Friday, March 20, 2009

Highlights of 3/19 meeting

I have included a lot of information here. I have written this as an ongoing resource to keep you informed about group discussions, to supplement your readings at any level and speed you desire, and to generate related comments, discussions and questions during the time between meetings. "Take what you need and leave the rest behind." - Rev. Cheryl

Prosperity Project

Readings:

Treatment for Unexpected Income

God is my Source and Good. I am one with the power and presence of the universe that is God. This divine presence as Spirit within me is the source and substance of all my good. I recognize that all that exists in the visible world of form comes from the invisible world of Spirit. My consciousness of Spirit as my unlimited source draws to me a flow of greater abundance and unexpected income. With love and joy I accept my increased good now. And so it is.

Treatment for Supply by Dr. Ernest Holmes

A treatment after this manner should prove the law of abundance in the life of those who use such statements, and believe in them:

"I am surrounded by pure Spirit, by God, the Living Spirit. My thought is God thought, and it is the law unto that thing where unto it is spoken. Everything that I do shall be a success. I am led, guided and inspired by the Living Spirit of Love and of right action. I am compelled to move in the right direction and to always know what to do, where, and how to do it. "I am surrounded by right action. I am filled with the consciousness of right action. Right action is success in all that I undertake to do. I am successful in all my undertakings, and I am compensated for all my efforts. I am surrounded by Substance, which is always taking the form of supply and always manifesting Itself to me in the form of whatever my need may be at the time. "I always have an abundance of money and an abundance of whatever it takes to make life happy and opulent. There is a continuous movement toward me of supply, of money, of all that I need to express the fullest life, happiness and action. "I have an inner understanding of my place in the Universe. I know that it is unique. The Divine has not incarnated in anyone else in just the same individual way that It has in me. I am unique and forever individualized. Therefore, I do not need to imitate anyone or to long for the good that belongs to another. All good is now mine and is now manifest in my experience. I do not compete with anyone, for I am and remain forever myself. This self is united with all selves, but is always an individual and a unique self. "There is that in me which all people recognize as worth while and desirable, and everyone whom I meet loves this self of mine and recognizes its worth. I draw all toward me and those whom I can benefit and those who can benefit me are irresistibly drawn toward me. I do not strain, will or coerce. I know. The Truth makes me free from the fear of poverty or bondage, and emancipates me from the thought of limitation. I see that money, like everything else that is desirable, must be a spiritual idea, and I know that I have this idea right in my mind at this moment, I shall always have this idea of abundance. It is mine and I take it. "The opportunity for self-expression and compensation is always open to me and I am at all times compelled to know, accept and operate upon this opportunity. I have abundance because I am abundance. "All that the Father hath is mine."And So It Is. Amen.


Prosperity Discussion

Metaphysical Definition of Prosperity
Prosperity is more than having an abundance of money. It is knowing that there is One source of good that created everything in its image and likeness and also supports everything at its highest expression. So prosperity is knowing that we have an infinite and perpetual supply of health, wealth, beauty, joy, love, and wisdom. This supply comes from the invisible to the visible, from spirit into form, from first cause (the cause of all that is) into effect (everything that we see, hear, taste, smell, touch.) All we need do is to accept it into our experience.
To accept is to receive. - A Course in Miracles
It is done unto you as you believe. - Jesus
What is Meant by Unexpected Income
What is unexpected about unexpected income is the way it comes into our life. When we treat, we visualize with feeling that which we desire (love) to have more of in our experience, in this case, income. We are not the ways and means committee. We do not "figure out" how to bring this about. We merely see it in mind, then "let go and let God" bring it about through the higher channels. The result comes about through the element of delightful surprise. The surprise is not that we have set into motion the demonstration of another channel of income, for we are quite intelligent, creative and resourceful. The surprise is the way it came into our life. It is the nature of Spirit/God/Love to be spontaneous and creative.
Turning Away from Appearances of Lack and Limitation
Our thoughts create our experience. Everything we are now experiencing individually and collectively is the result of past thought, so to react to what we see around us is to stay stuck in the past. At every moment, we are capable of creating a new chain of causation with our thoughts and inspired action. So our project is about lifting ourselves, our thoughts and beliefs to a higher, more fulfilling level of experience, in Holmes' words into "a greater degree of livingness." We embody our new level of belief by stepping out in faith. As we take inspired action, all that we need is given us as we need it - in the form of information, people, opportunities, and additional resources.

