Discovering Our Unity | Rev. John Riley

Discovering Unity: Unraveling the Essence of Togetherness

Okay, one more time just to get out of her system. Let’s go. Come on. Give him a band. Thank you, Margot. Thank you Ronnie. Thank you, Russell. Magnificent. That was fantastic. And here we are today. And our goal here is to help us begin to discover our unity. And we had a question last week about, or the week before and the week before or whenever it was. How do we describe unity? And just, I really wanted to dive deep into this idea of discovering what Unity really is. So I brought my textbooks. Are you ready? Pop quiz. Are you ready? Ready. Okay. You’re not ready for my pop quiz yet? Let me, let me try that again. Are you ready? Yes. All right. So name three things. Now, first off, when you name three things, I want you to really go just like shadow ’em, but the first things that come into your head, don’t think about it. Don’t get all spiritual on me. Just, you know, what comes to your head. Name things. Three things. Now remember, just take a look around, take a look around, remember where you are. So make sure those three things are safe for church. Name three things. Now when I say go, when I say go, just shout it out loud. Okay? You ready? Nate? Someone said no. Is there a question on, is it on go or all three? It’s on go. It’s not 1, 2, 3. You know, it’s not that, that’s not that conundrum. We all know where that leads us. We’ll be here for the rest of the day on go. Are you ready? Name three things you did this morning. Go. You all pass. Second question. Name three ways you are being this morning. Go. Paul gets an A. The rest of you are about a c plus. I’ll give you an A minus participation points. But did you notice how it took you a little bit longer to answer that question? Yes.

Redefining Identity and Unity Beyond the Doing

Yeah. Did you notice how the things that you’re doing, oh, I did this, I did this, I did this this morning, but the way I was being how was I being, what, what, what, what did I, how did I show up this morning? We had to think about how we showed up. Yes. Yes. Now, if you think about when you’re at a gathering, and this can be any gathering, and you’re meeting somebody for the first time, what’s one of, what is one of the top questions that you might ask them? What’s your name? What do you do? What’s your name? That’s a, that’s probably number one. What do you do is one of the top ones. Where do you work? Where do you live? Where do you, that’s getting a little personal, but you start asking, you know, kind of one of the first questions that we tend to do is ask, what do you do? Because that’s how we’ve been taught to define who we are. We’ve been taught to define who we are as the things that we do. And if we’re not doing great things, you know, who are we? Or I, I don’t know if you’ve ever been in a work situation where, you know, you know, five months ago you did great things. Anybody do great things five months ago? And then the question is, okay, what are you doing today? What have you done for me lately? Have you heard that saying we’re so tuned into and wired in doing, and e even from a spiritual purpose, from a spiritual basis.

Embracing Unity Beyond Labels

What’s my purpose in life? What am I supposed to do? John, you have to tell me what I’m supposed to do. Well, first you make a tithe. It’s to unity power. Oh, So that’s what we do as human beings, right? We start to categorize ourselves. And the reason we categorize the other people is we want to know, are they in my bucket? Are they in my group? Can I relate to them? You know do they think the same way I do or do they do the same things? Are they doing something that I would be interested in? And once we categorize us into a bucket, then we start micro categorizing each other. Well, you say you’re unity, but do you really practice practical Christianity? Anybody know what that is besides Sarah Anne? Well, you say you’re unity, but do you understand metaphysical Christianity?

Understanding the Threefold Beings of Consciousness and Embracing Authenticity

Do you understand metaphysics? Do you understand the threefold beings of consciousness besides Joe? ’cause She’s studying it as a test coming up, right? Because we, we want to narrow that focus, so they really like me and we start to put everyone into silos. So, and those silos can be amongst a lot of different things. Not just what we do, but how we show up in life. And so, our goal, it’s, it’s like if you were, for example, an actuary at the local insurance, insurance company, anybody know what the act an actual does? Actuarial An actuarial? Statistics. Statistics, right? They go out and they analyze the claim and figure out what happened or what, who owes what? And they, they really get into the details of the numbers. So let’s say you’re at a party and you say, hi, I am an actuarial for my local insurance company. I love actuarials. I know a few actually. But that doesn’t define you, does it? That’s not who you are. That’s something that you do. 

