Saturday, April 1, 2006 (Group/Brattleboro, Vermont)
Participants: Mary (Michael), Alicia (Tisara), Bill (Zit), Carole (Aileen), Daniil (Zynn), Donna (Luera), Ella (Bella), George (Gregor), Hernan, Inna (Beatrix), Ioanna (Iona), Jenaro (Archer), Judy, Ken M (Oba), Ken P (Alida), Lynda (Ruther), Magdalena, Natasha (Nichole), Pat (Treice), Paul (Paneus), Rodney (Zacharie), Terry (Uliva), Veronica (Amadis)
Elias arrives at 11:41 AM. (Arrival time is 20 seconds.)
ELIAS: Good afternoon!
GROUP: (Loudly) Hi, Elias!
ELIAS: What we shall be discussing: motivation, why bad things happen, energy, and your favorite subject, truths. Identifying truths, which is what we shall begin with.
Who has identified a truth?
ELLA: Does it qualify if I realize that certain beliefs from my childhood that I never analyzed or questioned, I realized that they were beliefs and that they (inaudible). Is that true?
ELIAS: Not necessarily.
JENARO: I have one. I have a belief that love requires sacrifice.
ELIAS: Very well. And in that, what do you view are the influences?
JENARO: So far, I’ve viewed it relating to one of my religious beliefs about self-worth and deservingness.
ELIAS: And how do you view that is affecting of you in your daily actions?
JENARO: I’ve noticed in addressing to that belief or that truth that I usually tend to forfeit my choice to the other individual by discounting my own expressions in viewing the other individual’s wants or expressions as more deserving than mine.
ELIAS: And how does this truth influence you in mundane actions that you engage yourself?
JENARO: Usually I notice I tend to hold back and create a lot of restrictions, even in playing video games. Sometimes crossing the street, I might create a lot of traffic and I view cars holding more dominance over the road than me, so to speak, because they’re bigger and can kill me.
ELIAS: In identifying this truth and recognizing its influences, do you recognize how often in one day there are expressions that are generated or actions that are generated that are associated with that truth?
JENARO: Many, many times.
ELIAS: And what do you do?
JENARO: Since I’ve become aware of it and allow that awareness, usually I present myself with choice. Sometimes I offer a fluctuation, where I seem to want to create both the familiar — which is going back into the forfeiting of my choice — and also moving into the new choice. It just depends on the moment and the specific expression, where in that moment I am choosing to place my trust — if I actually trust the new information or the new direction, which is the trust in myself and the validity of my expression, or if I choose to go back into the familiar and not do that.
ELIAS: Very well. (Looking at the group) Another?
ELLA: I don’t know if it’s a truth, but recently I realized that I have a thought in my head that I talk a lot. I’ve never analyzed that as being my truth. But lately I am seeing how, like you said, through the day it influences my beliefs so that internally I tell myself that I have to control, that I am doing something that affects other individuals in ways that they don’t feel comfortable with, and it also leaves a negative connotation of myself to me. But lately I’ve been more aware of that and also of the generating more choice of accepting myself just the way I am rather than fighting it, and feeling that maybe I am not worthwhile to be listened to. Is that the thing that you are describing?
ELIAS: Yes. Another?
VERONICA: I am in conflict as to the foods that I can safely eat — do I need to eat organic food in order to maintain my health. At times I say it doesn’t make a difference, because if I believe that potato chips are good for me, I can eat them. But I’m caught between eating foods that I think are good for me and foods that are not good for me.
ELIAS: What is the identification of the truth?
VERONICA: The truth is that I hold conflict as to what to eat.
ELIAS: That is an influence. What is the truth?
VERONICA: I am what I eat, and if I want to be healthy I need to eat what I label as good food or what is labeled as good healthy food.
ELIAS: The truth would be concerning health.
VERONICA: And the food that I eat?
ELIAS: The food is an influence. The truth is health. In this, a strong influence of that truth with you is food and what types of food you eat. How does this truth affect you in relation to other individuals and differences?
VERONICA: I will try to convince others as to their choice of diet rather than allowing them to make their own choices. So I’m kind of controlling their choices rather than just saying let them eat their choice and don’t interfere.
ELIAS: Another?
PAT: A belief in limitation, a truth of limitation, in a way that for me is that I must not be wasteful: waste food, waste water, waste power, waste energy.
ELIAS: And how do you view that to influence mundane actions that you generate within your day?
PAT: I’m very careful not to leave the faucet running or saving things from dinner. I have to save things, not to throw away things that have value to maybe someone else, that I shouldn’t throw that away; that’s wrong.
ELIAS: And how does this influence you in relation to other individuals and differences?
PAT: I make judgments about people who do waste things. How could they leave the water running? How could they leave all the lights on? How could they throw that away?
ELIAS: (Nods) Another?
KEN P: I am a focus of awareness and consciousness, and where that relates to day-to-day life is that I can be focused anywhere, not just in this body, but I can be focused in a dream, I can be focused in other altered states. What is becoming aware now is that there can be other focuses focusing through the body.
ELIAS: And what is the truth?
KEN P: The truth is that I am a focus of awareness and consciousness.
ELIAS: No. That is not a truth.
KEN P: It is not?
ELIAS: No. Another?
KEN M: The situation where one would feel that productivity that involves struggle would create an outcome that is more valued or valuable. Interestingly enough, sometimes for instance if I look at want ads in the paper, I will see ad after ad where somebody is looking for a hard worker — “we want a hard worker” — but to me that would imply hardship. I was curious as to why they would not put they’re looking for a vigorous worker, which would be the same thing and would not have that same kind of belief attached to it. I’m kind of curious about that.
I just feel that has been ingrained in us all our lives to work hard, work hard. But if something is acquired easily, it’s almost like you had that easy. So it’s like definitely a belief attached to that, in terms of productivity.
ELIAS: Do you view this as one of your truths?
KEN M: Yes, very much in my life I’ve done that and still find myself doing it. When I find myself thinking in terms of that, I’ve decided to just realize, wait a minute, I’m doing the old “this is valuable because I worked hard” and that it’s not necessarily a truth of reality. It’s just basically a belief that is entertained by many people.
I believe less thickness would be produced for me by looking at this as “I put forth a vigorous effort,” because that has kind of a neutrality to it. Vigor is just vigor, as opposed to “hard,” which always makes you think of hardship or twenty years at hard labor, that sort of thing.
Almost, in a way, it’s kind of like a thing that Seth once said about bridge beliefs, the same kind of thing, and I was wondering if it might have been kind of a precursor to your concepts of acceptance.
JENARO: Would that also be an example of struggle being more noble?
KEN M: Yes, that same sort of thing.
ELIAS: It is a belief. But we are identifying those beliefs that have been generated into absolutes that are being identified as your individual truths.
RODNEY: I’ve had these conversations going on in my head for my whole life. I create dialogues between people, between myself and people. The other day I said what’s with these friggin’ dialogues? They just go on. They get triggered and I don’t know what triggers them, although I’m improving as to discovering what does trigger them. In doing that, I realized that what motivates these dialogues in my head is a lack of trust in my own decision-making, in my own choices.
