Rita on guidance

Monday February 23, 2015

F: 4:10 a.m. All right, Miss Rita. We can proceed with the previous list or start on Charles’ updated list. Let me re-read them, and then we can go where you please.

R: You felt my preference as you read them. My preference / your preference – in this context it is hard for you to sort out which is which.

F: Very true.

R: That’s a confusing thing when you first start doing this and a confirming one after a while. Wasn’t it?

F: Yes indeed. If I had let my doubts about “maybe I’m just making this up” stop me, it would have been largely because the information was so readily there that it seemed too good to be true, so maybe was wishful thinking.

R: Always good to note for the record, as a part of the experience. Very well, copy Charles’ note and the first set of questions.

[From Charles, quoting Rita’s answer to Cat’s Paw:

[R: … I would prefer that it stays focused on what it can learn to understand and (in the positive sense of the term) manipulate, rather than be dissipated in idle speculation.

[I think that’s well put, Rita (and Frank). With that in mind, could Rita speak to this: She emphasizes repeatedly there is no separation of 3D and non 3D, but from our limited perspective that often does not seem to be the case. I also get that “information,” ideas, hunches, even events or situations may originate, as it were, in non 3D though we mostly remain unaware of the fact.

[1.Is it the case that the more we are able to bring (or allow, or manifest?) our non 3D (larger) being into everyday 3D life the better or richer the experience?

[2.If so, what techniques, practices, or attitudes are conducive for doing this?

[3. How important or relevant is being conscious or aware of this process–keeping in mind that we are presumably always “in touch” with non 3D yet mostly unaware of it?]

R: Answering (1), no, there is no such rule. People are formed for many different reasons, of different components, which in effect gives them different missions, different priorities and possibilities. But this answer must itself be seen in context, the context of “who is likely to read it?”

F: Yes, I get that, all right. Those whose “path” – whose composition – makes them interested in the material are no doubt interested for a reason. Those who are not interested, are not interested for the simple reason that it doesn’t interest them – that is, it doesn’t concern them, they aren’t going this way.

R: Yes, it is pretty nearly that simple. If you have no interest in woodworking, you are unlikely to spend a lot of time on woodworking websites, let alone pick up a chisel and hammer, or drawknife, or whatever.

F: So it amounts to “listen to guidance [to know] whether you should listen to guidance.”

R: In practice, I think you will find that this is what people do. No one is bereft of a pole star, no matter how it may look to others or even to themselves. But that doesn’t at all mean that they will or should therefore conceptualize it the same way or even be aware of it as such. You may be a woodsman or a mechanic or – make it as 3D-oriented as you please – the access to guidance is there, recognized or not, conceptualized or not.

F: Everybody has a guardian angel.

R: Yes except that the angel is concerned less with abstract questions of good and evil as if it were a hall monitor, and more with questions of good or evil for the mixture that the individual person is. If you concentrate on an abstract set of rules, as the church did, you will see it as an innate source of knowledge of whether you are transgressing or not, and this is not a mistake, but it is limited. A wider view sees that that guardian angel may be equally well seen as a person’s perception of his or her non-3D component, there to offer advice when requested (or, sometimes, urgently required), and of course it will always proceed from the point of view that what the person is, is right, regardless of whether what the person specifically does in any given circumstance is right or not.

F: Hmm. Long disquisition possible here. You want to proceed along this line, or continue with the second question?

R: Let’s say a few words more. You have the sense of it, you begin it.

F: The defect of the Catholic upbringing for many people – certainly including me – is the sense of guilt that accompanies one’s inability to live up to an abstract inflexible set of rules of conduct. Granted, there was Confession to give one a sense of relief, of release, of a fresh start – but it would be a fresh start to again attempt to live up to an ideal, which by definition can never be lived, but only lived toward.

R: And now you can see that the support of the moral code could have been given without the pervading sense of guilt and failure, had the nature of the challenge and the opportunities been given differently. If what you are is taken as given, then the difference between what you are and what you naturally aspire to be or to become may be more of a route-indicator and less of a reproach.

