HEAVEN IS …

As a coach relying much on the study and personal practice of “energy psychology” I have had to re-think a lot of religious concepts in terms of my own experience rather than tradition. After some time exploring the tenets of Sylvia Hartmann’s Sanctuary Project. I have begun to re-vision “heaven” as a place where Divine Providence allows ample time and space for us to become “all we can be.”

A Jewish theologian has called our race “homo imaginus,” a people of the imagination. Surly it is that imagination in its creative and self-reflective potential is a human attribute that sets us apart as spiritual beings. We believe that “what we can conceive we can achieve.” Is this our vanity speaking or is this the fulfillment of our place in creation?

Let us take a look here at “faith,” being the evidence of things unseen. Jesu said if we had faith we could move the mountain. Perhaps it is the mountain of our inability to imagine a thing that he is speaking of. Surly people scoffed at Eddison when he shared his vision of the incandescent light. Yet it was real in his imagination, real enough to carry him through the discovery of the 999 ways it wouldn’t work and into the realm of manifestation where even the eyes of the skeptics were opened to a new reality.

One philosopher declared imagination IS reality. Consider the words of an English novelist: “We see things not as they are, but as we are.” Psychology can now show us with certainty that we are incapable of perceiving things as they are due to the filters of our conditioning and judgments as well as the limitations of the 5 senses. Perhaps this is why Jesu asked us not to judge and not to be bound by the literalism of the word, for it kills.

The spirit gives life, and we see that life’s guidance – from the Holy Spirit - comes in the form of visions and dreams and demonstrations of phenomenon that shake up our conditioned ideas of reality and bring us face to face with the apparent miraculous. And yet is it a miracle we see? Jesu said of these things he did, that we could do them as well and even greater things. Perhaps they are not miraculous but simply the activity of a mature child of G-d … an entity by the way, which we are expected to become.

How then should we begin to cultivate our future divine natures, and to what end? We begin simply enough by belief and let go of all unbelief. Yet this is easier said than done so we learn as all children learn … by imagining it first. As to what end … perhaps it is to become co-creators with Jesu in the formation of a world under the reign of heaven and the power of Holy Spirit.

And what could such a Spirit driven Heaven manifesting reality appear like?

There is a link between our thought and our body. It is this link that explains psychosomatic illness, various kinds of suggestion, and some instantaneous reversals of illness. When we have verified this connection with ourselves, it is not a huge step to consider that there is a link between mind and matter in general. This is for me what the vision of life in Heaven is like and is then translated exactly as the Lord offered in the formula of prayer … “Thy will be done, on Earth, as it is (envisioned) in heaven. Heaven then is a state of mind that eventually creates what we call sense-based reality.

This state of mind is not a “place” we go to and certainly we do not have to wait until death to enter it. It is as close as our ability to dream and like a lucid dream – having its own autonomy; being unlike my ordinary fantasy life – I can commune with, participate with, an intelligence greater than my own conscious desire.

So are you beginning to get an idea of heaven being larger than what you were told? Here are some of the things I see:

First of all, heaven is both unique to each of us and yet also shared – there are many mansions as Jesu said. Yet it is perhaps more intimate, like each of us dwelling in connecting apartments. We are never far apart, only a thought and a step away.

In heaven all whom I have ever loved are as near as my hearts desire.

In heaven I create what is needful by intention by the innate power of the spiritual gift – a gift I may not understand yet never fails.

In Heaven the tongues of angels are mine and words do it no justice for feelings are the language and like a picture are worth a thousand words.

In heaven the pleasures like the beauty of this world are magnified for this world is constrained by the limitation of five limited senses. I can here smell colors and taste a caress.

If I desire to know a thing, there are those to help me learn and messengers to rely upon simply for the asking.

All the majesty of worlds now inconceivable is now available to form shelter and nourishment and satisfy an inventive curiosity.

Space shrinks or expands at will and time runs backwards if I please that I may fill in blanks to my history/story, or erase any scene I wish to rewrite like any author would, all in the service of beauty.

This is a place of perfect safety, and any fears of demons lurking in dark corners are soothed by the knowledge they have only the presence and power you give them.

Here to my heart is an open book to those I choose to share myself with and there is room enough inside for all who would enter.

And here to heal another all I need do is heal myself of the false belief of separation and every act will be a healing one.

All here is but a divine energy and is alive as you are and thus there is no other, no loneliness, no separation between thee and G-d.

Here you will come to a great peace that whatever path you walk it is done without error for your perfection is ordained and your spirit held in the world to come awaiting your completion of the journey.

Here you find the law of relationship as Love is satisfied in celebration of uncreated and indefatigable Joy. Truly this is a paradise, which leaves no good thing unfulfilled if you but wish it.

For me this is a vision greater than streets of gold or crystal cathedrals. How about you? Perhaps today is a good day to begin living it.

Arjay