Unity Beyond Boundaries

Now, what defines an defines that person might be something like, I’m here to experience clarity, to bring clarity to a situation. I’m here to be honest. I’m here to express integrity. I’m here to express order. And that’s more who I am. It’s not even my skills. My skills may be statistics, but who I am lies behind that skill, right? It’s that value that we are here to express into the world and how we might bring that into the world. And so why is unity so hard to describe? Well, because people want to put you into a bucket that they understand. And you say, I’m from unity. Okay, here are my religious buckets. Which one are you in? And if you’re not in one of the buckets, they don’t get it. And if they’re interested in who you are, then they’ll ask more questions. But if they’re not, they’re just gonna put you into the bucket of cuckoo. If I don’t understand it, it’s gotta be cuckoo. If I don’t know about it, I don’t get it. So more importantly, are we in their bucket that that’s the question that they’re asking. Are you in my bucket? And can I relate to you? Are you one of us or are you one of them? I hear some groans out there starting to recognize that, right? So how often do we put someone in our bucket? Are you one of us or are you one of them? So the idea here is really, can you understand that even though they’re outside of your bucket, can you understand who they are? Can you get to know them? Can you begin to create connection with them? Can you begin to see their point of view? You don’t have to agree with it, but can you even see a different point of view.

Unveiling the True Self Through Daily Spiritual Practice

In unity? I think it’s so difficult because it’s not about our doing as much. Yes, we do outreach. Yes, we do meditation and prayer and affirmative prayer. Yes, we do this thing on Sunday called church or spiritual service, or whatever you wanna call it. We do some things, but what unity really does is not about the things that you do, those are just the practices to get to that deeper level, that deeper understanding of who you are and who you’ve come here to be. So when we do this through daily spiritual practice, we do it through daily spiritual practice so that we can begin to show up in life as the person that we’ve come here to be as our higher self, as that better me. I don’t wanna put any labels on it. We label it a lot. You know, your divine consciousness, your Christ consciousness, your, it’s just your better self. 

Discovering Your Better Self: Embracing Unity, Consciousness, and Divine Potential

Let’s just keep it simple today, your better self. So unity changes our beingness. Unity changes our consciousness through our daily spiritual practices. And it changes our thoughts, our habits, and our inner dialogue. I thought about the idea, you know, those tapes that you play, and then I thought about my kids. Do they even know what a tape is? My kids don’t. My oldest did, she made, made mixed tapes, but my younger kids don’t make mixed tapes. I think they’ve seen a tape before. So I’ll just say your playlist, maybe that will bring in all the generations, right? That playlist that’s going on automatically in your head. What Unity does is open you up to that self-awareness that Lisa talked about, that awareness of myself. And when I notice that I’m beginning to put someone in the other category, then I have the opportunity to bring that other category in. I have the opportunity to make a connection with someone to understand where they’re coming from, to know that even though I may not see it or experience it, that within them there is that divine potential. There is that higher self potential, even if it doesn’t meet my standards. And I’ve got pretty high standards for you all. You’ve heard it said by the master teacher that you were the light of the world. Anybody hear that one? You heard it said by the master teacher, Jesus the Christ, you were the salt of the earth. Have you heard of that one? What does it mean?

Good things. Good things. That good things.

Unity and Spiritual Practice for Self-Discovery

The good thing. It means you’re your higher self. It means you come to life expressing your higher self. You come to life expressing with the intention of being that highest self that you can be. You come to life not trying to change anyone, but just to shine. That’s the whole poor point of the light set up on a hill is, you know, can be seen by all. You’re not going down and dragging people up the hill. You’re just shining your light. And I think that’s what unity does. I had somebody come and tell me recently that they were talking to their, their child and their child said, wow, I can see the difference in you that unity is making. That’s how we describe what unity is. It changes our beingness when we practice the spiritual principles. And I’m calling it unity because we’re in a unity building. But it could be any spiritual practice that brings you closer to that infinite intelligence, the ness of life that helps you recognize your unity with the ness of life, helps you recognize your unity with God’s Spirit. Isness, divine mind, infinite intelligence helps you recognize that there is no separation except that which we believe in our minds. That’s the only place that separation exists are those playlists that go on and on that say, I’m not good enough. I’m not worthy.

Uniting with Like-Minded Souls in the Art of Quantum Living

I’m there. The other, right? I have to find people like me. And it’s wonderful when you find like-minded people and can we go out into the world, into our life because everyone else is out there. Have you noticed that everyone else is out there. And can we still be that presence of who we’ve come here to be and not, you know, show up as a actuarial? I’m just a actuarial, right? And maybe what you do, but how can you shine your light in everything that you do? So we show up expressing our higher self, and there’s, and there’s a practice that we’re doing in the art of quantum living class that helps us create these ideas, these values, these spiritual values that we hold dear to our hearts. Now I can tell you, you have to have my spiritual values. Are you ready? Right? Are you gonna write this down or what? self. Why am I even looking? Self-Awareness, love and wisdom. Faith and authentic will and open-heartedness. That’s who I’ve come here to be. So how do we determine how we’ve come here to be? How do we determine what those values are? 

