Salt Spring Island

Transcribed by machine and corrected by a reader against the recording.

01What is it that you’ve discovered?0:01

What is it that you’ve discovered? Well, Shane, what I discovered 34 years ago is miraculous, to say the least. And I was blessed with the gift that was given to me. And what I found out was there was three divine principles—divine mind, divine consciousness, and divine thought. And they are the Three Principles that hold the secret to all human experience. And I realized when I first found them, if psychology and psychiatry could understand this, it would change psychology and put it into another dimension altogether, to cover everything in this world, the entire psychological experience, because this is what life is.

From the cradle to the grave, it’s a psychological experience. It’s all brought about by using mind, consciousness, and thought. And without these principles, there wouldn’t even be life. And they’re the Trinity. There can’t be any more because they’re the Trinity. They’re the total essence of all life here on Earth. Could you once again talk about the Three Principles and what they are and what they mean? Well, let’s put it this way. I’ll digest the story, and we’ll go back 34 years ago.

02Sucked down a tunnel1:46

And I’ll tell you the story how it happened. And maybe this will help you. I remember I was sitting in the living room reading the paper, the newspaper, and I stood up to tell my late wife something. And instead, I looked out the picture window at the ocean, and it was like being sucked down a tunnel, literally sucked down a tunnel. And all of a sudden, I was shrouded by white, buzzing light. And I went beyond time, space, and matter, beyond this world, and realized that all life was a great illusion created from this formless energy.

03I’m home, I’m free, I’ve made it2:45

Then when it, I don’t know how many seconds it took, but this light vanished, and I turned around and started to cry. And I said to my late wife, “I’m home, I’m free, I’ve made it, I’ve conquered this world.” Now that was a very unusual thing for me to say. Well, that’s what happened, but you can imagine Barbara’s face. It was like I’d shot her, she thought I’d gone off my head. But since then, everything I said has become a fact.

04Four hundred people, all using the Principles3:32

I know it sounds strange. As a matter of fact, when I first found this, three days later, I went back to my work, and unknown to me, I’d changed so much that nobody knew me. My voice was different, my face was different, the way I talked was different, the way I acted was different, and I never realized it. But one thing I did realize, and it was interesting, is when I went back into the work, there was maybe 400 people, I saw every single one of them working from these principles. And if they were using those principles negatively, then they were unhappy people, or sad people, or disturbed people.

And the ones that were using them in a positive way, they were the happy ones. It’s because those principles, how you use them dictates your whole outcome in life. You wouldn’t be alive if you weren’t using them. You’re using them all the time. You just have to understand that you are. You are using them all the time, but you’re only using them wrongly sometimes. Sometimes you’re using them correctly. But if you know what they are, then you can go around and change your life. Why it happened to me, I have no idea.

Because, to be truthful with you, I was definitely most undeserving, but it did happen. And that’s what you call self-realization. You realize—how you are connected to this world. You realize what some people call the oneness of life. You realize that everything comes from a divine formless spiritual energy before creation. And when this formless divine energy takes form, we call it creation. Well, you go further.

05The whole world is an illusion5:54

The whole world is an illusion. The second we leave our mother’s womb, we start using those Three Principles, mind, consciousness, and thought, to see creation. The second we do that, we’re into our intellect, and we lose this wisdom that was deep in our soul before birth. And the idea is to go back and claim this wisdom. That’s why the great mystics have always told you, “Look within for the answer.” It’s not out there. Out there is the illusion. This is what we blame for our problems. Then we create more problems.

But if you look inside, you find the wisdom. Once you find the wisdom, you become wiser. It’s like we’re helping business people. We don’t know anything. I don’t know anything about business. I’ve never even tried. I don’t have to. If I’m trying to help a businessman, I would try and get him to find his own wisdom. Then when he finds it, he becomes a wise businessman. And that goes for any profession in the world. You’re not telling them what to do. You’re making them wiser. And this is what these Three Principles do.

06The lost secret7:21

As I say, they’re the trinity to all human experience here on Earth. They’re the essence, they’re the lost secret that the psychologists and psychiatrists have been looking for since day one. And I realize they’ve been taught certain things, and I know it’s difficult to believe. But you see, what they were taught was from the outside to go inside and make you better. And that’s not it. The secret lies when you realize the wisdom you seek is inside, then you go outside and change it.

That’s the difference. It’s so simple, and yet it’s so profound. And people think, “Well, I know all about mind, consciousness, and thought because intellectually I can see it.” But that’s not it. My pet parrot could say mind, consciousness, and thought, but the parrot wouldn’t know anything about it. And they’ll say, “Well, come to an end once you realize that.” That’s not true. If you start talking about the principles, you could talk forever because they cover everything in this world.

07Talking to the physicists8:53

You could never come to the end of discussing the Three Principles. It’d go into psychology, psychiatry, philosophy, theosophy. It would go into mysticism. It would go into physics, neuroscience. It’s got the ultimate answer. Now, I don’t know anything about physics, because I only had a grade nine education. But after this experience, I knew I’d found the ultimate answer that the physicists were looking for. And consequently, I’ve been invited down to the States quite a few times to talk to some of the best physicists, and they always wanted me to explain why it is I say time, space, and matter are all an illusion.

And what the puzzle was, they were talking about the already formed energy in this world, and what I’m talking about is the divine formless energy before it is created into this world. But after I was finished, two of them came up to me and said, “You know, Syd, we don’t have a clue what you’re talking about, but we know you know.” And I thought that was a beautiful thing to say. And someday I’d love to go back again. It is. It’s a divine illusion suspended within the boundaries of time, space, and matter, and time, space, and matter are all illusionary.

