2010-05-10-Freedom of Endless Association
Marin #189
Contents
• 1 Heading
o 1.1 Topic: Freedom of Endless Association
o 1.2 Group: Marin TeaM
• 2 Facilitators
o 2.1 Teacher: Nebadonia
o 2.2 TR: JL
• 3 Session
o 3.1 Opening
o 3.2 Lesson
3.2.1 Sharing
3.2.2 Time, Experience
3.2.3 Individual, Groups
3.2.4 Mind, Collective Intelligence
o 3.3 Dialogue
3.3.1 Loyalty
3.3.2 Freedom
3.3.3 Self Realization
o 3.4 Closing
Topic: Freedom of Endless Association
Group: Marin TeaM
Facilitators
Teacher: Nebadonia
TR: JL
Session
Opening
Dear Mother Spirit and Michael, We’re just one day past our celebration of Mother’s Day and I wanted to thank you, Nebadonia, for being the necessary motherly connection between us and our Father. Thank you for me. Thank you and Michael and your Life Carrier Sons for starting life on this planet and guiding all that led up to me being here this evening. Thank you for this body of mine. Thank you for your Holy Spirit being part of my mind and always being here whenever I need to feel your presence. I invite you to help me be aware of you whenever it pleases you.
Thank you for us–everyone I’ve known. One of the sweetest truths you’ve taught in many lessons is what fills our souls–greater than all the material things we’ve known so well, our wonderful toys, the great tools we work with and all the kitchen gear we use to prepare our food, the homes we’ve known–the houses and apartments; the living physical planet: greater than all this material creation are the other souls we’ve known. In our meditation they come and visit us, these other finally unfathomable beings of God’s, and of yours, and Michael’s creation. We experience their character within us. We feel again the love they showed us, and again, the love we were aglow to radiate towards them. Thank you for giving all of us life, to fill our lives with each other. Amen.
NEBADONIA: Good evening, my children, this is Nebadonia, your spirit mother.
Lesson
Yes, indeed, happy Mothers Day to me. I relish your thanksgiving but please do not worship me, my children. I would rather you feel me even closer to you than that: my Holy Spirit is part of you. Then too, we’re both, you and I, children of our Father. We both have this wonderful relationship to someone who is all encompassing, for in Him we truly live, and move, and have our being. It is from His desire and His creativity–His original notion of autonomy, if you will–that we have our freedom, our independence, even from Him. We each have our individualized unique personality like no other in all of creation. We are each distinct, discreet living personal beings and it’s our very freedom from God that gives us the ability then to choose, in all freedom, to worship Him and say: Thank you, Father, for me. And thank You for these companions, this infinity of other personal beings with whom to share eternity.
Sharing
(The freedom of endless association)
My children, just as you recognize that the other folks you have known and loved so dearly are truly what fill your soul, so too will they continue to fill eternity with you. This is another great freedom, an endless freedom of association. Michael recently put it as the great personality circuit, the way, even in this first life of yours, you participate in the Deity Absolute, the single transcendent reality of all personal beings created by God.
We delight in your recent development–say in the last hundred years or so–of your marvelous science fiction and fantasy for now we can speak of dimensions of reality and you can get some feeling for all the different, sparkling facets of the encompassing in which we are all being held. It includes every other order of personal beings, each of which is yet another kind of consciousness that you will encounter and have fun making your own. This is God’s endless gift of experience. All of us experiential beings are growing, constantly growing our souls. This is the marvelous way the creation itself is set up to, as we’ve taught, not repeat itself, but grow, so each moment of universal history is unique as well.
Time, Experience
This spontaneous half of reality means there’s something very special to each moment of time. All reality is expanding not only with new materialization but also, with an increasing number of personal beings throughout, more mind and individual spirit, more soul experience. It’s all expanding and growing, forever. This is the essence of experience. As your Urantia book puts it into pure poetry, God escapes the “fetters of infinity and absolute perfection” by His ability to create finite creatures who can participate in their own growing perfection, forever. This is true even though in each moment of time He is complete, the creation is complete, and you are complete in the sense that nothing is missing. It’s all here. Everything is complete just as it is. There’s no need for any of this. It simply is by His will. It continues to grow by His will. Time is a dimension of His will. You too grow towards a perfection you will never reach the end of, for you will never cease reaching for it.
