Wednesday, 26 October, 1994
Michael: Good morning, Bivalia.
Bivalia:[a] Good morning, Michael. How are you?
Michael: Surviving, I guess.
Bivalia: What brings you here so early in the morning, by your standards?
Michael: Well, I just woke up, I guess. I had a bit of a funny dream.
Bivalia: Do you want to tell me about it?
Michael: I can try; it's one of those long, confused, complicated dreams
of which I only remember a few fragments anyway, some of which I may not be
able to find the words to describe anyway, as often happens.
Bivalia: See what you can come up with.
Michael: Well, it was one of those dreams about the M. family I used
to live next door to at my previous address. I hardly knew them, but when I
was living there I used to constantly dream about them, sometimes every week
or so. It's slackened off a bit now, and sometimes so long goes by without a
dream about them that I think that's all over now, and then another one comes
up, quite definitely featuring one or more members of that family.
Bivalia: This is interesting, isn't it?
Michael: Yes. I hardly knew them, would barely meet them even passingly
from one month to the next, and from what little I knew of them I have no
reason whatsoever to think I would have anything in common with them anyway;
yet they did seem to fascinate me, anyway. And there's no doubt, they did
fascinate me, somehow, and if I saw Mr. or Mrs. M. walking along the
street, I would make a point of saying hullo, which is not something I usually
make a point of doing unless I already know someone well, which wasn't the
case here.
Bivalia: Interesting. It seems to indicate connections with them at more
subtle levels than the physical. Did the dreams or the fascination in waking
life start first?
Michael: I'm not sure. I think they sort of grew together, each feeding
the other. But I can't tell you how it began, exactly. I think it began very
small and unnoticeably, and gradually grew so that at first I was hardly aware
anything was happening.
Bivalia: Would you like to tell me a bit about this family?
Michael: I can't tell you much. And I certainly hope, by a quirk of
fate, this writing doesn't fall into their hands. They'd think I was nuts.
Bivalia: I think that is most unlikely to happen.
Michael: Well, Mr. M., James, or Jim, is from Britain, perhaps
Scotland, and spoke with a thick accent, not quite the usual English one, but
related - perhaps Scottish (I'm not good at identifying accents). He's a
stockbroker who works in the city (I once heard from another neighbour), I
suppose in his 50s or so. His wife is called Lynn, and her speech sounds
Australian, and I think she's a bit younger than him. They have a cattle
property on King Island.
I believe both had previous marriages, and he had two daughters from his
previous marriage (I don't know their names or anything about them), and she
had two sons, Kent and Scott, from her previous marriage. They have no
children by each other. All this was told to me by a couple of neighbours, at
various times, who knew them better than I did. I know next to nothing about
them in my own right.
I think the daughters moved out relatively soon after I moved in next
door, although I never met them or even knew of their existence. Despite the
fact that their house was just over the fence facing where I lived, perhaps
less than 10 yards away, I saw very little of their comings and goings and for
years didn't even know how many members there were in the family.
There's nothing whatsoever about all of this that should make them
interest me, is there?
Bivalia: You can't tell just by looking at outward facts.
Michael: I believe they're rather well-to-do; I think their property
would be worth quite a lot, being near Camberwell junction as it is, and he
drives a Mercedes Benz, which I've been told are cars that cost at least
$50,000 - the cheapest models, that is. But none of that would mean much to me.
Bivalia: It would seem to me that you have connections with these people
going back before you met them physically. The Mercedes Benz, previous
marriages, and all that stuff need not mean much to you personally; it's those
souls, those entities, that form the essence of the connection.
Michael: I didn't even know it was a Mercedes Benz at the time. It was
only later on, less than a year ago, that Mum pointed one out to me, and I
said to her, "Oh, that's a Mercedes Benz, is it? I didn't know; I've
never known what those cars are with the triangular symbol on them. They don't ever
seem to have 'Mercedes Benz' written on them", to which she replied, "They
don't need to have it written on them. Everyone knows, except you."
Bivalia: Well, it isn't every day that I meet someone who can't recognize a
Mercedes Benz. A little out of touch with the world, are you, my friend?
