James Allen Daily

I figure since I am just starting nursery school here, I may as well utilize the forum to also building character given this is a financial forum and how corruptive greed for money can be to one’s mind and heart.

James Allen’s words can sometimes be a bit heavy on the spiritual side as he was a beast of a Jedi of sorts, so if at any point you jump in and get offended at an excerpt just know James bordered on being a saint lol, we’re all imperfect creatures still so don’t get upset at the loftiness of some of these passages if you draw more to the Dark Side of the Force, if that makes sense to you.

A balancing act for myself if you will. Please enjoy the daily excerpts if nothing else. Chime in for whatever reason at any point if you feel compelled!
[B]
Renounce.[/B]

[B][I]August Fifteenth.[/I][/B]

IF you are given to anger, worry, jealousy, greed, or any other inharmonious state of mind, and expect perfect physical health, you are expecting the impossible, for you are continually sowing the seeds of disease in your mind. Such conditions of mind are carefully shunned by the wise man, for he knows them to be far more dangerous than a bad drain or an infected house. If you would be free from all physical aches and pains, and would enjoy perfect physical harmony, then put your mind in order, and harmonise your thoughts. Think joyful thoughts; think loving thoughts ; let the elixir of goodwill course through your veins, and you will need no other medicine. Put away your jealousies, your suspicions, your worries, your hatreds, your selfish indulgences, and you will put away your dyspepsia, your biliousness, your nervousness and aching joints.

If you would secure health, you must learn to work without friction.

[U]Fifteenth Morning[/U]

If men only understood
That their hatred and resentment
Slays their peace and sweet contentment,
Hurts themselves, helps not another,
Does not cheer one lonely brother,
They would seek the better doing
Of good deeds which leaves no rueing-
If they only understood.
If men only understood
How Love conquers; how prevailing
Is its might, grim hate assailing;
How compassion endeth sorrow,
Maketh wise, and doth not borrow
Pain of passion, they would ever
Live in Love, in hatred never-
If they only understood.

[U]Fifteenth Evening[/U]

The grace and beauty that were in Jesus
can be of no value to you-cannot be
understood by you-unless they are also
in you, and they can never be in you, until
you practise them, for, apart from doing,
the qualities which constitute Goodness
do not, as far as you are concerned, exist.
To adore Jesus for his good qualities is a
long step towards Truth, but to practise
those qualities is Truth itself; and he who
fully adores the perfection of another will
not rest content in his own imperfection,
but will fashion his soul after the likeness
of that other.

Therefore thou who adorest Jesus for
his divine qualities, practise those qualities
Thyself, and thou too shalt be divine.

:64: Lemme get a jump on tomorrow’s daily right now. I do love this forum btw. Can’t wait to be a successful full-time trader in a couple years. For now, you’ll see me mostly melting in this friendly warm pot down here at the bottom of the forum, or perhaps lurking around devouring Honorary Member posts.

[B]Order your thoughts and you will order your life.[/B]

[B][I]August Sixteenth.[/I][/B]

POUR the oil of tranquillity upon the turbulent waters of the passions and prejudices, and the tempests of misfortune, however they may threaten, will be powerless to wreck the barque of your soul, as it threads its way across the ocean of life. And if that barque be piloted by a cheerful and never-failing faith, its course will be doubly sure, and many perils will pass it by which would otherwise attack it. By the power of faith every enduring work is accomplished. Faith in the Supreme ; faith in the over-ruling Law; faith in your work, and in your power to accomplish that work—here is the rock upon which you must build if you would achieve, if you would stand and not fall.

Follow, under all circumstances, the highest promptings within you.

[U]Sixteenth Morning[/U]

Let a man realize that life in its totality
proceeds from the mind, and lo, the way
of blessedness is opened up to him! For
he will then discover that he possesses the
power to rule his mind and to fashion it
in accordance with his Ideal.

So will he elect to strongly and stead-
fastly walk those pathways of thought and
action which are altogether excellent; to
him life will become beautiful and sacred;
and, sooner or later, he will put to flight
all evil, confusion, and suffering; for it
is impossible for a man to fall short of
liberation, enlightenment, and peace,
who guards with unwearying diligence
the gateway of his heart.

[U]Sixteenth Evening[/U]

By constantly overcoming self, a man gains
a knowledge of the subtle intricacies of
his mind; and it is this divine knowledge
which enables him to become established
in calmness.

Without self-knowledge there can be no
abiding peace of mind, and those who are
carried away by tempestuous passions,
cannot approach the holy place where
calmness reigns.

The weak man is like one who, having
mounted a fiery steed, allows it to run
away with him, and carry him withersoever
it wills; the strong man is like one who,
having mounted the steed, governs it
with a masterly hand and makes it go in
whatever direction and at whatever speed
he commands.

:7:

Just kind of bulldozed right into this forum section hahah I apologize. Some of these dailies hit the spot for me, other days are like well I’m not really trying to be THAT pure or become a monk hahahaha still attached to many an earthly enjoyment but still read them nonetheless. James was the man. I’m not religious at all either nor do I believe in God, but being a practicing Buddhist I respect universal truth and James tapped into that quite deeply. Timeless wisdom.

I think having the proper foundation of character is vitally important to begin trading. I’m in absolutely no rush.

My Father is into stocks. They just didn’t appeal to me for some reason, not sure what it was but I was just never interested. When my friend mentioned Forex I became immediately intrigued for some reason. He talked to a woman who trades and she turned him on to it and the flame just passed on to me I guess?

Anyways a short bio on James and today’s passage:

Biographical information about James Allen and his wife Lily Allen.

[B]Let your heart grow large and loving and unselfish, and great and lasting will be your influence and success.[/B]
[B][I]
August Seventeenth.[/I][/B]

CULTIVATE a pure and unselfish spirit, and combine with purity and faith singleness of purpose, and you are evolving from the elements enduring success of greatness and power.

If your present position is distasteful to you, and your heart is not in your work, nevertheless perform your duties with scrupulous diligence ; and whilst resting your mind in the idea that the better position and greater opportunities are waiting for you, ever keep an active mental outlook for budding possibilities, so that when the critical moment arrives, and the new channel presents itself, you will step into it with your mind fully prepared for the undertaking, and with that intelligence and foresight which is born of mental discipline.

Whatever your task may be, concentrate your whole mind upon it, throw into it all the energy of which you are capable. The faultless completion of small tasks leads inevitably to larger tasks.

Learn by constant practice how to husband your resources, and to concentrate them, at any moment, upon a given point.

[U]Seventeenth Morning[/U]

There is no strife, no selfishness, in the
Kingdom; there is perfect harmony,
equipoise, and rest.

Those who live in the Kingdom of
Love, have all their needs supplied by
the Law of Love.

As self is the root cause of all strife
And suffering, so Love is the root cause
of all peace and bliss.
Those who are at rest in the Kingdom,
do not look for happiness in any outward
possessions. They are freed from all anxiety
and trouble and, resting in Love, they are
the embodiment of happiness.

