The Center for Common Sense Counseling
Helping
and Healing the Inner You
Helping and Healing the Inner You
Integrative Strategies for Self
Empowerment and Spiritual Growth
Copyright © 2014 by
Mandatory
disclaimer. I am not a doctor. I am a Christian counselor and life coach. The information provided here is for
educational and informational purposes only. In no way should it be considered
as offering medical advice. Doing anything suggested or recommended in this
book must be done at your own risk. Please check with a physician if you suspect you are ill. The information contained
is not intended for medical advice. You should always discuss any medical
treatment with your Health Care Provider.
Finding
and Unblocking Restoration
The Secret to a Stress Free Life
The Role of Hypnosis in our Conflicts,
Tensions, Illnesses, and Misdirected Lifestyles
The Danger of Wanting Something Too Much
Forgiving, Relating, Living, Loving
A Primer on Stress & the Solution
More About How the Soul Gives Power
How to Become Free of Your Hang-ups and
Guilts
How to Become Free of Your Hang-ups and
Guilts, Part Two
Overcoming the Effects of Resentment
Ego Problems and Their Solutions
The Letter Kills, but the Spirit Gives Life
The Secret to Life is in Response
- 1 -
Finding and Unblocking Restoration
All of our symptoms, including death itself,
are caused by a defection from God and His Right Way.
Pain is evidence that something is wrong.
In a sense, physical pain is the body crying out, asking for help or relief.
Something being wrong is a sign that something is out of order. Cancer is the
growth of cells that are under the authority of a head renegade cell. But the
renegade cell would not have gained a foothold if the body’s immune system were
functioning well. It would have been observed, reported, and hunted down.
Secondly, other cells would not have
defected to the authority of the terrorist if the ruling authority of the body
were just and loving.
In the perfect hierarchy, The Creator is the
ultimate authority, then
With the soul, humble and obedient, as the
good king of the body--the mind and all the body’s systems, all the way down to
the individual cells, live in a perfect system of justice.
In such a system, the ego wants to do God’s
will. Through the respectful aware soul, truth and love are expressed; and the
mind and body carry out the descending orders.
In such a system ruled by proper authority,
there is no need or desire to rebel, since all is justice. An atmosphere of
Truth surrounds the truth-loving soul, and the Light of Truth searches out all
things, revealing and healing even hidden remnants of sin and wrong living in
the body.
The mind that is ruled by the Light from God
is attentive to what is right, because the soul loves what is right and makes
it more important than anything else. Such a mind is ever aware, and in the
Light is keen to observe and stay away from anything improper.
Can you see the parallel between this
mental/spiritual process and that of the operation of the healthy immune
system?
An aware person is careful about hygiene,
nutrition, and association. Clean in body and careful about associations, the
person is less likely to come in contact with harmful pathogens. If any do get
through, the body is scanning constantly so that anything harmful or foreign is
quickly dealt with by the immune system.
In a similar way, the humble and honorable
soul shuns promiscuous improper associations. When something improper is
observed, it is not allowed to cohabitate in the mind. The Light Itself,
operating through the still observant soul, does the screening.
The soul merely needs to remain aware and
not get caught up in goals, schemes, excessive thought or emotions.
Another analogy is this: you could compare
excessive thoughts and emotions with eating too much. A person who has gorged
himself and is overstuffed with food or drink is not as alert as the person who
has eaten very little or in moderation. Too much of anything tends to interfere
with a proper state of mind.
When the body or the blood becomes
overfilled with chemicals, salt, sugar, undigested foodstuff, or toxins—it
becomes exceedingly difficult to have a clear mind or to realize anything. Yet
it is realization that is the key to
salvation.
Truth must be realized. When we indulge
ourselves in anything—be it food, music, anger, excitement, drugs or even
sights and sounds—realization is interfered with.
When we are on medication, we are in a
mental fog. When we are sick, and especially when we run a fever, our mind is
fogged and delirious. However, if the sickness and suffering sober the soul, it
might initiate a time of sincere searching. The pure intent and yearning of
this soul will be a silent cry to the Father.
He will make it possible for the soul to
realize despite the downdraft of the sickness. All I am saying is that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
Better to begin seeing what we need to see while it is easier. But if, like
with many people, it has taken a desperate situation to begin sobering up--take
heart. With God all things are possible.
Sometimes a troubling ailment or condition
will settle upon a person who has otherwise led a clean and principled life.
“How can an ailment like cancer attack such a person?” we ask. In fact, it is
often the most sociable, amiable person who it attacks. The answer is complex,
but here is one clue.
Remember what we said about the renegade
cancer cell answering to another authority? Its only purpose is survival of
itself. The will of the chief rogue cell intimidates other cells and later the
body itself. Converted over through intimidation, the other cells serve the
head terrorist, and the aberrant behavior grows.
Even the immune system itself can be converted
over to serve another will. Some of the kindest and gentlest people in the
world have spent their life serving and being nice to other people and the
establishment system. They give and give to what on the surface appears to be a
good cause, but underneath the plastic surface of society another will
operates. Any form of intimidation—even giving in and serving the will of a
seemingly nice person who is close to you is a form of intimidation.
Many people spend their life serving and
worshipping their mother or someone whose demands they can’t say "no"
to. Giving in to the will of another leads to serving them. And when you do,
they take your life and give you something of their nature, even their
governing entity.
And so it comes to pass that the sweetest
child in the world gets leukemia, as its life is being drained by a smothering
mother. To all the world she seems wonderful, and no one suspects that the
child’s life has become an external life support for the one who is draining
it.
Remember--worldly institutions and yes,
even worldly churches, have their roots in hell. They provide an alternative to
God’s direct rule.
They can take your life, your energy, your
money—and all the while you think they are leading you to heaven when they are
leading you to themselves and their governing spirit. When you respond to
middlemen, putting your trust in middlemen, without realizing it, you bypass
the still small voice within.
Serve God or serve mammon.
In fact, from a spiritual perspective, many
of our physical ailments are the result of abuse of the body by the ego. For
example, many people misuse food. Instead of eating to be aware, they eat to
forget. When most people eat, they go into a trance, separated from God and
reality, and immersed in their self-indulgence, fantasy and good feelings.
Other people use food as a substitute for
love. The resentful person, for example, uses food to comfort his or her angry
self. The woman who resents her husband uses the food to be her lover. Alcohol,
tobacco, marijuana, and drugs are modified food.
