Back to: Reality Architecture: Consciousness, Intention & the Nature of Manifestation
Recommended Reading
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Text |
What to Focus On |
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Neville Goddard, Feeling Is the Secret (complete) |
Pay particular attention to Chapters 1 and 3. Goddard’s description of the relationship between the conscious mind, the subconscious mind, and the feeling-impressed state is the practical core of the entire course. Read slowly. Read more than once. Notice where his teaching coincides with, and where it goes beyond, the neuroscience you will encounter in Module 3. |
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Neville Goddard, The Power of Awareness (complete) |
This is Goddard’s most philosophically explicit text. The opening chapters on the nature of ‘I AM’ consciousness are essential for understanding the ontological foundation of his teaching. Chapter 4, ‘Assumptions Harden Into Fact,’ contains one of the clearest statements of his core principle. |
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Thomas Troward, The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science, Lectures 1–5 |
Troward is the bridge between formal idealist philosophy and practical New Thought teaching. His analysis of the relationship between the ‘Universal Mind’ and the ‘individual mind’ anticipates later psychological research on the conscious and unconscious dimensions of cognition. Challenging reading, but essential for understanding the philosophical framework behind the practice. |
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Mitch Horowitz, The Miracle Club, Chapters 1–5 |
Horowitz is the best contemporary historian and philosophical analyst of the New Thought tradition. These chapters provide both historical context and a sophisticated evaluation of what the tradition gets right and where it falls short. Horowitz is neither a true believer nor a dismissive skeptic. Exactly the stance this course aims to cultivate. |
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Mitch Horowitz, Daydream Believer, Introduction |
A more personal and accessible entry point into Horowitz’s thinking about the practical dimensions of New Thought philosophy. |
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Gary Lachman, A Secret History of Consciousness, Selected Chapters |
Lachman provides the most readable and philosophically literate overview of the Western consciousness tradition. From Swedenborg through Gurdjieff, Owen Barfield, and beyond. Essential for placing New Thought and Goddard in the broader context of Western esoteric thought. |
Supplementary Reading for Deeper Exploration
- Neville Goddard, Awakened Imagination: The most explicitly mystical of Goddard’s major texts, and the one most directly concerned with the imagination as a divine faculty rather than a psychological technique.
- Israel Regardie, The Middle Pillar: The most accessible practical guide to the Hermetic/Kabbalistic tradition, providing the ritual and meditative practices that underlie the philosophical framework we examine in this module.
- William Walker Atkinson (“Three Initiates”), The Kybalion: The primary source text for the seven Hermetic principles. Essential background for the entire course.
- Swami Venkatesananda, The Supreme Yoga (Yoga Vasistha): The most accessible English translation and commentary on this foundational Vedantic text.
- Philip Goldberg, American Veda: A scholarly but readable history of how Vedantic philosophy shaped American culture, providing important context for the development of New Thought.
- William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience: James was a near-contemporary of the early New Thought movement and was deeply influenced by it. His philosophical framework for examining religious experience provides an important empirical anchor for the historical material in this module.