The underlying process to waking up is to remove anything and everything that is in the way or interferes with it, remembering that the true and natural human state is this place. The rest is a trick, a lie, an illusion, a trap, a prison, etc.

We need to remember who we are. We are Divine and our natural state of being is wholeness, perfection, health, prosperity, peace, joy, love, connectedness, oneness, etc.

We move back and forth between remembering and forgetting, between expansion and contraction, between love and fear. The path is about spending less time in the place of forgetting, contracting and fear and more time in the place of remembering, expansion and love.

Why is this so difficult to grasp or to put into words? Why is it so difficult to experience at will? It is what we all know exists, what we search for and long for, but often miss. When we do find it for whatever brief period, we rejoice; when it’s gone, we feel devastated. This is why people use drugs and alcohol–they are looking for this sensation or place of being in the flow…this place of joy and bliss and connectedness. Drugs and alcohol simulate it, but it’s not nearly as good as the real thing, and when you come down from a drug high you are even further away from the real thing–a viscous circle with the only escape being one or more of the above paths at work in your life.

The place is the place where miracles and healing and manifestation happen. It is the space in between everything. This is what Christ meant when he said the Truth will set you free…it is this place…this high energy, almost manic blissful place where life seems magical and wondrous that he was speaking about. To be human and remember your Divinity is about as good as it gets…it’s like being in love with Life.

When someone is in this place it affects everyone around him/her. They can feel the energy because that person has tapped directly into Source and has become a clear channel for that energy and it is electric and intoxicating.

To access this Source requires nothing more than clearing the channel and removing whatever is in the way physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually, energetically, etc.

This will allow us to access this Source more at will rather than at random.

Sometimes it seems so random. I’ve worked hard for years with all the techniques, but lately it just seems to happen without anything specific preceding it, as if I’m just finding the location and then the channel opens up.

Maybe my son was right and there are two “earths” and one is underneath the other one. One is REAL and the other one is a lie, a simulation or game. There are doors and escape hatches from the matrix earth into the real one, and perhaps we slip into it when we dream or meditate or take hallucinogenic drugs or sometimes just randomly have a peak experience. But then we always come back into the matrix–the limited earth, the painful earth, the challenging earth. Finding the doors are the key to a better life. Death is one door, but there are many, many other doors, and within this false earth there are clues everywhere about how to access the REAL one. It’s tricky and requires lots of work and removal of the false persona that we’ve been led to believe is real. When we remember who we are, we automatically have access to the REAL earth. But remembering ain’t easy; luckily there are lots of catalysts around that can trigger a memory.

None of us know how much time we have in this life. That’s part of the beauty of being human and the terror of it. If you knew you only had a few hours, weeks or even months to live, those hours would be worth more than if you knew you had several more decades. But we aren’t privy to that information. So where does that leave us?

It leaves us wanting.

There is a gift in not knowing. It keeps us in the thick of things, immersed in the day to day. If we were always looking over our shoulder for the grim reaper, we wouldn’t be fully engaged in living, but would be focused instead on avoiding death.

However, our sometimes arrogant assumption that we’re going to live forever or a very long time, can lead us to waste precious time on things that simply aren’t worth our attention.

Our time is our currency. Once you spend it, you can’t get it back. It’s gone forever. Are you spending it wisely? Are you spending it doing something you hate or something you love? Are you giving your time to activities and relationships that feed your being? Or are you frittering it away on meaningless tasks and unfulfilling or even abusive relationships?

In the world of work, time takes on an even greater meaning. In order to support ourselves and our families, to keep a roof over our heads and pay our bills, most of us exchange our time for money. In light of the fact that you can’t get those hours back, are you getting compensated enough for that time? It can get a little uncomfortable when looked at that way. We are exchanging one currency for another. But think about the difference in the value of those two currencies. One represents our life and the other represents the legal tender that pays for goods and services. Not quite in the same continuum.

Our entire economy is based on our willingness to give up our life hours for sometimes 40, 50, 60 hours per week in exchange for whatever value our form of livelihood offers. If you are an unskilled laborer, the amount you receive for your life hours is significantly less than a doctor or lawyer. Does that mean your life is worth less? From an economic standpoint, it is. In the big picture, we know that it’s not.

