There is an energy that occurs when a group of people come together with one thing in mind. It does’t matter what that one thing is. It might be peace. There is something about the unity of consciousness that creates coherence in the world. Have you gazed upon a flock of birds or a school of fish that all move together. There is no leader; they are totally in oneness.

The struggle that we are having now is that the energy is divided. It appears as chaos. It appears as struggle and conflict, a quest for power. I believe in positive thinking. This doesn’t mean that everything in our life is perfect. It doesn’t mean that we do not have challenges. It means we have to stand for unity. We stand for love. We begin with love for the self. There is no where else to start. If we do not love ourselves, we cannot love others, for we would have nothing to love from. I believe this makes perfect sense. We have to believe more in love than in separation.

I am noticing that many people are going through challenges right now, including myself. I know that any challenge is calling me deeper. It is calling me deeper into self-love. It is calling me deeper into service. It is calling me deeper into knowing that God is all there is no matter what appears to be. What I have come to know is that the only place to come home is to the self. I want to love myself more than anyone and then I want to take that love out into the world and help others to do the same. It’s so simplistic, yet so profound. Cleaning up one’s mental closet and finding the pearl of great price is a life-long journey. It is not selfish, it is not self-absorption. As we save ourselves, we save the world. We walk out as the change we wish to see.

Every Sunday, I stand in front of my congregation and I share my life. I share my struggles and my triumphs with one thing in mind. That others might know what is possible when we believe in something greater than ourselves that lies within. Ernest Holmes wrote this: “Our lives are the rsult of our self-contemplations and are peopled with the personifications of our thoughts and ideas. Accept this without question.”

If our lives are the result of our self-contemplation it seems that this would be where we start. What do you feel about yourself? Even if you are suffering from something – finances, illness, lack of friends, etc. What are you contemplating about yourself. Do you still love yourself no matter what? Do you? I ask myself this everyday.

Loving myself means that I accept myself to be just where I am and I allow myself to feel what I feel. I don’t think less of myself for not having this or that. I know that everything depends on my love. I seek to love myself deeper. There is a Hindu saying by Gurrdeva that says, “I identify myself as the inner being.” For me that means that what I truly am lies within me. It is not relegated to what I have or how I appear. Everything comes from within and that is where the change must take place.

My husband asked me what it means to me to be fully expressed. It means that I am living out loud all of me. I am living without holding back. I am giving my talents. I am feeling worthy of everything not because of what I do, but because of who I am. Sometimes people want us to slow down. I’ve been told that on occasion. I might not want to slow down. I might want to live out fully. I want to live – fully, vibrantly with all our talents expressed.

“Refuse to receive anyone’s condemnation. In the idependence of your own mentality, believe and feel that you are wonderful. This is not conceit, it the truth. What can be more wonderful than the manifestation of the Infinite Mind?” Ernest Holmes

Love and Aloha,

Rev. Rita Andriello-Feren, Author, Teacher, Co-Founding Spiritual Director CSL Kaua`i