Contact With The Life Force

By The Pathwork Guide

Greetings, my dearest, dearest friends. Blessings for all of you, present and absent. Blessed are your further efforts on this Path, now and in the time to come.

This past working year was one of the most crucial on your path for most of my friends, individually and for this group as a whole. Many of you are keenly aware of this fact. Some of you may sense it vaguely and others may still have to come to this point, perhaps in the next working season when they will experience this crucial, most significant transformation within themselves. If you will continue in the next year as you have worked until now, the promise is great. Some of you, hearing or reading this, will no longer feel that these are merely words, but will know that this is so. So may the coming weeks during the summer be for all of you a time of consolidation of the past work and preparation for the future work phase on your inner path of liberation.

In tonight's lecture I should like to discuss, once again, the life force. As you know, each time I treat a topic that we discussed previously, it is done on a deeper level and it is possible to give you more material because you are better able to absorb and utilize it. It thus has a more immediate meaning for you. What I said about this topic was then, for you, a beautiful theory. Many of you today are able to see that this is not merely a theory, a far-away philosophical principle. It is, indeed, a key with which life can be lived, in the real sense of the word.

Let us recapitulate certain facets of the life force. The life force is profoundly intelligent. Its intelligence is always available, always present and applicable not only for great, important issues, as man may be inclined to believe. This super intelligence does "deign" to express itself on supposedly small, unimportant issues, if one makes use of it. It knows no important or unimportant, big or small issues. It pervades all when it is allowed to do so. One of its most striking aspects is that there is no conflict contained in it. The small, limited human mind is often confronted with alternatives in which something is good on the one hand, but bad on the other; favorable for one person, but unfavorable for another. When such is the case, man is not in truth; he is separated from that aspect of the life force which can let him partake of its vast intelligence through which the right result knows no ifs and buts, knows no disadvantages in any way or for anyone concerned. It is deeply right from any possible point of view. It leaves no trace of doubt or uneasy feelings. It leaves man with the peaceful knowledge that all is well, increasing his security in himself and in life.

This vast intelligence is available for every one of your smallest cares and concerns. It is forever ready to respond if you choose to request its service. It never pushes itself onto you, but it is there, ready, and at your disposal. It is up to you to be in contact with it. All it needs is the awareness of its existence and your desire to make use of it, concisely formulating your questions and aims. When these are hazy and vague, when you are lost in a fog of confusion, the life force cannot penetrate. You cannot partake of it. Your effort at clear formulation and exact awareness of your problems, confusions, and split motivations is necessary, as well as your reaching out for the life force, requesting its help. The Pathwork is specifically preparing you for this.

Even when man believes in this principle, he is often under the wrong impression that he has first to reach a certain stage in his development, he has to shed his conflicts and have a great deal of spiritual knowledge, before he can be in contact with the life force. This may be next year, or the day after tomorrow he, thinks, and when that day comes, it will befall him like a gift from heaven he has finally earned. This concept is all wrong. Man does not have to be perfect in order to be tuned into the life force. It can be right now, provided he clears up the confusion of his present feelings, thoughts, and moods. He does not even have to clear up confused concepts. All he needs to do is to realize that he is confused, and reach out in thought and desire for this vaster intelligence to help him further. This can be right now, whenever he approaches himself in this fashion.

Another significant facet of the life force is its immediacy, the Now. If you live in the Now, you are in tune with the life force. If this Now is confusion, depression, or stagnation, and these feelings are fully faced, without the slightest evasion, their existence formulated, while asserting the fact that the very presence of such feelings indicates error and lack of truth, wishing for truth to manifest within, the negative feelings dissolve, and truth begins to enter.