[U]Seventeenth Evening[/U]

Let it not be supposed that the children of
The Kingdom live in ease and indolence
(these two sins are the first that have
to be eradicated when the search for the
Kingdom is entered upon); they live in a
peaceful activity; in fact, they only truly
live, for the life of self, with its train of
worries, griefs, and fears, is not real life.

The children of the Kingdom are
Known by their life, they manifest the fruits
of the Spirit-“Love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
meekness, temperance, self-control”-
under all circumstances and vicissitudes.

Making money for the sake of just making money is commendable, we all need to make money. But I also definitely plan on becoming a regular over here if Forex trading works out for me, The Chronicle of Philanthropy - The news and tools you need to change the world

Will be throwing in passages from other texts by James alongside the daily passages.

"It is said of Nature that she knows on vacuum. She also knows no waste. In the divine economy my Nature everything is conserved and turned to good account. Even excreta are chemically transmitted, and utilized in the building up of new forms. Nature destroys every foulness, not by annihilation, but by transmutation, by sweetening and purifying it, and making it serve the ends of things beautiful, useful and good.

That economy which, in nature is a universal principle, is in man a moral quality and it is that quality by which he preserves his energies, and sustains his place as a working unit in the scheme of things.

Financial economy is merely a fragment of this principle, or rather it is a material symbol of that economy which is purely mental, and its transmutations spiritual. The financial economist exchanges coppers for silver, silver for gold, gold for notes, and the notes he converts into the figures of a bank account. By these conversions of money into more readily transmissible forms he is the gainer in the financial management of his affairs. The spiritual economist transmutes passions into intelligence, intelligence into principles, principles into wisdom, and wisdom is manifested in actions which are few but of powerful effect. By all these transmutations he is the gainer in character and in the management of his life.

True economy is the middle way in all things, whether material or mental, between waste and undue retention. That which is wasted, whether money or mental energy, is rendered powerless; that which is selfishly retained and hoarded up, is equally powerless. To secure power, whether of capital or mentality, there must be concentration, but concentration must be followed by legitimate use. The gathering up of money or energy is only a means; the end is use; and it is use only that produces power.

An all round economy consists in finding the middle way in the following seven things:- Money, Food, Clothing, Recreation, Rest, Time and Energy.

Money is the symbol of exchange, and represents purchasing power. He who is anxious to acquire financial wealth as well as he who wishes to avoid debt – must study how to apportion, his expenditure in accordance with his income, so as to leave a margin of ever increasing working capital, or to have a little store ready in hand for any emergency. Money spent in thoughtless expenditure – in worthless pleasures or harmful luxuries – is money wasted and power destroyed; for, although a limited and subordinate power, the means and capacity for legitimate and virtuous purchase is, nevertheless, a power, and one that enters largely into the details of our everyday life. The spendthrift can never become rich, but if he begin with riches, must soon become poor. The miser, with all his stored-away gold, cannot be said to be rich, for he is in want, and his gold, lying idle, is deprived of its power of purchase. The thrifty and prudent are on the way to riches, for while they spend wisely they save carefully, and gradually enlarge their spheres as their growing means allow.

The poor man who is to become rich must begin at the bottom, and must not wish, nor try to appear affluent by attempting something far beyond his means. There is always plenty of room and scope at the bottom, and it is a safe place from which to begin, as there is nothing below, and everything above. Many a young business man comes at once to grief by swagger and display which he foolishly imagines are necessary to success, but which, deceiving no one but himself, lead quickly to ruin. A modest and true beginning, in any sphere, will better ensure success than an exaggerated advertisement of one’s standing and importance. The smaller the capital, the smaller should be the sphere of operations. Capital and scope are hand and glove, and they should fit. Concentrate your capital within the circle of its working power, and however circumscribed that circle may be it will continue to widen and extend as the gathering momentum of power presses for expression.

Above all take care always to avoid the two extremes of parsimony and prodigality."

[B]Passion is not power ; it is the abuse of power, the dispersion of power.[/B]

[B][I]August Eighteenth.[/I][/B]

WHEN that young man, whom I knew, passing through continual reverses and misfortunes, was mocked by his friends and told to desist from further effort, and he replied, " The time is not far distant when you will marvel at my good fortune and success," he showed that he was possessed of that silent and irresistible power which has taken him over innumerable difficulties, and crowned his life with success.

If you have not this power, you may acquire it by practice, and the beginning of power is likewise the beginning of wisdom. You must commence by overcoming those purposeless trivialities to which you have hitherto been a willing victim. Boisterous and uncontrolled laughter, slander and idle talk, and joking merely to raise a laugh—all these things must be put on one side as so much waste of valuable energy.

Be of single aim ; have a legitimate and useful purpose, and devote yourself unreservedly to it.

[U]Eighteenth Morning[/U]

The gospel of Jesus is a gospel of living and
doing. If it were not this it would not voice
the Eternal Truth. Its Temple is Purified
Conduct, the entrance-door to which is
Self-surrender. It invites men to shake off
sin, and promises, as a result, joy and
blessedness and perfect peace.

The Kingdom of Heaven is perfect
trust, perfect knowledge, perfect peace. . . .
No sin can enter therein, no self-born
Thought or deed can pass its golden gates;
no impure desire can defile its radiant
robes. . . . All may enter it who will, but
all must pay the price-the unconditional
abandonment of self.

[U]Eighteenth Evening[/U]

I say this-and know it to be truth-that
circumstances can only affect you in so far
as you allow them to do so. You are swayed
by circumstances because you have not a
right understanding of the nature, use, and
power of thought. You believe (and upon
this little word belief hang all our joys and
sorrows) that outward things have the
power to make or mar your life; by so
doing you submit to those outward things,
confess that you are their slave, and they
your unconditional master. By so doing
you invest them with a power which they
do not of themselves possess, and you
succumb, in reality not to the circumstances,
but to the gloom or gladness, the
fear or hope, the strength or weakness,
which your thought-sphere has thrown
around them.

I apologize for the obnoxious font size I had going there, 4 seems to be much friendlier on the eyes :22:

I’m a musical type of guy as you will come to see in my threads in this section, sorry yall hopefully you’ll grow into my presence, I’ve already kinda grown into you :stuck_out_tongue:

[B]2. The Nature and Power of Mind[/B]

MIND IS THE ARBITER of life. It is the creator and shaper of conditions, and the recipient of its own results. It contains within itself both the power to create illusion and to perceive reality. Mind is the infallible weaver of destiny. Thought is the thread, good and evil deeds are the “warp and woof” or foundation, and the web, woven upon the loom of life, is character. Mind clothes itself in garments of its own making.

Man, as a mental being, possesses all the powers of mind, and is furnished with unlimited choice. He learns by experience, and he can accelerate or retard his experience. He is not arbitrarily bound at any point, but he has bound himself at many points, and having bound himself he can, when he chooses, liberate himself.