Why do we agree to this devaluation of our time at all? The answer is so simple, it’s painful: most of us don’t take the time to question it. We simply continue to do as we’ve always done.

Some of us are fortunate. We have an experience that jolts us out of our complacency: a near death experience, an illness, an accident, or job loss–something radical that shifts our perspective and typically our priorities, motivating and empowering us to do things differently.

Sometimes it happens more subtly: we meet someone who reminds us there is another way to be or we wake up one day unable to tolerate selling our souls to a meaningless job for one more day.

Regardless of where we are in this process, what we want to remember is that each hour is a precious gift that once spent is gone forever, and how we spend it, with whom, doing what, is an extremely important decision.

As Carlos Castaneda learned from his teacher, Don Juan, we need to use death as ally, so that we always remember to value ourselves and our time.

How will you spend your time today?

Life is a wonder and a mystery. We move through it under the strong illusion that we have some degree of control of it or at least our personal corner. On the surface at least, we don’t, and life does not hesitate to remind of this regularly.

But there is something deeper here…a paradox to be sure. There is a deep place within us that is connected to the Whole of ALL THAT IS. It is in this connection that we can tap into something deeper. This is the place where we can see the bigger picture and recognize the Divine Perfection all around us. It is the place where we can laugh at what is unfolding and not take it so seriously. This is also the place where we can get freed up of all of that drama and biographical, genetic, ancestral and societal baggage we keep dragging around with us.

As small children, we are powerfully imprinted by our early experiences, both good and bad. It is where our first impressions of love, relationships and the world are made. Depending on whether those early experiences were positive and uplifting or dark and traumatic or somewhere in between, they shape our perception and ways of navigating through the world.

If we grow up on a starvation diet devoid of much attention and affection, that becomes our normal because we don’t know what a full meal tastes like. Because it feels normal, we will tend to perpetuate that diet and attract people and circumstances into our lives that only partially feed us.

To stop carrying those early imprints with us, we need to heal and release the thoughts and beliefs about the world they created. Often they are so much a part of us, that we cannot even see them. But in spite of their invisibility, they shape and influence every decision we make.

For someone who is used to being deprived, learning to receive love and attention and affection, is a major healing event. It is a process of unwinding and unraveling all of those deeply ingrained ways of being, reacting and moving and opening the channel for a new level of aliveness.

In order to do what it believes will keep us safe, our subconscious sabotages all of our desires and needs and deep cravings to grow and change. This saboteur affects everything we do. To really heal these subterranean levels of fear, we need to connect with something greater. To reduce the imagined threat of releasing our old way of being, we need to remember who we are.

This is nothing short of dying to what was and being reborn to what is. It is where we will find real freedom. It is where we will find our authentic voice. It is where we will learn what it means to be alive.

We, perhaps for the first time, will be back in the driver’s seat of our lives, rather than feeling like some rogue part of ourselves is behind the wheel.

This is not really about control, but rather surrender and allowing and being with what is at a very high level of acceptance. Control is about the need to survive. When we begin to taste freedom, we no longer feel in danger and so no longer need to control things. We are no longer out of alignment with what is before us and what is unfolding. The feeling of being out of sync was simply all that noise from our subconscious trying to survive what it perceived to be a very confusing world.

There are many modalities that allow us to release our early scripts and beliefs. When we are ready to really let go, we will find them.

In the meantime, take a look at your circumstances and relationships. Notice any repeating themes or patterns? Feelings of powerlessness and frustration? A sense of moving ten steps forward and two back? A gnawing feeling of being victimized, but with no clue how to shake the feeling or change your circumstances?

That’s it. Keep paying attention to it. Call it forth from the shadows into the light of day. Watch what happens when a little bit of awareness creeps in. The power and intensity starts to diminish. Exposure is half the battle.

It’s as if you’ve discovered a few stowaways living inside of you…long-term house guests, and it’s time to show them the door.

For that you may need help, because these squatters aren’t usually so keen on leaving. They will do anything to convince you they are helping you and that you cannot survive without them. An objective person can help you to hold steady and not be swayed or undermined by such tactics.

