 We are ready to go. We are good to go. How's it going for everyone? Good. Good? Busting. Busting, bursting. Busting, bursting. Busting. Emotions flowing, everything flowing. Woo-hoo! I can tell it's going well because this day when I was having lunch with Elf she was reminding me of a time back, I think it was in Nusa where the idea came in where we, you know how Jesus washed the feet of the apostles. I got there to Nusa and I and the messengers we went around and we washed all, there was probably 40 some participants, 60 people were there. We washed the feet of all 60. We went around with little buckets and water and rose petals so they got this, they showed up in the beginning, the first thing they experienced of a week-long retreat was showing up and getting their feet immersed and we all went down and knelt down before them and we all hit towels and you said that you had tears coming and one of your teardrops had landed on my bald head at the time. And now, look. So... So... You've heard of, you've heard of Miracle Bro. This was Elf tears, Elf tears. And then, Jeffrey on the way today he got paired up with the Healing Touch and he was down and he was going through the process with Elf and he felt a little drop and he said, pick me up this morning, he said, I got an Elf tear on my hair. That's right. Jesus. It was long. He'll show up by the end of the seven days with the long hair. That's it. So, if anybody's got any need for hair just... Elf will help you out. I wish somebody would do it for me. Oh my... So... Well, today we've just heard a bit of an update on the expression sessions and... Yeah, there's a lot of things. As you start to work with the Course and you get deeper into it you'll find that there's certain teachings that Jesus have in the Course that take a lot of willingness and a lot of determination over actually what will seem to be a lot of years before it starts to come over the horizon and into your awareness of one of the concepts that Jesus talks about in the Course is the unhealed healer. It's very tempting to pick up this book with all this great metaphysical wisdom and to start assimilated like you would a human being and then go, I got the goods now. I can heal. And then you're looking around to try to find somebody to heal with all this new metaphysical wisdom that you've got and basically the Course is saying it takes a really full transfer of training to go from the unhealed healer which is coming from a place of still seeing errors still seeing errors in people and the world and thinking that you are there sent to offer the answers because of this book that you've read whereas Jesus is like no actually to forgive you have to get so aligned with the Holy Spirit in your mind that you don't see the error at all you're just happy you're just joyful and that happiness and joy will be the inspiration that heals then when other people are around you they will feel relaxed they will feel like wow this person's really happy and they're not judging me I can relax and be myself and then that's how the healing occurs when you feel relaxed because generally people like to be and gravitate towards happy people and if you have a happy state of mind then that will be a perfect ignition of healing in fact that's the whole healing when you're happy the whole world is healed along with you when you're smiling when you're smiling the whole world smiles with you there it is it's the course in miracles when you're happy she's ready for the next line the next version and so that's that's one that's pretty common I'm trying to think what else we've covered true empathy is another one people pleasing true empathy is one that takes quite a while when the mind is deluded and when the mind's asleep and insane it's constantly looking outward at everything so it's judging and evaluating everything even it's own success it will try to use externals to judge its success and true empathy is just a state where you come and you join within to what is real and true and that's where you find the happiness and the joy and the peace and then you you cease to be interested you cease to care about appearances Jesus even has a question as posed to him in the manual for teachers should healing be repeated and basically if you get to the point where you pray and you join and you offer healing then you come to a point where you have a doubt thought in your mind and you're not sure if the healing worked you need to come back inside because it's your own mind where the doubt thought is you should never be judging symptoms or judging appearances to see whether the healing worked it's your state of mind your happiness, your joy, your glee is what the healing is so if you're starting to look at symptoms looking at how it's going for somebody how are they doing then you've gotten out of true empathy which is staying with the spirit and you've gotten into false empathy and of course a lot of us have come from that place where how are you doing, you poor baby we've come from a whole system of false empathy where we've been taught that false empathy and concern is actually helpful it's like that's crazy continuing concern is worry do you think worry is helpful where's your mind at when you're worrying when you're so concerned so these are things that take a lot of practice but it's good to talk about them openly so we can be aware of them so when they come up we can go oh yeah that's right I just need to come back inside here I don't need to try to figure anything out I don't need to get caught into comparing or contrasting or watching the world watching how things are going for other people I need to just pay full attention to what my emotional state of mind is and then use my emotional state of mind as my touchstone as my barometer as my reminder to come back back inside how do you feel different true versus false empathy how does that feel different true empathy is always happy and loving and joyful and the false empathy because it has the concern the worry, the doubt that's where the word false comes in it's not really empathy at all it can be sympathy and then even the Buddhist teachings a lot of times in Buddhism they'll talk about compassion and it's true compassion would be like true empathy it's totally coming from love false compassion would be compassion for the suffering of others where you're perceiving the suffering and then you're saying but I will have love and Jesus is saying listen, if you're perceiving the suffering you got a problem you got a twisted distorted perception that even perceives the suffering because if you're with me all is well you will be the light of the world you will bring love and laughter and joy and the most you'll see of suffering is like a call for love like go extend love it's not the sense of worse off or somebody is less than this whole perception of suffering gets into this idea of less than like someone is less than and someone has worse conditions there's a great line in the course where Jesus says beware of the temptation to perceive yourself unfairly treated but I would even extend it to beware of the temptation to perceive anyone unfairly treated people countries as soon as you are perceiving mistreatment you're perceiving victimization what kind of a thought system is perceiving victimization the ego and where is the ego in your own mind so where does the victimization end in my own mind where does the world hunger end in my mind where does war end in my mind where does sickness and suffering end in my mind wow that's helpful to be reminded of that because we want to empower our mind we don't want to disempower ourselves and set it up so we still believe that there's something outside of us that's causing harm that's wreaking havoc this thing's out of control that thing's out of control basically that's how the ego works with politics perceiving external terrorism where is the terrorist oh if I'm perceiving terror it's in my mind I shouldn't be pointing the finger oh there's a terrorist over in this country and there's a terrorist here Jesus every time I had in the early years the slightest thought of something that was gone wrong somewhere in the world and one day some person he would say oh yeah pointing the finger again there's three fingers pointing back you point the finger David and three fingers point back one for the father one for the son and one for the holy ghost all reminding you quit pointing the finger take responsibility for your state of mind don't blame don't put the blame out on an external world when your mind is generating that guilt and that blame and so that's another thing that happens you have to allow the emotions to come up and as soon as those intense emotions come up watch how fast the ego wants to look for blaming like oh we're at a farm the farmer