Wanted! Some honest feedback on The God Franchise

Time for some honest feedback, please. I have been writing this blog about The God Franchise for over four months, and I would dearly love to know how you feel about the blog and about the ideas it contains. Does The God Franchise grab you at all?

The book, The God Franchise, is a work of discovery – I wrote what I was inspired to write, and then assessed it afterwards. I have found it fascinating, and have learnt a huge amount from it. It really became A Theory of Everything. The contents of the book can be found here or on the website http://publishing.lifemagic.co.nz.

To make it easy, here are the main points I have covered in this blog so far. I invite you to check out the original blogs, which you will find in the archives in the right hand column, if you wish.

• Consciousness is the Uncaused Cause of everything – Man has called It God.
• I have used the term God-Consciousness to clarify that God is Consciousness rather than a superhuman-like being sitting in a place called Heaven.
• Consciousness is the fundamental element of the universe. The universe is made of the very fabric of God. You can say that we exist in the Mind of God.
• You might agree that a God displaying the following qualities would definitely be worthy of the name, God:
  • God is conscious
  • God is eternal. God-Consciousness was all that existed prior to the start of the universe.
  • God is omnipotent (all-powerful). Since nothing can be conceived where God-Consciousness is not the one conceiving it, nothing more powerful can exist.
  • God is omnipresent  (present everywhere). There is no alternative when God-Consciousness is everything that is. Nothing else exists.
  • God is omniscient (all-knowing). Because God-Consciousness is everything, He must know everything.
  • God is the Creator of the universe. To be rational and truly scientific there is no alternative.
  • God has a purpose for His Creation: to add experience, expression, and enjoyment into His Life.
  • God is absolutely good (omnibenevolent). Since God-Consciousness has created the universe out of His own essence, why would He create anything that He did not see as good?
  • God is likely to be immutable (unchanging through time). The universe only works as it does because of immutable physical and mathematical laws. God is as immutable as His laws.
• Accepting these qualities, extend that sense of God-Consciousness into the realms of the Unknowable, and get an unbiased, un-predetermined, unlimited, formless sense of God-Consciousness. This is a tiny pointer to the true essence of God, which we can best simply call God-Consciousness.
• Of course we have free will. Why would God create a bunch of automatons?
• You are a unique aspect of consciousness, coming from one particular perspective. You by some strange happenstance are you.
• Your Higher Self is God-Consciousness. This is God expressing Himself in the form of a human being. God is everything in the universe (omnipresence) and is the only reality.
• Your Lesser Self is an illusion. It hides your Higher Self and pretends to be you, and your Ego and mind, which are created through expressing free will.
• This Lesser Self is not separate from God — as it cannot be — it just lives in the illusion that it is separate from God.
• All the experience your Lesser Self and Higher Self have, is perfect. The Lesser Self (Ego) judges itself and others. From God’s perspective, the perspective of the Higher Self, what you do is experience.
• Healing comes from God-Consciousness. Prayers to God are heard by the God-Consciousness of the Higher Self, and can be immediately answered if the Lesser Self is prepared to allow the healing in.
• So who am I really? Individually we are like a splash of water from the Ocean of God-Consciousness that is briefly separated from the Ocean, and then falls back into the Ocean again.
• Any degree of impurity or evil in the Creation is purely due to the Ego acting as a filter.
• By creating Mankind in His own image, God-Consciousness franchised His Creative Power to each and every man and woman on Earth. In fact, He gave us all His qualities to a greater or lesser extent. He franchised everything to each of us in what may be termed The God Franchise.
• Whether we are a spiritual adept, a high-flying businessperson, or a beggar in the street, we have an equal stake as a God Franchisee. God is an equal-opportunity franchisor!

So, please tell! What do you think of all this? I must admit I was blown away by the implications of The God Franchise. Likewise, all the feedback I have had from people who have read the book, has been equally positive.

Now I would like to know what you think, both of The God Franchise and of this blog. What else would it be good to know before you decide that this is one book you need to read? (Availability)

If you are at all interested in the reality and deeper aspects of life, I believe you will find this book, The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything, extremely interesting and thought-provoking. Not only that, it will stir you at a deeper level, far beyond thought and interest.

What more can I say? Over to you now …

I Know the Title, but What is The God Franchise?

When I realised the tremendous implications of The God Franchise, I was astounded. Initially I thought it just meant that while God had “created” the natural aspects of the universe, He had given Man a franchise to create technology and all the manufactured and developed things in the world today. No! It is so much more than that.

In the book I start by describing a franchise as developed in the business world. A franchise agreement between a franchisor (the originator) and a franchisee (you) allows you to create and run a business under the franchise name, and market and sell the franchised product or service.

For the privilege of being able to do this, you pay the franchisor a franchise fee, plus a percentage of the sales of your business. In return, the franchisor provides the systems you will need to run the business, as well as some marketing support, including group advertising. 

The God Franchise takes this concept to the ultimate. It states that God-Consciousness (God) can be seen as a Franchisor, and that you and I and every other person on this Earth individually is a Franchisee. By creating Mankind in his own image, God-Consciousness franchised His Creative Power to each and every man and woman on Earth. This is a key concept of The God Franchise. In addition, God-Consciousness gave us free will (as He naturally has), consciousness, and purpose. In fact, he gave us all his qualities to a greater or lesser extent: He franchised everything to each of us in what may be termed The God Franchise.

Now, before you get too carried away with this concept, let’s look at it more closely. It does not mean that you can rush off and create universes. We have many veils covering our Godhead (such as unconsciousness, Ego, self, separateness, and materialism), and there are other constraints, some of which I have covered in recent blogs.

You and I are franchisees in the ability to create and to live our lives from a divine perspective. The qualities we have discussed in earlier blogs as being God’s qualities, are available to each of us to a greater or lesser extent, whether we use them consciously or unconsciously. Remember that God’s use of these qualities is way beyond what we need to use, and our personal application of them is really as much as we can handle, and for practical purposes is unlimited.

God is conscious, eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, creator, purposeful, omnibenevolent and immutable. So I am saying that we have access to these very qualities at some level. To be more specific than that would take more space than is available to me in this current blog. I do go into all the details of both this and the franchise comparison in Chapter 11 of The God Franchise.

This is all very well, you say, but does that make me God? No, not quite. Just because God is you, does not make you God. Just because you are a McDonald’s franchise holder does not mean you are McDonald’s! It means you have the right to run a store according to some very strict rules, and you are compensated for your efforts. However, you also need to pay dues to McDonald’s Corporation, and you cannot claim to be the McDonald’s Corporation.

As spiritual adepts know, it is possible to get close to God-Consciousness. In doing that, they usually, if not always, leave behind the trappings of the earthly experience. Nevertheless, all the powers and qualities of God-Consciousness are represented in each of us in a more manageable potency. We have all the powers and qualities we need and, frankly, all we can handle.

Whether we are a spiritual adept, a high-flying businessperson, or a beggar in the street, we have an equal stake as a God Franchisee. God is an equal-opportunity franchisor!

So isn’t this great? Does this not change your view of life? What do you think? I would very much appreciate your comments.

(This is largely an extract from Chapter 11 of my book, The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything, which is now available to you in paperback from over a dozen major online bookshops)

God’s Decision to Create the Universe

In my last post I listed a series of different experiences that God-Consciousness might choose to experience. Of course there are billions of others. So what happened next?

With these sorts of experiences and goals in mind, God-Consciousness set about creating the universe exactly as it needed to be to fulfil these ideals. While God-Consciousness would be able to interfere if He needed to, there was no challenge in constantly tweaking this universe when something went wrong. As He could see ahead in time how things would pan out, He could create the universe with a set of rules or Laws that would see it through.

I am certainly not able to list what is needed to create a universe; however, our scientists have figured out some of the requirements, for instance:

• A stable set of rules or laws
• Oxygen, water, and carbon to sustain life
• A particular range of temperatures to support life
• A particular set of universal constants
• A supply of energy to make the universe dynamic
• And so on …

And so it was that God-Consciousness created a universe that met His requirements. While complicated in its details, mind-boggling in fact, it is very simple in its concept. We, as humans, overcomplicate things as far as I can see. The real Truths are essentially very simple.

God-Consciousness created the universe in a Big Bang. He created the Laws that were needed and the building blocks of matter – namely the 94 natural elements in a very simple system we can see today in the Periodic Table of the Elements. He watched through time as 14 billion years passed, developing the rich and bountiful world we have around us today.

Finally, the time came for Man to appear on the scene. Bearing in mind that God-Consciousness is within each person on this Earth – in fact, within each cell of the bodies of each person on this Earth, and is them – He played His trump card.

He introduced The God Franchise.

(This is largely an extract from Chapter 10 of my book, The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything, which is now available to you in paperback from over a dozen major online bookshops)

God’s Motivation for the Creation

Instead of there being one point of God-Consciousness as there was before the Creation, He wanted there to be a universe where He would be able to experience things from every possible perspective:

He could feel how a rock feels warming in the Sun.

He could feel the rain on His petals.

He could feel His fruit being eaten by a bird.

He could taste the fruit like a bird.

He could make love as a badger.

He could make love as an elephant.

He could make love as a man.

He could make love as a woman.

He could see the beauty of the sunrise.

He could be the power and light of the Sun.

He could swim as a fish in the sea.

He could be pushed helplessly as seaweed in the currents.

He could be smashed on the rocks.

He could feel joy as a child.

He could feel the pain of a rejected lover.

He could drink the water.

He could drink the wine.

He could die in the desert.

He could die on an executioner’s cross.

He could experience the flight of the electron in the atom.

He could mystify scientists.

He could be a mystified scientist.

He could make spells.

He could make smells.

He could rot on the ground.

He could enrich the earth with His life-blood.

He could break His leg.

He could heal His leg.

He could be without legs and slither on the ground.

He could be inside the mouth of a lion.

He could be inside the stomach of a whale.

He could smile.

He could cry.

He could live at the depths of the ocean.

He could be a molecule of water at the greatest depths in the ocean.

He could be the next molecule of water to that, rubbing up against it.

He could fly through the air as a beam of light, or as a bird.

He could be the air, the trees, the earth, and the sky.

He could live on Earth or on Mars or on Betelgeuse.

He could use a telephone.

He could design a rocket ship.

He could be inside a turbojet at full power.

He could fling Himself over a waterfall, as a drop of water and as a log.

He could experience the fullness of life in the universe.

