Article by Arthur Carrier
Dr. Arthur Carrier, MD, is a retired psychiatrist, psychotherapist, and currently offers spiritual direction for those attracted to mystical Christianity. His book is called: Adventures in Soulmaking
At the end of this article, Dr. Carrier writes a beautiful and effective meditation practice that will help you see results.
May you be blessed as you read this insightful work.
--Doug Esse
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As a psychotherapist, one is always seeking improved ways of helping people through their issues in better and faster ways. Both Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) teachers and hypnosis teachers such as The American Academy of Medical Hypnoanalysis where I trained, appreciated the benefits of bringing resources of comfort and hope into old memory situations in order to rework the trauma memory and disentangle the current behaviors from the past hurts. The NLP organization titled their technique the “Change History” technique. Here is a YouTube video
about it.
Hypnotherapy’s term for a similar technique was “age regression.” If you look at the NLP technique, you will see that they spend a good bit of time creating sensory rich memories of comfort and power. They then anchor that resource state to a place on the body. They then go to the problem state and anchor it to a separate place on the body. This is very similar to what Ra suggests that we do when dealing with everyday catalysts. See here Ra's* take on balance.
When at the ending of the day or when alone, mentally examine, as with the scalpel of a surgeon, each bias which you can remember. Attempt to remember precisely the biases or qualities held by the self at any moment during the experiential space/time of the waking state. Consciously visualize, feel and again become that bias. Slowly accentuate that bias until it fills your being. Then visualize the oppositely polarized bias. Do not create this bias mentally, but wait until this is called from within yourself by the process of natural discovery. Allow this opposite bias to fill your being until it is as accentuated as the bias you originally felt. Now visualize an image filled with both things. This is not indifference or objectivity but a finely tuned compassion and love which sees all things as love. Balance is not indifference but rather the observer not blinded by any feelings of separation but rather fully imbued with love.
*Note: This quote comes from a Q'uo session where "G" summarizes their understanding of Ra's balancing technique and then, "Asks what is the meaning of the word “bias” as used in this meditation?" https://www.llresearch.org/transcripts/issues/2009/2009_0214.aspx
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So Ra encourages us, like NLP, to set up intense awareness states as a set of
opposites or polarities. Hold those opposites within the mind in separate places. Then bring to the opposites the resource state of compassion and love. The love integrates the opposites, bringing healing of the negative mental state related to the catalyst. This allows one to go forth into the next day in a more integrated and whole state of mind, not carrying the thought forms of negativity with us.
The Problems of Remembering Trauma
As a psychotherapist I found that when people’s trauma was intense, if I uncovered the trauma memory without developing resources of comfort first, a person was prone to relive the trauma, and somewhat retraumatize themselves from the reliving.
I, as their therapist, was something of a comforting presence, so I could coach them through the difficulty and they eventually came out okay, but sometimes it was with disruptive screaming or other expressions that were distressing to my officemates. Seeking a remedy for this, I eventually came to appreciate that by spending a number of sessions developing a relationship of the person to the innate inner resource of the higher self or a spiritual comforter, one mitigated some of the unpleasant agitation of reworking old traumas.
I then made it a point to take people on journeys to pleasant meadows or forest glens and helped them experience a visitation of some representative of either the higher self or a spiritual helper. As I saw many people from the Christian community, that spiritual helper was often Jesus
The Inner Jesus is Not a Mere Fantasy
I came to realize through many years of taking people back through their personal histories in hypnosis, that when Jesus came to a scene, he often did much more for the person than provide mere comfort. Sometimes comfort was all that was needed. It would be as if Jesus spoke to their hearts his words from Matthew, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11:28-29).
At other times, I was very impressed with autonomous creativity of the Jesus presence. He would surprise both the patient and myself. Here is a story I shared in the climactic chapter 18 of my book, Adventures in Soulmaking, to illustrate this point.
Inviting Jesus through Imagistic or Inner Healing Prayer
Jesse was thirty when she came to see me. She was having trouble with feelings related to raising her daughter. Her difficulties were similar to those of several other patients I was already treating, and I had resolved to avoid taking any new patients with her kind of problem for a while.
However, something inside nagged at me, making me think I should treat her. I went to the Lord in prayer, laying out my conflict and seeking direction. I heard very clearly in my intuitive inner voice, “If you will treat her, I will bless you.”
