Chapter Nine- “Helping” and helpers.

This is a transcript from the channelled fellowhship of the River  in the early 1980’s. I was about to start my therapy career. My question followed a session about the soul path of the Aire Way-the path of compassion, love and relationships.

Contemplating this transcript now, I am still disturbed by their thoughts. The answers astonished me when it was first delivered and for a long time, I thought perhaps the River was simply wrong about their statements.

There is much to ponder here about helping and helpers. I have been helped by others a lot. But looking back, I see that it was up to me to accept the help, and how I accepted the help was instrumental in how their assistance furthered me along my journey. And whether I took the help with an attitude of entitlement or gratitude. Or even with awareness.

 

Julia: Can I ask a question? I am engaged in the helping professions - do you have any advice for helpers, people who care for others?

River: Helping begins first of all, with compassionate stance and recognition of the Other. Recognition, not so much of the Other as who they are at this moment, that is recognized of course, but the Other may also be recognized more for the potential that they are, and that they are in their situation for very spiritual reasons, acknowledging spiritual themes and lessons that they may not be aware of.

Looking underneath and seeing, this connection, this being is here for a purpose and whether they are aware of it or not, they are in a position, in a position of growth, needing to step forward.

The helping professions are only needed as long as, first of all, if it is based on spiritual seeing a recognition. Second of all, allowing the Other to make the mistakes they need to make and letting them go with a bow of honor that maybe in this lifetime no progress will be made.

However, by merely recognizing their theme, their position in the Great Net, you have raised the Net, and you have already helped. In reality, the helping professions, all helping professions, require a commitment on both parts.  Of the helper it requires a commitment of working from a place of total freedom and acknowledgement of the Other. From those who needing help, it requires a vision of their wholeness and their right and their ability to become more than they are. It does not need to be said, it needs to be an internal vision of the person helping.

However, on another level, we must say here that their helping is really an impossibility in most cases, and the helping is usually only for the helper.

Julia: You said once that helpers become exhausted if they only focus on the human elements?

(This advice was from an earlier session when the River talked about helpers needing time every day when they can take a break from the human world. This could be time with pets or other animals, a walk in nature, being engaged in meditation or other creative expressions which don’t include interaction with other humans. It can be taking some time to garden, put your back against a tree or lie on the grass and gaze up at the sky. I have lived by this principle and it has given me resilience and ability to turn up for my clients with patience, clarity and compassion.)

River: Exactly!

Julia: How could you change that?

River: For example, we just said that helping is mostly for the helper, and the needs of the helper is to help, fundamentally for the very reason they have not dealt with their own needs and their own growth. The helper may be in a stagnated state usually and reaches out to help as an impetus to their own growth. That is one part

The helper grows exhausted if... First of all, let us backtrack. If a helper can act out of an empty place, no expectations, and no goals, a compassionate state, objectively, compassionate state of only being there comes of being there for the Other as a mirror. Being there as a mirror, the Other becomes angry, resentful, and struggles. When this reaction is thrust upon the helper, if the helper does not come from an empty compassionate state, then exhaustion sets in. That is one reason for exhaustion.

The second reason for exhaustion is within the lifestyle of the helper. If there are any areas of hypocrisy, or conflict in seeing that all being is interconnected and of value there are areas of blindness, these become fatiguing elements within the helping process itself. Do you understand these two areas?

Julia: It seems to me most people have blind areas

River: And that is your job. And that is why you are alive and why you are doing this work. It is as if you began with a very small circle, a circle, a circle just around your body. You know what is inside? You have a liver and kidneys and a heart. Gradually the circle widens and widens and widens. It will never stop, this widening process. The awakeness and alertness do not interfere with daily life when you come from a place of action and not reaction.

Fundamentally, remembering expectations, ideals, and critical analysis are all fatiguing and require a mirror. This is a very important fact. You will call down to you a mirror, a teacher that is without when you have expectations, ideals and critical viewpoints.

