Election Results Do Not Unnerve Us

If an election does not produce the results we'd like ... there is no need to abandon our peace or joy. The principles we are learning with the lessons of this course are perfect for maintaining our invulnerability in the wake of an election as well during all political happenings. In fact, just as the ultimate goal of a liberty activist is far beyond the intermediate issues talked about in a particular election cycle, so the ultimate goal of this course is not only long range political success but benefit far beyond the realm of politics.

There is nothing we cannot accomplish if we live by these principles. The more we learn about spiritual opening (not religious beliefs, but true spiritual opening beyond any particular beliefs), the happier and more efficient our lives become. When we release guilt, fear, anger, wanting, fixed belief systems, and other pain-causing habits, what remains is love, joy, and inner peace. Why wouldn't our whole lives be more efficient?

Does this mean a spiritually opened person can live within the prohibitive darkness of a Marxist society or the depressing gray cloud of a liberal-progressive dictatorship and still thrive and be happy? As a matter of fact ... yes. Because a spiritually opened person is in touch with inner happiness which does not depend on external circumstances.

Does this mean we can still feel free in an unfree world? As a matter of fact, yes ... if we are seeing clearly that an unfree world doesn't have to affect our freedom. But such clear seeing requires being open spiritually. A truly free person, a person in touch with inner freedom, does not need to be affected by external circumstances.

In a political activism context, does this mean we can be joyous and happy and not the least bit depressed even if liberty-leaning candidates lose everywhere in an overwhelming election landslide? Why not? Who decides whether we are happy or not? Voting results external to us? Or we ourselves ... in charge of how we feel?

If we are in charge of how we feel ... if external events or circumstances do not determine our inner happiness ... then we are in a very, very strong position indeed.

Well, it turns out the only way we can become depressed or unhappy is if we allow external circumstances or events to have more importance in our minds than they need have, so the logical choice is easy. We can choose to see that specific outcomes are nowhere near as important as our inner state of being. What an incredible position of strength! Now we are like Howard Roark in The Fountainhead, in Roark's words asking nothing, expecting nothing, depending on nothing ... experiencing freedom.

This month let's use this lesson to fortify in our minds the idea that external events, external circumstances or external outcomes like election results do not matter as much as our egos would like us to believe because we can choose to be happy no matter what.

To this end we start each day with some form of affirmation which reminds us. Something like:

"Independent of election results ... I'm the one who decides whether I am happy or not! Knowing this, I am invulnerable."

"My strength today comes from my choice to stay happy in the face of any and all circumstances in the world."

"Today my priorities are: (1) choose happiness, (2) choose happiness, and (3) choose happiness. What power this gives me!"

It doesn't matter what affirmations we use to remind ourselves. Our inner voice may give us very powerful statements indeed. The important thing is to allow our imagination to give us mental pictures while using the affirmations, and then to use the statements until we feel the truth of them.

As always, we also take at least 20 minutes during the day for meditation, quieting our minds, and really feeling the peace and joy of our inner being.

When we retire each day this month, we rejoice in our strength and power. We rejoice that we do not give away our strength by thinking that externals are so important as to affect our happiness. We rejoice that one-time election results cannot get in the way of our achieving our ultimate political goals precisely because temporary results don't affect who we really are. Before smiling ourselves to sleep, we might say aloud to ourselves one last reminder:

"Having surrendered the need for particular outcomes, I am unstoppable."




The device which even more deeply prepares freedom lovers for success, A Course in Miracles , talks about our ultimate need to free ourselves from every kind of slavery:

You have been told to bring the darkness to the light, and guilt to holiness. And you have also been told that error must be corrected at its source. Therefore, it is the tiny part of your self, the little thought that seems split off and separate, that the Holy Spirit needs. The rest is fully in God's keeping, and needs no guide. But this wild and delusional thought needs help, because, in its delusions, it thinks it is the Son of God, whole and omnipotent, sole ruler of the kingdom it set apart to tyrannize by madness into obedience and slavery.




Also available free of charge online:
Course in Relationship Miracles