WELCOME 6

Interesting group Sunday—lots of questions/discussion. 

I think we set a record—we covered ONE paragraph! Good thing we are not on a fixed schedule.

We began by sharing an awareness that the material we are exploring is not new and also shows up in varying different ways. Even looking back, we find that teachings of this sort existed before we even knew it. The example one of our classmates offered was watching [reruns of]the Bill Moyer’s interviews of Joseph Campbell and the discussion around mythology and the energies connected with myth. (A myth is far more than just a story; myth carries with it an energy,  a creative force. A simple example would be your astrological sign. If you are a Leo, for example, as I am, you will notice that there are certain energies, patterns of thought and behavior that help to personify you. 

You will also notice that at certain times a “story” becomes much more than a story. The early Star Wars movies are a good example of that. Harry Potter is another. The story becomes a phenomenon, an energy that many connect and identify with. It goes beyond our intellectual understanding. [Obviously, this is a very brief if and limited description.])

Before we even got into the book we begin to explore various levels of consciousness, each of which carries with it a vibration. We exist and interact on many energetic levels and one of the things we are working on is to become more aware of those energies.

I shared a model that I came across a number of years ago. 

If you could imagine that you have a channel selector on the side of your head and you could click your awareness from one channel to another, here's a way that would be like.

Channel 1 is your physical reality, where the primal energies are most in force. Here is where we are taking care of our physical needs. Hunger, food, warmth, shelter, reproduction, are all the focus of this channel.

Channel 2 is what we might call the personality channel, the soap opera channel, the story channel, all the stories we are making up about ourselves and all those around us.  This is an easy one to get lost in or to overly identify with because most of us are naturally taught to think this is who we are. You might also call this the ego channel, and when I am living from my ego people fall into three categories—those I am controlling, those who are trying to control me, and those that are irrelevant. Power, Control, Drama are all part of living in this reality of channel 2.

When I flip into channel 3, I begin to realize that life is bigger than my overly simplistic story. This is what is sometimes termed the mythological realm. It is a bridge to the spiritual, but not quite there yet. We still see ourselves as individuals, but it is more as the hero or a heroine on a quest, a prince or princess seeking a lost love. (In some more “primitive” cultures as you reach a certain angel, you become a crone, a wise woman, or a grandfather, not in the literal sense, but as a keeper of the tribes wisdom and history.)  I find myself living out a role much bigger than my personality self, and if I am willing to, I see you doing that as well. There is quite a bit of creativity and creative energy that flows from this awareness. There is a connectedness with other beings on this channel that has not been previously part of our awareness.

And then we moved to channel4. This is a place where are sense of the spiritual deeply connects. It is from this awareness that we can love, show compassion. We begin to realize that even though we are on unique journeys and that each one of us is a unique expression of the Divine, that we are also linked together with the sense of oneness. That our purpose no matter what personality we might be wearing is the same–to love as deeply as possible and to identify with the divine than we are as the essence of our truth. I believe mother Theresa expressed this beautifully when she described her job, her mission on earth, “to see Christ in all his distressing disguises.”

(I might note here that we occupy all those channels simultaneously, it is our awareness, constricted or expanded that makes the difference.)

Even though this was not a planned part of our book discussion it does fit in, giving us a model for awareness and a way of being able to identify when we are in lower vibration or limited awareness of the truth of who we are. 

I also became aware that another word or term or explanation for what is referred to as “illusion” would also be the concept of limitation. When I am looking at you or me in limitation I am in illusion. In other words, I am not seeing you or myself the way we truly are.

A few weeks ago I came across this idea: “We all know the truth of who we are, but we just don't completely believe it yet.” How do we know that? Simply put, the world would be a very different place if we all believed the truth of who we are.

The thought also occurred to me that the only reason I can think of, at the moment, of why we would not fully believe the truth of who we are, is that somehow or another the thought or the energy of unworthiness still remains. Like a dandelion whose roots go deeply within the earth, we can keep pulling them up but unless we get to the roots it will keep growing back.

Now here is our dilemma, I do not dig up the roots of my unworthiness through my personality self. That is just an impossible task. It's apples and oranges; it doesn't work. The only way I can up root my unworthiness this through my divine self and identifying wiht my Divine Self, which doesn't have any unworthiness about it at all.

