Late Night Chat with Jeff Wolverton: E&G: ”Our Real Work” June 1, 2026, live Baba Zoom

Late Night Chat with Jeff Wolverton: E&G: ”Our Real Work” June 1, 2026, live Baba Zoom

The Topic: Our Real Work Dear folks of Baba, In this chapter on Our Real Work, Darwin talks about finding what type of service we feel suited to do for Baba. A large percentage of the Baba people are in the healing and service professions, but the majority have positions in a wide range of vocations. Whatever the field, it is possible to serve Baba and participate in His work in the world. I came from a politically active family, and so when I began working at the Center, primarily on the cabin crew, I initially wondered what cleaning cabins has to do with serving the world and contributing to its spiritual upliftment. Reading the following passage from Baba’s discourses helped me understand that it doesn’t really matter what we do externally. That we dedicate our work wholeheartedly to Baba is enough. He wrote: "The unity and solidarity of the inner plane makes it possible for the Master to use his disciple as a medium for his work even when the disciple is unconscious of serving this larger purpose of the Master. This is possible because the disciple, through his love and understanding of the Master as well as his obedience and surrender, establishes a rapport with the Master and comes into tune with him. Those who come into direct contact with the Master receive his direct help, and those who are closely connected with his disciple receive the Master's indirect help. Sharing of spiritual work is by no means one-sided; even the disciples who merely think of the Master or meditate upon him have the privilege of sharing the spiritual and universal work in which the Master might be engaged at that moment. As he is one with eternity, the Master is beyond time and all limitations of time; as he is also interested in the spiritual upliftment of humanity, he assumes many of the limitations of time and his work can be helped by the voluntary co-operation of his disciples. The Master feeds upon the love of his disciples and utilizes the spiritual forces released by them for his universal work. In this way the Master is like the relaying station which receives a song only in order to broadcast it to the world at large. To love the Master is to love all, not merely symbolically but actually; for what the Master receives on the subtle planes he spiritualizes and distributes. Thus he not only strengthens the personal links which the disciples may have with him but also gives them the privilege of sharing his divine work." Whether we are taking Baba’s name with each stride in our morning jog, or designing our flower garden as a loving gift for Him, offering our morning and evening prayers to Him, composing a song to share with His lovers, stirring His name into the batter of the cake we're baking for someone’s birthday, bringing our kids to the Center in Myrtle Beach so they can be in His loving atmosphere, attending wholeheartedly to all the small details involved in our office job—in countless ways we can bring our day in tune with Baba’s loving presence, knowing that He is always pleased with anything we do for Him. In fact, He has said, “Whatever you do for Me is done by Me." Even when circumstances don’t allow for the outer expression of love, we can always emanate Baba’s love from within. In all that we do, as He says, we can allow Him to work through us for the "spiritual upliftment of the world," even if we are not aware of it. Is it really necessary to be aware of this higher purpose? Whatever our outer work, our inner effort is best focused on and occupied with expressing in the world the divine qualities of “truth, love, purity and beauty.” As Darwin says, “We open up to the Master within and invite His divine impressions to filter in through our heart center.” They are “there already, resident in the heart” and only need to be awakened. In our efforts with Baba, our personality, rather than being a base of operations, is gradually transmuted into being a vehicle for His love. Darwin says, “We are heading for a life of service, and on the spiritual path, each of us has a duty to perform. Everyone who comes to Baba is put to work.” How will we serve Baba? “Golden opportunities for service to Meher Baba will come up,” Darwin assured us. “Even just loving Baba is a great service, because that love is going out, affecting the environment and counteracting at least some of the negative forces that are out there…Baba would often have people as useful tools—avenues or channels—for His work. They did not necessarily know what was happening; they were just being themselves. “ “Serving the Master is a joy for the disciple, even when it means an ordeal that tries his body or mind.” Meher Baba In His love, Jeff We are continuing on page 100. A link to the PDF of Effort and Grace: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xrR75eksY-tErdKZm9aOBs3omuhioasb/view?usp=sharing [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xrR75eksY-tErdKZm9aOBs3omuhioasb/view?usp=sharing]

Sahavas for Everyone: guest Alex Bober, May 28, 2026 live on Baba Zoom

Alex Bober Sahavas for Everyone, third Thursday of the month. Avatar Meher Baba is in each one of us. And His Love is the focus of this gathering. Open discussion with each session having a topic or theme. Hosted by Laurent Weichberger in SC. Jai Baba! This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

Late Night Chat with Jeff Wolverton: E&G: ”Our Personality Self,” May 25, 2026, live Baba Zoom

