Thoughts and Excerpts

Overcoming Limitations

 

Zingdad Note: As I engage in my on-going quest to find the greatest joy and the greatest peace I can for myself in this life, so I continue always to quest after my own healing and growth. Along the way I often find something that might be interesting or useful to others. The following text is exactly this: a record of a conversation between myself and my spirit-guide, 8, in which he shares with me some insights that I feel might be as useful and liberating to others as they were to me. I am very sure this excerpt will find a place in some future part of The Ascension Papers but, until then, I wished to share it here with you.

 

Arn: 8… I’m struggling with something quite troublesome. I think I need the input and advice of a wise and trusted friend who knows me very well. So… “tag, you’re it!” you lucky fella.

 

8: (laughs) Lucky indeed! But isn’t this exactly what a spirit-guide is after all for? So, let’s hear it. What ails you?

 

Arn: There’s this dilemma present in my soul. It’s been there all my life but I’ve always misdirected myself and thought it was something else. One by one I’ve removed the masking issues and now it is revealed. I don’t know why it is there and most of all I don’t know what to do about it. But it is causing me pain and I have to heal this now.

 

8: Thank you for the background. What is the issue itself?

 

Arn: On the one hand I have found within myself a set of gifts that I have to give to Life. Finding them has been a bit of a triumph for me. And I love, love, love that I have found them and I want to give those gifts. I actually get a kind of a high when I am working with someone and I am able to be a part of catalyzing the transformation of their pain into joy. Being present for that is the best thing. I love it. And I love to work with you and J-D and Adamu and whoever else to bring the same kind of healing to the collective consciousness by addressing beliefs and ideas that are commonly held. That’s another gift giving that I love to do. And I love working with groups to assist everyone to find greater internal harmony. In short: I love what I do. And I am neither coy nor boastful if I say that I am really very good at these things. It is clear to me that this is the kind of thing my soul has been crafted for. So I feel as if I am living my purpose when I do these things.

 

I also believe, as hard and confusing as life in this particular planetary reality can be, that I am here very specifically for this purpose. Not to “save” anyone else… no… but to find and express my own truest nature here in this place of forgetting. Which I do through the vehicle of giving my gift. So I do believe that I need to be right here on this planet doing exactly what I am doing.

 

8: So far so good. But there is “the other hand…”

 

Arn: Yes. The other hand holds the problem that I don’t understand. I have such huge inertia that I find it nearly impossible to ever get going on anything. It takes an excruciating effort of will to take even the smallest step towards giving my gift each time. All I want to do is fall back into complacency and do nothing. I just want to curl up and sleep for a hundred years. Or do anything at all other than give my gift. Watch movies, play computer games, surf the ‘net and who know what all else. Anything to avoid getting going and being productive. Anything.

When I do force myself to get moving, then I find myself loving it. When I am “in the flow” it is the best thing ever. But to get going… oh! It’s actual agony!

 

And you’d think it would get better. You’d think that because I have noticed this problem that it would get easier. Surely if I see that I love the doing then I’ll just get over myself and just get going each time. But the funny thing is that this is just getting harder and harder. Avoidance becomes more and more attractive to me as I proceed.

I don’t know why I feel this way or what this is. I just don’t know.

 

What I have come to see, however, is that this avoidance is the root cause of my depression. There are other factors that come into play, but at very bottom, when I give in and sink into avoidance, then I begin to feel as if life has no purpose or meaning. And when I feel like that then I find myself spiralling inwards and then all I want is to exit this world and all of life. Then I just want to “go home” where everything is golden and joyful.

 

8: Arn… I want to interrupt you here. We will return to your narrative in a moment but there is something that you need to know. The “home” that you speak of is not a place. It is a state of being. If you exit your current incarnation then you exit that profoundly limited state of deepest forgetting. Outside of incarnation you will find that you are then still somewhat veiled… but much, much less than you now are. And yes, you do experience this as a golden, joyful state. But there is, within all that golden joy, a very small shard of painful darkness. And it is that shard that keeps you attached to this reality.  In fact that shard is your attachment to this reality.

 

So, when you are “home” you know and can see clearly. And what you know is that you have to resolve this painful issue. Now there are always many ways to climb a mountain and so there are always many ways to resolve a difficulty. But when you are here with me, outside of incarnation… when you are holding the much broader perspective of being your own Inner-Self… when you have much broader knowing and much clearer vision… then you always come to the same conclusion: that you must resolve this issue from inside of incarnation.

If you exited incarnation right now you would immediately find this to be true. And as soon as you did, you’d make the choice to return to incarnation. And so the life-planning process would begin again: You’d look carefully at what conditions you need in your next incarnation to allow you to heal yourself and then you’d begin putting those conditions in place.

