{"id":298,"date":"2008-05-10T06:19:14","date_gmt":"2008-05-10T06:19:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/conversationswithgod\/2008\/05\/will-our-own-sacred-beliefs-un.html"},"modified":"2008-05-10T06:19:14","modified_gmt":"2008-05-10T06:19:14","slug":"will-our-own-sacred-beliefs-un","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/conversationswithgod\/2008\/05\/will-our-own-sacred-beliefs-un.html","title":{"rendered":"Will our own sacred beliefs undo us?"},"content":{"rendered":"

We say that we build our lives on our most sacred beliefs. But is it possible that some of our beliefs about God and life are actually self-destructive? Humanity had better look at this…and soon.
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\nNOTE: Saturday is Prose & Poetry Day here on the blog, a time to take a moment once a week to relax the mind, open the heart, and access the soul through the gift of prose from one of the many books of The New Spirituality, and through the poetry of m. Claire, author of the forthcoming volume, Silent Sacred Holy Deeply: Heart.<\/em>
\nFor this week’s prose we offer…the third in a series of excerpts from The New Revelations<\/em>…
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\nLast Saturday the dialogue left off with a statement from God that “Beliefs create behaviors.” We pick up that dialogue here…
\nAll behaviors are created by beliefs?<\/p>\n

All behaviors.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Aren\u2019t there such things as \u201cautomatic reactions\u201d?<\/p>\n

Even those reactions are based on what you believe is occurring, is about to occur, or could occur.
\nAll behaviors are sponsored by beliefs.
\nYou cannot make a long-term change in behaviors without addressing the beliefs that underlie them.
\nI\u2019m going to repeat that, because the brevity of the statement belies its importance.
\nI said:
\nYou cannot make a long-term change in behaviors without addressing the beliefs that underlie them. <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So it is on our beliefs that society needs to focus.<\/p>\n

Exactly. And this is precisely where most of your societies have not been focusing\u2014except those societies that are now causing, and have historically caused, the most upheaval. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But if we\u2014<\/p>\n

\n\u2014Listen to me. I am telling you something very important here.
\nWhat I just said was\u2026.those societies that are now causing, and that have historically caused, the most upheaval in your world are those societies which have focused on beliefs.
\nMost humans try to change things by focusing on behaviors. They keep thinking they can make things better by doing something. So, everyone is running around trying to figure out what they can do. The focus is on doing something, rather than on believing something.
\nBut radical forces within your societies have always sought to change things by using the power of thought, not action, for they know that thought produces action. Get a person thinking a certain way and you can get a person to act a certain way. It is not easily done the other way around.
\nTake killing, for example. You can rarely get a person to go out and kill another person simply by telling him to do so. You have to give him a reason. And \u201creason\u201d exists only in thought. And thought is always…<\/p>\n


\n…based in Belief. So, if you want to get one person to kill another, the fastest way to do that is to give him a belief that supports the action, and can sponsor it. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Such as?<\/p>\n

One such belief might be that killing a particular other is what God wants, that it is doing the Will of God, and that one will be rewarded in heaven for doing it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That could be a very powerful belief, a very powerful incentive.<\/p>\n

And so, while most of the world is seeking to bring about change by telling people what to DO, those who truly know how to motivate people are bringing about change by telling people what to BELIEVE.
\nDo you get it?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Wow. Yes.<\/p>\n

Your world is facing enormous problems right now, and you must solve the problems at the level of belief. You cannot solve the problems at the level of behavior.
\nSeek to change beliefs, not behaviors.
\nAfter you change a belief, the behavior will change by itself.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But we are a very action-oriented society. The Western world, in particular, has always found it solutions in action, not in quiet contemplation or philosophy.<\/p>\n

You can take whatever action you want to take to alter someone else\u2019s behavior or to stop it, but unless you alter the beliefs that produced such behavior, you will alter nothing and stop nothing. You can alter a belief in two ways. Either by enlarging upon it, or by changing it completely. But you must do one or the other or you will not alter behavior.
\nYou will merely interrupt it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In other words, the behavior will return.<\/p>\n

Is there any question about that? Do you not see your history repeating itself?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I see that, yes. And it\u2019s frustrating.<\/p>\n

Your species does the same thing over and over again because your species has not changed its basic beliefs\u2014about God and about Life\u2014in millennia.
\nBeliefs are taught in virtually every school on your planet, in nearly every culture, in one form or another. Often you present beliefs as \u201cfacts,\u201d but they are beliefs nonetheless.
\nThis would not be so bad, and would not produce such terrible results, if what you believe, if what you taught, was what is so. But it is not what is so. You teach your children what is not so, and tell them \u201cthis is what\u2019s so.\u201d
\nFor the most part you are not doing this intentionally. You do not know that these are falsehoods. They are, after all, the things that you were taught. You thus assume them to be true. It is in this way that the \u201csins of the father are visited upon the son, even unto the seventh generation.\u201d
\nIn some schools\u2014particularly some religious schools where children in their earliest years are encouraged to view life through the prism of particular religious doctrines and cultural prejudices\u2014the result of this is the inbreeding of incredibly negative behaviors reflecting extraordinarily mistaken beliefs.
\nYou teach your children to believe in an intolerant God, and thus condone for them their own behaviors of intolerance.
\nYou teach your children to believe in an angry God, and thus condone for them their own behaviors of anger.
\nYou teach your children to believe in a vengeful God, and thus condone for them their own behaviors of vengeance.
\nThen you send these, your children, to do battle with the demons of your own creation. It is not an accident that by far the highest numbers of \u201cwarriors\u201d in any radical movement are the young.
\nWhen you move the youngest among you from religious schools or military academies directly into your fighting forces, promising them that they are struggling for \u201ca higher cause\u201d or \u201ca grander purpose\u201d or that God is on their side, what are they to think?
\nAre they to contradict their elders, their teachers, their priests, their ulama?
\nYet if you are not careful, your own children will undo you.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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\nIf you experience that you received benefit this excerpt from The New Revelations<\/em> you are going to love Happier Than God<\/em>, the newest book in the CwG cosmology. Described as “a Master’s Guide to Spiritual Awakening,” this extraordinary new work has just been released and is available now. Click on the Happier Than God icon at the right of this blog page for more info, and embrace one of the most empowering books you will ever read.
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\nNow…this week’s gift of poetry<\/strong><\/em>
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\nI AM THAT I AM
\nand
\nso much more:
\nthe Light, the Sound, the Living of God on the Ground.
\n*
\nI could show you every feather
\nin the Wing.
\nEvery color and hue.
\nEvery Beautiful thing.
\nBut
\nI AM THAT I AM
\nwants to
\n*
\nLove
\n*
\nWhatever
\nhas not yet had it
\nWhomever
\nhas not yet heard it
\nHowever
\nLife\u2019s not yet done it.
\n*
\nThere is still so much Loving,
\nyet to be found,
\njust
\nLiving God on the Ground.
\n(I Am That I Am – m. claire – copyright 2007 – all rights reserved)
\nFor more of the work of this new poetic voice you are invited to visit www.mclairepoet.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We say that we build our lives on our most sacred beliefs. But is it possible that some of our beliefs about God and life are actually self-destructive? 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