# Renewal {{@628}}

We oscillate through many cycles of growth and rest

**CLASSIFICATION**
R	P	M	1

**JURISDICTION**
- [x] soil	- [x] Land	- [ ] Sea	- [ ] AIR

**SOURCE:** tmtranscripts teamcircuits email archive Nov. 22, 1998 Teacher Lantarnek, Elyon T/R Jonathan. Mark

It is difficult for many beings, not just mortals currently in physical form, to maintain a head of steam, so to speak, when struggling to attain new levels, when striving to sustain current levels. We often do repeat our lessons for this very reason, much as you repeat your breakfast, lunch, and dinner nourishment cycles, that a lesson once given, though registered in the intellect and known in a statistical sense for having been stated and perceived, spiritually you benefit from recurring presentations and repeated applications. I address you today on the topic of renewal. During your ascension you will oscillate through many cycles of growth and rest, ever climbing higher. Each time your rest will be in comparison to prior levels; what beforehand was a difficult level to reach and maintain yet now is your restful cycle. Subsequent to an attainment there follows the fine tuning and adjusting of your initial realization. This cultivation and pruning, this nurturing, strengthens the original insight or experience, yet these minor adjustments do not appear to have the same impact that the original awakening had. But as you know through many undertakings in your life on all levels, these finer adjustments really improve, actually polish, the first attainment, the first endeavor. Although it is not of great benefit to simply foster enthusiasm and excitement for its own sake, its own end, I encourage you today to think of the process of renewal when you are feeling stale or stagnant. Much like climbing a flight of stairs, let us picture your attainment of Paradise and the struggle to do so as giant steps. When you reach the nose of the first tread you can see the nose of the next and even slightly the nose of the higher beyond. Yet as you traverse across the tread toward the riser to climb to the next level, that viewpoint is obscured. Here in this level, growth cycle, one can face doubts; one can become confused, lacking the clarity of perception from the original view. Renewal is simply placing yourself in spiritual perspective back at the nose of the tread where you can, with your faith and with your trust, re-perceive those higher levels once faintly glimpsed. This provides strength and stamina before you make your next strenuous climb to actually attain that hoped-for ideal and goal. Renewal is a refreshment of a status level already accomplished by you. It gives you enthusiasm anew for something which you already have struggled to accomplish. For those of you who practice music, this is much like returning to a song you know well after having spent time to perform one you are just beginning to learn. It renews your sense of ability. It invigorates your sense that you can accomplish something difficult, for it is the very demonstration of accomplishment beforehand. I salute you all who review your lessons from all of us, for this renews you regarding prior presentations by us. It demonstrates that even a lesson of many years ago can still be applicable to you today, can restore your sight to the higher levels you seek. I would once again restate that your time in stillness is an act of renewal. It is actually far more important in this regard than it is a method for higher attainment. It is a time of refreshment, for reflection, for daily life is the arena wherein you face the new hurdles and climb the new mountains. Mark: Those were beautiful words on ascension. I wonder at the relative difference of one of our caliber of spiritual ascension as compared with fusion. I always thought it beyond our grasp for this life. Is fusion a level tenfold, one hundred-fold, one thousand-fold, beyond our accomplishments to this point? Lantarnek: The ability to fuse with the Father's Fragment is, in the scale of Paradise ascension, right at your fingertips. This statement is most true subsequent to your having made your eternal decisions regarding the Father and eternal life and your service for Him and your growth toward Him. But like my reference to polishing and adjusting, once you have this decision behind you, there is a whole new array of adjustments that you must undergo. These are quite numerous; in a sense it is like this: Prior to your supreme choice you can liken your spiritual progress to our oft-quoted analogy of the jigsaw puzzle where all the parts are in the box and all the potential is there for this attainment. Your supreme decision is equivalent to spilling the pieces out on the table. Now begins a great process of assembly. Yet, without opening the box, none of the adjustments could be made. To have lifted the lid is the most important thing you could have done and begins the inevitable attainment of fusion, that of assembling, perceiving and, in this case, becoming that big picture. Mark: Am I correct that to race toward fusion is not necessarily the goal? There's no real hurry. Putting together the puzzle is our task. Lantarnek: Yes, fusion is an event of eternal consequence, and its time orientation is insignificant in regard to the eternal ramifications. Your diligent and careful work in cooperation with the Father makes the event nearer at hand. Your hankering for, your intense desire to fuse, will in no way bring you any closer to the event itself. Your alignment with truth, your love for beauty, and your living goodness will go far greater in bringing about the event than to pray for and wish for that event itself. In some ways the assembly of the puzzle has many events of enjoyment as you begin to discern fragments of the picture, and clarity begins to dawn on you as to how it is going to finalize. Those are multiple, and those are quite fulfilling. The actual completed picture signals a completion. After your fusion, you will be faced with a completely new horizon, one that you are more greatly endowed with divine power to attain, but one that, though rising out of your past experience, is now based upon an entirely new reality, your union with God. This you could liken to returning to your game store and walking the aisles in search for which of the many puzzles you will open next. To seek the Father before your union with His Fragment is a different undertaking than will be the undertaking subsequent to fusion. You will note that that undertaking stretches over far greater periods of time than the one prior to fusion. This is why I tell you your fusion is at your fingertips. Lantarnek: In my capping off my little discussion I would remind you that the Spirit of Truth is the handrail that will guide you all