One day after hitting absolute rock bottom, I shouted from my veranda, “God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?”
I had never considered myself to be a religious person, so when the word God came out of my mouth, I must say I was a wee bit surprised, to say the least. But at the same time, it felt like it was a true relationship with God that had been missing all this time, and that for my life to change, I needed to look at the possibility that there was a God.
For me to even consider this was huge. Growing up, I was not religious and didn’t want anything to do with religion. I thought it was all rubbish, a waste of time and something that people used to hide behind to avoid not having to take responsibility for their behaviour, actions or thoughts. I believed that religion was something that instigated wars, caused people to behave in hypocritical ways and allowed a group of people to create something they called religion as a way to control, manipulate and influence others.
I know this sounds harsh, but as a young child heading into adulthood, from what I had observed, my perception was one that I later came to realise held some truth. However, the picture I had, and what I had observed of religion, was certainly not what I have now come to know true religion to be.
What if there was another meaning for Religion? What if for all these thousands of years we had falsely believed that God was a being that lived outside of us, that he was the only being that could grant us salvation and give us retribution, and permission to enter the golden gates of Heaven; or the supposed alternative, going to the fiery depths below, and that this was not actually true? What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?
What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?
I have come to understand that True Religion is not something or someone that lives outside of us, it is not about visiting a place of worship or repenting our sins. True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.
Knowing that all we need is already within, we have a choice to connect to our body and live by and from the impulses of our inner heart, or we can make the choice to ignore our body, and instead let our minds lead the way, allowing beliefs to guide us, instead of love and a sense of equality for all.
In contrast to the mind, which constantly seeks acceptance and recognition from others, the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is. It knows it already has, and is, all that it needs – there is nothing else, only an allowing for one to be love, and to live in and from this place.
True Religion has no rules, there is no guide book, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters, there is always a bigger picture at play, a grander plan you could say, one that includes everyone and everything. Each one of us is affected and impacted by the choices we all make and the way that we choose to live. I have found that this way of life is not about self, but about everyone.
It is True Religion that re-connects us with our inner heart, allowing us to honour the amazing beings we are, supporting us to build and develop a relationship with ourselves and in turn, redeveloping our relationship with God.
After many years of attending Universal Medicine courses, retreats and presentations, it was this that I discovered for myself. I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.
Before this I used to live with a lack of acceptance for myself, refusing to take responsibility for the choices I made and the life I had created, a life that I continually tried to escape from, to avoid, my life that stayed with me, no matter what I did or where I went. How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?
It was not until I fully felt this, accepted it and began to take responsibility for myself, my choices and the life I had created, that things began to change.
And wow!… have they changed, all because I have chosen to love and honour all that I am.
Making heart-felt choices that support my body, eating foods that leave me feeling light, not heavy, dull or bloated, going to bed when I am tired, establishing a rhythm leading up to my bedtime, showering, preparing my bed by pulling back the sheets, lighting an incense and having a fresh glass of water next to my bed, not pushing my body beyond what I feel it is capable of in that moment and listening intently to the signs it offers me, the niggles and aches, no matter how large or small they are, are important and deserve to be heard as well as felt. These are just some of the things I now choose for myself and this allows my body to then be the marker for what comes next.
Beginning with a few simple but profound changes in my life with the ongoing support, love and inspiration of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine, I am able to continue developing and deepening the love I have for myself and others by living a life of True Religion.
By Nicole Serafin, Woman, Wife, Mother, Hairdresser
Further Reading:
Observation builds trust
Religion|Unimedpedia
My True and False Experiences of God
The Truth about Universal Medicine 
Our connection to our heart, our inner-heart is a key part of our lives, ‘Knowing that all we need is already within, we have a choice to connect to our body and live by and from the impulses of our inner heart’.
Thank you Nicole, and taking “responsibility for the choices you made in the first place,” deepens the true appreciation we have for our own divinity and thus we start to also see the divinity in others, then we have rejoined true religion, through reconnecting to our inner-most and the appreciative-ness of that connection.
As much as we want to we can never escape our past, for every experience we have walks with us until we resolve and let it go.
A beautiful description of the true meaning of religion: ‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’
What if the word ‘religion’ has lost its true meaning over the years, ‘What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?’
“I believed that religion was something that instigated wars, caused people to behave in hypocritical ways and allowed a group of people to create something they called religion as a way to control, manipulate and influence others”. It is easy to believe this as you grow up, as I did, because this is what we observe. This doesn’t mean that this is what religion is supposed to be about. Re-finding that knowing of God within me that I had and never questioned as a kid has been profound and is undoing the false ideas about religion that have been piled on top over the years.
No wonder so many people turned away from what they observed as religion, when historically it has been seen to be about wars, corruption, greed and hypocrisy.
We yearn and seek God, that connection to something that confirms us regardless, and to me religion is that connection, the relationship that is the dearest and actually unwavering even when I pretend it to be flaky or wobbly, as that is the truth of who we are.
It is incredible that the spark we all have within remains undimmed by time, or anything that we might do to it.. always ready to be reignited the moment we choose.
‘the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is’. Suddenly all that drive, all the force, the complication drops away… and I find myself facing something so simple and profound. That is God (or an aspect of) and its simply a question of diving in deep.
I felt so poignantly the part where we let go of the recognition from the mind and just settle in the heart…we don’t need anything when we are here. And everything is being taken care of.
“What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?” When that ‘What if?’ becomes truth we know we are a part of something profoundly amazing and that we are so much greater than we ever imagined.
What if we are so much grander than we could ever imagine, ‘It is True Religion that re-connects us with our inner heart, allowing us to honour the amazing beings we are, supporting us to build and develop a relationship with ourselves and in turn, redeveloping our relationship with God.’
I love the practical way you say that “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love…” and how the intelligence of our body can guide us here rather than ideals or beliefs about how that should look…
Our body is like a wise best friend, we just have to listen to, and honour it, ‘Making heart-felt choices that support my body, eating foods that leave me feeling light, not heavy, dull or bloated, going to bed when I am tired, establishing a rhythm leading up to my bedtime’.
To free oneself from the pictures we hold about religion and just allow ourselves to feel the innate connection we have to everyone and everything and take our steps from there has us feel and walk and live true religion that is innately ours.
You raise an important point in your blog Nicole, was only when you took responsibility in your life that things began to change. Being part of a true religion now, I used to run away from responsibility but have found the power in embracing this quality and learning to live it more and more each day.
Where institutionalised religion has been created in a way that actually keeps people in separation from themselves and God, true religion will naturally bring them together, in a way where living in brotherhood and knowing God is simply a natural way of being in this world.
True religion is now a welcome part of my life too, ‘Beginning with a few simple but profound changes in my life with the ongoing support, love and inspiration of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine, I am able to continue developing and deepening the love I have for myself and others by living a life of True Religion.’
Accepting the fact that one is deeply religious but this does not mean to accept that mainstream so called religions are such thing, is deeply liberating and has a huge impact on our movements.
The pull for us to re-connect with our innermost heart and divine essence is always there, often felt as a deep sadness from missing that connection that we have chosen to separate from. To make new choices to re-build the re-connection within is the way home to living and being true religion in daily life.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are”.
What a welcome change, to have a world based on love, coming from the love we are in truth.
True religion has no impositions it allows you to be you and it comes from the essence of love.
“I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life”- I could not agree with you more with this statement. True religion is in everything and not in a particular building.
” One day after hitting absolute rock bottom, I shouted from my veranda, “God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?” ”
While it may look like rock bottom , it can be the start of the return to whats true . For when one hits rock bottom it can be the recognising that this presented way of life is in fact not true, therefore there must be a true way of life.
“What if there was another meaning for Religion?” The magic of reconnecting to the essence of our inner being and the truth of our divinity that is equally in all.
Discovering that God is not outside of ourselves but within, is a huge transformation, because it means we no longer see God from the ideals and beliefs we held of him, but truly feel the love of god from within.
I can confidently say I have had a few ‘religious experiences’ where I have felt deeply God by my side, and in me. Yet they still remain moments, peak experiences, because I have yet to weave that connection throughout my everyday. Simple question – why not? Its there for all of all of the time. We just have to choose it.
A religion that knows love and truth and expresses both could well be a true religion. The catch is knowing and expressing both love and truth, rather than dogma.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’ This asks us to be responsible for every choice we make, to feel every message from our body and make changes accordingly.
By making loving choices for ourselves we are actually introducing religion into our lives. As we are from love and then by introducing love into our lives we do appreciate the fact we are and deserve to live in the love of God. This is simply already religion, the acknowledgement that we are love and deserve to live that love that we all can sense lives within.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” Religion is so simple and practical. Why did we make divinity so complicated?
Yes, very similar to life. Identical even?
Bring back the simplicity, let go of complication is all part of living a life based on love.
Most people who are members of an orthodox religion have the best of intentions and truly believe that they are connecting with God yet ironically the system that they are member of actually alienates them from the thing they crave – love and fullness. However, intention is not an excuse for anyone not to discern that what is being presented does not deliver what they desire – it is just more comfortable not to question.
The false religion that I belonged to was all about self sacrifice for the good of others, when I came to understand what true religion meant and how to have it which started with connection to my innermost and loving myself instead of denying myself this was a huge turnaround to make, how simply divine it is to learn to live from the love that resides with in us that has always has been there.
“I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.” A great reminder for today – that religion is about everything, which includes every movement and every choice that I make – no matter how small. . Thankyou Nicole.
I loved reading this blog again today Nicole, what a different world we would live in if people began to live true Religion. So many Religions today are lacking this deep wisdom, truth and love, it has been very powerful and inspiring to be introduced to The Way of The Livingness and to be part of a true Religion that is about developing a beautiful relationship with God and reminding us of the divinity and sacredness we are all truly from.
When I came to Universal Medicine, even though ‘God’ was mentioned, it wasn’t until a few years later that the word ‘religion’ started to get uttered, and I could feel I knew exactly what it was, but I was doing my very best to avoid using that ‘r’ word to describe what it was Universal Medicine was presenting through The Way of The Livingness. I thought I was simply learning to live. Now it makes absolute sense that that is the true religion. It is about life being lived and its every aspect. We may try looking away, but it is not possible for us not to be in a relationship with the All.
Its not that God creates wars, its the people who invest themselves into an ideology, don’t connect whatsoever with a true relationship with God, and then preach that in opposition to the next guy… Its crazy that this is what we thing religion is and have done for thousands of years… very revealing of the continued human condition.
Let put it this way, instead of saying that a true relationship with God was missing, we could also say a false relationship with God is what I was engaged with…. And did not truly work. Saying it one way or the other may convey the same basic message. Yet, the second way allows us to become aware that a false relationship with God is the basis for false relationships with oneself and with the other ones.
When we start to feel the innate truth that we’d live in the beholding love of God that is the interconnected oneness within and around us all, the idea of humanity railing against an external God becomes very surreal.
When I read ‘True religion’ I can’t but listen within me and feel how it truly feels like. And this feels very different to what usually is presented in any religion. It’s not something external that I have to learn or fit in, it’s just living the sacredness in my daily life, having my own connection and communicaton with God, without separation, but by honouring the divine in me and allowing this to expand with my movements.
Embracing the true meaning of religion felt like a liberation from the lies of what I thought religion was. Now knowing there is no more searching outside of myself for God and religion, but simply connecting to my inner heart and living from that love in every aspect of my life, knowing and experiencing God within.
I am still developing what the word Religion means to me, still unwrapping it. There are a few comments on this blog that really add to what you have shared Nicole and its just a great conversation to re-imprint, as the word Religion has been used in many untrue ways over the years. I like how practical you make your relationship with this word Religion.
In my experience and observations of people, it is like we all crave something more it is just about whether we give space to explore this or shut it down and try to fill it with something else.
What you have expressed here Nicole is so true and wise; a reminder for us of the responsibility to live true religion for the benefit of all;
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.”
True religion is us living in connection to the fact we are divine. Our greatest prayer is to move, breathe and speak knowing we are Sons of God and beings of light. Forgetting these essential facts leads to all the war, devastation, anger, blame and hurt we see. It just goes on, endlessly. We should always know you seem to say Nicole, that we are so much more than just the limited everyday that we see.
We all know God, whether we admit it or not. We may wait until our dying breaths to admit it, but the knowing is there within.
Religion as a re-uniting with God and the love that we innately are – coming home to our essence; that is true religion to me too. Thank goodness for Universal Medicine helping to bring back the true meaning of this word.
True religion is the breath felt in our lungs, the connection to our heartbeat and the feeling of our feet touching the ground. We then take this connection within our bodies, into our daily living and bring greater awareness to our interactions with others. We can then continue to confirm, learn, appreciate and explore more and more of our connection to what living a religious life really is and how joyful it can really be.
Without the knowing of God in my life everyday I feel a sense of giving up and what is the point of all of this. Yet as soon as I reconnect to the knowing that I am, as we all are, Sons of God then I get a renewed sense of purpose and zest for life.
All our often we blame God for our own choices.
I know I certainly have tried to blame God and pretty much everybody else for what I have effectively chosen. The problem with this is nothing changes and things actually get worse. No one can ever make us do anything the question is how willing are we to be honest with the choices we have made because only then does true healing begin.
And get mad at him for not fixing things!
Which is then the prefect excuse to turn our back on him – and ourselves.
And also blame him when whatever has happened we actually did it to ourselves and thus it’s our own responsibility to clear it away.
God cops it! Yet his love is unconditional and he is always there waiting for our return.
Religion is union and where would this union be if it was not first embodied with ourselves? The responsibility is for us to take the steps towards this union with our body.
We are all deeply religious when we are deeply connected with our bodies, it is a natural relationship we have with everything around us and can truly feel our interconnectedness with the all.
When this is truly understood – we come to feel that which is innately in us that makes religion. And so the most crazy thing we can imagine ourselves is that God is outside of us..It is like saying to a cat that it is a cow. So this connection from within us will only truly re-unite us to what true religion is. Hence we should be careful with what is written and shared all over the world : saying it is religion. We must always keep feeling the truth within us.
True religion is listening to our inner heart and moving with all that juicy richness from within and sharing that reflection in every step, breath and word spoken. Thank you Nicole.
There are multitudes of people in the world that don’t trust religion, don’t know what to think about God,or say they don’t believe there is such a thing and that is because man has done a pretty fine job of confusing the whole issue with a lot of conflicting information. I do feel though if we give ourselves the time to sit and feel we all do know true religion and the fact that God is everything and everything is everything whether we like it or not.
I love this level of responsibility “How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” We have to be and live the change we want to see in our own lives, not wait to feel it is safe to do so, or for someone to invite us.
Learning to live in connection to our Soul through every facet of human life is what true religion now means to me, and has allowed me to understand, accept and embrace that we are constantly in a relationship with God, the universe and all encompassed within. It is solely our choice as to whether we surrender to deepening this relationship, or our relationship is to resist it.
It is true wisdom that we hold in ourselves, living from this wisdom and making the choices that we know we need to make is true religion. It is every part of our life’s.
True religion is simply living life from our bodies first in connection to all that is in our own unique ways.
There is always the time and space to re-connect to the fiery truth of who we are, by the way we live. So religion is a living expression, intimately close with ourselves in deep relationship with our soul and with God.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’ Spot on Nicole, the wisdom you share in this blog is a beautiful reminder of living true religion and feeling the many joys this brings to not only ourselves but to all our relationships and every aspect of our lives.
It is interesting to reread this blog in light of the fact that there is currently an Inquiry in Australia under way into the freedom of religion in this country. Religion in many ways needs to be treated not as something to be tolerated as a hobby or past time, but rather as something that remains one of the few untapped fields of exploration for human kind. At the end of the day, someone has to have it right, and if you do not allow for unfettered freedom of religion, then it is likely that by fostering a society that is not understanding of such a right, you are limiting the opportunity of all human beings to discover the truth in time – whatever that truth may be.
bringing such simple practical changes into our lives, and listening to the body’s communication, and a depth and richness of the world is uncovered that we could never have previously imagined.. yet we can also recognise the fleeting glimpses of knowing that we have been offered all along – only now it is available for us to live constantly
It is beautiful to feel the wisdom and fire of God within us. The way we live, breathe and move shows us that God is within us all and once realised brings a whole new level of love to the table. Thank you Nicole.
True Religion is there for each and every one of us in reuniting ourselves with the love within the inner-heart and feeling the glory of the Divine Order of the Universe.
True religion is living lovingly with our selves and with others, taking responsibility for all our choices and their quality knowing that everything affects everything bar none.
“How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” This is so true. God is not to blame for our lives, I have found God is there waiting for me, always has been waiting for me, for when I was ready to re-connect to the support that is there and was there even when I felt I was on my own. We make a choice to feel we are alone, to not ask for help, to reduce our vision to consider the only help we can have is from someone who is in the room, physically in our lives. The relationship we can re-build with God and love has so much support it blows me away. It is as simple as accepting that I am the one who holds it out.
True religion is in truth not dogmatic, but rather a very personal relationship one has with God, the universe, and all living life.
Your opening lines highlights for me how much blame I have had towards God and how we can test him. It seems to be a fairly common thing. If we get cancer often we ask God “Why me?” Even when we don’t think we believe in God we still direct questions like that too him. Asking God if there is more than this to life is like a demand to say, “Go on, show me and then I’ll know,” But what if he shows us all the time and we don’t see it? What if there is magic in so many things but we have an idea of what more should be? God has a pretty tough job with many of our attitudes towards him!
It seems to me that the concepts of Heaven and Hell, or an eternity of beating ourselves up, or rewarding ourselves just seem like such human devices, merely an extension of what we do to ourselves everyday. My feeling of God is that it is so much grander than this – our relationship with divinity through our own choices.
To consider that religion is something that lives inside us all is, to me, the quintessential science of life. And so, never is there a moment that passes when we are not engaged in the act of religion, as it is the very act of life itself.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” Religion is who we are and how we live everyday. It is our constant teacher and we are forever students because we are learning and growing from how we interact, move and express with everyone in any given moment. That is a pretty cool religion in my book.
