October 19, 2011 Wednesday, Cosmic Healing Class

Barbara: Good evening, welcome. We have two parts to the class tonight. Usually we start with class discussion. Tonight Aaron has asked that we start instead with his talking a bit and leading us in an exercise, and then move into a discussion. In the discussion,  you were asked to reflect on the nature of the box you put yourself in? What gets you out of the box? What holds you into the box? Where are we stuck in self-stories of not being good enough, or having to be perfect, or whatever it may be, whatever stories we're caught in? We're going to save that for the second half of the class. Aaron is going to incorporate now and talk and have you work with his exercise.

Aaron: Good evening.  You have been looking at intention. You all have many intentions. From the highest vibrational part of you come the highest intentions for the highest good, the soul's deepest plan, and from the human with its somewhat lower vibration there can be fear and resistance to enactment of the highest intention. This must also be respected as intention, to protect the self.

There's a very huge difference when you hold the highest intention and grit your teeth and forge ahead with it than when you open deeply to that intention in your heart and hold it, really cherish it, and enact it with love, despite fear. The you attend to the lower vibrational intentions lovingly until they no longer block the way for the higher ones. .

I've thought of a very simple exercise, a little visualization to give you a chance to experience both aspects of this. What I hope is that you can literally feel, deeply experience, the experience of enacting intention from a clear place even while clouds of confusion and contraction are passing by.

We have some spoons here and a cup of water. The visualization is this... (counting those present; Okay, five at a time...) There is a great battle going on around you. Bombs are falling. (to new arrival) I am speaking of intention from a place of love or fear, and how love can carry intention. Fear can only carry it so far. The visualization is that of a battlefield. Loud noises around you. People screaming around you.

I have here a magic elixir that will heal wounds, but I have a very limited quantity of it. Your beloved brother or sister lies close to death. I will give you a teaspoon of water, and you need to walk across the room without spilling this precious liquid and give it to the loved one across the way. Literally offer it to them. You're not going to want to spill a drop. But around you are people screaming and running.

(creates three groups of five) Take your spoon. Now, the rest of you are going to be screaming and stomping your feet, and even getting up,  walking around and getting in their way. The people who are carrying the spoons will need to be focused, holding the deep intention, “This is blessed water that I carry to my brother or sister to save their life. I'm not going to get caught up in the noise around me.” And yet of course, you will. If somebody walks right up in your path, blocks you, how are you going to respond? Can you stay centered in your intention? What allows you to stay centered?

Now, I don't want basketball guarding, here. You can stand in front of somebody but do let them walk around you.

What allows you to stay with your intention? Watch where intention comes from a place of fear, where there's contraction. I'd like you to try this twice. Once walking across, feeling, “I have to get there,” and contraction and visualizing all the things that can happen. You could stumble. Somebody could bump into you. If you spill this cherished water, the person will die. I want you to first visualize it with all those fear stories.

Then the second time I want you to clearly see yourself being able to walk across, and whatever comes in front of you simply is like a cloud passing by, and that will vanish away. I want you not to get caught up in the stories of the negative things that can happen, but to fully envision and know the deliverance of this blessed, life-saving water.

There's no doubt you can do it. See yourself carrying it. See yourself delivering it. And if doubt arises, just pause and breathe with it, “contracted, fear.” Then go to the place beyond fear and contraction, the one who knows the perfection of this moment. Is it clear what I want you to do?

(exercise)

Watch how easy it is to slip into a disaster mode: “Oh, I'm not gonna be able to do it.” And if you believe you're not going to be able to do it, you won't be able to do it. Whereas when you hold to the clear image of easy movement, you can do it.

The second time, I want you to watch doubt as it arises, watch any fear or tension, and try to deeply envision yourself fulfilling this task with joy. See this person reviving. Feel how strong this possibility is. This is the reality you choose to create! Here within the akashic field is every possibility: the possibility for disaster and the possibility for complete fulfillment. Which one do you invite through your intentions and through your conditioning that runs into fear? “It won't work. I can't do it.” and all those stories?

Okay, let's do it a second time...

(exercise)

(We have people literally skipping around the room, and people standing in front of those carrying the water...) Deep focus, seeing yourself successful, there's no other possibility. See how it feels. Feel your energy field open.

(new group tries exercise) Again, we do this twice...

Can you feel the tension? As long as you believe that she can block you, she can block you...

The second time around, I want you to envision the ease and fulfillment of this. There is no other possibility. Put yourself in a place where you clearly envision the success of this and that any doubt that arises is just doubt, that you don't have to get caught in those stories. Feel yourself filled with spirit, with love.

