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Let us begin. I would like to begin this evening by acknowledging with Sarah in a gesture of huge gratitude on my part towards you and towards those also whom you know from our times together in other places, other settings, primarily in the small temple which was our home together. It has been my privilege to greet and speak with many people, but each is like the first and the only, for a heart to heart is always a unique experience and as it is the heart of which we speak in our interactions together therefore each is singular and important and so I offer you my grateful thanks for these many opportunities to exchange love together over the years. Indeed, whenever there is an exchange of love between one who is in body and one who is not in body why all of creation sings with the acknowledgment of the oneness of all things without time without space as it is thought of in your realm. The unity of all forms of life is unquestionable and where there is that unity there is love and the preservation of that love, the valuing of it, the enhancing of it, the growing of it. And that is my business as you know - the growing of love consciousness - the appreciation of the oneness, the inseparability of all things, and so to speak with you while I seem to be without form and you are formed we can notice then that where we are touching each other is without visible form, therefore the form is inconsequential as to what matters. Your form changes second by second. In fact, you may have noticed if you have not seen each other for a while as you greet each other this evening you will notice how the other has changed. Did that happen tonight? Have you noticed change in each other? It is inevitable. But what didn’t change as you greeted one another? Wasn’t it the heart? As you have loved them before you found as you greeted them tonight you still love them. You still had a oneness, a unity of intention with each other. That had not changed nor does it change in my relationship. Therefore then, I welcome you from the deepest and bottommost part of my heart to that same place in you.
Now this evening, as Sarah has mentioned, it is my great honor to present Orion to you who, as you know, is my teacher. It is with Orion that I am especially glad to come to you for I am also under contract, as some of you may be to your employers. I have an agreement that I keep at every opportunity, and that is to meet heart to heart with as many beings in and I will also say out of body as possible. For with those beings who have left their form behind are also in my domain shall we say. I am like a true monk of the road interested in meeting any and all who wish to meet me. But tonight there is my teacher who I bring to you. Now why do I call him my teacher? He is my teacher because I learn. What do I learn? I learn about those places of being which are beyond conscious thought. As you know my relationship with you is of a conscious nature. We speak about reality as we know it together, the realm of human feeling, perception, mental analysis. It is my effort to help you harmonize your feelings and thoughts with your physical actions so that you have an integrity that pleases you with which you are at peace. As you know, you speak to me often about those parts of your life which seem to be misunderstood, where your actions do not seem to represent your heart or perhaps even your mind consciously. And so we speak of these things.
Now Orion comes to you with a somewhat different purpose. His purpose, and it is not small, is to transform you utterly into the being which you truly are in your total self. Now your total self includes that formless, idea-less dark unknowable self. Now when I say dark I only mean that you can get lost not seeming to know where you are going when you are in search of yourself Orion’s purpose is to train your mind on the search for light and the understanding of that light. For if you are in a constant training or seeking for light, then all things will be made understood. As soon as your mind can form a question, you will have an instantaneous answer that comes singularly in its origin of light. Now if you try to understand light there you will fall on ground that is difficult for you to orient yourself on. You must simply take that light into your being and allow it to perfect you. You allow it to direct you, inspire you and transform you. And so that is Orion’s purpose and his appearance is to bring you into light and give you a craving within your entire being, body and mind. Your entire soul wants it, to know it, to feel it, to have it. And for all of your experiences to be in that light. Now you see the difference - do you see the difference? - the difference is that I understand your grievances. As you feel, I feel. Orion comes to you and Orion is the essence of light, or let us say, the essence or origin of mind. He says so are you. You are that essence yourself. You are that essence of the origin of mind. Be that. Be that. Come to see yourself as divine as the great Source. Come to see yourself as shall we say a chip off the old block. You are a portion of that light source. No doubt about it. That, my friends, is more powerful than the human process of forgiveness, understanding and the transformation that is possible to your consciousness. I say that to you, who I know and love as you are, and yet I know that you are much more. Be that. Be that which is greater and larger than your mind can ever understand. Be that which is greater than the sum total of your karma. Be that which is the origin of your purpose right now.
It reminds me of a story. I will tell you a story. There was a young boy whose pleasure was to walk - to simply walk. He lived in a place that seemed to have no beginning and no end. There were no hills in sight and the roads seemed to go everywhere and nowhere at the same time. Now it was his great pleasure to put himself in the middle of the everywhere and the nowhere at the same time. How did he know how to get home you might ask. He knew the roads but what he drew pleasure from was the experience of being in the middle of nowhere and if you’ve ever been to Kansas you know what I mean.
