After the first few years the prayer discipline was completelyunnecessary, because I had learned to pray without ceasing. I made thecontact so thoroughly that into my prayer consciousness I put anycondition or person in the world I am concerned about and the resttakes place automatically.
Occasionally some condition is brought back into my consciousmind because I need to really concentrate on it. If some person is indire difficulty, and that person returns to my mind for thought, Isometimes use the prayer of visualization, which has always beenvery natural for me, but I understand not so for everybody. I reachout—my divine nature reaches out—to contact their divine nature.
Then I have the feeling of lifting them, lifting them, lifting them, andI have the feeling of bringing God’s light to them. I try to envisionthem bathed in God’s light, and finally I do see them standing andreaching out their arms bathed in golden light. At that point I leavethem in God’s hands.
In all people I meet—though some may be governed by the selfcenterednature and may not know their potential at all—I see thatdivine spark, and that’s what I concentrate on. All people look beautifulto me; they look like shining lights to me. I always have the feelingof being thankful for these beautiful people who walk the earthwith me.
So I would say part of my prayer is a feeling of thankfulness, andof course a feeling of genuine love for all of God’s children and all ofGod’s creation. Prayer is a concentration of positive thoughts.That’sa little bit about prayer.
Ways of Prayer.
You can visualize God’s light each day and send it to someonewho needs help.Your divine nature must reach out and touch thedivine nature of another. Within you is the light of the world, it mustbe shared with the world.
Visualize a golden light within you and spread it out. First tothose about you—your circle of friends and relatives—and thengradually to the world. Keep on visualizing God’s golden lightsurrounding our earth.
And if you have a problem, take the matter to God in prayer,and visualize it in God’s hands. Then leave it, knowing it is inthe best possible hands, and turn your attention to other things.
That’s not the only prayer you can pray, but I have discoveredthat for some who were in very great trouble, this prayer of visualizationwas helpful to them. I’ve heard of results later, so I do a littleof this.
There is also a constant prayer of thankfulness—I am constantlythankful. The world is so beautiful, I am thankful. I have endlessenergy, I am thankful. I am plugged into the source of UniversalSupply, I am thankful. I am plugged into the source of UniversalTruth, I am thankful. I have this constant feeling of thankfulness,which is a prayer.
When you’re learning, it’s true it may be valuable to take specialtimes, even to use special forms... I can see that.
Several times people have written to me and said, “Peace, willyou pray with me at four o’clock in the afternoon or nine o’clock inthe evening, which is such and such a time, daylight saving time?” Iwrite and tell them, “You don’t have to figure all that out for me—plug in at anytime and you will be praying with me, and I will be prayingwith you, because I pray without ceasing.”
Praying without ceasing is not ritualized, nor are there evenwords. It is a constant state of awareness of oneness with God; it is asincere seeking for a good thing; and it is a concentration on thething sought, with faith that it is obtainable. All right prayer has goodeffect, but if you give your whole life to the prayer you multiply itspower ...No one really knows the full power of prayer. Of course,there is a relationship between prayer and action. Receptive prayerresults in an inner receiving, which motivates to right action.
Let me tell you a story about an answer to prayer. I was pickedup late one night by a young policeman as I was walking along alonely highway. I believe he was thinking in terms of protective custody.
He said to me,“Why, nobody in this town would walk out alongthis highway at this time of night.”
I said to him,“Well, you see, I walk completely without fear.ThereforeI’m not attracting things which are not good. It says, That which Ifeared came upon me. But I fear nothing and expect only good.”
He took me in anyhow, and I found myself in a cell.The floor waslittered with old newspapers and cigarette butts and every old thing.
The accommodations consisted of a single mattress on the floor andfour ragged blankets. There were two women attempting to sleeptogether on that single mattress.They told me there had been eightwomen in that cell the night before with those accommodations.
There was a rather nice feeling among the prisoners in general.Theysaid to me, “You’ll need to have two blankets because you’ll be sleepingon the floor.” So I took a newspaper and cleared a place on thefloor, then put one blanket down and the other blanket over me andslept comfortably enough.
It wasn’t the first time I had slept on a cement floor, nor the last.
If you’re relaxed you can sleep anywhere. When I woke up in themorning I saw this man staring through the bars. I said to him,“Whattime does court convene?” He said, “I don’t know.” I said, “Well,aren’t you a policeman?” “No,” he said, “I just like to look at thegirls.” It was one of the town sports.Anyone could come in right offthe street and see what they had there today: “Let’s go look at thegirls!”
One of the women was middle aged and was being held for beingdrunk and disorderly. It was her seventh offense, she told me, so itwasn’t so hard on her. But the other was an eighteen year old girl.
