One Size Fits All

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The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no recipe for living that suits all cases.

Jung, Carl, 1875-1961, Swiss Psychiatrist

What is necessary for life on earth? What is the one thing that without which there could be no life? The answer is, contrast. There could be no life without contrast. There could be no physicality without non-physicality. Being could not exist without the belief in non-being. One of the primary purposes of this journey is to experience contrast. We find who we are by seeing who we are not. We find where we are by understanding where we are not. Every contrast that we experience is a way for the soul to stretch itself and grow in knowledge of itself.

It is the same as a play, a movie, or even a novel. Ideally, in a play or a movie the actors, directors, writers, designers, as well as the audience are affected by contrast of the work or the characters to their own lives. We vicariously experience our fears, our possibilities, or our dreams, reflected in the lives and experiences that are depicted. The play or book allows us to walk, for a brief time, in shoes of others.

Incarnating into all races, religions, nations and economic levels enriches each soul as a story enriches the writer, the actor and the reader or viewer. There are as many individual roles to play – shoes to walk in as there are souls on the planet. Each one teaches us something unique. This is why no two individuals are the same. It is why our world contains such diversity. We will throughout our many incarnations, all have played as many parts is takes for each soul to realized that there is only One, and that is what we are a part of. That One is called by many names, but its essence is Love. Ultimately we learn that love does not distinguish, it does not discriminate or differentiate as it is said in the Bible, 1 John 4:7 (King James Version) “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.”

We live our lives here on earth through our mythology, through archetypes. For us to have a hero, there must be a villain. To have a victor, we must have a victim. For one soul to experience itself as strong, it must play against another soul who experiences itself as weak. To believe in good, we must encounter what is believed to be evil. We experience every variation on a theme.

Each grouping that separates us has something that is unique to it, some experience that is uniquely shared only by those within that group, just as each person has qualities that make that person different from any other. Through the experience of many incarnations and many different perspectives the soul comes to understand that there are three hundred and sixty different angles of perception but regardless of the view from whichever angle you are in, there is still only one truth and that truth is understood only when you combine the perceptions of every possible angle. We learn that we must incorporate not eliminate.

Each nation, each tribe, each ethnic, religious, and racial group has, through the recorded history of the world, and even before our recorded history had its day in the sun. This is the way life works. Everything exists in cycles, a nation, or a group of people may be the ruling group for hundreds of centuries.

The goal is not for us to lose our differences. The goal is for us to accept and celebrate our differences. I cannot be me if you are not you. If we are the same, then I am not different and if I am not different then I am not I. If you and I are the same in every respect, then how can I be an individual? Many of us are repulsed by the idea of losing our identity. Our fear of death, even if we believe that we do not die, but become a part of God, is just that; merging into the identity of God and losing the identity of self.

We fear loss of individuality, yet, we hate and fear those who, being different are the very ones defining our uniqueness. We have chosen the earth as our schoolhouse because of our desire to feel that we are God. We seek to experience being the creator of our own lives. And so, we constantly create. We create children, works of art, technological advances, tools, ideas and so on.

The Source created us to experience itself as Loving and being Love and receiving Love. And through its creations, it experiences being – and grows richer. Through each experience that we have, the whole experiences itself. God created every species in the universe so as to experience every aspect of itself as a whole and as an individual. This experience is a Divine Gift, wherever we are in the picture.

Besides being influenced by the intent of the soul family, each soul is influenced by the aspect of experience through which it has chosen to incarnate. There are those who choose in this life to learn to master the material world through the lower senses, their journey is to be of the world. Others choose to be master over their lower senses and to rise above the material world, to be in it but no longer of it. Whatever area of crisis we choose to work through, material, emotional, mental, religious, or a varied mixture of each our goal is to learn about the meaning of Love in all of its faces.

Whichever mixture of challenges we choose will color the soul and its experiences here. It will color the way that each of us perceives our lives and also the experiences that we magnetize to us. The families through which we choose to enter will influence us by, imprinting on our lives and our vision the essence of the challenges we have chosen to grow through in this life and those carried over from those lives we consider as past.

Each particular mix, just like a recipe, will add a distinct flavor, a distinct aura to each individual. It makes our lives what they are in contrast to the lives of those around us. In addition to this is the joint experience that we choose to enter through race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, and national origin. Each of these elements will color our lives, but in a particular way that is unique to each us as it all combines with the particular soul qualities. Therefore even though we may contain the same ingredients as someone else, somehow when it mixes with all that we carried with us into this life, we still come out unique.

