When you become emotionally dependent on someone, it produces a

sense of expectation and entitlement from the person. When you don’t
get what you want from the person, you get angry with them because
you think they owe it to you, but that is just coming from your
attachment to them and lack of connection with God’s love.

In spirituality, attainment has to be gradual because the circumstances

of life are what refines and purifies you, and that occurs over a
lifetime. When we feel we have attained, a test will come and show us
how much more we have to go. So the tests are necessary in order to
humble us and to offer us opportunities for further growth.

People use the idea of God as an escape into spiritual materialism--as

a way to not have to face the pain and vulnerability of suffering and
being a human being.

What is the purpose of our intellect? Is it to discover truth or merely to

acquire knowledge?

Our life is not the circumstances of our life. Our true life consists of our
faith in God, and the spiritual spark that animates us. Our true life is
not the content of our lives, it is the spirit of life.

Higher love is not something people with lower love can understand.
So they may see an action coming from higher love as something that
is not loving, because they don’t understand the nature of higher love.
And they may regard the person with higher love as unloving or even
malevolent.

Fear is the combination of past memories of painful emotions (felt as

uncomfortable bodily sensations), and anticipation of future pain,
especially emotional pain, that may arise from various situations and
circumstances in life.

All human beings are at all times subject to desire for pleasure and
aversion to pain. Every impulse of every human being, at all times, is
to maximize pleasure and to minimize pain. Even altruistic impulses
have pleasure as their root motivation (it feels good to help someone).
Absolute selflessness is impossible. The closest one can get to
selflessness is recognition of one’s helplessness and powerlessness
before a sovereign, all-knowing, all-loving God. Even if a person
embraces pain as a spontaneous spiritual act, it is because ultimately
the spiritual or sacrificial act leads to a pleasurable feeling of prayer or
transcendence. We are always imperfect and always in need. God is
the only loving one, the only one who can be trusted.

People don’t know what they want. Society, mostly through corporate
advertising, tells them what to want, and that is what is called
conditioning.

Can we be detached from material possessions? Can we be spiritual

while being attached to the things and pleasures of this world? Can we
enjoy the pleasures of this world while being detached from them?
What would this look like? How could you tell if someone is detached or
not?

We have been taught that certain emotions are unacceptable, such as

fear, hurt, shame, and guilt.

God’s grace is not only there when you get the things you want in life,
but His grace is present even when you don’t get what you want. Since
your heart is not getting filled with attachment to this world’s
pleasures, when you don’t get what you want you have more
opportunity to realize God’s grace—more reason to seek it.

We judge others in the ways we fear others are judging and have
judged us. We’re hurt by others’ judgments of us, and instead of
processing those feelings by understanding them, turning to God, and
forgiving others, we project these feelings onto others—not onto those
who are judging us, but onto those whom we are judging.

Why are we afraid? Simply because we don’t feel loved. Fear is a lack
of feeling comfort and security, which comes from pleasure, mainly,
but specifically from feeling an inner warmth and glow. This ultimately
comes from the love of God, but we use all kinds of worldly things to
give us a feeling of pleasure. Fear arises when we perceive we don’t
have these securities, or when we feel they have been taken away. I
believe we feel fear around others because others don’t love us, and
we sense that in our bodies. We also are not in touch with God’s love.
But we need love from people as well as from God in order to eliminate
fear. Sure, we are afraid of people’s judgments about us, and their
thoughts and remarks about us may hurt us emotionally. If they had
pure love for us, we would not feel scared. So I believe fear is a real
indicator of a lack of love within us and as well, within others as they
relate to us.

When a couple who were once in love break up, their feelings for each
other eventually become repressed and go into hiding in the
unconscious. The hurt is initially covered with anger and resentment,
then the exigencies and requirements of life force the couple to build
emotional walls and scars around the resentment. The feelings of love
and desire, need and attraction which they once felt for each other,
ultimately become hardened and frozen, and turn into artifacts of the
unconscious, housed along with many other demons and ghosts from
past hurts and unmet needs.

The disorder called depression is a scam. The reason people feel

‘depressed’ is because they live in a world of fake people with no love
and no connection with God or truth. You’re taught to be fake as a
child--all your energy and motivation to live is based on lies. There is
no one who is real, who knows the truth. Most people just buy into the
scam of artificial, materialistic life. For those who don’t, life is difficult.
For those who feel and see that people are fake, life is painful. No one
hears, no one listens. It would be natural to feel depressed in light of
this dire and desperate situation. It’s funny how they just give
depressed people drugs instead of looking at the real societal problems
and causes. Depression seems like a sane and normal response to a
world where people have no love and don’t know God.

From religious communities, we get our superficial needs met for

acceptance. But this is artificial, since we must be artificial in order to
fit in and be accepted. So are our needs really being met? Is it only at a
superficial level, or not at all? Our real need is acceptance for our soul,
and for our whole being—not for the constructed person we become in
order to please others and gain their approval. Is that even acceptance
at all? We are deceiving ourselves if we think that is a satisfying kind of
acceptance.

Negative thoughts such as remorse and regret and about past actions,
blaming people, anger at others and oneself, hopeless thoughts about
one’s future--all serve to ward off feelings of pain and sadness. The
negative thinking becomes a buffer for the actual painful sensations of
loss. Anger and judgment create an ‘ego power’, as a defense
mechanism for the feelings of loss, defeat, vulnerability, sadness, fear,
emptiness, or guilt that would be a normal response to when
unfavorable conditions and situations occur in life.

Bob’s healing work:

After I discover and realize how to use good health and physical
pleasure to connect with God, I’ll be able to heal people physically.

When you weigh pros and cons about a decision, one must consider
that some pros or cons are more significant and carry more weight
than others.

