Turning his gaze to me, Andy said, "Eric, do you remember how I told you last year that Thought is spiritually based, and that if you could understand my words, you would have success beyond anything you had ever witnessed?"
Startled by his question, I asked, "Just like Mrs. Taylor?"
"Yes, just like Mrs. Taylor and the others who say their lives have changed because they heard something regarding their thoughts—not through analyzing their thoughts, but by seeing the power of Thought itself."
All four of us sat bemused by Andy's reply, not knowing what to say. Finally I asked Andy, "Are you trying to tell us that some of my clients are finding their own innate wisdom?"
"Can you give me a better explanation for what has been happening?" he replied.
Both Tom and Peter immediately disagreed, saying it was their fervent belief that wisdom had to be taught, and that time and patience also had a lot to do with finding wisdom.
"That's an old wives' tale—a sheer fallacy," Andy said dismissively. "Wisdom is not connected to age; wisdom is an innate spiritual intelligence that lies within the soul of every human being on earth, hidden only by our contaminated thoughts. This is why one must look within for true knowledge."
Andy became very serious then, asking us to listen carefully to what he was about to say and to try listening with an open mind to discover something lying beyond the beliefs we now possessed. "After all," he said softly, "you have to remember that you are looking for the unknown, not the known. May I therefore suggest that you listen not with these two external ears that stick out of your head, but with an inner ear that lies deep within your soul."
Speaking directly to me, Andy said, "When you told Mrs. Taylor that it was her own thinking that had been creating many of her miserable feelings about life, your words opened her mind to another level of understanding, which for a moment in time took her back to Original Thought. Let's say your words triggered something inside her consciousness that took her back to when her mind was purer, before her nightmarish behavior patterns started, thus giving her a new start in life. One could say her mind was elevated to a new level, and once the mind has been elevated, it will never return permanently to its original state."
"Astonishing! How could one simple observation or insight have such a profound impact on someone?" Peter marveled.
Andy's piercing blue eyes locked with Peter's, then he said, "Never underestimate the power of an insight, young man. Sometimes one genuine insight is worth all your previous experiences in life put together."
Turning back to me, Andy continued, "May I suggest to you that Mrs. Taylor had more than just an inkling. Clearly, she attained a fairly deep understanding that her debilitating memories were being kept alive by her own continuous digging through the rubble of her past, that her own thoughts were holding her a prisoner of her yesterdays and making her present existence unbearable. The way I see it, your Mrs. Taylor realized that she had been blaming her past circumstances for her present-day state. She suddenly recognized that she was herself the sole author of her present condition."
I was amazed by how astutely Andy explained Mrs. Taylor's recovery, and by how correctly he described how she had admitted that her own malformed thoughts and negative feelings played a big role in her desperately unhappy life. As I sat there listening to Andy, there was no doubt in my mind that all of my recent clients had responded in a beautiful way to the realization that their thinking was directly linked to some of their problems.
It was after just such an office experience that my partner and I realized to a deeper extent that we had stumbled upon something different, something that was beyond our training. We could see that some real healing was somehow happening in our patients, even though we explained very little to them about the thought process. Furthermore, we were consistently amazed by what the patients would say to us when describing their new understanding of themselves. That is why I wanted to further investigate Andy's unusual theory that Thought was the missing link that we therapists had been searching for. So I asked the gardener to explain his theory of Thought again.
Pointing to a nearby shrub, Andy said, "Take that rose bush, for example. We are all looking at the same plant, but our perception of it varies according to the way we each think and see. One person may see a vigorous rose, another may see a rose that could benefit from a little pruning, and a third might see a mess that no amount of attention would save. The rose bush isn't changing; it's the way we personally perceive it that differs, the way each of us thinks that colors our perception."
"It's the same with life," he continued. "It's only natural that a happy person will see life quite differently than an unhappy person will. Again, the secret lies in the perception fashioned from our personal thoughts. Now please remember, I am not judging anyone; I don't care how people use their thoughts. I am not talking in personal terms but in impersonal ones. In complete neutrality, it is my belief that our personal realities are created by using the power of Thought."
"What do you mean?" Peter questioned. "Are you suggesting that we actually create the reality that is all around us in our own minds?"
Andy stroked his chin as he contemplated the best answer to Peter's question. "What I mean is, our manner of coping with life evolves from our personal thoughts and the way these thoughts cause us to relate to each new day. Never forget, your thoughts and feelings are the blueprints from which your personal reality is built. Change your blueprints and the reality changes accordingly. My advice is to use your thoughts and feelings wisely, and they will never let you down.
"As therapists you should understand that Thought is the vehicle that will take you to the secret knowledge that lies at the root of all human experience here on earth. And you should always remember, thought is not written in stone.
It is fluid and can be molded to suit the day.
Universal Thought is the creative agent we use to direct ourselves through this spiritual experience called life."
There was dead silence for the longest time as we tried to fathom the meaning of the gardener's unusual words. Andy picked up his shovel and dug into the soft, rich soil. As he positioned a small plant, he turned to Peter. "What you seek is like a cosmic jigsaw puzzle and, with fate on your side, you may find where some of the pieces fit. From then on, the search for the other missing pieces becomes a wonderful adventure."
Tom snorted and looked away, absently tossing pebbles into the fountain.
"That's an interesting way to put it," Peter admitted.
Andy bowed his head at Peter's acceptance of his words. Then he said, "By the way, Peter, one important piece of this cosmic jigsaw is to realize the fact that intellectual thought is merely a byproduct of Universal Thought."
Janet explained to Andy that, as therapists, none of us had ever been taught about the power of thought, let alone a concept like Universal Thought.
Peter then eagerly explained to Andy that cognitive therapy deals in positive thought and doesn't go back into the past as many other approaches do. "However, its practitioners do concentrate on the contents of our thoughts, and as far as I know they don't put as much emphasis on the role of mind or thought as you seem to do."
Andy sat in silence as he listened to Peter's brief explanation of the correlation between thought and cognitive therapy.
"Is there any difference between what you were talking about and cognitive therapy, Andy?" Janet asked.