 

So you’d need a human body that would support this process; an agile brain and a physicality that did not distract you from this work. You’d need a place to stay on Earth where you could be peaceful and contemplative so that you could do this inner work. You’d need some kind of vocation that didn’t distract you from the work but, indeed, that supported your own inner journey. A good option would be to be “teaching that which you most desired to learn”. So you’d want to set up a spiritual healing practice. You’d want the loving support of a partner who could keep bringing you back to your own truth when you strayed. And so on and so on. The point here is, of course, that you’d want pretty much exactly the life you have right now. You’d want to be Arn living in Arn’s life. So you’d go back to the Halls of Learning and you’d consult the Masters and request permission to open another time-line for yourself in which you didn’t exit incarnation but, instead, stayed with this journey because this is exactly what you need on a soul level. The Masters would see that great good would come out of creating an additional time line and so they’d agree to your proposal and back you’d go. And then you’d be Arn again but without the memory of this little loop. You would, in point of fact, be exactly where you are now.

 

Arn: So… have I…. done that?

 

8: No… don’t even ask. The answer is too complex and will derail this discussion. All I’ll say is that, from the higher perspective, there is a fair amount of potentiality that is expressed by your soul. Everything that is possible, actually is. But for you all the potentialities fold back into your living this life and healing this shard in your heart whilst still incarnated.

 

You cannot leave separation without this healing and, while there are many ways to achieve that healing, every single time you look at this question from a place of knowing you make the same decision over and over again. You say: “The best, fastest, most powerful way to do this is to do it inside that reality as Arn.”

If there was a better way to do this… a less painful, easier more direct route to your wholeness… do you not think that between Joy-Divine and I and all those we have access to… do you not think we would have found it? And if there was a better route for you to travel do you not think we’d have you on it? Really, there are only three possibilities here:

 

1. J-D and I are incompetent.

2. J-D and I don’t actually care very much for you.

3. You are in exactly the right place to do exactly what you need to do and all is exactly perfectly as it should be.

 

Arn: I… yes… I can’t argue with the logic. And I find I can’t doubt either your competence or your love for me. So I guess I have to agree. I am in the right place doing the right thing.

 

8: It is also important for you to realise that no one is forcing you to do anything. You choose and then you live your choice.

 

I recognise that living this life is a hard choice for you. I recognise that when you are inside the deep forgetting of incarnation then you don’t always feel like you have chosen this. But that does not change the basic fact. It is so. You are exactly where you chose to be doing exactly what you chose to do.

 

Arn: Hmm.  I know in my heart that what you say is true.

 

So there is nowhere to go. I can’t get around this and I can’t avoid it. I just have to be Arn and deal with it. Whatever “it” actually is.

 

8: It would seem so.

 

Arn: Thank you for that.

 

The thing is, 8, I don’t actually not want to be here. I love my life and I love this world and I am blessed beyond belief to have what I have. So this isn’t actually about my “going somewhere else”. I don’t actually want to die. It’s just that I have this dilemma I was telling you about. This impossible inertia. And when I feel it, there is something inside of me that screams to avoid the pain in whatever way I can. But, enough avoidance and then I have fantasies about just “going home”. But even while that is going on, I don’t actually want to leave my life! 

And then there’s this other thing. When I give in to the inertia and I let my life come to a stop for a while, then I find myself getting depressed. And the depression is like a monster that will swallow me whole if I let it.

 

8: I’ll take another small tangent here, if you don’t mind?

 

Arn: By all means!

 

8: It is the nature of all of life to grow. Everything either grows or dies. And at root what you actually are is consciousness. Consciousness is pure distilled life-force. And life must live. So you too must constantly grow. If you stop growing you go through illusory experiences of dying. What I mean is: if you stop growing then you then experience all that you are attached to withering and passing away. So your emotional and physical bodies get ill. The things of your life begin to fall to entropy. Your finances go to ruin. Your relationships become rocky. This is what happens when you cease to grow. And your depression is a symptom of that. You are feeling, in your emotional body, the death that you are bringing to yourself.

 

If you stay on such a path and resolutely refuse to engage with your own growth then you’ll get other more dire symptoms of the illusion of death. Your body will get ill. Your financial affairs will utterly collapse. Your relationships will perish and you’ll find yourself lonely and alone as others lose patience with your bleak state. And then, somewhere in all this, your body will evict you at the expense of its own continued existence.

 

And then you’ll find yourself back here with me. On the one hand you’ll be relieved to have the nightmare over, but on the other you’ll find yourself quite disappointed with yourself for not grasping the many, many wondrous opportunities for growth that life presented you.

 

What you’ll do then I don’t know and there isn’t really any point in speculating as these dismal outcomes are not explored by your soul. You are, quite simply, not doing any of this. I tell you all this only to drive the point home that you really have to choose your own constant growth.

 

Arn: So… by what you are saying… every single thing in this universe is either growing or dying.

 

8: Yes, I affirm that everything is either growing or dying. But to avoid confusion, I must point out again that death is an illusion. There is no death; only transitions. If you resist growth, or for some reason cannot grow any more in a particular milieu, then you experience the illusion of death, which is actually just a transition out of that milieu. You find the transition to be growthful and then you also find yourself back in an environment that is growthful.

