1996-09-08-Intention and Decision
Spokane #40
Contents
• 1 Heading
o 1.1 Topic: Intention and Decision
o 1.2 Group: Spokane TeaM
• 2 Facilitators
o 2.1 Teacher: Aaron, Elyon, Michael
o 2.2 TR: Sandy Montee, Jonathan
• 3 Session
o 3.1 Opening
o 3.2 Dialogue
3.2.1 Habit
3.2.2 Intention, Decision
3.2.3 Exercise
o 3.3 Closing
3.3.1 Communion
Topic: Intention and Decision
Group: Spokane TeaM
Facilitators
Teacher: Aaron, Elyon, Michael
TR: Sandy Montee, Jonathan
Session
Opening
AARON: (Sandy TR): Hi, friends, I am Aaron. I have been standing back not talking much with your group, but I do watch the dynamics going on. I think sometimes you get a feeling of being over loaded, and this is opposite of what should be felt. You need to feel the lightness, the taking away of your burdens and the fun of playing at friendships, based on the learning experience that we are trying to give you. The heaviness is your putting the load on your own shoulders. We need to shift that responsibility back on to ourselves. If we do not know how to be free, there is something stopping that, as it is not the real way of life. Of course, we all want a purpose to our lives and we feel like we need to hang on to the personality and to the drudgery…, drud…
Sandy: I can’t say that; they will have to give me another word.
AARON: All of the work you need to do to just survive is just that; it is work, because an attitude that we have so much work to do, and we need to be responsible, and that just isn’t correct. Look at your burdens and decide if they are really all that important to you. If they are not, just walk away from them. Why you still feel guilty for something that you did thirty years ago is beyond my imagination. You are my dear friends, and I wish you well today.
Dialogue
Sandy: Aaron is still here if you have questions.
Evelyn: I don’t have any questions, but I thank you for that reminder that we can choose our battles. We don’t have to feel so burdened.
Habit
Ginny: Do you have any suggestions or techniques for when we can catch ourselves going into these times when we slip so easily into old patterns and choose not to think a certain way. How can we notice these things coming up before they happen?
AARON: : Yes. The way we do things most of the time is from habit. If you can say, “Oh, I did that again” and try to break that with a new, positive thought over and over again; we need to be aware that it’s a habit instead of reality. Just like someone who has left the kitchen doors open all their life and now they have to go back and shut the door, to make that into a habit. A good question to ask is: Is this reality? What is the problem here? Identify the problem. Sometimes there is not even a problem. Does that help?
Ginny: Yes, thank you. Another idea would be is when you are not in a particularly negative space to deliberately do something that would be a positive thought or action. That would help to change the habit, because it is already partially changed when a new situation comes along. Make it like a game, a special project. Deliberately call someone on the phone, or do something out of the normal routine.
AARON: : It is very difficult to try to change yourself.
Intention, Decision
ELYON: (Jonathan): I am Elyon. I greet you again as always with love and help you in your growth. This day I would address you concerning the differences between intention and decision, choices. The dilemmas encountered in your life wherein decisions are necessary yet understanding appears inadequate to accurately choose, it is helpful to evaluate intent. Intention is an overriding qualifier for every decision.
If, for instance, your intention is to relax, engage in recreation, certain decisions (are) appropriate and beneficial; others would be wrong decisions to meet the intended purpose. Yet should your intention be character growth, mind training, those correct decisions under playful intention may be incorrect decisions under the intention to work on yourself and grow. It is the intention that conditions the appropriate use of choice. Decisions themselves are not right or wrong but relative to intent.
Now having considered decisions, the question arises the value of intentions, their relative right and wrongness. It is, in a sense, pyramidal; for if your supreme purpose is the Father’s will, intention will clarify itself due to the spiritual value contained within each intended purpose. Any particular intention on your part has a multitude, a myriad, of decisions that are potential. Yet your intentions can number far less, all under the single purpose to do the will of God. When confusion arises, confusion in the multiplicity of choices, work on the level above your intentions. Sort them for understanding, always compared against the background of the will of God. It is easier to work on boxes of apples than all the apples scattered un-contained.
Your decisions are the apples, your intentions are the boxes. As Aaron has addressed the point of habits, intention goes a great distance in establishing a habit far more than does a single decision, for you all realize that a choice must be repeated many times before a habit conforms to your intention. I am through with my comments. Thank you. (pause) Addendum: The Father’s will is the truck in which you may place your box of apples.
Evelyn: The Father’s will seems so broad. It’s been a relief to read in the book how the will of God is your willingness to share your inner life with Him. That just isn’t confining at all. When you try to narrow down a lot of choices, somehow the will of God opens up even more. I suppose it eliminates some obvious poor choices.
ELYON: : It helps to align a choice under appropriate and inappropriate based on the intervening level of intention that exists between Father’s will and a specific choice. Much of what the Father wills is for you to intend to maximize the gifts and talents bestowed upon you. As you have pointed out, great latitude is given in choosing how. This mechanism itself when consciously applied is the Father’s will for you. It is the same mechanism which transforms belief into faith and faith into lifestyle.
It is recognizable that lifestyles vary even under the same faith umbrella. The will of the Father is to enact faith. The breadth of the Supreme engagement for yourselves allows the multiplicity required for each human being to uniquely live in a manner in which no other human being could live. This process is also the will of the Father. God’s will does not choose for you in the specific but asks that you function according to the principles and processes that define the universe that you are currently living in. Does this help you?
Evelyn: You have said it all.
Exercise
ELYON: : In a way it is the Father’s will that apples grow. It is the conditions of time and space that determine the ripe ones, the bruised ones, the wormy ones, the juicy ones.
unidentified (Ginny): As with anything you want to learn, practice makes perfect. Lessons in the spiritual realm have the same requirements as lessons on your material world. You are a spiritual athlete, so to speak, who needs to train in this way of being with many, many hours of practice and training. You are already doing much to increase your spiritual athleticism, to strengthen your spiritual muscles, to develop endurance, flexibility and strength. This is a daily task.
We do encourage all of you who are intent on increasing and developing your spiritual muscles to work out daily so that you can perform your task with ease. Great performers are great because it looks so easy. Yet, behind this ease of performance are thousands of hours of practice. If you wish to perform easily individually, then you must practice. A daily routine is a good idea. Also remember that you have within you a companion who can guide your choices and who can help you have greater insight. Your indwelling spirit is always eager to communicate with you if you but prepare the way with your intentions and with your time and with your attention. Keep up your good intentions of improving. You have much assistance if you but ask. We bless all of your efforts; they are noted, each and every one.
Ginny: I’m not sure who this is. Norson?
Closing
Communion
MICHAEL: (Jonathan): I would direct your focus now for the purpose of spiritual contemplation and communion. The Infinite Father encompasses all things, encompassing the personality absoluteness of the Eternal Son, who likewise encompasses all with the spirit gravity that he bestows. And I, your Creator Son, am encompassed within this sonship, while I encompass all of you with my presence, my Spirit of Truth. As you are bathed in this energy, you encompass the very Father within you. Thereby is the cycle complete, all into one and one with all. This is the kingdom, the brotherhood, the family. My love to you always.
Ginny: My love to you, too.