Alcoholism, drug addiction and food
addiction are simply the gross symptoms of a stubborn ego in denial. The
alcohol, the food and the drug help us deny the truth. People misuse their
doctor and his medicines.
They prefer to have symptoms alleviated and
they misuse the services of their doctor and his medicines for that purpose.
Food abuse, sex abuse, and work abuse occur
when we use our mind and body to deny something we don’t want to face. The
person who is resentful becomes angry and misuses food to comfort her angry
self.
The person who resents something at home
misuses work to stay away from home. The person who does not have real love
misuses work and money to attempt to buy the love of his family. The person who
studies too much is trying to compensate for a lack of understanding or is
seeking to prove something.
There is the obvious misuse of the body when
we become angry--raising our blood pressure, changing our blood lipids, etc.
The person who is faithless and who becomes upset, and then uses the upset to
escape into and immerse the ego into is also obviously causing wear and tear on
the organs and body systems.
The misuse of anything always has the body
as an intermediary, and thus the body is abused in order to misuse something
else.
Before long, the body becomes worn down and
damaged. Pain or other discomfort is the first symptom, followed by faltering
performance and eventual shut down.
Typical organs that exhibit the effect of
the abuse include: the pancreas, the adrenals, the brain, the heart, the
stomach, and the intestines.
It is easy to see why taking pain pills and
other palliative efforts do not get to the real cause of the problem which is
the abuse of the body for egotistical purposes.
Sometimes altering the environment of the
body (such as finding other work or getting more fresh air) affords relief.
Eliminating certain poisons, such as tobacco or excessive junk food, is
beneficial. Sometimes a rest is helpful—whereby the body has a chance to
recover.
But the ultimate fix for our ailments
involves a change of attitude of the ego. It requires a soul that realizes that
its hatred, willfulness and denial are wrong. When the soul is no longer
compatible with anger abuse, for example, because it is more forgiving and less
resentful—the soul will simply stop abusing the body.
A person who is no longer trying to deny the
Truth will no longer need drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, excessive food or emotion
to help it deny.
- 2 -
Understand this: every sin has pain
associated with it. Every sin has a short-lived pleasure associated with it—but
this pleasure soon leads to its opposite, pain.
Every high is followed by a low, for
example. Intellectually, we all know this is true, because we have observed
drug addicts getting a high and then suffering the horrors of the low. I
remember that when I was in college, one of my friends took some “uppers” to
stay awake to cram for final exams. He soon became a terrible monster: hateful
and dark, impossible to live with.
We also know this is true because we have
all had the experience of getting too excited and worked up over some goal.
Once it was achieved, we then had a big let down.
Unfortunately, we tended to blame someone
else or the goal itself--which led to resentment. Resentment being a
"pleasure" of sorts led to even more pain and more resentment. This
process can lead to depression and even suicidal thoughts. And it all began
with the simple sin of making something too important to our ego.
Most people, who have been the victim of
some injustice (real or imagined), enjoy the “pleasure” of judging the one who
committed the infraction. The high of judging is pleasurable to the ego. But
there is always a backlash of guilt, anxiety, and fear associated with the
judgment. Since it is wrong to judge, guilt accrues. Because the ego does not
want to admit it is wrong, it suffers the pain for being wrong.
The ego feels pain when it must realize it
is wrong. And the incorrigible ego will blame others for "making him
wrong." This leads to more resentment and another round of pain.
Unwilling to face its wrongness, the ego must
also do something with the pain of being wrong (for judging). The ego may blame
and punish another person--a process of projecting onto others. In this situation, the ego often blames and
accuses another of the very thing it was guilty of. This is how it projects and
pawns off its own wrong. But because this process itself is wrong and an
injustice to the other, it only adds more guilt, shame and pain.
The pain of being wrong becomes various
symptoms including uneasiness, nervousness, anxiety, and eventually other forms
of physical ailments, some psychosomatic and some real.
The basis of nervousness, uneasiness, and
restlessness is not wanting to be observed by conscience.
Guilty people feel uneasy because they are
not living properly and they are aware of this fact at some level. The Truth is
always there, and its presence is a constant but unwelcome reminder that
something is wrong about the way we are living.
Because we want to feel good, we resent the
presence of conscience (or any aware person) which makes us feel uncomfortable. The uneasiness and nervousness is due to our
wanting to escape the incriminating presence of Truth.
When we do not feel dominant, we feel like
we are the victim of the watchful eye or presence of an aware innocent person.
We seek to wiggle out of their questions or get away from their scrutiny.
When we feel dominant, like when we are the
parent of a little child, our uneasiness takes the form of impatience. We
become cruel and vicious, seeking to confuse, put the observer down, or
eliminate what makes us uncomfortable.
The person who cannot overcome the scrutiny
of conscience or Truth becomes resentful. The person who thinks he can dominate
becomes violent and cruel.
Remember, the whole process of suffering,
deteriorating, and dying is the inevitable result of sin.
This is the truth. We are all sinning and
dying. We must face this truth without resentment, blame or denial. If we use
resentment to deny the truth about our human plight, we are adding sin to sin.
It is a sin to deny the truth.
Fortunately, the person who is willing to
admit the truth is graced by God to suffer differently from others.
The egotist denies the truth by resenting it
and then suffers the pain of conflict with God, the pain of being wrong, and
the pain of the symptoms of separating from God and the symptoms of dying.
The person who is willing to admit the
truth, on the other hand, suffers the special form of suffering called
repentance—the sorrow and regret of seeing one’s own wrong. Thanks to the mercy
and goodness of God, the pain of repentance is short-lived. He forgives us and
removes the pain. He then also permits us to observe the symptoms of our prior
sins come off the assembly line in an orderly fashion—to be observed,
understood, and set free from.
He permits us to see our symptoms for what
they are—the sequelae of sin. We may have to experience them for a short time
in order to fully comprehend the ramifications of sin. During this period, the
soul is given the grace to humbly bear what it cannot change without resentment
or blame.
Furthermore, seeing the nature of sin and
its inevitable results, the person now also stops judging others who s/he once
hated for their denials, imperfections and errors. The soul is given to see
that without grace, other's pain of being wrong is just too much for them to
bear.
The soul sees that others became wrong
because of the projections and accusations laid upon them when they were young.
