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Gentle Healing Year 3 ~ Daily Contemplation #254

November 30, 2021

Please read quotes 827-828 in The Seven Steps to Awakening with your inner teacher. Here is the last quote:

Liberation confers “inner coolness” (peace) on the mind; bondage promotes psychological distress. Even after realizing this, one does not strive for liberation. How foolish people are! Such people are overcome by desire for sense-gratification. But even they can cultivate a desire for liberation by a study of this scripture.

Note: The next Daily Contemplation will be available tomorrow morning after 2am ET at this link.

Tip for Gentle Healing Year 2 – Day 275 – Revelation 6

November 30, 2021

Before reading today’s tip, please read Revelation 6:1-14 in the Bible.

Revelation 6:1-14

On Day 273, we saw that everyone is able to open the symbolic scroll, which means that everyone is able to awaken to absolute truth. The six seals mentioned in today’s reading are six of seven steps that are part of the awakening process.

Step 1– Desiring awakening more than anything else. As we have seen repeatedly since Gentle Healing Year 1, the desire to awaken is the most important part of the awakening process.

Step 2– Seeing through the ‘mask’ of your own ferociousness. Ferociousness is being aggressive towards others (or towards circumstances), and it can show up in a number of ways. Some synonyms for ferocious include brutal, vicious, cruel, merciless, severe, raging, and murderous. Every unenlightened human is ferocious in some way, even if it only shows up as mental attack. Step 2 is acknowledging your own ferociousness and then looking beneath it to see what drives it. In this way, you see beyond it, and it loses its power. It no longer has any value when you see through it. (Root Cause Inquiry is a tool used in Step 2.)

Step 3– Tiring of judgment, which is tiring of wanting things to be different than they are. (The Loving All method is a tool used in Step 3.)

Step 4– Letting go of the belief that life is temporary. This belief comes about when you believe the body-mind-personality is primary and life is secondary to it. The ego, being mental identification with a specific form, sees life in form. It sees life in people, life in animals and life in plants. That’s why there appears to be death. If form is primary and life is secondary, when form ends, life ends. (Awareness-watching-awareness is a tool used in Step 4. It helps us see that life-awareness is primary and form is secondary.)

Step 5– Learning to trust all that is as it is. (Living with an attitude of trust.)

Step 6– Letting go of perception, which is letting go of thought as me.

Today’s reading does not address the seventh step. We will look at the seventh step in a couple of days. However, the seventh step is giving no meaning to anything the ego says or any experience you may have as the ego dies its final death.

It is helpful to contemplate today’s reading in NTI carefully. How do you feel you are doing on the six steps that are discussed in today’s reading? We aren’t asking this question in order to condemn ourselves, but we do want to find out if there is a desire for and an opportunity for improvement. I recommend asking yourself if you would like to work on these steps more directly than you have been, just as you’d work directly towards any goal if achieving the goal is important to you.

Thoughts of Awakening # 275

The answer is stillness.
In stillness, there is peaceful love.
In stillness, there is appreciation
for all of God’s creation
as God’s creation,
which is seeing through untruth
to the truth that always is.

~From our Holy Spirit

Paul Hedderman ~ Traveling Lighter 11-30-21

November 30, 2021

In this program, Paul through the vehicle of Satsang and repetition will be helping us to let go of misidentification and recognize Being Consciousness as our Truth.

Paul suggests repetition through Satsangs is helpful. It is an example of how the dreamING repurposes another programming element, repetition. What was used to (mis)identify, becomes instead a helpful undoing within the dreaming of that identification. The helpfulness of the Message is recognized in what Paul calls “traveling lighter.” In the surrender of an assumed need to escape/improve, the ever-present reality of consciousness already now/here becomes where our interest stays. Being consciousness in contact (in/as/through sensory experiencING), we appreciate being “successful” – already, as that Reality.

You can also learn more about Paul on his website www.zenbitchslap.com or his YouTube channel under the same title (Zen Bitchslap).

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Heart Explorations: Embracing the Whole Show~11/30/21

November 30, 2021

During our time together, we will explore what it takes to live from an open, undefended heart. Naturally, any true exploration of living from the heart necessarily entails taking a deep and sustained look at what prevents us from keeping our hearts open. Grounded in the knowledge that the essence of us, our true nature, is the very lovingness within us all, we will explore how to recognize and release egoic energies by cultivating open-hearted awareness practices which support us in directly experiencing our true Self. By leaning into willingness, steeped in self-honesty, and with a consistent dash of courage, we endeavor to open to whatever life brings, as it brings it, that is, on life’s terms. In so doing, we trust that everything – absolutely everything – is here for us to use for healing, for purification, and for learning to live from the heart. We look forward to supporting each other in our individual explorations of how we truly embrace the entirety of this show we call life.

