Separation and Oneness

[Excerpts from conversations between Rita Warren and “the guys upstairs,” in the years 2001 and 2002, edited from The Sphere and the Hologram.]

Separation and Oneness

R: In this process that we’re doing, here and now – Frank’s conscious activity seems to move in and out. Sometimes I feel like he really is able to step aside enough so that I can speak directly to you, and other times I feel him coming back in. I’m asking questions about this generally without a very good way of putting it, but – what’s going on here? Is this to some extent a matter of Frank’s needing to or wanting to control what comes up, or is it just not wanting to miss anything? I’m asking why he comes back in when he does, I guess, and does this in effect get in the way?

TGU: No, you’re not seeing it right. It’s not going in and out at all. He’s never not here. And we’re never not here. [pause] The manner of expression alters so that sometimes it seems him and sometimes it seems us, but it’s always the same thing in different proportions. That’s the best we’re going to be able to do with that. You’re never going to get all him; you’re never going to get all us. It’s always going to be mixed. And the reason is, because that’s how he lives. That’s his normal life.

This disappointed him, when he was younger. There is no “him stepping all the way aside and us talking,” because there’s not that much separation between him and us to make that possible. Or even desirable. But also, oddly enough, there is no talking to him and not talking to us. Because the separation is not there and not desirable. So even when you’re talking to him about tuna fish, we’ll be popping in and out all the time, because he’s not got the barrier there. You see?

R: And yet it seems sometimes that you bring up information that Frank is not aware of.

TGU: Oh absolutely! Absolutely. That’s the value, you know. Well, not so much information, the value is that we are a corrective point of view. Actually, he might not see it that way. He would prefer more information than we usually can bring. He tends to think of us as having all knowledge and access to all knowledge, which is theoretically true, but in practice it isn’t true, because it depends on the questions. You see? [pause] We wouldn’t answer for the results if you were to ask us a question in Mandarin Chinese. Given the right circumstances, we suppose we could go find somebody. But it would have to be real and not theoretical; I don’t know how to explain that.

R: Okay, so my question really was aimed at what we’re doing here, and I’m hearing you say that there’s nothing that interferes.

TGU: That’s right. What you’re getting is hard for people to believe because of your concepts. It’s only a very slight exaggeration of your own life. In your own life, your own Gentlemen Upstairs – your Ladies Upstairs, whichever you prefer – are popping in and out all the time. Well, they’re not so much popping in and out as they’re there but they’re not always contributing. It’s just that your language and your civilization doesn’t encourage you to recognize the fact. And that’s one of the things that he’s here to do. Perhaps he’ll accomplish it, perhaps not. If you all realize that you are we and we are you, and that it’s not a question of a great occasional leap across a barrier, but of everyday intercourse, that will change your civilization radically.

R: Yes, that’s certainly true. And I’m encouraged to think in those terms. And yet people are encouraged to pray, to ask for help –

TGU: Yes, but, look what’s implied there. A prayer implies distance. You know? You’re praying to something else, which is a very strongly different nuance from opening your own channels. You can call ’em the guys upstairs, you can call ’em God, you can call ’em anything you want. But you also would be better off to remember that it’s part of you, it’s not something different. It is but it isn’t; you’re always going to get that. Because of the difference in playing fields, every answer is going to be, “Well it is but it isn’t,” because it depends on where you are when you ask the question. You are the same as your higher self. But you’re not. But you are. You pays your money and you takes your choice. [pause]

The whole mode of operation that assumes that there is a Frank and that there’s an “us” is incorrect. It’s a useful fiction, but that’s all. Because when there is identity, there can only be relative distinctions. There can only be polarities, let’s say. So, to say “Well Frank, you get out of the way, we want to talk to the guys,” sets up a willingness to open up a little more, and a willingness to speak without pre-intent, and to let come whatever comes, but it does not in any meaningful way substitute one personality for another.

R: Or create any kind of separation.

TGU: Exactly. There is none. Now, for many people there is that separation, but it’s only of their own concepts. The separation vanishes when it’s desired to vanish, on a deep enough level. If you define yourself as Downstairs, there will be a difference between Downstairs and Upstairs, because you will systematically ignore, or not recognize, or distort, the input that comes from other than inside your definition. As you loosen the definition, the distortion lessens. That’s probably the simplest way to put it.