To be in tune with the life force is the same as being in contact with God, which is the same as living in the Now. This can be the case only when you are in contact with yourself. For yourself and the immediate Now are one, yourself at this moment, which may be different from yourself in the next moment. For you are no flat, one-dimensional creature, but dynamic and many dimensional. You consist of many possibilities and infinite changes of outlook, attitude, feeling, and thoughts, which are the result of the various combinations of your components. Therefore, your Now is never the same. Man's tendency to petrify a pleasant result, because this seems an easy solution for an apparently insecure future, makes him falsify truth. It makes him hold back.

The more you become aware of all the hitherto hidden levels of your being, the more are you in contact with, and in possession of, yourself. Hence, the more are you capable of living in the Now, for there is no longer a need to run away from the Now. Consequently, the more are you in contact with the life force. Thus, being in contact with yourself, you gain a greater understanding of inner causes and outer effects in your personal life, and therefore as a principle applying to all of life. The better this is understood, the more security is gained, the more are you in control of your fate -- in the real sense. You then know that you are safe and not ever dependent on something beyond your capacities. The vibrant feeling of being alive, in stimulating peacefulness, fills you, even while you still experience the negative mood -- anxiety, depression, lifelessness, whatever it may be. It is as though two levels of your being begin to meet and make themselves aware, through your seeking the truth of the Now, asserting its unreality, and requesting the greater truth of the life force. Little by little, you become acutely aware of the reasons for the negative moods. More and more you do not forget that the answer and explanation exist in you. You assert this fact, requesting understanding and help to correct error and false concepts -- not waiting for tomorrow when this will be done for you, but doing it now yourself by letting the infinite intelligence into yourself. The slightest trace of guilt that you are "still" not farther developed, that you should not have such negative feelings, causes you to struggle away from the Now. Struggling away from the Now makes impossible the contact with oneself and therefore with God. The attitude of acknowledging the fact that you must be in illusion at this moment incorporates many qualities and soul movements necessary for being in tune with the life force. It means to stop struggling away. It means humility and proper self-evaluation. It means the right, appropriate kind of fighting against illusion, rather than fighting illusion with illusion. This cannot be done. In the way I suggest, you fight illusion with reality, even if your present reality is illusion. The clear acknowledgment of this fact is then reality. Denial of your illusion is further illusion.

The work of self-confrontation gradually leads to this attitude. If you then make the additional step and actively assert your desire for the eternal presence of the life force, with its much greater wisdom, to take over, you can never again be helpless and lost. The vibrant life force will flow through you, not in rare moments, but more and more as a steady companion: it will be your way of living and being. You and the life force will be one, as one inseparable factor.

The beauty of Creation is that reality is happiness. This happiness is easy. There is no struggle about it. The tragedy of man is that he so arduously struggles against happiness by fearing truth and holding on to misconceptions. When we talk about the liberation which is a result of the path, about shedding the shackles that keep you enchained, what possibly could the meaning of these words be if you think about them deeply? If truth and reality would be more difficult -- as obviously you are unconsciously convinced of -- if it were true, for instance, that self-responsibility and adulthood were more difficult than the position of a child you so ferociously defend, then breaking through on this path and coming into your own would never be felt as a joyful liberation. Instead, it would be felt as coming into a prison, where you encounter more hardship than before. If man's resistance, his No-currents, would exist in order to prevent something unwelcome and disagreeable, they would be understandable and justified. But the tragedy is that he often struggles with all his might against that which makes life easier and happier, more agreeable and safe. He inwardly acts as though the opposite were true, as though the pathwork expects him to undertake a venture in which he might perish, and he can be pried loose of his resistances only with the greatest of difficulties. This is the sad irony. He is so blind that what is his advantage seems like disaster, and what is his disaster seems like safety and advantage. If divine truth and reality were not all good, happy, and advantageous, from any conceivable point of view, many of my friends would not have experienced liberation and ease following a breakthrough, following the overcoming of resistance. This fact is important to contemplate, because it is the proof that there is nothing to fear in God's World, in letting one's own organic development proceed without an artificial halt. Most of you have made sufficient progress to know that what you leave behind was unnecessary hardship and the growth you move toward, the new way of life you adopt, is indeed much easier than what you so tightly held on to.

