Dropping Labels - L,L,&L W/ Glenn Ambrose

It's time to let go of the judgements, the labels and the preoccupation with words, even in the spiritual community. I go into detail about why this is important and how this will minimize controversy moving forward.

Transcript

Welcome to Life,

Lessons & Laughter with your host,

Glenn Ambrose.

There I am.

Hey everybody,

Welcome,

Welcome,

Welcome.

So today I am going to talk about dropping labels.

I believe that this is a different way to come at a common spiritual law or ideology.

So,

You know,

There's nothing new about dropping labels.

Because then you don't put it into a little box,

You know,

Like Eckhart Tolle talked about it in The Power of Now,

I believe.

And it's,

As soon as we label something,

We basically minimize it into that thing,

Whatever the label is,

Whatever that word means to us.

So,

For example,

I used to practice dropping labels and connecting to things.

And it's often easier to do with something that's alive.

So,

Like a plant or a tree,

So you can sit there and if you just look at a tree and you drop the label of tree and you're just looking at it,

It's like,

You don't have to say anything.

I mean,

Sometimes you can,

But if you can even drop describing it,

That's even better.

So,

Like,

You can be looking at a tree and instead of going,

Oh,

My God,

That's such a beautiful tree,

Drop the label tree.

And then you can look at it and you go,

Oh,

My God,

This is so,

This thing is so beautiful and majestic.

And then,

Like,

You can feel something.

If you're open,

You can actually feel a sensation,

Like in your heart area.

And it's this connection.

You're kind of seeing the tree for what it truly is instead of the minimized concept of a tree.

And you can go even deeper by dropping the,

It's so beautiful.

You just,

You know,

Kids do this sometimes.

You can see with kids because they don't know what things are.

You know,

Like the first time a kid sees a dragonfly and they don't know what a dragonfly is,

But the thing looks cool and they don't have words.

And you see the enthusiasm in them and the excitement.

It's because they're connecting to this thing and they can't label it.

So they're seeing,

They're connecting to its essence.

I was just talking about essence in my last podcast,

My friend Jesus's essence.

So it's,

We want to connect to that essence of things because that's what they truly are.

I mean,

You are not a human being,

Like solely,

You're more than that.

You know,

You're more than just a person in a meat suit,

Like walking around with a particular name and a particular hair color.

Like there's an essence to you.

There's qualities to you that no label can encompass.

You know,

So if somebody says,

Oh,

Look at the human being.

Well,

They're more than a human being,

You know,

Especially just ask their loved ones.

They'll tell you,

You know,

So there's this essence to us all,

To everything.

And especially when it's alive,

Where it's that much closer to our frequency so we can feel it.

But there's an essence to everything.

There's an essence to a rock,

To a table.

Why?

It's because there's movement in it.

There's actually electrons moving inside.

You know,

Like we think things are solid.

They're not solid.

It's mostly empty space with energy vibrating at a certain rate,

Determining on what that molecule is.

So you can kind of feel that a little bit.

You can kind of sense it.

That took a while.

I mean,

I was so into this,

I don't know,

You know,

17 years ago or something.

Like I was enamored by it.

I just used to play with this type of thing and this type of mentality regularly throughout the day.

You know,

I'd be sitting home and just sitting there looking at a plant on my coffee table,

Just like trying to connect to it.

And I didn't know what I was doing or how to do it,

But like the effort was there,

Right?

So after a little time,

I would just have this feeling and I'm like,

Oh my God,

I think that's it.

I put my attention on it.

And,

You know,

Then I could like feel the plant.

And then after a while I got consistent with it and I started doing it to inanimate objects like the coffee table itself.

And I'd be like,

You know,

And then all of a sudden I'd get a little glimpse of it and I'd get excited.

So you can play around with this stuff.

And,

You know,

That is kind of the door that people come in to dropping labels.

It's you can connect to the essence of things.

You have a deeper understanding that people or things are more than just the label we put on them,

You know,

And minimizes it into an object.

So this is one of the reasons why when I go outside at night,

There's so many stars here,

You know,

Because I'm in Dominican Republic in the mountains and there isn't all the light pollution.

So I look up and there's just stars everywhere.

I've never seen so many stars.

And what most people do,

Including me,

Is when we go outside,

We look at the stars.

Those are things and they're easy to label.

They're called stars.

So you look at those and you're like,

Oh,

Look at the beautiful star.

As soon as we say,

Look at the beautiful star,

We're minimizing it into a mind made object,

A mind conceived object that doesn't include its essence.

So you can just look at the stars without labeling them,

But kind of an easier thing to do is just look at the space in between the stars.

You can enjoy the stars,

Too,

But take some time to look at the space in between the stars,

And if you're just open.

You'll feel this connection with the entire universe.

Because there's something,

You know,

They've proven this scientifically.

The black space in between the stars is not nothing.

They used to think it was nothing.

