Consecration is a level of commitment that we arrive at in stages through a combination of our own effort and God's grace.

In making this commitment, we sanctify our lives. 'Consecration' means 'to make holy or sacred,' and what we make sacred grows and expands as we grow in the light.

The consecration of our lives becomes increasingly possible as Divine love flows through us. When our hearts awaken through connecting with the source of Divine love, we experience the possibility of bringing this love more fully into our lives - into all the places we have previously felt were separate from God. This awakening calls to us to sanctify our lives by living in love from the truth and integrity of our deepest being.

The commitment of consecration is not to be taken lightly, for it calls us to be obedient to the inner teacher and to become one-pointed in our desire to let go of motives that do not honor our indwelling divinity. In the step-by-step process of letting go of these impure motives, our ego learns to assume a more submissive role in determining our behavior, and bows before the ever-increasing importance of the higher self.

As we move toward greater purity, we experience many significant transitions in our lives which, over and over again, require a major letting go of the ego. Regardless of what we call these transitions, the result is the progressive surrender of the ego to a higher Will.

The experience of becoming aligned with the inner master - the inner voice of truth that dwells within - brings us step-by-step into sacred Covenant with God. This Covenant is ultimately the true basis and goal of a consecrated life. Movement in this direction is offered to us as both our spiritual birthright and gift - an opportunity to use our free will to join more fully with the Divine presence within. In doing so, we intentionally release all that blocks us from our greater spiritual calling, in order to become what we are meant to be.

As we contemplate our willingness and readiness to surrender more to God's will and to consecrate our lives, we can keep our minds and hearts open to a level of surrender that may presently feel impossible. In doing this, we understand that 'letting go' is a process that takes place in degrees or increments, and that what is not possible at one stage becomes possible at another.

With this in mind, we must be gentle with ourselves when our present capacity does not meet our present wish or intention. We must be gentle with ourselves when fears about further letting go seem to impede the process. As long as we stay dedicated to the journey, we can be assured that new levels of surrender will open up within us and bring us closer to living the truth of our spirit.

Ultimately, consecration involves becoming a true servant of God. It requires the passage of time to do this, for it is time that is needed to purify the personal will and make it one with Divine will. At the point of consecration, our personal identity and life becomes a planetary identity and life, and our personal truth is linked with universal truth forever.

To perceive truth, we begin by acknowledging the importance of balance between the mind and the heart which occurs through the process of purification. When mind and heart are balanced, we can trust that by centering and aligning in the heart, our mind will also serve us through its connection with God's light and truth. Since God is One, our seeking of alignment with Divine perspective produces a receptivity to love and light. This receptivity penetrates the heart and mind and results in a capacity to perceive truth through intuition.

Intuition can take place primarily in the heart, or primarily in the mind, but generally involves the joining of both in the presence of light. As this occurs, the mind feels the truth of what the heart knows, even in the absence of a clear or objective basis for that knowing.

Intuition is the vehicle through which inner knowing can take place. When intuition founded in both mind and heart is infused by light, it becomes capable of distinguishing between truth and falsehood and between greater truth and lesser truth. It also becomes capable of discerning layers of defenses that arise within the self or others that need to be penetrated.

As we move forward with the purification process, we learn more and more to rely on our intuition as a trustworthy guide to knowing and deciding. Ultimately, intuition offers us increasing access to universal truth and to the knowing of the being of God.

Discernment involves the heightened capacity to distinguish one thing from another, the real from the unreal, the true from the false. Developing intuition creates within us the possibility for new levels of discernment. Yet, often as we move toward greater consecration of life, we continue to find obstacles along the way that make it difficult or impossible for us to discern inner truth.

The energy of darkness, for example, fuels forces within us that are anti-truth. Denial, doubt, and projection are examples of internal experiences that counteract our attempts to hear and perceive core truth. Compulsive or repetitive thought patterns based on human conditioning that take up mental energy also deter us from listening and attuning with clarity.

With this in mind, we must practice discerning inner truth over and over again. As time passes, as we listen more attentively to the voice of our soul within us, we learn more precisely how to hear the source of spiritual knowing that resides within. If we are still enough, and listen long enough, we hear the whisper of truth more and more certainly as it speaks to us of perceptions and understandings that we didn't know we had. This feel for the voice of our soul speaking through our hearts and intuition, becomes more and more a part of our everyday perception. Eventually, it infuses the totality of our lives.

In addition to the discernment of truth from falsehood, and lesser truth from greater, there is another kind of discernment that is possible for us. This concerns the 'seed of truth' that is implanted deep within our consciousness that contains the pattern of our destiny, the promise of all that we are meant to be.

This seed of truth is the imprint¹⁴ of our soul memory and the remembrance of our Divine essence. As it awakens, it provides us with the necessary kernel of guidance for our spiritual seeking. As we purify, it germinates and grows within us. With time, patience, and nurturance on our parts, it becomes more conscious, more clear, and more mature in its expression.