F: Yes, and all this without reference to heaven or hell, which are mostly exaggerations of incentive.

R: In this context.

F: In this context, yes. I mean, the conflict between what we are and what we want to be exists without the promised reward or punishment.

R: For you it did. For some it did. But the world contains a world of different types of people, who respond to different sets of incentives. But this is all in answer to the first question: Different strokes for different folks, and each will know his or her own way. So I would rephrase it somewhat to say, the more you are able to stay in touch with your non-3D component, the more likely you are to stay on the beam – but this predicts nothing about how this will manifest. In some it will be a mystical bent, in others an intellectual abstract curiosity, in others a severe allergy to the mention of anything metaphysical, etc. The variations are as numerous as the types of people, and of course everyone who exists is right! That is, people are not created defective, no matter how it may seem to you. Their values may be antithetical to yours (and to each other’s); their beliefs may be contradictory; they may manifest many evil traits; they may seem blind to reality. It doesn’t matter: they were no more created “wrong” than you were. Everybody is a perfect expression of what they were created of, and nobody is perfect measured from any abstract table of values or attributes.

F: So, heaven and hell are useful concepts for some people.

R: You might say they are true concepts for some kinds of people, and [objectively] as true as any other description of what is called the afterlife, including this one. In this case the yardstick is shaped to the thing being measured.

F: Not sure I understand that last sentence.

R: Let it marinate, and let’s proceed to question #2, which as you see should require little discussion.

[2.If so, what techniques, practices, or attitudes are conducive for doing this?]

R: Discard the “if so” in so far as it implies that I agree that this is for everybody, for the reasons just stated. With that understood, I decline to prescribe specifics, as everyone’s circumstances, opportunities and limitations are different, and a specific answer would have too much weight for some people, leading them either to feel that their own guidance is wrong, or to rebel against what does not resonate. The simple answer is, you will know what is right for you. Just – ask guidance! Where else is the knowing going to come from?

That said, of course there are generalities I can give you without the risk of discouraging people. Openness to your own guidance is the key to all of it. The only thing external guidance (such as this) can do is to remind you “from the outside,” as it will seem, and get your attention.

F: On to #3?

R: Yes.

[3. How important or relevant is being conscious or aware of this process–keeping in mind that we are presumably always “in touch” with non 3D yet mostly unaware of it?]

R: This question has been answered above, you see. For those to whom it is important, it is important. For those to whom it is nonexistent, it is non-existent! And every gradation between the two. It is a tautology. One size does not fit all

F: We still have another ten minutes or so. Shall we continue or stop here?

R: We can at least begin on the next question.

[Charles quotes a question from Suzanne:
[I wonder if Rita could comment on the idea of soulmates. I think of it not necessarily as “that person you were destined to marry”, but as a particularly strong feeling you get, when you meet someone, that you have known them all along and/or have been waiting to find them. What is going on when that happens? Are we recognizing “strands” that we have been part of before? (If the topic has already been addressed, disregard. I did a search for soulmate and saw nothing come up.)]

R: The guys talked to us of soulmates, and explained that the concept arises from the mistaken view that individuals are unitary rather than compound, though they didn’t put it that way. Like most concepts, it can have a utility, but like most concepts it is easily overemphasized and mistaken for a rule or an invariant or inflexible description of reality.

Clearly the phenomenon exists, or there would be no concept seeking to explain it. But the fact that an inexplicable resonance between people exists does not mean that a given concept is the best way, let alone the only way, to explain it. In this context the explanation you offer – that it is recognition of a strand that you have been part of before – is close, but it might be better to see it as recognition of a strand that you share. No past tense about it.

But more to the point, why the question? That is, why is the question arising within you, and why now, and what is the answer going to affect? Understand, I am not criticizing the question, I am saying that introspection into the genesis of the question and its importance to you may be worthwhile.

And that’s about it for the day. We may begin again wherever Charles prefers.

F: This seems to be working well. Thanks as always, and we’ll see you next time.