Faith is not belief without proof, but trust without reservation.
–Elton Trueblood
You must have heard or said to someone “Just have faith, everything will be fine”, it is an expression used in situations where a person is going through some very tough or disappointing experience.
So, does this advice really good, does it work, does it solve the problems of a person?
In, this article let’s try to understand what faith really is, what it means to have faith, how does faith work in a person’s life, and what are the practical applications of faith that we can use in our daily life.
Meaning of faith
The word faith came from the Middle English “Feith” which is originally driven from the Latin “fidem” which means ‘to trust.’
So faith in simple words can be defined as a state of mind where a person puts his trust in someone, something, or some cause without having, in the present time, any physical proof for it.
For example – an athlete train himself having faith that he will win, a businessman invest his resources and energy having faith that his business will grow and produce more than he invested, but when they make the decision and work for it, they don’t have any guarantee of their success but they believe that if they give their best they will receive the best.
So, it is clear that when you start anything that you truly want to do, it begins with faith, you have nothing but a vision that you want to accomplish and a trust or faith in yourself and in the power within you, that you can/will accomplish it.
The people, who cannot put their faith in the future that they cannot yet perceive through their physical senses, do not accomplish anything worthwhile in their life.
What does it mean to have faith?
As you read above that the faith means ‘to trust’, but what does it really mean to have faith?
In simple terms, to have faith simply means to keep working for your goal/purpose regardless of the resistance you have to face in order to get it.
To get a better understanding of it, think about Mahatma Gandhi and his accomplishment, when he began his journey for the betterment of his country, his idea was to raise the voice of and stop the unfair treatment of Indian people under British rule, he wasn’t completely against the British rule in the beginning, he knew that British rule is important to keep order in the country.
But, after he realized that Indian people can never found their salvation under British rule, he started to fight for an Independent India. He, with the National Congress, envisioned an India that would be ruled by its own government, chosen by its own people.
Now, the important thing to notice here is that, when he envisioned an independent India, his vision was all he had, and he had no proof or guarantee that it will be accomplished, but he trusted the power within him, he believed that if he stays on the principles upon which his life work was built upon, and did everything he could in the direction of the accomplishment of his vision, then the power within him would execute his vision and bring it into reality through a natural sequence of growth.
So, what we can see here is that he was a practitioner of the principles of truth, when the idea of complete independence enter his mind, he made a decision to work for it, then he get emotionally involved with this idea, he believed that it will happen at the right time, he brought his thought, feelings, and actions in harmony with his idea, which inspired millions of Indians to work for a single purpose, which ultimately resulted in the declaration of an Independent India.
How Does faith works in a Person’s Life?
Now, as you can see, that the first step to any accomplishment is to have a vision of the future. The second step is to get emotionally involved with the idea; getting emotionally involved means to create a feeling in your body, through your thoughts and imagination, as if your vision has already been accomplished. The third step is to bring your action and behavior in harmony with your vision.
When you have a clear vision of your future in your mind, you have the associated feeling of that future in your body, and you are taking action towards it every day, then you are working with and through faith, and if you keep your faith strong and keep working, your vision will materialize in a relatively short period of time.
However, if you have a vision in your mind, you also have some feelings of it in your body, but still, you don’t take action and work towards your purpose, then you don’t have faith in yourself and in the power within you.
If you are waiting for something to change in your world in order for you to act on your vision, you don’t carry faith within you, rather you carry an excuse, and it might cause you to think that you have faith and you are just waiting for the right opportunity, but in truth, you would be procrastinating.
Always remember, what Dr. Joe Dispenza says, “If you are waiting, you are not creating.”
When someone carries faith within them, it will reflect in their words, their thoughts, their feelings, their behavior, and their actions.
When you have a goal or a vision in your mind, and you want to experience the fulfillment of that vision, then there will be two directions or potential that would be available for you.
