Introspection

 ​

Introspection is my word of the month. For many reasons, there is a need for self-examination in our world, and that looking within is obviously an individual project. Am I acting in certain ways because I think it’s what is expected of me, or am I being true to my inner Self? Am I jumping up on my proverbial high horse and looking down on others with a sanctimonious, holier-than-thou attitude? Maybe. It’s always been a personal fault. My pettiness could be interpreted in much the same way as I’m interpreting the actions of others, so I’m going to pay attention to that, sincerely. There is such beauty and goodness in this world. My prayer is to add to that glory...

“If a friend informs us of a fault, do we listen patiently to the rebuke and credit what is said? Do we not rather give thanks that we are ‘not as other men’? During many years the author has been most grateful for merited rebuke. The wrong lies in unmerited censure, — in the falsehood which does no one any good.” Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 8:30

The Steering Mechanism of Human Experience

 ​

photo credit: Aaron Springston

"Human thought is actually the steering mechanism of human experience." This statement I read recently can be interpreted in different ways, but I see how it has been demonstrated in my own life. Decades ago, I felt like a victim of life's circumstances. Of the top five stress-producing situations in life, I constantly was in the midst of two or three of them. It was a never-ending drama, with sadness which I tried to quelch by staying stoned all the time. It took years of concentrated effort to calm my thoughts and erase my addictions, but the reward has been happiness. It's easy to slip back into ways of thinking which bring distress -- such as being upset over political happenings, fear of disease, worry about children and loved ones. While I have not made a New Year's resolution to stop thinking this way, I have vowed to be thankful and to be aware of where my thought is steering me. I have preached to others the importance of our first thoughts upon waking and our last mental images before going to sleep. I've been lax in the good habits which became mine through practice. No matter what my waking thought is tomorrow morning, I want to turn it into this daily prayer which was given to us by Mary Baker Eddy: "'Thy kingdom come:' let the reign of divine Life, Truth, and Love be established in me, and rule out of me all sin [erroneous thoughts of separation]; and may Thy Word enrich the affections of all mankind, and govern them!"

Golden Bridges

 ​​

photo credit: Aaron Springston

Mark Twain had a lot to say about human nature. He supposedly said that a lie can travel around the globe while the truth is still putting on its boots. As if to prove the point, he probably never said any such thing! Today we are wondering how lies have ensnared so many people. There is a belief that mainstream media is in cahoots to fool us all, and, sure enough, we all know of instances when the media have manipulated us. If someone believes that The Christian Science Monitor is part of the mainstream media plot to feed us lies, it’s very difficult to point to Reuters and The Associated Press as proof that the Monitor is reporting facts. If someone believes that Epoch Times and One America News are telling the truth, they can back it up by pointing to Fox opinions and thousands of youtube videos by Q-Anon adherents to prove that their version of the news is fact. Opinions and belief have deeply sunk their barbs into our society. In the past, I’ve said that I try not to have strong opinions because they close my mind to everything else. If this is true, closed minds can be opened by releasing damaging beliefs. I love this statement I read today: “The term ‘golden bridge’ comes from Sun Tzu, the great strategist and author of The Art of War, who said, ‘Build your opponent a golden bridge to retreat across.’ In the military setting, golden bridges are a way to encourage a losing adversary to leave peacefully rather than fight to the death.” Perhaps I just love the way this sounds: golden bridge. I’m going to hold that image while joining with my loving, compassionate brothers and sisters in this journey to truth.

"One moment of divine consciousness, or the spiritual understanding of Life and Love, is a foretaste of eternity." Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 598:23

Cognitive Dissonance

 

Cognitive dissonance is something most of us have experienced, but usually it occurs over something which doesn't really mess us up mentally -- such as, I know I shouldn't use plastic because it ends up in oceans. But what am I supposed to do? Looking at the image above causes a bit of distress in me because I want to rectify the images with the descriptions, but can't seem to move the words around in ways which make sense and feel right. I'm pretty sure many people are feeling this dissonance right now concerning things they have been convinced are true. The people I know who thoroughly believe the conspiracy theories they perpetuate as truth are feeling cognitive dissonance to the max! They believe they know things which most people don't know, and they have spent countless hours researching their findings, causing them to believe they are onto something which we "sheeple" don't know about or simply won't accept. The folks I know who believe these things are good people, friends even, and so I have examined my own thoughts deeply, on a regular basis, looking at things from other standpoints and trying my best to ascertain what is indeed going on in our world. My curiosity concerning how we have arrived at this place is so great that I vow to study hard and look for answers within myself, to change how I think about ideas I find offensive, and to go forward in a proactive way to help truth be known. I willingly acknowledge that our government needs restructuring, just as our police and healthcare systems do, but that doesn't mean we need to throw everything out, or throw up our hands in frustration declaring nothing can be done to fix them. There are solutions to every problem, and they begin with me and you. Let's all be gentle with each other and figure out what to do!