decides to cut the whole field of hay right before the day before a seven day retreat the harmer it's a long high field of hay and it's just sliced down and boxed up and people go hmm the ego's like ha ha ha ha but you see nothing happens by accident we've called this upon for healing we've called it upon to bring back causation to our mind to look within and say what's disturbing me and irritating me inside that I'm not willing to look at and then the ego's like it's out there no it's not it's not out there that is helpful the more you get into the habit of bringing it back and saying hmm what's under my skin what's irritating me what's annoying me there are no small upsets any upset no matter the degree of the upset is taking away your peace of mind you know irritation and annoyance take away your peace of mind just like rage does and rage may seem more intense but it's not any better or worse than irritation and annoyance it's equally upsetting that's another training that we have to work with with Jesus on is that there are no small upsets and sometimes we're busy looking at the error trying to look at the degree of the error there is no degree of error error is error and healing is healing and it's going to take a full effort of willingness for us to go through that transformation of consciousness to come to say oh I'm ready to be wholly healed not partially healed because that'll just lead a little more space for error if we're going for partial healing there's all these games in the world where you get points for coming close but salvation is not one of those games darts and horseshoes you must have some Australian games down here right? you get bonus points for getting close no? that's good okay six points okay that Australian rules okay very good we have the same thing in America but not in reality there's no bonus points the angels don't go oh great so close you know it's more the call is go all the way go all the way for the peace Jesus says in the course this course will be believed entirely or not at all I liked reading that okay give me the fine print upfront I don't want to go through it and put in a lot of time and energy and then what or what did you say not at all when I first read that line I mentioned it in my study group and somebody in the study group said now that's depressing and I said I didn't think it was depressing I just thought not at all is not an option it's basically I'm not here in this lifetime for not at all experience that's what reincarnation is about you know reincarnation is so okay let's give it another go round and try it next time I'm not really into future times either you know people say well you get it your next lifetime oh no that's not an option so let's see what are some other topics people pleasing fear of love people pleasing the root of people pleasing is that it seemed to separate from God it was very shaky about its new identity because it's true identity is Christ so to take on an identity of flesh instead of spirit is a shaky proposition it's a shady proposition it's full of shadows and there's an uncertainty so the persona the mass the personality is always shaky you know a lot of times people will say come on toast masters will train you to be good public speakers and be confident and be sure and be certain but I'll guarantee you there will you will never find a 100% confident person because the person is the mask that would be like saying a 100% confident mask and Christ has no mask the point of here is to be demasked to be unmasked you know I always remember that Jim Koshy song you don't tug on Superman's cape you don't spit into the wind you don't pull the mask off the old lone ranger and you don't mess around with slim but his whole point is by the end slim is not to be messed with he basically cuts up the bully in that Jim Koshy song but actually the Holy Spirit is saying yeah let's go ahead and pull the mask off the lone ranger I don't know if you know the lone ranger down here Tonto silver hi ho silver yes the horse you do want to be demasked no matter how confident you get those masters or maybe you jump out of airplanes and then you say get stronger stronger and you think you're pretty spiritual you're the best you can be where you're so strong and confident Jesus is like no actually that's not what I want I want the burst I don't want I don't want a fully human human I want a spirit I want myself a spirit so this whole idea of self improvement as a person how much stress have we put ourselves under into trying to make ourselves a better person or be a better person there's even a slogan I remember all the catchy little jingles and slogans I've heard in my life but for the United States Army be all that you can be I don't think so I don't think a killing machine is all you can be I think there's more than learning how to use rifle and drop bombs and shoot people be all that you can be Jesus would say yeah be all that you are is what he would say not can be for this future and that's still this game of self improvement that's why they run us through so many years of education we have to keep going all this expertise and all this specialization and then just when you're 40, 50 years old you went glad that's all over they say no continuing education what? you got to keep your skills sharp you got to go back it just goes on and on and on and on they come up to grandpa 80 years old have you done your continuing education are you stretching? grandpa doesn't want to stretch grandpa wants to sit in the chair don't stretch grandpa are we ever I mean when do you stop when do you stop this self improvement thing it's a never ending wheel and that's where the people pleasing comes in because you're always trying to please someone if you have a sense of insecurity or a sense of deep unworthiness then the ego says we'll prop that up a little bit you know get some friends get some approval get something outside of yourself that will prop up your shaky little self and make the best of a bad situation it's basically how the ego is going and basically Jesus is saying no you were created perfect and you are still perfect you can't improve upon perfection you can't improve upon the way that you were created so if you might as well drop the mask and even drop the sense of trying to improve and make a better self that's a relief I think at some point I think I was in my 20s where the way it came to me is time to retire I'm taking early retirement I think I was in my late 20s when the course came to me and that was the feeling I had after I watched over me after I read the course I was like whoa he's giving me permission to retire like Jesus says I'm calling you out of the world I'm calling you to the kingdom of heaven within I want you to retire from the world yes take early retirement at the time I thought that meant an easy life but it certainly doesn't feel easy when you're working through all the darkness it feels like you've taken a graduate class in pain because it's been so repressed and denied and pushed out of awareness that when you take the lid off and say okay bring it up that's when it starts and also why is that people pleasing is something that we really emphasize a lot it's one of the only two rules that we live by as a community because it is such assumed like it's an underlying way that we operate in this world and gradually it becomes a default way of operating whether we talk about it or not when we were in Asia when we were in Japan for the first time to talk about people pleasing was very confusing because people said that is good but we value even if we put it on the table to talk about people pleasing that is something that you are taught to do you are to please your family, you are to please the elders you're here to please your boss this is our culture this is what is supposed to be a good human being and even in other cultures if that is not inadvertently encouraged that is still underlying the way we operate in this world and yet underneath it what is motivating this people pleasing behavior is fear what is motivating that is this littleness it's not love and a lot of the times when we talk about people pleasing people confuse that with the behavior because we we tend to judge behavior as is this people pleasing or is that people pleasing if we say you shouldn't people pleasing does that mean you don't do anything that is so-called loving at the behavior level and that isn't really what we are talking about we are talking about something as a motivation underneath because at the behavior level you can still be inspired to hug someone and to comfort someone when it is as inspiration from the spirit but you might as well do the very same behavior if it is just to please someone to hide the resentment and hide the fear and hide the anger and try