2005-11-28-Stillness & Re-Evaluation
Marin #71
Contents
• 1 Heading
o 1.1 Topic: Stillness & Re-Evaluation
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
o 3.3 Dialogue
o 3.4 Closing
Topic: Stillness & Re-Evaluation
Group: Marin TeaM
Facilitators
Teacher: Nebadonia
TR: JL
Session.
Opening.
Dear Mother Spirit and Michael. On this our first really blustery winter evening this year, we certainly do welcome the special warmth You bring inside us with Your presence. In fact, if we could have one wish fulfilled, if would be for everyone who will come to read Your words to feel Your presence like we do. But then in a way, they can—those who open their heart and open their mind to embrace deeply the meaning in Your words–they would certainly feel the love You put into them. Amen.
Nebadonia. Good evening, My stalwart sons, this is your Mother, Nebadonia. Yes it is always a special occasion when you brave the weather to get together like this—you especially C, coming so far as you do. (Ed. Charlie Hicks has been driving about eighty miles each way, weekly, for over three years to attend these sessions). Your loyalty is greatly appreciated. It gives an extra measure of warmth all around. In this you are touching on something truly ancient with your species—this delight to get together on a cold evening and gather around a fire and just enjoy each others’ company in being warm.
Mercy is fully accepting others.
Lesson.
So too our hearts go out to those who are not so fortunate this evening, either without food or shelter, enough clothing or warmth. This is a great part of being merciful, to open your heart to those who are less fortunate, to not turn away but to welcome them into your personal realm, to be aware of them and to do what you can for them. It all starts with that gift Michael mentioned last week, that true mercy is this dedication to realizing, by accepting fully within yourself, these other folks around you. Just as I mentioned last time, this is accomplished by being aware of all the really subtle kinds of judgement you may feel you need to exercise in order to keep other people honest. For this has some small validity—the kind of feedback you can give one another. But My children, you have to be so careful and wait for the invitation for your advise. It cannot be your duty to go around correcting the world. Insofar as using any kind of correction such as this, that you feel you need to offer another, you must have a very sensitive spiritual evaluation of the total balance of what is happening.
Is this correction you are proposing in your mind to help your fellow, is the net effect going to be positive or negative? First do your best to accept another totally without this correction, without judging whether or not they are fully in accord with your ideas of reality. Just open your heart and really listen—just take them in. Let them share themselves with you. Only then in the course of your discussions, if they invite some advice, or ask for your opinion, can you do so in a positive way that will actually help them.
This is especially so for your brothers and sisters who are less fortunate in their immediate situation. Again there is a balance between long term and short term help that you do have to evaluate, such as if a homeless person on the street seems to being using what income comes their way for unhealthy habits. It might be wiser to offer this person to buy them some food, or help them get some shelter–if you are fearful your contribution would just go for more unhealthy drugs. But this is a longer view, and you should not let it interfere with what immediate spiritual help you can give them.
As We asked of you once before, if you cannot directly help these individuals, contribute your time and effort to researching/investigating those organizations that do good work, who can put your gift directly into helping and not fritter away these precious resources for their own self-aggrandizement or enrichment. Seek out and help those organizations that apply their funds as directly as possible where they are so desperately needed.
Determinism. (The limits of economic determinism).
It is very tragic in an ironic way, in that the human race as a whole has been so productive these last few millennia that you are all involved in this enormous drama called civilization, building vast cities, great walls that can be seen from outer space, huge pyramids, and still, several thousand years later, there are still people dying for want of food and shelter. So while it is true that so long as you live a physical life in a material world, the economic aspect of your life is always important, it is not the sole, or even the most important determination of how you live you life. I offer this viewpoint to help you realize in yet one more way how spirit is such a part of your human reality—the value you put upon your various endeavors and adventures, projects and accomplishments.
You are very blessed that your anthropological curiosity by way of your mass media now shows you so many cultures existing all over the world at so many different material and technological phases, that now you can see how different races and cultures organize their day to day lives to find meaning and value. Consider the elaborate rituals that some of the more primitive peoples live within, all the mores and taboos that rigidly dictate what they should do in almost every familiar endeavor. You see immediately that only a small part of this actually goes for essentials of food and shelter. So much tradition affecting the perception of reality is passed on generation to generation to give each person a sense of continuity, to find meaning in their human situation, to help them realize the value of very fundamental happenings such as youth and old age, birth, marriage, death.
