Casa Group Workshop
December 10, 2005
Westport, CT

December 10, 2005 - Aaron's talk to Friends of the Casa - Westport, CT.  This day was part of a weekend workshop in Connecticut. On this day all the 25 participants had been to Casa de Dom Inacio, the healing center of John of God in Brazil.

Barbara: Welcome. I'm Barbara Brodsky. I'm profoundly deaf in both ears. If you can't hear me, please let me know. I know how loud my voice is but I don't know if there is an airplane flying overhead. If you can't hear, let me know. Aaron probably does know if there is an airplane flying over and will speak up but I can't. This is my husband Hal and he is here to fingerspell. We don't use full sign language but just spelling the first letter of each word. So when there is some dialogue with you and Aaron you'll talk and Hal will fingerspell it to me.

Our plan for today is to start with just some simple introduction and then I will move into a trance and Aaron will take over the body and will talk to you. He wants to start with the bigger picture, and where the Casa and your work there fits into that bigger picture. There will be time for him to talk, time for some dialogue with him, lunch, some other breaks. In the afternoon and opening talk about some of the deeper energetic workings of the Casa, some of the questions you've all had. How do the entities operate, what happens with that hemostat in the nose? We'll have a lot of time for dialogue and questions; we've purposely left the day relatively unstructured because we know you'll have many questions and we want to leave a lot of room for those questions.

I lost my hearing in 1972; I had perfect hearing until then. It obviously was a traumatic experience. I had just given birth to our first child. They don't know exactly what went wrong, maybe hormone changes in the body from pregnancy. For some reason the blood vessels became constricted and there was no oxygen flow to the middle ears, so the nerves died. So there was no hearing and there was no balance. It was a very difficult time: I couldn't walk, I couldn't hear, and I was so dizzy that I couldn't even focus to see, to read. It was very hard for us to communicate with each other, to figure out how to take care of the baby and so forth, very scary.

I coped well with it. I had already been meditating at that time for many years and my spiritual practice supported me, I continued to meditate. But I shut my feelings aside; I shut grief aside, and anger, in order to cope. And I paid a high price for that, because I separated myself from myself. So on one level I seemed to be living my life skillfully. On another level everything was closing in and I could feel that closing in. The more I shut myself out from myself, the more dishonesty, the more separation, the less I could find any kind of wholeness in myself.

I prayed for help, I was feeling very stuck. I don't know what kind of help I was expecting but it certainly was not for a discarnate spiritual entity to appear. There was really little in my prior adult life to lead me into this. I wasn't a new-ager, Even the word channeling was foreign to my vocabulary. My religious affiliation was as a Quaker, which still is my formal religious affiliation. So I was sitting in my living room the day after this prayer for help, and a spirit appeared. I could see him: long white hair, white beard, deep blue eyes, high cheek bones; a somewhat biblical looking figure. I could feel his energy. You know how it is when your back is to a door and somebody walks into the room. Without hearing them you can feel the energy. It was very clear to me that something was there. I got up and went into the kitchen to make a cup of tea. If I could have passed it off and just said "ah I'm hallucinating" it would have been easier in a lot of ways. But I knew I wasn't hallucinating and that if I was experiencing it, it was real. I didn't do drugs, I was emotionally relatively stable and I didn't hallucinate. So the alternative was real.

I came back, I felt his presence again, I meditated a bit. I said "who are you, why are you here?" He said "you asked for help". I sat there for the rest of that morning meditating, didn't want to talk to him. The next day he was back. So I said "ok, I asked for help you're here, how are you going to help me?" He said "you're suffering, let's start there, let's look at the nature of this suffering".

What he pointed out to me in the following weeks was how much I was blaming the deafness itself for my suffering. I believed if only I wasn't deaf everything would be fine, that kind of thinking. Certainly the deafness was a catalyst for it, but what was really creating the suffering was the grasping, the fear, feeling so alone inside, wanting it so much to be different. There was so much fear and so much grasping and then condemnation of myself saying "it should be ok". So I really was putting myself out of my heart, no compassion for my situation, just, "stuff it and cope."

What I learned was him those first 2 months was profound. I shifted from a place where there was so much fear I couldn't go to a gathering, I couldn't even have lunch with 2 friends because if they started to talk with each other so much tension, fear, and rage, really, came up. I'd see tem talk and the thought, "What are they saying?" became an enormous grasping impulse, then anger at myself that I couldn't let it be. We'd be in a restaurant, one friend asking another to pass the salt or looking on the menu, asking, "are you going to have the chicken or the tuna salad." "What are you saying?!" So much grasping. As I got to know Aaron and to trust him, he asked me, "watch the fear, watch grasping as an object." This was already how I meditated. watching what came into the mind and body and noting, "Here is tension in the body; it has arisen out of conditions. Here is fear; here is an angry thought." I had learned to observe body sensations and thoughts as objects, not disassociating from them but not building a personal identity and stories around them. So I'd been doing this form of meditation for many years already but I had not been able to apply it to the experiences around the deafness because they were so difficult.

So Aaron said, "It is no different; here is not hearing, what is the experience of not hearing, before all the stories come?" And I could see what he meant, not hearing is just not hearing. It's like we have an itch; an itch is just an itch. The impulse to scratch the itch is completely different. The aversion to the itch is completely different. In not hearing, just not hearing; in aversion to not hearing, just aversion, no judgment needed, no stories of poor me or what will happen? That's fear and taking it out of the moment. In this moment just not hearing.

So the whole thing opened up and the miracle was that after a couple of months there was just not hearing. When people opened their mouth to talk there was just not hearing but all the stories didn't come and all the grasping didn't come. It was still painful sometimes but I was no longer suffering in the same way. It was painful because I would look at my 3 children and wish how much I could hear them. Our lives do bring us pain but there is a big difference between pain and suffering. Pain happens, suffering we have a choice about: how are we relating to the pain? So there was an enormous shift, Hal could see it in me. And then friends began to ask me to talk to Aaron? People came with questions for him. At first there were yes and no answers. And then there was a longer answer. I said, "Aaron I don't know how to do this." He said, "Just listen to my thoughts and say them out loud". I did that and somebody said to me, "Oh you're channeling." "What is 'channeling'?", I asked.

At that point I was a sculptor and I taught sculpture at University of Michigan. I had spent my entire college and adult life getting to this point where I was a "successful sculptor" selling works, getting commissions, getting some name for myself, invited into shows. It's very interesting to me as I look back that it didn't matter. It was very clear this is the work I took birth for. So I made a shift that year after I met Aaron, and just began to teach the meditation practice which I had been doing for many years but which he was helping me to find ways to articulate, and channeling Aaron.

Around that work within a year or two, a non-profit organization Deep Spring Center grew up, Deep Spring Center for Meditation and Spiritual Inquiry. We hold classes and retreats, I'm the guiding teacher but there are 15 other teachers. We teach in many different venues: in the community, in hospice, in prisons not channeling, just teaching meditation. But for almost everybody there Aaron is a primary teacher and he's what holds Deep Spring together. I am so grateful to him as my teacher. It's really transformed my life. It's been just an amazing experience.

I teach all over the world. It's wonderful to come to places like this, just sharing Aaron in this way. I see him transforming people's lives and it's beautiful to watch. So I'm very grateful for where my life has taken me. The deafness at this point, is simply part of the path that took me to where I am right now and to the ability to do the work I am doing. It still challenges me at times; one of my sons is a professional musician. He writes his own music and words and he performs. I saw him performing on a stage last month in front of hundreds of people. I was sitting up close I could see him but I can't lip read from that distance and I wish so much I could hear his voice. So there is still some sadness but he sings for me privately, he writes down the words and music and plays the songs slowly so I can follow them. I've got a sense of how he must sound. But I do see the deafness also as a gift. Our lives bring us many gifts and they sometimes come in odd shapes; we don't recognize them as gifts at first. It takes time for that.

Through many years of deafness people had been suggesting to try this or that for healing. In the beginning I did and then I saw there was a franticness to it, grasping. And I put it aside and for many years I just said no, when the right thing comes along I'll know it. Somebody I don't know, - I got on her mailing list "by accident" - sent me an email about a trip to John of God. I read this and went to the website and I said "that's it" that's what I've been looking for! There was an immediate resonance with Joao's picture. I made the decision to go there almost immediately. And it surprised both of us (looks at Hal) because for so many years I had just said ok, I'm deaf that is how it is for now. But it had become clear to me in the years just before that email, that I was ready to release the deafness, ready to hear again. And I understood that it was possible although medically the doctors say of course, not possible. So I went through the list on a website of all the Casa guides, read about each of them. Found Heather's name and also picked out a couple of others, emailed these three or four people and when Heather wrote back it was very clear she was the person I needed to be working with. It was clear to me immediately that we had some kind of teach-learn connection together. So this is how I come to be here.

At this point I am simply going to let Aaron come into the body and talk to you. Let me say one more thing before Aaron comes up. For most of the years channeling Aaron I did what was called conscious channeling. This meant that I was in a light trance where I could hear his thoughts and take them, one fragment of thought at a time, and phase it in words and send it out. So it was a cooperative effort. Doing that, both Aaron's and my own vibrational frequency were in the body. It created a lot of dissonance in the body. I was exhausted, it was hard. In Feb, 2005, my last trip to the Casa, I asked for help with channeling. I felt they are experts on this; they use Joao's body as lightly and gracefully as possible. They changed the channeling process completely. They said both of us cannot be in the body at the same time without tearing it apart; I have to get out before Aaron comes in; then he uses the body. It's really eased things, it's been wonderful. They are wonderful teachers. So Aaron will incorporate, as they phrase it at the Casa, and talk. I'll need a few minutes, and ask you to meditate with me as we make this shift.

Aaron: My blessings and love to you all. I am Aaron. I greet you in love and in light and thank you for your presence here today. I would begin with the admonition if what I speak does not resonate with your own deepest truth please lay it aside. You are as wise and radiant as I am. So if something is discordant to your truth, lay it aside; trust yourselves. I can only speak from my own perspective. We are all of the brother or sister hood of Light. We are one in that. It is your love and your radiant heart that have brought you here. I cherish and respect that in each of you. They say the eyes are the windows of the soul and I find that to be true. (Pause as Aaron looks around at participants.) It is a great joy to look into each of your souls.

There is so much I would like to share with you today, we would need two weeks. Yet we do have time to cover some very important areas of thought. I know many of you come with questions about your experiences at the Casa. This afternoon I hope to have time to go deeply into those questions. I do want to start with the bigger picture. Who am I? Who are the Entities? Who are you? Beside the personal healing work, why are you here? Here to day, here in the incarnation, here as friends who have visited the Casa. Besides your own personal healing what has drawn you to the Casa?

I called you brothers and sisters of light. There is a vast brother/sisterhood of light - beings that are deeply committed to the transition of earth into a higher vibrational frequency, and a higher level of consciousness. In a Universe in which there is much chaos, discordance, and darkness, the earth is a grand experiment at bringing into expression the nonduality of Light and darkness, and seeing how darkness opens into Light. Light and darkness are not dual with each other, you must understand this at the start. Darkness is not dual with the light but is simply increasing absence of light. That which is the darkest will one day come into the light just as a room that has lain dark for thousands of years becomes light when you open the shutters.

But meanwhile there are many beings who are quite attached to darkness and through that darkness create much pain, much suffering, not only on the earth but on many planes. In response to those who are attached to darkness and contraction, those that you know as the Archangels co-created with the elementals this planet you call earth; holding it in a high vibrational frequency of love.

There was a non-intervention policy set around the earth almost immediately upon its creation, so that negative polarity could not come in and create havoc. And yet as part of the truth of the light we honor free will. Therefore positivity can hold a force field around the earth but if any being wishes to break through that force field we do not stop them; they have free will. And so negativity did break that force field, and has penetrated into the earth. I remind you again when I speak of negativity, I mean nothing that is absolutely evil, but that which carries intention to hold a lower vibration of increasingly negative polarity, and a contracted energy.