Raising the Law of Averages
As we lift our thoughts to the Truth of our perpetual supply of good or well-being, we also raise the "law of averages" for the human race. There is a pool of thoughts in our subconscious mind representing every thought ever thought since the beginning of time. They average out to the current tendency of thought today. As we gain a greater degree of self-knowledge, we add this understanding, this wisdom to the pool of subconscious human thought, referred to by Jung as the collective unconscious and by Holmes as race consciousness. It is the nature of spiritual evolution for life to become more self-knowing, which results in a higher degree of volition, will and choice. The spiritual evolution comes first, the physical evolution follows from this mental equivalent.
This is a perfect segway into our Science of Mind reading.

Science of Mind Discussion

In our discussion of the nature of Spirit, Objectivity or the Self-Conscious Mind in metaphysical chart 1 last week, we completed the section on volition, choice and will and undertook additional research on the subtle differences between the three during the week.
In SOM 1926, Holmes defines these terms as follows:

Volition means the power of conscious choice.
Choice means the ability to choose consciously.
Will means decision coming into execution.
These terms are further elucidated in quotes by Holmes from other books in the Related
Readings section below.
Reading from SOM 1926:

Volition, choice and will must be attributes of Spirit. They
mean practically the same thing. We must be careful, however, not to think of
these qualities of Spirit in terms of human or limited thought. When we choose,
we choose between different things; but when Spirit chooses, It simply announces
that It is a certain thing. The Spirit does not have to will to make things
happen; things happen because it is the will of Spirit that they should be. This
will, then, is simply the execution of a purpose; and since Spirit is Absolute,
there can be nothing to deny Its Will. Choice, volition and will are necessary
and real attributes of Self-Existent Power; for without them there would be no
channel through which the Ideas of God could be expressed. In man these
qualities of mentality are limited but in God they are limitless.

POWER.--The energy by which everything lives.

LIFE.--Life means that Inner Something that makes everything
live. Life and Power are necessary attributes of a Limitless Being, and go hand
in hand to complete a Perfect Being. Life is That Which Lives, and Power is the
Energy with which It operates. Considering Life and Power as a combined quality
of Causation, we see that they combine to make the underlying basis of all
manifestation visible and invisible. In the objective world, Life is the Power
that binds everything together; It is the Intelligent Basis of all that exists.
For instance, in the material world, It is the Power that holds
the atoms together that they may produce form. In the mental world, It is the
Power that enables us to think; and in the Spiritual World, It is the Power that
enables us to live at all.
[Cheryl's comment: The following paragraph describes Holmes' view of evolution]

It appears that Life manifests on different levels. In the mineral world, and in the world of all material form, It seems to be unconscious; that is, It is not manifesting in a self-conscious state. We know, however, that a certain degree of intelligence
runs through all Creation. Chemical Affinity is a manifestation of Life as the
attraction of Itself to Itself. In plant life It seems to have a more developed
degree of consciousness. That is, It manifests in the vegetable world as a power
to express in one spot, but without volition to move about. This, however, does
not limit The Spirit but is simply one of the ways that It works. In the animal
world, we see different degrees of Life's manifestation, from the first cell
life up to Man. For instance, a dog is more intelligent than a fish, yet each
has the power to move about. The fish seems to move by instinct alone; the dog
appears to have some degree of conscious being, although there is a difference
of opinion on this score. At least, in most animal life, we find the ability to
move about and, either from instinct or self-choice, the ability to express a
certain degree of freedom. In man, Life expresses in terms of Volition and
Self-Will; It is manifesting at the level of Self-Consciousness. While The
Spirit, of Itself, must always know Itself, yet we are perfectly justified in
saying that It manifests on different levels. This does not limit The Spirit,
but on the other hand proves that It is really Limitless. For if It had to
manifest on one level only, It would then be limited, but because It can
manifest on as many levels as It wishes It is Limitless.

