January 1st 1971
We would bring you words of comfort because we realise only too well, that at this time your heart is often heavy through the feeling of lack. Because the body refuses more and more to do the things that you feel that you yourself ought to do. And we know that you are at times doubtful concerning your ability to carry on day by day.
But if you could bring back to your waking life, the memory of the things that happen when your Spirit passes over, when your body is asleep, you would be full of thankfulness and you would not feel so limited in the ordinary course of your daily life. Because the more you become incapable and unable of doing things in the body in the daytime, the easier it is for your Spirit to slip as it were into this other world when sleep holds you.
And we wonder if you do not remember the discussions and the talks that we have during the sleep state, when the Spirit is free. You always loved the hills, the valleys, and the lakes of the Earth world. And these things you always appreciated and gave thanks for. And when sleep holds the body, in Spirit you walk with us, and you see the real. You love the shadows, you loved the mountains and the natural things of Earth, but these Mary, were in very truth but shadows of the real. And you are at home and happy in these places where reality is a fact and where true, uninhibited beauty lies before you on every hand. You see and you know these places of which hitherto you have felt the shadow to be beautiful and real. And there is the real hut, there is the real house and power which you and we have built through your very thought. And because you appreciate and love this little shadow of the real in your garden, the garden of Earth, you shall see and know a Temple of Light in the Spirit sphere.
Already it is known to be a house of power and of feeling. And there are many who pass on into this world who are not ready, who have not searched, who have not prepared themselves for the so called after-life, and these are they who we can bring to your very own Temple of Light and power which has come into creation in these spheres through the thought power created in the little hut in which you now sit. And from this, from this place of prayer and peace and hope there is so much. So much has come about from this. If we try to explain to you and to tell you, you could not possibly understand. But when sleep holds you, you see and you hear and you know and you partake in the work which is being created through your thought in the hut in your little garden.
And it is because you see, and you realise, and you value the work that goes on here that you have this deep love and longing for the little hut in your ordinary, everyday life. And it shall become a shrine upon the Earth, and many will come to look upon it, to renew and to restore their faith and their hope. It already has its proper place in this. The land where things are as they are and where only the true and the real can find a place. But it is, it is. It is the stone. It is the stone which is so very, very beautiful. And this is your very, very own. And it has a special place in this little temple of power in the world of Spirit. And there are very few who have power to create this Spiritual stone and sent it on as it were, before them. And from this stone many learn. It has more information than any book upon the Earth plane to those who understand the working of Spirit. The colours are multitudinous, they are manifold, and each colour talks and speaks in its own particular way. And each colour, and each facet of this beautiful stone heals and teaches, comforts and brings peace.
And we often hear you say that you are looking for your independence. Child of the Spirit you know not what you say. For many that are really dependent that truly must lean on others come to this stone which you have created which stands in this little Temple of Light and they receive power unknown to you and yet which you have created. And they receive light and love and learning. If you feel that your independence has been taken away from you it is only because you're getting nearer and nearer to the reality to the true, to the imperishable, to the indestructible. And these things which you seem to be giving up are simply a peeling off of the outer skin which belonged to the Earth and which must go back to the Earth. But in the centre,in the deep centre, is the Spirit, indestructible, the Pearl of Great Price, innumerable treasures of the Spirit and all that wonderful love which has emanated from your heart and from your mind. And so, dear child art but giving up the lesser for the greater, for the all,for the love. And we would that we could talk to all the ageing people of Earth as we can talk to you. If only they would ask, if they only they would knock, all would be given unto each and every one. Abide in that peace which you have made your own. And we will help in every way possible. But we do not have to work very hard Mary, because all those round about you love you. And this is God himself at work.
This transcript speaks directly to the specific pain of a body "refusing more and more to do the things you feel you ought to do," and offers something more concrete than reassurance: the very limitation being grieved is described as the mechanism that makes something else possible. As the body becomes less capable, the transcript says, "the easier it is for your Spirit to slip... into this other world" during sleep — decline and freedom moving together rather than one simply compensating for the other.
Its central image gathers threads from across this collection into one place: the little garden hut, so loved in ordinary life, is revealed as "but a shadow of the real" — its true counterpart, a genuine Temple of Light built through years of thought and prayer, already exists in spirit, already serving newly-passed souls unprepared for what comes after death. And within it stands the stone, this collection's oldest and most recurring symbol, now given a startling further meaning: not just a personal achievement but an active teaching instrument in its own right, its "multitudinous" colours and facets each "healing and teaching" others who come to it, offering "more information than any book upon the Earth plane."
Its most pointed correction concerns independence, mourned as something being lost: the transcript insists this reading is backwards — "you know not what you say" — since what looks like dependency increasing is only "the outer skin which belonged to the Earth" peeling away from something far more permanent underneath. What's being given up, on this account, is never the real treasure, only what was always going to return to earth regardless; the "Pearl of Great Price," met throughout this book, remains exactly where it has always been, at the centre, untouched by any of it.