Metanoism: Loving Service Informed by the Law of One

For those of us who are students of the Law of One material, we are reminded by Ra that even they did not feel an urgency in the dissemination of their esoterica material. Rather, they stressed the importance of helping us help others learning the ways of loving service (ref. 17.2)

Over the past 22 years of working as a professional counselor as well as my understanding of how people transformed, I see a pattern that seems to be effective. I call it “Metanoism.”

Metanoism follows three steps: 1) Enter into solidarity with another; 2) Cultivate hope; and 3) Allow process to unfold.

This podcast interview took place between Ashton Gustafson, host of Good, True, & Beautiful, and myself.

In this episode, I introduce Metanoism as a psychospiritual framework for those who desire to help steward positive change in our world. I understand metanoia as expanding our way of living, thinking, seeing, perceiving, giving, receiving, engaging, learning, knowing, and loving.

Audio:

Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-true-beautiful-with-ashton-gustafson/id982221063?i=1000613679580

Android: https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/ashtongustafson/episodes/2023-05-19T07_23_45-07_00

Etymology of Metanoism

“Meta” (enlarge, broaden, transform)
“Noia” (nous: field of consciousness that synthesizes compassion and wisdom)
“-ism” (framework of concepts and praxis)

–Metanoism

Three Steps of Metanoism

STEP ONE

Enter into solidarity with another: “interview” (“enter-view”) or *enter* the world*view* of the other.

—Curious Listening: Gather a sense of who the other is.

What might their predominant worldview be? (understanding different models of hierarchical complexity can be helpful. ie Steve McIntosh’s Developmental Politics, metamodernism, spiral dynamics, Brian McLaren’s Recognizing Our Biases,)
Can we get a sense of the other’s Enneagram style?

Other curiosities can include:

Curiosity about values
Curiosity about person’s image of God
Curiosity about vision of a true community

Solidarity in the Law of One material:

I am Ra […] We are old upon your planet and have served with varying degrees of success in transmitting the Law of One, of Unity, of Singleness to your peoples. We have walked your earth. We have seen the faces of your peoples. […] We are not a part of time and, thus, are able to be with you in any of your times.

Law of One 1.1

I am Ra. We have walked among your people. We remember. We remember sorrow. We have seen much. […].

Law of One 6.20

I am Ra. I speak for the social memory complex termed Ra. We came among you to aid you. Our efforts in service were perverted. Our desire then is to eliminate as far as possible the distortions caused by those misreading our information and guidance. The general cause of service such as the Confederation offers is that of the primal distortion of the Law of One, which is service. The One Being of the creation is like unto a body, if you will accept this third-density analogy. Would we ignore a pain in the leg? A bruise upon the skin? A cut which is festering? No. There is no ignoring a call. We, the entities of sorrow, choose as our service the attempt to heal the sorrow which we are calling analogous to the pains of a physical body complex distortion.

Law of One 14.18

STEP TWO

Cultivate hope in another: finding out what can inspire hope for the other.

Meaning Making: Listen for how the other makes meaning in times of difficulty

Resilience: Listen for what has worked for them in the past during times of difficulty

Surprised by Hope: Listen for how “God” has surprised them in the past by showing up when they didn’t expect it.

Clinical Approaches

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT): Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) is an action-oriented approach to psychotherapy that stems from traditional behavior therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy. Clients learn to stop avoiding, denying, and struggling with their inner emotions and, instead, accept that these deeper feelings are appropriate responses to certain situations that should not prevent them from moving forward in their lives. With this understanding, clients begin to accept their hardships and commit to making necessary changes in their behavior, regardless of what is going on in their lives and how they feel about it (1).

Motivational Interviewing (MI): “MI is a collaborative, goal-oriented style of communication with particular attention to the language of change. It is designed to strengthen personal motivation for and commitment to a specific goal by eliciting and exploring the person’s own reasons for change within an atmosphere of acceptance and compassion.” (Miller & Rollnick, 2013, p. 29) (2)

Solution-Focused Brief Therapy: Focus on solutions, strengths, and health. Solution-focused brief therapy focuses on what clients can do versus what clients cannot do. Instead of focusing and exploring clients’ problems and deficiencies, the focus is on the successes and accomplishments when clients are able to satisfactorily address their problems of living. The focus is on how to notice, identify, expand, and use these successes them more often (3).

