How's your back doing Vajra?

What do you mean by ego? A sense of self?  The self-centered part of ourselves?

I suppose that opposed to helping out by doing something such as retrievels, a person could just sit back and say that the world is nothing but an illusion and everything is just an ego trap, and do nothing. Of course if spirits actually do get stuck and need help from us embodied folks that would be a mistake.  To them the statement "nothing you see is real" wouldn't matter much, considering their suffering. Perhaps we shouldn't count our chickens before they hatch.

I wonder if Helen Schuchman has been retrieved. Her state of mind was quite negative when she died.  Before she could ask for help, she'd have to be willing to admit that what she did is wrong.

Is it egotistical to claim that a course comes from Christ, without making a serious effort to find out if it actually does? Our so-called egos can cling to just about anything.

Greetings,

Vajra, it's especially good to hear from you!

Regarding the morality/ appropriateness of retrievals, the process of most retrievals for the retrievers is to first ask Guidance for help. I believe this Guidance is like an OverSoul or Guardian Angel; when asked, it suggests right choices. A few times my Guidance has redefined my purpose in going or even denied that some retrievals were possible.
Alysia was the first  on site to  begin emphasizing this important step -- many thanks, Allysia!

When first attempting retrievals, it's good at first to let Guidance make the choices of where one goes. I suspect that the souls we are sent to are those we have some sort of attachments to through our Disk family or Earth-bound contacts.

Our discussions here, not Bruce's examples in his books, got us into the idea we could go get whomever we chose.

Most or all retrievals that others requested were actually visitations. I used that word instead of retrievals in my reports on the retrieval forum. I, or we in some group efforts, were allowed to visit the deceased, verify who they were to the best of our ability, and communicate with them briefly on whatever issue their earthbound relative/friend had requested.

So what you are discussing  is partially a problem of semanatics --we just don't have enough words for this newish activity!

Bets

Hi everybody..as a way to participate on this thread I've written an article and provided a link to anyone interested, regarding R's question what is the ego.

I worked on it about 4 hours so I hope someone benefits besides myself from writing it.
it was far too lengthy to put up here.
http://blog.myspace.com/laughingrain

Relating to what Betson wrote, I never go out and hunt for stuck spirits to retrieve. Spirit helpers direct them my way.

Sometimes the egotistical part of myself wants to take credit for helping with retrievels. I hate it when it does that.  I need to get to the point where I'm certain of my spiritual beauty to an extent, where I don't need to seek for ways to validate myself. I say this, even though I believe it is beautiful when people do things to help other living beings.

Vajra:

Responses below in quotation marks:


I'd agree 100% that we manifest at multiple levels, including the individual. I guess the issue arises when we identify with the individual persona as what we are - we progress from that point to build a whole edifice of beliefs to prop up that core one.

[The above seems to contend that the creative part of our being can only be used to create meaningless delusion. What about love and beauty? Certainly it is okay for souls who know how to live according to love and wisdom to make use of the creative part of their selves in a meaningful way.  The creative aspect of our being is divine just as awareness and love are divine. In fact, I believe that love is one of the attributes that came to be after source being learned to use its creative aspect of being to create love.  Love implies more than one, because love is an attribute that is shared.]


I know you're not keen on ACIM ad eastern stuff, but for what it's worth they would both suggest that ego is not just a wrong view but actually the direct result of our mistakenly deciding that the individual self is what we are.

[The above is one of the reasons I don't agree with ACIM and Eastern teachings.  I used to believe in the no-self viewpoint for a number of years, but when I reached the point where I realized that the gurus of the World don't have all of the answers, I started to come to understand that it is possible for unique souls to exist, without these souls being nothing but an illlusion.

Consider the factor of mind. Each of us has the ability to think in our own way. For a while we get bogged down in our psychological conditioning and thinking seems like a problem. Eventually our souls reach a state of being where it isn't a problem for us to have the ability to think.

Our ability to think and learn isn't something that exists independent of the awareness part of ourselves. Our ability to be aware, think, learn, understand and create according to what we learned, are all connected.

The extent to which each of our souls is unique is demonstrated by the fact that each of our souls manifest according to their own level of development. It isn't a matter of a bunch of unconnected mind energy moving about in a chaotic random way and our experiences changing from moment to moment. Rather, there is a connection between what we experience one day and what we experience the next day,  because the spirit energy that has been allocated to each of us can be allocated in a meaningful and permanent way.

This is more than intellectual banter. Some of my experiences and the experiences of other people have found that our souls do have a factual reality. This is hard to see if we keep looking for ways to see that our soul isn't there. Sure we can't grab hold of one object and say this is "I." But we can experience as much of the totality of ourself as we are able, and come to understand that we do exist as unique beings. We can do this and at the same time see that we are parts of a greater whole.

If there is in fact only one being and the rest of us are a bunch of delusions, then I figure part of the totality has already claimed dibs on being this one self. This means that rest of us will eventually puff out of existence and only one self all by its lonesome self will exist. Thank goodness that my experiences and the experiences of others have found differently, even though people have claimed that there is no such thing as a specific entity while existing as specific entities.  ]  

In the ACIM case it's taught as being a response to the fear experienced on the initial separation from God by the collective mind of which we are a part - all of the subsequent urges, beliefs and motivations follow from the attempt to support this view, and to suppress an (inappropriate) fear that it will result in punishment by God.

