WHY NOT GO ALL THE WAY? - Keys to the Ultimate Freedom

星空

Lester: You've been given the direction on how to go all the way. So far, none of us have taken it. We've gone to the place where life is nice, easy and comfortable; we're satisfied, not totally, but satisfied enough not to go all the way.

Q: Well, I'd like to go all the way, but it's always over the next hill. I get to this point and it's not there; and I get to the next one and it's not there.

Lester: Not really, because it's right where you are. Over the next hill is where it isn't. Right where you are, where the "I" of you is, is where it is.

Q: How come we don't know it?

Lester: Yes, how come? That's what I want to know.

Q: That was my question.

Lester: Yes, but what is the answer? I say it's silly not to, because once you do, you'll never, ever have a moment of unpleasantness, ever again. It becomes impossible to be unhappy. What's wrong with that? Why don't we do it?

I would say you don't believe it enough. You dont believe that you have no limits; you dont believe that life can be, every second, ecstatically happy; you don't believe that it can be totally effortless; you dont believe that you can do things mentally.

Or, is it that we keep procrastinating? I say that if we really do want to go all the way, we do it. So, again, why don't we go all the way?

Q: Well, I think, in my case, I've probably hypnotized myself into believing the opposite. I've associated with the finite me all my life, in all my conscious awareness, to the degree that it is real to me.

Lester: Oh, then to you the Infinite would do away with finite?

Q: Yes. Because the finite is what I believe in; it's real to me. What you say about the Infinite has infinite possibilities but until I can totally accept that, it's like when you touch a light bulb and it burns you and somebody says, "Now touch it and it won't burn you"; it's difficult to overcome your subconscious reaction not to touch it.

Lester: Well, let me tell you then, that the Infinite includes the finite, and is the basis for it. You see, you can hold onto all the finite you want when you're infinite; you don't have lose a thing.

Q: Then, I'd be glad to give it up for the Infinite.

Lester: Give it up? Maybe this is what's bothering us; that we're afraid that we're going to give up our bodies; that we're going to give up our families and homes. It doesn't happen that way. When those who did go all the way achieved it, they did not abandon their bodies, homes and families. They only abandoned their former feelings of bondage and attachment to their bodies, homes and families and in place of it felt free.

Q: If there's happiness greater than what I've experienced in a body, to heck with this!

Lester: Well, again, you do not give up your body. Your happiness gets more intense the more you move toward total freedom, until it reaches a point where you just can't contain it any more. Then you resolve it into a very beautiful peace that is never, ever again disturbed. And that peace is really far more delicious than the intense joy was. And then, when you choose to be active in the world, you'll never, ever lose that background peace; you will feel it all the time. And you are free to do anything in the world; you can act angry, scared; be poor or rich; you can do anything you want; but you do not disappear.

Q: It doesn't affect you?

Lester: The world can never, never touch you again, because you have imperturbable peace.

Q: I understand.

Lester: So then, why don't you come along?

Q: Whenever I identify my source of income with the effort I exert in my business. I say to myself. "You're a stupid idiot. This isn't the source of my infinite supply." However, I'm not strong enough to just say. "Well, this isn't it; I'll do it the other way," because I think, "What if it doesn't work?"

Lester: You would have exactly what you had before you tried it. However, you expect it not to work if you say that.

Q: Yes, but that's where the hang-up is. Maybe it's a lack of faith, not that it hasn't worked for you, but whether it'll work for me, I am not convinced. If you could only help me, just one little infinite bit of strength that you could give me

Lester: Oh, now wait a minute; you have the support and I've given you many directions, anyone of which would take you all the way. I could give them to you again.

Q: That's like the sign "San Francisco." I'll bet there are probably a hundred signs that point the way to San Francisco; but if I get to the sign and sit down underneath it, it would take more than just knowing where San Francisco is, and that's where I bog down.

Lester: Right, you don't take the direction; you look at it and sit down. Now, the direction: Get to the place where no one and no thing can disturb you, would have taken you all the way.

Q: Yes, but that's like going to the moon.

