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Life is so scary. And
so confusing. I wish things could be more clear. There
is nothing scary about life, if you are not attached to results.
You mean if you don't
want anything. That's
right. Choose, but don't want. That's easy for people
who don't have anybody depending on them. What if you have a wife and
children? The
path of the householder has always been a most challenging path. Perhaps
the most challenging. As you point out, it is easy to "want nothing" when
you are only dealing with yourself. It is natural, when you have others
you love, to want only the best for them. It hurts when you
can't give them all that you want them to have. A nice home, some decent
clothes, enough food. I feel as though I've been struggling for 20 years
just to make ends meet. And I still have nothing to show for it.
You
mean in terms of material wealth? I mean in terms of just
some of the basics that a man would like to pass on to his children. I
mean in terms of some of the very simple things a man would like to
provide for his wife. I
see.
You see it as your job in life to provide all these things. Is that what
you imagine your life to be about? I'm not sure I'd state
it that way. This is not what my life is about, but it sure would
be nice if this could be a by-product, at least.
Well,
let's go back, then. What do you see your life being about?
That's a good
question. I've had a lot of different answers to that through the years.
What
is your answer now? It feels as though I
have two answers to that question; the answer I'd like to see, and
the answer I'm seeing. What's
the answer you'd like to see? I'd like to see my
life being about the evolution of my soul. I'd like to see my life being
about expressing and experiencing the part of me I love most. The part of
me that is compassion and patience and giving and helping. The part of me
that is knowing and wise, forgiving and ... love.
Sounds
like you've been reading this book! Yes, well it's a
beautiful book, on an esoteric level, but I'm trying to figure out how to
"practicalize" that. The answer to your question that I see being real in
my life is that it's about day-to-day survival. Oh.
And you think one thing precludes the other? Well ...
You
think esoterics preclude survival? The truth is, I'd like
to do more than just survive. I've been surviving all these years.
I notice I'm still here. But I'd like the struggle for survival to
end. I see that just getting by from day to day is still a struggle. I'd
like to do more than just survive. I'd like to prosper.
And
what would you call prospering? Having enough that I
don't have to worry where my next dollar is coming from; not having to
stress and strain just to make the rent, or handle the phone bill. I mean,
I hate to get so mundane, but we're talking real life here, not the
airy-fairy, spiritually romanticized picture of life you draw throughout
this book. Do
I hear a little anger there? Not anger so much as
frustration. I've been at the spiritual game for over 20 years now, and
look where it's gotten me. One paycheck away from the poorhouse! And now
I've just lost my job, and it looks like the cash flow has stopped
again. I'm getting really tired of the struggle. I'm 49
years old, and I'd like to have some security in life so that I
could devote more time to "God stuff," to soul "evoluting," etc.
That's where my heart is, but it's not where my life allows me to go ... Well,
you've said a mouthful there, and I suspect you're speaking for a whole
lot of people when you share that experience. I'm
going to respond to your truth one sentence at a time, so that we can
easily track, and dissect, the answer. You
have not been "at this spiritual game" for 20 years,you have been barely
skirting the edges of it. (This is not a "spanking," by the way, this is
just a statement of the truth.) I'll concede that for two decades you've
been looking at it; flirting with it; experimenting
now and then ... but I haven't felt your true- your
truest-
commitment
to
the game until just recently. Let's
be clear that "being at the spiritual game" means dedicating your whole
mind, your whole body, your whole soul to the process of creating Self in
the image and likeness of God. This
is the process of Self realization about which Eastern mystics have
written. It is the process of salvation to which much Western theology has
devoted itself. This
is a day-to-day, hour-to-hour, moment-to-moment act of supreme
consciousness. It is a choosing and a re-choosing every instant. It is
ongoing creation. Conscious creation. Creation with a purpose.
It is using the tools of creation we have discussed, and using them
with awareness and sublime intention. That
is
"playing this spiritual game." Now, how long have you been at this?
I haven't even begun.
Don't
go from one extreme to the other, and don't be so hard on yourself. You
have been dedicated to this process- and you're actually engaged in it
more than you'll give yourself credit for. But you haven't been doing so
for 20 years- or anything close to that. Yet the truth is, how long you
have been engaged in it is not important. Are you engaged in it
now? That's all that matters. Let's
move on with your statement. You ask us to "look where it's gotten you,"
and you describe yourself as being "one step away from the poorhouse." I
look at you and see a quite different thing. I see a person who is one
step away from the rich house! You feel you are one paycheck from
oblivion, and I see you as one paycheck from Nirvana. Now much depends, of
course, on what you see as your "pay"- and to what end you are working.
