Response-Ability Our Dreams

What and How?

   Chris and I are traveling from Arizona to British Columbia in a few weeks.  We are going by car and taking our time along the western coast.  Chris has created an itinerary that includes daily driving time, overnight stops and special sights.  We have a desire to see all of this country and we have the ability to respond to that desire.

   Many of us have had dreams that we never really reached for because we just couldn’t see how they could come true.  We are such a task oriented society that we want to be able to see the whole road, from the first idea that struck us all the way to its final outcome; manifesting our dream.  We want road maps and time lines and motels along the way.  Launching our dream can be sort of like driving across country without a map or GPS.  If we can’t see the entire path we have a difficult time taking the first step.  Yet we do have the ability to respond to the urge contained in that dream.

   There is a quote from Laurence J Peter, which goes something like this:  “If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll probably end up somewhere else.”  That speaks to the most important part of making dreams come true.  You have to know what it is.  You have to be able to pin down your final destination.  For instance, I want to be interviewed by Oprah Winfrey about one of my books.  Do you suppose I have any idea how to make that happen?  Not so much, but its clear the first step is writing the book and getting it published.  The next step is calling attention to it.  That could be steps three through umpty-hundred.

   The point is, each step you take reveals the next step.  You see, we are not responsible for the “how,” we are only responsible for the “what.”  When you nail down your “what” and begin taking steps in that direction you might get a great surprise.  The “what” just might morph and change into something else; something so great you never would have dared to dream it in the beginning.  As you are guided in the steps to take, you may also be guided to a higher path and that higher path is guaranteed to give you greater joy.  That always happens when you choose your “what” and trust to Spirit to guide your steps.  You’ve got the ability to respond to your dreams.  Let’s get walking!

Paths of the Gods

Mastery through Changing Our Minds

The great teachers of all time say pretty much the same things.  Life is good, relationships are holy, and all we want in an abundant universe is ours for the claiming.  If each of us could fully accept those three ideas, what would our world be like?

I have an idea what our world would be like.  We would live without fear.  We would live without anger, without competition, without war, without hatred and discrimination, without pollution and crime.  The only reason we experience these things, hatred and fear and war and the rest, is because we believe that there is not enough to go around, we believe some people are dangerous and bad, and we believe mistakes are inevitable and deadly.  Are you ready to give up those beliefs?  Let’s see if I can tempt you.

Without fear and anger and competition, we would all be free to live our lives in an ecstasy of creativity.  Remember for a moment how good it feels to do something really creative.  Wouldn’t you like to feel that way all the time?  Creativity and fear cannot live in one mind at the same time.  The only reason for fear is a belief in lack, in not enough for me.  Not enough money, not enough resources, not enough love.  War is simply ongoing scrabbling for the top of the heap which we are compelled to do because of our belief in “not enough”.

Without war and hatred and discrimination, all of our resources could be spent on making this a better world.  For example, an international study was done that concluded every human being on the earth could be provided with adequate housing, food, medical care and education, and it could be done in six years.  The total cost for this huge project is less than the nations of the world spend on armies and defenses in a single year.  What’s it going to take for us to give up our belief that some people are evil and war is necessary? What is it going to take to realize that if enough of us change our beliefs and begin to live fully creatively, experiencing abundance and safety, we will be able to handle the relatively minor problems such as crime and pollution easily?

Stay tuned.  More next week.

Paths of the Gods

Mastery

   Each of us is on a sacred path; a path to freedom, a path to growing, a path to the heart of love that lives at the very center of our beings.  A path to knowing we are an extension of the energy field that created the universe, and as living extensions of Divine life, we are, in the daily lives we share with each other, walking among the gods.

   Our journey is toward mastery, the state of being in which we no longer see events as happening “to me” or even “through me,” but “as me.”  As Nelson Mandela proclaimed, “I am the master of my fate, the captain of my soul.”  We come to realize that the energy field we generate with our thoughts and feelings creates our human experience.  The great gift we must discover and learn to trust is that every experience, joyful or painful, brings us growth.  Our human understanding grows into the mastery that is our souls, stretching and enhancing our souls as we do so.

    Mastery is a state of pure grace and can't be forced.  As spiritual masters, we model a pattern of life fully in harmony with the greatest good possible.  We live at the "As Me" level when we experience no separation from Creator or Creation.  The dreams we build on the earth are temporary, but the transformation in our soul is eternal.  Building our life as a co-creator within the creative force of the universe is the most important thing we will ever do.  As you move through each step of building your dreams, you grow not only closer to achieving a harvest you can smell, taste, and feel, but into the eternal harvest of awakening.

