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A Wanderer’s Handbook - Excerpt
CHAPTER THREE: AGENBITE OF INWIT: PERSISTENCE OF PAIN
A word on this chapter title: it is a phrase taken from James Joyce’s writing, meaning roughly the looking again into the pain of the self as perceived by the self. There is an iterative and increasingly powerful effect of this inner watching that can sap already vulnerable energies and deepen already substantial self-doubt. This inner watch is, I think, very typical of wanderers.
SELF-DOUBT
We are looking, in this chapter, more deeply into the purely emotional and often largely subconscious energies of our beings. There are layers to the basic experience of being a wanderer. There are rejections that push at us more deeply than those of childhood or family: the bad opinion of our own selves. There is the murky, yet powerfully fertile, subconscious emotive flow, the deeper, the darker, that surfaces in the emotional life. At this level, it’s really all about us. We are the main players on this stage of being our own characters in the personal myths we create of our lives. This is the area where pride comes fully into bloom, as the antithesis of and last defense before, humility and the truth of the self. This is also the locus of self-doubt and insecurity, the deep sinkhole that remains unhealed while we get our surface behavior shaped up to fit within the cultural preferences we choose to honor.
Self-doubt can be a crippling thing. Wanderers are easy prey for the emotional binds of self-doubt and insecurity, since much of the response we get from more normal people is sometimes unkind or hostile. People with feelings of insecurity can express this by straightforwardly expressing fears about the self, or, alternately, by becoming seemingly sure of the self and being overbearing. In either case, the neurosis involved is insecurity about the worth of the self. Certainly, it can be said that this is not only true for wanderers, but for all sorts of people. However, the sensitivity of the wanderer is such that all problems seem to hit harder and do more damage. Because this level of emotional pain is not immediately obvious from surface behavior, it can go very wrong and very deeply so, and result in challenges such as psychic greeting. The “normal” people of this world, being generally untroubled by a metaphysically oriented point of view, simply are not experiencing the pain of self-doubt with the same timbre and resonance. Here are some wanderers with self-doubt on their minds:
Why is there such a battle going on within my own self? How come I can say the right things to others and yet stay in such a state of confusion for myself?[130]
**
One of the hardest and most unpleasant things that I have been doing in this last year is getting to remember who I really am. This is at times most unpleasant and very much hard work. My husband was afraid, my children were afraid, even our dog. I saw why, too. To learn to trust yourself, your soul, is a very large step when you have been raised your whole life to try and swallow this concept, to trust and believe in anyone and everyone but yourself.[131]
Wanderers often feel very much at risk and vulnerable in the outer world:
I mentally tell myself, I’m safe, I’m OK, but my emotional self is screaming, “No you’re not, no you’re not.” It only proves what I’ve been saying the past few years: logic and knowledge are not enough. The heart is what gives things substance. If you rely on logic and knowledge only, you get a shell and nothing more. The only way I can see a way out of this is to work from my heart to get the substance back and prove to my emotional body, “Look, you’re safe, really.”[132]
It is easy to feel like a failure in a world where the inner beauty and love of truth that we possess are scorned:
I think something in the recipe of this life is lacking, or is overdosed, I don’t know. I feel my life to have become too salty with tears of sorrow. Oh, how I wished to create love and peace. Where is the peace I so sincerely wanted for life?[133]
It is easy to feel that one cannot be of service, since one is so muddled sometimes:
I guess the idea of me being there to help others is a bit silly to me. If you could only see inside my head for a day! I get so confused, scared, angry, and all the others. This idea of me serving others sounds so foolish. You know, like the blind leading the blind! It even scares me. To be open to others means that one is vulnerable to them. That scares me. And also there is the fear of making a mistake. Yet with all that going on, all a person has to say is, “I need to talk,” and all that fear is gone. I am so willing to just go ahead and jump in if I am needed. There is this part of me that will not let me sit by and watch another suffer like that. It is only afterwards that all this begins to arise.[134]
And self-doubt can manifest as a fear of one’s deeper self:
I believe that I have a fear of my own power. In most things I only go so far and it’s not conscious. I am becoming more aware of it and I feel this surge of energy rising and I eat to stop myself from feeling it or assisting it. I’ve allowed myself to fall into a pattern where I would gladly do anything for anyone else but face my own personal power.[135]
The Confederation sources address questions frequently from members of our group concerning this emotional sensitivity and self-doubt, and how to deal with it:
It is appropriate that each seeker feel a certain amount of doubt as it approaches a new experience upon the spiritual path. For this kind of doubt or questioning is that which prepares the seeker in an inner sense to take the step from the cliff not knowing whether the foot that steps shall rest upon firm fundament or not. Thus, if there is interest upon your heart and doubt in your ability, we recommend that you rely upon that desire which you feel and that you put aside for the moment the doubt in order that your journey may continue along that path which is designated by the passion and desire within you.[136]
**
The positive path is full of shadows, of questions and doubts, of continual learning and balance. The choice for positivity is not the choice for simplicity of early lessons.[137]
Heaven forbid we should have things simple and easy! Usually that’s not the wanderer’s path description:
