So these limitation factors that are present in human beings which spoil the pattern of individual manifestation, cloud the vision with respect to what is really working out, are often the basis upon which a human being makes an utterly false judgment and then assumes a pattern of self-righteousness which is in the range, the danger range, the range where well, results are questionable shall we say. This matter of the limitation factors can be seen in this regard from a little different standpoint. Again, I am going to use a particularized application of the principle as it relates to me. The same principle extends on out through to you, to the degree that you reach a point of carrying focalization, responsibility, etc.
But many people have found it difficult, so they say, to understand me. Actually it should not be so. But many have imagined it to be so because they try to see me in a position where I am not. They develop a mirage and they imagine they see me in this position or that, and they try to work out a pattern of understanding, or concept or attitude, with respect to the mirage, and then they direct that toward me. Now that leads to this question, “Where am I; where can I be found; where can I be seen?”
In only one place, and that is in the position of complete and absolute and centered dedication to the LORD’s service on earth, without regard to persons or places or things. And the moment the pattern of relationship between me and someone else begins to get in a position where I would have to violate that, I seem to violate the pattern of friendship, or love, or whatever else, because I am in just one place, not some other, just one, and in this one place, on the basis of that pattern of dedication, my function is not as the human pattern of function might be, or might be imagined.
In the first place, even if we were to carry it back to a matter of self-interest, of personal fulfilment. I know that whatever fulfilment I am to have, and I am not particularly concerned about that, but whatever fulfilment I may have must come as a result of Unit fulfilment—a fulfilment in and through those whom I serve, and I cannot have any fulfilment on any other basis. I do not want any. I am not interested. My concern then is not with respect to personal fulfilment of any kind or regard whatsoever. My concern is for the fulfilment of the whole, and I know that whatever fulfilment I need will come automatically in that.
Now human beings tend to constantly imagine that they can establish some kind of a pattern in relationship to me, and it works with men and women both, all kinds of situations, where they can establish a basis of relationship according to their idea of what would be desirable. They think they see something in my being or my living, or something which would make their pattern acceptable. They imagine that it would fit and so they begin to see me in relationship to that, and build up a mirage in relationship to me in a position where I am not, and proceed then to try to make it work on that basis, and it will not, it absolutely will not work. So, I have seen human beings build one mirage after another, adjusting them a little bit, trying to make it work, and it will not.
What do these mirage patterns evolve out of? What is their source? Some kind of a desire on the part of the individual to attain satisfaction, fulfilment, position, love, growth, spiritual growth, unfolding some kind of personal progress, something for himself or herself. Now, generally after a person comes here, he has refined it a little bit, so he puts it on the basis, “Well, I just want to grow. I want to have the knowledge. I want to have the understanding. I want to have the spiritual awareness, etc., that will let me be of real service to God and to man. I want this personal fulfilment, but I do not want it for selfish reasons, understand. I want to be able to serve. But I do want this personal fulfilment.” And there you are. That person, having so set his course is headed for trouble, sooner or later, because if your desire is for personal fulfilment you cannot share with me that which I have to share. I do not care how good your reason for desiring that personal fulfilment may be. To serve God Almighty, you think. It will not work.
One of the things that begins to work immediately in our class program here or your experience on Sunrise Ranch is the process of diminishing, taking away, modifying, removing, the desire for personal fulfilment. And sometimes human beings struggle with that, they imagine that they were making a lot better progress out there somewhere, and they say, “Here, I do not know what is happening to me. I do not feel the same way, and I am not encouraged to make all these steps in personal fulfilment. I want to do this. I want to become something important in God's Service.”
A desire for personal fulfilment for such a good reason, but it will not work. You might as well get it clear to start with. It will not work because if your function here as an individual or class member, in class or out of it, continues to be based upon a desire for personal fulfilment, you are going to fail, and sooner or later, if you persist in that pattern, something will work out, and I will help to emphasize; if necessary, the fact that it will not work. Some experience will begin to show it.
Until we reach a point of absolute selflessness in regard to these things, where our one concern is for the fulfilment of the whole, the outworking of God's Plan, without regard to personal fulfilment—until we reach that point, the individual is constantly going to do those things which will defeat his fulfilment. This is not a paradox really. It may look like it. But the individual who desires personal fulfilment will constantly do those things which will prevent his personal fulfilment. No matter how hard he tries, no matter how hard he works or what he does, as long as his motivating factor is for personal fulfilment for no matter how good a cause, he is going to serve the LORD and KING of Heaven and earth once he has this fulfilment, he will persistently and constantly do those things which defeat him. If you need to analyze that, we might do so sometime. Actually, it is easy to see why. From what we have already studied, it should be evident. But this limitation factor of self-centeredness, given a new dress, is a wolf in sheep's clothing.
