Monstaville Book II. Chapter 29

29 

“Meher Baba’s three R’s: “(Don’t) react - instead Reflect - and then Respond.”

When you don’t react, it shows you more of who you really are because, by not behaving in a way that is engaged with illusion, the opposite - reality, the Self - becomes more apparent. Through the mirror of a still consciousness, the clear light and pure energy of the spiritual Sun is seen, and felt, shining. Radiating positive energy - love and light - to somebody is the one thing you can do without limit, with full power, without aggression or inflicting harm on others or yourself. It serves only to raise the vibrations and is added to that person’s reservoir of healing energy which their guides can use as appropriate when they are ready to receive it. 

“Others who harbour feelings of criticism, jealousy and irritation concerning the actions and accomplishments of friend or foe may create just as much harm as those whose malice is intended. Gossip itself is one of the most deadly forms of black magic and can bring about the physical death of its victims. Seeing that all harm eventually returns to the one sending it forth, would it not be well for all true alchemists to take the vow of harmlessness, at the same time recognising that the defence of truth and freedom sometimes necessitates making a choice between the lesser of evils? I urge then that all understand the need to magnetise the grand design of God for all parts of life.” – St. Germain (Intermediate Studies in Alchemy, channelled through Mark L. Prophet, Summit University Press, MT., U.S., 1970, p.47).

“Fire and swords are slow engines of destruction, compared to the tongue of a Gossip.” - Richard Steele.

"The tongue, like a sharp knife, kills without drawing blood." - Buddha.

A wound from a tongue is worse
than a wound from a sword
for that latter affects only the body,
the former affects the spirit.
- Pythagoras.

[Retrospective note: I was fortunate enough to have an opportunity, on a regular basis, to practice letting go of people’s ego projections and not take it personally in the martial arts class I attended during this period].

ADon=t take it personally. It is never personal. It is always someone dealing with their own emotional garbage which far from relating directly to you may go back thousands of years. You are just the trigger for that suppressed emotion and others are triggers for you. Let=s get out of the Earthly personality and into the eternity of it all. However people behave towards us or anyone else, just love them. The more negatively they act the more love they are crying out for. We don=t have to approve of their actions to love them. Yet what do we do? We give our love to those who conform to our blueprint, our expectations, and deny love to those who don=t. As almost no-one conforms to that blueprint we truly love almost no-one, usually no-one. Because others are insisting that we conform to their blueprints, almost no-one, usually no-one, truly loves us. This is why the world is so short of love.@ - David Icke (I am Me, I am Free, Cambridge, U.K., Bridge of Love Publications, Cambridge, U.K., 1996, p.184.).

Shaman Don Miguel Ruiz also emphasises this point in his Second Agreement. This was an important step in my learning process, to realise that nothing anyone does is because of me. It has nothing to do with me, in fact. It is simply a projection of their own shit, or ‘stuff.’ Ruiz explains that we all live in our own minds. Consequently, when we take something personally we make the assumption that they know what is in our world, and we try to impose our world on their world. We react in order to defend our beliefs but in so doing we cause further conflict, making mountains out of molehills,  Often, when people are stuck in their egos, they are determined to prove everyone wrong in order to justify their position, their attitude or behaviour. Their ‘need to be right’ may result in opinions and insults that simply indicate how the person is feeling within themselves and dealing with their own consciousness. It is their own insecurities and judgements that have caused them to send poison to you, by calling you ‘fat,’ for example. He even goes as far as to call such people ‘black magicians.’ When we take things personally, says Ruiz, we become ‘easy prey’ for these predators. When we take things personally, he adds, we can be hooked by just ‘one little opinion.’ We eat their ‘emotional garbage’ and it becomes our garbage. “Immunity to poison in the middle of hell is the gift of this agreement,” he explains. (The Four Agreements, Amber-Allen Publishing, CA, U.S., 1997, p.49-50). It may be said that the person has yet to see ‘the light’ and is not ready to break out of the shell of social conditioning. People fear change because change and letting go of the past can be a painful experience. The underlying cause, then, appears to be attachment, generally. But people are also lazy and it is easier to just spout off what surfaces from their negative subconscious than to look within, to face themselves and undertake the work that is required in order to expand their consciousness and deepen their self-awareness. 

