Speaker 1: Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Coast to Coast AM. I am Lie
Speaker 1: Cigar and my guest is Marianne Williamson. We've been talking
Speaker 1: about the state of the world today and how many
Speaker 1: Americans are feeling this level of anxiety or depression or despair,
Speaker 1: and how we can change that level of thinking. And
Speaker 1: although the statistics are daunting, Marianne, how can we use
Speaker 1: any type of discipline of your mind to bring about
Speaker 1: some type of good for yourself or others? Is there
Speaker 1: anything that you recommend. I know that you're a big
Speaker 1: student of the course and miracles. Well, it has to
Speaker 1: begin on the inside, of course, and many people pray,
Speaker 1: many people meditate, anything that has to do with finding
Speaker 1: that love inside yourself. Sometimes we are so wounded and
Speaker 1: hurt by life that we become hard and we put
Speaker 1: a shell around ourselves so we won't be hurt by
Speaker 1: anyone again. But putting up that shell and putting up
Speaker 1: those walls actually invites more hurt because when we do
Speaker 1: put up a wall, what we're really signing deep in
Speaker 1: a heart someone please love me. But we deflect, you know,
Speaker 1: we send away the love, the relationships, the good will
Speaker 1: that we most want. So it does begin with waking
Speaker 1: up in the morning and just sending love out to
Speaker 1: everybody you're going to see today. You know, people say, oh,
Speaker 1: that's silly, Well, it's funny to hear when you know, theoretically,
Speaker 1: isn't that what the words of Jesus were, that we
Speaker 1: should love one another, The words of Buddha, where our
Speaker 1: infinite compassion brings happiness, the words of the Old Testament justice, justice,
Speaker 1: do justice, of mercy, walk humbly with thy God. And
Speaker 1: many people who don't relate specifically to a particular religious
Speaker 1: philosophy are coming to understand we've all got to find
Speaker 1: that inner quiet within ourselves. I think between social media,
Speaker 1: the fact we're all on our tablets, we're on our
Speaker 1: on our you know people, you know, we go to
Speaker 1: the dinner table and our kids are on their computers,
Speaker 1: they're on their tablets, are on their iPads or iPhones.
Speaker 1: We've got to discover each other again. And I think
Speaker 1: that takes some discipline because the one thing, as far
Speaker 1: as those tablets are concerned, we're all addicted and we
Speaker 1: know it, and they they they're designed that way. Yes,
Speaker 1: they're designed to addict us. And we all know have
Speaker 1: to start in our own families. It has to start
Speaker 1: in our own homes. It has to start with parents saying,
Speaker 1: you know, you're not going to bring that to the
Speaker 1: dinner table. It has to start with our talking to
Speaker 1: one another again and just asking, you know, asking the
Speaker 1: God of your understanding, make me an instrument of love.
Speaker 1: Make me a person who contributes to other people. Help
Speaker 1: me not worry about myself so much that I'm not
Speaker 1: thinking about how many other people are in the same
Speaker 1: boat that I'm in, going through the same struggles that
Speaker 1: I'm going through. That's the only way that aren't any
Speaker 1: silver bullets that's going to heal everything, right, But there's
Speaker 1: if there's way to the only thing that's going to
Speaker 1: dissolve all the hate that's in the era is if
Speaker 1: we put out more love. Love is the only thing
Speaker 1: that can drive out hate. You you have the only
Speaker 1: thing that can drive out darkness. You've been a student
Speaker 1: and a teacher of course and miracles for many, many,
Speaker 1: many years. I've followed your daily lessons from the course.
Speaker 1: Could you tell us a little bit about what that is?
