The Strangest Secret Article by: Earl Nightingale

The Strangest Secret Article by: Earl Nightingale

Transcribed from The Strangest Secret audio program by Earl Nightingale

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Some years ago, the late Nobel prize-winning Dr. Albert Schweitzer was asked by a reporter, “Doctor, what’s wrong with men today?” The great doctor was silent a moment, and then he said, “Men simply don’t think!”

It’s about this that I want to talk with you. We live today in a golden age. This is an era that humanity has looked forward to, dreamed of, and worked toward for thousands of years. We live in the richest era that ever existed on the face of the earth … a land of abundant opportunity for everyone.

However, if you take 100 individuals who start even at the age of 25, do you have any idea what will happen to those men and women by the time they’re 65? These 100 people believe they’re going to be successful. They are eager toward life, there is a certain sparkle in their eye, an erectness to their carriage, and life seems like a pretty interesting adventure to them.

But by the time they’re 65, only one will be rich, four will be financially independent, five will still be working, and 54 will be broke and depending on others for life’s necessities.

Only five out of 100 make the grade! Why do so many fail? What has happened to the sparkle that was there when they were 25? What has become of the dreams, the hopes, the plans … and why is there such a large disparity between what these people intended to do and what they actually accomplished?

THE DEFINITION OF SUCCESS

First, we have to define success and here is the best definition I’ve ever been able to find: “Success is the progressive realization of a worthy ideal.”

A success is the school teacher who is teaching because that’s what he or she wants to do. A success is the entrepreneur who start his own company because that was his dream and that’s what he wanted to do. A success is the salesperson who wants to become the best salesperson in his or her company and sets forth on the pursuit of that goal.

A success is anyone who is realizing a worthy predetermined ideal, because that’s what he or she decided to do … deliberately. But only one out of 20 does that! The rest are “failures.”

Rollo May, the distinguished psychiatrist, wrote a wonderful book called Man’s Search for Himself, and in this book he says: “The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice … it is conformity.” And there you have the reason for so many failures. Conformity and people acting like everyone else, without knowing why or where they are going.

We learn to read by the time we’re seven. We learn to make a living by the time we’re 30. Often by that time we’re not only making a living, we’re supporting a family. And yet by the time we’re 65, we haven’t learned how to become financially independent in the richest land that has ever been known. Why? We conform! Most of us are acting like the wrong percentage group and the 95 who don’t succeed.

GOALS

Have you ever wondered why so many people work so hard and honestly without ever achieving anything in particular, and why others don’t seem to work hard, yet seem to get everything? They seem to have the “magic touch.” You’ve heard people say, “Everything he touches turns to gold.” Have you ever noticed that a person who becomes successful tends to continue to become more successful? And, on the other hand, have you noticed how someone who’s a failure tends to continue to fail?

The difference is goals. People with goals succeed because they know where they’re going. It’s that simple. Failures, on the other hand, believe that their lives are shaped by circumstances … by things that happen to them … by exterior forces.

That’s why it’s so easy to make a living today. It takes no particular brains or talent to make a living and support a family today. We have a plateau of so-called “security.” So, to succeed, all we must do is decide how high above this plateau we want to aim.

Throughout history, the great wise men and teachers, philosophers, and prophets have disagreed with one another on many different things. It is only on this one point that they are in complete and unanimous agreement and the key to success and the key to failure is this:

WE BECOME WHAT WE THINK ABOUT

This is The Strangest Secret! Now, why do I say it’s strange, and why do I call it a secret? Actually, it isn’t a secret at all. It was first promulgated by some of the earliest wise men, and it appears again and again throughout the Bible. But very few people have learned it or understand it. That’s why it’s strange, and why for some equally strange reason it virtually remains a secret.

Marcus Aurelius, the great Roman Emperor, said: “A man’s life is what his thoughts make of it.”

Disraeli said this: “Everything comes if a man will only wait … a human being with a settled purpose must accomplish it, and nothing can resist a will that will stake even existence for its fulfillment.”

William James said: “We need only in cold blood act as if the thing in question were real, and it will become infallibly real by growing into such a connection with our life that it will become real. It will become so knit with habit and emotion that our interests in it will be those which characterize belief.” He continues, ” … only you must, then, really wish these things, and wish them exclusively, and not wish at the same time a hundred other incompatible things just as strongly.”

My old friend Dr. Norman Vincent Peale put it this way: “If you think in negative terms, you will get negative results. If you think in positive terms, you will achieve positive results.” George Bernard Shaw said: “People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don’t believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can’t find them, make them.”

Well, it’s pretty apparent, isn’t it? We become what we think about. A person who is thinking about a concrete and worthwhile goal is going to reach it, because that’s what he’s thinking about. Conversely, the person who has no goal, who doesn’t know where he’s going, and whose thoughts must therefore be thoughts of confusion, anxiety, fear, and worry will thereby create a life of frustration, fear, anxiety and worry. And if he thinks about nothing … he becomes nothing.

AS YE SOW and SO SHALL YE REAP

The problem is that our mind comes as standard equipment at birth. It’s free. And things that are given to us for nothing, we place little value on. Things that we pay money for, we value.

The paradox is that exactly the reverse is true. Everything that’s really worthwhile in life came to us free and our minds, our souls, our bodies, our hopes, our dreams, our ambitions, our intelligence, our love of family and children and friends and country. All these priceless possessions are free.

But the things that cost us money are actually very cheap and can be replaced at any time. A good man can be completely wiped out and make another fortune. He can do that several times. Even if our home burns down, we can rebuild it. But the things we got for nothing, we can never replace.