Yes and the fact we can live in a way that builds a knowingness of that relationship in our body is what our bodies have been trying to tell us for years, if not lifetimes!
When the truth that you have shared here is embodied, Nicole, that everyone and everything matters, life no longer is about self and the small world we call our reality, but constantly about the whole, how the quality of our intrinsic divine nature can be felt and shared in any given moment.
Thank you Nicole for a beautiful sharing, “I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.” This truth I am gradually coming to understand that absolutely everything is important even down to the way I comb my hair and the ripple effect it has along with everything else, on humanity.
God does permeate everything but we tend to keep away from that by holding ourselves less than God – only when times get rough do we consider God either in blame or distrust or maybe something else. The key thing in my experience is to accept the fact that we are all divine and to let that out, only then will we truly know what God truly is. God is not meant to keep to ourselves, if that is possible, but there for everyone else to also see they are heavenly.
It is the way I prepare myself for bed that supports my sleep and the way I prepare myself in the morning that supports my day. Each day leads to the next as we complete another 24hour cycle so what I do on one day impacts the next. ‘True Religion is about everything’
Growing up in the Catholic religion something never felt right for me, I was never comfortable with the word religion or the beliefs about God that the church held, so I eventually turned my back on all religions. I was then introduced to The Way of The Livingness presented by Serge Benhayon and I got to feel very clearly this was a true religion, a religion that was about truth and love and my deep connection with everyone and everything.
Indeed ‘True Religion is about everything’, it starts with our connection to ourselves, or rather our reconnection, and unfolds into the grandness of our equal connection and part to play in the all. This is true responsibility and true joy.
It has been awesome to be reminded that we don’t need to believe in God ever, we just have to live and move in a way that constantly reaffirms the innate connection and belonging we have to God and to the Universe. Easier for a child than the overthinking, overanalysing, emotional baggage-laden adults we may have created ourselves to be.
This is the truth about religion, taking our own responsibility for the life we live, and when we don’t we live with the consequences. It is key to then not be the victim of our own choices but feel that it is us who chooses how our life plays out. It is us that is choosing all, and when we choose to truly support our body we are supported to the utmost degree by the divinity that is inside us all.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” I love this line Nicole, because it is us simply living and allowing ourselves to connect to the very core of who we are and that’s the divine love of God. Thank you.
If I look back at what God or who God was to me growing up it wasn’t a pretty picture. I remember not being able to work it out fully. He was a person? No not really, he lives among us?, I couldn’t see him, who was a he? Well not really either, he made everything? yes created it, Out of what? The earth. There was so many questions I had and nothing made sense to me, it didn’t make sense what everyone was saying about God and I found it contradicted and changed constantly. What I know now makes so much more sense as God is an energy, yes it is a person or being but not as we see as human beings. I was trying to make sense of God from only seeing myself as a physical human being but yet so much of our world is not physical. The more and more I open up and become aware of the energetic world with respect to the physical world the more life and God in life makes sense. So much of my view of the world was upside down and I had a view of God in the same way.
Wow, thank you for this thought, “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.”
It doesn’t make sense to me how we can worship a God that is outside of us without first honouring ourselves. It says in the bible that we are all children of God and so from God so doesn’t it make sense to respect and honour this truth. My connection to God within me is becoming stronger as I re-awaken and commit to myself more deeply. The way in which I choose to live my live is evolving, refining a rhythm in my day that truly supports me and therefore, those around me.
This I can and do embrace, ‘It is True Religion that re-connects us with our inner heart, allowing us to honour the amazing beings we are, supporting us to build and develop a relationship with ourselves and in turn, redeveloping our relationship with God.’
How different my perception of Religion is now also, Nicole. To think that many are still chained to the beliefs and restrictions of many Churches that would have us believe that there is a Hell for all who sin and do not have absolution! All I can say is Thank God for Serge Benhayons sharings of The Way of The Livingness.
‘ I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.’ Many of us live with the feeling that we are not enough, that we are wrong, and that we need to ‘improve’ our ways. My question is, who invented the word ‘sin’? The Catholic Church claims we are all born with ‘Original Sin’ and that only the rituals of the Church can absolve us of our sins. But that means we can sin and seek absolution and sin again, not truly learning anything. Personally I prefer the concept that through reincarnation we get to experience the consequences of our choices – directly, and repeatedly until we naturally choose differently. To me that makes far more sense than the concept of going to a place of eternal damnation called Hell.
“In contrast to the mind, which constantly seeks acceptance and recognition from others, the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is.” This is so beautiful to read as I know from essence that this is true, not only to me but for all equally so. I know we all will return one day to this way of living, a way of living where we simply are, live from our inner heart and that is known as The Way of The Livingness as being presented for years by Serge Benhayon, and lived already by many students of Universal Medicine.
True religion is something I had not known was possible until being introduced to The Way of The Livingness through Universal Medicine. Religion is my every day, and with no bells or whistles I am all I can be with whatever I am doing.
Are we driven by our minds, which constantly seek acceptance and recognition from others, or from that inner connection, ‘ the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is. It knows it already has, and is, all that it needs – there is nothing else, only an allowing for one to be love, and to live in and from this place.’
Religion is a living way, living from the inner fire that is love. A gorgeous way to live, being open and taking the responsibility is all that is asked.
True religion lives within and is waiting for us to connect, it is about us connecting to that inner glory, living in a way that supports and builds that inner connection.
I grew up not liking religion, seeing the wars etcetera that were carried out in its name, it seemed so hypocritical. I now understand the true meaning of religion, ‘It is True Religion that re-connects us with our inner heart, allowing us to honour the amazing beings we are, supporting us to build and develop a relationship with ourselves and in turn, redeveloping our relationship with God.’
Religion is a word that I associated with sin and guilt, punishment and boring sermons. How wrong was I! Religion is the warm, tender, loving re-connection to my innermost, religious moments in my daily life are the fun-moments when I care for myself and express who I am.
Religion and being religious had always bought a mix of feelings to me. I grew up in a catholic dominated community and so church on Sunday’s was always a bit of a drag and as a kid I never wanted to go. At school it was the same, I didn’t understand it so I wanted nothing to do with it. As I grew nothing had changed and only there were things I didn’t understand in life, I did wonder about God. I didn’t relate God or religion to everyday life, it was just something you did on Sunday or when things were dire. I have come to know more depth to these two things through The Way Of The Livingness and now see more of what they truly are. I can’t believe everything I thought they were before and how tricked I was into thinking all those things. God and religion are one and the same and have nothing to do with a building or a place. They are you, me and all of us and actually bring us together. Anything that supports a divide isn’t truly aligned to God or religion, it’s a version that is just using the names as headings for it’s own purpose. It may sound harsh but that is my experience and the only thing that feels true and simply makes sense.
This is such a gorgeous presentation of your relationship with the word religion. It’s unusual to share such a personal experience of what religion truly means and it’s not a very openly talked about topic, but why not? In the same way people talk about and have a relationship with the weather, their food, television and work, we all have our own feelings of what religion is and how it plays a part in our lives/the world.
The ‘heart’ of True religion is the inner-heart within us all.
I was brought up believing that being religious was making a connection to something outside of myself and I spent 50 years searching for, and endeavouring to make that connection. Discovering through the Ageless Wisdom, as presented by Serge Benhayon, that to connect with God was by and through connecting with myself has and is a true ‘God-send’.
I always enjoy reading your sharing Nicole and find they are so spot on ! Life is about our connection to God , the God within us all. I feel the Religion as taught by The Way of The Livingness is showing us a truly Loving God that sees us as His equal Sons.
What we are denying when we deny religion is all the false and harmful things that take place under the name of religion. Most of what comes under the umbrella of the word religion is nothing whatsoever to do with true religion. This is pure evil in the true energetic meaning of the word evil which is anything that separates us from who we truly are. Connecting to who we truly are is religion and therefore to interfere with that or bastardise the word is pure evil.
It is deeply beautiful to discover that true religion is one that encompasses every aspect of our daily living, where we are responsible for the quality of the lives that we are living, through the choices we make. And that the choice can be to live Soulfully, in connection to our love within, in connection to God through all we do, bringing a richness to life that I had only sensed was possible and almost had given up on thinking it was unattainable. Through the Way of The Livingness I now as best I can, choose to live a quality of life that celebrates the joy and glory that we are all here to live together, whilst always exploring and learning the never-ending depth of richness of evolution that is available for us all.
The thought of religion used to conjure up all sorts of pictures of rules and regulations that didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. But through the teachings of Serge Benhayon I have experienced that religion is a connection within myself, and that connection brings forth the light of my soul, and this has been the most incredible realisation and self-education.
Religion is on offer to everyone, every single one of us, without needing us to be special or adhere to rules. Religion is already within us, we only have to realize it and live it out.
The truth of the word religion has nothing to do with the man-made version of the definition, and therefore, when this man-made definition has come to replace the true meaning of this word, what we are reacting against is not truly religion, but the bastardized version of it. The truth of the word religion is the unifying relationship we have with God and our Soul, and then with everyone and everything else, it is a relationship that never stops.
I always found the idea of repenting your sins a little weird. I can remember being in Year 3 at a Catholic school and having to go into the confession box and tell the priest about my sins in preparation for my first communion. I didn’t know what to say as I was a pretty fair and decent kid so I made up a lie that I had stolen something. The priest got angry and was never the same with me after that- it felt so far away from what I felt God to be that I lost faith in religion. These actions also contradicted all the stories I know of Jesus and his life. My understanding of God is, he holds us in who we are and it is for us to uncover the true depth of our love.
True religion does live within and is always patiently waiting for us to connect. For me it is about me connecting to that inner glory and living in the rhythmns, routines, movement, ways of being etc that support that inner connection, love, and truth to the best of my ability. Anything that claims to be religion but is ‘a way to control, manipulate and influence others.’ is absolutely a bastardisation, human reinterpretation and misinterpretation of the grand love we come from and God. Religion is lived through us – if a person’s body does not physically reflect openness and love it shows very clearly. We all, because we do all have that equal inner flame in us – can have it reflecting in our physical body through the love and self care and connection we choose moment to moment.
Your opening question to God , “God there has to be more” just shows that even though we may not say we are any one thing, that we all in fact do know that there is something more than us no matter what we may call it. Even if you didn’t put the word God in there the question, as I think many ask in life, would be directed to a more knowing grandness. This for me shows that every one is in fact religious.
‘the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is. It knows it already has, and is, all that it needs – there is nothing else, only an allowing for one to be love, and to live in and from this place.’ Beautifully expressed Nicole. I am part of an Esoteric Yoga program (Union with God) and felt at the end of the session my connection to my inner heart was full and complete, with no need for outside stimulation, which is a contrast to how I was feeling the hour before!
Religion is a word that has been deliberately corrupted so that people will react to its false presentation – and in this way will not be open to the immense power and our connection to Divinity that is our birthright and so we continue to live blindly in ignorance to the truth of who we are.
The word ‘religion’ has been bastardized over the ages which for many of us has kept us seeking God outside of ourselves through an institution, a dogma or a building. What comes to mind is what Jesus said “The Kingdom of God lives inside us” and this is where I have found my true religion. The more I develop a way of living and my movements are in accordance with the natural flow of the universe, I feel God within me and within everything around me.
Your blog shows so well how reinterpretation or misuse of words can create a detachment from something like religion because we do not like what we associate religion with. But, what if what we considered as religion is not religion and what truly is religion is something we love and deeply long for? It is the ultimate set up to keep ourselves from connecting with ourselves, our inner hearts and with that, with God.
What is true religion? It is the connection to the universal pulse of love light and the truth that we are divine. No rules, no dogma, no should, just the fact that we are part of everything.
I love the question you pose here Nicole, it reminds me of a huge-ever-burning fire in the home hearth, crackling and burning merrily away with warmth and beauty during the winter nights – highly symbolic to me of of the inner fire that is always there waiting within for us to return to it.
“What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?”
You could have written this blog for me Nicole, I too grew up not feeling the real love in religion and only seeing the bigotry and war that was often carried out in its name, yet coming to The Way of The Livingness and understanding that real religion is in all of us and that we are all equal sons of God and that we know this through our connection to our inner heart, it is not a mind or knowledge thing makes perfect sense to me. We are all so much more then what we are currently living and The Way of The Livingness offers an opportunity for us to see the potential divinity that is in every move we make.
How simple true religion is. How simple true devotion is. How simple and exquisite is the application of true rituals that support you to deepen constantly and be in connection with the real you, with your soul. How simple is true ceremony, and the movement of grace in all that we do when ceremony underpins the routines we have.
Religion in truth is beyond words. It is Godly. Deeply precious and a way of living that I will forever cherish.
“the picture I had, and what I had observed of religion, was certainly not what I have now come to know true religion to be.” the same for me, how is it possible that we let the simplicity of religion be taken over by the complexity of dogma and control? I’ve certainly come to understand true religion is very different to the what I considered religion to be, in fact the two are completely opposite.
It is so important to understand that we cannot escape from life and that we are an integrated part of it if we like it or not. Acceptance of this fact is a huge hurdle to take as in that we also have to acknowledge that we have contributed to the waywardness our societies are in. This is true religion, to see all of life as our responsibility and that in that I cannot make others accountable for but only myself.
“What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?”
What an absolutely glorious divine world it would be. The choice and responsibility is ours!
I too was never religious for all same the reasons you shared Nicole, that is not until I attended The Way of The Livingness presentations where the truth of religion was shared. This resonated deeply with me and I then understood why I had felt so put off by other so called religions. They were all about a God outside of us rather then the fact that God resides in each and every-one of us and we are responsible for every choice we make. Now this makes sense.
Why is it we as a human race, tend to wait till our darkest hour, till the wheels come off, till our body breaks, before we call out and consider God’s help? What is it in us that is addicted to pursuing life as if it’s working when we know that it is not? Why do we let slide and slip so much that is not lovely, under the belief that ‘we deserve it’ and life is hard? For when we honour and start to cherish ourselves it becomes inescapably clear that Religion is all about our relationship with our body and we are never without this, in some shape or form, it is just a matter of how much we embrace and accept God’s Love. Thank you Nicole, for this latest sermon we need to hear.
I remember feeling that there had been many times during my life that God could have stepped in but never did, and from that experience I believed that God didn’t exist, that was until I started connecting more deeply to my body and opened up my heart to know that God does exist.
Religion for me is about our every day loving choices, I don’t feel that it is about attending church or reading a book, it is more about living in a caring and loving way supporting ourselves and humanity as a whole.
What if god is not in a church or temple but within us all, and within every moment of every day, every choice and how we move in our lives, the ripples we create and the directions we head. If we saw god not as a being in the sky but a living part of our everything then for me I feel that opens up the possibility to really know god, to create a relationship with this everything. Not mystical or far out but real, tangible and part of all that occurs. I am still developing this relationship and have not fully accepted this is how it may be, but in reading what you share Nicole this certainly feels true to me.
The word Religion has been tainted and in that can be misunderstood, what I get from this article is that Religion is about true relationship with your inner most self and with this level of detail and care for yourself you also deeply care for and respect the universe that you live in and the people and things that share that space.
Well said Sarah, for in that tainting of the word religion that has occurred through the evil acts that have been done under the reinterpretation or guise of particular religious beliefs, it has totally warped and misconstrued our understanding and appreciation of its value in our day to day lives.
Religion is a word that means many different things to different people. For me I agree with you Nicole when you say that religion is about reconnecting with the love that we essentially are within and developing living this with everyone and everything in our daily lives.
A religion that doesn’t dictate or judge. This is a strange sentence that doesn’t really make sense. Religion in truth means “without dictation or judgement”. It’s simply because of the bastardization of the word “religion” that we have to mention there is ONE without these imposters. The Way of The Livingness.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” I remember being asked one day, what did religion look like in its earliest form before it was written down…it made total sense to me that it is a living way, alive, real and everyday within the movements and expressions of those naturally pulled to a Universal order.
What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all? To realise this is the game changer.
I was asked the question yesterday, do I believe in God. I kept my reply very brief and said, my search for God or some higher power ended when I reconnected with my body and started to listen and honour all the communication from my body, along with the understanding that everything I need is already within me.
I was recently in the car with a group of people and one person asked who believed in God. The air went quite thick. It can be such a contentious subject to talk about openly in public. One person in the car said they didn’t believe in God but that they wished there was a God. It was a very powerful comment.
I love the concept that the problem is not religion but how we have interpreted religion that is the problem.
“What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?” This turns religion on its head and exposes how the so called religions of the world could have got it so wrong and why we have ended up with injustices perpetrated in the name of religion. When religion becomes an organisation, a corporation, rather than a deep connection for each individual, this is where we can lose ourselves.
Religion – a way of living that restores us back to the interconnection with all there is thereby exposing everything that separates us and needs to be healed, let go of, understood, embraced…
I love this blog Nicole. To me the absolute foundation of a true religion is that it holds all equally.
When I first heard Serge Benhayon talk about religion, I squirmed because of everything I knew and felt about religious groups. But I’m getting more and more at ease with the word religion, as I get to feel how religion really is a way of living, and not a dogma or set of rules to be followed.
“What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?” What an empowering and expansive question. There have been so many hints about this being the case such as Jesus’s famous “the kingdom of God is within you”, yet we have been on a wild goose chase of trying to find religion outside of us and this has not brought man to a great place. It is time to embrace religion in truth and embrace the responsibility, love and connection it invites.
‘What is True Religion?” Living who you really are.
It is that simple!
Nicole there are some great points that you raise here especially around what religion is and what it has been presented as, in many cases it is presented as exclusive as something that by virtue excludes all else, when the truth that I have come to understand is very different in that in true religion encompasses and is part of everything, not excluding anything.
