Alex: I want to tell you, and even more, beg you to not give up hopes. Don't
give up hope. But again, if you don't give up hope just because I tell you
then its not so much better because you might have false hope.

BeiYin: So, - what is 'hope'? What is 'false hope'? Isn't any kind of hope false hope? Or better said: Doesn't any hope turns out to be false? Isn't hope always connected and bound to wishes and personal needs? So hope is the expectation that something we desire and imagine will be fulfilled? This might be completed and then we find out that there are many other open desires. And so we never can be really satisfied? Is this a way to survive to go from one hope to the next, clinging to it like onto the straw which keeps us from being drowned into nothingness...
Betsy: It appears that a hope for something better than what is one's current position is a motivation to go forward.  This seems to be an element of growth then which would continue to create painful conditions, which then would not allow one to drown into nothingness. Can one then really give up all hope if one is in this physical world?
BeiYin: From where comes the thought that something is better than your current position?... 
Betsy: I meant 'better' in that it seems an improvement over the current situation. I have hope that humanity can change when I look at the current situation and also on a personal level it is recognizing some of my own habits and wanting to change them, and lastly  there is a feeling of being alone. I see that all of these arise from my own personal structure and the 'better' viewpoint is subjective. Clearly, I make the 'call' and create the thought.
BeiYin: ...Indeed, the hope might give you the motivation to go forward, with the side effect that your view is directed towards your goal, excluding from your awareness what is not within this frame of desire. So probably you will not be able
to accept or being aware of or being able to enjoy what lays beside your intention to reach. ...
Betsy: Yes, I see the problem of tunnel vision due to holding a goal or hope in 'mind'. I am reminded of a phrase that 'acceptance' is the answer to all of my problems.
BeiYin: ...Is it really that 'going forward' means necessarily 'growing'? ...
Betsy: No, it can just be endless substitution or of one goal for another, which keeps one stuck in a circle of not enjoying what is here now. That I can see. But without a goal or motivation to change something, thereby allowing a new decision, is there growth?
BeiYin: ...It is not possible to give up one's hope, because hope is connected with one's personality. But there might come the moment when hope just falls apart, because the individual comes to the total acceptance of one's condition...
Betsy: The total acceptance of one's condition being that of acknowledging one's personal structure or one's working field? Moving on from there, of a position of non-hope to one of making new decisions?
BeiYin: ...Checking my situation, I can say that I have no hope, - no expectation. Being disappointed for that many years...
Disappointment coming out of not fulfilled hope, again and again, that finally reality is unveiling itself. Then hope can't last.
Betsy: Then what are you saying? Is this a new position at least in the last year or so?
BeiYin: This seems not to be clear: Coming to the position of not having any hope left is NOT a negative situation. Being aware of reality is also NOT negative. ...
Betsy: I saw both as positive situations. My question was if this was a new position for you of late, given the long string of disappointments. You do say 'finally'... But if you are responding more to the thread level of my last post, then the 'not clear' part makes sense.
BeiYin: ...A person with hope is not interested to recognize reality because this would undermine the hope, which is the wish that expectations build up by one's wishes will be fulfilled. ...
Betsy: This is so clear. I need only review a specific hope that is repetitive and I can clearly see how 'maintaining' it gives me an alternate view of reality. I wish/ want the hope so bad that I don't see what is really around.  Clearly a state of denial and also a waste of time. I can see where the hope resides (in my personal wishes) and clearly these are due to my structure built from my past experiences. I also see that holding a hope is a means not to take action with what is here now.
So yes, looking at reality would undermine the hopes and wishes and essentially invalidate them. I suspect that to do this, it would require that one can be content with what presents on a moment to moment basis.
I have been contemplating the difference between hope and trust. Hope (as a guiding factor) is something that I conjure or imagine with my thoughts, something that I would prefer than my current situation. Hope is "a personally constructed reaction", and thus unlikely to meet the condition of reality that I'm confronted with on a daily basis. This clinging to the hope obviously causes suffering because it is not manifest. I can see that Trust is a different type of guidance that can come when one lets go of all hopes. Coming to this point, then can allow me to relate to what is here now - the presenting reality. This relating can guide one in a growing fashion similar to walking into another dimension. 
