Deepen Your Connection With the Divine GF Live 9-09-23

We must make – and keep -- a special place within us for what we love; otherwise, our heart becomes an overnight motel filled with the visitations of a thousand fickle lovers…not one of which is capable of loving anything other than itself.
Please note: This track was recorded live and may contain background noises.

Transcript

I have a couple of stories that I want to tell you. Sometimes stories are a better way of parables or a better way of communicating than something that's straight up intellectual. But when we have parables, When we have these kind of teachings expressed through image and emotion, It's more essential than ever that we realize that the picture is not the thing. The sensation is certainly not the source of the teachings. We all want to answer a certain, God willing, A certain need that we have, That I would start by saying we didn't put in ourselves by any stretch of the imagination. And even to understand that much, Honestly, Is a major first step because a person can start to realize that there are lots of times when life brings things that seem to be the antithesis of what we need, The last thing we want. And yet we must learn in those moments to recognize that if something put a need in us to know what is true and good, What is loving, What is divine, If something put that in us, Then it is and has done so for a purpose that we who are first seated with that nascent soul and its wishes, We can't know what that need is. We must learn to answer it. So let me ask you to not post for a moment or two, And I'm going to have Kate put the key lesson into the box here so that you can have it in front of you. Again, Just hold off posting for a moment, Please. Let's put it up, Kate. We must make and keep a special place within us for what we love. Otherwise, Our heart becomes like an overnight motel filled with the visitations of a thousand fickle lovers, Not one of which is capable of loving anything other than itself. We must make and keep a special place within us for what we love. Otherwise, Our heart becomes like an overnight motel filled with the visitations of a thousand fickle lovers, Not one of which is capable of loving anything other than itself. Perhaps one of the greatest shocks that awaits all true seekers is that the reason our life is the way that it is, Whatever that may be at the moment, Has one and one only reason for being that way. And I know what happens when I say these things, And I can only say that if you're willing to listen, I can explain to you the truth of it. Our life is what it is moment to moment for one reason, And that's simply because of what we love. It's really perfect justice, You know, Because as we begin to realize that it's what we put first in our lives that we receive from life in that moment, It's a reciprocal relationship. What I give, I get. If I want to change what I get from life, I must recognize the relationship between what I'm giving to it that brings that response, That brings that manifestation. This is the heart of all true spiritual teachings, I might add. It is a way in which a person can start to understand that these revelations that we push away all the time, I mean, Who amongst us doesn't look at a moment, A painful one, Some kind of suffering, Some kind of loss, Some kind of fear, And think to ourselves, Why me? Why do I deserve that? And we don't understand that what we reject and resist that we feel is being given to us without deserving so is actually life in a very unique way serving us up a certain kind of lesson. And we have to go through what we have to go through in order to finally recognize that these revelations that are at first unwanted turn always, If we're lucky to see it, Into a realization that, By God, Thank you for. . . How would I have ever known? And it's not until I actually start to know that if I'm going to receive something else from life, Something new, I'm going to have to have a new first. The first shall be last, The last shall be first. All of these biblical East and West scriptures speak of this reversing that has to take place. The only way that you and I come to have a new first is by seeing that what we get from every moment of life is because of what we are loving first and foremost in that moment. And let me jump to this. What is it that we love but don't know that not only is it our first love, But that it has no love for us? Our first love is rescuing ourselves. In spite of the fact for millennia, Every time we rescue ourselves with that justification, That consolation, That distraction, That next leg of our spiritual journey where this time we're going to be able to have this abundance, All of that nonsense and all of the disappointment and then the reiteration of reconfiguring our life, All of that points to a simple fact. And that is that we believe that we can rescue ourselves from ourselves. Because we don't see that actually what we are trying to rescue ourselves from moment to moment is a life that this consciousness has created in its own image, I might add. And so our practice on a daily level is always waiting for something to happen, Positive or negative, It makes no difference, And then manipulating it so that somehow or other we can get it to turn around to be something that we can either fix that will free us or that we can add to ourselves that will further liberate us, Failing to see that at the drop of a hat, Which we're going to look at together, At the drop of a hat, I'm