Concepts Dominate Our Perceptions

Concepts Dominate Our Perceptions

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6:20 In simple terms, every perception we have is understood in relation to the concepts we have about what is being perceived. Once we learn to glimpse perception prior to our conceptual additions, we begin to understand the nature of concept and how it can limit us in our ability to experience. I’m not suggesting that we attempt to live without concept, but that we need to be aware of how concept dominates our perceptions and experience. We’ve already touched on this notion, but now let’s look into it in more detail and depth.

6:21 Pure perception is incomprehensible to us. What we commonly call perception is really the interpretation of a meaningless phenomenon into a specific and useful “cognition.” Fundamentally, a perception is simply a sensory encounter with some object or occurrence, and is without association or emotional charge.

6:22 There are two major conceptual contributors that dominate all of our experience: “interpretation” and “meaning.” Since perception as itself is meaningless, what we perceive is useless without interpretation. The mere fact of seeing an object, hearing a sound, or feeling a sensation means nothing unless we know what it is and how it relates to us. To make sense of what we perceive, we automatically associate, classify, and interpret the meaningless data that is available. First, everything perceived is quickly interpreted so as to determine what it is—a flower, a squeak, a dog, a chair, soft, fast, a person. Having conceptually identified what something is, we then immediately relate it to ourselves.

6:23 No matter what we perceive, once we interpret it in some basic way, we will go on to assess its value or threat to us by associating it with an array of past experiences and beliefs, and so supply it with meaning. This meaning renders the thing ugly, expensive, mine, hers, sacred, too big, useful, ridiculous, friendly, dangerous, or what have you. Once meaning is attached, our minds will immediately infuse the thing with some “emotional” charge, subtle or gross, to indicate in a feeling-sense how we should relate to it. This charge is based on the value or threat that a thing or notion has relative to us, and so this feeling-reaction contains information suggesting particular behavior—should we run or feed it a biscuit? Such feeling-charge manifests as attraction, fear, disinterest, annoyance, desire, boredom, importance, repulsion, and so on, as well as many such feelings far too subtle to warrant a name. The application of interpretation, meaning, and emotional-charge occurs so fast and automatically that we do not distinguish any of these as separate activities within our whole experience.

6:24 This mechanism is a remarkable feature of the human mind—a rapid means of converting all perceptions into a self relating form which enables us to take the necessary actions to insure our safety and survival. It’s wise to remember, however, that everything we think we “know” is an interpretation. Every bit of information we take in is influenced and altered by our particular set of beliefs, assumptions, and associations. These alterations are conceptual “add-ons” that strongly influence our experience of whatever is perceived. What we react to is not the object itself but rather the interpretation and meaning that we ourselves apply to the object.

There is nothing either good or bad,

but thinking makes it so.

—William Shakespeare

6:25 The same process that we apply to objects of perception also works the same way on our own thoughts, emotions, and sensations. We associate them with the past, we assess their meaning and value— just about any reaction we can have to physical objects will also arise in relation to our own mental processes. Our ideas and beliefs and, in a way, our entire history are applied to everything that comes into our awareness—whether it’s people and objects, or our own thoughts and feelings.

6:26 What we know as reality is influenced by the concepts with which we interpret it. From “tree” to “hot” to “disgusting,” what something means to us predetermines how we will perceive it. Yet this relationship between concept and reality is so seamless it is undetectable. The car “is” beautiful in our eyes, the apple “is” delightful in our mouths. Our reactions to an ugly and dangerous monster are pretty much the same thing to us as the experience of the monster itself.

6:27 Unless we make the distinction between our additions and what’s there, we can’t become conscious of what’s actually there. Our whole experience of self and life is conceptually dominated. This means that we are not simply experiencing life and who we are; we’re also constantly “imagining” life and who we are. Since it doesn’t seem like it’s our imagination we’re perceiving, we don’t know the difference between what we are adding and what is there. Let’s see if we can recognize the way this conceptual influence acts on our personal experience.

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The Book of Not Knowing, Chapter Six

Peter Ralston

What Is a Concept?

 What Is a Concept?

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6:14 But what actually is a concept? There is some confusion about what is meant by concept, so let’s look into it by starting with a definition or two:

Concept:

1. A general idea derived or inferred from specific instances or occurrences.

2. Something formed in the mind; a thought or notion.

3. A scheme; a plan.

Conceptual:

1. Of, pertaining to, or relating to mental conceptions.

6:15 We often think of a concept as a general idea, or a vaguely organized mental image: I’ve never been to a barn raising, but I get the concept. But anything that is fabricated in the mind is conceptual. A concept is unreal in the objective sense, meaning nothing substantial exists. Some people might call it a “conceptual object” since it appears to us as some “thing,” but a concept has no mass, no location, occupies no space—it exists solely within our mental perceptions or imagination. This does not make it any less powerful, simply less objective. What we need to grasp at this juncture is that concept is not something that exists of its own accord, but is the summation of a mental process. It refers to something; it is never the thing itself.

6:16 Concepts are ways of knowing, and everything we know is conceptual. Some examples of concepts are interpretation, memory, beliefs, ideas, notions, dreams, imagination, thoughts, fantasies, visualizations, assumptions, and anything else that is a product of the mind. We could even say that emotions are conceptual in nature since they are produced through conceptualization. Concepts are not limited to one aspect of mental activity; they comprise the entire field of mind and as such they influence almost everything of which we are aware.

6:17 Abstractions, such as a mathematical formula, a daydream, or a decorating idea, are easily recognized as concepts because they are different from our normal experience and perceptions. But one of the main jobs of concept is to mimic our everyday perceptions and experiences. This means that a perception such as the sight of a bus can be somehow “known” when there is no bus around. We can “see” the bus in our minds, so to speak. It is the same with sounds—like remembering a song—as well as smells, tastes, and touch. Anything we’ve perceived, and even things we haven’t, can be conceptually perceived in the mind. Whenever we remember something, we are “reperceiving” past events. Given we are conscious that these events have passed, we know them as memories, but they are conceptual nonetheless. Concept not only mimics reality, however, it serves to help create reality.

6:18 When we look at a tree, we imagine that we are merely perceiving the tree when in actuality we are interpreting or “knowing” it as a tree. We may see some object there, but when we interpret it as a tree something more is now perceived that wasn’t there previously. This is a conceptual superimposition placed upon what is perceived, without which we would not see a “tree.” We don’t recognize that we live entirely within a conceptual reality any more than a fish recognizes that water has always surrounded him.

6:19 Everything we perceive, whether it’s an object or mental image, is subject to interpretation—making sense of incoming data so we can recognize and categorize it. Interpretation allows us to order our world, which requires mental processes that are all conceptual. It is also true that much of what is “experienced” as oneself is really a concept rather than an experience. And as I’ve suggested already, there is a distinction we need to make between the experience of being and the concept of self.

