Workshop - Dr. Robert R. Gibson - Albuquerque, NM 1977

[NOTE: The original transcript of this workshop was typewritten by Carolyn Franklin in 1977. It has faded over time and a new copy is presented below. No audio has been found.]

Today we will talk about truth. Most people that I run into tell me they are truth seekers. Would any of you say you qualified for that title? Truth Seeker? Most people have spent most of their lives seeking for truth. If you had found it you would be a “truth man.” We will not tell you what truth is, but we might show you, instead of being a truth seeker, something else that would be more fun.

To clarify a situation, I will only make statements. Now a statement is merely a statement, isn’t it? It is according to you what you do with that statement. I will not try to prove any of the statements I make and I will not defend them. If you want to fight with them – fight! It is just a statement anyway. I didn’t say I was an authority and you have to believe what I say, or you will suffer eternally or any of those things – I’m just going to make statements. If it happens to be of value to you and appears to be of interest, take and do what you like with it. If it doesn’t have any interest to you, there are plenty of containers out there you can drop it in. You won’t have to contend with these things, you won’t have to fight. And if I make a statement that opposes something that you hold to be absolutely true, I didn’t hurt your truth, did I? It will just be a statement that I make.

We are going to talk about truth. Truth is, to me – one of my statements, now – what you have made true and live by. Whatever you live by is your truth. You change it now and then a little bit; but your truth is what you live by. Most of us are unaware of what we are living by. We pick up a phrase here and there – but we don’t live by them. I have a friend, a very delightful person who can’t get out of the house. He can’t move through the front door – he has tried for years. Every time he gets his hat on, gets the keys to his car in his pocket and heads for the door, when he gets to the door, he remembers something in the house that must get done and he’s back in the house. He made a statement one time that he found in a magazine or something that his total way of living was, “I am a free man;” but he can’t get out the front door. His truth is that there is an invisible barrier across the exit of the house and he can’t get out of it – and that is what he lives by.

So, truth is that which I live by. My truth is that which I live by. The first step out we are going to talk about the truth that we now live by. I think we will come pretty close to covering everyone’s truth. We will again say, “This is a statement” – and yours is probably pretty far away from what we will describe. But in all probability, you will recognize a little bit of it as the truth that you are now living by.

First of all, we will draw a diagram which we will call the “Picture of Man.”  Somebody said the other day that I used the term, “Man” – and he is referring to Spirit – and wanted to know if I was a male chauvinist pig, and I said, “No, I’m a half-breed myself.” My mother was a woman and I didn’t use the term of “she” all the time, nor “it,” because one time, I tried to put all the pronouns quickly together. You know, he, she, it – and I said it too fast – so I haven’t done it since. So here is a picture of mankind. Mankind, each of us, has four aspects that make up the one unit – that is a human being.

The most obvious one is the Physical Body. We don’t know much about how they work, but we can recognize it. We know very little about how they work inside or what makes them work.

The other aspect is the Awareness. Something in it says they are aware – even if they are in a coma. We can stick a pin in them and a hole closes up as soon as we pull the pin out – there is a little awareness going on in there. If they are dead, you stick the pin in and it will leave a hole.

Another aspect there is something called Life. Whatever that may be – no one has a very good definition of it. There are a few words that man doesn’t have a definition for, like Life, Love, Truth, Spirit, God, and a few of those things. There just isn’t a definition that is adequate, so we will use a big X.  They taught me that in algebra that when I knew something existed but didn’t know what it was, put an X and I would find out. So, we will use X for Life. There is life in every person. And we’ve all seen those forms laying around that didn’t have life in it; and if you were around when it departs you can sure tell when it went. So, X is that which is alive.

And we are always doing something. We are sleeping, eating, working, talking, so there is always a Function going on.

This human being exists in an environment and each of us feels that we are the center of my environment. Everything revolves around me, doesn’t it? From the environment we perceive impressions in one form or another such as, sound, touch, sight, the various senses and so forth – and a lot of other things besides the senses. And of course, what we hold to be true we form certain feelings. Now, I said from what we hold to be true, we form a feeling about these impressions that come in, and X responds to that feeling. It perceives that as a report, and for some reason or another, X’s whole job seems to be to do the appropriate thing for the information it receives.

Now we can talk to it all day long, and we might as well be talking to one of those hot air balloons out there – It doesn’t pay any attention to you. But what you feel, it responds to instantly and completely for what information it receives from what we hold to be true. And it sends a neuroendocrine impulse to the Physical Body which mobilizes the energy to carry out the appropriate action.

So, if I were standing up on that podium and decide to jump off – I would have a feeling about how far it was to the floor – and X would generate exactly the right amount of energy so that I could jump to the floor and not hurt myself. Now, if I were blindfolded standing on the podium and decide to jump and said, “X will take care of me,” we might come up with something broken.

Now, it comes down to that which we make true. Cause as we said, this feeling would be impressions based upon truth. What I have made true to me and live by – whether I know about it anymore or not. So we are going to put the first truth that the human being generally forms. As I said, each of us may be the exception, but I would make book that we are not, okay? No doubt, this will fit everyone except number one; but it even fits number one.

The first truth that the person made was in the process of being born.

We had been floating around in the uterine world. You see that was one of my past lives – the uterine world. I lived there for several months and floated around in about the most non-disturbed state that you could conceive of. There wasn’t anything interesting or delightful going on – but it was non-disturbing. There weren’t any loud noises – they were all muffled. There wasn’t any sudden change in temperature, there wasn’t anybody making any demands on me or any of those things – I was there floating around. Nobody even challenged me. So, in the process of being born, all that gets changed suddenly.

We begin to experience sensations we are not used to and they were very unpleasant – like compression, squeezing, pulling, suffocation, etc., etc., etc. And after we are born, they treat us with great indignity. They grip you up by the heels and whack your bottom. Some joker sticks his finger down your throat and feels around to see if there is any mucus, pours some silver nitrate in your eyeballs and it burns like fury. All of this is pretty sudden and you have no control over it; but you have a big memory of a few minutes ago of being non-disturbed.

So, the basic truth that everybody makes is the purpose of living. That seems to be the first one everybody forms – the whole purpose of living. Now, we didn’t have the use of words in those days. But we sure had our feelings, and our feelings were: the whole purpose of living – my truth – is to regain the non-disturbed state.

Now, the non-disturbed state in the earth plane is very difficult to achieve. You get a little of it when you are sleeping – and not dreaming – and that isn’t very often; but basically, it is very difficult to achieve. Nevertheless, it is attempted morning, noon, and night – we want to regain the non-disturbed state.

Now, we may work ourselves into a frenzy trying to get rich so we could then be non-disturbed. We may go off and give away all our possessions so we can go out and live like a hermit. We want to get married and unmarried – each one assuming it is going to make a non-disturbed state when we get it. We are going to work and build us a business so we will be non-disturbed. We are going to get rich so we will be non-disturbed, and when that doesn’t produce it, we try to get all sorts of other things.

I read about the man, Howard Hughes. He tried to get non-disturbed by becoming intensely wealthy – that didn’t work. So, then he became somewhat hooked on various and sundry drugs, which makes you insensible for a little while. You know, kind of out of it, all of which is an effort to be non-disturbed.

Non-disturbance goes on many levels. First, it is on physical level, to gain pleasure and comfort and escape all pain. But did you ever wonder what it would be like to suddenly have something happen to you today that you could no longer experience pain? Any sensation that you didn’t like you couldn’t experience anymore. Do you think that could be a desirable thing to happen? You picked up a hot skillet handle and you wouldn’t know that you got ahold of it until you smelled burning meat. Right? Or you could break a heel bone and you would just wander off on it till you smashed it up pretty good. You wouldn’t know anything about it – just walk on. And your teeth could have holes in them because you couldn’t experience pain.

But of course, to the child all the pain is pretty bad. So we generally have that idea thru life that pain is an evil thing that has happened to me to punish me, or just plain annoy me. We seldom see that it is a signal from X to the Awareness that our lifestyle is kind of jolted up a bit. Like holding hot skillet handles in our hand, that’s a funny way to learn about lifestyle, isn’t it?

In all sort of ways pain tells us that something needs to be done – not that it should be destroyed or killed. But of course, you don’t approach it that way. The quickest medication we can get that will make me insensible is the best one.

You can watch the boob tube, and there are various guys on telling you that their pain killer is stronger. In other words, it will interfere quicker between X and Awareness than the other guys that make pain killer pills. All they are is insulators; they numb the nerves until you no longer hear that something is haywire. And each one says, “Get the strong medicine and knock down the pain,” and you can go on and do that which makes you hurt anyway.

Now, as we get older we want to gain attention and escape being ignored or rejected – by older I mean three months. Did you ever feed a baby, and get it all warm and dry, and put it in its little bassinet and it goes to sleep for about the first three months? After that, when you start to leave the room it lets out a yell because it doesn’t want to be ignored. So you stay there and watch it while it goes to sleep.

The next thing, we want to gain approval and escape all disapproval. And later we want to be important and escape all sense of inferiority – especially important, which means I have
control over other people. That’s the only way I am important is if I can control you. And if I can’t control you, you might do something I don’t want you to do – and that would be very upsetting to me.

So now this becomes our truth – our very fundamental truth – that my purpose of living is to be non-disturbed – regain the non-disturbed state on all these levels. Now, when an impression comes in I don’t like, I panic and X responds by preparing me to fight or run… and I probably don’t fight or run.

We begin to form other truths as we go along on how to achieve this non-disturbed state. The first one we discovered was to complain. Now, a baby complains by crying and it is very appropriate, because it is the only way it has to communicate. But this truth about being non-disturbed was probably the most appropriate truth that the baby could form. But none of us are babies anymore, right? Even though we like to be called that once in a while. Complaining was an excellent way for the baby to achieve its truth. But complaining is about the last way that works for us grown up folks – we have grown bodies.

Now, if we want to check up and see whether we are still using this truth or not – which most of us have no doubt that we are – let’s see how long it has been since you complained. Have you complained in the last 24 hours? So, you see that we live by that the whole purpose of living is to be non-disturbed, and here comes along some little insignificant something and we find that complaining is the automatic method.

Now, that is neither good nor bad, right or wrong – we must look at it and see if that fits my purpose today. If my purpose is to be non-disturbed, then I’m working at it. Maybe complaining is just fine, but it usually brought about some counter complaints. Somebody started denying that they were to blame and that you were picking on them – and the fight was on.

