Transcript

Maria Felipe:                        00:02                       Hi everyone and welcome to Live Your Happy TV. I am really excited about our guest this week. Um, and I’m, I’m just thrilled and I’ll get you to be able to interview him. He’s somebody that I met when I was a speaker at different retreats, called weekend of freedom retreat. Um, that was done by my dear friend Shiryl and we just became good friends and one thing I remember about, about my next guest is, we got lost on a hike together. We got lost on a hike together and he kind of was acting like he, he could get. He knew about this hike and he could get this done and we got lost. So I thought it was so cool. And we got lost like for an hour just so everybody knows, like a hike that takes, like, I don’t know if we were already gone forever, but we’re alive, which is really important. And we’re alive and we’re here to teach about love, happiness, of course, miracles. I’m bruce is a student of a course in miracles. He also teaches it as well, and I love his approach because he comes from more intellectual scientific approach, which is really great because I’m more about like joy and I come more from the heart as of where bruce comes from, Lauren intellectual standpoint, which kind of Ken Wop Wop, Nick did as well, I feel. And, um, I just, I love the, the way that your approach is because I feel that everybody has their gift and everybody identifies with different types of teachers and students and that’s what we’re here to do. We’re all here to be versatile and see who brings out the best in us. Um, and who, who really inspires us and this truly helpful. So Bruce, Ross, thank you for being here today on live. You’re happy.

Bruce Rawles:                      01:48                       Thank you for inviting me, Maria. I really appreciate it.

Maria Felipe:                        01:52                       I know me too. We’re going to go ahead and we’re going to talk about, um, our, our center kindness teacher, our inner kindness teacher. Now, for those that don’t know, I’m the course of miracles, talks about our inner teacher. Um, you can call it inner wisdom. Um, you can call it a holy spirit love, it’s the opposite of the voice of fear, which is the voice of the ego that the course talks about. So this is going to be a beautiful subject. I feel that bruce is going to really inspire us and give us golden nuggets on how to be able to listen to this voice. Now, what I love about, um, what I love about Bruce is how he shares about the course in a more scientific point of view. And I want you to first tell us a little bit about that and how the course plays into this type of approach.

Bruce Rawles:                      02:41                       Sure, sure. Yeah. I kind of like, as I’m sharing, before we started the recording, I kind of grew up and I sometimes joke. In fact, even in my second book, I wrote a little intro saying that I grew up in a nuclear family literally and figuratively because my dad was a supervisor on a cyclotron in livermore, California where my mom still lives. And um, so I kinda got through Osmosis a thorough indoctrination in, in the physics, modern physics and particularly [inaudible] and Adam smashers cyclotrons and that kind of thing. Basically, you know, that’s all they’re about is, is pushing forward the frontiers of physics. So I kinda heard terms around the dinner table as a kid, like isotope deuterium and, and, uh, all those kinds of terms that most people. I figured everyone knew what those men, you know, and then I learned later that not so much but, but, um, that was the, the, uh, the physics and, and also a love of nature because my dad liked to be in the outdoors.

Bruce Rawles:                      03:43                       I kind of got from my, my father, my from my mom’s side of the family, uh, was more of the intellectual curiosity. Not that my dad wasn’t intellectually curious but, but, uh, um, metaphysical in particular, she, she was kind of going through her, uh, what’s life all about, about the time I was in adolescence. And uh, so she was dragging the family around all these different churches and things. And, and, and among the many books that she gathered, uh, in the late seventies was these three blue volumes called a course in miracles and I saw them on the shelf there and everyone’s slide. We’ll flip through and say, well, yeah, maybe someday I’ll read these. And when I moved to the, uh, the foot hills of northern California in the mid eighties, I finally cracked them open. It was like, wow, this is pretty cool stuff. And I studied him for a few years, but it wasn’t till about 11 years ago, um, that I really kind of got plunged back into them headlong again when I saw Gary Renard book on the coffee table of a friend’s house. And, uh, and I picked it up, but I couldn’t put it down. And it’s like, oh my gosh, this is all in the course of miracles. I, I’ve got to check this out again. Makes I’ve been, I’ve been kind of in a back burner student for, for a couple of decades really. And, uh, so, and then that plunged me into not only Gary Renard work, but I’ll come up next brilliance as well. And that’s kind of what I’ve been doing pretty much full time for the last 11 years. So it’s, it’s a real quick, quick biography.

