predencia

‘I am as God created me.’

We will repeat today’s idea from time to time. For this one thought would be enough to save you and the world, if you believed that it is true. If you remain as God created you, appearances cannot replace the truth, health cannot turn to sickness, nor can death be substitute for life, or fear for love. All this has not occurred if you remain as God created you.

The healing power of today’s idea is limitless. It is the birthplace of all miracles. Practice today’s idea with gratitude. This is the truth that comes to set you free. For your five-minute practice periods, begin with this:

I am as God created me. His Son can suffer nothing.
And I am His Son.

This is the second time this lesson’s come up. It was also lesson 94. Obviously we need to be reminded that we are as God created us. It was a hectic day (coaching, meetings and a Zumba class) and I didn’t always remember to remind myself that I am as God created me, but when I did I felt like I was having an energy rush. Seriously. I think it was the bit about health and life and love and the fact that these are what is really true.

I had to draw heavily on the lesson when I had my conversation with my car insurance company, who tried to tell me my car wasn’t registered with DVLA. Here is a tip. If you don’t check your car insurance document when you get them…I urge you to. There is every possibility that they could have put down the wrong number plate, and it is your responsibility to alert them to it. Of the five people I asked today if they checked their documents only one said yes.

It’s amazing, when I feel someone is trying to make me out to be an idiot, my hackles come right up. I was right in the middle of it today when I remembered…if I am as God created me then no-one can make me feel like an idiot. Actually, as it turned out, the person I was speaking to didn’t understand her own company’s process. Just in time I remembered that what I give out I get back. I simply asked politely to speak to her supervisor, who did understand the process. I sent my first contact love and wished her well with her next call…actually it was much later when I remembered to do that.

I went to a 2 hour charity Zumba event tonight, (see separate blog) organised by Shok Out Dance Fitness in aid of an Ethiopian children’s project – Butterflies. It was hard work. I sweated like a pig, and felt it better to declined the invitation to go to the bar afterwards. No point driving everyone else out.

‘I rest in God.’

We ask for rest today, and quietness unshaken by the world’s appearances. We ask for peace and stillness, in the midst of all the turmoil born of clashing dreams. We ask for safety and for happiness, although we seem to look on danger and on sorrow.

‘I rest in God.’ This thought will bring you the rest and quiet and stillness and the safety and the happiness you seek. ‘I rest in God.’ This thought has power to wake the sleeping truth in you, whose vision sees beyond appearances to that same truth in everyone and everything there is.

In Him you have no cares and no concerns, no burdens, no anxiety, no pain, no fear of future and no past regrets. In timelessness you rest, while time goes by without its touch upon you. You rest today. And as you close your eyes, sink into stillness. Let these periods of rest and respite reassure your mind that all its frantic fantasies were but the dreams of fever that has passed away.

Each time that you take your rest today, a tired mind is suddenly made glad, a bird with broken wings begins to sing, a stream long dry begins to flow again. The world is born again each time you rest, and hourly remember that you came to bring the peace of God into the world, that it might take its rest along with you.

You rest within the peace of God today, quiet and unafraid. Each brother comes to take his rest, and offers it to you.

There was so much I had planned to do today, but I heeded the lesson and rested in God. Maybe it was the reflexology treatment yesterday, or the massage or the combination of the two, but I felt very chilled, not wanting to rush around. There really is something exquisitely peaceful when you quieten the clatter of everyday life. Of course most of the clatter goes on in one’s head. Today I found a way to silence a thought that had been very stubborn in its presence. I reframed the experience as a beautiful holiday and found much comfort and pleasure in it, instead of anxiety and worry.

In timelessness you rest, while time goes by without its touch upon you. I chuckled at this as I thought about my age-reversing experiment. Taking steps back to 25. Each day when you do not get any older is a day when time passed you by without touching you.

I decided to give the Fitness Boot Camp a miss and postponed a visit to a friend. I had only two phone calls, and spent a lot of time on my own, editing. I hadn’t realised before, that editing is a highly reflective activity, but I’m going to have to put my skates on if I’m going to get it off to the publisher by Sunday.

Tomorrow night I’m doing a two hour charity Zumba class with Shok Out Becks. Guess I won’t be doing much resting.

‘To give and to receive are one in truth.’

Vision depends upon today’s idea. True light that makes true vision possible is not the light the body behold. It is a state of mind that has become so unified that darkness cannot be perceived at all. This is the light that shows no opposites, and vision being healed, has power to heal. This is the light that brings your peace of mind to other minds, to share it and to be glad that they are one with you and with themselves. This is the light that heals because it brings single perception, that giving and receiving are the same.

