Enemies

Classroom Talk: 9/26/2003 - Here is a tough spiritual lesson, but one that must be learned before we free ourselves from the circle of false friends: There was once a sheep who kept crying out, "Why do the wolves chase me, bite at my heels, and want to hurt me so?" The Shepherd smiled and replied: "Why do you like to wander through the woods where they live, and what makes you think that when another creature shows you its teeth that it's smiling at you?"

Classroom Talk: 8/31/2003 - Part 1: We want to be free of unpleasant inner states but refuse to consciously bear the weight of them...which is a mandatory interim stage between living with the burden of self and being released from it. Part 2: All forms of stress secretly serve the nature of those thoughts responsible for its creation.

Classroom Talk: 7/6/2003 - No one who drinks from the Cup of Truth shall perish; for Truth is the Light, and the Light is forever -- having no beginning or end.

Classroom Talk: 12/6/2002 - We cannot control the way the world turns. We cannot change day into night. We cannot keep what is not ours, and we cannot hide these facts from ourselves no matter how hard we try. But what we are given to do, and that turns out to be the one power of ours truly capable of transforming our experience of life, is that we can choose the internal company we keep...

Classroom Talk: 9/11/2002 - Part 1: The reason that you give to yourself for the suffering that has come over you is, itself, a secret part of the suffering that overcomes you! Part 2: The only reason that your inner enemies, those dark negative states, have so much say over your life is because you are so willing to stand there and listen!

Classroom Talk: 7/17/2002 - The True spiritual key to finding forgiveness in your heart for another is in awakening to your need to be forgiven for having been seduced into becoming someone who believes there is a valid reason for hating anyone.

Classroom Talk: 7/14/2002 - The seat of power and perfection hidden away in the heart of one's soul is its potential to receive what is Divine and in this silent conception to be made anew. This means that our work is not about struggling to somehow make ourselves whole, but simply to surrender ourselves to the will of that eternal relationship already holy, already established within each of us.

Classroom Talk: 3/6/2002 - How can we ever hope to help one another if each of us is convinced that the only work we should do is for the benefit of ourselves? Spiritual awakening is about coming to remember that there is a work on this earth that we are all created to share in common: To learn what it means to love one another.