"You Are the Placebo: making your mind matter," Rumi's, "The Guest House," a "Star Trek" episode, A Course in Miracles, Lesson 44

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2/9

Of course, Jesus begins His Workbook by having us become aware of our thoughts, since it is only our thoughts that are standing between us and our salvation, our recognition that we are as the holy Sons of God.

Lesson 4, These thoughts do not mean anything.

Lesson 8, My mind is preoccupied with past thoughts.

Lesson   10, My thoughts do not mean anything.

Lesson 11, My meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world.

Although I was well aware of my ceaselessly-chattering mind,  I do not think I had fully realized what we are up against, until I read these passages from Joe Dispenza’s book, “You Are the Placebo:  making your mind matter.”

Let’s begin with our own personal daily thoughts.

We are creatures of habit.  We think somewhere between 60,000 to 70,000 thoughts in one day, and 90% of these thoughts are exactly the same ones we had the day before.  The latest scientific results in psychology estimate that about 70% of our thoughts are negative and redundant.

If it sounds as though I am saying that we are living a large part of our lives on auto-pilot, that is exactly right. (ppl98,99)

Of course, Jesus shows us the way to undo our auto-pilot and come into the awareness of being here, now, so that we can become aware of the Holy Spirit’s still, quiet Voice speaking to us all through the day.

Lesson 39,  My holiness is my salvation:

Begin the practice periods as usual by repeating today’s idea to yourself.  Then with closed eyes search your unloving thoughts in whatever from they appear—uneasiness, depression, anger, fear, worry, attack, insecurity, and so on.  Whatever form they take, they are unloving and therefore fearful.  And so it is from them you need to be saved.

And here is an exercise:

My unloving thoughts about    _________ are keeping me in hell! 

My holiness is my salvation.

Lesson 4 0, I am blessed as a son of God.

Practice.  Practice.  Practice.

Jesus tells us, “Once every ten minutes would be desirable.”

I am blessed as a Son of God.  I am calm, quiet, assured and confident.

(Hmmm. . .If I were up 16 hours a day, that would be 96 times a day.  OK.)

2/11

Two days ago, I wrote a Post about  our thousands of daily thoughts, and what to do about them, inspired by Joe Dispenza’s book, “”You Are the Placebo:  making your mind matter,”and today, it was no accident that I came across this magnificent poem by Rumi, urging us to treat them as guests, coming from the understanding that what we resist, persists, and resist NOT evil.

THE  GUEST  HOUSE Rumi
	This being human is a guest house.
	Every morning a new arrival.
	A joy, a depression, a meanness,
	some momentary awareness comes
	as an unexpected visitor.
	Welcome and entertain them all!
	Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
	who violently sweep your house
	empty of its furniture,
	still, treat each guest honorably.
	He may be clearing you out
	for some new delight.
	The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
	meet them at the door laughing,
	and invite them in.
	Be grateful for whatever comes,
	because each has been sent
	as a guide from beyond.

2/12

While reading Joe Dispenza’s book, “You Are the Placebo:  making your mind matter,” I was fascinated to come across the fact that we have 60,000 to 70,000 thoughts crossing our minds, daily, and 70% of them are negative.

And, talk about synchronicity, last night Christine and I saw an incredible “Star Trek:  The Next Generation” episode entitled, “Man of the People  ,” (Season 6, Episode 3)that vividly portrayed one way, a nasty way, to deal with these thousands of thoughts.

   Ves Alkar, , an Ambassador, comes aboard the Starship Enterprise with his “mother” who looks old and haggard, and who is terribly mean and rude, particularly, to Counselor Troy who is, surprisingly, attracted to this kind and thoughtful man who is completely centered and peaceful.

She comes onto him, and he asks for her support, and performs a ritual with her, chanting a mysterious phrase, and they drink a potion from crystal glasses.

Soon, Counselor Troy becomes mean to everyone, particularly to her friend,   Will Riker, and grows old and haggard.

It turns out that Ambassador Alkar thought that by being centered and peaceful, himself, he would be a more successful mediator.  He could do this by pouring the thousands of negative thoughts going through his mind into a “receptacle.”  The woman he came aboard with was not his mother at all, simply a “receptacle” he had recruited.  And since she was dying of all the negative thoughts being poured into her, he needed to recruit another one.

This explains his peaceful, centered state of mind, and yet, he was not experiencing true forgiveness, only a casting away of all negative thoughts.

Well, all’s well that ends well, and I will let you see how it all comes out.

I am just grateful for the vivid example that, unless I take full responsibility for my  thousands of negative thoughts on a daily basis, by recognizing them and forgiving them, I will project them unto others, using my brothers as “receptacles,” and get old and sick and die.

