Many of us torture ourselves with ‘if onlys’ when the world comes crashing down around us. When we begin to accept that what’s done is done, we may turn to religion for solace or rage at God for ‘allowing’ the unthinkable to happen. Either way, for many of us God is the one we call on in our darkest hours and religion is a word that seems to accompany him.
When the proverbial excrement hits the fan, we are given a moment to stop and consider what it is that we truly believe – what rings true for us and what we subscribe to in the way of religion.
It is flat out nightmarish to be stuck in a loop replaying the lead-up to disaster over and over again in your mind. Many torture themselves in this way until they believe that the accident, break up, fire, loss or death may not have occurred if only they had woken up 5 minutes later, caught another bus, said different words, stopped to smell a rose or stayed an hour later.
When life brings us to our knees, we are offered a choice: jump down the spiralling rabbit hole of ‘if onlys’ or connect to who we truly are and what we know is a Truth about a situation or feeling, without any doubt.
For what if true religion is actually the lived understanding of your own divine essence? What if every breath you take has the ability to remind you who you truly are? What if each and every moment of your life is divinely constellated to remind you who you truly are?
“If you understand what religion truly is, then everything is religion.”
Serge Benhayon, Esoteric Teachings & Revelations, p 46
True religion is living the truth that you know with every last cell of your being. It is knowing that each and every moment you experience is a gift, no matter how horrifying or unfair it may seem at first glance. When you know true religion, there are no more ‘if onlys’.
Leonne Sharkey
Related Reading:
From Religious Confusion to Religious Truth
What is true religion?
My Relationship with Religion
The Truth about Universal Medicine 
These ‘if onlys’ are very destructive and so often play out in my life. The regurgitation of this acid plays havoc on not only one’s body but mind too.
I am bringing more understanding nowadays, it is what it is and it is what it’s meant to be and as stated by Serge Benhayon, ‘everything is religion’. To me it means that everything, whether we perceive as ’good’ or whether as ‘bad’ is actually just ‘right’.
Living true religion brings purpose, direction and joy to life.
“What if each and every moment of your life is divinely constellated to remind you who you truly are?” And what if every person on the planet lived who they are then there would be no more ‘if onlys’.
And how we breathe can support us to return to who we are in essence, ‘What if every breath you take has the ability to remind you who you truly are?’
‘For what if true religion is actually the lived understanding of your own divine essence?’ Great call Leonne, and it is something we can only discover the truth and beauty of if we live our divine essence more and more.
What you have shared so succinctly Leone is that there is power in simplicity. And in the simplicity of this blog is a powerful message for us all. “If only” keep us firmly entrenched in the past but choosing to be in the present we offer ourselves the space to feel the truth of religion, that we are, and have, everything we need in that moment to step confidently forward into the next moment, and so on.
True religion is to know your reconnection to yourself, God and the Universe – no ‘ifs’ or ‘buts’.
True religion asks you to surrender.
“What if every breath you take has the ability to remind you who you truly are? What if each and every moment of your life is divinely constellated to remind you who you truly are?”
I think I may have wasted a few of these :- But the beauty of them is that they never stop coming, so I have a another choice in every breath and in every moment.
Powerful. A message for us all that we have made excuses that do not let us feel the truth of what initially is there. An understanding we can get from the above shared.
If you understand what religion truly is, then everything is religion.” Our inner heart knows exactly what religion is.
The biggest ‘if only’ is ‘if only I hadn’t chosen to separate from the Divine and had held to true purpose to live in Co-creation with God. Then all the other ‘if onlys’ would never have arisen.
So true Mary – talk about regrets! Why torment ourselves with regrets when every single moment is another opportunity to choose all that we are. Sure we could have done it sooner and should have never lessened it in the first place, but that’s the beautiful thing about life – there are a lot more moments.
Absolutely Mary, ‘if only I hadn’t chosen to separate from the Divine and had held to true purpose to live in Co-creation with God.’
We are living with the consequences of separating from the Divine, ‘Then all the other ‘if onlys’ would never have arisen.’
Thank you for including this very pertinent quote from Serge Benhayon in your inspiring blog Leonne. To live from the quality of the re-connection to our Divine Essence, innate stillness, harmony and joy to express truth in our every movement is living true religion.
“If you understand what religion truly is, then everything is religion.”
Serge Benhayon, Esoteric Teachings & Revelations, p 46
Understanding religion is actually quite simple, it is not meant to be complicated and it is something we all know how to live. Through our connection to our essence, our relationship with our Soul is one and the same as our relationship with God, through which we are guided to move with the love we are, as such our every move from this point is a religious one. And so, it is possible to live religiously in all that we do, not needing to find or seek connecting to God in a church as the true house of God is our bodies, with us 24/7.
