“Greetings everyone.  This is Michael.  Today I will address another question that has been offered by the group in the comments section.  This question was asked by a dear one more than once.  We have not addressed it yet because we wished for this individual to go within and seek the answer herself.  However, we will attempt to leave some breadcrumbs, so to speak to assist in all of you discovering the answers.

Let me first tell a story that we found within our channel’s memories.   Many of you already know the story, but listen anyway with an open mind. 

Once there were three blind men walking together in India.  They came upon an elephant.  Now these wise men had never encountered an elephant before and being blind, they wanted to perceive the elephant in the way that they could most effectively do so–through touch. 

They separated a little, and the first blind man grasped the elephant’s trunk.  He said, “Verily an elephant, this being is just like a snake.” 

The second blind man grasped a leg of the elephant.  He felt its broad expanse and rough exterior and said, “Oh no!  An elephant is like a tree trunk.”  Then the third blind man, this wise being, grasped the elephant’s tail and said, “ No, no!  You both are wrong, for an elephant is like a rope!”

This is the nature of all of the literature, the talks, the information in your world about the nature of reality.  Many people have grasped portions of reality and said, ”Ah, this is what it’s like.”  Or they’ve had powerful inner experiences and said,  “Aha, I understand now.  This is the way the universe works.”

All of them, I say to you, all of them are only portions of reality from the perception of that individual and the level of their consciousness. This is why, to know the truth, you must ever go deeper and deeper within.

The more you fill your mind with a variety of information, the more confused your mind can be.  It takes profound contemplation and a purified awareness to be able to sort the chaff from the truth.  When your mind is filled with so much reading and knowledge from various authors speaking different things, in order for a teacher to teach you, first they have to empty you out.  Because as long as there are so many concepts within you can’t receive any more.  It’s all compared to things you already believe from what you’ve read or heard.  Instead, find the truth within your own being.

Now when you have inner experiences in meditation, they are symbols.   They’re representations of the truth, very contracted portions so that you can take it almost like a little pill–a little piece of the truth at a time.  For the mind cannot grasp these truths.  It is far beyond the ability of your intellectual mind.  This is because of the veils of awareness. 

Your universe, your experience of creation, all exist within Source.  And every single layer that you peel back is still part of a dream because each higher and higher being is still dreaming.  It’s just a much more purified version.  For even Source is manifesting a dream-like reality within its own being that we are a part of.  And each portion of this dreamlike reality is conscious, and as it is conscious, it has contracted abilities that are the same as Source.

Source has the ability to manifest everything.  Source has the ability to sustain this manifestation within its own being, and Source has the ability to enfold it back–to dissolve it.  It also has a supreme ability

to awaken these dreamlike characters within its being to seek the truth because in some sense it is curious and also would like to know the truth.   The truth ever expands so this never ends. 

Now your question:  What is the higher self?”  The higher self is you.   The mundane self is you.   It’s all you.  But when you as a limited being, choose to experience this dreamlike reality and enter through the veils of consciousness, only a tiny portion of you is present–just a sliver of you.  The rest of you, at whatever level of consciousness you exist, remains there. This is your higher self.  Simple.

The other question, not so simple.  (“What is the Oversoul?”)  This is why we told the story at the beginning.  .The oversoul as we see it, does not exist.  There is no oversoul. 

You have a soul–only a tiny fragment of your soul as you exist as a human, within your being.  This is a data collection device.  This is a portion of consciousness created by Source to experience emotion, activities,  everything.  That is the soul’s purpose.  However, the soul, even though it is supremely pure, is still in school because to facilitate its collection and understanding of emotions and experience, questions are asked of it, issues arise that need to be answered by the soul.  The soul in answering it, does not do so in words.  It answers these questions in experience.

It expresses a portion of its consciousness into what appears to be a physical form–usually a baby, though sometimes an adult just appears, and often, because there is no sense of time where the soul exists, it may do it in a variety of what we call lifetimes.  You may be a beggar.  You may be a king. You may be an inventor.  You may be a great doctor.  You may be a primitive man.  And all of this can be issued forth simultaneously by your soul.  But when it does so, only a very tiny portion of the soul is expressed into each being which are dreamlike representations of the soul.

The majority, the vast majority of the soul remains where it is, but it expresses itself in consciousness.  Simultaneously your personality, that part of you that carries memories, that reacts to the world, that creates the venue for the soul to learn goes back and forth between the dreamlike world of earth (or some other place) and the realm that it exists in normally.  That is determined by each being’s level of consciousness.