The second way that we determine the way to achieve our truth is to stick up for our rights. You know what sticking up for your rights is. You get a little ticked off – angry. Now we only get angry when we feel that somebody has violated our right, is that correct? If you think about it, it is the only way you can get angry – is that somebody has violated your rights. So we stick up for our rights – that’s the way to be non-disturbed. Now we could ask another question; how long has it been since you have been ticked off at something? At the cab? Telephone operator or the darn telephone?

I saw a guy jerk a telephone thing right out off the hook the other day and throw it on the floor because he lost twenty cents. He put it in there and it chewed it right up and he got angry with it. And he started yanking on that receiver and tore it right off and threw it down. Now obviously, that darn telephone had deliberately snitched his twenty cents and had violated his rights. And the feeling was ___, and X did ___ and the appropriate thing happened. Now, what went on was appropriate for what his truth was and what he experienced.

Now, you may laugh at that, but have you ever had the telephone steal your twenty cents? Did you ever go out and the car wouldn’t start when you knew it should? And you go around and kick the tires or anything, stop it, slap it. Surprising how that would help it start!

You see, we are really working at having our rights. Our rights are to be what? Our purpose of living is to be non-disturbed – and it is my right to be non-disturbed – and people better get out of my way, consider me carefully. And all this darn equipment in the world better consider me and all do its thing, ‘cause if it doesn’t my rights will be violated and I will of necessity be angry.

I heard a song the other day. It was down on the gulf coast of Texas where they play quite a bit of country western music. And I went into the coffee shop to get a cup of coffee, and somebody went over and put a quarter in the jukebox and they played a song, “You’ve Given Me the Right to do Wrong.” He was very guilty over it. She went off and if he couldn’t have her right there, so he was sitting around with other girls. But she had giving him the right to do wrong. I thought that was a good one. I’m going to buy that record.

Now, we get along with these two ways of achieving our truth for a while. We’ve got to have a method, you see. When you have a truth you live by you have to have a method. Now, these are the first two methods one of which most everybody uses constantly. Do you use these two pretty frequently? Whether you are in California or New Mexico you use them and they don’t work much better one place or the other, huh? But nevertheless, we don’t have anything else and we don’t know what else, and we don’t even know what we have made true or what we are living by – so go ahead and use them.

Now the third way that we come up with was kind of forced on me as a way to be non-disturbed – my folks insisted upon it. They got tired of this foolishness because they were complaining and sticking up for their rights – and I was interfering with it – and they were bigger than I was. So they kind of forced me to the conclusion that the way to gain non-disturbance was to please them.

Now, do you ever feel kind of sorry for yourself because you had to please and take care of everybody? And you never get to do what you want to do, but you have to do what they want you to do all the time? Did you ever have that? Frequently! You were good and you please them. Not because you want to, but because in some way you feel constrained to do so, is that right? And that is a miserable feeling, isn’t it. And when we are off mumbling to ourselves, we say, “I don’t see why I have to do all this. Everybody else gets to do what they want to do and I have to do what they want me to all the time!”  

Now that brings a split right down the middle. We have the same truth, but we are beginning to get opposing methods of getting it. Now that’s when the fun really stars; we are probably about two and a half or three years old when this starts – conflict.

So a little stimulus comes in from the environment – some impressions – and I still want to be non-disturbed. But this one says, “Do this.” But over there somebody has screamed and hollered, and we call it conditioned. In other words, they have repeatedly pushed it in there with usually a little discomfort. So now I have a quandary. Eat the cookie ‘cause I’m hungry and it will taste so good? But mama will scold me if she catches me eating the cookie before dinner. Or, will I not have the cookie and feel sorry for myself, because I don’t ever get to eat a cookie when I want a cookie, I just get it when she wants. She makes me eat those old vegetables and all that good stuff.

Now I have a conflict. If I do it this way then I will feel guilty, which is the feeling you are going to get caught later. Guilt is not that you are sorry you did it, it’s because you are afraid you are going to get caught – that’s what guilt is. Have you ever felt guilty? Isn’t that what it’s all about? You’re afraid you are going to get caught later, all of it is going to hang out pretty soon. That’s a horrible feeling, isn’t it?

Now, if you know for sure and certain it will never come out, you wouldn’t even worry about it at all, would you? So let’s not get that guilt bit that we are wanting to do good. It’s that we are fearful that we are going to get caught on whatever we did; it’s all going to hang out and we are going to be embarrassed. You know that’s what we all fear. And if I go and do the goody good bit and don’t eat the cookie, then I will sit and feel sorry for myself because I have the most misunderstanding mother who doesn’t like me – who won’t let me do anything I want to do. So I will hurt or feel sorry for myself, which means I have already been hurt and nobody gives a darn. And there it sits and we have conflict going.

Now this is a feeling of emergency and X prepares us to fight or run – simple. X is simple. It doesn’t make any great complicated philosophical whacking about it. It simply says, “You are in an emergency, let’s load you full of sudden energy to fight or run.” So, it gives you a big shot of adrenalin, thyroxin, pituitary extract, the liver squirts out a big glob of sugar in the from of glucose – which is fuel – the pancreas squirts out a little insulin, and we sit there! And then we wonder why we don’t feel so good, why we age and fall apart. The belly has ulcers in it. Why our ears don’t work so well, and headaches, and all these many, many things – and the human race disintegrates. But all we are doing is trying to achieve our truth that we are living by, only we have two ways to go about it.

Now, as this goes along and it doesn’t work so well, they take us down and introduce us to the school teacher and to the policeman, etc., and they tell us that we have to do what they tell us, or else. Like I said when we started this morning, I was only going to make statements and you aren’t going to be eternally damned or anything if you don’t buy any of my statements – it is totally irrelevant to me. But these people told us that we buy it under pain of jail, eternal damnation, lung cancer, etc., etc., etc. You are going to have all sorts of things happen if you don’t do exactly as you are told by your authorities, is that right? You are going to get terrible things if you don’t just do what your authorities tell you.

Now they don’t just make statements, they issue edicts – “Believe and do as I am told by my authorities.” Now, my authorities may be a different brand from yours, but they’re the ones we all got caught up with. They tell us we have to do all sorts of things, and that they are absolutely right, and what they say is the only method to achieve truth, and of course the truth always comes back to the same thing – to be non-disturbed. The only thing the authorities will tell you is that you go thru hell now to be non-disturbed later.

Did you ever notice they don’t want you to do anything you really enjoy? They prohibit all sorts of things you want to do and they never prohibit anything you don’t want to do. Did you ever see signs around that say, “Don’t eat rocks”? We got a little place the other day on the water down on the gulf coast, and we are having a sign made up to stick on a post out in the water that says, “Walking on the water barefoot is prohibited.” Now we feel that everybody can live by these rules. If you saw signs around that said you mustn’t do this and mustn’t do that because it is harmful to your health, if we are going to prohibit everything that is harmful to your health obviously we will prohibit eating little rocks ‘cause chewing them up is hard on your teeth and hard to digest.

Now, I haven’t ever seen those prohibited anywhere. It's only something you want to eat that somebody tells you it will make you sick, or fat, or something like that – it’s only something that you want to do. They told you that if you do it, it will be immoral, fattening, or illegal, is that right? It’s only what you want to do. Have you ever had anything you were particularly interested in prohibited to you, or told it was immoral, fattening or illegal?

So, this one (pleaser) is in very decided conflict with that one (you want to stick up for your rights.) You want to do what feels good right now. And this one is in conflict with this one because it says, “Complain,” and this one says, “No, you do what you are told to do, and act like you’re supposed to, and don’t go popping off while you do it, either.” Even if you go to do it, you have to have the right look on your face.

Then we finally decided within ourselves that “if I were just different.” So, I ought to be different, and then I could achieve all these things if I were just different. And we’ve been through our long struggles of self-improvement of umpteen sorts of ways. We learn how to think positive and we learn how to act positive, and we learn how to stand on our heads and still be comfortable and go through lots of lots of good things. We read our appropriate “horriblescope” every morning to get started. A lady called me the other morning and said, she was just reading her horriblescope – I think it’s called horoscope – and it said to call somebody wise, so she called me. So I said, “Why didn’t you do what it said instead of calling some joker like me who will just make jokes with you?” So we made jokes and she felt better and she said, “Well it was all right to call you.”

Then we finally discover the whole situation is how can we really straighten everything out. See that if it, you, he, she, this and that were different, then I would be all right – I would be just as happy as a little bug in a rug. So then I learned to blame. Who have you found to blame lately, huh? And this is the usual case you know – and this usual case goes on when something isn’t just like you want it.

What is the first, almost immediate response to look for? What’s to blame. Somebody gets sick and they take him down to the doctor – they don’t say, “Can you get him well?” I practiced for 40 years and not one person said, “Do think you can get the old guy all right?” They say, “What do you think caused it?” What can we blame for it? He is a member of the human race – that’s what’s wrong with him – but that didn’t seem to satisfy them. You have to give them a name to blame it on. Now, not one person in 40 years ever said, “Do you think you can get this kid all right or the old man all right?”  Never one person ever asked me that in 40 some years of practice – they only said, “What do you think caused it, Doc? What can I blame it on?”

So now we have our little truth – the purpose of living is my truth. My whole truth is that my purpose of living is to be non-disturbed, and then I have two different methods to get it. Now that is going to be conflict, and nothing but conflict. It’s going to be conflict many times a day – and conflict is the disintegrating factor.

Now we don’t have to go into some long, complicated stuff. You wouldn’t disintegrate unless you were in conflict. Now that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t get injured or socked or you might have a wreck now and then. But you would not just plain disintegrate – falling apart at the seams as we say ­ – unless you are in a state of conflict. So, conflict is the disintegrating factor. If we stopped the disintegrating factor, in all possibility, we could hack all these accidents, jolts, jars, and falls – it may take few days to get over them but it gets all right. We can get over all these injuries, but the disintegrating thing is what goes on year after year after year until you fall apart at the seams totally and completely.

