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"You have
made your body comfortable and have turned your attention inward; you
have called to the Spirit within to quicken you with that tide of
spiritual energy which you need. Now, you must remain silent and
passive, and you must neither suggest nor affirm to the energy which
fills you, nor must you let your attention wander outward to the things
of the material world. You are just to rest, to be conscious and
awake, but passive and receptive. Don't even "try to
feel" the energy which is working within you, for your imagination
has nothing to do with the process; this is not auto-suggestion, nor is
it always a process which makes an impression upon your feelings.
You may feel nothing, or you may be so shaken that you will be
terrified. You are in the hands of the Great One who formed you
out of Its own spiritual substance, and who best knows how to perfect
you in body, consciousness, and estate.
There
is no certain time which you must remain in the silence. At first,
it will perhaps be an unsatisfactory experience; but if you are
faithful, you will come to recognize these periods when you are
conscious but without formulated thought, and when every cell and fiber
of your physical body is being cleansed and re-created, as times of
wonderful blessing. At the right time each withdrawal into the
silence will terminate itself.
... Do not hurry away to your regular employment, but pause a few
minutes and silently examine the thoughts that come to you.
Perhaps the wisdom which you particularly need will be revealed to you
at this time. If not, you may pass on, knowing that you are going
forth regenerated."
-
Paul
Ellsworth, Direct Healing, 1914(modified)
I
cannot emphasize enough that "all healing is done in the
silence" ... whether we desire to heal our physical body, our
relationships, our finances, or whatever it is that we want to
experience more of the Good in, ultimately, this healing will take place
within us, in the silence. In a culture where we are addicted to
television, video games, radio, iPods, cell phones, etc. ... a few
minutes in the stillness of the silence may seem like an eternity.
But, no matter how difficult it may, at first, seem to be, with
consistent practice we shall find our way into the stillness of the
silence. The benefits of the silence are so vast and so personal
to each person who practices it, that it is impossible for any one
person to define them.
Louise Hay wrote in "You Can Heal Your
Life": "There was one client who seemed to me to be so
bright and intelligent. Her mind was unusually clever and quick,
and she had a great sense of humor. Yet she could not get her act
together. She was overweight, broke, frustrated in her career, and
without a romance for many years. She could accept all the
metaphysical concepts quickly; they made a lot of sense to her.
Yet she was too clever, too quick. She found it difficult to slow
herself down enough to practice over a meaningful period of time the
ideas she could grasp so quickly on a moment-by-moment basis. ... Daily
meditation helped her enormously. We began with only 5 minutes a
day and very gradually worked up to 15 or 20 minutes."
Dr. Holmes writes that the whole process of
giving a spiritual mind treatment (affirmative prayer) is a relaxed,
effortless endeavor. Our work in silent meditation will give us
the level of relaxation necessary to free us from distractions as we
formulate our affirmative prayers. In this more relaxed state of
mind, our mind is free to think and contemplate what it is that we want
to include in our affirmation. Too often our focus in prayer is an
attempt to change something in our outer world of experience, but this
cannot be done unless we first unify and identify with Spirit and change
something within us ... and we will accomplish this to a greater degree
as we are able to get still and relaxed.
As we identify with Spirit, we must know that
the same joy, happiness and harmony that is part of Spirit, is also part
of us ... as we share in this Life that is G-d. As our mind is
conscious of these things, we can begin to affirm what it is that we
desire to experience. We are not asking, nor are we begging ... we
are only convincing our selves that we can accept, with joy, the Good
that G-d desires
for us. Often when we finish our prayer, we will feel the urge to
remain still and quiet for awhile, and in this stillness of our mind we
may sense an inner joy and gratitude. This inner joy and gratitude
is an effect of the time we have sat in the silence and stilled our
mind. For most of us, this becomes and inner knowing and our
treatment or prayer is complete and has accomplished the thing we have
directed it to accomplish.
Let us say with Dr. Holmes: "Today
I accept my own affirmations. There is nothing in me that can
contradict them. I have a deep inward sense, a feeling and
conviction and complete faith that there is a Law of Good governing
everything, and that It is governing completely, with absolute
certainty, without deviation, with no exception; that there is nothing
to oppose It, nothing to change It, nothing to limit or circumscribe Its
action. I abandon myself to this faith. I live in its
atmosphere and accept its conclusion. I know that I am a Divine
being on the pathway of an endless self-expression and that the Eternal
G-d is my host, now and forevermore."
AND
SO IT IS!
Keep
the faith!
Rev.
Dr. Henry Lee Bates
Visit Rev. Bates BLOG: Living
the Science of Mind
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