Immediate Engagement:

What are three goals they have for their lives?

What are three things they can do to accomplish each goal?

What can they practically do today or ASAP as a first step that helps them start on one or more of their goals?

What do they think is the best way to be held in loving accountability? Check in within a week? Month?

Hope in the Law of One material:

(Regarding positive UFO-human contact) If the result is hope, friendly feelings, and the awakening of a positive feeling of purposeful service to others, the marks of Confederation contact are evident.

Law of One 53.17

There are those whose lessons are more random due to their present inability to comprehend the nature and mechanism of the evolution of mind, body, and spirit. Of these we may say that the process is guarded by those who never cease their watchful expectation of being of service. There is no entity without help, either through self-awareness of the unity of creation or through guardians of the self which protect the less sophisticated mind/body/spirit from any permanent separation from unity while the lessons of your density continue.

Law of One 50.5

Therefore, may we ask the student to look up from inward working and behold the glory, the might, the majesty, the mystery, and the peace of oneness. Let no consideration of bird or beast, darkness or light, shape or shadow keep any which seeks from the central consideration of unity.

Law of One 97.9

We may note at this point while you ponder the possibility/probability vortices that although you have many, many items which cause distress and thus offer seeking and service opportunities, there is always one container in that store of peace, love, light, and joy. This vortex may be very small, but to turn one’s back upon it is to forget the infinite possibilities of the present moment. Could your planet polarize towards harmony in one fine, strong moment of inspiration? Yes, my friends. It is not probable; but it is ever possible.

Law of One 65.12

STEP THREE

Allowing process to unfold.

We fully accept that all things and all people, individually and collectively, are on a journey. This safeguards humility for the servant leader. The term “Surrender”speaks of biblical kenosis, a full surrender of oneself into Nature’s own education: evolution.

Important Points:
- Listen for examples of growth in their history
- Relationships take time to develop.
- Conflicts and resistance are opportunities to pull back and re-enter the worldview of the other and re-establish what motivates them. Conflicts can serve as “green flags” to approach the relationship in a different direction.

Helpful Metaphysics:

Law of Three: We learn how to look for the third way when faced with apparent conflicts. “In every new arising there are three forces involved: affirming, denying, and reconciling. The interweaving of the three produces a fourth in a new dimension.” –Dr. Rev. Cynthia Bourgeault (4).

Process Theology: “A theological approach that understands ultimate reality in terms of a dynamic process of becoming and ongoing change. This processive understanding may be contrasted with static notions of being that are based in Aristotelian and scholastic categories. Existence is understood in terms of the mutual interaction of entities, through which change occurs.” –Don S. Armentrout and Robert Boak Slocum, editors (5) In other words, all things are in process. God is in process, too. [Work of Alfred North Whitehead, Dr. Matt Segall, ]

Allowing Process to Unfold in the Law of One material:

Questioner: We have decided to accept, if offered, the honor/duty of learning/teaching the healing process. I would ask as to the first step which we should accomplish in becoming effective healers.

Ra: I am Ra. We shall begin with the first of the three teachings/learnings.

We begin with the mental learn/teachings necessary for contact with intelligent infinity. The prerequisite of mental work is the ability to retain silence of self at a steady state when required by the self. The mind must be opened like a door. The key is silence.

Within the door lies an hierarchical construction you may liken unto geography and in some ways geometry, for the hierarchy is quite regular, bearing inner relationships.

To begin to master the concept of mental discipline it is necessary to examine the self. The polarity of your dimension must be internalized. Where you find patience within your mind you must consciously find the corresponding impatience and vice versa. Each thought that a being has, has in its turn an antithesis. The disciplines of the mind involve, first of all, identifying both those things of which you approve and those things of which you disapprove within yourself, and then balancing each and every positive and negative charge with its equal. The mind contains all things. Therefore, you must discover this completeness within yourself.