R: And at the same time, at the level at which we are all one, an additional set of factors come in that we interpret as meaning that we are individual and separate. And while you and Frank are the same thing, Frank and I are the same thing, and –

TGU: And you and we are the same thing, yes.

The Sphere and the Hologram, 15th anniversary edition, published by SNN / TGU Books, is available as print or eBook from Amazon and other booksellers.

 

Healing

[Excerpts from conversations between Rita Warren and “the guys upstairs,” in the years 2001 and 2002, edited from The Sphere and the Hologram.]

Healing

R: I want to move to the idea of distant healing, the idea of our trying to use ourselves as a beacon to send healing energy to someone at a distance. How can one best use one’s self here, with a purpose of healing someone who is not present?

TGU: The simplest thing is to overcome the illusion of distance. That’s really all you need to do. You and the other person are part of one thing, literally. Not metaphorically, but literally, there is no distance between you in another dimension, no matter what there is physically. The idea of distance that’s in your mind because of physical bodies tends to unconsciously make you think you have to overcome the distance. But you don’t. All you need to do is remember that there is no difference, and it’s an easy, simple thing to then just be at a level of being that is healing, and resonate with the person so that they can rev themselves up to that level again. That’s really all they need to do. You’re acting as a tuning fork for them, so to speak.

R: So we don’t need to make the distinction between the distance healing or side-by-side healing.

TGU: There isn’t a distinction. It appears to be, because you’re in bodies, but there’s no distinction, it’s the same thing.

R: Okay, well how does one best direct this being-ness to be helpful in some way to someone else?

TGU: Your easiest way is to look at your religious traditions. They show you a very good way to do it. They would not put it this way, but they’re saying, “My personal power, brought up to a higher power, and brought down again to the other power, to the other person.” And so you might think in these terms: You, at all levels, in contact with the other person at all of their levels, and helping them. Assuming that they want the help. (Assuming that you’re not actually interfering with them. That’s an important thing. It gets overlooked.)

That’s really all that needs to be done. To the degree that you can remember how great you are, and not think of yourself as a limited physical body, then you’ll know that you have all you need. And they have all that they need to be able to receive. It’s really just strictly a matter of love. That’s all there really is. Lots of complicated techniques are invented, and these things really are belief crutches. And if they work, that’s fine. But they’re not needed. Jesus was not a Reiki master.

R: I can see that the belief systems tie up with particular techniques or strategies for doing this.

TGU: And to the degree that they work for the people, well and good, but they’re not necessary – unless they’re necessary for that person.

R: When you say that the healer is trying to connect with a higher power –

TGU: That is to say, other levels of themselves. It’s not a different person.

R: Yes. Higher self, or whatever language one uses. Bringing forth energy through the person, or sending it directly, would seem to be the only difference between distant healing and –

TGU: It seems to you that you’re sending the energy, and there’s nothing wrong with that seeming. But really what’s happening is, you are resonating at a state of health, like a tuning fork, and the other person is being able to lean on that resonance in order to get back up to speed. However, we recognize that for people in general it looks like sending healing. And there’s nothing wrong with that; it works. We’re just stating that’s not really what’s happening. Not from our point of view, anyway.

R: Well, I guess another way of going at that is, when one is aiming to do a healing with another person in one’s presence, and has a sense of energy flowing through them, say into their hands or through their hands to another person, is this imagery that we use? Is it unnecessary to use the imagery that way?

TGU: [pause] Well, we’re tempted to say that people don’t do things that aren’t necessary. As your world changes, the experiences that you have change. You’ll notice that in the healing that you’re doing back and forth [i.e., Frank and Rita], the experience changes unpredictably. Neither of you know what’s going to happen, necessarily, until it does. That’s a pretty good sign that neither of you is intending it, you are just removing the barriers from it. Which is fine. You know, the intending is that help shall be given and received. But neither of you could do it in the way that you could write your name, or do any skill that you perform. It’s not so much a skill, it’s a being. So sometimes you’ll perceive it as tingling, sometimes as heat, sometimes as transfer of energy, sometimes as something else.

