Our questions today have to do with how we tend to look at a new challenge before us with some fear, foreboding, dread, wondering if it’s going to work out. No matter what the situation is, there is in many people the tendency to feel that the worse case scenario is staring them in the face and that there’s a good chance that it will come about. Is there a value to what we might call this fearful or fear-filled approach? To some apprehension? To anxiety? Is there some way that this might be used in a positive fashion by people who are preparing to set out on a new adventure, to undertake a new challenge or opportunity? Or is it better if the person completely relies upon what we might call blind faith and just has the optimistic point of view that everything’s going to be all right no matter what it might look like to begin with, and that if we just believe that things are going to be all right that this is the proper attitude with which to meet any challenge? Or is there a dynamic tension between blind faith and anxiety that brings out the best in us? Is there a balance that can be achieved to increase our efficiency in problem-solving and in meeting new challenges?

(Carla channeling)

I am Q’uo. Greetings in the love and in the light of the one infinite Creator. We are grateful this day to be called to your circle and to be able to speak upon the subject of the usefulness of fear and pessimism as regards entities looking at situations and needing to make decisions. As always, we ask each to be aware of the paucity of our wisdom and the fallibility of our statements. We offer the best opinion of which we are capable, but this opinion is flawed by our own distortions, which do in some measure continue. We thank each for allowing us this luxury, else we could not in good conscience speak.

Our statement to you that we are fallible is an example of our use of pessimism. We find there to be occasion to use what seems to be pessimistic thought at times when we are dealing with ourselves or other selves in a way which may cause a difference to be made in the decision-making processes of spiritual evolution. It is not likely that any would consider our words infallible, but, as this instrument would put it, the worst case scenario is that an entity would take our words out of context and literally, and, using them rather than the entity’s own discrimination, make a choice which would have an impact upon that entity’s spiritual evolution. We hope to have the impact upon your people’s spiritual evolution which your people choose to take from us, thinking for themselves. We do not at all wish to ask any to take our words on blind faith. Thus, you may see that we cannot give an easy answer to your question.

Let us consider the aspect, nearness of decision. Many are the times when one creates mentally a possible future situation. It may not be probable, and, if probable, it may not occur. And if it is most probably to occur, it will be long enough in coming that consideration of a decisive kind is premature. In this case, the use of consideration which could be called pessimistic of many possible scenarios is not recommended, as it is not utile. When there is simply a concern or worry on the horizon, it may be seen as weather—the storm cloud which is over someone else’s land, some other farmer’s crops, some other person’s hapless head. It will not impinge upon you.

This concern or cloud is real. Far more real in the thought world—or, as some perceive it, the world of spirit—than it is within your continuum. However, only damage can be done by the application of rational intelligence to a situation which has not yet become susceptible to rational thought. In this circumstance, the appropriate frame of mind or attitude would be prayerful and affirmative. That is to say, that any storm cloud of difficulty not directly impinging upon one can, with good results, be placed in the heart, be taken into meditation, and be contemplated with affirmative visualizations concerning its eventual process of outcome. In the example we used, it would be appropriate to know that the cloud brought rain to the farmer and watered his crop well, but that lightning did not strike the farmer while crops were being so fed.

When a worry, anxiety or concern enters the mind, therefore, the first question to put to the self is, “Is this a concern which has come to the proximity wherein I must needs consider and choose a plan of action?” If the answer is “No, this situation is not proximal, but is further from the entrance into imminent illusion than that,” then the persistent and gentle effort may well be made to downgrade concern until it becomes that which is the concern of one who prays in faith, holding all things up to the light and asking for light so that the possible situation dwells in thought in light, and the self possibly overly-concerned about this question dwells also in light in the beneficial rays of faith’s connection with the spiritual riches of an inexhaustible Source of love.

There is another category of considerations which we shall mention, for those considerations are important; yet, they have but a slender portion of the percentage of room in an entity’s usual considerations. These are general questions which one may have concerning keeping one’s word, being a certain way, dwelling with a certain point of view, and then noticing that one has emotionally or mentally slipped away from this standpoint or point of view. We may use the example from your holy works of the ones who awaited the bridegroom, each supposedly a bride to be. Each had, in this story, a lamp which used oil. Yet, some who hoped to marry did not carry the fuel to light the lamp. Others were prudent and had both light and fuel.