Michael: Yes, I guess so. I have no need to keep in touch with the world
at large, since the things that really mean a lot to me do not tend to be
bound up with the world generally. Anyway, that shows you how much I know
about cars, although I can now recognize Mercedes Benzes.
Bivalia: There's still hope for you yet. If you can recognize them now,
you might be able to get one next year. You might yet make it in your world.
Michael: Yuk. I assume you're joking. Anyway, about the M.s, I must
say there's something about Mr. M., in particular (he was never James or
Jim to me), that seems vaguely familiar about him, although that can't be so.
There can't be any possible way I ever knew him before I moved in next door.
Bivalia: In this life-time, physically, at least. But perhaps you knew him
in previous life-times, and it was not his body that triggered that feeling of
vague familiarity, because you'd never seen his body before, but it was his
spirit, his Higher Self, that triggered it. There are two obvious possible
answers: either you knew this being in previous lives, and/or you knew him
astrally in this life-time, and perhaps met him during sleep, and had work to do
with him.
Michael: I never dreamed about him before I first saw him physically.
Bivalia: That could have been buried in those parts of your dream life that
you never remember upon awakening. You are aware that what you remember is only
a small proportion of what really takes place. But once you saw him physically,
that caused him to stand out in your dreams more, so that you often remembered
dreaming about him.
Michael: Are you saying that is so?
Bivalia: It would seem quite likely.
Michael: But you're not definite. I would have thought, you, of all
people, would know for certain.
Bivalia: I can only channel information through your mind. You
must understand that channelling is not quite like a telephone conversation. At
this time, I can only come through your mind, which has limitations of knowledge,
and this does limit what I can tell you.
If only it were otherwise; and one day it will be, perhaps not as far off
as you think; but so far, I can't answer all the riddles of your life, because at
present your mind is not really ready to accept and believe that. I suppose in a
way what you are typing is what you think I'm saying rather than what I'm
definitely saying; and hopefully there is not too much discrepancy between the
two, and the two are getting closer all the time.
I can't tell you all the answers to your spiritual life, past lives, and
things of that sort; but I can prod you and stimulate you into remembering these
things yourself; and I can assure you that, although this may take longer, it
will be much more valuable to you in the long run, because you will know the
truth of these things, not merely have my word for it.
What about other members of the family?
Michael: They don't seem to have that familiar feeling to them right from
the start, but they did sometimes appear in the dreams. But for a couple of
years I didn't even know how many children there were, and I didn't even know
what Mrs. M. looked like. I occasionally saw a grey-haired woman in the
garden and thought that was her, but apparently it was his mother. At times I
wondered if he was a widower, but a time came when I got to know what Mrs.
M. looked like; I don't remember, but I suppose I must have met her by
chance at some time.
The girls I never met or even saw, and, as I said, I think they moved out
relatively soon after I moved in. I don't think they ever came into the
dreams. The boys, Kent and Scott, did sometimes, but I met them very rarely.
So it was basically the people I met at least occasionally who came into the
dreams, but it was Mr. M. most often.
Bivalia: Well, what happened in the dream you just had?
Michael: I don't remember much. It seems I was with them somewhere, in a
house, I don't know where. I had to go back home for some reason, to get
something, then come back. It's pretty trivial when you look at it in the
cold light of day.
Bivalia: Well, was there more to it?
Michael: Lots more, but it's all vague, and probably fading from mind
even now. There seemed to be this bit where I had made some sandwiches, and
somehow the sandwiches seemed to be tied in with a piece of music I had
written, a piano piece; and I seem to remember I was in a hurry to get back
again before someone ate the sandwiches and I lost my piece of music. Crazy,
isn't it?
Bivalia: Well, as you know, dream events, taking place in the astral plane
as they do, often can't be described in ordinary language, and when you try,
something garbled like that comes out.
Michael: Yes, someone once said that trying to interpret dreams properly
is a bit like trying to deduce what a party was like from the smell of the
food scraps left over at the end.
Bivalia: That's not a bad analogy of what it's like. I think it's the
feel, the atmosphere of a dream that counts the most, not necessarily the actual
events which, as you point out, are sometimes nonsensical. But your dream had a
definite atmosphere to it, didn't it?