If we take the lesson offered when disaster strikes, it serves its purpose. Saying ‘if only’ and wallowing in wishing something didn’t happen means you miss out on the healing and learning. I am sure that nothing is random and nothing happens because God is a vengeful being. There is an order to the universe and corrections are a way of bringing us wayward humans back into order, back to the Godliness we are.
When we go into the if onlys, there is always an issue with not being able to accept life as it is and the consequences of not living the truth of who we truly are.
When we think about the ‘if Only’s’ we are forgetting that for every choice there is a consequence and that we are responsible for our own choices.
Yes agree Sally. It does feel like the ‘if only’ approach is an avoidance of the responsibility we hold as to what we are aligning to, and instead wishing that things could be different. Completely disempowering via the avoidance of the truth of offer being reflected in every situation we are in.
We are responsible for our choices, and that starts with how we move, and so what source of energy we align with.
The ‘if only’ trap stops us from looking at the truth of a situation, it stops our ability to read what is truly at play and see the bigger picture.
I have come to the understanding that how we live matters to the smallest detail. If for example I am feeling frustrated with work and send out emails written in that frustration, then everyone gets affected, not just the people receiving the emails, everyone else in the world too.
When we don’t go into the ‘if only’, we can become aware that we are offered a space to learn and grow from our mistakes. Whatever is happening in our lives, evolution is always being offered for us to be more of who we truly are.
‘What if each and every moment of your life is divinely constellated to remind you of who you truly are?’ This is a great reminder of what is on offer from the hierarchy if we surrender to the support that is consistently there for us
We can’t change what we did or didn’t do in the past but what we can take charge of is our choices in the present and the quality that we make them from. It’s great to reflect on past choices to simply learn and appreciate the consequences of our actions but to get lost in regret just keeps us stuck.
It is definitely time for us to understand what True Religion really is.
This blog has supported me to look at all the subtle ‘if onlys’ I allow in my life. While it can be helpful to look at what went awry in the past, regret is never healing or supportive. As soon as I examine my life from a starting point of responsibility I can let go of regret and rejoice in seeing exactly what it is I need to change.
“For what if true religion is actually the lived understanding of your own divine essence?” Could it really be that simple? Yes is the answer. http://www.unimedliving.com/the-way-of-the-livingness/what-is-religion/what-is-true-religion.html
Humanity has been so conditioned not to believe in God, I feel we have been hoodwinked by so many Religions which one truly represents God? I am coming back to my understanding and belief that God is everywhere in the smallest of details to the magnificence we see all around us. Somehow in this constant drive to succeed at any cost to ourselves we do not stop to smell the roses so to say and deeply appreciate what we have been given. As one of those people that was blindly driven constantly chasing the carrot on a stick that was dangling just out of reach. I have decided I don’t like carrots anyway instead I have stopped to smell the roses and in that stop moment reconnected back to the simplicity that is God all around me. This is true religion a coming back to God and a reunion with me.
I feel we take breathing for granted it’s just something that we do, like eating without ever considering what we are putting into our bodies, I know from my own experience that this is considered ‘normal’. However things have changed, I now have an understanding that every in breath and out breath I am breathing God, as God is the space in between everything, as we are breathing space and the space is God. So all these years of feeling that somehow I had lost my connection to God is an illusion, a lie, because God is everywhere he is the space and the universe, so I can never not be in connection to God. Just writing these words it feels as though a veil has been lifted from my eyes.
When we understand who we are when connected to our inner-most our honesty starts the ball rolling towards the point of absolute honesty before we can move onto Truth!
‘It is knowing that each and every moment you experience is a gift, no matter how horrifying or unfair it may seem at first glance.’ When we really get this we can look to the bigger picture and understand that everything has it’s place. We are in Earth School and this is yet another lesson to heed and learn from.
““If you understand what religion truly is, then everything is religion.” I could say – if only I had woken up to this fact earlier in my life….. But I feel blessed to know the truth now. A beautiful sharing and quotes – thankyou Leonne.
Religion is simply our connection with our inner heart, our Soul, the universe, the all. It connects us to a grandness we are from, and with that also the awareness that we are equally part of this grandness. So to me living religiously is not just a belief as many people have from their relationship with the man made religion, but it is a way of living that it is not a fixture but constantly expanding to a greater awareness simply because of the expansive nature of the universe I am connected to.
Amen to that Leonne. When we live in connection to the truth of who we are, true religion is our everyday through which our every breath, our every move is a magnification of the love we know we are in essence… wherever we are and whatever we do.