He can become bestial or pure, ignorant or noble, foolish or wise, just as he chooses. He can, by reoccurring practice, form habits, and he can, by renewed effort, break them off. He can surround himself with illusions until Truth is completely lost, and he can destroy each of those illusions until Truth is entirely recovered. His possibilities are endless; his freedom is complete.

It is the nature of the mind to create its own conditions, and to choose the states in which it shall dwell. It also has the power to alter any condition, to abandon any state. This it is continually doing as it gathers knowledge of state after state by repeated choice and exhaustive experience.

Inward processes of thought make up the sum of character and life. Man can modify and alter these processes by bringing will and effort to bear upon them. The bonds of habit, impotence, and sin are self-made, and can only be destroyed by one’s self. They exist nowhere but in one’s mind, and although they are directly related to outward things, they have no real existence in those things.

The outer is molded and animated by the inner, and never the inner by the outer. Temptation does not arise in the outer object, but in the lust of the mind for that object. Nor do sorrow and suffering belong by nature to the external things and happenings of life, but in an undisciplined attitude of mind toward those things and happenings.

The mind that is disciplined by Purity and fortified by Wisdom avoids all those lusts and desires which are inseparately bound up with affliction, and so arrives at enlightenment and peace.

To condemn others as evil, and to curse at outside conditions as the source of evil, increases and does not lessen, the world’s suffering and unrest. The outer is but the shadow and effect of the inner, and when the heart is pure all outward things are pure.

All growth and life is from within outward; all decay and death is from without inward. This is the universal law. All evolution proceeds from within. All adjustment must take place within. He who ceases to strive against others, and employs his powers in the transformation, regeneration, and development of his own mind, conserves his energies and preserves himself. And as he succeeds in harmonizing his own mind, he leads others by consideration and charity into a like blessed state.

The way of enlightenment and peace is not gained by assuming authority and guidance over other minds, but by exercising a lawful authority over one’s own mind, and by guiding one’s self in pathways of steadfast and lofty virtue.

A man’s life proceeds from his heart and his mind. He has compounded that mind by his own thoughts and deeds. It is within his power to refashion that mind by his choice of thought. In this manner he can transform his life. Let us see how this is to be done.

[B]Happiness is that inward state of perfect satisfaction which is joy and peace.[/B]

[B][I]August Nineteenth.[/I][/B]

THE satisfaction which results from gratified desire is brief and illusionary, and is always followed by an increased demand for gratification. Desire is insatiable as the ocean, and clamours louder and louder as its demands are attended to. It claims ever-increasing service from its deluded devotees, until at last they are struck down with physical or mental anguish, and are hurled into the purifying fires of suffering. Desire is the region of hell, and all torments are centred there. The giving up of desire is the realisation of heaven, and all delights await the pilgrim there.

" I sent my soul through the invisible, Some letter of that after life to spell, And by and by my soul returned to me, And whispered, ’ I myself am heaven and hell.’ "

Heaven and hell are inward states.
[U]
Nineteenth Morning[/U]

If you are one of those who are praying for,
and looking forward to a happier world
beyond the grave, here is a message of
gladness for you-you may enter into and
realize that happy world now; it fills the
whole universe, and it is within you,
waiting for you to find, acknowledge,
and possess.

Said one who understood the inner
laws of Being-“When men shall say,
lo here, or lo there, go not after them.
The Kingdom of God is within you.”

[U]Nineteenth Evening[/U]

Heaven and hell are inward states.
Sink into self and all its gratifications,
and you sink into hell; rise above self
into that state of consciousness which is
the utter denial and forgetfulness of self,
and you enter heaven.

So long as you persist in selfishly
seeking for your own personal happiness,
so long will happiness elude you, and you
will be sowing the seeds of wretchedness.
in so far as you succeed in losing yourself
in the service of others, in that measure
will happiness come to you, and you will
reap a harvest of bliss.

MONK MODE WARNING, today’s daily is a bit heavy on the renunciate side of things, I will post a monk mode warning for such daily entries that are a bit much to be reading if you are just concerned with worldly success and material living, some of these ideas can be very intimidating for a secular mind so a warning will prevent someone from barking a criticism behind their screen perhaps hehe.

[B]To seek selfishly is only to lose happiness.[/B]
[B][I]
August Twentieth.[/I][/B]

SINK into self and all its gratifications, and you sink into hell; rise above self into that state of consciousness which is the utter denial and forgetfulness of self, and you enter heaven. Self is blind, without judgment, not possessed of true knowledge, and always leads to suffering. Correct perception, unbiased judgment, and true knowledge belong only to the divine state, and only in so far as you realise this divine consciousness can you know what real happiness is. So long as you persist in selfishly seeking for your own happiness, so long will happiness elude you, and you will be sowing the seeds of wretchedness. In so far as you succeed in losing yourself in the service of others, in that measure will happiness come to you, and you will reap a harvest of bliss.

Abiding happiness will come to you when, ceasing to selfishly cling, you are willing to give up.

[U]Twentieth Morning[/U]

Sympathy given can never be waste.

One aspect of sympathy is that of
Pity-pity for the distressed or pain-
stricken, with a desire to alleviate
or help them in their sufferings.
The world needs more of this
divine quality.

“For pity makes the world
Soft to the weak, and noble
for the strong."

Another form of sympathy is that
of rejoicing with others who are more
successful than ourselves, and though
their success were our own.

[U]Twentieth Evening[/U]

Sweet are companionships, pleasures, and
material comforts, but they change and
fade away. Sweeter still are Purity, Wisdom,
and the knowledge of Truth, and these
never change nor fade away.

He who attained to the possession of
spiritual things can never be deprived of
his source of happiness; he will never have
to part company with it, and wherever he
goes in the whole universe, he will carry
his possessions with him. His spiritual
end will be the fulness of joy.

[B]1. True Happiness[/B]

To maintain an unchangeable sweetness of disposition, to think only thoughts that are pure and gentle, and to be happy under all circumstances - such blessed conditions and such beauty of character and life should be the aim of all, and particularly so of those who wish to lessen the misery of the world. If anyone has failed to lift himself above ungentleness, impurity, and unhappiness, he is greatly deluded if he imagines he can make the world happier by the propagation of any theory or theology. He who is daily living in harshness, impurity, or unhappiness is day by day adding to the sum of the world’s misery; whereas he who continually lives in goodwill, and does not depart from happiness, is day by day increasing the sum of the world’s happiness, and this independently of any religious beliefs which these may or may not hold.

He who has not learned how to be gentle, or giving, loving and happy, has learned very little, great though his book-learning and profound his acquaintance which the letter of Scripture may be, for it is in the process of becoming gentle, pure, and happy that the deep, real and enduring lessons of life are learned. Unbroken sweetness of conduct in the face of all outward antagonism is the infallible indication of a self-conquered soul, the witness of wisdom, and the proof of the possession of Truth.