the way to the head of the stairs. Elyon: I would add but little to the words of your Melchizedek instructor. What I would add is the perspective that you who are aware that you are assembling this spirit puzzle, that you are actively engaged in the construction of this image before you with intent and with purpose, are indeed making great strides for the very reason that you do this with purpose, you do this with certainty and you do this with faith. There are many who do not yet possess this perspective of understanding to realize that they are indeed engaged in this process and that there are levels of successive growth involved in this process as you are aware. When you first start with your puzzle it is much like one designed for a child. As you succeed in completing your task, you would then move on to a puzzle of greater challenge, one designed for an adult. If you persist, you may be challenged by a puzzle created for an expert. It is your choice; it is your pace, and you are in awareness of what you are about. Even though there may be times of uncertainty and darkness when you fumble for the pieces, and you are uncertain of their relationship to the whole, you are aware that you are piecing together this image of reality, this image of the greater whole. Therefore you press forward even in misunderstanding and darkness; you try again and again until you find the piece which you are looking for that allows you to link these patterns together. As you have seen in your exercise, if persistent, you will find this piece. It is there right before you. It is simply at this time not uncovered, not examined thoroughly enough to be utilized by you, but it is there. It is contained in your box. There are no missing pieces to thwart you. It is simply a matter of persistence and faith that you will in time assemble the entire image and meet with certain success. It is often hard to provide adequate perspective to those involved in the process, which is why we attempt so many times to refer to your progress in relationship to your previous state and as relates to your potentials. We are attempting to act as your cheerleader squad, constantly reminding you of your accomplishments and luring you towards your accomplishments just ahead of you. You are indeed making excellent progress, and there is, of course, much more that lies ahead of you. We will remain on your side cheering for your every advancement and attempting to make you aware of these advancements as they occur so that you can be refreshed in these accomplishments and rejuvenated in these achievements. Remember when your current puzzle is completed you will smile with affection and appreciation at your accomplishment, and you will realize the many steps you have taken to accomplish this. You will rest on your laurels for a time, and then you will seek greater challenges. You will open and dump another box. We will be there to assist and to acknowledge your steps as it is also very exciting for us to see the great changes which occur when you exercise your abilities. Mary: I would like to note how your and Lantarnek's words tie into what Tom related, how his friend's position didn't appear too good until you expand your view to include how far he has come. We should not only apply the principles to ourselves but use them in our relations with others to help us treat each other kindly. Elyon: Our lessons are meant to be helpful to you both individually and personally at the time that they are delivered, and they also carry another level, a level of examples that we would wish you would adopt toward those who are behind you in this evolutionary process. You note that we repeatedly and often praise you for the advancements you make. We are never hesitant to accommodate you at the level at which you want to engage us. We are always offering the positive alternative to your situation. We exercise great patience with your attention spans. These are all qualities which we would hope would rub off on you as teachers in your realm. To accommodate those who are in your sphere of influence, to look to the good in any given situation, to reach and teach at any given level you are sought, and to always provide a positive and loving, and accommodating perspective, this does far more than any lesson, any message, any words that may happen to pass across your lips. Your attitude in acceptance, love, tolerance, patience says volumes more than your potential solutions or steps to alleviation of unfortunate circumstances of those around you. So, I am pleased you have made this association. Lantarnek: I would like to elaborate a little more on this puzzle analogy. Picture in your mind the classic shape of a jigsaw puzzle piece, and now view that as your being and view it as, likewise, cut up into many, smaller puzzle pieces. Some of them are provided by the Father and some you, due to necessity of evolutionary growth, must actually create for yourself to help form this puzzle. When you are complete you will notice that you mesh with others. Much of your friendship and bonding at this time is because you are beginning to fit your puzzle together with another's puzzle. You have clustered yourselves into a group. But each of you is incomplete. There will come instances when you will meet another partial puzzle piece and find you cannot connect. This may be due to your own incompletion or theirs or both. The spiritually progressive individual realizes there is no need to call off a relationship but rather to continue to love and to understand the momentary differences, and in the settled age of grand universe light and life all meshing will have completed itself. Though that other individual who may not join you side by side, will join you in the overall assembly and will take his or her place in that brotherhood picture. Mark: In an attempt to be more aware, I think this group has the potential to function as one of these working groups. If it is required to be in awareness of this, then I offer that awareness. I offer the willingness and desire to be involved in a group like that, and I think I speak for everyone. Lantarnek: I salute you in your perception for two reasons. One, the milestone of knowing that you have before you pieces that are assemble-able into a portion. The other is that recognition where you understand that you are a portion in assembly and can now, as a group, lock in, interconnect, with other portions. Your awareness precipitates new undertakings for you and us. This will magnify also as other conclaves of personalities rise to and attain this awareness. Thank you for making that statement. It is significant. Mark: It is sincere, as well. May we seek the challenges particular to a working group working in harmony. Lantarnek: So be it.