The experience is more a function of your concepts than it is of what’s really happening. So if you have a concept of putting energy in, and having the energy come in and rearrange things, there’s nothing wrong with that, and it works. Someone else with a different concept would heal in a totally different way and it would work. Neither one is invalid, neither one is imagination, it’s just that the phenomena are the product of your states of being, really. A good Catholic at Lourdes might have a broken arm instantly restored, and that would follow a certain unconscious expectation. If you were in another context, it might be a slower process, like the laying down of new nerves and things. The healing will manifest as a result of the belief systems. But it’s only a manifestation, it’s not the actual thing.

The Sphere and the Hologram, 15th anniversary edition, published by SNN / TGU Books, is available as print or eBook from Amazon and other booksellers.

How to Make a Better World

[Excerpts from conversations between Rita Warren and “the guys upstairs,” in the years 2001 and 2002, edited from The Sphere and the Hologram.]

How to Make a Better World

R: One of the things that we think about is how to improve our world for the masses of individuals in it. And we think about that in terms of children, and how children’s lives are led, and how it impacts them and doesn’t. Millions of us have lived our lives trying to make a better world, if you will. And I’m hearing you say well of course, it makes sense that one does that with children. But the whole goal of making a better world doesn’t seem to make any sense from the perspective that you’re speaking.

TGU: We’ll try to say this carefully. Your trying to make a better world is good work, because of what you’re choosing. But “better world” implies that you know how to make a better world. Your ability to know what a better world would be is very great for yourself; it’s pretty good for your family and friends; it’s somewhat good for your neighborhood; and it’s less good the wider the circle goes.

Now, it’s true that abstractly you can have preferences and some of those preferences may be absolutely right. Certainly you want to have clean water rather than water that’s not safe to drink. But in actual human terms your ability to know what’s good and your ability to know what will bring the good is really very limited. We would say your major ability to make the world a better place to live in is one simple thing:

Be a beacon.

R: Say that again?

TGU: Be a beacon. Shine what you are. It’s very powerful. It’s very subtle and seemingly inconsequential. Many of the results are not in the physical plane at all. The closest we could come at the moment would be to say that your reactions – what you are – resonate with others, and that resonance is not just within time-space. We’ve never tried to express this, because you don’t have the words for it. The what-you-are mingles with other people who are the same thing, and it creates a warp, a pattern, in the energy system.

Let’s go back to the basics. By being a beacon, your example – not so much what you do, although that’s how it shows, as through what you do, what you are – encourages other people to be like that as well, and that creates a better world. Now, it’s true that “goodness is as goodness does,” but the “is” and not the “does” is the essence of it. A person could do good works and actually be a negative beacon. A person could do no good works, or none that were apparent, and be quite a positive beacon. So it isn’t the works, it’s the choosing to be what you are.

R: Somehow your essence is communicated out there.

TGU: Yes. Yes, yes. You’re broadcasting your essence every second of the day.

You haven’t any choice about that.

The Sphere and the Hologram, 15th anniversary edition, published by SNN / TGU Books, is available as print or eBook from Amazon and other booksellers.

 

Wanting to help

[Excerpts from conversations between Rita Warren and “the guys upstairs,” in the years 2001 and 2002, edited from The Sphere and the Hologram.]

Wanting to help

R: Okay. A bit of a change of topic here. Sometimes Frank seems to feel very dissatisfied with his life. How do you react to that?

TGU: Well, we’re used to it. [pause] There’s nothing wrong with dissatisfaction, there’s nothing wrong with any state.

R: So this isn’t a situation where you might give him some advice, or –

TGU: Oh, we’ll always give him advice! Will he take it? Or will he be able to take it? And, – [pause]

Supposing you have a child and you want the child to perform some intricate task. You might make it harder for them to learn by hovering over them than by giving them a little distance. You might, by giving them a little distance, reduce the pressure on them, actually. So, in other words, we hear you saying we could help if we chose to by being closer, but actually not. Not in our judgment, anyway. But we’re always there when he asks. And we’ve certainly given him plenty of clues over the years. Plenty of nudges, really.

R: Do you understand the source of his depression?

TGU: Certainly.

R: In a way that you could help those of us who care about him, help him out in some way?