One day he was very confident and feeling very knowledgeable of his path and so he stepped up his pace and he held his head a little higher than usual so that his gaze was above the horizon line and he walked. And as he walked, because he was not looking at the road ahead of him, he missed the crossroads, a critical piece of geography in this nameless placeless place. Because he missed the crossroads, when he happened to look down at the end of what was actually a very long walk, because as you know those of you who walk, the more you walk, well, the more you can walk. And so he had walked and walked and when he looked down at the road, it looked like every other part of the road and he was lost, genuinely and utterly lost. For around him there was nothingness. Very few if any markers to orient him. He oriented immediately to the sun, but because he had been walking in a placeless way in his mind he did not know how much time had elapsed on his walk. Was the sun rising or was it setting. He didn’t know. And so he decided to sit down. And so he did, he sat and he watched the sun set. It went down around him and he decided because he was sufficiently disoriented, he would wait until the next morning, get up and go again.
That night he dreamt that he was in the sky in a nameless placeless sort of way. Without orientation to things or familiar objects about him. He was in the sky - the night sky, full of stars. And he was moving within that night sky in a placeless bodiless kind of way until he came up face to face with a human form. As he had been taking his walk with his eyes just above the horizon so had he also been in the sky moving in that placeless nameless way until he found himself face to face with a being who seemed to have a great mass of white hair and a huge white beard. And his first thought was, Oh my God is that you? And so he stopped and he noticed. He stopped and in that placeless place with the only piece of geography, if you will, that he recognized. Well, the being didn’t move so of course he had to stop. He looked into the face of the being who was smiling and twinkling and he thought perhaps this is Santa Claus, for he was a boy. But as he looked deeper into the face he saw registering in front of him every emotion that he himself had ever felt. The full range of joy and grief, registering in the matter of a second. He saw it all in the eyes and the cheeks and the mouth of this being.
He wanted to hug the being, but he wasn’t sure that was proper, so instead he allowed himself to merge with the being. It was effortless. He did not will it, he simply allowed it. He went into the being. When he looked at his own body he could see both his familiar flesh and clothing even but he also could feel that he was inside God. Because he could see the whiteness, he could feel the fluffiness of the beard and the clothing which seemed to be made of clouds. He thought, “Now this is a fine outfit, I like this piece of clothing, I like this body, this God, this feels good to me,” and as he had that thought he found himself once again on the road in the dark, but he felt himself as he was lying on the dirt and he was cold. And yet, he realized that his body was warm with the feeling of this God who had disappeared. He thought “Now, that was fine dream. When I wake up in the morning I will know how to get home.”
Indeed, he watched the sunrise, and as the sun rose he remembered which way he looked at home when the sun rose, and so he thought, it is time to go home now. I’m going to go home now. And he turned around and he walked. This time his gaze was at the horizon - it was not above in the sky. And so he saw the crossroads as he passed them and he also happened to notice other features, fencing, certain pieces of plant growth, rocks in various locations, things he had never noticed before. This must be because I have on my new God clothing. I have this new part of me now. I’m seeing things I never saw before. When he saw his home, he came to his home, he went inside and he said to his mother. Do I look any different? Do I look any different? I have seen God.
Perhaps you have had an experience like that - releasing into God one way or another. Perhaps it was in illness or danger or out of pain or love or craving. Some state which brought you closer to that experience of God. Some portion of your search here on earth in human mind, in human form. Some thing has brought you face to face with God. Now if you are like the boy you don’t know whether to hug God or what to do and so like the boy you merge, simply flow into that God place, and it feels just right - like new clothing, like warmth, like the stroke on your cheek of a loved one. I say this all to you because when you have seen the face of God and merged into that being, that place, and felt God’s love around you encasing you, warming you, loving you, those are the moments when you are in being - when you are in pure being.
My lessons to you have often been about how to bring being into your daily life. For example the boy, he no longer looked up or down, he looked at the horizon line and saw around him. But he needed to see to help him find his way. It made his life easier to look at the horizon and to look at the sky or to look at the earth. That has been my effort with you over the years, to ease you into identifying with God, ease you into identifying with your being, to help you understand that your challenges, your pains and your difficulties are in order to bring you face to face with God. Whatever that pain has been, whatever that moment of difficulty, that moment of being lost where you took the time to sit - to simply wait until you knew. That has been my guidance to you. Wait. Wait until the face of God is staring at you, and at that moment, that is your moment to move, to move into beingness. The more often you move into beingness, the easier your life will be. For as you reconcile the struggles, the pain, your losses, your difficulties and release, accept beingness, you bring yourself into that point of identification with the larger you - the placeless you and the unknowable you - as you identify with that, your human struggles lessen and you are more and more facing God himself.
