Class: Body vs. Mind
Class summary: This class has four parts. Part 1: Answering a question from Nina in regards to how observing her ego makes her feel more like a prisoner, not less. Part 2: A short clip from a one-on-one session with anonymous #1 talking about how seeking to “have your cake and eat it too” can be subtly used by the ego. Part 3: For the third week in a row, a clip from a one-on-one session with Lyla where we discuss the contrast between mind-identification and body-identification in regards to our experience of disease and sickness. And the final part of class is a clip from a one-on-one session with anonymous #2 that deals with a recent painful break-up.
Time of class: 1:08:55
Bonnie performs Cavatina (since this is her first accompaniment since our wedding and that was our wedding song).
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Thank you for supporting the monastery.
February 7th, 2010 at 2:16 pm
Another wonderful class! And Bonnie!!! Wow!! Such beautiful playing! Thank you!
February 7th, 2010 at 10:06 pm
Thank you for a wonderful class. The message is always the same isn’t it. Forgive yourself for making judgments. It’s hard for me to be aware first of all that I am in my ego and then to forgive it. This two-part process is something I have to work at. Oh-oh “to work at” is that my ego talking? I liked to hear that there is a place of non-judgment that already exists in my mind and all I have to do is have a little willingness to bring it to the surface.
Trusting the process was another reminder that stayed with me, to be patient, to just show up and to show up and to show up / chop wood and carry water, chop wood and carry water / mow the lawn and mow the lawn and mow the lawn ….
February 7th, 2010 at 11:32 pm
I am grateful that you keep reminding me in so many ways to step back, watch myself choose the ego, and notice the pain this is causing me.. Eventually I will decide I no longer want the pain and will make a different choice. I continually try to make it harder than “chop wood carry water” as Linda said… — It even sounds boring to my ego… I want more flashes of lightening, more spiritual wows and highs than that… gawd dammit I want spiritual experiences!! for chrine out loud. And above all, I want my feelings to be important and woefully acknowledged.. not just a quiet contemplation that you describe, a quiet acceptance. At least now I can see what I’m doing by wanting these things.
It seems as if only when the pain gets too great that I say.. OK.. peace would be better than this (excitement – fill in the blank).. Whether it is feeling imprisoned, frightened by loss of ability to breathe, upset that I want a relationship that won’t happen, or want my cake and eat it too… Any and all of these forms of sabotaging myself will do.. on any given day I may go through all of them… but mostly it’s my breathing issues.
I appreciate your steady plodding and prodding.. the phrases and concepts do stick with me, as I find my mind remembering the things I learn in class when I am faced up with a choice.. and I do remember lots of the time that for the freedom I seek, the quiet and gentle path is my way Home.
Thanks to class participants Nina, Anony-mouse #1, Anony-mouse #2, and Lyla for your questions, and your sharing of your sessions with Monk… and Bonnie, it is wonderful to hear you play again… now as Mrs. Head Monk… you are always awesome.
Love,
Mother
February 7th, 2010 at 11:50 pm
I really loved.. “oh yeah, I’m in my ego again… oh, I’m in my ego again…. oh yeah, my hair is on fire again…”
Classic Monk. Love you. Thank you for teaching me nonchalance. Thank you for loving us.
M.
February 8th, 2010 at 4:39 am
Hey Jamie and everyone else, I just wish to thank you for everything, for WHAT you are…
Love G.
February 8th, 2010 at 7:36 am
Thanks Monk and participants, with the last three classes I have allowed myself to hear what I had never heard before. And imagine this… I think I am only now really practicing the Course, I thought I was but must have been reinforcing quilt, just a little twist of ego will do it. And I am an OLD Course student as in age and years since met it and on and on!
And wanting those spiritual experiences, Mother, I once had them often and they left years back and still I judge myself for lack of woo, I am a victim of their leaving. I so want external validation, showing I am right and good and as for peace or Jesus’ Love that just doesn’t seem to be enough, having decided the way His Love must feel and look…some proof in the world please and my preferably way through the body thank you.
Again, these recent sessions and the Love…it all has been stunning in its helpfulness.
