Living The Way of Mastery with Jason Amoroso
Each day I will read a passage from The Way of Mastery and share my commentary on it. The intention is to provide an opportunity to develop a consistent, simple spiritual study practice and grow together.
Living The Way of Mastery with Jason Amoroso
Lesson 16: The Matrix Into Which You Have Descended
Lesson 16: The Birth of Egoic Consciousness
Section 6: Fear Has Taken Its Final Form
Paragraphs: 15-19
We dive deep into Lesson 16 of The Way of Mastery, exploring how our consciousness creates our reality through our beliefs and perceptions about ourselves.
• Fear causes contraction in our being, drawing us into experiences that match our beliefs about ourselves
• We are divine beings having a human experience, not separate from God but using God's power to create a dream of separation
• Our life circumstances perfectly reflect the subconscious beliefs we hold about ourselves
• Every soul chooses its human experience as a curriculum for awakening and growth
• When we identify with the ego, we experience ourselves as separate, lonely, weak individuals
• At death, we experience our vast consciousness, but fear drives us back into limited physical experience
• Self-honesty is the greatest act of love we can give ourselves
• Changing our beliefs requires commitment, repetition, and willingness to look for evidence of our new perspectives
• Community support is essential for maintaining momentum in our spiritual growth
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Hello and welcome back to Living the Way of Mastery. I'm Jason Amoroso, your guide, friend and fellow student. And today we continue with Lesson 16, the Birth of Egoic Consciousness, section 6. Fear has taken its final form and we are picking up in Paragraph 15, where Jeshua says, if you were lucky, both parents consciously desired to use the body as a communication device for teaching only love and gave one unto another and then accepted that little spark of light that begins yet the birthing of another body and clearly invited another soul to come and abide with them as teacher and friend, as brother or sister. Unfortunately, that is yet rare upon your planet. So Jeshua continues this explanation of how we are, this divine being that is having this human, physical, embodied experience, and he says, if you're lucky, both parents were conscious, they were both wanting to use the body as a communication device to teach. And when Jeshua uses the word teach, he simply means demonstrate to teach only love. That, hey, I am here sharing this connection. You know, some people say sex stands for S-E-X, sacred energy exchange. And so he's like, if you're lucky, both parents were really conscious and sharing in this love and connection with each other. And just to go back to that last sentence. Unfortunately, that is yet rare upon your planet, and we know that a lot of people use sex for a lot of different things for power, for abuse, for addiction, for, you know, just hedonistic pleasure, for whatever reason. It's not right or wrong. He's just giving you this example that, hey, if you're lucky, your parents are really coming together consciously sharing in this sacred energy exchange. And he continues and then they accepted the little spark of light that begins yet birthing of another body, and they clearly invited another soul to come and abide with them as teacher and friend, as brother or sister. And this too is rare, that parents are really aware and conscious that this is what's happening. A lot of us just think it's a propagation of the species. Right, oh, we're having children. This is amazing, we're going to keep the bloodline going. But it's so much more than that when you have this spiritual perspective that this is a divine being coming in, to have this human experience coming into earth school through the perfect parents, I believe the parents choose the child and the child chooses the parents, and it's all one big agreement to play, to serve each other through these lessons, through these lifetimes. So they accept this little body, the body accepts the parents, boom, we're making an agreement. And here I come seemingly into the physical, because again we know that the physical is just energetic, it's all consciousness, just different kind of levels and dimensions of experience.
Speaker 1:So Jeshua continues the word matrix here, or that the movie the Matrix is called the Matrix because that's what this experience is from a certain level of consciousness. It is this simulation. In a way, it is this illusion that feels real, that we are in a way in the Matrix, we are being programmed by life society. But it's really a part of our subconscious right. It's really the ego outpict, giving, creating an experience for us based on our own self-identity.
Speaker 1:When we identify with the ego, the tiny, mad idea of separation, that somehow I a separate, I did the impossible, which is separate from all that is from God, there's guilt there and, oh my gosh, I'm going to be punished. That is a big theme in A Course in Miracles and it follows through in the way of mastery, although it's explained differently. And so because I'm the small separate, I'm not all that is, I'm not all powerful, I'm not God, even though the ego of course wants to try and be that because it knows that it's really not. I experience what I believe I am and Jeshua uses the words right here a separate, lonely, failing, weak individual. And so I create this experience of coming back into the human body over and over and over again to prove to myself that that's what I am, because that's what they. If you identify as a human, that's what it is.