Our mind can do any kind of job we assign to it, but generally speaking, we use it for little jobs instead of big ones. So decide now. What is it you want? Plant your goal in your mind. It’s the most important decision you’ll ever make in your entire life.

Do you want to excel at your particular job? Do you want to go places in your company … in your community? Do you want to get rich? All you have got to do is plant that seed in your mind, care for it, work steadily toward your goal, and it will become a reality.

It not only will, there’s no way that it cannot. You see, that’s a law and like the laws of Sir Isaac Newton, the laws of gravity. If you get on top of a building and jump off, you’ll always go down and you’ll never go up.

And it’s the same with all the other laws of nature. They always work. They’re inflexible. Think about your goal in a relaxed, positive way. Picture yourself in your mind’s eye as having already achieved this goal. See yourself doing the things you will be doing when you have reached your goal.

Every one of us is the sum total of our own thoughts. We are where we are because that’s exactly where we really want or feel we deserve to be and whether we’ll admit that or not. Each of us must live off the fruit of our thoughts in the future, because what you think today and tomorrow and next month and next year and will mold your life and determine your future. You’re guided by your mind.

Do what the experts since the dawn of recorded history have told us to do: pay the price, by becoming the person you want to become. It’s not nearly as difficult as living unsuccessfully.

The moment you decide on a goal to work toward, you’re immediately a successful person and you are then in that rare group of people who know where they’re going. Out of every hundred people, you belong to the top five. Don’t concern yourself too much with how you are going to achieve your goal and leave that completely to a power greater than yourself. All you have to do is know where you’re going. The answers will come to you of their own accord, and at the right time.

Start today. You have nothing to lose and but you have your whole life to win.

30-DAYACTION IDEAS FOR PUTTING THE STRANGEST SECRET TO WORK FOR YOU

For the next 30-days follow each of these steps every day until you have achieved your goal.

1. Write on a card what it is you want more that anything else. It may be more money. Perhaps you’d like to double your income or make a specific amount of money. It may be a beautiful home. It may be success at your job. It may be a particular position in life. It could be a more harmonious family.

Write down on your card specifically what it is you want. Make sure it’s a single goal and clearly defined. You needn’t show it to anyone, but carry it with you so that you can look at it several times a day. Think about it in a cheerful, relaxed, positive way each morning when you get up, and immediately you have something to work for and something to get out of bed for, something to live for.

Look at it every chance you get during the day and just before going to bed at night. As you look at it, remember that you must become what you think about, and since you’re thinking about your goal, you realize that soon it will be yours. In fact, it’s really yours the moment you write it down and begin to think about it.

2. Stop thinking about what it is you fear. Each time a fearful or negative thought comes into your mind, replace it with a mental picture of your positive and worthwhile goal. And there will come a time when you’ll feel like giving up. It’s easier for a human being to think negatively than positively. That’s why only five percent are successful! You must begin now to place yourself in that group.

“Act as though it were impossible to fail,” as Dorothea Brande said. No matter what your goal and if you’ve kept your goal before you every day and you’ll wonder and marvel at this new life you’ve found.

3. Your success will always be measured by the quality and quantity of service you render. Most people will tell you that they want to make money, without understanding this law. The only people who make money work in a mint. The rest of us must earn money. This is what causes those who keep looking for something for nothing, or a free ride, to fail in life. Success is not the result of making money; earning money is the result of success and and success is in direct proportion to our service.

Most people have this law backwards. It’s like the man who stands in front of the stove and says to it: “Give me heat and then I’ll add the wood.” How many men and women do you know, or do you suppose there are today, who take the same attitude toward life? There are millions.

We’ve got to put the fuel in before we can expect heat. Likewise, we’ve got to be of service first before we can expect money. Don’t concern yourself with the money. Be of service … build … work … dream … create! Do this and you’ll find there is no limit to the prosperity and abundance that will come to you.

Don’t start your test until you’ve made up your mind to stick with it. If you should fail during your first 30 days and by that I mean suddenly find yourself overwhelmed by negative thoughts and simply start over again from that point and go 30 more days. Gradually, your new habit will form, until you find yourself one of that wonderful minority to whom virtually nothing is impossible.

Above all … don’t worry! Worry brings fear, and fear is crippling. The only thing that can cause you to worry during your test is trying to do it all yourself. Know that all you have to do is hold your goal before you; everything else will take care of itself.

Take this 30-day test, then repeat it … then repeat it again. Each time it will become more a part of you until you’ll wonder how you could have ever have lived any other way. Live this new way and the floodgates of abundance will open and pour over you more riches than you may have dreamed existed. Money? Yes, lots of it. But what’s more important, you’ll have peace … you’ll be in that wonderful minority who lead calm, cheerful, successful lives.

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Earl Nightingale

Source

https://www.nightingale.com/articles/the-strangest-secret/

Mind and Speech

Mind and Speech

The whole manifested world goes to show us what use we have made of God’s gift. Receiving a gift does not mean that we are going to use it wisely, but we have the gift. Everyone has the gift; and the world simply reflects the use of that gift.

So you and I have been given a gift. To what use have we put it? In a book written in the First Century, written at the time of our Gospel, — it’s called the Hermetica, and this is a translation by Walter Scott.

It is a wonderful series of four volumes; and in this he says: “There are two gifts that God has given to man alone, and to no other mortal creature, and these two gifts are Mind and Speech. And the gifts of Mind and Speech are essential and identical with Immortality. If they are used rightly, man will not differ in any respect from the immortals; and when he quits the body, these two will be his guides and they will lead him into the troop of the gods and. to the souls that have attained to bliss.”

