Topics covered: Instead of telling you what to do, the present moment is first and foremost asking what it is that you love and what is it that you will serve; We are not going to change other people by resisting what they are and insisting that they be something else; Unconscious suffering involves blame, shame and judgment. Conscious suffering reveals unconscious suffering and everything that comes with it.

 

Classroom Talk: 8/4/2002 - All partial loves prove themselves to be just that; and in their inevitable passing we are always returned to that bittersweet realization that the love we long for can never become the possession of the self that longs.

Each one of us is the living expression of the sum of our understanding, and it is the sum of our understanding that determines our level of happiness. Most of our experiences in life would be different if we were more present and aware of ourselves in the moment. By becoming aware of our habitual reactions to life's movements, we can begin to notice where it is that we compromise ourselves. M...

The only thing that really troubles us is that our attention doesn't belong to us. Presently, something calls for us and claims our attention. Every errant thought and feeling that passes through our psychic system commands that we attend to what it tells us to, and then tries to direct us to what we have to discover based on resistance to the moment produced by our misplaced attention...

To hold a wish to punish someone begins with the unconscious embrace of the very pain we wish to inflict.

Which would you rather do? Be identified with all the things in life that come and go... so that this lower sense of self compels you to cry and worry and fight to keep everything in place? Or, would you rather be free of that lower nature that lives to cling... so that you're increasingly able to just let what "comes and goes" do just that... come and go with no further muss and fuss? We've...

Classroom Talk: 6/7/2002 - Part 1: Those pointed negative states that jump out of us whenever we rush to blame someone else for our pain are always dead-end streets whose one-way signs deceptively read: This way out! Part 2: In a heated moment of a trial with someone else, instead of struggling in vain to get him or her to see the lesson in it for them, we should learn to ask ourselves, "What is the hidden lesson in this for me?"

Classroom Talk: 11/23/2003 - A thief may steal from me my wallet, or even manage to acquire and abuse my name, but the only way he can rob me of my peace of mind is if that which he has stolen from my pocket has secret strings attached to my heart.

Classroom Talk: 8/8/2003 - Just as a swarm of flies that darkens the sky is swept aside by a single breeze, so too can the pervasive negative states that darken one's heart and mind be brushed away -- if we will only dare to come awake to ourselves and ask that tormenting spirit a single question: Upon what is your authority based?

Classroom Talk: 11/21/2003 - We must do more than just try to remember that nothing disturbs our peace of mind without first having gained our consent to enjoin us in that conflict; we must learn to fight for ourselves, to boldly reject any negative state that would rule us -- or else accept the lot of victim and wear his mantle of woe.

Classroom Talk: 11/14/2003 - It is far better for us to seek the Truth of ourselves, as challenging as this course may be at times, than to rest in the false comfort of believing ourselves to be something we are not, and then finding out too late the lie.

Topics covered: A chief feature of a divided mind is to judge; Most of what bothers you about other people is what they've stirred in you; When you really change you change in both directions of time; Your awareness of your long body is what changes your past; We have no humility in the face of our negative states; Observation creates humility; Something in me wants to be safe and right; A tru...