Excerpts - Integration Not as a Goal Tape #123 - side one
We are going to discuss the nature of integration. Integration means a person is a whole man. He has all of his aspects and they are all working; and in addition, he’s not in conflict with himself. We do not state to anyone that integration is a desirable goal because if they make it a goal, it makes them very ill. That is to say they try to figure out in their head what it means to be integrated—and a disintegrated person trying to figure out what an integrated person is will drive one mad.
But the end of disintegration is very worthwhile. We can put a stop to disintegrating because we’ve become acquainted with it and we can begin to do something with it.
A person can’t intelligently choose a purpose until there is an end to disintegration because all we’re doing is running around in the struggle of disintegration. So we can leave our goals aside.
It is to our advantage to see and be aware of the accumulated beliefs—that means to be aware of the beliefs without resistance or judgment which, if we do resist or judge, results in conflict. So we don’t try to resist or struggle with the accumulated beliefs—they’re just beliefs that we’ve taken on throughout the years without checking them out or recognizing that they are mutually exclusive. I can have them, but I’m not trying to change them.
You see, we have opposite ones, like “it’s important to have my way now” and at the same time, “it’s important to please you”. And we try to make them work at the same time. So I keep both of these things. How can I work with that? Ok, I’ll use one--I think “I’ll try pleasing first”. And I will talk with you and kindly try to sell my bill.
We play this little game every once in a while when we’re somewhere—not here. We were in Phoenix once; and we went in a restaurant late at night when we finished work. There was seven of us working that night, and we said we’d like a table for 7. They said there were no tables for 7--there was only two tables for four each. So I thought that would be an interesting time to play a little game. So we asked politely that we wanted a table for 7. The lady said there is only two tables for 4; and I said very politely again, “But we want a table for 7”. So we continued this being nice, but firm; and pretty soon a manager comes out and says there’s no table for seven, you’ll will have to divide up into two or four. I said, “We want a table for 7 please.” I never said I didn’t hear you or anything else—I just kept saying, “We want a table for 7.” So, they finally brought the two tables together, set it up for us.
So these things are kind of fun to see that you use both of these decisions. There’s no use to get rid of any of your decisions, only you use them consciously, and use use them one at a time--and that’s the end of conflict. Isn’t that simple? Keep them all, why throw any of them out. Huh?
One time down at Simpatico, we were needing a big hot water heater put in. There was a 30-gal hot water heater for the hotel; and it pretty interesting when you’re trying to wash dishes for about 80 people. So we bought us another big hot water heater.
A man came out and he says he’ll be back and put it in. He comes in Monday morning and unhooks all the water in the building and says, there won’t be any water until I get this thing hooked up. Well, this went on about two hours and he said, “I gotta go to lunch.” We said we’d fix him a nice lunch. “No, I got to go to town.” So he’s gone and comes back at 4:30 pm--fiddles around for a few minutes--wiggles the water heater across the floor and says, “We’ll hook it up tomorrow.” And I said, “No, we have to have it tonight.” We went about the same route that we had gone through with the table for seven. The only thing is he kept saying, “No.” Finally, I picked up the meat cleaver and started tapping it on the counter, and he got that water heater hooked up quite fast.
Now you can use all these basic decisions we have illustrated in the picture of man. But just don’t try to use conflicting ones at the same time. If you use one of them consciously, the other side won’t jump up and say “But why didn’t you do it my way.”
When you’re unconscious, they create horrible conflict. So we don’t have to change ourselves, we don’t have to undo them, we merely reevaluate them and make them conscious.
If we had acknowledged that we had heard the little lady about only having two tables for 4, and started contending with her that there was a way to use the two tables, we’d never have gotten anywhere. But we never did say, I didn’t hear you or anything else. We didn’t say we don’t want two tables of four--we just kept repeating that we wanted a table for 7. ………and it got there too.
We got outwitted one time. One night we went into a coffee shop and said we wanted dinner. At 10:00 the kitchen’s closed. Well, we stayed for quite a spell, but we still had to go. But they apologized every day after that.
So why would you want to fight yourself when you have all these nice mechanisms—but you can do them consciously. Then there is no conflict there—there is no struggle. They may be useful at times; and then you may not use one for months.
If you’re not trying to be comfortable at all times, you might discover that sometimes it’s to your advantage to be uncomfortable for a little while in order to be more comfortable later.
(from the audience……….It was uncomfortable while Bob was standing there very impassively trying to get us the table for 7.)
Yes, everybody was thinking that the manager was going to hit me or that we were going to get thrown out of there. I did get what we wanted. It was just an interesting experiment. It was totally unimportant.
(I don’t know whether I was in a state of awe or shock.) (laughter)
So when there is no reason to change, then the only thing we want to do is be conscious.
And so what have we been doing all our lives? We have identified, build us an image, got totally unconscious and went out here wandering around in a big crowd of other human beings that aren’t aware they’re human beings, and that’s why there’s quite a mess out there—you notice—it’s a bit dangerous.
(It’s like sleep walking.)
Sleep walking is right, huh? Is that a clear enough statement?
We are not interested in looking for Truth only—only in finding misconceptions. We’re not even looking for Truth. When a “false” is seen as being “false”, Truth is, is it not?
(That’s an interesting idea.)
Well, let’s stay with it a minute, if it’s an interesting idea.
When I see the “false idea” as being “false”, have I not then seen the Truth of something? And I can quit fighting with it then, can’t I? Old Columbus saw the idea that the ocean might be an optical illusion, and he went to see about it. He saw that the false was false and then the Truth was and is, is that right? So if we look for the “false”, we can find a lot of it. If we look for misconceptions, we can find a lot. But if we go out and start looking for Truth, what happens? I think it was old Churchill said, “Every once in a while we stumble over a piece of Truth, but we usually jump up, brush ourselves off and go on like nothing ever happened. (laughter)
Think of all the ideas--even in our time--that have been demonstrated to be false—then we have been freed of a great load.
They tried to teach me powerfully, when I was a young lad, that “what you don’t know won’t hurt you” I discovered they were trying to mis-teach me very early because I found out I didn’t know that mules would bolt and run off and break organs when you shoot firecrackers. I shot off a firecracker to impress my friends, and the mules ran off--the organ bounced all over the wagon and went down the hillside--just like that. So I found out that what I didn’t know could cause an awful lot of chaos.
So we’re willing to check and double-check every one of the things we think we know. You remember we’ve been through a couple of times saying that in order to approach things, we have to be able to see that possibly something I hold to be “true” just may not be “true”. In other words I’m willing to investigate it, look at it, and study it. If proves to be false, good riddance. If I can’t prove it wrong, then I better stay with it for a while until it comes up otherwise. And this way we get rid of a lot of stuff.
The Truth is always here—it’s only covered up with false stuff and that’s why we want to look at it.