Some Observations on Beliefs
Nature of our thoughts
1.0 We constantly time travel. Our thoughts are seldom anchored in the present - they continually flit from past memories (even if only of minutes before) to anticipations of future whatevers - mostly fears and hopes. Our thoughts weave backwards and forwards but only occasionally actually dwell in the present moment - at best, they pause there. But more. That we somehow actually time travel is such a frequent experience that there is even a name for it: déjà vu, which The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines as: "illusory feeling of having already experienced a present situation; something tediously familiar; (French for ‘already seen')." Of course, the movie Groundhog Day is an extreme and bizarre example.
2.0 Our thoughts also constantly weave backwards and forwards between our ‘higher' or spiritual selves and our ‘base' or ego selves. That is to say, we oscillate between pure/ idealistic/ fine and uplifting thoughts/ feelings, and those ego thoughts about physicality - bodily concerns to do with safety, food, sexuality.... But the higher thoughts of spirit are continually and almost immediately blotted out by the ego thoughts. Yet the higher thoughts always keep coming back.
3.0 Nearly always we put ourselves down: "I can't do this or that....I'm not good enough ...." and so forth. These loud or strident thoughts can be termed as warlike thoughts because we are attacking our own worth. However, immediately after each one of these self-deprecating thoughts there is a gentle counter thought - an echo, if you will, which is peaceful (and not loud at all) and always occurs. These echoes directly contradict the attack thoughts and always consist of positive affirmations as to our worth.
3.1 Listen for these counter thoughts - they are from the Holy Spirit! The ego speaks first in attack; the Holy Spirit contradicts it with peace, denying the ego's negative judgment of you. So remember to listen for the echo or counter thought.
3.2 Almost as an aside, the ACIM lessons will teach you how to meditate - how to listen for spirit. Meditation stills the ego's thoughts - you will become aware of them as mere surface ripples on the ocean of your mind - because meditation suspends your judgment against .... against everything!
Dissociation
We can only maintain our beliefs in duality via dissociation. Our world appears to consist of sets opposites (e.g. life-death, love-hate) wherein each part of the set contradicts the other. We can only maintain these sets of beliefs and concepts by keeping the self-contradictions separate and apart in our awareness. If we bring them together in the light of reason one or the other part of the contradiction cannot stand. Which part of the double concept we accept as being the truth (or reality) directly determines the world that arises before either (1) our horrified gaze or (2) our thankful relief. You will experience either one of these two distinct alternatives in your sojourn in this world. You cannot experience both of the alternatives simultaneously.
Here are some examples of dissociated sets of beliefs.
1.0 We believe simultaneously in time and eternity
But these two concepts deny the existence of the other. Time means there is no eternity. Eternity means this instant, constantly and always. Note that always has no direction.
1.1 We believe in both body and soul (or spirit)
Obviously, the body is part of the realm of time - of mortality. Spirit is of the realm of eternity. Both cannot be true. Your content (or essence) is either body or spirit but cannot be both in reality. You can believe that you are both but this does not make it so.
1.2 We believe in Heaven and Earth
Heaven comprises infinite eternity, and as spirits we are therein located. Earth is part of the finite, physical universe. The finite cannot contain the infinite - thus Heaven cannot be found in the physical universe because the physical is not its location. Nor can you be located in the physical universe even though you believe that you are.
1.3 Given the above, we believe that we are separate from God
God is our life source thus we cannot be separate from the Creator. God is One and One is all.
1.4 We believe that God created us in His image
God is Perfection; and the Creator is not a body. Thus gender is meaningless. God did not create us in ‘His' image - God extended ‘Himself.' The Creator expanded ‘His' thought to create us within ‘Himself'. We are actually a part of God, and ‘He' is part of us. It is like droplets being part of the ocean, and the ocean containing all of the blending droplets. There is no separation. Thus in this sense we are God.
1.5 We believe in God and in Satan.
God has no opposite. What is All, Everywhere and Everywhen leaves no room for an opposite. The closest thing to the Devil is our own egos. But even the ego is not real because the ego is the belief and concept that we are separate from everything else in the physical universe. But there is no separation in the universe of universes created by God. Only what God creates is real - the Creator is the only author of reality.
