January 2013 Vol. 86 No. 1

January 2013 Vol. 86 No. 1

spiritual hero 10 Science of Mind

He s been called the Father of Motivation. A best-selling author for nearly four decades, he overcame childhood deprivation to help others create more authentic and meaningful lives. Over the years, his message has evolved from self-actualization to actualizing our spiritual potential, demonstrating a deep connection with the teachings of Ernest Holmes. With his generous spirit and message of personal and global transformation, Dr. Wayne Dyer is Science of Mind s Spiritual Hero for 2012. Early Challenges Dyer never knew his father, an alcoholic who abandoned the family before Wayne was two. He spent eight years in orphanages and foster homes around Detroit until his mother remarried, a mixed blessing for Wayne, his mother, and his two older brothers, for her second husband was another abusive alcoholic. Growing up, Wayne dreamed of meeting his father one of his life s greatest mysteries. When he was fifteen, his paternal grandmother died. Wayne went to the funeral, hoping to see his father, who never showed up. For the next few years, he followed his father s trail, meeting ex-girlfriends, learning fragments of information, but never finding him. Then, in 1962, after serving two years in the Navy, he went to college and graduate school at Wayne State University, intent on making something of his life. In May 1970, he finished his doctoral orals, externally successful, but emotionally, he admits, his life was out of control. Angry, drinking, and overweight, he was haunted by intense dreams of fighting with his father. January 2013 11

Spiritual Awakening A few years later, Dyer was teaching at St. John s University in New York, when a cousin called to tell him that his father had died ten years earlier in New Orleans of cirrhosis of the liver and was buried in Biloxi, Mississippi. In August 1974, Dyer accepted a government assignment to study integration in Mississippi. Renting a car at the airport, he noticed the driver s side seatbelt buckle was missing; he found it under the front seat, wrapped in cellophane with a business card from the Candlelight Inn, Biloxi, Mississippi. His heart began pounding as he felt guided to solve the mystery that had haunted him all his life. He drove two hundred miles to Biloxi, where he learned that his father had been buried in a pauper s grave on the property of the Candlelight Inn. He stood at the grave for hours, filling the air with angry accusations. As the sun sank below the horizon, his feelings shifted to sadness, warmth, and kindness. From this moment on, he said, I send you love, and he walked away a changed man. With only days before the new fall semester, Dyer checked into a motel in Ft. Lauderdale, feeling called to write the book that became Your Erroneous Zones. Looking back, he says, You realize years later from a cosmic perspective how that all fits together. In August of 74, I was down at my father s grave at Biloxi, and then in September, I was writing Your Erroneous Zones in fourteen days. It wrote itself. Fourteen days that was after I forgave my father. The book went on to sell over 70 million copies and has been translated into forty-seven languages. Suddenly, Dyer s whole life changed. He stopped drinking, started running, began eating healthier foods, and moved to Florida. Appearing on latenight talk shows, he became a celebrity, teaching millions of people about personal empowerment. A Power for Good in the Universe Like Ernest Holmes, Dyer believes that there s a power for good in the universe. Ernest Holmes is a true hero to me, he says. I ve quoted him many times. Dyer has spoken at many New Thought churches, and seen firsthand how virtually every wish or desire I ve placed my attention on has transformed from a mental thought into an objective fact. His movie The Shift was filmed at Asilomar three years ago during the annual Science of Mind conference. In fact, he explains, Many 12 Science of Mind

of the people in the film as extras were at that conference. The Hand of God was all over. Every single thing that we needed for the filming kept showing up. Each day was filled with joy and celebration. One day, he spoke at the Asilomar conference introduced, as a surprise, as a promising new speaker. On another day, he performed the wedding ceremony of Ellen DeGeneres to Portia de Rossi, who was acting in The Shift. Exploring New Spiritual Horizons Dyer continues to explore new opportunities to share his message. Nine of his thirty-seven books have become public television specials Manifest Your Destiny, Wisdom of the Ages, There s a Spiritual Solution to Every Problem, 10 Secrets for Success and Inner Peace, The Power of Intention, Inspiration, Change Your Thoughts Change Your Life, Excuses Begone, and his newest book, Wishes Fulfilled. Recently, he began making movies. When some people told him that it was unrealistic for him, at sixty-eight, with no acting experience, to act in movies, he signed up for acting lessons and began. He s also taken people on Experiencing the Miraculous journeys to Assisi, Lourdes, and Medjugorje. A few years ago at Assisi, he experienced a miraculous healing. Before the trip, his doctors had recommended surgery on his right knee, and when Dyer reached out to help a disabled man up a narrow circular staircase at San Damiano, his knee began to buckle. Then he saw a fleeting image of St. Francis, and a burst of energy propelled him up the stairs with the man clinging to his back. By reaching out to help a friend, Dyer became God s instrument, as in the prayer of St. Francis, filled with the healing power of love. He has never had any trouble with his knee since. Claiming Our Spiritual Identity Dr. Wayne Dyer s calling, or dharma, is helping people recognize their divine nature. You have to be love, be kindness, be fulfillment, be peace, he says. It s not about coming from lack and saying, I want a new BMW in my driveway or I want a Rolex watch on my arm that s coming from a place of lack. Instead, we need to connect with the power of I AM. In Wishes Fulfilled, he explains how Moses learned that the name of God is I Am that I Am, so when you say, I am healthy, I am prosperous, I am happy, you are using the name of God. Too many people say January 2013 13

