Is it possible for any person to act inappropriately if we use only that person’s yardstick as a measure? The answer is, no. Everything imagines himself to be acting according to the highest good as he perceives it. The fact that she may not be acting in the highest good according to the reasoning of another is always, internally, irrelevant to the question.
Yesterday I made a statement, following a short discourse on former U.S. President Jimmy Carter’s talks with leaders of Hamas in Damacus. I noted that Conversations with God says: “No one does anything inappropriate, given their model of the world.”
That brought this response from a person posting as “Reagonite in NYC” in the Comments Section of this blog:
“Is that ALWAYS true? Yes or no? If yes, then does that mean that Nazism was appropriate for Germany and Central Europe in the 1930s and 1940s, “given their [the Nazis'] model of the world?” If yes, then does that mean that waterboarding and other forms of torture are appropriate in dealing with captured Al Quaeda terrorists, “given their [US intelligence agencies'] model of the world?”
“If it is NOT ALWAYS true, then WHO decides when exceptions to the general principle are valid? And under WHAT conditions?
“Would kindly appreciate a clarification or explanation from anyone on this board, including from Neal Donald Walsch and/or from someone familiar with his writings. Many thanks in advanceReagonite in NYO”
I am pleased to respond here. Yes, my friend, in my understanding and in my experience, that is always true. The Conversations with God books tell us that “beliefs create behaviors.” If we want to alter humanity’s future and put an end to the self-destructive behaviors that our species exhibits, we are going to have to alter humanity’s Cultural Story. That is, our beliefs.
It is our beliefs that create our “model of the world.” For instance, if we believe that a person acting in self-defense is innocent of any wrong doing, no matter what he does, then he will feel free to do anything at all in the name of self defense — including preemptively striking another nation on the suspicion that the other nation is planning to strike his.
This is what I call Suspicion Diplomacy, and it largely, if not completely, describes our foreign policy during most of the years of the second Bush Administration. We have the right–if we think you are going to strike us or our friends–to strike you. So you’d better not give us cause to even think that.
This is our “model of the world”, and nothing the U.S. has done is considered inappropriate by those Americans who hold this model as their belief. Belief creates behavior.
My friend, you have asked…Does that mean that “Nazism was appropriate for Germany and Central Europe in the 1930s and 1940s…?
It may not have been appropriate for all of Germany and Central Europe, but it was appropriate for those who believed that it was. And that is the point. Neither Hitler nor his followers thought for one minute that they were doing anything but what was best for their country. It is essential to understand that if we are to understand how Hitler and his Nazis could have done what they did.
This does not condone what they did. This simply (and tragically) explains it. The true tragedy of the Hitler experience is not that a ‘Hitler’ came along, but that so many people went along. They went along because their belief system supported their actions. Their model of the world was reflected in their choices.
The fact that their model of the world was insanely distorted is beside the point. It is their model that drove the engine of their experience. It is their model that produced their behavior.
You have asked, “…then does that mean that waterboarding and other forms of torture are appropriate in dealing with captured Al Quaeda terrorists, their [US intelligence agencies'] model of the world?”
That is a very good question. That is a very piercing and painful question. And the answer is equally piercing and painful: Of course it does. Waterboarding is appropriate to those who are doing it–or they wouldn’t be doing it. It may not be appropriate in the minds of others…but that doesn’t seem to matter, now, does it…
My statement was NOT that “everything that anyone does is appropriate for everyone else in the world, so long as the person doing it agrees with what he is doing…” That is not what I said. What I said was: “Nobody does anything inapppropriate, given their model of the world.”
Obviously, the sentence intends to carry the meaning that nobody does anything that THEY think is inappropriate. This is made clear by the fact that they have done it.
So when we find people acting in a way that WE deem to be “inappropriate,” our task within the New Spirituality movement is to find out how they could think such a thing to be apppropriate. This can only be done by sitting down and talking with your enemies. It CAN’T be done by simply shouting at your enemies that they are acting inappropriately and to stop it or else. That is insanity. That gets one nowhere.
As we have seen.
Conversations with God offers a wonderful tool to use in situations such as this. It is a simple question: “What hurts you so bad that you feel you have to hurt me in order to heal it?”
This is what Jimmy Carter was trying to find out.
posted April 22, 2008 at 3:41 pm
Neale Donald Walsch:
Thus, have not had time to read through, let alone absorb, your thoughtful reply. But I will … and, if need be, will get back to you with a reply and/or further questions.
Many thanks to you for taking the time to respond in detail to my question. Am trying to meet a deadline before rushing off to an evening class
In the meantime, Neale Donald Walsch, please accept my sincerest thanks for your generosity with your time !!
