The Moment When Life Begins

A Course in Miracles tells us that in all moments we are making a choice between love and fear.  It is very simple, really.  All we have to do is choose love now.  And in the next moment, choose love now.

"When you look upon all things without judgment through the eyes of forgiveness, when you decide to embody only the reality of Love no matter what anybody else is doing, that is when life begins."  --The Way of Mastery p.79

Only we can be the master of our thought.  No one else can get inside our head. We must be the one to cease the endless fear thoughts the ego stirs up.   At times, this may seem difficult to do, however, this is only the fearful thinking of the ego, trying to convince us it can't be done.  It can be done. It must be done.

And what is our reward for this effort?  Why, it's peace, of course.  It's love. Happiness. Joy.

It's a chance to leave this "hell on earth" we create in our very own minds and enter into Heaven right here in our own daily lives.  Right here. Right now.

In most moments, most days, it's just a matter of noticing our thoughts.  When fear creeps in, when judgment takes over, we can make another choice.  "Choose again", as A Course in Miracles says. We can make that choice to flip the switch from fear to love.

Choose again.

But...some days it's harder to flip the switch.

Occasionally the darkness descends and won't be transcended easily.  When this happens, ask the Holy Spirit to help.  Give all your fearful thoughts over to the Holy Spirit.  If it helps, visualize yourself actually handing them over.  Or create a huge white light altar and place your fear upon it.  Spirit will take it from you and cleanse your mind. Sometimes this cleansing happens instantly.  Sometimes this process can take hours.  Vow to sit right where you are until your thinking clears.  Wait it out.  Every time a fear thought comes, turn it over.  Do it again and again if you have to. Here's an affirmation you can use:

"I accept the love of God."

Repeat this over and over.  Then spend some time just quietly listening with no expectations of hearing anything.  If there is anyone you can forgive for anything, do it.  Work at this process diligently, and I promise you, the fear will pass.  Love thinking will return.

Does this seem difficult?  Uncomfortable?  Insane?  Actually, it's insanity to live in torment, when a choice for peace exists.  It's insanity to live in fear when a choice for love exists.  There are people all over this planet choosing love, right now.  Join us.

This is when life begins.  

Do you wish people well when they walk through the streets of your mind?

Or is your mind a mind field?

When you think of others, do you think with attack or love?

Is your mind a dangerous place for others?  If so, it is also a dangerous place for you.

What you give out, you get back.
If your mental habit is to attack and judge others, then...
you will be attacked and judged by others.

What are you offering to the world?
When your mind is a dangerous place, you are creating a world of fear.

When your mind holds love, you are creating a world of love.

Your thought is under your own dominion.
You choose your thoughts.
Don't let them choose you.
When attack thoughts come...
Choose again.  Make a choice for love.

Again and again.  Make another choice.
Create the habit of choosing love.  Always.
Let love and a better world be your legacy.

This is how you create happiness.
Happiness in the world around you.
And happiness in your own mind.

Choose Acceptance for Peace

There is a larger plan for us and our lives are carefully orchestrated to lead us to love.  In every decision, choice and pathway, love is always an option.  In fact, our ultimate and true purpose here is to learn to make that choice for love every time.

And, as it says in A Course in Miracles, we don't really know what anything we see in the world around us is for.  Sometimes life seems confusing.  It may not always look like we are being taken care of.  In our human smallness, there is just too much that we cannot know.  However, if we always look for that choice for love, we can know that we are on the pathway to peace and happiness.

"What could you not accept, if you but knew that everything that happens, all events, past, present and to come, are gently planned by One Whose only purpose is your good?" --A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 135

Sometimes that choice for love is in simply accepting the world around us as we see it.  We drop our defenses, quit battling with life and just breathe and accept.  It is never going to be the world our egos want it to be.  And, in fact, our egos don't have our higher interests are heart anyway.  What the ego wants is not necessarily the best for anyone involved.

So stop desperately wanting to get ahead.  Stop the constant wishing for a thinner body or a lottery win.  The answer is not in a fancier car, lower cholesterol, a fatter pay check or a better love life.  All the worldly things you desperately long for will never bring you the life you actually want.  Putting all your energy into planning, controlling, spinning, lamenting, begging and nudging the details of your life to become the life you wish it was will never work.  And here's the proof of this...has it worked so far?

The life you actually want comes through acceptance, forgiveness and love.   The world around you is the one that has been chosen for you, by you and with you.  It is the world that is very best suited to lead you to peace.  Make that choice for love in every moment you can today.  Just love and accept what you see around you today.  No need to judge it.  It's all good.  Forgive what bugs you and accept the rest.

And when you wake up tomorrow, make that choice for love again.

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Happiness is Something You Decide On

"The 92-year old, petite, well-poised and proud lady, who is fully dressed each morning by eight o'clock, with her hair done and makeup applied, even though she is legally blind, moved to a nursing home today. Her husband of 70 years recently passed away, making the move necessary.

After many hours of waiting patiently in the lobby of the nursing home, she smiled sweetly when told her room was ready. As she maneuvered her walker to the elevator, I provided a visual description of her tiny room, including the eyelet sheets that had been hung on her window. “I love it,” she stated with the enthusiasm of an eight-year-old having just been presented with a new puppy. 

“Mrs. Jones, you haven’t seen the room ...” 

“That doesn’t have anything to do with it,” she replied. “Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn’t depend on how the furniture is arranged, it’s how I arrange my mind. I already decided to love it."  --The above story came from Chapter Two Blog .   

