Let’s face it. You are in love with illusion. You love illusion more than anything. You who would deny that you love pomp and circumstance love illusion. You love a parade. You hardly love the deeper significance of life. In fact, you do not love it at all. The deeper significance of life seems like a wayward thing, a miscreant perhaps. You don’t consider the carrot of everlasting life to be so desirable as it is.

What do you really care about what is behind the veil when you are happy or when you are suffering? You tell yourself that you live in the here and now, and you don’t want later or what’s secretly going on at this supposed time to confuse you. You want that which you like to see, and you want it now, and you want it to stay, and you want that to be the truth of existence whether it is or not. Existence has been enough for you, and sometimes too much for you.

Nevertheless, you want the surface to be permanent when you want it to be, and you want the surface to be temporary when you want it to be, and sometimes you want all or nothing.

You do not want to be adrift in the ocean of life, and yet you want its highlights. You want that which you want, and you want it now, for you mean to live in the present. All the while, you are living in illusion. You want to be at a party that never ends. You do not want the clock to toll midnight. You do not want Cinderella to look like a motherless scullery maid again. Beloveds, you are caught up in appearances. What are princess and scullery maid but appearances? Call them reality, if you like, yet they are still appearances. Call them real life, if you like, for that makes them true for you whether they are true or not.

You never want any color to fade. You want all colors to be bright and flattering to you and your living quarters. You want the sun to shine every day, unless you happen to want snow to ski on.

Illusion captivates you very much. Alas, illusion is illusion and cannot be anything else.

It so happens that the real action is subterranean. It is like a poem that is not quite clear. It may have a great affect on you, and yet you don’t understand it. Understandably, you don’t want to deal with anything you don’t understand. You like to deal with what you do understand, although you do understand very little of it, of life, of yourself, and what you are doing on this illusive Earth.

Yet there is comfort in turning the key of your car, and it starts. There is even comfort in getting on the bus and showing your bus pass. Life is made up of so much of these little acts that give a continuity to life. All this is enough for you. You have to manage these steps of life anyway. How can you deal with this underlying Silence when you have all you can do to deal with the noise? What do I, God, think you are anyway, you ask.

You know by now what I think. I think you are beautiful and true. I think your veering away from the validity and solidity of the Silence is a mask. You hold a mask before your face and attend the masquerade ball. And, so, you while away your time, your illusory time, and you like to think that you make hay while the sun shines.

Whereof I speak, the sun shines all the time, and you are on favored ground. You don’t have to leave the surface of life in order to enjoy the underlying Silence. You keep your eye on the day-to-day life, and yet you keep an ear to the deeper foundation of life from which, when all is said and done, you cannot flee. And I have to ask you, why would you want to flee from that which gives real meaning to your life? You cannot escape anyway. You cannot escape the joy I have made ready for you. You are already here with Me, and that’s how it is, and that’s how you are.