Imagine the presence of a great warmth that feels utterly nurturing, good, and peaceful. See it as the most beautiful color or colors that you can imagine. Feel it as having the texture or sensation of something incredibly soft, like a favorite blanket or article of clothing, the skin of a baby, or the fur of an animal.

The weeds keep multiplying in our garden, which is our mind ruled by fear. Rip them out and call them by name. The illnesses, the rejections, the defamations, the injustices, the aloneness, all the "I should haves" and "I didn't do's." In place of the ugly weeds of fear, plant now the roses of Hope, Love...

Hope is an expectation, not always with absolute certainty, but with confidence and assurance that something can or will happen. Hope is a desire accompanied by a belief in fulfillment. Hope is a force that urges us on — stimulating us to continue. It is a powerful force that we...

I realize the whole universe is at my fingertips, as is my willingness to manifest what is needed in my reality. Every experience of life is God teaching me. As I look in this pure state of awareness, I feel the pure energy within my whole body. From the rhythm of my breathing, I feel a quiet state of attunement — one with God.

Problems do not limit your aliveness or happiness. They are simply challenges that give you opportunities to make choices and grow. As you increasingly open to yourself, happiness wells up from deep inside you. Feel it. Remember a happy feeling from the past, or imagine one now. If you like, tie it to a scene or image. Feel the feeling. Be in the middle of it. Let the happiness of that feeling fill you full and overflow beyond you, filling the room.

The phrase "thy will be done" in the Lord's Prayer is a statement of resignation for many, the calling down of a power to do something that may not be what we had in mind. It's as though we're saying, "Since I can't have what I want in life, I guess I'll have to settle...

Meditation does work. Millions of learned and loving people have practiced it throughout the ages, because it clears the mind and opens the heart. The current interest in meditation has inspired many modern teachers to simplify the ancient techniques...

Relaxation and muscle balance are necessary to the practices of concentration and meditation so that (1) the body may not be injured by the mental efforts and (2) the mental work may not be spoiled by bodily discomfort. Third, we have to remember that bodily attitudes are associated with states of feeling, such as lying down with sleep, and...

Co-meditation is based on the principle that a certain mode of respiration evokes a particular state of mind and vice-versa. The power of the breath and the breath-mind relationship has been recognized for centuries by many cultures and religious traditions. Like other forms of meditation, the deep abdominal breathing produced by co-meditation affects the...

Take a moment now and find the very center of your energy. Let your focus soften as you become one with your surroundings for the next few moments as we travel together. Ask permission to join with the Earth and for her to be a part of your circle at this time. Breathe deeply and feel the energy shift in the room...

Jenny was eager to talk to me about her five-year-old nephew, who she was beginning to believe was the reincarnation of her grandfather. She hadn't known that it was possible for a child to be the reincarnation of a family member. Now Dylan's strange behaviors were beginning to make sense to her.

Could any of us watching Peter Pan struggling with his shadow -- to find his shadow, to keep his shadow and, ultimately, to "bind" his shadow to him -- have known that the shadow carries powerful psychological implications? We might have noticed that Peter seemed different once his shadow was firmly attached. He was still delightful and charming but slightly subdued and not quite so self-centered and irresponsible. A bit more... dare we say, grown up? As Peter Pan could tell us, the shadow is...

by John Payne. The time has come for you to realize that you are always in safety. The reason why you fear such things is that you do not yet believe that you are the creator of your own experience. As we have said many, many times before, that which you turn your attention to is that which you draw unto yourself...

For eons of time, prophets, seers, religions and Holy Books have foretold the coming of an Age when Heaven would manifest on Earth, an Age in which Humanity would develop the latent powers within and reunite with our own Divinity, an Age when transformation would occur at an atomic, cellular level, and...

One of the most startling developments of the late twentieth century has been the emergence within every major religious tradition of a militant piety popularly known as "fundamentalism." Its manifestations are sometimes shocking. Fundamentalists have gunned down worshippers in a mosque, have killed doctors and nurses who work in abortion clinics, have shot their presidents, and have even toppled a powerful government. It is only a small minority...

by Del Kyger. Since childhood, Mildred "Billie" Steves has felt the loving presence of God. So when Billie began to receive communications from God following her morning meditations, she was quite at ease and did not see these events as out of the ordinary...

And on the eighth day, man created God. Who else but man would donate only a mere three letters of the alphabet to the power behind the universe? Three letters do not bear much weight in light of a God who is attributed with creating a world, saving its people, and providing a life everlasting. Many would profess to say that God in fact is not the name they would use at all to depict their own conception of a higher being. Nature, the Great Spirit, Allah, Buddha, Goddess, Jesus Christ, no Christ, the earth, so many names...

Like many people on their spiritual path, it was some time before my spirit guide revealed his name to me. I must admit I thought it rather curious when he told me his name was Joe. I asked if he were an angelic being, or perhaps a saint, but he said I could just address him as Joe. Being a no-nonsense, down-to-earth kind of a person myself, I reasoned that was the type of guide I would attract. As you may have noticed, many metaphysical people tend to ask one another...

I've heard people say that they learned the truth of health and wholeness by being sick, the reality of abundance by suffering lack, the beauty of harmonious relationships by witnessing first hand the ugliness of discord. If that's the game plan they have chosen, fine, but doesn't it remind you of the old joke about someone who hit himself on the head with a hammer so it would feel good when he stopped? Many of us...

A paradox is a statement that seems to say opposite things: 'She was strong because of her weakness.' Life is full of paradoxes. Sometimes when I am asked what my theological position is, I often -- and paradoxically -- call myself a faithful agnostic. I say it quite seriously, though I enjoy the consternation it sometimes produces. The agnostic does not know whether God exists...

by Marie T. Russell. Summer has gone... and Winter will be arriving... yet Spring will return. The seasons pass in nature, as in our own lives. The winter of doubt and fear does pass away as we become aware that there is no one to blame for the dark times we went through -- not even ourselves. These are simply the processes of life, the changing seasons as it were.

Zen is a kind of uneducation. Zen is a kind of unlearning. It teaches you how to drop that which you have learned, how to become unskillful again, how to become a child again, how to start existing without mind again, how to be here without any mind.

You can use random sounds (such as sirens, the neighbor's lawn mower, etc.) as reminders to return to the present moment. This technique encourages us to transcend our mood.