It isn't nothing.

It's something.

There's energy that's in that,

Right?

So they've proven this scientifically at this point.

So you can just feel that connection.

So another example of dropping a label.

Obviously,

When,

You know,

This labeling thing is such a problem.

Throughout history,

You know,

Have you ever wondered?

I wonder about this stuff all the time.

So I tune into it.

Have you ever wondered why there have been so many wars throughout history,

Like how we can excuse that behavior?

How can we rationalize that behavior?

How can we,

You know,

Especially with all these holy wars and all these wars throughout history that were supposedly in the name of God.

In the name of a God that said,

Thou shall not kill.

I mean,

That's pretty clear.

Like,

You know,

This is supposedly in the Ten Commandments.

This is like the ten things,

Man.

If there's ten things in that religion that you can't do or that God specifically mentioned in their ideology,

It's those Ten Commandments.

They're literally commandments.

Thou shall not kill.

There's not a lot of room to confuse that,

Right?

So how are people running around killing other people in the name of God that said thou shall not kill?

It's because of labels,

Honestly.

Because when you label somebody,

They become that label.

And this is really deep.

Like,

Depending on where you are in your journey,

Some of you are going to get it,

Some of you are not going to get it.

You've got to go deep,

Deep,

Deep to get this concept.

Because it sounds ridiculous at first,

But it's not.

So the concept is that when you call somebody a non-believer,

For this example of the Holy Wars and stuff,

A non-believer or an enemy.

Something along those lines,

I guess,

Would be appropriate for this example,

Especially.

You are minimizing them to that.

Now,

This is the weird part.

It actually strips some of their humanity.

People are going to go,

No,

No,

Like it doesn't,

No,

It doesn't strip them.

I know they're a human being,

But they're my enemy.

So they're a human being,

That's my enemy.

So,

No,

I know that they're a human being,

But they're my enemy too.

No,

It's deeper than that.

You actually,

On an unconscious level,

The label actually strips them of their humanity.

Now,

If you thought deep about it,

If you thought deep,

Like if you went to the unconscious level with that mindset,

You'd figure it out yourself.

But most people don't,

They stay on the surface.

So,

If you sit there and you go,

Okay,

Well,

You're saying enemy,

Then I don't see that they're a human being,

But I think that I do.

So,

Like,

I'll kill my enemy because they're out to hurt me,

I think.

It's like,

Okay,

Wait,

You're going to kill your enemy,

So you're going to kill a human being.

Well,

Yeah,

But they're my enemy.

Well,

Wait,

Like you can't exclude human being,

They're a human being and your enemy,

You said.

Well,

Yeah,

But they're more my enemy.

Do you see when you take one step deeper,

It starts getting confusing?

That's because you're getting closer to the truth and you're in that middle spot and it starts getting a little bit confusing.

So you're like,

Well,

No,

I mean,

And then you try to figure out a way to rationalize it.

Well,

No,

They're a human being.

I know,

I know that they're like,

See,

Like,

I'm capable of being honest with myself deeply.

I do this regular,

Regularly.

So,

Like,

As I start going there and I'm trying to come up with some rationalization to prove to myself that an enemy is also a human being.

I can't do it.

That's why I kind of stopped right there,

Because I was trying to tune in and do it to give you guys the example.

And like,

I could see that there was nothing that I could say at that point to prove that my enemy,

I still saw my enemy as a human being and it was okay to kill another human being.

Like now,

I,

So I had to stop right there.

Now,

Depending on how able you are to be honest with yourself,

How many times you've done this type of practice,

How much you believe your own BS,

You might be able to rationalize it a little bit deeper.

But if you're deeply honest with yourself,

No enemy basically strips something,

Somebody of their humanity.

It becomes a thing that's not technically human.

Or maybe it's just that the humanity of them isn't really that important.

It's not as important as the fact that they're my enemy.

You know,

And now just to differentiate what I'm talking about,

I'm not talking about self-defense.

You know,

I'm not talking about that.

I mean,

I'm not talking about protecting your family.

And some people will use wars like,

Like,

Oh,

No,

You don't understand the reason.

The reason that the people in power are making us go to war and kill these people is because if they didn't,

They would come kill us.

Most of the time,

That's a load of crap.

I'm not saying that's never,

Ever true,

But most of the time that's a load of crap.

Especially back in like the Holy Wars,

They were just running around conquering nations.

They were attacking other people.

Other people weren't attacking them,

You know,

In some of the,

In a lot of these wars.

And those examples make it clearer.

It makes it clearer when you're looking at that.

Okay.

When you,

It gets blurrier when you get closer to the line of protecting your own.

You know,

I mean,

If I don't,

I don't know what I would do.

If I'm sure that there were,

If there was a situation where I needed to protect myself,

I would protect myself.

I think that's human nature.

There's a,

There's a certain aspect of human nature that we can,

That we can get to.