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The Book of Not Knowing, Chapter Six

Peter Ralston

Bible Reference 2...Hebrews 11

Bible Reference 2...Hebrews 11

New Revised Standard Version

(A good antidote to fear and worry and to develop self-confidence and inner peace)

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The Meaning of Faith

11 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2 Indeed, by faith[a] our ancestors received approval. 3 By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible.[b]

The Examples of Abel, Enoch, and Noah

4 By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable[c] sacrifice than Cain’s. Through this he received approval as righteous, God himself giving approval to his gifts; he died, but through his faith[d] he still speaks. 5 By faith Enoch was taken so that he did not experience death; and “he was not found, because God had taken him.” For it was attested before he was taken away that “he had pleased God.” 6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, for whoever would approach him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. 7 By faith Noah, warned by God about events as yet unseen, respected the warning and built an ark to save his household; by this he condemned the world and became an heir to the righteousness that is in accordance with faith.

The Faith of Abraham

8 By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to set out for a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; and he set out, not knowing where he was going. 9 By faith he stayed for a time in the land he had been promised, as in a foreign land, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he looked forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God. 11 By faith he received power of procreation, even though he was too old—and Sarah herself was barren—because he considered him faithful who had promised.[e] 12 Therefore from one person, and this one as good as dead, descendants were born, “as many as the stars of heaven and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.”

13 All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, 14 for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15 If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; indeed, he has prepared a city for them.

17 By faith Abraham, when put to the test, offered up Isaac. He who had received the promises was ready to offer up his only son, 18 of whom he had been told, “It is through Isaac that descendants shall be named for you.” 19 He considered the fact that God is able even to raise someone from the dead—and figuratively speaking, he did receive him back. 20 By faith Isaac invoked blessings for the future on Jacob and Esau. 21 By faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, “bowing in worship over the top of his staff.” 22 By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave instructions about his burial.[f]

The Faith of Moses

23 By faith Moses was hidden by his parents for three months after his birth, because they saw that the child was beautiful; and they were not afraid of the king’s edict.[g] 24 By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called a son of Pharaoh’s daughter, 25 choosing rather to share ill-treatment with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. 26 He considered abuse suffered for the Christ[h] to be greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking ahead to the reward. 27 By faith he left Egypt, unafraid of the king’s anger; for he persevered as though[i] he saw him who is invisible. 28 By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood, so that the destroyer of the firstborn would not touch the firstborn of Israel.[j]

The Faith of Other Israelite Heroes

29 By faith the people passed through the Red Sea as if it were dry land, but when the Egyptians attempted to do so they were drowned. 30 By faith the walls of Jericho fell after they had been encircled for seven days. 31 By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient,[k] because she had received the spies in peace.

32 And what more should I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets— 33 who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, 34 quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. 35 Women received their dead by resurrection. Others were tortured, refusing to accept release, in order to obtain a better resurrection. 36 Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned to death, they were sawn in two,[l] they were killed by the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, persecuted, tormented— 38 of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground.

39 Yet all these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised, 40 since God had provided something better so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect.

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Footnotes

Hebrews 11:2 Gk by this

Hebrews 11:3 Or was not made out of visible things

Hebrews 11:4 Gk greater

Hebrews 11:4 Gk through it

Hebrews 11:11 Or By faith Sarah herself, though barren, received power to conceive, even when she was too old, because she considered him faithful who had promised.

Hebrews 11:22 Gk his bones

Hebrews 11:23 Other ancient authorities add By faith Moses, when he was grown up, killed the Egyptian, because he observed the humiliation of his people (Gk brothers)

Hebrews 11:26 Or the Messiah

Hebrews 11:27 Or because

Hebrews 11:28 Gk would not touch them

Hebrews 11:31 Or unbelieving

Hebrews 11:37 Other ancient authorities add they were tempted

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Source

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Hebrews+11&version=NRSV

Joseph Murphy Prayer for Healing

 Joseph Murphy Prayers

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The infinite healing presence which created my body and all its organs knows all the processes and functions of my body. 

I claim, feel, and know definitely and absolutely that the infinite grandeur and glory of the infinite are made manifest in my mind and body. 

The wholeness, vitality, and life of the infinite flow through me now. 

And every atom of my being is transformed by the infinite healing presence.

I fully and freely forgive everyone. 

And I pour out life, love, truth, and beauty on all my relatives and in-laws. 

I know that I have forgiven everyone because I can meet the person in my mind and there is no longer any sting. 

I give thanks for the healing that is taking place now. And I know that when I call the answer comes.

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Joseph Murphy - The Unbelievable Power of Suggestion - Morning Meditation - Positive Affirmations - Morning Mantra - Morning Prayer- 

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Thank you Father for this wonderful day.

It is God's Day:

It is filled with Joy, peace, happiness and success.

I look forward of the happy expectancy to this day.

The wisdom and inspiration of the almighty will govern me during the entire day.

The infinite intelligence is my partner, my 'senior partner'.

Everything I do will turn out in a wonderful way.

I believe that infinite intelligence is guiding me and Divine Love fills my soul.

I know infinite intelligence watches over me all day today and at all times everywhere.

I let go... I am poised, serene and calm.

I know that it is God in action in all phases of my life.

And Divine Law and Order reign supreme in my life.

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The "I AM"

The "I AM"

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WE often do not sufficiently recognize the truth of Walt Whitman's pithy saying, "I am not all contained between my hat and my boots," and forget the two-fold nature of the "I AM," that it is at once both the manifested and the un-manifested, the universal and the individual. By losing sight of this truth we surround ourselves with limitations; we see only part of the self, and then we are surprised that the part fails to do the work of the whole. Factors crop up on which we had not reckoned, and we wonder where they come from, and do not understand that they necessarily arise from that great unity in which we are all included.

It is the grand intelligence and livingness of Universal Spirit continually pressing forward to manifestation of itself in a glorious humanity.

This must be effected by each individual's recognition of his power to co-operate with the Supreme Principle through an intelligent conception of its purpose and of the natural laws by which that purpose is accomplished--a recognition which can proceed only from the realization that he himself is none other than the same Universal Principle in particular manifestation.

When he sees this he sees that Walt Whitman's saying is true, and that his source of intelligence, power, and purpose is in that Universal Self, which is his as well as another's just because it is universal, and which is therefore as completely and entirely identified with himself as. though there were no other expression of it in the world.

The understanding which alone gives value to knowledge is the understanding that, when we employ the formula "I am, therefore I can, therefore I will," the "I AM" with which the series starts is a being who, so to speak, has his head in heaven and his feet upon the earth, a perfect unity, and with a range of ideas far transcending the little ideas which are limited by the requirements of a day or an hour. On the other hand, the requirements of the day and the hour are real while they last, and since the manifested life can be lived only in the moment that now is, whether it be to-day or ten thousand years hence, our need is to harmonize the life of expression with the life of purpose, and by realizing in ourselves the source of the highest purposes to realize also the life of the fullest expression.