That very notion of ‘if only’ seems to tell us that we do know otherwise, that we do know we are capable of being truer. What you say here makes me really appreciate the potential and power we are being endowed with at every segment and fragment of what we call life. Thank you, Leonne.
‘“If you understand what religion truly is, then everything is religion.” True religion a movement of true purpose that is lived and expressed in our everyday. This is a very different approach to the man pictures and religions we here today and yet it makes such sense and feels amazing living from the body in this way. Our true intelligence is found within the vessels we call our bodies and the wisdom they possess.
If only is actually a way of disempowering yourself of knowing the truth and stand for it.. As we are in truth dishonest when we say ‘if only’, because that simply did not exist..
At the end of a person’s life the thing that disturbs people the most are the “if only’s”, e.g if only I loved more, spent more time with people etc. We have to learn to live in a way where there are no regrets.
Agreed Elizabeth, most people want to complete their bucket list, but pay no attention to completing each relationship without any regret.
I agree Elizabeth for when we commit to resolving and healing our past hurts and living each day to its fullest the shadow of the if only’s will be eliminated.
There are no “if only”s” in our heart – our heart is made to be open, and if we shut it down, there is that not much flow that will be able to flow through us – hence we are stopped – until we see that the if only”s used from the closed heart are simple results.. But the root we can change – by opening our hearts… Yes.
” For what if true religion is actually the lived understanding of your own divine essence? What if every breath you take has the ability to remind you who you truly are? What if each and every moment of your life is divinely constellated to remind you who you truly are? ” This is so beautiful Leonne the best description of religion I have ever heard thank you.
I loved reading your article Leonne. I have been reading quiet a few articles this morning around religion, and what is absolutely crystal clear is how amazingingly blessed we are to be a part of a true religion The Way of The Livingness, and to walk beside so many that are also choosing to live this truth and love consistently.
In each ‘if only’, there is a will to escape to the truth that is revealed with the situation that is judged as unfair, avoidable, wrong,… Only by accepting the things as they are in the first place and surrendering to the message that comes with them, we are able to understand and receive the gift that has been offered everytime
Beautifully said Amapro. I agree that ‘if only’ exposes every moment we resisted surrendering to truth and every occasion that we said ‘no’ to evolution. As such offering us yet another opportunity to heal and renounce the loveless momentum that keeps us from being moved by the vibration of love.
Each and every moment to remind us who we truly are, amazing. The divineness from within and being reflected to that which out there. The thing is we can’t get it wrong, or fail – we only choose to move in a way that allows this divines to be in and with us or we move against it – and hence hold off the divine love that is always holding and Impulsing us.
Thank you Leonne, this is gold! as in truth we are being offered opportunities to be more all of the time so it is our responsibility to question life and the quality of our experiences as they are a mere reflection of the choices we are making that support or are detriment to our own evolution.
Bang on Leonne! The ‘if only’ game is taxing and destructive. It serves no purpose other than to feed a lack of responsibility and desire to blame.
We willingly enter the wormhole of ‘if onlys’ when we are not willing to accept the evolution on offer in the current situation we find ourselves in. However ‘bad’ this may appear to us on the surface, there is always a light at the end of the tunnel when we realise that the tunnel is itself the self-created space we hide in to not live our true potential.
If only’s only give away the immense power that is in one and that is actually to be lived and brought to life in full by its very own choice. That is – yes to love or yes to not love (evil).
How we live is key to what happens to us. If we do not honor ourselves we invite energies to play up with us and this is what happens. We can make up stories and reduce what happens to the temporal world, but in truth, there is us, our alignments and choices that truly account for what happens next
The ‘if only’ thing is just an excuse for not being and doing everything we already are and can then do.
True religion is living our every choice knowing there is love. It is our free will if we choose it or not.
When we connect with our inner hearts and start to feel and trust the innately beautiful flow of the universe and the interconnectedness of all things… the ‘if only’s’ really start to let go.
There are no if onlys, all that happens happens for a reason and a purpose, an opportunity to feel and accept responsibility for our choices.
I hadn’t really acknowledged the fact that I have actually renounced nearly all the “if onlys” in my life thanks to the support that Universal Medicine offers in understanding the true purpose of life. It is not about perfection or having a “great” life, “doing good” or “providing for your family”. Sure these are things we all do but its not the reason we are here. If you stop and feel, you can feel strongly that we are here to grow, evolve and learn from each other. We are here to return and relearn how to bring more of our God given natural light through and to reawaken to the fact that we are actually all made of the same love that God is. .