Listener question: Thank-you so much Clare for creating a podcast for this.  I have listened to it three times and also our recording once over.  I'm now in a weird place.  I feel frantic that I have to change a lot of things in my life and don't know where to begin.  I'm also confused as to why I've stayed with something that's creating unhappiness for so many years.  I guess with the 3ps I thought it wasn't the job (outside in thinking) so for now I just need to sit with it I guess.  I'm more scattered and anxious, so things need to settle. So many in the 3p world told me they changed jobs only for the anxiety to follow, so making a big upheaval towards something that isn't even calling to me feels wrong.  I just don't know.

Thank-you Clare, you've been so generous with me in every way.  I think I'm looking this way for the wrong reasons, so maybe I need to stop.

Listener question: Today a friend held me. Since a diagnosis of breast cancer in January, surgery at the beginning of March, such a lonely journey in COVID, I just kept going to provide for my family. And then today as my friend held me, I just broke down and sobbed, and cried my heart out. Like a floodgate opened. 

Is that wrong Clare, is that un-spiritual? Is that just a needy desperate self identity? 

Listener question:  I wonder if it would be possible to discuss what seems to going on for me just now.  I seem to be doing well (better than in a long time) and then without notice I’m plunged into my greatest fears (plus some).... this has been going on for a few nights, is beyond uncomfortable and I would appreciate your thoughts.  I’ve absolutely loved the Real course and have taken a lot from it.  Thank you in anticipation xx

Listener question: 
I wonder if you could consider the following for a Listener Question on your podcasts?

I realise virtually my whole life I have been a people pleaser. A learnt and essential approach growing up in my family. I can now see the destructive nature of being this way.  I seem to follow a cycle of     People Pleasing  > Rejection > Victim > People Pleasing etc etc.  How do I break this cycle and how do I simply be me?

I would sincerely appreciate a little guidance with this Clare.

Listener question:should I act on my idea? 

Listener question: hi Clare a relative of mine is a narcissist. It gets me down how much attention she demands all the time. I find it exhausting. How does that fit when we are talking about the self? 

Listener question: what do you mean by back room?

Listener question: In the book WELL, at one point you have a phrase you often use about “giving itself up.”

And by an objective reality giving itself up we see what’s real.

Can you talk more about what this “giving itself up” is?

Is there an example in your life when something “gave itself up”?

Listener question: I cannot see how events/conditioning have been put in place for the ultimate purpose of waking us up to what we are. What I understand is that life happens despite me and I do not create my reality. It seems more to me that life is an impersonal, spontaneous synchronicity of events. In other words, every event appears to have an ultimate reason or cause, but ultimately, no event is an absolute unto itself, ever. To say that events/conditioning etc. are put there for the purpose of waking us up to what we are seems to me to personalize what is happening—as long as the need is there to find an ultimate reason for everything, it’s an indication there is a fear of being out of control. Since the knowing “I Am” is already there, who needs to “wake up?” What I understand is that what we are has never forgotten, doesn’t need to remember and does not need to wake up to who/what we are. I understand that it is impossible to understand Self via the mind and once you realize you are not an object “having” experiences, it doesn’t mean you know who or what You really are, but rather, it means you know who You are not. Am i understanding correctly?

Listener question: Are Events Random? Is there such a thing as Cause and effect?

Events have been “put there by the conditioned program of our mind.” Are you saying a “program” of conditioning created events, like COVID, to use your example, or am I not hearing correctly what you are saying?  ….”so no randomness in the way anything appears and there entirely for the waking up to what we are.” I can see that how events and the ‘me’ are perceived/experienced are a function of the conditioning/belief  systems and how this could, in a way, and perhaps in the way you are speaking about it, even be seen to be “not random,” but wasn’t the very development of this conditioning “random" with no absolute cause and effect? And when you say, “COVID is a construct of me, it exists because I exist…” can you please explain “who/what” exists?