Conversations with Zoe and Buddha: In the Absence of Love
Buddha: In the absence of love nothing is real. Your sensory perception still perceives but it has lost its connection to All That Is. Remember the Heart of the Matter. Only love is real. Everything else is meaningless.
Conversations with Zoe and Buddha: The Heart of the Matter
Buddha: Let’s get to the heart of the matter. Only love is real. You are created by it, created from it and prosper by harnessing it and love is your central driving force. When you understand this the problems you face, as well as the problems of the world, will fade a way.
I love you. You love me too. You might just not know it yet…
Buddha: Let us start how we must begin. A mind is a mind. A tooth is a tooth, A television a television. But are they not also of mind? Who named them? Created them? Can you visualize them? Experience them? Only through your mind.
So, where do I say you should all start? By questioning everything you think you know. You think you know. You think you know nothing. You know… You know…
Well I say to you- Ha! There is nothing to know. There is everything to know. But all of it- ALL OF IT- is a play on words, worlds, concepts, realities. Each of you go as far as your mind will let you. Know this.
Conversations with Zoe and Buddha: The Three Musketeers
Buddha: The Three Musketeers- I like that story. The story that resolves itself around a principle that I myself taught and continue to witness being taught.
One for All and All for One!
You are bonded by your heritage- part of the cosmic force that defies time and space, form and formless and conceptual reality. You are all one species, physically, here on earth.
Yet you spend time distinguishing self for others. ‘This makes me special, unique, individual’. I say ALL FOR ONE AND ONE FOR ALL! Be your selves. You are separated by the unique combination of the parts that make a body look a certain way, a voice sound a certain way, a mind influenced and think in ways. All of you are unique aspects of the other. This is what your differences are- a reflection of the other parts that you are currently not in this life. So are you unique? In a very tertiary and transitory way. Like a fleeting thought, a small gasp of air. But truly you a real part of the kaleidoscope of ALL. Unite your perspectives and physical forms and see the ALL that you are.
Conversation with Jesus and Zoe: Heed The Murmurings
Jesus: So you think you can do this on your own, this life? This existence?
You can’t. You are all interconnected and interwoven, dependant of the well being of all, all than the one. All of you at the day of reckoning will be held accountable to Us for your ignorance, misdemeanours and misnomers towards others.
Each of you must learn to turn the other cheek, help the stranger, love your neighbour before the ascent of your race is possible. This is why highly evolved beings return to earth – to ease the suffering. Thinking of the All not just the One. The suffering tide is coming. It will come in TV shows and books, churches, synagogues, mosques, earthquakes and hurricanes and it will ask each of you to look within and find the humanity, the strength, the willingness to help those who are weaker, more vulnerable and less able than yourselves.
For those of you who worship at the bank and in “goods” this will be shaken or taken away and a New world order, a New earth will emerge and fill the cracks, the voids in the old ones.
The prophets are in place. The time is now. Those that feel the move will move with it.
For those that ignore and refuse the inner murmurings (it’s in you All) there will be consequences.
Hail the new order has come and with it a new beginning, a new possibility a New Way of Being for you All.
Heed the murmurings, awake to the realities of your life and your consequential affect on the lives of others and you will hardly notice the change take place.
Conversations with Jesus and Zoe: Lesson on Love Part 3
Jesus: It is not easy to love in the face of adversity. Love is a state that can be cultivated easily for it is your natural state! It is only the stresses and fears of modern life that separates you from your love and others for your love too.
Love is not for sunshine days but for rainy days too. (It is especially effective then.)
Learn to cultivate love in your everyday reality and come closer to me.
How do you do that? Make it your intention to practice love throughout the day. Pay particular attention to times when you disconnect from love (it will be a time of perceived slight) and then reconnect.
For mind and mastery to be complete there needs to be a full understanding of the nature of mind; the workings of mind and the ability from that therefore to direct mind. “Resist nothing” does not refer to earthly pleasures or deliberately indulging in squalid, dirty, self gratification states. However, the fear that that is where the mind could take one, means that one resists certain thoughts, urges and in the resistance, one becomes unable to see what is real. In other words the fear of what might be real creates resistance so that reality is never quite achieved albeit heavily sought by the individual.
