Happy Sunday from Tian and Marsha!
Welcome to Week 6 of the Life’s Word Experiment. We hope you’re finding it most interesting as it works on you; Marsha (marsha@marshasummers.com) and I love your feedback. Remember, you can also post your comments for all to see on Marsha’s blog.
Jason (aka James) is still in hospital, mending up from his motorcycle accident. Thank you to all who’ve sent good wishes, accurate reporting, and prayers his way. I will continue to send the weekly reminders until he’s back on the job. Thanks for bearing with this one as the waters are navigated for the first time!
Remember, you can read (or copy) the entire workshop at:
http://www.marshasummers.com/innerman/lwworkshoppart1.htm
on Marsha’s website: www.marshasummers.com
And thanks to Steven Coleman, you can also listen to the chapters by going to: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/3zd34dd8r8kh3s1/rsBi6noLwx
In joy!
Tian
PS: As always, please do not reply directly to this email, but to teachings@marshasummers.com or to the entire group by posting on Marsha’s blog or to our personal emails.
VI
Sixth Mystery: Giving
You wanna take a break or you wanna wait ‘til I get through with the next little mystery here? Ok, we’ll go to Number 6. We got five. So far they all look kinda sensible even, don’t they? We’ll take a break after this one here.
The Sixth Mystery is the mystery of Giving.
Now this really gets with it.
Behold I have set My sun in the sky, and the light in which it lives is the light that radiates itself.
That’s the only light around the sun is the sun it radiates, ok?
It is not lighted by reason of any light which comes to it,
Nothin’ out there brighter than it is or gets anywheres near it.
…but only by reason of that light which goes out from it. So unto you I have given the power to radiate My love, My happiness, My health, My wealth, My vitality and My wisdom.
Ok? “I have given the power unto you.” Each and every one of you. “So unto you I have given the power to radiate My love, My happiness, My health, My wealth, My vitality and My wisdom.” You already have that ability, ok?
And as the sun cannot live in any light except that which it radiates or gives out, so is it impossible for you to live in any light that you do not radiate.
…nor have any Life, and love, and happiness, and health, and wealth, and vitality and wisdom, which is all called light. That’s what is meant by “light” – all those things.
Now the only bit of that I will ever live in is what I can radiate. So why not just radiate me a whole gob of it if I like it, huh? There’s nothin’ wrong with it, nobody keepin’ me from it. Is there, Mack? Nobody keepin’ me from it. So if I want to have light which is love, happiness, health, wealth, vitality, and wisdom, that is what is meant by light – not light comin’ through the ceiling up here. That is the light that we can live in – is that which we radiate.
You cannot obtain love by getting it from without,
You know, I would never know whether anybody loves me or not. I can know how they treat me. I can see when you treat me nicely and caringly and all that. I can see that, but I don’t know whether that’s from love or you figured it was to your advantage to do it that way. I don’t know. It may be a big act for all I know, huh?
You cannot obtain love by getting it from without, even as the sun cannot obtain light by getting it from without.
The sun don’t get any light from outside of itself. It’s got its own source goin’, huh? So if you love, you will feel that everybody loves you. But if you don’t love, you’re always questioning and wondering and doubting and all that good stuff – that about right?
Happiness is constantly yours to the extent that you do give it out.
So if you pitch out a little joy as you go through this world, an awful lot you’re livin’ in then. You don’t get back – you’re just living in it. You’re already spreading it around you, so it’s like you’re sitting in the middle of that light thing. It’s all around you then.
Seeking happiness from without and drawing it to the self is its own destruction.
Now I’ve had many people come to me and say, “I’d just give anything to be happy.” I said, “Well fine, the day you don’t give a damn whether you’re happy or not, you’ll find you are.” Try it on for size someday. As long as you’re tryin’ to be happy, you’re checkin’ up every minute and it don’t seem you are. But if you don’t care whether you’re happy or not, what kind of state are you in? Wouldn’t trade with nobody in all the world, you know it? Because you’re not tryin’ to make yourself happy. You’re not checkin’ up on it. Happiness is like a body. No self-respecting body will work well while being spied on; and happiness couldn’t stay around if you’re checkin’ up on it every minute. So…
Happiness is constantly yours to the extent that you do give it out. Seeking happiness from without, and drawing it to the self, is its own destruction. The desire to obtain happiness from without gives the sense of the lack of happiness. This sense is the only unhappiness.
Isn’t that funny? And that is a fact – I’ve checked up on that one for years. The only way you ever feel unhappy is when you’re tryin’ to be happy by trying to get it. “If I had this”, and “if I had that”. . . .
