AAM’s Distinction Between Being Right and Doing Right

2012 September 17

Posted by Steve Beckow

A friend of mine, who wishes to remain anonymous, has just had a personal reading with Archangel Michael through Linda Dillon and AAM made a wonderful distinction, which sends me running for my pen, it’s so fertile. He said:

“There is no one in the human realm that does not desire to be right. And part of the measure of the evolution of the soul is the difference between being right and shifting to doing right and aligning with right action, right will — what we call truth. And that is part of the journey.” (1)

My heavens, why didn’t I think of that! It’s so obvious after the fact but I never saw it. Perhaps you’ll allow me to develop that thought a bit, as much for myself as for anyone else.

“Being right” is, as far as I’m aware, the ego’s constant preoccupation. Psychologist John Enright once said that being wrong is like death to the ego. (2)  Some of us, myself included, will go to great lengths to manage our impression so that we appear right.

We may excuse ourselves, justify ourselves, or deny allegations which by rights we shouldn’t, in order to appear right. We work on our renditions of events, or “stories,” until we have them just right. And “just right” means that they portray us as right and often others as wrong.

That’s called the self-serving bias. We posture, preen, strut, and dramatize in order to remain looking good or being right. And we withhold acknowledgement from others, minimize their contributions or assign them fault and blame to work the same effect.

What I notice here is that this is the focus of a person serving him or herself. It’s a “service to self” preoccupation. And that in itself is associated with the old paradigm of separation, competition, win/lose and judgmentalness.
People who’ve evolved to a “service to others” preoccupation have more of an intention to “do right.” Doing right may mean observing the universal laws, or living up to the divine qualities, following the counsel of the masters, or whatever yardstick a person uses to guide them in matters of spiritual conduct. That’s a new-paradigm way of being and is associated with unity, cooperation, win/win, and non-judgmentalness.

“Being right” is paying superficial attention to our image in others’ eyes. “Doing right” is paying attention to the way the universe was designed to work and what the final goal of life is (which is realization of our true nature as divine beings, which doing right serves).

The purpose for which life was designed, from God’s perspective, is, as far as I know, that God should meet God in a moment of enlightenment. From our perspective, it’s that we should realize our true nature in a moment of enlightenment. “Doing right” aligns us with God’s own ways, as far as I can discern. “Being right” or “looking right” often takes us farther away from that goal.

AAM’s distinction really struck a chord with me and clarified some things that remained somewhat unclear to me. I’ll be posting some of the other things he said in this reading later because they too assisted me to clarify some matters of spirituality.

Footnotes

(1) Personal Reading with Archangel Michael through Linda Dillon with M, Sept. 12, 2012.
(2) His actual words were: “Being wrong is to the ego what death is to the body: it is ego-death to be wrong.” (Awareness, Responsibility and Communication Workshop, Cold Mountain Institute, April 10, 1976.)