“Suffering is Optional: Three Keys to Freedom and Joy centres around three basic aspects of Zen practice: pay attention, believe nothing, and don’t take anything personally,” the book’s author, Cheri Huber, explains. She says, “There is no suffering in paying attention. Suffering occurs when we believe there is something wrong with the content of what we’re attending to.” She also writes: “‘Don’t take anything personally’ points us in the direction of realising that nothing is personal, there is no such thing as personal. It is difficult, impossible in fact, for an illusion of separation not to take life personally. The practice of not taking anything personally gives us a breather from the parts of ourselves who struggle to control who and how we are and how we deal with what life gives us. The ‘truth’ and ‘knowing’ are so important to us because they perpetuate the belief that it is possible to control life. If I know enough, I can be safe. If I have enough accurate information, I can do the right thing and get the result I want. Suffering results because that belief is simply not true.” (Watkins Review, September 2001).

“You need not be weak or weakened when confronted by waves of discordant energy – whether your own or another’s. Nor is it necessary for you to be rude in your rebuttal of human error; for it is not the person, but the impersonal energy personally misdirected that must be challenged. Therefore, establish yourself in a firm, unyielding consciousness that rejects evil as the lie of man’s misqualification; and as you breathe in the essence of the sacred fire, ‘flower of Power,’ determine to strip that lie of its negative Power manifesting as thorns of abuse.” - St. Germain (recorded by Mark L. Prophet and Elizabeth Clare Prophet, Saint Germain on Alchemy. Formulas for Self-transformation, Summit Publications, Inc., MT., U.S., 1985 and 1993, p.278-280).

“‘I, Buddha, who wept with all my brothers’ tears, whose heart was broken by a whole world’s woe, laugh and am glad, for there is liberty! Ho! Ye who suffer! Know ye suffer from yourself!” (A Path to Oriental Wisdom by G. Parulski, 1976, p.50, quoted in Watching the Tree by Adeline Yen Mah, 2000, HarperCollinsPublishers, London, U.K., p.78).

“Pain is a relatively objective, physical phenomenon; suffering is our psychological resistance to what happens. Events may create physical pain, but they do not in themselves create suffering. Resistance creates suffering. Stress happens when your mind resists what is...The only problem in your life is your mind's resistance to life as it unfolds.” - Dan Millman.

Neo (Keanu Reeves): What are you trying to tell me? That I can dodge bullets?

Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne): No, Neo. I'm trying to tell you that when you're ready, you won't have to.

                - The Matrix (directed by Andy and Larry Wachowski, 1999). 

Retrospective inserts.

“Before my interest led me to learn about dealing with difficult people, I had few responses to criticism or hostile aggression: fear, sadness, defensiveness, anger, self-righteousness and self-pity. Now that I know that each of us is either in a state of some form of fear or in a state of some form of love, I’m much less likely to take criticism or aggression personally.” - Betty Perkins (Lion Taming. The courage to deal with difficult people including yourself, Tzedakah Publications, CA., U.S., 1995, p.75). 

For me, love is like a sweet and delicious food and my neighbours’ behaviour puts me off it, as though it goes cold or turns sour, like it goes off. The heart closes to some degree and my primary concern becomes self-preservation as I attempt to protect myself from feeling pain.

 MySpace message from my friend Billy on 4 August 2009. Subject: funny.

 "Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world." ‑ C.S. Lewis.

“These pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.” – Rumi.

A MySpace friend trekking across the States: “How pain pushes love out you. The more pain I am in climbing up a mountain, the less I am in love with what’s around me. Oh, do I have stories of playing with deer, like puppies, extremely beautiful. Glowing fungus. Some good stuff, more later. I have been on a quest for earth chakras and had no idea I was. Titicaca here I come.

My reply (excerpt): Interesting. Yes, indeed. It lowers our vibration and closes us up, eh? That would be why women are more resilient and loving than men then! Haha. Because they open and close freely and responsively like flowers…more easily. Not to worry...our new silicone based DNA/bodies will make us more open and able to hold more Light…and more love. Though, as you suggest, it is surely always hard not to love nature's beauty and sweetness. And, indeed, the animals and elementals do inspire that playful, loving, soft side of us...if only we can remain open to our feelings. The male body contracts, closes, shuts feeling out, so I guess we have to make more effort. Like calling upon the elementals...and the Green Man who is everywhere. They are real my friend. :D

"Spirituality cannot be seen in a person, or measured by their wealth or status in society. Actions surely do speak louder than words, but words also carry with them a vibration that can heal; or harm a person. Be careful therefore Dear Ones, to watch your words carefully as they carry the power of creation within them.@ - SaLuSa (channelled through Mike Quinsey, 9 Nov 2009, www.gfbymikequinsey.blogspot.com).

“Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones; and when you have laboriously accomplished your daily task, go to sleep in peace. God is awake.” – Victor Hugo.

