Discernment - How can I avoid being fooled?

[mischief]

Experience.
Living and making 'mistakes' and then learning from them.
Not being afraid to try, trying and keeping at it til you get 'there'.
I think it is more if a learning journey than an end point.

At some point in this journey, you feel that you can see through to the truth of the matter and VOILA LA... discernment. (small letters on purpose).

[Lifebringer]

Amen. I think that's why Christ had to attend this "planetary created school of thought intent, unconditional love, tolerance and unity as "hue-man souls in the universe.
He had to learn it thru experience from birth to death, then comes judgement as the messengers guide, but don't influence.
The meddlers in this creation, have twisted "wrong, into right."
We must use the "word as a guide of conscious by the creator's choices in leadership/messenger, and discern if those backed by bankers who pillage, aren't allowed to guard the treasury of the future generations contributing to this nation, peoples, world in survival of the courses.
No playing hooky, it's time to graduate!

PS/hint. "remember every time the bankers n fed want to crash the system, they entrench us in wars n steal from retirees that finally recovered their losses in a debt crash every 10 years.
We're due for another on our children's watch n our baby boomer retirement funds.
Only the fed, knows the totals of that. They will spring the trap after inflating the value of WS.

[AutumnW]

Discernment is determining truth from fiction. Those who call on 'their higher powers of discernment' in a conscious way don't have much. Anybody who self describes as wise, discerning, blah blah blah, stay away from. And if somebody says they have mastered 'unconditional love,' run as fast as your discerning legs can run.

[The Freedom Train]

Posted by AutumnW (here)
Discernment is determining truth from fiction. Those who call on 'their higher powers of discernment' in a conscious way don't have much. Anybody who self describes as wise, discerning, blah blah blah, stay away from. And if somebody says they have mastered 'unconditional love,' run as fast as your discerning legs can run.

Amen to that!

[The Freedom Train]

Posted by Joe (here)
From what I distilled from that thread, a balance must be struck between extremes of skepticism and gullibility. With the extremes of both considered bad, such as cynicism on the one hand and blind faith on the other. However, the ability to remain open to new information, as well as rational skepticism, are considered good.

So in my way of thinking, increasing discernment allows me to broaden the field and amount of information I take in without becoming overwhelmed. This seems to me to be a way to increase my consciousness. The greater my field of awareness, the more conscious I am.

Consciousness is essentially the way in which I interact with the world around me, which is threefold: Intellect or mind, heart/feeling, and body/willpower, it seems to me there should be a threefold method of developing discernment. Logic, intuition, and courage.

Which gets me back to the 64 gazillion dollar question. What are your ideas about how I can increase discernment? How do I apply greater discernment in my life?

First of all, thanks for bringing up such an *excellent* and timely topic (considering the whole pizzagate phenomenon right now - and back and forth discussions of fake news, psyops, cover ups, and the like).

What comes to mind initially is something from George Orwell's 1984 - wherein the main character Winston has trouble with the fact that he has to rewrite history on a continual basis to reflect the new normal. He would be able to remember the "facts" as they were given in prior news reports, which he then had to edit later on for various reasons. He was therefore in a unique position to be discerning, since he was privy to and personally taking part in the process of rewriting and covering up the trail of lies being perpetuated by TPTB in Oceania. And still, his discernment was damaged by the torture and mind control tactics that TPTB used against him. In the end, he is happy that finally, he can believe that 2+2 can equal 5.

Is it a relief to finally convince one's brain to accept a lie? Is this what spiritualist cults are all about? Is the enlightenment that so many people seek possibly a false flag event leading to the resolution of the cognitive dissonance we all struggle with in this crazy world? Am I just thinking way too much?

When one is not "in the know" like 1984's Winston was, it is so difficult to know what to believe (and arguably being "in the know" does not mean that the knowledge being party to is Ultimate Truth).

Following my line of confused, philosophical rambling, the most believable accounts could be lies. The most insane sounding theories could be true. How does one decide?

I would love to say that dreams and intuitions are helpful pointers, but then I learned about mind control and psychotronic manipulation. If it is really a campaign, as per the declassified MK Ultra documents suggest, then can we even believe our own thoughts?

I find it is helpful to eschew all beliefs from time to time and start all over again, from the beginning. To be entrenched in any way of perceiving the world seems to me to be a dangerous position to hold to.

