INTERPERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS

Q: RAYSON, could you elaborate on personality commingling that you referred to earlier?

A: Yes. You may sit alone and read the truth in The Urantia Book. You may have a thought of truth on your own. But when another personality imparts this truth or thought to you and you are there to receive it, to catch it, your personalities commingle, and if the truth or thought is carried on a circuit of love it will hit its mark, and that is the power of what happens here. You are listening to my words but you are feeling the depth of my love for you as I say them, and this is unfathomably more powerful than reading these truths.

Think of the Apostles, for in truth the message of JESUS is no different than the message of The Urantia Book. Both have taught us that God is a loving FATHER and that men are all brothers. To have received this lesson at the foot of the Master would be much more impactful than to have quietly discovered The Urantia Book on your own and read by yourself. Personality is the gift of The FATHER. When two personalities participate in give and take, a new facet of the Supreme Being is born. It is an act of creation as well as an act of learning. Does this answer?

(Affirmative response.)

Student: I sincerely believe that I am specially blessed in being included. At first I didn't know whether to believe in the teaching mission or not. And as you said, the love that is felt is part of the convincing - listening to the tapes of brother HAM teaching his group, and all of the love that I felt in his voice before you came to join us, convinced me. That what seemed true to me had to be real - that the method was real - because the love was for real. And we feel this same love from you, and are very grateful.

RAYSON: Thank you, (student). As I have grown to know each one of you, personally, and develop our little personal relationships, my love for you has blossomed. And of greatest importance is that you experience the veracity of my love, for it is the same love that comes from The FATHER for you and can come from you to each other.

Q: RAYSON, when we rediscover this simple truth we've been talking about, and we do that with another person of whose knowledge is commingling, and we do it - in a way - a lot of it is like a creation that moment. Isn’t it? Or did I misunderstand what you said?

A: No, you understood perfectly. It is like the creation of a cell in the body of the Supreme Being.

Student: Thank you RAYSON. That's why it's so terribly exciting.

Q: RAYSON, does this personality commingling have anything to do with the fact that – a person can help to heal himself by association with another person who simply cares for him and has a positive relationship with him or her?

A: Yes. Of course. There is no hurt that - there is no boo-boo that is not made better by a kiss. (laughter) There is no great mystery here to personality commingling. It is simply talking to each other, relating. It is simply one unique child of God with one other unique child of God interacting through love. The greatest lesson is learned there. The greatest love is felt there. It’s simple. It happens all day, all the time, to every one.

(S), every burden is made lighter when shared with a friend. I spoke earlier of a circuit of love. We talked about how effective teaching is when it's sent from teacher to student on a circuit of love. That is what helps it hit its mark. This love between personalities is powerful, and when experienced, can and has many times changed the entire emotional - and ultimately spiritual - life of beings, of people. If one is burdened and holds those burdens to himself, he carries their full weight. If a friend is present and expresses love, the circuit is affected and the burden travels across the circuit to the friend who - in a moment - shares the load and the weight is lifted.

The FATHER also provides you with this circuit, but more readily accessible to you mortals on Urantia at this time are the circuits created by your personality commingling. You must learn to lighten your burden by allowing your brothers and sisters to love you and carry their weight.

Q: Is there any qualitative difference in my relationship with other beings in this area and my relationship with you or other spiritual-morontial God?

A: Yes. I am sorry to say that though I love you deeply I cannot share the weight of your Urantia life experience as readily as those who are here with you. You may appeal to me to your angels, to MICHAEL, to The FATHER and receive great amounts of love, however the mortals of Urantia can provide an empathic experience of friendship that is founded on shared material electro-magnetic life that we cannot give you. Therefore, for the trial of Urantia life the burden is better shared with other mortals. (08/16/92)

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Q: What are the meaning and value of relationships on a celestial basis? When we are in our mansion worlds and beyond, can we maintain the same interpersonal relationships we've had on this planet? Do we continue on with our friends and relatives?

A: This depends on the level of progressive attainment that you have attained at that time and your relation to these other beings. You will be given an opportunity to keep on with these same relationships in the same way. But since you will be looking at your relationship from a different perspective, you may wish not to. This will be entirely up to you and your integration of your knowledge and your learnings in application to these matters at that time.

Q: Could you comment on the function of the ego in interpersonal relationships?

A: The ego is understood differently amongst each of you. When your will, your seat of identity is of a physical and mental plane of identity, when you identify with the comforts of physical life, when you identify with your status, your perception by others, your reputation, and you base your actions on these, you can say that this is caused by your ego. This is how it is taken or understood by many. In this context it will be dissipated - your ego will not be.

When you place your seat of identity in the Thought Adjuster or your soul, then when you deal with others, in your relationships you will act not in your own best interests nor in their best interests, but in the interests of The FATHER.

Q: What would you do to increase the spiritual value of our interpersonal relationships?

A: You can pray and worship and realize yourself. Self-mastery is the key to service and the best of relationships. When you have mastered yourself you are doing the will of God. When you relate to others, when you serve them, you will not be serving them because of your own ego, or your self aggrandizement, or your wish to be known as a good person, rather you will serve in the interest of God and you will relate to others with the intention of doing the will of God. This does not mean that you cannot express your own feelings of love, of empathy, compassion, and other spiritual and high emotions, because these are in line with the will of God. So the more you can realize the best part of yourself, and master yourself, the better will be your relationship with others including beings of celestial origin and the Creator.

