September 14, 2011 Wednesday, Cosmic Healing Class

September 14, 2011 Wednesday, Cosmic Healing Class and Open Wednesday;

This is a full room, about 49 people.

Aaron: My blessings and love to you all. I am Aaron. What an extraordinary glow! The room is radiant! Thank you for being here with me. Because your light and energy supports each other, it blossoms, it grows and expands! It is very beautiful to see.

Let's start with something very simple. How about the metta chant?

The words are simply “metta, karuna, mudita, upekkha.” These are four Pali language words. Metta means loving kindness. Karuna means compassion. Mudita means joy for others, for all beings. Upekkha means equanimity. Just the repetition of these words.

Sing from your hearts! I want to open the energy in here.

(Chanting metta, karuna, mudita, upekkha...)

Can you feel that energy? Can you feel it not only in the room but in your own hearts?

Tonight we begin what I envision as a several-year program. People need not stay committed through the whole program; it's not something you commit to for a number of years. But I envision it as traveling the path that I have outlined in the talk “Trainings”.

“Trainings” is in the book Cosmic Healing, and it will be posted on the website. It outlines a course of spiritual evolution, a spiral of ascending consciousness. On this path, you have increasing awareness of the mind and body, first from the perspective of the everyday self, aware of the emotions that arise, the physical sensations that arise, and with knowing when the arisen object is pleasant and when it's unpleasant, aware of the thoughts that arise.

As the human, at first these emotions, sensations, and thoughts push you off course like a sailboat suddenly hit by a strong wind. But just as the good sailor learns how to release some wind so the boat doesn't turn over or get blown off course, so you learn in your meditation practice how to deal with the strong gusts that blow you, to spill a bit of the wind and keep sailing on a straight tack.

In the beginning, it's the everyday self that does this. We teach this through the vipassana meditation practice. Is there anybody here who has no experience at all with vipassana meditation? A very few. On the Deep Spring website you'll find basic instructions, and should you wish it, Deep Spring offers, on numerous Saturday mornings, half-day introductions as well as longer classes. For those that are in the ongoing class, I would like to suggest that you consider the October retreat, Friday night through Sunday, as a wonderful way to deepen your vipassana practice. Friday evening through Sunday noon: silence, instruction, practice, guidance from the teachers-- me and Barbara and a colleague, John.

So, meditation is a staple of your spiritual work. Many of you have done other forms of meditation, and I am not belittling these other forms, but they have different fruits. What we're teaching here and asking you to practice is presence in this body and mind in each moment so that you become aware of what's arising in the body, what's arising in the mind, and how you are relating to these objects. You're not trying to change these objects but simply to observe the habitual patterns in your relationships with whatever has arisen..

Give a little push here (push). If I tense up like that, that's one pattern. If I just kind of lean and come back, that's another pattern. Push my arm... I let the push go by, but I don't collapse, I simply feed the energy back to the pusher, but I don't arm myself against it. Life is constantly pushing you. This is a wonderful example. We can practice literally with this Tai Chi exercise, and also in meditation. When so many subtle pushes come at you-- unpleasant thoughts, unpleasant body sensations, or pleasant thoughts that you want to ride along into daydreams-- we can watch the habitual patterns and see where we get caught.

This is the first ring of the spiral in “Trainings”. In that first ring there is that everyday self, mundane consciousness, watching sensations and thoughts, watching the response to the sensations and thoughts-- pleasant, unpleasant, grasping, aversion, and so forth. But gradually there's a shift, as we come around the second time, into, let's call it the witness or higher consciousness, that can watch the arising of sensations, emotions, and thoughts with compassion for the human, and without taking what comes so personally.

(push) First time around the spiral: “She's pushing me! I don't like that!”

Either I'm going to push back or I'm going to fold.

The second time around (the spiral), “Hmm, she's pushing.” Not, “She's pushing me,” but “She's pushing. I wonder what's inspiring her to push, what's happening within her. I open my heart in compassion to this human who's pushing.” But if she keeps pushing me so I start to fall on the floor, I'll move away. I don't have to allow myself to be pushed.

So, on the second level of the spiral we begin to experience more selflessness, more experiencing from a place of awareness, a deeper consciousness that's not so rooted in the everyday self but starts to know the interconnection of that divine self and every other self, to experience the place where you come together. She is not pushing me, fear is pushing love. How is love going to respond? If it's truly love, it's going to respond compassionately, which doesn't mean letting itself be steamrolled by fear. We say no, but with compassion.

So, we come around the second level of the spiral. Sometimes it's more conceptual in that second level. We start to see the divine self and we can spend moments resting in that divine self, but there's no stability. Then we come to the third level of the spiral. At the third level, there is deeper stability. You're increasingly able to rest in that place of compassionate awareness, attending to what's going on around you from a place of presence and love -- the title of my other book here, Presence, Kindness, and Freedom. When we are present with the world with things just as they are, with an attitude of kindness rather than fear or aversion, we find freedom.