Maria Felipe:                        05:06                       Yeah, no, that’s wonderful. And it’s um, we get to know you better. So I really liked hearing that because I didn’t know that about you in reference to Gary. I’m book for everybody that doesn’t know Gary. He’s an amazing teacher because he has a book, the disappearance of the universe. It’s really helpful for any new student or just even somebody that’s been a student for a long time. It’s just so, so, so it’s such a helpful book. What happened with you, with Gary actually happened with me with Marianne Williamson when I first read a return to love. She’s the one that I’m back in 1995 is when I first even heard about the course and it was through that book, but I feel that they both teach it in such a practical way, um, and, and how to understand it so much better. And I think that your struggle and your wholesale was just like everybody else’s, that we kind of, we read the course and then we don’t understand it and then we kind like just leave it. And then it kind of surfaces again, like through you, through Gary and then that helps you, you know, and you’re like, you’re back.

Bruce Rawles:                      06:05                       Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, there were, there was a year when I had one of these off the chart years I go through a divorce, my father, grandfather, uncle, and Anna, I’ll fellow core student passed on and uh, and as I know a lot of soul searching and I kind of plunged back into the course and uh, realized that it was speaking to me, the, you mentioned the heart and I think the, the intellect and the heart really need to work together, uh, in order for us to really appreciate the chorus. And I think, uh, you know, can walk. Nick exemplified that in beautifully. And the fact that he, he really obviously had an impeccable mind and, and a brilliant understanding of the course, but he also shared it from the heart. And you could tell from, from all the work that he did that, that it was really a completely a genuine appreciation, not, um, not just that were similar, but the, the, the true unity.

Bruce Rawles:                      06:57                       And I think that’s one of the goals of the course is to recognize how we’re really all the same, uh, in, in, uh, not, not just a similar way, but a true, the true nondual oneness. And I, I guess that might be a good segue to some of the things in modern physics that I found fascinating that, uh, again, we kinda like we build houses, uh, on, on a foundation. We might try to make the foundation flat, although we know the earth is round, spherical or spheroid will actually. But, but the same thing is true with modern physics. We kind of know intellectually that I’m at least, if you studied modern physics at all, that a modern physics suggests that the rs basic assumptions about the reality of matter and energy. We’re totally a revolutionized. Several decades ago with quantum physics and quantum mechanics and fact, there’s a physicist named John Wheeler who said there’s no out there out there, which is basically a kind of a one way of saying that what modern physics turned upside down was the whole Newtonian model that that matter is the real deal and mind as well.

Bruce Rawles:                      08:12                       We can kind of dismiss mind because it doesn’t, it doesn’t enter, enter, enter into. I can say that in any of those Newtonian equations. Meaning that, uh, that from the, the old school point of view, yeah, the physical reality was the real deal. And what, what was going on in your mind had nothing to do with it. Well, maybe your brain, but, but, but the mind is something that was beyond space and time. That was, that was not even, that was just out there, you know, mystical stuff. And not the, not the realm of physics. Well, well, what happened in Copenhagen several decades ago, they had this thing called the Copenhagen interpretation. It was named after this event, when the likes of Albert Einstein, Niels Bohr, Max Planck in a Heisenberg, all these, all these luminaries, these really famous people in the realm of modern physics. Well, not at that time, but now they are, uh, came together and they kind of looked at each other like, holy, holy, whatever.

Bruce Rawles:                      09:12                       How are we going to explain to the world because no longer could you take mind as being this like thing we can kinda shove aside because mine was now primary because of this thing called the double slit experiment, which basically said that if you expected to see a particle in these experiments that were repeated hundreds and hundreds of times in different places all over the world, you are going to see a particle. But if you expected to see a wave, you’re going to see a wave. And that was called the wave particle duality, which basically says that it’s not just these, these objects acting by themselves. Duality essentially, you know, this, this, this idea of everything separate from each other. But mind is principal. Mine is primary mind is, is, is completely intertwined. Which is what the, you know, is a perfect segue to an appreciation of the metaphysics, the pure nondual metaphysics of a course in miracles, because what that suggests is that we can’t have a thought that’s apart from everything and everyone in the universe, they’re, they’re the, the, the interconnection is, is not only so complete, um, but it, it, it brings a responsibility back to us to look at the contents of our mind and choose peace or fear in any given moment.

