Can I learn how to channel?

The short answer to this question is yes, anyone can learn to channel. The first extension to that response comes in the form of another question. Why do you wish to channel? Let’s talk about what this channeling is. I would describe it as directly hearing Spirit’s Voice. It is your job as a human desiring to awaken to learn how to hear Spirit speak within you. That is everyone’s job, a task that you will all eventually master. It may or may not be your job to share that with others. That is none of your business. That is up to Spirit’s plan; it is My business. If you have a desire to be a channel for others, if that is a goal, know that that comes from the ego. That wish sprouts from the ego need to prove that your separate individual self has some special value. This stems from your imagined separation from God, your fear of God, and your hope that some specialness on your part might invite His forgiveness and that you could now be welcomed home. As we have mentioned many times before, all of this is absolutely crazy and unnecessary. The only separation that exists between you and God, between you and Divinity, between you and Heaven is in your imagination. Your return home is a consequence of your self-forgiveness, not any choice of God’s. If your intention is to channel – even if you were to have some success – the focus of the channeling would be to maintain the separation. Your ego mind is not capable of truly choosing to return home; it will always hold the illusion of separation. However, you can still set the intention to return home and ask Me to intervene. And if I wish to come through you as a channel as a part of your return, I will do just that.

Let’s take a little detour. Some people have approached Michael about their desire to channel as he does, perhaps channeling Me. They ask for guidance in doing this, or in some cases believe they can just step in and begin. I would like to tell you some of the story about the channeling I do through Michael. To begin with, this was an agreement made before Michael began the illusion of this incarnation, though he did not consciously remember this promise. However, I often whispered in his ear and he was open to the spiritual direction in which I was guiding him, though he was often quite confused and had no idea where it would lead. I exposed him to the idea of channeling through books about channels and books that were channeled. He became aware that some of the best information available was channeled, though certainly that was no guarantee of quality. I put him in the physical presence of people who were channeling. Nowhere through any of this did Michael have a conscious intention to channel nor did he have any belief that he was a person who could channel. Quite the opposite was the case; he did not consider himself to be intuitive or to be in possession of “psychic” abilities. What happened was that I continued to speak into his ear and he heard me without any idea where the voice was coming from and followed the guidance as it came. He took steps that the mass consciousness of the world considered as absolutely insane. He accepted, though not without resistance, what I brought to him. I don’t tell this story to in any way suggest that Michael is special. He was simply keeping his word with me, holding to – despite fears and uncertainties – the pact that he was barely conscious of, following a course that he was constantly surprised by.

I told Michael as much as he could receive at any given point. Though it sometimes felt to him  that it was a little bit too much, I only stretched but never broke him. I know exactly what is necessary at each stage. The stretching is required for there to be opening, for the awakening process to progress. When it was time to stretch him into an awareness that he was actually channeling – something that had felt to him to be just a conversation in his mind – I asked him if was willing to let me come through. He asked “Who?” I replied, “I think you know.” He responded, “Sanhia?” I never answered the question, but simply repeated, “Will you let me through?” Though he wasn’t absolutely certain I had answered his question, he assumed that I had and that allowed him to say, “Yes, but I don’t know how to do that”. And it went from there. At that time it was an enormous stretch for him to accept that he was channeling the ascended master Sanhia with the accompanying stories of the Apache lifetime where Sanhia ascended and his previous incarnation as the disciple Thomas in the Jesus lifetime. These stories were not actually true because none of the stories in the illusion are true, but they have their value. If I had said to Michael as we began our conscious channeling activity that this is Spirit speaking to you and through you, this is the Divine Voice, it would have been more than he could have handled. He had his hands full trusting that he was channeling Sanhia. In the beginning My message was diluted because Michael was not ready for the full power of God to come through. That time has passed. It is time to come fully out of the closet. This is and always has been the Voice of Spirit. You may continue to refer to me as Sanhia. It makes no difference. This is the voice of Spirit coming to you. As I speak, Michael doesn’t exist. There is only this Divine Voice guiding you home, a beacon, a lighthouse. I am speaking in this manner through Michael because he agreed to it and has now fully surrendered to allowing My expression. That is his job. He is happy to do it. He performs this task, now, fearlessly. He has no other function and is aware of that.

This is something that is there for each one of you. I am constantly speaking to each of you. You have the choice to listen or not (as you have done for lifetimes). There is no problem if you can’t hear me within yourself. Ultimately you will. If you are hearing/listening to what I am saying, you have the choice to follow or not. Channeling ultimately entails the willingness to listen and the courage to follow, nothing more, nothing less. This does not mean that you will operate in the way that Michael does. You will be led to your unique expression. I will use you to touch others, as you are being touched now. How that will be is none of your business. That is My job. Your job is only to surrender, to allow yourself to be led. Any fear you have of surrendering and to giving up the idea that you know what to do comes from the ego. This is not a battle between Me and your ego. There can be no conflict between truth and illusion. As you listen to and accept truth, illusion simply disappears. As you develop your ability to channel me and to follow my guidance, the voice of ego will grow dimmer and dimmer.

The form that the communication with me will take will vary for each of you. For some of you it may be more visual or using other senses than the verbal. What will be consistent for all is that the message you receive will pass the test of truth. If anything that you are receiving is fear provoking or causes pain or a feeling of separation, it is not fully Me you are channeling. This is not to say that you won’t ever have fear about following the guidance. At any rate offer the fear or confusion up to Me and ask for help in seeing the truth. That truth is always centered in the absolute and unconditional love of God, in the Divine. It is always about your total innocence, that you have done nothing wrong and could not do anything wrong. There is never anything to forgive. You are the Divine Child of God. When My Voice reaches you, it will reinforce all of that. Anything outside of that is not My Voice. Ask Me to lift you up so that We can look down at the illusion together and see the truth. My guidance will always lead you to your next step.

None of this matters. None of the experiences you are having have any value, except as support in your awakening process. If you think anything does matter, ask for support in seeing that it doesn’t, and in seeing what does. You all will become channels of love and truth through Me. It can be no other way. Let go of any thought that it should appear in a certain way or at a particular time. Release any thought that you should be a “channel” for others and simply channel the messages that are for you. I will take care of everything else.

Good Now

Sanhia/Spirit

Is there a difference between awakening and ascension?

This question has come up recently. We have been using the term awakening quite a bit lately. People are wondering if that word means the same thing as ascension. Are the terms interchangeable? I can understand the confusion, and it is time to clear things up. Not only will we clarify the information, but we will give you some valuable insights that I have not previously presented. Now it is time for you to receive them. We dealt with this question some years ago using still different terminology and I highly recommend that you click here to read that message as it provides good information on this subject without specifically focusing on most of what I have to say now. So, with no further ado, let’s speak of awakening and ascension. In that previous message we used the term enlightenment.  We’ll deal with that word right now so that our focus can be limited to the two terms in the title. Enlightenment and awakening are synonyms. They have the same general meaning as I use them. You are welcome to substitute the word enlightenment any time I say awakening, but I will only use the latter term for the rest of this message.

Now, let’s go back to the beginning. In this process of dealing with the subject of pure non-duality – the realization that any time we are dealing with opposites we are dealing with illusion, with things that are not real in that they do not pass the test of foreverness – we are dealing with questions of truth or untruth. In truth there is Oneness. Of course it goes without saying – though I am saying it anyway and have said it before – we are using words here and words never express the truth. They are by nature dualistic because your reasoning mind can only work in the realm of separation. When we speak of Spirit and ego, we are speaking dualistically as if these are two different things that truly exist, when in truth only Spirit exists. Spirit is connected to the Divine and ego is not. This process that we are talking about in using the terms awakening and ascension has two steps. This is the new information for you, or at least for most of you. The first step is what we have often been dealing with in these messages. That is the letting go of the ego. This process is what we have been calling awakening. When you are awakened you are in an ego-free state. This means that you have no attachments; you no longer hold people or things as special; you have no personal goals; you have no horse in the race – whatever happens is perfect. What you do is to simply listen to your inner guidance, to Spirit, and follow it in absolute trust and love without a need for understanding. When the ego is dropped there is no judgment, no competition, and no right and wrong; there is only love.

