Meeting 11 3\/07\/1975

March 7,1975

SERENA SAYS

(Fred 1/3/2010 text cleaned up, punctuation and paragraph editing in process.)

SERENA: Someone can sit in my chair. I enjoy sitting on the floor. Andy, would you put this over there for someone to sit on? All beliefs gathered together. We're just seeing different scenery on the roadside - it's the same road. So, if there are any questions, please feel free to ask them because I think I do my best talking when someone gives me a push as to what to say.

But before you do that, Linda Brown asked me to talk on purification of ourselves, so this is what I decided I would do. It is very important that with all the things that man has ready to learn now, all the books he has, and all these things, that we learn the one main key to finding God within ourselves and everywhere we look, and that is through purification of ourselves. Purification of our minds to pull the lower desires into higher desires and then on into no desire at all. This is what we are striving for, to purify, to completely clean this sacred vessel that we have been given, so that God can function through it even better than He is now.

Nothing exists but God. And with that thought in mind, it makes it easier to put God into our lives, because you are not putting anything new there, you are just acknowledging what has always been. To purify ourselves is a long and hard process sometimes. Because when God begins to clean a vessel, He is very slow and very thorough in His cleansing so that no particle of dust will remain in his sacred temple. So it is that we begin this purification process by focusing all our love on God.

It was that when Jesus walked the earth, there was a woman named Mary Magdalene which came to Him. And she recognized that Jesus was from God. And she loved Him, but she was not pure, and many of her ways had not been what man considered good. But she loved Him the only way she knew how. And at that time it was a physical attraction. But she got down before Him, and she wanted Him. She loved Him. And the only love she knew was physical love. Her ideas were not yet pure. Her love was not yet pure. She was at that point an unclean vessel, but she was on her way to beginning to know God. And when she recognized this man, and she said, "This man is a holy man." At first she felt ashamed of the way she felt for Him, when the other men laughed at her, and scorned Jesus. "For how could you love this harlot?" And Jesus said, "This one recognizes me far more than any of you who make these remarks. She sees me as I am as much as she can see, that is what she sees. And she does love me far more than you men who call yourselves good. For she loves me the best way she knows how." And so it was at this point Mary Magdalene began to realize that Jesus could see exactly what she was, and He loved her. He saw the God within her, both God illusion and God reality, and He loved her. And this set her on her path of self purification. When she knew and acknowledged that fact that Jesus was from God, and that He did love her, she began to get rid of the "seven devils", as they term it, which are the Seven Sins of all mortals. She began to be purified because she loved him the only way she knew how.

And this is how it is with us today. To place our love in God as best as we know how. He loves us for it. And to fully place our love on God, whatever we conceive Him to be, or a Master, then it is that we begin on the road to self purification, giving all we have to God, knowing that sooner than we think, we will have even more to give. Because the more we give, the more we do receive to give. And so it is.

There is a story of Krishna with a young lady a long, long time ago. And all the people made fun of Krishna. "Krishna, why is it that you spend so much time with this one young girl? What's wrong with the rest of us?" And we could compare this to the story of Mary Magdalene and Jesus. And it was that Krishna said, "Okay, all of you come and gather together with me today." And so they did. They all came. And he took a sieve and a bucket of water and he said, "Okay, all of you, line up. The one who can pour the water through this sieve, and it doesn't go through, then that will tell me you're pure." So all the people lined up, and they all dumped the water through and it came right through. But the young girl he had been spending so much time with, she took the bucket of water and she poured it in, and it didn't go right through. And he said, "Now see, she's pure."

And this is how Jesus saw Mary Magdalene. You see, although the people talked very badly about the fact that Mary Magdalene was there, it was like when Krishna looked at the young girl, he saw what lay ahead for her, because he saw that she was willing to give far more than the others. So it was that Krishna let that happen. He was a man of miracles, too. But this is the story of the "seven devils". They were the devils that man faces today, the sins as you could term them. Gluttony, greed, lust, anger .. And it was that when she began to love Him, and she acknowledged the fact that He loved her, she began to be purified.

So this is an important thing for us to do today. To place our love, knowing that God would accept us just as we are, if we will continue to give our best - to serve mankind every way we can. Purity is what John the Baptist represented also. He paved the way for Jesus. Purity came before perfection. Purity paved the way for perfection. This was all symbolic also. That when we purify, we reach our oneness with God, but not until.

So all the things that we learn, and all the things that we go through every day can all be brought up into a higher light through self purification, disciplining our thoughts to a point of... You see, the human mind is so used to just standing around and you are sitting in a room like this, and just think back over the past 5 minutes, how many people did you look at and say, "Oh, she looks nice."? "He looks bad." And you looked at me and you thought, "Serena looks funny." or "Serena looks nice." "That was off tune." "That was on tune." All these things that the mind does. And is not until we still the mind, and we no longer say, "You look bad, you look good. You should have combed your hair, you should have brushed your teeth." All those things are important, but as long as we fill our minds with things like this, then that's exactly what we are. What you think is what you are. And that's very true. So when we begin to just acknowledge, "You are God." And we look at someone - if it takes added effort, be willing to give it - and find the God in them. If you have to sit there with their picture in front of you for three days or longer. Find the beauty within them. Christ said, "To be purified, do as I do." He said, "Everything I look at, I look for the face of my Father. I look for the beauty in it." And He says, "If you breathe in the air, you will become healed." Because the air contains God. And if we realize what it is that we are breathing in, then this too is a step to purification. Just acknowledging that God is.

God is everywhere. Nothing exists but God. It is God that is experiencing through us. Because our souls are a fragment of Him, struggling to know itself, struggling to regain our oneness with God.

It is when we no longer let the mind travel and say,"You're ugly" or "I don't like him." Or you lust for someone. All these things. We begin to pull the reins on these desires. We begin to put them into focus and say, "There is no lusting for God." And if we say that every man is God... You see, too many times we say this, yet if we really believed it, how could anyone make us angry?

If God himself came down, we wouldn't get angry at him. We would be afraid to. So we go around a nice comfortable way, and say, "God is everyone, and boy, did he make me mad today." Or, "I don't like her." Now think of what we're saying here. "I love God. God is everyone. I don't like him. I hate her." We're contradicting ourselves. So let that be a lesson of self purification. Purifying our thoughts, our words, and our deeds.

You see in the human language, especially in America, I guess. That's what we'll speak about. It's all over the world. We say a lot of things we couldn't mean. Not and say we love God. Because some of them are really harsh sometimes. It seems so easy to get angry and let the desire just fly out. And you say, "Oh, get the ** out of here!" Just to put it bluntly. I hear this from you sometimes. I listen in. Things like this go through and you try to catch it, and you say, "Oh, I don't mean that. I've already said it though." "Now, how do I get to God?" We say. "How can I purify?" The moment you begin to get angry, look at yourself. You're miserable. You really are. If you looked in the mirror, your eyes would be ugly because the very worst in you is coming forward to greet the God in that other person looking back at you. If we could stand above the entire situation and see our human bodies and see the way we are all day long, and we could hear the things we say, it would scare us. So it is when we begin to really appreciate what we have. That we have a human body that functions very nicely for us. I don't think that just a man can go out and design one that works as well as some of these we have. And that we have all the God we could possibly need, because we have. God everywhere. But still people are seeking God, all over the world. All over the world people are in need. And they sometimes can't figure out what it is they need. But it is God. It has to be. Because that's all there is. Nothing can last but the God that we bring within our hearts.