If
the object of your life is to acquire what you call security, I see and
understand why you feel you are "one
paycheck from the poorhouse." Yet even this assessment is open to
correction. Because with My pay, all good things come to you-
including the experience of feeling secure in the physical
world. My
pay- the payoff you get when you "work for" Me- provides a great deal more
than spiritual comfort. Physical comfort, too, can be yours. Yet
the ironic part about all this is that, once you experience the kind of
spiritual comfort my payoff provides, the last thing you'll find yourself
worrying about is physical comfort. Even
the physical comfort of members of your family will no longer be a concern
to you- for once you rise to a level of God consciousness you will
understand that you are not responsible for any other human soul, and that
while it is commendable to wish every soul to live in comfort, each soul
must choose- is choosing- its own destiny this instant.
Clearly,
it is not the highest action to deliberately abuse or destroy another.
Clearly, it is equally inappropriate to neglect the needs of those you
have caused to be dependent on you. Your
job is to render them independent; to teach them as quickly and
completely as possible how to get along without you. For you are no
blessing to them so long as they need you to survive, but bless them truly
only in the moment they realize you are unnecessary.
In
the same sense, God's greatest moment is the moment you realize you
need no God. I
know, I know ... this is the antithesis of everything you've ever been
taught. Yet your teachers have told you of an angry God, a jealous God, a
God who needs to be needed. And that is not a God at all, but a neurotic
substitute for that which would be a deity. A
true Master is not the one with the most students, but one who creates the
most Masters. A
true leader is not the one with the most followers, but one who creates
the most leaders. A
true king is not the one with the most subjects, but one who leads the
most to royalty. A
true teacher is not the one with the most knowledge, but one who causes
the most others to have knowledge. And
a true God is not One with the most servants, but One who serves
the most thereby making Gods of all others. For
this is both the goal and the glory of God: that His subjects shall be no
more, and that all shall know God not as the unattainable, but as the
unavoidable. I
would that you could this understand: your happy destiny is
unavoidable. You cannot not be "saved." There is no hell
except not knowing this. So
now, as parents, spouses, and loved ones, seek not to make of your love a
glue that binds, but rather a magnet that first attracts, then turns
around and repels, lest those who are attracted begin to believe they must
stick to you to survive. Nothing could be further from the truth. Nothing
could be more damaging to another. Let
your love propel your beloveds into the world- and into the full
experience of who they are. In this will you have truly
loved. It
is a great challenge, this path of the householder. There are many
distractions, many worldly concerns. The ascetic is bothered by none of
these. He is brought his bread and water, and given his humble mat on
which to lie, and he can devote his every hour to prayer, meditation, and
contemplation of the divine. How easy to see the divine under such
circumstances! How simple a task! Ah, but give one a spouse, and children!
See the divine in a baby who needs changing at 3 A.M. See the divine in a
bill that needs paying by the first of the month. Recognize the hand of
God in the illness that takes a spouse, the job that's lost, the child's
fever, the parent's pain. Now we are talking saintliness.
I
understand your fatigue. I know you are tired of the struggle. Yet I tell
you this: When you follow Me, the struggle disappears. Live in your God
space and the events become blessings, one and all. How can I get to my
God space when I've lost my job, the rent needs paying, the kids need a
dentist, and being in my lofty, philosophical space seems the least likely
way to solve any of this? Do
not forsake Me when you need Me most. Now is the hour of your greatest
testing. Now is the time of your greatest chance. It is the chance to
prove everything that has been written here. When
I say "don't forsake Me," I sound like that needy, neurotic God we talked
about. But I'm not. You can "forsake Me" all you want. I don't care, and
it won't change a thing between us. I merely say this in answer to your
questions. It is when the going gets tough that you so often forget Who
You Are, and the tools I have given you for creating the life
that you would choose. Now
is the time to go to your God space more than ever. First, it will bring
you great peace of mind- and from a peaceful mind do great ideas flow-
ideas which could be solutions to the biggest problems you imagine
yourself to have. Second,
it is in your God space that you Self realize, and that is the purpose-
the only purpose- of your soul. When
you are in your God space, you know and understand that all you are now
experiencing is temporary. I tell you that heaven and Earth shall pass
away, but you shall not. This ever-lasting perspective helps you to
see things in their proper light. You
can define these present conditions and circumstances as what they truly
are: temporary and temporal. You may then use them as tools- for that is
what they are, temporary, temporal tools- in the creation of present
experience. Just
who do you think you are? In relationship to the experience called
lose-a-job, who do you think you are? And, perhaps more to the point, who
do you think I am? Do you imagine this is too big a problem for Me
to solve? Is getting out of this jam too big a miracle for Me to handle? I
understand that you may think it's too big for you to handle, even
with all the tools I have given you- but do you really think it's too big
for Me? I know intellectually
that no job is too big for God. But emotionally I guess I can't be sure.