Whenever you are aware of resistance and can then pinpoint it as to its exact misconceptions and confusion, you have already won, because then you have the tools; you can safely trust them to work from past experience. Once you know you are confused, you can meet this confusion. This is living in the Now. But when the confusion is not conscious, when it can be denied and unpleasant feelings ascribed to other factors, having nothing to do with you, the illusion is so great because you do not even know your illusion and can do nothing to eliminate it. It is then that you fight against the happier, easier, fuller life and hold on to an unnecessary hardship. Man's unconscious conclusions claim that it is to his advantage to grow and to his disadvantage to remain statically in the status quo. This senseless falsity causes untold pain. Without the prevalence of this fundamental misunderstanding about life, so much suffering would be avoided. Man would be vibrantly alive in the immediate Now. Whenever this is so, there is a peace and, at the same time, a vibrancy. There is stimulation while being in serenity.

As I have mentioned in the past, the basic struggle against truth results in split concepts. In this case, for example, man often conceives of life being stimulating, but for this interest he must pay by giving up his peace of mind. If he wants peace and serenity, he feels that he must sacrifice the dynamic, stimulating life. He must stagnate and be secluded. These false alternatives lead to a false choice, for whatever is chosen is based on wrong assumptions. The conviction of having to make do without a facet of life that every individual is meant to enjoy -- either peace or vibrancy and interest -- will indeed, through behavior and emanation, through implicit and explicit attitudes, bring an unnecessary deprivation of either the one or the other facet of the life force. In this conviction, he conditions himself so that whenever he is stimulated, he will register anxiety and whenever he is in peace, he will be bored. The moment he is aware of the fact that he in in error, that it does not have to be that way and that it is that way only because of his previous wrong convictions, he fully faces the Now, his Now. He may find further aspects responsible for this wrong conclusion, that cuts his self off from the life force. As he realizes that, in truth, the life force combines two apparent incompatibles, and he begins to reach out for the possibility that he may partake of both favorable aspects, he will begin to experience the truth that all good is possible for man, if but he allows himself to experience it and does away with false limitations.

So many similar misunderstandings exist which unnecessarily prevent man from the blissful, enlivening, peaceful penetration of the life force, apart from man's personal images and their misconceptions. So often the great spiritual truths in particular seem contradictory. If or when he formulates such confusions, he has already overcome them because he has brought forth his desire to find clarity by acknowledging his present confusion. Clarification is on the way and will soon fill his being. But only too often man is unaware of such dormant, smoldering, festering confusions and apparent contradictions. The purpose of these lectures is also to make you aware that such apparent contradictions may exist in you.

