On 3-16-79 (S2), Vernon Howard gave an enlightening talk where he said, “There is no one there to be built upon.” He was referring to the belief that you are a separate self that needs attention, maintenance, and promotion. In other words, his teachings are centered on the truth that there is no separate self.
And it is the belief in this fake separate self that causes all of the woes of this world: wars, hunger, fighting, and general unrest.
Slowing down one’s life and thinking, I can observe what is leading me to actions and reactions; I discover everything about bad habits.
If I go into action, by observing my thoughts, firstly, I make a remarkable discovery. I can witness my mind in action. Secondly, by breaking down the process of my thinking, and can see what is keeping my bad habits in place. Realizing that I have inner powers that I was unaware of, I become truly inspired. A new inspiration I have never witnessed before. Therefore, by slowing down and monitoring the thoughts that pass through my mind, I can see any mistakes I’m making. I begin to make astonishing revelations about myself.
In conclusion, I can actually witness where I am in cahoots with keeping that bad habit alive and well. I’m shocked silly! This revelation changes everything about how I think. Placing more attention on my thoughts produces inner gold. My view of the whole world changes. My thinking becomes fresh and new, and the bad habit is no more. If you have had enough of failing to break your bad habits, this is hard work, but it is the solution you have been asking for. Nothing can dismay the truly sincere.
Vernon gave such friendly, nice talks on how to live on a very troubled planet and still maintain a happy and inspired spirit. Thank You, Mr. Howard, your teachings are a lifesaver, and I’m very grateful. These mere words can’t convey my thanks.
Backtracking your thinking and any wrong positions you may take exposes everything about your suffering. You see that fearing your suffering keeps it in place. Now you are getting wise. Make as many mistakes as you must to understand this whole process.
From Vernon Howard’s booklet, “Freedom from a Life of Hell:”
#57 Strong Oak. A person dwells in his little world of habitual activities which give him something to do with himself. So he fears and fights change. Hell to him is to be unable to meet himself dozens of times a day inside his own petty mind. Millions suffer from this obsession with self-repetition. But you can have an eternal nature that is unconcerned with changes in time. An oak remains strong thru hundreds of changes in weather. So can you.
To find this “something else,” we must take this above message from VH very personally, and see the truth about our existence and what we are spending our time doing on this planet. This is not just a cute paragraph VH wrote to fill up his booklet, but a high, high message for those with ears to hear. Change is not good or bad, it is change.
Is it true that it is “our” belief in the separative, false sense of self that perpetuates its influence? If not, then what does believe in or perpetuate belief in the fake self, that self which divides us? Actually it is, in fact, the false self, itself, alone, that can possibly believe in itself. Surely the divine spark of light and wisdom that we truly are, in reality, does not and can not give reality to something that fraudulently pretends to be “us”. It is a trick of the deceptive thought generated sense of self using its capacity to divide itself into yet another self, a secondary self, that can now also again try to impersonate us, and thus promote belief in the first self, falsely insinuating that it is “we” who are somehow responsible for the belief in the original, first, or any other so called “self”. What we truly are, spirit / consciousness, could never possibly believe in or give credence to a fictitious unreal supposed entity or “self”. On the contrary it is spiritual insight alone that allows the recognition of the fake self for what it is, an illusory instrument of division. Thus it is only the fictitious self, talking to itself, that gives itself its only apparent credibility, and it is only the fictitious self that fraudulently tries to make it seem that “we” are somehow responsible for the self’s apparent credibility or that we are somehow responsible for the self’s continued activity. What you, in reality, actually are, an emanation of spiritual wisdom and insight, could never give anything false the permission to supposedly obscure spirituality’s own beneficial influence. It is merely a compilation of thoughts, over time, through deception, that created the counterfeit, imposter self in the first place and which by talking to a replication of itself, has thus tried again to impersonate “us” in order to make it seem that “we” have somehow acquiesced in some way to confirm the self’s existence or to perpetuate the self’s activities. We need not feel guilty of some supposed shortcoming in our nature that the self apparently exists or continues to apparently exist. We did not create the illusion of the imposter sense of self nor do we “believe” in it or perpetuate its existence by a “belief” in it. Rather what we truly are, as always, is the capacity to expose the self’s fraudulent nature and to be free of it. We are not, never have been, or ever will be a “self”.