Take Up Thy Bed and Walk

TAKE UP THY BED AND WALK

So many people have never been told we have the ability to heal ourselves. I was taught as a child that if we got sick, somebody else had to heal us. My dear mother never took an active part in her own healing because she did not know that she could. At the end of her life, she was in a state of Alzheimer's for years in spite of the fortune that was spent on her care.

Jesus said, "Physician, heal thy Self." He would not have said this if we were not able to accomplish our own healing. Many people have written stories of the healings he accomplished. In every instance he was teaching us how to heal ourselves and others. The unfortunate part of these written accounts is that the writer could not convey what Jesus was thinking as he did his healings. They could not read his mind to see his conviction in the process he was using to create sight in the eyes of the blind man or to restore life in the lifeless bodies of those who had died. The writers conveyed the words he spoke but not his silent understanding that the divine power was inherent in the words, which was the key that moved the energy and caused the healings.

When Jesus healed we know that he used powerful commands-ARISE, COME OUT, TAKE UP THY BED AND WALK. In every instance he was commanding an action to accomplish the healing. He used verbs requiring action, movement and change. I often say to my clients, you have to be willing to change. Continuing to hold onto your old attitudes and old ways of thinking and doing things will not bring about the healing you desire. Jesus was known far and wide as a powerful healer. He could instantly read the minds of his patients and could tell if they believed that their healing would be accomplished. He spoke of FAITH many times, and even said, "Thy FAITH hath made thee whole," when a woman was healed just by touching his garment. The patient has to be ready and willing to accept the healing for it to be accomplished. The patient's mind must be open to change. If changing the way we do something or changing our way of reacting to someone is what causes healing, we are able to do this. We change our mind every day. The minute your mind accepts the needed change, you have your healing. The change you make will really cause you to feel different.

What stands in the way of changing our mind is our negative beliefs. "Oh, I can't get well because someone told me I'll always have this illness. I've had this for years so it's unlikely to change. This is an incurable illness. Nobody knows how to heal this so I'm stuck with it." These negative beliefs comprise attitudes that will hold the patient in a state of illness indefinitely. You have to be willing to change your beliefs and stop believing them to be true. The most important thing to change is your attitude toward your Self.

If anyone has taught you to humble your Self, then you need to get your Self back together. The Self is your direct connection to the Spirit power that heals you. You must consciously recognize that you have a Self that is an entity. The Self is your essential connection to nature. The greater you can believe your Self to be, the faster you will accomplish your healings. Jesus made himself equal with God (John 5:18). He was teaching us how to heal ourselves. Some modern religions teach their practitioners to humble themselves, which is the opposite of what Jesus taught us. Webster defines the word humble as follows: To destroy the power, independence or prestige of, to decisively defeat; to DEGRADE, ABASE. If we follow anyone's teachings blindly and apply such misteachings to ourselves without understanding the true meaning that stands behind the word they are telling us to apply to ourselves, then we can defeat, damage and even destroy ourselves without understanding what caused it. Jesus gave us a commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves. When we are taught to humble ourselves, we break this commandment by destroying and degrading ourselves. The Self, as the God part of you, needs your love and your praise to produce a healthy body for you. Say I LOVE MY SELF. I PRAISE MY SELF every day. Our purpose for your healing is to wake up the spiritual side of your Self. Because the Self is your direct connection to the Spirit power that can heal you, it is vital to your healing that you reverse this gross misteaching and begin at once to follow Jesus' example in making your Self as equal with God as you can possibly manage. Many of your old beliefs will fight you on that one. Are you willing to change? Are you ready to heal? Begin now to say, I BELIEVE IN MY SELF. Conscious recognition of the Self is essential if you wish to heal your Self of anything. So you may need to begin your healing by saying, I CONSCIOUSLY RECOGNIZE THAT I HAVE A SELF TO LOVE.

Most of us are not taught as children that OUR THINKING CAUSES. This is not an occasional thought that causes. It is our every thought. The thoughts that we think repeatedly manifest on our bodies and in our lives. Negative thoughts produce our illnesses and positive thoughts produce good health. Whatever hateful thoughts we think in our mind manifest on our body, no matter how much anger we might direct toward another person. Some words carry a powerful amount of negative energy and can cause harm to our bodies-thus, the importance of forgiving and forgetting. Forgive means "let it go." Forget means "get your mind on something else-something pleasant."

