Waking Up In the Real World

The theme I want to explore today is living in the real world.

Introduction - core concepts
As background, please keep in mind two of Neville Goddard’s core concepts which inform his interpretation of Christianity. The first is that human beings are one with God. The creative source itself, which we call God, dwells in the depths of the mind of the individual. From Neville’s perspective, an individual must somehow discover the reality of God within oneself, and the first step is to learn awareness of being, true self-remembering consciousness. Season 01 Episode 01; Season 2 Episode 7. Dreams of a certain unmistakable quality can be a compelling channel of communication. Neville’s instruction is that God is to awaken – to be clear, awaken as the person himself or herself – for we do not lose our individuality.

The second core concept is that Man’s entire experience and the whole universe – following the Hermetic principle – are mental in nature. All is mentation. The result of adopting that view is that one need not be at the mercy of an external threatening world which impinges upon oneself – this is a misconception. Rather, the whole thing is reversed, whereby one accepts experience of the world as an unfailing mirror of one’s own position.

Those two foundational concepts – the unity of Man and God; Man and the universe as all imagination, all psyche, as opposed to a clumsy, building block reality as the materialists would have it – have been presented and discussed in many aspects in previous episodes.

Let’s go now to the main topic which is, as I mentioned, living in the real world. I think this will be of interest if you have a desire to really take Neville seriously, to take him at his word, and make a mental shift. I am going to have to call to mind all the faith I can muster -- that is the crucial ingredient of credence, a profound belief which is needed required to make an inner change – and this will be based on all prior work, all my preparation and careful contemplation of Neville Goddard’s worldview.

What is the real world?
So, what is the real world? It is neither the invisible world of concepts, emotions, thoughts, and intuitions; nor merely the visible, physical environment—whether natural or constructed. The real world is the unification of both the inner and outer worlds. They must come together in a single, undivided experience. The division between inner and outer is a misconception; it tends to evaporate when you turn over in your mind and start to accept, even as a hypothetical approach, the precept I mentioned that all is mental.

Neville’s Christianity affirms the outer, everyday life

Christianity, in Neville’s interpretation, is grounded in conscious experience, which tears down the walls between the mental, the spiritual and the seeming physical.

One implication of this fresh understanding of Christianity is that we cannot reject mundane, everyday life as something lesser or disdainful, which I think is often implied in a lot of spiritual practice. This is probably a cultural hangover from institutional Christianity, which conceived life as a “vale of tears” – merely a dull preparation for some remote afterlife.

The sane approach is to integrate inner striving with immediate reality. Embrace the daily grind; use it and transform it. This is, after all, our main field of practice – our school. Neville, in his writings and lectures, continually unifies the inner and outer realms in one lived experience.

Listen to more practical tips on waking up in the real world, podcast S02E12, audio – or read the transcript.