Michael: Yes, and I couldn't even begin to describe it.
Bivalia: Are there other parts you remember?
Michael: Well, the journey to my place (which was, in the dream, where it
really is) seemed to be very slow and difficult. Where I had been with the
M.s seemed to be a few miles sort of north-north-west, which would place
it, I suppose, in East Kew or East Hawthorn, although it wasn't at all like
that region really is.
I think I walked south along Burke Rd. at one point, and at Camberwell
junction I saw a quite visibly deformed person who appeared to be the famous
astronomer and theoretical physicist, Stephen Hawking, who in actual fact is
almost totally crippled with motor neurone disease. He can move a couple of
fingers and that's about it, and he has to have the mucus pumped out of his
lungs every few hours. Despite all this, he's probably the world's foremost
expert on black holes and related phenomena.
Anyway, I saw him on crutches there at the junction, all shrivelled up
and emaciated, which is really how he does look. I was pleased, because if he
could get around on crutches, it was certainly an improvement on the situation
he'd been in previously.
I don't remember if I spoke to him or not.
I think I caught a tram along Riversdale Rd. at this point, and on it met
someone I know from the Church of Antioch, one of the clergy there, Sandra
London. We got to talking a bit, and it caused me to get off the tram several
stops too late. (In fact, it was the wrong tram for getting to my place, but
for some reason it seemed right in the dream.)
And, for some reason, Sandra gave me the news that Stephen Hawking had
just died, which she somehow knew before it got into any of the papers.
My journey home continued, and I seem to remember winding my way through
remote alleys, and even walking through people's houses and across their
back-yards, and over their back fences, anxious in case anyone should see me
doing this. The whole business just seemed very laborious, although I did
meet a couple of really weird cats who seemed attracted to me and tried to
follow me, although I wasn't sure if I was attracted to them or not.
I don't seem to remember any more than that, and the dream somehow faded
out and I woke up about 9.30 a.m., which is considerably earlier than I am in
the habit of waking up, although I think I fell asleep considerably earlier
than usual the previous night.
Bivalia: Well, this does seem to be a dream where you are making things
unnecessarily difficult for yourself. Why didn't you go home from Camberwell
junction just simply by walking up Camberwell Rd.?
Michael: I don't know. I think the whole geography of the district was
completely different. That often happens in dreams, with me at any rate.
Bivalia: But I wonder if it could be a metaphor for making things
unnecessarily difficult. There could be a shortcut to achieving what you want to
that will be obvious once you open your mind to it as a possibility.
Michael: Maybe, but I can't imagine what that could be, in specific terms.
Bivalia: Well, think about it anyway, any time things seem more difficult
than you would like them to be.
Michael: What about Stephen Hawking? Why did he come in, and then die?
Is it possible I know him astrally too?
Bivalia: It's possible; but since you don't dream about him regularly, I
would say the connection is much less. I suppose it's possible his presence
there is symbolic of something, not necessarily literal.
Michael: You suppose. I come to you for answers, not suppositions.
Bivalia: Alas, I have to disappoint you sometimes. I told you before why I
can't just answer everything like that. I think it would be better to think in
terms of getting to know me better and working with me, than to think of me as a
giant database of answers about your spiritual life. I'm afraid it just doesn't
seem to work that way; even I can't change the universe yet, but perhaps one
day. But seek the kingdom of God first (and I am an important step along the way
to that), and all the other things will be added. Sounds familiar, does it?
Michael: Yes, it's somewhere in the Bible.
Bivalia: It happens to be quite true, and I don't call everything in the
Bible true; but that's one that is.
Michael: Wouldn't it be strange if I went out and saw a newspaper
headline outside a newsagent's, saying "HAWKING DEAD"? If I saw something of
that sort accurately before I could have any normal way of knowing about it, I
think it would be very important to me, because it would convince me that
there are ways of learning things that go beyond the senses and ordinary
reasoning, ways that therefore must be dependent on spiritual or non-physical
realms.
Bivalia: Such things are reported from time to time.
Michael: But until it happens to me, it won't convince me. Second-hand
accounts always have the possibility that the person is a hoaxer, or simply
honestly mistaken about something, such as the fact that they did read the
fact but forgot consciously - you know, that sort of thing.
