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<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal
align=center><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">Michael--</SPAN><st1:date Year="2010" Day="11"
Month="1"><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">January 11,
2010</SPAN></st1:date><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma">Marin TM 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 style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT
size=3>MICHAEL--T/R-JL<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Creative
spirit)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Michael’s New Year’s
message--appreciation) <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Inexorable evolution)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Universal evolution)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(The Big Plan)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Keeping your own hearts
beating)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(News and entertainment)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(A hallmark of
wisdom)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Dear Michael and Mother Spirit,<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Here we go again, off into
another new year, happily looking forward to sharing our human adventures with
the two of you and our mutual Father. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We thank you for your cheerful words over
the holidays--Michael, your calling our attention to the spiritual boost we feel
if we are so lucky to have friends that we value more than anything else. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You’re right; it is ungraspable and
somewhat inexplicable--this joy we feel with those we’ve known for so long and
with whom we’ve shared so much.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Mother, we thank you for your lesson on
how, if we face our fears and our mistakes and all the things that abrade our
souls, if we have the courage and the nerve to face these in full consciousness
and look at them once again in a more mature, soulful completeness, we do
re-discover the single, unbroken cord that is literally who and what we
are.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And so we are once again
consciously re-invigorated and reassured by this life-force we have always
been.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Thank you for your lessons. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We look forward to innumerable others and
are happy to share them with whomever is interested. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank you, dear parents. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Amen. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Good evening, my loyal sons. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is Michael. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes indeed, here we are again!--and in a
way, if you truly have faith, if you credit what you can feel and know deep down
inside, you can very validly believe that: here we will always be. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>In this special sense of just between you
and me--we’re not going anywhere. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We’re there.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is what Mother Spirit tried to
convey, that each of us, you and I, we’re very much alike in the fact we’re both
sitting in the middle of our own, yet shared universe, and all Mother Spirit and
I can do is to introduce parts of it--tease you into entertaining notions, and
ideas, and concepts. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So see if you
can find some resonance within you, perhaps something that’s been--at least in
potential--there all along.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Creative
spirit)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>There is a special movement of creative
spirit that is so hard to express in space and time terminology, of how
potentials evolve into actuals and are in turn affected by them: i.e. the more
you learn, and do--actualize, the greater your potential. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The eternal/present situation goes to
God’s primal creation as well as to how time and space events will never,
literally cannot, exhaust His creativity.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>He is spirit, ultimate and absolute and infinite creativity.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s His potential that you, as a
discrete human being, experience one successive moment after another.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>If you will, the unlimited potential of
His awaits each moment of your life to be actual, as you. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>From this standpoint, this way of looking
at things, your life is that continuity; you are that continuing realization for
it’s your God-created personality that literally realizes reality for you.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As you are a unique creation of God’s,
so this whole universe of yours, my children, is somewhat unique to
you.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Michael’s New Year’s
message--appreciation) <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Looking at primitive human history from
this angle, there are a lot of somewhat unique personal beings running around
intrinsically--as all animals are--ferocious, just to survive. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Think of a mother rabbit facing off and
even attacking a fox that is after her kits.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Even fish are territorial.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>By the time you get up to human beings
that ferocity and territoriality has always been, and still is, a cause for
almost endless warfare and strife. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>See if you can appreciate the evolution
of civilization.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s how all these
unique personalities, running around inter-relating, had to slowly find ways of
being civil with each other.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That
is the basis of civilization, this--hopefully--increasing civility.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As you look around the world today, you