This is the meaning of prayer. Prayer is not a foolish seeking to change the mind of Supreme Wisdom, but it is an intelligent seeking to embody that wisdom in our thoughts so as more and more perfectly to express it in expressing ourselves. Thus, as we gradually grow into the habit of finding this inspiring Presence within ourselves, and of realizing its forward movement as the ultimate determining factor in all true healthful mental action, it will become second nature to us to have all our plans, down to the apparently most trivial, so floating upon the undercurrent of this Universal Intelligence that a great harmony will come into our lives, every discordant manifestation will disappear, and we shall find ourselves more and more controlling all things into the forms that we desire.

Why? Because we have attained to commanding the Spirit and making it obey us? Certainly not, for "if the blind lead the blind both shall fall into the ditch"; but because we are companions of the Spirit, and by a continuous and growing intimacy have changed, not "the mind of the Spirit," but our own, and have learned to think from a higher standpoint, where we see that the old-world saying "know thyself" includes the knowledge of all that we mean when we speak of God.

I AM IS ONE

This may seem a very elementary proposition, but it is one of which we are too apt to lose sight. What does it mean? It means everything; but we are most concerned with what it means in regard to ourselves, and to each of us personally it means this. It means that there are not two Spirits, one which is myself and one which is another. It means that there is not some great unknown power external to myself which may be actuated by perfectly different motives to my own, and which will, therefore, oppose me with its irresistible force and pass over me, leaving me crushed and broken like the devotee over whom the car of Jaggarnath has rolled. It means that there is only one mind, one motive, one power--not two opposing each other--and that my conscious mind in all its movements is only the one mind expressing itself as (not merely through) my own particular individuality.

There are not two I AMS, but one I Am. Whatever, therefore, I can conceive the Great Universal Life Principle to be, that I am. Let us try fully to realize what this means. Can you conceive the Great Originating and Sustaining Life Principle of the whole universe as poor, weak, sordid, miserable, jealous, angry, anxious, uncertain, or in any other way limited? We know that this is impossible. Then because the I AM is one it is equally untrue of ourselves. Learn first to distinguish the true self that you are from the mental and physical processes which it throws forth as the instruments of its expression, and then learn that this self controls these instruments, and not vice versa. As we advance in this knowledge we know ourselves to be unlimited, and that, in the miniature world, whose centre we are, we ourselves are the very same overflowing of joyous livingness that the Great Life Spirit is in the Great All. The I AM is One.

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The Hidden Power, by Thomas Troward [1921]

Source

https://www.sacred-texts.com/eso/thp/thp05.htm

The Seven Eyes Of God

The Seven Eyes Of God

This is a particularly outstanding lecture by Neville. I had to read and transcribe many other lectures by Neville before I really appreciated what he is saying here...This is truly the keys to the kingdom...

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…we must go on to higher and higher levels, for that is the purpose of the teacher. I would like to look tonight into what it is to my mind, the greatest book in the world, the Bible, and show you a section with which you may not be familiar. It concerns the Seven Eyes of God, from the visions of Zechariah. He saw a stone with seven facets, and the Voice said, this is actually the seven eyes of God that reach over the entire world. For these seven eyes are really in man, for man is the earth of God. So forget this little planet and know that man is the true earth in which God is planted. These are the seven visions of God, seven increasingly clarifying visions of the Creator. The Bible names them but you must look for them.

The first appears only once in the Bible in Isaiah 14 ~ Lucifer, the morning star. And it tells how he is fallen and cut down to the ground - this shining being. All races have taught that man has fallen. It is not something that belongs to the Christian or the Jewish faiths, but all races have held this concept. So the first Eye of God is Lucifer - cut down to the ground.

The second is Molech, the strange god that demands sacrifices (Jeremiah 32). Man offers up his sons and daughters to appease this being he conceives to be God. But the Voice said, “I command them not, neither came it unto my mind, that they should do this abomination to cause Judah to sin.” This Eye is in every man who thinks he has angered God and must make sacrifices to appease Him. All the wars of the world are an appeasement. The Inquisition with its tortures was an appeasement to God. The wicker baskets in which men were burned alive were an appeasement. They did it all to appease God that he might not be angry.

The third eye is Elohim, or gods, gods above and outside of man. The elements he worshipped, the stars and planets he thinks can regulate his life and influence his behavior. He turns to something outside of himself and it fails him and he cries that he is forsaken.

The fourth is Shaddai - almighty. In this eye, man seeks security and comfort. These are the governments, the mighty political machines, the rulers that man trusts, and all this fails him, too.

And then he turns to the fifth eye of Pahath, which means, “to dig a ditch or to snare animals, dig a pit.” It does not mean the animals of the forest; no, it is man I bring into my little trap. Much of the world functions like that today, everywhere in every business, especially in the great advertising campaigns. These people rule like tyrants over us. Every paper, every magazine, every TV commercial has another method of trapping us into buying all these things, so many things that we never get them paid for before we have still others.

And then the sixth eye is Jehovah - Yod He Vau He - or I AM. Man finally grows out of the snaring process. He does not now have to trap anyone in the world, but only boldly assert himself. Bold inner persuasion will create the condition that I AM persuaded of. That is Jehovah, the sixth eye.

The seventh is Jesus, or “Jehovah saves,” or “rescue.” Where man boldly asserts himself but his heart is torn for those still asleep, and he sacrifices for the others and gives himself for the whole vast world. Not as the churches teach it, but as the mystic tells you. You will take anyone, no matter who he is or what he has done, for he is only in a state. You do not condemn anyone but you lift him out of the state, and you do it by identifying the one you would save with the idea he wants to embody, and to the degree that you are faithful to your vision of that person, he will embody his ideal and become it. That is the eye called Jesus, or the seventh eye.

There is an eighth eye, only implied in the Bible and it is veiled. On the eighth day they circumcise the child and unveil the organ of creation. There is an eye in man and Blake names it. He says, “He did not come. He hid in Albion’s forest.” Albion is Blake’s name for universal man, male or female. This eye is hidden in “Albion’s forest” - in the dark convolutions of the brain. There this eye is hiding. When you finally begin to exercise your imagination for another and actually revel in the joy of others as they become the embodiment of what they desire, and you revel in that far beyond what you would for yourself, that is the eye of Jesus. What begins to be the perfect seeing of the seventh eye of God, then something stirs, and it stirs exactly like something trying to get out of an egg. It is something trying to break through Golgotha - and Golgotha is “the skull,” that is the meaning of the word. But it is held by five nails, the five senses. The five senses confine man to this world, and then he breaks loose from this skull as the seventh eye is clarified; and the eighth eye sees concrete reality for the first time in his life, and then, once seeing clearly, he never blames anyone. For with this eighth eye, he sees the perfect world. This is called circumcision or the unveiling of the perfect organ, which is man’s Imagination. On the eighth day, he is circumcised. It means that the eighth eye is open. It does not open by the process of time, but only after the clarifying of the seventh eye of Jesus. Then you see that God became man, that man, awakening, may become God. God contracts Himself to this very limit of opacity, so that living in this state may be called the very grave of man, and “God enters death’s door with them that enter, and lies down in the grave with them, in visions of Eternity until they awake.” (Blake) And then there are these seven visions.

First - Lucifer, the fallen one.

