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To Bargain is to Bar Gain We bargain prices, another word for haggling. Some of us even take great pride in being thrifty bargainers. How would it strike us if we substituted hugs for Dollars and overheard two men bargaining? The shopper asks: "how much are these good?" The vendor replies: "One dozen hugs, Sir, but if you hug me now (cash), I will give you a discount of two hugs". - "No, thank you, I only want to hug you eight times for these goods. If you settled for eight, I would be agreeable". The vendor agrees, receives eight prickly hugs and smugly rubs his hands behind the parting shopper, congratulating himself for his splendid sales talents, because the goods given away for eight hugs, he valued at only six. The man, once outside, meets with his wife and delights: "Imagine, I succeeded in obtaining one dozen hugs worth, for only eight." And she, the wife congratulates herself for having such an extremely smart husband. The act of bargaining reflects the clearest form of worldly giving: the withholding of Love. it should give cause for contemplation, when we consider the world's poorest nations as being the ones where bargaining has become a way of life. More poignantly: where withholding Love from one's brother has become the accepted norm and thus the cause of poverty. Our use of credit cards shows clearly how we withhold love. "Give me some love now - I shall return it later". - "That's fine" says the finance company, "as long as you give us quite a bit of extra love (interest) on top". Facing our real attitudes courageously may not be very palatable, but it nonetheless remains a fact that we make deals and bargains with Love. What about our ability to give love with love when we must repay a debt to some impersonal financial institution or pay our taxes? Then this ability is heavily taxed for now we fail to see the receiver as being lovable. The receiver is always lovable, because in reality we give but to our SELF. Which form the SELF assumes as the receiver matters not at all. I AM gives to I AM, that is "All-There-Is" to it. However, as these last few sentences may cause many a reader to swallow hard, an expanded definition seems appropriate: The officialdom of any nation merely reflects the Spirit of that nation. There are those who would, and do, sell their soul for positions of power and the rest are the lukewarm who have abdicated their ability and right to think for themselves, hence have reduced themselves to receivers of orders. There is no one to blame. The attitude suggested above does not suppose that we enthusiastically agree with every claim officialdom issues forth, thus only helping to finance the prison it builds around its brothers. It does not suggest we condone attitudes of total lovelessness. If bureaucracy had its way, then it would draw every single soul into the cobwebs of its joyless, grizzling world of stifling rules and regulations and make the rest of mankind the cow to be eternally milked. What it does advocate is this: Hardeners hearts are still children of God, however steeped in egotistic schemes, therefore they are lovable all the same. Whatever their conduct may be, they are part of humanity as you and I. It is one humanity growing and learning, working its way through from darkness to light, even though mostly by mistakes. Singling out groups within humanity as undesirable on grounds of misconduct would create an imbalance of polarities once more. That many of these brothers have forgotten their roles as servants to the whole and want to play masters and rulers instead does not change the fact of their Being being the same as ours. Remember, this is a free-will universe where "everything goes". They have come here to learn, the same as you and I, although they, as most others, forgot this very fact, and are lost in their sandbox instead. But they are still learning. Their hunger for control is simply born of the fear of not being in control. They have not discovered Love as a principle of State as yet. * * * Returning to the subject of bargaining, examining the real reasoning behind this concept reveals unpleasant facts. We imagine two people in love. The world adores lovers and romance, for it senses union here and true giving - the giving of Self to SELF. But altered state of Being is quickly off its mark and offers its reversed version of truth again. The giving of Self to SELF becomes the gift of Self to Self. Before we continue with this examination, the assurance seems in place here that no judgment at all is laid upon the lovers of this world. They too are here to learn as every other soul. The following illustration touches a very delicate chord in all of us. Although our understanding of love is a reversed one, for Love is Reality - exactly what we deny- we nevertheless regard is as our highest virtue. Observing our lovers now, we see this: They ache for each other, seek each other's company wherever possible - in short, they need each other. The most noble feelings the heart contains are now experienced here. And truly, this is the closest man ever comes to see his SELF in the other's heart. This is the reason for romance's appeal. She worships him - he worships her. "Ask what you will - I shall surrender it with ease, if only I can be ONE with you", says each to the other soul. Beauty is here, trust and open hearts and wonderful it is indeed, there is no doubt at all, if it were not for the value each one puts onto its Self. But what is really taking place here is a bargain, which robs the romance of its true virtue: union. The soul, yearning for completion, knowing in its heart of hearts it is not complete, seeks to complete itself with its Divine SELF. The altered state of mind obscures this goal and leads away from where union could be found. its identity being the body, it now points to another body and says: "Unite". Two Body Selves make not ONE SELF. In truth, each lover values the other more than his or her own Self. And so the bargain is struck. What these two do not say in words is really this: "I give my Self, which I value less than you, to you and in return I receive your Self, which I value more. This way I shall be complete." Obviously, the one I gave my discounted Self to must have picked the shorter straw. Therefore both made a bad "deal", each one believing he have won the lottery. What bad deals have in common is that they leave a bad after-taste, which burps up at the time of divorce. * * * Love must be allowed to rush in and this we can do only by releasing fear. To love we first must learn the love of SELF, the God in us, before it can be extended to those around. If we do not love our SELF, how can we love another? In a different way: if contact has not been made with our own Source, how can we let love flow to others - from which source could it spring forth and flow? * * * Everything that exists is Love in one form or another. Our supply is a direct reflection of our ability to give love and to give with love. It follows then, that CURRENCY is CONSCIOUSNESS. The Ego would prefer to see this thought as polarities - rich and poor. But this is not so. The meaning here is not to depict a rich man as having a greater capacity for love than his poorer brother. The meaning is the perfect supply of our needs. The rich man may have more or different needs than the poor. If his need is to be a multi-millionaire, then this need shall be met. Caution here - let us not mock this thought, for to this man, being a millionaire is a genuine need. He needs this experience to instruct his soul with the feeling of it. He may have come for that specific reason into this particular life-stream. Notwithstanding its real purpose as a learning aid, it is a need to him all the same. A poor man, in contrast to his richer brother, may take offence to material possessions, thus his needs may not necessarily be furnishable through the medium of monetary currency. Love shall supply here too. So, terms as rich and poor ought to be interpreted on the level of form content, not on the level of form itself. The content simply projects the love capacity of each. The poorer man's capacity could well exceed the rich man's ability to love.
The
above is
an excerpt
from the book God
I AM: From Tragic to Magic by Peter Erbe.
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