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Ascended Master Mother Mary through Kim Michaels, April 9, 2023. This dictation was given during the 2023 Easter webinar – Taking Christianity and yourself down from the cross.

I AM the Ascended Master Mother Mary.

Let us take a look at the world and the world situation. Or rather, let us look at how you, ascended-master students, look at the world and the world situation. How do you react, how do you feel about the world? Surely when you look at the world right now, you can see that there are certain conflicts, certain problems, that seem to be getting worse. You have the war in Ukraine, of course. You have the situation in Israel in Jerusalem where the conflict is boiling over between Jews and Palestinians, but even between different factions of the Jewish society. You have the situation in the United States with the court cases against Trump and the reaction of his supporters. You have the situation with the recent bank collapses and the potential that there are other banks, even those called shadow banks or non-banks, that could collapse and drag the regular banks down with them.

You can look at the world as it is right now and say: “There is cause for concern. There is cause to be concerned about the future developments and what might and might not happen.” But the perspective I want to give you here is that if you step back a few years, a few decades, 50 years, 100 years, 200 years, 500 years, 1,000 years, 2,000 years–at any point between now and then, there were people who looked at the world with the same concern, the same fear of what would happen in the future, the same sense of panic or dread about potential conflicts or the conflicts they already saw.

What have we said that the world is? A reality simulator where you must be able to create any situation that you can imagine and then, inside your own mind, you have the sense that this is real, that this situation is real and that the way you look at it is real. Have we not given you this teaching over and over through this messenger now for several years, even going back beyond several years? Have we not, in various contexts, with various words and descriptions, given you this teaching about the cosmic mirror, about the reality simulator, about your perception filter, about free will and that people must be given the opportunity to create any life experience they want and to have it for as long as they want it?

The phase of being focused on world conditions

So what life experience do you, as ascended master students, desire to have? Not all of you have this pattern, but some of you have this pattern that you are very focused on, very concerned about the outer world and what is happening in the world. And I know very well that we, as ascended masters and I myself in my dictations and my books, have told you that you have an important mission to change the world by giving the calls and invocations, but also by raising your consciousness thereby pulling up on the collective. So I am fully aware, which is partly why I am giving this talk, that you could say we have put you in a dilemma, but it would be more correct to say that some of you have taken our teachings, interpreted them a certain way and put yourselves in a dilemma.

On the one hand, you are here on earth to have a positive impact on world conditions. You are here on earth to make the calls, thereby authorizing us of the ascended masters to step in and use our power to change conditions. Yet does that necessarily mean that you have to be focused on outer conditions, concerned about outer conditions, fearing for the future? Is that what we want as ascended masters for our students? What is it that happens when you go into this state of being very focused on the world, on world conditions, how important it is to do something about world conditions and how you must make a sacrifice and you must always seek to be focused on what could happen next so you can make the calls and be mentally prepared for what might happen?

Well, the messenger himself knows this very well because he was in that state of mind for many years when he was in a previous ascended master movement where they gave many, many hours of decrees for world conditions. He knows very well that you can put yourself in this frame of mind where so much of your attention is directed outwards. And what you are actually feeling, what your state of mind actually is, is that until conditions in the world change you cannot really be at peace. You cannot really be yourself. You cannot really start the creative phase of your divine plan. You must focus on the work phase. This is how he felt for a number of years with giving all of these decrees, and many other ascended master students in that dispensation felt the same and some still do.

We also know that in this dispensation some people have felt this way and I am not here saying that this is wrong. It was for the messenger a phase that has for many other people been a phase that you had to go through and it is part of your divine plan to go through this for a variety of reasons. But a phase is not forever. A phase is a temporary condition.

I cannot be at peace until the world has changed

What is it that actually happens when you put yourself in this frame of mind where you are essentially saying: “I have to focus on world conditions and therefore I cannot be at peace inside myself?” What is it that happens? Well, you are crucified. You are hanging on a cross because your inner state of mind depends on external conditions, which means other people and their free will. You are making your state of mind dependent on conditions outside your mind and this is what makes you crucified. This is what fixates you on the cross, made up of the four levels of your mind, physical, emotional, mental, identity. You see that there are two ways to crucify yourself, an alpha and an omega. Well, you could even say there are more, but let us at least look at this.

