How can your faith help you to know yourself?

There is more to each of us than we realize. The greater part of our minds have not been utilized; our potential to experience more peace, love, harmony and well being has not been discovered; our skill levels in any given area can be increased.

Most of us exercise our potential for successful living to the point where life is tolerable. It isn't great or ideal. We have adapted to life's roller coaster of ups and downs.  What if you had the potential to make the "up" times of life even higher and longer lasting and the "down" times of life shorter and not so long in duration. Well, you can.

You have that potential. The primary obstacles holding us back from growing and utilizing our higher potential is fear. Fear of failure, fear of what others will think when we do fail, fear of discovering we don't have a higher potential. This is where faith comes in:  the willingness to step into the unknown, to explore new territory of being, to being okay not knowing how to get to the desired destination but willing to take the first step and have faith that as we do the next step will be shown to us.

There is no physical evidence of your untapped higher potential. Faith is knowing it's there.

Do religions hold their followers to high enough standards?

Historically, religions have failed miserably at attempting to hold people to standards that were unrealistic, unreasonable and which the leaders themselves couldn't live up to.

Jesus was crucified because he called the religious leaders of the day on their hypocrisy. In the Book of Matthew 23:327 Jesus states to the Pharisees and Teachers of the Law: "You hypocrites! You are like white washed tombs which look fine on the outside but are full of decaying bones on the inside. In the same way on the outside you appear good to everybody, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and sins."

The same point could easily be made today. There are priests, rabbis and ministers in all religions who put forth dogmatic assertions and impositions that they themselves don't follow then shellac others with guilt, shame and threats of doom in the after life for not living up to their religious laws. Many of these "man-made" religious laws are of no significance when it comes to one's goodness and moral character, but rather are simply veiled attempts to maintain a sense of power over people and keep them in subservient positions.

Religion's purpose is to present a loving, peaceful, harmonious way to live, not harshly judge others and spew out potential penalties if they don't agree with another's actions.

There are literally thousands of religious laws, rules and regulations on the books but if one treats others the way he/she wants to be treated a good life is being lived.

How does one keeping from losing Hope?

Hope is nothing more or nothing less than a thought that is infused with an optimistic emotion. Hope exists in our mind, it is a power within us. It never dwindles, it never dries up; it is never out of reach. It only appears to be absent when we choose to think thoughts of an opposite nature.     

The thoughts we think may be hopeful or hopeless. When we commit to beliefs that we can do something; that we can make it through a difficult time; that we can realize our hearts desire we experience hope. When we commit to thoughts that are of a despairing nature we experience hopelessness and expect the worst to happen.  

So the question arises, who determines the thoughts we think? Each of us is the ultimate authority of the thoughts we think and the feelings we have. When we take full responsibility for our outlook on life and the frame of mind we are in, we draw on our inner power to direct our thoughts.

The thoughts you are thinking this very moment are creating your present emotional reality and at the same time putting in place the stepping stones that will lead to your future emotional reality. Think about it for a moment, your thoughts are your reality. Good, bad, happy, sad, hopeful, hopeless...the choice is yours.

If we get what God wants us to have, why ask?

I believe God wants us to have peace of mind, the strongest desire we have; God wants us to be in harmony, our most natural state; and God wants us to be in a continual cycle of giving and receiving love, the greatest experience we can have on this earth.  

God wants us to have these things because that is what God is. Not an old man with long white beard sitting on a throne somewhere in the far reaches of the universe eager to punish us if we do wrong. God is Life.   

The three primary characteristics that assure the continuation of Life on Earth are peace, harmony and love and every person born into this world has the unlimited potential to express these three attributes.

We have free will to choose how we want to live our lives but at times we make the wrong choices. In a fit of anger we choose conflict instead of peace. Prejudices, discrimination and harsh judgments lead us into disharmony with others. And there are times when we choose not to love. We "have" what God wants us to have. Peace, harmony and love are the very essence of our being, we never have to ask for them.

But we don't always get what God wants us to have because we choose otherwise.

Is it important to believe in the existence of heaven?

We can perceive "Heaven" in two ways. As a destination of peace, harmony and love available to us when we leave this earthly plane. We can also perceive heaven as a state of existence on this earthly plane that is characterized as one of peace harmony and love. Heaven is a state of mind, whether on earth or in the hereafter that comes about as a result of our thoughts. When we align our thoughts with the thinking of the great spiritual masters we automatically receive the benefits of a heavenly state.

The universal principle of cause and effect states the nature of any cause is found in its effect. If love is the cause of your thoughts, words and actions, love is going to be the effect. The same holds true for hate, resentment and conflict, which create an uncomfortable condition in our lives often referred to as hell. Each of us individually creates the emotional state of our existence.

We have the free-will to chose the thoughts, words and actions we express. By choosing to express peace, harmony and love we create situations in our lives that are of "heaven".   You are responsible for the conditions of your life. So, the next time you are feeling greatly disturbed, hateful, in conflict or out of harmony ask yourself, "What IN hell, am I doing."       

Can we worry God too much with our little problems?

I don't believe God worries but rather I see God as a worry eliminator. Just as the mighty force of water from a fire hose can extinguish the greatest flame, the mighty faith within each of us can extinguish every doubt, worry, fear or anxiety when we turn it over to our higher power and trust in the divine order of life.

There are two kinds of problems in this world.The ones we can do something about and the ones we can't do anything about.

If we are powerless to change the situations or circumstances of a problem, challenge, setback or loss we have no other choice but to adapt to it.This often calls on us to change our thoughts, feelings, attitudes and perceptions about what has taken place or what might happen in the future.

In our prayers rather than beseeching God to "take this cup of suffering from me", we can use affirmative prayers such as: I now let go of any thoughts that hamper my peace of mind and affirm that I have everything I need to move through this difficult time and establish a sense of serenity in my life.  

If we can do something about a problem or challenge we face, then we need to draw on our resources and initiate action. Pronto! 

Should religion attempt to control people's behavior?

The various levels of government in this country provide us with 150,000 new laws and 2,000,000 new regulations (each year) all of which attempt to control the behavior of the people of the United States of America.  

Why would anybody want to engage in a religion that tried to control them even more. It appears to me that throughout history, religion has been woefully mistaken in its primary purpose. Religion is not meant to impose rules and regulations on people but rather propose higher insights that lead to a more  successful life. Religion is not meant to overpower the individual's will but rather empower an individual to take control of his/her life and express a higher potential.  

Lastly, religion is not meant to issue ultimatums, bordering on threats, of what will happen to someone in the afterlife if they don't subscribe to and abide by church doctrine in this life.  

None of those things move us closer to God. We are not sinners; we are not unworthy in the eyes of God; we don't need to be put down but rather we need to be lifted up.  Religions that attempt to control our lives put us in a cage with crumbs to eat. Let us out, and we will soar to new heights where we will find a new life and and a new connection with God that has been unimagined.