Tag Archives: Teachers

My Soul Is A Site For Spelunking

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I recall many years ago being shown a diagram with four quadrants, where one quadrant is what we know and others know about ourselves (our public selves), what we know about ourselves that others don’t know (our secret selves), what others know about us that we don’t know (the “bad breath area”) and the part of us which neither we nor others know about us.  Steps to Knowledge teaches that a person’s mission in life resides in that mysterious portion of life. This is taught in Step 36, “My life is a mystery to explore.” Part of the price of admission for getting to where Steps to Knowledge is going is the willingness to explore that unknown, undocumented region.

Another part of the price of admission is the recognition that not everyone is interested in taking this journey, and releasing other people from the requirement that they appreciate this journey.  I’ve already been told once that I’m not like most people, but I still sometimes have a hard time thinking of it as a benefit rather than a problem.  Step 34 spoke of emotional honesty as a hallmark of Knowledge, so I believe that flattery would not be a strategy to get people to go forward.

As I thought about this step, I recalled the proverb of Solomon: “The crucible for silver and the furnace for gold, but people are tested by their praise.” (Proverbs 27:21, NIV)

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

And Who Did You Meet?

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Oh, who did you meet, my blue-eyed son?
Who did you meet, my darling young one?
I met a young child beside a dead pony
I met a white man who walked a black dog
I met a young woman whose body was burning
I met a young girl, she gave me a rainbow
I met one man who was wounded in love
I met another man who was wounded with hatred
And it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard
It’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall

Bob Dylan – A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall

One thing that is interesting about this particular review is that it is the first time the word “prayer” is used in Steps to Knowledge:

We shall begin our fourth review period with a special prayer.

“I accept my Knowledge as a gift from God. I accept my Teachers as my elder brothers and sisters. I accept my world as a place where Knowledge can be reclaimed and contributed. I accept my past as a demonstration of life without Knowledge. I accept the miracles of my life as a demonstration of the presence of Knowledge and I give myself now to cultivate that which is of the greatest good within myself to be given to the world.”

Here is the word cloud for the steps under review (steps 22-27):
I’m not happy with the shape of this word cloud, but I’m seeing that experience and error are things by which I must practice being served. The final paragraph of the review talks about the value of the review, not just for me, but for the people I will serve in the future.  Part of my development is being aware of how people learn (or don’t learn) things.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

Alone Is An Unword In This Poem

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I recall being not particularly happy with my study of step 25 in Steps to Knowledge “I am at one with the greatest truth of life” for multiple reasons.

I was eagerly waiting for a proposition to be proposed, only to be told that this great truth is an experience coming from great relationships.

Steps to Knowledge has already used the word “great” a number of times, and consistently uses it as an descriptive adjective signifying “large” or “larger than other things.”

I was not particularly happy with being told I hold a great relationship with life. On my weaker days, I have a hard time thinking life and I have been very good to each other. On my stronger days, I try to be a little bit better to life, and I recognize that life is trying to be a little bit better to me.

I was not particularly happy with being told I hold a great relationship with my Teachers, who are within me.  Are they merely a mental construct?  That doesn’t seem to go with Step 22 “I am surrounded by the Teachers of God” and Step 23 “I am loved, surrounded and supported by the Teachers of God.”  I was not particularly clear as to what was meant by “within,” and not particularly happy about that.

I was not particularly happy with being instructed to practice feeling this relationship.  I was not happy because I was still struggling with the very premise of practicing feeling something, and the fact that I’ve been given this instruction three times in the first 25 steps, signified to me that this is something about which I need to come to a better resolution.  I was not particularly clear as to which relationship I was being asked to practice feeling.  My relationship with life?  My relationship with my Teachers?

You get the idea.  On the other hand, other students have reported great happiness as they practiced this step.  It would seem that analysis has its limits.  That might be the point.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

I Am The Self I Deserve (And Other Self-Esteem Issues)

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There is a grand total of 220 unique Google results for the exact phrase “I am worthy of God’s love,” which is step 24 in Steps to Knowledge.  It’s not one of those things I hear people say on a regular basis.

The top search result for this exact phrase is its presence in Steps to Knowledge.  What does this mean?  I think it means that whether this idea is true or false, whether this idea is right or wrong, Steps to Knowledge is a bold, loud and forthright proclaimer of this idea.

The first sentence of step 24 repeats the step, adding the word “indeed,” repeating the pattern of step 22.

And just when I think it’s safe to surmise that this is point of step 24, the very next sentence delivers an even more barbed point.  This point is repeated in the first paragraph.

You are indeed worthy of God’s love. In fact, you really are God’s love. Without pretense of any kind, at the very core of yourself, this is your True Self.  It is not the Self you yet experience, and until you do experience it, do not pretend that this is your experience. But hold in true awareness that this is your Self. You are a person, but you are greater than a person.  How can you be unworthy of God’s love if that is what you are? Your Teachers surround you and provide that which you are so that you may experience yourself and your true relationship with life.

This is not the first time the phrase “True Self” has appeared.  It first appeared in step 10 “What is Knowledge?” and appeared again in step 16 “Beyond my mind is Knowledge.”

The sentence “I am the self I deserve” could be punctuated in a number of ways at the end. But which way would make it the most truthful?  I am the self I deserve.  I am the self I deserve?  I believe the punctuation Steps to Knowledge offers is “I am the self I deserve!”

Google doesn’t show this exact sentence to have been written anywhere yet, but I believe it is a succinct way of saying the point of step 24:

Knowledge is the love of God, and my True Self.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.