There is one where you are crucified by your own psychology and this is the case with many, many people in the world who have a difficult psychology, who have experienced trauma, who are divided in their psychology. They are focused on themselves. They are focused on their own psychology their immediate situation and they are crucified by their own minds, the conditions in their own minds. Then there are those, and it of course applies not only to ascended master students who are focused outside themselves, they are focused on changing other people, changing the world and therefore they are crucified by conditions outside their own minds. But of course, you can say: “What is it that crucifies you when you are in this state of mind?” Is it the outer conditions or is it your reaction to the outer conditions? And where does your reaction to outer conditions come from? It comes from the conditions in your own mind, the separate selves, the subconscious reactionary patterns.

What we are pointing out to you at this conference is that you are crucified by some condition in your psychology that you have not yet looked at. And as this messenger was willing to admit to himself some time ago, he had used the teachings of the ascended masters and the need to decree for world conditions as an excuse for not looking at himself, his own psychology. He decided to change this, go into therapy and start a process of healing and some of you could benefit from taking this as an example, looking at yourselves and saying: “What are my concerns about the world? Are there certain conditions in the world that I am very, very concerned about and I am very, very attached to seeing a specific outcome? And have I put myself in a condition where I feel that I cannot be at peace until this external outcome is manifest?” In other words, my internal state cannot change until the external state has changed.

The attachment to the outer results

This is why you see, as Jesus mentioned, that some people become very, very attached to a particular view of external conditions. It can be the war in Ukraine, the COVID pandemic, the US election and the Trump controversy. It can be any number of other things. But the basic psychology is that if you look at yourself and see that you have certain issues that seem very important to you, more important than attaining peace of mind, for example, then you are crucified. You are hanging on a cross. And you may think that it is the world that has put you on the cross because after all, your concern is only there because of external conditions so if the war stopped, if there was no pandemic, if Trump was president, then you would not feel what you feel. But this is not the reality. If a specific outer condition changed, you would not feel what you feel about that condition. But I can assure you that your mind would then instantly move on and pick another condition that you would be concerned about and attached to an outcome and you would again project that until that external condition was changed, your internal condition could not change.

Your inner state vs. external conditions

Do you see what I am saying? Do you hear what I am saying? The psychology that puts you on the cross is that you think your internal state depends on an external state and that your internal state will automatically and will only change when the external state changes. But this is not reality. Your internal state is your internal state. The external state is just camouflage, an excuse. It is just what focuses your internal state right now. But your internal state would persist after the external state was changed, and you would find another external state to focus on. There are people who have found an ascended master teaching, followed it, practiced the decrees and invocations for decades but they have not made that switch. They are still hanging on the cross of their own making and they have not begun to truly grasp a very, very simple fact. There is a different way to react to external conditions than the one that you have had for this lifetime or perhaps for many lifetimes. There is a different way to react.

And what is the spiritual path all about? It is raising your consciousness. But what does that mean? When you raise your consciousness, will your reaction to certain external conditions stay the same? This is what some people seem to think. But of course, as we have said so many times, by giving the examples of the Buddha overcoming attachments, being confronted with the demons of Mara. When your consciousness is raised, your reaction to external conditions will change. It must change. If you look at yourself and see that you have a certain issue that you have been attached to for some time, then you need to seriously consider: “Have I made progress in raising my consciousness? Have I actually made progress? Have I really overcome the illusion I need to overcome, the separate self I need to overcome? Have I really raised my consciousness?”

Expanding your understanding vs. raising your consciousness

You can say: “But I have expanded my understanding of the world and of the spiritual path and of the teaching so much.” But you can expand your understanding of the world and spiritual teachings in a horizontal way, in an intellectual way by looking at it from a distance, by looking at yourself as a subject, looking at an object. But this is not the same as raising your consciousness, transcending your previous level and rising to a new level. And some of you understand this intellectually, but you have not applied it to yourselves. You have not seen that intellectual understanding is not enough. You need to switch and therefore you are still hanging on the cross. And the proof is your internal tension, your attachment to a specific outcome, your attachment to being right, being seen as right, and proving wrong anyone who either has a different opinion or does not validate your opinion.

If you can see yourself in this pattern, it may be that you have still grown somewhat on the path, but there is clearly a separate self that you have not seen and that you have not overcome. I am not saying this to blame anyone. I am saying it to free you, by making you aware of this. An attachment always comes from a separate self. It cannot be any other way. The Conscious You is not attached to anything on earth. It can experience itself as attached only through a separate self and the attachment resides in the separate self. When you step outside of it, you do not experience the attachment. There is no magic here. It is not that the Buddha was so much more advanced than you. He just did, even though he would not have used those words 2,500 years ago, he just did what we have described. He came to see a separate self, separated himself from it and let it die. And that is why when he sat under the Bo tree, was facing the demons of Mara, they could not tempt him into reacting because he had no selves that were attached to anything on earth. What is the way to truly free yourself from the cross? Free yourselves from these selves, especially the reactionary selves.