Let’s go deeper into what this ego-free state is like. I won’t cover all of the many questions you might have about it, so feel free to send any that linger with you to Michael and we will visit them in future messages. When you are in this awakened state there is nothing that limits you. This physical illusion is now your playground instead of your classroom. You know that whatever happens is perfect, so the thought of anything possibly being upsetting to you is insanity. It does not compute. It will not happen. You know that everything that does happen is on purpose and as it should be. Your part is to play your role, following your guidance, doing something that will be a joy for you. You know what to do because you feel guided. You are being told what to do, but there is no separation between you and the guiding Spirit. Your wills are one. That is non-dualistic. There is no limit to the possibilities of what different services you may be asked to perform. You might be teaching others through your words, written or spoken. You might be led to artistic expressions. You might be building things or growing things. Again, there are no limits to what you may be inspired to, other than you will be filled with love and joy in the doing. Results will not matter; only the doing itself has value for you.

You may be wondering how long this ego-free state goes on for. The answer to that is up to the Divine. We will say that as you are performing the services that Spirit is asking of you, which you are doing with love and joy, you are still aware of yourself. You notice the world. You have consciousness, even though the ego has disappeared. There is the observer and the observed. You are in an in-between state. Perhaps we could say that you are not ruled by dualism, yet you do not have the full experience of Oneness. It is not possible to have a self and to be One at the same time, so your non-dualism cannot be pure. You are still experiencing separation from God. The longer you are in this state of egoless self, the more you will feel the separation blurring. As you do all of these Spirit inspired things you will gradually realize there is less that you are motivated to do in the illusion. Ultimately, you come to the second step which is the letting go of the self. When this occurs you no longer have an identity; you no longer have consciousness. There is no you remaining that can observe. You are One with all, One with God.  There is no longer a physical experience, a body.

There is an important understanding that accompanies the two step ascension process of first dropping the ego, and second dropping the self. Some of you have been afraid to drop the ego because you thought that ascension was in one step. You feared that dropping the ego meant you would immediately – poof! – leave your body, the world, everything! But that is not the case. When you awaken, everything is still there, except the ego. You are now experiencing the illusion without an ego. That’s it! Then you will have a long run – or a short run, depending on what Spirit has in mind for you – of playing with the illusion from an egoless perspective until you are complete with that. You cannot be forced into letting go of the self, nor can you force it to happen. You will stay and play in the illusion until you have had your fill. What we call ascension is the point where you willingly and through the grace of God let go of the self. Then the illusion absolutely disappears. There is no separate consciousness, and you are One with God. Of course the truth is that you are already One with God, even as you are experiencing the illusion of a separate self and an ego, but that hasn’t been a part of your conscious awareness.

In the awakened level of letting go of the ego, you know that it is all an illusion so you are able to play in it without attachment to anything. In the second level, or ascension, there is no more you. You have let go of the self, of consciousness of any separate awareness. Both of these ascension steps happen with the grace of God. Your ego will not choose to let itself go, so you ask Spirit to do that for you. You, therefore, cannot control the timing, though you can maintain a clear focus and continually face the untruths you are holding. Your awakened self also cannot decide to let go of itself because that would be an act of consciousness. Only Divine energy can dissolve that illusion of separation to allow the self to be submerged into the Oneness. It is analogous to falling asleep. You cannot will yourself into sleep. The more you try to sleep, the more you will remain awake.  Sleep comes when you let go, which allows it to happen. When you have left the ego, your awakened self may still have a lot to do. Let it run its course. Your ascension occurs when the self has nothing left to do and can let go, simultaneously free of any need to stay or to leave. When this happens, we call it “by the grace of God”. This was demonstrated by Jesus. This was not demonstrated by the Buddha, though he did demonstrate awakening.

We have today, and in all of the messages talked about the egoless experience, how to achieve it and what it is like. To talk about the self-less experience is not possible. There is nothing I could say that would give you the remotest feeling for what the Divine experience is, not even a sniff. I have given the following analogy before. It has been said that the human mind only uses five per cent of its potential. What would the experience of using the full potential be? The awakened egoless self has a similar relationship with the experience of the Divine. Notice we’re not even bringing the ego consciousness level into this equation. And in saying that the awakened self experiences only 5 percent of the ecstasy of Divinity, we are being very generous. When the self has a “divine” experience, this a projection of the self, not a true experience of the Divine. The most glorious earthly experience with perfect weather, fantastic nature, smells, sights, sounds, loving people, and the feeling of a divine connection with God would, from the Divine perspective, be a descent into hell. The highest dualistic heaven would be experienced as hell by the Divine. So much for your ego attempts to create heaven on earth.

For most of you reading this, the information about leaving the self is academic. Your work is in leaving the ego. If there is anyone in the audience who is egoless, your job is to enjoy creating in that place as long as you are so inspired.  Leaving the self is not a focus of any importance. Back to the rest of you, there will likely be a gradual transition where you are less and less influenced by your ego and more and more listening to the guidance of Spirit. If you still can get upset, there is work remaining. Again the final letting go of ego is through grace, not your efforts. It is not earned, but there is clear intention. For all there is never a rush. Everything happens in Divine time and order. Go set your alarms for awakening, but without selecting a time.

Good Now

Sanhia

Do I have to surrender my personal identity in order to ascend?

In the past few messages we have talked a little about the subject of one’s personal identity, the sense of self. The questions come flying in, “Sanhia, do you mean that I have to give up my identity, my individuality, my self if I want to wake up and to ascend?” First, take a deep breath…..relax….. We will start by taking the “have to” out of the equation. There is no force here, no coercion. You are free to hold on to anything you wish to hold on to. This is not to say that there are not consequences with your choices. Remember that this is an illusion. This world and the identity that you hold are absolutely your creation. Within your dream you are free to create any way that you want. For each and every one of you the day will come when you choose freely to let go of your personal identity, as each of you will wake up to the truth of your innocence and divinity. Because time is a part of this illusion, how long this will take is just a part of the dream. Time doesn’t exist. In awakening, all of this disappears. None of it ever happened. It isn’t happening now. This is but a dream and the truth of you is home with God.

Let’s return to the beginning, to the crazy, mad idea that you entertained for a moment, but forgot to laugh at. You played with the idea that you could have an identity separate from God, that you could be the creator of yourself. You thought you could choose whatever you wanted, creating your own separate existence. That was the idea, the plan. It was a mad idea, not mad as in angry, but mad as in absolute loony bin crazy. It is simply not possible for you to create yourself. All is created by God in the image of God. There could be nothing existing outside of God. That would be inconceivable, impossible. The only way that you could create this self, this individuality – which eventually became a physical universe and bodies – was in your mind, in your dreams. It could exist only as a thought, not as a reality. That is how it stands right now. Your body and this world are just a dream in your mind. You want to project, to pretend that something outside of you has created your self and this universe. Then you want to blame God for everything. Why did you create this horrible universe with all of its pain and suffering, and this body which just gets sick and dies? Why, why, why did you do that God? God didn’t do that. You did that. Of course, since nothing here is real, you didn’t do anything. Perhaps you don’t want to face up to blaming God. In that case you merely project all of the problems onto whatever scapegoats you can find: parents, exes, bosses, politicians, the wealthy, the poor, and so on. As long as you live in the world of projection, victimhood, and denial, you will suffer, experiencing pain and discomfort. Finally your physical body dies. You find yourself with another body and another body and….seem to be trapped endlessly in the illusion of time. The only way to wake up from this cycle is to take responsibility, to realize that you are the cause. You are the god of your nightmare. The good news is that it is nothing more than that. It is just a bad dream and you will wake up. And that nightmare will just be gone.

You will each slowly grow tired of the pain and suffering of being human, of having a personal identity. You will grow tired of it. You will ask to be shown something else. You know there must be another way. That opens the door to Spirit to guide you home. Spirit will remind you that you are not a victim to anything, that it is all your creation and you can stop this miscreation anytime you choose to. But, you can’t have your cake and eat it too. You can’t say that you want to let go of the illusion, but still hold on to being you. You can’t let go of the illusion and experience your Oneness with God and at the same time hold on to your personal identity which keeps you feeling separate from God. If you hold on to your individuality you have to keep the whole shooting match along with it. Letting go of the illusion will require relinquishing your individual self, because it is part of the illusion. It is not you. It is not the truth of who you are. Part of the good news is that the truth of you is so far above and beyond the limits and poverty inherent in your personal identity, that you would have to be crazy to hold on to your individual self when you could be experiencing your Divine nature. That statement is redundant, because holding on to your separated self is an act of craziness. It is that mad idea that you could create separately from God that made possible your illusion of an individual self.

