Darkness is complicated. It feels heavy and exhausting. All forms of darkness flow from fear. Systems of authority control you through punishment and reward. Corporations exploit you by selling dangerous drugs, unhealthy food, and toxic media content. Spouses, parents, and friends judge you, shame you, blame you, and punish you. Schools make false promises and teach meaningless information. You are continually exploited just as you are attacked. Even as you give everything you have to hold onto a job, you never seem to have enough money.

Sometimes it feels as if you don’t belong in this world. You blame yourself for not fitting-in. You look around and believe that others are doing fine. They aren’t. Everybody is lying to each other because we are scared.

Light is easy. It feels effortless yet contains infinite energy. All forms of light flow from love. Love is a higher form of vision. It is a seeing of other souls and all existence beyond the level of form. It is a looking past the waves and knowing the depth of the ocean. It is an awareness that what is real cannot be changed or threatened. Nothing that is real about us can be lost or taken away from us. There is no lack of anything, therefore we are free to give everything. Giving and receiving is the basic functioning of life.

Darkness cannot be undone with the values and tactics of darkness. Only light can abolish darkness and it does so in an instant. Darkness only seems real in our lives because we believe in it. Now we put our faith in light and we no longer see the darkness. We continue tomorrow and each day after that.

Whenever light enters darkness, the darkness is abolished. A Course in Miracles

All human relationships are inherently sacred and have the potential to lift us up. When we fail to see this—choosing instead to respond to a brother or sister with superficiality, judgment, suspicion, or with any form of resistance—we are making the tragic mistake of choosing failure and depression instead of liberation and abundance.  

What would happen if, instead, we were to open our hearts and our minds to each other in faith that every interaction with everyone is sacred?

When we meet every human interaction with total acceptance and total honesty, what always happens (as Michael S. Singer points out in his book Untethered Soul) is that we become filled with positive energy and inspiration that never fades. Open heart. Open mind. Feel the energy flow.

When we then orient ourselves toward service and value-creation, what always happens is that we experience wealth and abundance. Only by creating value for others does value return to us. Money isn’t the source of value; only a storage container. The source of value is our willingness and ability to practice perfect love in our relationships (even our challenging business relationships). Love is giving and serving—which of course is value creation.

You want to feel good, you want to succeed, and you want to be happy. The simple truth is, you can’t do it alone. Isolation is hell. Union is heaven. Salvation is the act of meeting each human relationship with perfect love. This is the purpose behind the “I Am by Infobeing” mobile app experiment. Join the community to practice this relationship yoga with others who share the same purpose.

We continue tomorrow and each day after that.

Image by Jo Sam.

Reality is not necessarily what we see because so much of what our senses perceive are the makings of the human mind. While we may call this “reality”, the truth is that what is man-made is the stuff of dreams and illusions.

First there is the man-made material realm, which we have filled with products, machines, buildings, décor, devices, things – all manifestations of the human mind. Our creative minds take the stuff of nature and transform it into the stuff of society. While everything in this man-made realm may be real in the sense that you can see it, touch it, taste it, and use it, it is also true that everything man-made was dreamed into existence. These are only ideas brought to the realm of form – illusions.

Then there are the immaterial makings of man: money, rules, laws, customs, standards of behavior. We have been conditioned to believe that this is reality, yet again these are only ideas – words written in a book and violently enforced. Here there is no reality or truth.

Then there is this other category of reality that we acknowledge only occasionally: nature. Next time you find yourself worried about money, about something you shouldn’t have done, about something in the future that may or may not happen – if you start to believe that any of this is real, just contemplate a blade of grass. Do our worries matter to a blade of grass?

So what is the real world? The illusions we have created? Nature? What is truth? The ideas forced upon us by authority and thoughtlessly accepted by most people? Or is truth to be found somewhere else? Perhaps in the energy of love? Or in the pure consciousness of a baby?

Truth is that which is unchanging. Nothing that takes physical form is truth because it is unstable and changing. Truth, on the other hand, is that which cannot be threatened, is beyond time, and does not change. Truth is in the realm of the unmanifested, the nothingness, the realm of consciousness, spirit, love, God. We continue tomorrow and each day after that.

To feel burdened and unfree because of a life situation, a job, a relationship, or for any reason at all is to falsely perceive what is not there. It would be impossible for anyone to take away your perfect freedom if you did not first make an agreement that allowed them to do so.

Free will is a choice about whether to be free. This is a choice made by you and by you alone. Others may attempt to manipulate you – putting you in chains for their own perceived gain. But the decision to make the chains real is entirely up to you.

What prevents us from living freely? Only fear. We fear future consequence and we fear letting go of the familiar. Others have certainly conspired to make the fears real, but these thoughts and emotions can never be more real than we agree to make them.