TGU: [laughs] Well, the problem is, how does anyone know what is good or bad, what is right or wrong, what is helpful or not helpful? We appreciate the intent, but this is really his bicycle to learn to ride, and other than running along with the bicycle holding the seat until he sort of gets his balance, there’s not much one can do. Otherwise, he won’t really learn how to ride the bicycle. He may get to the end of the driveway, but he won’t still have learned how to ride the bicycle. It will actually have crippled him rather than assisting him. This is not to say that it is bad to offer someone help. Of course it’s always good.

R: But it sounds as though your recommendation would be to take the same stance you’re taking, which is feel supportive but let him live his own life.

TGU: Well, you wouldn’t have any choice about that anyway. No one can live another person’s life.

You could – theoretically – find the source of someone’s depression, or someone’s anxiety, or someone’s rage, or any other strong emotion or dominant emotional pattern, but as we say, it might not be a good thing. The impulse to help is always good. The care and compassion is always good. But there may not always be a point of application, and if there is a point of application, it may not always be really what’s needed. Supposing one had a fever so that certain germs could be burned out. Reducing the fever might retard the process of burning out the germs. On the other hand, reducing the fever might prevent death, you know, so it’s always a matter of judgment.

To give you the bluntest answer, there’s no way that you can get at his sense of the meaninglessness of his life. He fights that out, but if it were easy enough for someone to give him an answer, he’d have got the answer.

The Sphere and the Hologram, 15th anniversary edition, published by SNN / TGU Books, is available as print or eBook from Amazon and other booksellers.

Silent partners

[Excerpts from conversations between Rita Warren and “the guys upstairs,” in the years 2001 and 2002, edited from The Sphere and the Hologram.]

Silent partners

R: You have explained that Frank is part of you and vice versa, but do you sometimes act as a council in order to advise Frank about something?

TGU: That would be one metaphor, but we would move more toward the metaphor of the automatic habit systems in your brain. It’s more like he is an extension of a certain neural function of the brain that is all of us. Rather than thinking of it as a council, which implies not only individual wills but conflict and clashes, we would think of it more as an automatic adjustment of energies. For instance, you asked this question. We don’t need to sit around and discuss how to answer the question; the question polarizes the answer. It’s a pooling of what we know from what we are. In fact, you could argue that you in bodies are largely responsible for our consciousness because you are limited, and because you’re pointed.

R: Implied in my question was the concept of you sometimes responding to something without Frank included and other times with him included.

TGU: Well, with him conscious and other times without him conscious. He may be off doing other things, too, from our point of view. And frequently is.

R: So the situation wouldn’t arise where Frank would be doing something and you all would be saying to yourselves “boy this is not a good thing for him to be doing.”

TGU: [laughs] This is a less theoretical question than you might think! But there’s nothing more absolutely respected than free will, because that’s what you’re there for. We can watch you play in traffic, and we can say “That is not a smart thing to do,” but we will almost never step in. There are occasions where we’ll step in for overriding reasons, but in general the rule is, “No, if you go play in traffic, take the consequences.” Even though we don’t like the consequences.

R: Okay, so that I understand. He’s operating on the principle of free will and you’re having some reaction to this, which doesn’t include him, at least at a conscious level.

TGU: That’s a very good qualifier, “at least at a conscious level.” Exactly. That’s the nature of conscience. It’s not only “Did I do the right thing or the wrong thing,” but it’s also “Am I on the beam or am I off the beam” in a morally neutral way. If your conscious mind wants to do something, and unconsciously you’re hearing, “No, this is not the best thing for you to do,” or “You could react better to the situation than the way you are,” the thinness or thickness of the barrier between that realization and your will determines how easy it is for you to stay on the beam. So not only we, but also another part of yourself, in a more direct way, is trying to give you guidance, and it’s always up to you to say yes or no.

R: This suggests that you may have an opinion of something that is quite different from Frank’s opinion about it, and different from his interpretation of events, and so on.

TGU: Oh, sure. In fact, even when we agree with what he’s doing, we have a different view. That’s inherent in the situation. Outside of time and space the threads that are separated by time-periods might seem clearer to us than the moment of time you’re in. To you while you’re in a body those threads in different times seem to be absolutely different. So we’re just saying that yes, we always see it differently.

R: You suggested a bit ago that by and large you wouldn’t call these differences to his awareness.