“Truth will correct all errors in my mind. What can correct illusions but the truth? And what are errors but illusions that remain unrecognized for what they are? Where truth has entered errors disappear. They merely vanish, leaving not a trace by which to be remembered. They are gone because, without belief, they have no life.  And so they disappear to nothingness, returning whence they came.  From dust to dust they come and go, for only truth remains.” A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 107

People Helping People

 

photo credit: Datura Böes

​A private school in California is run by a group which also has a prison outreach program. The inmates were so appreciative that they wanted to give something back, and asked what they could do to help the community. The school had a student whose parents had lost their jobs and had medical problems and, even with scholarship aid, they could not pay for their son's education to continue attending. The inmates pooled their resources and paid for the boy to finish his senior year. The student said he worked extra hard because he didn't want to let down his benefactors. He graduated and got a full scholarship to college. One of the incarcerated men who helped collect donations from others in his unit, says the men who contributed were eager to add value to someone’s life. “The damage to our victims can’t be undone, and we can make the choice to sow new things into the world. Now we have the opportunity to sow goodness, to sow charity, to sow love,” he says. In these times when so many thoughts are attuned to retribution and blame, let's remember these men and the good they wanted to add to the world by their gifts. I love these stories of people helping people, don't you? 

"And we solemnly promise to watch, and pray for that Mind to be in us which was also in Christ Jesus; to do unto others as we would have them do unto us and to be merciful, just, and pure." Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 497:24

Truth or Belief

 ​

Zarks Window, Eureka Springs - PC: Richard Quick

For years I’ve heard people talk about “my truth”, or that’s “her truth”, and I’ve always wondered what that was all about. I finally understand that people are referring to belief, not truth. Beliefs can feel like truth, because we have been taught that they are sacredly true, or scientifically true, or just-because-I-say-so true! But these ideas tend to change through increased knowledge and larger perspectives. Today, in 2021, we find ourselves believing things to be true because we’ve heard them repeated so often they have become a part of us. Television commercials, respected politicians stumping their causes, bull-headed people refusing to think outside their preacher’s prescribed rhetoric, social media hypnotizing us with our tribes’ beliefs — all these things, and more, contribute to our ignorance, our lack of knowledge. We have generations of people who have never learned how to think, how to question authority, how to examine themselves. It appears many of these folks have learned how to pass the buck and duck under cover when they are caught in a lie. Whatever happened to fessing up and saying we’re sorry? I was wrong. I’m sorry. It’s not so difficult! Truth and mercy are foremost in my thoughts this year, and they will remain my focus throughout this lifetime. As usual, please let me know if you see something I’m missing and/or need to understand! Namaste...

“Evidence drawn from the five physical senses relates solely to human reason, and because of opacity to the true light, human reason dimly reflects and feebly transmits Jesus’ works and words. Truth is a revelation.” Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 117:24

What Are You?

photo credit: Aaron Springston

In searching for wisdom tonight, I found these words of Kahlil Gibran, from The New Frontier:

“Come and tell me who and what are you.

Are you a politician asking what your country can do for you or a zealous one asking what you can do for your country? If you are the first, then you are a parasite; is the second, then you are an oasis in a desert.

Are you a merchant utilizing the need of society for the necessities of life, for monopoly and exorbitant profit? Or a sincere, hard-working and diligent man facilitating the exchange between the weaver and the farmer? Are you charging a reasonable profit as a middleman between supply and demand? If you are the first, then you are a criminal whether you live in a palace or a prison. If you are the second, then you are a charitable man whether you are thanked or denounced by people.

Are you a religious leader, weaving for your body a gown out of the ignorance of the people, fashioning a crown out of the simplicity of their hearts and pretending to hate the devil merely to live upon his income? Or are you a devout and a pious man who sees in the piety of the individual the foundation for a progressive nation, and who can see through a profound search in the depth of his own soul a ladder to the eternal soul that directs the world? If you are the first, then you are a heretic, a disbeliever in God even if you fast by day and pray by night. If you are the second, then you are a violet in the garden of truth even though its fragrance is lost upon the nostrils of humanity or whether its aroma rises into that rare air where the fragrance of flowers is preserved.

Are you a newspaperman who sells his idea and principle in the slave market, who lives on the misery of people like a buzzard which descends only upon a decaying carcass? Or are you a teacher on the platform of the city gathering experience from life and presenting it to the people as sermons you have learned? If you are the first, then you are a sore and an ulcer. If you are the second, then you are a balsam and a medicine.

Are you a governor who denigrates himself before those who appoint him and denigrates those whom he is to govern, who never raises a hand unless it is to reach into pockets and who does not take a step unless it is for greed? Or are you a faithful servant who serves only the welfare of the people? If you are the first, then you are as a tare in the threshing floor of the nations; and if the second, then you are a blessing upon its granaries.

Are you a husband who allows for himself what he disallows for his wife, living in abandonment with the key of her prison in his boots, gorging himself with his favourite food while she sits, by herself, before an empty dish? Or are you a companion, taking no action except hand in hand, nor doing anything unless she gives her thoughts and opinions, and sharing with her your happiness and success? If you are the first, then you are a remnant of a tribe which, still dressing in the skins of animals, vanished long before leaving the caves; and if you are the second, then you are a leader in a nation moving in the dawn toward the light of justice and wisdom.

Are you a searching writer full of self-admiration, keeping his head in the valley of a dusty past, where the ages discarded the remnant of its clothes and useless ideas? Or are you a clear thinker examining what is good and useful for society and spending your life in building what is useful and destroying what is harmful? If you are the first, then you are feeble and stupid, and if you are the second, then you are bread for the hungry and water for the thirsty.

Are you a poet, who plays the tambourine at the doors of emirs, or the one who throws the flowers during weddings and who walks in processions with a sponge full of warm water in his mouth, a sponge to be pressed by his tongue and lips as soon as he reaches the cemetery? Or have you a gift which God has placed in your hands on which to play heavenly melodies which draw our hearts toward the beautiful in life? If you are the first, then you are a juggler who evokes in our soul that which is contrary to what you intend. If you are the second, then you are love in our hearts and a vision in our minds."