Category Archives: True self

I Am What I Think

Posted on by under Healing, spiritual awakening, Spiritual light, Spirituality, True self

 

We are what we think. This idea goes back centuries. It has been used to encourage people to put spirit first; it has been used as a way to get ahead in business. Here are some quotes about how our thinking affects our reality:

  • Proverbs 23:7: For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he.
  • Henry Ford: If you think you can do a thing or think you can’t do a thing, you’re right.
  • Buddha: We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves.
  • Albert Einstein: The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.
  • Earl Nightingale: You become what you think about all day long.

Some have been skeptical about the power of thought. Lao Tzu held an interesting view: “Stop thinking, and end your problems.”

Some spiritual teachers warn about the tricks and trapdoors that come with too much intellectualization. A friend recently said, “Don’t trust the intellect except as it comes from the heart.

My favorite quote about the power of thought comes from “The Course in Miracles” on the subject of vision and wholeness. You’ll find it in Lesson 56, paragraph 27.

“Recognizing that what I see reflects what I think I am, I realize that vision is my greatest need. The world I see attests to the fearful nature of the self image I have made.  If I would remember who I am, it is essential that I let this image of myself go. As it is replaced by truth, vision will surely be given me. And with this vision, I will look upon the world and on myself with charity and love.”

That’s clear. Let go of the fearful ego and its troubled thoughts. Let your true nature and true vision look out on the world with love and compassion. The Christ/Krishna/Buddha within you looks out on the world with love. If you allow that vision to be yours, you will live in peace. Spirit is present within us all. It is infinite and eternal. Its influence on our lives depends on how much of our self we’re willing to surrender to its light.

Let the light inside cleanse your thoughts of fear. You’ll then see the world as it truly is – a reflection of the spirit light within.

Holy Instant Is Meant to Last

Posted on by under Spiritual light, Spirituality, True self

Most people I know have experienced moments of spiritual experience or insight. My research sample of friends is too small to assert that everyone has experiences of being in the presence of spirit. But probably everyone has these experiences at different times in life. While some believe these are momentary flashes that come on their own, I’m convinced they can be encouraged and sustained.

I experienced spiritual moments when I was young. I didn’t think anything of them. They were simply moments of feeling that all was well. Usually I experienced this while I was in the woods or trudging through fields in search of snakes and toads. I was complete. The world was complete. And there was no difference between me and the world.

Later I experienced spiritual epiphanies during my late teens and early 20s during experiences with psychedelic drugs such as LSD, DMT, and psilocybin. The drugs delivered a much different holy instant. They produced spiritual sensations, but those experiences were laced with an edgy chemical feeling. When the drug wore off, so did the spirituality.

Shortly after that period, I met a girl who had a strong commitment to spirituality. We attended Self-Realization Fellowship classes at the Detroit Institute of Arts. She would have direct spiritual experiences with friends. She described this as “clicking.” She told she was waiting to click with me. I had no idea what she was talking about.

Then one evening as we pulled into the parking lot of my apartment, a feeling started coming over me. It was a strong physical feeling that was both light and comforting. There was nothing subtle about it. We were both looking straight ahead. Softly, she said, “This is it. This is clicking.” I had no fear, no anxiety, just a strong sense of love and presence.

I started to ask what it was. She said, “No, don’t disturb it.” The feeling lasted for about five or ten minutes. When it faded I finally asked her what it was. “That was clicking,” she said. When I pressed, she said, “I don’t know what it is. It’s clicking. I think it’s God.”

The clicking never happened again. She moved on to another boyfriend. I moved on to another girlfriend. I have felt the sensation again – though in a weaker strength – during meditation. As my spiritual commitment and activities increased in recent years, I’ve felt it again, many times, but not with the same intensity or the same mystery. These days, when I experience the presence of spirit, it’s not mysterious at all. I’ve become convinced it’s our natural state of being.

Holy instants sometimes last only seconds. They are precious moments when we finally see reality. They’re like a moment of sunshine on a cloudy day. When the sun pokes through, we know the sun is not being inconsistent. The sun is never diminished by the clouds that block it.

 

Likewise with spirit during a holy instant. Our experience of the presence may be brief, but that doesn’t mean spirit is any less complete. Spirit is never inconsistent, never brief. Celestial light is constant. It’s not distant. It’s present and complete at all times, in our heart, in our breath, in our very being. The holy instant is our true nature, our true identity. This waking life is the illusion. The holy instant is the truth, and it can be called forth to the center of our being, to the center of our experience of this world.

This Little Light of Mine

Posted on by under spiritual awakening, Spiritual light, True self

“Some of my friends don’t know who they belong to. Some can’t get a single thing to work inside,” lyrics by Gram Parson, from “A Song for You.”

I spent years in the condition Gram Parsons describes in the song lyric. I had no idea who I belonged to. I seemed to be isolated in the universe. I would sometimes have a fleeting feeling I was part of something larger than myself,  but it was usually an odd inarticulate sense. It was certainly not a feeling or a sensation I could call up for support or comfort.

I had great difficulty trying to get anything to work inside. I had a head full of noise – insecurities, uncertainties, fear. That didn’t stop me from trying to accomplish things – a writing career followed by successful efforts to launch and grow a publishing company. From the outside, my life probably looked orderly and deliberate. In reality my life was a whirl of dashing from one thing to another – putting out some fires, starting others.