There will be suffering and confusion throughout this illusion, for it is by such testing that these basic principles are forged in the fire of experience within each entity’s heart. Be gentle with yourself, not expecting too much, yet placing before yourself the goal each day of renewing faith in the fact there are truly no mistakes within this illusion. There are great puzzles and riddles and experiences of confusion and doubt which each seeker of truth will find placed upon the path and with which each seeker must grapple.[138]
There is one thing that wanderers with low self-worth, like myself, have going for them, and that is, at least apparently, the attitude of humility. I have long considered four qualities the most central to doing work in consciousness: humility, patience, persistence and humor. Humility is a tremendously saving and sustaining quality of character and I can only encourage wanderers to cultivate it assiduously. I have for as long as I can remember. Unfortunately, it is the most difficult of all gifts for me to receive, for pride is my most stubborn fault. I work with it day after day, year after year, and just when I feel I might be making a little progress, I notice I am proud of that. The Confederation speaks about humility:
It is very important that there be negativity and difficult experiences, that one may learn the humility of one who allows, observes and then acts, rather than reacts. To take the life into one’s own hands is not to take control of what one wishes by affirmations and prayers unceasing. It is, rather, to realize that the plan has already been made, the pattern has been set. It is the best pattern you and your higher self could create for you, and all that you need do this time is allow yourself to be upon the path upon which you are, keeping your eyes open, watching your feelings, finding ways to manifest love, the smile upon the street, the kind word to a stranger.[139]
Humility need not indicate low self-worth, but rather a restful and peaceable nature alert to the love in the moment.
PRIDE AND SURRENDER
131 is an ebullient and gifted artist, and when in the flow of her creative work, she experiences many energies, some of which feel highly spiritual. She writes to me:
I am trying to understand the difference between the Creator’s will and my own will. Sometimes I think there is no difference at all, that in fact whatever is my will is also the Creator’s. But realistically, I don’t think this is true, at least not all the time. What do you think about this? Is there a line to be drawn in our perceptions of these things, and also in the reality of this? What is a good way to think about these things? I think the question is very tied in with the concept of humility, but I really don’t know how to address it in an intelligent manner.[140]
Notice that there is no pride in her question at all. She is simply having experiences, and thinking about and weighing them. When one is in the flow, it feels as though our will is one with the Creator’s. I have moments, hours, sometimes days in somewhat altered states of joy and light. These are experiences. They happen. I cannot predict them, except to say that adversity seems to encourage them. How to evaluate them? Similarly with the whole issue of wanderers’ differences from more worldly and unawakened people, it is not that we are more intelligent, or better, or wiser even, but that we feel not only different, but glad of it. It is very easy to be prideful, to feel “better than.” It is the attitude encompassed so admirably by Oscar Wilde when he said, more or less, that all of us were lying drunk in the gutter, but some of us were looking at the stars. Q’uo says:
As long as you think that you have a self that you need to defend you shall be working with spiritual pride, and so entities for the most part are working with this no matter how persistently and purely and devotionally they have sought year after year, yet still there is the sense of “I” am searching. “I” am looking. “I” am seeking to become the best that “I” can.[141]
Sometimes we can hold pride before us like a shield:
To gaze at the pride within an entity is to gaze upon that portion of the self that has been created by the self for the purpose of self-defense. That is, one who has pride has attempted to discover a good, right or noble way to think or behave or speak. Then one adopts the mask that is most efficient, is most in line with the desired making of an impression on others. It is as though a man with a modest garden were to put a wall twenty feet high about the garden, certainly more than the garden needs in order to be a protected plot.[142]
This wall, however we may see it in ourselves, is of our making. The question is, how can we become courageous enough to let down the wall:
The final goal of all of these true spiritual paths is humility and a willingness to surrender that clay, the pride, the arrogance, the unworthiness and fear, to surrender all these emotions utterly to the power and peace of knowing that you are love.[143]
ELITISM
It has happened so often. I find myself thinking, to myself, that I am glad I am awake spiritually, and not asleep on the surface of the world, floating towards the drain with no depth of insight into metaphysical thought. I catch myself and go through the process of giving that self-congratulatory pride up, releasing myself from the self-judgment that ensues, and starting anew, again. And again, and again. We as wanderers are in the position of the refined city chap who gets out on the farm and has to walk through tall, buggy grass strewn with cowpies. In the emotional nature we bring with us, or discover when we awaken spiritually, we are too sensitive for the swirling, busy inanity of Earth, at least as seen from our jaundiced perspectives. Don used to say that we on Earth were all living in an insane asylum, and he was just glad to have a private room. He really felt Earth thinking was crazy. Sometimes it is hard not to agree with him. But those of Latwii say:
The principle of negativity is that principle which intensifies the illusion of separation which is implicit within all creation. The illusion of separation is then used by those who have gained a knowledge of the negative polarity to dominate those who are not what is called elite, shall we say. Whatever characteristics are determined and determine the elite, then, are those characteristics which are used to separate the elite from the non-elite. Therefore, you may see the distortion towards negativity within many, many portions of your environment, and, indeed, within the self, for are not all entities one, and do you not contain all things?[144]
