ACTING IN A CERTAIN WAY
The last two Sundays, I have asked you to take a little assessment to see where you are with fully experiencing:
* A Pathway of God's Plenty,
* a Journey of the Joy living from Spirit's Purpose as you,
* a Course of Conscious Creation
Do you remember that!? And you gave yourself a number between 1 to 5, remember? Good. If you weren't here to do that, you can go online to our website and either listen or read last week's talk. In fact, I would encourage you to either listen to or read last week and the week before if you weren't here because we've talked about some powerful stuff for creating:
* a life we love living;
* a life in harmony with our Divine Nature and on purpose; and
* a life lived by design and not by default.
We've talked about cultivating a deep, personal, regular relationship with our CSO (God!) and about doing what is ours to do and letting our CSO do the rest. And what are the 4 things that are ours to do? (Be clear about what we want, align with what we want, be grateful in advance for what we want, follow any guidance we get.)
We've explored having daily business meetings with our CSO. I even gave you a 30-day practice. To have a daily meeting that consisted of 5 things, which are outline on this orange card. You can find a card in the foyer if you didn't get one. It's never too late to start, and we would love to have you join us. Who began the practice last week?
Today we continue combining the work of May McCarthy in her book The Path to Wealth with the work of Wallace Wattles in The Science of Getting Rich and find that in addition to our regular meetings with our CSO, we must also act in a certain way.
In fact, Wattles writes in The Science of Getting Rich: ". . . you must not rely upon thought alone, paying no attention to personal action. That is the rock upon which many otherwise scientific metaphysical thinkers meet shipwreck --- the failure to connect thought with personal action."a
Today, we are going to "connect thought with personal action."
THINKING IN A CERTAIN WAY
In order to connect thought with personal action, we need to focus for a few minutes on the idea of what kind of thoughts we are connecting to action, and Wattles happens to have a chapter in the book entitled, "Thinking in a Certain Way." So let's explore that for just a few moments, and then we will make the connection to Acting in a Certain Way.
Caveat - Now this is not going to be new to you! We talk about this a lot. But I want you to listen to it with new ears! What have you not heard before? What have you not yet incorporated into your life?
1. Thinking in a Certain Way
Wattles suggests that in order to think a certain way, we must have a foundation on which to build our thinking. So I want to share three principles on which our work is based. Here they are:
1. There is one original Formless Stuff, or Substance, from which all things are made and which -- in its unformed state -- permeates, penetrates and fills all space.
Or, from Talks on Truth,: "Mind is not a thing; Mind is. It is that which, through orderly process, produces the thing. This orderly process, we have learned by observation, is from an invisible center to a visible circumstance."b
2. A thought, placed into this Substance, produces the thing that is thought.
Holmes writes: "The starting point of all creation is the . . .Thought of God. It is the Self-Knowing Mind, speaking Itself into manifestation."c
3. Therefore, we can form things in our thoughts, which are impressed upon the Formless Stuff or Substance, and cause the thing we thought about to be created.
Fillmore writes: "The source of all my manifestations is my mind. This source is exactly like the Father - is the Father in degree. An idea arises in my mind of something that I want to do; this idea is the Son. I express that idea in definite thought; that is Spirit going forth to accomplish that whereto I have sent it."d
To repeat.
1. There is one original Formless Stuff, or Substance, from which all things are made and which -- in its unformed state -- permeates, penetrates and fills all space.
2. A thought, placed into this Substance, produces the thing that is thought.
3. Therefore, we can form things in our thoughts, which are impressed upon the Formless Stuff or Substance, and cause the thing we thought about to be created.
That is New Thought 101 in the words of Wallace Wattles from The Science of Getting Rich supported by Ernest Holmes and Charles Fillmore. Because this is all true - and it is! - we must then be sure to Think in a Certain Way. And what is that way? Wattles writes: "You must form a clear and definite mental picture of what you want; you cannot transmit an idea unless you have it yourself. You must have it before you can give it; and many people fail to impress Thinking Substance because they have themselves only a vague and misty concept of the things they want to do, to have or to become. . . . You need to know what you want, and to want it badly enough so that it will stay in your thoughts."e
What is the first of the 4 things that are ours to do (and everything else is up to our CSO)? Remember? It is to decide what we want!
And what is the second thing that is ours to do, leaving the rest to our CSO? To align with what we want. Where do we align? Of course, first, in our thoughts!
And that is where our spiritual work is! To stand guard the portals of our minds and to think only the thoughts we want to see manifested in our lives.
In This Thing Called You, Holmes says not to let anything pass through our lips we don't want returned to us in our lives. I will add to that and say don't let anything pass between your ears that you don't want returned in your life! Not always that easy to do, I do understand that!
Wattles writes: "It is not your part to guide or supervise the creative process; all you have to do with that is to retain your vision, stick to your purpose, and maintain your faith [faith that the 3 fundamental principles are in fact true!] and gratitude."f
And the third thing that is ours to do according to May McCarthy? To be grateful in advance!
It is the vision, faith, gratitude and one more ingredient which make the difference between the scientist and the dreamer! And that one more ingredient, according to Wattles and every other metaphysical teacher I know of, is . . .
ACTING IN A CERTAIN WAY
2. Acting in a Certain Way
Wattles writes: "Your pocketbook is not going to be transformed into a Fortunata's purse, which shall be always full of money without effort on your part. This is the crucial point in the science of getting rich; right here, where thought and personal action must be combined."g
The first line of that quote . . . "Your pocketbook is not going to be transformed into a Fortunata's purse, which shall be always full of money without effort on your part" . . .
