GF Live 09-24-22 Stop And Drop Any Painful Negative Reaction

I'm glad that you're here.

I'm glad that we have,

Again,

Some time to work together,

To look together at some of the things that,

While we must work on them individually,

Changes our relationship with each other and the world that we're in.

So we'll just do as I always do and urge you to do.

Let's take a nice deep breath.

Just become as fully present to ourselves as we know how to be.

It really is effortless.

You walk by a bakery shop and that fresh baked bread or chocolate chip cookies is wafting outside the door.

It doesn't take any effort at all,

Does it,

To connect yourself to the whole of that moment.

And of course,

For one reason or another,

The whole of that moment is the sudden sense of pleasure,

Quite a bit connected,

I might add,

To our memories of subsequent days with fresh baked bread or chocolate chip cookies.

But the simple point being that it takes no effort to give ourselves to something that we want to give ourselves to.

But if we're going to become a different kind of human being,

Which is I trust the reason that you tune in and listen to the speaker,

In search of a new order of understanding,

If we're going to become a new kind of human being,

Go through the necessary transformation that requires what it does,

We're going to have to want to give ourselves to something that presently we want to run from as fast as we can.

So I think pretty much everyone that's going to be here for this is going to be on board.

So let's get started.

It's a bit of a quiz.

What's the one thing that we do every day,

Multiple times,

That we don't want to do,

But that the more we do it,

The more we find ourselves not wanting what we've done?

Kind of a riddle.

What's the one thing we do every day that if we had any choice at all,

We wouldn't do it?

And yet we do.

And the more we do it,

The more we find ourselves not wanting to do that thing.

Can you guess what it is?

I'll take a moment or two and look at the little line here to see if he wants to throw an answer out.

Maggie says worry.

Okay.

Rebecca writes worry too.

We've been talking about worry quite a bit recently,

But that's not it.

Worry is the effect of what I'm talking about.

John writes get negative.

That's close.

The one thing that we do every day that we do believing that if we do it enough,

We'll finally get past the point where we have to do it.

The one thing that we do every day is identify with a negative reaction.

We are forever involved in negative reactions.

And I trust that you will see it with me because I can't spend the time to ensure that you do.

What has any negative reaction ever done for you?

Or for that matter for the world or anyone that you're involved with?

It's pretty evident that something in us thinks that there is a value in being negative.

Why else would I be negative if I didn't think there was some valid,

Justifiable reason for me to be so,

And not of that reason for being negative,

The steps that I must take to bring an end to what I see as the cause of the conflict producing that negative reaction?

And if there's anything that should be clear to us at this point,

And I trust that it's starting to be,

As long as we look at these negative reactions that we have through the same eyes that we always look at them through,

There will be no possible change in our relationship to those negative reactions.

How many times have you had a negative reaction,

Lashed out at somebody,

Did something,

And not necessarily that you see overtly negative.

Sometimes a person goes and decides,

I've got to go eat something,

I've got to go buy something,

I've got to take a trip,

I've got to run someplace.

These are all effects of a negative reaction.

How many times have you been at the end of that trail,

Produced by that reaction,

And realized,

You know,

How did I get here again?

And the answer has to be,

I got there again because I didn't see where I started.

I couldn't see that what had come over me did not come to rescue me,

But merely to keep me in the thralls of a certain set of thoughts and feelings that are forever doing the same thing.

And the same thing is that it never brings an end to those reactions.

We need a new way of looking at our own negative reactions.

This in itself is a very important subject,

Because you see,

We only look at our negative reactions through the part of ourselves that's negative.

So that what we see when we're negative is the justification in the person,

The problem,

The place,

For why we feel the way we do.

So what I'm asking,

Can we look at negative reactions that always put us on a collision course and recognize certain problems inherent in them,

So that,

And much to the opening point here,

That if we can learn to see these reactions with a new set of eyes,

Which is very much our topic of late,

Then as we learn to see these reactions in a new way,

We will learn higher ways to deal with the reaction itself,

Not deal with what we're reacting to,

Because that's automatic,

It's mechanical,

It's habitual,

It's familiar,

But a way in which we can begin to see the reaction itself,

So that we can begin to understand the nature,

The consciousness,

That always has that same reaction.

