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<DIV>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt; TEXT-ALIGN: center"
align=center><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">Michael--</SPAN><st1:date Year="2008" Day="8"
Month="9"><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">September 8,
2008</SPAN></st1:date><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">Marin T/M Group--Mill Valley,
</SPAN><st1:State><st1:place><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">California</SPAN></st1:place></st1:State><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">--</SPAN><st1:country-region><st1:place><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">U.S.A.</SPAN></st1:place></st1:country-region><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT
size=3>MICHAEL--T/R-JL<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Honoring your conscious lives)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Acting on
faith)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Ego and self)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(The fruits of ones soul)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Inner feelings of fear and something
missing)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(The need for courage and
self-forgetfulness to get going)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Ego and
patience)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Understanding yourself)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Origins, abilities, destiny)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Letting go)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Dear Michael and Mother Spirit,<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Welcome. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As we get together to feel your presence
and to honor you, our spiritual parents, we ask you help us keep in mind the
profound other reasons we gather like this, and those are because we can. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Help us keep in mind those human rights
that we are blessed to enjoy in a society and political culture that more than
grants them by constitutional law, but actually acknowledges them as fundamental
and inalienable--those abilities to assemble together and be free to express
ourselves, to share our innermost thoughts and truths with each other. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And as we value these basic human rights,
help us then to evaluate both our own and others’, and other society's progress
in developing and evolving and assuring these rights for all. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This we ask in the name of your
definition of us as beings created with will dignity--the dignity to choose and
the freedom to get together to experience and share what those decisions are
based upon. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Amen.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Honoring your conscious lives)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Good evening, my children, this is
Michael, your spiritual father, your one-time brother in the flesh--so even,
still, and always, your spiritual brother too.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You are not only my sons and daughters,
you are my brothers and sisters.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We
are all children of God and it is both my and Mother Spirit’s great delight to
share your lives with you. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We can
feel what it is to be you from the inside-out as well as from the outside-in.
<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This we wish to assure you, over
and over again, that we treasure these equally.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is not only our ability to see you as
your spiritual parents, with many hundreds of billions of years experience now
on literally millions of inhabited worlds--the way in which we can see you even
more fully and completely that you are yet able to see yourselves--your
God-given personalities, your evolving souls; also we appreciate and we honor
the way in which you see yourselves, the lives you live for yourselves.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This way we can see you as well as a
very dynamic, profoundly growing self.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>We give you this assurance that as you feel yourselves, as you experience
yourselves--however limited, however changing, however prone to necessary
relapses into unconsciousness to sleep and rest; still these conscious
selves--the conscious lives you live, have their own spiritual value that is
growing. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So we would have you, my
children, value and feel the spirit in yourselves, in your conscious lives, even
while you humbly acknowledge there is as yet so much more to you, just there is
so much more to Mother Spirit, and myself, and our mutual Universal Father, that
must remain a matter of faith, something to grow into as your experience and
your wisdom also evolve. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>As we see it, this is what it is to be
a human being as you mentioned in your opening prayer, a creature of will
dignity.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>A corollary to that, my
children, is: how to increase in a valid way the true dignity you can earn for
yourselves day to day, and not be led off into some spurious, phony, unreal,
what you call an ego trip, some unbalanced and very harmful over-evaluation,
over-inflation of yourself? <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s
all very much a moment-to-moment kind of living balance, getting an ever greater
capacity to feel all you are and all you are growing to be, at the same time
also maintaining an ever increasing open-mindedness, an ever evolving ability to
avoid prejudice--pre-judging any number of things before you actually experience
them. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is seeking and actually
relying upon spiritual humility rather than fearing feeling your self to be such
a limited, finite creature. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Glory
in all that reality that is greater than you that you can be aware
of.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>We gave the example once before of
standing on the seashore and, rather than feeling dwarfed and miniscule and
insignificant, just a tiny little self-conscious speck of reality, glory in all
that you can be aware of--that illimitable ocean, that infinity of personal
beings surrounding you, every one of them an infinity to himself or herself
inside. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is the glory of
humility, of being aware of what is greater than you that you can orient
yourself towards as the way forward, the way to grow.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Yes, it is true that what you value in
your own life becomes a kind of tool that you can use to evaluate yourself and
others, your growth and theirs. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And
here again you have that balance, that humility in acknowledging that everyone
has their own profound inner uniqueness they share only with themselves and with