Some wanderers express denial that they are better than anyone else:
I hate when people see me as being more wise than them, or see me as a teacher. I think the teacher/student is within us all, and I learn as much from anyone I come in contact with. I’m not into power plays or superiority complexes. I do have a knack of angering some people because I have a tendency to say all this meta-stuff is easy and anyone can learn it.[145]
Notice here that even in denying elitism, there is the play of pride. Wanderers are often mega-smart, but as I have said, high intelligence is not the same as wisdom. It just gives us a good game computer/intellect to play with, perhaps not realizing that it is playing us instead. The brothers and sisters of Q’uo say:
We do not see ourselves as being wiser than those within third density but merely in a somewhat different illusion, and, therefore, in somewhat different circumstances. Yet we, as you, seek to know and yet do not know. We simply have come to hold fairly settled opinions, and, as is the way of things spiritual, our truths move constantly into the unknown, as do your own. Thusly, there is always the contradiction, the tangle, the knot of attempting to understand that which can only be embodied.[146]
Other wanderers have squared off with pride and are working towards humility:
I realize that I have to work on humility. It is not easy to want to live a good spiritual life, and have a good worldly report card.[147]
**
I have to watch out for the nasty ego! I have to laugh at myself some times.[148]
We are all bozos on this bus! This is important! We need to keep this etched upon our memories. As those of Latwii say:
Generally speaking, those entities known as wanderers enter the density no better equipped, for the most part, than those who (are) originally of that density, in that the wanderer, in experiencing the forgetting, is not allowed to draw upon the full resource of experiences. They are, in essence, playing the odds, so to speak, that their natural tendency toward positive polarization will exert itself, and they will be successful in both contributing to the welfare of those about them and the attainment of sufficient polarization, upon their physical death, to be presented the option of returning to their original density or progressing to another act of service.[149]
We may have come from a wonderfully “other” locus in time and space. If we are Earth natives who have awakened, we may resonate to the metaphysical energies of such “other” places, no longer identifying with Earth thinking. We may have gifts to offer those of Earth, and Earth itself, by the nature of our core being, but as surface personalities and as souls in flesh, we are precisely equal with all other third-density human beings, in that we all will have to come through the same tests in order to graduate from the Earth school. It can be easy to think we are “condescending” to offer Earth our service. In actuality, I feel that we worked hard to obtain an incarnation here, and were thrilled to be accepted, for in serving those of Earth, we have earned the chance which no one has in higher densities, to live a third-density incarnation by faith alone and thusly to work on our polarity and purity of desire. When we think we are here to offer our bounty to the lowly natives, we start getting into unfortunate frames of mind like these:
I was becoming more and more disconnected from my essence. I was becoming cynical, angry, pessimistic, and more service-to-self orientated. I started to believe that people needed to be controlled for their own good.[150]
The world likes to focus on controlling other people. Spiritual seekers and wanderers of all descriptions, on the other hand, do well to have in common that uncommon frame of mind that focuses on the echoes and shadows of concept complexes of our own deep selves, rather than the gleaming surface concerns of our well-packaged world. In working in consciousness, our goals involve work only on ourselves, and include removing fear from our reasons for doing things, and replacing fear with honest love. I agree that it is well not to talk freely about the life of the spirit that so fascinates us, if the other person with whom we are conversing has not brought up this topic. But I encourage serious and thoughtful contemplation of our own personality shell or ego and its concerns. The balancing of the energies of the self depends on this kind of subtle work, moving into true concepts to remove untrue nuances. If we are all tempted to feel pride and elitism, then it is not surprising that spiritual groups would also be tempted thusly. Latwii says:
Many consciousness groups inadvertently foster an elitism based upon a truth which is seen but not comprehended logically, and that is that each person who believes in the ideals of love and service is chosen, is special, is anointed or passed by special vows, and that this specialness is a metaphysical and enduring specialness enduring far beyond what you think of on the surface as life. You may see those who have almost no consciousness at all apparently, and those whose consciousness, though competent, does not admit metaphysics. Yet these are not those who are lost forever; these are those who are learning a different lesson, taking a different road, going more slowly. There is time enough for all of consciousness which has been created fully to tap the birthright of that consciousness. There is no elite, my friends. There is in truth only in relative time, as you know it, the so-called remnant. There are no permanent wailers and gnashers of teeth, as this instrument would put it. All shall be made one. For some it will take more cycles of experience than others. Those who speed up their experience, speed up both the pain and the joy of that experience, for in using catalyst completely, those side effects will occur. We wish you the fullness and richness of that joy and the understanding of pain which it contains.[151]
In our personal work and in our work with groups, let us endeavor to seek the heart of our truth and worth, but never the hollow shell of elitism. Those of Q’uo end this section with these eloquent words of good advice:
