An Exclusive Interview With Bill Missett, Author, Awakening the Soul
By Bob Yehling, editor, WordJourneys.com
Bill Missett has spent the past 40 years of his life investigating, exploring and uncovering truth—and then telling people about it. For 25 years, he was the editor of The Blade-Tribune (now The North County Times), a North San Diego County daily newspaper that played journalism by the rules—the old rules. Under Missett's direction, The Blade-Tribune became not only a bastion of good journalism, but a breeding and training ground for talent. Former B-T staff members went on to become top-notch magazine journalists, authors, top writers and photographers at major metro newspapers; one, Kirk MacDonald, has been a chief executive with Hearst Newspapers and the Denver Post.
In 1992, Missett retired and moved to an idyllic hideaway on the Mexican coast with his wife, Patrice. He plunged fully into his soul's calling—a deep relationship with Spirit and how it works with other souls. He'd been learning, studying, practicing and teaching forms of meditation and the spiritual way of life for 15 years. As he ran a restaurant in Mexico, another soul call hit him—to write a book that showed people how to awaken their souls. Several years and 900 pages later, Missett realized that the Awakening the Soul project would be not one, but three books.
We interviewed Bill Missett from New York, where he was preparing to embark on his first speaking engagements in advance of the full release of Awakening the Soul.
Bookstand: You had a moment that accelerated your arrival on the spiritual path—the near-drowning experience 25 years ago. I've heard moments like this described as a "brick on the head." Do you feel that, because of the busy-body lives we lead in this society, it takes such traumatic experiences for us to "wake up" and start heading toward our divine nature?
Bill Missett: It is not only our busy, hectic lives which interfere with our spiritual awareness and perception, but the parental, religious, cultural and societal programming we have all been exposed to practically since infancy. Sometimes a good smack on the head is necessary to break through that wall of programming and the distractions we all experience to open awareness of our divine potential. However, I believe my book offers a much more gentle solution to this difficult obstacle—a practical method of reprogramming the Ego's responsibilities and of consciously involving your Soul in your everyday activities. This effortlessly brings your divine nature into your everyday life, and brings you the gift of knowing your divinity with a minimum of external interference. Awakening the Soul replaces the brick in the head with a much kinder method of getting your attention.
Q: You did something very interesting here—the third book in your magnum opus trilogy on spiritual awakening and soul awakening is the first to be published. Why is that?
A: When the instructions for my Soul and Ego that form the core of Book 3 arrived in my meditations, I knew this was what I had to write about. But I also knew that before I could advise people how to restore their spiritual nature, I first had to convince them that they actually possessed a spiritual nature. I had a great deal of information about our spiritual nature, gathered for a planned weekly newspaper column on personal spirituality. That material and much more went into the first part of the book. There is so much confirming evidence of our spiritual nature it is amazing that we have ignored it for so long. This is primarily because we have considered all the parts of the puzzle separately, instead of looking at the evidence as a mosaic of our lives. Once you step back and look at the evidence as a whole, our true spiritual nature comes instantly into focus.
I also realized that I needed to show how we had lost awareness of our spiritual nature. The extensive research into that subject became the second portion of the book. It is the most shocking part of the Awakening The Soul trilogy, because I discovered that the primary reason we are so out of touch with our spiritual nature is because of its suppression by Western Religions, primarily Christianity. Then came the third section of the book, which was how to restore awareness of our spiritual nature. When completed, it was a huge text, more than 800 pages. After presenting it to numerous literary agents, I was advised that it was unlikely that any major publisher would accept it because of its size. At the same time, several people close to me said, "You have two or three books in there."
Also at the same time, literary agents were advising me that the third part – the restoration process – was most needed now. So I excised the last five chapters from the manuscript, added an extensive personalized introduction, and Bingo! – I had a stand-alone book. Book 1, subtitled Realizing Our Spiritual Nature is complete, and will follow next year. Book 2, subtitled Our Lost Spiritual Heritage needs a little more work, and is planned for release in 2004.
Q: Your awakening the soul meditation is very profound. As you were guided into this practice, and later assembled it for readers' consumption, what precepts did you consider to be most important to convey?