Now, if only had one truth and one truth of getting it – and it doesn’t matter what you have made true particularly – the only thing is, you can’t stop this one because it is already hooked up with these two.[pointing to the blackboard] So if we formed a new purpose of living today – and made us a new method of getting it – you might be totally without conflict before the end of the day. Now I didn’t say you would, and what I said was just a statement; but the point is it is within the realm of possibility. It is well within the realm of actualization that you could make a new truth today and have only one way to get it, and that is quite adequate. Then you could do that with the greatest of ease and you could be without conflict ­ ­– therefore the end of disintegration today.

Now, integration is what people are when they are one within.
One truth, one method of getting it – that’s integrated.

Now this thing sits down here – the Four Dual Basic Urges to be non-disturbed – it is going to be your truth. You might say It checks out everything that comes in on these impressions, checks it out and makes a feeling about it – everyone of them that comes through. So if you have a new truth today, no truth is something that is ready made. That’s why truth seekers never find it – they are looking for a readymade one. Now we can find readymade suits, readymade pants, shoes, automobiles, we can find all sorts of things readymade. But you will never find any readymade truth ‘cause the other guy’s truth is only a statement for you – period. And you can either accept it or reject it if you want to, it is still only a statement and your truth is only a statement to the other guy. So, truth is something you make for yourself and live by.

Now you have been living by this one – to be non-disturbed all your life, trying to find the truth so you wouldn’t be so darned uncomfortable. But you are trying to do the impossible – trying to gain this truth with two opposing means, and that is what people are truth seekers for. They are trying to find another way of being comfortable – only they call it truth. If you were really comfortable, I will guarantee you wouldn’t be a truth seeker, is that right? Have you been comfortable most of your life or have you been downright miserable inside? Basically, you have been struggling, trying to find a way to be non-disturbed. If you check it out, you can see that. You want something to come along that you accept as true. But if I make it, it is just a statement, and you may use it one day; but it is only a statement to you, and you really didn’t make it true – you decided to agree with it.

Now, there is a decided difference in making something true – making a truth for me – and agreeing with something you said. Because I can agree with a lot of things you say, but I might also disagree with a lot of things that you say, is that right? So, all we get from interpretation is somebody making a statement that I agree with. And then somebody else makes a statement that you did not agree with, is that right? Maybe the same person made one, two minutes later that you didn’t agree with, huh? You’ve had that, a guy says something you agree with, the next minute you don’t agree with him – that is not making it true. That’s only putting it over here in this number four (#4) which says, “To believe and do as you are told by your authorities.” So if you make someone your authority, you might say, you have made him into a guru or something like that, and you will accept some of the things they say – you agree with him.

You might read a book and might agree with several of the statements in the book – statements are all that are in a book – and you may agree with some of them; but agreeing with them doesn’t make you live by them. You see we have all sorts of things that we agree with.

Somebody says, “Don’t you think honesty is the best policy?” and I said, “How would I know? I haven’t tried it.” (laughter) But it may be a good policy if you went out there to use it. But you would only do it part time because the Purpose of Living is the one we are down to the truth in – that is our only truth. So, I decided to try to be non-disturbed by being honest. I lost my shirt; I decided right quick that wasn’t the way to do it. You can try all sorts of things. Now I’m only making statements. You see we still haven’t come down to the truth of it. The truth is – what do I live by? And not some little method that I read, that you said I could use for a while, do you see?

(___)

Oh yes, I have heard about those various levels of truths. May I improve upon the statement a little bit? There have been various levels of agreement – period. I would say that you have lived by different beliefs for a few days at a time – here, there, and elsewhere – that your fundamental truth still has never been looked at nor changed. But you have picked up new things in here – under number four – you have picked up slews of them. You know, this is when we come out and say, “Well, I have all kinds of levels of truth.” I’ve lived by different truths, but I have always lived by different methods temporarily.

Now, I’m not fighting with you, I’m just making statements – I’m going to make my statements and you can do what you want with them. You have picked up from various and sundry sources, different ways which you have accepted as being the way to get you more non-disturbed sooner or later, and you have had many of these – so has everybody else in here. One has read a book that says, “Think and Grow Rich,” another one has read another book, and one attends another meeting, and one had heard a discussion, and one has taken up standing on her head, and one has taken up exercises, and one has taken up various and sundry uses of drugs, etc., all of which has only changed in this one number four (number four (#4) –watch it and see.

Now, we change our authorities. Sometimes we use some very sedate authorities and other times some far out authorities. Sometimes we use various experiences we have had as authorities – you can eat pickles for dinner late at night and have some wonderful experiences; sometimes you can have nightmares. You can take various and sundry drugs – which have an effect on the mind – which gives you an experience and that becomes an authority for some people. You can listen to somebody who sounds like he knows what he is talking about, stands up with a very pompous voice and wears particular cloths and makes funny sounds. So, you can make all these into authorities. But the only reason to have any authorities is an attempt to gain our purpose of living, which if we observe it enough, it goes back to the bit of being non-disturbed.

Now, this is why people in truth efforts get so lost, because they didn’t even know what their truth was in the first place – which was to be non-disturbed. And in the second place, they found a thousand different authorities according to how old we are. I’ve been around a long time so I have gobs of them. Some of you haven’t been around as long, so you only have a few dozen. So what’s the difference? You are still open to having more and more authorities.

I see people go from one authority that they hold to be absolutely, divinely inspired for a few years, and then they have another one that is just as good that is totally opposed to it. And all it is, is the old decision to gain non-disturbance if you have the proper authority. I haven’t found it yet, have you? I hope you never do – you get hung up if you do. He’ll always have a flaw. They tell me that all idols have feet of clay and an idol is the only one we make into an authority. If we make somebody into an authority, we make an idol out of him and he always has feet of clay, because sooner or later you see him crumble down.

Okay, any question? Words of wisdom or something or other?

(___?)

I think I could demonstrate better than I could define. Feelings, one of those self-evident things – we have feelings. If I walked up and said certain words to you in a certain tone of voice, you would have a certain feeling, and if I said exactly the same thing with an entirely different tone of voice, you would have an entirely different feeling, is that right? The best way I could possibly say it is that feelings are either threatening – a feeling of being threatened – or you have a feeling of being accepted. You have a feeling of safety or a feeling of threat, is that somewhere along the line?

For instance, we’ll say that some acquaintance, or a friend, or a relative dies. So, six of them die and I have grief feelings, and one of them goes by and I don’t have nothing – so what’s the difference?

It’s like feeling guilty. Have you ever felt guilty about doing certain things? One little lady over here said she felt guilty constantly. But if you do the same act that you feel guilty about three times in a row, you won’t feel guilty about it anymore. So it’s all a matter of changing what you put as an authority in number four (#4) – sometimes it’s where your attention is. Let’s say you have a feeling of anger for a certain little act, and one day it happens again and you could care less because you were busy doing something else.

(___?)

You make that true and do it if you like. But somebody says, “That’s too big a load, I would be responsible for them.” You have picked up a little different method than the way you used to live – it’s the way to live your truth too, isn’t it? It’s not an authority, it’s a statement that you can play with and use it – if it’s a statement you like. It’s like reading a book. Somebody tells me it’s a good book – all they are telling me is that they agree with the writer, and if I didn’t agree with him, it’s a lousy book, is that right?

The last thing anybody wants is to be responsible.

That is kind of miserable to think you are responsible for your own mood! Like our friend over here said a little a while ago, he could choose whether he wanted to lay and wallow in self-pity, or get up and go out and have a good time. Now, of course that makes him responsible. So if he is laying around feeling sorry for himself you know how much attention we pay to him, don’t you? We let him enjoy it; it must be what he wants to do – it’s used to being an attention getting device. He could get more attention by being miserable, sick and having pains and all that good stuff. And now it doesn’t get him any because his friends all know that if he is miserable, it’s what he wants. But that makes us responsible.

So that is why the truth first makes you miserable – the idea of being responsible for your own feelings instead of having other people make them for you. Now, it makes us kind of miserable, you know? It’s so comfortable to say, “You made me mad, I didn’t have a thing to do with it, and you gave me the right to do wrong! I’m not responsible! Taking on all this responsibility is a big load!” And who wants that?

Now we have one word – Truth. We talked about what we had seen that possibly everybody had made true – we made a few statements about it. It will be of no value to you unless you check up on those statements to see if they refer to you. Now please, there is nothing right, wrong, good, bad or indifferent about having your purpose of living to be non-disturbed. No doubt, as an infant or a young child it was the most appropriate purpose of living one could have. The only thing was that we unknowingly grew up with it.

I remember what a shock it was to see that my feet were at the foot of the bed one morning. So we do grow up and the same purpose of living is possibly out of place today – as our activities as a child are out of place. We would all look kind of funny sitting around playing with cars and trucks and dolls, coloring with crayons on little pieces of paper and not going out to work every day. We would look a little out of place. Now, our purpose of living – which was perfect for a little child – is out of place today.

At least it is worth checking up on. We don’t say it should change or anything else. Maybe after you check it out you’ll like it better that way than any other way. I don’t know. But the point is, as we pointed out, that there is possibly this truth that everybody is living by – and it’s singular – and we can not put another one on top of it. In other words, without reevaluating that statement, that truth, and seeing if I want to continue with it… instead of lumping another one on top of it, which always the older one, being stronger, will win.

So, we don’t try to put a new truth on top of an old one. Somebody a long time ago said, “You can’t put new wine in an old bottle.” ‘Cause if you do, the bottle breaks and spills the wine and bottle and everything. And they said, “You can’t patch an old garment with a new cloth.” So you can’t take the purpose of living that said to regain the non-disturbed state___

(Tape changed)

___is true which nobody knows if it’s true or not – it’s just a statement. And you may want to hack it out and use it again for a few years sometime. You know, you may come by this way again. So, you don’t destroy it or anything – you just don’t use it. So you could say, “That one doesn’t fit my purpose anymore,” if it doesn’t. Maybe it still does, maybe you enjoy conflict. Maybe you don’t want to be responsible and have to lose all your attention and everything for being miserable. So we keep this one, or let it go. We can’t keep it and add another one on it. If you are keeping this one, don’t add another on top of it; because it will only increase conflict, therefore increase disintegration. You will have more confusion that way.