Very best regards,
“Reaganite in NYC”
posted April 22, 2008 at 4:04 pm
These discussions also fall into the law of attraction theory. What I think I create through my own actions. I spoke to this when Echart Tolle book New Earth came up for discussion at my church. Many people are not ready for the explanation that we are responsible for what we create. Changing this belief is difficult when we want God to take the blame for all the so-called mistakes that happen to us.
I believe cancer is a miracle, when cancer forms in us there is an order of circumstances that must occur in a perfect array creating the right conditions for the cancer cells to grow. Being healed from cancer is a miracle that occurs under the same set of rules.
When a disease happens in our lives like cancer, we help the process along by ways of attraction. Cancer doesn’t just happen to us it is willed up from our own creation.
Blessings
Blake Hayner
posted April 22, 2008 at 7:25 pm
Hi Neale,
Thanks for the little soul and the sun parable
Akshay
posted April 22, 2008 at 8:55 pm
I´ve just read your book communion with god, and it has been changing my life. I´m anxious to buy the book conversations with God. After watching the movie based on your life, i´ve been having a very good feeling, that i don´t know how to explain, but i fell very good with it.
Thanks a lot for your message!!!
posted April 22, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Neale wrote:
Conversations with God offers a wonderful tool to use in situations such as this. It is a simple question: “What hurts you so bad that you feel you have to hurt me in order to heal it?”
Jesus said “Love your enemies.” Your single, simple sentence is the best instruction I have seen on how to go about that. Bravo!
Mary Baker Eddy once wrote: “Love your enemies, or you will not loose them. And if you love them you will help to reform them.” (Not sure I have the exact quote, but it’s close enough.)
posted April 22, 2008 at 9:47 pm
As Socrates observed;
“All men do what they believe to be the good. It cannot be otherwise. If they knew better, they’d do better”
Thank you Neale
posted April 22, 2008 at 9:56 pm
The question: “Does anyone ever act inappropriately?” – is a thought provoking question. Many people will not understand that Hitler acted appropriately according to his model of the world.
Perhaps an alternate question could also cause a shift in our “model of the world.” “What if everyone acted appropriately, given the model that Jesus taught,” – love your neighbor, love your enemy, love yourself, love God. If we all showed compassion, helped whenever we can, accepted others as they are, allowed each soul to walk their own path, and loved unconditionally, the world would be heaven on earth. When we believe, know, think, say and act – or by being love, we wouldn’t have the issues in the world today.
When we choose the highest choices – this is when we change our self, and thus start changing those around us, and thus change our world. How about we start with changing ourselves. To do this, we need to think, say and do things differently – with intent. When we intend to act appropriately – we will – and others will notice. Love is always the highest choice and love is what I choose.
Love to all.
posted April 22, 2008 at 10:35 pm
Neale,
The feeling that is described as suffering so often arises because of the missed understanding that events arise and serve the purposes of Awareness. One is allowed the benefit of One’s choices, gracious and ungracious alike. Even in the circumstances of WW2 Germany, ungracious choices invited instructive consequences that reminded us that more gracious choices were missed in the choosing. So many souls engaged in that drama for the purpose of reminding us of this. One trusts that they have all returned and benefit from the lessons of that period. Sadly, it is now time for the heirs of the Atlantean experience to appreciate the instructive consequences arising from ungracious military actions not unlike those that doomed that earlier social order. We are all One. From the simplest design arises the greatest complexity: All choices generate benefit for purposes of appreciation. One does well to appreciate the Law of Grace. Namaste.
posted April 22, 2008 at 11:22 pm
a Cognitive “AH-HAH” for sure. But here’s a question that unfolds naturally from the fruit of Neale’s plant.
What shall we do when people act inappropriately ?
For example – If I wrote in this space something like – - -
Why do liberals approve of letting millions of African babies die of Malaria – because of their insane banning of DDT – or – Why do liberals approve of harming millions of living and breathing beings with beating hearts, who just happen to live inside the womb of a woman at the moment – - – The very writing of that would probably cause the liberal blog police to remove my post from these comments … because they have the right to use their yardstick to measure what is appropriate.
Never mind the fact that a child in Africa suffering greatly from Malaria caused by mosquito bites from mosquitos that could have been killed by the chemical DDT – - is obviously a much more painful situation than someone reading some words on their computer screen.
So – I guess What shall we do
posted April 23, 2008 at 8:02 am
Humans are feeling beings…we can never completely achieve a state of complete self expressiveness no matter in what language: mother tongue or
second tongue. Some feelings can not be fit into words and from this inability rises wars and attrition amongst humans.It would have been better if we could easily read other peoples intentions accurately…but
I dont know which science would be able to do this.
