Participant: Is everything preplanned?
I knew you were going to ask that. (laughs) Just kidding… a little. Both the short answer and the long answer is… yes. One of the favorite games of the ego mind is convincing you that you have choice. Not only does it convince you that you have the power of choice, but also that your choices will affect what will happen in the illusion. Therefore, you have a great responsibility to choose well, because what you choose is what you are going to get. We will start out by asking Our favorite question, “How has that worked for you so far?” Certainly, if you have received whatever you have chosen, we would not be having this conversation. What need would you have for a disembodied voice if you had all the money, fame, success, relationships, sex, adventures, and good health you could ever want? Obviously, you have received many things you never in your worst nightmares would have asked for. I assume for all of you to varying degrees getting what you think you want has not been the normal result for you. What that leaves is the possibility that you didn’t do a good enough job, allowing in too many doubts or thoughts that you could not have what you wanted. In this scenario if you had been pure in your thoughts everything would have worked out perfectly. A corollary to this is that you don’t deserve what you want.
Participant: Is the only choice to follow the Will of God?
Wow! You are way ahead of me. Perhaps we should switch places. We will come around to that point, but let’s fill in a few blanks first. The bottom line here is that if you have the ability to choose and your choice will make a positive difference, then why don’t your choices always work out? Of course, most of you will think of examples where you did choose something and it more or less happened as you desired it to. The question then is, “Having received what you asked for, did that leave you feeling full and complete?” The honest answer to that probably is that though it might have felt good for a period of time, eventually there was something else that you wanted. Perhaps there was not even a short-term satisfaction before realizing that you did not find the feeling you were hoping to have. So, the choosing continues on and on without ever delivering the heaven that has been sought. More likely there is a failure even to gain what is desired.
Let’s jump over to the other side and assume that it makes absolutely no difference what you choose or don’t choose. Whatever is going to happen is going to happen. Sometimes your wishes are aligned with that result and sometimes they aren’t. When what happens is aligned, you believe that you did it. You don’t want it to rain because you have a picnic planned and the skies remain clear. Do you now believe that you have power over the weather? If it had rained, who would you have pointed the finger at in blame? Yourself? God? Global warming? Alignment does not prove cause and effect. What if the whole script is already written out and there is nothing you can do to change that story?
Participant: But sometimes I find myself at a fork in the road and my whole life will change based on whether I bend to the left or to the right. Doesn’t that show that choice does make a difference?
Good question. It certainly shows that there is an illusion of the power of choice. It could be said that the choice you make was already written.
Participant: But Sanhia it feels like I could have chosen in the opposite way.
Then why didn’t you? You chose the only way you could choose. Let’s look at how the ego mind actually operates. It is no different than a computer. It is programmed and acts and reacts from that programming. In your programming you have been taught to believe and to act in accordance with all that you have experienced in what appears to be your life story. All of that conditioning leads to the choice you make in this moment. In another moment you might choose quite differently because included in your program now are the results from your previous choice. Your choice in the moment might also be affected by the emotions you are experiencing right at that time. Did you choose to be angry, impatient, pessimistic, or optimistic when it was time to make your choice? Things constantly change; things that you have little or no control over. Perhaps the choice you are making is totally influenced by your parents’ teachings. Do you remember choosing those parents? Did you choose the teachers you had growing up? Did you choose your religion or lack of one? Did you choose a friend who suddenly appears in your story? Did you pick your race, gender, or the area where you lived in your formative years? The answers are obvious. Of course not. Yet, all of these experiences formed who you feel yourself to be and out of them you are programmed to make choices. All these events were planned. Nothing was random. Nothing was chosen by you. Yet you act as if you have a power to control the world, to determine your future. That, too, has been programmed into you. As long as you attempt to guide things you will be frustrated. The “best” outcome is that you have moments of feeling successful, periods of peace and happiness. Those moments will end. More likely you will experience a sense of failure and look at your future with foreboding.
Imagine for a moment that you have no choice, that everything is unfolding as it is meant to. You are off the hook. You have no responsibility. You can neither puff up your chest and take credit for what has happened nor blame yourself and feel guilt. You did neither of those things. The place that we call the awakened state is simply one where there is absolute acceptance for what is. Nothing can be changed. It is simply happening. It would be futile to resist what already is because it cannot be changed. It already is! Close your eyes and pretend it isn’t there, but it is still there. You can want to change it, but the genie is already out of the bottle. Here is what the ego mind does when it hears this news. It goes into absolute terror and denial. It asks how can you ever be happy in life if you can’t create what you want? Are you expected to bite the bullet and accept whatever shit comes your way? This, according to the ego mind, is the worst of all hells.
