Take a nice deep breath everybody.
In one respect what we're going to look at together this morning is incredibly simple.
In fact it's so simple that it's missed almost entirely but I hope that when we're done with our 40 or 45 minutes together we'll have opened the door a little bit,
Cracked the window so to speak so that some light and air can get into this this density called our our present consciousness and we can begin to at least be willing to explore something that by and large no one's willing to explore because of the a certain sense of dread that comes over us anytime and to the point of this opening comment what is the one thing that you and I avoid virtually at almost any cost in any given moment when things seem to go sour when problems overpower whatever we've put in place what would you say what is this presence that seems to be lurking in the shadows like some dragon that we can't see but we can sense the the the pounding what do you think that is that we're always trying to escape in life when moments go south if you had to guess you know Chantelle that actually is the answer but we don't know anything about death Carl yeah what I don't want it's not supposed to be like this we we can fill in these answers and I always appreciate when we at least correspond that way John says the unknown but let's let's really dread is another good answer pain all of these things are appropriate but they can all be tied into one word and I'm going to yes danger I'm gonna bring that one word in now because it is the theme of our talk the last thing that any of us want and that all of our pursuits in life are dedicated to avoiding is uncertainty even the tick-tock tick-tock of the clock and and suddenly we look up and we have someplace to go or something to do and all of a sudden we can that that great crocodile than Peter Pan's story with the clock inside of a tick-tock suddenly there's the uncertainty of the predator of the moment that we don't know what it means is on its way or this just unfolded and everything that we had put into place is suddenly in the air and flying around in winds that we can't control this this incessant need on our part to seek an answer to why this has happened and what to do is because this uncertainty stalks us and I'll get ahead of myself because at some point and only you as an individual will reach that point through your own work not through any scripture you'll ever read through what so-called teacher will tell you at a certain point you will see the cost of trying to make things certain is too great to bear the cost of certainty is too great to pay and then we'll look at this and we'll understand why and again you're not to believe anything I say please never take anything I say you must work with it to see whether it's true or not that do we or do we not have the same unwanted experience over and over again the smallest thing and and we can feel the stress the anxiety that we have to somehow or other get everything coalesced back into whatever that condition was prior to the strike of midnight in that timetable that is sits out there and so explaining and explaining and explaining justifying over and over again 10,
000 different ways what do I do now how do I handle this what am I to make out of this situation look at the world look at my look at my my weaknesses all all of this looking for explanations to give ourselves to return to ourselves a sense of certainty that suddenly was just shattered by the smallest thing and then and we don't see it as true what has this moment brought that produced the uncertainty except for a challenge to whatever certainty we had put together the last time around so that every time this mind looks for and grabs on to explanations and produces some form of new certainty so that it can slip through that moment untouched it has produced for itself without knowing it the prison of that certainty that will suddenly be revealed when that moment or that person or that problem pops out of nowhere and there I am again in that same dreaded feeling of uncertainty how am I gonna pull this off what must I do to prove myself one more time it just sits there you don't see it behind like it's like some strange thing and behind a curtain someplace where you can see his little feet sticking out under the curtain but you never see the creature itself and yet if you're understanding this I trust that you are what I'm saying it can be proven that there's no certainty in this world it can be proven and yet in spite of the fact it can be proven there is this immense need seeming need that we have for it so we question everything that threatens it how to obtain what I need control these people get some kind of security lock back down and in spite of the fact that it's like like some sandcastle on a shore washed away by waves that come in and on their own timetable we never questioned rebuilding and rebuilding and rebuilding what this sense of self that stands stable as it were for as long as the circumstances that it's created for itself remain in place and yet and I was looking out the window yesterday when I was thinking about what I wanted to share with you this time of the year all of the the leaves begin to fall from the Madrones and the and the Oaks the Oaks Madrones they shed their leaves couple times a year the all the Oaks and if I could turn my camera around I I'd show you the ground is just covered with leaves and then when the pressure systems change around the world and the wind comes in the leaves go running what causes that gust of wind that picks up the leaf what what produces that dry bed stream instead of the one that was running just two months ago or the flower in the desert the thorns that grow on the rose you you can pick anything you want tell me has any book ever written been able to explain this incredibly intelligent constant intersection of conditions and forces that create