Insight Timer Talks

It is a big mistake to believe that negative imagination requires we be present to its calculated organization in order to imprison us in what feels like some fearful, or angry sense of self; quite the opposite is true. Truth be known, our most familiar, if not dominant sense of "I" is thus manufactured, and our identification with the works of this dark machinery is the unseen source of most of our fear and sorrow.

Let every search for a solution to the suffering you feel begin in the unlit corners of your own consciousness, and soon you will never again wonder "why" you feel the worries, fear, and the bitterness that you do.

While it's impossible to be entirely free of a psychological body -- including the elements inherent in the constant appearance of its deeply conditioned reactions -- we are free to change our relationship to that body and -- in so doing -- start working to liberate ourselves from being unconsciously identified with what amounts to negative thoughts and feelings of the self-created kind.

Fear and anxiety do not exist outside of an old mind that -- moment by moment -- creates these dark states in a deeply divided space within itself.

No matter how challenging the condition may be, regardless how steep the learning curve -- or wide the gap between what you desire to do, and yet cannot -- the first limitation you meet in these moments is always one and the same as an invitation to transcend it. The first imperfection is spiritual self-ignorance.

True serenity, real inner repose is the same as being quietly, consciously, released from a legion of false beliefs... each of which gives rise to an equally false sense of self.

One of our greatest, least understood sorrows in this life, the root cause of an uninspired life, is that -- given our present level of being -- we have no other place to explore besides the valley of thought: an unconscious realm where the shadows of things that were hide their emptiness by changing their shape to look like a time to come -- just ahead -- when, at long last, we will reach the time and place where our struggles with life are at last behind us!

The mind that thinks in order to understand life believes it can see, but (it) can't; while the mind that sees doesn't need to think to understand life; (it) has no need for belief.

Lesson #1: Far too many things that you so often feel so sure are important... are not! And that's why it's wise to be suspicious of any form of painful, let alone fearful certainty! Lesson #2: There is a Divine intelligence that knows before you do exactly what you need to realize what you may not yet know you even need! But, it's hard to hear that still, small part of yourself when you're always so busy talking to yourself!

You've no doubt fought and won countless battles in life, yet repeatedly -- seemingly  inescapably -- you continue to find yourself at war, not just with others but within yourself, as well. And so... I want to share seven of the most important lessons I've learned in my life, so that you might watch for the moments in your life when you can see the truth in them. To consider even a little of what I've come to tell you...

Only in our conscious awareness of a personal limitation -- through our ability to sense the presence of any indwelling negative, or otherwise self-denigrating thought or feeling -- is realized the strength we need to die to an unconscious nature that, otherwise... lives to ensure that we accept its dark and limited view of life as our own.

The sure way to guarantee that those painful voices in your head will continue to disturb you... is to keep listening to what they have to say about your life!