I love butter. I put butter on my bread four times thicker than anybody you ever saw. So I have a dialogue in my head about butter’s good for me and I don’t give a damn what other people do. But why am I having that dialogue? It came to me that there’s a very strong belief that I have to justify myself, period. (Elias nods) That’s draining an awful lot of energy out of me.
ELIAS: What is the truth?
RODNEY: That’s what I’m trying to see. It’s gotta be a truth because it’s so prevalent.
ELIAS: You expressed it already. (Smiling) What did you say?
RODNEY: I said a lot of things.
ELIAS: Justification.
RODNEY: Yes, I see that very clearly.
ELIAS: Therefore...
RODNEY: So what’s the truth?
ELIAS: That IS the truth.
RODNEY: That I have to justify myself?
ELIAS: Yes.
RODNEY: So the antidote to that...
ELIAS: We shall proceed in that direction shortly.
RODNEY: You can’t just say? (Laughter)
ELIAS: We shall continue in that direction shortly. (Looking at Alicia) Yes?
ALICIA: I’m almost embarrassed to say this, but I think it’s a truth because it feels absolute to me. I don’t pay attention to it but it influences me. I think I still hold that creation occurs outside the self. Things will happen to me and my immediate response is somebody’s doing that TO me, this is happening TO me, as opposed to I am generating this. (Elias nods)
Actually, one of the things I’m finding is — I don’t know if this is typical — I don’t think I like any of my truths or my beliefs. I feel like I live them and I’ve been raised by them, and all of a sudden I don’t like any of them. So when you talk about preferences, they’re not my preferences but I still live by them. It’s very frustrating.
BILL: One of mine, I believe, is a truth that I need to fill time, like I need to do something. It doesn’t need to be a struggle; it’s just that I need to be doing something, like sitting there meditating, which I don’t like doing. Maybe I don’t like it because it’s one of my truths. That seems to be a truth that I’ve never really thought about before.
ELIAS: (Nods) Yes.
PAUL: How about respect? That’s a big one I think.
ELIAS: Yes, and how does this influence you?
PAUL: I think I go through a process of judging others if they don’t respect either themselves, other people, me. I fall into this trap of judging.
ELIAS: And how do you view that influencing you in mundane actions that you generate within your day?
PAUL: Unknown; I don’t know. I haven’t processed it fully.
ELIAS: Very well.
ELLA: Elias, what I thought of as my truth, which is that I talk a lot, does that concern self-worthiness and also caring what other individuals think of me? Is that what I would identify as the underlying truth?
ELIAS: Image.
ELLA: My self-image?
ELIAS: Yes.
ELLA: But you don’t leave it to self-worthiness? I don’t understand. I understand that it’s not the maybe the best (inaudible), but doesn’t it deeper relate to self-worthiness?
ELIAS: That can be an influence, that can be an avenue, but the truth is image.
KEN P: Are you working to get a distinction here between truth and belief? Is that part of what this exercise is?
ELIAS: No. We have established that your truths, your individual truths ARE beliefs. They are merely beliefs that have been generated into absolute. The point is that they are challenging if not quite difficult to identify, for they are so unquestioned and they are generated so automatically. Generally, you are unaware of what they are or how to identify them, but they are very influencing.
And now we address to the second part of your question, in that they are NOT your enemy. They are your guidelines. In your terms, they are good.
RODNEY: Boy, they don’t feel that way!
ALICIA: No, they don’t!
ELIAS: The reason that you make this association that they are bad is that you are not aware of the expressions and influences of them in mundane actions that you engage every day that you ARE comfortable with. What you notice is influences that are uncomfortable or that are automatic responses that limit your choices.
When you identify a truth and recognize a truth genuinely and begin to view how that truth is associated with many, many actions that you engage within your day, you begin to recognize that there are many expressions of that truth that ARE comfortable for you. They ARE preferences and they are your guidelines. They become conflicting and what you view as your enemy when you are not aware of these influences or when you are not aware that they are a guideline for you, or when you are discounting your own guideline and expressing to yourself that it is bad.
Not being wasteful — this IS a preference; it IS a guideline. But that guideline can also create conflicts in association with differences.
If you are not aware of your guidelines and that they are YOUR guidelines and that they are not necessarily other individuals’ guidelines, what occurs is — as it is an absolute and it is not questioned, unless it is being questioned in discounting yourself — there is an underlying expectation continuously expressed within you that other individuals shall respond in like manner to yourself in any given situation.
This blocks the acceptance of difference, for you are automatically generating a personalization of those differences, for they are absolute. There is no other means or manner to engage in certain actions. You must and all other individuals must also, for this is the absolute established method. But it is not. It is your own absolute established method, and that is not necessarily bad.
Truths are all associated in some capacity with your preferences, but many of you are not aware of your preferences. In this, those same truths that generate conflict are also the same truths that influence you to behave in certain manners, to engage certain actions in certain capacities, in certain directions. You engage actions within your day that are mundane actions that do not incorporate thought, and you do not generate any recognition of any association with those actions.
Do you wash your dishes?
GROUP: Yes.
ELIAS: Do you wash your clothes?
GROUP: Yes.
ELIAS: And each of you shall engage these actions in a particular manner. You will each engage these actions with your own method. Do you fold your clothes? Do you hang your clothes? If you do or if you do not, every action that you engage is being associated and motivated by your truths, by your guidelines.
The manner in which you engage these actions is an expression of energy. In that expression of energy, if you are not aware of your truth and how it is influencing you and you encounter another individual that washes their clothes differently than you do, your automatic association shall be the other individual is wrong, or my method is better, or the other individual should do this, or you shall confuse yourself and express to yourself a lack of understanding and express, “Why do other individuals do this?”
ELLA: Or you could say maybe I’ve always done it wrong and maybe they are doing it right, if you are not that comfortable with yourself.
ELIAS: That also can occur. The point in this is that this wave is intensifying. (Group comments, mostly of the “you’ve got to be kidding” variety) And why would it not intensify, as most individuals are not actually addressing to truths?
JENARO: Is this related to the truth in despair also in the not addressing to it, it will exist until the addressment to?
ELIAS: In what capacity?
JENARO: In transitioning to the addressing to, depending on how a group of individuals are responding to their own truths and their own actions. Regardless of whether there is an allowance of this information or not, some of them might feel lost or confused or even depressed, and based on their allowance in viewing these types of things in whatever manner they’re choosing, that might create a type of despair, which I’ve heard discussed previously. So I’m asking if that would be in relation to the intensifying of the truth wave.
ELIAS: Yes, you are correct.
PAUL: Are we going to see a physical manifestation globally that will mark this increase in the truth wave?
ELIAS: You already are.
PAUL: I’m thinking like a catastrophic event.
ELIAS: You already are.
JENARO: Like with Bush, for example — many people have varying opinions and beliefs about his approach to things. Would that be an example of viewing truths as well?
