A universal assembly for true discernment
On Day 74, we saw that Love is life-awareness. The light is also life-awareness. Love, light and life-awareness are synonymous.
On Day 74, our tip said:
When NTI says that our Father is the extension of Love, it means that life-awareness is the only present reality. We are asked to see anything that isn’t love (life-awareness) as meaningless and valueless.
Since everything is life-awareness in reality, what isn’t life-awareness?
Mental interpretation isn’t life-awareness. We are to see mental interpretation as meaningless and valueless.
That is the essence of today’s reading too. Today’s reading teaches that everything is light. If we do not see only light, it is because we choose not to see it.
Some of us may think that we do want to see everything as life-awareness, but NTI is clear that if that were true, we would see that way. Since we don’t see that way, it means we don’t want it as much as we think we do.
This points to a core problem:
We may think we value truth,
but what we really value is our thinking.
Every time I believe a judgment in my mind about anyone or anything, I choose my thinking over truth.
Every time I think thinking is the answer to a problem I perceive, I choose my thinking over truth.
Every time I think I know or understand something based on my thinking and my past experience, I choose my thinking over truth.
This has been pointed out to us before. On Day 79, our tip said:
It’s important to be clear that if it were not for the mind, our truth would be obvious to us. This is important, because humans tend to value their mind above everything else that they value. That means that we put the obstacle to truth above everything else in our list of ‘What Is Important to Me’.
The false self is made up of thought. If we value our thinking, we value our false self.
What we truly are is freedom. If freedom chooses to value a false idea about itself, freedom sees falsely. That is the essence of freedom.
In order to see truly, we must value truth over falsehood. That means we must value the presence of life-awareness as everything over thinking, which defines everything differently.
When we look at the world, we often see people doing things that we think they shouldn’t do. We see people in situations and places that we think they shouldn’t be in. Interestingly, that is not how knowledge sees.
Knowledge sees the light in everyone and it sees everyone in the light, because knowledge knows only the light. When the light is all that is seen, there isn’t a judgment that someone is doing something they shouldn’t do or that they are in a situation or place they shouldn’t be in.
The only “mistake” that knowledge knows of is the mistake of not welcoming the light. In this case, mistake means “to misunderstand or misinterpret.” It can also mean “to identify wrongly,” but it doesn’t mean to do something one shouldn’t be doing or to be in a place or circumstance one shouldn’t be in.
Since knowledge sees the light in everyone and sees everyone in the light, the only “mistake” is misunderstanding reality, and the only “correction” is accepting reality as it is. Since one can accept this correction at any time, everyone is always in the right place. No one needs to go anywhere else or do anything differently.
I remember when I first became aware of John Sherman. His awakening came while he was in prison. During the interview that I was listening to, he explained that being in prison was the perfect place for him to be in order to realize truth. And then he looked at the interviewer and said, “And your life is the perfect life for you to realize truth.”
That’s how knowledge sees.
Who you think you are
separates you from
who you think you are not.
Who you think you are
provides you with
the opportunity to judge.
Who you think you are
is more than an experience.
It is a tool.
It is a tool that allows you
to continue to play
the game of separation.
Are you willing
to let go of
who you think you are?
~From our Holy Spirit
Today’s reading teaches that there is a direct correlation between how we see now and how we want to see. For some, this may be hard to read. Often people want to believe that their desire for truth is stronger than it is. However, we can see how strong our desire for truth is by looking at exactly how we see (and experience) now.
Why do we want to believe that our desire for truth is stronger than it is?
As we learned in NTI Luke, we believe that we are inherently guilty for seeing ourselves as separate individuals. We feel guilty for seeing ourselves as some thing, because that isn’t truth; life is what we are. Interestingly, seeing ourselves as guilty is an ego preservation strategy.
How is it an ego preservation strategy?
Seeing ourselves as guilty is seeing ourselves as something. In order to see ourselves (and everything else) as it is, we need to let go of all beliefs that we have about what we are. We also need to let go of all beliefs about what others are, what the world is and what the world is supposed to be.
