Teacher: Teacher Ophelius

Today’s message is about the discipline of sympathy. To achieve the perfection and likeness of your heavenly Father, you must attain a high level of sympathy for your brothers and sisters, and in doing so, you gain the understanding of tolerance and reap the survival values of wisdom through the self mastery of your emotions and your reactions towards others. To have sympathy is to have the ability and capacity to understand and share feelings with someone—to put yourself in their shoes, so to speak, without judgment or regard for their intents or motives.

When you act with sympathy for others, you find it easier to tolerate the differing beliefs and opinions of others, regardless of how contrary they are to your own values. By looking back to an earlier time in your own path, you can understand the sometimes ignorant and crude reactions of others who are at different positions in the spiral of soul development. To have sympathy you must consider the background and the history of the individual; their education; their likes and dislikes; their level of values—in other words, what makes this person the way they are? Understanding this, you have the ability to disarm their fears and build a level of trust where you may then communicate your feelings without offense.

Having sympathy means you must take the time to listen to others, putting their needs before your own and finding common ground with all the diverse personalities that surround you in your daily walk through life. Understanding that each individual is indwelt with the living spirit of the Father, you can have sympathy in the brotherhood of this fraternal pursuit to find God and to be like him, yet realizing that all are on differing paths and varying levels of soul progression. It is this diversity of being that makes such a colorful and beautiful quilt of human experience so valuable a gift to the Supreme Being. Through sympathy and understanding, you take out the fear and the disharmony of living by accepting your brothers and sisters for who they are, while learning to build bridges of trust and a progressive direction toward higher ideals and values.

By showing sympathy to others, you are also teaching them to have sympathy by your example to accept them on their terms. The results of having sympathy for others will manifest in greater joy of living; less anger and frustration; and harmony of trust. Consider this my beloved, and reach out to those who are misunderstood.

“Happy are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God.”

Peace to you,

The Circle of Seven