External authority versus internal authority

The power to manifest - Part 5

We've walked a long path dissecting spiritual materialism, mind over matter, and the New Age spirituality community's fixation on the power to manifest. At this point, I won't bother repeating important points. You can find them in any one of the preceding four essays in varying degrees of detail, starting with The Power to Manifest.

This week I'd like to zero in on one of the more subtle yet profound aspects of this whole topic, which is namely the issue of internal versus external authority and our relationship with both.

Nature decides

I talked earlier about the holographic nature of existence and the fact that humans are spirit beings that reflect the whole of existence. We are not separate from anything. We are nature—all of creation—bundled up into what seems like individual physical bodies that actually are not physical at all, but rather interpenetrating fields of energy/information containing the wisdom of All That Is.

As the Sufi poet Rumi put it: "You are not a drop in the ocean, you are the ocean in a drop."

With this in mind, I made the point that manifestation is not personal and can never be "personal," because we are each part of the whole. Thus, it is the whole of existence that does the manifesting—it is the whole of existence that decides what manifests and what doesn't based upon whether an individual desire is beneficial for the whole ... not just beneficial for the teeny tiny "part" called you and me—the part that thinks it would be a great idea to have millions of dollars worth of gold doubloons fall from the heavens into our bank accounts.

As Jacqueline Hobbs, aka Oracle Girl puts it: "Nature decides," not us. Which totally explains why "the power to manifest" is so hit and miss. Why little things arrive effortlessly and BIG things don't. Or why one major hit happens like magic and then POOF! Nada. Nothing else happens no matter how intensely you focus.

Nature—the entirety of our being aka the fabric of the universe—decides.

Not us.

Implications

When I ran across it, the whole idea that "nature decides" pissed me off because I immediately felt disempowered. Or at least the "little me" personality part felt disempowered.

I liked the idea of being autonomous and in charge of my life ... in charge of what happened and didn't happen. And "nature decides" was far too similar to "God decides" for my taste. Either way, I was left holding the bag, waiting on some higher authority than me to decide whether I got what I wanted or not. And that sucked.

What sucked even more was the fact that I'd only just recently gotten over the whole "God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth" thing.

Globally, 60 percent of the world's population believes in God or some sort of higher power. Nineteen percent are on the fence. Which is lower than the US statistics. The latest Pew research survey finds that 81 percent of Americans believe in God. (Down from 87 percent ten years ago.)  

Personally, I never once seriously questioned the fact of God's existence. I grew up and got married in the Episcopal Church before decades of spiritual teachings introduced me to the concept of my own divine nature. After that, thousands of hours of meditation gave me plenty of experience feeling connected and one with life. All of which reframed my relationship with God from dutiful worshiper to divine participant in life.

Which was quite a healthy progression.

And yet ... in actuality, 10,000 hours of blissful communion with the divine with my eyes closed was nothing compared to the impact of the 640,000 hours of hard living I'd done so far. Meditative bliss and even periods of enlightenment weren't nearly enough to defray the overarching impression of human limitation and powerlessness that life lived in 20th and 21st century America had dished out.

Which meant in spite of decades of spiritual effort, on a day-today basis, I was living more of a concept of personal divinity and being one with God than anything else.

Which is why, up to a couple years ago, part of me was still subconsciously hoping God would take care of me on some level. At the very least maybe He could help me out in the money and health departments. And perhaps He could steer a new partner my way? Or grease the skids for one of my books hugely taking off?

Bottomline, through all of this, God was ... well, GOD. Terrifying authority figure or a divine peer, God was always an absolute given.

And then COVID came along and dealt my belief in a divine Higher Power a nasty blow.

Our eternal nature

I don't care what kind of philosophy or story you make up to rationalize the misery of our human condition: Earth is a School for spiritual neophytes; Earth is a prison planet; Earth is a galactic genetic experiment ... what kind of God would permit such criminal insanity as attempted global genocide?

COVID, medical weaponization, and the Controlling Elite's drive towards transhumanism woke me up to the reality that something else was going on. That nothing in my world was as it seemed.

But the coup de grâce to my belief in God was finally seeing a truth that was made apparent during what can only be called several days of enlightenment that occurred way back in October of 2007. During the first few moments of those three ineffable days, I saw that not only would I never die, I realized that I had never been born.

I always had been and always would be.

Oh, not the personality and the embodiment called "Cate." That was transitory. But "I" —the real "I"—was eternal.

Remembering this in the midst of COVID finally got it through my head that if I am an eternal being it was literally impossible for"God" to create me … or to create you or anything else. Because life and the spark of intelligence is in all things and beings and has been forever.

Always was, is, and always will be.

A new paradigm

It took about a year, but eventually I got comfortable with this understanding and stopped looking upwards for help at odd moments of the day or night, saying things like "God help me," and "God only knows," and "God, would you look at that." I got over the shock of God's absence. And then, just when I was starting to feel comfortable about the situation, the whole "nature decides" conversation dropped in my lap.

As I said, initially it upset me. But after some thought there was something about the idea that caught my attention.