Today’s reading says:
When a man welcomes the Light fully, he ceases to be a man, and he becomes the Light. For the Light is a presence that denies the existence of man. It knows only the Light. … To know the Light is to know eternity.
It is as Floyd Henderson wrote in his book, The Blissful Abidance Series:
The entire contents [of the mind] must be discarded if you would “fill the cup” with that which can bring you something with a taste that can be enjoyed. There is no other way than the way of emptiness first, fullness second…
When all learned ignorance is tossed, then everything that also accompanies ignorance will go. … You will have returned to Your original nature … You will have tasted the sweet taste of the nectar of immortality.
Michael Langford teaches that the most important first step you can take toward awakening in this lifetime is to increase your desire for awakening.
Michael Langford teaches, “another great key is self-honesty.” He writes:
Self-honesty will help in all aspects of the quest for liberation. Self-honesty will help you to increase your desire for liberation.
That means that in spite of the ego’s tendency to pretend that our desire for awakening is greater than it is, it is actually most helpful to be honest about our level of desire. When we pretend that our desire is greater than it is, we hold onto the repressed belief that we are guilty. When we are honest without guilt, we let go of the belief that we are guilty. That is letting go of one of the ego’s core preservation strategies.
Look at who you think you are,
and realize it isn’t true,
but do not deny it is what you think.
Look at it.
Who do you think you are?
How do you describe that?
Now,
after you have looked,
give willingness to see that you are wrong.
And give willingness
to discover
that being wrong
isn’t fearful.
~From our Holy Spirit
Yesterday’s tip pointed this out:
The wish to be something leads to identification with a specific body-mind-personality as ‘me,’ which leads to a distorted way of seeing—seeing form as primary and life as secondary. When the wish to be something dissolves, the distorted way of seeing dissolves too, and then we see life as primary and form as secondary. With this shift in the way we see, everything changes.
NTI John opens with a focus on light as primary. “Light” is the symbol for eternal, non-changing life, the essence. “Darkness” is the symbol of the ego’s distorted way of seeing form as primary.
The light is truth, so the light is always present. If we see with darkness instead of light, it is because we think we are something. Of course, that is how most humans see. One might wonder why any human ever awakens to the light. Why does anyone desire to know the light when the perspective of darkness is accepted as truth in the world?
The best answer to that question is simply that light is our truth—eternal life is what we are—and a belief that we are something cannot fully block truth. At some point, the truth begins to tug at our heart. If we follow its promptings, that tug grows stronger until we find ourselves driven to rediscover truth. That search is never futile, because everything is that which we seek, and it responds to our desire to see it (and ourselves) as it is.
It is as Michael Langford wrote in The Most Direct Means to Eternal Bliss:
In other words, the way to truth realization is to follow our desire for truth realization. If we follow our desire, and keep it foremost in our minds, everything else will happen naturally to bring us to awakening.
Today’s reading is the last chapter in NTI Luke. The “voice” of this book leaves us with a summary of Luke’s teaching before it drifts off so that another “voice” can come and teach us from another point-of-view.
NTI Luke has been primarily about purification, and so the summary leaves us with a reminder to practice the new habits we’ve been taught with our every breath until purification is complete. The next book that we go into will have a different emphasis, so let’s vow now that we will not forget Luke’s teachings as we move forward into a different reading.
Even though NTI Luke was primarily about purification of that which isn’t true, Luke ended its teaching with truth. Since the ego does not like truth, and those who have not yet completed purification are typically still identified with ego, Luke encourages us to continue to seek truth. Today’s reading says:
Bow your head and check your heart’s desire. Do you wish to be deceived? Do you wish to see what you have wished to see, or do you wish to see the truth?
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. To the ego, which is mental identification with form, form is primary and life is secondary. That’s why there appears to be death. If form is primary and life is secondary, when form ends, life ends.
However, this is ego’s distorted view based on ego’s wish—the wish to be something. Today’s reading promises that when we are free of this wish, we will also be free of ego’s distorted way of seeing. Instead of seeing form as primary and life as secondary, we will see life as primary and form as secondary. With this shift in the way we see, everything changes.
