Today’s reading is a guided meditation. It is another attempt at Self-inquiry, this time coming at Self-inquiry from a different angle than NTI 2 Corinthians 12.

Today’s Self-inquiry focuses on feelings. As you read and practice today’s Self-inquiry, you will be led through five steps:

1. Take time to get quiet.
2. Ask to see the feelings that are within you. Notice the different feelings that arise.
3. Go deeper, still noticing feelings. In this step, you are looking for the feeling of ‘me.’ It has a distinctness  about it.
4. After you notice the feeling of ‘me,’ ask to see what is beyond that.
5. Allow yourself to experience that which is beyond ‘me.’

When you go through this meditation, you may notice a lot of different feelings at Step 2. Don’t rush through Step 2. When a feeling arises to be seen, notice it, acknowledge it, and then ask, “Is there something else here to be seen?” Stay with Step 2 until you feel you have fully experienced the feelings at this level.

The feeling of ‘me’ is a very interesting feeling. I have come to recognize it easily as an object—not as ‘me’ at all—but in the beginning that wasn’t the case. It was a feeling I lived with everyday and took for ‘me’ without ever looking at it directly. The first time I ever noticed it was during this meditation, and there was a strong pull to stop there. There was a strong idea that nothing was beyond it. That’s why the reading says:

You may seem to come to a very personal feeling. It may seem strong, like a wall. This feeling tells you that you are what you are not, so do not pause to listen to it.

I was guided not to listen to the idea that there was nothing beyond the feeling of  ‘me.’ I was guided to continue and discover what was beyond that “wall.”

This meditation taught me that the wall—the personal feeling of ‘me’—and all of the feelings I found before the wall were not me. The lighter, non-attached Self that I found beyond ‘me’ is what I am. You could say this meditation was my first successful Self-inquiry.

When you go through the reading today, read slowly. Pause and practice the steps as you go through them. Look at the feelings before the wall, notice the wall itself, and then go beyond it.

What is beyond that feeling of ‘me’?

If you can know that which is beyond the feeling of ‘me,’ can you be that ‘me’?

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link.

Today, we are taught to investigate so we can discover if we are praying for truth or illusion through our daily living.

If you are reading NTI, then you have been called to awaken. Your purpose now is truth. If truth wasn’t your purpose, NTI could not hold your interest. However, your prior purpose was illusion. That isn’t a judgment. Consciousness as a whole chose illusion when it created the creative principle and made manifestation. But now, there is a return motion—returning to truth realization—and you have been called into that motion. Truth realization is the purpose you have been called to accept, and you have accepted it, which is why you read NTI.

Since illusion was your prior purpose, you are in the habit of praying for illusion. That is the same as saying that you are attached to the world. It is also the same as saying you are in the habit of believing the world, your thoughts and your emotions.

It’s time now to begin living from a new motive. So, starting today, you will observe yourself to find where you are in the habit of living from the wish for illusion, and you will shift your way of being  so that you live from the desire for truth. Living from the desire for truth is being in the world but not of it.

Since action is the expression of thought, NTI asks us to watch the body to learn which motive we live from, truth or illusion. We can tell which motive we live from if we watch the body without judgment, because the body’s action is the physical representation of a motive.

For example:

If you find yourself getting upset, believing your upset and acting out from your upset, you live from the wish for illusion.

If you find yourself getting upset, taking a break from the situation, practicing rest-accept-trust and possibly journaling to learn more about your upset, you live from the desire for truth.

Here’s another example:

If you are worried that the stock market will crash, you lose lots of sleep worrying about it, you call the stockbroker and move all of your investments to cash accounts, and then you find yourself laying awake all night worrying that you made a mistake, you live from the wish for illusion.

If you notice a thought that the stock market will crash, ask within if you are to do anything, do or not do based on what you feel intuitively, and then forget about it, you live from the desire for truth.

I could write examples all day, because there are many. However, you don’t need me to describe every possible scenario. As today’s reading says:

When you observe the body with the purpose of learning, you do not observe alone. The One who knows you and teaches you observes with you so you may learn. Call on this One and ask Him your questions. He will lead you to find answers, for His purpose is the same as yours.

What do you do if you observe the body and find that you are living from the wish for illusion? Make a correction. Bring more spiritual practice into your daily living. You know the purpose you’ve accepted. There isn’t really a question about that anymore, so now do your best to live from that motive instead of from old habits.

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link.