The second mental discipline is acceptance of the completeness within your consciousness. It is not for a being of polarity in the physical consciousness to pick and choose among attributes, thus building the roles that cause blockages and confusions in the already-distorted mind complex. Each acceptance smoothes part of the many distortions that the faculty you call judgment engenders.

The third discipline of the mind is a repetition of the first but with the gaze outward towards the fellow entities that it meets. In each entity there exists completeness. Thus, the ability to understand each balance is necessary. When you view patience, you are responsible for mirroring in your mental understanding, patience/impatience. When you view impatience, it is necessary for your mental configuration of understanding to be impatience/patience. We use this as a simple example. Most configurations of mind have many facets, and understanding of either self polarities, or what you would call other-self polarities, can and must be understood as subtle work.

The next step is the acceptance of the other-self polarities, which mirrors the second step.

These are the first four steps of learning mental discipline. The fifth step involves observing the geographical and geometrical relationships and ratios of the mind, the other mind, the mass mind, and the infinite mind.

The second area of learn/teaching is the study/understanding of the body complexes. It is necessary to know your body well. This is a matter of using the mind to examine how the feelings, the biases, what you would call the emotions, affect various portions of the body complex. It shall be necessary to both understand the bodily polarities and to accept them, repeating in a chemical/physical manifestation the work you have done upon the mind bethinking the consciousness.

The body is a creature of the mind’s creation. It has its biases. The biological bias must be first completely understood and then the opposite bias allowed to find full expression in understanding. Again, the process of acceptance of the body as a balanced, as well as polarized, individual may then be accomplished.

It is then the task to extend this understanding to the bodies of the other-selves whom you will meet. The simplest example of this is the understanding that each biological male is female; each biological female is male. This is a simple example. However, in almost every case wherein you are attempting the understanding of the body of self or other-self, you will again find that the most subtle discernment is necessary in order to fully grasp the polarity complexes involved.

At this time we would suggest closing the description until the next time of work so that we may devote time to the third area commensurate with its importance.

We can answer a query if it is a short one before we leave this instrument.
Law of One 5.2

We cannot offer shortcuts to enlightenment. Enlightenment is of the moment, is an opening to intelligent infinity. It can only be accomplished by the self, for the self. Another self cannot teach/learn enlightenment, but only teach/learn information, inspiration, or a sharing of love, of mystery, of the unknown that makes the other-self reach out and begin the seeking process that ends in a moment, but who can know when an entity will open the gate to the present?
Law of One 17.2

Hermeneutic of Metanoism:

Hermeneutic: refers to the bias or interpretive lens through which we engage something.

Hermeneutics of Metanoism is: Conspiring of Wholeness

Behind our apparent reality is a hidden wholeness. This wholeness is breaking into our reality from the bottom up and from the top down.

We do not possess the ability to understand our plane of reality objectively or even subjectively. We cannot apprehend all of the hidden elements within wholeness that emerge, surround, overshadow, penetrate, influence, affirm, and frustrate our apparent reality.

We affirm that wholeness has a hidden agenda: to bring the luminosity of wholeness into the darkness of apparent separation.

Everything belongs within wholeness-making.

Epistemology of Metanoism:

Epistemology: refers to how we know what we know.

Epistemologies of Metanoism: Humility and Plurality

Epistemology of Humility: “Epistemic humility, as I’m using the term, refers to a responsive awareness of the limits of one’s own knowledge as well as a responsive awareness of the limits of one’s ability to independently acquire knowledge. I refer to this as responsive awareness because epistemic humility requires not only that one realize the limits of one’s knowledge, but also that one act in accordance of the limits recognized.” (Mark Satta is a 3L at Harvard Law School and Executive Online Editor for the Harvard Law & Policy Review. Retrieved 2-17-23 from https://harvardlpr.com/2018/05/17/epistemic-humility-as-a-presidential-virtue)
- We can’t all be experts in everything. It is important to recognize authorities and specialists in areas.

Epistemology of Plurality: “Epistemological pluralism recognizes that, in any given research context, there may be several valuable ways of knowing, and that accommodating this plurality can lead to more successful integrated study.” https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol13/iss2/art46/
- A multi-perspectival approach to epistemology