Thursday, March 28, 2024
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Applying spirituality in a practical, common sense manner to daily life for success and happiness. To help you to discover that personal kernel of spiritual wisdom that exists within.

What is Faith?

Having been brought up Catholic, I grew weary of hearing the phrase, "you must have faith." Someone would always say that to me after I had tried and tried to get something I wanted, but knew eventually that it was going to be impossible. Having faith became, to me, associated with failure.

"If at first you don't succeed, try, try again." That's another one I always hated to hear.

It always seemed people would recommend faith to me after they already knew I wasn't going to succeed. It was their way to make me feel better, but in my mind it was recognition of my incompetence.

Yet faith is a concept that has been with mankind for millennia. In order for something to survive that long in the consciousness of the species, there must be some benefit or truth to it!

Let's look at faith in relation to the Universal Operating System.

Faith could be defined as holding to what is desired purely, with no counterthought or intention. Faith does not allow observation of the current reality to vibrationally influence intent. In that sense, it is completely a priori.

Faith gets a bad name because it is theoretical, not based on experience or experiment. Faith is sometimes pejoritavely associated with fundamentalism or fanaticism, because those who practice it refuse to acknowledge reality, but hold to their intent nonetheless.

But faith can also be meliorative (to make better). No matter what your intent, the Law of Attraction goes to bat for you.

You might say, having faith is easy to say but impossible to do. I cant even meditate for 5 minutes without my mind wandering. Well, yeah, but whats the alternative? If you want to improve, you cant operate on the same frequencies or nothing will change. So you have to get some new thoughts, and an understanding of faith can help you to do that.

An understanding of universal principles makes having faith much easier. Even if your dream is completely divorced from your current reality, you can get started with confidence, knowing that the Law of Vibration and the Law of Attraction will back you up.

Faith isnt delusional. Delusion is looking at black and calling it white. Faith is simply holding to your dream despite all reasons not to. It can be the engine of your personal creative process, for the subtle energy phenomenon of vibrational matching will bring to you, sometimes in ways that would never occur to you, opportunities, synchronicities, 'luck', people and resources to assist you. You just have to begin to apply this idea and watch what happens. Once you begin to see your life change, you will never doubt it, and having faith will become easier and easier. Having faith should be a fun process, because your thoughts are all geared toward those things that bring you joy.

Heres an example: last winter I was writing full time and not working at all. Although my books were selling at this point, it wasnt enough to pay the bills each month. So I dreamed up a job that would pay well and last a minimum of 6 months, enough time to finish my book. For the next couple of days I continued to create this idea and then let it go. I even had a dream about it, so it was pretty well established in my consciousness. Two weeks later I received a phone call from a contractor who wanted me to work with him on an exciting project which would pay well and last between 6 months and two years! This co-incidence was remarkable because I performed no action cycles whatsoever. I made no phone calls, did no promotion; nothing except send out a vibrational signal to the universe and maintain it. It was effortless!

This is the opposite of what I learned in religion classes. I learned that faith is very difficult, achieved only through great diligence. And it IS difficult, if what you are attempting to achieve doesnt line up with what YOU want. If youre trying to achieve the goals others have set for you, instead of the ones youve set for yourself, faith can indeed be arduous!

For instance, I was taught in religion class that my elders were always wiser and smarter than I, and that it was the duty of a child to always obey parents, teachers, and authority figures. I was taught that helping others is saintly, and doings things for oneself is selfish. So I lived my life like a good little citizen, molding my thoughts and beliefs to others and living in fear of making a misstep. I was compliant, helped others, ignored my own needs, and was miserable! But it was OK, I reasoned, because my soul was being purified and a great reward lie waiting for me at the end of my life, if I would only believe.

I know, most people are smarter than that, but it took me a long time to understand the proper role of faith in my life.

I finally learned that it is much better to have faith in yourself than to have faith in another, for you are divine, a little piece of God walking around on earth. So when you have faith in yourself, you have faith in God as well.

There are two flavors of faith, one associated with religion, and the other associated with the creative process. My mistake was confusing the former with the latter.

Faith is a powerful concept in any creative endeavor, for it keeps you aligned to the goal. In other words, having faith means holding your vibration in the place you want it. In order to make faith work however, you have to do a little sales job on yourself at the beginning, and get yourself in the right frame of mind to start the ball rolling. In other words, if youve been creating negatively in an area for years, you first have to overcome vibrational inertia. But this inertia is within the scope of your control, for your vibrational signal is generated within yourself. The universes responses are entirely dependent upon your vibrational orientation. No one can control your vibrational signal except you! You are the initiator of everything you experience.