to push it down into awareness and put on a mask so there is no real we are not really talking about the level of behavior of how to judge a behavior and how to change behaviors what we are really talking about is people pleasing is a motivation and this motivation is actually for hiding of what is truly underneath there is a distraction for us to get in touch of with the emotions that wants to come up in the present moment and we behave instead you know in a way that we think is polite we think is a good human being or we think this is the way of getting approval from other people so that is what we are talking about and people pleasing is always there because we assume I am a person and what I am talking to or involved with is a person that is underneath assumption otherwise there is no even need to people please underneath assumption is a big assumption we are human beings we are individual separate individuals so I feel you know if we don't people please then how does that look well we spirit please because what we are going to pull back our attention toward is the spirit is the spirit in my mind you know what is the spirit want me to to see what is the spirit want me to say that becomes a focus how to see the spirit in my brother instead of seeing this person as a suffering human being that needs my help so that is the shift the tweet in the mind that we are going to make and inevitably every single time when the focus is pulled back from pleasing a person who I think I know and has a human history to how do I be in alignment with the spirit it's always the experience of feeling the peace and feeling the love and feeling the uplifting sense and then you can just always feel a deeper sense of connection with the people that you actually joined in because I have just had so many experiences with you know different ones and especially with my mother over the years you know this is people pleasing is a very thick dynamic that is expected in the family construct and in the culture and just by me turning away from trying to fulfill a role with her and the expectation and to allow the spirit to guide me there are just countless miracles that that I experience for myself but also I witness in her how that actually not only benefit myself but put her into something that's much deeper that what she is actually calling for as a spirit herself wanting to know her true self you know she might crying for you are doing something so radical you don't yourself you don't think about me but every single time when I don't compromise she actually pop through and goes deeper in her mind and we can connect to a much deeper level you know rise above the rose that we gave ourselves so that is something that we can do to benefit ourselves but also the whole universe it is so huge there's no people pleasing and true empathy they are very closely connected these two concepts I'd say a synonym for people pleasing is codependency it's just another word so you say well people please and if I completely rate it codependency we've heard that you may say well with my experiences on planet earth you can say well in partnerships a lot of times there's this thing people call an economic factor who's the bread winner of the family who's bringing in the income often times the one who's not bringing in the income it's the one who is bringing in the income things have changed over the decades it used to be a lot of times it was men but now it's flipped around a lot of times the women women is the bread winner and there's people pleasing it can go any angle but it always can come from a sense of inferiority there's a pressure I've got to please the partner to keep the partner and why do I want to keep the partner because I dependent on the partner for what for survival for emotional things you know you see how the ego is set it up that you're not whole and complete and you need people to prop up the mask so it's not enough to have just a mask of a person you need a lot of other people to prop up this insecurity and then people can say well what about like when you're a child you know if you're four years old you're gonna people please mom mom's runs the show usually at four you've got a little bitty body and mom's got a big body and dad's got a big body and you know and you can say all these people pleasing tendencies go back to childhood because I was just a child my way or the highway you know you start even as a teenager you start to assert a little bit of autonomy my way or the highway you play by my rules or you're out some of us in the community like Kirsten I think she left tried to leave the 13 by 15 she left school and she was out just left because there was a sense of I'm not playing by those rules I'm gonna play by a different set of rules but that people pleasing is set up by the mind before you even seem to come to this world there's insecurities there's fears before you seem to manifest as a person the mind is already believing in the ego if you were identified with the spirit you wouldn't come to this world why would you go from truth to illusion if you're already in truth you must believe in illusions to come to time and space or to seem to come into time and space so it's already in the mind there's all this inferior superior stuff going on in the mind there's all this I'm not good enough there's all this unworthiness and basically you come to planet earth or you come to time and space because my synonym for this world is distraction bill you're coming because you don't want to know who you are if you knew who you were you wouldn't come at all you wouldn't come again for sure there's somebody down here I think AJ and Mary some of you have heard of and reincarnation of Jesus and Mary Magdalene it's like why would Jesus reincarnate there's no point if you're the one you don't need to reincarnate if Neo is the one too you don't need Matrix 2 and Matrix 3 that's just sequels to make money for the Wachowski brothers and Warner Brothers everybody knows one was all you needed everyone's like what the heck is Neo getting involved with here in number two and three but that's the whole point if you believe you're not who you are then you will set up a world of all kinds of crazy interactions that are just there to reflect that you're not whole and complete in fact in a course in Miracles Jesus uses the word people which for most of us is a noun he uses it as a verb in the course he said the ego peopled the world a verb talk about should the ego has peopled the world the ego has projected out a bunch of bodies that are not whole and complete that are going to act out insecurities and doubts and then no wonder there's problems in interpersonal relationships because the ego peopled the world the ego put the bodies there and dumps the guilt onto the bodies and so you seem to fall in love with the body things go good for a while and then all of a sudden things start to go bad and then they go really bad and then you hate them it starts off lovey dovey dovey all the time and it goes to don't ever speak to me again ever I never want to see your face again you see the love has gone somewhere or wasn't even there but if the ego peopled the world then all of these cultures all of these relationships and everything that everyone's struggling with is because the ego's set it up and now you're being asked to come inside nirvana kingdom of heaven is within come inside come into your truth yes you made a comment about why would Jesus wants to reincarnate perfectly right because once you are nirvana realized you don't want to you don't come back as a body however the term given in Vedanta is when God does come in the form of a body is incarnation which is the avatar I think most of us have now heard this word avatar so avatar is when God decides to take the form of a normal body to spread the good in his message when that message is not spread it around enough for example I could see you as David as the avatar of Jesus because what you are preaching is Jesus love to all of us and in Vedanta they say the God does come from time to time but the term used for that is avatar the incarnation but not reincarnation because there is a purpose behind Jesus taking the form of a human being to be with the human beings to separate that love which somehow over a period of time disappears so seriously sitting here when you are talking like that you are the Jesus avatar well I can mention in the course that basically it starts off with this saying he goes back to what the Bible says it says in the beginning the word is capitalized in the beginning the word was made flesh in a course in miracles Jesus takes that line right from the Bible and you think he might say like this is what what's happening in a helpful way and he says strictly speaking this is impossible that's