1. The least you should know about choice


The main message of all true spiritual teachers is, “YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE!” Yet what does it take to change your life? Albert Einstein said: “Insanity is when you keep doing the same thing and expect a different result.” If your life is to change, something must change. If you keep doing the same thing, how likely is it that your life will change by itself?

There are two basic approaches to life. There are those who keep doing the same thing, always living in the dream that some day a stroke of luck, fate, magic or divine intervention will change their lives. There are those who realize that if their lives are to change, they must actively do something different to bring about change. They must begin by changing that which they have the power to change.

All true spiritual teachers talk about the eternal law that you cannot change your life without changing yourself. To change your outer situation, you must be willing to start by changing your inner situation. You must be willing to look in the mirror. You must be willing to look for – and remove – the beam in your own eye.

To change your life, you must understand the power of free will. You must choose change over stillstand. You must choose growth over comfortability. You must choose life over death. Life is all about choice. Life is a process of making choices, and only you can make the decisions that will change your life.

You are constantly choosing, and you can never turn off the responsibility of making choices. You can stop making decisions, but to do so you must make a decision. You can allow other people or institutions to make decisions for you, but to do so you must make a decision. And you can uphold this state only by continuing to make the decision not to make decisions.

Deciding not to make decisions puts you in a state of being spiritually dead. You can remain physically alive while being spiritually dead. You cannot remain spiritually alive without making choices. Life is a choice. Life is the choice to be more. Death is the choice to be less.

Choices are not made in a vacuum. All choices have consequences. Being spiritually dead does not make you unconscious. Thus, it does not prevent you from experiencing the consequences of your life choices—regardless of who makes those choices. The equation is simple. Either you make your own choices or you allow others to make choices for you. In either case, you are the one who must live with the consequences. Only by making your own decisions can you influence the consequences.

There are two types of consequences. Some consequences limit you and have a negative impact on your life experience. Some consequences liberate you and enhance your life experience. Consequences either make your life experience less or they make it more.

Limiting consequences are the results of choices that are based on incomplete or incorrect knowledge. Liberating consequences are based on full understanding. The truth will set you free to be more. Lack of truth will limit you and turn your life into a struggle.

Change must start with a desire to change, and the equation is simple. You must desire change so much that you are willing to reach for a higher understanding in order to bring about that change. What will it take to bring you to that point? It might help to know your options.


2. The least you should know about your options

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Copyright © 2005 by Kim Michaels

 

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A very thought-provoking book that exposes the spiritual and psychological causes of religious conflict. This book will forever change the way you look at religion and the reason God gives us religion.
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