Real/Imagination

Just led a five-hour workshop on psychic skills and techniques. Nine women, all feisty, all with psychic ability already streaming, though many a protective dam in place. I never fail to lose delight in how juiced they get when they discover that it's a skill like reading, like math, that with practice and guidance, is very easily doable.

As usual, somewhere in the middle it hits me: nine human beings have paid money to hear me gumflap. And I'm humbled. And I ask myself: are you giving them something useful in exchange for the money, the time they are giving? And it makes me stop and reassess, ask myself: what are we really here for?

And as with any other class/workshop I teach, the real take home message is: the answers, the power you seek is inside of you. They come because of some "skill" I will teach them. But the real message never changes. If I do my job right, I make myself obsolete. If I do my job really well, I'll never see them again.

Each class/workshop I teach, I always think: this time I'll get away with just teaching the skill, sliding a few subtle messages in about the direction to head (inward). But each class, someone innocently asks the question that turns the whole class on its ass. Today the question was:

"I get most of my clarity when I drive in my car and I sort of talk to myself. I hold these conversations, and then I get answers. But what I want to know is: is this real or is it my imagination?"

And as I stare off into space, knowing that the real answer is: "Nothing Is Real" but that it will never fly, I flail about looking for a way to comfortably answer the question. I get that, yet again, I'm trapped. But how much do I tell them? How much is too much and they run screaming back into numbness? And so I dance around the answer, attempt to bring the answer back to something true, yet still safe.

I say that they have all given money and time to come and be a part of a class. That I have been set up as teacher and they have taken on the role of student. I tell them that my job is to gumflap. And that as I do this, they sort through and create mental piles of Yes, No, and Maybe. But that no matter how much Yes goes in the pile, it is still less "real" than what occurs in her car. That what occurs in her car is more real because it is less removed. In the case of the classroom setup, the info comes from outside of her, and so is therefor less real. For it to be more real, it has to run through the filter of her experience. And yet the experience she has in her car is still fraught with b.s. because it is still being run through the experience of speaking to an "other", be it Guide or Higher Self or whatever. And that is why she asks the question, because she can still smell the b.s. The b.s., I tell her, will be gone when you simply Know, when you finally lay down the separation between you and "the problem", when you look at a situation and face the truth of it, which makes itself known in the contraction (no) or expansion (yes) you feel. There will be no more "decisions", only acknowledgment of what Is Occurring. There will be no more "problem". There will only be This, then the next This, then the next.

And I forget what I said next, something where I attempted to sidestep the whole flood of stuff which of course comes after I say these things. Somehow we end up talking about how there is no real choice with the info that comes to them when they open the psychic channels. That there is no choice of pawing through to only take in "the positive", only the clear receiving of data. I make them repeat the 3 commandments of this workshop:

1. Thou shalt not judge yourself
2. Thou shalt not judge the information you receive
3. Thou shalt not judge, just read the energy

And somehow this leads to a discussion about the current insanity that is unleashing in the world. Someone says: we are at some sort of threshold. Another says: we are at a turning point. And I say to them: the skills you are learning, the techniques of how to read energy and then turn inward for answers is going to be incredibly important as the markers outside of ourselves get even more skewed.

I talk about the movie The Matrix, how it is a very thinly veiled metaphor for what is actually occurring. I talk about how reading the truth and living it doesn't mean that others will like you for it. I talk about how I blasted open to a place last year of such awakening that it shut me down for many months, left me in a place of such utter paranoia and fear that I could barely stay in forward motion. I almost talk about how they can become the strongest, clearest readers known to earthkind, and still it won't make them any happier or saner or more well-adjusted, in fact it will make the opposite occur, but I stop myself and don't say anything, just let the ghost of almost hang there in the air.

The room got very quiet. Still. I felt the energy shift in a direction that veered radically away from the simple straightforward trajectory of a psychic skills class. So I sidestepped, said something about how my experience wasn't theirs, not to worry, just work the steps we'd gone over.

And the room stayed quiet and one woman finally spoke up and said: it's okay that you say the things that you do. We need to hear this. You are dealing with a room full of people who have been dealing with panic attacks and anxiety meds and people thinking we're crazy, and really, please just be honest with us.

And so I talked a bit more. Did my best to speak only in facts. But I still pulled back. Because do they really want to hear the truth? Really? I can barely stand it, and I've been hammering away at myself for years. Maybe I disrespect them by not telling them that everything they know isn't true. But I cannot find a firm footing and so I give them a booby prize.

I make a joke and say that we could all stand up, start screaming, tear off all our clothes, run howling into the streets, and that would be more true than the gunflapping we do as we sit in this room. And everyone laughs. And I wonder how many of them saw the truth in what I just said.

I look up to see one woman nodding vigorously, her eyes fierce. She's very young and beautiful, a red-headed artist who makes jewelry and comes to all my classes, bartering rings and earrings and necklaces made of hammered metals and huge chunks of red coral. And I know that she's game for anything at this stage in her awakening. But we don't do anything more than meet eyes, acknowledge the moment.

After the workshop, we're all burnt crispy. I announce that I'm going to go get a burger and a glass of wine and welcome company. A few of us head out. And we talk nothing more serious than Battlestar Gallactica and Grey's Anatomy. And then I go home.

Which is where I sit now. Another workshop done. Another group of people sitting in their homes, absorbing what they went through today, sorting through, asking themselves: what was real? what was my imagination?

I hope I did my job. I hope I drove them inward. I hope I never see them again . . .

Comments

[mm]

Well done. And that last sentence rings so true.

[Guy]

Hello there,
loved the blog, reminded me that I had someone tell me the other day that they like me because they think I'm 'deep'... which made me feel a bit awkward, because I'm simply whatever I am, but what made me laugh was the phrase that came into my mind as a reply :

"How deep is a drop of water in the ocean ?"

Sounds very zen-like and even 'mixed mataphors', maybe you'll understand it better than me ?

Love,
Guy

[bellamagic]

You are f*cking brilliant. Brava! *bows in your general direction*

[Daniel McCullough]

It seems that wisdom and knowledge have ever been at odds with happiness. I am reminded of a scene from "I, Claudius". An astrologer has just delivered a very accurate yet ominous reading. He then seeks to mitigate the harshness of it by saying he could be completely wrong. Then one character says to another, "It is not enough that astronomers know the future, they also want to be loved!"

Should not one of the rules be "Thou shalt not judge the student"? You did just that and found them wanting.

[melissa]

hmmm...interesting comment by Daniel.

Are you protecting your students (from hearing hard truth that will freak them out) or yourself (from having freaked out students who will withdraw from you, dislike you, belittle your opinion, etc...)...?

But it's an interesting dilemma b/c in any kind of teaching..or marketing...or sales...we're taught to know our audience and speak to them where they are and about what they're ready to hear --- this makes me wonder, how much of any of that is really for the student (or the consumer)? If they're not ready for the truth, it won't really hurt them, they'll probably just refuse to believe it. (Or refuse to buy it.) And then again, maybe someday down the road, they will.

It hurts the messenger more, doesn't it? To be denied, disbelieved, maybe even mocked...hmm. I struggle with this with my yoga teaching. Do I want to be liked or do I want to be honest?