Marsha Bogolin February 7, 2021 Seoul, South Korea
Last Sunday we completed our seventh Living the Word [LTW] seminar in Korea. Thirteen participants and eight others joined as staff for part or all of the time. It was a powerfully transformative time. In the fine pneumaplasm that built in our eight days together, we touched deep remembrance of our original heavenly home. On Saturday before my last presentation I awoke with a vivid message from Heaven, to help participants handle creatively the challenges they would likely face after returning to daily life. I want to consider that message further now, because I think it may help those who participated in LTW, as well as everyone else.
As I said, we shared a wonderful, heavenly time together in LTW. But, after returning home I guessed at some point each would notice things in their lives that are not so heavenly. That might stir disappointment and questioning—of oneself, of whether it’s really possible to bring heaven into our daily lives. Certainly the lifestyles of most Koreans don’t make that easy. Working late into the night, busy most of the day, leaves little space for generating finer pneumaplasm. Especially in LTW having 8 days together, participants really discovered how much difference pneumaplasm makes in our lives. Pneumaplasm opens our remembrance of who we truly are, our power, vision and freedom. It actually makes more difference in our lives than money.
This message Heaven gave me was to help our LTW friends sustain this essential pneumaplasm in daily life. I want to talk about one part of the message: We don’t have a choice of what comes to us, but we do have a choice of what we give our hearts to. Our freedom of choice is such a precious gift. But most people waste it because they direct it wrongly. They spend a lot of time trying to get good things to come to them and avoid bad things. This precious freedom of choice is not for what comes to us. It’s the freedom to choose how we respond to what comes. That is principally what we direct our feelings to: negative reaction to the challenge, or response to Heaven so it may help us handle the challenge creatively. Do we give our hearts to pain and troubles? Or to the Light from which our help comes? What we give our heart to determines where we will go. If we give our strong feelings to things of Light, we’ll move in a creative direction. If we give our strong feelings to things of darkness, pain, hopelessness, that is where we’ll go.
I’m not suggesting we won’t feel troubled feelings. But we can learn to use the troubled feelings as fuel for what we’re creating. Feelings, emotion is energy. How we use that energy determines whether it overcomes us or empowers us. In this too we have choice. That choice depends on where we stand in relation to the energies. If we stand below them, they surround and engulf us. If we stand above them, they can be a “kick that becomes a boost.” Uranda suggested we can reach a state where “Every kick becomes a boost.” The negative energies actually propel us higher. This is, I hear, one of the secrets of martial arts. Like that, we can divert negative, attacking energy to our creative purpose. Sometimes a few days before it’s my turn to speak for Sunday service, LOTS of negative energies come. Disappointing circumstances, near or far. At times I’ve wondered how I could offer something that inspires others when I myself need inspiring. Maybe you’ve already guessed the secret to this: Work through the energies to inspire yourself and that’s how you will inspire others. When you do that, you discover the gift within the challenge. Then the challenge no longer feels like a burden, but a wonderful opportunity. Like Uranda says in the Seven Steps To The Temple Of Light: “Every instant is filled with glorious adventures in Radiating Love.”
We don’t have a choice of what comes to us, but we do have a choice of how we respond to what comes. The habit of reacting to what comes runs very deep in humanity. Here’s something I’ve found very helpful from Uranda: “The human being reacts and becomes subject to that which is external to himself. He is not his own. If anyone says an ill thing, does something wrong, there is an emotional upheaval and he is subject to what someone else has said or done.”
You’ve experienced that, right? Me too. This is a habit that takes real commitment to change. Thousands of times of recommitting. The way Uranda describes this helped me change that habit. At times when I’ve thought, “I really don’t like what that person did. But I am not going to be subject to that person. I reacted emotionally, and that caught part of my heart. I’m not going to let more of my heart be caught by continuing to be subject to that.” Can you feel how realizing this stirs our true power?
Uranda emphasized the importance of Jesus’ words: “Let not your heart be troubled.” He called it a divine command, as important a commandment as the two great commandments. Uranda said: “Let not your heart be troubled.” Let not your feeling perception, the means by which you can become aware of the spirit of God, be troubled. Do not use this ability to bring things of spirit into the range of your mind to become aware of every ill thing round about you, to become subject to it, but turn the eyes of your spirit to God.