still have a ways to go to perfect this. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>By having an appreciation for the
uniqueness of each individual--that fundamental reality, you can get an enhanced
appreciation for all the stages that people have had come through to get to
where they are now. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Your modern
explorers have captured in media some of the still existing primitive tribes on
earth.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>If you’ve watched some of
these shows on National Geographic or so forth, you’ve noticed that when the
explorers with their camera crews approached some of these final holdouts, the
first thing they saw was the tips of the natives’ spears, and fully-drawn
arrows, pointing at them, not only with a ferocious aggressiveness but also with
sheer terror at these strange alien beings with all their fantastic technology,
coming into their territory.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>So consider all these stages from the
most primitive all the way up to the present day and see if you can appreciate
and marvel at the enormous civility that has been evolved just to enable you to
live your fantastically complex lives. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Think of all the intricate
inter-relationships in your modern societies. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There are those of you who have never
planted a seed, never watched a carrot come out of the ground, or ever butchered
an animal. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>At the same time, how
many farmers have made their own tractors, right down to the spark plugs? <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>How many of you have worked on the roads
that are tying you all together, or strung the telephone lines, or now--fiber
optic cables? <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This is one essence of appreciation,
just looking around and marveling at this enormous, world-wide, complex
interaction. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Think too of the
specialization. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It wasn’t too many
centuries ago where wealthy individuals who could read and write and have a
library of even two hundred books--maybe one tenth of one percent of the
population then--were considered to be well-rounded in their studies. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Can you feel some sense of acceleration
here? <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>A few decades ago you had an
expression--future shock, where, with various social revolutions taking place,
there were those folks who quite honestly said, “Slow down!--I’m not ready for
this yet!”<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yet there’s another
apropos saying: the cat’s out of the bag. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>No matter how nostalgically you may want
to bring back some previous, less complex time, you can’t.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There’s a fundamental difference between
such nostalgia that simply blurs over in pure sentimentality some previous time,
and the fullness and completeness of true soulful reminiscence.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>One small example: how many of you want
to go back a century to the dentistry of that time?<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Inexorable evolution)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>So yes, my children, we hope you can
get the feeling for what we call the inexorable evolution of a planet, because
some of this is, from the human standpoint, truly scary stuff. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Think of how not long ago the inventions
of high explosives and machine guns were thought to, hopefully, put an end to
warfare.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>War would be so terrible
the human race would be horrified with what carnage could be wrought, and all
would sue each other for peace.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And
now you can bring the surface of the sun onto the earth.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Now with the modern media you have
tying everyone together, can you feel a not-so-subtle pressure to become ever
more civilized on the fundamental level of individuals--i.e.--you? <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Can you get an appreciation of the fact
you still have somewhat isolated major cultures on the planet, now being
squeezed by modern media into a smaller world where ever increasing intimate
relationships are unavoidable? <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>And so you may wonder: is this in the
Big Plan? <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Was It All set up this
way? <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Was this evolving need for
world wide civilization always potential? <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>From the time our children the Life
Carriers arrived on the planet and, with Mother Spirit’s and the Super
Universe’s agents, created the first living cells, all this potential was there
for this particular planet.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Predating this event: your Urantia book talks about the evolution of a
whole Local Universe and how we are all learning, Mother Spirit and myself,
along with our Life Carrier sons.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>They, on the Constellation level, compare notes in a kind of medium we
can’t begin to describe to you, of what they’ve all learned on neigh onto four
million evolutionary planets so far. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So your world, in spite of its checkered
history, was a recipient of all our Local Universe evolution too.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As on the Cosmos level, as on the Local
Universe level, there is a kind of perfection-pressure, let’s call it, which
drives the evolution on every planet as well towards evermore civil, evermore
connected, worldwide civilization, eventually the status of Light and
Life.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Universal evolution)
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This universal evolution is truly
beyond the scope of any one group, any one nation state, or any one religion.
