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If we are unconditionally present each moment is a new opportunity.
If you forget to be present, just have a little laugh and start again.
Transcript:
Kira:
This time in the world, there is a lot of what can be perceived as challenges. We have the economy, how the global politics are, but also in people’s everyday lives, in what’s happening in their relationship and their family situation.
Paul:
Yeah. I was just thinking then … about how nature works using a universal term. The weaker animals either die or they get killed by predators. If the food is short, the breading either stops or reduces. I know this is a bit vague. When the desert gets really hot, hot air rises and cool air is brought in to balance the vacuum. We call it a wind. There’s balance going on all the time, so even although we’re not seeing it, there is a chaos … everywhere on every level.
I mean, I haven’t had much experience, but I’ve seen videos of electron microscopes and watching what goes on in there, massive amount of movement in there that looks chaotic. And yet, somehow out of that chaos in us, appears us. Something keeps balancing. Heraclites called it the hidden harmony. There’s a balance going on all the time. Over many, many years I’ve been told by psychics, and the message is: There’s a time of chaos coming. Things are going to seem to get worse. So then, when you ask a question, “Oh. So, is that so?” Yes, it does seem to be so.
Now, I take into account that because our communications are so much more sophisticated now, we’re hearing more about all the things that go on. But as soon as I say that, my memory goes back to my childhood. No, that wasn’t happening around me. Nobody got stabbed at my school. We threw a few rocks at each other … but there was nothing like the conflict, nothing like the rage, nothing like the violence in our time, even on the news. There was some but … very little. It does seem to be building up. Now, what could that be about? It could be about balance. It could be about waking up. It could be about, as a species, you’re on the way out. Now, many scientists and experts are saying, “Yes, we’re on the way out.”
That famous scientist, who’s in a wheel chair, Stephen Hawking, I’ve seen him on videos saying, “We’re on a course of destruction which has happened at least five or seven times on this planet before.” So, there are experts saying, we can’t go on like this. We can’t go on using the resources. We can’t keep on dumping our stuff the way we’re dumping. We can’t keep fighting without the possibility of a major destructive war.
There is a feeling that something is building up. And I see that as a message: “Come on, people, wake up. Don’t you see, don’t you see?” And I think that’s a possibility. I think something’s going to wake us up like Trump getting to be president in America, if they let him.
You see, when we had AIDS, I thought, “Oh, that can do it. AIDS can get so big, we’re going to wake up to … or bird flu or some catastrophe’s going to be so major, we’re all going to have to come together to take care of it.” Get it? Come together. We’re divided. We’re not taking care of what to mirror our brothers and sisters in the Middle East. And in America, they’re fining people who are homeless. I can’t even begin to think how ridiculous that is. They’re taking their blankets away. There’s a report that they stopped charities giving food to homeless people. It has to get so ridiculous that we all wake up and say, “No, we’re not doing that anymore! That’s finished. We’re going to take over and we’re going to look after each other. We’re going to take care.”
Now, some people are doing that. Some people are taking in refugees, some people are adopting children, there are charities taking care, but it’s so small. And there’s a possibility that things are getting so bad, so bad, so bad, so we say, “Hey, that’s it. No more.” So it could be, the things are getting worse, it’s not just the news reporting. They…. It is getting worse on every, every level. Just, how many famous people have died this year? Huge! And of course, that shakes us up a bit.
It feels as though there’s a shake-up coming. So that’s universally. But now let’s be practical. Let’s look at our own lives. And as soon as I say that, I say … in … each … moment, because there is nothing you can do for the past. You can take care of the consequences for the past, but only in the moment. You could look to possibilities in the future, but the only place you can take care of it is in the moment. And I feel as though somehow I haven’t said it or it hasn’t been heard, and then I check. Am I saying something silly? No, they all seem to say the same. Be here, now, this is it, take care of now … unconditional awareness.
I hope you can hear it for what we’re calling “the New Year”. It’s all about now. Everything’s about now. And then I say the New Year. When I say, “the New Year”, the universe doesn’t have time. Oh yeah, that’s right, even the scientists are saying that now, and Jesus said that of course, “Time no more. Take no thought of tomorrow.” There is no New Year. Every … moment … is new. Every moment … is an opportunity.
