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.
Jesus: The impact of the spoken and written word is immense. Many men have risen and fallen as a result of words.
Practice speaking and writing wisdom. This does not mean telling people what to do, how to behave or think. This means look for the wisdom in any given situation, practice contemplation then teach yourself to communicate with love, respect and honour for the intended recipient.
This small act will change how you feel and impact the lives of everyone you communicate with. This makes speaking wisdom a powerful tool for change.
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 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.
Conversation with Buddha and Zoe: Mind is Strength, Faith, Focus, Union with Spirit
Buddha: Zoë, you have been hearing my words in your head, ‘resist nothing, resist nothing’ and so on. Let me explain what this means.
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, honour, trust, faith, strength. Yet this is not the experience of mind that people have. For most, ‘mind’ equates 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, one immediately censors those thoughts.
Yet where do these thoughts come from? Why would you censor one and not all thought?
If we were fully present we would be aware of the nature of our thoughts and the thinking process.
I will try to keep this clear and simple 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 union is paved and littered with thought. These thoughts are like leaves fallen from the trees in autumn. How do we choose to respond to our journey whilst in body? It 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.
Buddha: We are moving to a time where earth will be as one. A great peace will descend from on high, from on low and this peace will arise in those who are awake and those who are seeking to become awake. We are looking to help this process and this will indeed be speeded up. Speeded up by you, readers, as you choose to open yourselves to change, to love, to peace and work in your own lives to become centered. So for each of you who choose a centred life, one by one, you help choose peace, a new age. And we all thank you for this. There will come a time when there is a significant number walking the earth that will be able to pull us into their hearts. The mechanisms of this are with those who are seeking peace, seeking a different way of being. A harmonious one, a loving one, a joyful one and those that are taking the action to create a centered existence. So for all of you who wish to see the change be the change. These are words well known amongst several of you. Center your lives: not by changing what you do, but merely by focusing on how you do it. The new earth will not come about by the world becoming poets and philosophers. It will come about as each individual in their day to day lives awakens, makes choices and takes action to become the change, become the peace.
Buddha: We wish to speak to you today about extremes. Because extremes move in different ways from a perceived central point, are they any different? No. To clarify, if one is looking to get fit, becoming a couch potato could be extreme, exercising for five hours a day could be perceived as extreme. Are they any different? While the behaviors of a couch potato person and someone who is exercising five hours a day may seem radically different, extremes are extremes.
People who move into extreme behaviors are cut off from their center, so, although we are speaking about extremes, we are actually speaking about those who are devoid of center.
At Wimbledon, the most prestigious court is center court. I like this! One of the best thing or compliments that can be given to a person is that they are centered. Would you trust someone more or less if you described them as centered? Would it be easier to love someone more or less if they were centered?
Humans were designed to be centered yet many spend their lives rushing around in extremes. What do I mean? I mean that ‘centered’ means feeling strong, feeling safe and sound within your own being. How many people actually spend time practicing this within their day-to-day activities? Equally, as there are so few people who practice feeling centered, there are also fewer people who exist in their center; center is all there is.
I ask that all readers find their center. How do you know where your center is? It’s the mind state that makes you feel ‘centered’. I try not to play with words. Sometimes I resist the opportunities to play with minds other times I don’t. The irony is that it is the mind that takes one out of ones center! But let’s not toy here.
To get into your center stop, breathe. You can still do all that you need to do in your day-to-day activities. You can go to work, be at work, come home from work, cook, sleep: centered. You can wake up the children, feed the children, take the children to school, get on with your daily chores, collect the children, feed the children, feed yourself: being centered. Or you can become un-centered and end up in extremes whereby you are in a rush to get to work, rush to complete your work, rush to get home, rush to cook, rush to get to bed. Similarly you can become lost in the chores or lose you own center by focusing on the children’s centers. Are the children fine, are the children fed, are the children ready are the children this, are the children that? These are extremes. I will speak about child rearing at a different time for now it is suffice to say if you are lucky enough to be raising children physically, then be aware- as they say on the airlines, fit your own oxygen mask before you fit that of the child’s. In this case center yourself. A centered parent will raise centered children: simple as that.