Through eons, some sentient beings upon the earth have worked with spirit to raise the vibrational frequency of sentient consciousness, and of the earth itself, to make it increasingly inhospitable to negativity. At the same time, there has been no fear of that negativity, only recognition of it as teacher. If there were no mealy apple, how would you appreciate the firm, sweet taste of the crisp apple? Yet we acknowledge that the mealy apple does not nourish, and leaves a sour taste ion the mouth. It is unpleasant.

The intelligent beings of earth have expressed various level of consciousness; some of these are familiar to you through traditional teachings. Consciousness-expressions such as that of Piaget, talk about these levels of consciousness. He uses the terms, magical consciousness, mythical consciousness, and rational consciousness which is where earth has sat for so long. Beyond the rational is vision-logic consciousness, that consciousness that is just barely capable of perceiving beyond the physical senses, and onto psychic consciousness, which brings in the non-physical senses and the ability to trust those senses. Earth is on route through this whole array of consciousness, on route to what might be called Christ or Buddha consciousness, and to finally non-dual consciousness. As we speak of these levels, it is important to remember that what I describe is like a building where all the floors are already in place. On what level do you reside? Thus, you do not create non-dual or cosmic consciousness, only remember it and how to raise yourself to it.

Many of you have participated in a very conscious way in that transition to the remembrance of and living in higher consciousness through your own spiritual practices. So when I say "non-dual consciousness" it's not just a concept for you but many of you have tasted that non-dual, where nothing is separate. On the relative level you are separate human beings; we don't deny that. On the ultimate level there is just One, and the transition of consciousness to remember that One. The transition of earth into a higher density eases the way for knowing the One, just as the knowing opens the door to higher earth density.

This process is something in which you and many beings are participating. As part of its service, the entire brother/sisterhood of Light offers the teachings of light and love in many different ways, so as to be accessible to each of you in the way that you can best hear it. This is not new. Jesus was of that brotherhood; the Buddha was of that brotherhood; the teachings of the Druids, the Essenes, these are all part of the teachings of this brother/sisterhood. Many of you were there in those ancient times and you're here still. Most of you are here because karma has pulled you back, because there is personal karma yet to resolve, but also because you have taken on this commitment to expanding consciousness as your highest truth, whether you have been able to verbalize that commitment or not. It is a commitment to service, a commitment to bringing love where there has previously been fear and darkness, a commitment to know yourself and in that knowing to know all beings, to know the One, a commitment to bring the power of light through on this planet, stabilizing an oasis of light in the Universe. It can become a place that will beam such radiance that it become a haven of light and then a source of light into the Universe in which there is darkness.

Love is the only answer to darkness, to hatred, fear, and greed. And you are all learning that each in your own lives. Each of you was drawn to visit the Casa for some personal reason, sometimes physical sometimes emotional, sometimes spiritual, sometimes you are not clear why you went, just knew you needed to go. On a conscious level that personal reason brought forth the choice but I think for each of you, if you reflect here, you will see deeply in the soul that commitment of service to the light that also drew you. This is a brave and a beautiful work we do, this transformation of heavy vibration experience into light through the power of love.

It is not easy work when there is such strong habit energy around the negative thoughts, and around the heavy vibrations of the body. Even there is attachment to those as a sense of this is who and what you are! What does it mean to release that heavy energy and self identification to it, and be light? Some people liken it to the experience of free fall in outer space, letting go of everything that you thought you were, to allow what you truly are. It includes letting go of all your old attachments, belief systems, and whatever negativity there has been.

So you were drawn to the Casa. The wonderful beings there that you call the Entities, are very much of the brother/sisterhood of light. They have two commitments because one cannot separate the relative and the ultimate level of being. On the relative level their commitment is to the alleviation of the immediate human suffering, to healing the body, healing the mind. On the ultimate level the commitment is to help shepherd this entire passage of the earth plane into the light. When you sit in the current, you are joining in a vast circle of beings, not only those who sit in the current room, but many more beings. Do you know the Buddhist word 'bodhisattva'? This is a very loving being who often has no karmic need to come back to the earth but comes back only for love, only for the alleviation of suffering. Included in that circle of bodhisattvas are those who still may have some karmic reason to come to the earth, personal karma to resolve. Those whose highest intention is not just for the comfort of self but truly in service to all beings, to learn these lessons of love and manifest them in the self so you may bring them more fully out into the world, these are bodhisattvas. Some of you see that service to all beings in the Universe but just service one to another is enough. The other represents all beings. So when you sit in the current you join that vast circle of great bodhisattvas, including great masters who are beyond human karma. You join in that great circle of love and you bring forth your own commitment to serve that love.

Somebody asked me once is this not like dangling a carrot in front of the horse to make it go, to say well we'll give you physical healing but really your goal should be enlightenment in the highest sense. I think not because one seems to trick the horse get him to go with the carrot when really want him to pull the cart, but nobody is tricking you. The deepest truths are available to you- it's fine to visit the Casa because you have a cancer or a bad knee and you want it to be healed. But nobody can go there and come away untouched by the love and light that's there, so the inner transformation is left to your free will, to embrace it or to let it go. For those who let it go, it's not a problem, nobody condemns you. But most beings do not let it go; it's as if a spark is lit and even if it takes several lifetimes it will wake up in your soul eventually and awaken you to your deepest truth. So this is the bigger picture of the work at the Casa, work in which you are all involved.

It's one thing to be taught the experience of love and another to learn how to bring forth that love even when there's fear. Thus, in one way or another, in one articulation or another, we enter into a series of teachings that are ancient to the earth. These were the core teachings taught in the Essene community, the core teachings taught in many Native American and other such cultures, merely articulated in different ways. I want to introduce you to these teachings in my own articulation of them. You'll find they are not new to you but perhaps you've never considered them in this precise a way before. (See transcript, The Trainings, for Aaron's original articulation of these trainings given in Abadiania.)

Here are three sets of thought, not linear but simultaneous. Number 1, 6, and 11 are similar, but at different levels. Number 2, 7, 12 are similar. You do not live through these in a linear way but you go back and forth deepening in one which leads you to an understanding of another. The first three are an understanding of the physical, emotional, and mental bodies. You all have four bodies- physical, emotional, mental, and spirit. They are increasingly heavy or light. The physical body has the heaviest vibration the spirit body has the highest, clearest vibration.

Objects come to the physical body, for example a cramp in the leg or an itch, a pleasant or unpleasant scent. Whatever is experienced by the body will either be pleasant or unpleasant or sometimes neutral. What happens on the precise level of experience is that the sense organ, the eye for example, touches an object, like the green scarf here, and seeing-consciousness arises. For there to be seeing-consciousness there needs to be an eye organ and an object. If the organ and object are present, consciousness will arise. For Barbara there cannot be hearing consciousness because the ear organ doesn't work, so even if there is sound there is no hearing consciousness. When the consciousness arises it will either be pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral. There will be a perception. For example, perception of the color green. Old conditioning will enter in. If you have very unpleasant associations with a certain visual object, or even a little negativity about it, aversion and then certain stories come into your consciousness, such as, "This is good, this is bad".

I use Barbara's experience here. Her dog sometimes moves his bowels sometimes in the backyard and once spring comes there is a lot of dog feces to pick up. It's been there for several months covered by the snow, and lost any odor. Barbara must clean it up. The mind says 'dog shit', the nose expects there to be something unpleasant, she starts to gag. But it was simply the remnants of the food the dog had eaten, that had wintered on the ground that had no smell. So I asked her just to pick it up, not to think of 'dog shit' and its associations but simply to think of the nurturing of the dog and its digestive process, to think of it as that which could be turned into the soil as manure. The unpleasantness leaves, the story, 'I don't want to do this' leaves. Gagging ends.

Your usual experience is that you don't observe how consciousness, associations, aversion or grasping come up in your mind. You say, 'I like this,' 'I don't like that' and you build stories of good and bad. The stories include who you think you are. You do the same thing with emotions and thoughts. Often with the thoughts and emotions there's not much kindness to yourselves. If you are walking on the ground barefoot and you step on a tack there's going to be pain, there's going to be blood. You don't think there shouldn't be blood or pain do you? You would stop and pull the tack out. Are there any of you who would condemn the foot? You would be loving to the foot. When you step on the so called emotional tack, that is you walk into a room and somebody says something rude to you and anger comes up, most of you think, 'I shouldn't be angry.' This is not kindness! So you judge the anger, you condemn yourself for having anger, you say 'I won't have anger' and that 'I won't' — feel the contraction in that 'I won't'— is just more anger? So when anger arises you practice anger. It's almost funny because you have learned so well, most of you in this circle, to be gentle and caring to the physical body but not so much to the emotional and mental body. You build a story of the self upon it, self-identification: this is the angry one, or perhaps the unworthy one, or the one who must be strong and be the helper. The particular story is conditioned by your own past experiences and it becomes your image of who you think you are.

The first three trainings take the physical, mental and emotional bodies and ask you to regard how a physical sensation arises (knowing sensation, sense organ and object touching), how an emotion arises, (seeing anger consciousness or sadness consciousness, for example), how a thought arises (seeing perhaps planning, or remembering consciousness) and to know these have arisen out of conditions. I am responsible to what has arisen. If anger has arisen, I am responsible not to use it in a way to harm others, but I don't have to build a self-identification around it. The learning of this is necessary for your graduation from this plane.

In my teaching I use a system in which I define what I call eight densities. I know I'm giving you a lot of material here. You don't need to hold onto the words or the details; your heart will hold onto the deeper part of it.

First density is mineral and gas. Second density is vegetable and animal, all the way up to your pets who are at the top end of second density. They are learning awareness and then self-awareness, which is the end of second density. Then the being incarnates into a third density, human form. The primary learnings of third density are faith and love. You are ready to graduate from third density, when you are ready to move into fourth density which is presently a fully telepathic non-material form of existence. However as the earth goes through this transition fourth density will be material, you will have bodies and still be fourth density beings. Are you ready to be telepathic? Some of you might say 'of course, it sounds like fun!' but think about it. Have you had any thoughts today that you ashamed of? Did you look at somebody and say 'oh I don't like her shoes, or the color of her hair'. Would you want the person to hear that thought from you or is there some shame about it? Do you want to hear it from others/ What if somebody else had a thought about you, 'I don't like the way she looks,' are you able to hear that and not take it personally? You still build a self and the story of a self around thoughts and what is heard or seen. You don't see that this thought, not liking the color of my hair, has come out of this person's conditioning; it doesn't mean there is anything wrong with my hair, simply this person's conditioning gave rise to this thought. It's not a good or bad thought, just a thought, arisen from conditions. If a mosquito bites your arm and it gives rise to an itch, it's just an itch, not good, not bad, though perhaps uncomfortable.

The nature of the mental body is to give rise to thoughts. As long as you create a story of a self there is a lot of turmoil. Nobody is ever going to love you all the time. Nobody is going to hate you all the time either. You can't please everybody all the time no matter how hard you try. When someone is displeased, then you think 'I'm a failure'. But sometimes you are going to displease people. The nature of these trainings is to remove the self-story and know it has just arisen from conditions.

What you're after is equanimity with all of this. By equanimity I mean a state of ease and peace that knows deeply, objects arise out of conditions, they may be pleasant or unpleasant, but I do not need to contract my energy around them and build this self story around them. This non-contraction of energy is a key as we will talk more deeply about this afternoon in relation to the light and work of the Casa.

You know the experience when something pushes at you and your energy contracts. Something can push at you without contraction. Hal I'm going to ask you to help me here, come forward if you would please. I want you to push, push me (Hal pushes and Aaron pushes back).

