Student Talks: 4/29/2022 - Key Lesson: It is a distinct stage in the development of the aspirant when -- rather than being easily distracted by some imagined consolation for his pain, or by concluding who is to blame for it -- his first and real preference in that dark moment is to increase his awareness of his condition, and not to find ways around it.

Topics covered: The way you walk out of dark moments is that you stop walking into them. So-called dark moments cannot be separated from who and what you think you are in those moments; We cannot separate a dark moment from the unconscious resistance to that moment; What we call a dark moment cannot be separated from the level of consciousness that meets and reacts to that moment...

Classroom Talk: 4/24/2022 - It is a distinct stage in the development of the aspirant when -- rather than being easily distracted by some imagined consolation for his pain, or by concluding who is to blame for it -- his first and real preference in that dark moment is to increase his awareness of his condition, and not to find ways around it.

In this answer to a viewer's question, "Secret of Letting Go" author Guy Finley explains that real meditation involves being present to both the interior world as well as the exterior world at the same time. That presence is the center of all things.

Student Talks: 11/12/2021 - Key Lesson: We must make -- and keep -- a special place within us for what we love; otherwise, our heart becomes an overnight motel filled with the visitations of a thousand fickle lovers... not one of which is capable of loving anything other than itself.

Topics Covered: It is destructive to hate another human being. It is destructive to be afraid. It is destructive to rush, to be anxious, to worry; The unconscious mind is forever bringing up something that it can identify with; The realization of a new possibility is the same as becoming aware of an old limitation; What determines our possibilities in any given moment is what...

Classroom Talk: 11/7/2021 - We must make -- and keep -- a special place within us for what we love; otherwise, our heart becomes an overnight motel filled with the visitations of a thousand fickle lovers... not one of which is capable of loving anything other than itself.

Topic: Bringing Silence to a Noisy Mind that Won't Stop Talking to Itself (10/20/21 Classroom Talk)

Topics Covered: Where does an inner dialog get its authority over us? It starts with our unconscious consent to identify with those thoughts; The root of self-talk begins with judgment; Self-talk is inseparable from the moment of conflict where something happens and it is interpreted as a threat to who I think I am and what I'm identified with; No self-talk starts without being triggered...

Classroom Talk: 10/20/2021 - Part 1: The sure way to guarantee that any suffering continues unabated is to keep talking to yourself about it! Part 2: The more we talk to ourselves about how we need to make some real change in our life, the less we see how consoling ourselves with ideas for a brighter tomorrow keeps us from realizing a simple truth...

All of our life experiences have been trying to teach us a certain grand lesson: Liberation from our captive condition (whatever that may be in the moment) cannot come by further deliberating it. We can see the wisdom in doing nothing toward our own troubled thoughts and feelings when we realize that the only way not to be dragged under by these negative states is to stay...

Topic: Realize the Divine Purpose Behind Any Painful Human Relationship (7/7/21 Classroom Talk)