"Does The Heart Have A Mind Of Its Own?"

 Chapter 16

                             LEARNING TO DISCERN FROM HEART

You have probably heard the saying “things of the Heart” well may I suggest that when you are at the computer, Google or search the internet for secular sayings that have the word heart in them.  Then check Bible Gateway.com  for the words “discerning heart.”  I think you will be surprised at how much more the heart is to both the secular world and the spiritual world.  The heart is more than just a pump.  Listen to this quote from writer author and political activist Helen Keller.  Helen was born deaf-blind.    "The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched - they must be felt with the heart."

As I mentioned earlier in the book when the police want to see if you are telling them the truth, they do not monitor your mind when putting you through a lie detector test.  They know as do we that the mind has thought and thought can manipulate the truth and the mind often lies to us.  We also know that our vision can be tricked into believing that an illusion is real as many of us have already found out.  Jesus makes a promise to his followers in the Gospel of John 14: 15-17  “If you love me, keep my commands. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever—  the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you."

The Sprit is truth and therefore the spirit doesn't lie, your spirit which houses itself in the heart is preprogrammed to speak only the truth.  

The Christian bible teaches us that God has given us a discerning heart to govern over us.  Proverbs 15:14 The discerning heart seeks knowledge, but the mouth of a fool feeds on folly.   I believe the Holy Spirit resides in your heart and that the spirit speaks not to the mind but to the heart.  When the spirit speaks through the heart it produces a sense of knowing.   All of a sudden the lights get turned on and you see the truth in your mind’s eye.   Sometimes it comes as an epiphany or a moment of great enlightenment.   It has been know to happen for people when they are baptised, or have a great spiritual experience.  Moses went to the mountain and came back full of the spirit.  This stuttering frail wretched man was transformed by the spirit and would carry the truth to his people until the day of death when he returned to womb of new birth. 

Your mind cannot comprehend this Holy Spirit because it speaks its own language.  The spirit speaks to the heart and the heart translates the truth into wisdom of knowing the Creators will.    Jesus spoke about this in John 16: 12 -15 “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear.  But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.  He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you.  All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you.”

Here is where the battle for control over your mind and body become a real battle.    The mind, part of you human nature, doesn't want the heart, part of your spiritual nature to over influence you to the point that you begin to question its thinking.  The mind want to control.  The Apostle Paul writes about this tug of war between the human nature {sinful nature} and the spiritual nature {Godly nature} in his letters to church in the Galatians.  As I mentioned before you can read about this battle in Galatians chapter 5 of the New Testament.   Now I ask you, which of these two natures would you want to have control over your life, your human nature or your spiritual nature?

There is a councillor {spiritual teacher} named Ernie Larson who works with recovering addicts.  He has a phrase he uses quite often when counselling, he says it is our “Stinking Thinking” that keeps us addicted.  The mind produces this thinking to feed and re-enforce our ego. You might say that doesn't make any sense that our ego wants us to remain addicted.  Let us never forget that in order for ego to exist and remain healthy it will do anything to feed. Ego doesn't care about you it 's only purpose is survival.   It’s feeding does not have to make any sense or be positive.  We drink alcohol to make ourselves feel relaxed and good.  Yet drinking has the opposite effect and makes people uptight self concious and eventually sick.  Can’t you just see it, the broken homes, the deaths, and the awful feelings the morning after?  Ego doesn't care about you it just needs to be fed and it will create any kind of an illusion to do so.  Every once in a while Ego does something good because it can also feed on goodness as well.   Let us never forget that your Ego has a central purpose, survival. Why?  Because it knows that it is mortal and will do anything to survive.  

Your Spiritual Nature on the other hand doesn't need to survive, why?  because it is eternal it has no need to vary from the truth.      

                                                                "Spirit Song" 

"Do You Just Follow Along"

Chapter 15 ---------------------------------------

THE WAY OF THE WORLD

I have a story I sometimes tell to illustrate how we can be easily convinced or conned into following the ways of the world and our human nature.  Before I tell it lets remind ourselves that while in the womb you had no concept of material needing, longing, nor did you want for anything everything in your Eden was being provided. You had no concept nor did you have any understand of greed, selfishness, jealousy, hatred, anger, moral or unethical behaviour, and so on.  Imagine these negative attributes are seeds of darkness and when planted, they feed the human nature.  Within conception your Creator takes care of everything you needed for your survival.   Everything was as it was meant to be.    Here is the story. 

