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Truth Seekers in the Age of Deception: Finding Your Path When Knocked Off Course

• Terri Wilson

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Navigating through a world where truth seems increasingly elusive requires both discernment and resilience. When bombarded by contradicting information, false narratives, and outright deception, how do we stay on our authentic path? More importantly, how do we recover when inevitably knocked off course?

The HALT framework offers profound insight into our vulnerability to deception. When we're Hurried, Angry, Lonely, or Tired, our discernment weakens dramatically. We see this playing out across society - people racing through life without pause for reflection, anger dominating online discourse, profound disconnection despite digital "connection," and collective exhaustion that compromises clear thinking. These conditions create perfect breeding grounds for falsehood to flourish.

My personal journey through multiple deceptive spiritual organizations taught me that getting knocked off path isn't just possible - it's practically guaranteed for truth-seekers. The most dangerous liars often believe their own deceptions, painting enthralling visions built on pride and greed. Yet there's profound hope in knowing that darkness cannot survive exposure to light. As the saying goes, "Truth always wins, but unfortunately, liars get their turn first."

What sustains me through cycles of falling and rising is the unwavering confidence that divine purpose ultimately prevails. Proverbs 19:21 reminds us: "Many are the plans in a person's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails." This truth serves as both comfort and compass, guiding us back to our authentic path even after the most disorienting detours. The journey toward truth may be narrow and sometimes lonely, but it remains infinitely worth walking.

Ready to strengthen your discernment? Join our community of truth-seekers as we navigate these challenging times together, learning to recognize deception while cultivating authentic connection with ourselves, others, and the divine.

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Speaker 1:

Today. I believe there is nothing more subversive than helping to midwife a new evolutionary shift of the human species into an era where we will no longer be entranced with socio-economic formations and ways of being and thinking that produce disconnection, domination and devastation. Instead, we can learn to be present upon the earth in ways that bring healing, wholeness and a sense of the sacred in our connection with one another and with all of creation. Is a quote by Fania Davis, and I thank you, fania, for that beautiful quote, and I want to welcome you all back in to Free to Just Be, the podcast empowering humanity to courageously step out of old patterns and programs and learn to embrace new ways of being and healing and becoming as the planet also becomes new, and I hope this finds you in the greatest of health, with vibrant energy today, because you have chosen to accept full responsibility for your body, mind and soul. Here on Free To Just Be, we will try to inspire each other to truly be who we came here to be, and that begins with authenticity which is like a dirty word today and transparency and total honesty, beginning with ourselves, and that produces freedom and alignment with our highest potential. So won't you join me, teresa Marie, your ambassador of Chi, on this transformative journey to rewrite our narratives and live lives of purpose and passion. I welcome you back on this beautiful Tuesday and want to continue the Falling Off the Cliff series today, and I want to talk today about how to navigate in a world of liar, liar pants on fire people. I mean, that is kind of the world. No, it's not kind of. The world has become so polluted with untruth. So how do you navigate when you get knocked off your path? Because, oh baby, we are going to get knocked off our path more times than we think we are, and we need to not only prepare for that, expect it, even anticipate that we're going to get knocked off and yet continue to move forward. So how do we navigate that? You know, getting knocked off the path in today's economy, in today's online AI world, is even more easy. Oh, that didn't fly More easy. Yeah, it's much more difficult, shall I say, to ascertain truth in a world that is so convoluted with lies and misinformation, and that is what we're going to talk about today.

Speaker 1:

I've been really diving deep into this and found myself kind of on HALT. And what does HALT stand for? The acronym HALT, you know, back in my addiction days and going sitting in on AA meetings or NA meetings. You know they talk about HALT, and HALT stands for hurried, angry, lonely and tired, and that constitutes a lot of what's happening in the world. We all know how hurried we are. We forget that we have plenty of time and the grind is ever present. We lay in bed at night and we think about what has to be done tomorrow. We get up and oftentimes we're beating the clock or we're racing the clock. So hurried is very much part, especially of the Western world, is it not?

Speaker 1:

Angry, oh my gosh. The anger and frustration whirling around the blender of what life looks like today. We see it online all the time. Looks like today. We see it online all the time. Just look at any comment section on any platform and you will see the anger, you will see the disbelief, you will see the argumentation of the armchair warriors that are not living life but they are vicariously living through the comment pages of all these online platforms.

Speaker 1:

Lonely, oh buddy. We don't want to get in the midst of this convolution. We don't want to get in the midst of the blender. We would prefer to just stay out of the mix, and so we have fallen prey to the darkness's attempt to keep us disconnected. And what does disconnection lead to? Obviously, loneliness. And then we don't understand why we're feeling so empty and so frustrated. It's because community communication connection has been snuffed out by this ever-present online AI world. And boy, they have done a great job, haven't they? And then tired. We are all so incredibly exhausted. All the time Our cortisol levels are off the chart, we're bloated, we're full of inflammation, and all of it starts between our ears. And so how do we navigate in this world? It is we have become as a culture in the 21st century. We've become so used to hearing so many lies that truth doesn't even seem real. How do we figure out what is true and what is a lie? It's so incredibly difficult. And yet what do we as believers, as Christians, as followers of Christ, where do we get our advice? Well, and then there's the whole argument of well, how much is taken out of the Word, how much has been added to the Word, how much has been twisted in the Word?