So this is your message today from the center to the center, saying find your center. How do you do that? Stop, breathe, be present. Once you have this go about your day to day activities and you will be successful. Success follows center. Spend a minute now thinking about how mundane tasks feel when you’re centered and how mundane tasks feel when you’re not. Similarly think about a big event. How does a big event feel when you’re centered and how does a big event feel when you’re not.
This exercise itself should conclude the importance to you of being centered at all times.
Conversation with Jesus and TMichael: Jesus Answers a Reader’s Question
TMichael: Christine C. submitted the following questions. Your sincere questions are welcome and I’ll do my best to include them in a conversation for publication from time to time.
Q: Christine C. asks:
“It is written that our DNA is many strands short of what was originally intended for “human beings”, and that unseen powers (to us earthlings) altered DNA. I agree that humans have spiritually existed primarily from faith as our awareness is veiled for reasons possibly connected to the same powers (or for the continued exercise of faith?). At what point does the planet deserve divine assistance, possibly in reconnecting the DNA, thus greater awareness and resulting better health? When does the veil lift for humanity? What purpose does the veil serve?”
A: Master Jesus: There are many perspectives on what has happened on Earth to interfere with humanity’s progress. This is a major one and the ones making the claim do so without complete disclosure of the facts. While they are well-intentioned in their aim, they are withholding information about their own role in this ordeal. I will not go into to the detail, but I will summarize by saying that there was a heated dispute around the DNA issue, and the prevailing side took advantage of a technicality to rush their point of view into place. The group who caused publication of this claim created the technical default through their actions. So, while the outcome is as you have stated, the motives behind it were not sinister as has been portrayed.
It does not matter what could have been, we must take responsibility for what it is now. Divine assistance, meaning assistance from the spiritual realm, has been and continues to be an integral part of the evolution of Earth. There are at present over 3 billion spirit beings attached to Earth service. Some reside within the sphere and others work from distant posts. The dedication and loyalty to humanity is unsurpassed.
Some humans are ready for higher levels of awareness, but most are not. It is our role to lift those who are unprepared to a point that they can receive greater awareness. We do so by offering love and light to all who live upon Earth. We work diligently with individuals and groups to open their senses and their understanding to higher ideals.
The veil, as you call it, represents the darkness of ignorance. Humanity must take responsibility for its part. So long as humanity’s focus is steeped predominately in materiality, ignorance of your true essence will be concealed. The deeper your daily lives become intertwined in material survival and accumulation of material security, the less energy you have for discovering the truth about yourselves. Humanity has the power to turn this around. Those of us in the spiritual realm are here to assist and stand ready to offer all that is needed.
Q: Christine C. asks:
“From another perspective, it is written that this marvelous Earth is the place for emotional healing, divine healing, from the original cause. It is easy to see that if we each heal individually, if we are fortunate enough to have the tools for understanding, that the resulting connection with each other is another path to awareness. Again we are pulling in other “times” of our existence for which we are now responsible. Is this also deserving of divine help on a world wide or even universal scale to assist in blowing away the mists of misperception, thus clearing the way for more wonderful loving vistas?”
A: Master Jesus: This is true. A key to understanding the potential is to discover the minimum of your own. That serves as inspiration to continue and to connect with others along the lines of love and light. Those terms, love and light, are used often and yet what do we mean by them? In these conversations we have talked much about love and what it is, but never can we do justice to the complete experience of love through these words. Light understanding is in a similar predicament. The two go together in a way that makes a description feeble in capturing the true experience. And yet the faithful, those who have glimpsed even a moment of the experience witness to others the splendor achieved. Who is insane? Who is misinformed? Is it the one who clings to material possessions and property rights as supreme to human rights? Or is it the one who claims spiritual sovereignty in the face of doubt and contradiction?
