Contrasting Beliefs

Examine your beliefs, realize that they form your experience, and consciously change those that do not give the effect you want. In such an examination you will be aware of many excellent beliefs that work for you. Trace these through. See how they were followed by your imagination and emotions. If possible, look into your own past for points where recognizable new ideas came to you and beneficially changed your experience. Ideas not only alter the world constantly, they make it constantly.

Jane Roberts, the psychic, poet, and author, wrote those words in one of her Seth Books. We don’t examine our beliefs. Beliefs are beliefs. We believe our beliefs are set in stone. Some beliefs begin at birth; others before birth. Beliefs are thoughts reinforced by imagination and emotions. Those thoughts also contain associations, influences, and conditions. We build our lives around our beliefs. And when they begin to change in some way, we ask for help.

We don’t grade our beliefs. They are true to us, so they are all good. Bad beliefs are not ours. They belong to others that don’t share our truths. We put up an invisible wall between our beliefs and opposing beliefs. And we defend them at all costs. Our ideas about good and bad, and right and wrong are associations within our beliefs.

Those associations, along with others, alter our world. Associations, influences, and mental conditions within our beliefs are meant to be different. If we all believed the same thing nothing would change. Contrasting beliefs create expansion as well as life-changing experiences.

The notion that we should force all to agree as we believe is a fruitless task. We should respect all beliefs, and then learn to discern from the influences and conditions within them. Discernment gives us the power to appreciate differences. We may not agree with differences, but we grow from the energy within them.