You’ve gathered by now Michael and I delight in introducing you to yourselves. Last time he mentioned the mystery that you remain to yourselves, partly because everything, including you, is changing and growing, and needs to be constantly rediscovered. He asked you to understand then, in this light, so much of human behavior and how this deep mystery is so differently experienced and interpreted by each person. To some it’s a terror, a boundless and groundless anxiety they feel, like a pit they will fall into any moment. It remains something they can never finally know and have done with, some yawning chasm of unpredictability. They feel righteously fearful of the deliberate unpredictability of others, evolved over a million years of nigh incessant territorial, political, and economic warfare, let alone petty crime; that calls for genuine reassurance of friendliness, one to another.
Individual, Groups
(Unique and universal: individual and group) So let’s deepen the mystery. Let’s think about yet another living balance that you experience, and this is both the internal and outward balance between the individual and the group. Aside from some extremely rare individuals who’ve had the freedom to choose to live, say, as hermits off somewhere totally independent of all other human contact; except for these extremely rare individuals, people have always lived in relationship to others. And these others are, like you, a combination of a unique personality coupled though with a near universal planetary form of living energy, the human body/mind. I’m sure you’d agree that if you needed a surgeon it’s nice he doesn’t have to start exploring from scratch, so much of your physical form is universally shared with all the others on this planet. Then too the mind that comes from this physical-ness is in so many aspects universally shared with everyone as well. It’s my Mind/Spirit Adjutant kind of mind that you have, and my Holy Spirit is in each one of you, and you are all in me. So internally you have this living balance between a unique personality and a nigh universal body/mind reality.
Externally this individual/group balance is reflected in the cultural conditioning shared among large groups of people along the lines of regional nation/states, different religions and beliefs, and the whole spectrum from a primitive to a scientific understanding of Natural Law. For the individual these are, you might say, large conglomerations of coincidences–(Mother Spirit chuckles)–into which they are born, situations within which they participate more or less both by choice and coercion.
Your Urantia book states, and the First Amendment to your Constitution also expresses, a necessity for freedom of speech in all forms of communication. While it is true that all thought originates in each individual, hopefully in touch with their inner presence of God, their Thought Adjuster, so too you recognize the necessity for freely communicating with your fellows in order to have a sharing and concurrence of ideas that lead to that friendly assurance I mentioned. The very language with which you think is a collective evolution, and so even your own individual creativity, my children, is dependent in part, and reflected by, your ability to share your thoughts with each other.
Mind, Collective Intelligence
In the realm of mind is where, if you will, one and one make more than two. There is something in a lively exchange between two people that can be so much greater than what each one is capable of originating alone. And so here too, in your very ability to think, you have a living balance between the individual and the group. You do well to have this freedom reflected in your society, your freedom of the press and writing, then radio and movies and TV, and now the internet and all your electronic media. They enable you to share so much, to know so much of so many more lives and experiences in addition to your own. This individual ability is also growing exponentially in the collective, planetary sense.
The political implications of this are obvious in how societies have evolved all over the world through a living, dynamic struggle between the rights of the individual and the need for each person to be aware of and experience and enjoy their individuality, their uniqueness; balanced with their ability to respond to the group; and the responsibility of the group toward the individual. For again, with very few exceptions, no one lives alone. Each person is in a living situation of independence, dependence, and interdependence, and it should be thrilling for you to realize all these different aspects. A truly evolving society is one in which all these relationships are enhanced by being brought into highly conscious individual choice. For it’s a member’s unconscious, knee-jerk identification with a religion, a society, a political party–any group–that gives the leaders of that group or institution an unquestioned authority over them. The great evolution in human society is when individuals become evermore conscious of their relationship to, first, the presence of God within them that gives them the realization of their uniqueness, and then their freedom of choice in how they respond to all the groups that impinge upon them. This is the great movement from unconsciousness to conscious realization and freedom, freedom with and freedom from the very religious, social, and political conditioning that gives meaning to their lives.
You might wonder where you fit in along this whole spectrum of unconscious to highly conscious identification. Wonder: who or what is it you owe your allegiance to? As we have said before; as one of your poets stated: it is not he, or she, or them, or It–that you belong to. You belong to yourself and to God. But you want to develop the ability to respond with all those with whom you relate, near and far.