All you have to do is ‘be.’

“…seemingly unknown to us, we collectively hold a key to our survival - if we will only use it. The key to which they refer is the act of living in ever-increasing levels of appreciation…our DNA responds to our emotional state (our feelings) and then emits light and energy-patterns that affect matter. In other words, our DNA somehow affects our external reality through a process of vortex mechanics…In my own personal experiments with appreciation, I have found that when it is experienced for longer than a few minutes, it often produces a hypnotic-type feeling of bliss, which I equate to an increase in endorphins. At the very least, I think most of us would benefit from regular periods of appreciation/bliss in the course of our day-to-day lives. The challenge for many persons is how to feel appreciation when there is seemingly no reason for it.” - Tom Kenyon (The Big Island, Hawaii, 2 January 2005, www.crawford2000.co.uk/hathor.htm and www.tomkenyon.com).

‘It's All in Divine Order’ by B☼dhi Mind (www.myspace.com/bhodimind, blog 11 July 2008).

“What if we knew in our hearts that everything that happens to us is for our highest and best?

What if we knew that we ARE the co-creators of our reality right NOW ?

If we could accept that we ARE powerful beyond measure?

Our only real point of power is in the present moment.

When we lament over our situation, instead of accepting what is happening,

we are not in the present moment or present in the moment.

Consciously accepting ‘what is’ ‘as is’ ‘right now’ is the key.

This phrase, ‘It's all in Divine Order’ became my reminder.

I started saying it in all situations, especially under dire circumstances.

I borrowed it from a friend, in 1990. She used to say it all the time.

(I was recently surprised to learn that most of my friends think of this phrase when they think of me).

I don't have particularly great karma, to be quite honest. (I seem to have arrived in this life with some karma to work out!) I have endured many events that seem quite unfair. Fortunately, I learned to be at peace about it all through acceptance, so my suffering is minor, much less than you might expect. These events were a training ground. After any ‘catastrophe,’ I got into the habit of saying, immediately, ‘It's all in Divine Order.’ Rather than blaming, shaming or justifying or somehow flipping into some victim behaviour. Most people (strangers, mostly) just thought I was stupid, to be honest. They thought that I was too naive and dumb to see what was happening.

It is more accurate to say that we had different beliefs about the true nature of reality.

If you can accept that all that is happening is for your benefit, and that you get exactly what you need to evolve in every moment, then you are on the way to being in the creative state of mind that asks, ‘How can I use this experience to grow and evolve?’ Or ‘What is my lesson in this?’ This state of mind (willingness) springs from a conscious choice to align yourself with a state of acceptance.

Often, when faced with adversity, we ask, ‘Why?’ I find that ‘Why?’ activates my mind in a way that doesn't really serve me. I can rationalise, justify and intellectualise. I can tell all my friends and garner support for my thoughts. I can run from my faith and curse God for allowing this to happen. This is the opposite of being a co-creator. Victimhood. Make an effort to stay out of that mental ghetto. It's not truth. We are not victims. We are co-creators and we are learning from all of our experiences.

What I REALLY need to know, when faced with adversity, is how to move forward in that moment towards truth rather than down the victimhood path, which is the usual route for most of us, at least initially. Make a choice to go beyond that initial ‘reaction.’ Affirming that even misfortunes are synchronicities is empowering. It doesn't mean that we approve of what happens or would want it to happen. I think it works a bit like forgiveness. Forgiveness is not about the people who are to be forgiven. It's about the person holding the grudge. I can't explain the details of exactly how situations are in divine order. There are so many seeming injustices. Yet, I do believe that there is a bigger picture than the one that we generally look at. Acceptance is a key to getting the mind willing to see the bigger picture and the options or choices available. In accepting a situation, we often become more willing to make choices about how to respond. When we are not accepting of the moment, or reality, our minds spin arguments and questions, looking for fairness or blame. We are not exactly in present time in that state and it is more difficult to resolve our difficulties when we are ‘out to lunch.’

‘It's All in Divine Order.’

(Or whatever phrase reminds you to say ‘yes’ to reality).

To use this affirmation most effectively, remember that it is best used to remind yourself to choose acceptance in the moment rather than allowing your mind hang out in the mental ghettos of victimhood and blame, anger, denial, ignorance, attachment or fear.

Sure, it may be your first reaction and that's normal.

Realise where you are and start looking for the truth.

Love is the only Truth. Everything else is a delusion.

Oneness is Truth. Every negative emotion is a dyslexic perception of ourselves and others.