Uranda called our hearts, our feeling nature, the eyes of our spirit. “Turn the eyes of your spirit to God,” especially when we see and feel distortions and pain. Why? Because if we don’t, it rapidly takes us on a downward spiral. Even thousands of years ago, wise sages have known this. I want to read some verses from the Bhagavad-Gita. As some of you probably know, the Gita is among the most important texts of Hindus and was written about 200 BCE. Uranda loved the Gita, and thought the translation by Sir Edwin Arnold was particularly true to its original meaning. Since at least the 1950s, the Gita was one of the important booklets for Emissary spiritual education. As I mentioned in LTW, most Americans were Christian during Uranda’s lifetime. So of course he utilized Christian scriptures, like the Bible, because that was the context of most people’s understanding. But he was not limited to those. This verse from the Gita has been a guiding star for me for decades: “Who keeps the mastery of himself? If one ponders responsively the objects of the outer, there springs attraction; from attraction grows desire. Desire flames to fierce passion. Passion breeds recklessness. Then the memory—all betrayed—lets noble purpose go, and saps the mind, till purpose, mind, and man are all undone.”
Doesn’t that describe exactly the downward spiral we sometimes take? It starts with just a little turning of our hearts to outer circumstances. At first it may be just a little attraction. But attraction grows. From attraction grows desire. It grows more. “Desire flames to fierce passion.” And soon “passion breeds recklessness.” Passion for outer things blinds us and we do foolish things. Then our memory of the Light fades. And we forget our noble purpose. The mind is drained (sapped) of its memory of true purpose. “Purpose, mind, and man are all undone.” We fall into despair. That’s the downward spiral. It starts with just a little tangent from the Light.
There are two ways we repeatedly make trouble for ourselves: 1. Emotional reaction to circumstances. We’ve covered that fairly well. Let’s go to the second: 2. Manipulating change versus initiating a creative cycle for change.
As I said earlier, there are things in our lives that are not so heavenly. Things that clearly need changing. Usually people don’t even think of initiating a creative cycle to bring change. Usually it’s: “I want it to change, and I want it to change right now!” So we do something in frustration. And that actually makes things worse. You’ve done that, right? I have. Actions based in frustration, or more subtle reactions like calculated manipulation. But these actually interfere with what was already in motion from Heaven to bring change. Such reactive actions actually block us from seeing what we could do to assist the change Heaven is bringing. The usual approach is: react to what needs changing, complain about it, tear it apart, and then demand change. That sounds more like a destructive cycle than a creative cycle, doesn’t it? Most of the time, we don’t have to engineer the whole change. What’s needed from us is usually just a small part to initiate change. But instead of a light touch, we get out our big hammer.
When you see things that need changing, likely that indicates a Water Cycle. What is our right action in the Water Cycle? In the first seminar, Art of Living, we learn: Listen for direction and design. In LTW, our fourth seminar, we look more deeply. We see it’s important that we respond to the Light and initiate a creative cycle. As I said, the usual approach when things happen that we don’t like is we object to what’s happening. That drags us down into the darkness. We get involved in the problem. Instead, we have to deliberately do something to increase the light. Do something that turns our attention to the Light—away from problems. When we have a problem, it can absorb all of our attention. But when we respond to the Light, we begin to see what we could do about the problem. How we see and what we see changes. We see opportunities, new starting points, larger perspective.
I think all of you have discovered how much changes when you respond to the Light. At times, it takes some muscle, spiritual muscle, to deliberately respond to the Light, the Truth. One of the processes we learned in LTW to handle heavy patterns and challenges is Attunement Prayer. It actually does just this. It turns our attention to the Light and helps us initiate a creative cycle.
“Initiate a creative cycle” does not mean that quick action is never needed. But even quick action should be based in true creative principles, and attitudes that are true to who we are. But most of the time quick action is not needed. Have you noticed that God’s creations, Nature’s creations, take time? Especially in this age of the internet and cellphones where everything is done 5 seconds, we forget that things take time. What if instead of a baby taking 9 months to develop in the womb, it took just 9 minutes? I think most mothers would not like that. Even in spring leaves and flowers don’t just pop out. They gently grow and unfold over a number of weeks. It takes patience to initiate a creative cycle for change. Patience! The first step to become the Temple of Light.
