Doing What I Could
Writing
Before Unity I did a lot of wishing and hoping. I had dreams, who doesn’t? I also had a lot of frustration, envy and despair. How on earth are you supposed to make your dreams come true? I had no idea. I knew you had to write them down as goals and picture them. But then how do you make them happen? They seemed like something you pursued in the outer. If you wanted to have more it was done by hard work.
I didn’t allow myself to write down the big dreams: being financially free, having a deeply meaningful loving relationship, fulfilling work, and being happy. I went for what I thought I could achieve: a new pair of shoes; a nicer place to rent. I wanted to get out of debt but I couldn’t see how I could ever achieve that.
Picturing
My goals then were largely driven by necessity. There was a time when my husband and I were needing to move from the house we were renting as the owners were coming back. So I cut out some pictures from a magazine of the sort of house I would love to live in. I chose a picture that was taken from inside a kitchen showing a beautiful wooden bench and a window with a view out to sea. I wanted the property to be drive-on which is a big ask in hilly Wellington and room for a garden.
When we started looking we saw this ad in the paper for a house overlooking one of the bays about ten minutes out of the city. When we got there it was anything but drive-on. In fact there were 136 steps down to the house! But we loved it and when I walked into the kitchen it was as if the picture I had chosen was taken from it. That pretty much cinched the deal. It was meant to be. I had stipulated “at a price we can easily afford” and although initially the price seemed steep we decided if we rented out one of the rooms it was manageable. And that’s what we did. And you know a few weeks after we had moved in and were slogging up and down those steps we got a message from the owners to say that workmen would be coming onto the property to install a cable car. So it became a drive-on property after all.
Feeling
So that’s two things: writing down what you would love to do, have or be and then picture them as if they already exist. But I didn’t really understand the power of this and wearied of the whole process. Did you have to keep setting goals? It was like going to the ocean of abundance with a bucket and having to continually fill it up. I wanted a pipeline but didn’t know how to achieve that.
I didn’t know that if you can picture it means it already exists in some form or other. My awareness of how this worked was very limited and one dimensional. It was all about the stuff. I had a very materialistic view I guess and maybe that was because I was feeling so deprived. The things I wanted in life: getting out of debt, feeling financially secure, fulfilled in my work, happy in my relationships, and being generally happy all seemed out of reach.
Everything already exists in one form or another. The fact that it’s not yet visible is a mere technicality. If you can picture it and actually feel what it is like to actually be in the new situation, whatever it might be, it will happen. It has to. The key then is that behind the picture is the emotion, the feeling that it is already in existence. To live as if.
Seeking
How was I to achieve those things that I really wanted in life: financial freedom, happiness in my relationships, fulfilling work when they seemed so out of reach. How do you picture those things? On the day I was born the Daily Word was “Be Not Anxious for Your Life” and the passage from the Bible was from Matthew 6:25: “But seek ye first his kingdom, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added.”
What I came to understand is that it’s not about pursuing things in the outer. It’s all an inside job. As I cleared up my thinking and feelings of “poor me” and “there’s not enough” I started to develop a consciousness of well-being.
I started to feel grateful for what I did have instead of feeling lack. I came to understand that wanting more is a natural state of being. We are wired that way. It’s the way we grow spiritually. Our desires are good.
I wanted my good to become automatic. I wanted that pipeline. I wanted to be in a permanent state of well-being, in a consciousness that I am totally looked after by this universal force known to some as God, or universal goodness. The more I was able to do that, to believe and feel it, the more good I allowed in.
Finding
I found that I still had to get definite about what I wanted. During one prosperity class, that I was participating in whilst living in the US, a thought flashed across my mind that I wanted a centre to nourish mind, body, and soul when we returned to New Zealand. I had no idea how that might come about. At first, the idea was so big, in my mind, that it scared me. I couldn’t even talk about it. But it bubbled away inside me. It wouldn’t let me go.
I took the idea “do what you can, with what you have, from where you are” and began to do that. Whilst still in the states I started to look at properties for sale in New Zealand. I started writing out every day what I’d like to see in the centre. It was to have yoga, tai chi, massage, classes, places to meditate, beautiful grounds, a pond, and a cafe. I didn’t ever really see living on the property but in2017, back in NZ, the yoga centre where I was holding Unity gatherings produced a plan that had all the things I’d listed plus housing. At first I didn’t think it matched my vision but I think that was because it was even bigger and better than what I had envisaged. Instead of me having to find the resources to fund building the kind of centre I wanted suddenly there were 30 households all contributing to it.
Almost two years ago we moved into one of the new houses and I can just walk down the road to the big beautiful community centre for yoga, tai chi classes, and enjoy the view over the pond. We don’t have a cafe but we do have a lovely kitchen and dining area with a log fire.
Allowing
So what had I learned along the way? That setting goals is not what I thought. We are supposed to be living the life of our dreams. We do that by getting clear about what that means to us and imagine already living like that.
I became grateful for what I already had. I was grateful for what I was about to receive. I began to allow the gifts of the universe into my life. If a blockage appeared then I knew something had to give and that something was me.
I allowed things to unfold. It took 17 years from when I had that vision flash across my mind to moving in. I am grateful that the dream wouldn’t let me go. I am grateful for all the Unity teachings which reinforced the idea that we are powerful beyond measure and that we have everything within us to fulfill our dreams.