God, with Mother Spirit and myself. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>For as you feel this personal uniqueness
deeper and deeper within yourself, and welcome it without feeling cut off or
isolated or lonely because of it, to that very degree you can grant this to
others; you can actually see it in them. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is how you avoid simple-minded
generalities and prejudices while you seek for true spiritual simplicity, those
universal threads that run through everything and everyone.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This is how you keep in mind you are
all experiential beings--your life’s experiences are what fill your souls.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is what you most truly are--all
those experiences you’ve had--that even God had to create you and set you free,
to have for Himself through you, with you, as you. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Here again you could feel so utterly,
terribly limited with your few years of life compared to that vast eternity
stretching out before you, and so we tease you by calling you tadpoles; but only
with respect to what you will become some day.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You also, my children, already have
souls that are enormous, all those thousands and thousands of hours of living
experience captured and vouchsafed by a fragment of
God.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This is, if you will, your life seen
through His eyes, with His understanding, His knowledge, His wisdom, and so
we’ve given you ways of getting in touch with this enormous soul of yours, not
only feeling and glorying in your conscious life, but taking time out in your
busy, necessary activities to value this contact with spirit.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>If you set aside some time just to be
and let whatever of your soul that wants to, pop up, this will assure you that
it too is there: your soul is more than just faith. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is how faith becomes a matter of
experience.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Acting on
faith)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Here on this very special world of
yours where things have gone so wildly askew from a one-time possible divine
plan, all of you who can have faith, who can act on the evidence of things
unseen, who can act with all the help of Mother Spirit’s Mind/Spirit
Adjutants--especially those of courage, understanding, counsel, worship and
wisdom; those who can actually act on these do fulfill the special role of
Agondonter. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is contrasted to
those who live on worlds with the long time spiritual out-workings of a loyal
Planetary Prince, Material Son and Daughter, the Planetary Prince’s material
staff--they are all there, but for the Prince--physical living beings to see,
feel and touch.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You don’t have
these and so those of you who can actually act upon your faith, and realize
it--feel that marvelous transformation as faith becomes experience, becomes part
of your soul; this develops a kind of character, a kind of personality
soul-possession that even the angels envy you--(Michael chuckles)--your
so-called blighted planetary condition. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Such choice you have, such dignity of
will you can evolve here. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And
seeing this, and understanding this, gives you that confidence in God’s
essential goodness, God’s sense of balance and compensation. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>He compensates for you being on the
lowest rung of personal beings by giving you a Fragment of His pure Self to be
at the tender mercies of your decisions, of your taking time out to value and
befriend Him within you.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>And so congratulations, my children,
this is why Mother Spirit and I have such confidence in you. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We are blessed to see you growing in ways
which are not yet perceptible to yourselves. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But every day you lean into the
challenges, every day you exercise your faith, you are developing the precious
quality of character. This is the ultimate value of your personality, if you
will, its sole but only necessary possession.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>As you encounter each other this is
what you can feel, what you perceive of each others’ soul: that ineffable but
very real quality of character. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So
be of good cheer. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Fight the good
fight of faith, loyalty, and consciousness. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Glory in all that you are and all you’ve
known so far, ever humble to that enormity out there you will never ever, in all
of eternity, even begin to exhaust. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is also how you put your trust in
our Father, Mother Spirit, and me. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is how you step off, trusting the
ground will be underfoot when it’s all new. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Keep leaning into it. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Keep being determined to experience; and
then let us do the rest. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Trust in
us to be there for you. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is our
joy.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is our glory in being
your spiritual parents, and son and daughter of God.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>If you have any questions or comments
this evening, just stretch out your hands and open your minds.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Reach for us, my children, and we’ll
meet you half way. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Father Michael, I was wondering, once
more I guess, about ego and how it plays a role in my life. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I have an extreme difficulty with
meditation stillness. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I can’t even
sit down and do it. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I’m wondering
why.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Why can’t I sit down and do
such an important thing?<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes, my son.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>First let me ask you what you mean by
ego for that term, as you know, has such a variety of meanings in different
psychologies, and almost every person has a different sense of their
own.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I don’t have a good definition, I guess
I’m looking for one. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Maybe it’s not
even ego; maybe it’s plain fear or something. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Maybe it’s just plain sloth. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I have no idea what it