We are in the coffee shop a few minutes ago and the waiter came by and asked if we wanted marmalade or not. And while our sweet lady was pondering as to whether it would be the appropriate thing, I told him we would take everything we could get. He had a big decision to make, and she had to make a decision and it was terrible! We have learned in running restaurants to make a small number of decisions as possible. We don’t say you could have this or that, etc. We go into restaurants that do and it does seem such a bother. We just tell
people what they get and move on. We don’t go through all these decisions bit because that is the agony that people get into – to make a decision. Should we buy this building or not? Should we buy this piece of equipment or not buy it?

Now, I don’t know what the purpose of living is. Period. And I haven’t run into a person who does. Period. I have found some people who have made various things their purpose of living – their truth – and found they get along pretty nicely. Now I will share with you what these people have made as their purpose of living – a few of them that I run in to, okay?

Please, I’m only making statements – not saying that this is the purpose of living because there’s s a lot of difference between my purpose of living and “The Purpose of Living” – I don’t know what it is. I only want to know what mine is and I’m not going to tell you what it is; but I will tell you what some people I have run into made as their purpose of living. One great man wrote a book about remarkable men he had met. These I am going to talk about are not worth remarking about – so we won’t mention their names or anything. We will tell you something about what made as their truth, and their purpose and methods of achieving it, okay?

I ran into some people who have admitted they don’t know the purpose of living; but they said they were going to make them one. And they didn’t like this one – at least they didn’t go look at this one that the whole purpose of living was to be non-disturbed and saw that it did not fit their purpose, so they were going to make one. Now being rather intelligent men and women – I’ll get both in there because there is both sexes which has very little to do with it, if any; besides, it will keep women’s lib and chauvinist pigs off my back – they hunted themselves something that they felt nobody would interfere with them doing. They took a little time to determine their purpose of living. So, what they came up with and told me was their purpose of living – and I have observed that they are living by it – their purpose, their truth. You could say,” My truth,” that these people made. Now this is merely a statement that they made and I observed that they are doing it.

One said that what he wanted to do was to be considerate of other people – all the people he met. Now, no one will keep you from being considerate of every human being you meet, and of every form of life you meet – dogs, cats, reindeers, whatever. There are no laws against you being considerate of everyone that you meet. Nobody will prevent you from being considerate. There are no laws against it – no rules against it, nothing. Now he made it his truth that his purpose of living was to be considerate. Now, his method of doing it was to be considerate.

Now, we ask most people, “What do you want to be? What do you want to have? And what do you want to do?” Those are questions that bother people, and most of them come out with___. So, we'll put up over here that this side is spiritual, and this side is materialistic. Obviously, those questions get answered on both sides maybe.

Now, I have asked numerous people when they were talking about their purpose of living and they will always come off down this side. They say it in many different ways: some want to be rich, some want to have a companion that is nice to live with. Some say they want to be a healer. Some say they want to help people. Some say they want to be spiritual and umpteen other things along this nature – all of which are materialistic, because they all say ways that “I will gain attention, approval, be important,” etc. Now some people say they want to be in charge, to have power over other people. We can put all of these down here – material side.

Now the people who are interested in being one within know that all of these are by-products. You probably have better than you could think of – but they are by-products. A by-product is something that just happens. Like when you gin cotton, you are going to have by­products of seeds, etc. because your product is cotton. And if you are going to make cider, your product is cider. But you are going to have a by-product of some pomace and some other good things
running around that you really didn't have to work to get, so all of these will come as a by-product. We are not going to talk about the materialistic level, which we have no objection to, and you can work for it all you want to – or you can let it happen as a by-product.

These people I was talking about said they would be considerate, so what he wanted to do and be was considerate. Now there is nothing to keep him from it. There is no obstruction, no laws to keep him from being considerate of every person he meets – if he wants to take it on as his purpose of living, is that right? And what does he want to have? Consideration for everybody. What does he want to do? Be considerate. Now he is hung up on only one thing – totally integrated. There is no conflict, no struggle, no resistance, and the only thing it takes is, he is being responsible for his truth. Now he can say that the whole purpose of living is to be considerate – it is to him because he made it true.

When you make something true, it is true to you and you live by it.
So the purpose and the method turned out to be the same.

So, I tipped my hat to him and said that was pretty good doing there. Now that is totally integrated – there is no conflict, no struggle, no resistance, and there are no laws against it. And you don't have to worry if you are having your way because you are always having your way because your purpose is being considerate.

There is nothing to keep you from it, is there? Except that you have never thought of it - except that Mama said you should be considerate. But being that you should be considerate and being considerate are two different things. If I am doing it because I should do it, it will ring like an empty old beer can being kicked down the street. But if I'm doing it because it is my purpose, it has a little more sincere ring to it, is that right? You know I wouldn't want someone to treat me nice because they should, would you? If they don't want to like me just like I am – let's forget it. So if you are always being kind to me because you should be, then I don't want your kindness, is that right?

So, there is a man that simply came up and re­evaluated that this was no longer his purpose at all. He didn't know if he would ever be disturbed or not – he looked over the whole situation and said he had been disturbed all his life. “I've been disturbed all the days of my life. I've been angry, I've felt guilty, I’ve felt self-pity. I've done all these things while I was struggling to be non-disturbed and that doesn't work anymore. But I can be considerate.” And he made that his purpose of living was to be considerate. So now, he is a considerate person; that is what he wants to be – considerate. What does he have? He has consideration for all people. What does he want to do? He wants to be considerate – so he is considerate.

And incidentally, his material possessions have increased about 1000% since he started ceasing to be rich and be non-disturbed – by simply letting it be a by-product. His by-product over here in the materialistic world is better than any he could conceive of.

There is a little statement in the scriptures that say something like, "Why do you seek after what you are going to eat, what you are going to wear, where you are going to live? You have to seek first the kingdom of heaven” – which is unity, oneness, being without conflict. That's hell, you know – conflict – and all these other things will be added unto you. Now that is a statement – not anything else. You don't have to make it true because it was written; but it is interesting to observe, because it is a pretty accurate statement. I don't know if it is true under all cases by any means – I don’t have any reason to put it out as being true. But it is a statement that has been checked up on as being true in a high percentage of cases – factual. But it is a by-product over here, and the one man set up as being considerate.

Now I know another person who set up one that said, he would be a contributor to Life – contribution to Life. Now he decided that no longer was he going to try to gain non-disturbance – to be a getter from Life – he was going to be a contributor. Now he says that he can contribute by everything that he does – as long as he is aware of what he is doing. So if he makes a poster like that one over there, he says that is his contribution for this moment – so he is making a contribution. So if he cooks a meal and sets it on the table, and somebody enjoys it, or survives because they had food – that is a contribution. If you go out and put up a building – that is a contribution for shelter for living beings. If he contributes to a pleasant harmonious mood wherever he may be – that is a contribution. Now he can't make a pleasant harmonious mood all the way, but he can sure make a contribution to it where ever he may be. If he is driving on the highway and he drives considerately and safely, then he is making a contribution to safety on the highway. But he can't make it all the way, there are a lot of other people out there.

So, he put as his purpose of living to make a contribution to Life, so everything he does is a contribution. What does he want to be? A contributor to Life. What does he have? A sense of being a contributor. Don't go around telling everybody about it. I had to work quite a while to figure out what he was doing, even though it was obvious – it took me quite a while to dig through it. What does he want to do? Make a contribution. Now his purpose and method-become one – there is no separation on it. You remember when his purpose was to be non-disturbed, there were two methods diametrically opposed. Now this is a great simplification that the method and the purpose is exactly the same. Now who made it? He did. Who said it was true? He did – he made it true for himself.

Now, when you make something true, it is true only for you, not for anybody else.
It is only a statement.

He is not going around telling everybody that his purpose of living is to make a contribution – he is simply going on and doing it. And incidentally, his by-product is every bit as great as the one who is being considerate.

Now I know various and sundry people who have made other things true. And every time they made something true, it usually comes out that the thing they made is true; the purpose and the method comes out the same. Now that is simple – you don't have to have two things. And
in every case that I have known they made it over here – on the spiritual side – what am I. Now how would you describe these people if you knew them? You would have to say this man was considerate. That this man was always making some contribution to Life. So would you say that what the person is – I am the truth that I made and live by. And you will live by your truth.

That is all you can do – everybody does – is live by your truth. I am the truth that I make. You can also say the method, which is a way to accomplish something, I am the way that I made and live by. It gets it down to a little simplification, you know – but I am the way too.

So how does this guy behave? Well, he is considerate, right? And this one is a contributor. One of the others I know decided he was going to be kind to all life that he met. So, is there any rule to your being kind? None! Is being kind, to you, your purpose of living and your method – would they be the same? So, you would be the way, and the truth, and you would also have a light -– something that is your thing to go by all the time. So, each of them has a light don't they?

How did he get it? He made it. So instead of being a truth seeker, maybe we could for a change be a truth maker – that of course gets me responsible, doesn't it? That's tough! Instead of being a truth seeker – looking for ready-made truth – we could be maker of it. In other words, creating a little truth as we go along.

I frequently meet people who say they want to be creators. Now, would you say these three people with their entirely different purpose of living are creating? How about that, huh? Very creative. They are creating something that is not ordinarily around, and experiencing tremendous side effects in the materialistic world. And they are doing something that there are no rules against, so you don't have to go out and get other people to agree with you that it
is the truth.

See, what usually passes for truth is just agreement.

If I can get you to agree with me on something then the two of us can say we have the truth, huh? And if we can get 20 people to agree with us – we have a movement. And if we got 20 more people going, we probably would have an organization – all around truth, huh? Now that's just a statement. Now you don't have to go out and get any agreement from anybody. You don't have to go out and get a movement started. You don't have to have a charter and put up an organization – you don't have to do any of these things. You don't have to promote it. You don't have to do anything except make your truth and live by it. Now, your truth would always be – if it is going to be a workable one – which would be spiritual. Now that is different from having power, etc. That's materialistic.

Now, if I wanted to be a healer – God forbid – what would happen? I would say look at all the attention I would get, look at all the approval I would get, and people would be calling me, wanting me to heal them. And what would I be doing? I would only be chasing their symptoms around anyway, because their life style is going to demand some kind of adaptation. So we have one symptom gone, what difference would it make? They would have a worse one in the morning anyway – or next week.

