Goodness Is Who You Are

AWAKENING THE HEART OF SERVICE

by Tara Singh 

ONE HAS TO MAKE CONTACT with who one really is.

Whatever we really are would have to be intrinsic.

It is not something learned, it is who you are.

Goodness is something that you and I are.

It is impersonal and absolute; all of us have it.

Yet we have not really made contact with it.

Goodness may not conform another.

Goodness may have no conditions.

Can you see the good in the other person,

irrespective of what they do? It would be a

wholly different relationship when I no longer

acknowledge your reactions - when I am rooted

in my own goodness.

How do I become rooted in my goodness?

I see the good in you. And my goodness may

awaken the goodness in you. Then my nonreaction

introduces you to who you are.

For instance, Jesus says if someone slaps you

on one cheek, turn the other also. The person who

turns the other cheek has done one of the most

noble, powerful things upon the planet.

Such a person no longer reacts. He just sees

that you have become a victim of your anger, your

vested interests, your assumptions. But he is not

affected by them. Then you have a better chance

of knowing the power of that goodness.

You may say, "Well, I am greedy, I am selfish,

I am reactive." But that is your opinion. Your

opinion is not basic. Goodness is basic.

So is gratefulness basic. Gratefulness is the

adoration of creation; it has touched upon the

Divine Intelligence of compassion - that

everything is sustained by life.

The rivers flow and they flow timelessly. The

snow falls, the seasons change, and my circulation

continues. There is another order of the universe.

There is another rhythm in life which is not

personalized. And in this non-personalized life,

there is goodness.

When a child is born, there is an involuntary

tenderness in the mother, and the milk appears

in the breast to feed the child. That is a different

action, an action of goodness that sustains life.

But we are spending more money on armament

to destroy one another. Self-destruction is at work.

What we need is some contact with the sanity

of goodness. It does not need a cause. It does not

need to organize. You and I are responsible for our

own goodness. You say, "Well, I will get cheated./

I wonder.

Whether you are a typist, a lawyer, or a bus

driver, you can still be good and kind. Kindness is

never wrong. So the question is, what prevents us

from being our true selves?

Fear. And insecurity. Our whole culture is

based on insecurity from the outset. I think I may

not have shelter or enough food to survive.

Someone else owns the the house; someone else

owns the land. Possessiveness and insecurity have

become one. Possessiveness is the expression of

insecurity. And now it can not give.

Goodness and gratefulness and love know only

giving. The water knows only to give, the tree

knows only to give. Everything that is created

gives. So there is the world of creation that is

eternal, impersonal. There is nothing you can do

about it. The sun is going to rise, your heart is

going to beat. You are not in control. It is outside

our reach, but it sustains life.

As long as I am related with the manmade

world, I am insecure. But what if I were related

with creation? I think it would take insecurity

away. What would it be like never to be insecure?

To recognize that there are other forces at work?

Now I am totally oblivious of them. I think it is just

the Congress that works, or the mayor, or the police.

These are our projections and inventions.

I WAS IN NEW YORK. I had just come from

India. I had quite a lot of money and I had

a nation behind me. But there are exchange

laws and it became very difficult to convert

money.

Now I was left without a penny. I did not

have any skills nor did I want to get a job, even

if there was one. You are in a state that does not

compromise. It is not that you are lazy. You

have something to give to mankind.

It is a test. It is your own direct experience.

Do you know we do not have any direct

experience in our life? We live by emotions and

sensations and thoughts of fear, tomorrow and

yesterday. That is not living. What about being

in the present? The resources of the present are

tremendous. But for a few days, nothing happened. I did not eat.

To MAKE CONTACT WITH THE PRESENT FIRST

would be the only sanity. And yet we put that in the second place

and get busy with brain activity and the illusions

of yesterday and tomorrow.

We get distracted. And therefore we cannot know love, nor goodness,

nor anything. Whatever we do know would be emotional, self-centered,

related not to reality, but to our memories, and the memories of the

race.

You have to discipline yourself to make contact with the present.

I said, "1will not compromise. The present has resources.

I want to make contact with them."

That was my experiment.

And it was amazing. I am still alive. Strange things happen.

When you do not compromise, you have order in your life;

no insecurity touches you. So my needs were met.

I began to see other forces at work, and they brought me to adoration.

When you will not compromise,

you are connected with the Source of life itself. It provides.

Some time later, I met Mr. J. Krishnamurti. I asked him, "Does life take care?"

He said, "Yes, if you absolutely let go."

What do you let go? Your fear and your thought.

What is your thought? It represents insecurity, greed, selfishness -

"Look at me, self-improved." The misery of it. The falseness .

A Course In Miracles questions everything. And

the answer is the miracle, a moment of insight. It

brings you to questioning, to undoing the past and

the fear of the future. It introduces you to the

vitality of the present.

A Course In Miracles gives one the discipline

that is most practical. It says bring to remembrance

that you are divine. Bring to remembrance that

'nothing real can be threatened.'* Bring to remembrance

that 'nothing unreal exists.'

In reality there is no fear.

Fear is of tomorrow; it is

never in the present.

The Course awakens awareness. When you make

contact with the timeless reality of yourself,

there is a miracle: you are clear.

In clarity there is goodness. In goodness there is certainty.

And your onIy expression is of gratefulness

that life is kind.

You step out of the world of time into the world

of eternity, the universal order. It cannot be organized.

I can awaken myself; you can awaken yourself.

Any person can awaken - male, female, rich,

poor, children, anyone.

So something is emerging out of A Course In

Miracles: the action of the Joseph Plan for those

who are in need. It starts with goodness, with

giving rather than wanting.

The Course offers the peace of God, a state of

stillness. The power of stillness is the discovery of

the present and the discovery of goodness. When

you have something of yourself to give, then you

are extending your true nature. And "Love ye one

another”** becomes true.•

• ACIM, Text, Introduction •• John 13:34