[I figure billions of souls in various bodily forms have incarnated on this earth. I find it hard to believe that we have a basic guilt about separating from God. For one thing, I don't believe that we actually ever completely separate from God.  Also, I believe that we incarnate into this World for very definite reasons, not just so we can some day escape it.  It seems to me that ACIM might cause a person to believe in a guilt that we don't originially have.  I don't believe that this is productive. It might set a person off course.  Belief systems have a way of doing so.]

Don:

-Even if it were possible for guides to provide information that could be verified on the internet (or some other way) everytime a retrievel took place, a skeptic might believe that a person researched online obituaries, and then claimed that retrievels were done.

-Not all spirits that are retrieved will have their obituary on the internet.

-It isn't always easy to obtain a name in a clear way. Even if you do obtain a name you'll need other information, because numerous people have the same name.

-For some of the retrievels I did in a manner similar to what Bruce Moen advocates, information I could verify is the last thing I had in mind.

-If a person really wants to help, I believe it is best that he or she gives it a go, rather than wait for some detailed study to take place.

-I can't underestimate the value of reaching a point where a person understands that he or she is working with spirit helpers that won't lead he or she on wild goose chases.

I agree that in the beginning a person should find a way to make certain that he or she is actually helping with retrievels.

Hi R. I guess I'm certainly not in a position to verify or otherwise the macro ACIM/Eastern view on ego/existence of this reality. The best I can manage is that as a working hypothesis I seem to find it provides consistent answers to many difficult questions about the nature of existence. We each have to follow our own path, and as before there's many ways up the hill.

To try to summarise one view:

The teaching is basically that mind creates, but that only creations based on love (that reflect God/ highest mind) have any real existence. That the rest is unreal, and subject to dissolution once we drop our belief in it.

The logic is basically that there is an aspect of mind that believes in separation that creates our perception of this this whole reality - the appearance of ego/self, and the context it exists within. It does this by applying selective perception - seeing only in accordance with it's beliefs.

While we experience just our own 'piece' of this separated aspect of mind, it's ultimately collectively comprised of the sum of all of the bits of separated mind 'belonging' to all the beings in this reality.

This mind or ego (whether collective or individual) is driven by fear to keep on dividing further and further down into ever more granular/individual  form - as it seeks to avoid recognition of the reality of its situation.

It's situation is built to create a preoccupation with conflict. The creative ability it draws on, and which it/we use to create it derives from God, and is love. But despite this it seeks to use it to create beings/situations that it is aggressive towards, and which are aggressive towards each other. (out of fear, and out of the mistaken sense that taking leads to growth/survival)

These realities are not supported by God/highest mind, as a result cannot be real, and exist only as long as we (not necessarily consciously) continue to believe in them.

We each meanwhile contain too an aspect of mind that knows all and is never separated from God (perhaps in the eastern traditions that which gives rise to Buddha nature) - which continues to be guided by Spirit, and eventually as a result leads to our dropping belief in the reality/beliefs created by the ego aspect of mind.

This leaves us harbouring split minds, with conflicting impulses and beliefs depending on which tune is playing at a given time. This explains too the creative and genuinely loving aspects we can display - as well as the the more horrendous variety.

The ending of this is it seems an all or nothing affair - the logic being that we can't be truly loving while we harbour elements of the selfish and aggressive tendencies of ego, and consequently perceive some people as 'good', and some as 'bad'. (fail to see their true nature beyond the veneer created by ego)

This on the basis that reality is the God created 'oneness', unity and loving nature of all beings - that our perception of separation is mistaken. When we project and judge others as evil or negative we are in this situation in effect judging ourselves.

Which  on the positive side suggests that we only have to heal ourselves to heal all.

Our task is not to learn what at the higher level we already know and have not forgotten - our task instead is to drop the ego fuelled but unfounded belief in guilt and separation.

We're already forgiven by a loving God on the basis that the separation never happened in reality - our task can thus be seen actually to be only to forgive ourselves. Because by the same logic once we forgive self we forgive all.

Some of us have temporarily experienced a sense of the joy this oneness/unity brings about in higher states of consciousness - and the resulting knowing while not scientific has left us in no doubt as to its existence.

On proof or otherwise. There's actually quite a lot of documented stuff about, but if the above is broadly true it points to a fundamental issue where 'scientific' proof is concerned.

To access other realities we seem require a mind state where the thinking mind and especially ego is transcended. Having (not) done so we contact realities we can perceive/report only in time/space, linear logic, relative and ego informed terms - terms which are inherently biased and grossly unsuited to dealing with multi faceted and holistic realities which dance in and out of existence.

Is it any wonder that the spiritual traditions counsel great care in the application of rational thought to matters spiritual, and emphasise the importance of higher intuitive knowing? We're essentially stuck with the problem that whatever we believe we will perceive.

PS Don. 'sexually torturing' surely distorts Monroe's account of the past life you mention. He was in a sense tempted - and proved his worthiness to all present by not succumbing..