I know one old gent who was a pretty heavy alcoholic. He drank a considerable amount of booze every day, like a gallon, and somebody got to him and told him to reform. He didn't drink anymore and three weeks later he was a quadriplegic. So I was invited to see the old gent, and we sat and talked for a while. Then I asked him which he would rather be, a drunk or a quadriplegic – he couldn't move neither hand nor foot – and he said, “Drunk – any day.” So, I went out and got a fifth and put it on the table, and he took a drink and walked out of the room. The family said I had performed a miracle until they smelled his breath – then I wasn't so popular any more. It's immaterial – when they say heal, heal!

Sometimes people say, you can't determine whether something is. Just because you made it true, doesn't make it true. It makes it true for you and only you. Back in the hills of Kentucky where I grew up, there was an old man named Densmore that lived around the community who was a pretty good trader, to say the least. He liked to trade with other farmers for various and sundry things. And quite often, the other farmers didn't think they got the fair end of the thing – frequently they had him in court.

So in one particular incidence, I happen to be at the court house which was entertainment in a small community of 200. So ,I was sitting in the court and he had one of his trials come up. A man accused him of misrepresentation because he had sold him a barren cow with a calf by side, which Mr. Densmore had told the man it was the cow's calf. And the neighbors had verified to this man that the cow had been barren for more than five years. The farmers don't like barren cows – they like them to have a calf every year. So this man sued for the return of his money and damages. The man told all his story and the judge said, "Mr. Densmore, what do you have to say?"

He said, "Plenty!"  And he gets up in his ragged clothes and a rope for a belt and he said, "I want to tell you how this was, Judge. This old cow didn't have a calf, that's true. She's barren, been barren for five or six years. I don't remember exactly five or six. And she was very lonely. So, I went down to Mr. Stone's house and he had a nice calf there and I bought it. I took it home and put it in the pen and said, “Old Cow, now you have a calf, I just bought it and brought it home and it's yours.” It was her calf because I bought it and give it to her, and I did not misrepresent myself, ‘cause I know it's her calf, ‘cause I bought it and give it to her. And told her so when I did."

Of course, the court broke up and the judge dismissed the case. Now Mr. Densmore made something true – he was rather creative. That's when I began to decide that, being a con artist was probably the best way to live. When you make things true for you and for the cow – that's the way it was. And he's not guilty of anything other than being a little smarter than the other guy. So you see being creative sometimes other people don't understand it. Sometimes when you are creative, they frequently call it bad. But if you are going to have any creativeness, the first thing you have to create is your own truth.

Now there is one thing that a person must want to do – to be responsible. Could you have any truth without being responsible for it? Huh? No way. ‘Cause, you have to be responsible for it –you have to be responsible for you. Now as long as I go around and say, “The food made me fat, the food made me sick, the disease caught me, attacked me,” and that, “You made me mad, you made me laugh,” you did this, you did that – I am denying even existing. So I am refusing responsibility. If I refuse responsibility, obviously I could not make truth. I cannot be creative because I would say, it just happened or something.

So, the first thing out that a person takes on is to be responsible.
Now that is the easiest thing that people forget.

We frequently see that people work with these ideas – statements that we put out, or they quit working with them. Now the only place that you quit working – you quit being responsible. You know you might go along and be responsible for your truth, your purpose, your method for a few days, we'll say for a lack of a better one – kind. And then after, you got going for a few days or weeks, you got it working pretty well – you cease being responsible for your truth. You know it's going pretty well – so we forget to be responsible. Now responsible merely means that I am able to respond.

(___?)

If you are going to remain with conditioning that we talked about the first hour this morning, that your whole purpose of living was to gain pleasure and comfort, escape pain, to gain attention and escape being rejected, etc. – we said we would set it aside before we did this. Now then, obviously, I could have as my purpose to always have approval and avoid disapproval – but your tone of voice could sound disapproving, couldn't it? How did we say it was set up this morning? We started off that everything went through conditioning, and a feeling was formed, went to Life, and Life projected to the body and it came out as a function.

Now as long as I have the Four Dual Basic Urges there – to gain pleasure and comfort, escape pain, gain attention, escape being ignored or rejected, gain approval and escape disapproval, and be important and escape the sense of inferiority – then, there is going to be a feeling that goes up to X saying, “I am in an emergency situation ‘cause your tone of voice sounded disapproving to me.” So, you can't iive with two purposes of living. Such as, the first one, and then, put on one of these or ten thousand others that you can think up on your own. You couldn't do that because you would already be tangled up because it went through that purpose of living first.

And if your purpose of living was to avoid – then you would be on the defensive immediately, wouldn't you? You see, most everybody that you walk up to and make a statement – just go along and make a statement – they immediately start defending themselves. I made a statement yesterday and somebody on the other end of the horn went into 20 minutes of defense. And I really didn't have any ulterior motive in my statement – I just made a statement.

There is no reason to go into all these things, unless we have the Four Dual Basic Urges – and if you have that you are busy. You have to be on the defensive most of the time. You spend most of your time defending, and you will spend a lot of your time trying to prove that your statements are all true. And if you don't have that one – then you are an objective free being. As we said, you have to set this one aside – you can't have both. This one has to be given up or lived by – one or the other. If it's lived by, you have conflict, etc., all the time because you have two ways to get it. So have you ever noticed that most of the time you are trying to prove something or defend something? Now you can't defend or prove anything that is only true psychologically anyway. There is no way to prove it and there is nothing to defend.

So if you walked up and said anything you wanted to a person who has made themselves a new truth –which is a new purpose of living – they don't have anything to prove to you or defend. If they make a statement and everybody challenges it, they don't have to prove it. It doesn't matter a bit, you see. But, as long as you have the Four Dual Basic Urges as your purpose of living, your truth, you will find that you are constantly embroiled in trying to prove something or to defend something. Okay, you can't have both.

I will agree with you 100% that if you got the Four Dual Basic Urges, I could walk up to you and say, "I'm glad to see you, friend," you would feel all right. Or I could walk up and say, "Hi, friend," and you would want to knock the hell out of me: “Great friend you are! Friends like you, I don't need any enemies,” and then the fight is on. I said the same word, "friend," but varied the tone. And if you are living by the Four Dual Basic Urges, you will go on the defensive trying to prove that, yes, you were a friend, or no, you did not do anything.

So, if you keep the old purpose of living – your old truth which you came up with as an infant –and have never reevaluated or looked at it, then you will always have these feelings and find yourself either frustrated because you didn't go on the defensive, or go on the defensive and wished you hadn’t later, or think of some beautiful things you could have said to him on the way down town.

Have you ever had one of those that you got pushed out, and on the way, you saw how you could have really chopped him. Then the next time you tell it you say you did it and believe it. Next time you tell it -– how you really chopped him up. It gets better as you go along – it's just a statement anyway. What's the difference. In other words, there is capability of seeing something in little flashes here and there, and do you want to use it or not want to use it?

So, we try to wake you up just momentarily by making you laugh or something, that you could see there is a possibility of doing something other than struggle. I didn't say you should, ought to, must, or that it even made any difference. But if you want to there is a capability of it. I will supply the impetus to shake you just enough that you can say, “Well, I'd like to try that,” right? Just long enough so I can say, “I am going to take charge of my inner feeling,” then I wish I hadn't made that commitment because now I don't get any attention – just took a split second, okay? Let's take a lunch break.

[after lunch]

Well, we'll talk about conditioning, or conditions for a little bit to start with. In as much as it's the biggest obstruction to a person being free – or to making a new truth and living by it. The biggest obstruction is conditioning. So most of us are very busy setting up conditions. Oh, we would like to feel good, we would like to be happy, we would like to accomplish things; but we set up conditions before we will do that. Now, before I will be happy, you must do exactly what I want you to. Now you probably haven't the foggiest idea of what I have in mind for you – and probably wouldn't care if you did. But nevertheless, I refuse to be contented, or at ease, or what people ordinarily call happy unless you do exactly what I want you to.

Now, I'm not talking about you, but they tell me it's utterly impossible to lose weight. I eat like
a bird. Well, I checked up on how birds eat – usually about 18 times their body weight every day. And so, I agreed, they eat like birds – that's the way it goes all the time.

Now I know people who say they want to have a big income but they don't want to be tied down. You want to try that one on for size someday? In other words, I want a big income, but I don't want to have any work to do. It's nice – it comes out easy that way.

Another says, "I want to be free but I want to have all my things, and all my people lined up and everything.” Now if I have a bunch of things and people I have to control, I am not free, right? Did you ever think of that? I saw two guys going into a restaurant one day and they had a chain tied between them – one to the other – locked around their wrists. One had a badge on, one didn't have a badge on. But who was locked up? I couldn't see any difference, one wasn't free. So if I have to control you, then I am just as much locked up.

Now, did you ever find that you couldn't be pleased with somebody unless they dressed just like you wanted them to? A little lady told me a while ago that if she wore certain kinds of shoes, her feet did not hurt; but she wore those other kinds of shoes, so her feet hurt. “I don't know why. Well, they all look pretty – it shouldn't be all that difficult. I have to be pretty, but I want to be comfortable! Somebody told me you can't be grand and comfortable at the same time. I never did try it – I don't know! Did you ever try that?” So, what kind of conditions do I set up before I will be at ease?

Now, do I have you do a certain thing, not do certain things – before I can be at ease? Huh? Do you have to have certain things met? Let’s hear some of them, dear. Yes, people try and dress a certain way, or you will not be comfortable, right? Well, maybe they would be if they didn't comb their hair. So now this starts what we would know as inter-personal conflict, that right?

Now if I like you, I just like you. Did you ever notice that when you like somebody
that whatever they do, it’s all right?

Did you ever notice that when you don't like someone that they can't do anything right? Even if they combed their hair and put on different clothes and you didn't like them, you would say, “Well, they still have a lousy attitude,” is that right?

So what does it take in order to like people? Just like them. We don’t use all those fancy words like love and all that – those are scary words. Did you ever hear the rest of the sentence when somebody comes up and says, “I love you”? That’s another place where a condition comes in. You want to hear it? “I love you, therefore you are obligated to me, and you must do exactly as I want you to do when I want you to, or else I will be hurt, and then I will cry and it’s all your fault. So there!” That’s the rest of the sentence.

But if you like someone everything they do is all right. But if you don't like someone, you tell the reason you don't like them is that they haven't dressed properly, or that they don’t have their hair combed like you want it, or they haven't used the proper hair spray today, or several other things they sell on the boob tube, right? And if they went and did all those things, do you think you would like them then? No way.

