Reader question:
Dear Neale.. One question I've had about reading the CWG books is this. If everything is all one (which I believe it is) then how is God really experiencing anything? For instance, how do we form relationships, or intimate relationships, if we're all the same thing? Is Free Will just an illusion then? Considering that everything is God, isn’t it God's will and not ours? How does God love "us" as his/her children when it knows it is exactly that. Isn't everything you have written just God talking to Itself, fooling Itself?
Thank you very much, Erin V.
Neale Responds:
Dear Erin...Good questions. My answers, one at a time:
#1: That fact that everything is all one does not preclude God from experiencing anything. God experiences everything, through the various parts of itself. The fact that your body is all One Body does not prevent your head from experiencing a headache, even though your toe feels fine, right? The various parts of you can experience different things, allowing the Whole Body to experience it. Sex is a good example. You may be using only one or two parts of your body, but that does not stop your whole body from experiencing it.
#2: We form intimate relationships with others in the same way that we form intimate relationships with ourselves. Do you not have an intimate relationship with your Self? Do you never talk to yourself, think to yourself, comfort yourself, etc. Of course you do. The fact that you are not separate from yourself does not stop you from doing this.
#3. God says, "Your will for you is my will for you." God allows each of its many aspects to express themselves freely, at the level of consciousness which they possess. You are right, everything IS God's Will...and God's WILL is that every human being, which is a part of God, expresses its Will individually in any way they choose. Yet when we do so, we are expressing God's Will. Let me give you a practical illustration. Do you believe that you could so much as lift your little finger if God did not want you to? No. You could not. This does not mean, however, that God FORCES you to lift your little finger. So if you lift your little finger, you are doing it as an act of personal, free will. Yet you could not DO it if God did not want you to. God could stop you in a minute. In a second. In less than a second. So we see, then, that it is God's Will that you express Your Will. Yes? You see? The two are one. You are exactly right. But they are not contradictory. Your Free Will is God's Will. You see?
#4. God loves "us," even though God knows that God IS us, the same way that we love ourselves. I can love myself even though I know that I am the Self I am loving. What is the problem with that?
#5. Yes, everything I have written is God talking to Itself, but not "fooling" Itself. It is God talking to Itself, reminding the parts of Itself what those individual parts of Itself have forgotten.
Hope this all helps to clarify things for you Erin.
Sending God’s Love…..
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