Mrs. Jones knows something big.  And this is something that most of us go our entire lives without learning.  Mrs. Jones knows that our thoughts are the one thing in life that we have complete and utter control over.  How we chose to look at the world is the one choice that is ours to make.  Mrs. Jones knows that each of us has the wherewithal to choose to allow only thoughts that ultimately contribute to our happiness to fill our minds.   

Choosing to be happy means that we choose to accept everything that occurs in our lives, even blindness. 

Choosing to be happy means that we learn to trust that whatever occurs is ultimately for our greater good, if we will only let it unfold, watching it with love and acceptance.

Choosing to be happy means that we let go of our habit of judging.  We stop judging the people we encounter, we stop judging the events that occur in our life and we stop judging the world and its conditions.

Choosing to be happy means that we commit to work to forgive the source of our disappointments, pains, losses, lack, discomfort, unhappiness, sadness, frustrations and fear, whatever it may be.  

Choosing to be happy means that it is okay for us to experience and feel real pain and hurt when it shows up in our lives.  It's okay to grieve.  It's okay to gnash ones teeth.  It's okay to howl with frustration.  But then, we release it and move on.  we don't fixate and get stuck in victim-hood.  We forgive.   

Choosing to be happy means that we develop a forgiveness lifestyle, that we practice forgiving whatever pushes our buttons each day in our present, that we forgive the painful events from our past and that we work to uncover the "false beliefs" that we have created as the result of these past events that are creating upsetting, confusing and painful patterns in our present.

And finally. choosing to be happy means that we flip the switch in our mind whenever the ego rears it's ugly head.  We flip the switch from fear to love.  We choose to think with Spirit in our minds.  Whenever we notice that the ego has returned with its thoughts of fear and worry, sadness and disappointment, frustration and anger, hurt and despair...we process, we inquire, we dig deep into our pasts to find the source of these thoughts, we examine, we feel and we release.  And then we kick the ego to the curb and get on with our happy lives.  

Withholding Love

On a quantum level, we are all joined.  All minds are joined.  That means that when we refuse to forgive someone, or when we judge someone, on a sub-conscious level, they know.

A while back I read about experiments with plants where love and praise was lavishly given or withheld.  In the studies, each family was given a plant and asked to keep it on their kitchen table where it would be seen frequently by all member of the family.  Half of the families were asked to praise and give love to the plants each time they entered the room.  "I love you.  You are beautiful.  You are magnificent.  You are a wonderful addition to our home."

The other families were asked to scold and ignore the plant.  "I hate you.  You are ugly.  Why are you even here?"

What happened?  The loved plants flourished and the despised plants died.  Yes, they DIED!

Let's talk for a moment about what happens to others when we either refuse to forgive or we forgive them (in tomorrow's post I will talk about what happens to ourselves).  If we choose to judge others harshly, they do suffer.  Everyone of us knows how it feels to be in someone's bad graces.  This suffering also happens on an unseen level.  Whether they know consciously that we are not forgiving them, they do know sub-consciously.  Remember that only a small part of our awareness is conscious.  The much bigger part of us is sub-conscious.  Just like the plants, any people we choose not to forgive will suffer.

On the other hand, when we choose to forgive, they heal.  Consciously, they may not know why, and we may not know why, but when we forgive others it changes them.  Forgiveness means focusing loving feelings towards others.  Love changes everything.

In The Hidden Messages of Water, Dr. Emoto proved that thoughts and feelings affect physical reality.  "By producing different focused intentions through written and spoken words and music and literally presenting it to the same water samples, the water appears to change its expression." --What the Bleep Do We Know?

Water Crystals Given Love and Gratitude

Water Crystals Played Heavy Metal Music

We may think that holding grievances is a harmless, neutral act, but it is not.  When we refuse to forgive, we are actually HARMING others.  

I really don't want to be that person.  I don't want to harm anyone, really, even annoying people.  I can see clearly that it is my job just get over it!  I must not allow myself to feel provoked, injured or even annoyed by anyone because I don't want to do harm.  

Join me in non-violent thought!

Flip the Switch

Forgiveness is a matter of flipping the switch.  We go from fear to love.  From attack to generosity.  From thinking with the ego to thinking with Spirit.  From thoughts of torment, worry and trouble to thoughts of calm and inner peace.

At first, it's difficult to flip the switch.  We love our grudges.  They are cherished by us and we think we'll be giving up something we need if we release them.  But actually, they are nothing.  They bring us only pain.  Once released, we are happier.

With practice, we find it easier to just drop our grievance thinking and forgive.  Like anything else in life, the more we do it, the better we get at it.  Forgiveness becomes easy.  Most importantly, as we live the rewards of forgiveness we watch the happiness growing in our lives.  The more it grows, the more we want to forgive.

So come on, come on....get happy!

Start your happiness today.  For an easy guided forgiveness process, download Forgive Someone NOW for $2.99, here. You can load it onto your computer and then sinc it into your smart phone to listen to on head phones at night before you go to sleep.

Or download a copy of "Forgiveness is the Key to Happiness";

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What do you Choose?

"Nothing outside yourself can hurt you, or disturb your peace or upset you in any way."  --A Course in Miracles Lesson 70, Workbook

It's all a matter of choice.  How do we choose to see the world?  If we choose to see it through the eyes of forgiveness, the world will treat us gently.  If we choose to hold grievances, the world will continue to seem to be a fearful place. 

When we forgive, we are trusting God and knowing that everything we experience is for our greater good.  Sometimes it can be hard to understand this, especially when we are in the midst of  what seems nightmarish.  However, almost always, a purpose behind the pain comes clear at a later time.

In the meantime, we can look at the painful situations we have drawn to us and meditate on what we can learn from then.  What can we accept and forgive here?  How is this situation helping us to grow and purify and come to know more of love?

 

 

 

 

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