October 9, 2011 Sunday, Discussion Period, Seattle Retreat

(In response to a question, Barbara has explained how to connect to guides. This instruction can be found in Cosmic Healing and numerous transcripts.)

Barbara: I have a new book coming out in December called The Aaron/Q'uo Dialogues. Q'uo is an entity channeled through my friend Carla Rueckart. For ten years Carla and I got together and did a workshop. We ended up with 33 sessions of dialogue between Aaron and Q'uo. The Aaron/Q'uo Dialogues are these sessions between Aaron and Q'uo, published by the same publisher as Cosmic Healing. It will be out December 6. Carla is a friend who lives in Kentucky and is a channel for the Ra Material. We've been friends for over 20 years.

In those dialogues, at the start of each session we do what we call tuning, bringing up our energy and asking for the highest guidance, and so forth. There are numerous examples in the dialogues of how we do that, each of us giving our own process.

We are spending some time with questions. (Summarizing for a new attendee) Yesterday we started the day with vipassana and in the afternoon we did some pure awareness practice. Last night Aaron gave a talk on the akashic field.

In the smallest capsule, we have four elements, earth, air, fire, and water, and a fifth element called akasha or ether. The akasha is an element, and just as there's a fire field or an earth field, there is an akashic field.

If we have the Unconditioned here (hands open below, representing the Unconditioned) , picture some kind of one-way filter lying on the Unconditioned so everything in the Unconditioned can rise upward. The positive and the non-positive, everything comes up. A distortion is not necessarily negative. As Aaron describes it, if a ray of light hits the water, which is a heavier material, it bends. That bend is a distortion, it's a distortion of the straight direction of the light. When our energies bang into heavier density objects, they bend, and sometimes fear or greed or anger come up. We don't treat it as something bad to be gotten rid of, we simply note it as distortion.

Right there with the distortion is the ever-perfect. That ray of light coming down is the perfect clear ray of light, but when it hits the heavier substance of the water, it bends. When you're out of the water looking and you see the spotlight, bright spotlight coming down shining on the water and seeming to bend. Yet when you look into the water, the perfect light is still there. I think you understand what I mean by that from your practice.

So, what we're working on here now is how to be in both places: the simultaneity of the ever-perfect and the distortion. Not get caught in the distortion but know that the ever-perfect is right there with the distortion, which is really no different than what you've heard me teaching for years. You know “that which is aware of anger is not angry; that which is aware of fear is not afraid.” No denial of the relative experience of anger or fear in that moment, but not self-identified with it, just some spaciousness around it. And seeing the ever-perfect is there.

The akashic field work takes it one step further because we move directly into the akashic field, which is the place where the ever-perfect is filtering up and the distortions are revealed, and we see that we can wade through and find just what's right.

Aaron used an example last night. He said if you had a plate of crackers with soft cheese on the beach, if your hand was jostled and they all fell on the sand, some cheese side down, some cheese side up, you would not try to scrape each grain of sand off the cheese-side-down ones, you'd just pick up the cheese-side-up ones and enjoy them. Let the ants and the birds and whatever else enjoy the cheese-side-down ones. They're perfect too, they're just not perfect for your consumption at that moment.

We go into the akashic field in that way, sorting out, not saying, “This is bad,” but simply, “This is for something else. This is not what I need to digest right now. This other is what I choose.”

So, we did some meditation about how to move into the akashic field, how to experience that in meditation. Part of this is based on work I did with Aaron this summer, based on a restricted Tibetan text called Circle of the Sun. I began to read it, meditate with it and talk with Aaron about it. I sent out a series of I think 17 journals through the summer with typing from the text. This (copy in hand) is the original of the text. I only typed excerpts from the text and Aaron's guidance on how to work with it.

This is a Tibetan practice called togyal. The book begins with trekchod, the basic dzogchen practice, and then togyal, which is a second level of practice. You've done some of the trekchod practice with me. This is the basic pure awareness practice. Aaron used the reading not to teach us togyal but to teach me how to enter the akashic field, and that togyal practices are one method of entering it. He pointed out that shamanism in different cultures has different methods of entering the field, that there are different paths. The primary thing is that we see that it's possible, that we can choose to enter it as a way of releasing the stickiness of the distortions and choosing that which is wholesome.

That's where we're at, in a nutshell.

