Years ago when I was still in the midst of grieving over the loss of my sons due to doing the “right thing” by having them live with their father after divorce; I went to a hypnotherapist for a past life reading.  During that previous life in some east coast Native American community, I got in touch with the spirit of camaraderie that was much like the level 5 group environment referred to by Alysia in focus retrievals, but, on this plane.  It explained why I was able to quickly learn how to (P.E.T.) work with my children in an atmosphere of unconditional love and cooperation for the good of the family.  I recall as I walked into that community, I was welcomed as a master of the crafts that individuals in the community were working on.  I look for those individuals in this life and because I don’t recognize them I tend to view many I resonate with as possibilities. I was an elderly woman at that time and we laughed with glee as I joined them. It was a delightful experience of us all being together and creating the various projects for the good of the community.  The warmth emanating was palatable and we all seemed to feel valued.  Meanwhile the therapist was seeing what I was seeing; I talked very little during this experience.  But when I had completed my tale including my death (but that’s another story), he was teary about my experience.  Weird but a delightful confirmation! 

I have yet to see this spirit of camaraderie happening in our culture although we do pay a lot of lip service to these concepts.  Organizations I’ve worked for seem to embrace the team concept, which only really means that as long as you do what I, the leader says, and agree with me you’re a wonderful part of the team.  I do remember that the communes of the 60’s sought this very thing but power plays and materialism won out, as might have been the case in earlier utopian communities. Certainly the Native Americans communities were annihilated by being over powered.  Currently the organizations like Pro Neighbor (downside is that they have to work with government funding-but Hey it’s a start) are attempting to use this concept within communities and of course IONS, especially people like Wink Franklin (now transitioned) work on a global level but it appears to be quite an alien concept to many of our fear based groups and individual leaders. 

Trust is the first issues as Bruce says and many of us just can’t take that first leap of faith because we could be killed, die, and disappear etc.  Monroe/Moen, the retrievers first hand accounts, and my experiences do make that concept a bit of a joke.  As long as we hold on to the allusion that we are vulnerable and victims, we can keep the game of competitiveness, power, and fear going.  I just want to get back/forward to that community that believes in the spirit of cooperation and appreciation and love as the only way to go forward.  Meanwhile I attempt to model the spirit of camaraderie described in level 5 in an atmosphere of we know what’s best for those people and individuals who rarely want to admit that those people are us caught in a system that is, so far, inherently divisional (much like the religions).  I think that every time someone remembers that it is an aspect of him or herself that is standing before him or her and that aspect is asking to be helped in a way that is loving and respectful; there is a chance that the help will be given in the right spirit.

For the time being, holding onto the past memory of that life as a reality and the love of my sons motivates me to keep going. Just being who I am and practicing what I believe about cooperation and unconditional love appear to be my most powerful tools at my disposal.  And although they seem to be leading me towards a pretty lonely existence at times, I do get a word of encouragement when I’m at my lowest 100% of the time if I remember to pick my head up, ask for help, and then become aware of the offer.  But I still do miss level 5 even though I think the work I do here is valuable, interesting, frustrating, and intense.  Do any of you out there miss Level 5 too?

Jean                

Alysia,

Thanks for being you and being here. Now get back to your book as I'm a reader and my best friends are books. I just finished Gordon's and am going through it again.  Not too many books out there really deal with an overview the way these current ones do so keep on truckin' 

Jean