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Earth-Centered Awareness Programs to Support Personal and Global Balance

Experiencing Our Infinite Self &

Minding Our Bank Account
By Laura Turlington

Human beings are built to experience. With our bodies, we experience life force - the energy that creates everything - as
it moves through the universe and finds its expression through us. This life force manifests itself as feelings, sensation,
and direct perception. In this state and in this way, we experience ourselves as what we are: infinite and boundless;
unified with, contributing to and drawing from everything we can see, everything we can imagine, and more. The magni-
tude of our true nature is larger than any one of us, and at the same time, it finds expression through us as individuals,
as we are all an aspect of it.

At the same time we recognize that we are direct perceiving bodies, we also know that we have a mind, an ego, a per-
sona. These interchangeable terms all represent the tool we use to translate our direct experience into words, identify-
ing experience for ourselves and sharing it with one another. It is the job of the ego to perform this function: to be the
storyteller that explains and communicates direct experience. The storytelling mind is useful and necessary to bring the
infinite, unexplainable quality that we are into the physical realm where we live in community, make relationships, nur-
ture children, and build the forms for expressing life in its largest sense.

Our infinite nature just is. The potential of our storyteller mind is maximized when we learn to use it with discernment.
The storyteller mind works like a bank account: it is the repository of all of the interpretations of our life’s experiences.
The deposits consist of our descriptions, opinions and beliefs made at the time of the deposit. When the bank is fully
operational, we have an amazing amount of capital from which to make withdrawals. The capital is most effective when
it is used to bring the qualities of direct experience into physical form. When the capital is used as a substitute for di-
rect experience, it displaces feeling (direct experience) and blocks the flow of life from our largest self. These withdraw-
als cannot take the place of direct experience, although when we are not paying attention, this is what happens. Over
time, we forget how the original investment was made and what its purpose was, and we let the old deposits take the
place of the current direct experience. Without awareness of this, we actually use these old deposits to keep us sepa-
rate from life.

The perceiving body and the storytelling mind are a great team when they are in balance and when we are aware of
their roles. Our bodies experience life moving through us and connect us to our infinite source, and the storytelling
mind shares this quality with others and brings it into the physical world. When the storytelling mind precedes or pre-
empts experience, we deny ourselves the potential of expressing our infinite selves. If we share direct experience with
the aware storytelling mind, then we bring the quality of the infinite-self to the physical realm. When we each presence
the quality of our infinite-self in as many moments as possible, we evolve ourselves and humanity into balance, into
harmony and into living the truth of what we are.

This article was first printed in aspire magazine, February 2008. Please visit www.aspiremag.net
Please contact Laura at One Community Programs for information about lectures and upcoming events

Earth · Spirit · Balance

www.onecommunityprograms.com
203-215-0070 860-983-4390