Second - Molech, the being that demands sacrifices. They are doing that right now, only they call it Nationalism, and they offer up their sons and daughters to Molech, though the Voice said, “I do not command them to do this and cause Judah to fall into sin.”

Man sickens of it and turns to the third eye or Elohim, but the stars, the planets, do not respond. Then he turns to the fourth eye or Shaddai - Almighty, to the financial and political “gods”. And then he separates from that and digs his little pit, Pahath, and snares all the people of the world because he can outsmart them, and because of his smartness he lives very well during this little span from the cradle to the grave, and that is the fifth eye through which much of the world is seeing today.

He sickens of it, and then he finds that I AM - or Jehovah, is the only reality, or the sixth eye of God. And I build my world, as I want it and when I sicken of it, offer myself as a sacrifice for all others and give completely of myself for the good of others, and my good fortune then becomes the joy of hearing their good fortune. As it says in Job 42:5 “I heard by the hearing of my ear, but now my eye seeth Thee.” Suddenly something happens within me, and the eighth eye opens and I am circumcised, in mind, not in the flesh, and as that something opens within you, you see the reason for it all, and you see that Eternity is, and you can take anyone in this world and pull him out of any state in the world. That is the eighth eye of God.

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I want to share with you an experience. The true method of knowledge is through experiment. So we invite you to experiment. The true faculty of knowing is the faculty of experiencing. For, when you have had the experiences, you no longer care whether anyone else knows it or not. It does not matter. You know it, and you know that you know it. So I would like to share this with you, this experience, for when you begin to awaken, then you begin to remember. For if Christ is the center, then I can say, “Return to me the glory that was mine before the world was. I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life I now live I live by the faith of the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.” If the center of man is Christ, and He was before the world was, then when I begin to awaken I only begin to remember. And when that happens, then the world cannot any longer teach you anything. So when man begins to awaken he does not question the things of this world; he knows they are not true. Psychologists tell us a complete understanding of a dream depends on the knowledge that you are dreaming, and then that wakes you up, for this is the only world they know. They speak of a dream state as being subjective and a deep dream state as the unconscious and doubt the worth of it all. But when you open the eighth eye you will know there are worlds within worlds and you are heirs to all of them. You can test your experiences and bring anything you want into your world and prove it.

Years ago I felt myself dreaming and I was swimming. I knew it was a dream. I looked up and saw the shore of a primitive island, not the little island where I was born, for that is well cultivated and in no way primitive, but this was primitive. I saw it was an island and I knew I was dreaming, and I saw these strange things like cement posts driven down through the water but they were in a state of decay. They could have been at one time part of a jetty. I could see this peculiar primitive beach and I prolonged the dream, for if you know you are dreaming you need not wake. Something in me began to tell me, as memory began to return, that if I would take hold of one of these pilings and not let it go, and awaken, I would awaken there. I felt it and it was solidly real, just as it would feel here, and my hand did not go through it, and I held on to it and made myself awake; and I awoke in that water on that beach and then I waded ashore. I was no more asleep in that sphere than I am here in this one.

It taught me a lesson that if I could touch anything in another world and compel myself to awaken while holding it, I would find it was real. So you do it for your world. A job you want, the home you would occupy, the marriage you want. Sit at the desk at which you would sit, live in the house you want to live in, be married to the sort of person you want to be married to, and if you hold to it in your imagination, then you will make it real in your outer world. The Ancients called this capacity the Western Gate, and tied it in with the sense of touch. If you can hang on to the thing you touch and then awaken, you will find that the thing has become real. We have it in Genesis in the story of Jacob and Esau. Isaac, the father, who was blind said, “Come close that I may touch you. Come closer.” And the state symbolized by Jacob, the supplanter, was made real in place of the state that had seemed so real before, symbolized by Esau.

We are told again in Judges 17:19 how the seven locks were shaved from the head of Samson and then the Philistines came and gouged out his eyes and he was eyeless in Gaza. And they made him dance before the crowd. He asked to be taken to the temple and placed where he might touch the two middle pillars, and then he pressed and pushed and pulled down the whole thing and slew more Philistines than he had ever slain during his life. All this is symbolical of the capacity to touch. I know, for I have done it. Many a time, finding myself dreaming, I have held on to an object in the dream and found myself awakening in another world. I have also found myself in other aspects of this world. I did it in Barbados when I wished to be seen by my sister who was 2000 miles away. But whether it be in this little aspect or in another world, it does not matter, for there are infinite worlds and you are heir to all of them.

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You can get all you want in this world. You can use the fifth eye or the fourth eye. All those who lead us into battle are using the second and third. Few are using the sixth and only an nth part use the seventh eye or the eye of Jesus, and not until it is used and you would rather have the good of another than your own good, and rejoice for another more than for yourself, have you really opened the seventh eye and then you are ready for the opening of the eighth eye.

The seventh eye, the eye of Jesus, has nothing to do with a man born 2000 years ago; it has everything to do with the expanding mind of man. When you exercise the seventh, then something opens. It is the eighth. But until the seventh is fully open, “he hides in the forest of Albion.” He hides in the dark convolutions of the brain. It may scare you a little at first, the feeling of an electric battery moving in your head. You feel memory come back and you feel it on this side and then on that, and then you center it, and then you SEE. Something opens and you actually see a world no one else can see. The seventh eye is based purely on faith. Man does not know God will actually redeem him and he cries, “My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” And then the new world will be seen.

Man seeks security and comfort through the fourth eye. These are the dictators, the political machines, etc. They are always going to save the country, save the world, and then they are driven out - but they take a half billion dollars with them. We have seen it in this hemisphere - the very ones impoverishing the treasury that men had just called the saviors of their country.

They have not reached the sixth eye, or I AM. He who has reached that turns to no one. He knows, “I AM that I will be, I AM what I am.” You can be that or anything you want. But then you go beyond it and you want nothing for yourself but only for others. Then he starts giving himself for man and then when that is completely clarified the eighth eye opens.

Look in your Bible and read the story of the unveiling of the mind of man. But it comes only after the seventh eye is exercised. So I must learn to experience feeling and touching. That is called the Western Gate, and it is closed in man, but he must learn about it, and before I close this eye he must learn much about the Western Gate, for I was told not to hold back one secret, and having had the experience of holding on to an object and awakening not on my bed at all, I must share it with you. I awake in the world where I am holding the object. I have been shut out many times from this world by holding on to an object in that world and awakening in it, and it was just as real as this, but I came back to this. I had a body here and one there. When I returned here where was that other body? Have I not many bodies, for I am scattered over all the world, and man, as he begins to awake, collects the scattered portions of himself, and then he finally finds the being that is God. You can love everyone in this world and you will find joy beyond your wildest dreams in doing good for another; when he asks of you and you, in your Imagination create, and then you have confirmation of it, and then you rejoice as God rejoices. “These things have I spoken that my joy may remain in you.” For whenever anyone awakes, that is the eye of God.

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So there are seven stated quite clearly and the eighth implied. I tell you that you will feel it like a chick in the egg of the skull. Christ is crucified on this cross (man) with five nails - the five senses. The same meaning is in the story of the five foolish virgins. And then he tears himself free from this cross.

