If you don't like something, let go of it.

A Sunday School teacher once told me a story I've never forgotten.  It was about how hunters captured monkeys in the jungle.  The trappers would simply put a banana in a jar with a narrow mouth.  They would then tie the jar to a tree and wait.  Soon enough, a monkey would come along and see the banana in the jar.  The monkey could squeeze his hand into the jar to grab the banana, but as he gripped the banana with his fist, his hand could not fit through the mouth of the jar, leaving him trapped to the jar and the tree.  It was a simple matter for the trappers to come and scoop him up.
The obvious moral of the story is that if the monkey had enough sense to just let go of the banana, he could have easily withdrawn his hand and escaped.  It was only his own stupidity and stubborn attitude that left him trapped.
Sadly, people are often guilty of the same type behavior.  No, we may not realize that it is within our power to let go of something and be free, but we are.  Whether we are clutching sickness, poverty, depression, or hopelessness, the story applies.  Mortal mind, aka. human reasoning, would argue that these things are imposed on us by forces and circumstances beyond our control - a weak body, bad genes, an economic downturn, failure in a relationship, and on and on.  We are educated from birth to believe that we live in an objective state of being and that there is scientific proof that something outside our control has had a negative effect on our well-being.  If you believe this, you are certainly in the majority.  But is it really true?
The science of physics has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt, that, in fact, we do not live in an objective state, but a subjective one.  The experimenter's thoughts and attitudes directly affect the results of his experiments.  Google the terms placebo and nocebo and read what you find there.
So, what if our attitudes and beliefs are truly a part, maybe even the whole, of our experience?  That means that if we are suffering humanly, that suffering is in fact a product of our thoughts, our attitudes, our beliefs.  And if we can change those thoughts, we can change our experience.  Too often, though, just like our friends the monkeys, we are so fixated on having that banana, that we are not about to let it go, even if that simple action would free us.
Ask yourself, do I wholeheartedly believe that some problem is real and truly a part of my life?  Do I refer to "my cancer" or "my evil boss" or even "my horrible life?"  If you do, then stop and consider how much you want those negative things.  Are you tired enough of them to let them go?  Could you begin to think differently about yourself if you knew it would bring healing to your life?  Even if you're not convinced and certain of this, would it not be worth a little effort to try?  In speaking of healing, the Master Christian, Jesus Christ, tells us that we should, "...know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."  If this Truth is that we are always held in God's loving arms - never hurt, never sick, never threatened - and if knowing this will free us from the human circumstances that say we are, shouldn't we listen to him?
Whether you believe this premise or not, surely we can all agree that thinking positively and expecting goodness is a better way to live than thinking negatively and expecting evil.  So, start each day by reminding yourself that you are Love's expression.  Remember that all through the day.  Fight any suggestion to see and believe in sin, sickness, or death.  You will find comfort and healing in proportion to how sincerely you hold onto these loving thoughts.  Healing in this way happens every day.  Don't be a silly monkey and refuse to let go of that mortal banana.  Peace.

Understanding what matters and what doesn't

In the Ten Commandments, we find a prohibition against murder and another against bearing false witness.  Hmm...quite a broad spectrum there.  What can we learn from such widely varied commandments?
Again, in Isaiah 55:8-9, we read, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts."
The angel message in these passages is that mortal, material thoughts and actions and all the laws relating to them reflect their source - mortality, materiality, nothingness.  The Creator of the universe is divine, infinite Spirit and that which is the only truth of creation must likewise be completely Spirit, Mind, Love.  So when we think of human life and death, good and evil, morality and immorality, we are simply entertaining vacant unreality - nothing claiming to be something.  The sad thing is how many good and loving ideas of God have been condemned to misery and even death on the basis of vacuous mortal dictates.  The preacher who believes in the power of sin is just as guilty as the simple sinner who believes that there is pleasure in debauched mortal existence.
Does this mean that we have the freedom to completely disregard human morals and rules of righteousness?  Only if we never want to discover our true, eternally loving state of being.  A wise teacher once said that sin is anything that separates us from God, Love, Truth.  Since the ultimate reality of creation is that we can never truly be separated from our Father-Mother, God, sin cannot exist in the kingdom of heaven - our eternal, spiritual home.  
So what and where and why is sin?  Sin is simply a mistake about what is real - an illusion about life that, if believed and practiced will hide our true spiritual, perfect natures from us.  The only reality of sin is that it serves to reveal to us the suffering separation from divine Love brings.  Our Father-Mother, Love doesn't create sin or make us prone to it.  But divine Love does remind us through a still, small voice within our hearts that we are loving, pure ideas.  This voice triggers within us a repulsion to all that is sinful, impure, and mortal.  If we wish to uplift our lives, we listen to that voice and turn away from all that is unlike God, good.  The true meaning of "free will" is that we can choose to embrace sin, conclude its seeming pleasures are what we want, and live lives separated from heavenly good.  But those sin-filled lives are never real.  They are always delusional.  And we may choose to live in this way time and time again, but all that is really happening is that we are wasting eons in false dreaming, never aware that there is true happiness, peace, and everlasting joy at our very fingertips.  All we have to do is to turn away wholeheartedly from anything that makes us bow down to matter, sin, disease, and death. and steadfastly listen to that inner voice of Truth that is always with us - always guiding, guarding, and governing us.
To escape from evil, we must be steadfast in our focus on the Truth of being - in spiritual living and blessedness.  We must stand up against the subtle lies that delusional error tries to impress upon us as our own thoughts.  Humanly when we dream at night, we are convinced that we are living a real existence - traveling to foreign lands and doing wondrous things - when all the while we are simply lying motionless, asleep in a bed.  Likewise, when we look at our daily human existence as reality, all we are truly seeing is a waking dream - sometimes exciting or beautiful, but always false.  We are so acclimated to this pseudo-reality that we think it represents true being.  This is where we must listen to our inner voice - the voice of an angel - if we are going to awake and begin to seek what truly constitutes life and being - divine Spirit.
So, dear friends, do not despair, no matter how deeply mired in mortal delusion you may seem to be.  Your true being has never sinned.  Your true identity is "...hid with Christ in God."  And all the years of hopeless slavery to matter that you may believe you have spent are less than nothing.  It only takes a moment to awaken from this mortal dream and reach out with your heart to divine Love.  Your Father-Mother, God is always there to lift you up as we read in the book of James (4:8): "Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double-minded."  Keep your hearts and minds so focused on perfect Love that you listen to and claim no other mind but the divine Mind as your own.  Peace. 

