Independence Day
Tomorrow, July 4th, Americans will celebrate the 232nd birthday of this glorious and beautiful nation that I am proud to call my native land. Families from Maine to California, Alaska to Florida, Hawaii to the US Virgin Islands, will celebrate with good food, quite a lot of liquid refreshment and fireworks. Oh my, the fireworks - that is what the 4th signifies for many Americans. As I write this blog that is seen around the world, I wanted those readers beyond our shores to get a sense of what this day really means on a personal and national level and how it relates to spirituality.
Yes, tomorrow's holiday celebrates our Declaration of Independence from our Mother Country, Great Britain (UK), but July 4th was merely the creation of the idea of Indepndence, not its accomplishment. America was to fight a bloody, often seemingly hopeless, war for nearly 10 years. Finally, with great help from France, we secured our nationhood.
Independence could not have occured in 1756 or even 1766 because we were still Englishmen in our hearts and minds. The idea of nationhood, something called The United States of America, had not yet began to take root in the American consciousness. To be achieved, Independence had to be imagined, pictured and accepted in a large number of American minds before any action could be taken.
Even on the eve of the Declaration, more than 45% of Americans wanted reconciliation with Mother England and King. It was so hard for them to leave their comfort zone of Englishness, their well worn paths of thought and action; even when the economic and political situation was clearly untenable.
As any historian will tell you, Canada became the home for many of the 45% of Americans who could not give up their loyalty to the Crown and to the idea of being British. As a result, Canada, while appearing similiar in culture and custom, is a very different nation with very different ideas of the role of government than we hold in the US. Canadians are not Americans with strange accents - they are an entirely differnt people who have built a fine and wonderful land. They lived their dream; we in the US lived ours. Both of us have a God given right to live our dream.
My point is that no great change in a nation happens unless it happens first in the mind of one person, spreads to a critical mass of others (about 1/3) and becomes the accepted truth of that nation. It cannot be forced from the outside; it must come from the heart and mind outward into manifestation. Wouldn't our current government benefit from this wisdom?
What we can all learn from this 232nd Independence Day is that even the birth of this great nation began in the minds of a very few. So it is with our individual lives. Until we get a clear picture of what our personal Independence Day looks like and feels like; until we become this idea from the inside out, nothing lasting can be created in our personal lives or in our country. From Zimbabwe to Iraq, Bolivia to Tibet; people are giving birth to new ideas of nationhood. When at least a large minority believe in the new national vision, it must come to pass. First the mind must conceive, then believe - then the hand can build.
When a people decide that freedom is more precious than even life, nothing can stand in their way - no power on earth can prevail. What are you willing to do to create your dream, to transform your life; to free your people, and your nation from the bonds of apathy and old thinking? A nation's current circumstance is the mirror of the mind of its people; just as your life circumstance is the mirror of your mind and your heart.
Remember this: we create, promote or allow everything that happens in our lives or collectively in the life of our nation. What are you passively allowing and when will you declare your personal Independence?
Here in America we have allowed apathy and the pursuit of material well being to lull us into acceptance of that which should never be acceptable. We accept without a whimper the curtailing of our personal liberty in ways King George 3rd never dreamed of.
We meekly accept the idea of "political correctness", a Maoist idea about as foreign to the American mind as an idea can be. Free speech is no longer free if we cannot speak our mind, regardles of who might be offended or who might disagree. Political correctness has sapped our ability to speak out, to protest, to say, NO! Good heavens, we might offend someone and we can't do that, now can we? Offense is a choice, let those offended make another choice.
Are you accepting a life that you do not desire, a life that is not of your choosing? Are you living your parent's life, your church's plan for you, your government's idea of what you should do and be? My friends, God is in you. You and God are one. You are of royal blood, the blood of the King of the Universe is in your veins. Don't you know that you do not have to do or say or be anything that is not pleasing to you? You are the writer of your life script, the producer of your life's movie and you play the starring role.
You are not a "weak worm of the dust"; you are a Divine Creation of the Most High God. Did not one of this planet's greatest teachers, Jesus The Christ, say clearly: Greater things than I have done, will you do also - if you believe?
If your dreams die stillborn, who killed them? No one but you! Your unbelief and lack of faith keeps them just "wishes" which have no power at all. Belief and determined and tenacious action is the power that always prevails.
Want a new life? Get a clear picture of what you want your life to be, how you want to live and then believe it - regardless of the facts around you. Facts are the detrius of other people's thinking and you are not bound by them. Believe in your vision, tenaciously work toward the life you want as if that desire was already manifest in your life. It may take ten years, like the birthing of America; but won't it be worth every bit of the sacrifice? The more firm your belief and your will, the sooner the change will occur.
Do you want to help create a new vision for your homeland? Do you want your children and grandchildren to lay their heads down in peace at night, to know the wonderful feeling of a full stomach, loving arms about them and a bright future ahead? Wishing will never make it so! Get the picture of the life you want for you, your children and your country; share it with those you trust, spread the vision and then settle for nothing else, so help you God! And She will!
