May 29, 1994

• Be honest in your evaluation of who you really are, where you are on your personal

journey, and where you would like to be

The winds of God of which we have spoken are indeed a part of each of your souls. They blow nourishment and refreshment to everyone of you, as indeed they work for the benefit of all souls everywhere.

Much of the last two messages imply the importance of communication— communication among each other, but also a kind of communication which is directed inward. For you to reach outward to others, you must be more fully aware of who you are as individuals. You must be willing to communicate with your inner self. Obviously we don't mean just talking to yourself, but rather you must be willing to be open to an honest view of who you are, where you are on your own personal journey, and where you would like to be.

These are not easy questions. Perhaps the first is the most difficult: knowing who you are. What is it that motivates you? What is it that identifies and clarifies your character? What is it about you that you are aware of that makes you unique? And most importantly, what is it about you as an individual that binds you with everything that has been created, not just mineral content but more significant bonds? Where do you fit into the picture of creation?

That second question is more easily dealt with when you recognize honestly who you are. Your perception of where you want to go, what you wish to develop into, is greatly shaped by your perception of the meaning of life, of the importance of the spirit, and of the current position you now occupy.

Communication is important to all three perceptions. How do you communicate with yourself? How do you really understand who you are? There are numerous ways of getting at this, but for many, the simple act of making a list, writing down your ideas of who you are and what is important to you can be extremely helpful. It is not so much the act of writing down, but the organizing of your thoughts to enable you to write them down that is really important.

You all have concerns, areas of your life that create anxiety and worry. You also have elements in your experience that create great pleasure and a sense of well-being and fulfillment and joy. One is not more important than another. There is no need to order these elements in a specific way. There is no first and last. It is just a beginning compilation. But as you search yourselves honestly and try to describe who you are, you do become more aware in a very stark light of the you that exists at the moment with no concerns about who you will be in the future. It is just one means of learning more about who you are.

You must be willing to accept with patience and totally noncritically all that you find out about yourself. In examining your growing awareness of who you are, you will soon recognize that much of what you see also characterizes many who are around you. You will begin to recognize in a significant way how you are alike, how you are nearly identical to others. In examining who you are it is not so valuable to recognize that you are short in temper or very long in patience. What is more important is to understand what it is that creates your feelings of inadequacy or anger or joy or frustration, for the reaction is of less significance at this stage than the causes for that reaction. It is good to know, of course, that you experience joy, but it is more beneficial to know what it is that brings you joy, and so it is with all of the emotions.

This assessment, this willingness to communicate openly to your inner being, to view yourself honestly, takes a long time. Indeed you will find that if you start such a list you will never finish it, for years from now you will become much more aware of who you are than at the present time. So the list grows. The point here is not to complete the list, but to be actively engaged in an acknowledgment of who you really are. Often times this can be done by yourselves, but there are many instances where it is important to have the help of others. The essential issue, by whatever means, is your willingness to be as honest as possible in recognizing who you are, what the basis of your reactions is. Recognizing that, in most part without ever being finished, it is easier to acknowledge where you perceive yourself to be on your spiritual journey.

Your understanding of God as a result of so many gatherings over the years, such as the one you now share, leads you to an understanding of the potential for growth, what is important, where your souls can direct themselves and thereby shape your human lives. The point here is that you should not go through life blindly assuming that you are growing and proceeding in the best way possible. You must be willing to communicate with yourselves. This communication can be private, it can be in a group format, it can be any way that provides meaning for what it is you are doing. All that is necessary is the courage to be open and honest. You must strip away hopes, fears, pretense, the need for image if that is important. Your view must be honest.

When you have been honest in communicating to yourself, you are in a much better position to communicate through the help of God with others. You cannot help strengthen another unless you are helping from a position of strength. You cannot help another grow in faith unless you have developed a degree of faith. You cannot effectively help another experience peace until you have experienced the meaning of peace. All that you do reaching outward in the world can be effective only when you have achieved a measure of those objectives in your inner journey.

Just as your contribution to the lives of others is never really finished, so your understanding of self is never complete. But the fact that this completion is never achieved should not discourage the actions of self-communication and self-knowledge.

Many of the religions of the world emphasize the importance of meditation, but the main purpose of such meditation is not to change the world but to grow from within, for in that growth you are thereby empowered to reach outward. The sun is warm not because of what exists on the surface but of what lies within. The warmth you feel from others—friendship, support, and love—is not experienced as a result of superficial acts of kindness, for each of you can see through that. You experience the warmth of others because of the intensity of warmth that exists within. You nurture that intensity by your communication to your inner self.

There are many terms for this, but it is not important to label. It is only important to be actively involved in understanding who you really are. Some of this takes place just as the result of living and experience in interacting, but your lives are not nearly as fulfilled if you rely on this automatic understanding. Your lives gain perspective and meaning and relevance as a result of your own inward journey.

You are at crossroads. This juncture of life's experiences is essential, and it provides shape and character for your lives, but the potential for growth in a positive way is greatly enhanced if you have a clear understanding of your own strengths and weaknesses. You do not set off on a challenging journey unprepared. The preparation is essential for the completion of the trip. In order to make informed decisions in your lives, you must have as full a knowledge as possible of who you are. In that way, you are more able to be guided to make the right decisions, and you are then more confident of the rightness and are able to go forward with a strength of vision buoyed by confidence rather than weakened by self-doubt.

We mention this importance of self-knowledge because it is important for you to understand the balance necessary in life if you are going to effectively enhance the dignity of all creation. God's wish for you is to bring light to the lives around you. God's wish for you is to reaffirm the dignity of what has been created by God, but for you to reaffirm that dignity, you must feel that dignity. For you to feel that dignity, you must know yourselves honestly and thoroughly.

When you have that knowledge and can respect your failings as well as your successes, you are well on your way to affirming the failing of others as important and as belonging to God's creation. If you accept your own shortcomings, you are more able to forgive the misdeeds of another. If you cannot accept your own errors, you will never be able to affirm the godliness in another human being. You will then be setting goals for others which cannot be met, just as you set goals for yourself that cannot be met.

You cannot live in total perfection and neither can another. Imperfection is a part of life. You must accept it, embrace it, affirm its value, affirm its necessity. That does not mean that you ignore it, but you are willing to accept it. You can challenge yourself to work on it as you can challenge others to improve their position. The challenging is always achieved from a position of respect, never criticism. No one is motivated to improve as a result of criticism, but all are motivated to improve when the challenge is offered with respect and acceptance. So this acceptance begins with yourselves and branches outward to the world.

We, your guides, accept you fully and without reservation. We know your strengths and we accept your weaknesses. We are never critical, but we approach each of you with challenges offered only through love and affirmation. You all stand within the warm light of God, not by deserving it but by being who you are. Let others stand in your light, affirmed by the same convictions.

God blesses each of you with peace and love and light.

Amen.