All these material things will fly away very quickly. If we compare one life to an eternity, it is but the blink of an eye. So why do we cling to these things which we will lose so quickly? Why can we not fill our souls with God and become complete so that all else begins to fade away? Seeking the truth of every situation, everywhere we go. Loving and not expecting love in return. Giving and not expecting to receive. Serving and never once expecting any man to serve you. These are our guidelines to God.

And you think, "What am I getting out of all this?" For sometimes you grow tired of giving and serving. But whenever we do that then we can see that we have a fault in our giving. If ever we grow tired, we must beware. Because that shows us that something wasn't pure when we were giving. Because we did expect something. Maybe not right at the beginning, but we expected something later, lest we wouldn't be so tired now. If we truly love God, we would give so far beyond what we have to give that you feel like you are almost about to empty out and it is then at that moment that God's grace restores us again to give even more. It's good to pray. It is good to meditate. Buddha said to calm the heart within. And when we don't take time to, then the Bible says, "Be still and know that I am God."

But when we don't take time to do this, Buddha likens it unto a chicken that wanted little baby chicks but she wouldn't take the time to sit on her eggs. And the eggs grew old. And the chicken was unhappy because she had no babies. But she would not take the time for them. We will only receive of God what we give to God. No more or no less. God does not give to one man and take from another. And sometimes it rushes through our heart that we wish He would. When we are angry. We feel like saying, "I wish he would drop dead." or, "I wish he would just lose everything." But these things, they are not necessary. Because it only harms us. It does not harm the other man. Excepting when the vibration goes forward and makes the man ill. So it is that we need to give of ourselves. And when it is difficult to love, if you find someone that you can't love, the fault lies in you, not in the other man. For the other man is struggling. And if we look to condemn, we must first condemn that which is within us. And that is exactly what we are doing when we condemn that other man.

So love is the key to this time and all the other times that have ever been. Every master, every guru, every teacher, whatever they wish to call themselves, have taught the same thing. Love yourself. Love your neighbor as yourself. That all men are your neighbor. Love your enemies, for all your enemies are within yourself. Which brings us back to love yourself.

Any questions? Please?

QUESTION: What do you mean that all your enemies are within yourself?

SERENA: Well, it is that every man we see is a mirror for us. And it is usually that if we have an enemy, it is because that there is a part of us that we don't like and we see it in this other man, and we wish to turn from it. Because this man is maybe nasty, and we don't like ourselves when we're nasty. The man is angry. We don't wish to think about ourselves when we are angry because, "That's just because I am human. It doesn't last very long anyway. And I'm really trying. But I couldn't help it. You would have gotten angry, too." is what we say. But every man we come into contact with is a mirror. And we see ourselves. And if that man has the same nice things in him that we feel we have in ourselves, then we have a best friend. How often is it that mortals say, "My best friend and I, we're just alike, we really are. We love the same things, we like to go to the same places." And you think, "Isn't it nice you have each other." Man usually loves himself.

• (tape change)

... If we don't, we find that the only one we harm is ourselves. Because if he did not care so much as to harm us, then certainly he will not care it we hate him. And so the damage comes within our own selves. If this man was cruel to you and you recognized this cruelty and you said inside yourself, "This is not the way." Then be we wise so as to not to do cruelty to that man and become as he looks to us.

QUESTION: How is such a situation as she described, even though you don't hate him and consume yourself that way, how can you turn around in the face of severe injustice and love.

SERENA: Because love conquers all things. And if it was that our faith in God would say, "God, you must want me to go through this, lest I would not be here." Because it is not by accident that we are here. It is not by accident that we meet the people that we do meet. And what is done is done. The greater damage is when we do not learn our lessons from these things. And if we cannot turn and see the God in that man who has done us wrong, then it will do us no good to find the God in the man who does things that we consider right, for God must be found in all, or not at all.

QUESTION: Serena, are we not asking for more punishment if we just turn the other cheek? Do we not just lay ourselves open for more?

SERENA: Well, if it is that a man is cruel, and we feel that he is cruel, then wisely, we would turn the other cheek, and when we do, we find that we are walking away. Because fools would we be if we were somewhere where we only burdened. And we must be a burden when they find it in themselves that they must harm us. That is a sign that they don't want us there undoubtedly. So it is that we turn the other cheek by moving away. By not burdening them. If a man harms us, then we should love so purely and so highly that we would recognize why he wanted to do harm to us and not wishing to bestow upon him our presence to cause him to do harm again. Then we would remove our presence from this man. And seek the understanding of why he does those things.

QUESTION: Divine, then we would not try to reason with this man?

SERENA: Well, yes, you would. You would try to talk, but if you found that your presence merely stirred something in him which made him uncomfortable and you too, then the wiser man would go off and pray and not subject him to bringing him down lower than perhaps he feels. Because he could not be comfortable during these times. We have to understand that every human is like every other human. And if there is a man who does you wrong, though he may seem to not care if he does you wrong, he does. And we know this is true when we remember how many times we've said things to people that we didn't mean. And you suffer because of it. You hurt within yourself because of it. So if we are wise we will know that there is no man who is happy when he is cruel to anything. It is but a false happiness. And if we have learned the lesson to surpass and to go above this cruelty then let us not forget what it was like before we had gone over this cruelty. Let us remember there was a time when we were like them. And if it is that we cannot recognize this, then it is that we are not above this at all. That we are right there with them.

QUESTION: Would you enumerate the balance of the "seven sins" or mistakes we make?

SERENA: Well, it is just that everything when brought up into Truth, which is what we are seeking to do, whenever we see the truth of all situations, it is that we cannot any longer sin. For sin is an imperfection. And Christ said, "Become like me," and that we have not become like Him tells us that we are imperfect. And our imperfection causes what seems to be evil, or seems to be negative, or seems to be sin. It is not any more than lack of understanding. Sometimes lack of true love. And all the time lack of God within our hearts.

You go beyond lusting or becoming angry or greedy, because you love so much that these things fade away. It's not something that we sit here tonight and say I'm not ever going to do any of these things again. It's a process of so beginning to love God, so beginning to seek God's face in everything we look at, so beginning to become that which is pure that these things no longer have dominance over us. They begin to leave because you don't need them anymore. God's love far replaces anything that we think now is important to us. When you have God, that's all you need. And if we begin to fill ourselves with him, fill these sacred vessels that we have been given with this sacred wine, which is God. And when we become filled let us pour it out upon the land and fill every man.