A: I'm pushing back, experiencing contraction. Now push me again (pushes again and Aaron does not push but redirects Hal's energy so it just moves past Aaron). No contraction, can you see that? Just letting it go by; it's just a push. In this moment he's pushing because I asked him to but so often the world pushes you when you haven't asked for it. The issue is not whether it pushes you or not but how you relate to it. Please push again. If I take it personally and become tense, thinking, "no don't push", there is a lot of contraction. If I don't take it personally, it's just a push. There's ease, there's no contraction.

It doesn't matter what the catalyst is, you can learn to dance with it in this way. This is what the first three trainings are about, finding that spaciousness and ease with the arising of the physical, mental, and emotional bodies were you to not take these objects personally but know they have arisen from conditions and learn how to dance with them. Thank you my brother. (Hal sits)

However there is still a self doing this. In the fourth and fifth trainings you begin to see more deeply into the nature of non-duality, perhaps have a glimpse in your spiritual practice of what that non-dual means, although it's still conceptual. When you come back in the sixth through tenth trainings, the sixth to eighth trainings, you are working again with the physical, emotional, and mental bodies, but there is not so much of a self doing it. So at first 'I will not react' but there is still the 'self'. But as you move deeper into the experience even at a conceptual level of non-self, you start to ask yourself 'who is not going to react?' The 'I' starts to fall out of it and you find that love holds open that spaciousness. The tenth training takes you deeper into the direct experience of the non-dual. You become more stable in that experience. I spoke earlier of the fact there is a relative and a ultimate level to your experience in every moment. These are reversed a bit, I don't know if any of you are coming tomorrow, but my intention in tomorrow's talk is to speak of the angel and the earthsuit. The earthsuit is the relative level of the human, the angel is the Divine level, and they are simultaneous. You cannot hide in the Divine level, in denial of the human experience, and you cannot simply muck around in the human experience and loose the awareness of the Divine level, you most hold both. That is what we are going to focus on tomorrow so I will not go further today.

At the tenth level of training you come into a direct, profound experience of the non-dual. You begin to stabilize in that experience so that you begin to be able to live as what I call a pole: feet planted in the earth, head in the heavens, and to be maybe not constantly, but most frequently, conscious of the simultaneity of both the human and the supramundane experience. You begin to relate to negative energy around you, not from the brain but from the heart directly. It becomes a habit to relate from the heart. When something negative occurs around you, you respond with love. Instead of the brain having to say, "What am I suppose to do with this? Let's look at the instruction sheet," the heart knows how to respond. Then the eleventh to fifteenth levels of training take it deeper from that place of 'knowing' how to respond; practicing it until it's quite perfect. You can see that you go up and down with this. Some catalyst might challenge you so you find your way back at the top, first five levels. Something really terrifies you, touches you, and you react. In other areas you may go deeper, truly being able to hold that non-dual reality.

As we will discuss this afternoon, the physical body is heavy. The cellular structure of the physical body is water. The water becomes distorted because of the contractedness that comes up in the physical, emotional, and mental bodies. Part of the Casa's work is to clarify that water in the cellular tissue in the body but unless you do the inner work you cannot hold that clear water because each time there is contraction around the contraction, there will be distortion.

Notice I do not say, "Each time there is contraction," but "Contraction around the contraction." I hit the knee and the foot jerks. It's just a contraction. BOO! Contraction. It still resonates in the body a bit but are you holding a contraction around it or is there ease? Breathing in the body contracts, and then releases. These are natural contractions, part of the ebb and flow of your being. If I feel fear and I am aware of the fear, of tension; breathing out I smile to the tension releasing it. There is no ongoing contraction around it. The problem is not contraction, the problem is that the brain kicks in, old habit energy kicks in, and the contraction is held and lodged in the body, lodged in the cellular tissue, lodged in the karma. Then you think, "I've got to fight with this, I've got to get rid of this contraction" …more contraction.

So the Casa work helps to bring forth the clarity of the body, of all the bodies; helps you to feel that state of greater ease, joy, spaciousness to feel the possibilities of that, but then you come home and you've got to do the work with it, because contraction is going to come back again. How are you going to relate to it? Can there be more kindness? As in picking the tack out of the foot, can you begin to relate to your emotions and thoughts with the same degree of love and kindness? The wonderful thing here is that you do not do this work just for yourself, although that may be your first perception. As you start to know that you are part of all that is, you know you do this work for all beings.

There are many supports and one of the primary ones is the recognition is, "I'm not doing this alone or just for myself, but I am part of this entire brother/sisterhood of light." The intention is not just to your own ease and comfort but literally to eradicate suffering from the Universe, to bring joy and peace to all beings, physical and discarnate, all beings on every plane. That may sound like a big ambition and yet all of you have undertaken that at some level and that's why you are here.

(break)

So now a period for your questions, questions related to what I spoke of this morning. I will be talking in more depth about the Casa this afternoon, about the details and the functioning there. Yes, you may ask a personal question; that's fine.

Q: In the first part you mentioned pain and suffering and it seems like you think they could be separated and one is a matter of training and one is a matter of healing ourselves. So I wanted to know the difference between pain and suffering?

A: Yes I understand the question my sister. Let's try an experiment together, all of you. Hold out an arm, straight out, palm up. Just breathing holding the arm out. It begins to grow a bit heavy yes? Stay with it. Be aware as the discomfort comes, be aware of it. A slight ache perhaps. Just the physical sensation, for most of you there is not really a lot of pain just a slight discomfort. If we put this in your hand you'll feel the pain must faster (placing a heavy book on her face up palm). Do you feel it? Now bring awareness to the physical sensation and to contracting, disliking the sensation and contracting around it. Can you feel that they are two different things? There is a physical sensation of weight and achiness and there is an inner movement of 'I don't want that'.

The physical sensation at this point is not real pain just subtle discomfort but it would turn into pain if you kept the arm out for a long time. Watch the way mind shifts from the physical sensation itself into that 'don't want this.' That grasping is the root of suffering. Sometimes there will be pain; this is how your bodies are. You cannot avoid physical pain. And really you cannot avoid emotional pain; loss, sadness. Are you feeling the heaviness of the arm now? (yes) Can you feel the distinction? The physical sensation is just the physical sensation. How do you relate to it? It will be in the habitual way you each have with discomfort. Say this with me. "Breathing in I am aware of tension in the shoulder, throbbing, breathing out I smile to it." See how your experience of sensation changes as you bring a sense of open heartedness and ease, real love for this part of your body. Flood with the whole shoulder with loving kindness, with light. The physical sensation does not go away but can you feel how much more capacity there is to be with it? (yes) There can be ease with it. It came out of conditions and will go. Nobody has to fix it. See how you can be with that pain without tension, without fear. You may put your arms down. But when there is fear and the thought 'I have to fix this, I have to get rid of this' becomes predominant, the whole body contracts around it and you shift into separateness. Then you are suffering. Does this make it clearer for you?

Q: Would you then say that suffering is the rejection of pain and of love? A: Suffering involves rejection and also involves grasping, wanting things to be different than they are. Suffering is not in the physical body, suffering is in the mind. When there is that rejection or grasping, the physical body then contracts creating more physical, emotional, or mental pain. Sometimes there is a choice about pain, sometimes there's not. In other words, if you step on a tack there is going to be body pain; if somebody says something mean to you there may be some mental pain. When you move into the place in the heart that says ahh, so, this is how it is right now — the sprained ankle, the cut finger, the mean words — you watch the part of the mind that says 'I don't want this' with a spaciousness and a kindness that does not self identify with it, does not get into that push-pull fight with it. Simply a physical object has arisen, or a mental object, and then certain repercussions of that object. You come back to the infinite heart that can hold space for it all. And then there is no suffering.

It would be best for Barbara to tell her own story but I don't want to pull her out of her trance for this. She related to you how much she suffered around her deafness, so much grasping, so much aversion and it was very difficult for many years. 18 months ago she was in a bad accident. She refers to it as her surfing accident; struck by a wave and thrown off her surfboard into the bottom of the sea, knocked unconscious, many broken bones, especially in the face. There was bleeding in both eyes, a very serious decline in vision. Vision of course is very important to her; it is her primary way of access to the world since she has no hearing. She was terrified. I will not say she did not suffer but she had learned enough about suffering to be able to take this experience and know, "This is how it is. I cannot escape the experience of diminished vision. This is how it is, maybe for now, maybe for ever. But I don't have to suffer."

So she was able very quickly, maybe within a week or two, to shift herself out of that experience of acute suffering. She was at her cabin in the country with Hal for the weekend. She went out on the porch to meditate one morning, the first morning at dawn, and everything was blurry in this beloved, familiar forest. She began to cry, "I can't live like this, I can't stand it." So I asked her just to close her eyes, still herself and meditate. She was feeling once again so cut off as she had been with her deafness, now not able to see, not able to read, hardly even able to lip read. Strong fear came, and despair because she loved the visual beauty around her that now seemed taken away. So she meditated for a while. Then the sun came up a bit over the trees. She opened her eyes and it was exquisite; because of the shift in her vision, everything was softened. Light streamed through the trees, with a lack of detail but everything soft; the quality of light was something she had never seen before with the eyes the way they had been. It was beautiful. And she stopped and suddenly she was full of gratitude. "These eyes still see, they see differently. As long as I'm attached to seeing things as they use to be I will suffer. When I can be present seeing things as they are now I need not suffer."

Last January the Entities were able to stop the bleeding in the left eye and that eye has returned to 20/20 vision with aid of her glasses. The right eye vision is quite poor. The Entities were able to help the eye a lot and then the doctor in the medical center in Michigan, said laser surgery was necessary but the procedure diminished the vision again so she was literally blind in this eye, seeing only light and dark. But I think in January when she returns to the Casa there'll be an improvement in vision again.

But what she realized is whether she can see or not see is not what's most important. If she can see that will be good; she wants to be able to see. She chooses to see, and yet, if it's necessary not to see there will be some way to communicate, she will find some way to live with that. It's not what's predominant here. Sadness for the loss yes, but not suffering. Being with things as they are with an open heart. Over lunchtime you can talk with her about this experience if you wish. Does that answer your question? (yes)

Q: You talked about the levels of training and levels of being this morning. How do you know where you are and where you should go to learn to move forward?

A: Are you talking here about the levels of consciousness? (yes) Again, it's not linear. There are times when all of you are in that mythical and magical consciousness, very basic consciousness. Times when all of you are in a relative consciousness. Just seeing and experiencing from the physical senses with a barricade, thinking there is nothing beyond that. There are times when each of you shift into vision logic and into psychic consciousness. There are probably times when each of you experience the Christ / Buddha consciousness or even non-dual and cosmic consciousness. What's important is what is the highest stable level that you can maintain throughout life experience.

It's easy to rest in that non-dual consciousness at the Casa, in the current room, feeling all that energy around you. It's much harder when you are having a disagreement with somebody. You just keep remembering the possibility of living from the higher consciousness. You slip — you move into the fight, and into rational consciousness or even magical consciousness wishing that person to go away — and then you recognize the contraction and you know this is not where you want to be. You open your eyes and you look and suddenly instead of seeing an enemy you see a person who is suffering and the heart responds by saying, "May you have well being. May you be happy and peaceful." It doesn't mean that give way to the other's views if they are antithetical to your values, but you also see that the other is suffering; your heart opens to the other and in that moment of heart opening you move right into the Christ consciousness. You keep practicing with this, working to become more stable in what you know of the higher levels of consciousness. You know when you are caught in the small self and the ego, or when you are in that more expanded state. You practice until you rest more stably in that expanded state if that is your commitment, and move on.

Q: I wanted to get back to the pain and suffering. So what I am understanding is by accepting the pain, its softening our suffering. So if we can accept our pain that eases the suffering?

