Yesterday’s reading said:
You give through thought.
There is literally no other way to give.
Today’s reading asks us to take discernment beyond thought. It asks us to practice discernment regarding the actions we take in the world.
That brings up a question:
If we give through thought and there is no other way to give, do actions matter?
Today’s reading teaches that our actions do matter, because all action is an expression of thought.
For example:
On Day 165, I mentioned that I used to parent through yelling. When I practiced inquiry, I found that I yelled because of a mind-made law that said, “Daughters are supposed to always happily obey their mothers.” Yelling was an expression of that untrue idea. If I had said, “I see that idea, and I don’t believe it anymore,” but continued to yell, that would not have been honest. I yelled, because I believed the thought. My action demonstrated the belief.
When we practice discernment regarding the actions we take, we are practicing discernment regarding thought, because action is an expression of thought.
For example:
Imagine a woman wants her son to accept one job offer over another job offer. She notices she feels a lot of anxiety about her son’s decision, so she practices root cause inquiry to discover the cause of the anxiety. She discovers that she is embarrassed when she thinks about telling people her son is a trash man, and she feels better when she thinks about telling people he works for the state highway authority. As she inquires further, she realizes her anxiety is caused by her own sense of unworthiness.
The next day, her son calls to let her know what he’s decided. As he explains why he is going to accept the job as trash collector, she notices a strong desire to change his mind. She wants to point out the disadvantages of that job and emphasize the advantages of the job with the highway authority. If she follows that temptation, she will enliven the idea of her own unworthiness, since the belief in her unworthiness is at the root of the temptation. If she chooses to stay quiet, listen to her son and practice rest-accept-trust with her feelings, she permits a false idea to weaken in her mind.
It is important to note that changing what we do because we want truth and changing what we do because we think we are guilty for doing it are not the same motive. The first is genuinely helpful. The second continues to clog the creative principle with untruth, since guilt is an untrue idea.
Note: The next tip will be available tomorrow morning after 3:50am ET at this link.