QUESTION: I would like to pick up the thread again about the question that you had. I feel that, I believe that many of us have had this question that you voiced in our minds because after all it is a question of human relations, and each one of us comes almost daily in a situation where we feel we would like to cut loose with a hard answer or feel that we must turn away from somebody or think "Oh, well, who are you or what are you or what do I have to do with you?"

Yet the situation to me - more or less severe as it may be always boils down to one or two things. We can tell ourselves what has been done here or what has been said here to me is the outcome of my own karma. Therefore, we can say, "Well, this may have been a situation where I have had it coming." Because inevitably as we do, so shall we be done by others. Whether it comes in this lifetime or in another lifetime,it matters not, it does come. So with this understanding we would be one step ahead if this thought flashes into our minds, and we say now wait a minute, maybe it is something that is my just reward from the past. Or else we could consider even though we know the person is wrong, he is the one that right that minute is making himself his karma. So what actually do we have to do with it? Nothing. Because if we feel that it was gross injustice, that we have been harmless towards this person, that we harbored no bad thoughts, that we did not direct bad thoughts towards him or her, and they still turn, well, then we know that they are in the way of making their own karma. If we retaliate in any way whatsoever, we are adding to it, not only to theirs but to ours again. And this becomes the dreary round of reaction and action upon reaction. And every action becoming a reaction again in another life. So I think along this thought line we can at least as a first step gain control over ourselves, and say, "I will have nothing to do with adding either to my or to his karmic liability."

QUESTION: I'd like to comment on this. Supposing you are in a situation that you can't get out of - say a child being raised by parents who continually fought, and the child was helpless in the situation and therefore they are the blunt end of everything. This is not really the child's fault. This is their parents' own aggravation. If the child is to survive they really must turn themselves away from their parents or avoid all situations where they would be in the line of fire. This is what I meant. Also there are other situations, I have one close to me that I couldn't talk about it was so isolated without revealing my whole life, but there are situations where a person really can't get away physically from another person, whether they work with them or live in a close relationship, and this person wants something from the other person or desires the other person or under the pretenses of caring for the other person is turned to bitterness. And they are cruel to the other person in an emotional way. I feel that you are laying yourself open to more punishment if you say, "I forgive you, and I turn the other cheek." You're just going to get it over and over again.

SERENA: Turning the other cheek is not a weakness by any means. And if we looked at it that way, that is what it would be summed up to be. Turning the other cheek is a strength. Any man can just cower down and get ready to attack, but the strong man, the wise man, the more difficult of the two situations, is the man who can say, "I forgive you." Because unless we are perfect ourselves, then that means that that man saw something imperfect within us and he worked on it through his own imperfection, and were we both to be as we should be, one with God, as we could be, then it is that this could have no reason to take place. But the strongest of the two decisions is to forgive. If we acknowledge, if we say that that man is God, that man undoubtedly felt that he needed to do that or he could not have done it. Or let's not bring ourselves even farther down, because if he hurt us, then let's not hurt our own selves by turning against him. It's difficult sometimes, but that is one of life's greatest lessons.

QUESTION: Then the only solution to this is to get away from the situation?

SERENA: No. Maybe mentally get yourself away from them.

QUESTION: Isn't there another lesson to learn? Tolerance.

SERENA: Oh, yes. This is the greatest virtue of the saints.

QUESTION: Patience. Tolerance. Still greater things to learn from all of these things. Perhaps that is why we go through all these situations.

SERENA: There is one thing that I'd like to say on the idea of karma. What you said is very true, but I have to add one thing, let's not become so complicated and bring that added touch of coldness, to stand back and say, "You go ahead, you make your own karma. I'm not having anything to do with it." Let's just make sure that it is understood that if we acknowledge the fact that it is their karma, then if we can aid in any way by helping them to not make such a big thing out of a small situation, then let us do so. Beware of just standing back and saying I'm just going to let the whole world make their own bad karma, and I'm not having anything to do with it. We must be careful of that, because divine love can take us to a point where we want to help other men. So don't just stand back and say, "Well, just do what you want to do." But be wise in your decisions of what should be done, always knowing that if you have love, if you ask God in a situation, it will truly come out as it should.

QUESTION: You know, all these words like faith, hope, and charity, tolerance, and patience all have great meaning. And the more you study the word and the more things that happen to you so that you can understand the words, the more meaningful they are to you. They carry book and books and volumes and volumes of understanding in each and every single word. It is very complex and it takes a lot of patience, much patience, and what you have in yourself, you must understand that's mine. Okay. The man next door may have Jesus with him, or the man next door may have the devil with him, that's theirs. You must isolate yourself at times from other people, although you can love them, you must love them, but you must isolate yourself. That's something that has never been brought up. By the same token, having the tolerance and patience of other people and their actions and knowing what you do and the way you do is returned to you is the most important thing you should remember. And take care of your own little way of living. Because we will never learn unless we see other people and their other problems that through their problems you see how you must learn. Whatever happens to you follow through this formula. It's your formula and only you can live it.

SERENA: But here again, I've probably said the same thing, so if I have I don't recall saying it, but if I did, then I am correcting myself too, and I hope not to do it again. But we must be careful. There is a certain coldness that I always detect when we say, "That man, it is his own karma. I'm going to leave him alone." or "That man has his own route to go, and I don't want to bother with his." I still detect a coldness there that always makes me want to pull away the lining and put a little divine love in it and close it back up. Maybe I've said the same thing.

QUESTION: I'm sorry, I hadn't meant it that way at all.

SERENA: I said that I have probably said it too. So if I have, I am going to correct myself, too.

QUESTION: No, it wasn't meant that way. I was just trying to say this in order that in the first moment when there is a rush of disappointment or anger or an emotion of any kind, that this might be a thought like this, might be so to speak a rope that we can latch onto and pull ourselves back to a neutral level where we can gather our reasoning faculties and say, "Well, let's look at the situation. Is there anything within me that brought this on?" And even if we have the thought that maybe this has been me in the past and I have it coming, then this is all the more reason to just calm down. And I believe firmly that after this is done two or three times, that we recognize these things and then we will give room to be able to love again. So long as our emotions go helter-skelter and uncontrolled we can't love. When we are angry at someone, for that moment we just can't do it. So there is some way that we can try to pull ourselves together and say, "Now, just wait. Maybe I had it coming. Maybe it was something from my past that is coming to me now. Or maybe it is a trial for me."

SERENA: Or better yet, maybe it is what we thought of doing to that man yesterday that we met in the grocery store that was so nasty, that was in front of me and wouldn't hurry and go on and I was in a hurry and he should have seen that. So maybe that's what is happening to me today.

QUESTION: You've always got an answer if you understand the law of cause and effect. You've always got an answer for whatever happens to you. You know why.