When Spirit manifests in the purely mechanical and material
world we say that It is Unconscious Life; when It manifests in the animal world
we say that It is manifesting in a state of simple consciousness; and when it
manifests in and through man we say that It is in a Self-Conscious State. As
this Self-Conscious state of man's mentality reaches a larger world of
realization and comprehends something of Its Unity with the Whole, we say that
It is in a Cosmic State. We now know of four different levels upon which Spirit
manifests:--Unconscious State, Simple-Consciousness, Self-Consciousness and
Cosmic-Consciousness. All of these are but different ways through which the One
Power operates. Life, then, is that quality of Being, running through all, which
enables anything to be what It is.
Related Readings
(1): Judge Thomas Troward
Holmes was heavily influenced by Troward's work on evolution but the two differed in their definition of involution and evolution. Troward's works include "The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science," http://thomastroward.wwwhubs.com/elomstitle.htm. "The Dore Lectures on Mental Science," http://thomastroward.wwwhubs.com/dore.htm, "The Law and the Word," http://manybooks.net/authors/trowardt.html, "The Hidden Power," http://manybooks.net/authors/trowardt.html, "Bible Mystery and Bible Meaning," "The Creative Process in the Individual, http://manybooks.net/authors/trowardt.html."
A biography of Troward is located at http://thomastroward.wwwhubs.com/.
(2): Choice, Volition, Imagination and Will quotes from Ernest Holmes:

Choice
We control our thoughts by our power of choice. We can deliber­ately refuse to entertain negative thoughts and choose the type of thought we will permit to
function through us.

In studying the order of human evolution, it seems certain that it was necessary – from the time humans were brought to a point of self-choice – that they be left alone to discover their true nature. If they are endowed with the attributes of self-choice and free will, they must be allowed to make this great discovery for themselves. Even God could not make a mechanical individual.

Man is an individual and that means self choice, backed by a power that will produce the thing chosen. In discovering himself, man chooses many things, uses them and passes to a higher choice, ever ascending in the scale of being. As fast as he chooses, he experiences the thing which he thinks about

We are at choice every moment. We cannot live a choiceless life; it is impossible. Every day, every minute, every second there is a choice. If it weren't we wouldn't be individuals. But there is a difference between choosing and outlining. We choose what we want but we trust the Law to determine how our choice is to come about, We are on the Planning Committee but we are not on the Ways and Means Committee.

In principle and in potential we are immersed in good for we are in the Mind of God. But we have freedom, or volition, to create in our own experience, out of the possibilities of life with which we have been endowed, the prerogative of heaven or hell. So we need to shake ourselves loose from the tyranny of fear and superstition and isolation and the emotional traditions.

The power of choice with which man has been endowed is either his greatest blessing or his greatest curse. Properly understood, it can lift him to the heights; misunderstood, it can drag him to the depths. He is free to choose anything which he wishes, but he must accept the responsibility for his choices, because inexorable Law will create his experiences according to his choices.

The word "CHOOSE" is one of the important words in this study. Every advance that has ever been made by anyone has been accomplished by a series of cold, conscious, deliberate choices, regardless of the way the person has felt. The feeling-life and the
reasoning-life are in conflict during the early days when one is taking up the Science of Mind, just as they are during childhood.

But you may ask, “Why would an Almighty Power and a Divine Intelligence permit such possible disaster?” This is something that you and I have no control over. God, or the Creative Genius of the universe, has placed this prerogative in the mind of man through giving him volition and choice. God Himself could not will it otherwise.
For, if there is to be a valid choice, it must be accompanied by the possibility of more than one thing to choose.

Choose calmly and dispassionately the images of thought we wish to embody, that we may finally govern environment in which we are to live.

If we could just identify ourselves with life and forget death, with love and forget hate, with joy and forget misery, with peace and forget discord, with abundance and forget limitation, how wonderful it would be.

It is important that the student catch this fine distinction between the choosing life and the feeling life. Because it is the crux of the problem in making his move from the place where he is to the place where he wants to be.

We cannot keep the birds from flying over our heads, but we can prevent them from build­ing nests in our hair." We cannot prevent negative thoughts from seeking an outlet in our consciousness, but we can choose to admit only those thoughts which we desire. The student should remember that thoughts never come singly, but in pairs, for one is always the re­verse of the other. Whenever a negative thought comes to the mind, remember that no thought can force its way in until it is permitted, so just say, "I refuse that negative idea and accept its positive opposite which I know is there with it." We may think that we do not choose the thoughts that we entertain, but that is because a lifetime of nega­tive thinking has made the choosing of the negative an
automatic thing.

