by Mark Pitstick MA, DC

If you’ve not already, please read . . .

  1. ‘The Great News‘ (article #19 at SoulProof.com/Articles)
  2. ‘Eight Developments for Widespread Conscious Living Now’ (#125)
  3. Greater Reality LIVING Program: Integrating ‘The 8 Developments’ Into Your Daily Life (#72)
  4. Greater Reality HEALING Program: Journeying FROM Deeply Grieving TO Brightly Shining (#82)

The evidence-based information and holistic resources outlined in these articles will help you to:

  • realize your true nature as an eternal being of consciousness / life-force / energy 
  • receive guidance and assistance from highly evolved energies and Source / The Light
  • heal old wounds, release lower energies, and update erroneous teachings
  • create the greatest life YOU have envisioned (YOU = your higher self / soul)
  • help others by sharing your greatest gifts
  • make our world a better place

As enough people do this, widespread personal and planetary change will naturally unfold. 

 

Enlightenment

In my early twenties, I heard about the concept of enlightenment through yoga and meditation classes, and popular authors who bridged East and West such as Ram Dass, Ken Keyes, and Alan Watts.  Those views shared some common themes with my Lutheran upbringing.  However, this new information emphasized my role and responsibility in awakening; Source Energy was viewed as a never-ending and totally loving fount of love for ‘the just and the unjust’.

Becoming enlightened seemed a monumental task for a twenty-something who didn’t yet know what he wanted to be when he grew up.  I doubted I would reach that exalted state during this earthly experience, but hoped I would after another one hundred of so times around the wheel of incarnations.

Christian and Hindu teachings were partly responsible for enlightenment seeming so unattainable by the average person.  Their robes, rituals, and ornate trappings conveyed the message that ministers and yogis were somehow special.  They knew the truth about God and life, and would share it with us for a nominal fee.  Someday, maybe, if the rest of us worked and prayed really hard and long, we could be ‘in the know’ like them.

Forty-five years later, I see that enlightenment – seeing the big picture of life and living accordingly – isn’t difficult.  To the contrary, it’s easy, natural, and childlike. 

Before sharing my views about this, I’ll define what I mean by enlightenment.  Some synonyms are awakening, seeing the light, being saved from ignorance / darkness, and understanding the meaning of life.

A breakdown of that includes a deep knowing that you and everyone else:

  1.  are much more than your body.
  2. continue living after your human form dies.
  3. are integral, infinite, eternal, and beloved parts of Source Energy / Creator right now.
  4. will see your ‘departed’ loved ones someday and can do so now
  5. have everything you need to know and show – in every moment and no matter what is going on around you – who you really are
  6. receive assistance and guidance from sources variously described as angels, guides,     master teachers, and higher energies
  7. already know all this within; as such, understanding the nature of reality is more a       process of remembering versus learning
  8. create how heavenly or hellish your life feels by your predominant thoughts, words and deeds.
  9. are sacredly interconnected with all people, animals, and nature.
  10. have special purposes for experiencing being on this planet now.
  11. can have a series of different and perhaps simultaneous life experiences.

Looking back, I see how past traditions tried to explain this to people.  It can seem so complex until you see the light.  As Meher Baba said, “To attain union with God is so impossibly difficult because it is impossible to become what you already are!”

Here are some paraphrased statements from my early religious teaching that helped . . .

– Ask and you shall receive, knock and it will be opened to you.

– Unless you become like a child, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.

– I and the Father are one, and so are you.

– His eye is on the sparrow and I know he watches me.

– Do you have ears that hear and eyes that see?

Until you glimpse the greater reality of life, these statements can seem paradoxical or even nonsensical.

The following quotes from different religions were very helpful for me to ‘get’ the great news:

◆   Hinduism: “God bides hidden in the hearts of all.”

◆   Shintoism: “Do not search in distant skies for God.  In man’s own heart is He found.”

◆   Sikhism: “Why wilt thou go into the jungles?  What do you hope to find there?  Even as   the scent dwells within the flower, so God within thine own heart ever abides.  Seek Him with earnestness and find Him there.”

◆   Christianity: “The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: neither shall they say,   “Lo, here! Or, lo there! For, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.”

◆   Confucianism: “What the undeveloped man seeks is outside; what the advanced man      seeks is within himself.”

The great news is sprinkled throughout the Bible and other scriptures among a lot of sleep-inducing verbiage .  That news includes . . .

  • Genesis 1: 27 stating, “So God created man in his own image…”
  • Psalms 82:6 stated, “I have said, ye are Gods; and all of you are children of the most High.”
  • I Corinthians 3:16, the apostle Paul asked, “Know ye not that ye are a temple of God, and that the spirit of God dwelleth in you?”
  • Ephesians 4:6 St. Paul said, “One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.” (Emphasizing the word ‘all’ four times in one sentence makes our oneness with Source pretty clear.)