Maria Felipe:                        10:36                       Speaking about choosing peace or fear, how does our inner teacher and her kindness seizure, which we’ll be talking about today, which is the Holy Spirit, how does that, how, how does that relate to quantum physics and science?

Bruce Rawles:                      10:51                       I think, I think, I think again, that the foundations of the modern physics suggests that, that the body and the material universe of matter and energy and space and time are just an interpretation of reality. So if that’s the case, I mean, it’s a very convincing hologram that we’re all living in, right?

Maria Felipe:                        11:11                       It appears, it appears very, very real. Well,

Bruce Rawles:                      11:15                       we, I mean, we have all the evidence in the world that says this is the real deal and yet there’s something, there’s something always missing. There’s always this awareness that something could be better, you know, and this is what Helen and bill, uh, yeah, Helen Sharman and Bill Thetford said to each other back in the mid sixties when they were at each other’s throats because I mean, on an intellectual level, I mean, and a credentialed academic, they were at the top of their game. They were, you know, career psychologist at Columbia Presbyterian University and, and, uh, you know, back east and, but they couldn’t get along with each other. And so out of that frustration was born this understanding that, that, you know, there must be a better way. And then I think we all have that calling and, and, and again, modern physics I think ties into it just as Freud and Plato and Shakespeare and, and, uh, you know, all of these things that fit into Helen Chapman’s a mine and her passions and interest fit into how the, the course came out in terms of form all of these things. Also, we’re the perfect background for a course in miracles to have the kind of message that would be receptive to a large percentage of the planet worldwide.

Maria Felipe:                        12:36                       Why I feel, I feel that, um, one thing that a lot of people could relate to is to the undoing of the ego and the mind because we all as bodies have egos. So any, any type of book or anything that has to do with undoing the ego and your mind is, is, is helpful because we all suffer from this crisis of fear based thoughts. You know. So how, how is it that you work with your thoughts of fear, which is the opposite of the inner kindness teacher, um, in your daily life. You feel like,

Bruce Rawles:                      13:11                       I think the best way is to just practice, practice, practice being mindful of the least little annoyance, irritation, victim hood, uh, any, any kind of feeling of, well, this is an intrusion or an interruption or a big, you know, we were just talking about that in a study group. I’m, I attend online, uh, you know, this morning and how, as Ken said, the, the, the interruptions aren’t diverting us from our classroom. They are the classroom because again, tying it back into the physics if, if there is no out there out there, as is physicist John Wheeler said that that’s basically just another way of saying ideas don’t leave their source. So if there’s something that is, seems to be outside of me that really becomes my forgiveness classroom when I realized that I am projecting everything that I experience, maybe not consciously, but that’s the whole beauty of how um, you know, as [inaudible] was talking about Freud and how to generalize what Freud was saying about the unconscious mind with dreams being the royal road to the unconscious.

Bruce Rawles:                      14:20                       Well, of course in miracles says all your time is spent in dreaming. Now we don’t, we don’t really like to hear that because we went, no, this is so real. But, but in a metaphoric way, if, if you know, the eastern mystics are right, and then you combine that with the western, you know, quantum mechanics. Then if, if the dream is really the dream, that separation is possible, which is the dualistic dream, uh, that, that space is real, time is real. Then we need look at everything that seems to come back to us as a feedback process. I like that rather than, rather than this is being done to me as Gary Renard work, you know, and I love how he puts it. It’s being done by me. So, but wait, we need to bring that back into our mind. We need to restore the causality back to the mine and see that there’s no separate things.