stranded again. I'm isolated again. I'm afraid again. On the island of self-doubt, Some peninsula that's cut off from the rest of the mainland, Where there's a daily dose of pain, Alternating with pleasure, And we just go to sleep there. So let me, 10 minutes in now, Let me get to the first of the stories. It will lead to the second story. And then I will save time, As I've been doing now, Of 10, 12 minutes, God willing, For us to talk about what it is that I've shared with you. So let's take a nice deep breath and have the first story. Imagine a merchant marine ship of some kind, Traveling through open seas, Gets torpedoed, And the vessel goes down, And God help us, Men and women go down with it. But some of them, A small group of people, Managed to make it to a deserted island. The island doesn't have much value. It's not big enough for a landing strip, But there is food and water sufficient enough to sustain the people on that island that are stranded there. And after a certain period of time, Where they begin to realize rescue's not coming, I could stop there and may just for a moment, Just for a heartbeat, The rescue you imagine is coming isn't coming. You just don't want to acknowledge it. You don't want to acknowledge that the next plan you have, The next person that's going to come into your life, Or the next person you boot out of your life, The next bountiful moment where you get a check or somebody flatters you, You want to believe that that's going to rescue you, And it's not, It hasn't. There's nothing this world can give you that will rescue you from the consciousness that creates this world of absence, Of lack. So our hero, Which by the way, Dwells within us, All these stories, All the characters are you and I, Every last one of them. Our hero realizes at a certain point, Rescue's not coming the way, You know, We just sit here and wait for it, It's not coming. We can pray to our gods, We can do all the things we do, But it's not coming. And so this woman, Much to the disdain of the other stranded people, Realizes she's going to have to take some kind of action. The new first isn't going to be waiting, The new first is going to be proactive in a new way that requires, On her part, Collecting firewood, Finding a way, Though she doesn't know how, To ignite it. And to somehow or other, In spite of the squalls that come through and wash over the island that put out every fire because there's no real shelter, To gather the wood again and start again, To deal with the resentment of those who say she's wasting her time while they sit in some distant place, Wasting their time hoping for something that'll never come, All the time wishing that she didn't have to do it. Why do I have to make myself uncomfortable, Be out here? But it was evident to her, A need was in her to be rescued and she understood that if that need was going to be answered, She was going to have a particular part to play a part in it. Well, What do you think happens? A rescue boat parked out off of the shores sends a little dinghy aboard because they see the rescue fire, The smoke. They pull on the shore and she sees them and she rushes, Oh, Thank God, Thank God you've come. Let me go get the others. And she's told on the spot, You do not have time to go get the others. These waters are patrolled by the ship that sunk your ship, Presumably, And we have to get you and we have to get off. But what about the others? And she's told, Look, You can come back for them later, If possible, When there's no longer this danger. But now you come with us or not. What is she going to do? She has to go. Now, Just to finish the story later, Much like the story of the philosopher King in the Allegory of the Cave, She does come back and those that had survived, Who had any sanity left at all, Were taken off the island. So here's the story. The question is, How do I attract rescue? I can't rescue myself. Not one thought of mine is ever going to relieve me from the presence of troubled thought. Not one reaction is ever going to release me from a part of myself that measures every moment and then finds it coming up short or that people aren't the way they're supposed to be, So that I'm not going to be rescued from this comparative consciousness through anything that it tells me to do. How do I attract this rescue? What must be my practice? What does it mean? The equivalent of always ensuring that there is a fire lit on the beach. Take a nice deep breath because I'm going to tell you something. Real rescue, Attracting it, Starts with realizing that you're not the only one who wants you to be free. And I'm not talking about your wife or your children or somebody at work or your friends or so-called friends who are all the time painting the next picture of the next pleasure or otherwise validating themselves and compromising the conditions they find themselves where what they rescued themselves through turns out to be the next prison. There is something that wants you and I to be free, And actually more important than wanting us to be free, It is already seen to the business of our liberation and it sees to it unceasingly. But we're not in a place inwardly. We don't have the understanding, The awareness yet to recognize that we are not alone in these moments where we suddenly feel stranded by somebody's cruel remark or by something the world throws in our path that seems to punish us. We're not alone, But we don't know we're not alone. And there's only one way for us to find out that we are not alone, That