Category: choice

Divine Timing

I have always felt I have had my feet in two states, California where I was born, and Arizona where my brother Erik lives in Prescott Valley. Traveling back and forth for four decades I was as much at home in PV as I was in California. Now a resident of the great state 48, I often wonder why it took me so long to commit to something I knew in my heart was where I really wanted to be. All in Divine Timing.

One of several advantages I have learned living in the A-Z is not having to concern myself with time. I no longer must spend days, or even weeks adjusting all the digital clocks in my home, because there was always one, I would forget to reset. It all simply stays the same. Unlike our lives.

As the Spring Equinox approaches, I no longer think about “Springing Forward” but simply being still, and let time be. Spring Forward and Fall Back have now taken on more spiritual meanings. More of, “Divine time”, my time, our time with Spirit/God.

Spring has always represented a time where we spend our time cleaning out and sorting through things we no longer require. A time to create a fresh start. So, we simply spring forward in our actions to wipe our slates clean, moving forward into a new experience. Hopefully, not Falling Back into old habits, and collecting things that tend to anchor us.

Springtime is also when Passover and Easter are celebrated. Two holy-days in the metaphysical realm that often go unnoticed. Why? Because many metaphysicians consider themselves not to be Christian. However, there is more to these holy days than the Jewish tradition’s exit from Egypt, and a rabbit that hides colored eggs.

The current time we are in is referred to as Lent. Lent is an old English word meaning to “lengthen.” Our days during the Spring Equinox become longer. Usually with more daylight to enjoy our outdoor lifestyles. It often is associated with Jesus the Christ and his 40-day endurance and preparation for his trial, and crucifixion. We need not endure or prepare for Lent as a time where we are to give something up, as to suffer, as Jesus choose to do for himself.

Instead, let us reflect on the good, our highest good as Metaphysician’s we experience the time of longer days, as an opportunity of spiritual growth, and progressive unfoldment. It is not the experience of giving up. but having our minds firmly planted in the fertile soil of possibility.

It is a time of “rebirth”, to begin again. We roll away the stone on old ideas, and discover we walk into a new life. The garden of life is for us to enjoy through our human experiences. It speaks to us through restoration, rest, and taking our time, that being Divine time.

Ernest Holmes said, “There is something right within you and within me that is awaiting expression, and what we must learn to do is to get out of the way and let it express itself. Withdraw to ourselves, receive, and distribute this, Spirit.” Love and Law, pg. 95.2

When we understand this principle of Spirit working through us, as us, we realize we are one with the creative power. However, the second thing to understand is all things happen in Divine time. Our minds create in an instant, but it takes a little longer for matter to manifest. So, as we move forward, let us embrace all things new, working for us. Accepting love, and Spirit is our source from which all is created and, it’s not our time, but Divine time.

Namaste, Rev. Rhonda

Happy New Year!

After powering through the holidays. Celebrating with all sorts of foods. Then starting a new year, it feels like it is time to change something or other.

What is a reasonable change? Part of me wants to continue with uncontrolled eating and resting. But this is in direct conflict with wanting to feel healthy.

Part of me feels like wow it is time to really change things up and initiate some sort of paradigm shift change. Really shake things up and rise to the dreams that inspire fear and awe because things would be very different.

What are reasonable limitations? And what are my real authentic beliefs?

I know my life is reflecting my beliefs because that is what shows up. Change needs to align with who I am. Fortunately Science of Mind has given me unlimited resources to cope with and advance my future. Even if I experience fear, loss of focus, change my belief, lose steam, or experience cycles of old recurring ideas. I have an exceptional tool called Spiritual Mind Treatment.

With this tool alone my life can change in a way that aligns with those authentic beliefs. One understanding of the Mulitiverse that I adhere to is that Everything Everywhere is in constant eternal vibration. The Multiverse cannot ever be static.

So even when or if I feel off course. I can apply five simple steps and start a realignment.

Life is good and so it is.

–Chris Wheeler

Names of God

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As we head into the busy holiday season, I’ve been leaning into Spirit and all its Divine aspects. Troward says God/Spirit is Life, Light, Joy, Love, Peace, Beauty, and Power. One of my favorite meditations is to repeat the phrase, “There is only one Life, that Life is God’s Life, that Life is perfect, that Life is my Life now.” I then repeat the phrase replacing Life with Light, Joy, Love, Peace, Beauty, and finally, Power. I will also insert Mind, Body, and Source; “There is only one Mind, that Mind is God’s Mind, that Mind is perfect, that Mind is my Mind now.” This chant always brings me calm and is a great reminder that I am one with Source (God is my Peace, my Source, my Power Now!).