Your mind takes you in a myriad of directions always towards the same point though: truth, honor, trust, faith, strength. Yet this is not the experience of mind that people have. Indeed for most mind is perpetual thinking, perpetual thoughts that take you in a myriad of directions. When one approaches a type of thought that one identifies as ‘bad’, such as what we have already spoken about- thoughts of squalor, deprivation, etc,- one immediately sensors those thoughts. Yet where do these thoughts come from? Why would you sensor one and not all thought? For if we were to be fully present we would be aware of the nature of our thoughts.
I will try to keep this clear on this occasion. Mind is strength, faith, focus, union with spirit. It is a gateway to the essence, to the soul, to God, and the God experience. The road to this is paved and littered with thought. These thoughts are like leaves fallen from the trees in autumn and how we choose to respond to our journey, whilst in body, is often to become distracted by the thoughts that are on the path: to the point that we become concerned only with the nature of the leaves and the nature of do we like the leaves. And we have forgotten that the purpose of the path is to bring us to union, union with ourselves in the arms of God. Therefore resist no leaf. As you are dedicated to following your path- the path to you, the path to union with God – falsehood comes only from focusing and identifying and creating relationships with thought forms. Therefore resist nothing. Accept all and continue on your journey where we will await you.
Conversation with Buddha and Zoe: All Is Impermanent
Buddha: Begin now to look at the world the way we see it. This world is of temporary form- always shifting, always moving out, shifting each of your every lives. This world that you live in is bigger, bolder and greater than the individual life that you currently inhabit.
With this knowledge learn to respect the earth. Learn to keep the earth’s greatness in your mind and with every choice that you make be aware of consequence. I say this to each and every one of you.Yet do not become fixed on the permanence of damage or sustainability or even on life itself.
Think of yourself as in transit. You are always moving from one form into another. Birth, life stages, days, places that you visit- always moving in and out of form. Not just within the lifetime of the soul but within the lifetime even of the day. One moment is always different from the next, yet you remain. So treat your host with respect and dignity, your host the earth. You are traveling through this lifetime and leave it well.
Begin to recognize that there are those that have gone before you who knew and understood this and worked to leave no footprint of themselves upon the earth. Take a step towards this. This will do two things: Firstly this will give the respect to the earth that it deserves. Secondly this will begin to train you in the nature of your reality right now as you sit and read these words. This moment, whilst real now, will be gone in a moment from now. Take from it what you need. Recognize the impermanence of all and become still and settled within that. Great is the suffering of the many who try and fix points through time, through desire.
Whilst great things can be achieved within a lifetime, within a year, within a month, a week, a day, all is just single moments threaded together. All is impermanent.
I taught to think of moments, of actions, of words spoken to others, of thoughts, all of these as beads on string. Each bead represents that thought, that moment, that desire, that action. This will be the legacy that the soul will carry forth from you. You will with you a string of beads and on that string will be your decisions whether you have been conscious of them or not. This is what you will take to what id beyond form. I taught that this is all that is important- a string of beads- and that isn’t even real in form but metaphysical.
Today I will teach you to value the impact of your life, your choices. Delve into your thoughts, your desires to help you become aware of the impact of your life and your choices, conscious or not.
Life is different today. Different in the fact that impact is greater, desire is greater, restlessness and suffering is greater and this happens at a time when many of you have more of that which is in form. Therefore switch your focus from your daytime job to give you things, material forms, and instead focus on your inner world. This is your real job and it matters not what you do in the world of form. What matters is how. Bring conscious awareness into your life, into your moment and learn to keep the focus on your internal world. learn to become aware of when you become out of yourself and learn to hold the moments where you are inside. Inside your body, inside your life, inside what you are doing- this is where you meet the present. This is where you are doing you inner work.
Conversation with Buddha and Zoe: Where are you? An Exercise
Buddha: So reader, with a pen and paper in front of you draw a square and put you name inside the square.
Now where are you, are you in your body or are you in the square? Are you in both? For those of you who are acquainted with the sensations of energy, are you pulled into the square therefore connected to it or do you simply feel nothing at all?
Now draw a circle under the square, put your name in this. Draw a line connecting the square to the circle. Where are you now? You are in your body, you are in the square, you are also in the circle and you have made a connection.