Q: I understand that distortions cannot enter the dharmakaya. However, they can enter the akashic field. It seems one can also enter the akashic field with, let's say, unpure intentions and manipulate the field...

Barbara: One can enter the akashic field from an ego place, wanting to gratify one's own ego self, wanting the benefit for the self and not all beings. This is why it's a restricted text, because once you enter the akashic field there is a lot of power. And if one entering the field is not holding the intention for the highest good, one can do a lot of harm. Picture a Hitler with the ability to enter the akashic field. He already had a lot of relative world power. What if he had that spiritual power?

Aaron says good morning to you all. He says it's much harder to enter the akashic field with negative intention because you will find angelic presence blocking your movement into the field. But it can be done.

Q: This morning I think I entered the akashic field. It was very beautiful and amazing. But I became frightened about the power, the potential. I stated my highest intentions and bodhisattva vow but I was frightened to do anything else, because I don't know what is in the highest good for all. Once we enter the akashic field, how do we work with it?

Aaron: My love to you all. I am Aaron. You don't need to know in your everyday mind what is for the highest good. You hold the intention in your heart and that is sufficient. The self will always come in with little fears and voices of uncertainty or feelings of unworthiness. You simply touch those with love.

One of the reasons there's fear is that the negative emotions are not fully purified, for any of you, so there is the doubt, “If I have this much power, might I not misuse it?” And yes, you might. If you do, you will experience the karmic consequences of that misuse. You will learn. But because each of you holds such a strong intention to live your life with love and with non-harm, it's doubtful whether such egoistic drive will go far. It may come up, but then it will be checked quickly by the loving heart and the power of the intention.

Here it may be helpful to connect with guidance, even just to ask, “Aaron, I'm uncertain here. Take my hand.”

Q: When we are in the akashic field, what do we do? How do we work skillfully?

Aaron: Many lifetimes ago I was a healer serving on a field of battle. I stood behind the lines during the battle. Now, please don't picture bombs falling, but rather, beings with swords and lances bashing at each other. Then both sides would withdraw. It was almost as if a referee blew a whistle and said, “Let us get in,” the healers on both sides, to remove the maimed, those who could be helped. Take a break, time out.

There would be dead bodies, dying bodies, injured bodies, those who were not deeply injured but just emotionally overwrought. Some of them would be on my team, so to speak, and some on the other team.

So I would ask, what is for the highest good? Often I was drawn toward the beings who were dying, who were in the most pain, and yet there was only a limited amount of time and energy, and those who were wounded and needed tending could be saved. The ego would want to go to those who were screaming in agony and were dying. By going into the akashic field, I could see the whole flow of energies and that some beings were truly being tended to by angelic presences, and were in transition. While ideally a human hand to hold might be helpful to them, there were not advanced medical techniques and I could not save them. But the ego would say, “Go there, he's screaming loudest.” I had to learn to let it be.

The one who is lying silently, somewhat stoically, I could see his energy field writhing. I could see the life force within him with a potential at that moment to rise or to fade away, and that this one could be helped. Just trusting myself, not condemning the ego voice, but also not being a slave to the ego voice. Coming back again and again into the whole energy field that I saw.

Does that help to clarify it?

Q: Your guidance is holding the highest intention for all?

Aaron: But also knowing, “I don't know what the highest intention for others is. This being may have resolved at some level to use this battle to leave the incarnation. It's my job to do what I can to bring him back, if that's possible, but not to try to save him against his will. And to trust that at some level, if he had intended to survived, his energy field would be showing me that. And if his energy field is showing a sense of deep withdrawal, the ego says, ‘No, I'm not going to let him die,' but that which chooses the highest good and respect for the free will of each being will let him be.”

Now, if I had nothing else to do, I would simply hold his hand and hold presence with him while he died, or decided to live. That would be kind. But if it's a choice between that and literally saving the life of one who deeply chooses to live, I need to go there.

Q: I find that for me, when I state the intention to be of service to the highest and best for all beings, sometimes that statement becomes a bit mechanical. So what I do is, I stop and ask myself, “Q, look me in the eye and state that again.” And yes, I do hold that intention for the highest and best for all beings. I find that re-stating it that way helps open up. I really feel the field open up.

Aaron: It's important at that point, “I” as ego do not know what's for the highest good. I ask to come into this heart where everything is interwoven together, where I can literally see and feel the patterns and the disruption of those patterns. Where I can see which disruptions are calling out for help and which disruptions are making the statement, “Just leave me alone to be disrupted for now.”