We would encourage each not to feel better than the entity who is not aware of spiritual evolution. Insofar as you have become aware of the process of evolution, of the kind of thing spiritual evolution is, yet still you are equipped with the full array of challenges, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, and all of these threads of being have their own best luster and strength. So much of the tapestry of life is created from difficulties, the dark side of things, that we cannot over-emphasize the value of these lower energies and working upon them as though they were as exciting to work with as the higher centers.[152]
PSYCHIC GREETING
When wanderers become aware of their mission and seek to do “light work” on behalf of the planet, if they are well enough in tune with the light to begin with, they begin to be a channel for a good deal of light going into the Earth planes, and they thusly attract the attention of “the loyal opposition,” as I often call those discarnate entities whose path is that of service to self. Such entities are drawn to the flow of light which the light worker is offering through its instrument, and wish to trap that light for themselves. If the light workers are proud of what they are doing, or if there is any distortion of truth anywhere in their offering of self as channel, the chance of attracting psychic “attack” grows. People standing close to the light in their work in consciousness may always expect occasional psychic greetings, for we are all human and prone to error. The hope of avoiding error and living a “perfect” life is footless. One can hone one’s desire, one can surrender to one’s guidance; but one cannot avoid confusion. So, when psychic attack or greeting occurs, we need not feel like we have somehow failed. Just deal with the greeting. The ordinary fellow is not likely to attract such greeting. As the Q’uo say:
We suggest that there can be no psychic greeting component without your free will choice in an area which lies within your course of study, shall we say. There may be no obstacles placed in your path by those who are of the loyal opposition, as we have described it, but those entities may magnify those experiences which you utilize, though we must at this time suggest that this phenomenon is far more unusual than most entities would imagine, for most of the entities within your illusion find themselves moving between the choice of service to others and service to self, and have not moved far enough in either direction to attract the attention of those who would choose to manipulate that movement.[153]
Our group at L/L Research went through psychic greetings aplenty during the work with those of Ra, and ever since then we have been somewhat prone to them, as we do constantly work as a “lighthouse,” offering worship on a daily basis and framing our common life and all its details as sacred. Through the years, many people around the world have come to visit, and many more to depend upon L/L’s being there. In the inner sense, we constitute a fairly large spiritual community. So of course, we continue to attract some attention from the loyal opposition. Jim McCarty wrote in The Law Of One, Book V that:
One’s choices can be used in either the positive or the negative sense, even when there is the seeming interference of negative entities in the manner of what many light workers call psychic attack and what we came to call psychic greetings. We chose the term greeting to emphasize that there does not have to be a negative experience on the part of the one who is greeted and that the experience that the one who is greeted actually has is in direct proportion to how that entity looks at the situation. If one wishes to see such a greeting as a difficult attack, then that becomes the experience. One can, however, also choose to see the Creator in all entities and events and can praise and seek the light within any situation and then that will become the experience.[154]
Here, he talks of our experiences during the contact with those of Ra:
Most people would probably not have described the feeling of not quite being whole and in harmony which our group experienced during the fall of 1982 as true disharmony. Yet as one moves further along the path of seeking light and begins to stand closer to it, as we were privileged to do in the Ra contact, even the smallest of lapses of harmony, when left unresolved, can become targets of opportunity for those such as our friend of negative polarity to intensify. These psychic greetings can become great opportunities to heal those lapses of harmony and to move even further and faster upon the evolutionary journey because what such a negative entity is actually doing when it intensifies one’s disharmonious choices is pointing out to you weak points which you might have missed in your own conscious seeking. But one must take quick and thorough action in order to unravel these distortions in one’s beingness or further confusion and difficulty may ensue, again due to, first, your original free will choice, second, the intensification of that choice by the negative entity, and third, by lack of attention on your part in finally resolving the distortion and balancing it. Fortunately, most people do not have to deal with the magical abilities of a fifth-density entity but with the lesser abilities of the fourth-density minions who are usually quite effective on their own.[155]
When I began working on this handbook, I generated enough effort, eventually, to attract greetings. Two of them, one right after the other, manifested in my belly, and I realized that there were issues connected with personal control in the writing of the book to untangle. The pain was coming from the orange and yellow ray chakras, the belly and the solar plexus. I examined the book for issues between myself and others, and myself and groups and found that I was being somewhat lax about obtaining formal permission in a timely manner from each source whose words I wanted to share in this book. That was the orange-ray concern, the concern between me and individuals. But what was the group I was attempting to deal with? I realized I was, myself, thinking of myself as a group, as L/L Research, as if I were wise and knew all things. Or, rather, as if L/L Research’s archive of channeled material did. OOPS! I faced my pride yet again, and confirmed that I could of myself do nothing except play with words. I do love these channeled messages we have gathered in our group, but I needed fully to see that there was nothing brand new here for me to offer; little or nothing that the reader, failing to find it here, could not find elsewhere. Taking in this home truth, I found that the difficulty gradually subsided.