Two emotional words that Jesus taught us not to indulge in are FEAR and ANGER. These two words with their many variations cause our more serious illnesses when they are habitually indulged in. Variations of these words are resentment, remorse, aggravation, hatred, worry, anxiety, and other words of this nature. Whatever things in our lives cause us to feel anger and fear need to be changed and released. We need to put our minds at rest and maintain ourselves in a peaceful harmonious state as consistently as possible to be healthy. All illnesses are caused from mental disturbances where negative emotional words have been thought consistently to the point the body reacts and responds with pain or disease, because our thinking causes. Next time you are upset and reacting to something unpleasant, observe your attitude and particularly the negative emotional words you are thinking, because later on when you find your Self not feeling well, it may be those very attitudes that you will need to change and release to bring about your healing. St. Paul said, "Whatsoever things are true, ...honest, ...just, ...pure, ...lovely, ...of good report, if there be any virtue or praise, think on these things." Our own negative attitudes cause our illnesses. By reversing these attitudes and really being willing to change, we bring about our healing.

Spirit is working for you all of the time. It produces for you exactly what your emotions dictate. It is your heart-felt feeling that it produces. You may say that you want one thing but feel in your heart that you want another. Spirit follows the heart feeling when it produces for you. The word Spirit means attitude and in healing we have to change our attitudes to accomplish the healing. There may be many negative attitudes that you need to change, but in spiritual healing, we start with our attitudes about the Self. The more loving, praising and genuine (pure in Spirit) you are, the greater will be your achievements in healing your Self from any ailment.

There are certain things that can prevent you from healing. Believing that your illness cannot be healed, as someone may have told you, could prevent your recovery. Believing that you are guilty of something and need to be punished, destroyed or abused could prevent it. Refusing to believe in your Self or failing to see that there is a Self to believe in could prevent it. Letting fear get the best of you could prevent it. Not really wanting to get well for whatever reason could prevent it. Not being willing to make needed changes in the problem areas of your life could prevent it. Healing comes from within; it begins with you. You have to be ready to get well. You have to be willing to change your opinion of your Self and realize you are much greater than you ever thought you were. Getting well takes some work-but it is mental work. Dissolve old negative thoughts and attitudes, think new loving thoughts about your Self and change anything in your life that seems to be unloving to your Self.

There are three steps to follow in spiritual healing. 1) Empty out-eliminate wrong thinking. Clean out the old words to make room for the new words. Consciously dispel the negative words and feelings that have caused your disease. To dispel them, you scatter the letters of the words so they spell nothing. Visualize a negative emotional word that you know has bothered you, like hopeless, and in your imagination tear it apart letter by letter until it spells nothing. Send the letters of the word back into the alphabet where they are harmless. 2) Fill your mind with right thinking. Consciously add new positive words to your mind in powerful commands. I HAVE HOPE. I KNOW THAT I HAVE IT BECAUSE I SEE IT HERE IN MY MIND. The correct words to add are always the direct opposite words from the way you have felt in the past. When you catch your Self reacting negatively to some recurring unpleasant person or situation in your life, be aware that this reaction may be the negative emotion that is causing your disease, especially if you have reacted with discomfort to that person many times before. Learn to say "no" to someone who has become a problem in your life, continually annoys you and expects you to say "yes." Learning to say "no" rather than "yes" to whatever he or she wants this time can cause a big change in your health. When you say "no" it puts you in control and prevents you from feeling the negative emotion that has made you sick when you have said "yes" so many times in the past. Saying "no" can be the beginning of getting well. Have the courage to say "no" from now on and do not waver if you value your health. You might wonder why changing "yes" to "no" could cause a healing. The answer is because it changes your reactions and emotions. I used this method to heal my nine-year-old son of a congenital medically-incurable illness, and for the first time in years, by saying "no," I found my Self in control of a situation that had been out of control for years. I tell the story of this healing in my book, Heal Yourself of Anything, Example Glaucoma. 3) Relax and enjoy the difference you have made. Your body will naturally and perfectly reflect the good changes in your attitudes to the exact way you feel about the problem NOW that you have made a change. There is no fooling Spirit. It will give you exactly the change you bring about in your own mind. Your Spirit loves you, and it wants you to be well, but you control what it gives you as you choose either to keep your new peace of mind achieved by changing your emotional reactions or to keep your on-going frustrations by not changing the way you react to annoying people in your life.