BeiYin: ...I can give an example: Why people feel that when they come to the place FalconBlanco, that the description on our Web site doesn't correspond with reality? The description is pretty complete and shows not just the beautiful idea but also the difficulties. Probably people read in a way that they pick up just that what they like to sort into their wishful images, which confirms their picture of themselves. Then when they arrive at FalconBlanco, things seem to be different. Then people are reacting out of frustration and looking for outside reasons, although having gotten the information in advance that this is part of the process. ...
Betsy: This seems to be the normal way of all people, that we filter all information that comes to us with our personal values having to do with our 'best way' that we see or imagine ourselves to be. 
BeiYin: ...On the other hand: Why is the information people give about themselves so different from what shows up when they are here at FalconBlanco? A very simple example: In our 'info-form' we ask the question what people would like to work when they come. When they wrote: 'Anything what is necessary', then this turns out quite often not to correspond with their reality, which is in extreme cases that they don't like to work at all. ...
Betsy: This brings up the question of why people lie about things? I remember from job interviews, lying and telling the interviewers 'what I thought they wanted to hear'.  I knew this was lying and I was doing it to 'land the job.' Eventually I came to the point of refusing to interview because if I didn't lie I wouldn't get the job.  So I suspect, it is the same with people coming to FalconBlanco.
BeiYin: So why are people lying and pretending? Obviously to get what they want...
Betsy: I agree, and in terms of living in community it appears that there are  quite a lot of different wants perhaps as varied as the number of individuals.
BeiYin: ...It is a question of survival for them. But why they are lying to themselves? Or is it not a lie to recognize only what they want to see and then when the reality turns out to make others responsible? Is this all part of the survival game?
Betsy: I am getting more leery of the people who appear so worldly. In that some of these seem to have found community hopping as a way in and of itself to survive. So this appears to be a game for them. It appears there are two types of liars, the first is consciously lying and the second is not aware that they are lying. The majority of people fit in the second category, what I don't understand is the first type. But I can see that it is what they have adopted as a survival means to avoid looking at themselves, it is their main-line of defense. 
BeiYin: ...We are trying to protect ourselves from such people, but this seems to be very difficult. Can anybody give an advice how we can protect our project and prevent that people show up who are just looking for their own advantage. Is there any way to avoid that people show up with whatever expectation and then leave after a few days? This all brings a lot of disturbance into the process of building up a creative group energy. Indeed it sucks and it turns out that often being with people needs more energy than doing all the outside work alone. What of course makes no sense if one wants to be with people, wanting to form an 'intentional community'.
It is pretty clear that forming part of FalconBlanco needs motivation, dedication and commitment. But how can a person have this coming with one's own expectation and not even being able to understand what goes on here?
There is a lot of information offered...
I was interrupted in my writing by a girl who wanted to say good bey because she was leaving after about a week. She wanted to stay for a couple of months, but decided differently because I turned out not to be that friendly as she had imagined from our email correspondence...
What can I say to this? There are about a dozen people around who are asking for attention. There was a forest fire a few weeks ago and we are not yet finish with cleaning. It is still pretty chaotic. There is pressure from the authorities. The work is tough and sometimes there is tension. I expressed very clear, that somebody who wants something from me must ask for it. This person wanted to be initiated into meditation, but never ask me to do it. I never say no if somebody wants to talk with me, but I'm not running after people who are in need.
It is also a question of survival for the project 'FalconBlanco'. It might not be enough to be motivated to work because of some convincing reasons presented by some charming people or a charismatic leader, the motivation must come out of the individual because it is there anyway and doesn't depend on certain circumstances and the behavior of people. 
Betsy: This makes me sad. Is this the only way to let go of all hope?
Is the end of all hope a good thing, is it a condition of reality?