Meanwhile, as I steep myself in the brimming beauties and blessings of Jim’s stonework and gardens, I see that always psychic greeting turns into the opportunity to cooperate once more with destiny. I have genuinely found reason for praise and thanksgiving as I work with psychic greetings. This is the key. Psychic greeting may bring mental, emotional or physical pain. It also comes with blessings in its hands.
I do not mean to say that psychic greeting is not sometimes alarming. It certainly is. There can be immense pain and staggering amounts of suffering in a greeting, and it can take many forms. I do mean to say that it is nothing to fear. Sometimes, the new age thinking can deny psychic greeting altogether, saying that there is no negativity. Yvonne talks about this:
I know that the subject of psychic attack or as you call it, psychic greeting, is something that many, even enlightened people, shun away from. At least this is true in my country, Sweden. Fear has gotten its claws into this country and since there is also a spiritual drought among the people, the so-called new age movement is thriving. The problem with the new age movement of this country, apart from a lot of false prophets, is that as it teaches about love and light it won’t touch the dark side; in fact, I’ve met a lot of new age people who seriously think that the dark and evil doesn’t exist; it’s only in your head and if it’s in your head, who are you? As you know, there are many levels to this, many different ways of looking at it. In one way, yes, you can say that evil doesn’t exist, because if you raise yourself above the astral plane you don’t have to bother with fear and evil, but how many of us down here on Earth have actually gotten to that point?[156]
Not I, at any rate. The view of the loyal opposition needs to be balanced, to see that service-to-self entities are of a certain kind, and service-to-others entities make certain choices, and these choices have rhyme and reason. Service to self tries to control and manipulate. Service to others releases, surrenders, allows and cooperates. Where we see psychic greeting, then, ask ourselves not to contract into fear, but instead to deal with the greeting, with the mind that analyzes, with the intuition that makes hidden connections, with the spirit that goes about this prayerfully and with an eye to holy things. All these seeming attackers are portions of ourselves. In a profound and helpful sense we may model psychic greeting as an attack on the self by a portion of the self. That portion is part of our dark side or shadow, to use a Jungian term, and it needs to be loved, accepted and re-integrated into the daylight self to create the universal and whole self. Some wanderers share their experiences:
I have had negative entities attack me. I’m cut off from the Creator. I don’t know what to do. I’m going to keep trying to convince myself that it’s OK and safe to love the world, but it’s just not going to happen overnight. It’s going to take time. But in the meantime, there really is no safe place.[157]
**
I was sitting there as usual, taking notes, listening to the drone of the professor, when suddenly out of the blue or black, this huge cylinder came down over me. When this thing came over me, the noise and talk of the professor became muffled, like something had placed a vacuum over me. Well, I looked around to see if anyone else could see this tube or vacuum cylinder over me, and no one else was doing anything different et cetera. I felt, then, the same way you do when you are going to pass out, almost. I guess the air might have been changed around me too. Then I started the prayer, and sending out of the light and energy. This did the trick. It broke the cylinder or whatever it was, and things returned to normal. The negative forces or dark mass consciousness around our Earth does exist, and will do whatever it or they can to stop light work if it or they can.[158]
Psychic greeting can take place within dreams as well as during conscious awareness. The typical time for such nightmarish dreams is the deep of night, at three or four in the morning. Initiation can bring about the same situation, of awakening in the night feeling attacked and hag-ridden. Most of the time, such nocturnal experiences are signs of initiation, not psychic greeting. When this occurs in our experience, we can deal with it the same way, whether it is psychic greeting or part of an initiatory experience. Prayers and affirmations of thankfulness and praise for all blessings received calm and center the mind. For more detailed information on how to deal with psychic greetings, I recommend Dion Fortune’s book, Psychic Self Defense, usually available in paperback in bookstores. Here is a psychic greeting dream that Mary reports:
The most frightening dream I ever had and the most difficult to think and write about even now, concerns the most powerful battle I have ever had and never want to have again. In the dream I was riding my bicycle, having been to a house on the northwest side of town, and was headed home. I was aware of a couple of men on bicycles who seemed to be following me. One was of average intelligence and the other seemed to have something wrong with him mentally. I stopped at a store and when I came out my bicycle was gone. I began to walk and came to a combination laundromat and eating place. I went inside and got something to eat. When I came out the bicycle was there so I got on and started for home again. The men had disappeared. Suddenly I could feel myself changing. Then a rather mean voice began saying something about going somewhere else. It dawned on me that this voice was inside me. I asked who this voice was, rather low because I didn’t want other people standing close by to hear me seemingly talking to myself. The voice kept jabbering about going somewhere else. I knew I had to get rid of it and told it to get out of me. It refused. As I was arguing with it, I found myself at the Third Street and Eighth Avenue stoplight. The bicycle had disappeared again and I was now yelling at the voice to get out of me. Finally, it began to get weaker and started to leave. The light turned green, the cars stopped and as I began to cross the street, I found myself in a heap on the pavement. A woman came running to help me. The voice was mercifully gone. I feel I was given a spiritual choice to make in this dream. Had I made a different choice, I probably wouldn’t be here writing this now.