the world we see that never stop changing in which if there's anything that's certain there's no certainty except that the seasons will come and go and that all of the creatures will be impacted by them and all of them will go through whatever it is that they go through without ever having to as Christ said in the consider the lily in the field it does it doesn't seek certainty so you and I without realizing it in this world in a an infinite number of interconnecting events by an endless influx of of celestial planetary energies converging all working together and bringing about through their convergence this the existence of what of a single blade of grass that a deer can walk over and nip off then we we can see and acknowledge that is true in nature and then somehow it's convenient we just avoid the whole topic when it comes to our life and if what I've said is true with any veracity then please tell me how it is that you and I believe that somehow or other when there's this unwanted condition we have some power to change the revelate to change the conditions that produced it now don't misunderstand me I'm not saying be an ostrich and stick your head in the sand I'm just saying that at some point doesn't one have to weigh the reoccurrence of the conditions that create this anxiety in this fear this worry about what does that mean and how what is what's going to take at some point doesn't doesn't something in us has to ask how many times am I going to go back and get this certainty only to have it obliterated again and spend my life by the way is it painful or pleasurable is it anxiety or is it confidence that comes to us in moments where circumstances challenge what we have put together and call our life and what is it that we call our life we call our life and what we hope God help us is our life is that is the continuity the the certainty that I'm gonna get to go through this again hopefully this time when I go through it again I won't have to go through it again I won't have to be afraid again I won't be angry again I won't be I won't be washed away and so what does our mind do in the throw of these waves of uncertainty what what is the the one thing the mind scrambles to do in every instant as we reach pretty much the halfway I've been talking about this I hope that you've been joining me online it's free the mind scrambles to weigh all of the negative implications and their possibilities and what do I do here will it affect that caught up in all that and so the mind feels like it has to reduce all of the unknown variables into something it can understand which God help us and it is true for all to whatever extent it is God help us imagine spending your life trying to reduce all of the negative implications and their projected painful possibilities into a new and single conclusion that will put all of that in its place and then you'll walk out clean and fresh not touched by the moment imagine that to reduce all of life into a single thought into a single explanation that allows me to get by that moment because that's what we do anything to restore lost certainty so that in achieving so-called this understanding for a moment the dread of uncertainty is replaced with a new feeling of certainty until and this is our problem because we just were our mind is so divided so in constant in its capacity to hold a line of attention through time that with each moment of sudden uncertainty it never dawns on us that we have been in that uncertainty a million times because the understanding of that continuation of that unconscious reaction to those moments obliterates any possibility of being able to remember oneself so that what what happens one is given what they need to remember by the consciousness responsible for the uncertainty and then we bite one more time and live one more time dove invest ourselves one more time into that certainty into that into that tendency to reduce every moment each of those unwanted impressions into a single image a single thought that then we hope we can rely on because it feels to us as if we have ground beneath us again I've been talking about this again how thought will thought thought will reduce all possibilities and collapse the field of those possibilities into one thing all the possibilities thought takes and the moment that the mind takes that thought it collapses it's a quantum collapse of a certain field of infinite possibilities into a singularity that because of our identification with it and the need to restore our sense of identity through that thought and then everything else disappears and without having any idea that we've done so we have just established for ourselves listen to this we've established for ourselves through that sudden established new anchor that new anchor is actually a form of a prison that we don't see we have anchored ourselves we have been complicit in the in the process of trying to anchor ourselves one more time in a world where there is no such thing as an anchor that will ever hold us our manifested life in place so suddenly this new thought this sense of self well here's what I'll do here's how I'll handle it and then the rush the anxiety the fear years ago I told this story and I just came to me while I was sitting here I about this back in the 1800s or 1700s maybe 1600s you know they had these sailing ships that's how there weren't everything was you know three mass sailing ships and trade was taking place all around the world and imagine this scenario where there is a one of these merchant marine companies and they send their ships to this one particular place and the possibilities are vast there but every time they send one of their ships they're filled with silks and spices or whatever it is they said the ship somehow winds up being ransacked it washes up on some reef near the island it doesn't get to it and then the pirates come and take everything off and it keeps