This concept is almost too simple to be grasped, when we are used to making things complicated or a struggle to be ‘worth’ anything.. . But it is true. Just being in our bodies and honouring its feelings. . and we can access a different form of intelligence that can inform us of everything we need in that moment. and trying to think our way into being in the body doesn’t work either 🙂
What you’ve shared here Nicole brings home a teaching often presented by Serge Benhayon, the founder and director of Universal Medicine – i.e. that so much of what it means to live a true life has been obscured, if not wilfully misinterpreted, via the bastardisation of words and their true meaning in activity.
And so the reclamation of words such as religion – intrinsic to our very core if its true meaning is considered – are vital to the restoration of a true life, i.e. a life that is led and lived from the inner-heart as you’ve shared.
What you’ve shared here is ground-breaking in this regard, showing and exposing all that we’ve allowed to be abused and misrepresented, and at once, the beauty and real possibility of reconnecting to what is, indelibly true. Thank-you.
Well said and shared from your own livingness of religion Nicole.
What a travesty we have in our hands, that we even need to say the words ‘true’ and ‘religion’ together – to actually define the fact that there is a way of living religion that is true. And that so much of what we have seen on our planet in the name of ‘religion’ has not reflected this in every measure.
” What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?” It’s changes everything when we know this as a truth and live in the connection to our inner heart which is God. Same as nature pulses with the rhythm of the seasons, we are also part of the Divine plan and in connection with the cycles.
Yes, throw out that rule book, indeed all punitive measures, guilt, sympathy, pity and shame.
None of this has a place in True Religion. We have been sold and swallowed the greatest lie- to seek God outside of ourselves when all the while we are a mere connection away, regardless of where we are or who we are.
Great point Deborah, many have been hooked by the lies and false pictures of God, that’s why true Religion is needed more than ever in a world that is starving for this deeper connection with God and divinity.
This blog reads like a ray of sunshine after a storm.
I love that true religion is how I am living life everyday-it is about my choices, my awareness, my connections, my responsibilities and my ability to being open to the flow of love from my innermost out and then back again. Why would I choose to live any other way?
There is a deeper level of life that is all of ours to behold, and yet it takes in truth generally a point where you yearn for that deeper level of connection – often after you realise that there is nothing in this life that can deliver what you are looking for. It is often at that point of despair, of dis-satisfaction, that you start looking for more, and awaiting you of course is a plethora of religious and spiritual concepts from which to choose – an absolute minefield of possibilities of what the truth possibly might be behind our existence. So starts a religious experience, which in truth is nothing more than a phrase for one who is willing to explore our true nature. In other words, its no big deal to say you are religious.
When we ask.. there has to be more. Perhaps there isn’t any more, its just that we have been looking in entirely the wrong place, trying to find something that has never left us and is waiting patiently in every moment!
True religion is within us, and in living our inner most we are connected to the all. It is about living from the marker of connection we have built and evolve from that.
God is not responsible for our circumstances. We are. There is always more. No doubt about it. The problem is that we reject it. So, there is no point at getting angry with God.
Interesting – growing up I too had considered Religion was a form of cop-out of taking responsibility for oneself and one’s actions, however now I understand that this was not true religion, but rather a way for many of creating a life that allowed for irresponsibility and illusion to thrive. So it seems we as children can sense when something does not feel true – it also means that there is something we do know is true inside to know when the outside does not reflect this, and that truth we know deep inside is where true religion comes from.
We are at times so scared or so controlled and focused on the word religion. It would seem there are some places that think they own the word or have the say on what is and what isn’t a religion. What if religion was simply this “I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.” Therefore no one owns it but more it belongs to us all, feels like a more common sense truth to me.
The way you write about religion, I feel my body surrender to what you say. Especially when you write that all we need is within us right now. I feel it expand into more around me and I feel connected to more of it as well. I do not get that when I think of the word religion of how it has been sold to us. My shoulders tighten and my head hurts a bit. That is not true religion.
I completely relate to your relationship with religion. It is so freeing to now be able to say I am religious without all these feelings of shame coming up.
I have had the same experience. It is incredibly freeing to say I am religious without all the guilt and weirdness coming up. After all we are religious (have a relationship) with everything whether or not we choose to use the word.
‘These are just some of the things I now choose for myself and this allows my body to then be the marker for what comes next.’ – I love the simplicity in which you express the flow of life and how you choose to go with it rather than fighting it and looking for obstacles and complications. True religion is simple.
“I have come to understand that True Religion is not something or someone that lives outside of us, it is not about visiting a place of worship or repenting our sins. True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” So beautiful so true and something I have come to also. What an amazing blog offering what is in us all along that we all know and that we have simply chosen not to feel this.
As we care more deeply for ourselves and our bodies become clearer and more vital we are able to read more easily what is actually happening in our lives. This is not always easy and requires a continuing dedication for us to be able to act responsibly when we may have been avoiding this level of commitment to life for some time. There is a certain freedom that comes with this responsibility and it is felt in the body. Could this be us reconnecting (religare from the Latin means just this) not only to something within us but to all that is ?
I was brought up as a Lutheran, it was just one of those tick the boxes things that were part of growing up. We were like a car assembly plant when young, where all the required bits that were added to ensure a reasonable life span. Religion was the part where the parts were dipped in paint to help keep rust from accruing. I felt all of these efforts were putting things that are outside of us, on us to carry. As you have expressed Nicole, that true religion has always lived within us all, so why don’t we show respect for the body that God resides in?
You are an inspiration Nicole, down to earth mother, stunning wife to an amazing husband, hard worker and just a super steady human being with so much love and warmth to offer all that meet you. All of this is felt in your written words, a multi-talented woman and might I add a massive turn around from how you were running your life before you discovered the Universal Medicine teachings and philosophy, just awesome.
It is deeply healing to realise that True Religion has been with us all along and is never something to acquire and seek membership for the privilege of – Connect to our inner-most essence and we can not but be in connection to God and the All.
The greatest thing about true religion is that we all know deep inside that we are a part of something greater than what our reality presents, that we have a connection to all, and that means there is nothing to be sought outside of us, only the truth of what we already know within. It is just a matter of reconnecting and remembering what we already know.
I was also put off religion in my youth by observing, quite accurately the hypocrisy, judgement, self flagellation and double standards that my organised religion was allowing to pass as normal. I also remember a lot of well intentioned people in my religion who believed in love and unity but they were too caught up in believing something to really allow themselves the freedom to express what they knew was true. However the problem was when I rejected religion in this form I also decided to give up on God. I have since come to realise that the two are very different things and today I am rebuilding my relationship with God, myself and my own soul which is what I would call true religion.
It feels like true religion is all about responsibility. If we are not willing to be truly responsible then there is no way we will be open to what religion is all about as it is asking us to be responsible in the first place.
I’ve always found it extremely heart breaking to feel how the truth of God and religion have been used in a way that is the complete opposite to what beauty and love true religion holds.
It’s very exposing that the one true thing to unite us all, ‘religion’, has been the major cause of such separation. This exposes to me the way things have been reinterpreted and not lived as truth, for true religion is the igniting force that lives within us all.
True religion is our true relationship with our own choices, living these choices knowing the responsibility that flows into to every aspect of our lives and ripples or quakes out to all.
“What is True Religion?” This is a great question. For so long people have claimed that their religion is the true religion and are prepared to wage war over their religion, which only goes to show that what they are talking about as religion has nothing to do with what religion actually is. True Religion connects us, first to our inner heart and then to one another, anything that divides therefore can never be True Religion.
This article nominates the true meaning of religion
Nowhere have I ever been presented the fact that the body can be our gateway to knowing God and living True Religion in life. Everywhere I have been to before I met Serge Benhayon was presenting how to live in a way that in truth is what I have found to be very dishonouring and somewhat harmfull to our own bodies. Thank God for the presentations of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine. They are the only things that truly make sense of life to me.
So many of us have been jaded by what we think religion is, not what it actually is, for it is impossible for a loving relationship to hurt anyone. It just goes to show religion is a quality that is lived first and foremost.
In coming to true religion, it appears to me that it is clear just how imposing the established institutional religions are, in that they have attempted to take ownership of language and have bastardised it in such a way as to hide and distort the truth, to prevent it being accessible to all.
How empowering to know that God is not something outside of us, holding us to rules and senseless rituals. That we are responsible for the outcome of the choices that we make and at any time can chose to live a more loving, honouring and religious life. Beautiful blog, Nicole.
We have not been taught that true religion is about ‘making heartfelt choices that support the body’ to be in relationship with ourselves, others and God. True religion is available to everyone.
God is always associated with us unconditionally so. We humans, choose whether or not to associate with Him and if we do in what terms do we engage. In doing so, most humans tend to give their power away to books, myths, stories, rituals that are not truth. The main problem is that what we align to pollutes our body so it becomes less discerning of what is true and what I have to believe because THEY say it is true.
I love re-reading this article. I can feel I have known God all my life but chose the artificially bright lights of the world. I remember I lived in the country as a child and would look out to the local town’s dull orange skyline and think that was where all that would make me feel better lied. I spent many years in the hope this was true, but being disappointed. But now I am returning to what I know: God is in all of us and everything, we are in God, I am feeling the all encompassing nature of life. If I make life about me only and how the latest job prospect will suit my wants, or completing a task for me only or whatever, I am removing myself from being in connection with God and all of humanity.
I love your blog and the thoughts and sharings concerning religion. I agree religion is something which encompasses all aspects of life and for me everything has to do with how I am related to all aspects of life.
True Religion is definitely something for us to each discover for ourselves and never a series of forced doctrines and beliefs and the giving away of ourselves in worship of another.
Hopefully one day there will be a new definition for what religion means. That humanity does begin to understand how the word religion has become so bastardised, that there really was a true meaning to the word. I have only become acquainted and have a deep understanding of what true religion means through the amazing teachings of Serge Benhayon and the Ageless Wisdom. This is what now fills my heart and soul, that religion is about a relationship with me and divinity, then how I operate in the world from there is about my choices.
“What if for all these thousands of years we had falsely believed that God was a being that lived outside of us, that he was the only being that could grant us salvation and give us retribution, and permission to enter the golden gates of Heaven; or the supposed alternative, going to the fiery depths below, and that this was not actually true? What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?”
A great question to ask Nicole, and one that is so needed as we continue to separate ourselves from God….and each other.
‘It was not until I fully felt this, accepted it and began to take responsibility for myself, my choices and the life I had created, that things began to change.’ being open to the responsibly we have for our own outcomes as a result of our own choices changes the way we perceive just about everything.
How gorgeous and truly inspiring to live this way “… the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is. It knows it already has, and is, all that it needs – there is nothing else, only an allowing for one to be love, and to live in and from this place.”
“What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?” I have connected to the truth of this question. I have always known that god existed, but that the so called religions did not quite have it right. I always felt a connection to god but it did not feel true that he was a being that I had to beseech for favour to seek some form of life in heaven once I died. To me, god is everywhere and in everything, and religion is my relationship with this all.
Everything and everyone matters in true religion. Responding to and living by the impulses of God supports us to stay in relationship with him.
‘The inner heart seeks nothing’ – this is super huge to consider and allow ourselves to ponder and feel. And when I do, all the striving and struggle slips away as I surrender home to God.
The way we are taught religion, that God is big and unforgiving and we are all minions unworthy of his attention, is specifically designed to keep us feeling small and unworthy. Valuing ourselves for being a Son of God, learning who we are by connecting within, being guided by what we feel rather than what we think – these are all a whole new way of being for many of us and yet it is the most ancient of religions, before the current organised religions were invented. It is the most natural, the only one that applies to all of humanity, every single one of us, and the one that allows us to feel and discern what is true.
I did not used to talk about God as if I knew what, who God was, did not trust the word, use to react to the word. I now say I know God, I feel I am part of God equally. The fact is I also realise I am reconnecting to something I have always known, it feels so familiar, it is like coming home.
I feel this is true, I can feel it in my life “What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?” When I disconnect from this feeling and knowing, I feel lost and wonder what it is all about. When I am with it I feel held and know that I and all are from divinity.
“… What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?…” This is a great statement to pose, as it brings a stop to consider how the ‘outward looking’ for answers, understanding, the meaning of life is actually right here with us the whole time.
This is a profoundly powerful blog Nicole, thank you. What stands out for me is how you described the way, due to each choice and each loving movement you make, your body allows a marker for what comes next. Herein is a loving momentum your building as a foundation for your life. lt truly makes sense. lt feels like a true religion, with such loving attention paid to each tiny detail.
Thank you Nicole – your sharing here is inviting me to go deeper. I can feel, in all appreciation and awe of what has been given to us through Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine, I get somewhat enamored by a big picture and right now I feel as though the details of my everyday life are a bit neglected. And here I am being reminded of the fundamental importance of everyday, every moment, choices in every movement.
Thank-you Christopher for the photos, they are living proof of what you express clearly. And I agree with you. “What Universal Medicine presents is a more loving way to be with ourselves and others, a way that leads to a more harmonious way of communication and a more harmonious way of living”.
‘What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?’ – The Way of the Livingness is the only religion I have come across that has inspired me to look within and connect to that which I already am, an equal Son of God, as opposed to an endless search outside of myself for answers and/or solutions.
For me religion is very simple – it is about living as loving a life as possible. The trick for me has been in learning and understanding what is truly loving and what just looks or acts the part.
I have always found it easy to wave aside the classic religious ideologies because of the notion of a God sitting in judgement or being a separate entity to ourselves that we have to please or be accountable to. It is quite different viewing God as a source of an energy of healing and love that dwells within. Then it connects me with a sense of healing and of bringing purpose to life that does not get squashed into a duty or trying to be something I am not. Then religion speaks through me, not at me as something separate.
A great way to look at religion – and be real about what is true and not. This empowers you as an individual. This truth is felt by our inner-hearts and not our heads, and so we can only fool our mind but never our body. Thank you for sharing Nicole.
We have played around with this word ‘Religion’ for many many years to get to a place now where we have many different ways to use it. It’s amazing to think at one point that there was just one simple meaning and we all were on the same page. Hard to believe? Well at least lets explore the possibility. It would seem religion is very personal and yet like anything there is or should be a one unified truth. When you read back in history, this seems like how ‘council’ came together in the town centre to be unified in a way of moving forward. Now we have moved this out further to where we no longer have a town unified and at times not even person to person in the same house. We have many different opinions and many different forms of truth, could this be one of the things that adds to our current ills in the world?
I feel that we all have an understanding, an inner knowing, that there is more to life than what we can just see and that death is not the end. There are many who override this knowing with so called knowledge or want to see ‘proof’ rather than trust what they feel. For me, my relationship with this knowing is part of true religion.
Yes, once reconnecting to the love thats within the body, you realise that our own body is the doorway that we enter into the ‘church’. No specifically designated building denotes more of a scared place that the space with which our body contains.
No other religion speaks of the fact that the way that we live affects us all. That is True Energetic RESPONSIBILITY. We believe that if it’s not our family member that’s ill affected then it doesn’t matter. This is NOT the Truth. We ALL matter, ALL OF THE TIME. The Way of the Livingness is the only Religion that has shown me that and this is why it is my chosen way.
In the past I had always eschewed or discounted rituals, routines as belonging to a stuckness of an ill society that allowed it to continue to stagnate in ignorance and stupor. However I had little insight or deliberately ignored the fact that my own life was a series of rituals (of a different kind) that also allowed my own stagnation, and was deeply imprisoning even in its illusion of freedom and lack of attachment. Learning the true value of ritual and rhythms I have found supports us in holding the quality of our presence and connection, and with that greater awareness and hence true freedom is possible.
I agree Nicole, true religion cannot be compartmentalised into a specific time or ritual or event, but rather is with us always in our connection to oneself and to God in every moment, ever unfolding the sacredness we all hold inside equally.
I have so enjoyed developing my understanding of true religion. I did look all over the place, at religions as we see them today, and knew that there were truths within most of them, but none of them encompassed the big picture, inclusive and loving in the way that Universal Medicine does. A simple coming home to that which I know within and maybe cheekily suggest, we all know.
I am finally in a place within that I am ok with being religious, ok in that I will share that I am religious with someone I know well or a stranger. I had for so long felt odd or strange at the thought of being religious but now knowing that to be religious is to be connected to my self and therefore God, its the simple truth.
Hard to imagine people going to war over whether you should or should not take the time to fold your pyjamas in the morning. So maybe we have bastardised the true meaning of religion?
There is so much to appreciate about this blog and what is shared here, To choose one thing for now, it is ‘I have found that this way of life is not about self, but about everyone.’ Yes, to me, true religion is about everyone equally and not about self. Accepting this fact brings access to a whole new level of connection with ourselves, each other and our world, and with that a new level of responsibility for it all. What I experience through this acceptance is a greater sense of fullness than I do otherwise. I am more me, more of who I truly am and I bring and offer more to the world.
In contrast to Nicole Serafin, I had felt deeply religious as a child. There were times in fact that I would make up my own religion and rituals for it. Needless to say, I had very strong views on what true religion is, and would reject that which I could see was not true, but self serving and exclusive. For me, religion always made me feel whole and a part of something bigger than myself or my immediate family. It unifies and confirms you as a person and yet keeps your life purpose to be about everyone. In my made up religions no one was ever left out, even the plants and animals, all were included and cherished. However, I can see why so many people do turn away from religion, because what we are presented with in society in general is not in accordance to what is alive in our hearts. So, there is no reason to accept that which is not true, and in fact to not trust, but to know that what you feel is absolutely correct.
How strange is it that the fire that burns within us all was turned against us to be what the fires of hell were like? Was this the first great PR moment to herd the masses to the way they wanted you to believe?
Religion is the activity of living connected to the spark of God within us. Being religious is not the withdrawal from the world that organised world religions have reinterpreted it to be, but committing to every aspect of life and deepening our ability to bring our true essence to all we do.
True religion without imposition, in true equality for all men and woman, religion that includes everything Universally so, makes so much sense to me.
The most important thing we as humanity need to reclaim is that God is within us. This isn’t a big deal or for special people, it is in the fabric of who we are. Yet we have moved away from knowing this, leaving us open to misinterpretations by religions that would have us believe God is above us, in a church, in certain people etc.