A: It is both about acceptance my sister, releasing the fear and grasping of how things should be and being fully present with how things are. But it's also about the shift into the ultimate reality and the simultaneous holding of both. This arm hurts on one level but on another level there is no pain. Do you understand what I mean by that? For example, anger might arise, and judgment that there shouldn't be anger. There is not acceptance that anger is present in this mind and body right now, but judgment, mind and body contracted, wanting to get rid of the anger. There is suffering. With acknowledgment, "This is what is present. I will take care of it, see that it does not do harm, but I will not reject it, I will not hate it," right there is compassion. The anger is still present but also compassion.

Compassion, loving kindness, these are the most powerful forces. You do not have to get rid of the anger to find that which is not angry- can you see that they exist simultaneously? May I have a piece of paper, just plain paper- an unwrinkled perfect sheet of paper, yes? (Aaron wrinkles it, wads it up then opens it out and displays it.) Where did the unwrinkled sheet go? Can you see it's still there? It has wrinkles and the unwrinkled sheet is right here. Where would it go? Your innate loving kindness is there with the anger. That which has the infinite capacity to be present with the pain is right there along with the rejection of pain. You don't have to get rid of the rejection of pain to find that place of acceptance. Rather you acknowledge the aversion to the pain and know the simultaneous presence of the infinite heart that can hold the space for the pain. They are both there together. As long as you think it's got to be one or the other, you get into a war: get rid of this so I can get that! And then there is just more contraction and more suffering. Does that answer your question? (yes)

Q: Isn't there some way to accept the possibility I mean, I think that we all get so caught up in anger, or the grasping or whatever, that we forget the possibility of that piece of paper, that non-duality is there, so what I am taking away, what seems to resonate with me, is the word possibility. That I should remember that.

A: What you are asking is…?

Q: I forget that I can move from that space; I forget the space exists.

A: Yes. You are amnesiacs. You all have amnesia. With your birth you accept the condition of amnesia. You wake up and you are in this world and then say who am I, where am I where did I come from? You look at the faces around you, some of them smiling, some of them frowning, who are they? It all feels so familiar but you can't remember it — who am I, how did I get here? You agreed to the amnesia with the birth. You agreed because if you remembered that you were spirit from that moment of birth then your life would be the expression of self-discipline. If something was difficult you would say, "No, I am spirit; I will do it this way," and push through. But you are learning faith and love, not force and will.

Imagine, all of you, that you slipped on the ice outside today. As you were coming in the door you each hit your heads. Other people helped you sit up. You came inside and said, "Where was I going? Is this the house I was going to? What am I doing here? I have amnesia — who am I? I don't remember who I am." What we are teaching you resonates with your truth so you decide to stay, but if your experience was different you might listen and say, "This is not for me; is there a bar somewhere? Is there a sports arena, this is not where I came to be." You are finding through your experience what fits, who you are.

What if instead of coming into this house, you were downtown, in the town square and you hit your head. You opened your eyes and woke up. Concerned people surround you asking if you are okay. There is a bruise here but yes, you're ok. The people leave and suddenly you say, "Who am I, where was I going?" You look around the square and there is a church, there's a bar, there's a coffee shop, a movie theatre, a sports arena, a meditation center, a yoga center, a park. Where would you go? H, where would you go?

H: Here, right here, to be with you.

A: Asks another, where would you go? You don't know that I'm here; would you go into the meditation center, the church, or the park? Anybody drawn to the ice skating rink? The sledding hill?

R: The beach

A: The beach. The beach, yes. Where else? Anybody going to the movie theatre? You are moved by a deeper truth. The heart knows where to go, and you are led by your heart. You find the deepest truth within the heart. Other questions?

Q: Why do so many people have to suffer with loneliness?

A: Many are people who came into the incarnation with the strong pre-incarnative determination to remember their innate connection with all that is. The catalyst of experienced loneliness and separation spurs you into an inquiry. Is anything really separate and if not, why is it experienced so intensely. Then you begin to understand the relative situation of the lone human and the ultimate situation of interbeing. The experience of loneliness pushes you to investigate. You are suffering so you look for a way out. To learn, it is not necessary to suffer, only to pay attention. But often you do not pay attention until there is suffering.

Barbara spoke before of her experience of losing her hearing. She felt as if she was separated from the world by a glass window. Everybody else on the other side talking to each other and she was cut off from it by the lack of sound. There was intense loneliness and she asked herself, "Despite the deepest meditations that teach me we are all connected, I experience this loneliness. How do I resolve this incongruity, this paradox?" This is what led her to go into the deeper levels to find and know that place of connection so deeply that she could not loose it.

Most of you who experience this kind of loneliness have this intention. The difficulty is that you get caught up in the loneliness thinking it's a problem, something that has to be fixed. There are no problems; there are only situations that need your loving attention. When you relate to it as a problem, you relate with a contracted energy that pulls you more and more into separation; separation from others and separation from yourself. When you recognize you are contracting around this "push" of loneliness and trying to push back, you recognize another choice. You may dance with this push I call loneliness, just be present and know the experience. In the physical body, and in the mind, know this direct experience without rejecting the experience. Ask the question 'who is lonely'? Can you find any 'who' here, any separate individual? Yes, on the relative plane certainly you are a separate individual but on the ultimate level you are not. This experience "feeling lonely," came up in this mind and body and we respect and recognize that with kindness. And yet at a deeper level, that 'who' is feeling it can lead us into the heart of connection when we see this is the pain of all beings. In that moment you know connection. It's very powerful.

Q: How do we heal the pain?

A: Another of Barbara's stories. Many years ago she had a severe leg infection; the leg was very swollen, very painful. She had been in the hospital for perhaps weeks. They were trying different antibiotics but the drugs were not working. The infection was moving up the leg. They began to talk about the possibility that if they could not find an appropriate antibiotic they were going to have to remove the leg so the infection would not move up into the body. She found herself cutting off the leg in her mind, rejecting the leg, not embracing but rejecting it. Of course it could not heal because it was not brought into the heart. She was feeling sorry for herself and also experiencing excruciating pain and the medication they were giving her did not eliminate the pain; for some reason they were concerned to give her too much pain killer medication.

In the middle of one night they wheeled an elderly woman into the bed next to hers. As they were working on her, the curtain between the beds got pushed aside and Barbara could see that the woman's leg was freshly amputated and that the other leg had been previously amputated. One with a raw wound and one a healed wound; no feet. Barbara sat meditating in semi-darkness on her bed, not behind the curtain because the curtain was pushed aside, but next to the curtain. In meditation she so clearly saw beings all over the world who that day had lost a leg to war, to accident, to illness, and the heart opened in compassion for all beings that sought healing. Suddenly she realized, "This is healing not about my leg; there is just this one leg to heal for us all." So this woman's conditioned awakened the compassion in her.

The compassionate heart is able to hold it all, no longer "my pain", but "our pain". As soon as you make that shift, there is healing. Not surprisingly the new antibiotic began to work, the infection subsided, the leg healed. Interestingly, when she awakened in the morning, the next bed was empty again.

How do you make that shift from "my pain, "which statement is steeped in fear, to "our pain," which articulation is merged with compassion? It becomes part of the habit energy. If you have the habit energy for fear then your pain becomes 'oh, my pain, fear, how will I get rid of it'? As you work harder to nourish the compassionate heart, to watch yourself moving into fear and work with it, there is space. Say, "No, I know where this fear is heading and will not follow the stories it offers. Breathing in, I am aware of fear; breathing out I smile to fear. I hold that fear in a spacious and loving container."

Right there with fear is that which is not afraid but if all you can see is the fear, you can't see that which is not afraid. You absorb into the fear and become myopic. As soon as you remember fearlessness is right here, love is right here, you know you don't have to get rid of the fear, the anger to open to these, they are right here. This is your birth-right, this is your choice. It doesn't mean that the fear goes away, only it's no longer all-powerful because there's a big container for it.

I like this image and it may help some of you. Imagine yourselves as you are sitting here, sitting in a small box, each chair in a box. I come into the room with a box full of tarantulas. approach your box and I'm going to put the tarantula in your box. Can you stay in it? Of course not. Now imagine yourself in a room that's about 10 by 10, a big box. And I approach with a tarantula. Maybe you could stay in for a second or two. I put it on the ground, you watch, as soon as it starts to scurry toward you, you hop out. Now imagine yourself is a space three times the size of this room with no furniture in it, a bare open space. I come with the tarantula and I put it on the ground in the far corner. Can you see that you would be able to stay present with it? If it headed toward you, you'd get up and move to the other side of the room. You'd live with it; we'd take it out at night so you could sleep; we'd put it back the next morning. You'd live with it. You'd get used to it, you'd get to know it. There would be a spaciousness with it. Eventually you might even reach out and embrace it.

This is what you must develop with that you have judged as negative in yourself: fear, anger, greed, impatience, whatever it may be. You create that bigger container not because you 'should,' not from that force to fix yourself, for there is nothing broken, nothing you need to fix; but from a place of loving kindness that knows your work here is to learn compassion. Your own difficult emotions are the most potent teacher you have. Here is anger, "Thank you anger, now I can practice compassion." What a different attitude from anger as enemy.

Q: I've been listening to you carefully and I have been searching for a way to establish for myself what teachings you are giving us today, and the word that keeps coming to me is acceptance. That the first stage is acceptance then enabling the heart to open. I'm wondering whether or not I'm on the right track?

A: My brother I would say that on the relative level the first stage is acceptance and on the ultimate level the only need is to recognize the innate compassion of the already open heart. The human needs to accept, the spirit has nothing it needs to accept. There is nothing separate from it, nothing that frightens it. This must be learned in sequence to some degree, so there must be some level of acceptance and easing of contraction before you can move to that place of resting in spirit, resting in love. But do not think of acceptance only, because acceptance is a doing and the doing keeps you trapped in the relative human.

Q: How can you have compassion for people when you feel they are possibly not respecting your space and you are vulnerable yourself and you want to have compassion but you also want to learn how to protect yourself at the same time?

A: There is a misunderstanding of compassion, my sister, that thinks of compassion as weak, spineless. Compassion is strong, compassion know how to say no. You are all habituated to think that only anger can say no. Love knows how to say no. When you say no it will come from both places, your work is to see that right there with the anger there is compassion, there is kindness, there is love. Allow the no, for it's not kind to let somebody abuse you. You must say no to abuse. Love says no. It takes practice. The confusion is that the anger can be so strong you almost see the anger, and feel its heat. You lose track of the possibility of love. Then you may judge yourself for not being more compassionate, or even for being too spineless to speak your truth. However it comes, it is still judgment and contracts you further.

Let's try something else together. Hold your hands six inches in front of you face and wiggle the fingers. Here's anger wiggling its way around (wiggling one finger), here is doubt (wiggling another) , here is some pain in the belly (wiggling a third finger) , here is confusion (fourth finger) , here is hate (fifth finger wiggling). They are all dancing around; focus on them. Now while they keep wiggling look through; look right up there to Barbara. If you can see me, so much the better. You don't loose sight of the fingers do you? You break through into that vast spaciousness that was always there, but the fingers remain. Return focus to the fingers now; broad focus, then fine focus again. See how you loose the spaciousness immediately when you focus in on the fingers? Break through again.

The anger or the belly ache remain but there is also that vast space. You are so use to focusing in on one pain or emotion and making it into a problem that needs to be fixed. You forget that you can rest in that spaciousness, rest in the loving heart, rest in truth, rest in awareness. Much of what you have to learn is acceptance but equally important is moving into spaciousness. Look at the objects, people here: one person, two persons, three persons, you don't deny they are separate people. But between them is space! Does anybody see the space? Look through the fingers, there is space, there are fingers in the space. What is the predominant thing is this room? Space. We take it for granted; we don't see all that space.

Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out, breathe in pause, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out, pause. Breathe in, pause. Breathe out, pause. Breathe in, pause. Breathe out, pause Can you feel that space? The breath arises and falls away within the space.