ELIAS: Yes, and differences and the intensification of the lack of acceptance of differences. For the lack of understanding of differences, the lack of realization that in association with your own truths you yourselves are creating or initiating the conflicts in not being aware of what they are and not identifying them, most individuals, as I have stated, are not addressing to them and they have not even identified them.
RODNEY: This mass event taking place right now over the immigrant issue with Mexico — we’ve got 11 million unidentified Mexicans in this country, and there are big street protests taking place.
Why is it that when they do polls you find that almost 50 percent of the people disagree on an issue and 50 percent agree on an issue? In other words, one half of the people say yes and one half of the people say no, and that occurs again and again and again and again. A lot of our elections are very close. They differ by only a few votes.
ELIAS: Polarization.
RODNEY: Yes, but that’s indicating that our truths are mirrored 50-50. Why is that? Why would half of us see it this way and half of us see it that way, instead of 80-20? It’s almost like you get into a discussion with someone and you go so far, and then you come to the place where I see it this way and the other person sees it that way.
ELLA: Maybe because there is a stalemate right now. (Inaudible) ...because the majority was then, and right now the forces are almost equal. You have stalemate. You can’t move anywhere. One side pulls at the same force as another, and you block and suspend this way.
ELIAS: Which is also associated with this wave. It is polarizing, and that is allowing very little leeway and much rigidity and extremes.
ALICIA: Elias, I’m confused. I want to go back a little bit. I said that one of my truths was that creation occurs outside the self. Where I’m confused is how does that influence how I wash my dishes or launder my clothes or whether or not I hang them up or leave them on the floor?
ELIAS: This is the point. This is the point of clearly or correctly identifying a truth, for a truth will be influencing of almost every action you engage.
ALICIA: So then that is not a truth of mine? I guess I’m not seeing how it influences.
ELIAS: That is an influence.
ALICIA: What is?
ELIAS: That there are occurrences that are generated outside of you, that reality is created outside of you, or that elements of your reality are being created not by you.
ALICIA: So that’s not a truth, that’s an influence? (Elias nods in agreement) So what’s the truth?
RODNEY: If it’s an internal thing, how does my truth of “I need to justify everything I do” influence how I wash my clothes?
ELIAS: How DO you wash them?
RODNEY: Soap and water in a washing machine, the same way everybody else does.
ELIAS: Is it?
RODNEY: No, probably not. There are different ways to wash clothes.
ELIAS: Yes, there are. In that, how YOU do this action will be somewhat influenced by your truth...
RODNEY: ...that I need to justify myself.
ELIAS: Yes.
RODNEY: Maybe I use a little bit more soap than I have to...?
ELIAS: Not necessarily. The influence shall not be obvious unless you are presented with a difference. If another individual visited your home and engaged your laundry for you in an entirely different manner than you do, you may not necessarily appreciate their effort.
RODNEY: I’d say, “Why’d you do it that way?”
ELIAS: Correct, and in that, you shall justify your method.
RODNEY: Yes. That’s the influence, the justification?
ELIAS: The justification is the truth, and in mundane actions that you incorporate there is an association with that. It is your truth. It is your guideline. Therefore, you do not view that action as bad. It is the manner in which you do it. But if that same action is done differently, you shall justify your method.
RODNEY: I would feel the need to protect, because justifying is associated with protection. It seems to me that I’m hooked into protecting myself constantly or to protect my ideas. Am I going too far afield with this?
ELIAS: No. That is another influence and can be quite affecting in association with your interaction with other individuals.
Generally speaking, your truths become tapped when you are presented or when you present yourself with a difference. The difference threatens your truth, for your truth is absolute and there are many avenues of your truth that are comfortable and that are not conflicting.
JENARO: Is this where conflict would come into play? For example, he’s washing his clothes, and for him the truths he holds based around washing his clothes as the thing that is threatened, so to speak, by the other individual, is that threat and that justification also motivated by the belief that another individual’s reality or truths are more valid? Is that where the threat or the conflict is?
ELIAS: Not necessarily that the other individual is more valid or that their method or their beliefs or their behaviors or actions are more valid. In actuality, quite the contrary, that your own is more valid, that your direction IS the direction.
IOANNA: Like when I rearrange the dishwasher after my mother. I won’t say anything to her but I’ll go in and put everything how I like it. Is that discounting her when I do that or is that just expressing my preference without bringing it to her attention? I know one of my truths is that there’s a certain way that has to be done to make sure everything is clean.
ELIAS: In that, yes, in a manner it is discounting of the other individual, but it is also generating that action of figuratively placing that energy into that container, which this is why bad things happen.
In association with your truths, in mundane actions that you incorporate within your day that you are NOT actually addressing to within self and recognizing the potential of these mundane actions, you are placing that energy into your invisible container that you pull with you in every direction that you move, with every step.
As you continue to place that energy in these small actions into that container, as it fills and begins to overflow, you shall blast that container with an equal strength of energy in opposition to it, and you will create some occurrence that is uncomfortable or that is conflicting or that you do not like. In this, it may be in any type of expression. It may be that you generate an occurrence of some possession that you own is damaged.
IOANNA: Like the ceiling coming down after we just repaired it.
ELIAS: Yes, or your window may be broken or your vehicle may be stolen or you may engage in a significant conflict with another individual or you may be frustrated that you cannot accomplish a particular task or that you are not accomplishing generating what you want.
The energy that is generated in creating those types of occurrences, bad things happening, the same truths that influence those types of occurrences are the same truths that you engage every day, many times within your day, and you do not notice, and they are not recognized, and you do not think. For what is to think — why?
DANIIL: How many truths on average does an individual have? Is it hundreds and hundreds, or is it a few major ones?
ELIAS: I would express that each individual incorporates many truths, but that each individual may incorporate a few that would be considered the core truths.
DANIIL: So it may be that washing my clothes, for me, I would have a different truth than someone else?
ELIAS: Yes, yes. Your truth may be...
NATASHA: Washing may be a major truth, how you wash your clothes?
ELIAS: It is not the washing of the clothes that is the truth. It is associated or motivated by a truth that may be appearing to you to be far removed from the action of washing your clothes.
As this individual expressed, one truth of respect, one truth of consideration, this may appear initially to you to have no association with an action of washing your clothes. But you wash them in a particular manner, and when presented with a difference, you may generate an association with consideration or respect, for it is not being expressed in the manner that YOU express. You shall generate this association, for you automatically interpret the expression of the other individual in relation to your truth.
You shall automatically express within yourself the identification “this individual is expressing in an inconsiderate manner.” The individual may not be expressing in an inconsiderate manner, but you shall interpret it in that manner for that is your guideline, and it is unquestioned.
Another individual may not be expressing disrespectfulness, but YOU shall interpret in that manner for that is YOUR truth, YOUR guideline, and you automatically interpret the other individual’s expression or behavior in association with your truth, your guideline. It is unquestioned.
GEORGE: So if I find myself making a judgment about another person, at that moment, if I begin to then focus on that judgment and work backwards and attempt to use that as a way of discovering the truth that’s causing me to make that judgment...?
ELIAS: Yes, yes.