We choose to know the truth in spite of all outward appearances, we are prosperous, because riches within will produce riches without. So we say, "I've listened to lies long enough, and they've brought me misery. Right now I deny those false beliefs, and affirm the truth. I am prosperous, I am prosperous, because I choose to know that I am prosperous.

Volition

We are corning to recognize that there are forces which operate strictly and all
the time according to fixed laws, apparently without any volition upon their
part. At the same time it is observed that the highest force of all - the force
of thought - is a personal, volitional form of en­ergy.

Will

Will becomes the tool holding the creative power in place until it accomplishes
a definite object.

The will consciously decides what we are going to think, but it is never the real creative agency. If we think of the will as directive rather than creative, and think of the inner feeling of conviction as giving real life to our intention and receptivity, and also think of faith in the invisible as necessary to all our work, we shall probably have a right mental attitude and outlook.

The will is a conscious directive power but never seeks to compel. We should develop the ability to focus by definite intention rather than to concentrate by any form of coercion. In doing this, the will should surrender itself to the thought that once having given direction to the Creative Power, it must be willing to take any part in objective life that is necessary. It may now relax and permit the Power to work for it. It does not try to peer around the corner to see if the thing is really going to happen.

The will is a directive power rather than a creative agency. Man never really creates anything; he merely uses a Creative Force. This Creative Force is not coerced; it is recognized and used. It is the office of the will to hold thought in place long enough to do this. We combine and distribute the operation of a Power which already is.

The Great Life Principle is always surging to express Itself and needs no coercion. It does, however, need direction, just as we would direct electricity or any other natural force. The will is a tool, an implement. Backed by feeling and conviction, by acceptance and grateful recognition, the will permits the Great Creative Force to do something for us. It does not concentrate this Force, it merely looses It into definite action.

The will is given us to use as a directive agency but not as a creative force. The will never coerces, compels or supplicates; it merely comes into agreement with. It merely determines to hold thought in place long enough to permit right action to take place. [Cheryl's note: This is what Abraham refers to as the 68 second rule.]

The Will of God and the Nature of God are identical. Divine will for all is wholeness, peace and joy. The Will of God is always toward the more abundant life.

We should interpret the Will of God to be everything that expresses life without hurt. This seems to be a fair, logical, sane and intelligent criterion. Anything that will enable us to express greater life, greater happiness, greater power -- so long as it does not harm anyone -- must be the Will of God for us. As much life as one can conceive will become a part of his experience.

If we want to find out what the will of God is, we must find out what the nature of God is. If the nature of God is Wholeness, the will of God is Wholeness.

The Nature of God, the Will of God, and the Power of God are one and the same thing. It matters not that countless millions of people through endless generations have misinterpreted this Will of God, and thought that It meant limitation and suffering. The nature of God is demonstrated when It is understood. It is proved when It is known.

The will of God is that life be expressed more fully. Anything that will enable me to express greater life, greater happiness, greater power, so long as it doesn't hurt anyone, must be the will of God for me.

God’s Will for every person is Happiness, Peace, and Joy. [This is consistent with A Course in Miracles. "God's purpose for me is total happiness."] God’s Will for all creation is
Self-Expression, since creation is an expression of this invisible Cause which we call God, nor can it be considered to be anything else.

This teaching should not be confused with the idea that we can show people how to get what they want, regardless. True prayer must be, “Thy will be done,” but the
implication relative to the Will of God in this prayer is not a submission to the inevitability of evil or limitation; it is a knowledge that the Will of God is always GOOD.

So long as what we desire will bring no harm to anyone else and will enrich our own experience it cannot be opposed to the will of God. It is the nature of God to express Himself. It follows that the will of God and the nature of God are one.

If some sincere person says to you, “Then if all this is true, I can do exactly as I please since God has no Will for me,” explain to him again that God’s Will and God’s Nature are One, and one part of God’s Nature is the immutable Law of Cause and Effect. Every man must reap as he sows.