Let’s come back to this idea that you have guilt because you believe that you “killed” God and now He is seeking revenge as we discussed in the previous message. That is the deepest, though usually unconscious, fear that you have, one that perhaps you have done some work with during the last month. If not, eventually you will face this fear and guilt. Almost as deep and all encompassing, but more conscious for most of you, is the fear that without your personal identity you would not exist. You would simply disappear. You are like the river becoming one with the ocean or the drop of water becoming one with the stream. Does that drop of water cease to exist? It has become part of the oneness of the ocean, no longer having a separate existence. The fear that you hold as an individual is that you don’t exist separate from your identity. It is connected to the belief that you are your body, so that when your body dies, that’s it. You are gone. But, it is even bigger than that. You might have a trust and faith that when this body dies, you will come back in another body. Perhaps you are able to move into altered states and remember some of these different dreams in different bodies. Your ego may have pride in some of them and there might be speculations about those still to come. All of these thoughts about reincarnation still hold on to the idea of a continuity of the individual self. The idea of absolutely surrendering your separate identity is terrifying. That’s why it is never forced on anyone. It is not Spirit’s job to terrify people. You have enough fear on your plate already. We don’t need to add to it. It’s fine. Hold on to your personal self as long you wish to. Squeeze as much joy and pleasure as you can out of it, midst the tears and fears. It will be fully your choice when the price is no longer worth it for the pleasure that can be obtained. Sooner or later you will make that choice, but it will be your choice.

For those of you who are ready to begin moving in that direction – and I say “begin” because you can’t make that jump all at once; it is like leaping over the Grand Canyon; it’s too big, too enormous – you will do it step by step. Each time you notice yourself with judgment, anger, victimhood, or guilt – bring that to Spirit. Ask for help recognizing that what you are experiencing is an illusion, that there is nothing to fear, that you are not a victim of anything, that you are the innocent Divine Child of God. Ask for help in remembering all of that and each time you do that you chisel off a little piece of your separate identity. The more you chisel off, the less identity remains, the easier it is to let go of still more, the easier it is to recognize the ego’s separation choice and the pain it brings. The more you become aware of the pain of separation as you experience it and the unnecessariness of having that pain – that you are not being forced to suffer, that it always comes from your guilt, from your choice – the easier and easier it becomes to bring each of those moments to Spirit and to release them. That’s all you have to do. You don’t have to figure out how to let go of your identity. All that is needed is for you to bring each illusion to Spirit as you are aware of it. Spirit will take care of the rest.

One thing that helps hold you in your personal identity is having a sense of importance, believing that you have a significant role to play. It may seem that you are here to help to create heaven on earth in some way – to make the world a better place – or that you are here as a savior to help others; perhaps it is that you have a special gift to share. This is a way your ego tricks you into valuing your personal identity. If you, in separation from God, think that you can help others, you are absolutely hearing the voice of your ego. In separation from God all you can help others to do is to maintain their belief in their own separation from God. You are helping them to hold on to their pain and suffering. If you think you are doing God’s work here, the kindest thing I can think to say is that you don’t have a clue. God does not need you; you need God. Save yourself. That is all you can do. If you want to help others, then do whatever you can do to extricate yourself from this hellhole of a nightmare. Wake up! If you are staying here to help others, what you are teaching is martyrdom. If there is any part for you to play in the awakening of your fellow dreamers, it will not happen out of you consciously knowing and choosing the right thing to do or to say to another. It will come through your absolute surrender to Spirit. That means that you give up your personal will, recognizing that your will and God’s will are one. You allow God’s will to work through you, hearing His guidance. That can be tricky. Your ego can easily convince you that it is God speaking, that you are God’s favorite, the chosen one who is to act for him. If you have a plan, it is yours: it is of the ego. Spirit will speak through you in the moment. Spirit’s use of you will feel spontaneous. You won’t think about what you are going to say. It will simply come through. If it is truly of Spirit and not from your separate self, you will have no attachment to how it will be received or to what the larger plan is. Your job will be simply to deliver the mail, not to decide on the importance of the contents or how the receiver should act upon opening (or not opening) it. You are just the middle man, a delivery vehicle where you set aside your separate self and allow the Oneness of God to speak through you. If you are in doubt about the purity of your transmission, then the ego is likely involved, either in the transmission itself or in casting doubt about your ability to surrender and trust. Let it go and bring your doubt and fear to Spirit and receive whatever comes from that.

I will guarantee you one thing. Letting go of your personal identity and taking on your true identity as the innocent, unconditionally loved Son of God is such a trade up in experience that the difference is immeasurable. It is in the scope of the infinite. Those of you who are in the process of letting go of your ego and of victimhood, of letting go of pain and suffering and guilt are beginning to feel what I am talking about. But you are getting just a taste, just enough that you could never choose to reverse course and go back to just listening to your ego. There are always those days when you feel that you have moved absolutely in retrograde, rather than inching slowly forward. That’s okay. When you have clutched onto your personal identity for so long and valued it so highly, it will usually only leave accompanied by much screaming and kicking. This transformation will not take just a few days or even, probably, just a few years. That’s okay. It is not your job to be perfect. Remember that nothing that happens here will be remembered. It is not that important. Your only job is to take the next little step. Spirit will take care of the rest.

Good Now

Sanhia

How do I deal with my fear of death?

There is a popular saying that goes, “There is nothing certain but death and taxes”. Within the illusion we would agree that death is certain. Taxes….well….perhaps they are also, unless you can figure out how to avoid them. Just kidding…it is not possible to avoid them all without marooning yourself on a deserted island. We are going to look at death a little differently today. Most of you have a fear of death. I want to question the way that you look upon death and ask you to entertain the possibility that you truly hold more of an attraction toward death than a terror of it. You might be racking your brain right now and come up with the thought that at least those who commit suicide must feel some attraction to death, since they have made that choice. Perhaps you are questioning where the attraction is for those who seem to die from accidents, disease, old age, violence, war, and so on. I want to remind you that all death is suicide. It is all chosen. There are never victims.

So why – let us say you are willing to give me a little rope here to hang myself – would people want to kill themselves? Now we are starting to get somewhere. We will return, as we have done several times over recent messages, to what could be called the “origin story”. This is where you had the crazy, mad idea that it would be fun to create an identity, an individuality that was separate from God. This of course was not possible, it was just an idea – it never really happened; it is just a dream you find yourself in the midst of, believing it is real. You have no conscious memory of this creation, but what you thought at the time was that you killed God and took His place. Instead of God being your creator, you held yourself as your own creator of the new individual you, and as the creator of your experience. Now this means that you came into this illusory experience with blood on your hands. You believed that you had killed God. Spirit has a good laugh at this idea; it is a funny concept. However, God is all there is. God is the Creator and Isness of all and could not be destroyed, nor could anything be created outside of Him. But, you convinced yourself that you had actually carried out this violent revolution. You then created these bodies and this physical universe to disappear into. You covered your trail with a figurative branch of leaves to hide your tracks, not just from God, but from yourself. So now you fully believe that you are just these bodies, that you actually are these humans, and that this dream is real. In addition, you covered your tracks so well that you are in denial that you think you killed God. That guilt is just too scary, so you either project it on others (Jesus killers!) or naively go on killing Him (there is no God).

At the same time, deep inside you in your mind that is one with the Mind of God, you know that this murder did not happen. Your true mind knows that you are One with God and that you are Divine; that part of your mind – which we will call Spirit – does guide you and will eventually lead you back home out of the dream. However, the louder part of your mind – which initially came up with this crazy, mad idea and which we call the ego – encourages you to hold guilty over this patricide. “You only exist,” says the ego mind, “because you successfully killed God.” Your true mind knows that this murder was simply not possible. The ego mind provides the additional fear that you only tried to kill God, but he is still ALIVE! And he is coming after you!! Out of this guilt and fear you have created a body that is not really such a hot item. You may complain about companies that sell products with planned obsolescence, things designed to fail or become outdated, so that you have to buy a replacement product. That is just the kind of body you designed. It is designed to break down and die. Bodies are programmed to get sick, broken, old, and finally stop working altogether. Not to speak of the world you set it up to “live” in, which is certainly less than ideal much of the time. The bad news from this ego point of view is that death is certain. But the ego mind has also convinced you that death is necessary in order that you could possibly be forgiven by God. Maybe by losing this “life” you stole from God, He will forgive you. In a more perverse turn, your “death” proves that you are “alive” and have a separate existence. To the ego mind, without death you have no individual life. At any rate the deep fear is that God will get his revenge because He is more powerful than you. And so the insane lead the insane. God has already and has always forgiven you. There was never any judgment to begin with, nothing to forgive. You could not possibly have killed God. He has no part in this nightmare of yours and only sees your Divine presence. The part of you that is in the dream really wants to wake up.

The attraction to death is one part a hope for God’s forgiveness and one part a hope for help in waking up. But these are mostly not conscious thoughts. It’s also one part desire to get out of the hellhole you have created. Death can appear to be an escape from your pain and suffering. The truth is that the body is not real. There is no such thing as death. Life and death are not opposites. Death does not exist; it is just a part of the illusion. Only life exists. Anything that can die or end or change is not real. It has no life. Again, the body is not real, so it has no life. This event that you call death is something that has never happened and could not ever happen. Only form changes and form is not real. All form is illusory. That’s why we call the body and death illusions. You have set up this illusion so that it is necessary to die. In the illusion it may appear that you get another body and play this game again, and again, and again. Meanwhile the truth of you simply is. The human you has two choices. You can listen to Spirit about death or you can listen to ego about death. Ego tells you that death is either something to fear or to welcome, that it is necessary and inevitable. Accompanying the ego picture is the terror of absolute nonexistence, the fear that there is no continuation of you after the body dies. For many humans, that is the belief. That’s all folks. Poof! It’s over. Finito. End of story. Ego tells you that who you are is your body. From that point of view you begin at birth (or in utero) and then you are busy dying. You are on a trajectory, and the bull’s eye is death. This is what happens in the illusion of believing that you have a separate identity. A separate identity means you are separate from God. God is Life, which leaves you with what? Sooner or later the separate identity has to die. The whole idea of having a body is centered on death. Death gives the body meaning. That is why you have an attraction to death. Without death, the body has no meaning. You may have heard people say, or perhaps thought yourself that death is what makes life worth living.

Spirit, on the other hand, reminds you that you are not your body and beyond that, you are not a separate identity. You are One with God. You are One with each other. You are One with Spirit. All that can die is the separate identity, the dream. You cannot die because you are alive. You are created by God in the image of God. You simply are. There is no time; there is no space; there is no physicality. You simply are. Your only job while having the experience of being in a separate body is to wake up to the truth of Who you are. When you fully awaken there is no longer any function in having the illusion of a body. It might look to the world as if you have died, but for your consciousness it is awakening; it is ascension. It is leaving behind the illusion and personal identity, and consciously accepting your true place as the Son – One with God. Each one of you will do this.

Part of the good news is that it makes absolutely no difference if you die, because death is not real, your body is not real. The truth of you always exists. Perhaps part of the illusion seems to be the creation of another body, but that will not be any more real than the one you let go of. The only thing that is certain is that at some point in the illusion your eyes will pop open and you will go, “Holy shit! None of this is real.” And you will absolutely know it. You will absolutely know Who you are, that you are innocent and forgiven and unconditionally loved. There is no fear; there is no pain. There is no death. Death is just a part of the classroom that you are in. When you come to an absolute peace with death, neither feeling fear nor attraction, you are free. It doesn’t matter anymore. It doesn’t matter what happens to you or to anyone else. In the meantime, as you are working with your “death” energy, look around. Notice where you see victimhood connected with death: victims of Corona, victims of pollution, victims of substance abuse, victims of physical violence and war, victims of cancer. Wherever you see this victimhood, recognize it for what it is, that in each case the individual has chosen death – they have an attraction to the death process. If any of this is troubling to you, then you too have a similar attraction. Knowing that, you bring your victimhood and your fear/attraction of/to death to Spirit. You keep bringing it back every time it pops up. You ask to see death and victimhood through Spirit’s eyes rather than those of the ego. For those who in the illusion of your life have died…let them go. The truth of them was never who you held them as being, whether it was mother/father, son/daughter, brother/sister, spouse, or friend. That was not who they were; it was a part of the false personal identity of separation. Holding them in that earthly role is holding you in your role as a human, dealing with death, and in pain and suffering with just enough pleasure to keep you hooked into the cycle. On the other hand, as you are able to let go of this fear/attraction relationship with death you will find your time in a body to be increasingly peaceful, loving, and safe. If the meaning of life for humans is eventual death and you have no fear of death, then “life” as you have known it has no meaning. If staying alive no longer matters, how can anything else be of true value? What a step into awakening is provided by the realization that the only reason for anything in your so-called life is to help you wake up.

In conclusion, your job is to heal your issues with death. Deal with the guilt you feel for believing you killed God in order to have life, and come to terms with having hidden that belief. Your job is to remember that life and death are not opposites; they are mutually exclusive. You cannot have them both together. Life is eternal and true. Death is an illusion, having no reality. You do not lose your life when you die because your body is not alive. Your eventual awakening may not mean that you will immediately leave your body to die in the eyes of the world and abandon your separate identity. You may stay in a body for an indefinite period, with the awareness that none of it is real, as Spirit uses you as a pawn in Its plan for waking all of the Sonship. This never means that you ask Spirit for support in guiding another. Such a request can only come from the ego. Healing others is not yours to do. Recognize that your desire to help another is always your call for help and take your cry for help to Spirit. In an awakened state, Spirit will simply use you. This does not come from a place of a separate you knowing what should be said or done. You surrender fully to Spirit and are guided. It’s none of your business. Whether you stay in the illusion upon awakening or leave it is also not your call. Your only part as a seemingly separate individual is to wake up. Awake, you can have no thought separate from Spirit. I’ll set the alarm for you.

Good Now

Sanhia

Is the ego part of me or is it separate?

We talk about the ego a lot. People are sometimes a little confused about what the ego actually is. Is it a real entity? Is it like the Christian devil? Is it something outside of us or inside of us? These are all very good questions. We will start by saying that the ego is neither inside you nor outside you because, in truth, it does not exist. Neither do you, not the part you think of as an individual and separate from others. The ego has existence only in the sense that the world has existence, and your physical body exists. It is part of the dream. We could say that the birth of the ego was that single crazy, mad thought that came into the mind of the Son of God that said “Maybe we could create something separate from God”. For an instant that idea flashed through and the mind of the Son of God entertained it. The thought was absolutely insane, impossible. Nothing can exist outside of God. Part of the Son’s mind found the idea to be fun and wanted to run with it. A second part of the mind of the Son recognized the insanity and dismissed the thought immediately. Since the idea was not possible, it could only manifest as a dream. What instigated the idea for that dream? We call that insane voice the ego. Still, there was yet a third part of the mind of the Son of God that found itself in the middle. It realized that the idea was crazy and couldn’t happen, but felt a need to rescue the first part of the mind. This validated the dream for both of these parts of the Son. Meanwhile, the second part simply held that the dream didn’t exist. This part warned the third part not to go after something that wasn’t real. You, the reader, are this third part of the mind of the Son. You came in to rescue, when there is nothing that needs rescuing. So it appeared that there was a split in the Son of God, in the Oneness, but nothing really happened.

You came attacking an enemy that doesn’t exist. You came to protect God who needs no protection. You came to take God’s place. This enemy is what we call the ego. The ego is the voice that tells you there is some meaning to this dream. It is the part of you that believes you can be separate from God. The ego is the voice of insanity. It only has the reality you have given it. If you were to ignore that voice and listen only to those who never entertained the illusion – which we call the voice of Spirit – it would disappear because it is not real. In truth, neither the ego nor Spirit is real. They exist only in the dream. In truth there is only Oneness. It doesn’t matter whether you consider the ego or Spirit to be a part of you or outside of you. None of the players here are real. What part of your dream last night was you and what part was separate from you? That seems like a crazy question. It was just a dream. Today it doesn’t exist. What difference does it make if that was part of you or not? It wasn’t real. Welcome to your life, to your dream. It is no more real. We could say that it is all part of you, because you are creating the dream, but that doesn’t make it any more real. No part of what you consider to be your separate self has any true existence.

