We have the capacity to stop making ourselves powerless by waking up to having put ourselves where our powers are stolen from us.

When we talk about making changes in ourselves, it could be said that it's like climbing a mountain. Why is the mountain a metaphor for spiritual change? There's a certain kind of effort necessary for climbing, isn't there? Also, the mountain represents a higher view. Because as you ascend the mountain, not only does the atmosphere change in terms of becoming more rarified, but every step higher up the mountain produces...

Have you ever noticed how the more negative you get, the more difficult everything about your life becomes, including being able to do the simplest things? It's like suddenly sinking into dark molasses, where not only can't you move, but everything you don't want seems stuck to you!...

Our True Self is not a person. It is a great spirit. And it is part of a ceaseless flow in which the idea of "good" and "bad" only exists because in that flow has been born a certain creature, given an imagination that has created a self in the name of itself. And there you have all of the problem. When you resist what life brings and don't accept it, all you're really doing is....

How many of us spend our precious time and energy fuming over what others may have done to us? Unseen in the steam of our heated emotions and churning thoughts is the one inescapable fact that we are the secret prisoner of anyone we wish to punish. And the more we would punish this person, the less freedom we have to be at peace with ourselves. Here's a beautiful lesson in invisible justice,...

Perhaps you have heard the expression that God never gives you more than you can handle. And perhaps you wondered whether or not it was true. I'm now going to tell you why it's the absolute truth. It's the absolute truth because any time you choose, you can ask God to take back what He has given you. Any time you choose, you can say, "Dear Lord, I now see I asked for [and now you fill in the...

A wild stallion was captured and put in a wood-fenced compound bordering the open country in which he once ran free. His first week in captivity he showed all the wildness of a once-free creature now penned; but in the weeks that followed, even the dried grasses once refused as food became not only tolerable but even agreeable.

Any real intention we set for ourselves to rise above our present level of being is going to reveal a lower level of self that doesn't want to change. This is a powerful spiritual law that creates both challenge and opportunity at the same time. The challenge: agreeing to see how our unconscious nature -- encased and enchanted by its own negative reactions -- is incapable of doing anything other than resisting unwanted moments.

Most of us hold the unquestioned belief that our hearts and minds are at peace before one of life's "waves" washes in to disturb us. But if we take away the prejudice of self-pleasing images -- and add the ease with which we are disturbed by unwanted moments -- we have good cause to suspect something entirely different about ourselves. Could a truer view of what takes place in such times of...

A wild stallion was captured and put in a wood-fenced compound bordering the open country in which he once ran free. His first week in captivity he showed all the wildness of a once-free creature now penned; but in the weeks that followed, even the dried grasses once refused as food became not only tolerable but even agreeable. After all, no effort was required on his part to eat his fill. F...

Rebecca had decided that her best chance of getting hired by a company doing geological survey work in the Alaskan wilderness was to earn a private license to fly twin-engine planes. A few days later she began taking lessons from a wise old bush pilot, highly respected throughout the region for his cool and collected ways of dealing with the worst possible situations. After the mandatory gro...

Seeking and receiving approval from others is like sitting down hungry to an imaginary meal. You're invited to eat all you want, but no matter how much imaginary food is served, you can never get your fill. Your hunger remains. No fictional feast ever satisfies. But this fact isn't so apparent when it comes to our appetite for approval. We still look to others for our sense of self even thou...