<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>For all that collective authority,
whether social or political or religious, there are still those individuals,
those living, breathing men and women who are the leaders of those societies,
economic systems, and religions. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Who’s in charge of it all? Think about
that.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Think about how this
seemingly extra-human pressure towards social, political, economic and religious
evolution brings about an equally inexorable need for more individual freedom,
responsibility, realization and expression. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This is that special, evolutionary
movement of spiritual creativity from an overall view of the cosmos. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It actualizes the potential of all
individuals. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>On Urantia it
manifests through living people and again, as your Urantia book reminds you,
every child born must recapitulate this whole evolution. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You have that delightful story about Tom
Sawyer and Huck Finn where the boys weren’t at all certain they wanted to be
“sivilized” yet.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Every child has to
be tamed. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank goodness your
little three-year-old, in the midst of one of his or her tantrums, doesn’t have
the power to annihilate you. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>No
parents would survive. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This is incidentally why Mother Spirit
and I always--even when I lived among you as Jesus--this is why we self-limit
ourselves to working with and through individuals to try to bring about all the
good works we see in prospect for your world. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We do not violate the basic spiritual
laws which God has established for the whole time/space realms, and that is to
create individuals--unique personalities--unique personal beings who can have a
hand, first in their own evolution and then, in combination, the evolution of
the whole--the whole family, the whole town or city, the whole nation, the whole
planet, the whole Local Universe.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -0.25in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(The Big Plan) <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Yes, this is the Big Plan, and yes it
is inexorable--unstoppable.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It will
happen in the whole because God’s will always obtains in the whole. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is nevertheless dependent upon each
individual personal being doing his or her best. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The potential lies within living personal
beings and the actuality coming down moment by moment is their activity. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>God has set the whole thing in motion
initially, but then He has shared His creative power out to truly relatively
autonomous personal beings--all His children.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is one more example of how He is
not separate from us but is living within and riding along in these adventures,
of each of ours, with us. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>So let yourselves stretch, my dear
ones. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Try to be aware of both the
forest and the trees, the community and the individuals. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>See the shared reality of being human in
everyone and see in each pair of eyes you meet another unique soul of
experience, that wealth of difference you have to offer each other: if you will,
infinity piled upon infinity. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s
all in The Plan. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>God is that
infinite potential; you are the actuality. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As Mother Spirit said, you are the living
cord tying your kind of unique universe together. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is the fun of it all, and that deep
insight into the playfulness of it all. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>From the standpoint of pure potential,
none of the creation had to be.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So
we glory that it is.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank you,
dear Father, for me.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And thank You
for all of us, that we can have each other.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>If you have any questions or comments
this evening, you can make them actual too.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Father Michael, I have a couple of
questions.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You and Mother have said
many times that we don’t even keep our own hearts beating.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Is that literal or is that
figurative?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Second, how can we get
more people to come to these meetings?<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(Keeping your own hearts
beating)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL, chuckling:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Well, I’ll take them one at a time, my
son.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is quite literally true you
are not keeping your own heart beating.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Just feel it.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>(long
pause)<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>From the standpoint of your
personality--the most fundamental essence of who and what you are, you are given
a living body insofar as you transcend this body.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>When this body returns to dust you will
be reborn into a wholly different kind of world with a wholly different kind of
plant and animal life, and celestial beings that we tease you, you will be
encountering.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You will once again
have a very distinct, but highly advanced body and perceptions with which to
contact and experience impersonal reality--material and energy--as well
continuing, as now, to experience other spiritual beings with your own spirit,
only much more directly.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Your body is a gift, and one that we
are truly sorrowful to see so many folks misusing and disrespecting.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Within your more developed countries so
much of your disease and suffering, and your failure to develop further, is due
to life-style choices that are within each individual’s free will to
change.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We sorrow that you spend so
much time arguing and posturing about this current health-care debate and fail
to realize that unless you all, individually and collectively, simply get more
healthy, right within your available choices, it is in part a misdirected
effort.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>No amount of after-the-fact
care with however amazing technology and heroic efforts can make up for years of
neglect and unhealthy indulgence in your knowingly bad habits, and your lack of
good, available nutrition and exercise. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Rather, my son, we would have you
expand your wonder that the heart beating in your chest is a pure gift of life
from God, from Mother Spirit and me, and it is susceptible to your choices about
