If, then, revelation is requested, it cannot be had, for the act of asking is a statement that it is not there; that nothing of God is now being revealed. Such a statement produces the experience. For your thought about something is creative, and your word is productive, and your thought and your word together are magnificently effective in giving birth to your reality. Therefore shall you experience that God is not now revealed, for if God were, you would not ask God to be.
Does that mean I cannot ask for anything I want? Are You saying that praying for something actually pushes it away from us?
This is a question which has been asked through the Ages--and has been answered whenever it has been asked. Yet you have not heard the answer, or will not believe it.
The question is answered again, in today's terms, and today's language, thusly:
You will not have that for which you ask, nor can you have anything you want. This is because your very request is a statement of lack, and your saying you want a thing only works to produce that precise experience--wanting--in your reality.
The correct prayer is therefore never a prayer of supplication, but a prayer of gratitude.
When you thank God in advance for that which you choose to experience in your reality, you, in effect, acknowledge that it is there...in effect. Thankfulness is thus the most powerful statement to God; an affirmation that even before you ask, I have answered.
Therefore never supplicate. Appreciate."
Conversations with God, Neale Donald WalschWhen human relationships fail (relationships never truly fail, except in the strictly human sense that they did not produce what you want), they fail because they were entered into for the wrong reason.
("Wrong," of course, is a relative term, meaning something measured against that which is "right"--whatever that is! It would be more accurate in your language to say "relationships fail—change—most often when they are entered into for reasons not wholly beneficial or conducive to their survival.")
Most people enter into relationships with an eye toward what they can get out of them, rather than what they can put into them.
The purpose of a relationship is to decide what part of yourself you'd like to see "show up," not what part of another you can capture and hold.
There can be only one purpose for relationships--and for all of life: to be and decide Who You Really Are.
It is very romantic to say that you were "nothing" until that special other came along, but it is not true. Worse, it puts an incredible pressure on the other to be all sorts of things he or she is not.
Not wanting to "let you down," they try very hard to be and do these things until they cannot anymore. They can no longer fill the roles to which they have been assigned. Resentment builds. Anger follows.
Finally, in order to save themselves (and the relationship), these special others begin to reclaim their real selves, acting more in accordance with Who They Really Are. It is about this time that you say they've "really changed."
It is very romantic to say that now that your special other has entered your life, you feel complete. Yet the purpose of relationship is not to have another who might complete you; but to have another with whom you might share your completeness.
Here is the paradox of all human relationships: You have no need for a particular other in order for you to experience, fully, Who You Are, and...without another, you are nothing.
This is both the mystery and the wonder, the frustration and the joy of the human experience. It requires deep understanding and total willingness to live within this paradox in a way which makes sense. I observe that very few people do.
Most of you enter your relationship-forming years ripe with anticipation, full of sexual energy, a wide open heart, and a joyful, if eager, soul.
Somewhere between 40 and 60 (and for most it is sooner rather than later) you've given up on your grandest dream, set aside your highest hope, and settled for your lowest expectation--or nothing at all.
The problem is so basic, so simple, and yet so tragically misunderstood: your grandest dream, your highest idea, and your fondest hope has had to do with your beloved other rather than your beloved Self. The test of your relationships has had to do with how well the other lived up to your ideas, and how well you saw yourself living up to his or hers. Yet the only true test has to do with how well you live up to yours.
Relationships are sacred because they provide life's grandest opportunity--indeed, its only opportunity--to create and produce the experience of your highest conceptualization of Self. Relationships fail when you see them as life's grandest opportunity to create and produce the experience of your highest conceptualization of another.
from Conversations with God, book 1, by Neal Donald Walsch"Happiness, therefore, does not lie in amusement; it would, indeed, be strange if the end were amusement, and one were to take trouble and suffer hardship all one's life in order to amuse oneself. For everything that we choose we choose for the sake of something else—except happiness, which is an end. Now to exert oneself and work for the sake of amusement seems silly and utterly childish. But to amuse oneself in order that one may exert oneself...seems right; for amusement is a sort of relaxation, and we need relaxation because we cannot work continuously. Relaxation, then, is not an end; for it is taken for the sake of activity. "
Aristotle, 4th cent. B.C. Nichomachean Ethics, Book X, Ch.6"As long as you derive inner help and comfort from anything, you should keep it. If you were to give it up in a mood of self sacrifice or out of a stern sense of duty, you would continue to want it back, and that unsatisfied want would make trouble for you. Only give up a thing when you want some other condition so much that the thing no longer has any attraction for you, or when it seems to interfere with that which is more greatly desired."
Mohandas GandhiPrinciple 1: Don't criticize, condemn, or complain.
Principle 2: Give honest and sincere appreciation.
Principle 3: Arouse in the other person an eager want.
Principle 1: Become genuinely interested in other people.
Principle 2: Smile.
Principle 3: Remember that a person's name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.
Principle 4: Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
Principle 5: Talk in terms of the other person's interests.
