The Ins and Outs of Positive Thinking

My parents from 1956 to 1960 were in charge of the "I AM" Sanctuary in Los Angeles. The basis of the religion is similar to Christain Science in that one is taught to create what they want in their lives by experiencing it here right now. The process is called Co-Creating with God.

I don't wish this to be about wealth or poverty but rather Ascending with Christ. But I saw many different results both good, bad and indifferent.

The result of this for me is that I met many very wealthy people who made this work and I met a lot of really crazy people that basically lived in a dream who stayed poor because one component or another was missing from their lives. So I learned not only what worked and what didn't work through this, I learned balance.

From the wealthy people I learned pragmatism, from the poor grateful people I learned kindness and sweetness and philosophy. And from the out of balance but sincere people I mostly found I was scared by them and their plight.

Like the lady who grabbed me by my sunday suit lapels when I was about 10 years old and began to sing, "I love money! I love money! I love Money! Oh Mighty I AM" and continued this for about 5 minutes straight. Five minutes to a 10 year old is an eternity as many of you know. I didn't know what to make of her except she was crazy. There was this tenant of celibacy that wreaked havoc on a lot of lives in this religion as well. Even my parents only were intimate about once a year during the time they were in charge of this church.

What it was like for me looking back now was like being on a Hollywood set making a movie, only some of the people knew it was a movie being made and others thought it was all real. So, as a child I found this sort of scary. It wasn't as scary as going to school and watching kids get beat up or intimidated but it was close.

What I took from all this was what I learned from the most successful ministers and wealthy people of my church. From them I learned what it is to be intelligent and cultured and I learned what is important in life. At the time I couldn't have told you all this. But as time has gone on in my life and I've had time to reflect on what I learned then, it was the ability to be respectful to both wealthy people and poor people and everyone in between. In other words what was most important about those days was learning to respect all classes of people no matter how smart or crazy they might be. And this has both helped me and even saved my life in the many many very different and diverse situations I have been in in the United States and around the world.

So, in the end the good thing about Positive Thinking is that people all over the world use it to literally pull themselves out of really terrible and awful situations by "pulling themselves up by their bootstraps". The really awful thing about positive thinking is when people are just too unrealistic and impractical for their own good.

Every structure whether physical or psychological has certain elements that have to be in place for the structure to stand ongoing. Learning what those elements are can be vital to having a good outcome in one's life. Just like in building a house if you don't lay a good foundation, later without one the house just might blow away in a good wind if you haven't tied the house to a good foundation. And just like the foundation of a house every element needs to be well designed to work and prosper for hundreds or thousands of years. This is true for families, nations as well as civilizations. So learning the basics of whatever you want to accomplish is a necessary part of not only creating something good but also of making it last.