Meanwhile, as you are experiencing yourself being in this dream, in this world – which I like to call hell, for lack of a better term – there seems to be both an ego and Spirit along for the ride. The important question is not whether an imaginary ego is inside or outside of an imaginary you, but whether you are listening to its imaginary voice or the imaginary voice of Spirit. Even though neither exists, ego keeps you in hell and Spirit guides you home, that is, toward the place of peace, love, and joy. This is a choice that I call a no-brainer. You may think that it is not that easy. Yes, that is the voice of the ego. The ego says that you are stuck with the world. It is real. The best you can do is to make it better. Is that voice within you or coming from the outside? If you are crazy, is that craziness from within you or from the outside? If the answer to a question you are asking yourself seems impossible to determine, you may be asking the wrong question. The right question is easy to answer. For example would you choose love or fear? Do you choose peace and joy or pain and suffering? If you tell me that you want love and peace, but choose to listen to a voice that can only lead you to more pain and suffering – isn’t that crazy? We call that dissociation. The important question is not this “how many angels can dance on the head of a pin” query about where the ego is located, but whether the decider part of you, the part that is your mind, is going to listen to that ego – or not. As a human you have this illusion that you are separated from God and from each other, but that is not true. The truth of you is One. How can you be two places at once when you are not anywhere at all? There is no inside and outside. This question is an ego question. The truth of you is not even separate from the ego. The ego simply does not exist. The only question is “Are you going to listen to this insane voice?”

You all will wake up. You all will come home. It is a matter of time and time is also not real. It is only the way in which you measure your pain. It is certain that you will go home, because you never left. You are there now, if there was such a designation as “there”. This is only a dream from which you will awaken. Spirit and the ego are there with you in your dream. One softly invites you to awaken; the other encourages you to dream better. Where you are, even in the dream, is in the now. If your now encompasses listening to the ego, now feels like forever, is painful, and is hell. How painful does it have to be before you choose Spirit? Is it hot enough for you yet? Should we turn the heat up a little more? This is not a question of good or bad – Spirit good, ego bad. Ego is not the enemy. The world is not evil. It is just a question of truth. Spirit speaks truth, knows only truth. Ego lies, know only untruth. Your mind recognizes truth and will eventually choose it, resulting in the disappearance of the lie.

Let’s look at the elephant in the room. Your fear of God is so enormous concerning your alleged separation from Him, the ensuing guilt, and your hiding from his imagined retribution. Not only does this feel bigger than you can handle but also as something you can’t deal with by yourself. It amounts to a gigantic feeling of stuckness, magnified by the fact that you have a difficult time even facing the fullness of your guilt. Ego, like a good politician, promises all kinds of ways to avoid the wrath of God. Its promises are equally empty, providing at best a temporary reprieve from your guilt, pain, and suffering. Spirit makes no promises. Spirit only asks you to listen and to trust. Spirit holds your hand while you face your fear, rather than distracting you from it. Spirit faces your fear with you, whispering the truth of your innocence in your ear as you stand together. Spirit doesn’t ask you to confront more of your fear than you are able to handle. Will it be scary? Yes. Will you get through it? Yes. Eventually, all of it disappears: the ego, Spirit, fear, a separate you, and the world. Only your Divine Self is left. The truth of you remains as it has always been: One with God, One with the Son, in Eternal Love. The trip begins as you commit to listening to Spirit rather than the ego. Bon voyage!

Good Now

Sanhia

What is the meaning of the Coronavirus?

With the Coronavirus everybody is on the same page. You can search through your memory banks and be unable to find another time when the whole world was on the same page. Americans of a certain age remember the time when all of that country was on the same page following the Kennedy assassination or 9-11. Swedes had a similar unity around the assassination of Olof Palme. However, outside of your respective countries the effect was not so big and it became still smaller when extended to other continents. But here, now, everyone in the world is touched by the Coronavirus, no matter what continent, race, religion, or age. This is, indeed, a very interesting time. Look at what has been manifested here. Everyone has, seemingly, no choice but to focus on this phenomenon. It is affecting every aspect of your life.

As always, there are two voices that you can listen to, the voice of love or the voice of fear – the voice of Spirit or the voice of ego. You are surrounded by the voices of fear. There is no need for me to repeat the fear scenarios that are present. You can turn on the television, go online, or pick up a newspaper and be inundated with fearful stories and fingers pointed at those who can be blamed for causing, spreading, or failing to slow or halt the virus. My job today is to speak to you from Spirit, to remind you that there are no accidents and that everything is in perfection. You have a heightened opportunity now to choose love over fear. We have spoken often of the advice, and you have heard it many other places (thank you Ram Dass), to be here now, to be present, and to be in the Now. When you are absolutely present, you are with Spirit. When you are not present, you are with ego. All that truly exists is this moment. It exists forever. In this moment you are One with God; you are One with Spirit; you are One with me; you are One with each other. All there is is love.

The Coronavirus has been given to you by Spirit as an enormous gift to help you let go of the ego and be here now. Many of the normal distractions of your earthly experience are denied to you in this moment. You don’t feel the freedom to go where you want; you can’t watch the game on television or even read about it. You are likely at home most of the time, some of you not able to go to work. Your opportunities to socialize are minimized. What you do have is this enormous gift to help you let go. You can choose to be with ego, to be lamenting and sorrowful about what you are asked to give up, fearful or terrified about what the future might bring – or – you can receive this gift. You can revel in the stillness. You can take this as an opportunity to communicate with Spirit, to give all your fears, all of your judgments, all of your anger, everything that takes away from the peace that is your birthright – and give all of that to Spirit.

Now is the time to let death die. In the eternal now there is no death. Death is of the ego. It is not real. Yes of course, bodies die. You are not your body. You do not die. You cannot die. Jesus demonstrated that for us. This is a time given to you by Spirit to release and let go of all your fear of death. Give your death to Spirit. Know that if Spirit has use for you in your body to help all to awaken, you will stay in your body. If Spirit says that you have done what you came here to do and now it is time to come home into the Oneness, then you will let go of your body in love and joy, not in fear. That is not a death, but a full awakening. Invite Spirit into your heart today. Use your quarantine to be with Spirit. It is just the two of you; your challenge is to make it the One of you by surrendering your fearful, ego-based will. Ask, “What is it that you wish me to do with this space you have provided for me through the gift of the Coronavirus?” You now have this opportunity that you would not normally have. You would be so busy with your daily life and with what the ego says is important to do. Now this intervention precludes business as usual. Not only is there the space to listen to Spirit, but also the motivation to deal with those fears the Coronavirus has triggered in you. Besides the fear of death, you may be experiencing financial worries, loss of opportunities, fears about losing loved ones, uncertainties about the future, anger, or blame. This just might be the perfect storm that gives you the gentle shove that encourages you to let go of your attachment to the drama and finally surrender to Spirit. What an opportunity for healing! Now is the time to give all that fear, judgment, and projection to Spirit and listen to the message and guidance that are there for you.

While everything that has been said here goes to the core of what this event is truly about, we don’t suggest that you ignore the recommendations of health officials. Unless you are personally guided in a different direction, quarantine yourself, use proper cleaning techniques, pay attention to your own health signs, and strengthen your immune system. If you fear you may have may draw something your way, be conscious in protecting yourself. On the other hand, whatever happens is perfect and is in Spirit’s hand. Trust in God and tether your camel.

I want to encourage you to feel an enormous gratitude for this gift of the Coronavirus and for Spirit bringing this potentiality for awakening into your now. Take this opportunity to hold each of your mirrors, every other human, in a place of loving acceptance and kindness. Part of the magic of this gift is that you are all in it together. When you find yourself talking with another about this situation, ask Spirit why He has brought this person to you. Are you to receive something from them or is there something that you are asked to give. Allow whatever it is to happen. If you meet your neighbor and they are in pain or fear, remember he is your mirror. He is reflecting that part of you which may be hard for you to see. Give silent thanks for that gift and take your pain and fear to Spirit. Perhaps you have a gift to share with your neighbor about the perfection of what is unfolding, about his Divinity, about his safety – but first take your concerns to Spirit and see what you are guided to say to the other. It is not your job to heal them. That is Spirit’s work. If you are to be a tool for Spirit, He will let you know. It is your job to bring all the fears that are triggered by the Coronavirus and others’ responses to it to Spirit to be lifted to love. Always thank Spirit for this opportunity to awaken.

Good Now

Sanhia

How can I become One with God?