It’s interesting how we have ideas of what a religious person looks like or acts like. Most of these pre-conceived ideas and stereotypes don’t feel true and put us off. This perception stops us from feeling that we are all religious, and it’s our natural way to be. Feeling what is there to be felt in connection to God is key rather than being limited by what we are told is there.
When we have reacted to the false versions of religion that most of us as kids saw through instantly, it can surprise us when you find we actually have a relationship with God – which is actually what religion is about for me. The false versions of religion with all the man made reinterpretations put us off God, but the real relationship we have with God cannot be touched, no matter how burnt or disillusioned we may become.
Knowing God there is always more, but it is beautiful unfolding inner experience to surrender to – nothing we have to go out and achieve, attain, gather or hoard.
‘…not pushing my body beyond what I feel it is capable of in that moment and listening intently to the signs it offers me, the niggles and aches, no matter how large or small they are, are important and deserve to be heard as well as felt.’ This is such massive important point, I am amazed at the tenderness my body can go to when I equally honour the aches and discomforts that may arise along the way.
I have heard non religious people say that people who need to rely on religion are weak because they are needing an external influence to direct them how to live their lives. This understanding you are bringing Nicole, ‘What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?’ makes complete sense to me. We all have true religion within us, we can choose to disconnect to it or re-interpret it, but when we feel it, it is a knowing for us all to connect with.
‘One day after hitting absolute rock bottom, I shouted from my veranda, “God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?’ This seems to be a common theme for humanity at the moment, that is, we only really stop and question our life when something huge happens with our health or as you did here hit rock bottom, the same happened with me. Otherwise we tend to accept how life is, even though looking around us and in the news we can see it is actually getting worse and not better. Universal Medicine are an absolute blessing as they tangibly show this can be turned around with making consistent loving choices for ourselves, which in turn has a ripple affect on others. I love what you have shared here ‘I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.’
Practical, absolute, simple truth. So radically different from what we are taught to believe as religion. No wonder so many run a mile from the bastardised version of the word ‘religion’. Thank you for your offering that corrects the balance.
Sometimes we have to hit rock bottom to remember that there is more to life than what meets the eye and is demanded of us on a daily basis.
It’s a great question Nicole because you can’t change your life if you are not prepared to take responsibility for the choices you make…. and using your body as wise master of what is true is a gorgeous support in designing a life that is deeply loving and forever evolving to be forever more and absolutely the life we deserve.
Hello Nicole and I agree with what you are saying about Religion and so if it is everything like we are saying then it would change from moment to moment. It would follow the same quality or direction but from one moment to the next it would expand. I am just relating this to the fact that when I first read your blog religion held a meaning but now I look at it today my view has changed. As I said not that it’s no longer everything but more that ‘everything’ now feels greater. Religion is forever expanding and for me can’t be pinned down to an old belief or pattern.
True Religion is the sacred relationship we unfold within, connecting back to our own Divinity, and in holding that connection we hold all others in the same sacredness, knowing that we are all of the one light.
Living from the mind void of the connection to the inner heart creates a life without true connection, and without that, no true compass to guide us – and so we will be at the whims of all the forces that constantly play with us. But making the choice to connect to our inner heart, to our Soul, and the external forces have no power and so we regain true life and true freedom, that can be lived for all.
This is a beautiful way to express what true religion is Nicole.”True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” Religion is my loving relationship with everything in life.
‘What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?’ This is a feeling that I was reunited with again recently in an esoteric healing session after my own choices had led me away from it. Nothing compares to the feeling of being connected to your innermost, the divinity within.
Religion is not easy to speak about without loading it with centuries of intellect, doctrines and masters, but what you have laid out here Nicole is beautifully simple, indeed your livingness, your religion shines through.
“In contrast to the mind, which constantly seeks acceptance and recognition from others, the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is. It knows it already has, and is, all that it needs – there is nothing else, only an allowing for one to be love, and to live in and from this place.” Often it feels like I have become so conditioned by the minds created complication that the simplicity offered by this inner connection is too confronting.
Living a life of true religion. I absolutely love this. The only way to live life truly and in full.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.”
This takes commitment and responsibility and for many it is easier to belief that there is a god outside of our self that we pray to to make life good and if it doesn’t turn out the way we want it to we can always blame God. No wonder most of humanity are in one type of religion or another as it is easier to give their power away to something outside of themselves instead of being responsible for their lives.
It feels so harmonious; religion being a way of life we feel from within, from our bodies. We can listen to our mind with all its shoulds, a mind that is never satisfied and places recognition before our health. Or we can honour our bodies and feel our connection to love, where our mind is a tool that serves everyone. The choice really is simple, it’s only when I am not connected with my body that my mind seeks to make it complicated.
What a super powerful question to call to be answered, “God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?” When a question is asked and awareness is truly sought, then the answers come our way. The answers are waiting there all the time to be accessed, we just need to be willing to receive them.
I love how practicle this blog is. Thank you Nicole.
The Way of the Livingness is the only religion that I have come across that made sense of religion and didn’t leave me with questions that couldn’t be answered or didn’t make sense.
Me too, Fiona. The Way of The Livingness is such a blessing as it makes sense of the world in a way that leaves no stone unturned.
“so when the word God came out of my mouth, I must say I was a wee bit surprised, to say the least.” It’s interesting how we can live life in denial that God exists, but underneath there is a knowing that what we have subscribed to is false and that when we are at the point where the arrogance can no longer have the upper hand it is natural for us to call his name.
‘What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?’ – The key word in this powerful sentence is ’ALL’ – true religion does not discriminate or separate, we are indeed ALL equal in every sense of the word, and we all have equal access to our inner fire and boundless love.
To me, religion is about my connection to all that is unseen in the world. It is about my relationship with the unseen. For me, religion is not about turning up at a certain place or time to engage in rituals that are meant to ensure an outcome, it is about my ongoing relationship and connection with all things. Religion is also a constantly changing and refining relationship, a true relationship that is a two way street of communication. I am deeply religious, but do not worship anything or anyone.
The power in your words of how, when we do not take responsibility for our choices they follow us around like our shadows. When we do accept our part in those choices life does change. I have also found that simple small profound changes, make’s room for what is next!
As an adult I had to rediscover God, but as a child there was no doubt in me what so ever about the truth of his presence. Yet, from all the teachings abound and all the parts that did not feel true, I gave up on this connection. I remember the time at 15 when I said ‘no more’ to the Catholic religion as I just could not put up with its presentations any more, but a deep sadness enveloped me as I was also closing my connection to God at the same time. My views about God had been squeezed into something that my head couldn’t make sense of. On hearing the presentations of Universal Medicine and The Way of The Livingness I re-learnt that true religion is ‘not just about God, it was about absolutely everything,’ everything slipped back into place as it once did when I felt this as a child.
‘True Religion has no rules, there is no guide book, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters’ – This is gorgeous Nicole and I agree, true religion is universal and cannot be reduced to a set of rules or ‘do’s and don’t’s’.
In the future, we may look back with wry smiles on our face at the books and internet sites dedicated to ‘great relationships’ with that special girl or guy. For underneath, don’t we know that we are here to represent and illustrate that relationships are all about ‘the one’? The one is all of us, is everything and it is this you beautifully celebrate Nicole in this example of living with w-one-der as our everyday religious way.
I often used to question religion, feeling that something didn’t quite add up between people who would talk about the values of being a ‘good christian’ for example when they were in Church, but then would go off and behave in ways that were the complete opposite of what they had been talking about a few hours previously. So when True Religion was introduced to me through Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon, everything made complete sense and suddenly I understood what it meant to be Truly Religious. I no longer had to look outside of myself and go to a cold, damp, empty Church to know God. All I had to do was to connect to my inner most being by taking a moment to stop and feel this, and I realised my connection to God was there with me all the time. A simple and beautiful way to live.
I love how you describe true religion, Nicole. It is so simple. Connecting deeply to the wisdom inside and from this we get shown how sensitive and tender we are. From this awareness we cannot behave abusively but get shown by the reaction of our bodies what true love is. Like you have mentioned Nicole, to take care for oneself and nurture oneself is crucial in order to meet the sensitivity and tenderness within ourselves.
I love what you’re sharing here, Nicole, how true religion isn’t just about God or our relationship with God, it’s about everything and everyone …. without this, when there are rules and demarcations we are immediately excluding and no longer consider ourselves to be equal along with everyone else. This is why The Way of the Livingness is the only religion that has ever felt true for me too.
We have all been so burned by Religion that when a true one comes along we can hardly see what is right in front of us.
“True Religion has no rules, there is no guide book, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters, there is always a bigger picture at play, a grander plan you could say, one that includes everyone and everything. Each one of us is affected and impacted by the choices we all make and the way that we choose to live. I have found that this way of life is not about self, but about everyone.”
The concept of religion has kept the masses from the truth of religion for eons.
Interesting how we can call on God in despair, anger or frustration despite ordinarily professing to not be religious. Perhaps part of our frustration stems from a deep inner knowing of the truth of God, but not knowing how to connect with him or, in truth, ourselves.
I love this Nicole, ‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’ Beautifully expressed and The Way of The Livingness re-connected me back to God, back to me where life is full of simplicity, joy, deeper relationships and much love and truth…..and so much more.
Thank you for sharing what true religion is all about Nicole, the simplicity of it is mindblowing where there is no room for self, only our absolute connection to the all.
‘…refusing to take responsibility for the choices I made and the life I had created…’ In refusing to take responsibility for the choices in our past we are also making it possible to continue to turn a blind eye to our awareness of what may be true choices currently.
It’s a big subject Religion as even the word alone brings up different ideas and Gods. How did we get to this? and at some point was it all much much simpler? Usually it’s best to go to history to see where things have been and throughout history it would seem we have stepped further and further away from the true meaning of a simple word like Religion. Like anything now we have a competing religious landscape where some people are afraid to speak about this word and so avoid it and others are out door knocking to sell theirs. It is a sad state of affairs when we treat something so sacred as a commercial venture. I was born into a Roman Catholic valued family that had trouble explaining why we do what we do, church, donations, communion etc. None of it made sense and when you asked as a child you were shut down and at times ridiculed. Universal Medicine and more accurately the religious way, The Way Of The Livingness filled in all the gaps in my religious teachings and for me brought the word back to its origins, a simple reconnection with me. I am religious but you won’t see me selling it, I am a living religion.
That is a comment worth reading, my only thing to add would be “What he said” or “Ditto”
I was uncomfortable about talking about Religion until I read this, you just paved the way…’I am living religion’, love it!
This line in your comment ‘It is a sad state of affairs when we treat something so sacred as a commercial venture’ really stood out for me. God is being marketed or sold, when its something we all already have available within if we choose to connect. Bizarre. I love how you finish with ‘I am a living religion.’
Why wait , what are we waiting for? … in the words of a great song by Chris James. Are we waiting for a saviour to save us … really?? Has it worked? A controlling mechanism that we have bowed down to for centuries through most religions. Now the Ageless Wisdom is offered to us through the great teachings of Serge Benhayon and we have no place else to look other than what is inside us.. right now, and to live that in every way.
Being in true religion is living in God’s rhythm. This can be as simple as honouring our body’s bed time and waking times or listening to our body when we need to stop and go for a walk. Or it may also be about expressing in a timely way, and acting on impulses as we receive them.
What I love about what you are sharing Nicole is, that the learning and deepening never ends, that life is a step by step process where every moment counts and is the foundation for the next.
This is definitely one for my kids to read. So crystal clear. So true. So applicable. So accessible. So real. So great. Thank you.
These days I love saying that I am a deeply religious person because I now know what true religion is.
Wow! Indeed! ‘I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life’. I absolutely agree and God to me is ‘absolutely everything’ and he is all ‘encompassing’ and it is up to me to make that choice to see God in all I do!
True Religion is what I was looking for my whole life and is was not until I found the presentations by Serge Benhayon 12 years ago that I started my journey back to being me, by making more loving choices!
I also drifted far away from God and had lost all but the tinniest understanding of what God was all about, until one day I found my body so smashed and beat-up that I asked for forgiveness and started my path of return. This happened 26 years ago and it took me another 14 years to find the presentations by Serge Benhayon so that now after the last 12 years of being a Student of The Livingness, I am starting to understand all the implications of the word religion / or should I say ‘true religion’, because so many words have been re-interpreted from their true meaning. As I understand a ‘truth’ it is being me in my expression that which is for all of us equally, and or being unifying in it’s expression!
True Religion is the way home for Humanity – restoring unity, equality and connection with all.
“How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” – changing jobs, relationships and countries doesn’t change anything except the surroundings unless you’re prepared to be honest and take responsibility for your part in what it is you’re moving away from. I’ve found when I deal with whatever it is I don’t like and take responsibility for my part, things change and sometimes it isn’t always necessary to move on.
True Religion starts with accepting our own connection with our inner-heart and our body as our Divine instrument to share our universal love and wisdom.
I have always loved God and was so confused by the way he was portrayed through the religions I was exposed to as a child. I hated church but complied because everyone said that was where he was. I know for me that I found God as a feeling, mostly when I was alone in nature… Fast track to today and over 10 years working with Universal Medicine and I know that true religion and God is everything and everywhere and my relationship with it and him, is very much from within, rather than a deity governing me from on high.
Through my lived understanding of the word religion I have replaced my suspicion of the word with a very natural love for it.
Nicole, I have read your insightful blog a couple of times now and both times I got an overwhelming sense of how stupendously lost we are as a race of people and the really ironic part is we fervently believe that we have life worked out.
It’s understandable why we don’t want to be seen to be religious. There is the undesirable image of the ‘God Squad’ that usually prevails when we announce that we are religious. But ultimately we are all aware of a divine presence as you discovered when you cried for help, and it really is as simple as being open to this and experiencing it in our own way.
“God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?” – You have pointed out something here that I can very much relate to, I was never into any religion and I did not even consider myself believing in God, but the interesting thing is that whenever I was in a despereate situation, I KNEW God was there.
When I read this blog I totally GET religion. How many zillions of miles is this from the version of religion that we are fed as children. No wonder it all seems ridiculous, inaccessible and utterly irrelevant. No wonder children turn away from themselves. Yet, when it is presented with the true simplicity, power and absolute every-day accessibility that it is, then it makes utter, utter sense. True religion feels true.
Learning the origin of the word religion and the meaning behind it being to re-connect, re-turn, re-unite etc. has supported me to understand the practical application of what it means to be and live in a religious way.
Nicole growing up in the Catholic religion I thought that was the only religion but many parts did not feel true. From my experience all major religions today have lost the truth of religion, the simple re-connection with ourselves and then living from that connection. To be true religion is about our inner connection and not prescribing to some set of outside ideals. Yet it’s only by being introduced to this possibility was I free to look back and see my version of religion in the past was simply not true.
‘“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are”. This way of expressing true religion, simplifies it and brings it back to the way we live our life day to day.
“How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” And this is where the searching begins, the ache of knowing that there is something missing and trying to manage it with the relief of travelling, yoga retreats and endless distractions, we have become masters of compartmentalising our lives, finding solutions to our emptiness. Enter Universal Medicine, a mirror so crystal clear, that self responsibility is seen for the medicine that will truly change life as we know it.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” Beautifully expressed Nicole, how can we know love if we are led to believe that it is outside of us or greater than ourselves or indeed that we have to strive to get there.
Great question Nicole “What if there was another meaning for Religion? What if for all these thousands of years we had falsely believed that God was a being that lived outside of us, that he was the only being that could grant us salvation and give us retribution, and permission to enter the golden gates of Heaven;” We give ourselves permission. It is our own free choice to live and move in the knowing of His love, that is in fact here and all around us.
I love what you’ve shared true religion is about taking deep care of ourselves and then we can truly feel how divine we all are.
Growing up I was not religious either Nicole, from what I observed, I felt that there was a falseness in religious people, that they were lost and their devotion came from need, a need to belong. Having attended an all girls semi catholic boarding school I felt zero confirmation in our endless mass assemblies or found any inspiration from the nuns and priests that held our services.
I love this blog and all it offers so much “it felt like it was a true relationship with God that had been missing all this time” Without this relationship life is empty, pointless and has no meaning but with this relationship with God in absolutely everything our lives are full of love and with immense purpose and joy and this is true religion with the Livingness of this.
In the world that I grew up in, whether it was in church, school or any other institution, I was never once told that I was already divine, or encouraged to bring out and live from my essence. And of course this has been the case for the majority of us. Universal Medicine has started a revolution to make life about love again, re-instating our natural and truly religious way of being.
Nicole, I love reading this article, you make religion very tangible and practical and not ‘out there’, as I have in the past thought religion was. ‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’
“I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.” After many years of studying with Universal Medicine this truth is still unfolding for me. Everyday I have the opportunity to deepen my religious relationship with all I do, paying more and more attention to the details, all those insignificant places that in the past I never thought mattered, bringing all of my attention and love, learning to live a seamless life whereby the quality of love that resides within me is equally applied to every inch of my life.
True Religion offers us the opportunity to connect to our inner self that is Love. And by taking responsibility for our way of living and connecting to the energy of fire that we choose to use to do this. To me The Way of The Livingness is indeed True Religion, as presented by Serge Benhayon. Thank you Nicole for being an inspiration to us all!
A truly religious life indeed, one that does not require a monastery or cave in the Himalayas, no arduous meditation practices; on the contrary, it fully engages with and in life, is based on love and embraces honesty and responsibility. As you write, it describes The Way of The Livingness so well for me: “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are”.
Yes Gabriel, this definition feels spot on for me as well since I too have been developing a truly religious way of living by simple self supportive, consistent ways and this has enabled me to feel the Fire/Love/God within me. So simple.
The word religion itself can be a block to many in exploring a relationship with God. What I have come to realise is that Religion is simply having a relationship with self, with those around us and the environment in which we live and that God is the fabric that makes up the love in this way of being. There is nothing I am not in relationship with and so it follows that God is everywhere and innately within me.
