The Power of Mind

• I wanted to share with you an e-mail conversation I had with one of my friends. He had mentioned he was beginning the P90X workout regimen. I could not do that workout without having a heart attack. My friend has spent the past two years doing nothing. He eats like a starving horse, drinks heavily, and has done little to no exercise. With all that, he still is in tip top shape. I had asked him, more as a joke than anything else, what was his secret. He responded by telling me that although he is in essence a couch potato, he thinks that everything he does, including just sitting there, is beneficial to his body and that it keeps him in shape. In essence, all he does is think that he is in shape and that becomes his reality.

• He also referenced a study that was done in England on two floors of a business building. The people on each floor had the same jobs but one floor was told that their job was beneficial to their health, while the other was told their job was bad for their health. After two years the floor that was told their job was beneficial experienced sharp increases in their overall health. Ailments and illnesses went away, pounds were dropped, attitudes were improved, and calling in sick became obsolete. The people that were told that their jobs were bad for their health experienced sharp decreases in their overall health. They gained weight, acquired illnesses, became depressed, and sick days skyrocketed. I had seen this study, or one similar to it, covered in a documentary I watched, so I was familiar with it. But it wasn’t until my friend referenced it that the significance of its findings really hit home with me. The power of the mind!

• Here is my response and a summary of the realization his fairly straightforward e-mail inspired in me:

That’s cool. The power of the mind. I saw that documentary that covered that study about people and their jobs. Very interesting.

• Check this out: After you sent me your explanation of using your mind to keep yourself in shape, I received similar messages throughout the course of the day. Right after I read your e-mail I opened my work e-mail and had a message from the Napoleon Hill Foundation (author of the Law of Success). The message was about “The FlexBrain Method”, a system of neurobic exercises that stimulate your brain. It states by doing this exercises you can rid your life of stress, build muscle strength without ever moving a muscle, improve your learning, and prevent memory loss. The message was in harmony with what you were stating to me: use your brain to create the results you want.

• I also read a passage from “The Art of Living” that stated the Good Life is the Life of Inner Serenity. The passage then goes on to state that a good life cannot be accomplished with destructive thoughts. One must let go of those thoughts and instead latch on to positive thinking patterns. The positivity of the mind will translate to positive effects in one’s life. Once again, a message aligned with what you said.

• Third, I read a section from the book “A Course In Miracles” that parallels your message. The book is quite remarkable though somewhat laborious to read (even for me). However, the book has really opened my eyes and taking my learning to a whole different level. The passage I read was entitled “The Justice of God” and it went a little something like this (at least in my interpretation of it):

1. Christ is a consciousness inside of us. It is not a body.

2. We ourselves our consciousness, not bodies. Perceiving ourselves as only bodies severely limits our ability.

3. Bodies die and thus harbor death. What gives life cannot be housed in death.

4. We are not bodies but minds. Minds are eternal while bodies are temporary. If you believe you are a body you will perish. If you believe you are a mind/spirit you will prosper eternally.

5. Bodies are an illusion. We all feel separated from God because bodies give off the illusion that we are separate. Instead of knowing we are all one within the framework of God, we feel isolated in our body, and since we identify with it instead of our mind we feel alone and fearful. We thus develop egos that constantly attack others to make ourselves feel secure. We seek to have more than others, we measure all of our success against the success of others.

6. When we let go of our faith in our body and put it in Christ (mind/spirit) the importance of our body takes a backseat to our minds. The body has no purpose save for what our mind gives it. Look at physical death, when the mind/spirit leaves the body, the body decays it has no purpose any longer without the mind.

7. The flaw of religion is that it limits Christ (mind/spirit) to a single man, whether that be Jesus, The Buddha, Zoroaster, Mithra, Muhammad, Krishna, etc. The reason why people still suffer despite the aid of religion is because they project their faith onto a body, a man on the cross. Instead of the spirit which is shared amongst everyone and not exclusive to a separate Lord.

8. Jesus and many sages of history have all said, “The Kingdom of God is inside you.” Christ is in all of us, yet we are looking for Christ outside of ourselves and therefore we never find it. Until we look into ourselves we will never have union with the One power of the universe.

9. The son of man is not Christ. The body of Christ holds not meaning and is nothing holy. The carcass that perished on the cross is nothing sacred. The biggest fallacy of Christianity is the worship of Christ on the cross. Christ was not on the cross; a body was on the cross. Christianity focuses on the crucifixion instead of the resurrection. It is through the resurrection that Christ conquered death. Christ did not resurrect in a body, he resurrected and lived on in mind/spirit. The Son of God is not a body; the Son of God is a mind/spirit. His resurrection showed that death is nothing to fear, as through it we experience true liberation and continue our immortal lives.

10. Sickness and death persist because we think of ourselves as bodies. We will suffer and die as long as we continue to hold the body as paramount over the mind/spirit. The body is not of divine nature it is of physical/animal nature. Think of it, our DNA is only slightly different from Chimps. Are we more evolved monkeys or Sons of God? Which one would you rather believe?

11. The message of Christ and all the sages can be summarized as such: We are all one. Death and separation from each other and God are nothing more than illusions. Belief in mind and union will set us free. If we are all one and death does not exist how is it that we can be harmed? It is not possible.

12. If you believe you cannot be harmed and cannot die. What will prevent you from carrying out your divine purpose? Belief in mind/spirit frees you to accomplish all you are meant to do. And everything you want can be had when you seek reunion with God and all his creations. This why Jesus stated seek God first and then everything else you desire will follow.

13. We are all one. If we were all independent consciousness we would be unconscious of each other. How is that we all see the same tree, the same cubicle, the same car, the same images of bodies? It is because we share the Christ consciousness. If my consciousness is separate from yours, how would I even know you existed? It is not possible. If we were separate consciousnesses we would be unconscious of each other, as your consciousness would not be a part of mine. One cannot acknowledge something they are unconscious of.