A sweet and happy soul is the ripened fruit of experience and wisdom, and it sheds abroad the invisible yet powerful aroma of its influence, gladdening the hearts of others, and purifying the world. And all who will, and who have not yet commenced, may begin this day, if they will so resolve, to live sweetly and happily, as becomes the dignity of a true manhood or womanhood. Do not say that your surroundings are against you. A man’s surroundings are never against him; they are there to aid him, and all those outward occurrences over which you lose sweetness and peace of mind are the very conditions necessary to your development, and it is only by meeting and overcoming them that you can learn, and grow, and ripen. The fault is in yourself.

Pure happiness is the rightful and healthy condition of the soul, and all may possess it if they will live purely and unselfish.

“Have goodwill
To all that lives, letting unkindness die,
And greed and wrath, so that your lives be made
Like soft airs passing by.”

Is this too difficult for you? Then unrest and unhappiness will continue to dwell with you. Your belief and aspiration and resolve are all that are necessary to make it easy, to render it in the near future a thing accomplished, a blessed state realised.

Despondency, irritability, anxiety and complaining, condemning and grumbling all these are thought-cankers, mind-diseases; they are the indications of a wrong mental condition, and those who suffer therefrom would do well to remedy their thinking and conduct. It is true there is much sin and misery in the world, so that all our love and compassion are needed, but our misery is not needed- there is already too much of that. No, it is our cheerfulness and happiness that are needed for there is too little of that. We can give nothing better to the world than beauty of life and character; without this, all other things are vain; this is pre-eminently excellent; it is enduring, real, and not to be overthrown, and it includes all joy and blessedness.

Cease to dwell pessimistically upon the wrongs around you; dwell no more in complaints about, and revolt against, the evil in others, and commence to live free from all wrong and evil yourself. Peace of mind, pure religion, and true reform lie this way. If you would have others true, be true; if you would have the world emancipated from misery and sin, emancipate yourself; if you would have your home and your surroundings happy, be happy. You can transform everything around you if you will transform yourself.

“Don’t bewail and bemoan…
Don’t waste yourself in rejection, nor bark against the bad,
but chant the beauties of the good.”

And this you will naturally and spontaneously do as you realise the good in yourself.

[B][I][B]JEDI MODE WARNING[/B][/I][/B]

[B]7. The Realization of Prosperity[/B]

It is granted only to the heart that abounds with integrity, trust, generosity and love to realize true prosperity. The heart that is not possessed of these qualities cannot know prosperity, for prosperity, like happiness, is not an outward possession, but an inward realization.

The greedy man may become a millionaire, but he will always be wretched, and mean, and poor, and will even consider himself outwardly poor so long as there is a man in the world who is richer than himself, whilst the upright, the open-handed and loving will realize a full and rich prosperity, even though their outward possessions may be small.

He is poor who is dissatisfied; he is rich who is contented with what he has, and he is richer who is generous with what he has.

When we contemplate the fact that the universe is abounding in all good things, material as well as spiritual, and compare it with man’s blind eagerness to secure a few gold coins, or a few acres of dirt, it is then that we realize how dark and ignorant selfishness is; it is then that we know that self-seeking is self-destruction.

Nature gives all, without reservation, and loses nothing; man, grasping all, loses everything.

If you would realize true prosperity do not settle down, as many have done, into the belief that if you do right everything will go wrong. Do not allow the word “competition” to shake your faith in the supremacy of righteousness.

I care not what men may say about the “laws of competition,” for do I not know the unchangeable Law, which shall one day put them all to rout, and which puts them to rout even now in the heart and life of the righteous man?

And knowing this Law I can contemplate all dishonesty with undisturbed repose, for I know where certain destruction awaits it. Under all circumstances do that which you believe to be right, and trust the Law; trust the Divine Power that is imminent in the universe, and it will never desert you, and you will always be protected.

By such a trust all your losses will be converted into gains, and all curses which threaten will be transmuted into blessings. Never let go of integrity, generosity, and love, for these, coupled with energy, will lift you into the truly prosperous state.

Do not believe the world when it tells you that you must always attend to “number one” first, and to others afterwards. To do this is not to think of others at all, but only of one’s own comforts.

To those who practice this the day will come when they will be deserted by all, and when they cry out in their loneliness and anguish there will be no one to hear and help them. To consider one’s self before all others is to cramp and warp and hinder every noble and divine impulse.

Let your soul expand, let your heart reach out to others in loving and generous warmth, and great and lasting will be your joy, and all prosperity will come to you. Those who have wandered from the highway of righteousness guard themselves against competition; those who always pursue the right need not to trouble about such defense.

This is no empty statement, There are men today who, by the power of integrity and faith, have defied all competition, and who, without swerving in the least from their methods, when competed with, have risen steadily into prosperity, whilst those who tried to undermine them have fallen back defeated.

To possess those inward qualities which constitute goodness is to be armored against all the powers of evil, and to be doubly protected in every time of trial; and to build’ oneself up in those qualities is to build up a success which cannot be shaken, and to enter into a prosperity which will endure forever.

The White Robe of the Heart Invisible
Is stained with sin and sorrow, grief and pain,
And all repentant pools and springs of prayer
Shall not avail to wash it white again.

While in the path of ignorance I walk,
The stains of error will not cease to cling
Defilements mark the crooked path of self,
Where anguish lurks and disappointments sting.

Knowledge and wisdom only can avail
To purify and make my garment clean,
For therein lie love’s waters ; therein rests
Peace undisturbed, eternal, and serene.

Sin and repentance is the path of pain,
Knowledge and wisdom is the path of Peace
By the near way of practice I will find
Where bliss begins, how pains and sorrows cease.

Self shall depart, and Truth shall take its place
The Changeless One, the Indivisible
Shall take up His abode in me, and cleanse
The White Robe of the Heart Invisible.

[B][I]MONK MODE WARNING
[/I][/B]
[B]Whatsoever you constantly meditate upon you will not only come to understand, but will grow more and more into its likeness.[/B]

[B][I]August Twenty-first.[/I][/B]

SPIRITUAL meditation is the pathway to Divinity. It is the mystic ladder which reaches from earth to heaven, from error to Truth, from pain to peace. Every saint has climbed it; every sinner must sooner or later come to it, and every weary pilgrim that turns his back upon self and the world, and sets his face resolutely towards the Father’s Home, must plant his feet upon its golden rounds. Without its aid you cannot grow into the divine state, the divine likeness, the divine peace, and the fadeless glories and unpolluting joys of Truth will remain hidden from you.

If you constantly dwell upon that which is selfish and debasing, you will ultimately become selfish and debased.

[U]Twenty-First Morning[/U]

Let your heart grow and expand with ever-
broadening love, until, freed from all
hatred, and passion, and condemnation,
it embraces the whole universe with
thoughtful tenderness.

As the flower opens its petals to receive
the morning light, so open your soul more
and more to the glorious light of Truth.

Soar upward on the wings of aspiration;
be fearless and believe in the loftiest
possibilities.