 

So, there is actually only growth.

 

Arn: So, people who are dying are resisting their growth?

 

8: Perhaps. Or perhaps they have gained all they need from that particular life and it offers them no further scope for growth. Then it is time to leave. When the soul has gained all the growth that it wanted from a life-time then what is the point of keeping on with it?

 

If you release your judgements of death and your judgements of other people then you come to see that all is always exactly as it should be.

 

But to bring the discussion back on target: YOU are not done extracting the growth from this life as Arn. It is so rich with opportunities for expansion and learning that it’s just ridiculous. That is why you are still there, despite your own internal resistance.

 

Arn: Okay. That works for me.

So… as long as I am growing… no matter how slowly… I’ll keep living?

 

8: Ugh! How you search for loop-holes!

 

No, my friend, you will not be allowed to scrape by with the bare minimum. This is just your most self-limiting, most fearful self speaking. You must learn to love the process of striving always for your greatest version of self… reaching always for the maximum growth from each moment.

 

You see… some incarnations bear relatively little light. Those incarnations are not meant to be ones in which the soul experiences very much change or growth. Those are not the incarnations where the soul returns Itself to wholeness. Those are the incarnations where the soul just wanted to experience life from a certain perspective. So from those lives only a very moderate amount of growth is expected. When you bear a very little light, then you can grow at a more sedate pace and that is all that is desired or expected.

 

Then, by contrast, are there the incarnations into which the soul expresses a great deal of its aspirations and energies. These are the lives that bear a great deal more light. With that light, there is so much more that you can do. So much more that you can achieve. And so much more that is expected of you. The more light you bear, the more you are responsible for. You cannot bear the bright light that you do and hope to creep along unnoticed doing nothing much of any significance!

 

So, no. The downside of the fact of bringing as much light as you have to bear into an incarnation is that you must take responsibility for all that light. If you are a light bearer then you must act like it. You must advance and grow at a rate consonant with the quotient of light that you bear or else you must experience dying and death.

 

Arn: So, by my own choices, I put myself in a corner. I need to heal myself and grow. I need to learn to love this process and seek it out. And there is nothing for it but to overcome my resistance and fear. The only way forward is to learn to love my own growth.

 

But how?

 

I have no idea even why I feel this resistance in the first place.

 

8: I’m going to allow for a very, very little imbalance. We’ll resolve the imbalance later as it is only the very smallest amount. So I am simply going to tell you what ails you. It is this:

 

You fear change.

 

It’s as simple as that.

 

Arn: That’s it?  I fear change?

 

8: Yes. But remember change is the only constant in this universe. So… this fear is a pretty big one. Strangely enough this isn’t a particularly unique fear, though. Many people share this fear with you. Those that do not share this particular fear will have a different root fear. And just like you, almost all here will have their root-fear masked by other subordinate fears and self-limiting beliefs.

 

But we are talking about you now. And your root fear is of change. So you try to avoid change.

The problem for you is that it is your Soul’s purpose to be an agent of change. You are an interventionist. So, by definition, you bring change. Powerful, radical, direction-altering, life-changing interactions is what you bring to Life. Even now, already, you are practising this when you work with your clients. That is what you were talking about earlier. You were telling me how you love to do this. And yet you fear it too.

 

So this is it. It is your greatest passion and your greatest fear.

 

But it’s not this fear that is the problem. It’s what you do with it that actually ails you. 

 

Arn: Really? What do you mean by that? What do I do with the fear of change?

 

8: Self-destructiveness.

 

There is something very important that you should know. It goes like this:

 

This reality is created through the agency of the Veil of Unknowing. To enter into this reality is to forget and to “not know”. When you are inside this reality you answer the question: “who am I if I don’t know”. And by the way you answer that question, you navigate yourself through the layers of consciousness.

 

Fear of that which is not known is perhaps the most normal of all responses. And those who do respond like that “lower” their consciousness. They move to deeper levels of this reality. This is what you have done. You have created a fear - for you it is the fear of change - and, with that, you moved out of unity consciousness. 

 

And then there are even deeper levels of separation. The very deepest layer where one can still be conscious of selfhood is the 3^rd density of consciousness. And this is the level of existence for all those who have responded to their fear with self-destructiveness.

 

What I am saying, Arn, is that everyone in your world has previously come to seek to destroy themselves, their lives, those around them or some part of their reality. That is how you get to be where you are.

 

You move your consciousness back “up” and out of that level of existence by firmly and resolutely giving up on your urge to self-destruction. You see, parts of the One that seek to destroy Self can simply not be permitted to roam around enacting those urges. You must be allowed to overcome them before you can be a creator-being amongst equals in the eternal Oneness of All.

 

Arn: You’ve told me something like this before. But I’m really beginning to understand this now.

