Today I will not try to be happy. Continuation Training Step 12

Today I will not try to be happy. CT Step 12 (MP3)

Today I will not try to be happy. CT Step 12

Being happy is the natural result of being aligned with Knowledge within yourself and of being close to those who are meant to be with you and close to that which you are meant to do. This is a deeper kind of happiness, a confirming kind of happiness, a happiness that resonates all through your life. It establishes a rightness with yourself, a sense of integrity and harmony despite whatever difficulties may be facing you in the moment. For if you are not right with yourself, then what pleasantries on the outside can allay the pain and the discomfort that this produces? And yet most people suffer under this duress, for they are not where they need to be, and they are not with whom they need to be. They are often not engaged in the right activities. And this produces a discomfort, a sense of wrongness that is very difficult to avoid.

Therefore, today do not try to be happy. Instead, look at all the activities that people do to try to be happy. Look at the expense-of money, of time, of energy trying to be happy. Look at the rewards. What a high cost is being paid for such fleeting experiences. And look deeper at whether someone is really right with their own life. The more that people are not right with their lives, the more that they have to engage in outside activities to try to allay their own suffering and discomfort. The more desperate this becomes, the greater the costs, and the more energy invested. Desperately seeking relief, they are trying to be happy.

Today you do not need to try to be happy. In your practice in stillness and in your hourly practices in awareness and discernment, take another step towards bringing your life into true balance. This cannot be done all at once. It is a process with many steps and many important decisions along the way. But each step in this direction gives you a firm foundation. This is a gift that keeps giving itself within you. Then you find happiness in work and work in happiness. And the desperate attempt to escape the world and your condition will not be so prevailing. You will find a greater comfort and a greater ease being in the world even as it is.

If you are to be a force for good in the world, then everything about your life must be in harmony. That does not mean that everything that happens to you is good. It does not mean that the world is in harmony around you. Yet it does mean that the Four Pillars of your life are in an essential balance.

Beyond your practice in stillness and your hourly practices, think about this today.

Practice 12:    One 30-minute stillness practice.

                         Contemplation practice.

                         Hourly practice.

Picture:  Las Vegas, Nevada strip – a place people go to be happy. November 11, 2006.

Plan B - If the MP3 doesn’t work, here’s the link to the folder: New Message - Student Spoken Steps CT Recordings - Steps to Knowledge Continuation Training - Working file

Chapter 12: Whom will you meet?

We continue.

NNC

Note: If you’ve some interest, but this is the first time you’ve seen Steps, you should go to the beginning blog post. From here you will learn about Steps to Knowledge and can begin it on the day that makes sense; then progress as needed. Begin at the beginning.

If you do know about Steps, but have not done Steps twice completely, read the related materials, and have a sense of the direction of this study, you won’t get the experience. The Introduction begins:

“This is the Steps to Knowledge Continuation Training. It is designed to build upon the Steps that were learned in Steps to Knowledge to enable you to experience the grace, the power and the direction of Knowledge in your life and to become an expression of Knowledge in everything that you do. If you have completed the book, Steps to Knowledge, twice through and have followed the instructions as they were given without altering the curriculum in any way, then you are now ready to begin this more advanced study”.

If you are an independent student, that is certainly an option. Posts here provide a trail that may let you have a virtual companion when and if you want one. One may have to study alone, as I did in the beginning. There are other Steps students blogging their experience and you might find a person more like you as a companion, or use a number of such Steps journeys. There are options as well through the Free School of the New Message.