What do reactions do?

A negative reaction.

Is there ever a negative reaction that doesn't begin with resistance?

The answer is no.

So every negative reaction starts with you and I being identified with something that we blame outside of ourselves,

But that if we can look a little bit more closely,

We can see that there is something in our consciousness that is resisting with both hands and feet,

Whatever that event is that has come along,

And that we blame for that reaction.

So the root that I'm getting to here is that as long as we meet a moment and resist it,

We will never be able to see the truth of the part of us making that opposition,

That resistance.

Resistance blinds us.

You can never learn anything by resisting its appearance.

It's impossible.

See it with me,

Resistance is separation.

There's me and what I resist.

And in this moment,

What we're looking at,

If you will,

Doesn't it seem like in these moments,

More often than not,

What's that proverbial statement,

That life has thrown us a curveball?

Isn't that the onset of the negative reaction?

Here we are,

Batter at the plate,

Hoping somebody's going to throw us a little,

A home run ball,

That life will bring us this moment.

And here comes this curveball cutting inside.

And we never know,

Do we,

When that curveball is going to come.

And if we're honest with ourselves,

Because we are kind of always caught off guard by these curveballs and we keep facing the same picture,

It seems,

Our life kind of becomes this sort of tense state of always looking for the curveball.

When is the next thing coming that's going to bring up this negative reaction?

And that's the mindset.

So here's the first important point.

Then we're going to prove its possibility.

What's the one thing that never occurs to us just because someone has thrown us a curveball?

What is the one thing that never occurs to us when life throws us that unwanted moment,

Throws us that curveball?

Anybody want to put something in the line thing?

What's the one thing that never occurs to us when someone throws us a curveball?

It's so surprising.

Any thoughts?

Here's the answer.

Who says you have to catch it?

Yes,

Tony.

Yes,

Shelby.

These are all right answers.

But the response that we're looking for here is that isn't there instantaneously appearing within us in the moment anybody,

Anything,

Anyone does something that essentially challenges some image that we have of ourselves?

Because that's where the reactions are born.

Every negative reaction is the byproduct of a certain sense of threat that this identity of ours suddenly perceives as being life threatening.

Something terrible is going to happen.

And so the minute that that event,

And listen,

The moment that event seems to come at us.

We think our response to the moment that's coming at us because it's threatening us is that we have to catch it.

We have to somehow intercede in that moment with what life is throwing at us so that we can avoid or catch and control.

And what we're going to look at here together is that what is it that is actually coming at us?

What is it in those moments that threatens us,

That produces this instant resistance and that we believe is coming at us at 100 miles an hour?

And the answer is pretty simple.

What's actually coming at us is a negative consequence that we've imagined.

The moment can't throw anything at you.

I know that we don't see it because we're always feeling something coming at us.

Got to dodge,

Got to duck,

Got to catch,

Got to control.

The moment doesn't throw anything at us.

The moment is constantly bringing us into a relationship with another order of our own consciousness that doesn't fear what life brings because it realizes that whatever life is bringing to it,

To us,

It is bringing to us for the purpose of helping us go through the required transformation of that consciousness if we will agree with what is being given to us.

No negative consequence,

What we see coming at us that we take as a threat,

Can exist without our first having imagined it.

Can you see that?

It's kind of an old saying of mine that there is no such thing as psychological fear without negative imagination.

So I have a negative reaction because I feel threatened.

You don't have a negative reaction for any other reason than something has come that seems to be threatening who I am,

What I have,

And all the rest of that.

But the event that we see coming at us is the event that our own consciousness identified as it is with whatever these images of ourselves may be,

Sees the advent of that moment as something that absolutely we must protect ourselves from.

And the thing is,

If you can see it with me,

How many times in your life have you protected yourself from a moment that you didn't want only to find out that not only did you not actually free yourself from the moment you didn't want,

But the moment keeps coming back.