Did you like my story? Did you like the boy? He was a very bright boy, bright enough to know that you can learn whatever you need to know by going to it, waiting for the answer to come to you.
Now I would like to take a few questions. I am most eager for questions if there are any this evening?
Q: I feel like that boy sometimes, especially involved in the struggles that I have with my son and the answers that I want to find and the search that I am on and I just wondered if I’m on the right path in making him a healthy person. Or is he already healthy? Am I wasting my time worrying?
Mother, mother. You are on the right path. You are on the path of love. Wherever your journey takes you on that path it is the right place for you and for your son. That does not mean that you will not change. Today you worry about health. Perhaps tomorrow you will worry about education and then you will worry about his employment and then you will worry about his children and maybe then later you will worry about his children’s children and their education and their health. But if you are on the path of love, you are on the right path and if you bring that love to your son, to your child, regardless of your worries. If your prayers take you on that path of love, you will find answers. Answers that work for you perhaps today, perhaps tomorrow you will have different answers. That is all you need to ask yourself on this. Am I today this moment on the path of love with my child. You need not have all the right answers - all the right healings. You should know that your worries are meant to bring you closer to that feeling and knowledge of being on the love path. But they do not necessarily serve you - your worries. If you could give up your worrying and enjoy the path of love more, then perhaps the answers you seek will become more clear to you. Do you understand?
Q: I want to [inaudible]. I just have to let go?
You do it all the time. It’s only the worries that you remember. So when you have a worry, remind yourself that worrying doesn’t help. Put the worry aside, plant yourself back on the path of love and notice that your answers will come to you effortlessly. As in a dream, it takes you face to face with God. It is the remembering that I am pointing out to you when [you notice you are worrying]. It is the remembering - Oh now I see it! I am worrying! I am worrying this very second, this moment! I am afraid. I am afraid. Oh, I see it now. I am afraid. Oh. If I am afraid then I need to be brave. I must find courage. I must put aside my fear and have courage of my love. Now that is always the answer. Shall we say the difficulty is, a lot of effort can be spent worrying before you realize you’ve been worrying. How much thought has gone into those worries before all of a sudden you realize that you are in a small little ball of knots or that your mind has been racing, if I do this, this will happen, if I do that, that will happen, if I don’t do this, if I do do that, and all those options. All of the thoughts go on and on. The constant, constant chattering of the mind, strategizing, re-strategizing. It is easier to practice - to put yourself on the path of love in a conscious deliberate way and say, "Oh, I’m just worrying again." Then, rather, you say "I will put myself now on the path of love and I will wait for the answers to come. I will wait for them to come because they will. They will be there if I am patient and if I wait. Why, I will have a dream and the dream will take me face to face with God. Then I will know how to get home" - just like that boy.
Is there another question?
Q: Emmanuel, I have a question about [finding my path]. I feel like I’m on many paths crossing and I’m not sure which one to choose. I’m thinking of going home to my origin [family] and while I’m there I feel love and while I’m here I feel love. I walked in tonight and this feels like my home, like my family. I’m uncertain I’m on the path of love though I know what one to go to.
I believe I heard an answer from your own lips. There are many paths and yet only one. Your path, why you want your path to be that path of love. Even those moments where you do not feel love, those are always invitations to open the door to put yourself back on the path of love as if you have just momentarily stepped aside and gotten lost again. I can only offer you this and that is as you open your heart. Why, it’s like a compass in your case very much a compass. You open the compass, you allow it to move until it is still and then you see which direction it points. And if you are wanting to place your feet on the center of the path of love and the compass shows you which direction to go. We offer you that my dear. Your own heart is like a compass. You can spin it if you like - you can spin it - you can move the pointer. But sooner or later it will stop and it will point you in a direction and that is where you should go. It’s that simple. But I cannot tell you I cannot tell you which part of the path to walk - no, you must trust the compass in your heart for that.
Q: I was wondering if as I was walking that path I was like that little boy with my head above the horizon and that I don’t know where I am.
Well he was smart, wasn’t he. As soon as he realized he was lost he stopped. Now you can do the same. And perhaps wait for an answer. Is that what you’re saying?
Q: That is what I’m saying but I’m not sure if it’s my ego that [expects that].