Then look at the enormous complexity of your more modern technologically advanced societies. Look at your homes, your transportation, the variety of foodstuffs you enjoy from all over the world now on a daily basis irrespective of season. All this too is indeed a far cry from basic food and shelter and clothing. So much of this can be seen as being in the realm of spirit, that to which you give value, and in turn derive meaning to your life.
Stillness and re-evaluation.
These are the dimensions of your human lives We ask you to consider, for these are the things you must consciously and continuously evaluate if you are to grow spiritually. How much of anything is enough? What does it mean to have enough? What does it mean to have more than enough? This is where your stillness helps you regain a pure spiritual home base so you can have that great, precious strength of starting over again in rediscovering your beginner’s mind; so you can look around your own personally controlled reality and ask yourself, is this enough? Is it too much? With respect to any particular object, ask yourself what was your original intention here? Have you fulfilled it? If perhaps you have over-fulfilled this one time desire, are you somehow going backwards? Are you somehow losing ground? Is your life somehow more complicated than necessary, not only in a material or monetary way, but in terms of mental energy and living spirit? What are each of these facets of your life costing you ?
This is especially true with your use of time. Most of you who have started a regular practice of stillness know how taking out even twenty minutes twice a day really sharpens your sense and your evaluation of how you are spending your time—just in freeing up these twenty to forty minutes a day to return to a home base deep within yourself, with only Us and our Father for company. But this is how you renew yourself. This is how you break out of the cocoon of habits and brush off the cobwebs of living purely by reaction. This is how you renew and reevaluate all those things which are dragging you down and making you feel old long before your time. For the overburdened soul there is nothing so precious as rest, nothing so needful as relaxation, and yet for some poor, self-harried and driven souls, nothing so harder to find.
So if you would give of yourselves, My children, this is how you do it. This is how you refresh yourselves and open yourselves to that next person you meet. This is how you stay interested and active and on the ball—this reevaluation, this employing and using spirit, seeing spirit, realizing what it is in your life. This is what keeps you curious, and gets you to wondering. This is that inner light that, through the miracle of projection, illuminates your whole outer world, especially those folks out there.
(Be the person you would love to meet).
This is that aspect of mercy, that connection that ties you in with the folks around you by letting them come in, by seeing and hearing them in their fullness, by being the cheerful, good, strong and stalwart soul that you would love to meet yourself. Be this person in your neighborhood. Reap and cherish the enormous reward of love that will come your way once you decide to beam it out there. Are you game for this adventure, My sons?
All—yes!.
Yes, I think you are. We’ve enjoyed sharing these insights for a few years now, and I know that you know they really work. Your increasing joy and fulfillment fulfills Michael and I as well, for We too can feel and enjoy the love you engender. We share your happiness. So stay young and green inside. If your well-meaning but rather judgmental friends accuse you of being still an adolescent, or wearing rose-colored glasses, or simply being too cheerful, just smile and see if you can’t tease them into joining the game. Will you, won’t you join the dance? If you have any questions or comments this evening, let’s consider them just another two-step—you and I.
Dialogue.
Student. Thank You, Mother, it’s always a delight to be with You and Father Michael, no matter how far away I am from here. I would also thank You for all the support and guidance and love You’ve given me over the last seven weeks—I believe it is. It has made a difference in several peoples’ lives, including mine. There are also Others around that I don’t know about, but I thank Them too.
I have a question. A week or so ago You were talking with D about when you’re in front of someone who you think is spiritually receptive, to ask Monjoronson and Michael to infuse in them forgiveness. Could You speak a little bit more on that? Personally I would like a bit more instruction. Thank You.
(The perception of spiritual connection).
Nebadonia. Yes, C, We know that your belief and your faith exist at different times on many fluctuating levels, sometimes consciously, sometimes not. The same goes for your realization of so much of what we have talked about these last few years. We realize that much of what We have expressed to you, and you have read about in your textbook, is rather new in your culture—Our particular point of view. And so you do not always find it easy to fully realize this dimension of spirit.
You cannot always perceive how you and those around you are spiritually connected, or how, on spiritual levels completely over and above any kind of what you call body language or physical signals back and forth–even on an unconscious level, for all this too is always going on—you are also deeply spiritually influencing each other. This is where opening yourself up simply by reminding yourself of Monjoronson’s mission here, and how you can be a part of it, is very much the same as Michael’s invitation for you to beam love into everyone.