JENARO: I’ve been in discussions with some common individuals and some soft individuals about relationships. In some of these conversations I’ve had, I’ve noticed that some of the conflict comes into play when a common individual might hold a truth that to be in love with someone or to be expressing in a romantic intimate manner, you have to be outwardly expressing, like hugging or kissing or things like that, whereas a soft individual may be expressing in a different manner. It’s not that they’re not holding those feelings, but it’s just more that the common individual has that truth.
ELIAS: Yes, and how differences trigger. But it is not the other individual or the difference that is actually triggering. It is YOU, for you have already set into motion that trigger before it even occurs, for you are continuously expressing your truths. They ARE your guidelines. They ARE NOT bad.
You express your truth of respect. This guides you in how you shall behave and how you shall express. But in not being aware of how many actions you engage that are also associated with that truth, you cannot view the choices that you can engage to not create bad things happening.
PAUL: So one way we could look at this is, let’s say we identify our truth, whatever it may be, and then start looking at our day’s activities. In my case, I could have a place-card saying my truth is this, and then I’ll carry it with me or have it posted somewhere where I’ll see it daily, and I’ll try to stop myself and notice aspects of that truth that will influence that given set of activities and beliefs in the moment.
ELIAS: Yes.
PAUL: Then as we do that, that’ll start diffusing some of that energy we’re carrying around in our bucket?
ELIAS: You begin to empty that container and not continue to place the energy in that container, for you diffuse it. You allow yourself to notice, and you begin to recognize that you do not incorporate merely one choice. You incorporate MANY choices, and it is a matter of choosing the choice that is not expressing your own triggers, that allows you to move in a direction that you continue to appreciate your direction, your guidelines, but you do not set yourself in the choices that shall trigger your own truths in relation to differences.
Yes?
CAROLE: I have a very developed understanding that I’m creating my own reality 24/7. I never think that it’s coming from outside of me. However, I’m just beginning to understand that one of my truths is still the old religious truths of right and wrong, sin and retribution, crime and punishment.
Because I really, really always think that it’s always me, no matter what’s going on in my life. When I create something that I don’t like, it feels like somehow I’m to blame or I’m wrong or I’m bad, because I know that I created it. I never think it’s anyone else or anything else. So that brings me to the point of realizing that one of my truths is still that old-time religion — good and bad, right and wrong, I do something and I get punished. So I create a whole little string of minor physical ailments, and I think, “Why am I doing this to myself?”
ELIAS: Cause and effect, in any direction, any expression, which does incorporate the influence of good and bad, right and wrong, and crime and punishment. But it is the truth of cause and effect.
CAROLE: So that’s the truth?
ELIAS: Yes: every action that I incorporate, there shall be a consequence.
RODNEY: That’s a truth?
ELIAS: This is this individual’s truth, of cause and effect. As I have expressed, you each incorporate several core truths that shall influence you in all that you do.
RODNEY: Wouldn’t you say that a belief in cause and effect as an absolute truth is probably core to most of us?
ELIAS: Yes.
RODNEY: It’s universal.
ELIAS: Not necessarily universal, but yes, many, many, many individuals incorporate this as a core truth.
GEORGE: For most of the people in this room, cause and effect is a core truth?
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: Elias, if you could help me? I think I’m having difficulty identifying a truth, and I think I had a couple of experiences in the last couple of weeks that probably are eliciting to my attention what the truth is. I’m having a hard time figuring it out because it involved conflict and it intensified.
It was interesting. You said that with the boss that I was describing to you that her being there was to help me see my own responses. So right after that, we had two big fights. They seemed to be around her thinking that I am not doing my work and her coming in, and in my experience, being very intrusive to me, not trusting me, constantly wanting to know every little thing that I’m doing, questioning the things that I have on the floor by my chair thinking that it’s not work material, looking over my shoulder to see what I have on the computer because she doesn’t think that it’s work material. Finally I just sort of told her to get off my back, and we got into an argument.
I’m thinking that I must have a truth there. It happened twice in two weeks, and has been occurring, not as intense as the last couple of weeks, but it’s been occurring in the last couple of years that I’ve been with her. So is there a truth somewhere that I...? I don’t know. (Laughs) I’m one of those people who are struggling in being unable to identify their truths. I can see just the influence, and that’s obviously why it keeps happening, from what you’re saying.
ELIAS: This is the point.
ALICIA: Right, I am the point! (Group laughter) At that time you said that to me, and I know I’m one of those people! So use me as a guinea pig. How do I begin the process of identifying the truth, moving beyond just understanding...?
ELIAS: Paying attention to what YOU are doing...
ALICIA: I’m becoming defensive, is that what you mean?
ELIAS: That and what you are physically doing, paying attention to ALL that you are doing within your day — genuinely paying attention and allowing yourself to question what is your motivation.
ALICIA: I’m still confused. How can I begin to break this apart this particular instant to see what my truths are? You said by paying attention to myself, but I guess I’m not paying attention to myself!
ELIAS: I did not express “pay attention to yourself,” I expressed “pay attention to what you are doing.”
ALICIA: You mean before the conflict happens?
ELIAS: And during. What associations are being generated? What are you doing?
ALICIA: I’m talking.
ELLA: Maybe you don’t like your job or something. You go to work thinking you don’t want to go there, trying to understand how you relate to your work.
GEORGE: What you’re doing, actually, right now is related to this issue, and what you were doing a few moments ago. I noticed that you had your hand up, and I was looking at that for a while, and then it occurred to me that’s what I used to do when I was in grade school to get the attention of the teacher. I was thinking one of your truths is that you’re a student in relation to Elias and also perhaps in relation to this other person with whom you’re having this conflict.
RODNEY: It’s almost a statement of a question of authority, because there’s a half a dozen people here that would simply interrupt the conversation at what they felt was an appropriate spot, and that seems to flow. But you’re standing there with your hand up, waiting for some outside authority to say it’s all right for you to speak.
CAROLE: All right, I’m going to interrupt then, now that everybody’s wanting to interrupt. Can we get back to cause and effect?
ELIAS: Although...
CAROLE: I don’t feel that was developed enough, because it sounds like it’s ubiquitous. It also sounds like it’s related to a lot of the things that are going on here. Because if you move away from cause and effect, what you move to is having each action be a choice regardless of any preconceived notions of an effect of that action, right?
ELIAS: Yes.
CAROLE: I can keep talking, but I’d rather listen to you. (Elias chuckles)
RODNEY: But we ARE getting to the issue.
ELIAS: Yes.
RODNEY: The cause and effect is paramount, in my mind, because if you took the energy out of the box that you’re filling with that, you would become very, very, very powerful...
ELIAS: Precisely. And this truth...
RODNEY: ...because that truth controls every single thing that you do. Everything has a cause; everything has an effect.
ELIAS: Somewhat.
ALICIA: Something tells me, though, that what I thought about wasn’t so different from what you’re talking about. If there’s a belief of authority, isn’t that cause and effect?
ELIAS: The expression that you are generating, the truth that you are generating is not concerning authority.