You also have to overcome the fatalistic tendency to regard the solid stuff around you as immovable and unchanging. The unfulfilling relationship, job, or lifestyle seems stuck in place, but it is there only as a consequence of your unchanging vibrational signal to the universe. Change that, and your life will change as well.

Having faith means allowing the law of like attracts like to work in your favor. In order to see the law of like attracts like at work in your life, begin with something trivial, like finding a model of car you like. I chose Audi's because they are not so common. Soon I was noticing Audi's everywhere! I had no idea there were so many guys with Audi's around. You could say the Audi's were there all the time, you just didn't notice them before. Well, its a little deeper than that. The Audis might have been there, but you didnt see them. If you arent aware of something, you cant access or use it. Therefore, it is invisible and does not exist for you. It's like having a huge database, but losing the index. You've got tons of data, but you can't access any of it! That is how the process of conscious creation works. When you deliberately create your vibrational signal, you become aware of the universes responses and can take advantage. Otherwise, you are blind to something that may already be right in front of your nose. Swami Muktananda expressed this idea when he said (paraphrasing) In order to know God, you must keep God in the forefront of your consciousness.

It does turn out that the more attention you pay to something, the more of it actually arrives in your experience. You have to find this out for yourself however, by experimentation in the laboratory of life.

Remember also that an unchanging vibration will always generate similar actions. In these essays, we dont advise quitting your job and trying to think your way to success. Its certainly possible, but unless you are a true master of thought, youre not going to make any Great Leaps Forward. When you truly change your vibe, youll feel excited, and youll want to get into action. You may be working very hard indeed, but it wont seem like work at all, itll be fun! Lets face it: if youre incarnated here, you came for the action and adventure. You could have stayed in the nonphysical realm, but you decided to come to earth and mix it up! A human being is a spirit intimately associated with a physical body. The Law of Attraction is a powerful weapon, but it should be used synergistically within the spiritmindbody framework.

Faith vs Hope

Many people associate faith with hope. Hope is an entirely different thing from faith. If you have gotten to the stage where you are hoping, you have almost lost the game!

Hope could be defined as trying to get what you want from a place where you are pretty sure you arent going to get it.

Hope usually comes after youre already discouraged: "Oh, I so much want to buy a house, but the mortgage is too expensive. I hope that one day I can." When you are hoping, you are hanging on to just a thread of desire. This vibration is more about lack of a house than having a house! If you think over times in your life when you were hoping for something, you will find that almost always you werent very confident of a positive outcome.

However, I'm not trying to bad-mouth hope! Hope is a lot better than being completely discouraged. When you are hoping, there is still some focus upon what is wanted. It is a good place to start the creative process.

But faith is a much stronger feeling. Faith will never fail to get you where you want to go, because having faith creates a vibration unsullied and unhindered by contradictory thoughts and feelings. Faith is purely holding your vision so that you may come together in time and space with the people and resources you need in your creative process. That is what "synchronicity," or coincidence, is all about. What passes for coincidence is simply the lining up of vibration. You didn't just get that new job offer by chance! You create every one of your opportunities.

Holding the Vision

The most crucial aspect of "having faith" is continuing to hold the vision through every stage of the creative process, even though the goal has not yet been attained. When you want something because you think that you cant be happy without it, however, faith becomes a burden. This is exactly backwards and will always result in failure, because it places material objects as source-point and you at effect-point. This is using the creative process wrong-end-forwards, for the creative energy of the universe is the animating principle itself. You, as consciousness, are always at source-point!

Worry results from the idea that you might not get the thing youre wanting and causes a disconnect from life force energy, which makes you feels worse, which makes you worry some morethis is what happens when you identify your happiness with something outside yourself. When you worry, you focus on something unwanted, and place that vibrational along your future path, thereby becoming an attractor for it.