this rescue is unceasing. What is the appearance of any unwanted moment? First of all, What do we try to rescue ourselves from? Unwanted moments, Unwanted thoughts that come when the moments we wanted turn sour. What is the appearance of those unwanted moments other than, And this is much to the point for you, As you should have already realized, Other than that unwanted moment is an invitation to learn whatever the lesson is in the moment of that conflict with life. So the lesson that seems to be about this problem that's come, That we have always tried to rescue ourselves by naming the problem and then pursuing whatever we thought would free us. The real lesson in that moment is one, We don't know what it is that just happened, But we are aware of the fact that it took place within us. That that moment brought something to us, A revelation of something that we would have never seen or understood in ourselves as long as we continue to push it away through rescuing ourselves. A revelation, Meaning something that comes and shows us something about ourselves, Is exactly what the old saying, When the student is ready, The teacher appears. What does the teacher come to do? Rather than to help us see and recognize that we have come into that moment, Bringing with us into that moment, Some aspect of our, Of a consciousness, Not our consciousness, But a consciousness. Our consciousness is just one of the many branches of a larger unconscious, Completely conditioned nature. We take all of these moments to be our consciousness and our lesson in it. It is always one consciousness and one lesson. And the one lesson behind all of them is where is it that I am apart from rescue? Where is it that I'm apart from realizing that whatever the moment is, Especially the ones where the squall comes and seems to put out the light, Where the suffering seems to prove that all of this has been for nothing, These moments, If we've been through them at least once, We realized they brought something to us. We couldn't give ourselves and that we wouldn't dream of even asking for, Because who wants to ask for something that requires? We see that we have a false love, That we have a false sense of self, That we live from an incomplete nature that produces the idea of time and becoming someone who one day will be free. Who wants to even become close to recognizing the truth of that? And yet it is in the truth of that, That we are rescued. Because what are we rescued from in any moment where we've ever had any form of liberation other than we're rescued from a misunderstanding of who we are, What we're here for and our purpose on the planet. We're rescued from a false understanding of ourselves. This is what it means when the student is ready. And we want to be ready, Don't we? And yet we don't really fully understand what this readiness means. So let me get into the second story, Because what we're looking at is what's the right response to strengthen, To deepen our relationship with the divine, So that in the depth and breadth of an ever renewed relationship with what is true, There's no moment in which we are being given an opportunity to discover something that is true about ourselves that we didn't know before. And until we know the truth of ourselves, We cannot be free. It's that simple. So how do we ask for the truth that sets us free? Take a nice deep breath. I don't know, It was years ago, There was all these reality TV shows. One of them was, I think, Called The Apprentice. I'm not totally sure of it. And by God, Please don't go off on some tangent. See, That's what happens. Someone will bring up one word, One idea, And our mind just runs away with us. Can we remember that you and I are here for a lesson? And maybe part of the lesson is just seeing. That's extraordinary how I could have either a painful or a pleasurable reaction to the mention of a TV show. There was a reality TV show. This is what the story is about, Where a dozen aspiring upper echelon design artists at a major clothing manufacturer are selected to go through a process of competition with each other, Where one of them will be assigned directly to the assistant of the CDO, The chief design officer, Who works directly under the chief executive officer. So it's an opportunity that's unparalleled. Now it turns out that at this particular moment in time, Unbeknownst to the employees of this major corporation, The company was going through a major shakeup. Profits had been falling, And no one knew that the board was meeting secretly and looking to select a brand new chief executive officer, Because whoever had been at the helm was not steering the ship in a profitable direction, And so they wanted to make a change. Now when the word of this change came out onto the street, Suddenly the stock began to first tank, And then it began to rise, Because there was hope. So all of this is the background of this story, Where one of these supervising design artists is going to be selected to work directly with the chief design officer. So here's how it unfolds from this point. Two months later, Fast forward through all the processing. One of the ladies is selected as the chief design officer's direct assistant. And when, Of course, She's selected out of the dozen candidates, You know what happens to all the other candidates. That's not fair. That's not right. Why her? I was more qualified, And the moaning and the complaining goes on, But it doesn't change the fact that someone new, Her name is Mary, Has been selected to