Lovely to see you.

Lovely, lovely to be here. Thank you, Michael. Thank you, Tonya. Thank you to all of you, unity of you.

And it's just wonderful to be here.

Very grateful to have the opportunity to speak in this place at this moment.

Before we do anything else, please introduce yourselves to the people who are around you.

To you right and to your left and in front of you and behind you. All right, you ready? All right. Together let's all take a deep breath and close our eyes. We see a lot of people who are in the same room. We're all in the same room. We're all in the same room. We're all in the same room. All right, you ready? All right. Together let's all take a deep breath and close our eyes. We see in the middle of our mind a little ball of golden light. We watch this light as it begins to grow larger and larger. Until now it covers the entire inner vision of our mind. We see for ourselves within this light a beautiful temple. We see a garden that surrounds the temple and the body of water that flows through the garden. We see that the inside of the temple is lit as well by the same beautiful golden light. And here we are. For we have been drawn together by the power and in the presence of God. And we devote our time spent together, our relationships to one another. All of our experiences here, praying that His Spirit be upon us, uplift our thoughts, our feelings, our bodies, beyond the fear, the suffering, and the turmoil of this world. And so it is together, we all say, amen. I'd like to begin this evening, reading you a quote that I saw the other day from a Nobel lawyer in chemistry who has since passed. His name was Ilja Prigorgin, I think, unless somebody knows how to pronounce that better. But I think it speaks to why we're here tonight. He said, when a complex system is is far from equilibrium, small islands of coherence in a sea of chaos have the capacity to shift the system to a higher order. So we've all known for a long time, you know, this idea when two or more are gathered. Of course, America says the most powerful force in the world is an agreement between two

people. And we've known for a long time, you know, people would talk about cells of terrorists. And when you'd hear about a terrorist, you get kind of nervous, but you'd hear about a cell, and you'd really get scared, because there's, we all know that as the Course in Miracles, it also says an idea grows stronger when it is shared. And we need cells of love. We need to join together, just like we all heard years ago about the people over at HeartMath, and what they would find when two people's hearts were beating in coherence. And so we have a job at this moment in order to help dissolve the chaos of this time to uplift not only in our individual lives, but also how we dwell in community and with others in so providing the power of peace, not just the presence of peace, but the power that comes along with that peace, so great that it is as light that casts out darkness. Now I don't need to tell anybody here. We're in a very chaotic moment, chaotic moment in our country obviously, chaotic moment in many ways in the world. What is our response ability at such a time as this? We all know the quote from Einstein that the thinking of the world that created the problems is not the level of thinking that will get out of the

problem, get us out of the problems. Much of the chaos in the world today is a product

