Action for Transcendent Being
While I dislike the popular culture attitude of “change anything in your life in X-many easy steps”, there is some merit to summarising actions into a limited number of steps to enable people to digest complex things. So here’s an approach for transcendent living in five steps (and, by the way, they’re not easy):
1. Recognise you as soul
2. Maintain permanent consciousness of you as soul
3. Re-connect to the Holy Spirit given to you by God
4. By your thoughts, feelings, and actions, live the will of God
5. Despite challenges stay strong in your spiritual consciousness
Over time, more of us have fallen prey to the ideal of material individualism, which is rooted in ego. We identify with our body and material belongings to give us an ego-driven sense of self – who we think we are; our self-worth; our significance in this world all hinges on our self-identity. Our “self” dominates us and we lose contact with our soul; in becoming more “self-aware” we become less “soul-conscious”.
Step one. Recognise that we are, above all else, soul. Our body lives because of the soul in it. Without soul, our body is nothing but a lifeless corpse. When I talk of “recognising” that we are soul I am not talking of a fleeting passive admission or understanding that there is a mysterious force called soul within us, I’m talking about a permanent, daily, active appreciation that our body is alive because of the soul in it, and that soul ultimately comes from the One true God. I am because the soul enables it.
Step two. Once we know we are soul (and not just the body-shell that carries the soul), maintain consciousness of us as “soul” rather than “self”. This is a very complex part of our “5-step” approach – a part I will have to write about in further articles if I am going to do it any justice. We have to detach from our ego. Then we have to re-program our consciousness so that we become fully aware – “mindful” in common parlance – of every aspect of our aliveness; this is where we must understand false constructs in our life, such as time and space, so that we know there is only “now” (everything we do only ever happens now). Then we have to learn (and this is continuous over the course of our entire life) that as soul we are not individuals with separate ego-identities, but we are all connected as one soul ultimately assimilating into the One true God. We do not automatically attain this knowledge and then permanently hold onto it – we have to earn it through every living action in every moment of our existence – it takes disciplined work. True soul consciousness is understanding that we are all one, and that my actions affect you and vice versa – the “health and welfare” of the entire universe lies within us and depends on how we act.
Step three. Accept the truth: whether we like it or not, we all received the Holy Spirit from God after soul was instilled within us as human creations of the fallen. Without the Holy Spirit – enlightenment – our soul is doomed to live an empty life and to die in that emptiness. Now this is a choice for all of us – we can choose to accept or reject the truth – and there is no judgement against us for the choice we make, there is only outcome: accept enlightenment and find eternal life for the soul, or reject enlightenment and find mortality for the soul. Of course, mortality of the soul is no “big deal” – if the soul dies, you, as a soul, lose all consciousness of ever having existed – you just disappear, never, ever to have any consciousness of you again. When we choose enlightenment we re-connect with the Holy Spirit and we recognise that we are an integral part of the One – we are life and ultimately immortal. Enlightened souls never have to reincarnate into the prison of a material body; enlightened souls forego the body and transcend into light.
Step four. Consciously live, through our thoughts, feelings, and actions, the will of the One true God. What is that will? It is absolute selfless love and care for all life in every element of the universe. That’s huge, but it starts with us as individuals – we have to love and care for everything and everyone around us. That means not thinking, feeling, and acting from an ego-driven state infested with negativity such as selfishness, fear, doubt, shame, disgust, frustration, jealousy, anger, hatred, rejection, etc. When we release ourselves from our ego we move into more positive states such as selflessness, fearlessness, confidence, honour, fulfilment, achievement, acceptance, peace, love, unity, etc. The challenge for us is to discover how we can feed our minds (for that is where everything is interpreted and materialised into thoughts, which drive feelings, which drive actions) with healthy and positive “material” that creates “goodness" within us.
Step five. Understand that, as spiritually connected soul conscious beings we become the target of evil behaviour in all its subtle forms. The purpose – the extreme narcissistic ego-driven mission – of evil is to convert anything that is good into evil, and to stop all that is good. Evil intentions and actions directed at us manifest as obstacles and challenges specifically designed to invoke negative reactions from our ego-driven self. We need to make the right choices when we encounter evil: we can simply let the obstacles pass; we can respond to the obstacles in positive ways (with constructive thoughts, feelings, and actions); or we can react to the obstacles in negative ways (such as anger and rage). The choice is ours; remember choices come with consequences. So, if we react to evil with evil we will get more evil. We must persevere in our journey to enlightenment – we cannot let evil take the light away from us. We must remain conscious of soul, keep our connection to the light of God’s Holy Spirit, and live God’s will in a consistent and disciplined way.
Image: Sun radiance behind clouds, Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, UK. Copyright - Michael Beaton
Comments
Post a Comment