Invitation #3 - The Ego's Gifts

p. 36 - You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey from Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy by James Blanchard Cisneros.

"Can the blind lead the blind? Shall they not both fall into the ditch?"                                                         - Luke 6:39

My friend, we have chosen the ego as our guide. We have chosen the blind to lead us. We have chosen the king of loneliness, separation and regret to rule over us. We have chosen the father of fear, judgment and darkness to light our paths.

For a moment, sit by yourself in quiet remembrance of where your ego has taken you. Sit with the feelings it has offered you. Sit with the gifts judgment has furnished you. Remember the times you blamed your brother or sister, the times you judged your brother or sister, the times you feared your brother or sister. These are the times the ego offered its gifts and you accepted. Sit alone and ask yourself this simple question: What has the ego ever truly offered me?

Gift yourself some time alone to finally question the ego. Questioning illusions and the ego is the first step in undoing them.

Remember the strangers the ego assisted you in condemning. Remember the relationships it assisted you in breaking, the friends it assisted you in hurting, and the family members it told you weren't worth your forgiveness. Sit with at least one of these events or feelings in your mind. Question the ego and your actions, and feel what it has brought and offered you.

The ego has led you into the darkness long enough. Your tolerance for pain has been high, but it is not without limit. There is a time for all of us when we must ask ourselves if there is a better way. My friend, I am here to remind you that there is. Know that there is always hope, for darkness is simply a lack of light, and whenever light enters, darkness dissipates. This light has always been within you and waits with everlasting patience to once again shine through you, illuminating all you see. It is a journey without distance; it simply waits for your willingness to see it, to appear.

A moment of true forgiveness will end a lifetime of pain. Now ask God for assistance in dealing with your past actions and reactions, and it shall be given. Ask God to hold your heart in His hand, and He shall do so. Ask angels to surround you, and know that they will. And with all their assistance and support, take an honest look at how you have reacted to your brothers and sisters. Ask God for forgiveness, ask your brothers and sisters for forgiveness, ask yourself for forgiveness, and forgiveness will surround you in its light.  

With your permission, the ego has built walls around your heart, walls between you and your brothers and sisters, walls between you and God. Be with that light and feel it permeating the walls of your ego. It has taken a lifetime for these walls to be built. All you need is a little willingness, a holy instant, to allow God's love to shine through. In that holy instant, you will recognize what has always been true, that you have never been disconnected from your loving source, that you have never been disconnected from your brothers and sisters.

When brothers or sisters attack you they are subconsciously asking for love. They might not ever believe this, but I know in your heart you understand what it is I am sharing with you. This is one of the reasons that you and those living in the light should try to be more patient with angry brothers and sisters. These angry brothers and sisters are lost. They are feeling bad about themselves and taking it out on you. They take it out on you because they believe that you are the easier target. They could not take it out on God because lost brothers and sisters usually have a fear of God.

The next time a brother or sister who is ruled by the ego attacks you, consider that he or she is simply asking for love. He or she is a lost soul asking you for direction. Would you lead him or her toward more darkness or toward the light? This is the choice you make every time you react to a lost brother or sister.

Understand that the choice you make will bring you closer to the place you send him or her. Lead him or her toward darkness, and you too shall feel and experience the darkness. Lead him or her toward light, and you too shall feel and experience the light.

Take this opportunity to choose peace. Deep peace comes from meeting your brother or sister without judgment. In choosing peace, you will understand that your brothers and sisters are fighting their own difficult battles with their egos. Ask your heart, ask your spirit for guidance on the right thing to do, and you'll know what is right, for what is right will bring you peace. It is truly that simple; the right thing to do will bring you peace. Understand that the world you see is the world that exists for you. As you change the way you perceive the world, the world that exists also seems to change. But understand that the world never really changes, it is only how you see it that changes. The world is simply the effect, the cause is how you think, who you believe yourself to be. How you think comes from where you are in your mind. The more peaceful you are within your mind, the more peaceful the world will appear.

Think back to a time when you shared an experience with friends or family members. Even though the experience was the same, you and the others around you may not have reacted the same way. Some may have been more at peace with the experience than others, some may have been more distressed, but it was still the same experience. The way you react is colored by your past experiences that are similar in nature. You might believe that someone overreacted to a situation. Once that situation is discussed, the person who you thought overreacted, might change his or her mind about the reaction, and thus receive peace from changing his or her mind. You can receive peace, not from changing the situation, for that cannot be changed, but from changing your thoughts about the situation. The power lies within you, not outside of you.

Peace is a choice you are able to make in every situation. You can make the choice for peace immediately, or you can take as much time as you want to find peace about the situation. But understand that the amount of time you take to accept peace in any situation is purely up to you. You contain within yourself this ability to choose peace. Yet, judgment is always the ego's answer, and its result is pain, stress and resentment. In every situation the ego offers this gift to you, and it is mighty proud when you accept it.
 

Read more Spiritual / Self Development Activities which cultivate the concepts in the book 'You Have Chosen to Remember' - including Forgiveness, Embodying Your Godself, Developing Peace of Mind, and more.

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