The will of God is peace. Only the finite is confused; the Infinite remains certain of Itself.

The Will of God and the Nature of God are identical, since God could have no will opposed to His nature. Hence, if God is wholeness, peace and joy, then the Divine Will for all is wholeness.

God’s Will is always toward Life and more Life.

There is no will of God for you. Today there are still some very beautiful souls who say, “If it is God’s will that I prosper, then I will prosper.” That is sincere, but not clear thinking. For if we believe that it is God’s will that we suffer, we would never go to the dentist or doctor, or take any constructive action about our welfare. God’s will could not be different from God’s nature. If we want to find out what the will of God is, we must find out what the nature of God is. If the nature of God is Wholeness, the will of God is Wholeness. If the natural order is Beauty, we will discover that the will
of God is toward the beautiful. It is toward living and not death, because the nature of God is Life. “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.” The will of God is Truth, Beauty, Love, Happiness, Wholeness. Therefore, our intelligence bears witness that our inspiration is true.

When I say “the will of God” I mean the nature of Being, because that is the will of God. God cannot will anything other than His own nature, and the will of God is the
spontaneous nature of God everywhere. Therefore, the will of God is for the creativeness of man – the manifestation of the Divine in what we call the human
– and that will cannot be more for one person than another.

What is God's will? The Will of God must be consistent with the Nature
of God. The Nature of God is Wholeness: the nature of Wholeness is Happiness:
the nature of Happiness is Peace; the nature of Peace is Harmony; and the nature
of Harmony is Joy… The Nature of God, the Will of God and the Power of God are
one and the same thing.

We must patiently, persistently, and insistently show people that the Will of God cannot be toward anything other than that which is Good; that the Will of God and the Nature of God are identical and must forever remain so; that there is nothing in the Universe which opposes their Good except their misuse of the Law which of Itself is Good. This Law must present Itself to each individual according to his belief.

The Nature of God, is Perfect; therefore the Will of God, which can never be
divorced from God’s Nature, must always be a Will toward our Wholeness, Peace,
Poise, Power, and Self-Expression.

If we try to will things to happen or spend too much time in strenuous mental concentration, we are likely to defeat the very purpose we wish to attain. The very strenuous approach is a denial of the spontaneous flow of the Power we are using. We must free the mind from all anxiety.

Metaphysical practice is not the use of will power, not is it an exercise to develop the will to the extent that one can concentrate on a given thought or object for some period of time. That kind of will, though popularly thought of as attending metaphysical practice, is contrary to the way in which Life operates. We use the will merely to decide what it is we are going to do. [It may appear as if Holmes and Abraham differ on this point. Given that Abraham is into "going with the flow" and talks about the "art of allowing," my take is that the 68 seconds is not about forced concentration, but rather about relaxing into a state of non-oppositional thought. This would be a good research project for someone.]

Will power has nothing whatever to do with success or prosperity. The abundant life is the result of the operation of Law. We cannot conceive of any amount of will power having anything to do with two and two making four. All the will we need is the knowledge that they do make four.

The will is directive but not creative. Will is the conscious, directive power of the
intellect and as such has a very important place in the creative order but in no
case is it to be used as though it could force things to happen.

Because the will is a directive, not a creative force, you should use will to keep your
mind and your thoughts focused. Do not use will in an attempt to force things to
happen. [ We will discuss more the difference between force and focus. The book "Power v. Force" by David Hawkins gets into this and would be good supplemental reading.] The Law, having been given a direction, is what causes things to happen.- Will is an instrument of the intellect, not of the imagination. Use your will in making decisions and your feeling and imagination in bringing power to them. Remember that when imagination and will are in conflict, imagination invariably wins. This is because emotion strikes deeper in the wellsprings of being than does the intellect. [Important point to discuss.]

The will gives us the self-control not to compel nor to coerce, but to live in constant agreement with our own word.

The function of the will is to direct the imagination. Will is directive. Imagination is creative.

Your strength of will is never going to heal a single soul. All your reading and knowledge, all your “understanding” will never budge one obstacle, unless it is seen at its true worth and in its true place.

It is the office of the will and the intellect to consciously decide and choose what we want to think about; it is the office of the imagination to feel the reality of what we are thinking about. [Another important point for discussion.]