1.6 We believe in sin and damnation
God created us within ‘Himself' and thus perfect. The perfect cannot be made imperfect, for perfection means without flaw. For us to have become corrupted (by sin) means either that we were not made perfect (and hence the Creator was not perfect) or that we could create the Creator after the event of our creation; and with us creating the Creator in our image as imperfect and corruptible - which is impossible and totally insane to believe. Although we cannot sin, we can make mistakes because of our ego values and beliefs. Mistakes call for correction, not punishment.
1.7 We believe in conditional love
There is no such quality as conditional love. Such is merely a bargain made and disguised as love. You cannot love conditionally. The conditions mean that some are more acceptable than others and involves judging against the worth of others, with this judgment based on the vagaries of the scales of desire. When we judge against, we cast out. Thus conditional love is ‘specialness' based on exclusion. Love means inclusion - without qualification and without anyone left outside.
God loves unconditionally - this is perfection. We are totally free and are not held to account and punished for our ‘sins.' A punishing god is not a loving god. We cannot lovingly punish nor punish lovingly. Punishment is war; love is peace.
Although are totally free, we do not have autonomy of being. We cannot create ourselves and then create God - we always remain exactly as God created us, and thus we are innocent still. We may be mistaken in what we believe and value, yes - but innocent still.
1.8 We believe that God loves the sinner but not the sin
God loves us and had provided us with the Holy Spirit to correct our mistakes. There is no sin.
1.9 We believe that Jesus died for our sins
God did not send ‘His only Son' to atone for our sins through the torture and murder of Jesus. It is hardly a loving act to send an innocent to be tortured and slaughtered for sins He did not commit. Redemption is not gained through torture, suffering of any description, sacrifice or death. Redemption and salvation are found in awakening once more to our reality. That is what enlightenment means - remembering Who We are (Children of the Light) and Who created Us.
Jesus came into this world to teach the Covenant of Unconditional Love and thus eternal innocence - something We once knew but have forgotten. By the miracles performed through Him, Jesus taught that ‘physical laws' are subservient to the eternal laws of God. His resurrection demonstrated that the body does not matter - that there is no death, that bodies are not the truth of us. The Crucifixion was an extreme teaching lesson that also taught the total lack of value of the body; and that defence and counter attack are never justified.
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Comments: 39
The nature of thought you can test with your own experience. The disassociated sets of double concepts you can test with reason. Little or no faith is required to do so.
And, letting my baser ego come to the fore for a moment, I am wondering how the MM drive-bys here are gonna handle this reasoned and erudite look at the totality of God. I suspect a few brains might explode...
Okay ego, time to get packed away again...
Thank you, Magi.
The intent here is to provoke thought rather than a verbal slinging match along the lines of, "I believe this and you're wrong about that and ....."
I'm a bit puzzled as to how you found this article - I posted it only to the brand new 'Angels On Our Pillows' group, with the article only to be visible to members of the group. If you're not a member, perhaps you should consider joining.
"1.1 We believe in both body and soul (or spirit)
Obviously, the body is part of the realm of time - of mortality. Spirit is of the realm of eternity. Both cannot be true. Your content (or essence) is either body or spirit but cannot be both in reality. You can believe that you are both but this does not make it so."
..and here is the reason:
As we know, our bodies are comprised of all that the earth is comprised of, on a molecular level...water, minerals...all of those things that the earth is comprised of, so are we...and the dissolution of those molecular bodies become part of the universe once again, or part of the earth, air, ether, wind, water...and so also we contain ENERGY, as in our thoughts and all of our essence is controlled by our brain and it's electrical currents, we give off warmth....we are soul-beings. Hence, I believe, how we look as we age is a very good reflection of our lives and who we TRULY are. How can the body NOT be a projection of the spirit? It must be! I believe body and spirit/soul are one in the same...without the will to live, we would not exist, our bodies would perish, and that will is the will of the spirit/soul.
It is not good or bad or anything. It just is.
Love with conditions is not love at all. There is, like you say, only unconditional love and with that comes compassion. I have often thought that compassion, as Jesus (the projected spirit in material form) is the key to understanding unconditional love.
GREAT article!
