Lots of us want to change various aspects of our life, and even more of us would like others to change things about their lives.

A tremendous amount of hot air is wasted proclaiming how we are going to “make a change” in our life, or urging those close to us to alter their behavior in some way. The fact is, most of our vows to change, and our cajoling of others to get them to change, don't produce the outcome we wish for.

The reality is that substantive change in our experience of life comes about only when it happens not from a mental determination, as we decide we would rather behave in this manner rather than in that manner, but as a spontaneous flow of will power from the heart.

It’s true that with enough positive thinking, we can effect certain changes—but only up to a point. We can reprogram our mind, learn and practice techniques, use carefully devised strategies, and as a result see a measure of improvement. But there’s always tension involved—always a lot of “efforting.” And so often, we are at risk of slipping back into our old patterns.

In contrast, when transformation springs from a shift in our state of being, so that a new behavior is in line with a new awareness of who we are in our essence, the transformation is both lasting and fulfilling. It also comes about without a great deal of agonizing on our part.

These two different ways of bringing change to how we experience our life are mirrored in a foundational story of western civilization, a mythology that dates back close to 3,000 years to the time of the royal court of King David in Israel, when one of his scribes likely penned it. It’s the story of two trees in a mythic garden.

One of these trees is known as “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” This tree represents the right way versus the wrong way, a good decision versus a bad decision, a beneficial choice versus a poor choice.

If you think about how most people make their decisions in life, how they set goals, how they choose one course of action above another, they tend to do so by weighing the pros and cons of a situation. This is how the tree of the knowledge of good and evil works. You figure out the advantages versus the disadvantages, then you take the plunge.

The problem with this approach is that much of the time we can’t see all the hidden factors, all the unknowns, all the variables of a situation—and so we end up getting burned.

When, in the mythical story, Eve chose to live from this approach, she did so because she thought the fruit of this tree was something that had the potential to make a person “wise.” Indeed, it held out the promise of living the way the divine lives.

The mind loves this kind of thing. It loves to investigate, probe, analyze, and figure out the best course of action. It just doesn’t like the consequences when it gets it wrong, because it can be a deadly way of going about life.

The other tree in the mythic garden is called “the tree of life.” Adam and Eve didn’t eat of this tree because they bought into the idea that they needed to become wise, become like God, become good. Because they believed the lie that they were somehow lacking, they opted for figuring out the best plan in life instead of simply coming from flow in everything.

Each day, we all get to choose many times which of the two trees we will base our life on: the approach of mentally figuring out the wise choice, or simply trusting the divine wisdom that’s our very nature if we but knew it.

Whichever approach we take, inch by inch life has a way of teaching us, opening us up to see how much needless pain we cause ourselves and revealing to us that we already have all the answers we need in the divine consciousness that’s our essential being.

Nothing is an ultimate mistake because our inner knower teams with our inner grower to enable us to learn from our mistakes, a topic we will take up next Monday.

Opportunity for Self-inquiry and Sharing:

 A. Do you recall a time in your life when you tried to figure out the right decision, make the right choice, and thought you were right on track—only to find you had either fooled yourself, or simply were unaware of all the factors, and it turned out disastrously?

B. Can you call to mind a time when you needed to make a choice, but you were so present that no decision was necessary, because the decision simply made itself?

C. When you look at these two different approaches and their outcomes in your life, what was the difference between them from a feeling point of view? As you look back, how might you have known the difference?