SERENA: If we look at the karma and we say, "What is happening to me today is because of something I did 500 years ago." Well, I can bring you up a little closer. Everything that you did 500 years ago had something trigger it off in this incarnation to get it rolling forward again. So you can say that everything that is happening to you today is because of something did maybe 2 weeks ago.

QUESTION: If a person is threatened with physical violence, and you have it repeated, it seems to me that one should say to herself or to himself, that person doesn't understand love or life, and I will not be around any more to experience the same thing. And just go. Of course there are many factors in determining how soon you can go. But I think to remove oneself from the present location is a good idea.

QUESTION: While I was speaking before, I was going to say, "Get the dickens out of there in a hurry." And I wouldn't allow myself to turn the cheek. You can't turn your cheek in your own mind, and I know that I have reasons, and I have a very definite situation that has happened that calling upon the Father, and calling upon the power that you have within yourself, and placing the powerful light you have around you. I have used it and it has proven that physical violences have never come. It has come close, but never that close that it has reached me. It has come very close at times. But of course I am the type of person who doesn't have much patience either, and my temper is short, so look out. However, I do know the values of the power used, and it has worked out tremendously. I've had quite a bit of experiences in the church, and some of them had to do with that. It does have great affect upon our lives. Sometimes if we get into a situation like this lady, the nature of it gets off balance, and it is very good for you to use your own God-like power from within, and use that for protection. Just ask for it, and know that you received it, and you will receive it. That's how it works. Knowing that you will have it, that it is there, and it will work.

SERENA: Yes.

QUESTION: Will you say something about detachment, especially when we go through transitions in life.

SERENA: Like I said, once when God begins to fill us, and divine love begins to come forward from us and blossom forth, and the God within us begins to see that it is God, then it is that the detachment becomes a lot easier. We begin to see the things that we have to leave for awhile. Because in reality, we don't leave them. In reality we draw them into our heart and go on with knowing that all is God, and that if there is someone that we love and we must leave, we will see them again.

QUESTION: Not merely people, but changes in lifestyle. Like you feel like you've got it and then it's gone. Just be thinking that.

SERENA: Yes, the mind will play tricks on us and tell us we are doing well, and we are not doing well all. That why it is so important that God fits into our lives. Because the mind will say "You don't need God." This is what the mind says because the mind has no understanding. It but knows things as it sees things. So the mind says, "Man, you do not need God. You just need parties and drinking. We have enough things in the world," the mind says, "to occupy us." "We don't have room for God now. We'll wait until we get old, and then we'll start to go to church." This is what the mind says. But when the heart comes forward, the heart has understanding. No cold facts does the heart contain - just wisdom and understanding. And when the heart and the mind become friends, the mind goes out and gathers things, knowledge, and the heart brings forth understanding and converts it into wisdom. So the heart says, "You must need have God. Because God is all there is." I am God. All men are God. We need God. And we need man. So when we bring the two together - that brings up an interesting point. We need to bring the two together. They must become friends. The mind too long has dominated. But the mind is not to be looked upon as something bad or evil This mind that has no understanding, we have to give it understanding of why it has no understanding. And know that this mind has helped to learn all these lessons that we have learned thus far. But now we add a greater step of consciousness. So it is that it is the heart's turn to come forth and dominate. And when we ascend those twelve steps, then the mind and the heart are perfectly balanced, and we rise above both. But the heart is the only thing that can give us understanding. The mind cannot. Yet the heart cannot go forth and gather knowledge from the world. The mind can. The mind lives the lessons we learn. The heart gives us understanding of these lessons. The mind goes forth and seeks knowledge. The heart comes forth and exchanges it into wisdom. The mind says, "I don't know if that is true or not true. The heart comes forth and says that is true or that is not true. The heart is one of the greatest things we have. I am speaking of the heart of the soul which is one with God. The voice which speaks to us, the hand that guides us is the heart. So let us unite them. In meditation contemplate upon a busy complicated mind and a serene, peaceful heart, and merge the two knowing that one cannot live without the other in truth. And let them become friends. Let them love. Let them bring forth wisdom and truth. And let them begin to purify each other.

QUESTION: Serena, is this what causes a conflict in people between being say a realist and in idealist? The mind is a realist and the heart is wanting us to be an idealist?

SERENA: What's an idealist?

QUESTION: Well, that's where you kind of picture everything as being very good and beautiful. You don't really see things the way they are. You sort of make them flowery and nice.

SERENA: We must beware of the mind too. Because that brings up another trick about the mind. Some minds make everything look bad, and some minds wear what the humans call rose-colored glasses. So we have to beware of both. We have to find the balance. And it is when we seek the truth of situations that we find that we no longer see things that are beautiful or ugly. We don't make something of a situation that it is not. We just find the truth of it. But what you said is true. These are the heart and the mind battling each other. The man who works through the mind cannot perceive things that the man with the heart says and believes. But they are both striving. And eventually every man unites with that part in him. And every man unites them, being that all things are God.

QUESTION: I would like to say that if a person who has a great love in their heart for everything and everyone, no matter what they look at is beautiful to them, doesn't wear rose-colored glasses. And they emanate the vibrations of a great love, that when they are in a place where there is a situation, the situation dissolves. Because of the love that he emanates.

SERENA: Yes, but we must beware that we don't become false God seekers and go around - you see, we can emanate things through the aura, we can emanate vibrations that can be very false. We can be in public, and many times I have seen this in action, we can be in public and look at a man who says,"1 love you. I love you." And he is just smiling and everyone goes, "Wow, what a man." And then the man gets home and he says, "You know, she said something that I really didn't like, and it was all I could do to hold my tongue. But I kept on smiling."

QUESTION: I'm talking about only truth.

SERENA: That's what I was speaking of.

QUESTION: I'm not thinking of false. A person can very well be in a group and feel good in a group and have a great love and go home and beat his wife. But true love, a person with true love in his heart don't go home and beat his wife. He beats his dog but not his wife. I'm only kidding.

SERENA: But true love does not deal with the mind. As I said the mind is not capable of understanding.

QUESTION: Honey, I'm speaking of the love in the man's heart, love for each and every man - God love, true God love.

SERENA: I was just telling you what I was speaking of. Okay, it's settled. We believe the same thing. Which comes from the heart not from the mind like I said.

QUESTION: No, from the heart. Yes, definitely from the heart. There are not rose-colored glasses in the eyes.

SERENA: No, but the rose-colored glasses can only come from the mind.

QUESTION: Exactly.

SERENA: Like I said. Never argue with a lady, Sir. I've learned that on earth.

QUESTION: Let's do that over. That's alright.

SERENA: Pretty good. Yes.

QUESTION: Serena, do I perceive it correctly? The mind sees things in their opposite nature, or their real nature as we call it here.

SERENA: Yes, the mind can sometimes trick us without meaning to. It's just the way it's accustomed to being.

QUESTION: But the heart is like the owner of the merry-go-round. He knows what's all the way around and he knows why one horse is different from another.

