The Living Obstruction

View this email in your browser Dear Friends, This week's quote is from spiritual awareness class CC 63 which was published in Volume 3 of The Living Light Dialogue. "You see, what the mind does, my friends, it says, "This, that, that, and that—if it will work that way, then I will be happy, I will be free and my life will be fulfilled." Well, when we say that, we set that law into motion and unless those particular things take place in our life, we don't experience happiness. Because we've limited the Divine. How have we limited the Divine? We've narrowed our understanding. We certainly haven't had much consideration: we only have three things that are going to make us happy. We haven't encompassed the whole universes. And so we become the living obstruction. And that certainly, in my understanding, is not wisdom. Now, it all takes place inside of ourselves. It takes place—and we say that a million times—it takes place where man doesn't want to look. You see? Now, we don't want to look in here for freedom. We want to look out there for freedom. Because we do not want to face the truth. And the truth, my friends, is it's inside. And there is no God outside that's going to change it for you. There is no God that's done it to us. And therefore, there is no God that can take it from us. That is not the God that this Association and this philosophy understands. There is no God, my friends, that can change your life, that can give you what you want, or take away what you don't want. That type of a God only exists in the illusion of our mind. There's no hero in the sky that can transform our life. But there is the greatest hero you will ever find: it's in the depths of your own being. And when you follow that path of total consideration, acceptance, and expression, then you will see a great God—and its name is understanding."   Recently a number of individuals have emailed their questions and comments. Although great effort is made to respond to all sincere questions and expressions, occasionally, and for a variety of reasons, a communication will go unanswered. The spam filters are not very perceptive and with so much work to be done to share these teachings with a wider audience, sometimes things just get lost. So if it is important to you and you do not hear from us, please ask the question again. And to all those who have made the effort to communicate with Serenity, I just wanted to say thank you. If you have any topics you would like addressed in these weekly emails, please feel free to email your request. To ensure that you consistently receive Serenity's weekly emails, be sure to add Serenity's email address to your contacts and your white list. This will help ensure that the emails are not treated as spam. Additional information on these teachings is available on Serenity's website: http://www.livinglight.org Sincerely yours, Russell Fitzgerald Vice President Copyright © 2020 Serenity Association, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you opted in via our website. Our mailing address is: Serenity Association PO Box 4187 San Rafael, CA 94913-4187 Add us to your address book Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.

Insight into Giving

View this email in your browser Dear Friends, This week's quote is from spiritual awareness class The Lost Discourse: Giving, which will be published in Volume 18 of The Living Light Dialogue. "Why is it that the giver is the one that is blessed? My dear friends, you can and will progress only to the degree and extent in which you help another on the eternal ladder of progression. Truly are we blessed when we know how to give. There are many who are aware of this, and there are many, many more who give only for the thought of receiving. But to the many who give not with the thought of receiving, they are giving because at some time in their progression they have learned that the giver is fulfilling an absolute law which causes them to go on and on upward in progression. Why is it that so many, having experiences of which they are not fond, are unable to release the thought and memory of those experiences? My dear children, it is because they have not yet learned to be true givers. Don't you see, my friends, if we are not true givers, then we hold things to ourselves? And regardless whether the experiences are good or seeming bad, we are unable to release them, for we have not yet learned the art of true giving. The mental body must be educated so that it can give freely what it receives. Please understand, I am not speaking of the giving of objects, for there are those who give of objects with such great show, for within their very being they are indeed most selfish. And this they do not want, naturally, to be known. The giving of which I am speaking is the giving of the self, the giving of what you hold most dear. I pray that you will perceive, for, my children, the art of giving is a guarantee of the great freedom that awaits you. And I do pray that you may turn your eyes upward to learn of the things which will help in your progression."   Regardless of the headlines, regardless of the storms of creation, there is reason to be encouraged. Though our minds know it not, great good is being accomplished. But it is up to us to make the effort in consciousness to become more aware. If you have any topics you would like addressed in these weekly emails, please feel free to email your request. To ensure that you consistently receive Serenity's weekly emails, be sure to add Serenity's email address to your contacts and your white list. This will help ensure that the emails are not treated as spam. Additional information on these teachings is available on Serenity's website: http://www.livinglight.org Sincerely yours, Russell Fitzgerald Vice President Copyright © 2020 Serenity Association, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you opted in via our website. Our mailing address is: Serenity Association PO Box 4187 San Rafael, CA 94913-4187 Add us to your address book Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.