You may have the idea by now. God-Consciousness is in everything and is everything. As the Bible says, “For in him we live, and move, and have our being.” (Acts 17:28). And it is not just you and me, it is everything that is in Him, that lives in Him, and that moves in Him. I am not saying this from a religious viewpoint. I am saying this from a realist viewpoint.

This is how it is.

(This is an extract from Chapter 10 of my book, The God Franchise, which is now available to you in paperback from a dozen major online bookshops)

A Successful Book Launch

The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything is officially launched!

On Tuesday 27 March 2012 we held a book launch at Goodeys Bookstore in Newmarket, Auckland, New Zealand. We had a good turnout of over twenty people, and the presentation went easily and smoothly. I read some chosen parts from the book, interspersed with an overview of the book’s contents. This was followed by questions and answers.

Not to mention the cheese and biscuits, and a glass of wine or two…

Sales of the book were good too. And I kept busy signing copies of the book afterwards.

I have had subsequent feedback from many who attended the launch that they enjoyed the evening and found the talk on The God Franchise very interesting.

If you would like more information about what was said at the talk, or The God Franchise itself, and you are not already on our mail list, please click on the Life Magic Publishing (http://publishing.lifemagic.co.nz) website.

Alternatively, please purchase your copy of The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything from Amazon or one of the many other online stockists around the world. See http://publishing.lifemagic.co.nz/stockists.htm for a full list of stockists.

Over to you now!

The Filters from the Scriptures

There are many scriptures and holy books in the world, written at different times and from different perspectives. These include the Holy Bible (Old Testament and New Testament), the Koran, the Bhagavad-Gita, the Upanishads, and the Tao Te Ching. I am not a scholar of these books and am only familiar with the Bible to a certain extent, so I will limit my comments.

The books of the Old Testament were originally transmitted by word of mouth and were written down between 1200 BC and 100 BC, while the New Testament books were written down between 50 AD and 150 AD. As Bible scholars will tell you, there were many authors of these books and there is still considerable controversy about much of the detail and circumstance of the Bible. Of course, now is not the time to debate this, nor am I equipped to do so.

What I can say is that the Bible is the inspired Word of God. I can say this because God-Consciousness is the being of every one of us, and of course every one of the authors of the Bible. Just as we have filters come into play in everything we do and say, as discussed in earlier blogs, so is this true of the authors of the Bible. The Bible was written to the level of understanding and the terminology of the people of those times.

Likewise, every other scripture, and for that matter every other book ever written on spiritual or other matters, is to some greater or lesser extent the work of God-Consciousness. However, and I accept this is a big however, the filters of the author’s own Ego make a huge difference to the importance and trustworthiness of the final work. Thus, one cannot equate the Holy Scriptures listed above with say a formulaic Mills & Boon romantic novel, or the work of a biased, egocentric, down-on-his-luck-and-skills pseudo-scientist or pseudo-spiritual teacher.

Each one of us, individually, comes from our own place. This is part God-Consciousness and part Ego. The mix differs for each person, and this is what makes it interesting. This is what makes each individual’s contribution to evolution and continuing creation interesting, and it is from this that wars, corruption, and poverty spring. They do not come from a Satan lurking in the background, from Original Sin, or from a dystheistic (possibly evil) God — they come from free will and the Ego, nothing else.

St John chapters 13 to 17 are very interesting chapters in the Bible. These are the words of Jesus at the Last Supper, just before he was betrayed by Judas. They are worth reading and studying. Christians take the words to mean we need to be Christians and follow Jesus in order to know God. I believe the meaning of the words is much broader, so please do take some time to read these five chapters of St John with an open mind.

These passages point to God-Consciousness being in Jesus, and that there was still a differentiation. It is not that God and Jesus are identical entities. Jesus was not speaking from a point of Ego here, so when he speaks of I or me, he is speaking of the Christhood or God-Consciousness in him. And so, “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do.” (John 14:12) This refers to anyone who recognises the God-Consciousness in themselves. We all, without Ego, can do greater works than Jesus did. This is not a competition. This is reality, and it is evolution in all things.

So the Scriptures are very important in that they are the way most of us get to hear about, and start to think about, God. However, the Scriptures cannot be taken as literal in their entirety. Firstly, they were worded for an audience different from today’s audience, and secondly, while they may be the inspired Word of God, there is also the human element of Ego filtering the work, either intentionally or unintentionally. This does not invalidate the Scriptures — it just means you need to use them as a source of inspiration and of pointers, not of literal facts. Having said that, this current book, my humble offering to the spiritual literature, is also not a book of literal facts — it is offered as a source of inspiration and pointers to the Truth, whatever that really is.

The Truth is within you, within the God-Consciousness that you are.

(This is largely an extract from Chapter 14 of my book, The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything, which is now available to you in paperback from over a dozen major online bookshops)

The Human Being and Conscious Creation

In my last few blogs I have been talking about the filters that exist with regard to ongoing creation. Whether the creation process is done consciously or unconsciously has a considerable impact on the outcome, and so is the next filter we need to consider.

People can be either more or less conscious about their creativity. We could say that some creativity is conscious and other creativity is unconscious.

Conscious Creation is about an individual’s conscious appreciation of the fact that he or she can create consciously. That it is not only the ability to create a new book, a new artwork, or a new product, it is also the ability to create your own experience of life at will.

In truth, there are many thousands of people who do understand and operate the Law of Conscious Creation, which we can call by its more common and topical name, the Law of Attraction — or by the name I prefer, the Law of Manifestation. Nevertheless, there is no general appreciation of the realities of The God Franchise. There are many books now on the market about the Law of Attraction, and it is becoming better known. Still, people generally do not appreciate what it is and how it works. This is an exciting development (evolution) ahead for Man.

Unconscious Creation is the experience of the vast majority of people during the greater part of their lives. Since Man appeared on Earth some 150,000 years ago, development has been very slow. Cultures have come and gone, and it is only since the Industrial Revolution, which started around 1850, that progress has been huge. Since then, of course, the rate of change has been phenomenal, and today new products are obsolete even before they hit the marketplace.

The everyday person has been caught up in this constant rush of creativity, and many people are directly involved in making something better from what has already been created. This creativity has been a part of the lives of every living person on Earth today, with the possible exception of those people living in the outposts of the world – those living away from civilisation. Nevertheless, there is no real appreciation in most people of what this power of creativity is, and therefore, much of this creativity can be viewed as being unconscious.

In addition to this, and perhaps more importantly, everything we do or say or think in this life is attracting things towards us or pushing things away from us. This is creation at a much more subtle level. We create the lives that we lead, in every detail. I cover this subject in much more detail in Part Four of The God Franchise.

 (This is largely an extract from Chapter 14 of my book, The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything, which is now available to you in paperback from over a dozen major online bookshops)

Writing The God Franchise: A Potted History

The process of writing my first book, The God Franchise, is very interesting, and I thought I would like to share it here.

I started way back in 2003 writing a book which I called Life Magic: Your God Franchise. The emphasis was on various aspects of Life and how we could perform magic on our lives, Life Magic being defined as “the art of creating your own experience of life at will”. The first half of the book covered principles, and the second half practice. After writing for about six months, I realised that the book needed, and I needed, more practical experience of what I was writing about.  

Accordingly I took some training on spiritual healing (late 2003), and set up practice as an energy healer in 2004, using the name Life Magic Associates. In 2004 I flirted with Life Coaching and completed the NLP Practitioner Course, adding Neuro-Linguistic Programming to my practical offering. I also became interested in bio-energetics and even bought a BioMeridian MSAS Professional System at the end of 2004. This system is used to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of a person’s energetic health and balance, as well as producing an energetic homoeopathic-like remedy to aid the client regain their health. 

Unfortunately I soon realised that the MSAS was far too subjective in that I was able to directly influence it, and I did not have the background health knowledge to support any conclusions reached by the machine. So through 2005 and 2006 I attended a Naturopathic College fulltime, with the intention of learning all I needed to support my healing work. By mid-2006 I came to the conclusion that the more medical aspects of the course were not for me, and decided to leave before the final year of studies. In 2007 and 2008 I attended all the modules of The Journey Practitioners Programme, as well as completing the 45 case studies that are required. During 2007 I also undertook a course in copywriting, and started working in that field, undertaking a number of interesting projects. In addition, in 2008 I completed the Master NLP Practitioners Course. 

I received my accreditation as a Journey Practitioner in January 2009, and have been practising as a Journey Practitioner since then in what was now termed the Life Magic Healing Centre. For almost 3 years I had premises just off the local high street, but had to move out when my landlord decided to retire.  

In December 2009 I joined Brandon Bays, the founder of The Journey, and about 140 other Journey Practitioners on a three-week spiritual tour of India. We visited Delhi, Rishikesh, Lucknow, Varanasi, Sarnath, Bodh Gaya, Tiruvannamalai (Mt. Arunachala) and Mamallapuram. On my return from India in early January, I was in a state of openness about my life, and decided, after a couple of days, that now was the time to complete my book!

For the first half of 2010 I worked on writing a book which I gave the working title of Stop the Search. Then in August 2010 I suddenly realised that another book had to be written first: The God Franchise. So setting all I had written aside, I started again. This time the work flowed and the book soon started taking shape.

By March 2011 The God Franchise was complete, had had its first edit by a friend, and I was able to enter it into the prestigious Ashton Wylie Trust Unpublished Manuscript Award 2011. By the end of August The God Franchise had been nominated as a finalist (4 out of 57) in the competition, and I decided that self-publishing was the answer for this book. 

The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything was published 25 January 2012, a mere 5 months after I had decided to take that route. In that time I had obtained permission to use various quotes, had the book professionally edited, had the cover and interior professionally designed, and set up a printer (Lightning Source in Australia, US and UK). Phew!

Now all that is left is to entice you to buy a copy. How about it? Try Amazon.com or your favourite online bookshop – a full list of stockists  is available at http://publishing.lifemagic.co.nz. 

Thank you. Please blog your thoughts and queries after reading The God Franchise in the Q & A section of this site, and let’s get to it.

The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything is published!

For two weeks I have been quiet on the blog front. However, on the book front I have been very, very busy! Now I can announce to the world that The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything is well and truly published. It is available for purchase on over a dozen international websites, and it is available for viewing on both Amazon.com and on Google Books.

It is also available in a number of brick and mortar bookshops in Auckland. For a full list of stockists, please see http://publishing.lifemagic.co.nz/stockists.htm.

You have had a taste of the book on this blog over the past 3 months so I don’t need to describe it any more. However, I would like to say that all the people who have read it so far and have come back to me, have been extremely complimentary about it. Likewise, every bookshop I took it to in Auckland commented on the quality of the book’s appearance both inside and out.