Now, you catch it on the wing, but I tell you that you will discover all kinds of wonderful things in the awakening of God in man. For God became man that man may become God. So this wonderful poem that existed only for God is beginning to exist for itself. Sentients begin to appear in the poem, lifting it to higher states and we become at last creators, one of an infinite society of gods.

This eighth eye is misunderstood by the priesthoods of the world and they circumcise the child. It is the Imagination that must be unveiled, not the physical organ, and it comes only after the perfect clarity of vision through the eye of Jesus. Jesus means, “Jehovah saves.” Not one is lost. He has fallen into a state, but you, through the eye of Jesus, save him. You ask him, “What do you want?” and see that condition real for him, and then seeing it embody itself, you rejoice that one has been lifted out of the mire. You do it over and over, and then your head becomes alive and you feel electric currents through it, and yet you will know what you should do, just as a chick knows what to do. It pecks its way out. And then the place where the skull grew together after birth becomes awake again, and you see another world, and you see the world was perfectly made and every state is perfect, and then you will know that you are awake to play beautifully on this eternal world, to bring out these beautiful combinations made by your Father...(Neville is describing his own experience here)

If tonight’s talk seems different from what you expected, then nothing is more practical than the sixth eye. You can make your world what you want it to be by the sixth eye; in fact the fifth has done it. You can snare all kinds of people in your little traps. Read the morning papers. Every ad is to snare us into emptying our pockets, and they will be thrilled that they can do it. Every year we find new traps to get what we have. We have new forms of credit. No one dies leaving anything behind any more. The whole vast thing is a trap. It has become the way of life, the fifth eye.

But then come the sixth and the seventh and then the eighth; and when the eighth opens you forgive everyone in the world, no matter what he has done. You, as man, have gone through every eye. You have worshipped Elohim and sacrificed to Molech.

But when the eighth opens, you will know that nothing displeases your Father but unbelief. Sin does not displease him. The priesthoods of the world tell you sin displeases him, but only disbelief displeases him, for they that come to him must believe in him. Anything you can believe is an image of truth. Could you believe that someone in dire need is now well taken care of? Then he can become as you see him. But sin does not displease your Father. It means, “to miss the mark,” and He comes to the world to show everyone how not to miss the mark. If I do miss the mark, He makes a greater effort to show me how not to miss marks.

Hebrews 11 - “Those who come to Him must believe that He is, and that He is the rewarder of them that seek…” So seek Him first and then all these things will be added.

So there are these eight eyes in man. The eighth hides in the forest of Albion, or the dark convolutions of the brain. Breathing won’t bring it out, or diets, or Yoga exercises will not do it. He will come out only when, as you look through the seventh eye, which is the vision of Jesus, you see only the good of another and glory in that beyond what is only for yourself. Then you will begin to see through the eighth eye of God.

Use the seventh eye consciously and take every person regardless of color, race or creed and ask of him only, “What do you want?” For in Him there is neither Greek nor Jew, nor bond nor free. So you take everyone, for he has only fallen into a state and you single out that individual’s request and persuade yourself that he is now the embodiment of the ideal that he wants to embody and to the degree that you use the seventh eye will the eighth come out of the “forest of Albion”. The opening of the eighth eye is actually the second coming of Jesus. For when the seventh becomes perfectly clear, then the eighth will open, as if it were released from the tomb, and then you see as God.

One cannot be born a Christian. If you are not using the seventh eye, you are not a Christian. If you are the Pope, you are using the fourth eye and all the priesthoods of the world use the fourth eye. So-called almighty powers all use the fourth eye. But you must use the eye of Jesus. Jesus is the eye of God that sacrifices itself for the whole vast world. He gives himself for every being in the world, seeing for them their ideal, their perfect state.

Now let us go into the silence.

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Neville Goddard

Lecture, June 11, 1959

Step Into The Picture, (Who GOD Really Is)

Step Into The Picture, (Who GOD Really Is)

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We are told: “With God, all things are possible.” I think anyone who believes in God would say “yes”  to that. But then we are told that: “God is Spirit, and the Spirit of God dwells in us.” I think any man  who believes that should make every effort to find out who God really is who “dwells in us.” He is  Spirit, and “the Spirit of God dwells in us.” This God creates all things. “By Him all things were made, and without Him was not anything made that was made.” 

So everything in the world, regardless of what it is, — for we are told: “I form the light, and I create darkness; I make the weal, and I create the woe. I am the Lord who do all these things.” Well surely, we should make every effort to find out who He is. 

I firmly believe, from my own experiences, that this God of whom the Bible speaks is our own wonderful human imagination; that God and the human imagination are one; that all natural effects in the world, though they are created by the Spirit of God, are caused by Spirit. So, “every natural effect has a spiritual cause, and not a natural. A natural cause only seems; it is a delusion of our” — fading, I would say, “memory.” (Blake, from “Milton”) For here in this world I can’t quite remember when I imagined that which is now taking place in my world. I do not recall it. I can’t quite remember when I set it in notion. 

But if this is Law, — and a Law that no man can break, — at some time, somewhere, I imagined what I am now encountering; that my present moment is not really receding into the past; it is advancing into the future to confront me, but I forgot it. And I now think it has a natural or physical cause, and it does not have a natural cause. 

“Every natural effect has a spiritual cause,” or the Bible is completely wrong. For we are told: “By Him all things were made,” — without exception; “and without Him was not anything made that was made.” And: “He is Spirit,” and “the Spirit of God dwells in me.” Well, if He dwells in me, I have identified Him with my imagination. Only on this level, I do not remember having imagined it; but along the way, I must have if this is Principle. 

Now let me share with you some of my experiences. We are in this room tonight, and the room — at this moment — is more real to us than anything in the world. It has a cubic reality, because we are in it. Think of your home; you know your home far better than you know this room, but your home — at this moment — is not as real as this room. This room now occupies reality to you, and everything else is shadowy as you think of it. Why is this real? Because you have entered it. You are in it. You occupy it. 

This I know from experience. Sitting in a chair, suddenly I am seeing what reason tells me I should not see. I am seeing what seems to be the interior of a home. Or lying on my bed, I see the interior, — or it seems to be, — of a great hotel, an unoccupied suite ready for occupancy but not occupied. It was just as vivid as any painting of a great artist. An artist would give us the impression of a three-dimensional picture. We know, for reason tells us, that it is on a flat surface; it is simply depicting three dimensions, but it is all on a flat surface. 

Well, while seated in the chair or lying on my bed, my consciousness follows vision, and I entered that room. I actually occupied it. I came back to where I was seated, on one occasion, —to where I was lying on my bed on another; and then I went back, and again it took on a cubic reality. I came back knowing exactly what I am doing, and knowing this whole thing makes no sense whatsoever to the rational mind, but I cannot deny what I am experiencing. Here I have the evidence, — no one to share it with, but I have the evidence. I came back, and then went back into the picture. At the moment I entered the picture, it took on cubic reality; and after doing it maybe a dozen times or more, I said to myself, “I am going to explore. This time I am going to go right into it and remain there and explore,” which I did. 

