2000-07-16-Mastery of Mind

Session

Opening

Elyon (Jonathan TR): Greetings, this is Elyon. I would like to begin our meeting by once again acknowledging our friendship and our collective mission to be of service to those upon this world who seek life, who yearn for love, and who are hungry to advance their souls in time to the recognition and fellowship of the Father.

Lesson

Balance

I have heard your discussion. I wish to comment on Jonathan's analogy of the balance scale and add one more point. When the scale is rocking due to influences on each side and it tips back and forth, you can indeed discern balance through the motion in spite of the view of the instant where it appears tipped to one side or the other. Let me draw your attention to the sliding weight beam and play with that aspect of this scale for a moment.

The goal of Nebadon is to lead you into becoming a full-fledged personality fit for the traversal of the superuniverse and entrance into the Havona circuits. Just like every parent brings a son or daughter into the world only to let them leave the nest to stand on their own, so do Michael and Nebadonia engage the services of many ministering spirits for just such an end for each of us ascending beings. You are being trained to stand on your own two feet. Until you have reached a stage of spiritual balance where you will be ready to enter into this spiritual adventure, the whole morontia effort is to assist you, and these weights on your scale are the assistants. If you are imbalanced and find that you cannot supply in your own strength the counter balance, call upon spirit, slide the weight over to balance. When you have attained the maturity spiritually, the experiences, you can slide back the weight, for you are now wholly fulfilled in your own well-being.

Sometimes an individual who reaches a personal balance fears the loss of spirit influence, because during imbalance spirit was relied on greatly for the counterweight. Balance can be mistaken as a stagnation, a loss of contact, when in reality spirit -- and I use that term to represent collectively all of Michael's assistance to you -- spirit is overjoyed that you are, in your own right, stable. This intervening counterweight of spirit ministry must not be viewed as a crutch but as a bridge to help you attain personally what spirit can offer in service. Spirit can also grant a foretaste of the balance you seek when confusion blocks your vision.

To ignore these weights and leave them at zero, you may tip so extremely that you cannot perceive the counterweight in your own experience that is necessary to reach balance. Where the goal is to be capable in your own being, reaching that capability does necessitate the help of others. You cannot truly do it all on your own. That's why we are here at Michael's request. We wish to be of assistance as you seek our guidance. Yes, this will put us out of a job when you become capable on your own, but in the meantime we will enjoy a great friendship, a great relationship, and all of us will advance as we cooperatively contribute to one another's growth.

I have finished my comments and will remain here with you today.

Tomas (Gerdean): Greetings, fellows, this is Tomas. I am here to say hello. I have been out and about. I have not been briefed; I have not heard the lesson. Like Elyon, I am here and glad to be among you. I am not familiar with your discussion today as yet, and the option is up to you. Shall we commence with questions or further discussions or shall we pull a lesson from the hat and add it to the mix?

It is wonderful to see the new energies of our guests today. I am embracing you and experiencing with you the essence of summer. Like a plant that has gone to seed and wafts on the air, kissing the earth delicately touching and then moving on, gentle friendships enhance all of our lives. The seasons of summer and friends allow for the efforts of aloneness and winter to be bearable. Blessed be...

Dialogue

Study, Manifestation

Evelyn: I wouldn't mind hearing more about the idea of "study" as increasing our skills in observing.

Tomas: Yes, your understanding of study is a direct result of your academic applications, and they are certainly satisfying, for when you apply yourself you are given a mark that indicates a degree of attainment. In millennia to come you will continue your studies, but they are not always as matter-of-fact as the studies of your material schools. The purpose of study is to stimulate the mind to bring order out of chaos, to extend a greater reality into the arena, and many times this is indeed about the inner life and in revealing our Father in our daily affairs.

The study of character is an education in itself. It is a study in behavior, in sociology, this brotherhood of man. The Master was able to see his fellows so clearly because he had such insight into human character. He of course had mastery of his own self and deep insight into the machinations of the mind of the animal and the socialized creature, but the dimension of spirit lends depth and breadth to human behavior that is at once more simplifying and also more complicating. Thus, a study of yourself and your fellows is a constant balancing of interpretations of the divine nature and the human nature.