You grow into this gradually and with practice. I'm speaking in this talk of the specific levels (reading):

The tenth level is the first of a more mature service to the light. It is the first level where the automatic response to negativity is to offer it love, to draw it into the light, to draw the negativity up inward into the light and bring the light downward into the negativity.”

So eventually we want this response to be automatic. And then we move to the higher trainings.

“Once the mastery is in place, (of drawing negativity into the light) anything may be done with light.”

This is where we're going, over this year. In order to respond with loving kindness to negativity in your self and in the world, first there needs to be awareness of the habitual pattern of response to negativity. There needs to be awareness that you have a choice; you're not forced into this pattern. Gradually, there is weaning of self-identification from this small self and resting more completely in the higher self, the divine self. And then we begin to practice using the chakras, opening the chakras, working with body energy, working with light. We connect with our spirit guides, and yes, each of you does have a guide, or several. We begin to connect with the divine guidance that's there. We open more completely to our highest intentions.

There's a beautiful practice in the Buddhist tradition called clear comprehension. The first step of clear comprehension is clear comprehension of purpose. What is my highest purpose? She's pushing me. What is my highest purpose? Is it to push her back and be right or to be powerful? Is it to protect myself? Or is it toward harmony? I need to know what my highest purpose is before I can know how I will respond. There's nothing wrong with having two purposes: to find harmony and also not to be harmed, not to be harmed myself and not to harm another. But as long as I see it in terms of self and other, there's going to be some sense of manipulation, me against whoever is pushing, whatever negativity has arisen. When I begin deeply to experience the place where we come together, deeply to experience compassion to whatever conditions have given rise to this negativity and with the awareness, “these conditions can affect any of us including me,” then there's a different relationship to it.

Clear comprehension of purpose is first. Next is clear comprehension of suitability. Is what I am about to do suitable to that purpose? How do we respond?

Over 20 years ago, when I suggested to Barbara that she was ready to begin teaching (herself, not just channeling me), she said, “I don't think I can. I don't think I'm ready.” And I said, “What is your purpose? Is it to share the dharma in these deepest ways, to share the teachings of wisdom and love? Or is it never to make a fool of yourself?” I said, “If you're going to teach, probably sometimes you're going to make a fool of yourself. Are you willing to let that happen?”

She thought about it and she said, “Okay, if it has to be that way, I'm willing. I'm willing to teach.” She could not say, “I'm willing to teach but I'll never say anything wrong or make a fool of myself.” “I'm willing to teach and sometimes I'm going to get it wrong. It's okay.” Clear comprehension of purpose. Clear comprehension of suitability.

So, we start with intention. What is your highest intention? And in any moment, when any push is coming to you, to your mind, your body, your spirit, your emotions, your thoughts, is your response suitable to your highest purpose? If not, can you take it into meditation and look at what's happening, and see if you can find a clear path? That's the third step in the clear comprehension practice, clear comprehension of the domain of meditation, the power of meditation to help us understand how this self becomes so solid, and shift into the spaciousness of the divine self.

At this point, there still seems to be a duality-- the everyday self on one hand and the divine self on the other, and you find that sometimes you can move through the everyday self, sometimes the divine self.

Barbara has a wonderful visual aid that she did not bring with her to class. There are 2 canisters. One fits inside the other. The small one has a little teddy bear in it. The teddy bear lives in the everyday reality. The teddy bear sometimes leaps out of everyday reality and leaps into the other canister, ultimate reality. He's very happy there, but he doesn't know how to stay there, and he doesn't know how to attend to the world from that canister of ultimate reality. He believes, erroneously, that he must be in everyday reality in order to attend to the world, and then to have these high meditation experiences that bring him into ultimate reality.

As you move up this spiral into Level 10 and above, you begin to find how you can center. We see the 2 canisters and the bear with a foot in each, if you can envision that. He's balancing, one foot in everyday reality, one foot in ultimate reality. How do you stabilize that level of awareness so that you never abandon the everyday reality to hide out in ultimate reality, and you never lose the ultimate reality, that reality of the divine essence of yourself and all beings, you never lose that and become lost in the everyday reality.

This is the crucial turning point in your spiritual evolution. It's a step-by-step growth. You cannot say, “That's what I want to get,” but suddenly you realize, “Ah, this is how I'm now beginning to experience the world, at least more and more, if not always. Gradually I can be present with painful catalyst in this moment without taking it so personally, attending to it with love, with compassion. There is less need to go and hide away in some ultimate reality to escape the pain of the present, and I am not so hooked into the present situation that I lose touch with the divine essence that's surrounding this whole situation.”