Maybe not with the same person,

Maybe you dumped them,

Maybe you changed where you work,

Maybe you did all of those things.

But the one constant is that wherever I go,

There always seems to be somebody,

Something throwing a curveball at me.

And so we spend our lives buying catcher mitts,

Meaning coming up with different ways in which to resolve what we think we are responsible for resolving.

That's why I say the last thing that occurs to us is that we don't have to catch it.

We believe that catching whatever it is that's coming at us is the way in which we work to resolve whatever threw it at us.

I hope you're following the metaphor.

I'm not really a baseball fan,

But it holds true.

So that what we're actually looking at in these moments that we see coming at us is what we don't want.

Now,

If I don't want something,

Why would I catch it?

Years ago,

I don't know where I was talking.

Yes,

Shelby,

It goes totally against our nature to not catch it.

I was working with some ideas at one point years and years ago.

I was sure that I wanted to.

I still would like to,

But I don't have the means or the staff.

I wanted to open a special school for children or a school where children could learn some of what I'm about to describe to you.

And one of the ways in which I had developed exercises that these children would do was that I had two bean bags.

I had a red bean bag and a green bean bag.

And I did this in some of my workshops back in the day,

Trying to illustrate this point that you don't have to catch it.

And I told the participants that the red bean bag represented something that when you caught it,

Immediately burned you,

Immediately hurt you,

Immediately caused some reaction,

Some resistance,

Some pain.

The green bag represented those events,

Everyday occurrences,

People just saying something to you,

Not somebody threatening you.

That's the red bag meaning saying something cruel.

Just conversation,

Just an event,

Going by the baker shop,

Smelling the fresh-baked cookies.

And so I had the two people stand three,

Four feet apart from each other,

And one person would hold the two bean bags behind their back.

And then they would throw one of those bean bags,

Toss it gently,

To the person standing across from them.

Now,

If I'm standing across from you three or four feet and you throw,

Toss,

A red bean bag toward me,

I can see the red bean bag when you toss it.

And if I know,

Because I'm aware that that red bean bag represents something that is threatening a problem,

A pain,

I know as I see it coming not to catch it.

Because something in me recognizes long before that bag is identified as any specific problem or pain,

I know that that is not something I want to be connected to.

Because I see the content,

I see the nature of the bag.

Are you following this illustration?

If I can see it,

I don't have to catch it.

On the other hand,

When a person from behind their back would toss the green bag,

I can see the green bag coming,

I know it's not a problem,

It's not a threat,

It's natural,

I catch the green bag.

Now,

You would be surprised how many times and in different ways individuals going through this exercise began to realize that they just catch everything that's thrown to them.

It's automatic.

And even more importantly is that they don't actually look to see what they're catching,

But it's just part of the reaction of something coming at me to catch it,

Because that's part of what this mechanical consciousness does.

Only in this instance,

What we can't see but eventually will,

Is that when we have a negative reaction of any kind,

Who is throwing it at me?

If the negative reaction is what I don't want,

And I'm looking at that which I don't want come at me,

Why in the name of God would I connect myself to it,

Give my attention to it so thoroughly that I catch that negative reaction?

And in catching it,

Of course,

Become identified with everything that that bag represents,

With everything my mind tells me that that event means.

I wouldn't have to deal with it at all at that level.

So this is why I said,

What would happen if instead of trying to deal with what we see as the cause of our reaction,

We became students of the reaction itself?

Because if I understood the reaction itself,

Then I would be there observing the reactor.

I would realize you can't separate the negative reaction from the level of consciousness that instantaneously resists anything that it finds not to its wanting.

Do you see,

Did you,

You know the original meaning in the,

Actually across the board,

In the Aramaic,

The old,

The old word repent?

It's not,

Was never meant to be this unbelievably horribly painful conflict causing idea that somehow or other you are a morally bankrupt person and you must hate yourself,

You must turn against yourself,

You must judge yourself.

The word repent meant simply to turn around and look in a new direction.

It had to do with the idea of metanoia,

A word that was quite used,

Used quite often,

A new mind.

A new mind looks in a new direction.

And the new direction that we must look in is interior.

