Center for Spiritual Living Midtown

Try A Little Kindness - Rev Paul Gonyea

If we help someone out of a sense of obligation or guilt, it’s better than not helping them at all, at least for them. But what does it do to us? If we feel like we’re being manipulated or coerced into doing something nice for someone, even if it’s very subtle, it’s going to negatively affect the way we see that person. Instead of seeing them as someone who could use a hand, and providing a hand simply because we have a hand to give, we’re going to end up seeing them as helpless, or as a victim of circumstances who needs us. That’s a very different level of interaction. It’s out of balance. That’s why the Buddhists use the term “loving kindness,” as if it were one word. Because love for other people and love of ourselves is the foundation for sharing our mutual strengths in order to balance out our temporary individual weaknesses.

That Good Old Law of Attraction - Rev Paul Gonyea

If we allow our thoughts and our emotions to be scattered in all directions, jumping all around, reacting to every alarm bell the world sets off, getting caught up in every drama on the news, believing in all the dangers and limitations that the world tells us are real, then we’ll never be able to generate enough concentrated, directed energy to attract into our life the things we want to attract. But, if we refuse to be distracted or confused, if we focus our attention on giving our thoughts and desires and beliefs some positive conscious direction, and if we stick with that direction no matter what, then we will automatically generate an attracting energy in that direction. And we will draw to us everything that is in tune with what we’re putting out. That’s how the Law of Attraction works.

We're All Unfinished Business - Rev Paul Gonyea

Our life is not a never-ending series of goals to be achieved; it’s an endless path of self-discovery. And when I say “self-discovery,” I’m talking about our God-Self. Our Mind is never finished. Our Soul, our Spirit, our passion for Life is never finished. These things have no limits; they continue to evolve and expand without limit, because they are attributes we share with the Universal Consciousness, and that One Mind has no limits. We’re not here just to achieve and to accomplish and to acquire; we’re here to express and to experience and to understand. We’re here to think and to be and to discover and to create and to enjoy. We’re here to learn, and learning never stops. Unless, of course, we make the choice to stop learning

Reality Check - Rev Ursula Lentine

We suffer because we are ignorant, but ignorance is simply a lack of conscious awareness. Ignorance of the Truth creates stress. Stress is our response to life because we are living in a state of ill references. Once we clean up our self debilitating mind set, then we can make better choices that create more peace, more love and more compassion in our life. This talk exposes the darkness that many of us live from, how we can identify it in our every day living and how we can change it.

Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due - Rev. Paul Gonyea

When we assume that an answer has to come from one particular place, we limit the possibility of synergy, of different individual sources combining to find the best solution. Life shows up, not in one specific way, but in a lot of different ways. Life is diverse. We are diverse. Our body and our thoughts and our feelings are diverse. We are a blend of possibilities. Not only are we “alive”; we are the process of Life itself. We are thought in motion, we are passion in expression, we are creation in action. We create our experiences, we respond to Life’s challenges, and only we can choose which thoughts and feelings we allow to remain in our heart and mind.

The Father In Me - Rev Paul Gonyea

The idea of God as a “father figure” started out with the best of intentions. But once organized religion got hold of it, the original meaning changed drastically. And that has caused an incredible amount of confusion over something which, especially in an enlightened age such as this one, should not be confusing at all. But it is. In fact, it has caused many people’s idea of God to remain stuck in an old, patriarchal, dualistic model that was originally intended to expand our spiritual understanding instead of making it more limited, which is how it ended up. And until we can figure out how to get our collective religious traditions to accept a much more spiritual and scientific idea of what it means when all the old prayers, and all the old Bible verses, describe God as “Our Father” --- we’re going to keep on being confused.

Dance To Your Own Music - Rev. Paul Gonyea

In today’s world, I think we’re all beginning to realize that criticizing or condemning the way that other people choose to express themselves can have some pretty serious consequences. Besides dancing, we express ourselves in the language we use, the religion we practice, the clothes we wear, the people we love, and the work that we do, among other things. But when we, for whatever reason, come to believe that our way of thinking or doing or being is either the right answer or the only answer for other people, we’re not only criticizing them; we are criticizing Life itself. Because Life has no one answer, no one way of doing things. Every blade of grass, every rose, every snowflake, every grain of sand is different from every other.

IT WORKS BOTH WAYS - Rev. Angela Harmon

I remember the first time I heard Dr. Kennedy Shultz refer to God as IT.
It made complete sense to me, though I was raised quite differently about God. I shared my enlightenment, but conversing was difficult to translate, with so many others believing God was a person in the far distances with control and anger management issues, or happy when “His” commands were obeyed.

The more I heard about IT, the more I wanted to know. I began to practice IT in a greater way. My life became greater because now I knew that what I believe happens. Now I had a greater idea of what I wanted.

Greatness happens because of our thoughts; “not so great” happens for the same reason. It works both ways. Why not allow the greater side of self to dominate your life? If you’re not living in the fullness of life, you are the cause. If your life is robust, creating the joys you want out of life, you are the cause. IT does not choose for you. We are the masters of our fate, as well as the means to our demise…IT works both ways!

The Courage Found In Fear - Rev Paul Gonyea

Fear doesn’t always show up in the same way. Sometimes it shows up as anger or self-righteousness. Sometimes it shows up as “just retribution,” as “an eye for an eye,” or as self-defense. This is true on the international level, but it’s also true at the personal level, whether it’s with a divorce, or a family problem, or a business conflict. Whenever we’re afraid, we respond in a variety of different ways. We attack. We blame. We criticize. We stop communicating. We start telling lies about each other. That gives rise to suspicion, revenge and resentment. When we get that far along, it’s very difficult for us to remember the Truth about each other, that we’re all connected at the God level, because by then we’re in such pain, we feel like we have to blame someone, whether it’s the other person or the other country for all of our suffering.

The Three (3) OF ME - Greta Counts RsCP

I am the One Power, always creating my life anew.  Our life’s choices are shaped by our experiences and our perception of those experiences.  And even though we are always free to choose, in most cases we continue to choose what is familiar to us.  For things to change, we must change.  Who we were in the past has influenced who we are today and who we are today will influence who we become.  When we are willing to heal and release the past, to practice awareness in the present, it opens us to the possibility of living the life we desire and deserve