Knowing that there is an alternative to the conditions on earth

Now, there are of course, different types of these selves. We have hinted at it before, but I will say it again and it is easiest to explain with an avatar because you come to earth from a natural planet. You have not been here on earth before and now you face the situation of having to take embodiment on earth and in order to take embodiment, you have to first go to the 144th level, where you take on a particular illusion. That allows you to go to the 143rd level where you take on another illusion and you keep going until you reach the 48th level. However, this does not mean that you as an avatar, look at and experience life the same way as a person who was created as the original inhabitant of earth, and who has perhaps, after going below the 48th level, risen back up to the 48th level.

You can have an original inhabitant at the 48th level and an avatar at the 48th level and they have the same illusions above them and in order to follow the path of the ascension, they have to overcome these illusions. But it does not mean they have the same worldview, the same attitude, the same approach to life on earth. Why? Because the original inhabitant has never experienced an alternative, a different environment than earth but the avatar has. And even though you do not remember this consciously, you still have a certain sense that there is something beyond earth and therefore you are not as attached to earth as the original inhabitant.

Reactionary selves based on the illusions of separation

That is why, as is described in the My Lives book, when the protagonist descended to the first embodiment, he had a greater awareness than most people on earth. But he still had taken on those specific illusions. What does that mean? It means that the illusions you take on from the 144th level to the 48th level are illusions based on the current conditions on earth, meaning the density of matter, how the earth is designed, how your physical body is designed and functions. But above the 48th level, these illusions are not based on duality and the illusion of separation. Those you only take on when you go below the 48th level, or you can also take them on at the 48th level and higher by reacting to those people who are trapped in duality and therefore, as we have explained with the fallen beings, expose you to this very dramatic situation that causes your cosmic birth trauma.

These are not the same selves that you take on in order to descend to the 48th level. They are what I would call reactionary selves, where you are reacting to those in the duality consciousness, whether it is the original inhabitants or the fallen beings. The original inhabitants often ignore an avatar or put you down in various ways. But the fallen beings will often attack you directly and seek to destroy you to the best of their ability. As an avatar who starts at the 48th level, it is impossible to not react to this, given the density of the collective consciousness on earth.

The reactionary outlook on life

You now start the path at the 48th level, you go up to the 49th, the 50th, you keep going above but what you need to recognize here is that as you create these reactionary selves you shift, and this is again almost inevitable. You shift your outlook, your worldview, your approach to life on earth. You come here as an avatar, you have a positive view of earth, positive view of what you can do here and you shift this as you are exposed to the birth trauma. It is almost impossible to maintain a positive outlook on earth after you have been exposed to the birth trauma. You can regain it when you overcome the birth trauma, but this does not happen at the 48th level.

So, you start the spiritual path, you find the spiritual movement and you are going up, you are rising in consciousness because you are overcoming some of these illusions, some of these selves that you took on to go down to the 48th level. You can come to a point where you are now at the 96th level of consciousness, meaning you overcome all the illusions between the 48th and 96th level. Now, most people when they go through this they do also change at least somewhat their outlook on life, their approach to earth but not all. You can maintain the reactionary outlook on life, the not so positive outlook on earth that you took on after the birth trauma.

The question is, as you come closer and closer to the 96th level, can you let go of this? This reactionary worldview, can you let it go and return to the original view that you came with as an avatar? If you cannot, then you cannot pass that initiation at the 96th level and stop focusing on yourself. You cannot go to the 97th level unless you overcome that not so positive outlook, the reactionary outlook you took on. That is where students can then start going down again because they become so attached to validating and proving right the outlook on life that they accepted as a result of reacting to the fallen beings. Not only what the fallen beings did to you, but some of the illusions that the fallen being used to attack you, to try to fool you or to just get you to react. You have adopted a reactionary outlook which you are meant to overcome, that is what the spiritual path is all about. But if you do not see this, if you are not willing to question it and overcome it, then you can start going down from whatever level you are at and you are now so focused on validating this self, that you are not as Jesus described it, you cannot follow Christ. You are more concerned about validating your negative outlook on earth than following Christ, overcoming the outlook, letting it die, letting it go. You cannot say: “What is that to me? I will follow thee,” you cannot let that separate self die.