In our recent membership class, we were asked to bring five names for God to class. Some people had two or three names; others had a long list of names they use for God. I have often heard it said that Ernest Holmes said we can call God “Potato” if that is what works for us (as God created potatoes, Spirit is there, too!). Below is the combined list of names for God our group came up with:

Every faith tradition has multiple names for God. In Islam, it is a practice to meditate and recite the 99 names of God. Several years ago, Rev. Dr. Edward Viljoen compiled 99 names for God out of the Science of Mind text.

This holiday season, and into the new year, I invite you into the practice of meditating on the names of God. Pick one that resonates with you and sit with it for a while; recognizing you are that. Wishing you Happy Holidays and a Blessed New Year.

–Sharon Whealy, RScP

Additional Thoughts on a New Minister

I’ll be honest. When our previous minister announced to the Board of Trustees that she was retiring, I was shocked and disappointed. Reverend Janis was the first person I encountered when I showed up over 10 years ago at the Gregory School looking for the meditation meeting. She was a practitioner then and obviously a leader in the congregation.

My negative reaction came from fear of what would happen to CSL Tucson and the pain of losing a caring, intelligent minister, whom I liked. Of course, I didn’t stay in fear and sense of lack. I calmed down, remembered I am at choice and accessed my faith. Ernest Holmes states, “We know that thought is constantly changing, forever taking on new ways of expression. It cannot possibly remain permanent. It has to change. Can we not, accordingly, change it to a better state instead of to a worse?” (Science Of Mind 216.3)

I have enjoyed and benefited from our visiting speakers in the last few months. Yet something has been missing. Last December I was attending a Christmas chorale with a friend and ran into Reverend Janis. It was a comfortable feeling to introduce Reverend Janis to my friend as “my minister.”

I lived part-time in Lake Havasu City for 5 years from 2014 -2018. I had become ‘Grammy’ and was blessed to experience the joy of spending time with my grandson. I attended CSL there regularly. There was no permanent minister and available classes were rare. The population of Lake Havasu City swells substantially in the winter months and declines in the hot summer. Visiting ministers from Las Vegas and the Phoenix area were Sunday speakers much of the time. One Sunday, Reverend Janis was the visiting minister, and I was thrilled to see her. From time to time, especially in the summer months, a local lay member would talk. This had mixed results. One Sunday a local was speaking and, in my judgment, his talk was self-centered rambling and offensive in a couple of comments. I spoke to two Board members to express my concern. A handful of people who attended regularly walked out early in the talk. Unfortunately, one of them wrote to the local newspaper’s Orchids and Onions column, complaining about the speaker and by connection the Center. Awkward.

A Position Description for CSL Tucson states, “The Senior Minister is the spiritual leader, ecclesiastical head, and administrative executive officer of the church. S/he is responsible for expressing the vision of the church through its ministry and through teaching and embodying the principles of Science of Mind as expressed by Ernest Holmes…” Specific responsibilities are described.

Your Board of Trustees and Minister Selection Committee strongly recommend that members vote on Sunday, December 17, to affirm Reverend Rhonda Tretsven as our new minister/spiritual leader. She has experience and qualifications too numerous to mention here. In interviews we found her to be sensitive to the needs of our community, capable of wise leadership of a congregation, authentic in presence, strong, yet charismatic. She is also a musician who sings, plays the guitar and other instruments.

I envision Reverend Rhonda as both coach and cheerleader for our community. I look forward to getting to know her and her getting to know us. There is potential for intimate connection, trust, and respect in our interactions. We all experience challenging life events and would benefit from the compassion Reverend Rhonda demonstrates. Her previous talks are available to watch online through links in our newsletter. I believe that Spirit delivered the perfect candidate for our new Minister. I encourage all members to vote in favor of this next adventure for our Center.

–Linda Bullock

GOT CLUTTER?

Clutterers Anonymous (CLA) is a fellowship of compulsive clutterers who practice a 12-step and 12-tradition program modeled after AA (Alcoholics Anonymous.)

What is clutter? Clutter is anything we don’t need, want, or use that takes our time, energy, or space, and destroys our serenity.

I know I am a clutterer and I know I am not alone. I have created physical, mental/emotional, and paper/email clutter to name a few.

Physical: This is the behavior that results in the stacks piles and objects and unfinished projects that fill my home. Whether organized or thrown about, it is all so overwhelming. I have become owned by my possessions.

Mental/Emotional: This is the mental clutter I carry in my mind-resentments, unfinished thoughts, emotional baggage, worries about the future, regrets about the past. My mind and thoughts often are often filled with clutter. Paper/e-mail: Unprocessed mail, notes written on scraps of paper, endless books and e-mails not yet read all add to the clutter. It’s so overwhelming.