2/13

We have 60,000 to 70,000 thoughts crossing our minds, daily, and 70% of them are negative. (Joe Dispenza, “You Are the Placebo:  making your mind matter,”)

Lesson 44, God is the light in which I see.

Try to sink into your mind, letting go every kind of interference and intrusion by quietly sinking past them. Your mind cannot be stopped in this unless you choose to stop it. It is merely taking its natural course. Try to observe your passing THOUGHTS without involvement, and slip quietly by them.  You are attempting something very holy. 

If you are doing the exercises correctly, you should experience some sense of relaxation, and even a feeling that you are approaching, if not actually entering into light. Try to think of light, formless and without limit, as you pass by the THOUGHTS of this world. And do not forget that they cannot hold you to the world unless you give them the power to do so.

"If" by Rudyard Kipling: A Poem that I First Loved

“If” by Rudyard Kipling:  A Poem that I First Loved

I first came across Rudyard Kipling’s poem, “If” when I was in the 9^th Grade in high school.  I was captivated by a British actor reading it on the Ed Sullivan Show.  I found a copy in the library a couple of days later, and I read it, again, intently.

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream---and not make dreams your master;
If you can think---and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings---nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And---which is more---you'll be a Man, my son!

This poem spoke to me, expressing in words my hard-won way of looking at life; “if” I worked hard enough, and was determined enough, and persisted enough, then I would achieve my goals, and be worthy.

I grew up in a small town in southern Michigan, Three Rivers.  My father worked as a butcher in a nearby grocery store.  My mother worked as a secretary in the business office of the Continental Can Company.

My father’s face was usually stoic; my mother usually had the expression of a martyr, suffering some sort of pain she never talked about.  I kept reading their expressions, trying to figure out if I were doing the right thing.

I can look back, now, and see how I was trying to develop a sense of how to conduct myself in the world.  I felt that I was alone in this undertaking, and “if” I were to get anything done, I would have to do it myself.  I was constantly looking at challenges.

I loved watching Western movies with strong heroes played by actors like John Wayne, Gary Cooper, Henry Fonda, William Holden, Lee Marvin, Richard Widmark, and quintessentially, Alan Ladd in “Shane;” on television I liked James Arness in “Gunsmoke,” Richard Boone in “have Gun:  Will Travel,” and Chuck Connors in “The Rifleman.”

These were all manly men. . .my son!”

I learned to grit my teeth and say to myself what John Wayne says in one of his movies, “Get it done, Pilgrim.”

I remember when I was about eleven years old, and I went with my friends to the Gravel Pit to play cowboys and Indians, and a much older boy, a well-known bully, and his buddies came by, and he stood in front of me and said, “Get out of here; go play somewhere else.”

Suddenly, I hit him in the mouth, hard; he just stood there for a moment, his eyes swimming in his head, and I should have hit him again, but then I made the mistake of running away.

He caught me, knocked me down, and started hitting me.  Every time he did, I said, “Fuck you,” and he kept at it until he became tired and gave up.

Whenever I ran into him later, he never bothered me again.

I remember when I was about thirteen, my buddies and I were out on a summer night being mischievous, throwing water-filled balloons at cars driven by older boys, and then running away.  One time the car screeched to a halt, and four guys  were yelling at us and chasing us.

The adrenalin hit, and all of a sudden, I realized I was about 15 yards ahead of my buddies.  It’s the first time I realized I had good speed.

In the early fall when I was in the 8^th Grade, I joined a bunch of upper-classmen playing football, and at the end, they decided to spring 60 yards.  Much to my amazement, I beat the senior 100 yard-dash man, Jim Hurd, who went on to play football and run track at Albion College.  

In that same year, Roger Bannister broke the four-minute mile barrier, running it in 3:59.7.

This reinforced my belief that hard work and a strong will would lead to success.

When I was 15 years old, at the beginning of my track career, running the hurdles and the quarter mile, I ran gritting my teeth and clenching my fists.  “If” I ran with that determination, I would win.

Then, I watched Bobby Morrow sprinting in the 1956 Olympics.  He won the 100 and 200 meter dashes, running with his jaws completely relaxed and his hands open.

I learned, then, that “if” I could be relaxed and still “Get it done, Pilgrim.”

In this poem, there are 20 dualistic set-ups.  I placed myself in the middle and hoped that I would have the strength to make the better choice.  

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

The “if” places the responsibility directly on me; am I strong enough?  Do I have resolute enough to make the right choice?  Do I have the “right stuff.?  I have the potential.  It’s totally on me.  I am all alone.  I set it up so that it’s a question of my will.  The “if” makes it clear that the result of an either/or situation is conditional on my resolve, my will.  “If” I’m strong enough, it will turn out all right.  I must do everything I can not to be weak.

I saw my life as a balancing act, and it was completely up to me to keep my life in balance.