Faith during trying times - sometimes difficult, always rewarding.

A wise teacher once wrote: "Trials are proofs of God's care." In the midst of challenging periods in our lives, most of us have a tough time believing that the pain and suffering we are going through could possibly be evidence of a caring Father-Mother, God.  So, what does this quote mean?
Well, it comes down to how much do we need to grow spiritually in our lives to truly know Love's heavenly kingdom.  The true saints among us live their lives facing the same kinds of trials that we do, but their faith in omnipotent Love is so great that they see beyond the pain to the true reality of being.  They have gained such faith by years of devoted prayer and communion with God.  The suffering they endured early in life taught them a most valuable lesson of faith and trust in Almighty God.  We suffer because we need to grow in our perception and understanding of spiritual, perfect reality.  Our inner spiritual voice reminds us that Love is more potent than hate, Life is more real than death, and Good is more powerful than evil.  When we confront the illusory forces of evil or human error, our human sense of being is troubled.  Much like trying to read a book while riding in the back seat of a car on a hilly, curvy road, the human brain is receiving mixed signals.  The eyes say we are sitting still reading a stationary book while the inner ear testifies that we are moving up and down, right and left.  The end result of these mixed signals is we feel carsick.  Likewise, when our spiritual sense is telling us that divine Love is our life and that we are safe and protected, sometimes our mortal sense tells us otherwise, and we suffer.
Our response to this suffering is key.  Do we accept the suffering as real?  Do we allow the suffering to overcome our sense of God's care?  Do we look elsewhere than Spirit for relief?  If we do any of the preceding, we allow ourselves to lose the lesson we could learn.  If we wallow in the suffering and believe it is reality, we suffer more and defeat the only real purpose suffering has - to prod us into a greater faith, a more steadfast turning to divine Mind.  The result is that we must continue to suffer until we reach that point where we awaken and allow suffering to refocus our minds.  When we finally begin to reject the suffering for its unreality, we will see the true purpose for its seeming presence in our lives.  That truth is telling us that we need to turn more to Spirit and Love and look away from matter and error.
The old adage about suffering, "That which doesn't kill you makes you stronger" applies.  If we turn our thoughts and lives to spiritual being and goodness and find that the trial we were facing is behind us, we can rejoice because we have risen up higher in the scale of existence.  We have added a new piece of evidence to our mental file folder declaring that Spirit can be trusted to overcome matter, and we are blessed by this addition.
So, since divine Love cares dearly for each and every one of us, that Love continues to remind us that we should look away from error, evil, and matter and turn wholeheartedly to Spirit.  Those reminders that we get look a lot like trials and suffering, but they are really just heavenly wake-up calls.  The Bible says: "Rejoice in all things!"  Even suffering can be a call to rejoice when we let it teach us to look to God.  Divine Love is faithful and will deliver us from the lions' den or the fiery furnace.  Likewise, Love will meet any human need we have, including the need for relief from a suffering human sense of pain in life.  So, after the first blush of fear that may accompany a trial or test of our faith, resolve to look heavenward.  As Jesus advises us, "...know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."(John 8:32)


Trials teach mortals not to lean on a material staff,-- a broken reed, which pierces the heart. We do not half remember this in the sunshine of joy and prosperity. Sorrow is salutary. Through great tribulation we enter the kingdom. Trials are proofs of God's care. Spiritual development germinates not from seed sown in the soil of material hopes, but when these decay, Love propagates anew the higher joys of Spirit, which have no taint of earth. Each successive stage of experience unfolds new views of divine goodness and love.  (Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health, 66:6)