 

I mean – if I look at the world then it is apparent that we humans are a pretty destructive lot. And to seek to destroy anything is to destroy the self.

 

8: And to seek to destroy the self is to seek to destroy the All. Yes.

 

Arn: So we are here in a kind of a spiritual quarantine?

 

8: You can see it like that. But it is a self-imposed quarantine. You are there to resolve this urge. Each of you. And you do this with love. You find that which you love and then that love raises your consciousness above the destructiveness. This is the meaning of the Service to Self (STS) and Service to Other (STO) ascension paths. Those who learn to love the self or the other enough that they place their energy in service, move beyond their own destructiveness.

 

Then they find themselves back facing their fear. Whatever it is. But at least the avenue of self-destructiveness is resolved. It has been explored and it no longer causes them difficulty. They no longer respond to fear with self-destruction. So they find other ways of dealing with their fear until that too is resolved.  And then they step once again into their true creative power.

 

Arn: Okay… so what do I do with the fear of change then?

 

8: Acceptance of yourself and the situation. And you do this by finding the love. Then you have what you need from your situation and then you transition it into something more beautiful.

 

Let me tell you about that.

 

The truth of the matter is that the only thing that is real is love. This is because Oneness is real and separation is an illusion. Love is that which reminds you of oneness. Fear is the false evidence that you use to believe in separation. So, while fear is illusory and false, it is yet the opposite of love.

 

Simply put: fear and love cannot both exist in the same space. If you try to make this happen the fear (which does not really exist) is displaced by the love (which does).

 

A good way to understand this is that there is no such thing as actual darkness. It’s not a “thing” in its own right. It’s just an absence of light. But for all that, light and dark are opposites of each other. And so you cannot have light and dark occupy the same space. If you try, the darkness will be displaced by the light.

 

So then it becomes quite obvious what one should do when you wish to resolve and address a fear: you find the love in that situation.

 

Now the thing to realise is that you cannot replace a fear of spiders by thinking how much you love your dog. This is as sensible as trying to light a dark closet by switching on a light in another room.

 

What I am saying is you must bring the “light” of love to the very place where you find the “darkness” of fear.

 

Arn: So how exactly do I find the love in something, 8?

 

8: I’m pleased you asked that.

 

Let me use something very familiar to you as an example: food and eating. Let’s say you are in a hurry, dashing off somewhere and you become aware that you must eat something or else you’ll go hungry later. So you just grab some generic thing to eat as you dash. A sandwich from a cafeteria, for example. And then you eat it on the go while having a conversation and driving your car. That sandwich will disappear into your body without you even noticing it. It’s nothing special. It’s just fuel. Am I right?

 

Now by contrast: You have a meal in front of you that you are about to share with friends. The vegetable ingredients of this meal have all been grown by you in your own garden. Every little thing has been lovingly nurtured from seed and watered by your own hand. You’ve seen things grow and ripen and then picked them when they were perfect. The ingredients not grown by you have been sourced locally from neighbours. You know that these ingredients too have been produced with love.

 

And then you carefully and lovingly crafted this meal as a gift of love to your friends and to your own body.

So you sit in companionable conversation and you savour the meal together.

 

Under these conditions that meal will be sublime. It cannot be otherwise. You have really and truly found the love in that food because you have put it in there yourself! And others will taste the difference too.

 

Arn: But not everyone can do that with their food. And even I can’t do that for every meal.

 

8: I am just using that as an example. I make a stark comparison to really show the difference. But let me tell you: if you took that same cafeteria sandwich and, before eating it, you took a moment to notice what a wonder it really is: wheat and water and yeast to make the bread. Perhaps tomato and a leaf of lettuce that was grown somewhere on a farm. A slice of cheese made from cows milk. All put together in this here-and-now for your pleasure and nourishment. What a wonder! You can eat it without having to have tilled soil, planted seed or raised cows! If you can find the love and gratitude that is an appropriate response to this wonder and then take your time to slowly, and with great attention and reverence, eat that sandwich… well… it would surprise you how wonderful it might taste.

 

Arn: Okay, yes, I have experienced something like that. And so I think I get what you mean when you say “find the love” in something.

 

But perhaps you can help me with a more personally troubling example. In order to just be here… in order to be alive on planet earth in this here-and-now, I have to pay bills. I have to earn money. And one fear I seem to have in common with many, many people is the fear of lack. Of not having enough. Or of a future in which I’ll run out and be destitute.

 

8: Okay, before we go into this, let me just check: do you have “enough” right now?

 

Arn: Oh sure. I’m doing fine right now but…

 

8: (Interrupts) so you fear that this will change?

 

Arn: I… yeah…

 

8: Okay. I’m just making a subtle point.

 

Now let’s look at this “money” and “lack” thing and see where we can find the love, shall we?

How would your life be different if you had more than enough money? Or if there was no such thing as money? Or no such thing as lack?