Bivalia: I know. What about cases where a person claims to know something,
quite publicly, so that they are definitely known to have made the claim? But
it's a fact no-one knows at all at the time, something no-one could guess by
chance, and then it is verified at a later date. Perhaps that might convince you.
Michael: It might. But I have never come across such an instance that is
a matter of public fact, that can't be denied. I doubt if such an instance
exists; if it did, it would be so remarkable a proof of metaphysical reality
that it would surely be famous, beyond the ability of anyone to suppress.
Well, in the dream, my feelings about Hawking's death were a mixture of
sadness, and gladness for him that his terrible physical ordeal was at last
over. It seemed in the dream that I cared about him.
Bivalia: I think you do. I think you are a being of considerable love and
compassion, however well-hidden it may be at times in everyday life. I remember
a time when an account you heard of the gruesome physical details of his illness
brought you uncomfortably close to crying.
Michael: Yes, his illness is just so horrible that such things surely
shouldn't exist anywhere in the universe for any reason whatsoever. The sort
of stuff that could turn one into a convinced atheist.
Bivalia: Yes, this problem of suffering is a difficult one for you, isn't
it? And none of the conventional spiritual explanations about karma even begin
to make sense to you, do they?
Bivalia: I can't give you the answers now. But remember that your own
progress is not dependent on you working out the answers to such matters. You
are not called upon to work out the answers in this life. Perhaps you may work
on this one day, if your heart draws you that way; but you don't need to take the
universe's problems on your shoulders now. You are not presently equipped for
such a massive task.
Michael: It seems to me that either God exists or he doesn't; and if he
does, either he can't remedy suffering, or simply won't. It can't be
anything else; it must be one or the other of those possibilities. Now, if he
can't, he's not really much use to anyone, and we might as well ignore him; if
he won't, that is, he can but chooses not to, that would make him little short
of evil, a dangerous tyrant who sits watching people suffer the most appalling
things. Perhaps we ought to revolt and destroy him, which I think is
something alluded to by broadcaster and former priest Terry Lane.
Bivalia: I understand your feelings about this. Perhaps I can see God a
little more closely. I can also see that things are not as simple as this
black-and-white type of reasoning would seem to suggest. It really can't be
explained in words, which is why so many people have tried over the millennia and
failed. Well, those who agree with what they say may think they succeeded, but I
meant failed in the sense that their explanation was not universally and
generally accepted.
I can assure you though, beloved, from what I see of God, that he
understands the conflicting feelings you have about him, a mixture of disbelief
and desire to find him, a mixture of resentment at what he allows to happen and
longing for all the wonderful love he has; and if you could just see how
understanding he is, and how much he loves you, you would not feel such confusion
over your attitude to him.
As near as it can be put into words at all, perhaps I can tell you that God
is evolving too, and he is helping us evolve, and we are helping him evolve too.
Perhaps he can't, in a given situation, instantly cure all pain; and I know that
he knows pain too: he hurts along with the people who hurt, and is on
their side. I know you have doubts about the explanation given in Rabbi Harold
Kushner's book When Bad Things Happen to Good People, but there were at
least parts that made some sort of sense. You might like to think about that a
bit further.
It's a difficult problem even in higher dimensions than yours, and we don't
have a cut-and-dried solution ourselves, or else we would be busting a gut to
share it with humanity generally. We're all on your side, you know, God too -
especially God - difficult though it is for you to believe.
It's really difficult to explain, but I think you will one day feel it, if
you continue to draw closer to God. And you are already doing what you need to
do to draw closer to God, that is, following what you believe to be truth,
keeping the hope of that sense of wonder growing more and more real, growing
closer to me, and keeping in touch with those Masters you feel drawn to.
Michael: We seem to keep coming back to this matter in session after
session, don't we?
Bivalia: You have much feeling within you to be released about this issue.
It won't happen all at once. You have much pain from previous lives that is
still casting a shadow over you even now.
Michael: The sort of stuff Sananda told me about?
Bivalia: Yes, that sort of stuff, and probably others too that he didn't go
into.
Michael: I just long to be out of this world.
