Category: Life

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Take your head out of your past!

Most of the time, we think of death as being the end of life. The definition for rebirth is “to be born again!” Put the two together, dying to the old” and “born again,” and you have what many evangelicals refer to as being “Born again.”

I think of being born again as being a daily event at the very least. Every day of our life we have “stuff” happen in our lives, which offer us an opportunity for growth. The good things we want to grow, and the bad things we want to go away. The good things carry us on a high, until we hit a wall. When the bad happens, we tend to hold on to it, where we shall under just shake it off, and oft times we allow it to become our story, the reason that thing didn’t work. We then wallow in that place and use it as a bragging point as to why we shouldn’t continue trying to achieve that or something even better. “The pain just isn’t”t worth it! It ruined my life. I’ll never be the same again. I am a failure!”

Have you ever heard that? People give up for no good reason at all. Imagine if Thomas Edison had given up on creating the light bulb! It took him thousands of attempts to create it, but he didn’t give up. In the same way, at one point in my life after I had become self employed I thought, “I could make a lot more money going back to banking!” I even went as far as to schedule a couple of job interviews and even went to one of them. It was while I was in the first interview that I realized why I had become self employed in the first place, and really redoubled my efforts to make my business work! All that it took was to “take my head out of my past” and bring it back to the present moment and do the work. With that, the work became fun and the chore was no more! I had been born again! Woo-hoo!

It was at that point that one more piece of my spiritual puzzle began to make sense. It was at that point that I realized (again) that I wasn’t at the effect of some external force, some external power, but that there was within me a power that if directed to a purpose, activated and became my life experience.

The “God in me” expressed in, through, and as me. IT created as me the new experience I wanted in my life and has pretty much, ever since. When I don’t experience something after really working it, I try it differently, or something else.

What about you? Are you happy with your story, or are you open to a new experience? Better now than later!

from Love, in Peace,

~revjim

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#aworldthatworks
Spirit Education is a CSL Authorized Virtual Education Provider
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How do you start your day? (Happy or grumpy)

Happy-Grumpy-300x224I still remember when I left my banking “career” and became a carpenter on a small island. From the first day I moved there, I would wake up in the morning and greet the sunrise through my front window and proclaim, “What a glorious day! I may not be in first place, but I’m way ahead of whatever is in second place!” I’ve never forgotten that and though my waking prayer has become much more contemplative, I awaken always grateful for where I am and for the “New” day!

Why would you even want to wake up thinking about how screwed up the day could be? Why put that out there for the universe to pick up on and reflect back to you? When we are born anew every day, we have the potential every day of building a new life. Why start it with unwanted thoughts of how it should be.

Start your day with thoughts of how it “could” be!

from Love, in Peace,

~revjim

#spirit-edu.com -Spirituality Online
#aworldthatworks
Spirit Education is a CSL Authorized Virtual Education Provider
https://spirit-edu.com
https://spirit-edu.com/zoominar/

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Something You Hope You Never have to Learn the Hard Way!

parachutes

As a former paratrooper we were trained that when you exited the aircraft, you give a 4 second count, and look up to see if your main chute is open. Truth be told, you almost always felt a tug before you finished the count, but you looked up anyway, just to make sure it was fully functional. Luckily, the only time I ever had to pop my reserve was to climb down after I landed in the trees and was about 20 feet off the ground at final rest. Thank you God!

Life is the same way, if you just think about something and never attempt it, you’ll never know what could have been.

Carpe Diem!

from Love, in Peace,

~revjim

#spirit-edu.com -Spirituality Online
#aworldthatworks
Spirit Education is a CSL Authorized Virtual Education Provider
https://spirit-edu.com
https://spirit-edu.com/zoominar/

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What is Chaos?

Chaos is the product of our ego. It is that part of us that has to be in charge and has to be right. Does it sound like anyone you know? It is part of our overblown self-worth that tells us everyone is out to get us, that we can’t trust anyone, that they’re all out to get us.

