The phrase 'I am' has been used in many contexts to summarize the ultimate choice in our existence. We choose to be the totality of our spiritual being, open and ready to be a servant and teacher of God. In the past, we may have answered the question posed by another person of 'who are you?' in terms of the roles we play in our daily existence. We may have answered with our occupation, with our family status, with our financial status or with our attachments to objects. We may have answered with a label we placed upon physical attributes of ourselves. We may have automatically answered with a physical or an emotional feeling state such as 'I am happy, angry, depressed,' etc. All of these become delimiting thoughts of separation because they exclude the totality of who we are.
The wisdom of Krishnamurti speaks of this totality and a need for a much more deliberate intention in defining who we are.
'When you call yourself an Indian or a Muslim or a Christian or a European, or anything else, you are being violent. Do you see why it is violent? Because you are separating yourself from the rest of mankind. When you separate yourself by belief, by nationality, by tradition, it breeds violence. So a man who is trying to understand violence does not belong to any country, to any religion, to any political party or partial system; he is concerned with the total understanding of mankind.'
We are all and everything--perfect in our imperfection, whole in our potential. We are that unique portion of God we call ourself, yet interconnected with an infinite number of unique parts that are at our disposal, simply by inviting God's conscious presence within our minds. We have found through deliberate practice of our decisions to call upon the Voice for God, that we are helped in directing our thoughts and our perceptions to light up our experience of the world. We are increasingly open to receive miracles great and small and to give of these miracles, which are ours to create. The flow of loving energy passes through us and illuminates from us. We are learning to experience our loving totality by placing aside judgments of separation and differences through the practice of forgiveness. As we forgive, we offer ourselves our own salvation, consciously joining our little selves with our Greater Self in the Universal Mind of God.
So, as we grow into greater awareness, how do we discern who we are? In any given moment in time, we are all that we could ever become. We are the flowing energy of miracles and we are the ministerial witnesses to loving energy in miracles. We are teachers, speaking of God and carrying God's words to everyone who has been sent to us. And yet we need not know what special words to say, what particular activities to perform. In being, we are simply open to what God has in store for us.
How have we placed imagined limits on our unlimited being? This is what our conscious spiritual study has brought to the surface. Now we place our ego thoughts upon our altar daily. We see them vanish simply by seeing them as being false projections. We commit ourselves to experiencing our own joy and happiness daily. We turn in our thoughts of power, control, self-protection and the need to be 'right' and exchange them for pleasurable anticipation of what is to come, gratitude for everything that has been experienced, and joy in all present moments.
By now, we have experienced increasing peace and serenity. We are ones who are coming to a heightened awareness of the choices available to us, and we are ones who are remembering what we truly desire from moment to moment. We are realizing that no matter what we end up doing, no matter what role we play in the dance of life, every form of doing that we choose is a matter of being. We literally succeed at any interaction in business, politics, family, or otherwise where we have been the messenger of loving affirmation to the best of our ability. When we fall short, we are not ones who chastise ourselves. We realize that it is part of our spiritual learning process allowing us to be that much more loving in our next encounter of that nature.
Truly committed to our state of a loving mind, there is literally no goal that we can set for ourselves that cannot be accomplished, no amount of success that cannot be reached, no day in which fatigue overtakes us. We have no desire for addictions, no false Gods or idols, no desire to avoid our true reality. Our minds are open, clear, conscious and with a ready confidence that we have the power of prayer and thought which shows us the solutions to all our temporary challenges. We remember again that all questions posed to us lead to an answer which is only for our good and well-being. We claim the courage to face these challenges as they present themselves, knowing we are God's children, and we are blessed with eternal peace.
Who am I? The letter 'I' is a fascinating symbol and a wonderful spiritual symbol. It has a top, and a bottom, and a large pillar in the center. The bottom line is the foundation we stand on, the Earth, and the top line represents Heaven. These parallel lines at the top and bottom could be imagined to reach into infinity. The center post of the pronoun 'I' meets at a 90-degree angle both at the bottom and the top. The connectness, which flows in both directions, comes through us, our own spirit. The concept of 'I' becomes a symbol of our recognition of our connection between our earthly tasks and the greater meaning of those tasks in the context of Heaven. This makes it stable and solid, held up eternally.
In contrast, the small 'i' consists of a single line with a disconnected dot floating above it. Metaphorically, it represents our conscious choice of identity between the Child of God within ('I') and the ego ('i'). As part of our spiritual statement of who we truly are, we choose for 'I'. The pronoun 'I', therefore, is a commitment to place our perception of Heaven, the Real World within all of our earthly experiences. This is exactly what our meditations in this book have been teaching us to become; who I really am.
WAKING MEDITATION
This meditation can be used as a means of culmination of all the meditations we have practiced over this period of time. Upon completion of your deep breathing meditation, bring to your physical altar or in your mind's eye, a particular circumstance in which you have questions about who you are and how you might be a messenger of love.
STEPS TOWARD PEACEFUL SOLUTIONS
Review the 'Steps Toward Peaceful Solutions' below. After reading through this list, write down after each step whatever guided message is brought to you in response to the circumstance you have brought to your altar. We need not give this undue contemplation. Answers will come, as we are ready for them. We can leave some areas blank for now, if that is most comfortable.
In the evening, review your sheet and dialogue with the Holy Spirit. Where you sense a need for greater release from blocks to love, ask to be shown more clearly love's miraculous transformations in your next day's travels.
GUIDED IMAGERY
Upon completion of your deep breathing meditation, simply envision yourself printing, deliberately and consciously, the words 'I AM' in capital letters. Feel yourself holding the writing instrument in your mind, placing it onto the paper with the pressure you select, and writing out the letters. Notice how fast or how slow you go in this writing.
Experiment with being guided in your mind to write the words using different patterns of pressure, style and emphasis on particular parts of the letters. Notice as you try these different patterns in your mind, changes in how you feel. Now, mentally put the pencil aside and look at the words you just wrote. Feel each phrase. Feel the spiritual connectedness of the power of each phrase and each letter within each phrase and each stroke within each letter. Finally, allow your mind to complete the phrase 'I am' with an inspiration you hear/see/feel from the Voice for God. Don't judge its' completion. Merely take it in and let it be. Know with ever increasing clarity that only love is real, and therefore only love is who I am.
JOURNAL ENTRIES
Reflect upon your answers to the 'Steps Towards Peaceful Solutions' above in situations where you are seeking your role as helper and guide to loving and peaceful affirmation. Glean from your answers which meditations in the previous chapters can use some revisiting for further deepening effects.
The 'I AM' exercise above can be done with or without actually writing. If you do the exercise by writing in your journal, notice the minute details of speed and pressure that you apply at various parts of the writing. Deliberately repeat these methods of writing or even exaggerate them. Dialogue with the Holy Spirit on what lessons of love these writing methods may have for you. Also, practice the affirmation below as often as you like.
AFFIRMATION
to be said and thought as often as you are inspired:
'I AM'... then wait for the answer.
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