Magi, I am not joined just yet, but came to check out what the group was about, and saw this article featured. I am planning to JOIN the group, although I would not have known about the group except by invitation. Thanks for inviting, Elizabeth, I am really psyched about this group!
I am book-marking this page so I can come back again.
(About your question to Pat? I am not a member of that group, either...but your article appeared on My Gather page, under "Articles For You"... )
However, I will join up.
the body is part of the realm of time - of mortality. Spirit is of the realm of eternity. Both cannot be true. Your content (or essence) is either body or spirit but cannot be both in reality. You can believe that you are both but this does not make it so.
Your belief in physicality is just that. Although it is true for you because you believe it, your belief does not make it the Truth or the reality God created. He is the author of both Truth and reality. The eternal and mortal have no meeting place in the reality God created. No more does infinity and the finite. You can try the compromise of maintaining that the spiritual or infinite universe, which it eternal (and thus timeless) and changeless, somehow projects its opposite - the physical universe, which is finite, forever changing and mortal (everything 'dies' or changes in time). But ask yourself, why? Reflect on this: the eternal is Oneness - with God - like droplets in the ocean. Its opposite is the belief and valuing of separation. That each of us is a disconnected universe, separate from all that lives and from all that appears to exist outside of ourselves - no actual joining of fusion or blending is possible. It denies union.
Enlightenment is remembering that All is One and One is All - that God is Everywhen, Everywhere. 'He' is the lifeforce. The spiritual journey through this seeming world is one of transition - moving in our awareness away from separation (from everything) and progressively towards inclusion of everything. It is the awakening to Truth as God created it.
You can believe that you are spirit projecting the body - and in this you are correct. But the projection itself does not make the body real. Think of a mirage .... therein, what your eyes see deceive you. Vision and sight are opposites. Physical sight rests on form whereas vision looks past form to content.
And this response is now far too long.
Well done you!
This wasn't posted with the intention of being a scholarly essay - it was really meant as a thought provoker for Bob and to test out the group settings. See my comment to Pat as to what went wrong with that idea. But, what the heck. The article created interesting discussion.
Verbs? Are they something you put in soup?
wonderfully written, amazingly complex, and perfectly arranged, my friend. thank you for this mind and heart opener.
Sip coffee as you ruminate, my friend. LOL
Make room for me Mona, Faith... don't hog the whole corner.
It's worse than you think. Given the above, we think we are seperate from Earth, earth in this case means the whole of life on this place we live.
Given that we think we're only passign through, there are some who care very little for what shape they leave the earth.
We believe in God and in Satan.
Not much in either. Less one than the other.
"Hobbs, do you believe in Satan?" asked Calvin, the little boy to his pet tiger.
"What do you mean?" replied Hobbs, the pet tiger.
"You know, a supernatural and evil spirit that causes people do really bad things to one another." explained Calvin.
"Naw." said Hobbs. " I never thought humans needed the help."
" You just can't discuss philosophy with a tiger."
There is much more wisdom in that comic strip than most tomes.
As to point 1.3. it is even far more than you think: the ego is the belief and concept that we are separate from everything else in the entire physical universe.
As to God and Satan: What is All, Everywhere and Everywhen leaves no room for an opposite. The closest thing to the Devil is our own egos.
If you were to ask God about sin and Satan, He would probably reply something like: "My dear child, whatever do you mean? What is this sin and Satan of which you speak? I do not understand."
Where there are no subclasses there is no evil?
If you were to ask God about sin and Satan
So why bother to believe in either?
You don't have to believe in either .... and you remain a powerless victim buffeted by forces beyond your control until you go into the grave. It need not be so - littleness is not the truth of you. Magnitude is! What really matters, though, is that God believes in you. All else is meaningless dross.
I remember concluding as a child that belief in God involved accepting contradiction because diction - words - is inherently insufficient to describe that which is beyond human words.
Words are symbols we use to communicate thoughts which themselves are symbols of experiencing whatever it is that we experience. Hence words are twice removed from experience and thus are scarcely adequate to express what we felt. God does not accept contradiction - what is One leaves no room for contradiction. All is One is the simplest spiritual lesson and the easiest one to learn - the egos resistance to accepting this simple truth is where all the darkness and confusion begin. And where there is confusion, the confusion (and denial) is total.