You will know sooner or later won’t you. Did you not give yourself the answer there too. You have been a good student over the years. You have taught yourself [much]. Now there are moments in life when the compass point seems to be pointing in an unreasonable direction. Ever had that experience? You look at the pointer and perhaps it says “go up” and you say ‘well now, how the devil do I do that? I live on a lateral plane and how can I go up?’ Well, up is temporary like everything else. But if you are told to go up then up you go. Go up until eventually you come down again and then maybe you’ll know where you are. And then you’ll understand better and the pointer points and you say “Now that I can understand, but I didn’t understand it until I went up first and came down again.”
I have one very short story for you now. There was once an old woman who lay on her death bed, knowing that death was imminent, and she was afraid. For in her mind she kept going over all the things that she felt she should have done and hadn’t. The words she should have said but hadn’t said. The people she should have loved more but hadn’t as well as the care that she’d given herself when she should have been better. Now all these thoughts were in her mind as she lay waiting for death to come. The mind you see was very busy, as if she had gone into the kitchen and it was dinner time and was looking around to see what there was to cook. She took all the ingredients in her mind, all the unfinished pieces, or the pieces she felt had been incorrectly managed. This is what occupied her mind as she lay there. And she said as if to death, “Wait, wait, there’s a few more things that I forgot to do and say, maybe if I just think them now, we’ll be as good as done.” So she brought her energy into a feverish pitch of thought and was saying her prayers. “Please forgive me, please forgive me,” endlessly on and on, she could not even pause as she kept thinking about more and more and more, and she fell into a deep sleep. In fact, she thought perhaps death had come for her because she could not wake up.
As she slept she had a dream. She dreamed that God came to her. When she saw this, she thought surely her body had left and she had stepped over and she wondered, like a laundry list or an errand list or a shopping list, she thought, Is there something I forgot to forgive myself for? Is there anything?” She looked at the face of God distraught, “God, did I forget something?” God looked at her, gave her a little wink, and he said, “Come with me my dear." She was beset by all of her worries and she thought, “Oh, I’m here in the presence of God, am I worthy, is my hair combed, do I have on my underwear, am I dressed properly?”
God took her and led her [to heaven]. She knew it was [heaven] because it was filled with light, and in that beautiful, beautiful light, it was so bright. And she thought, “If I’m dreaming, I’m going to wake up, it’s so bright!” She saw the faces of everyone she had ever known. And they were not scolding her for this or that piece of business that she had recrimination herself for. No, each of them was smiling at her. She thought, “This is for me? How could this be for me? I have failed in so many [ways]. As she looked at the faces all smiling at her, she saw there her relatives, and saw as well her own children who were alive and sleeping in their beds. She saw the face of her husband, her parents, her teachers, her pets. Even the garden she had planted over the years, why they were there in perfect love. Pieces of creation, she had to say so herself. They were beautiful. And she saw the faces of her children eating the meals that she had lovingly prepared, and she saw the faces of her teachers smiling with approval over all of the papers she had done well on. They did not show her the ones she had not done well on, only the ones where she had pleased herself with her own perfection. And then she looked and she saw that God was smiling at her, twinkling in fact, amused with her, all of her thoughts, and she herself felt quite silly, almost embarrassed. And then she thought, “I’m in the presence of God, this is not a time to be embarrassed. This is a time to be happy!" And she almost felt more shy than embarrassed, but in her shyness she understood her [life]. She had preoccupied her mind over the years with her failures.
Now her mind immediately began to say, “Oh, how stupid of you to think about your failures over and over again. You foolish woman, how could you have wasted your life like that. Look at all these smiling faces!" When she looked at the face of God, she noticed that God was looking at her as if he was saying, “You get the point, don’t you?” And as she looked, she saw, and she smiled.
At that moment she woke up in her bed, and she noticed that around her many of the people she loved were all gathered, because they thought she was about to die, and they were gathered to be witnesses for her death and for her transference over to the other side. She had gone somewhere very special and they thought perhaps she had died. And she opened her eyes and she looked at them and said, “I just saw all of you. I just saw all of your smiling faces. Why do you look so serious and glum?" And as she smiled at them all they smiled back. As they smiled, she smiled. The feeling of love and joy began to grow in her as if it were a great wave. A great wave of being cascading through her mind. And she could see it cascading down her bedclothes, down the sheets and the blankets to the bottom of the bed. She could see it cascading over the edges of the bed and flowing into the presence of those whom she loved and as they became enveloped in this great wave of love, she closed her eyes and she [died].
Well my time is up. So I offer you these thoughts tonight to help you remember to cherish the path of love as it presents itself to you.