Michele Longo O’Donnell

Turning Mr. Hyde back into Dr. Jekyll

March 19, 2018 40 Comments

“People show up in our lives as opportunities to reach out in love. In spite of what we see, there is fullness and glory. Our job is to call it forth, to strengthen it, to honor it, to pray for it to rise.”—Michele Longo-O’Donnell ho'

You may have heard about Dr. Hew Len. He’s a former psychologist assigned to the special ward at the Hawaii State Hospital, a notorious clinic for the criminally insane.

It was so bad that Hew Len’s predecessors all left in despair (usually in less than a month) after making zero inroads in the lives of the seriously disturbed murderers, rapists and you know, the type of dates we hope not to encounter on say, Tinder or Match.com.

Hew Len was different. He rarely left his office. In fact, not once did he meet with any of the inmates, preferring instead to retrieve their files one-by-one and practice the ancient Hawaiian art of ho’oponopono.

Basically, as he explained it, he was healing the part of himself that created such atrocities. It was pointless, he believed, to try to heal others. All he could do was heal himself.

Little by little, nurses started noticing changes. Inmates required less shackling, less pharmaceutical drugs. Some mystery person began tending the gardens, repairing the tennis courts. The atmosphere changed SO MUCH that the prisoners, one by one, were eventually released. After four years, Hawaii’s much-despised clinic for the mentally insane was shuttered forever.

Although ACIM Lesson 78 (Let Miracles Replace All Grievances) doesn’t actually prescribe ho’oponopono, it might as well. It reflects Hew Len’s belief that anything that happens TO us is our responsibility.

Anything we perceive, any person we don’t like is our creation and thus our responsibility. One hundred percent. No exceptions.

It sounds crazy. But it worked for Hew Len and it’s the only thing that can ever heal our lives. We must first heal our perceptions. The world is a projection of our mind and today’s lesson asks us to choose just one lucky individual and use him or her to heal the planet.

Even though I can barely pronounce it and have to frequently look up its spelling, I use ho’oponopono all the time. I’ve successfully turned Mr. Hydes back into Dr. Jekylls.

All it requires is saying these shockingly simple phrases to all ogres on your path:

I’m sorry.

Please forgive me.

I love you.

Thank you.

Pam Grout is the author of 19 books including E-Squared, E-Cubed, Thank & Grow Rich and her new book, Art & Soul,Reloaded: A Year-Long Apprenticeship to Summon the Muses and Ignite Your Daring, Audacious, Creative Side.

Rewriting my story about God

March 5, 2018 23 Comments

“It is not until our image of God is corrected that we begin to understand how we sabotage our own happiness.”—Michele Longo-O’Donnell

Before we commence with today’s festivities, I want to answer a question that was posted on my blog yesterday.

Could you give some suggestions on how to forgive the old story?

The simple answer, of course, is quit thinking about it, but that’s rather flip and perhaps not helpful.

So it came to me this morning as one my own old stories was playing out in my head that: a) I had cemented this “problem” into the plaster of my life by believing it was absolutely true and b) that an alternative story (in fact a gajillion other stories) were also true.

And that maybe that field of the other gajillion stories (where an alternative story could be true and a whole different thing could happen) is actually a pretty good definition of God.

And that forgiveness is nothing more than withdrawing my belief in the one story, withdrawing my conviction that this “problem” needs to be solved.

At that point, I can return to the field of gajillion possibilities. Or, to use the old terminology, return to God. Or love.

Absolutely anything is possible. Until that moment I pluck one particular possibility (usually a problem) out of the gajillion possibilities and then whip the bejesus out of myself for having it.

In quantum physics, it’s called collapsing the wave. All of our problems are nothing but waves we chose to collapse out of the field of gajillion possibilities.

So to turn it over to God is to turn it back over to the field where anything at all is possible. Where the wave is no longer collapsed.

It occurs to me that this definition may be just as difficult to understand as the Course often is. And my goal is to make it as simple as possible. So let me try one more time.

ACIM Lesson 64 (Let me not forget my function) encourages me to bring my attention back to the field of gajillion possibilities instead of zeroing in on one collapsed wave.

My function is to “be the light,” “to spread molecules of merriment.” And it’s much easier to fulfill that function when I focus on the gajillion possibilities (God) rather than the one thing that I just know is a problem, that thing I failed to “forgive.”

This lesson tells me that it’s all very simple–although it begs the question why the Course has used so many words to tout simplicity.

