Hidden Beliefs

One of my big goals this year was to find a new spiritual home. I love the Episcopal church, but it just doesn't move me the way it used to, so I have been attending the Center for Spiritual Living (CSL). CSL is unlike any church I've ever been to. The messages really resonate with me. Though I always hear the truth in what is spoken,some of their ideas are a radical departure from how I was raised. It is taking me some time to wrap my mind around the basic principals of religious science, not because they are complicated...quite the contrary, religious science is so logical and the principals so basic, that sometimes I find myself struggling to overcome my disbelief that anything so meaningful could be so easy.

In order to learn more and also to see if I want to make CSL my spiritual home, I am taking the Beyond Limits class. For our first assignment we did an exercise where we uncovered our hidden beliefs by noticing our actions. I was actually kind of shocked by what I discovered. Shoshana always teases me that my word is truth. She says I am always very honest and push others to be honest with me...which is true, I don't appreciate lies and deceit, and I do always try to think from my heart. But in examining what I actually do or how I actually feel as a opposed to what I think I believe, I've found some descrepencies.

I started class last week, the day after I met Terry Mc Bride, so in addition to my homework I spent my week reading Terry's book "The Hell I Can't". This book really helped me, not because it was a sunshine rainbow "woo woo" book about how Terry's faith healed him and changed his life, but because it was a gritty real book that resonated much more with my experiences with illness. Thankfully I have never been as ill as Terry, but I did spend a miserable year at home with mono. That was the year I got strep throat three time, bronchitis twice, a cold, the flu, and an ear infection. I couldn't go to school. Did I mention I was depressed? I did not feel at choice. I felt awful. I just didn't want to hurt anymore, but the more I dwelled on being sick, the worse it became. Terry's story was intense. His spine was infected with E coli bacteria and he ended up having 27 surgeries a colostomy bag, before he was able to get well. That lasted 11 YEARS! 11 YEARS! During that time he had all these doctors telling him he would never be healthy and that it was unreasonable for him to expect to get through this experience physically whole.

Though the illness is a salient part of the book, the over arching theme is how to be at choice. It's the story of how Terry was able to change his beliefs that illness would always be a part of his life, and that his doctors had full authority and control over his healing. It wasn't easy. It always sounds so easy when they say it during worship. You are what you think, so think well...choose your life, manifest what you want and watch it show up. Some things are easy. After creating my vision board just a few months ago, many wonderful components of my vision have magically appeared from completing my book of poetry and finding a publisher to having the opportunity to share my art, but these things were easy to believe in. I have been writing for years and I've always received positive feedback. This has given me the belief that what I write has value and that if I work on it can be excellent. I wasn't given the same feedback about my art. In fact I never liked any of my art teachers in school, but I so fell in love with the creative process that whether or not I was any good ceased to be important. It was just something I loved to do, but when I started seeing a shift in painting, I self validated. I liked it and therefore I could believe that others would like it too and that it would be professional enough to be shown.

But what about the beliefs that are harder to change? For example, I was born 4lbs 11 oz, about a month premature. Mom was a smoker then (She just didn't know any better. No one did at the time.) and as such it was expected that I would be prone to illness. And so it was that during my childhood I was sick every winter. My Dad used to joke that you couldn't take me to the corner without me getting sick. That became one of my beliefs...that I am prone to illness. Within the last few years, my belief has shifted to be that as an adult I am less prone to illness. I don't even suffer from asthma anymore. But I still believe that illness exist and can effect me. How can I change this belief in something that is scientifically proven? Terry had the same problem...while surround constantly by evidence of the severe illness plaguing his body, he wasn't able to just wake up one day and be at total choice. I'm sure if he could have, he would have just shifted his beliefs instantly and woken up whole and healed, but instead he made a plan for gradual healing which included modern medicine...something he also believed in. It worked for him, but what will work for me? How can I heal myself of my negative beliefs? And once that happens, will I really be able to manifest the parts of my vision that have eluded me? Still trying to figure it all out.