(bells rings) Listen to the bell. The room is not silent, little movements of people, perhaps sounds from outside but there's the spaciousness of no speech, semi-silent, then the sound of the bell. Stay with the bell until it dies away. Go with it into the space. (rings bell again) Can you feel that space? This is one expression of the Ground of Being, what you might call the Unconditioned or Divine. In this conditioned world, objects that arise out of conditions are impermanent; they pass away. A physical object, a thought, when the conditions are present they arise, when the conditions cease, they cease. Beyond that there is what we would call the Unconditioned, or call it God. It is that which exists without any conditions, That Which Is. The Native American's call it, grandmother awareness, That Which Is. You live your lives forgetting that Heart, and forgetting that you are That, you are not these thoughts, you are the Divinity. This is the path of remembering, wake up from your amnesia.

(lunch break)

Afternoon-

B: I am talking about the use of the tuning forks. In meditation, Dr Oswaldo Cruz has been the Entity I've been able to hear the way I hear Aaron. He's not always there, like Aaron is, but when I ask a question if he's there I get an answer, so he's the one who gave me these instructions. I don't think they originated with him; He was only transmitting the information, telling what the Entities wanted me to do. I've also experienced Dr. Oswaldo and Dr Augusto energy's a lot working directly with the eye. But I don't hear Dr. Augusto in the same way. It's a different frequency; I can't really pick it up.

I asked last January asking am I doing this right? I came in with a set of tuning forks as Dr. Cruz had specified the year before and demonstrated what I wad doing. The entity speaking through Joao said I was doing it just right keep going, so I'm continuing. I sound each one and chant "ohm" with it as I hold it near my ear, trying to match the tone. I also hold each fork stem on the chakra with which that tone connects and feel that energy and vibration in the body.

I have no idea where it's going; I'm just doing it. I know the ears are capable of hearing again, I know it may not be through normal channels. What I've understood is that the tuning forks have two purposes: one is for the whole body to learn to hear. We don't just hear with our ears we hear with our whole bodies, we see with our whole bodies. The intention is to open everything in the body that can hear, to hear.

The other — Aaron says he spoke a bit about this, this morning — the vibrational frequency of the water in the cells has a low vibration where there is unhealthy tissue. That water has a strong distortion to it. The image that the entities have given me is this. There is a big gap where the nerves are dead. When there is only a small gap such as for somebody with a spinal cord injury that is just a small break, they can grow the nerves back together. But with this bigger gap they can't reconnect those dead nerves. They are trying to grow a whole new neural network. The idea is that the higher the vibrational frequency of the water in the cells will support the growth of those nerves. No knowing if it's going to be possible just trying it.

It's a very pleasant exercise. Of course in doing the exercise I'm raising the vibrational frequency of the whole body and, the accident aside, my body has not been healthier in a long time. Damaged tissue healed amazingly quickly, the broken bones and various things. There is good energy in the body, the body is feeling well. So all of this tuning seems to be helping.

We tune in many ways, through sound, through what we take into the body. This is why the Casa water is so valuable. It has a high vibrational frequency; we keep taking this high frequency water into ourselves, into the cells, and the body discharges the lower frequency water and releases it. We keep replacing water with something that's increasingly pure and of higher vibration. Through our spiritual work we hold our whole energy fields, the physical, mental, and emotional bodies at a higher and higher vibrational frequency that is able to support the continuation of this high energy water in the cells. So it becomes more stable. We don't have to keep replenishing as constantly but the natural level of the vibration of the water in the cells raises and raises and raises. Why not? (laughter)

In the beginning I saw the grasping, wanting to hear again; now it's really relaxed. I still want and intend to hear again and I really can feel that possibility of hearing. But there's not any grasping at it any more. However spirit wants to use this body is fine. They hear my intention, aspiring to hear again. Aspiring to hear all of those beautiful sounds, the silence of falling snow, birds singing in the spring, my children's voices. Hal and I are going to be grandparents in April. I want to hear that baby's voice, I didn't get to hear my sons' voices. I want to hear my grandbaby's voice. So, just opening toward that possibility, we really can create the world around us but we can't always control it. I would not say at all costs I want to hear again, just if it's for the good of all beings then this is one purpose, one intention.

Somebody asked me where was I this morning while Aaron was talking. He's used this image. I'm driving my car, this body, this vehicle. He asks me please may I use the body in service to all beings, in the spirit of love. And he tells me he will cherish and respect the body and return it unharmed. He offers some gratitude for my willingness to share the body. I say yes, you may use the body. And I repeat this formula, in service to all beings, in the spirit of love, in the service of Jesus, for all that which I hold dear, I offer this body. And then I make the statement, "This body is consecrated to the light and may not be used for any other purpose." That's a way of protecting the body at this point of crossover, where the body temporarily, just for a fraction of a second is vacant, and something could come in if it were not protected. So by the force of that statement, that this body and all it's voices are consecrated to the light, I offer a protection around the body and almost in that instant as I say that, I feel Aaron come into the body.

He says, figuratively, I get out of the car and sit under a tree. He gets in, drives off and does what he needs to do with the body. When he's finished he comes back, nudges me and says, "I return the body." What I experience is an energy presence. I shift back into the body. Until then I'm just sitting under that tree.

He's recently been teaching something different; When I get out of the car to allow him the driver seat, I can get back in the passenger seat so I can have some awareness of what's going on. I'm not very good of that. We are just learning this skill under the entities' tutelage and my tendency is to be a backseat driver. I'm aware of what's going on and I want to offer input. So for now I better stay under the tree until I can get into the passenger seat and relax and trust him to steer the body.

Channeling is a very powerful spiritual practice. It's taught me about letting go of control. I did not start to channel him immediately, you know that. At first I developed a trust of him simply speaking to me and teaching me. When I first started channeling there already was that trust. I knew he would not misuse the body, that he would never use the body to do anything that was not within my own value system. This next step of more fully giving him the body rather than co-existing in it is just an extension of that trust. I marvel at Joao's trust to allow so many entities to take over control of the body.

In the very beginning I trusted Aaron but it was myself I didn't trust. What if my own ego came in and distorted this work? But I saw that didn't happen so I began to trust not only him but myself and relaxed into the process. But I could not have down this trance channeling, really giving him the body, back then. I had to develop a complete level of trust through so many years to be able to release the body. But it's a very powerful spiritual practice because so much of what we're all involved in is releasing the ego, releasing the self identification, 'I am this body, I am this mind'. We are not that. So that's a brief answers to some of the questions that came to me at lunch time. I'm going to move back into a trance and let Aaron speak.

A: My blessings and love to you, again I greet you in love and in the light. I thank you for your loving presence here, very high loving energy, to transform this room. I want to address the primary questions that come around about the Casa, the work there. I know you will have many other questions and I will not talk for too long a time this afternoon, maybe half an hour now, just to address the basic questions that repeat themselves, and then open the floor of the variety of questions you bring.

I don't know if your eyes were opened or closed but for those of you with eyes open you saw that as I come into Barbara's body the body jerks, why? I have a much higher vibrational frequency. No matter how much I step down that energy it charges into the body. I suppose in your electrical terminology you call it surge, a surge of energy that comes in. It is not harmful to this body, regardless of how it looks. If it were harmful I would not do it. The body receives that energy and the energy settles into the body. For me it is like putting on a small garment into which I must wiggle myself, a corset! Conversely at the end of the session when I move out of the body, the body deflates itself somewhat, moving back to the vibrational frequency that is more natural to it. At that time Barbara often experiences a sense of weakness, not really fatigue, just weakness and disorientation. Depending on the situation she's in, others may help to support her coming back into a more centered space by taking her hands, or she will do this work herself with the help of spirit, by moving into meditation, bringing in light, opening the chakras. Here she works with her inner healing team. So she re-centers in the body for a few minutes and she's ready to function again.

I am talking here of energy and the affects of energy on the body. Each of you has an energy system. On the ultimate level the energy, or chakras that support the energy system, are always open and on the relative level sometimes they're closed. When I use the terms open and closed related to the chakras, picture a chakra spinning as a spinning wheel, and the next chakra spinning beside it. You understand centrifugal force. If you were to spin a bucket filled with water that had small holes in the outside the water would force its way out. Can you picture that? If are both spinning the water will come together. In just that way, if this chakra is open and spinning and that one is open and spinning, this energy extends out from each and they merge. Then we say the chakra is open, meaning the connection between this one and that one is open. But if this one is spinning and sending that energy out but the next one is not spinning, there is there's nothing to merge. The one without spin does not express energy. That is what you call a blockage but blockage is not the precise, correct word. Rather, energy simply doesn't move; the energy has stagnated.

The work then is to invite the chakras to spin on the relative level, always remembering that on the ultimate level they are always spinning. This is a concept that is a bit hard to understand. It relates to our wrinkled piece of paper. The wrinkles are there, or in this case, the chakras are blocked, and the ever perfect sheet of paper is there. We don't loose that openness, but on the relative plane we can't access it.

Picture a deep, pure, underground spring of water. The water is absolutely pure. It has no contact with the outer levels, its underground. You can't stick your muddy hand in, it's underground. You can't access it. But it perks up through the soil to the surface. In that moment when it reaches the surface, this ever-perfect comes into the relative plane; it touches relative reality and there it can pick up pollution or distortion. Acid rain comes down, dust, the dirt from an animal as it wades in to drink the water, these all touch that ever-perfect. The water tumbles down the mountainside. Several hundred yards down it looks quite murky, cattle are there grazing; there is run off from the farm fields. Where is the clear water? If you want a drink of water you would think you'd have to go back to the spring because this water downhill is polluted. Certainly in relative reality you will not simply drink because there is pollution in the water but in the ever perfect water is right there. You only need a filter.

Where would the ever-perfect water be? It's right there. What you are learning is to access that ever-perfect at all times even with the distortion of relative reality. Your filters are kindness and awareness. The negative emotions come, body contraction comes, these various distortions come. This is the nature of the human experience. The distortions will become far less frequent and far less heavy, but still they will come. This is the nature of the human mind and body. Don't concern yourselves with the distortions. Find the ever-perfect!

This brings me to the current rooms, your entrance to the Casa. Think of the outer room, before the mediums' current room. You sit there with some agitation perhaps. Then you move into the outer current room, the mediums' current room. The reason for two current rooms as I see it is this: in the outer room, you are doing much what I described as the work in those trainings. There is awareness of agitation of the body, of the mind, and there is an increasing level of equanimity with that agitation and increasingly ability to let it go. Those who sit in that room hold that space of equanimity for those who pass through, so that those who pass through with their agitation find themselves held in this large container of loving kindness, wherein the agitation is not despised or there is no attempt to get rid of the agitation but simply it is known for what it is, like a bubble. The entities support this passage, of course, with high energy vibration and love. It is the room of calming and release.

When we teach we often carry with us a bottle of children's bubbles. I dip the wand in the bubble solution and blow and the bubbles float up. Then, pop, pop, pop, pop — nothing there. They look solid, in many colors, sizes, but pop, pop. There's a whole roomful of them, yet they are nothing!

(Someone then produces a small bottle of bubbles) Thank you my sister. (blows bubbles) Perfect. (blows more bubbles) Does everybody see something solid and do you see something not at all solid, simultaneously? (yes) Nothing there. I wonder if it could become acceptable to blow bubbles in the outer current room, as a reminder to people that it's all illusion, to let it go, to let the self fall away. Poof, gone. Thank you. (returns bottle)

The outer current room serves the primary purpose for both those who pass through and those who are sitting there, to deepen into that knowing, it's all bubbles, all illusion; let it go. Don't build the self and the stories of self upon mind and body experience. If there is agitation let awareness watch agitation. That which is aware of agitation is not agitated. If there is fear, that which is aware of fear is not afraid. There is agitation and you rest in that space of non-agitation. Fear and you rest in that space of fearlessness. Anger and you rest in that space of loving kindness, without having to get rid of the agitation, fear, or anger. Objects arising and passing away. There is body pain and there is that which is not in pain, that which can watch the pain with an open heart; being drawn into Oneness thereby.