I am very pleased (and excited) by the result. I would like to acknowledge my two professional assistants in achieving the high quality: Judith Sansweet of Proofread NZ Ltd did a tremendous job of ensuring the grammar, spelling and language of the book was perfect. Likewise, I am deeply indebted to Justine Elliott for her design of the cover and the book interior. The book has turned out absolutely beautiful.

If you should need the services of a proofreader/copyeditor, email judith@proofreadnz.co.nz and if you need a book designer, email mondo@orcon.net.nz (Justine). I didn’t meet them but worked with them using email (and phone a couple of times with Judith), so wherever you are in the world, you can work with these stars. (By the way, Judith is from the US so is fully familiar with US expectations, while happy to work with my NZ/UK requirements).

The God Franchise has been a labour of love, and I have gained a tremendous amount as the truths revealed themselves to me. This is not a book of recording information I already knew, but a journey of discovery which I am able to share with you.

The ball is in your court. In the US the price is $16.95 or less, in the UK £11.99 or less, in Australia $24.95 or less and in New Zealand $37.99 or less. This is a reasonable price in each of those markets.

The value that you get for your money is incalculable. You have been warned!

(If you would like to drop a review into Amazon, Google Books, or your favourite online bookshop, I would greatly appreciate it. As you know, online bookshops are driven by readers’ reviews).

Thank you and bless you. And enjoy the read!

alan

The Human Being and Emotions – Part 2 of 2

So, how do the emotions act as filters on creation? First, we add an element of judgement to creation. We say some things are good and some are evil. We say this as if our pronouncement was absolutely true. It is not that the created thing is changed by our perception in any way —whatever it is it is a perfect expression of our ability to create through The God Franchise, or if you like, for God to create through us. What is changed by our perception is how we feel about that created thing. It changes our experience of that created thing. God-Consciousness is satisfied with experiencing whatever we choose to experience. We have free will in how we choose to experience any created thing.

What we have is the freedom to have choice, taste, opinions, and preferences. Free will gives us the freedom to prefer one thing over another and one experience over another. We can choose what we love and desire, and we can decide what it is we would rather avoid or not experience. This is what makes us all different, and what gives God-Consciousness the variety He likes to experience.

Unfortunately, at times, emotions get in the way of the creation. Different people (Egos) believe strongly and differently about the same thing and fight over it. The root cause of this is they believe there is a built-in limitation on creation or on the material expression of creation. Two men will fight over the same girl, forgetting there are many other girls in the world with equal if not better qualities. Two people will fight over ownership of the same house, or car, or other unique creation. Egos will try to get as much as they can for themselves, even if they have to resort to crime or war to achieve it. Countries fight over mineral rights or sea access or state security or religion, when in fact, it is just the Egos at the top who want to have their own way. The soldiers who have to fight the wars or the civilians living in the battlefield usually don’t care about the cause being fought for. They just want peace and to be able to get on with their daily lives.

If you look into any of these situations, you will find Ego, and you will find negative emotions. The negative emotions drive the Ego and colour the decisions and actions being taken. These emotions are extremely powerful and are the driving force behind the Ego and in the individual experience of the Creation. The emotions are extremely significant filters on the Creation.

Another interesting aspect of emotions is the fact that those we have classified as negative have a strong impact on the person who is feeling them. While we might try to put the blame out there on Creation, the cause of the negative emotion is within ourselves. It does not feel good, so we react to it or resist it, and this is what causes the pain. This pain stirs us to do more negative things, and we end up in a downward spiral of self-inflicted pain and resistance to reality (what is here now).

By contrast, the positive emotions do not involve the Ego, and you feel closer to your true self, your Higher Self. You could express this as being closer to God. It is not that God-Consciousness is good or only wants good, it is just that the fundamental, non-Ego way of feeling and being is in keeping with what we have termed positive emotions. If we were not coming from Ego, we would not experience the negative emotions at all. Our only experience would be the positive emotions that we would not call positive or good as the duality in the emotions would no longer exist.

So far, I have conveniently overlooked the survival (self-preservation) emotions. Remember, these are only felt as a sense of separation from God-Consciousness. If we truly realise we are one with God-Consciousness and that “in him we live, and move, and have our being” (Acts 17:28), we will not feel scared or worried or overwhelmed — we will feel secure, safe, and protected. Once again, without the duality of fear, etc., the feeling of safety and protection will be “just” a state of peace and wholeness.

(This is an extract from Chapter 14 of my book, The God Franchise, which is now available to you in paperback from a dozen major online bookshops)

The Human Being and Emotions – Part 1 of 2

The emotions are strange things, and I suspect that most of us misunderstand them. Some people might classify them as an aspect of mind (“your emotions are all in the mind”). Others associate them more with spirit, I guess, as they are rather ephemeral. Others, in turn, associate them with the body because they are felt in the body.

Perhaps that is part of the mystery of the emotions, that they don’t have a neat home in mind, body, or spirit, but can be experienced and classified in all those parts of the being. Nevertheless, they are extremely important, and they do act as very significant filters of creation.

It is not a surprise to find that writers apparently do not agree on a clear and consistent categorisation of emotions. Even some states of being like peacefulness, calmness, and tranquillity seem to get overlooked altogether, maybe because they are not active enough. I will, therefore, classify emotions into three groups. Any other emotional words you think of should fit into one of these three groups:

• Positive emotions include feeling amazed, amused, calm, caring, comfortable, compassionate, confident, content, curious, delighted, eager, ecstatic, elated, enthusiastic, excited, glad, good, happy, humble, joyous, loving, optimistic, passionate, patient, peaceful, pleased, surprised, sympathetic, thrilled, tranquil, warm, wonderful
• Survival (self-preservation) emotions include feeling anguish, anxious, cautious, desire, fearful, grief, helpless, homesick, horror, nervous, overwhelmed, panicky, protected, relieved, safe, scared, secure, suffering, terrified, worried
• Negative emotions include feeling alienated, angry, annoyed, arrogant, contemptuous, cynical, defeated, depressed, despairing, disappointed, disgusted, embarrassed, envious, frustrated, guilty, hateful, humiliated, impatient, irritated, isolated, jealous, lazy, loathing, lonely, mean, miserable, pain, enraged, resentful, sad, shameful, shy, sorrowful, spiteful, unhappy.

(An emotion like pride can have either a positive or a negative connotation, and fits in well with either of these once you know the context.)

It is interesting, when we review these lists of emotions, that the positive emotions do not seem to relate to the Ego, whereas the negative emotions shout out the word Ego. The emotions I have classed as survival emotions do not have a sense of Ego about them, although they are protective of the separated self. They give a feeling of separation from God-Consciousness certainly, and they are beyond the Ego.

One can easily and correctly reach the conclusion that emotions that come from the Ego are negative or hurtful ones — ones that cause us pain. Pain comes from resistance, and with these emotions we are resisting something. We don’t like the reality that is facing us, we don’t accept what is, and our Ego becomes angry, depressed, envious, unhappy, or whatever.

However, with the positive emotions there is a sense of wholeness and oneness. The Ego is not present, and instead our Higher Self reaches out to the situation or the other person and we gently feel love, compassion, happiness, optimism, patience, and so on.

The middle group of survival emotions are felt because the self feels threatened, or there is relief that the threat has abated. These emotions are not felt in the same way as the negative group. There is no sense of Ego or self-importance, but rather a sense of separation from God.

So, how do the emotions act as filters on creation? I will write about this in Part 2!

(This is an extract from Chapter 14 of my book, The God Franchise, which is now available to you in paperback from major online bookshops in the US and UK)

How the Ego Filters Creation

If God-Consciousness (God) continues to create through you and me and the other 6,999,998 people in the world, why is there so much wrong with that creation? Why are things not perfect?

The Ego acts as a filter on creation – that is what it is! Instead of creation flowing through us in a perfect way, it is coloured by our Ego, our Mind, and all the fears, pain, and beliefs that we carry. Of course it is not just our own stuff that is in the mix, but all the stuff that has come down the centuries from our ancestors. One could say, all the stuff right back to when Adam and Eve ate of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. That is when the Ego came into existence – when the gift of free will was first abused.

You and I are perfect aspects of God. We are God incarnate, if you like. It is not that you are God. No, it is that God is you. Many Christians believe that not only was Jesus the Son of God, but that He was God incarnate. The truth is that we are all God incarnate. Jesus, of course, was a shining portrayal of what it is to be God incarnate, and we can certainly acknowledge him for that, as Christians do. Nevertheless, Jesus the Christ was not the only Son of God; we are all sons and daughters of God, and He is “well pleased” (Matthew 3:17) with every one of us. We just have greater Egos than Jesus did!

When God differentiates into an individual, He gives that human being, that incarnate spirit, free will. He does this so He can experience a unique expression of His Life. This free will has been misinterpreted to mean Man can do things of his own volition, so he becomes a creator and can be powerful without any need for God to exist at all. He has even stretched God’s permission or directive to “have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth” (Genesis 1:28) to include his fellow human beings. Over the thousands of years that Mankind has existed, this belief has been extended and developed as free will has gone further and further to our heads.

The Ego, personality, and human beliefs act as filters on everything that God creates through a particular human channel. So, if you are a perfectly egoless channel, the individual creation will be perfect, be it a work of art, a piece of music, the design or prototype of a new machine or device, or a piece of writing. As the Ego gets in the way, this acts as a filter to change the pure creation and produce something that contains traces of the individual’s free will. One could say that the creation is God’s, while the filter is the Ego’s. The creation is the Higher Self’s, while the filter is the Lesser Self’s.

If you watch any performer or artist at work, you will see they are completely open and egoless when they are in the midst of a peak performance. There is pure God-Consciousness in evidence in that moment, and the Ego is set aside. Creation is not limited to works of art, music, engineering, or writing either. Everything we do in our day-to-day lives is a part of the continuing creation process. Everything we are and stand for is a part of creation and a resulting development of that creation. And all the way through the creation is God’s — or to put it another way, the Creator is God-Consciousness operating through the Higher Self. Any degree of impurity or evil in that Creation is purely due to the Ego acting as a filter.

(Parts of this blog are quoted from Chapter 14 of my book, The God Franchise)

Why Is So Much Wrong with The Creation?