Now you begin to awaken to the truth of you.  So enter freely and safely into the halls of the Gods.  You are one of them, one of us.  You belong here.  Love is your source.  Love is your nature.  It is the ground of your being, and the lens of your life.  Walk, and be welcome, on the paths of the Gods.

Prayer

What is prayer to me; my personal experience of prayer?  In childhood I thought my family was the universe and I was the center, literally with “Now I lay me down to sleep.  I loved praying as a child, especially the rosary.  Then in my late teens, it seemed to me that all that praying didn’t do much, and that was the beginning of resistance.  Life became busy, and there were more important and effective things than prayer that I could do.  It was the stage of believing the illusion that I could consciously master my fate, and that no one out there was listening anyway.  My universe had gotten much larger than my family, but I still had the unconscious perspective of being the center of that universe.

Robert and Janet Ellsworth defined three major types of prayer.  The first is results oriented prayer, in which you pray for specific requests for yourself or someone else.  The next is defined as consciousness expanding prayer, or affirmative prayer and prayers of praise and thanksgiving.  The third is defined as non-directed prayer, or meditation and the experience of the silence. 

All three of these types of prayer have a place in my life.  When I am troubled, or when another is in need, results oriented prayer brings me great comfort.  God is within me, but God is also much more.  I turn within to find Divine contact and surrender my concerns and the needs of others to that one Presence and Power which sustains all of us in love.

Consciousness expanding, or affirmative prayer, is a tool to break down the barriers in my own mind to the good of God’s will.  It is my path to discovering and activating the power of creation in and through me.  It is a method to transform my own negative thoughts, my fears, my false beliefs, into realization of the love and power active in my life, often in spite of me.

Non-directed prayer, or meditation and the experience of silence, is the source of my joy.  This is where the thoughts of my mind, the feelings of my heart, and the knowing of my spirit come together and meet a “something” that is so great and so beautiful that touching it, even for just a few moments, sustains me and give me a serenity which lasts for days, sometimes weeks.

I invite you to examine your own prayer history, and your prayer life now.  Which forms of prayer seem to work best for you?  What brings you the most joy, the most comfort, the most growth?  Is it different kinds of prayer at different times, or is there one way that always suits you best?  Become familiar with what stimulates you to pray, which forms of prayer you use, and which kinds of events lead you to the various forms of prayer that are a part of your prayer life.  This is where the conscious mind and will can make a positive contribution to mastery of your fate.  Know yourself, become consciously aware of the truth of who you are, and use your will to make the choice for comfort, for growth, and for joy.

Occupy Your Heart

Love’s Energy

Do you know that people can feel you?  It may not be conscious but they will respond to the feeling.  The energy we send out will repel or attract and those around us will behave accordingly.  Our job is to offer the energy of love.  That’s it.  That’s how we each transform our own little corner of the world and co-create a world that works for all.  Where do we start?  With our relationships

Dr Michael Beckwith once said,  “All the love your heart can hold, all the success you are meant to experience is already within you, begging to be released through your love energy. Today, open the floodgates of your heart and pour out a blessing of Love into your own life. Then see how outrageously rich you are in the gifts of the Spirit.”  There are a couple of things worth noting here.  First, you already are all that you need; love, success, joy.  All of it.  Second, open your heart and pour out all that energy and you are outrageously blessed.

The first relationship we have is the eternal one between our Spirit and our Creator.  That is why we already are all that we need.  Our next relationship is between our Spirit and our human self.  Our human self must come to realize the truth of our nature and once it does, the pouring out of love can begin.  This comes gradually, over time and with practice, but it is there for every one of us.  The more in touch we are with our own love nature, the better all our relationships will be. 

I heard this story of a man overcome with joy during a great Sunday service and he began dancing up and down the aisles shouting, “Lord, fill me.  Fill me Lord, fill me now.  And he hears a voice say, “I am filling you, but you keep leaking.”  That’s exactly what happens, it’s an energy leak in us.  When we have a relationship rift with someone, the energy of love is leaking out of us.  There’s a place in us where darkness is, where love cannot live and we bring light into that darkness by healing the relationships within ourselves then with others.

I think that’s the kind of thing Jesus was saying.  Our whole life is on the line.  “I came that you might have life and have it abundantly,” and when the energy of separation begins to build in me, he’s saying, “make this primary.”  Make it primary in your life that you don’t allow this stuff in you.  Reschedule your day if you have to.  If you recognize a breach in love, climb all over it right now.  It’s primary to heal that because if you don’t, it leaves another measure of darkness in both of you.  “Oh there’s a relationship hurt, I feel something, I feel separation, what am I going to do?”  Allow your Spirit to shine through your humanity and radiate the love that you are.