Because, my dear ones, there is always a divine essence. Nothing is happening just from the everyday self. You are spirit. This Earth is your schoolroom and you are here to learn. The learning is the product of your presence and your increasingly open heart. That's another piece of the ongoing path we'll be doing this year, looking at what opens the heart and what the resistances are to opening the heart.

As you become more stable in that place of non-dual experience, present with both the mundane and the divine and not distinguishing between them, you begin to know the core of energy and light in yourselves, and the power that you have.

Here, we get into a different aspect of this spiraling evolution. You who are drawn here tonight, all of you, are old souls. This designation has nothing to do with your chronological age in your body but the evolution of the spirit. You all have been drawn into the incarnation with the intention to purify your own energy, and to service in the world. For many of you, that service takes the form of helping to create more harmony in the world, but you don't know how to do that. You seek more harmony in yourself, but you don't know how to do that.

You are drawn here not only by your own persona karma and intention to evolve personally, but because this Earth that you live on is shifting into a higher vibration. You've heard talk of 4th density, some of you have, the Earth moving into a higher vibration, a higher density, beings evolving into that density.

I have a new book coming in December, co-channeled with another Brother of Light called The Aaron/Q'uo Dialogues1. Q'uo is the light brother, a different kind of being than I am in that he, it, has never evolved on the earth plane but only outer light planes. But I have so much love and respect for Q'uo, and for 10 years and over 30 workshops together we talked about this whole process of the evolution of the Earth and of the spirit. That book will be available in early December. The publisher is preparing it for print now. So much of what I'm talking about here will be available in an easily readable form later on this fall.

I don't want to force beliefs on you, though. You don't have to believe that the Earth is moving into a higher density. It's not a question of belief. If you look around you, you can see that there is seeming conflict between light and darkness, love and hostility, love and fear, and all of you who are older souls, more aware beings, are being challenged as to how you respond to those pushes. How do you respond with compassion? How do you remember the strength of compassion that knows how to say no, but says no with love and never with hatred? And then what do you do with hatred and fear? How do you handle those, because they will arise? As long as you are humans, you will have emotions.

If you walked through this room and stepped on a tack, it punctured your foot, there would be pain and a drop of blood. You would not say, “Oh no, I shouldn't feel pain. I won't bleed.” I hope not, at least. You'd hold that foot tenderly in your hand and pull out the tack. You'd wash it off gently, send loving energy to it. Why is it so hard to do the same thing with the emotional body?

So as you learn and evolve, the whole world learns and evolves. The world cannot do it on its own. Each of you teaches others, models the process for others as you master it, and gradually these trainings of light expand outward. It's very powerful to see how that shift can happen.

Some of you may feel, “But when anger comes, I don't know what to do. I'm helpless.” This spring I was visiting in a home across the country where there was a young boy, 4 or 5 years old. He was building with a pile of Lego blocks and his structure wouldn't hold together. Finally he got angry and he threw them across the room, sat there very angry. I was not incorporated in Barbara's body at the time, just observing, but we moved over to him and Barbara said, “You look angry.”

“I'm very angry.” You could see all the tension in his body.

Barbara said, “Can I help?”

“No, I'm taking care of my anger.”

Barbara asked him, “May I sit with you and just keep you company while you take care of it?”

“Yes.” (long hard breaths) He was breathing... (breathes) After a few minutes, had quieted down a bit, and finally slowed down to normal breathing and the fists relaxed. And after about 5 minutes he looked up at Barbara and said, “I'm all done. We can play now.”

My dear ones, you can learn this. Every one of you can learn this. What is your primary purpose? This work asks you to go deep into yourselves and look at the habitual tendencies toward an unhealthy self-cherishing and self-protection. When I say “unhealthy self-cherishing,” I want you to cherish these divine selves that you are with love, with respect, but not with fear. Not holding yourself apart from any other flame of that divinity, but knowing the entirety of the divinity. Cherishing that, not the small self.

And yet, also, you must cherish the small self, this mammal that carries you around, because this is also part of what you are. You must feed the body, rest the body, exercise the body, take loving care of the body. You must exercise the mind, practice your meditation, and so forth. This is taking care of the small self. You take care of the small self the way you would take care of fine tools, keeping them clean and sharp so they will do their work well. If you disregard the body, it's not going to be able to support you in the deep spiritual work you wish to do.

The Buddha talks of this so early in his teachings when the teachings say he was living in a very austere way, eating one grain of rice a day. And he saw that he could not do this. He had no energy. He could not meditate. He could not do his inner work. His companions thought he was abandoning the path when he began to eat a more normal diet, but he was simply confirming the path and the necessity to take care of the body without overdoing that care. In other words, he wasn't drinking milkshakes and eating steaks every day. He was eating in a reasonable way; the middle way..

