Click the link below to read the minutes from this meeting.
(To learn more about the Member Board of Trustees, click here.)
Deal at Your Level of Awareness, by Liz Cronkite
Often when I answer in my newsletter/blog a question from someone experiencing an upset in their life they explain that they have tried and failed over and over again to forgive the situation as just a projected image in their mind. This effort would seem to be in line with A Course in Miracles but in practice it is not helpful. If your awareness has not grown to the point where you see something as just a projected image trying to forgive it leads to repression rather than to release (forgiveness).
What shows up at the level of form is the result of cause and effect at the level of form. The mind in which this occurs is the one split mind, which ACIM calls the “Son of God” or the “dreamer of the dream”. What you experience as “you” having the upset is a figure in the dream. Your mind is ultimately the one split mind (dreamer), but that is not how you experience it. You experience it as though it is the figure in the dream. And you have to deal with the thoughts in your mind at the level at which you experience them. It is not helpful to pretend you have an awareness that you have not yet attained. So my answers address how the writer experiences their problem at the level of form. I deal with their projected interpretation of what they see rather than with the image itself because their upset is in response to their interpretation, not to the actual image.
For example, sometimes I get emails where someone writes something like: “I just learned that my sister has stage 3 cancer. Since she is an image that I project I have tried and tried to forgive this but her cancer persists. I want to know what I’m doing wrong. How did I cause this? What thoughts do I have to forgive to heal her?”
At the level of form the writer is not responsible for all of the forms that she sees. She did not think her sister into cancer. Logically, how could that be? She does not live in a vacuum with her sister. What about everyone else in her sister’s life? Did they contribute to her having cancer also? If this were the case then everyone who ever saw the image of her sister would have to heal whatever it was in their mind that caused her cancer so that she could heal! And what about her sister’s own mind? Didn’t that contribute also? The writer is not responsible for the cancer but for what she tells herself about the cancer and its effect on her sister and her own life. These stories are what determine her experience of peace or conflict.
When you do rise in awareness and become aware that you do project what you see you are no longer identifying with the figure in the dream. You are the “dreamer of the dream”. You realize you are the one split mind and that you project the whole dream not just individual parts. And you also see that it is nothing. In other words, forgiveness and the awareness that you are the dreamer occur simultaneously. The “dreamer of the dream” is the level of awareness that is forgiveness. Until you have that awareness, concerning yourself with what shows up rather than just with the meaning (interpretation) that you project onto it only increases guilt. Form is still real to you and you think that it has meaning. So deal with undoing the meaning that you project onto the images that you see and eventually you will realize that what you see has no meaning in itself. It is nothing. All the meaning that you see you give to it. This will help you to see that there is no justification for guilt. And as guilt falls away your awareness will transcend the dream and forgive it.
Awakening Together Satsang with John Mark Stroud
John Mark has been guided by Yeshua’s direct communication with him, and brings together the essence of A Course of Love, The Way Of Mastery, A Course in Miracles. He had a major life changing awakening experience in 2011 after spending a month in India in an intense spiritual process. What he shares is authentic, alive, spontaneous, spirit guided and fitting for the present moment and the people that find themselves so fortunate to be around him.
John Mark’s website: onewhowakes.org
Weekly Gathering, 9/20/15
Dwelling in Spiritual Diligence
Rev Regina Dawn Akers uses the teachings of Buddha and John Lennon to help us see how we weave the dream by being lost in the present. We also look at Buddha’s simple suggestion for how to replace this old habit with new ones, so that we aren’t continuing as the dreamweaver.
Jane Polley-Bass reads Buddha’s Discourse on “Knowing the Better Way to Live Alone.”
Barbara Deurwaarder serves as the Sanctuary Administrator.
Satsang with John Mark Stroud – In the Sanctuary on Sunday, September 20 at 8pm ET
Join us in the Sanctuary this coming Sunday, September 20, at 8pm ET for Satsang with John Mark Stroud.
To help you get to know him before Sunday, here are some biographical excerpts from John Mark’s Website:
In early 2011, I experienced a spiritual awakening. It is sometimes referred to as Enlightenment. That experience deeply and radically changed my life. The months following the Enlightenment were spent in deep silence and stillness. Being a relative newcomer to the spiritual path, I also spent these months studying great teachings in order to place the awakening experience into a context that would allow the universal truth be communicated to all.
I offer here a brief summary of my life before the awakening.