happening and finally the the head of the merchant marine company hires a detective and here's what he finds out I've got to go through the story quickly every time a ship sets out for a big journey like that it is inspected or at least it should be make everything in place and it turns out that this investigator finds out that just before each of these ships in that particular vessel a rain of vessels going there it has its anchor replaced by one of the company that's that creates anchors and this is a better anchor and they a bigger anchor to hold it in place because apparently the ship runs and runs aground and so what does he find out he finds out that the company is in cahoots with the pirates on the island that are sacking the ship when it runs aground on the reef and why is that company that makes the anchors in cahoots with the pirates because the company makes anchors made out of salt and paints them with black lead so that when that anchor goes in the water all of the salt gradually dissolves and when the salt dissolves all of a sudden the ship is no longer anchored that is exactly what happens when taking thought we create the next explanation for ourselves how we can somehow or other restore certainty to ourselves this mind creates an anchor it anchors itself in what in the known it anchors itself in what it has done before but now knows how to do better so it recreates for itself from the content of its own past experience what it calls a new understanding or a new approach to the same old pain and it drops that anchor meaning we identify with that thought with that explanation and at least for a few minutes the ship is stable and honestly so can bury it so good there it's not to accept chaos and move on because that has this connotation that life is chaos life is not chaos humanity the world it has created the world I have created in my relationships depending upon how asleep I am and what are my motivations that creates the chaos but the chaos is not between the heaven and earth the chaos is between a human being believing that his mind knows what certainty is and then in creating that certainty in thought creates the constant chaos of running into the fact that thought can't keep anything in place and what it produces is a prison not possibilities that's what we have to understand so we are constantly momentarily securing ourselves through some set of new considerations why did Christ say what man what woman taking thought can add one cubit to their stature what was he saying he was saying that it doesn't matter how many times you restore your life through a new explanation a new plan it's not going to change the consciousness that is constantly running into that shifting ground that it blames the world for shifting when it wouldn't be there shifting if it hadn't been first created by an unconscious nature and then identified with it and then hoping it could stand on its own conclusions stand on its own conclusions I used to say that a crisis is a close encounter of the truthful kind and you and I do not know how to use those crises because the close encounter of the truthful kind is the sudden shock that everything that I have called myself and vested myself in and struggle so mightily to ensure that you continue to see me as this kind of person and the world holds me in this kind of esteem that all of those efforts for the continuity of myself that all of the effort for the continuity of myself is in vain and we've swallowed it so thoroughly lock stock and barrel my legacy look I I know what I'm saying isn't popular and I could care less honestly because people don't want to hear it no one wants to hear it what is this this incredible investment in my children and my grandchildren what is all of that about other than I go on no you don't go on what goes on is the same lunacy the children infected and the grandchildren infected by the same unconscious nature that you and I have been taken over by that believe somehow or other it's going to assemble a world create a heaven in its own image only to find out that every heaven it creates is assaulted by someone else's heaven and then both heavens turn into hell and you have war on the earth and not just between nations but between people families at war with each other because my brother or my sister threatened something that I'm identified with they didn't confirm me as I see myself in that moment the waiter doesn't give me what I want on and on it goes and every last one of those moments bringing up this this fear that we're not aware of of the discontinuation of the line of myself and then and then people ask well how do I how do I how do I put this into practice yes Rebecca because what am I what am I teaching I'm not teaching anything I'm asking you to see what I see what do you think any true teacher any enlightened man any true man we need to mistake what do you think what do you think it is that they're doing they are they are saying look this is the road you are on and you can prove to yourself it's the road you're on if you want to but in order to prove it's the road you want you have to see that you're on that road and then experience what happens to you when you realize that road doesn't go anywhere I started this talk saying the cost of the continuation of oneself is too great nobody thinks that I love I love the continuation of myself I can't wait because I can get in there and mix it up again I'll get my sisters to go along with what I want I'll get my brother to stop being so sarcastic I'll get my husband my wife to tow the line I'll make sure my money's in place and it'll always be there and I'll always be okay and then life comes along and it says listen you are okay but the you that you think you are will never be okay because it lives on an island that it created for itself that's being washed over by waves incessantly trying to release you from your identification with that nature so what I'm saying here and I guess if we could put two and two together maybe we can understand that at least intellectually that we're not meant to sit here and explain ourselves to ourselves I'm not here to it I'm not when you when you finally wake up when you see a little bit more how did I ever arrive at a place where I believe that my place in life is to sit wherever I am and let anxious thoughts and feelings fearful angry worried let all these thoughts and feelings that weren't there a moment before but suddenly the condition has appeared time has produced the influx of these energies has brought about some kind of intersection that I just wasn't ready for I'm not I didn't prepare for this or I did prepare and I'm inadequate you you fill in the blank here it comes and my whole life spent what sitting there going no no it'll see what will hold the kiss hold can you hold the phone hold on I need a few more minutes oh please God that you should understand that's the whole thing hold on I just need a few more moments to get this right do you want to be on your deathbed thinking that because you will be if you don't work that's what every if you've ever and I know personally I've been with people watching them die God bless my mother my father afraid I've run out of time to be certain and now the great uncertainty is upon me why wait for the great uncertainty why not agree as best you can now listen to experience the pain and the conflict in recreating certainty for yourself so that you can do what go back through the same iteration again it's not the conditions around us that are responsible for our uncertainty what's responsible for our uncertainty is that we are unconsciously identified with a sense of security produced by an absolutely insecure consciousness this consciousness only knows how to secure itself through what it thinks about and makes in its own image and when it makes what it makes in its own image and then it sees itself and it goes ah this is real I am real it fails to realize that every image and every condition is subject to conditions greater than itself that it cannot control and that will move through like a tornado and turn everything upside down and then you've got to rebuild your life again and again and again have you ever I you ever drive in your car I don't know if you were able to do this you're in a stoplight safely and you look over and you watch men and women and and they are hypnotized they are looking forward that their hands are on the wheel what do you think and you'll know what they're doing when you know what you're doing what are they doing they're there they're restoring their life they're they're figuring the ins and outs and how to make sure this happens that way and this doesn't happen that way dealing with the uncertainty and God help us this world is in such a terrible state it almost seems impossible to even consider not being caught up in thought trying to juggle what we have to so we can keep our life in place I get it be a good householder do what is in your power to do but refuse to do what is not and what is not in your power is to give yourself psychological certainty based on conditions that you're able to manipulate and keep in place for a certain amount of time because in the end and it is in the end it is isn't it isn't that a crisis isn't a crisis a moment of a mini end m-i-n-i dash end a mini end isn't that what a crisis is a mini end oh oh and what's come to an end my certainty what's my certainty the sense of identity established through building one more time out of explanation and thought a sense of myself that suddenly no longer like that anchor has any stability it is dissolved in the sea of change you and I are meant to live in the sea of change and do what we need to as decent householders be able to provide for the people that we love and by the way not your 30 year olds be able to take care of ourselves if we want to and can afford to have good food to eat good organic food to wear clean clothes not $500 shirts clean clothes and God help us not to envy the people that walk around looking as if their life is together no human being who is asleep has a life that is together for any longer than the thought he or she has established and by the way so much of our family and business and all the rest of that what do you think political parties are all of the the nations gathered together and set against each other other than being against something gives us certainty that what we are for is true you're not in this world I'm not in this world to be against anything because what can happen when we're against is that we are we have a solidarity of a psychology that knows itself through opposition and anything that knows itself through opposition is opposed to itself because really all we ever oppose is any idea that isn't the one that we think is valuable the one thing we never know that we never learn unless we by the grace of God were exposed to the right kind of truthful ideas is what would happen if instead of living with this ceaseless conflict that's inherent in an in this unquestioned certainty and the self that establishes it so we can stand up and know itself a right what would happen if we if the if we finally reach that point where instead of trying to restore reality again we let what is real do its real work within us so that instead of unconsciously suffering the continuation of a certainty that has no certainty except for the fact that it will be dissolved instead of living from that that incessant need to do that we we agreed in that moment to let things be uncertain as much as we can bear gosh there's so much to say I'm out of time I want to be able to bring you in why why why would if if life itself is this river is this movement is this interchange this exchange where nothing remains constant everything is living and dying in the same moment if that's real life where am I who am I to think that somehow I can step outside of that flow establish for myself a kingdom and the rest of that river and flow will serve me try to understand we must learn to study and understand this nature of uncertainty in us because if we do if we start to see you know this most painful thing in the world is trying to keep everything in place then I'll begin to understand ah that's the cost of the continuation of myself this pain that produces nothing but another possibility that will be the same this pain is the cost of the continuity of my own continuity and then you will be liberated that's where freedom comes not from you freeing yourself but from seeing that you have you have cast 10,