Every decision I make leads to either unhappiness (This problem is real, I believe in it with all my heart) or happiness (Absolutely anything is possible once I return to the field of gajillion possibilities). I prefer definition 2.

Finally! A year of unremitting miracles

January 1, 2018 40 Comments

“If I have a problem I cannot seem to walk away from, there is a belief or thought, an obstruction of flow to the Presence of Truth.”—Michele Longo-O’Donnell

Rapturous New Year, my friends!!!

When I wrote E-Cubed, I begged Hay House to print it upside down. I requested this unconventional layout to make the point that everything we know is backwards, wrong side up. To avoid confusion, Hay House allowed one upside down page.

In a nutshell, that’s the first 50 lessons of a Course in Miracles. What we have learned about the world is the exact opposite of how it really is. We’ve been taught that possibilities are finite, that life is scary, that we need to protect ourselves. The Course is designed to undo and retrain our mind.

Here’s why I’ve stuck with it year after year:

1. It requires no effort on my part. In fact, the more I give up to the F.P. (the Course uses God terminology, but, as I pointed out in E-Squared, that word has more baggage than the Chicago airport at Thanksgiving), the more effective it becomes.

2. It can be practiced anywhere. I’ve worked the Course lessons on airplanes, in an African safari tent and in a Filipino hot springs.

3. When I started following this big, fat book in earnest, my life began to change. When I asked J.C. and the Holy S. (as I like to call them) for assistance, all sorts of miracles were orchestrated on my behalf.

So let’s review. I don’t have to do anything. It’s geographically flexible. Miracles appear before my eyes.

So shall we begin:

Lesson 1: Nothing I see means anything.

For one measly minute, you simply look around the room, out the window, whatever happens to be in your line of sight and say: this lamp doesn’t mean anything, this TV doesn’t mean anything, this computer doesn’t mean anything.

That’s it. As the Course says, you don’t have to believe it. You don’t even have to like it. Just follow the damned instructions.

And for those who fear I will no longer share miracles from readers, here’s a fun one I found in yesterday’s inbox:

“I just finished the first experiment. My results were beyond my wildest expectations. Within 24 hours I had received a call from a new riding student. Within 72 hours I won a contest that I entered the day after starting the experiment, with a local radio station, worth over $1,000 in prizes. Within that 72 hours I also received a $25 gift card for Safeway from my office as well as a second call from another new riding student. I’m not sure I’ve ever smiled, laughed and cried that much in 72 hours.”

Have a great day, my friends!

Pam Grout is the author of 19 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality and the just-released, Art & Soul,Reloaded: A Year-Long Apprenticeship to Summon the Muses and Ignite Your Daring, Audacious, Creative Side.

Every moment offers a multiple choice of perceptions. Choose wonderment.

September 25, 2017 24 Comments

“Life is not a roll of the dice. It is a result of what conscious awareness we find ourselves living out from. We can make a deliberate choice to shift our perception from this atmosphere of sickness and sorrow and live out from a higher principle.”–Michele Longo-O’Donnell

Elizabeth Gilbert had the words “stubborn gladness” tattooed on her arm. It’s from her favorite poem by Jack Gilbert. In the poem, “A Brief for the Defense,” he writes, “We must have the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless furnace of this world.”

I think about stubborn gladness a lot. It defies the chasm so many of us believe—that you are either A) a realist who can’t help but notice the world is going to you-know-where in a you-know-what or 2) you’re a naïve Pollyanna who turns a blind eye to the world’s suffering.

The middle way, that Gilbert embraces, is to find joy even when……. even though….

The stubborn gladness worldview is being committed to finding the wonder amidst the chaos, amidst the terror.

A few years ago, a member of the Canadian Olympic dressage team came to a workshop I gave in British Columbia. I was spouting my normal controversial belief that joy is always possible, that finding it in every situation is one of the greatest gifts we can give our fellow humans. Some of the workshop participants weren’t so sure. But what about this? What about that?

So the Canadian Olympian told this story from her childhood. Her father worked for an international corporation. When the family was in the Philippines, they had a housekeeper who loved life with a deep and abiding joy. She found astonishment in everything. Her unabashed contentment and happiness was a continual source of inspiration to the wealthy family who employed her.

One day, a tsunami or earthquake or typhoon (sorry, I don’t remember the exact natural disaster) struck. The wealthy family fretted after hearing that their housekeeper’s family home had been swept away, had been completely obliterated in the storm. When she showed up for work the next week, they tiptoed around, wondering how they could help. They wanted to know how she and her family were faring. They fully expected her to be morose, to have lost her unbridled enthusiasm for the beauty of each moment.

