Recording 605B is one of four used as source material for Chapter 9, “The Issues of Life Are in Consciousness” in the book Consciousness Is What I Am. While this recording is no longer available for listening on this website, if you are a subscriber to the Joel S. Goldsmith Streaming Service, you will be able to listen to it there. The additional study material for this recording will continue to be available here on the Goldsmith Global site. To purchase the recording or the transcript, click/tap here.
This summary is provided simply as a reminder of the content of the class. To download or print this summary, click/tap here.
In the course of this class, Joel provides answers to some key questions about the body. These are not questions that are directly asked by students, but questions that we might have as we consider the topic of body:
In the human world, “substance” is that which we can see, feel, touch, or handle. That is why so much effort is made to acquire money, property, or merchandise. While the materialist does not believe that money of itself is valuable, he believes that money can be exchanged for something that will give him peace of mind, satisfaction, joy, harmony, or health. By contrast, a person of spiritual vision has realized that these qualities of life cannot be “purchased,” but come forth from the invisible substance called God, Spirit, Soul, or Consciousness within his own being.
There is a world belief that certain foods nourish us, and that is so in the human picture. But in truth, the food you eat does not nourish you. Nor do your digestive organs digest or your eliminative organs eliminate. In and of themselves, the organs of the body can’t do a thing. Left to itself, your hand would stay put forever. It can’t punch and it can’t pet. There must be an I to move it; I determine what my hand will do. I am the activity, the intelligence, and the law unto this hand. Without I, this hand is nothing, can do nothing, and can be nothing. Now, there is no difference between the hand and the heart, or the liver, or the lungs, or the digestive or eliminative organs. If you think that the digestive organs can digest separate and apart from your direction, you have failed to see that the body, in and of itself, is just a dead piece of flesh. There is an I that governs and controls the entire body.
You get a special sensation when you touch the hand of the one you love. Is that sensation in the hand or in you? If it were in the hand, we would have the same sensation any time we touch anybody, but we don’t. So the “electricity” we feel has nothing to do with the hand. It has to do with me, my identity. Similarly, one individual responds to ice cream or chocolate, and another does not. Is it the body that is responding or not responding? No. I am responding.
Universally accepted human belief says that your life is in your heart, or your liver, or your kidneys, or your digestive organs. We have become victims of that belief, and we say, “My heart doesn’t function,” or “My kidneys don’t function.” We might just as well say, “My hand punches everybody it sees,” as if my hand had such a power! So, several times a day, realize that the soul of you, the intelligence of you, the life of you, at the center of your being, is governing and controlling your body; that your body is not controlling you. The function of the soul, or spirit, or consciousness, at the center of your being is to be the law, substance, activity, and intelligence of your body and to govern your body intelligently, harmoniously, and eternally.
It takes practice and discipline to get used to the idea that the organs and functions of your body do not determine your health, but that the issues of health are determined by your soul, your spirit, your consciousness, and that it is your consciousness that animates, governs, and controls the organs and functions of your body. For generations, we have lived under the universal belief that the body can tell us whether we’re going to be healthy or sick, or whether we will live or die. Now we must make the transition into spiritual consciousness, which is the Christ teaching: “What did hinder you? Rise, pick up your bed and walk.” (See John 5:8)
There is a universal claim that food has power over us. But just look at a piece of food as it is being cooked. Doesn’t it seem foolish to believe that it has so much power over us? Actually, food hasn’t such power. Here again, a belief has been handed down that the nutritive value is in the food, but that is not true. The nourishment value of your food is in your soul, in your consciousness, not in the food itself. Before food can nourish you, consciousness, the soul at the center of your being, has to impart the nourishment value to that food. Likewise, before food can harm you, you have to give it the power to harm you. We do that when we say, “This doesn’t agree with me,” or “If I eat this, it will upset me.” Many people say, “Coffee will keep me awake at night,” but they are empowering the coffee to keep them awake by accepting the belief. In and of itself, food is not harmful, and even if there is a world belief that it is harmful, it can do no harm to me unless my consciousness empowers it to be harmful. So every time you eat, realize that the value of the food comes from your own consciousness. It draws out of the food whatever is necessary for the harmonious maintenance and sustenance of your body.
Sooner or later, you must do this same thing with the organs and functions of the body. All power is in God at the center of my being, and that God imparts to my body, my food, and my climate all of the energies and powers that they have in and on me. Once you realize that nothing external to you has power over you, and that all power is derived from God and given unto you, you see that whether it is the organs and functions of the body or the food you eat, your consciousness, God, the soul of your being, determines its good in your experience. Jesus revealed the secret of the spiritual life when he said, “I have meat ye know not of. (John 4:32) I can give you water which will spring up into life eternal.” (John 4:14) He could resist the three temptations because he knew that at the center of his being was the God-power that fed and sustained him. Likewise, in proportion as you realize that your life is self-sustained and self-maintained, you will make less effort to improve it, and you will find that it takes care of itself.