is.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Ego and self)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We once likened ego to your bathroom
mirror, a very handy, even necessary device by which you try to see
yourselves.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The simplest definition
of ego is your self image if you expand that to include all of your self
perceptions, even how you feel your own body, moment to moment, which is also
ever changing; along with your memories of who you feel you’ve been.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Like your bathroom mirror these
perceptions are necessary and useful, on the one hand to shave or put on your
makeup, more broadly to take care of yourself.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And also like the mirror your ego is
very limited dimensionally and is not by any means your full self.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>What Mother Spirit and I have been
trying to instruct you is that even your conscious self, that you can be aware
of, is more than this ego: something ineffable; something transcendent.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>But what you are on the edge of, my
son, is what we mean by your being infinite to yourself--not just the enormous,
partially-spiritual Morontia soul you’ve developed already; not just the
millions of electro/chemical processes in your body--all the unconsciousness
activities of your brain and nervous system; not even the forgotten memories
that pop up on their own while listening to a piece of music: all these are
hints that you are more than just your provisional ego so susceptible to your
ever changing moods.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Because your ego is only a small
fraction of you, by focusing exclusively on this self image are you led astray.
<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s mistaking a limited image for
your true spiritual reality, and because you are then based on the illusion of
this fraction being your whole self, there is an inherent anxiety that leads to
what you call egomania. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You see
this intrinsic, inherent anxiety most clearly in folks who feel driven to prop
up their ego not only at the expense to themselves and their own growth.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Egomaniacal tyrants all through history
have showed the ruthlessness with which they were willing to sacrifice anyone
else to keep propping up that shaky part of themselves.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Stillness is essentially quieting some
of this self-propping-up by sitting down and just feeling yourself living--being
thankful to be alive for awhile.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Many good philosophies and metaphysics have evolved any number of
meditative regimens--things to think about, mantras to repeat to yourself--and
all of these are good exercises in and of themselves, and not to be slighted.
<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yet what we call stillness is just
being, just relaxing the frantic need to support some notion of who and what you
are by devoting a certain amount of time to relaxing and seeing what emerges.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Relax and let some of your soul wealth
come to the surface.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is the
wonderful fullness in otherwise worn-out memories that lets you relive for some
precious few moments some other time of your life, and lets your poor, shaky ego
be aware there is so much more to you than just it. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The conundrum is: how do you enable a
small, shaky, fearful part of you to relax into what it does not know will come
along? <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is the fear in
meditation: if you relax this hold on yourself, this self-image, my
goodness!--who knows what might come out--because it does.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Sometimes individuals have to wade
through an enormous fear of pain involved in past experiences, in their
soul.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yet you have opportunity to
re-experience these previous times in the light--now--of your advanced wisdom,
knowledge, and understanding. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Let
these moments of your soul emerge and truly feel who you were at five, or ten,
or fifteen. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Take this opportunity
to embrace and forgive those who may have hurt you so terribly, or those
terrible mistakes where you find it so hard to forgive yourself. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is how your consciousness expands to
embrace all that you are, including all you’ve been--your soul.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>But finally, my son, let me remind
there is no particular formal way of doing this. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You do not have to sit down. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You don’t have to get in some yoga
position on a little pillow…<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>…I can’t do that anymore, anyway…
(Michael and group laughs)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(The fruits of ones soul)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Just reflect as you go through your
days--what we call little mini-meditations.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Enjoying the fruits of your soul is, in
a sense, escaping the narrow ego orientation, enjoying more and more who you
are, what you are, what you are becoming. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is the real stuff. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is the real meditation. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>If you are doing this, you will be way
ahead of the game for, in a way, this is the more advanced stage of what sitting
in a formal kind of meditation ultimately leads to--a continuous,
self-supporting and -reflecting awareness. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is the living, tipping balance I was
talking about between what you are and what you are becoming--those perceptions
you can act upon, and that faith that allows you to act upon what is not yet
perceptible, but only possible. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>So think of it this way, my son.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>See how much you are meditating, how
much you are gaining a certain kind of stillness
already.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank you, Father Michael, you really
are my brother and my father, and I appreciate your love and your words and the
simple fact you are with us.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank
you. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>My pleasure.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I see you are growing, and you become
aware of this from time to time. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You are growing more inwardly still, more
confident. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You are gaining in
knowledge and understanding. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You
are feeling more free--as you have expressed so many times. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Hopefully you’ll lose the fear of fear
itself. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>When those fearful moments
come along, you’ll simply recognize them: here I am fearful again.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Just wait them out, or even approach
them with curiosity. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Keep going, my
son, you’re doing well.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And be in
my peace.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student: <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank you, Father Michael.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Good evening, Michael. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Going to a study group today we were
reading about the idea of returning good for evil in all its aspects--the idea
of turning the other cheek, and going the second mile.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I also wonder about how you would work
with someone to return to them their sense of self respect and self esteem.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>There was also the idea of having to
act on the good, to use your will to actually take action in the world.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>For me my struggle has always been with
the sense of not feeling quite good enough to do it, and that for me…I know that
you and God and His spirit are there for me--totally--but I never feel quite
equal to it.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>My will never feels
quite strong enough to really act on how I feel or perceive what I would need or
want to do.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s almost as if I’m
too tight inside with fear and being overly-aware of myself.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I freeze in the moment.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>A lot of the time it feels like there’s
something missing, something I didn’t get--I’m not getting.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I would just like to hear what you have
to say to me about it.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Inner feelings of fear and something
missing)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL: <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>My daughter, it strikes me you are a very
keen and courageous observer of the human condition.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That is both a kind of glory in and of
itself, being able to perceive a limitation that so many folks who get carried
away with themselves and their projects lack, yet you are also feeling the
trepidation and the constant need for courage to act in the face of this
awareness.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So first of all I want
to congratulate you on that perception, for this is, as Mother Spirit reminded
you; to feel this finiteness, this limitation in being a human being, this is
what it is to be one in full consciousness.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>You are very much identifying with
spirit, for this is what gives you the perception of physical and mental
limitations.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You can understand
that for those who do not have this perception from this point of view, they
have no such sense.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>They may feel
they are more than quite good enough for anything.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Those who identify only with their
physical strength--such as a young and inexperienced person--often require a
solid object to run into--(Michael laughs)--over and over again before they
begin to acknowledge they are not a be-all and end-all in themselves.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And so it also is for those who have a
great ego sense of their intellectual abilities and magnificence, who have no
self-doubts that they know all there is to know about anything that might
arise.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Still and all--understanding this,
seeing this clearly--the feeling is still there of things not being quite good
enough.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I think you need to allow
yourself to feel a little glory in what I talked about tonight as genuine
accomplishments.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I say this because
you have such a keen sense of other’s ego trips you fear falling into such a
trap yourself.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You can be
overly-cautious this way and belittle your own genuine accomplishments.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And I mean this in your day to day
fulfilling your duties to your children and friends and yourself.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There is really no need for
self-abasement, about yourself or in what you see.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>You very correctly intuit that there is
a kind of relaxation possible in allowing yourself to be content in God’s
spirit, even though you feel so terribly finite and imperfect in this beginning
stage of your life, my daughter, compared to all you will grow into.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>See if you can feel what Mother Spirit
and I have talked about as completeness in each moment, insofar as you and
everything else are God’s creation.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>There’s a kind of stillness in each instant of reality in which you and
all the universe are complete already and, in a very--granted--humanly-strange
sense, don’t need to continue on.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>You simply do--by God’s will: time and movement are God’s will. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Each instant is complete and absolute and
unique; incompleteness and imperfection allowing for growth and evolution exist
in duration.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>In time you are
growing, you are growing more perfect through your efforts.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But in each instant there is nothing
missing.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Everything that
exists--right down to the subatomic particle in its little nano-second of
life--is the full resolution of preexisting forces.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The seeming imperfection of every
physical object is what makes it unique in its own self.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Does any of this resonate with you, my
daughter?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Can you get a sense of
what I mean by this completeness, this full sufficiency of existence, that
everything is fully real as it is moment to moment?--yet how this in no way
limits you in making things better according to your own sense of goodness, your
own sense of God’s will?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Sometimes I can think of it and know
that it’s good enough--complete in the moment.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Other times I
can’t.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(The need for courage and
