What happens is our lives become so heavily oriented around the expectations of others that we become more and more like them and less and less like ourselves. We become split. I was split. I had this person I knew I was made to be, yet it was mixed in with all of these other ... people. As the lights were turned on, I saw I had all of this guilt and shame because I wasn't measuring up to the image of the perfect person I had in my head.

But reading the Bible, you learn that it's not about trying to be something you're not—it's about learning to see the movement and motion and possibilities right in the midst of whatever world you find yourself in. We're not living in the first century or the ancient Near East—we're here, now. At this time. In this world.

It's possible to resist the very growth and change and expanding consciousness that God desires for you by appealing to your religious convictions.

right isn't even the best way to think about the Bible. How about dancing? You dance with it. And to dance, you have to hear its music. And then you move in response to it.

It is your responsibility to stop listening to voices that hinder your ongoing growth and maturity.

Can you see why Jesus often began his teachings by saying "Repent!"? You know what repent means? It means to change your thinking, to see things in a new way, to have your mind renewed—all

It's at the end of ourselves that new futures open up.

It's very common to hear talk about heaven framed in terms of who "gets in" or how to "get in." What we find Jesus teaching, over and over and over again, is that he's interested in our hearts being transformed, so that we can actually handle heaven.

heaven has the potential to be a kind of starting over. Learning how to be human all over again. Imagine living with no fear.

Spirit is often lurking in whatever it is you most dislike.

I'd like to get away from earth awhile And then come back to it and begin over. May no fate wilfully misunderstand me And half grant what I wish and snatch me away Not to return. Earth's the right place for love: I don't know where it's likely to go better.

Something we were withholding made us weak, until we found it was ourselves.