The inner current room, the Entities current room, is a place where you come to know your connection with all that is. Again it's just as in these trainings that I've described. Equanimity develops with what arises in the emotional body, the mental body and then mind moves deeper into an awareness of non separation, non-duality. Resting in non-duality becomes stable. In the entities' current room, having come through the outer room, either sat there or passed through, there was a releasing of self-identity with what arises in the heavier bodies. You then come into this space where the current is strong and you feel the unity of all there is, and more ability to rest in that inter-connection. Some of you feel it more strongly than others as is appropriate.

This is as the trainings of fifth level, the tenth level, the fifteenth level. Those who are more new to it will only touch upon this conceptually. Those who have worked with it will deepen into a place where the whole body and ego dissolve and there is only oneness and connection, no longer a current of separate beings but One, the Divine itself, holding that space. It is upon the base of that energy, and supported by the subsurface crystals, that the Entities are able to do their work. I am not suggesting they could not do it without, but it certainly makes it much easier. When we speak in a group like this it is easier, much easier for me to hold Barbara's body, much easier for Barbara to relax into releasing the body, than when she speaks in a group of people who are more diverse, perhaps skeptical, more angry. Your high energy helps and supports our work. I know you have questions and I'm just going to move through some basics here and we'll then go back to your further questions.

Let's move onto what happens in that inner room. First of course one or another of the Entities moves into Medium João's body, just as the way I am in Barbara's body. João vacates the body and the Entity moves in. Usually there is only one predominant one at a time, but occasionally there is more than one working cooperatively. Some of you may be able to distinguish which Entity is in the body and sometimes there's confusion which one is it. Often at those times of confusions several are working cooperatively in the body with one predominant.

The Entities can see you just as I see you, I see your physical forms, I see your energy fields, I see your aura, I see the areas of distortion in each of the three heavier bodies and I see – I don't want to say soul distortion, on the ultimate level the soul is never distorted; on the ultimate level non of the bodies are distorted. The distortion is very subtle. We can't really call it soul distortion — the mental or emotional overlay over the spirit body which causes the semblance or shadow of distortion. Can you see the difference in the phrasing? So we see that which is shifting the soul body into an appearance of distortion.

Different entities will each work in their own way to help re-balance that distortion. The Casa Entities are more physically inclined in their work. This does not mean they don't work at a soul level. They work very much at a soul level, but they work at the soul level through the physical body where, for example, I work at the soul level more through the mental body and mind. We all work through energy too.

The predominant work is to raise the vibrational frequency of the heavier bodies by bringing into balance that which is unbalanced. The entities often do that by their application of high energy. I do it more through speech and inviting you to release that which is heavy.

Sometimes the imbalances have caused disease. I've noticed that the Entities never work in an effort to fix something because they know nothing is broken. They do see that there is the appearance of distortion that has moved down and down through the bodies into a material manifestation, which is sometimes expressing itself in a life threatening way. On a soul level that doesn't matter so much, there will be another body once one passes but out of their enormous compassion they bring forth whatever healing may come.

I think it's very true that people who are in enormous pain, either physical pain or emotional pain, or pain about the perceived untimely ending of their lives, find it harder to carry a high vibration because there is fear, pain and sadness. The entities are aware of this and willing to help to resolve the distortions both because it is your will that it is to be so and because they see that the soul can flourish and open and tell it's truth more easily when not faced with that heavy distortion. And so it is an act of compassion.

The primary tool of the Entities is light. You are light; they are not bringing something alien into you, they are helping the body tissue or the emotional body, remember its truth. You are light. It is so easy to forget that truth. Have you ever had the experience of sitting in a room working at some deskwork or sewing with your back to the window, and suddenly looking around you wondering why is it so dark? But your back is turned to the window. It's not dark. You've just forgotten to turn and face the light. A big part of what they are doing is turning you around. Face the light; wake up; remember; face the light. There are times when the body has closed down and doesn't allow the light to come through. Then they will use whatever tools they have to help open the body so it can reconnect to its light basis.

Many questions come forth about the surgery that is done. The entity incorporated into Medium João's body picks up a seeming kitchen knife. The Entity cuts with it and yet, there is no infection, there is little blood loss. What is going on? The Entities have a very high vibrational frequency. When they pick up this knife, the knife broadcasts the high frequency. The knife is as a laser beam. It is converted almost immediately to light. In your human eyes it still has the semblance of a knife but as soon as it touches the flesh it is simply light.

Metal cutting flesh disrupts the cells, causes cells to break apart. A knife cuts the cells in half, so the wound bleeds a lot, and flesh is traumatized. Light finds the space between the cells and it simply opens the space. You are not solid. You know that! There is nothing solid here. You are porous. The light that they use causes very little trauma since it damages very few cells. The incision heals quickly because what they are doing is simply separating the cells to create an opening into the body, rather than cutting the cells.

There is no infection because the vibrational frequency of the knife is so high, no microorganism can live in its field. The incision is sterile just by the power of the vibration. So the Entity cuts, perhaps into the breast, into a cancerous tumor. He opens the skin and then uses either the knife or the fingers. With light extending from tool or fingers, he reaches into the opening to where the tumor is attached. Perhaps you have seen photographs of Medium João's hand reaching into a body. You can see the light.

The work is similar to work on a computer with a photograph blown up so that you can see the pixels and you can touch them with your cursor. Beep, beep, beep, cutting away this pixel and that pixel, beep, beep, beep. It's that precise. Their control with light is extraordinary. They are able to bring light to play precisely where the tumor attaches or extends, and without doing the damage of cutting within the body. The healthy cells are not injured. They just cut that one little connection and then lift it out. If there are threads of the tumor attaching, instead of cutting away and causing a massive traumatic experience to healthy and malignant cells, they just touch each little thread of tumor, then lift it out.

When something is torn, for example the surgery that we witnessed where a man had a torn tendon or ligament in the shoulder, the process is similar. We watched as the incision was made and then the hands were put inside with a turning motion, literally weaving the cells of that tendon together, taking torn ends of the tendon and re-working them. The physical doctor here in your country would need to use stitches inside but here it was just mended using light. Then the incision edges were invited to rejoin. Energy inviting the frayed edges of the wound to come together and because the cells themselves have not been ruptured but are whole, the cells come together smoothly with very little scaring, little pain, little bleeding and they heal very quickly.

The forceps in the nose is a good example of this Light work. What is going on? Certainly such a tool could not be inserted into the nostrils and up into the head and remain solid without killing the human. As soon as the forceps is inserted it turns to light. It's just light, just energy. What I perceive here is first it goes in and then is twisted around, and sometimes even down. Perhaps there is something in the kidney's that needs attendance. Instead of cutting an opening there, one can go in the existing nostril opening and through. The light is unlimited and there is such precision while using that tool that he can point into the precise place where that light is needed. He takes a small growth off the kidney, and removes it without needing to cause trauma of an incision to the abdominal area. It's easier on the body. So the forceps surgery may treat any area of the body. I saw one surgery of the foot done through the nose.

The entities see far more than your CAT scans can see. They can see every cell in the body and just where the distortion is. They have excellent aim! They know just where they are going.

The other advantage to this approach is that as the light comes through the body it touches everything it passes. It energizes the body in that way. Why a kitchen knife, why a forceps? Well, when Barbara asked me this I said to her he could use a banana but the high energy would probably explode it and it would get messy. He could use his finger but in your culture one does not stick the finger in the nostril. It is respectful Medium João to use a tool, much kinder.

After surgery, they ask you to rest. There are specific rules you are asked to follow. Part of what they are teaching with these rules is kindness, to remind you to be loving to this body. They want you to create a new habit with the body, not to keep pushing the body to the limits of its endurance but to treat it with kindness and with care. The rules are reasonable. The body has been through major surgery. It's easy to forget that because you might feel well, and yet most of you go back to your room and do sleep and you need that rest. You are forming a new habit energy, not to regard the body only as an instrument but to regard the body as an expression of your divinity and to treat the body with the respect and love to be offered to any expression of divinity. So the rules remind you to treat the body respectfully and hopefully you will bring learning that home with you. You will remember this kindness in the future, not just about the physical body, but about the emotional and mental bodies as well. Whatever arises, treat it with kindness.

We will have a rest period now.

During the break, some people asked Aaron about energy and healing, not recorded. One woman sitting near Aaron was experiencing pain and he inquired if he could be of help.

Aaron: You know that the Casa is built over a strong crystal base that supplies some of the energy for the Casa, it's helpful. It's not essential; we see that Medium João and the entities are able to do this work in Germany or other places so the Casa's work is not fully reliant on that crystal base. [At this point Aaron helps the woman in pain - he puts his hand on her leg and assists her energetically.] There is but one energy, One. Everything is an expression of that One, call it God, Goddess, call it what you will. Your personal energy is an expression of it; the crystal energy is an expression of it; that which the Entities use is an expression of it. You are learning how to recognize that energy, to cherish it in yourselves as the personalized expression; to utilize it skillfully and to give it out to others skillfully. As you practice in the personal sense you come into a greater understanding of the fullness of that which you are, your deepest essence. You are coming to know that you are divine; you are beautiful expressions of that one. So much of the Casa's work is simply to remind you of that truth. I know you have many questions. This brief introduction to energy is our basis upon which we will build so now I'd like to hear your questions.

Q: When Barbara goes out and Aaron comes in she mentioned the protection against something that could come in and that dark side. W hat is that and why would it want to come in?

A: On the ultimate level there is only positive polarity only light but on the relative level there are distortions of that light, which we call negative polarity. It is important not to think of this as dualistic with light, and yet the expression of it is with an intent for service to the self rather than to others and it gratifies itself with the fear of others, feeds off fear and pain. One must learn not to hate negative polarity, to know it simply as a distortion of the light, but also to respect that it exists. We spoke earlier of the power of compassion to say no. Compassion must say no to negativity and say it with love, not hatred.

When one does the kind of work that Barbara does it attracts many non-material beings who wonder how they can use Barbara's gifts. These may be what we sometimes call mischievous spirits, though beyond that are beings that are deeply negatively polarized and would like to bring in great distortion, perhaps to find some feeding place in Barbara's ego or Barbara's body situation. This would be something that could come in and nudge at Barbara saying, "Oh we can fix the hearing, we can fix the vision; for you are too special to bear such infirmities." Or "Would you like to set yourself up as being more powerful, not to give yourself humbly?" So negativity may offer a temptation. Barbara knows she is not doing this work; God is doing this work. She simply offers the body and mind in service to God. She accepts whatever the situation is with the body with love, so she is able to say no to that kind of temptation. But it's hard work, requiring mindfulness and care.

Certainly you have heard of channels that do bring in a lot of distortion, who bring in a lot of fear and negativity. They may have started the work very purely but then because they did not do the inner work as was needed the distortion comes. One of the reasons that Medium João is so successful in his work is that he truly knows he does not do this work. God does this work. He does not accept personal gain for his work, in a sense of demanding a lot of money and power. If he did, it would destroy him. He knows that. Barbara also knows this. It is essential to offer the work freely, though one may receive gifts of appreciation that allow one to maintain a livelihood. But if there was greed and fear, that would make the spirit, mind and body vulnerable to negativity.