Why is there so much around us that appears to be the exact antithesis of what one would expect God to create? If God is still creating His Creation through us as I said in my last blog, why is there disease, poverty, war, corruption, danger, and death? Philosophers ask how God can be omnibenevolent in the face of all these dreadful occurrences if He is also omniscient and omnipotent. The argument is that if God knows about Evil, as He is omniscient, and is powerful enough to destroy all Evil as he is omnipotent, how can He be omnibenevolent if He allows Evil to occur? This is the so-called Problem of Evil.

Let me say that while God is the creator, His creations are filtered through our physical being, including our Egos. If our Ego is so big that we want to interfere with the creation, or so big that we think we have greater skills than we really have, we are dumbing down the creation. Our Egos can even pervert the creative process so that what starts as a benign discovery (e.g. atomic power, motion pictures) is directed by Ego into being something we can view as being very evil (e.g. nuclear weapons, child pornography).

Over the next few blogs I am going to cover what I see as some of the filters that seem to affect and possibly minimise the on-going creation work of God-Consciousness. We will start by looking at you and me, and the other 6,999,998 people in the world, as most of the trouble starts here. The Ego has a lot to account for!

Despite these unhelpful filters, and despite the apparent “wrong” or evil that we see in the creation, in the universe around us, the reality is that you are looked after by God-Consciousness just by being a perfectly open channel for His creation. All you need will flow to you as well, including money as the current common exchange unit. You are constantly in the presence of creation. It is happening all around you.

So, is there much wrong with this creation? Could you have done a better job? I believe the next few blogs will clarify why things are as they are, and why the universe is in fact the best possible universe, and why everything is “right” just as it is.

I hope you will bow with me in awe to the whole of creation!

(Parts of this blog are quoted from Chapter 14 of my book, The God Franchise)

The Creation Continues …

I used to hold the idea that God had created only the natural world of Earth, the Sun, the Moon, and the stars. God had created the humans, the animals, the plants, and the minerals. God had created the atom, the 94 chemical elements that make up the physical world, and so on. I also believed that Man had created the invented world that we see around us: the buildings, the cars, the space shuttles, the computers, the CDs, DVDs, iPods^TM and iPads^TM, the clothes, the sculptured gardens, the genetic modifications, the hybrids, and essentially the whole modern world.

Of course, everything that Man has invented and created is made out of the materials that God has created: the minerals, the oil, the wood, the plants, and so on. It seemed to me that God gave us the ability to go out and create whatever we wanted to of our own right. I felt, and still feel, there is no limit to what can be invented, designed, and created. No limit whatsoever.

With my realisation of The God Franchise came a subtle shift. What if it is not Man who creates all these new things? What if it is God who creates them through us instead? What if God is the Creator of everything, from the natural world and wonderful modern creations we have around us, to the atom bomb, the gun, the porn movie, and junk food?

God uses you and me as channels for His further creation. In reality, not even as channels. As I have said, God is you and me continuing His Creation through our forms. You and I have this false idea of self, which is effectively just Ego showing up. Ego says I created that or I designed this. Ego says I wrote this wonderful song or I painted this fantastic picture. If we remove Ego, all that is left is God creating.

What if we painted a picture, wrote a poem, or designed a spaceship and just accepted that it was good? Not that I was good, but rather “Look at this wonderful creation that God has created through me.” Let’s use, appreciate, and enjoy the creation, not the Ego that created it. God is the Creator. When we see a great painting, we don’t need to say “Wow, what a brilliant artist!” No, let’s say, “Wow, what a brilliant picture!” Or rather than “aren’t you a great cook,” say “what a great meal!” Or rather than “what a talented musician,” say “what a great piece of music or beautiful song.” The Creator is God in every instance, so thank Him.

 “And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.”  (Genesis 1:31)  Even God didn’t say, “Behold, I am very good — look how clever I am.”

Of course, many human creators have been humble enough to recognise that it is not themselves as individual Egos who should be credited with their creations. But what about you and me? How often do we think we have just done something marvellous? We don’t need to know about how to create — that is not our job. Our job is to be the best channel we can be for the creation. By learning practical skills (art, music, design, writing, cooking, carpentry, welding, you-name-it), and by leaving the Ego out of it, we are creating the best channel we can for God’s work. Our second job is to appreciate and enjoy what has been created for us, and through us.

(This is an extract from Chapter 14 of my book, The God Franchise)

My First Copy of The God Franchise

I must interrupt my ruminations on God and the universe to say that today I received my first copy of The God Franchise from the printers. It looks brilliant and I am thrilled with how it has turned out. It is a proper book!

I have immediately put in an order for 250 copies so that I can supply my manuscript readers and supporters, and then have some to sell directly myself as well as supply a few selected New Zealand mind-body-spirit bookshops.

Most sales will be through online bookshops worldwide, and these will shortly be updated with the book. Then you can order your copy of The God Franchise . Don’t worry, I will keep you posted.

Did I say how lovely the book is? And how proud I am of it?

We all are God Franchisees

So far in my blogs, I have suggested that God created the universe so that He could have experience, and also that He created the universe out of His very essence: Consciousness. I have even hinted that God experiences Himself through you and me and AS you and me, along with 6,999,999,998 other people. He also experiences His universe through every animal, bird, fish and every other creature on this Earth. Also through every plant and every inanimate object, even down to every atom that makes up the universe.

The book, The God Franchise, states that God-Consciousness can be seen as a Franchisor, and that you and I and every other person on this Earth individually is a Franchisee. By creating Mankind in His own image (Genesis 1:27), God-Consciousness franchised His Creative Power to each and every man and woman on Earth. In addition, God-Consciousness gave us free will (as He naturally has), consciousness, and purpose. In fact, He gave us all His qualities to a greater or lesser extent. He franchised everything to each of us in what may be termed The God Franchise.

Now, before you get too carried away with this concept, let’s look at it more closely. It does not mean that you can rush off and create universes. We have many veils covering our Godhead (such as unconsciousness, Ego, self, separateness, and materialism), and there are some other constraints I will cover in my next few blogs. Firstly, though, let’s run through God’s qualities briefly and see how they apply to The God Franchise we have been given. 

We are conscious; however, we do cover our consciousness beneath many veils. We do much that is unconscious and we are unaware of our true selves. We have a Higher Self and a Lesser Self, and only the Higher Self could be seen as truly conscious, although, of course, our Lesser Self cannot see even that.

We, as individuals, are not eternal; however, it is entirely possible/probable that we maintain our individuality for longer than just our present stay on Earth for three score years and ten. Our God Essence is eternal, and if and when we lose our individuality, we merely drop back into the Ocean of God-Consciousness, which is eternal.

We are not omnipotent; however, we do have all the power we need. The Law of Manifestation attracts into our experience whatever it is that we want or need, either consciously or unconsciously, and without fail.

We are not omnipresent; however, we are able to move outside our present location in time and space through our minds, and using modern communication systems. In spiritual terms, we can attain God-Consciousness through meditation and similar practices if we are so inclined. We can also be present at all times in the Now. Any restrictions on where and when we are present are self-imposed.

We are not omniscient; however, we can find out whatever it is we wish to discover. These days this is assisted through the Internet. The main constraint is our own Ego that holds us in limitations and preconceptions. We have the ability to shake off these shackles if we so desire. Any restrictions on what we know or understand are self-imposed.

We cannot create a universe; however, we do create our own lives. We create our lives through the Law of Manifestation whether we do it consciously or unconsciously. You could say we create our own universe.

We each have a purpose: to use our free will and to experience. We can direct this purpose wherever we wish to direct it, and, by being ourselves, we fulfil God’s purpose of experience.

We are omnibenevolent in our Higher Self; however, our Lesser Self is caught up in the illusion of the Ego. It is from the Ego and the misuse of our free will that evil derives.

We are immutable in our essence (Higher Self) as we are a splash in the Ocean of God-Consciousness; however, in the environment of time and space, and in terms of our Lesser Self, we do change. 

(Parts of this blog are quoted from Chapter 11 of my book, The God Franchise)

What is the Purpose of Life?

Time for a question! What do you believe is the purpose of life? I wonder …

So Who Am I Really?

Individually we are like a splash of water from the Ocean of God-Consciousness that is briefly separated from the Ocean, and then falls back into the Ocean again. While rising above the Ocean as a splash, it is easy in that moment to think you are separated, but the reality is, you are still part of the Ocean; you are still a part of God. So, do you want to call that Divine Splash the Ocean (God) incarnate in a bubble or splash, or a son or daughter of the Ocean (God), or even an aspect of the Ocean (God)? It is just semantics. The reality is unchanged.

(A short extract from my book, The God Franchise)

Who Am I? – Part 2 of 2

As I have said in Part One, I see myself as a Higher Self who is God-Consciousness in form, and a Lesser Self who is Ego, and ultimately an illusion. I see every one of the seven billion people on Earth in exactly the same way. As well as the five points I made in Part One, I also see the following being true about myself:

• All experience my Lesser Self and Higher Self have is perfect. That is one of the major purposes of life — God experiencing Himself. There is no true judgement from God — there is only the Lesser Self judging itself and judging others. It is the Ego that thinks it can judge. From God’s perspective, the perspective of my Higher Self, what I do is experience.

• When I die, I may cease to exist as an individual and may be absorbed back into the Ocean of formless God-Consciousness. Alternatively, I might continue as a separate entity. Frankly, it does not matter. It is only the Ego (Lesser Self) that needs to think it is special enough to continue separately. I am not going to argue one way or the other as to whether I continue as a separate individual in the afterlife, or whether I become One with God-Consciousness, which I am anyway. It is irrelevant to the eternal Now, which is the only reality.

• My body is an expression of consciousness. How things are with my body may influence the Lesser Self as to how it responds to that body. However, the greater influence is the other way around — my body will respond to what is in my mind and in the consciousness of my Lesser Self. If I am sick, it is my mind that is usually sick first, and the body is just reflecting that state of mind.

• If I need to heal my mind or body, I need to allow my Higher Self to come through, and then allow my Lesser Self to withdraw from its fixed attitudes or stance. Healing comes from God-Consciousness. Prayers to God are heard by the God-Consciousness of my Higher Self, and can be immediately answered if my Lesser Self is prepared to allow the healing in. God does not interfere from outside His Creation (including me); He interferes from within. Thus, the Lesser Self and free will are not compromised. They are healed by acceptance and surrender. Healing is always readily available.

• My purpose in life is to express myself and experience. I can choose to do a lot in each minute of my life or I can choose to do very little. I have free will. I cannot complain about my excess or lack of life experience as it is in my own hands. My Lesser Self has the say as it has usurped the free will that I have been given as a God Franchisee. My Higher Self accepts what is presented to it, and will help my Lesser Self whenever it is truly asked for that help. This is my hotline to God.

