Chapter 13 of Your Faith Is Your Fortune – Neville Goddard
THE I’M-PRESSIONS
“And as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.”
Your consciousness or your I AM is the unlimited potential upon which impressions are made. I’m-pressions are defined states pressed upon your I AM.
Your consciousness or your I AM can be likened to a sensitive film. In the virgin state, it is potentially unlimited. You can impress or record a message of love or a hymn of hate, a wonderful symphony or discordant jazz. It does not matter what the nature of the impression might be; your I AM will, without a murmur, willingly receive and sustain all impressions.
Your consciousness is the one referred to in Isaiah 53:3-7.
“He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from Him, He was despised, and we esteemed Him not”.
“Surely He hath borne our grieves, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted”.
“But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed”.
“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all”.
“He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not his mouth: He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so He openeth not His mouth.”
Your unconditioned consciousness is impersonal; it is no respecter of persons. Without thought or effort, it automatically expresses every impression that is registered upon it. It does not object to any impression that is placed upon it for; although it is capable of receiving and expressing any and all defined states, it remains forever an immaculate and an unlimited potential.
Your I AM is the foundation upon which the defined state or conception of yourself rests; but it is not defined by, nor is it dependent on, such defined states for its being.
Your I AM neither expands nor contracts; nothing alters or adds to it. Before any defined state was, it is. When all states cease to be, it is. All defined states or conceptions of yourself are but ephemeral expressions of your eternal being.
To be impressed is to be I’m-pressed (I AM pressed, first person, present tense). All expressions are the result of I’m-pressions.
Only as you claim yourself to be that which you desire to be will you express such desires. Let all desires become impressions of qualities that are, not of qualities that will be. I AM (your awareness) is God and God is the fullness of all, the Eternal now, I AM.
Take no thought of tomorrow; tomorrow’s expressions are determined by today’s impressions.
“Now is the accepted time.”
“The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.”
Jesus (salvation) said,
“I AM with you always.”
Your awareness is the savior that is with you always; but, if you deny Him, He will deny you also. You deny Him by claiming that He will appear, as millions today are claiming that salvation is to come; this is the equivalent of saying,
“We are not saved”.
You must stop looking for your savior to appear and begin claiming that you are already saved, and the signs of your claims will follow.
When the widow was asked what she had in her house, there was recognition of substance; her claim was a few drops of oil. A few drops will become a gusher if properly claimed. Your awareness magnifies all consciousness. To claim that I shall have oil (joy) is to confess that I have empty measures.
Such impressions of lack produce lack.
God, your awareness, is no respecter of persons. Purely impersonal, God, this awareness of all existence, receives impressions, qualities and attributes defining consciousness, namely, your impressions.
Your every desire should be determined by need. Needs whether seeming or real, will automatically be fulfilled when they are welcomed with sufficient intensity of purpose as defined desires. Knowing that your awareness is God, you should look upon each desire as the spoken word of God, telling you that which is.
“Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of?”
We are ever that which is defined by our awareness. Never claim,
“I shall be that”.
Let all claims from now on be,
“I AM that I AM”.
Before we ask, we are answered. The solution of any problem associated with desire is obvious. Every problem automatically produces the desire of solution.
Man is schooled in the belief that his desires are things against which he must struggle.
In his ignorance, he denies his savior who is constantly knocking at the door of consciousness to be let in (I AM the door). Would not your desire, if realized, save you from your problem? To let your savior in is the easiest thing in the world. Things must be, to be let in.
You are conscious of a desire; the desire is something you are aware of now. Your desire, though invisible, must be affirmed by you to be something that is real.
“God calleth those things which be not (are not seen) as though they were.”
Claiming I AM the thing desired, I let the savior in.
“Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me.”
Every desire is the savior’s knock at the door. This knock every man hears. Man opens the door when he claims,
“I AM He”.
See to it that you let your savior in. Let the thing desired press itself upon you until you are I’m-pressed with nowness of your savior; then you utter the cry of victory,
“It is finished.”