SERENA: But a merry-go-round is not good unless it has children riding on it. So that's how the heart and the mind are. Everybody that doesn't already know everything ask a question?

QUESTION: This young lady spoke of detachment.

SERENA: And I so nicely got off the subject. I'm sorry. Did you have a comment about it?

QUESTION: I think that would be very good to pursue a bit. Do we in detachment mean the kind that we can look above and see the truth, and if that means detachment without becoming emotionally well, it's hard to leave the emotions out, but if we look through our mind and our heart see the truth, we don't get bogged down by it. ...(inaudible)

SERENA: You're marvelous. You said everything I would have said. Well, it is that when we become filled with divine love that you see detachment is sometimes a word that scares people, because they are trying to rid themselves of things that they feel aren't right, but they don't have the understanding of why they aren't or it would have already faded away. Upon the moment that we receive divine understanding of why something no longer is necessary for us, it leaves. So the word detachment just slowly fades into a word called divine will. That God so directs our path, because we so love, we're beginning to love, and when divine love begins to blossom forth, then these things leave us. They exhaust themselves through us. Detachment is only difficult with most humans, I believe, when it is that there is a fault within us. Detachment is difficult if we don't know why it is we need to get rid of that. We may think we know, but we do not. Lest it would be easy to let it fade from us. Is there something I should have said, but didn't? Mrs. Walters, do you have anything to say about that?

QUESTION: The only thing I would say about detachment is that as a first step to it, practice complete harmlessness towards each and all. Total harmlessness. I think this is one first step. And detachment will speedily follow.

QUESTION: What do you all mean by detachment?

QUESTION: How speedily?

QUESTION: Very speedily. You practice total harmlessness a while.

SERENA: Because harmlessness can come only when we have understanding of it. And this comes through divine love pouring forth from us.

QUESTION: I heard one time that even the adepts struggle with harmlessness.

SERENA: Yes, that's a hard one.

QUESTION: What he meant by speedily, he meant...

SERENA: Speedily when compared to an eternity but not compared to ten years.

QUESTION: Right.

QUESTION: The point is simply this. We are speaking of ideals which each of us must hold and must have experienced true effort toward the ideal. It doesn't become us to dwell on the length of time here, and yet wisdom will bring us to a personality understanding that it isn't going to happen like that. And that in fact each experience along the way needs to be closely analyzed. As you have so nicely pointed out, that understanding and wisdom comes. Now I am not suggesting that we put off anything. However, I find it very difficult to really progress in a perfect manner.

SERENA: But who is a man to say what is a perfect manner.

QUESTION: I know that I have for every two steps forward there is one step back.

SERENA: But the step back is a step forward in recognizing that we had a fault that seemed to take us a step back.

QUESTION: So it is perpetual. Eternal vigilance actually in the examination of every experience.

SERENA: Right, yes.

QUESTION: Right. That's a key word, eternal vigilance. That's true.

SERENA: Nancy had a question.

QUESTION: I don't understand what you all mean by detachment. Do you mean isolation from something?

QUESTION: No, just withdrawal from impressions which pound the mind. I think Serena has touched on this already. The impressions which pound the mind continually. The withdrawal to the self within - to a point which we find perhaps at a calm time for ourselves. Or let's say just a point of inner relaxation which we may have experienced sometime or another, and we seek to come back to this point again. Like an island of peace within us. Not for the purpose to close up against the world or against man, but a point of rest within us. And also try over and over again to hold this type of restfulness within. And when impressions or the events begin to pound us or experiences become harsh, know this as your point of detachment. And try to remove thereon. Whether this is that you are setting up a thought form that is most beautiful to you, that you are taking the line of a poem that gives you something very dear to you, touches your heart, anything that meets and opens your heart and brings rest and tranquility to you will be a point of detachment for you. And then from there on you can go out from this point to your everyday life, and feel that there is a point you can come to your own self within.

SERENA Detachment is the transformation of earth things into God things.

QUESTION You might says it is attachment to the Lord, to God instead of detachment.

SERENA Which brings us around to what I said, right? Two versions.

QUESTION Could this be a return to a peaceful mind?

SERENA: Just an opening of what's always been there.

QUESTION: Is it true, Serena, that the mind is the slayer of the real?

SERENA: Yes, because it doesn't understand.

QUESTION: Take a die-hard scientist for instance, who maintains that there is nothing but the physical world. You have here an example of the mind being the slayer of the real. He sees nothing but the physical world, and he says that there is nothing beyond that because he cannot take it into his lab and put it into his test tube and try it out.

SERENA That brings us to a marvelous realization. You see, the scientist who doesn't accept that there is anything but the physical world can be compared to this mind that does not understand, but when we see that scientist and know that he is God and know that one day soon that he will know, thus it shows us that the mind too can become one with the heart, and it too shall know. So the process of evolution is the same everywhere.

QUESTION: If this scientist is a good man and loves the people around him, he doesn't do anything bad, then I don't see anything wrong with him, except that he doesn't have this capability.

SERENA Which is just like what I said. He doesn't yet understand but he will.

QUESTION Who are we to say that we understand so that we understand. He his his own understanding, and he himself is he. We ourselves are us. We can't say that he doesn't understand. He may not understand what we understand, we certainly can't understand what he understands, so we are all individuals. As individuals we are one.

SERENA Right, but if we are talking about that he has not yet acknowledged anything beyond the physical world, this shows us that on his evolutionary path he has not yet discovered the inner planes, which is necessary for all men to discover at one time or another. Which doesn't lessen him or make him greater or anything.

QUESTION: It was just meant that his mind has progressed only to that certain point, but that doesn't mean that he is not a good man or he doesn't have his heart developed in any way. We didn't say that.

QUESTION: Excuse me. I want to say that there again we are judging whether his mind got to a certain level of understanding or our mind.

QUESTION: No. Nobody has judged anything.

QUESTION: Yes you do. You say, "Well, he's a die-hard scientist."

SERENA: Come on. This is my meeting tonight. Let's have a little peace, okay? That's how I can do it. This is my night.

QUESTION: All I want to bring out is the point of judge not lest ye be judged. We are all individuals.

SERENA: That's very true. I believe that. I believe you, too.

QUESTION: I was just reading a book this week that seems to be relevant right now. It says in the book that just as our bodies are composed of cell that have to be raised to a higher vibration before we can start taking these initiations along the path, that the world we live in is composed of cells - and we could think of different people as cells in the body of the world, and that we all have to be raised to a higher vibration before the whole world can take its next initiation on the path that earth is traveling toward God. And so we just have to all move along together.

