FREEDOM 20

P. 160-167

We began by exploring again that statement from A Course in Miracles, “You are always creating; you are either creating by default or creating consciously.”

I kept reviewing that concept in my mind, especially after watching the news, and asking myself, “How the hell did I create this mess?” And I was not getting into blame so much as I was puzzlement. I have not experienced such a sense of separateness, intolerance and sometimes downright hatred, within our country (and within myself) in a very long time. It almost appears as if we are living in two different realities or what Kellyanne Conway called “alternative facts.” As ludicrous as that sounds, we seem to be in a space where communication is almost impossible between one side and the other. Not only are beliefs and ideas so polarized, but we look at one another with bafflement having no grounds for understanding how or why another can hold the beleifs that they do.

And so the answer became a little bit more clear as I realized that much of our separation and conflict is the result of unconscious creation or creation by default. If I am asleep or unconscious, then it is my fear and my personality and my sense of separateness that is contributing to creating the world around me. At this point in our evolution, I must be conscious in order to create Unity and Love. Perhaps that will change at sometime, but for now, at least, what I observe is that the sleeping mind will create from a sense of fear and separateness, and it is only the mind that is awake that can create from the power of Unity and Love.

It also occurred to me that those of us who are awake and continuing to work on awakening and awareness have a responsibility here. We do not just claim personal awareness or personal enlightenment.

The image, or the metaphor, that came to mind was being on a boat that is sinking and I know how to swim but many others do not. Do I just save myself?

The question came up, “Okay, what do I do? I know we are in trouble as a country or a racial consciousness. I know that we are divided and even many awakened beings are living with a sense of fear and separateness. So what do I do to begin to change that?”

First it is to know that each one of us is probably being called to respond in our own unique way. When we respond from Love and a sense of Unity, we also respond with a sense of the gifts and talents we have that are the vehicle for raising the energy or the vibration of the world and those around us. And for each one of us that vehicle or the expression of higher vibration might be different from moment to moment or day today.

A simple example: Your special gift might be cooking, and so the brownies you make or the cakes you bake for a class on Thursday night or a big sale at church might be the expression of your special gift to raise the vibration of the world around you. The catch is that you need to be aware of that and to reinforce that as your Truth. To say all this is “only a cake” or this is “only a casserole I'm bringing to my neighbor” limits the vibration that you can create with that act of love. It is perfectly okay to know that on an exterior level what you are doing or what you are giving does not seem to amount to a whole lot, but on an internal level you can embrace it as a valuable and unique expression of Love. It is your intention behind the gift that truly gives it life. The personality self would like to measure it in terms of size or quantity or money, but the True Self can know the value is limitless if whatever is given is given with an open heart.

There might be things we are called to do in the external world-- go ahead and do them knowing that they have importance and value, but that the energy of transformation around those acts comes again from your willingness in your intention.

Prayer, not just asking God for something, but using your connection and your realization of the Divine Nature that you participate in, to raise the vibration of your thoughts, to raise the vibration of your perception as to how you see yourself and others. All of this contributes to Conscious Creation.

We all noted that even though we know all of this is true, and we practice it occasionally, when we can remember, that the negative side or the dark side sometimes seems so seductive or so much more real in scope and in power in the positive loving side of our nature.

It is difficult, some days, to see through that veil of Illusion but that is part of our learning and part of our challenge.

Can you see beyond the illusion of separation and fear that you yourself have created? Can you realize that you created it to participate in this false sense of safety and security that predictability seems to bring?

But there is no such thing as predictability. Helen Keller once said so beautifully, “Security is but a myth; life is either a daring adventure or it is nothing at all.”

Many of our institutions, especially the religious ones, after their creation, spend most of their time and energy in attempting to keep themselves intact. The original intent and the energy that created this entity in the first place, soon gave way to the need to organize and control.

Many of us identified with the church or religion that was so far away from the axiom of “loving my neighbor” and the truth and power contained in The Sermon on the Mount that the religion of our upbringing carried little or none of that meaning. All that seems to occur was a growing dependence on this organization in order to be able to be OK; to be OK in our own eyes, in the eyes of others, and in the eyes of God. Without realizing it, we had given our power away to an illusion.

