USING the physical body and its five senses, our soul has the ability to fully experience the emotional melodrama of human life, for apart from our mental library holding the memories of the past that are needed to negotiate our way through the hazardous maze of daily life, it also contains the memories of all the emotions we have ever experienced.

These are used for contrast between opposites (good, bad, positive, negative) and as we learn over lifetimes, conscious awareness of our true purpose grows and expands. As an increasing number of us connect with our soul/true self, it will become easier for others to follow. (A rising tide lifts all boats, as the saying goes.)

Yet strangely, despite our soul’s mission to fully experience the human condition, both good and bad, while we continue to identify with our ego, we are constantly searching for shortcuts to feeling good and avoiding the ones that we deem bad.

Thinking that we (our ego self) knows best, we have invented myriad quick fixes to try and avoid the ordinariness of life – like the use of drugs, alcohol, chocolate, over eating, sexual addiction, extreme sports, etc.

Not to say that any of these are bad in and of themselves but we need to become consciously aware that we may very well be using them to get away from what we feel is the humdrum of ordinary life – which in reality is not to achieve happiness, peace, joy or any of those things – but to experience pleasure.

To try and stop using a shortcut without understanding our egos need for it, only makes the situation worse, for there is always a cost involved after experiencing a high brought on by a quick fix. The price we pay as a result is dependency, cravings, addictions – and the pain of their accompanying withdrawal symptoms…

Dan’s Quote: “Our mission in life is to discard the illusion of the false.”