(Now we have a chain of people across the middle of the room, holding shoulders. Those delivering the water are trying to step around them, or under their arms...)

Envision the arms lifted and  staying up. Hold the vision of it staying up...

And once more (new group)... The first time with all the alarmist thinking, “Oh, maybe I can't do it. Oh, this can happen.”

(exercise)

And then once more, knowing that it can be done. Knowing the fulfillment of it.

(exercise)

Envision the perfection, this deliverance of this life-saving sip of water. No possibility of doubt: this is your calling. This is what you are born to do.

(exercise ends; return to sitting in circle)

So what did you experience? Please tell us about it. Could you feel the difference, when you held the intention with fierceness and doubt, and when you held the intention with clarity, touching that part of you that completely envisioned success? Some of you nodding yes, a few nodding no. Please share with us.

Q: I think having the experience is the lesson.

Aaron: Yes, I wanted you all to get it experientially. It's no good to just talk about it conceptually, but do share your experience. What happened within you at that point where there was just clear knowing, “Just me to there, that's how it's going to happen.”? What happened?

Q: I went almost directly to the person.

Aaron: Was there less contraction that second time? (Yes.) Others?

Q: There was tension in the body when you said “fear,” and some shaking that I couldn't stop, even though it was very small. And on the second attempt, I got very focused on the water being still in the spoon, and we would make it. (inaudible) And having patience with some ease, without noticeable tension.

Q: When I held the intention, I was able to have fun with it.

Aaron: What does that say about the intentions we all hold in our lives and the places where life seems like a burden rather than fun?

Q: Fear replaces the fun.

Aaron: Yes, and fear blocks the fun. Others?

Q: I think the sense of ease is important, the clarity of intentions, but not grasping. The simply knowing that it can be and will be, and moving confidently forward on that path,

Q: I <> determination in the second run, and then faster results. And again, experienced that sense of fun.

Q: I felt the heart center open energetically to the person I was going to. (Aaron: Both times, or just the second?) The second.

Q: The second time I came across, I experienced a wall of people! So I stepped on your foot in love. (laughter)

Aaron: Considering you were not wearing shoes, that's okay. If you were wearing sharp spiked boots, you would not choose to do that. So we envision the way flowing with harm to none, but a gentle nudge is fine. That can be compassionate. Others?

What have we learned here? Each of you aspires to the highest good, to service, to enactment of loving energy in the world. And each of you still gets caught in resistance, fear, and all the old stories. “I'm not capable of that. It will be too hard. I don't know if I can do it.” You image various disasters happening.

Barbara was driving someplace today at a normal speed, following a flow of traffic. There was a light a distance up ahead. She saw a car in a driveway but it had stopped so she kept driving. Suddenly the car pulled out, right in her path. She slammed on her brakes and had to swerve, and ran into the curb to avoid hitting it. And it just pulled out.

Immediately she began to envision all kinds of disasters. I asked her, “Why do you need to envision that? What habitual pattern is there that sees you crashing into this person?” If you are envisioning it, at some level part of you is still choosing to manifest it. At some level, there was that choice before the car pulled out, because you co-created that car's pulling out.

She was in a hurry. She was trying to get home. She had left a digital recorder at home, had to get back home to retrieve it. There was tension, “I won't get back in time. There will be traffic,” instead of envisioning the smooth flowing drive home. So she got home and I asked her to just sit in the car for a few minutes and center herself, and then envision coming back with no resistance at all, traffic parting before her, everything opening, which indeed it did, all green lights, everything open, flowing.

You manifest this. What is it you want to manifest? And is it based on fear or on love? This is about your emotions, this is about your physical health. It's about everything in your life, your relationships, your work. What is it you want to manifest, and is it coming from this uncontracted place of love and spaciousness?

These images will arise. The car crashing into another car. Dropping the recorder and its breaking (the recorder just fell to the floor but is undamaged) . Dropping the spoon and the water splashing all over. You pause and note, “This is old conditioning. I no longer need to be engaged in these stories or unhappy visions. Where is my heart focus? What clear image do I wish to sustain? What is my highest intention?”

There are always going to be a multitude of crossroads. You're sailing along smoothly and suddenly there's a fork in the road. What is your highest intention? Which fork do you take?

Sometimes you don't know for sure where the fork leads. You have to ask deep inside, which way takes me where I intend to go? If there's a mixed intention, to fulfill the highest intention or to engage in disaster, then how can you trust your intuition as to which fork to take?