Sometimes you have to sneak up on them and trick them into leaving. Whatever it takes, whatever modalities you choose, by all means stand firm. Give them a hug, thank them for serving you, but don’t forget to lock the door once they’re gone.

Life essentially gives us what we ask for. How do we ask? By what we put forth. Everything that leaves our circle of being…and I do mean everything—our thoughts, emotions, judgments, beliefs—comes back around in some way. We are all connected and there is no place in that field of connection to hide. If we soil the ocean of existence, there is no way to escape accountability for that.

It’s taken me a good many years and many hard life lessons to realize that life has certain rules of operation and the sooner we align with those rules, the easier our lives become. Those rules include showing up to do our part, being fully accountable for ALL of our actions and keeping our corner of existence clean. A tall order, indeed.

Spiritual maturity is not about finding easy answers to life’s problems. It is about meeting what is head on without resistance, embracing it fully with all of its confusion and chaos. It’s also about knowing that life is always a reflection of what is happening inside of us on ALL levels, both conscious and unconscious.

Many people on the spiritual path make the mistake of thinking that prayer and affirmations are enough to shifts things in their lives and the lives of their loved ones. But it takes more than that. Showing up is a big part of manifestation. In order to attract what we want into our lives, we need to demonstrate our desire and willingness to receive it through our actions. It is a way of meeting life halfway. We cannot complain that things are missing from our lives if we aren’t willing to put ourselves forth to meet these things fully. Hiding out in our habitual comfort zones, and then wondering why our lives are so full of lack, makes no sense, but that’s what most of us do. We passively wait for the good to show up for us.

To spiritually mature, we also need to put our attention on our accountability. Many of us are conscientious when it comes to our behavior in the world, but lazy when it comes to our thoughts and emotions and what comes out of our mouths. This won’t fly because everything that moves from us, touches everyone else and eventually comes back and touches us. If you knew that when you spoke a sharp word about someone, it traveled from you and pierced another, would you be so willing to let it go? If you knew that the reason you felt pain at a given time was due to that same sharp word you sent out, would you still allow yourself to be the originator of that pain?

Of course not. But most of us have not cultivated an awareness of that level of accountability yet. If we had, our conversations with others would be quite different, as would our conversations with ourselves.

Finally, how do we clean things up if we do make a mess? It’s quite simple: honesty and forgiveness. Being honest with ourselves and others, taking responsibility and then apologizing for our part in the mess cleans it up. We don’t have to beat ourselves up or even hold onto the mistake, except to receive the lesson it imparts. Rather, it is really only necessary to see it, acknowledge it, clean it up, forgive ourselves and then MOVE ON.

There is nothing to be gained by lingering in the mess. As we move through this process of cleaning things up, we will find ourselves far more forgiving and compassionate when others make a mess. This creates all kinds of space and openness around us and then there is finally room for the good stuff: love, joy, peace, etc.

The magic of life comes in when we embrace life and ourselves fully, messiness and all.

Growing up sounds terribly dull and boring, but in fact it is quite the opposite. All of that mess that we were unconsciously creating was in fact blocking all the good things we’ve been seeking. It created distractions and constant fires to put out. When we begin to take responsibility for the mess and clean it up, this allows us to clear the channel so that we can receive what has always been there. It allows us to become childlike and look at life with wonder again.

My sense is that we will also have much more access to the parts of ourselves that are mostly dormant and unused…the parts of us that are able to transcend time and space. Most of us have had glimpses of that, and the possibilities are endless and tremendously exciting.

But I’m getting ahead of myself…

I’ve been speaking to friends of mine about why life seems so hard much of the time, and through a circuitous route, we ended up with a number of conclusions, none entirely satisfying. People’s theories ranged from, “none of this is real” to “your outer world is a reflection of your inner world” to “suffering and struggle are necessary” to all theories in between.

Even those of us who put lots of attention on the meaning of life seem baffled most of the time. No amount of our intricate story-weaving really even touches the mysteries of life nor answers our demands for an explanation.

I’ve always cultivated a fantasy that somewhere, sometime I would meet someone who would tap me on the shoulder and point me in the direction of the Truth. That like Dorothy and her friends in the Wizard of Oz, the man behind the curtain would be outed.