Why do we worry even though we know that its irrational, and that it doesnt help? Because we dont understand that a human being is primarily consciousness associated with a physical body, and that consciousness interfaces with other consciousness and the universes operating system. We dont even acknowledge the importance of the animating principle, even though it is us, and has designed and created the universe! We look for proof to matter and energy, and fail to consult the powerful, positive energy of our own life force. We have no idea of the powerful nature of subtle energy phenomena, because we are told that the basis of life is biological, and that consciousness itself comes forth from biology! We have no idea how powerful we are, for our religions and our philosophies assert that man is an irrelevant nothing, living on an isolated planet on the edge of an insignificant galaxy in an infinite universe. Our science tells us that life was a happy accident, a random and accidental conglomeration of chemicals, and that the universe will eventually either expand and cool and die, or shrink in on itself, destroying all life within it. When you look at life from the viewpoint of consciousness however, you understand that you are eternally self aware and you connect with your own life force, and when you do that you are filled with a power and joy and you feel like a god!

Half the battle of faith is having a proper comprehension of who you really are. Of course, if you have never felt the power of your own life force, you wont have a bloody clue what Im talking about. But then you probably wont be reading this essay either, so it doesnt matter.

When you are absolutely clear about what you want, when you have a goal and a vision AND you are filled with positive emotion, you are unstoppable, and what you desire is as inevitable as turning on a garden hose. Even if the hose is very long and you have to wait a while, you KNOW the water will eventually find it's way to your nozzle.

However, if you are the type of person who just wants the stuff, faith wont work for you. You will never truly connect to the inner feeling of your desire, for your attention is on the object and not on the creative energy that fuels the creative process. And so you will never, vibrationally, come off of where youre at. Hey, I want a new car and a lot of money, so if faith really works, Ill just think about it for a while and, by magic, Ill have it. Sorry, it doesnt work that way! With this attitude, you will always be at A, looking towards B. You will never connect to that life giving feeling of joy and well being that is always associated with a desire that is in alignment with your true Self. And all of your actions will reflect your position at A, looking towards B, but never reaching the goal.

The magic isnt getting the car and the money, the magic is connecting to the life force energy in your desire, and the fantastic feeling that comes with it. Then, as you follow your hunches, as you get inspired to take action, you will inevitably be led down the path of least resistance. The distance to any manifestation, as weve said before, is a vibrational distance, not a distance in time and space that can be overcome solely through action cycles. Without lining yourself up vibrationally toward the goal, manifestation is impossible. The magic of the creative process is the priceless feeling of joy and excitement in the journey! And at the end is the satisfaction of a job well done, but traveled along a path filled with enjoyment, excitement, and learning.

The Two Pole System

Lets say you are working a boring 9 to 5 job, but you really want to start your own business. You have an idea for a small consulting company that helps people set up computer networks in small businesses. You have plenty of experience with computers, but you are not sure how you will get clients if you set out on your own.

Focusing on a goal sets up a 2-pole system of energy. There is the energy pole of your present situation, the 9 to 5 job, and your desire for a business of your own (pole A). There is the other pole of your goal, a successful small business (pole B). There are two ways to look at the gap between A and B: as an obstacle, or an opportunity to exercise your creative will. If you see the current reality as an impediment you will be acutely conscious of the present situation, which keeps you vibrating at the energy of pole A, so you can never get to pole B. Worry and doubt keep you fixed firmly at pole A. All of your actions never seem to connect you up with the resources you need, leading to enormous frustration.

However, as Robert Fritz points out in his book, The Path of Least Resistance, the gap between the goal and where you are now sets up an energy potential that you can harness. Without the gap between pole A and pole B, there can be no movement forward. In Chapter 2 (see the book The Vibrational Universe), we saw how Jills position higher on the emotional scale allowed Kathy to move from apathy through anger and into the realm of positive emotion regarding her boyfriend Thorpe. A higher emotion has the potential to entrain a lower emotion.

Once you achieve the goal, there is no potential and no movement, for the two poles now occupy the same space. That is why the excitement of having something wears off after a while because, as creative beings, we are always reaching to be more, do more and have more. The creative impulses of consciousness, the animating principle, are always expanding the universe onward! So even though life seems to be all about achieving the goal and getting things done and accumulating stuff, its really never about the material object, and always about how you feel. The goal only exists to inspire and motivate you to another creative process.

Every unfulfilled desire is a creative engine, generating potential energy, and not something to be ashamed of. You arent a failure if you havent achieved your goal yet! Manifestation cannot occur unless there is first an unfulfilled desire, which sets up an energy potential driving you forward. When you get discouraged and give up, you knock down both poles, collapsing the energy potential and ensuring failure.