TGU: Oh no. We will always call it to his awareness if he’s interested in hearing it. That is, if he doesn’t block it out. But we almost never would override his will. That could happen, but it’s somewhat a last resort. For instance, supposing someone’s lifetime has important ramifications for the people around them, and for their own sake and the people around them it’s really important that they stay on the beam. If they are about to fall off the edge, it could happen that it would be decided, “No, that’s too disruptive to the whole pattern. It can’t be allowed to happen.” In that case it would be more a matter of that person’s own self over here invading his consciousness, you might say, and causing him to act in ways that would be inexplicable to the conscious person. But that’s a very rare situation.

R: Would Frank be aware of this intervention that occurred?

TGU: Well, it would depend partly on introspection, partly on the dissonance between the action and what that particularly active part of his own mind wanted to do. [pause] A lifetime of introspection will help you in that regard. It will make it clearer when you are receiving transmissions, shall we say.

R: But more typically, he’s asking for your input when you give it.

TGU: [pause] We’re talking about something a lot more than input. We could theoretically override what he wanted to do, so that he would not have his free will available to him. And that’s what is forbidden, almost always. That’s what we’re talking about. The input is always offered, and is always available. [pause] The input is really in a way only a more sophisticated version of his own – or anyone’s own – pondering and experience and wisdom and thought. It’s just from a larger perspective.

The Sphere and the Hologram, 15th anniversary edition, published by SNN / TGU Books, is available as print or eBook from Amazon and other booksellers.

 

Voices and questions

[Excerpts from conversations between Rita Warren and “the guys upstairs,” in the years 2001 and 2002, edited from The Sphere and the Hologram.]

Voices and questions

R: All right, now I want to clear something up. You’ve indicated – you, Frank – that essentially I’m not directly speaking with the guys upstairs, and, whoever I’m talking to, you are answering me.

[As Frank]: Mm-hmm. I’m never out of the picture. I can hear it, let’s put it that way. Go ahead.

R: You’re hearing it. The voice that’s coming through is the voice that I heard when you wrote in your book that it was the guys upstairs speaking.

Frank: Hmm. Okay. So you can hear a difference in voice, huh?

R: My assumption has been that I’ve asked you to move your energy slightly aside so that it can be as direct as possible, and I thought maybe tonight you were saying that that really wasn’t possible. That it’s all coming –

[Back in the altered state, letting the words flow through as TGU]: No, that’s not quite what’s meant. There’s an extreme, which is the trance medium, who will be asleep and won’t know anything that comes, because literally their consciousness will be elsewhere. The consciousness will not be participating.

The other extreme is an everyday consciousness with no intuitive input, strictly rational thinking, aware on a conscious level. In between is this vaguer area, and Frank lives in that area normally. Just as Edgar Cayce’s talent was to be able to put his personality aside and bring it through, Frank’s talent [laughs] – talent or predicament – is to be here and there, to be every day in a conscious level at some point functioning instinctively rather than rationally. There’s not a word for it. Well, if there is I don’t know what it is. [Edgar Cayce (1877-1945) was, of course, the famous psychic known as “The Sleeping Prophet.”]

R: It’s constantly a communication that’s coming out of you and Frank together.

TGU: Yes. To a varying degree. And when he speaks, as usually, without first knowing what he’s going to say, that is very much close to what’s going on here. And that is rather unusual in our experience. People usually stop and decide what they’re going to say, and say it. They decide what image they want to project. We don’t mean that as a criticism. There’s an interposition of their personality that will shape it, whereas with him it just comes. Usually. That’s what’s going on here. That’s why the difference is less than you might expect, and it’s why he’s easily able to go in and out, but it’s also why he didn’t recognize it for all those years. It was so normal that he was looking for something that would be unnormal! He was looking for trance mediumship.

R: I think that’s all I had for tonight. Unless you have something useful to add to this?

TGU: Yes, there is, actually. Your input you undervalue. And we’ll try to give you a sense of the input from the outside, to give you something to chew on intellectually. From outside, it would look like a person with acknowledged and undoubted intellectual ability, and emotional trustworthiness and rational trustworthiness. In other words, smart enough to know what to do, good enough to do what’s in everyone’s best interest. Frank was a reporter professionally and can use those reporting techniques. You use the academic techniques. The professional thinker. And by so doing you can bring better answers out of us because you ask better questions.