So the core of this work is clarifying your intention, #1. And #2, knowing the existence of resistance, not being afraid of the resistance but simply knowing it as old conditioning. Opening your heart to this human that's been so conditioned for so many lifetimes into these fear-based patterns. Then comes the willingness to say no to it.

We come back to the lifejacket metaphor. Here you are, having just discovered that your lifejacket indeed does drag you down to the bottom, that it's waterlogged, moldy, and rotten. You climb up on the dock with me and I say, “Are you ready to take it off?” “No.”

At that point, we have the third part of this work: kindness to this human who is so deeply conditioned by fear that you can't let yourself out of the box. That you hold on to that box and to that trap or dead end, batting your head against the wall again and again and again. So many of you ask me, where is freedom? You're never going to find it if you keep batting your head against the wall.

And yet, can there be compassion for the human that keeps doing this? Because learning compassion is the vital point. When you judge the human, feel anger toward the human, try to force the human, that has been the habitual pattern for eternity. The big shift here is that you use this catalyst of fear, contraction, and tension as a reminder to compassion, to opening the heart.

Are there questions? (No.) You've all got it? Good! Now do it. Practice it.

So that is my core lesson for tonight. I'll speak more. But for now I'd like you to divide into three groups of five for about 20 minutes. I want you to share, what is the predominant box in which you find yourself, and what helps you out of the box? This is the homework that was given. Try to see what overlaps there are for all of you, though you may be in five different boxes. There are certain facets that are the same. What holds you in the box? What helps you find release from the box? Okay?

Please remember the question that I had raised last week: what does this box protect me from? If I was not within this box, what might I be experiencing that, uncomfortable as the box is, this other possibility is even more frightening?

(15 minute group sharing)

Barbara: Anna Marie just facilitated a discussion about what people are experiencing about the boxes, and intentions and so forth. The difference for me is not that there ceases to be a box, but there is one who is aware of the box who is not the personal self but something deeper and is no longer entrapped by the belief in the box.

The box on one level is real and on one level is an illusion. I can't say it's just an illusion and be dismissive of it, I have to be compassionate to the human who is experiencing it, and I can't say, “Well, it's real and I have to fix it,” or it's just more contracted energy. How do we find that balance point where there's real, deep compassion for the human who keeps getting caught in this old conditioning, but from the perspective of, a great old meditation master (Ajahn Chah) called it The One Who Knows. Be really centered in this One Who Knows. It's not a self who knows, it's the deepest wisdom that knows.

This is where our meditation practice comes in. The more often we come back to that centered place that's empty of the personality self, when I say empty of the personality self, the personality self might be right there, dancing in front of us, but there's not self-identification with it. We know that's not the fullness of who I am. We center in this spaciousness that we come to in meditation, and we can watch all the boxes popping up and all the dances and all the stories and just say, “Ahh, so.” Just let it go.

We've talked of the story of Milarepa, I think, yes? Milarepa the Tibetan monk? So all the demons come and they're hideous, and he says, “Come and have tea.”

“Aren't you afraid of us?”

“No, your hideous appearance only reminds me to be aware, to have mercy. Come and have tea.” We just keep inviting these demons in for tea. Eventually they get tired of showing up because they see we're not going to get pulled into the stories anymore. They're going to go bother somebody else. We're not prey for them anymore. And it doesn't mean they stop entirely; they show up by surprise now and then. But we don't get caught in the stories.

I want to give you a short example. I have a 94 year old mother and I call her every evening, somewhere between 8pm and 10pm. So I called last night and it rang about 20 rings. I figured maybe she was in the bathroom. I hung up. I called again 15 minutes later. It rang for 20 rings. Her answering machine didn't answer. I called repeatedly for 2 hours. Now, I was starting to get worried.

I called my niece who lives 10 minutes from her, but there was just an answering machine. I called my sister-in-law who lives a half an hour from her. There was just an answering machine. Immediately mind jumped to, “They're all at my mother's house and she's dying or dead!” The stories! And here I am 500 miles away, helpless.

Almost immediately when I sat, I saw that it was a box: the one who should be able to protect my 94 year old mother. She had been given the choice whether she wanted to live where she is, near my niece and her family and my sister-in-law (my brother is no longer alive), or here in Ann Arbor, and she said Michigan is too cold. So there she is in Philadelphia. It's her choice, and it's her choice whether at 94 she's decided it's time to leave the body. Let it be. She's either fine or she's not fine, but either way she is fine. Let it be. And it was amazing how easy it was to step out of the stories. Mind just stopped churning completely and there was a total relaxation and acceptance, it is as it is, and just let it go. By tomorrow morning I'll find out what happened.