So I stepped into the picture; and as it closed around me, from my bed it seemed to be thirty by twenty; but when I stepped into it, determined this time to keep going regardless of consequences, it closed around me, a third of what it seemed to be as I looked at it from the bed. So thirty by twenty became ten by seven. I found it to be a dressing room — a dressing room of a huge, wonderful suite ready for occupancy. No one was in it; I am the only occupant now. I came out by opening up a door. I didn’t go through it by some vapor; I actually opened the door, and to myself I was solidly real, just like the man who is talking to you now. 

My hand could open a door, and the door was solid and it was real, and I went through the door. I entered the corridor. It was a nice, wide corridor dimly lit. At the end of the corridor, intersecting it was a brilliantly lit corridor. I walked down to the very end; and when I got to the end, here is this luminous, luminous, wonderful corridor. 

I saw two ladies coming down the corridor. I knew exactly what I was doing. I knew how it began; it began by seeing what seemed to me just a vision, like a painting. I knew that I left my bed, my consciousness following vision, and entered the painting; and the painting took on cubic reality. I knew it: so I call that a “dream.” Knowing it began as a dream, I said to myself, “It has still to be a dream. But I am dreaming now awake. I am not dreaming sleeping; I am fully awake, and it is a dream.” 

And I said to the ladies as they came by, “Ladies, this is all a dream.” They did exactly what any nice ladies would do — a stranger standing in a corridor and saying to them, “This whole thing is a dream.” They thought they were looking at a mad man. So they got as far removed from me as they could, and got right next to the wall. But the wall was as solidly real as that wall (indicating) They couldn’t go through it any more than I could. 

While looking at them, — and they are frightened to death, — they walked quickly by; and then I saw something hanging, like a chandelier. It reminded me of an object that I had seen about six months before in a friend’s home, and he said to me, “You can hardly tell that this thing is suspended. If you look closely, there is an almost invisible thread that connects it to the ceiling.” So I looked, and I did see that very little, thin thread connecting this to the ceiling. Then I was convinced, — “Well, it is a dream. This is a memory image of what I saw in my friend’s home.” 

So again, I said to the ladies, “Look, this must be all gossamer.” But as I held it, it was solidly real. It was just as solid as this (indicating). That surprised me. They kept on moving, and they moved rapidly towards the end; and here I am, holding this thing in my hand. I took my hand off and I said to myself, “Now you know it began as a dream, Neville, and this still has to be a dream. All ends run true to origins, and the origin of this experience of yours was a dream. So this must be a dream.” But it is not a dream. I am just as awake as I am now, talking to you, as I was talking to those ladies. 

When they got to the end, they looked back at this mad person. In their eyes, I was mad, and they simply disappeared by stepping down a few steps into what undoubtedly was the great reception room, the foyer of a huge, big hotel. 

Then I said to myself, “You know, — how are you going to get back? How are you going to get back? There is no road leading back to that bed on which you left a body. You have unfinished business. You have a wife and an uneducated daughter who has the ambition to go to college, and she’s now only in high school; and you have left inadequate funds to take care of your obligations to your wife and daughter. You’ve got to get back.” 

How to get back? I couldn’t go through that door that led from the suite of rooms into the corridor and find any exit from there back to where I lived in Beverly Hills. What on earth am I going to do? I knew — reason told me that if I don’t get back within a very short time, they will find that body on the bed and they will have to examine it, and they will declare it a heart attack or something; but they have got to find a physical cause for it. And here, I am looking at something entirely different. It will “die” all right if I don’t get back. I must get back. Then I remembered a similar experience that happened years before when feeling brought me back. 

Feeling awoke me in a dream. I found myself on a beach. It wasn’t Barbados. It was more like the Pacific Islands. I have not been there, but I had been born in the tropics; so I knew exactly what they must look like. But it was not the West Indies; it was the East Indies. And here, I know I am dreaming. I thought to myself, “1 wonder if I held a physical object and forced myself to wake, if I would wake?” So, I tried it. I held onto a pile driven into the beach there — a solid mass of cement. As I held it, I said, “I am not going to let go; I am going to awake right here.” So I held it; and as I held it, I said, “Come on, awake: You know you are dreaming.” And I felt myself come to, as a person comes to when they are waking in the morning. I awoke and there I am, completely awake, wading in the water, holding onto this object. Then I went towards the beach, and a strange, peculiar animal approached me, and it scared me. I got back through fright, and I awoke in that water through feeling. 

Now, I am not afraid of what I am doing. My only concern is to get back and take care of my obligations in life, which is my wife and my daughter. Now, how to get back? I am not afraid. I said, “I can’t frighten myself, because I am not afraid.” But I thought feeling would do it. So I closed my eyes, and I imagined that my head was on a pillow, and that I could feel the pillow; and then after a little while when I opened my eyes, I am still standing in the corridor. I tried it again; and then by the third time, as I tried it, I could feel something under my head. I allowed that to remain; then suddenly I could feel it. 

I tried to open my eyes, and I couldn’t this time. Instead of standing as I am now, perpendicular, I feel I am lying horizontally. So I felt, “Well, I must be back now,” but I couldn’t move my body. The body was cataleptic and I am frozen like this. Then in about, — oh, maybe, twenty seconds or so, I could move this little finger. I couldn’t open my eyes. In a little while I could move from the elbow down; and then, with tremendous effort, I could move the arm, and I pushed it out to feel the warm body of my wife. Then I knew I was back, but I hadn’t yet been able to open the eyes. 

Then, with a tremendous effort, 1 could open the lid, and see the familiar objects in the room that I had left behind me. Then I knew what makes everything real in this world: “The Spirit of God dwells in me,” and He is my own wonderful human imagination. I walked into a thing that I could only see lying upon my bed. Entering that state, it took on a cubic reality. God made this world real by entering it. As we are told, He is not only translucent — I would say, in a translucent manner; we are told, He is above all. He is also through all, and He is in all. If He is through all, He is Omnipresent. If He is in all, He is immanent. Then I am told, He dwells in me. He is in me, He is in you, He is in everyone. 

Am I now confined to this little place here at the podium? I am not. I proved that that night. I have proved it unnumbered times since. I am not actually confined to where this body is. I dwell in it; and He who dwells in it is the Spirit of God, and the Spirit of God is my imagination. 

I have proven to my own satisfaction that my imagination can travel. I don’t have to stand here and think of my home. I can stand here and penetrate my home, leaving the body here as I did on the bed; and penetrating the home, the home becomes a cubic reality, as it will tonight when I take this body home and enter my door. The house is a cubic reality. But must I wait until I get home tonight in this body to give it that? Can I not now, knowing Who God is, — God is Spirit, and He is now encased in this little garment of flesh; but He is Spirit, and I have discovered He is my own wonderful human imagination. 