Here’s what happens when you give up fighting what is and simply experience it and live with it. You begin to experience the fullness of life. Ego mind is screaming that what is here isn’t right, it isn’t good, it isn’t what you should have. I am telling you that what is happening is perfect, is exactly what should be happening, is just what you need. Spirit, the Divine, is presenting your perfect now. It is eons beyond what you could have chosen for yourself (and remember your track record). Everything is given in Love.
Participant: So again, the only choice I really have is to choose the Will of God. Maybe this will make me more content with life?
As you said, “the only choice I really have is to choose the Will of God”, but that is still a choice. That may be your intention, but who is expressing that intention? Like all choice, it can only come from the ego mind. Like all your other plans, it may or may not happen. Armed with that intention you drive off down the road only to find you have a flat tire. Is your mind just fine with all of that or do you find yourself in resistance to what is? These reactions are immediate and programmed. The habit that has been nurtured for so long is to resist the Will of God and then to choose what you think would be better. Maybe at some point the awareness that you are resisting what is occurs to you and you stop fighting. Each experience rewires your data base. Another day you might find yourself just fine with a flat tire as it happens. Perhaps the gap between noticing the resistance and accepting what is will continually narrow.
In the meantime I will simply remind you that not accepting God’s gifts always leaves you feeling separate from your own Divinity. My voice is now a part of your programming as are your attempts and failures to heed it. Be certain that your opportunities to let go of your personal will shall be unlimited. In the meantime, are you in guilt and blame when your choice for God’s Will fails to materialize? Are you then choosing to give up guilt and blame? Who is choosing that? And so it goes. (laughter) This doesn’t mean that things are hopeless and you are helpless. The perfect thing is always happening right now. What you think of as you just isn’t in control. If choosing is present, if guilt and blame are there, you notice that. If you have thought of changing how you respond…you notice that. You are not going to be able to change either of those things. They have already happened, but the noticing, the experience, and the awareness are now part of your programming. Perhaps then over time you find it easier and easier to accept God’s Will. More quickly you are able to let go of “Why is this happening” and “Poor me”. You might find yourself letting go of guilt and blame more speedily. You do this not because of setting such goals, but through the experience that none of that stuff works. It can feel hard to surrender and trust the Will of God instead of pursuing what you want to happen.
Participant: How can it be easier?
Your personal will chooses only out of a sense of separation from God, not from alignment. Personal will accepts almost nothing as it is, instead it thinks about would feel better and visualizes a future with all its desires met, a fantasy of peace, love, and joy. Again, we return to our favorite question, “So, how has that worked out for you so far?” There are three primary reasons why it hasn’t worked out. The first is that you don’t have a clue. What you think will bring you happiness will never do so, will never bring you that sense of peace and Oneness. The second reason is that you are looking in the wrong place. The world cannot give you what you want, because it is simply the projection of your lack. What you seek is within you. It lies with your thoughts and beliefs. If you want love, then be love. Finally, as is the whole point of this message, it is already decided. There is nothing you can do to change anything.
For a moment let’s leap back over to the other side, to the part of you that is able to accept what is without any need or attempt to change it. We could call this the awakened self, although the sense of self has disappeared. There is an observation of that self taking place, but there is no ownership of it. The idea of choice is not present here. This jump cannot be chosen, though you may make efforts toward it by letting go of personal will and asking to hear and follow God’s Will. To believe that you have choice and are separate from Divinity is the sleeping self, living in a dream while believing it is real. This sleeping self believes it must use its personal will, its choice, to protect itself from the universe or from God. The awakened you is One with everything, experiencing rather than choosing and resisting.
Participant: You have been talking about being in the now and accepting what is, that what is here now is exactly what is needed for me.
Yes. In this perfection of the now, if you are truly there, there is no question of choice. Choice only exists in the horizontal when the mind is referring to the ideas of past and present. In the present there is no choice to make; there is just what is here. Rather than choice there is simply action or reaction, and that also just happens. Any thought of needing to make a choice indicates you are no longer in the now and have drifted off back into sleep. Notice that. That becomes part of your experience. The now is relentless and you have infinite opportunities to be present or not. Again, you cannot choose to be present, but you can notice when you are not. Hmmm. Interesting. Notice where there is judgment, blame, or guilt. Hmmm. Interesting.
Yes, this preplanned world is absolutely perfect. Everything that is present exists to stimulate that leap of faith, that awakening. If your ego mind is running the show right now, that is what is perfect. Notice that and accept it. Or don’t notice or don’t accept. It doesn’t matter. It is still perfect. When it is time to notice or to accept, you will do that. Nothing you do in following the lies of the ego mind makes any real difference. What is true is true, and what is true is of Love and of God. The rest is a dream, or if you prefer, a nightmare. There is no such thing as failure or success, but there is a perfection in holding on to the belief in them until you don’t. Spirit’s GPS is guiding you and loving you in every moment, even when you feel the most alone and abandoned.
Good Now
