From 2024 Fall/Winter Newsletter

    Recently, I happened to see a political analyst on TV who was biased to an extreme. He couldn’t see the forest for the trees. His belief in what he was espousing was insane. I was trying to understand how he could be so blind as to have such a narrow, distorted view of things. His perspective stemmed from an utter hatred of one person and a completely unrealistic view of someone else.
     One word that comes to mind to describe what I saw is worship. In Your Power of Natural Knowing there is a chapter entitled Vernonisms. It originally was produced in booklet form and it’s where Vernon Howard used special words, phrases and definitions of actual human conditions or attitudes to help us better understand human nature. One of them is called Memory Worshipper: “To live from mental films stored in the memory bank in which the person is the center of attention. Memory worship is self-worship. Escape this painful condition by erasing egotism.”
     Worship is the idolization of someone or something. Society defines it as an admirable quality. It tells us that worship is a good thing, a healthy thing when it is really a bad thing. Worship is defined as a type of unquestioning devotion or adoration of someone or something. In A Treasury of Trueness, Vernon Howard states, “Admiration is a terrible thing. It is division. Admiring God or someone else means you are apart. The idea stands between you and the good life.” How can you love something that isn’t real, that doesn’t exist in reality? Why would you idolize something or someone that is undeveloped or flawed?
     When we put another human being or some statue or ornament or doctrine or belief above God, we’re abdicating self-responsibility for waking up. God exists, but not as someone to be blindly followed. Would it not make sense that God wants you to have all things good?  And if you only have your idea of who God is, how can there be anything good, decent, clear, superior, patient, happy, content, above all problems, without stress, etc.
      It makes no sense that we would be put on this earth to experience some future heaven or hell. It’s been a wasted life if I don’t make an effort to understand why I’ve been given this earthly life. God is not an idea. Truth did not put us here to follow some lost human being or belief or opinion. Another Vernonism under Word Worshippers is defined as, “Those believing that words have virtues in themselves. Write the word sandwich on a piece of paper and then try to satisfy your hunger by eating the paper. Talking about God cannot satisfy your spiritual needs.”
     I recently was having breakfast at a dining establishment and there was a young couple there also eating breakfast. They each had a Bible and were completely immersed in what they were reading. If you’re making an effort to be consciously aware, you can see and feel the states of others. At a glance, it was apparent that they were lost and frightened human beings. There was zero awareness there. They didn’t know the other existed or that there was anyone else in the restaurant. Their fear was so pervasive that even if they were reading a passage that had truth in it, it would do them no good.
      Imagination is a very powerful deceiver. We think by doing certain things that we will somehow attract right things to us. If I faithfully read the Bible every day, or mechanically pray at certain times of the day, I will be blessed, and only favorable things will come to me.
     This planet is on a very low level. All we have to do is look at the news and headlines on the Internet or in the newspaper or on the 5 o’clock TV news.
     As I’m writing this article, there’s war in the Middle East and people on both sides are killing each other or threatening to kill one another. Russia and Ukraine are in conflict, killing, destroying property and buildings and homes all over the place. The stock market plummeted 1000 points in one day and there’s a possible impending recession or even worse. So and so is going to take someone to court in a nasty divorce dispute. There’s a rash of violent crimes in this city. There’s a controversy in this sporting event at the Olympics. Are these events any indication of a sane world? No, this world is utterly mad.
     Of course, we are always justified in doing this or that because I’m right and you’re wrong. Of course, we can always depend upon the experts to tell us the facts. They claim to be the ultimate authority on a particular matter and present the so-called ‘facts’ to you. Then another individual or group loudly proclaims they are the ultimate authority, giving out an opposing set of ‘facts.’ All of this causes tremendous confusion and uncertainty. But the good news is that happiness exists and there is true winning but not in the way this world tells us.
     Here is something I delightfully discovered recently in The Power of Your Supermind and which connects with everything I have been talking about up until now. “Never assume what your added good will be. Never assume how and when it will come. Assumptions are projections of your own desires, which produce nothing new. Your added good is always different from your preconceived imagination.”
     In a previous article, I mentioned I was once in a restaurant where four men were discussing a book they all had read about the meaning of certain passages in the Bible. None of them could wait for the others to stop talking so that they could give their interpretation of what they had read or recite what the author had said. They all thought they were having a meaningful dialogue, when in reality they had no clue what they were talking about. The earlier illustrations given here from Vernonisms also applied to them. They all were Memory and Word Worshippers. The only thing that will help is to develop a deeper understanding of these matters that comes from within. This true understanding exists above the mind and is available to anyone who is open to it and wants it badly enough.
     Just having the knowledge about something doesn’t mean we actually know or understand anything at all. I have known people who were walking encyclopedias of information and have read thousands of books in their lives or people who have important positions in this life, but their personal lives were a mess. They were miserable. All the accumulated knowledge and experiences and wealth did nothing for them. Only the pure Truth can fulfill what we truly yearn for, will take away the awful pain and give our life real meaning and satisfaction.
     Abandoning the present to retreat into the past or project into the future is a harmful universal human trait. It distracts us from what we should be doing and can lead to making mistakes. I recently showed up for an appointment and was kept waiting for 15 minutes while the person I was seeing finished up a phone call. She was taking care of some business matters, and I could tell she was harried and distracted so when she got to me her mind was still occupied with the phone call along with other situations she was having to deal with. She was feeling guilty for making me wait for 15 minutes too.
     I also know someone who was looking forward to a vacation, but it didn’t live up to his expectations and upon returning, the trip was forgotten, and he was already moving on to the “next thing” to occupy his time and energy. If we’re always looking forward to “what’s next,” how can we enjoy “right now”? Even on the trip this person was likely thinking about all the things that had to be taken care of when he came back home. So, how could he enjoy himself when the mind was not present where his body was? So, we’re caught in the trap of thinking ahead or thinking in the past. What might have been, which is regret.
     The reason we’re so unhappy is we’re never living in the present moment. I’m busy collecting memories and experiences and I’m also constantly looking forward to “the next thing,” whatever that may be. These are my ‘gods.’ This is what we are unconsciously worshipping. We fail to see the trap our minds have set for us. We are constantly letting ourselves be distracted by someone or something.
     This is why we make mistakes, drop things, lose things, forget things and get into trouble with other people. There is no awareness because our minds are going a million miles per hour and dominating everything we do. Vernon Howard put it this way from The Power of Your Supermind, Chapter 11, “When you enjoy the ­­ present moment, you do not worry about tomorrow’s enjoyment.”