But to do that,

We're going to need new eyes because all our present eyes,

Meaning our psychology,

The only thing it perceives instantaneously when something comes at it that's seen as a punishment or a threat,

The only thing it knows to look at is what it blames for that threat.

And again,

Just one more time,

The event never threatens you.

It's impossible for an event to threaten a human being.

The event threatens what that human being is identified with.

And it is the identification and the attachment to it that rises up and resists the moment.

And in resisting the moment only knows how to judge or blame the condition that it sees as coming to steal its contentment.

I want to show you something about reactions.

I want to help you see something about them.

It's a bit of new knowledge.

I speak of it often.

And I find it like the most valuable thing in the world to contemplate and from the contemplation to gain the eventual glimpse.

I would add before I start,

If any of you are amateur astronomers,

To have a telescope or even look up at the sky through a set of binoculars,

You are essentially looking at and up into a space that whatever you're perceiving relative to the whole of the possibility is very similar to the relationship of a grain of sand to all the sand in the world.

And so even these glimpses that we're describing,

What they do is that they prove that there is a far more vast consciousness into which we can turn our attention.

Whether or not one day by the grace of God that view expands into something that allows us to capture more than just one star,

But perhaps a galaxy,

And then maybe galaxy upon galaxy,

Because as our awareness of our consciousness expands,

So does that consciousness give us an expansive understanding of itself.

But for now,

Just to begin to look into this interior world and understand that we are forever and every one of us taking part in what we could call,

But don't see taking place,

Creation itself.

I hope you don't mind if I take pains to spell this out.

I'm looking out right now at this gorgeous first day of fall,

Sunny morning in southern Oregon.

And the turkeys are out there,

The deer are out there.

Now,

Most of us,

We look out the window,

And what we have is a kind of situational awareness relative to where we are,

What we want to do,

And how we have to navigate the space that we're in.

So that we don't see the world that we are navigating through as our mind and thoughts dictate.

We don't see that the world that we see is static,

Set.

We don't see the world that we see as static as what it actually is.

We haven't the eyes to see it.

Our physical eyes see physical things.

Our physical senses report to us that everything is fixed,

Because it has to be if we're going to navigate.

But nothing in creation is fixed.

Everything is going through a constant process of transformation.

It was one of the interesting things.

They brought so many interesting.

.

.

Whoever wrote that,

The matrix,

You saw all of that stream of what was called data,

You know,

All that stream.

There is never a moment in which the trees,

The grass that I'm looking at,

The leaf,

There's never a moment in which something isn't acting on that blade of grass.

In this instance,

This morning,

It's the sunlight.

The sunlight comes and it acts on that blade of grass.

As the sunlight acts on that blade of grass,

The blade of grass being of a different material,

Or I should say,

Being of a solidified light,

Everything is light.

The blade of grass responds to the energy of the sun as something that is acting upon it,

And it brings about a reaction in the blade of the grass.

And the reaction in the blade of grass that can't be separated from the light that is acting on it is to begin to convert that energy of that sunlight through that reaction into something that serves the overall good of that blade of grass,

That serves the ground that grass grows out of,

And that serves the creatures that nourish themselves from that blade of grass,

Literally eating sunlight.

So that there is,

In this unending relationship between all that is in existence,

This invisible yet absolutely ceaseless in its action set of reactions that are always converting what acts on something into something that what is being acted on can use that for its benefit.

So that reactions cannot be separated from,

Yes,

Isabella,

Transformation.

No reaction,

No transformation.

The question is,

And what we're looking at here,

Is whether or not in that moment where that light acts on the blade of grass,

Bringing about what?

A reconciliation,

An equalization in that moment between two very different forms of life.

So that the reaction is,

In essence,

The equalization of the will of two completely different forms of energy,

One static,

More or less,

Relative to the movement of the light.

But the bottom line is that that whole reaction and that reconciliation is literally built into that creature.

It doesn't need to do anything at all in order to allow that action,

The reaction,

And the transformation to fulfill the purpose of its existence in that moment.

And if you can see the big picture,

Then you realize that's what life is.