 

Arn: Um… I’d be a lot more relaxed for one thing!

 

8: I’m sure you would. But what would you be doing? Would you still have pursued your own truth in response to the pain you felt within yourself?

 

Arn: You mean like I am doing now?

 

8: Yes. And the way you did when you wrote Book 1 of The Ascension Papers.

 

Arn: Oh right. Yes, I certainly would have pursued my own healing in that way. But I must be honest. I wouldn’t have bothered to carefully craft what I found into words to share with others. I wouldn’t have gone through the laborious process of creating a book that I could sell to others if I didn’t need the money.

 

8: Really? How fascinating. So, no Ascension Papers if you didn’t need money. And the things that came after publishing that first book? Soul Re-Integration, Ascension School, your other books, courses, writings… what about them?

 

Arn: Well… they only came as a result of The Ascension Papers so, no, I wouldn’t have created any of those things.

 

Jeez, 8, this is the first time I have thought about things this way. If I didn’t have to earn money I would not have done any of the things of which I am most proud in this life. I wrote The Ascension Papers for me. But I published it for money. It is true. And I kept on creating other interactions and expressions to serve that same lack. This is also true.

 

Wow, that’s a really painful thing to admit!

 

8: And now that it’s out there, is it really such a bad thing? You went to truckloads of effort to get The Ascension Papers published and worked your butt off to make it into a product that would be a joy for others to engage with and read. So, you went to all that effort so that you might get something back. What is wrong with that?

Do you think that anyone else judges you for this? Do you think your readers don’t know you put your book on sale because you wanted money for it? I mean… duh! Right?

 

So, let the judgment of yourself go and see the beauty of this. The things in this life that you consider to be your greatest accomplishments were motivated by this fact that you perceived a lack – to whit your own financial lack – and you sought to fill that lack by offering the gifts you have for sale. So you have money to thank for you getting your ass in gear to create something beautiful.

 

Don’t you just love that there was something that could get you over your own inertia to create something beautiful? Aren’t you really grateful that, as a result of that impetus, you found all the additional gifts that you have found within yourself and that you have been able to give them to others?

 

Arn: That’s certainly a different perspective! But, yeah, I guess that is so. Someone emailed me little graph a while ago and there was no attribution so I don’t know who first created it, but I’ll re-create it to show you. It looked like this:

I really liked it when I saw it because it’s so true. The magic only ever happens when I am out of my comfort zone. And now I am being forced to admit it was my sense of lack that drove me out of my comfort zone. It was this perceived “need” to earn some money that got me to do my “magic”.

 

8: So “hooray” for money!

 

Arn: Except, of course, I didn’t ONLY do it for the money!

 

8: Does it matter? What would be wrong with it if you did?

 

Arn: If I only did it for the money then that would be a very selfish notion.

 

8: Perhaps. But let’s talk about why you think “selfish” is a bad thing.

 

Arn: Well because it is!  I mean selfish is bad. That’s self evident.

 

8: No it isn’t. Selfish is sensible. In fact it’s the only thing that is really sane. It is your job to take care of you. If you are to be an adult spirit being then you must act like one: You must take responsibility for your own being. You can’t look to others to take care of you if you wish to stand in the shoes you are stepping into.  So you take care of yourself. Doesn’t that seem right?

 

And the reverse is true: Adults don’t seek out children to co-create with so you will want to begin interacting now with others who also take care of themselves, right?

 

So the bottom line here is that you must take care of you and others must take care of themselves.

This means you must seek constantly to know yourself ever more deeply so that you know always what is right for you. And as you become clearer on what is right for you, you must move ever more powerfully towards the choices and experiences that are right for you. Not those that are right for others… those that are right for you.

And isn’t that the very definition of “selfish”? Making choices based solely upon what is really and truly right for you?

 

And isn’t that exactly what you should be doing right now?

 

Arn: Wow, yeah. I’m pretty surprised to find myself agreeing with you.

 

But what stops me then from hurting and abusing others if I am just going to be selfish.

 

8: Not being stupid is what stops you.

 

You have travelled a long enough journey to see that you cannot hurt and abuse others without doing the same to yourself. Once you have seen that, you would be idiotic to act in that way. And if there is someone who has not yet seen this, then they will. At some point or another every single mote of consciousness will realise this. And when they do, they will know that they can no longer do anything that seeks to hurt another. Then they will find themselves on the path to love. And soon after they will find themselves where you are now: seeking ways of dancing delicately with life such that you do the minimum harm and create the maximum joy. Being motivated by love rather than fear.

 

So this is a beautiful journey you are all on. But don’t, for a moment mistake! Every step of this path is motivated by self-interest. You wish to maximise the happy and minimise the crappy. For yourself. And the best way to do that is to seek it for the All. And so you do that. And then when you do, you find you are one with the All.

Magic!

 

Arn: So selfish is actually okay. I mean it’s good. That’s pretty crazy!

