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Awakening Your Higher MindWe can never have what we cannot imagine: All new creations must begin in the mind as someone's inspired idea or vision. If we are to go forward now and co-create a world we'd all be privileged to share, we must find concrete and practical means for bringing Spirit into our lives – ways to override the heavy weights and measures of calculating reason that focus obsessively on utility and advantage – cold intellectual heads that snuff out warm, soulful hearts. Our new life will evade us, though, until as adventurous co-creators we consciously decide to invent our next stance through our own efforts. We are Self-creative organisms with free will and must therefore lift ourselves up by our own bootstraps, over and over, as evolution moves us forward. Otherwise, Fate overtakes us and does all this creating without our conscious participation. And then we become its pawns. So we must listen to our inner God-filled life, our sacred longings and inspirations – and not be afraid to act on what we know to be our desired future. To birth a new consciousness is never an easy task. We've all got attachments and illusions we don't even know we have until they start to unravel at the edges of our cherished identities and familiar comfort zones. These resistances to new life die hard, so quite naturally, this process creates a tension – between who we've been and who we are becoming. Many view their lives through a rear-view mirror and miss the thrill of what's unfolding just ahead as our future awaits its entrance into our mind's conception of it. The future does not exist until we literally "make it up." We use our higher cognitions: the creative imagination, inspiration, and intuition. These are our birthright as spiritual beings.
Belief versus KnowingIt can be very dangerous to hold religious or philosophical ideas as simply objects of belief. Where there is only belief, there will be doubt. And unfortunately, the more fiercely and naively we believe in something, the more devastating the doubt once it starts to be questioned. But we must console ourselves with this truth: That which is believed always and everywhere by everybody is truly a psychological fact! We are absolutely influenced by what others, especially those we consider experts, tell us is true. So we mustn't fall into shame when we realize that some strongly-held spiritual principle or psychological maxim suddenly betrays us. This happens all the time. It's how we learn the difference between illusion and reality. Knowing as opposed to believing can only happen through one's direct experience. In our psychospiritual group work, we use the invocation, "Let Reality govern my every thought and Truth be the heart of my life. For so it must be. And help me to do my part." Using this as a consistent prayer will remove all illusion from our lives and bring us face to face with the truth of every situation. It forces us to take full responsibility for "our part" in any erroneous or troublesome relationship or activity. This is living the authentic spiritual life of the responsible steward in everyday practical ways. As we cross into this new cycle of our unfoldment in this new century, we slowly realize the fact that God is not outside us. We discover that God indeed lives inside our own nature. And this is an awesome responsibility, but such a joyous one. Here we thought we were living life. Now we see that a Greater Life is living us!
Betrayal: An Agent of TransformationWhen Destiny calls you to move on, if you do not heed the call, something quite disastrous can happen to get your attention. The archetypal wound of Betrayal can stab you in the heart. This potent transformational tool will force you to reflect all the way to your depths to see what you did to make betrayal happen. Betrayal's cosmic purpose is to lead us out of some primal unconscious trust. It will always end a chapter in your life and move you to the next step you could never take amidst the old conditions. Anytime we feel a victim of anything, we've forgotten that we always draw to ourselves exactly what our soul knows that we need. When a betrayal tears up your life, you can always look back and see how you had your part in setting up the circumstances for the betrayal. Whenever you place an overabundance of trust in someone else, the seeds of betrayal are sewn. No one can ever live up to being idolized. In the hardest cases, we often have a form of spiritual blindness that prohibits our seeing the bigger picture, just so we will go deeply enough into the human suffering we've taken on as "our cross to bear." And easy life with no suffering has no depth. This sacred wound is one of being faced with the agonizing gap between the actual and the ideal, where you are now and where you'd like to be. You'll see an actual set of circumstances you'd like to get beyond, but you still lack the conviction, the fortitude, or the willingness for how to proceed. This is the desperation that haunts us when we know we are not living up to our full potential. If we did not suffer this angst, we would never be motivated to press on.
The Call to Conscious ParentingToday in North America literally thousands are living on Ritalin and Prozac! The statistics are overwhelming. Children are given drugs to stop them from expressing, taught that drugs are essential to balance their natures. Then, when teens they are condemned for wanting to use drugs. An unsavory mixed message indeed! We don't know what to do with all this energy we have as fiery creative souls. People drive themselves half-crazy trying to hold down this intense creative force that is our essence. Addictions are rampant in this country. And we wonder from whence cometh this dire need for so many extremes, not realizing that our soul is an inspired artist of the highest order, struggling to express its talents in our human world. To be self-creative, we have to stir things up to make a little friction so our soul has something "to rub against." Otherwise, there is no energetic power coming through, so nothing moves. Every young child just naturally does this. Watch them, and you'll see the magic they create by simply being themselves. Everyone has a "little genius" living inside them, demanding its inherent right to come forth. Our children need to know this and be honored for their high spirits. Then we need to help them find appropriate outlets for their wild genius and creativity. The struggle of modern-day parents with knowing how to guide all these brilliant kids coming into our planet now is itself transformative! So, parents, teach your children who they really are and help them find their true expression in life. Knowing that each of us has come here with our to do in making our world a better place can in itself heal many a frenetic psyche. This gives every young life a special sense of sacred purpose.