For a while, I run a little thing on Tuesday nights. We give a talk for an hour or so every Tuesday night out in California and there was a bunch of people came, and they would bring me letters of all the things they wanted. One lady started in with what she wanted. Started out with a yellow corvette, and then it went to a man who makes ten million a year and already has a lot, and he would let her have an affair every year with some guy named Erhardt or somethin’ or other – and this went on and on. Now this is all she required to be happy. It was about eight pages. I still have the thing; I’ll let you read it sometime. About eight pages of just this and this and this, and then she’d be happy. Now, if she had all that, she wouldn’t be. I know that. Because she’d know she must have forgotten something.
So as long as you’re trying to be happy, you won’t be. And when you say, “What difference does it make? Who am I that I should be happy? It’s pretty wonderful just like it is without it,” you’ll find you are bubblin’ over with joy from there on. You like to be happy, Mary?
(Yes.)
Good. You see there’s no reason not to be happy because it’s already been given to us as a gift. But we ignore the gift and start running around lookin’ under rocks trying to find it.
All things drawn towards the self prove, when obtained, to be but the mirage of the desert.
Isn’t that funny? When you’re gonna try and get it, it’s gonna make you happy. When you get it, it has about the same validity as the mirage in the desert. You know it can look so real out there. I’ve been driving across the desert and see a beautiful seashore with palm trees and even a big pretty boat in it. When I get up there, it’s just sand hills. It just all disappears.
The anxiety to get for the self from without proves always disappointing.
That’s when we settle it – one simple little statement which we throw around. You know I don’t think in these terms, these pretty words. “Whenever I make anything important, I am anxious.” You wanna try that one out? Anytime you make anything important, whether it’s to feel good or be happy, or be helpful or contribute somethin’ great to the world, to be creative or all these wonderful things that people lay out that they just want – as long as you make it important, you will be anxious.
Whenever I make anything important, I am anxious. When you see that nothin’s important – it’s just a very interesting, delightful thing set up here that Life’s runnin’, why then you’re not anxious. So the anxiety or the importance to get for the self from without proves always disappointing because all realities radiate from within. Where does health come from? I radiate it out. Where does joy come from? You radiate it out. We have talked about that if you act a certain way, you will begin to feel that way. In other words, you begin to radiate it, right? So if I act miserable, how will I feel? If I act very joyful and happy and delighted and see nothin’ but expressions of Life around me, what am I radiating? What am I doing? I’m pushin’ it out.
Health is from within only. All attempts to gain health from without are likened unto the sun should it attempt to draw back light unto itself.
Can you imagine givin’ the sun a couple of pills? You know, so it will work better? Thing’s got spots on it, you know – it’s got pimples. You know that every day – the thing’s got pimples all over it. Can you imagine us getting us some good pills and getting a big gun and shooting them up there for it to get rid of its sun spots? It’s got pimples on it – probably ulcers.
Such an attempt would, if it could succeed, result in darkness. When you do receive my health, whether I inspire one of my other bodies to draw it forth or whether you are inspired with it, you will find it to be a fountain within you and not an external force which you can draw unto you.
You’re not going to find the Fountain of Youth out there in Florida, New Mexico or Alabama or any other glorious spot in the country. You’re not going to find health in a bottle or in pills or in anything else. It’ll come from within or you won’t know about it. It comes from within when you begin to express health. But most people express illnesses. As I said, you ask, “How are you?” and you get an organ recital. Hmm?
All that you are you give out. If, therefore, you give not anything, you, the self, are not that thing. To be anything is to possess that thing, so I say unto you that you have nothing but what you are. Yet you are I, Myself, and therefore do possess all things. Herein is the Sixth Mystery.
You own everything that you care to express. You want love, express it – then you have it. You want joy, express it – you have it. You want peace, express it—you have it. You want wealth, express it – you have it. You want energy, express it and you’ll have it. Whatever you can come up with. You only have that which you care to express, and you already have it because Life is what you really are, and Life is all things if you will but express it.
Now, it’s not gonna run away with you. It’ll let you sit there and listen to the not-I’s and be mournful and miserable and pathetic and really need sympathy. If nobody else, you can give it to yourself, can’t you, Mary? You won’t believe it, but you are.
My wealth is the possession of all things. Gold unused is not wealth.
You can’t eat it, wear it, play with it or much of anything else. All you can do is leave it sitting around, huh?
Silver or lands or houses or raiment – not one of these is wealth unless used.
