Manifesting the World We Want to Live In

My father, Mendek Rubin, no longer lives on this earth, but he continues to be my teacher. One of the most important things he’s taught me is how to harness the immense transformative power of visualization—the freedom to imagine the life we want as an essential part of actualizing it. He wrote, “Visualization brought me the realization that life is neither fixed nor limited, but rather an ever-changing opportunity for exploration and wonder. Visualization freed me to experience a brighter future and no longer feel like a helpless bystander.”

Mendek, who survived the Holocaust while almost his entire family was murdered, devoted his life to understanding how the human mind works and how beliefs—including those that people are willing to kill or die for—are formed. He studied the ways we’re conditioned by all that came before us, and realized that repetition is the mind’s forte. He wrote, “When it comes to the workings of the mind, we still live in the dark ages. Our demons are as old as history, and our inner world has hardly changed over the past centuries. The ‘progress’ we’ve achieved hasn’t transformed the way we’re trapped by thought patterns based on scarcity and fear. Advancements that have improved our physical lives haven’t brought us any closer to peace of mind. Scientific breakthroughs abound, but we have yet to discover spiritual elevators that can lift us into a world of light and love.”

This time in history—when the fires of fear, anger, blame and discontent are burning so fiercely—feels alarmingly reminiscent of wartime. The immense challenges our country and the world are facing right now makes it clear that we are at a dramatic crossroads—ripe for either accelerated devastation or dramatic positive transformation. We could sure use a “spiritual elevator” to take us to a place high above the fray where peace, acceptance, balance, reverence, generosity and healing become the things society cultivates and prizes.

In addition to working hard to affect transformation in the “real world”—getting people to vote, standing up against injustice, and helping those in need—I’ve grown to believe that we can also be powerful changemakers in the energetic realms by amplifying the love in our hearts and sowing much-needed seeds of positivity. Visualization, done together in big groups to magnify the impact, may actually be able to function as a type of “spiritual elevator” for us right now.

I began imagining “Circles of Light,” an initiative to gather as many people as possible to serve as “energetic activists” committed to fostering more positivity in ourselves and the world by activating a strong connection to love, light, and community. Yes, the power of energetic realms hasn’t been incontrovertibly verified by science and may be dismissed by some, but I think back to how people viewed organic farming in 1984 when Drew and I founded Earthbound Farm—by and large, it was considered “fringe” and for “kooks” because its benefits hadn’t yet been substantiated by scientific studies. Just look at the popularity and mainstream acceptance of that “hippie food” now!

So why not explore the possibility of tackling our current problems from a different dimension, rather than only repeating past strategies that have failed to create the kind of transformation our world needs so desperately right now? Why not create Circles of Light?

I ran the idea by Sally Kempton, a widely respected teacher of meditation and spiritual wisdom, because I had just read her best-selling book, Awakening Shakti: The Transformative Power of the Goddesses of Yoga. In it she wrote, “Because human consciousness and human imagination are so powerfully creative, our attention to these forms have a powerful effect on our own life experience, and also affects collective consciousness. In other words, when a lot of people are invoking a particular cosmic energy, they create a channel that makes it easier for that energy to show up in the human world.”

Sally embraced the “Circles of Light” concept wholeheartedly because she believes we are living in an incredibly significant time for the earth and humanity. “It’s more important than ever that we offer our best. That means holding space for positive transformation, filling our minds with energies of light and blessing, and realizing that every thought and feeling matters.”

In addition to Sally, I reached out to a few of my favorite healers and teachers, all of whom offered to contribute guided visualizations for people to use individually or in healing circles with family, friends, or members of their own community. Quest for Eternal Sunshine will also offer a live Zoom “Circle of Light” every Tuesday at 5:20 pm Pacific/8:20 pm Eastern for twenty minutes, starting on October 13 and running through November 3, Election Day. Our circle will be led by the wonderful healer I’ve worked with for over a decade, Hilary Nicholls. Sally Kempton will begin her circle on October 13.