Today we practice with the special case of giving and receiving. To give is to receive. Today we will attempt to offer peace to everyone, and see how quickly peace returns to us. So we begin the practice periods with the instruction for today and say:

To give and to receive are one in truth.
I will receive what I am giving now.

Then close your eyes and for five minutes think of what you would hold out to everyone, to have it yours. You might for instance say:

To everyone I offer quietness.
To everyone I offer peace of mind.
To everyone I offer gentleness.

Say each one slowly and then pause a while, expecting to receive the gift you gave. And it will come to you in the amount in which you gave it.

Our very simple lesson for today will teach you much. Effect and cause will be far better understood from this point on, and we will make much faster progress now.

This is the lesson that keeps me on the straight and narrow. It was a MASSIVE one to grasp first time round, but once it sank in I could never again blame anything outside of me for my state of mind. ‘I will receive what I am giving now.’ And I’ve monitored it in my life from then. Always when I’m not getting something it’s because I’m not giving it, and conversely when I’m getting something unpleasant it’s because I’ve been giving it out.

If we’re being met with anger, its because we’re giving out anger. It may not be the open aggressive anger we’re experiencing from others, it may the kind that bubbles and boils on the inside, but energetically it is being returned to us.

On the other hand, if we’re being met with happy helpful people and situations, it’s because that’s what we’re giving out.

The thing I learned from this was that if I am the cause of the effect, then there was no point trying to change the effect. I have to change the cause. If I want a different response from people I have to change the way I approach them, not keep my approach the same and expect something different from them. They are merely returning to me what I sent to them, fear, anger, mistrust, peace, love, joy.

Since practicing this as much as I can, I have indeed experienced miracles, but not without a fight from the ego.

Whenever you find yourself blaming somebody else for the way you are feeling just remind yourself that ‘I will receive what I am giving now.’ You too will be blamed for someone else’s feelings, and so the vicious cycle continues, until we decide to break it.

On another note: the editing is a little slow, but my Ceroc is coming on in leaps and bounds. I moved up to the intermediate class tonight, and was pretty much on the dance floor all night for the freestyle. I am missing belly dance but this is a great substitute for now. I’m going to keep it going when I start back at belly dance.

Pics are of Ceroc style dancers in Barbados. Would be great to be back there in the warmth.

‘Truth will correct all errors in my mind.’

What can correct illusions but the truth? And what are errors but illusions that remain uncategorised for what they are? Where truth has entered errors disappear. Can you imagine what a state of mind without illusions is? Try to remember a time – perhaps a minute, maybe even less – when nothing came to interrupt your peace; when you were certain you were loved and safe. Then try to picture what it would be like to have that moment be extended to the end of time and eternity. Then let the sense of quiet that you felt be multiplied a hundred times, and then be multiplied a hundred times more.

And now you have a hint, not just more than just the faintest intimation of the state of your mind will rest in when the truth has come. Truth does not come and go nor shift nor change. It does not hide. It stands open in light, in obvious accessibility. It is impossible that anyone would seek it truly and not succeed. Today belongs to truth. Give truth its due, and it will give you yours. You were not meant to suffer and to die.

Truth will correct all errors in your mind which tell you you could be apart from Him. To share His function is to share His joy. His confidence is with you as you say:

Truth will correct all errors in my mind.
And I will rest in Him Who is my Self

Then let him lead you gently to the truth, which will envelop you and give you peace so deep and tranquil that you will return to the familiar world reluctantly.

I did a lot of journaling today and had to face up to some pretty unpleasant truths about myself. Well, maybe not necessarily unpleasant, but certainly things I’ve been deceiving myself about. Lesson 105 about the guilt inducing nature of gifts has been spinning round in my head, and I’ve been rooting out where I give gifts with the expectation of them being returned with interests.

With the uncovering of this came the truth that sometimes these are bound up with issues of control and manipulation. It was quite sobering, and a little frightening, because I thought I’d overcome these issues some time ago.

I carried the lesson with me on a bit of paper and asked for the truth frequently. Whether it’s because I’m more rested, or because I spent most of the day editing, I had a very peaceful day. I remember a time nearly two years ago where I lived in the space between two worlds for a few days, where I found that deep and tranqjuil peace and was indeed reluctant to return to the familiar world. But I was willing to accept that my work here is not yet complete and agreed to stay for a while longer. My aim is to get back to that place on a permanent basis. I believe truly that we are not meant to suffer and to die.