 

8: And so the STS are saved.

 

Arn: STS?  But I’m not…

 

Oh.

*expletive*

I am. 

 

I am motivated entirely by my own self interest. I am STS.

 

Its just I realise that my very deepest and greatest self-interest is served when I am as loving as possible to all.

 

8: So you are an evolved STS. You have moved your consciousness firmly into 5D by knowing to the core of your being that you must give to the other in order to get for yourself.

 

So you give to the other to get for yourself.

 

You publish a book to get money.

 

All the things you have done, you did because you expected a return. Your website, The Ascension Papers, your healing modalities, your ascension school, your more recent books… all of them. You put them out there in order to get something back.

 

Arn: No, wait, I did a lot of that stuff just for the love of doing it!

 

8: Not buying it. Sorry.

1. You had pain and so you sought healing. Self interest.

2. You eventually found a mechanism to work on your pain. Me. You worked with me to heal your pain. A lot of that involved the transference of understanding from me to you. You wanted to record the conversations for your later reference. So you began to write. Self interest.

3. Then you began to see that this was something that others would also enjoy. So you decided to offer it as a book. You put effort into getting it publishable. So that you could sell it. Self interest

 

Arn: Yes, that is all true but I actually really loved doing all that. And I love doing Soul Re-Integration sessions with clients. And I love presenting my Ascension School material. I love what I do. So it isn’t only for the money!

 

8: If not for the money you would not have felt the need… the urge… to go to the effort to present yourself and your light to the world. Money was the motivator. Then, when you begin to offer these gifts, you discovered that you really loved doing so. So I am not arguing that you don’t love to give these gifts, but can you not now see why you are also so deeply resistant to giving them?

 

Your gift is given out of self interest and you judge self interest as bad. You tie a knot in your own energy.

 

Arn: And this is why I am not in pain when I am outside of separation. There is no money there and no lack. There I have no need to drive me.

 

8: There you are simply golden joy. No need to do anything when you are joy. Money and doing and lack and such things are just… ideas. And there these are ideas that you are not at all involved with.

 

Arn: So that’s the difference between me and my inner-self. I judge myself to be wrong. My inner-self accepts Itself completely, exactly as it is.

 

8: Yes, that is another of the differences.

 

Arn: Okay. Wow. So I am STS. And that’s okay.

 

8: And acceptance arrives!  Just in time to notice that you are not only STS. You are, of course, also STO. Isn’t it so that your natural and first impulse is always to help others? And you are, after all, only in this reality because you heard “the call”. And the call was a call for help. When you got here, you knew that entering and helping would come at great cost to you. You knew you’d endure suffering to enter this reality to render the assistance requested. But you didn’t hesitate. You leaped into the meat-grinder. You were willing to experience profound self-sacrifice to help another. That is the epitome of STO.

 

And in your life you help others all the time. You do it just for the joy of doing it. And it’s a beautiful thing to see.

 

Arn: Interestingly, I don’t seem to have any problem accepting my STO side.

 

8: That indicates your own polarity. You are both… but a little more STO than STS. But that’s all about to become irrelevant.

 

Arn: Why?

 

8: When you totally accept both sides of yourself (and everyone has both sides inside themselves in some ratio or another). Then you are not in resistance to any part of it. Then you accept yourself in polarity. And that is when your consciousness can rise above it. When you find this total acceptance, then you move from 5D to 6D.

Then you discover truly that you are at one with yourself. And if you do it inside this reality, then you know you are at one with the reality. Then everyone and everything in the reality is all as Self for you. Then your truest light and energy can enter this whole reality. Then you can give your gift without limitation or hold.  And this thing: this opening of your heart to give… because you are inherently more STO oriented… will feel so right and natural that you’ll be even greater at giving your gift. And then what will flow will be astounding. And then what will flow back will reflect that and you will be awash in an abundance of everything you could wish for.

And so that’s brings me full circle to acceptance. You just need to accept yourself as you are. All of yourself. You need to accept the fears you currently hold and the effects they have on you. Accept, accept, accept.

When you do accept all of this about yourself, then you see that it is right, good and perfect. And when you see that, then it has no further hold on you… no more power over you. Then it is simply something within you and you move on to other things.

 

I’ll use your case as my example: When you are in resistance to your fear then you respond with self-destructive behaviour. When you are in resistance to your self-destructiveness then you spiral into it and it becomes more so. This continues until it is unbearable… until you hit rock-bottom with it. Then you begin to try different ways of being. In this lifetime you are doing that: you are trying ways of being that are not self-destructive. But until you accept that part of yourself, you are actually still in resistance to it. And it still has power over you. You are like a little spaceship that is circling a black hole. No matter what you do, you just keep getting sucked back into it.

Acceptance, true acceptance, changes that completely. Then suddenly the black hole is just one of the many, many things inside of you. Perhaps, to stretch my metaphor, the little spaceship discovers a way to engulf the black-hole and use it as a power-source! (he smiles) That would be what would happen to you when you find total and true acceptance.

