Faith and Beliefs Are They The Same Thing?

I have faith that a car approaching me in the opposite lane of a divided highway will stay on their side of the road.  This despite the factual belief that it can cross onto my lane and crash head on into me.

One can rediscover faith by removing it from religion and superstition … adopting it as as the best way to live in all areas of life.

faith-beliefs
Faith and beliefs are not synonymous, many different beliefs are held by people with faith.  Belief is an opinion derived by experience. Whereas faith is a conviction that requires no experience. Beliefs are derived from critical thinking through evaluating information and evidences to which one is exposed. Faith is above and separate from our minds and from critical thinking. Faith sees beliefs for what they are, limiting and limited.

As conscious Beings with awareness we can recognize the varied beliefs derived and subscribed to through human intellect. Beliefs surrounding god, nature, politics, religion, theology, money, government, race, etc. etc. All these belief systems require one to engage intellectually with personal experience or shared knowledge.

Faith requires no such conditioning. Genuine faith cannot be shaken by any belief system. Faith allows for and encourages a willingness to explore ALL beliefs. Faith allows one to quickly see beyond the limitations of any belief. Faith allows one to recognize that beliefs are prejudiced from one’s own point of view.

Faith is fair-minded treating all viewpoints equally without regard for one’s own feelings or vested interests. Faith delivers a person from the prison of beliefs and delivers an awareness that all beliefs are limiting and actually work against faith. Faith is open to all beliefs understanding that beliefs are the framework that builds societies and are adopted for harmonious living.

Faith moves one through the contradictions and complexity of human beliefs allowing the willingness to explore and confirm all beliefs in an open-minded manner knowing they are limited to those who hold to them.

By being open to all beliefs and conditioned thought patterns we encourage unity and oneness. By holding to one belief as true over another denies faith which is open oneness and completeness. Resist limiting beliefs embrace the abundance of faith.

Spirituality and The Path of Ascension

What goes on in our heads is a network of ideas and beliefs that have been formulated by our own experiences, our community, our society and our dna. What control do we exercise over our development? In Kabbalah we say we have no freedom, we are products of our environment. The only control we exercise in our own development is in the environment we put ourselves.

Chances are the person most open-minded is the person who has held many beliefs but is always questioning those beliefs. The process of asking the question is the only way to get the answer. The truth is in the question not in the answer. Any answer by definition is limited to the perspective of the individual making the conclusion.

Once we believe we have “the truth” we are done growing. Until we question our own conclusions we will stay stuck in “our truth”. Truth is in everything and in everyone; and until we can accept everyone and everything we will not obtain “the truth”. Words and arguments are so limiting and weighty, while openness and love is so empowering and rich with blessings. The minute we feel the need to defend our position we are stuck in a limited belief.

We don’t stop a belief or drop an understanding we expand our understanding to encompass more. Most of us know what it’s like to be a small child believing in Santa Claus; we still believe just in larger more encompassing way. Learn how to open your heart and mind to what others have to say, especially those who disagree with your conclusions.

This is a fabulous way to fast-track your own understanding and spiritual development, we don’t need to defend our positions because there is nothing to defend. The truth is not a belief it’s a process. A process of accepting and understanding everything and everyone with love.

Stay open and stay loving with those with whom you disagree and you’ll see the wealth of wisdom that resides inside your own consciousness. No need to fix anyone else or prove your wisdom that’s the ego talking. Your path is a process of accepting … we call it ascension or elevation where you begin to see things from a much higher point of view, a view above reason.

Using Ego as a Tool For Spiritual Growth

EGO … we are quick to assign it as a negative characteristic, yet it’s a part of who we are and it is a tool that moves us toward greater enlightenment. Our drive as humans to progress is an internal disruption, a sensation that requires resolution as our egos must know what true reality is.

How does the ego come to know the true reality? It all begins with information accumulation. As we acquire information we define it and categorize it and it becomes “our truth”, which indeed it is, but is it “the truth”?

Once it was a true reality that the earth was flat …it was truth based on all human observation and community understanding of the time. Yet today would we say that was truth? Truth is a perspective relative to our own conclusions. How do we break the hold our ego’s have on “our truth”?

The first indication of a “break-through moment” is when you ask a question within yourself that challenges your current belief. The very fact that you ask the question is evidence that you’re ready to expand your truth. “Ask and you shall receive” was the promise; the action of the request demands that the ego gets the answer.

