Following the path you speak of gives me only temporary freedom from pain. This is actually my fault because after getting freedom, I forget to continue meditation, which gives past pain some time to regain strength to attack me at other times. How do I get permanent freedom?...

Featured Study Group Topic for the Week of July 8, 2013. Part 1: There is no hope in the dark I see... But only in the light that reveals it to me. Part 2: When it comes to a choice in meals, deals, or what wheels to buy, one can afford to make mistakes; these decisions are generally not irreparable. But when it comes to the possibility of developing one's soul, the choice and eventual cost of...

I work consciously every day to overcome inner resistance, doubts, etc., but there is one thing that I don't know how to crack... that is tension and intense body pain that began early in my life that just seems to worsen over time...would you have any thoughts on this?...

Those with whom we assemble we will soon resemble, so the simple old saying goes. Yet it tells of a deep truth. It says that who we are -- the stuff of our soul at present -- is being transformed continuously by the nature of the company we keep; so that, in our essence we are always moving and evolving towards a kind of psychic oneness with whatever relationships we have revolving around us t...

Classroom Talk: 9/24/2003 - Until we learn what it means to come to a complete inward stop, nothing of a true spiritual nature can start within us.

The wheat knows that it has chaff in it. The chaff thinks that it is pure wheat. The wheat seeks the threshing floor; while the chaff flies from it... believing that it knows the right direction to go, when in truth it is headed for oblivion.

Strive in all things, but especially in your spiritual work, to make your actions continuous. Even a small act of conscious self-work done each and every day is better than a large effort every second moon.

In this exchange with an online viewer, "letting go" author Guy Finley talks about a critical stage in the inner development of spiritual aspirants in which a necessary sense of emptiness appears after letting go of painful attachments.

Just as St. Paul was forgiven by Christ for all the wrongdoing he was complicit in, so will the man or woman who brings their own "mud" into the light be relieved of their spiritual debt. The greater the debt, the greater the gratitude for being released from it.

Classroom Talk: 12/11/2002 - No one ever falls into a dark psychological hole that he didn't help dig!

Topics covered: unconditional love, feeling empty, emptiness, dry, unmotivated, acceptance, sacrifice, persistence...

The whole idea of turning straw into gold is connected to using any unwanted moment to gain a whole new level of understanding and to connect to a higher level of consciousness that is not afraid of the moment.