Greetings All –
You
are beginning to learn how to learn, and you are seeing the world change as a
result. Review Step 266 (MP3)
TODAY
AS BEFORE REVIEW THE PAST TWO WEEKS of preparation. Take this opportunity in
your long practice period today to review all that has transpired in these past
two weeks concerning the directions given in this preparation, your experiences
of the practices and the overall results in your life. Carry on this Review
with as much objectivity as you can, especially regarding the results in your
life, many of which you still cannot assess objectively.
MANY
THINGS WILL CHANGE AS YOU PROGRESS in your studies. Some things will fall away
from you; other things will begin to build. Worldly problems will press upon
you that require your engagement and application. Other things that you thought
were problems will become increasingly remote and unnecessary for you to
concern yourself with. Thus, your outer life adjusts itself so that you can
recognize where you are to apply yourself now. Then, your inner life and outer
life can reflect one another. This is very important. You are beginning to
learn how to learn, and you are seeing the world change as a result. The
quality of your experience will be transformed in time so that all things, both
common and extraordinary, will be viewed from a different viewpoint than
before. You can then learn to take advantage of all opportunities and thus
learn to appreciate life, even in its disappointments.
PRACTICE
THIS IN THE REVIEW TODAY. Be very thorough in your investigation. Begin with
the first lesson in the two-week period and follow it day by day. Recognize
what happened in your life each day. Try to remember. Try to concentrate here.
In this way, you will feel the movement of your own life. It is in recognizing
this movement over a period of time and seeing how the stages of your life
progress that you will realize that you are firmly on the road to Knowledge.
You will then see that there will be less and less behind you to hold you back
and that the future will open itself to accommodate you increasingly. This is
the beneficence of life bowing before you who are becoming a student of
Knowledge.
PRACTICE
266: One long practice period.
Plan B - If the MP3 doesn’t work, here’s the link
to the folder: New Message - Student Spoken Steps Recordings -
Steps to Knowledge - Working file
If this is your first time seeing one of the “Steps to Knowledge”,
then welcome. There are 365 Steps, daily spiritual practices if one seeks to
complete them in a year, but that is not necessary. They can be used by people
of any religious tradition or no religious tradition. They will help one to
become mindful in the world.
The Step today is from the book: Steps to Knowledge: The Book of Inner Knowing. The practices were
brought to the world through Marshall Vian Summers, The Messenger for The New
Message From God. Important background for the Steps is in: “Greater Community Spirituality” and the “Wisdom Books - I and II”.
Hard copies are available from the New Knowledge Library Store. The
Society for the New Message from God also has a Free Book Project. If you need
the books now, PDF files can be found here: http://goo.gl/RJuuGP
Keeping a journal is recommended. If you have a Steps book,
write your reactions and comments, highlight or underline points that strike
you, and date the note. In this way, your Steps book can be a partial journal.
Using the PDF, you can print out pages as you need them, or use
the software to maintain a digital copy where you can enter notes and highlight
text that stands out.
Other modern methods of keeping a journal include having a
document on your PC or phone to keep notes. You could send yourself an email or
use the voice recorder function. It is important to capture insights and
reactions because it is by this means that you can understand change. Sometimes
it may just be a word or short phrase, an image or a scene.
To end this post I again offer the blessing: "May the
presence of the Teachers be with you." In the invocative language of
Knowledge this blessing is: "Nasi Novare Coram" (pronounced NAH-see
no-VAHR-ay co-RAHM)
The short form of Nasi Novare Coram used by students is NNC.
The short form of Nasi Novare Coram used by students is NNC.
NNC
P.S. Often it takes 18 months to get through the Steps once. For
this blog, the pace is one-a-day, but it really makes no difference how fast
you do it, only that you begin, persist and repeat. Posts linked below 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.
Doing Steps with only the texts, messages and your life
experience, including what you may have studied and practiced is your journey.
I’m showing Step comments after the Step, so as not to influence anyone in
advance. It is a wilderness trek to be left to your own wits, but then you can
also listen more closely for guides, angels and teachers, always first saying:
“I surround and protect myself with the Love and the Grace of God.” Thankfully,
I was taught this practice in 1989.