Your better human nature is pitted against your false concepts of reality and it is a battle that shall conclude in victory for the better nature. How you get there is your choice as well as how long it takes. Each generation is challenged with living with, through and transforming to some small degree, the actions of previous generations. Be gentle with yourselves as you evaluate your progress within each turn. Love and light shall be yours. It only requires your openness to receive. Once you receive it you will share it, and once you share it you will rejoice in its endless bounty.
Conversation with Jesus and TMichael on Sexuality in Western Society (Part 2)
TM: We left off in the first conversation talking about infidelity, divorce, and the role of guilt, shame and judgment within a heterosexual marriage (also monogamous relationship). What would you like to add to that part before we move on?
Master Jesus: What do you wish to know?
TM: Is there anything that husbands and wives, lovers, mates can do to better understand the contemporary shifts occurring around sexuality within their relationships that would help them provide more joy for themselves and their families?
Master Jesus: First of all, they can stop and recognize that there are many changes going on in Western culture and that as much as each one is a part of the shift each one is also affected by the shift. This requires compassion for all, even when one feels more affected and less the one producing the effects. This wouldn’t be so difficult if there weren’t so many changes occurring simultaneously in your society. The compounding of so much cultural shift is devastating to sensitive ones and challenging to everyone. There was a time when most people knew their place in society and knew the code of behavior that went with it. This has been disintegrating for some time now and it is blurry for most people.
This is why you see a severe clinging to groups and organizations that emphasize the ways of the past. It’s an effort to put the brakes on rapid changes. So, for those of you who feel changes are not happening quickly enough to satisfy your desires, have compassion for those who feel it is happening too quickly and they want relief from the compression of fear.
I can tell you the number of prayers that are uttered each day to slow down society’s speed of change and to return to better days. Also, I can tell you the number of ones that wish for it to speed up to get to the point of new awakening and joy. The goals are the same; both types want peace and joy in their lives. They have different tolerances and notions of how to get there. Have compassion for each other.
TM: So, what is the most significant change with sexuality between marriage/life mate partners?
Master Jesus: The most significant change will be equality between the genders. The imbalance of male dominance as the authority will give way to equality. This is not easy, as has been evidenced over the past one hundred years and more specifically in the past fifty years. Some men are reluctant to give up this power and some women are all too anxious to take it from them abruptly. It will work out steadily over time. There are a great number of people of both genders who embrace this and make it work in their daily lives even though they don’t see it routinely supported in society at large. That will change as more and more people shift into this mode and more examples and reinforcement are evident.
TM: What kind of time frame are you suggesting?
Master Jesus: I’m not suggesting a time frame, but pointing out the process. Time is shifting according to the acts and acceptance of all those beings in the process. Understand the process and where it is going and do what you can to support and encourage it with love and compassion for how difficult it is for everyone.
TM: To continue with heterosexual relations, is sexuality between men and women more about social adjustment right now rather than sex acts (physically speaking)?
Master Jesus: It always has been, it’s just more exaggerated now given the major shift we just discussed. There are the basic physical acts between partners and those are important in conveying intimacy, tenderness, comfort, passion, intensity, joy and an array of emotions that spring from each person and from togetherness. But sexuality is not confined to those acts and represents attraction on all levels. Whether or not this is registered, depends on the conscious awareness of the partners. In other words, there are energetic exchanges occurring on many levels and some people are aware and others are not.
You’ll witness the current interest in tantric sexual practices, which is an effort to connect to the many levels of consciousness available. The emotional level most people experience, but many still are blocked in this way. Others are primarily attracted to the mental level. These are represented by fantasy exploration and imaginative experimentation. The spiritual level is rarely if ever experienced by humans. Those who do experience it have a difficult time describing it to others because it is beyond your normal sensual range.
TM: Is the spiritual level more related to the emotional level?
Master Jesus: Yes, in that it is a hyper-feeling sensation. Yet it is beyond the one-to-one experience of the physical sex act; meaning that what many mystics reported in their experience of rapture, a feeling oneness with all, is closer to the reference.