Now he is not speaking of any outer speech, for you and I have had this experience, — I know I have many times. You have gone to a party, and many people you do not know, you meet them and the usual greetings: “Nice to know you,” “What a joy to know you,” “Pleased to meet you,” and the usual clichés; and then you have drinks and your little hors d’oeuvre, and then the party breaks up and they all separate. And you hear someone say, “What a creep,” “What a bore”; yet they were so pleased to meet them: “What a joy to know you.” The outer words did not conform whatsoever with what they were really thinking on the inside. And God sees, not the outer man; He sees the inner Man.

It’s the inner speech that is frozen in the world round about us. This whole vast world is but “frozen” inner speech. What are we saying on the inside?

If one could only control these inner conversations morning, noon and night, and carry them right into the dream world, he would know what world he is creating. Stop for one moment and ask yourself, what am I thinking now? You are carrying on a little tiny inner speech at every moment of time. You may be in the presence of someone that the world thinks important, but you don’t, and inwardly you are saying, “But only God hears it.” That’s what you are actually saying. Outwardly you are pleased to meet him, and you are flattered with the contact; but inwardly, what are you saying?

This is what I ask everyone to observe. Observe what you are actually doing on the inside, for that is what God sees; and what you are doing on the inside, you are doing in little tiny speech movements, and they are crystallizing in the manifested world round about you. We all would be everything we want to be in this world. But we find it more difficult to do it than to know what to do. So I could tell you from now until the ends of time, but only practice will do it — just practice.

So you read something, and actually inwardly you are repeating the words. Well now, the whole thing is in your imagination. That is all it was in him, only his imagination. That was God’s gift.  It is translated in the Hermetica as “Mind.” “And God has given to man, and to man alone, two gifts, and to no other mortal creature. The gifts are Mind and Speech; and these are like the gifts of Immortality, and by these gifts he does not differ in any respect from the Immortals. If he uses them wisely,” — the whole world is his. Are we not told that: “The world was created by the Word of God;” and “things that are seen were made out of things that are not seen?”

So here, out of the nowhere, we create by inner speech through the use of what? Call it “mind” if you will. I like the word “imagination.” To me, it inflames me. When I imagine a state — any state, if I can only persuade myself of the reality of the state imagined, that’s the important thing; to believe in the reality of the state imagined. But to know what to do is not the same as doing it

Let me now make it quite clear: You have the gift. You can speak. Even if you were dumb, you can still speak — inwardly you speak, and you form these little speech movements within yourself. Make them conform to your wish fulfilled.

Whether you be a Frenchman or an American or any other nationality, you have speech and you have a mind. Instead of accepting what you have already done with that gift, you simply ignore it. You brought it into being. All this is solidified speech — the whole vast manifested world.

I would say to them, “Do you not know what you are doing to yourself?” “Yes, but just give me one little moment because I am so enjoying the feeling of getting even with them.” You “get even” with no one. There is no one else in the world. As you are told: “I am the Lord, and beside Me there is no god.” Read it in the 45th chapter of the Book of Isaiah, “I am the Lord, and beside Me there is no god.” “Now you want the Word?” He said, “The Word is very near unto you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, that you can do it. See, I set before you this day life and good, blessings and curses, death and evil. Choose life, that you and your descendants may live.”

The whole thing is before you. You can choose death if you want it, because the Word is on your tongue, it is in your mouth, it is in your heart. And you can do it now. You don’t have to ask who will go up to Heaven and bring it down for me, or go into the depths and bring it up for me. It is now nearer than you know; in your mouth and in your heart, that you can do it now. Well what would you do now? What sentence would imply that you are now what you would like to be?

You know what to do. And I say, it’s not knowing what to do; it is the doing it. Someone got the most marvelous revelation. I was there the morning that it happened. “Stop spending your thoughts, your time and your money. Everything in life must be an investment,” And I so loved it, I incorporated that thought in the chapter, “The Coin of Heaven,” in my book, “Awakened Imagination.” She would be the first to confess, although it came through her, and it was her revelation from God to her, — shared with me, and I shared it through the written form with those who read it in the book, — but she is the first to confess she never applied it.

So I ask you to really apply it. Don’t think for one second that knowing what to do is going to do anything for you. It’s the doing it that matters. So, if every moment of time you know what to do, then do it. If you find yourself carrying on any negative conversation, break it, even though it gives you pleasure, as it does many people; they find such fun in being critical. They think they are alone and no one sees them; so it doesn’t matter. No one sees you? The only One that matters sees you every moment of time, and that’s your Father. He sees into the very depths of your Being, and He knows exactly what you are doing. And your world is built out of these inner conversations.

So, today if you are not satisfied with the world in which you live, blame no one, but turn within to these two gifts and use them wisely, for here we are told to order our life according to our conversations. Then in Ephesians we are told, — it’s the 4th chapter: “Put off the old nature which belongs to the former conversations, and put on the new nature.” The new nature is sometimes translated “the new man,” and the “old nature” the “old man.” Well, if I equate the “old nature” with the “former conversations,” I must equate the “new man” with the new conversation. He identifies the inner speech with man’s nature. So now, what am I actually doing on the inside of myself? And I am doing it morning, noon and night; I can’t stop it. If I stop for one moment, it isn’t. You can’t stop it. You take it into your dreams, and you are still talking. You are really talking at all moments of time.