Insight into procrastination

View this email in your browser Dear Friends, This week's quote is from spiritual awareness class CC 63, which was published in Volume 3 of The Living Light Dialogue. "Now, there is another function that's very important and it's the function of procrastination. Its soul faculty balance is unity. If we are united in our levels of consciousness within ourselves, then there is no expression—or let us say, at least a far lesser expression—of the function of procrastination. Now, what is procrastination? Well, I think it is best described with a very old saying, which is, "Hell is paved with good intentions and broken promises." And so a person has good intention to do something; they just never get around to the point of actually doing it. Now, we may ask ourselves, "Well, how come I have these good intentions? I have a good intention, for example, of being prompt and being on time, because it's a true mark of my character. And I don't want my character not to be up to the par of my own pride." What is it that we have the intent and we say we want to do something, we say that we're going to do something, and we just never seem to get to it? It's rather embarrassing and humiliating, I would think, for any of us to have all these good intentions and never get them into application. Well, a person says, "Well, I intended to do that, but all of these other things distracted me." Well, my friends, stop and think. All experience takes place within our own mind. Man is a law unto himself. So man alone is guaranteeing all the experiences and distractions necessary in order to continue on expressing what is known as the function of procrastination. So the first thing we want to do—and that takes unity inside of ourselves—we want to stop and we want to think, "What am I gaining from this constant and continuous procrastination that I find myself in?" The moment you become aware of what you are gaining, then you're on the first step of bringing unity into your being and you will no longer procrastinate. Now remember this: there is no mind in any universe that does anything that it does not believe it is gaining from. That is not the way the mind works. So if you have problems with procrastination, find out what it is in your mind that has accepted gain from the experience. And once you find that out—of course, that takes unity—and once you find that out, you will no longer have the need to procrastinate."   One of the many aspects of this philosophy that has resonated with me is the insight it provides into the various emotions that I experience. As I have often been the victim of my own emotions, for me, any perspective that offers even the slightest degree of freedom from that turmoil and upheaval is of great value. Those who are new to Serenity, you will find additional quotes on Serenity's Facebook Fanpage but for some time now I have not been able to update that page. Unfortunately, I seem to have reached an impasse with Facebook and my efforts have been unsuccessful.   If you have any topics you would like addressed in these weekly emails, please feel free to email your request. To ensure that you consistently receive Serenity's weekly emails, be sure to add Serenity's email address to your contacts and your white list. This will help ensure that the emails are not treated as spam. Additional information on these teachings is available on Serenity's website: http://www.livinglight.org Sincerely yours, Russell Fitzgerald Vice President Copyright © 2020 Serenity Association, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you opted in via our website. Our mailing address is: Serenity Association PO Box 4187 San Rafael, CA 94913-4187 Add us to your address book Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.

What we take with us

View this email in your browser Dear Friends, This week's quote is from spiritual awareness class CC 61, which was published in Volume 3 of The Living Light Dialogue. "Now, in reference to someone at the time of transition experiencing, sometimes, voices of the departed or their forms or music, etc., that means simply that they have reached that level of consciousness, you understand, and therefore are having the experience on spiritual levels of consciousness—or it could even be astral levels of consciousness. Now, you know, it's so wonderful when we face a situation where we say, "Well, Lord, I know I have accepted I've only got a few months left to live on this earth realm." It is just wonderful, the experiences that we go through. It really is. You see, man, believe me, doesn't want to think about so-called death or transition. He just pushes that right out of his mind until [The Teacher knocks on the wooden lectern.] it knocks. And it knocks according to what we rely upon. For example, if we rely upon a medical doctor and we have faith in the doctor and the doctor says, "Well, Joe, you've got two months left to go," well, of course, we accept that, if that's where we've placed our faith and our reliance. And when we do that, the mind goes through all kinds of changes and processes. Well, the truth of the matter is, you might go two months and you might go another twenty years: that isn't dependent upon the doctor at all. No. He's not the one who's going to make you go two years, two months, or twenty. No. However, it does ofttimes serve a very good purpose. You know why? We start to think, "Do I really believe, really in the continuity of life? Am I pleased with what I've done with my life to this point?" That's where the truth starts rising in our consciousness and we start really to think. Most of us have been brainwashed to a god of wrath, a god of absolute justice. And we start to shudder, because we're not quite sure whether we really believe in the continuity of life or we're going to face this judge, which, in truth, of course, is our own conscience. And something inside of us starts to go to work. And so it's nice. I think it would help all of my students to sit down and take about eighteen minutes and say to yourself, "Well, in nine minutes I'm going to leave this body for good. How do I feel about it? What have I left unfinished? Who am I going to have to face and what kind of judgment will I be able to accept, because, whether I accept it or not, it's going to be." It behooves you, my friends. Stop and think. Stop and think. Then, you know what will happen? You'll say, "Well, I have nine minutes to go. The train's coming and I'm on my way and I can't turn back. Well, I have a house and I have a couple cars and I have this and that." Well, what value do they have? You're not going to take them with you. What are you going to take with you? Remember, you take no physical substance into those dimensions, because it doesn't exist in those dimensions. What are you going to take with you, friends? What is going to comfort you on your journey? What is going to encourage you and keep you going? What do you have? What do you have to take with you? The only thing you have is your mind. That's all. What kind of a mind are you going to take? Are you going to be pleased with it? Think about that. Every moment is a death and every moment is a birth, for it is a death and birth in consciousness. So think. So often we think, "Well, in ten years I'll have this here, in this physical world." Or, "In twenty years I'll have that." Well, my friends, you might not make it ten years. You might not even make it ten days. So is that sensible? Is it reasonable to garner up all of the gold of this material world and put it all into a bank account? Is it logical? Is it even logical to live in that kind of fear? Because, you see, if you live in that kind of fear, if that's where your security is, when you leave your physical body you will not be able to leave the bank doors, because that's where your security is. And so you, your astral body, your desire bodies, will hover at those bank vaults. But all it can do is hover and go through its frustrations. Think, my good students, is that what you want? We're all going to have to face that. And we don't know what hour, what day, or what moment we're going to face it. Prepare yourselves. Somehow you have merited the opportunity to consider it."   The above passage was in response to a student's question, but since the quote was rather long, I was a bit reluctant to include the question. It is not our soul that fears. Those who are new to Serenity, you will find additional quotes on Serenity's Facebook Fanpage but for some time now I have not been able to update that page. Unfortunately, I seem to have reached an impasse with Facebook and my efforts have been unsuccessful.   If you have any topics you would like addressed in these weekly emails, please feel free to email your request. To ensure that you consistently receive Serenity's weekly emails, be sure to add Serenity's email address to your contacts and your white list. This will help ensure that the emails are not treated as spam. Additional information on these teachings is available on Serenity's website: http://www.livinglight.org Sincerely yours, Russell Fitzgerald Vice President Copyright © 2020 Serenity Association, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you opted in via our website. Our mailing address is: Serenity Association PO Box 4187 San Rafael, CA 94913-4187 Add us to your address book Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.