This represents a kind of trust in Us, for you may not yet be able to perceive—simply as a human being so thoroughly enmeshed in a physical/material reality—you cannot directly perceive how beaming love into, say, a total stranger walking down the sidewalk, what possible effect this has. And so you accept it from Us as a matter of faith, all the more so if you are in an intimate conversation with someone. Just calling to your mind, within yourself, all these notions and different aspects or facets of mercy—just recalling these and beaming them toward another person with love in your heart, has a spiritual effect in addition to all the physical nuances they can pick up in your voice, your facial expressions, how you are standing and presenting yourself.
In addition to all these even very subtle physical clues, there is a real spiritual effect. As We have reassured you before, this is in no way trespassing upon their individual spiritual freedom. In the realm of spirit this is a pure gift that you give unconditionally, and allow them to respond—or not, equally—for it is not your purpose to change them in any way. This refers back to what I said earlier this evening of having the courage and the strength to just project your love and good wishes on a spiritual level as divinely unconditionally as you can. And then just continue to be open to them–whatever their response.
This is what will change this old, tired world, My son. This is mercy, this offering unconditional connection. Believe Me, it forces you to grow. (laughter). Whatever your starting point, this will always be something big for you to encompass. But that’s a delightful surprise, and a promise. Does this help you understand the dynamic involved in projecting Monjoronson’s mercy and love to another?
Student. Yes it does. What You say reminds me of the way You accept us as we are at any particular time, and project it back into us–us in this group and as human beings; and the rest of the world also–not just us specifically.
The only question I have now is, does this come from the heart, or come from the mind, or come from both? Because I’ve thought about it before, thought in my mind to project Michael’s love into somebody. Sometimes it seems to work, but at other times absolutely nothing happened. So I decided to accept it on faith that just because nothing happens doesn’t mean I did it incorrectly.
Nebadonia. Well, thank you My son, for realizing just how much Michael and I do love you. We of course, just being the kind of beings We are, have a bit of an advantage here in being able to directly access you as a spiritual being. We can see your soul. We can realize your whole life’s experience. Not only because of that, but with that, We haven’t the slightest inclination to judge you. It is also true that as you are able to see more and more of each others’ souls, so you too will find it so much easier to suspend judgment. So let people express their souls to you, which they can only do with a nonjudgmental reception.
(Beaming love into folks).
Your curiosity is leading you right to the crux of the situation where you do wonder, when you beam love at someone and it seems to have no effect, is anything happening? And so, I am reassuring you tonight that something is indeed happening, and it exists extra-materially. It is primarily a function of spirit, that aspect of your uniting personality that expresses the degree to which your heart and your mind are, say, overlapping–in agreement, not in contention.
This force of spirit is primarily from your personality and your soul, your personality’s experience, and it goes directly to their soul. We’ve referred to this before as planting seeds, sowing possibilities, encouraging freedom, and then patiently awaiting a fruitful harvest. It is very much a matter of faith. And faith is also a bit like a physical muscle. You have to exercise it for it to grow. Does this answer you question My son?
Student. Yes, it does. Also it raises more, but I will save those for another day.
Nebadonia. One more then, if you wish.
Student. I don’t quite understand yet the connection between mind and heart, when we beam forgiveness or love into somebody. It seems like it all comes from my mind, and my heart doesn’t really do much. So I don’t quite understand that yet.
Nebadonia. You have to ask yourself, why are you doing this? Do you put a value on it? If so, it is coming from the realm of your personality, your personal spirit’s initiation. True, your mind formulates the thought and this can be, partly, just a memory, just remembering that this is a good thing to do, that Michael and I asked you to do.
(Heart and mind: feelings and ideas).
We use the word heart to refer to those feelings which are your primal experience of reality. This is what we mean by heart. This is how your heart is in your projected love. It’s what you feel as you are doing this. This in turn can be a wonderful inner feedback and become to a large degree why you do this. It really reinforces this good feeling of connection, of generosity, along with the idea of projecting love. It is partly an idea, but it is mainly this feeling of connection and support that you are projecting with the idea. So the idea may be the form, but the–stuff itself–this is your heart; these are your feelings. And it is your personality choosing to do this that initiates the whole sequence. Does that explain it?
Student. Yes, it does, Mother (laughs). Thank You. Thank You also for your love and support. I would not have been able to do the last seven weeks without it! Thank You.
Nebadonia. Well, My son, you have been taking Our love and applying it most effectively, and most lovingly–taking care of your friend. So We thank you! Be in Our Love.
Student. Nebadonia, I’d ask for some help to coordinate better listening and visual skills. I know Jesus could really focus on an individual in front of Him, and I’m finding if I could improve my balance between hearing and sight, it would be a help. Thanks in advance.