of old thinking. And from a metaphysical perspective, everything that's out there is a reflection of what's in here. Everything happening in America today is a product of who we have been. And in order for there to be a different state, we need to change. The breakdown that we are experiencing today is a whole systems breakdown and it demands a whole systems response. I remember back in the 80s when A had arrived at really what burst onto the scene with that was a whole new conversation about healing. And before then, we were pretty much stuck. The mainstream was certainly stuck in this alopathic model of healing. You didn't have to worry about your food. You didn't have to worry about nutrition. You didn't have to worry about exercise. You didn't have to worry about lifestyle. If you got sick, you simply hoped there would be an externalized remedy that we call an alopathic remedy that would suppress or eradicate the symptoms. But around the 80s and the United States was actually behind a lot of European countries, for instance, were ahead of us on this. We're already talking about holistic medicine, integrative models, that you didn't just wait to get sick, you proactively cultivated health, that sickness was the absence of health. Health was not the absence of sickness. And that even if sickness arose, there were psychological elements to healing. There were emotional elements to healing. There were emotional elements to healing. At first they talked about it as alternative medicine. And then they moved, no, it's not really alternative, it's complementary. And then finally it landed where I think it belonged, into great medicine. And that's how we have to see politics now. Because the dominant political model is, it's all about the symptoms. There was no serious conversation in ways there should have been about proactively cultivating more of a democracy. There wasn't a conversation that should have been about proactively cultivating peace. And the same thinking which allowed that to happen now is thinking only in terms of political old think of how to fix it. And the political old think has to do number one just treating the symptoms, just treating externalities, but also, and this is particularly frightening for Americans, it's also about the recognition that many of the institutions that we thought we'd keep us safe should such chaos ever emerge, like how many of us are, well, my political party is certainly filled with people who will handle this. No matter whether you're Republican or Democrat, we thought our Congress would handle it. We thought our Supreme Court would handle it. So many of the institutions and entities that we looked to, it's a feeling almost of like children and we're on our own. But that's the problem. We allowed ourselves to be so infantilized. We allowed ourselves to become spectators. So in AA, they say every problem comes bearing its own solution. One of the solutions to this is all of us remembering that the power was always supposed to be in the hands of the people. The fact that we so often did surrender that power to whatever entity or institutional power we thought could handle it somehow better than we, that we did surrender so much of our critical thought. Maybe we weren't thinking as intelligently as we could have been before, but let's all agree tonight, we're thinking intelligently now. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. But in thinking intelligently, as I said, intelligent thinking now is not just thinking about external symptoms. It's looking to cause. It's an integrated politics. It's a holistic holistic whole person vision. And for that to occur, I believe that there is as much in myth and archetype and fairy tale and the great scriptural stories to guide us at this moment, eternal truths guiding us at this moment. We have as much to learn from that as from any of the voices that theoretically knew something or we wouldn't be. Didn't obviously mean any, excuse me, from forces that obviously didn't know as much as they would have wanted us to think they knew or we wouldn't be in this situation to begin with. And one of those stories that I think is very helpful in a moment like this is the story of Moses and the Exodus. The beauty of scripture is especially metaphysical interpretation, Jungi and interpretation, every single detail. So I want to talk to you tonight about the fact that God parted the Red Sea. Because actually, when you look at the chaos of this moment, we need an escape route. We need a portal of new possibility. Because one of the reasons it's so upsetting this moment is because on a material level alone, we're in big trouble on a material level alone. The message of spiritual expanded thought is that there is so much more going on than the material level. Now Moses leads the Israelites out of Egypt, just about at the time when they got to the Red Sea. The Pharaoh decided, you know, I want my slaves back. And he said to his soldiers, I want you to go chase them and I want you to capture them and I want you to bring them back to be my enslaved people, and if they resist, kill them. So the Israelites are standing at the Red Sea and talking about between Iraq and the heart place, if they go forward, they will drown. And if they turn back around, they will be captured by the Egyptian soldiers. Now we all know God parted the Red Sea, but let's look at the details. Before God parted the Red Sea, he said to Moses, lift your rod and with it, put your hand above the waters. In other words God didn't just part the Red Sea, Moses had a part to play in that as well. Now what is the rod of Moses? The rod of Moses is like the wand of the fairy godmother. It's like the wizard's wand. It is vertical consciousness. When the fairy godmother took her wand and she surrounded Cinderella's rags with light and they turned into a ballgown. She surrounded the pumpkin with light and it turned into a coach. She surrounded the mice with light and they turned into footmen. Light from a metaphysical perspective in the course of miracles is called understanding. Your rod, keep it, keep it high. And Moses was told by God, remember the word it is wrong came from. It came from a snake. That's your consciousness. If you're not in control of it, it will destroy you.

You pick it up high for God because God told you to

and you keep it straight up going there,

it is your victory.

And in the Bible.

