April 2022

TRUTH NEVER HURTS
     Truth hurts! That’s my lecture. I could spend forty-five minutes saying that same thing, and give you little stories about it, and elaborate on it. You will remember or write down TRUTH HURTS! It’ll explain everything! From wars, to broken marriages, to broken hearts, it’ll explain everything. TRUTH HURTS! Nobody will ever investigate why they feel bad. And of course, you know, you should know, that Truth never hurts. It’s the resistance to it that causes the pain.
     You refuse to stand alone! And right now, you’re far from being capable of standing alone. Most horribly of all you associate with yourself! Did you ever think of that thought, that you associate with yourself? And you’re going to ask yourself to be your strength?
     Standing alone means to not stand with yourself! But I know the problem, and maybe you suspect that you haven’t separated enough inside yourself where you can see that you're depending on that familiar retort. You’re depending on that huddling up inside of yourself. You're depending on hoping that someone will speak to you first and be nice to you.
     You stand around, even in this room and in other places, and just hope that someone else is going to take the initiative to relieve your insecurity, your loneliness. And they come over to relieve theirs, not for your sake.
     If the Truth hurts — which it does — then why don’t you let it hurt you so completely, so altogether, that you can understand it. And you won’t throw up all these defenses, all this heavy artillery of resistance, or of giving yourself comforting thoughts, “Well, tomorrow will be different.” It won’t!
     I run out of the ability to tell you certain things — certain marvelous facts which I know — and which I want you to know too. Because God, Truth, Reality is overseeing all of us, you and me, in order for us to escape from ourselves. I run out of words. And yet, I can use words, which are very limited. And I'll tell you what I'm talking about right now.
     There is a great secret, with a capital S, that the world knows nothing about, doesn’t care about, has no interest in it, has no interest in pursuing it.
     I just said that there is a great secret. Now it has no meaning to people who want to remain rude. This has no meaning to people who want to continue to pretend that they are superior to everyone, including a speaker. Someone who comes and tells them about things — they know more than that man. In their own minds they believe that they know everything. Right? Now, I'm going to explain to you the unexplainable while using words.
     In order to get over pain you inflict more pain on yourself so it’ll be stronger than the previous one, so that all you can do is close your eyes and cry. Completely self-enclosed, thinking that’s going to block it out. This is known as living in hell!
     When you’re out — when you're really out — you think different, you live different, you act different. And you never, never, again want to hurt anyone.
     Will you see your mistake then, in trying to climb over the wall, which is self-defeating? Which will only give you an egotistical and neurotic thrill, and the pleasure of punishment — the pleasure of punishment, because now you can think about yourself.
     You want the secret? I’ll tell you. The guide, the member of the escape committee, is ready to talk to you any time you are ready to listen. And he'll tell you the right way to go. I’m talking about Truth of course, which will enter a receptive heart. And no matter how hardened we are, how stubborn we are, how hopeless it seems, if you'll come back again, and again, and again, and put yourself in back of that guide. If you'll put yourself in back of that guide you will know that he is in front of you all the way out.
     Listen to what I said. If you're outside, you know that all those evils, and all the viciousness, and all those whips, and all the cruelty of human beings can't get over the wall. They don’t want out. They can’t get out because they don't want out. They want to be who, and what, they are. We have got tired of that lie! We have said we want out. And we can make it.

JUST WATCH
     There is a part of your mind which is perfectly capable of standing aside to calmly observe another part which is disturbed. It is like a referee at a football game who sees everything but is not involved in the battle.
     Realizing this is one of the greatest discoveries we can make. You can see why. It proves the existence of another way of thinking, of a force which is never drawn into the whirlpool of agitated thought. You will recall that we have called this the technique of self-observation. But, of course, we must practice until we experience this power for ourselves. Any daily challenge will serve.
     Just watch. Never mind if nothing happens at first, you’re still experimenting. Quietly observe every upset feeling the moment it arises. What results from this? What results is a human being who is no longer the victim of exterior influences, a person who determines his own thought and who lives his own life.