[U]Twenty-First Evening[/U]

Mind clothes itself in garments of its own
making.
Mind is the arbiter of life; it is the
creator and shaper of conditions, and the
recipient of its own results. It contains
within itself both the power to create
illusion and to perceive reality.

Mind is the infallible weaver of destiny;
thought is the thread, good and evil deeds
are the warp and woof, and the web,
woven upon the loom of life, is character.
Make pure thy heart, and thou wilt make
thy life
Rich, sweet, and beautiful, unmarred by
strife.

[I]JEDI MODE WARNING[/I]

[B]If you would enter into possession of profound and abiding peace, come now and enter the path of meditation.[/B]
[B][I]
August Twenty-second.[/I][/B]

SELECT some portion of the day in which to meditate, and keep that period sacred to your purpose. The best time is the very early morning when the spirit of repose is upon everything. All natural conditions will then be in your favour ; the passions, after the long bodily fast of the night, will be subdued, the excitements and worries of the previous day will have died away, and the mind, strong and yet restful, will be receptive to spiritual instruction. Indeed, one of the first efforts you will be called upon to make will be to shake off lethargy and indulgence, and if you refuse you will be unable to advance, for the demands of the spirit are imperative.

The sluggard and the self-indulgent can have no knowledge of Truth.

[U]Twenty-Second Morning[/U]

Cherish your visions; cherish your ideals;
cherish the music that stirs in your heart,
the beauty that forms in your mind, the
Loveliness that drapes your purest thoughts,
for out of them will grow all delightful
conditions, all heavenly environment;
of these, if you will remain true to them,
your world will at last be built.

Guard well thy mind, and, noble, strong,
and free,
Nothing shall harm, disturb or conquer
thee;
For all thy foes are in thy heart and mind,
There also thy salvation thou shalt find.
[U]
Twenty-Second Evening[/U]

Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream
so shall you become. Your vision is the
promise of what you shall one day be;
your Ideal is the prophecy of what you
shall at last unveil.

The greatest achievement was at first
and for a time a dream. The oak sleeps
in the acorn; the bird waits in the egg;
and in the highest vision of the soul
a waking angel stirs.

Your circumstances may be uncongenial,
but they shall not long remain so when
you perceive an Ideal and strive to reach it.

Will also be featuring random excerpts by other [B]New Thought[/B] authors from [B]The James Allen Library[/B]. I think today’s world has been led astray on a pretty massive scale in terms of perceiving what true and lasting success really means. [B]Timothy Ferriss[/B] and [B]Ramit Sethi[/B] may be intelligent and really great guys, but in all truth there is no shortcut to genuine success and freedom of lifestyle, and I’m afraid we are going to see even more of these ‘life hackers’ trying to rise to riches and notoriety by capitalizing on the frustrated and greedy masses.

“In the intellect constructive, which we popularly designate by the word Genius, we observe the same balance of two elements as in intellect receptive. The constructive intellect produces thoughts, sentences, poems, plans, designs, systems. It is the generation of the mind, the marriage of thought with nature. To genius must always go two gifts, the thought and the publication. The first is revelation, always a miracle, which no frequency of occurrence or incessant study can ever familiarize, but which must always leave the inquirer stupid with wonder. It is the advent of truth into the world, a form of thought now, for the first time, bursting into the universe, a child of the old eternal soul, a piece of genuine and immeasurable greatness. It seems, for the time, to inherit all that has yet existed, and to dictate to the unborn. It affects every thought of man, and goes to fashion every institution. But to make it available, it needs a vehicle or art by which it is conveyed to men. To be communicable, it must become picture or sensible object. We must learn the language of facts. The most wonderful inspirations die with their subject, if he has no hand to paint them to the senses. The ray of light passes invisible through space, and only when it falls on an object is it seen. When the spiritual energy is directed on something outward, then it is a thought. The relation between it and you first makes you, the value of you, apparent to me. The rich, inventive genius of the painter must be smothered and lost for want of the power of drawing, and in our happy hours we should be inexhaustible poets, if once we could break through the silence into adequate rhyme. As all men have some access to primary truth, so all have some art or power of communication in their head, but only in the artist does it descend into the hand. There is an inequality, whose laws we do not yet know, between two men and between two moments of the same man, in respect to this faculty. In common hours, we have the same facts as in the uncommon or inspired, but they do not sit for their portraits; they are not detached, but lie in a web. The thought of genius is spontaneous; but the power of picture or expression, in the most enriched and flowing nature, implies a mixture of will, a certain control over the spontaneous states, without which no production is possible. It is a conversion of all nature into the rhetoric of thought, under the eye of judgment, with a strenuous exercise of choice. And yet the imaginative vocabulary seems to be spontaneous also. It does not flow from experience only or mainly, but from a richer source. Not by any conscious imitation of particular forms are the grand strokes of the painter executed, but by repairing to the fountain-head of all forms in his mind. Who is the first drawing-master? Without instruction we know very well the ideal of the human form. A child knows if an arm or a leg be distorted in a picture, if the attitude be natural or grand, or mean, though he has never received any instruction in drawing, or heard any conversation on the subject, nor can himself draw with correctness a single feature. A good form strikes all eyes pleasantly, long before they have any science on the subject, and a beautiful face sets twenty hearts in palpitation, prior to all consideration of the mechanical proportions of the features and head. We may owe to dreams some light on the fountain of this skill; for, as soon as we let our will go, and let the unconscious states ensue, see what cunning draughtsmen we are! We entertain ourselves with wonderful forms of men, of women, of animals, of gardens, of woods, and of monsters, and the mystic pencil wherewith we then draw has no awkwardness or inexperience, no meagreness or poverty; it can design well, and group well; its composition is full of art, its colors are well laid on, and the whole canvas which it paints is life-like, and apt to touch us with terror, with tenderness, with desire, and with grief. Neither are the artist’s copies from experience ever mere copies, but always touched and softened by tints from this ideal domain.”

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

Ralph had some grand ideas but he uses too many words to express them. Will have to sit down and make myself read entire works so as to dissect the most valuable excerpts. Who the hell even wants to read this stuff nowadays?

We’re all turning into quick fix internet addicts with the attention span of squirrels. Well, at least many truly are. Scary.

[B][I]JEDI MODE WARNING[/I][/B]

[B]The direct outcome of your meditations will be a calm, spiritual strength.[/B]
[B][I]
August Twenty-third.[/I][/B]

IF you are given to hatred or anger, you will meditate upon gentleness and forgiveness, so as to become acutely alive to a sense of your harsh and foolish conduct. You will then begin to dwell in thoughts of love, of gentleness, of abounding forgiveness ; and as you overcome the lower by the higher, there will gradually, silently steal into your heart a knowledge of the divine Law of Love with an understanding of its bearing upon all the intricacies of life and conduct. And in applying this knowledge to your every thought, word, and act, you will grow more and more gentle, more and more loving, more and more divine. And thus with every error, every selfish desire, every human weakness ; by the power of meditation is it overcome ; and as each sin, each error, is thrust out, a fuller and clearer measure of the Light of Truth illumines the pilgrim soul.