When we become stronger in our spiritual identities, the seed of truth within us expands to become the basis for our entire lives. All that we do, and all that we are, becomes congruent with its message.

The tenth principle asks us to bring greater awareness to all of life's decisions, to the words we speak, and to every thought that we hold. Devoting ourselves to truth in this way holds the promise of freedom for us, rather than limitation, for we are becoming able to live life as our true selves. Despite the personal and emotional risks that we may perceive or feel, we give ourselves permission to express the life force within us freely, so that our human lives may be embedded in the life of Spirit. This happens simply by being who we really are.

Throughout the purification process, we are asked to release our attachment to a more limited perception of ourselves and our realities, built on fear. We do this in order to acquire a new vision of our self, built on love and limitlessness.

Integrity of being and of living is our goal. When the voices of human conditioning are quieted within us, we begin to feel a new energy moving through us that opens us up to unexpected possibilities for responding to life. An important guideline as we open in this way is the sensitive recognition of what makes us feel fully alive and awake, as compared with what deadens us. Once we feel this distinction, it becomes our sacred duty to nurture this aliveness by making choices that validate what we feel energized by and intuitively drawn to, and by rejecting those that create further repression or contraction. In this way, we foster the development of our truth and integrity and abandon paths and situations that lead us into greater deadness.

Living with integrity as a whole self is the overall goal and outcome of embodying, living, and speaking truth. Our decisions, both small and large, form the knots in a cord which lead us from one level of integrity to another. These decisions need to reflect our inner truth, regardless of the presence or absence of external approval and support, and regardless of the dictates of social convention. In order to do this, courage is needed, dedication is needed, truth is needed.

The inner voice gets stronger and easier to follow, the more we learn to trust ourselves and the perfection of Divine unfoldment in our work, our relationships, and in virtually every aspect of our lives. Doing what 'feels right' becomes the priority, even though at the time we may not understand why or what the final outcome will be.

'Doing what feels right' creates a pattern of living based on inner truth, and allows God to lead us "by a way we know not."'¹⁵ This happens not through the dictates of our minds, but through the messages of our souls. These messages are communicated most clearly when the mind relaxes around decision-making and gives up the need to know and to understand. To live and to act from this state of unknowing, and to listen to the voice of our heart, may fly in the face of reason or practicality, yet it becomes a testament to our trust in the truth of God's love.

When core truth operates as a primary principle in life, our relationships take on new meaning. When our highest intention is to relate to the Divinity in ourselves and in others, our relationship lives begin to change. Being 'real' and perceiving another's reality in terms of spiritual essence becomes more and more important. Eventually, our perception shifts from the limited focus it had in conventional reality, to the expanded view now possible as conventional reality merges with God's reality.

Allowing others the freedom to be themselves and to live a truth that differs from ours is also part of being real. The ability to do this is developed through a firm commitment to both truth and non-judgment which allows all to be who they are without blame. With unconditional love as our foundation, we begin to live life with honesty and humility, free of blame, resentment, expectations, or anger.

Embodying, living, and speaking truth becomes increasingly possible as we learn to have faith that we will be upheld by God as we do this. With faith, we can more easily relinquish motives of self-protection stemming from fear, and live in truth more freely. With faith, we know that we are sustained at all times, even in the face of adversity.

Risk-taking with respect to living in truth can include loss and rejection as described in the Ninth Principle. It can include conflict with political, economic, or social systems of which we are a part. It can also include the discomfort we feel when what we believe is not shared by large numbers of people, or when a view we express is met by fear.

The outcome of risks that we take in the name of truth may not be predictable from the outset. This, too, is a source of discomfort. Therefore, the spiritual training we undergo is most needed. In the face of potentially difficult consequences, it helps us to persevere with courage, and to trust in God, and in the healing power of truth, to ultimately overcome all obstacles. This trust remains firm, despite the particular momentary or current consequences of our beliefs, words, or actions.

Our commitment to truthfulness enables us also to increasingly discern degrees of truth within ourselves, based on the amount of light each carries. Our goal is always to align with the truth that carries the highest light in ourselves and in others, and to eliminate all falseness from our lives through conscious non-participation.

Increasingly, our commitment to truth may call us to confront outer darkness. When this happens, we move always in the direction of separating the energy of darkness from the person in terms of our response. Our sole intention is to speak truthfully on behalf of the principles of light, rather than to attack persons. Taking a firm position against an unconscious action may be necessary in the service of light, but criticizing, attacking, or maligning persons reflects a misunderstanding of the soul performing this action and does not follow the highest law of love and forgiveness.

As we continue our journey, we can be reassured that living in truth is a learning process, and that we are moving forward at all times. As we deepen our commitment to a consecrated life built on love for God, love for others, self-reflection, and self-love, we understand that we are securely putting in place the building blocks that will allow our life to unfold. We also trust that one day we will be able to live in truth and integrity at all times and in all places, at one with ourselves, others, and God.