When someone else asks you a question that challenges your current belief that’s a different situation all together. The ego now takes over all reasoning and it is set-up to defend itself at all costs. The question itself does not lead to growth … it’s whose asking it.

Are you trying to grow, ascend and become enlightened? Do you want to see and experience true peace within yourself and within the world? Sadly most people are stuck in an ego belief system that keeps them held back from such growth.

What makes us identify ourselves as a Christian or a Muslim, a Democrat or Republican, a Conservative or Liberal, the 99% vs. the 1%? These are all egocentric identifications that have deeply planted roots within our psyche defining who we are. Can you uproot these limiting conclusions without compromising your identity?

Do we really need to defend our egocentric identification with some truth? We can choose to leverage our ego; to use it as the driving factor behind uniting and connecting with those with whom we disagree. When we consciously seek to find areas of connection with those with whom we disagree we can make rapid spiritual progress toward enlightenment. We quickly start seeing things differently, more clearly, creating a loving unifying internal sensation.

When you reach a point of leveraging your ego to always being open minded you’ll discover a vast resource of reasoning that will provide you with limitless powers of comprehension and insight. You will discover a love and a connection with those with whom you disagree.

When you stop fighting to support “your idea” you see that any idea is always irrelevant to the Truth of love. We can individually ascend to this ultimate love awareness by choosing to do so. Can we as a community and as a species move to the ultimate reality of … “love thy enemy as we do ourselves”? This is “The Truth” that will set you free!

Spirituality Grows With Change … Accelerate Your Growth

What is it you and your society consider “right” and “wrong” today? Perhaps what you considered “wrong” in the not-too-distant past, you might consider it okay or “right” today. How do we know what is “right”? Do we sit in judgment of another who fails to accept our own ideas about what is “right” and “wrong”? Genuine spiritual growth requires that we evolve and change our definitions of “right” and “wrong” to include others with whom we sometimes disagree.

Changing your ideas of what is “right” and “wrong” is the path of growth. You have to be open to changing your ideas, or you will limit your own spiritual growth. Change is the process of life and growth. We have to change as our world does. Our values must change too … just think of what morality was 50 years ago with respects to child rearing and modest attire.

The problem we face individually in meeting the change requirements of life is that we insist on believing that the values we have are the “right ones”. You should of course hold onto the beliefs that serve you well, as your ideas about “right” and “wrong” are the definitions for Who You Are. But do not stay “stuck” in your present beliefs if they are not serving you. A non wed pregnant teen may not meet your ideal “right” and “wrong” scenario, always be open to changing your mental constructs about “right” and “wrong”.

NEVER require another person to define themselves according to your terms of “right” and “wrong” … NEVER allow another to define that for you either. Believing that you can or should manage the growth and expansion of others, even our own children or a spouse, is a path filled with pain for you and them. You can influence others but not actually restrict them even if you wanted to; each life goes on progressing at its own pace.

Remaining the same … or seeking to, moves against the laws of life. This is foolish, because in this struggle, life will always win out. Nothing stays the same, everything is changing. Learn to influence where you can but remain open to change your truth!

Be open to change the notions of your truth, be willing to expand your internal structures of thought. Allow the deepest truths of who you are to be altered. A new broader description and idea of Who You Are is where the growth is. When you challenge your beliefs you accelerate your own growth and experience in life. Your new ideas mean your story begins anew. A better more fulfilling you and that process and your story will never end as long as you keep living via the process of expansion by change.

Please don’t close yourself off from the possibility of new truth because you have been comfortable with an old one. Your life expands at the end of “your” comfort zone. Your being open to new “truths” is where the excitement lives, that’s where you and your relationship with life becomes more fully realized; more fulfilling, more challenging, more expansive, more joyful, more happy, more complex, more enlightened, better balanced, etc.

So if it’s music preferences … religious preferences … body piercings and tattoos … sexual orientation … sexual encounters … pregnancies and offspring … divorce and cheating … parenting and teaching … political views and associations … remember there is room in this world for every person regardless of how we define “right” and “wrong”. By our showing love in all of these malformed or right formed conclusions we expand who we are and become more like our Heavenly Father who IS LOVE …

Avoid standing in judgment of another person’s “right” and “wrong” that contradicts your own. Another person’s mistakes are their own living and growth experiences. Another person’s choices and decisions are just as important to their life experience. Allow others to grow too.