So what are you saying at every moment of time? Watch it; be careful what you are saying, because your whole vast world is this inner conversation “pushed out.” And you can change it only by changing the conversation, because the conversation is equated with your nature.

So if you walk the street or you ride the bus, or you sit alone, you are still talking; at every moment of time you are talking. And all you need to do to find out what you have been saying is to look at your world. Your world reflects this inner speech. I have seen it every moment of time.  I am not going to tell you I have not faltered. I would not for one moment tell you that I am always in control of the inner conversations.

So I tell you, you watch carefully what you are saying morning, noon and night. When you go to bed at night, just watch your inner conversations, and see that the sun is not descending upon your anger. Resolve it at that very moment, and make it conform to your wish fulfilled, and make that “wish fulfilled” a. thing of love. What would it be like if it were true? Just what would it be like? Then carry on a conversation from the premise of the wish fulfilled, all clothed in love, for anyone that you think of; and watch how things happen in your world. Your night, — may I tell you — if that is your last thought, it will dominate the dream of the night, You are completely dominated, and your Father is speaking to you constantly through the medium of dreams and through the medium of vision, and you will see the whole thing unfolding within you; and you will know that you are the Lord Jesus Christ.

You don’t go out and scream it from the housetops. You know it, and you walk in the comfort of being the Awakened Man, who is God. Let everyone say exactly what he wants to say about you, and pay no attention to it, because they have to do it. When you come down to the end, they have to do it. The separation must take place. And you don’t justify it. Self-justification is the voice of hell. So you don’t justify anything, and you don’t try to always be right. Another almost incurable disease of man is the necessity of always being right. So you don’t make any effort to prove that you are right. You know what you have experienced, and you can’t deny the experience; so you go your way, telling it just as it comes to you. And it comes to you in the most glorious manner. It’s all in Scripture; so when you come to the end, you aren’t disappointed and you aren’t surprised that those that you sent off alive and free will now take up arms against you and call you insane, call you a devil, and would disrupt their family life. You know exactly what you’ve done. You have only told the truth. And when the Truth comes into the world, it comes not to bring peace but a sword. He is going to separate you from that traditional background that enslaved you in the past, because real progress in this world, — religious progress, — is a gradual transition from a god of tradition to a God of experience. You experience God: and the whole thing reflects it.

“Put off the former conversation, and then be renewed in the spirit of your mind.” If you put it off — it’s equated with the “old man.” Now, as I put it off, I have to replace it with something — a “new conversation”; so you are told in the Book of Joel: “Let the weak say, I am strong.” You read that in the 3rd chapter, the 10th verse. “Let the weak say, I am strong,” for there is no other God. “I am the Lord, and beside Me there is no god.” So, “I set before you,” — and you make the choice. You can choose life or you can choose death. You can choose the good or choose the evil, a blessing or a curse. It’s entirely up to man to choose anything. And look into this manifested world, and you’ll see what we have chosen.

But every morning you see headlines — nothing but disaster, you see what man has chosen. He seems either to want it or he is “fed” it, — one or the other. Look at the editorials. “We need that in order to sell papers,” Or else, we ourselves are demanding it from Him, but you “feed” upon it. Morning, noon and night we feast upon all this unloveliness and carry on these little internal mental conversations with ourselves; but they don’t remain there. They balloon and objectify themselves and become solidified as our manifested world.

So this whole manifested world goes to show us what use or misuse we have made of God’s gift. And God’s gift is your Mind and your Speech; and it’s not your outer speech, for we know how deceptive that is. You see it morning, noon and night. A salesman goes in, and he is trained to deceive the buyer. The advertiser is trained to deceive the buyer. And everything is on the outside. God sees only the inside. Man sees the outer appearance and God sees the Inner Man. So when you watch your inner conversation, you are actually watching the new nature. That is your nature. And if you don’t like it, change it. You “put off the old man,” and then “put on the new man”; and “He will show you the salvation of Gad.” Then the whole thing will unfold within you.

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From an edited lecture by Neville Goddard

How to use the i ching – an introduction

How to use the i ching – an introduction

summary

The I Ching, pronounced “ee cheeng“, sometimes written as Yi Jing and also known as The Book of Changes, is an extraordinary classic text. This post provides and introductory guide to help you understand and use the I Ching to benefit your life.

essential teaching notes

I Ching basics

The I Ching is not commonly recognised or discussed in the West, yet surprisingly many people have an old copy tucked away somewhere on their bookshelf or have encountered its Chinese Taoist wisdom during their experimental student days, perhaps without progressing the experience further.

When I hold workshops on the I Ching I’m always amazed at the sheer variety of I Ching books my students have amassed, often without ever fully understanding or accessing its wisdom.

The I Ching is one of the oldest and most spiritual books in the world and, coupled with the Tao Te Ching, it makes up the fundamental sacred teachings that command a special place in all Taoist’s hearts. For many Chinese thinkers and philosophers the I Ching is as important as the Bible is to Western society and philosophy, although it’s read and consulted in a totally different way.

The I Ching is essentially a means of obtaining spiritual guidance, inspirational insight and Universal wisdom. It can help with personal development or provide encouragement in finding authentic understanding and solutions to the questions or decisions that are of importance to you at any given time or situation.

The book acts not only as a spiritual compass but also offers a wealth of beautiful poetry and Chinese philosophy that stretches back 5000 years into the origins of ancient Chinese customs and values. Its wisdom has the potential to stimulate your sensitivity, creativity and resourcefulness, even whilst experiencing the most challenging and demanding emotional periods of your life, often when those vital personal qualities are not so readily accessed.

