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Classroom Talk: 10/25/2023 - The inevitable outcome of all unconscious self-compromise -- within ourselves, but primarily in relationships with others -- is to reach a kind of critical mass of resentment that then spills itself out on others in words and deeds too soon enacted, and too late regretted.

No condition, in and of itself, is ever the cause of psychological stress, fear, or regret; suffering of this kind is inherent in an unseen, unconscious level of "self" that resists changing conditions because it is incapable of changing with them.

Classroom Talk: 10/18/2023 - Any action we take initiated by resisting some unwanted moment ensures the continuation of an unconscious, deeply conflicted nature so asleep to itself that it can't tell the difference between struggling to escape a prison, and not walking into one in the first place.

No real lesson in life becomes our understanding until we realize that each unwanted experience in life serves as a secret reflection of an undetected interior imbalance within us. These lessons exist - and are brought about - to help strengthen, and temper the character of our soul.

Classroom Talk: 10/11/2023 - Part 1: We can't hope to change what comes out of any given moment until we change the one within whom it appears. Part 2: The task is not to be perfect as imagined, an illusion supported by the pain of unrelenting self-judgment; rather the real task is to do the interior work of seeing ourselves as perfectly as we can regardless of how much we would rather not.

In much the same way as a mirror reflects whatever object is brought before it, so our consciousness reflects - and realizes - the character or quality of whatever is revealed within it.

Classroom Talk: 10/4/2023 - The consistency of any painful, negative reaction to some person or event doesn't prove -- as we imagine it does -- that the "guilty" party remains unchanged as "charged." Rather, what it does show -- at the very least -- is that it is we who are unchanged: an unwitting captive of being unconsciously identified with our own negative reaction.

In REAL life there are no "tracks" to follow, but thought runs along the tracks of memory, and memory always departs from, and returns to the same station: the PAST. This explains why it seems we never arrive at the higher station in life called "True Freedom"...because real freedom is not in time.

Classroom Talk: 9/27/2023 - You can't learn how to be; it's impossible. But you can see through the futility of the endless struggle to make yourself (feel) real. So, yes: it's hard to die to the hope that some time yet to come holds the key, but it does get easier the more you realize that whatever freedom you've imagined... doesn't exist without the fear that it doesn't.

We can either spend our life resisting painful, unwanted moments - wishing they go away - or we can learn to look outside of them, which is the only way to discover the Truth that sets us free: within any dark moment dwells a Living Light that increases (itself) with every step we dare take into it.

Classroom Talk: 9/20/2023 - To see that "taking thought" leads to naught... is the beginning of the end of all useless solutions.

Part 1: The more we complain about any unwanted moment in life, the more certain we can be that it will repeat itself. Part 2: The more we are at ease with complaining about something, the more difficult, the harder becomes our life. Why? Because the repetition of any negative reaction not only makes it harder to see just how destructive it is, but (it) also serves to strengthen our unconscious inclination to identify with a lower level of...