Look at the solar system and you must be immediately aware of what makes this world different. All of the colors made by the different bodies in our galaxy are joined together in our one planet. There is the blue planet, the yellow sun, the red planet, the orange planet, and then there is the earth, the planet where all shades of all colors stand brilliantly side by side, not poured into a bucket to form some single shade of mud, but together forming one planet that stands out among all the others not for its size, or its shape, but for the beauty of its uniqueness. If you were a soul floating through the galaxy passing all of the objects orbiting the sun you would have to say, “I want to go there”. It is alive with diversity. And with all of its color, and all of its diversity it still is one planet. One planet that is special because one size does not fit all.

Our Haves

There is no mountain that we cannot climb so long as we can fix our eyes on the peak
To truly believe something is to have innate knowledge. That innate knowledge is faith. Faith is connected with inner sight, the sight that sees the truth that our eyes do not see. We are only capable of believing that which is possible. We all believe in fate. Even those people, who feel that they are totally in charge of their lives, believe that at some point that something happened in their lives that had the feeling of Divine Intervention. There was at least some moment in which fate played a part.

Whether we believe that fate is the path defined by God, by the Universe or simply the path we ourselves determined prior to coming here; fate still has a hand in determining the path that we walk.
We each contain knowledge of our path. The Maya, or the veil of illusion, fools us into believing that we are driven by our wants, our desires, or our wishes, when in fact what moves us ahead are our possibilities. Each of us longs to fulfill our own destiny. It is through our needs, our wishes, desires and our choices that we are guided towards that destiny. When we are able to visualize something or when we are fueled with the passion for something to the point that such a passion consumes us, this is not a desire. It is in fact a, “Knowing”. It is a piercing of the veil of illusion to that which actually will be.

We cannot sustain a burning desire for anything that we cannot actually achieve. If in fact we are capable of truly visualizing a goal, it is not simply a goal; it is the actual vision of our destiny. The fact that it is real and not just imaginary is the only reason that we are actually capable of visualizing it.
It is our beliefs that work to manifest our reality. We cannot truly hold on to a belief that is impossible to realize. We may hold a vision for a short period of time but we cannot maintain it unless it is real. Therefore if we can really believe something to be true, if we can really believe that we can attain a certain goal, this is only because we will attain it, or at least it is within our capabilities to attain it.

Let’s say that we all come into this incarnation with what I call a, “Bag of ‘Haves”’. These are the things that are within us to do, to accomplish, or to obtain. These things are a part of our destiny. The knowledge of these things is expressed through our dreams, wishes and desires. We would take no notice of or at least we would not be able to retain any desire for these same objects, positions, or relationships if they were not within our ability to have.

Many times we are obsessed with getting to one point and once there we feel as though it isn’t where we want to be at all. This wasn’t a mistake; it was a step that we had to reach on the road to our ultimate destiny. The lessons come in each step of the process and sometimes the lessons are meant to make us feel lost, or out of step because within that experience is the key to the next door, or the clue to our next step.

Some people spend their entire lives feeling lost and out of place. Even that would mean that within those feelings are the lessons to be learned in this lifetime. What is important to remember is that we are always going to have what we came here to have. We always have what we really need; it may be just a matter of time and experience until we receive it.

There was a time when in order to get a donkey to move they would attach a carrot to a stick and put that stick on the donkey’s head. The donkey would keep going in order to reach the carrot. Of course he never reached it because it was always in front of him. Yet, he always had it because it was attached to his head. He would go around chasing the carrot because he could see it, but actually the reason that he could visualize the carrot is because he really had it. He could not reach the carrot because he did not believe that he had it. If he believed he had it, he would find a way to get it off of his head, instead of chasing it. Faith is the step to remove the carrot from the head and place it in the hand. The carrot is ours and it is on our heads. We simply have to take it.

We just see the carrot as what we want as what we wish for and desire. When we have faith, we realize that the carrot is ours and we stop following it and just take it. But if it were not attached to our heads, if it were not in front of our eyes, in other words within our, “bag of haves”, we could not think to desire or want it.
So it is helpful to say that if we can visualize what we want and believe it, then it is truly already ours, it is in fact attached to our heads; now it is just a matter of getting to it. When we are capable of visualizing a thing, a goal, or a relationship so totally that we can feel it and believe it, that is not the work of our imagination, it is simply piercing the veil into the truth of what is really ours. When we are taught that the appropriate prayer for receiving what we want is a prayer of thanks for having it already, it is truly appropriate. The reason being that we do actually have it already. “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours…” (Mark 11:24)

Understanding this does not change the fact that it is in front of us and not in our hands. We must still do the work of reaching for it whatever that may entail. The difference is that if we know that it is actually ours and there is a way that it can be reached, we can remove our confusion, and our doubt. We may simply focus on getting it. This still requires faith. If I know that the thing that I desire is behind one of the doors before me, I will get it.