But if we have people living in a,

This is another,

Wow,

This is another crazy concept.

That's really hard to swallow depending on where you are.

If we lived in a utopian world where we open up to spirituality,

There actually wouldn't be people trying to hurt us.

See that like the dysfunction feeds the dysfunction.

So,

You know,

Sometimes we have to defend ourselves because there are people left on this planet still that are violent and angry and do things even without provocation sometimes.

Right.

So there are,

So the society we live in now,

There's still that aspect that we have to,

Why?

Because we're not awake.

So we have to be conscious of that and,

And,

You know,

Be aware.

It's like I've said before,

Like snapping our fingers and dissolving all the milk on the planet tomorrow would be foolish because we're not at a stage where we could handle that.

Right.

So this,

Just remember,

This is conceptual.

These are concepts.

We,

It doesn't mean that we can implement these concepts overnight.

Tomorrow we have to work towards them.

But if you live in a utopian world,

There would be no need for military because people,

We wouldn't be hoarding and keeping things from people.

You know,

Terrorism dissolves in a specific area when people have all their basic needs met.

And then a terrorism just dissolves.

Like terrorism thrives in an area where the basic needs of people aren't met.

Because if somebody is feeding their family and has some education and,

And,

You know,

Is living a happy life and somebody comes over and says,

Hey,

Here's a machine gun.

We want you to go kill a bunch of people there.

They'd be like,

Why would I do that?

Like that's foolishness.

Right.

But if they can't feed their families and they're starving and they're oppressed and they're in these horrible situations.

Well,

Then somebody comes over and says,

Hey,

These people are to blame for that.

Here's a machine gun.

Let's go take them out so you can get yours.

Yeah.

Okay.

So,

You know.

So if we lived in a world where there wasn't a reason,

If people weren't oppressing other people,

If everybody had access to basic needs,

Which we have the ability to do that,

We just choose not to.

We have the,

There's more than enough food on the planet to feed everybody.

There's more than enough money to go around housing.

Like we have technology to do everything.

We could solve all the world's problems.

We just don't.

Okay.

So if you were living in a utopian world,

There would be no reason to defend yourself because nobody would be attacking you because they would have no reason to attack you.

You know,

People aren't just sitting there.

And,

You know,

Again,

Once society shifts to a more peaceful place,

That's necessary.

I mean,

If somebody sitting in anger and then eventually they run out of the house and go do something stupid.

Yeah,

That happens.

It wasn't because of that day.

It was because they were sitting around with all this anger inside of them for so long and it finally came out.

Right.

So if we were sitting around and we weren't filled with anger and rage and victimization all the time,

Then we wouldn't just run out and go attack somebody for no reason.

I mean,

Geez,

Even now,

When we're all unconscious,

Most of the time you got to rationalize a reason to attack somebody.

You know.

So.

So this is the this is the problems that labels bring in,

You know,

And I use some pretty extreme examples,

But,

You know.

The.

What I'm really talking about today is the this is where I see society going now.

OK,

Like we're to me,

We're obviously in a spiritual shift.

And,

You know,

I the the NFL football playoffs started and I like sports,

So I watch some.

And on the field and on the back of their helmets,

It says be love.

And I just start laughing because I'm like,

You're telling me there's no spiritual shift happening on the planet.

Like this is a violent sport where people kind of try to kill each other every play.

Right.

And it's commercialized and they will do anything to get more viewers.

Right.

They spend billions to get more viewers.

It's the name of the game.

It's show business,

It's viewers,

It's money.

Right.

And where are they putting their money into be love?

Why,

Why,

Why are they doing that?

Well,

It's because that's what the that's what society is craving now.

That's what people want to see.

So they're obliging if people didn't want to see be love,

I guarantee you,

It wouldn't be on the back of everybody's helmet.

It's resonating with people.

So the spiritual shift is happening.

So with this spiritual shift.

One of the ways we've been dragging our feet and we've been dragging our feet quite a bit,

Even myself,

I see that there's ways that I drag my feet.

And some of it is,

Well,

Almost all of it is unconscious.

OK,

My version of the unconscious aspect of it is like I don't I don't always recognize how far down the road of the spiritual shift we're already on.

Like where we're a ways down,

We're further down than most people think,

I believe.

And we're further down than I think.

Because I keep catching myself going like,

Oh,

Wait,

Wait,

Like I need to be being this like I need to stay in front of this spiritual shift because I'm awake.

So those of us that are awake,

We have to remember our positioning,

Like we're in the front of the spiritual shift.

So we have to act like it.

OK,

So what that consists of is we need to be looking into the future to create the paradigm that we want.

Like we've been walking around going,

Oh,

I want love.

I want peace.

I want this in the world.

I want this in the world.

I want this in the world.

And it's like and the universe is going like,

Yeah,

So go do that.

Like,

Why are you standing here saying like,

Oh,

I want this.

