02
Develop an intense curiosity about what meets you in the silence. And how you react to it. Everyone who has thought about it through the ages has said there are only three things that impact us throughout our life: Desire Fear Duty. How we live is how we live in relation to the mixture of these three elements. Once we come to terms with them, it is clear sailing with "fair winds and following seas." In the silence, you have ample opportunity to study your response to Desire, Fear and Duty over the course of your life to this point. Therein lies the key to living differently over what remains of your life. You will also get all the help you need from your nighttime dreams. Our dreams are always coming to our aid, and we are always saying, "Honey, you won't believe the stupid dream I had last night!" And, stepping back into our traditional ways of dealing with Desire, Fear and Duty. Our traditional ways of dealing with them has us exactly where we are. Time for review and redirection, don't you think? That begins with you developing an intense curiosity about what meets you in the silence. And how you react to it.
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01
Sincerity is the core value-- the essence of being human. Sincerity is non-contrivance. We aren't trying to get anything by it. We aren't trying to get anything. There is nothing to get, or have, or own, or possess, or want, or desire, or do, or be beyond being sincere. If you are going to be anything, be sincere. If you think there is anything more than sincerity to achieve, acquire, admire, aspire to, go back to the womb and start over. If you understand the central place of sincerity in our life, live so that everyone understands that you understand that. Sincerity is the basis of humanity, the ground of both The Individual and The Collective. We cannot be an "I" until we are sincere. We cannot be a "We" until we are sincere. Most of the "We's" we are a part of require us to leave our "I" at the door. We have to scrap our sincerity to join the commune. We have to say "we believe" what everybody believes. To be sincere is to be a heretic. To blaspheme. To "go rogue." Give me a We that is sincere-- particularly about not-knowing what it doesn't know. "What's best," for example. "What's right," for another example. "How things ought to be," for another. Give me a We that doesn't say, or imply, "Our way or the highway!" Give me a We that says, "You are welcome here! We are a place where everyone listens everyone else to the truth of what they are saying-- which is the truth of who they are-- where everyone is glad to be in everyone's company, and to be blessed by everyone's presence, without telling anyone who they ought to be, or what they ought to believe/think/do. So, come in! You will know whether you belong here within five minutes."