What I really want is to be in surroundings of beauty, order, and serenity; a balanced life; and harmonious relationships.

How do I achieve this?

By following the 12-step program of CLA along with the teachings from our Center for Spiritual Living.

They complement each other beautifully.

–Madeline Pallanes

Learning & Thinking

I learned today that Alexander the Great (yes that world conqueror) in a drunken argument killed a very good friend – killed a very good friend. After three days of bottomless mourning and grief beyond my imagining – he went on to do what he did.

One wonders what he might have learned from that experience.

What a way to learn a lesson.  One hopes we all are quicker studies requiring less violent instruction than he appears to have needed.

One hopes to learn and do in such a way as to create more good for ourselves and for our world.

“Blessed is he who plants trees under whose shade he will never sit.”  Indian proverb

And the way of that has been available for a very long time to all who would study, learn, and practice.

“You Control how you respond to things.” – Epictetus

“Our life is what our thoughts make it.”  – Marcus Aurelius

And from our somewhat more contemporary teacher –

“Thought can be creative of my good and it can also be productive of things I do not desire, for all thought is creative.”  Ernest Holmes,  A New Design for Living  page 29

“We always succeed.”     “We need to learn to succeed in the right things.”  Ernest Holmes, A New Design for Living page 149

A major project/goal for me in the coming months, is the whole “what am I thinking –  aka am I actually thinking right now – or have I backslid into letting my unconscious create my life with no direction.  Am I reacting without thinking or responding with care. The post-it in the kitchen reads:  “who’s in charge right now?”  Work in progress always.

And holding the following from The Text close to my heart and head:

 “We may change the trend of causation which has been set in motion at any time we decide to do so.” Ernest Holmes Science of Mind 128.2

Of course, on the preceding page he quoted Jesus saying, “As thou hast believed, so be it done unto you.” Going on to add Jesus did not say: “It  is done unto you as you wish.”

“Such is the power of right thinking that it cancels and erases everything unlike itself.”Science of Mind 128.4.

Do it with Power & Presence.

–In Peace, Mariann

CHANGE THAT I KNOW…

This morning I felt the small but definite feeling that fall is in the air. Living in the desert often means the signs of seasonal change appear subtle. It doesn’t necessarily mean the heat will be gone. It means the change is apparent to me as the sun moves south in the sky and the experience of cooler nights is close at hand.

I recognize that our desert is a delicate balance of resources. The wildlife that occupies the area has adapted to the environment. I love having the understanding and awareness that any small change can have a lasting effect. I do my best to honor and protect the environment.

Generally speaking human beings have been ravaging the planet since we emerged from the ocean in a more primitive form. The consequences of our actions have always been changing and mostly we have been able to adapt.

Since discovering Science of Mind I continue revising how I’m thinking. My life, like all life, has been constant revisions (or not) until we arrive at the present – the only time that really is.

Finding new and better ways to interpret and use thought is an exciting and promising approach to interact with my perceived reality. I really mean perceived. It is now accepted that our vision is actually interpreted by our mind as right side up when in reality our eyes flip the image on the way to the brain and the brain makes the corrections.

Our brain takes some time from birth to self-awareness to what I recently heard that our brain was described as the game engine. And that engine interprets and influences the world in very real ways. That I am the player, and that player has been developed by Law until I think of myself as an individual and I continue to interact with my perceived world.

To me this is just another example that I get to experiment with and learn from on my way to the next idea.

— Chris Wheeler

Falling into Place

In June I took a meditation retreat in Colorado Springs with Dr. Roger Teel, who led Mile Hi Church for 25 years. I have enjoyed watching his online talks and when he mentioned his mediation retreat, I knew I wanted to go. I looked online and when registra6on for the workshop opened, I immediately signed up.

The workshop was at the Franciscan Retreat Center in the foothills of Rockies. The setting was lovely, with big trees, old buildings, and lots of space to wander. There were deer roaming freely. One morning I went to get my journal out of my car and there was a deer five or six feet away from the driver’s side. I unlocked the doors with the remote and the deer lifted its head then returned to eating. I opened the passenger door and rooted around for my journal. When I looked out through the driver’s side windows there were three deer looking at me as if they were wondering what I was doing. What a treat!

The workshop consisted of lectures, stories and lots of time meditating using a variety of techniques, and free time to walk around the grounds and contemplate. It was liberating to have 3 days where I didn’t have to think about anything, as our days were scheduled, meals prepared.

Going to the retreat jump started my meditation practice. The app Insight Timer has kept track of my meditations and I have reached 60 days in a row. I have given myself the rules that I can’t have coffee or open my Fitbit app to see what my sleep score until I sit. Those boundaries are working for me. After sitting the rest of my day seems to fall into place and I’m more productive since I have been consistent with my practice. Taking the retreat, was a treat, an immersion I highly recommend. Here’s a little taste of the workshop: Affirmation Meditation for JOY – Dr. Roger Teel.