Q: In the first Venture Fourth meeting that we had, I was in the middle of a deal that I was working on, and while at that meeting the deal fell apart. It was very painful because it was a deal that would have really resolved a lot of my financial problems, and a lot of heavy emotions came up. I received a bit of a spiritual admonishment, a loving slap on the hand, reminding me that my intention is for the highest and best for all beings, and then asking me, “How do you know that this is for the highest and best? You don't. Just relax.”

Barbara: When I was at Omega two weeks ago, the first two days we were helping to anchor the entities' current. Feeling all this energy and feeling deeply connected. It was hard work and also  blissful experience. At the end of the second day Heather handed me a note saying, “you're to go to surgery tomorrow morning.” And the first thing I thought was, “Oh no, I can't do that. My work is for the highest good of all beings!” And (smiling) Aaron said, “Are you assuming you as ego know what is for the highest good better than the incorporated Entity here does? You say you love and respect him. For the highest good, tomorrow morning you're to go to surgery! Just do it.”

Q: I am wondering whether Aaron could guide us into the akashic field.

Barbara: Okay. Aaron is here with me. He has not fully left the body. We're kind of sharing the body at this moment so I can participate too. He says, “It is my plan to do that, perhaps this afternoon.”

Q: I have a couple of questions that I was waiting until this morning. When I do energy work, I have been taught to use the akashic element. I use it. I have also done shamanic journeying into the akashic field a few times, but it is in the symbolic language of this shamanistic way. So when I use the akashic element, there is a way that it feels. Just like there is a feeling of fire or air or water, it has a particular feel. I was wanting to know the difference between the kundalini energy and the akashic. I feel kundalini in my body as ecstasy. Is there a signature energy feel to this channel, or a way of understanding if I am in the akashic field by the feel?

Guided Kundalini and Central Channel Meditation

Aaron: Focus first at the base of the spine. Feel the energy coming into the base of the spine. Breathe in and let it rise all the way up into the crown. Drop down into what's call the hara under the ribs and back down into the base of the spine. Breathing in, it rises up. Breathing out, it comes back down into the base chakra again. A few breaths like that...

As you feel it in the base of the spine, the base chakra, before the in-breath, feel down into the earth and draw the energy from the earth. Breathe in slowly and feel it moving up the spine through each of the chakras, into the crown. As you breathe out, draw energy into the crown chakra, not just what you've just circulated but more energy, coming into the crown chakra, coming down into the hara and down into the base of the spine with the full out breath...

This breath supports the fullest possible opening of kundalini at that moment, the opening of the chakras. Do it for 4 or 5 breaths, and feel it. Don't forget to draw energy into the crown chakra as you begin the exhale. You are reaching far down into the earth at the start of the inhale. You are reaching into the infinite heavens at the start of the exhale...

One could slow it down and picture each chakra, a much slower meditation, but for most of you this is enough. You can get the sense of the flow of kundalini energy. If a particular chakra appears closed, then you could work with it with color, with light, with special attention. Assuming the chakras are relatively open, this will support the flow of kundalini...

Now I want you to hold forth a new intention. The chakras are already relatively open. The next step, then: As you bring the energy in through the base chakra, hold the intention to open the channel to the akashic field. Try to visualize something just in front of the spine coming up from the base to the heart. Put one hand over the heart, touching the heart. And then, (3 fingers at the forehead) touching at the third eye, one finger in the center at the third eye and a thumb over one eye, a finger over the other eye. Inviting energy not all the way up to the crown chakra but to this area behind the eyeballs. Coming up to the third eye and behind the eyeballs.

Breathing out... Breathing in that energy and light again. Inviting it to come into the heart and then rise from the heart to this area behind the eyes. As this process becomes more sophisticated, you will experience the side channels. For now, I'm focusing only on the central channel.

Hold the intention to enter as deeply as this human that you are, is able,  into the akashic field, for the highest good. The out breath is more of a release. The focus is on the in breath and drawing the energy up. Then as you release, open into the direct experience of the akashic field.

Barbara often sees it as a vast ocean, a sea, very still in the light of the full moon and with very gentle swells. Light is rippling with those gentle swells, but there is also a strong reflective quality. For Barbara, who is a visual person, she begins to experience myriad objects floating on that sea. She does not start with a specific direction but asks, what most needs my attention here? And is often drawn to one or another object: a being in physical pain, a being with sorrow, a being experiencing a lot of contraction.