Do you have children? Most of us at one time or another have raised kids. Do you like them? Now everybody will tell me they love them, but I said, “Do you like them?” Once in a while – when they are doing what you want them to do, but you love them dearly, don't you? But liking them is another story. Now we all love the children – the family and all that; but do you like them? If you like them, you can get along fine with them. They do whatever they do and you like them, because they are that person and that's it, and you don't have to have any reason to make them over. They don't have to quit smoking, or they don't have to quit wearing bell bottoms, or they don't have to change their whole life style – but that's the way we set it up.

Now this comes about with a conditioning that is based upon a belief in an ideal. Every person has as part of their truth package an ideal of how things ought to be. I wonder where we got it and how come it is so believed by each of us to be a universal truth? Do you have an ideal of how people should behave around you?

(You talking to me?)

It's up to you, I'll talk to anybody who will answer me. (laughter) Do you have an ideal that everybody knows what you should wear, what you should eat? I am frequently with people and they say, "Why do you smoke?" I guess ‘cause I got one of those things in my mouth and it's on fire. What else do you do with it? Spit it out? You know… Somebody else tells me, “Why do you drink coffee?” Sometimes I'll order a steak – I like it medium rare, “Why do you like it medium rare? Can you tell me why you like anything you like? Do you like corn flakes for breakfast? No. Do you know why you don't like corn flakes for breakfast?

(There is no nutrition in it.)

I don't know. Somebody else eats them and they look all right. You know the thing is that the food costs more that has no nutrition in it. Did you notice that? All the calories get taken out, and all the nutrition is gone, and the food costs more. Did you notice that? Low calorie this, low calorie that – cost more than the other. Like unleaded gas costs more than others, and it keeps your car clunking. So why do you not like something? You don't know. You can just give me some answer, but it really wouldn't mean anything. Either you do or you don't, is that right?

Now what is an ideal? Anybody know what the ideal is? Eating corn flakes for breakfast is not going to disturb you. We have a lot of these little things that goes on top of our conditionings – 
that we know what ought to be.

The ideal is what ought to be. What ought to be – that's what the ideal is, isn't it?

Somewhere did we get it and why is it worth being upset over? So and so does not fit my what ought to be. Whether it's a kid or whether it's a mate, or whether it's water in a restaurant or whatever – it doesn't fit my ideal of what ought to be. Where did you get that ought to be? From our parents? I wonder where they got it? From their parents? I wonder where they got it? It goes on and on.

Old Adam sure had a mess going, didn't he? It's all his fault – so we can all blame old Adam. But the point is, do we have to continue that endless thing like you got it from your mother and father, and they got it from their mother and father, and they got it from theirs’s? So we have to keep it going? All it does is what? It produces nothing but conflict, aggravation, annoyances, non-communication between people. So then, when a what ought to be is there – it keeps all sorts of commotion going doesn't it?

Now, can't you just like a person just like they are? I find it easy enough. I like you just like you are – I don't have to make you over. Now, I have had very poor experience in making people anyway – It turns out a mess. Did you ever make one up anywhere? It turns out a mess. There's Jim, I like him just as he is. There's Tony, I can even like him just like he is. It takes a little more doing, but I can do it – like him just like he is.

Just simply like people as they are – they are human beings. No two of us are alike, so there is no standard for us. Obviously if you had no two alike of anything there is no standard. Now
you can make ten thousand spark plugs and they are all supposed to be alike; then you can throw out part of them as rejects because they did not fit the standard.

How about people? No two of us are alike anywhere. That's what makes them interesting, isn't it? Can't you just like yourself like you are? Or do you have to be made over? That's another one you know – I live with me all the time. So the first person I want to like is me – just like I am. I don't need any changing. I don't need to be made over or anything of the sort. No.

You need to be made over before you can like you? Well, can't you start today being more comfortable with yourself? How about just starting to like you – just as you are. You're a fine, beautiful person. You look good to me. I wouldn't see a thing about you I would need to change to like you. Why do you have to be so picky? You're a nice person like you are. All the things that you do merely says, “You are unique.” Is that right? Not another one in the world like you. So you are a unique piece of art.

Now the only way you can change is to be more like someone else, wouldn't it? Can you go like them? Can you start off by, just right now, “I like me just like I am,” or do you need to change something? Do you ever think about yourself? Do you? You like yourself just like you are. Good! That's the only way to fly.

Most people want to change themselves to fit their ideal, and they are in a big conflict because they want to change, and they don't want to change at the same time – and that's a conflict. So why not just start out with what you are. If you change, well fine, that's what you are for that day, isn't it? But you don't have to make an issue out of it. We don't have to set up all the conditions that “I have to be different” in some way or other.

That is the fifth decision, the fifth not-I that says, “I ought to be different.”  He is a pretty strong one in most people. “I ought to be different, then I would be all right.” That's just a not-I. A not-I always says he is you – and obviously it is not you. Five gets talking and you can listen to him and agree with him all the time. That's awfully easy – it's a condition he sets up.

So, we will draw that little picture again if we may. Here is the purpose of living and this is the method. It's split down the middle because they don't like each other. This is the complainer, so sometimes we say, “I should quit complaining so much.” But you never did complain. Only the complainer ­­– the not-I complained, but you agreed with him. The second one is, “Stick up for your rights.” So I got to quit being angry so much – so what! Then the blamer, “I want to quit blaming all the time.”

Of course, that is blaming yourself for blaming so much. And this one says, “Quote authorities,” we ought to do better. That would only be because the authority said one thing that was better than the other one – this is pleaser. And this is a guy that says that, “I ought to be different all the time” – or the self-improver.

Now, we set up these conditions before we can even like ourselves, and we set them up before we will like other people. Now if we took all these conditions away, just for a minute, I have absolutely no conditions set up – could I like you just like you are? I have no conditions for you to meet. The sad part of this is, you don't know the conditions I set up anyway – you couldn't know. But is it just as easy to set aside all these conditions when we look and see that they have absolutely no validity? They are just statements from the not-I's.

The not-I's – which are these little things here, which sets themselves up at various times because they say the “how” of doing these. Now we say, “I would be so happy if so and so.” I have known several dear people that I have known over a number of years that one time or another told me that they would be so happy if they could just get married to a certain person. Well in a few cases I have helped them arrange it. Then they tell me they would be so happy if he or she were different. And then, they did not want to get married to that person at all, they wanted somebody different – and we went on and on with this.

I have one dear little lady who calls me very frequently. She went into great difficulty that she wanted to marry a certain man. Well, I arranged that she would get married to him. He bet me $50 he would not marry her and I won the $50. And it's still going on – she's still hassling. She called me this week with the ultimate of things. He left her some time ago with two or three kids – he took off with some other girl. Now he is very lonely, he claims. His not-I's are hurting him because he left the little kids, and all these things.

He called her up the other day and wanted her to come and live with him. But only on one condition – that he could keep his girlfriend in the house. I said, “Well go on, take charge. move in, and move her out in a little while – what's the difference.” All the conditions weren't fitting right. I thought it might be kind of fun, I think I'll arrange it anyway. She just moves in with the kids, with the other girl, and see which one of them has got the most on the ball – see who can take charge.

After all, she has a background of polygamy in the family anyways – a little more won't hurt. I might as well reactivate it. I thought it would be the thing to do – just move right on in. She wants a condition before she moves in; she wants that other girl to move out. So what? What difference does it make if she lives in the house or down the street. I can't see the difference, do you? Do you have a condition setup somewhere?

Now, it's all right to set conditions. But, do you think it would be appropriate if we let other people in on the conditions? You see, if I make a contract with somebody – we agreed on certain things give and take on the contract. We wrote it down, I do and you do. Now, if we wrote that down it's all right, but if I come in with all your do's and none of the I do’s, and you don't even know about the you do's. And I am all upset because you did not behave the right way. Now that is about the basic way we go about it. In all our interpersonal relationships we set up what your do's is, and I don't bother to write down the I do’s – and I did not let you in on the you do's. Would you sign such a contract anyway? No.

So at least if we are going to have to have conditions, would you feel that it would be not wise to set it up to deal with the other person unless they agreed to that condition? You wrote it out. But now what do we get all these interpersonal relationships started on? “I love you, so everything is going to be so beautiful.” You'll fight like hell, is that correct?

You know, you would feel it beneath your dignity if you sit down and some guy came up and wanted to get married – then to sit and write out the agreement? He does, I do and you do? Could you do that? That would be terrible, wouldn't it? If you're in love, wouldn't it? Terrible! Almost an insult. But you got it all set up one-sided anyway. And that guy you married had it all set up one-sided, and he didn't let you in on it. If he would have told you what he expected of you, and you said what you expected of him – I do and you do – at least you would have gone into the deal knowing what you were doing and you would have known what was expected of you, and maybe have lived up to it. Who knows, that would have been easier than what you did. But you didn't know so you were a no-good bum.

So, what is the condition that I have to set up before I will agree to be serene within me?

Now, I think that everybody could take that question and keep it with them for a few days – not just hear it while we stand here talking about it. But take a little piece of paper and write on it somewhere, what conditions do I demand before I will agree to be serene within myself? You
might be surprised as to how much you torment yourself over things. What conditions do I have to have met before I will agree to be serene within myself? I think that is a reasonable question, don't you? Do you have to have any conditions met? I can be serene with everybody sitting around doing what they are doing. Can you? Not necessarily - that would be too big a responsibility.

I am the only one that can figure it out. So if I want to be serene, who in the world is to prevent me from doing it unless it's me? So you see if I want to set up a condition, even if I have it met momentarily, I'll be worrying that it won't be met tomorrow, is that right? He's being all right today, but tomorrow? I have no assurance of it.

So, is there any possible thing that prevents us from being serene, except ourselves setting up conditions? How about that? Would you like serenity every day, day in and day out? Are your conditions worth more to you to hang onto them even though other people don't live up to them, than it is to set them in the trash can, go on and be serene every day? They are not going to live by them anyway. You made them up for other people and they don't even know about them. So they are not going to do it. But you hang onto them for dear life. Scream and holler, and be miserable inside. Upset because your conditions are not met, and they would be behaving the same way if you did not have the conditions set up for them. You could be serene.
So really, I don't care how you behave.
As long as I am serene, I don't care what you do.