They were required to suffer for the sins of their parents and elders. Because
of their resentment, they began to feel inferior, and that inferiority made
them suggestible; and they were compelled to take on the suggestions and curses
laid upon them. Then the pain of their
resentment of the injustice kept them wrong.
Later, when they became parents and the
opportunity was afforded them, they could not resist dumping their pain on
their kids. Of such is the legacy of original sin.
This is precisely what happened to you. You
are not responsible for the sins dumped on you by others. And yes, you did
suffer. But your biggest mistake was resenting them. The resentment actually
made you wrong for resenting, and because of YOUR wrong you accepted blame
because it was compatible with the guilt you felt. You undoubtedly made the
mistake of thinking that you felt guilty for what you were being accused of
(though your guilt was really for resenting).
Resentment has a way of accepting blame and
punishment because feeling bad feeds and seems to confirm a reason for the
resentment.
Resentment also accepts blame for the pleasure
of judging.
But once having accepted blame, the ego must
suffer the pain of being wrong or continue the process of dumping on another.
A false accusation causes resentment and
pain. The ego might then decide to go ahead and do or be what it was accused of
for whatever pleasure values are associated with it.
A child accused of being a thief might very
well steal something in order to enjoy the stolen thing (since he’s being
accused of it anyway) or steal to enjoy the pleasure of seeing the parent
suffer.
Resentment locks the person into the
pain/pleasure cycle and into the fantasy of imagining pleasures and envisioning
morbid results. The cycle ever spirals downward to more guilt, further removal
from God, and deeper and darker imaginings, more intense pains, and more
loathsome ways of relieving the pain and lowering consciousness.
The solution is to give up the resentment.
Willing to know what the truth is without resentment permits the soul to be
softened and to receive God’s redeeming forgiveness. It also permits the soul
to begin to see objectively what the reality is.
You will see is a world where people are
dumping on each other and seeking to relieve the pain of their own wrong. You will see a world of false comforts, where
each comfort the wrong ego receives only makes it more wrong.
You will also see that you fell into the
same trap of hating and being hated, hurting and being hurt, and seeking
pleasure to relieve pain because, like other foolish egos, you became resentful.
Give up resentment and the pain for being
wrong goes away. What are left are natural pains to be born for awhile (without
resentment) until God heals them too.
Someday you will see that most of your life
you have been living a lie through accepting lies and then acting them out.
For example, as kids, many of us were
harshly teased about something. The implication of the tease was that there was
something wrong with us. Resenting and accepting the accusation, we then lived
out life as if there were something wrong with us. We accepted the blame, the
pity, or the comfort that attended our fault.
On the other hand we may have resentfully
rebelled against the cruel implication. The rest of our life involved expending
energy to disprove or compensate for our fault.
Remember, resentment separates us from
Truth. Resenting an implication, we are left to deal with it without grace:
giving in to it or fighting it with anger and compensation.
In fact, culture is neatly arranged around
death. Everything including insurance policies, retirement plans, emotional
funerals, humanism and the false comfort of medicine and euthanasia is designed
to imply that death is inevitable.
Early on in our lives we mostly ignored
death or pushed it out of our consciousness. But as the years passed, we were
gradually worn down to accept it. Those of us who don’t accept it, try to fight
it with resentment.
The truth of the matter is that death,
though it has become a reality, is a reality because of sin. But death is not
inevitable. We were not originally meant to die. We do so now because of the
curse of original sin, our own sins, and our failure to find salvation through
believing into the truth.
In order to be saved from sin, you need to
be saved from the belief in death. But if you continue to believe in death, how
can you live in such a way that does not make it inevitable?
This is speculation on my part, but I
actually think that some of our deterioration, perhaps all of it, if not caused
by sin, is due to a firm belief in death and decay which gives the body no
chance of acting otherwise. It’s a self fulfilling prophesy, you see.
There is a certain power in belief. We all
know that if a person believes they can’t do something, they probably won’t. We
know that some people believe they can do something and they find a way to do
it.
It is said that some people who were firmly
convinced that someone had spoken a voodoo curse on them have actually died.
It's not the voodoo curse itself but it is the shock of believing in the curse.
The flip side is placebo, which operates through false hypnotic belief, and
displacement or transfer of symptom.
Placebo does not really cure anything, but
sometimes it stops worry in its tracks, so that the body has a chance to repair
itself without the interference of negative thought and emotion.
While the negative effects of wrong belief
can become permanent; unfortunately the so called cures of false belief or
belief in a wrong source are short lived. Afterwards, the person is worse off
for having misplaced trust, followed by disappointment and loss of hope.
However, there is such a thing as belief in
the true Source. If someone tells you the truth and you believe it, you are
operating in reality and on valid basis.
God does not lie. What He has said is true.
He also is merciful, forgiving and He may remove the effects of sin. It is
doubt that separates us from God. His forgiveness is already there, but through
doubt, disbelief, and pride, we reject it.
It is not enough to believe words about God,
nor is it enough to believe in an imaginary God or
I will never forget a man I met at
Starbucks. He had come to town, having been attracted by a church that promised
all manner of miraculous healings and life changes. While at the church
service, he noted that many people were responding to the big light show,
music, and multimedia presentation complete with glittering fake manna that was
released and came floating down from the ceiling.
Part
of him wanted to believe what he was observing, but something in him made him
doubt it.
Little did he realize that what it was in
him that was silently whispering "it isn't so" was God's Holy Spirit
of Truth trying to warn him. His salvation depends upon which he believes. If
he believes the external trappings, he will be doomed and he will become a
slave of the unholy spirit that is behind the falsity. If he doubts the lie and believes into the
Spirit of Truth, he will be saved.
Just as you cannot be just a little bit
pregnant, you cannot believe into the truth one moment and the lie the next.
Life is decisive. You can't ride two horses at the same time. The spirit of the lie is everywhere operating
through its dupes and agents seeking to make you doubt what you know in your
heart. It uses hypnosis inducing words, music, and emotional appeals.
It appeals to your pride and it takes
advantage of your gullibility and propensity to doubt. It talks to you through
its strutting shills and it also talks to you in your mind. Belief in the
correct Source saves you, and belief in myriad of variations in the lie and the
unholy spirit that stands behind them dooms you.
When it comes to spiritual matters, there is
a real belief and a false belief. A belief that is all intellectual, emotional,
word-based and fantasy-based might help a person do better for awhile, but it
cannot save you. This is hypnotic
belief.