This gives you an idea of how I see my place in the universe. I also see you and every other person in the universe in the same way. The effect of viewing people in this way may lead you to become much more empathetic to others, much less swayed by trivia driven by ignorance and illusion (or delusion), and much more understanding of why people do what they do. There have been many occasions when I have read or seen in the news a story of someone who has committed a serious crime and is described as evil. Based on the perspective stated above, I have come to realise they are not evil, but have acted from a place of pain, ignorance, and Ego. Forgiveness and understanding arise much more easily.

So how do you feel about what I have said in Parts One and Two? The Comment box is below, just waiting to receive your thoughts!

(Parts of this blog are quoted from Chapter 12 of my book, The God Franchise)

Who Am I? – Part 1 of 2

I believe that each and every one of the seven billion people on Earth is formed in the same way, whether we are good, bad, or indifferent. I will describe how I view myself, and then you can assess how you feel in contrast or similarity.

• I am in essence a Higher Self and a Lesser Self that together make up what I call me. There is no one else in the universe who is the same as me and I am unique in my expression in the universe.

• My Higher Self is God-Consciousness. This is God expressing Himself in the form of a human being on planet Earth. God is in everything and is everything in the universe (omnipresence) and is the only reality. Amongst all those things and creatures and plants and minerals, He is also in the form of Alan H. Dawe. In this, I am no better and no worse than any rock, plant, animal, or other person. I am “just” God-Consciousness in expression (or form).

• My Lesser Self is an illusion, a very real illusion that I can’t see through at this stage, but an illusion nevertheless. It hides my Higher Self and pretends to be me. Here resides my Ego and my mind. This is what I have created through expressing my free will. In Christian terms, this is my fallen self, the original sinner born of Adam and Eve. However, this Lesser Self is not separate from God — as it cannot be — it just lives in the illusion that it is separate from God.

• When I was born, I came into form as Alan H. Dawe. Whether I was a separate entity before that really does not matter. Maybe I am a separate spirit or soul who has incarnated many times before, or maybe this is the first (and only) time. Frankly, it does not matter, as I cannot remember the time before I was born, and I am happy with myself and understand why I am as I am with reference purely to this lifetime. I am not going to argue one way or the other on the question of whether I have lived before, because it is irrelevant to this life, and it is irrelevant to the eternal Now, which is the only reality.

• During this lifetime, I express myself as I feel at the time. I do the best I can in every moment. Sometimes my best meets the standards I expect of myself and meets the expectations of others, and sometimes it doesn’t. Whatever happens and whatever I do, my Higher Self (God-Consciousness) is right there and is experiencing it without judgement.

These are the first five points in answer to the question, Who Am I? I will save the others for tomorrow. It is well-worthwhile considering how you see yourself in terms of the above description. I invite you to add your thoughts and comments on this very important subject.  What can be more important than, Who Am I?

(Parts of this blog are quoted from Chapter 12 of my book, The God Franchise)

Why Did God Create a Universe? – Part 2 of 2

So, we have realised that God without a universe would be rather lonely and bored – there would just be eternal nothingness and His eternal thoughts about nothing.

Now, I expect that an omniscient God would be smart enough to figure out that there would be some fun in experiencing more than this. He may have come up first with a black and white (or even sepia) photo. Boring. How about a colour photo? No, still boring. How about a moving picture? God could watch movies all day. Well, how about a live action world that He could sit up here and watch? No, this is all still very superficial. He needed to really experience what He was seeing.

Therefore, I submit that God-Consciousness did just that. He did not create a world that He could watch voyeuristically from Heaven. No, He created a world that He could take part in and experience first-hand.

God-Consciousness is eternal. This means that He had no beginning and will have no end. Does this mean that He experiences all time at once? That is beyond the knowable and understandable. It is in truth, incomprehensible. Whether that is true or not, one imagines He might be interested in seeing how things progress sequentially. To see everything at once might seem to be an unholy mess, to use a word. When you have all time (and beyond), why not see some of what you can experience sequentially. See it develop. See it change. See evolution.

God-Consciousness is omnipotent. This means that He can do anything, and there is nothing that is too big or too powerful for Him to achieve. Handling a Big Bang is not an issue.

God-Consciousness is omnipresent. This means He is everywhere: in every cell in your body, and in everything that you do, be it good or bad. He is in every square inch of the universe. He experiences the universe from within.

God-Consciousness is omniscient or all-knowing; therefore, if He needed to figure out the constants that govern the universe, that would not be a problem. If He had to figure out how evolution would work, that would not be a problem either. Neither would the Law of Gravity, the Laws of Mathematics, the Laws controlling the structure of matter, and so on. God can figure it out and set it all in motion ahead of time. Bearing in mind that He is outside time if He chooses to be, He can be sure that all the things that need to be in place for the future will be there when they are needed.

Therefore, God-Consciousness had the motivation and the ability to create the universe, and that is what He did. He also did not create something out of nothing, as that is impossible. What He did create was the universe out of His very essence. He created the universe out of Consciousness.

(Parts of this blog are quoted from Chapter 8 of my book, The God Franchise)

Why Did God Create a Universe? – Part 1 of 2

Before the universe was created, there was either absolutely nothing at all, or there was God-Consciousness. Since we have a complex universe around us, and you, I, and a few other people are here and alive, there could not have been nothing, since there would have been no motivation to get started and no raw material with which to start. Therefore, God-Consciousness had to exist prior to the start of the universe, prior to the Creation.

From my recent blogs you will have quite a good picture of God (or God-Consciousness), and perhaps an understanding of why I see Him as conscious, eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, Creator, having a purpose, omnibenevolent and immutable.

But why did God bother to create a universe?

If we picture the scene before the Creation . . . well, there is not much of a scene to picture:

There is God-Consciousness and nothing else.

There is God-Consciousness and nothing else.

There is God-Consciousness and nothing else.

There is God-Consciousness and nothing else.

There is God-Consciousness and nothing else.

Great isn’t it?

So, there is God-Consciousness and nothing else. And God-Consciousness is eternal, all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-present. What is the point? You might ask. And no doubt God asked Himself the same question.

God needed to experience Himself; God-Consciousness needed to experience Itself. At this stage, God-Consciousness was no more than Potential, formless Potential. While we cannot even start to conceive of what that must be like, it would seem obvious there was not a lot for God to see or do. It would be a lonely existence. So, God needed to do something about it.

Being omnipotent and omniscient, He created a ball of His Energy and placed it in a space in His Mind/Being/Consciousness.

He then caused it to explode in a tremendous Big Bang…

********************************

Before we continue too far through this story, let’s spend a few moments looking at the motivation God-Consciousness had at this time.

God’s situation can be the same as ours. If He were not aware or conscious of His own Being, He would cease to exist. Since Consciousness needs to exist or there would be absolutely nothing, we can take it that God is aware of God-Consciousness, always, eternally.

If we consider the time before the Creation, before the Big Bang, we can see there was nothing except God-Consciousness. Nothing at all. Do you not think, in our terms, that God would be bored? His experience would be of…. Well, not a lot anyway. It would be like looking at a blank photograph. A photo of the inside of the lens cap. Looking at that eternally, that is, forever.

The story continues in Part Two…

(Parts of this blog are quoted from Chapter 8 of my book, The God Franchise)

God is Immutable

Yes, God is immutable (unchanging through time). God-Consciousness is and always will be God-Consciousness. God Himself is unchanging in that He has no need to change in His formless state. With His presence in the Eternal Now, there is no need to change in essence. Nevertheless, from the viewpoint of His Creation, there is all that change, growth, evolution, experience, invention, and development offers. God-Consciousness experiences movement, change, life, joy, and excitement through our Higher Selves. This is within His overall immutability.

Experience does not change God-Consciousness in essence as He has no need to change. Experience is experience and that is all it is. God is beyond time and is already conscious of past, present and future without taking the experience of free will away from His Creation.

Taking mathematical laws as an analogy, we can say that 1 + 1 = 2 is an immutable law. In fact all mathematical and physical laws are unchanging, assuming of course that they have been correctly formulated in the first place. If they have been incorrectly stated, all we need to do is correct the error. It is not that the law was wrong in itself or that the law was not immutable, but merely that Man made an error in its expression.

So, God-Consciousness is like the immutable mathematical law 4 + 3 = 7, and His experience (in time) being the figuring out of the value of  a  in the equation,

The mathematical law is immutable, but in time there is the experience of solving the equation. In other words, having fun and experience within time.

As we have said, we cannot break physical and mathematical laws. They are what they are as immutable facts, and we live within those constraints. In truth, we would not be alive unless those constraints were in place. The universe only works as it does because of those immutable physical and mathematical laws.

God, so far beyond His Creation that He is really beyond our comprehension and description, can nevertheless be accepted as being as immutable as His laws.

(Parts of this blog are quoted from my book, The God Franchise)

God is Omnibenevolent

Yes, God is omnibenevolent (absolutely good). Since God-Consciousness has created the universe out of His own essence, why would He create anything that He did not see as good? Having said that, in God’s terms, there is neither good nor bad, there is just experience. God can be seen as omnibenevolent because He has not gone out of His way to create evil, pain, suffering, catastrophes, and the other aspects of evil cited as part of the Problem of Evil.

The Problem of Evil asks, How can a God who is omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent allow the evil we see in the world? Epicurus (341-270BC) explained it in what became known as the Epicurean paradox:

• If a perfectly good God exists, then evil does not
• There is evil in the world
• Therefore, a perfectly good God does not exist.

As I see it, before Man attained the knowledge of good and evil (as described in the story of Adam and Eve), there was neither. There was just whatever was, and that was not judged as being either good or bad. God does not judge things as good or bad, but rather as experience.

Plants and animals do not judge things as good or bad. If a tree gets its leaves eaten by a passing giraffe, this is not bad. Even if an elephant uproots the whole tree, this is not evil. Likewise, if a lion is able to bring down a zebra or baby wildebeest, this is not evil; it is the law of the wild. Plants and animals live in the Now and face whatever the conditions, experiences, and situations are now, and the fittest survive.

So, God too is as He is, and that is it. Nothing He is or has created is either good or bad. It is just what it is. It is all in keeping with how things should be and how they are, as created by God, and as experienced by God-Consciousness through us. Therefore, we can say that God-Consciousness is omnibenevolent because He has not created anything for an evil purpose — everything is created for a positive purpose as discussed in my last blog. He has not set out to torture, to destroy, to goad, to cause pain, or to cause sorrow. God’s Creation is perfect, and He is perfectly omnibenevolent.

