Welcome to the Lake Tahoe Spiritual Living Center!

Every Wednesday night, from 7 to 9 pm at the Center for Spiritual Living in Carson City (1927 North Carson Street, in the Frontier Plaza, on the corner of Winnie Lane) I have the pleasure of facilitating a wonderful group of people in a book study.  We are just finishing up a book called the Laws of Manifestation by David Spangler.   It’s a great little book, with only five chapters and 157 pages.  We figured we would be done with this book in two months, tops.  It will take us about 4 1/2 months to finish it.  But this group is profound:  they ask intelligent questions, they offer wisdom and insight that is refreshing.  The result of that is that while we often have deep discussions that solve all the world’s problems in a two hour span, we sometimes make little progress in the book.  We like it that way, and have a lot of fun while we are doing it.  You are free to join us, anytime!  It’s a book study, not a class!  That means you can drop in as you wish, come and go, no commitments, no homework, just good talk, fellowship, and learning in a very practical way how to apply what we teach to our individual lives.

We anticipate finishing up with The Laws of Manifestation in two weeks, and will begin with the Four Agreements  by Don Miguel Ruiz starting May 18.  Order the book from the Amazon portal at our Center web site:  http://www.cslcc.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&layout=blog&id=31&Itemid=118. Then show up to the Center on Wednesday, May 18 at 7 pm!  We always have coffee and tea, and sometimes surprise snacks show up.

Meanwhile, I thought a summary of the Laws of Manifestation might be in order.  We have decided to make the phrase, “be the bungalow” our secret handshake.  Guess it’s not a secret anymore huh?  We had a lot of fun with this one last night as we read through a section in the book that resulted in telling us that if we wanted to manifest a bungalow, we must be the bungalow.  Being the bungalow refers to a basic law of New Thought:  if you wish to manifest something, you must become it.  It works with everything:  if you want a loving relationship, you must be love.  If you want abundance, you must embody the principles that abundance represent to you, such as freedom.  If you want a bungalow, you must be the bungalow.

Spangler breaks it down into four stages:  Right Identification, Right Imagination, Right Action and Right Attunement.

Right Identification comes from self knowledge, and self knowledge at the levels we are talking about here comes from disciplined spiritual practice.  We are talking about the knowledge that God is within.

Once we have that knowing, that peace that comes from a connection with Spirit within, we are ready to move to the next step, that of Right Imagination. It’s really a variation on visualization.  Spangler talks about “precise thought and visualization on the mental levels.”  But he expands that visualization technique to visualizing more than just a thing.  We need to also visualize what that thing means to us.  In the case of the bungalow, we have to decide whether the bungalow fits our vision of who and what we are in the community, will the bungalow serve our purpose?  And again, Spangler stresses that in order to create, we must start with silence and meditation.

The next step is Right Action.  I call this doing the next indicated right thing.  In Centers for Spiritual Living we talk about “treat and move your feet!”  Spangler describes it very well: It is “the willingness and ability to do whatever is necessary on physical levels to bring the manifestation about.”  He adds, “Manifestation is not always about having something ‘drop into one’s lap.’ “  In addition, right speech and gratitude are very important aspects of this step.  Right speech refers to speaking positively and avoiding things like gossip and criticism.  And gratitude means more than giving thanks.  Gratitude is a verb, it’s all about the action.  If you are grateful for having received something, what are you doing to care for it, and to use it with skill and wisdom?

And last but not least, we have Right Attunement, which really brings us back to being the bungalow again.  Right attunement is the combining of the first three steps, using all of them to access that incredible power that we all have. I hope to see you at the Center soon, either while we are still in the Laws of Manifestation, or when we start the Four Agreements!  And I hope this little primer on manifesting helps you to achieve whatever you want in life!

I’m reading another book, one last one I figure I can squeeze in before  classes start.  It’s called How to Know God by Deepak Chopra.  Where have I been the last  nine years, ooops, ten years now (this book was published in 2000)  that I missed this one?  Of course, as in all things, books,  like people, come in and out of my life when I am ready for them.  I probably would not have been ready for this book in 2000, but I’m ready now!

I’ve read many of his other books.  This guy is a master metaphysician!  I love his concepts, his soul, his work!  I love the way he writes.  And this book is incredible.  I wish I had been available to participate in the book study they did down at the Carson City Center for Spiritual Living.