The secret to pursuing without faltering is to understand it's a cyclical process

**CLASSIFICATION**
R	P	M	1

**JURISDICTION**
- [x] soil	- [x] Land	- [ ] Sea	- [ ] AIR

**SOURCE:** tmtranscripts teamcircuits email archive December 6, 1998. Teacher Lantarnek T/R Jonathan

Lantarnek: You recall that I spoke of renewal as a flight of stairs and how at the nose of every tread you can see the ones ahead, yet in the deep of the tread it is hard to perceive the next level. Conversion often is perceived as a singular event where renewal is perceived as a continuing, recurring process. In light of our stairway I emphasize to you that conversion is also a recurring process and, itself, is two-phased. The first phase is like your traversing the stairway tread and reaching the riser where you need to climb again following the plateau of attainment. Here is the critical moment of decision where you encounter reluctance, willingness to remain secure, unwillingness to face new doubts. The ease of not having to struggle is a temptation to avoid the climb. However, subsequent to your decision and following the climb to the new level, there is one extremely difficult phase in the conversion to overcome. If you will picture the nose of your tread with overhang, it is that backward climb around that edge where you can see back down, and your grip is difficult. In order to make the distance you must continue round and on top of the next. This point is where you further foster your prior abilities and skills for the continued ascent by applying a strong-minded diligence. This is the critical decision point of actually accepting the new level. It differs from the prior decision of accepting the climb to the new level. Being able to look backward at the comfort zones behind you and being willing to forsake them fosters your faith in the assurance that you will reach another level of comfort. Elyon mentioned the handrail of the Spirit of Truth that is with you at every step. I also point out to you the side boards that help guide you forward and resist your straying laterally. This gives you insight into the master's statement that the way is narrow. It is not narrow in the limitation of who is accepted. It is narrow in that the pathway is defined; the guidance is established, and that you must choose to convert yourself every time. These are the narrow factors of the ascent. The beauty of the ascension of a mortal creature to Paradise is, to us, the revelation of how you each finish your stairway. Your physical stairs often have carpets, sometimes wood, sometimes they have no-slip strips on every step. The personality types of mortal beings in a way fall into these varieties. Some ascenders leave behind them a trail of comfort, of assurance for others of the softness and beauty of the climb. Others leave behind marked indicators of fundamental principles that should not be violated, of essential truths that must be recognized, the sure grip of making progress with the least amount of danger. You have wide range of creative allowance from the Father as to how you finish your ascent, how you dress the stairway in your climb. Confusion over what to do, what to accomplish, in personality attainment can be alleviated by recalling the handrail, the side boards, and to honestly and sincerely face the fact that you will at times require renewal, and repeatedly you require to undergo conversion. The secret to pursuing without faltering is to understand this cyclical process, to not become disturbed at any single point in your journey, but to always hold in your mind that the important element at any point is your understanding of the overall process, for the particular event that you are involved in is part of this continuum. The continuum, the ascent to Paradise, is the important macro-event. You are educated to the fact that the ascent to Paradise, the Father's house, is the path of perfection attainment, yet it will become evident as the ages roll on that you will leave behind you many squeaky steps. This is acceptable to the Father. Be not concerned if treads you have left behind are not perfect. They are steps upward, not the final landing. Even the Supreme itself will ascend its own enormous stairway, not only a composite of all your treads and rises, but an overarching series of steps which illuminate to the perfect Father that even imperfect steps can create a beautiful, continuous ascent to Himself and result in attainment of perfection with imperfection. So, when you will, as you will, encounter new difficulties in your life, couple your effort to perceive truly, to grasp what is real spiritually as well as physically with the important element that, not only do you have a problem to overcome, you have your own being to convert. As you convert yourself you become increasingly able to manifest truth and beauty and