Let us now discuss some such apparent contradictions which stand in your way, which prevent you from being in contact with the life force and, therefore, from happiness. A deep misunderstanding and confusion, for many, is the fact that all truth teachings postulate that man's free will is responsible for his fate. Many religions and philosophies may word this fact differently, but it all amounts to the same. Psychology also talks about the necessity of self-government and self-responsibility. At the same time, spiritual teachings also postulate that man, with his small self, with his little mind, cannot succeed, he requires the vaster intelligence to guide him. This seems a contradiction, but only so long as pertinent underlying problem areas remain hidden, unrecognized, and therefore unchanged. As long as man struggles against standing on his own feet, he will cling to an authority outside himself and rely on an externalized God to take the place of a benign parent. He must reject the need for self-responsibility. Concomitantly, as long as he needs such an authority, he must be disappointed and subsequently rebel against it. In this rebellion he often rejects the idea that a vaster Intelligence than his own can guide and enlighten him. He fears giving up his small selfwill and selfishness, therefore not entrusting himself to the vaster power at his disposal. It is these inner deviations, these insistences on a childish way of life, these ignorances and misconceptions which create the aforementioned contradiction. The moment you give up a relevant misconception and resistance, two apparent contradictions unify into one whole truth: by shouldering self-responsibility, by realizing that you, and you alone, are the maker of your fate; by understanding causes and effects of your life, you actively seek enlightenment through the greater Intelligence that exists within yourself. You put the little mind aside -- not blindly but seeingly -- in order to let the bigger mind manifest. This does not mean absolving self-responsibility. Rather, you are responsible for opening the door, not for an outer deity, for another person, as it were, who is supposed to take the burden of adulthood away from you, but for the vaster self, forming an integral part of your psychic personality. The latter is kept from manifesting itself as long as unawareness and confusion exist. But to the degree that awareness dawns, the vaster self begins to fill the consciousness with Its truth and Its power, until the integration is complete and there are no longer different levels of functioning. Then mature self-responsibility and entrusting oneself to God, asking for His help and His way, become one and the same. In the lack of awareness it seems as though one must not wish to govern oneself in order to let God govern one's life. In awareness, self-government and accountability for one's actions, thoughts, and feelings are a prerequisite for the greater Intelligence to manifest. The little selfwill stands in the way of mature self-responsibility. It often must be given up in order to assume proper self-government. It is the same with God's will and self-government. The latter does not mean selfwill. When the small, greedy, childish, selfish selfwill is given up, self-government and entrusting oneself to the cosmic intelligence become interdependent, instead of mutually exclusive. Self-responsibility and self-government do not mean arrogant overestimation of the little self. In fact. Gradually the larger self takes over altogether. This is the integration we speak of on this path. If God is looked for as a substitute for mature self-responsibility and accountability, true contact with the life force cannot possibly exist. When you wish an outer authority to substitute for you, then all your faculties are paralyzed; the faculties of the smaller mind that has to take the first step to contact the bigger mind. It is the smaller mind, with its immediate outer will, that must be set in motion in order to open the inner will and reach the larger intelligence. It is the little outer determination that gives the initial momentum to open up the door, and then become part of, the vast limitless power that very gradually enables you to truly master life, as these split concepts begin to mend through your widened understanding.

Another such apparent contradiction is the fact that spiritual truth teachings postulate that man is supposed to be happy; that it is God's will for man to live in joy, while he is taught on a path such as this that God must not be used in order to strengthen the childish desire for magic; in order to encourage the equally childish greed to have everything one wants when one wants it; in order to indulge in the wishful thinking of the child, which is incapable of giving up its desire for utopia. Why do we take such pains on this path to grow out of this childish state when, in the same breath, I tell you that God wants man's happiness? Is this not a contradiction? This greedy child wants happiness, too. The great power of the life force is supposed to make all things possible. Is it not in contradiction to the aim of this path, which reiterates the necessity to give up the desire for magic? Whether or not you have consciously formulated such confusions, they may often exist, and it is important to draw them to the surface and straighten them out. So let us consider why it is true that man must be free of the childish desire for magic, must be able to accept the self-produced misery, instead of cringing from it. And why it is equally true that man has every right and possibility for happiness. You see, my friends, the desire for magic signifies the wish to avoid the consequences of one's actions; it denies self-responsibility without liberation and true mastery over one's fate, and therefore the bliss of being in the life force is not possible. The greed of having to have one's own way demands happiness for the sake of avoiding the imagined annihilation of one's images and misconceptions. Now, these fears are founded on false ideas. Man must convince himself that these ideas are false. He must learn that he does not perish when thus and thus happens. His misery is never caused by the feared event itself, but only and exclusively by his attitude. As long as he is tied to the wrong idea that an outer event -- be it rejection, criticism, loss, or whatever -- can cause his suffering, he is in illusion, and therefore a seeming contradiction will split a concept. When he realizes that his fears are unfounded, he sees that the threat is not the event but his attitude to the event. When he thus learns to give up and let go of tight currents, he can truly combine giving up his selfwill, his compulsion for gratification, while being fully aware of his right to be happy, and calmly striving toward fulfillment on all levels and in every respect of his life.

