To leave the illusion behind is humanity’s divine destiny because humanity’s destiny is divine. It has ensnared, enslaved, and entranced you all for far too long and your unwillingness to release yourselves from it is all that holds you within it. You have the power and the capability to do so because you are divine beings, and, because it is your will and God’s, you will release yourselves.

Nevertheless, you are conflicted within yourselves by the intriguing but fanciful opportunities with which it tempts you, and by your desire to find the real meaning in life, a meaning that overwhelms and shatters the unreal dreams that seem to be your constant companions – wealth, security, a lover, and a beautiful environment in which to enjoy them. But the dreams seem so real! This is because you are very powerful beings, and you have made them seem very real, so real that they hid and continue to hide Reality from you, as was your original intent. Hence this intense inner conflict and your endless confusion.

However, your divine Father knew that your infatuation with your unreal environment would not last, and that it would bring you untold pain and suffering, so He, at the moment that you built it by imagining it within your brilliant mind, instantly provided everything you need to release yourselves from it and return Home. What He provided was the inextinguishable inner flame of His Love that calls to you constantly to awaken.

This is such a rugged time for me. Everything incomplete is coming up. And some of you tell me it’s the same for you.

Whether it’s a trough in the waves of love or an intensified energy that draws all incompletions out of me, it’s painful, deep, unbearable.

I’m going through existential loneliness and I know it’s caused by seeing myself as separate from God.

I think all loneliness comes from that. It’s the chief cause, the head vampire of existential loneliness.

We try to fill this yawning chasm of emptiness with sports cars and speedboats and vacations.  But nothing fills it. It can only be filled with God.

God is omnipresent, this is something even the backwards religions teach. Do you understand what this means, how amazing it is? God is not separate from you in anything you do, God is always there. And don't worry, God knows what you look like naked, the realization of God's omnipresence doesn't need to make things awkward when you're taking a shower or during sex.

For those who believe in a judgmental god, I can see how omnipresence can be a frightening thing. Supposedly the ultimate authority figure is watching and scrutinizing everything you do, even more so than the NSA! It's a good thing God Is Unconditionally Loving, which makes damning others through judgment impossible. Still, people damn themselves with their own judgements, and the judgments of others.

What kind of a dumb creator would judge their creations, and not also apply that judgment to themselves? Everything you create is a direct expression of you, and this is why we encourage artistic creation as a form of self-discovery. If an artist creates a painting, and then judges it, good or bad, he's also judging himself. You cannot separate the creator and the creation, the two are forever linked.

Judgmental people create judgmental gods. Jealous people create jealous gods. Angry people create angry gods. There's the whole story of religion right there. God didn't create stupid people though, God created beautiful, unique and Divine Beings who simply put on strange disguises and forgot what was underneath. They became their disguise, and they even fool themselves!

Microbes are in the news these days. Specifically, the microbes that live in and on the human body, making up our “microbiome.” Michael Pollan made a splash with a column titled “ Some of My Best Friends are Germs” about a year ago, and now Martin Blaser, director of the Human Microbiome Project at NYU, has published a book called Missing Microbes: How the Overuse of Antibiotics Is Fueling Our Modern Plagues.

In a short period of time, bacteria, fungi and other microbes have gone from enemy to friend in the public consciousness. 

But in addition to the many studies finding out about the numbers and diversity of the microbes with whom we share our bodies and their roles in our nutrition and immune function, some researchers have made some surprising findings: the bugs in your gut might actually impact your emotions.

Read the rest here... (alternet.org)

The ability to remain focused on joy and true happiness in life, regardless of our circumstances, is rooted in the desire to grow beyond mere existence to a life that is overflowing. 

Life can be quite a roller coaster ride. It’s easy to be happy when we’re at the top of the ride and things are going well.

The problem is – life being the grand adventure that it is – for all the carefree high points, from time to time there will inevitably be corresponding lows. They may only last for an hour, a day or a week … but sometimes we hit a particularly rough patch when no matter how hard we try it feels like that darn ride is never going to make the swing back up to where the sun shines and we get to “be happy” again.

Happiness is not something readymade. It comes from your own actions. ~Dalai Lama XIV

While it may not feel like it when you’re stuck in one of those low points, we each have the ability to be as happy as we choose to be, it’s just that sometimes we need to be reminded. Whatever your circumstances, it’s going to be a lot easier to shift your attitude and feelings to your happy place if you have a few strategies to rely on.

Read the rest here... (emotionallyresilientliving.com)