We do not use willpower and the will is directive, not creative. Concentration of
thought is not an effort to compel, but the desire to permit, the stream of Creative Energy to take definite form.

This process is not so much a problem of will as it is one of willingness. The only important role the will plays is in a decision to keep thought poised long enough to permit the law to operate. This is not a prayer of beseechment but a recognition or acknowledgment of right action.

The Power that is within you is the Power of your word operated upon by Law. This Power is not so much a will as it is a willingness. You will never have to will things to happen; you will merely have to know that they are happening.

We must not lose sight of the fact that what we are talking about has nothing to do with will power. We are not forcing anything to happen. We do not coerce God. We cooperate. As we recognize God’s universal nature as good, as the source of all abundance, and as the perfection that resides behind all life, then we may come to accept all these things. We do not create them of ourselves. We accept them, and in our acceptance of them they are manifested in and as our experience.

You will never have to will things to happen; you will merely have to know they are happening.

Willpower is not man's strongest force. The imagination is far more potent than the will, and when properly understood is the directing force behind the will, which gives
will all its drive. [!]

Imagination
We should use our imagination, will and emotion to the end that we shall have freedom instead of bondage, joy instead of unhappiness, peace in the place of confusion.

Creation is accomplished, not by compulsion, but through imagination, using only enough will in the process to hold thought in one place long enough to permit a definite creation to take place.

Life is infinite energy coupled with the limitless creative imagination. It is the
invisible essence and substance of every visible form. Its nature is goodness, truth, wisdom and beauty, as well as energy and imagination.

When we use our creative imagination in strong faith, it will create for us, out of the One Substance, whatever we have formed in thought. In this way man becomes a
Co-Creator with God.

The power of the imagination lies in the fact that it is the CREATIVE activity….Creative activity follows vision. In the beginning of any creative series, God contemplates the image of that which He desires to create, and it manifests because any image steadily contemplated is bound to manifest. [Compare with Abraham's Law of Deliberate Creation.] Man likewise holds an image, then superimposes upon it another conflicting image, and they both tend to come forth, neither one clear and sharp. Thus the multi­plicity of images hinders the average person in his quest for progress.

The urge to live creatively comes from the urge of the Divine Imagination which pushes Itself out through us into self-expression. This is man’s nature. He neither made it nor can he change it. He is compelled to live under its law.

Since imagination can be pre-empted by fear, with the result that we are kept from our rightful heritage, we can reverse this process.

In the Science of Mind, we make use of imagination to help us rise to the heights-- the uninstructed man uses it to pull him down to the depths.

A person trying to break destructive habits or to build
constructive new hab­its through will-power will find that he can solve his
habit problem through the right use of the imagination. [How can we apply this to our lives?]

Q: Relative to one another, what parts do will and imagination play in treatment?
A: Each is just as important as the other. When the imaging faculty is used in treatment of illness or in harmony, it recognizes only the true body of perfection which the Perfect Life has made. - The imaging faculty of the mind is creative; it
builds and molds; it makes the mental form, conceives the desire consciously or
unconsciously. But maintaining this recognition of perfection is the work of the
will. Without direction by the will, imagination becomes mere day-dreaming.

Since imagination is older than will, it follows that it is deeper-seated in conscious­ness than is the will, and a logical corollary of this is that imagination is therefore far stronger than will. Therefore, in any conflict between the imagination and the will the imagination is bound to win. [!]

The imaging faculty of the mind is creative; it builds and molds; it makes the mental form, conceives the desire consciously or unconsciously. But maintaining this recognition of perfection is the work of the will. Without direction by the will, imagination becomes mere day-dreaming.

The imagination and feeling are creative where the will is only directive. So the
will, the imagination, and the feeling must come into conjunc­tion, into mutual agreement, before there is a right mental life.

If we could see ourselves as perfect, in our creative imagination, thus inducing in mind a subjective equival­ent of perfect being, our health would automatically improve. [Any examples?]

2 comments:

  1. I appreciated the collected wisdom expressions & your comments. I believe you understand what you shared, so that is mighty.
    The amount of thought is more than a night's consideration.
    Love,
    Jim

    ReplyDelete