I love the feeling of religion being a living connection and relationship with all that emanates from within.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” Pure Gold, this definition should be in every dictionary in the world.
Your livingness opens the door to religion Nicole. They are one and the same connecting and reflecting who you are in the way you live. You are an inspiration.
I grew up in a home where God and religion were seen as a lie and falsity. Yet deep down all my life I had a sense that God was real. This sense led me to Universal Medicine and has proven to not only be true, but to be a responsibility that I feel, to live from my connection with God, a forever deepening connection that I am constantly developing every day.
Building a deeper relationship with our bodies allows us to connect more to the magnificence of the universe where we can live with a blind trust that everything is taken care of, so life no longer is focused on the mind that feeds us ideals and beliefs, more the quality within that is in connection to the all.
I feel that there are no multiple ways back to ourselves and God as we’re told (sold) in the world. There’s only one way back to love: The Way of The Livingness. Which means building and expanding continuously the relationship with both ourselves, other people and God – and all through our body. Simple.
Taking responsibility is key in coming to an understanding of what is true religion. Without taking full responsibility of the choices we make, we will always look outside of ourselves whether that be to get something from a higher ‘so-called being’ such as God, or if that is blaming that ‘so-called being’ for what we lack. However true religion is about discovering that God is actually within, and all the choices that we make in life affect the flow in which we live. If the choices that we made offer a way of living that allows for a flow, we feel God in all that we do. This is the ultimate form of responsibility – to live as the Sons of God, knowing that he dwells within.
This must be one of the first times someone has ever mentioned in a blog the key and rather critical link between self-care and true religion. After all, how can we possibly know and be in a true relationship with God when we are not living such love and care with ourselves and with others?
“What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?” So simple and so obvious when it is pointed out. How lost must we be to override this knowing?
“How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” it is a simple concept but profound in its impact.
What is it about us that needs to hit rock bottom before we ask the big questions in life? And yet, when all is comfortable and smooth sailing, we are happy to let any deeper pondering remain as a distant question mark that only very occasionally may enter our peripheral thoughts.
There is so much happening in life, reading this blog is religious in itself as it supports me to reflect on my everyday. Thank you for all you have shared here Nicole.
“How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?”-
So true Nicole. In accepting that our past and present choices have created the life we live today, we can then choose more loving choices in each and every moment by listening to our body which will build a foundation of love in our body.
We are destined to return to God, independently from our beliefs. In that sense, we can say that all ‘roads lead to Rome’. Yet we cannot truly say that religious paths (if we bother to go there), are alike.
‘…not pushing my body beyond what I feel it is capable of in that moment and listening intently to the signs it offers me, the niggles and aches, no matter how large or small they are, are important and deserve to be heard as well as felt.’ This is so pivotal Nicole. I feel our bodies are the key to all we need to know (and more) about life, the universe and everything, and need to be appreciated as such. We venerate the mind but where has that led us? True religion lives within and honouring our bodies, down to the niggles and aches, will surely foster and strengthen our connection to that in-shrined religiousity of which you speak.
I used to think that because I never spoke or thought about God as a child that this meant that I was not religious, however I have come to understand recently that I, like most children was naturally very religious, by the simple fact of being a child.
“What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?” Could this be why when we have tried everything that is around and outside of us we return, quite often at a time of crisis, that which has always been there – our connection to ourself and therefore naturally God, no special buildings, places or clothes just ourself ‘naked’ as we are in our glory? Is this what the gorgeousness of new born babies show us? In this how can we not be religious in looking after this heartfelt beauty and divinity?
“I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.” Rather than abstract ideals and beliefs this is what makes religion real and true.
One aspect of true religion for me is to be deeply honest with oneself.
Love is simple and being religious in truth is simple too .. a relationship with connection to self and the body. “.. we have a choice to connect to our body and live by and from the impulses of our inner heart,..” Its a long way from how much we have loaded ourselves through the reinterpreted word.
I love this blog Nicole reminding us all what is true religion and I particularly love this line “I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything” This is is huge and exposes the arrogant way we have been living, Religion is in the way we move, the way we eat what we choose to wear. I too used to cringe with the word religion yet getting to see how this word has been bastardised over many years and starting to feel the true meaning, knowing deep down we are all (every single body) naturally religious helps me to clear the fog and illusion around this word.
It is often when we are at rock bottom do we call out for God, God is always there, it’s us who has lost our way back. It’s in this moment of desperation we open our eyes again to see the light and feel the connection.
Tonight I felt very much in my body that I am religious to my bones and I have nothing to hide from or be embarrassed by. Too long have I hidden from the natural rays of divinity in a desire to fit in to the normal of society. What a crummy payoff!
‘What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?’ This is huge and turns everything we have known about religion and God on its head. How is it possible that such a truth could be so widely mis-taught?
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‘What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?’ This is huge and turns everything we have known about religion and God on its head. How is it possible that such a truth could be so widely taught?
It is no coincidence that twice in one day I find myself in conversation with two people about God. The first was shared with you in my last comment. The second, was in an airport lounge where I spent two hours with a fellow traveller talking about life, meaning and love. God and the search for what seemed elusive, was central to what we shared. It occurs to me that these two meetings both with men, were constellated by my inner self as a way of reflecting my own relationship with God. And it could be said that the two men and I are one and the same: still to live and breathe our inner divinity in all our everyday expression.
We can make all sorts of excuses for the way our lives are but if we aren’t taking responsibility for our choices, nothing will change.
Your honesty is refreshing Nicole – there is so much truth in what you observed about religion when you were young. I’m sure we all feel this but ignore, deny or override this with the need for recognition, acceptance and a deep desire for connection.
The personification of God brings all of us down as it keeps us searching for that which is already within. The claiming of God in all and in everything unites and lifts us all, even those who hold a grudge against God or vehemently deny God’s existence, because in true religion all are equal no matter what their beliefs.
Love the simplicity and practicalities you offer here Nicole… true religion is the dedication of the quality in which we do the simple and practical things in life.
A life with God is a life that is spherical. For a long time I didn’t know what that meant. Or to be honest, I was completely disconnected from the fact, consciously that is. I’ve got the feeling that I’ve only just dipped my toes in the water when it comes to a spherical way of living. Through the teachings of Universal Medicine, and the different choices I’ve made in the last years, I now know for a fact that there’s an interconnectedness between all of us that is just too beautiful, too grand to understand in full. Yet, I’m enjoying already the magnificence of what I do experience.
I also strongly disliked what I understood to be religion, believing that the religious people around me were getting an easy way out of life, denying everything that was going on in the world and escaping reality. But I have discovered that religion is not that at all, true religion is responsibility and in this we truly hold each other in love.
Nicole this is a beautiful piece which I think everyone will relate to. We look so high and low for an ease with ourselves, for a freedom and flow of expression, for intimacy, for joy, harmony and love. We look for it in odd places and really believe that we will find it there, even when we are repeatedly not finding it there. Are we not simply looking for God?
“What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?” This is how religion feels to me. A connection and relationship within. A living and changing dynamic relationship with all that is seen and unseen.
What is remarkable about human history up until now, is the segregated way we have lived every day. There has always seemed to be one clan or tribe or nation or group always promoting itself as better or superior in some way. This starts to make some sense, when you understand that we have all lived segregated in ourselves, divided, isolated, withdrawn and seriously divided from the love and magnificence of God. How different it is to see the unity in our divinity and that true beauty lives equally in you and me, in everything. Thank you Nicole, for this true hymn to God.
7 am this morning, on my way home from the swimming pool, I met a man He stood on a street corner with beer can in one hand and threw his hands up into the air and exclaimed ‘God where are you?’ I stopped and said, ‘He’s inside you, all you have to do is connect to him’. He said ‘Really, well I never!’ I said Yes, inside everyone of us. And we both laughed. A brief moment of connection with another human being, desperately seek solace but not knowing how to. He thanked me for not walking by thinking he was mad.
“In contrast to the mind, which constantly seeks acceptance and recognition from others, the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is.” The difference between what the mind does and our heart is a contrast that is worth understanding and experiencing for ourselves. When we offer ourselves the re-connection back to us in loving, gentle and very simple ways, we can feel our own connection with God, no tricks or special prayers or approvals, we are this.
Yes, to really feel that this can’t be all and then to do something about it that is not a quick or slow fix, that is the key.
Yes, it is about everything as everything is a choice to express divinely or not to do so.
“True Religion has no rules, there is no guide book, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters, there is always a bigger picture at play, a grander plan you could say, one that includes everyone and everything.” If this was taught to us as young children simply as a way of life, we would all grow up with an understanding and an awareness of all those around us all of the time, leaving no room for anything but truth. How different our lives and relationships would be between families, friends, work colleagues, countries and even nations. This has to be worth considering.
Through the love of God we are able to re-connect to ourselves and ‘save’ ourselves from the prison we’ve created for ourselves. With the absolute Grace from God, we’re able to undo all the choices we’ve made away from him and his innate Love for himself and for us. We’re to learn to surrender to the love that is all around us and carrying us, rather than fighting that what we in truth can’t fight. The religion is our connection with our Soul and with God.
I love the simplicity of how you have defined True Religion, that it is by taking responsibility for how we live that will affect our ability to reconnect to the divine being each of us already is.
I love this question Nicole – it offers a truth that resonates deeply within my upper chest filling it with warmth and a sense of expansion as I read it.
What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?”
‘I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything’ – How true Nicole, I have come from a place of much resistance and judgment towards religions – when I learnt that true religion is simply, to the best of our ability, to live our lives in responsibility, deeply honouring of ourselves and everyone else, religion started to make sense. As did God.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’ – It is so refreshing to hear religion being described this way – as something that comes from a lived way rather than a principal or an ideal. Thank you for sharing what you now know religion to be and for helping to break all the concepts that are attached to this.
‘These are just some of the things I now choose for myself and this allows my body to then be the marker for what comes next.’
I feel I am just exploring the tip of the iceberg with this, that is, making choices that allow me to feel in love as much as possible. There is a wisdom and strength coming to the fore of my everyday as result.
As people,we search high and low for God, we beseech him to reveal himself to us, we wail, we spin, we dance, we pray, we rock, we fast, we go on pilgrimages, we do all manner of things in a desperate attempt to know God, whilst all the time he is residing quietly inside us.
Nicole your writing has an exquisite silkiness to it that makes reading it an absolute delight.
It is interesting that even strong non-believers still have dialogues with God.
As you mention Nicole I have found that It is the rhythm and routines that build a deeper relationship with ourselves, it is there that I have found the beauty and come up against the not so beautiful parts of myself. But in that there is a level of honesty that is understood.
To be be religious is to ponder upon the truth of our relationship with ourselves and with the Universe – and in doing so to deepen our relationship with all of life,. Unfortunately the word has been twisted to mean dogma, rather than being associated with true freedom of thought.
What you describe here Nicole is also my understanding now of the true meaning of life. This is here for us all to choose to feel, to find within us, that is already there, ready and waiting in the inner heart – it simply is. Knowing that we need nothing else means we don’t have to work hard to seek anything else.
“What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?” When I first grasped this concept it allowed my body to let go.
‘I believed that religion was something that instigated wars, caused people to behave in hypocritical ways and allowed a group of people to create something they called religion as a way to control, manipulate and influence another’ – Too many people share this belief, and it’s absurd that ‘religion’ has been linked to all of these things and associated so strongly with separation when in truth it is the opposite.. True religion is everything to do with unification and reconnection, not borders, control or identity.
Your sharing here Nicole is profound and brings a reality, knowing and simplicity to true religion. By connecting to our inner heart and the impulses we receive from here with God we are in union with our body and our movements reflect this also. Our inner knowing brought into our lives lived from here brings a true magic and purpose to our lives lovingly.
“What if for all these thousands of years we had falsely believed that God was a being that lived outside of us, that he was the only being that could grant us salvation and give us retribution, and permission to enter the golden gates of Heaven; or the supposed alternative, going to the fiery depths below, and that this was not actually true?
This is a nice picture, which tells us that we can do whatever we want, because God is living outside of us and will fix everything again. Is this not a lifestyle we live in day to day? We have medicine which fixes our health problems, no matter how harming we treat our body, there is the church which takes care of the moral side of our lifes etc. So we do not need to take any responsibility.
To remain open to the fact that there is a God even when every cell in our little body is screaming, “this religion is not it,” shows our absolute knowing within, of what God is.
It is touching that you didn’t think you were religious but when you were at rock bottom you called out to God. Innately we know that we are connected to the Divine, even when we don’t want to acknowledge it.
Unlike the traditional forms of religion, which requires one to be subordinate to someone or something, True Religion necessitates one being subordinate to no one but oneself.
“True Religion has no rules … everyone and everything matters” and here lies the truth we all are wanting to return to, the knowing and full appreciation that everyone and everything lives in the one body of God and there is no separation. How we treat ourselves, our family, friends and all we meet, how we are with everything makes up the whole, so resuming responsibility for the quality of our lives contributes to restoring the quality of everyone’s lives and the return to true brotherhood once more.
Nicole its a great point about asking for God even if we claim we have no religion, I’ve heard this time and time again that people who are not religious still call to God in time of crisis. Today that is making me consider the fact that deep down we all know something greater is there and that we are part of something much bigger than this physical life, that “religion” in its institutional way gets in the way of what we know to be true and finally what if we embraced our connect with God and our relationship with God, we could then work with God and not against him.
Making life about everyone and everything is very different than the common trend nowadays of looking after me and mine. It is a completely different orientation that considers the impact of all of our choices and the ripple effect of every action, word or thought. When we live in this way also get the joy of feeling connected to something grand that we are all equally a part of.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” Magical words of wisdom, so simple and then we add all the complications.
Nicole, what you are sharing here about true religion exposes how false many religions are – they seem to be very much about rules, are not for everyone and are not about us re-connecting with our innermost and certainly do not tell us how amazing we are. The Way of the Livingness feels very different to all other religions that I have come across, it makes sense, is simple and it works and does not leave me feeling less.
Nicole I love what you have shared about religion in your awesome blog: “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” What you have described is true religion for me and this form of religion needs the extra word TRUE as the other religion lived so far by me had nothing to do with what true religion really means – reconnection to my innermost.
I love blogs like this one, bringing the truth of life so clearly and simply and everyday ,showing us that we all have this within and we can all do it.
If true religion was taught to us as children, if it was lived by those around us, we would all want to be part of it.
“True religion has no rules, there is no guidebook, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters, there is a bigger picture at play” and we are all part of that bigger picture. “I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything,” It makes sense for if there are no rules or dictates to follow but simply re-connecting with our inner-most being, it is therefore always available to everyone equally and there is no need to go searching outside of ourselves, for it matters not who or where we live, our religious background, race or culture and to me that is just glorious.
“True religion has no rules, there is no guide book, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters, there is always a bigger picture at play”. and we are all part of that bigger picture. “I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything,” It makes sense for if there are no rules or regulations but simply re-connecting with our innermost being, it is always available to everyone equally, there is no need to go searching for it outside of ourselves and it matters not who or where we live, our religious back ground, race or culture.
For years I kept hearing “God has created man in his image” and I would look around at the mess in our world and think “yeah right. Who are you kidding? If he was this bad the universe would be in chaos.” all of a sudden I got it. Man had created his beliefs about God which I was being sold as religion in man’s image, and to make it worse it seemes to be in the image of man’s worst traits: dictatorial, threatening, bullying, demanding servitude, judgmental, vengeful, punishing. These were not even the true nature of man but a deviated behaviour. I love the teachings of Universal Medicine /Serge Benhayon and the re-introduction of true religion. It is so simple, so natural and so all encompassing, and I know God once more not through any dogma or any chants or any other human beings, but through my own inner heart.
I know that feeling, that rock bottom moment, when you are in it, it feels like there is no way out, everything feels so hard and I/we want only for two things, for everything to stop or to run away from everything.
I am now very aware of True Religion and live it to the best of my ability on a daily basis. What I now struggle with is supporting others when they get to this point that they feel they cant arise from, that is my next challenge, to truly support another without attachment or investment.
To know that we are to surrender to ourselves and our body and start the process of loving ourselves once again. Again, as we disconnected from the love by choice, although for many this appears to be unconscious. God loves us in a way that is so amazing, so precious, that we might feel overwhelmed, yet he’s inviting us to accept that we’re his equal. And that he offers everything he has in order for us all to come back to the same love we innately are.
Great to have the truth about religion re-written as it serves the world to be more brighter, as we have made religion heavy and loaded – which in truth it is not. So beautiful marker of true religion is made – like everyone can connect to.
It seems common that when people are in a crisis or have hit rock bottom that they reach to God even if they haven’t had any association with God before. It’s interesting to note this and shows that we all innately know God. This is because he is an innate part of us that dwells within and to have a relationship with God is our true religion.
It is the most liberating thing to be free to be religious, in our time and day this is becoming quite challenging so it is really important that we remain claimed in our religious ways.
I absolutely love this Nicole. I love that god is alive within each of us and we can connect to god by connecting to ourselves. I know for myself I can have unloving thoughts when coming from my mind, but when I live from my heart, my thoughts are loving for all.
We can make changes and better our life but it is not until we see our place on a universal scale that we start to realize our purpose and how much every little thing affects everything around us. As you say Nicole, “I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything,…”
How can you truly escape from your own life? Nicole, this is a question worth pondering. We think we can hide or not be accountable but in fact there is nowhere to hide and escaping is just causing further delay from taking responsibility for our choices.
Nicole, like many of us we see the bastardisation of religion and the many harmful things that are done in the name of religion, but we tend to then ‘throw the baby out with the bathwater’ in reaction to our perception.
God is in every cell of our being connecting us to everything, and if we are connecting to everything then there is no need to seek anything. Most established religions seek something, whereas The Way of The Livingness is about living and choosing every day what is already there inside us — in every cell.
