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What You Think Of Yourself Is What
YouThink Of The World
by Wayne Dyer
How do you see the world
you live in? What do you think people in general are really like? Do you
believe that evil is triumphing over good? Is the world filled with
egocentric, selfish people? Can the little guy ever get ahead? Are
government entities and all their representatives corrupt and
untrustworthy? Is life unfair? Is it impossible to get ahead if you
don’t have connections?
All of these attitudes
emerge from your own assessment of your personal interaction with life.
If your thoughts reflect a pessimistic view of the world, then that’s
actually how you feel about yourself. If your thoughts reflect an
optimistic view of the world, then that’s how you feel about your life.
Whatever attitude you have about the world in general is a good
indicator of the respect you have for your abilities to intend into this
world what you desire. Pessimism strongly suggests that you don’t
subscribe to the idea that you can access the power of intention to help
you create your own blissful reality.
I recall hearing the
following conversation after the events of 9/11 in New York City. A
grandfather was talking to his grandson, telling him, “I have two wolves
barking inside of me. The first wolf is filled with anger, hatred,
bitterness and mostly revenge. The second wolf inside of me is filled
with love, kindness, compassion and mostly forgiveness.”
“Which wolf do you think
will win?” the young boy inquired.
The grandfather responded,
“Whichever one I feed.”
There are always two ways
to look at the conditions of our world. We can see the hate, prejudice,
mistreatment, starvation, poverty and crime and conclude that this is a
horrible world. We can feed this barking wolf and see more and more of
what we despise. But this will only fill us with the same things that we
find so malignant. Or we can look at the world from a position of self
love and self-respect and see the improvements that have been made in
race relations in our lifetime; the fall of so many dictatorships, lower
crime rates, the dismantling of the atrocious apartheid systems, the
elevated consciousness of the environmental movement and the desire on
the part of so many to rid our world of nuclear weapons and instruments
of mass destruction. We can remind ourselves that for every act of evil
in the world, there are a million acts of kindness and we can then feed
the second wolf that barks from a position of hope for humanity. If you
see yourself as a divine creation, you’ll look for this in your world
view and the gloom-and-doom naysayers will have no impact on you and
your self-respect.
When you have a gloomy
picture of what the world looks like, you’re unreceptive to the
potential assistance that’s there to help you with your own individual
intentions. Why would others want to come to your aid when you view them
as contemptible? Why would the universal force be attracted to that
which repels it? How could a world that’s so corrupt ever be of
assistance to someone who has noble intentions? The answers to these
questions are obvious. You attract into your life what you feel inside.
If you feel that you’re not worthy of being respected, you attract
disrespect. This weak self-respect is the result of an exceptionally
rusty link to the field of intention. This link must be cleansed and
purified and that takes place within your own mind.
Without high esteem for
yourself, you shut down the entire process of intention. Without
unflagging self-respect, the process of intention is operating at the
lowest levels. The universal field of intention is love, kindness and
beauty, which it has for all that it brings into the material world.
Those who wish to replicate the works of the universal all-creating mind
must be in harmony with the attributes of love, kindness and beauty. If
you disrespect anyone or anything that God creates, you disrespect that
creative force. You are one of those creations. If you view yourself
disrespectfully, you’ve forsaken, cast aside or at the very least,
sullied your connection to the power of intention.
It’s important that you
recognize that your entire world view is based on how much respect you
have for yourself. Believe in infinite possibilities and you cast a vote
for your own possibilities. Stand firm on the potential for humans to
live in peace and be receptive to all and you’re someone who’s at peace
and receptive to life’s possibilities. Know that the universe is filled
with abundance and prosperity and is available to everyone and you come
down on the side of having that abundance show up for you as well. Your
level of self regard must come from your knowing within yourself that
you have a sacred connection. Let nothing shake that divine foundation.
In this way, your link to intention is cleansed and you always know that
self-respect is your personal choice. It has nothing to do with what
others may think of you. Your self-respect comes from the self and the
self alone.
The self in self-respect.
Perhaps the greatest
mistake we make, which causes a loss of self-respect, is making the
opinions of others more important than our own opinion of ourselves.
Self respect means just what it says – it originates from the self. This
self originated in a universal field of intention that intended you here
– from the infinite formless state to a being of molecules and physical
substance. If you fail to respect yourself, you’re showing contempt for
the process of Creation.
You’ll find no shortage of
opinions directed at you. If you allow them to undermine your
self-respect, you’re seeking the respect of others over your own and
you’re abdicating yourself. Then you’re attempting to reconnect to the
field of intention with low-energy attitudes of judgment, hostility and
anxiety. You’ll cycle into low energy vibrations that will simply force
you to attract more and more of these lower energies into your life.
Remember, it’s high energy that nullifies and converts lower energy.
Light eradicates darkness; love dissolves hate. If you’ve allowed any of
those lower negative thoughts and opinions directed your way to become
the basis of your self-portrait, you’re asking the universal mind do the
same. Why? Because at the high frequencies, the universal Source of
intention is pure creativeness, love, kindness, beauty and abundance.
Self-respect attracts the higher energy. Lack of self-respect attracts
the lower. It knows no other way.
The negative viewpoints of
others represent their low-energy ego working on you. Very simply, if
you’re judging anyone, you aren’t loving them at that moment. The
judgments coming your way, likewise, are unloving but have nothing to do
with your self-respect. Their judgments (and yours as well) distance you
from your Source and therefore away from the power of intention. As my
friend and colleague Gerald Jampolsky observed, “When I am able to
resist the temptation to judge others, I can see them as teachers of
forgiveness in my life, reminding me that I can only have peace of mind
when I forgive rather than judge.”
This is how you return to
the self in self-respect. Rather than judging those who judge you,
thereby lowering your self-respect, you send them a silent blessing of
forgiveness and imagine them doing the same toward you. You’re
connecting to intention and guaranteeing that you’ll always respect the
divinity that you are. You’ve cleared the path to be able to enjoy the
great power that is yours in the field of intention.
Excerpted from The Power
of Intention: Learning to Co-create Your World Your Way
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