goodness. Renewal reinvigorates you from your prior attainments. Conversion stimulates you to higher levels. They go hand-in-hand, one following the other ever onward. Elyon: Today I would like to illustrate a principle of brotherhood and fatherhood that may help you to understand your relationship to one another in light of your common Parent. You are all discrete personalities with your own boundaries. You are all - and I really should add myself - we are all together like grains of sand. We do not blend with each other as you might picture clay doing so. Yet we can be united one body of children of God through the infusion of His spiritual presence among us all, and you are trained to understand this principle through the presence of the Supreme, the Spirit of Truth; the omniscient, omnipresent Infinite Spirit, and the Eternal Son. They are like the water, the ocean, that penetrates all the grains of sand, all lifted up and, in fluidity, moving together. Without this spirit influence you would all lie dormant. But with this infusion of divinity you all are mobile. You are continually rearranged, re-associated, creating new patterns simply through this displacement of personalities throughout the universe. So, when you do run into each other, crash into each other, bump into each other, realize that it is the fluid spirit that has given you motion. This fluidity will help you to approach forgiveness, for, even though another may not have accomplished the spiritual tasks of attainment you have, they are nonetheless swept up in the same current of spirit. It is the spirit that is moving them as it is the spirit that is moving you, and your directions happen to collide. The difficulty you encounter is due to the awareness of your discrete individuality and your inability to blend. But the blend is nonetheless real in your common spiritual hydrodynamics. To forgive does not mean you must invalidate your own standards, your own beliefs, in order to allow another theirs and their behavior. It is rather to understand that all the children that the Father has created are being moved by Him. If the decisions you make bring you closer to Him, He is pleased. If the decisions you make thwart His efforts, He simply rearranges so that you, once again, have the chance to choose. In difficulties, simply rearranging yourself with them can solve problems. Not the aggressive overcome and conquer, not the negative turn away and avoid, but the creative re-associaton. You will note that the revelation dealing with the various administrative levels throughout the universe tells you about the reassignment of even rulers of the various levels. This reassignment is, like the repositioning and like the renewals and conversions, creating new potential. Mary: It makes me think of the jigsaw puzzle and how we find pieces that look alike. Since you don't know how they fit together you group them over here. Then you realize this piece fits better with this group than with that group. I like your metaphors. Elyon: Thank you, and that was an excellent association, for you know how sometimes two pieces seem to click together, but when you observe more closely either the patterns don't match or the curvature is not quite right. It is perfectly fine and acceptable to detach them and associate them where it is appropriate. This does not mean you ought to condemn the relationship; it means that your relationship will be associated through other linkages, other appropriate hookups in the greater association. You can love one another even though you do not get along because of this very pattern. Mary: It's helpful to keep in mind when you are having an abrasive encounter to know that we may not fit well but somewhere in the whole of reality we can harmoniously coexist. Elyon: If we continue this metaphor, imagine being a corner piece where at the most three pieces connect to you. It is the understanding that you are part of the entire puzzle that brings your connectivity to all. Where it would appear that one centrally located piece has more around it, in reality it likewise has only a few that can actually touch. This day you are all in contact with a few puzzle pieces, that is, the mortals of of this world. You are beginning to realize the closeness, the proximity, of your celestial puzzle pieces. In time your puzzle will three-dimensionalize and stack very deep and connect up and down as well as crosswise in a planar sense. Therefore, the effort you make to deepen the relationship that you have with your closest associates will translate themselves far and wide as your life unfolds world after world. Evelyn: If you think of us as grains of sand with sharp edges no wonder we abrade each other. Mary: And I was thinking how all this fluidity sands us down, smoothes us so we might fit in with each other better. Tumble those puzzle pieces.