May God Bless and Keep you and may this be your personal Independence Day!
AND SO IT IS (21st Century Amen)
Yes, tomorrow's holiday celebrates our Declaration of Independence from our Mother Country, Great Britain (UK), but July 4th was merely the creation of the idea of Indepndence, not its accomplishment. America was to fight a bloody, often seemingly hopeless, war for nearly 10 years. Finally, with great help from France, we secured our nationhood.
Independence could not have occured in 1756 or even 1766 because we were still Englishmen in our hearts and minds. The idea of nationhood, something called The United States of America, had not yet began to take root in the American consciousness. To be achieved, Independence had to be imagined, pictured and accepted in a large number of American minds before any action could be taken.
Even on the eve of the Declaration, more than 45% of Americans wanted reconciliation with Mother England and King. It was so hard for them to leave their comfort zone of Englishness, their well worn paths of thought and action; even when the economic and political situation was clearly untenable.
As any historian will tell you, Canada became the home for many of the 45% of Americans who could not give up their loyalty to the Crown and to the idea of being British. As a result, Canada, while appearing similiar in culture and custom, is a very different nation with very different ideas of the role of government than we hold in the US. Canadians are not Americans with strange accents - they are an entirely differnt people who have built a fine and wonderful land. They lived their dream; we in the US lived ours. Both of us have a God given right to live our dream.
My point is that no great change in a nation happens unless it happens first in the mind of one person, spreads to a critical mass of others (about 1/3) and becomes the accepted truth of that nation. It cannot be forced from the outside; it must come from the heart and mind outward into manifestation. Wouldn't our current government benefit from this wisdom?
What we can all learn from this 232nd Independence Day is that even the birth of this great nation began in the minds of a very few. So it is with our individual lives. Until we get a clear picture of what our personal Independence Day looks like and feels like; until we become this idea from the inside out, nothing lasting can be created in our personal lives or in our country. From Zimbabwe to Iraq, Bolivia to Tibet; people are giving birth to new ideas of nationhood. When at least a large minority believe in the new national vision, it must come to pass. First the mind must conceive, then believe - then the hand can build.
When a people decide that freedom is more precious than even life, nothing can stand in their way - no power on earth can prevail. What are you willing to do to create your dream, to transform your life; to free your people, and your nation from the bonds of apathy and old thinking? A nation's current circumstance is the mirror of the mind of its people; just as your life circumstance is the mirror of your mind and your heart.
Remember this: we create, promote or allow everything that happens in our lives or collectively in the life of our nation. What are you passively allowing and when will you declare your personal Independence?
Here in America we have allowed apathy and the pursuit of material well being to lull us into acceptance of that which should never be acceptable. We accept without a whimper the curtailing of our personal liberty in ways King George 3rd never dreamed of.
We meekly accept the idea of "political correctness", a Maoist idea about as foreign to the American mind as an idea can be. Free speech is no longer free if we cannot speak our mind, regardles of who might be offended or who might disagree. Political correctness has sapped our ability to speak out, to protest, to say, NO! Good heavens, we might offend someone and we can't do that, now can we? Offense is a choice, let those offended make another choice.
Are you accepting a life that you do not desire, a life that is not of your choosing? Are you living your parent's life, your church's plan for you, your government's idea of what you should do and be? My friends, God is in you. You and God are one. You are of royal blood, the blood of the King of the Universe is in your veins. Don't you know that you do not have to do or say or be anything that is not pleasing to you? You are the writer of your life script, the producer of your life's movie and you play the starring role.
You are not a "weak worm of the dust"; you are a Divine Creation of the Most High God. Did not one of this planet's greatest teachers, Jesus The Christ, say clearly: Greater things than I have done, will you do also - if you believe?
If your dreams die stillborn, who killed them? No one but you! Your unbelief and lack of faith keeps them just "wishes" which have no power at all. Belief and determined and tenacious action is the power that always prevails.
Want a new life? Get a clear picture of what you want your life to be, how you want to live and then believe it - regardless of the facts around you. Facts are the detrius of other people's thinking and you are not bound by them. Believe in your vision, tenaciously work toward the life you want as if that desire was already manifest in your life. It may take ten years, like the birthing of America; but won't it be worth every bit of the sacrifice? The more firm your belief and your will, the sooner the change will occur.
Do you want to help create a new vision for your homeland? Do you want your children and grandchildren to lay their heads down in peace at night, to know the wonderful feeling of a full stomach, loving arms about them and a bright future ahead? Wishing will never make it so! Get the picture of the life you want for you, your children and your country; share it with those you trust, spread the vision and then settle for nothing else, so help you God! And She will!
May God Bless and Keep you and may this be your personal Independence Day!
AND SO IT IS (21st Century Amen)
posted by Rev. Dore' Jacques Patlian at
7:27 PM
1 Comments:
Hittin' the nail on the head, yet again....thank you, Rev. Dore', for giving us a good meditative thought for this, our Independence Day!
- Susie Jennings
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Anonymous, at 12:09 PM
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