Speaker 1:If you identify with a body, the body dies, no matter what the body suffers. The body is in pain, the body is fragile, the body is weak, the body is separate. So if you're identifying with that, you come back over and over and over thousands of lifetimes, if you will, until you wake up or at least have a willingness to be like there's got to be something more than this, there's got to be another way. But when you're identified in the ego and you're living in this fear and this belief in separation and weakness and loneliness at the death of the body, you have this experience of your soul again, of this vast expansiveness, and it scares the living shit out of the ego, out of the part of you that's identifying with the ego, and we've seen this in near-death experiences that when people leave the body they have this vast expanse of consciousness. And so it makes me think of this.
Speaker 1:Marianne Williamson quote from A Return to Love, her book, and she's a teacher in A Course in Miracles. And it's not our darkness that frightens us, it's our light. That's what this paragraph is speaking to you, to that we see how radiant and powerful and lightful we are. It scares us, and so we go back to the familiar, we go back to the little comfort of the little ego, belief, this tiny mad idea. We go back to hiding out from God, hoping not to be punished. It seems crazy, but we all know that. We know that experience he says the light is not the same as your interpretation that you had learned of yourself. So you taught yourself and you learned of yourself that you are this small, weak individual, lonely, separate, being, when in reality you're not. And just because when we're in that level of consciousness, it doesn't change the truth of the capital T, and that's what this whole section is about. You're experiencing this feeling of fear and separation and illusion. You could only experience it from the allness consciousness. It's happening within the allness consciousness, so it doesn't change God, the nature of God itself, that you're having this temporary, tiny mad idea experience.
Speaker 1:So Jeshua continues fear causes condensation, contraction, falling, if you will, and what you fall into is a matrix of energy that best resonates with your own in italics, your own perception and belief about yourself. Belief is not just thought, it is a quality of vibration that's powerful. Belief is not just a thought, it is a vibration, and anyone who's kind of learning more about spirituality, or if you follow, like teachers like Tony Robbins or Deepak Chopra, a lot of the newer or older teachers of metaphysics, you understand that everything is vibration, that a thought is vibration and it has power to it, whether that is a negative meaning, a false, a false, not true energy, or it is a positive, a life affirming energy. And that makes me think of David Hawkins work in power versus force. That falsehood just has no, it makes the body go weak because it has nothing to sustain itself. But truth and power make the bus keep the body strong, because it's true, it's real, it's not an illusion.
Speaker 1:So Jeshua was saying when we are in fear, we experience this condensing, this contraction, and you know that in your heart. When you're afraid, does your heart feel small and contracted and armored up, or does it feel big and expansive and radiant? I mean, we all know the answer to that. So next time you're afraid, just bring your awareness to your heart space, breathe into your heart space and imagine and feel in a way, take a slow, deep breath and maybe even pull your chest back, pull your shoulders back, open your chest and just feel your heart softening, its contraction and opening. And that might feel dangerous. It might feel vulnerable to open our heart when it feels like we're a threat, when we are at threat, when there's things that are threatening us and that might feel dangerous. It might feel vulnerable to open our heart when it feels like we're a threat, when we are at threat, when there's things that are threatening us. And that's where we have the practice of just staying with ourself as an opening and softening as much as we can in our heart and just being with the thought or the vibration of oh my gosh, this is risky, this is dangerous, or you're right, don't give up this position. And I can just stay with and notice, not be in it, but notice that fear, notice that voice of contraction, notice that not wanting to give up being right and just. My bigger intention is to keep my heart open. So I breathe, I pull my shoulders back, I open my chest and I feel my heart opening and expanding. Chest, and I feel my heart opening and expanding.
Speaker 1:And again he uses this term the matrix of energy that resonates with your own perception and belief about yourself. This is lesson one. You don't experience the world, you experience your perception, what you're choosing to perceive, the perspective you're choosing to hold. And again, this is so. Most of this is 95% of it's subconscious. We're not aware hey, I'm choosing to believe in lack and limitation because the conscious, the kind of the prefrontal cortex part of us, the thinking brain, is like I don't like lack and limitation, why would I choose lack and limitation? Yet that's what our subconscious, the supercomputer, is doing. It's believing in that. And so we start to make the subconscious, conscious, bring love and compassion and forgiveness to that part of us that thought that we needed lack and limitation to stay safe in some way, or that that's how reality is. Just bring love to the part of us that suffers when we believe that and then make a different conscious choice Through affirmation, through meditation, through action, through taking actions that reinforce abundance and generosity and plenty. Not just affirming it in our thinking, but actually doing the action to back it up. Belief is not just a thought, it is a quality of vibration.