Out in the world the individual who is selfish and self-centered obviously has this attitude; he is not particularly concerned about anybody else. But as there is response coming to the point here, the individual realizes that a selfish, self-centered pattern is not going to be acceptable, so he dresses it up. He is going to desire personal fulfilment in order to Glorify God, and serve his brother man, then everything is going to be all right. He has got a new reason now for desiring personal fulfilment, and he prevents that fulfilment.
Now I have pointed out over and over again that certain things are necessary if we are to have fulfilment, that is true, so I am not in any sense contradicting myself. The point is, that if you are functioning on basis, a motivating factor of a desire for that personal fulfilment, even if it is to serve God Almighty, or get to heaven, or be saved, or anything else that is supposedly good, you will defeat yourself. We have to reach a point where our first concern, our primary motivation is for the welfare and fulfilment of the whole, where relinquishing the things personally desired for the benefit of the whole is no longer in any sense a sacrifice. And once we have integrated in consciousness, in the feeling realm, into the Unit pattern, with that centralized dedication, we will be in position to let it work out.
As long as you have a personal desire for fulfilment and that is the driving force, you will not let it work out. You are going to be interfering with your own progress at every turn. You will not let God bless you, you will not let anyone else bless you. You are making a constant hodgepodge of your own life because you will not let it work out. You may say, “Well, I try so hard.” But it will not work. Once we have this centralized dedication, the fulfilment of the Unit is the first thing that is the motivating factor in all that we think and say and do, we begin to have a love and a concern for all, but we cease working on the basis of personalities as such. It frees us from so many traps.
Now we could conceivably take perhaps several weeks analyzing the limitation factors in all their different patterns of manifestation which prevent the progress of individuals. Oh, it is a big field and we could spend a lot of time in it, but all it would amount to would be to come back to this one thing, with a lot of supporting evidence that the individual who desires personal fulfilment, and that is his primary motivating factor, is constantly defeating himself. And the moment we accept the central dedication with respect to the whole, we are freed from so many, many traps because then personal feelings with respect to others is no longer a controlling factor. Either a feeling of love or a feeling of, what shall we say, not caring quite so much? We love all, but there are some we like to be around, and others we do not care to be around too much—there is a differential. But on either basis we are not controlled, our feelings are not controlled by such things, our attitudes are not controlled by such things, which means that we are not controlled by others as human beings, their whims and fancies, their pushings and pullings, and there is the breakdown, there is the barrier which human beings have not surmounted down through these millenia which separate us from the day of the fall.
Personal desires for fulfilment, position, accomplishment, attainment, something; the personal desire to be saved, out here in the world churches; the personal desire for position, the personal desire for particularized security patterns, all kinds of things—human beings trying to attain good, such good goals. They are so well justified. But these are the things that are wolves in sheep's clothing, because they make the individual forget the whole, and he is governed by the people he loves, and by the people he dislikes, by circumstances, by what he thinks will be good for himself. “This will help me grow. That will hinder my growth, so I will stay away from that.” He is trying to make the whole universe revolve around himself as a human being.
Generally, at first at least, if you were to point that out to someone, they think, “Oh, no, I do not want to be the center of everything. I just want what I want.” But you cannot be self-centered, even in the refined sense, without in actual fact trying to get God, the universe, and everyone on the face of the earth, to revolve around you. You are going to be the big hit. Perhaps you never thought of self-centeredness that way, and you think it is extreme. Oh, no, it is not extreme at all.
If we carry out the implications in the various attitudes, I know you would deny it, and say, “Oh, no, I do not want anything like that.” And maybe some will say, “I do not even see how it connects up.” It does, it really does. So the difference is, the self-centered person who seeks personal fulfilment for the best of reasons, to serve God, or to serve me, or to do something else, is asking God, the universe, me, everyone here on the Ranch, to revolve around him or her, and it will not work.
I am not the center of the universe, nor are you. We are out here in this little world, and it is a vitally important world, and we have a big enough task without trying to take on the universe, and without trying to direct God. But that is where self-centeredness leads to, that is why it separates us from God, from life, from opportunity, from privilege, from everything lovely and beautiful, because it puts the individual in the position of trying to exert influence, to the end that it shall all revolve around himself. I do not want it to all revolve around me. I am perfectly content to leave it to the Beings whose task it is to provide that centering. I have no envy of them. I have great love for them, admiration, respect and a deep willingness to obey.