In other words, you will call down someone to challenge you. For all three (expectations, ideals and critical analysis) are signposts that you are not coming from emptiness and will bring the spiritual recognition that you are coming from an ego point of view, and from your own needs and desires.

Next question- is how does one act this emptiness way? We would suggest that you hold the question in your mind - “Who steps into the river”? (this question brings to mind the famous statement by Heraclitus who said, “No one can step into the same river twice for it is not the same river and he is not the same person.”)

  Keep in mind that you yourself are a changing in a flowing way because you are from the Great Water Way. How can you have expectation ideals and critical viewpoints of what the Other is to be? No one fundamentally acts. That is where you were going. Let go and be change. Let go and be the river, so that no one steps in.

At the same time, we will remind you, not keeping yourself open always is the wisdom way. Guarding the body in its influences from others is probably a wise thing to do. Whereas energy moves within and outside of you, it does with Others too. Unless you are very strong and very balanced, the energy of Others calls up memories in your own charkas of similarities and may not be appropriate for you in this lifetime. For you have lived many lifetimes and have been many people, sometimes you have acted with low intent. By low intent, we mean destructive, a lowering of the Great Net. If you are in a weakened state or if you have diverted energy into one specific area within your body, other areas then are easily influenced by a similar memory called by proximity of others. Is this understood?

 Julia: Yes, is this why sometimes I feel so exhausted by my work?

River: These two reasons are why. You have directed energy to one specific area and because it is not a natural thing for the life force within the body to be directed in particular to the upper chakras, it is a fatiguing practice for the body physical, for the body physical also needs the life force. And because the energy has been directed and focused this way, it means that what little is left for the other areas, are reaching there in a sporadic way and not a steady way. A sporadic life force flow is more fatiguing than anything- that is one reason.

Another reason is that you would be wise to guard the lower chakras and the lower part of the body with some simple blocks and fields, however you devise. For you have been in the past focused on the lower charkas and issues of survival, as much as the people around you are now. Memories are easily called up by them when you are in a weakened state. It is like a familiarity, and the familiarity is draining.

There is also an added feature that in some stages of development, there is a great need of the Self to attach to the strong life force and knowing us of those who have gone before. It is not an intent, but a natural consequence of growth. At certain stages of growth, knowing where one goes means you are headed in a certain direction, and by this very fact, there is a draining of your energy, by those who are going where you are going. Therefore, without a destructive intent, some individuals around you are using your energy for their own growth. Just as you did at other times in your growth and will again as will again! For it is the natural way to head in some direction.

So, there are three reasons, and you may guard yourself by placing some shield around your lower chacras, re directing energy within your own body, and seeing energy as flowing in an even way. Then of course there are just the ordinary diet, exercise, lifestyle factors that it is not necessary to give you guidance for. But remember that any people that touch you in any way in the Great Net, are very much part of you on levels of commitments and obligations that are very deep, just as they are committed to you, as students, you are committed to them as a teacher, and the relationship has an debt/obligation which is very deep.

Steadiness of energy is your goal. After you have worked on running energy from the top of your body to the bottom, then refocus on seeing it internally as radiating up and down in an even flow.

Julia: This clarifies a lot of things from me.

River: Yes, and in fact you have been within these people in your dream states in the last few weeks, and we would suggest before going to sleep, putting out a loving command of privacy, that you care deeply about these people who are your students but that you are yourself and you release them for the night. They are reaching towards you in the dream state, for at that time there is a closeness between all beings.

The net is very much known in the dream states, compared to the waking state.

A simple command of love and a request for privacy will clear this matter up quickly.

Julia: Is this why for the last month or so my sleep hasn't been restful?

River: It is because for these people, you have entered their dreams as their creation and therefore are affecting you. It is during this time that it is easy for the spirit to travel down the interconnecting lines of the Great Net. The wisdom of the sleeping body is far greater than the wisdom of the waking body. For their growth, they yearn towards you, and reach towards you, in inappropriate ways wanting and needing to grow having little control over their own energy, their own intents and direction. It is understandable.