ALICIA: Well, then what is it? Please tell me!
ELIAS: It would also be respect — you being respectful and you expecting respect in the manner that you express it.
ALICIA: So the raising of my hand is respect?
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: But how is that with the boss and the conflict? Is that also respect?
ELIAS: For you interpret the other individual in her differences as disrespectful, and that generates conflict for that is threatening to YOUR truth, to your guideline.
ELLA: May I express that I had a person trying to supervise me every moment? I saw that that person was insecure. He wanted my report every 30 minutes, but I would give it every 15 minutes. That person seemed very comfortable that I know what I’m doing, that I am cooperating in a very appreciating manner. I didn’t do it with attitude. I genuinely wanted him to be more secure, so I reported twice as often as he expected. It lasted two days, and he never wanted to monitor me again! (Group laughter)
ALICIA: Except in my case, it’s the opposite. I’m giving her logs, and now she’s wanting more.
ELIAS: We shall break and continue momentarily.
GROUP: Thank you.
BREAK at 12:45 PM RESUME at 2:00 PM
ELIAS: Continuing! In association with your truths, it is important that you recognize how they interplay with your movement, how they complement you, how your truths allow you to move in your directions in a comfortable manner, and it is important that you acknowledge the value of them. The automatic response is to perceive them as bad and to merely focus upon the influences of them that hinder you. But there are many more influences that do not hinder you, that allow you to move in your own natural expression and allow you to interact with yourself in a manner of comfort. They ARE precisely your guidelines.
(To Carole) It is not bad to incorporate a core truth of cause and effect. It guides you: it guides your behavior; it guides how you think; it guides how you interact. It prevents you, many times, from generating an action that you may regret.
(To Paul) It is not bad to incorporate a core truth of respect. It guides your behavior, how you interact with other individuals.
(To Rodney) It is not bad to be incorporating a core truth of justification. It guides you in allowing you to accomplish what you want in the fashion that you want.
(To Jenaro) It is not bad to incorporate the core belief concerning relationships or your experience in relation to other individuals and moving in the direction of placing other individuals first or valuing other individuals. It guides your behavior.
(To Lynda) It is not bad to incorporate a core truth of consideration. It guides you in how you behave.
None of your truths are bad. They do incorporate influences that limit you, but only in association with automatic responses. You become so very familiar with your truths that in being unquestioned, they incorporate many, many automatic responses.
Some of your automatic responses you would evaluate as good and you would not change and you would appreciate. Some of your automatic responses lead you into conflict and lead you into bad things occurring, in your terminology. This is the reason that it is so very important and significant that you identify what your truths are, and that you not merely identify what your truths are but that you recognize what the influences are, and in that, allow yourself to recognize that you incorporate choice.
Let me also express to you, when you genuinely recognize (and) identify your truth, the element of “you do not create all of your reality” becomes a moot point, for in accepting the responsibility of your own truth, you begin to recognize and perceive in reality that you ARE creating all of your reality. You are not a victim to circumstances, to scenarios, to situations, to other individuals, for YOU incorporate the choices and you can choose different actions to allow yourself to continue in the expression of your truth but not be dissuaded by other individuals’ choices, expressions or behaviors. They literally move into the expression of “it matters not.” You shall incorporate no judgment associated with differences, for you shall offer yourself choices that open new avenues, even in association with washing your clothes. Even in the mundane actions that you generate each day, you shall not be placing that energy into that container, for you shall allow yourself to engage choices that circumvent that expression of setting yourself into motion to trigger yourself.
Other individuals are merely a catalyst in reflection; they are not actually DOING the action of triggering you. YOU are doing the action of triggering you, and you began that before you presented the scenario to yourself in which you become triggered, for you engaged choices that set you in a direction to be triggered. But if you are aware of your truths, you are intentionally directing and intentionally creating.
What is the intention of every individual within this room or within this Forum? The intention of every individual is to be aware of themselves objectively to the point that you can objectively intentionally create your reality in the manner that you want, whether it be associated with relationships or money or home or family or children or your employment; it matters not.
What you want is to intentionally direct yourselves to create what you want. That being such an intense desire, it is motivating you to be generating all of these experiences, the experiences that you do not like, the experiences that generate discomfort. The reason that you generate these experiences is associated with that desire. But you lose sight of that desire and you express to yourselves, “Why can I not create what I want now?” Why can you not create what you want now? You are not aware of what influences you NOW in all that you do.
I have been expressing for an extended time framework the significance and the importance of paying attention to all that you do. There is NO element hidden from you. There is no subconscious. ALL is available to you. It is merely a matter of paying attention and not placing yourself in the position of the co-pilot of your airplane, with no pilot. Without the pilot, it is quite a guess where the plane shall fly, and you incorporate no sense of control! In that, you open the door to be the victim of situations, of circumstances, of other individuals — even of yourselves! You sabotage yourselves, for you are not directing.
The question in each individual is “How do I direct? What does this mean? And what do I pay attention to?” You wish to be incorporating a formula. You wish for me to offer you the formula. I HAVE, repeatedly. But the formula is too simple, and without the complication, the formula is not being received, for you continue to look for more of the formula: “Complicate it, Elias. Generate more of it, Elias. This is simple. This cannot be accomplished; it cannot be all that there is.”
I express to you to pay attention to what you are doing, and you incorporate questions in your mind. “What am I doing? I am sitting, I am listening; I am doing nothing.” You are never doing nothing. You are always engaging choices and you are always doing in many more expressions than you allow yourself to be aware of. Your body consciousness is always doing. You are always generating choices, every moment. Each of you in this moment is generating a choice to sit, to listen...
RODNEY: To munch! (Group laughter)
ELIAS: And are you aware of what you are doing, what associations you are generating as you are listening?
PAUL: Yes. I am processing.
ELLA: I also notice that I automatically distract myself and then I recall that action. I just noticed I was sitting doing this. It was my action to distract myself, and especially what you were saying, I can see the difficulty. I tried paying attention and it’s especially difficult. It’s simple — the formula is simple; the action is difficult. So I start distracting myself, and then I recall.
I also analyze. While you were reciting every truth, I was noticing my body’s response to each of the truths. For me, it was an opportunity to see if I can identify more of them, and from that I deduct that probably cause and effect and consideration are more prominent than respect, and justification comes somewhere in the middle, for me personally.
ELIAS: Yes, and image.
ELLA: Image is the first one you identified, so I knew I didn’t have to analyze that. I was trying to identify what I didn’t identify myself. So that’s what I’ve been doing. Do you commend? Do you concur?
ELIAS: I do. I do concur, and I am also acknowledging. I am acknowledging of you all that you ARE participating and that you are noticing what you are doing. You are not merely listening. You are paying attention that there are other actions that you are engaging also, regardless of whether you are moving physically or not.
Yes?
BILL: Elias, it’s interesting that you got to this point. I was sitting here wanting to ask a question like crazy. I’m sitting back and I’m putting my hand up or not. When you started talking about noticing, I’m noticing this incredible belief I have that interrupting people is not a good thing. So I put my hand down and squirm and energy’s going through me. So having said that, I’m going to ask a question I’ve been wanting to ask.