No matter how “good” you think things have been, they can be better. No matter how wonderful you think your truth is, it will be even more wonderful if you stay open to change. Expand change and grow it’s the process of living a satisfied spiritually rich life.

Judgment – Judgmental – Judging

Judgment … judgmental … judging … all these are terms that float around, they’re typically what one perceives as wrong. Well then what is wrong, or what is right … with anything? “Wrong” is a relative term, related to a previous judgment we’ve made on what we’ve decided is “right.”

Okay so now, let’s stay positive, what is “right”? Can you be objective in determining what’s right? “Right”, and wrong for that matter, are simply descriptions overlaid on events and circumstances experienced by you; and then your conclusions are added to your accumulated experiences. Your experiences are one of a kind; therefore your conclusions are based on a limited amount of data, only your experiences.

Next we seek acceptance from our own peers and community. So we’re quick to adopt our society’s truth on what’s right and wrong. Very few of our daily decisions about what is “right” and “wrong” are being made by us dealing with the facts of the moment, they are based on this accumulated intellectual structure we’ve built in our mind. Our own understanding of right and wrong.

Okay so one day you’re in a conversation with another person who has a different conclusion than you do on a certain matter. How do you respond, how do they respond when the conflict is realized? Usually we seek to straighten out the other persons view by exposing them to our conclusions.

Imagine if they were engaged in your conclusions, listening with intensity and probing with inquisitive questions, seeking to understand you. They are intrigued, asking themselves, “how could another person who’s lived and experienced life gotten it so wrong?” As they listen and probe what are they experiencing? They are growing in enlightenment, they are expanding their perceptions enlarging their spiritual comprehension.

I ask that you be the open one … you be the one to seek and understand those with whom you disagree. You be the bigger, wiser and more mature one. Your listening carefully and understanding another puts you head and shoulders above those who remain stuck in ruts of limited experiences. Those who hold rigid judgmental views are usually the ones who yell the loudest, speak the most, and are quick to condemn or belittle others.

The fastest way to enlightenment is to embrace those we condemn or whom condemn us. Embrace those with whom we disagree and the issues we fear most. The exposure to these concepts and ideas will broaden your perspective in the fastest way possible. It’s the way to reveal the light, bring your light to the darkness you perceive around you. Don’t try and fight it or hide from it … embrace it and you’ll be amazed at how fast you’ll reach a high spiritual enlightened perspective.

“There is no right or wrong there only IS” … “IS” we define it from a perspective … so expand it at every opportunity. There are a lot of opportunities in life for you to move forward at lightening speed, if you adopt a Spiritually Open Minded spirit with others. Why not start right now by examining your own history on interactions with others? Find the friend or foe who can help you expand and grow !

Spiritually Open Minded – Are You Open Minded?

Most people quick to say that they are “open minded” are usually not really that open. Sadly most religious people, we think would be the most open, are usually the least tolerant.

Every person on this planet has a unique life experience. Our spiritual views are an accumulation of every activity, every association, every experience good and bad; everyone is strongly influenced by their sphere of friends, community, family and upbringing. All this information we accumulate helps to mold and develop our perceptions. It’s this environmental influence that can also lead to our becoming “closed minded”.

Most religious people see themselves and their life conclusions as right; this is healthy, why would someone live in a way they viewed as wrong? However the true measure of being “open minded” is when we are exposed to something we disagree with. The open minded person is willing to listen and to explore another persons life conclusions without judgment and argument.

The deeper we explore, that which we disagree with, the more open-minded we become and the bigger we grow. We learn something more, understand deeper, we now have more information to refine our own positions and enlarge our own perceptions.

One is never obligated to accept any information as true or required, we maintain the right and the obligation to accept or reject any information that we are exposed too. However by refusing to to explore that with which we disagree is closing our minds to further enlightenment.

God is Love …. he loves everyone … we need to see beyond our own current human perspective. Our current perspective, which we inherited from our upbringing, may seem foolish or unfounded to those of another religion, country or culture. If such a person would just take the time to inquire and understand you and your perspective they would be all the wiser for it.

Would we be as open with someone we disagree with? Our growth comes through knowledge and understanding mainly focusing on what we don’t know or what we disagree with.

The more we investigate, the more we learn, the deeper we understand the richer and more fulfilled our lives become. We are better equipped to understand and help others. We become more loving and tolerant of other views.

We expand our ability to connect with others and we move beyond our own limited perspectives to see the world as God sees it, with Love for everyone. Read more about Spiritual Love here