The only way I know how to deal with this is through a continuing act of surrender. “See me, feel me, touch me, heal me, guide me, love me.” That is one of my prayers. Another is “Lord that I may see” that I may see myself as You see me. Or in words we are more familiar with—“May I see myself with the eyes of the Christ,” and, of course, when I see myself with the eyes of the Christ, I see all other beings that way as well.

Along similar lines, an interesting question came up about this sense of worthiness. A classmate described  having a good sense of their own worthiness, but having a difficult time seeing some others as worthy as well. Here is another of those “sneaky” pieces of awareness that shows up every once in a while.

Let me give you an example of my own. A Course in Miracles suggests that every human interaction is either an “act of love or cry for help.” The way I initially interpreted that was that I was in charge of deciding whether this other person was either in an active love or a cry for help. I did not realize it but that was my personality self’s interpretation. If I see you as helpless or hurt or angry or lost or  confused, I am actually seeing you through my own sense of limitation. In other words, I am not seeing you as you truly are. I am the one who is crying for help, because I am seeing with the eyes of limitation.

Another example of that comes from scripture is a brief parable that Jesus spoke called “The Publican and the Pharisee.” Rather than paraphrase, let me quote it here for you:

“He spoke also this parable to certain people who were convinced of their own righteousness, and who despised all others. "Two men went up into the temple to pray; one was a Pharisee, and the other was a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed to himself like this: 'God, I thank you, that I am not like the rest of men, extortioners, unrighteous, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get.' But the tax collector, standing far away, wouldn't even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner!' I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted."

— Luke 18:9-14, World English Bible

Now there is a real catch to this story. Everyone wishes to identify with the humility of the publican, which is fine, but what we are saying without realizing that is “Thank God I'm not like that Pharisee over there.” So here we are falling into that same trap of judgment we were wanting to avoid!

The truth we are dealing with here is that either I hold everyone in the light or no one. This is one of those few absolutely clear cut  decisions. As a line from the song goes “You can't hold your brother in the dark and expect to see the light.”

Thank you all for walking each other home.

Interesting group Sunday—lots of questions/discussion. 

I think we set a record—we covered ONE paragraph! Good thing we are not on a fixed schedule.

We began by sharing an awareness that the material we are exploring is not new and also shows up in varying different ways. Even looking back, we find that teachings of this sort existed before we even knew it. The example one of our classmates offered was watching [reruns of]the Bill Moyer’s interviews of Joseph Campbell and the discussion around mythology and the energies connected with myth. (A myth is far more than just a story; myth carries with it an energy,  a creative force. A simple example would be your astrological sign. If you are a Leo, for example, as I am, you will notice that there are certain energies, patterns of thought and behavior that help to personify you. 

You will also notice that at certain times a “story” becomes much more than a story. The early Star Wars movies are a good example of that. Harry Potter is another. The story becomes a phenomenon, an energy that many connect and identify with. It goes beyond our intellectual understanding. [Obviously, this is a very brief if and limited description.])

Before we even got into the book we begin to explore various levels of consciousness, each of which carries with it a vibration. We exist and interact on many energetic levels and one of the things we are working on is to become more aware of those energies.

I shared a model that I came across a number of years ago. 

If you could imagine that you have a channel selector on the side of your head and you could click your awareness from one channel to another, here's a way that would be like.

Channel 1 is your physical reality, where the primal energies are most in force. Here is where we are taking care of our physical needs. Hunger, food, warmth, shelter, reproduction, are all the focus of this channel.

Channel 2 is what we might call the personality channel, the soap opera channel, the story channel, all the stories we are making up about ourselves and all those around us.  This is an easy one to get lost in or to overly identify with because most of us are naturally taught to think this is who we are. You might also call this the ego channel, and when I am living from my ego people fall into three categories—those I am controlling, those who are trying to control me, and those that are irrelevant. Power, Control, Drama are all part of living in this reality of channel 2.