How Much Reality Can You Stand?Your personality is a triune of physical, emotional, and intellectual energies. It can love nature, other people, and give things meaning. It can even look inward to access Spirit for guidance and support. Your divine self is a triune of cosmic breath, numinous light, and spiritual fire, which purifies, illumines, and brings you mystical union with God. When all three of these layers are aligned and balanced with your personality, you've got an integrated personality empowered by the soul. This, then, becomes a transformed self who can walk through life expressing compassion and understanding in all types of situations, no matter how dark or light. This way of being is a "walker in two worlds" who lives both in this world and beyond it. People who can live this way know that every human soul is both human and divine. There is no denial of our human traits, nor any wish to by-pass the ordinary human responsibilities and the deep affinities we connect with here. Nor is there any need to deny the higher worlds, a God of our understanding, or the knowledge that we ourselves are "more than what we look like" with more expanded ways of knowing. All of this is you! So how much are you willing to take responsibility for? What brought you to this planet? And what do you plan to do with yourself while here? How badly are you screwing up? Are you willing to come on out and be seen in all your magnificence? Or are you still hiding out? To think like gods now and then gets us back on track. And then we can be there for others who may be floundering in this complex world that is rapidly becoming digital and cold.
Invocation is Active PrayerDivine intervention awaits us at every turn of the cosmic wheel of destiny. A great principle or power lies behind every desired quality or possibility. But a Higher Power cannot intervene in our lives unless we give it permission, for this would be a violation of cosmic law. All we must do is petition what we desire, then await a response. We petition through a process called 'Invocation.' Invocation is active prayer, co-creative in nature. It is a subtle voiceless appeal, an energetic process that happens inwardly when we call out for spiritual sustenance or for some new way. It's how we draw the future into the present time. Invocation is a concentration of psychic energy on a "God-image," a process which transfers the energy to the divine being or archetypal image constellated by our cry. When we cry out to a divine image that we envision, there will always be a response. Invocation is self-assertive, will-to-action prayer that goes beyond conventional passive religious faith. It assumes that we're not separate from God, but a part of our Creator, with creative powers ourselves, a realization that we have "our part" to do. To invoke is to call down with potent mental force what we are willing to represent for God. Perhaps Invocation is the prayer for the coming Age. In the past we have prayed, but it was more an emotional plea of helplessness, begging God to do something for us. In this new way to pray, we are declaring that we are ready and anxious to do our part in manifesting the divine Plan on earth. Knowing we don't have the power to create apart from our Creator, we invoke the desired qualities and needed changes, and then commit to enact them as our truth.
QuestingThe mindful quest for truth is what perpetually elevates us toward realizing our spiritual aims. The seeking itself literally alters our brains. This is one of the great secrets to living the abundant life of Spirit. When we can no longer ask, we are lost in the mundane and useless activities of unconscious repetitive living. Haven't you noticed how, when unable to access Spirit, your days are literally eaten away in the maze of non-essentials? The search for the misplaced car keys ruined your morning; the argument with your neighbor left you feeling scattered and annoyed. At the day's end you fall into bed praying for instant anasthesia so you can, at least for awhile, forget your life. The quester is one who remembers there is a bigger picture unfolding upon a larger canvass –one in which we each play an active part, always willing to ask, indeed, to demand, that the numinous life of Spirit come upon one's calling! But we must cry out; otherwise, Spirit cannot intervene here in this earthly existence, as we've been given the undeniable sacred right of free will. No intervention from a higher dimension of consciousness is ever allowed to intercept our movement through life without our permission. Prayer and invocation are the keys to aligning with Spirit. When we fall into the trap of feeling stupid because we don't know 'the answer,' or ever believing that 'we've arrived,' we must lift these faulty beliefs right out of our minds. The seeker of truth is always just beginning, a curious and humble novice at every new turn of the road, able to step willingly into the unknown. The force of Spirit can only enter an open mind. And remember: the Grail only appears to the pure of heart.
Soul EventsThere is a universal process underlying our 'little biographies' that remains an unbroken thread of essence no matter what our personal circumstances are. Until we make conscious a certain type of inner event – that happens usually during a critical life experience or a 'big dream' – we may not recognize this greater unfolding we do inwardly upon a larger canvass. These important 'peak experiences' are how the soul reminds us wešre immortal. They don't happen every day, or even every year; they happen only when we need them most, usually when we're somehow giving up. My first conscious soul event happened during a clinical near-death experience caused by an uncontrollable hemmorrage when I was twenty-nine. I'd been hospitalized for several days, now considered out of danger, when one morning all chaos broke loose and I found myself on the ceiling looking down at that small body covered in blood, with no one there to help her. From my wide perspective, I recognized her with some compassion, saying calmly to myself, "You don't want to go back in that body, do you? That body's 'had it.'" Then, I thought of her eight-year-old diabetic son who badly needed a mother, felt the pang of his little heart, and was instantly back in my body. The doctor was there saving my life. I never knew how I got out, nor how I got back in. But this experience transformed my life. Perhaps you, too, have had such a poignant reminder that you are immortal. If not, I hope my story will ignite your own eternal flame of remembrance that we are divine. When we learn to live in both the temporal and eternal worlds simultaneously, knowing each is legitimate, we fall into bliss, a knowing that our sacred identities have indeed "mattered" here on earth.
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Jacquelyn Small has written many books on the personal transformation process and has recorded many tapes with experiential exercises for healing and self-awareness. Visit the Eupsychia Online Bookstore for descriptive information. If you enjoyed these articles, you might also enjoy other Science of Mind authors.
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