When you know yourself it is possible to recognize yourself in others. Many of you have delighted to read in The Course in Miracles the philosophy of reflecting yourself in all you do through your fellows, in all you are through your fellows. When you behold something that is unpleasant to you it is a reflection of something that is unpleasant in yourself. This bears great wisdom, but it also will require readjustments when the plateau of self mastery has been attained such as Jesus attained. It was then that he began to truly minister and be effective. In your own lives you too will find this disparity, this dichotomy, that in learning who you are and how to be the best that you can be, your fellows will reflect that about you that you find undesirable within yourself. Even so, as the practice of becoming one with your Indwelling Adjuster, the view is altered such that it is one of patience and tolerance and love rather than a constant reflection of your own lesser qualities that also require tolerance and forgiveness.

It is an undertaking, -- and a very exciting undertaking for the human being -- but indeed it is our hope that one day you will have attained a degree of seniority that you will no longer need to be reminded of your sonship and the attitude of a son of God for his fellows. You will find the reflection of God in everything that your eye falls upon. This is the great garden of the guru that we all admire and seek to find wherein everything is perfect, the quintessential Garden of Eden, if you will. What is and remains true in this process is the need for you to return consistently into the spirit within. The deep well which will replenish your association with spirit will remind you of your purpose and will send you forth in your experiential endeavors to gain further perfection.

It is coming about that in your various pockets of Light and Life the personality of Jesus is being manifested through his children. The qualities that have endeared the master to his devotees for centuries are being expressed and nobly carried in and through you who are seeking to be more like our Father and who find the master the inspiration for your efforts.

Thus, the main thrust of your studies for some time will be in the realms of relationship, motivation, manifestation. It is essentially learning how to get along and how to elevate the plateau upon which you find yourself planted with your peers. It is a study. It may well be an emotional reaction, but it will require thought in conjunction with the spirit to see you through to being able to incorporate the greater value of all that is and let be gone that which isn't in him.

Do you see my point, daughter?

Evelyn: I would have to review all that. I guess so. I have to admit I didn't follow closely.

Tomas: This is not to say that book learning is not important. That is an element of study that is not to be overlooked. Indeed, there are great mental exercises in academics and in an appreciation of history and science and facts related to all that is in your material realm and throughout the universe. Indeed, many of your future studies will involve chemistry and physics, science and astronomy. But in your early ages it is essential for you to begin to study yourself, your relationship with God, and your subsequent relationship with others in order that you may know the necessary balance in order to prevail in harmony in those things which must be done in order for your world to find fruition.

Those would be my remarks.

Character

Elyon (Jonathan): Elyon speaking, I would toss a few comments your way in this pursuit of study. I would recall to you that the greatest thing you can do is to study the life of the Master, how he lived it. It was mentioned here today that, though an individual may not hope to have the perfection of personality poise that the master had, you can in you own way reach the same balance. You also are aware that if you do not like your own mind you can exchange it for the mind of Christ.

Tomas has emphasized character, and I would take liberty to play with that word and re-pronounce it as "care actor". [encouraged you last week] to work on modification of behavior. A little reflection would bring to your awareness that how you behave is a result of character attainment. One may hope to be of a more noble character than one really is until behavior reveals the true status of being. Such revelation does not intend to defeat one but rather to indicate the course by which you may grow to the ideal you seek of yourself in character. If you seek the Master's way of living the human life, you are at first acting and then you become. If you study you are taking care that you are applying yourself willfully and diligently towards comprehending the Master's life and how he lived it.

Character emerges from within. It is not a garment to be purchased and worn, to be put on about you. It takes this careful study of observing higher being-ness so that you can infuse your own being and have it re-emerge as a higher human standing. This is how Michael as Jesus transformed himself from an infant into a first circle mortal personality, and this is the very way which you can also.

I hope I have contributed beneficially.

Self-mastery

Tomas (Gerdean): I have one addendum to add having to do with the mastery of mind as the pinnacle of attainment, and this is a real study, a true challenge, to master one's mind. It is similar to superconsciousness being consciousness of consciousness. Being superminded would be being mindful of how your mind behaves and mastering its behavior in accordance with your Indwelling Spirit, thereupon you may begin to truly serve.

Jada: Is this mastery of mind something we might hope to attain in this lifetime?

