Audio version read by Rev. Steven Lane Taylor, B.Msc.
“Beyond Thinking”

“You Are What You Think” or “Thinking Makes It So”

Since the advent of what can be described as New Thought Metaphysics, the saying “You are what you think” has been accepted by many. To scores of people it forms the nucleus of positive spirituality. It is the foundation of all positive-thinking movements, whether of a spiritual or self-help nature. The concept is that if you think positively, your life will be positive; but the reverse will be true if you think negatively. Carrying this concept still further into the psychic realm of interacting energies, there is the so-called law of attraction.

We know that each soul will awaken to certain levels of understanding with every passing lifetime. Souls who are currently in a level of “You are what you think” are basically content that they have achieved some sort of absolute spirituality upon which to base their lives. And, from their previous perspectives of life, they have. There is, of course, a wide gap between power-of-thought metaphysics and religions based upon the precepts of hell and damnation. Therefore, to those who have made this giant leap, it would seem that they have possibly arrived at some pinnacle of spiritual wisdom. Plus, from this position, emerges still another popular saying: “Your thinking makes it so,” which suggests that the power of thought can manifest one’s needs or desires.

Factuality and Non-Factuality

Certainly there is truth that if the personal ego level of the mind focuses on the positive, other positive, like-minded people will be attracted to that energy. And certainly it is better to have a positive self-image to keep up one’s spirits when attempting to accomplish something, even though the positive self-image is associated with one’s personal ego identity. Indeed, a person’s life will be far better off than having the self-destructive thinking that is so much a part of the hell-and-damnation mindset.

But the true power behind thought-metaphysics hasn’t been fully grasped by some who think the idea of “thinking makes it so” means “Think positively about wealth and prosperity, and wealth and prosperity will be yours.” This statement, either directly or indirectly, suggests that one can think one’s self into becoming wealthy and prosperous—as if one’s mind were some kind of mental Aladdin’s lamp.

We are also told that the power of one’s thinking can also keep one or make one healthy. By thinking positively about the health of your body, health can be either maintained or restored. In addition, when it comes to life’s greatest reward—that of love—the idea is that if you think positively about love, you will attract love.

Now all three premises can help, but they are far from producing the power to make it so.

By thinking positively about wealth and prosperity, you maintain an attitude that serves you well when interacting with other people who could be key figures in your having a better material prosperity—but this attitude will not make it so.

By thinking positively about the health of one’s body, one certainly can have a better energetic influence over one’s body. Being an energy field made up of energy cells, there’s no doubt that cellular energy can be influenced by energy factors within the mind. But to think that positive thought will cure or heal what is wrong with oneself is not factual in many cases and conditions. Likewise, to go into denial by affirming that some physical condition does not exist, will not, by such thinking alone, make it go away. What is true, is that in a large percentage of physical conditions, a condition will clear up on its own, or more specifically, it will clear up through the Presence and Grace of God working in and through the body.

When it comes to creating love in one’s life, certainly thinking positively about love produces an outer personal ego sense of identity that makes one more attractive to others, and, hence, improves the likelihood that love will come visiting. But, thinking positively about love will not of itself bring love into existence in one’s life.

In all of the life scenarios just given as examples, there is the presence of one common denominator—the false sense of personal ego identity. All such positive thinking takes place within something that is false in and of itself. To generate any Real Power over anything in one’s life that emerges from an illusion is, of itself, an illusion. The best that can be done is to neutralize a small portion of the personal ego’s sense of limitation so as to at least suggest that something better or improved is possible. But it will not come as a direct result of positive thinking or that one’s thinking makes it so.

So What Is the Reality?

The Reality is that only God can make anything so. It is only by the Grace and Power of Universal Presence that one is prosperous, is healthy or healed, and that one has love or any other thing in life that can be described as a blessing.

The Power of Universal God Presence is beyond human thinking. It is beyond reason, analysis, logic, and all the other toys found in the toy box of the false sense of personal ego identity. If Universal God Presence is The Real Power behind all human improvement and betterment, both individually and collectively, how do we bring this Power for Good into our lives?

How? THINK less and BE more.

Think less every day! Cut down on the amount of so-called time spent on analyzing and picking away at every little detail of your life and the lives of others. If you haven’t already, learn to shut down your thought process through meditation. The less you think on the surface level of your mind, the more the possibility that Universal God Consciousness will surface to the frontal part of your consciousness. Eventually thoughts in your mind will be emerging from the Universal God Presence within you. Such truly God-Inspired thoughts will provide one with God-Guided Intuitive Thinking. One then experiences Christ Mindedness, as St. Paul once expressed it with the words, “Let this mind be in you that also was in Christ Jesus.”

Other words from the Bible further illustrate this Reality, with statements such as: “As he thinketh in his heart, so he is.” From a mystically aware interpretation, these words state that thought originating in the heart, or in that place where Universal God Consciousness is Present, is where Thought Reality really exists. This is consciousness beyond thinking, where Thought Reality is not simply thought, but an Awareness of Beingness.

Thinking less about what seems to be, and letting go to find the Presence of Universal God Consciousness within, opens an Awareness to Beingness where All is known—but not thought about.

Dr. Paul Leon Masters

Reference:

Text taken from Dr. Paul Leon Masters’ Book, “Mystical Insights: Knowing the Unknown,” Pgs. 79–82. Copyright © 2016 by the International Metaphysical Ministry.
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