So, we take care of the body, we take care of the spirit, and we find all of the tools that are available to us. Coming back, then, to the place where you begin to rest stably in that divine self and feel the light and energy, both kundalini energy and other. There are 3 channels that come up through the body: the central channel and 2 side channels that come up and end behind the eyes. This is a complex teaching. I want to just touch the edges of it tonight.

There are four basic elements: earth, air, fire, and water, and a fifth element called ether or akasha. Akasha is, let's call it the primordial ooze. If we have the four elements of earth, air, fire, and water, the akasha is the substance that supports these four elements, and beneath the akasha we have the Unconditioned. The Unconditioned has everything, it's complete, but you, from the human consciousness, cannot move directly into the Unconditioned and maintain a level of everyday mundane consciousness. You may have a very deep experience of the Unconditioned but it's hard to bring that out into human terms. So we need a bridge of some sort.

The akasha, in a sense, serves as that bridge. Think of it as a semi-permeable membrane, the Unconditioned always filtering through it, but the conditioned world cannot pour back and pollute the Unconditioned. The Unconditioned remains perfectly pure, it cannot be distorted. Then, the membrane on top, the akasha, and what we call the akashic field, and out of that akasha, everything else is expressing. So we say that the whole conditioned world expresses from the Unconditioned.

If the perfection you seek lies in the Unconditioned and you're in the conditioned, how do you get to that perfection? So you start to despair, “I cannot attain that perfection. I cannot touch that perfection.” And you forget that it's always been there. It's constantly seeping up from the Unconditioned; this divinity, radiance, love and beauty are expressing out of you constantly. But because negative thought also expresses out, you don't believe the radiance and the beauty. You negate it. You say, “How could I be a loving person when I'm angry? How could I be a generous person when sometimes I'm greedy?” So you don't believe in your innate perfection.

Part of our work together this year through Cosmic Healing class will be introducing you to this divine self and helping you trust the truth of this divine self. We will discuss how to access that in meditation; how to work with the negative thoughts and become more balanced between the conditioned and Unconditioned, able to access both.

We have a meditation that I think we'll do here tonight called the Pole Meditation, in which your feet are down on the earth, in the dirt, your head and your hands are up in the heavens, and the heart is the place that connects the two.

As you're more able to rest in this heart center, connected to the grit of the earth, connected to the radiance of the heavens, and not creating a duality, you begin to experience the energy movement through you and learn how to open and rest in what I call the akashic field, and how from within that field you truly have choice. It's the place where old karma can be healed. On one level there never was anything to heal, and on another level, you still do need to attend to it. So at that place, it can be healed.

There are some specific energy and light practices that we'll work with through the year. For those of you who are not in the class, the transcripts of any talks I give in the smaller class groups will be transcribed and up on the website for you to read, so you certainly can follow along with this, coming once a month or reading and doing the practices yourself at home. We're trying to make this as accessible as possible for as many people as possible. They have a setup here  where apparently we're going through the phone wires. They're working on some wonderful technology whereby people out of state can listen to these talks. Hopefully that will work.

Once upon a time you were all telepathic and people could have tuned in to me a thousand miles away and listened to this talk. At this point, because you don't believe you have that ability, you rely on your technology. Eventually you're going to come to know your true ability for telepathy and be able to tune in and trust what you hear. But for now, we'll use Skype! So much of your current technology is an attempt to restore abilities you once had and have lost, and are struggling to regain.

So, this is a synopsis of where we're going this year, looking at many different areas that support your spiritual evolution, at your meditation practice, at energy work, working with spiritual guidance, working with crystals, chanting, opening the heart. Shifting from self-identification from the everyday self to a much deeper self-identification with the divine within and outside, and starting to see, with that identification with the divine how the limits fall away. And you find how truly powerful you are.

It is in this knowing of your power, this evolution-- I don't want to toss what may sound like New Age mumbo jumbo on some of you, but, truly the changing of your DNA, changing of your physical structure and DNA structure, all of this is happening. Everything is changing. Basically you can change with it, or not. That's up to you. If you don't, you become a reactionary.

Barbara has some memories of her father, who was a very wise and loving man but he had certain limits beyond which he was not willing to go, and she was always pushing at those limits. He was always telling her, “You're dreaming.” Now sometimes she hears her children and that thought comes to her, “You're dreaming,” and she's got to stop herself and ask, “In what way am I holding to old limits? Can I move ahead to where my children are moving?” It's all evolving; are you going to go along with it or not? What fear, what resistance holds you back?

We're talking about a certain kind of prudence that doesn't simply leap from a cliff without seeing what's below. We're talking about checking out first to be sure it's safe where you're going to land, then going up on the cliff and leaping. Nobody's going to ask you to throw yourself on the rocks. But do you have the courage, once you are assured that it's safe, to let yourself soar? To let yourself be the spirit that you truly are?