You said that everything’s a choice and that we also create conflict. It’s a choice to create that, and we may not like it. The question I have is I think you may have said at one point that some people desire conflict. If it’s a desire rather than a want that’s incorrectly interpreted by thought, how do you know that the conflict you’ve created is actually a desire? Do you understand what I’m saying? (Elias nods) If you’re a drama queen or a drama king, how do you know if that’s part of your desire rather than just a want? Because in your thoughts, it’s not something you want.
ELIAS: Correct.
BILL: How do you know the difference?
ELIAS: How have I instructed to evaluate or discover what your intent is?
BILL: To pay attention to the events of the entirety of your life.
ELIAS: Correct, the theme of your experiences. In this, if the theme of your experiences within the entirety of your focus has consistently been conflict and you begin to evaluate how that conflict is generated rather than merely moving in the direction of blame, if you begin to evaluate how YOU create that and your participation in that, an individual MAY generate the recognition that this is an action that they value.
BILL: Are there people who actually like conflict? (Assents from the group) Really? I hate it.
JENARO: I do, at times. It gives me a challenge.
ELIAS: There are individuals that do like conflict and appreciate that.
ELLA: Conflict is a great way to clear the air in some cases. If you miscommunicate and never speak your mind, eventually it will blow. In some cases it’s very beneficial, because there you are, face to face.
BILL: That’s if you’re paying attention. What I’m getting at is if you’re experiencing conflict, for people who don’t pay attention...
ELLA: That’s what I’m talking about! For me, it’s true. In the normal situation where people are not aware of this concept, very often conflict is at the time where people say to each other, “This is my preference; this is yours.” Now they clash and then resolve it, and very often out of conflict eventually compromises occur.
BILL: You’re talking about yourself. I’m talking about myself.
ELLA: I’m describing mine.
BILL: Yeah, because you’re not describing MY experience of conflict. My experience of conflict is that I don’t like it. Before, I have to win and you have to lose, and I don’t like that.
ELLA: I’ve been involved where they clear the air like a thunderstorm.
BILL: Yeah, for you!
ELLA: I’m not imposing my view on you. I’m just saying my experience is that, and I know other individuals that this happens to, probably because I’m attracted to that. I’m not saying that you experience the same.
BILL: So how do you know? For me, I don’t like it; for you, it resolves something. For me, it repels me — at least it did more before I got engaged with you.
ELIAS: Which is recognizing a preference.
BILL: What has happened since I got engaged with you is I rarely encounter conflict anymore, because I don’t need to win. A lot of my intent had to do with this win/lose, my experience of polar opposites like right and wrong, competition, everything I’ve done.
ELIAS: I am understanding. But that is not necessarily intent; that is associated with truths...
BILL: Of right and wrong?
ELIAS: Yes.
BILL: There has to be a winner.
ELIAS: And that influences perception very strongly, and it motivates you.
As to motivation also, this is another factor. For in association with shifting and discovering or identifying truths, your movement is changing. What you are familiar with, what you are accustomed to is goals. You set a goal, you set an ideal, you focus upon a wanted outcome and that is the focal point, and that motivates you to accomplish achieving that goal or that outcome.
What is shifting in perception and being misinterpreted as a lack of motivation with many individuals is the unfamiliarity of generating more importance in relation to the process than the outcome. In paying attention to the process, which is associated with what your desire is — to be more aware of yourselves and intentionally creating what you want — the outcome becomes unknown. Therefore, the process becomes ultimately important.
For you may engage an idea of what you want, but what you genuinely want is to be generating the awareness to create your reality intentionally entirely in association with what you want — THAT is the genuine desire. That can be expressed and developed in many, many different manners, and not necessarily always comfortable, for that choosing aspect of you does not distinguish between comfort or the lack of comfort. What it moves toward is whatever is most efficient to gain your attention.
RODNEY: Ha! Dying will get you there very quickly! (Group laughter)
ELIAS: Yes. (Smiles) Therefore, whether an expression is comfortable or not, if it is efficient and if it gains your attention quickly, that is what you will choose.
In this, as you shift into paying more attention to the process — which is what you are doing, all of you — your motivation becomes unclear, for you are not incorporating a clear goal. You incorporate an idea that you want to create your reality intentionally. What does that entail? You are not sure, and therefore the goal appears to you to be somewhat defined, but somewhat undefined and vague. It is not; it is quite clear, but you do not incorporate an expectation of what the outcome may be. Without the expectation, that creates, in a manner of speaking, a type of floundering, for it is unfamiliar. You always incorporate an expectation — you KNOW what to expect, you KNOW your direction, you KNOW what you want — but the greater desire is to be aware and to be intentionally directing and creating what you want.
You can think of many, many, many expressions that you want, but in relation to any of them the desire to be intentionally creating and aware of creating is greater than any of the individual wants that you may want to create. You may want a particular employment, you may want not to be employed, you may want to engage a particular action, you may want to create a relationship, you may want to create money — yes, these are all valid wants. But the greater want is to understand and know HOW to be directing yourself intentionally to create those WHEN you want.
Therefore, in that greater desire, you yourself shall present to yourself the opportunity to become more familiar with yourself by identifying what is the most influencing of you that prevents you from creating what you want, and those, many times, are your truths, merely in association with not being aware of them and therefore not intentionally directing yourself in relation to them as guidelines. Therefore, yourself shall present many different expressions and scenarios in which you can offer a showing to yourself of your truths and how they are influencing.
That opens the door to choice, and choice presents your freedom. For once you recognize that you incorporate choice in every situation, in every moment, that you are not locked to one expression or one direction, that within any scenario — within every scenario — you incorporate choices, not one choice but many choices, there lies the seat of you directing yourself intentionally and allowing you to create what you want WHEN you want it. Not futurely, not anticipating: “Some day I shall arrive. Some day I shall incorporate the ability to create this. Eventually I shall incorporate the ability to create what I want.” No.
“NOW, in this moment, I can create what I want, for I am aware of what influences me and I am aware that I incorporate choices. It is not black and white. I am not hidden from myself. I am also acknowledging of myself and my guidelines, for they are what allow me to create what I want” — not that I discount myself in incorporating these guidelines, not that they are bad.
Not justification — terrible word; very, very bad. No, it is not. It can be, but it is not.
Respect — very, very bad; incorporates tremendous judgment. This is very bad. “I should not be judgmental of other individuals. I should be...” Should, should, should, should!
Image — “I should, should, should. I should present myself in this manner. I should appear in this manner. I should express in this manner. I should not express in that manner. I should be aware of how I present myself physically and mentally and interactively. I should be aware of how I present myself in attractiveness or not attractiveness. My form, my thoughts, my speaking.” Many, many, many shoulds!
ELLA: It’s always self seeing self inside of your head.
ELIAS: And this is what creates the discounting. This is what creates the obstacles and this is what creates your truth, your own guideline as an enemy.
ELLA: How do you...?