Oh,

I want like,

Yeah,

The time is now.

Go be it.

Go,

Go do it.

Like,

What do you want?

Specifically,

You want to be love,

Then walk around floating around being in love.

Like you don't have to wait for other people to find love within themselves for you to find love within yourself.

You don't have to wait till everybody else is fixed.

If you want to be loved,

Then just be loved.

Like you can do that all on your own.

You don't need society to be different.

You don't need anything to be different.

So just be that.

And if you want to change your life,

If you want to act,

If you want to be able to create and manifest the life of your dreams,

Well,

Do it like now.

Like,

Don't sit there and be like,

Oh,

It's going to be wonderful when.

No,

The when is now.

So go do whatever you want to go do.

If you want to change your life,

Go change your life tomorrow.

Like,

It's here.

You can't sit and say,

I have no choice but to stay in my job anymore.

You can't.

It's because it's not true.

You do have choices.

The universe is behind you.

The support is there.

The energy is flowing in that direction.

Everybody that's changing their jobs is having a really good time changing their jobs.

Why?

Because they're doing it and it's being supported.

People that want to buy land off grid somewhere and live a life like that,

They're doing it.

Like,

I don't know if you guys know this,

But there's a ton of people already doing this stuff.

So if you're sitting there going,

Oh,

I want I want the time is now like there's already people doing it.

And if you're awake,

You're conscious,

You're working on yourself,

Then you should be doing it,

Too.

We're creating a new paradigm now.

We have to keep that in mind.

Okay.

So as we're creating this,

A big aspect that we need to do to make this work is we need to drop the labels.

And I don't,

You know,

I used examples to set up what I was talking about.

We'll see where it goes from here.

But specifically,

What I had in mind with this topic was the labels that I'm seeing that divide us.

Obviously,

There's like Democrat and Republican.

We must drop those labels.

But even more specifically,

The one that I was thinking of was religious,

Spiritual.

And.

I don't know if we would consider it atheist,

Maybe or nonbeliever or whatever,

Whatever you want to call it.

It doesn't matter because we're trying to drop the labels,

Not create them.

This is so this is cool.

Actually,

This just popped in.

This is why we're having so much difficulty with words.

Like I've talked about this before.

Words.

We're having difficulty with words because like woke comes from being awakened.

Right.

That's where the term came from.

So being awakened is like think of Buddha.

Like Buddha literally means the awakened one.

His name was Siddhartha.

His name wasn't Buddha.

But when he awakened fully,

He became Buddha because Buddha means the awakened one.

Right.

So if you think of Buddha,

The awakened one.

Like what did he taught?

Right.

He taught what?

Love,

Peace,

Contentment.

Love for everyone.

Right.

So that's what an awakened being.

That's the energy that they're in.

It's just pure love,

Acceptance.

You know,

It's what most people want more than anything if they know what it is.

OK,

So that's such a beautiful thing.

And now woke has become some dirty word like I don't even know.

I don't follow what people think words mean because it's so ridiculous at this stage.

But like apparently woke means some negative stuff.

So whatever,

You know,

But so now it's a bad thing.

This is what I mean.

The terms change all the time.

Like we used to have in spiritual terms,

We used to have soulmates and then twin flames.

And then I think there's like another one.

And then there's an argument over what a soulmate means and then what a twin flame is.

And then what we really want to seek and what we don't want to seek.

And what's like the terminology is ridiculous at this point.

We're always we we're always arguing over words instead of the meaning of the words.

Like what is somebody trying to say?

People don't pay attention to what you're trying to say.

They pay attention to the words to try to find a word that they think means something else.

So they can tack it so they can be controversial.

We need to get out of this type of thing and just try to understand what people mean.

You know,

It happened with the Black Lives Matter thing.

You know,

Like I've been diving into these these words for a few years to start understanding what was going on because I could see the disconnect.

So with the Black Lives Matter thing,

Everybody's going,

Well,

No,

It should be all lives matter.

And I'm like,

OK,

I understand why they say that.

I understand why they say that.

But why?

But the Black Lives Matter is saying,

No,

No,

No,

We should be saying Black Lives Matter.

And I'm like,

OK,

Well,

There's a difference of opinion here.

Why are they saying that?

So I dove in and I researched and I looked and I said,

You know,

Why?

And as I looked into it,

You know,

I found some explanations and they said,

You know,

One of them that I liked was like,

Well,

If you have a neighborhood with a bunch of houses on it.

And there's one house on fire and,

You know,

People are running around going,

Save my house,

Save,

You know,

My house matters.

My house matters.

Help me.

My house matters.

And people are standing around going,

Yeah,

But my house matters,

Too.

It's like,

Yeah,

But yours isn't on fire.

I'm not saying that your house doesn't matter.

By me saying my house matters,

I'm not implying that your house doesn't matter.

That's not what there's no implication of that.

I'm just saying my house is on fire right now.