I'd like to lead you in the Pole Meditation for about 10 minutes, and then shift this to questions and answers. Ideally we'd do this standing, but I'm afraid the room may be to crowded for everybody to stand. What do you think? Do you think you can stand comfortably? (Group: Yes.) Alright then, all stand up.

Close your eyes, if your balance will permit. Stand, feet spread far enough apart that you're comfortable. Allow your energy to move down through the body, down the legs into the feet, and into the earth. Feel this building grounded in the earth. Rock and earth, the deep rich earth beneath your feet, running down and down...

Allow yourselves to feel that earth energy, drawing it up through the legs and into the base chakra, and then back down again into the earth. Up into the base chakra, and with the exhale, down. You may even bend the knees just slightly as you exhale, and bring it down... And then breathing in, straighten the knees and bring the energy up into the body. Out, down, inhaling and drawing it in. Feel the part of you that IS earth. Now bring it further up, into the heart.

(pause to do)

Now I'd ask you to raise your hands over your head. Envision the radiant, infinite heavens above you, a realm of light, love, clarity. Sway the body just slightly and move the arms. Be like a tree raising its branches up into the heavens, the tree seeking the light, thriving from the light, blessed by the light. Breathe that light in, through the arms, through the crown chakra and down into the heart. And again, breathing it in... and again, filling the heart with that light and space.

Moving attention down to the feet, now, and drawing that earth energy up into the heart. Attention to the hands, bringing the radiance, space, and light into the heart. Breathing in, the earth energy coming up to the heart, and breathing out. Breathing in, and light coming into the heart.

(pause to do)

Put your hands over your heart, now. Head remains in the heavenly realms. Radiant light hitting the crown chakra. Feel the place where the earth energy and the light meet in the heart, and let them mingle. Feel the enormous power you have when you hold both together, neither abandoning the heaviness of the earth, the sometimes enormous pain of the earth, nor abandoning the light and love, but feeling them meld together in the heart...

For those who have been to the Casa, I teach this as a very powerful meditation to do in the Current room where there is sometimes great pain and enormous light. Inviting them to come together in the loving heart so that one is not escaping into the heavenly realms to avoid pain, and one does not feel lost in the heavy realms, lost in the pain, but remembering the capacity of the heart to hold both.

Breathing in love and light and sending it out to wherever there is pain. Breathing in pain into the heart, feeling the heaviness of the earth plane, without fear of letting it touch the heart. And breathing out, release it. Breathing in light, and feeling it touch that pain in the heart and truly transform it. Feeling the heart growing, opening, and the enormous capacity to hold space for that pain and bring light and love to it.

(Bell, bell, bell)

You may sit...

So now I'd like to shift this and invite your questions.

Q: I have a question. I'm fearful to ask it.

Aaron: Let me say, daughter, and to all of you: there are no “bad” questions!

Q: ... Not that it's bad; I'm afraid of the answer.

Aaron: That, too! But the truth, while sometimes painful, is also always helpful.

Q: I am to have heart surgery next month. Is there anything I need to know?

Aaron: Daughter, this is a wonderful opportunity. It's terrifying to envision them cutting into your heart, I know that. But also, you have a few weeks now to envision any armor around the heart, any old habits, old beliefs, and the ways they are locked into the heart. As you come to this surgery, to ask spirit to help you literally break open the old armor of the heart, to heal the heart fully, both in the relative sense and also in the spiritual sense.

Begin to ask yourself, “What if this heart opened fully and expressed its radiance and glory? What am I afraid of, if that happens? In what ways do I hold the heart tight, closed? Am I willing to allow infinite light and love into the heart, to allow the surgery to be the symbolic event that breaks open the holdings of a lifetime and heals them?”

Our prayers will be with you.

Q: My mother has breast cancer and it's in the late stages. I'm her caretaker. I'm wondering, what is the best way to help someone and serve someone who may be transitioning into death? What can I do to help her?

Aaron: Let me ask you first: has the cancer spread into the organs? Yes. Child, be aware, on the one hand how terribly painful this is, loving your mother, wanting to help her, to fix her pain, to see her healed. Be aware also that she is also an old soul on a spiritual journey. She has chosen this to teach her self something, and to teach you something as well. She does not have cancer so you can learn lessons; she has cancer, and indirectly in caring for her, you have the opportunity for learning, too.

She does not need to be fixed; only to be loved. She needs care, whatever alleviates pain and suffering, perhaps rubbing her feet or using compresses, or just singing or talking to her; presence, love. But you are not there to fix her, just to love her. It's very hard to believe that, because the heart wants to say, “I should be doing this, I should be doing that. I'm not doing enough.” When you act in that way, it makes it harder for her.