’How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?’ – A powerful question asked here Nicole – crazy thing is that it seems quite common to think we can escape from the choices we have made… There was a time when I would run for the hills if you had asked me that question. My understanding of life and what it means to be a responsible person has totally changed since I’ve been introduced to Serge Benhayons teachings.
Reading this I realise how little I have been appreciating the small choices I make on a daily basis that support me – such as the ones Nicole pointed out – putting a fresh glass of water by my bed, lighting incense, making my bed, folding my PJs, flossing my teeth………. I have been choosing instead to focus on the things that I am inconsistent about and as a result, find myself today feeling very sad after having been very hard on myself. Serge Benhayon has been presenting how powerful appreciation is in supporting us to change the momentum so many of us live with that is being hard and critical of ourselves, and therefore others. By overlooking appreciating the small details of my routines and rituals I have been giving power to the self-critical judgements. Thanks to blogs like this, where the writers share real and practical examples of their own experiences, it can switch on a lightbulb for another, even if it can seem like an insignificant detail. Thank you Nicole for doing just that for me!
I can remember reaching my mid 30’s with a husband, two young children, a lovely home and no major stresses in my life, but feeling such a strong sense that there was something major missing in my life. When I shared this with friends the general response was, ‘but you have so much, what else could you possibly want?’ I always knew there was more to life than what was there in front of me to see, but could never get to what it was. Enter Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine a few years later, and suddenly all my questions and feelings were being answered. To understand and know that true religion is about the consistency of how we live, and staying connected to who we are so that we can bring all of us to all that we do, and not about having to go somewhere to worship a being outside of ourselves, has been completely and utterly life changing. Not to mention the simplicity of it, and that it is there accessible for anyone and everyone.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” Life is inevitably based on rhythms and routines, so love how you mention that building these with quality is what true religion is about.
Connection with God can be found in all of our daily choices, and isn’t reserved to a special time, spot, place, building or with certain people. I love doing house chores, because if we appreciate the value it is bringing to the home we walk every step with God.
Your first line reminds me of when I was travelling and being on a beach at night on the steps of a life guard hut, and shouting in my head similar things, that surely that has to be more than this. I remember feeling such despair that only ever decreased when I put distractions in between me and it to avoid feeling such emptiness, and the awareness that I had in fact created this situation. I lived with low grade despair constantly which now I see was simply a disconnection from God and myself. I’m no way perfect with this connection but boy is it worth choosing what will foster it. Separating from God’s love leaves one feeling bereft of purpose – no wonder I used to cry buckets!!
I can recall as a young woman being bemused by what I felt was religion. I had a relationship with God that felt quite natural but at the same time felt disconnected to the people that I met at church. It feels profound and confirming as I now realise that the relationship I have with God is the most normal thing in the world. By finding Universal Medicine I have found a way of life that is supportive and sustainable – and I appreciate the freedom this gives me to explore my own connection to God without rules and regulations.
Truth is we all are religious.. it is just a matter of asking what we are religious with.
“… it felt like it was a true relationship with God that had been missing all this time, …” We are taught to have a relationship with God in so many ways – go to church, be forgiven for your sins, other religions are not true we are the chosen ones, God will save us, etc. In all of the stories and passages, I never heard the difference described so clearly about the difference between the Soul and the Spirit as Serge Benhayon the founder of Universal Medicine presented when I attended for the first time. I was certainly ready to hear it when I did – I had had enough of the pain I was living in. It explained why life is like it is. “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.”
This is GOLD – “It was not until I fully felt this, accepted it and began to take responsibility for myself, my choices and the life I had created, that things began to change.” It has brought a greater meaning to my life to take responsibility for what I know to be true in how I live. What quality of life do I want? I know what I want without a doubt I can feel it. Life is to live to the absolute knowing and claim it so.
This is what I love about The Way of The Livingness, it has no rules and it asks nothing of us, expect to be love. This is definitely a true religion for me and one that has completely changed the meaning of the word religion.
When we reach that point – that rock bottom so to speak, it is often humbling enough to begin to ask some serious questions, and really look at life and what it is in truth – it can be that rock bottom questioning that disillusions us from life and sets us on the path of return to ourselves.
When I look into Serge Benhayon’s eyes and see the universe reflected back I know that we are all from the one same God.
This feels so real to me too Nicole. True Religion is a living way where everyone and everything matters, it is not something we reach out for, it is already within us, to be found within everyone. Once we realise this, and take responsibility for our own choices, there is never ever a need or desire to escape away again.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are’ – This is a gorgeous definition Nicole, and it rings extremely true. The word ‘religion’ has been bastardised to mean something associated with belonging to a group, culture or set of beliefs, but in truth it is all to do with our relationship with ourselves and the universal plan we are ALL a part of (hence there is no separation in the true meaning of the word).
I love this definition of religion too. I used to think of religion as some heavy dogma imposed upon people – because of how the word has been so bastardised. The understanding of religion as simply a reconnection back to who we truly are, as a part of the whole, feels expansive and light, and needs nothing from the outside.
The image of us all burning in hellfire because of ‘sins’ we may have committed is one that is presented as a complete bastardisation of the true facts, but that, and the made up image of the ‘Devil’ are deeply embedded as fact in Christian societies today, such that we grow up with the deeply held belief that we are somehow ‘wrong’ and have to be punished for our sins. Learning about Karma, and the cycle of rebirth, where we experience back what we have done to others, presents a far more loving way of experiencing life’s lessons.
Our fire within is like the Olympic fire that is never extinguished, it just patiently awaits for us to turn up the gas for all to see and feel. True Religion is what is always burning inside of all of us, all of the time.
To know oneself being part of a greater all-encompassing whole where every part is interconnected with every other part is ‘home’. To live life from that deeply felt knowing is religion – living in relationship with everything all of the time.
Nicole, it is great to come back to your article, and to feel how important loving and honouring ourselves is, I can feel that I have not heard this with other religions, from my experience religions often seem to be about worshiping something or someone outside of ourselves rather than loving and taking care of ourselves. The Way of The Livingness from my experience is a very true, very practical and real religion that makes sense and is a really beautiful way to live.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” This so unlike what was presented to me as a child and experienced throughout my life until my late 50’s when I met the Ageless Wisdom as presented by Serge Benhayon and who introduced me to the original and true meaning of religion. Having given up on religion prior to that it was an eye-opener that enabled me to see and connect with what I had been missing all my life – my connection to myself, my Soul and God.
”One day after hitting absolute rock bottom, I shouted from my veranda, “God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?” I had a very similar experience as nothing about the world or presented religion made sense. The sense of frustration and angst I felt was so strong. Then roughly two years later I found the Way of The Livingness through the presentations of Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon. It transformed everything. A light went on and everything slipped into place and made sense. I found true religion at last!
“What if there was another meaning for Religion?” An essential question to ask in a world where humanity has warped the real meaning of the word into an excuse to attack, invade, control and supress one another, all actions that are in total opposition to its true Religion. The real meaning of the word when truly appreciated, re-connects us to our true purpose: to evolve and return to our divine expression as the Sons of God we all immutably are. There is no room for war, suppression, control or separatism in Religion, there is only room for God’s Love.
“How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” What great questions. It made me realise that if we do not like our lives we are mostly first trying to not feel this dislike of life by numbing it with substances, distraction etc. but the numbing of it will not make it go away. What will truly make a change is actually starting to make different choices and feeling we are able to make choices which result into a life we do like and enjoy living. It is so simple that it makes me wonder why it seems to be so difficult at times to change unsupportive choices!
It is so beautiful to consider that there is a part of us, the inner heart, that has no need whatsoever. Without needs there is total freedom. The more we connect to our inner heart the freer we are to just be ourselves.
This is so simple and changes our perception of religion, it is no longer about visiting a church a temple or a building of worship, and believing that only a few are privy to be with God. We all have this ability if we connect to our inner heart and make love our way of living.
I have come to the understanding that for true harmony to be restored where we all get along with each other it has to begin with me. Every choice I make affects everyone and everything. Every loving choice I make towards myself contributes towards love for the all so it makes absolute sense to me to keep developing and refining a loving way for myself.
There are so many false pictures of God around – for example the white bearded old man on the throne. They are intentionally spread so that we miss the true version of God whom we all innately know by heart. The true seed of the white-beard-man picture is that we can relate to Him as our father – older and wiser and grander than the Universe – who loves us to bits!
This line you wrote Nicole, “God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?” means that we do know that we are from God and have a lifetime relationship with him. Not recognising this fact or even to deny that there is a God, is in fact debilitating our full potential and is the root cause of all the illnesses and diseases, as we live a lesser life than what we are made of and come from.
I’m so glad you broadened the topic of religion as it isn’t the narrow perspective that many people believe it to be but an ever expanding detail to how we relate to everything else around and in us.
Amazing blog Nicole – debunking the poison that is called religion that is actually not religion and giving us your experience of True Religion. Life, God and everything becomes so simple when we make it about our daily life and connection to what is within. What a relief! God is within and all we need is there already.
‘How can you truly escape from your own life?’ This is a great question Nicole, because most of us try to! From my experience, it never worked – the food, holidays, partying, TV and music were only a bandaid from life, and guess what… Life was still there waiting for me on return and I just had more ‘stuff’ to wade through before getting back to a sense of myself.
True religion is connecting to love and truth and living love and truth.
Beautiful, thank you for sharing Nicole.
“…I have come to understand that True Religion is not something or someone that lives outside of us, it is not about visiting a place of worship or repenting our sins…” yes, true religion is about reconnection within ourselves and within our body is the stillness and expansiveness of what can only be described as a deep feeling of love – so wherever we walk, we are within the house (body) of God… no designated building required.
Although the religion i grew up with was of the organised type of catholicism, deep down i still felt connected to the root sacredness aspects of religion at school via ceremonies, incense and rituals, lighting candles, its order and connection to God. Though oddly i never embraced or wanted to embrace this religion at school or into adulthood…or be associated with it/the church, the religion i referred to and knew was a label of ‘being catholic’. Today with the Way of The Livingness, it is a religion i feel entirely connected to and confirmed in, because that religion is me; the truth inside of me being confirmed by the way i live life in connection to everything around me including God or the divine. It’s a religion i feel joy for.
“How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” – super Nicole, when there is no admittance of these two facts you share, then there can be no acceptance. And if there is no acceptance there is only stagnation and it’s this that makes us want to escape – the stagnation, the no change or status quo. The more I learn to accept things, myself, choices, others choices, the more life has flow and freeness to it.
An inspirational sharing Nicole! Beautifully expressed “How can you truly escape your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place” It all comes back to responsibility and our own choices in everything we do!
How funny that we try and escape life, which is the very thing that we are made of!
I love what you say about true religion not just being about God but being about absolutely everything, I have come to understand this to be so too. It makes all of life and the connections we make throughout our lives very rich indeed.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” So beautifully simple and absolutely true – just imagine how amazing our world would be if we all connected to True Religion.
Often it is a sense of God or something more that drives people to seek out religion, to gain an understanding of our purpose here and to feel a connection to something greater than us. And yet what I have always felt to be true and confirmed by The Way of The Livingness, is that there is first and foremost a connection to ourselves that connects us to god, for religion is that personal reconnection, rather than a discovery or a finding.
Nicole, thank you, you capture great truths here and one jumps out loudly for me today; how can we escape our lives, true, and that the only way to accept them is to take responsibility for them – yes, there is no other way, we are the masters of our lives and how they are (our choices determine that).
I used to think exactly the same as you about religion. I didn’t like it, none of them felt true or truly loving, as it seemed to me they were used to look outside of ourselves instead of the truth, which lays innately within us. Many people used the word religion and God to start wars, cause separation and differences, make themselves feel more superior and gain control. And in many cases this still happens. I love what you share here about true religion; this feels far more in line with what I feel in my body ‘True Religion has no rules, there is no guide book, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters, there is always a bigger picture at play, a grander plan you could say, one that includes everyone and everything. Each one of us is affected and impacted by the choices we all make and the way that we choose to live. I have found that this way of life is not about self, but about everyone.’ Personally I still feel I haven’t fully reclaimed the word religion and what it means to me; only today someone asked me if I was religious when I wasn’t expecting it at all and I said no. I know there is a God, although in truth this word feels bastardised to me as well, that there is a bigger love beyond what we know or think of as God, that it’s a personal and equal connection from within, that there is a divine plan and a Hierarchy who are our brothers who have walked the same path and many lives before, and reincarnation. It is still work in progress and an unfoldment of what religion is for me. Thank you for sharing.
Making those heart felt choices that supports us to have a solid foundation of knowing who we truly are and how each of these loving, honouring and nurturing choices confirms the all mighty preciousness that we are. This awareness and deep respect for ourselves is worth celebrating and rejoicing.
The world is set up to have us be ‘mental’ about our life, thinking everything through, learning, rationalising, stimulating, but in truth these all separate us from the Love and Wisdom that is within all equally. Our reconnection to this source is our true religion, and our essence is our unique expression in our livingness, as God is all within the inner heart of us all.
It is great to call out what religion really is rather than the absolute bastardisation of the word that it is held to mean in today’s world. I have been feeling this a lot in the last few days about how it is just totally fine to be religious that I still hold such a big deal about it because I could not see how I would ever want to be religious when I looked at the world’s religions. To be free of this imposition is really something I am beginning to feel is possible.
How liberating it has been to find that God is everything and everyone, not the imposed beliefs and rules of the religious life I was brought up and educated by.
I also like how you have shared that “True Religion has no rules, there is no guide book, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters, there is always a bigger picture at play, a grander plan you could say, one that includes everyone and everything. Each one of us is affected and impacted by the choices we all make and the way that we choose to live. I have found that this way of life is not about self, but about everyone.”
Which shows the universality of true religion and our relationship with god and how it’s not about self gain, or bettering ourselves for comfort or control over others but developing a heavenly body through our deeper connection to our bodies through our own inner hearts which allows us to bloom or flower. To then live more like this the flower opens, in full bloom rather than wilted, parched struggling weeds constantly looking outside for distraction and recognition in our minds, held by false ideals and beliefs.
The images we have been sold of religion are so toxic and untrue that it is little wonder that most of us either fall for it at the expense of losing our true selves amongst a list of doctrines and scriptures that have been so distorted and manipulated and so full of ‘should’s’ and ‘shouldn’ts’ that they leave us lost for many lives, OR we live in complete reaction to it, dismissing it entirely or perhaps going off to seek some relief via the many trapping on offer through the spiritual new age.
Any scripture, teaching, meditation or philosophy that does not teach that we are love first before we are anything else and that true love is a quality of our Soul and not the lofty spirit that has taken us on a wild goose chase since time began, in search of anything and everything but the fire (love) that burns within, is a deliberate ploy to keep us under a darkened cloud of ‘mystery’, fear and total glamour, lest we poke our head out and see things as they truly are. Love is who we are – true religion is a celebration of this.
This is an excellent definition of religion – “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” It is as simple as that.
I grew up not trusting God, how could I?, each country had their own so which one could I trust or should I pick. This of course gave me many different pictures around religion and I didn’t like the word and I stayed clear of it. That has all changed in the last few years and on reading this paragraph “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” I realise and accept how religious I am. I have always been religious the only problem was that I had the definition of the word all wrong!.
I find it interesting that many people who don’t see themselves as religious or don’t think that there is a god, in times of crisis call on god for help or curse god for lack of assistance. To me, this is further evidence of the innate knowing that we have that there is more to life than what we can see and touch. God is real, it is just whether we choose to have a relationship with god or not.
Gorgeously delivered Nicole. True religion is about our relationship with the world; how we relate to each other and the greater Universe (God) in which we are held. It is about the rhythms we put in place that support us to live the great love we all in essence are and the awareness that these rhythms need to be in accordance to the greater cycles that govern us for true harmony to be felt and thus lived. We have all lived this way in the ancient past and as such true religion is a re-turn back to all that we already are, ready to be lived in full once more.
This is gold Nicole “What if there was another meaning for Religion? What if for all these thousands of years we had falsely believed that God was a being that lived outside of us, that he was the only being that could grant us salvation and give us retribution, and permission to enter the golden gates of Heaven; or the supposed alternative, going to the fiery depths below, and that this was not actually true? What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all? “
Nicole this is a great article, it explains so well what true religion is all about and our connection with god. It feels true and refreshing to hear and understand how by deepening our relationship with self, through making choices that hold and honour us through our bodies lead us to deepening our relationship with God and also everyone else equally. After all we are all particles or sons of God, and only choose to live disconnected through our ill choices and ideals and beliefs.
Nicole, I have just re-read your blog and I love how when we read something for a second time, there is something more we get out of it. This time around what stood out for me is how religion is really our relationship with ourselves, the deepest part of our selves. And that how we are with everyone and everything is also religion. It is not something that can be conveniently shelved for a while, rather it is something that is lived every moment bar none. Religion is a way of living. And the The Way of The Livingness is the religion that I have embraced.
Through the love of God we are able to re-connect to ourselves and ‘save’ ourselves from the prison we’ve created for ourselves. With the absolute Grace from God, we’re able to undo all the choices away from him and his innate Love for himself and for us. We’re to learn to surrender to the love that is all around us and carrying us, rather then fighting that what we in truth can’t fight. The re-ligion of our connection with our Soul and with God.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’ I love this as it reminds me how supportive it is to keep on building the rhythms and routines until they are part of a solid foundation that does not waver and how this then supports us not to wobble when life gets more intense.
“What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?” – what if this is true? It is a total game changer when you look around and see the utter attrocities going on in the world under the guise of religion. These actions by the minority have nothing to do with religion, they are actions by people living without a connection to themselves and living by made up or man made beliefs about religion.
‘True religion is about absolutely everything’, when we take this on board life changes as we start to look at all the little pockets of our lives equally, rather than focusing on one area and hoping the rest will take care of itself.
