“None of this would have been in my life if I hadn’t stumbled across Syd and his teachings. I mean, I can’t convey what a beautiful thing that is—a life I almost missed.”
This is a quote from “Tom,” one of the interviewees in Lori Carpenos and Christine Heath’s book, The Secret of Love.
What fresh belief might be awaiting your awareness?
What might you be missing in life?
Who knows what fresh belief might be pushing its way up through the stagnant thinking floating around your consciousness and sullying your life? Just like the awakening of the earth, as the spring thaw allows for that greening bud to appear on the end of a dead-looking brown twig, a fresh belief can transform your clouded experience of life. Every new day is an opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of life and how to live more fully—more in the present. This is one of the greatest gifts of being human: our capacity to embrace fresh beliefs that open our lives to joy, peace, and equanimity, or mental calmness and composure.
An Enlightenment That Continues to Evolve
Who is Syd?
What was the fresh belief that changed Tom’s and his wife Jane’s, lives? And who is Syd? Sydney Banks was a ninth-grade educated Scotsman, a welder in British Columbia, Canada, who pictured himself as an insecure man who believed his unhappiness stemmed from his childhood in foster care. In 1973, Syd had an “enlightening” experience that totally changed his life trajectory. He realized that within us, we have “Divine Consciousness” and that it is our personal thinking that causes us to make up stories that prevent us from seeing this gift that we ALL possess.
What is the Fresh Understanding?
This fresh understanding, now known as The Three Principles of Mind, Thought, and Consciousness, transformed Syd’s life. His internal shift was so immense that his co-workers didn’t even recognize him when he returned to work after his experience. Six months later, he left his welding job. Psychologists, psychiatrists, and those wanting to glean the benefits of his wisdom began flowing into his small British Columbia community of Salt Spring Island. Soon he was invited to speak at universities and engagements in the US and abroad. For the next forty years, Syd shared this understanding with people, positively impacting them and leading them to share this knowledge in prisons, schools, hospitals, and housing communities. Though Syd died in 2009, millions of people continue to wake up to Syd’s message, realizing that happiness and peace lie within each of us.
How do we create fresh beliefs? Aren’t our beliefs a set aspect of our value system?
If you examine your life, I imagine that you’ve changed many of the beliefs you once honored. Let’s get back to Tom and Jane. What belief was preventing their happiness? Jane reported that she and Tom had been in an off-and-on relationship for three and a half years, “It was one of those argumentative relationships…We were both searching for peace…One strong belief was that society was all messed up, and that was why it was so hard to feel peaceful.” As many of us have done, they decided a change of place would make the difference, so they moved off the grid to a remote area of the Yukon to get away from what they believed was creating their unhappiness.
The Insight that Changed Everything
They enjoyed their Alaskan adventures, yet they were still bickering and arguing until they traveled to Salt Spring, and Jane was intrigued by what she heard in a tape of one of Syd’s presentations. Wanting to know more and experience Syd in person, Jane returned to the island and attended one of Syd’s talks. She explained what awakened the fresh belief that forever changed her, “…At one point, he [Syd] said something about Divine Consciousness being within each one of us. At that moment, my world changed. I had thought that finding peace and happiness required some sort of search, but when Syd said that and I got that insight, I felt this joy and incredible peace. I just knew that my happiness came from within me and not from outside of me. That was the insight that really changed everything.”
“Everything I was trying to get away from I brought with me in my head”
When she returned to Yukon and Tom, she realized that she had been blaming her bad moods and irritations on Tom. Thus, when she did have low moments, she would recognize it was just coming from her thinking, and it was “easier to let go then.” Tom’s fresh belief sprouted when Jane was gone for a month, “I was alone and realized that all the things that seemed to be making me miserable were no longer there, but I was still miserable. It hit me that everything I was trying to get away from I brought with me in my head.” It wasn’t the horrors of society that were making them miserable…it was their attributing their moods and frustrations to external circumstances and each other.
What are the Three Principles?
They are the building blocks of our psychological experience – how we make sense of the world:
Mind:
We are alive, and the energy behind life provides wisdom beyond our imagining (If we choose to listen – our egos like to truncate this soft voice of wisdom.)
Thought:
Our capacity to think drives our personal thought system, bringing us a contingency of emotions (joy to total hopelessness – thus, we create our misery via Mind, Thought, & Consciousness, not just our peace and equanimity).
Consciousness:
Our awareness. We feel our thinking, often not even knowing there is a thought behind the emotion. Awareness of our feelings reveals limiting beliefs, helping us recognize the quality of our thoughts. Jane and Tom thought their bad feelings were coming from each other and a crazy society. In the end, they realized it was their thinking and the story they were telling themselves that led to the frustrating feelings and what they thought was incompatibility.
What is the rest of Jane and Tom’s story?
Before the 3Ps, Tom and Jane couldn’t imagine marriage or having children due to the instability of their relationship. That belief changed as they understood the inside-out nature of life, and they developed a very copesetic relationship. Of their fresh partnership, Jane recounts, “So many limiting beliefs fell away…It was that beautiful foundation [the 3Ps] that was the saving grace for our marriage and having children. We are still learning how to live life gracefully from an understanding of the Three Principles. It’s always unfolding more deeply.”
What about YOU?
One important message Syd shared was that we are all our own leaders. Through his books, tapes, and many other 3P authors and YouTubes, shared via the Three Principles Global Community and elsewhere on the web, we can each decide what fresh beliefs will bring us the life satisfaction we want.
As for me, I’m going to sink into the good feelings of watching Spring evolve and wait for that next popping green insight to flower my life! Best of Fresh Beliefs as we all do our best not to miss our best LIVES.
Listen to Related Podcast: Finding YOUR Spark: Sarah Sparks shares her story on better understanding herself, how she identified her purpose in life, and how she guides others to finding their spark in business and personal relationships. Sarah is a highly sought out Spiritual Business Mentor who helps people identify purpose and the path to embracing life to its fullest. Sarah also shares her definition of spiritual wellness and how one can pursue a whole life embracing mind, body, and spirit.