“Oh, we are having so much fun,” she said. “My whole family, including all the aunts and uncles and cousins are living together in the basement of a church. It has been so fantastic all of us being together.”

Say what?

How was this even possible? How could she find joy in what most of us would rate as one of the top worst things that could ever happen.

Stubborn gladness, my friends, is an internal decision. No question that life sometimes throws curveballs. But it’s still up to us to cultivate joy and find the wonderment that, like air, always surrounds us.

It’s time for all of us to turn up the light

June 20, 2016 24 Comments

“I want to choose again, I want to live in the Kingdom. I want to live out from my true spiritual estate, who I really am. I want to live out from eternal, perpetual health and wholeness and strength and vitality. I want to live out from the knowledge that the abundance of all good is a continual flow.”—Michele Longo-O’Donnell

Tonight is the full moon which can only mean one thing: it’s time to put on my dancing shoes.

Last year at Omega, my group made a pact that we would dance “together” on each full moon—no matter where we happened to be on the planet. It is a dance in celebration of oneness and possibility and knowing that the coming month will bring forth riches of all kinds.

You are invited tonight to join with us. Wherever you might be.

Because here’s the thing.

The world right now is crying out for a whole team of radio towers who are beaming in the cosmic energy of infinite possibility. It needs a whole contingent of human frequencies who believe in the invisible power of light and love.

In fact, I would like to suggest that there is nothing more important you could ever do for yourself, your family, your friends and your planet than to tune in to the frequency of gratitude and joy.

At every moment, whether you know it or not, you are contributing to the collective consciousness. Your thoughts, your energy field, your frequency, is putting out an electromagnetic charge that either adds to the old story—the story of lack and limitation—or beams in the new story.

I think we can all agree we could use a new story.

The old story, the story of separation, tells us our thoughts, our beliefs, our energy fields . . . don’t really matter, not in the vast universe of others. It tells us that force and control and taking action is the way to bring about change.

But there is a better way. And I feel certain it has to do with dancing. Beaming love. Living in Truth. Knowing that the headlines, the political race have nothing whatsoever to do with me. And that when I don’t fall for their crazy-making plot lines, I am a much more effective force on the planet.

I hope you’ll join me and hundreds of others who have committed to dance on the full moon. As always, we will dance for love, for possibility, for light.

Pam Grout is the author of 18 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality and the about to be released, Thank and Grow Rich: a 30-day Experiment in Shameless

Tell it like you want it to be

May 14, 2014 15 Comments

“We have perfected the attitude of worry. If we don’t have something to worry about, that worries us.”—Michele Longo O’Donnell

Our ability to manifest material things is the reason most people get excited about the principles from E-Squared. But “manifesting stuff” is really a bit of a misnomer. The truth about the quantum field is that you are already connected to everything you could ever want to manifest.

What you end up drawing from the quantum soup of endless possibilities is whatever you focus your attention upon. What coalesces around you is what you invest your energy in.

Because the dominant paradigm focuses on problems, that’s what we see. When we focus instead on gratitude, on what is going right (so many more things than you can even imagine), problems dissolve back into the nothingness from which they arose.

Pam Grout is the author of 17 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality and the soon-to-be-released sequel, E-Cubed, 9 More Experiments that Prove Mirth, Magic and Merriment is your Full-time Gig.

“Love is present everywhere, and its presence only needs to be realized.”—David Hawkins

August 5, 2013 8 Comments

“Everything we need at this moment is already available to us in abundance, exceedingly, abundantly above all that we can ask or think.”—Michele Longo O’Donnell

Last Friday, the federal government set standards to bring uniformity to the $4 billion market for gluten-free foods.

It seems everybody and their mother is giving up gluten…..or sugar….or dairy…..or meat or….well, the list goes on.

I find it ironic that we exert such Herculean efforts to give up particular foods, but make little effort to give up negative thoughts that, in the end, have more of a deleterious effect than gluten ever could.

Our thoughts and what we focus upon provide the structure for our lives, our day-to-day experiences and nothing could be more important than feasting on thoughts of abundance, tolerance, love, joy and well-being.

I have no idea yet what I will eat today (although hummus will likely be involved since I’m meeting friends for Mediterranean food tonight), but I do know I’ll forgo any thought that doesn’t provide the nourishment of the world’s unlimited beneficence.

Pam Grout is the author of 16 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality.