Preface

It was a great relief to discover that I'm not this body. Unfortunately, it took 20 years of my life before I started asking the questions that led me to at least begin to understand this perspective on life. And I haven't gotten very far in my realization of this lofty perspective because, like anyone else, I still have a hard time dealing with those things that are very much a part of this body, like disease and old age and knowing that I'm going to die...and then have to take another birth - but that's another post on this blog. I'm also really getting sick and tired of the everyday struggles in life that I bring upon myself because I constantly forget that I'm not this body.

Anyway, I know I am not a mystic or metaphysical genius—and certainly no saint!—I am just a "normal" American guy. But I do know that I'd really like to find some straight answers about the way things are goin' on around this universe. I guess I'll just start throwing out some of the questions that I've had for a long time and share some of the answers I have found and explore my perspectives to see if it might help make some sense of this thing we call Life.

What I Believe

An essay published in the Syracuse Post-Standard newspaper, Saturday edition 03.13.2010.

I believe in God as the Supreme Person – beyond the finite dualities of male or female, young or old, and great or small. He is the Living Force within all living beings. He is infinite in qualities and we are His eternal parts and parcels with the same qualities as He but in minute, infinitesimal quantity – just as a drop of seawater has the same quality as the great ocean but is infinitesimal in comparison. We are the same as He but, inconceivably, simultaneously different from Him.

There is a living force, the soul, in everything that lives and nothing lives without a soul. Life never dies and non-living things never come to life. There was no “Big Bang” where life came from lifelessness. Never was there a time when you or I did not exist nor in the future shall any of us cease to be. We are not these temporary bodies. We are all eternal, spirit souls. We live within these temporary bodies for some period of time whether it is a human body, dog body, tree body or fish body or any other body but we will leave this body when our allotted time is up and we will take another body based upon the desires and aspirations we have developed while in these bodies. As spirit souls, we do not evolve, we transmigrate through different bodies.

God is the seed-giving Father. We are ALL His children and He loves each of us equally. He grants us freedom, or independence, to decide whether we want to love Him and live with Him in our eternal, spiritual home free from all miseries far, far from the material world or live here within the body of our choosing and try to enjoy separately from Him by enjoying our material senses. Without that freedom, how could there be true love? If we were to hold God responsible for and ask Him to stop our troubles, our bad decisions, our bad inventions like nuclear weapons, our hatreds, our enemies, our sufferings from natural disasters, etc., would we also not be the first ones to ask, “where is our freedom”? Somewhere along the line we chose, of our own free will, to live in the material world which is inherently full of miseries caused by the illusion of identifying with these bodies.

As spirit souls we are all the same. We are all brothers and sisters of the same Father, in the same family, forever. We only discriminate on the bodily platform conditioned by the material senses and material mind and ego. Ultimately – spiritually – we are not Christian, or Hindu or Muslim, we are not white or black, and we are not heterosexual or homosexual, we are not American or Russian or Indian or Arabian. We are not these bodies!

God is a person and therefore He has a personality. He has unlimited beauty, knowledge, fame, strength, wealth and independence. He is transcendental – beyond our material senses. He is always blissful, eternally. Our relationship with Him is always one of service – whether voluntary or not. Service is our eternal occupation and when it is reposed in a loving relationship with the Supreme Person we are in our constitutional position and we can enjoy equally. Service is the soul’s “religion”. It is not a faith that may change from one belief to another, but is like wetness is to water or heat is to fire – it is the essence of the soul. We will only know true happiness and peace when we return to the loving devotional service of the Supreme Personality of God.

Introduction: I'm Not This Body

Isn't that an interesting perspective? Let's stay away from any religious overtones, or undertones for that matter, while we explore what this fundamental understanding of life means. Let's also stay away from the other viewpoint that some call "science" in this day and age. After all, neither one of these views has been very successful in answering the questions human beings have been asking since time immemorial: what is the meaning of life? I say "human beings" not because they are the only living beings in the universe that matter but that this question is what separates humans from all other living entities on the actual, spiritual evolutionary path.