Sally’s work is known to kindle powerful meditative states, so I am happy to share the text of the beautiful “Circle of Light” meditation she created. On the “Circle of Light” webpage you will soon find both the text and an audio recording of it, as well as resources from the other amazing teachers and healers who are collaborating on this project, including Trudy Goodman, Debra Silverman, and Hilary Nicholls, whose contributions I’ll be highlighting over the coming weeks. We are also developing suggestions on how to create your own circle and incorporate these practices into your life. I hope you will use and benefit from these valuable resources, and also sign up for Quest for Eternals Sunshine’s “Circle of Light.”

I am immensely grateful to Spirituality & Health Magazine for publishing a piece I recently wrote about “Circles of Light” to help spread the word. Please read the article which explains more about the evolution of the concept and includes many profound insights from Michael Murphy, the wise visionary who founded Esalen Institute more than 58 years ago.

Consider becoming an energetic activist and participating in a Circle of Light. Circles are lovely and relaxing, as well energizing and powerful. As Richard Bach said, “To bring anything into your life, imagine that it’s already there.”

With gratitude and the hope that we can work together to help create a healthy, equitable, beautiful world for our children and grandchildren,

Myra

Sign up for Quest's first live Circle of Light on October 13

Sally Kempton’s “Circle of Light” Meditation

Welcome to our daily meditation and to the creation of our Circle of Light.

Please take a moment to find a comfortable, upright posture. Inhaling, feel the hips and buttocks becoming heavy and sinking into the seat. Exhaling, feel the spinal column elongating upward through the crown.

Your shoulders release onto the back, your head rises as if held by a thread from the ceiling. Your chest lifts and opens.

Focus for a moment on the simple flow of breath, cool on the inhalation, warm on the exhalation. Your face is soft. Your belly is soft. Your shoulders drop. Now, begin to sense the breath flowing directly into the heart. You might feel as though there is an opening or softening in the chest wall, so that the breath, like a caress, can touch and open your heart.

Be aware of the network of hearts meditating at this moment. Allow yourself to feel part of this golden current of love and care for our world.

Now, take a moment to form an intention. How do you want the future to look? Can you imagine a world where there is genuine equality of opportunity? Where our social systems support us? Where there is fundamental trust between people, where our institutions act for the greatest good? Going farther, can you see a world in which humans recognize the truth that we are all part of a single tapestry, that we are all sacred, and that each one of us has the power to live from a divine core? Can we imagine a world in which we protect nature, and recognize the rights of all living creatures and of the earth itself? A world in which we all recognize that behind the forms of this world is the shimmer of light and the shimmer of love?

Today, at this moment, what is the brightest future you can conceive? Create that intention for this moment. It doesn’t have to be the same vision you had yesterday. But let it be a vision fully expressing your love, beauty, and wisdom.

From the heart, feel that your intention fills the space of the heart. Feel that the inner heart is filled with the energy of light, irradiating your intention and filling you with loving light energy.

Now, imagine that your intention is reality. Feel that your intention, carried by the light, filled with radiance, is spreading from within you and irradiating your entire body. Sense that light softly flowing from your body to fill the space around you. Then the room. Now have the feeling that this light flows in waves from within your heart to the entire neighborhood. Now be aware that all around the globe there are others who are holding this same light in their hearts. Feel that the loving sacred intentions of all these beings are joining, and that together we are offering light and loving kindness into the field of this planet. Sense this light flowing through our cities. Feel it penetrating the corridors of our government buildings. Feel that light flowing into the homes of people of people all through your region of the world. sense this light filling the trees and the buildings. Feel it softening and inspiring everyone and everything it touches.

Inhaling, draw your intention for light and love into your own body. Exhaling, feel it spreading softly from your heart into the world. Imagine the people you love filled with light. Imagine people you distrust or reject being filled with the light. Imagine that where there is fear and unhappiness and cruelty, this light dispels fear and pain. Imagine that people all over the world look into each other’s eyes and recognize our shared humanity. See how naturally the light interpenetrates the stuck parts of each one of us, and turns our confusion into clarity, our suspicion into trust, our fear into the willingness to love.

Meditate on the illumination of the world.

Myra GoodmanOctober 2, 2020Lessons from Mendek, Circle of Light, Meditation, Hilary Nicholls, Sally Kempton, Featured Teachers