Jesus, as channeled by John Smallman, has offered us a remarkable discussion yesterday (Jan. 16, 2012) and I found myself so enthused by it that I wanted to comment – at some length, if you’ll permit me.
It’s not a rare event that the masters here to assist us offer us sound advice. But it’s rarer that they pack so much into one article or give us a bird’s-eye view of the entire subject of what keeps us in illusion.
In the first part of it, he tells us why people would want to descend into duality. To appreciate it, we need to keep in mind that the entire purpose of life is for unconscious fragments of the Divine to rise in consciousness to the point where they become aware of their identity as God. Free will and a “school” of experience are given them in which to learn what is needed to realize their true identity.
The descent into duality, Jesus says, “was to enable you to play with the concept of being separated from God (only in your imaginations!) and to experience the pain, the sense of abandonment, and the insanity in which that state seemed to embroil you.” (1)
Not only was the opportunity given to experience the illusion of separation from God, but also “your Father … put in place the apparatus necessary to assist you in freeing yourselves from the severely limiting place that you built.”
We are “now in the process of freeing yourselves from what appears to be a very sticky environment from which long tentacles reach out to grab you and draw you back.”
1. Dropping Judgements
Jesus then goes on to lay out for us what we must do, to use Archangel Michael’s term, to be free to fly. The first bond that we must extricate ourselves from are “the unloving thoughts and judgments of others whom you perceive as having mistreated or offended you.”
He points to “the game of ‘shame and blame'” as … one of the main underpinnings of the illusion” and counsels us to:
“Move away from that game; forgive those whom you perceive as having hurt or caused suffering to you, to your loved ones, or to any others – because to do so will bring you peace and relieve your stress, even though that action may seem to you to be counter-intuitive.”
He chides us for our “desperate hope that God will recognize how badly you have been treated and provide you with well-deserved recompense or restitution.” He tells us that this hope stays with us through “lifetimes of grudges and resentments.” But he also reminds us that “all in the illusion have offended or mistreated others at some time, so everyone owes! Fortunately, it is only an illusion.”
2. Practicing Forgiveness
Jesus tells us that the only exit from our dilemma is to practice forgiveness: “The only way out of this endless loop of being offended and demanding restitution is to unconditionally and indiscriminately forgive everyone everywhere.” He adds that negotiation always fails to utterly resolve our problems.
“Satisfaction is impossible, and negotiations held for this purpose are never successful because all the parties involved have to give up something for an agreement to be reached. Consequently, they will always feel either that they have received less than was their due, or that they have been forced to pay out more than could fairly be expected of them. As a result, grudges and resentments will always remain, and they will be constantly and painfully remembered.”
Only forgiveness is powerful enough to dissolve our memories and their stress.
“Forgiveness – true and unconditional – dissolves all those painful memories and relieves the stress that they caused, uncovering the peace and contentment within you that those constantly playing, endless tape-loops were drowning out with their whining cacophony of dissatisfaction. When you truly forgive for the first time you will be amazed at the peace you feel and experience, and which replaces the self-righteous grudge to which it seemed that you were so firmly and inextricably attached.”
These “endless tape-loops” are a major part of what I call vasanas. But in reality the whole behavioral complex that Jesus is describing is the vasana – the traumatic incidents and the resulting games of shame and blame, grudges and resentments, and endless complaints and victimization. Werner Erhard described it in a similarly-systemic manner:
“For the mind to survive, it tries to keep itself intact, it seeks agreement, and tries to avoid disagreement. It wants to dominate and to avoid domination. It wants to justify its points of view, conclusions, decisions, and avoid invalidation. It wants to be right. Running through it all, over it all, is the unending effort of the mind to prove itself right.” (3)
We end up mired in illusion and dead-right about it all, guys in a diner, old fogeys rocking in our chairs.
2. Ending Irresponsibility
Operating in the fashion that Jesus describes, our lives revolve around avoiding responsibility for feelings we don’t like or enjoy, which themselves arise out of actions that did not work out the way we wanted them to.