In my mid twenties I had an experience, one that left me with a deep and dark sense of emptiness. … By 2007, I was no longer able to gloss over the emptiness that had been lurking in the back of my mind. It was time to face the truth. My marriage was deeply unhappy, I struggled to connect with my children, I was bored with my business, and the distractions of possessions and travel weren’t working anymore. I came to realize the emptiness was not going to go away, and nothing I could do or achieve was going to fill it. It was like a black hole. I decided that no matter what it took, I would find lasting happiness and peace. I finally was ready to turn toward the emptiness instead of avoiding it. I decided to dive into the darkness and despair with the same vigor and commitment that I had approached all my worldly activity. As was my nature, I went “all in.” I sold my business, and began the search.
Almost immediately, I was swept up in a tidal wave of synchronistic events that began to reveal to me in ever deepening ways, the reasons for and the nature of my unhappiness. For the next two years I was moved in ways that were far outside of my comfort zone. This dive into darkness was transforming despair into hope and healing. … I realized I was walking a spiritual path, a path to a destination as yet unknown, but one I would not attempt to avoid even if I had been able.
I attended a 10 day Vipassana meditation retreat. I understood deeply that I needed to learn to still and calm my mind. It was then that I truly began to dive deeply into my own mind. During that retreat that I had several of what I later learned were mystical experiences. Those experiences of revelation began a deep and profound inner shift in awareness. Soon after the mediation retreat I was guided to A Course in Miracles. I instantly recognized it contained the answers I had been seeking. It was as though life itself begin to move me, instead of me trying to control my life. With growing trust, I started surrendering ever deeper into the void and to the Force that was carrying me. That Force, often referred to in Christianity as the Holy Spirit, began to guide me toward awakening.
In December of 2010, I found myself on a month long sojourn to Oneness University in India. That thirty days was a continuous revelation of miracles. I began to see so clearly that the nature of my own suffering was the same for all of humanity. During the third week of that trip, I had an experience in meditation that I later came to understand was similar to the Buddha’s experience 2500 years before. The following week, while in a small red cab on the way the Chennai airport for my flight home, the full experience of Enlightenment descended upon me. It seemed to come out of nowhere and as an experience of light that goes beyond description. It was wordless, and it cast me beyond the mind and world of form. The very nature of reality or God was experienced directly. I was ALL of creation. I was everyone and everything that had ever been and it was all so beautiful and perfect. All of creation was being birthed within me in that very moment. I was creator and created all at once. … That experience deeply and profoundly shifted my consciousness to a simple moment to moment awareness of deep silence and stillness. That unchanging pure awareness became the very center of my being.
Click here for “Waking Up to the Movies” by John Mark Stroud
Join Us in the Sanctuary for 30 Minutes of Stillness & Rest – Prayer Circle, Every Thursday at 6pm ET
Prayer Circle is a wonderful time to come together in reverent silence and honor prayer requests from our members and friends.
When life is busy, we all need the refreshment of silence. Prayer Circle offers that opportunity at the end of the day, near the end of the week.
Make a cup of tea, or possibly light some incense, kick off your shoes, grab a comfortable throw blanket, and relax in stillness with us for thirty minutes, every Thursday at 6pm Eastern Time in the Awakening Together Sanctuary.
If you have a prayer request that you would like us to honor, please click here to let us know about it.
ACIM Conference in Las Vegas, April 8-10, 2016
Opportunity to Buy Tickets at the Pre-Launch Price of $449!
The 2016 ACIM Conference has not been formally launched yet. However, as one of the presenters at the conference, I have permission to offer you the opportunity to purchase tickets at a pre-launch discount price of $449.
Note: Once the conference is formally launched, the price will go up!
To get your tickets at the pre-lauch price of $449,
donate $100 using this Donation form
or call Community Miracles Center at (415) 621-2556.
Email: miracles@earthlink.net
Be sure to tell them you were inspired by Regina Dawn Akers & Awakening Together
to register for the Las Vegas ACIM conference.
List of Presenters:
Regina Dawn AkersJerry Cusimano
Candace Doyle and DavidPaul Doyle
Maria Felipe
David Fishman and Veronica Gabrielle Labarrie
Bill Free and Lisa Natoli
Mary Gerard Lenihan
Larry Glenz and Myron Jones
Jennifer Hadley
Jon Marc Hammer(Jayem)
Jon Marc Hammer(Jayem)
David Hoffmeister
Yasuko Kasaki
Greg Macki
Maureen Muldoon
Jon Mundy Ph.D.