So it turned out her phone wire had come unhooked, that's all. No big problem. But I was aware of how much different it was even a few years ago when she had had a bad fall and had to be taken to the hospital, and how I was all churned up about it, and my mind kept running into stories, “Should I fly down there? What should I do?”

When we see the box with compassion for the human side who says, “It's my mother and I can't do anything to help her,” feeling that pain and letting go, and trusting everything is always as it needs to be, even if doesn't seem that way. That's a strong statement. If a child is raped, for example, how can we say it's as it needs to be? But somehow, karmically, this child has participated at some level in this. I want to say this carefully because the child did not cause the rape. If we have been abused in some way, we did not cause the abuse. But at some level karmically we agreed to participate in this, either in service to the other person or for our own learning. And at some level that sounds harsh, but at some level it's all okay.

If we were not expecting to have these tough experiences, Aaron keeps saying we would not have come into the human incarnation in the first place, we would have just stayed on the spirit plane. This is a tough place to live. It's temporary. And the question is not, can we survive it? We're not going to survive it. Can we learn from our experiences and grow? Because that's why we came here. We didn't come here to be comfortable. We would have stayed on the spirit plane. We came here to learn and to grow, and it's going to be very uncomfortable sometimes.

The more we can center in this place of love, and the more we meditate and experience this center so that we can reestablish it for ourselves when there's turmoil, the more we can respond lovingly to what's going on around us. I just wanted to share that.

If there is other discussion, we welcome it. If there isn't, Aaron is going to come back and talk for a few minutes and lead us on a guided meditation. Aaron is asking, he is not in my body, he's just raising the question, have any of you worked with the exercise of connecting with your guides? Could we have some discussion on that before his guided meditation?

(at times hard to hear, missed words)

Q: My experience was to have intuitive thoughts dropped in, but not automatic writing. I need more patience for the writing.

AM: But you still got it, right? Each of us has a predominant sense or two that we usually learn to work with,  and so when we're communicating with spirit it can come through that same sense-- that feeling, writing, hearing things, any one of those, it doesn't have to be the same for everyone. For you it was more intuitive thought than hearing.

Q: For me, inviting spirit to speak, or sometimes I recognize an energy signature that presents itself, and I go through, and have for some time, the challenge to determine whether I want to continue or not. And all of that for me is a sense of the energy of clarity before I proceed writing, or in some cases, being verbal with who comes through. At the same time, some awareness, I don't know what I want to call this awareness, the congruency of that energy during that period.

There are some times I experience a very dark cloud, very massive, and for me I recognize that is negativity in one form or another and I stop. Part of my intention is allowing only highly positively polarized beings to come through, and where negativity shows up, I invite them to sit on the sidelines with all of my other guides and observe. And I don't experience any fear around that and I haven't for some time. Just, “Okay, come join us. You have no permission, though, to intercede in any way.”

Q: When I tried it, I heard words and I was not sure whether it was my guide or my thoughts. And when I tried the writing, my hand wrote all kinds of stuff that was not in English. I could make out a word here and there, just like scribbles, and then it was kind of like symbols.

Barbara: When you stop and read it and it's a different language, simply state to spirit, “I only speak English. Please state this in English.” Ask for what you need.

Q: I never thought of that!

Q: If they're spirit, don't they know that?

Barbara: Not necessarily, because past incarnations of you probably spoke the language they're speaking.

Q: I forgot that language!

Barbara: But Aaron says, at some level you know that language, and they know you know that language. However, it's fine to say, “Right now I'm caught in a box of belief that I do not know that language, so please speak English.”

Q: Always a challenge!

Q: I know I tried briefly one day, and I wrote a couple paragraphs, but actually it was what I've been telling myself for months. But that does not mean that the “I” wasn't guide. I felt that this was perhaps not a deep connection, but I felt that I was at least hearing from a wiser part of myself.

Barbara: Dialogue with it. When you read it and it feels like what you've been thinking and writing about for months, and some part of it feels true, and if there's any resonance to it, say that. “Yes, this sounds right.” Or if there's resistance to it, or confusion, say that. Try to get it into dialogue. And this is where new learning will come in, if you can be open to what it's suggesting and no pushing it away. And if there's fear, you can say, “There's fear about what you're saying. It resonates but it scares me.”

Q: And it was morel like that. It felt true and important, but not that new, and not that easy to do.