work directly under the CDO. So it's a big story, Because it's a highly recognized, Reputable company, And a reporter wants to find out for himself, How has this happened? Because she was like the bottom of the list, And there was like a fantasy league. Everybody was betting on who was going to be selected. So this reporter goes to Mary and says to her, First of all, Congratulations, But I'm just wondering, How is it that you were selected out of the other people? And she said, You know what? I have no idea. Because for one thing, I did know the former CEO, But I didn't know the former CEO from Adam. In fact, Nobody here did. He said, Well, I get it, But still, Why were you the one selected? She said, Look, I don't know. Honestly, I don't know. If you want to know what you're asking me, Go see the new CEO. Maybe he or she, The CDO, The chief, Maybe they can help you understand what's going on. I'm grateful it happened, But I do not know myself. So the reporter calls and makes an appointment with the CEO. And he sits down to interview him, And he says, I won't be very long. He said, I just want to understand what took place here. The CEO says, Look, First of all, You have to understand that I was brought in in a very difficult time to this company. In fact, I suspect that one of the reasons they started this contest was to elevate the popularity of the company in the eyes of the public as somebody that was very open and fair competition, Blah, Blah, Blah. He said, I didn't know anything about it. He said, But when I came in, Suddenly I was handed the job of discerning which of these candidates was going to be the one to win the contest. And I didn't know any of them, He said. The reporter said, Well, This is intriguing. Well, What did you do? And the CEO says, Well, The first thing I did was I didn't let anybody know that I would actually come to work yet. We postponed it, At least in the eyes of the employees, That I was still several weeks out from taking the helm. And I disguised myself, Because there might have been a few who knew me from other companies, Because I was a former CEO. And I disguised myself, And I disguised myself as someone who was himself a new hire for the chief design officer. And I went about doing what I only knew would give me the answers I wanted. Please go on, The reporter said. Look, I came into the company, I wasn't sure about the protocol. Some of the younger, Less VIP designers and employees knew much more about this company than I did. I didn't even know where to look for stuff. So what I thought to myself was, I'm going to go to all of the ones involved in this competition. And I'm going to ask each and every one of them more than once to help me, Not knowing who I am. They're going to either help me or they're not. And I'm going to learn something about their character. And that's what I did for three straight weeks. I went to each and every one of these candidates, And I asked, Look, I'm confused, I'm stuck, I don't know where something is. How can I get past this point? And every last one of them, Except for one, Always had an excuse. They were always too busy. They always promised to get back with me. But Mary, Mary was different. And when I would come to Mary, And I would say, I need some help. She would always say one thing. And every time she said it as true as could possibly be. And I knew that she was busy. She didn't know who I was, But I knew who she was. And the reporter said, I'm all ears. What is it that Mary said to you the others didn't, That determined for you that she was the right choice to be the direct assistant under the new CEO? And by the way, CEO means chief executive officer, But in this story, It means celestial executive officer. Why did you choose her? And he said, Because she always said to me when I'd ask, Of course, What can I do to help you? How can I be of assistance in this moment to you? You know, It never occurs to us that every creature in existence, And how much more so with the so-called crown of creation, Human beings. Never dawns on us that our Father, That the Divine, The Divine Mother, I don't care what you call the Almighty, Nor does it, I might add, That it needs our assistance. It needs us to participate in its will on earth, That it might be done in heaven in the same way. What do you think these moments are that we run into where life seems to ask us for something and the cup's empty, Or the cup's bitter, Or we have our own problems, Or too busy trying to rescue ourselves to be concerned with anything other than ensuring that somehow or other we get through that storm, We get through this problem with this person? It never dawns on us that these storms and these problems are all leading indicators of something that is incomplete in this consciousness that we are representatives of and that we live in and that lives in us. Students ready, The teacher appears, The teacher represents the moment in which the student, The aspirant is asked, Will you help me? Will you attend to this moment with everything you have? Will you give your love to this moment even though you feel no love in it for you in the moment that it takes place because everything in you is rejecting it? How can I help? Don't sentimentalize this, I beg of you. What a nightmare that would be. But can I see that I am asked by something that I do not know the nature of what asks me to take part in another kind of life? If I wasn't being asked, I would never have the dissatisfaction that I do on a daily basis with all that