So, we come to the point of realizing, if we will, that we can shed limitation factors almost as you would take off a coat, by this one change. We could spend weeks analyzing the whole field and waste our time. I may touch into the field now and again to be sure that a point is cleared for you, but it comes down to this: Where is the centering of your dedication, and what is the real motivating factor? Personal fulfilment or fulfilment for the whole? If it is fulfilment for the whole, and the dedication is so centered there that all of these pushings and pullings are like the waves around a granite rock, all will be well.
And so, one of the limitation factors that has been at work, and still is on Sunrise Ranch, is because human beings are trying to see me where I am not. A mirage vision. They may think they see me over there. But where is it that we have the mirage? In the desert place where there is not enough water, not enough Truth. And a mirage vision has no reality in it. [greatcosmicstory.blogspot.com/the-uranda-may31-1953-class-0-0-1-26.html] Many a person, perishing of thirst in the desert, has seen a mirage and started toward it, and if you had been there and tried to restrain him and tell him it was a mirage, he would have called you a liar, he would have fought you, he would have done anything. He says, “I see it”, and he is going to go to it, and goes stumbling out across the desert to let his bones be picked by the vultures and bleached by the sun. So it is, here.
A mirage vision is never dependable, and when I suggest that it is a mirage vision, sometimes the human being tries to tell me I am wrong, and the individual says, “Well I cannot doubt my own senses. I see.” Yes, the mirage on the desert can be seen, you see. But sooner or later, each must learn to look for me where I am and not where I am not. And remember that when personal fulfilment for any individual comes into a position where it seems to be weighed in the balance against the fulfilment of the whole, there is not a single one of you I would not sacrifice, that quickly. If we function correctly, it will not get in that position. If you are not functioning in a self-centered pattern, desiring personal fulfilment or something of that nature, it will never get into that pattern, but if it seems to to you, remember that there is no person on the face of the earth, no matter how much I love that person, no group of persons, the whole lot of you if it comes to that, that I would not sacrifice. It would not be really be my doing it, but I would not yield to the pressure; it would seem to avert it but it really would not, in relationship to the whole, because it is the whole as far as I am concerned.
I love the individuals who work toward that ministry in the whole, for the whole, but personalities, human ideas, desires and determinations that tend to interfere with that whole have absolutely no weight, meaning or value to me. I will modify such things as long as I may. I will make it as easy for you to come out of that pattern, the Egyptian darkness, as you will let it be, but personalities as such, no matter who you are or how important your potentiality, cannot change the course as far as I am concerned.
So, look for me where I am and you will learn to share that fulfilment which is being made manifest in the whole in relationship to me, and all others who share that task. We share it on the right basis or we do not share it. I cannot change the Laws of God, but if I could I would not to please you or anyone else on the face of the earth. It is this way, and it is going to stay that way no matter who comes or goes, who pushes or pulls, no matter what mirage visions may be engendered. It is this way, like it or not. So let us learn to like it.
And remember whenever you find yourself motivated by a desire for personal fulfilment, whether it is just in a moment, and a little thing or a big thing, that is a trap. Stay out of it. Our purpose here is the fulfilment of the whole to the Glory of God, our LORD and KING, and to the blessing of mankind—and the human limitation patterns or factors may be swept away in this. We can go out in the field here, and struggle with this one and that one, and try to overcome this one and change that one, and we can spend our lives struggling at the job, never get it done, and accomplish nothing. There have been many who have been, what shall we say, by some enchantment, carried away into that vast field where they are going to serve humanity, changing this little human limitation pattern and that one, doing this and that and the other thing, steadying the whole mess—and oh, it can be fascinating.
If I had had it in my mind to violate my sphere of responsibility, I think I could have made a journey into that field so fascinating, so interesting, and so seemingly important and valuable, that there are very few of you who would not have followed me if I had taken you into it. I could have done it. I venture there are not many who would not have followed, because I could have made it very fascinating, and seem to be so important, and you would not have known that you had left the true course until you were so far away you could not have ever gotten back. But actually, we do not need to go out there.
We can deal with these problems at their basic point of cause, clear the pattern and move forward. And for those individual needs which may arise, there will be help in its season, but this is the way it is, now and in all the days to come. So let us thank God for it, and work according to the pattern as it is, and not try to make it be the way we think we would like it to be. God bless you each one.