“The inner heart seeks nothing”. This brings me back to truth as my mind is constantly looking for ways to be liked or accepted. When I am in my heart, there is a freedom to be me in the world without trying.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” Once there is an understanding and a lived experience of our own re-connection to the fire within our body then it is a natural choice to appreciate the source of this is divine and comes from the heavens above. It isn’t something we can learn or create, mimic or reproduce it is something we re-connect with that we innately are and choose to lovingly accept. This is where we feel the presence of God because we are of the same spark.
Nicole I love your expression of what true religion is being about rhythms and routines that support us to live from love. This allows me to see another layer where I’ve been basing religion on living correctly and not from my connection with the love that I am that is my relationship with God.
True religion is a way of living and a way of being in relationship with ourselves and everyone else at the same time. Universal Medicine and The Way of The Livingness is bringing back the true meaning of religion here on earth so that we can walk together as brothers. True religion is bringing us back to ourselves and God at the same time.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” ThIs offers a simplicity that is simply beautiful.
A great blog Nicole. ” I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.” The word religion has been so bastardised that it is important to express the truth about true religion. Thankyou. The quality of our everyday choices….
If one can have ‘religion’ in their life and yet not deeply know the exquisiteness of a true relationship with God, then it is not religion at all.
Great blog Nicole and I am all for this, “I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.” I may have said it before but this line sums it up for me and this is my ongoing dedication in every moment.
The word God has always brought up feelings I did not understand. It was like I did not want to go there. I understand now that it was because if went there, I would have feel the devastation of giving up on God and myself. Deep down I knew there was a God, but did not want to admit it because then I would have to take responsibility for separating from him. Thank you Serge Benhayon for supporting me to see the real truth.
There are many ideas, beliefs, thoughts and conditions of what Love is, yet there is only one and the same truth that encompasses all, that reflects the Divinity of who we all are in essence, regardless our race, gender or culture, and that is the Love from with our inner–hearts. When we live from this place our every move, our every breath is then a truly religious one.
When we are guided by the Soulful quality that lies within us all, Love, we then have no need for beliefs or ideals to dictate how should be, who belongs and who doesn’t. For with the universality of Love as our guide we naturally and simply live in honor of all.
‘I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.’ Everything really means everything and this I feel is the missing element in other religions today. The Way of The Livingness presents a way of living that takes in regard the impact of every choice on ourselves and others… and for this we need to be responsible.
When we understand that True religion is not outside of us at all but is a simple connection away – we will come to know that True Religion is a forever relationship with God, our father.
The difference between conventional religion and True Religion is that True Religion says you cannot love another if you do not love yourself. Conventional religion on the other hand mostly tells you to hate yourself, feel guilty and ashamed but love everyone else. Certainly, does not make sense to me.
I can relate to always having a sense of God, but not really ever exploring this for myself, that is, until my life became so miserable I just knew there must be another way to live.
In the past I also use to be uncomfortable around the words god and religion, even though I knew without a doubt that I was part of something so much more, not separate from it. Words may be bastadised or misinterpreted and there may be a reaction to that, but that doesn’t change the truth of our divinity.
When we look at the religious beliefs that have been imposed upon us from a very early age, it is easy to see how imposing they are and how much they reflect a need to control the masses. If, instead, we were encouraged to feel each other and live in true love, true brotherhood and not fear, the world could be a very different place. The Way of The Livingness is one such religion.
It is the case that we create our own reality, so rather than moan, blame or ignore and let it continue, I’ve found I can choose, and sometimes it’s very difficult to stomach, but choose to take responsibility for what’s going on, understand my part in it, and bring change to how I am – not expect or wait for the change to come from the outside first.
Beautiful Nicole, religion for me must consider everyone, it can’t be about rules and it can’t take place in a set building. None of that makes sense to me of what god would ask of us. God to me is not vengeful or judging and he does not instil fear in people to get things done. God is everywhere and everything, living breathing all our experiences, and it is from this beautiful sense of god that i feel I want to live my life. Caring and compassionate but not driven by rules or doctrines.
I love what you have written here Nicole about religion. I could relate to you shouting out asking God if there is more to life than this. I never shouted this out, but there were periods throughout my life when everything felt mundane and pointless that I would say this to myself. I always knew there was a God but I wasn’t sure how I could connect to him. It was only when I came to Universal Medicine that I got to understand how much I was missing out on life by not including God in every part of my life. I am now a forever student in finding my way back to God, there is so much to feel and see and be aware of. I feel blessed that in this life I have reconnected back to God and the joy that this brings.
Hear! Hear! The path of return for me has been somewhat the same with not knowing where to turn and so I looked into the new age spiritual teaching, which also took me away from ‘true religion’. Over the last 12 years I have chosen The Way of The Livingness so I can include God in every part of my life but I can still get caught in some of the old ideals and beliefs about religion or spiritual teachings. I now ‘feel blessed’ to be re-connecting with God on my path of return to ‘true religion’, which is not about perfection but me returning and fully being reconnected to my ‘inner-heart’.
Taking responsibility for our lives is the game changer, and what I also discovered is that so many more choices become available, for example, my choice to begin to self-nurture and to listen to my body have significantly improved my health and life has become so much simpler.
True religion encompasses every aspect of life which is how it differs from the myriad of religions that have bastardised the word in so many ways including imposing rules on their ‘followers’ and giving a false sense of inclusivity by shutting others out.
Building love into my life so that the smallest things become part of my religion, part of my ritual that supports me to know God is the most important thing I can do. Each movement reflects all there is. There is no searching needed. It is within us all, and known when we bring ourselves back to love.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’ This is such a beautifully practical explanation of how it is possible for anyone to live true religion once they make the choice to connect to love.
Religion is a huge subject, and one that ignites a great deal of fear and animosity. It is great to feel the solidness in your writing of the truth that you know.
“I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.” To see, feel, know and realise True Religion is about all in life and not just God or churches, as I thought, is absolute gold. It brings an understanding that everything we do in life is important and not just to make it about God outside of ourselves but to make it about cherishing and nurturing the divinity that is inside us equally so.
Great blog Nicole, I don’t know which gem to comment on first, but this one stood out:
“In contrast to the mind, which constantly seeks acceptance and recognition from others, the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is.”
To live life from the inner heart is so simple, it stops all the anxiousness, the worries, the difficulties that the mind conjures up. It is a life truly worth pursuing as it brings us back to joy and love.
Such a great point you make Nicole… “How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” We cannot truly escape from our own lives, even suicide does not achieve this. All we can do is delay the inevitable taking of responsibility for the choices made to that point.
The word religion conjures up many negative emotions in some. I remember my mum saying never discuss politics or religion. I learnt from an early age that these topics, especially religion always ended up in very heated emotional arguments. I used to avoid religious people because I was always worried they were going to lecture me about God and try and convert me and invite me to their church. I can see that the meaning of the word religion has been changed and so makes many recoil, but I am now able to say that I am religious, because the true roots and meaning of the word have been explained to me. I don’t have to go to any church, as it is my way of living that is religious, from ironing my clothes, to walking in the park to being a professional at work and every little thing in between. For me it’s a beautiful way to live.
Thank you Nicole for a heart felt sharing. Once I came to know again the true meaning of the word religion, through listening to Universal Medicine Presentations, I have felt much more at ease using the word and applying to how I am living – knowing it is about the relationship and connection I have with myself from within and therefore naturally God.
Having attended a masters degree in the study of religions, I can firmly attest to the fact that religion can become an intellectual pursuit. There is however a unifying aspect to almost all religions on the planet, in that each religion seems to be aware of the fact that there is a source. The meaning and the name of this can be changed, bastardised, reinterpreted. But the main theme throughout humanity and our long history of religious pursuit, is the undeniable conviction to the fact that there is a source to life. Through The Way of The Livingness I have come to understand this source to be God Within Us All and that there is another energetic quality we can align our bodies to which is not God’s light, but another more harmful and separative energy that causes us to live in separation from that light and thus from each other. This energy is called prana, and it is not bad as such, and you are never bad for choosing it, it just simply should not be used for expression, and this is what we do, we choose to express separation instead of God’s love for each other which can manifest itself though intellectual religious practices that do not unify every single person on the planet but cause exclusive groups which can be studied and analysed such as at a masters degree.
Gorgeous Nicole, I love how you describe true religion – so simple and practical and not about giving our power away to a God who is outside of us, ‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’
Thank you Nicole, taking responsibility for our selves and what we chose to align to is definitely the missing ingredient in our current conundrums. Studying Universal Medicine has brought it home to me that we can be very religious about a huge range of things we would not consider Holy in any way, such as smoking pot, drinking beer, watching T.V, a thousand and one different hobbies, fundamentalism, fanaticism and so on, all things that take us away from a life we can ‘t bear living and as you say Nicole, a life we cannot run away from try as we might. It all points to the fact that the drive to be religious is innately within us all and our quality of life arises from what we choose to align to. Choosing to align to our inner wisdom, our innate love, our fragility and power can and does completely transform the way we live and the qualities of our lives, so much so that all thoughts of escape transmute into total and complete embrace of what life and people offer us. Today being religious is for me a natural part of my day, as it is yours, building and living simple loving rituals that support and respect my body, honour my relationships and continue to deepen my inner connection, self awareness, expression and commitment to living a life of Love in Harmony with the whole of humanity. After all is this not what true religion is all about?
The accepted forms of religion require one to believe in something external and to ‘give oneself over’ to it. With True Religion, as you clearly express Nicole, one does not ‘give oneself over’ to anyone or anything but instead surrender completely to oneself and thereby a true, personal connection with God.
This brief description blows away everything misconstrued about what living a religious life is about – “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love.” When presented like this, who would not want to bring more love into their daily life? Could it really be this simple?
Nicole I am certainly with you here, my disdain for the religious institutions was quite black or white, yet behind this veil was the knowing that there is something greater out there than human existence. There is more. This knowing was never confirmed until I came to the presentations of Universal Medicine where for the first time I came to reconnect to the fact that religion is a personal connection with myself and God. Nothing external but as you share internal.
Beautiful Nicole – such super important point, I am forever learning to accept the things I don’t like to see about myself, my experience is that I can not fully accept all the amazing things about myself until I equally accept all the other bits.
My religion is my personal relationship with God, the universal order and from there with everyone and everything in life – simple. That brings forth a certain way of living expressing the qualities and characteristics that come from such relationship. And like every true relationship it is a constant development, interaction that requires learning, adjustment, deepening, expansion; there is a science to it and a philosophical understanding of life from the big picture down to the detail – this religion is The Way of The Livingness, living in and through me.
Ah, the key to the age-old problem of where is God? We have believed and followed others and accepted these dogmas as truth. As you have found Nicole and many others, that God has always resided in all of us, all of the time. It has always just been a choice away to re-connect to the true religion within us all.
There were points in my life when I called out in desperation and asked the question ‘ God, Is this all there is to life?’ especially when I could not find answers anywhere to explain the emptiness I felt inside. I was raised in a religious household, God was a figure head way off in the distance. I participated in rituals, worship and teachings, but never fully connected with it. Not trusting this version of religion, I questioned, challenged and ultimately rejected its hypocrisy and sheer ugliness and replaced it with a futile search for ‘spirituality’. Years in the wilderness prepared me well to finally come home and embrace true religion as presented by Universal Medicine and Ageless Wisdom teachings. God lives within me and it is for me to connect to my inner divinity and bring this quality to life.
Thank you Nicole for bringing to our attention the responsibility we all have to choose the quality of life we live, and the quality of life we share with the world. It is through our relationship with our Soul, with God and all that we interact with that offers us the opportunity to claim a deeply religious life, which is simply a celebration of the equal, eternal and universal Love we all are in essence.
True religion is a way of living that celebrates, honors and is led by the connection to all that we already are within. We are all born Divine and true religion is simply the activity that follows from living in connection to our Soul, our Divinity within, and all that this encompasses.
When I was young I had a natural sense and experience of God and Christ, which had come from a feeling, from a warmth within me. However this sense did not match up to or was supported by the teachings presented at school where we learnt what was expected of us to be recognised as good Christians. This all came from a belief and rules outside of ourselves, from a belief that we were incomplete, born sinners, and that the things we did would hopefully add up to enough ‘goodness’ or ‘good deeds’ so that when we died we would then be with God. Over the years I observed, witnessed and learnt of the wickedness that came as a result from the division from each other, from the various religious denominations that excluded those who would not abide by their rules. And so I had given up on religion as none that existed today reflected the oneness, the all-encompassing eternal Love for all that I had sensed God is, and my relationship with God and my Soul had become a fleeting thought, an unattainable idea, until I came across Universal Medicine and The Way of The Livingness.
True Religion reconnects us to the truth of true love that is in the inner-heart of each and every one of us.
“How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?”
I am learning about this everyday and it is such a support to finally take care and responsibility for the areas I was ignoring for a long time.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love…’ And here we have religion in one of its simplest senses: that of living in a certain way religiously, every day and with dedication – and that way of living is about making loving choices in every moment.
The issue many have with religion might have to do with the fact that what we are taught to be religion is not religion.
The issue many have with God might have to do with the fact that what we are taught to be God is not God.
I love what you bring Nicole, with by looking after our bodies with the utter most care we will allow our bodies to then be the marker for what comes next. I never learned this when I was young, not at home, not at school, but now we are blessed with Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine who bring this teaching in everything they present, and in that we gain back the responsibility for living our lives for evolution and in that we have to be prepared in any moment for what is next.
Religion is about our relationship with God and equally so with everyone else – thanks Nicole for this beautiful reminder that we are all family and we are all here to learn to live with so more love for ourselves and each other.
I found the congregations that called themselves religious truly scary; in my eyes they were either gone with the fairies or downright scary and domineering with their martyrs, tales of hell and damnation. God was surely nowhere in sight.
Religion to me conjured up control, rules, instilling fear, a God outside of ourselves unattainable unless you obeyed the rules of the church; and that we are born a sinner therefore we must repent by living in suffering.
What a breath of fresh air when true religion was explained to me from Serge Benhayon as being a relationship with God and with everyone and everything.
Nicole your interpretation of what true religion is feels true and very loving.:”True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.”
To know what we have been seeking all our lives has always been here right within us has changed my perspective on life. I totally agree with your sentiment on the institutionalized religions, but I have a feeling that those who choose to adhere to them are also after the very same thing that a true religion has always represented – a reunification with God.
Awesome blog Nicole, I can totally relate to everything you’ve shared. I used to feel exactly the same way about religion and it wasn’t until I was introduced to The Way of The Livingness that I started to understand what religion truly means. What I was reacting to was the false version of it prior to this and now that I have found the true meaning and have started to live it. I am blown away by The Way of The Livingness teachings, I am learning about life, about love and about truth, and our return to God.
A great blog describing True Religion Nicole!… “…True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are…” Having routines and a rhythm that supports our day, there then becomes an incremental movement or development of re-turning back to a simplicity of living in connection with ourselves and love.
It is worth having this conversation – as so many belong to religions that perhaps as a child they questioned the seeming illogicalities, incongruities, or things that simply didn’t make sense, but as they grew older resigned themselves that this was the best attempt at truth they would settle for, for the sake of fitting in, belonging, not rocking any boats, not upsetting family etc, – but what if there is a truth to religion, and that together we can learn and grow to understand the one truth that lives within – for all equally.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” I never really associated myself as a religious person, far from it. But ever since I found Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon I have re-established a commitment to how I live, walk, eat, sleep and express. These details of my day are my religious rhythms and one that supports me throughout my days to be me, and that is bringing the light of God from within me out. Very cool.
I took the path of blaming situations and life for a long time until I realised that all that had happened was a result of my choices and I was responsible for all of them and my future. Thank GOD I became aware of that, and thank GOD I got over my reactions and walls that I had built around the word God and religion.
Institutionalised religion that I’ve experienced seemed to teach that God is out there, separate and mysterious. However I feel this is deeply disempowering and contra to what my experiences have been. My connection to God is always there inside me and I am also held in the energy of God, which is always all around me and everyone and everything.
“What if we all have the ability to feel an inner glory, a fire that burns deep within, an inner-heart that waits for us to re-unite with it once more?” – yes, finally, a religion that makes sense. A religion that is with everyone equally, no one is excluded, God is with us all, always, the choice is ours, to simply connect to our inner-heart and feel the love and divinity that we all already are.
How you have described Religion to be Nicole just feels to be such a natural way that you wouldn’t associate any of the bloodshed, punishments, man-made temples and concepts such as “hell” etc. with, which is what religion currently in the world also endorses. And if the word religion means communion with God, the definitions of religion currently do not reflect that. As all religions do impart a part but not whole truth—such as mass murdering people under the name of religion is not truth is it? So the question is, what is the true meaning of Religion, have we been sold a version of it that is not the whole truth? And if what is not of true truth, and we can all feel truth, are we reacting towards something that our bodies cannot lie to us about? And instead of reacting, which does no good to anyone, it simply feels much more natural to just live what we know true Religion to be, in fact, it is so natural that when we unlearn what we have taken on as truth, but it is not, there is Religion, it is just us living a natural rhythm with our Soul.
Living a truly religious way, where everyone and everything is equally important, there is true purpose in life.
Thank you Nicole, beautifully expressed. Growing up, I found religion to be so heavy and dull, based on a sense of duty, obligation and rituals that were done more out of tradition than with any great sense of meaning that I could connect to. Since then I’ve come to understand that true religion is about rebuilding and reconnecting to that sense of divinity and grandness -the universe – that’s all around and within us.
Religion that is practiced in the world today does indeed promote the energy of irresponsibility, anything that we want fixed we ask God and we pray. As God is the highest one, we can keep ourselves small and helpless, we have given our power away from the very beginning. Equality is not a possibility ever when we separate ourselves with what we call an almighty power. This is all self-created though, as God never compares with us, and the truth is if we know we come from God, how can we be separate from that whom we have come from really?
‘How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?’ Great question. It’s not until we’re fully prepared to take responsibility to see and feel every single one of our choices and accept them and where we have ended up as a result, and in that, accept ourselves, that things truly begin to change.