Overcoming attachments to conditions on earth

Now, of course, I am not hereby saying that when you return to the positive outlook you had when you came as an avatar, you are home free because what you need to do above the 96th level is that you need to start considering: “But why did I come to earth? What was the outlook I had on earth? And how was that actually limiting me?” Because you thought that you have to do specific things on earth, you have to change other people according to the vision you had from a natural planet. You need to step up, as we have explained also several times, to fully grasping free will, to fully accepting that free will must be allowed to outplay itself. That is when you need to reconsider again, why should your inner state be linked to, be dependent on, an outer state on earth?

Basically, you can say that it is when you go above the 96th level that you really start the path of Christhood, before that it is the path of self-mastery as we have named it with the Chohans but up above that, you start the path of Christhood. But what is Christhood? What is Christhood? It is for an avatar, overcoming all identification, not only with the earth, but with a natural planet. If you are an original inhabitant of earth, you need to overcome all identification with the earth. This means that you come to this point that Jesus demonstrated, that the Buddha demonstrated, when the prince of this world has nothing in you, because you have no attachments to conditions on earth. You are basically saying, regardless of what conditions are on earth: “I will manifest my Christhood. I will walk the path of Christhood. I will take the next step up on Christhood, even though there are these external conditions on earth that I clearly see are not ideal and really should not be there.” But you will not let it hold you back from taking the next step up, which means overcoming the next illusion, overcoming the next step itself.

The essence of the path to Christhood

There is nothing glamorous as such, about walking the path of Christhood. As you saw, there was nothing particularly glamorous about Jesus and his path. You may say, yes, it was glamorous when he was received as a king when he entered Jerusalem riding on a donkey, but then see how quickly that changed and now he was arrested, the people denied him, he was tortured, he had to walk and carry the cross and he was crucified. The symbol of the crucifixion is that hopefully you will not have to go through a physical crucifixion, physically being tortured and killed, but you are still going through it in your mind. You are still going through this and the question is always, will you let the world crucify you? Or will you strive to attain inner psychological spiritual independence so that no matter what the world does, you are not feeling that you are held fixated on a cross.

You have transcended that level of consciousness where the world can stop your growth or where the world can define you, what you are and what you are not. This is the key consideration. If you find yourself having an attachment to a particular outcome on earth, you can see if you are willing, that this comes because you have not transcended the attitude, the approach, the outlook that you took on after you came to earth and were exposed to the fallen beings and the original inhabitants and what they did to you. I am not blaming you. It is very natural that you had that reaction. We all had a reaction. We all had our individual reaction but they followed the same pattern. It is not that I was so sophisticated that I did not react when I first came to earth. It is not that Jesus or the Buddha was so sophisticated that they did not react. This is in fact one of the important aspects of the My Lives book, showing that Jesus took embodiment like everybody else and that he had a certain reaction so that you can all see that it is perfectly fine that you reacted.

But you can also see why did Mother Mary ascend, why did Jesus ascend, why did the Buddha ascend, why did Saint Germain and Master More ascend? Because we overcame the reaction. We came to a point of saying: “We will not let conditions on this planet and we will not let our reaction to conditions on this planet define us anymore.” That is the path to Christhood, or at least part of it, when you stop letting external states determine your internal state. As long as you are reacting to anything on earth, you are crucified. You are on some kind of cross. You may go up in consciousness, you may overcome the illusions I have talked about, but if you still carry with you that reactionary self, you are crucified by that self and you will remain crucified until you make that shift. And as Jesus said, you can make that shift basically at any time above the 48th level, but certainly as you get closer to the 96th level, it becomes easier to make it. But you need to make it in order to get down from the cross, in order to transcend the cross and of course, we want our direct students to get down from the cross.

Getting down from the cross

Now again, the reactionary self cannot take you down from the cross. You need the perspective from outside your own mind. That is what we offer you with our teachings and with our willingness to assist you personally. But for you to receive our assistance and make use of it, the Conscious You has to be willing to separate itself from the reactionary self. You have to be willing to look at it and say: “Oh, I do have a reactionary self, that is why I am so concerned about the world, that is why I am so attached to the world.” And when you are willing to make that shift, where you are willing to look at the self instead of defending it, then we can help you and you can fairly quickly get down from that cross. This means that now you can actually really start having an impact on changing the earth. Your invocations and decrees will have a much greater effect. But not only that, you will also have a much greater effect on pulling up on the collective consciousness. So long as you are in this reactionary self, there is a limit to the effect you can have on the collective consciousness, even if you raise your consciousness above the 48th level, because you are reacting just like most people on earth are reacting and that doesn’t raise the consciousness, at least not in that aspect of it. Of course, it raises the consciousness somewhat, but not to the full extent that it could if you shift it out of that reactionary self.