But of course, we’ve got to be here … to be with that opportunity, to be with that possibility, to be with taking care of what could possibly happen in what we call “the future”. It’s all about now. It just keeps coming back to now. And I mean this now. You listening to this, now! Not, “Oh yes, that’s right, I’ll do that in the future.” No! Now. Now. … Now.
I just want to add this little bit. I’m not always 100% in the now, absolutely not. I do some very silly things, forget things and forget what I was going to get … and it’s my priority. And I don’t chastise myself. If I miss, I just laugh [chuckles], “Oh, there he goes again. It’s your priority and you just missed again.” So, don’t take it too seriously. And please, please don’t be hard on yourself. Because whatever you’re doing, you’re doing the best you know how under the circumstances you’ve been given in your life. And there is a possibility of more by seeing if you can remember … to be as present as you know, in each moment. And when you forget, just have a little laugh.
Here’s a very silly thing, it’s a Christmas thing. What do you get, if you eat Christmas decorations? Tinsel-itis.
Kira:
I hear lots of people commenting that they feel overwhelmed either what’s happening in the world, or with their own lives first and then with what they’re hearing, bigger picture of the world. And even when they might listen to something like this, and hear the comment to be here now, to feel it overwhelming, like it’s too hard. Yesterday, I heard a news report of a man, who got sick of listening to all of the bad stories of 2016. So he’s collated all the good stories of 2016. So, I just wondered if you could add something.
Paul:
Well, we have been programmed to look at the negative, and to look what we’re not, and where we failed, and where we could be better. So we have been programmed that way. And we don’t realize just how strong and how much that is. So, when anything is brought up and we look at it, we tend to go to that way. And as you were just saying, there is a very strong sense all over … on the global level and the individual level of being overwhelmed. And it’s when so much comes into the consciousness, in the moment, and it’s viewed in a negative way which is the way we’ve been programmed to see things: See it negative, so we can make it positive.
Jesus said: “When two or three are gathered together in my name….”, and I’ve seen this very strongly in groups. And when the groups have ended, I’ve encouraged people to meet every now and again in little groups. And we can do that in our relationships as well, and with our friends, and with our families. And what we can say is, “Look, I’ve got a new priority. I keep getting overwhelmed. I keep getting stuck, and I need some outside perspective. So I would really appreciate if you would share with me what you think you’re seeing. It doesn’t matter whether you’re right, or you’re not right, or whether it comes across judgemental, or not. I need some light in the darkness of being overwhelmed. Everything gets too contracted and I can’t see anymore. I don’t have any space. So if you would just tell me what you’re seeing, what you’re …, then it doesn’t matter whether you’re right or not. It just put’s in a different perspective from my mind, the way it’s looking at it.”
And another thing you can do with that – and this is really powerful – whenever you get upset, what upsets you, and take a look as if you’ve got that part in you that you’re not allowing, you’re not excepting, giving it some space, “Oh, that’s right, I still do that! I still forget, or I still judge, or I still … I still do that. And I acknowledge, I don’t want to be doing that. And I acknowledge that I am, or was.” So you can see it by reflection of people and things. Even if the dog keeps barking helps you to see your contraction, and your lack of acceptance. And acceptance could be talking to the neighbour … or moving … but to deal with it rather than contract, and then feel overwhelmed.
Find ways of making some space in there. As I say, becoming aware of what upsets you, getting your friends to share with you and seeing when whatever happens, what is there in there for you. What’s for you? And shifting as much as you can from complaint for what isn’t, or what’s upsetting you, to gratefulness for what is, because we’re all, certainly all of us listening to this, oh compared, we’re blessed.
And you know, you’re going to feel more and more blessed, the more you allow the blessing. The more grateful you feel for your life the way it is. Even if you want to compare it to how bad it could be.
Just gratefulness opens things up. The light turns on … and then be grateful to yourself for allowing yourself to feel grateful.