Convince a hypnotized person that he is
cured and he may get out of bed and say that his pain is gone. He is compelled
to act cured. Unfortunately the underlying cause of is ailment is not taken
away.
Sometimes a person might be under sway of a
false negative belief. Hypnotizing him with a false positive belief may make
the negative behavior patterns go away, and this has a positive benefit. Giving
up drugs and taking up religion results in a better life style.
Letting go of a negative belief also gives
the body some space to recover naturally.
We are always better off for believing truth
rather than lies. But just believing in words of truth (even though they may be
factual) cannot save you.
The saving belief is belief into the Spirit
of Truth sent from God. Believing into the Truth joins you to God. What
positive thoughts and hopes He gives you will come to pass because He is in
change of them.
Can you see how cultural Christians or
hypnotized Christians can be misled? By believing in words, they miss out on
believing into the Spirit of Truth itself.
They then look at their own emotions and use
them as evidence that they believe. But they are deceived by the words, the
speaker, and their own emotions.
Thus it is that even positive or religious
words can kill us if they lead us away from the wordless Word of Truth within.
Words, even holy words, are just words. It is the inner wordless testimony that is
the important thing. The Holy Spirit
wordlessly testifies to the truth of the external fact. It is God Who made the fact a fact, and it is
He Who testifies within to its truth.
- 3 -
For the person who has turned to the inner
wordless way of knowing and trusts in it, the positive things and the sense
that something good is about to happen are inspired by the Creator.
These are not beliefs you gave yourself. Nor
are they beliefs that some other person gave you. Therefore they have the power
of good behind them.
Perhaps this would be a good place to talk
about faith for just a moment. Most people think that faith is some far out
thing. Others think it is just a concept. Still others think it is an emotional
thing.
Faith is a relationship with someone
and a trust in them. Can you see why putting your faith in anyone (no matter
how knowledgeable, how seemingly nice, or how credentialed they might be) means
not putting your faith in God.
The relationship with God, that I call faith, means looking to intuition first.
It is an involvement with the inner Light. Like a little child who holds his
daddy’s hand and who looks to daddy whenever he has a question or concern about
anything, the soul looks inward with a silent plea or questioning.
This involvement is not an emotional one. It is an attitude of looking to God, of ever checking the rightness of
things, and ever wanting to be guided to do the right thing.
Perhaps the best ways to describe faith is
by pointing out what it is not. What most people think of as faith is an
emotional involvement with words, objects or people. It is the involvement of
the ego with whatever or whoever gives it faith in itself and makes it feel
good about itself.
This involvement is emotional, physical and imaginal. For example, we get
involved with some person (lover or leader) who appeals to our ego. We have an
emotional attachment to them, they make us feel, and we toy with them in our
imagination.
We become sensitive to their physical
presence, which stirs us to feelings. Of course, the feelings associated with
being in love come to mind. It is obvious how the lover appeals to something we
want for our ego.
We are also stirred by the excitement that a speeding car represents, a soft
luxurious coat, or a fancy piece of jewelry. They stand for something—power,
party time, excitement, self righteousness, luxury, and so on. A person can
also get excited over words or over knowledge.
Just about anything that holds out a promise
of glory, greatness, worship, or even the hope of a cure can make us excited
and emotional. People who look to medicine to save them can become excited over
the latest operation or a new experimental medicine that holds out the
possibility of a cure.
A leader or lover appeals to our ego, offering it something, and we will begin
to get involved with them, and soon we even have a fantasy relationship with
them.
It’s only a small stretch to see how someone
we hate also involves us with emotions and fantasy. The one we hate gives us
feelings of judgment and powerful anger feelings. We judge them, and the
feelings of anger or unhappiness, support our ego in its role as judge.
Here’s a cute story that illustrates the relationship aspect
of faith. A little boy was standing by the curb. A business man came along and
asked: “Why are you standing here?” I’m waiting for the bus, said the boy. The
business man chuckled and said, I hate to tell you, but this is not a bus stop.
After a few more attempts by the businessman to dissuade him, the boy announced:
I have faith that this is a bus stop.
The business man shook his head and began to walk away.
As he was walking away, he heard the sound of bus brakes behind him. He turned
and saw a big bus stopping for the boy.
As the boy was getting on the bus, he turned to the businessman and said: You
see, Mister, the bus driver is my dad.”
Faith is a relationship for better or worse.
When we put our faith in what we know we know deep down, we are permitting the
Light of Truth to enter, and we are involving ourselves with the Spirit of
Truth. We yearn for it and we welcome God’s involvement in our life. In
exchange for our yearning and trust, He helps us to change for the better and
wordlessly guides us.
It’s not an emotional thing, it’s a deep
soul yearning and turning to God. It’s an inclination of the soul. It’s
obedience and a willingness to follow through with what we realize is right.
It leads to realizations and private revelations that give us more and more
good reason for the way we are going. The good that we see happening all around
us is the evidence of the faith we had, which was the substance of things not
seen and not yet made.
Indeed, the quiet faith does lead
to a change in our physical being, evidenced by the happy sad emotion of
repentance that purges us of error. We also have a quiet excitement over our
discoveries, a joy, and a peace of mind that we cannot give ourselves. More
often than not, real faith is trusting in a silent knowing, what we know deep
down in our hearts.
One mother will coldly and ambitiously send her child off to godless preschool
or school where the child is taught and bullied by strangers and conformed to
peers.
Another mother will hear the cries of her child the first day she sends the child
off to spend the day with strangers. But she will doubt her heart ache, ignore
her intuition and believe and have faith in strangers and experts. Hardening
her heart, she pushes the child onto the school bus anyway.
Another mom will heed her wordless intuition and clasp her child
close to her bosom. She will find a way to home school her child. This woman
has faith. The still small voice, the quiet intuition is from God. This
faithful mother may not know this, but what she does have is love for her child
and a willingness to do what is right.
It is said that the mind of man plans and schemes, but the Lord
directs his feet. But this only for the soul that stands back from thinking,
and listens to the heart. Despite the doubts, and though the whole world be
arrayed against her, the faithful soul does what she knows deep down in her
heart is right.
But the wrong kind of faith—the one most of us have--is a hypnotic and
emotional involvement with people, objects, words, or ideas. The ego responds
to someone or something that holds our some sort of promise or appeal to it,
and the response is excitement and an inclination toward that person or object.