There was a time when one woodsman lived the wilderness who loved the life he had been given.  His freedom was outrageous.  There was no need to be concerned for anything for the forest provided everything he needed, food, shelter and beauty.  He was content, comfortable and provided for.  He learned to live with nature and his natural environment.  He had the sun and rain by day and the stars and moon by night.  He was content and his spirit gave him the sense that life was as it was meant to be.  One day the Woodsman found out he was not alone after all.  Another man came into the forest to alert the Woodsman that there were many others and that they were coming.  He explained to the Woodsman that the time had come when he must stake off a plot of land for himself.  If he didn't stake out his claim now, greed would overrun the forest and he would have nothing left.  “You need to register your land, then fence it off so you will be protected”.   Feeling fear for the first time in his life, he accepted the man’s advice and sure enough they came and everything was as he said.  It wasn't long before another man arrived at the Woodsman door to tell him how productive his neighbours had become with cultivation, crops, buildings and livestock.  He convinced the Woodsman that he would be better off to follow suite and become prosperous too, otherwise he would get left behind.  “I am here to help you sir, all you need to do is buy some seed and livestock from me, get some of the equipment I have for you, build a building or two and you to will get rich just like everyone else and everything will be as it was meant to be.”   He did and it seemed so.   One day another man came along and convinced the Woodsman that he was so valuable that he needed protection, “I can offer you insurance”.  He accepted and began to feel protected.   On another find day a man came from the Bank and told the Woodsman that he was spread too thin.  That he needed to consolidate his bills into one payment one mortgage, and it became so.  Then one dark day two men from the bank came to visit the Woodsman after he had a couple of poor years.  They sat at his kitchen table to inform him, “due to your misfortune and your inability to pay your debt, we are here to take possession, what was is no more and we have come to repossess and sell to pay off your debt.  

Did you see it coming, deception and darkness I mean.  Darkness creeps in, not because we are not aware but because we have over fed our human nature.  Our human nature is convinced that the ways of the world are the way.  Our human nature is easily lead astray and if not put into check can lead us into darkness.  Its trouble can be very subtle and often comes in many disguises that appear to be to our benefit.  

Trouble starts out much like a mischievous child but the Father of trouble is Chaos, and Chaos is fully aware of itself and its purpose.   

None of us will ever completely escape the ways of our human nature.  Why?  Because it was given to us by God in conception and it contains the gift of free will.  When we exercise free will, it is the very thing that can get us out of alignment with the will of God or, the very thing that can get us aligned with the will of God, making it one of the bibles paradoxes.  

In fact make the right choice and you will feed the light in your life .  Make the wrong choice and you will feed the darkness in life.

Don’t ever let life circumstances or someone you know convince you that you have no choice in life.  No one can take away your freedom to choose accept you. Free will can be your worst enemy or your best friend.  That was the way it was designed.  Make a good choice, reap the benefits and learn.  Make a bad choice, reap the benefits and learn.  How come the same????   It’s not about right or wrong, it about choices.  It is all about choices and what we can learn from them.   One choice is full of light and the other full of darkness.  

Many of us continue to follow traditions, rules and laws made by man because we assume there is a right and a wrong in every situation.  Not so, but there is always a choice and the opportunity to learn from every situation.  No one can judge on the basis of right and wrong.  Choose poorly and evil hands out its punishment, not always immediately.   Choose wisely and goodness hands out its reward not always immediately either. Often you cannot use logic in doing the right thing for you because things of the heart are not always logical to our human nature.  When you make a choice be it good or poor, your thoughts and your actions send out a ripple.   Some ripples are hardly noticeable and others have devastating consequences.   The ripple effect of the choices we make also affects the lives of innocent bystanders, some may benefit from our choices, some may suffer, and some may perish.  This is why young, innocent, and good people often suffer in our world.  We are all affected by the choices others around us make and in some circumstances they can be on the other side of the planet.  Hiroshima comes to mind.  

Next time:  "Learning To Discern From The Heart not The Head" 

" Which Nature Do You Feed The Most"

  

Chapter 14 -------------------------------------------------

WHICH NATURE DO YOU FEED THE MOST

Early on in the series I offered the awareness that we live with two natures.  One is our Spiritual nature which I have referred to as the nature of God, and our human nature which is the nature of our first human ancestor ADAM.   The warfare that the Apostol Paul writes about in Ephesians 6 is not with the world but is between these two natures who want to be the dominant influence in your life.   

You can read about these two natures in the New Testament of the Christian Bible.  They are found in Paul's’ letters to the Galatians starting at chapter 5: verses 16 -26.

