What is enlightenment?
The new age movement many times uses this word enlightenment to "get away"
with judgementalism the way that other people use "religion". You will
at times say to each other, that is not the enlightened thing to do. Or
you will say, or think I am more enlightened then he or she is. We tell
you that to be enlightened, you would do NEITHER of those things. To be
truly enlightened is to be without judgement of another. To be truly enlightened
is to accept the other person EXACTLY as they are and do not try to change
them or think that they are better then you or think that they are making
a mistake and you know the better way. NO individual knows what is wrong
for another on their path. The entire need for being more enlightened than
another is impossible when you realize that each person you encounter in
your life is a mirror of your beliefs. So what that other person is expressing,
is what you believe or need to look at in your life.
How can I be without judgement
of another? In your society based upon your belief that there is one "right"
answer, there is one right ideal, you have the idea that one way is right
and another way is wrong. Instead there is again no right and no wrong
from our vantage point. There are as many ways to enlightenment as there
are individuals that walk upon the earth. Each person has their own way
of becoming close to god, goddess, universal force, Buddha etc. In "reality"
for each individual there is a god or path for them. Your idea of what
works and what doesn't work are just that, YOUR ideas. They may be just
as valid or INVALID for another person. To be enlightened is to "see" that
you are gaining enlightenment for yourself on your path. And even though
you may add a bit of light here or there for another because they have
drawn you into their reality, as you have drawn them into yours, There
is a "limit" of what you can do for that other. Instead of seeking to enlightenment
them with your way you may wish to ask yourself what lesson they are serving
in your life and what lesson you are serving in theirs? What are the reasons
that you both have chosen to cross each other's paths? Usually there is
something that you need to learn from EACH other. If there is any enlightened
way to view another, that is it. What is the lesson I am to learn from
this person and what is the lesson they are to learn from having chosen
me?
Ask yourself what is the perfect idea of God to you? Is god caring, is God compassion, is God a good friend? God from our vantage point is your highest version of self, the self that you mostly wish to be. It is the conception of your highest values and ideals. We suggest that you create a god for yourself. We suggest that you sit down and ask yourself who you want god to be and then choose how that god would wish to be worshiped and worship that god, and follow that enlightenment.
Your version of god is your version of the highest ideals within yourself. Within each individual, their lies a sense of value that they wish to express, values that they wish to fulfill in their life before they die. These ideals, these values, are part of the purpose that you came here to fill. Maybe you value motherhood. You are here to explore how to raise and create highly fulfilled human beings. So in your mind you see God as something that is wonderfully maternal. Maybe the god of motherhood always wore vines of green in her hair to represent abundance and nature.
Every year, one way to celebrate the New Year is to sit down and reevaluate who god is to you, reevaluate what god is to you and how you have changed your version of god through the year. Then you may wish to "see" that how your idea of god changes so do you change and so does your purpose becomes fulfilled. In the above example, of motherhood, possibly as a young mother, the individuals believed that being a mother was always having a clean house for her children to grow up in. Then after a few years, she began to realize that time spent with the children is more important then a clean floor. Maybe the next year the mother realizes that it is NOT only the time spent, it is the QUALITY of time spent. So in order to become a quality mother, you must become a quality person. God initially would be a woman who always wore an apron and had a broom in her hand, then possibly god became a woman who threw out the clock and then god becomes a woman who learns to find peace within herself. Your vision of god always underlies your purpose. Your visions o god expresses the ideal or the concepts you came to earth to physical life to understand as you ideas of god evolves so does your deeper understanding or your purpose and how it is to be best fulfilled.
Samantha started life as a Catholic, and had a tremendous need to understand spirituality. At one point she wished Enlightenment and looked into becoming a nun. As the years progressed, her idea of what was spiritual changed and so did her ideas, so that now God is a being of light that is ever loving, ever warm and ever understanding. Each year these ideas evolve within her a bit more. Your relationship with God, with the universe is also about your relationship to purpose, your relationship to your highest self and how you relate to it.
The God of Susan is different the God of Dawn or Anne or Peter, Thomas or John.
We suggest that religion needs to become a process of becoming a godmaker. Instead of learning about someone else's definition of God, religion needs to be about learning YOUR definition of god. That is enlightenment.
As well, learning to make
a god is also learning about symbols, for example, let us say that you
bring in the New Year by looking at your idea of god and god tells you
to go to the forest in the next year and sit among the trees. As you do
this, you sit under a great oak, that great oak "speaks" to you, then god
comes alive in the oak tree. God is NOT just what you make it. Your god
comes alive and becomes as real and as valid as any other god. God is your
highest self, talking to you. And we use the word highest very loosely,
because your highest self and your lowest self are actually very much the
same because they are all part of you. By highest we again mean your highest
ideals. That god of your highest ideals and highest concepts EXISTS, as
much as say another god, and through your energy becomes real. Through
you, the belief becomes an entity in it's own right. As you give birth
to your god, your god gives birth to you. The more someone believes in
a God, the more energy it has, the more powerful a god it becomes. Jesus,
god the father, and the holy spirit are powerful gods because many people
believe in them. As well, as Buddha. There is archetypal energy that is
created and used when you create your god.
Now for worshipping your god, ask yourself how would you wish to worship your god. Does your god require sacrifice to give your life meaning or does your god believe that every single life is valuable and joy is a better way to worship? Does your god require rituals, to give you meaning and if so what rituals. Or is your god a causal god? Must you get dressed up on a certain day and go to a certain place of honor? Or does your god allow you to simply walk outside and see the sunset? If you are female and your god is male, ask yourself can you then be powerful? What does it mean that your god is of the opposite sex?
Do you need other people to worship your god? Can you learn to find god within yourself? To enlighten another, you simply act in conjunction with your god's laws and rules and your presence will reflect your highest self and thereby enlighten others around you. Writers are taught that it is better to SHOW something that a character does than to TELL readers something. For example, it is better to show a character being late for work and mussing up their best business suit to save a kitten up in tree, than to simply SAY that character loves animals. Likewise it is much better to show what you believe and to BE what you believe then to "preach" what you believe. Children do what you do and NOT what you say.
One act of kindness is more
powerful than ten preaches of kindness. So if your god is kind, the best
form of worship is to also be kind and be kind as much as it is possible
for you to be. That is the most "enlightened" approach