There were ancient cultures of this planet (and others, as well) that had a thorough understanding and social structure based upon this universal science of the constitutional position of the living entity. Of course, "living entities" might mean different things to different so-called intelligent people. Most scientists of the current age are so blinded by the very limited understanding and teachings of Darwinism that they can't even see the spiritual dimension nor accept sound philosophy and reason and they just become mental speculators. The so-called religious experts are so wrapped up in sectarianism and faith-based rituals and also reject sound philosophy and reason that they become sentimentalists or worse, fanatics.

Scientific Darwinism
Religious Sectarianism

Everyone on either side of these perspectives are basically unaware and ignorant, or at the very least forgetful, of the fact that they are not this body! All of these "isms" and many, many others fade into oblivion from the Not This Body (NTB) perspective.

If I'm not this body, what am I?

Let's go through things logically and physically:

I can point to my head and say, I'm not this head nor am I the brain inside it. It's MY head and MY brain.

I can point to my mouth and say, I'm not this mouth (even though it IS pretty big sometimes). It's MY mouth.

I can point to my arms, legs, hands, feet, eyes, ears, butt and genitals and say, I'm not any of them. They are MINE.

So, who am I? Obviously, I'm somehow everywhere in these body parts because if I pinch any of them I can feel something. Why? Because I am conscious of everything within my limited sphere of consciousness, my body. I pervade my body. Let's equate consciousness to a symptom of energy for a moment. I am the energetic source of that energy.

So, I am energy.

This energy is what gives "life" to otherwise dead, unconscious materials: water, earth, fire, air, etc., that when mixed together make up the cell structures, blood, bones and flesh of this body. But matter never becomes "alive" as much as life never dies. This is an eternal fact and no "big-bang" theory or some sentimental faith in creation of life in six days will ever refute it.

A rock or dirt or clay or water or air or space or fire or iron or magnesium or calcium or any other material, unconscious element of matter was never "alive" and never will become alive by some freak stroke of chance or "nature".

That which is living has always been living eternally and will never stop living and that which is dead or non-living will remain non-living and at best will be manifest temporarily.

So, if I'm not this body I'm not...

anything that is relative only to a body. Like,

I am not a Christian,

I am not a Jew,

I am not a Muslim,

nor am I a Hindu.

These are all bodily designations. Numerators, if you will, that can change, just as one's faith may change, above the common denominator, the consciousness or energy that is the life, the soul, of the body. Bodies change but the soul remains the same.

Religion, or faith, as designated by these relative terms, is material. The followers of a particular faith may change that faith and a Jew will become a Christian or a Hindu will become a Muslim. The religious practices, rituals, tenets and beliefs of a particular faith are all relative to the bodily designation. Therefore the religious practices end with the end of the body.

Material things, or matter, never "come alive". It is temporary in manifestation. The soul, on the other hand, never becomes non-living nor does it die nor can it be slain. It is eternal. It is not material, therefore we shall define it as spiritual.

Now, I know when we normally speak of spiritual we tend to think of God but generally in relation to some religious institution's faith-based definition even though most of the religions above have never been very forthcoming in describing who or what "their" God looks like or where He lives.

So, for now, let's refer to this spiritual thing, as opposed to material things, as Godhead.

Evolution?

Some thoughts on Evolution from the NTB perspective.

If we were all born from the apes millions and millions of years ago as the result of evolutionary mutation does that mean that on a certain day, millions and millions of years ago, a human being was born in a monkey family? And if so, why haven't we seen another human being born in a monkey family since? Why did the mutation stop? And isn't today millions and millions of years from millions and millions of years ago? Why aren't people being born to monkeys at the local zoos today?

And who did that first monkey-man or monkey-woman have sex with to create the next human being? Or did another human being happen to be born in a neighboring monkey family within the 50 or 60 year lifespan of monkey-man One and then happen to meet each other at the local watering hole and get it on?

So, all human beings came from these two, Monkey-Adam and Monkey-Eve?

Or did a certain monkey millions and millions of years ago grow up and turn into a human being and by chance meet another monkey that did the same and have sex with each other ? And just by some unbelievable odds these two incredible freaks of nature happened to live close to one another and that mutation that doesn't happen except over millions and millions of years happened to occur twice within 50-60 years within some monkey clan or monkeyhood?

Have we ever seen another species that never existed before born from the womb of a different species? Twice? Of opposite sex? And able to propagate amongst themselves to create billions of that new species?

Are we going to someday soon see another species born naturally from a human womb?

Do Evolution's mutations cease?