000 anchors into the sea of changing life and 10,
000 times it's dissolved and then the next time will come and you simply won't do it you will see where the sea takes you you will see what happens next and you will always find out I promise you this that if you did that and you work through it you'll be given something you'll be given a true place that cannot be washed away it is within you and is within your relationship with the divine went a little longer than I had intended I've only got about five or six minutes but we can I'm happy to look at your comments and and we can talk a little bit hi Nellie just spent a week angry at how my life turned out so now I have shingles you know what that's a lot more true than we know the the constant immersion of our body and mind in negative states in opposing life what do you think happens when you've got something rubbing like this and rubbing like this and pushing the friction breaks everything down all right so now you know let us learn just a little bit of time let us deal just a little bit as we can with whatever that uncertainty is feel the compulsion to try to figure out what to do no Lisa that the feeling of being completely lost is a requirement for giving up the self that only knows itself through its own direction I tread on slightly dangerous ground here but I tell you it's true and I I know this from myself and it every any any any true teacher of any ilk will have always said the same thing the love of what is true the love of what is divine is never going to betray you it's never going to take you someplace where it isn't giving you more than it has asked you to see needs to be given up it is never not giving you more than it has asked you to see what must be given up and according to what you give up one loses their life to gain it according to what we're willing to give up we are given discoveries that deliver us from this unconscious nature John the way we receive the divine is by making room for the divine what do you think no room at the end was about this world this world this this is the world I am the world you think there's any difference between any of these ethnicities these religious these political these nation national do you think there's any difference between any of these men and women there's none because all are possessed by the exact same demand that they find security and security always has to do with something that they must have that somebody else doesn't want them to have what they believe they must go through that someone else stands in their way and all of that is based in this idea of certainty so that you have these religious creeds sweet God when is humanity going to make up wake up wake up to make up the answer isn't in these religious ideologies the answer is in seeing the idiocy of being so identified with any ideology that it makes you my enemy that's the answer but in order to get past that point one is going to have to see the pain that this consciousness produces that then it points to someone else as being responsible for and then seeing it is not the continuity of this of my of my lifeline it's not the continuity of my religion it's not the continuity of anything in which life dwells life dwells in the ceaseless uncertainty of its own rebirth and our relationship to it is what allows us to participate in that why do we talk first aid train why do we take first rate aiding CPR training contribute to be prepared seeds do you know look I'm not going to explain to you why what rebirth means that you go back into your mother's womb what is first aid training have to do with anything I'm talking about physician heal myself that's the first requirement and if and as I do that and I learn how to take care of myself and I become an emergency medical technician and thank God for them then I do what is necessary I heard in my head that I trying to come up with a me to feel better yeah that's it that's Jill that's what we're always trying to do I want to get through this moment I don't want so let me reimagine what I do want in order to get past it and then what I do want becomes the ground of my next uncertainty when conditions threaten it yes seeds we must be prepared at that level for the unexpected expectation do what's in our power refused to do what's not well that's probably enough I am going to be online again today you can find out I can not allowed to promote anything I speak several times a week for free go to my profile find me online join me whenever you can this is not an easy journey but it is the only one and the clearer that becomes to you the easier it will be to deal with the uncertainty born out of what it means basically to start realizing if I don't if I'm not if I'm not participating consciously in realizing these moments where unconsciously something is pushing and shoving and pushing and shoving so that I can go on if I'm not present that I that consciousness is going to go on and on and on our hope rests in those men and women and those of us who are willing to make that that true sacrifice by seeing all how we have sacrificed has not brought about anything other than this the suffering that we call this world in our life
