind us, we will all take this step now or later.

“Now ask yourself this: Am I willing, at this time, to engage myself fully in a process of transformation that may require me to release beliefs that I have held to be true? Am I willing now to engage in a process that will ask me to recognize my fear and to absolve it from its path by releasing it completely to the Christ? Am I willing now to be on a path of radical change that will leave me naked and resplendent in my frequency and without the tethers to a past self that are no longer serving me? Am I willing now to go on a journey with the Christ of realizing myself as the child of God made manifest that I am intended to be? If you say, “Yes ,” to this, we will encourage you to read forward. If you say, “Yes ,” to this, we will work with you now. Because we are in frequency, we can work with you where you are, and the resonance of this book will actually be beyond the pages , but will be instilled in the frequency of the words and the intention that this book has been created in.” p. 25

This can be frightening to my limited, little personal ego consciousness, and it seems silly for me to deny that or pretend it is not there. So I want to acknowledge the fear and discomfort, and I want to encourage us to accept that as a normal natural thing, and to know we do not need to let those feelings dictate our lives.

One of my metaphors for this is as follows:

I am standing on a busy street corner, holding a young child who is frightened by all the noise and activity, and he/she becomes truly terrified, crying and squirming, when I begin to cross the street. What do I do? Just stay where I am and never cross the street? Muzzle the kid and tie him up so he stops causing problems?

I can talk, placate and cajole, but at some point no matter if the fear has dissipated or not, I am going to need to take charge and go across the street.

Please notice the “me” that is acting up—the ego—is not the same “me” that is deciding to take action.

We are all dedicated to our spiritual growth. We all realize we do not know what forms or challenges that might take, but we are not alone and this journey is not one of peril so much as it is one of awakening.

Peace

9/28 book Prologue 1

As I mentioned in our class Sunday, this is not new stuff, HOWEVER, it is good for us to realize that we are swimming in a different pool of spirituality than we have been before.

Even though most of us have moved from the moralistic, blame, shame and guilt we grew up with, we have not been offered a whole lot to put in its place.

So what happens then is this unfilled void in Christianity and spirituality becomes something like, "Jesus was nice and we are supposed to be nice too."

The reason why most of us are stepping into a class like this one is because we do recognize that void, and we want to fill it with more than just little fortune cookie sayings. We want SUBSTANCE; we want EXPERIENCE. We want to go beyond the material world of thoughts and feelings.

I’m going to present a word and idea that is not generally part or our spiritual vocabulary. Are your ready???? MYSTIC.

Yes, we are being called to be mystics—please read on.

Of course in years past, mystical consciousness was only for monks and nuns locked away in cloistered monasteries or hermits on the mountain top.

But today, this consciousness is offered to everyone. A mystic is simply one who is consciously living in the presence of God, the presence of Love. And so, here is the heart of our yearning. To be in Love; to be One with; not just to have peace, but to BE peace. 

The scary part is that this poor little isolated ego which we have been identified with for so long, thinks that it is going to die if we take the plunge. The truth is that it will disappear for a second or two; it will "die" for a moment, but it will be back. This work is not about killing or destroying the ego, it is simply about putting the ego in its proper place and recognizing it is not who I am. 

So that brings us to some reflections on last Sunday's work.

Being the Word, simply means recognizing we are a creation of God, a creation of Love, that is our nature, that is our essence that is who we are underneath or beyond all the stuff, all the roles, all the labels.

When I say, “Word, I am Word,” that is simply a shorter version of saying, “I am a a creation of Love; I choose to see all things in and with Love; Love is who I am and who you are. There is nothing else of importance.”

Here are a few quotes, old and new, that describe this journey.

from some of the great teachers of the 2nd and 3rd Century:

Clement(of Alexandria): ``The Logos(Word) of God had become man so that you might learn from a man how a man may become God.’’

Origen: ``From Him [Christ] there began the union of the divine with the human nature, in order that the human, by communion with the divine, might rise to be divine.’' 

``Identification with Christ would lift the believer through the human nature of Christ to union with his divine nature and thus with God and thus to deification.’'

Irenaeus: "The Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, who did, through His transcendent love, become what we are, that He might bring us to be even what He is Himself."

Meister Eckhart 14th Century: "The seed of God is in us. Given an intelligent and hard-working farmer, it will thrive and grow up to God, whose seed it is; and accordingly its fruits will be God-nature. Pear seeds grow into pear trees, nut seeds into nut trees, and God-seed into God.

Scott Peck: "This is the meaning of our individual existence. We are born that we might become, as a conscious individual, a new life form of God.” 

and from our book:

“Why you have come is to realize yourself as the Christed Self that you were intended to be. That is the mission of man. That is the mission of every man. That is the mission that you have been bequeathed and that you are answering to , each  one of you, in your way, as you transpire to move through this time.”

“Now many of you are going to ask, “What does this mean? What am I then? What does it mean to be the Christ?” And we will tell you very simply: what it means to be the Christ is to be in the frequency of Christ, and to recognize the self in its divinity as one with the Creator without the separation of self that the ego process would keep in place to diminish the glory of the self as one with its Creator.”

“If you understand that your light is a piece of the great light, then you have the beginning of the understanding of your Christed Self.”

Last week I shared that wonderful parable from Richard Bach’s Illusions.

I just came across another one that fits beautifully with some of he ideas expressed above:

Once upon a time, in a not-so-faraway land, there was a kingdom of acorns, nestled at the foot of a grand old oak tree. Since the citizens of this kingdom were modern, fully Westernized acorns, they went about their business with purposeful energy; and since they were midlife, baby-boomer acorns, they engaged in a lot of self-help courses. There were seminars called "Getting All You Can out of Your Shell." There were wounded-ness and recovery groups for acorns who had been bruised in their original fall from the tree. There were spas for oiling and polishing those shells and various acornopathic therapies to enhance longevity and well-being. One day in the midst of this kingdom there suddenly appeared a knotty little stranger, apparently dropped "out of the blue" by a passing bird. He was capless and dirty, making an immediate negative impression on his fellow acorns. As he crouched beneath the oak tree, he stammered out a wild tale. Pointing upward at the tree, he said, "We ... are ... that!”

“Delusional thinking, obviously,” the other acorns concluded, but one of them continued to engage him in conversation: "So tell us, how would we become that tree?" "Well," said he, pointing downward, "it has something to do with going into the ground ... and cracking open the shell." "Insane," they responded. "Totally morbid! Why, then we wouldn't he acorns anymore." 

Humor aside, the point is obvious-at least when it comes to acorns. An acorn is only a seed; its nature and destiny is to become an oak tree. Everyone knows this. What's much more difficult is to apply this same parable to ourselves. Cynthia Bourgeault. The Wisdom Way of Knowing.

Jesus said, “Unless the grain of wheat fall unto the ground and die unto itself; it shall not live.”

I know its scary, but we are not flying without a net. God has promised, just as Jesus reached out to Peter when he was sinking under the waves after his abortive attempt to walk on water, “If you ever think you are falling, I will always be here to catch you.”

You really don't have to be different from who you already are.