I have saved myself for and from. And yet here is this dissatisfaction, Here is this need, Here is this need to be rescued. Oh, How human beings have fallen so far and so dark and so deep that the idea of needing rescue is repugnant to us. And yet conversely, As sick as it is, We look to the government, We look to religious leaders, We look to phony baloney gurus, We look to everyone and everything else, Including the psychopathic unconscious nature, Forever spinning tales of how we're going to triumph only to lead us into a defeat and then give us an excuse, Then give us the next thing to do to rescue ourselves, False fires, Fake flames, Fake truth. That's right there in front of us all the time. For those of us who are willing to do what is necessary in that moment, Let me have a first business. Let me have a first, Let me get up in the morning and regardless how I feel, Let me remember, Even though it's difficult, That there is something that wants me to be free. I don't feel it, I have no contact with it, As the case may be on any given day, And yet I can remember because I've seen it. I know that rescue is possible, I've had a taste of it. And if I do that, If I have a first, If I build that fire on that stranded beach where nobody else comes to help and nobody's interested, Oh, They're interested for a moment because they can sit by the fire and throw down some coconut juice or whatever it is and then talk about rescue and then talk about how things are going to be when they get home, But nobody wants to sit there through the storms, Do we? Sit there through the moments where the teacher comes and there's nothing that I'm interested in, In what's being shown to me about myself. I want nothing to do with the lesson. When I want everything to do with what the lesson has brought me, Then I will receive the lesson and in receiving the lesson, I know I'm rescued. Because what is the receiving the lesson, Other than the revelation, The realization and the integration of a consciousness that thought it was alone and lost and now realizes something wants more for it than it can give itself. Have a first, Have a first, Have a first. I don't care what you're doing. You're going someplace. I don't care. Have a first while you go there. You don't feel like doing your spiritual work. I don't care. Have a first. What would be the first? See how unbelievably reticent I am. I want nothing to do with anything spiritual because I'm full of sadness or anger or frustration. And to see that, To receive the lesson that in this moment, I am filled with something that has come to me because I've made space for it in my life. There's room in this inn for these negative states. Let me find a place where there is no longer room in this inn for these negative states and where I am welcomed in, If you will, By the truth that wants to set me free because I have agreed to have a first. Give an example, Please. Here I am and I'm with somebody and they've said something that hurts my feelings. What's the first thing that you do, Anne, When somebody hurts your feelings or everybody else? Because Anne is no different than any of us. This is the same consciousness. I immediately feel resistance. I feel anger, Perhaps resentment. And no matter how I want to color that moment, The next step on my part, Anne, Is to rescue myself by calling on thoughts and feelings that explain to me what's wrong with that person, What needs to be done with this situation, How I must change whatever just took place because it's just not right. So to have a new first in that moment is to put first this willingness to see that there's something that always comes to rescue me, But what it's rescuing me from is not what it points to. What I need to be rescued from, Anne, Is a consciousness that's forever pointing its finger outside of itself as the problem that it's in the pain it's over. That's an example. Make your own, By the way. You must. And you have a thousand times every day. I'll give you a personal example. Last night, For whatever reasons, As it happens, I was awakened at 2 a. M. And I wouldn't know how else to say it. Something just wants to download. Something that I am not prepared for when it's doing it. It's too much. To have a first means that I don't sit and wish that it would go away. It means that as best I can, I ask, How can I help you when I'm getting nothing out of it other than I feel like I'm going to die or my mind is going to explode? How can I participate in this moment that I'm being given, Especially when I don't want it? I have to recognize that something is always asking. There's no moment where life isn't placing a request on us. The task is to become more receptive, Not to be more self-rescuing. Because the more receptive we can be, The more we realize that we are always being rescued from a consciousness that knows nothing about itself by something that takes us into the awareness of that consciousness and releases us from our former attachment and identification with it. The board's open for another six, Seven minutes, Anybody that wants to ask. I have a strong, Stubborn streak and it's not a virtue. Yeah, But see, But let's not judge that. See, I see this strong, Stubborn streak in me. I see this addiction. I see this preference to go into painful thoughts or blame or hatred. I see it. But at least now if I actually see it, I can understand that resisting that state, Shoshanna, Is exactly what keeps it in place. I resist an unwanted moment to rescue myself from it. Because