 

Arn: But how, 8? How do I accept my fear and my self-destructiveness?

 

8: You find the love in it.

 

Arn: Oh yeah…

 

Okay. Let’s see...

 

You say this fear of mine is the root cause of the self-destructiveness and the self-destructiveness is what allows me to be here in this reality. Well, I actually love being here. There is so much that is amazing. It’s also hard and confusing and painful. But… well… I am only here for such a short time. Human lives are so, so ridiculously short. But I am here now. And this is an incredible thing actually to be here inside this reality. It’s a miracle of creation, this universe and this world. And there is so much to be explored and discovered. So I am here. And soon enough I’ll have to leave. So I want to relish this. I want to extract all the joy and wonder that I can out of being here. So that, when it is time to leave, I’ll have no regrets. Not one single “I wish I had still done this or that”. Instead, when I leave I want to say “What a ride! And I wrung every drop of joy out of it!”

 

What I am saying is that if I “find the love” in this place and then I find that I love my self-destructiveness and my fear. Because they are what makes it possible for me to be here.

 

8: Very well said.

 

Arn: Hmm… but as I say all this I seem to arrive at the realisation that, as long as I am in this life I will never actually defeat these two things. As long as I am here this fear of change and this urge to avoidance will be here with me.

 

8: I’m impressed that you found that. And what do you do with that realisation? How does it make you feel?

 

Arn: It’s odd. I think if I had known that before I incarnated I would not have been willing to come here at all.

 

8: You did know. And you didn’t want to incarnate again.

 

Arn: Oh. Right.

 

But what’s funny is that I feel differently about this fear and this pain now. I know I still bear these burdens, I know I will for the rest of my life. But that’s okay. These are my burdens to bear.

 

8: I’d like to offer you a metaphor. Deep-sea divers strap on belts of lead weights before entering the sea. This allows them to sink to the depths they wish to go rather than just float to the surface. In just the same way it is true that you and every other soul incarnated in 3D requires a certain ballast to weigh you down that you might be able to explore those depths of this reality.

 

Arn: When I am done with the ballast, then I am done with these depths?

 

8: In a very real way they are actually the same thing. You have heard Joy-Divine and I say to you that there is no reality outside of you. There is only what you are projecting inside your own mind. Well, your fear and your pain are the filters that you are using to help you to create the illusion of separation from the rest of the whole of the Oneness.

 

You are projecting your whole reality in co-creation with other aspects of the One who are also holding their own similar filters that allow you to work together on this creation at this level of reality.

 

Arn: The fear and the pain are actually tools?  They enable this creation? Wow!  I had never thought about it that way!

 

8: That is a useful perspective!

 

So, yes, they are tools that allow you to co-create this version of life. That does not mean that they are not quite difficult to wield. But, once you understand this, then you can find ways to compensate to make the work of wielding these tools less onerous.

 

Truly, I say to you, Arn: you have made the job far harder for yourself than you have needed to. What I mean here is that you have often chosen to immerse yourself in your suffering when it was not necessary to do so. You could have had a much, much lighter time of it than you have chosen to.

 

Now this is not a criticism. In many ways it is perfect that you have done as you have so that you could really feel the weight of these tools. But what it does mean is that there are now ways to make the rest of your life much, much easier.

 

Arn: Okay so:

I accept that I am in this world, in this reality, for a very good reason.

I see, feel and know that there is great growth for me to be had here and for that I am very grateful.

I have found ways to turn my growth into gifts that I share with others… and that is my great joy. I love doing that.

So I love being here and I love what I am doing here.

I accept completely that my fear of change and my self-destructiveness are the means by which I am able to be here.

I accept too that this very fear and pain is what enables me to have greater compassion and insight when working with others to help with their fear and pain.

So I choose now and for the rest of my life, to accept this, my burden.

 

But all of that said: if you say there are ways to lighten the load of this burden, then I would like to hear about that please!

 

8: The most powerful way is to do exactly as you have now just done. To accept completely.

 

So, well done! Now live that acceptance and see how it changes your whole experience.

 

The next step then unfolds: From acceptance comes understanding. If you accept that this is your burden then you understand what it means to carry it.

 

It means that you no longer wish it away or hope there is something that’s going to come along and fix it. This is as it is when you are as you are. That’s acceptance. So then you can begin to find coping mechanisms instead of looking for rescues or cures.

 

And here is coping mechanism number 1:

Remember you just have to take it moment by moment. You don’t have to worry about tomorrow. You don’t have to concern yourself with how you will feel in 5 years time. You only have to deal with the fear and the pain in this moment right now. And the funny, funny thing is there is never actually any fear and pain in the NOW, is there?

So in this NOW you are recording this conversation with me. Do you feel fear?

 

Arn: Uh… no, actually!

