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

No 218/March 2005

Dear Friends,
We note how our lives turn in cycles, great and small, as we spiral in and through the great Wheel of Life. Caught up in the constant interplay of apparent opposites and their gravitational pull, we spiral between them - spirit/matter, life/death, day/night, good/bad, etc. Immersed in the forms created from their interplay we can forget the great heart of Life beating throughout them all - like a great magnet separating the lines of force into circular patterns between the poles. In similar vein our life-bearing blood circulates through the arteries, resolving and healing, enlivening and inspiring according to the beat of the heart at the centre and fired by the breath of spirit. So history cycles through its "ups and downs" and we cycle, as individuals, groups, nations and civilisations, in and out of each day's experience, each month and year, and eventually in and out of incarnation. And substanding and pervading all the apparent opposites, the opposing poles that pull us through the cycles, is the life flowing from the still point at the centre.

Yet even in the midst of the abundance of all life we can easily forget that point of synthesis, that living source, when caught up in a belief in lack and scarcity - until something reminds us such as the following story recently circulated on the internet:

The professor of a university challenged his students with this question. "Did God create everything that exists?" A student answered bravely, "Yes, he did". The professor then asked, "If God created everything, then he created evil. Since evil exists (as noticed by our own actions), so God is evil." The student couldn't respond to that statement causing the professor to conclude that he had "proved" that "belief in God" was a fairy tale, and therefore worthless. … Another student raised his hand and asked the professor, "May I pose a question? " "Of course" answered the professor. The young student stood up and asked : "Professor does Cold exists?" The professor answered, "What kind of question is that? Of course the cold exists. Haven't you ever been cold?" The young student answered, "In fact sir, Cold does not exist. According to the laws of Physics, what we consider cold, in fact is the absence of heat. Anything is able to be studied as long as it transmits energy (heat). Absolute Zero is the total absence of heat, but cold does not exist. What we have done is create a term to describe how we feel if we don't have body heat or we are not hot." … "And, does Dark exist?" he continued. The professor answered "Of course". This time the student responded, "Again you're wrong, Sir. Darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in fact simply the absence of light. Light can be studied, darkness can not. Darkness cannot be broken down. A simple ray of light tears the darkness and illuminates the surface where the light beam finishes. Dark is a term that we humans have created to describe what happens when there's lack of light." … Finally, the student asked the professor, "Sir, does evil exist?" The professor replied, "Of course it exists, as I mentioned at the beginning, we see violations, crimes and violence anywhere in the world, and those things are evil." The student responded, "Sir, Evil does not exist. Just as in the previous cases, Evil is a term which man has created to describe the result of the absence of God's presence in the hearts of man. After this, the professor bowed down his head, and didn't answer back. The young man's name was Albert Einstein.

This story takes us through the opposites and the illusion of lack to the reality of wholeness. It demonstrates that evil is only a term for the absence of something and does not actually have any validity or existence of its own. Thus might all the pairs of opposites be exposed as illusions that no longer exist when we see them from the perspective of the whole, of completion. From the centre of that whole everything may be seen at a point in time and space, a point of emergence in a greater cyclic flow and part way in an expanding understanding. Reality ultimately is wholeness and abundance. Any lack or absence arises from a partial view. Imbued with the illusion that lack or scarcity is real we have even defined what IS real in terms of it, such as defining peace as the lack or absence of war when, in fact, peace is the presence of all that war lacks - life, wholeness, relationship, fusion and creativity, and overriding and all-encompassing purpose.

We can redefine our universe through these realisations of wholeness, oneness and synthesis. Indeed so powerful is the energy of the whole that even in the depth of the illusion of separation we are still driven by it to share - even (so-called) terrorists and criminals may band together and establish a kind of coherent, synthesising rationale and develop an "honour among thieves". Relationship and interconnectedness permeates everything so subtly we simply don't see it if we are only looking for separativeness, difference and conflict. So, as we see the different qualities of all around, let's see them as contributory to the common life we share instead of as cause for conflict.