When I come into the body, the body is vacant, and therefore vulnerable, just as is a house that stands vacant and may be entered by anyone. This is a time where the utmost care must be given that the body is safeguarded so negative energy cannot move into it. I am a high sixth density entity. I have not explained the meaning of these densities; I'll do that tomorrow. But a being that is negatively polarized sixth density, a very powerful negative sixth density, can feel very much like me in its vibrational frequency. It is like the balance beam. You have a weight far out to the right and another weight far to the left will seem equal. Such an entity will not speak words of hate, but will bring forth subtle distortions, and push its way in using whatever are Barbara's most vulnerable places as opening. For this reason we protect the body. Barbara protects it through the statement of her intention and if there is any concern at all we call in the four Archangels to form a circle, to hold a force field around the momentarily vacant body as I come into the body. Does that answer your question? (yes)

The reason I'm going into this in detail is that each of you has visitations by negative polarity and you must learn how to say no. When temptation comes your way to lie, to take something that doesn't belong to you, to act in a self centered way that does not serve others, be aware. There is not necessarily a distinct, separate Entity supporting this temptation; it may or may not be. Simply, here is some force of negativity how are you going to respond to it? As you practice responding to it in a clear, compassionate, loving way, saying no, you will not do this or that, will not tell an untruth or create a distortion because it would be a disservice to yourself and all beings, as you practice that, you learn how to say no to negativity in a very compassionate and clear way.

Q: When one is in pure mind, pure reality, no thought, no object, no self, is there a way to be in that state and navigate ordinary reality?

A: Absolutely. You come to one of the week-long meditation retreats and we'll teach you. I can only give a few words about it now. There is the everyday mind, I like the Tibetan vocabulary here. They call the every day mind 'sem', and that which I call pure awareness mind, 'rigpa'. Through these words they make the distinction that there are these two levels of mind, the mind that is based on the conditioned realm, thoughts arising and passing away and that which is centered in awareness. In the Tibetan dzogchen trainings – dzogchen means non-dual awareness – we teach in stages. "Seeing the view" is seeing this pure awareness mind, just getting a quick glimpse of it, knowing, "This is it." Just seeing it.

Then you learn the meditation practice, which is why you need the week; the meditation practice stabilizes the non-dual awareness. Within that practice when a thought comes up that pulls you off center, you ask a question about that thought or experience. The way I phrase the question is, "Is there anything here that is not an expression of the unconditioned?" For example, if a negative thought, such as an angry thought, arises, instead of creating separation around that thought, one observes this thought arose out of conditions, and it is an expression of those conditions. When those conditions cease it will cease.

Think of the ocean. When certain conditions are present waves arise. When the conditions stop the waves calm down. But the waves are never separate from the ocean, the waves are always an expression of the ocean. Whether it is a small wave or a giant wave, a tsunami wave about to engulf and kill thousands of people, it's just an expression of the ocean. Certainly it is a powerful wave and its going to do some harm but it's just an expression of the ocean. The wave of anger comes- it's just an expression of the ocean, the ground of being, the unconditioned itself, it's an expression albeit a distorted expression of love. So in the meditation practice you stabilize. The more waves that come, figuratively speaking, the more chance to practice; so we don't try to stop thoughts but each time a thought comes and the idea 'this one is bad' ahh, it's just thought. Separating- anything here that's not an expression of the unconditioned, and we see there is only non duality, only the ocean, but we are still doing some form of meditation practice. Once the practice is stable then we move into the third leg of the practice, which is the action leg. We take it out into the world. But you don't try to do that too soon, you have to wait until it is stable in meditation first.

Q: I want to know about being in a high trans-personal state, perhaps at the level of the divine, the God-head. How is this possible?

A: The Pure Awareness mind is the natural state of being. This is the trans-personal state. Super-imposed on that is the every-day personal consciousness. Personal consciousness arises and falls like the waves. The ground remains, the trans-personal state. But you cannot hold to that trans-personal state in suppression of the waves. This is the dilemma that most people get themselves into. They think they can access either/or; they don't recognize both can be present simultaneously.

There is another beautiful Buddhist teaching. I'm tossing a bit of Buddhist terminology at you, but there is no English equivalent. The primary word is 'kaya' which means body. Dharmakaya is the truth body; Nirmanakaya the form body, the outer expression. We see them as dualistic, that there is either the truth body or the form body. But they are contiguous. Put a bridge between as if you were to span a deep abyss with the form body on one side and the truth body on the other, a bridge that is grounded deep into each side. As soon as you put one foot on the bridge you're in both. This is the sambhogakaya or wealth body. It contains the fullest wealth of dharmakaya and nirmanakaya.

This is your human work. Most humans, through so many lifetimes, have created and believed in a duality of divine body and form body, the outer world and the inner world, the ever perfect and that which is distorted. The whole focus of your learning at this point is to transcend that duality and hold the space, so you have glimpses into the trans-personal, though you don't yet know how to rest there.

The first important step is simply to recognize that it is real. Begin to see the expressions of the mundane realm not as separate from the trans-personal but as expressing out of it. This is very precise. One's anger, one's confusion, one's impatience, watch the way you separate these out and say, "This is other-than". Stop yourself and ask is there anything that is other than? Right here with this anger can you see the divine? Such seeing does not give you permission to act out the anger of course, but right here with the anger is the divine. Where are you going to rest your attention? When you move your attention deeper and deeper into that divinity you find increasingly that you can hold the space, that you can live with no denial or dismissal of the heavy emotion, but rather the ability to hold the space, allowing it to bubble up until it goes, poof, like a bubble.

It takes ongoing practice I think that the heart of the practice at the simplest level is just to remember the question "Is there anything here that is not an expression of God?" You are going to have to do some work with that, those who are convinced that negative thought is not an expression of God. Clearly it's a distorted expression, but it's not evil, it simply has arisen from conditions. There is dirt outside the house. If we had a heavy rainstorm it would turn to mud. If we had flower seed it would turn to garden but the dirt's still there, just expressing differently. You step in the mud and say 'ick'. But it's just the earth, and necessary for the flowers.

Q: At the Casa I know there is a difference between healing and being cured why do some people get seemingly healed and some people not?

A: This is a difficult answer for you to accept. Let's say that a local Brazilian farmer suffered an injury with his tractor that left him incapacitated, unable to do his farming work, unable to care for his children. His primary interest is to heal this body so he can again take care of his family and function in the world. He has no secondary interest, just that. Certainly there is some karma working there but he's not much concerned with the karma. He just wants to get back to the health to support his family. He is more likely to heal. Barbara on the other hand went to Brazil saying I would like to hear if it is for the good of all beings, but if what supports the good of all beings is my conditioned deafness I am willing to bear with it. If to carry this deafness is useful in resolving past karma, I'm willing to continue to carry this deafness, if there is karma that is yet unresolved, I am willing to carry it as long as needed and ask help to resolve the karma. So she's got a different intention. Sometimes it's not so conscious an intention but for many of you, you do come with the intention of that which is the highest good, not just to heal at all costs.

This is not 100% true of course, but usually the Entities follow the highest intention to deal with what they are able. The farmer with his injury is healed, he goes back to his work and it may be 10 years before he starts to think about what happened, starts to look at different personality traits that are not wholesome, to wish to learn to release the traits that are harmful to people. And he comes back to the Casa and asks, "How do I release this in the way that I released the terrible injuries?" It may be another lifetime before he is ready to ask that question. Each being invites the healing for which they are ready.

The healing may also happen at a very deep level and yet not at the surface level of the body. I'm sure some of you have experienced that. I want to be careful here. What I speak of here are my own perceptions. The entities, if you were able to ask them, could give you a different explanation but this is what I perceive.

Q: Could you tell us more about yourself? At the Casa there are those who perform surgery because they have that skill. Is there a particular skill that you have that has brought you to this work?

A: My brother, basically I teach from my non-dual awareness and invite others to come into that space with me. I am of high sixth density and very much a part of the brother/sisterhood of light, deeply committed to the teachings of love and non-duality; deeply committed to serving as a guide for those of you who have courageously come into the incarnation to co-birth the earth into its transition to higher density and to birth your own consciousness into transition into higher consciousness.

Although I put on a male energy it's simply that Aaron was a karmic ancestor who was a wise and loving teacher. Barbara did not want to call me 'hey you' so putting on the personality was skillful, but I have no attachment nor self identification to that personality. This is the personality I chose to adapt in becoming a teacher to make it easier for you to talk to me. I am not Aaron, it's just somebody that I was once. I am androgynous, a spirit. As spirit, I can help you also to know yourself as spirit. Aaron was an articulate teacher. I also am that.

In my final human lifetime I was a meditation master, in Thailand in 1500s. I found liberation from this whole cycle of birth and death and resolved all karma. I opened to the realization of my divinity in that lifetime. Using the meditation practices I teach you here and have given Barbara to teach. Although in that final lifetime I was Buddhist, I do not identify myself as of any one religion but do deeply respect the value of this path to liberation.

In that final lifetime I was considered an expert with this form of meditation drawn from the Buddhist tradition, Vipassana or Insight meditation. After my own enlightenment I helped many others find liberation with this path so this is one part of what I teach, though what I teach far transcends the tradition of Buddhist teachings. Yet one does not lightly put aside a tool that is so useful, so this is what we teach.

I am quite proficient with physical healing but I do not do a lot of it. My energy is too high to connect directly with most humans. I am not trained in the precision to scale down and direct that energy precisely to serve the human body. With students with whom I work regularly I may do some energy work, and I can see into the body and give some guidance in to what might be needed to balance the systems of the body. But I leave most deep body-plane healing to my more skilled brothers and sisters. I do work more on the etheric and astral levels, and also do assist you with the seeing and resolution of karma.

Q: My understanding of pain and suffering helps me now to understand that I experience pain in my life but chose suffering. And through that pain and suffering, through that process, I experienced growth. Can we learn without the pain, does there always have to be the pain for the growth?

A: For the human there will always be pain; that is the nature of these bodies- the nerves are jangled and ache or burn. That is how the body is. Eventually the human race will learn how to attend these nerve twitches to bring quick balance, little pain. Since nothing is permanent, you cannot hold onto what you love, and there are feelings of sadness, loss and the pain of loss. So pain will come. But suffering is not necessary. Suffering invites you to pay attention. It is not the suffering that teaches you; paying attention teaches you. When you start to pay attention without the suffering you don't need the suffering any more as condition for learning.

You suffer in large part because it is habit. This is something that I think touches many of you. You come to a point in your evolution where you so deeply yearn to come home, whatever that home means to you. You see the radiance of the divine, the light of the divine, and superimposed on it you see what seems to be your own shadow and there is despair about the shadow. The habit energy then is to pick up scouring pads and try to scrub away the shadow. If there was dirt on the window glass would it stain the window itself or change the nature of the window glass? What if, seeing the dirt on the window glass you picked up heavy steel wool scouring pads and began to try to scrub away at it. Then you inflict damage on the window. The dirt on the window is just dirt. Wipe it away.

But the habit energy is to see the movement of negativity and to contract into the "fix it" mode because you so deeply want to re-connect with the light, to come home and you feel that the stain on yourselves is what separates you from the light and that it must be destroyed. You can never destroy it.

You come to a point where you recognize that the attempt to destroy it is just more negativity and you say, "I don't know what to do." The answer is right there in your hearts – love! Love the foot that has the tack in it, love the human that is experiencing anger, jealousy or impatience. Don't act out the emotion but offer love. It is through this process and only through this process that you learn. It is not that you finally come home; you begin to see that you have always been home. It's only this misguided idea that you must fix something, which has kept you from knowing that you are home. Let us take a break here – 20 minutes.

(break)

Q: I just want to confirm that all of us here that have opened ourselves up at the Casa. We opened up to the reality of negative vibration and worked to stop it until it ceased. We're still focusing on protecting ourselves at this time. When I protect I contract.

A: All of you are learning how to open your hearts to the negativity. Each to a different degree learning this, each in your own place just where you need to be; all of you have made the commitment to live your lives in love. All of you have not fully understood what that means, so some of you still create a duality to some degree and there is still contacting around that which appears to be negative. But I think all of you have understood the futility of such contraction, that it does not limit the negative but rather enhances it. And some of you are puzzling over how to proceed from there. Some of you have hopefully learned how to proceed by watching the contraction in reaction to the negative energy and just saying, "No, this is not what I need to do now and bring forth love." You all are within this process of learning. If there is a contraction, offer that contraction the same love.