Julia: I feel so much better after last weekend!

River: This is because you yourself have developed some inner strength to deal with their yearning in your own dream state. Coming to grips with your responsibility and your lack of responsibility towards these people will certainly clarify it also. If you had let things go on, you would gradually have found internal ways of dealing with their spiritual demands because their spiritual demands during sleep have certainly been great.

Remember the connections are very close in dream states, and all matter is linked closely. However, for the people that you are teaching, these links are intimate as your very flesh in the spirit world. And you have obligations as the teacher, and they have obligations to grow and change. At this same time, we can tell you that by being the teacher, you are also being the student. That is quite clear, isn't it?

Julia: You mean I'm learning a lot?

River: Yes, you are learning a lot. About the interconnections between you and others, and it is getting easier and easier to be empty of ego in movement and spontaneous in wisdom and caring without regrets or demands. You are reaching for them in the ways that we spoke up. All matter as being recognized as right in itself. And it is that which caused them to make demands of you, and it is that which caused them to yearn towards you in their dream state.

It is a great thing this dance- is it not?

Julia: Yes, it is a very intense period in my life right now.

River: Yes, it is very intense, and this is the heart of where learning takes place, in intensity and only in intensity does change become effective. It is only in the possibility of intensity that the deeper realms are known, like this intent of writing this book, spirit is intent. It is only fear that causes the peacefulness of non-change a non-being. Intensity is living immediately- in the now.

Julia: Do you have any advice about these challenges that people are experiencing now?

River: Yes, they are learning to see themselves in truth and caring. Many still blame the world for their lives’ challenges and cut themselves off because of this. It is a common thing to do. It is the easiest and most common way of opposing the self while traveling the interior path. Sometimes it is necessary to be ill and sick, so that the self can turn inwards and explore the inner regions.  Many are stuck in blaming the world. They do not know on a deep level their own responsibilities, and their own creativeness in the external world.

Many are in the stages of listening to their own feelings and self but there is nothing you can do to help. You can be there, you are there, but this is something others must work on. You cannot force them to do the work they need to do. Only they can make that choice. The choice is often made verbally, but it has not reached the deeps part of who they are yet.

Julia: Is why creativity is good?

River: it is a way of creating the world and in this small step of responsibility of creation, it is one way of learning about the other responsibilities of creation. However, it is not a bad thing when one is in discomfort, for a person who needs pain to make his journey. It is a pact with one’s own soul., It is painful to observe but must be honored. It is a choice that many sensitive people make. It is a pact that does not need to be made, but it is made anyway. For many the positive gains from this pact, in all lifetimes are in measurable.

Julia: I feel sorry for these people.

River: You do not need to feel sorrow for people who have lived this lifetime well as they could. They are already reaching towards their next lifetime and are gaining and looking for liberation even in this one. Each have made tremendous growth in their spiritual gains even in this lifetime now. Their journey has been from a very small sense of consciousness, to a much larger compassionate one. It is a good life. It is a good life for everyone who can see the Other as stepping stones in their own growth, and that is a rare thing. Conflicts have been necessary for them, and the lessons and growth they have made from it have been great!

Julia: I think that's true.

 

However, in summary I have learned over forty years of ‘helping’ others, that the central question is-how to turn up for others in our lives with openness and compassion without any expectations, critical analysis or standards. The answer lies somewhere in-as helpers we can offer our resources, our co regulations, and our wisdom. But we must remember, our offerings are a gift which may be refused, and we have to accept that rejection without rancor, frustration or hopelessness. We can offer, but the sovereignty of the individual to choose is sacrosanct and change is always up to the person, deciding in the moment to accept, partially accept of completely reject. We can only understand those teachings which we have the capacity to recieve.