Wednesday, October 10, 2012

ABOUT THAT ENERGY RAY CALLED FAITH?


Human beings have certain universal core values, like truth and peace and wisdom and courage. These values are very pure strands of energy. Some liken them to rays of beautiful, clear light.



People have instinctively honored these core values since the beginning of recorded history. The early gods and goddesses in ancient cultures were often representations of these energy strands; putting them into form as humans or animals made them easier to understand and to access.



Unfortunately, these values became trapped in statues and temples. Myths and belief systems sprang up around them. Those myths were appealing, and grew to such an extent that they often overshadowed the value itself. The original meaning of the energy strand was corrupted. Because of this, some of the core universal values once available to us now seem distasteful, because they have been polluted for so long, and are in danger of being forgotten.


FAITH is one of those pure energy strands that has lost its original meaning. People now associate faith with various religions and spiritual figures, not all of them pleasant, and tend to shrug off the word, rather than seeing the pure essence of what it really means and how huge and rich it could be to embrace faith in our lives.

A NECESSARY ASIDE: People have an enormous need to know. We require reasons and answers. One of the greatest areas of mental discomfort for human beings is the state of not knowing.

Think about it like this: you find yourself driving on a road. You have to have a reason for driving, even if the reason is, “I’m driving for no particular reason.” If you can’t find any reason for why you are out on the road driving, you might easily go insane. We latch onto reasons, often with desperation. Our minds just have to know.

Here’s something curious. Whether we arrive at reasons that are true or not doesn’t matter! All that matters is to get out of the place of unknowingness as fast as possible. Brain scientists recognize that we are hard-wired to find reasons, regardless of how rational they are, and to latch onto them, believing them wholeheartedly. All of us do it. (To observe this hard-wiring in action, just think about people with political beliefs that are opposite your own!)

Parents of children who were abducted frequently say that the worst part of the ordeal for them was not knowing. Many have reported feeling a sense of relief when they finally found out what actually happened to their child, even though what they heard may have been very sad. It was not their choice to feel that way. It is part of being a human.

Faith can, for some, mean relying on that which we call God. That isn’t the pure meaning of faith, however.

Faith, in its purest definition, simply means permitting ourselves to be comfortable in unknowingness.


Article and illustrations (c) 2012, Mary Elizabeth Raines and Laughing Cherub Unlimited
All rights reserved.
Please do not copy or reproduce in whole or in part; links to this post, however, are welcome!

If you enjoyed this article, you might also enjoy reading Mary Elizabeth Raines' whimsical look at the New Age and the coming transformations, TRANSITIONS, TREES AND COTTAGE CHEESE, now available for Kindle or for download on Amazon.com.


About Me

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Mary Elizabeth (Leach) Raines is the author of a collection of quirky short stories ("The Man in the GPS and Other Stories"), novels ("UNA" and "The Secret of Eating Raspberries"), and nonfiction ("How to Help and Heal with Hypnosis: An Advanced Guide to Hypnotism" and "The Laughing Cherub Guide to Past-Life Regression: A Handbook for Real People.") In addition to writing, Mary Elizabeth teaches hypnosis as the director of the Academy for Professional Hypnosis Training, speaking at conferences and leading workshops across the USA. She is a columnist for "The Journal of Hypnotism," and in the past she was a newspaper reporter and features writer. She has won a number of awards for her writing. Mary Elizabeth attended New England Conservatory of Music in Boston in the 1960s as a piano performance major. Later she pursued independent film studies at UW-Oshkosh. In her free time, Mary Elizabeth plays the piano, creates fractal art, cooks, paints, dabbles with computers, acts, gardens organically, and keeps bees.