Do you? You see you could have serenity and live with a person. Because if you are serene, it is a much more pleasant household to live in than if you're uptight. You think it is hard to do? It is not any harder if I don't set up any conditions for them to meet. I don't see any reason for it to be any harder to stay in the same house, in the same business, same building with somebody without setting up all the conditions, do you?

If I am going to set up conditions, I want them to know what they are before I start, and agree to them – then there would be no problem anyway. If I say, “Well you do this and I'll to that. I'll pay the rent, you do something else, you pay the utility bill.” (I'll come out the best these days.) Then we understand where we are going. There are still no conditions – only those we agreed on. It’s all these not agreed on conditions that we get all upset over. Would you be serene if you just dropped them off? Wouldn't you get along just the same in the house as you do with all the glitching because they haven't lived up to your conditions? They are going to do the same thing anyway. Without conditions they are pretty nice people –fairly easy to live with. Now if I set up conditions that only I know about – you must not do so and so and so on – well you can have all kinds of misery.

One of the most beat up people I ever took care of when I was doing professional practice was a woman who had been married about three months. She and her husband went to Sunday school in the morning, and they came home and she fixed lunch, and they were going out somewhere in the afternoon. So she went in to change her clothes – you know ladies have to take off their go-to-meeting-clothes and put on some more casual ones. They were going out to a ball game or something, and she put on a red blouse.

This was in the deep south, and the man went into a tizzy, because only two kinds of people wore red blouses. You want to guess what the two kinds were? You guessed it all right. And he beat her almost to death with a two by four. Well, he had his ideal – he knew what ought to be – and here that woman he was married to came out in a red blouse. And he wasn't going to be married to either one of them – the red blouse made her both of them apparently. If she had known what the conditions were before she married him, she would not have put on a red blouse – it would have been all right. But she didn't get that straightened out that's what he expected.

Now, it's no great thing wearing a red blouse, is it? You may go for years and never wear a red blouse, right? And if you know that the alternative was to get the hell beat out of you with a two by four, you leave it off. If you knew it was part of the deal – you leave it off. But she didn't know it was in the deal. She was just supposed to know, like all the conditions we set for people – they are supposed to know that.

And are our conditions any different from his? We object to what the kids wear, we object to what they do, we object to where they go, we object to their life styles. What's the difference in what he did? Only thing is, we don't use a two by four, we just get ulcers, cancer, arthritis – and a few of those little things. It's just as fatal, only not quite as dramatic. In fact, she got over her bruises, a busted nose; most of us don't get over cancer or arthritis and all those things.

You want to keep your conditions of how you will refuse to be serene unless people meet them – and they don't even know about them? Now if you want to go to them and say, “These are the conditions that I will get along well with you,” that's all right. If they don't like it, they can leave or you can leave right now – and that's over with. As long as the condition is either understood and agreed upon by two or more, or it is not even bothered with. Now the ones
we get all the hassle over are the ones we don't even tell people about. Like that guy didn't tell that girl about red blouses when he declared undying love for her when he married her.

So, let's all take a little piece of paper and put down
what conditions have to be met before I will allow myself to be serene.

Now, serenity is a pretty good state to live in. It does not mean your blouse, sitting under a shade tree; it means you can be really interested in everything you are doing. You’re enjoying existence and in no turmoil or conflict within. Serenity is a pretty nice way to go. It's like driving down the freeway when all systems are a go on the car, okay? Everything is a go. You can accomplish about three times as much when you are serene than you can when you are up tight.

Do you think that is a fair question to put to yourself? What conditions have to be met before you will be serene, or happy, or peaceful – whatever word you want to put in there. It is a kind of a state that you would like to be in – if it was not for all these jerks out here doing all these terrible things. Is that a fair question to put to yourself? I didn't say it was a goal. I just said you didn't have to go through misery to live. I didn't say there was any goal to get rid of them. But if I didn't have all those conditions, we said there would be a form of existence that you wouldn't know about. If you didn't like it, you could go back to conflict next week, is that right?

It would be like you knew where there were 64 bars of gold and you can have all the treasure; the only thing is you have to remove a little of the dirt on them – off the top of them, pick them up, okay? And this is the difference – the dirt on top of really living, truly living – it is altogether different than what we have experienced. You know what we have experienced mostly every day is kind of like the soap operas every afternoon – terrible problems! We live with a lot of turmoil and as we say, these six decisions pretty well encompass what is going on in us, and in our interpersonal life.

I do know that the not-I's will sit and tell you that if you even do anything it will be for some self-improvement – because they are notorious liars. And they would like for you to use absolutely nothing, because you might find you could make your own truth. A creative act and make your own truth and live without all their turmoil and they would have no place to live or eat. They have been living off you all these years – like termites, they like to live off you. So, our next discussion is going to be about the cunning behavior of not-I's.

(___?)

The difference is you would be doing it on purpose. The basic difference in doing something creative or only going through life muddling through, is which direction your attention is directed. Now basically your attention is, “How does this affect me?” How do you affect me, how does she affect me, and how does this situation affect me? That's the usual way we look at things. Now if we turn it around – and that would be an interesting thing to do – and say, “What affect am I having on you?” You see everything is concerned with how does it affect me. Now if I wanted to actualize creativeness, I would turn it around and see how I was affecting you. Simple, isn't it? You could do that, couldn't you?

You have to get rid of the first purpose and see it no longer fits your purpose. It should take you at lease a minute. You could probably take 20 years if you like. The not-I's will tell you it is very hard, it is very difficult – it will take years. But when you see that something does not fit your purpose, how long does it take you to junk it? When you see that the peelings you took off the potatoes no longer have any purpose, how long does it take you to dispose of them down the drain or in the sack? So when once you see that something has no value to you any more, you junk it right there.

Now, when you junk the purpose of being non-disturbed, you junk with it the not-I's – because they are part of the same piece of machinery.

Then you put you a new purpose and a new method – which we said would turn out to be the same one. You can do that immediately – that also should take you at least one minute.

Now what usually happens is we go to sleep on the job when things start working pretty well. When you make your own truth and your own method, it begins to go very well. Essentially as a by-product, you're non-disturbed – believe it not, that's really the way it works. And we decide, we have it made, and start turning the attention back inward – we got it made. Of course, that is to reactivate the old truth again. It's called stopping work in the middle of the stream.

Now the point is, we keep on being conscious of this new truth we are making, and a new action. But it's not a long drawn-out process even though the not-I's scream that it is – they are liars. Because you can do it in about a minute. You could reevaluate the Four Dual Basic Urges and see that they simply don't fit your existence. That they were beautiful for a
little child – it's perfect for them – but you are a grown person and see that one doesn't fit, and then you can make another one and you can start using it. Like you could be totally considerate – immediately you have a new purpose.

Of course, you may get more and more proficient with it. I don't doubt that anything I have ever done repeatedly, I have got a little more proficient at it, haven't you? Whether it is running a typewriter, or making movies, cooking or anything else – the more times I do it, the more proficient I get. Finally, I get so proficient that I go to sleep on the job if I don't start doing it a little different. It's easy to go to sleep on the job once in a while if you don't add on a little more of a challenge. You see, we human beings seem to be able to get so adapted to doing something that we go to sleep on the job – unless we throw an extra little challenge in, ourselves. So, I like to throw an extra little challenge in, create a little more truth of some kind or other – just for fun, not because I should or ought to.

(What becomes of the not-I's?)

In all probability they are doing well. I am not going to check them up – I am not going to nose into them to see. It's like a man told me that, not long ago, he wrote a poem about that. He finally got so he didn't give a darn about these conditions one day. And suddenly he had a joy and a delight and a sense of being that was beyond all comprehension. And he so enjoyed it a few days, then he got to thinking about it – he got to logicizing about it, philosophizing about it. “Now what will I do if this should go? What must I do to keep it from going?” And he said, “It suddenly was gone.” He has not found a way to get it back yet because he is still philosophizing on it how he is going to get it back.

So, the not-I's do not bother you – as long as you don't have the purpose that goes with them. See, their only function is to actualize the purpose of being non-disturbed. And if you are not trying to be non-disturbed any more, they are not there. Now, I am sure that if you want to check them out, you would find them well, alive, and thriving. But as long as you are not trying to be non-disturbed, now or later, they have no effect on you anymore. You'll never hear from them, truthfully – you will not hear them; but that's too simple. As long as I have argued with these not-I's, it should take at least years to get them whipped into shape – everybody knows that. But it really can be done in a second. It really can be a transformation – it can happen in
a second.

Now, the only transformation possible to us
is a transformation in our purpose of living.

Now, how long would it take you to transform your purpose of living from being non-disturbed to being totally considerate? How long did it take you? Is it done already? Not quite yet. How long does it take you to throw out what you see has no value to you anymore? You usually carry it around – a little left over that is too good to throw out. In a week or two it turns green, then you can throw it out. Is that the way you do it with food? I figured that.

 I know two people that got a divorce because the guy came in every day and checked the refrigerator. And stuff was just sitting there, three or four days, then finally it turned green and his wife forgot to throw it out. He screamed at her, hollered how much waste it was to keep that junk cold instead of throwing it out. I don't know if it costs any more to keep it there or not, but I know what I would do – set it in the refrigerator until it turned green then throw it out. We hate to throw anything out when all those thousands of starving sons of India are dying, right? Eat everything on your plate, but don't get fat! Let's take a break.

[after break]

The not-I's are very cunning little folks and they took their training from our ancestors. As the lady said a little while ago, “We got it from our ancestor and they got it from theirs,” etc. So, the first thing they want you to do is, “Always do the right thing!” That seems really commendable –always do the right thing. And another one is that, “My inner feeling is dependent upon
circumstances.” Both of those are promoted to us as being truth, are they not? That if you always do the right thing, everything would be all right. And of course, the only question is, how to determine what is the right thing? That seems the only question for you to figure out. Which leaves us in quite a quandary.

We have two right things. One is, “to stick up for your rights,” and the other is, “to please people.” One of my parents would tell me to always stick up for my rights out there – if I didn't, nobody else was going to. The other one would tell me that, “I had to always be nice all the time.” Did you get told that, too? And so, we go to do the right thing.