We are here to learn lessons, to grow, to perfect our souls. This is done through our experiences here on earth. We all have our own destiny, our own path along which lies our personal lessons and our, “haves”. In order to reach each of our “haves” we must pass through different experiences, and in order to hold onto our, “haves” we must again go through lesson.

An infant has a burning desire, an obsession to raise its head. It is not really a goal from our point of view; it is a step toward standing and walking. It is simply a step in the path of development for a human being. However to that infant it is the end product. That infant cannot focus on anything else until it reaches that goal. Then it moves to the goal of turning over. Well, we do not spend our entire lives rolling over, even though while striving for that goal, to the infant, it is complete in itself.

We can only see the horizon and consider reaching it as our goal. However, each horizon turns into another. Each horizon takes us closer to God. When we finally reach the horizon, we are there. This is also how it works with our “haves”.
The stronger the desire is that one has, the more one is connected to that, “innate knowing”. There really is no such thing as a desire. A desire is really the veil that covers one’s destiny. We cannot desire what is not ours, just as the donkey could not desire the carrot if it were not visible in front of it’s face twenty four hours a day.

I am not referring to the desire that comes from envy, or from wanting what someone else has. That is not a desire for the thing in itself it is a desire for the feeling that the other person exhibits from having whatever it is. If I know that what I want is definitely in front of me; that it is definitely behind one of the doors that I am facing, even though I must still find which door and face what ever challenges lie before me, I know that it is mine. The difference is that I will reach it because I know that it will be there whenever and however I get there. Most of all I know that I will get there.

When we are clear and able to focus on the journey and the process and are not confused by doubt or fear then we are able to listen and accept the guidance that is constantly given to us on our path to attainment. We can learn our lessons as we travel because we are awake to our journey and not lost in fear.

It is important to understand that the lesson, is the process and the process contains the journey, the journeyer and the destination.

God Is An Ocean

God is an Ocean of Consciousness
Nothing exists outside of it
For there is no outside of it…it is THAT
It is All That Is and All that will ever be
From its deepest being a wave rises into a dream
And from THAT a rainbow of luminous drops are cast up
From the Ocean in which each drop has always existed yet
Unaware of its existence
To become self-conscious – self aware
To journey into the dream and find the individual “I am”
A journey to know the eternal self that slept within THAT
A self that once awakened
To itself
Will eternally be
Itself, eternally “I am”
This is the beginning of evolution
To know oneself apart from One-Self
It says, “I am this” but “Great is THAT”
It first sees THAT as all-powerful
So it seeks to amass power
It then sees THAT as the Creator
So it seeks to create
It sees All That Is as belonging to THAT
So it seeks to own all there is
It sees THAT as perfect
So it seeks the power to create and define perfection
And defines it in its own image
So that it can attain what it seeks
And excludes all others that appear different
Because it sees only the world of the dream
It comes to learn that it needs love, so
The self seeks to learn LOVE
It comes to learn that it needs kindness, so
The self seeks to learn KINDNESS
It comes to learn that it needs compassion, so
The self seeks to learn COMPASSION
Through many lives in many dreams
Through every shade of every body, and
Every gain with equal loss
As it absorbs each pain and sorrow
Each joyful moment along the path
In each life within the dream the self becomes the sum
Of all lives before
Until, when all dreams have been dreamt
All characters have been played – oppressed, oppressor,
Winner, loser, master, slave, persecutor, persecuted, superior, inferior
It doesn’t remember that it has walked every path, but somehow it knows
The pain of the stones and the nails on the way…
It becomes Empathy
It doesn’t remember all of the times that it was hungry, or homeless
But the needs of others feel too familiar
So, it becomes Kindness
It doesn’t remember its lives of suffering, but scars of the suffering has become
A part of its being and so, without thought, or plan, all suffering of all beings
Opens wounds lost in time
It becomes Compassion.
It doesn’t remember the lives of material abundance, but the soul knows
The dream holds nothing it has not tired of, and so it covets nothing
And coveting nothing
It becomes free
It doesn’t remember all the battles, diseases, and deaths it has passed through
Yet each one is a part of the self’s becoming
Without knowing why, it knows its eternal, unconsciously knowing
There’s nothing to fear
It becomes fearless
Being fearless, wanting nothing, the dream becomes powerless and
It becomes Power
Feeling all life as itself, and seeing the Divine in all,
No longer aware of differences, no longer nourished by the stuff of the dream,
The dream vanishes, the dreamer awakens
It knows that it is, itself, it knows it knows that it is the SELF, it says, “I AM”,
It says “I know that I AM,” it says, “I know, that I am, and that you are, THAT”
Enriched and Awakened, it returns, to bring its gifts back to ITSELF,
back to All-That-is. And as it’s many lives, color by color
Turned the drop from the rainbow into the rainbow itself
It returns home to the Ocean, once lost, now found
Once empty, now complete -
Once seeking, now guiding, once asking, now offering, once alone
Now All-One.



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The Value Of Man

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"And He sat down opposite the treasury, and began observing how the multitude were putting money into the treasury; and many rich people were putting in large sums. And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which amount to a cent. And calling His disciples to Him, He said to them, 'Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the contributors to the treasury; for they all put in out of their surplus, but she, out of her poverty, put in all she owned, all she had to live on.'" (Mark 12:41-44)

In the transitory material world, the value of a man or woman is based upon how much he has amassed. Yet, in the Spiritual World, the value of a man is based upon how much of what he has amassed, he has given to those in need. We are all here to contribute what we have, and who we are. What is expected of us is dependent upon the level of evolution of our souls. A young soul is here to contribute to building of material structure. Young souls translate the spiritual concepts into material form. They immerse themselves in the material world, without them, and all of their apparent superficiality there would be no material world from which the spiritual may emerge. All life is symbolic. A caterpillar represents the soul. The cocoon symbolically represents the material world and the ego. The young soul dissolves into ‘both’ while here on the earth. Remember the cocoon is hard, and it is dark. The caterpillar is lost to itself inside of the cocoon, however, for a time in the beginning it is also safe.

Without knowing why, the young soul is drawn to the material world so opposite from its spiritual origin. Just as the caterpillar is compelled to leave the world of the familiar to create and enter the cocoon. They build the ego structure. The young soul learns to depend upon the material world and all that it has to offer. It learns to be greedy, lustful, and all of those non-spiritual drives that form the walls of the ego structure. Once the young soul has mastered the material world, the ego has no more to learn and so it has no more to give to the soul. The cocoon is complete. Now the soul, once enclosed by the ego must consume the knowledge of the ego and transform the material back into the spiritual and the ego back into the soul. At which point, it becomes a butterfly free of the world. As the young soul begins to find it is no longer nourished by the world as it had once been, it seeks that which is higher than the world. On this part of the journey the soul seeks spiritual nourishment, and still guided by the ego, it seeks this in the world that it knows, the world outside of the self. Thus, it sees God outside of itself. It only does what it knows to do. It recreates spirit in form. It worships God in the image of man, a superman – but still with the feelings and emotions of man, of a father creator. It has not yet seen the world for what it is, but it knows that it needs something more than it sees, or at least above the world that it sees. In order, to reach the God that is above the world it creates religion as a stairway up to that God.

As the process continues, the soul becomes immersed in emotional situations desperately seeking fulfillment of the need to merge, to fully feel at one with something that it does not yet understand. Severed from the ability to identify and merge with the things of the world, it now hungers to identify as one with another. Through the pain and suffering of this part of the journey the soul matures. It begins to find that nothing and no one can satisfy its ‘hunger’ or its ‘emptiness’. Nothing outside of itself can reach into the emptiness within itself and fill the growing void. Again the soul seeks God, but now it can no longer be a God that ‘communicates’ from without nor ‘dictates rules’ from without nor ‘has a home’ without. It must find God within - hear the voice from within and become filled from within. Now the soul finds itself betrayed by the world, betrayed by its things unable to find another soul who can fulfill its expectations and nonetheless, forsaken by its religion. Then, certain of God, certain that what it needs can be found, the mature soul begins to change the direction of its quest from without to within.

Finding less and less value in what it posses, it begins to give. The more that it gives, the better it feels. Without knowing it, the soul has begun the process of turning form into spirit - material into spiritual - and as it does this it finds itself nourished and ‘made full’ in a way that it could never have imagined. The mature soul begins to see beauty, miracles and perfection in the spirit of the world and the spirit of each living spirit on it. And so it releases its attachment to having, and to holding and finds its only joy in giving and sharing. Miraculously, the love, respect, self-worth and value that the soul has spent lifetimes seeking in the world are found in an ever-flowing Source – the God Self within. Diamonds are hidden within coal. The greatest joy in the world is hidden within our fear. Why do we not give more? It is because we fear not having enough.

Once I had a job where I worked very hard. I did my job and my manager’s job. When it came time for the end of the year review, the person in charge of giving out the raises gave me a $2000.00 a year raise and gave him a $5000.00 a year raise. When I complained, he told me that although looking at the amounts it seemed that his raise was greater than mine, if I looked at the percentage increase in his income compared to the percentage increase in my income I would see that my work had been given much greater value. At first, I thought it was a really good line. However later I realized that it was true in everything. In the marketplace, money is money, and one hundred dollars does not buy as much as one-thousand. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s. However, when it comes to giving, the value lies not in the face value of the gift, but in how much of what you have to give, you want to give to a person - or to the world.

We live with God within us: we are of God. When we give, to whomever we give, we are expressing how much we care - how much of ourselves have merged with our Spirit and how much of ourselves are yet with the world. That amount has no figure on it, there is no great sum that shows how giving and loving a person is, there is only a great percentage of what we have. If a person has only a penny and selflessly gives that penny, it becomes a mustard seed and grows not only in the works it performs but in the heart and soul of the person who gave it. If a person has a million dollars and gives one thousand to others, the gift will supply its market value and little more. It has little spiritual energy, and it will end up taking more from the giver than it gives. When you give all that you can to those in need, you will be given more than you can contain in love and self-worth.

Contrary to all of your fears, what you give is returned to you ten-fold because you gave beyond what your ‘worldly self’ could release, and you placed your God before the world. No one ever needs to know what you did, nor does anyone need to praise what you did, because the praise flows from within and the gift grows nurtured by Spirit as do you. Here is a true story:
A sobbing little girl stood near a small church from which she had been turned away because it was "too crowded."

"I can't go to Sunday School," she sobbed to the pastor as he walked by.

Seeing her shabby, unkempt appearance, the pastor guessed the reason and, taking her by the hand, took her inside and found a place for her in the Sunday school class.

The child was so happy that they found room for her, and she went to bed that night thinking of the children who have no place to worship Jesus.



Some two years later, this child lay dead in one of the poor tenement buildings. Her parents called for the kindhearted pastor who had befriended their daughter to handle the final arrangements.

As her poor little body was being moved, a worn and crumpled red purse was found which seemed to have been rummaged from some trash dump.

Inside was found 57 cents and a note, scribbled in childish handwriting, which read: "This is to help build the little church bigger so more children can go to Sunday School." For two years she had saved for this offering of love.

When the pastor tearfully read that note, he knew instantly what he would do. Carrying this note and the cracked, red pocketbook to the pulpit, he told the story of her unselfish love and devotion.

He challenged his deacons to get busy and raise enough money for the larger building.

But the story does not end there...

A newspaper learned of the story and published. It was read by a wealthy realtor who offered them a parcel of land worth many thousands.

When told that the church could not pay so much, he offered to sell it to the little church for 57 cents.

Church members made large donations. Checks came from far and wide. Within five years the little girl's gift had increased to $250,000.00-a huge sum for that time (near the turn of the century). Her unselfish love had paid large dividends.

When you are in the city of Philadelphia, look up Temple Baptist Church, with a seating capacity of 3,300.

And be sure to visit Temple University, where thousands of students are educated.

Have a look, too, at the Good Samaritan Hospital and at a Sunday School building which houses hundreds of beautiful children, built so that no child in the area will ever need to be left outside during Sunday school time.

In one of the rooms of this building may be seen the picture of the sweet face of the little girl whose 57 cents, so sacrificially saved, made such remarkable history. Alongside of it is a portrait of her kind pastor, Dr. Russel H. Conwell, author of the book, "Acres of Diamonds".

As a soul matures, it finds that all that it clings to and becomes addicted to, in the world, only makes it emptier and hungrier. The emptiness and hunger is only satisfied by letting go, and giving. This turns matter into spirit. It turns what is transitory into what is permanent. The soul learns that only by emptying can it become filled, only by giving can it receive. Then happiness is replaced by joy and the journey to find self-esteem and self-worth finally ends.