Bivalia: I know. I understand why you do, and I don't blame you in the
slightest. Much has gone wrong in your world. Many starseeds have this feeling,
because at some deeper level of their being, they have a vision, a memory, of how
things really should be. This is why your current world system pains them so
much.
Michael: And I think this is why I've somehow clung to the ascension
philosophy I've heard of over the last year or so. It seems to offer a
hopeful prospect, however unlikely it might be.
Bivalia: Well, time will tell. It is obvious that something must happen in
your world soon, say within your normal life expectancy. Societies hitherto
regarded as stable are breaking down gradually but inexorably, standards are
sliding, hatred and greed are increasing, pollution getting worse and worse, more
and more trees being cut, the world population steadily increasing. It is
obvious something must happen. If there is not intervention from higher realms,
disaster will happen. I don't think there can be any doubt about it: one or the
other of these things must happen: either intervention from above, or disaster.
Michael: The question is, which will it be? Throughout much of history,
various people have predicted the end of the world, or at least some sort of
divine intervention, and nothing has happened so far.
Bivalia: I know. Without the sort of inner knowledge you want but don't
have yet, it is difficult to believe in these things. But today's situation is
different from all the previous ones. From an ecological point of view, the
danger the Earth as a whole is in is quite unprecedented; never before has the
degree of damage been so widespread and severe as to threaten the planet as a
whole. While this does not prove that intervention is imminent, it does at least
provide a particular reason why intervention should come now as against any other
time, provided at least that you believe intervention is a possibility, even if a
very rare one. And of course history shows that intervention, if it happens at
all, is exceedingly rare. All of recorded history shows no signs of such
intervention, except for ancient myths which may be founded on truth but can't be
regarded as proven, so it is obvious that the usual course of events is for
things on Earth to work themselves out in their own way, for better or worse,
according to the usual physical laws of nature.
Michael: Yes. You are only too correct.
Bivalia: Things will change one day. They have to if life is to continue.
Various beings from higher realms are telling us we've just passed the nadir,
that the phase of the universe is now ended where things just work themselves out
blindly according to mechanical laws of physics and chemistry, all the sort of
stuff that scientists use for predicting things.
Physicists don't really know the ultimate fate of the universe yet, whether
it will all coalesce one day into a gigantic black hole, or whether it will
expand indefinitely until the increase of entropy simply reaches the final stage
of heat death, where all energy is so evenly spread in the different parts of the
universe that no transfers of energy can take place, and nothing can happen.
Michael: Maybe one of those will happen, and life won't continue. It
proves nothing about intervention.
Bivalia: It doesn't. But it would be just as well to remember that the
scientific view that predicts black holes, heat death, and so on doesn't have a
monopoly on truth. I feel I should remind you of this every now and then.
Michael: I feel this discussion has not reached any very satisfying
conclusions, somehow.
Bivalia: We cannot expect to solve all the riddles of the universe here and
now. We are simply getting to know each other; or, since I already know you
well, perhaps I should say that you are getting to know me better. And by that
criterion, I think our sessions are very successful indeed.
Bivalia: You are much harder on yourself than I am, or God is, or the
Masters are. Perhaps you are climbing over a few too many back fences, rather
than walking in a direct line along the streets.
Michael: You know, I think this discussion is fizzling out. I think that
dream was all I had in mind to bring up now.
Bivalia: You have my permission to fizzle out, if that is your desire. And
if you didn't have my permission, there would be nothing to stop you anyway.
You're the one doing the physical work of typing, not me; you hold the strings,
not me.
Michael: Well, I like to be agreeable with you, not just act
autocratically.
Bivalia: My dear one, you are always very agreeable to me, whatever you
do. There is great love between you and me; this didn't begin merely when you
started writing dialogues with me.
Michael: Well, I can't spend a lot of time here today, because I want to
go and print the previous few sessions (and this one too), because Ra Leah
says she would really like to read them, in particular the long session where
we talked about my grandmother and about that walk I took.
Bivalia: As you please. I think she will enjoy reading that, won't she?
Michael: Probably. Well, I might as well say good-bye.
Bivalia: Good-bye, my friend, until we meet again.
|