The basis for this chapter is Recording 259A, from the 1959 Hawaiian Village Open Class, titled, “Grace – The Purpose of Meditation.” This recording is no longer available on this website. If you subscribe to the Joel S. Goldsmith Streaming Service, you will be able to listen to the recording there. The optional study suggestions for this chapter will continue to be available here on the Goldsmith Global site. To purchase this recording from The Infinite Way Office, click/tap here.
This chapter is another lesson from Joel on the importance of practicing the presence and practicing meditation. Once again, he emphasizes that the experience of God-realization that came to Buddha, Jesus, Moses, and others was what enabled them to live by grace. That experience will enable us to live in the same way, and the purpose of The Infinite Way is to lead us to that experience of God-realization. Then we, too, live by grace. We never have to take thought, and yet wonderful things take place in our lives. God’s grace flows to us and flows out from us to bless others.
Joel says that if we do not have this God-experience, it is because the human mind does not want to be disciplined and we do not do what we must to attain the God-experience. Joel is unequivocal: “Nothing can happen to a person except what happens in his consciousness. Therefore, … there must at all times be an activity of truth in consciousness.”
It seems clear that the appropriate focus for practice with this chapter is working on maintaining an activity of truth in consciousness at all times. How do we do this?
Often in the writings and recordings, Joel takes us through the day, explaining how to continuously maintain an activity of truth in consciousness. In Chapter 7, he does this in the section titled “Keep Truth Active in Consciousness.”
If more clarification about this aspect of spiritual living would be helpful to you, we can recommend any of these resources: