DO BELIEFS PLAY A ROLE IN THE SOUL-AWAKENING PROCESS?
The process of awakening to the truth of who we really are, why we are here, and where we are going is known in the Message Art as the ‘soul-awakening process’. This process is initiated by choice and while in it, there are different levels of awareness that can be attained, the highest of which is when we become fully aware of our oneness with God. In the context of this unique art collection, the word God represents the ever-present, all-powerful and all-knowing source of life or the energy of love.
When I agreed to receive and paint the fifteen paintings that make up the Message Art collection in the fall of 1999, I had no idea I was about to discover how few of my beliefs were actually my own. The divine insights revealed through the individual elements of one of these unique paintings teaches that we are not born with beliefs. Rather, we acquire our beliefs by choosing, knowingly or not, to repeatedly think the same or similar thoughts. In actuality, our past repetitive thoughts are the building blocks that formed our current beliefs. Because they most likely include other people repetitive thoughts which we unknowingly accepted as our own, chances are many, if not most of our current beliefs, are not our own.
A simple way to verify if your beliefs are your own is by determining the origin of the repetitive thoughts that formed each one of them. For example, do your beliefs about God or love originate from your own experiences of God and love or from other people’s repetitive thoughts (beliefs) of them? What about the beliefs you have concerning different religions, cultures and lifestyles? Or those related to the discord between countries, or about marriage, raising children and education?
After days of journaling with God about this particular painting’s divine messages, I was shocked to discover how few of my beliefs actually originated from my own experiences. I had unknowingly accepted other people’s repetitive thoughts, in other words, their beliefs about most everything in life. But even more startling was how difficult it was to let go of my old beliefs about God and yet my soul-awakening process could not progress any further unless I did.
I was also yet to discover that my beliefs made it impossible for me to discover my own truth in the same way that a thick cloud prevents a person from seeing the sun and the beautiful blue sky on the other side of it. No matter how long the cloud remains, the truth behind it never changes.
It took me several more months to realize that my beliefs had also prevented me from ‘experiencing’ a personal relationship with God and would continue to do so until I learnt to trust the divine messages conveyed by the Message Art paintings. For that to happen, I needed to let go and let God guide me to my own truth even if it meant it wasn’t the same as the one held so fervently by most people in my life.
The first step in developing this type of trust was to allow myself to become more open-minded which I learned later would also help me to dissipate the thick cloud between me and the truth. Taking that step was challenging at first but once I did, the way I perceived myself and the world around me began to change dramatically even though I still had many questions and sometimes felt frustrated. For example, how was it possible that God was not a separate being but rather the sum of all that exists? You mean to say I am ‘a part of’ rather than ‘apart from’ God? Why had I not been taught this life-altering information at church or even at school while I was growing up?
I had spent nearly fifty years fervently believing that God was this really large male being somewhere up in heaven forever watching and judging me. Being told so often that I was a sinner had convinced me that my chances for going to heaven were slim to none.
Unfortunately, my old beliefs had caused me to fear God for all those years. I certainly would never have imagined that I could have a two-way conversation with God or that I was deserving of such an awesome experience. The more time I spent journaling about the Message Art, the more I realized that the God I was communicating with was nothing like the one I had been taught about.
The God I was experiencing was loving, understanding and extremely patient. I never once felt rushed, judged or punished during the fourteen years it took me to receive, assimilate and then apply each painting’s insights to my life. There was also never a moment that I didn’t feel an all-encompassing presence of love in and around me while asking the gazillion questions that I needed to, to fully understand the messages I was receiving.
Another one of my old beliefs was that my soul was inside my body, either within or close to my heart. Replacing the past repetitive thoughts which had formed that belief with the new thoughts God was sending me was not achieved overnight. With more guidance, I came to understand that I am not a physical being having a spiritual experience but rather a spirit having a physical experience. Actually, this concept is the catalyst which initiated the new repetitive thoughts that eventually formed the beliefs I have since had about God and who I am.
I no longer question why the magnificence and grandeur of my soul cannot possibly be contained within the small dense energy field that makes up my physical body.
My personal experiences with the Message Art have convinced me that beliefs do in fact play a major role in the soul-awakening process–they either prevent us from initiating this life-altering process or they assist us in accelerating it. Our beliefs also determine when and how deeply we delve into this process.
Had I not been able to let go of my old beliefs, I would not be experiencing the profound inner peace, joy, and happiness that I am today, nor would it be my life’s mission to help others to accelerate their own soul-awakening process through The Message Art Study.
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