self-forgetfulness to get going)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There is always that need for courage,
and it is quite OK to pray for this, to ask for Mother Spirit’s and my help in
this.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Sometimes even a greater
curse than fear is inertia, just getting going.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>(Yes)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As you know, for so many folks in your
culture this is the main use of drugs--stimulants--just to get that initial
nudge.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is where your acute
sense of yourself in your human condition has to be set aside in
self-forgetfulness, right in what you want to do.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Be open-minded.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Ask yourself: what is there then that
really captures me?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>What quest must
I go on to discover that which takes me out of myself and fulfills me? <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>In what can I loose myself in the very
doing of it?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This might be a
necessary quest for you continually outgrow things, situations, and
conditions.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You are a living,
experiential nodule of self-awareness.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Really feel that.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Be
unafraid to feel.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Then rest in that
experience of life.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank our
Father for that--whatever it is. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is how you keep leap-frogging--(Ed:
spelling?)--yourself with your momentary successes and accomplishments.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Because each one runs out; each leads
only to the next.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But the whole
keeps getting bigger.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Your soul
keeps getting bigger.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And your faith as
well--right?<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I understand, my daughter, that it
is…tricky.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Because of your own
creativity there is a kind of self-fulfilling prophesy to it all.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>If you get lost in fear then that is
what comes about through your own creative dread.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I once said that to those who have much
will more be given, while to those who have little, and are lost in fear, even
that little may be taken away.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And
that doesn’t seem fair at all.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But
you have to trust the wisdom that set it up this way, that gives you the
consciousness of your own finiteness, your own imperfection, your own need to
grow--and the means to do so.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You
may have a fear of your unbounded curiosity because it seems to question those
things you want to keep sacrosanct.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>To see disquieting curiosity for the blessing it is does take a bit of
ironic humor.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So in a sense the way that it is for me
is the way it needs to be--for me, in order for me to grow.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Moment by moment: acceptance and
will-power.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is part of your
acuteness of perception that you can see it.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>(Yes)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Now you need to welcome that as a
positive ability.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Think of the more
gross errors it keeps you out of.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>It is a kind of caution, and you can be too cautious.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is that living balance I spoke
of.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>If you’re overwhelmed with
worries and concerns and plans and projects, set them aside for a while and just
meditate on your breath coming in and out.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Feel the power of this living being you are.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is an ability, and you are learning
it; you are earning it.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And that
too is part of God’s plan for you, certainly, to learn those positive abilities
which enable you to handle what has been put into your hands, and what you too
have chosen to do and be.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I’m just
reminding you that choice is still alive in you, that choice to welcome and
embrace life, and be thankful for it.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>And be in my peace.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank you.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes Michael.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So the circumstances we are a part of
are what will benefit our own growth in experiencing a wholeness and oneness
with our Father.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes, that possibility is there if you
take those circumstances the right way.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And that’s where stillness comes
in.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s a great help.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As I mentioned to C, that stillness can
be a number of things; it can be an inner quiet and confidence and acceptance
that lets you see the completeness and uniqueness of everything that is.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Every grain of sand on a beach, every
tree in a vast forest, every one of you: no two are the same.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is a big part of those
circumstances you mention.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>One of the challenges I seem to have is
patience with the circumstance of desiring something else, but not knowing what
that something else is.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I do want
the wisdom and the faith that whatever that is, it is for the highest good and
benefit.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So sometimes the hardest
thing, as Paul said in the Bible, is waiting things out, and not trying to
coerce or shove or push the envelop to have something else created.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Because I feel that if I do that I’m
coming from ego.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I’m coming from
that self-image that is limited.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So
for me, waiting things out is that wisdom; the rewards are
greater.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Ego and
patience)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Well, I just have to totally agree.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>(much laughter)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That is a good definition of ego--that
