Beloved Students:

Welcome to the New Year—2006 to the West, which seems quite young to the East. However you count the years, the point remains that this is your “now,” the most important time of all, since it is the time you have in which to create (or perhaps re-create) the world in which you experience. Congratulations! How will you project your “now?” How will the world change, or in what ways remain the same, as a result of your creative interventions during the next twelve months?

This is an important time to consider what the world might be asking of you; for indeed, She is asking something of all Her children. But perhaps an even more important question to ponder regards what you may be requiring of yourself as you create your movement through this year. How do you perceive your place in this world at this time? When you consider the amount of personal energy you will expend in the coming twelve months, what do you intend to bring forth, birth or manifest in your life with the flow, or use, of that energy? Will the world be a better place as a result of your mental projections? Or, will you come eventually to discover that with the passage of another twelve months, those habits of mind have become only stronger, rather than weakened; or the patterns which elicit your suffering more entrenched rather than less so?

What could you offer to this world—the experience of which you find so compelling—that might lessen the effects of suffering for all? If there were something you could offer that promised such relief to the many beings who populate the planet, how much energy would you put into bringing forth that gift? If you could purchase it, what would you be willing to spend to acquire it? What if the manifestation of the gift were to require your everything? Would you be willing to pay the price to bring forth a profound gift to all sentient beings? If the gift were hidden, would you be willing to scour the Earth to find it? Of course, the possibility also exists that this incredible gift lies right under your nose, and all you have to do to make it available to all other beings is to awaken from the trance sleep of repetitive cyclic patterns or habits of mind.

Given the scope of the possible, one must, of course, carefully consider just what the world might be asking of one at this time. Even more important is the consideration of what that one will require of him/herself in the coming year—the package of time that is so unlimited, so precious and so compelling at the new point of the year. To make it more personal, what will you bring into the world this year that clearly demonstrates your wisdom quotient, your compassion quotient, and your enlightenment quotient? How much energy will you devote toward making this world of 2006 better, softer, kinder, gentler and wiser than 2005?

While many would hold that such questions raise possibilities that are too provocative, too overwhelming to be taken seriously, the dedicated spiritual aspirant must, of course, take a different view. Those who recognize that cutting through the limiting parameters of the conventional reality is not only possible but is truly one’s goal in life will see the tremendous possibilities here presented. If one’s mental projections create, or manifest, the world one sees, then it would behoove such a one to see the possibilities in life, rather than the problems that so invade the collective mind. Of course, most have no idea that they have control over the direction their mind wanders, so rather than interrupt the familiar old mental habits, they simply give in to them, often at a cost of increasing the wasteland of their own discontent.

As I’m sure you are all aware by now, it is obsessional tendencies of mind that create and sustain the problems each experiences. Problems, or the perception of them, generate a vast and compelling wasteland of discontent within the mind; and all the internal “territory” that could be used to generate, sustain and accomplish enlightenment ends up growing nothing, yielding nothing more than what appears to mimic the process of the so-called “desertification” which consumes the vibrant and potentially lush lands of much of Earth’s soil. When this process arises within the mind, suffering is, of course, guaranteed at both personal and collective levels of experiencing.

Indeed, if one understands the controlling nature of repeating obsessional and/or compulsive thoughts (projections), such understanding should also present a transformative possibility. If one can arrest obsessional or compulsive thoughts and projections as they arise, one can learn to go free from the prison of problems and can reclaim the wasteland for beneficial growth and abundant harvest. As in the actual reclamation of wasted soil, reclaiming the inner wasteland will require time, energy, and attention to detail, as well as a pretty solid commitment to the task.

In the first place, one must ask oneself just where it is that problems (or the perception thereof) reside. “Where do I experience these mental afflictions I call my problems? Where do I wrestle with them, solve them—indeed, where do I dissolve them?” Ultimately, each discovers that this “location” can be only in the mind, since it is the only place one can “hold” a problem. Thus, if one can learn to “drop” a problem with the same proclivity most “hold” problems, then freedom from the tyranny of the problem-obsessed mind is clearly within reach. The wasteland can be reclaimed, renewed and revivified.

While most can see some value in going free of their perceived problems, few see clearly the bigger picture in terms of how freeing themselves of their perceived problems can benefit the world. At first hearing, such a notion may sound even a bit grandiose. However, with a more penetrating inquiry one can mentally move into the experience of Oneness that pervades not only all beings, but all experiences as well. Moving the mind in this fashion not only loosens the grip of those karmic projections, but also allows one to see the internal wasteland that has been created over countless lives of suffering and discontentment. When one considers the plethora of lifetimes that beings (self and all others) have found that the very happiness they seek is sorely just out of reach, it then becomes obvious why the world appears to be such a mess at the present time.

Indeed, humans the world over, believing they have no control over their own discomfort or their perpetual problems of discontent, rise up in frustration, and cause pain or harm to other beings. One group of people seeks to annihilate another group. Another group seeks to dominate yet a third group. All over the world, those arise in their own perceived powerlessness to torment or perpetrate outright abuse upon members of the animal kingdom, forgetting that they, too, are part of the Oneness of Being, the Oneness of Experience. The harshness they show is reflected—even magnified—in the world they perceive around them, and some even justify acts of cruelty. Clearly, those who see the world in this way are quite in need of a great gift from the wise, compassionate and creatively alive. What they are actually seeking is happiness (or perhaps Happiness); but because of their apathetic, disempowered internal “self portrait," as yet they can see only images of ugliness and destruction. These images become the source of the obsessional mind, and get projected into all manner of experiencing, returning (with interest) the mind’s investment.

Please join me this month in listening to Two Kinds of Ice Cream, the talk I gave by teleconference on December 4, 2005. This talk was given in the spirit of generosity not only to my students, but to all sentient beings. May you receive it in a manner that allows you, in turn, to make a great gift available to all with whom you have any contact, whether actual or energetic. May you receive many gems from this lecture, but above all, May You Be Happy!

Share your happiness with others through your infinite capacity, perhaps not as yet fully integrated, to love. Know that you are beings of Love, and that Love is what supports you on your journey. It is not your love, of course, but Love Itself that holds you in the Great Heart and sustains your every loving thought, word and deed. Walk in Love, know Love, and become the bright beacon of Love and Happiness for which the Earth now calls you!

Your Loving Teacher,
Djwhal Khul