Dear folks of Baba, Back in 1970, I was a young adult living in Schenectady, N.Y. near Darwin and Jeanne Shaw, two of Baba’s early Western followers who had met Him in the 1930s. The meetings held at their home were magical and brimming over with love. Darwin would read one of Baba’s discourses and share invaluable insights with us, and we always felt free to ask questions about what we could do to cultivate the inner life with Baba. It was after one of these meetings, as we were standing around in their living room enjoying apple juice and oatmeal cookies provided by Jeanne, that Darwin looked over very casually at me and said, “Jeff, you are not the personality self.” This Jeff is not me, I thought? I had no place to put that. I don’t think it had ever occurred to me that I wasn’t Jeff! Up until then I had thought that the whole purpose of this life was to get to know myself, to delve deeper and go on improving myself and improving myself until I reached the goal. And here, in his low-key, unassuming way, Darwin was basically telling me I’m barking up the wrong tree! I felt the truth of his words at a deep level within, and I thought, I’ll just file that away for now and see if I evolve into the truth of his words. Over the following decades, I worked on developing some inner space between my awareness (what Baba calls our “witness-consciousness”) and the personality self. In Darwin’s words, “The personality self is just a storefront for the soul. We put so much importance on the window displays, dressing them up and changing them with the seasons, when we could go within and enjoy the priceless merchandise.” This movement toward the timeless and spacious realm within is at the core of Darwin’s book, Effort and Grace, illustrated with ways to bring this about pro-actively. How do we create and develop inner space between our consciousness on the one side and our personality self on the other? One of the major ways is to think of our personality self as a vehicle, a conduit as Darwin would say, through which Baba can express the deeper feelings of our heart. This entails gradually giving up our selfish ambitions, desires and compelling emotions that drag us back time after time into identifying as only our personality self. And if we identify ourself as only our personality, we will respond to others as only personalities and fail to connect to their soul, which is behind and deeper than their personality. That is, our attention will be distracted by their window displays, and we will invariably relate to others, storefront to storefront, so to speak, not soul to soul. What experiences in your life have given you the sense that you are not actually the personality self? Do you find that this realization is a shock or a relief? What emotional experiences, cravings and thought patterns cause you to leave your detached awareness (“witness-consciousness”) and jump back into a heavy identification with your personality? How successful have you been in surrendering some of the heavy baggage and burden of the personality self to Baba? “Sooner or later, you discover you are nobody, and that is not an unhappy discovery!” - Darwin Shaw More Briefly in His love, Jeff We are continuing on page 96. This event was recorded live. To be first to be notified of a new video on this channel, please hit the red subscribe button, then the notifications bell. To join future live events, see www.babazoom.net. Please join our Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/meherbabafamily

Late Night Chat with Jeff Wolverton: E&G: ”Loving Baba in Others,” May 18, 2026, live Baba Zoom

Dear folks of Baba, Baba said that for this advent “the path is through people.” Baba once said, “All differences between one another are merely superficial and cannot affect the love we feel for each other deep down.” I take this to mean that the love we have for each other doesn’t grow; it is already complete; the challenge is to remove the impediments, the veils, that prevent us from seeing the truth of Baba’s words. In fact, asserting this loving truth inwardly to others sometimes actually awakens a more favorable attitude toward us from those who otherwise might be inclined to dislike us and withhold their love. Why? Because in some small measure, we are reflecting their own loving soul back to them, a truth that we all have been unconsciously longing to experience. Ideally, it is best for us to allow the love in our soul to flow continuously toward everyone and everything, and it is the heart that is our primary vehicle in relating personally to others. Baba once said to the mandali, “Not too near, not too far.” I take this to mean that we have a responsibility to know where to position our heart with its love in relation to others. If, for example, we know a person is prickly or abrasive, we may have to position our heart at some distance so as that it is not unnecessarilyhurt and shut down. In this way, we can continue to send them love safely from our heart. In another example, if we let our heart flow out too intimately to someone, we might inadvertently signal to them that we have a romantic interest and they may feel hurt when we don’t reciprocate. Or, sometimes our own heart is hurt because we have misjudged someone by getting too close, and we may react by withdrawing our heart too far and put up a wall. There are other times when we might be too warm to someone and they feel that we are extending a lifelong friendship to them, something that due to circumstances we may not be able to follow through with. Sometimes it is even wise to keep a polite distance with our heart. In all these examples, it is important that at the level of the spirit our love continues to flow from wherever we position our heart. It is not that the heart is always positioned in relation to others in a fixed place. Even during the course of a conversation, as we are getting to know someone, we may have to adjust our position a number of times depending on the signals we are getting. It is important to be flexible about where we place our heart. Unfortunately, some people, without realizing it, position their heart “too far” from others and miss out on the joy of the give-and-take of love. At times it may be important to position our heart in a very firm yet loving place when we have to be entirely direct with someone who is being inappropriate. Usually over time, our intuition positions our heart spontaneously and fluidly in relation to others without our conscious involvement. Throughout our life, we all have been engaged in this process at one level or another; it is making this more conscious. All this for me has been a work in progress, keeping the heart flowing with love in all circumstances, and through such efforts, a greater sensitivity is developed over time. The main purpose is that we don’t want to let our heart shut down completely toward any circumstance or anyone. This is a tall, tall order. I have come to see it as my responsibility to be aware and sensitive to where I place my heart in relation to others, and if I am deeply hurt by someone, I do not take it as their fault really (even though their behavior may be unacceptable), but as a mistake on my part for having left my heart unnecessarily vulnerable. Over the years, in holding myself accountable rather than in blaming others for hurting me or making me uncomfortable, I have learned from my mistakes. I don’t mean to imply that when someone is very abusive to us that we don’t distance ourselves from such persons, but we hold them accountable when they are truly inappropriate. Many of us have been taught to be “pleasant” with others, even martyrs, and accept and overlook the abusive and cruel behavior of others. We can get ourselves unnecessarily hurt. It’s important that the heart remains inwardly open, but not necessarily open to all others at an external level. That is, we remain radiating love invisibly to others, but we sometimes have to withhold expressing it when faced with an abusive and negative situation. “To love one soul is like adding its life to your own, and your life is, as it were, multiplied and you virtually live in two centers. If you love the whole world, you vicariously live in the whole world.” - Meher Baba In His love, Jeff Login info can be found at babazoom.net

