This is part two in a six-part article. Parts 3-6 will be posted in future months. Be sure to watch for them! Catch up by reading Life in Time-Space part 1: How You Got Here and What to Do About It
All That Is
Let’s call this the second claim: God exists. God is all there is. Nothing is not God, and everything that exists was created using the power of God, there is no other power. Nothing ever was or ever could be separate from God. This is simply the definition of the word God, of omnipresence, but the implications are subtle, powerful, and far-reaching.
Our entire time-space universe is part of God, it is within God. Humanity is within God. Everything that humanity does, both the loving and the hurtful, it does by using the power of God. With that understanding, words like spiritual and divine take on new meanings … or perhaps they lose some significance. One thing is not more or less spiritual than another thing because different things are not nearer to or farther away from God. Nothing is not spiritual. Nothing is not divine. This is one of the most important ideas to keep in mind throughout life. Going to the dentist is as spiritual as going to church. Meditation is no more spiritual than paying the monthly bills. A grocery store is no less holy than a place of worship. City intersections offer no fewer blessings than the world’s most highly esteemed shrines.
Behaviors that we call good and bad are simply the results of choices we make. There is no such thing as evil. Being mean and causing pain and suffering to others are choices we make, just as are being caring and honorable. Living life well entails being gentle, compassionate, and kind. Within the framework of kindness and honor, there are no right or wrong choices. There is no outside force judging us over what activities we choose to, or choose not to, pursue. We choose for ourselves and we judge for ourselves.
Within Oneness
It is hard for us to comprehend infinity. It is harder still for us to understand how infinite oneness can stir within itself and create apparent diversity, but obviously it does. The oneness of God exists and so do we. When we reflect on God, it is God reflecting on Itself. Using the power of God, God manipulates the material of God into everything that exists. Our time-space universe exists, and there are an infinite number of other realities that are nothing like time-space. They are inconceivably different and incomprehensible to us. They are far beyond the imagination of our wildest science fiction. Yet it is all God. (It was suggested in Part 1 of this article that a Unified Field Theory might be thought of as a description of omnipresence, of God. It might be worth considering that our theory would describe an omnipresence befitting our time-space universe. Perhaps our theory would need to be expanded infinitely to encompass the omnipresence sustaining all realities, underlying all that exists.)
Our universe is structured by the rules of time and space. Time-space is the nature of the reality in which we live. In our reality, objects appear separate and distinct – this is not that. There is a sequence to events: past, present, and future ̶ this happened before that. Currently, we are rooted in this reality, but there is infinitely more.
Time-space is not an illusion. It is very real on its own level. It is not bad. Living in time-space is not punishment or something to be escaped from. It is not unholy, undesirable, or ignorance. But our beliefs about it can color how we perceive it to be. Can we expand our understanding and perception to more directly sense that which is beyond our ordinary experience? Yes, but our intellect will only take us so far in that pursuit. With patience and practice, and using our intuition and feelings, we can gain a deeper experience of what is normally unknown. Is it important that we do that? Not necessarily. If seeking such is of personal interest, then it could be a wonderful and satisfying pursuit. But a beautiful and fulfilling life can be lived by simply focusing on being caring and helpful to those around us, by being the best person we can be. If it is important to us to seek a deep understanding of life, existence, God, and if that pursuit serves to enrich our lives and to make us a source of inspiration and upliftment to others, then nothing could be better. That which uplifts and unites is to be encouraged, whatever it is. That which disheartens, belittles, and separates should be discouraged, even if – especially if – it is one’s misguided approach to seeking a deeper understanding of existence.
Souls
God stirred and individualization was created. How and in what forms exactly, we currently lack the tools for knowing. Within infinite oneness, individual intelligence and its self-awareness were created. We can use the word souls here. Souls is a good word as long as we understand how it is being used. Souls means intelligent, self-aware, eternal beings who know their eternal nature and who, using the power of God, have the ability to create. This description is not as foreign as it might appear. Our human physical bodies are not eternal and few of us currently perceive eternal realities, but we are self-aware and intelligent, and using the power of God, we create.
Looking at this from the opposite direction, from time-space, we see that for centuries people have reported experiences of self-awareness independent of their physical bodies. Any review of the literature on the subject is more than convincing that whatever it is that makes us feel that I am me can be detached from our physical bodies and exist in a fully conscious, self-aware, nonphysical state. There are many credible books on this subject, so it is not necessary to list specific examples of the phenomenon here. (Robert A. Monroe’s book Ultimate Journey is good.) There have been different ways of explaining these experiences, but the underlying conclusions are the same: who we are is more than, and independent of, the collection of chemicals and electrical impulses that we call our bodies. We have an unseen side. In fact, this unseen side is who we really are. We are that and we use a physical body, as opposed to, we are this physical body and thereby we have that. What is that? Probably every language in history has had at least one name for it. The most common words in English are soul and spirit. We will use the word soul here, and we will use it in the same way as we used it in the previous paragraph.
Our understanding of the out-of-body experience, as it is often called, is far from complete. Certainly, many of us have had clear, direct experiences of at least the first stages of self-awareness independent of the physical body. The qualifier first stages is used because as long as we are attached to this time-space existence, our ability to fully understand non-time-space will be a bit limited. Our experience and understanding after our departure from time-space will be far more expansive than the out-of-body and near-death experiences that we currently have and hear about.
This is difficult territory for our current intellectual nature. We are steeped in the scientific method. We use instruments to collect data. We insist on repeatability. Fortunately, scientists will continue to refine their abilities to investigate and understand extremely subtle phenomena. But some physicists readily acknowledge that there may come a time when the traditional tools of science will reach their limit of perception and become inadequate. It has been suggested that the study of the finest realms might be the study of consciousness itself, and that the best tool for studying consciousness might be consciousness. It might not be possible to use time-space instruments to study non-time-space reality. For most of us, these ideas are hard to grasp, but what was once metaphysics has become physics, and there is infinitely more to discover.
Hierarchy of Souls
There is no hierarchy. There is little value in speculating along the lines of, “Are we first-tier souls, or did first-tier souls create our souls, or are we third or fourth-tier souls?” Nothing is closer to, or farther from, God. There is no greater or lesser; no first, second, or third; no higher or lower. That is time-space reasoning being applied to non-time-space reality. Our brains are not usually wired to perceive and comprehend non-time-space. Our words are inadequate. As souls, we are among an infinite number of wise, eternal beings who directly perceive the oneness of existence and who, using the power of God, are free to create whatever and however we wish.
This is the end of Part 2. Please look for Part 3 in future months of The Edge. If you wish, you may read the entire article as a free download at LifeInTimeSpace.com