Before we go on with the lecture, is there any question at this point. Is all I said clear?

QUESTION: If something terrible happens, let's say death to a near person, how can unhappiness not be there?

ANSWER: Here lies an important misunderstanding. Just because you feel you ought not to be unhappy, you struggle away from the Now, therefore from yourself, and therefore from contact with the life force. It is either that greedy, selfwilled child that demands the fulfillment of all its desires, gratification for every wish, fearing the opposite; or it is the false idea that a spiritually evolved person should be so far developed as never to be unhappy, never to be puzzled, etc. Often, it is a combination of these two aspects, for the misunderstood spirituality is a product of the greedy, fearful, weak, dependent child. The less the person is willing to lose, to give up if need be, the weaker he gets, the more dependent on circumstances outside his control, the more insistent on such and such to happen from outside so as to prevent his own undoing -- as he falsely believes. Therefore struggle against the Now produces greater misery than the event itself. If none of these unhealthy aspects existed, the pain would be lived through and grown out of. The more he learns to do this, at the moment, the sooner the apparent opposites would meld and the full living of the painful moment will become simultaneous bliss. One then reaches beyond the illusion of opposites. If you, on the other hand, quietly acknowledge: "I am now unhappy, but at the same time I know that in this unhappiness I am somehow not quite in truth," you first enter into a peace. Yes, you are unhappy at the moment because of this loss or that disturbance. Nevertheless, a peace comes into you by fully acknowledging the feeling of the moment and the assertion that some of these feelings are the outcome of illusion, although you are as yet unable to change the illusion. Your desire to change from illusion into truth, while acknowledging all the negative feelings -- the outcome of your illusion -- will make you stop running and struggling, fighting against what is. Hence a deep peace fills you and, gradually, new understanding dawns in you from deep recesses that become accessible by your desire to tap divine truth, the life force in you. The more peace and vital new insight fill you, the more unhappiness and happiness become one -- because you cease struggling against the Now, you are in the Now. In this approach, you gradually experience more and more the fact that it is your attitude to an event that causes happiness or unhappiness, never the event itself. This discovery liberates and induces strength and security. It puts you into contact with the life force.

QUESTION (Question cannot be understood in the recording)

ANSWER: This indicates the same fundamental misunderstanding, so frequent in the human psyche, namely that unhappiness is a virtue. In this case, I advise the meditation: "My happiness cannot possibly detract from the other person, quite the contrary. However, my unhappiness adds to theirs." This will help you to develop a strong, full yes-current for your happiness. It is one of the wonderful truths about the life force, often so difficult for man to understand. He so often believes himself confronted with alternatives, or choices, where one thing is good, another bad; where one person is benefited, another damaged. Whenever he is caught in such a predicament, you may be sure that he is entangled in a wrong concept. Whenever you are in truth, my friends, there is no such thing that a decision is good on the one hand and bad on the other. It must be good all around, for everyone concerned. That is the rightness of divine truth, that is the wonder and beauty of it. When you truly comprehend this and are confronted with decisions but cannot see, with your human mind, how to arrive at this all-around rightness, you may then request this truth: put your small mind aside and let the larger intelligence enter. Open yourself to it. Assert: "As long as I can see disadvantage, harm, destructiveness in decisions, either for one or the other person, I know I am in distortion. I wish to be in possession of the divine truth, where the decision is right and harmonious for all, and I wish to be able to feel this deeply. I cannot see this yet, hence I am in untruth." In this way, you know the Now, you do not run from it, you fully face the Now, while, at the same time, calmly wishing to be enlightened. The combination of facing the Now without struggle against yourself and desiring the greater truth will make it possible for the life force to fill you with vision, wisdom, and strength.

Now let me ask you a question. Apart from what I have already said on the subject, does anyone here have any idea why it is really no contradiction that it is man's birthright to be happy, while he must be able to accept an unhappy Now, must relinquish selfwill and greed?