It is Man and his Ego, abusing free will, this gift from God, that has created the notion of good and evil. All the crime, wars, rape, pillage, and torture that men and women have imposed on others have come from Ego. If a true understanding of God and His universe were realised by everyone, then all evil would cease.

Even natural disasters — floods, earthquakes, drought, eruptions, tsunamis, plagues — are merely part of the way things are. They are not intrinsically evil. We judge them so, particularly when we are caught in the midst of them. However, great good can come from these things too. In the end, it is all experience. The very worst thing that can happen is that we die and the earthly experience ends. From the perspective of God-Consciousness, who is our very being, this is acceptable and perfect in the moment.

God-Consciousness is absolutely good (omnibenevolent) in reality, which is God’s perspective of things. Any view to the contrary comes from the Ego and is maya (illusion).

(Parts of this blog are quoted from my book, The God Franchise)

God Has a Purpose for His Creation

Yes, God has a purpose for His Creation. First, we can be sure that God-Consciousness is not going to go to the trouble of creating a universe without a reason. Second, His main purpose appears to be to have experiences. Without a Creation of some description, God-Consciousness would be like a very bored dreamer who had nothing to dream about. Experience and interest require something to experience and be interested in.

Without His Creation, God-Consciousness would be nothing but eternal nothing and some idle musings about nothing. So, God’s first purpose in creating the universe was to add experience, expression, and enjoyment into His Life. God-Consciousness experiences what it is to be a grain of sand on the beach, to be the Sun that warms it, and the wave that cools it. He is the child who puts it into a bucket and He is the bucket. How much experience, expression, and enjoyment can He take?

Another purpose is to experience His Creation learning to see through the futility of Ego and evil. From God’s perspective, it is all experience, and at the same time it is all illusion (maya); it would be very rewarding to see His Creation, and humanity in particular, realise the Truth and then to voluntarily relinquish Ego and duality. A key mechanism towards this realisation is relationship. In forming a deep intimate or spiritual relationship with other people, we experience a deeper relationship with ourselves, and so a deeper relationship with God, to the point where we can realise our Oneness with God, and so come to the self-realisation of our own true Being.

Since God-Consciousness is all there is, the idea of the Creation being there specifically to praise God is nonsense. God-Consciousness does not need to praise Himself to be fulfilled. Nevertheless, praise that is heartfelt appreciation of our lives and our experience (God-Consciousness’ life and experience) does not go amiss. It is just appreciation and recognition. However, it is not the purpose of God’s Creation. The purpose of God’s Creation is to experience.

(Parts of this blog are quoted from my book, The God Franchise)

God is Creator of the Universe

Yes, God is Creator of the Universe. God is the Prime Cause of everything, He is the only thing that is eternal, and therefore, He must be the ultimate Creator. Also, everything is made out of the essence of God-Consciousness. There was/is no other raw material available. As you know, we always use raw materials to “create” anything. There is always a transformation of one physical thing (or energy) into another – a change of form. God too needed a raw material for the Creation, and the only one available was consciousness – His God-Consciousness.

Creationists believe that God created the universe about 6,000 years ago, over a period of 6 days. They believe that God created every plant species, animal species and the human race from scratch, and that the theory of evolution is incorrect. To be honest, I cannot accept this scenario, but believe the scientists who tell us there was a Big Bang that started the universe about 14 billion years ago, and that evolution has happened since then, and that Man evolved about 150,000 years ago. Why should this be wrong? Isn’t this just as feasible as a baby growing from the fertilisation of an egg by a sperm and developing over a period of 9 months, and then growing into an adult human being over a period of about 20 years? This is also true of animals, birds and fish in their own way and their own timeframes.

God-Consciousness used the mechanism of the Big Bang, evolution and DNA to achieve what we have today. As scientists have uncovered it and explained it to us, it is a wonderful and inspiring journey that the universe has taken, and is taking into the future. This is even more of an achievement by an omnipotent and omniscient God than the biblical-style creation. Why do we try to limit God’s ability to have achieved what He has achieved, through the mechanisms described by science?

Nevertheless, no scientist has uncovered what existed before the Big Bang, how life started, where consciousness came from, or many other fundamental initial sources of what is here today. The reason? Because God-Consciousness is the ultimate explanation of the universe, and most scientists refuse to look at God as being a solution. This is a lot more than declaring God “the God of the gaps.” It is the only rational answer.

I find the solution, that there is God and God created the universe, to be the simplest solution of all. Some scientific theories postulate multiverses (multiple universes in different spaces and/or times), an eternal universe expanding and contracting in cycles, life springing spontaneously from inert matter, and so on. To me, these solutions are so complex as to be ludicrous. They do not explain anything, but rather add an extra layer of difficulty to an already complex question. Applying Occam’s razor, that a simple, succinct solution is usually the correct one, it is easy to accept that God exists and that He created the universe.

To be rational and truly scientific there is no alternative but that God-Consciousness is the Creator of the universe.

(Parts of this blog are quoted from The God Franchise)

Do We Have Free Will?

Happy New Year, everyone. This is a good time to look at whether we have the free will to make New Year’s Resolutions and succeed with them – or is it a lost cause and, ultimately, we have no free will.

The following question was raised by Thirdobservation in Q & A: “I read your three omni-posts and have a question about free will. In your last one you say we have free will but how can that be if God knows everything and is all powerful? If I personally decide something with “free” will then I have that power to decide, so I have that specific power and not God.

“You might say he could override me (but he doesn’t, or it isn’t free) or he had the power to give me free will but at the point of making the decision it is my power to decide (so he can’t be all powerful) and presumably because it is my choice then God doesn’t know the outcome of my decision until I declare it so then he isn’t all knowing.

“How do we have free will?”

The answer, in short, is Yes – we have total and absolute free will. This is part of The God Franchise that we have individually been given. If we go back to the very start, with the allegory of Adam and Eve, God gave them (and us) free will, and although they were warned not to, they had the free will to eat of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. I discuss the implications of this in great depth in the book. But for now, about free will …

Let’s assume we have total free will and there is no God. Today, we decide with total free will to do number 82 of 100 options. If we look back at that tomorrow, we can say with certainty we freely chose option 82 of 100 options. Now, if we add a God who can see the past, the present, and the future, and if He were to focus on tomorrow, He would merely see that we had chosen option 82 out of 100 options with our free will. It is that simple. This does not compromise either His omniscience or our free will.

If God is omnipotent, does that mean that He has the power and I don’t? There are two major reasons God is omnipotent: First is that He was/is the prime cause of everything and He could not make anything more powerful than Himself.

Second, He, God-Consciousness, is the substance or essence of everything. There is nothing that exists that is not made up of the fabric of God-Consciousness. If it was meaningful to say this, you could say that God is the sum total of all His various expressions or forms, and therefore however powerful any one of those forms might be, it is still a subset of God-Consciousness, and there are gazillions of other expressions or subsets that make up the totality of God-Consciousness. Logically, the totality must always be greater than any individual subset.

The first concept to get our heads around is that our being, that you and me, are not separate from God-Consciousness. From God’s perspective, He is the totality of everything that exists, and through that is omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent. From our individual perspective we are merely a splash of water in His Ocean.

Of course we have free will. Why would God create a bunch of automatons? What’s the fun in that?

So make those New Year’s Resolutions freely, and you have the power to decide personally and freely whether to carry them out or not. You have total freedom and responsibility in doing that. Thank God!

(Parts of this blog are quoted from The God Franchise)

God is Omniscient

Yes, God is omniscient. God-Consciousness is in everything and is everywhere, as I have already covered in previous blogs. If God-Consciousness is the very substance of every aspect of our universe, and of all other possible universes, as well as of Himself, He is by definition omniscient. He knows everything that is, because He is everything that is. There is nothing else that exists.

He does not know what cannot be known at this time. For instance, 100 years ago, God did not know what a DVD player was. This is because even the greatest minds in the world had not conceived of a DVD player or anything remotely resembling that creation. Due to free will, we are free to create our own futures. We are God-Consciousness in essence, and in order to enable free will to operate, God-Consciousness has chosen not to view the future within our universe.

God adds to His knowledge as each of us adds to our knowledge. I, in myself, do not know everything, but what I know is adding to the totality of all knowledge that is known. God-Consciousness is that totality, and can be said to know it all – to be omniscient. This continual addition to knowledge is within time.

From a perspective outside time, God-Consciousness knows all there is to know, past, present and future, but within time, He experiences things as they happen in general terms. The ability of clairvoyants and fortune tellers to see the future does not contradict this statement, allowing of course that the seeing of the future is genuine and is not either trickery or the intuitive assessment of potentials, and that God-Consciousness is prepared in that instance to allow that future to be glimpsed. It is like God peaking beneath the blindfold of time if He has reason or purpose to do so.

However you put it, because God is everything, He must know everything, and is therefore omniscient. That is the bottom line.

(Parts of this blog are quoted from The God Franchise)

God is Omnipresent

Yes, God is omnipresent. God-Consciousness is the essence of everything and, therefore, wherever there is something, there is God-Consciousness. He is immaterial in His essence, even if He is also present in all matter. There can be no place that exists where there is something that is not God-Consciousness.

God-Consciousness is present in every atom that exists — in every sub-atomic particle. He is also conscious at every level of grouping such as cells, organs, organisms, and so on. Omnipresence is thus the totality of these individual presences, if you like.

The God Franchise asserts that God (or God-Consciousness) was That that existed before there was any physical manifestation – before the Creation of the universe. Since there was no raw material with which to make a universe other than His own essence, God used consciousness. In effect, He differentiated His Consciousness into different forms and therefore one can readily say that He is in everything and is everything that exists.

The Bible says (Acts 17:28), “For in him we live, and move, and have our being.” This is literally true. God created the universe and everything in it inside His own Consciousness. The world is not out there — it is in here. In a sense, you and I and everything in the universe are merely thoughts in the Mind of God.

If I desire to enter the presence of God, to talk with Him, to get His support and help in any time of need, I only have to realise that He is here right now. He is here and is able to inspire me here and now. Other places don’t matter to me, only where I am right now. As it happens, God is here too.

God-Consciousness is everything that is. There is nothing else that exists. Therefore God is omnipresent, since there is no alternative.

