Creativity is amazing… Rudy climbed onto an AMTRAK train, wearing his Captain America T-shirt, and immediately sat down and began talking to anyone who made eye contact about being on his way to the largest poker game in America, and how similar it was to Ocean’s Eleven and the Rat Pack and the later Ocean’s Twelve, and how Dean Martin wasn’t really a drunk (it was just an act) and how he finally started drinking when his son Dino died, and that Dean’s real Italian name was Dino, and that Frank Sinatra was from Hobokin, New Jersey, and he (Rudy) was from the Bronx, where many famous actors, including Dean, came from, and that he was a real live Captain America as a helicopter pilot in Viet Nam, and how he only flew one flight and was immediately shot down, and that he met and knew the real Miss Saigon and how she didn’t get on the last flight out, and how Bronx Pizza dough was flown in from New York City and that they made the best pizza in the San Diego area because of the dough, and that he was going to this poker game in Oceanside to meet up with his 18-year-old girlfriend who thinks he is the best looking guy around and, “Oh my god, she’s a regular Sharon Stone,” and on and on the monologue continued for the better part of an hour, while riding from Encinitas to San Diego.

On and on and on went Rudy… and on and on and on… even when officer Mike, the AMTRAK security officer approached, Rudy’s incessant banter continued for several more minutes. Officer Mike then turned to those around Rudy and asked, “Is he harassing you?” with a hopeful tone, wishing he could discharge Rudy from the train. People didn’t know how to answer, because Rudy wasn’t really harassing anyone. He was just bugging the living daylights out of them because he wouldn’t shut up. He was friendly to a fault, and talkative and entertaining to the max, but he wasn’t exactly harassing, so it was difficult to answer, “Yes.”

Besides, the last stop was coming up in about five minutes and everyone knew they could get off Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, which had appeared as a young man named Rudy in a Captain America T-shirt. The whole scenario was like a badly-scripted sitcom. Creativity can be like that.

How people use their creativity depends upon their life experiences and the decisions they have made throughout their life. Rudy’s stories are no less real or valid to Rudy than the next person’s, and the next person’s judgments are equally real and valid to them, even though they are stories about Rudy’s stories. This is one way we use our creativity, and how the Creative Law works. The Creative Law of cause and effect doesn’t discriminate. It assumes people want the experience that automatically comes with their decisions and it cooperates
with those decisions.

People use their imagination to make up stories all of the time, and those stories tend to rule that person’s life. Stories like, “There’s never enough,” can fill a person’s head and subsequently fill that person’s experience. This does not really mean there is not enough. It only means that the person believes there is not enough, and he or she subsequently experiences not-enough-ness because of that belief.

Everyone has heard, “It is done unto you as you believe.” The master teacher didn’t say, “…as you wish you believe.” He said, “…as you believe.” He was talking about core beliefs, the beliefs that have become deeply embedded and reinforced for so long that they have become reality to that person. Core beliefs cause experiences that are consistent with the belief.

There are many beliefs centered around prosperity and “enoughness”. Some beliefs become experiences of lack and limitation and some become experiences of abundant good and well-being. Many people creatively and easily change their experience of prosperity or well-being or health by changing their beliefs about these ideas. This is where the work is, this is from where real freedom comes, and this work is the New Gospel, the newest Good News.

The Center for Spiritual Living Tucson offers spiritual tools that improve lives and make the world a better place.

Donald Graves is the spiritual leader of the Center for Spiritual Living Tucson. He is loved and respected for the dynamic way he challenges each individual to experience personal freedom, power and magnificence. His love of life is contagious, his sense of humor infectious, his speaking style captivating and his interactive teaching compels those that are willing to become infinitely greater than they previously thought possible.