She felt her entire life was ruined because of this experience. I said,“It’s my second time and I certainly don’t think my life is ruined!” Igot her all cheered up and we talked about what she’d do when shegot out. She was to get out that day or the next day.
Then they changed the guards. I never saw a matron. The newguard saw me and said, “What are you doing in there? I saw yourpicture in the newspaper. I heard you over the air.” Then they just letme go.
But before I left I got a broom from the man who cleaned uparound there and gave it to the girls so they could clean up their cell.
I also got them a comb; their hair was all matted.They had been thereabout a week without a comb.
What I really wanted to tell you is that the eighteen year old girlwas a deeply religious person. She had been desperately praying forhelp. I believe that I was picked up off the highway that night and setbehind prison bars in answer to her prayers.
The most important part of prayer is what we feel, not what wesay.We spend a great deal of time telling God what we think shouldbe done, and not enough time waiting in the stillness for God to tellus what to do.
Now, beside God’s laws, which are the same for all of us, thereis also God’s guidance and that is unique for every human soul. If youdon’t know what God’s guidance for your life is, you might try seekingin receptive silence. I used to walk receptive and silent amidst thebeauties of nature.Wonderful insights would come to me which Ithen put into practice in my life.
You might prefer listening to beautiful, uplifting music, readinga few beautiful words and pondering on them.To me, the beauties ofnature were always the most inspiring, and so actually that was mytime alone with God. It didn’t last more than an hour, if that, and Igot so much from it.
Now the young folks talk to me today about things like breathingexercises and meditation techniques, which in some cultures aredefinitely religious practices. But I say, look what I got from my timealone with God: From the beauty around me, my inspiration; fromthe silent receptiveness, my meditation; and from my walking, notonly my exercise but my breathing. Four things at once! I believe inmaking very good use of my time. And you can’t be too pushy whenyou’re doing four things at once.
Foolish people have sometimes used very strenuous breathingexercises or meditation techniques that tore them apart and pushedthem into an undesirable state instead of into the spiritual state. (Yes,that was long before psychedelic drugs!) I always think of the bud ofa flower. If you give it proper conditions it will open into a beautifulflower, but if you’re impatient and try to tear the petals open youpermanently injure the flower for the earth life. The flower can beequated with the earthly human life. Give the spiritual growing-upthe proper growing conditions and it will open into a thing of beauty.
When you feel the need of a spiritual lift, try getting to bed earlyand get up early to have a quiet time at dawn.Then carry the serene“in tune” feeling that comes to you into your day, no matter what youmay be doing.
For those of you who are seeking the spiritual life, I recommendthese four daily practices: Spend time alone each day in receptivesilence. When angry, or afflicted with any negative emotion, taketime to be alone with God. (Do not talk with people who are angry;they are irrational and cannot be reasoned with. If you or they areangry, it is best to leave and pray.) Visualize God’s light each day andsend it to someone who needs help. Exercise the body, it is thetemple of the soul.
On Fasting.
I have been asked about my forty-five day period of prayer andfasting. I undertook it as a prayer discipline, to keep me concentratedon my prayer for peace. It was in the second year of my pilgrimagewhen I was coming slowly back across the country and I wasn’t walkingextensively.
Fasting can have a great deal of spiritual significance, and thoughI had already found inner peace, it may have been that the fast helpedme to learn to pray without ceasing.
While I fasted I was at the home of a chiropractor who used fastingfor healing. He wanted to see how a well person would react toa fast because he had never fasted a well person. I talked to him as afriend; he just observed me, he didn’t examine me. (There are manydoctors, including medical doctors, who are my friends—but noneof them have ever treated me or even examined me. Although occasionallya dentist friend will repair an old cavity which came from mypoor eating habits in younger days.) The last meal before my fast wasa grapefruit and two oranges, so I wasn’t thirsty.The first three dayswere undertaken without food or water. After that I took distilledwater at room temperature. Nothing else. And when I broke my fastit was not unusual—it was the regular way to break a fast.The juiceof one freshly squeezed orange every hour the first day. The juice oftwo freshly squeezed oranges, alternating with the juice of onegrapefruit, every two hours the second day. A grapefruit and twooranges three times the third day, and after that adding a little bituntil in a week I was able to eat full rations.
It was no different from the usual pattern of fasting. I did obeythe laws of fasting: no extreme exertion. I did not walk long distances,though I did walk some. I did some typing for the doctor. Ityped until he took the typewriter away about a month along in thefast. He didn’t think I ought to handle it anymore, so then I wrote byhand, which was really harder than typing. But I do the best I canwith these things.
I didn’t go in and talk to his patients as much as I would haveliked to because he didn’t want me to move around that much. I didgo to see them occasionally to help keep up their spirits.
Once during my fast—I remember I was in a state betweenwakefulness and sleep—I looked up and saw a dismal cross aboveme. It was just hanging there, and I knew someone must take up theburden. I reached up to accept it and I was immediately lifted abovethe cross where all was light and beauty. All that was needed was thewillingness to accept the burden—and then I was raised above it.
Instead of hardships, I found a wonderful sense of peace and joy.
On Healing.
One must be very careful when praying for others to pray for theremoval of the cause and not the removal of the symptom. A simplehealing prayer is this:
“Bring this life into harmony with Divine Purpose...may thislife come into harmony with God’s Will. May you so live that allwho meet you will be uplifted, that all who bless you will be blessed,that all who serve you will receive the greatest satisfaction. If anyshould attempt to harm you, may they contact your thought of Godand be healed.”
Eager beaver psychic healers are those who work on the removalof symptoms and not the removal of cause. When you desire phenomena,you possess phenomena; you do not get God. Let’s say I ama psychic healer living next door to you, and you have chosen tocome into this life to face some kind of physical symptom until youhave removed the cause. Well, when the symptom manifests, Iremove it. And so the symptom manifests again, and I then remove itagain, and I manage to keep that symptom removed.
When you step over to the disembodied side of life, for anotherreason altogether, instead of blessing me for having removed thesymptom you’ll say, “That meddler! I came to solve this problem butshe kept removing the symptom and therefore I never solved it!”
That’s what I mean when I speak about some who are content todeal with the removal of symptoms.When one meddles in the life ofanother it will just cause the symptoms not only to re-manifest, butcarry over into another lifetime. Most healers do not know this andthey go on merrily removing symptoms.
I admit that a long time ago, before I really knew what I wasdoing, when working with people who had problems I comfortedthem by putting my hands on the back of their neck and the forehead.
I certainly wouldn’t do that now. I did not realize I was doinganything but to comfort. Now I place any problem into my prayerconsciousness. I place it into the best possible hands—God’s hands,and turn my attention to other things.
The Power of Thought.
Are you a slave to your self-centered nature, or does your divinenature guide your life? Do you know that every moment of your lifeyou’re creating through thought? You create your own inner condition;you’re helping create the conditions around you.
Christian teachings tell us that “As a man thinketh in his heart, so ishe.” Which is saying very clearly that we are creating the conditionsaround us. If we could look a bit more deeply into life, we might seethat physical difficulties are reflections of spiritual difficulties, andthat negative thoughts and feelings are much more harmful than diseasegerms.
If you realized how powerful your thoughts are, you would neverthink a defeatist or negative thought. Since we create throughthought, we need to concentrate very strongly on positive thoughts.
If you think you can’t do something, you can’t. But if you think youcan, you may be surprised to discover that you can. It is importantthat our thoughts be constantly for the best that could happen in asituation—for the good things we would like to see happen.
I have met some NewAge people who had heard some predictionof disaster and were actually concentrating on that.What a terriblething to do! Why, we’re creating every moment of our lives throughthought.And we’re helping to create the conditions around us.
When you hear of any predictions of disaster there’s a reason forit.The reason is that you are to throw the entire weight of your positivethought in the opposite direction.
For instance, when there were dozens of predictions that half ofCalifornia was to slide into the sea from a terrible earthquake, Ideliberately planned to be in that section of California.There wasn’ta tremor. But I missed some of my friends who were on the eastcoast, playing it safe.
Remember where it says there shall be prophecies and they shallfail? Why is it? Because all you can predict is the trend of things.Youcan never say what the outcome will be, because we are constantlyable to turn that prediction in another direction, in a positive directionif we get together on that.
Every good thing you do, every good thing you say, every goodthought you think, vibrates on and on and never ceases. The evilremains only until it is overcome by the good, but the good remainsforever.
Just concentrate on thinking and living and acting in harmonywith God’s laws and inspiring others to do likewise.
Every time you meet a person, think of some encouraging thingto say—a kind word, a helpful suggestion, an expression of admiration.
Never think of any right effort as being fruitless. All right effortbears fruit, whether we see the results or not.
Be a sweet melody in the great orchestration, instead of a discordantnote. The medicine this sick world needs is love. Hatred mustbe replaced by love, and fear by faith that love will prevail.
A song has this phrase: Love is flowing like a river, flowing out fromyou and me. Spreading out into the desert, setting all the captives free.
Yes, the captives are those who don’t know who they are, thosewho don’t know they are God’s children.
Remember this: Be still and know that I am God. Don’t ever forgetwho you are! You cannot be where God is not.
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