A: I really never chose which parts seemed most important, nor did I consciously select portions to stress to readers. It was obvious from the beginning that this process was being given to me to convey to others, and I did so with total discernment and clarity. I simply followed my intuition and the instructions as they came to me. The instructions came in two primary parts; an initiation process, and a daily invocation which allows the Soul Awakening process to mature. After the instructions were fully received, it became obvious that a preparation process was necessary before anyone should engage the initiation or invocation instructions. I was guided to understand what preparations would be necessary to lay the groundwork for engaging the process. It involves spiritual housecleaning to rid ourselves of the mental and emotional garbage we have stored away, which interferes with enlightenment. I was also guided to understand what immediate life changes would occur as a result of using the Soul Awakening process daily, and what long-term awakenings of our spiritual nature might occur. These aspects became various chapters surrounding the core instructions. When you realize that all those events we call "mystical" are really just aspects of our normal spiritual nature, – Awakening The Soul: Book 3: Restoring Your Spiritual Nature is basically an instruction book, but one containing an extraordinary spiritual tool.
Q: We're in an interesting time, a period of darkness after one dawn (Age of Aquarius) and before another. Yet, I get the sense this is a necessary rise of darkness, evil and warmongering in order to point out to us the folly of materialism and the urgency of connecting with God. What are the most important pieces of inner work that people can be doing to come to grips with the world today and come to grips with themselves?
A: Look at the sources of most of the darkness and warmongering in the world. What is causing most of it? The shocking answer is that much of the evil in the world is being perpetrated in the name of Religion. It's Catholics versus Protestants in Northern Ireland, Muslims versus Hindus in Kashmir, Muslims versus Jews in the Middle East, on and on around the world. Organized religions have become a major problem on Earth, and it is time for each of us to act on our own to solve this difficult problem. We can do just that. If everyone would Awaken their Soul, peace on Earth would reign. You cannot entertain darkness, evil or war when you Awaken your Soul and realize that we are all brothers and sisters, we are all equally divine children of God/Goddess, and that he/she lives through each of us. You cannot consciously host the presence of God/Goddess in your Soul and act negatively.
Q: Your background is intriguing: a no-nonsense newspaper editor whose job required healthy skepticism of the status quo and of what subjects of stories said to you and your reporters. Yet, you moved into a very unprovable (in material terms, at the time) field, in spirituality and metaphysics, that requires a layer of deep trust in Divine Source throughout. How did you reconcile the two?
A: I never had to reconcile the two. My training as a skeptical newspaper editor helped eliminate anything that did not ring true, and helped confirm everything that was true. It facilitated cutting through the chaff to get to the truth of the heart of the matter. The primary reason spirituality and metaphysics have been considered unprovable in the past is because we have never before looked at all "psychic phenomena" as a whole, nor with the one simple, common answer to those "mysteries"—that they are collectively a portrait of our spiritual nature. I think you can prove all aspects of both metaphysics and spirituality if you simply shift your perception to that view. As far as trusting the channeled information, when Spirit speaks through you, it eliminates all doubt about the reality and validity of the experience.
Q: In your introduction, you made a very interesting point about how, with increasing time spent meditating and connecting with the Divine, the physical body changes along with the other bodies—mental, emotional and spiritual. How did this happen for you?
A: I became much healthier, guided to appropriate natural or herbal solutions for whatever ailed me. I havenêt suffered any lasting illness (even colds) for about six years now since I serendipitously discovered colloidal silver. I have also conquered most of my physical ailments with the Five Tibetan Rites. The only thing hanging on is allergies, and Iêm working on them with traditional Mexican herbs and aromatherapy.
Q: Using Awakening The Soul as a guidepost, how does someone move into vocation or practice of their higher calling when it becomes apparent that the tried-and-true way of doing things is neitherãand they're scared to death of moving on?
A: When using the Awakening The Soul processes, two things will occur. First, you will discover great trust in the process, because it may be the most valid experience you have had in life. Secondly, when you devote yourself to the process, doors will open in your life to accommodate your spiritual growth. You have established the trust to step through those doorways, and the results seem miraculous. It is so obvious that the old ways are not working — and have not for some time—that it is easy to release the old programming, and thus, the fear.
Q: Meditation is the centerpiece of everything you write here — daily superconscious contact with God. Can you speak to the importance of meditation in our lives, and its benefits in our work, play, relationships with mates, nature and others?