Now below the circle draw a square and write the name of your sibling or the name of your friend. Where are you now? You are in your body, you are in your square, your circle, the connections between your square and your circle. Are you in this square with your sibling or friends name? No for you can’t. For those of you who are sensitive to energies do you feel attracted or repelled to the square with another name in it? This square, with the other name in it, is a form that is separate to your own yet can you enter that form? No. You can depict that form in letters and shape. This has often been the case with art but can you enter the form of another? No.
So you cannot enter the form of another. But you can enter other forms of yourself. Now I will try not to speak in riddles as this is a subject that I could speak about for many hours.
You, whilst here on earth, have a body yet you are able to put parts of yourself into form that is outside of your body. You do this with your work. You do this with your food when you create a meal. With every creative project you put part of yourself and you become linked to that creative project. So you create a trail whilst living; a trail of essence or, at least those who are working and connected to their essence, create this.
There is a piece of you in everything you will do, in everything you have ever done. And this is deliberately been designed to be the case. You are unbelievably creative and invest you in everything you do. Yet the great experience for most of you is life lives on automatic pilot or with resistance. Would you change what you did and what you do if you knew that part of yourself became invested in it and connected to it?
This is my question for all of you today. You cannot escape your actions, the choices. This is so. At all times you can also change form. This is so. So when you realize that you have been drawing squares through deeds and realize that you do not like the fact that part of you is invested in a square then you can simply start from that point to draw a circle or any other shape you fancy. For whilst you need to reconcile what has been done with what you do, with the present and with where you are, know that you can also use the present to create a new.
Conversation with Master Buddha and TMichael: Gay Marriage
TM: I’ve been reading news accounts of the battle between those who favor gay marriage being sanctioned under law and those who oppose it. Some oppose it on religious grounds and some on biological grounds in that it doesn’t facilitate pro-creation naturally. What is your view on the religious grounds for or against gay marriage?
Master Buddha: If a man and a woman have sexual intercourse, there is a probability pregnancy will result, and a second probability that child birth will follow. This is commonly known and understood in modern society. That wasn’t always the case—many centuries ago it was a mystery how offspring were conceived by the vast majority of human population. There arose from the mystery many superstitions around conception and child birth. Conception and child birth require the engagement of male and female contributing each their part. This is a biologic fact. It doesn’t require a social bond to be successful. As a matter of modern fact, it doesn’t require that they ever physically engage in person (artificial insemination).
TM: Ok, I’m with you so far. Creating babies follows sex between a man and a woman, or by artificial means. A long time ago, and I hope a very long time ago, people didn’t quite make the connection and so developed superstitious beliefs around baby-making.
Master Buddha: So, by biologic fact a gay male marriage cannot produce offspring between the two partners, but can enlist a female outside the marriage to perform that role. The same of course then for two female partners. This means that gay couples are capable of producing offspring by proxy of a third partner if they so desire. This is the same for heterosexual couples who are unable to conceive a child. It merely accommodates the biologic fact.
TM: If it’s a biologic fact, then how does it become a religious issue or even a social concern?
Master Buddha: I’m pulling this apart for you, because it can get very tangled. At some point in human history there was a shift in social belief that the chief role of marriage between a man and woman was to create offspring. To ensure that their offspring would not just be running around in reckless abandon they also created social convention around the single-family household and the early beginnings of property rights. The child belonged to the parents and the household and was subject to their supervision and responsibility, and they together as a household subject to the larger society and community.
TM: You’re saying it was a social evolution, not a religious one. Is that correct?
Master Buddha: It is difficult to separate religion from social, because religion is a social enterprise. This is why this subject is so impossible for some people to intellectually grasp. I will continue now to explain.
Religion is a social enterprise, which means that humans have created religions and formed into social sects in order to propagate their religious beliefs and social tenets.
TM: Hold on a second, almost all religious people will say that religions were created by God, or Gods through prophets or enlightened intermediaries (present company included), and that they are followers of that particular religious teaching. God laid the foundation and they followed his word to build on it.
Master Buddha: Please refer to other conversations we’ve had on the subject of truth and how it is convoluted with faith and a state of not knowing everything. Humans will posit truth on a great many things, but that doesn’t make it true. It is merely their belief in what is true. Let’s assume for a moment that religions were founded on direct expression of truth from God or Gods. Humans, as you suggest, interpret that and build on it to make it a social belief system. The filter applied is still of human origin, and therefore subject to the ignorance of humanity.
