I've heard people say that they learned the truth of health and wholeness by being sick, the reality of abundance by suffering lack, the beauty of harmonious relationships by witnessing first hand the ugliness of discord. If that's the game plan they have chosen, fine, but doesn't it remind you of the old joke about someone who hit himself on the head with a hammer so it would feel good when he stopped? Many of us do that. We worship the hammer god as our way of experiencing the good life.
Why can't we accept the fact that positive living is the natural way — that this is a totally benevolent universe? For one thing, organized religion has told us something different, which means that we may have to do some deprogramming on ourselves to get straightened out. And that's why the bookstores are filled with great spiritual books. This isn't a knock against "the emotion of reverence" — Emerson's definition of religion. I am simply saying that we have to move past the teaching that says we were all conceived in sin with a depraved nature destined for damnation.
Another reason for our unacceptance of total good is that unnatural experiences with people in and out of the family unit may have conditioned us to expect something less than positive in life. This is why closing the door to the past and throwing away the key is crucial — to be followed by a complete change of attitude about life and living.
Thinking As Truth
How do we change our attitude? Instead of thinking about Truth, let's think as Truth. How do we do this? Ask yourself the next time a problem arises: How would the only Self look at this situation? What is my Reality seeing and saying? That's what brings forth the Divine Realization that all is perfect now — not to come in the future, but NOW!
Why do we, subjectively perhaps, blame God for the traps on the path? Because we believe, rightly, that God's Will is the only Power, that God's Authority is Absolute, and God's Law is the only Cause. BUT...what does God will, authorize, and cause? Certainly not sickness, scarcity, or suffering. We just don't have a mean old God. The only God there is is the Law, the Principle, the Author, the Revealer of Wholeness, Abundance, and Happiness. Ah, maybe it's time to change Gods.
Looking For Reasons, Rather Than Solutions
When something seems to go wrong, we look for a "reason" — some sort of cause and effect relationship. Does Self waste time doing that? No. The trend of downward thinking emanating from the ego does that. (Remember that the ego is not a mind. It's only a false belief held in consciousness, which can be changed.) Maybe we decide that the problem has been caused by our rebellion against authority, or a fear of the future. Whatever it is, we set it up on a throne by giving it our attention. We make it a god, thus implying that there is more than one Mind, one Presence, one Power.
For example, I knew an allergy sufferer once who was told that his sneezing and sniffling must be the result of low self-worth. He immediately began to look for reasons why his self-esteem had diminished. Probably began as a child, he thought, when his father told him he couldn't do anything right. So he becomes angry at father. Then he remembered an action he had taken on the job, which his employer had frowned upon. Must be that. Becomes resentful toward employer. Squirrel-cage continues. He was focusing on the problem, not the solution, and his mind zeroed in on the ideas of uselessness, fruitlessness, and futility.
Let's Look Within
Going all the way back to Sanskrit, we find that the root word of god is invoked one. Invoke means to call forth, to summon. So in this context, God is whatever we call forth and give power to. Is that what some of us are doing? Summoning the god of sickness to teach us wholeness, the god of scarcity to show us the truth of abundance, the god of unemployment to find our true place?
The answer? We know, you know. It's to deal only with The God, the Almighty, the Father-Mother Supreme Being, our Creator, Who has expressed in the fullness of the Godhead as the True Self of everyone. The one who also goes by such names as Abundance, Bliss, Cause, Deliverer, Essence, Fulfillment, Grace, Harmony, Inspiration, Joy, Knowledge, Life, Magnificence, Nourisher, Order, Peace, Quickener, Reality, Splendor, Truth, Understanding, Victory, Wisdom, XP, Yes!, and Zest.
Let's put our attention on The God Within — that field of infinite, positive, ready-for-immediate-expression possibilities. This is not something separate from us, it is WHAT we are. And in this Energy Field there are no problems because its nature — our nature — is total perfection.
We don't seek a healing; we seek the understanding that there is nothing to heal. We don't try to demonstrate abundance, but rather we realize that we ARE abundance. As the very Kingdom of God, we are never unemployed, uncreative, uninspired, unfulfilled, or unable to do what we came to this plane to accomplish.
The next time we feel less than we are, let's remind ourselves (1) Spirit does not feel anger, fear, guilt, insecure, confused, rejected, or whatever the negative emotion is, (2) I am Spirit, and therefore (3) I cannot experience that emotion.
We are not effect, we are Cause, and as Cause, we can stop fooling around with false gods, which means that we don't have to experience the darkness to understand the Light. Let's be free because we are.
Recommended book by this author:
Practical Spirituality
by John Randolph Price.
Info/Order this book (revised edition)
About The Author
John Price and his wife, Jan, are the founders of the Quartus Foundation. This article was reprinted with permission from the Foundation's newsletter, "The Quartus Report". You may contact The Quartus Foundation at PO Box 1768, Boerne, TX 78006-6768 or visit their website: www.quartus.org for more information on workshops and other books.