At this point in the series I am going to ask you to do a small exercise.  Think of it as a litmus test to see which nature, human or spiritual, is the strongest or dominate one in your life.  I want you to see if you tend to lean towards darkness or light in your daily life.  In order for you to see a true picture, you must be honest with yourself here.  Do not do this with another person it is only for you.  Put a check mark besides the dominate words or feelings that are taking place in your life these days.  

easily angered,------------very accommodative
feel resentment-------------very forgiving
fearful ----------hopeful
obsessive ---------easily let go
jealously ----------satisfied

anxious ---------- content

feel rejected ----------eel acceptable

pessimistic ----------positive

lie often ----------always truthful

cheat ------- honest

addicted -------- addiction free                                             

unworthy ----------worthy

ashamed -------feel good about me    

I am needy------- I am content
feel emptiness ------generally happy                                                         

hatred -------loving

feel lonely -------secure

do things excessively-----do things in moderation

in a hurry --------relaxed

negative -------hopeful

careless ------cautious

do not like change -----open to change  

doubting-------trusting

low self esteem -------healthy self image
like a little chaos -------no need of chaos

                       

The column on the left strengthens darkness.  The column on the right strengthens light. 

Now comes the awareness part, ask yourself this question.  Which words occupy my life more, words of darkness or words of light?

Darkness often begins to invade our lives as we listen to the voice of our human nature that gets its strength through man-made teachings.  For instance let me give you a simple example of how jealously can become like a cancer, meaning something that literally can make you very ill.  A man and his wife are out to a restaurant for dinner.  The waitress is gorgeous and the man just cannot keep himself from glancing at her beauty.  His wife is furious but cannot express herself until she arrives home.  For the rest of the evening and all the way home she is imagining all the other women he has looked at with those lustful eyes.  Now she is imagining that he has cheated on her at some point and begins to recall times when he was late, times he didn't remember her birthday, anniversary etc.  Can you see where this is going, jealously breeds darkness as it consumes your thinking?  The drama just keeps on building.   Anger, resentment, hatred, predigest etc. all begin and build in the same way.   

Often we carry around the burdens of guilt and shame laid upon us by our religious teachings.  Do this and you go to heaven, do this and you are going to hell.  Our human nature love to bathe in this kind of logic that can lead us into darkness.   Our Spiritual nature on the other hand is not subject to man-made religious laws and bathes in the light of God’s unconditional love. Here is a story to illustrate my point. 

A religious mystic teacher and a student were walking along the road side in the early afternoon shortly after a heavy rain.  One of the spiritual teachings told to the student was that you should never physically touch or look directly into the eyes of a woman.  The reasoning was that it can bring upon you sexual passions which could lead you into darkness.  A young lady was stuck in the heavy mud of the ditch calling out in desperation for help.  The spiritual master went to her immediately, physically picked her up in his arms and carried her to dry ground on the other side.   She thanked him and master looking into her eyes nodded with humbleness.  The student and the master continued on their way.  About one half hour into the walk the student could no longer hold his tongue.  “Master” he said, “ the teaching, we are taught never to physically touch or look into the eyes of a women, I don’t understand.”  The Master replied, sometimes you need to think with your heart not your mind, besides, I put the women down one half hour ago why are you still carrying her”. 

Next time:  “Do You Just Following Along”

The Light Dispels Darkness

Chapter 13

“LIGHT DISPELS DARKNESS”

If you allow light into your darkness it can change the way you see things forever.

Let me tell you a story of how light dispelled darkness and changed the life of several trapped miners forever.   Coal is mined in many parts of the world and miners will tell you that there is nothing to compare with the darkness in the shaft of a coal mine when light is not available.

A mining disaster took place in a small community in eastern Canada were several men were trapped a couple of thousand feet below the surface.    By the end of the first week, their hope was almost completely gone, they had little or no food and their water had run out.  It was reported that in the desperation for moisture they drank the own urn.  There were no signs of hope for them ever being found after the first 12 days of their nightmare.

Miners took with them extra food in their lunch can when they went to work in the mine to feed the pit rats who roamed on the different levels.  The food keep the rats from bothering the miners as they worked thought-out the day.  After the disaster happened and most of the mine had collapsed they not only found themselves trapped, many of the rats were trapped with them.  The trapped miners could no longer afford to feed the rats but realized they needed to conserve whatever food they had for as long as they could.  The rats, being hungry became restless and the miners now without light of any kind could no longer see them but could feel them as they ran over their legs or as they tried nibbling at their hands in the dark.   Without food, water and light, the mines darkness was darker than anything they had ever experienced, and at times the fear was overwhelming.  One of the miners known as the singing miner began to sing Christian hymns.  The singing gave the men moments of relief.  It was in one of those moments that one miner lifted his head in praise to God and to his astonishment rubbed his eyes.  There in the distance he could see a pin head glimmer of light through the darkness.  Crawling on hands and knees towards it, he ran into a wall of fallen rock.  His eye still fixed on the glimmer.  It was light and it was coming through the wall.  As he scratched and moved rock with his hand the light grew bit by bit and the darkness was dispelled, all the trapped miners were rescued that day.  They were alive again and living with hope.  It was if the Light of the world have come to them dispelling their darkness and fear.

