Several people speak with John in the Jewel Cafe:
Q1: Things are better with my daughter.
John: It’s better between you and your self.
Q1: What do you mean by “better between me and my self”?
John: It’s not really between you and your daughter; it’s between you and your self. If you had a different self, then what you experience between you and your daughter would be completely different.
Q1: Yes, but that’s the self I have. It’s really very difficult for me to see.
John: Your experience with your daughter is really your relationship between you and your self. As soon as your self changes, your relationship with you and your daughter changes, even if she doesn’t change.
Q1: It’s difficult, yes, but it’s so mutual. If I have a very strong relationship with someone, it’s not just me.
John: If you had my self instead of yours, your experience of the relationship with your daughter and other people would be really different.
If you were to have someone else’s self each day for a whole year, you’ll realize that your experience of what it’s like to be with your daughter is going to change with each self. It wouldn’t take very long, and you’ll realize what it is that is constant in your relating with her that is not based on the self you have.
At the end of the year, when you get your self back, the way that you view it is going to be really different. You won’t be able to take it seriously anymore because you’ll realize it’s like one of many selves, and it’s the constancy in being within each self that is real to you.
Q2: Is there anything in the self that really has worth or informs us of anything?
John: Yes. The value is in the clarity and the delicacy of feeling that’s there. When you have a different self each day, you realize what you know is true within the thinking and feeling of each self. You develop this constancy of knowing which part is worth relating to within each self. You’ll receive and move with that, and you’ll let go of the rest of it.
Q3: Truth is in everything, right? It’s not only underneath but it’s in everything.
John: If you discern it, then you’re moving as that in whatever self of the day you have. In some selves there will be an enormous amount of really good clarity and deep goodness. With some other selves there’ll be almost nothing, but it doesn’t matter which self you have, there’s going to be something. There’s going to be what you’re able to discern as real and good.
After going through many selves, if you’re able you’ll realize that what is constant is the part within each self that you can use to discern what to receive into your heart and what to just let go.
Q2: There’s this vast, empty space that I am in the most. It’s a constant, available space and I know the goodness of it. Things arise within it, and what I notice in that is that my sense of ‘I’ is completely changing.
John: If you would have a different self, someone else’s self each day for a year, what you’d realize is that you are that which you speak of. The way that you move within your self of the day is as warmth and clarity, and it doesn’t matter to you what self you get.
Whether it’s extremely clear, wholesome, good and mature, or full of holes and tightness, it wouldn’t matter to you because you’ll move as this warmth, clarity and goodness.