It is often our negative emotions that cause us to feel separate from ourselves, others and the Creator as well as our own creativity and our own innate ability to co-create our lives rather than feeling victimised by our experiences.

The good news is that emotions can be changed. We have free will. We exercise our free will by making choices. You always have a choice. A choice is different than control. A choice is limitless. You may not be able to control all that happens in your life but you CAN choose your response to what happens. You can choose how you think about things, how you respond to and interpret life and so much more.

What is standing between you and the feeling of being at choice? Emotional stress.

How can you reduce your emotional stress for free?

Meditate.

Make Choices.

And Remember: It's All in Divine Order.

(Acceptance)

You CAN make lemonade when life hands you lemons.

It's a fine skill to cultivate.

‘i Am yOu

aNd

YoU aRe Me

AnD

We ArE

aLL

oNe

In tHiS

ToGeThEr.

wE aRe OnE

wItH ThE

cReAtOr Of

ThE SuN.

LeT's

ShInE!’

~ B☼dhi Mind  ~"

Taoist Priest

“The Tao includes everything that is, was and ever could be. There is nothing that isn’t part of the Tao – even nothing is part of the Tao. But the Tao cannot be described or explained – that’s its only rule – it’s just too big too all-embracing. So its followers don’t even try. Instead, it’s just accepted as a premise or a fact.

                In Magic Roundabout language, suppose the Tao was a huge, limitless being, an intelligent macrocosmos. That being, Big Tao (pronounced dow, by the way) would look about itself, see all the pleasure and all the pain in the entire universe, and being totally enlightened about both the beneficence and cruelty of life, say, ‘Perfect. Absolutely damn perfect!’ This wouldn’t be for any latent sadistic tendencies on its part. When you’re big enough to encompass the entirety of all that is, you have the perspective of a span of an infinite number of aeons to see that everything in nature, all its agony and ecstasy, is exactly as it’s meant to be and is all perfect. There is no sentimentality at this level.”

- Barefoot Doctor (Dear Barefoot. Taoist Wisdom For Everyday Living, Atlantic Books on behalf of Guardian Newspapers Ltd, London, U.K., 2004, p.298-299).

“Life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness. How do you know this is the experience you need? Because this is the experience you are having at the moment.” - Eckhart Tolle (A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose).

"As long as you think that the cause of your problem is ‘out there’ - as long as you think that anyone or anything is responsible for your suffering - the situation is hopeless. It means that you are forever in the role of victim, that you’re suffering in paradise." - Byron Katie.

“Many enlightening human beings get stuck on one story from their life, usually that involves being victimised in some way. Something ‘bad’ has happened to them, and they begin to proceed with the rest of their lives tentatively in case they get hurt again. Dear Ones, you cannot move into your authentic power holding onto your victim consciousness! So many humans are stuck in the loop of their old stories and by doing so continue victimising themselves, over and again, by staying in that old energy. Isn't it time to finally, truly, let that energy go? The old stories only continue to define you if you let them. How would you feel if you never had to feel that old energy again? How much lighter would you be? True surrender allows you to wipe the slate clean, so to speak, and to start creating the life that so better matches who you really are. You cannot surrender cautiously, Dear Ones. Surrender with all of your being and consider it a leap into freedom and empowerment and allow your spirit to soar.” - Archangel Gabriel (channelled through Shelley Young, 3 July 2012, www.trinityesoterics.wordpress.com).

“Instructions are necessary only so long as one has not surrendered oneself.” - Sri Ramana Maharshi (Talk 434, 28 December 1937).

“Everything is a gift of the universe - even joy, anger, jealously, frustration, or separateness. Everything is perfect either for our growth or our enjoyment.” - Ken Keyes, Jr.

“You may witness outbursts from people in the coming days and months, particularly from those who have not yet learned how to practice balance and energetic clarity and those who are resisting the shift. Dear Ones, never take those outbursts personally. They speak loudly of the other person's discomfort and say nothing about you.” - Archangel Gabriel (channelled through Shelley Young, 5 July 2012, www.trinityesoterics.wordpress.com).

Interviewer: If the bad teaches, is the bad bad?

Steven Seagal: [Laughs] Well, in the ultimate teaching all is good.

"Accept where you are and don't pretend to be otherwise." - Jeshua (channelled through Jayem, The Way of Mastery, Heartfelt Publishing, VA., U.S., 1997, www.wayofmastery.com).

“Having a soft heart in a cruel world is courage, not weakness.” - Katherine Henson.

"Blessed are those who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused." - Unknown.