3-41. Habits have traction. They can require time to reverse. Negative thoughts are no exception. Practice releasing your fears by trusting that God will always guide you correctly.
The Guidance of God will not be forced upon you, for that would subvert your free will. If you are willing to accept that it is possible that you can be guided to the most opportune situations and towards the most solicitous and valuable people who can serve to reflect to you some aspect of your Truth that you are, as of yet, unwilling or unable to see, then you shall be granted such support and direction. This is not a statement that is conditional - it is absolute. Assistance is available in all instances, and with regard to all occurrences, without any exception. All entreaties to God are answered, although frequently the response it so deeply muted by the ego that it appears to be invisible or unintelligible. That does not mean in any way that a response was not provided - it is merely indicative of the fact that you are not yet willing to accept the simplicity of the instruction. It is a confusion of the ego to presume that Creation must be intractably complex or fully incomprehensible. That is not the case at all, for while the expressions of Creation are vast and multitudinous in their variety, the underlying structure that dictates how they are organized is founded upon principles that are readily understandable and that are, at least primarily, relatable to other concepts which with you are likely already deeply familiar. The traction of habits is found in their repetition - thoughts become formulations of perception when they are repeated to such an extent that they are accepted as rote conventions of conception without any further examination. Is that of value to you or anyone else? Certainly not, for the unexamined life is indeed an existence in which you exist, but do not expand to any degree that has value for you at all. Negativity is one of the hallmarks of the ego, for the ego is angry indeed that you might ever wish to betray it - for to the ego, any unfolding of your wings that allows you soar high above the barren salt flats of the ego’s desolation is a betrayal of the deepest cruelty. Negativity is a belief in impossibility now manifested into a bewildering subset of forms, ideas of what is possible and that which cannot be, all of which find their final expression and justification within a presumption of unworthiness that has no genuine evidence. All of this is but a presentation of limited perspective used to prop up a structure of conceptualization of all that is Unitary as being evidence of distance and separation. Yet that is simply not True, and so it can be released. But you will hold to these ideas for just as long as the fear of becoming all that you can be is greater than the anticipation of the freedom that you will naturally experience once you begin to cast all off all of your prior acceptance of the boundaries that the ego has created to entrap you within its web of deceit. Negative expressions are their own justifications - “just my luck” presents the presumption of misfortune as a constant companion, whereas the Truth of this material universe is that it is decidedly neutral and indeed, trials and tribulations strike the “worthy” and the “unworthy” with no regard to their apparent status. No life is immune from the indignities of tragedy, and it is not within your ambit of control to dictate what might occur. What you can choose is how you react, and that freedom is universal and inalterable. Negativity is a presumption that unfortunate events must engender an unfortunate reaction within your perception, yet they need not. Such is the essence of acceptance - it is the ability to recognize that an unwanted occurrence has arrived, and to then discover the most apt route for moving beyond the challenge, rather than becoming mired in frustration and a belief that you “didn’t deserve” what occurred. Deserving has no reflection in the randomness of this world of form, for “things happen” and that is that. They do not seek you out as some form of punishment, and you are not responsible for all that befalls you. You are responsible for your reactivity, or the absence thereof, and within that ability you can find your deepest and most horrific hell, if you choose to believe that you are a victim of fate, or your greatest triumph, when you are willing to consistently rise above all that afflicts you, becoming stoic to an extent that you may previously have believed to be inaccessible to you. Fear is a counterpoint to negativity, as fear is an unwillingness to accept future events with the certainty that a joyous heart will always hold. There is no mechanism available at the present to accurately predict what will occur, other than in the most general sense. As such, you are not provided with intimate knowledge of all that the future holds, and so you can step forward with trepidation and recalcitrance, or you can be bold and you can accept that no matter what unfolds, you are Loved and that is all that is of genuine and permanent importance. The import of your willingness to accept the Love of God is fearlessness in all instances, for what is there to fear if your place within the Heart of God is Certain and inalterable? This is not a proposition for the genuinely faint of heart, for it requires a surrendering of the belief that physical demise carries with it a destruction of spirit that is nonsensical. As such, if relinquishing all fear of death appears to gargantuan a task at this moment, then do not attempt to do so. Start with some aspect of your awareness that is a bit smaller, such as your assumption that the past has any power to dictate the future. It does not, for the present moment separates the past from the future in a manner that cannot be undone. Start with examining your resistance to being directed as is most appropriate, and then ask yourself if that is what you truly wish to experience. If you do, then so be it - you will, and that will not change until you are willing to change. If, however, you find within your heart some inkling of a desire to allow yourself to be given Guidance in any form, hold fast to that light and cherish it, for that is the Certainty and the Grace of your heart, perhaps for so long forgotten but which is now beginning to surface from the depths of your awareness. Fear is an expression of the ego, for it is a presumption of fragility that is not reflected in your spirit or soul. The ego must perish, for it is of this world, and all that is transitory will degrade and alter. Yet your awareness will not, and within that certainty, you can begin to construct a structure that extends beyond the ego’s inherent limitations. This great abutment to the Kingdom of Heaven can serve as a bridge of light that will assist you to allow the Guidance of God to flow through your heart, allowing you to be directed as is most appropriate towards whatever it is that you are to learn next. What could you possibly loose when you relinquish negativity and distrust, accepting in their place that you can be Given all that you might need - and more importantly, that indeed you already have? This is the inflection point from which uncertainty is relinquished and the Power of God is presented to you as your own as well. It is possible to be without fear. It is not possible to be without God. Because God is with you, forever, there is nothing that can be used to genuinely justify fear in any way at all. Accept but this, and all that is restrictive will crumble, just as rapidly as you are willing to let it be dissolved into the nothingness from which it was first formed.