A Technology for Transformation The Life Visioning Process is a spiritual technology I created to be used primarily in developmental Stages Three and Four. At those stages, you are most able to catch universal insights and articulate them into being. In Stages Three and Four, you have practiced becoming available to the greater good that is seeking to emerge through you. Your practice has made you pliable and able to approach life with the humility of beginner s mind. You re not trying to tell the universe what to do. You re seeking to be used by a higher power within, which wants to become conscious of itself as you. You have mastered the practices of affirmative prayer and visualization and are ready to enter a practice of intuition or direct knowing. Sri Aurobindo put it this way: Imagination itself is, in its nature, a substitute for a truer consciousness; the faculty of intuition. Life Visioning is a process designed to activate and refine your intuitive faculties so that you can have knowledge beyond the five senses, by seeing the invisible and hearing the inaudible. Thus you can catch in consciousness the unmanifested intelligence that is seeking to manifest through you. You exist in a realm of ideas. You are surrounded by Divine ideation, which is waiting to find the right condition to express itself. Visioning is the means by which you become the living condition through which these ideas can be expressed. Before I explain the steps of Visioning, I d like to mention that although Visioning reaches its fullest potential when used in Stages Three and Four, you can do the Life Visioning Process at any stage of consciousness. If you are in Stages One or Two, the process can still be helpful to you. a technology for transformation 39 t1312d_pages.indd 39
As a transformational modality however, you will get the fullest benefit from this practice once you are seeking to be a dynamic expression of your potential, not merely trying to get what you think will make you happy in your present paradigm. Thus, Visioning is an addition to your toolbox of spiritual technologies that allows you to download the spiritual ideation that s trying to emerge as you. The Steps of Visioning The Life Visioning Process is a technology I birthed more than twenty years ago for the specific purpose of enabling the growth, development, and unfoldment of the soul. You can use the Visioning Process for anything from simple problem solving to uncovering the next big step in your evolution. It is the process by which Agape International was birthed, and it continues to be the tool we use to gain greater insight into our next steps as a spiritual community. The process has seven components and is best done in a place where you can turn within and won t be disturbed. It is a meditative process, so don t worry about trying to write down each insight as you go through the process. There will be time after the Visioning session to fully download the wisdom you have harvested. The entirety of Session Two is devoted to thoroughly explaining the process and guide you through a Visioning session, but I will also briefly summarize the basic elements of the process for you here. Once you have found a quiet location to sit and vision, the first step is to close your eyes, take a few deep breaths, and cultivate a field of unconditional love as the surrounding atmosphere for the process. That is, you become still and allow the quality of unconditional love to emanate from within. Love or agape (the Greek word for love), is not a syrupy-sweet sentimentality. It s not even an emotion. Love is the total given-ness and giving-ness of the spirit. There is no withholding in unconditional love. As you generate unconditional love, let it flow through you; unbounded, unrestricted, and undivided from the whole of the universe. Next, offer your willingness to engage in deep listening. You will learn to develop this skill at an expert level as you 40 life visioning t1312d_pages.indd 40
continue to use the Vision Process. So start with intention and earnestness by affirming, I am willing to listen to the eternal broadcast of spirit. With reverential alertness, affirm your willingness to listen. With those two conditions in place, you move into the stage of inquiry. As the scripture states, Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and the door shall be opened. The spiritual ideas of God are always being broadcast. By asking, you re simply making yourself available. Ask and you shall receive. The first question to ask is, What wants to emerge through me? When you ask that question, and any other question during this process, the answer may come to you in several different ways. You may get an intuitive hit, hear a word in your mind, or see an image pop into your awareness. Ultimately, the answer is going to come through you in a language you can understand. As you become more adept at Visioning, you ll be able to discern the answers with ease. After you discern a description of the vision, the next step is to ask, What must I become to manifest this vision? This is a powerful question and one which, on an inner level, you already know the answer to you simply hide it from yourself. As you ask this question with sincerity, your higher self will begin to reveal what qualities need to be birthed. Next, you inquire further by asking, What must I release to manifest this vision? You might deepen that question by asking, What must I let go of? What points of view do I need to shed? What aspects of my life are no longer serving me? Remember, 100 percent of spiritual growth, development, and unfoldment is about letting go of that which hinders insight and revelation. Then you move into the next question which is, What talents, gifts, and capacities do I already have that can serve this vision? Often you re simply sitting on assets, qualities, and gifts that are latent or underutilized. This particular step in the Vision Process allows you to become aware of what you already have. When you acknowledge what is already present, you will see an emergence of self-love and spiritual esteem with the knowledge that you are already bringing your gifts to the table, so to speak. a technology for transformation 41 t1312d_pages.indd 41
The seventh step of Visioning is to offer your willingness to grow, your sacred yes. Here, you go deeper into meditation until you catch the feeling tone of willingness. This step is necessary because when you ask, What must I become? you may encounter some resistance from within. So with this step you release your resistance and allow yourself to radiate a willingness to bring this vision into being. Finally, you move into gratitude. That is, you feel down to your very bones a thanksgiving, a gratefulness, and an appreciation not just for the vision, but for the awareness that the vision is already happening. Although your vision seeks to manifest through you, it s not in the future. It s not somewhere out there, external to you. No. The vision you ve just received is already happening in the mind of love-intelligence; it is simply waiting for the right conditions to manifest in physical form. Your surface mind may call it the future, but in reality that vision is already happening in some other dimension, occupying the same space you re in right now. Years ago, when science was in its infancy, it was believed that two objects could not occupy the same space. Now through the discovery of quantum reality, we understand the truth that multiple events can occupy the same space because they are happening in different dimensions. Thus, when you catch a vision, you catch a reality that exists in another dimension. You then seek to become the right condition to manifest it in this dimension. By offering gratitude, you re giving thanks for the vision that, on some level, is happening right now. The last step in the Visioning Process is to take as much time as you need to write down all of the insights you harvested from your vision, including any next steps you might take to begin activating it. The Life Visioning Process becomes the means by which you can consciously participate in your own unfoldment. As you practice Visioning with different aspects of your life from simple personal issues to spiritual crises you will notice that the process begins to hone your intuitive faculty. You ll find yourself able to discern the Voice of vision, which speaks of the emergent energy trying to happen as you. Visioning is a beautiful process. It is a 42 life visioning t1312d_pages.indd 42
technology of transformation that allows you to break free from your existing paradigms and catch the universal insight that wants to emerge through and as you. Session 2, tracks 1 8 Continuing on Your Journey Know that by embarking on this journey, you have given your permission for Divine energy to have its way with you, so to speak. I congratulate you for having the courage and desire to become more fully yourself. Just as the sunbeam is a dimension of the sun, carrying all of the qualities of the sun the luminosity, the light, the heat yet is never separate from the sun, you too are never separate from your Source, from goodness, luminosity, intelligence, power, and beauty. You can offer your unique, Divine expression in a way that only you can; and in so doing, become a beneficial presence to all of humanity. I wish for you those grace notes of the Spirit where incrementally, suddenly, or dramatically you discover that your life is the life of the Divine and you catch the insights wanting to express as you. May your life reveal this wholeness, this beauty, and this love. May you have the sincere and earnest intention to wake up to this truth not as a final resting place, but with the willingness to continually evolve as God consciousness. Peace and infinite blessings on your journey. a technology for transformation 43 t1312d_pages.indd 43 8/5/08 5:23:55 PM