Featured Study Group Topic for the Week of December 17, 2012. Dwelling on any dark state is a form of negative fascination; fear, doubt, resentment, and worry are all part of an unconscious routine through which resistance continues to refresh itself, all the while draining its unwary host. So remember: real life never repeats itself... and neither should you.

What others may or may not think about us is not our business. Our business is being aware of the unconscious parts of us that fear we’re only as worthwhile as others agree we are. Worrying about what tomorrow may bring, or how to fix yesterday’s sorrow is not our business...

Topics Covered: We are awash in a world of resistance which isn't just global in its formation, but finds in us a willing instrument; It doesn't matter what this world does because this is not your world; We all suffer from SFS and FOPPS, which stand for "Stage Fright Syndrome" and "Fear Of Poor Performance Syndrome." The symptoms of these syndromes are anxiety, worry and self-doubt...

Anxiety seems to be my lot in life lately. I have a full plate of activities with children, a challenging job, and a few outside interests. I feel like I balance these and keep my priorities straight, yet still, I'm often visited by worry and anxiety. Do you have any suggestions on how I can work through this? When caught in an anxious state, it seems that the more I try to be awake and aware,...

Topics covered: Everything that can make an impression has an inherent feeling in it; A pure feeling has no residue; A true feeling is connected to the beginning of all things; Sensation is the pursuit of stimulation; As soon as the mind attempts to describe anything, it has already separated from what it is trying to describe; Real prayer is born out of wanting to be free of something rather...

Your messages are thought-provoking and sound so simple... yet I find them difficult to apply to my situation in life. Having two special needs young adults at home is an everyday challenge and constant worry as their future is unknown. How wonderful it would be if we could just say "yes" to your suggestions, but it doesn't work that way. Some of us have been dealt with more than we can handle...

Refuse to negatively anticipate the arrival of any imagined moment, and you won't have anything to resist now... or ever.

As surely as an abandoned home is slowly taken over by invasive forms that have nothing to do with its original purpose for being built, so too does the unattended mind become a house of lower forces whose unconscious nature makes impossible the entrance of any higher presence.

Nothing in this world can answer your true spiritual need to be kind, whole, and quietly happy as long as you consent to live with fear, compromising yourself in the now for the freedom it promises will come later.

There can be no starting place in our lives any truer than what our own awareness of the present moment permits. This friendly fact tells us that our life direction, our actual destiny, is determined by the level of our awareness that attends the full range of each step we take. The next two examples prove this insight beyond the calling of any logic. No one consciously takes a step in haste...

Classroom Talk: 7/31/2002 - Part 1: When you can look a worry or anger in the eye and tell it, "There is nothing between us anymore," then you are well on your way to the birth of a new kind of freedom in you that nothing can oppose or ever take away from you! Part 2: Our problems, what amounts to our lives defined by these protracted burdens, become weightless the moment we cease to identify with them...

Topics covered: We are bullied all the time by something within ourselves that we do not recognize as a bully. In fact, we often look to this inner bully for guidance; What makes us the favorite of any bully? The answer is that weakness always pounces on weakness. The bully does not exist without something to bully; We are bullied inwardly by fear, anxiety, anger, worry, depression, or any other negative state that we are not aware of...