Lester: It is easy, -if you would do it. It is your decision to be disturbed or not to be disturbed.

Q: That's quite a challenge!

Lester: Do you want more? I'll give you new ones.

Q: Yes.

Lester: Be totally selfless. Be interested only in others; have no interest in you, yourself. That would take you all the way. If we would be totally selfless in our behavior, act not for ourselves but for the other ones. -this would do it rapidly.

Q: I don't mean to be argumentative but this is really a nitty- gritty.

Lester: I'll give you another one: Get to the place where you have no more desire keep letting go of desires until there are no more and that's it! You don't like that one either, do you?

Q: Well, part of it. I've got a lot of things I'd like to let go of.

Lester: If anyone would carry that through until there are no more desires, and it's just letting go of them as they come up, you'd go all the way.

Q: Lester:, what about the one that you and I discussed, about the mind? You see everything out there in your mind, right? So that's where everything is. So, that thing out there is just your mind. When you discover this, you change your mind and it changes out there.

Lester: Yes, that would take you there.

Q: What about no attachments and no aversions?

Lester: That'll do it too. That will take you all the way. But why haven't we used these things? They are not new to us.

Q: That's what I'm earnestly trying to decide for myself. This is ridiculous; all this intellectual knowledge that I've acquired and what little I've actually done with it. It's alarming. I said, "How many people have their own private Master in their family." You've given us all this stuff and I 'say, "It's my responsibility what I do with it; why haven't I used it?"

Lester: Yes, and your private Master is you! This is important: Your private Master is you!

Q: Isn't there only One any way?

Lester: When you see what you really are, you'll see the Oneness and no more otherness.

Q: I try to squint and no matter how I do it, I still see separation.

Lester: That's the way you are approaching it, with squinty eyes; you won't look at it full view, wide open, because you are afraid you're going to disappear. So what you have to do is dig down within, pull it out and see it. Once you see it, you'll naturally let go of that fear. You're also afraid you're going to lose your individuality. Your individuality is something you'll never ever lose. Its with you through eternity. The "I" that I am, is never, ever lost. What happens is that we just expand it to include more and more until it includes the entire infinity.

I say you're afraid of losing yourself, your body, your mind, your family, your business, and all your little things; you're subconsciously afraid you're going to lose them. If it were conscious, you'd look at it, drop it, and be free.

Q: Well, you reached me when you added those other things. The physical body attachment I don't see, but when you included my family and my business and these other things.

Lester: Do you want me to show you how attached you are to that physical body? Just imagine, don't do it, but just image throwing your body over a cliff. Can you now see your attachment to the body?

Q: Yes. But do you have to have that desire to get rid of it?

Lester: You don't get rid of it; you see what you are and then you'll see that you are not the body, that the body is one infinitesimal part of you.

Q: Why can't I go all the way?

Lester: Because you're afraid that if you do, you're going to disappear. Does anyone feel that? That you'll disappear if you go all the way?

Q: I'm afraid I'd lose my mind. (Laughter.)

Lester: You actually do lose your mind, and then you reestablish it so that you can communicate. It's far more difficult to reestablish the mind than it was originally to let go of it because the mind itself was such a clamping down of you, you don't want to come back to it. But you will; youll start thinking again. The only difference in the before and after picture is that now your thinking is unfree, determined by subconscious, compulsive thoughts; in the after picture there are no more subconscious, compulsive thoughts. Every thought is totally free and without any conditioning by your tendencies and predispositions.

That leads me to another great one: Rid yourself of all your tendencies and predispositions and you will go all the way.

I have never talked much about miracles, have I? I dont feel as though Im imposing on you now, as I used to feel, were I to talk about miracles because, having moved up, you are more able to accept them. When I first moved to Sedona and lived by myself, most things were done by thought and I was unaware of it. However, others began to come in, and it was because of them that I became aware of these unusual things. To me they were natural, but not to the others.

I might have told one or two of you about the teleportation incident. This one is interesting because it involved two others, one who is following this path, and another one who is not.