Today, we look in truth and see that there are no chains. We are free, perfect, and complete – just as we have been since the day we were born. We continue tomorrow and each day after that.

While filmed during the summer of 2018, Treetops documents a lifestyle and way of thinking that is highly relevant in the new world of 2020. Simplifying your life is no sacrifice at all; rather, an opportunity to end your suffering and experience life in a joyful new way. 

Watch the film on Amazon Prime.

The full film is also available for free on YouTube:

The word “freedom” scares some people, just like the word “God” turns off others. In truth, freedom means the same thing as consciousness, presence, enlightenment, and God. Freedom without atonement (another word), without inner peace, without awareness of your true self is impossible and means nothing. Today we look past the word and look more deeply at freedom.

If you are in a job where you are forced to be in a specific environment—where you must behave in a way that is inauthentic for 40 hours a week or more—it will be very difficult for you to experience a spiritual awakening. You need to be free to feel good, to meditate, to exercise, to go for a walk, to chase an idea, to start a new venture, to meet someone for a conversation, to read, write, or play music.

If you depend upon one employer for your income, you are not free. You are placing your faith not in your ability to create value through service and creation, not in the abundance of the universe that is possible if you are aligned with love, not in spirit, nor in yourself, nor in God. You have chosen to seek safety and protection from an employer, and for this you have sacrificed a great deal. This is a house without a foundation. Companies fail, they get acquired, and your job might be outsourced or automated. Your freedom is worth too much to exchange for this false sense of safety.

Work is always necessary, but the goal and purpose of work is maximum income in minimum time. Work is not about sitting in an office pretending, living in fear of losing your job. Employment is beneficial and useful for a time to help us gain skills. Beyond that, it becomes crippling. Peace, joy and happiness through enlightenment requires freedom.

You can take the first step toward breaking free by reading the “4-Hour Workweek” by Tim Ferriss. Learn to produce value in the way that you choose to, for the reasons you understand. Learn to serve many companies and many people. Earn income from multiple sources. The source of value and abundance in your life is the love within you. Love is giving, serving, creating. Learn to channel it wisely and earn maximum income.

Most of us find ourselves in a relationship or a job in which we are not entirely free. This is an essential part of life experience and a wonderful opportunity for growth. You can still find peace and joy by going to the present moment. But ultimately, we all dream of more—total abundance and the freedom to live in alignment with truth. This is what we are learning. We continue tomorrow and each day after that.

There is nothing that the soul can possess. Perhaps more interesting—there is nothing that even the body can possess. This pursuit of “getting” is a phantom and an impossibility from the start.

What can the body receive other than visions, sounds, food and water? The body is not designed to “have” anything because there is nowhere inside of us to put it or keep it. The body can receive only that which is experienced in the now. Sensory perception is the full extent of our capacity to get, receive, possess.

Life is sensory perception—a state of being, not having. Any illusion of having requires external protection of something that forever remains external to us. Property must be locked-up and is never entirely secure. Money must be stored somewhere, and its value is unstable. Status, success, physical appearances—all completely unstable and impermanent. We never possess a single thing—not even on the level of the body and not even for a day.

It is untrue that having more makes us happier. Everything we attempt to have requires some degree of effort, sacrifice or struggle. Large houses must be cleaned. Cars must be safely parked somewhere. New clothes must be stored. Gadgets unpackaged. Career or status requires great sacrifice.

Even “having children” or “having a spouse” can cause worry, struggle, and frustration if you believe that it is possible to “have” another person. This is jealousy. To end the feeling of jealousy, know only that having is impossible.

This pursuit of having, this chasing of an eternally-elusive phantom, is the root of our worldly frustration. Minimalism is not a sacrifice—it is the only possibility of happiness. Anything that exists in our life situation on the level of external form is only valuable to the extent that it enhances our state of being.

Go even deeper and realize that you are not body; rather soul. It is impossible for the body to possess—and you do not possess your body. We exist, together, in the eternal present moment on the level of the soul. We continue tomorrow and each day after that.

To imagine a loveless miracle is to misunderstand both miracles and love.

What do you imagine when you think of miracles? Perhaps physical healing? The miracle of life? Winning the lottery?

It would be impossible for a person to heal while in a state of fear. Love is the opposite of fear, the antidote to all suffering and the source of all healing. Child birth is only a miracle if the child is brought into a world where love and beauty is possible. And if a great fortune is given to a person who does not know self-love, that fortune will likely only fund self-destructive behavior and lead to misery.

Love is the source of all miracles, or as A Course in Miracles beautifully states:

The real miracle is the love that inspires them. Miracles are everyone’s right, but purification is necessary first.

Purification is the escape the ego. That is what we are learning here. We continue tomorrow.

Everything that comes from love is a miracle. A course in Miracles : Combined Volume

Paper art by Zuzana Jurekova