A common statement or intention expressed through many spiritual disciplines is that of becoming one with God. People ask me,”What in the hell does that mean, Sanhia? And even if I think I have some idea of what it means, how could I possibly achieve that?” There are so many fun ways we could answer this question, so let’s see how many roads we can go down (How many roads can a man go down before they call him God?). “How do I become one with God?” is one of those nonsense questions. To be horribly trite, it is like asking a fish how to become one with water. You are now one with God. You have always been one with God. There is no time, no past, no present. You simply are one with God. You could not be anything else. That’s just how it is. Well, that was a short message! ….. Okay, we’ll go on to the next part. Being one with God without being aware of being one with God is not so desirable. When you have a fight with your partner it does not feel like you are one with God. When you are stuck in traffic it does not feel like being one with God. When you listen to or read the news it certainly doesn’t feel like you are one with God. So, I ‘m guessing you want to know a little more about the realizing side of this reality.

We have told this old story before, so I’m not going to go into great detail about it, but let me give you just the outline. The story goes like this: God created you in His own image…..which makes you an angry old man. Wait, that’s not the right story…..that is the one about you creating God in your own image. This means that you have no physicalness; the truth of you is absolutely one and in unity with God. At the same time you are not God, but are the Son. You did not create yourself. Like God you have no beginning or end, because there is no time. You simply are. In your infinite creativity you had a thought, a crazy, mad thought. “What if I could create something separate from God, something apart from God, something God didn’t know about?” That thought took off like a runaway train. Part of you disappeared into that idea. That part decided to create an identity, uniqueness, specialness. That all seemed like a great deal of fun; it seemed absolutely fantastic. The truth, however, was that no, you couldn’t do that. You are one with God, You are absolutely connected. There is no part of you that isn’t a part of God. God is everything; nothing could be created separate from that. So that mad idea couldn’t create anything real. It remained an idea. The universe it spawned was not real, only an idea. As you birthed this idea, you, the One Son, splintered into millions, billions of pieces – each one with an identity separate from the others. This allowed you to create this imaginary universe of specialness. Well, we all know how that worked out. It’s so funny; you have to join me in laughing at all of this. You created your specialness, your individuality, your separation from God and you discovered it was a terrifying place to be. Alone! In pain! Having to defend yourself constantly! That’s how it feels for the human believing he is separate from God. So the question is not one of how you become one with God, it is one of how to remember who you really are – that you are one with God. You cannot create what already is; you can only deny it. You have spent eons in that denial out of the fear of God’s anger. You project that He wants to get revenge for your abandonment of Him. Some of you take this denial into a place where you convince yourself there is no God, therefore nobody to punish you. This only frees you to stay here perpetually in the hell of your creation with no way out. This is the planet of free suffering. I hope you are still laughing with me here.

Now we come to the really meaty part of this message. You know about this work. You have an understanding about the importance of forgiveness, stopping the blind adherence to ego, listening to that soft, gentle, humorous, loving voice of Spirit, and letting that voice guide you home. To some degree or other, with whatever amount of dissociation (remember last month’s message) that is involved in your process, you are slowly waking up to the awareness of this truth of yourself as one with God. I want to tell you about the biggest crevice you have to leap over, the largest challenge you face. Some of you have felt this already. For some it is so scary I almost hate to tell you about it. You might not sleep well tonight. But, then you probably aren’t sleeping well anyway. If you look this fear straight in the face, you might begin to sleep better. Well, here it goes. You came into this illusion, into this dream or this nightmare, with your own personal identity. The only way out of this dream or nightmare is to leave your personal identity at the door as you exit. You can’t take it with you. Your personal identity is your separation from God, not to speak of the rest of the Son-ship. To realize your oneness with God you have to abandon this illusion of having a separate identity. Otherwise you keep cycling around in this place that feels so distant from heaven, so far away from home. You remain with the pain, the suffering, and the guilt that we have talked about so many times, that you are so familiar with. But! And here is the crux of the matter. Giving up your personal identity feels like a permanent death, not death as in death and rebirth, or reincarnation. This is the black hole death, the void. This is the nothingness, the terror that the ego feeds in you. Actually it is the ego that will die, because it exists only in separation. This fear tells you that you have no existence outside of your personal identity. The truth is just the opposite; you have no real existence in your personal identity. You want to feel nothing but love, but that is not possible here. You want to feel unconditional acceptance, to experience that you are absolutely guilt free. That cannot be accomplished without releasing the separation of your personal identity. Each one of you will do that eventually.

You have had other lifetimes where you had different names and different bodies, perhaps a different gender, race, or religion. None of those things are you. You are not this name that calls you to dinner. It has nothing to do with you. It is like you have come to a strange planet knowing nothing about it and you pick up a foreign object wondering what it is and you make up a name for it. Let’s say you call it glook. So, to you it is a glook, but it is not. That is simply a name you have given to something that doesn’t really exist. You are not your name.  You are not your body. You can keep trading these bodies in. There is only one thing you truly carry with you from lifetime to lifetime; that is your guilt. You can be certain that as long as you hold on to your identity, your guilt will be waiting for you in the next infant version of your separation that comes flying down the tube, or more likely is reluctantly pulled from the womb, from not your true mother into not your true home. The guilt and the fear will be right there with you. That’s all that you carry with you. This identity that you hold as so valuable is your pain and suffering.

Sooner or later the weight of that will be so strong, you will be so exhausted by it, that you will be ready to let it go. If that day is approaching for you, I can give you a few hints to make it easier. Whenever you see another and see them as different from you, remind yourself that they are not. Remind yourself that there are only two things that all humans ever express. They either say “I love you” or “Help me”. That’s all they do. That’s all you do. You are all exactly the same. If you meet somebody today and you do not feel “I love you” coming from them, they are crying out for help. If you have a hard time receiving that plea it is because they are your mirror. You are projecting your cry for help onto them. Thank them for being a fellow traveler in pain. It’s not your job to remove their pain; your job is to remove yours. Thank them for the reminder and stop the separation. Give up pointing at them, making them to be the one in pain. Don’t blame them. Don’t make them the asshole. Don’t make them the cause of their problems, or yours. Don’t feed the separation. Don’t allow yourself to feel superior…”well at least I’m not as bad off as they are”. Every time you choose separation, you choose to remain in hell. Every time! Pretty silly isn’t it. As we look at it together, isn’t that a really funny thing? You think it is somebody else when it is really yourself. You could choose to forgive and love, but you have chosen to project and blame. And then it hurts you! And all the time you pretend not to be doing it. You have to see the humor in that, so laugh with me and let it go. Forgive yourself and the other.

You are all in this together. That’s why we suggest that you be as kind as you can with each other. When you are kind to another you are kind to yourself. When you are kind to yourself you may actually reach the point of realizing your innocence, that you don’t deserve punishment. If you look out at one other, just one person, and think he is guilty and should be punished – you can look at the other six billion and see them all as innocent – that one is you. That is you that you want to send to hell. It just takes one, but let’s be honest – there is more than one such person for you. Each one of them you wish to see punished is you. So funny! Laugh again with me. So simple! The ego wants you to stay in separation, in guilt, in pain; Spirit wants to wake you up, bring you home to the love of God. It’s not a hard call to make. Come here with us. We will look at everything with you and help you to laugh. And always, as always……remember…..

God Blesses You

Sanhia

Why is it so difficult to let go of the illusion of the world?

Most people have this experience – we could call it schizophrenia – where on the one hand they understand the spiritual truth of pure non-dualism on a mental level; they read these messages and have read and studied A Course in Miracles, perhaps multiple times. That side of them believes in the truth of oneness with Spirit and with God and correspondingly disbelieves in the ego and the reality of the physical world. Yet when it comes to the push and shove of daily life, they seem to live in another world.  There appears to be such a split. They ask, “Why, Sanhia, is it so hard for me to live the truth? Why do I know that it is all a dream, and yet take the dream so seriously and get upset and angry, am filled with judgment, pain hurt, fear, and feelings of victimhood. I know it’s not real, but I am still overwhelmed by all of these feelings! Why Sanhia? Why? Can you help me?” I can’t help you because there is no problem here. I hope you are laughing with me now. You are just being human and cannot be expected to be behaving any differently.