SERENA: Man needs God and man needs man. And God needs man and God needs God. Everything has to go together. Sir, I'm sorry I got a little mad, because it reminded me of the other Friday night, and this all is just a misunderstanding. When we speak of the evolutionary path, there is no man beyond another. No man less than another, which I have stated time and time again. And for those who haven't already heard me, I'll say it again tonight, that it is that every man is striving towards God, and there is no man who can say, "You are on the right road, You are on the wrong road." There is no man that can say that at all. Because everyone must do what his heart leads him to do. But we can sit and say, "God is necessary in your life because God is all there is." And the scientist who has not yet acknowledged that there is a world beyond the physical world - we don't dare put him down, because he is learning things about this physical world that very much aid us in understanding the physical world also. And while we live in it, it is a very important part of us. It is important that we live in the world but not be of the world. And have possessions, but never be possessed. So the scientist is contributing to the evolution of the world by raising man's consciousness so as to better understand his planet. And the Masters are aiding to raise the consciousness of the planet by helping man to better understand that which is beyond this planet or within this planet. So if we all work together, the physical world and the spiritual world go hand in hand and they reach a point of supreme balance in which both are seen for what they truly are. And so all men are aiding to the growth of the planet. All men are...

(tape change)

QUESTION Well, there is always something to learn.

QUESTION Well, I'm sorry I just gave that example, and it just hit my mind as a scientist. But it is not only a scientist. There are some people who say, "When I am gone from this earth, there is nothing more." Any human being, not necessarily a scientist - I didn't mean to touch anybody - because you said the statement that the mind can be the slayer of the real. This is why I said this. But it still happens that there are still people in this world who say, "When I die, that's the end of me. There is nothing beyond." So it was not really meant necessarily only the scientist.

SERENA: There is not a whole lot.

QUESTION That reminds me of something that is not necessarily related to this. You told us one night that before you came here you were in a sleep state more or less. Then I started to think when we leave here do we - where do we go? Do we enter an active state or a sleep state? If we don't, why were you in a sleep state?

SERENA: Okay. Before I came here I recall being in a very conscious unconscious state. Because in the spirit world after one passes and leaves the physical body behind and goes into the inner worlds, things are not dense, therefore things have a rougher and more gross impression on us here in this world. In other words, things here seem larger and they seem crude and they seem rough. And when you reach the higher planes or the planes that you go into after death, physical death, then it is that things no longer have such a.. things are more free flowing and things don't... Your sight... I don't know what I'm trying to say. I usually never do this. Upon leaving the physical body it is that we enter a world where that - a little bit of hostility in the air - so it is that we reach a state of being we have such a wider scope of seeing and we don't have these dense senses like we do here. Therefore there is music and there are these things but they are not crude like they are in this world if we compare this world to the inner planes. And so it is that it is like an unconscious conscious state, because we are aware of learning, of viewing our past lives, of bringing forward ourselves again. But yet when we enter a child reviews the things that it has done before and then it is that there is a period after several days wherein that begins to fade away, and it is like a dream that you had last week, that you remember and yet you don't remember. Yet it is impressed upon you so firmly that you can't forget. But to sit down and tell someone about the dream you would not be able to. So this is what physical death is like. You are conscious, but things have no ability to impress upon you like they do in this world. So what I recall before I came forward again this incarnation was in which I was quite aware of all the functionings of the universe. Yet it was I was resting and preparing to come forward again.

QUESTION Can you say why you needed to come forward again?

SERENA One, two, three

QUESTION Was it a scary experience?

SERENA No, not at all. In fact, really nice.

QUESTION: Isn't it a fact when we leave our body and we go into the spirit world that we lose our free will that we have while we are here in this body. We are not governed by the same laws.

SERENA: Well, you don't lose it. Nothing is ever lost or gained. But like I said, upon passing the physical body and going to a higher plane, the senses are no longer as gross as they are in this world. Therefore the free will which we feel is such a magical gift down here. And gets us into so much trouble. Upon passing this world and entering another, we come to our senses, our real senses, and begin to see and actually review what you did before and you say "I agree to do this and this and this because I must learn it."

QUESTION: Perhaps I didn't ask it in the right way. Perhaps I didn't put my thoughts out properly. What I'm trying to say is, here we have the free will. Well, I can jump into my car and go to Oshkosh if I want, or I can go home and fight with my wife, or turn the T.V. on or things like that. But I felt that when you are in the spirit world, you're out of the body, lots of this free will that you have here is relieved, you are relieved of it. You have the free will of course of going in the direction of the light or going the other way.

SERENA: Upon passing the physical body it is like I said. The free will is brought up to a higher state of free will - in which we are so willing to do what God would have us do most of the time that we put ourselves in a position where that we can best flow. We have the free will, but at that point it is raised to a higher state, a keener state, a purer state. And so it is we say I would that I could learn. Or I would that I could come forward again into the physical realm and do this or do that. We don't lose it, and we are not relieved of it, it is just pulled into the higher sense, which it should be to aid us while we are in the spirit body.

QUESTION The reason I say that, I have an experience recently. A friend of mine's wife passed away. Of course I knew her for many years just recently. And she stayed around awhile and finally she just seemed to disappear. And I delved into this situation and found that she was going to another school because she was spiritually inclined, very spiritual here. She had many attributes here. She had much learning and lots of push in that direction. She was very strong minded. So she was fine. But I did find that when she was in the spirit world, I found that she was in a new class of new learning and following a higher elevation, a higher spiritual situation. And I spoke to Bob today, I was up at his home, and he said, "Gee, she's not here no more. Or she comes back once and awhile now rather than being here." And it is only recently that she left. Knowing her as I know I knew she had gone away ...

SERENA: Wait a minute. You are talking of a physical man who lost a physical wife?

QUESTION: Yes.

SERENA: And what did you mean, she only comes back every now and then. Spiritually?

QUESTION: Yes, as we are when we are without a body. As we are when we pass into spirit. I recognize these, because I speak to many people this way. And I knew that she was in another school. That she was learning. But she does come back from time to time when he needs her. And he does need her. He's kind of old now, and he does need someone. So she does come back and he knows that. Someday, he doesn't come out in the evenings, I want to bring him over, and I want him to, I want you to speak to him a little bit. I think he's got a lot to talk about. And he has a lot to say. He's very good. He's very wonderful.

QUESTION: I couldn't help but learn you say when we pass into the other plane that we will lose a lot of the dross, so I guess what you are saying is that things will be smoother.

SERENA: Right. We lose the dense senses we have here, and once again we bring forward those keener senses, which we know so well in the spirit world.

QUESTION: No matter what kind of life we lived here?

SERENA: You pretty well go on what you have learned, but it is that the spiritual realm does bring us to a better understanding sometimes. But upon entering the physical body we sometimes forget what it is we understood up there or in there or out there.

QUESTION: It's a good thing that (inaudible)

QUESTION: As we progress from one plane to another, as our vibrations increase, the astral plane will be a finer vibration than the physical, and then the causal and the mental and so forth. Earth will get finer as we go higher? Are there temples of wisdom on each plane?