The question whether any one ever acts inappropriately can be can be likened to a persons habits in private, what are the things that goes on in the mind of people at thier leisures when they are out of range of examination by others or by people superior to them? how do we define civility and the how do we carry on. A close study of the life and dispositions of known rebels might lead to some interesting findings.
posted April 23, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Neale’s assertion that “Everything imagines himself to be acting according to the highest good as he perceives it” fails to recognize that people can and do consciously choose not to live up to their own ideals of “highest good”. It is universally recognized that Love is the highest good – a conviction placed in our hearts by the First Cause of all life. However, humans also have the freedom and ability to choose otherwise. That is the problem. Until humanity makes the conscious choice to align themselves with the highest moral law in the universe – the Law of Love – nothing will change.
posted April 23, 2008 at 8:36 pm
Given my model of the world, I don’t always agree with N.D. Walsch, however I always enjoy reading his viewpoints. And especially his latest comments on the Clinton/Obama race (seems to me human nature is not changing…people want to see more of people like themselves…nothing suprising in that) and ideas about acting “inappropriately”. Been having a hard time dealing with people who refuse to get involved in environmentalism or even take 5 minutes to learn about what their government is doing…and wondering why God allowed the creation of such a short sighted species. I can’t quite see Her/His/Its model of the world/creation, but I’m trying. ;-j
posted April 24, 2008 at 7:00 am
“Is it possible for any person to act inappropriately if we use only that person’s yardstick as a measure?”
One example often used for the purpose of defining this question is a generally accepted rightous moral conclusion about genocide as practiced by the Nazis.
While it’s clear to me that genocide is an indefensible abomination, the question that still arises for me in this case is; how did it happen that so many German people could somehow justify to themselves what was being done to a particular ethnic group which had lived among them for generations?
Fear for their own safety seems to be part of that mental equation but what else? How had so many German Christians lost the human connection between themselves and the Jewish people, so much so that they would allow them to be reviled and abused by the Nazi party who represented them? Even if they didn’t know about the death camps, as many have claimed, they surely condoned the abuse of Jews.
The answer is that there was a serious conflict of beliefs between the Jewish people and German Christians, a conflict which wasn’t found only in Germany.
Jewish people had been taught to believe, for many generations, that they were “the chosen people”, chosen by God to lead because of their supposed God given superiority. This belief, a preposterious illusion to others, was one which was not in question among the Jews. It was a long established fact of life, one upon which to act in dealings with others and in which to take refuge from criticism of it by those who felt demeaned by it.
The German people, on the other hand, had been endoctrinated to believe that they were a group apart also, “the master race”, a similarly illusory creation of the mind.
Given those two opposing beliefs and the attitude of arrogance which attended them, why would it surprise anyone that a serious conflict arose between “the chosen people” and “the master race”?
The Nazis created that issue, using it to justify and act upon their own fears and hatreds.
Arrogance is clearly the illusion and the enemy. It is something which we Americans should look at closely now, particularly during this next national election.
Some of our most prominent elected leaders have shown a lot of arrogance, and they have built a new set of policies about pre-emptive war-making which threaten to destroy our most treasured liberties.
May God’s Will prevail. For that to happen, many more of us must become attuned to God within ourselves.
posted April 27, 2008 at 11:00 am
The US wasn’t thinking that Iraq might be thinking about striking, 9/11 was orchestrated so the US could go into Iraq to kill people, and keep the war going for as long as possible, for world domination purposes.
posted April 28, 2008 at 8:39 am
This message could not have been more timely at this point in my life and journey. Thank you Neale. It helps me to understand more about having compassion for those that I have felt offended by and compassion for myself in the mistakes and offenses I have made in this quest.
The “world” and this experience and all the range of perceptions and emotions can be quite a patch to sort through yet this simplifies…at least for me, a perspective that I have re-membered and am re-membering from reading the CWG books long ago.
If my perception is one of fear I will act according to my belief in the basis for that fear or even in the belief in fear it self and to me that would be appropriate at that time. If my perception is one of compassion for those in fear…as I am in fear as well and can understand through my own personal pain a connection…compassion has a chance to enter as I allow it to be the driving force of who I really am thus, these actions will be equally appropriate given THIS model of the world I perceive and accept as my reality.
Conclusivley this calls me to personal responisibility to do my best to dig deeply for empathy and consider my own actions based on my model of the world (my CHOSEN beliefs)…my friends, loved ones, and even those I don’t know yet and maybe act less self-serving and “preemptively consider” how my actions might be received and their effects, prior to making the decision to act.
At least, this is how I understand it in my current world model. I feel it is brilliant.
Thank you, God
Thank you, Neale
Peace, Patrick