Q: I've had several experiences that you might care to comment on if you feel it's appropriate in this environment relating to my opening up in my relationship to you and to a teacher. In terms of relationships, I have thought about the past month rather heavily the statement in The Urantia Book that the act is ours, the consequences God's. And I find that to be an incredibly powerful statement concerning ego and concerning the machinations of the human mind, that statement seems to be incredibly freeing in the sense that - for myself – it just means to just go about the business of being perfectly human, as opposed to the human conception of perfection which we all have. It's impossible to live perfectly on a sphere that's imperfect. But to be perfectly human is perfectly possible. And that comment about the act is yours the consequences God's appears to me to be one of the keys in the book in the sense that it makes us free to relate to both our brother and sister human beings as we see fit with the concept of values and meanings as (S) brought up. And also it frees us to relate to those celestial personalities that we might care to relate to. I also sense that there might be an entire lesson perhaps planned on that comment because I see it to be a pivotal and powerful and very simple statement. So I was wondering if you can confirm my experiences, or deny them, and comment on “the act is ours, the consequences God's.”

A: Your experiences are real, although they have been attenuated by your mind and ego. As to the statement from The Urantia Book “the act is ours, the consequences God's,” in your daily lives you act to make decisions. Some are based upon previous experiences - positive or negative. If they are positive, then most likely you will act positively. And vice versa. There are things, which are not – or cannot be - based upon previous experience because you will, I hope, look at each new bit of information without bias. But it is information, which is of value, and you will re-evaluate. When this happens, sometimes you do not know whether you should act or not. Your previous experience may tell you that you should not act. Some new information may tell you that you should act. When it is of spiritual value, and you think that it might be or could lead to value in a person, then by all means act! Your celestial backup, so to speak, will make the most out of the situation, the acts. What you have done will lead to a train of results. If you find out that it is negative, that you should not have done your act, well - of course - it is too late. But you may learn from that. That is the purpose of acting. Without action, how will you know? This is the meaning of experiential knowledge. If you always only do what you know to be true, you may never make a mistake. But you will never gain these valuable lessons from making a wrong call. So, do not act upon fear that you will make a mistake. Act!

Q: RAYSON, how is it best to deal with the difficult personality, someone who is maybe very abusive? Which is the best way for us to deal with that for our own best spiritual growth - and for theirs?

A: Try to find out what makes that person abusive. Pray for that person. Try to find out what interests that person and communicate on that level. And after achieving some kind of feeling for each other, expand into other aspects such as his perception of God, his perception of how to relate to others, his or her way of dealing with problems, of dealing with that person's insecurities. Find out how vulnerable that person is. Is he open and willing to let others into his inner core? Or is he arrogant with an outer shell? Most people who are abusive are the latter. They are abusive because they have a soft inner core, which they will not let others into. And so when it is threatened and when it appears that that defense is broached, that person will lash out with an invective or an act, which is aggressive and abusive.

To try to forcefully penetrate that person's defense is unwise. It is better to subtly get closer slowly, little by little, into that person's confidence and once you have attained a relationship where that person is willing to let you touch his inner core, then you may try to talk to him about the love of God - His unconditional love - and the love between his brothers and sisters which he can have if he only opens himself. This will be a slow process and you may be emotionally hurt in the process, But, do not fear. If you desire to make this person a better person, less abusive person, you can. But do not be a - do not approach this person with the purpose of changing the person, or to be a teacher, or to place yourself above that person. Rather, place yourself side by side as you would to a brother or a sister and then proceed on that level of being.

Q: Do we have the responsibility to be in the space of very difficult people, or can we just love them and bless them and not be in their space.

A: You do not have to do this. Only if you wish it. If that person is so abusive and it is beyond your power to deal with that person, then try to avoid that person, by all means. You know what you are capable of. And you know what you are not capable of. Use this knowledge of yourself to ascertain the best way to deal with this person.

Q: What is our responsibility for people we don't know, particularly groups of people on our planet who may be suffering that we are concerned about but we don't know how to help? We feel overwhelmed with helping large groups of people whom we may never know but we still feel concern for?

A: Would you like to express how you feel? Do you feel that you should be doing something, but that you cannot?

Q: Yes, I feel like there are things that you might be able to do, but I worry with some of the things that other people have said to me, that some other things you might be doing would be self aggrandizing, helping people do what you think they need to have done to have a better life. I wonder if, when you are helping people, how much you might be bringing in your own ego, or when you are helping them in the ways that they need to be helped.

A: Even when one is helping others because one wants to self-aggrandize one's self that is not necessarily bad or evil. Sometimes one must do that. One must act, but the feeling for service is in them. And through that action, you will realize whether that service was, indeed, for your own purpose or if it was for The FATHER. But yes, you must act if you feel like doing service, yes. Put your heart and soul into doing that. If it turns out that you are merely inflating your own ego you will know - and then you can look into yourself and find out how you can serve others by achieving self-mastery in doing the will of God. For once you have achieved self-mastery, this feeling of wanting to do the will of God will be so overwhelming that you will not be able to keep it stoppered in you. It will by its own nature express itself.

As for the many unfortunate beings who are in their state of hunger, homelessness, sickness, and war they are out there not just on this planet but also in the universe. We must help when we can, but we must try to make sure that we do not become one of them. If each person tried their best so that they do not become dependent on others in the matter of needing hand-outs, and to try to achieve - let me rephrase that - if all of us did our utmost to achieve self-mastery, there would be less hungry, destitute, and beings of unfortunate circumstances. In other words, let us take care of ourselves so that others do not have to take care of us. When we have done that, when we are self- sufficient and we have gained enough material wealth - accompanied by spiritual and mental wealth - then we may go out and serve those who are less fortunate. But before we look to taking the mote out of the one who cannot see, let us take the beam out of our own eye. (11/15/92)

"Michael est toujours au Volant."

(Michael is always at the Steering Wheel.)

11:11 Angels