Late Night Chat with Jeff Wolverton: E&G: ”A Glorious Culmination,” May 11, 2026, live Baba Zoom

Dear folks of Baba, There was a woman who came to the Center who had lost the person most dear to her in this life. She was still in grief. In talking with a fellow Baba lover, he felt she was indulging in her feelings and urged her to get over it. She was deeply hurt but didn’t say anything. He had the mental conviction from Baba’s writings that this world is just an illusion, all its happenings a mere dream, but he did not really have this conviction through experience. If he had, he would have had more empathy for this woman. Within a year, someone who was very dear to him passed on and he suffered the loss profoundly. He found out that his idea that it is all an illusion did not protect his heart from great pain. It is through such experiences that Baba in a natural way awakens in us His empathy for others. Knowing with the mind is not the knowing of the heart. Similarly, some Baba lovers claim to have faith that Baba is in charge of this present war, and why are people worrying about it? After all, they assert, everything is in Baba’s hands. But there are people in our community who have family and friends in this war whose lives are being completely disrupted and even some who are being killed. Isn’t it possible to have genuine faith that it is all in Baba’s hands and still “suffer in the sufferings of others?” The mandali, who more than anyone knew the illusion of life, nevertheless showed such deep compassion and care for us through all our troubles and heartache. For myself, this more universal sensitivity has been very slow and painful to awaken in me. Darwin would say that the mind in collusion with the ego is so powerful that it can convince us that we already know the truth about things. The ego has found a way to keep us from dropping down into our heart where true wisdom resides. Those of us around Darwin often pondered what he actually experienced in his inner life with Baba. It was possible to infer from the things he shared with us what his experience was, but that was all. He was not forthcoming on this subject. But then one day, I said to him, “Darwin, you have a lot of rare wine in your cellar [speaking metaphorically] and if you die, it will only go to your relatives! I think we should bring it up and enjoy it now! You have been focusing on Baba for the last seventy years, year after year, day by day, moment to moment. What is your experience now?” He was amused by this lead-in, and so, at the ripe old age of 96, Darwin shared this with us: “Just as when we breathe all day, we don’t have to say, now it’s time to inhale, now it's time to exhale. This all happens automatically. Eventually life just unfolds. We are no longer trying to get things to go this way or that. We’ve let go. Consciousness is then freed at the level of the world. It goes up to the level of the spirit and out to the far corners of the universe, and we live in and through everyone and everything.” That is, when we’re let out of the prison of our finite identity, our life and consciousness expand infinitely in all directions. Looking across the table where he sat relaxed in Baba’s home in the West, who would have thought that this wizened old gentleman contained such a sublime experience! This was the glorious culmination of a lifetime of loving effort in living for Baba. The inner life that Baba spoke of was relatively unknown to us in our youth, but Darwin kept encouraging us to go deeper into Baba, inviting us to move from the monkey mind down to the unspeakable treasures of the heart. Years later, we discovered there was another side of Darwin that he rarely spoke of, and that was his compassion for this world of ours, the many hours he spent alone working inwardly at great depths to send Baba’s love to all those in need who inhabit this fair earth. In this inner work, he would first send love to his family and when he had enveloped them sufficiently with Baba’s love, he would flow out to the city of Schenectady, and then on to New York state and out to the Baba family scattered throughout the country, and then on to the whole world. He would not proceed to the next stage until he had enveloped that stage with Baba’s love. This was a part of the major inner work that Darwin did with Baba. It’s no wonder that such souls seem to us larger than life! I once asked him, “What is the biggest mistake the Baba lovers are making?” Not critically but as an encouragement to us, Darwin replied, “They think of themselves as small and they remain small. Think big! Think outside even the traditional spiritual box. They could open up to a much larger world and would be much happier." One of the lines from Baba's discourses that Darwin would most often quote was: “All finiteness and limitation is subjective and self-created.” The poignant prayer of Mother Teresa expresses all of this so well: “Dear Lord, break my heart so completely that the whole world falls in.” In His love, Jeff