If someone asks a vague question about good or evil, they might get better than a vague answer, but the chances are much better if you ask a sculpted, or a crafted, or a thought-out question, and follow it through. The differences between the two of you set up a helpful polarity. If too much were understood already, there would be no need to articulate it, and you can’t learn as well. So actually two people who don’t understand each other intellectually can learn better than two people who do!

This pulling-out process, the teasing-out of the implication of things, will make the product for the end reader. So, we just want to give you that kind of reassurance, because a) it’s not necessarily your idea [laugh] and b), you’re not scunching on other people’s time or interests. And we’ll leave it at that.

R: That was a statement that I really appreciate. And I appreciate the whole session tonight and I am full of gratitude.

TGU: Well, if you can realize it, so are we. It isn’t everybody who can do this, or will do this, for us. With us. Against us. Whatever.

Frank: [stretching] Oh, if they think I’m going to talk about gratitude to them, they’re wrong. [We laugh]

 

 The Sphere and the Hologram, 15th anniversary edition, published by SNN / TGU Books, is available as print or eBook from Amazon and other booksellers.

 

Harmony

[Excerpts from conversations between Rita Warren and “the guys upstairs,” in the years 2001 and 2002, edited from The Sphere and the Hologram.]

Harmony

R: This kind of session we’re having here is different from what we did in the lab, where we would be asking you to go to a state where important information is available to you, and ask for you to comment on that.

TGU: We’re open to whatever you want to do. The mechanism wouldn’t be much different because unless Frank becomes a trance medium he’s going to feel the answer and then say it. But you’re certainly welcome to experiment.

R: One aspect of doing it the way we’re doing it is that I get information that I’m interested in, and it may well be that there are other areas that would be helpful for Frank to get in touch with through these kinds of sessions, where presumably –

TGU: If we may paraphrase you, you’re saying perhaps you’re asking the wrong questions by chance and coincidence. [they laugh] We’re not concerned about it. We recognize the unselfish intent, but it’s misplaced. You’re being directed, too.

R: I assume that that’s the case, but I don’t know whether I’m being directed on Frank’s behalf or not.

TGU: Well, you know, we don’t actually see a distinction there. And if you’re interested in that, we could look at it a little.

R: I would like to hear it.

TGU: People get in trouble because they allow their personal interests to override someone else’s interests, because they feel they have to force something to happen. You know, “there’s only one acceptable solution.” If you don’t do that, you can’t get in trouble. Your highest good and his highest good will mesh. They can’t help mesh. [pause] If that’s not clear, we’ll say more, but to us it’s so clear.

[chuckles]

R: Well, I liked hearing that, but I’m not sure exactly how that works.

TGU: Suppose you had a bunch of large goldfish in a pond. They look perfectly orchestrated. They don’t bump into each other, and there’s nothing clumsy about it; it really looks like a dance. This is because everyone makes second-by-second adjustments, watching the other ones. They know where each other are and they just get out of each others’ way. To get awkwardness into a situation like that, just have one fish say “by God, I’m going this way right now, and you just stay out of my way.” Now, even there, you could conceivably still have harmony, with everybody else just saying “okay, well fine.” But when you have two of them [chuckles] the odds are less, and if you have three of them, the odds are less. You see.

Whenever you have people who are drawn together out of an affinity, and are each operating out of the place that you’re operating out of, rather than [self-]assertion, what’s good for you is good for him, and it will always appear serendipitous. When you’re out of that place, anything can happen. But when you’re in that place, there’s nothing to worry about. Literally nothing to worry about. We can’t conceive of a way in which two people, operating on the beam, can wind up where one has to win and one has to lose. It’s like saying black could be white. [pause] So don’t worry about it. [chuckles]

R: Okay, here’s something else. I’ve been somewhat concerned about the possibility of these sessions getting in the way of sessions in the laboratory monitored by Skip [Atwater]. Is there something to be done to make this process easier?

TGU: Is it even conceivable that you might actually be following directions in doing this? [they laugh] In other words, why after so many months did you think of it just now? And why after so many months did it become possible, just now? And not only possible, but effortless. We think those are pretty blatant clues. [they laugh]

R: I can appreciate that. As long as that’s with this situation in mind.

The Sphere and the Hologram, 15th anniversary edition, published by SNN / TGU Books, is available as print or eBook from Amazon and other booksellers.