SYDNEY GOODWILL UNIT OF SERVICE

PP 297537/00068
PO Box 627
Caringbah NSW 1495
Tel: (02) 9540 2391
Fax: (02) 9524 0025
www.sydneygoodwill.org.au

No 187 / July 2002

Dear Friends,

How clear it has become, as we watch daily events around the world, that we live in an interdependent way with each other, with each place, culture, religion and nation and with the other kingdoms in nature. We have even grown to accept the interdependent life of our planet within its solar system and within the greater universe in which it manifests. That very sense of planetary identity has motivated scientists and astronomers to search for a similar planet elsewhere in the system. And the latest discoveries indicate that one could exist in the constellation of Cancer where a Jupiter-like planet has been found orbiting a star about the same age as our Sun.

Intellectually we know and accept that we are part of a great "oneness". At peak moments, perhaps in meditation or prayer, we may experience emotional or mental reflections of that oneness. Yet as the pattern of daily affairs distracts our attention we are absorbed once more in a sense of separate identity, whether in conflict or harmony with others, seeking an individual expression, recognition and fulfilment of desires and needs. The difference between taking an individual's responsibility for life as a whole and an individual's desire for its own life, living and satisfaction becomes lost in fog and so is left to self-justifying rationalisations.

In microcosm our physical body lives and operates as an integrated "oneness". It is a single co-ordinated system - each separate part having its own function and its own needs of the whole and yet only serving that whole in all that it is and does. It is inspired and directed according to a purpose observed by the whole unit. The whole unit then becomes a useful vehicle and tool for the indwelling personality and through it for the soul and initiatory spark of its existence. The physical body, however, is an automaton. The next step in integration is the merging of the emotional and mental bodies so that the whole is a oneness serving as a vehicle for our conscious presence in the world according to divine purpose.

How would we view life if we lived into actual, daily expression an identity completely at-one with our planetary life - or even with just one other human being? Everything, including our vocabulary and terminology for identifying the world, would be re-defined, re-made, re-created in a very different way so that all meaning, significance and priority changes. The individual life is no longer the prime motivation. How can an awareness that can grasp and embrace the universe view the world through the eyes of an individual form? Such a consciousness knows no limitation of time or place or anything bound by them. It can know the infinite dimensions of the universe and yet express through the exigencies of a single personal lifetime.

Not being concerned about "appearances" it is then susceptible to Purpose. This Purpose is both the initiating force and the end result - and therefore exists unconfined by the partitions of unfolding time. It is both "alpha and omega, the beginning and the end". It IS and is therefore both pervasive yet unassailable. To speak of achieving purpose does not affect purpose but is an expression of our changing response to it through time and space. Time and space then become the media through which our realisation of purpose is achieved and for this we use the power of will. This journey of conscious realisation is described in these words by the Tibetan Master, Djwhal Khul:

" The will is too often regarded as a power by means of which things are done, activities are instituted and plans worked out. This general definition is the easiest for men to formulate because it is understood by them in terms of their own self-will, the will to individual self-betterment - selfish and misunderstood at first but tending eventually to selflessness as evolution carries out its beneficent task. Then the will is interpreted in terms of the hierarchical plan, and the effort of the individual man becomes that of negating his self-will and seeking to merge his will with that of the group, the group being itself an aspect of the hierarchical effort. This is a great step onward in orientation and will lead to a change in consciousness eventually.
. . However, the will is in reality something very different to these expressions of it which exist in the human consciousness as men attempt to interpret the divine will in terms of their present point in evolution. The clue to understanding . . is to be found in the words 'blotting out all form'. When the lure of substance is overcome and desire dies, then the attractive power of the soul becomes dominant and the emphasis for so long laid upon individual form and individual living and activity gives place to group form and group purpose. Then the attractive power of the (spiritual) Hierarchy and of the Ashrams of the Masters supersedes the lower attractions and the lesser focal points of interest. When these, in their turn, assume their rightful place in consciousness then the dynamic 'pull' of Shamballa can be felt, entirely unrelated to form or forms, to a group or groups. Only a group sense of 'well-Being' . . is realised, for it is comprehended as the will-to-good. No forms can then hold; no group or Ashram can then confine the consciousness of the initiate, and all differences of every kind disappear."

The differences appear when time and space introduce the illusion of separation. This illusion obstructs and conflicts only when we experience the world of form as the prime importance. Yet within a sense of oneness forms, or appearances, no longer have any significance of their own. Having released all the illusions of desire or fear our vision is no longer distorted and we see through to the underlying reality in process of expression. The reality of oneness is expressed in that great assertion by H. P. Blavatsky: "Matter is spirit at its lowest point of manifestation and spirit is matter at its highest."

Human consciousness is the meeting ground where reality (progressively realised) dissolves the false fabrications which can only ever be replications of eternal and infinite truths, reflecting our current point of realisation within the constant and unceasing emergence flowing through human mind and heart into expression, constantly being renewed and ever inspired by that mind of God whose likeness we have the capacity to reflect within time and space because we are an integral part of it.

What then is success? Is it worldly wealth, recognition superior to others in some way, satisfaction of physical instincts or emotional desires? Is it comfort, ease, even boredom? What is failure? All these things pass in a moment, an hour, a day - leaving only the purity of realisation as the substantial and enduring effect. And each realisation leads to the next until the journey is complete and the events along the way are as nothing when purpose is realised.

* * * * * *
The Festival in Cancer will be celebrated at a meditation meeting at 8pm on
Monday, 24 June, at the YWCA, 5-11 Wentworth Avenue, Sydney.
The keynote is: "I build a lighted house and therein dwell."

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Email List - If you would prefer to receive this Newsletter by email please let us know by post, fax or by emailing goodwill@sydneygoodwill.org.au and let us know your email address.
* * * * * *
Lucis Trust Visit - A quick note to let all friends and co-workers know that Sarah McKechnie of the Lucis Trust, New York, will be in Sydney on 16th and 17th October 2002 for evening meetings on those dates.


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