Making a decision can be as tedious as a court proceeding—one must

gather and weigh all the facts in the case, the evidence for both sides.

Dehumanization is what you see in many workplaces, families, and

schools.

The true self is surrender to God.

Whosever life falls apart first, wins.

Karma is used as a replacement for God. Karma and past lives are
used to explain suffering, or effects in this life which have no apparent,
traceable causes. We would say it is God’s will. Hindus and Buddhists
say it is due to karma and past lives.

Emotions bridge time to the timeless. They are the effect of the past
and the perceived future, but are experienced in the present.

The Baha’i community had to completely lose the spirit so that seekers
of truth would be forced to truly turn to God instead of getting
attached to a seemingly healthy Baha’i community.

There is a palpable and visceral stream of experience emanating from

the core of my being.

Why is it socially and culturally acceptable for women to show more

skin than men in public, if the case is that men are more prone to
lusting after women’s bodies than women are to lusting after men’s
bodies?

“Pain cooks you.” (Roxana)

In spirit, everyone is everywhere, so we’re never alone.

The only benefit people receive from following the laws and rules of
religion is confirmation of their identity of being a good person, so this
identity can successfully ward off the feelings of inadequacy, guilt,
shame, and the feeling of being unloved. In these people there is no
real experiential understanding of the benefits of following the laws of
God.

Progressive people often rebel against following the laws of God when
this compliance is used for ego validation. Yet their own inner feelings
of guilt result from this same attitude and approach to the laws of God.
They intellectually realize that this is a flawed approach to following
the laws of God, but emotionally it is still what has been ingrained and
conditioned into their psyche. This approach revolves around the idea
that your value and worth is dependent upon how well you follow the
letter of religious law, as it is dictated to you by parents, teachers, and
leaders of religion. In this approach, there is no mercy, grace, love, or
forgiveness. The sense of inadequacy engendered by falling short of
this standard and other man-made standards is the driving force
behind almost all worldly accomplishments, as people rush to
compensate for this sense of weakness. The result is a hollow and
materialistic culture filled with artificial and alienated people.

When we see a great musician perform or a great piece of art, we

always praise and glorify the artist or musician. We speak of how great
and talented he is. But we rarely praise and glorify God, the author of
the talent. We praise people in an exaggerated way because we don’t
realize that God is to be praised—we miss that important component in
appreciating great works of art or design.

You need to find harmony between intellect and emotion.

The divine appearing in the human is a paradoxical mystery.

Women want to hide behind the shadow of a prestigious man. They

want to escape their feelings of fear and inadequacy, especially in
public, by being seen with a man of worldly power and status. This way
they will be respected and admired, and their inner demons will go into
hiding in their unconscious. Of course later when they are alone with
their husband, they may want genuine emotional connection, but that
won’t be possible, since the purpose of the marriage is to create an
illusion of power and security. Emotional intimacy happens when the
walls come down and everyone is honest with each other. Ha! That
can’t happen.

When women are with me in public, they feel ambivalent. On one

hand, they want to play the worldly act of ego power for people, so
they can feel secure and not feel any inadequacy, fear, or shame. On
the other hand, being with me is a safe place to feel natural
inadequacy and they know I will not judge them. But since they are
with others who wouldn’t accept them being more real, they have to
kind of act like they don’t know me, and even be offensive toward me
to show that they have power over someone who might expose their
vulnerability. Also, their disrespect and discounting of me helps them
to repress their own feelings of vulnerability, as they are discounting
their own feelings inside.

8/17/09
I’ve been experiencing random periods of unexplained euphoria lately.
Funny, ‘cause it’s mixed in with periodic headaches, anxiety, and
fatigue. I think I’m repressing loneliness. Funny, ‘cause that’s mixed in
with a warm, connective faith in a higher love and deeper purpose. It’s
all mixed in together, and makes a delicious soup.

Maybe I’m having left-brain dementia or stroke, or brain tumor. I think

those can cause euphoria. Or maybe I’m anticipating intimacy with
someone. Or maybe I’m getting closer to God, but I don’t know it. Or
maybe I’m anticipating impending euphoric sleep due to a new high-
end mattress.

9/23/09
No church or person tells me what to do. I use my free will and
freedom to choose when I choose to follow the laws of the Baha’i Faith.
Not one person has ever guided me in this decision. So much for being
controlled by religion.

We fabricate a counterfeit self because other people would not know

how to relate to us otherwise. We know there is more inside, but other
people are not taught how to relate to what is behind the mask. So we
take on roles in life so our function can be identified, and then people
know how to interact with us. Mother, teacher, lawyer, homeless guy,
musician, crazy dude, obnoxious guy, pretty girl, smart kid, whatever.
We all relate according to what we can get or what we can give. We’re
not taught to communicate or interact from a deep place, so it gets
filled with fear, insecurity, shame, confusion, hurt, anger. No love gets
deep inside, so it is filled with these dark ‘demons’. We must put a
mask on and bury all this fear and shame, lest we get no acceptance in
this artificial world.

Isn't it interesting how some people feel extremely blessed after a

terrible, crippling accident because their life was spared? They gain a
new appreciation for life. Calamities and suffering always have a
deeper meaning, and are always meant to help us grow spiritually--
whether the suffering is due to our mistakes or not.

We have to transplant our trust in the world to the soil of trust in God.

It takes a village to raise a child; it takes a community to transform a

soul.

It is best to relate to people from the love of God. If you can’t do that,
try to be authentic with them. If you can’t do that, then construct an
artificial self and relate to them through this mask. But make sure it
treats all people well!
The wise man suffers, but does not become sad by it. Also, the sad
man suffers, but he is not made wise by it.