Can we look at my house?

And I was like,

Oh,

Wow.

OK,

I understand that mentality.

You know,

There's there's racial issues that are affecting that race.

And they're saying,

Hey,

Look over here.

There's some problems specifically here that we need to address.

Oh,

OK.

So you're not trying to marginalize everybody else.

You're just saying there happens to be some problems here.

I understand what you're saying.

Why do I understand?

Because I tried to understand.

I didn't sit there and go,

Wait,

I don't like their words.

I tried to understand what they meant by their words.

Once I understood what they meant by their words,

I was like,

Oh,

OK,

I agree with their meaning.

You see,

So then the division is gone,

Like because we're not arguing over words and we do this with everything.

We do this with all the issues out there.

We just argue over the words and we forget the reality that we're all the same.

We all want peace.

We all want love.

We all want our families to be safe.

We all want to be able to feed our families and provide a home for them.

We all want the same things.

And all we do is argue up here over words when we all mean and want the same thing.

We got to let go of these words.

These words are labels.

We have to let go of them.

So,

You know,

Back to what I was saying about the religious,

I'm going to use atheists for this particular example.

So right now,

Another one of the issues that we're having with labels is religion,

Spirituality and atheist.

They think they're at odds.

Why?

Because the label means something different,

They think.

So the religious people don't like the spiritual people and the spiritual people don't like the religious people.

And the atheists don't like the religious people and the religious people don't like the atheists.

And the atheists don't like the spiritual people and the spiritual people don't like the atheists.

So now we got these three groups of people and nobody likes one another.

And we're all busy trying to prove why the other one's wrong.

Okay,

So look under the labels.

Like,

Does an atheist just want to have a peaceful life?

Yes.

Okay.

How he gets there or she gets there,

Is that their own business?

Yes.

Okay.

Religious people,

They like the idea of religion,

Structure that it brings,

Guidelines that it brings.

They find comfort in there.

And it seems like an effective path to connect with what they believe to be important.

Which is a God.

Why?

So they can have a peaceful,

Happy life.

Okay,

So their path to have a peaceful,

Happy life is different than the atheist.

That's fine.

It's also different than the people who call themselves spiritual.

Like,

That's the label I've been using for myself up until this point.

So,

To me,

Spirituality used to be more inclusive.

That's why I liked it.

I liked spirituality because it was inclusive.

I was like,

Well,

No.

Like,

I don't want to pick a particular religion.

I don't resonate with one particular religion fully.

But when I studied all the different religions,

What I found is that I resonated with all of them.

I resonated with the message of Jesus underneath Christianity.

I resonated with the message of Buddha underneath Buddhism.

I resonated with the message of Hinduism underneath all the dogma.

So,

Like,

When I saw that river that flowed underneath all the religions,

That,

To me,

Was a spiritual river.

You know,

And don't get hung up on the words.

Just try to understand what I'm meaning when I'm explaining what I mean.

So,

It doesn't matter if you agree with it.

Just try to understand it.

So,

I feel,

And maybe I'm wrong because I'm not God,

That there is a particular flow of information,

Of ideology that flows underneath all religions.

I believe they all teach love.

And I'm like,

Okay,

Well,

Some people resonate with a particular one,

And they're one of those religions.

I'm like all of them.

I resonate with all of them.

I can take some stuff out of each of them because,

To me,

They all teach the same thing.

Like,

I don't see them teaching different things.

I see them all teaching the same thing.

That's just my perspective.

Not everybody's going to agree with it.

Some people are going to think that,

Like,

Hinduism,

Right?

Like,

A lot of people think that Hinduism has a bunch of gods.

No,

They don't.

They have one.

If you actually,

Because I've studied it and I've researched it and I've looked into it because I was curious.

So,

Like,

All the major religions basically have the same formula.

They have something at the top,

Energy,

God,

Something.

And then it breaks off into a trilogy,

Which is three things,

Creation,

Destruction,

And movement,

Or life.

Okay?

So,

They all have that at the top of their religion.

That's the big,

Well,

I don't know if it's the beginning point.

I guess it would be the ending point.

So,

The ending point is the God.

Just before that is the trilogy.

And then just underneath that,

There's many things.

So,

People look at Hinduism and they say,

Oh,

No,

There's a bunch of gods.

Well,

No,

That's not actually true.

They have different gods to them that they use the term different gods.

But the term,

They say,

Yeah,

We have different gods,

But there's one thing at the top.

And we're like,

Well,

Yeah,

We have one thing at the top.

That's God.

And they go,

Well,

We don't use the label God for that thing at the top.

And then we go,

Well,

Then you think that there's multiple gods.

Well,

Yeah,

We do think that there's multiple gods.

But we think that there's one thing at the top.

And you think that there's one thing at the top.

We just call it a different word.

So,

All the gods in Hinduism represent different aspects,

Right,

That we might need help with,

Which is the same in Christianity with the angels that represent different things.

