As I went about my business over the next few days, I practiced observing my life as if it were a movie. From that detached perspective, I was better able to see how much drama I, and the people around me, created every day. I was amazed at the stories I made up without realizing I did so. I guess I did pretty well with the awareness lesson, because when Portal 2 appeared before me, I passed right through it.

It took me a while to figure out where I was, which was in a huge tent. There were loud noises outside and people moving quickly inside. When I heard the unforgettable blast of a nearby bomb, I knew there was a war going on. There was a nurse in front of me, holding out a pair of combat boots.

“Come on! Put these on. People are dying. Let's move!” she yelled.

When she handed me the boots, I looked in her eyes and saw the beggar. He was now a nurse with braided brown hair tied up in a bun. She wore light blue scrubs that were spotted with blood. There were many beds within the tent and several nurses and doctors, also in blood-splattered scrubs. As I put the boots on, my entire outfit was transformed and I, too, was in similar apparel.

“Grab that tray,” she ordered.

“What are we doing here?” I asked.

“The tray, and follow me.”

The nurse moved from one side of the tent to the other, passing many soldiers writhing in pain, as well as a few still ones with sheets over their heads. We stopped at a bed that held a soldier with one leg bloodied and shredded below the knee. He screamed out in agony. Another medic ran over to help, hooking the soldier up to an IV. Within a few moments, he was still visibly in pain, but much calmer.

“Hand me that bandage. The big one.”

I looked on the tray and grabbed what I thought she wanted. She used it like a tourniquet and wrapped it around what remained of his bloodied leg. She then asked me to help her hold the man down while someone else took a saw and raised it above the soldier's kneecap. I realized he was about to begin cutting and I felt my own knees weakening.

The next thing I remember was sitting outside the tent on a blanket, watching many planes flying in random patterns across the distant sky. I imagined all the people who were injured or killed in the war, and I began to feel a deep sense of grief.

The nurse came out of the tent, removed her plastic gloves, walked toward me, and sat down. She looked at the sky, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath.

“What do you make of all this?”

“Tragic. Just hard to believe what we do to each other,” I said.

“Do you believe it is bad?”

“Well of course I do. Who wouldn't?”

“Maybe the question should be what wouldn't? Take my hand, please.”

We disappeared and instantly reappeared on the boardwalk at the beach where I had my first lucid dream.

Right in front of me, a seagull dropped a large crab on one of the boardwalk's slats. They faced each other in what appeared to be an impending battle. Then they froze like the raindrops in the first portal. Everything other than the nurse and me was frozen in time. Even other birds were suspended in midair. My thoughts at this point had changed from wondering if I was creating all of my dream content to wondering whether I created any of it.

“What are they thinking?”

“I have no idea,” I said.

“Everyone and everything is connected. What if you thought with their minds instead of with yours?”

I began imagining that I was the bird. I remembered the lesson about seeing and didn't want to create a story. “What do I see?” I asked myself.

I closed my eyes and took a breath. I felt a connection and then just blurted out a hunch. “The bird is deciding where to strike. It wants to make sure it doesn't get within the range of the claws.” I stopped to try to feel more deeply. “Nothing else.” I opened my eyes and turned to the nurse “I have no other thoughts.”

“Now experience the crab. Go even deeper this time.”

I closed my eyes again. It took a few moments to tune myself in to what felt like the crab's experience.

“The crab, it's … I'm … I'm not thinking, exactly … I'm feeling … stimulation … excitement. But not in a good or bad way. I'm just ready for battle.” I opened my eyes again. “The crab is operating on instinct.”

Just then, everything became reanimated. The battle was over very quickly. The gull was way too powerful for the crab. It wasn't even a fight.

“So, what is the difference between that battle and the one from our last stop?”

“Well, I think the gull and crab were just doing what they do, living, eating, dying. Surviving or not. Nothing more. But people feel fear, anger, worry, hatred, and a lot of other things.”

“So you are saying that the animals did not display judgment?” she asked.

“Yes, I guess that's what I'm saying. Only humans do. It was a natural event for the animals.” I paused before continuing. “Maybe it's not correct to say that it's unnatural for humans, but it feels that way.”

“Nature is natural, and we are all nature. We all do what we are instinctually programmed to do. Everyone fights—animals to nourish or protect themselves, and humans for the same purpose. There is no difference except your viewpoint of the two experiences.”

“But humans have a choice. They don't have to kill, which they often do out of anger, stemming from judgment,” I said.

“We all want pleasure and we all seek to remove pain, and we will kill for either. Until we raise our level of consciousness by understanding the idea that we are all One, we will continue to perpetuate our ancestor's conditioning, which tells us to kill or be killed. You are correct that most people judge and so live from old ideas instead of new ones. In that sense, most people are just sleepwalking in a nightmare from which they are not yet ready to awaken.

“Keep something in mind, though; all beings are on a journey. All journeys are part of a normal, natural process. They all lead to Consciousness. We are all the same, just at different stages of awakening.”

“But I would never kill anyone,” I said

“How sure are you of that? Think about what you would do if a loved one was being threatened. We all have our justifications. We all do whatever we can to protect ourselves and our beliefs and what we hold dear to us. If you cannot yet remember that we are all One, remember at least that we are all similar.”

I thought about Damon and how I judged him and how hard it would be not to. I wondered how I could ever just accept him for who he was. The nurse must have read my mind.

“First, know that conflict is derived from fear and that all people are afraid. How can we not be if we do not remember our True Essence?”

She held out her hand, and I was soon in a room full of babies. They all looked pretty much the same.

“Where is the conflict?”

“I see none,” I replied.

With a snap of her fingers, I was then with a group of toddlers.

“Tell me about the conflict within these children.”

“I still don't see any.”

