How I Became the Whole in the Donut

Imagine a giant donut shape with the “whole” in the center of the donut filled with “me”, a vast beingness occupying the center of a circumference of energy. This vision came to me while sitting in meditation during a church service on a Sunday morning. I wasn’t in this container, I was the actual center of this container, peaceful, calm, and centered. Suddenly, this donut-shaped container around me began filling up with thoughts and feelings that had no reference to my immediate experience. This led me to the conclusion that these thoughts and feelings were not exactly my own, or had originated within me. I had entered the building that morning at peace, calm, centered and clear of any residual thoughts or feelings from the past. These thoughts and feelings from my environment felt foreign as if they didn’t quite fit with my internal experience of who I was or what I was doing.
I felt myself being drawn into these mixed feelings and thoughts; a swirling and twirling sensation that confused me; I became disoriented. I experienced a wide variety of emotions: first, anxiety, then sorrow, next frustration, some passing anger, a deep resentment, humiliation, and then again confusion. I had been floating peacefully in calm waters when the waters began to churn; I began to sink into the surrounding mix of fluid thoughts and emotion. A still small Presence within guided my attention back to the center of that donut-shaped container, back to that still place of grace I had known just moments before. Internally I shifted to the center, looked around with the inner eye and watched, with detachment, all of the feelings and thoughts that did not “belong” to me swirling all around in the donut space around me. I felt and knew a clarity, a deep understanding of the confusion I often experience in other situations as being this phenomenon of being the center of a container that held all that is around and within my environment.
Ernest Holmes, a new thought spiritual leader from the early 1900s says:
Telepathy is the act of reading subjective thought, or of receiving conscious thought without audible words being spoken. But there must be a mental tuning in, so to speak, just as there must be in radio. We are surrounded by all sorts of vibrations, and if we wish to catch any of them distinctly, we must tune in; but there is a great deal of interference, and we do not always get the messages clearly. We often get the wrong ones, and sometimes many of the vibrations come together and seem to be nothing but a lot of noises, without any particular reason for being. It is only when the instrument is properly adjusted to some individual vibration that a clear message may be received. (Science of Mind, Pg 240)
There is much more to be said about the phenomenon of telepathy. In some ways this is how my thoughts and your thoughts become our thoughts. We enter the kingdom and are One, individuated, yet One in the container that is One container.

Soul-Strung Voices Singing Only of Life & Delight

From Emma Curtis Hopkins:
CHRISTMAS LESSON: SHEPHERDS AND THE STAR/Luke 2:8-20

Why did the shepherds catch the gleams of a light that was not sunlight or moonlight or fire light? Because they were setting themselves free from the world-wide idea that some kind of material light must shine or they would be in darkness.

Why did they have the songs of harmonious choirs whose soul-strung voices never had chanted of death or of mourning, but only of life and delight? Because for just a brief space they let alone the teachings of their schools and their churches concerning dying before seeing heavenly beings, and being resurrected before hearing of happiness as everywhere.
"Shepherds were watching their flocks by night, When far o'er the hills shown a beautiful light."
That which was being enacted on the Jordan hills 1900 years ago is again taking place. Those who put to one side the "passes" of the doctrines of mankind are shepherds taking good care of their thoughts. The light that shines is the science of God now being taught. It has no trace of the sunlight or moonlight of former doctrine in its mysterious shining. To those who follow where it leads there is a young realization born. This realization of the divine power and divine harmony, waiting within each soul to be the arbiter of each life, is the young Jesus Christ.
No one has yet come into the manger with offerings of all his gold and frankincense and myrrh of property, genius, reputation. They who have the light shine round are those who think they will follow up the science and see where it leads. It will lead down to the meekness and lowliness of yielding up of will, love of praise, fear of blame, eagerness to be successful, into the mysterious manger of nothingness of such traditions.
He who does this is afterward lost as a shepherd of sheep. He is the Christ. He can work miracles. He shall not be a man with the idea of limited abilities. He shall be Jesus Christ with all power. He shall not reckon his age by years, his possessions by count, his health by state of flesh. He shall realize that before the world was he was, and without end is his ownership. His health and beauty are not reckoned by conditions of flesh, but by his mastership of flesh as Spirit.
There are a great number near the manger. They are now learning to give up their eagerness for praise, their fear of blame, their struggles to be ahead of their neighbors or to be of equal importance with the rest of the sound of the voice of Spirit. The "passes" of the world's competitions do not move them. They know that success must first be of the Spirit before it has any taste.
"Seek first the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added."
"For we know that prosperity is of Thee."
It is now time for the light of Spiritual science to shine over the shepherds of the planet as it once shone over the shepherds of Judea. As Mary was not Jesus Christ but only brought Him forth, so those who brought out this doctrine from the archives of the ages where it had been hidden are not Jesus Christ because they have not shown the miracle working power of Jesus Christ, the Spiritual science of his hour.
But as Mary yielded all things to Jesus, so those who preach it are now giving it its absolute freedom with their life. They are standing back and letting it demonstrate for itself. The knowledge which they bear in their bosom that it is omnipotent truth, is as much activity as they care to exhibit.
"Mary kept all these sayings and pondered them in her heart." We will each do our protecting duty by the young science, which never had any beginning but was with man from his first breath. We will tell how true it is. We will tell its doctrines. We will praise its power. We will yield all we have, and are, to it till we are it absolutely. We shall prove that we are it only by our power of demonstrating in plain light of all mankind that there is no sin, no sickness, no death, no poverty, no feebleness, no senility, no mourning, for God is omnipresent and afflicted by none of these things.
December 25, 1892

"I'm going to leave you 'God' in my will."