I suppose the not-knowing is what keeps life interesting and magical. The uncertainty keeps us in the game. But, and most would agree, sometimes, it is just all too much. Sometimes, I’m just tired. Moving through the density of the 3-D feels like a trudge through the mud, and once in a while — without the help of mind altering substances or the nightly out of body forays of the dreamstate — I’d like to have the sensation of flowing freely through and with it (sober AND awake).

The best I’ve come up with so far is to not resist what is. Rather, I just let myself fall into what’s happening in the moment…fully and completely, until I’m so in it, I don’t differentiate myself from it. I merge into it with a full out embrace and trust. Seated in the Is-ness, I am gifted with periods of real peace and even joy, but not what I would call freedom. Sorry, but that’s what I’m really going for. Sadly, I think that’s the one thing I cannot really have. At least not in the way I imagine it.

Being here on this plane of existence doesn’t appear to be about freedom or transcendence or nirvana. If it is, it certainly isn’t the easiest door to open. Believe me, I’ve tried, and paradoxically, it is that trying that has led to my failure. It seems as though the very act of wanting and seeking and desiring a way out of the limitations of physically existence, actually seals the door even tighter, whereas, letting go of the need for things to be different, being with all that is as it is, tends to crack it open just a hair.

In other words, if you’re here, be here. Death is your ticket out. Life has a built in exit plan. Knowing that, wouldn’t you want to hang out here and see what happens next? Besides, how do you or I know that once we die, we aren’t lining up to come right back? How do we know this isn’t one of the coolest places in existence to incarnate?

On the other hand, it could also be a prison matrix where we’ve been sent to learn some heavy-duty lessons as part of some kind of karmic debt. Or even further down that line of thinking, we could be prisoners with no real reason behind our imprisonment other than we were in the wrong place at the wrong time. In that model, those of us looking for an escape would be considered heroes.

This illusiveness and speculation is precisely the problem. Like a kaleidoscope, our experience of life shifts depending on how you look at it. Turn it one way and it looks like a cosmic dance filled with divine blessings and opportunities. Turn it another way, and it looks like a cruel, painful phenomenon filled with unnecessary hardship and suffering. Turn it again, and it falls somewhere in the middle and looks like the most ordinary thing in the world.

Maybe it’s all of those things, plus more. Perhaps we’ll never really know what this is all about. Maybe that’s a good thing.

I don’t know…personally, I don’t think I’ll ever stop looking for answers or wondering what’s around the next corner. Maybe that’s a good thing, too.

I recently read that when Marlon Brando was asked why he didn’t memorize his lines, he replied, “Real people don’t know what they want to say.” I relate to this because when I teach or give a presentation, it flows much better and more authentically when I don’t prepare beforehand. I can reflect on what I might like to do and have a few triggers or props handy, but the REAL stuff emerges when I get out the way completely and just let what wants to come through flow unimpeded. Amazingly, I end up learning a hell of a lot as well…it’s as if I tap into an infinite, universal well of knowledge and I become a conduit for a greater source of knowledge than I would have if I’d spent time efforting at it through research, creating outlines, and writing copious notes.

After 18 years of teaching, I only discovered this recently when I began to teach teenagers. Knowing I needed to make my classes more dynamic and exciting to capture and sustain their attention, I accidentally stumbled upon a core truth at the heart of all creativity: THE LESS I TRIED to teach them or inspire them, the more I actually did and THE MORE I TRIED, the more I failed. The REAL juicy passionate fun stuff happens through you when YOU get out of the way. As soon as you put the “I” into the equation and you try and manipulate or control the outcome, your efforts flatline and the passion gets sucked dry.

My presumption that we are not the doer was confirmed by a recent conversation I had with an engineer. The engineer explained that the perception of ourselves as the doer and the originator of an idea was actually caused by a split second delay in the left side of our brain, the part that perceives the “I”. He agreed that when the “I” tries to do anything, it messes things up.

