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E-Squared

Nine Do-It-Yourself Energy Experiments That Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality

Hay House Insights

CHAPTER 1

Experiment #1

THE DUDE ABIDES PRINCIPLE:

There Is an Invisible Energy Force or Field of Infinite Possibilities

"Everyone else is waiting for eternity and the shamans are saying, 'How about tonight?'"

— Alberto Villoldo, Ph.D., Cuban-born author and teacher of energy medicine

The Premise

This experiment will prove to you once and for all that there is a loving, abundant, totally hip force in the universe. Some people call it God. You can call it prana, "the all there is," or "Cosmo Kramer," for all I care.

The problem, up until now, is that we've had to take this force on faith. We weren't allowed to see it or touch it. Of course, we've been asked to do lots of things in its name, like tithe and meditate and put ashes on our head. I much prefer the idea of an energy force that moves on two-way streets. Does give and take ring any bells?

In this experiment, we're going to let the FP know that, baby, it's now or never. We are done believing in something that gets its jollies by playing hide-and-seek. We want irrefutable proof. And we want it now. You know those four little initials—A.S.A.P. Well, those are the ones we're shooting for. We are going to give the FP exactly 48 hours to give us a sign, a clear sign, a sign that cannot be written off. Neon would work.

Because we bought this idea that the force is vague and mysterious, we don't really expect to find it. Or at least we're not surprised when we don't. Because we haven't been trained to notice, this inspiring, energizing, life-altering force is zooming in, around, and through us without our awareness.

What Me, Wait?

"If your medicine doesn't grow corn, of what use is it?"

— Sun Bear, Chippewa elder

For those who want to wait for the pearly gates, go right ahead. It's like a modern-day person refusing to use electricity. All you have to do to access electricity is find an outlet, plug in an electronic device or appliance, and voilà! You get all sorts of cool stuff—toasted bread, music that's piped in from radio towers, movies and news, and fellow humans performing all sorts of antics like eating slugs on deserted islands.

We have to retrain ourselves to think of this energy force the same way we think of electricity. We don't wonder, Am I good enough to plug my toaster oven into the outlet? or Have I prayed long enough or deep enough to deserve the right to flick on the kitchen lights?

We don't feel guilty for wanting to turn on the radio and listen to NPR. The FP is just as nonprejudiced and available as electricity once we make the decision to really look for it.

And it's not that hard to find.

Anecdotal Evidence

"God is not the pushover that some people would like you to believe."

— Barbara Park, Alex Frankovitch in Skinny Bones

This is the section where we talk about the elephant in the room. Yes, I'm talking about God.

Unless you just crawled out from underneath a cabbage leaf, you've probably observed that an awful lot of people talk about this guy named God. One out of every seven days is devoted to worshipping him. Buildings of all shapes and sizes have been built to honor him. Many newspapers have a religious section right next to the political section, the local news, the weather, and the crossword puzzle.

Some version of "the dude" (to borrow a moniker from the cult-classic film The Big Lebowski) exists in every culture that has ever existed. Even physicists whose sole line of work is studying the properties and interactions of matter and energy know about the invisible force. Most of them do not call it God. Albert Einstein, for example, claimed no belief in the traditional God, but he sure as heck knew there was something a whole lot juicier out there in the cosmos. In fact, that juice, he said, was all he really cared about. The rest, he claimed, was just details.

The God most of us believe in is an invention of man, fabricated for the sake of convenience. We accept this human-made God as an indisputable fact. But it makes no sense. If God is love, if God is perfect, and if God is all the other beneficent descriptions we ascribe to him, why would he toss anyone into a lion's den? Furthermore, why would anyone in their right mind want to hook up with a capricious and unjust god who gets his jollies from punishing them? Even the ditziest of women knows theoretically that she shouldn't hang out with a guy who might hurt her.

I mean, who needs it?

God as Terrorist

"I don't know if God exists, but it would certainly be better for his reputation if he didn't."

— Jules Renard, French Author

No sooner had I mastered my ABC's than I was taught that I, little Pammy Sue Grout, was a miserable sinner and had fallen short of the glory of God. It was a fact, same as two plus two equals four and the reality that el-em-en-oh-pee is more than one letter in the alphabetical lineup. The only redeeming part of this all-important lesson was that at least I wasn't alone. Turns out, everybody else in the world was a sinner, too. Even Mrs. Beckwith, my tenderhearted kindergarten teacher who let me bring Pokey, my pet turtle, to class every other Monday.

The bad thing about being a sinner is that it guarantees a one-way ticket to hell. It was a little hard getting a handle on hell, because I hadn't traveled much farther than the Kansas border. But, according to my dad, hell was not a place you wanted to be. It was hotter than my Aunt Gwen and Uncle Ted's house in Texas the summer their air conditioner broke. And, unlike that vacation that ended after four days, you stay in hell for eternity. To understand eternity, he said, you think of how you felt last December 26 waiting for Christmas again.