In this case, it is always well to look most pessimistically and firmly upon one’s perceived lack of forethought in fuel-carrying. One’s principles are the result of choices already made. They are your lamp. They are what you hold up before you as you await marriage with the present moment. However, without the fuel to light this lamp, the bridegroom of the present moment cannot find you in the darkness. Your forethought, your energetic concern in backing up previous ethical and metaphysical choices with the fuel to keep them fresh and lighted, are your way of being prepared for the usually unexpected arrival of a present moment, the bridegroom of which has need of your light, your face, your ethical positivity, your polarity in consciousness.

One who seeks the truth cannot rest upon the previously found truths or previously made ethical choices of one’s pilgrimage, but must continuously be prepared to meet that present circumstance which uses all past choices and demands then a living witness of your own polarity. Your choices without the energy of your will are like lamps without fuel and are not useful. Thusly, in your theoretical, abstract, metaphysical being, be very conscious that the entity who seeks shall be tested and the seeking shall go forward when the test has been passed, the passing of the test being the responsible and reliable remembrance and embracing of past choices which have increased positive polarity.

The third consideration in wondering about the wisdom of pessimism is the largest of the three considerations, for it is the one which needs balancing and which has an impact upon the decision-making process. As in many things, there is the balancing act. Let us divide this third kind of pessimism into two parts: firstly, the situation where a possible difficulty is intuited clearly as being present; the second, a situation which is proximate and has come to what may be called a “turning point.”

Firstly, there are those things about which one may have lucid intuition. A well known example within your culture is also found in your holy work, the Bible. It is the situation in which Joseph of the Many-Colored Robe is asked to interpret the dreams of a ruler. The young Joseph does interpret the dreams of the ruler in such a way that the dreams seem to have an internal order and consistency and to point to right action. Therefore, the ruler and Joseph move upon this dream’s suggestions concerning an unknown future. Seven bumper crops are first to be harvested and plenty is to rain. Then there are predicted in the dreams a like period of drought and consequent hunger and even starvation. The response to this clear dreaming is the preservation of enough food to buffer successfully a drought, should it indeed occur. This is a right use of what you might call fear or pessimism.

If there is a lucid and clear dream or process resembling clear dreaming wherein a precaution seems wise in the taking, and if this precaution is able to be done without destructive impact upon the integrated life of the self or family or society as a whole, then such a precaution is well made, as long as the effort is made not to dwell upon such a possibility being inevitable. The example in this instrument’s mind closest to its surface is the placing of the matches and the lighting instruments such as candles and lamps in case your electrical power fails. It is not foolish to prepare for this possibility, and shows prudence rather than random fear.

In the case of being faced with the necessity for making a decision, we hope you may see that much of the concern evinced in this query is irrelevant. When a decision must be made, there is no fault either in blind faith or in worst case scenario spinning. The movement of a personality through third density provides each entity with various lessons concerning loving. What love is, how it may manifest through one, how it may come to one, how it can be discerned, are all questions which the pilgrim of the king’s highway must needs ask. In some cases, an entity’s lessons are those in which an entity must learn to be less wise and more faithful.

Let us give the example told by Jesus in your holy work where a master gives several servants money. One servant buries the money. The others create, through enterprise, interest compounded to the money. When the master receives again the money, those who acted in faith that their judgment in investing for their master was adequate were rewarded with thanks and more duties, more services to perform for the master. The one who buries the coin, the pessimist, has what it has had, that and no more. And then the master takes even that coin away. This seems, in your logical terms, to be a harsh penalty. However, within the parable, the point is being made that one who acts without faith will not progress in polarity. The use of faith as a portion of each decision is a central requirement. The faith may show itself simply as a compassionate way of expressing wisdom, but it is centrally important that this impulse be respected and nurtured in each and every situation.

Upon the other hand, many are the lessons of love wherein an entity moves foolishly and quickly, in blind and unreasoned faith, thereby abandoning tools and resources which have been given within the illusion in which each lives by the infinite Creator. These faculties of reason were not given in order to create excess. These abilities of reasoning and questioning are valuable tools. Thusly, when one must needs make one’s personal choice, one first ascertains that the time has come to make the choice. If the time is not yet, the mind should remain out of gear and the concern given to the heart, to the inner room of prayer, and to the affirmative workings of an over-reaching faith in the rightness and goodness of all that there is behind and beyond the visible illusion.