I think this book will become one, like Conversations with God has, that I will give to  people who come to me asking how to get a closer connection with God.  Although Conversations might be better for beginners, this one seems like it might be a bit over the head of someone just starting on their spiritual journey.  No matter, I’ll get a couple of extra copies and have them handy, just in case.  I always have extra copies of Conversations around as well to give to people.

If you are thinking that this is the year you want to develop a closer connection with God, you might check out this book.  It won’t matter what religion you are, if any, Chopra has endorsements  from folks from every major religion, as well as all the leaders of the New Thought movement. 

I had to laugh when I tried to access the web site listed in the book (www.mypotential.com).  It’s no longer  in existence, so I did a google search and before I just went directly to Chopra’s web site (www.deepakchopra.com), I of course found all the naysayers and fear mongers.  Seems some folks are very threatened by a work such as this.  No matter, it’s a great book, and if you are searching for something that will get you closer to a God of your understanding, you might check out this book.

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Treasure Map Playshop! Saturday, January 30th. Cost is $29 plus $5 materials charge. We will spend the playing, coloring, pasting, talking, laughing and experiencing profound moments! Contact me for more info and to register.

So I decided to get one last fun book in before classes start in January.  I’m told I will not have time to read anything but the assigned books once studies start.  Those of you who know me are probably figuring, “so she’s got another book with sex craved vampires or a mystery, what on earth does this have to do with a column about spiritual stuff?”  HAH!  I read other things besides books starring sex craved vampires.  One of them is called the Biology of Belief, by Bruce Lipton, and I have to say that I am quite pleasantly surprised.  I am enjoying this book thoroughly.

Not only is it one more piece of evidence that science and spirituality do mix, and mix quite well, but Lipton’s writing style makes it easy to read.  Either that or he’s got a great editor.  In any case, if you are at all interested in how our bodies, right down to our cells, are connected with spirit, you should read this book.

I haven’t progressed very far in it.  Just to chapter two.  But the Epilogue is intriguing enough to me to intice me to continue reading to the end, it’s called “Spirit and Science.”

Since I discovered how much information can be in a Preface and Forewards about 18 years ago, I’ve been reading those in every book I pick up.  So I’m reading along in Lipton’s prologue (which is another section at the beginning of books) and all of a sudden I find myself reading this statement, “….a cell’s life is controlled by the physical and energetic environment and not by its genes.  It is a single cell’s ‘awareness’ of the environment, not its genes, that sets into motion the mechanisms of life.”  He then goes on to explain just  how we, as trillion-celled humans, behave exactly like a single cell behaves, so if a cell is controlled by it’s responses to the environment, then so are we.

I have highlighted this section in the prologue:  “I could change the character of my life by changing my beliefs.  I was instantly energized because I realized that there was a science-based path that would take me from my job as perennial’”victim’ to my new position as ‘co-creator’ of my destiny.”

He talks about 99% of the population suffering from disempowering beliefs about being victims of their genes.  It reminds me of a conversation I had with my mom just before she died of, officially, some sort of exotic cancer in the lining of her lungs.  I say officially because I believe she died of confusion and loneliness, the cancer was just a sypmtom.  But I digress.  She informed me one day that henceforth I was going to have to be extra vigilant and get tested for all sorts of cancers all the time, because as her daughter I was susceptible to the same sort of stuff she was.  Well, I hadn’t read Biology of Belief yet, I hadn’t even become a Practitioner yet,  but I can tell you that her comment was not well received by me.  I told her, in no uncertain terms, that her cancer was hers, not mine, and that I was in no circumstances in a position to get sick like her just because we were from the same gene pool.  I’m afraid I wasn’t very nice.  I’d like to think that I would be a bit more tactful and gentle now, but I still believe the same thing:  I am not a victim of my genes.  And this book supports that.

The book aims to help a lay person understand how our cells respond to our thoughts and perceptions.  As Lipton says, “The insights we gain through this new biology unleash the power of consciousness, matter and miracles.”  This from a scientist!  I love it!

He closes his prologue by saying the book “is not a self-help book, it is a self-empowerment book.”

I don’t know if Lipton considers himself a Religious Scientist.  I don’t know if the guy has ever stepped foot in a Center for Spiritual Living.  But he’s talkin our stuff, that’s for sure!  I don’t think I’ll have any problem finishing this book before classes start in January.