A: Meditation is our divine connection to our Source, and the rewards of establishing and maintaining that connection are unlimited. The Soul Awakening invocation is an entrée to meditation, which sets the tone and intention of the meditation to the highest spiritual standards. It goes far beyond unstructured meditation. Once you establish a daily pattern of meditation, your life becomes enhanced in every possible way. It has been said that prayer, which most of us have been taught, is talking to God, and that meditation, which few of us have been taught, is listening to God. When we listen, we experience our divine nature unfolding, and that enhances every aspect of our lives. It is ironic that Christianity has known about meditation since its earliest days, but has never taught its followers to meditate. Yet the Catholic Church to this day requires all priests and nuns to meditate daily. One must wonder why the Church refused to teach its followers to meditate also.
Q: How did your training as a journalist and editor enable you to sift through the enormous mountain of material that you obviously accessed and studied to put together this book and trilogy?
A: It helped enormously, because much of my later research was done in the New York City public libraries, some of the largest and finest in the world, with miles of aisles. I kept the investigative journalistês adage, "If it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it's probably a duck" constantly in mind. This led to several remarkable discoveries, including the realization that all of the "psychic metaphysical phenomena" I was studying was collectively aspects of our spiritual nature, and secondly, that Western Religions were responsible for suppressing awareness of our spiritual nature.
Q: We've been told for two millenia to have "blind faith," "blind trust," "belief," etc. When Paramhansa Yogananda came to America in 1920, already a great Master who lived in Divine Consciousness, he shocked everyone by saying, "Don't take what I or any other teacher tells you at face value. Test it out through the fires of meditation and divine perception." How does this speak to the precepts you lay down in Awakening the Soul.
A: Yogananda was right on the money in his advice. I would say the exact same thing about what I have written. Since Awakening The Soul is an individual process that each person customizes for their own needs, there is no belief system to accept, except one: that you are a divine creation who has access to divine guidance. Once that acceptance occurs, your dharma comes effortlessly to you, and your trust in your divinity guides you to your destiny.
Q: Finally, you shared your bodysurfing experience where you nearly drowned 25 years ago. This reminded me so much of (singer) Cat Stevens' conversion to Islam after he nearly drowned while swimming in southern California. But in your case, there's always been a deep relationship between moving ocean/waves and flow of spirit. Could you elaborate on this relationship?
A: One of the primary initial steps you must take to awaken your spiritual nature is embracing Nature in all its glory. I was always close to Nature (I lived on an island for several years as a young barefoot boy), but surfing brought me into the arms of Mother Nature. Riding the waves, sometimes with surfing dolphins, brought me closer to Nature than ever before. It brought clarity and strength to my physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual life that was vital in bringing me to this point. Surfing also directly served up the transcendental experience of two-way mental telepathy that triggered my spiritual awakening.
1) You’ve successfully completed quite an arduous undertaking – digging through 2,000 years of lies and deception to remind us of our spiritual heritage and the truths of our souls. What prompted you to set out on such an enormous task?
I was literally spiritually inspired to tackle this huge undertaking when I began channeling the first portions of what became Awakening The Soul: Book 3: Restoring Your Spiritual Nature in 1993. I had been planning a weekly newspaper column on the emerging personal spirituality, but I knew this information was far more important, universally applicable, and demanded my full attention.
The soul-awakening instructions began one day in meditation, when a voice clearly spoke to me, and said: “Tell your ego to go into your left brain.” I was then given detailed but simple instructions on how to reprogram my ego so it would no longer interfere with my spiritual growth. (It is a remarkable process, because you can actually feel your ego go into your left brain, which instantly validates the material.) In the succeeding days, I also was given instructions on how to elevate my soul to become my daily guide in all I do, how to create my “inner trinity of being,” and how to connect this inner trinity with my higher divine soul to restore my spiritual body to its original conscious expression. The instructions also contain vital mind unification steps, which allow you to reunite the “separated” left and right hemispheres of the brain, to allow more complete functioning of mental processes. It provides a perfect example of how to create your own reality. Additionally, ATS3 has been called “the key to the 12th Step” of Alcoholics Anonymous and other 12-step groups, for it provides the necessary spiritual awakening..
As that section of the manuscript began taking form, I realized that I would also have to convince a lot of people about the reality and extent of their spiritual nature, so they would realize they possessed these same spiritual traits, even though they might be unaware of them. This material became ATS: Book One: Proof Of Our Spiritual Nature, which catalogues and explains more than 70 differing examples of our spiritual traits and abilities, many familiar in our daily lives. The book also details 10 spiritual experiences and abilities in depth, such as reincarnation, apparitions, communication with the spirit world, and the aura. This makes ATS1 a valuable primer for the novice, as well as reminding those with spiritual experience just how pervasive and broad our spiritual nature truly is, whether we are aware of it or not.