Love seems to be the only truth I can cling to in these crazy times. TPTB can try to pervert it all they want, but I have to hope that they cannot ultimately succeed. To give up on this hope would make life, in my opinion, a waste of time and space.

My own loving presence has led me down (and away from) many a strange path in my life - and this has as much to do with self love as it does with having love and appreciation for others. It seems to go like this: my openness leads to a strange situation. My love carries me through it, and back to a place of relative "safety." Do I feel like I have more discernment now than I did before all of these experiences? I would like to hope so, but when I really get down to the nitty gritty of belief structures, I always end up throwing my hands up saying oh well for goodness sake we could all be brains in vats, how can we truly believe anything at all?

[Rocky_Shorz]

Discernment means if this is the first time hearing this stuff, don't be packing your bags to move to the mountain yet...

Don't panic and quit your job...

We've been hearing it for 30 years and still haven't seen proof any of it is real...

Fasten your seat belt, we're going in the rabbit hole...

[TEOTWAIKI]

Posted by The Freedom Train (here)
[...]
My own loving presence has led me down (and away from) many a strange path in my life - and this has as much to do with self love as it does with having love and appreciation for others. It seems to go like this: my openness leads to a strange situation. My love carries me through it, and back to a place of relative "safety."

This gave me a good chuckle because it accurately describes my entire life so far

[Hervé]

Anti-logic: the education plague

by Jon Rappoport Nov 25, 2016

In all times and places, logic is never taught to the masses. There is no intention to do so.

Now, in our “egalitarian society,” education carries with it great PR pretension, a fakery that outflanks any other period in history.

Therefore, graduating students wrongly believe they know how to think.

In my latest collection, Power Outside The Matrix, I include a long audio tutorial, Analyzing Information in the Age of Disinformation, which is all about carrying out deep investigations of major official scenarios/stories, and discovering how and where these official structures can be penetrated, taken apart, and unfolded, so all their flaws and deceptions are exposed.

This training is meant to remedy the deep hole people find themselves in, when they go up against entrenched (or even alternative) “knowledge.”

For example, there is a particular logical fallacy I call: “this means that.”

It runs rampant throughout society. The fallacy bleeds into the reasoning process, into notions of self-worth, into people’s need to identify themselves with an “acceptable” position.

Take the concept of manmade global warming. For many people, affirming this as a reality means:

“I’m defending the sacred quality of life on Earth, I’m helping the planet, I’m exposing the nasty crimes of big corporations, I’m acknowledging and shining a spotlight on the selfish and petty actions of the masses, I’m in the vanguard of recognizing that this issue represents the greatest threat humankind has ever known, I’m transcending ‘profits over values’, I’m envisioning with others a better world, I’m aligning myself with the best international scientific minds, I’m experiencing the sensation of having a larger mission in life.”

This—manmade global warming—means all that.

Therefore, how do you approach rational discourse on the subject of manmade warming?

You don’t.

There is no logic to be found. There is only “this means that.”

The concept or idea or symbol of manmade warming is so fully packed with sentiment, it resists all attempts at entry.

Here is another example: “America must field a powerful military force all over the world.”

For many people this means: “US wars are good and righteous wars, support our troops, admire the representations of war in sports, praise large American corporations, vote for a ‘tough President’, winning is everything, expand the Pentagon budget, develop a kick-ass attitude, love technology in all forms and degrees, obey and agree with institutional authority, assume that bigger is always better.”

“This means that.”

Therefore, a rational discussion about the wisdom of deploying the US military all over the planet is impossible. The amount of packed sentiment is a suit of body and mind armor.

In the case of manmade warming, examining the science behind the hypothesis becomes completely irrelevant. To even begin to look at it feels like an act of betrayal to the person who has “this means that” firmly in place.

Nothing in the person’s education has ever challenged his reflexive hard-wired “this-that” formulation. A breakthrough has never been made in the area of logic.

Instead, education has, at best, skated across the surface of “this means that” and left it undisturbed.

With some degree of accuracy, one could say that all the other traditional logical fallacies—ad hominem attack, straw man, vague generality, circular reasoning, appeal to authority, etc.—spring from “this means that.”

When I attended college in the 1950s, it was my good fortune to have a logic professor who could analyze and separate a thousand angels dancing on the head of a pin—and at the same time, maintain his great and natural charm and sense of humor.