limited self that is based on ignore-ance--ignoring, the lack of humility to see
and accept the bigger picture and how things are progressing, irrespective of
oneself.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Patience is a virtue insofar as you are
not yet able to see and experience that perfect unity that you will be able to
some day.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Without that unity,
patience is the wiser part of you suggesting to the impatient part that wants to
push and hurry up, that it’s best to wait a change in
circumstances…<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>…which is prompted by anxiety--that
impatient part of me; or fear.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Or as you correctly recognized, the ego
part of you that is anxious for itself because it is just a part; it’s
intrinsically anxious because it doesn’t feel the wholeness which is possible
with relaxing into spirit awareness.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student, laughing:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes, because it feels like it’s going to
loose itself--which is an illusion.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But--ironically--this is what needs to
happen.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Ego has its own, funny
little mock-wisdom of being afraid for itself.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It fears getting lost in something so
much bigger than it--yet this is exactly what you--as your ego, when you are
identifying solely with your self image--have to get over.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That’s why it takes courage and
accumulated wisdom and experience---maturity--for you to let go of yourself into
that greater reality that is there for you.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Sometimes you let go; sometimes you’re
completely overwhelmed and taken out of yourself, and then--my
goodness!--surprise!--you survive.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>You not only survive but, like wading into a tough chore that scares you,
all of a sudden you experience that other thing for which there is no
substitute--genuine accomplishment.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>You take a chance and let go and you not only survive, you begin to
thrive. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And that is
understanding.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Right, it’s based on experience.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Otherwise just clinging onto yourself
cuts you off from the very experiences which can help you grow.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>All you experience is your own
fear.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s like taking a drop of water from
the ocean.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You feel isolated and
defenseless and powerless and unknowing, but then you realize you are!--you’re
not going anywhere.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>If you die it’s
better to go back to the ocean and feel that power and
wisdom.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Or you can grow into where you feel
both--both your full individuality, the fact you are identical to no other drop,
yet you are always in the ocean, you are always surrounded by God--in God, and
of His continuing creativity.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>In seems, in our society, we always want
to push the envelop, to create something that may not be in our best
interest.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That’s where patience
comes in, and tolerance.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>With my
own family situation, I’m learning about wisdom where sometimes it’s wiser to be
quiet and just hold my opinions, and allow the truth to unfold in its own way
with my daughter and her boyfriend.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Because I could say things until I’m blue in the face, but if it’s not
the right time, it doesn’t mean anything.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>They’re not ripe for it.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And
our egos are just telling stories to satisfy us; they’re good at
that.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>In that sense your ego is the story you
are constantly telling yourself.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>And it has its own uses--like a mirror.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Consider that those without any sense of
themselves generally have to be institutionalized and taken care of.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The ideal is to have a strong and
healthy, valid sense of yourself and what you’ve accomplished, along with the
sense of your personal limitations and all that other out there--both--as where
next to explore and develop.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Allow
yourself, feel yourself going in these pulses of accomplishment and then the
need to let go and extend once again.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The dichotomy I’ve been wrestling with
is the one of surrender and resignation.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>I don’t want to settle; there’s a fear in me of settling--although I
don’t think life will let me; I have a little two-year-old granddaughter to
attest to that.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>She keeps bringing
me out of some kind of dream-life into the one I’m actually
living.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Understanding yourself)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yet there’s also the truth that without
your dreams, you’re lost.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Your
dreams are your orientation to what you want, your inner compass to: wouldn’t it
be nice…<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Like your ego, these
aspects of your inner life are so useful, even necessary--so long as they are
understood for being what they are.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>That understanding comes from--represents--your greater self, your
personality’s soul-wealth that transcends the moment.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Ideally it includes the pure spiritual
input from your Father Fragment, as well as that of Mother Spirit and
myself.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>We see the wisdom in teasing you and
dangling things out in front of you to get you to stretch your understanding,
and choose.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And so it can be for
you and those younger than you.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Having a good experience of your soul keeps you in touch with your own
younger self when you didn’t yet have the experience and wisdom, and you had to
go along pretty much on pure principles and abstractions.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So you too can tease and maybe offer a
few hints to nudge them in the right direction.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>A good parent gives their children the