Great is the overcoming power of holy thought.

[U]Twenty-Third Morning[/U]

He who has conquered doubt and fear has
conquered failure. His every thought is
allied with power, and all difficulties are
bravely met and wisely overcome. His
purposes are seasonably planted, and they
bloom and bring forth fruit which does
not fall prematurely to the ground.

Thought allied fearlessly to purpose
becomes creative force: he who knows this
is ready to become something higher and
stronger than a mere bundle of wavering
thoughts and fluctuating sensations; he
who does this has become the conscious
and intelligent wielder of his mental powers.

[U]Twenty-Third Evening[/U]

Man’s true place in the Cosmos is that of
a king, not a slave, a commander under
the Law of Good, and not a helpless tool
in the region of evil.

I write for men, not for babes; for
those who are eager to learn, and earnest
to achieve; for those who will put away
(for the world’s good) a petty personal
indulgence, a selfish desire, a mean
thought, and live on as though it were
not, sans craving and regret.

Man is a master. If he were not, he
could not act contrary to law.

Evil and weakness are self destructive.
The universe is girt with goodness
and strength, and it protects the good
and the strong.

The angry man is the weak man.

ABSOLUTELY BEASTLY EXCERPTS ON WILLPOWER COMING. BEASTLY. VICE HAS NO PLACE IN FOREX TRADING.

[U][B]Without the Will There is no Individuality: And in Proportion as the Will is Strong or Weak, So is the Individual Strong or Weak: The Will is the Individual
[/B][/U]
When desire has proceeded through unconscious growth accompanied by expectation so clear as to admit no shadow of doubt to cloud it, it becomes what we call a will. What, then, is a human will? It is desire ripened into a knowledge of power; ripened to the point where it feels that it is master and can stand alone, commanding what it pleases, begging and borrowing of none. At this point, if a man will learn the Law of Growth as he may learn it, he can take himself up where unconscious growth dropped him, and go on growing through all eternity. This he must do if he is to continue his existence on this planet. He is a self-created being and cannot shuffle off the responsibility of his existence. He must do his own growing. Even the death of the body, should his spirit survive it, will not release him from the work. Death is one of the things he must conquer before he can make further advancement. He must conquer death for himself, or he must so recognize the principles of its conquest by others as to become a participant in this conquest. This latter kind of conquest is salvation by belief. It is a species of mental healing, a kind of self-hypnotism. In time it may ripen into a more positive kind of salvation.

Desire, in its forth going in search of happiness, never positively commands that for which it is reaching until it comes to the place where it sees its own power. As soon as it sees its power it knows what its true character is, and is able to pronounce its own name, and that name the Human Will.

The human will—these are words of unmeasured and immeasurable power. What strength the thought of them confers! Whosoever can pronounce them understandingly is no longer under the bondage of fear, no longer compelled to submit to sickness, poverty or death. Such can truthfully say, "I am what I desire to be. My intelligence has at last crowned my desire and shown me my own mastery. I have that measure of understanding that enables me to see myself as I am. I have been building myself all through the ages without knowing what I was building. Now I know. I have been building a human will, the world’s conqueror.’’ Intelligence has ripened blind desire into that positive personality, a human will.

Let us look at the will for a moment—the will which has come to a knowledge of man’s true relationship to all things. Why! what a vaunting thing it is! It sets aside all those limitations so long prescribed by its fear. It tells him at once what he wants is incarnate in himself. The intelligence recognizes the Tightness of desire; desire is guided by the intelligence; the two are at one—that one the will of the man—and it in harmony with the Law of Being.

What we will we love; therefore, to be a human will is to be a human love. We do not will that to be which we do not love.

Intellect in man has been shaped by contact with the outside world. It has been pressed into a mold, as it were, by its environments, and these environments seem to it to be utterly unyielding and inflexible. Therefore, the intellect in its present phase of development prescribes boundaries to the will, to the vital life force within us, and it has been imposing these bounds for centuries to the retarding of our growth.

The man who is afraid of his will is afraid of his love. He is afraid of the best part of himself, for the will is the highest attribute he possesses. It is not only the highest, but it is the strongest; it is that which makes him go. To go aright is a matter of experience with him; but to go at all is the great point. The will turns ever in the direction of happiness. It never seeks unhappiness. All so-called sins are simply mistakes; they are misdirected efforts at the attainment of happiness that everyone will avoid if he certainly knows how to do so. The old idea that human nature is depraved, and that we would rather sin than not, becomes positively absurd when the character of sin is understood. A sin being the mistake a man makes in the pursuit of happiness, it is folly to suppose that he will make mistakes willfully, when every mistake he makes helps to retard the pleasure he is seeking. It is as if we said a man would go the way he does not wish rather than the way he does wish to go.

Christian Science in denying individuality denies not the functions of the will alone, but those of the intellect also. This is a very grave mistake. Individuality is the visible expression of the universal will. If “at the beginning” was “The Word,” then individuality is the spoken word, the word made manifest. Without the will there is no individuality, and in proportion as the will is strong or weak so is the individual strong or weak. The will is the individual.

Nature is not a myth, as Christian Science asserts. Man’s personal life is an assured reality, and all the efforts of Mental Science are directed toward the establishment of the man more firmly in it. This is the one matter of infinite importance, and instead of ignoring it, every aim of my life and of every word I have written, or shall write, will be directed toward the establishment of it more firmly in race belief. The will is a force. It pushes onward; it is expansive, and if an uneducated intellect did not hold it in check, it would soon carry the race out of the ruts in which it has been moving for ages.

That desire should be held in check until the intelligence had ripened to a comprehension of its uses seems to have been a wise thing. No doubt it has been the proper thing, for in nature “whatever is, is right.” But now that the intellect has grown to an understanding of the uses of desire and begins to cast about, wondering how it can cooperate with, instead of seeking means to crush it, desire may wisely be given leadership. As soon as the intellect learns the value and uses of desire, the seeming two will have become consciously one; that one, the indestructible will, and in the language of theology, man will have made the atonement (at-one-ment) and may rightfully exercise authority over all things below him, both animate and inanimate.

The evolution of the universal will through our personalities will bring heaven to the world, for the universal will is love.

Without personality there would be no uses, nothing to do, no works to bring forth, no faculties of brain to develop. A heaven without personalities would be even more uninviting than the one where saints wear crowns, play on harps, and have one eternal Sabbath.

To be forever busy in making our surroundings better and enlarging our sphere of activities, knowing that there is no limit to our faculties any more than there is a limit to the Principle of Attraction—this is heaven.

Obedience to the will, which is the voice of the Life Principle in man, involves constant effort. Will inspires to perpetual conquest. Conquest is life; there is no life but by conquest. Anything short of continual conquest is death.