The result is an emotional response, a trauma, a physical change, and an
imprinting of a memory. Emotion is the evidence of ego response.
The response is also hypnotic. It is a rapport that develops
between the object we are responding to and the ego.
The faithful soul is the one who is committed to what is right and so turned to
the inner good that the external teases have no appeal.
The faithless soul does not love what is right enough to not want
to leave the door to the mind ever so slightly ajar, so as not to miss some
titillating ego appeal. And when it makes its approach, the soul toys with it
mentally, which already lets it in. Soon emotions and feelings begin to take
hold and then the person acts on the feelings.
The hypnosis is the hold that the appealing person or object has on the mind.
Once the emotional bond and hypnosis sets in, thoughts and attitudes are
transmitted through the emotional connection from one to another, and
especially from the dominant stressor to the one who attention has been
captured.
Soon the hypnotized person may take on the thoughts, the mind, the attitudes,
the beliefs of the tempting stressor that are projected his way. In short, the
victim becomes identified with the dominant stress.
That is why the captives of terrorists often become loyal to those that
terrorized them. It’s called the Stockholm syndrome. That is why young people,
who are easily appealed to with idealistic notions, can come under influence of
a cult or cause to which they give their all, and from which it is almost
impossible to loose them.
People become identified and loyal to their
pets, their team, even their drugs. The psychotic clings to what he has been
converted to for life, for hope, for identity. And when he finally sees that he
has been betrayed, he often clings to it in hate: going on hating it and unable
to give up his grudge against it.
Can you now understand why God commands us not to have any other gods before
Him? Whatever we make too important, whatever we give ourselves to in love or
hate, gains the power to rule us and we become its slave. Only God gives us freedom.
Anything else can only enslave. Even if it is a mere object (we have resented
or emotionally reacted to), it gains a terrible power over us even in our mind.
An object cannot set you free. Even if another’s intent is not to enslave you
(though often it is, because that is how they gain power over you), there is
the enslavement in the mind: the obsession, the memory, the resentment.
The only way to become free is to regret your making something too important
and forgetting about your Creator. See what has happened, don’t resent your
enslavement, and let go of the hate and resentment.
The ultimate hold that things have over us stems from our own stubbornness.
Something we don’t want to admit, something we still look to it for, or a
resentment that keeps us trying to win, prove something, or get even.
By standing back, we let go. Look at it this way: if something in the past
keeps haunting you, there must be something that gives it a power over you.
Remember, we said that the stubborn ego actually uses the memory to struggle
with and hide in. The stubborn ego does not want to acknowledge dependence on
God and submit to God. A complete reliance on, trust in, attachment to and
loyalty to the Creator results in disinterested mental distance. But the
unrepentant ego moves toward the person or object or notion that is appealing
to it. Some sort of continuing desire, resentment, unforgiveness, or hope keeps
the attached and enslaved. Think of it! The ego actually enslaves itself to
something in order to avoid God.
People and objects lose power over us when we stand back and no longer want
their lies and no longer want anything from them. By standing back, we move
closer to the Creator and farther from the creature.
Now, getting back to whatever it is that still has a hold on you from the past.
There has to be a continuing hold of some sort. Whatever it was that first
enticed you to leave your first estate and venture into the world of beasts and
drugs is long gone. What is it that now, at this very moment, keeps the
attachment, memory and rapport alive? There has to be a present day something,
involving the will--something you don’t want to admit or something you don’t
want to let go of that keeps the attachment alive.
Often it is something that we still want (power, money, respect, a
happy home, or appreciation) that we just don’t want to let go of. We think
back to the past where it was denied us, and we still want and resent not
getting it.
It can also be something we don’t want to admit: that mom didn’t
love you, that you failed your child, that have failed in business. Not wanting
to admit that this is true, you resent and struggle with the idea. But it keeps
coming back to haunt you. If it suddenly became unimportant to you, it would
lose energy and go away.
Another factor is trying to make up for the loss we experienced in that moment
when we think we lost respect, love, success or whatever. The memory of that
moment comes to mind, we resent it, and then we are energized to strive and
struggle to prove ourselves.
The present moment factor that keeps the enslavement going is most likely a
form of stubbornness: resentment (conscious stubbornness) or repression, anger,
suppressed hostility (which are often unconscious), or striving to prove or
obtain something.
Another form of stubbornness is an
unwillingness to admit something. As I said, it is often something like an
unwillingness to admit that you hated your mom, for example. This unwillingness
to admit the truth keeps you subject to lies and subject to having to serve
that person in guilt. It can even keep us tied to someone after they die. We
are not able to be set free because we won’t admit the truth.
Perhaps now you can see that the soul’s unwillingness to admit
that it is wrong keeps it subject to
Can you see why a willingness to admit wrong and be sorry in our heart is the
key to getting better from whatever ails us and whatever has us in its grips?
The principle of standing back and observing, with a sincere willingness lay
down the life of pride will eventually set you free from everything. As a
matter of fact, the very act of meditation combined with a willingness to admit
wrong and to know the truth, regardless of the consequences, is already
salvation. After this beginning, there will be a long period of seeing more and
more wrongs and errors, seeing more and more subtle struggles, willfulness,
denials, and little attachments to words and notions that support some sort of
pridefulness. With each denial, resentment, attachment, false hope seen and let
go of—one is progressively freer.
Do you now understand what
Bear in mind that resentment and judgment are the most subtle and insidious
sustainers of pride. The ego life, to a large extent, consists of a secret
fantasy life of judging others and resenting our luck and lot in life. Can you
see how the ego uses knowledge of good and knowledge of evil to make judgments
about others? Can you see how resentment can maintain a whole ego life built
around some incident that we keep resenting and which sustains the pride to
keep living in hate?
Can you see how the devil himself was traumatized by his hatred of God and
good, and now lives on informally hating over and over again anything good?
Can you now see why we must not resent anyone or anything? If you do, you are
likely to Can you now see how an appeal—sometimes extremely subtle, such as a
little come on or a hint of meanness, can cause something to enter the mind? And
then, toying with the notion, the victim can then search out more experience to
find out if there is more there, to be sure about something, or to struggle
with it?