I shared this conversation in an email to my brother in-law, an artist, and he responded by describing his experience when he paints, “When I go into a painting, you might say that I intend to be spontaneous once that the brush has its first dip into the paint. When the painting is going well (here I begin to sound like Jackson Pollack) “I” have no idea of how it will go or come out. The more I try to intervene, the worse the result in the long run and “I” recognize it as a failure or simply as a bad result (since I’m an old hand at this). But then, I always hear the voice of Carl Sublett, one of my favorite professors, who said. “We never LOSE a painting,” which means that your spontaneity can have freedom after you re-evaluate the painting and align yourself again with your original intention. You “repaint” the painting. In other words, it seems like intention is a program of the ego and spontaneity is when one releases oneself to that “cosmic intelligence” or “great spirit”. When the two are one, then you’re on a roll.”

Releasing oneself to that cosmic intelligence or getting out of the way creates the space for magic to happen. Life becomes more of a dance that way with us as both the participant and the observer.

If you really knew that the part of you that you refer to as the “I” was really a perceptual trick and actually wasn’t deciding or controlling anything, imagine the freedom that would come from that! Imagine truly knowing that you could trust what is happening as it’s happening rather than feeling the need to control it or change it! You would be free to just experience it, to be in it without an agenda.

This of course, would not mean you would become completely passive or catatonic. Instead, you would simply shift from directing things to following where you were directed to go. The cool thing is that there is no one exactly like you, so what comes through you is a specific set of experiences that can only manifest through your particular form with all of its unique characteristics.

Ultimately, what this all means is that you would remember that you are not the “I”, but the life force and awareness behind the “I”. The “I” is merely there as a tool to use to gain experience. Where we get tripped up is thinking it’s who we are.

I used to think these peak experiences, spontaneity and the feeling of being in the flow was something random that just happened here and there. Now I see that this as the natural state of our being, and the best indication that we have finally gotten out of our own way.

Something’s gotta give. The planet is strained to the breaking point in its ability to sustain our burgeoning human population with our ever growing waste and toxic lifestyles.

We need help. But short of an evolved extraterrestrial species arriving at the eleventh hour to bail us out of our stupidity and ignorance, we’re on our own.

To some people, plain and simple, that would mean we’re doomed. However, I would like to suggest that left to our own devices, we actually DO have the capacity to transform our current situation. The problem is that we’ve forgotten how. We’ve forgotten that in addition to being human, we also have within us something quite extraordinary, something mostly unseen and unnoticed, but something not at all limited by the boundaries of time and space.

This transcendent aspect of us is the energy or intelligence within us that created us and gives us life. Don’t you find it strange, how little attention we give to this core essence of our existence? Instead, few of us acknowledge that this even exists or that we have any access to it or would know what to do with it even if we could access it.

It’s as if life is a puzzle and we’re born into it with a bit of amnesia and confusion and only a handful of clues about our existence. As our life unfolds, we have many opportunities to remember and become clear and even to work the puzzle. Our tendency is to look outside of ourselves for answers. There are so many sources of information and teachers out there who promise to answer our questions. All ultimately lead us astray, except those who redirect our query back to their source: ourselves.

It is only then that we can begin to discover for ourselves not only the answers to our questions, but the source of the questions themselves. We begin at the end and end at the beginning. All our fruitless searches return us to where we started, with the greatest discovery of all being that there is nowhere to go and what we seek we already have.

With that said, how will that discovery save us? It will not only save us but it will relieve us finally of the burden of having to figure it all out. Because whether we know it or not, we are not in charge of the show. We are simply playing our small role. There is instead, a director or cosmic intelligence that can see the whole thing as it plays out. Our only duty is to make sure we listen to that intelligence as it gives us our cues and tells us our positions in the grand drama that is unfolding.

I read somewhere recently that the “ordinary world is a delusion with no sense of purpose”. Notice the word ordinary here, an intentional descriptive device clearly meant to distinguish it from, I suppose, the non-ordinary world. It is this distinction that is what is most interesting to me. This idea of the world we see on a day to day basis—the ordinary world—as not being real can be found at the heart of many spiritual teachings; it’s not something you stumble upon with surface religious teachings, but rather lies deeper within the mystical knowledge. Shamans in indigenous cultures also know that the world of the five senses, the world I affectionately called the 3-D world, is not all there is. But ironically, we treat it as if it is all there is, putting most of our attention there and making most of our decisions based on that assumption.

Given the prevalence of paranormal experiences–UFO sightings, encounters with ghosts and other unexplained phenomena, out of body and near death experiences, and so forth—I think that we might begin to challenge that assumption a little more.