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Please note: it may be necessary to download the audio to listen to it fully.

500 Days with NTI ~ Day 332

November 29, 2021

Day 332 Assignment

This evening (or tomorrow morning):

Listen to the first 16-minutes of this NTI Ephesians audio. You will listen to the rest of the audio tomorrow.
Select a situation or person that you want to forgive. Practice forgiveness as it is taught in NTI Galatians 6. (You may want to reread NTI Galatians 6 as you go through the forgiveness process.)

Tomorrow:

Meditate using the stage 1, 2 or 3 meditation technique, whichever suits you best.

Gentle Healing Year 3 ~ Daily Contemplation #253

November 29, 2021

Please read quotes 823-826 in The Seven Steps to Awakening with your inner teacher. Here is the last quote:

When one is knocked about by the troubles and tribulations of earthly existence and is “tired of all this”, he seeks refuge from all this.

Note: The next Daily Contemplation will be available tomorrow morning after 2am ET at this link.

Tip for Gentle Healing Year 2 – Day 274 – Commentary on Love

November 29, 2021

Thoughts of Awakening # 274

God is the Self,
and the Self is all.

To deny anything
as not a part of you
is to deny God.

To love God
is to love all.
This is also
to love Self.

~From our Holy Spirit

Qigong : “The Movement of Now” with Ian McArthur~ 11-21-21

November 29, 2021

In this program, Ian teaches about the traditional Mind, Body, and Spirit practice of Qigong (Chi Kung). Qi meaning life energy, referring to the energy circulating through the body, and Gong meaning cultivation or work. The two words are combined to describe a practice to cultivate and balance life energy. By following movements (forms) and a simple breathing technique, we encourage more Qi to flow which in turn allows us to feel more peaceful and at One with ourselves.

Live in the Sanctuary Sundays at 2:30-3:30 pm ET/12:30-1:30 pm MT on the 1st and 3rd Sunday of the Month.

11/28/2021 ~ Movie Discussion Group: As Good As It Gets

November 29, 2021

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As Good as It Gets is a 1997 American romantic comedy-drama film directed by James L. Brooks, who co-wrote it with Mark Andrus. Melvin Udall, played by Jack Nicholson is a cranky, bigoted, obsessive-compulsive writer who finds his life turned upside down when neighboring gay artist Simon is hospitalized and his dog is entrusted to Melvin. In addition, Carol, played by Helen Hunt, is the only waitress who will tolerate him must leave work to care for her sick son, making it impossible for Melvin to eat breakfast. We watch the storyline unfold as these characters interact and develop relationships that help to crumble the previous structured world of Melvin, a grumpy author with OCD. And eventually, the unraveling leads to an opening into love.

Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt won the Academy Award for Best Actor and Best Actress, respectively, making As Good as It Gets the most recent film to win both of the lead acting awards and the first since 1991’s The Silence of the Lambs. It was also nominated for Best Picture. It is ranked 140th on Empire magazine’s “The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time” list.

You can find this movie on Netflix with a subscription. It’s also available on Amazon Prime, Vudu, and iTunes.

This month’s movie group was facilitated by Rev. George Maddox

Something Genuine: “How to Figure Out What You Really Want” 11/28/21

November 29, 2021

In this program, we watched and discussed a selected TED talk. TED talks follow a unique format. Speakers at TED events have a maximum of 18 minutes to share their messages, which are delivered in highly polished, succinct speeches. TED talks are delivered by people from all walks of life on a multitude of subjects. A great many of these talks are about the insights gained by ordinary people–insights gained through extraordinary experiences or based on their contemplation of the ordinary events of their lives. Either way, their insights are genuine—not based upon theory or dogma, but through experience.

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Have you ever wondered what you actually want? Then join Ashley Stahl–career coach, author, former counterterrorism and podcast host– as she shares her 3 key steps to help you connect to your life’s purpose, discover your ideal career path, and make what she likes to call a “You Turn,” the decision to get out of fear and tap into to what you actually want out of life. She hosts inspirational guests each week on her show, “the You Turn Podcast”, with the intention of helping her listeners upgrade their mindset both in work and love, and land a new job they love. Ashley Stahl is a counterterrorism professional turned podcaster, forthcoming author, and career coach who helps clients find their purpose, build their confidence and launch successful service-based businesses. Ashley also hosts inspirational guests each week on her show, the You Turn Podcast, with the intention of helping listeners work on themselves, raise their confidence—all while taking life less seriously.

This group was facilitated by Rev. Jacquelyn Eckert.