Our conversations outside of class were moments of excitement. They were also rugged mind workouts.

His parting shot to me, as I was about to graduate: “Know what you don’t know.”

Some 20 years later, when I began a career as a reporter, that piece of advice came back to me.

I was prepared to do investigations, because I could make assessments of what I didn’t know and therefore needed to find out.

I could evaluate sources, who would often try to deploy logical flaws to derail me.

One of the great delights of reporting is discovering that the story you’re working on isn’t the story. The story turns out to be something else entirely.

That was the case in 1987, when I got down to writing my first book, AIDS Inc (note: AIDS Inc is included as bonus in Power Outside The Matrix). People were coming at me from every direction, feeding me their half-baked theories about what AIDS “really was.”

They seemed to believe that, because they were departing from the conventional wisdom on the subject, they must be right.

Encountering that odd notion of self-entitlement stood me in good stead, from that time forward.

When I eventually arrived at the bottom of the AIDS story, I was shocked to see it wasn’t at all what I predicted it would be.

It’s astounding how many logical steps people are willing to skip over, when they have a “this means that” cooking in their heads.

Like a foreign traveler visiting a bizarre museum, I’ve encountered many varieties of sophistry over the past 30 years.

Logic isn’t the be-all and end-all. But it is, in the largest sense, an ever-expanding method you can use to probe deeper and deeper into an argument, a line of reasoning, and engage with the basic assumptions that underlie a position a person is occupying.

It’s as if you’re learning a story backwards, moving toward the beginning, where all the secrets are.

And chances are good that you will eventually encounter some form of the abiding “this means that,” hiding like a horned toad under a bush.

He’s there, he’s quiet, he’s waiting, and when you turn a branch away from a shadow, he stares at you and you know you’ve arrived at the nexus: the unyielding stubborn source of confusion and illogic.

And sometimes, on good days, you can get the horned toad to tell his story. His real story. All the way through. And you can see him regain his lost sanity.

That’s an experience not to be missed. You’ll remember it for your whole life.

[...]

This is about your power. Not as an abstract idea, but as a living core of your being. This is about accessing that power, expanding it, and using it.

On this road, there are no limits.

That’s what Power Outside The Matrix is all about.

Jon Rappoport

[shaberon]

I stick to a simple formula.

When the announcements, stories, explanations, etc., come out, well, something is wrong with them. Some of it is lies (on purpose) and some of it is just wrong (mistaken). So firstly, weed out the purpose of the statement, try to figure out the motive in saying it. Most of the motives are there in some way to result in harm to the receiver and benefit to the speaker, and there are many schools of thought doing it in different ways--some of them are quite subtle, but once you can start to expose their playbook, it starts making sense.

On the other hand, there are many of those who do not have a domineering motive, but they may be recycling statements from that camp. They may have had a clever or interesting idea which turns out to be incorrect. Either way, they wind up building a bigger structure, with no real foundation. This is normal.

Both of those things get ingrained into our mental selves, which gets tricky to clean. The more valid information is going to survive scrutiny, sacrifice, and pain. Do any of the "experts" reflect that? Is there an impression they sit in an office reading reports? Anything that shows personal trial, tribulation, great cost?

Everything is wrong--with a few exceptions. My trust lies in the tendency of things to flow to the least common denominator.

[Barron]

I found this useful to share with others regarding the subject of discernment, over the years.... http://spiritlibrary.com/about/discernment http://spiritlibrary.com/about/discernment

[Rich]

By being honest

[Sue (Ayt)]

I wasn't sure where to post this email newsletter that moved me, but this discussion seems as good a place as any. It is sometimes hard to watch folks who are newly awakening being led down the various rabbit holes, occasionally resulting in rather dire consequences for themselves and those around them.

Way back, I ran into the new-to-me spiritual teachings of Jonathan Parker, and his insights became a large part of my own expansion. He never claimed to be anything or anyone special, beyond a person sharing his own gained insights through years of interest and searching. Back then, he sold sets of cassette tapes, which I actually treasured, as they had a lot to do with my ah-ha moments. I played them most every night as I drifted off to sleep. The set I purchased was called "Pathways to Mastership" and included guided meditations. I believe that set was his first endeavor.