health and well-being in which love and respect play a great part.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Love and respect this beating heart of
yours, this gift of a body that is, for all extents and purposes, and in spite
of your hundreds of thousands of books on human physiology in all your
libraries, is still a living<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>infinity to each of you personally moment to moment.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Tune in to your heart center as often as
it occurs to you, and pay some respect to this living, beating organ that ties
you in to life itself.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is not
some figurative symbolism but an actual spiritual connection you can feel,
through your heart, that can give your life more meaning and value.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s not the these word symbols pointing
at an experience but the actual experience itself you have to go for, and know
for yourself.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Pause now and tune in
to your heart.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>(long
pause)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>As for how you get more folks to come
to these meetings, you have to do your best to share with others why you
yourselves have been so loyally coming for so many years.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Open your hearts and let others feel
what this means and has meant for you.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>Isn’t it this experience what you want to share?<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Isn’t it out of some generosity of
spirit that you wish more folks could be here and know the deep joy we’ve
known?<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student, laughing:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL, laughing along:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Then be not shy.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Be unafraid to stand naked in what
you’ve experienced so soulfully, and let your wonder show.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>If you want to think of it as extending
the kingdom, that’s good.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But to
begin, get down to the wonder and joy we’ve shared so abundantly.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>That’s what really does it.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes, I can see that.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I have a habit of intellectualizing what
goes on here instead of the feeling of it. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>But thank you, Father
Michael.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICGHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Remember the lesson I gave one time on
how thought is only finely articulated feeling?<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Your intellect is only a further
development of that.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>These ideas of
yours are all the better expressed when they stay close to their feeling
origins.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You can’t be too shy about
expressing your feelings directly, but it does take thought and intellect
too.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So be open and accepting of
the response you’re receiving.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Real
communication involves two, so listen well to their spiritual experiences
too.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And be in that other
feeling/reality I offer you: be in my peace.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><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 style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes, Michael, thinking about our
meetings here: people have come and gone simply because they’ve moved away.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Others have come once or twice and then
that was it; it just didn’t seem to resonate with them.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>They didn’t get the same feeling that C
and I experience.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Maybe they have
another place to go to, and so we have to honor that as well.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>On a selfish level (student laughs) I
do enjoy these more intimate meetings.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>But I also like it when there is a full house of seven or eight people
here.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There’s more variety of
personal perspectives, and ideas.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>About your lesson tonight on how each
individual is unique, and how we can benefit in one another’s lives; I was
listening to a program yesterday and the moderator was saying that while we may
need to know all the bad news of the day, we should balance it with the good
news too.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And so the program was
about people sharing the good things that have happened to them.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There are a lot of grass-roots programs
of people doing a lot of good things in this world that we don’t hear about
because it’s not considered “news-worthy.”<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>One example was of a lady who started picking up fallen fruit from trees
that was going to waste, and how that led, after a few years of giving this food
to needy people, into them starting urban gardens on their own.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This instilled in me a hope that even
though there are still wars going on in the world, there is something underneath
all that--that some good is happening too, even if it doesn’t get reported.
<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Thank you, my son, I enjoyed that.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is what Mother Spirit and I mean
when we say that the spiritual glow of the world--the sacrifices and the
helping, the fun and the joy that people share, so totally, enormously outshines
the strife and contention.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This is
a fact for us, a direct perception.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(News and entertainment)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>It’s been the case ever since the first
story-tellers, then as your media grew from hand-written to printed books, on to
movies and television and so forth; what you call news has always had a large
quotient of entertainment value attached to its appeal.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Modern electronic news, aside from
providing needed information, runs into the psychological challenges of
saturation and jaded-ness when different news companies compete against each
other on the entertainment level, which in turn leads to further efforts of
melodrama and sensationalism to satisfy the news-junkies and bad-news
addicts.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It’s simply easier to, as
you say, push peoples’ buttons of shock and horror when you concentrate on those
events which produce irreversible damage, like personal injury or conflict, or
major property loss by war or natural disaster.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The real drama of one’s own life is
drowned out by this flood of melodrama if that is all you’re watching.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This is what you’re pointing at, my
son, an entertainment-value contest between irreversible loss like a car
accident or someone’s house burning down, and the cynical or resigned attitude
that the good things in life are all too fleeting and not--as you say--news