In my original book outline, I planned a few small chapters on how we lost awareness of our spiritual nature. As my research expanded, I kept running across references to how religions suppressed various aspects of spiritual experience or abilities. So I began researching specifically for that suppression, and what I found was absolutely shocking Judaism, Christianity and Islam had all suppressed humanity’s mystics and their mystical experiences. However Christianity, primarily western Catholicism, did the worst damage, almost eradicating our spiritual memory banks. It did so by labeling those who exhibited spiritual abilities as “heretics” and killed millions while trying to eliminate all spiritual beliefs but its own invented dogma.
The Church also intimidated science into not investigating humanity’s spiritual consciousness until the 19th Century. This repression directly created science’s current mental block about honestly investigating anything metaphysical in nature or any traits of this vital human experience. This information became ATS: Book 2: Our Suppressed Spiritual Nature. It’s almost 400 pages, the largest book in the trilogy, which took 13 years to complete.
2) How did your years as a newspaper editor, who adhered to the strictest tenets of journalistic integrity; serve you as you sifted through the mountains of research and tried to wind your way through this spiritual labyrinth?
I just followed the same principles I required my reporters to follow when working critical stories: Follow the “duck” axiom (If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it’s probably a duck), the “say/do” axiom (Don’t pay attention to what they say, observe what they do.), require all pertinent evidence to fit the established pattern, and require at least two sources of evidence on critical issues. I also found that my Spirit Guides were providing impeccable guidance as to where to look next, and revealing patterns of developing information. This allowed the highly-detailed, voluminous subject matter to stay focused and on point, and to have an understandable, cohesive message.
Also, as a newspaper editor I wanted to make sure that the average American reader and spiritual skeptic would believe what I was reporting so I wanted to make sure I had enough evidence to convince them without overwhelming them. I think my books speak to the average American and are a good, thorough introduction to the historical suppression of our spiritual nature and the urgent need to reawaken our souls at this time in history, if we are to change the destructive path of war and planetary degradation humanity seems bent upon.
3) It seems to me that most “spirituality” in this world is practiced from the mind, rather than from the utterances of the soul and heart. Is this your conclusion as well – and when did the focus switch from an inside to an outside practice?
My first spiritual awakening occurred in the arms of Mother Nature, while bodysurfing the Pacific Ocean. Although many believe surfing is nothing more than a water sport, it is also a powerful means of activating a spiritual lifestyle. Surfing is extraordinarily relaxing and stress-relieving, a means of connecting with the spirit of nature unlike any other I know, although I am sure there are other sports which do the same. Mother Nature provides a wondrously gentle, non-religious enhancement of spirituality in your life. It’s most easily accomplished through caring for plants or animals. Connecting with Nature is an excellent way to start your spiritual rebirth.
The only way we are going to truly honor our spiritual heritage is to live it on a daily basis, doing and saying what we believe at all times. Ernest Holmes, the founder of Science of Mind, best expressed this concept in his writings, which form a blueprint for spiritual living on a daily basis. We cannot just go to church on Sunday and forget all our spiritual obligations until the next Sunday. We must express them constantly in all that we do. When I’m in New York City, I attend services at the Sacred Center for Spiritual Living, whose name says it all.
Although the mind, which interfaces with heart and soul, is the fertile bed for developing our personal spirituality, spirituality does not have optimal meaning in our lives until it comes out of our minds and into our hands in our everyday actions.
4) You take particular aim at the Vatican, which has seen better days in lieu of the Da Vinci Codes, all the Holy Grail materials coming out now, and of course Pope Benedict’s reputation as the late Pope John Paul’s Rottweiler. What are a few of the most egregious transgressions the Vatican committed that really robbed us of our spiritual nature?
Whoa, that’s a tall order. You really have to read the entire 118 pages of Chapter 5 in ATS2 to get the full picture, but here’s my short list: 1) Denying that God’s spiritual presence is inside each of our souls while teaching us that S/He is somewhere else, “up there.” 2) Denying that the presence of Christ and the Holy Spirit can come to each individual, as they continue to speak to us today without the need for “priestly intercession” (Historian Garry Wills charges in Papal Sin: Structures of Deceit that the Vatican believes the Holy Spirit speaks only to the Pope these days.) 3) The suppression of the Divine Feminine, the inherent spiritual nature of women (and men who are in touch with their feminine side), fully half of humanity, and 4) Denying the concept of reincarnation, so that the Church could use the concepts of fear, guilt and Original Sin and thus enrich its coffers by selling “plenary indulgences.”