“And you cannot, as they are still relatively pure within their Essence. However, notice that some act differently than others. They are beginning to learn to have their own separate identities: their own way of interacting. They learn that from everyone they encounter as well as from their senses. From there they will develop what comes next, which is an ego.”

“Yes, I can understand that,” I said.

“The ego creates a sense of self, which continues to separate them even more. Separation causes fear. These toddlers are all learning to be afraid, because they are starting to forget the truth and so, beginning to feel isolated, alone, and vulnerable. They will soon learn to fight to protect themselves. I am not sure if you can understand this yet, but this is a purposeful process. Everything is purposeful, or it would not exist. The children are supposed to forget. Their current experience of isolation and vulnerability will help them awaken to their True Essence as One and invulnerable. We all fall asleep and forget, and we all awaken and remember. That, too, is part of nature, a natural process.”

Her fingers snapped again and we found ourselves in a group of slightly older children, perhaps six or seven years old.

“Look at them. Each looks very different now, yet they are all still trying to find their way back to their true nature again. They have forgotten, and so they are lost. Confused. Their world tells them that they are separate and isolated, which is something that they inherently know is untrue. They are caught in the illusion of self, and they are learning to be afraid accordingly. That fear is born along with their feeling of separation.”

“I can certainly relate to that.” I said.

“Everyone can probably relate to that to some degree. From now on, no matter who a person might be, no matter what they might do, know that they are just like all of us, all just young children trying to feel acceptance, peace, and love—all trying to feel safe. Regardless of how it appears, we all want the exact same things, and we are all on the same path. See this, and you will no longer judge others, and no longer judge yourself. See this, and your level of consciousness will move closer to its natural state.”

I paused for a moment to consider what she'd said and the idea that we live in a world of our mind's creation. “If it causes us so much trouble, why do we create judgment in our lives?” I then asked.

“The judgments we make are natural consequences from our experiences in a world based on duality and opposites. A world filled with either/or thinking. In fact, think about the babies we saw. They did not yet make any distinctions between themselves and the world around them. Based on their perceptions, their minds inevitably learned to separate themselves from others and judge everything and everyone in comparison to themselves. We are not born into duality; our minds create it.”

“So nonjudgment should be my quest?”

“This is the Portal of Acceptance. Unconditional Acceptance. Nonjudgment is required to move toward that, but I would not think of it or anything as a quest or goal. You cannot consider something that is inevitable to be a goal. Awakening to reality is a natural process. It will happen. We all eventually remember. Our only choice is when. For many, it will become more prominent later in their lives. When that occurs, their inner truth will pull them toward wholeness until they awaken to feel it.”

“So we all awaken in our lifetimes?”

“That depends on how you define life. I said our choice is about when we awaken. Those who do not make that choice in this ‘lifetime’ do not awaken within it. Another portal will help you understand your belief about the concept of life.”

“Is it even possible to truly experience nonjudgment?”

“When you no longer ask that question, it will be.”

“Are you saying that because my mind is limited and I'm asking from within its constraints, I can't understand the concept?”

“You talk about your mind as if it is a possession and describe it as if it is not one with you. The mind only seems to be separate, but it is not. It is one with nature at all times. There is no way that it cannot be, as nothing is truly separate. However, as you have learned before, the mind is the part of you that does not remember the truth, so yes, it will try to stop you because it believes that if you find your True Self, it will lose itself, its identity as Scott.”

“So to experience nonjudgment, I must let go of my mind's hold on what it believes is reality.”

“Yes, and that may not be easy, but you can take steps toward it by becoming more accepting, one experience at a time.”

“Please tell me more about acceptance,” I requested.

“If you accept the world fully, there will be no judgment, so there will be no disgust, nor will there be any good or bad outcomes. Think of it this way: When you say accept, you use it in a way that depicts resignation. True Acceptance does not render you a victim. The opposite occurs. Unconditional Acceptance empowers you to see the God in all others. It removes your suffering and brings peace your way.”

“And how does acceptance differ from what I learned in the awareness portal?”

“To satisfy your mind, I will tell you that Portal 1 was about seeing without interpretation, meaning seeing without the filters that cloud your sight. This portal is about experiencing what you see without judgment.”

“You said before that I can take steps toward becoming more accepting. It would help my mind again if you distinguished between accepting and acceptance.”

“As with all states of experience, there is a difference between being accepting of things, which is the mind wanting to do something, and being Unconditional Acceptance, which is not about doing; it is a quality of Being, and as you said before, unlike anything you can conceive of with your mind. Like Awareness, true Acceptance is a permanent state. I will help you experience Acceptance when you are better prepared, and for now, remember that being more accepting is a step toward Acceptance.”

“I think it would be difficult for me to be even just more accepting. Is it really worth the effort?”

“I will let you answer that question yourself. Consider this: How well do you accept your life, including all that you are, based on all you have experienced, including your upbringing?”

A chill came over me. I'd learned to distinguish between the good chill, the tingling one that begins to warm my body, and the other chill, the one that cools it. This time, I was freezing.

“Imagine what it would be like to relieve yourself of pain that no longer serves you. That would be one benefit, and there are many more. Understand that most of your emotional suffering comes from nonacceptance. Once you unconditionally accept the people, places, and things in your life, you will release yourself from the confinement created from deep within your mind that keeps you stuck in the illusion of a painful, unjust, and disappointing world.

“Surrender, Scott. First see and then surrender to what is. Let go. Let it be.”

I thought about my job, the relationship issues, my fears and self-doubts, and again I couldn't help thinking about how badly I had messed up my life. “I'm honestly not sure if I can ever unconditionally accept myself and my life,” I said. That admission made me wonder if my portal journeys would end before I even made it through this one.

“There's someone you want to talk to. It's time to reach out. You will help each other.”

6:59.