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So when man “dies,” he cannot die; only the garment that he “wears” can die. But that Being that he really is, is all imagination. And as He enters, wherever He enters, it takes on cubic reality. That I have proven. The Immortal You cannot die. It did not begin. So when you leave this world, because you are all imagination, — the very moment that you depart, you are in some state; but, you being there, you give it cubic reality. That world is just as real as this world. It’s terrestrial, just as this world is; and no one in this world can “die.” Everything dwells in your own wonderful human imagination. 

The purpose, now, is to awaken that Being in you, so He is fully conscious at all times. That is the purpose of life. He who came down and took upon Himself the weaknesses and the limitations of this garment and confined Himself to it, is destined to awaken while He walks this earth. And by “this earth,” I mean this earth to the senses; but it does not end where my senses cease to register it. It doesn’t terminate at the point called “death,” because the Being in it goes on, and He is still in the world. But His entrance into that state gives it a cubic reality just like this room now because we are in it. 

Now we come down to a practical use of this Law. Because this is so, your dream now is shadowy. You would like to be other than what you are. I think everyone does in this world. It’s a form of growing and growing; and we grow, and we outgrow. So you would like to be it. But to those who are not in their dream, it’s shadowy — a mere possibility. But to those who enter into the dream, it seems the only substance. 

A man who is now poor and embarrassed because of his poverty — he can still dream, and dream of wealth, dream of security; but it’s a shadowy state. It is something that seems to him almost impossible if he is going to use reason. He will say, “How is this thing possible? Because I have no background either intellectually or financially or socially to even hope to achieve that sort of thing.” But if he knows who He really is — the Spirit of God who creates all things dwells in him, and that he can detach that Indwelling Being from the body that he “wears,” and actually enter his dream, — the dream will take on reality. And, if he persists in it, it will objectify itself in this world. 

I know that from many problems that I have had. When I was told that I could not do this or I could not do that; having remembered experiences that were all mystical, I applied them to practical things, and they work just as well in the practical state. I entered into my dream. It was a dream. 

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When I was in the Army, I couldn’t get out; but I wanted to get out, and I wanted to get out honorably. I did not wish to be dishonorably discharged. I wanted to go through this world as a very honest — I would say, clean, wholesome American citizen, and not when asked the question, “Were you ever in the Army?” and then they say, “Were you honorably discharged?” and have to say, “No, I was dishonorably discharged.” I didn’t want that on my record. So, I would not run away from the Army. I wanted out of it, and to get out of it before the end of the war, and to get out of it honorably; so I took the same lesson that I had learned, and I applied it to that. 

So while in the Army, I assumed that I am in my home in New York City two thousand miles away. I was in Camp Pope, Louisiana; and I had an apartment in New York City in Washington Square. So going to bed physically at Camp Pope, I went to bed in imagination in my home in New York City, —  not there on furlough, not there on some little escape, but there honorably discharged. Then I got off my imaginary bed, walked all through my apartment and saw everything that I would see if I were there. It took on cubic reality. 

When I awoke the next morning, I was still in Camp Pope, Louisiana; but that night a strange thing happened to me. It was 4:15 in the morning, and here a sheet came before my eyes, and on this sheet a hand appeared from here down holding a pen, and the pen wrote: “That which I have done, I have done. Do nothing.” First of all, the voice said that, but the pen scratched out my disapproval, for I applied for a discharge, and my Colonel disapproved it. He said, “Disallowed,’ and signed it “Colonel Theodore Bilboe, Jr.” That was his name, which is on a record. You can look it up, for he was the one who disallowed my application for discharge. And the hand simply scratched it out, and over that it wrote in: “Approved,” — this hand holding a pen. Then the voice said to me: “That which I have done, I have done. Do nothing.” What did he do? He scratched out the Colonel’s disapproval, and he wrote in, “Approved.” And then I awoke. 

Ten days later I was honorably discharged by that same Colonel, and he shook my hand; and as I left that base, he said, “I will see you after the war is over.” 

I said, “All right, Colonel. Thank you very much.” And that very night I was on a train back to my place in New York City. 

That’s how it works. I know from my own personal experience. I am sharing with you what I have experienced, both in the world of Caesar and in the world that is transcendent, something entirely different; so when I speak of being “born from above,” I am not theorizing. I am telling you exactly what happened to me. 

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When I speak of meeting the Son of God who calls me, “Father,” I am telling you exactly what happened to me. When I tell you I ascended into Heaven like a fiery serpent, as told in Scripture, that’s exactly what happened to me, When the dove descended upon my hand, and then smothered me with love, kissing me all over my face, my neck, my head, I know exactly what happened, because it happened to me. So I am only sharing with you, not theory, not speculation, but only what I know from my own experiences. 

So tonight, the most impossible thing in the world — and who is not confronted with it? I am, — an almost impossible thing that I have to actually deny the evidence of my senses and apply my Principle towards that event. I know it could not have happened — nothing happens by natural causes. Nothing in this world happens by a natural cause; it’s all spiritual. And you may say —and the world will say — it happened because you did so-and-so over a period of time and that is the cause of your present physical ailment. It isn’t so at all 

You admire someone intensely, and try to duplicate their every act in this world, and you wish you were just like them; and they depart this world by a similar experience, and never once did the physical things that you are accused of having done that are the cause of what is happening to you. Never for one moment did it ever occur to her, the one she admired, to actually do for one moment what this one, suffering from the identical thing, is now suffering. And the world will say you are suffering from it because of a physical cause. Had you not done for 40 years what you have done, it could not happen; but yet her own loving mother that she worshiped beyond anyone in this world, and tried so much to emulate, never once in her life smoked a cigarette. She would take an occasional little drink — an occasional a little drink, but very sweet, very weak; and died of the very thing that she now is suffering from. There was no one in this world that she worshiped more than her mother. 

That imaginal act in the beginning of time — and the whole thing came forward, and now she is fulfilling completely her ideal to be just like her mother. And the world will tell me that the thing that is happening to her is caused by a physical state. It isn’t so at all. I could duplicate that and multiply it by the unnumbered number, if man only had a memory that could retain the imaginal acts of the past. 

“Every natural effect has a spiritual cause, and not a natural. A natural cause only seems. It is a delusion of the perishing vegetable memory.” (Blake, from “Milton”) 

If man could only bear in mind that every simple little imaginal act sends a quiver through Omniscience, right through Omnipotence, and right through Immanence so the whole thing is like a huge, big computer, — your imaginal act instantly is added to the sum total of it all; and instantly the whole, thing is changed, and the world is reflecting every imaginal act in this world of man, and keeping it all perfectly recorded, so that there is no such thing as a natural cause. It is all a spiritual cause. 

“All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.” 

And where does He dwell? He dwells in us, for He is Spirit, and “the Spirit of God dwells in us.” He dwells in us, and I have, by experiment, discovered what that Spirit is; and I tell you from my own experience, the Spirit of God and the human imagination are one. They are not two. 

So when you depart this world, your reality — which is the Spirit of God - is your own wonderful human imagination; and that gives cubic reality to everything in this world if you enter it. Now, the secret is to enter it. Can I enter the state of my wish fulfilled? Those other states were simply experiments. Can I enter the state of the wish fulfilled? I have done it. On several occasions I have. When it seemed essential, I did it. If someone asked of me, I tried my best to do it. And how do I do it? By feeling. 