Not whether You can handle it, but whether You will.
I
see. So it's a matter of faith. Yes.
You
don't question My ability, you merely doubt My desire.
You see, I still live
this theology that says there may be a lesson in here somewhere for me.
I'm still not sure I'm supposed to have a solution. Maybe I'm
supposed to have the problem. Maybe this is one of those "tests" my
theology keeps telling me about. So I worry that this problem may
not be solved. That this is one of those You're going to let
me hang here with ... Perhaps
this is a good time to go over once more how it is that I interact with
you, because you think it is a question of My desire, and I'm telling you
it's a question of yours. I
want
for you what you want for you. Nothing more, nothing less. I don't
sit here and make a judgment, request by request, whether something should
be granted you. My
law is the law of cause and effect, not the law of We'll See. There is
nothing you can't have if you choose it. Even before you ask, I
will have given it to you. Do you believe this? No. I'm sorry. I've
seen too many prayers go unanswered. Don't
be sorry. Just always stay with the truth- the truth of your experience. I
understand that. I honor that. That's okay with Me. Good, because I
don't believe that whatever I ask, I get. My life has not been a
testimony to that. In fact, I rarely get what I ask for. When I do,
I consider myself damned lucky. That's
an interesting choice of words. You have an option, it seems. In your
life, you can either be damned lucky, or you can be blessing lucky. I'd
rather you be blessing lucky- but, of course, I'll never interfere with
your decisions. I
tell you this: You always get what you create, and you are
always creating. I
do not make a judgment about the creations that you conjure, I simply
empower you to conjure more- and more and more and more. If you don't like
what you've just created, choose again. My job, as God, is to
always give you that opportunity. Now
you are telling Me that you haven't always gotten what you've wanted. Yet
I am here to tell you that you've always gotten what you called forth.
Your
Life is always
a result of your thoughts about it- including your obviously creative
thought that you seldom get what you choose. You
think these things mean nothing? You misunderstand your power. I tell you
this: Your Life proceeds out of your intentions for
it. So
what is your intention now? Do you intend to prove your theory that life
seldom brings you what you choose?
Or do you intend to demonstrate Who You Really Are and Who I
Am?
I feel chagrined.
Chastised. Embarrassed Does
that serve you? Why not simply acknowledge the truth when you hear it, and
move toward it? There is no need to recriminate against yourself. Simply
notice what you've been choosing and choose again. But why am I so ready
to always choose the negative? And then to spank myself for it?
What
can you expect? You were told from your earliest days that you're "bad."
You accept that you were born in "sin." Feeling guilty is a learned
response. You've been told to feel guilty about yourself for things
you did before you could even do anything. You have been taught to feel
shame for being born less than perfect. This
alleged state of imperfection in which you are said to have come into this
world is what your religionists have the gall to call original sin. And it
is original sin- but not yours. It is the first sin to be
perpetrated upon you by a world which knows nothing of God if it thinks
that God would- or could- create anything irn- perfect.
Some
of your religions have built up whole theologies around this
misconception. And that is what it is, literally: a
misconception. For anything I conceive- all that to which I give life-
is perfect; a perfect reflection of perfection itself, made in the image
and likeness of Me. Yet,
in order to justify the idea of a punitive God, your religions needed to
create something for Me to be angry about. So that even those people who
lead exemplary lives somehow need to be saved. If they don't need to be
saved from themselves, then they need to be saved from their own
built-in imperfection. So (these religions say) you'd better do
something about all of this- and fast- or you'll go straight to hell.
This,
in the end, may do nothing to mollify a weird, vindictive, angry God, but
it does give life to weird, vindictive, angry religions. Thus do
religions perpetuate themselves. Thus does power remain concentrated in
the hands of the few, rather than experienced though the hands of the
many. Of
course you choose constantly the lesser thought, the smaller idea, the
tiniest concept of yourself and your power, to say nothing of Me and Mine.
You've been taught to. My God, how can I undo
the teaching? A
good question, and addressed to just the right person!
You
can undo the teaching by reading and re-reading this book. Over and over
again, read it. Until you understand every passage. Until you're familiar
with every word. When you can quote its passages to others, when you can
bring its phrases to mind in the midst of the darkest hour, then you will
have "undone the teaching." Yet there is still so
much I want to ask You; still so much I want to know.
Indeed.
You began with a very long list of questions. Shall we get back to
it? |
Contact: info@kulshreshtha.org |