Speaker 1:

I have always gone back to the Word because I have found it to be a true navigation tool. Whenever I feel in the least bit lost, I run to my Word and many of you say, oh well, that's just a make-believe book and you know, man wrote it and yes, that is all true. But yet it has remained for me a constant director of getting me back on path, and like today was no different. Today is the 19th of August and so today I was directed to read Psalm 19 and Proverbs 19. And Proverbs is full of nuggets and gems of truth, and I'm just going to throw a couple of them out because it fits what we're talking about today regarding getting knocked off the path which, again, I will reiterate, is so much easier today.

Speaker 1:

Because what is truth? You not only have to navigate your own life, right, you have to peel back those veils of unconsciousness. Well, right, you have to peel back those veils of unconsciousness. Well, guess what? A lot of times, before we even get to our veils of unconsciousness, we have to remove all the lives that are put before us out in society first. So verse 20 says listen to advice and accept instruction and in the end you will be wise. That's Proverbs 19.20.

Speaker 1:

Well, but then you think about the liar, liar pants on fire world we live in and how. 19, verse 5, says a false witness will not go unpunished, and he who pours out lies will not go free, and he who pours out lies will not go free. So, those of us that are out on the or in the online world, which is unfortunately that is, where a lot of commerce happens, it's the public marketplace. That's where people go to sell their wares and their services, to sell their wares and their services and, oh, buddy, talk about an area, a market full of the unjust and those that are compromising and those that are convoluting truth in order to make a buck.

Speaker 1:

And we have to be so cautious about that. And that's really what got me coming out of my last episode of untruths. Omg, am I spewing untruths? Am I causing somebody stumble on my words? I don't want to be a stumbling block for anybody, right? I don't want to be one of those false witnesses because I don't want to be punished for speaking lies. So it becomes something that we look inside and we say, god, am I doing that? You know, we have to constantly hold ourselves accountable to very, very high standards of integrity and truth.

Speaker 1:

What else does it say in Proverbs 19? In verse 27, the reverse, you know. First, it's saying listen to advice, right and accept instruction. So we have to be very cautious on whose instruction we're listening to. And there are so many teachers out there, right, there are many that claim to be teachers.

Speaker 1:

Now, I don't want to ever claim to be a teacher. I want to think of myself as a experiential storyteller. Think of myself as a experiential storyteller. All I'm doing is sharing the episodes, the chapters, the paragraphs that are occurring in my life, in the hopes that maybe what I'm going through and I own the things that I do, I can only speak for what is occurring in my life. It may not be occurring in yours, but as we share these exchanges with each other and communicate with one another, we can help each other ascertain truth. That is my belief. But putting on the title of teacher is a very precarious and dangerous title these days because oh, baby, you are going to be have your feet put to the fire, and I want that. I want God to test me and try me and know that the things that I am sharing are as true and as much aligned with him as possible.

Speaker 1:

But then verse 27 says stop listening to instruction, my son and you will stray from the words of knowledge. So again I ask you what do you do, humanityville, to avoid getting knocked off your path by lies, by the convolution of truth? It is a tricky path that we are traveling on, this destination unknown journey of the ascension path, right? We strive each day to become closer and closer and more and more like the example of Jesus, and yet we are not Jesus, we are not the living truth, we are sparks of him. Yes, and we don't want to become false witnesses, right? A false witness will not go unpunished and he who pours out lies will perish. 19.9 says so. We certainly don't want to be in that camp.

Speaker 1:

And yet the most dangerous liars in life are those who think they are telling the truth. Right, and those of us on this ascension journey that are trying to help others navigate through it are even at a higher standard. So this is why I think it's so very important to have these conversations, because we are so used to having so many lies around us, we're steeped in them, that often the truth doesn't seem real and we are struggling on any given day to understand what is true and what is false. So I personally am beginning to realize that I can still feel safe in the midst of my enemies, because truth is all-powerful and will prevail. And what is truth? Well, the truth, the Tao, the way, it's still God Almighty, it's still our creator, it is still his word. And as much as it's been twisted and has been knocked down and it has been messed with, I still believe I can feel safe because, no matter what happens just like what happened with me in the last four years I did get knocked off my path but truth always wins. And, as Michael Chesire quoted, truth always wins.

Speaker 1:

But unfortunately, liars get their turn first. And we are right now living in the midst of that very truth that liars are getting their turn first and one by one. The sun, s-o-n. Is rising up from the earth and from the heavens, and the light is getting so bright that those liars who are now having their turn are being exposed over and over and over and over again. Because, you see, darkness cannot reside in light. So, as the light continues to flow in us, through us and throughout the planet, even the cockroaches, even those hiding in shadows waiting to devour us, are being exposed left and right. We see it everywhere. We see false prophets. All of a sudden, their integrity comes to bear and we see one after another, they're falling and it really is.