This is Barbara's story, but perhaps she would not mind me telling it, about her father, in the latest stages of his life in a nursing home, when he could not move himself, even, could not lift his head or change his body position, so he was in a lot of discomfort. People would come in and they would say, “Can I read to you?” or “What can I get you?” They would talk or try to get into conversation. These questions were not unskillful in themselves but they would want to fix things for him and assuage their own discomfort at his discomfort. Barbara would come in and look into his eyes and say, “I love you, Dad. Do you want to talk now?” “No.” So she would just hold his hand and send loving energy to him. He told her at some point along that passageway, “I love it when you visit because you're the only person who doesn't try to fix everything for me, so I don't have to do anything to make you feel better.”

Just be with your mother with as much love as you can, and know that you have the opportunity to learn equanimity and compassion, and to learn a deeper faith in the unlimitedness of life. She certainly will leave her body at some point, but she will not depart your presence. Where would she go? She lives in your heart.

Q: My mother has Alzheimer's. My father is angry, and he is her caretaker. I will visit him every Wednesday that I come to class. I'll spend the night. How do I be with him? How am I with him, to help him?

Aaron: Not much different than what I just said. He is angry, he is afraid. He doesn't trust that he's doing what he needs to do for her, and he's angry at her for abandoning him. It's so valuable to him for you to say, “Dad, of course you're angry.” And if he says, “No, I'm not angry”? “Well, many people would be angry in your situation, and it's okay to be angry. It must be so hard to feel her leaving you this way.” Just talk to him and normalized his feelings in the best way you can, and let him know you love him, and that you do not hold his emotions against him. That's the best way you can support him.

As for your mother, just love her. Whatever helps her, again perhaps massaging her feet or singing a song with her, or whatever she enjoys. She doesn't have to remember you. She still can enjoy things.

We had a friend whose mother with Alzheimer's was in a nursing home. Her body was weakened but able to move a bit. They used to play volleyball in the nursing home, patients sitting in wheelchairs, and they used a big inflated ball and a low net. She said her mother loved the game. Every week, once a week, they played. She had to be told what she was doing, what the rules were. She forgot from week to week. But once she was reminded, she loved it. She couldn't wait until the ball would come to her and she could pop it back over the net. She said it was such a delight to watch her mother's joy.

See what brings your mother joy. She might enjoy finger painting or music, who knows? See what she likes. See what brings a smile to her face. And then help support your Dad being able to do that when you're not there. Her Alzheimer's does not mean she cannot have any joy in her life anymore, and your father will feel a great deal of relief knowing he can still do something for her that brings her joy.

I would also like to suggest to you, have you ever done a compassion meditation? It's in Cosmic Healing. You'll find it spelled out how to do it. Begin with a loved one, someone who's easy to love; not your mother or father because right now, even though you love them, there's pain. But someone who's easy to love.

Note how much you love them and note that they also have suffered, have known loss, body pain, etc. And state what you wish for them: “May you be free of suffering. May your heart open and flower. May you love and be loved. May you find the healing that you seek.” Wish these wishes from your heart, whatever your heart prompts, for a few minutes.

Then release that person and bring yourself in. It's harder with yourself. We often say, “I don't deserve these wishes.” How does it feel to wish yourself well and to acknowledge your suffering? “I am losing my mother. I feel anger. I feel fear. I feel pain. I feel helplessness. May I be free from suffering. May I find the healing that I seek,” and so forth.

After a few minutes, turn the meditation to your father or your mother, one and then the other, acknowledging their suffering, wishing them well. I think you'll find this a very healing practice.

Is your body healed from your accident?

Q: Still sprained, a little bit.

Aaron: Mostly healed, though? Good. Others?

Q: I'm wondering how to respond to people who only know anger, that's their only response. How do I deal with that, if it's a next-door neighbor?

Aaron: Consider how deeply this neighbor is suffering, and let the compassion be your guide. Your work is not to fix your neighbor, only to love your neighbor.

People think of compassion as letting oneself be pushed around, and that's not how compassion is. Compassion knows how to say no, so if your neighbor speaks abusively to you, compassion knows how to step forth and say, “No, you may not speak to me like that. I hear how upset you are,” and then redirect it, “I hear how angry you are. Let's look at the issue and how there can be some healing of this issue.” Redirect the anger from you to focus on the issue.

If your neighbor will not focus on the issue but continues to attack you, it's okay to say, “I hear how much pain you're in, but I won't stand here and let myself be attacked. I'd be happy to talk about this at another time, if you feel you can talk about it more calmly without personally attacking me.” Or if the neighbor is attacking others, you can say the same thing. “I hear your anger, but I don't want to stand here and hear you badmouthing him or her. Let's look at the issue together and where resolution can be found, not just the voicing of the anger.” And if the neighbor continues to voice the anger, then just say, “No, I will not participate in this badmouthing of others, but I'd be happy to discuss this with you when you're ready to explore resolution.”