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So, I found a new web site that I want to share with you:  www.spirituallivingarchives.org.  A physical library located in Encinitas, California, an online library complete with downloadable books and pamphlets, not only by Ernest Holmes but by other New Thought authors as well!  Check it out!  In the meantime, I want to share a portion of Ernest Holmes last talk, given in 1959 at the annual conference at Asilomar.

“…

Find me one person who is for something and against nothing, who is

redeemed enough not to condemn others out of the burden of his soul,

and I will find another savior, another Jesus, and an exalted human

being.

6

Find me one person who no longer has any fear of the universe, or of

God, or of man, or of anything else, and you will have brought to me

someone in whose presence we may sit, and fear shall vanish as

clouds before the sunlight.

Find me someone who has redeemed his own soul, and he shall

become my redeemer.

Find me someone who has given all that he has in love, without

morbidity, and I will have found the lover of my soul. Is not this true?

Why? Because he will have revealed to me the nature of God and

proved to me the possibility of all human souls.

This is what Religious Science stands for. It is not a new dogmatism, it

is not a new authority generated from a new alleged revelation of the

God who never revealed anything to anybody, as such, else He could

not have revealed all things to all people. There is no special

dispensation of Providence, but there is a specialized dispensation

which the great and good and wise and just have known, even though

they knew it intuitively.

Find me one person who can get his own littleness out of the way and

he shall reveal to me the immeasurable magnitude of the Universe in

which I live.

Find me one person who knows how to talk to God, really, and I shall

walk with him through the woods and everything that seems inanimate

will respond – the leaves of the trees will clap their hands, the grass

will grow soft under him.

Find me one person who communes with cause and effect, and in the

evening, the evening star will sing to him and the darkness will turn to

light. Through him, as the woman who touched the hem of the

garment of Christ was healed, shall I be healed of all loneliness

forever.

Find me someone who is no longer sad, whose memory has been

redeemed from morbidity, and I shall hear laughter.

Find me someone whose song is really celestial, because it is the

outburst of the cosmic urge to sing, and I shall hear the music of the

spheres.”

That’s only a part of it.  You can get the rest of it by becoming a member of the Spiritual Living Archives.  It’s a great talk, but too long to post in it’s entirety here. 

My favorite part is the part about being for everything and against nothing.  No judgement!  Wouldn’t that make the world a better place, if each of us strove to be for everything and against nothing?  Try it!

One of the neat things about not taking or teaching any classes (tomorrow night is the last night for the meditation class that I’m teaching) is that I get to read anything I want.  I’m a voracious reader, I’ve currently got four books in a pile that I read from each morning, plus a bunch of em on my Kindle.   It’s a rare book (other than my mysteries) that I read from start to finish, I jump around and read what I feel like.

But I picked up a book at the bookstore at the Santa Rosa Spiritual Living Center (http://www.cslsr.org/) that was written by their minister, Edward Viljoen and another person, Chris Michaels.  It’s called The Prosperous Life Journal.  It’s a cute little thing, 224 pages, with journal pages at the end.  The body of the book has text on the left, space for journaling on the right, except in the middle of the book is a short section called Seven Spiritual Truths About Prosperity, and there are no journal pages in that section.

It’s a great book!  Easy to read, well written.  I’m only on page 30 but this book will probably become one of my rereads. 

Here’s a quote from the very first page:

The rich aren’t rich because they have money.  They have money because they are rich.  They have a consciousness of prosperity that causes money to be drawn to them.  A prosperity consciousness is the cause and money is the effect.

I have written in the journal section:  I have a consciousness of prosperity that causes money to be drawn to me.

Now, I know that a simple affirmation is very powerful.  I also know that simple affirmations are only part of the process.  Another huge part is changing my beliefs, my thinking.  I can do this by self exploration (writing in the journal) and working with another Practitioner, which I’m doing.  But the act of saying that to myself several times a day has the effect of working on me, helping me to explore my beliefs and my thinking, helping me to train my mind, helping me to turn my thoughts around. 

Affirmations, self exploration and working with another is a very powerful combination that works!

I’ll probably have some more to say about this book as I progress through it, but if you are looking for something new to read, you might want to check this book out.

Ok, so I’m taking this visioning class and I’m loving it.  I’m loving that I can go deeper into myself and establish more of a connection with Source using this technique.  I’m loving that it seems to be helping me to have an even firmer bedrock of peace upon which to live my life.  I’m loving that it seems to be strengthening an already strong and well developed intuitive sense.