The growth process is continual

**CLASSIFICATION**
R	P	M	1

**JURISDICTION**
- [x] soil	- [x] Land	- [ ] Sea	- [ ] AIR

**SOURCE:** tmtranscripts teamcircuits email archive December 13, 1998 Teacher Elyon, Malvantra T/R Mark, Jonathan

Tom: In light of our recent studies in renewal and conversion, the point was made that renewal was continuous, and conversion is also. You used the analogy that, as in music, a person will go back to playing a song again, a form of reversion of an already accomplished function. Conversion stimulates you to a higher level. There's something I don't understand about conversion. I thought of an atheist converting to a religion, yet you mention we have to convert ourselves all the way to Paradise. I need a definition of conversion. I believe it falls on worship and it falls in the realm of feelings, which is composed of willingness, welcoming, and wonder. I see how one could languish until propelled out of a situation. A problem would connect conversion and renewal. A problem makes you dissatisfied, willing to look higher, to wonder what is on the next level, and welcome the opportunity to do that. Can you give me an example of what conversion is? Could you use it in a musical context? Elyon: First, my friend, I must applaud your efforts at grasping the finer points of the lessons. Much can be learned by way of example in your efforts to cross-reference and to assimilate these teachings. I would now point out that this conversion for which you seek definition is, in fact, the very process of embracing a new and higher technique in the place of an old and inferior one. I would offer the example that, once a parent learns that to strike a child may be harmful and injurious and unhelpful in the process of training that child, then a parent will embrace a higher method of training and will in the process eliminate the older practice. This process of growth is what is continual, of embracing the new and higher way and releasing the former and lower way. In your studies of our lessons you are continually seeking, albeit somewhat unconsciously, to replace existing frameworks under which you function with new and higher ones. This conversion is only made real and genuine when you no longer look back, when you no longer adopt your former mind-frame and fully and completely change your manner of thinking of being to embrace and accept the new and higher way. When you have completed this process of conversion and acceptance you are renewed, you are as if made fresh again with a new framework in which to operate. You have observed that problems or troubles are a factor in this conversion process, and this is correct. I would only amend this to refer to these occasions as opportunities. They may not always consist of problems or troubles or distasteful encounters but may also consist of longing, yearning, and desire. Either way, the effect is the same as a propellant to urge you forward to seek a new and higher understanding, a new and higher level of existence. Then, once having seen this new arena, it is incumbent upon you as progressive mortals to embrace it, to accept it as your reality and in so doing release from your existence things which are subsequently inconsistent and incompatible with this new view which you now hold. This is most difficult for beings of your order because you are very prone to remain in states which have become comfortable, familiar to you. It takes courage, strength, and wisdom to reach outside of your comfort zone and to look outside of your sphere for a higher truth, a better way. It takes even greater strength and courage and faith to adopt this new and higher way for your own. You are learning, however, that when you undertake this exercise the rewards are great; the return for your efforts is immense. It may be uncomfortable in the beginning for you to undertake this activity, but each one of you here has learned that once accomplished it is not a frightening prospect but a glorious one. So, as you grow your life is a series of embracing a new, higher way and releasing from your being a way that is no longer consistent with this new truth. Tom: Process is key. Love is a direction, not an attainment. It seems this conversion is an inversion of that phrase. Elyon: It is very much likened to a continuing process, as you speak of, in that you never truly outgrow the need to reach outside of yourself for something higher. Therefore this process of growth and shedding of your old skins, if you will, is a long term process in which one should learn to take comfort and dispel the fear which can accompany this process. Malvantra: I wish to give you my version of conversion. Let me approach this by qualifying a few things. If we treat this process from a musical perspective we can derive a few more insights. Repeating a song previously learned is a refreshing reversion, the expression of attained skill and the pleasure of repeated accomplishment. Renewal has an extra dimension to it. In returning to repeat a learned song, in the cycle of returning and repeating you apply new arrangements. You play the chord in a different manner because your growth has forever changed you, making you capable of a new expression upon the old pattern. When problems, conflicts, present themselves, as would be the case when confronted with the prospect of learning a new piece of music, the creature-will can resist the effort, can erect decoys to avoid the undertaking. You can, instead of conversion, indulge in diversion. This is comparable to playing the same song but in another key, giving you the feeling that you are doing something but yet not approaching the new. And of course there are the two most negative elements, those being aversion and perversion. If you were to play your tune in these manners we would turn the volume down. Conversion is not only the taking on of the new way of being, in our analogy learning the song, it is also the transformation of yourself into that new song you not only have in you a reality dimension as yet