Discovering Joy and Transformation Through Meditation and Affirmative Prayer

Well, a lot of times we can get them through meditation and affirmative prayer. We can just open ourselves up to who I’ve come here to be. We can also under identify who we’ve come here to be when we are our highest self. Anybody, have you ever been your highest self? How about this? Have you ever experienced joy? Have you ever experienced enthusiasm and excitement for life? Have you ever said, oh, this is awesome? Yeah, we’ve all had some experience out there. And when we think back to that experience, we can bring that experience back to us and we can re-experience that, relive it and, and let it flow. What’s interesting is we tend not to do that. And I don’t know scientifically what the theory is, but here’s my theory about the science, the amygdala, which houses our memories. Also, how is the, the, the, the WatchGuard for us? Are we in trouble, or is there a threat? So anytime we, what someone asks me, how come I think about my family, I think about my father. I know I had, or I think about some experience. I know we had a wonderful time, but the only thing that ever comes up when I think about that, or all of the things that went wrong, ever go on that wonderful vacation and that, oh yeah, the bus was late or it was 106 or this happened, right?

Unleashing the Power of Wonderful Memories

And those are the things that come back first because our amygdala’s saying, oh, wait, wait, that was not safe. There were these things that weren’t so bad. So the good stuff tends to be lost because we don’t cultivate it. We allow the negativity to be our lens through which we’re seeing the world today. So one of our practices is going back to those wonderful experiences that you have and really draw forth the memories, the experience of when, of the things that were wonderful. And as you do, you can draw into you that experience. Again, they talk about trauma. And trauma is in the nervous system. ’cause The things that happen in our past, we relive every time we bring it up again, we relive it. It’s trauma happening all over again in my nervous system. Well, the same thing can happen for the wonderful things in your life. Did you know that? It’s the same process within you. You bring it up and it lifts you up.

Illuminating the World and Savoring Life’s Flavor

So you are here to be the light of the world to show and express and experience your higher self and how that shows up. We’ll talk about in a moment. And you’re also here to be the salt of the earth. And I love this part of it. It’s for me, this is my own interpretation of that idea of what does it mean to be the salt of the earth? You know, the salt brings out the flavor in foods. The salt is, is the, is the character of life, the savoriness of life. And that’s who you’ve come here to be too. You’re here to express your flavor, your individuality, your uniqueness, your own sense of, you know, I’m here, I’m juicy, you know, I I’m here to be me in my own way, not some pious. Yes, I’m the light bask in my glory. I think I’ve gone to Madagascar now. I’ve got kids of all ages. I’ve seen Madagascar, the movie probably a hundred times. And so it’s just innate in my nature. Alright, so here’s a practice. Here’s, here’s a practice, here’s a practice that we can do every day. 

Embodying Your Role Models and Expressing Your Authenticity

Here’s my first textbook. Who have you come here to be? We need to start cultivating our spiritual values. We need to start bringing them to life and practicing them every day. Practicing them with self-awareness, with intention, so that when the stuff hits the fan, it’s right there for us. And we could be in it and we can express it. Yes, yes, yes. So think about, we’re gonna do a quick exercise. Just think in your mind and don’t think too hard. Just bring to mind somebody in life. Fact or fiction. Real or not real. It could be a cartoon character, it doesn’t matter. But someone in your memory, in your life that you truly admire that has some value that you, that you look up to, that you would like to express into the world.

Bring to mind somebody. It could be a, a luminary or a, you know, a religious figure. Or you, like I said, a cartoon character or a movie character. Something that you looked and said, oh, I really resonate with that value. Can you think of it? Yes, yes. 

Cultivating Your Authentic Values: Embodying the Qualities You Admire

Now just think about what’s the top value that comes to mind. Why do you look up for that person? What are they expressing? What value are they expressing? And if you’re having trouble, here’s a book called, who Have I Come Here to Be? 101 Possibilities for Contemplation. Who have I come here to be? And yes, it’s available in the bookstore. So for example, surrendered, spiritual, noble, poised, blessed, free, tough, resilient visioning, harmonious, grateful. So can you bring to mind at least one quality in your life that you want to experience? So bring to life, bring to mind that quality, whatever it is for you. Just hold that quality in your mind and think about what does it mean to be that? How can I experience more of that? How can that show up in my life every day? How can I cultivate, cultivate that idea? So for example, one of my, one of mine that I read earlier was Authentic Will. By the way, the board does this. 

Living in Alignment with Your True Self

Each year we come up with our own spiritual values and we use this as our touchstone during our meetings. And sometimes I really need it. And none of the ex board members are laughing at that one. I’m joking. It’s a joke. So one of ’em is authentic Will. So what does authentic will look like to me? You know, there’s, I had another idea of au authenticity when I was younger. When I first started looking at authenticity. And you know, when I was younger, it was just blurting out whatever’s in my mind. I said, well, you know, that’s the truth. That’s my authentic self. But is it really? No, that was my shadow self. That was my fear, that was my frustration, that was my, you know, my sense of unworthiness coming out. So authenticity really means for me, first asking myself, is this authentic or is this just another playlist going on in my head? Is this authentic? What I’m experiencing, what I’m thinking, what I’m feeling? Is it true to who I’ve come here to be?