This also means that you can now start what we have called the creative phase of your divine plan or the revolutionary phase of your divine plan because you can now start acting instead of reacting. What the fallen beings have done on earth is to put most people on earth in a reactionary mode where they are always reacting to the fallen beings. As an avatar, how are you going to help raise the earth if you are also reacting to the fallen beings? It cannot be done. We have given you the tools, we have given you the teachings, and all we are trying to say is, consider whether it is time for you to make this switch that will take you down from the cross so you are no longer hanging on it, you are free to be yourself.

Just let it flow

If you want a simple measure, watch the messenger’s videos where he talks about his path. Monitor yourself, your own reactions, whatever you feel, whatever thoughts come up and see how you react to the way he talks, the way he talks about himself. If you look at these, you will see that as he is perfectly well aware, that he could not have made these videos very long ago because he was not free. But now he has attained a high degree of freedom, non-attachment, so he can just speak without any predefined script and just let it flow. You can do the same. All of you have the same potential to speak freely, to express yourself freely, without being so concerned about the reactions, the standards of this world, whether they do this, whether they say that. Does it matter? Does it matter to you, all of these human reactions? If you see that you have a reaction to this, that you do not feel free, that you would not be able to speak so freely, then that is part of this reactionary self because you are concerned about: “How would the world react to my speaking about myself?” Then you can use our tools to go after that so that you can gradually come to the point where you can be free, you can be at peace to express yourself. Just express yourself and let this flow based on your experiences, but also coming from your I AM Presence, let the spirit flow through you. That is what we desire for all of you.

It is good that one person can do it, but it is better that many people can do it and you will all feel more free if you can do it, even if you do not do it. The fact that you are free to do it means you are free in many other ways to do other things in life. It is that freedom that we have and that we desire to see you have. In a sense, you could say that everything we have ever done as ascended masters is to help people attain the same freedom that we have. You cannot quite achieve the same freedom while you are still in embodiment, but you can certainly achieve as great of a freedom as it is possible to have on a planet like earth.

Giving decrees and invocations with a positive attitude

So this is what we desire for you and again, I am not thereby saying you should ignore conditions in the world. It is important that you give your decrees, your invocations, your Mother Mary 500 vigil for the economy (I know it has been going on for a long time, but it is because it is a very important topic as you can see by these latest bank failures and how this is sending shockwaves through the entire financial system).

Your work has a very important impact. The vigil for spiritual healing that some of you have participated in also has an important impact on the collective consciousness. Our webinars and our conferences have a very important impact. All of these things are important. I am not trying to say here that you should not be doing it. I am only saying that you can actually do the same work with a more positive attitude and that this will make you feel better about yourself and about being on earth. Some of you have this attitude that you cannot really enjoy life on earth because the planet is so dark. In fact, the messenger had for many years this attitude that he was not here for his own enjoyment, he was here to make a positive difference and that is why he could set aside so much of his personal life to focus on moving to the United States, living near the headquarters of his movement and giving all of these hours of decrees. Although this was necessary for, and part of his Divine Plan, it was not necessary or mandated that he do it with this sense that he could not allow himself to enjoy life on earth.

Enjoying life on earth

You are on earth. You are in a physical body. Earth is a very difficult planet to be on. It is actually difficult to be in a body as dense as the bodies you have on earth but you can still find enjoyment and it is not sinful and it is not anti-spiritual. Certainly beyond just even enjoying life on earth, you can enjoy being alive, being conscious, being self-aware. Self-awareness is an incredible gift. Self-awareness, being aware as a being, as an individual expression of the one being, the one mind of God, is an incredible gift. But as long as you are trapped in this reactionary self, you cannot see that. You cannot experience it because for you, self-awareness is a burden because there are all these outer states that are affecting your inner state, so you are not really self-aware. You are aware of a self, you are aware through a self, but you are not “self-aware” as the Conscious You being aware of itself as not being all of these selves, but being an extension of the I AM Presence and being pure awareness, meaning you have not become the selves you have created in order to take embodiment on earth or the selves you have created in reaction.

The conscious self creates these selves, but it does not become the selves and it is when you realize that, when you acknowledge that consciously, that you can start enjoying self-awareness even in an environment like earth. This is what I, who holds the office as the Divine Mother, desire. I desire it for all people, but the vast majority of people on earth are very far from being able to achieve it. But you who are our direct students, you could achieve it fairly quickly if you are willing to go through this switch that we have been talking about.

Why are we talking about it at this conference? Because many of you, by following the path, by using the tools, you are ready to make that switch. Not necessarily right now, not necessarily tomorrow, but within a short period of time, you can make that switch.