The first one is Frances and the second one is D-, the son of T-, whom you all know. He came to Sedona from Phoenix and asked me if I would take a walk and naturally, he would choose a direction uphill. We walked a mile and a half uphill, Frances, D- and I; and when we got to the end of our trip, we sat down to have our sandwiches. We had only a pint size canteen of water for the three of us and we drank most of it on the way up. We had left only about an eighth of an inch of water in the bottom of this pint canteen, hardly enough for half a cup. But the three of us were thirsty, and so I let go with the feeling "Everything is perfect!" I received the inner knowledge that the water was abundantly there.

Then I asked, "Do you want a drink Frances?" "Sure." I gave Frances a cupful. Then D- drank a cup, then I. We kept drinking until each one was satiated. We each had seven drinks! I curiously looked into the canteen and the same amount of water was there as originally, just about an eighth of an inch on the bottom of the canteen.

We then started the downward trek for home. I was so tired that I felt as though the body would not walk any more. I just let go and I said, "Oh, Lord, there must be a better way!" And the thought again came to me, "Everything is perfect." As I thought, "perfect, " we, the three of us, had one step up there and the next step was down near my home, where the surroundings were similar to the place we had left so as not to make it obvious to D-. Frances caught it and said, "Lester:, we teleported!" I said. "Oh, you're crazy Frances, you're imagining it," because D-'s mind was in a turbulence; his face showed a frown and a consternation. For his sake I had to again say. "It's your imagination, Frances," and shut her up. Frances knew. Later, when she was alone without D-, I said, "What made you think we teleported?" And she laughed. She said, "Don't you remember, on the way up D- and I were collecting rocks and in several places we put them on the left side of the road on the way up (the road was cut into the side of the hill). I wanted to pick up those rocks on the way back, but we by-passed all of those places. "

Now, to do these things, it takes a mere effortless thought; you surrender, let go, and have a thought with no effort, no drive. It's the easiest thought you could have. And then it happens.

During the early days in Sedona I was living this way, unaware of it. To me it was natural. Whatever I thought, I expected. It seemed natural, just the way everyone thinks he lives naturally. It is really the natural way and it is meant for us to live that way. Although, if we did, we wouldn't fit very well into our present society, would we? So, if you want to stay in communication, you go the way of people.

Miracles are just this dream world effected immediately. And miracles don't necessarily mean spiritual development because the majority of people in the universe use these things; they use them on other planets where they're not necessarily more spiritually advanced than we. It is their natural way of life.

But the easier way to live is purely mentally; mentally do everything. You people should be able to do all this. Why not go all the way and have nature serve you? Why do you do things the harder way? I think it's because you're afraid you're going to disappear. I'm saying to you. "Look, I have been through these things. And I still have a body here. I didn't disappear. "

Q: Can you demonstrate your infinity for me too?

Lester: You must demonstrate your own. You have had ample witnessing of these unusual things. If I do it for you that would mean you can't do it. I just finished saying: You can do it! It's surrendering, then mere effortless thinking! You have the feeling that it is not I but the Father who worketh through me.

I can go on and on. I'm trying to entice you. When I moved into the mobile home on my grounds, a girl, now living here in Laguna Beach, asked me. "How often do you fill that butane bottle?" (It was a five-gallon bottle.) I said, "Every month." Then I remembered it had been eight months since I had last filled it. Becoming aware of it, I let go of it.

When I was trying to show Frances how to conserve water, I let her take charge of and keep filled my 55 gallon water drum alongside my mobile home. It took care of all my needs, including a shower every morning.. The reason why I wanted her to take care of it was that I wanted to show her that you can live on very little water. But I lost track of time and when I brought it to her attention, she laughed. It had been four months since she had filled it last. I kept using the water and the tank wouldn't empty out! When we opened it and looked, it was still full, after using it for four months. It never would have emptied out if I had not let go of it.

Q: "Had not let go of it," what do you mean?

Lester: Let go of it by letting it be "normal."

Q: You thought again of it as being a limited thing?

Lester: No. I let it be as usual, or as is normal to people. I want to remain in communication with people and I choose to live like people live, because if I live in an unusual way, I'm out of communication. It "even scares people.