Once a suggestion enters, we often keep toying with it. If it’s negative, we
try to find a way to defeat it or counter it. The victim may get so involved
that he or she may spend a lifetime trying to disprove it. Often the victim is
converted over to the notion, if he or she cannot find the way to completely
disprove it.
The emotionally and hypnotically and traumatically created
follower or believer is a mindless slave of the cause, cult or idea. Completely
converted over, through the trauma of emotional belief, the victim becomes a
rabid groupie. Islamic terrorists, follower of
Once again, the faith that stems from involvement with people,
objects, words, or imagination is emotional hypnotic. It is ego involvement
based on emotional response to an ego appeal.
The true faith in God is unemotional.
It is based on awareness, whereby the soul stands back from experience and
observes calmly and neutrally from a little distance. In the Light of Truth,
the soul sees the fatal appeal and shrinks from it without reacting, without
assenting or rejecting. It remains distant and impervious.
Standing in the Light, the souls sees in the Light. Remember, the
analogy I gave earlier about how love is not looking into each others eyes, but
together both looking at the sunset.
A little child will not be afraid to investigate a noise in the
dark if he is holding his daddy’s hand and together they get a flashlight and
go to look.
When the soul locates the inner light (which it now knows as
conscience or intuition), loves that light, and wants to remain aware in the
Light, will then view things without being disturbed by them or being sucked
into them. Aloof, wondering in the light, not tempted to get involved or sucked
in, the soul is safe. The light reveals deception, and the soul does not
follow.
The ego which avoids the shaming Light (because it is unwilling to
be humbled) is forced to deal with and grapple with things on its own. Being an
ego, it simply cannot help but deal with things in an egotistical way. It
worries, analyzes, decides, and falls into error. And because it is subjective,
it looks at everything for a mindset of what will preserve or promote pride. It
simply cannot see that the lying support or the offer that’s true good to be
true is in fact a lie and a deception. It errors, falls in love and falls in
hate. And it suffers from an ever deepening and enslaving involvement with
people, objects, words, knowledge and substances.
- 3 -
At some point,
If this is true, those who would truly
belong to Him would be given such power by Him. If they were not truly His
disciples, they would not be given the power.
Therefore, it can only be assumed that
something has gone terribly wrong with today’s Christian church and today’s
so-called followers. They seemingly have no authority and no power.
The average person today has fallen so low
that he or she cannot even heal himself, let alone anyone else. Worse yet,
today’s average person is in terrible health. Allergies, asthma, diabetes,
sexually transmitted diseases, auto immune diseases, heart trouble and cancer
are just some of the conditions that are rampant.
Just about everyone is sooner or later
affected by one or more of these illnesses and conditions. There are many more,
and they seem to be attacking younger and younger people, even children.
Our medical men and pharmacologists cut,
burn, or irradiate the bad cells. Sometimes cutting out, burning, irradiating,
or poisoning the afflicted part gives the patient a chance to recover and
sometimes it doesn’t. When the cause is unknown and the symptoms keep coming
back, we grow impatient with our body and we ask our medical practitioners to
alleviate, hide or mask symptoms, primarily with the use of drugs.
Our medical practitioners do the best they
can. But only when we change our attitude and our life style will we strike at
the root of our affliction. As long as we remain prideful and disconnected from
our own inner good--disease, deterioration and death are on the horizon.
Robust good health is hard to find, except
among the young, and even they seem to be suffering from an increasing number
of conditions such as juvenile diabetes, asthma, and even cancer. Many people take multiple drugs, and then
suffer the side effects.
A large proportion of the populace feels
tired, fatigued, drained, and anxious. People full of zest and verve are fewer in
number despite the huge medical, pharmacological, health, and alternative
medicine business.
When all else fails, people turn to
religion. But the truth must simply be stated: few of today’s Christians appear
to have real healing power. They perform no miracles. The so called miracle
cures we hear of usually have some other explainable basis: most are not really
cures at all, just the transfer of symptoms or the hypnotic suppression of
symptoms with emotionalized belief and placebo. Sadly, the so-called faith
healers on TV are mostly frauds. At best, they are naive or clever conmen
without real power and authority.
Is it possible that there are few real
Christians today? If they were real, wouldn’t at least some of them have power
and authority to do good, to heal and to restore? And for the millions of
decent goodly Christian people, could it be that they are just not Christian
enough?
There are also plenty of emotional and
mental health problems around. Except for the temporary displacement of
symptoms through hypnosis and suggestion, today’s believers seem powerless to
really effect healing. Christian families have just as many divorces as any
other group.
Drug abuse, emotional abuse, financial
problems, misunderstanding, anger, hurt feelings, and parent/child problems are
found in Christian homes too. When help is needed, counselors and psychologists
are turned to. If they were really Christians through and through, why would
they need the help of psychologists?
The bottom line is this: the power that
Christians should have is not there. For the most part, they have no edge over
anyone else in even solving their own emotional or family problems.
Please do not misunderstand me: I am not
knocking them. I love the Christian people. I’m afraid many have been misled,
and are looking to knowledge, emotion, and external signs and wonders, instead
of looking within. I believe even many ministers who are not ambitious
sincerely wish to do the right thing; but they follow the tried and true path
of study, college, formal training, and so on. It hasn’t really worked.
Our medical practitioners are often well
meaning too; but they receive training at medical school that is all about
technology and drugs. It is fortunate if a doctor has any common sense and
intuition left after medical school.
We, as a society and as individuals, tend to
think of healing in terms of our physical bodies. But we forget that far more
important is the healing of the soul.
Obviously
In fact, in one of the Gospels, it mentions
that
Believing in the Truth which He bore witness
to, brought about a turning point in people’s lives. When they also gave over their will by
calling upon Him, it meant that they looked to no one else, including themselves
or their leaders. By believing in Him
and calling upon Him, it became His responsibility to heal them.
Because all power comes from God, those who
are obedient to God’s authority are granted power, such power as God gives to
them.
Every temptation seeks to get us to
draw upon our own cleverness and energy to respond. Unenlightened and
powerless, the tempted person can only draw on their own life force. And this
force (hostility, anger, or excitement) is also an environmental stimulus
(temptation) that tempts the other to respond with emotion of their own or more
temptation.
We live in an atmosphere
of wall to wall tease. People are becoming drained and increasingly sick today.
The terrible school, work and institutional environments are mostly presided
over by ambitious motivators and prideful unenlightened people They view truth
as a threat. They have no use for real goodness or virtue. They want ambitious
yes men and they want those who give without asking questions.