And today, as long as Moses holds the rod high, the Israelites will be victorious. When he does not hold the victory, the rod high, the victories were defeated. That's why one of the most powerful parts in the Bible is where Moses is so exhausted. He can't, he can't, it's too heavy a burden, it's too heavy a burden. And someone named Err and the Bible, it's so odd when you get older, isn't it weird what you remember and what you don't remember? For whatever reason, I remember his name was Err. Err picks up under one shoulder and his brother Aaron under the other. So God told Moses, take that high consciousness and your hand over the water. Your water, metaphysically, is your subconscious mind. Get in control. Get in control. The Course in Miracles talks about how we achieve so little because we have undisciplined minds and we are far too tolerant of mind wandering. So the Ratesi parted, not just because God parted the sea, but because God told Moses, lift your consciousness high and put that consciousness over everything that's happening. Now after that, it's interesting, because I'm sure many of you have, well, you know, it's so interesting. They have now shown that the kind of tunnel, horizontal tunnel to which the Israelites escaped is an actual physical phenomenon. Did you want to know that? It actually happens. And this is so interesting to me. Because in the Bible it says, after God told Moses, take your rod and there's one other element. And I've read two interpretations of this. I've read that it was Moses, and also, that it was another one of these relics with him. Walk into the water. Walk into the water, okay? Keep walking. Keep walking. Keep walking and had to get all the way to here. How much faith you have. How much faith you have. How much faith you have. Now after that, it wasn't like all of a sudden the Red Sea parted. It was a very stormy night. And when I read about this scientifically, when this happens, you know, remember when there were the tsunamis? And everybody was talking about how before tsunami, the waves go go backwards. Well, they know about all these physical phenomena happen in the ocean and what happens first. When this particular horizontal tornado occurs, it is preceded by hours of storm. And so it says in the Bible. It was preceded by hours of storm. We're in the storm. We're also in those three days between the crucifixion and the resurrection. We're also in those 40 years that the Israelites wander through the desert. There are no paved roads in this desert. So the issue is not who is Donald Trump, the issue is not who is Peter Teal, the issue is not who is mosque, the issue is not who are white supremacists, who are Christian nationalists, who are the technobroaks, all those things matter, they are part of it, but the issue is who are we. In life it's not just what happens to you, it's who you are in the space of what's happening. I know a lot of people right now, and for good reason, we're all upset, whether you're on the right, whether you're on the left, all people of good will are left. I don't are upset. You know, this is not, I believe, just a left-right issue what's going on in this country. I think that that's been purposely, it's a narrative that's been used to divide us. You know, when you look at what happened with Jimmy Kimmel the other night, your own very conservative senator Ted Cruz was one of the loudest voices, saying no to Brendan Carr. This is about the people in America, left or right, who believe in the high-minded values of both conservative and level principles and know that our allegiance to the Constitution of the United States, the Declaration of Independence, and the traditions of American liberty and democracy and humanitarian values make us who we are, and we will not give that up now, now, not ever for anyone. So, who do we have to be? That's the question. We have to find our inner Moses. This is not about who is going to be the Moses. You know, I'm old enough to remember when they shot Martin Luther King and they shot Bobby Kennedy, senior and they shot John Kennedy, all that. No, no, no. If this is about just individuals, we're very clear what they can do to get rid of individuals. This can't be an age of a soloist. This has to be about the choir. This has to be you and you and you and you and you. And anytime we're thinking, what am I supposed to do? Gandhi said when he was asked who is the leader of the Indian Independence Movement, he said the small still voice within. This is why the Dalai Lama said, in order to save the world, we must have a plan, but no plan will work unless we meditate. What that means is that just like there's a GPS, right? You take a wrong route and the GPS will automatically recalibrate. You and I are now going to a period of great recalibration. And each and every one of us, every individual life it's like a hologram. Every individual life is a microcosm of what's happening in the lower order. So the chaos that many of us are experiencing, we're not just experiencing it outside ourselves, we're experiencing it in our own personal lives because this recalibration is occurring. And this recalibration means where you want the wrong road before, get on the right road now, because that's what this GPS is about. So if we lift our wand and we put our hands over the water and we know the world will not change unless I change, there are certain things we all know we have to do. First of all, no matter whether you're on the left of the right, get that smirk off your face. Nobody has a monopoly on truth. Nobody gets to be right, only in a totalitarian society does everybody have to line up and see things the same way. Freedom means everybody gets to have their own view. You know, Eisenhower, President Eisenhower, said the American mind at its best is both liberal and conservative, high-minded liberal, high-minded conservative, our best we're kind of a yin and a yon. This idea that your side of the political, we're the moral ones. Oh really? We're right and they're wrong. That is what makes us the dis-united states. United States of America means we all get to be different genders, different sexuality, different sex, different religions, different ethnic groups, but we are bound by our common allegiance to the things I said before the Constitution and so forth. Now in this, the Course in Miracles says God has an answer to every problem, the moment the problem occurs. So once again, think of it as that car which is swerved off the road, America has swerved off the road clearly. But I'd like to remind you we've swerved before. We had slavery in this country. This is not the first time that there's been serious serious problems in this country, but you know what? It's not just about identifying the problems in our past, it's about identifying with the problem solvers in our past. In other generations, generations rose up and they handled it. And we have to have that conviction within ourselves. The course in miracles says miracles arise from conviction. Conviction is a force multiplier. I'm hearing way too many people already given

what's happening in America that I well it's over there's really nothing we can do. That is terrible. How many of you have kids? How many of you have or have had a teenager? You know that thing that happens.