In this regard the I Ching can also be helpful as a meditation support, providing comfort and guidance. The text and subsequent visualisations that flow from its words have the power to stimulate a deep-seated personal authentic vibration.

These mystical aspects are both challenging to explain and unique to each reader, but nevertheless the spiritual inspiration and experiences that result are as valid today as when our Eastern ancestors began consulting these ancient texts.

Appreciating Oneness

Paradoxically there’s no need to study or even understand Taoist philosophy to appreciate or benefit from the teachings of the I Ching. All that’s necessary is the sincerity and aptitude to explore the concept of aligning with natural and Universal laws and the energetic polarities of Yin and Yang.

To many Westerners polarity may mean opposites, as in ‘negative’ and ‘positive’. To understand and embrace the I Ching it’s necessary to abandon these rather fixed ideas and perceptions and instead appreciate that the seemingly opposing energies of Yin and Yang are in fact complementary.

They are part of the whole or Oneness almost like a ‘cosmic web’ to be explored. Indeed, great insight and awareness can be gained by simply re-focusing your perception on the entirety rather than a single isolated part of the energy being contemplated or encountered (this principle relates to a profound Taoist teaching that was passed onto me when I was ordained and I have written several other articles on this particular subject).

In the same way that night follows day, gradually and without division, or the seasons evolve into one other, it may be interesting for you to consider that nothing is fixed or ever unchanging; nothing is split into past, present or future; everything is interlinked and constantly moving and changing, always in a state of flux and transition.

Quantum physics and cosmological research are now driving forward Western theories of ‘interconnection’ and ‘co-existence’ at an exciting pace. I’m heartened to read that ‘unscientific’ Taoist hypotheses on such matters, which were dismissed only a few years ago, are now receiving approval from earlier doubters!

These concepts also relate to what Jung called ‘synchronicity‘ – a way of looking at things which connect one to another in unexpected ways. For example, you might be thinking of someone and then, apparently out of the blue, they arrive on your doorstep or they call you on the telephone. Or you may be worrying about a problem or situation and, seemingly by chance, you find an answer in a newspaper or magazine article you’re reading, or it seems to appear from nowhere.

The truth is likely that the ‘answer’ has always been within you, sometimes overlooked, blocked or stagnated, but it is there nevertheless, waiting to be accessed!

Finding your flow

Another important principle examined within the I Ching is how to maintain this energetic vibration of inter-connectedness by encouraging the smooth harmonious flow of Qi within yourself, your life and the world around you. There is no name or word in the West that directly translates the word ‘Qi’. The label that is often used is ‘energy’ and although this is a useful description I think the terms ‘life-force / universal-force’ or ‘love’ are perhaps more holistic and apt in widening your understanding of this profound concept.

As with all types of energy, Qi comprises of Yang energy (active, masculine and powerful) and Yin energy (passive, feminine and gentle) to make it whole. The balance between the two is ever changing and transforming and this is signified by the wavy, not straight, centre line (or Wu Wei line) in the familiar Yin-Yang symbol (also known as Tai Chi or The Great Ultimate).

The concepts of Yin-Yang and energetic balance and flow have a deep and meaningful relationship in your life and that of the Universe as a whole. Taoist thinking holds that everything in the Universe is generated from the Yin-Yang polarity and the flow between the two. And so it is that the philosophy of the I Ching welcomes change, movement, transformation, momentum and regeneration.

The Chinese word ‘I‘ normally translates as ‘change‘ and the book is all about change: exploring and defining the changes that you’re presented with, which may be beyond your current understanding, as well as revealing possibilities for future change, action, or indeed inaction (the latter relating to the Taoist teaching of ‘Wu Wei’).

Letting go and embracing choice

Through the process of consulting the I Ching the numerous ideas that the book presents become a positive focus of your creative attention. In turn your thoughts and energy shift away from dwelling excessively on the stimuli, issue or situation being confronted and the emotional feelings you may be experiencing. This then allows you to begin to address the matter at hand in a more balanced, authentic and resourceful way.

The change outlined in the text could be perceived as negative, positive or any possible scenario in between the two. This is the wonder and joy of the I Ching and a point which many people misunderstand. The I Ching doesn’t predict future circumstances or events and it contains no hard and fast rules or commandments.

It simply highlights all choices, paths of action and possibilities open to you. It allows for your personal interpretation and meditation on the text and inspires you to look within yourself to find your authentic truth. Your subsequent decisions and actions will be determined only by your personal viewpoint and choice.

I like to think of it as consulting my own very old, wise, inscrutable 5,000 year old Chinese sage. You may prefer to think of it connecting to your ‘inner guide’, ‘inner compass’, ‘intuition’, ‘gut feeling’, ‘guardian angel’, ‘spirit guide’, ‘Buddha’, ‘God’, or whatever concept feels most appropriate to you.

To use the I Ching to its fullest you should approach the text with an open mind and without expectation. Allow it to stimulate and broaden your perspective on the situation or change you are encountering. Embrace and respond to it in a way that moves you onto your path of true self-worth. Seek to align with and incorporate the change rather that opposing or blocking it, thus ‘going with the flow’, holding your balanced ‘Wu Wei’, no matter how challenging or fearful it may emotionally feel at the time.

When you go with the flow in this way you become more creative and authentic, you begin to let go of past and outdated modes of conditioning and thinking that no longer serve you and your authentic potential.

And so it follows that if you alter your perception of the present your future must change.

Remember: the ancestor of your current situation is a thought, and the same principle applies to your future.

