The Whole Truth, Nothing but the Truth

Our society is obsessed with truth. We hold sacred the truth for the good of all. I am no exception. If I discover even a mild deception, my immediate reaction is to condemn that person to death. I just don’t understand why anyone would lie. No, that’s not true, I can see why they would, I just don’t know how they can do it. There have been enough times in my life where, for the love of rhubarb, if I could just have kept my mouth shut, things would have worked out so much better. Saying nothing would have been great, a little white lie would probably have been even better, but I just can’t do it. It simply doesn’t work. It’s like there is a button missing. Fortunately as I’ve grown older I’ve seen the benefit of not always sharing the truth about things, but I’ve never managed to actually lie about something. And still, whilst I think I’m so much more accepting of people now, if I’m completely honest, if I discover someone in a lie, they just die a little in my eyes. Usually it’s something completely harmless, but that’s even worse, like, what’s the point?

What I’m learning now is that the truth is pointless. I’ve vacillated over this subject for a while, and then a few days ago, just browsing the website of an animal communicator, I found a quoted passage which pretty much summed up what I wanted to say, so I took it as a sign that I had to get my own version out. Or I could just quote him verbatim instead, and go and have lunch…

Abraham Hicks and indeed, all the Law of Attraction community agree that everything we want, everything we desire, is because we believe that in the having of it, we will be happier. And that what motivates everyone is the desire to be happy – it’s just that we get caught up in the “things” we think we need to make us happy instead of focusing on what we really want, which is simply to be happy.

If I look up the definition of truth (definitions from Oxford Languages, the default for Google) it is the quality or state of being true; that which is true or in accordance with fact or reality; a fact or belief that is accepted a true. A fact is a thing that is known or proved to be true. A belief is an acceptance that something exists or is true, especially one without proof; something one accepts as true or real; a firmly held opinion. An opinion is a view or judgement formed about something not necessarily based on fact or the beliefs or views of a a group or majority of people. Doesn’t it feel like we’re going around in circles?

According to Abraham Hicks, a belief is simply a thought you keep thinking. When you look closely at all of this, you do see there is a huge element of subjectivity in all of it. The problem with humans is that we’ve put too much emphasis on the “truth” and by “truth” let me use the word reality. Reality: the state of things as they actually exist. Reality, for us, being what we perceive (see, hear, smell, touch, taste) in our physical world. Law of Attraction says that if you see something that you don’t like, look away. Jesus said, turn the other cheek. Now if all this is getting you hot under the collar, it’s not going to get any easier. This is perhaps the thorniest issue with LOA. Turning away from cruelty or starving children doesn’t feel like the right thing to do in our society where we believe that we must fix every wrong. The position of LOA is not that you should condone or even ignore suffering, but rather that unless you are in a state of alignment, you have nothing to offer in terms of a solution. And to be in alignment you need to be happy. And most of us are incapable of being happy when confronted with suffering. We are not yet evolved enough to hold our alignment in the face of things that trigger our emotions. That the most you can ever offer anyone or anything is your own happiness and the happier you are, the more you offer the world. 

At this point, anyone who isn’t a LOA convert is usually frothing at the mouth. You can’t ignore reality they will rage. Well, you can, if you allow yourself to, you just have to be convinced that you’re not an evil selfish troll for doing so. Such is the pressure of our society, there is no room for us to be different. There is plenty of evidence that focussing on a problem only exacerbates it (think war on drugs, war on terrorism – neither of these “problems” have been solved despite the massive attention and resources spent on them). If you find this attitude disgusting, believe me I was right there with you. I just didn’t get it. It was with Eckhart Tolle that I first encountered this idea with and it really upset me. Who was I if I wasn’t there to protect the vulnerable, the innocent, the under-dog? If people didn’t stand up to injustice, where would that end? If you aren’t part of the solution you’re part of the problem, and so on and so forth. This viscerally upset me, especially when I considered ignoring cruelty to animals, so I feel your resistance. It took a few years of various teachers to gently get this point across to me, and it’s a bit like Eckhart says in his book (I forget which one), if you don’t quite get this, you’re just not ready for it. Which means I can’t convince you. There are plenty of teachers who may sway your mind, but I don’t intend to compete with them! But you open your mind to the possibility, you’ll find that gradually, it begins to make sense.

I think the episode that convinced me was an Abraham Hicks rant about the Middle East. It was really funny, delivered in that way of Esther’s that is so unique, basically a volley of the questions, concerns, confusion about everything that happens, when it feels wrong, but is deemed right, how we want to help, but don’t seem to be, about who is right and who is wrong, how we think we’re helping, and yet patently we’re not, how some people want our help, but others don’t, that we can’t stop them fighting, but they don’t want our peace, that everything we do backfires, yet we just keep trying, that the people we’re trying to protect don’t want our involvement. It goes on and on, getting more and more confusing and ridiculous and she stops. “What in the hell are you gonna do about all that?” And that’s the point. As an individual, even with the best intention in the world, we are pretty powerless in these situations. We support one regime only to realise that they have other beliefs that we weren’t expecting and aren’t aligned with. And that’s just it. Your beliefs on all these issues, be they religion, race, violence, terrorism, occupation, dictatorship – all depend on where you stand. Unless you’re prepared to believe that every single person who does not agree with you is evil, you have to wonder whether any of us should be standing in judgement of anyone else.

The Law of Attraction position isn’t really about not caring, it’s based on the premise that whatever you put your attention on,  you give momentum to. So focussing on the war on drugs for example, adds momentum to the war on drugs, but doesn’t actually help the desired result which is presumably, a world without drug addiction. If you want that, you need to put your attention on what the end result will be, not try to “fix” the thing you think is causing the problem. The old, “focus on the end result” not what you think will get you there. So in the case of drugs putting your attention on visualising a world where people don’t need drugs, or helping people build a life without drugs, rather than fighting drug lords and campaigning for stronger anti-drug legislation.

Anyway, my point here is not to convince you, but more to share my epiphany about a much smaller scale of this.

So what does the truth really give us? If your parents told you when you were 8 that Sammy the dog’s disappearance was because he went off to live with Grandma, and you find out at age 15 that wasn’t true, what have you really gained? If you were happier thinking that Sammy was living out his days in a far away land, sure you missed him, but thinking he was happy may have helped you be a little happier than if they had told you he had died a gruesome death under the wheels of the postman’s van. And this is true of so many situations. Putting aside situations which require your urgent personal action to save the world (no one is advocating that you ignore people in need when you’re in a situation to help, and feel willing and able to help rather than being coerced, guilted or bullied into helping), is there any point at all in “facing the truth” about upsetting situations you can’t control? Are you really any better prepared for catastrophe just because you’ve had a good worry about it beforehand? Why does our society insist that worrying pointlessly about things is somehow worthy, that we have to suffer right along with the victims, and not doing so makes you somehow responsible for it? And going a step further, why not just choose to believe the best of things that can’t actually be measured?

My example here, my little epiphany, was about my animal communication and talking to my guides. On the one hand, when I work with other people, I have a strong and obvious connection with their animals  and my guides. I’m usually getting constant validation from the owner of the animal or the person whose guides I’m communicating with, but beyond that I can also feel the vibration of what the animal or the guides are saying. I get waves of goosebumps, physically reassuring me of my connection to source and when I’m in it, I have an unwavering faith that it’s the real deal. On the other hand, when I dither around wondering what’s wrong with my own cat, or I’m swithering in a paradox about my abilities, it’s all too easy to lose faith in the whole thing. It’s a well known fact that reading your own animal is hard – because how do you know if you’re not making it up? When I connect with my clients animal I know nothing about them, so I can’t be making it up. When I talk to the sheep in the field, I have no human to validate what I’m getting. When I talk to the crows I could just be talking out of my backside, and likewise when I talk to my guides, is it not just my ego sounding grown up because I’ve taken a few breaths and stopped panicking?

As I swirl around in my chasms of self-doubt, many of my colleagues who I studied with are in the same place. But there are some who have literally just taken that plunge. Taken the plunge to believe. To surrender. And as soon as they do, the data they get comes quicker, with more clarity, more easily. Their intuition starts offering information all the time about everything. I’m teetering on the edge of acceptance, knowing that if I surrender my resistance my world will blossom and open up in ways I can’t even dream of, but still my ego holds on. Some people I studied with have always known the were different, intuitive, and maybe for them it’s easier to take that gentle step over the edge; for me though it’s agonising. I’ve always been “different” (and not in a good way) but for reasons I can’t quite reconcile with being intuitive even though my “difference” probably was because I was highly sensitive, and that led to being misunderstood. Oh we’re all so misunderstood aren’t we….

My epiphany was so clear at the time, but even a few days later it feels less clear and less compelling, as fear and doubt seep back in.  All I have to do is trust myself. All my beliefs support my own truth: if I chose to believe that everything I’m getting is real, then everything I’m getting will be real. That’s it. That’s all it takes for me to reap the rewards of heaven on earth: to trust and surrender. Sounds easy doesn’t it?

The Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth.

So Help Me God.

 

If you’re interesting in subjects like these, please join Julie and I at Making Light: Two Humans Being. Julie is one of the folks who has gracefully surrendered into her truth, and continuous to inspire me daily! We discuss this particular topic in our upcoming episode “Is Ranting Ever OK?” scheduled for 21 October 2021.