There is a term that psychologists use that goes back to Freud called dissociation. Freud also talked about projection, where people assign their own self judgments to others so that they can live with themselves (though probably not so happily). Jesus also told us all about this phenomenon. Dissociation can be described or explained in the following way: you want to change your life, to change your experience of things, to give up all of the pain and suffering and to implement a new plan; but a part of you disconnects from that new plan and does the same old thing. You sabotage your own strongly desired program. The old story simply continues to run your life with all of the old pain and suffering included. Even though you consciously say that you don’t want this, you keep doing it. That is dissociation; that is schizophrenia. In therapy, you have decided on a course of treatment, but you don’t seem to be able to carry it out. In spiritual healing, you decide to listen to Spirit instead of the ego, but the ego keeps running things.

Why would anybody do that? Why would they act against their own self interest? The short answer is, “because the ego made me do it”. A slightly longer version is that it is more comfortable to keep choosing the ego. It could be said that the known devil is preferable to the unknown devil. So far you have all survived while listening to the ego. It may have been painful, but it is familiar. It is comfortable like your old clothes. A big part of you doesn’t want to let go of that. And…what is this unknown? What would you be letting go of the ego for?

Before answering that question, let’s take a giant step backwards. As a child you often felt pretty helpless in a hostile world. Your protection was to build a wall and hide behind it. You didn’t let anybody penetrate that wall. In your private world you were an innocent victim of your parents, teachers, siblings, neighborhood bullies, and whoever else seemed to be more powerful than you. You blamed them for your troubles, and forgiveness was out of the question. The truth behind your wall and behind everybody’s walls was that you were terrified of God. This fear felt too dangerous to face, so you hid it, even from yourself. In this way you could pretend that God would take pity on you and punish those who were so harsh to you. The only problem was that none of that was true. You now have the spiritual awareness of why it wasn’t true and why it ultimately wouldn’t work for you then, or now. But, you also have this habit, and it seems to have kept you alive.

So, you are not just letting go of the ego; you have to tear down this entire wall that has seemed to protect you, though at an increasingly high cost.  And what are you getting in exchange?  You are willing to give up the pain, the fear, the suffering, the anger, the judgment, and the victimhood. You will also be giving up your personal identity, which is absolutely tied up in all of this. For you to fully release the illusion, you will have to fully release your attachment to your separate identity. This is fertile ground for the ego to grab hold of. Are you sure you are ready to do that? To become One with God and Spirit it is necessary to lose your uniqueness, to lose your sense of self, this sense of you. That is what letting go of the ego entails. What you do then, unconsciously of course, is to keep a foot in each camp. On the one hand you keep your spiritual disciple going through reading, studying, affirming, and asking Spirit for support. On the other hand you keep the other foot firmly planted in the ego’s camp, holding on to your specialness and that of others. So you have your support group of people you judge as specially good and the opposition group which is specially bad. You have special love and special hate. You hold that for yourself as well. You tell yourself all of the things that make you a special person: you are on a spiritual path, you recycle and care for the environment, you are against war, and you try to help the disadvantaged, and so on. You pat yourself on the back for being good. Then your special hate for yourself surfaces and you judge yourself for failing to be perfect with your spiritual practice, for not eating well enough, for losing your temper, for catching yourself judging, and so on. So you bounce back and forth between being so enlightened and being such an asshole who will never get it.

Boy does ego like all of this back and forth crap. If you choose Spirit you have to let go of it all, the special hate and the special love. This is enormous. It is bigger than your separated mind can even hold on to. That’s how big it is. The fear is gargantuan. There is no way that you can survive it. Sanhia! What are you saying?  I mean that you as a separated, individual self cannot survive. If you let go of the ego comfort zone and pull that foot out of the game you will leave your personal identity and fall back into the Oneness of God. Sooner or later you will have to do this, but right now you are driving with a heavy foot on the brakes. The only choice you have is for how long and how slowly you want to rip that bandage off. The fear is usually way too big to rip it all off at once. For one thing you have no idea how long the bandage is, nor how many hairs will have to be ripped out. Beyond that, you have no idea what replaces the bandage and the accompanying pain. You know what a separate self feels like, but Oneness can feel like it might be an endless void. You have no conception of what the experience of “no you” is like.

Spirit demands nothing. You will never be forced to come home. Spirit knows that of course you dissociate. Of course you try to maintain your separate self. That’s what humans do. No problem. There is nothing you have to do about it. You are not wrong to continue, nor are you right to stop. But since you do want to listen, Spirit whispers to you to notice that you dissociate. Then Spirit suggests that you have a willingness to look right at the areas where you have a special hate toward yourself or others. If you say to me that you don’t have any hate for anybody, I suggest you are dissociating. It is fear provoking to admit your hate and judgment. Everybody in a body carries hate. It goes with the territory. You hate yourself for separating from God or you project that hate onto God for abandoning you. The fear is that if the hate is exposed, God will punish you. That is an insane thought, expecting something God is not capable of. But, if you pretend it is not there, you can’t deal with it. It remains hidden behind your wall and you stay in the hell of separation. Part of dissociation is pretending you are healed when you are not, pretending that you don’t have a problem. The ego here might suggest to you that since the problem isn’t real, there is no reason to look at it. But, you believe it is real. So, look right at it.

You look at it, not because you have a work that you have to do to transform this fear, but simply in recognition that you have a judgment. Notice that you have this judgment, this anger, this hate; become aware that you feel you are a victim, that you blame this person, that you blame yourself, and on and on. Just be conscious that you are doing that. Bring that to me. Bring that to Spirit. We’ll look at it together. That’s all you have to do. When you look at what is not real side-by-side with what is real, only the truth will eventually remain. The fear will disappear, will evaporate, will be burned away. This is like the second step in the five-step process. Love and fear cannot long occupy the same space. Do this throughout the day. Whenever you notice yourself experiencing any of the aforementioned manifestations of fear and separation, don’t try to hide or ignore what you are feeling or believing. On the other hand, don’t accept it in helpless self hatred. Look right at it and invite me, invite Spirit in at that moment. Ask us to look at it with you. Let go of the judgment and just look with us. This can be called “looking down upon the battlefield”. We will see you acting from this dispassionate viewpoint. We will remind you of your innocence and that you are unconditionally loved. As we watch together, you will become aware that you are the only one judging, and will realize there is no benefit to you from continuing, but plenty to gain from loving yourself. The fear is too great to face alone. Fortunately, you are never alone. You are always welcome to come join with us. Welcome us in. Invite us to gently shake you and to point out when you are dissociating. Allow us to remind you that it is safe to bring those judgments out into the open with us.

Good Now

Sanhia

Is it part of my purpose to help heal others?

As you are working with your spiritual process, with realizing your Divinity, with noticing you are listening to a voice, with learning to discern whether it is Spirit or the ego you are listening to, and with learning to hear, trust, and follow Spirit – as you are doing all of these things and you look around at your friends, relatives, co-workers, and perhaps even strangers – you notice that they are making what seems to you to be wrong choices. They may seem to be acting in ways that bring them pain and confusion as they listen to the ego and make the illusion real. A very natural reaction you may likely have is to say to yourself, “Oh, if they only knew what they were doing!” You think that perhaps you can be of help to them. You could point out how they are listening to the ego, how what they are seeing isn’t real, how their choices cannot work out for them. You may wonder if that is part of your path. As you are gaining wisdom, should you be sharing it with those around you? My answer to this is a very simple and clear “No”. That is not your job. That is my job. That is Spirit’s job. It is not your job. Perhaps that is not what you wanted to hear. Or maybe you are letting go a sigh of relief.

Let me explain why healing others is not your job. There are myriad reasons, so I will wander about and touch on this and that. I will begin by reminding that when you want to intercede when observing another in pain – what you are seeing is you. This is where the voice of the ego in you likely goes crazy and says, “No! That is them.” No, this is your creation. Do not confuse the cause and the effect. Whatever you see in the world is your creation. Everything is created by your mind. You are not a disconnected observer. What you see is born in your mind, not in the world. So, everything in the world is your mirror. When you see another choosing ego, it is you choosing ego. The work, then, is not to fix them, but to heal yourself. Your only job, your only purpose for being here, is to heal yourself. You have no responsibility for dealing with what you perceive as others’ challenges or problems.

Now, your mind may be asking, “But, what if they ask me for help?” That is a different question. Any requests you receive for support are to be given to Spirit. Allow Spirit to speak through you. Trust what comes and share it with the one who has requested support. Then, let it go. Have no attachment to it being heard, received, or acted on in the “right” way. That is none of your business. Your only job is to share what Spirit gives to you and let it go.