For this reason, the
average person is tempted on all sides by those demanding his energies, money,
and allegiance. After years in phony and unloving environments, the person has
learned to shut down perception and to suppress expressing the truth.
When we do not express
ourselves, we also suppress the latent powers of the soul. We lose our virtue,
courage, creativity, and other powers. We become diseased, sick and preyed
upon. Even our immune system which is an extension of the soul’s power to fight
off germs becomes depressed. The soul’s ability to throw off unwholesome
influence is repressed.
Even at a purely
psychological and physical level, we are so used to responding only after being
tempted or upset, that we have become incapable of living from inner
motivation. We literally have to be upset or excited in order to function.
Parents who pressure or bribe their kids raise kids who need tease or pressure
in order to function. To a large extent, this has happened to all of us. The
more we are reactive, the more we depend on external stimuli.
Having lost control of our
powers and having suppressed them so long, that when we do need to act, we need
something to upset us or make us angry: in order to bring up energy. While it
is true that we draw energy from anger or upset, it also true that serves those
who upset us and each time we lose our precious storehouse of energy we are a
little closer to death.
More and more, people are
actually becoming unresponsive to goodness and truth. They are unmoved by the
sight of a mother and child.
They are not outraged by injustice. They are unmoved by beautiful music
or a flower. They feel no awe; they have no respect for proper authority. They
have no compassion for the elderly.
Repressed so long, the very sensibilities of the soul are atrophied thorough
disuse.
Increasingly,
they need various contrived excitements, such as spectator sports, video games,
survivor television programs, gambling, or drugs to stimulate them.
We should be moved by intuition from
God.
When we see another person in need, our compassion is awakened and we
search our heart for what to do. Upon hearing truth, we are awakened to intuit
in the inner Light that it is true. When our family teases us for love, we
should respond with calm reason and understanding love that come from within.
When others err, we should respond with patience and compassionate correction
which come from within.
Can you now understand the
meaning of the phrase “You cannot hurt another person without hurting
yourself?” If another is in need and you turn from them when you
intuition would tell you to lend a hand, you must suppress your soul. If
another is in need of correction, and you intuit that you should say something,
but you turn from them and say nothing in order to preserve some cozy external
relationship, you must suppress your soul.
Not only do you suppress your
soul’s sensibilities and harden your heart, you also deny yourself life that
would flow through your soul if you obeyed the Creator.
In essence, also, the
life, the light and love that would enter the soul from within in order to help
the other person is now also denied yourself. It does not enter, so it is not
there for you either. The forgiveness you extend to another permits the
forgiveness of the Creator to flow into you. By denying yourself the “pleasure”
of resenting and judging, the emptiness is filled by the infilling of God’s
grace.
But when we do not forgive
our neighbor, then the grace does not enter and we do not experience
forgiveness either.
When we are patient with our
neighbor, then the peace of God can enter from within.
You've
probably heard the expression "Don't sweat the small stuff." We know
this is true, but the problem is we don't know how to not sweat the small
stuff.
This
is because we have literally conditioned ourselves to become irritated. And
when the next little thing occurs, our body reacts. . A small irritant to which
we have reacted can literally build to the point that we're ready to have an
emotional meltdown over it. Moreover, we react and suppress our emotions all
day long, so there is an accumulation of upset and tension leading us to
explode in anger at a loved one or reach for the bottle.
Here
is the key.
Learning
to watch for and let go of resentment which sustains and reinforces our
reaction. It was resentment that led to the very first reaction to a look alike
situation long ago, and it is resentment that sustains it and reinforces it.
The resentment must be let go of, whether it be resentment against the
situation, the person, the first occurrence, oneself, or resentment against
anything. . If you don't know how to get enough distance mentally to stand back
and watch for the resentment, I can teach you how.
As I
will relate later, becoming upset is a way of life for most of us. So the
second thing that must be learned is to practice going through life in a more
detached way, as more of an observer. In my writings I can show you how and why
this dispassionate state of mind and calm state way of living is based on
principles of forgiveness and patience. In fact, the reader will see that these principles correspond to
beautiful religious or philosophical principles you may have heard and
appreciated but never learned to apply.
The
secret to regaining self control has to do with the timeless moment just before
we react. In that moment we have the
freedom to make a choice between going with the resentment and all that
follows, or to remain patient. Once we go ahead and resent or choose to indulge
the judgment, then there is a due process that occurs, and the bodily stress
responses take place, one after another.
However,
many people can understand where I'm coming from. They see their resentment and
impatience and don't want to be that way, but don't know how to make the
change. I can show you how.
- 4 -
Not My
Can you now see the importance of
obedience? The person who is not obedient to God is not in concert with His
authority. No power will be given because they have no authority. Power goes
with authority, because authority without power is impotent.
The person who obeys God and submits to His
authority will be given the power to carry out what is God’s will.
It is the will to power (to be our own
authority and to rule others) that separates us from obedience to God’s
authority. We do not want to do His will because we want to do our own will.
Thus we are powerless, powerless to do good and powerless to resist evil. Of
course we might use the compensations of anger and effort to compensate and
struggle. But it is a losing battle because we use up our life force; worse, we
actually give our life force to that with which we are struggling.
In order to have authority and power, we
have to subject ourselves to some other authority. And so we subject ourselves
to various leaders who we hope will teach us the secrets to power and who
provide the hope of promotion.
Of course, most of these leaders do not have
real power either. Their power depends upon what they can extract from their
followers and on their guile and rhetoric to spin the promises that keep people
in line.
We rise (fall) in the hierarchy of the
damned by giving up principle and by obeying our masters. If we do not shame
them, and if we give them our energy and life, they may reward us with position
from which we use the curse of hypnosis to direct others. Once we reach our
position, if we make the right noises, wear the right clothes, and look like
the tyrants of their past, they will follow us by transferring the allegiance
from tyrants and seducers in their past to us.
Even if we are troubled by this arrangement,
few of us have enough love to tell the truth—to wake people up to our pretense
and deception, and to reveal the tricks we use on them so that they might be
free of us.
If we did, we would lose power (the worldly
power to fool others) and worldly authority, and lose the respect others give
us in the worldly system.