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As we are told in the 17th chapter of Acts: “Happy is the man that feels after Him and finds Him,” — he is speaking now of God, — “for in Him we live, and move, and have our being.” 

He has just got through speaking to the Athenians. He said, “Oh, men of Athens, I see that you are very religious; but I notice over your temple an inscription to the Unknown God. Now, the one you worship as unknown, I will reveal to you, for He is not a God afar off. He is near, that you may feel after Him and find Him; for in Him we live, and move, and have our being.” So the God of Whom I speak is never so far off as even to be near, for nearness implies separation. No matter how near he is, that’s not the God. He can’t be near because I AM He. “Be still and know that I AM God.” That is what you are told in the 46th Psalm, the 10th verse. 

“Be still,” — why? That you may know “I AM He.” I am God. So the fundamental sin of Scripture is the lack of faith in “I AM He.” As you are told, “You will die in your sins,” — that is, you will die missing the mark, — “unless you believe I AM He.” 

“And before that the world was, I AM.” 

“Before Abraham was, I AM.” 

So “I AM” can’t he near; that’s the core of my being. I can say, “I am a man,” and that’s something near. “I have a hand”; that is near. “1 am rich”; that is near. “I am poor”; that is near. But before I can say anything, I must first establish the sense of being, and that is I AM. So I must first be, before I can be anything in this world. And so, the lack of faith in that reality is the fundamental sin. 

So here I share with you what I have discovered. I have discovered that your own wonderful human imagination is the Spirit of God, and that you can enter any state in this world, and on entrance, it ceases to be a flat surface, depicting reality. It is reality. Why? Because you are the reality who dwells in it. Wherever you are, things are real. If you are not in it, then they are not real. They go to their flat surfaces. 

And all things exist in the human imagination. We are called upon to select that state in which we will dwell — the state that we will enter and make real in our world. And I do it by simply feeling. What would the feeling be like, were it true? 

How would I feel, were it true? And how would I see the world, were it true? Then I feel myself into that state, and try to give it all the tones of reality, all the sensory vividness that I can. If I can give it sensory vividness and the tones of reality, even though I do not see it, it will work; but sometimes it becomes so vivid and so intense, you do see it. The whole thing opens. Your eye opens, and the whole thing is real; and then you are in an entirely different world — the world of your dreams, for because you entered it, it is real. 

But whether the eye opens or not, it will still work, may I tell you? This is the Law spoken of in Scripture; and because no Creator in the world exists but God, — He is the only one, — He has to create good and evil. If there is good and evil, God does it. If there is darkness and light, God did it. 

He said, “I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal, and none can deliver out of my hands.” We think a “devil” kills and God makes alive; that the devil wounds and God heals. It’s God who kills and God who wounds, and God who makes alive and God who heals. There is only God. Read it in the 32nd chapter of Deuteronomy. 

“I, even I, am He, and there is no God beside me. I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal; and none can deliver out of my hands.” And the God spoken of in that chapter is seated here in everyone who is seated, for that one in you is the Spirit of God, and the Spirit of God is your own wonderful human imagination. So blame no one in this world for anything that befalls you. 

It’s too late to share with you an experience of mine last Sunday morning, but I will on Friday. I asked for it. I woke at 1 :30 and thinking of many things concerning my dear wife, I asked for some wonderful experience now, and then fell asleep. And it came in the most glorious manner while I was waking at 6:15. 1 ran straight to my yellow pad and wrote the whole thing down. It was the most vivid experience in answer. Because I wove myself into an experience, it had to take place. What experience it would be, I left it in the depths of my own Being to decide that. But give me some wonderful experience this night in answer to something; and then came the most glorious experience. And then I wrote the whole thing down. It’s too long to tell tonight. I will tell you on Friday if you are here. Or whether you are here or not, I will tell it on Friday. 

Let us go into the Silence. 

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Now, are there any questions, please? 

A Lady: What is the difference in the reality factor between the body on the bed and what they call astral projection? Is there a difference? 

Neville: Well I have had out-of-body experiences of what the world would call astral projection, but they are not anything like this. I am convinced that the Thing-That-You-Really-Are is dreaming what you believe yourself to be. One day you will awake; and you and the dreamer of you will be one. I have seen myself out of this body many times, but it is not that of which I speak today. 

Any other questions, please? 

Another Lady: If you have time, I would like to hear again the story that you told about an experience you had in the past where you tried to get through a wall, and you couldn’t get through it. 

Neville: That was really an astral projection. I was living in my hotel room in New York City; and I felt this peculiar force in my head, and I moved out in a circular motion — or rather, a spiral motion, and I found myself on the beach. I didn’t know anyone, but I knew I had just left a body on the bed in New York City. I was more curious about how that thing happened than about the people on the beach. They meant nothing to me. So I inwardly wished to return and duplicate it, but this time not to go to the beach, but to actually come down in the room and observe the body out of which I had just spun. So I had no sooner wished it then I came back into the body; and I am in the body, and I am not in the body. 

But now the same motion is taking place, the same intensity; but this time, as I whirled out in a spiral motion, I willed myself to come back into that room and not go elsewhere. I wanted to see exactly how this thing works. So I came into the hotel room, and there was the body on the bed. The face is covered with a cloud. There are breaks in the cloud; and through the breaks in the cloud I can see my face, but only through breaks in the cloud. And here I am looking at this “thing,” — I call it a “thing” because the Reality is looking at it. That which I always believed to be my reality, my self that I shave in the morning, that I bathe in the morning and I feed all through the day, — that’s only an envelope.I am the Being looking at it. 

Well I figured: Now, if I am now out, I am Spirit; therefore I could easily go through the wall. And so, I ran towards the wall and ran at it and bumped my head. I came back and was thinking to myself, that’s crazy. Spirit, — there is the thing that should bump its head, not me. I ran again, and I bumped my head again. I came back and this time I said, “Now, there must be some way that it can be done because I am Spirit.” 

I imagined myself out of that room, and instantly I was where I imagined myself. The mere fact that I saw the wall as a barrier, it was a harrier to me; and so, trying to go through it, I was going against my own rational mind, and so I bumped it. But when I stood in the room, not going through any wall or any door, I simply imagined myself elsewhere, and I was elsewhere. 

So that’s how I learned that lesson, — with a good bump. Now that was an involuntary projection. I have had many voluntary ones. But I am not talking of that. That is behind me now. That is like child’s play. I am speaking of God in us, who is called in Scripture “Jesus Christ,” for the divine body of God is your own wonderful human imagination, which is one with God, who is Jesus Christ. That’s the Lord. 

And may I tell you, in the end, although all these bumps and these horrors of the world, in the end, He is Infinite Love. He appears at first as power — destructive violence; but in the end, it was Love behind it all — just sheer Love — nothing but Love in the end. And that is God. 

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Neville Goddard 5-10-1971 

Source

https://archive.org/stream/NevilleGoddard002/step_into_the_picture_djvu.txt