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Michael072406MarinTM_General&IndividualEvolution
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[[Image:lighterstill.jpg]] [[File:Teaching_buddha_small.jpg|right|frame]]
 
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Michael—July 24, 2006
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Marin TM Group—Mill Valley, California—U.S.A.
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MICHAEL—T/R-JL
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  1.
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      (General and Individual Evolution)
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  2.
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      (Stillness as a Source of Good Ideas)
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  3.
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      (Stillness, Faith, and Effort)
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  4.
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      (Personal Morality)
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  5.
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      (You Don’t Automatically Know God’s Will)
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  6.
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      (The Inside and Outside of Human Experience)
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  7.
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      (Self-doubt Vs. Self-questioning)
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  8.
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      (Faith Vs. Tempting God)
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==Heading==
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===Topic: ''General & Individual Evolution''===
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===Group: [[Marin TeaM]]===
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==Facilitators==
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===Teacher: [[Michael]]===
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===TR: [[JL]]===
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== Session==
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===Opening===
 
Dear Michael and Mother Spirit, Tonight we want to thank You for helping us broaden our contact with, and understanding of, the spiritual dimension in our lives. Yet we find ourselves in the awkward position of often knowing more than we can implement. We often find it difficult to make the transition from general ideals to specific, good, useable ideas; and so we ask Your help in bringing down to earth, into our own lives, some of these principles we have been discovering. Amen.
 
Dear Michael and Mother Spirit, Tonight we want to thank You for helping us broaden our contact with, and understanding of, the spiritual dimension in our lives. Yet we find ourselves in the awkward position of often knowing more than we can implement. We often find it difficult to make the transition from general ideals to specific, good, useable ideas; and so we ask Your help in bringing down to earth, into our own lives, some of these principles we have been discovering. Amen.
    
MICHAEL: Good evening, My dear sons, this is Michael. I welcome your prayer this evening for it indicates you are ready now to take a few more steps along this path you have chosen to share with Mother and Me and, indeed, your whole spiritual family. For the human race this path is one of general and utterly unstoppable evolution, but it is not imposed and inevitable when you consider an individual human life.
 
MICHAEL: Good evening, My dear sons, this is Michael. I welcome your prayer this evening for it indicates you are ready now to take a few more steps along this path you have chosen to share with Mother and Me and, indeed, your whole spiritual family. For the human race this path is one of general and utterly unstoppable evolution, but it is not imposed and inevitable when you consider an individual human life.
 
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===Lesson===
(General and individual evolution)
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You remember back a few years ago in your own United States culture, when there was such a generational kind of revolution that, while some folks couldn’t wait for things to change fast enough, others were expressing their own reaction as "future shock" as if things were happening far too fast--good traditions and the accumulated value of the ages, if you will, were being lost.
 
You remember back a few years ago in your own United States culture, when there was such a generational kind of revolution that, while some folks couldn’t wait for things to change fast enough, others were expressing their own reaction as "future shock" as if things were happening far too fast--good traditions and the accumulated value of the ages, if you will, were being lost.
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Now, My children, with the help of Our enticing and teasing, you are turning around and re-orienting your attitudes away from being so exclusively captured by the past, to looking towards the future. You are feeling this gap, as you expressed it, of being in the uncomfortable or awkward position of understanding these principles, yet uncertain on how to implement them in your day to day life.
 
Now, My children, with the help of Our enticing and teasing, you are turning around and re-orienting your attitudes away from being so exclusively captured by the past, to looking towards the future. You are feeling this gap, as you expressed it, of being in the uncomfortable or awkward position of understanding these principles, yet uncertain on how to implement them in your day to day life.
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(Stillness as a source of good ideas)
      
The most simple, straight-forward, true and accurate prescription is one We have been recommending from the first: the practice of stillness. Bring to a halt as profoundly as you can, on a regular basis, your habitual ways of doing and thinking. I would ask you to consider that in every major religion of Urantia, there’s a great similarity of approach for those who wish to dedicate themselves to living what they feel is an overtly religious life, in other words, the monks who dwell in monasteries throughout the world.
 
The most simple, straight-forward, true and accurate prescription is one We have been recommending from the first: the practice of stillness. Bring to a halt as profoundly as you can, on a regular basis, your habitual ways of doing and thinking. I would ask you to consider that in every major religion of Urantia, there’s a great similarity of approach for those who wish to dedicate themselves to living what they feel is an overtly religious life, in other words, the monks who dwell in monasteries throughout the world.
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Then practice your stillness. Let this physical/mental part of your being relax in such a way that your spiritual home base swells forth, and you can welcome the re-evaluation of your life. This is where it will come to you, My children: what to try differently today or tomorrow, whichever is next.
 