Gotta use it or it’s no good to you, is that right? You could have a closet full of beautiful gowns, and if you didn’t wear ‘em, they might as well been old cut up newspaper patterns hangin’ in there, is that right? Wouldn’t do you any more good one way or the other. Had millions of dollars all stored up in money market funds, why, you’d be just as poor as you could be, still be eatin’ out of garbage cans. Most people don’t eat out of garbage cans physically. They do mentally. But…
So I say unto you that use is the only wealth.
I think that is worthwhile remembering—“use is the only wealth”. If I don’t express happiness, what’s the use of havin’ it, huh? I couldn’t say I had it unless I expressed it or use it. Not one of anything is wealth until used.
So I say unto you that use is the only wealth. He who spends a small silver piece with a free hand is wealthier in that moment than he who has hoarded millions, and used them not.
That right? He went out and spent you a quarter for something and really enjoyed it, and the other man got millions and he had to hang onto it and he’s afraid to spend it because somethin’ might happen to him. Who had the most wealth? Who’s the wealthiest at the moment, huh? Not who has it, but who is the wealthiest? The man who’s enjoyin’ the quarter.
The Divine sense of wealth is from within and radiates outward.
It’s not from numbers on the outside radiating inward.
It is not helped nor hindered by external circumstances.
It isn’t hindered by having a few million dollars layin’ around. It isn’t helped either. No problem there.
Neither debts and slavery nor piles of gold and mastery over others, at all affects Life.
Doesn’t do a thing for it, doesn’t affect your sense of wealth at all.
If you feel rich, you give out that feeling and freely give to whatsoever you do feel like giving.
So if you really feel wealthy, man it’s pretty liberal, is that right? But if you feel poor, no matter how many millions you got, you’re hard up.
But giving with a desire to accomplish some purpose is not free giving and is not a sign of My inward wealth.
Now, that one you know. If you give in order to get a write off, why you’re really wasn’t givin’. You was just maneuverin’ a little bit. I have a lot of people call me up and says, “Have you got a non-profit corporation or somethin’? I’ll give you some money.” That’s so they get a write off. But you know I say no, I don’t have those things. Just drop it on me, I’ll spend it. “Oh, well, I don’t get a write off then by just givin’ it to you.” So well, now then that kind of gets down to where the givin’ is, do you see? There’s no giving when you’re just gonna get a write off. That’s just maneuverin’ Uncle, hopin’ you can maneuver a little bit out of him, isn’t that right? What’s wrong with just givin’ somebody something if you want to? I think the post is, we don’t wanna give, we wanna get a write off. You see, there’s a difference. So then we can say, “I give,” but really I didn’t give, I bought myself a write off somewheres on a tax-deductible item.
But giving with a desire to accomplish some purpose is not free giving and is not a sign of My inward wealth.
…this feeling of wealth.
Whatever the purpose may be, whether it is to alter the circumstance of others for their good as you see it, or to satisfy those who make a demand upon you, or to put others under an obligation to you,
That’s a pretty good one you know. You give somebody something, now they’re obligated to you. They gotta give you somethin’ back. They don’t give you something and then, “After all, look at the way you treated me, hmm? After all I have given you?” That is to put people under demands. That’s makin’ people sign a promissory note without them knowing they did so. That’s really trickery.
… to put others under an obligation to you, or to obtain the world’s praise for your generosity you express –
That is a good one, too.
yet it is “your purpose”, and the giving is done to accomplish your own will, and is not free giving, but is a buying [of something].
Whether you’re buying approval, whether you’re buying obligation on somebody or whether you’re buyin’ a write off, or whatever it is, it’s still buying and is not giving.
Yet, do I not forbid you to buy thus,
You can buy all you want to. Life’s not gonna tell you not to. It’s not going to forbid you to do anything.
for until you can be free, you must be bound.
Not because Life’s going to bind you, but because you won’t take the strings off.
If, then, you have the thought that love can be obtained from others – from without thee – you feel lonely and unloved. If you have the thought that happiness consists of outward things, or can be obtained through them,
“If you have the thought that happiness consists of outward things, or can be obtained through them,” …you know, new cars, new homes, new clothes, trips, etcetera and etcetera, and all the other little prestige items… then it’s kinda kiddin’ you.
you do thus create for the self a torment of unhappiness.
And how.
If you have the thought that health is to be obtained from without, from diet, or medicine, or influence, and do therefore endeavor to draw health towards the self, then you do cause the condition you call sickness.
And it can be not only sick from trying to be healthy, but you can get sick from tryin’ to be happy. It all works on any of those things, if you want to call them that. Anything you’re strugglin’ to get which is gonna make you happy or healthy or wealthy or wise – when you try to get it – will usually have the affect of making you rather sickish to say the least.
My law is a Mystery unto you because I say you live in what you do radiate outward, and you die in what you call towards yourself.