. . . reminds me of a story. It's about a man who walks into a restaurant with an ostrich behind him, and as he sits, the waitress comes over and asks for his order. The man says, "I'll have a hamburger, fries and a coke," and turns to the ostrich. "What's yours?" "I'll have the same," says the ostrich.
A short time later the waitress returns with the order. "That will be $12.40 please," and the man reaches into his pocket and without even looking or counting, he pulls out the exact change for payment.
The next day, the man and the ostrich come again and the man says, "I'll have a grilled cheese sandwich, potato salad and a coke," and the ostrich says, "I'll have the same." Order costs $10.10. Once again the man reaches into his pocket and pays with exact change.
The next evening the two enter again. "I will have a steak, baked potato and salad -- oh, and a coke," says the man. "Same for me," says the ostrich.
A short time later the waitress comes with the order and says, "That will be $35.62." Once again the man pulls exact change out of his pocket and places it on the table.
The waitress can't hold back her curiosity any longer. "Excuse me, sir. How do you manage to always come up with the exact change out of your pocket every time?"
"Well," says the man, "several years ago I was cleaning the attic and I found an old tarnished lamp. It was a pretty lamp and I thought how much better it would look if it were polished, so I started to rub it. And suddenly a Genie appeared and offered me two wishes.
My first wish was that if I ever had to pay for anything, I could just put my hand in my pocket, and the right amount of money would always be there."
"That's brilliant and so well thought out!" says the waitress. "Most people would wish for a million dollars or something, but you'll always be as rich as you want for as long as you live!"
"That's right! Whether it's a gallon of milk or a Rolls Royce, the exact money is always there. It's really wonderful!" says the man.
The waitress asks, "One other thing, sir, what's with the ostrich?"
The man replies, "My second wish wasn't as well thought out -- I wished for a chick with long legs who always agreed with me."
And, as we now know from the Geico commercials - genies are very literal! Guy wishes for a million bucks and that's what he got all over his yard!
So, we don't have a genie to give us magic pockets, we must take action.
Wattles writes: "By thought, the thing you want is brought to you; by action you receive it."h
But what kind of action? We must, according to Wattles, Act in a Certain Way.
Wattles writes: "You cannot act where you are not; you cannot act where you have been, and you cannot act where you are going to be; you can act only where you are today. Do not bother as to whether yesterday's work was well done or ill done; do today's work well. Do not try to do tomorrow's work now; there will be plenty of time to do that when you get to it. Do not wait for a change of environment, before you act; get a change of environment by action. Hold with faith and purpose the vision of yourself in the better environment, but act upon your present environment with all your heart, and with all your strength and with all your mind."i
Amelia Earhart wanted to be a great aviator. But it was the 1920s and people still thought that women were frail and weak and didn't have what it takes. Woman suffrage was not even a decade old.
She couldn't make her living as a pilot, so she took a job as a social worker, keeping her vision to be a pilot and acting upon her present environment with all her heart, strength and mind.
Then one day her phone rang. The man on the line had a pretty offensive proposition, along with lines of: We have someone willing to fund the first female transatlantic flight. Now you won't get to actually fly the plane, and we're going to send two men along as chaperones and guess what, we'll pay them a lot of money and you won't get anything. Oh, and you very well might die while doing this. Do you want it? You know what she said to that offer? Yes, of course!
Because that's what people who have a vision and choose to act on it do. That's how people who become great do. They start. Anywhere. Anyhow. They don't care if the conditions are perfect or if they are being slighted.
She did that flight successfully and less than 5 years after it, Amelia was the first women to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic and became, rightly, one of the most famous and respected people in the world.
But none of that would have happened had she turned up her nose at that offensive offer or sat around feeling sorry for herself. Rather, she Acted in a Certain Way!j
So the idea of having your vision, seeing it and living it by Thinking and Acting in a Certain Way is how we experience:
* A Pathway of God's Plenty,
* a Journey of the Joy living from Spirit's Purpose as you,
* a Course of Conscious Creation
And I want to leave you with some really wise thoughts from a very wise person about this Journey of Joy living from Spirit's Purpose - he refers to it as "calling," but it's the same thing:
"I now realize that we don't get to choose our calling in Life! We get to choose whether or not we will listen to each nudge or flare, whether or not we will believe and whether or not we will dedicate ourselves to this territory of homecoming within us. Sometimes I really wish that people understood how it feels to be me. Each and every day I have this big fire inside of me to move mountains. I want so much to use this gift inside of me to change so many lives. But the hardest job has been to move the mountains within my own life. Thank you for giving me the tools to move those mountains."
Those tools are exactly what we are talking about this month. Creating a relationship with your CSO, having your daily meetings, thinking in a certain way and acting in a certain way. That is what he has done! And if the author of those words can do it, so can you, my friends. Who wrote those words?
Well, they came to an acquaintance in a letter from Leo Wright, resident of Lewis Prison. If Leo can do it in the environment he is in, my friends, I think we can too, don't you?
aWallace Wattles The Science of Getting Rich, p. 74
bCharles Fillmore Talks on Truth, p. 33
cErnest Holmes Science Of Mind, p. 69
dCharles Fillmore Talks on Truth p. 134
eWallace Wattles The Science of Getting Rich p. 51 & 53
fWallace Wattles The Science of Getting Rich p. 76
gWallace Wattles The Science of Getting Rich p. 77
hWallace Wattles The Science of Getting Rich p. 77
iWallace Wattles The Science of Getting Rich
jObstacle is the Way, p. 71
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