• by Barbara McCaughey • I awoke on a Saturday morning just after sunrise and sat up to meditate. I could see the light of the morning sun peeking over the hills to the east. After a quiet time, I began a prayer for an experience of the uninterrupted purity of God, unencumbered by my own desires. My thoughts turned to Divine Spirit as beauty, simplicity, skill, focus, enthusiasm and joy.
When I opened my eyes, they fell on the leaves of the tree a few feet from my house. I was admiring their form and the glint of the sun upon them. Just beyond the tree it seemed there was an ongoing conference. Repeatedly, small birds flew in from various directions, lit in close proximity, chattered, then flew off.
While I was staring at this scene, out of nowhere a bird flew into view of my window, but just a few inches away. It hovered before my gaze for awhile, showing me its brilliant orange head above a dark band of feathers around its neck. This exquisite burst of color left me in awe, and a flood of tears spontaneously ran down my cheeks. It seemed that I had “tuned in,” with greater concentration than usual, to Nature’s own discovery show.
Finally I arose, filled with a quiet appreciation for the miracle I had just observed, each leaf and creature expressing pure life and joy in its unique way. To witness it was an answer to my prayer. The free, exultant expression of life in its myriad forms is the purity of God. Each individual offering, in harmony with the whole creation, seemed to sing a sweet song. I felt inspired to again read my favorite chapter in the book Cosmic Consciousness by R. Maurice Bucke. Here’s a quote:
“I left my friend and was walking slowly homeward, enjoying the calm beauty of the evening, when I became conscious of an unutterable stillness, and simultaneously every object about me became bathed in a soft light, clearer and more ethereal than I had ever before seen.
“Then a voice whispered in my soul: ‘God is all. He is not far away in the heavens; He is here. This grass under your feet is He, this bountiful harvest, that blue sky, those roses in your hand—you yourself—are all one with him. All is well forever and ever, for there is no place or time where God is not.’ Then the earth and sky thrilled and vibrated to one song, and the burden of it was, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.’”
As I finish this writing, a hummingbird is sucking the nectar from a jasmine flower by the porch. I watch with fascination and pleasure. The harmonic song of praise goes on.
God says, “It is a pure heart I look for; that is the place in which I rest.” – Thomas a Kempis
• by Dawn King • During this festive to frantic time of the year, we are especially challenged to maintain an even keel of mental and emotional calmness. Current planetary alignments reflect the fact that this will continue to be particularly challenging right through the end of the year. Keeping the following affirmations and quotes at hand in memory, or as a physical cue, can help us survive gracefully.
Daily meditation is the key to stilling the mind.
To control the breath is to control the mind.
Affirmation: I take a deep breath and realize this moment is a fleeting scene in a cosmic play. I remember that I am a divine spark of God manifesting in this physical body. A detached enjoyment of life helps me maintain my spiritual awareness.
Affirmation: I relax and cast aside all mental burdens, allowing God to express through me perfect love, peace, and wisdom.
Sibylle Custer: This world we live in has been compared to a web. If you touch a spider web in one place, the whole web quivers. Our vibrations, our thoughts, what we do, all send a quiver through the web of this planet. May the vibrations that we each send out this moment, this day, be for the healing and comfort and upliftment of all.
Paramahansa Yogananda: God has given us one tremendous instrument of protection—more powerful than machine guns, electricity, poison gas, or any medic—the mind. It is the mind that must be strengthened.
An important part of the adventure of life is to get hold of the mind and to keep that controlled mind constantly attuned to the Lord. This is the secret of a happy, successful existence. It comes by exercising mind power and by attuning the mind to God through meditation. Be in constant attunement with God.
Talking with Arjuna, in the Bhagavad Gita God says: “The state of constant calmness (neutralization of restless thoughts) is attained by the continuous practice of meditation and by keeping the attention fixed at the point between the eyebrows. In this state of calmness, man witnesses the thoughts and emotions and their workings without being disturbed at all, reflecting in his consciousness only the unchangeable image of Spirit.
• by Patricia Paulsen • Norman Vincent Peale, a contemporary of Paramahansa Yogananda, was born in 1898. Living in New York, he reached out to inspire people through his ministry and writing. In 1952, his book The Power of Positive Thinking was reviewed by mental health professionals who claimed his “radical” ideas were going to mislead people. He lost friends and got bad publicity, but his controversial book became a best seller that endures today. It was written with the sole objective of helping people achieve a happy, satisfying and worthwhile life.
Dr. Peale’s main point was that positive thinking is the foundation of happiness. His principles are used today in most self-help groups, life coaching, motivational speeches, and in spiritual practices. He wrote:
Pray a great deal, and let your prayer take the form of thanksgiving. Cast out those old, dead, unhealthy thoughts; substitute for them new vital dynamic thoughts. You can depend upon it: an inflow of creative healthy thoughts will remake you and your life. Negative thoughts may vie for your attention, but the new and healthy thoughts will now be stronger and better fortified and therefore able to replace them.
