Last thoughts of William Arkle

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According to Michael Perry, William ('Bill') Arkle experienced an 'intensely creative period' in the months leading up to his death in October of 2000.

http://www.billarkle.co.uk/billintro.html

The writings from this period include the Foreword to Michael Perry's web archive, and also four short prose pieces named Floundering, Enjoy the Process, Apology from God and Cup of Day

http://www.billarkle.co.uk/prose/index.html

These late pieces apparently contain the fruits of a lifetime of deep reflection; but are (in my estimation) written from the perspective of someone who seems to be in the sanctified state of having his head in Heaven even while his feet are yet on the ground. Perhaps consequently, the style strikes me a peculiarly naive, and likely to be misleading or off-putting to those unfamiliar with Arkle's earlier and more systematic works.

At any rate, that is my excuse for editing these last four essays into a single, more aphoristic, piece; which is intended to capture what I understand to be the essence of the articles, in a more accessible and (I hope) acceptable form.

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God is speaking throughout the following:


I smile like I do, because I know that everything that is happening is in place of nothing happening.

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Experience and waste go together and lead to discovery, so don't be anxious about results. Do not fear to waste your time and energy - you will never run out of them!

We think we can lose, but we can't: there are safety nets around everything.

All that is really valuable will come back to you when it is needed.

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What you see as misery in the world is often what you see in your child as he lives from crisis to crisis each hour of the day - it is the way young things grow.

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Angels live and work for me in the highest realms; and as teachers they will give you the powerful and highly-organized feeling of the structures required to build and maintain the 'playground and play-ers' for the great game of mortal life.

But the point is for you all to be quite free of the initiating organization and its necessarily awesome power and energy; so we, both of us, can arrive at a mutually-friendly relationship.

But if you get too involved with the activities of the Organizing Angels, you will probably not be able to do this.

Because, unlike me, Angels are self-conscious perfectionists.

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Trying to understand what is just beyond us is what I call floundering.

For instance, if 'God is everything' then 'Why does he bother with creation?' Well, why?

The answer is that God is a living God, and not a 'Done it all, that's it!' kind of God.

The unknown and unknowable is with us now - in the beauty of flowers. It feels so strange that we can grasp 'flowers' with our awareness, and yet find no answer.

There seems to be a package that includes enjoyment of the light and colour and shape of flowers now; and understanding the originating motivation of God in creation.

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I detect a big amused smile being directed at me; a loving smile.

Life is meant to be an opportunity for you to live out your best joys - I want you to smile on me as I smile on you.


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A letter from Bill Arkle (culled from the internet) probably from the 1990s

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As a detached bystander, it was so good to get the 'AllWrite' from M100!. M100 being M to the power of 100 - wow! I love all the things you are doing with M100 and love to read about the camp and the letters from those who join in. What a revelation it is to read all those comments! A real education for me. I would love to have been involved with what you are doing but I have been dragged off, often by the scruff, to do other things. Who is dragging whom? There are so many pearls of such deep wisdom among the afterwords of your camp's participants. I am amazed.

But what you say is right: others are trying to influence the noosphere but in more simplistic atmospheric way rather than your correct amplification way. What is felt by them (the Fountain Groups for instance) is that, as with Creation, Mind overcomes Matter by its higher position in the scheme of things.

But there is much paradox in these matters. Higher Beings, Angels and, perhaps, the Nine are trying to improve us and tidy us up - rather like socialists do, by putting us into a manageable form. Angels naturally abhor the mess that the world has got itself into, and harmony is to be sought at any price. But might it not also be true that God needs the mess?

I'm interested in looking into 'God's hidden agenda'. Books like those of El Daoud (The Gospel of Simplicity, 1959), The Winds of Truth (of the Lord Mikaal, 1950s) and Only Planet of Choice give us a vision of the way God has had to set about preparing the ground for His Dearest Agenda. He has had to use His Children, who work and understand within His Holistic Atmosphere to prepare the ground for His other children from outside that Holistic Atmosphere, whom He hopes will grow too. This is in order to achieve the radical self -programmed Self who is the result of chance and disobedient (unobedient, really) living, in a very complicated and richly-endowed human soup.

This agenda leads to enemies of Creation and of Himself - yet it is the only way to engender real friends of Creation and of Himself. Friends who, unlike devotees, have independence and 'cheeky' self-valuing to live from. By cheeky, I mean that unafraid directness of the child when it is 'in trust' with someone - it asks leading questions and questions the answers. As I see it, devotees and obedient helpers cannot take the extraordinary step of friendship and the strong independence and freely-given affection that makes this work. Only friends can relieve the loneliness (and even incipient boredom) that I feel God suffers from. Praise and devoted affection won't relieve it!

I hope I am not engendering incipient boredom in you by all this! But it comes in the nature of the blessings we want to bless the world with - it may not be quite the same as the blessing we want to bless God with. Can you come and eat cake with me again?

All good things, Bill.