how he addresses it so again what's so great about Jesus in the course he's always saying bring the illusion to the truth he's not even taking the best chance he's got in the beginning you should already start to question when you hear the words in the beginning if everything is eternal in the beginning who's talking here who's talking the word was made flesh so spirit was made matter how did that happen how did you get eternal spirit and he says strictly speaking that's impossible because they're different levels one is a realm of spiritual reality and one is that in fact he goes so far to talk about the saints of God and he even says at one point there are those that have laid the body aside in order to increase their helpfulness isn't that an interesting end there are those who have laid the body aside in order to increase because from the realm of this we think of healing the sick, raising the dead speaking, laughing, shining we think that's good good good you're doing good good good but Jesus is like well actually if you let it all go I'll be more pleased you know which is really what all the scriptures the Vedanta everyone's saying release your attachment to form release your attachment to the temporal and accept the eternal that's what all the perennial wisdom teaches us about the centuries so that's something to keep in mind and I would say I consider avatars and saints and mystics and everything those are just helpful symbols because when we perceive them there's something in our heart that is resonating and it's saying ah yes thank you for reflecting helping be a way shower pointing the direction in the end of course we have to let go of the concepts of saints and avatars and enlightened people because what would enlightened people can be but enlightened mask and would the mask ever be enlightened no it's a block to the one it's not an actual thing that is a realistic possibility yes Peter yeah sorry I might have missed something there what would that look like to lay the body to one side to be more helpful I'm not sure if that means you died so that you're more helpful dead or if that means you haven't um yeah you've just given yourself fully to you know what does that look like yeah we've had old ideas about laying the body to side because we're used to when somebody dies and we see them in a casket or we throw them in the ground and throw some dirt on them that they've laid the body to side you could say laid the body and the world aside because the body is just perception and the world is just perception really the body is no different than the stars or the planets it's certainly not made of anything different than the dust of this cosmos or the matter of this cosmos so what is really saying is go in your mind have the burst find the happy dream in which you don't judge anything all things are equally acceptable all things work together for good happiness of everything where you find joy with everything without exception find that happy dream and then God will take the final step in other words you don't even have to be concerned what comes beyond that if you make your mind ready for God by not judging anything oh it's not it's not far at all back to remembrance of God from a state of non-judgment I think that the entire teachings of the New Testament and Jesus's Sermon on the Mount if you boil down the Sermon on the Mount to just two words it would be judge not not because you shouldn't but because you can't God didn't create us to be a judge in the first place and that place of complete acceptance complete non-judgment complete open-mindedness that's making your mind ready to remember God and that's where our focus is but the focus shouldn't even be on laying the body aside because that's more of like laying the world aside is like an outcome of forgiveness where you simply have no need for it anymore for a while you use the body as a communication device Jesus says that's the one use that the Spirit has for the body just as a communication device but then basically there is one tiny part in the Course that I founded at one point where I couldn't believe I read the words but I read it in there and I was like oh my gosh Jesus says the body has no purpose all these other places it's just he's being practical communication device but then he says it has no purpose of course if it's not real that's probably why it doesn't have a purpose it's not deep it goes where you just let everything go come with open arms unto your God lay aside all thoughts the thoughts of the body the thoughts of perception the thoughts of a happy even at the end you let go of the happy dream who wants to keep dreaming if there's something called awake even happy dreams happily come to an end because you are the happiness you actually are the spirit of happiness and so even dreaming doesn't content the mind yes when you said this when you made a comment on we shouldn't even believe the words in the beginning because there is no beginning and no end I've always thought of the separation the moment of separation is happening some time in the past but there is no past so we constantly like round hog day moment to moment nanosecond to nanosecond constantly rebirthing that concept of separation in our minds right now we're giving birth to it right now is the beginning if we had to put a label on a beginning and the end is right now probably the most profound expression I heard was Jesus told Helen Shackman one time history would not exist if you didn't keep making the same mistake in the present now that sends us all in a very interesting direction you know instead of looking at the ozone layer and end pollution and end world nuclear armaments and everything now we're going to focus our attention if we're still making the same mistake in the present let's put our attention on the present let's really come in and zoom in close and say there's some kind of a sneaky deception going on where it's all right here for me the whole joy of the kingdom of heaven is closer than breath closer than breathing closer than he said a kingdom of heaven is at hand that's pretty close but the kingdom of heaven is closer than a hand then let's start going into that and isn't that a wonderful thing to use our minds energy for is to go zooming into the present you know when people call me I mean I was out traveling one time and I had my cell phone I'm going around and you've heard or met our friend Lisa my friend Lisa fair but she called me on the phone I answered the telephone I've never met her before I never heard from her I answered the phone I go hello she didn't even say hello she didn't say hi she didn't say how are you she didn't say is this David she said I want joy that's what I got when I answered the phone I answered the phone I want joy great I join you completely in that you know the spirits right there to respond that's what we're going for we really are going for a life of joy and whatever the sneaky thing is that's keeping us from our present moment we are determined to expose that we are determined to not buy into that not believe it anymore not keep repeating like groundhog day these days over and over yes Nicole you said earlier about when we stop when we stop at judging we come to that place where then God will pick us up and does it mean judging I stop judging because I understand I see or understand the level of this being illusionary or does it mean even with my current state of understanding I'm you're all looking pretty real to me I'm quite convinced about the illusion at the moment but if I discipline my thought enough and even at the state of mind I stop judging then that will be enough for God to come and take me yeah it's really the same to all you have to do is quiet the mind that's what the goal of meditation is is to sink beneath the thoughts and reach that still point underneath if you reach the still point then game over for the world and the ego if you reach the still point by just training your mind not to judge I would say instead of meditation let's say you start to talk we talk about guidance and I say you can be guided through the day every step of the way without exception is a workbook lesson God's voice speaks to me all through the day now most human beings would say yeah I believe that but I don't want to hear it I've got my own agenda where sometimes I tell God yeah hold it pipe down a little bit there I'm enjoying this too much later when I've got a problem with connects things are good now but if we knew what was good we wouldn't be putting God on hold if we really knew what was good for ourselves we don't know our own best interest but let's say instead of meditation you say no it's too long and I don't know if I can't meditate my mind's too distracted but I am going to practice hearing guidance and being