Dr. Wayne Dyer I am poor, depressed, sick, sad, afraid, unlucky, and so on, and they continue to attract that into their lives. By connecting with our divine nature, we experience infinite, empowering love, which has been a lifelong lesson for Dyer at his father s grave, in the prayer of St. Francis, in his own healings. He celebrates his birthdays with acts of love, sharing gifts with the homeless in San Francisco for his seventy-first birthday and on Maui for his seventysecond. It s just such a glorious way to spend your birthday, he says. Someday, he plans to write a book about divine love, which he describes by quoting Patanjali: When you are steadfast in your abstention of thoughts of harm directed towards yourself and others, all living creatures will cease to feel fear in your presence. He says, It s the kind of love that St. Francis had. Spiritual Lessons and Companions on the Journey Dyer has a deep personal connection with St. Francis because he believed so intensely in who he was and what he was teaching about Christ consciousness. In 2006, he connected with another spiritual teacher, Lao-Tzu, while writing Change Your Thoughts Change Your Life: Living the Wisdom of the Tao. It was one 14 Science of Mind

of the most significant years of my life, he says. I would read a verse, spend four days on it thinking about it, meditating on it. And it spoke to me. Lately, he s been studying Neville Goddard, whose lessons are woven through Wishes Fulfilled. Dyer s recent healing from leukemia brought deeper spiritual lessons and a new awareness of the power of divine love. The day he was diagnosed, California nurse-practitioner Pamela McDonald had flown to Maui to consult with him, then offered to assist with his healing. In April 2011, his friend Dr. Rayna Piskova arranged for him to undergo long-distance spiritual surgery by Brazilian healer John of God. Flying to Brazil, she relayed a list of instructions, and shipped Dyer medicinal herbs. He took the herbs, went to bed wearing white, and experienced a miraculous healing. Not only was he restored to health, he was filled with a tremendous infusion of divine love. Since the surgery, he says, everything has looked more beautiful, and his life has been filled with remarkable synchronicities. A friend sent him the transcript of Anita Moorjani s near-death experience. Inspired by her healing from terminal cancer by a vision of divine love, Dyer wrote the book s foreword and arranged for Hay House to publish her book, Dying to Be Me. His Life Today Today, at seventy-two, Dyer is radiantly healthy. He begins each day saying Thank you, asking How can I serve? and discovering daily miracles, large and small. When he s not traveling to share his message, he enjoys his time at home on Maui, walking on the beach, swimming, doing Bikram yoga, writing, meditating, and spending time with his eight children. They often meditate together to his new I AM Wishes Fulfilled meditation CD. His writing brings continuing inspiration. He always writes in longhand, lights three white candles, sits in his sacred writing space, and lets the words flow. While writing Wishes Fulfilled, he says, I was reading Neville; I was reading the I AM Discourses, I had these experiences, the John of God healing, the leukemia all of it flowed into a whole new awareness and the writing just reflected it all. He begins each book by deciding on a title, has Hay House design a book jacket, and then tapes it around a book he sets before him. He explains, As I m in the process of writing, I see the finished book every day, both in my imagination and in January 2013 15

its symbolic representation. The day of our interview, he had been up at 5:00 AM for one writing session and was looking forward to another. Something has been happening in the last few books I ve been writing, he says. Something has just taken over. It s really about letting it all write through you. I m in a place of writing that is so exquisitely blissful. Lately, he s been writing a spiritual memoir, I Can See Clearly Now, looking back at major episodes in his life, reflecting on their spiritual lessons. He recalls how at age twenty-three, the death of President Kennedy made him shift away from just thinking about [him]self into a consciousness of how can I serve? Then in 1974, while teaching in Berlin, he visited Dachau, where he saw the ultimate impact of groupthink: a Holocaust, where millions of people are willing to do what they re told even to the point that they suppress what Lao-Tzu called their original nature: which is gentleness, and kindness, which is love. So it s so important to teach people how to think for themselves, to get out of that kind of thinking. That s what Erroneous Zones was. That s what Pulling Your Own Strings was. That s what basically my books have been about. From Personal Empowerment to Global Healing In his writing, teaching, and daily life, Dr. Wayne Dyer lives his dharma, his empowering message that we can move from the ordinary to the extraordinary. By returning to our original nature, he believes, we can change the world: I really believe that if this message gets out there, we can shift the consciousness of this planet. By placing into our imagination a world based on living from a place of love and kindness and God consciousness and spiritual awareness Divine Mind at work I believe it s possible. Holding out the light of hope to millions, Dr. Wayne Dyer reminds us that our dreams of a better world are possible and that peace begins within each one of us. To order Wishes Fulfilled by Wayne Dyer, visit scienceofmind.com. 16 Science of Mind