2020 Steps Vigil, Full Messenger Teaching | Night 4

But I’d like to talk about this journey and the mysterious part of this journey, which will actually challenge you in ways that you have not expected. Because at some point whatever it is that you feel is the strongest motivation for you…at some point, this reason for being here will not seem to be fulfilled. And here you can hit a threshold where you stop, unsure of what to do. Yes, things are changing within you, you can feel that. But it’s not what you perhaps thought would happen. It’s as if things are beginning to shed away from you, rather than being added on—wonderful qualities being added on, new strengths, new ideas, new everything, added on—but really, it’s more like things are shedding.

And the things that are shedding really are the things in you that aren’t you. How this happens is mysterious. But the more we focus on Knowledge and the experience of Knowledge, the more other things begin to change for us. So we hit this threshold. And many people stop at this threshold. Not getting what they wanted or expected, they begin to feel that perhaps they shouldn’t be doing this; perhaps it’s not working for them. Here you can seem to be losing motivation, but there’s something in you that’s urging you to go on, that stopping would not feel really right within you.

And as you proceed, some of your values and desires will begin to fade. Perhaps things you’ve felt for a long time just aren’t so important anymore, or you’re not sure. And here you’re breaking new ground, so to speak. So you’re not used to being in this state of mind, in between almost. The New Message describes it as the trapeze artist who, for a moment, is not holding on anything, is between bars, swinging from bar to bar. You’re suspended almost.

These thresholds are so important because they represent stages of our development. The stages are both tests and turning points where some motivation we had for participating now is falling away; and what remains to carry us forward? Perhaps we’re not feeling as certain as we thought we would feel. We’re not feeling as enlightened or as happy or as inspired. In fact, the road’s getting a little rough, perhaps challenging, confusing. We were hoping for certainty, but now we feel more confused. We were hoping for resolution, but now our path seems even more cloudy. So what we thought would happen is not happening, or not the way we thought it would. 

If you’re only doing this for personal reasons, if you’re only undertaking the journey to Steps, Steps to Knowledge, you will not pass through these thresholds, and there are more than one.

You will lose interest. Your reasons for being there will run out. And perhaps you’ll say to yourself, “Well, this is just not for me. It’s not doing, it’s not giving me what I want. It’s not doing what I hoped it would do.” Things just run out. And yet, something will move you on and encourage you to continue. 

So you go into a state of being less certain about what you’re doing, but more certain that you should do it if that makes sense. You can’t explain it to yourself or to other…certainly to other people. But there’s a certainty that you should continue, but you’re not sure why. Here you’re beginning to transcend the realm of your surface mind and to engage with the deeper state of you that doesn’t operate on reasons and justifications and comparisons. Because at this deeper level, your participation here is not evaluated in terms of benefits and costs, time spent, rewards received; that’s not the emphasis at all. 

So your ideas cannot take you to Knowledge, even the most lofty ideas, the most spiritual ideas, famous ideas, because your personal mind cannot recognize Knowledge. It was created in a state of Separation. It’s a part of you that is estranged from Knowledge, is apart from Knowledge. It has its role to play in the future as it comes to become a servant of Knowledge or become an expression of Knowledge. But at the beginning, what you’re dealing with here is beyond its grasp.

So your ideas cannot take you to Knowledge. Here the personal mind wants to use Knowledge to get what it wants and thinks it needs, things like power and relationships, recognition, happiness, contentment—whatever it takes to try to end suffering, trying to make Separation work in this life. But alas and wonderfully, Knowledge has other plans for you. Your personal mind can begin the journey, but it cannot take you to Knowledge because only Knowledge can take you to Knowledge. 

Therefore, everything that motivates you forward will eventually run out, leaving only the thing that really matters because the motivation here is actually a force of Knowledge. So you find Knowledge by taking the Steps to Knowledge, not just an understanding of Knowledge or an appreciation of Knowledge or a sense of Knowledge, but actually Knowledge. 

People often say to me when they come to visit on a Vigil or an Encampment gathering, they say, “You know, I don’t really know-how…if I’m experiencing Knowledge.” I say to them, “Well, Knowledge is what brought you here.”