With some lingering concern, I decided to follow this leading. As I expected, she was challenging, but I kept looking for the blessing. She was not a Christian. In fact, she had dabbled in the occult as a teenager. Nevertheless, it became natural for us to have spiritual discussions. I was gently proposing that she might consider the possibility that Jesus could help her in some way that her other spiritual efforts could not.
During one session, we were working in a particularly intense way. Using inner imagery, we were seeking to understand more about the nature of Jesse’s turmoil. What presented to her vividly was a turreted castle keep. Jesse was on the outside of the keep, but she could see that there were many wounded children inside who represented hurt parts of herself that needed healing. They were surrounded by an ominous cancerous growth.
It was an extended session, and Jesse worked until about an hour into the session, trying to find some way to get inside the keep to help the distressed children. She struggled mightily with all the energy that her intense maternal instinct could provide. She tried different symbolic maneuvers, like trying to break through the wall, trying to talk to the children through a window, and other things, but the children got no relief and continued to cry for help.
After she had struggled on her own for a long and futile while, I suggested she try a different approach. She had been open enough previously in considering Christianity that I felt safe suggesting she might like to try asking if Jesus would help her. Her frustration and desperation were strong enough that she was willing to try my suggestion.
She asked Jesus to join her in her efforts. Immediately, the image of Christ appeared to her, accompanied by a sense of holy light from God. As he stood there beside her, she went back to her struggles, trying to reach the children, but nothing was different. I suggested she try to wield the light like a tool to get through the wall. She did but was unable to penetrate the wall or find any kind of relief.
Our time allotment was drawing to a close. I personally did not understand why the vivid Jesus presence just stood there and watched as Jesse struggled. He did seemingly nothing to help her, and it did not look like Jesse was going to make any more headway that day.
I began to go through the process of drawing a session to a close. About a quarter of the way through the process, Jesse suddenly cried, “Wait!” Once Jesse gave up her struggle and it seemed hope was gone, Jesus took the offensive. He effortlessly broke through into the castle keep’s interior. There he walked among the children, offering love and healing. The cancerous growth receded. The sense of contamination and ominous danger left. And in a moment, Jesse felt intense relief, release, and a godly sense of wholeness unlike anything she had ever experienced.
She was amazed, and frankly, I was, as well. By that time, I had seen Jesus help in a variety of ways in incremental healing, but for him to swoop in and heal in a last-minute dramatic surprise was something I had never witnessed. To Jesse, the utter astonishment of it all was a convincing testament to the fact that this healing was not from Dr. Carrier and was not from her ego efforts. It was from Something outside of her that was larger, higher, and more loving than she had imagined.
Now, this session did not cure all of Jesse’s difficulties, but it was an important start on a new kind of life and healing process that she had not known before. Forever after, she referred to this time as her miracle. And truly, it was.
The technique that Jesse and I were using together is called inner healing prayer or imagistic prayer. It began as psychotherapy in a state of deep relaxation where I set up a very general scenario with guided imagery. Then, I let her soul and unconscious take it from there.
Typically, I start with a symptom and then suggest that the symptom take the form of an image. I suggest that the image/symbol can lead us to something important for the person’s healing that day. I may be more specific, suggesting a particular memory to go to if I know of something, but the higher unconscious is more insightful about the person than I am. I like it to lead as much as possible. This psychological technique is sometimes called an affective bridge. Any feeling can be turned into an image/symbol. Jung added this insight to psychology. Jesse’s work prior to Jesus’ coming might be considered psychological. Once Jesus arrived, however, it became prayer.
Names of Power
Like in stories of near-death experiences, intrapsychic spiritual helpers can take a variety of forms. The Buddhists might have the Buddha, some might experience an angelic presence, some might have a saint or a beloved departed relative. However, the Confederation informs us that in the cosmos there are certain names that have become names of power.