worthy.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This viewpoint seems
especially true to a person who is getting most of their opinions of life
through the level of news you’ve mentioned.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The joy of life can seem so conditional
and provisional while the sorrow and pain can seem so final.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>This fatalism is further magnified by
the person’s poor health brought on by such an attitude.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As a person looses their sensitivity and
any inner life of their own, it takes ever rougher sandpaper--so to speak--to
register on their jaded nerves.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>This is why we invite our children to
strive toward greater physical and mental health and sensitivity, spiritual
liveliness and generosity, so they can begin to see what Mother Spirit and I
see--the overwhelming true drama of human life: all the love, all the sharing,
all the sacrifice, all these noble qualities by the hundreds that are derived
from truth and beauty and goodness.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>So thank you, my son, for bringing up
this spiritual challenge to see the real goodness of life so often hidden behind
the melodrama of the evening news.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Student:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>There are a couple of newspapers and
websites that just focus on positive things.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So there are some forces that do
emphasize that.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I’d like to do more
myself, but I can only live and be in the present moment, and be with who I am
with--this moment, without getting caught up in grandiose desires to save the
world and be recognized for that--you know. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>A few years ago I heard about an
African tribe where they don’t punish people when they do something wrong.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Say if someone stole something from
someone else, and they knew who it was, all the people would go up to the guilty
party and stand in a circle around him, then one by one go up to him and tell
him about all the good things they know about him--all the positive things he’s
done.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And you know?--there’s never
been a murder or a rape or anything really serious like that in this
village.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So that’s one small,
little antidote or positive feedback in this whole world, one other way of
living.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We need to see what you
talked about, the infinity of each person.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Every now and then I just stand under
this oak tree where I work and look around, and listen to the sounds of nature,
and feel the earth beneath my feet.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>So last week I was doing this and started thinking about the earth
spinning around, and I’m spinning with it--though I can’t actually feel
that.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And it’s billions of years
old, and the universe is even older; and the intelligence or wisdom that created
all this also created me; and at that moment I had access to that wisdom that
has been here all that time.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So why
not access that?---what all the great teachers have been pointing at?<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Why not let this divine intelligence be
the ruler of my life?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It seems like
history keeps repeating itself, so isn’t it time to stop that treadmill and let
the intelligence that created all this take root and hold?<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So anyway…<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>I didn’t mean to express so much
tonight, but I guess I did, you know, trying to put things in
perspective.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>(A hallmark of
wisdom)<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>MICHAEL:<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Yes, my son.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It brings to mind that single sentence
in your Urantia book we’ve mentioned several times before: a hallmark of wisdom
is a sense of proportion.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>For
wisdom is more than mere knowledge, it’s what you’ve experienced for yourself
and made your own by way of understanding and soul value.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Wisdom is what Mother Spirit herself
augments by way of one of her Mind/Spirit Adjutants--wisdom being one of the
dimensions of her extra-spatial consciousness infusing meaning and value right
within your mind.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>Think about your sense of proportion,
not just principles or essences, but the amount and ratio of each to
another.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We’ve mentioned how, as a
youngster, you form your intellectual understanding by abstracting principles
and generalities from all the multiplicity of things.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You hunger to see and understand pure
connections and causes and effects to give you at least some small power over
events, some feeling of security in knowing what’s happening and why.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>So much of your modern schooling is
aimed right at this, and is good in and of itself; good but not sufficient.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You don’t want to get stuck on this
level of adolescent abstraction and become a social demagogue, or a political
ideologue, or a religious fundamentalist, trying to bend any and all persons and
events to your preconceived opinions and pure principles.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>You need to open your mind and get out
in the real--if seemingly messy and complex--world and experience all that is
not-you and your limited vision. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>And so, my son, as this applies to what
you mentioned, if a person is raised too much in some melodramatic, one-sided
and prejudiced news outlet, it takes courage to seek out and welcome those
other, opposing points of view in order to come to a good, well-rounded sense of
proportion on a particular issue.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>In the case you noticed, think of what it takes to not just sit back smug
in that you’re so much better or better off than the melodrama you’re seeing on
TV, but get out and have a more challenging life of your own--create some of
that goodness you so long to see.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3>So…<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Keep going!<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>(Michael laughs)<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And be in my peace.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Good evening.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><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>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3><SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><SPAN
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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 style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in -1in 0pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
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style="FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><SPAN
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