The first one would be Fear. When you have a vision, it begins in your conscious mind, however, your beliefs and behaviors are stored in your subconscious mind. So, when you build the vision of your future in your conscious mind and start to get emotionally involved with it, you would begin to feel very uncomfortable, it happens because the present conditioned beliefs of your subconscious mind doesn’t support your vision, so it would try to make you feel so uncomfortable that you would want to let go of your vision so that you could feel better or familiar feelings.
You would hear voices or suggestions in your head like- I don’t feel like doing the work today, start tomorrow, it’s too hard, you’ll never gonna change, you don’t have the resources to do it, it doesn’t feel right, etc.
Now, if you fall into the trap of this uncomfortable feeling, and start reacting to these voices as if they are true, then it will cause you to doubt your ability to accomplish your goal, which will cause you to worry about your future, which will then create an emotional state, called fear, in your mind and body.
The fear then would be expressed through the body, and you won’t be able to act on your goal, and then eventually the goal or vision would be lost, and you would return back to your old ways of living your life and doing your things.
Now, this happens to most people, they try something new, they move forward, and then they hit the wall of fear and return back without accomplishing anything.
The other would be faith. When you would start to work on your vision or goal and uncomfortable feelings sets in, you begin to hear voices or suggestions in your mind, but instead of reacting to them, you understand what is causing them, then you would be able to lower the volume of those voices and focus on your vision or goal.
This understanding when emotionalize, would become faith, this faith then would be expressed through your actions and behaviors.
If you keep this faith stronger than any fear that you may feel when you begin to doubt yourself, your mental creation, in a relatively short period of time, would become your physical reality. reality
Applications of faith
As you have read above, the meaning of faith and how it works, I think there is a greater need for understanding the practical methods of building faith through which you can create great changes in your life.
Now, as you may have understood by now that in order to have faith, you must have a purpose or goal, because if you don’t have something to accomplish then there won’t be any important application of faith in your life.
In order to apply the principle of faith in your life, you have to have a purpose or goal that you want to accomplish.
When you have a clear image, in your mind, of what you want; you have something that you want to experience in your life.
Now, your job is to fill this image with emotions, so that you begin to feel in your body as if you have already accomplished your goal.
In order to give emotion to your mental image, you have to practice, in your mind, living the life that you would be living once your desire becomes a manifested reality.
When you would be living, in your mind, as if your desire has already been fulfilled, you’d begin to feel self-confidence and enthusiasm, because your body, which is primarily an instrument of the subconscious mind, doesn’t know the difference between an experience you are having in your outer world and an experience you are creating in your mind by thoughts alone.
Now, when you have the understanding of how reality works, you understand the power within you, you have a clear vision of your future in your mind, and you are emotionally involved with your vision, then you have a greater understanding of life, this understanding, when mixed with positive emotions, becomes faith.
When you move forward in your life carrying the faith in your heart, you are going to accomplish everything you want to accomplish in your life.
Having faith also helps to improve the quality of the relationship you are in. If you have faith in the love/affection you feel for the other person, and you give it your best, you automatically cause the other person to give their best, as a result, the quality of the relationship rises.
If you carry faith and your partner doesn’t appreciate your effort, your faith would eventually bring you to the person who would.
Everything you do in your life, the principle of faith can be applied there. Everything that happens to us or to the world around us has something good in it for us, and there is always a greater purpose behind everything, sometimes, we might not be able to understand and perceive it, but it’s there.
Spend your days trusting or having faith that everything that’s happened to you or happening to you in your life is happening to take you to the path that will give greater meaning to your life, also, everything is happening for the greater good and growth of your being.
With faith, you would be able to have a positive attitude towards every experience of your life, and when you do, you’d rise to the heights that you never thought yourself worthy of.
Now, understand that creating or having faith in something that you can’t see or perceive through physical senses, takes time, it takes effort, it takes persistence, and it needs a strong will, but once you have developed great faith in the power within, you will become great.
Thank you very much
– Parvez Alam