PARTICIPANT: It is often that man does not know what is good for him. What he wants with his little mind may not be what he would really want if he were more developed (Further comments here not audible).

THE GUIDE: Yes, that is true. Any other ideas?

ANOTHER PARTICIPANT: I think we often can't get the fulfillment right now. We are impatient and would want it immediately.

COMMENT: I think the Now has nothing to do with it.

(Further remarks from participants cannot be heard due to the cooling system)

THE GUIDE: The desires of the smaller and the larger self may be different, but not necessarily. Often they both wish for the same, and what the smaller self desires is not necessarily wrong. The question is The How. The little self is under the illusion that it must perish if its will is not fulfilled. This creates fear, as well as additional negative emotions. Hence it is these negative emotions and attitudes, due to the false idea of perishing when unfulfilled, that make the expression of the little self wrong, not the nature of the wish itself. On the other hand, if the real self issues forth a wish, it expresses itself without fear because non-fulfillment will not seem to annihilate. Consequently, further negative emotions will not be created.

I underline all you said, my friends. In addition, I would like to say this: the apparent contradiction is that man has to be able to give up what he wants to gain. In this giving up lies the necessary soul movement in order to be in contact with the life force. This soul movement is of crucial importance. In it lies the truth that not the event, the fulfillment of a wish, can bring happiness. In the relaxed giving up lie all the emotions which are a byproduct of truth. In the disharmonious soul movement contact with the life force is impossible. Soul movements are always a result of attitudes. Sometimes one needs merely to concentrate on attitudes and harmonious soul movements automatically follow. At other times, it is useful on the path to observe the soul movements themselves and approach them simultaneously from two directions. All false ideas create disharmonious emotions. The latter create tense, harsh, rigid soul movements. Truthful concepts create relaxed, warm, positive feelings, and, further, flexible, harmonious, rhythmic, organic soul movements. For example, the fear that non-fulfillment of a wish is annihilation creates a Must. Whenever there is a Must, it is contrary to the slow, harmonious waves of the life stream or life force.

My dearest friends, when you now look back on the work on this path, on the lectures and on your development, you will see that it was all painstakingly built up to lead to this point -- the mending of split concepts through the proper soul movements, or vice versa. This, in turn, enables you to be in possession of the immeasurable wisdom, energy, and peace of the life force.

To be in harmony when outside circumstances work according to your wishes is not really harmony, because you are dependent on these circumstances beyond your control. Even if it works well for you now, you must be in deep, possibly unrecognized, fear that it may not always be that way. But when you realize that you have the resources to live in dignity and self-respect and are not wholly dependent on any event outside yourself, then you are truly in harmony. Then you have come into your own. Then you make use of your birthright and begin to control your fate in the true sense of the word. Then the available abundance will be open to you, will give you all the many fulfillments you cannot even dream about, surpassing even the greediest selfwill of the childish self.

This is why pride, fear, selfwill, greed, and childish dependency, refusal to stand on one's own feet, produce soul movements which must run counter to one's self-interest. The conditions produced by these soul movements are such that they increase fear of non-fulfillment because man then believes that it is the outer event and not his attitude that produces the misery.

Being in contact with the life force is possible even while you are still in error, in illusion, provided you are aware of the latter, and provided you assert this fact, and express the desire for contact with the life force. Then you will be helped to eliminate the obstructions and will taste the vibrant, dynamic life force. Every pore and cell of your physical and emotional organism will be filled with this stimulating and peaceful experience. You will taste real security, looking forward to every next moment, knowing joy through fearlessness. You do not have to wait for perfection in order to experience this, if you can approach the imperfect limited self in the truth of the moment. Thus you will eliminate the imperfections much more effectively than by struggling against them.