undiscovered, but you have developed within yourself a creature attainment that was not available beforehand. ##### The Analogy of the Wheel I would like to offer you another analogy. You know that personality is changeless. If we take the imagery of a wheel, we can blend some to of these ideas together, hoping to increase our insight. If you consider the axle of the wheel as your personality, it is motionless in itself, yet the rest of you is in constant change. You can liken the axle as the Spirit of Truth, the ball bearings as the endowments of spirit ministry and mind, the spokes and hub as your education and training, your experiences gone by and those ever-important elements of faith, of trust. The treads, the tire itself, is your soul which experiences constant change. Unlike your material wheel where the treads wear bare, your soul increases in its ability to grip, becomes stronger, thicker, in every revolution. Renewal is the cycle of the wheel when it leaves the road and rises back to the top of the revolution, picking you up and preparing you for the next episode. Conversion is when you head back down the rotation to meet a new event on your path to Paradise. The personality moves forward in this process in spite of the fact that it has never, itself, turned over. All else that makes up your being is in constant movement. This movement propels your being forward. The Father's presence is much like the fork of a bicycle that guides you toward Him on Paradise. When you waver, the Father endeavors to bring you back into balance. Here you are learning simple things like how to inflate the tire, how to prepare it for motion, how to stand upright. The one thing we ask of you all is that you remove the fenders of your wheel and let the mud fly. Let the truth and the goodness and beauty you experience be flung far and wide. Mark: I have been grappling with desires to jump on this renewal energy. My desire is strong but my flesh is weak. How can I gain strength to adopt some of the higher ways that my mind knows but my being refuses to embrace? Elyon: You are not unlike the rest of your fellows in this dilemma, for you all are dual nature. You know that when a wheel is spun eventually it comes to a standstill due to the results of friction. You will ever be faced with this present condition, for that is part of the necessary ingredient in time and space that fosters growth through the presence of resistance. What you can do is, as you have stated, perceive, take note, of those elements in your life that contribute to the resistance, those that are hinged upon your decision-making influences, for those factors are like the application of the handbrake to the rim of your wheel. It would be a pleasure to all of us growing souls to have a downhill coast, but this is not the case. Encourage yourself with joy when you realize you are pedaling uphill. Your question to me indicates uphill movement rather than the downhill, out of control, slide. If you inventory deliberately, concretely, your high ideals and desires and that about yourself which annoys you, it will help to clarify the many factors involved, but more so it will give you an intensified period of time for reflection that isn't merely passing thoughts as you do other things. It is a focused meditation. You know that it is not through the resistance of what you dislike that you overcome what you do not approve of, but it is your love for what you do like that brings you closer to the ideal person you wish to be. When you list, make effort to tip the scale heavy on your hopes, your wishes, your goals, your values that are ideal to counter that all is hopeless when your list of negatives appears too long. Both personal ministry to others and growth of oneself have the same conflicts. Applying this principle to projects will bring the same desired results they do in regard to your own growth of self. But I assure you, my friend, that your expression today is the greatest element towards forward progress. In reflection, you know that as you grew from infancy to childhood how many toys that were loved dearly soon faded away as you began to take on interests of an older self, a more mature self. You did not have to deliberately dispose of those objects; they lost their lure. As you seek the maturity of a growing spirit being, much of what you wish to dispose of will, of its own, remove itself. But it is good to assess your condition. Far too few on this world spend time in that reflection. The master spent many hours reflecting on his life condition when here on Urantia and what his future would be in light of the Father's will. His apostles often failed in this same method because they would not fearlessly face themselves in this manner. They relied upon constructs taught to them by their culture. It is quite common for all social creatures to feel constrained by the expectations of those around them. In order to promote social harmony a certain degree of flex is required where you may not perform to your ideal but the interworking of fellows runs smoother. But one must be willing to stand steadfast to your high ideals, to not let the social tides sway you when you know of certainty the truth of how better to behave. I hope this brings to mind for you many aspects that can help both increase your understanding of your current position and promote a clearer view of your forward progress. Here on Earth much of life appears like a symphony tuning up before the classic piece begins. It appears so disharmonious and random and scattered. The condition of the world today in the end will contribute to immense faith on your part. Your experience of finding a tune for yourself among all the clatter will carry with you into the stretches of eternity and will reward you again and again, age upon age. So, even though within the year or the next you still struggle with these conflicts, rest assured of your eventual triumph. You will attain your desired goals, but this assurance should never foster complacency. It does require hard work.