Irresolution or weakness expresses itself in all the various forms of disease, including old age, and ending in death. The constant conquest essential to one who means to outlive and outdistance all the weaknesses incident to humanity on this present plane looks appalling to a person of ordinary habits of indolence; for, I repeat, that constant conquest involves constant effort; and habits of indolence are among the first things to conquer. If one yields to habits of indolence in thought he expresses this condition in the absence of action, and sinks deeper and deeper into a state of lethargy leading down to death. We must patiently cultivate a dauntlessness of will that is ready to overleap any barrier and undertake anything, and we must begin this in the small things of everyday life.

Small conquests are great in their time, and no conquest goes uncounted in the general makeup of character.

Perhaps you feel too weak for the day’s work. Say, “My intelligent will is competent to manage this;” then put your hands to the work, remembering that the will in you is from that unfailing source, the vital principle itself—the steam power in every motion ever made, whether great or small—and see how fast the strength will come.

Perhaps you hesitate over some business undertaking, the success of which rests with you, and with no one else. Look to your intelligent will for moral support. Trust it as the saint trusts his oracle. Do not cloud it by doubt, and it will lift you over every difficulty and crown you with victory. Note this—that I use the words “intelligent will.” I make a distinction between intelligent will and the brute will, though they are both one in different states of development. The brute will and the intellectual will are the same thing, only that the intellectual will has been lifted to a higher plane through the development of the reasoning powers. Man has been invincible through the strength of the will on all the lower planes of existence. The will he exercised was the will of the brute. Man may become absolutely invincible by the cultivation of the intellectual will, and may wield an infinitely greater power than he ever before wielded. Disease, old age and death are but intellectual negations, or denials, of the strength and perfectness of the will. The will is the moving power of the man. It is a man’s very self. It is great and strong in proportion as the strength and power are recognized and confided in.

The will should be the executor of the intellect and our bodies the executors of our wills. It is said that man is dual. Very well; he is will and intelligence, or love and intelligence. These two are one. A knowledge of this fact is the marriage everywhere spoken of in the Bible. It is that union which will produce the fruit of righteousness (rightness) or holiness (wholeness); that is, it will make us right, or whole, put us in harmonious relations with the principle of being, and so enable us to command it.

The will is the man.

The will alone has rights.

Nothing besides the will has any rights whatever.

The whole aim of life should be to live the will and to make the will personal in our bodies.

Every place in this chapter where the word “will” is used the word “love” may be substituted without changing the meaning materially. The will of the man is the love of the man. That which he loves he wills, and when intelligence is truly married to desire, the resultant will is rightful ruler of all things.

But to go back to the word “desire.” Desire is love in its outreaching form. It is love before it comes to an understanding of itself, reaching out towards an understanding of itself. It cries, “More! More!” every moment. More what? More food, the creature thinks. More knowledge, more recognition of itself, is really what it wants—a better understanding of its infusing Life Principle—and this it gets constantly, and as constantly yields a better materialization of itself, or a better personality.

At last it reaches that point of understanding of itself where it gets an idea of its own power, and then desire takes on a more positive character and culminates in will. That is to say, when the intelligence recognizes the true nature of desire, all that out-reaching which had appeared as desire simply, feels the power enshrined within it, and so calls itself a will.

cont’d…

So long as the idea of force alone enters into an understanding of the will, it has not been lifted out of the realm of brute instinct. To lift it out of this realm we must get into the knowledge that there is a higher force than brute force. This higher force is love.

During the period of unconscious growth, desire was always accompanied by faith or expectation. It was blind faith, to be sure, but it was faith of a most unquestioning nature. This faith was based on the creature’s dumb recognition of one of the greatest facts connected with the revelation of the new truth. It was based on the fact that there is no time but the present. The eternal now contains all, and the creature in its gut reaching desires held within itself the positive promise of fulfillment of its every wish. Indeed, because there is no future, but only one eternal now, the desire of the creature and the fulfillment of desire were blossom and fruit on the same stem. The asking for a thing was simply the making it apparent in the creature’s personality. It was an out-blossoming of itself, like the newly opening buds on the plant. The animals demonstrated this fact simply because their intelligences were too undeveloped to contradict it. It has only been during the period of man’s ripening into a consciousness of the truth that faith has been separated from desire; but this, too, is passing with the growth of his intelligence, and we are now rounding the last turn in the road, into a fully matured understanding of the Law.

“When you pray, believe that you receive and you have.” This sentence from the Bible contains the whole truth as regards both the conscious and the unconscious growth. Whatever you desire, be sure the tiling exists, or you would not desire it. As it does exist, it is yours by reason of the fact that you do desire it. Therefore, rest in faith—nay, in absolute knowledge that you already have what you asked for, and it will soon begin to materialize to your conscious perceptions.

Your desire is co-related to that which you desire, and the one cannot exist without the other. This is an eternal fact, and I think I have repeated it more times than there are pages in this book. But the hope of the race, and the stimulus of the race to greater effort, are in it. It is absolutely indisputable, and it is the containment of all hope.

When desire culminates in will by the knowledge of many things, chief among which is the fact that we have built ourselves through our growing intelligences, and are, therefore, masters of our surroundings; and furthermore when we know that all we desire exists now, and is ours for the clear seeing of these great truths, we are in a position of mighty strength. We have emerged from the negative plane wherein we felt dependent upon so many things, and, indeed, where we seemed but as pensioners on an unknown God, and beggars on the face of creation—to the strong place in a personal intelligence, where we perceive the independence and majesty we have attained to, resting as it does upon our personal conquests through a period of thousands of years—and we are strong. We are human wills—human loves, and we glory in the freedom of our condition.

For though, as concerns our internal and unseen selves, we are of the universal Life Principle and dependent upon it, yet our external lives are in the personal. Our work is in the personal. The universe of uses is related to the personal, and these personalities that we are building will always endure for the purpose of materializing more of the universal vitality—the Principle of Attraction—or drawing its eternal harmonies forth into organization.

Though the true power within us is of the Principle of Attraction and invisible to us, yet the life we are seeking is not in the invisible, and is not to be found by a denial of our personalities. It is to be found and made available in the world of uses by drawing these powers out and adapting them to our everyday work. It is for this purpose that we investigate the unseen force, which seems to lie behind or within these personalities. We want to know what it is. We want to know its strength, its power and majesty, because the knowing makes every glorious attribute of our unseen selves visible and available in the external life. Our whole duty as citizens of the universe is to make visible the unseen powers that already exist, and have always existed.

