“The Great Awakening” – Online Weekend Retreat – Closing Session—How Can I Experience the Present Goal of Joy?

David Hoffmeister closes this remarkable online retreat with answers to our deepest questions as he shares that the world is a big mirror of our state of mind. Seemingly the mind is full of past memory implants, and human beings think they have a life of their own as well as a time between birth and death, where they can choose whatever they want, like a great adventure, except that the ego has rigged the whole thing! The memory implants never happened. It’s a world of imagination, and for most people, it’s actually not a happy dream when they come here. This world is not set up by God! Whatever you want from the world, the world wants from you. But if we give our judgment to the Holy Spirit, the perception of the world will change. The needs you think you have in the world will be reflected by other people having needs from you, because those thoughts are still thoughts in your mind. When we stop judging the world, the world seems to stop judging us!

Gold Nugget:

“Pain is an example of wrong-mindedness, and pleasure is an example of wrong-mindedness. Pain and pleasure are the same error, both of them reinforcing the body as real. And that’s why pleasure is such a distraction for waking up, the idea that you have to believe in externals to even experience pleasure. So there’s a section in the Manual for Teachers where the title of it is a question for Jesus, ‘What Is the Real Meaning of Sacrifice?’ (M-13) and Jesus comes out in that section and says, ‘God’s teachers can have no regret on giving up the pleasures of the world.’ (M-13.4:1) Now we’re moving a little closer to mysticism beyond the mainstream views of spirituality; we’re actually getting down to the heart of the matter. Because pleasure is definitely a wrong-minded perception, as well as pain. And when you get into the miracle working function, which is our function, and forgiveness is our function, that inspires joy! Because by receiving in consciousness the miracle impulses and acting directly on those miracle impulses, which is just the body as a communication device, then the body is used like a puppet, an oracle to share the kindness, the happiness, the laughter, the joy! That’s what Jesus is a good example of, during most of the latter part of the thirty-some-odd years. That was an example of right-mindedness, where he was just reflecting the inspiration of the Spirit. What was he doing? He just simply heard one Voice; he did not respond to a split mind anymore. He heard only the Voice of the Holy Spirit. As I’ve said, the Holy Spirit is the spirit of joy! And ‘It is possible even in this world to hear only that Voice and no other.’ (T-5.II.3:9) There it is; that’s Atonement! Hearing one Voice and following that one Voice is what leads to the experience of joy.”

 

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