ELIAS: You appreciate this IS your guideline. This is what you do. This is who you are. This is the manner in which you behave. This is not bad.
ELLA: This is acknowledgment of myself, which I’m doing lately. It feels liberating. But when you say “guideline,” to me it has a connotation that it gives you a sense of direction.
ELIAS: Yes!
ELLA: Acknowledgment, I understand that — I acknowledge myself. But how do I direct myself going somewhere where I don’t associate with sense of direction in that? I’m not sure.
ELIAS: It already IS your direction. You already do this.
ELLA: I do. But I thought when you said “guideline”...
ELIAS: That IS the guideline.
ELLA: Guideline for me means behave along those lines — is that what you’re saying?
ELIAS: Yes, and you already do this. You ALL already do this.
GEORGE: You are doing what you were saying before. You are making this more complex than it is.
ELIAS: Yes.
GEORGE: You’re saying, “I understand, but...” and adding some other element there. But you are acknowledging yourself.
ELLA: You sense something, but not entirely the way that you feel comfortable already. So you’re halfway there? I don’t know if it works this way.
DANIIL: In Ella’s case, image is the truth, right? (Inaudible) ...by trying to make a certain image and not to protect at all. So oftentimes it helps you to direct. Your thinking about image helps you to make choices that will serve you well.
GEORGE: That IS your guideline.
ELIAS: Yes.
GEORGE: You’re already doing it.
ELLA: But in those cases that I notice that I say “I should,” then I say to myself “I really shouldn’t, it’s only that I believe that I should.” Then I am helping myself, right?
ELIAS: No. The should and the should-not are the expectations. Those are the obstacles associated with your truths. Those are the discounting elements of your truths. Those are the opposing expressions of your truths.
ELLA: I am saying, me, myself, what am I doing? Not that I should not have an expectation, just accepting myself just the way I am. I don’t say that I’m talking a lot, so stop talking. No. I’m just saying, “I talk a lot; it comes naturally to me. So what?” Is that...?
ELIAS: Partially, yes. Partially. But in association with other individuals, if that generates conflict or uncomfortableness, there are other choices that you can engage, not merely expressing to yourself the acknowledgment “this is what I do,” but also with the what you expressed “so what.”
In that, you generate another element, and in that element you are closing yourself to genuine interaction. In this, you are also setting yourself in a direction to create conflict or distress or disappointment or hurt in relation to how another individual may respond to you in difference. The point is, yes, acknowledge your direction, acknowledge your truth, do not view your truth as bad but recognize that in relation to other individuals you incorporate choices of HOW you express.
ELLA: I’m hearing. I’m not sure I am processing that internally yet.
ELIAS: You will. Cause and effect, also.
CAROLE: So we’re talking about the how and getting to know ourselves, but we’re not going into the why. We’re not going into why we became that way or why we perceive that we became that way. We’re simply talking about this is the way we are and we’re acknowledging of it. We’re also acknowledging the fact that we have other choices...
ELIAS: Yes.
CAROLE: ...should we discover that this way causes too much conflict for us and a lot of uncomfortableness that we’re becoming aware of, and also why that conflict and uncomfortableness is manifesting in our lives. So it’s more of an understanding of ourselves and who we are, kind of a “know thyself,” correct?
ELIAS: Yes!
CAROLE: There’s a new method in hypnosis called Part therapy. In this method they have one self — maybe the hypnotist or they teach people to do this themselves — talk to the other parts of themselves, the selves that are giving them conflict. My understanding in my way of thinking is that they don’t need to find out why these aspects have evolved, because I always think the why is a waste of time. I’m just curious if you concur with that.
ELIAS: Yes, and I would also not be encouraging of that type of action. For in that, you are generating an automatic association that your body consciousness is wrong or that it is creating in opposition to you, and it IS you.
CAROLE: So that’s ascribing the cause to something or someone other than ourselves, and it’s always ourselves.
ELIAS: Correct. It is also discounting of your body consciousness, that YOU did not create this, cells created this. An individual that incorporates asthma did not create that; their body consciousness creates that and attacks them. No. The individual that incorporates asthma restricts themselves in some form and generates a physical expression of that in constricting breath. The body consciousness is not attacking; there is no attack. It is an expression that is created in...
CAROLE: It’s an expression of the body consciousness but created by us.
ELIAS: Yes, yes. But you ARE your body consciousness. You cannot separate. You are not a vessel. Your body is not a vessel. It is the physical expression projection of YOU. Therefore, what it does, what it manifests is a reflection of what you are doing. It is a communication. It is an expression of you.
As to not-wastefulness, this is not bad either. It is your guideline. How it generates conflict is the lack of acceptance of differences. For once again, it is so absolute, how can other individuals NOT proceed in this manner? How can other individuals NOT be aware of conservation and the importance of it? Some individuals are not, and that is their guideline. But it is not BAD for you to incorporate your guidelines, and to engage those actions and generate different choices in association with other individuals that allow you to continue in regard to your guideline; but do not generate expectations of the other individual.
As an example, perhaps you may be dining with a friend, and you are dining with this friend in their home. Subsequent to your dinner, you notice that there are many elements of the dinner left and the other individual shall probably discard them. You can express, “I shall offer to incorporate them myself.” This allows you to cooperate with you, to cooperate with your guideline, but incorporate no judgment or expectation of the other individual and their guidelines, which are different — and that circumvents your distress.
DANIIL: Would it also be a valid method to try? If I am not wasteful all my life, I may wish to be wasteful for one day intentionally just to observe my reactions to that. I remember (inaudible) who were vegetarians in one part of the house where we were consuming meat, and meat-eaters to be vegetarians, etcetera, just to look at yourself from the other side.
ELIAS: Which is merely experimentation. That is an exploration. What we are discussing are truths that are continuously influencing of you.
In that, generally speaking, most of your core truths you incorporate throughout your focus. But you can relax them in a manner that allows you to make different choices and move in easier expressions. It is not that you discard those truths, but that you relax your perception with them and you allow yourself more freedom of other choices.
Just as you (looking at Bill) expressed in the competition, the win or lose, that has not been eliminated. It is being expressed in a different manner in which you allow yourself a perception that all directions win rather than merely yours. It continues to be a truth and it continues to be influencing and expressed, but you are incorporating different choices in which now it does not necessarily entirely concern winning and losing but how all individuals that you encounter can win, which is more effective and generates more comfort and less conflict with you.
BILL: A lot more.
ELIAS: Yes. This is an example that your truths are not the enemy. They are your guidelines, but you also incorporate many, many choices. You merely do not allow yourselves to view or to see your choices, for you move in these absolute, one direction, these-are-the-only-choices: each situation incorporates only one choice; there is only one manner in which each situation can be perceived, for IT IS and there is no more. It is.
JENARO: I’d like to offer an example along those lines in relation to the core truth I expressed earlier that I noticed about myself. I’ve been looking at, as we’ve discussed, doing these workshops, and the point in my interacting with other individuals is to be noticing my own beliefs and my own movements, my own expressions through those interactions.