These exclusions and barriers were rigidly in place for centuries, but now the concepts that each of us today can receive Christ’s presence or receive the Holy Spirit are breaking through hidebound western religious traditions. However, many items of suppression, like exercising our God-given spiritual talent of clairvoyance, and the spiritual experience of reincarnation, are still specifically denied to this day by the many religions, including the Catholic Church. I discovered 14 major areas of direct spiritual suppression, with several other minor areas of suppression as well, all presented in ATS2. These areas of suppression stifled our spiritual nature for centuries, retarded humanity’s spiritual growth, and denied us necessary spiritual nourishment. This has deeply affected our history, our culture, our societal mores, our beliefs, our behavior, and our future.
5) What is our spiritual nature?
It is everything that emanates from our Soul. It is the expression of God within us. The more we express God through us, the greater His/Her presence becomes in our lives. It is the sum of our being, most of which has been suppressed. I realized early on that all the things we variously call “paranormal,” “metaphysical,” “psi” or “phenomena” are all just examples of our Soul’s spiritual nature at work.
That paradigm shift in turn revealed another momentous paradigm shift that what Christianity did during the eradication of almost all other religions and spiritual beliefs, through the Inquisition, the witch hunts, and all its other numerous crimes against humanity was not the suppression of “heresy,” but rather was a brutal, concerted effort to silence the still small voice of our Souls and stamp out humanity’s true spiritual nature. This was almost accomplished in 1,500 years of the most severe persecution seen on the planet.
In the course of the development of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, mystics and mysticism were suppressed for promoting their true spiritual nature. Almost every single one of our spiritual abilities, traits or experiences were banned as “demonic,” “heretical” or “evil” by western religions attempting to eliminate the old “pagan” knowledge and enforce their own invented brand of spirituality. Those who exhibited almost any spiritual experience from prophecy, known today as channeling, to spontaneous healing were often branded “heretics” and hounded by the Church. This suppression began with Judaism’s bans on divination (predicting the future) and necromancy (communicating with spirit beings), but was taken to new heights of intimidation by Christianity, which killed millions for what they thought or said from the 4th Century to the 19th Century.
6) Your works offer a steady stream of attributed sources, to the point of elevating these books to academic levels. Yet, I know you had to leave a lot of things out for the sake of brevity. What was your decision-making process like as you figured out what to include and what not to?
Simply staying on point by eliminating any tangential evidence that didn’t apply to the primary thrust of spiritual or mystical suppression. This rule was easy to conceive but difficult to execute, because I wanted so many tangential items of evidence included that ultimately I had to reject for brevity’s sake. However, some issues kept resurfacing over and over for me, until I finally realized I was being told, “Pay attention to this. It’s important.”
This especially happened to me with both the issues of the suppression of women and the suppressed story of the Fatima Secrets in particular. Both issues kept resurfacing in my mind until I was forced to pay attention to them, and see how they fit the picture. There was much I had to exclude or severely limit simply to keep the book on point and not lead readers astray into unrelated (but immensely interesting) areas of religious history.
7) What struck me as I edited the books was the steady needle on your inner compass. The focus was always sharp and sure. Can you talk about the practices in your own life, your own spiritual work, that has enabled you to write from a place of such deep truth and focus?
The greatest assistance I had was actively utilizing the meditation process to balance my Soul and Ego and write from the soul. This was given to me in my Awakening The Soul meditation, the core instructions found in ATS3. This activation of my heart, mind and soul, which I exercised each day before starting the writing process, kept me on point at all times. Much of the material came to me spontaneously in odd moments, but I almost always knew precisely where this channeled information belonged in the manuscript.
I also had a lot of spiritual assistance during the editing process, when “inner guidance” would tell me to move large blocks of information here or there in the text, to maintain the sharp focus on spiritual suppression and not lead readers astray into unrelated fields, however interesting. This guided process also sharpened the continuity of the material.