Whatever she is called to, she does not go into it to fix it but simply, for example, right there with contraction is the uncontracted. She holds the uncontracted as a mirror to whatever distress she has experienced. Or where there is sorrow, she holds ease and spaciousness as a mirror. Reflecting the possibilities.

At this point there is no longer Barbara doing this but simply pure awareness moving within the akashic field and attending to the distortions that come to this awareness. There's a sense of great spaciousness, great light. For Barbara, there is usually a sense of broad support.

When Barbara leads a meditation sitting, once the group is settled she usually moves into the akashic field. Some of you have felt her or me working with you, attending to you in your discomfort during the sitting. Before she rings the bell, she closes off her entry into the akashic field, because when she comes out of the sitting, and Barbara's ego is back to some degree leading the sitting, leading the retreat, it's no longer appropriate for her to be meddling in the akashic field.

This is a very short guided meditation. I hope it will provide some clarity. Can you feel the difference? (Q: No. Not really a difference between the kundalini movement and this heart-to-third-eye movement.)

Q: Is this movement and more just light or spaciousness? (Aaron: Yes, exactly.) And the kundalini is a movement?

Aaron: Exactly. So you need to begin to trust the light and spaciousness and simply follow it. To know it is different from the kundalini. You're entering a different channel.

Q: Is it different than when I have entered it in shamanic journeying?

Aaron: If I were to lead you on a shamanic journey to enter the akashic field, I would lead you on a different route. This is just a very simple energetic practice, as opposed what would be a journey and visualization.

If I were leading you on a visualization, a shamanic journey, I would probably put you into canoes paddling down a river to a sea. I would create various visualizations wherein as you approached the sea there would be the opportunity to attend to various distortions, and for you to feel what it is that attends. How you can enter the bigger field that sees what needs attendance, as I described my healer work in battle. That would be a shamanic journey. So what I'm describing here is just pure energy practice.

If you were a Tibetan practitioner working with the togyal practice, you'd use a lot more visualizations. The visualizations are helpful because people have worked with them and are familiar with them and this is their ongoing practice.

There is no one path. I think that what's most important here is beginning to feel the difference between the movement, which is energy, and the spaciousness, which is stillness. And that the energy of the akashic field remains available to you within the stillness. But in order to enter the akashic field, you must enter the stillness.

There is a fear for many people of releasing, of losing the energy. You maintain the energy, but you are not based in the energy but in the stillness. And of course there's no duality between them. Energy and stillness, kyo and jitsu.

Let's have one last question and then a short break and sitting. We'll have more questions later.

Q: How does Barbara close her access to the akashic field?

Aaron: Let me partially release the body so Barbara can answer that...

Barbara: You're asking how do I close my access to the akashic field. It's like rigpa: I never completely close it, it simply steps out of being the center of focus, but it's always there and I can always move back into it as I need to. It's like putting weight on this foot or on that foot. One foot is on the hard ground and one is in marsh. If I want to attend to something in the water, I need to put my weight on the foot in the marsh. If I want to attend to something that's happening on land and in the village, I need to put more weight on the foot that's on solid ground.

Aaron says that's not entirely accurate. He's questioning me... Aaron is saying that I don't remove the foot from the marsh, I simply do not have as much weight on it. I move the weight from one foot to the other, but I am always connected to both. And he's saying, it's the same thing for rigpa, with rigpa or everyday mind.

Q: How do you ensure that you are not meddling in the akashic field if you are in both?

Barbara: Because if “I” am meddling, there's some ego in there and it carries a certain tension with it, a certain contraction. And mindfulness to the presence of that contraction has become such an ongoing practice for me that as soon as I see that kind of contraction, I note it, “contracting, self”. Stepping back, re-centering myself. This always has to start with rigpa. If I am very much in sem, in everyday mind, rather than in rigpa, then I am in no position to work within the akashic field. So I always need to start by moving into pure awareness, and the arising of intention. For me it's mostly intention for service and for the highest good of beings and to do no harm.

Personally, I reach my hand out to spirit, to Aaron and to Jeshua. I take them as my two guides, and I ask them to lead me, to support me, and to let me know if I am in any way meddling or doing harm.

Okay, let's have a few minutes break and come back and sit...

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