“If you decide today that you can access new levels of expression, new levels of experience, you can rely upon the new to support the claims you make and understand history as what it is—just an idea. Read your history books for an hour and you will see that they are slanted to the culture that dominates, and the history book seeks to affirm their view of what happened, where and when. If you look at a church and its investment in its politics, its desire to survive has created dogma that was never implicit in the original text. You are being used by confirming them to claim an idea that was just an opinion a long time ago.”

((((*One of our group was asking about the idea of “original sin” and where that came from. I'm going to explore that issue a little bit more in another piece that I will send  along. It is more complicated than I originally thought, so I'd rather not muddy the waters too much. Not to say this is not an important concept since most of us grew up with it along with the sense of unfairness about how or why we should be saddled with someone else's mistake. Along with that the whole notion of our being “born in sin” seemed to affirm for many of us that sense of “not enoughness” we carried around beginning as a child.))))) 

We are being asked to move beyond our sense of personal history in defining Who We Are. Without spending a whole lot of time focusing on the weeds in our garden or attempting to root out or even transform limiting ideas or negative beliefs, we are being asked to continually, as long as we can think about it, to affirm the truth of Who We Are. And to continue to affirm that truth until it becomes a natural part of our awareness. 

“Again, the claim “I am “free, I am free, I am free” supports you in this realization that you are not bound by history, but please ask yourself where you seek to confirm it out of the convenience of relying upon the old.

Once again, we say these words: “Behold. I make all things new.” That is the True Self in its vision, in its expectation, so as you align to it, you may begin to receive its fruits. ”

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Day Eight

As I side with the next few pages wish we all seem to lovingly absorb there were a few Central ideas Edward Express need little or no commentary so I will just summarize for a moment: 

“the encounter with fear, which you have had with you since birth, must now be seen as something that can be moved beyond. But this will not happen if you don’t agree to it.”

“A decision made in fear will call more fear to it by energetic action and by agreement in vibration.”

“there is an aspect of you here who has always been, who will always be, who is unafraid and doesn’t react or condemn or claim a life in fear.”

“As you announce this—“I am free, I am free, I am free,” which is the freedom of the known and all that the fear has claimed—you announce yourself in a new world, a world that doesn’t agree to fear because the vibration you hold will not align to it.”

“As you announce this—“I am free, I am free, I am free,” which is the freedom of the known and all that the fear has claimed—you announce yourself in a new world, a world that doesn’t agree to fear because the vibration you hold will not align to it.”

“The True Self, you see, doesn’t care, and is unafraid, and in her love she will support you, the self you think you are, in a level of acclimation to a way of being that will actually support you in reinforcing her and her purview over everything you see.”

“You are literally lifting your world in vibratory accord through your presence and through your action of witness upon the world you see.”

“The Divine Self is who exists at this level, and the Divine as you, the manifestation of you in form and field in vibratory accord, is what supports the claim of agreement that allows your entry. The small self, who is invested in fear, cannot enter the Kingdom because she is not in alignment to it. The exercise we bring you in this teaching is a reconciliation with who and what you are as it exists outside of fear.”

“Paul is interrupting again. “But can we exist outside of fear? This is a proclamation I can’t agree to. I am afraid of many things. I can’t imagine myself without fear, fear of this or that, and I am not alone. We fear famine, we fear war. What becomes of us when we are old and alone or infirm? What do we do? And are you saying that these things can be rid of?”

Yes, we are. We are saying that. But we must say the list that you just gave was the small self’s agenda for keeping herself away, himself away, from her divinity and his True Self. Everything you listed was a denial of the Divine or the presence of God that can be known in form and agreed to in a higher way. By your list, you are saying, “There will always be war, there will always be famine, we may grow old alone and become infirm” as if these things cannot be met by you as the True Self in a vastly different encounter than you have aligned to thus far.”

A closing thought. I began with my reflections that were triggered by watching the news. And as I was sitting with this lesson, the realization came to me, “Who is it that is writing the news? Who is it that is listening? Who is it that is affected?” It's certainly not my Divine self or our divine self.

In fact my thoughts and feeling about the news and the source of all that--our personalty, ego, drama addicted little self) seemed so contradictory to the message of the Christ who says “I will make all things new.” “What am I saying to myself when I watch the news? I reinforce my own sense of cynicism, I become self-righteous, angry, smug, separate, better than or worse than, all attributes coming from my limited perception as a personality.

PEACE