The swinging of attention between the illusory opposites and the distraction of the flow of cycles eventually lead us to the point from which they emerge into outer seeming. The Tibetan speaks of the lesson of the interludes: "These interludes are … the growing times; they are essentially the 'epochs for storage' … those interludes in the initiate's life of service wherein he draws all his forces into a 'well of silence' - a well full of the water of life. In this state of consciousness two definite activities transpire: Tension and Recognition. Without these interludes of abstraction, his work would slowly weaken as the tension, earlier initiated, weakened; his ability to attract and hold others true to the vision would likewise slowly disappear, as his power to recognise became myopic. … As he inhales the life of the (Spiritual) Hierarchy, and increasingly that of the Monad … and as he exhales the living essence into the 'world of serving lives', he becomes steadily more dependent on the 'interludes' wherein both these phases of activity cease and he becomes immersed in Being and in Consciousness - the intrinsic parts of the animating Whole. I use this phrase 'animating Whole' advisedly to indicate that the points of interlude are not related to form life at all but to the life of Life itself."

So in the midst of outer turmoil and chaos we can stand in the joy of being and see reality into expression. We know that "energy follows thought" and that "the eye, opened by thought, directs that energy". Seeing the reality of the interconnectedness of all life empowers that realisation and so it emerges in human consciousness, and from thence into human expression in the world. The Tibetan asks one of his disciples: "Have you ever thought, my brother, that just as there is a discipline of pain and sorrow, there may also be a discipline of joy and achievement? … Men need these days to learn this new truth, and its perception will greatly change human consciousness. That which is bliss is today here or on its way, and (we) … must be taught how to recognise and implement it."

Elsewhere he explains that: "The Kingdom of God is present on Earth today and forever has been, but only a few, relatively speaking, are aware of its signs and manifestations. The world of subtle phenomena … is ever with us and can be seen and contacted and proved as a field for experiment and experience and activity if the mechanism of perception is developed as it surely can be. The sounds and sights of the heavenly world (as the mystics call it) are as clearly perceived by the higher initiate as are the sights and sounds of the physical plane as you contact it in your daily round of duties. The world of energies with its streams of directed force and its centres of concentrated light are likewise present, and the eye of the seer can see it, just as the eye of the mental clairvoyant can see the geometrical patterns which thoughts assume upon the mental plane, or the lower psychic can contact the glamours, the illusions and delusions of the astral world. The subjective world is vitally more real than the objective world, once it is entered and known. It is simply … a question of the acceptance, first of all, of its existence, the development of a mechanism of contact, the cultivation of the ability to use this mechanism at will, and then inspired interpretation. … much of the abstract formulations of the occult sciences and the academic psychologists are incident to the over-activity of men's minds and emotional natures. If you can grasp broad and relatively simple facts and recognise that you possess the key or the clue in your already developed capacities, then you will go forward with simplicity, making no undue mental difficulties when dealing with these more subtle phases of your ever-existent environment. It is … just a question as to what 'impresses' you at any given moment, and then in what manner it conditions you."

The source of clarity amid the turning seasons and pull of the external world is apparent in this verse:

"Learn of the power of the spirit.
Its strength is inexhaustible.
A word is but a minute part.
As the whirlwind is but the visible sign of turbulence,
As the snow is but the messenger of the cold,
As the lightning is but the eye of the storm,
So is the word as a grain of dust blown by the impact of a creative thought.
The source of thought shines into the eyes of those who see.
And the chord of tension resounds into the sensitive ear.
And I, too, terrified, was overwhelmed at my nothingness.
But the Creator's Greatness makes equal the grain of sand and the mountain.
Understanding of the Beginning and of the Eternal fills each heart.
But be ready and grant it entrance.
Leaves grow each day, but flowers have their seasons."