I might not know what Peace looks/fells like but I am much close to knowing what it isn’t. njn
February 8th, 2010 at 11:47 am
Bravo Ninjanun… I just loved your whisper.. I think your last sentence IS what we’re going for… knowing what Peace isn’t. I just love the way you put it… And yes, me too on the ’spiritual experience’ thingy. And well, all of it! Your whole whisper. Same here, and I’m so glad we have this Monastery and Monk (and you) to help us. =-= Love, Mother
Gabrielius, right back atcha!! =-= Love, Mother
February 8th, 2010 at 4:04 pm
Aw! thanks Jamie and Bonnie. This class is a MUST. The second part of the Observer really completes this so fundamental teaching. Thanks Nina for your valuable question, thanks to it we have now a really whole picture of what it is to be the Observer according to Jesus in the Course. The part of Lyla´s session is also wonderful, thanks, too, Lyla. And the rest of the class is really so good, that we can´t ask more of a class. And then, it closes with Bonnie´s violin. What a gift. I can only say thank you. Hugs and lots of love, Lisi
February 9th, 2010 at 8:40 am
Jamie and all,
it took me two listenings to your answer to my questions before I even could start to hear a bit of it, and this night after listening the third time I for the first time ( really!) heard that I could say: ” I don’t want to look at the ego with the ego, I want to look with jesus.” And after having done that, through a rather unpleasant attack where it seemed i was glued to the prisonwalls, and which lasted most of the night (while i was repeating the same prayer) – then, at a certain point in the early morning, something seems to r-i-p inside, the feeling of being glued disappeared and I knew I was in the arms of Jesus. The feeling of identification was not gone until that moment. It was not possible to take that step back and look with Jesus through the window at all, before that moment.
But when the rip seemed to happen, I so knew where I was, and with Whom, and the practice just flowed from that. Then i fell asleep – peaceful at last – and when i woke up, I was glued again. So I repeated that I don’t want to look with the ego, I want to look with Jesus – .
It’s so easy when I know what I am looking at is not real. How very convincingly strong the illusion of being an ego feels.
February 9th, 2010 at 8:51 am
{{{{Nina’s heart}}}}
February 9th, 2010 at 8:54 am
{{{Nina’s heart}}}
February 9th, 2010 at 10:59 am
Nina, it’s nice you’ve managed to look at it with Jesus. I too notice, that I don’t want to hear, to learn. I don’t sleep peacefully for quite a time too.
“How very convincingly strong the illusion of being an ego feels.” Today I too wondered, that ego thoughts seem so strong, so real. They create a vast illusion, which seems so real that I start to act based on that illusion’s laws.
I see it is an illusion, but still cling to it… *sigh*
February 9th, 2010 at 11:25 am
…..deep sigh……
February 9th, 2010 at 11:33 am
{{{Nina}}}
deep sigh too Gabrielius
If it is fear, it is ego, right?
February 9th, 2010 at 3:44 pm
Dearest Ruth-Anne,
my heart and I feel so safe now, with those hugs from Jesus/Ruthie. Amazingly freeing space around the heart. I will go to bed now, slowly thawing :-)
February 10th, 2010 at 12:23 am
Yes, Ruth-Anne, yes! yes! It is ego! Gabrielius cries… ;))
February 10th, 2010 at 1:33 am
sweet dreams beloved Nina !xoxoox
February 10th, 2010 at 9:35 am
{{{Gabrielius}}}
February 10th, 2010 at 9:47 am
I just was able to finish this class. Having to make phonecalls, clean, and falling asleep was the “resistance du jour”. Great class Jamie. As per always.
So….”Jesus I am just plum loco. Help!”
Are you a Texan/Canadian too?
February 10th, 2010 at 10:53 am
Dear Ruth-Anne:
yes, I am
Jesus
March 2nd, 2010 at 5:01 pm
This is the first hour class I’ve attended! Only you, dear Monk, could pack so much in – in an hour! ;-)
My new prayer, shortened from my usual – “Jesus, I’m just plum loco” “Please help!” STOP! Too crazy to go any further—love it!
Love and Gratitude from your crazy little sister, ;-)
melody
March 2nd, 2010 at 5:58 pm
Bonnie, it is awesome to hear your lovely playing…as always. Thank you to Lyla, anonymous, Monk, and all who so generously share their process in these classes. We truly are one mind, as all of our problems are the same. Maybe different forms, but the content of the pain is the same, hence we can learn so much from sharing.
Time really is a trick,…..the content of this one hour class couldn’t have been greater!
With Love and Gratitude~