The I Ching offers a source of self-enlightenment, appreciation of your self-worth, and can empower you to reach your true harmonious potential. When you go with the flow, rather than clinging to the energy of an outdated situation, relationship or mindset, nothing remains fixed or rigid. You become open to all opportunities, which then flood into your life almost as if you’ve turned on a tap of Universal energy and love.

If this all sounds a little familiar, it is – this ancient Taoist concept is exactly what advocates of the ‘Law of Attraction’ are talking about right now!

Consulting the I Ching

The I Ching is made up of 64 chapters, each relating to a corresponding ‘hexagram’ which presents a particular message. Full details of the method of consultation are given in most I Ching books and I so will provide only a brief resume here.

The first step in consulting the I Ching is to formulate a question and create a hexagram, typically though the process of throwing coins.

There are several other ways to consult the I Ching – one traditional method uses grains of rice, another uses yarrow sticks (allegedly because Yarrow grows on the grave of Confucius) but the main method used in the West is throwing coins, usually Chinese, although any coins will do the job.

Before you cast the coins write down and meditate on the question relating to the stimuli, issue or situation you are facing. Being mindful to formulate the question ‘correctly’ can be an invaluable part of the meditative and enlightenment process. Then ‘throwing’ the I Ching is very simple: with your question in mind, shake the three coins in a cupped hand and throw them down when you feel the time is right – there is no time limit protocol.

Creating a Hexagram

In throwing the coins the intention is to create a hexagram. Each hexagram is built up from a series of six lines, either broken or unbroken, which are considered to be a reflection of the energetic qualities of the situation at hand.

A straight line ‘_______’ represents Yang energy or young Yang, and a broken line ‘____ ____’ represents Yin energy or young Yin. There is also another energetic quality which reflects the fact that the Yin or Yang energy of any situation is dynamic and thus may be at the point of transformation, either from Yin to Yang or vice versa. These lines are called ‘moving’ or ‘changing’ lines and a can be Yin moving/changing (old Yin) or Yang moving/changing (old Yang).

It is the unique combination of the four energetic qualities and possibilities over the six lines of the hexagram that represent the energy of the whole of the situation you are consulting on.

If you use the coin method, every time you throw your three coins the outcome can be translated into an energetic line. By throwing the coins six times you then create the six lines that become the whole hexagram.

Once you have formulated your question you should select three coins which have an identifiable ‘head’ and ‘tail’ or two easily distinguishable sides that you can assign the following numerical values to: heads = 3 and tails = 2.

By throwing the three coins their combined total value will fall between 6 and 9. For example, two heads and one tail would total 8, two tails and a head would total 7, three tails would total 6, etc.

These values can then be translated their energetic lines:

3 tails thrown = value of 6, represented as a Yin broken line which becomes a moving/changing line (old Yin), because the coins are identical:

2 tails and 1 head thrown = value of 7, represented as a Yang straight line (young Yang):

2 heads and 1 tail thrown = value of 8, represented as a Yin broken line (young Yin):

3 heads thrown = value of 9, represented as a Yang straight line, which becomes a moving/changing line (old Yang) because the coins are identical:

Note that moving/changing lines within the hexagram are often represented with an ‘x’ or ‘o’ in the middle of the line to indicate that the lines are changing from Yin to Yang, or Yang to Yin, respectively.

The value and energetic line type of the first throw corresponds to the first or bottom line of the hexagram, the value and energetic line type of the second throw corresponds to the second from bottom line, etc. Repeating this throwing action six times then builds the hexagram from the bottom up.

The bottom three lines of the hexagram are referred to as the lower trigram and the top three lines are referred to as the upper trigram, together they make up the whole hexagram.

An example would be:

Once you have the trigrams written down you can consult the grid table which is printed in the back of all I Ching books to identify the name and number of the hexagram you will be consulting – this is your primary hexagram. Both the hexagram and the position of the two trigrams have very important meanings, which become evident as your reading progresses.

In the example shown above the particular upper and lower trigrams shown are called ‘Sun’ and ‘Li’ respectively. Together they make up hexagram 37, called ‘Chia Jen’, translated as ‘The Family’.

Shifting energy and the importance of changing lines

Each hexagram chapter is divided into two sections. The main opening text gives a broad overview of the message and should always be read. There’s also a series of six supplementary passages, each relating to one of the six lines of the hexagram.

If you throw values of 6 or 9 and therefore have moving/changing lines within your hexagram you should also read the additional line passages that these correspond to for further guidance or insight.

With the hexagram example above, the second and fifth lines are moving/changing and so the line passages two and five should also be read alongside the main opening text.

Where moving/changing lines are present within your hexagram this can mean that the situation or question presented is in an extreme state of flux, unbalanced or due for immediate change and attention. In addition to reading the supplementary line passages within your primary hexagram chapter, the moving/changing lines can also be ‘allowed to change’: every old Yin (6) becomes a young Yang (7), and every old Yang (9) becomes a young Yin (8), and so a second extension (or relating) hexagram is created.

Your two hexagrams can then be read together (the main body text and relevant line passages of the primary hexagram and the main body text of the extension hexagram) to disclose the full meaning of the guidance being offered.

Using the example above, the following second extension hexagram would be created by allowing the moving/changing lines to transform:

make up hexagram 26, called ‘Ta Ch’u, translated as ‘The Taming Power of The Great’.

