It is important to understand what it means to be in the wrong place. The right place isn’t just where your body is sitting. Have you ever been in the right place physically, paid a lot of money to go there, and then sat there resenting the fact that there was pulp in your orange juice? You can be in the most exquisite spot in the world and at the same time be inwardly in the most exquisite fear, worry, or pain, despite what you have put together for yourself. When we’re in the wrong place inwardly, it simply doesn’t matter where we are outwardly.

What is it that must take place in our life so that we can begin the process of recognizing the simple truth of that idea? The most beautiful truths, are the simplest ones. Our problem is that we just don’t know when we’re in the wrong place. We can be in the wrong place even while thinking we’re in the right place.

Do you know why we don’t know when we’re in the wrong place? Because when we find ourselves in the wrong place, something in us starts telling us how to get out of there. Something inside of us never acknowledges, “You know what? You got here because you were asleep. You got here because you were not attentive to what your heart and mind were saying and doing. You got here surrounded and pressed by these ravening thoughts. You got here because you gave your attention to these punishing feelings when they called for you.”

All you have to do in the moment where you find yourself stressed, tense, worried, irritable, angry — when you find yourself in a negative state, thinking about what to do about your negativity – is realize that you’re in the wrong place. Don’t think about what to do with where you are. Admit to yourself you’re in the wrong place, and then… just don’t go there.

We may, at any moment that we wish, become aware of ourselves sufficiently enough to know where we are inwardly. To know that we’re judging is the end of judgment. If we know, if we are aware that we’re judging, we will be conscious of the fact that we are rendering that pain unto ourselves. When you find yourself living a resentment over again, all you have to do is see that you’re surrounded by thoughts and feelings that were produced by your resistance to a remembered event. That’s all you have to do. Who made you remember what you now wish hadn’t happened to you? Who made you picture the person you resent? Who brought up the failure from your past? Who made clear to you what your parents did thirty years ago? Who did that in the moment when you’re sitting by yourself, or driving in your car, or eating your croissant? Who did that? The answer is something inside of you that is always trying to drag you into a place where it assumes power over you. That’s who! And it’s not a who, it’s a what. It’s not a you. Don’t judge yourself! Don’t condemn yourself for these parts that we’re talking about. They belong to an aspect of an unconscious nature that is still unconscious. Our work is to make it conscious. We’re going to bring this light into ourselves so thoroughly that what now acts upon us will be unable to produce the punishment it does because it gets us into its house, into the world where nothing good can happen. Why? Because we have gone into the wrong place.

Just don’t go there. Can you remember that? The problem is, when we get into pain, our pain immediately gives us the reasons why we’re there. The reasons for being in pain are the wrong place to be. Thinking about our reason for why we’re unhappy is the wrong place to be. It’s part of our unhappiness; it’s not the solution to it. Come wide awake and fully back to yourself so you can say (inwardly): “Hold on a moment. This isn’t a good place for me to be.” Then, step out of that world of time, which is what thought is. Step out of that world of tribulation and into the present moment. Because this Presence Moment is the essence of all that makes a human being whole, healthy, and happy. It is where love exists, and where fear cannot dwell. You have the capacity to stop making yourself powerless by awakening to having put yourself where your powers are stolen from you.