Over the last 50 years, I’ve helped many people in hospitals, pastoral counseling settings, suicide prevention centers, mental health centers, and holistic health care clinics.  All this has given me a keen understanding about what keeps people in spiritual amnesia.  Common blocks to realizing who you really are – and recommended articles at SoulProof.com to address those – include:

  1. Abuse while young whether it was mental, physical, and/or sexual.This trauma can    twist the mind, harden the heart, and make the great news above seem like wishful   thinking.  See article #49: When You Have Been Abused.
  2. Bizarre teachings about a vengeful, fearsome, and judging Creator.Article #13: What Is G.O.D. Really Like?
  3. Even more schizoid teachings that a Creator of unfathomable love would allow any of “His” children to suffer in a fiery hell forever.(I use quotation marks around ‘His’ because    the Creator and Sustainer of All Life is beyond gender. Also, such teachings about hell only make sense in a patriarchal system; what good mother would even think of such a thing?)
  4. Believing that you are, by nature, a lowly sinner who is weak and needs saved. Article             #15: The True Nature of Humans
  5. Not being in touch with why you are on earth at this time.Article #21: Identify and Fulfill       Your Soul’s Missions

Learning more accurate information about these areas can rekindle your inner light and help you feel closer to life.  Then you can enjoy the journey of enlightenment and realize the truth of the statement: it’s all good, it’s all God.

Other statements that helped me see past the illusion of death and separateness include:

  • In Wisdom of the Ages, Wayne Dyer said, “If God is everywhere, then there is no place that God is not. And this includes you.  Once you connect to this understanding, you regain the power of your very source.  Rather than seeing yourself as separate from the miraculous power of God, you claim your divinity and reclaim all the potency that God is.  You are a principal work, a fragment of God Himself.”
  • In Discover The Power Within You, Unity minister Eric Butterworth stated, “You can never be separated from God because you are an expression of God, the self-livingness of God.”
  • Speaking of the Source, Alfred Tennyson wrote: “Closer is He than breathing and nearer than hands and feet.”
  • The Christian mystic St. John of the Cross said: “Oh, then, soul most beautiful among all the creatures, so anxious to know the dwelling place of your Beloved that you may go in quest of Him and be united with Him, now we are telling you that you yourself are his dwelling… his secret chamber and hiding place.”

Awakening to how wonderful and safe life is will be easier after official announcements of scientific proof of life after death.  Those will be followed by demonstrations of the first inter-dimensional communication technology and client sessions.  All this will augment faith and knowing.  To learn more, visit SoulPhone.com.

One key to enlightenment is really knowing that death of the earthly form is not the end of life.

In the past, much confusion and many concerns existed about whether life after death existed.  And if it did, what was the nature of it?  Evidence-based answers to those questions are pivotal in how we live and treat one another.  Historically, there have been three basic views about the afterlife:

A. Life Does NOT Continue After Bodily Death

  1. life is a random process, a freak and transient result of biological processes
  2. the only value of people, animals, plants is their temporary benefit to how long and how well you live during this earthly experience

B. Life After Death Exists as a Wonderful Heaven or Fiery Hell

  1. quality of your eternity based on judgment by huge deity
  2. certain denominations believe that only a small percentage of humans will attain heaven
  3. the rest are doomed to a fiery eternal hell forever
  4. these disbelievers are, then, of little value since they will fry for eternity anyway
  5. a conscious or unconscious justification can be made to make them slaves, mistreat, etc.
  6. those who aren’t on ‘the way true path’ aren’t worthy of respect and love unless they ‘get saved’ and join that belief system
  7. people live in fear of ‘making the cut’ and live in ways they think they will get them to heaven versus hell
  8. this results in high individual and collective levels of fear, hopelessness, guilt, and other lower energy emotions and ways of being

C. Life After Death Exists AND . . .

  1. universal salvation exists, that is, everyone has the opportunity to experience heavenly states of being now and in the afterlife
  2. Heaven is primarily a high level of consciousness characterized by love, peace, joy, gratitude, enlightenment and other higher energy emotions and ways of being. Heaven is also how you feel each day and during your life review as you see and feel the ripples from your thoughts, words, and deeds toward yourself and others.  From this level of awareness, one realizes their inherent oneness with Creator and all life.  This wonderful state of being can be experienced whether living on earth or the next phase of life.  Knowing and showing all this – even a little more than before – has been termed enlightenment, awakening, seeing the light, being saved, realizing the great news that sets you free, etc.
  3. Hell is the opposite of heaven and is characterized by lower energy emotions such as hate, anger, bitterness, fear, hopelessness, guilt, etc. This level of being results in a hellish level of life whether on earth or beyond.  However, upgrading one’s consciousness is always an open-ended possibility.  G.O.D., angels, etc. always assist, guide, and love.  However, those living in a hellish state of mind may not believe or detect this.

Again, it’s much easier to be aware of and follow your inner guidance when you know that (C.) is the most accurate understanding of the afterlife.  Many seniors have shared with me that religious teachings about a fearful God and fiery hell never made sense to them as a child.  That’s one reason why it’s said ‘unless you become like a child . . . ‘  It’s important to trust your heart and inner knowing.  Awakening is also aided by regularly appreciating the beauty of nature, following your joy, and sharing your greatest gifts and love.  When you do that, even a little more, life seems more heavenly.  It becomes a positive spiral day by day.