no longer, No quicker does that resistance come up than part of the reaction is, Here's what you need to do to save yourself. Let us not save ourselves. Let us not console ourselves. Let us be willing to see what we're being given, What we're being asked. And that's the rub, Isn't it? When we're asked to see something, We're actually being given something to see. When we're asked to see something, We're being given something to see. If something is giving us something to see, It is for the purpose of that awareness that has brought that light into our life, Into this darkness that knows itself not. How do I respond then to bullying? Do I say anything to that person? You may or you may not. But to sit and regret or resent someone that you've never sat down with and said to them, You know what? This doesn't work. This is how you are hurting me. But we almost never get to a place where we're able to actually sit down and calmly say to somebody, Look, There's this conflict because we're so afraid of what will happen to us if we go into that moment because the resentment has built. And so we know that we're a churning urn, A burning funk. We're going to go off like a torch. So we avoid the moment, Avoid the moment until we can't anymore, And then bang. Then now we are not only fighting and being defensive, But we actually believe we're rescuing ourselves from something that only exists to the extent of our resistance. And if you do speak to someone and you say you're hurting me and they continue to hurt you, Who stays with anyone or anything that continues to hurt them? And please understand, When I say who stays with them, Who stays with their thoughts about this person? Who stays with their reactions to this person, To reliving the resentment, To building accounts because that's what happens. And I build accounts because I believe in that book of life that I'm, By the way, The accountant, That I can finally rescue myself when I've got all the facts in place. And then I'll be free. No, You'll never be free as long as you keep an account of any kind with any human being. The moment that we have a problem with another person or with the moment itself or with ourselves, In those moments, Those are the moments where we're intended to say, How can I be assistance? How can I help you? Meaning how can I help that light, That energy? How can I be an assistant to the resolution of this karma instead of resisting it, Which reincarnates the consciousness that produced it? All of these things are there right in front of us all the time. But God help us. We're so full of ourselves. We're so full of reasons why we are the way we are, Hating ourselves, Loving ourselves, Protecting ourselves, Pursuing new kinds of selves so that we can be better in a time to come. All of that's got to go. And it will go because that's the beauty of the teaching. That's the beauty of when the teacher appears. What's the teacher doing? Saying, You know what? This has got to go. And you can't let it go of yourself. But if I show you enough about it, You may just lose interest in it because now you realize it never loved you. It doesn't know what love is. It doesn't know what love is. But what calls itself love will fight tooth and nail to prove to you and to itself that it knows what love is. Love never turns into hatred. Perfect love casts out fear. Love doesn't push. It doesn't pull. Love doesn't shout. It just quietly shows you, Shows you, Shows you, And asks when it does, Will you help me do what needs to be done within you so that we can be closer, So that the world within you can change, And then the world outside of you can change because you agreed. It feels like this is the most important thing beyond time, Even though I don't know the reason for it. That's such a rub. But in the end, Love and faith are synonymous. No human being of him or herself would take themselves time and time again to a precipice that when they look over into this abyss, They cannot see what is there, And yet it is so clear that they cannot go back to where they came from. So they have to remain there in this unknowing. What is the good way to approach fear? When you feel a fear come into you, And I intend to give a talk on this later, Anytime you feel any negative state, Instead of trying to rescue yourself from it, Which is always the suggestion that the negative state gives you, The reactions to a problem never just appear like, Oh, That's a problem. The problem always has the solution connected to it, And we fail to see that what we're actually trying to solve in that moment, We wouldn't be having to solve if it weren't for the consciousness that first produced that unconsciousness, That fear. So the task is, And this was a story I told long ago, Tell me all about yourself. Tell me all about yourself. I'm not going to tell me about you. I'm not going to talk to myself about what you are. I'm not going to do anything. I'm just going to sit here and ask, How can I be of assistance? How can I learn something? What must I do? What must I see? And then let it stay there. If you do that, You'll see something new. When you see something new, You'll understand you have just been renewed. When you know you can be renewed, That's all you'll be interested in. Have a first. That was the point of this. Have a first, A first love. And if it's just to remember that there is a first love that you need, Even if it's just that much, It will fly in the face of all these false loves that have passed themselves off as our God.