The escape clause is that you can "get saved."

So when I was four years old, with the church organist playing "Just as I Am," I walked to the front of the little Methodist church in Canton, Kansas, plopped down on my knobby little four-year-old knees, and asked the good Lord to "forgive me for my sins." My family, from a long line of Methodists, collectively breathed a sigh of relief. Dad and Mom called all the aunts and uncles that very night to broadcast the good news.

"Well, our oldest is officially saved now," they crowed proudly. "At least, we can be assured that Pam is going to heaven."

The best part, they figured, was that my conversion couldn't help but set a good example for my sister, Becki, who was two; and my brother, Bobby, who was only three months old, although I secretly hoped they would give him until he was old enough to talk.

Of course, you didn't want to take any chances. I mean, Jesus could come back at any time—night or day. He was like a thief in the night. He could come in the morning while you were stirring circles in your Cap'n Crunch cereal. He could come at recess while you were hanging from your knees on the monkey bars. He could even come at 2 in the morning while you were sleeping, which could be a real problem if you happened to be a heavy sleeper. Jesus could snatch you up before you had time to get the sleep out of your eyes.

And that you didn't even want to think about. I mean, Aunt Gwen and Uncle Ted's house was hot.

At the same time that I was learning to accept my true sinful identity, I was being told over and over again that "God is love." Never mind that the churches presented God as a sort of hidden camera that watched over everything I did.

It made no rational sense. But, of course, I was only four. What did I know?

Even though I was yawningly close to being a perfect kid (I made straight A's, tried not to fight with my siblings, stayed away from drugs and alcohol, and even made my bed without being told), I felt I was constantly being critiqued by this "loving God" who was sitting up in heaven, gleefully rubbing his hands together whenever I screwed up. Which, gosh darn it (oops, there I go again, using his name in vain!) seemed to be pretty often.

What a legacy to dump on an innocent child.

God Looks Like Z.Z. Top and Other Annoying Myths

"Our ideas of God tells us more about ourselves than about Him."

— THOMAS MERTON, CHRISTIAN MYSTIC

Ask the average individual if he believes in God and he will probably say something like, "Well, duh!" However, it's unlikely he will have ever asked himself exactly what he means by God. When pressed, he'd probably offer some cliché about "the guy upstairs."

Trying to define God, of course, is impossible. God isn't static, any more than electricity or light is static. God lies beyond the material world of matter, shape, and form. It fills the cosmos, saturates reality, and supersedes time and space. But that doesn't stop us from trying to construct definitions. Here are the top eight whoppers we've made up about God:

Whopper #1: God is a him. Even though the progressive churches sometimes refer to God as she, the FP doesn't really have a gender. We certainly don't talk about Mrs. Electricity or Mr. Gravity. The more appropriate pronoun would be it. The FP is a force field that runs the universe, the same energy source that grows flowers, forms scabs over skinned knees, and constantly pushes for wholeness.

God is more like the force in Star Wars, a presence that dwells within us, a principle by which we live. That's why Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader have become such a phenomenon. Star Wars is a myth that speaks to us at a deep, gut level. Some part of us knows that "the force" is with us and that we, through our words, thoughts, and deeds, create the world.

Whopper #2: God looks like ZZ Top, makes black check marks after your name, and is basically too busy working on world hunger to care about you. God, if you believe the accepted box, is a little like Boo Radley in To Kill a Mockingbird: this mysterious neighbor constantly peering out the window of his penthouse suite, waiting to catch us doing something "naughty, naughty." We can't really see him, but we've been properly warned that he's there. Watching. Judging. Monitoring our every move. If you don't follow this commandment or if you break that rule, God just might send his angel Secret Service after you to bop you on the head like Little Bunny Foo-Foo.

Whopper #3: God plays favorites. The FP is a force field that's equally available to everyone. It's a natural capacity in all of us, not an exclusive gift bestowed upon a few. In fact, that is the primary lesson Jesus taught. God is within. You are part of God. You can perform miracles.

To worship Jesus the way we do is a little like worshipping Benjamin Franklin because he first discovered electricity. Ben Franklin sent that kite up in an electric storm so we could use the principle he demonstrated. He didn't do it so we'd build temples to him, paint pictures of him, and wear little commemorative keys around our necks. He wanted us to take the principle of electricity and use it—which we do to run radios and computers and air conditioners. Had we stopped with Ben's discovery the way we did with Jesus's discovery, we'd all be sitting in the dark.

