Hi Danny

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless yet be determined to make them otherwise.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald

I have found that such truths as you are beginning to embrace almost always appear as paradox, a need to hold two seemingly conflicting notions as true at the same time. I believe a reason for this is due to the nature of conciseness and growth

Einstein noted that:  “No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.” thus I believe that when we are asked to grow we will be confronted with  seeming paradox. When contemplated paradox calls us to empty ourselves, detach from what we already think we know and feel, from who we think we are, to opening the door for a higher level of consciousness to answer the question.

“As you think so you shall be” but then later on in the same book he says “You are not your thoughts”

“In racing, they say that your car goes where your eyes go. The driver who cannot tear his eyes away from the wall as he spins out of control will meet that wall; the driver who looks down the track as he feels his tires break free will regain control of his vehicle.” – Racing in the Rain

You are not your car, you are not your eyes you are not the wall you fear hitting, you are not the road… Yet there is a car, a road, a wall and the car will go where your eyes go.  The driver that looks down the road does not ignore the wall. The driver is fully aware of the car and the wall, notes it, then trust the skills (their knowing) to avoid it. The first skill they learn to avoid the wall is to look down the track to the direction the driver and car wants to go…

Another challenge for you. in the above metaphor you are not the driver either. 🙂

It is said “We see the world as we are not as it is”. The level of consciousness that realizes this problem needs a higher level of consciousness to address the problem of ‘as we are‘. Self emptying we notice we have thoughts, we are not our thoughts, we have emotions we are not our emotions, we have jobs we, we are not our jobs, we have experiences, we our not our experiences, we have stories, we are not our stories… This state of being allows our thoughts, emotions, experiences to flow instead of clinging to them, blocking them, identifying the Self with them and hitting the wall we wish to avoid.

So you are not your thoughts – as you think so shell you be – isn’t a paradox at all.  (notice how changing the order of the two thoughts changes things?) If you know at a deep level of knowing you are not your thoughts so shell you BE. (who might that be detached from thought?)

So another paradox for you 🙂 –   we work for that which no work is required.