Higher consciousness is a characteristic of any living being that is in touch with the inner light that corresponds to the fundamental intelligence of the Universe as a whole. Dolphins, dogs, and other creatures may have this higher consciousness, even if they can’t put it into words or communicate it in other ways. It is an awareness of our connectedness to it all at the deepest level. It goes beyond the daily grind, survival tactics, fear, and anything that is ego-based.

Pure consciousness is that fundamental intelligence of the Universe of which higher consciousness is aware. It is the organizing principle behind all of life, the planets, the galaxies, and our souls. We can connect to it any time but we must “get out of our own way.” In other words, we cannot be running interference with never-ending streams of thought, usually based on anxiety, inability to be in the present moment, and a feeling of lack.

They are not the same, but they are related. One cannot exist without the other. If we are not aware of something, it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist. It just means it doesn’t exist for us. Pure consciousness keeps on being pure consciousness forever. Higher consciousness depends on who attains it, who works for it, who is able to step aside from the endless bombardments of worries and fearful thoughts.
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To the animals and other beings, higher consciousness comes naturally. They do not live fretful lives and they are connected to the Peace of the Universe (unless humans interfere, cage or abuse them). Humans, however, do need to work for this peaceful state. It takes effort to cast aside the barrage of thoughts and fears. That is why meditation, yoga, and other modalities have come to be. Sometimes higher consciousness comes spontaneously to humans, especially after “The Dark Night of the Soul.” But in general, it takes intention and effort to get there.

Socrates wasn’t a hedonist, but his student Aristippus of Cyrene, was what is known as an “ethical hedonist.” He stated that pleasure is the highest good.

Aristippus explained that hedonistic ethical egoism is the concept that everyone has the right to do everything they can to attain the greatest amount of pleasure possible to them. He also said that everyone's pleasure should far surpass their amount of pain. He came to these conclusions after sitting at Socrates’ feet and hearing his musings and stimulating questions.

Socrates never made an explicit stand against hedonism itself. He stated that knowledge is virtue (which is what brings happiness and fulfillment). He was more interested in concepts such as, “Know Thyself” and “The unexamined life is not worth living.” This could be seen as the very opposite of unthinking hedonism, in which people satisfy their every whim and desire without anything else in mind besides having fun.
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Frolicking around in an endless party doesn’t always end well, though. Ultimately, the fun will go away, and then what will we be left with if we don’t know who we truly are in the depths of our heart, inner-mind, and Soul? Gorging on food and drink, sex and riotous living is actually the opposite of what Socrates was pointing to if we want inner peace and contentment.

In a sense, we can determine that Socrates thought hedonism was self-defeating. If we are totally self-interested and seek nothing but pleasure, we are bound to fail because the appetite for pleasure is insatiable. It’s called the “paradox of hedonism.” So, although Socrates doesn’t think hedonism is bad, he just saw it as self-defeating and would never bring true happiness.

Yes. We can go about our daily lives and not notice that someone important to us is stuck in old patterns and beliefs that we have already moved beyond. If we are on a path of growth and development while they are content to stay where they are or regress, it can be a problem. We love them dearly and yet it feels frustrating to be around them.

If we try to talk to them about it, they either don’t get it or get hurt or angry—even if we approach the subject in a gentle and loving way. If we express anger because of frustration with their stuck-ness, it creates a further wedge and does not really solve the issue. If we dumb ourselves down just to get along, it also doesn’t feel good.

It can be very disruptive when we are growing, learning, and expanding into new horizons, while “the other” is mulling around in old patterns. I had a friend for over 35 years who was on my level of consciousness, adventure, and passion for life when we met. Then she got married and took on endless responsibilities of house maintenance and drudgery. She became consumed by houses, repairing them, cleaning them, and all sorts of endless activities that were not in the same creative mode that she had displayed to me for so many years in the past. They made her cranky, distracted, and anxious—testy and difficult to be around.
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I just didn’t buy into why she had to live this life of restlessness and striving while she neglected her Soul. So you can say I outgrew her. It was not a happy experience to feel as we parted. I don’t think she had any insight into why it happened. She was completely unconscious. And I had also been unconscious as it happened through the years. But when I finally woke up, it was over.

