January 3, 2020

December Satsang Gems (from our weekly Sunday online meetings)

Fred Davis

Notice that fear is always coupled with hope. Hope and fear are caught up in the story of time. When I am fearful, that means I am believing I am separate from the absolute and that I know what is best for this fictitious character.
The spiritual journey starts with doubt but evolves into conviction, provided there is willingness. The degree to which conviction arises is proportional to Awakeness superseding the character. We are here to clear the illusion of the character out.
Is this Awakeness believing it’s a Joyce, or is this Awakeness?
Some of our patterns are seeking to be unraveled, but others react by contracting even tighter. This is the fear that is felt in the clearing process.
You won’t stop believing thoughts until you challenge them. Awakeness colonizes the unit by seeing through one believed thought at a time. Thought and seeking are conditioned reflexes, which can cause a sense of oscillation. Allow them to be – just don’t identify with or believe them.
I don’t need to overcome 70,000 years of evolution of cognitive thought. I just have to be alert enough to question it.
There’s an ongoing unlearning that feels like learning. It’s the dropping of concepts for mystery. Ultimately it’s the mystery that proves more satisfying.
Awakeness is constantly experiencing and unveiling itself in unique ways which are interpreted by the character through its senses and conditioning. But experiencing is not the truth. Experiences have a beginning, middle and end. You – the truth, the absolute, Awakeness – are timeless and changeless.
Reincarnation is an idea that extends the sense of being. Within the dream anything is possible. But there is no after me if there is no me to begin with. That which doesn’t exist can’t claim ownership of experiences. In truth you are prior to and post all experiences.
Time can only be experienced by that which is timeless, through the character.
We’ve made up the idea that there’s such a thing as a year, that it’s coming to a close and there will be a new one. And there’s the feeling that the next year will be an improvement over this one. With Betsy recently retired and able to help more with ACN, I’m very much looking forward to the illusion of 2020.
Compassion for all things occurs when one realizes that there is only oneness – no otherness or separation.
Love heals all by noticing that nothing needs to be healed.