intuitive and following that guidance and the spirit will give you instructions which are still within the realm of words and judgments but it will take you to that leaping off point where you go ah got it you know this isn't my I'm not meant to be judging I always like the the sermon on the mountain I like those two words judge not and then there's two more words that I think would summarize this was from the Gospel of Thomas you know most people know the Bible and Matthew, Mark, Luke and John but they did discover in the Middle East the gospel of Thomas and much of what Gary has written about Gary Renard has written the Gospels of Thomas are very much in his books after disappearance but in the Gospel of Thomas they say Jesus is sureness teaching not judge not but the shortest teaching is two words be passers by those are the two words be passers by that's what he wants you to do with this world be passers by watch the world but don't engage in it watch the images but don't judge them and don't don't feel you have to fix them change them correct them anything be passers by and he does if you want an expanded version from the course on be passers by if you go to lesson 128 in the workbook the world I see holds nothing that I want Jesus got a sentence early on he says the only value that this world holds for you is that you pass it by you know he gets your attention with the first part of the sentence and then he wipes it like the send mandala he just wipes the sand away is that you pass it by that's the quickest way to happiness and joy and you do this through guidance you have to be practical if he goes wound you into debts and obligations and duties you just pray to the Holy Spirit say unwind me from those because I'm getting I'm being guilty because I'm so wounded to false obligations and duty unwind me out of those and the Holy Spirit will do that in a very practical way you will not abdicate you will not just try to push things away like the ostrich who puts the head in the sand and just buries the head in the sand to pretend the world is not there you want the Holy Spirit to show you step by step that the world is an illusion take me take me by the hand unwind me guide me where do I go Holy Spirit what would you have me say what would you have me do where would you have me go that's the way my life has gone it has not been a path of necessarily long long long hours of meditation just sitting and trying to sink beneath the thoughts it's been listen and follow and I would say for everyone in our community that's our pathway we're here to listen and follow and follow the guidance and let the Spirit take us to that pristine state of mind can I just ask another question to the expression sessions because you said when we feel we go below and look what is below to get to belief to change to true desire now it turns out all the time every time some emotion is there something shitty is at the bottom and every time I must change to desiring peace of God can I also instead of going through all this process all the time so it can be a bit much you know can I just go like oh there is this thought again this just means I'm not desiring peace of God I don't want this I change to desire peace of God but it's not good enough you have to go all the way all the time every time people have asked me if it's a process or an instant actually awakening is an instant and also do I have to go through all this darkness to find a light is there like a shortcut and when I was talking the other night about cause and effect you know it's to come to a realization that cause and effect are together are not apart then the darkness is gone in that realization but I think what you're saying too is is it possible for me to keep so focused on what is it that I want and I think that there are pathways to God that are like that I think when I think of eastern pathways like India and I think of Ramana Maharshi he basically said there was one question you should always ask yourself who am I that's like the core issue it's every single question every single thought every single belief is really a question of identity but most people find that too difficult imagine like you go through your day and you're supposed to practice who am I thousands of times you know you're in the middle of singing a song who am I you know it seems impractical the who am I question and so with the Course in Miracles Jesus has designed a system where he gives you the text as like a theoretical basis so your mind is kind of oriented in what's going on or more oriented to let go of thinking you know what's going on because you don't have a clue really is what the text is teaching us then he gives us a workbook so we have one lesson a day to practice with our eyes open usually moving through our daily activities and he throws in in the middle of a workbook he says it is possible to listen to the voice for God all through the day without interrupting your regular activities oh my God that doesn't sound like eyes closed meditation he's telling us it's actually possible to go through the day listening only to the voice for God without interrupting your regular activities in any way that's amazing that's like what a pathway for most of us who have been raised in western cultures and we have many busy doings we have jobs there's relationships there's family there's yards to tend to there's investments or whatever you're doing you know there's a lot of things that seem to need to require attention and he's like don't worry about it my boy will work and we're just going to work on shifting your perception inward and Francis I think you have something practical someone asked me a similar question about this process it seems like a very you know like an analysis process that we go through and I know for me because I had a very intellectual mind to start with so it's almost like this kind of process satisfied that mind and to somehow rest allow it to rest in the end because it almost could not just accept the change quickly like that without somehow it wants to understand what is underneath it why I feel this way why you know what exactly so it took me quite a while I did use the process the chart and the instrument for peace to just allow myself to really go through that process but like David said it is really a process until it becomes an instant in the end healing only takes an instant over the years what really happened to me is a real recognition like a very full recognition in my mind that if there is something going on it is always because of the desire and that is not an intellectual understanding it's not just because it's said in the book or by David it becomes understanding over all of this observation and attentiveness put in my mind my emotion and in my perception so when that becomes a clear recognition then it becomes very quick so whenever there is something I know for a fact I desire something else thank God and the prayer becomes a sincere prayer help me to grow my desire for you you know and I don't want to just overlay it I don't desire it I must have desired it that's what I have been calling for and I've experienced so what is the most genuine prayer I can set in that moment is please help me grow my desire for you and has been like that for me and it's just very very profound for me to always allow this desire to grow and really bring everything back to the desire but that is what I feel for someone who actually don't really need this process to sort of satisfy this intellectual mind then you're great it's really a great place already if that is the case really when the emotion comes up and when you notice the thoughts that is the block where that is the judgment you can connect say yes help me change my desire that's it and by the result you will know whether that is a genuine handing over or not you know by that fruit you will know them it's the same you know by the fruit of the result what you experience you know what what thoughts you are actually holding on in your mind yeah I think you have the inspiration all of us have the inspiration that will take us just most perfectly into that still state of mind we've been here and Jeffrey and Jeff have been taking this back and forth and then they were talking about this movie amongst the white clouds and last night I watched that and it was basically over in China first it starts off the movie it's a documentary it just shows Beijing and it shows the busyness of thousands and thousands of millions of people you know walking in their days like you if you were in a big city like that of twenty some million and then it shows the whole documentary is about those that have chosen to live as ascetics and monks up in the mountains so it follows them the main characters I guess an American who goes out and he asks