So welcome to another mystery, my children. Welcome all these relationships into consciousness. Be aware to whom and what you give your allegiance, and maintain the ability to withdraw it upon your choice. Be very careful about your freedom. At each moment it is no more than a potential being realized this particular time. It is how you are living your life, yet the potential for more freedom is also always present. This is how you grow to become a true faith son or daughter of God. You not only ascertain His will for you, but you are able to choose it. This too is His blessing upon you. Now if you have any questions or comments this evening, I’m always open and enjoy hearing them.
Dialogue
Student: Thank you, Mother, for your undying love, the way you are always supportive. Thank you for your presence in our lives. I’m just now learning to get your love from my head down to my heart. It’s really nice. The question I have is, you mentioned allegiance, but to whom should we give our allegiance: you, or Michael, or the Heavenly Father; or all three of you?
Loyalty
(To whom do you give your allegiance?)
NEBADONIA: Yes, my son: this is for you to decide. This is your choice: where you direct your love and appreciation. We can only encourage you to make it your own, to acquire the full status of a creature of free will dignity.
Student: Kind-of seems to me that Heavenly Father–through the Thought Adjuster–is closer than you and Michael, and I‘ve been taught to give allegiance to Heavenly Father. Now I’m wondering whether or not, or where you and Michael fit in. I guess that’s the same question I just asked (all chuckle).
NEBADONIA: My son, Michael and I are happy to be the conduit for your love and your respect and your honor to our Father. You are quite capable, and have so much in the past, addressed each of us in turn, and we all, collectively–the three of us, feel your love, and respond. Be undisturbed if you can’t quite yet distinguish us, except by name and understanding. We enjoy a supernal unity that is quite transcendent to human comprehension and so be not dismayed that our presence is felt as one. We are quite distinct, discrete beings, yet as Michael said, as Jesus, I and my Father are one. We are quite in accord–(Mother Spirit chuckles)–with each other.
But as to whom and what you give your allegiance, the important thing is that it is your choice. The more consciously you make that decision, the more genuine and powerful then is your ability to direct your love. So choose wisely. Wonder and explore within yourself, my son. If you feel any lingering alliance to any human organization or institution, this is not necessarily wrong by any means. But it is good for you to make these choices anew from time to time, well conscious of whom you are choosing to back, to give your time, and your attention, and your wealth.
Consciousness: that’s the ticket here; that’s the thing. So meditate on this. Let your soul come forth, curious as to whom you’ve give your allegiance in the past. Does this self-exploration seem like a worthwhile activity?
STUDENT: It does indeed. I’m beginning to notice that I’m unconsciously giving allegiance to a lot of things–people, places, and organizations–without even thinking about them much. What do you suggest, Mother?
NEBADONIA: Well, all human beings are born into an amazing array–(Mother Spirit chuckles)–of conditioning–familial, political, social, scientific, religious. These gave you the very language–the words, and concepts, and relationships–with which you began to think; and taught you how to perceive reality. This is the universal situation of childhood, and so we encourage each person to grow to their full estate of inner freedom, the free will and dignity of each conscious, free will choice, moment by moment. This is no light thing. This is the weight you carry, but it gives substance to all things. You are the co-creator of your life.
Student: Thank you, Mother.
NEBADONIA: You’re very welcome. Be in my love. Keep letting your meditation deepen. You are breaking free to a greater connection.
Student: Thank you, Mother, again.
Student: Mother, I belong to an organization, a church that worships God, that worships Jesus Christ, but it seems to me to be in error and not in freedom. There are so many rules, and prohibitions, and …(unclear)…about the bible, and I feel foreign, always, because I love these people and I see that they are striving for truth, but they are so bound by their fear of freedom. If you have any advice to give me about how do I relate to these people who are trying to be your people, be God’s people, but can’t let themselves, and others, be free. How do I love them and help them into freedom?
Freedom
(Helping others be free)
NEBADONIA: Yes, my daughter. As with C, I have to throw it right back into your lap. It’s how you decide to live, moment by moment. May I suggest: lively, lightheartedly, spontaneously, joyfully, teasingly, and lovingly. You have moved a great deal just in your realization of this problem and your desire to face the fear of being an individual yourself, and stand on your own two feet and take responsibility for your own beliefs–in the midst of those who believe otherwise.
