Bartholomew opened this session by reminding students that life's purpose is to experience blissful awareness moment by moment, moving away from identification with personal drama toward something vaster and more exciting. He addressed the primary tension observed during a recent California workshop - participants' overwhelming fear about predicted earth changes and financial collapse preventing them from relaxing into direct experience of the light. This exemplifies how external concerns can completely dominate awareness, blocking access to the deeper dimensions of consciousness always available in each moment.

The teaching established that humans live simultaneously on two levels of reality, with most people becoming transfixed by the obvious drama of incarnation while ignoring the magnificent other dimension. Bartholomew explained the session's provocative title by stating that the conscious mind knows one fundamental truth with absolute certainty: "Living is dangerous to your health." This awareness creates the basic human motivation system and underlying fear that drives people into protective cocoons, desperately trying to avoid discomfort, fear, and the essential vulnerability of being human. Rather than embracing life's inherent uncertainty and excitement, many retreat into increasingly narrow existences in pursuit of safety, which ironically leads to the very boredom and death-in-life they're trying to avoid.

Central to the discussion is the fundamental human operating system of moving toward pleasure and away from pain - the two batteries that power earthly experience. Rather than fighting this natural polarity, Bartholomew taught students to observe how fear and excitement constantly alternate, like breathing in and out. He pointed out that within even the most difficult experiences, there exists a part of the being that rises in anticipatory excitement, recognizing these as significant life moments. The key involves learning to ride the wave of constant change as an energetic phenomenon rather than getting trapped in demanding that life move only from "lesser to more."

The master teacher becomes the breath itself, demonstrating the essential rhythm of existence through its natural rise and fall. Students learned that holding either the in-breath or out-breath causes unconsciousness, revealing the fundamental wisdom of allowing natural movement rather than trying to control outcomes. This principle extends to all emotional and mental states - fear, boredom, joy, hunger, and tiredness naturally rise and fall when observed with awareness. The common mistake involves believing one experiences only a single state persistently, when careful attention reveals constant movement between different feelings and perceptions throughout each hour.

Bartholomew introduced then what he calls "Bartholomew work" - the disciplined practice of paying attention to one's actual moment-by-moment experience. This involves gentle watching and noting: "Ah, I'm thinking that again" or "I'm feeling that again" without trying to change anything. When this sweet attention softens, students return to breathing and experience the second part of consciousness - that dimension which contains excitement and anticipation about whatever assignments the vast, wise Self has provided. He emphasized that one's life circumstances represent a holy assignment perfectly matched to one's capacity for awakening and wholeness.

The teaching addressed the apparent contradiction of experiencing bliss simultaneously with pain or difficulty. Bartholomew explained that truly enlightened beings like Christ and Buddha experienced tremendous external challenges while maintaining constant underlying bliss. This differs from the polarized psyche's assumption that despair must be eliminated before accessing happiness, which then supposedly leads to bliss. Instead, he taught that bliss remains ever-present regardless of surface conditions, requiring only the training to recognize it rather than demanding circumstances change first.

The discussion culminated by exploring authentic trust - not trusting others to always please us or trusting the changeable small self, but trusting the continuity of awareness that possesses the capacity to meet anything with fullness, light, understanding, compassion and power. This trustworthy dimension exists as the eternal presence, the light of consciousness that permeates everything completely and totally. Students learn to trust this magnificent wholeness directing all experience in harmony with infinite wisdom, allowing them to appreciate even their most apparently foolish or painful choices as perfectly appropriate for their awakening journey.