It's incredibly impersonal.

Now,

If you followed what I've said,

And maybe I could see a few hands over here in the box.

Are you following what I'm getting to?

Because we're about to make an important point.

So I have.

Good.

Great.

Thank you.

So here I am,

And you say something to me that I don't like.

Now,

Can I have a negative reaction to what you say to me that I don't like?

Unless prior to you saying what you've said to me,

Something within this consciousness has already,

Lives with a certain expectation that you should only say certain things to me in certain ways and never,

Ever,

Ever look at me like that,

Talk to me like that.

Don't you ever challenge my opinion.

So that what we blame the reaction on is inseparable from the consciousness that meets and goes into every one of these moments with a set of demands that it has placed upon life itself.

And when life doesn't confirm the demand that's inherent in this conditioning,

This consciousness that clings to this idea of who you should be,

How I should be,

What should happen.

That we fail to see that in those moments where something seems to be thrown at us,

That instead of trying to catch it and then control what we see as the offending event,

We can begin to do something altogether different with that moment,

Which is to meet it with a new understanding about our own reactions.

And what is the new understanding about our own reactions,

Negative reactions,

That allows us to let that curveball go by,

That allows us to not become immediately identified with it because it has struck something inside of us?

Here's the answer.

We recognize that every single moment,

And I don't know how this divine intelligence manages something as magnificent,

As unthinkable as it does,

Is bringing into what we call the moment,

And this is again,

I spoke about this last Wednesday,

What we call the moment has come and gone.

What we call the moment is what our mind has captured and then shaped into the image of something from our past so that we can look and see and say,

Oh,

That's the moment.

And then having identified what the moment is,

Decide whether or not we like what we've defined.

See it with me.

When something happens that you don't want,

The first reaction isn't that you know that he shouldn't be like that or this shouldn't take place.

The first reaction is simply the registration of something that has come in and disturbed this consciousness.

That's the first reaction.

And that first reaction has no name.

That first reaction doesn't exist without that which has acted on,

That which is waiting to be acted upon.

And if we can understand the bigger picture,

And I don't know if I'm clearly expressing it,

Everything is waiting to be touched.

Everything awaits the touch of the will of the divine,

Awaits the touch of what is timeless.

What is in time awaits the touch of what is timeless.

Why?

Because when what is timeless,

When what is a will that comes from what is invisible and beyond thought comes into this world manifest,

This conditioned consciousness,

The consciousness that's touched by that is awakened by that.

We have a momentary awareness,

An awakening.

Life is an endless awakening.

What do you think Christ's story is about?

What do you think it represents,

This idea of a kernel of corn laying in the ground,

And unless it abides alone and dies there,

Nothing could come of it,

Losing one's life to gain it.

What do you think it's all about?

It's describing something that's right in front of our eyes but that we don't see.

And we don't see it because we're always looking at the world around us as something coming at us.

And the world around us is not coming at us,

It's coming up and into and through us to touch a consciousness that is waiting.

Because it's incomplete,

As is every creation.

Why would there have to be this ceaseless movement of what is above acting on what is below and bringing about a new conception from that relationship unless life in the creation itself wasn't requiring that to be born again and born again and born again.

But what happens when we have a negative reaction and catch that thought or feeling which is really just our own mind throwing at us something that it feels threatened by,

What happens when we catch that?

The whole process just stops.

It just grinds to a halt,

And you and I with it.

Have you not noticed how the more you repeat a negative reaction,

The more prone you are to a deeper expression of it?

We don't want to breed a consciousness that is set against itself.

We want to allow that consciousness to be seeded with what allows it to become aware of itself.

And that's what the reaction is.

I don't know.

You and I,

If we're sitting here right now,

If we can have any form of awareness at all,

How is it that I'm aware of myself?

What a miracle it is.

As far as we know,

No other creature can be aware of itself.

How am I aware of myself?

And by the way,

How is it that I'm not aware of myself?

I'm aware of myself because every,

I use the word,

There's no other word,

The English language is so bankrupt.