If you can posit a principle of a self-created, self-sustaining infinite substance, the next logical step is to say that it is the only substance that exists, and that it is eternal and immortal. So, the substance of all form and any form must also be eternal and immortal, governed by that self-created, self-maintained principle or substance. Then, if the organs and functions of the body, or the food we eat, or the air we breathe, is of that self-created and self-maintained substance, there is no evil in them. Yes, you can make anything evil in your experience by thinking it so, but that doesn’t mean that it is evil in and of itself. On the contrary, nothing in this world is evil, because everything that exists is a form or formation of that one self-created and self-maintained substance, which we call God, or Soul, or Spirit, or Life, or Principle, or Law. That substance is within you, and it becomes the law unto the organs and functions of your body and the food that you eat. That substance and law at the center of your being constitutes the only nourishment that food can have. Ordinarily, when we eat, we do not take in the food. We take in the world belief about the food—that it is fattening, or it is thinning, or it is good for us, or it is bad for us. Every time we eat a morsel, we eat the world belief about that morsel.
No change takes place in our life except through the activity of our own consciousness. So every time we eat, we must consciously realize that I imparts to you the activities, the nourishment, and the satisfaction, taste, and pleasure of the food. I—consciousness, soul, spirit, at the center of my being—give unto the organs and functions of my body their capacities to do what they are supposed to do. Now you are consciously transferring all power from the outer world and placing it where it really belongs—within you. The kingdom of God, of all power, is within you. You have been given dominion over everything that exists, but you must consciously take possession of that dominion. You have to do this consciously for weeks and months until it becomes automatic.
It takes a lot of mental discipline to remember where power is, how power was derived, and what real substance is. For example, when we are tempted to think of supply in terms of money, we have to consciously realize, “No, the power of substance and supply is within me, not within dollar bills. The consciousness, the soul of me determines my supply.” We have to translate the human belief to the spiritual truth until we can demonstrate it. You pay the penalty of any belief you accept until the belief is corrected.
Whatever of good comes to us has to come through the activity of our consciousness in accepting the truth and rejecting a universally believed lie. So try this exercise: Every day, consciously remember that God at the center of my being is the law of my experience and governs my experience. God, at the center of my being, is the substance and nourishment of the food that I eat. God, at the center of my being, is the law and activity unto every organ and function of my body. God, at the center of my being, draws unto me everything necessary for my good and acts as a law of elimination to anything unnecessary to my spiritual unfoldment. Three times a day, remember that all power is vested in your own consciousness, and that your own soul is the substance of your body, your food, your weather, your friendships, and your family relationships. Only in proportion as we know this truth can it make us free.
As human beings, we live under the laws of belief. The laws of materia medica, the laws of food, and the laws of climate are not powers, but they operate as power until we consciously eliminate the beliefs and exchange them for truth. Give up these beliefs as fast as you discover them and realize that I is God at the center of my being, the substance and soul of my being. I don’t have to tell my hand not to steal, because there is a soul at the center of my being governing that for me. All I have to know is that soul is governing it. I don’t have to tell God how much money I need. All I have to know is that this soul at the center of my being is providing all that is necessary for my unfoldment and development, without my taking thought.
This is the transition from material sense to spiritual sense, or “dying daily.” Every day you whittle away some world belief and substitute some activity of truth until you come to the day when you can say, “I live, yet not I. Christ liveth in me.” (Galatians 2:20) Then you have reached the ultimate of spiritual living, where you do not have to take conscious thought. Something at the center of your being brings the right food for you to eat, rejects the wrong food, digests, eliminates, brings the right opportunities to you, and steers you away from the wrong ones. Then you are not living your life. Christ is the life of you, and you just watch what It does.
As we have mentioned, when we previewed recordings for this study program on the body, we found several classes in which Joel teaches some wonderful lessons about the body, but covers other topics as well. We chose not to use these for our weekly sessions, but to post the best of them from time to time as “Additional Offerings for Study.” For this session, we offered another of these recordings as a complement. It was recording 117B, from the 1955 Kailua Study Group, titled “The Invisible Nature of Your Life.” This class reinforces several of the themes we heard in our online sessions for this study program. In addition, Joel touches on these ideas:
Recording 117B was one of many sources used for Chapter 9, “The Silver Is Mine,” Chapter 11, “For Love Is of God,” and Chapter 12, “For He Is Thy Life,” in The Art of Meditation. While this recording is no longer available for listening on this website, if you are a subscriber to the Joel S. Goldsmith Streaming Service, you can listen to it there. To purchase the recording or the transcript, click/tap here.