As I was driving to work the other day, I heard the local radio personality announce, \u201cAnd stay tuned for the three things you need to know<\/i> from the radio station that keeps you up to date with what is important in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oh, my goodness, I was going to arrive at my destination well before they told me the three things I need to know.\u00a0 Should I stay in my car and risk being late for my appointment while I wait for these vital pieces of information?\u00a0 What will happen to me if I don\u2019t hear these three crucial nuggets of wisdom?\u00a0 Because if I need <\/i>to know them, won\u2019t the absence<\/i> of knowing them surely have dire circumstances for me?<\/p>\n
Could it be that I need to know that the American government is continuing to play intramural hardball with each other at the expense of the very people who voted them into office, the very people who they claim to have their best interests in mind?<\/p>\n
Could it be that I need to know that former Olympian Bruce Jenner and his wife, Kris Jenner, are now officially separated after 22 years of marriage?<\/p>\n
Could it be that I need to know that there are people who reacted sharply with racist comments and harsh accusations in response to Nina Davuluri becoming the most recent Miss America because of her Indian origin?<\/p>\n
Could it be that I need to know that a young pregnant woman in Mexico City gave birth on the front lawn of a medical clinic after being denied care from the medical personnel inside the facility who told her she was not ready to deliver?<\/p>\n
Or maybe I need to know that the foods I am eating are entirely wrong or what movies I must be watching. \u00a0Perhaps I need to know which preschools my children should be going to in order to ensure they will be successful adults or how to Feng Shui the furniture in my living room. \u00a0Maybe someone will tell me what car I\u2019m supposed to be driving, what brand of jeans someone \u201cmy age\u201d should wear, what length my hair is supposed to be. \u00a0And surely I need to know which politician is involved in the latest sex scandal.\u00a0 \u00a0And, of course, here is the big one that someone must tell me now: \u00a0which version of God I am supposed to be embracing?<\/p>\n
Where does the long list of \u201cthings I need to know\u201d end?<\/p>\n
And how is it that everyone else<\/i> knows what I<\/i> need to know, and I don\u2019t?<\/p>\n
Of course, I\u2019m being slightly facetious here to make a point.\u00a0 But how many times and in what kinds of ways are we being told we need something in our lives in order to be, do, or have something else? \u00a0 In order to be happy? \u00a0In order to be abundant? \u00a0In order to be in a relationship? \u00a0And do we ever stop to consider where we are getting that information?<\/p>\n
Buried deep beneath our belief that somehow we are incomplete, insufficient, less-than, it seems we have forgotten the nature of who we really are.\u00a0 We have caused ourselves to miss entirely the opportunity to experience ourselves as the source of our own joy and happiness by looking to and accepting external sources of information for our answers and our truth, even when that information is not in alignment with our own wisdom.\u00a0 Can you imagine a more perfectly vulnerable position for someone to be in if and when somebody else wants their<\/i> truth to also be yours<\/i>?<\/p>\n
For me, it has been my experience that the understanding of what I need to know is most often realized in the space of nothingness, in the stillness of nature, and in the absence of words. \u00a0And while the outside world provides us an extraordinary opportunity to apply our consciousness through the process of choosing and creating and recreating, I believe there are not 3 things we need to know, nor are there 100 things or one million things. \u00a0There is only one<\/em> thing we need to know; and that is this: \u00a0we<\/em> already know<\/i>.<\/p>\n \u201cLife (as you call it) is an opportunity for you to know experientially what you already know conceptually. ~ Conversations With God: An Uncommon Dialogue, Vol. 1<\/i><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n
\nYou need learn nothing to do this. You need merely remember what you already know, and act on it.\u201d<\/p>\n