Speaker 1:

I have seen it firsthand five times now where the very people who I fell prey to were so incredibly convincing. And why is that? Well, because we all have our own constructs that we are building around us. We all have our own lens right, and some of the people who led these cults that I was involved with became so enthralled with their own lies, with their own world, that they painted the picture that they designed, the model that they began to play out in their lives. And every single time, unfortunately, it had to do with two of the most insidious and prevalent deadly sins, and that is pride and greed. Pride and greed are like twin sins that run together, and every cult that I came out of began with a liar who was so good at painting the picture of their construct, a picture of their construct of their world, of their way of being. They painted such an enthralling and enticing picture of how we are going to change the world, how we are going to help so many people.

Speaker 1:

And each time I look, I look back with the lens of God and I see clearly where I was taken in because of my desire to help others, my desire to serve God and just one little twist can really knock you off kilter. One little twist can knock you off your path. But the thing that I want us to focus on more than looking at being knocked off, is knowing knowing beyond the shadow of a doubt that Proverbs 19.21 tells us that many are the plans in a man's heart. We all have desires to do good, we all have desires to be abundant, we all have a desire to contribute, to help one another or at least I hope to shout that we do. And if your only desire is to make money and live a comfortable life, well, that is a different truth that you're going to have to walk yourself through.

Speaker 1:

But for me, my desire, since I was a kid, has always been to contribute, to help, to be an impact, to not leave the world in the mess that I entered it in. Right, that's kind of the deal. And with that type of attitude, you have to know that you're going to get knocked down because the darkness is coming for you. The darkness is not going to stand for people who just want to be shiny and bright and bring people home to God, right. So we, right there, know that we're going to get knocked off our path.

Speaker 1:

And the thing is, how much do you trust God? How much do you trust God that if we have all these plans to do good for him and we get knocked off course, what is? The rest of verse 21 says but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails. That is my safety net, because, you see, of all these times in the last 40 years that I got knocked off, what happened? God has picked me up, his purpose prevailed and he set me back on the path to begin again, and that is what I feel like, keeps me on course every day. That is what helps me to feel safe in the midst of my enemies, because always, always, always the truth. God is always all-powerful and will always prevail.

Speaker 1:

He has rescued me over and over again from paths of my own making, from constructs of my own making, from organizations and teachings that I allowed in my life that were in error. He's let me run with them for X amount of time, milk them for the good, and then said nope, remember, look, you see this one piece, this one piece is out of line, this one piece of this particular teacher, of this organization, and then he lifts me out. Sometimes I get the wake up, call myself and pull myself out. Sometimes he's been speaking it to me for years, like this last time. And what was it? My pride, my pride kept me from opening my eyes fully and deciding myself to be pulled out. It often is that he'll give us time after time, opportunity after opportunity to lift ourselves out, but when we're not willing to do that ourselves, sometimes he'll shift it himself.

Speaker 1:

God will make it so incredibly uncomfortable, and sometimes he literally plucks us out of the season and gets us back on track, just like a good mom and dad will do. As our toddler falls for the hundredth time and they're exhausted, what do we do as parents? We lift them up and each of us takes a hand and we show them that, yes, you can get back on the path and you can continue to learn how to walk. In my love, that is how I know that, getting off track, getting knocked off the saddle, I will always be righted because, see, I have a God that loves me that much and, even though we live in a world that's built on promises constructed by liars, he will always, always set our path straight again, and that is a truth that we can bank on.

Speaker 1:

So if you've been knocked off the path and tomorrow I'm going to talk about what usually happens, at least in my world, and maybe you'll be able to identify some of the very survival mode what would we call them the survival mode tactics that we have. Some of them are very similar to all the rest of the world because it's kind of like a pattern that we have, a pattern of walking the truth and then realizing that we have failed and then having to brush ourselves off, learn from the lesson and then get back on the path of truth. So I want us to remember getting knocked off our path will, does and will forever happen, over and over and over again. But today you can rest assured that the truth of God, our creator, will always rise back up within us and in his great mercy and grace he will put us, not us. God will put us back on the path of truth until the next time we fall.

Speaker 1:

So quit beating yourself up today, yeah, we fall, and then we get back up and we take a step forward, and then we fall and we get back up and rejoice. Rejoice that today we have new opportunities to walk in the path of truth, to walk the Tao the way, and it is very narrow and it is very lonely and we do get angry and we do want to hurry through it. So use halt today if you have to. Just pause Sila, which of course means pause and ponder Ponder, where you're at Ponder, if you've been in an erroneous situation, and ask God how to get back on track. And we'll come back on a walk away Wednesday and talk about all the tactics that we can be aware of and we can learn to walk away from and learn new ways of being and new ways to strengthen that belt of truth. Have yourself a terrific Tuesday, peace out.