The Last Judgment

“The quickest, most elegant way of finding the stillness is to let go of your judgments about others and yourself. This exercise will help do that. It’s like the introduction process, only you play from your seats.

“MA will you demonstrate?” IAM said. MA nodded.
IAM gave instructions. “Each of you will come up on stage. You get one minute to speak the main voice and any and all auxiliary voices that block the stillness. After one minute you will here a sound.” IAM pointed to the supervisors.
A bell sounded from the back table.

“Then you will finish that thought. Any neophytes who have a judgment about you or your sharing will stand. Any questions?”

“I don’t get it. How is this going to quiet my mind?” Alan said, one of the few who had not been to the Doctor’s classes. “I’ve been meditating for twenty years and five seconds of silence is amazing. I can’t see how this will do anything except make a lot more noise. This is a very simple minded attempt at something people work at their whole lives.”
“Thank you for sharing,” IAM said. “Anyone else?”

“I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.” Shelly, the quiet girl from the Canby farm, said. “I’m scared I’ll say the wrong thing and people’ll hate me.”
“Shelly, who’s responsible for your feelings?” MA said.
“I am.”

The neophytes raised a collective fist in approval.

“We’re ready. We’ll start in the back and work row by row.”
“I’ll demo,” Ma said. “I have a voice that says I’m doing the devils work. A voice that says I should be teaching Sunday school and getting my life together with Jesus. “A voice that says I shouldn’t have friends that are gay. Another voice that tells me to go back to teaching social studies. I’m a klutz. Why bother to dance or exercise?
“I have a voice that says I’m better than you and one in duet that says I’m less than you. A voice that says there is not enough money and that I’ll always be poor. Sometimes I know AWE will never make enough to pay my bills, much less get what I want, and I don’t know what I want and even if I did, I couldn’t do anything about it cause I have those two kids and a womanizing husband.
“Voices that say AWE is the best thing going and we are making a difference, and this is the work the Lord put me here to do.
“Voices that say PA is the most lovable man in the world and that IAM is a blessing and that my clothes fit good and my teeth are crooked and I don’t know what to do with my hair.
“I got voices from rock n roll, TV shows, movies, and a jingle that says, ‘See the USA in a Chevrolet’.
“What are we suppose to do? What did we do? What we are going to do next.
"This isn’t working. Ah, shit. I got voices that got something to say about everyone and everything.”
The bell sounded and there was a moment of silence.

“Now those with judgments about MA or anything she said stand,” IAM said.
About ten people rose from their seats.
“MA will call on you. Say, I judge you for whatever the judgment is. Then MA will say, “Thank you I can use that.” Put those judgments out there so the Hoover in the sky can get rid of them.” IAM said.

Everyone’s judgments about each other unfolded all the fears, angers, doubt and sorrows that IAM call the FADS.

“Our judgments are keeping us from our stillness,” Joe said.
“I see everyone as a trainer. The collective unconsciousness holds us back, and let us go at the same time. We are wise fools. We believe what we judged. We judged others not from our being, but from our judgments. Judgments judging judgments.

We were miles from a direct experience of our self or others.” Shelly spoke encompassing the group mind.

In the back of the room, an assistant wrote the judgments on a flip chart. After all forty neophytes finished, the air was thick with judgments. But everyone seemed lighter.Then IAM said, “We’re going to take a ten minute silent break.”