White Dog

The sun shimmered upon the open waters. Pink Ladies and Kniphofia uvaria (Red Hot Pokers)infused color and scent along the coastal trail. The Pacific Ocean gleamed with the warmth of the late summer sky. Then, I met a white dog--a Maltese, white locks framing its small brown eyes. His name was Jack. He came to me, gently, softly and stepped into my lap. He nuzzled his muzzle against my bosom and rested there for a moment. I held him with my soft touch. The stillness of Spirit was present in that moment. Love came from this Friend that could only be described as an expression of a Divine Presence saying hello to me, loving me. I have a special relationship with white dogs, and black dogs. During my spiritual studies I encountered the metaphor of feeding the white dog as a way to cultivate the white light, the Light over the darkness. The white light came to me today as a Maltese. The owner of Jack plans to award me ownership in his will. As if to say "I'm going to leave you 'God' in my will." ^_^ Blessings...

Crystals Are a Spiritual Tool Not to Be Overlooked

The Earth is one giant crystal ball spinning through the universe. Crystals have been found in the digs of ancient cultures, are in our computers. Crystals are a life form and this video is enlightening. They are a spiritual tool not to be overlooked...
Spirit Science--Crystals

The Vision Board

"Open & Allowing" is the focus of the next VISION BOARD workshop on Saturday, August 11, from 2-4pm at the Center for Spiritual Living in Santa Rosa . Love Yourself, Live Life Fully!

Creating mental images builds inroads into your subconscious. It is something that you can do to help you in the art of manifestation. Oprah Winfrey revealed that she has created one with the intention that Obama not only become president but that she would go to the inaugural ball wearing the dress that appeared on her board. A plethora of high quality images will be available as we tune into our inner guidance leading us to those images that will inform our awareness about our higher purpose. Creating a VISION BOARD in this way brings into visual form a healing, nurturing collage of pictures and words that will lead you to your good. We will be given guidelines for dialoging with our VISION BOARD. This dialogue process aligns our consciousness with the All Knowing, One Consciousness that is active within us, guiding us, leading us. Folks can register for this workshop at the Center 707-546-4543. Fee is $25 and a materials donation of $5-$10 is collected at the door. Register now as these workshops do fill up quickly. See you there.

"...turn entirely away..."

"...turn entirely away from the condition, because as long as we look at it, we cannot overcome it. By thinking upon a condition, we tend to animate it with the life of our thought, and thereby it is perpetuated and magnified. To rise above the contemplation of conditions is to enter that field of Causation which makes all things new in our experience." Ernest Holmes
There are those days when I am at peace with my spiritual beliefs and teachings in New Thought/Science of Mind, and then there are those days when I am completely thrown by a statement that stimulates so many questions that I am lost in my faith; when I become so bewildered by a statement that I am thrown into a tailspin and know no peace with the tradition I had just yesterday strongly aligned myself with. I am looking for the Truth in this quote with a capitol T. My mind naturally gravitates toward solving problems, studying a situation in order to understand its parts and effects. I feel I must understand what is my part in facilitating any changes that will benefit and uplift the situation. (Like solving our environmental dilemmas.)I have been trained to never ignore or deny the shadow but to acknowledge its presence as a way of neutralizing the dark effects it can have. To turn entirely away from a situation can also mean to go into denial, to oppress, to disassociate when direct attention is the healing mechanism. Unless Ernest Holmes in this statement is referring to the tendencies sometimes to unnecessarily obsess or perseverate about a situation I am right now in disagreement with him. And I am in deep contemplation about the implications herein. One day inner peace, the next day not as much...Peace is not an easy or passive path.

Art is a Spiritual Practice

Image above: "Ribbon Dancer" by Sanna
"What we are learning is that for every situation in our lives, there is a thought pattern that both precedes and maintains it. So that our consistent thinking patterns create our experience. By changing our thinking we also change our experience...The basic step is to confront what we actually believe." Suzi Gablik
According to Pat Allen in her book "Art As A WAy of Knowing" Art is a way of knowing what it is that we actually believe. Once we know what our real beliefs are, we can allow them to evolve and change if they do not serve us. Art making is a way to explore our imagination and begin to allow it to be more flexible, to learn how to see more options. Using the image-making process we can explore our many layers, loosen outworn ideas, and try out new images for ourselves. We can create and re-create our world through art making. Pat Allen
Art making is a spiritual practice where the creative process becomes an act of co-creating with the Great Spirit, aligning our awareness with a power within that is greater than we are guiding our hands, informing our imagination with infinite possibilities.