Working this out in a more personal, specific way with each one of you is the program to follow on the path now. Once again, merely hearing the words will not be enough. They may sound like a complicated theory. But with the help of your personal sessions it will be possible to learn. You will all learn, step by step, to come into full possession of the meaning of these words, thus to be more and more in the vibrant truth of contact with the life force, contact with your real self, contact with God. Most of you are now ready to learn the technique of fully living in the Now. In order to do so, it is necessary to be aware of the many levels of emotional reactions. As long as so many unconscious or half conscious reactions remain hidden, man is oblivious of the various realities of his being. All he experiences as real are the most shallow, superficial, material, outer levels, the peripheral effects. He is so far away from the core of himself, so unaware of what he really feels and thinks, that he cannot live in the Now. But sufficient progress has been made in the group as a whole by most of you, sufficient awareness gained of the reality of the inner levels, that the Now can be looked for and seen. Hence the soul movements can be adjusted. Hence contact with the life force is possible.

For some it may still take a little time until they get to this point.

Now, are there are questions?

QUESTION: If you want something very badly, but there is fear, pride, selfwill, then it is a counter-current and you can't get it?

ANSWER: I would put it this way: whenever a no-current exists, there must be a false concept behind it, otherwise there could be no no-current. Simultaneously, the false concept creates fear, pride, selfwill, etc. But what I discussed before goes even a little beyond that. Instead of pushing against a no-current, assert its presence, assert the fact that it is based on false ideas, assert your wish to be helped in understanding the facets that lead to this state, without frantically pushing against it. This is living in the Now; it is the only effective approach to inner disturbance and disharmony, putting you immediately in touch with your real self, with the life force.

QUESTION: How should we think of God?

ANSWER: I cannot possibly go into this answer now, at least not extensively. All I should like to say is this: do not think of God as a person in human form. Think of this tremendous power, continuously creating life in a purposeful way. Look around and open your eyes. In all branches of science you find aspects of the Universal Intelligence and Power. In all manifestations of nature you find it. In the very complex physical, mental, emotional organism of the human creature lies the proof of this Intelligence and Power. God is not a disciplinarian, God is beyond good or bad. Man often cannot conceive of God, seeing existing strife, because the only way he can think of God is in human terms. Before he can come to a wider understanding, he often has first to give up the small disciplinarian that he wants and fears, to act as a substitute for a parent, and also because he is too afraid of tackling life by himself. As I have pointed out again and again, before the true God experience can occur, man must learn to stand on his own feet, and perhaps shelve his search for God for a while. Do not declare "there is," due to false guilt and the misunderstandings of human relations, if you are not certain. But do not declare "there is not" because your outlook is as yet blurred by your hopelessness and confusion with life, with yourself. At such a time it is healthy to say "I do not yet know," without guilt and yet without defiance. And as you find yourself -- and this is always the way the path must start -- as you find yourself, true self, the rest is given unto you. It comes by itself. It is natural understanding that comes when you learn about yourself what you need to know in order to live successfully. Finding God cannot be done by discussing theories on an intellectual level. Keep the problem shelved, my friends, keep yourself open, but find yourself first. This is all that matters. For then, indeed, you will come into the true outlook that comes from inside, from your personal experience, rather than accepting postulates and dogmas one takes on out of fear, obedience, out of wishful thinking, out of the desire for dependency and reward, through the rejection of self-responsibility. In fact, the wishful thinking has to go, the childish greed has to be given up, all attitudes changed which make man cling to the false God image, before a true God experience is possible. Every vestige of escapism must disappear before genuine God experience is possible. This, then, is built on a rock.

And so, my dearest friends, I bless each and every one of you. Rejoice in the knowledge that the reality of yourself brings you into a harmonious relationship with life. And this becomes more and more a proven fact in your everyday life, not a hope in a vague future. Go on in this search of facing yourself in utter truthfulness. For, when you do that, everything else is given onto you. Be blessed, all of you, be in peace, be in God.

The Guide
by Eva Pierrakos
June 26, 1964

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