38.
A lifestyle not a quick-fix
NOTE:
This is an excerpt from the book The
Least You Should Know About Life.
Spiritual masters have always stressed that persistence and constancy
are important virtues on the spiritual path. For example, Jesus said
that in your patience you will possess your soul. There are many people
who have practiced spiritual techniques and studied spiritual teachings
for years and have then given up because they did not get a specific
result. Yet had they continued a little bit longer, the results would
have manifested. There are also people who do not get the specific results
they expected but who get plenty of other benefits that often go unnoticed.
The real key to success on the spiritual path is to realize that it
is not something you do for a few months to get specific results, such
as losing weight, getting out of debt or attracting the perfect partner.
Following the spiritual path is a lifestyle and it becomes a life-long
quest for a higher state of consciousness. This state of mind has been
demonstrated by many spiritual masters, such as Jesus and the Buddha.
It leads you to develop a true sense of identity based on the fact that
you are a co-creator with God and that you have a unique spiritual individuality.
It leads you to attain the mastery of mind over matter, including mastering
your thoughts and emotions to attain peace of mind and a sense of inner
wholeness.
This state of consciousness can be called enlightenment, the Christ
consciousness, cosmic consciousness or many other names. However, the
essential realization is that it is possible for everyone to attain
a higher state of consciousness in which you have risen above all of
the human limitations that lead to a life of suffering. Instead, you
attain mastery over both your inner and outer circumstances.
Right now you may not be able to even imagine this state of consciousness,
or you may not be able to accept that you could attain it. And that
is why following the spiritual path must become a lifestyle where you
take the long view. The process of attaining the higher state of consciousness
can be compared to climbing a spiral staircase. Right now, you are at
a certain step, and you might not be able to see the top of the staircase.
Your imagination and vision is limited by the imperfect beliefs and
misqualified energies in the four levels of your mind.
This is an extremely important realization because it demonstrates the
danger of making decisions with the outer mind. For example, many people
have decided that they must stay in their present belief system or continue
performing certain practices for the rest of their lives. Yet the reality
is that the spiritual path has several levels or stages, as does the
school system on planet Earth. In kindergarten it is perfectly fine
to use crayons, but it would be non-constructive to insist on still
using them in college.
The point being that you must never allow your outer mind to become
fixated on particular beliefs and practices. Instead, you must realize
that the key to walking the path is to develop your intuition, your
direct connection with the inner teacher of your Christ self and I AM
Presence. As you do this, you will get inner direction that might require
you to leave behind certain beliefs or practices that previously seemed
very important to you. If you are not willing to leave behind what you
no longer need, you can get stuck at a certain step of the spiral staircase.
Thus, the essential quality that will ensure your continued progress
is that you are always willing to take the next step.
Your ego does not want you to follow the spiritual path, for in the
end, this will lead to the death of the ego. Your conscious self has
already overridden your ego to some degree, and that is why you are
reading this book. However, the fact that you have started following
the spiritual path does not mean that your ego has given up. The ego
is very subtle, and it will attempt to use your current spiritual beliefs
and practices to trap you. The ego has not been able to prevent you
from rising to your current step on the spiral staircase, but it will
attempt to use your current beliefs to make sure you do not rise beyond
this step. It will seek to make you attached to something –
anything – in this world. It will seek to make you afraid
of taking the next step or make you so prideful that you think you do
not have to take the next step.
It is a fact that many people claim to be spiritual and religious, but
they believe they have risen as far as they can or as far as they need
to rise. They have attained a sense of security and comfortability and
often believe they are saved because they belong to the only true religion.
This belief is entirely created by the ego and the ego will seek to
make you blind to the need to take the next step. The reality of the
path is that the growth in consciousness never stops—unless you
decide not to take the next step. Thus, those who are ultimately successful
in manifesting the higher state of consciousness are those who never
let their egos – or any other force in the material world –
prevent them from taking the next step. ALWAYS TAKE THE NEXT STEP is
the motto of those who make it to the top of the spiral staircase instead
of getting stuck at a lower step while believing in the ego’s
illusion that they have reached the highest step.
When people learn that they have the potential to reach the same level
of consciousness as spiritual masters, there are some common reactions
that spring from the ego. One is that you look at your current actions
and level of consciousness compared to the consciousness of for example
Jesus, and you feel completely inadequate. You feel that you have made
so many mistakes that you could not possibly rise above them and this
gives rise to guilt or shame.
The key to overcoming this trap is to realize that such negative feelings
do not come from God. God created you, gave you free will and gave you
the material universe as a laboratory for your experimentation. God
did not want you to lose your awareness that you are a spiritual being,
but since that has happened, all God wants is for you to reclaim your
true identity—the identity God created. Thus, anything that holds
you back from walking the path is not of God’s doing but is of
the ego’s doing.
You may feel you have made too many mistakes, but in reality you always
did the best you could, and God requires no more. Whatever you did in
the past was an expression of who you were and what you understood about
life at the time. Thus, you did the best you could, given your level
of consciousness. You now realize that you have the potential to rise
to a higher level of consciousness, and thus there is no point in wasting
time in regrets about the past. You did what you did because it was
the best you could do, given your understanding at the time. You now
need to focus all of your energy and attention on expanding your understanding,
so you can do better now and in the future.
You cannot change what happened in the past. However, by changing your
understanding, by changing the way you look at life, you can change
how your past affects your now and your future. By overcoming the imperfect
beliefs and misqualified energies that prevented you from doing better
in the past, you can do better in the now. Thus, you can truly rise
above your past and build a better future.
The reason why you need to look at the past, acknowledge your mistakes
and understand the consciousness that caused you to make those mistakes
is that in order to be free of the past, you have to let go. Yet it
is a universal law that you cannot give away what you do not own. And
if you do not acknowledge that you have certain imperfect beliefs, how
can you let go of those beliefs? Ignoring a tumor will not make it go
away, and thus until you look at the past – without guilt and
judgment – and accept responsibility for your own choices or non-choices,
you cannot rise above the past. You must take ownership of the past
before you can let it go and be free.
Another important consideration is that how you see yourself right now
could be a product of some very limiting circumstances you have experienced
in this lifetime. Yet in past lifetimes you might have reached a higher
level of spiritual maturity than you are now expressing. Thus, by reconnecting
to your higher Being, you can unlock your past attainment and quickly
rise above your current limitations. You can even reconnect to the greater
purpose for which you came to Earth, both in the long run and in this
lifetime. You can rediscover your Divine plan for this lifetime, and
this will give you the greatest sense of purpose, meaning, fulfillment
and happiness.
Always do the best you can according to your current understanding,
and always seek to increase your understanding. The rest of this book
will present answers to the fundamental questions of life, which will
empower you to rediscover your true purpose for being on this planet.
39.
Where did God come from?
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Copyright
© 2007 by Kim Michaels |