Anyway - he is still active, but not well-known as far as I can tell. But he still offers his lessons, and transitioned at some point to the internet. I get his newsletter simply because I value his wisdom. Felt moved to post the one below here:
--------

Hi ,

Remember at the “trial” of Jesus Pilate asked, “What is truth?” Today more than ever that is a very relevant question. This has become a more important concern in the past few decades especially since Ronald Regan was president and removed the requirement that our news media be fair, honest, and balanced.

As you are undoubtedly aware by now, many of our trusted sources have been intentionally not only distorting information, but also fabricating story lines they want you to believe. This has made it challenging to know what is really going on and even among those who purport to know, it seems at best we are only looking through a keyhole and missing the wide-screen version of reality.

Our illustrious space industry vehicle NASA has many referring to it as “Never A Straight Answer.” Official words they put out have been contradicted by employee whistle-blowers. All of this leaves us wondering what to believe which is why I have adopted the outlook on just about everything I hear as “maybe.” There is quite plainly no way any citizen can know all of the truth behind anything we read or hear. This also applies to predictions and spiritual teachings. Everyone seems to have a unique perspective and belief system.

In 1982 a book was channeled by a woman in New Mexico describing impending planetary catastrophe and the rescue of spiritually evolved souls. The woman's name was Tuella, and her book was titled "Project: World Evacuation." The being channeling the book was described as being tall and having blue eyes and shoulder-length blond hair. If you've been keeping up with this topic from channelers and ET contactees you will recognize this description as very similar to what you might be hearing currently.

Maybe you've also heard about the photon belt which is said to be a wave of energy that will transform the world. Well, that story was popular in the 1980s. In 1981 Shirley Kemp published an article on the “photon belt” telling of a spiritual light that was about to engulf the earth. Maybe there is some truth to that, but the results of it have not conformed to the expectations.

Many who believe they are good are still awaiting ascension or being rescued by aliens. One well-known teacher has been saying for years all you have to do is be a nice person and you will ascend or be beamed up to an ET spaceship. He even went into the mountains in 2012 waiting for something like that.

Other authors said there would be 3-5 days of continuous darkness in 1992 or 1993. You’ve probably also heard that one in recent years from QAnon and other “conspiracy theory” websites saying the exact same thing. lt seems that many of these “influencers” are tuned into the same “channel.”

Many channelers were also saying there would be an ascension of spiritual people by the Fall of 1995. There were books on the subject and a plethora of articles in magazines all touting the need to prepare to ascend to the 4th or 5th dimension. I know because I bought some of the books myself. Some very well known teachers and authors jumped on that bandwagon, but most people today have forgotten this or are too young to remember this.

Many began stocking up food and other provisions in preparation for the coming disasters. According to a host of channeled sources most inhabitants of Earth wouldn't be able to endure the vibrations by December 1982.

Fortunately, the "good people" would be rescued either by space ships or ascension to a higher plane of existence.

I know, you've heard much of this before, and you are still hearing very similar stories if you are keeping up on it today. All the dates including 2012 have come and gone and the world didn’t end even though Hollywood did their best by providing movies and documentaries on the subject. Many of the same promises are being repackaged once again, but we are given new dates. Now I’m hearing anything from 2025-2032. How can we know what to believe?

I'm now old enough to have been following this phenomena for more than 50 years and have been fascinated by it and intrigued by the messages, and I’m amazed that every few years there arises a new batch of "True Believers."

History shows that many had similar beliefs more than 1000 years ago at the turn of the millennium. In fact, people in nearly every era since the days of Jesus and the apostles have believed they were living in the "last days." I remember talking to my grandmother more than 60 years ago when she was telling me the world was going to end soon and Jesus would be returning in her lifetime.

One of the songs in the Messiah oratorio usually sung at Christmas and Easter celebrations is "The Trumpet Shall Sound." The words to that song are from the apostle Paul's writings in the Bible describing the last days when the righteous would be rescued by an Ascension event before the rest of the world is destroyed to be then followed by a thousand-year golden age.

Many in the New Age movement today are receiving similar messages supposedly channeled from their Higher Self, Ascended Masters, the Galactic Federation, ETs, and other cosmic beings. Some of them have thousands of followers and true believers.

Let me know what you think about all of this. I'll tell you more of what I think next time, and there is more!

From the Heart,
Jonathan

https://www.jonathanparker.org

I will post newsletter 2 and 3 as they follow.