Mari Perron
Tony Ponticello
Earl Raj Purdy
Amy Torres
James Twyman
Craig Villarrubia and Corinne Zupko
Conference price includes dinner on Friday evening, lunch & dinner on Saturday and brunch on Sunday. It also includes a live band, “The Unauthorized Rolling Stones” on Saturday night.
The Las Vegas conference will be held at the Rio All-Suite Hotel, an off-strip hotel with casino, pool, spa, fitness center, shows and more. (Room price is additional.)
Book Your Room Now
Want some inspiration?
This conference is a wonderful opportunity for a road trip. Whether you are traveling to Las Vegas from the north, south, east or west, there are many mystical places along the way. Although you can fly into Las Vegas, many of you may want to consider driving so you can enjoy the national parks and other magnificent and quiet places that surround Las Vegas.
9-20-16 Member Meeting Audio
In the third quarter member meeting, Regina shared:
- Update regarding our application for church status
- Full Disclosure – Financial Status Review
- Update regarding our upcoming 2015 Fall Retreat
- Introduction to John Mark Stroud, our guest teacher for online Satsang in the Sanctuary at 8pm ET on September 20
Coming to Know a Truth, by Hal Seeley
I have experienced a tumultuous few weeks being on a roller coaster of emotions and found myself becoming very skeptical of this whole idea of this world being a dream and that we are something other than what we appear to be. And as usual it was a good thing. I needed to reboot and start over as I have come to realize my spiritual foundation was faulty. I have been so focused on the end game, the final result, the big awakening, that I have been rushing down the path trying to get to the end and I became delusional. I hungered so much for an imagined result, I blinded myself to the fact the imagined result could not be found.
I was going over a lesson at the Trinfinity Academy site where Bentinho was saying that once we came to know that we are a Presence at all times apart from our seeming selves, then it becomes very obvious to us that we are eternal beings. I thought, how did he make that jump from the physical temporary body to the eternal being, for I certainly don’t see it? What I see is someone that has become aware of behavior patterns that brings anger and pain, has let them go, and is certainly leading a more peaceful life, but I am still a human being that has a finite existence here and do not have any feeling of being an infinite being. I thought, what did I miss here?
It took me a couple of journaling pages to finally arrive at a place where I found peace, and here is where I ended up:
My skepticism lead me to write down all the things I do know, the things I know are true and not future truths I am supposed to come to know. That left me with the question, “am I something other than what I appear to be, and if I am, how can I come to know this?” I thought about this question and I do sense a Presence within me and this is what I have to focus in on. I have to zero in on this Presence and see if it brings me to know if there is in fact a Being behind a veil that I have been told exists. This Presence feels so right it is hard to explain. It feels so right because it is not something I have convinced myself is true for I feel a Presence within and looking back on my life I have known of it all along. I sense that the more I stay with the Presence the less I will identify with this body. But it still leaves me with this body. Will it lead to seeing something I don’t see right now?
This is what I should have been doing all along, coming to know a truth, not accepting what someone else said is true, accepting it and convincing myself that by believing it I will arrive at the door of enlightenment. I realize now that my general feeling of discomfort was the signal telling me I had to take another look at things with my aspirations of awakening to the truth still in hand. I became skeptical and found the reason for my skepticism.
New Class Starts This Month: Jesus of the New Testament
This class is 4 weeks long.
For centuries, Christian mystics have awakened to truth by contemplating the teachings of Jesus as written in the New Testament. What did they see in his teachings that traditional Christianity has been unable to see? Contemplate scripture as the mystics have, and discover the answer for yourself.
In this class you will:
1. Become familiar with the life of Jesus as told in the New Testament.
2. Let inner discernment bring forth clarity.
Specific Information:
There are two class schedules available:
~ On Tuesday evenings, September 29 – October 20 from 7:30pm-9:30pm Eastern Time. Homework begins September 23. Facilitator: Jay McCormick, or
~ On Wednesday mornings, September 30 – October 21 from 10am-noon Eastern Time. Homework begins September 24. Facilitator: Regina Dawn Akers.
Cost is $80.
Textbook needed is any New Testament.
Class is offered in PalTalk. Familiarity with PalTalk is helpful.
Registration closes on September 22.
For more information on this class, click here.
Click to register
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