Listening. (Really listening and seeing).
Nebadonia. Yes V, let Me tell you the real knack in listening and taking someone in visually. This is the spiritual strength of self-forgetfulness. Very literally, you have to let go of yourself–relinquish yourself, and be more curious about this other person than about what is going on within you. This again is a spiritual matter of value. You have to value another as much as you value yourself. In a conversation, you take in fully what they’re saying to you by not judging it, or immediately evaluating it. And for so many folks, this is almost impossible. They’re only half-listening or half-seeing while the other half or more of their attention is focused on their own reactions to what is happening. This is why I said earlier this evening how precious it is to take someone in without any of this subtle judgment going on of how you are reacting to them. So you can see why it takes a degree of courage and strength to open yourself this way.
But after you do so for awhile, by being genuinely curious, you find you literally can adapt to it. For as you adapt, you begin to trust your own responses, your own spontaneity. All the time they’re talking to you, you do not have to be elaborately working up your response. You come to trust that when they are through speaking, you can just spontaneously reply.
I’m going into this in such detail so you can be aware, when you are with someone, how much of your own inner dialogue or inner reactions are occurring to you, and see if you can suspend them. This leads to the next great step for many people, and that is being comfortable with gaps in the conversation, with silence. Consider them to be little mini-stillness moments, so when you are with someone you are very comfortable with letting the conversation die of itself from time to time.
There is no need to fill every moment with verbal exchanges. Finally, I would ask you to consider the difference between communication and expression. You can express yourself wonderfully, and very fully, when you are by yourself. Taking a drive alone in your car, or taking a walk by yourself is a way of expressing yourself. But when you are in a conversation, a good conversation, you are really taking in your partner. And if you let spirit guide you, if you let this overarching connection We have been talking about guide you, you will discover that quite spontaneously your speech adapts to each different person you’re talking to. Because now you are taking them in fully.
You’re also not saying things that would be hurtful, or pointless, or incomprehensible, because you are taking them in fully, and responding freshly. You’re avoiding that terrible, destructive habit of one-upmanship, where no matter what they say, you come up with a bigger, better, finer example. By taking them in fully, and not being anxious for yourself, you just automatically avoid so many pitfalls.
Everything I’ve said about hearing goes equally well for seeing. Don’t be startled to be seeing people afresh, rather than kind-of mentally squinting so you can see them as you’ve always seen them for the last ten years. (laughter). Take them in! Welcome and respect this new living reality standing before you–which also takes nerve. But then you have the delight, after so thoroughly relinquishing yourself, to find you can spontaneously pop back up again, and speak all the more fully from a refreshed heart and mind to the person in front of you–now. Or not. You might want to enjoy another little period of quiet since there’s nothing driving you–now. Does all this make sense, My son?
Student. It’s a wonderful lesson, and I hope it goes out to the world. As you probably know, I’m a communications release in the method of Scientology, so I’ve made the ethical and moral decisions to be willing to hear everything about people, and have them hear everything about me. But I really appreciate this newfound clarity on using my own genetic abilities of listening and seeing all the better. I find it really profound. Thanks!
Nebadonia. You’re very welcome. And be in My Love. So! You’re taking My lesson to heart, and enjoying a little stillness.
Student. Yes, Mother. I really don’t have any questions at this moment, just the desire to be more patient in the unfolding of my life, and the lives of those around me as they grapple with their own journey and…just letting them–these people around me–take their own steps towards their own growth and expansion. I’m finding out what truly moves them, as they’re finding their own souls, and what they think is real. But I have taken to heart what You’ve said tonight about not giving my advise, or not interfering, but just kind-of watching and being there, and looking at my own inner reactions, and seeing where that source is.
Patience.
Perception.
Nebadonia. My son, patience is definitely a human virtue. Once, in these meetings, someone thanked Michael and I for Our patience. (laughter). We had to honestly reply that We don’t need it so much. (laughter). Think of the opposite: think of impatience. It can mean you have your own schedule of events, preceding at your own particular pace, and generally things aren’t going quite fast enough for you. So you deliberately put on the brakes of patience inside. This can be transcended by exchanging this need for patience for ever more fulfilling, direct perception, which I am delighted to note that you yourself have just expressed–that you are really enjoying watching others grow, and transform.
