Memorial Day has passed and summer feels officially underway with the beautiful weather, and the energy of the sun setting later, and people being out and about. With entering into a new season and time, I have been thinking about what my intentions are for this summer. Last summer, after living in Arizona for eight years, my family and I moved back to Naperville, so a lot of this past year has been spent on grounding myself and getting settled in. I feel called to think about what I want to make and create out of one of my favorite seasons now that I am grounded and settled, and in my reflecting I am being called to explore deeper Unity teachings around both the power of our thinking and the power of our silence.
I have been reading a fantastic book my father-in-law gave to me called The Intention Experiment: Using Your Thoughts to Change Your Life and the World by Lynne McTaggart. Some of you may know her from the hit film, What the BLEEP Do We Know!? and her work on integrating science and spirituality, and showing how unified they really are. As our guest speaker Shannon Plummer quoted from a poem she read last week: “All of life is caught up in this great Cosmic dance and spirituality and science become one in the same; one single experience we can all expect.” Scientific research is reporting what Unity Principles teach, which is that “every thought we have is tangible energy with the power to transform. A thought is not only a thing; a thought is a thing that influences other things” (McTaggart).
For me, last summer, all of my thoughts were focused on tilling the external land, planting the seeds and nurturing the roots I was creating in Illinois. This summer I feel called to go within and move my intention away from creating a physical life in Naperville and instead strengthen my spiritual consciousness within. I have been reading again Emilie Cady’s work on using Unity’s teachings on “Denials” to break free from the thoughts that no longer serve me and “Affirmations” to help me nurture my spiritual development. I am finding these tools to help me strengthen my ability to follow through on my intentions and stay focused.
McTaggart also shares that from the numerous studies done on what meditation does to the brain, it is shown across all studies that, “Meditation makes the brain permanently more coherent and that the brain appears to revise itself throughout life, depending on the nature of its thoughts. Certain sustained thoughts produce measurable physical differences and changed its structure. Form followed function; consciousness helped to form the brain.” It makes me think of Matthew 6:6, where it states, “But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.” Whether you follow science or Scripture, the evidence is there that something powerful happens when we go within, shut the door and sit in the Silence.
So, an invitation I send out to my fellow Unity followers, is to reflect on your intentions for this summer, and to continue to cultivate a space in the garden of your mind that allows for the highest form of You to be expressed and cared for so that this season can be the best one for you yet!
Here’s to backyard (plant based) BBQ’s J, delighting in the fireflies at night, and to enjoying every single moment for the perfection that it is in this season of summer.
Cheers!
Jaimee Ory, Board Member
