Three,
Two,
One.
So this morning I was going to talk to you about self-awareness and spiritual alignment and self-renewal and spiritual discernment.
I was going to talk about all wonderful things to talk about considering our theme this morning is transcendence.
But then I read this quote on page 41 in How to Change Your Life,
An Ernest Holmes book,
And he wrote,
The first step for you to take involves becoming aware that you already have the God qualities you wish to cultivate and experience in everyday life.
You already have what you want.
And I thought,
Well,
If that's true,
Dr.
Holmes,
If it's all there and available to everyone,
How am I,
Well,
Better yet,
Do I even need to inspire anyone,
Any of you out there to transcend your transcendence,
Which is my talk title today,
Transcend your transcendence.
You know,
Self-improvement gurus would tell you it's so simple,
All you have to do is ask the right questions to receive the best answers.
You know,
There's a story that I heard about an archeologist who,
After years of research and exploration,
Discovered this ancient book that was said to answer any question you asked of it,
Absolutely any question.
And being a professional,
Of course,
The archeologist took this book back to his prestigious university to research its power in a controlled manner,
Double-blind,
Peer-viewed,
All that good stuff.
So he rounded up three of the university's brightest minds.
Now first he talked to a researcher of astrophysics who had led the field for many,
Many years and had produced many,
Many papers theorizing all the cosmic events and what it all means and how it happened.
And so this archeologist told the astrophysicist to ask the book one question,
Right,
And to document then whether the response was accurate according to all the research that he had done.
And so the astrophysicist thought for a moment and asked the book,
What was existence like before the Big Bang?
The archeologist opened the book,
Turned it around and showed it to the physicist who instantly eyes wide open went on a manic quest and started scrolling equations on the nearest pad of paper mumbling to himself over and over and over.
Shocked and a little uneasy,
But determined to see his research through,
The archeologist then moved on to the next researcher,
A leading professor of mathematics who had produced many papers on numbers and their effect on humanity and human interpretations behind the ever-growing sequences and quantities and the relation to space and structure and order,
All that mathematical wonderness.
And the mathematician,
Knowing why he was there,
Barely thought for a second and asked the book,
How can a human being,
How can a human being best visualize infinity?
How can a human being best visualize infinity?
The archeologist once again opened the book,
Turned it around and showed it to the mathematician whose eyes widened in shock and confusion and immediately ran to the chalkboard at the other end of the room frantically writing formulas,
Principles,
And archimedes calculations trying to make sense of what he had seen,
The answer to his ultimate question.
Now shaken but persistent,
The archeologist then turned to the final volunteer,
One of the world's most highly regarded philosophers who had spent her whole life researching the different views and interpretations of a variety of philosophical thoughts and systems and aesthetics and debates.
And the philosopher,
Of course,
Knew the process,
Had watched the other two folk do it and then confidently turned to the book and asked it,
What is the meaning of life?
She asked,
What is the meaning of life?
And of course the archeologist opened the book,
Showed the philosopher its answer and smiling,
She shouted with glee,
Perfect,
Just what I thought.
I'm going to lunch now.
And then she left the room smiling and satisfied.
The archeologist thinking he had found the ultimate answer in this ancient book revealing the most important,
The most deep question anyone could ever answer or ask and get an answer for,
Turned the book around to himself and looked at the answer which delighted the philosopher so much.
Five pages were blank.
So this story,
Okay,
This story is reminding me then we write our own meaning of life,
Right?
Not others,
We write it,
Not me,
Not me for you,
I mean,
Or Ernest Holmes or Thomas Troward or Yeshua or any mystic at any time from before to forever.
We do it ourselves.
The page is blank.
The answer is within.
In fact,
The great mythologist Joseph Campbell wrote,
Life has no meaning.
Each of us has meaning and we bring it to life.
It is a waste to be asking the question when you are the answer.
So I am the answer.
You are the answer.
Well then you may think for a second,
Wait a minute,
Does that mean that we make or maybe made some sort of deal with God or whatever in the ethos before we were ever born?
So we come with the answer already set like predestination,
Predetermination?
What about all the big bang Genesis stuff?
Does that not matter?
I was thinking about and thinking about it and like what usually happens,
I turned on my computer and was looking for,
I don't know what I was looking for,
But this popped up in the search and it was this story.
It was a creation story and I know I've told all these creation stories before,
But listen to this one.
On the first day,
God created the dog and said,
Sit all day by the door of your house and bark at anyone who comes in or walks past.
For this,
I will give you a lifespan of 20 years.
And the dog said,
That's a long time to be barking.
How about 10 years and I'll give you back the other 10.
And God agreed.
On the second day,
God created the monkey and said,
Entertain people,
Do tricks and make them laugh.
For this,
I will give you 20 year lifespan.
Monkey said tricks for 20 years.
That's a pretty long time to perform.
How about I give you back 10 of those years just like the dog did.
And God agreed.
On the third day,
God created the cow and said,
You must go into the field with the farmer all day long and suffer under the sun,
Have calves and give milk to support the farmer's family.
And for this,
I will give you a lifespan of 60 years.
The cow said,
That's kind of tough life you're giving me here.
You want me to live for 60 years that way?
How about 20?
And I'll give you back the other 40.
God said,
Okay.
And on the fourth day,
God created man,
Mankind,
Humankind and said,
Eat,
Sleep,
Play,
Marry and enjoy your life.
For this,
I'll give you 20 years.
But the man said,
What?
Only 20 years?
Could you possibly give me my 20?
And the 40,
The cow gave back,
The 10,
The monkey gave back and that other 10,
The dog gave back to make 80.
Is that okay?
God said,
Okay,
Sure.
You ask,
You receive.