There was something about it that drew me in and made me feel part of the conversation. I mean, my body is part of nature. Right? The plants and (ever fewer) animals I eat are part of nature. My cats are part of nature. The wind in my hair and the glorious sunrise that bring me joy are part of nature. The starry night skies that dazzle me are part of nature. They are LIFE.

Unlike God, nature comes with no scary "authority figure" overtones. No implied threats of judgment and punishment for transgressions against God's (frequently schizophrenic) laws. (EG. Thou shalt not kill. But never mind that and go slaughter My enemies and the children of My enemies and the children's children of My enemies.)

Yes, nature has laws. But they are not arbitrary. They are unyielding and unequivocal.

Drink and eat chemical poisons that interfere with and shut down cellular function and you die. Step in front of a tornedo or avalanche and you die. Fly a space craft with walls as thin as tissue paper through the radiation of the Van Allen Belt and you die.

No judgment. No remorse. Just immediate, reliable consequences for ignorance, arrogance and stupidity.

Which is kinda refreshing. Very ... clean. And actually empowering. I mean, we can choose to go along with what is and guide our choices and actions accordingly. Or we can choose to push the limits or even go against the natural order of things and see what happens. After that ... no judgment. No punishment.

Just consequences.

The dance

This situation reminds me very much of dancing. Let's pretend for a moment that "nature" is a waltz being conducted by a highly skilled orchestra. The music is harmonious. The movement of the dance is fluid. When everyone is dancing with the music, it's pure exhilarating fun. Majestic even.

But if some people stop waltzing and start doing the jitterbug, moving upstream, or the twist, or start twerking in the middle of the dance floor, dancers crash into one another. People get hurt. Chaos ensues.

On the other hand, if you stick with going with the flow of the music, synchronously moving with all the other dancers, there's a sense of oneness and belonging. There’s still individuality and individual choice, but there’s no fighting, no chaos, and—dare I say it?—no fear.

Wow.

As I deeply contemplated the whole "nature decides" scenario, once I got over freaking out about being disempowered yet again by some arbitrary authority figure looming overhead, I tentatively settled into the felt sense and natural rhythms of nature.

I imagined lying back and surrendering to the gentle waters of a flowing river. I leaned back. (The opposite of what we're taught about always having to lean in to get anything done.) And as I leaned back, I relaxed.

And something about it just felt right.

I was surrendering ... not to something or SOMEONE ... I was surrendering to what I already am.

In some strange way, I was surrendering to myself. I didn't have to struggle anymore. I didn't have to strive. I didn't have to push, and shove and strain my brain or my muscles.

Eventually, the more I leaned into this trusting sensation, I began to feel a sense of relief.

OMG I mean, oh my! I don't have to do it all myself anymore! Came the thought. I have resources! I have all of life at my back! I am supported!

The thought was shocking and revolutionary. The sense of belonging and safety was sweet and sensual. A childlike sense of comfort and trust suffused my being, and I could almost hear the whispered message:  It's okay sweetheart. Shhhhh ...you can stop crying now. You don't have to be afraid anymore. I'm here. Everything is going to be okay .... I promise.

The danger

This surrender process is, of course, almost identical to the traditional surrender to God sternly commanded by Church authorities since time immemorial. And/or the surrender to the omnipotent King of the Realm or the Pope—people who are supposedly God's representatives on Earth.

The simply enormous difference is this: Instead of surrendering to another singular, albeit grandiose, Being ... instead of surrendering to outside authority, we're surrendering to ourselves and our own nature: IE. life itself.

In this scenario, there is no separation. No duality. No greater than and less than. No hierarchy is involved. No artificial Rules and Regulations. No commands from on High. There is nothing above or below us. Just life.

The only danger involved in adopting and leaning into the whole "nature decides" reality, is me/you/humanity falling back into the old program of believing in hierarchy. Of projecting onto nature an image outside of ourselves—an image of omnipotent Power that knows better than us—that we then give our lives and personal autonomy over to.

Which is what people have done with nature in the past, because humanity has been cowed by programming into seeking and relying upon outside authority for thousands of years.

Next time

There's a whole history to this program of thinking we're small, worthless and incapable of motoring along safely on our own—plus a whole program demonizing nature—that I'll get into next week.

In the meantime, if it resonates, try on the whole "nature decides" thing. Try leaning back and relaxing into the arms of All That Is, knowing that the only agenda of nature is more life and more growth, more expansion and more possibility.

There's no control. No "have to's." Nothing "over" you. Just a steadfast flowing river you know how to safely swim in because you were swimming in it before you were ever born.

Much love and aloha ~

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About Cate Montana

I’m a professional journalist specializing in alternative medicine and health, and the author of several books, including Unearthing Venus: My Search for the Woman Within [Watkins 2013], and The E Word, Ego Enlightenment & Other Essentials [Atria 2017], and a spiritual novel titled Apollo & Me. I have a master’s degree in psychology. A lot of TV, radio and podcast show hosts as well as listeners around the world have told me I’m an interesting and informative—even compelling—speaker. To which I say “Thank you.” Talking is something I enjoy doing even more than writing! (It’s more immediate and connected.)

I am extremely blessed to have been called to Maui and grateful every day to awaken here.

For more information you can reach me at www.catemontana.com and info@catemontana.com