–Maria

PASSION PURPOSE POWER

Recently life has been distracting with a few experiences definitely needing some improvement. And then I was having a hard time finding my topic. So when in doubt, go to the Source. Thank you, Dr. Holmes.

For me the following quotes support this month’s always important theme of Passion & Purpose. They address what is needed to claim a purpose with passion and then deliver with power. When I allow myself to recognize and commit to an idea with full personal force then these passages come to Life and Law delivers for me.

“We must consciously know that we can use creative power. The more complete such acceptance on our part, the more completely we shall be able to use this power for definite purposes. Ernest Holmes – The Science of Mind 401.3

“Mind as Law is helpless without direction. It has nowhere to go and nothing to do of Itself. IT MUST BE DIRECTED OR IT WILL DO NOTHING OF PERMANENT WORTH…. Ernest Holmes. – The Science of Mind 396.3

“The Law of Mind obeys the orders that are given It whether we are conscious or unconscious that such orders are being given. Ernest Holmes – The Science of Mind 397.3

These are the reminders of the three actions needed: Claim the Creative Power that is mine. (That is everyone’s). Admit and define completely what I want. AND do that persistent, consistent direction of attention thing.

“We should be careful to distinguish day dreaming and wistful wishing from really dynamic and creative treatment. When we treat we do not wish, we KNOW. We do not dream, we STATE. We do not hope, we ACCEPT. We do not pray, we ANNOUNCE. We do not expect something is going to happen, we BELIEVE THAT IT HAS ALREADY HAPPENED. Ernest Holmes – The Science of Mind 399.3

And for those unclear times we all experience:

“If one does not know exactly what he wishes to do one should treat for general success in whatever one attempts to do…. One must treat for guidance … remembering that the Inner Mind knows infinitely more than the intellect…. how to take ideas and form objective circumstances around them. Ernest Holmes – The Science of Mind 400.3

And the last words I have for all of us: If you haven’t re-read the General Summary of the Text recently, it’s a really good read.

–In Peace, Mariann

The Freedom of Forgiveness

As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn’t leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison. Nelson Mandela

We have thought that outside things controlled us, when all the time we have had that within that could have changed everything and given us freedom of bondage. Ernest Holmes

There are a lot of books and articles on the topic of forgiveness and plenty of advice. Some describe what forgiveness isn’t – it doesn’t mean you immediately allow the person back into your life or your heart; it is not condoning what the person did or pretending that you were not hurt; it is not trusting the offender or relieving that person of responsibility.

Forgiveness is not something we do for other people. We forgive others not because they deserve forgiveness but because we deserve peace. It’s something we do for ourselves so that we can move on and no longer experience an emotional charge when we think about what led to the resentment.

The practice of forgiveness is emotional and spiritual work, taking time and effort. It is a process, not an event. When Nelson Mandela first walked into prison, he was a very angry man. Desmond Tutu states that “it took the many years in jail, years he spent cultivating a daily practice of forgiveness, for him to become the luminous example of tolerance who was able to put our wounded country on the road to reconciliation and healing.” (The Book of Forgiving, page 218)

I have learned that I must choose to forgive. Waiting until we ‘feel like’ forgiving doesn’t usually work. Time alone does not heal all wounds, especially if we have stoked the fire of resentment. In the past I have hung on to an old resentment even though I knew I would have to release it eventually. The ego enjoys the feeling of ‘righteousness indignation’ and the manic energy of anger for a time. Yet psychologists ask us “would you rather be right? or would you rather be happy?”

Part of the ability to forgive is in recognizing that we are all human and flawed. One’s behavior is impacted by childhood experiences, culture, trauma, fear, and the like. The Prayer of St. Francis would have me seek to understand rather than to be understood. Had I been in that person’s shoes, would the words or behavior have been so unusual or unpredictable? Is my judgment impaired by self- centeredness? By a lack of compassion?

What matters is that I have a choice to change my thinking and achieve peace. “Nothing is more important than that we learn how to forgive both ourselves and others….it is impossible for us to feel relief and release from self-condemnation while we bear condemnation toward others.” (Ernest Holmes, Living the Science of Mind, page 402) Today I choose freedom by looking for any unforgiveness I am carrying. The most difficult forgiveness to achieve has been forgiving myself, influenced by a culture and religion that espoused sin, evil, hell and a punishing God. That’s a story for another day.

We must walk through the muddy shoals of hatred and anger and make our way through grief and loss to find the acceptance that is the hallmark of forgiveness. Desmond Tutu

–Linda Bullock

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