Please read and contemplate the following commentary in the same way that you read and contemplate the Thought of Awakening each day. The commentaries are designed to enrich your understanding of the Thoughts of Awakening.

~Commentary on Surrender~

Surrender is an act of not knowing while also desiring to be led by knowledge.

Surrender is an intent. It is the intent to be used by all, for all, with the good of all as one’s only purpose.

True surrender cannot be accomplished by one who has his own best interests in mind, because when one has an eye on his own best interests, he has also defined himself as apart from the all.

One can only truly surrender when he forgets to consider his best interests, and he asks the allness to make of him a slave, because he knows that to serve without thinking is joy, and to think without serving is the cause of all pain.

~From our Holy Spirit

Note from Regina:  Sometimes in writings such as this one, people have a strong negative reaction to the word “slave.” In this case, “slave” is a devotional term. As you contemplate today’s commentary, consider this dictionary definition of slave:

A device that is directly responsive to another, such as a printer to a computer.

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link.

For the next several days, we will take a break from NTI to read and contemplate commentaries that support the current day’s Thought of Awakening. The commentaries are from Thoughts of Awakening: 365 Thoughts for Contemplation.

Please read and contemplate each commentary deeply, in the same way that you read and contemplate the Thought of Awakening. Each commentary is a gem in the treasure chest of spiritual wisdom.

~Commentary on the Inner Guiding Force~

 The inner guiding force is birthed from silence, which means “not thinking.” It is described as a prodding or nudging, because it moves to action without reason or justification. It leads to non-action without telling why.

The inner guiding force is a guiding force and not a forcing force, because the guiding force requires (or respects) your cooperation. It does not ask of you that which you do not want to give, and if you want to give what it does not ask, it surrenders and rearranges itself in response to you. It this way, it is a perfect leader, because it leads as it would have you follow and it follows as it would have you lead.

The inner guiding force is discussed as if it is a separate force, but it cannot be. It is the perfect attunement of the allness as oneness, because the oneness is allness and the allness is one.

You cannot go against the will of the inner guiding force, because the inner guiding force provides in response to you. And yet, you cannot know the fulfillment of your part as the inner guiding force unless you listen as it listens and act as it acts.

Through being one with the inner guiding force, you know yourself as one with it.

Through driving the inner guiding force, you experience yourself as separate, and yet you are experiencing yourself in a way that can never be true.

~From our Holy Spirit

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link.

Today’s reading says:

The world is an image in the mind, or better said, a picture-thought within the thought of spirit.

Let’s review the Four Principles of God and see how it compares to this excerpt from today’s reading:

First Principle of God– Pure, unmanifest, life-awareness; abstract, unlimited potentiality.

Second Principle of God– Consciousness, also known as I Am or Spirit. It can be called “the thought of spirit” since it is a thought born out of the unlimited potentiality of the First Principle.

Third Principle of God– The ongoing activity of creation, which occurs naturally through the declarative  interaction of consciousness with that which is witnessed.

Fourth Principle of God– Manifestation, which is the realm of appearance (experience and images). In other words, “a picture-thought within the thought of spirit.”

Today’s reading points out that although the Fourth Principle isn’t real, it is experienced. It doesn’t take much self-honesty at all to notice that you experience the world. If you don’t believe me, pinch yourself. You will experience the pinch.

One reason the world seems real is because we confuse experience with reality. We think that if we experience it, that means it is real. However, you have experienced many nighttime dreams. Were they real?

No, your nighttime dreams were not real.

Therefore, it is easy to see that experience is not the criterion for determining reality.

As we saw on Day 134, the criterion for determining reality is unchanging existence. The world does not meet that criterion, nor does experience, because experience is always changing. (For example, you no longer feel your pinch, do you? That experience has already disappeared.)

Since experience does not meet the criterion for reality, experience is not real. Clearly, the unreal is not a criterion for reality. Therefore, we cannot determine reality by experience.

But, with all of that said, we still experience experience, which is why you felt your pinch.

Because we confuse experience with reality, when experience isn’t reality, we need another way to perceive or interpret our experience. Today’s reading provides that new interpretation.

Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link.