Imagine everybody in a deep hole and constantly arguing about how they are going to get out–who is going to stand on whose shoulders, who might be left behind. Yet until one gets out–that is, finds the way, none can follow. Until you yourself are free, you cannot help others realize their freedom. And so, facing this fear of freedom yourself, this apprehension of being so terribly singular in the midst of their more dogmatic beliefs, is the first step, for until you make it out and achieve some freedom yourself, how can you be an example for others?
As your Urantia book states, my daughter, it is a spiritual fragrance that actually moves others. There you are, being free, demonstrating with your love, and your caring, and your teasing, and your devotion, and your lively spontaneity–all of these: demonstrating what is possible. This is the greatest thing you can do for anyone. It was Jesus’ ability to take in others, even his sworn enemies, and still love them, that made such an impression.
There is no technique, no magic way, no universal method I could suggest, but the exact opposite. It by ridding yourself of any such notion, and trusting in your own creative self to be adequate to the moment, that you grow the ability to help others. Trust in your own love and your own caring to come up with the right word, the right gesture, the loving touch that fills their souls with you. This is what does it, and nothing shy of this really does.
Student: I will work on that, and try not to be so serious all the time. (everyone laughs). Thank you, Mother.
NEBADONIA: Just continue to love the folks, and let them believe what they will. This is not to say you can’t get into all kinds of lively theological discussions, but you avoid butting heads spiritually. You keep the inner connection with all-inclusive spirit–that loving touch, as your orientation to the truth in each moment with them, and let the rest fall into place where it will. This way you keep learning about them too. You’ll be showing them how to accept others, with love; and all the good belief systems are only aimed at that anyway, are they not? Continue to be in my love.
Student: And you in mine.
Student: Yes, Mother. I was thinking that this word freedom gets thrown around a lot without any true understanding of what it implies, and what are we being free from. Sometimes when people get political freedom there’s a lot of chaos at first. They don’t have the balance or integration to experience the true significance and value of being free. One viewpoint is that we are intrinsically free beings, but we choose to identify with ideologies so unquestionably that we consider them as truth itself. I think that this is where stillness comes into play, to relax ones grip on these identifications and allow our deeper need to be free to gently come forth.
You mentioned earlier about expansiveness, about expanding beyond anything that binds you to a particular ideology. As M just said, there are so many rules about what to do and think to become a true believer: that’s not freedom. That’s not free will. Our innate feelings of morality get covered over with so many do’s and don’ts. We’re not brought up to tune into something spiritual within ourselves, but trained to give obedience to someone else. I’d like to read something I wrote–if I can in this light. ‘Expansiveness is part of our nature. Life, space, God, or awareness–are always expanding. They are never tied down to anything–no concepts, no doctrines, no dogma, no belief systems, no teaching, no way of seeing oneself. If we have the idea of being of an independent nature, yet not being separate from our source–which is a great, shining brightness–then we are aware of this innate call to expand. Resistance to be so results in circumstances we perceive as troublesome or fearsome.’
Whenever I feel stuck like I’m not allowing myself to be free in the moment because of some idea, or some fear, I take the time to just be still with myself. I know my sense of freedom will come about all on its own. I just have to have faith. Anyway…that’s enough!
NEBADONIA: Yes, my son, it seems you have found not some dogmatic method of blind belief, but actually a way of suspending the inner need for this. This is the discovery of a true sense of stillness, of your own positive spirit, and ours, that will come forth if only given the chance. You choose to enter into an activity that enables you to rise above even the past few moments and come into a touch with your spontaneous self–what we’ve called the fact that reality is not only repeating itself but is also bursting forth ever anew from God’s creativity–including the portion He has endowed to you. Just to be aware of this is to be renewed.
(Unconscious identification again)
The only thing I would disagree with is the notion that people are bound up because they choose to identify with this or that dogma. My lesson tonight was that folks are stuck by their–lack–of conscious choice, simply because–for the most part–they were raised and conditioned by circumstances that were–from the standpoint of their just-beginning personality–purely coincidental: the coincidences of birth. Their identifications are unconscious, and this is what gives human institutions such enormous power over their members. The only way out is for these members to consciously withdraw their allegiance and make a new commitment–if they so choose–in the light of that real freedom. To do so they have to face the fear of individuality, of being singular, of being unique and alone with only God, and Michael, and me for their ultimate company. This means standing on their own within themselves. That is the supreme challenge to attain the free will dignity that, up to that moment, is only potential.
