What is Self-Reliance?

Self-reliance is not the act of using what you already know to get what you want in life.

Self-reliance is taking responsibility to find out what you do not know in order to truly live.

Work Item- De-personalize your faults

De-personalize characteristics that you see as your faults.

When you identify errors or shortcomings, cease to see them as yours. Treat them as being visitors, not residents of the entity that you call YOU. And then...watch how uncomfortable that is for you. This will teach you a valuable lesson.

Trouble (journal entry)

I cannot see the trouble if I am the trouble.

Developing Spiritual Ears

There is a spiritual adage which says, “Let those who have ears hear”

Awareness is the very means by which we develop our spiritual ears.

Self Exploration

For most, the exploration of self ends the moment something unpleasant is discovered. Although searchers thoroughly enjoy the discovery of mysterious and interesting facts about themselves, they recoil at the sight of anything unpleasant. It is too much for them, so they turn back to their old ways—and attempt to make them seem new. If they only knew the freedom that comes from fearless self-knowledge, they would certainly continue on.

Buried Knowledge

The most valuable pieces of knowledge, like precious gems are buried deep beneath the surface, not lying around in plain sight where we insist on looking for them.

Easy vs. Difficult

Learning to live an awakened life is not difficult at all. In fact, nothing could easier or more natural. The difficulty comes only in parting with preferred illusions.

All of Your Questions

Replace all of your questions with just one question:

“Am I awake right now?”

Imperfection

It is only Ego, which demands perfection and immediate results. The True Self has no quarrel with imperfection. It knows that only a better understanding is necessary.

The Idea of Freedom

Man’s idea of freedom is walking from one prison he is tired of into a new one he prefers.

Student & Teacher

Student: How do I become free of Ego?

Teacher: If I tell you, will you follow my advice?

Student: Yes, if it sounds good to me

Teacher: Begin then, by exhausting all ways, which sound good to you.

Complacency

Complacency is not a lack of action; it is the lack of new action.

Getting Real Help

One man chooses his idols and their ways to merely imitate.

Another man will take the ways of his idols and adjust them to suit himself.

Yet another insists on building his own set of ideals to follow.

All have forgotten to look up for Real Help.

Heaviness in Thought

Man is heavy with thought, which weighs him down. He fails to see that lightening his load is the way to move upward.

Intellect

Let intellect be the final recourse of a man who will not see anything higher than his own self.

Overindulgence

Man becomes concerned with overindulgence only when it makes him look bad.

Your Search for Truth II

The search for Truth may take you to a thousand places, but it will eventually lead you home.

Your Search for Truth

The search for Truth is always cheerful and uplifting. When it is frustrating and confusing it is only because you are really searching for something else, hoping it turns out to be Truth.

Calling

Why do you call yourself anything at all- particularly spiritual?

Making Something Happen

If you really want something to happen, stop trying to make things happen.

Immersed in Self (journal entry)

While immersed in self, I have no control whatsoever upon my thoughts, actions or intentions. While apart from self I control my entire world.

Liberty

Truth freely provides the greatest liberty of all, but human beings shun it in favor of their trivial earthy ones.

Rights

You have no right to anything.

And why would you want the right to anything? You already have everything…

My Indentities (Journal Entry)

I can see the flimsy structure of my personal identities in how easily they are shaken.

The Pleasant Faker

The nice faker puts themselves in a most difficult position. They convince themselves that their form of fakery is helpful to the world. The world concurs to the detriment of the faker.