[Sue (Ayt)]

Jonathan Parker - Part II (follows Part I above)

Hi ,

The wonderful channeled news is that there are 13 million space ships on hand to rescue those who would be considered spiritual enough to ascend to populate a new earth. To add further enticement, it was said that women would have 18-year old bodies and men 24-year old ones. Whooohooo!

While that channeled message may bring some comfort or excitement to many, the fact is that it was supposed to happen forty years ago, and also twenty four years ago, and also 12 years ago, and people are still predicting it will happen in the next 3-8 years. New dates I’ve heard are 2025, 2026, 2028, or 2032 so just take your pick of which one to hang on to. With dates if you don’t like the ones you are hearing just wait a few days and someone will give you new ones.

The channeled messages about this subject always contain a sense of urgency due to an impending disaster, and at least that part of the story does seem closer to reality today than ever.

We are assured that out of love for our planet, there are positive ETs fighting the dark forces that are trying to bring chaos through nuclear war and economic collapse. Channeled or “telepathic” messages assure us that without the help of ETs most life will be wiped out.

One of the prophecies stated that the entire Atlantic seaboard of the United States was supposed to be inundated in the winter of 1982-83 accompanied by a polar shift and three days of darkness.

Then there is the famous prediction of Edgar Cayce that California would slide into the ocean about the time of the millennium in 2000.

Today the messages continue with striking similarities to the messages which were given decades ago. In an effort to add credibility to the channeled messages, many of them claim to have come from people's higher self, ascended Masters, The Galactic Federation of Planets, or direct or telepathic contact with extraterrestrials.

The question is not whether sincere well-meaning individuals are channeling information, but what is the real source of the information, and how reliable is it really?

Where is this stuff really coming from?

The astral plane contains many emotionally laden thoughtforms created by the fears held in the mass consciousness of humanity which has created archetypes and astrally-projected holograms. Much of these projections are hallucinations of disaster and the product fear-driven nightmares in the collective unconscious. These include all the conscious and subconscious fears and expectations of global catastrophes that have been recycled for not just decades but millenniums from religious groups, spiritual teachers, and channelers.

The astral plane contains many facsimiles of famous Masters from history. Many of these do not exist as real beings but rather are archetypes sustained by the thoughts, wishes, and desires of those who want to believe.

To be sure, archetypes are powerful forces and can appear completely real so it is not surprising that some are tricked into believing.

Several years ago I was on the "A List" of a popular New Age Teacher named Stuart Wilde. He had written several books, and had a strong following. During the last few years of his life he was sending out emails describing many prophecies that he said were going to come to pass very soon, and his prophecies read much like the Book of Revelation in the Bible.

The only problem was that none of the prophecies ever came to pass. Stuart then said he couldn't understand why they hadn't happened because he had seen them in his visions and channelings and was certain they were imminent. As a result of them not coming to pass he said he would no longer send out emails with the content of his meditations and visions.

I have seen many respected spiritual teachers swept up with enthusiasm over prophetic information, visions, and channeled information only to end up with "eggs on their face" when none of it comes to pass. A lot of them fell into the trap of 2012 when the Mayan calendar appeared to indicate an end. Somehow this doesn’t deter people from setting new dates, perhaps to keep their followers hooked and following them.

Channeled communications nevertheless have a long and honorable history in human affairs, as many people have received valuable information through them. However, discernment and wisdom is clearly needed. Anything less than caution and skepticism leaves you vulnerable to false hopes from deceptive messages and messengers.

In addition to all of this, there is the story of Werner VonBraun’s prediction that a secret space force would use hologram technology to project images in the sky to look like an alien invasion. He said this was the last desperate attempt to unify the world with a New World Order. It has been called “project blue-beam” and is regarded as a conspiracy theory, but since many
”conspiracy theories” have come true it can’t be completely discarded. Ronald Regan made reference to this in a speech he gave at the UN, when he wondered out loud of an invasion of Earth from off world sources wouldn’t cause the governments of the world to unify.

In my next email I'll bring you more up to date. If you are getting tired of this topic my next email on this subject will be the last about this.

Let me know what you think about all of this. I'll tell you more of what I think next time, and there is more!

From the Heart,
Jonathan

https://www.jonathanparker.org

(part III not available yet)