Q: This wouldn't scare anybody.

Lester: I know by experience that it scares people. When if first came to me while I was living in New York City, some people wouldn't come near me because of these things happening.

What's wrong with this way of life? Why won't you take it? It is yours for the taking. I hope to allure you by making it so tempting that you will go all the way. Look at the difficulties you go through to make a living.

Ask yourself, "Why don't I go all the way?" "Why don't I take things directly, just for the thought of them?" "Why dont I express my total freedom?" And maybe the answer will come up and you'll see what you're doing to hold yourself down.

Q: One reason is that we are so used to being hamstrung that we don't realize that we can get out of it. I was just thinking of the motel, of getting it sold, and then I thought. "Do I really want to leave it?" and I know I upset it every time.

Lester: That's true and that is why I'm telling you of the easy way. Your habit of thought runs you the hard way. One way to undo all habits of thought, which are in the subconscious mind, is to see that you are not the mind, and you will scorch it.

Q: Tell us a little more about scorching this mind, which I have found out is most important.

Lester: I see you've gotten a realization just recently.

Q: That's right.

Lester: And yet, you didn't carry through on it. With that realization, you should have continued and said, "I can do it; I am infinite!" With that infinite power, you just pass your figurative hand over the mind and it's finished. It's just a mental wipe-out that you do. And that's it. You know how long it takes? Less than that (finger snap)! Less than a second.

When you get your full Realization, it's instantaneous. Before that, you play around, dropping a little bit at a time. This goes on and on, year in and year out, until you decide to let go of the whole thing; then you've got Full Realization. It really comes instantaneously, when it comes. You will it. Will is your power. You turn on your will so strongly that you just undo the whole mind, and you are totally Free.

Q: It just doesn't make any sense at all. It's just as though you're handing me all the money in the world and saying, "Here!" and I'm sitting and saying, "Why don't I take it?

9.

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Lester: Yes, why don't you?

Q: What's wrong with me?

Lester: What is? That's the big question. What is wrong? I know you think that this is possible, otherwise you would not have listened all this time.

Q: It's the intellect that's in the way.

Lester: That is it. Why not wipe it out? The intellect is the mind. We have to see we're not the mind and that it is external to us, and then just make it ineffective. Just like that; that's the way you'll do it.

Q: You said something the other night, Lester:, which was a help to me and that was "I am going to put Lester: to bed."

Lester: I always think that way. I'll send Lester: and this body around and make it appear to be doing things.

After I got the realization that I am not the body, it was years before I could use the word "I." People would laugh at me because I'd talk about Lester:; I would talk about "him" and sometimes I would say, "it, Lester:," or "Lester:, he." I couldn't say "I" even though I was being corrected. Why? I was not this body. I could talk about this body, but it was so obvious and glaring that I was not this body that I couldn't say I was this thing, any more than you could say you were your car. Because you are carrying yourself around in a car, would you call yourself the car? In the same way you'll look at this body. (This body is a car-case, a carcass.)

I say you're silly to not take the All.

Q: I think there's a stronger word than silly.

Lester: Yes, it's really stupid. He led me to say it. (Laughter) It's so stupid not to go through life with everything you want; with nothing but extreme joy, peace and loveliness every moment; when that is your inherent state. It takes no effort to be what you are. It does take extreme effort to be what you are not: a body with trouble, sicknesses and needing this and needing that. It takes effort to be what you're not, but to be what you are takes as much effort as you women would need to be a female and as much effort as you men would need to be a male. It takes no effort to be what you are. And yet you persist in using effort to be what you are not. It's really stupid!

Q: Well, I persist in using effort to try to be what you say I am. I keep working at this thing of being effortless. Does that make sense?

Lester: No, does it?

Q: Not to me.

Lester: Right. There's something wrong there.

Q: What did I say?

Lester: You're using effort in trying to make yourself effortless, -that's impossible! It's a contradiction. You've got to stop using effort. You've got to let go and let be. That's what is meant by "Let go and let God." You are it, you're the god; let go and let your Self be. However, it seems to take much effort because you are using tremendous effort to hold onto and maintain your non-self, your ego, and there is where your effort is. It takes no effort to be what you are, -the Self.