Speaker 1: Was it originally? Was it a channeled text. Well, the
Speaker 1: Course in Miracles. You know, no book like The Course
Speaker 1: of Miracles has a monopoly on truth. It's a psychological
Speaker 1: mind training based on universal spiritual things. So people from
Speaker 1: all religions read the course, people from no religions read
Speaker 1: the course. It's simply about recognizing the power of the mind,
Speaker 1: and that every single thought we think carries with it
Speaker 1: the capacity to affect our lives and the lives around us,
Speaker 1: not just everything we do, but everything we think. And
Speaker 1: we are trained in this world, and we're trained by
Speaker 1: the narratives of this world. And in many ways we're tempting,
Speaker 1: because of all the anxiety that we've been talking about
Speaker 1: here tonight, to be very judgmental and very mean. So
Speaker 1: and so the problem that group of people is the problem.
Speaker 1: And we can disagree about things like we were talking
Speaker 1: politically before. It's important to have passionate disagreements or to
Speaker 1: call systems to accounts that are unjust, but we don't
Speaker 1: have to personally demonize one another. And we once again
Speaker 1: it's on social media. It's in too much of the media.
Speaker 1: We are far too indulgent of hatred and our hearts
Speaker 1: and the only you know, we ourselves are responsible for
Speaker 1: transforming our lives on the inside. We have rights to
Speaker 1: expect our government to do a whole lot more than
Speaker 1: it now does to help transform things on the outside.
Speaker 1: But none of that is a substitute for the changes
Speaker 1: that we have to make inside our hearts. You know,
Speaker 1: everybody who's listening right now, they even think of just
Speaker 1: one person, and everybody's listening, there's one person who If
Speaker 1: you forgave that person, your whole life would change. Because
Speaker 1: you are holding onto resentments, and you're holding onto grievances,
Speaker 1: you're holding onto what they did to you, and so
Speaker 1: you're not letting life begin again. You're not letting you know,
Speaker 1: the way the universe works is kind of like a GPS.
Speaker 1: If you took the wrong turn, the GPS will automatically recalibrate. Well,
Speaker 1: that's how life works. You know, somebody treated you without love,
Speaker 1: You did something without love, somebody else did something to you,
Speaker 1: you did something stupid. We all have those things. We
Speaker 1: all have those things. This is so important to remember.
Speaker 1: At least, so we all have those things. But life
Speaker 1: is created to give you another path. But not if
Speaker 1: you're holding onto the resentments. You know, not if you're
Speaker 1: holding on to the you know what they did to me,
Speaker 1: you know, then you get a ship on your shoulder,
Speaker 1: and then you actually subconsciously invite more of the same
Speaker 1: kind of experience that you're so upset about, and life
Speaker 1: compounds the pain, and then you say, see, nothing ever changes,
Speaker 1: you know, to begin with us, it has to begin
Speaker 1: with a toning in our hearts, with a mistakes we've made,
Speaker 1: and praying in whatever way we pray, or asking, you know,
Speaker 1: whatever language works for us, that we might we ourselves
Speaker 1: might change and be more open hearted. Every thought we think,
Speaker 1: every spot we think, is either an open hearted response
Speaker 1: to life or a response to life that is a
Speaker 1: hardened heart. And when the heart is open, we attract
Speaker 1: good things. We attract people who want to be with us,
Speaker 1: We attract love, we attract happiness. But when our hearts
Speaker 1: are shut tight, what we attract is pain, and what
Speaker 1: we attract is other people who are shut down to
Speaker 1: us the way we're shut down to them. And you know,
Speaker 1: everybody's listening recognizes everything I'm saying, because this is just
Speaker 1: a human experience. Yes, it definitely is, and you have
Speaker 1: I was listening to a lecture from lind twist, and
Speaker 1: she wrote a book recently about the prophecies that she's
Speaker 1: gained from her years and years at with the pachamamallions
Speaker 1: visiting indigenous tribes. And there's a prophecy amongst these tribes
Speaker 1: collectively twenty or thirty of these tribes of the Eagle
Speaker 1: and the Condor, and I don't know the exact timing,
Speaker 1: but it's something about being in the last hundred years
Speaker 1: of this five hundred year cycle, where the beginning of