No one else in my family had ever gone to college.  I was amazed when my parents gave me a Remington portable typewriter when I went off to college.  It was the perfect gift because I was constantly writing essays in college.

Just before leaving for college, I taped a copy of “If” on the typewriter case, and it gave me strength as I faced the immense challenges, academically and athletically all through college.  I often read it while studying late into the night.  I was taking 5 classes, going to football or track practices in the afternoons, and working a campus job.  Reading the poem helped give me strength and courage, particularly in football and track.

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

I went on, “ifing” my way through life, going to graduate school, teaching in a junior high school, getting married, going back to graduate school, teaching in colleges and universities, getting a divorce, and finally, I am happy to say that the poem lost its grip in the mid-80’s.

Here’s Adya:

Now, if we’re completely caught up in our dualistic mind and not paying close attention, then we don’t even notice that a spiritual core of existence is shining through into the world of time and space.  Most people don’t begin to experience this or even know it’s there until something in their life opens them enough that they begin to experience the sublime.  (Adyashanti, Resurrecting Jesus: Embodying the Spirit of a Revolutionary Mystic, p. 34)

Christine and I came across the Course just after we started dating in the fall of 1985., twelve years before coming to Endeavor Academy.  

At the time, I was teaching English at a high school in Niles, MI, and an English  Teacher across the hall, just loved “If,” and he had a large poster of it on his classroom door.  I never said anything to him about the poem, yet I, now,  clearly saw from my experience reading the Course that standing in the middle of the duality, making choices, was not recognizing  the duality as illusory, and learning to forgive it, and resting in God.

If you can fill the unforgiving minute. . .

The minute IS unforgiving until I realize that time and space are illusory.

I finally realized that I was not alone, and that I was being guided.

And, now, I can say, after all these years, “if” I stand still for a moment and ask for Help, I will be receptive to the Voice of the Holy Spirit, and I will be guided to take the next step.  

For fifty-six years, I thought I was living my life all alone, and “If” helped me do it.  

And, now, I am so grateful that I know better.

I will not lead my life alone today.

I do not understand the world, and so

to try to lead my life alone must be

but foolishness. But there is One Who knows

all that is best for me. And He is glad

to make no choices for me but the ones

that lead to God. I give this day to Him,

for I would not delay my coming home,

and it is He Who knows the way to God.
(Lesson 242)

So Much Depends on Seeing with Vision

Reading the newspaper daily, I am always amazed at the suffering and pain and wars going on all the time around the world.  For much too long, I did not understand when a brother would say to me, “You are the cause.”

“What?  I am here, and that is taking place there.”

Well, I finally got it.  It all depends on whether I am looking at worldly events through the body’s eyes, or the eyes of Christ.  This is the causation.  Through my body’s eyes, I see projected images of what is dark within; through the eyes of Christ, I see a bright reflection of my innocent Self.

This all came back to me this morning while I was reading these passages from the Text of the Course.

A simple question yet remains, and needs an answer. Do you like what you have made?—a world of murder and attack, through which you thread your timid way through constant dangers, alone and frightened, hoping at most that death will wait a little longer before it overtakes you and you disappear. You made this up. It is a picture of what you think you are; of how you see yourself. A murderer is frightened, and those who kill fear death. All these are but the fearful thoughts of those who would adjust themselves to a world made fearful by their adjustments. And they look out in sorrow from what is sad within, and see the sadness there.

Have you not wondered what the world is really like; how it would look through happy eyes?

Who in a holy relationship can long remain unholy? The world the holy see is one with them, just as the world the ego looks upon is like itself. The world the holy see is beautiful because they see their innocence in it. They did not tell it what it was; they did not make adjustments to fit their orders. They gently questioned it and whispered, 'What are you?' And He Who watches over all perception answered. Take not the judgement of the world as answer to the question, 'What am I?' The world believes in sin, but the belief that made it as you see it is not outside you. (T-20.lll.4,6)

It all depends on what we choose to see, reminding me of this poem by William Carlos Williams (1883-1963 ).

The Red Wheelbarrow

so much depends

upon

a red wheel

barrow

glazed with rain

water

beside the white

chickens.

This is a demonstration of seeing something exactly as it is, objectively, no judgments,  no projections, just a simple reflection.

*     *     *

Just after writing this, I sat down to read “A Course of Love,” a book that Mari Perron scribed, listening to Jesus, and I read this passage, echoing what I just wrote:

There is not a soul who walks this earth that does not weep at what it sees.  Yet, the Christ in you does not weep, for the Christ in you sees with eyes of love.  The difference is the eyes of love see not the misery of despair.   This is the miracle.  The miracle is true seeing.  Think not that love can look on misery and see love there.  Love looks not on misery at all.  (p. 12, 2.10)