But if you go to a Christian with that,

That is against any other religion,

They're going to go,

No,

That's not true.

You know,

It's like,

No,

That's not how I see it.

Well,

It looks the same.

Like,

If you draw it without the labels,

If you drew on a piece of paper Christianity and Hinduism,

It would look exactly the same.

It's like one at the top and then branches off into three and then branches off into multiple.

It's the exact same formula.

So,

I just,

I believed in the love being taught that flows underneath all religions.

Who cares?

Why?

So,

Spiritually,

That was my version of spirituality.

And so,

Spirituality,

Like,

That's just my way of creating a life of peace and happiness.

So,

I have my way.

I want a life of peace and happiness.

The religious people want a life of peace and happiness.

The atheists want a life of peace and happiness.

So,

Why are we arguing?

We all want the same things.

We all want lives of peace and happiness.

Who cares how you do it?

Who cares?

You know,

And I'll use the religion.

I don't want to harp on the religions because religions,

In my opinion,

Catch too much flack.

I think religions do a lot of good in this world.

And I think a lot of people resonate with the structure that religions provide.

And I don't think I should be the one to judge.

Even if they're judging me,

I don't care.

That doesn't give me the right to judge them.

So,

I don't think I should be the one to judge their path.

I think their path is fine if that's what they resonate with.

But,

So,

For this example,

A lot of times,

The religious will,

Oh my god,

I just lost it.

Oh!

Sometimes I go off on those little side doors to explain stuff.

And then I try to come back.

So,

Sometimes in certain religions,

They say it has to be our way.

But who cares?

That's what it was.

Who cares?

So,

Like,

If a particular religion teaches that,

You know,

Like a lot of times Christianity says the way to the Father is through me and only through me,

Right?

So,

They—I interpret that in a different way.

But they interpret that to mean that you have to accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior or else you're going to hell.

Fine.

That's fine.

I'm not going to tell Christians that they can't believe that or whoever—or some of them or whoever believes it.

I'm not going to say you can't believe it.

You can believe whatever you want.

But it's not your job to make me believe it.

Like,

If I want to go to hell or risk going to hell,

That's my business.

It's not your business.

Let God judge me.

I have my faith in God.

I do not have my faith in you or how you interpret scripture.

So,

This is what I mean.

Let people—why?

Why is it your job to save everybody else?

This is the hook that we get.

You know,

Half the time when I post something about,

Like,

You know,

We really need to learn to forgive others.

You know,

There's a bunch of people that say,

Yeah,

I know,

I hate that when people won't forgive other people.

Oh,

I see a bunch of people out there who won't forgive.

It's so bad.

No,

I was talking about you.

So,

Like,

Why don't you forgive the people that you're irked with because they won't forgive others?

Do you see how we do the exact same thing with our labels?

We look at everybody else.

We're so concerned.

You know,

Jesus taught this.

You know,

Like,

Don't worry about the stick in somebody else's eye when you get a log in your own.

Don't worry about it.

Worry about yourself.

Worry about your path.

You know,

If somebody comes up to me and says,

You know what?

Like,

Let's say there's three of us.

I'll represent the spiritual one.

And then there's a religious and there's an atheist.

And the three of us get together and we sit down and we go,

What would you like to experience in this lifetime for you and your family?

And we'd all go,

Oh,

I want to,

You know,

I want to live a good life,

A happy life.

I want to be treated with respect.

I want to be able to take care of my family.

I want to be able to experience some joy in this lifetime.

You know,

That's the basics.

All three of us would say the same thing.

And if we stayed there,

We'd be fine.

But if we take,

Go one step up and we go,

Okay,

Well,

How do you think,

What do you think you have to do to achieve that?

Well,

I think that you need to accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.

And if you don't,

You're screwed.

Okay,

It's your belief.

I believe that the,

From spirituality,

That like,

If you open your heart and develop a connection with the source or the universe or something,

And you develop a relationship with that higher power.

Then,

Then you're,

You know,

You can achieve that.

And an atheist can go,

Well,

Yeah,

You're both full of crap.

There isn't anything bigger than us.

It's just us.

And that's where the controversy starts.

You see,

That's the beginning of it.

But even there,

If we just said,

Oh,

Okay,

You have the right to your belief.

I'm going to go live my life my way.

And you go live your life your way.

We'd be fine.

This is why we have to start dropping these labels.

Honestly,

Spirituality has just become another identity.

You know,

Like if you can talk with certain words and use them appropriate,

Then you must be spiritual.

You know,

Like the,

The,

I mean,

You know,

I'm not picking on these words.

Some of them use them and I,

They use them with intention and they actually use them correctly.

Sometimes I'm just saying that,

That the words don't matter.

Okay.

So like,

Uh,

What one that I hear all the time is understanding instead of understanding.

Okay.

I get what you mean.