Principle 6: Make the other person feel important - and do it sincerely.
Principle 1: The only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it.
Principle 2: Show respect for the other person's opinions. Never say, "You're wrong".
Principle 3: If you are wrong, admit it quickly and emphatically.
Principle 4: Begin in a friendly way.
Principle 5: Get the other person saying "yes, yes" immediately.
Principle 6: Let the other person do a great deal of the talking.
Principle 7: Let the other person feel that the idea is his or hers.
Principle 8: Try honestly to see things from the other person's point of view.
Principle 9: Be sympathetic with the other person's ideas and desires.
Principle 10: Appeal to the nobler motives.
Principle 11: Dramatize your ideas.
Principle 12: Throw down a challenge.
A leader's job often includes changing your people's attitudes and behavior. Some suggestions to accomplish this:
Principle 1: Begin with praise and honest appreciation.
Principle 2: Call attention to people's mistakes indirectly.
Principle 3: Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person.
Principle 4: Ask questions instead of giving direct orders.
Principle 5: Let the other person save face.
Principle 6: Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement. Be "hearty in your approbation and lavish in your praise."
Principle 7: Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to.
Principle 8: Use encouragement. Make the fault seem easy to correct.
Principle 9: Make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest.
from How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie, 1936Getting back to suffering-—Where did we ever get the idea that suffering was good? That the saintly “suffer in silence”?
The saintly do “suffer in silence,” but that does not mean suffering is good. The students in the school of Mastery suffer in silence because they understand that suffering is not the way of God, but rather, a sure sign that there is still something to learn of the way of God, still something to remember.
The true Master does not suffer in silence at all, but only appears to be suffering without complaint. The reason that the true Master does not complain is that the true Master is not suffering, but simply experiencing a set of circumstances that you would call insufferable.
A practicing Master does not speak of suffering simply because a Master practicing clearly understands the power of the Word—and so chooses to simply not say a word about it.
We make real that to which we pay attention. The Master knows this. The Master places himself at choice with regard to that which she chooses to make real.
You have all done this from time to time. There is not a one among you who has not made a headache disappear, or a visit to the dentist less painful, through your decision about it.
A Master simply makes the same decision about larger things.
But why have suffering at all? Why have even the possibility of suffering?
You cannot know, and become, that which you are, in the absence of that which you are not, as I have already explained to you.
I still don’t understand how we ever got the idea that suffering was good.
You are wise to be insistent in questioning that. The original wisdom surrounding suffering in silence has become so perverted that now many believe (and several religions actually teach) that suffering is good, and joy is bad. Therefore, you have decided that if someone has cancer, but keeps it to himself, he is a saint, whereas if someone has (to pick a dynamite topic) robust sexuality, and celebrates it openly, she is a sinner.
Boy, You did pick a dynamite topic. And You cleverly changed the pronoun, too, from male to female. Was that to make a point?
It was to show you your prejudices. You don’t like to think of women having robust sexuality, much less celebrating it openly.
You would rather see a man dying without a whimper on the battlefield than a woman making love with a whimper in the street.
Wouldn’t You?
I have no judgment one way or the other. But you have all sorts of them—and I suggest that it is your judgments which keep you from joy, and your expectations which make you unhappy.
All of this put together is what causes you dis-ease, and therein begins your suffering.
How do I know that what You are saying is true? How do I know this is even God speaking, and not my overactive imagination?
You’ve asked that before. My answer is the same. What difference does it make? Even if everything I’ve said is “wrong,” can you think of a better way to live?
No.
Then “wrong” is right, and “right” is wrong!
Yet I’ll tell you this, to help you out of your dilemma: believe nothing I say. Simply live it. Experience it. Then live whatever other paradigm you want to construct. Afterward, look to your experience to find your truth.
One day, if you have a great deal of courage, you will experience a world where making love is considered better than making war. On that day you will rejoice.
from Conversations with God, book 1, by Neal Donald WalschYou shall know that you have taken the path to God, and you shall know that you have found God, for there will be these signs, these indications, these changes in you:
And, you shall know you have taken the path to God because:
And, I shall give you these other signs as well:
And these other signs will I send you also, that you may know you are on the path:
Nor shall you...
Nor shall you...
You will know that you have found the path to God when you see these signs. For I promise that no one who truly seeks God shall any longer do these things. It would be impossible to continue such behaviors.
These are your freedoms, not your restrictions. These are my commitments, not my commandments. For God does not order about what God has created—God merely tells God's children: this is how you will know that you are coming home.
Moses asked in earnest—"How may I know? Give me a sign." Moses asked the same question that you ask now. The same question all people everywhere have asked since time began. My answer is likewise eternal. But it has never been, and never will be, a commandment. For who shall I command? And who shall I punish should My commandments not be kept?
There is only Me.
from Conversations with God, book 1, by Neal Donald WalschJan 2012 - Slideshow presentations, with matching blog posts for questions and comments. See Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors and LFTR Slideshow.
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