This whole process can seem a little mechanical and cumbersome at first but don’t let it prevent your authentic consultation. The methodical and mindful nature of the practice is actually very important as it slows down your highly stimulated human-centred mind allowing you to access your more meditative, creative Tao mind, enabling a true reflection of the current situation or issue to manifest.

 

Conclusion

In this article I’ve covered the basics of my philosophical interpretation and practice of consulting the I Ching. I intend to expand upon both these aspects in much greater detail in future posts, but for now I hope this introduction has whetted your appetite sufficiently that you seek out and dust off that old copy of the I Ching that may have been sitting neglected on your bookshelf or that of a nearby bookstore!

For me the I Ching represents an entire ancient philosophy and so should be treated with respect.

It symbolises the cyclical interconnections of the Universe and is a guide to a personal path of balance and harmony (Wu Wei) that follows natural laws which Western scientific endeavour are slowly awakening to.

Most importantly the I Ching does not give you the ‘answers’, rather it empowers you and encourages you to look within. Paradoxically, it appears mystical simply by emphasising your own phenomenal nature!

Remember: authentic inspiration originates from being at one with yourself, nature and the Universe.

You came from Source, you return to Source, therefore YOU ARE SOURCE.

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Source

https://wuweiwisdom.com/how-to-use-the-i-ching/

Do Our Questions Create the World?

Do Our Questions Create the World?

Quantum theorist John Wheeler’s “it from bit” hypothesis anticipated ongoing speculation that consciousness is fundamental to reality

By John Horgan

John Archibald Wheeler (right), conversing with Albert Einstein and Hideki Yukawa, at Princeton, 1954.

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Is quantum mechanics weird if no one is paying attention to it? Lots of people are paying attention to it now, and they seem to agree it’s weird. Several new books address the topic, including Beyond Weird by Philip Ball, What Is Real? by Adam Becker (see reviews by James Gleick and David Albert) and When Einstein Walked with Godel by Jim Holt (see the chapter “Einstein, ‘Spooky Action’ and the Reality of Space”). Scientific American has posted several columns on quantum weirdness, including “Quantum Physics May Be Even Spookier Than You Think,” by Ball, and “Coming to Grips with the Implications of Quantum Mechanics,” co-written by Bernardo Kastrup. Two physicists often cited in quantum discussions are John Wheeler and David Bohm, whom I interviewed in the early 1990s and wrote about in The End of Science. I thought my profiles of these physicists might contribute to current quantum debates. Below is my (lightly edited) profile of Wheeler, who died in 2008. I’ll post on Bohm soon. John Horgan

John Archibald Wheeler, the archetypal physics-for-poets physicist, is famed for his analogies and aphorisms, self-made and coopted. Among the one-liners he bestowed on me when I interviewed him at Princeton on a warm spring day in 1991 were: “If I can't picture it, I can't understand it” (Einstein); “Unitarianism [Wheeler's nominal religion] is a feather bed to catch falling Christians” (Darwin); and “If you haven't found something strange during the day it hasn't been much of a day” (Wheeler).

“I do take 100 percent seriously the idea that the world is a figment of the imagination.” John Wheeler (1911-2008). Credit: Princeton University

Wheeler is also renowned for his physical energy. When we left his third-floor office to get some lunch, he spurned the elevator—“elevators are hazardous to your health,” he declared--and charged down the stairs. He hooked an arm inside the bannister and pivoted at each landing, letting centrifugal force whirl him around the hairpin and down the next flight. “We have contests to see who can take the stairs fastest,” he said over a shoulder. Outside, Wheeler marched rather than walked, swinging his fists smartly in rhythm with his stride. He paused only when he reached a door. Invariably he got there first and yanked it open for me. After passing through I paused in reflexive deference--Wheeler was almost 80--but a moment later he was past me, barreling toward the next doorway.

The metaphor was so obvious I almost suspected Wheeler intended it. He has spent his career racing ahead of other scientists and throwing open doors for them. He has helped win acceptance--or at least attention--for some of science’s most outlandish ideas, from black holes to multiple-universe theories. Wheeler might have been dismissed as flakey if he did not have such unassailable credentials. In his early 20s, he traveled to Denmark to study under Niels Bohr (“because he sees further than any man alive,” Wheeler wrote in his fellowship application). In 1939 Bohr and Wheeler published the first paper to explain nuclear fission in quantum terms. Bohr also taught Wheeler to “be prepared for a surprise, and a very great surprise.”

After World War II Wheeler became an authority on general relativity. He coined the term black hole in the late 1960s, and he helped convince astronomers that these bizarre, infinitely dense objects might actually exist. He also became increasingly intrigued by the philosophical implications of quantum physics. The most widely accepted explanation of the “meaning” of quantum mechanics was the so-called orthodox, interpretation (although “orthodox” seems an odd descriptor for such a radical worldview). Also called the Copenhagen interpretation, because Bohr lectured on it in Copenhagen in the late 1920s, it holds that we cannot specify the nature of fundamental reality. Subatomic entities exist in a probabilistic limbo of many possible “superposed” states until they are brought into focus by the act of measurement.

Wheeler was one of the first prominent physicists to propose that reality might not be wholly physical; in some sense, our cosmos must be a “participatory” phenomenon requiring the act of observation--and thus consciousness itself. Wheeler also drew attention to intriguing links between physics and information theory, which was invented in 1948 by mathematician Claude Shannon. Just as physics builds on an elementary entity, the quantum, defined by the act of observation, so does information theory. Its “quantum” is the binary unit, or bit, which is a message representing one of two choices: heads or tails, yes or no, zero or one.