TM: I don’t mean to stray from our topic, but this seems important to clear up, because so much of what follows is dependent upon this point. You’re saying that religions are social institutions and are birthed and propagated as social tenets, not the word of God.
Master Buddha: I don’t wish to belabor the point of origin of religious beliefs, and so for our discussion I said we could assume that religions spring from the word of God or Gods. Humans the take that word and add to it their interpretations and filter it into social conventions by which they live. That means that religions become social entities imbued with human constructs of socialized behavior. May we continue?
TM: Yes, but maybe we have to come back to this at some point.
Master Buddha: The great problem for humanity in building laws that govern society is that they cannot separate social convention from religious teachings. Gay marriage as it relates to law must pass through the filters of social convention, which is conditioned by religious beliefs. So you can easily see the conundrum. And this provokes a challenge to the truths held by those who believe that the word of God prohibits such human relations.
For them the syllogism flows like this:
God has said that the purpose of a man|woman relationship is to create babies and form single-family households and rear their offspring.
Gay couples cannot create babies directly.
Therefore, gay marriage is not sanctioned by God, and must be excluded from human options.
For religious believers, denying this logic is tantamount to denying the word of God. It will then undermine a society based upon the word of God and eventually lead to the ruin of society. How it reconciles with many other words of God in which it produces conflict and contradiction is inconvenient, but doesn’t cause their belief to waver. They must default to the only intellectual escape possible, which is that God is mysterious and knows more than humankind, and so it isn’t the place of humanity to question this contradiction. It is for humanity to follow the things that are clear as well as the things that aren’t without fail. God will sort it out later.
TM: Yes, I believe you’ve stated that correctly according to what they believe. But is that correct?
Master Buddha: The question is presented incorrectly. Let me re-frame it. What is the role of religion for humanity and what is the role of social convention in creating laws that govern human behavior?
TM: So, you won’t just come right out with an answer to settle the question will you?
Master Buddha: I’m taking an approach that will help you understand the issue and formulate an answer. As we have stated previously in these conversations, the role of religion is to represent spiritual theories for individuals to ponder in an effort to expand their imaginations and range of possibilities for living a better life. Religions form from spiritual ideas and concepts, that in the pure state apply to an individual. Religions become social institutions because they are comprised of like-minded individuals. The purpose of which is to share and discuss the spiritual idea and concepts.
Humans have taken religions in this social form and expanded them into governance entities. Therein lies the problem. It sets up massive conflicts between different religions and between members of society who subscribe to those different religious beliefs. The only way for a system of religious-dominant laws to work without constant and violent conflict is too segregate inhabitants by religion and assign each to their own geographic place. Since that isn’t practical today, you must have a different way. Democratic societies have created a separation of religion and government. Ideally, this should work in a pluralistic religious society. But, it doesn’t work as perfectly as intended, because those who are aligned with religious beliefs that have been interpreted to guide their daily lives in an integrated society, immediately come in conflict with behaviors they find inconsistent with their beliefs. The resulting dissonance cries for resolution. They seek to alter laws to remove the dissonance.
TM: I can see why you’re not so popular with Christians and Muslims. From what I observe both religious groups would love for everyone to line up with them to rule the world according to their beliefs. In that scenario they could outlaw all the behaviors inconsistent with their beliefs and presumably find the harmony in governance.
Master Buddha: Well, secretly all religious groups wish for that scenario, but some are more vocal than others.
TM: Years ago when I visited Nepal and spent some time in Kathmandu, I noticed the incredible non-hostile melding of Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims and Christians. But back to our topic. How do we bring this conversation to a conclusion?
Master Buddha: Gay marriage could only be subject to religious scrutiny within a purely religious context. Religious context is confined to individuals and their peers for introspection. Social institutions that are erected for governance must take into consideration that there are many types of life styles and it is the responsibility of government to create laws that promote harmony among the differences while removing violence. The fact that gays must seek legal sanction within your laws informs us that the separation between government and religion is not yet a reality.
TM: Will it ever be?
Master Buddha: It’s possible of course, but only when people representing religions surrender to living peacefully with others with different beliefs and abstain from their agendas of hegemony in thought and behavior.