And if you want to use that word,

That's fine.

No harm,

No foul.

I'm not judging your word.

I'm just saying it doesn't make you spiritual.

There's a bunch of people walking around using the term inner standing and ain't spiritual.

They think they are because they use the term inner standing and not just that it's because they go to their drum circles and they sing and dance and chant and,

And,

And they go and.

They,

They read all the spiritual books and they listen to all the spiritual podcasts and,

And,

And they go to yoga and they experience Shavasana and they meditate every day and they try to connect with nature so that they think that that makes them spiritual.

None of that makes them spiritual.

All of it doesn't make you spiritual.

Can it help you connect to spirituality?

Yes,

It can.

Okay.

I'm not saying don't do those things.

I'm not saying that those things are bad.

I'm saying just because you do them,

It doesn't make you spiritual.

Because that's not what spirituality is.

Spirituality isn't a thing.

That's why I want us to drop the label.

It's not an identity.

You don't wear certain clothes,

Say certain words and do certain things and then you're spiritual.

None of that has to do with spirituality.

It's what those things do to you that makes you spiritual.

So if you go to a sound healing and it opens up your heart and you can interact with life and people in a more loving way because of the,

The,

The shift that you experienced during a sound bath and a rise of your vibration,

If that worked and you actually implemented it into your life.

You integrated the,

The,

The shift of vibration.

And I know many people had drank and have not shifted.

Right.

But if you do and you ship that it needs to play out and how you interact with life,

How you feel inside.

Are you walking in a,

In a place of contentment and peace and love within you?

Are you treating others better?

Are you,

Or are you still hung up on labels?

There's no room for the labels anymore.

People in,

In spirituality.

I guess I'm talking to more of the spiritual people.

I hope some of the religious and some of the,

The atheists will hear this as well,

But that's not really my audience.

We'll see.

But I,

So I guess this is a little bit more targeted towards the spiritual people.

We need to drop this identity of spirituality and just start being good people because like,

Let's just say for the sake of argument that we're right.

Okay.

Let's just say the spiritual people are right.

And you don't necessarily need religion or you or atheism.

Atheists need to open up and find spirituality.

Let's just say that's true just for the sake of argument.

So like,

If that were true,

How do you think that we're going to get more people to,

To open up to spirituality by telling them that they're idiots and that they're wrong and they're never going to find happiness the way that they're doing things and they should be more like us?

Or if we just act like love,

What if we accept them for who they are,

Where they are,

As they are?

Doesn't that sound like Jesus's teachings?

Why don't we accept people for who they are,

As they are,

Where they are in their journey?

Love thy neighbor.

Not,

It doesn't say judge thy neighbor.

Right?

So like,

We have to open up.

And I'm telling you,

I,

You know,

Do,

Can I,

Do I think the religious people need to do this too?

Uh-huh.

Will they?

I don't know.

It's not my place.

Do I think the atheist people should do this too?

Yeah.

Uh-huh.

But that's not my place.

The spiritual people.

Well,

I guess it's not my place to tell the spiritual people what to do either.

Right?

I'm no guru.

So.

What I'm saying is like,

This is one of the things they teach actually in recovery,

Which was my doorway into spirituality,

Right?

They teach attraction rather than promote promotion.

They're like,

Don't run around and tell people how wonderful it is to be sober,

How wonderful AA is and try to drag them in and make them do what you did.

It doesn't work.

Just so don't try to promote it.

Hey,

AA is wonderful.

Hey,

AA saved my life.

Hey,

You should go to AA too.

That's promotion.

And people tune it out because it's manipulation energy and they can feel it.

Attraction.

Isn't it interesting that they use the word attraction?

Attraction rather than promotion.

They chose the word attraction,

Which is another word that we use for manifestation,

Right?

Law of attraction.

So like they use attraction because all you got to do is just be love.

Just be like if you were a drunk.

Alcoholic like I was just be a happy,

Healthy,

Loving human being.

That's enough.

When alcoholics that are around you see you living differently.

Day after day after day.

And they notice it and they're like,

Wow,

Glenn.

Looks like you found another way.

Eyes probably full of crap.

Hey,

You're full of crap.

Well,

Sorry you feel that way.

And I don't fight back with them.

Right.

I'm just love.

So they're judging me,

But I'm not judging them back.

Then all of a sudden.

Well,

Geez,

He didn't.

He used to argue.

He's not even arguing anymore.

Well,

He seems more peaceful.

Then after a while,

They go,

Hey,

Glenn.

What's this AA thing?

Like,

How did that work for you?

Do you know how many people have done that to me over the last 20 years?

I can't count.

And it's not just with alcoholism.

It's also with just life.

People watch.

People pay attention.

Let them,

Man.

That's the beauty of it.

If you just emanate love and you treat everybody with love and non-judgment and meet them where they are,

Eventually they're going to want what you have.

And that's how it spreads.