Tomas: Yes, my son, it is possible indeed. In fact you have all begun the process by observing through your Correcting Time exercises how it is that your responses and reactions to life have come to be the way they are. These behaviors are based upon the way you think, the thoughts that were implanted in you in the imperfect reign of Lucifer. But in the realm of the Correcting Time under the Melchizedeks we are effecting those changes in you that would help your Adjuster adjust your thoughts such that your spirit will re-implant truth for you to follow. This is part of our effort. it is imminently possible, and, in fact, probable, for you are eager learners. When you have learned one level of being, you quickly scramble to the next, eager to learn the lessons of the next level of existence.

It would not behoove the Master and his agents to recommend such an attainment and not anticipate its possibility for you also. It is one of those lures, those spiritual stimuli that keep you moving forward. The idea of not having a mind clamoring for attention constantly is a refreshing thought to the aspiring spirit, one which, by and through your free will, can be mastered. When your mind is not full of itself, clamoring for attention, it is better prepared to listen to what our Father would have you do as a circuit of His divine love, which is why I say your service fields then are greatly expanded. This is a progressive attainment, as any reality. It is not that you simply one day graduate, but it is an acquirement that is indeed possible. We wish you well in your attempts.

As Elyon has suggested, if you have difficulty you may ask that your mind be replaced by the mind of Christ. Although that is a trick that I cannot explain to you, it is effective. With practice it is made yours.

Mind

Angus: Is there a difference between exchanging your mind for the mind of Christ and allowing your mind to become the mind of your Thought Adjuster?

Tomas: Not much. The difference would probably be in your perception, my son, for you have a tendency as a mortal to think in terms of Jesus' mind as one thing and the Thought Adjuster as an entirely different spirit, if only because that's true. TheInfinite Spirit is a source of universal mind. So, there is a fine line difference, but inasmuch as it is your path to find God through Jesus, you will encounter his mind first, and it will lead you home. So, essentially they are the same at least until such time as it makes a difference what the difference is. Is that helpful?

Angus: Yes.

Elyon (Jonathan): The papers revealed to you this century, the Urantia Papers contain the phrase that the mind is your ship (111:1.9). In reflecting upon exchanging your mind for the mind of Christ, you can think of it as whose ship are you on. Is it the self-willed, self-sufficient ship? Or is it the cruise liner of Nebadon that is well equipped and capable of carrying all on board to its destination? The mind of Christ is the mindedness that is sought for in every individual. Mind is the vehicle whereby you ascend to spirit.

Michael took upon himself the arduous task of revealing this journey when he bestowed himself here. To follow the manner in which he lived in your time and century will bring satisfaction in this life, bringing the morontia element to your mind and, in the life to follow, this spirit element to your morontia being. The Father's spirit will pilot you, but you must become skillful at reading the map, at interpreting the best course, taking into counsel the Father's presence. The journey to Paradise is not passive. Truly it is your choice to do the will of the Father. But your choice isn't as simple as buying your boarding pass and reaching the deck and sitting in a lounge chair. It requires becoming part of the crew and tending to the chores of the vessel.

I hope I have been contributing.

Tom: The text states that the technique of taking another's idea as your own is the technique by which the mind that was in Christ can also be in you. Is it that simple?

Elyon: It is that simple. There is in the taking of the thought of another no actual transfer of a possession. It duplicates itself, remaining resident in the presenter and becoming resident in the receiver. When you receive the mind of Christ -- and this should put an end to all fanatical behavior -- you do not become Jesus himself. He remains Michael of Nebadon, and you take upon you that mindedness. All can do that, therefore, no one of us his children can lay claim to being Christ. This transfer is a process of duplication rather than an exchange of ownership.

Does this help?

Tom: Yes. Knowledge is safeguarded by sharing. (48:7.28)

Elyon: Indeed it is.

Tomas (Gerdean): And the mind of Christ always said, "Not my will but your will be done, Father." The mind that seeks the Father's will is the mind of Christ.

Angus: It's not really all that complicated.

Closing

Tomas: I have done my work then. Elyon, I give you the platform for salutations. Good afternoon.

Elyon (Jonathan): I likewise bid you farewell. I would simply leave you an assignment for this week and that is to think on these things.