The second step is to do this same compassion meditation with your neighbor or with any other person. Start with a loved one, then yourself, and then the difficult person, helping you to see deeply into their pain and finding the place of genuine compassion for their pain in yourself. That's what allows you to stand there when they're yelling and furious and really keep your heart open instead of armoring the heart. You may keep having to come back to that meditation. It's okay.

And if you feel yourself getting caught up in their anger, it's okay to say, “I feel myself getting caught up in all this anger and I need to take a break from it. I'm going to go home now, but I'd be glad to talk about it another day.”

Q: (we have long-distance friends listening on skype through the computer) “Would Aaron explain more about the kundalini energy that he mentioned earlier when he was talking about being able to rest stably in awareness and to use tools?”

Aaron: Okay, let me clarify this. C, I believe I am speaking to you and I send my blessings and love.

The opening of kundalini precedes the work with the akashic field. It need not be complete. In other words, there need not be a complete kundalini awakening, but one has worked carefully with the chakras - worked with love with the chakras, attended to the places where the chakras are closed without trying to force them open, but seeing the non-duality of the seemingly closed chakra and the ever-open chakra. One begins to experience the openness that's there, right there with the closed quality.

I use as example what we talk of with emotions: that which is aware of anger is not angry. We teach you how to hold a spacious presence with the human experience of anger without being so self-identified with the anger. One begins to know that which is not angry, which is right there with the anger, not pushing the anger away to get at that which is not angry, but knowing the simultaneity of both. The anger has arisen out of conditions, it's impermanent. When the conditions pass, anger will pass. That which is not angry is what remains, the loving heart that is expression of the Unconditioned. That which is aware of fear is not afraid. That which is aware of greed is not grasping.

Resting in this pure awareness, you begin to know the radiant purity and beauty of the divine self and become more identified with that without any negative view on the fact that certain conditions are still present in this mind and body, and anger, fear, greed, or whatever, still arise with certain conditions.

In the same way, the energetic closing of the chakras, the experience of the chakras being closed, may still arise, and on another level, the central meridian is always open. At the point where you begin to experience that innate openness, you begin to know the movement of kundalini through the bodies.

When the kundalini is not yet fully open but there is much more openness, much less blockage, you begin to connect more deeply into the experience, not concept but experience, of the akashic field. Until the energy systems of the body are seen as, at one level, always open - even if not fully experienced, even if it's still largely concept -until that point, you can only conceptually imagine the akashic field. But as the energy system opens more, there can be a direct experience of the akashic field, and within that experience, the shift to which you aspire can happen.

(Does that answer your question? Yes.) Thank you, daughter.

Q: I just have a comment for Aaron, if you would consider this. Nothing personal, but, sometimes, like in this case, people use terms that I don't think many of the people here know. For example, kundalini, akashic, chakras. In respect to the people who don't know these terms, could he sometimes give a quick definition? I felt that he was addressing a particular person and I don't know if it was helpful to other people.

Aaron: Thank you, brother. In response to this, I'm going to ask for your help. When I use a word that you do not know, please raise your hand. I will pause if I see the hand up. You can say, “I don't know the word kundalini; please explain,” and I'll be happy to explain. If I use a word like chakra, is there anybody here who is not familiar with the word chakra? (one hand) So, you might raise your hand and I would explain. Is there anyone here who is not familiar with the word Unconditioned? Okay, one. So I can explain that word. But I don't want to explain words over and over, where nobody needs to hear the explanation.

Chakra. There are 7 energy centers in the body starting at the base, the spleen chakra around the navel, the solar plexus, the heart, the throat, the third eye, and the crown. They're a basic part of the energy pathways of the body. Each chakra lays on an organ meridian. So the heart chakra relates to the heart but it's not just at the heart; its path can be traced through the body. Different chakras respond to different tones and light. They can be helped to open. There's a chapter on chakras in Cosmic Healing and I suggest you read it if it interests you. It will explain it much further.

Working with the chakras can be a very powerful way of working with negative emotion, for example. If a lot of anger comes up, it's usually felt in the spleen or solar plexus, and those chakras seem to close tight. There's a feeling that energy is not moving through the body. If one brings attention to it, just bringing loving attention to that area, breathing light into those chakras, it can literally help in the release of the holding of the anger. It can help you to come back to that which is not angry, right there with the anger. That's very basic, chakras in capsule form.