Creative visualization starts the ball rolling. Immersing yourself in the energy of pole B simply for the fun of it, places your vibration automatically at pole B, and it should result in a feeling of excitement, or some other positive emotion. In effect, you move pole A (your present vibration) closer and closer to pole B, closing the gap in potential and bringing yourself vibrationally in range of the goal. Like a fuzzy camera lens that becomes clearer and clearer, you begin to see solutions to problems and become aware of people and resources in your environment.

In the spirit-mind-body framework the spirit, or consciousness, of a human being is primary. In our vibrational model of the universe, we are more vibrational than physical beings. Manifestation is just you and the thing you want existing at the same place and time. And that cannot possibly happen unless there is first a vibrational co-incidence. Weve talked about this before: you can walk into the automobile dealership with $5 in your pocket and stand next to that shiny new Porsche, but you cant drive out with it, unless there is vibrational attunement. Most people will say, No, its about the money, stupid. No, its not about the money. Money represents vibrational alignment. People who have money are aligned to abundance and people who dont, arent. No, people are abundant because they have money, you fool. No, thats backwards as well. Money is a physical representation of vibrational alignment with prosperity.

The meeting in time and space in the physical universe of you and what you want is, according to our model, a meeting and matching of vibration, because the physical object itself has a vibrational footprint. In other words, that Porsche in the dealership started out as a bunch of mud. It was first designed by human beings, and every one of its parts was manufactured by human hands and carries the vibrational imprint of those who have associated with it. Then the parts were put together under the watchful eyes (hopefully!) of other human beings, and finally it is sent to the dealership to be sold by other human beings. At each step of the assembly process, more and more thought energy is associated with the vehicle. The shiny new Porsche sitting in the dealership can validly be regarded as a complex set of vibrational energy. In our model of the universe, everything is alive!

This may seem silly at first, because we dont normally perceive material things except as stupid lumps that just sit there until we move them about. But once you begin to look at the world from a vibrational point of view, even things like glasses, computer monitors, desks, cars and houses seem to have personalities. You begin to perceive these objects not just on the surface, but inside them as well. Call me delusional or over imaginative, but its kinda fun.

The creative process ALWAYS begins with you at pole A and the goal at pole B! Life itself is a continuous process of reaching for something better. Therefore, life is a series of creative processes.

Pole B is on a different vibrational level than you are at present. That is why it has not yet manifested into your experience in time and space. In order to get a manifestation in the physical universe, you have to be a match to that higher energy of pole B. And the only way you can do that is by joyfully imagining being there. You can't get there by using the energy of pole A! Using the energy of pole A will just keep you at pole A. So, you gotta have faith! Faith is fun. It's just keeping your eyes on the prize.

The creative process first begins with the establishment of a vision and a feeling of what is wanted, hopefully as close to the vibration of the desire as possible. The closer one can get vibrationally to the goal, the closer one gets to it in time and space. Action always follows thought. Physical manifestation always follows (mirrors) the personal vibration you have established. Consciousness is at cause, matter and energy is effect. These are self-evident statements when you approach life from the viewpoint of nonphysical consciousness.

One might say, All this is much easier said than done. Well, it is if you look at the creative process as arduous and difficult. But creativeness is not difficult! Its fun! The degree of progress toward your goal can be measured not only by the manifestations (or lack of them) you get along the way, but even more importantly, by how much enjoyment youre feeling. If you arent having fun, you arent getting anywhere. Having faith is just a joyous process of constantly paying attention to where you want to be!

Summary

You are not a failure because your desires have not manifested. You are simply involved in an ongoing creative process of lining yourself up with what you want. If you dont believe you can be, do or have something, you cant, because you never get your vibrational stone in position to roll downhill.

Having unfulfilled desires is what life is all about. There will always be things that you want that you don't have yet. Imagine, if you had everything you wanted, how boring would that be? When I was a kid, I got bored with my toys real fast, maybe you did too.

Once you have painted that painting, written that program, composed or played that music, created anything, do you just sit on your laurels forever? You always feel you can do better, for those creative juices are always flowing through you.

It's about the journey, not the manifestation. As Esther Hicks says, you can't ever get it all done. You don't ever want to get it all done. If that ever happened, you would be dead, because you wouldn't have any more desire.

So have fun. Keep the faith. Which just means, never let go of your desires, your dreams.

Faith is what keeps you on the true path of joy and knowledge of self, and also to the manifestation of your desires.

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