Benjamin Franklin didn't invent electricity any more than Jesus invented spiritual principles. Lightning and the resulting electricity have always been available. We just didn't realize it or know how to access it. Galileo didn't invent gravity when he dropped the wooden ball off the leaning tower of Pisa. He just demonstrated it.

Likewise, Jesus demonstrated spiritual principles that he wants us to use and develop. We've wasted 2,000 years worshipping this idol of him instead of using the principles he taught us. Look through the Bible and nowhere does Jesus say, "Worship me." His call to us was "follow me." There's a big difference.

By making Jesus out to be a hero, we miss the whole point. Jesus wasn't saying, "I'm cool. Make statues of me, turn my birthday into a huge commercial holiday." He was saying, "Here, look what is possible. Look what we humans are capable of."

Jesus is our brother, our legacy, the guy we're supposed to emulate.

What Jesus was trying to tell us is that the churches, the religious leaders, and all their blaring rhetoric has drowned out God's truth. They've pulled the wool over our eyes by failing to mention the fact that the FP is not an object of worship, but a very real presence and a principle by which we should live.

Whopper #4: God rewards our suffering and gives brownie points for our sacrifice (better known as "Life sucks and then you die"). Many of us think life is some sort of boot camp for heaven. We believe this short life span is "only a test" for the paradise we're eventually going to earn. If we hang on and bear it, we'll someday walk through those pearly gates and be happy. These errors in thinking have been condensed into living facts. Nothing is plainer than the inevitability of sorrows and trials.

But what if it isn't necessary? What if there is no reason to be poor? Or get sick? Or do anything but live an abundant, exciting life? What if these tragic, difficult lives are another rumor made up by the churches and cemented into our consciousness by years and years of conditioning?

What I'd like to suggest is that this heaven you're waiting for is available now. And that you've been sold a bill of goods about who you are and what is possible.

Whopper #5: God is just so demanding. The FP doesn't judge. It doesn't punish. It doesn't think, Well, Sammy C. was a good boy yesterday, helping that little old lady cross the street. I think I'll answer his prayer about winning the lottery. Those are thoughts Clarence Thomas might think. The FP doesn't need anything. It requires nothing of us. It makes no demands. It doesn't like Mother Teresa more than Celine Dion. Only misinformed humans, scrambling desperately to make sense of their world, came up with a God who plays eenie-minie-mo with our lives, a God who likes and dislikes the same people we do. Our fear has trapped us into a box that plays out our very limited perception.

Whopper #6: You don't want to ask too much from God; you certainly wouldn't want to bug him. As I've already pointed out, the FP is not a person; therefore you cannot bug him. The FP is a power, an unseen energetic force. It isn't finite or limited, so you certainly couldn't ask too much of it. As the old saying goes, you can take an eyedropper or a bucket to the ocean. The ocean doesn't care. If anything, we don't use the FP power nearly enough. This is an all-powerful force we're talking about here, not some last-minute relief team that comes in to pay the mortgage. The FP is not an adversary that has to be coaxed to the bargaining table.

Whopper #7: God is just so vague. Au contraire. Once you get rid of the black cloud of rumors and half truths that hide your awareness, you'll find the unseen force communicates just as clearly as Dr. Phil. Once you rid yourself of the blocks, you'll be shown exactly what to do and how to do it.

We need to condition ourselves to think of God more like we think of electricity. Electricity doesn't care who plugs in a curling iron. Electricity doesn't ask us to prove we're good enough to make toast.

Whopper #8: God only answers when he's good and ready. There is never a time when God or "the force" isn't guiding you. And you do not have to wait for any green lights or "get out of jail free" cards. The big guy is available 24/7 once you're ready to focus your full attention on it. The FP's guidance, happens (as they say about ... well, something else)—through a song lyric on the radio, by a phone call from a long-lost friend. The trick is to pay attention, trust, and as I will continue to repeat, focus your full attention on it.

And while we're on the topic of God's will, let's get this out on the table. There is no place in our updated picture of God for a hell of everlasting torment or for a sadist who would or could attempt to put you there. Nor is there any room for the idea that sickness or deformity or death or poverty or limitation of any kind is the will of God. The will of God, for those who insist on using that term, is the ceaseless longing of the spirit in you to become all you're capable of being. Amen.

The Method

"Allowing myself to become a little nutty and irrational did open me up to certain mystical experiences."

— D. Patrick Miller, Founder of Fearless Books

In this experiment, you're going to devote 48 hours to looking for evidence of this all-knowing, all- perfect FP. Call it God, if that feels more comfortable. Luckily, the FP exists every single place you could ever think to look.
(Continues...)

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Excerpted from E-Squared by Pam Grout. Copyright © 2013 Pam Grout. Excerpted by permission of Hay House Insights.
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