Well, I woke up one morning recently and my goal for that day was to be finishing the website so that I could be promoting that a lot more, but instead I ended up talking on the phone for three or four hours. So again, moving to the mundane expression in my talking on the phone, at first within that core truth I was feeling automatically that I was putting other people first and wasn’t accomplishing what I wanted to accomplish. But then in noticing my expressing of that truth or that belief, I started to notice, wait a second, I don’t have to accomplish in the manner of the website to be moving into these workshops. Because the point is to be interactive, in which case I’m moving in that direction, and not necessarily in my automatic response in viewing that I was putting these other individuals first. That would be not discounting of the individuals or what actually occurred, but discounting my movement and what I was creating. Whereas, it was more beneficial for me to be interactive, which again was the point of what I was looking to do.
ELIAS: (Nodding) Correct.
CAROLE: And you made the phone calls or you answered the phone.
JENARO: Both.
CAROLE: What I’m saying is it was you! It wasn’t them; it was you.
ELIAS: I am acknowledging of you in your noticing and your recognition of that choice, and not necessarily discounting yourself but acknowledging that you were engaging a different choice but continuing in your direction.
JENARO: That’s a big difference compared to some of our previous conversations.
ELIAS: I would express agreement, and I am expressing to you congratulations. This is significant movement! (Laughs)
PAUL: Elias, I have a question. You mentioned process, and as we go toward The Shift, we focus more on process and no longer see the goal, necessarily?
ELIAS: You view the goal but it becomes less important.
PAUL: And that’s a good thing?
ELIAS: Yes. Or you may not necessarily actually incorporate a clear view of what the outcome may be, but you do incorporate somewhat of an awareness of the goal, but it becomes less important than the process.
ALICIA: Because the process is now...
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: ...and the goal is future...
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: ...and the point is to pay attention now.
ELIAS: And the now is what creates that goal.
DANIIL: So there is a connection between the idea of identifying truths and the idea of process. As you pay attention to what influences you more and more, you are more and more creating in the moment.
ELIAS: Yes, correct.
ELLA: I’m confused. From what I’ve observed, it seems to me that all of us more easily identify the influences of our truths than the underlying truth.
ELIAS: Yes.
ELLA: Then how could we be a little bit more...?
ELIAS: (Enunciating slowly and extra clearly) PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT YOU ARE DOING. This is the official formula! Ha ha!
ALICIA: I shouldn’t raise my hand here — I’m going to interrupt!
ELIAS: Ah! (Group applause and laughter) Discounting of yourself!
ALICIA: Did I discount myself?
ELIAS: Yes, in expressing that you should not!
ALICIA: Oh, the dreaded S word! Um... All of this and I forgot what I was going to say! (Group laughter) What did you just say?
ELLA: I said it was easier to identify influences of the truth rather than the truth.
ALICIA: Thank you. When you talk about what you’re doing, I think that’s the part that trips me up. I almost feel like it’s another language, even though it’s not, in that how I have always assumed the verb “to do” is not necessarily the whole spectrum of what you are doing. Doing is talking, but doing also means other things. Sometimes I feel like I don’t have the words in my awareness to be able to then label what I’m doing. Do you know what I’m saying? For example, I didn’t know until Chicago that discounting was really doing.(1)
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: But now I know. Now I have that word and association, so now I can notice. What’s hard for me is to notice what I’m doing when I feel like I don’t have the verbal language to attach to it. I feel like I want to broaden my vocabulary in terms of “to do.”
ELIAS: It is not a matter of broadening your vocabulary. It is a matter of broadening your awareness of doing, that when you are expressing a discounting, when you are defensive, when you are apprehensive, when you are projecting, when you are anticipating, when you are distressed, when you are pleased, you are DOING. These are all actions that you are also incorporating.
These are the actions, also including your physical actions, that are the indicators as to what type of energy you are projecting, which allows you to recognize what you shall draw to yourself. If you are projecting any type of opposing energy, in all of its forms, you shall draw reflections of that in many different forms.
It also allows you to recognize whether you are cooperating with yourself. Remember, cooperation is NOT teamwork! Cooperation is NOT what other individuals can do to acquiesce to you. Cooperation is what YOU can choose to do to allow yourself to continue in your own direction and to continue with your own guidelines, uninterrupted by other individuals’ choices or expressions or behaviors, and not expecting other individuals to change what they express. If you generate different choices in cooperation with yourself, not opposing yourself, it is not necessary for other individuals to change any expression.
ALICIA: One of the things that I noticed when you were talking about projecting, anticipating and everything else — which is a kind of form of doing, to observe — on the plane over here, it came to my mind and I was jotting down some thoughts that it almost seems like there’s a holding of energy. I don’t know if this is true for a lot of people, but even after I noticed that I’m projecting and that now I can make another choice, there’s a part of me that, I won’t say I don’t want to make another choice, but that I feel almost like I can’t... But it’s not that, either. I just feel like I’m holding to that. So then I wondered if that’s because if in that moment I am identifying projection as an enemy, so that somehow creates an opposition...
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: ...that then makes me hold to it.
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: It’s like, oh, that’s bad, I’ve got to get rid of that projection!
ELIAS: Yes. And this is also an element, in that you generate so very many associations of what is bad or what you are doing wrong.
CAROLE: Guilt and worry get thrown in there, too, don’t they?
ELIAS: Yes, at times.
CAROLE: They stop us. I somehow heard that, with what she was saying. The evil twins.
ELIAS: Waste of energy.
ELLA: But you are saying “at times.” You’re not saying that it’s always waste of energy.
ELIAS: No.
ELLA: I thought you always said it is, and now you’re making a distinction?
ELIAS: Guilt and worry? Yes — waste of energy. What I am expressing is at times that can be associated with these types of expressions. It is not always associated with guilt or worry.
ALICIA: So the energy would loosen up if I stopped thinking, “Oh, that’s something bad. I should stop projecting.”
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: Then naturally I will find another choice.
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: I think I got it!
ELIAS: (Laughs) Very well!
VERONICA: Excuse me, Elias? Are you saying the holding of the energy within the body can dissipate once the acknowledgment of fear and of lack of authority or indecisiveness will release itself?
ELIAS: Yes.
ELLA: I feel it every day.
ELIAS: Yes.
ELLA: When I notice I tense up for whatever reason, that I project, and then it’s okay that I projected, I can feel my muscles loosen up.
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: It goes back to the acceptance.
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: What you’re doing is accepting that you’re projecting, as opposed to judging it, which is opposing it. (Elias laughs) Well, that only took me about eighteen months!
VERONICA: Elias, can that be a rapid process?
ELIAS: Yes.
ALICIA: Not for me!
ELIAS: (Laughs) Very well, my friends! I express to all of you tremendous acknowledgment, appreciation and friendship. To each of you, I offer my energy in encouragement. To you all, au revoir.
GROUP: Au revoir.
Elias departs at 3:09 PM.
(1) The Chicago Elias group session, #1799, 7/16/05.
©2006 Mary Ennis, All Rights Reserved
Copyright 2006 Mary Ennis, All Rights Reserved.