SERENA: Yes, there are. Many, many schools. And it is at night or at all times of the day that you are learning in these schools to help you better learn the lessons down here. And that's why it's important to open ourselves to God. Because when we do, we also open that channel to that part of ourselves that is learning on the inner planes. And God can even better help us than when we close ourselves to Him. He is always wanting to give us everything He has, and that is a lot considering He has everything. So let us open ourselves to Him and receive so we can spread it to others.

QUESTION: When you look at these situations as teachings, can you look at things that one might call karma and cause and effect, but might also be looked upon as a deliberate lesson that you were put into that situation deliberately because of a learning you had to ...

SERENA: Because it is like entering the eighth grade. When you enter it, you might as well expect to learn eighth grade education, because that's agreed the moment you step into the class. And you're ready for eighth grade. And so it is. You see, if we consider that we are getting punished as some people like to say for something I did before. It's a lesson you agreed to learn, because you are agreeing to learn why it is that you should not have done that to the other man, that maybe you did it to. So we put ourselves here. Man is co-creator with God, and therefore we agree what it is we will learn, when we will learn it, along with the help of the lords of karma, to help us balance all our lessons and get through school, and graduation, and then become teachers.

QUESTION: And no one or no thing forces us into incarnation.

SERENA: No. Not at all. It's all upon our agreement. I was telling Hans the other night, the very moment that the soul has its first urge to know itself, which when the soul recognizes that it is a soul and at that point wishes to know itself and it says, "Father, I would do anything." And the Father says, "Okay." And at that point - He is a very agreeable Man- and as it is the first urge the soul feels to know itself, we at that point, our complete destiny is made. It's complete within us. Like the seed is a complete orange tree, but it must only go through an unfolding process. But it is complete in itself.

QUESTION: Is it true that we actually create by thought on that other plane, the exact type of vehicle and the exact type of experience we are going to need for learning? We do that?

SERENA We do that. Your soul working on the impressions that it has gathered from the past incarnations. You see the soul is like a wheel going around and around, and it is like a pipeline from the God directly onto this wheel that is turning. And as these things come forward and we relive them then they exhaust and another lesson comes forward. So it is all of our making. The God Immovable, the one source, the creator and sustainer of all things, that thing which we call Father God and Mother God, that we pray to provided all of this for us and made us co-creators that we could bring it forth when we needed to use it for the purpose of using it to better understand our Father and Mother God.

QUESTION: Serena, everytime someone mentions karma, why is it that it seems like they always have on their mind the negative aspects; they never think about the positive.

SERENA Yes, that's mortal man's usual way of thinking. I don't know. Because karma is nothing but a - it's like a chemistry book you could look at it two ways you could either hate chemistry or you could really be concerned with learning it. Karma is the same way. It is all what we make it. If we fight the teacher, we still have to go to school.

QUESTION: So we now have problems with these silly questions. Why is it that we are not allowed to remember what we were before and where we have been?

SERENA: If you look at yourself today and remember everything you have experienced in this life and look forward and be open for the things you will experience, you will have known everything about yourself that you could possibly ever know by going through your past incarnations. You are today what you have made of yourself yesterday. And you right now are in the process of forming your tomorrows. Nothing is new or old or lost or gained. It remains with you eternally, because it is you. It is that part which makes up your fragment of God, which is the God.

QUESTION: Well, I think it is a good thing that we don't remember. For the reason that you may remember that you were something that you don't like to be or hate, and that bringing with you this memory would affect you in this life, because of your thoughts and how you think and how you do.

SERENA: You see, you reach a point once you begin becoming master of yourself where you recall having lived before because you are at that time able to see the truth. Many Masters come into contact with students or gurus come into contact with students in which they see that in past incarnations that student killed them. Now were it that we were just mortal and mortal and I did not have understanding, and I saw that you had killed me before, then that might make me afraid of you, that might make me want to stay away from you. So it would be dangerous, it would not be well that I had these things until I reach understanding. Then I would see that this time we can learn to love each other, where last time we could not. But you see if I didn't have this understanding, it could be dangerous for both of us. So everything works out beautifully.

QUESTION: You could remember that you were a pirate one time, and that wouldn't be good either.

SERENA: A pirate? What was wrong with that? QUESTION: I'm speaking about a pirate aboard ship years ago when they did a lot of pilfering.

SERENA: You're not judging are you, sir?

QUESTION: I'm judging myself.

SERENA: But in the meantime you are judging every pirate who ever lived, so be careful for we might have some more in the room.

QUESTION: No, I'm judging what the pirate stands for, not the pirate.

QUESTION: Serena, I don't mean to bring up a touchy subject. A little while ago you said that you got a little bit mad.

SERENA: I did, yes.

QUESTION: Now, you are way up here somewhere, and we're way down here.

SERENA: No, I'm right here where you are. I felt anger from here, and I felt it from here, and I got mad.

QUESTION I didn't have no anger.

SERENA: You weren't the most peaceful man I've ever seen.

QUESTION: I know, but it was no anger. You misinterpreted the whole thing. Now you're taking something that isn't so. I said there was no anger.

SERENA: I said my interpretation of what I felt for you. I felt like you were hostile, and I felt like you were hostile. I felt like both of you were.

QUESTION: I'm not hostile. I never was.

QUESTION: When you were a pirate you were. SERENA: Yes, Mr. Foote.

QUESTION: Serena, you said that so beautifully that we will not have these past things paraded before our mind until we can handle them. We were just commenting on how beautiful that was, and this started me to thinking - if we should remember our past incarnations, perhaps when we were cave men, we would have some very fierce and awful things and perhaps we can't handle those.

SERENA: Yes, they could bring about unnecessary fears.

QUESTION: But don't we have to face them the minute that we pass over?

SERENA: Yes, you see these things. Mostly we review the most recent incarnation that we have had to better understand where it is that we need to go from there. That's like our road map to see where we are going.

QUESTION: What about things that make us fearful, whether they are on the physical plane or whatever plane you are talking about. But there is something that really scares you. What are we to do with these? I have read and I get from other people, "Oh, march up to it, knock it in the face, and walk right through it." But sometimes it isn't that simple. Like for me it isn't. There are some things, different things, that do scare me, and I don't know what those fear things are. You try to channel in to find out about them but then there is always a holding back, and I think that was illustrated the second time I was with you down in Saluda. Then it was that that particular obstacle, whatever it was, I don't know, but it was like after I left your presence it was something that was thrown up in front of me, and I saw it, and I understood it, and I didn't have to put a tag on it. But that was one incident. But I'm still struggling on this plane and there are things in the way of a dream or something which is a fearful thing and you always want to wake yourself up or you want to shut a door. How do you combat fear in a very general term?

SERENA: The only real thing to fear is fear. Because that is what brings us down. Sometimes when we think we fear something it's an escape type thing. Call them human survival mechanisms. We say, "I don't want to face that so I'll just be afraid of it, and then I'll call it a fear, and it'll still be there, but I'll have the tag 'fear' on it, and then I'll leave it alone because I always leave all my fears alone." So we must be careful. I'm with you all the way. I don't know what that means, but I am. What I mean by "mad." I've been saying that a lot. That's a human term to describe what I felt. Had it been my own anger, I would have said that I felt very forceful. But as it was I just felt humanly "mad."