Darkness can no longer completely occupy space in your life if you allow the light of awareness to enter in.  When you experience an epiphany of light, of awareness, even if it is only the size of a pin head, you can never be the same again.   If you can expose the darkness in your life to someone whom you trust the past cannot completely control you any longer and change will come to claim its rightful place in your life.  It may not happen in a moment for you, so, be patient.   As you shed more of your darkness more light will come.

I had and to some extent still have darkness to deal with in my own life.   As I matured into a young adult some of my close friends and family would say to me, “You really look like you are carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders Sim, you should see someone about that before it takes over your life.  Reluctantly but after a near death experience in my early 30’s I went looking for someone to help me out.  It wasn't too long after that my friends and family started telling me that I was looking better, seemed more positive, more cheerful, content and my middle name “TROUBLE” didn't seem fitting any longer.   All of a sudden people began to say things like: "Sim, you’re looking a lot better these days, what’s up, what are you on, who are you hanging out with anyway."   I'd just say that I had meet a man who seemed to able to look straight through me.  He put out his open hands in front of me and said “give me just one small thing that is weighting heavy on your heart Sim.  Place it right here in my open hands and while I am holding it for you, I guarantee that you will begin to feel a bit better.”  At first I was reluctant too, but one day I found the courage to do it and guess what?  He was right and so every time I would go to him, I’d give him a little more of my darkness and every time I would feel a bit lighter.    Little by little I am learning to let this man hold my darkness for me and allow his awareness and light to shine through me.   Oh there are times when I still slip back into old patterns of thinking and doing but even if I do, it only lasts for very short periods of time.   
Let me tell you a biblical story to illustrate.    

There is a story in the New Testament, Mark 10:50-52 where Jesus comes to man borne blind.  Being blind from birth,he would not have known the light of day, so he could only imagine how things might look if he could see.  Jesus cures his blindness and all of a sudden he can see.  Remember this man was born blind so he is seeing everything for the first time.  What he now sees may look completely different from what he imagined in his mind’s eye.  What we are not told in the story is this:  that even though his darkness was lifted, being born blind he probably would not be able to recognize or label his surroundings.  Therefore to feel normal, he may have had to cover his eyes producing temporary blindness in order to find his way home.   

This also happens with enlightenment and awareness when it comes to the darkness that plagues our lives.  Even though we may have had an epiphany where light has come into your life, you may, in an effort to feel normal seek reach out to your darkness temporarily but it won't last long.  

I call this my stinky blanket syndrome.   Many children have something they cling to as a baby.  No one knows for sure why, it is just that they picked that certain blanket, plush toy, piece of cloth, whatever and it gives them a sense of security, comfort or familiarity.   I will use a blanket to illustrate this because it can completely cover you.  You can curl up in it and hide away.  Almost like returning to that quite secure place like the womb once held for you.   This blanket gets pretty smelly and dirty at times and the mother wants to wash it.  Some mothers find it difficult to get the blanket from the child.    Once the child gets it back they will go right back to covering themselves wanting the familiar smells to return.    For some strange reason darkness holds a similar syndrome and can play itself out in many adult lives.  Many just cannot let go of those things they find comfort in even if it is smothering or steeling away their lives.  We get a strange comfort from the familiar, even if it is a stinky old miserable life.  Pain and suffering can work the same if it becomes our security blanket.   It’s easier for some to just live in and with it, than to change.  Many will continue to choose darkness over light, even though they are aware.    For many it is much easier to continue in difficult dark circumstances than to make the changes necessary to live a different kind of life.   

Here we must begin to realize that darkness, no matter how dark it is or how it came into in our lives can only be dispelled by letting in some light.    Darkness has no power over light and as light comes upon darkness it actually pushes the darkness out.  We all know that the moment you shine a light into a dark room some of the darkness will be dispelled.  If you shine enough light upon the spirits of darkness, fear, anxiety, loneliness, depression, or anything that breeds darkness, darkness loses it power over you and that spirit will eventually get discouraged and leave you.   

There will still be a great deal of work to do on your part to leave your darkness behind.  There are many things you will have to relearn.

 Next Time:  WHICH NATURE DO YOU FEED THE MOST