Bruce Rawles:                      15:14                       There’s just a, there’s an interpretation that is very popular. It’s outrageously popular. That suggests that there’s separate things and stuff and it would be silly of course, to, to, to work in the world as if that’s not the case, but of course in miracles is all wasn’t only about the mine and addresses a at that inner kindness teacher within us that we all have and says, hey, you, I could choose peace instead of this. And the way we do that as is moment to moment, bringing back in, reeling in the things that seem to be outside of ourselves and saying, Aha, if there’s something that I’m the least little bit out of peace with and out of harmony with, that is my clue. That’s my classroom, doesn’t have to be in my prayers. I can turn it around and make it a classroom for looking at what I need to forgive.

Bruce Rawles:                      16:04                       And, and recognizing that nothing happened to the truth of what we are in reality. That, that eternal, unshakable, unchangeable, wonderful, innocent, beautiful being that we all are. And share is really the foundation from which we can say, hey, if what I really am and what you really are, what everyone else really is, cannot be threatened. I can afford to forgive. But, but if I think I’m this little person that has this finite lifetime and, and I’m really attached to the outcome of what happens to this bruce character or this Maria character, whoever else is listening, um, mean, you know, it’s not that we don’t do those things, but if we can just kind of begin to take with a little bit less seriousness, I mean Kinda of recognize them in the cosmic scheme of things. Our real identity is so vast and so unlimited and the way we will get back to that awareness I think is just best moment to moment saying, do I want to see peace instead of this?

Maria Felipe:                        17:08                       That’s beautiful. I love everything you’re sharing because it just, you weren’t talking. And I was like, oh, that was like, not that I’m sleeping. It’s more like, it’s like I just feel peace, you know, because it’s so comforting. And I feel one of the key things that you said is talking about our inner kindness teacher. The Holy Spirit and our inner wisdom are our higher self. Our true self is, is, is the importance. What I was getting of asking for help from the Holy Spirit in as when you know how you were, how you were sharing too, to know that we’re not alone and the most important thing also is the mindfulness. I feel like how you opened. You were like to be mindful of our thoughts, to be, to be vigilant because what happens is with everything you were saying is that you cannot be a victim of the world that you see basically.

Maria Felipe:                        17:57                       And that’s the empowering part like you, you, you, when you’re mindful, you start to recognize, wow, this is just a classroom. This is just an opportunity for me to see that it’s not being done to me. It’s been done by me. And then you are like superman. You know, it’s like, you’re like, forget it. You don’t, you don’t, you don’t have anything or anyone that could take away your peace of mind. Nothing outside of you forum could take away your happiness and you know, we are so worthy. And I always say this, bruce, because as you know the course of miracles lessons, they talk about, you know, happiness is our inheritance, that happiness is our function and the only reason, the only way to tap into that is to tap into our inner kindness teacher. Now, do you have any type of practice aside from the mindfulness practice that you feel is helpful that people can do every day?

Maria Felipe:                        18:49                       That’s something, a simple practice to tune into holy spirit because I feel a lot of people don’t even know what that looks like. But real quick, I just wanted to share something that’s so funny. I, I had this situation with Christian that I just got with, with the baby coming. A lot of things started to get very heated in the household because you know, with having a baby, there’s just a lot of stuff going on and it’s very easy for the ego to be president, feel victimized and kind of manipulate and all this stuff. So I took a little break and this is exactly what you were talking about. I took a break just like you were saying, and I was mindful and I and I went within and I asked the Holy Spirit to help me and the Holy Spirit told me something and I love the inspiration I got.

Maria Felipe:                        19:30                       It wasn’t like a voice. I was like, not like that. It was more like of an inspired thought of where first of all, the Holy Spirit told me, don’t say anything. I don’t need to know what is wrong with you because I know exactly what is going on. That’s the first thing that I loved. I didn’t even have to explain. You still overly tired. Don’t even explain. I know that you need my comfort right now. And just so you know that I’m waiting on the sidelines whenever you need my help. And I was like, wow. Sidelines, like what is he talking about? I felt like maybe he’s behind a tree, you know, like what kristen and I are fighting, you know? So the whole point I’m trying to make here is that spirit spirit is so loving and it’s so gentle and it’s just a thought away, right? It’s not even if it’s closer than breath or heartbeat, yes,

Bruce Rawles:                      20:22                       it really is our true nature, but we’re not ready to accept that as our identity. So we have to kind of ease into it in baby steps. We have to kind of gradually get accustomed to the idea that our identity is all inclusive and is shared with everyone and that that’s just kind of a mind boggling thought. So, so the way we kind of get into it, I think is by instead of affirming what’s true, of course in miracles doesn’t ask us to do that. It basically says, look at, look at what your resistance is. Look at where were you, fight it tooth and nail and, and see when you put on your you’re recovering dream repair technician had as I like to think of it, it’s like, okay, I’m going to go out. I’m going to fix the dream because the dream is gonna make me happy.