Four keys for enhancing your personal experience of heaven now and always include:

  1. Fine-tune your body and brain so you can better see, feel, hear, and know the great news that sets you free.See articles #12 Holistically Fine-Tuning Yourself, #54 The 90 Day Program, #87 Natural Health Care, and #88 Whole Food Way of Eating and Supplements.
  2. Regularly use prayer, meditation, yoga, time in nature, centering practices, and sharing your greatest gifts to others.Articles #51 Meditation and Relaxation Techniques, #77 Centering Practices, #21 Identify and Fulfill Your Highest Purposes, #89 My Prayers.
  3. Find kindred spirits and one or more spiritual centers.This will expand your circle of  more love and service-based people with open minds and hearts.  Article #66 Optimal Relationships for Evolved People.
  4. Trust your sacred experiences that show you the way.Article #17: Internalize Your Spiritually Transformative Experiences

I have to smile when I see the amount of time, energy, and money people spend on superficial pursuits.  And then they wonder why they can’t cope with life’s changes and challenges.  They sometimes blame the devil or even Creator for the quality of their lives instead of taking responsibility for creating it.

I don’t judge, but I do encourage you to not ‘major in the minors’ during this earthly experience.  I encourage you to ‘seek first the kingdom’ and realize that exalted level of being is just waiting for you to claim it.  The more you understand the nature of reality and live authentically, the more you will experience high levels of peace, joy, love, and more.

*       *       *       *       *       *       *

Thank you for telling others about this article!  Your life, and that of others around you, will be more enriched when you:  

  1. read the article again so you really know it.
     
  2. discuss with close family and friends to more deeply internalize it.
     
  3. take action steps that seem right for you.
     
  4. share it with others via social media, discussion groups, and other ways.

Hugs, love, blessings, and let it shine!
Mark

Mark Pitstick, MA, DC
author, lecturer, counselor, and holistic chiropractic physician; spokesperson, research assistant, and strategic planner for the SoulPhone Project; founder of Greater Reality Living, Healing, Helping, and Sharing Programs

SoulProof.com    SoulPhone.org   GreaterRealityPrograms.com

Mark Pitstick, MA, DC is a master’s clinical psychologist, holistic chiropractic physician, and clinical nutritionist.  He has also helped others in pastoral counseling and suicide prevention / education settings.  His goal is to help you know and show that this earthly experience is a totally safe, meaningful, and magnificent adventure amidst eternity. 

To learn more about the Greater Reality LIVING, HEALING, HELPING, and SHARING Programs, visit ‘Greater Reality Programs’ top tab at SoulProof.com and SoulPhone.org.  Also see  articles #19, 72, 82, 119, 122, and 125 at SoulProof.com/Articles.

SoulProof.com provides many FREE resources:

  • 8 e-books Radiant Wellness, Soul Proof, The Eleven Questions, Greater Reality Living, The Big Picture of Life, The Afterlife Evidence, Ask the Soul Doctor, and Shining Light Parents Speak
  • 10 audio programs Holistic Breathing; Afterlife Contact; Ask Your Soul, Angels, and The Light; Pre-Birth Planning; Identify and Fulfill Your Purposes AND Enjoy Your Greatest Life; Your Life Review; Appreciate, Realize, and Transform; Love, Acceptance, and Forgiveness; Past Life Regression; Heal and Transform Your Suffering
  • 4 audio books (Greater Reality Living, Soul Proof, Radiant Wellness, and Shining Light Parents Speak; we don’t have control over the others)
  • 125 Articles (as of 3/1/25) answering the most commonly asked questions and providing holistic solutions for your toughest challenges
  • 25 Radio Shows: interviews with experts on consciousness, afterlife, and creating an optimal earthly experience. These include Wayne Dyer, Brian Weiss, Anita Moorjani, Raymond Moody, Michael Newton, Caroline Myss, and others. 
  • 27 Videos on different pages
  • Monthly newsletters (subscriber sign-up at bottom of each website page)

Instead of payment, he asks that you: (1) fully use and appreciate the products, (2) share them with others, and (3) help others in ways you feel called, that is, pay it forward.

The following are also available for a fee:

  • 8 printed books Radiant Wellness, Soul Proof, The Eleven Questions, Greater Reality Living, The Big Picture of Life, The Afterlife Evidence, Ask the Soul Doctor, and Shining Light Parents Speak
  • Coaching / Counseling Sessions with Dr. Pitstick by Zoom to gain answers to your biggest questions and holistic solutions to your toughest challenges.

Note: This article is intended as a reference source, not to replace professional treatment for physical, emotional, or mental problems.  The author disclaims any liability arising directly or indirectly from the voluntary use of action steps discussed in article. 

I created this article while ‘wearing the hat’ of a clinician, counselor, and educator.  My statements are based upon some scientific research; much clinical and experiential evidence; my personal experiences; and my best current understandings.  This program does not reflect my roles with the SoulPhone Project since those require solid scientific data for all statements.