I really meant it when used to say that I would love to have a holiday away from myself – because I just didn’t want to face the fact I’d been the one responsible for all my choices that were playing out as consequences. I wanted a break and to return to my creations after recharging my batteries. Choices have a habit of boomeranging right back, again and again, until we finally make ones that will truly support us.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are’ – there is so much in the simplicity of this statement, something that is available to everyone and is held back only through the choices we make. The acceptance that God is within and claiming the truth of this exposes the degree to which we do not hold ourselves in this magnificence. In this moment anyone of us can choose to change this for ourselves and bring a reflection of this truth for others.
True religion is in our everyday lives, it is in how we move. It is the choice we make to see divinity, choosing to see the love that we are innately from. Our connection with God.
All that you describe here Nicole is true religion as I know it to be also, in my whole body, with the love and support of Serge Benhayon and his inspiration to live in true religion for all humanity to know.
‘True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.’ Beautifully said. And what I love the most about this quote is how empowering it is. No handing over our power to something supposedly greater than us that will offer salvation, but about how we are with ourselves, true responsibility.
I couldn’t help but smile as it just sounds like it was only when you got so frustrated that you realised that God had been in the room looking and listening all the time. The great observer He is always there if we but care to look.
This is great. Explaining that true religion is everything is exactly how we need to start talking. After so many years of being anti-religion, I’m beginning to appreciate that the reason I’ve been so reactive to the word/practices I’m familiar with is because I’ve been sold a lie. None of what I’ve been taught has been of any true purpose, and never been about how life can be truly lived. God has always been an outside figure to me, and I still struggle with disconnecting the visual from the word. But as you’ve described here Nicole, it makes perfect sense.
The Way of The Livingness for me is sharing what it means to have true religion in our lives. God is not above us but within us and the teachings of this religion make simple sense to my body and when it makes sense to the body then it makes sense to other bodies, thus there can be no argument of what is true and what is not; we can choose to ignore the facts but that doesn’t change them.
Nicole, this is one of the best descriptions I have read about religion and living True Religion. God is within us and is there equally for us all. It is the equal for all that I love. There is too much self in this world and whilst we must deeply love and care for ourselves, we must always consider the all.
I recall the pure joy of looking up at a starry night and feeling deeply held, the sense that there is an order and science behind everything around me and being fascinated with exploring it, the delight in seeing a smile and a twinkle in other people’s eyes and my heart jumping as if to hug them. Little did I know that I was being deeply religious. I recall a little bit later learning about a book of rules, most of which doesn’t make sense to me, and a vengeful character that would for eternity burn me in hell if I disobeyed and would grant favours if I went along with the rules, although the thought of it made my heart sink. Little did I know that this man-made interpretation has nothing to do with true religion. I am so grateful to have come across Universal Medicine. It is pure joy to come full circle to my appreciation of the universe, nature, people, my body, as well as starting to live in a way that makes sense, and opening up to feel the natural flow of God through me once again.
I too used to react to the doctrines of religions feeling that the message of Jesus and others had been misinterpreted. When I connected to what I felt they offered humanity it was a very different feeling to what I got during mass. I am now reconnecting more to my own religion- my relationship to God, to myself and to all others and it is through this that I am starting to learn more about my own divineness- which we all equally hold.
True re-ligion for me is to (slowly) re-connect to both myself – through my body, to other people and to life, including God. An important part of the process for me is the fact that everything is energy. I am energy, my body’s energy, other people are energy and life is energy, including God. So, I am to feel everything. And to be able to feel around me, I am to feel myself first. The acceptance of the religion with myself and the importance of this connection is a gigantic step for me, that is freeing me from feeling overwhelmed by life.
There are so many pictures that we have of what religion is and what God is. Growing up in a religion I had certain beliefs that I had well and truly subscribed to. Since coming to The Way of The Livingness, I have worked on peeling back these images of what I ‘thought’ was religion and have come to feel for myself the truth of religion, which starts with my relationship with myself. The more I come to know myself, the more I come to know God, as he and I are not separate.
Choosing a living way that holds everything in equalness is living with True Religion. Allowing the space for this to unfold within my heart is the source. Choosing an understanding and loving appreciation that it is the integrity and intention for this to graciously be shared with humanity.
I knew as I grew up that there was more to religion that what we commonly saw or knew it to be. I released at one point that this was a great hurt and I see how much the way we think religion is has hurt many people and that hurt is keeping us stuck. Failing to ask the deeper questions, knowing that there is much more to God and Religion that we live and know it to be. It wasn’t until Serge Benhayon presented that religion is about returning, re bonding and relationships that I began to understand what religion is really about and it just makes sense and I deeply appreciate this understanding.
Growing up I too had strange ideas about God. They varied from an old man with a white beard sitting on a cloud, to someone who did not exist. Also to me the word religion was very tied up with evil, hypocrisy, and torture. Since being blessed to have met Serge Benhayon and reconnecting to myself, to God, and to True Religion, my life has totally transformed. As you say True Religion is found within the inner heart of every human being, it is absolutely not out there, or in a building, or on a cloud. God is pure love and does not judge at all. Almost everything in this world has been bastardised and presented as the opposite to how it truly is to keep us disconnected from our true selves. Once we are in connection to our true selves we are immensely powerful and cannot be controlled – gives a clue as to all the reinterpretations.
One more thing Nicole, what is funny is you say, “One day after hitting absolute rock bottom, I shouted from my veranda, “God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?” When I also hit rock bottom where did I go first? Even though at the time I said there was no such thing, I questioned God. I guess growing up in a Catholic family had turned me off God because I couldn’t make sense of what they were saying about him. I would question it but the answer would leave more questions. Serge Benhayon nailed these answers within the first few presentations I saw, answers no one anywhere else had even come close to giving me. What is more significant was that I didn’t ask Serge a question directly and he was not only talking to me at the time, how is this possible? The religious way is called The Way Of The Livingness.
Thank you for sharing this Nicole. True religion to me is about a relationship with god and something that is with us everywhere and in everything that we do, not just in a church on a Sunday morning. My understanding of god is not some external being or force that I give my power away to and seek favour from, but rather an all encompassing presence that is greater than any individual and which I am free to have a relationship with or not.
Hello Nicole, this is just perfect – “I have come to understand that True Religion is not something or someone that lives outside of us, it is not about visiting a place of worship or repenting our sins. True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” If you wanted a lesson for life, or a guide book on what to do next, this would be it for me, thank you.
For me as a child I would often speak to God – I felt his presence everywhere and within me – he was not some strange and removed almighty power, he was a beholding love that lived within me, and since coming the The Way of The Livingness I have found that there is a way to live this quality from the inside out.
“How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place? Therein lies the crux of the matter, and something that is not always easy to face. The bitter pill as they say is responsibility, but well worth taking. I have found it to be ‘good medicine’, as once taken life naturally changes once we know there is no going back. Gorgeous writing Nicole.
The thing that stands out strongly about True Religion is that there are no rules. That’s right! Absolutely not a single one. The only defining factor is the fact of a way of living that is all about love and fully committing to being that love in every way, without perfection but equally with a delicate art of equal dedication.
Thank you, Nicole. I love how you claimed your feelings and chose to bring your truth back again – and not liaise on others ideals, beliefs and bastardized truths. Good to hear that you are claiming living religious right back, and not afraid to confront the lies of the hidden ”good” (evil), and show the real way.. Thank you for that.
If we were all to embrace what religion truly is the world would be a totally different place. Living with true love, care and respect for ourselves and for our choices and in the way we move there is no way possible that we could harm another. True religion is about living with rhythm and harmony in our day, including how we interact with others.
As ever Nicole you bring a great conversation to the table. “How can you truly escape from your own life? How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?” We can’t. This can be overwhelming if you subscribe to the judgment model of religion, but if you subscribe to love and that religion is your relationship with love, that in fact God is love, then it is one small step to value responsibility.
I have done my fair share of calling out to God in times of despair, and often wondered why he didn’t reply and why nothing changed, that my problems weren’t magically fixed. I realise now that I was stuck in the belief that God was out there somewhere, but not until recently did I consider the possibility that he was not out there, as portrayed by all the religions, but that he was actually with me all the time; he had never left me, I had simply left him.
Same here Ingrid, most of us do leave him, but God awaits patiently with loving warm arms for each of his children to return. We are all equal in that choice.
Nicole how you have described true religion is resounding so fully in my body that I know that this is what religion is and was only ever meant to be. Thank you.
I’ve reacted to the word Religion too, from having associated it with practices that are done in the name of religion but that felt destructive and not true to me… But understanding the original root meaning of the word religion via Universal Medicine, has enabled me to open up to using it again in the sense that I know it to be! http://www.unimedliving.com/unimedpedia/word-index/unimedpedia-religion.html
Nicole, thank you for sharing what true religion is and providing the opportunity for people to have an understanding of religion that is a direct relationship with the universe and divinity. This is miles from what I grew up thinking religion was based on what I saw in the world. Universal Medicine connected me to what I felt and from there allowed me to appreciate and accept true religion.
‘What if religion was not outside of us but instead lived within us all?’ It is our connection with God and to connect to God is having a relationship with our bodies, to build, build and build the love that we are by The Way of The Livingness.
Profound Annelies; ‘ connection with God is having a relationship with our bodies’. And so listening to our bodies and what our bodies communicate, is in fact listening to God when of course we live in such a way that honors and appreciates the heavenly vehicle we have been given to walk each step back to the love we all come from.
I love the possibility that there are words that we have take as gospel and tried to live by, yet have totally mis-represented the it true meaning. Religion is definitely one such word.
That very personal choice to go to the inner heart, this relationship with ourselves, in fact connects us to a grander plan, one that includes everyone and everything. What a beautiful movement, that going deeper ignites an expansion to all we are connected to.
We ignore the one relationship that will inevitably bring us closer to God and that is the relationship with ourselves. When we keep God out there and think our problems are from out there, or that they will be sorted by fixing up what out there looks like, we will forever be chasing our tails. Connecting to me in those moments when I choose to stop, when I choose to stay very present with the movement I make, I connect to something within that I know is God. Always there, just waiting for me to connect to.
I ran as far away from religion as I could when I became an adult. I never liked churches and felt there was a lot of hypocrisy, where going to church meant you were better than non church goers, yet the behaviour of some so called religious people was far from loving. I became and atheist because I felt there could not be a god if all this horrible stuff was going on in our world. Why didn’t God stop it? At the same time I was ignoring my responsibility, not only as a member of the human race, but also to myself. Was I showing myself any love in the way I treated myself?
Since becoming a student of The Way of the Livingness, I have come to know of the true meaning of religion. I have discovered that religion is not something that we seek outside of ourselves but a deeply personal relationship that I have with myself, with God (who dwells inside of me), and with everyone else. It has been a huge thing to re imprint what religion means to me and to rediscover the joy of religion in its true form.
“In contrast to the mind, which constantly seeks acceptance and recognition from others, the inner heart seeks nothing – it simply is. It knows it already has, and is, all that it needs – there is nothing else, only an allowing for one to be love, and to live in and from this place.” Exquisite words of wisdom.
When we bastardise religion and poo-poo it as something we don’t want anything to do with, we are effectively poo-pooing ourselves. The distortion of religion is a reflection of the distortion of the human being through its own choice.
Religion is so so precious when it is true. It is the purest of ceremonies, the rituals that bring divinity into human life and remind us constantly that we are of something so much grander than we might otherwise erroneously believe.
Nicole, what an A W E S O M E blog to read. It is so refreshing to feel, absolutely, the true meaning behind the word religion that can be felt as lived experience in every word you write here. Yes – I am celebrating right along with you – the homecoming and return to the inner heart and bringing this reflection and expression to the world.
Growing up I always viewed God as something outside of me – the old man in heaven that I was to look up to for guidance. There was a sense of perfection known as God unattainable for me and most of humanity. It didn’t make sense. Now I see religion is about the everyday choices that reconnect me to my inner knowing of God, it is a living experience that is ever unfolding, without rules and beliefs or buildings.
Religion is relationship; it is love and responsibility in relationship. Your comment – ‘True Religion has no rules, there is no guide book, no dictates to follow, everyone and everything matters, there is always a bigger picture at play, a grander plan you could say, one that includes everyone and everything’ – expresses the essence of what religion is and the livingness in our life. Many of us have met that moment in time where we are so angry and frustrated with our lives that a crossroads shows itself. Thank you Nicole for the honesty in your expression and the confirmation that we all matter and it is up to us the form what this will take.
Religion has been manipulated and turned into something that is essentially a weapon. I have felt myself physically tense up at the mention of it. In my family for many generations it has caused division. I had to question as another generation unfolded with potential conflict – what was it that caused the division? A holding onto of beliefs, ideals, and pictures of how families should be? What I have now learnt that when one is in true religion with oneself the only way forward is love, and this religion is available equally for all.
‘I found that true religion was not just about God, it was about absolutely everything, and it was everything that needed to be encompassed when it came to the choices that I made in my daily life.’ – when we truly accept that we are a part of everything and that everything matters, our choices will honour this fact, and we in turn, will feel the divinity of being a part of everything flow through our bodies.
The teachings of the Catholic Church are deeply ingrained, thanks to centuries of indoctrination. When we learn that we were all created equal by the one God and that we are all an expression of that same God, it takes some mental leaps to change our deeply held beliefs, especially the ones that say we are not good enough, not worthy – words that are still in force in the Catholic Mass today. It has been a crime against humanity of the biggest order, to invent such a religion based on a bastardised version of true words given by a true World Teacher, and to manipulate the teachings into an enforced dogma that suppresses children and adults alike. Criminal, wicked and evil.
True religion is found when we walk with God.
The notion of hitting ‘rock bottom’ and the feelings of anger and despair that this brings. If we turn off from what is going on and what we are feeling, what we accept can be less divine and less divine until such time we reach breaking point.
Beautifully and delicately shared Nicole,
It is true to say that true religion is not that which we look for outside of ourselves but find within the knowing that we live inside a body of God and our movements can both celebrate and reflect this in all that we do in our everyday life.
In our darkest moments how many of us call out to God, how many pray ‘just in case’? Isn’t it interesting that when pressed we often look to help from somewhere else? This goes against the Godless way we seem to live, with compartmentalisation, labels, categories, sections, segments and sectors. No wonder – for if God is actually everything what label will work? Thank you Nicole, for showing it’s possible to return to a unified, way of life on earth,
Thank you for sharing Nicole. I completely agree with you about Religion. So much of what we call ‘religion’ is far from it, it has been changed and used to essentially control life, people and give us excuses. And as you said: ‘How can you change your life if you do not take responsibility for the choices you made in the first place?’ It all comes back to us and our choices.
“I have come to understand that True Religion is not something or someone that lives outside of us, it is not about visiting a place of worship or repenting our sins. True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” It wan’t until I also came to understand the meaning of True Religion that I was able to embrace it in a way that I had not been able to previously. The idea of having to worship something or someone outside of me has always felt alien, and being ‘made’ to go to church and school assembly was never something that felt good. Knwoing now that I am living my religion by simply connecting to the love and wisdom that is innately inside me, as it is in everyone else, has been revelatory and evolutionary on so many levels.
Indeed – Religion is often dressed other than it’s origins and True meaning. As a child the anomaly with how people lived their lives Monday until Sunday when they adorned their Sunday best clothes, manners and began their Sunday religious ritual was not lost upon me. I wondered how anybody could believe that God could punish, forgive or make our wrongdoings vanish until the next week when we turned up for the service again or why we would live with ceremony only at certain times and could be horrible to each other in-between…for these among many other beliefs commonly adopted in our communities were at great odds with the relationship I personally had with God and the knowing in my own heart. Whilst I respected people’s freedom to believe as they chose, religious beliefs among many other entrenched society values prompted great inner inquiry, a lot of unwanted questions to adults at the time and a lifetime of reflection. It was not until I was introduced to The Way of The Livingness that I have experienced a true Religion on this Earth that honours all that my heart speaks and my deepest knowing of God, divinity and True Connection.
Small changes often lead to bigger changes, and with regards to caring for ourselves, the knock on effects of the little choices is always bigger than they first appear. To find a true religion is something worth celebrating, and perhaps more will become reignited in their interest in religion when it is presented again as something that does not have rules but is first and foremost about our relationship with ourselves and from that we go out into the world to share.
I was brought up in the catholic religion, it never felt true to me and I stopped attending services when I was old enough to rebel against my parent’s beliefs. I was so scarred by the scare tactics of the church that I steered away from any sort of religion for years even though I knew innately there was a God. I could not find any congregation that resonated with how I felt, until I came across Universal Medicine, and like you Nicole, here I found true religion and re-connected to the God within.
“God there has to be more, surely this can’t be it?” I can relate to these words having said something similar after feeling totally desperate about life and renouncing all the different religions, spiritual modalities, yoga, mediations I had been involved in for the last ten years – it was at that point that I felt clearer and knew that something was on it’s way and that I just had to wait and it would present itself, and it did two years later. It came via Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine who presented The Way of The Livingness.
Julie, I did the same, though I did not use the word ‘God’.
Thank you, Nicole. It is beautiful to feel the joy you have in sharing your experience of true religion in daily life. Now everything has meaning and purpose, rather than the emptiness that you describe at the start and questioning of – is this all there is? I love how everything is equally important and we can be religious doing the simplest tasks. God is everywhere when we are feeling life from our bodies rather than our minds.
“True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” This sentence blows me away. A stunning description that describes religion in a way hadn’t considered before.
Absolutely Leonne! “True Religion is about building routines, rhythms and rituals that support us to live in a way that is based on love so that we can reignite the fire within our body and reconnect to the love that we are.” These to me are the roots of all religion and I feel one day all religions will return to these foundations because a power-full foundation is being set that will not give sway to external influences as has happened to all other religious ideologies!
Beautiful Nicole and so true, true religion is our relationship, not just with God but with everyone and everything; and most importantly with our self as it is through listening to, loving and nurturing the body that we build a relationship with our self that connects us with and to God.