8) In ATS 1 and 2, you talk about our spiritual nature and how it was stripped from us. In ATS3, you write about how to return it to our lives. What are some simple steps people can take to resurrect the “Christ” within them, to return to that hallowed place of truth and authenticity and relationship with the Divine in their lives?
There are a number of steps of preparation, which would include learning the daily practice of meditation, and reading certain books to adjust your ways of thinking before fully leaping into the enlightenment process. Although the number of books that could be helpful is enormous, I would recommend Jane Roberts’ Seth Speaks and The Nature of Personal Reality, and Ken Carey’s Starseed Transmissions, Vision, and Starseed: The Third Millennium. These steps will give the novice a good grounding before taking the big step of commitment to learn all you can about your personal spiritual nature.
Novices can educate themselves through reading the Awakening The Soul trilogy, and meditating on what they learn. ATS1 informs them about the extent of their spiritual nature, ATS2 tells them how they lost awareness of their spiritual nature, and ATS3 tells them how to get it back. ATS3 in particular contains a number of practices and exercises that can heighten your spiritual nature, and bring you closer to realizing your true spirituality. The Soul Awakening process revealed in ATS3 provides a simple, easy method to bring “Christ consciousness” into your daily life, and activate your own spiritual existence. But everyone is encouraged to follow their heart and mind in seeking out paths of knowledge, for we are all on different spiritual paths to reach the same goal of reunion with our Creator.
Knowing that each of us is truly designed to blossom into an exalted spiritual being, realizing how you lost awareness of that knowledge, and the simple but profound process of reactivating your Soul’s spiritual essence each day delivers undreamed-of spiritual benefits to each reader. These benefits, however, will be different for each individual. I know that until my spiritual awakening occurred, I wandered around without a clear goal of where I was headed spiritually. Now, no matter how bleak things seem, a few minutes spent “soul awakening” restores my spiritual guidance and dispels all darkness and uncertainty. Knowing that Spirit guides me in all I do gives me the courage and conviction to take this path in life.
9) With all of the writings about the Holy Grail, divine feminine and the huge spiritual book market in particular, there seems to be an inherent danger of this pendulum swinging the other way – from suppression of truth to everyone and their brother thinking they’ve been bestowed with the highest truths and thus must tell everyone in book form. I call this the “barely spiritual awakened” literature. How can people who are ardently seeking truth evaluate a book to determine its spiritual authenticity?
I feel those “barely spiritually awakened” books are out there because that’s the level of spiritual awakening for many who are looking beyond mainstream religions. It may be spiritual kindergarten for some, but it’s a level most are most comfortable venturing into. You can’t get to the graduate level until you’ve done the grade school work, which comes first to provide a solid foundation for the spiritual growth which will follow. Better this than nothing.
I had a mainstream publisher of spiritual books tell me that the ATS trilogy was written for the upper two percent of the spiritual reading public, while most spiritual books are sold to the lower 10 percent of that same group. “Most people don’t want enlightenment,” he said. “They just want their toys fixed.” (“Toys” being defined as relationships, health, happiness, finances, etc.)
Some good advice on evaluating a book’s worth: Never accept someone else’s “word” as “gospel.” That includes me, and my books. Be skeptical, but remain open and curious. Give each book’s premise the test of spirit: Does it ring true with you? Do you feel it speaks to you? If any book doesn’t meet those tests, it’s best to reserve judgment.
10) If we were to return to our spiritual nature as individuals and as a society, and re-wire our social culture, what would we experience? What would happen?
If the entire world’s population suddenly woke up fully spiritually aware one morning, the first thing which would need to be done is to immediately replace all governments which are religion-based, repressive or aggressive, war-making, pollution-promoting, or intolerant of human rights.
We would start caring for all our brothers and sisters all over the planet, by providing them the abundance of surplus foodstuffs produced in so many areas of the world, which are not freely distributed to the world’s neediest but rather are used as weapons of world control. We would end all wars and end producing all weapons of war, and spend those wasted trillions on improving the world.
We would immediately stop polluting Earth and its atmosphere and start cleaning up the mess we have made, which is now severely impacting the entire planet through global warming. We would speed development of non-polluting, renewable energy sources instead of stifling any energy resource that threatens the status quo of the oil, coal and nuclear industry. We would vastly diminish crime and its devastating affects. In short, we would recognize that we truly are all one, start loving all others as fellow brothers and sisters of our common Creator, and acting that way at all times.