Do not ask your body how it is feeling today. It will reply with that same old pain. Get busy and change your reactions. Change your way of handling the problem areas in your life and your body will automatically acknowledge the change with better health. This moment NOW is a new moment in which you have never thought a thought before. Your NOW THOUGHT, as yet un-thought, is your point-of-power to control the Spirit (the attitude) that heals you. The Spirit gives you whatever you think 51% of the time. It is there to serve you. Learning the correct use of this divine power within us is our greatest challenge. Spirit does not decipher between our negative and our positive attitudes. It just gives us whatever we think most often.

Overcome your fear first no matter what your problem is. Spirit will follow your fear and manifest the negative if it is greater than your conviction that health will manifest. The fight for victory and healing is a mental battle between your on-going negative attitudes and your positive attitudes. Your health and life experiences reflect your attitudes perfectly every day. Monitor your attitudes, honor your feelings and live in peace as your daily challenge.

To inform Spirit that you are making some changes you begin by talking to your Self. "Spirit, I'm making some changes here. No more humility. I am magnificent. I see my Self as the greatest of the great and on the way up. There is no stopping me." Then listen for Spirit's response. It may say to you, "Are you sure?" And you reply, "Yes, I'm changing." When you are beginning to reverse old attitudes, you may have to be very firm with Spirit. You gave it directives long ago that it is following to the letter and now all of a sudden you are telling it you want to change something, and it may question you. It wants to get it right and to know what you really want NOW. Tell it every day exactly what you want your health to be. Do not be double-minded. A house divided against it Self will not stand. You have to decide, how am I going to think this? If one minute you say, "Spirit, I'm changing. No more blindness. I see my Self clearly. I have perfect vision," and then fear takes over and you say, "Oh, I'm getting worse," Spirit will say, "Bah, hum bum," and leave you as you are. Be greater in your conviction of the power of Spirit to restore your sight than in the imagined power of fear, and you will accomplish your healing. Really believe in your Self without doubting what you are doing. Be willing to take control of your own health and change from the inside out. Do not go on and on with the same old problem any longer. Really change. Clean your house of clutter and clean your body and mind of harmful emotions.

You are a Spirit-being, full of attitudes. You have complete power and ability to heal your Self by changing these attitudes. Fill your Self with love and praise for your Self and that is a wonderful place to begin. Eliminate every negative element in your life that you can eliminate to keep your mind in harmonious balance. Communicate with Spirit in new deeper ways. Ask Spirit to help you achieve your goals. It will respond if you communicate directly with it.

Listen for its voice. Really open your mind to changing. Be patient with your healing. Know that every good positive thought you think about your Self or about your health is helping you. You do not know in what order your negative attitudes will unwind themselves from your body as you begin to think your new loving thoughts. If unwanted cholesterol goes first, maybe it came last and that why it disappeared first, as you do your good work. When any improvement appears, rejoice and praise your Self for your great mental accomplishment. You changed in some way or the illness would not have changed at all. Let any change help to convince you of your own great thinking power. Now, and now, and now you have the opportunity to think a new good thought about your Self and about your health. Add these good thoughts to your mind consciously. Your health does not depend on other people; it depends on you. To empty out your old negative ways of thinking and give new directions and new powerful commands to Spirit, say "NO MORE fear, I DISPEL hopelessness, I CANCEL resentment, I STOP anger, I RELEASE blindness. To fill your mind with your positive change in thought say, "I AM ABLE TO see, I AM WILLING TO change, I AM READY TO get well, I AM POWERFUL, I AM PERFECT, I AM SPIRIT," and then hold to that perfect ideal for your Self. If you can think the exact perfection you desire long enough and strong enough, you will manifest it, because Spirit will comply exactly with your thought, so be specific in your choice of words to add or subtract from your thinking. Know exactly what it is you are changing and be very firm in your directions. If you face your biggest problems, make a dynamic reversal in the way you react to them, and let your positive attitudes adjust, you will win your health back. If you do nothing to change those problem areas, do not expect your health to change.

If you believe you are less than perfect in any way, you will be. Make up your mind and get it on one track. Take the high road to paradise with no turning back. Think in ideals. Do not judge by perception in any area of your life. You can think a thought any way you want to think it and your good thoughts will cause if you persist in thinking them. Monitor and correct your thinking constantly. Your thoughts are your point of change. Have faith in your Self, and you will manifest your dreams.