Now my mother told me if I always did the right thing, everything would work out wonderfully. But she forgot to tell me what the right thing was. I didn't find out until two weeks ago. I was sitting watching the boob tube the other night and a lady come on and said she always did the right thing – she took Geritol every day. Now we know what the right thing is, remarkable what you can learn from the boob tube – finally, after all these years, I know what the right thing is. I haven't done it yet, but that's all right, at least I know what it is – It's take Geritol every day.

The not-I's will always tell us to do the right thing. Whatever you do happens to be the wrong thing according to the not-I's. Everything you propose to do, they will tell you that it may not be the right thing to do – so that will keep you in quite a quandary for a while. Did you ever try to
figure out the right thing to do? After you got it done, did you have a feeling of remorse about it? Like you know the right thing to do is to buy a new car because the old one needs tires and a new radiator cap – looks dingy and all this stuff. The man tells you the right thing to do would be to buy the new car, and that goes fine until you get the new car home. Then, the other me jumps up and starts screaming about how much you could have if you had the money in the bank and not those payments to make – it's called buyer’s remorse. Did you ever have that?

Did you ever have something that you wanted to do to somebody, and it seemed the only thing to do until you got it done? And then you had all kinds of reasons why you shouldn't have done it – then you got the guiltiest. There is one little not-I that holds it out as the only thing in the world to do until you get it done; then that one goes off and gets a short beer, and the other one comes up and tells you how terrible you were for doing it, is that correct? So you see, these little not-I's have a better game going. One tells you that you just would not be happy, there is nothing worthwhile if you did not go, or have so-and-so, is that right? And then, as soon as you get it done, and then you can't find that ally anywhere – he's gone. But there is another one there who tells you, you should have known better – you did know better and you went on and did it anyway, is that right?

You will find for a little while it's one way – then it completely reverses itself. So I don’t think anybody knows anything about what the right thing is, do you? Now if we could eliminate having to do the right thing and do your thing for a while, now do you think it will be the right thing to be inconsiderate at all times? I don't know, but it is one thing isn't it – just one thing. So then we will do one thing – I don’t know if it is the right thing or not. You see, that's what got people in trouble – trying to do the right thing. So, we will just look at this as a not-I trick and that is all it is. Keeping you all upset figuring whether to do it or not, and finally we do one thing or the other. If you do it, you wish you hadn’t, and if you don't do it, you will always wish you had. Have you been that route? You work on it for weeks and finally you decide, this is the right thing to do, and as soon as you get it done, oh man, it is horrible – really horrible!!

Now, the other one is that my inner feeling is dependent on circumstances. Now, a circumstance is a condition that we have set up. We are constantly in an ever-changing circumstance. Maybe natural forces have to do with circumstances. A certain circumstance comes along and we act like it is the end of the world for us – just terrible. But so far, we have lived over them – at least we survived them.

Now suppose we could see something – we will try something here. There is something for everybody to work on. Like that business of seeing – if you can drop the condition necessary for your serenity.

We'll lay out another one –

I am responsible for mv response to the circumstance;
but I am not responsible for the circumstance.

Now can't you respond to the circumstance about any way that you want to? You know, you can laugh at it or you can cry about it. That's why they have out in front of the theaters two faces, one sad and one a comic – you can do just about any one you want to, is that right? This young man used to be very serious – he always wanted to do the right thing; but now he has decided to be in charge of his responses to circumstances.

Now most of us struggle all our life to control circumstances, is that about right? The not-I's tell us we have to control the circumstances. We have to have our kids dress a certain way, and have them behave a certain way, and have them have certain jobs. We have to have our mates do certain things to be attentive – not overly attentive. Do you control circumstances? Now that is a struggle – to control circumstances because it comes from many, many directions. After all, everybody in this room has something to do with circumstances, isn't that right? And each of us has the responsibility, whether we like it or not, of choosing our response to that circumstance – I can respond any way I want to a circumstance.

Let's say you come up and call me a dirty name – I can choose any way I want to respond. I can get all upset and make it a production, or I can agree with you. If I agree with you, there isn't much you can do about it anymore, is there?

You may say, "All you think about is yourself!" “You're right, I'm glad you finally caught on.”
What are you going to argue about from now on? Now I can choose my response. I can't choose what you are going to say, I can't choose what you are going to do, huh? But I can choose my response.

You can't choose circumstances, but you can choose your response.

In other words, no matter what comes along, you can choose your response.

Your response at once determines your inner feeling.
Your inner feeling determines what X will do.

Life is going to get the feeling because that is the information it receives – your inner
Inner. I can choose my inner feeling, and I cannot choose circumstances. I have observed that most people I deal with – and I deal with a considerable number of people one way or another – spend a tremendous amount of time trying to control or determine circumstances. I think we all do it rather unconsciously, but approach it like it is the only thing to do.

And we spend almost no effort on choosing our own responses. The Not I's are telling us that circumstances have to be different or we just can't get along, is that right? This place is terrible! This job is terrible! Business is terrible! We spend all kinds of effort to remake circumstances. All kinds of energy are dissipated trying to make circumstances over. Really? Do they need to be made over? I think it is all right just like it is. You can laugh or scream; but I prefer to choose my own responses and I can usually laugh about it.

We went down to the coast a few days ago to a place of business, and we were going to clean up the kitchen – a commercial kitchen – and it turned out to be possibly the filthiest thing I have ever worked on. Apparently, the former people who had been there a number of years, clean-up consisted of turning the lights off and going home. It was cruddy.

The man came by and noticed what we were doing and he was trying to make some comment that circumstances had prevented him from doing it as much as he would like to have cleaned. But that they had always cleaned that flat grill. I had a hole chiseled through the grease to where I saw a sign that there was a grill, and I showed it to him and he said, “I'll be darned” – then a few minutes later he came back with his justification. He said that he had been so busy that he just hadn't had time to check up on it; but he had been eating on it – so here was a circumstance.

We could have fallen on the floor and screamed, or we could buy all the cleaners in town and clean it up. Now we can choose our responses – so I saw fit to go around and make a joke out of it. I have particularly amused myself for a few days by going around the former owner and making nice remarks like, "it's the first time I ever tried to make a kitchen out of a cesspool." I found it interesting – I don't know if he did. I don't think he caught on, though. But nevertheless, we couldn't choose the circumstances, but we could choose the response.

Now everyday existence is a series of unexpected circumstances. Everything you expected to happen never did, is that right? But what happened was all right cause you are still here. And I think that is the nature of it – to show that X can adequately respond to anything that may arise.

Certainly, we were unprepared for life. We came from the uterine world where we were non-disturbed, and came out here where there are constant challenges on all sides. If you had known what it would be like, do you think you would have been born, or would you have stuck your feet out on both sides and said, “No way!” But we got along all right with it, you know, we are here and that is about all that matters.

So let's make us a little experiment to run – 
that I will choose my response to circumstances,
and I will dissipate absolutely no energy trying to recreate circumstances.

Circumstances is given, we'll say, and that probably isn't exactly right because we had a little to do with it, and so did everybody else. But for an easy way out, we will put that circumstances are given and my response to the circumstance is my responsibility. I can choose any response to any circumstance that I want to. So let's take for a little experiment for the next few weeks that I am in charge of the response to the circumstance and I am not going to waste energy any time –any mental energy – fretting about why circumstances aren't different than they are.

Circumstance is given and it is up to me to choose my response. Someone is always saying, "I'm trying." Yes, very. Just do it for a change without all that “trying to” – that's just not-I's. But it really is not difficult. It is actually the greatest freedom or liberation that we can experience. It is really very interesting to choose our own response to the circumstances.

Now there is always more than one response and it is no use just responding mechanically –you might as well do it as something that you would enjoy. Now I don't know if that is the right thing to do, or the wrong thing to do, or anything. It’s just a statement that we make and you can check it out – that you can choose more than one response to any circumstance. You cannot choose your circumstance – except to a very limited degree. You can't choose whether it is going to rain, or if the sun is going to shine, or what have you, but you can choose your response. Did you ever have a picnic planned and then came a rain? You can choose your own response and your own attitude about it. And if I don't like rain or cold weather, I can always go where the calm trees grow.

(___?)

X is the motive power. It is that which is – Life. If it is not there we say, “Here lies the remains.” Now, what it is nobody seems to be able to define. I can tell you about how it works. It seems to have a tremendous urge for survival of that unit. It tells you when it needs food – we call it hunger. It tells you when it needs water, fluid – you get a feeling called thirst. X talks to you with sensations. You get a hold of something that is poisonous to you – you have a feeling to up-chuck, is that right? It also repairs broken bones.

It does the appropriate thing for the information it receives from your feeling. If you feel angry – it fills you full of adrenalin, thyroxin, etc. If you came up on an accident and someone was burning inside a car, you would probably find enough energy to lift that body out of the car. What it is? I don't know. We can tell when it is present and when it is not. If we had a definition of Life, then we would have a definition of X.

From all that we can observe,
X gives you the urge to actualize your major potential.

We'll say that you are potentially a great artist, but you had never done any artwork – you would have an urge all the time to do it. By the same token, you have a potential of being a completely conscious being. And I think, we all have a feeling of something not being just so, as long as we don't actualize that potential. So I think X gives us the motive to actualize our nature. People who have a talent for music, they always have a motive to get with it. I never had any talent for it so I don't have a motive to get with it – for music. But I think all of us have some sort of motive, an urge from within, to fully actualize – at least to a level of being conscious as we can be.

What we have talked about today is transcending old truths. X may have all capabilities, but the best I have noticed, it doesn't do anything unless I make a request of it by a feeling. I have a certain responsibility, I'm not along for a free ride – I am X's Awareness Function.

So could we say that, all that [he is pointing to a person] sitting there, is X, and that I can talk to its Awareness Function, and see its Motor Function. So maybe all there is, is X with Awareness Function, and Motor Function likes to run off and think it is all separate, and start claiming things. Maybe I am just what says I, is the Awareness Function of X. That might be an easier way of looking at it. X is the real Life – that is the reality.

And having an Awareness Function – the Awareness Function has a job, doesn't it? Functions have jobs. The stomach has a job of digesting and if it doesn't, it’s a worthless stomach – it's not fit to put groceries in. So, everything has a function. We'll say that you are the Awareness Function to report to X by feeling, any truth that you want to, and it will act upon it; but it will not act upon it unless you report to it. Okay? It is quite peaceful just like it is.

[End of transcript]