Q: If I could arrive at the dreamer instead of the dream, then I'd have it made. And that's why I've been thinking. "This is a dream? Who's dream is this?"

Lester: Right! Discover the dreamer. To make it more intimate: I, the Infinite Being, am dreaming that I am a limited body.

While you are in a night dream and you think you are a limited body in that night dream, it persists so long as you don't wake up. It's the same thing with this waking state. We're dreaming we're limited bodies. We have to wake up to the fact that we are infinite. We have to stop thinking that we're limited bodies, that's all. Stop thinking. Let go. Let be. Surrender is the word. If we would surrender this moment, that would be it. Not I, but Thou. Not my will, but Thy will. This is surrender. We could do that right now and that would be it. But no, we've got to be a busy ego-body, doing something. We must be a doer.

Q: Several of the people at the motel were discussing robots. Actually, I guess we could consider the body a robot. We're using this physical body and when we're through with it, we drop the physical body, but what we have is still there.

Lester: That's an excellent way to look upon the body.

All right, now I'll tell you something more. If you were really convinced of what I've said so far, you'd go home, you'd forget everything else and you'd sit down until you saw this; because this would give you everything, -just for the thought. If you were really convinced, you'd go home determined to sit until you see this; and if you did that, -you'd see it! Just like Buddha did when he left his throne and sat under a tree, determined not to leave until he saw the answer; and he saw the answer.

Q: Well. I think one thing that may be bogging some of us down, and I know to a certain extent it has to me, is that I have felt for a long time that I had to take something piecemeal and get each thing out of my system. Now, I'm finally beginning to realize that if I get above it then none of it makes any difference.

Lester: Yes. We all start that way by undoing single things at first. It begins to show us our mastership. Then we master our tendencies or predispositions. This undoes all the numerous multitudes of thoughts that made up that tendency or predisposition. You should not keep undoing these single things piecemeal. That was all right for the beginning; you don't need it any more. Drop a tendency or predisposition and you drop the millions of subconscious thoughts underlying it.

Q: When you first started to tell us that there is nobody out there but you, some of us just couldn't understand that, me included. I have discovered why there's nobody out there but me; because it is I who creates that out there and it is in me.

Lester: Yes, that's true!

Q: So I really know. I had a realization that was as clear as crystal.

Lester: O.K., why not clean up that "out there" until you do not waiver from seeing it all as in you?

Q: That's what I'm doing now.

Lester: You don't take enough time at it.

Q: That's true.

Lester: It should be all the time, regardless of what you're doing. While youre driving, talking to people, you can remain with it, and you would if you wanted it that much. If you really get with it, the joy of doing it is so great that you won't let go until you go all the way. It becomes the only thing you want. You begin to see the light and then, nothing in this world can interest you more than it. You just stay with it and you ride it all the way. Misery starts you in the direction, gets you to reverse your wrong direction. Then the desire for the wonderfulness of it takes you all the way to the top.

Q: Then you know you can play any game you want, because that mind is under your control.

Lester: Yes. However, the game played after reaching the top is usually the same game for everyone, although it will express differently; it's the game of helping others, which is really a great game.

Q: It becomes an interesting game.

Lester: It's the nicest game there is; it's the most rewarding game there is.

Q: What you are teaching me is really helping me.

Lester: That which Im offering you is more than a million dollars. What I'm offering is the whole universe. If you wanted gold, you could pile it up by the tons. Of course, when you can create unlimited tons of gold, do you want to pile it up? No, you take only that which you can use.

Q: Of all the different ways that you've offered, it seems like there ought to be one that I could be successful with.

Lester: Take anyone of many of those sayings in The Eternal Verities and if you carry it out until the end, that would be it. Take the good one mentioned before: Get to the place where no one and no thing can disturb you. Every time you are disturbed, look for the ego motivation wherein you wanted it to be other than it was. On recognizing it say, "Oh, I see. " and let go of your ego motivation of wanting it to be the way you want it to be. Every reaction or tendency is based on a selfish thing. We wanted it to be the way we wanted it to be. Keep dropping these reactive tendencies. Every time a reaction comes, look at it; see the selfish ego motivation and drop it. You'll soon reach a place where there is no more and you're there, -all the way.