Now we clearly see the two ways we repeatedly make trouble for ourselves. What can we do instead? Instead of emotional reaction to circumstances, we realize: We do have a choice of what we give our hearts to. What should we give our hearts to? What’s the creative choice? Heaven, the Light, Truth. In a way at the mental level, this is a very simple thing. But have you noticed how easy it is to forget it? Because the habit and prevailing practice in humanity is definitely not to respond to the Light. That’s why I’m emphasizing it. It has to go in so deep that even when it’s very dark for us, we can remember, “What was that? Oh! Respond to the Light.” Because there are things that happen that actually trick us. We think we’re doing something creative, but actually it’s manipulation.
I love how the Gita describes this choice:“Whoso, shaking off the yoke of the outer, lives lord, not servant, of his life. Set free from pride, from fear, from the sin of "self," that one touches tranquility! That is the state Divine!”
So in my words, when we choose to shake off control by outer circumstances, we live as lord of our life, not victim. We start to experience tranquility, and we know the divine state. We know who we really are.
Let’s review what we can do instead of the second way we make trouble for ourselves. Instead of manipulating change, we can initiate a creative cycle for change. We begin a creative cycle by responding to the Light. Then we work with the creative principles each step of the way under Heaven’s guidance. When we give our full heart to this, heaven begins to take form through us. The things that were not so heavenly in our lives become just a little more heavenly. And step by step we experience more of heavenly home in our lives. We bring heavenly home once again to this beautiful Earth. And the key is what we give our heart to. In this we have a choice. What we give our heart to determines how much pneumaplasm we generate and sustain. And pneumaplasm makes all the difference in our lives.
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I really appreciate what you’ve each commented. WeHyun spoke about a lot of despair in the world. Those of you who watch what’s happening in America probably realize there’s quite a lot of despair there, but not only in America, many places. So all of that is like a weight on our pneumaplasm. It’s almost as if we have strings attached to humanity that can suck out our pneumaplasm. So I’m really glad for those who realize how important it is for us to turn our hearts to the Light. WeHyun also said it’s not whether we can or can’t; it’s simply a matter of choice. We can see that clearly because we have enough pneumaplasm to see it. But actually a lot of people in the world have virtually no pneumaplasm, and it is hard for them even to realize they have choice. So that’s even more reason why we need to turn our hearts to the Light regularly. I was so glad Lilac spoke about the help that comes through our Sunday services in navigating our daily lives. As we choose the Light, the pneumaplasm on earth increases because of us. That gives others a chance. Someone also said even when I’m experiencing pain and suffering, still I can choose the Light. That’s an important realization. Especially when our own bodies, minds and hearts are in pain, turn to the Light. And don’t judge that you are feeling all this. Love yourself and surround yourself with the Light of Truth. In time, it will begin to change what you feel and think also.
I want to touch one last thing before closing. I’m glad that some who attended LTW spoke and acknowledged the large challenge that was waiting when they returned home. Or as OonHwa said, “Oh, I can feel the pneumaplasm going down!” Sometimes when people have experienced heaven and power and the truth of who they are, when they are hit by a wave that knocks them unconscious, they may actually say, “I wish I never touched heaven.” Because it is painful, painful to realize the difference. The fact is you may be more aware of the difference, but the level of pain is no different. Even in that time when it feels hopeless that you could ever return to heaven, turn to the Light. You have many friends now that can help you do that. When we help any other one, we help ourselves. In a way, each one of us is like a cell in the body of mankind. Sometimes some of the cells in our body are in great pain and darkness. We surround them with Light. But that cell, that person, must make the choice to turn to the Light. That is not something we can do for anyone else. It is our freedom of choice, each one individually. But as we make that choice, we make it so much easier for others to choose that too. When we are experiencing the Light of who we are, there’s no question about which is the right choice, the joyful choice, the exciting choice. It’s only in the darkness that there’s a hypnosis that can take us down. So let’s choose to give our hearts to the Light.