You are realizing more deeply the creative aspect of just being there with a very subtle and yet profound and strong support. You’re letting them know you are there, yet leaving them as much as possible to their own devices, to make their own discoveries, to have their own lives. You are able to relinquish more and more of yourself through this growing confidence within yourself–that you’re not going to disappear, you needn’t be anxious about your own reactions to what’s happening.
What a surprise! You’re not a hollow person after all with this exercise of spirit. What you are discovering is the irony of how fulfilling it is to exchange your own inner one person’s reality, and need for patience, by tuning in to all that great world of people out there, with their whole variety of different paces. So I congratulate you on your discovery, My son!
Student. What I’ve noticed is that if I come from that place of impatience, of wanting to get things moving because someone else in my circle is anxious, and wants to get things moving; I find, sometimes, it doesn’t go very far. In a sense, you can even take a step backwards because you are coming from a place of anxiety, and ego, and fear. Yet the moment I let that go and forget myself, it becomes even clearer of what is not to be done…but just keep on…keeping on. And it’s keeping this faith, and soothing the souls of those around me, and saying things are going to work out. But that’s the hardest part sometimes, just staying that course. But it is interesting, watching how people go after what they think they want, and seeing them grapple and grasp. The more they lessen that motivation and come home to themselves, they’re no longer coming from that place of anxiety or neediness, but from their own place of power and inner strength, and clarity.
Stillness to ground anxiety.
Nebadonia. That’s the spiritual dynamic, My son. Some of these things you mention of anxiety, ego fears, nervousness; so much of this is best handled very directly–inside. This is one of the glorious functions of your stillness meditation, that you can ground a lot of these anxieties, rather than feeling you need to run out and buy something, or express this outwardly to others. This is your gift to your fellows, if you can ground this anxiety or nervousness within yourself and not put it out into the community spirit.
It’s interesting how, just as patience is slowly supplanted by good perception, so too a lot of faith is slowly supplanted by success. As you see better how things actually work, and things do get better–things do work, so your faith can move on ahead to the next adventure, the next larger reach of spirit.
Student. Sometimes people do not realize they are being driven by fear, or wanting something better, because they think there is something better. Or they want to have safety in their lives, even though safety is within themselves. Sometimes they don’t know any other way, because they have never had that experience with it, of any other way, except in a way of a sense of unsettlement.
Nebadonia. This is where your Urantia book speaks of being spiritually fragrant, as a person, being the best way to offer this assurance to one who is anxious. It’s why Michael and I give you this assurance, from Our absolute knowledge, that you absolutely are! You do not need to be anxious about your very existence.
Last week Michael was telling you how, as a child, He was given such an assurance of His existence that He could relinquish Himself and look around and achieve a maturity of seeing individuals, rather than just categories of people, at a very early age. So He discovered the foundation, the true reality of society that He would continue to teach the whole of His life with you.
Student. What’s good too, from my perspective, is the idea of eternity, that there’s a timelessness to our existence, even on Urantia. And with that timelessness there’s less a sense of urgency to have to go and be something important, or be special, or be perfect–because of death, to accomplish all this before we die. There’s eternity; and there is no death, in that sense, just timelessness! Taking one step at a time, one breath at a time. There’s no ego telling us to light a fire under our rear-ends to get things going.
Nebadonia. Along those lines, Michael and I always find a great delight when one of Our children decides to pick up a guitar—or anything else–and learn how to play, when he or she is eighty-five or ninety, with the faith they are just beginning a long, long study.
Student. Thank You.
Nebadonia. And be in My Love.
Student. Mother Nebadonia, I think this evening I would like to hold my curiosity questions, and just ask for You to bathe my family and I in Your light and Your love. I feel I have recently stumbled quite a bit, and soiled myself in my efforts to be a good father and a good husband. And I haven’t called upon You lately to clean us up a bit; so I ask for that now.
(You need to ask for help).
Nebadonia. My son. Can you remember to ask Me again…and again…and again?
Student. I most certainly can, Mother.
Nebadonia. Then you have My Word: I will be there!
Student. Thank You for that.
Nebadonia. Let’s take a few more minutes just to open our hearts to each other, and feel each others’ presence here. If you have a feeling like a light, cool, expansive breeze is blowing through your soul, that’s just Me!
Closing.
Nebadonia. Now to quote one of your poets: (Robert Frost, I believe). You have miles to go before you sleep.
I hear the rain falling outside. So we come back to this small earthly room, and each other. I bid you all a good evening.
Good evening, Mother! Thank you Nebadonia!
Nebadonia. Go on to your homes in My Love.