It spreads when people want to be more like you because you seem peaceful and contented.

Not because you put out a good promotion for it.

It's attraction rather than promotion.

So just be.

Be the love that you want to see in this world.

This is what Gandhi meant.

This is why I love that saying.

It's one of my favorite sayings.

Be the change you wish to see in the world because it's so profound because it comes in at different angles and has different meanings,

And they're all in depth and profound at the base.

Be the change you wish to see in the world.

Just be love.

Just walk through love,

Non-judgment.

It's all good.

And people will be attracted to that way of life.

And then let them find their way.

It doesn't have to be your way.

That's one of the things I tell my clients all the time.

Like,

Listen,

The one thing that I know that I don't want to teach you is to walk my path.

I do not teach my clients to walk my path because it's my path.

So we're all individuals.

This is one of my tattoos.

The whole meaning of this whole sleeve is the meaning of this tattoo around the wrist at the beginning.

And what that says is as many paths to God as souls on earth.

So the one thing I know about my path is that it's not your path.

So I'm not going to teach people to walk my path because it's not theirs.

So they might experience some happiness and level things off in their life,

But at some point down the path,

They're going to wake up and go,

Wait,

This is Glenn's path.

This isn't my path.

And then they're going to have to relearn a bunch of stuff to get on their path.

I help people find their path and guide them on their path,

Not to duplicate mine.

So we all have to find our own path,

Even in religion,

Even in spirituality,

Even in atheism.

You need to learn how to deal and interact with life situations with different ideologies.

Like there's no way everybody in Christianity or Buddhism or Hinduism thinks the same or interpret scripture or any of the other sacred writings in the exact same way.

You can go to different churches and you can even get different scriptures interpreted in different ways.

I believe they try to control that to some degree,

But you still can.

Of course it's going to be different.

You take two priests and have them give a sermon on the same topic and there's going to be differences of interpretation in there,

As well there should be.

That's a problem.

We think we're all supposed to be on the same page,

Which is absurd.

We're not.

We're supposed to be on different pages.

On the surface,

That's our individuality coming out and expressing itself.

It's a beautiful thing when you allow it.

It's a beautiful thing when people agree with you.

Have you noticed that?

I was talking about this earlier with a client.

When people agree with you,

It's cool.

When you're having a good time and jiving with people,

It's cool when you have different perspectives.

So let's say you're telling a joke.

I think this was the example I gave earlier.

If you're telling a joke with a few friends and you tell a joke and then they kind of vibe off that joke and come at it a different angle and expand on it and then you laugh even harder and then somebody else comes at it a different way and they say another thing on top of it and you laugh even harder and you're like,

Oh,

My God,

That was a good one.

They took your joke and they variated off of it in their own ways.

In that scenario,

Individualism and the ability to think differently is valued and enjoyed.

But then when somebody doesn't agree with me,

Now all of a sudden it's unacceptable.

Right?

It's ridiculous.

Let's take that one step further.

For that to be appropriate in society,

For that to be right,

Then we would have to live a life where we were all individuals on things that we agreed on and had a good time on and we would run around expressing that individuality in all kinds of different ways and it would be fun and wonderful.

But then as soon as there was something that we disagreed on,

We would have to become more like robots and stay locked on to our belief systems and push back against the ones that don't like and maybe fight or kill them in the extreme situations or cut them out of our lives or push them away or call them bad or create different groups because we're not allowed to interact with them because they think differently.

Do you see a cohesive world coming out of that mentality?

It's impossible.

We would never get along as human beings like that.

So we have to go deeper underneath the labels.

Let the surface stuff go.

Go deeper underneath,

Underneath the labels and understand that we're all still looking for the same things and drop this issue that whether somebody's religious or somebody's atheist or somebody's spiritual,

That's the problem.

It's not the problem.

Some people are going to use religion in the wrong way.

Some people are going to use spirituality in the wrong way.

Some people are going to use atheism in the wrong way.

It doesn't mean that there's something wrong with religion or spirituality or atheism.

It means that there's something wrong with the way that particular person is using it and that's their battle.

That's their journey.

They need to figure that out.

We might have to protect ourselves from it to some degree.

Don't let it come into our lives.

But we think everything's coming into our lives.

Maybe it's because of social media or something.

Like if it's on your Facebook feed,

You think that it's in your life?

I think people actually unconsciously think that.

I never even considered this before.

But it's not in your life.

Just because you see it on your Facebook feed doesn't mean it's impeding in your life and there's pressure that people are putting on you to believe like them.

You can just scroll to the next thing,

You know.

Just let it go.

Very little stuff from the outside world makes it into the inside world as long as you don't invite it in.

All right,

Peeps.

That's my podcast.

Thank you,

Thank you,

Thank you for listening.

That was a fun one.

I enjoyed that.

So,

All right.

Reach out if you need anything.

And I will talk with you soon.

Peace.