The new year was originally celebrated by the romans on the spring equinox until Julius Caesar invented the new calendar, and in 46 BC decreed that the new year would start on January 1st. January was an added month to their calendar. It was given the name for the two-faced god, Janus. Janus has one face looking towards the back and the other looking forward. Janus is the god of beginnings, transitions, time, duality, passages, and endings. The romans placed this double faced god at their doorways, gates and entrances. A door can be symbolic of leaving one place and going into another. There is the saying by Alexander Graham Bell, “When one door closes another door opens.”
Today we shall begin by looking back at 2024 for the purpose of releasing of what we no longer wish to take with us into 2025. Then we will be changing our focus to looking forward to 2025.
Now for the releasing. I will first describe the process, and then we’ll do it together. I recommend having a piece of blank paper and a writing instrument, otherwise just mentally do the process. We will write down everything we wish to release from our life. Such as, people to forgive or to be forgiven, anger, painful memories, health conditions, and belongings to name a few. Sit quietly for a few moments. Then when things come up to be released write them down in brief statements, or if no paper to say it.
Then add “Thank you” after each one. We are having gratitude for the lessons learned and for the opportunity to heal from this experience. The following are a few examples: I release guilt about such and such - thank you! I forgive so and so - thank you! I forgive me about - thank you! I release pain - thank you! I release unneeded items - thank you!
We will now take the next few minutes to release and let go. I will play a song during this process titled “I Release What No Longer Serves Me” by Rev. Donna Michael, from her album “I Feel Joy.”
Now take that piece of paper and tear it into pieces and throw it away. Affirm: “I now fully release this to the ever forgiving love of God. The indwelling Christ now sets me free. Thank you God, it is done. Amen”
Feel the release and gratitude knowing we are free to begin anew.
We are now ready to move forward to our next process of envisioning.
“Where there is no vision, the people will perish.” from Proverbs 29:18. People who have no vision for their life are sleepwalking without a hint as to why they are here or what their purpose is. They have no hope for a better life and future. Many in today’s world may feel hopeless or without direction, in living out the collective society based beliefs on forces outside themselves.
We are spiritual beings made in the image and likeness of pure Spirit. We have the capacity to express love, imagination and intelligence for creating our experiences, and strength and power to bring them forth and live them. Each of us is a composite of spiritual ideas that Infinite Mind has thought. All of us have so much potential even if we might think most of our life is behind us, there still may be a another chapter in life to unfold. We hear of great artists and inventors being of senior age when they started a new career. My mother was ordained at 67 and served as a Co-Minister. At 80 Marie Dible fulfilled her dream as an ordained Assistant Minister.
Back in the 1960s my parents had a vision of having a spiritual center on their property in the mountains, and I would be part of it. In the meantime they sold their property. Instead it unfolded in the mid 1990s as part of my church ministry. Its not that I constantly was thinking or even striving to have a spiritual center. I was just living life first as a mother, a Grocery Clerk, Medical Assistant, Sr. Programmer Analyst and Manager of Computer Services. Also, volunteered on the Church Board, as Practitioner, Teacher, Assistant Minister, and Sr. Minister. In 1994 my position became a full-time paid position and the spiritual center became a reality. It was a gradual process of gaining experiences, education, and then opportunities came. It was something that took growing into and letting it become a reality.
Our purpose for being on this planet is simply to be an emanation or an expression of God’s love. We’re here to love – to perfect, amplify, and express the unconditional love of God. That’s our purpose, and it unfolds in unlimited ways. When we begin to understand our purpose for being here, then we can start to open ourselves up to God’s vision for us. Which is to discover our own unique individual gifts and talents for expressing.
As we open to the vision God has for our life and begin to live it, we become less and less influenced by the popular or entrenched beliefs of a particular society or culture, and we become much more available to Spirit. We become inspired by the ideas held in the mind of God, and they begin to live and express through us. We begin to be able to articulate them and to live and embody and reveal them. There is a feeling of coming home.
The process we are going to learn today is called envisioning, and is about co-creating with God. Envisioning is about aligning in consciousness with our divine purpose, which is to love and to express a greater degree of life. Then we open ourselves to catch a sense of how that expression is to occur through us. It is an intuitive process.
Envisioning brings with it a deep sense that we’re surrounded by unconditional love. We enter into the conscious awareness that we live, move, and have our being in this unconditional love, and we open ourselves up to what that love feels like. Its more than the emotional kind of love. The feeling we develop is of a spiritual nature, and this feeling is the whole foundation of envisioning.
We then ask, for example, “How does God see Itself expressing as my life?” or “How can I best express my gifts?” We then wait to inwardly hear, see, and catch what comes to us, what it looks like, what it feels and sounds like, and we pay close attention to any symbols, pictures, colors or metaphors that come to us.
All of this is done without judgment. We are opening ourselves to what comes up and we notice what begins to flow through so we can articulate it, write it down, and be aware of how it feels.. In this way we can begin to articulate God’s vision for our life.
Willingness to make necessary changes is an important factor in the success of the visioning process. Once we begin to be able to get God’s vision for us, and are feeling and sensing it, we ask the question: “What is it that I need to change or become in order for this vision to unfold and manifest?”
As we listen inwardly in a meditative state, we begin to hear from the deep levels of our being what we have to know, what we have to change or become. Then we write it down and dialogue about it. If doubts arise, then write it down and replace it with the truth of your being. For example: Fear is not part of God, therefore I thrive in love and truth.
A basic law of metaphysics is that we cannot have anything we are not willing to become. It’s an impossibility for us to have something in our life that is not aligned with our consciousness. So we begin to get a picture of how we need to develop and become it. No matter what the envisioning process focuses on, spiritual transformation of the individual is the ultimate result. Envisioning is always for self-transformation, and to shift our perception of reality. We engage in daily spiritual practices of affirmative prayer and meditation.
This process of unfoldment goes on forever. We never reach a place where the process is complete, because God’s idea is infinite and it’s always expressing. We just become more of who we are as vehicles for God’s ideas to express through.
Whoever uses the envisioning process in this way lifts us all, because it is a technique that allows us to realize we’re at one with God, at one with the love that is everywhere. There are only divine ideas in the universe, whole, perfect, complete ideas and we can catch them and make them our reality.
The following are the steps to Envisioning: Step 1: This is a meditative process, we quiet our mind, and become receptive in a listening state to the presence of God’s inspiration and guidance.
Step 2. We ask in silence without judgement, “How does God see itself as my life?” Write, draw symbols, or pictures.
Step 3. Ask “What is it that I have to change or become in order for this vision to become a reality? Write it down.
Step 4. List non supporting feelings or beliefs that come up for you. Then write a statement of truth that nullifies, and follow with Truth.
Step 5. Have gratitude for all that has been received and yet to unfold. Then release, it is done.
I will be posting this service in text format and recorded Podcast on our website’s “Healing Words” page, May your new year be filled with much love, joy and many blessings.
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