I know it was a miracle that happened to me. There’s no other way I could express it. Because how can a grade nine educated welder who has hardly read anything in his life know immediately that he was qualified to go into any university in the world and talk about all these different subjects. I mean, there’s something, something there, and that’s what they’ll have to look at. Because my time on this earth is limited, and I’d love to see it go out. My advice was to be to get a book or a tape, and you don’t need anything else because you’re getting it straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak.

08The monk who never got it11:26

There’s nobody contaminating it, telling you that there’s four principles, seven principles, or role play or techniques. They’re all from the intellect. Now, I remember many years ago, this monk with all his robes and everything came to see me on the island, and he listened and he wasn’t getting anywhere, and he was a very unhappy man. And he told me that his life wasn’t worth living, and he said to me, “But there’s something puzzles me. Why did you decide to put it out into psychology rather than spiritual?”

And I said, “Well, I did put it spiritual.” He says, “No, you didn’t. You’re putting it through psychology and psychiatry.” I said, “That’s only part of it. Didn’t I tell you that all life is a psychological experience?” He says, “Yes.” He says, “But that doesn’t answer my question. Why did you say mind, consciousness, and thought?” And I said, “Well, tell me something. What is the only thing in this world that could be divine mind?” And he thought for a while, and he said, “God.” And I said, “Well, what is the only thing in this world that can be divine consciousness?”

He said again, “God.” And I said, “Well, what is the only thing in this world that can be divine thought?” He says, “God.” I said, “Well, how much more spiritual can you get?” But he never got it. And to this day, he’s still searching all over the world for the truth. And here he was, he was standing listening to it, and he didn’t recognize it. But that’s okay because he wasn’t ready. And people will say, “Well, what makes you ready?” You make yourself ready. When you’re ready, you will hear it. If you never get ready, you won’t hear it. You might have to go to another lifetime and start all over again.

09They go to the Himalayas and search13:48

But when you’re ready, the truth will be there for you, no matter where you are. You know, see, people, they go to India and they search for truth. They go to China, search for truth. They go up the Himalayas and search for truth. They’ll never find it. Never. You know where you find it? You look in the mirror and you say, “Aha, it lies inside.” And once you see that, your search is finished. There’s no place to search. I’ve had so-called enlightened people come to me, see, many, many times to see me.

And the second they got off that boat, I knew that they weren’t. You know why? Because they were enlightened, supposedly, but they were still searching for the truth outside. The only thought they were. There’s that thought again, eh? Whatever you think the world is, that’s what the world is to you. Whatever you think you believe, that’s your belief system. It’s all thought. If you think you’re a sad person, you’re going to be a sad person. If you think you’re a happy person, you’re going to be a happy person. The thought creates the deeds.

How have you seen this philosophy of these principles reach out and change the world already? Oh, they’ve changed thousands of people’s lives. Personally, I’ve seen hundreds of people change before my eyes. People that were neurotic, psychotic, they were bulimic, anorexic, all different kinds of things, and I’ve seen them all change. And more than that, the beautiful thing is it changed a lot of therapists throughout the world. And when they found this, they threw away all their old training, started to work with the principles, and they started to see miracles in their offices.

They saw cures that they never thought possible. People who have been in therapy for many, many years. And told by the psychiatrists and psychologists that they would never be mentally healthy. And quite often they go back to the therapist and say, “I don’t need you anymore. I just read this book, or I just listened to this man called Sydney Banks.” And they’ll say, “That’s impossible.” And they want to give them more treatment, but they’ll walk away. Do you know what’s happened? Because they have jumped ahead of the therapist.

10The teacher in the jail16:44

And this is how powerful this is. And this is why I say, if the therapists of the world ever really start to take this, there’d be healings all over the world. I’ve been in a jail where there was 300 people, and every single one of them was carrying that book, The Enlightened Gardener, and I heard so many stories, it was unbelievable. I heard one story. Now this girl wasn’t in jail, but I met her there because she’s now a teacher. And her story was fantastic. When she was young, a young lady, she got abducted by a policeman, and she got tied up, she got raped, she got beaten.

Now finally the police found her, and she was released. But then she had to go for medical help for quite a few years. She was in and out of hospitals. She had every kind of treatment known to man. And she showed me a letter where the hospital centre, signed by a psychiatrist, saying that she would never be mentally healthy and she’d need help all her life. Now, when I walked into that jail, she came up to me and she hugged me and thanked me. And really, I didn’t even know what she was talking about. But then she told me the story.

And I’ll tell you something, it was unbelievable. And that lady now is so healthy that she’s become a teacher. She teaches the Three Principles to other prisoners. And all those therapists that have changed, they’ve told me that what they were doing didn’t work. And now they’re thrilled. They love their work, whereas before they were all cracking up. They were all leaving their profession. But now they go to work and they love it because they know they’re helping people.

11My hope for humanity19:04

Now that’s quite different. That’s really quite different. Maybe one last thing is, what’s your hope for humanity? What’s your hope for the world? Well, my hope for humanity is that the level of consciousness rises. See, nobody can change this world. I’ve said many times, for the world to change, the consciousness of humanity has to be elevated, because right now the conscious state of the world—is in a deplorable condition. And this is why there’s wars, atrocities, killings, etc., etc., and it’s going to get worse.

Believe me, it’s going to get worse unless the consciousness rises. And I’ve had therapists that will argue with me and say, “Hey Syd, just a minute. We’ve had conscious-raising seminars for years and they don’t work.” No, they didn’t. They weren’t raising the consciousness. They were telling you what you do with your consciousness. And if you ever realize the difference between what you do with it and the true nature of consciousness, then that elevates you, your consciousness. Then when you look out into the world, it looks different. And that’s what people have to do en masse, is lift their level of consciousness, to look outside and see a different world, then the world will change.