Barbara: Okay, Aaron would like to lead us in a guided meditation. He's going to speak to you for two or three minutes and then lead the guided meditation. (Aaron incorporates)

Aaron: I am Aaron. My blessings and love. So, we have intention. We have the old patterns of resistance and the old boxes. And as support for working with the resistance and fear, we have your meditation practice. We have loving kindness and heart opening practices. And we have guidance. We'll add to that toolbox as the weeks go by; this is just a start.

I would ask all of you to work at whatever level feels comfortable with the writing exercise or other means of connecting with your guidance. If you don't get words but get images or colors, that's okay. What's important is that you're allowing yourself to know your connection with spirit, to feel the energy of spirit, and gradually to develop a trust that can turn to spirit for guidance.

Somebody asked earlier, if the divine is in me, why do I need to turn to another spirit? Because you have heavy density physical, emotional, and mental bodies,  and the heavier vibration  creates a veil that prevents you from seeing clearly.

I like the illustration of you walking on the bottom of the ocean with a long snorkel tube. The water is a foot over your head. You have an obstacle course of buoys on the surface to find your way through. Not ocean, because it would have waves, let's use a lake. But you have a guide sitting on your shoulder who can kind of tap you this way and that way. The guide can see clearly because the head is out of the water. Your head is underwater. You can't see.

You develop an increasing ability to see, but the guides still have clearer vision because they are not pulled down by the lower vibration of this heavy physical, mental, emotional body.

So the connection with guidance can be wonderfully supportive, and eventually can help you touch deeper into your own deepest knowing. Our goal (as spirits) is not to create reliance on us but to create a co-creative energy with us where we're able to support you when you need support, and where through your own inner work you find the deepest clarity within yourself and no longer need to turn to us for support. Both are valuable.

So work with these. Work with, “What helps me get past fear and resistance? What tools do I have?” Developing the vipassana practice, developing loving kindness and compassion through guided meditations, and whatever. Work with your guides. Then next class we'll take it a step further.

Now I would ask you to close your eyes and I will lead you in a guided meditation. Many of you have experienced this meditation with me before.

You live in a beautiful valley beside a flowing stream. Across the stream is a dense woods. On your side there is a lush swath of grass and wildflowers. About a hundred yards beyond the stream, a hill goes up steeply and is pockmarked with caves in which you and your comrades live.

These are very unusual caves. They are, let us call them wish-fulfilling caves. As soon as you go in and touch the sides of the doorway, an aperture closes, sealing the cave. Air ventilation comes on, lights come on. There is a cushioned area upon which to rest, and a soft floor. All you need to do is think what you want-- food, water, a book, music, bathing facilities -- and it comes to you there in the cave. The only thing you cannot have in the cave is the presence of another being.

So there you are, sitting in the field one lovely morning. Near you a fawn is grazing and on the other side several rabbits are at play. The sun is warm. The flowers smell sweet. Your feet are in the cooling water of the stream. Nearby you see this friend and that friend, each of them enjoying this period of silent reflection, but later you will come together for a meal.

All of a sudden you feel a thud on your shoulder, a sharp pain, and almost immediately another one on your chest. You look up and see that people are throwing rocks, angry people from the woods across the stream. Some of them have spears, too.

So you get up and run into your cave and close the aperture. It cannot be opened from the outside. You hear rocks hitting the outside wall of the cave. You can hear shouting voices, angry voices. You are safe inside. You know you are safe. Eventually you settle down. Finding you're hungry, you have a meal. You turn on some music. You lie down on your bed, dim the lights. You still hear the rocks, but knowing you are safe, you finally go to sleep.

When you awaken, your clock says it's morning. No daylight in here. But you get up and wash yourself, toilet yourself, have some breakfast, and there's no sound outside. But who knows what's out there? So you stay in. The day passes, and a second, and a third.

Imagine yourself finally drawn by the intention to reconnect with your friends, your loved ones; your intention to make sure nobody was harmed, that everyone is safe; your intention to move out of the solitude and reconnect with your dear ones. Imagine yourself gradually opening this aperture and looking out. If you see something threatening, you can close it instantly and pull back into safety.

What leads you out? What holds you in?

I'm going to be quiet for a few minutes and let you simply sit with this. Then I will ring the bell. I'd like you to practice with this image at home, and with the question, what holds me into the cave, and what lets me step out of the cave? I'm sure you see the metaphor here of the box.

I'll be quiet now for a few minutes until the bell. My blessings and love to each of you. I'll be quiet.

(sitting, tape paused, then  3 bells) May your hearts open and flower. May you love and be loved. May you be happy and find peace.

That's all, good night.

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