QUESTION: Is that a very modified form of our anger, you're feeling "forceful"?

SERENA Yes, because if we allow people in here to get hostile, and no one ever says anything about it, and it keeps growing then that vibration would attack Harriet and Vesta and you, and pretty soon everyone would be getting these funny pains in their heads or for some reason they couldn't breathe well in here. And something would just hit you that you didn't like.

QUESTION As we progress, we will still feel the negative feelings?

SERENA Usually from other people. And then you just take hold of the situation and try to do something about it before it grows. You see, I'm a mirror, too. And when something like that happens, then I portray it. Better that I would than someone else. I just had visions of that other Friday night, and I just don't want to see it again if I can help it.

QUESTION And yet, most of us in the everyday world go through this what we call "practical" form of life, making a living, or fighting your way through the traffic, and sometimes you don't know what's up or down. You can only say, "Help, God, Help."

SERENA: The minute you ask, you shall receive, abundantly. Knock on any door, and you can have what's behind it. Any door you want. Knock on the door of God and that's what you will receive.

QUESTION: Did Jesus ever experience anger?

SERENA Yes, that's why he drove them out of the temple. And we used that for that other Friday night. I told them, "If you want to know why Jesus ran them out of the temple, just look." Just things like that. That was symbolic, Ken, of Jesus driving the evil out of the human body. It was an example of purification. You see this is our sacred temple, and Jesus did everything outwardly for us as symbolism today. And so when he ran through the temple with his cords, the cords represented the reins on the desires. And he drove the lust out, the greed, the money lenders, and the prostitutes. All these things because He ran them out of His temple. He purified it. He said, "My temple should be a house of prayer." And that's exactly what it should be. So that's what we are in the process of doing now.

SERENA: How many times have you shook your head tonight Fred?

QUESTION: It gets to coming too fast sometimes.,

QUESTION: I hope you never have to ride with one of us when we are driving, and hear what we have to say to some of the other drivers.

SERENA: I've heard it. I've ridden with Mary Ellen before. Mary Ellen is very open. She says to me, "I'm going just to be really honest with you, Serena. And I'm going to treat you like I would treat anyone else." So I get the treatment. She's taught me everything I need to know about mortals. I call Mary Ellen my grouch. I do love her, though. We get along very well. We balance each other. She's total negativity. What was it you asked? You said wasn't there something in the Bible that I could place you with, and I said, "Yes, maybe Abraham's camel." Didn't want you to get egotistical. She wanted me to tell her something nice. We love you, Mary Ellen. QUESTION: You mentioned ego. Will you go into that just a little more? That really is a bothersome thing.

SERENA: Sometimes things aren't ego, but we make ourselves think it is. Sometimes I notice that people think that they are egotistical, and they're not at all. And I say that mainly to you. The other night when you talked, I know you felt like maybe you were getting above, but I didn't feel that at all. I don't say this to raise the ego either, but in fact I don't sense egotism with you. Many times I sense your humbleness, and it makes me humble also.

QUESTION: I have thought that perhaps I was getting ahead of myself or above myself.

SERENA: As long as you know what you are talking about you can't ever get ahead of yourself. The ego is that little thing that thinks it is so big. Mrs. Walters, do you want to say anything on ego?

QUESTION: One of the hardest things to get rid of. This is the personality ego we are speaking of, not the higher ego. The me, myself, and I. Me, myself mostly.

QUESTION What did (inaudible) when he said that the heart can be deceived above all things?

SERENA: He's speaking of the emotional point of letting the heart love someone when it shouldn't. I don't mean love in the highest sense, because I'm speaking of the heart in the physical sense, the emotional type thing, the lower desires which we sometimes confuse to be the heart. So this is the importance of seeking the truth of all things and then we find that part within ourselves that is truth. We go beyond the illusion and see the truth of that. And when we see the truth of illusion then we have our feet firmly planted in reality. For reality sustains illusion, and illusion sustains reality. The two complement each other they need each other they are the two forces within us.

QUESTION: Serena, the other night you commented that you realized that that was the first time that you had ever lit a candle. Do you not do anything like this? What do you do?

SERENA: What do I do? I guess you are talking about just everyday things. I eat a lot of cheese, drink a lot of tea, I go to Fred and Linda's house a lot, and I see Bill Muerdter a lot, and I see Hans Picard and his wife a lot, and I see Leo a lot, and I see all of you, and think about you all the time. And I go to bed late and get up too early, and I talk on the telephone a lot and never stay in one place more than three or four days.

QUESTION: That's nice, but I don't mean here?

SERENA: You mean farther than here, you mean beyond here, within here. I do that, too. I try to work with everyone on the inner planes, helping everyone to balance and trying to tell them little things that will help them go along in their day to day lives.

QUESTION: But is it the same type of life that we have here?

SERENA: No, in this world I'm conscious of doing this type of world things, but in the other worlds I'm just conscious of helping. It's like a drifting along, and then helping someone, and a drifting along, but always helping.

QUESTION: How can we ... The development of the ability to hear those words of encouragement. Is that through the purification?

SERENA: As you open your channels. It's like sometimes you won't hear them but you will just get this revelation within you and you think, "Wow! I did it!" And I go, "No, you didn't, God did it." You see all these little funny awarenesses that come to you is all because of some Master somewhere working with you or just God helping you along. And so everything is God. I was telling the story the other night to Ken about the woman Master who told her disciples, "Before I became God conscious I thought it was 99% my effort and 1% God's grace. But upon reaching God-consciousness I realized it was 99% God's grace, add the other 1% wasn't mine either. It was God wanting me to return to him." So nothing exists but God. QUESTION: Serena, Are we mortals helping you develop?

SERENA: Yes, by helping you develop.

QUESTION: What are we doing to help you?

SERENA: Helping me to do what I want to do most - talk and try to serve. Can we do some more singing? Does anyone have any more questions? Is anyone ready to call it a night?

QUESTION: We love you.

SERENA: I love all of you.

QUESTION: Could we have some air in here?

QUESTION: And a prayer?

SERENA: Now are we ready for a prayer?

Father God, of whom it is that we are gathered here tonight, to praise thy Name, through words, through thoughts, and through deeds, light our path that we may know where Thou would have us go. Sometimes it is that we become blind. Help us to help ourselves. Help us to open our eyes to see what Thou would have us do, where Thou would have us go, and when Thou would have us do these things. Help us to fill ourselves with your eternal presence. Attune the ears of our souls to Thy ever present sound. Help us to realize the oneness of all things, and in our search to find ourselves, let us see that it is Thee searching through us for us, and around us. May we have many more nights when we can gather together. Let the praises pour forth from our souls upon our earthly lips that we might praise Thee as Thou art worthy of being praised. In Your ever blessed and Holy Name, Amen.