Bruce Rawles:                      21:06                       And then we forget that the dream, the world that, that, uh, it gets fed back to us is really just a classroom for us to see what we’ve been thinking. And, and if we can just kind of learned to gently laugh, it’s like, oh, there I go again, trying to fix the dream. Not that we don’t do the things, you know, like take care of your health, do you know your family, your community, your planet, you know, do all the things you can, um, but just don’t take them so seriously. And again, I think that’s where, where the physics comes in. One, in addition to the, the um, the double slit experiment that, that told physics that mind is primary. Another thing that’s happened since then, that’s kind of a cool, uh, just finished another favorite science thought thing called quantum entanglement. And this is the thing that’s again been shown over and over again in the labs.

Bruce Rawles:                      21:57                       You can take two electrodes since we’re recording this, I can, you can take two electrons that are part of a pair and they have an axis of spin, right? So, so for example, if, if one electron spinning this way and it’s North Pole is pointing this way, the one in that same electron pair points the exact same way. Now what happens is turns out is that the, the access of spin will, will track, and it doesn’t, it even these electrons could be pulled apart a foot apart or a light year apart or on opposite sides of the universe. And in the lab, they’ve proven that no matter how far apart you pull two pairs of electrons, the access of the spin changes instantaneously. Now that’s, that’s faster than the speed of light. What that means is that there is a connection, or perhaps maybe as Einstein suggested, you know, it’s space time really is a concept.

Bruce Rawles:                      23:00                       It’s an interpretation and I’m extrapolating a little bit there, but I think that was the gist of what he said, is that we’re experiencing the optical delusion of consciousness. And that is a phrase that he used. Uh, so I think our science really, if we listened to what the implications are, gets us solidly, uh, from the physics into the metaphysics and puts us right in league with some of the eastern mystical traditions that talk about the Maya or illusion of, of the world of separation. And then when you add to that, of course in miracles, which, which is again, can whopping points out brilliantly adds to it, the purpose of our wanting to fight it because there’s a tremendous resistance to learning and practicing this material that’s an a course in miracles because it suggests that we have to have eventually give up all of the misery that we identify with, which, which kind of ties into, I love the title of your book, you know, live, you’re happy.

Bruce Rawles:                      24:03                       And the way we do that is to buy by looking, you know, the not no principal, uh, not. It’s not affirming the assets, the not know is saying, well, what am I doing this denying the truth? And we have to deny the denial of truth. Every time we find ourselves investing in an outcome and saying, well, if this happens or this doesn’t happen, then I’ll be happy because that is a denial of truth. That’s basically using what, of course, some wrinkles call specialists and their special oven special hate. And they’re usually, you know, opposite sides of the same coin. But beyond that as the real love. But we don’t, we don’t get to that, which is always our true nature until we, we over usually a long period of time, practice, practice, practice, keep looking at our resistance and everyday, like you said, when things come up and, and you know, whether it’s a family situation or you know, a new arrival in the family, whether it’s a tree stuck in traffic or, or maybe something, maybe a politician on TV and a or it could be any number of things, you know, whether it’s an under your own household roof or on the other side of the planet.

Bruce Rawles:                      25:11                       Anything that comes up that says, uh, as, as an interpretation, a, I’m choosing not to be peaceful. Uh, that’s usually the, the meat, meat, meat, red light time, time to remember the metaphysics of the course is like, it’s not out there, number one. And number two, uh, this experience that I’m interpreting as, as something that is a problem, has a solution and that solution is in the mind. And the solution always involves recognizing that our true identity, our true nature is not isolated and stuck in a little space time vehicle that we’d call our bodies or even our personalities. So we’re, we’re all so much bigger than what our true identity is, completely outside of spacetime and the way we get back to that is just moment to moment looking and listening to our inner kindness teacher, following the guidance of the Holy Spirit and saying how whatever label you want to throw at it.