So you can see how the questioning mind is trying to piece things together, but the real current of your life is happening more deeply within you. The New Message describes this as like the ocean. If you were on a ship and looked over at the waters, you really couldn’t tell which direction the waves were going, necessarily. Maybe you could briefly if there were high winds, but then things change; the winds change, the ocean becomes calm. It’s very difficult to discern what’s moving the waters of the world when you’re looking at it from the surface. But down deep are the currents that are moving oceans of water all over the planet continuously, relentlessly. 

So we have these deeper movements within ourselves that aren’t really discernible from the surface but can be deeply felt once you orient yourself to the deeper realm within you where Knowledge resides.

So eventually, all your good ideas and reasons for taking the Steps to Knowledge, for journeying to Knowledge, will run out, leaving you only with the Knowledge that you know you must do this—free of debate, free of confusion, free of doubt, only the Knowledge “I must do this.” How simple, how strong, powerful; a force so great that it’s just…everything around it seems weak and confused and disturbed. 

When this will happen, you cannot tell. But you will go through some thresholds where you’re not sure why you’re doing this because your reasons for doing it seem to have run out or no longer seem important or it’s not what you expected or it’s not what you thought it was going to give you.

And some people quit at these thresholds. They just give up because, in their own minds, it isn’t working for them, when in fact, it may be working for them very well. For those who watch over you look for these opportunities for you to deepen your engagement rather than having personal incentives or reasons, things that are weak, fallible, easily challenged, easily overcome, easily influenced by other people. Now you’re calibrating to a deeper sense of purpose beneath the surface of the mind. 

So going through periods of doubt and confusion may seem like you’re failing the journey. But from a higher vantage point, it means that your ideas about taking the journey are falling away, leaving you just with the journey. Now you begin to come back to who you really are. Now the deeper teaching embedded in the Steps can become evident to you, whereas before you only had glimpses, momentary experiences. You were looking for something else, but now Steps reveals to you what is really there. 

Here you find Knowledge by taking the Steps to Knowledge, but you must persist. You’ll come to thresholds. You’ll have to choose again. But your choosing will become more authentic, more true to the purpose that calls to you, more true to the response within you that is the true response.

Nearly everyone begins the journey back to who they are, to their real purpose and mission life, in terms of self-interest, “What can it do for me?” And there is encouragement at that level. But what enables them to complete the journey is the greater purpose that has brought them into the world, which becomes ever more evident to you as everything else falls away. May the blessing be with you.

* * *

Something that really helped me in this regard was to understand that the world is a hospital full of sick people. And when you’re in the hospital, you don’t get angry for the people being sick; you just acknowledge that they’re in that hospital because they are sick. So it really changed my expectations to accept that people are ill in varying degrees—some people obviously very ill; some people don’t look ill, but they really are. And the illness is ever-present. It’s just the degree of the illness that changes from person to person. 

So living in Separation is an unhealthy environment for eternal beings. And seeking to find happiness and equanimity in a changing and hazardous environment such as the Earth is a kind of very stressful experience for eternal beings. We weren’t designed for this. This may be one of the reasons why it takes us so long to grow up, to finally get acclimated to being here. 

So I think if you can accept that everyone is mentally ill—some people obviously more than others, but everyone’s suffering under the weight of Separation—that can be a real change in how you’re looking at people. Otherwise, your expectations people should have their act together; they should be doing well; they should be honest; they should be self-aware; they should be able to account for themselves but they can’t or don’t…So I think accepting this image that everyone’s mentally ill to varying degrees can lead to real acceptance and compassion. 

This is a place where people are not well. Even if they’re living in splendor, even if they don’t seem to have a care, they’re not well. Some people are under terrible oppression and terrible suffering. 

So if you were an Angel walking the world, this is probably how you would look at it. I mean, to love people you have to accept them, which means you have to grant where they are…it’s a starting point. I mean this person is in this situation, this person’s … like, I mean, that’s your starting point. And some people are easy to like and some aren’t. And some are abusive to themselves and others, but we’re all suffering from the consequence of living in Separation. This is what the New Message teaches us. And if you can embrace that, it will begin to really alter how you look at people, and certainly who you choose to be in relationship with. That’s another story. Don’t have time for that tonight.