The second consideration is that of one’s principles, one’s spiritual or metaphysical facets of one’s gem of spiritual or magical personality. Are these principles upheld with the enthusiasm of one with the fire to light the lamp of builded, metaphysical structure? If such principles are in place and are not being subverted or denied, then this consideration may be closed. If one sees oneself slipping away from a truth which one has responsibly perceived, then efforts must needs be made to restore the firm potential of builded polarity for further evolutionary choices.

If a concern still rests within the mind, then there is a decision to be made. We can only suggest to each that when that self which is uniquely you sets out to choose, both the faculty of faith and the faculty of wisdom may usefully be invoked. If a balance can be achieved quickly, very well. If there is a continuing disquiet, then there are two ways in which one may learn more about one’s true desires. Firstly, one may refuse any thought concerning this choice for a limited period. This neglect allows the deep unconscious roots of mind to express deeper wisdom. The other technique is to choose on one diurnal period to spend every free second espousing a positive choice. In the next diurnal period, one must then take every free moment espousing the wisdom of a negative choice. This over-stimulation of the mind’s duality—yes, no, yes, no—achieves the same inner quiet within, and, again, a way is made for the wisdom deep within one to rise to the surface either through dreaming, a sudden feeling, or, as is more nearly the general case, a growing awareness which soon amounts to certainty that one particular choice is the appropriate one for the self at this crux.

We do not disparage the intellectual mind. We do not disparage the uses of fear. We do not disparage the uses of faith. We point out to one who wishes to be an ever more radiant person in the citizenry of the universe that both faith and doubt are necessary in the discovery of the true self and the truth of that self by the becoming, birthing being that is the universal citizen known locally as the self.

Each of you builds for eternity. Make haste, therefore, slowly, knowing that the safety of corrected error is absolute. Any self may feel, after the fact, that a choice has been wrong. Another choice shall come. The same procedure is available and the self-perceived previous error is that for which one may give thanks. It is the homework problem solved wrongly, explained to some extent by the teacher within or without, granting the self better tools and resources for making the choice again.

You gaze upon our perception of the entire point of the third-density experience which you now enjoy. Each present moment brings its burgeoning harvest of possibility. Some moments are over-burdened with the need to choose. Let your faith keep you as unflustered as possible. Let your skills at using reason keep you aware of mundane concerns. But, above all, realize that both are but tools. The decision, the choice, is best made when it is made not only by you, but by such a deep portion of the self that one is one who knows, one who has a quiet mind because there is an inner sureness, “Yes, I have opened the heart to faith, the mind to rational consideration. Decision is not mathematical. Beyond a certain point, I cannot defend my choice. However, I know and feel sure that it is the one I need to make.”

If this luxury may be yours in times of hard choices, then truly have you done all that one in your life experience can do, for you have used your resources and then opened the self to the greater compassion and wisdom which lies within in that portion of the self which is a portion of the one infinite Creator’s love reflected in love, as this instrument would say. You are all entities of love reflecting the Creator to each other. Be aware as often as possible of the nature of the self and other selves. This is one of the greatest resources for spiritual evolution which exists.

We would close this working through the one known as Jim. We thank this instrument and would transfer at this time, leaving this instrument in love and in light. We are known to you as those of Q’uo.

(Jim channeling)

I am Q’uo, and greet each again in love and in light through this instrument. We realize that we have spoken overly long and wish to ask if there might be any queries with which we may complete our presentation this afternoon?

[No questions. All thank Q’uo.]

I am Q’uo, and again we shall take this opportunity to thank you, each one of you, for your patience, your dedication, and your desire to know more of that which you call truth. That which we have shared we share with great joy, and also share with the admonition that you take only those words which have meaning to you, leaving behind those that do not. At this time, we shall take our leave of this group and this instrument, leaving each, as always, in the love and in the light of the one infinite Creator. We are known to you as those of Q’uo. Adonai, my friends. Adonai.