questions where are they what town what village where can I find these and the whole movies about going up into these hermitages of these monks that just built these tiny little huts pretty solid little huts up there but they've chosen to step away from the busyness of the world pursuits and business and family and all those things and then you listen to them it's in Chinese it's Mandarin but it's got the English subtitles I was laughing because sometimes the subtitles flash so fast I couldn't even read I was like okay alright alright a lot of them were like their families would say where are you going and the families would go up and try to find them and they were like they were just letting go of what we would consider most important things to the ego of human life so that they could start facing their fears facing their doubts facing their mind facing the present moment facing why am I not content what am I chasing this is really good because all of us have that capacity within ourselves at any instant we could just say to the rat race mmm no I'm just just take the scissors out rat race, rat race 20, 30, 40 years oh let's get the scissors the knife out we'll try something else let's try a hermitage instead and I did that I was watching the movie and I was thinking I went to Robert just go out and step away from all kinds of things and bake bread and do gardening we have a garden here I cleared out cut down trees and planted things and grew food and got down to the real basics and I had my course of miracles book out with me so I was like okay Jesus I still have a lot of thoughts and beliefs I'm dealing with but I kind of reduced my temptations to distractions a little bit seemingly by just moving to the woods and I did it a number of different times and ways but still you don't really reduce the distractions because the thoughts are in your mind the location isn't going to do anything but it was just my desire to face whatever I needed to face to simplify things so I could really face what I had to face all of us have options available and the Spirit's there to guide all of us in whatever way would be helpful and it will reach us the Spirit will reach us in a way that's compelling and interesting to us it's not the Spirit's not going to bore you to death because the Spirit wants to wake you up to joy so the Spirit's not going to suggest things that are so boring that you fall asleep with it for many people meditation is just if they find themselves sleeping all the time there's something in the mind that goes this can't be the way Jesus is guiding me to sleep sleep sleep sleep to wake up sleep all the time so it's there it's definitely there for us but we just have to tap into it have questions over here is it possible when we improve our awareness of our ego and its projections instead of having another egoic response to that of frustration, disappointment or resentment of that ego to just laugh at it with lightness just observe it and just find the whole thing extremely funny ridiculous that's inevitable Jesus is just like oh yeah oh yeah that's it that's exactly where this is heading and can I just ask a question of Francis when we were talking about people pleasing the difference between it doesn't mean don't ever do anything for anyone but it's the intent behind it and the purpose and identifying whether it's a divine Holy Spirit derived intent through love or whether it's the people pleasing egoic type of action that you're doing for someone there are a couple of red flags that we can look for to identify if it's ego bound and people pleasing if it feels like we're settling it might be one by doing that action or if we're aware of some subconscious secondary gain we might be expecting, might be another thing to look out for to see that it's an ego action rather than a love derived action I think in the end it's always about how you feel because you know we were trying this expression session group in the morning for everybody to tap into how to express and also how to listen and sometimes we have this paired up exercise that's also a very direct way for people to start experiencing because when you are talking to someone and someone has something that requires your response you can always tell by how you feel whether this response is coming from a place of trying to please or trying to join in the story or this response is coming from a truly inspired place by how you feel and in those exercises sometimes we do in gatherings like in Japan we did that exercise we have one person express whatever and the other person will not respond in any way that that is of the norm like you don't nod or smile or have any gestures and the only response you have is to quote a sentence from the workbook lesson from A Course in Miracles and we have everybody quote I'm the Holy Son of God and that response is not directly related to whatever people are expressing and definitely is not an answer for people's expression or questions or the cries for help in a direct way and yet when the experience that everybody has after the exercise is that when that because that is a true thought that is a thought that is truth so when anybody is expressing of their stories that comes from the ego the construct that becomes a problem and concern and emotional or belief system and your brother is assuring you or affirming a true thought whether it's relevant to what you think it is you know what you're saying or not it is so assuring it actually brings this huge sense of peace and healing to both that is the experience that is very surprising to the people who actually are in the middle of it but the result the experience is convincing and that is what we were talking about about no people pleasing that is just a very tiny example of how to listen and how to respond when people seem to join with you and but that actually can be transferred to all situations when someone is talking with you and expect something of you or when you are in a relationship or in a job situation it is also how you feel will be a good way to judge where you actually come from in dealing with a friend or a family member it's actually possible to practice that lesson I imagine if you have a partnership and there is a lot of conflict that comes up where you just sit down at dinner one night and say when we get into arguments it just escalates and it gets worse and worse and worse so we need let's try some kind of technique to get out of it and this technique would be to say okay one or the other goes into a sense of complete acceptance as an exercise and comes into some words that they resonate with in their heart and they're going to be the presence of love the argument is going to be gone and people have mystical experiences when we do these kind of diet work where they go wow I've never had an experience like that sometimes there will even be couples that will get paired up in a diet and they'll go well I felt so much love in that exercise I've never felt that much love with them regularly or maybe you feel like you're just getting ready to have an argument with somebody and you just picture Jesus coming down and saying here we're going to do an exercise now and I want you to play the presence of love or maybe even having Jesus morph and go inside the person that you're arguing with and then anything that you can use in your mind that helps you bring you out of this idea that you already know who they are and you already know their problems and you already know their issues that I know of mind that gets locked up into debating and arguing it's just not worth it we're a worth piece of mind we don't need to click back into those old habits we'll get a chance to watch how perfect love casts out fear in front of your eyes because when people are demanding some kind of response they're in the wrong mind already because they believe in a story that is not true they believe in some kind of suffering and the normal way that the ego handles is to come in join and try to find solution at that realm and then hopefully there is a temporary fix and the temporary sense of joining isn't really a joining because similar problem will come up another time with another person it's always going to be endless problems so when you started to connect in your mind with the spirit and you will see that the ego has nowhere to join and it can even feel a little discomfort because the ego seek and demand understanding and joining in that level and when there isn't and you can stay there there is no way it must disappear and someone there who somehow temporarily mistaken who they are will be able to have something higher to join to when you hold the high note and that is how healing happens you know that is that is so healing for your own mind to witness that and for someone else to be able to