At some point during adulthood, we all reach a point when life just doesn’t work any longer. When we get to this point, we usually realize life hasn’t been working for a long time. Even if we do everything right – whatever that means to us – things just stop working inside.

If we have half a brain and a little bit of guts, we throw up our hands and say, “Wait, just wait! I want off this crazy train.” Tom Waits described that feeling of desperation well in the song, “Fumblin’ with the Blues.” He sang, “Two dead ends and you still got to choose.” That’s when it’s time to change your life.

Some turn to alcohol or drugs. Some turn to therapy. Some turn to spirituality. I tried all three. What worked was the therapy and spirituality. Slowly I began to become aware there was a tiny light inside. I began to gain some new enthusiasm for life. I loved singing the words, “This little light of mine, I’m going to let it shine.”

At the time, I didn’t really understand that tiny light. I thought it was mine, and I thought it would only show up intermittently. When I sensed it, I would feel wonderful warmth and encouragement. Inevitably, though, things inside would go dark again and the noise in my head – the fears and insecurities – would return.

Real change in my life began as I came to learn that the tiny spec of light wasn’t mine at all, but something larger. And it wasn’t distant and intermittent. It was constant and inextinguishable. I came to realize the light was spirit and it was always in me. The light wasn’t tiny at all; it was everything. What was tiny was my ability to perceive it, my ability to truly believe in it, my ability to call it forth into my life.

The noise doesn’t go away when you come to believe in the infinite light within. Fear doesn’t go away. But it becomes less important. You notice the insecurities and anxieties, but you let them go. They’re the cage-rattling of the ego. You learn that the noise doesn’t have to threaten the truth, and the fear doesn’t have to disrupt your life.

If you focus on the light inside it grows until you are aware of it most of the time. You come to realize whatever truth we find in this world resides there. The light will guide you. The fears and insecurities that were once vicious monsters become mere gnats that are easily swatted away. That’s when you truly know who you belong to,  and that’s when things really begin to work inside.

Watching Love Watching Back

Posted on by under Healing, spiritual awakening, Spiritual light, Spirituality, True self

So, who am I? Such a huge question. Who am I and why am I here? When I was a teenager and later as a young adult, these questions were critically important. They meant everything.

Later life, I became surprised by the lightness of the questions. The intensity is completely gone.

These questions were so  mysterious once. Who am I? Why am I here? They were colossal. Existential chaos lived in the unknowing of these weighty considerations. They were the only questions that mattered.

Yet they no longer hold any mystery for me. The answer to these questions are as simple as breathing. I am spirit looking out through the eyes of a human being. While the answer may seem pat, it is true. I have always been with spirit. I always will be. And I am here because love is present.

When I was young, the questions swirled in a dizzy wind of change; change surrounded me every day. Now, the answer to the questions is unchanging. And though the world still seems to change, I know that’s an illusion. Only its appearance changes. The spirit within does not change. That is my truest self.

I have a worldly self – some call it the ego, some call it the false self. It walks and talks and has a personality. It grew up in this world. I remember a moment when I was young – about eight years old – when the idea of who I was moved to the earthly self. At the time, the shift was overwhelming. That feeling of overwhelm happened a number of times over a period of a few weeks. I would suddenly realize I was actually a human being.

That thought – that I’m a real person – was so surprising, so startling, that I would run inside from play, plop myself on my bed and just spin around with this new idea. This extraordinary feeling was physical. My bed seemed to fly around the room. I would think the thought over and over – I am real. It was tantalizing, frightening, and thrilling. It was a new and powerful thought – that I was a person, a distinct human being, and that I was real.

From there I began the dusty trek through the world. My ridiculously dear self had to go through the rough thickets of life – falling short, knowing that my tender core was hopelessly incomplete, raw, and vulnerable. And of course I was drawn to those very souls who could effortlessly penetrate even my strongest defenses. And since hurt people hurt people, I attacked back.

Through all the years, I would get the taste of something greater in life, whether it was young love or early spiritual strivings that made me believe I could walk into heaven intact. Young love was followed by a more mature love where we would negotiate a truce – a pact between two able warriors. But the pressure of the world is unrelenting, and it was only a matter of time before we would take up the emotional weapons – reluctantly, out of necessity, but brutally – and use them on each other.

All the time, my true self was brimming with love but hidden from me, far out of reach. In the world of my true self, no balm was needed for my wounds, nor even for the wounds I had scored against others in my frustration and confusion. For all is healed in the presence in the true self, the Krishna, the Christ within. My true self waited for me in the place where nothing changes, where nothing is real but love. Some call it heaven. It’s the place we came from, where we were born, where all road eventually lead.

What a way to see the world, from the eye of the truest self. The world is gorgeous in spite of its fiery delusions, and it is even more beautiful when we come to see the help we may bring to this rough and eager place we once called home, knowing that our Christ-self looks upon it all and sees nothing but love and offers nothing but healing. In this earthly world, with each person we meet, we can see the Christ within – even if just an ember glowing – and see that this person before us, struggling so hard with life, is actually at home with spirit all the while, watching love watching back.