Recently while visiting my dear friend Regina, I picked up one of her books by Mooji entitled Before I am and read this**:
I am reminded of a favorite passage in A Course in Miracles that tells us that we must seek and find within ourselves the obstacles to the awareness of the Love that we are. The false thought and beliefs we harbor are like bodyguards in that we feel protected by them, but yet, they are indeed the obstacles to knowing ourselves as free.
A month or so ago I had a realization that I am hiding from something, and then a day or so after reading this passage in Mooji’s book, in meditation I asked, “What am I hiding from?” I heard, “Your unattached Self.”
At first, I wondered what that meant, as I had expected something more profound, and then I realized that it is profound. The unattached Self is the true Self that we meet through our willingness to fire the false bodyguards that rob us of our true identity.
When I returned home from my trip I was prompted to delve deeper into the teachings in NTI 1 Corinthians on becoming an empty shell. I now see that in my willingness to practice this I meet my unattached Self. So in this blog, and more fully in the attached audio, I share teachings on: What, Why and How.*
What is an empty shell?
“Your self is to be given to Me now, that any self that is not your truth may be left behind. Choose not to cling to your self as you perceive yourself to be. Choose instead to lay your self aside and to become like an empty shell. That which is emptied shall be filled by Me, and one who is filled by Me shall know his own fullness.
“As an empty shell, you are filled by Me. As an empty shell, you witness the reason that is your own. Lay down your self in service to Me, that you may serve Me and come to know your Self.”
These teachings are similar to those in Eastern philosophies on the empty rice bowl. The idea being that if you come to the table with a full rice bowl, you cannot receive, but with an empty rice bowl you can be filled by truth.
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“I ask you to lay your thinking aside. This is to make yourself an empty shell. An empty shell is not the absence of you. An empty shell is the absence of delusion, which you are not. In the clarity of your emptiness, free from the delusion of false thoughts, you are free to hear your real thoughts. These are the thoughts that you recognize as Me.”
Why should I become an empty shell?
“That which has opened itself to the Spirit of God by becoming an empty shell has made a statement unto the mind that is its own. It has said, ‘I know I am not this thing I thought I was, as this thing cannot be my truth. So I put aside that which is false, that I may be open to receive only that which is true.
“When that which is false is put aside and that which is true is received and accepted, the mind listens to its truth. In its own memory, it recognizes its Self. Unto itself, it bids its Self welcome.”
How do I become an empty shell?
“Do not worry about your brother’s thought. For the thought you think he thinks is a thought within your mind. Look after your own thoughts, that you may be freed of your belief in the world. To be freed of the burden of belief is to be open to the realization of knowledge.”
This is such a great teaching! One morning several months ago, I was at the gym thinking about what I thought a friend thought of me. My “thinking mind” was in full gear as I thought about how I was going to set her straight. I like listening to audios while I’m getting ready for work, and that same morning I happened to listen to Regina teach on this very passage.
Busted!
How often do we fall into doing this without realizing that we are spinning the whole tale ourselves. We are listening to our own thoughts – the voice of the belief in separation.
For the sake of brevity I am not including all the quotes here, but it goes on to tell us that when our mind is filled with disagreements and temptations we are believing in that which is not true.
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“Practice is the answer until you know yourself to be an empty shell. Know there is an effective method of practice and there is a method that will seem to make the practice less useful to you. The effective method is to clear your thoughts by letting them pass upward. The less effective method is to press them back down into the place from which they seemed to rise.”
Letting our thoughts pass upward is looking at our thoughts with Holy Spirit. A great example came to mind on this:
An incident happened in my life where I felt victimized and my thinking mind was in an uproar about it for many months. In the scheme of things it wasn’t that big of a deal, however, I was upset about it. I then had thoughts that I needed to let it go because so many people have worse things going on, and so I felt guilty for the thoughts.
I saw the thoughts with Holy Spirit and was reminded that by thinking that I didn’t have a right to feel the way I did, because other people had bigger problems, I was actually pressing the thoughts back down, which means, ultimately they will rise again in different form.
My inner teacher right then said, “Stop! Look at those thoughts. Accept that this is the way you feel right now, and that’s okay.”
Holy Spirit,
I see these thoughts of attack and victimization.
I accept that my mind is filled with such thoughts right now.
I am willing, Holy Spirit,
to let You
correct all errors in my mind.
I am willing, Holy Spirit,
to be healed.
Amen
But if I were to think, “Oh No! I shouldn’t feel this way! Look at all the people who have worse problems! Right then I have repressed and denied and not looked at the thoughts of guilt, fear, attack or unworthiness, and therefore, what happens? We continue to have similar experiences in the world where we feel attacked, afraid or guilty.
To become an empty shell is to be willing to look at the thoughts with Love, and be willing to let Love heal them and correct them for us. This is the effective method.
“To let the thoughts pass upward, you must remember to trust in Me. I have said that you are innocent. If you trust in Me you will be able to look at your thoughts and let them pass upward, out of the shell, leaving the space within the shell empty.
“But if you do not trust Me, you will fear your thoughts, and you will repress them. In this way, the shell is not emptied, and there is pressure within the shell from where the feared thought is hidden.”
In the aforementioned book, on that same page, a person in conversation with Mooji spoke about how it’s easy to feel the truth while there, but when returning to the world it was more difficult. He replies:
“If I tell you a hundred times that you are one hundred percent truth always, that you are one hundred percent free, that your nature is joy, freedom and peace, you will be delighted to hear it a hundred times, and a hundred times you will forget it. Why? Because for thousands of times, you have embraced the idea that you are not free, not yet, that you’re not ready, not worthy, that more needs to be done.”
This is so true! We may sit in meditation for a few minutes in the morning, or read spiritual books and pray spiritual prayers, but many more hours of the day we find ourselves mesmerized by the world, other people, our perceived problems… We push these thoughts down instead of seeing them for what they are and letting them pass upward.
In the Course we are told to be vigilant for the Kingdom by being vigilant against the ego. The shell is the ego, the thinking mind, and in our willingness to let it be empty we come face-to-face with the unattached Self ~ the truth of who we are.
Take the door off the hinges.
Pull down your walls.
Allow yourself to be completely undressed by grace
so that you may begin seeing
with the eyes of God.
Mooji
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The audio is 59 minutes and goes into more than was shared here.
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