Man draws all his power from the great unseen, the universal life or vital force. Theology has taught this in a crude way, making man absolutely dependent upon an all-powerful personal God. The truth is that, while men and all things have but one source from which to draw, each may draw in infinite variety and without limit. It is simply a question of the knowing; of a recognition of the relation of the personal to the impersonal will; of man to the infinite. There is not a creature nor a power, either seen or unseen, that can say “no” to him. The power to know is man’s, and to know is to be. He can know what he wishes by giving himself to the effort. This places him in a position of absolute independence. He can stand up in the face of all creation and say, “I am monarch of all I survey; my right there is none to dispute. No man or power can claim mastery over me. I am myself by virtue of what I know, by virtue of intellectual clear-seeing, by virtue of my intelligent desire being in harmony with the infinite will. Seeing myself but incarnate will, and knowing that in the realm of the high and positive forces the supply is always equal to the demand, I feel myself more than a king. I walk on thrones. There is nothing greater than I.”

Let those who will, teach poor, deluded humanity how to die; I teach it how to live. The reign of the world’s negative religions is passing. I call them negative because their every idea negatives man’s power as a self-savior. The reign of the positive religion, the religion that teaches self-salvation, approaches—is here. The stale-junk-and-hardtack-ideas packed into books so carefully by our forefathers do not feed us. We have grown luxurious and demand the very best there is because we know there is nothing too good for us. Princes unto the manor born, we claim our own. We are what we are by virtue of claiming, and not by begging, and we beg no more. Living human wills, with every possibility enshrined within us, what more do we need? Whosoever can climb to such heights can rejoice and say, “I glory in my freedom; the freedom to know all there is to be known, and I know that by the knowing I shall grow and keep on growing. By the knowing, which is the growing, I shall make my body, this personality of me, a newer version of new and higher thought daily.” To whomsoever would be free I say—hold yourselves in freedom, for you are an intelligent human will. Do not let prejudice set a limit to the operation of your cultivated will. Remember that the cultivated will is always umpire, and give your thought its proper place as its executor.

Remember also that the foes to the operation of the will are only imaginary. You are your own will, your own love; and love dissolves all opposition. The very moment you weaken in your desire for something, fall back on your will. “Oh! divine will, where art thou? Manifest thyself! Conquer and preserve now in my time of need.” This is the prayer to offer. It is a prayer that is always answered, and it is one of the prayers the answer to which comes to stay.

One thing more remains to be said of the will. Desire always seems to hold what it wants in expectancy, but will has learned its power to command. It makes a statement of what it wants, and then falls into a reposeful attitude of kingly possession. “These things are already mine,” it says. “I have them now. They are a part of my individual being.” Then it dismisses the matter, and behold! that which it spoke for shows forth when the hour of use arrives.

[B][I]JEDI MODE WARNING[/I][/B]

[B]Meditation will enrich the soul with saving remembrance in the hour of strife, of sorrow, or of temptation.[/B]

[B][I]August Twenty-fourth.
[/I][/B]
AS, by the power of meditation, you grow in wisdom, you will relinquish, more and more, your selfish desires which are fickle, impermanent, and productive of sorrow and pain ; and will take your stand, with increasing steadfastness and trust, upon unchangeable principles, and will realise heavenly rest.

The use of meditation is the requirement of a knowledge of eternal principles, and the power which results from meditation is the ability to rest upon and trust those principles, and so become one with the Eternal. The end of meditation is, therefore, direct knowledge of Truth, God, and the realisation of divine and profound peace.

Strive to rise, by the power of meditation, above all selfish clinging to partial gods or party creeds ; above dead formalities and lifeless ignorance.

Remember that you are to grow into Truth by steady perseverance.

[U]Twenty-Fourth Morning[/U]

Not by learning will a man triumph over
evil; not by much study will he overcome
sin and sorrow. Only by conquering
himself will he conquer evil; only by
practising righteousness will he put an
end to sorrow.

Not for the clever, nor the learned, nor
the self-confident is the Life Triumphant,
but for the pure, the virtuous and wise.
The former achieve their particular success
in life, but the latter alone achieve the
great success so invincible and complete
that even in apparent defeat it shines with
added victory.

[U]Twenty-Fourth Evening[/U]

The true silence is not merely a silent
tongue; it is a silent mind. To merely hold
one’s tongue, and yet to carry about a
disturbed and rankling mind, is no remedy
for weakness, and no source of power.

Silentness, to be powerful, must
envelop the whole mind, must permeate
every chamber of the heart; it must be
the silence of peace.

To this broad, deep, abiding silentness
a man attains only in the measure that
he conquers himself.

I apologize if this thread seems absurd, or such a weird topic for this section. Surely if there was a more appropriate section for a thread of this nature, I would have posted it there, and don’t mind if I am mistaken in that if there is one I am ok having it moved.

:26:

Desire for money can be so polluting to one walking a spiritual path. I respect people treading all paths in life. We all come from the same Source after all, you don’t even need to be spiritual to respect that idea. Think Source Energy, and physics will surely provide ample evidence to agree everything in existence emanates from one great Well of universal energy. Lao Tzu picked up on it thousands of years ago, and I am sure in time physics research will keep making discoveries much in line with ancient Eastern ideas proposed by Sages thousands and thousands of years ago.

A book recommendation,

The Diamond Cutter: The Buddha on Managing Your Business and Your Life

[B][I]MONK MODE WARNING[/I][/B]

[B]Believe that a life of perfect holiness is possible.
[/B][B][I]
August Twenty-fifth.[/I][/B]

SO believing, so aspiring, so meditating, divinely sweet and beautiful will be your spiritual experiences, and glorious the revelations that will enrapture your inward vision. As you realise the divine Love, the divine Justice, the Perfect Law of Good, or God, great will be your bliss and deep your peace. Old things will pass away, and all things will become new. The veil of the material universe, so dense and impenetrable to the eye of error, so thin and gauzy to the eye of Truth, will be lifted and the spiritual universe will be revealed. Time will cease, and you will live only in Eternity. Change and mortality will no more cause you anxiety and sorrow, for you will become established in the unchangeable, and will dwell in the very heart of immortality.

He who believes climbs rapidly the heavenly hills.
[U]
Twenty-Fifth Morning[/U]

By curbing his tongue, a man gains
possession of his mind.

The fool babbles, gossips, argues,
and bandies words. He glories in the fact
that he has had the last word, and has
silenced his opponent. He exults in his
own folly, is ever on the defensive, and
wastes his energies in unprofitable channels.
He is like a gardener who continues to dig
and plant in unproductive soil.

The wise man avoids idle words, gossips,
vain argument, and self-defence. He is
content to appear defeated; rejoices when
he is defeated; knowing that, having found
and removed another error in himself, he
has thereby become wiser.
Blessed is he who does not strive for
the last word.

[U]Twenty-Fifth Evening[/U]

Desire is the craving for possession; aspiration
is the hunger of the heart for peace.

The craving for things leads ever
farther and farther from peace, and not
only ends in deprivation, but is in itself
A state of perpetual want. Until it comes
to an end, rest and satisfaction are
impossible.

The hunger for things can never be
satisfied, but the hunger for peace can,
and the satisfaction of peace is found-
is fully possessed, when all selfish desire is
abandoned. Then there is fullness of joy,
abounding plenty, and rich and complete
blessedness.