Transforming Thoughts into Empowered Action

‘Cause A lot of times those thoughts are not, they’re simply byproducts of my own fear, of my own stress, of my own belief system, of the tapes that, oh, sorry, the, the playlists that are playing in my head. So first, is it authentic for me? Is it real for me? And if it’s real for me, then activating my sense of will, my power of will, my ability of will, my ability to move forward and to act. And that action may come in mind, it may come in words, it may come in physical actions or things that I’m going to do, but I take action on it. I don’t just sit there and think, oh, that’s nice. What a pleasant thought, John. And do nothing about it. One really has to put that principle, put that value into action in your life, and then evaluate how it shows up for you.

Finding Harmony with Your Higher Self in Daily Life

How does it show up at work in the grocery store, on the freeway with my friends when I’m alone, when I’m on my walk? How does it show up for me when I’m speaking to somebody one-on-one, when we’re having a discussion about things that we’re frustrated about? How does that show up for me? How can I be authentic in that situation? Knowing and taking the time to just know, is this who I really am? So that first practice is to begin to cultivate those qualities, those spiritual qualities within you so that you can bring them out and you can be that quality throughout life in everything that you do, so that you can start living from your sense of self. And that’s a self with a capital s you know the difference, the capital Ss is your higher self, your divine potential starts a living a little bit more from your higher self rather than the lowercase self, which is our ego, which is our shadow qualities, which is our fear. Just noticing, oh, here’s how I’m showing up. And when I show up with my fear, with my insecurities, with my doubt, with my frustrations, I create disharmony within me. I’m no longer in harmony with Spirit that’s already there. I’m fighting against the current. I’m no longer in harmony with the people around me or the situations around me. I’m in disharmony. I’m creating disharmony, I’m creating what’s the opposite of peace? Disharmony. Yeah, I was gonna say un peace, but I just kind of ruined the flow there. Chaos. Well, I don’t know. There’s good things that happen in chaos too, but it’s that sense of discomfort. So who have you come here to be?

Harmonious Living through Small Actions

What values are you going to uniquely express in the world in all that you do? If you start to cultivate that side of you, the doing will be much more joyful, much more peaceful. It will flow more, more easily for you. And you will experience life from a completely different viewpoint. You will experience life from a more sense of harmony with what’s happening with you. James Freeman Clark was a a minister from the 18 hundreds I believe. He said, if I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way. Isn’t that powerful? If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way. And how many us of us have small things to do today? Yeah, if you’re not raising your hand, even going to sleep would be a small thing to do today. We all have small things to do. The dishes, the laundry. I changed a light switch the other day and had to create a hole in my roof. It’s a long story, not my roof, in my ceiling. And I’m not fixing it. Someone else is going to fix it because my strengths are not making it beautiful and be pretty and clean. My strengths are ripping it out.

Recognizing the Wholeness in Ourselves and Others

If you cannot do great things, do small things in great ways because when the great things come along, you’re ready for it. When the great things in life come along, you’re empowered by it and you’re ready to move. I’d like to close with a poem in my from the book Color, the Stay Beautiful by Joyce Riley, a k a mom. She’s not here in the sanctuary today, but she’s with me this week. Where is it? There it is. And this is entitled Who We Are by Joyce Riley. I am Spirit. I am soul. I am myself. I am whole. I am king kin to the universe. I am kin to each star. There is in me the power to bless. I bless you now for who you are. For you are Spirit, you are whole. You are yourself. You are whole. We are one with the universe. We are one with each star. We are one in Spirit. God blesses who we are. Her. To me, that’s the definition of unity, is being able to see that wholeness in each other. To see someone, not their, not judging them by the clothes that they’re wearing. You’re the minister or the crazy socks that they’re wearing. 

Embracing Wholeness: The Power of Seeing Beyond Externalities and Affirming Unity

Yeah, sorry. Online people. That’s a perk for being in person and sitting up close, seeing beyond those external, seeing beyond the fear, the uncertainty and the doubt that is being expressed by someone else. Seeing beyond the frustrations that are coming at you, seeing beyond that so you can see their true self so that you can see that they are whole in Spirit, even if they don’t understand it themselves. And then we can hold them in that consciousness of knowing their wholeness, of seeing them rising to that understanding. And we can hold ourselves in that same sense of wholeness regardless of what’s coming at me. So that I am confident and, and pure and just anchored in that. Anchored in that. So Felix, would you put our affirmation on the screen? It’s a simple one today from my mom’s poem. I am Spirit, I am soul. I am myself, I am whole. Would you affirm that with me?