Today's writing is called, "The Most Beautiful Illusion":

Here at the Galactic Free Press we normally focus on breaking down illusions, but today I'm going to defend an illusion. Illusions are not evil or wrong, all that stuff is an illusion in itself, it's just that issues arise when you believe an illusion is real. In fact I would say this is responsible for all the mental suffering on the Planet.

Look at a horror movie, the actors and the people watching know it's a movie, they're well aware it's an illusion. To get more emotionally involved, they pretend it's not an illusion for a while, but part of them still knows it's all an illusion. Now imagine how traumatic it would be for everyone if they forgot it was all pretend! A little change in perception can transform fun & games into a very frightening experience, and vice versa.

So which is "the most beautiful illusion"? Well from my perspective it's forgiveness. You may not have thought about forgiveness as an illusion before, but look at it, what exactly are you forgiving? If you forgive another, do you change something in them? Something may change in them as a result of the forgiveness, but that's up to them, not you. When you forgive another, what you're really doing is transforming something within yourself.

Read the rest here: http://soundofheart.org/galacticfreepress/content/most-beautiful-illusion

Donation total: $2,418 out of $3,000 monthly goal

Link to today's GFP newsletter: http://soundofheart.org/galacticfreepress/content/gfp-newsletter-3252014

We have a new writing out today, "What You Believe Creates Your Illusion":

This message may ruffle some feathers since I'm going to directly address a very popular new age belief, and I'm not planning on being very nice to it. The kind of people who don't want their beliefs to be challenged are the kind of people who cling to fragile and weak belief systems. These are the people who need to challenge their beliefs the most if they want to grow and evolve. Beware of getting too comfortable while walking the path, if that's the case you've probably stopped walking. Everything you believe needs to really be looked at, not just unconsciously accepted.

First, I'll talk about in what sense the belief that "your beliefs create your reality" is true. For most people, there's no clear difference between their personal illusion and the larger reality. As far as they can tell, their personal illusion is reality. That's all that they can see, so their beliefs, which do shape their personal illusion, appear to affect all of "reality". So long as you equate "your reality" with "your separate illusion", then yes, your beliefs create "your reality". Personally, it seems a bit insane to me to not make any distinction between reality and illusion, which is the denial of reality. I wouldn't pretend those terms are interchangeable, those two are as different as different can be.

When I'm talking about reality, I'm talking about God and Love, I'm talking about the much bigger Universe that goes far beyond the tiny human world. There is no reality separate from God, yet your beliefs can create the illusion that you're separate from God. This reveals the illusionary nature of the mind and its beliefs. Reality doesn't need any beliefs to be witnessed, it's easiest to see when the mind is silent and the Being Is Present.

Today's message is "The Dangers of Spiritual Elitism":

While this isn't true for everyone, there's a kind of elitism fairly common in spiritual groups. Some people have this illusion that they know so much more than everyone else, and this makes them "better". There's these loaded terms like "awakened" and "enlightened", and while these terms do mean something, the people who like to brag about being such are usually neither awakened nor enlightened. They've only taken the first few steps down that path. The ego likes to compare itself to others to gain a false sense of self-worth, and when they look at the sleeping masses they believe they're so much better.

I tell you a baker who does his work with love and joy, who has true respect for others and shares his happiness, this person is doing God's Work. This person can easily be doing far more to help humanity raise up out of fear than a person who's read a hundred spiritual books and pays thousands of dollars to attend the "best" spiritual retreats and conferences. Without the essential inner work, that stuff does nothing by itself, and can actually build up just as many illusions as it dissolves. Pay very close attention, you may be releasing one illusion only to replace it with another.

Read the rest here: http://soundofheart.org/galacticfreepress/content/dangers-spiritual-elitism

Donation total: $2,338 out of $3,000 monthly target

Link to today's GFP newsletter: http://soundofheart.org/galacticfreepress/content/gfp-newsletter-3232014

A big thanks to all our readers for helping us out with donations! We're currently at $2,200 total, which puts us right on track for our $3,000 monthly goal.

Our writing today is "Cultivating God Within - Artistic Creativity":

It's Spring! What better moment to plant the seeds of God within yourself? While we're far more about Being than doing here at the Galactic Free Press, I want to discuss some of the things you can do to assist yourself in discovering the Divine Within. In this article I'll talk about an excellent way of doing that, art.

Art is a language beyond words, even if words are part of the medium. Art is a way of communicating feeling, and a painting can evoke a feeling far more quickly and efficiently that 100,000 words. Language is really quite limited in that respect. Even if it's purely unconscious, a person expresses their feelings and emotions through their artistic creations. It can be a very powerful tool for getting in touch with those aspects of yourself.

You are an artist, even if you haven't realized that yet. Everyone is, everybody has that Creative Spark within. Even if you believe "I suck at drawing", and then you go to draw, you will probably create exactly what you intended, a sucky drawing. That's still creativity! I do recommend expressing something other than self-judgment through your art, but either way you'll still be getting in touch with how you feel. You have to acknowledge that before you can really evolve.

Read the full article here: http://soundofheart.org/galacticfreepress/content/cultivating-god-within-artistic-creativity

A request for donations & an explanation of what the GFP is about

At the Galactic Free Press, we like to explore new and different ways of doing things. We give everything away for free, we don't try to sell anything, we don't have ads, and we don't offer special services for only those who can afford them. We give freely, and we're supported by those who can give freely. We see this as part of the new paradigm.

Asking for donations is something we're not very fond of, but we've learned that if we don't specifically ask, we don't get very much. I know there's a few people who don't think we shouldn't be receiving donations at all, but our landlord doesn't give us a house for free nor does the local supermarket give us free food for being "spiritual" people. We have the same expenses as most people, as well as paying for a web site and a few other services related to that.

The Galactic Free Press is very much our job, and I don't mean that like it's a burden. We're happy to do it, it's our passion. We put around 12 hours or more of combined work each day into the site through writing articles, posting articles, reading articles, searching for new things to post, running our TinyChat room, answering questions (through email, tinychat, on our site, and on Facebook), providing technical support to our users, maintaining a website, and fighting against the near constant stream of spam we get since we've become fairly popular. Providing our website, as well as a network of support for people through other sites as well, is no small task. We do need help through donations or through active participation.