link up with that and to witness in practicality I came to Australia seven consecutive years around 2004 to 2011 and remember one early on tour my friend Raj took me down started up around Gold Coast and came down down down to Sydney then I flew down to Melbourne but as we are driving down I think we are maybe up near along there we actually got to this point where he was setting up the gatherings we would have all these people he would collect donations and do these different things he started to get so happy traveling with me he just got happier and happier and happier and then he started to get lightheaded and he started to get a bit dizzy and one time we were just he set up for gathering and before the people came it's getting dysfunctional he said I'm traveling with you and now I'm getting lightheaded and I'm just I'm just getting like I'm up in the clouds and just my mind is just so happy and everything and I said so what do you want and he said actually I need to be grounded I feel like I'm just I need to be grounded and I said okay very good let's work on that what do you want to do to be grounded and he said if you could just come out to a restaurant with me and have a big steak with me and a bottle of wine I think that would do it I said alright so we went out and had steak and wine he went that's much better everybody you have to be practical even as you get higher and higher and higher when you are a bit out of control then just stop and pause and be practical and be intuitive and that's the fun part of it the spirit is so Jesus is so playful Jesus is always working with you with what's practical never trying to take you too fast too far never taking you where you're so stretched that you get scared the spirit is always there with a light hearted sense of humor and keep it practical so that was a beautiful experience for me keep it real this statement who am I that you were saying a Maharishi was it Ramana Maharishi and know thyself that's in the Bible for some reason that just scary statements for me it's like we're trying to get beyond ourselves I'm not really sure what they mean I've never really every time I hear that I'll think oh goodness you know I don't know what they mean I'm trying to get beyond myself I lose the ego and the eye yeah it's so identity is so deeply ingrained that who am I or those know thyself those statements can stir up that's definitely a sense of restlessness for the ego because that's like the core issue and the entire world was made so that that issue is not looked at in other words it was all made as a distraction from that and then when you start to just even allow that to come in it's like oh what's the point of that the ego can get kind of stirred up even around those things because that's like a core thing so it's best to remember that really the prayer of your heart is you're saying to the spirit just show me the way you know the way you provide the guidance you give me those little prompts and nudges and even if it's going to take me those little steps little bite-sized steps I'm not going to gorge myself here I'm going to take it bite-sized by bite-sized step and to me that's where the path can be quite gentle and loving particularly that's my I was my incentive to tune into guidance okay what would you have me do just really stay into that every day is a blank slate every day is an open possibility and what would you have me do and often times it's like okay we're going to the movies I remember Jesus here we're going to listen to some music okay we're going to the movies sometimes I feel a little bit in the early years like two o'clock in the afternoon I think in everybody's working or everybody's at school or doing something theater at the matinee he's like relax we're going to have some fun here I'm going to talk to you during the movie we're going to use this one time I was on a road trip and Jesus said now once you go to the video store and read two movies and I'm like two movies now two movies in the afternoon he said yes and so we go to the video store and I get this movie Michael Douglas the game and Jesus is like there that's the first movie and I'll keep going Bill Murray the man who knew too little so he has me take these two videos home and watch them back to back the funny thing is both movies have basically the same theme both is a movie about brothers in both movies one brother is giving the other brother a gift and in the game it was Sean Penn giving Michael Douglas the gift of this recreation thing and then the man who knew too little it was Peter Gallagher giving Bill Murray the gift of like theater comes at you like what do they call it like a spontaneous theater straight theater yeah straight theater theater of life I think it was called in the movie where it's improv it comes at you and I'm like this is like a setup he's got me watching two movies and he's got the same themes in both and I'm like so I said okay are there any more instructions and he said yeah I want you to watch the game first and see how intense it is for Michael Douglas because of his pride he's like a powerful financier and he's fighting and kicking the ego's rearing up and he's kicking and fighting the whole way through in fact he fights and kicks so much that at one scene he's like he wakes up and he's like what he's his little cracks of light he's in a coffin he's been buried alive in Mexico and he's he's in a coffin he's kicking the dirt's coming down and everything and then the second movie is the man who knew too little Bill Murray and Jesus said now watch how he does it he has such a small self-concept that he is totally gliding through this movie they're shooting at him they're trying to poison him they're trying to strangle him they're trying to do all the things that they did to Michael Douglas and Bill Murray is like laughing his way through the whole thing and I'm like oh I see so he's saying I want you to live your life like Bill Murray character I want you to stay lighthearted I want him to laugh with me at things in fact he's so lighthearted that the other people in the man who knew too little think that Bill Murray is an American super agent they say he's fearless you can't strangle him and shoot him you can't and at one point they put truth serum they try to they get him and they tie him up and they put truth serum in him and they're like hey who do you work for they're trying to see if he's like working for the Russians or the Germans or the Americans or whatever and he's like he's got the truth serum and he's like and they say who do you work for answer the question blockbuster video Des Moines, Iowa he tells the truth and they go oh he is so good but he is telling the truth and he talks to blockbuster video Des Moines, Iowa and he's come across England to visit his brother and you see that's the fun of it Jesus is like you can tell the truth but he's so uninvested in the world that he even when they're shooting guns and things something flies in his eye and he goes hey hey watch it there because he's so sure it's the theater hip hop theater that these are just actors he's convinced that they're all just actors now think of that in your own life in your own relationships if you went to visit your mother for example and you have all these memories of oh my mother and how it's going to be and you just said no this is an act and then you went there and your mother put on the act and you could just watch it and just go bravo amazing guilty mother oh my god you should get the Academy Award instead of buying into it and going oh yeah your energy is going down and you listen for three hours about who's to blame and it's guilty you know they're all excited like Oscar as an Oscar performance you know but it's all in the frame of mind it's the state of mind if you can remember as Bill Murray's character was that this is all just an act you could have so much fun with everyone in the case of like Michael Douglas he just he kept fighting back he kept believing there were really people out to get him and he had this powerful powerful mind he thought he was important a very important man and nobody gets away from anything and he was going to fight back but the harder he fought back the more vicious that the game got to him until he found himself buried in Mexico yes I really understand that concept that you're talking about because when I think of sort of life as fiction that you talked about before as soon as you said that I thought comedy you know and I find myself in situations where I am sort of looking at something that may be perceived as tragic or sad or another person sharing something and I do see the comedy in it the comedy that I'm thinking and perceiving that but can I smile or do I hold back and sort of like I can focus in on my true self and be in that