Wheeler became more deeply convinced of the importance of information after conceiving a modified version of the famous two-slit experiment, which demonstrates the schizophrenic nature of quantum phenomena. When electrons are aimed at a barrier containing two slits, the electrons act like waves; they go through both slits at once and form what is called an interference pattern, created by the overlapping of the waves, when they strike a detector on the far side of the barrier. If the physicist closes off one slit at a time, however, the electrons pass through the open slit like simple particles and the interference pattern disappears.

In Wheeler’s version, called the delayed-choice experiment, the experimenter decides whether to leave both slits open or to close one off after the electron has already passed through the barrier--with the same results. The electrons seem to know in advance how the physicist will choose to observe it. This experiment was carried out in the early 1990s and confirmed Wheeler’s prediction.

Wheeler accounted for this conundrum with yet another analogy. He likened the job of a physicist to that of someone playing 20 questions in its “surprise” version. In this variant of the old game, one person leaves the room while the rest of the group--or so the excluded person thinks--agrees on some person, place or thing. He then re-enters the room and tries to guess what they have in mind with a series of questions that can only be answered with a yes or a no.

But unbeknownst to the guesser, the group has decided to play a trick on him. The first person to be queried will only think of an object and answer the question after the questioner asks his question. Each person after that will do the same, making sure that his response is consistent not only with the immediate question but also with all previous questions.

“The word wasn't in the room when I came in even though I thought it was,” Wheeler explained. In the same way, the electron, before the physicist chooses how to observe it, is neither a wave nor a particle. It is in some sense unreal; it exists in an indeterminate limbo. “Not until you start asking a question, do you get something,” Wheeler said. “The situation cannot declare itself until you've asked your question. But the asking of one question prevents and excludes the asking of another.”

Wheeler has condensed these ideas into a phrase that resembles a Zen koan: “the it from bit.” In one of his free-form essays, Wheeler unpacked the phrase as follows: “...every it--every particle, every field of force, even the spacetime continuum itself--derives its function, its meaning, its very existence entirely--even if in some contexts indirectly--from the apparatus-elicited answers to yes-or-no questions, binary choices, bits.”

Inspired by Wheeler, physicists and other researchers began probing the links between information theory and physics in the late 1980s. String theorists tried to use strings to knit together quantum field theory, black holes and information theory. Wheeler acknowledged that these ideas were still raw, not yet ready for rigorous testing. He and his fellow explorers were still “trying to get the lay of the land" and "learning how to express things that we already know” in the language of information theory. The effort may lead to a dead end, Wheeler said, or to a powerful new vision of reality, “the whole show.”

Wheeler emphasized that science has many mysteries left to explain. “We live still in the childhood of mankind,” he said. “All these horizons are beginning to light up in our day: molecular biology, DNA, cosmology. We're just children looking for answers.” He served up another aphorism: “As the island of our knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.” Yet he was also convinced that we will someday find “the answer.”

Abruptly Wheeler jumped up and pulled down a massive black book on gravity that he co-wrote in the late 1980s. Flipping to the book’s final page he read: “Someday surely we will see the principle underlying existence as so simple, so beautiful, so compelling that we will all say to each other, 'How could we all have been so stupid for so long.” Wheeler looked up from the book, his expression beatific. “I don't know whether it will be one year or a decade, but I think we can and will understand. That's the central thing I would like to stand for. We can and will understand.”

Many modern scientists, Wheeler noted, have shared his faith that humans will one day find the key to the mysteries of existence. Kurt Godel, Wheeler’s former neighbor in Princeton, believed that the key might have already been discovered. “He thought that maybe among the papers of Leibniz, which in his time had still not been fully smoked out, we would find the--what was the word--the philosopher's key, the magic way to find truth and solve any set of puzzlements.” Godel felt that this key “would give a person who understood it such power” that only “people of high moral character” should possess it.

Yet Wheeler’s mentor Bohr apparently doubted whether science or mathematics could achieve such a revelation. After Bohr died, his son told Wheeler that his father had felt the search for the ultimate theory of physics might never reach a satisfying conclusion; as physicists sought to penetrate further into nature they would face questions of increasing complexity and difficulty that would eventually overwhelm them. “I guess I'm more optimistic than that,” Wheeler said, “but maybe I'm kidding myself.”

The irony is that Wheeler’s it from bit implies that a final theory will always be a mirage, and that truth is something created rather than objectively apprehended. His view comes dangerously close to postmodernism, or worse. In the early 1980s, organizers of the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science placed Wheeler on the same program as three parapsychologists. Wheeler was furious. At the meeting, he made it clear that he did not share the belief of his co-speakers in psychic phenomena. He passed out a pamphlet that declared, in reference to parapsychology: “Where there’s smoke, there’s smoke.”

But Wheeler himself has suggested that there is nothing but smoke. “I do take 100 percent seriously the idea that the world is a figment of the imagination,” he remarked to physicist/science writer Jeremy Bernstein in 1985. Wheeler must know that this view defies common sense: Where was mind when the universe was born? And what sustained the universe for the billions of years before we came to be? He nonetheless bravely offers us a lovely, chilling paradox: At the heart of everything is a question, not an answer. When we peer down into the deepest recesses of matter or at the farthest edge of the universe, we see, finally, our own puzzled face looking back at us.

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John Horgan, who has written for Scientific American since 1986, comments on science on his free online journal Cross-Check. He has also posted his books Mind-Body Problems and My Quantum Experiment online. Horgan teaches at Stevens Institute of Technology.

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Source

https://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/cross-check/do-our-questions-create-the-world/