The editing is flowing. I think it was good to take a complete break from it. My aim is to have it with the publisher by the end of the week.

‘Let me be still and listen to the truth.’

If you will lay aside the ego’s voice, however loudly it may seem to call, if you will not accept its pretty gifts that give you nothing that you really want; if you will listen with an open mind, that has not told you what salvation is; then you will hear the mighty Voice of truth, quiet in power, strong in stillness, and completely certain in Its messages.

Be still today and listen for the truth. Be not deceived by voices of the dead, which tell you they have found the source of life and offer it to you for your belief. Attend them not, but listen to the truth. The bringer of all miracles need that you receive them first, and thus become the joyous giver of what you received.

Each hour’s exercises should begin with this request for your enlightenment:

I will be still and listen to the truth.
What does it mean to give and to receive?

Ask and expect an answer.

Today I was too tired to do anything but be still and listen to the truth, and put into practice yesterday’s lesson. I listened well to what it means to give and to receive. The answer was to give what I would like to receive, so I wrote to my friend in a manner that is not guilt laden and leaves the door wide open for the expression of love.

The thing with being willing to listen to the truth is that what you hear is not necessarily what you want to hear. It’s hard when you have to give up the ego and go with what is counterintuitive to the ego’s survival.

I’ve had five people’s comments on Betrayed, today being the deadline. I’m so grateful that so many people took the time to do this for me. Now begins the final editing before submitting it to the publisher.

‘God’s joy and peace are mine.’

God’s peace and joy are yours. Today we will accept them, knowing they belong to us. And we will try to understand these gifts increase as we receive them. They are not like the gifts the world can give, in which the giver loses as he gives the gift; the taker is the richer by his loss. Such are not gifts but bargains made with guilt. The truly given gift entails no loss. It is impossible that one can gain because another loses. This implies a limit and an insufficiency.

No gift is given thus. Such ‘gifts’ are but a bid for a more valuable return; a loan with interest to be paid in full, a temporary lending, meant to be a pledge of debt to be repaid with more than was received by him who took the gift. This strange distortion of what giving means pervades all levels of the world you see. It strips all meaning from the gifts you give, and leaves you nothing in the ones you take.

A major learning goal for this course has set is to reverse your view of giving, so you can receive. For giving has become a source of fear, and so you would avoid the only means by which you can receive. Accept God’s peace and joy, and you will learn a different way of looking at a gift. God’s gifts will never lessen when they are given away. They must increase thereby.

Today our practice periods will start a little differently. Begin today by thinking about those brothers who have been denied by you the peace and joy that are their right under the equal laws of God. Think of your ‘enemies’ a little while, and tell each one, as he occurs to you:

My brother, peace and joy I offer you.
That I may have God’s peace and joy as mine.

Now you are ready to accept the gift of peace and joy God has given you. Now you are ready to experience the peace and joy you have denied yourself. Now you can say, ‘God’s peace and joy are mine,’ for you have given what you would receive.

Phew! This was a tough one for me today! What amazes me constantly is how these lessons show up when I have just that issue going on in my life. I laughed out loud when I read this lesson today, because just last night I was grappling with the issue of whether it was better to contact a friend or make him suffer a little longer for breaking a promise. Should I phrase my contact in such a way as to make him feel guilty for being lax or just not make the contact at all? These were my thoughts prior to reading, ‘such are not gifts, but bargains made with guilt.’ And as I thought about losing face I read, ‘The truly given gift entails no loss. It is impossible that one can gain because another loses. This implies a limit and an insufficiency.

I realised that despite my intensive spiritual journey I still harbour thoughts of lack, of limit and insufficiency. For him to feel better I have to feel bad. Why can’t we both feel good? Because I was thinking I would have to give up something.

One other thing I’ve realised from doing this lesson today…I find it easier to give up material things – give them away as it were – than to give up emotional things. I had no idea losing face was still such a big thing for me. The layers seem never ending. Sometimes I hope to find that I’m peeling back a different onion, but NO, it is the same one I’ve been peeling back for years. The thing is I didn’t realise how big it was at the start.

Second day at the conference was heaps better than yesterday, although the first session I attended initially promised much of the same, (I walked out on the basis that I didn’t have too many hours of my life to waste listening to poorly presented and irrelevant words) I went instead to check out the book stall and bought two books. Caribbean Erotic and Dog-Heart. (see pics) The situation was totally reversed in the afternoon and ended on a real high. (See separate blog on the event).

Unfortunately my camera battery went dead and I couldn’t get any photos from the day. I hope the clips I filmed of the story telling and music performance by ABELA on my phone is usable.