“The first step on the path out of this unsatisfactory situation is to be honest with yourselves and admit that no one else is responsible or to blame for how you feel. How you feel is a choice that you make in every moment, and it is directly influenced by where you place your attention.”
We can never completely escape suffering in lives lived separate from God, Jesus says.
“No one experiencing life in the illusion is free of pain, anxiety, or fear, and if you focus your attention mainly on those issues, happiness and satisfaction will always elude you.”
If we want to be happy and peaceful we have to accept the situation we find ourselves in and its limitations.
“Those who are for the most part happy and contented have learnt this lesson: life happens; it happens to everyone; accept it and the lessons that it offers. If you do as they have done, you will find peace – as you discover that you can cope with all that occurs.”
We can choose not to cope, to protest and complain and fight back against the suffering that goes along with illusion, he tells us. But then we find ourselves tempted to blame others for our circumstances.
“Not to cope is a choice, and when made, it entails finding someone or something to blame, because when you make that choice it means you are refusing to take responsibility for yourself, your actions, and all the other choices that you make – because you do not believe you have a choice. This always leads to further suffering.”
But he sees us as having the ability at least to alter our appraisals of the situation, which may even affect the outcome.
“Alternate options are always available – not necessarily in the physical situation as it stands, but by altering your perception you uncover options that you were maybe unaware of, and that may well make it possible to change the way the situation develops, thus altering the outcome from that which you had originally envisaged.”
He reminds us of something that we may not fully appreciate – that the events in our lives happen for a reason.
“Be aware that you have made choices, and take responsibility for them because what happens is on your life path for a reason. It has been carefully planned to present you with the lessons that you chose to learn. If you do not take responsibility and deal with what occurs, it will be presented to you again and again (although the form may be different) until you do choose to deal with it.”
Thus karma will return to us the unlearned lessons of our life that stand in the way of our fully realizing our true identity as God.
3. Seeking Help and Guidance
In a message posted the same day, the master Hilarion tells us that “it is a Universal Law that you must ask before it can be given.” Knowing this explains why Jesus would advise: “Instead of apportioning blame and being miserable in a painful situation, ask for help and guidance.”
“Never before has so much help and guidance been available on the planet. This is because the moment of your awakening is fast approaching, and much work needs to be done to release the issues that are seemingly anchoring you in the illusion.”
Some of us or even many of us perhaps have not yet fully accepted that we have guides on other planes and that they’ve been joined by exalted beings who are also assisting us at this time. Even if we do we may only understand the universal laws they operate by only superficially. (That’s certainly the case with me.)
But Jesus tells us that we have all the assistance to release ourselves from duality at this time set aside for our return to oneness. He says: “You all have everything you need to set yourselves free, and all the assistance and guidance necessary to enable you to do so.
To set ourselves free we have to “take the essential steps of letting go of grudges, [and] of refusing to see yourselves in any way as victims, helpless or otherwise, so that you can enthusiastically claim that destiny.”
He paints for us a picture of how these changes in our ways of seeing and responding will serve us in this last period before we ascend.
“As your sense of peace increases – as it will when you follow this path – your doubts will fade, and the deep inner knowing you have that absolutely confirms your intention to awaken will come into your awareness. That knowledge will bring you comfort and contentment during these last stages of your journey Home.”
Footnotes
(1) All quotes are from “Jesus: How You Feel is a Choice You Make in Every Moment,” channeled by John Smallman, January 15, 2012, at https://www.johnsmallman2.wordpress.com
(2) “Hilarion: It is a Universal Law that You Must Ask Before It Can Be Given,” channeled by Marlene Swetlishoff/Tsu-tana, January 15-22, 2012, at https://www.therainbowscribe.com/hilarion2012.htm
(3) Luke Rhineheart, The Book of est. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1976. 174. Rinehart is not quoting Werner directly but the ideas are his nonetheless.