Here Bartholomew tackled one of the most fundamental question head-on, and his answer may be a surprise: the purpose of life is understanding you are not an ego. This tape also contains pointed warnings about the sense of "spiritual superiority" in relationships, and a remarkably clear description of what happens at death - along with a striking teaching on free will and the limits of "God's will," a firm denial of any organized evil, and grounded guidance on inner discipline and commitment.

Context: Speaking to the early Socorro (NM) quest group, Bartholomew addressed one of humanity's most fundamental questions - what is the purpose of life? He acknowledged that different listeners will seek different answers, but offered the teaching "in the highest degree" he perceives, trusting that those who can hear will hear, and those who cannot will someday come to hear.

The Core Teaching - You Are Not an Ego: The purpose of life, Bartholomew stated plainly, is to understand that you are not an ego. Most humans perceive life's meaning as bound up in family, work, personal love, country, or vocation - and while none of these are wrong, as long as we believe this illusion, we cannot fully participate in the broader teaching the planet provides. We say "all is one," but if we look honestly at our thoughts, we act constantly as if we are separate - not only body from body, but mind from mind. The ego maintains its power by promising us specialness: "You are special if you are a separate ego." But in oneness, no one is more important than anyone else - and this is something the ego refuses to accept.

Dangers of the Spiritual Path: Bartholomew warned against the misuse of the spiritual quest - anything that makes you feel different from or superior to others is a misuse, because there is no real difference. He pointed especially to close relationships, where an "insidious feeling" can emanate toward one's mate that makes them feel less. The long-suffering partner who stays home caring for family while the other attends spiritual meetings may well be the more caring and dedicated. Taking on the "deadly habit" of thinking oneself exalted because of some glimmering of spiritual truth is one of the greatest traps on the path.

Death and What Lies Beyond: Addressing the group's questions about death, Bartholomew explained that consciousness does not change when you die - there is no explosion into something vastly different, because there really is no "other side"; it is all the same. Fear exists only in the body sense, not in consciousness. He advised keeping awareness focused on consciousness rather than the body during transition, letting the body take care of itself. On the other side, what you envision will initially manifest, because the mind creates - and you will come to realize this is happening. The degree to which we cultivate deep awareness of our oneness with the divine force while in body determines how smooth and expansive the transition will be.

Finding Right Work: When asked how to discover what work one should be doing, Bartholomew observed that many people mistake their job for something "God has given them" when in fact they have placed themselves there through their own limitations - comfort, convenience, fear of expansion, fear of decreased income, or attachment to prestige. What the higher forces want above all is for us to move with creative joy. The first step is honest self-examination: Why am I here? Is it fear? Is it ego? Only after removing the veil from our true motivations can we become open to genuine guidance about our path.

Is Everything "God-Sent"? Free Will and the Prodigal Son: Asked whether all the events of our lives are God-sent, Bartholomew drew a careful distinction. Nothing happens outside of God, because there is nothing outside of God - yet that is not the same as saying everything is the will of God. Where a person acts from the limited, separated awareness of their own free will, without regard for harmony with the Tao, the result happens within God but is not willed by God. This, he said, answers the age-old objection - "If God moves everything, what of Hitler?" That chaos is not God; it is the working-out of a differentiated will that has turned away from the Source. The moment any of us genuinely changes our mind and says, "I don't want what I have created; help me," a real movement begins - not always instantaneous, but a slow, steady inundation of grace that makes change after change within the mind. Only from that turning can it truly be said that everything happens by God's will. This, Bartholomew affirmed, is precisely the meaning of the prodigal son: the son was never actually apart from his father, but his own will turned him away until he chose to return - and, tellingly, the resentful brother who stayed home was just as inwardly separated as the one who wandered.

There Is No Organized Evil - and the Peril of the "Dark": Asked about organized evil and negative forces, Bartholomew was emphatic: there is no devil, no organized evil, no such thing at all. What does exist are entities and clusters of thought-forms with a very negative outlook - real, but nothing like the demon of popular imagination. The essential law is that nothing can affect you unless you call it in: just as the God-force will not move into you of its own accord until you call it, neither will the dark. He described how some people, out of an inner war between light and dark, consciously experiment with dark energies for the peculiar stimulation they carry - and how they can find themselves unable to summon the light again once the balance has tipped. Here he explained the real nature of what is called exorcism or healing: a person of sufficient strength lends their own greater light to the diminished light of another, in a communion of minds, until that person can once more call on the light for themselves. This is what the great teachers do constantly for their disciples, and why one feels lifted in the presence of a master - though it cannot be sustained indefinitely. From this came a sober warning about the arrogance of unprepared "healers" who half-believe they can enter such situations: when two people meet in this work and the darker predominates, both are pulled down together.

Personal Guidance - Discipline, Commitment, and the "Reverse" Error: The latter part of the session turned to personal guidance for members of the group, from which several teachings of general value emerge. To a mother troubled by a strong-willed teenage daughter, Bartholomew counseled letting the young person make her own choices with no comment at all, and calmly standing responsible for one's own path rather than being drawn into the child's games. To a member ready for deeper work, he urged the choosing of a definite inner discipline - not austerity, but a committed practice such as a fixed daily meditation - as a symbol of commitment made first of all for oneself. And he named a common and crucial error: the reverse thinking that says, "If my outer situation would change, then I could make my commitment." The truth runs the other way. The movement must be made first; once a real call goes out from the heart - "My life is yours; whatever you wish, I will do" - circumstances rearrange to support it. He illustrated this with someone who had unexpectedly been given a house with a quiet space of her own, precisely answering a need she had never voiced. Life, he closed, is not a crystallized chronicle of pre-scripted events; even the meetings we assume are destined are not all fixed, and there are teachers we were meant to encounter and did not, because we had not used what we were already given. One must make one's commitment over and over again - and when we fail, rather than raging against ourselves, simply begin again to do the very thing we feel badly about neglecting.