You are complete moment by moment, but you can be rather completely enslaved to unconscious identifications. It is not that anything is missing; but that the state of your being is one of being born imperfect so that you can choose and have a hand in your own eternal perfectibility. This is God’s idea of sharing His perfection throughout the whole time/space realm with His children. This is how you, as an individual, even though you are reared by human authority, you can choose what will be unconditionally true for you. You reap the result of this choice in the instantaneous response of the rest of reality. The circumstantial conditioning into which you were born, that gives meaning to your life, is the very thing you need to be independent from. In your stillness let your soul come forth so you can review and reflect upon your life–all the spiritually significant events and folks that gave, and still give it meaning and value. As this comes into consciousness you enter a win-win situation of having all of this significance, and yet also being free of it. This is the movement of understanding, deeper and deeper understanding, and it is something that, by its very essence, you cannot anticipate.
Student: Yes, I see: people don’t always realize they have a choice. But I think that all over the world peoples’ belief systems are being threatened and put under a microscope because of the economic/financial…and other upheavals. Yet people don’t have that moment, that glimpse into something other than what is going on–another way out. It takes that moment of truth, or freedom; or they just keep on. I guess all one can do is love them for their true essence, whether they know it or not. I mean, that was what Jesus was all about, and Buddha, and all of them. They saw the truth of peoples’ true nature. So instead of getting down of what people believe, it’s up to people who do understand what freedom and love are all about to see them as that as well. So: thank you.
Self Realization
(The evolution of individualization)
NEBADONIA: You are welcome, my son. We’re touching here the fundamental evolution of individualization, and then of societies and cultures in general becoming self-aware and liberated in understanding. This takes place from the most primitive and savage tribal level where every individual is rigidly bound about by a thousand and one unquestioned taboos, clear to the point of what various religions or belief systems have called enlightenment, or realization, or being reborn in the spirit: an individual of true free will dignity responsibly expressing their unique, God-given personality. What a wealth of creative spirit coming from each person, for everybody! What a wealth of inner awareness and reality within everyone too!
I think this creative spirit is what you are hinting at with your notion of a person’s true nature. Yes, it is always operating, but mostly unconsciously. I’m merely suggesting it is an individual evolution, over time, insofar as it is realized by your conscious self, which is not always the case at all. Some folks experience moments of great, life-illuminating understanding; others perish for lack of that very thing. For those with the courage and understanding to realize their own individuality, they can then see this in all others–irrespective of how these others see themselves. They will have gone beyond prejudice and dogma and needy, self-serving projections to live in a world of genuine individuals, one step closer to how Michael, and I, and God, see everyone. These steps are endless, but each is a delight.
As Michael said, this is the challenge–growing the ability to welcome and embrace so much character and soul in every single person. It’s the ultimate gift of God’s–all these other, unique beings to fill your soul. You are His gift to them, and they are His gift to you. What a spontaneous game begins to emerge when you lose your fear of this and join the dance. You find freedom first for yourself, within, then in a loving relationship with those around you. You are only as alone as you feel you are. Your Father, Michael, and I: we are always here. But through your freedom, even from us, you can feel frightfully alone at times, even in the middle of a group. This is the awesome reality of individual personality. The suffering of felt separation is real. The pain is real. But then too, so is the way out of them.
It is a seeming paradox you can become paralyzed in contemplating: you are not free until you are free. Each free will choice is somewhat unique as is each changing moment. There is some genuine mystery here you can get lost in. Yet there is also just simple, profound action. You live in this mystery of yourself, and yet: you do something!–and it’s done. There it is. You’ve changed something in time and space, and it is a part of the Supreme forever.
(The adventure has no end to it)
Be honest with yourself. Entertain the good, the beautiful, the true, irrespective of how, or even if you can accomplish them. Pay that often uncomfortable price of awareness of limitation, to keep growing. This is the way, and this is the reward. You’ve a long way to go; literally, forever. So be not daunted that the adventure has no end to it. This is its essence. Without this, eternity would be a hell of repetition. Embrace this spontaneous quality of the creation that you cannot anticipate, and trust in God’s wisdom that He set it up like this out of love for you.
Closing
Be in my love. Good evening.