When you perceive that another has a challenge or might not be choosing in the highest way, what is truly going on is that you are judging them. This can feel like a thin line, discerning what is noticing and what is judging. If any kind of emotional reaction is present, know that judgment is involved. This can include positive as well as negative emotions. Let’s take it a step further. The truth of the other is that they are Divine, as are you. Any lack you perceive in them is an expression of denial of their Divinity. Thus, you are saying that you, also, are not really Divine. A good rule of thumb to use when looking at others is that if you cannot make your perception true for all others, it is not true. To judge one person for something you do not judge another for is to create separation. When you separate any son of God from another, you separate yourself from God. You could, instead, think in the following fashion. When you observe someone acting from the ego, you can say that they are not fully awake yet. That is true of all who are in the human condition, including yourself. To single out one individual as separate from God, while holding another as special or connected to God, creates the illusion of separation and cannot be a true observation. God is unity and Oneness. Any differences come from separation and the ego. As soon as you label any one person as out of balance, you have separated yourself from them and from God. In truth, of course, you are never separate from God, but this is your human experience.

If you wish to realize the truth of your Oneness with God and to let go of this physical illusion, don’t ever take on the cloak of the wise teacher, of being the healer. That is not your job. That, again, does not mean that Spirit may not use you, but it is for Spirit to decide. In truth, you cannot help but to teach what you have learned, but you will do this through your surrender to Spirit. Your job is not to teach, but to learn. If you are in doubt whether the words you receive are coming from Spirit, say nothing. The same words can come from the voice of ego or Spirit. What matters is if pure love is behind them. If you are unsure whether it is your ego or the voice of Spirit wishing to express, err on the side of discernment and caution. Give your doubt and confusion to Spirit. Continue to give to Spirit all of your perceptions of pain or fear or doubt or victimization or victimizing that you see expressed through others. Your task is to love them unconditionally and see yourself as one with them. If that is too great a challenge in the moment, it is no biggie. Give it to Spirit. You are the one crying out for help. When you turn the situation over to Spirit, you don’t tell Him how you want things handled. If you have any expectations about results, you have not let go, have not truly given it to Spirit. Remember that thinking you knew better than God is what got you here in the first place. Maybe Spirit has a message for you to share, maybe not. It is not your business. It does not matter what is going on in the world. That is effect not cause.

Your business is to heal your separation. You do this through forgiveness and reminding yourself of your innocence, not by noticing the log in your neighbor’s eye. Your healing will never be realized through projection. Own everything you see as yours; ask Spirit to help you forgive yourself and open to God’s love. You become frantic to heal the other, because you are frantic to heal yourself. When you try to heal the shadow rather than changing the projector you cannot succeed. At best, you end up with good slapstick comedy. Remember that it is never about the form. It is never about what appears to you to be going on in the world. It is always about the content of your mind. Is your focus on the truth of your Divinity, your innocence, on you being unconditionally loved by God – or – is it on your fear and guilt, on the belief that you have been kicked out of heaven, on trying to please God? It is never about fixing the world. It is not about saying the right words at the right time to the right person. None of that matters. Yes, Spirit will use humans in the process of ending the illusion, but it never matters when or how. The end is already certain. It was decided before any present perception, words, or actions transpire. When you speak with the influence of the ego there will be a shadow of judgment in your voice or an attachment to the end result. You may feel the listener must follow your advice to a successful conclusion or you have both failed. When influenced by Spirit you may never know why He has used you, what the purpose is. Let go of any need to know.

Your job is not to do “good”. Good is one half of the duality and we all know what the other half is. One cannot exist without the other. Love does not recognize good or evil. It shines on all until everything is dissolved but truth. The reason you want to heal another is your desire to be rewarded by God. God may then single you out for redemption because you are better than another. How fortunate that you noticed their failure so that you can help them because you are better than them. Look God! No hands! Your imagined redemption comes only after you see your absolute equality with every Son of God. God doesn’t need your help. Let go of thinking you have a better way. Be humble. Give up your need to be an individual, to stand out, to be better. Just be. Instead of healing another, simply be kind to them; be loving. That’s what God does. No matter how many times you fall on your face, you are loved beyond measure. No matter what you do or feel or say…

God Blesses You

Sanhia

How do you define yourself?

Today’s question, rather than being one that is asked of me, is one I wish to ask of you. The question is “How do you define yourself?” If your only answer is that you are a divine, eternal, unconditionally loved and loving, infinitely creative child of God – and that is all that ever comes into your mind when you think about who you are, that is fantastic…..and you can stop reading now and enjoy your oneness with God. There may be other ways that you see yourself that seem to stand in the way of realizing personal divinity, even if you have been making efforts to see the truth. For example, you might define yourself by some traumatic event that has come into your life, which was painful when it happened and you cannot forget about it or let go. Perhaps you tell this story to others, maybe often, and/or it regularly comes up in your thoughts (click for an introductory message about “old stories”). These are places where you allow yourself to believe in your separation from God. Rather than one traumatic event, there may be a painful pattern you have noticed in your life, perhaps dealing with money, relationships, deservedness, loneliness, or lovableness.

There are two things I wish to say concerning these things you hold about yourself. The first I have already mentioned. You define yourself by these issues. This is part of who you believe yourself to be. That’s why you relate these stories to others. It gives your fearful ego self a boost to have others understand what you have been through, and to receive some compassionate thoughts from them. Some of these identities you have carried for so long that it is difficult to imagine yourself without them. Not only is letting them go difficult, it is fear provoking. Who would you be without this story? An example of this is a parent who has lost a child, who thinks they can never recover from this and will never be the same again. Another example could be the belief that you were shaped by how your parents raised you. A third could be that money is always a struggle for you. Whatever your story is, it defines you.

I mentioned there were two things I wished to say. The second is to remind you that your story is not true; it is a fiction. It is a movie that you are acting out a role in. You are pretending to be a victim of some event or series of events. It simply is not true. What is actually there for you is an enormous gift. Whatever you see as an anchor weighing you down in your life is a blessing from Spirit. Whatever limiting, fear provoking message this event is telling you is something you came in with in this body. Out of the fear you brought with you, you created the event. You didn’t do this to punish yourself. It was part of your pre-planning for this lifetime. You created this to overcome the false beliefs and separation from God that you have carried through all your incarnations. You are presented with these enormous gifts so that you can choose to overcome. There is no real consequence to holding on to the story, other than your continued pain and suffering in this body and the next and the next, until you decide to let this illusion go. God doesn’t care how long you hold onto it. He doesn’t see your story. He sees only your perfection. God can only see what is real, which is the loving, divine you.

If you want to take the bull by the horns, if you want to be proactive – make a pact with yourself. First, become aware of these limiting definitions that are less than divine. Notice the stories you tell yourself and others. Agree to stop telling them. If one comes into your awareness, do the five-step process. Now, look at the fear connected with this story until it transforms. Let go of the hopelessness of feeling that you will have the story with you forever, and look it right in the face. The reason that you cannot seem to get away from it is because it is your creation. It will follow you wherever you go until you confront it and let it dissolve. It is not real, but until you look at it and feel it fully and completely without backing down, it will feel real. This is not a work that anybody else can do for you. In fact you will likely react angrily toward anybody who would try to help. That would probably be too frightening. You need to be in control here. The action is to come from you. You are to admit that you have chosen to be a victim. Nothing has happened to you. It is 100% voluntary. Because you have chosen the “old story”, you can unchoose it. The truth is that only things that are real can stay forever.

Something that can assist you in being proactive with this “old story” is to change it in your mind. Ask your guidance to show you how this “old story” has already been a blessing for you or how it could be seen in that light. For example, if you have had a severe financial crisis in your life, you might now recognize that you have survived the “worst possible thing” and no longer have the same fears about money. If you have a parent who you felt treated you in an abusive way, you could thank them for doing such a loving thing because it forced you to find your strength within you, to love yourself instead of looking for approval from others. There is always a true story in the gift presented by each piece of this identity you have given yourself. Ask for support in finding the truth of the benefit from each situation. Now you can burn your candle at both ends. At one end you face and transform your fear. At the other end you see the event as a blessing. Develop the habit of doing both of these things until you notice your fear evaporating and everything being a blessing for you. There is no reason or need for you to continue to suffer or be a victim any longer, absolutely none. Nor is there any judgment if you continue to do so, absolutely none. You are free. Choose as you will. Go in peace.

God Blesses You

Sanhia