[159]
Notice the depth of emotions as Mary attempted to convey the horror of the dream. Often these experiences are very subjective. They don’t necessarily sound scary as one talks about them rationally. It is the depth of terror and other dark emotions that mark such dreams. In any event, the key to dealing with psychic greeting is focusing upon the unity of the self with all that there is, including the entity who is attempting to “attack,” and moving into love and compassion. Q’uo says:
When one is attacked it is natural to defend, and yet in the sense of psychic greeting the defense creates the prolongation of attack.[160]
This advice, I believe, is meant in the same wise as Jesus’ admonition to “resist not evil.”
It is important for the entity upon the path of service to others to attempt to see the Creator within all beings at all times, to give praise and thanksgiving for the light of the Creator that exists in all, to seek and know that Creator in each, to offer within the meditative state, the heartfelt love for all who send greetings or attacks, and to surround the self, then, in that love and light of the infinite Creator.[161]
A word about initiation: like many terms related to the inner life and spiritual seeking, initiation is a fuzzy word. I am willing to leave the fuzz on it, rather than attempting to define more accurately those times of testing and trial that we receive as gifts from the spirit. Initiation occurs at a point when much has been learned. The catalyst has been taken and the responses have been those which attempt to polarize, to make some progress as a seeker of truth who knows herself. The learning wants to spiral ahead, and we feel ready. At that crux, there will often be a time of real inner challenge, complete with scary nightmares, odd visions, interrupted sleep and general spiritual malaise. I believe these are times when the spiritual part of self needs to be sure the previous learning has been well seated. Consequently, the way to proceed is to deal with the experiences straightforwardly and continue to live the life we believe in. Quietness of nature and a faith-filled heart will serve.
DESPAIR
Alienation can become despair when time cycles long enough, bringing nothing but seeming pain:
I looked at me
Looking at me
In a faded, antique mirror
Glanced accidentally to the left
Saw myself out of the side of my eyes
An old, red-haired lady
Looking lethargically down the next row
Of things and stuff
In the gray Seattle afternoon
Not hopeful, not quite bored
Just dead inside
That place where the dreams used to live.[162]
Those of Q’uo attempt to speak to this despair:
May each wanderer find comfort in the knowledge that it cannot help contributing positively to the planetary vibration. Even with what seems to be gross mismanagement of time and energy, yet still in that very basic alienated mindset there dwells that vibration which is fuller with light. This very alienation is simply a surface symptom of a deep and spiritual gift. Comfort yourself when the heart is heavy and the feelings bruised with the knowledge that you are being of service. You are doing that which you came to do. You may find ways to do it better, but you are not failing no matter what it seems like.[163]
001, a gentleman of exceedingly keen sensitivity with a long history of being on the outside looking in, despite impressive professional achievements, tries to express how he changes despair to loving sacrifice:
I think that we are all more or less aware of the sacrificial aspects of our lives, and desire to make both the offering and the recipient accord with our highest ideals.[164]
Taking all thoughts of elitism out, one can well frame the path of the wanderer as a sacrificial one. For we wanderers are here, once we awaken, to offer up the remainder of our entire incarnation. We are learning much as we move through it, and hopefully we are gaining polarity as we live a life in faith, but the entire beau geste of living on Earth is an offering of self. However, many wanderers have been so beaten by these Earth vibrations that they take an aloof point of view to assuage the pain of being here:
I was always striving to find some kind of homeostasis, acceptance, or peace of mind from the incessant restlessness but never really found it for any sustained period, the spells of cosmic consciousness in 1943 and 1967 being the obvious exception. These periods lasted for weeks. They were characterized be feelings of expansiveness, joy, of identification with the universe, a pervading oneness and unity that I have been struggling to regain ever since, but without much success.[165]