How can we train our minds to think positively? Today science tells us:“While we appreciate positive experiences, we are much more finely attuned and give much greater weight to negative experiences like fear, threats, or even just bad news.” (Jeff Haden, “Psychology Today”)
Negative experiences are quickly imprinted in our longterm memory. However, positive experiences and thoughts require that we hold onto them for twelve seconds (or longer) in order to create a longterm memory. Neuropsychologist Rich Hanson says “The brain is like velcro to negative experiences and Teflon to positive ones.” That being the case, we have to consciously apply ourselves, focusing on the good to stay in a positive healthy frame of mind.
Try it! Catch the good moments, and hold onto them. When something positive comes your way, hold that thought for at least 12 seconds. Plant positive seeds in your memory and watch your life transform.
This is a life process; it’s going to take time to create a new habit of thinking more positively. Believe in yourself! Have faith and confidence in your abilities! Catch the moment before moving into gossip, snippy remarks that are not necessary or
kind. Forgive yourself and others. Start filling your mind with creative healthy thoughts. Replace the weeds of negative thoughts with positive thought seeds and enjoy the peace of mind this brings. Thoughts only stay alive by the energy you give them.
Meditation trains the mind to slip into a calm peace, the wellspring of positive creative thinking. Here we have the power to plant seeds in the living field of consciousness within and around us. What a gift!
• by Norman Paulsen, Sunburst’s founder • In the beginning was the great ignition and explosion of light and life force. Everything that exists originated at that point in deep space: spinning galaxies, star systems, planets, and all life forms including these bodies that we find ourselves encompassed in today.
Each of us is directly connected to the Source, the first ignition, through an inner-dimensional tunnel of light. This tunnel can be seen in deep meditation by the grace of Spirit, and sometimes through accident or illness. Every human being is connected. This means every human being can see God face to face—can see the center of creation, the light where it all began.
The experience is of seeing the impossible being possible; this incredible vision staggers the self-conscious mind. It goes reeling away with all its former concepts of what the world is, what God is, and what life’s about. All concepts are being destroyed in the immensity of the stupendous reality of this experience.
The self-conscious mind wants to believe that God is alive, but it has no proof. We want to believe we are immortal and we’re going to gain a heavenly place, but we don’t have any proof. This event is more than the proof; it’s the direct experience of immortality. In that moment, looking into that Light and Presence, the most wondrous thing is that it is personal!
Yes, the light you see at the end of the tunnel, appearing brighter than our physical sun, begins to speak through audible thought transference. You hear a voice that is seemingly coming from all space, but it’s directed to you personally through inner space.
There’s a personal relationship just for you with the Divine, like a son or daughter to a father or mother. That relationship is such that you always wanted to believe it was possible, and suddenly, here it is. You are in it; you are experiencing it. It’s true, and it’s staggering. There are no words to describe it.
• by Sibylle Custer • A question on so many people’s minds is, “How do we find peace with other people and with the world around us?” I’ve been reflecting on the nature of peace, and know that first of all, you need to have peace in yourself before you can radiate it outwards.
There is a story that has inspired me through the years, even in my childhood. The Russian writer Leo Tolstoy wrote about a farmer who was put in a very challenging situation, and had to figure out a way to find peace in himself.
The farmer who was living in a village, was used to doing his farm work during the week and going to church on Sunday. But then the Communist era started, and his farm was subject to new rules. The communist leaders were not supportive of the religious practices of the people in the village.
When they came to this farmer’s house on an Easter Saturday, the official asked him to plow his field on Easter morning in keeping with the new plan of government. The farmer said: “It’s Easter Sunday tomorrow; I would like to go to church.”
The official left the farmer thinking that if he did not oblige and go according to the plan of the officials, he would lose his farm and his livelihood. So the farmer was faced with the question of what to do: go to church, or plow the field?
Nowadays, his solution sometimes comes to my mind. What he did fascinates me. He dressed in his Sunday clothes with white shirt, looking absolutely festive. He went to his plow and started to plow his field, but first put a candle on the plow and lit it. Now he plowed the field in his Sunday outfit, and nobody could say anything about that! He did what the world had asked of him, but he also did not give up what his soul wanted to do, which was to worship God on Sunday.
That is a decision that we are sometimes asked to make: to give the world what the world is asking, but also remain true to our own self. Jesus said, “Give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, but give unto God what is God’s.” This way you don’t lose your soul, which is as important (or more so) than whatever the world is asking of you. That solution has stayed really deep in me. That farmer was truly at peace.
“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass…. It’s about learning to dance in the rain.” – Vivian Greene