Speaker 1:And Jeshua continues and you fall yet again into a field. Oh, by the way, I do feel like I'm going all over the place, but I feel like I am hitting the main points that stand out to me. So if today feels like it's all over the place, hey, some days are going to be like that, and I trust that you're going to hear what you're going to hear. All right, I just have to address that, otherwise I'm going to go nuts inside my own head. Oh, this isn't good enough, oh, you're not making any sense. And then I just sit here re-recording over and over and over again, and that's not helpful for anybody. So, hey, I'm human too.
Speaker 1:Here we go and Jeshua says and you fall yet again into a field of energy, into a dream, into a physical universe, into a timeframe, into a family structure that resonates and vibrates with how you have learned to perceive yourself All the while you are yet that one radiant, perfectly free, using the very power of God to create and believe in a dream of smallness, weakness, separation and loneliness. And that's what he's been saying and what we've been talking about. Dream into this physical universe that, by definition, feels, physical feels, things are separate from one another into a time frame you choose, or you fall into a time frame, a family structure, a family belief system, a family trauma system that resonates and vibrates with how you have learned to perceive yourself. I'm nothing, I'm worthless, I'm shit Boom. It's not a punishment. It's what you believe you're worthy of. And then you create the experience.
Speaker 1:But your soul is not at the mercy of this. So in any moment, your soul is like all right, let's use this to wake up. Right? This is what A Course in Miracles and the Way of Mastery says. The minute you dreamed of the separation, the Holy Spirit kind of responded to it. It's like the separation never happened. The dream never happened, although it feels like it's happening, but it never happened because it's impossible to be separate. So we come into this human experience, our soul uses it to learn and to grow, and it's not a punishment. We have to say that over and over again. And so every soul, every being is exactly where they need to be for their unique curriculum.
Speaker 1:The mistake we make is judging. That is saying no, they don't deserve to be there, they don't belong there. Why are they having this kind of life and these people over there having that kind of life. That's not fair, that's injustice and all these things. When we make these generalizations, I'm not saying don't help people, I'm not saying like, don't feel called to be of service, to try and bring more love into the world and however you feel called to. But it's just these big sweeping judgments that we make that, oh, look at that person's situation, that's horrible. You have no idea what their soul curriculum is. And that doesn't lessen your compassion and your open heartedness. It actually respects them.
Speaker 1:I would say more, in a way, because you're seeing them as a sovereign soul who is completely capable to have the experience that they're having, knowing their soul is using it for growth. Because if that's true for them, that's true for me, that I can have the experience. I'm having it. My ego might go kicking and screaming and hate it and hate what I'm moving through and suffer all the way. And yet as I heal and grow and transcend the experience by moving through it, not getting out of it and running away from it, but by using it, I can see that, oh my gosh, my soul has been with me the whole time. My love has been with me. Spirit has been with me as I've moved through this situation and I return to love. I remember who I am, that this bad dream actually actually never happened, even though when I'm in it it feels really real. And I'm not gonna bypass it by saying, oh, it's only an illusion, it's only a dream. That is a bypassing technique To not feel, to not just let ourselves be where we are and be honest with ourself.
Speaker 1:That's why self-honesty is the greatest act of love that one can give. Remember that lesson. It's like when I'm honest with myself this is where I am. And with humility it's like, hey, god, hey soul, hey, higher self, hey, spirit. Like I know I'm lost. I don't know how I got here and I can't undo it. If I could, I would have done it. So I need help. And then the universe responds with help. Spirit, god, your higher self, whatever. Universe responds with help. Spirit, god, your higher self, whatever responds with help.
Speaker 1:Jeshua sent us this book, sent us this teaching. That's part of the help. You ask for help. Boom, here's the way of mastery. And then, as we'll learn later on a little bit of a spoiler alert it's you bringing this back to yourself, because there's only one self anyway. Anyways, that's getting a little too out there, but let's bring it back to this.