Q: Every time you feel offended or jealous or angry or hurt or anything like that, that's your ego and that's your mind.

Lester: Right. Rid yourself of all your feelings and you will go all the way. So, have we gained anything new?

Q: You have presented us with more of a challenge to understand what youre saying; you make it sound so darn easy and it affronts me to think that anything that easy could elude me.

Lester: When you do it, it is easy. When you don't do it, it's impossible. That's the way it really is. When you do it, it's easy. When you don't do it, it's impossible.

Q: Oh lord, wait a minute. When you do it, it's easy. When you don't do it, it's impossible.

Lester: It takes no effort to be what you really are: Infinite. It takes tremendous effort to be extremely limited as you now choose to be.

I feel' as though I've given what I could on going all the way. If there's any further question, I'll be happy to do what I can to answer it. If not, this is it.

Q: I keep looking at you and I see that there's hope. If you've made it, somebody has. It isn't impossible and I can do it.

Lester: Yes, do it. Go all the way. Everyone was moving rapidly upward and then leveled off; some came down just a little bit and leveled off there.

If you dont use what you've seen, you'll lose it. You have got to keep using it, otherwise the remaining subconscious habits will overwhelm you and you will lose your direction.

Q: When we go all the way, we still go on doing the same things; we still go on laughing. we still go to the ballet; do all these things. There's nothing denied.

Lester: Yes. The only difference is that, youre free to do or not to do whatever you want; you're no more compelled in any direction whatsoever.

I strongly recommend taking time out for thinking on these things every day, twice a day. In the morning before going to work and at night before going to bed. Never should a day go by without doing this. Get with it totally in a quiet spot until it sucks you in more and more until you let go of the world pull. Getting quiet enough, the infinite part of you just takes over and you go all the way. You reach a place where you feel helpless because it's effortless. Keep that up and you'll effortlessly be sucked right into your Infinity.

Q: Well. I know.-sometimes it seems that I'm getting so tall.

Lester: There's a sense of surrender in that.

Q:. There's that famous statement of yours: Let go and let God. It finally struck me that that means let go of your mind and let God.

Lester: Yes, another way to say that is, "Surrender." Even if you surrender to a mountain, you will get it, because surrender is "Not my will."

Q: Ego, mind and will are all the same thing. So if you let, that means let go of your mind, ego and all the other things.

Lester: Yes.

Q: Sometimes when something happens I can be very irritated but then I catch myself giggling to myself while I'm doing it. It really isn't affecting me.

Lester: Yes, get free and then you may act irritated.

Q: So you can act any part? And you're aware of the fact that you I re an actor?

Lester: Right. Go all the way and there is only fun.

Q: You can even keep your humor too?

Lester: Right. But the motivation for the humor is to make others happy, not for ego approval. That's the difference.

When I say you people leveled off and are on a plateau, it's not exactly correct. You leveled off into a slow, gradual, upward direction. It could be much faster, even immediate, rather than a slow, gradual, upward trend. Go all the way and then life from that point on is just a ball. You don't have to work. If you want to you can. You can always be successful; or you can even choose to be unsuccessful, just to make a game out of it. If you can succeed in failing, you can also succeed in succeeding.

Q: Would helping others really be a fast way?

Lester: Not so if your purpose is ego motivated. However, when you live only for others, it's a very fast way. Paradoxically, the most selfish thing you can do is to be totally selfless. When we are totally selfless, we have the All, the Infinity. It's a seeming paradox.

Q: That's it. You offer me the All!

Lester: Yes. We've all had glimpses of it. The thing to do is to establish that permanently, for all time.

So, again I say # take time out every day and effect it. Go all the way. You've got infinite power behind you; there's nothing to stop you but you. Make it part of your every day life and stay with it until it's established for all time. You can do it!

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This Session was recorded in Los Angeles, August 31, 1969.