So that is why for our first 20 years,
We eat,
Sleep,
Play and enjoy ourselves.
For the next 40 years,
We slave in the sun to support our family.
For the next 10 years after that,
We do monkey tricks to entertain the grandchildren.
And for the last 10 years,
We sit on the front porch and bark at everyone.
Yikes.
That may be true for some,
But to me,
That's not transcending my transcendence.
Transcending my transcendence is not a deal I made ahead of life,
A deal I have to stick to.
Now,
I think it's the deal I make now,
Right?
It's the power of now.
The deal I make today with myself.
That's got to be what transcendence is about,
The meaning of life even is about.
Now,
Of course,
There's commonalities that we all have with each other,
But what's the most important I think is how do I,
How do you,
How do each of us see the meaning of life?
Is it to be happy,
Fulfilled,
Successful in business,
Some romantic fun marriage or a healthy body?
Why do we make it so hard on ourselves to find that meaning of life?
Reminds me of this story.
John and Andy were these two recent philosophy graduates and they embarked on this cross-country journey because they wanted to better understand the meaning of life,
Just like everybody else,
Right?
Now,
They took with them one of their great friends,
Bill,
And they thought it would be great to have Bill for many reasons.
One is they thought it would be helpful for his personal growth since he was a college dropout,
He was a former drug addict,
He was still in recovery and he was open to receiving life,
Information and wisdom.
Now during the trip,
John and Andy always made interpretations out of everything they saw.
They saw a kid lying under the bridge or a bunch of kids lying under the bridge and then that brought on a conversation about poverty,
A conversation about prosperity.
They saw kids gorging themselves on the beach or something,
Plates of expensive desserts or chips and just tons and tons of food around them.
They talked about gluttony,
They talked about poverty in the world and people who go to sleep hungry.
When they saw wild animals,
You know,
Once they got into the forest,
They talked about freedom and the infinity of space.
When they saw or remembered or talked about people walking their dogs,
They talked about captivity and the captivity that we impose on ourselves as well.
And all the while,
Through all these conversations and all this supposed wisdom going on,
Bill stayed quiet.
So they'd been walking miles and miles in the forest and they finally reached this mountainous region and they decided to camp there for the night and they put up their tent and sat down,
Made a fire,
Had a little dinner and they started to reflect on their day,
On their journey so far.
The hours were starting to get late,
You know,
And so they decided to go to sleep for the night and get up early and continue their journey.
In the middle of the night,
Bill suddenly woke up and he looked around.
He decided to wake John and Andy up too.
And Bill said,
Look up,
Look up,
John,
Look up,
Andy,
Tell me,
What do you see?
And John and Andy both looked up and they were immediately amazed at what they saw,
These beautiful formations of an infinite amount of stars in the sky.
And so per their usual way,
They started pontificating on their spiritual interpretations of this scenery and the infinity of life and space and the divine and all this wonderful stuff.
And after delivering these,
This long,
Deep,
Elaborated discussion and conversation,
They turned to Bill and they asked him what he thought.
Bill looked at them and he said,
I think this means our tent has been stolen.
Our tent had been stolen.
They made all this for maybe even an hour,
All this discussion as beautiful as it is about what's going on in the universe and what all this means and didn't stay in the moment to know what was happening right now.
The meaning of life in that moment was their tent is gone,
What's next?
You want to transcend your transcendence?
Don't think so hard.
Just be still and know.
Do you think the meaning of life is getting zen,
Getting centered,
Being in the flow,
Having faith,
Using mental science,
Engaging in meditation?
Yes,
Yes,
And yes.
Or some maybe using the red pill or the blue pill or some sort of hallucination,
Hallucinogen to expand their mind into the matrix,
As they say,
Or putting yourself in some sort of mental,
Some sort of mindset goal,
All that good stuff,
Or a state of mind or state of being as we've been taught.
That's all great.
All that is fabulous.
But what is the most important way to answer the big questions,
The meaning of life?
Be still and know.
Be still and know what moments you feel most inspired by,
Most energetic from.
That's you transcending.
Be still and listen.
Listen to what is seeking to emerge through you as you and then rise up and answer that call.
That's you transcending.
Be still and allow yourself to awaken to who and what you already are right here,
Right now,
Nothing added.
Doesn't matter your education.
Doesn't matter your bank account.
Doesn't matter any of that stuff,
Who and what you already are right now,
An individualization of the divine source of all.
That's what you are.
That's who you are right here,
Right now.
Nothing else needs to be added.
That's how you transcend any transcendence.
There's something within you that sings the song of eternity.
Listen to it.
Ernest Holmes wrote that.
There's something within you that sings the song of eternity.
Listen to it.
Your transcendence is found in the essence and beautiful action of life itself.
Of course.
So your call this week then is to live in the macro.
No in the macro.
First the macro.
Your call this week is to live life in the macro.
Of course we talk about that every week.
Living in the macro.
Seek first the kingdom of the divine within to paraphrase Matthew 633.
Practice self-care.
Unplug.
Realize.
Nourish your soul.
Embrace spirit.
That's spiritual practice stuff.
Yes.
That is attaching ourselves to the macro on purpose.
But most importantly practice that self-care intentionally and consciously in the action of life.
Of life in the micro.
In the micro in your abilities your activities of self-talk of feeling of belief of imagination and just plain old living.
The meaning of life is within and active.
It's not just the theory.
So we need to seek it.
Listen to it.
Be joy in it and live it fulfilled with your choice.
And your choice and your choice and your choice.
Every one of us our own choices of what health wealth love peace wisdom beauty and power looks like and feels like.
We get to decide.
You are the power.
You are the transcendence.
So go ahead.
And yourself right now today.
Thank you so much.
Namaste.
You are displaced Ready!