Speaker 1:So Jeshua says you're having this human experience commensurate with what you believe you're worthy of from an ego standpoint. And Jeshua says and all the while, you're that one he could say God, universe source, but he's using the term. You are that one, radiant, perfectly free, using the very power of God to create and believe in a dream of smallness, weakness, separation and loneliness. You couldn't even have that experience if it not were for the power of God, for the power of consciousness. So it's all happening within the ocean and you're in this tiny, inch by inch little space of the ocean, saying I'm separate, I'm not enough, I'm unworthy, and meanwhile you are the whole ocean, and that's free will and that's unconditional love that God's not going to invalidate itself, saying you can't have a certain experience that would limit itself. So God allows all things, love allows all things, love embraces all things, love transcends all things.
Speaker 1:Last paragraph for today, jeshua says, right now, as you read these words now in italics that is what you're doing. You are choosing how you will think of yourself, and how you think of yourself is reflected in the world that you see and the experiences that are manifest within your own particular universe of consciousness. You so. So let's reverse engineer this and we can't hear this enough. Look at the experience you're having in life and then that will show you, that will reveal to you the beliefs and the thoughts about yourself that you're holding at a subconscious level. So if your experience in life is one of man, I just can't get ahead. Life is just always beating me down. I just have to be in survival mode all the time.
Speaker 1:Then you trace that back. Well then, what beliefs, what thoughts are you holding about yourself that would create that experience? I'm not enough, I'm not resourceful, I'm not supported, right, those are all some beliefs that could we're just making up this scenario could create that experience that you're having. And you reverse engineer it and you get curious and you ask that question huh, what belief? What story you know? Byron Katie has a similar thing what story are you telling? What belief are you investing in about this situation? And if you don't like the experience you're having, start to invest in a different belief, a different thought, because they're all just thoughts.
Speaker 1:But you've decided on some level probably not subconscious to believe in certain thoughts, maybe because your parents believed in them and you just thought, well, that's how it must be, because, look, they're my parents, they are the authority right On a human level. We do that. And then, as we grow up, we're like, holy shit, my parents are super flawed too. Holy shit, my parents have a lot of trauma they've never dealt with. They have a lot of healing that they never did because it wasn't part of their culture. Their parents didn't do it. Whoa.
Speaker 1:And I've been letting these conditions, this programming, impact my entire life, every decision I've made, how I see the world, how I see myself, based on them and nothing against them. They are really hurting and flawed and not perfect, and they're not really the authority. They did the best they could and I love them. And I get to make my own choices. I get to choose my own set of beliefs, my own core values. I get to choose how I see the world. And that can be challenging, because the programming can feel so deep. It can just feel like well, that's how it is, that's how I've always thought what do you mean?
Speaker 1:And then, when you start to change something, it takes effort. It takes effort and repetition and commitment over and over and over and over again, just like learning any new skill, and it takes the willingness and the desire to see evidence of the new belief. If you've grown up with this really hardcore belief there's not enough in the world of lack and scarcity and competing for resources, it's going to take a lot of effort to shift that belief. It is, and a willingness to look for examples, to look for experiences that prove your new belief that there's plenty in the world, that there's abundance everywhere. When I go out in nature and I see the leaves, look, there's abundance everywhere. When I see somebody do a kind gesture, look, people are kind everywhere. You will experience what you choose to see. As a man thinketh, so will he be, so will he experience. It's these same teachings, just packaged in different ways.
Speaker 1:But it takes vigilance, it takes a commitment. That's why I love coaches, that's why I have coaches, that's why I love community, that's why I love being in groups. When you go to the gym and work out, it's more fun when you're working out with other people and they kind of have goals to learn and grow together and we know when we've kind of got goals or things we're moving towards. Resistance comes up, fear comes up, the old beliefs come up, and that's why a community of people being like, hey, I'm doing this work too. It's hard and I'm in it right now. I need a little encouragement. Or, hey, look at this win that I had. If I can do it, you can do it. That's kind of what this way of mastery community is supposed to be about.
Speaker 1:That's what the podcast is like. You're not alone in doing this work. It can be really challenging sometimes. That's what the Facebook group is about. It's not really so much me leading anything. It's about you, the community, supporting each other, bringing your own questions, sharing your own wins, and we grow organically in that way. So, anyways, this is all we have today. I love you guys. I hope this session was a little valuable for you. You got something of value If you thought of someone in your life just randomly, as I was talking and I was sharing something, and they popped in share this episode with them. You don't have to give them any context. Hey, I like this episode. I thought of you. Or maybe you don't want to think, you know, you don't want to say I thought of them in case it wasn't something flattering, but you think the ideas will help them speak. Hey, I was listening to this and I wanted to share it with you. That's it, all right. Love you guys. If you get value, please like, subscribe, share and we'll see you next time.