But….

Last week we read an article by Michael Beckwith.  He’s a cool guy, and founder of one of the biggest centers for spiritual living, and also the “inventor” of the visioning technique.  Here’s the link to the article:  http://www.religiousscience.org/ucrs_site/pdf/visioning_interview.pdf  In it, he says that visualization is beginning metaphysics.  This implication is that only beginners ask for specific things from God, more advanced folks allow Source to work in our lives, our job is simply to be open.  Another implication:  that we really don’t know what’s best for us, that we limit ourselves by asking for specifics.

Ok, I agree:  we do tend to limit ourselves.  I agree, we should be open to all possibilities in our lives.

But if we shouldn’t ask for what we want, then what good is having all this power?  And, if God is within us, as metaphysics teaches, then whyohwhy are we implying that there is an outside God that knows better than we do what is best for our lives?  I bristle at any hint of a God that is outside of me, separate from me.  It is the main reason (other than the shame and dogma) that I have never much liked nor appreciated organized religion.  I also know that anything that provokes a strong reaction in me is likely to be something I need to work on (“if you spot it, you got it”).  But still.

This notion that I shouldn’t be asking for what I want, that I should be beyond all of that and simply be open to what God thinks is best for me, is giving me pause.  It’s making me question things, it’s making me wonder what the hell I’m doing here with all of this.  It hasn’t reached the level of crisis in faith, it isn’t causing me to consider any major changes in my spiritual beliefs, it’s just….well….giving me questions.

I don’t have any answers for you today.  No profound statements.  No words of wisdom, nor reminders to do your spiritual practices.  Read the article, then tell me what you think about all of this.

I just got a Kindle.  Remember, I’m the gadget girl.  For those of you who don’t know, a Kindle is an electric book reading device that you can only get from Amazon.com.  You wirelessly download books into the Kindle, then you can read them.  This little gadget will save me about 50 pounds of weight when I travel, as I typically travel with several books!  The only drawback to it is that not all books are yet accessible by Kindle, but the positives far outweigh the negatives!  It’s a cool gadget!

The reason I mention it is because I downloaded the 1926 edition of the Science of Mind textbook into my Kindle.  Now, I’m used to differing editions being exactly the same, with just a few minor changes, but this edition is totally different than the 1938 edition that I used for my classes.  It’s like a totally different book!  It is making sense to me in a way the 1938 edition doesn’t, and I am enjoying it thoroughly.  I haven’t figured out how to find page numbers in the Kindle that correspond to the actual printed page numbers, so while I can quote it to you, I won’t be able to tell you what page it’s on (unless you happen to have a Kindle).

This month’s quotes in the magazine are from the 1926 edition also.  So, this morning I’m trying to find the quote the magazine used, which is pretty cool, ” Jesus, the wisest Man that ever lived, said that God and man are One in real nature.”

Holmes also calls God Instinctive Man in the 1926 edition, which I really like.  So, expect some commentary from my readings in the 1926 edition, but don’t expect me to quote  you a page number.  If anyone out there can help me with finding actual page numbers in the Kindle I would appreciate it!

Before I move on to today’s topic, I want to apologize for not posting the last couple of days.  I am traveling, attending my photographer’s convention, and simply have not had the chance to log in!  It might be sporadic for the next few days while I’m here in Phoenix….

While I was in the airport I decided to buy a book to read on the plane.   I usually like to read mysteries, but two people in my life have mentioned The Shack to me, and it was in the airport so I thought I would check it out.  I honestly thought that it would not be a book that I would want to read.  I was practicing contempt prior to investigation and honestly thought it was going to be one of those dogmatic “you’re going to burn in hell unless you shape up” kind of books.  But I wanted to be open minded, so I picked up the book and started reading the testimonials…sure enough there were some that would lead me suspect that my inital thoughts were right, but then again there were some others from entertainers and college professors, so I decided to read the first couple of pages, as well as the foreward.  To make a long story short:

I highly recommend this book.

I’m only about halfway through, but the messages in this book are, for the most part, what I believe and have come to know to be true.  And they are delivered wonderfully.  This book speaks of us being one with God, of being created as a part of God, of taking responsibility for ourselves, of unconditional love…and the messages are delivered in a very well written way.

I’ll give another report when I finish!