Each step will reveal more to you the more time you spend with it. These Steps are deceptively simple. But I can assure you if you were to do Steps five times, on the fifth time, you’d see things you never saw before because you’ve gained the eyes to see. And now Steps is revealing more; it’s like revealing more to you. So…and you reflect upon what this Step is telling you that you could activate and bring into your life, how this might change the way you look at your own mind, your body or how you communicate—all these kinds of things. 

And … I was also thinking of various ways that we actually practice stillness but we’re not aware of it. Like if I’m sitting in, say, an outdoor restaurant, but I want to listen to the conversation two tables over, I’m going to be still because I want to listen. I’m going to stop my mind because I really want to hear something. Or if somebody’s telling me something important, I really want to hear it. And you will practice intervals of stillness doing these kinds of things. Anything that really gathers your attention will produce momentary experiences of stillness because your mind is focused on something. 

So we actually can do this in little bits. To practice more, I’ll give you this one little secret: you cannot think and be conscious of your breathing. Try it. If you were to breathe—inhale, exhale; inhale, exhale—if you can focus on that…you can’t do that and be in active thinking at the same time. So it’s just following the most natural motion of your body—one of the most natural motions—can give you a kind of a clue as to how to bring your mind into focus or sublimate it. “I’m just going to follow…” or counting your breath one to ten, one to ten, one to ten or following your breath. 

And Steps to Knowledge provides us this beautiful statement called Na Rahn, which I use in practice, which inhale Na, exhale Rahn. You don’t know what these words mean and that’s not important that you know what they mean. They don’t really have to mean anything. It’s just that you’re using them to give the mind something to focus on and you’re also focusing on your breathing. 

It’s amazingly simple, but you have to stay with it because you’ll keep falling out and you have to bring yourself back, keep falling out, going…keep bringing yourself back. But the more you bring yourself back, the longer you can stay. And the seconds become minutes and the minutes become more minutes and as you practice, and over time you just learn how, as Patricia would say, “to transcend the field of the mind” doing these very simple things. But you have to be focused. I mean, you can’t just let your mind run like a wild animal, which is what we’re in the habit of doing. We just follow our minds. Well, Steps will teach you how to guide your mind so it can follow you, which is what it’s supposed to do.

When I look at these Steps, I just recall the fatigue that I experienced receiving them, how I was really…I mean, I was joyful to receive them. But it was very, very demanding to have this kind of engagement, this level of intensity for that long. So I’ve often…when I look at the Steps like this, I bring back the memory of that fatigue. Patricia: Oh, my goodness.

It was a labor – I mean, it was a joyful labor – but a labor. It gave birth to something very precious, but it was a labor for me.

* * *

I probably woke up with the Presence, that I knew this was going to be a receiving day. But it took a long time to prepare to receive this, so I was geared up for it. It wasn’t thrust upon me unexpectedly. I mean, I knew this was coming. It took a lot. I actually changed my whole life before it could be given. I had to have all the elements of my new life in place before this could be given to me—marriage, family, leaving where I’d grown up and all my work there and all my students there and my affiliate associations there— now given 3000 miles away in a small little town. And from then, I was already on my way to a new life. This could not have happened in my old life. So it took years to make that transition to a new life. And then I had to practice receiving the Presence for long periods of time.

When I got sick in 2001, they didn’t talk to me for five and a half years, except in short messages—no revelations given. So that was the dry – what I call the dry period when I was doing a lot of radio interviews for Steps to Knowledge and speaking at conferences for Steps to Knowledge…for, excuse me, the Allies of Humanity, primarily. That was a time.

After this five-and-a-half years, there was this huge buildup when I finally became well enough to receive this kind of Presence, which is a pretty intense experience. That year I received 116 special teachings and three books.

PS: Mmm, Marshall…

MVS: That’s like doing one of these every other day for a year, was 2008; six [2006] a little bit, and seven [2007] it began to grow and then eight [2008], it was like a flood.