When I flip into channel 3, I begin to realize that life is bigger than my overly simplistic story. This is what is sometimes termed the mythological realm. It is a bridge to the spiritual, but not quite there yet. We still see ourselves as individuals, but it is more as the hero or a heroine on a quest, a prince or princess seeking a lost love. (In some more “primitive” cultures as you reach a certain angel, you become a crone, a wise woman, or a grandfather, not in the literal sense, but as a keeper of the tribes wisdom and history.)  I find myself living out a role much bigger than my personality self, and if I am willing to, I see you doing that as well. There is quite a bit of creativity and creative energy that flows from this awareness. There is a connectedness with other beings on this channel that has not been previously part of our awareness.

And then we moved to channel4. This is a place where are sense of the spiritual deeply connects. It is from this awareness that we can love, show compassion. We begin to realize that even though we are on unique journeys and that each one of us is a unique expression of the Divine, that we are also linked together with the sense of oneness. That our purpose no matter what personality we might be wearing is the same–to love as deeply as possible and to identify with the divine than we are as the essence of our truth. I believe mother Theresa expressed this beautifully when she described her job, her mission on earth, “to see Christ in all his distressing disguises.”

(I might note here that we occupy all those channels simultaneously, it is our awareness, constricted or expanded that makes the difference.)

Even though this was not a planned part of our book discussion it does fit in, giving us a model for awareness and a way of being able to identify when we are in lower vibration or limited awareness of the truth of who we are. 

I also became aware that another word or term or explanation for what is referred to as “illusion” would also be the concept of limitation. When I am looking at you or me in limitation I am in illusion. In other words, I am not seeing you or myself the way we truly are.

A few weeks ago I came across this idea: “We all know the truth of who we are, but we just don't completely believe it yet.” How do we know that? Simply put, the world would be a very different place if we all believed the truth of who we are.

The thought also occurred to me that the only reason I can think of, at the moment, of why we would not fully believe the truth of who we are, is that somehow or another the thought or the energy of unworthiness still remains. Like a dandelion whose roots go deeply within the earth, we can keep pulling them up but unless we get to the roots it will keep growing back.

Now here is our dilemma, I do not dig up the roots of my unworthiness through my personality self. That is just an impossible task. It's apples and oranges; it doesn't work. The only way I can up root my unworthiness this through my divine self and identifying wiht my Divine Self, which doesn't have any unworthiness about it at all.

The only way I know how to deal with this is through a continuing act of surrender. “See me, feel me, touch me, heal me, guide me, love me.” That is one of my prayers. Another is “Lord that I may see” that I may see myself as You see me. Or in words we are more familiar with—“May I see myself with the eyes of the Christ,” and, of course, when I see myself with the eyes of the Christ, I see all other beings that way as well.

Along similar lines, an interesting question came up about this sense of worthiness. A classmate described  having a good sense of their own worthiness, but having a difficult time seeing some others as worthy as well. Here is another of those “sneaky” pieces of awareness that shows up every once in a while.

Let me give you an example of my own. A Course in Miracles suggests that every human interaction is either an “act of love or cry for help.” The way I initially interpreted that was that I was in charge of deciding whether this other person was either in an active love or a cry for help. I did not realize it but that was my personality self’s interpretation. If I see you as helpless or hurt or angry or lost or  confused, I am actually seeing you through my own sense of limitation. In other words, I am not seeing you as you truly are. I am the one who is crying for help, because I am seeing with the eyes of limitation.

Another example of that comes from scripture is a brief parable that Jesus spoke called “The Publican and the Pharisee.” Rather than paraphrase, let me quote it here for you:

“He spoke also this parable to certain people who were convinced of their own righteousness, and who despised all others. "Two men went up into the temple to pray; one was a Pharisee, and the other was a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed to himself like this: 'God, I thank you, that I am not like the rest of men, extortioners, unrighteous, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get.' But the tax collector, standing far away, wouldn't even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner!' I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted."

— Luke 18:9-14, World English Bible

Now there is a real catch to this story. Everyone wishes to identify with the humility of the publican, which is fine, but what we are saying without realizing that is “Thank God I'm not like that Pharisee over there.” So here we are falling into that same trap of judgment we were wanting to avoid!

The truth we are dealing with here is that either I hold everyone in the light or no one. This is one of those few absolutely clear cut  decisions. As a line from the song goes “You can't hold your brother in the dark and expect to see the light.”

Thank you all for walking each other home.