Q: Can you define or describe the nature of karma and can we resolve it in this lifetime?

A: If I did not believe that you could resolve it in this lifetime I would not be here as a teacher. I deeply believe in the ability of each of you for full liberation in this lifetime, full liberation from your karma. Karma itself is energy. Karma it relates largely to contraction. In the spacious expanded space of pure awareness there is no karma. When you move into the sense of a separate solid self, you become reactive. Then when things push at you, you push back, with each return push you perpetuate the karma.

Think of karma as if you had a completely smooth sheet of sand or soil, just slightly sloped, and water drops dripping off a cliff above, drip, drip, drip, one at a time, and slowly. Because of the slope of that sheet of soil the drop of water runs off. It creates an infinitesimally small track picking up a little bit of dust as it rolls. The next drop follows the first instead of going this way or that way; it follows in that tiny crack. The pathway keeps deepening and deepening until you create the Grand Canyon.

Karma is the energy force that perpetuates that habit energy arisen from a place of contraction. In the non-contracted state there is no karma. This is why you must hold both the relative and the ultimate. You cannot hide out in the ultimate. To do so is escape from karma, not resolution of karma. While there is not karma in that ultimate stage, you must come back into the relative body and mind to live in the world.

You begin to look at the habit energies that have developed and find more skillful ways to deal with those habit energies. That is the first step. The second step is to realize that by being skillful with the habit energies, you are still creating a habit energy although a more wholesome one.

Then you begin to look at the question, "Whose habit energy is this? What is this whole notion of a separate self?" From the place of no-self you can still function in the world, you can function very well, but the predominant habit energy that holds most of you into karma is the delusion of separate self. But you cannot start with that issue. You start with whatever the predominant habit energies are: such as self judgment or the idea of unworthiness, or judgment of others, or feeling like you constantly need to be the caretaker fixing everything. You look at one habit energy and begin to see that it brings suffering. Begin to see that which can resolve, can really step out of the self-centered reference point for a moment and find a balance for the habit. When it's more balanced, then you are ready to look at that question, "Whose karma is this any how?" You begin to see the "nobody" that is there behind the somebody.

Karma is the planting of a seed. Simply put if you want sweet apples you will never get them by planting lemon seeds, if you want apples you have to plant apples. And yet the habit energy can be so strong that you keep planting the same old seed such as planting the seed of self judgment when anger arises. This simply deepens the habit energy. There must be awareness of the process in which you are caught.

The Buddhist terminology is helpful here. Pali offers two words where the English language gives us only one. 'Anusaya' in the Pali language, is habit energy. 'Asava' is the outflow of that habit energy. The habit energy for example, is when someone pushes you, to push back. You note the anusaya, habit energy and then each time you push back, judgment arises. This latter is the asava, the outflow of the habit energy. There might be constant state of self-recrimination, or shame, or perhaps with the same habit energy of anger, there might be the outflow of arising self righteousness and blame of others.

So it is helpful to break down habit energy in that way to see that there are different predominate habit energies that come as conditions and results, and there is a flow to it. Don't try to lump it all together, regard each as distinct- the outflow arose from the conditions of the habit energy and other conditions. When the habit energy is there and other kinds of habit energies come together, a certain outflow will come. When you begin to see it in this way it becomes clearer this mind state is simply arisen from conditions and you don't need to build a self identity around it. This practice erodes the whole idea of the separate self. Does that answer your question? (yes; thank you)

Q: Is it possible to receive too much energy into your home and into your body and feel like you can't control it?

A: Yes, it is possible. If you are working with a skilled energy worker they will be able to detect this sort of overflow and work with balancing it. Some people have a habit to take in without releasing. How much water can you drink without eliminating it? How many inhales can you take without an exhale? So it's useful if there is a sense of excess to look at that within the self that is resistant to releasing; perhaps there is a fear that if you release there will be nothing new to come to replenish it.

Q: When I was in Abadiãnia, between 2 and 4 in the morning, I had many experiences with spirit energy. I am not clear why I had those experiences.

A: Were those experiences visits from the entities, just looking in on you. Perhaps they were looking in on you at other times through the night but at that time you were more open, more able to experience their presence. So it's not that those were the only times they were present but the times that you were able to perceive their presence. Often especially after surgery, they'll look in regularly through the night.

It may also have been another entity, one of your guides for example, and that in that 2 to 4AM period you were especially open and able to feel their energy.

Q: My experience felt very powerful and strong and sometimes scary.

A: The experience of these entities sometimes felt scary?

Q: Yes

A: My sister I cannot tell you exactly what was happening for you, only conjecture. When you visit the Casa there is often an intention to take another step in your growth. Picture here someone who is just learning to swim, is not yet a strong swimmer, staying in the shallow end of the pool. Finally this person can swim across the pool and the teacher suggests to move to the deep end. You will swim up and down right next to the wall of the deep end. There is a certain point when it is time to let go of the rail and swim across and that's frightening. Each step beyond the self-perceived prior limits takes you into new, uncharted territory and it's scary.

With the first decision to go to the Casa, you are stepping into that uncharted territory. You are constantly being asked to take one step further than you thought you could. You were never pushed into that step, you were invited, and yet your own spirit, your own aspiration says yes, this is what I am here for. It is a constant letting go of old beliefs, of old attachments, belief in one's own limitation, attachment to one's own limitation. You might ask why would I be attached to limitation? It feels safe. Are you ready to leave the shallows and bring yourself into the river current? One has to develop confidence, gradually. There is no shame in that, one must be very loving to the self, and aware that this is hard work.

There is another possibility, which is that the energy you felt is something negative and thus felt frightening. Whatever of the negative may approach you, external or your own inner negative traits, offer it love. There at the casa you are very safe, with much mature positive energy to support your work.

Q: In the break now, Aaron told me that I should ask what I am supposed to do in relation to my illness. Who should I ask? I think Aaron meant spirit, someone spiritual, or an entity.

A: Ask your guides, your higher self. Whatever teachers may come to you. What I said was that there is a past life experience in which there was some need to limit the movement of one side of the body. This was quite a distant past life. The being that you were then committed violence with this side of the body and then experienced enormous shame and regret. I don't want to say limitation was a direct result but because of the idea that he had to cut off the use of that side of that body because of the violence of which it was capable, he co-created a situation which he fell off a ravine, damaged himself in such a way that the side of the body literally became paralyzed.

My sister is it okay for me to continue, as this is private information. Are you comfortable if I continue? (Yes)

Part of your intention in this life is to forgive that being and bring that whole side of the body back into the heart. For whatever reasons, whether it is the Parkinson's or some kind of blockage, whatever reasons, there is the gradual cutting off of the use of that side of the body. What seems most urgent to me is to invite that whole side of the body back into the loving heart, to offer forgiveness in whatever ways this arm, this leg, this side of the body has done harm to beings in a past life. Ask the forgiveness of those who were harmed through the past aspects of this body, and offer forgiveness for those who have harmed you or karmic ancestors of this present self. You might phrase it, "In whatever ways I have harmed, I ask forgiveness; in whatever ways acts have injured me, I offer forgiveness." Then turn to the arms and legs and forgive them and ask their forgiveness, in much the same way. Do this as a formal meditation practice especially asking forgiving of others and then, and forgiving yourself.

I think the heart of it is the need to forgive those negative aspects of the self, of the past and of the present. This is true for all of you. Can you forgive that which is capable of feeling hate? Can you open to that in yourself? "I hold myself in love, I forgive myself, that such thoughts or actions have arisen. They have arisen out of conditions, old habit energy. My intention is never to use this kind of thought to harm others, and yet hate still arises, so I hold the habit energy in my heart, hold the intention to healing and I forgive this human and all humans in whom this kind of energy arises and is acted upon."

It is about forgiveness and compassion. I can't promise it's going to change the physical condition- I think it's likely to – but I can't promise that. But you have nothing to lose because there is a deeper healing that will come. Whatever physical healing is possible, then will be more easily expressed because the karma is released. While I am speaking to just one person here I think this is a helpful example for all of you.

Q: Aaron, what you told me is very important for me and I'm very grateful for this information.

A: In Presence, Kindness and Freedom or perhaps on the website, we have a formal forgiveness meditation and it would be helpful for you to read it. It's in one of my books. Remember any of you who work with forgiveness meditation that it must never be forced; we do not approach it from a place 'I should forgive' but approach it instead from a place of compassion. As compassion deepens we find that there is nothing else left to forgive. And then the words and thoughts of forgiveness come easily. Forgiveness is a process like turning on a dimmer switch. It's not an event; it's a growing process, opening into the forgiveness of the loving heart.

There is nobody here who has not at some time in this life acted in a way that you regret. This is a very valuable practice for all of you because when you forgive yourself and find compassion for the human who acted out his/her fear, you find the compassion for others who have acted thusly to you. To forgive does not mean to condone. You have acted in an unskillful way or another has. When you forgive another you don't say, "What you did is okay," but "I understand that this came from your own fear, suffering, and distortion. It's not okay on one level; you caused pain to me or to others. But compassion is strong and I forgive you, I open my heart to you, I let you back into my heart." So don't confuse this with condoning the unskillful behavior. It is about compassion. When compassion is full, there is nothing left to forgive.

Q: There is terrorism today in the world and hate towards Americans. We are fighting a war in Iraq. US soldiers are suffering. How do we best heal this for ourselves, for the terrorists, and those around the rest of the world?

A: You are human; you are here on earth for a reason and you must be involved in the affairs on the human plane. All of your highest responsibility is to learn how to bring the deepest love you can, the deepest compassion that you can, to those affairs. And when you do the heart knows what to say; it knows how to speak out.

What is playing out in the world is an outward expression of what is playing out within your own selves: the 'war' between hatred and loving kindness. Thus, the first place to start is within your self. Ask yourself if you are creating a separation, holding yourselves separate from the world situation and feeling you are not responsible or do not want that responsibility. You can never say 'it's their war' or 'it's their fault'. None of you are exempt from responsibility, no matter whom you voted for.

Is there any war remaining in you? If so, can you begin to heal it, to heal the division from within your own self? Next, it is very helpful to regard your attitude toward those who seem to be at blame for the war. Is it an antagonistic, angry attitude? Can you change that anger into compassion, remembering compassion knows how to say no. Invite the change by presence with those who must make these decisions; feel their pain and uncertainty, their wish for peace. It is only through that strong compassion that you are going to bring forth a government that can make wiser and more loving decisions in the world. Fear can never bring forth a loving government, anger cannot. Complacency also cannot, turning the back cannot.

Where do you find compassion in the midst of pain and violence? I am telling Barbara stories today. More usually I tell my own stories but Barbara's seem relevant today. In the 1960's she was involved in many non-violent actions for social change, especially in the South. Freedom rides, sit-ins, and so forth. After one demonstration she found herself one of a number of women thrown into jail not a new experience for her. She felt that bigotry had thrown her in jail and was angry. There was a lot of righteous anger. The cell, was perhaps the size of this room, with a dozen or more women inside. As she tells the story, she was pacing up and down the cell; muttering angry words, wanting someone to blame. A middle aged black woman, a lovely woman with graying hair, wearing a black flowered dress and a hat that she still wore with the hat pin in it, this woman walked up to Barbara, took her by the hand and said, "You look so angry." Barbara said, "Yes I am angry, aren't you angry too?" The woman said to her, "Of course I'm angry sweetheart, but I also love them and they are so afraid."

This is a very powerful statement from a woman who has lived her life under that bigotry. "Of course I am angry but I also love them and they are so afraid." This is the voice of compassion. It doesn't judge the anger, it transcends the anger, perhaps even transmutes the anger, using the anger energy that carries into the compassionate heart and allows you to bring forth the change in the world. You need that anger; you need that energy> You need not live the concepts carried by the anger, all the blame and hatred. But rather, transmute the anger into energy that can connect you with your innate compassion and your knowing of how to bring forth change