BeiYin: It seems that suffering on the way to freedom is part of the process. As we know that suffering happens because our conditioned system reacts to reality, so knowing this we are capable to quest our reaction and look behind, discovering that we are causing our own suffering... 
Betsy: If the suffering is due to a conditioned response to that of reality, then how is it that we cause our own suffering? By not taking the step to quest our reaction and look behind it?
BeiYin: ...Becoming aware of the causing condition, we might be able to leave this behind. We don't need any effort, it is not an act of dropping something, it drops by itself, like an empty shell.
Betsy: The 'causing condition' then is our personal conditioned response, which is one of defense or survival? our capability is that of being able to quest the conditioned response and then make an active decision to respond differently given our review of our reaction. This new response allowing change of the personal conditioned structure over time, affecting future responses. 
BeiYin: ...There is another way to survive: Finding 'trust' within oneself. A new kind of security which doesn't depend on one's personal images. Having the trust that whatever happens is part of a growing process, which most of the time goes beyond one's understanding. Only sometimes we might get a flash of a limited part, which then makes sense to us. But obviously there is another 'sense' which can't be classified and placed into the proper order of our personal box system. We will not be able to come to this deeper understanding as long as we cling on hopes and personal desires. We can't just give up this. We can't give up ourselves. We ARE these hopes and images. The only way might be, to accept this fact and deal with it.
Betsy: Accepting that we are these hopes and images then is acknowledging the personal structure from whence these images arise. Okay, so then seeing that we have these, but not clinging on them, looking for when they occur and responding beyond those desires or with another viewpoint.
BeiYin: We do cling on them, that's why we are reacting. We can't respond beyond our desires, because that's what we are and we can't have another viewpoint. We are only able to accept our limitation and the fact that we are trapped. That will give thepossibility in its moment, to be aware of our own reaction.
Betsy: Clinging to the personalities structure is the same as reacting, or acting in a defensive way to protect those properties. We can't respond beyond our structure, or 'who we are right now'? Our viewpoint is our structure as of now. We are limited by the physical form and structure and this is what traps us. Seeing this is freedom?
BeiYin: ...The first step will be to understand the nature of what we think and feel we are. Not the usual way to get confirmation but to quest whatever shows up. 
Betsy: What is the nature of what we think and feel we are? Just a collection of past images grown over time? ... 
BeiYin: They nature of our feelings and thoughts is that we are reacting and these are the visible signs of this, responding to impulses without being aware of this. Indeed on the background of our past, which has structured the reflector of our personality. 
Betsy: In meditation I look for the root of the reacting thoughts and feelings to certain sensed data, and I can't see where it starts.
Betsy: ...Knowing what the main images are then allows us to not respond in a way that confirms and/or strengthens those images, in this way allowing a questing of that which came before and a subsequent new response.
BeiYin: Knowing one's structure might allow that we don't react in the same spontaneously way as before. But we will still react and so the questing might need to continue, but not of that what came before but of what is there.
Betsy: I don't see that there is a possibility of not reacting or an end of the questing. Always to me it seems to be review of the past, but what you seem to imply is a nowness that is not like a review allowing a different way to respond.
BeiYin: ...That includes the next step: Being more and more aware... 
Betsy: It is simply a growing process due to our relating to what presents to us?
BeiYin: The growing process includes the whole and this is much more than we can be aware of. 
Betsy: Okay, but what does this have to do with the individual's next step?
BeiYin: There is not much to do about it, - It happens. We relate to the many puzzles which appear in daily life. We don't need to understand the sense of each puzzle, we only need to respond to it in the best way we can, going on and on. Then it will happen that we suddenly see how it connects and that there is sense... beyond our limited personal view. 
Betsy: I'm still waiting.  I still don't feel I see *mostly* beyond my personal viewpoint, or that I have felt anything sudden happen. 
BeiYin: 'Waiting' means that you are hoping that something you expect will happen... You can't see beyond your personal viewpoint because you are a person.
Betsy: Seems to be a difference between we and I here. I can see the problem with my expectation, yet I find it hard to give it up.