Usually drug sex or alcohol are involved. And this fierce thing rises up in you. And you don't even know what you would do, but this fierceness, it's born of millions of years of evolution, recognizing the cubs are in danger. And you find yourself saying things you heard your own mother said

That will not be happening in this house. Do you understand me?

Now you're laughing inside because if they challenge you at this point you don't even know what you do

But you're so fierce and that look on your face is so serious. They're like a little mama man

Oh daddy mad because that will not happen here and

by the way a common characteristic of all advanced mammalian species that survive and thrive is the fierce behavior of the adult female of the species when she senses a threat to her cubs, the mama bear, the mama tiger, the mama lion. Do you know when she senses a threat to her cubs, the mama bearer, the mama tiger, the mama lion. Do you know when she senses a threat to her cubs being so great, do you know that among the hyenas, the hyenas, when hyena cubs are feeding, the adult females just walk around the minisercle to make sure that none of the adult males will come and get the food of the cups. Surely the women of America could do better than the hyenas. There's our fiercers and it's more difficult for women. It is more difficult for women because that is very inconvenient. Too many people, when a woman so stands up and they will label us with that word that too often will shot us up. She's angry. She's uppity. She's strident. And this is why it's a little side to women in the room. This is why sisterhood matters. This is why sisterhood matters. So we have to ask ourselves, where have I allowed myself to fall into cheap and easy stereotypical thinking about anyone? The work is on ourselves. If we're going to participate and by the way, I want to remind you, systems do not change only if there's a majority that changes. They change because there's a critical mass that changes. The majority didn't even want to separate from England. The majority did not wake up one day and say, why don't we just end slavery? The majority didn't wake up one day and say, I think we should give women the right to vote, you think? The majority didn't wake up and say, let's desecrocate the American self. That's not what happened. A critical mass of people who were so convicted because conviction is the force multiplier and conviction is the vertical. Conviction is the want, is the rod. It's not thinking horizontal. How do I convince them? Don't worry about that. I convinced them. Talk more to the people that you know who are already convinced and say what more could we do today? Right? It's about going deep. It's not just horizontal. And then when enough people do go deep, no, this is what our Constitution says. This is what we stand for. This is what makes us good people. And I believe with all my heart. And I say this having run for president twice. And having run for president twice, let me tell you, I have seen the dark underbelly. I visually know it. Nobody can tell me anything. I don't know about how the system can work in terms of the way the political system and media. I call it the political media industrial complex. I know it all, but I know enough to know that my cells know it. But let me tell you what I know. And what I believe after traveling all over this country as a presidential candidate twice, you know what I know? The American people are not the problem. We are a decent people. We are a decent people. We are a decent people. We're not the best people in the world. This idea of exceptionalism, there are ideals that are exceptional. But you can't just be exceptional because you call yourself exceptional. Exceptionalism isn't something one generation can just bequeathed to another. You have to own it for yourself. Our principles are exceptional. If you're not living your principles, there's nothing exceptional going on here. And I don't believe God loves any one nation more than He loves another, because God doesn't love any people more than He loves another. The Course in Miracle says that all of us are special and none of us are special. Now, when I talked about that issue of the GPS and the idea that God has an answer to every problem, the moment the problem occurs, the Course in me, now there is such a thing as God lifts people up and I think God does lift people up. And there are incredible stories about, you know, the great man theory of history, you know, the Lincoln's the FDRs, all that, that's true. But right now it's collective. God's response to this moment is what is gonna do inside you and what is gonna do inside you and what is gonna do inside you. God doesn't look at any of us and go, hey, I don't know, anyway, we'll talk about that one. And this is just a way of avoiding our own responsibility to think somebody else might handle it. And the Course in Miracle says that everybody has a highly individualized curriculum. And also, you know, if you're going to a forest and there's a poison, the antidote to that poison is within a certain feet away. So metaphysically, and this is true even before this moment, this is not like this moment, the laws of the universe didn't change because we have some political problems. These laws were there. It's just they're magnified right now.

Everything you need is either right in front of you

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