1948 - 2025

GIST MAGAZINE

Autumn 2008

GIST Magazine
Swiss student Beatrice Enz reads her lesson in the Absolute Monastery garden with Rex at her feet.

In This Issue:

God's Pocket
An Amish Miracle

Serendipity
Wild Metaphysicians!

EJ Shares
Giving-Receiving

Practitioner Letter
Practice, Practice, Practice

Affirmation Column
Happy Birthday Celebration

 

Practitioner Letter - Autumn 2008 Issue

The Bees Do It

THE PHILOSOPHY I have chosen to live is not a dogmatic recital of intellectual truisms. It is about applying the simple principle of speaking the truth about myself and my world - and in this sense the truth is the metaphysical essence of my being. The essence of my being is god as the creative cause and allness of all that is - simply said, there is only one god and that god is all there is.

Very early in my acquaintance with the UNI teachings I learned one important affirmation of truth; I know that I know that I know; god in me is the answer. It did take me a while though to understand that god and the concept of omniscience are not separate from me or from anything else. This omniscience is a reality and it is in us and through us. It is omni - it is in everything. The more I affirm this simple truth, the more I become aware of that inner unlimited storehouse of knowledge that is available inside of me.

Now, when I proctor lessons and reviews of students here at the University of Healing, I encourage them to use examples from their daily life, where they have thought their thought and spoken their word for a given solution. It is not just for the sharing the stories, but for them to become aware how they practice applying the principle, maybe by not even being conscious of having done so. It’s like with everything else in life - the more I practice something the more habitual it becomes.

These days I was thinking about how aware I am of speaking my word for casual little things in my life - of how I practice speaking my word instantly in a given situation. First thing that came to my mind was the can of coffee I bought a couple of weeks ago on my shopping day in town. As always my car was full of groceries when I came home - but I could not find the can of coffee. I said to myself, I have the coffee now, but it never surfaced until it dawned on me that I must have left it in the store. Well, it was about ten days later when I went to town again. The moment I entered the store with no receipt of purchase, nonetheless, a store sales lady came walking towards me, obviously with the intention of ending her shift. She saw the searching look on my face and asked if she could help. A glance at her badge revealed her as the manager of customer service. I told her my story and she smiled. "Honey, after 10 days none of us would remember a left-coffee-can - but if you have not found it at home, just go and grab yourself another one" - and with that she walked out of the door. I have my coffee now!

How perfect, and what a good start of my shopping day! Later, when I had put away some bags of food at Trader Joe’s, I could not find my car key. It must be in the car I told myself, because I have opened the doors to put away the groceries - but I could not find it! I stepped back for a moment, took a deep breath and said, I know that I know that I know - and as if on an inner string I walked to the rear passenger door and as it was sliding open, I saw my key neatly bundled next to the big blue cool box. And just to fill the example box with three stories - when I dusted my house on Saturday afternoon, the electricity in the corner where my bed stands did not work. I tried to change the light bulb, pulled out the power strip and plugged everything in separately - to no avail.

So I decided to go and pick up our Saturday evening movie at the video store. I stopped thinking of the "problem" and drove peacefully out of our main gate. Suddenly, as I am driving along, my inner wisdom paints a picture on the canvas of my awareness - me, while dusting, fumbling on two apparently useless switches at the back door - and while I look at the picture in my mind, the clear understanding comes to me that I had turned off the electricity to my corner with one of the switches. And - so it was!

The greatest lesson I learned from my little awareness game is the lesson of speaking my word instantly, before the spider webs of conflicting illusions start to cover the neat and clear solution of the first thought. Get my bloated nothingness out of the way of my divine wisdom - my thoughts of logic and reason. Speaking my word is a habit and as every good habit it needs my practice, practice, practice!

And then - when I have learned to listen to my first thought I am never aware of a problem anymore - because I live, I am, the solution before it needs to be called a solution. Smile.

—Dr Sylvia M Enz