place and know the projection and look from that place but do I need to hold back on that and be mindful and careful that the people are perceiving and understanding where I am yeah what I found over the years as I joined with Jesus he's always appropriate you know Jesus will never have you laughing or smiling if it would induce fear you can still have this inner happiness and glee and lightness and it's like for example if you went to a funeral you know it would be called to go in there and act like a stand-up comedian if people are there and they're grieving and they have a tremendous sense of loss you are in the light of the world so you will go there and in your state of mind often times you're there to behold the love and to be the love when my grandmother passed away she said that she wanted to speak through me at her own funeral we watched that ultimate gift where it was all on DVD and video she wanted to do a live performance at her own funeral so I said okay so I actually showed up and at the service where she was her body was laid out I let her speak to the whole group and people started crying because she recognized her presence very strongly and then the woman who was doing the eulogy the formal eulogy she just came up afterwards and said I wish I had a notebook my god I wish I could have taken notes on all the stuff that you said it was really her coming through me and then to the cemetery she took action she came through me and there was all these flowers she loved everybody there that came to the cemetery so she had me going out and giving flowers to everybody there and they could feel it it wasn't awkward they just felt all this love there it was appropriate because they knew her she was very unconditionally loving and they could feel the presence of love but you would never be guided to do something that would increase fear for anybody and it would always be appropriate so that's where you don't want to just practice that connection just stay with that connection that's the trust that's the trust letting yourself go to the spirit and completely trust the spirit you're never going to be inappropriate that's it, thank you just a little quick story, 20 years ago I went to a funeral of a friend and something that stayed with me there was a lot of distress because the man was quite young when he died and everyone was very sad except for this one woman young woman who apparently I found out later was his cousin who had flown over from the United States and she was a little bit further down the down the aisle and on the opposite side so I could see her clearly because I was on the edge of the aisle and I was just drawn to her the eulogy and the sermon and everything but she was sitting there she wasn't sad, she had the most unbelievable peaceful serene, calm happy, not giggly happy but just this tiny smile this gift of peace and she was she was just sitting there with this stillness and as he was taken out in the coffin at the end, she just watched him it was like she was just projecting this love it was radiating like a beacon from her I'm sure I'm not the only one in the church that noticed but I just thought oh my god I actually found it very soothing and comforting in my own sadness of losing this friend it was such a gift and she was like that at the grave side as well and it was so special and I just thought I want what she's got, it was just beautiful you couldn't describe it with words I will never forget that and so that was an appropriate expression of that even though she was smiling it was an appropriate smile and no one took offense I don't think, it was just incredible beautiful, thank you that's a perfect example of that being true in true empathy which is one of our topics, stay in true empathy but also let the gentleness of the spirit come through and be a beacon of light I just remember one incident in China a few weeks ago when we finished this gathering and we had a young man who was joining with us from another city and he was waiting for having a time to join with us and throughout the whole time we didn't have time until the day he was going to leave, we finished the whole thing he was going to fly back to this home city and he said can we talk, I have so much I need to cry every night and I said okay let's spend some time so we sat together he just throughout all his dark thoughts and he feels these intense things and it was very dark and he was just crying and all that I heard because I was listening to the spirit, not really to him because I was thinking this is really a human condition that he was describing, not him so I was listening to the spirit all the spirit said is put your feet on his lap and I thought so I was like okay so I took my shoes off and I was like that's taking my feet and I just taking my feet on his lap so obedience to follow put your feet on his lap and I didn't know because he didn't give me instruction of what to say whether I have to say something I just said I'm just going to do this and he just like oh my god oh my god thank you so much thank you so much that's my prayer I just so want to hold your feet before I leave I was praying to Jesus for days thank you so much and he just forget everything he was expressing and just burst into tears of gratitude and that's how we parted and I I wouldn't have any clue of how to respond in that moment you know Jesus told me about that, she said yeah I did, I couldn't I thought okay and then she did it and the reflection came immediately back to you immediately and that was the only thing that he really wanted to say he couldn't say that it was all this expression of darkness but when that solution came he just like thank you so much, thank you spirit thank you so much that was a beautiful joining to end the whole encounter that's Jesus okay well I guess it's about noon here that's the perfect perfect one to end for the day, so soup, do you have any logistics couple the first one is that there's a little bit of lost property gathering and it's out on the box next to the white board so if you've lost socks hats it's out there and there might even be a couple of books too and also that this afternoon we're going to do an experiential at three o'clock in here and people are very welcome if you're in process or you're just feeling the call to walk or just be with yourself to do that take that opportunity it's not it's all optional so if you don't feel to come please don't honour yourself and last of all in the morning when we come to our groups our expression session groups if you just come a few minutes before and just settle in and just tune into the spirit call him into the group and be aware of other groups setting up as well and not pass through the hall or the parlor if the group has already started it's a little bit distracting when someone's dropping into their feelings so you can always come this way if you're going to the hall or even come in through that other bathroom entrance there well there's another group in the hall ideally come early to get to the hall okay right okay it takes a lot of courage sometimes for people they're just getting in touch with some intense emotions and if these emotions have been pushed down for a long time and they're just allowing them up it's almost like a cocoon you know you wouldn't go and stick a stick in the middle of a cocoon or something you emotionally it's a really precious time and it's like turning the tables on a very deep pattern of saying I'm going to allow myself to feel these feelings and get in touch with them and so if people start coming in and walking in towards another group or trying to hurry to do that after the groups have already begun it's almost like you may think of them as like little sacred spaces where there's a healing going on there you don't want to step in in the middle of it that's really the intention behind it and just to be clear if you are trying to get to the hall you can come through this door on the veranda and slip in that way but it would be best if you get there on time because we've got a group out on that veranda too so yeah yes yes there is and that door doesn't close very easily so you'll have to be aware of that too okay thank you and we'll see it probably we might have a movie tonight but we'll just kind of feel into all the which I know there's so many options we'll just pray and tune in to one that will be very helpful for what issues are arising for us here yeah yeah it's good it's very good very good enjoy your lunch too to sing okay yeah this is a good time do you need a microphone or just want to sing no my favorite movie was The Boss and I wanted to sing over the rainbow and I know it's about your journey but at the end of the moment she actually realized that it was always there so I hope that's that song that's cute