WHAT’S GOING ON
WGO#158-September 2007
ALONG THE WAY
Spirit operates only in the present.
THIS MONTH’S THOUGHT
Actualization is a person capable of choosing any state of consciousness they want when they want to.
THE TWELVE STEP JOURNEY School Talk #18
There’s million ways of giving service. One, of course, as a teacher. One would be operating schools. One would be healing. But that’s totally unnecessary and that’s just one way of doing it and not necessarily the best way. At least one way we could all be of service is that we can contribute to a pleasant harmonious mood wherever we may be; and if you consider that for a bit, you might see that that’s one of the higher states of consciousness you can possibly come up with. It’s one of the nicest services you could do to all the people around you– strangers, friends, family, relatives. But if you can maintain a pleasant harmonious mood around you and contribute to other people’s having it, you haven’t done too shabby today. That’s for sure and certain.
It doesn’t mean you’re going to solve all the problems of the world because nobody’s going to do that. Each individual creates their own problems in the world and how they respond to the challenges that life gives them as an opportunity to wake up.
As I said a while ago we basically flub that because we start looking for what to blame or what we need, so we always come up with we needed a few extra million dollars or thinking if we had new situations around us or thinking if all these jerky, stupid bastards in the world would get out of my way and out of my circuit then everything would be all right. But it doesn’t seem as though it works that way. So the person still has the same old condition year in and year out and seldom seems to learn to ask the proper question….
It is stated in many writings and especially in some of the scripture and I think in the little book of James, it says “You ask and you do not receive because you ask amiss. You ask that you may spend it on your passions.” Asking doesn’t mean you would sit here and ask out of the ceiling and hope that potatoes or whatever you want comes falling through. It means that you ask the proper question so that you would be open to teachings, schoolwork, whatever it is–that you could possibly use and then if you ask the teacher improperly, it probably wouldn’t get you very far either. But if you ask properly, you’ll find there is always something forthcoming. Somebody is there to give you the proper material and put it is such a way that you can find a use and a way to use it.
We are asking for wisdom and understanding or we could say that we want to know what’s going on here. The best question any of us could ask is, “I would like to know what’s going on here You don’t know what to ask for. But just ask what’s going on and you’ll find out pretty soon.
WHY THE STUDY OF MAN INSTEAD OF HIS PROBLEMS?
By Dr. Bob Gibson
Man is continually looking for solutions to problems, believing that when his problems are solved he will be at peace. Although one cannot deny the value in the “problem-solving” approach, it is rather obvious that the peace man hopes to find seems to be the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. There is another approach to peace of mind, which is to truly understand man, himself. The reasons are as follows.
- Man usually begins with the assumption that his problems are assigned to something outside himself, thereby failing to see the real nature of the problem.
- Man thinks that he has free will, doing only that which he has consciously chosen to do. He fails to recognize that due to prior conditioning, he compulsively reacts to most life situations, thereby being like an automatic machine.
- Man thinks he knows his motivation or reason for doing what he is doing, when most of his motives are hidden from his conscious awareness. What he recognizes as his motives are often his rationalizations and justifications in the form of blame or excuse.
- Man is convinced that he has rights and many of his problems arise from needing to defend or use his rights. In this way man is in constant competition and conflict with what others are convinced are their rights.
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Man feels threatened with those who do not agree with him. He feels so pleased with that which does agree with him that he gives up his freedom to that which makes him feel right.
To be open is to be free and to be free is to be open. Nothing is open while there is struggle, conflict, resistance. These close the door to conscious union with Spirit. To be struggling with gaining and escaping and to avoid being disturbed is to be closed. To be free to be experiencing is to be open—open to the inflow of Spirit, to be filled with the Spirit, to be ONE with.
Struggle, conflict, resistance are the closers. To be closed is to be shut off. The struggle to be a better person, the resistance to being what one is, the conflict between what is and the ideal of what ought to be are the common lot of mankind and thus the feeling of being separate from God, Spirit. This all stems from the natural man assuming that he knows what the spiritual union is like; what being at one with God is, and what the conditions are—all of which are assumed.
Freedom is, when he or she discovers that there is freedom to experience whatever arises in one’s way today. This is being open. When one is truly open, union with God occurs. The Free One is conscious of being at one with Spirit.
“The Father and I are ONE.”
A STORY
Everyone at a given moment is doing the best he can do. When I first saw this statement, I said, “You’ve got to be kidding!” However, as I experimented with it, I realized the great truth of it.
I started with myself. At a given moment I am doing the best I can do. It may not be what I am potentially capable of doing, but with the experience, knowledge, wisdom, willingness and awareness, at that moment, I couldn’t do it any differently. A week, a day or even a minute later, I might have done it differently.
What does this realization do for me? Well, it relieves me of feeling guilty. I can quit bashing myself. It frees me to learn the lesson from the experience without getting all wadded up in emotional guilt trips, which paralyze my life.
Oh, so… When I know I am doing the best I can do with what Light I have, then it follows that everyone else is also doing the best they can do with what Light he has. This frees me from making judgments concerning their behavior. I would like to be able to tell you that I remember all this all of the time, but I cannot. I can tell you that I remember it as much as is possible for me to right now, with the willingness, experience, wisdom, and awareness that I have at this moment!
When my father apparently took his own life in 1980, I remembered all this for which I am extremely grateful. It brought understanding into a seemingly tragic situation and allowed me to be free of guilt and much of the pain.
In the Work, the Teachings, it is called AGAPE.
RULES FOR BEING HUMAN
- YOU WILL RECEIVE A BODY. You may like or hate it, but it will be yours for the entire period this time around.
- YOU WILL LEARN LESSONS. You are enrolled in a full-time school called life. Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid.
- THERE ARE NO MISTAKES, ONLY LESSONS. Growth is a process of trial and error: The “failed” experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiments that ultimately “works.”
- A LESSON IS REPEATED UNTIL LEARNED. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can then go on to the next lesson.
- LEARNING LESSONS DOES NOT END. There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons. If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned.
- “THERE” IS NO BETTER THAN “HERE”. When your “there” has become a “here”, you will simply obtain another “there” that will again look better than “here.”
- OTHERS ARE MERELY MIRRORS OF YOU. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects to you something you love or hate about yourself.
- WHAT YOU MAKE OF YOUR LIFE IS UP TO YOU. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.
- YOUR ANSWERS LIE INSIDE YOU. The answers to life’s questions lie inside you. All you need to do is look, listen and trust.
- YOU WILL FORGET ALL THIS.
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**I accept full responsibility for my actions except those that are someone else’s fault.**