(Parts of this blog are quoted from The God Franchise)

God is Omnipotent

Yes, God is omnipotent (all-powerful). This does not mean He can do the logically impossible, such as create a square circle. It just means if it can be done, God (God-Consciousness) can do it. There can be nothing more powerful than God-Consciousness because nothing exists or can exist that is not God-Consciousness. So, while you may be able to dream up some way in which God is not omnipotent, either you are asking for something which is intrinsically impossible and, therefore, nonsense, or you are dreaming up something that is unreal and does not and cannot exist.

There has been much argument on this point about whether God is or can even be all-powerful. Just think about it. If absolutely everything is held in God-Consciousness, then anything that exists or could exist is within the power of God to create. If something like the square circle is logically impossible, then God cannot create it either. This does not reduce His power. God-Consciousness can do whatever He can conceive of doing. Since there is nothing that can be conceived where God-Consciousness is not the one conceiving it, then nothing more powerful can exist. So, there is no need for any definition of what omnipotence means other than it is as powerful as it gets – however powerful that might be!

(Parts of this blog are quoted from The God Franchise)

So This is Christmas

John and Yoko’s very popular Christmas anthem “Happy Xmas (War is Over)” has the refrain:

      “A very Merry Christmas

       And a happy New Year

       Let’s hope it’s a good one

       Without any fear

       War is over, if you want it”

and ends with the words:

      ”War is over now”.

This is my wish for you and yours. I especially like the reminder that “War is over, if you want it. War is over now”. This has more to say than the usual meaning of the word “war”, and includes all fighting, whether with a supposed enemy, with any others or with one’s self. Anyway, war with others always boils down to war with one’s self first. War is over, if you want it.

We may struggle all year with ourselves, with others and with stress, overwork, exhaustion, pain, insecurity and so on, and at Christmas this somehow seems to be heightened. Everything conspires to exacerbate what it is you already feel. This is why many people dread the approach of Christmas.

But you don’t need to feel that way. War is over if you want it. You are in charge of how you feel, or you certainly are “if you want it”. Your consciousness is the source of your entire experience in life. What you expect, how you think, how you react, how you are, is exactly what you get back from the world at large.

You may feel that it is not quite as cut and dried as that, but if you go to the very essence of your human self, you will find that on balance, yes, your life is pretty much what you put into it. War is over, if you want it. But do you want it?

Governments don’t want to stop war because there is money in war. There is employment in war. There is power in war. There is pride in war.

Which wars don’t you want to stop – because you have vested interests, be it money, something to do, power, pride or whatever else is your benefit from that war? There are always what are called secondary gains in actions and non-actions. These are the hidden benefits in keeping up the war. Mind you, are they really benefits?

So whatever you feel about Christmas this year is a heightened sense of what you feel about life the rest of the year. Your experience is just enhanced. So rejoice in that! Christmas offers clarity. If you are joyful and full of love, know that this is your reality bubbling forth. If you are generous and giving, this is your reality. However if you are sad, lonely, depressed, or contracted at Christmas, know that this too is a reflection of your inner reality during the year, even if you have been successful in covering it up most of the time. Christmas heightens everything.

The good news is that one week later is New Year. “Let’s hope it’s a good one Without any fear”. You have the opportunity to change your consciousness to better express where you would like to be. Open into the you that you choose to be in the New Year. Realise that you have a full year to practice this new you, and then you can see how you have succeeded when next Christmas comes around to focus you …

And more good news. We have been talking about the “you” that I refer to as the Lesser Self, the Ego, the Mind and personality. Know that your Higher Self is there behind that, and that the Higher Self expresses and radiates the true essence of you, “if you want it”. And if you do, just open your heart and allow your true Self to reveal itself. See your consciousness blossom and heal, see the joy of the little innocent you grow up into the wise, experienced, self-affirming, radiant and life-embracing you.

War is over, if you want it. War is over now. To paraphrase Gandhi, be the peace you want to see in the world.

Happy Christmas to you and yours. Be present.

Many blessings

        alan

Alan H. Dawe

God Is Eternal

Yes, God is eternal. This means that God-Consciousness has no beginning and no end. It is difficult for us to conceive of anything having no beginning and no end because in our experience there is nothing like that. Nevertheless, logically, it is possible there could be something outside time. There is no reason whatsoever why Consciousness cannot be eternal. Perhaps a good analogy is the Laws of Mathematics. They are eternal would you not agree? No one invented 1 + 1 = 2. It just is, was, and always will be.

It is totally reasonable for God to be eternal, even if nothing else is. Everything has to have a cause, as something cannot come out of nothing. Since there needs to be a cause for everything, there cannot be a time when the Prime Cause, or the very first cause, did not exist. Going back to the very beginning of time and beyond, we find the Prime Cause, and because of Its absolute significance to everything that has followed, people have decided to call It God, or as I have suggested,  God-Consciousness.

The conundrum of Which came first, the chicken or the egg? can only have one answer. God either created the chicken or the egg to start things off. I am not saying this in the sense of the Book of Genesis, but in terms of the theory of evolution. The process had to start somewhere — neither chickens nor eggs are eternal.

So, which came first? I would suspect it is God!

(Parts of this blog are quoted from The God Franchise)

God is Conscious

Yes, God is conscious. In fact He is Consciousness itself. In essence all that exists is God-Consciousness. Even His Creation is Consciousness. As the scientists have seen, when you delve deeply into matter it dissolves into space. There is very little matter in matter, and what matter exists is derived from Consciousness. It is a denser form of the essence of God, which is Consciousness. We have used the term God-Consciousness as a reminder of what God really is.

So, the fundamental element of the universe is Consciousness. This had to pre-exist any possible physical earth. The universe started in a Big Bang 14 billion years ago, and before that these was nothing except Consciousness, the awareness and ability to determine choice of action, including to create a universe. Without that, there would have just continued to be nothing.

We know there is something (a universe) here rather than nothing, and the universe works pretty well, despite some people’s quibbles about certain aspects of it. Therefore why not call this Consciousness that set it all in motion, and underpins it, God. It does not matter if we do or not, but if we are interested in where we came from, why we are here, and what life is all about, the acceptance that there is this fundamental Consciousness at the heart of the matter, is of great interest to us, and has considerable explanatory value, as I have found in 371 pages of The God Franchise. (Yes, the exact number of pages of the printed book was determined today!)

Consciousness has no sense of separation from anything. It is totally aware and present in this moment. It has total experience. It has no need for doing — just being. It has no desires, no emotions, no human-like qualities — just pure consciousness.

Having said that in the best way I can, now let’s extend that sense of God-Consciousness into the realms of the Unknowable and just allow whatever is really there to be there as our unbiased, un-predetermined, unlimited, formless sense of God-Consciousness. This sense we now have is a tiny pointer to the true essence of God, which we can best simply call God-Consciousness.

(Parts of this blog are quoted from The God Franchise)

 

 

Qualities Associated with God

If we can clearly understand the qualities associated with God, we will have a much better idea of how the universe originated, why we are here, and how it all works! If we assume that God is our Source, and The God Franchise explains why this has to be the case, I feel it is important that we make some sense of the qualities associated with God. This helps us to place God in context in our lives, As well as helps us to really understand why things are as they are, and why we can assert, as I do, that everything is in its right place, and everything is perfect just as it is.

I am going to take this opportunity to list these qualities, and then we can look at them one by one, over the next few days. 

The God Franchise accepts most of the qualities that religious or spiritual people associate with God, or God-Consciousness as I prefer to think of Him. I say Him, and I use masculine pronouns through most of the book, but of course God is neither male nor female, not both, but rather is best described as It, when it comes to pronouns! Not very flattering when we are talking about the most important aspect of the whole of life and the universe!

While different religions and beliefs have various expectations of the nature of God, I would like to propose that the following qualities can be expected of God, if He is worth His salt:

• God is conscious
• God is eternal
• God is omnipotent (all-powerful)
• God is omnipresent (present everywhere)
• God is omniscient (all-knowing)
• God is the Creator of the universe
• God is likely to have a purpose for His Creation
• God is likely to be absolutely good (omnibenevolent)
• God is likely to be immutable (unchanging through time).

You may not accept all these qualities for God right now; although you might agree that if a God who displayed these qualities existed, He would definitely be worthy of the name, God.

What do you think? There is a comments box just here…

The God Franchise Chapter Headings

What a busy week, reading and rereading the manuscript, getting it ready for typesetting! Thank goodness for my excellent copyeditor and proofreader, Judith.

 It is time to share the chapter headings with you – here is a sneak preview.

 Part One

Does God Really Exist?

 

Chapter 1     Who or What is God?

Chapter 2     The Arguments For and Against God

Chapter 3     The Nature of God

Chapter 4     Consciousness

 

Part Two

What is The God Franchise?

 

Chapter 5     In the Beginning…

Chapter 6     The Story of Adam and Eve

Chapter 7    “But I Don’t Believe in Adam and Eve”

Chapter 8     Before the Creation and Why There is One

Chapter 9     Thoughts on Time and Space

Chapter 10   God’s Plan – the Ultimate Game

Chapter 11   The God Franchise

Chapter 12   Who Am I Then?

Chapter 13   The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil

Chapter 14   Creation and the Filters on It

Chapter 15   God’s Laws

 

Part Three

Comparing Our Beliefs

 

Chapter 16   Can We All Be Right?

Chapter 17   Approaching God

Chapter 18   Does God Exist?

Chapter 19   Is God One or Many?

Chapter 20   Is God a Personal God?

Chapter 21   Are God and His Creation One and the Same?

Chapter 22   Are There Many Paths or Only One?

Chapter 23   What Happens After We Die?

Chapter 24   Is Religion Necessary?

Chapter 25   What is Special about Humanity?

Chapter 26   Does Our Morality Come from God?

Chapter 27   So, What is Our Primary Problem?

Chapter 28   Why is it the Ego’s Fault?

Chapter 29   So, Do We Need to Strive for Anything?

Chapter 30   Are We There Yet?

 

Part Four

Daily Living as a God Franchisee

 

Chapter 31   What it All Means

Chapter 32   Taking Wise Action

Chapter 33   Secondary Gains

Chapter 34   Applying the Law of Manifestation

Chapter 35   It is All About Beliefs

Chapter 36   Your Environment

Chapter 37   Loss and Destruction           

Chapter 38   Sin and Temptation

Chapter 39   Judgement and Forgiveness           

Chapter 40   Working with Universal Law

Chapter 41   Prayer, Intuition and Inspiration

Chapter 42   God’s Grace

Chapter 43   Connections and Relationships

Chapter 44   So What is the Purpose of Life?

 

Part Five

Reaching a Conclusion

 

Chapter 45   What If The God Franchise is True?