What you’re trying to call into the self.
Herein is this Mystery, that getting destroys, and giving giveth life.
That’s the Mystery here. Getting destroys and giving gives life. Now we’ll just put it up there now. So getting destroys. That’s the struggle to get. Giving gives Life. That’s Life, a continuation, going on, light – all those things. That getting destroys and giving gives Life.
Call suffering unto you, and behold, it loses its power to hurt you.
Now come on, do your bit. I’m free to have all the discomforts and all these things. And you know, if I’m free to be miserable, you just can’t stay miserable very long. Did you ever freely try to worry up a storm ‘bout somethin’? What happened? It just falls apart right there in your hands. You can’t even do nothin’ with it. So if you’re free to die, you know, you’re still alive. But if you’re trying “not to get dead”, then there’s death around every corner, isn’t there? It’s hanging everywhere. It’s poisons and filth in the air and there’s destruction in the food and the water – all sorts of things. It’s just terrible.
Call suffering unto you and behold it loses it’s power to hurt you. Call happiness unto you and it loses its power to please you.
You try to get happy and you get all the things gonna make you happy and they don’t please anymore after you get ‘em.
Give suffering unto others and it eats into your own heart; give happiness unto others, sing unto them a song of gladness and joy, and it shall fill the heart with the beauty of sweetness of My love.
You know you can’t make anybody else happy, but you sure can pour a lot of pleasant stuff around. Sing ‘em a song. You don’t have to know a note to do that. You can sing a song. You can purr around them pretty good anywhere. But if you run up and give them your organ recital hoping they will be sorry for you, they walk away. Hmm?
You have no wisdom of your own until you hear My voice speaking from within the heart outward.
You know you really can have that happen to you, that you don’t know what to say, but you open your mouth and out comes a bit of wisdom. You even get to listen to it so that’s pretty nice too. Let that voice speak.
In that hour, you shall open the mouth and I will speak through it, and you shall live in the wisdom you give out.
Now that’s only when you don’t know what ought to be, and you open your mouth. This is in the Scripture in the New Testament. The man said if you’re called up before the judges, don’t prepare your piece as to what you’re gonna say. Just go down there and open your mouth, it’ll come out all right.
Yet it was My will that you should have long sought for love, trying to obtain it from without you and failing.
You know, that’s the only way you’re gonna find out anything is through experience. So it was wonderful that all of us went out searching that we would feel love by finding somebody to love me. “I’d be happy if I just had somebody to love me.” I’ve set through a lot of people that have told me that sad story. Said, “I’d just be so happy if somebody would love me.” I said, “Well, are you loveable?” Wouldn’t hurt you a little bit to be a little lovable once in a while, you know. Usually somebody will love you if you’re loveable. That seem reasonable? And maybe you’d have so much fun bein’ loveable you wouldn’t know whether they loved you or not and wouldn’t care.
And it was My will that you should have eagerly searched for happiness only to find that such a search is the only unhappiness.
Again, you learn from experiencing, not because somebody told us so. But maybe through all your searchin’ for happiness, you finally catch on to the joke. You know, you have a practical joke played on you enough times, you finally learn not to bite. So it’s a big practical joke to try to find love and happiness and wisdom and all these things out there. When you find out that the longer you struggle for ‘em is the only thing that keeps ‘em from bein’ there, looks like we would catch on to the joke. Mack, are you old enough to remember snipe hunts?
(Oh, yes, I was the farthest one.)
One. It’s been goin’ on since the day we been alive. (laughter) Don’t you see that? You been on more snipe hunts…
(I still got the bag.) (laughter)
All those other guys are goin’ out there, beatin’ the bushes and runnin’ the snipin’ attack while you sat out there all night waitin’ for ‘em, is that right? Are you catchin’ on? That’s what the whole world is – one big snipe hunt – while we’re all standin’ around holdin’ the bag. Can’t you catch on to that? Huh?
(Yep.)
Okay. I thought maybe you would finally catch on to that.
It was my will that you should seek health in vain among all the external imaginings of the brain.
That you should run from here to there and go to Mayo’s and back to Baylor and down to Houston. You know, the best place to go get well is a far distance. You know that. You know, the people in California go to the East coast. They go to John Hopkins. People over there come out to California to go to Pritikin Institute. Had an old gent, a very wealthy old man come in last week. He come from Connecticut out to Pritikins. Well, you know, all Pritikins does is starve you and walk you. And you can do that anywheres. Pritikin had taken his booze away from him and his cigars away from him, so he come to visit me. So I took him to lunch and he had two martinis and two cigars. He said, “God that feels good.” I said, “You’ll be back in the same boat you were in fore you left Connecticut.” So, you know, you’re gonna find it somewhere. He was feelin’ fine as long as he wasn’t killin’ himself. He hasn’t caught on. He’s still on a snipe hunt.