Unconditioned. This world is an outer world of conditions. Objects arise out of conditions and pass away when the conditions are past. In other words, when certain atmospheric conditions are present, it will rain. When those atmospheric conditions pass, the rain will stop. So we see the whole world seemingly based on a continuation of conditioned objects. Certain conditions lead to itching, maybe, or throbbing in the knee, or restlessness, or certain emotions, both joyful and unpleasant emotions, but it's all conditioned.

Beyond this conditioned realm, we have what we call the Unconditioned. The Buddha says it very succinctly. Speaking to a group of monks, he said, “Monks, there is an Unborn, Undying, Unchanging, Uncreated. If it were not so, there would be no reason for our lives.” Jesus taught this in a different way, teaching the power of love and, the power of entering into that Unconditioned consciousness that today we call Christ Consciousness. It's the essence of what we are, the deepest truth not just of ourselves but of everything, that place of love and unlimitedness. It is “The Unborn, Undying, Unchanging, Uncreated”; That Which Is. It does not exist because of conditions, it simply is. Some might call it God. You can call it whatever you like. It doesn't matter what you call it, it's that which is, and is not influenced by conditions.

What I've been talking about as our work is becoming aware of the world of conditions in which we live, in which certain objects arise in the mind and in the body when certain conditions are present and then pass away. That which is aware of that arising, of anger, of fear, helplessness, confusion, is not angry or afraid or helpless or confused. We learn to rest in that unconditioned essence of being and take care of the conditions.

Kundalini is a very powerful energy that usually arises up the back of the spine and over the top of the head and down back into the area below the rib cage. It comes as the chakras are more and more open. It's very hard to explain kundalini in words. It's an energy movement. Often people who meditate and move into a deep place will experience a strong opening of kundalini energy. Basically it's energy.

Are there any other words I've used that people do not understand? Please, will you take responsibility by putting up your hand when I use a word you don't know, and I'll be very happy to explain it.

I think we have time for one more question.

Q: I have a dear friend who had heart surgery about a year and a half ago. He's also been my life coach. He's a loving, active man. He's married. He has an ex-wife that I think his heart was broken over. He didn't want the divorce. He's still will not say her name. He calls her “What's-her-name”. And I'm just wondering what I can say or do to help him heal.

Aaron:  I think this karuna (compassion) meditation that I've been teaching would be of help. Tell him that you learned a form of guided meditation that you find helpful, and may you share it with him? Have him start with someone he loves, and then himself, and then only if he feels able, to bring the ex-wife in, knowing this is not about forgiveness. He's not ready for forgiveness; he's hurt. It's about opening his heart to another's pain and wishing them well. As compassion deepens, forgiveness comes automatically. It's a process, like a light with a dimmer switch: not on and off but gradually getting brighter, as he works with it. So I think that might help him.

Let us stop, then. For Monday and Wednesday small sections, let us have nametags. I would ask you all to read the talk, “Trainings,” that I've been speaking of (that will be put on the website) It's already in the book but it may not be accessible to people, everybody may not have the book. I would like you all to read this and reflect on what it means to you, how you are moving through these spirals of your path. Sometimes you may find yourself occasionally up there and occasionally down there; that's okay. Where do you get stuck consistently? What needs your attention? And what are your strengths?

And reflect on clear comprehension: what is my highest purpose? Are my choices suitable to my highest purpose? In what ways do I choose from a place of fear rather than a place of love? And what would support me being able to choose more often from a place of love? It's not easy to do that. Give yourself credit when you're able to do so, and don't condemn yourself when you're not.

Thank you all very much for sharing this time with me. My deepest blessings and love to all of you. I think Barbara or Anna Marie may have a few short announcements, so please just sit and hold the energy and space to help Barbara coming back into her body.

I wish you all a good night.

(Barbara returns)

Barbara: (announcements about schedule, dana, books, sign-up sheet, workshop, Cosmic Healing, classes, October retreat) Thanks to all of you for being here tonight... Those of you who are in the class, we look forward to seeing you next week, Monday morning, Wednesday night...

Q: Next (monthly gathering) time is October 5.

That's all. Good night.

1 From the publisher's site: Developed from the transcripts of nine weekends of joint channeling, The Aaron-Q'uo Dialogues offers teachings from a “positive channeling” or “positive polarity” perspective. This perspective emphasizes, as Rueckert says, “living, thinking, and acting in service to others,” and avoiding the “negative polarity” of focusing exclusively on service to self. The Aaron-Q'uo Dialogues shows how fear—fear of being too human, fear of death and dying, fear of failing to change with the times—holds us back, limiting our full potential and enjoyment of life. Addressing questions from a wide range of spiritual seekers who attended these sessions, Aaron and Q'uo answer a host of fundamental questions for living with more awareness and compassion. With warmth and humor, these conversations offer the spiritual seeker a valuable template for living a life of selflessness and spiritual peace.

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