Speaker 1: this cycle is very tumultuous, very dark, very much filled
Speaker 1: with contrast as we've seen the first twenty three years
Speaker 1: of this hundred year cycle we're in, but where the
Speaker 1: prophecy says that we're moving is more towards this light,
Speaker 1: more towards humanity coming together, more towards hope, more towards
Speaker 1: solution and resolution. And so this conversation is aproposed to
Speaker 1: that because you're talking about, yes, these daunting statistics and
Speaker 1: the place that humanity is in right now, specifically Americas
Speaker 1: in this country, very a lot of despair. Yet this
Speaker 1: conversation needs to go towards that level of hope. What
Speaker 1: do you feel is possible, Marianne, what do you see
Speaker 1: in the next twenty years. Well, we're living in two
Speaker 1: simultaneous realities right One world is clearly falling apart around us,
Speaker 1: There's no doubt about it. Our institutions, our environment, our democracy,
Speaker 1: I mean, things are crumbling, and clearly there is the
Speaker 1: end days of a certain era. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: as you've been talking about on the show tonight, wonderful
Speaker 1: things are happening and a new world. You know, there's
Speaker 1: an Indian writer, Aarondati Roy and she said there is
Speaker 1: a new world that is struggling to be born. We
Speaker 1: feel that too, And I think in that space called
Speaker 1: God or whatever we want to call it, there is
Speaker 1: infinite capacity to transform, to change, to begin again, I
Speaker 1: mean all of us, since I mean that's the mercy
Speaker 1: of God. Is this part of the power of faith
Speaker 1: that you know? I love the story in the Bible
Speaker 1: of this the prodigal son. The father is more excited
Speaker 1: to see the son who left and came back than
Speaker 1: to see the son who had never left it. We've
Speaker 1: all made our mistakes, we've all fallen down, but the
Speaker 1: issue in life is getting back up, you know him Anyway,
Speaker 1: the writer said life breaks everyone, but some people grow
Speaker 1: stronger in the broken places. That's happening too. What's happening
Speaker 1: is regeneration. What's happening is repair. And that's what we
Speaker 1: have to understand, I think, is that with every thought,
Speaker 1: every action, everything we do with our lives, we are
Speaker 1: either contributing to the energy of the downward spiral of
Speaker 1: our civilization or we are contributing to the upward spiral.
Speaker 1: And you know, there are so many ways that solutions
Speaker 1: are available today, from regenerative agriculture to green energy, to
Speaker 1: new ways of doing community and economics and business. The
Speaker 1: problem is the people who have the power aren't applying
Speaker 1: the solutions because they don't necessarily make quick corporate profits,
Speaker 1: and the people who have the solutions don't necessarily have
Speaker 1: the power. So we're living in this time of struggle,
Speaker 1: there's no doubt about that. But I think it's a
Speaker 1: time of great hope and possibility because if you believe
Speaker 1: in a power higher than we are, greater than we are,
Speaker 1: that lives within us, then the possibility of what God
Speaker 1: can do. You know, there's a line. God can only
Speaker 1: do for us what he can do through us. But
Speaker 1: if we surrender our lives and ask that our lives
Speaker 1: be used as instruments of good and peace and this
Speaker 1: extraordinary revolution of consciousness and love that is trying to
Speaker 1: take place. Then you start attracting more people who have
Speaker 1: that same kind of consciousness, the same kind of mindset.
Speaker 1: You stop attracting people around you who are just saying,
Speaker 1: ain't it awful. You start attracting more people who are
Speaker 1: inviting you into the space of the relationship and circumstance
Speaker 1: where people are doing cool new things. Both things are happening,
Speaker 1: and we ourselves, I think, have to take responsibility for
Speaker 1: which one of those things we're put in our attention to. Yes,
Speaker 1: as I mean, it's according to the prophecy and what
Speaker 1: you're talking about, these two worlds existing now, and I'm
Speaker 1: sure astrologically this is all being supported that we're in
Speaker 1: this transition I feel is taking place. But do you
Speaker 1: have any evidence of the fact that we are transitioning
Speaker 1: towards this more hopeful future, a more connected humanity. Well,
Speaker 1: I think we need to realize which way it will go.
