Manifesting vs Miracles

yinning the yang

As readers know, I like to alternate between masculine and feminine topics, so today’s is a masculine one. Just kidding, of course! But why is it obvious I’m kidding? Why is Manifesting vs. Miracles a feminine topic, that some of my research- and logic-oriented male readers may skip?

Speaking in generalities, men tend towards religions of authority or are anti-authoritarian atheists. Whether religious or atheist, they share a belief in evil. Facing the worst is important to them, whether that’s in human nature or the future.

Women tend more towards spirituality and intuitive knowledge. They accept teachers outside of traditional hierarchies. Looking for the best is important to them, whether in people or in hope for the future. Hope and wishful thinking can be the same.

Detour

I took a long time getting here,
much of it wasted on wrong turns,
back roads riddled by ruts.
I had adventures
I never would have known
if I proceeded as the crow flies.
Super highways are so sure
of where they are going:
they arrive too soon.

A straight line isn't always
the shortest distance
between two people.
Sometimes I act as though
I'm heading somewhere else
while, imperceptibly,
I narrow the gap between you and me.
I'm not sure I'll ever
know the right way, but I don't mind
getting lost now and then.
Maps don't know everything.

~ Ruth Feldman ~

(The Ambitions of Ghosts)

---

logic + intuition

If anyone can claim an audience that uses both sides of the brain, it’s me! My masculine topics have a feminine purpose, of enabling the world we want for our children. And they give everyone the benefit of the doubt.

My feminine topics use logic to make their points, even in the murky land of mysticism. I show why a belief in evil is logically inconsistent, either with a belief in a benevolent god or with human nature evolved from money genes.

And the question I’m asking today is really the most practical, hard-nosed—aka masculine—one possible. At essence, it’s asking ‘what is reality?’ The closer your perception is to reality, the more successful your actions will be.

It presents my own empirical evidence but invites you to run your own experiments. No one’s examples can convince anyone else. However, asking the question and paying attention to your own results is the most important study you can make.

The highest good is like water.
Water gives life to the ten thousand things and does not strive.
It flows in places men reject and so is like the Tao.

In dwelling, be close to the land.
In meditation, go deep in the heart.
In dealing with others, be gentle and kind.
In speech, be true.
In ruling, be just.
In business, be competent.
In action, watch the timing.

~ Tao Te Ching ~

(Translation by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English)

---

fear, guilt & blame: the unwholly trinity

From an atheist perspective, the world is chaos held in check by the ego. From a theist perspective, good fortune is granted or denied by a fickle god. In a spiritual framework, your thoughts have power. But do they make things happen or allow them?

What is the difference between manifesting and miracles? Manifesting depends on you to make it happen, the miracle reminds you everything is already happening to plan. When manifesting works, it induces fear because somehow you made the magic happen, but can you do it again?

When manifesting doesn’t work, or praying for things to happen or not, it induces guilt and anger. Guilt because maybe you didn’t do it right—pray hard enough, perform the right ritual, have enough faith. Anger because God let you down.

The miracle welcomes reality exactly as it is. It gets out of the way, releasing expectations. It escapes from fear because it shows there’s meaning and purpose in all things, whether or not you know what it is. Everything is happening for your greatest happiness and the happiness of everyone else.

"Live with skillful nonchalance and ceaseless concern."

~ Prajnaparamita Sutra ~

[editing in for Barbara Sinclair, author of The Quaking Poplar, for whom I’ve been the happy bearer of bear poems!]

---

be wholly instant

In the video, I tell the stories of a Belize DJ and my wild night out on my Appalachian town, involving prayers, green tea shots, and girls in leopard skin who want to have babies. For those stories, I’ll direct you to the video. I end by quoting a few lines from A Course in Miracles. Here is the quote in full:

The holy instant is the Wholly Spirit’s most useful learning device for teaching you love’s meaning. For its purpose is to suspend judgment entirely. Judgment always rests on the past, for past experience is the basis on which you judge. Judgment becomes impossible without the past, for without it you do not understand anything. You would make no attempt to judge, because it would be quite apparent to you that you do not understand what anything means. You are afraid of this because you believe that without the ego, all would be chaos. Yet I assure you that without the ego, all would be love.

A meme that I can’t relocate (but Philip did!) said:

Luxury is the time to think deeply, sleep soundly, move slowly, live quietly.

No one has that anymore.

Almost no one. I’ve been thinking that the difference between my situation and nearly everyone else is that I own my own time, and a big part of that is owning my space. One of my Course meditations was ‘Let me not forget my function.’ It imagined a blank canvas on which your function could be written. What came to me was that I’ve been given time and space so that everyone can reclaim their time and space.

Now is the Time

Now is the time to know
That all that you do is sacred.

Now, why not consider
A lasting truce with yourself and God.

Now is the time to understand
That all your ideas of right and wrong
Were just a child's training wheels
To be laid aside
When you finally live
With veracity
And love.

Hafiz is a divine envoy
Whom the Beloved
Has written a holy message upon.

My dear, please tell me,
Why do you still
Throw sticks at your heart
And God?

What is it in that sweet voice inside
That incites you to fear?

Now is the time for the world to know
That every thought and action is sacred.

This is the time
For you to compute the impossibility
That there is anything
But Grace.

Now is the season to know

That everything you do

Is sacred.

~ Hafiz ~

(The Gift - versions of Hafiz by Daniel Ladinsky)

---

bring in the clouds

I’m here in Appalachia where time is expansive, not expensive. The difference between a chore and a pleasure is time, and not a lot. Just enough to move slowly, pause to watch the chubby birds graze the yard, put on music or a podcast. And yet I always feel guilty to be ‘wasting time.’

I’m noticing that, looking slantways at clouds on the edge of the sun, they are rainbows with shades of cerulean I’ve never seen on land or sea. Obscured by the light, it’s the porch roof blocking the sun that lets me see its dazzling refraction. Maybe staring too long trying to see the truth is like that.

If there’s anything we own, it’s our time and our mind. Even if you can’t claim it all, take back a little for your Self today. Be inefficient. Go slow. Don’t let yourself think about what else you should be doing. Be here now, washing dishes, folding laundry, planting pansies—the most ephemeral of flowers. Time will hold still while you fritter.

---

To kick off a year of better arguments, I start with the Big Questions. I define the given proof of Reality as something perceived by more than one person. Then I expand the realm of possibility for how the world might not be real, using a logical theory that hits all the data points. I read from A Course in Miracles on What is Death? And I start with lyrics by Bill Callahan and end with Jose Gonzales.

My answer: the opposite of what we think. While romance is exclusivity, love is indiscriminate—the spiritual slut. I talk about love as non-judgment, newborn mind, and fear, guilt and blame as the unwholly trinity. I advise to guard your loneliness like a dragon's treasure and why the internet is a repository of loneliness. I end with A Course in Miracles on the Wholly Instant and the special relationship.

I combine Isaac Middle's wholesome wombat astrology with A Course in Miracles and the story of a backless sock box and a laundry room door. Chiron gets a scolding and retaliates immediately. Aphrodite and Luna take over the role of radiant healer. WTF becomes 'What's This For?'

The miracle isn't the big things, it's the small synchronicities that tell you nothing is an accident so you can stay calm and trust the big things to work out. Now when things are spinning out of control with hurricanes and wildfires and floods, watch the timing with little things in your own life.