freedom to explore and experience on their own.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So they can grow their own wisdom.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>OK.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That’s more or less what I’m learning to
do.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I enjoy this feeling of patience you’re
developing, of talking yourself into waiting a bit for the right moment, letting
your wisdom have a voice within you.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>This is how you get along well on the way to becoming unified with all
your inner aspects.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Well, it’s like I have no choice, or I’d
go crazy.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I’d be really, really
frustrated, and what good is that?<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL: <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yet that is what happens to many.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is a possibility.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yeah--OK.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I guess a better way, a positive way is
to say how I’ve been realizing my life is my own; my circumstances are
me---kind-of.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I don’t have to be a
victim of them.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That’s a choice I
make.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It allows me to be more
authentic, to experience what you call my will dignity more and more.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So that’s…that’s what I
am.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Origins, abilities, destiny)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Your Urantia book mentions when you look
at a creature--a created being--see its origin, and its present abilities, but
then too its destiny.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>In one way
your destiny is your future out there for whatever kind of being you are--human,
or seraphim, or Melchizedek--whatever.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>But also, as Mother Spirit pointed out, your destiny is what you are
doing day to day.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That is
fulfilling your destiny.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Your
circumstances are your life, and yet you have the freedom to be a bit apart from
them, with the spirit to evaluate them, and the dignity to choose to accept or
change them.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>You feel that apart-ness.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You can see, from a human viewpoint
anyway, imperfections in your circumstances and how to go about changing
them.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You see the need for dreams
and their orientation, and still--(Michael laughs)--still it calls for that
living balance, and that balanced living to feel both at home in the world, and
yet be willing and able to change it for the better.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>For you can see your poor brothers and
sisters who do suffer terribly when they are incapable of this--I mean the
self-doomed, those who cannot see they are living out their own self-fulfilling
philosophies, who cannot credit their own creativity and be responsible for it:
an enormous amount of suffering.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So
hopefully, slowly they start to connect the dots and see what truly leads to
what, and have the courage to step out and try something
new.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>My one critique of that is like, how
about people who don’t have that choice, like in war zones, or areas of
nothing--nothing to eat, not even water?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>They didn’t decide to be bombed, or have nothing.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>When they have nothing but survival, is
that their opportunity to experience God--because that’s all there is?
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Very true, my son.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There are folks caught up in
circumstances over which they have no control.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I was referring to those who, mainly
through family or cultural conditioning, feel they have no freedom of choice
even while they are greatly choosing how they are living.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>But yes, I once gave the example of
those standing out on the beach when the tsunami came in; people in the middle
of an earthquake; a small child who has no comprehension whatsoever of someone
else releasing a bomb at 40,000 feet above him.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is your very definition of
chance--that ultimate connection known only to God.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And yes again, they have only the
opportunity provided by what you call life after death to continue their search
for the Father.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Your critique is
very valid.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Well, thank
you.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You are very welcome.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You are finding a measure of my
peace.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Letting go)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>It seems, in this living balance,
sometimes your only desire is for it to stop--for everything just to stop awhile
and not do this tipping back and forth, and up and down, and in and out of
security and comfort.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And so there
comes the blessing of sleep, of letting go, of just relinquishing yourself.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Maybe you can remember as a small child
when first the fact, and then the growing wild and out-of-control terrifying
concept of death--your death--occurred to you, and came in to your young
life.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Remember those nights when
you were afraid to go to sleep?--when you said your now-I-lay-me-down-to-sleep
to comfort your little terrified soul, hanging on and hanging on and getting
tinnier and tinnier until finally warm oblivion overtook you way, way out
there?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>How many times did you have
to go through that to trust that you would pop up again in a new morning?<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That too, my children, is part of your
soul: something you’ve all come through and need to remember, and relive--now,
for your understanding--being that small child so afraid of death, and sleep; so
afraid of letting go.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Mother Spirit sends you her love, and I
bid you be in my peace.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Good
evening.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
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style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
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