Then practice your stillness. Let this physical/mental part of your being relax in such a way that your spiritual home base swells forth, and you can welcome the re-evaluation of your life. This is where it will come to you, My children: what to try differently today or tomorrow, whichever is next.
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(Stillness, faith, and effort)
      
In your present-day pop culture there is an attitude that if you feel a great effort is needed to change your life, to grow, to understand; you are doing something wrong. There’s some failure involved. This is a notion that if you are doing it right, life should be easy. True happiness is effortlessness. So Mother Spirit had Her lesson last week on the need to feel the inner experience of effort involved in what you are doing. This, My children, is one fine measure of the value of it.
 
In your present-day pop culture there is an attitude that if you feel a great effort is needed to change your life, to grow, to understand; you are doing something wrong. There’s some failure involved. This is a notion that if you are doing it right, life should be easy. True happiness is effortlessness. So Mother Spirit had Her lesson last week on the need to feel the inner experience of effort involved in what you are doing. This, My children, is one fine measure of the value of it.
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Think about it, yes, of course; but practice it. Do it. I’ll meet you there.
 
Think about it, yes, of course; but practice it. Do it. I’ll meet you there.
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If you have any questions or comments this evening, this is also something we share, is it not? Student: Father Michael, last week, I mean last lesson, You mentioned the word "moral" several times, and I’m wondering if You could say some more on the subject of moral, or morality, please?
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If you have any questions or comments this evening, this is also something we share, is it not?  
 
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===Dialogue===
(Personal morality)
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Student: Father Michael, last week, I mean last lesson, You mentioned the word "moral" several times, and I’m wondering if You could say some more on the subject of moral, or morality, please?
    
MICHAEL: Yes, C. I mentioned that when God creates personality of the human order, even though no being other than God can exhaustibly delineate what personality is, We are certain of certain characteristics or properties with which He endows you. One is the ability to discern in personal behavior and activity, a contrast of right and wrong, better and best. You are even capable of welcoming this as a conscious evaluation in every small phase of your life, from the moment you wake up in the morning to the moment you go to sleep at night.
 
MICHAEL: Yes, C. I mentioned that when God creates personality of the human order, even though no being other than God can exhaustibly delineate what personality is, We are certain of certain characteristics or properties with which He endows you. One is the ability to discern in personal behavior and activity, a contrast of right and wrong, better and best. You are even capable of welcoming this as a conscious evaluation in every small phase of your life, from the moment you wake up in the morning to the moment you go to sleep at night.
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MICHAEL: This is how you feel your way along, sometimes through the densest darkness of not knowing--still!—that very thing can be approaching a greater truth, especially if you have been burning the candle of your life at both ends, selling your body and your mind and your spirit short for some little illusion of vainglory.
 
MICHAEL: This is how you feel your way along, sometimes through the densest darkness of not knowing--still!—that very thing can be approaching a greater truth, especially if you have been burning the candle of your life at both ends, selling your body and your mind and your spirit short for some little illusion of vainglory.
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But to struggle to grow, to extend yourself with faith, praying for God’s help and acknowledging that He will be a large part of any success you find, still all the while being willing to accept the full responsibility for what happens—this, My children, is courage. This is the right way to go, the better method, the best life you can live. This potential is inherent in your human reality, so I invite you to sincerely join the hunt for it. I will say it again: you do not automatically know God’s will, but it helps in
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But to struggle to grow, to extend yourself with faith, praying for God’s help and acknowledging that He will be a large part of any success you find, still all the while being willing to accept the full responsibility for what happens—this, My children, is courage. This is the right way to go, the better method, the best life you can live. This potential is inherent in your human reality, so I invite you to sincerely join the hunt for it. I will say it again: you do not automatically know God’s will, but it helps in terms of your modern philosophy to equate it with Reality itself, and to credit the search as an adventure without parallel.  
terms of your modern philosophy to equate it with Reality itself, and to credit the search is an adventure without parallel. Enjoy it well. It will lead you to My peace. Good evening.
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===Closing===
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Enjoy it well. It will lead you to My peace. Good evening.
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END
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[[Category: The Teaching Mission: Dialogues]]
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[[Category: Marin TeaM]]
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[[Category: Michael]]
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[[Category: JL]]
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[[Category: 2006]]

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