Okay, are you following me?

So, we have spoken and others speak about you determining, according to what you want to learn, what your masters and teachers would suggest that you also learn–all of this is determined before you take birth as a person.  Simultaneous to that and inspired by it is your soul’s quest.  Now, before you worry that, “ Oh, my soul is the one directing everything and these masters and teachers.  I don’t have free will.”

No, you are your soul.  You are your personality, and you exist within the masters and teachers as they exist within you.  It’s all one.

Don’t get bent out of shape, so to speak, thinking you don’t have free will.  The majority of your life is determined by free will.  It is simply certain events, the structure of your life, and who are your parents that you determine prior to coming.  At a future time, we will speak of what you can change and what you can’t in your life.

All of this determining to come to a physical experience is simultaneous.  The impulse comes from the soul, goes to you, and boom you have determined everything, and you are here.

We do not consider the teachers of a soul, the inspirational beings for a soul who inspire a quest, to be an oversoul.  There’s simply some guidance that helps the soul to ask a question so that it can express itself in order to answer it.  The soul’s questions are all very high questions.   They’re questions about light, about divinity, about Source, and about itself.  In the process of answering these questions however, as it expresses itself as a tiny portion into a human being, it remains fully connected with that portion, so it experiences the whole range of emotions and human experiences that that tiny portion of soul experiences.

Now, to clarify, we have talked periodically or at least referred to the inner Self.  Allow me to differentiate between the inner Self and what you call the higher self which is just you without form. 

The inner Self is that tiny spark of divinity, of pure Source within every one of you.  It is so tiny, but when you finally reach the point where you can merge with it, you have merged with Source.  That is enlightenment. 

This doesn’t happen with the higher self.  The higher self is simply placed wherever its vibration, its consciousness is.  That’s where it exists.  But it can develop more rapidly through experiences—especially on earth because earth is considered a school.  You can understand why.   It is one of the few places where almost nothing exists except what you as an individual project outwardly onto its matrix, onto this grid-like formation of light.  And so. it’s a perfect place for you to learn, to expand, and to experience the whole range of emotion with the potential for turning and reaching out for a higher path, a higher understanding.

This is only possible when you are in a more developed space, a higher vibrational space.  Individuals who still carry a lower vibration are more earth-bound bound to the sensations and experiences of being physical.  That attachment often keeps them from even considering going higher in their awareness.  But those of you who are here and remain here with me are seeking actively.  You want to know the truth.   You want to know the undiluted truth,  and I congratulate you for this.

Let go of the books.  They can only take you so far.  What they do is spur your curiosity onward.  They give you seeds to contemplate, but ultimately, they confuse the mind.  Get clear about your path whatever it is and follow it. 

There are many spiritual paths in your world. Pick one.  Pick carefully.  Test it first.  Challenge it to see if it bears fruit for you, but if it does, commit to it and let go of all of the others.  They may all be good, but if you take on too many, you confuse the mind, and it becomes even more difficult to go within.

Consider crossing a lake with a boat.  You see two boats in front of you.  They’re both very similar, but one’s painted red, one’s painted blue and you say, ”Hey, if one boat’s good to cross, think how much better it would be to use both!”   So, you put one foot in one boat and one foot in the other boat.  They’re equal.  They will both take you across.  But what happens?  You fall in the water! 

On the spiritual path, your path will become narrower and narrower as you go deeper within.  It’s important to learn to focus.  And just as you are focusing within on your inner experiences and on finding the truth– the highest truth, in the same way focus is needed to simply walk your path.   First test your path.  See if it bears fruit for you, if it resonates with you, if it gives you the knowledge, the wisdom, the experiences that you’re looking for.   But if it does, and if it touches deep in your heart, then focus.

There are many, many paths to higher understanding, but it’s important at a point in your development that you choose one and learn to focus on it.  Once you have tested it,  once you have really checked it out, if you are clear that it’s your path, then surrender to it and allow it to teach you.

When you want to know something,  go within instead of grabbing a book.  For mundane knowledge, it’s fine.  For spiritual truths, you will most profoundly understand that truth within.  You can read about it, and you may read conflicting material about it.  In fact, there is so much conflicting material in your world.  But even if you read a book that told you about the truth and was absolutely accurate and pure, it would not have the same impact as experiencing it yourself.  So, find a path that leads you to direct experience, and go there and commit.

We leave you with that.

Meditate every day.  That will help you to understand what path you want to choose and what the truth truly is.

We all send you our love and our blessings.

I am Archangel Michael”