11) You use a lot of channeled information in ATS, though carefully vetted for its authenticity. What insights are these pure connections to divine truth able to bring us that our existing spiritual and religious leaders cannot?
Almost all profound channeled books offer information that directly empowers the individual, something our religious leaders have resisted doing for thousands of years. The Vatican has never acknowledged the compelling power of the channeled A Course In Miracles, which is written as if dictated by Christ. Nor has the Vatican acknowledged the discovery and importance of the Church-suppressed Nag Hammadi texts, which included the profound Gospel of Thomas, containing 114 quotations from Jesus found nowhere else in the Bible. The Church-banned Gospel of Thomas tells us that Christ comes to each of us, something the Gospel of John denies three times.
Religious leaders want the power in their hands; they do not want each of us to realize our oneness with Mother/Father God , our true spiritual source, our true spiritual nature and abilities, nor that we are the representatives of God on earth. They tell us in so many words, “You’re a hopeless unworthy sinner, but you can save yourself if you do things my way, don’t step out of line one iota, believe everything I tell you, and oh yes, give me 10 percent of your earnings while you’re at it.” Truly valuable channeled material doesn’t play games with our minds or wills or pocketbooks, it just informs us of our true potential, and tells us that each of us already possesses everything necessary in life to achieve our spiritual goals.
12) How have you changed as a person, and how have your views of religion, spirituality and the hope for the spiritual re-awakening of humanity changed as a result of writing this trilogy?
Awareness of my spiritual nature has given me the confidence and skills to achieve just about any goal I set for myself. I now know that I’m not a helpless, hopeless sinner who has to do it their way. I know I create my own reality, and do so. All I need do is to daily focus my spiritual self with my Creator’s guidance in all that I do.
The most important thing that I’ve learned is that you must keep working at your spiritual ascension. My spiritual traits and abilities have blossomed, particularly my intuition, a powerful tool for living better. Simply knowing what I have learned, however, does not mean you are instantly sanctified. You have to keep working at it to continue to grow spiritually. And you never stop growing spiritually, for it is your destiny here on Planet Earth.
Waking up to that fact is the first step in awakening spiritually. The learning process comes next. All the remaining steps must be taken one at a time, a day at a time, to achieve illumination and inspiration. I now better know my spiritual nature, but unless I exercise my Soul on a daily basis, it does not achieve its optimal qualities of bringing me closer to my Creator’s plan for me.
My view of religion in general, always rather skeptical, has grown to one of basic contempt and skepticism for most sects, particularly Christianity, especially Roman Catholicism. (And I was raised a Catholic.) I have a much higher opinion of the Eastern religions, most of which bring you closer to the God within. Although I still embrace the primary tenets of Christianity, I don’t follow its rules and reject its dogma. I exercise my own spirituality in my own manner for my own best good. I am very much in touch with the Christ within, without the benefit of the Church, something anyone can achieve. I believe the Second Coming of Christ is occurring right now, in the hearts of all those men and women who “take Christ into their hearts,” experience “Christ consciousness,” “Krishna consciousness,” “Allah consciousness” or become one with the Great Spirit.
My hope for the spiritual awakening of humanity is tempered with the realization that we have much to accomplish, and little time to accomplish it. Most are ignorant of their true being, and are so under the spell of their particular religious dogma they cannot see the Christ within each of us. It is becoming more and more apparent that it is going to take a miracle of global proportions to avoid the apocalypse and planetary debasement from global warming.
Spiritual awakening is still possible, but too many been brainwashed by “infallible” religious dogma into believing the apocalypse is inevitable. We should have been all indoctrinated into believing we are all God’s children, that we all worship the same Creator, and that to harm any of God’s children or Her creations in any way is wrong.
13) Finally, what comes next? Do you have future books or projects planned?
Yes. A major publisher challenged me to write a “spiritual novel” incorporating all the evidence I present in ATS2. That challenge was given to me on Friday at a luncheon. On Monday morning, I awoke from a lucid dream revealing a wonderful plot line to achieve that challenge. Now I have to write it. I also plan a stripped-down mass-market version of ATS2 entitled “Soul Theft: How The Church Seized Your Spiritual Nature” and a condensed version of ATS which incorporates all three books. I also have a few other possible projects including a 26-week newspaper course on personal spirituality, and a 24-week college-level internet course based on the ATS trilogy.
However, I know that at some point I need to stop writing and start teaching, and I am preparing for that now.
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