Chapter 46   Benediction

 

The Appendices

Appendix I    The Atheists’ Case

Appendix II   The Scientists’ Case

Appendix III  The Theory of Evolution

Appendix IV  The Theists’ Case

Appendix V   Changing Horses

 

Bibliography

Glossary

Index               

The Writing Process – Part Two of Two

I had discovered I needed to put my 80,000 word book aside, and start The God Franchise. It was quite a daunting task.

Once again starting from scratch, I weaved my way through the chapters. I started researching the question of whether God exists or not, as I felt that determining this was paramount. The details of all this research is placed in the appendices of The God Franchise, as optional reading.

I have always been fascinated by the story of the Creation and Adam and Eve as described in the first three chapters of Genesis in the Bible. So I worked through these verses, one by one, and just wrote what came to me as being the deeper meaning of the biblical story. This analysis covers just two chapters of my book, yet the implications of what I discovered run through the whole book. The more I wrote, the more I felt inspired to write. There were whole chapters of the book that just revealed themselves to me. I did not have specific knowledge or a particular plan of what I was going to say; rather I just allowed whatever came up to be what I needed to write. It was really interesting reading back what I had written, and thinking Wow! So that’s how it works!

Over the next six months I researched further and allowed the book to write itself. I read and reorganised, and was inspired to write more. By March 2011 I had a book that made a lot of sense to me, and that contained some very interesting concepts and explanations of why our world is as it is, and why and how The God Franchise affects each of us in every moment. Here I now had a “theory of everything”, and it was time to share it.

The fact that The God Franchise was listed as a finalist (4 out of 57 entries) in the top NZ mind-body-spirit writing competition, the Ashton Wylie Charitable Trust Unpublished Manuscript Awards 2011, was very encouraging.

This is a fascinating book. I have read it many times now, and each time I enjoy reading it. I enjoy the way it is phrased. I like the sense of fun, yet underneath the real deep truth about life and how it works. The God Franchise has been a real inspiration to me and I trust that you will find it as interesting and inspiring as I do.

It is great, if I say so myself!!!

The Writing Process – Part One of Two

The process of writing my first full-length book, The God Franchise, has been very interesting. I started way back in 2003 writing a book with an emphasis on various aspects of life. After writing for about six months, I realised that the book needed, and I needed, more practical experience of what I was writing about.

Accordingly over next five years from late 2003 to late 2008 I studied and put into practice to a greater or lesser extent, spiritual healing, neuro-linguistic programming (NLP), life coaching, bio-energetics, naturopathy, and The Journey.

I worked in spurts on my book, starting another book on aspects of health in 2005. In late 2008 and early 2009 I wrote a 96-page eBook on sleep, called Sleep, Glorious Sleep!. This was a commission, and I enjoyed researching and writing this book. In addition, in April 2009 I started writing a Weekly Healing Email to all my clients. I kept this up for 135 weeks, only deciding to stop this week as I start to focus on this blog as an alternative.

Also in 2009 I started a third book, which focused on the philosophical and practical aspects of the Law of Attraction, The Power of Now (Eckhart Tolle’s teachings) and The Journey. This book contained some interesting concepts, but was not flying.

In December 2009 I joined Brandon Bays, the founder of The Journey, and about 140 other Journey Practitioners on a three-week spiritual tour of India. On my return from India, I was in a state of openness about my life, and decided, after a couple of days, that now was the right time to complete my book!

I started work on it in February 2010, essentially beginning from scratch, the fourth time I had done this. Parts were based on the original 2003 book, and I pulled in the old material as I felt it was needed. Also many of the Weekly Healing Emails have found their way into this book. I saw real progress towards creating a book covering many different topics and aspects of life.

Then in August, after six months work, and with a book of about 80,000 words already in my computer, I suddenly came to the profound realisation that I had to put even this book on hold. I realised that Significant Things, as I have titled it, needs to be a second book, and that The God Franchise had to be first. (Part Two to follow).

What is Consciousness?

My assertion is that Consciousness is the fundamental element of the universe. Before the universe started, before the Big Bang, all that existed was Consciousness. Man has decided to call that Consciousness God. I prefer the name God-Consciousness.

According to the dictionary, consciousness with a small “c” is awareness of self, environment and mental activity, and the ability to determine choice of action. With a capital “C” I assert that Consciousness is all these plus there is the expectation that Consciousness is eternal, omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent (at least).

But what is consciousness really? You and I (I assume) are aware of ourselves as people. We both assume, I would guess, that all people will be equally aware of themselves. We might make exceptions for people who are new-born or perhaps handicapped in a cognitive way, but generally we can say that a person is conscious of his or her own self. We also assume that everyone is aware of their environment and of their own mind and the thoughts that are constantly commenting on what is being perceived. We might also expect that people have the ability to determine their own action, even if it is constrained in some way by outside forces.

Just for a few moments consider this. What is it like to be you? Recognise that you are totally unique. There is no one else in the universe who has a consciousness of being you. You by some strange happenstance are you. You have your own experience of life, your own thoughts and your own beliefs. These are all different to anybody else’s. You are consciousness coming from one particular perspective. You and your experience are unique. If you look around at other people, you can see that they are not you, yet you can be aware that they too, individually, have this same experience of being unique with their own unique experiences, thoughts and beliefs.

You can therefore definitely claim to be consciousness.

What of Consciousness with a capital “C”? Everything we have said above applies, and in addition, because we are applying this term as a name for God, we can add the qualities of being eternal, omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, and all the other qualities associated with God. (We will discuss these separately later)

So why should God be Consciousness or Consciousness be God? That is the real question. As I said in my previous blog, something had to have set the ball rolling in the universe, and that had to be something non-physical. Consciousness, or rather God-Consciousness, is rationally the only non-physical force that could have achieved this.

The only thing that scientists are aware of that is not physical is awareness itself. It is life and consciousness. Even time, energy and forces are reliant on physical things. However consciousness and being (life) are not necessarily dependent on anything physical. One can imagine that consciousness, being and intelligence could exist eternally in an uncaused way because physical laws do not apply to them.

As we said above, you can claim to be consciousness as it is what makes you exist. Yet scientists cannot explain the source or even the nature of either life or consciousness. The reason for this is that when we speak of life or consciousness, we are knocking on the door of the divine. Hence we speak of Consciousness and God-Consciousness. God-Consciousness is not only the only pre-existent and original force or being, but, as Consciousness was all that was available to Him as raw material, everything that has followed in the creation of the universe (and beyond), is Consciousness. The universe is made of the very fabric of God. You can say that we exist in the Mind of God. There is nothing else but God-Consciousness, and what He has chosen to develop (or allow to develop) from His Being and His Consciousness. The physical universe is Consciousness solidified into form.

Consciousness (with a capital C) is the fundamental element of the universe, and means nothing less than this.

(This is largely an extract from Chapter 4 of The God Franchise)

Does God Really Exist?

Although this may seem difficult or even impossible, try to imagine what it might have been like before there was an Earth, before there was a universe. Then ask yourself, what was there before that? If you come up with an answer, accept it and ask, what was there before that? Keep going back until you can go back no further.

Now try the same exercise forward in time. What comes after this universe that we live in? What comes after that? Clear away whatever comes up and ask, what comes after that? Keep going until you come to a stop.

If you go back far enough, there are only two possible answers to this question; either there was nothing, absolutely nothing at all, or else this universe is eternal and had no beginning. Likewise, looking forward, either there will be nothing left, absolutely nothing at all, or else this universe is eternal and has no end.

If there was absolutely nothing, the question is where and how did the universe spring into existence? If there was absolutely nothing, there was no need to do anything and there were no resources to make it happen. Nothing would just continue to be nothing. The only power that could possibly create something from nothing is Consciousness.

Consciousness means: an awareness of self, environment, and mental activity, and the ability to determine choice of action. So, in saying that Consciousness is the only power that could create something from nothing, I am saying that awareness and an ability to determine choice of action were the prime qualities needed to precede the creation of something from nothing. Science has no credible explanation of how nothing could suddenly become something. Scientists start with the Big Bang, not before it.

Just as an idea might be created out of nothing (though this seldom happens), so conceivably a powerful enough Consciousness might create the universe out of nothing. So, if there was nothing at all, there at least had to be Consciousness existent in order to create the universe of which we are now part. Man has decided to call this Consciousness “God”.

The other possibility, that the universe is eternal, without beginning or end, also seems to imply some sort of eternal force that underlies the whole process. We know that nothing physical lasts forever, so there would need to be a non-physical force underlying the universe just to keep it maintained. This force is best described as “Consciousness” or “God”.

Now, if we look into the future, either things go on eternally or else there will suddenly be nothing. Where will everything go unless it is dissolved back into Consciousness (God)? If God switches off and dies, there will be absolutely nothing, and no chance of a new start. It is very unlikely that if God started out eternally (in our past), that He would not continue into the future eternally too. And if He didn’t, and there was absolutely nothing left, it wouldn’t matter, would it? So, if there is eternity, there has to be something that is eternal. That something is Consciousness or God.

Does God really exist? Of course He does! Our concept of who or what God is may be inaccurate. But there had to be something, Consciousness in fact, to pre-exist the Universe. We may as well call this pre-existing Consciousness God, because in essence that is what being God is all about.

(This is the essence of the opening chapter of The God Franchise)

Introducing The God Franchise

A new book, The God Franchise. Wow!

It seems fitting that the first post should be an outline of the book. So here it is, from the back cover. You read it first here.

Do you ever wonder…

Who am I?

What is my purpose in life?

Why are things the way they are?

What is the universe all about?

Who or what is God?

What is The God Franchise?

     And a Theory of Everything? Really?

The God Franchise offers a compelling perspective that will help you to answer these questions . . .  and many others you might have about your life. This is a book of deep spirituality written simply and logically, and tinged with a sense of humour.  It can be read and reread and is guaranteed to provide you with fresh insight and understanding each time.

The God Franchise is a book about God and the universe we live in. It is also a book about YOU ― your loves, your triumphs, your good and not-so-good actions, your fears, and your pain. You will uncover truths about who you are and the purpose of your life. In fact, it is a Theory of Everything!

The God Franchise is a unique book. It is addressed to you, whatever your present beliefs and understanding of God and the universe. It is spiritual rather than religious, and builds bridges between your beliefs and others’, whether religious, agnostic, atheistic, or spiritual.

The God Franchise sets out to challenge and edge you towards uncovering your deepest personal reality. It is a practical book in many ways, yet, if you so choose, you don’t need to do a thing.

But, you will never be the same again…