My connection to Universal Love and Divine Light has been my ultimate source of happiness since I was a small child. Many frightening things surrounded me and my parents were too ill to intervene. My caretakers at the time were corrupt, cruel, and threatening. I began my conversations with God at about the age of four and found immediate consolation. I felt the peace that was beyond my child’s brain to completely comprehend. But I felt it and it gave me great courage.
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I was able to face my emotional abusers one day at the age of five, and put an end to the oppression. As soon as I felt the courage from a Source within and outside my small, child’s body, I triumphed. I told them, in the limited vocabulary of a little girl, that their reign of terror was finished. I knew then that I was not alone. I knew I could turn to my Source and Originator, some call God, and feel the strength that was beyond my own personal power.

Being acquainted with my Source Energy gave me an underlying happiness that stayed constant through lots of turmoil. That connection has never left me. Actually, during unfortunate events this connection comes in stronger than ever for me. It is the foundation of my life’s joy and peace. And it never lets me down so I know I can trust in it.

Meditation is very simple, though people can make a big deal of it. They feel they need to surround themselves with candles, incense, beautiful music, silken clothes, and be in a completely quiet setting. Only then do they feel they can calm their minds, which is the purpose of meditation, and get in contact with their inner being that is beyond the ceaseless chattering of the mind.
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But we don’t have to make such a big deal out of meditation. We can meditate in the middle of a loud fireworks display or in a prison cell. Meditation does not require any external conditions. And we don’t need to sit in the lotus position, stand on one leg for hours, or do any other ritual to achieve the results that pure, clean meditation brings. Riding a bike, surfing, running, washing the dishes, cleaning the toilet, all these activities and more can be done in a state of meditation.
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For meditation means we are not all over the place with our mind racing between the past and the future. It is being quiet in the now, no matter what is happening around us. Other than that, there are conditions. It’s nice to have a quiet sanctuary where we can retreat and go within, undistracted by the world around us. But even there, a car alarm can go off outside, a phone can ring, someone can be shouting or playing loud music. None of these distractions, though, compare to the ceaseless churning of the mind. Just getting away from it all doesn’t stop that—an inner effort i

I began reading Lao Tsu when I was 12 years old. It planted a new a way of looking at life within me. I didn’t understand it all, only very little. But I felt what he was getting at. He was talking about The Way, the underlying principle of the Universe: The Tao. He was describing something beyond the stories I had learned from my family’s religion about the meaning of life and why things were the way they were.
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Part of the reason I couldn’t understand Lao Tsu at first was that what he addresses is difficult to put into words. It is beyond the limited concepts of the human mind. Lao Tsu hints at it. He suggests it, quietly, simply. He knows that if you think you know the answer, you haven’t really seen the immensity of It All. It is a philosophy of humility and surrendering the human need to control everything.

I was raised in a religious tradition that placed heavy judgments on sinful behavior. Also we were evaluated about how loving and pure we were. Lao Tsu was not as concerned with moral and value judgments. He wasn’t interested in judgments at all, because he saw they are human-based, relative to each culture, and are changeable. Instead, he advised us to go with the flow. Don’t resist life. Be like the river. In this way, we will find happiness and inner peace.

I could see that following the Tao, people would behave in a naturally compassionate and decent way—not because they are being judged by The Man in the Sky, but because it is the simplest way that leads to the least amount of drama and unhappiness. This gave me tremendous freedom and allowed me to break away from the frightening idea that God was watching me all the time and taking notes on how evil I was, so I could be punished later.

Wise people are humble about what they think they know and what they don’t know. They see the larger picture and realize that their minds are limited, their senses can report false information, and just because someone said it is so, maybe it isn’t.


Unfortunately, it’s the people who “know” they know all the answers that create the most suffering on this planet. Obviously, all the evil dictators that oppress and slaughter people “know they know” and will kill or torture anyone who doubts it. The wise person, understands ideas such as relativity and what is just a matter of opinion. The person who knows is inflexible and righteous in his puffed up egotism.