And it was My will that prompted you to think that wealth consisted in getting.
Another snipe hunt.
So I have called you that you may know by failure and heart burnings, that you cannot obtain anything from without you; and that you might struggle to be strong and thus develop the organs of the mind and the body to be fit to perfectly express My perfect love, My perfect happiness, My perfect health, My perfect vitality, and My perfect wisdom, from within.
You already got it, but you’re standin’ out in the swamp, in the cane break in a little narrow hog trough, holding the sack waiting for somebody to run the snipe in it. Huh? That right, Mack?
(You’d think you had the wrong size bag, right?)
No doubt, they’d run out before you could shut it.
Take the gift where you will. If you give it freely, you can only give it unto the self.
If you give out something, you actually give it to you. So if you radiate health, you’re the one that’s gettin’ healthy, not all those other jerks that’s not entitled to it out there. It’s you. If you’re expressing happiness, it’s you that gets the happiness; the others may be amused, laugh for a few minutes, but they’ll go back to mournful ‘fore morning. So you only give it to yourself.
Give in order to receive a blessing, if you will, but know that such giving is not giving at all in My sight.
Now, you can tell people, you know, give ‘em an order – get with it.
Give unto the preacher of different views of My truth to help the view you see is right, if you will. But know that such giving is really to serve your own purpose and accomplish your own will and is not giving at all.
You know if you give to the preacher to go out and convert the world to your viewpoint so you won’t have to bother with it, just give him a few thousand, you’re really doin’ it for yourself. You’re not giving anything, you’re buying more of “your way”, is that right? You know ‘what you ought to have’ so you’re trying to buy it while you’re away. Mordida. You know. Ever go to Mexico? If you want some little favor from any official, you leave some coins around when you shake his hand, preferably long green ones, and you get it done. That’s called “mordida”. And you didn’t give him a gift; you was buyin’ something. He treats it as a gift (non-taxable) and you freely gave it to him – under duress – if you wanted to get it done.
I require no man to give.
Life doesn’t care.
If you give because you think it will please Me, know that I’m already pleased with you,
So you don’t get anything done there, ok? So if you think, “Well, this will please Life if I go out and give something,” forget it. Life’s already pleased, pleased with you. And you’re not gonna influence it in that way.
and nothing which you can do can alter My pleasure nor can cause My displeasure.
In other words, you’re not going to upset Life, ok? Do as you will.
You have all favor in My sight now, and I would not have you do anything with the object of gaining My favor.
You know there’s a prayer we’ve told people sometimes to try to get the point across a little bit. We say that the perfect prayer is that you say, “Oh Lord, if I serve you because I desire to gain a heaven, deny it to me; and if I serve you, Oh Lord, to escape a hell, throw me in.” Now if you can do that, why you’re not really trying to do anything for a purpose, you know. One man said, “I said that prayer because you told it to me and he did throw me in.” It really wasn’t the way it works; but anyway, that’s the way he saw it.
Give love to obtain love from others if you will, but know that what you give with an object is not love, but desire.
So if you go out and, “I’m gonna love all these people so they’ll love me”, you’re just horse-trading. And you probably will lose because they may not want to exchange for your horse. So you might as well keep it to yourself.
That which you love for a purpose is blighted unto you by that desire.
You love it because it will do this for you or that for you. It’s already destroyed, it’s blighted; and it’s all made sick.
You have lost all you have loved, if the love has been only a desire to keep them. Learn then this Sixth Mystery, that you live only in what you radiate.
Now we put it here that “getting destroys and giving gives Life” which is that you’re living or dying in one or the other; so everything you have is in what you radiate. Now is it fairly easy to radiate whatever you would choose to do so? But most of us never think about radiating or givin’ it out. We think about getting it, that right? We are a “getting” society. We have been taught from infancy that if you get enough things and situations and circumstances, you’d be healthy and respectable, is that right? Hmm? If you own your own home, you can get credit and so forth. If you can pass the test, you can get credit. And you may not have any credit if you don’t do all properly, is that correct? So then, it’s quite free that we can have whatever you radiate. Now, let’s all kinda check up once in a while to see what I want to radiate. Now, it’s no certain thing. You can radiate whatever you want to, but it might be interesting to find out what we are radiating. You spose, Mack? Ok? Any more questions, comments, what have you here? We’re gonna take a break for a few minutes and then we will proceed to number seven.