 

8: Right. And you are certainly not being self destructive in any way either. You aren’t avoiding or anything else. So in this moment right NOW you are fine, right?

 

Arn: Yeah!

 

But what then about when I have to plan things or think about what comes next.

 

8: There is a time for everything. So, if you become aware that you must also strategise, then set time aside for that. Pick an hour or so in your weekly schedule that is “weekly strategising”. Once that is set aside, then you get back to the NOW and do what is before you to do. When you are out of the “thinking about it” and into the “doing it”, then you are in the NOW. Then you are fine. The NOW is your safe, serene island in a stormy sea. So be in the NOW as much as possible.

 

Arn: Okay, and then the strat session?

 

8: When the day and the hour for that arrive, you just get directly into it. Don’t think about doing it. Just do it. Just start it and get on with it. You’ll notice that you can actually also be in the NOW while strategising too. It’s a job that requires thinking and moving ideas around. But that’s what all of your work really is. It’s all the same thing: moving ideas around and coming up with new creative ideas to insert into the flow. You are great at this. So do the same thing with the strategising. And then, as a result of the strat sessions, you’ll output plans for your week and perhaps longer term plans too. Just put them down in your calendar without trying to feel how it will feel to do those things in the future because that moves you out of the NOW. So just strategise and plan and, in that way, produce items for your calendar that you will take care of in the future.

 

When that is done, then the strat session is over. Get back into the NOW by doing what is before you in that next moment. Follow your own plan always in the NOW. Each moment only do what you have to do NOW.

 

Then, when next week rolls around and you find yourself back in your strat session, you begin by looking backwards at what worked and what did not. You refine and adjust your plan and produce another one for the next week.

 

Now, I’m not trying to teach you how to plan here. You are perfectly adequately equipped to do that. All I am doing is pointing out to you that there is a way to always remain in the NOW even when you are planning for the future and analysing the past. And when you are in the NOW, then you are not suffering.

 

This is in direct contrast to what you have been doing. You have made a practice of wallowing in the “not NOW”. You go there and tear your own soul apart with all the excruciating agony of how very wrong and bad it feels. Then you try to escape it and avoid it and do nothing. Then you suffer some more over that.

 

It would be an understatement to say that this is a highly ineffective utilisation of the beautiful bright light you bear within yourself.

 

Arn: I can see that.

 

8: So, Arn, this takes courage. It takes a willingness to begin each day with the choice to bear your burden. And then you just have to get on with it. Get into the NOW as much as you can and stay there for as long as you can. Initially this will not come naturally because you are not in the habit of doing so. And then, with practice, this will come to feel like your “safe refuge” and you’ll do so with ease.

 

And, of course, the process of learning to do this will yield great rewards too. You’ll learn about doing this and will then be able to help others to do it too.

 

It’s a beautiful thing, actually.

 

And then, when you have it all mastered, you’ll be done with it. Then it will be all over and you’ll find yourself back in the golden light of joy, but this time the dark shard will be transformed into a diamond of your soul.

 

Arn: That’s so perfect. Thank you, 8. I think I have what I need and this has been an awesome conversation. But curiosity drives me to ask one last little question. What is that dark shard, exactly? How did I first create it inside my light? And how exactly is it transformed into that beautiful jewel of my soul when I have mastered being in the Now?

 

8: It’s cute how you say you have one last “little” question and then you ask for a whole book-worth of information.

 

So here is what I am going to do. I am going to answer your question in very brief terms. This will give you some insight, but it will also open the way to many more questions that you can ask. And those additional questions will play out in our next conversation.

 

So the shard of darkness: this is your shadow. Every entity that enters into separation creates a shadow. This is the “negative self”. You see, entering into separation means moving beyond the veil. Moving beyond the veil means not knowing. Not knowing creates the inevitability of fear. And, in that moment, the shadow-self is created. This is the part of you that is motivated by your fears. The part of you that makes choices based upon what it does not know. The part of you that gives its energy to that which it does not want to have occur. Giving your energy to the opposite of your desire is a dark thing to do. It is a twist in your psyche from which your light cannot escape.

 

So the shadow is born when you enter separation. As long as you have this shadow in your soul, there is a part of yourself in separation. You can therefore not ever truly leave separation. The only thing to do is to come to totally heal Shadow. To completely redeem this part of yourself. There are different ways to do this. Since the most ancient times mystery schools have taught that one defeats the shadow by overcoming fear entirely. This is a very hard path. There is an easier path and that is to see that there really is nothing to fear in the first place. Whenever you move into the Now, you are where fear cannot reach you. Discovering that you can do this at will… that you can, if you choose, reside in the Now permanently… is to find that there is no cause for fear. You discover then that fear is an option. It is simply a choice. And you are the one who chooses.

 

Arn: Hmm-mmh. Okay I am getting that and it sounds awesome. But… you were quite right. It does open the door to more questions. I look forward to this next conversation then. A conversation about Shadow.

 

8: I’ll await your call.