It is the untruth trying to save our ass. It makes things up to reinforce our point of view.

Just imagine for a minute, if we examined those thoughts of distrust. Where would they lead? Probably back to beliefs that have unconsciously been injected into our psyche from external sources, like our family, our friends, politicians, and even the media. It probably started with our parents saying something like “don’t play with matches or you’ll get burned!”  That was true. And so we began to trust this ego, because it saved us, or could have from a worse fate.

Pretty soon, we’re beginning to believe more things our sources tell us, some not so true. We form a basis on which to build a philosophy, albeit a false one, based on others unchallenged beliefs. It was easy. We didn’t have to think about a thing, and we’ve written our book of life and how to blame it on others.

All we need to do is a little self-examination of these things we’ve allowed ourselves to be told, to begin to look at our thoughts critically, to reexamine what we have believed with the reality of what is actually going on around us, and we might find a whole new way to think and believe. We can walk our own path to freedom, to liberation from the fear of everything we thought we knew until we found out they weren’t even our thoughts.

That’s what happens when we begin to think for ourselves. When we decide to stop being sheep and walk upright, the view becomes less confused, less obstructed by  the sheep we are following. We begin to rise above the crowd and begin to see clearly.

~revjim

#spirit-edu.com -Spirituality Online
#aworldthatworks
Spirit Education is a CSL Authorized Virtual Education Provider

1st Century Mystics  October 4th
https://spirit-edu.com/learn/1st-century-mystics

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Giving Up!

man_with_question_mark.epsFunny, this word never used to be in my vocabulary. It still isn’t in the conventional sense. I have never given up on something I’ve thought was worthwhile. As I think about this, I know that I’ve almost never done something that I didn’t think was worthwhile, for me or someone I was trying to help.

So what has changed? Only the most basic reason, that I am doing it for me, or that I am doing it at all. It used to be when I was doing something I truly thought that it was me doing it. That I was in charge. I believed that it was my intellect that made it happen and I was the Mr. smarty pants that was responsible for all the great ideas. Then I realized that I was part of something greater. I realized that there was something at work here that is without equal in the universe, and it’s all a part of me, a part of all of us really.

There is a power in the universe, no, it is the universe, and it is the infinite source of our good. We can ignore it, or try to, but when we do that it is still there operating in and as us. It is our thoughts, and as we think about things the landscape of our life is being painted for us. The details of how our life unfolds, is pretty much up to us, and how we paint it. The colors we use and the detail we put into it paints a picture of greater and greater clarity.

Sometimes the colors we use don’t work, but luckily our canvas is not indelible, and we can scrape off what doesn’t work, or paint over the old, or better yet, begin with a new canvas. It is totally up to us. We are always supported from within as we fill the canvas of our lives.

We can start with a blank canvas anytime, and this clean canvas can be filled with our most precious thoughts, or our grandest dreams. We can paint this canvas in black and white, allow for shades of gray, or paint it in glorious color. It’s always best to keep it light of course, allowing for great and glorious things to unfold in full, living color. So, pull out that brush, spatula or crayons, and draw yourself a beautiful life. Allow the broad brush strokes of life to move through you in grandiose ways. Paint your thoughts like you life depends on it. Dreams become reality, and thoughts are things. If you keep your thoughts in alignment with with how you want your canvas and your life to look, both will become the masterpiece your mind has painted.

So, give up. Yes, give up on your old thoughts and ideas, if they’re not working for you and know that you are the artist of your life, and your thoughts out-picture as your life. The universe always gives you what you paint. Keep it bright and give it up to the power that resides within you, within each one of us!

~revjim

#spirit-edu.com -Spirituality Online
#aworldthatworks
Spirit Education is a CSL Authorized Virtual Education Provider

We’re having a Zoominar September 28th
1st Century Mystics  October 4th
https://spirit-edu.com/learn/courses/zoominar/
https://spirit-edu.com/learn/1st-century-mystics