SELF STUDY

Monthly Focus~

Loving The Dark Stuff

Our right relationship with God really is whatever it is right now. As soon as we decide that our relationship with Him is “wrong,” we separate our personal awareness from Him. We enter into negativity and judgments, which then create barriers between ourselves at this level of our being and the loving Spirit of God within us. God doesn’t judge us. He doesn’t separate Himself from us. But as soon as we decide that our relationship with Him is somehow wrong, we step into our worldly and judgmental selves, seeing things in terms of the world’s dualities of good and bad, right and wrong, better and worse, and so on. Whenever we do this, we step aside from His loving Spirit of acceptance, forgiveness, and infinite understanding. This stepping aside then causes us to distance ourselves from the very presence of loving with which we are now seeking to re-establish a right relationship.

Full Excerpt from Chapter 7 “Our Right Relationship with God”~

Many of us feel a long way from experiencing God’s Loving and from living in constant alignment with God. Maybe we haven’t really been dedicated students of life. We may not be meditating every single day. Or at times we may get so caught up in everyday life that it is we who forget God altogether. We may then begin to feel guilty or inadequate, and think that we’ve lost (or never even found) our “right relationship” with God. Perhaps we want now to experience His Loving and live as His children, but this may seem so hard or so very far away. Yet such thoughts of limitation are always a myth because we are all children of God right now, and any guilt or inadequacy we may be feeling is not coming from God, who sees us only with love and acceptance.

Our right relationship with God really is whatever it is right now. As soon as we decide that our relationship with Him is “wrong,” we separate our personal awareness from Him. We enter into negativity and judgments, which then create barriers between ourselves at this level of our being and the loving Spirit of God within us. God doesn’t judge us. He doesn’t separate Himself from us. But as soon as we decide that our relationship with Him is somehow wrong, we step into our worldly and judgmental selves, seeing things in terms of the world’s dualities of good and bad, right and wrong, better and worse, and so on. Whenever we do this, we step aside from His loving Spirit of acceptance, forgiveness, and infinite understanding. This stepping aside then causes us to distance ourselves from the very presence of loving with which we are now seeking to re-establish a right relationship.

So, the first step in establishing our right relationship with God is to see it as “right” right now. Our relationship with God will always be right; it will always be what perfectly represents our unfolding understanding and expression of Him, and this is what He most wants for us. This is how He has created us to be, and if we are to become more like the God in whose image we are created, we must begin to adopt the same attitude of loving acceptance of ourselves and of others, free of demands, free of judgments, and free of expectations.

Every human being is an expression of God. Every one of us is living as a child of God and in the light of God now. The difference, however, is in the degree to which we know ourselves to be His children, and in the thoughts and actions we express as we develop this awareness of our true identity. The only way we can really begin to come into the full awareness of ourselves is to adopt the same loving understanding towards ourselves that He has already.

Many of us may not realize how necessary it is to establish right relationships within ourselves before we can establish right relationships with others, or with God. But this really is true, and it is equally amazing how all of the relationships out- side ourselves reflect something about the relationships we have inside ourselves. As we develop and grow within ourselves, we often see our relationships with others evolving, growing, and changing as well. But this is no coincidence. It can be said that “the world is our mirror,” and, if we look closely, we can see how the world is constantly “reflecting” back to us that which we send out into it.

Monthly Focus “going Home work” ~

1. Do two and a half hours of daily meditation, and then do the “Loving The Dark Stuff” worksheet from LAF Course 2
2. Listen to Jim and Brian’s talks: DEVELOPING OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD
3. After you’re finished doing the “Loving The Dark Stuff” worksheet, journal the question: “What is right, right now with my relationship with God?”