Speaker 1: It is up to us, you know, I mean, that's
Speaker 1: the thing. You know, it's not you know. One of
Speaker 1: my least favorite comments or one of my biggest piece
Speaker 1: is when people say, well, we'll see, and though we
Speaker 1: have no power, you know, I think it's true that
Speaker 1: on an external level, the average American has much less
Speaker 1: power to change their circumstances than we should have for
Speaker 1: all the things we were talking about, lack of healthcare
Speaker 1: and all that kind of stuff. But internally we have
Speaker 1: the power. You know, Nobody can determine for you how
Speaker 1: you choose to live your life. No one can determine
Speaker 1: for you where you put your attention. No one can
Speaker 1: determine for you whether you're going to spend your life
Speaker 1: blessing other people or blaming other people, whether you're going
Speaker 1: to be an instrument of forgiveness or you're going to
Speaker 1: be an instrument of judgment. Only we can, you know,
Speaker 1: only you can determine that for yourself. And you know,
Speaker 1: nobody should just believe me because I said, you know,
Speaker 1: or because anyone else said it. Try it and see.
Speaker 1: And I just know in my own life when I
Speaker 1: always say, Lisa, when I practice what I preach, my
Speaker 1: life works really well. Get there twenty four hours every day.
Speaker 1: But when we seek, in whatever situation, to be kinder,
Speaker 1: to be to ask about other people's issues and not
Speaker 1: just our own to ask how we can be an
Speaker 1: agent of vetterment in somebody else's life. That's we are
Speaker 1: participating in a fundamental movement on the planet away from
Speaker 1: darkness and into light. And otherwise, with the state of
Speaker 1: our democracy, with the authoritarian stresses, with a stress of
Speaker 1: environmental breakdown, with the economic inequality, if we do not
Speaker 1: consciously exert a proactive effort to move in the direction
Speaker 1: of a light, then the darkness could definitely overwhelm us.
Speaker 1: And we shouldn't kid ourselves. Oh yeah, civilization could go
Speaker 1: through chaos the likes of which we've never known in
Speaker 1: our lifetime. Yes, there are I love that we're talking
Speaker 1: about this, that we have the power to change our thoughts,
Speaker 1: our neurology towards this conversation or towards a more hopeful conversation. Yes,
Speaker 1: we're aware of the statistics, and yes there is an
Speaker 1: onset of even new technologies with the first part of
Speaker 1: tonight's show is talking all about AI and chat GPT
Speaker 1: in this whole level of technology that's going to accelerate
Speaker 1: over the next ten months, likely what we've seen in
Speaker 1: the past ten years, and if just an ounce of
Speaker 1: this could be used towards good How do I create
Speaker 1: a more positive future? How do I learn to love
Speaker 1: my neighbor? How do I be kind to one person
Speaker 1: a day? That could be used towards anything that could
Speaker 1: create or generate goodness. It would make sense, It would
Speaker 1: make so much more sense, and then that could start
Speaker 1: to generate more of the same like it does in Ai. Well, also,
Speaker 1: you know when you say how do I, it's just
Speaker 1: there is no how to to this? You decide to
Speaker 1: You know, I realized a few years ago that the
Speaker 1: best advice I can give myself, I'm telling you, ninety
Speaker 1: percent of the time when I have a problem, the
Speaker 1: answer is some form of oh, Marianne, get over yourself. Yes,
Speaker 1: think about somebody who's life is a little harder than
Speaker 1: yours right now, And how could you help just that
Speaker 1: kind of thinking begin to transform everything? You know? Martin
Speaker 1: Luther King How to term cosmic companionship. Listen to more
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