Of course, some of us do. I’ve spent most of my life doing that. But I wonder what would happen if the majority of people focused their attention for long periods of time everyday on what lay beyond the five senses?

I suspect something extraordinary would happen. This “illusion” or distorted view of things we’re seeing would shift and we would begin to awaken to an expanded perception and viewpoint.

Those who have already done this, either consciously or by accident (such as in a near death experience), usually return from it with a much different way of seeing. As we know, once your perception shifts at that level, you can never return to your old way of seeing. All of your choices are influenced by that shift.

So we could say that waking up is not about changing or even transcending anything, it’s about seeing what is for the first time. It is always there, but in order to see it, we have to learn how to remove the blinders or the distorted lens.

It is truly waking up from the dream. But instead of unplugging from the matrix, you simply are able to see it without the usual limitations. Instead of feeling, as I quoted in that first sentence, as though life has no sense of purpose, its perfection and purpose are revealed.

If your worst nightmare is a world of pain, poverty, illness, injustice and suffering and one day you were able to wake up and realize that it had only been a dream, and that the REAL world was a world of peace, prosperity, health, justice and joy, how would you feel? What if the only difference between whether you experienced the nightmare or REAL world was what you chose to see at any given moment? What if you found out that human beings were not limited at all by their humanness, but in fact, were completely limitless due to their divinity? What if you recognized that you’d been duped all along into believing that human beings were powerless and sinful and limited–nothing more than thinking, self-aware animals? What would you do if you knew that the truth was that human beings are powerful, whole and completely free?

What then? Would you be angry? Shocked? Would you tell others?

If you are skeptical and doubt what I say, don’t take my word for it, test it out through your own experience and by observing others. Start looking for evidence of our divine nature and start tuning out our limitations. Every time you are bombarded with the negativity of the perceptions of the 3-D world, look for evidence to the contrary, look for things that cannot be explained by the five senses…coincidences, synchronicities, telepathy, spontaneous healing, etc. Expect to be surprised. Demand to see the truth. Refuse to buy into the lies that tell us this “ordinary” world all there is.

You know better.

The end is near. In our gut, we know something is wrong with the way things are. We feel it. The world is in crisis. People are suffering. The environment’s a mess. Our trust in our leaders is failing.

People everywhere are talking about the end times. When discussing the weather, one woman I know referred to it as apocalyptic.

There is no hiding from the challenges we’re facing. We live with the awareness of it and carry around with us everyday.

The problem is that few of us know what to do about it, so entrenched in the daily grind that we surrender to the complacency and passivity that is our lot in life. We don’t have time to think about the world’s problems, because our lives are literally being consumed by the details of survival.

Even on a personal level, our relationships, our families and our communities are strained to the breaking point. Not only do we not have time to self-reflect and build a foundation of relationship with the self, our relationships with others are under constant attack. Consumer society and the need for all of us to keep this great machine going, by necessity, requires us to sacrifice the very things we value most: our closest relationships.

We know this and yet, we cannot seem to escape it. Like prisoners, we try hard to accept the limitations that constrict our lives. We make the best of it. And when we can’t make the best of it, we try every available means of escape: we eat, drink, have sex, watch TV, shop, travel, anything to change the way we feel and give us temporary relief from the stress of the daily grind. And when that doesn’t work, we go to our doctor and ask for a drug to help us to cope and get through the day.

Not exactly a formula for a successful life. Pretty insane when you really look at it. Why aren’t we all in the streets protesting our captivity, screaming about the sacrifices we’re expected to make? Because, and here’s the slippery part, we don’t think anyone who can do anything about it will hear us. We don’t think anyone cares. And on one level we’re right. Why should our jailers want things to make things better for us, when we’re so good at making it better for them?

Did I just say there are people benefiting from our captivity? Absolutely. That’s exactly what I said. Think about it for a minute. This is nothing new. There have always been the lucky few who benefit from the hard work and sacrifice of the many. The only reason that this continues is that we allow it. We see it, but in truth, we’d rather not think about it. So we become passive and allow ourselves to be hypnotized by the belief that nothing can change. We give in to the agreed-upon mass amnesia that surrounds us and is reinforced everywhere we go, because we don’t want to cause trouble, we don’t want to attract attention, we don’t want to be perceived as abnormal or crazy. So we shut up and put up with the way it is, even though deep down inside we know something’s terribly wrong.

Well, I’m here to tell you, it doesn’t have to be this way. The only way that we can agree to being miserable is because we’ve forgotten something very important: we’ve forgotten who we are. The only reason this game of limitations can be perpetuated by those who are benefiting from it is if we agree to play it. And the only reason we agreed to such conditions is because we believed we didn’t have a choice. That is precisely what those in power are banking on.

But we do have a choice. Because we have the key to the prison door. We’ve always had the key, but we forgot where we put it.

Think of it this way. We were born as human beings. We were given this incredible instrument to play that has capabilities beyond our wildest dreams. We’ve been told we were made in the image of our creator, which essentially means that within us, we each have the same capabilities as that which created us. The problem is that even though we have this instrument, we weren’t given any instructions, so we don’t know how to play it. Our parents and our teachers teach us many things, but for the most part, the full range of the instrument is left un-utilized. Being mostly self-taught, we only know how to use a small percentage of the instrument (for most of us it is only around 10%). This keeps our range of experiences in life extremely limited. Our beliefs are limited so we develop limited habits of thinking and behaving. Our focus is mostly on the world outside of us, and because of that, we are heavily influenced by the thoughts and beliefs and actions of others.

This is a trick. This is how the odds of the game got so highly stacked against us and our freedom. The only way out of this endless loop, this nightmare, is to learn how to play the instrument we were given, to learn its capabilities.

Now here’s the tricky part. Where are we going to learn this? Who are we going to trust? Well, truth be told, there are a lot of smoke and mirrors out there, decoys and distractions and disinformation to throw you off the track. Why? Because as I said earlier, if you learned how to play your instrument, if you learned who you are, you would be free, you would be able to do those amazing, mind-blowing things called miracles, and you would be never see yourself as limited again. Essentially, if you knew how to utilize the other 90% of your capacity, you would become unstoppable. Your life and the lives of all human beings would change dramatically. Those in power would no longer be able to hold onto that power; and they would no longer be able to maintain the game they’re playing.

Without a doubt, it’s dangerous to talk about this. The risks are great. The infinite minefields that have been set up to keep all of us in prison are insidious and subtle and almost impossible to navigate through without help. But, given how close we are to destroying each other and the planet we live on, silence is no longer an option.

The bottom line is that we’ve been duped, duped into believing that bondage is the normal state of things and freedom an idealistic fantasy, duped into believing that things just “happen” to us, duped into believing that this is the way it is and we should simply accept it.

We’ve been told we’re sinners and weak and powerless and that salvation lies in a far-off place called Heaven. We’ve been sold a bill of goods and given a set of rules that will allegedly insure this salvation.

But at some time in your life haven’t you wondered what kind of world would be set up this way? Isn’t there something so inherently flawed and wrong with this picture?

Most of us don’t question things until we’re faced with a crisis, or even more likely when we’re facing our own death. Then the questions swirl around us en masse. Some of us decide to become seekers and try and find answers to the big questions, why are we here and what does this all mean?

Even with a passion to know the Truth though, the odds are against us finding it. Why? Because the world has been designed to keep the truth hidden and elusive. Most answers only breed more questions, leading to frustration and despair. It is so much easier to stick with what we know and do what everyone else is doing. There is very little support for real solutions to the human dilemma.

Then, even if we find what we think are solid answers, they don’t help, because most of the answers get stuck in the intellect and we cannot find a way to translate them into action or real change. So we spin around in circles trying to sort through the endless information and promises of freedom, enlightenment and salvation.

The answer is much simpler and more obvious than we think it is. In fact, it’s right under our noses. It’s within the instrument we were born with. Imagine if you will, that contained inside of this instrument is the very key that will set you free, answer all the questions you’ve ever had, and give you all the capabilities to change whatever circumstances in your life that you wish, a veritable magic box that holds within it the secret of who you really are, without limitations, a box full of miracles and all that is required to open it, is a willingness to do so.

Human beings are capable of extraordinary things. Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, we forgot this. It’s time to wake up to our Divine Nature and stop betraying ourselves. The self-sabotage has to end here and now.

The first step is to acknowledge that we are truly powerful. The second is to listen to ourselves above all others. The third is to trust that freedom is our birthright and cannot be denied to us.

Sounds impossible, doesn’t it? The world will keep reinforcing the lies to keep you off balance and send you down endless dead ends. It is akin to battle, but once you remember who you are, the odds are very strong in your favor.

The only way to find the Truth is to stop listening to the world around you, for at least part of every day, until the Truth gets stronger and stronger and begins to convince you that you’re on the right track. The power of the world will lessen, the images will dim and the sounds will become muted as you begin to listen to your own inner voice. Eventually, you will discover that the things others are affected by no longer affect you, and you’ll establish a foundation of meaning in the world beyond appearances. The bondage will start to come off when you realize you have a say in what manifests around you, not because you change your actions, but because your thinking is changing.

Yes, it is slow, but accessible. It takes practice and persistence and commitment to the Truth. At times, you will be tempted to regress into the world of appearances; for its pull and its promises are seductive. You will question the validity of what I’m saying again and again and again. You will doubt and curse and feel despair.

But believe me, it’s worth it. Think about it. Think about the limitations you live with everyday. It isn’t so bad you say. I can live with the way it is. Today perhaps. But what about tomorrow when something unexpected hits your life? Then what? Then I suspect that some of this may start to make sense. The Truth will be illuminated in such as way that you can never forget it. It will be there to anchor every thought and action you make.

What have you got to lose?

The mystic is someone who feels a calling to answer life’s big questions. A mystic always wants to know more. A mystic is never really satisfied, until he or she is stretched in the area of intuitive wisdom and awareness. A mystic lives for the quest, for the satisfaction of knowing that the mystery of life can never be solved. There is always more to know, more experiences to have, more of life to express.

A mystic takes the road less traveled; in fact, a mystic is likely to try and find the road not yet traveled so that he or she can create a new way, to cut a path forward, to make the way easier for others.

The connection to Source feels more natural to the mystic than the life of the world. Mystics spend part of everyday strengthening this connection, for without it they feel lost.

Many of us feel an inclination toward the mystical life, but are often too caught up and seduced by the attractions of the world to fully embody this path. Many artists are on a path similar to mystics. In fact, many artists are also mystics. The two paths complement each other on many levels. Both are more connected to their inner lives than they are to the world. Both are intensely curious about the mysteries of life. Both feel called to express either the mystical or artistic aspects of human life or both.

Mystics are gifted with a high level of intuition. They are typically empathic and feel other’s suffering deeply. They need solitude to recharge and quiet time for self-reflection. This does not equip them with tools to function in the world the way the average person does. Because of this, both the artist and the mystic are outsiders—they don’t fit into the status quo or conform well into society. They typically feel more at home on the fringe.

The life of the mystic is about transcendence and seeing beyond the ordinary world of everyday appearances. Mystics are looking to regain a sense of unity with all that is. They are ever aware that there is something missing in life and they spend their lives seeking this reconnection with the greatness that life is.

Never satisfied with the ordinary, mystics are willing to do whatever it takes to find this place of unity, including spending long stretches of time alone. Reducing the external stimuli allows for an immersion in the vast expanse of inner worlds, which brings about a renewed perspective of the world. It is a constant state of death and rebirth, as one lets go of identifying with the small self in exchange for a connection with a larger presence.

The yearning for freedom from ordinary human limitations is what drives the mystic forward through the toughest challenges and past the most impossible obstacles. This sense of freedom, rather than being a longing for something unknown, instead, for the mystic, feels more akin to a memory of a state of being–a return to something rather than an arrival—freedom being the natural human state.

To be in the world and yet not of it, is the ultimate state of being spoken about by our great spiritual teachers. Not abandoning what is, but embracing it fully without feeling infringed upon by it in any way. The mystical life is the discovery of the space between breaths, the infinitesimal gap in time where everything stops, the place between the seen and the unseen. It is this place that creation emanates from and gives birth to the expression of what is. It is in this place that freedom is found.

For the mystic, nothing less than this freedom will do.