I heard that in the Aramaic language, there
is a verb form of the word “faith.” In English we have only the noun “faith,” but
in Aramaic the action verb for operating in faith or expressing faith or doing
faith is a form of loving obedience. And how would this loving obedience be
expressed outwardly? It would be, first and foremost, patience. It would be
calmness and kindness, because we only become emotional when we are not
faithful.
In order to have power over anything, we
must remain connected to God. This occurs through meditating for mental
distance from the enticements and involvements of the world. By distancing ourselves
from the world, we are a little closer to the inner Light from God. And by
being closer to God, we can intuit and search out what is being wordlessly and
silently revealed to us. By finding the inner wordless Word and by then
remaining attentive to it (by not making anything too important), we can know
God’s will for us.
By believing and trusting in this inner way
of knowing, and by being obedient to it, we remain connected to the Source of
Power. We then become an instrument of His will, and he will make happen what
He wants to happen in His good time.
We become disconnected from this source of
living and knowing by
1.
Doubting it or doubting it even exists, and thereby turning to external
authorities, experts and their knowledge for answers.
2.
Seeking to do our own will instead of being willing to do God’s will.
3.
Becoming impatient with the quiet inner way of knowing and growing, and seeking
to make something happen.
4.
Becoming resentful. Resentment, being hatred or a denial of love, separates us
from the inner way (except it trails us as conscience). We sometimes experience
the loss of power and protection in a very palpable way.
When we become resentful, the force field of
protection collapses and negative forces rush in. Other people seem to have a
sixth sense abut our negativity, and they attack us at that point of
vulnerability. God’s guiding Light is a protective field, its power shields us.
But when we are resentful, we place ourselves in danger.
5.
Making something too important cuts us off from God’s protection and from the
power to do good. A person shuffling along, lost in thought or worry, is the
one who is most likely to be picked out as a victim for a mugging.
That person is self absorbed and self
preoccupied with trying to solve their own problems or in scheming and planning
for the future. Victimizers sense this and take advantage. Perhaps you can see
that even getting lost in thinking is, by its very nature, selfish and
faithless, and thus separates us from the power.
That’s why those who want to intimidate you
and have power over you seek to get you lost in thinking, analyzing, or
figuring things out. They often come up with some made up ailment or fault on
your part so they can make you self conscious and involved in trying to make
yourself better. Teachers who want power, parents who want to lord it over the
kids, government bureaucrats, experts hawking weight loss programs, and drug
manufacturers are examples of those who want you self conscious, striving, and looking
to them for answers. In short, they want you powerless. By being cut off from
your own ground of good, you have only emotional energy and a little money,
which they quickly relieve you of.
So once again, we have a divine paradox.
The person who tries to make something happen is the one cut off from the
power. The way to remain positive, protected and powerful is to not seek to
make things happen, not seek power, and not look to external authorities.
Faith is trusting in what is revealed to us
inwardly. And each revelation we have binds us more closely to God and to not
being willful ourselves. When we become upset, it because we have lost
confidence in God and His providence; or because we have lost confidence in
justice.
In either of these cases, we are tempted to
take matters into our own hands. The loss of faith leads to emotion. And
emotion becomes the energy of willfulness. We also are tempted to be emotional
when we are tempted to judge another. The action is resentment, a form of judgmental
willfulness. We also become emotional when we make something too important.
The resentful person, because resentment is
a forbidden act, is disobedient when to the law of love. Being disobedient, he
cuts himself off from God’s will.
He becomes empty, and the emptiness is
filled with emotion and mental images. Into this emptiness also come the kind
of suggestions that lead us into some wrong decision and wrong action.
Somewhere in the Epistles is said: All that
is not of faith is sin.
Let’s
now put all of this in terms of intuition. The aware person learns to question
thoughts and question emotions. He sees (intuits) that thoughts are misleading
and emotions are misleading. Because of this he does not follow them. By not
following them, he does not go in the wrong direction. In other words, he is
not led into disobedience. By not going the wrong way, he remains safe, ready
to go the right way when the door opens. God often makes things happen in a
mysterious way. Good comes into existence almost as if by magic without our
huffing and puffing and willful striving.
If you can grasp the above, then you can
realize why our willful activity actually gets in the way of grace. In
virtually every area of life, from career to raising our kids, from health to
actual salvation—we must learn to get out of the way, so that we do not block
grace.
This does not mean becoming a door mat. It
means learning how to be still and passive inwardly, so that we can be close to
the light. When we are close to the Light, we see deception and do not follow.
We remain aware and poised to do what is right, though not knowing what that
right is. All of a sudden, we do know, and effortlessly we make the right move.
This waiting (in faith) is a far cry from reacting
and then rushing to some tempting goal or rushing to try to clean up our own
mess.
We must be ready to receive grace, but as
long as we want to be the source of good ourselves, and as long as we are
unwilling to let go and let God, we are always getting in the way. Some of us
discover this fact, but we then put ourselves in the hands of experts and
educators who promise to restore us with knowledge, raise us up with knowledge,
and save us with knowledge.
Knowledge gets in the way of grace, just as
rote knowledge without understanding gets in the way of realizing and
discovery. No wonder our kids can’t learn today. It is because the most heavy
handed educators and evil seducer are in charge.
Thoughts and emotions are always rising to
save us. But what are they saving us from? They are saving us from salvation,
from seeing our wrong in the Light of Truth and being changed by that
realization.
Many people hear the truth, but instead of
quietly receiving it deeply, so deeply that it effects change, they instead run
it through the intellect or quickly say “yes, yes.” By quickly agreeing, they
give a shallow assent.
Once again, faith includes action: and the
proper action is sitting still and being quiet, letting the truth penetrate and
awaken us to the Truth within.
Along with His words and healings,
The reason their life improved is because
they knew they had no power to do anything good, least of all change themselves
or deal with the power of sin. As long as we are part of the worldly system,
and try with our own efforts or by the help of others to make ourselves well,
we do not have the power to rebuke sin or change our nature.
Those who realized their utter helplessness
and also believed
Today, we have the strange situation of many
so-called Christians saying all the right things, and yet there is no evidence
of power in their lives. This is because their belief is shallow. They have not
yet really believed into
The worldly preachers are looking for power
and so, the relationship is between them and their followers.
The followers are hypnotized by their leader
and they give him the power to direct them, in exchange for the glorious image
he gives them and the promises he has for them. The rapport between the leader
and followers is an ego rapport, based in emotion and deceit.