Tuesday, August 14, 2018

WELCOME 12

WELCOME 12
P. 49-51
We began this morning by asking the ultimate question, “What is the meaning of life?”

I recall the wonderful movie from the late 90's called  Oh God" with George Burns and John Denver. You could view this as a cute little movie, but it is filled with some marvelous one-liners that can keep you thinking. When God is asked the question “What is the meaning of life?” he replied: “Man and women, persons, their existence means exactly and precisely, not more, not one tiny bit less, just what they think it means and what I think, doesn't count at all.”
In other words, as one of my teachers likes to say, “You are the meaning maker of your life.” And I would like to add that much of the meaning we give our lives comes from our perception.

Here's one of the tricky parts- perception always comes from our limited sense of awareness, but we don't always realize that. Often we will take our perception is being the absolute truth. One of the many things we are learning here is to be aware that our perception of ourselves, of others, of God, and life —our perceptions which comes from our limited self, and so the perceptions are also going to be limited. This is why we make reference to “illusion.” We are not using that in a judgmental sense, but simply reinforcing the sense that our perception never gives us a complete picture or a complete understanding of what is going on.

For example, let us just take the idea of your perception of yourself, specifically your perception of yourself and where you are on your spiritual path. We do this all the time, especially when we are working with material from books such as these. We perceive ourselves to be at a particular place or juncture in our spirituality. In fact, most of the time, if not all of the time, we perceive ourselves as being in a place or a space that is just not quite where we need to be. We always seem, in our perception,  to be a little bit short of the mark. An old Jackson Browne song laments, “I’ve been up and down this highway, far as my eyes can see, no matter how fast I run I can never get away from me. No matter how hard I try, I’m always a day away from where I want to be.” That is a marvelous description of letting my limited perception define who I am.

What we do not realize is that our perception of ourselves is coming from our ego or our personality self which, by its very nature, lives in limitation. Our limited perception of ourselves is actually coming from an aspect of self that lives in limitation.

I am sure all of us have been confronted with this conundrum until we finally reach a point where, again after struggle upon struggle, after many attempts to grasp and understand, we let go and simply allow ourselves to be embraced in the truth of who we are. “I know who I am; I know what I am; I know how I serve; I am here; I am here; I am here.” I am a divine child God, unconditionally loved. Although my ego or personality self might object to this truth or demand some sort of additional verification, by this time on our path, no matter how we might be feeling, no matter how we might be perceiving our life experience, there is a space within us that lives beyond all possible doubt. There is a space within us that is aligned with and resonates with the truth of the divine self that we are. We can even live with our limited perception, especially when we know it is not the truth.

I am not denying the power of our limited perception to keep us in a limited space or a limited sense of self-awareness, but because of the work we have done, it is literally impossible to completely hold onto that illusion. There are chinks in the armor of my fear, of my separateness, of my protectiveness. There are spaces through which the light shines through despite all the energetic work of my ego and personality self in its attempts to hold onto my sense of limitation and separateness. Even if it is simply a tiny pinprick of light that is coming through the mask we have created, we can choose to begin to identify with the light that is shining through and as we do more will come to us.

I am reminded of that wonderful quote from Peace Pilgrim that says: “Live up to the light you have, and more will be given you.”

Don’t allow yourself to be limited by your perception, including your feelings—you are not what you feel or how you feel. Most feelings are quite complex and beyond the understanding of the thinking mind. Feelings are a composite of thoughts, beliefs, and life experiences, much of which remain in the unconscious. (It’s not our purpose to explore this in detail, just be aware, as important as feelings are, along with our need to process them—they do nat define who you are.) 

Close to the ending of our group was a meditation created from p. 50-51. I would encourage everyone to read over that section, even out loud, and just let it sink in.
Here is a link to the audio version:


“The lives that you have lived up until now were created by you to bring you to this juncture, where you will know yourself in a new way. We ask you this: Who in this reading would like to know herself, would like to know himself as an aspect of the Creator? If you would like to do this with us now, we would like to align you to our vibration through the act of welcome. If you would sit for a moment and be still in your body and feel the energy field that you hold around you, if you would do this with us, we would like to gift you with an experience of welcome.
We would like you now to align every cell in your being, every conscious receiver in your being that you have, to align to the frequency of welcome. We are inviting you right now to say welcome with every aspect of you. And what are you welcoming, you may ask? You are welcoming that aspect of you that is the Creator in manifestation. You will say this with us now if you would:
I am Word through my body, Word I am Word. “And in this moment we invite you to welcome us, your teachers, the Christ consciousness, all the aspects of you that are seeking to be brought into manifestation in alignment with your true self. And we would like you to say yes. Say yes, now if you would, and welcome us as you, as the aspect of you that you are aligning to.”

Peace—Thank you all!

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