 I think what we'll do is we'll just start off with a little music meditation short song so just get comfortable in your chair and take a few deep breaths and relax and just let this song of gentleness shanty wash over you just sink down into the piece there's lots of ego resistance that's going to pop up and you really go for the target of joy and happiness of enlightenment so we have a beautiful group of days is we to really dive into that experience for ourselves and it's the prayer of my heart that anything that you truly desire the answer for the insights the awarenesses will come into your awareness and the sooner the better delay is unknown in eternity but tragic in time so so it's always more than my motto let's not delay this that's where they go for this that's what we're here for that's what the best use of time is with us I recognize some faces from last year and some new faces here some people here that have been doing intensive here for the last five or six days how many people are not familiar with my teachings is this a first experience okay that's good and those of you I'm sure are familiar with Gary's teachings that's one of the reasons that you're here too I'll just say a little note about that at the beginning back several years ago when Disappearance of the Universe was published and your immortal reality was published I was doing my travels around the world in teachings and people started asking me about those books and I'd already reached a state at that point where I really didn't really read anymore including even the Course so it was really not necessary for that but I I do remember skimming through and kind of just getting an intuitive feeling about Disappearance of the Universe and your immortal reality and I just just had a big smile on my face I was like heart and in person are teaching the teachings that I've been sharing for almost two decades and it was kind of fun to see it in print at your local Barnes and Noble store to go see it you know at amazon.com or something because this wisdom is really precious and it's just beautiful I know I can feel the resonance of really deep clear teachings and I think a lot of times people that come to Gary's workshops and retreats and very very much fans of these books are are that way because they have a very deep resonance of clarity that's one aspect of them I think that are very helpful they're very very clear they're very straightforward they don't beat around the bush with a lot of theoretical and theological mumbo jumbo it's like let's cut to the chase give me the good stuff and give it to me direct and that's one thing that I like about those teachings and I think another aspect that touched me too initially when I glanced through it was I realized with Disappearance of the Universe it was based on eight years of interactions with Gary and with Art Van Persa and I'm a big fan of disclosure of just pouring out your emotions and taking the mask off and just laying things out on the table no matter how they look just lay them out tell them like it is or we could say as it seems to be