**
I am, at this point in time/space, a somewhat lonely and “lost” individual, although in the past I have had other experiences. I do not feel alien from this planet; in fact, I feel deeply for the beauty of this Earth, and have an abiding love for all of the creatures of nature, yet I feel removed from the people of this Earth.[166]
Those of Q’uo say:
These [wanderers] have within them the distant and dimly lit memory of their origin as being from elsewhere, and in many cases this feeling is in the form of what you may call a kind of homesickness or alienation from the planetary influences and vibrations that are of a more disharmonious nature within this third-density influence. However, each entity in the heart of its being is aware that, though there is a home that may be located elsewhere, the true home of all seekers of light and servants of the one Creator is within that service and within that light that comes from only one source, the one Creator, and each may take solace in knowing that the Creator resides within each entity and shines the light of love and service to all equally.[167]
INSIDE THE BELL JAR
The wanderer’s isolation is not exactly that of a person stranded in the desert. It is more as though we were inside a bell jar normal people do not even see, which effectively muffles communication and sometimes shuts it out entirely. At least that is the feeling we get:
Finding out that you’re some alien soul from another planet doesn’t make things any better than before, really. Sure, it puts certain things to rest because they’ve been resolved. But it causes more problems than it seems to be worth. I know that when I found that I fit in perfectly with the signs that distinguish a wanderer, I felt more left out and isolated than ever for a long while. I had a lot of sad nights when I’d cry myself to sleep with the thought that I didn’t belong anywhere. But it’ll be the death of you if you keep putting yourself down. Being a wanderer means that you have to hope and trust yourself.[168]
Those of Q’uo talk about this isolation:
What is this knotting that indicates that the shuttle of spirit is not in good working order? The simplest term is fear. The spiritually ill entity has moved into an isolation, a place alone within which the entity is unforgiven, and unnurtured. This isolation is crushing and, once entered, is very difficult to see, much less to work with.[169]
Fear feeds upon itself in untended isolation, as Bleu says:
What I find is that my thoughts have a tendency to run wild in periods of extended loneliness, but to quiet them down, I repeat the serenity prayer, especially if they start going negative. And, if you really look around, you aren’t lonely. There are people everywhere, and you can find the ones you can relate to. I have also been known to, in periods of sadness, climb a tree, and talk to it. Most times, the tree will really listen, and nature feeds off your negative energy anyway, so in a sense to do so when you’re not feeling so hot is a gift from you to nature, and nature will give back, if you allow yourself to feel it.[170]
I love Bleu’s attitude, and am a tree person myself, with a long history of perceiving trees as intelligent and loving beings, the “ents” of Tolkien’s Lord Of The Rings. When I was a toddler I used to run around the yard hugging and talking to trees, so the family legend has it. Those of Q’uo talk about this feeling of isolation:
Each entity walks alone, and this feeling of isolation is a tremendous source of suffering among your peoples. And yet when an entity stops looking for his feet and simply moves ahead, step by step, an unusual and unpredicted thing occurs, and that is that the steps of one who has stopped trying to see connections are more assured and livelier than those who are pressing with urgency against that envelope of blindness that surrounds the metaphysical self.[171]
Those as yet unawakened will be using their “catalyst,” their incoming sensations, as the outer world values and prioritizes things; the wanderer is using the same experiences but from a metaphysical agenda. Those of Hatonn put it another way:
It might be said that each individual lives within a vacuum, that each isolates himself or herself from the other selves that surround him, and in fear and misunderstanding of the isolation that has been created, each, as in a vacuum, contracts into himself, as if unable to contact the energy with which to expand outward and establish a reunion with those among whom one lives. My friends, we are aware of the exhaustion that is characteristic of those who strive to overcome this spiritual vacuum. It is a great struggle to constantly extend oneself, holding oneself open and extended, so to speak, in one’s attempt to establish and maintain contact with those other selves that compose the single unit that your race has the potential of becoming.[172]
Some wanderers actually prefer the solitude:
Throughout my life, accompanying the strong feeling of alienation was a powerful inner need to seek solitude. I have spent much of my life alone. I was the kid who sat at back, daydreaming, reading, not participating, hiding, dreading to be called upon for anything. Even during the years of family life I spent much of the time alone, working on postgraduate papers, jogging alone, walking endless miles. So, for me, two dominating themes appear to have been working in me despite the outward activities and interests: a deep-seated feeling of alienation and a need for solitude, a need to connect with the universe outside human habitation.[173]
Despite this oddly comforting thought, many wanderers feel very alone, very often. However, some wanderers write of realizing that they truly are no longer alone:
You may begin to feel isolated and alone because you have no one with whom to communicate with on the level of your new reality. For this reason, I encourage you to find a like-minded forum, group or individual with which you can associate and communicate to avoid this unnecessary, and uncomfortable, situation. If you have access to the internet, finding such a group is fairly easy. If not, finding a group or individual and communicating on a regular basis can be more difficult, but is necessary in my opinion.[174]
**
Networking and connecting with others is very important. In meeting you, I finally feel as though I’m not alone, being surrounded in day-to-day life by those who just wouldn’t understand any of this. I am very fortunate for the internet and e-mail connections. There are many that are not so fortunate to be hooked into the net. I know how I’ve felt all these years. It would of been most wonderful to pick up a newsletter or something and realized that years ago![175]
There is a tremendous desire on the part of many wanderers to meet others of like mind. I talk with them every day. These days, meeting others of like mind is easier to do because of the internet and its chat rooms and other e groups. I have promised the sources quoted in this handbook that if I receive mail for them from readers responding to their words, I will make sure they receive the mail. It is, of course, for them to decide whether to answer. If we wish to write someone quoted herein, please send the letter to me. You can send me e-mail by clicking here. Our street address is L/L Research, Box 5195, Louisville, Kentucky, 40255-0195. I have seen good friendships start on the internet, and certainly have met hundreds of fascinating people that way through the years. If we are lonely and feeling blue, by all means, start with a web site such as ours, whose web address is www.llresearch.org, and follow the links. We will find ourselves in an interesting and varied company!
SPIRITUAL EXHAUSTION
The end item of this laundry list of wanderers’ woes is exhaustion of spirit. This occurs when the wanderer comes to the end of his energies. Usually, the physical energy is the first to go, if it ever was there at all. The vital energy can endure for a long time on short rations, but it, too, can give out. Then the wanderer is really weary beyond any description of tiredness. Those of Q’uo say:
When the kind of weariness that a seeker feels is spiritual in nature, it often signifies a time in which the experience of incarnative life will seem very difficult. Small matters seem to take on a larger aspect, and therefore any small change or unexpected occurrence triggers catalyst far in excess of what the seeker would usually expect of itself. It is a condition of vulnerability because weariness sensitizes the perceptive web, which alters the level of information given to the physical mind and to the consciousness within. Small efforts seem to become major. The mind turns from tasks that normally are accomplished easily, for it sees these tasks with the jaundiced eye and the discontented heart of the weary seeker. The sense of self is disturbed and the level of comfort of mind drops.[176]
Uncomfortable wanderers agree:
I have the feeling like I am walking around with a big hole in my body. I am fighting a lot with sadness, exhaustion, panic and anger.[177]
**
I want to know how to cope with being a candle flame, up against the light of so many stars, yet remaining intact and being myself?[178]
**
I have this strange depletion which is not like ordinary fatigue, it feels like its a kind of vital energy that’s leaked out.[179]
Those of Q’uo offer:
It is well to do nothing until some insight into the fears and other emotions concerning this choice have become part of self-knowledge that can be first gazed carefully at and then surrendered. As long as any portion of the seeker is withheld from the inner surrender, there will be that proportion of things occurring with extra bumps and fits and starts. Thusly, if one were able, it could be said that the best way to make decisions is to wait and continue doing that which you are doing, while opening the self regularly and repeatedly in simple offering of thanks and praise and the desire to be sent forth, to allow light to shine through you. As you ask for this light to shine through, you begin to have the feeling that any road is good as long as this light is shining through you, as there is no exhaustion of spirit as long as the heart lies open, and the incoming undistorted light is then able to move through the transparent personality and out into the waiting and thirsty world. You yourself are thirsty for the light, yet that thirst in itself is a beginning of the deepest service.[180]
Remembering who we are and why we are here helps also. Those of Q’uo say:
This is where your power lies, in the momentary decision to seek the love in the moment. As those known as Ra have said, “Where is the love in this moment?” is a helpful question at any juncture, but especially when the spirit is weary or overwrought.[181]
And Pupak agrees:
Oh God, please grant me mindfulness and wisdom, this is my constant prayer.[182]
Those of Q’uo point out another way to deal with spiritually based exhaustion:
If you are too weary to move on, if that is the sense that you get at this point, then we say to you: lighten the load. Remove expectations from your own self and allow yourself to play, to be as the daisies that dance upon the wind, carefree and blameless. You do not have to learn today. You do not have to work today. You have to do only that which is in your heart to do.[183]
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