Certain oppressive groups of people “know” that women don’t have the capacity to be educated, that showing an ankle is a mortal sin punishable by public stoning, that certain races should be eradicated, and that singing and dancing is a sin that will take you straight to hell. This so-called knowledge is nothing but received, unexamined prejudice based on fear and dominance.


Wise people have the broad insight to see the beauty of natural individuality. They have a rich and vivid life of the imagination, spirit, and intellect. They don’t believe anything just because someone in authority said it. They examine things for themselves and come to their own conclusions. While knowledge is set in stone, wisdom is fluid, constantly growing, changing, and becoming more profound.

If you are enlightened, then your twin flame is enlightened because you are the same soul in two different bodies. Therefore, twin flames are on the same level with each other in terms of spiritual understanding.

Achieving enlightenment is not the same thing as discovering your twin flame. Meeting your twin flame may cause you to examine the spiritual aspects of life and can then take you both on that journey. But, in general, enlightenment is out of the equation. Bonnie and Clyde were twin souls and they went on a robbing and killing spree that caused a lot of distress. So enlightenment and twin flames don’t necessarily go together.

Most people on this planet right now are not enlightened. They do not look within and see their connection with the Universe or with their Eternal Souls. So wherever they are on the path, their twin soul will be exactly where they are too. The purpose of meeting our twin flames is deeply spiritual. When you feel the wonder of it, that can catapult you into understanding the unseen mysteries of life.
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Maybe you are an old soul, who has incarnated many times. Your twin flame will be on exactly the same level. Even if you live in New Jersey and your twin flame is in Australia, you really are the same soul. So it isn’t possible for one of you to be enlightened and the other one not. Both of you are One, and enlightenment has nothing to do with it. But be sure that meeting your twin flame always shakes you to your roots.

f we didn’t suffer in our bodies and our minds, we would not seek the answers that only the Spirit can bring. When we get to the point, as Eckhart Tolle did, where we just can’t live with ourselves anymore, we are forced to find a better way.

We can see that the ego-mind, with its inability to live in the present moment, is constantly seeking something to give it relief. But it can’t find it because it is the very structure of the ego mind that is the problem. This survival-based mind, with its defensiveness, desire to prove itself right, and need for more, more, and more—cannot be still.

This is how all the great thinkers and spiritual masters have evolved. If they were all living in a state of Pure Positive Energy 24/7, there would have been no impetus to leave that state of bliss. But the ego mind does not comprehend the bliss of peace. It struggles, suffers, can’t stand the present, thinks something in the future might do the trick. For a state of bliss, we need a combination of the Soul and the heart that bypasses the mind and its natural state of fear.
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Each bit of suffering we undergo can be transmuted into something profound and meaningful, if it leads to our further discovery of the truth of our Soul. That is where peace abides and nowhere else. As difficult as suffering is, it is an indicator that we can find a way out—it is not permanent and we don’t need to get lost in the misery of it. It is not the end of anything, just the beginning of our search for who we are as Eternal Souls.

Your mind is already connected to your subconscious mind, you just don’t know it. That is why it is called the sub-conscious. It is underneath your awareness and your ability to express it through words.

You can only talk about what is on your conscious mind. Techniques such as hypnosis, and certain drugs such as sodium pentathol, allow you to delve down into what has been long forgotten or repressed. There are problems with sodium pentothal, though. It’s a case of TMI (Too Much Information). It gives information in endless streams that are impossible to determine if they are fact or fiction.

Your conscious mind keeps things sorted and straight and it can actually influence the subconscious mind. This part of you is full of past lives memories and motivations, received knowledge from whatever culture you were born into, and repressed memories from this lifetime.
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The subconscious is what motivates our actions even if we think we are making rational decisions. Yet it is possible to use our conscious mind to restructure the subconscious and correct some of the patterns that don’t serve us. Techniques such as mantras and affirmations have been successful as a way of reprogramming old subconscious mental habits that run our lives forever if they are not addressed.