Bruce Rawles:                      26:11                       And just, you know, whenever we feel at peace, it’s like, okay, there, that’s, that’s what I need to be listening to. And it usually doesn’t have a specific, you got to do this and this and this. It’s usually just saying, I just need to look at it and look at it without condemnation, look at it without judgment and just let everybody off the hook at the same time see that the innocence is really there behind the form, behind the behavior and, and that’s fun. And that’s where the happiness really is, isn’t it? Yeah. I always say the second way, the second, you know, it’s like, it’s

Maria Felipe:                        26:43                       like very, very in the moment, you know, you just, you ask for help. It’s just constantly. And I, and I love that you said practice, you know, because I feel that that’s what live your happies all about, really is like constant practice and that’s why it’s called living. You’re happy it’s living. You know, my book could be called living the course of miracles, but that’s played out. So I called it live. You’re happy, but it’s really live a course in miracles without compromise anymore, you know, and, and to really do it even if you don’t want to because it’s going to get to a point that, you know, when you really say, you know, I’m, I’m just done with the suffering. I’m, I’m done with the hustle. I’m done with the struggling is just, I’m done with being depressed or sad and, and, and you, when you, it’s like the whole thing.

Maria Felipe:                        27:24                       When you say there must be another way, you know, it’s just like, you’re, you’re just tired. You’re sick and tired of being sick and tired. And then comes in all these beautiful, um, let’s go. Not, no, isn’t it? That’s the not. No. Yeah. The concern of being second target is this sort of another way of saying I’m going to deny the denial of truth is the not know. Oh, that’s true. I love that. Yeah. Well thank you so much bruce. That was amazing. It’s so. It was so helpful. I love everything that you shared. I think it’s going to be very helpful to a lot of people out there. Um, and the practicality, you know, I just feel that, you know, where you said there, I’m at the last last point is a golden nugget about the course, about the holy spirit, our inner kindness teacher and how it’s, it’s our duty and our job to, to call it in and to call it in and, and that, and to work it.

Maria Felipe:                        28:14                       You gotta work it, you gotta work it, you gotta work, you gotTa work, your work, your work, and with the work it. If not, then you’re screwed. But it’s, it’s a gentle vigilance, isn’t it? It’s just saying, you know, I deserve a better, more peaceful mind. And, and I recognize that everyone does and that we’re all in it together. We can all afford to be gentle and let each other off the hook. And, and that’s. And that’s when it becomes fun, isn’t it? Yeah. I, um, I have this little paper here, actually, if I had my son, um, he gave me a download of that Christian and I are here, two are in it to win it. And I was like, what do you mean in it to win it? So I wrote it and it says, here we are in it to win it.

Maria Felipe:                        28:58                       Now I said in it to win it, and Holy Spirit said the Kingdom of Heaven. And that’s what we’re here to do. We’re all here together. And this is why I do these interviews with teachers and students like yourself, is that we’re all here. We’re all here in it to win it. And we’re all here to just remember we’d never left the mind of God. And that’s how we win. The Kingdom of God is recognized. We’ve never left the mine. Oh God. You know, there’s no battle to win. We just have to accept it, isn’t it? Yes. Yes, absolutely. And remove the barriers to the awareness of love’s presence. And that’s how we, that’s how we remember. We’ve never left the man of God, you know. Alright Bruce, thank you so much. Yeah, one by real quick, what I’ll do is, um, we’re to go ahead and share all the wonderful stuff you’re doing. That stuff is got. Got Me, and we’re going to put on the description below every one. So if you want to know any, any, anything else about Bruce, um, we’ll, we’ll definitely get that information to you. In the meantime, everyone, just remember that you’re not a victim of the world that you see and to kindly take responsibility for your perceptions. Also forgive even if you don’t want to, because you’re going to really, really live. You’re happy. Alright everyone, until next time, thanks.