Quo notes:
Names of power aid in changing vibration and in opening the energy that is caught. We do not know what your name of power is, but it is that name by which you know love. You are not calling upon that name, as you use that name, in order to change your vibration. You are stating where you are, metaphysically speaking, upon what ground your feet stand as you seek love. This instrument, for instance, often offers a very short prayer, a one-word prayer, and that prayer is, “Jesus.” And when she utters this word within herself, she feels her vibration alter because she has remembered who she is and Whose she is.
https://www.llresearch.org/transcripts/issues/2010/2010_0227.pdf
In a 1988 channeling though Carla an infrequent Confederation source stated:
I am Ira, son of Mishdad. I greet you in the name of Jesus Christ. We wish to offer one more concept before we leave, that is that there was a question about the name, the importance of the name. We find in this instrument’s song, the hymn, “At the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow,” “Blessed be the name of the Lord.” We find many such phrases in this instrument’s worship. The naming is that which is the nature.When a person chooses a different nature and becomes passionately bonded to that nature in such a way that it will change the life, and seals the change by a name, that is a name of power, because that is a person of power. When a person chooses a symbol for perfect compassion and divine love for what this instrument calls the highest and best of all things, the seeker must name the symbol.
You may choose your Christ, but it is in the name that the power lies, for
https://www.llresearch.org/transcripts/issues/1988/1988_1113.aspx
the name is the nature, and the nature the name, and the I AM of consciousness is symbolized in its idealized form by my teacher, Jesus. I leave you in that blessed name.
The Ra Balancing Technique
So, when balancing the opposites within the soul like Ra teaches us, not only do we have the resources of our higher self as we hold the tension of the opposites using the balancing exercise, we have the higher spiritual resources as well. We can call on those names we associate with love and with whom we have developed a loving devotion over our many years
of spiritual practice. We will sometimes be surprised at the creative lengths to which that helper will go on our behalf. Such moments of epiphany make life and all of its struggles seem more worthwhile. They stir us to gratitude for those higher spheres which take thought for our souls.
Blessed be such Names.
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A Healing and Balancing Meditation by Dr. Arthur Carrier, MD
Within you are both love and fear.
These opposites are part of the experience of humankind on the earth and part of the life experience the Infinite Creator wants us all to have. In order to gain holy mastery over such opposites, one needs to learn to both tolerate and balance them. That way, we can experience them with a kind of holy neutrality called in spiritual tradition “apathea” (or equanimity).
The results of balancing include joy, springs of energy, and more and more finely tuned compassion; a finely tuned compassion and love which sees all things as the love of God. Thus, you become now able to approach the next situation in a creatively loving manner and feel less like a victim of the feelings. This is the maturing balance. To achieve that balance, I suggest the following practice.
Within meditation, allow the mind to riffle through the day’s experiences, searching for those things which have distracted or attracted, repelled or drawn your attention. These are the opposites you now welcome into your consciousness, both at the same time. You might picture them in some way, one on each side of a stage.
Use all of your sensory modalities to enhance the vision. Picture the challenging feeling as a shape or a symbol on one side of the stage. Notice its shape. Notice its color. Notice areas of light and shadow. Notice its texture. What sound does it make? What does it smell like? What’s its temperature. Does it vibrate, or is it still?
Or as an alternative, you can replay the memory of the troubling experience, for example, a moment when you felt fearful, angry, ashamed, or guilty. Do not make any attempt to change it. Instead just observe it. Use all of your sensory modes to enhance the image. What colors are present? What textures? How are the people standing or sitting? How do they move? What sounds are present? What is the energy in the space that you feel?
Allow the energy and experience of fear or other adverse feeling to fully express itself. Even intensify and exaggerate it. If you have trouble tolerating this, you can invite your spiritual helper now, but if you can tolerate it, wait until the last step to invite your helper. Allow these feelings and ideations to become ever stronger until you feel they are well intensified. Then mentally lay down that emotion and sit with that emotion without any attempt being made to change it.
Okay, now having done that, shift over to the opposite side of the stage where the opposite feeling can be invited and enhanced. In the same way, let those feelings play out and run their course. Let their intensity exaggerate to whatever degree you are able so you feel them to the fullest extent possible. Use all of your sensory modalities.
When the opposite of the first emotion is felt and has been respected and honored allow the thesis and antithesis, the original feeling and its complementary one, to exist side by side within the mind’s eye.
Now, invite Christ or Mary or an angel or Buddha or other positive spiritual presence to join you in the space between the opposites. Invite them to help you bring the energy of love as an integrating force to dwell in the space between the opposites. Both of these opposites are a part of you. And you are also the Infinite Creator.
Ask your spiritual helper to help you know yourself, accept yourself and these difficult opposites, and to become the creator, integrating these difficult opposites in some new and transcendent manner and in some surprising new way. If the issue involved is full of anguish and too fresh to work with today, it is time for us to rest and nurture ourselves in silence and peace, but as soon as possible, take up the balancing process.
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