Every moment,

Which again is seamless,

Is there any part of a river that isn't part of the whole of the river,

That isn't moving with the river,

That isn't part of the creation of everything that a river is?

Every moment is seamless.

And that seamless moment is producing all the time a reaction.

And that reaction is the awareness of the moment.

That's what the awareness is,

Is consciousness of the condition.

But there's another kind of awareness we can have.

And that awareness is this realization that if I'm understanding my relationship to this life,

It means,

For lack of better words,

That the true action in the moment is to simply be present to the reaction,

Instead of participating in what the reaction tells me I must do to deal with what is seen as the cause of the reaction.

See,

If I could be present to this reaction,

And if I've described it at all,

It is seamless,

It is one movement,

It is constant creation.

If I can be present to that reaction,

The witness of it,

Have a new understanding,

A new set of eyes,

What do I see?

I see the reaction resolves itself.

The reason for the reaction is brought to its own fruition.

So in this instance,

The consciousness that ordinarily resists and reacts and doesn't want anything that threatens the image of itself,

Instead of being caught in a reincarnating loop of trying to change the condition so as to avoid the fact that who and what I am doesn't exist without these images,

Then in that moment,

What happens?

I get to watch something take place in me that never required Guy to be there to do anything at all about allowing that reaction to bring about a new conception in Guy,

A new understanding of Guy,

A new relationship with every moment,

Because now moments are not seen as for me or against me.

Moments are seen as something that I am a participant in and must cooperate with if the moment is to fulfill its purpose,

Which is to bring about a transformation in the creation it acts upon.

A totally different order of relationship with life.

Here's two brothers,

They own an antique shop.

And the one brother,

We'll say it's the younger brother,

Is always astonished at how the older brother seems to be able to distinguish on the spot the value of something,

Whereas if you've ever dealt in any kind of merchandise like that,

You know the world is replete with phonies,

Fakes.

How does his brother's spot tell the difference,

Discern the difference between a phony and a fake?

Because he,

On the other hand,

Is often taken in.

But his pride forbids him,

Keeps him from asking his brother how does he do it.

Then one day when he makes this great mistake,

A costly mistake,

Isn't it a costly mistake when you mistake a negative reaction for being something that you must then go and get even with,

Do what you have to do?

He goes to his brother and says,

You know brother,

I've watched you,

How do you know that?

How do you know in that moment?

And his brother says it's simple and one day you'll understand it.

He says,

I'm never in a hurry to examine what's been brought into the store.

I also know that when something is brought into the store and the person who's brought it in is talking a lot about it and very defensive if I ask any questions about it,

I know the odds favor that the seller and what he has brought into the store is a phony,

Is a fake.

We have to learn to be able to discern.

And in this instance,

We want the capacity to be the observer of our reaction instead of the unconscious nature serving it as we always do.

The more we can step back and learn to discern by becoming the observer of the reaction,

The more we'll learn about that reaction.

And that first little people that looks up into this world of consciousness will begin to open and open so that we have an expansive view.

And because of the larger view,

A much better relationship to these negative reactions where we're no longer captured by them,

Because we're using the appearance of them to produce the conversion in this consciousness that every reaction is intended to produce.

If we would just let the reaction run its course without being carried away by it.

Try it.

Find someplace small.

You know,

You go into like a Walmart or some store,

You have a negative reaction.

Stand in that line and instead of talking to yourself about your negativity or what you blame the negativity on,

Stand there and deliberately observe the talker.

Observe what you're being sold.

Use every condition that you can,

Especially if you can know in advance that you're going to have a negative reaction.

Use every last one of those moments to leave that moment with more understanding about this reaction and this reactive nature than you went into it with.

If you do that,

You will find you are on the path of liberation and you will be led increasingly to far,

Far greater realizations about who and what you are.

And in particular,

That you're not apart from life itself and that life never stops trying to perfect itself and you and I as instruments in that life.

We're not a little bit longer than usual.

Have a big day today.

Hope you can join us.

Go to my profile there on Insight Timer.

Follow through.

Some very free talks,

Free dialogues coming up.

That's all I'm allowed to say.

Bye.