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[tresss]

Hmm, but what is outside is also inside, and vice versa. :-) A useful Tantric saying is: "What is here is elsewhere, and what is not here is nowhere". So for me, the cup of tea is just as much God, as anything else is whether it's in my digestive system or in the cup! Deities work the same way. My Goddess is outside and inside, manifest and unmanifest simultaneously. To me, I am the whole universe! The universe is also individually me! Or to put it another way, my Goddess is ALL, yet still remains herself.
 

[tresss]

Also,

we can be more than human, with human emotions and behaviour. Part of being a Goddess is being life! Universal consciousness is deity!

Btw, love your catipillar icon. :-)

[The Pet Goddess]

I like your thoughts, tresss.   

Growing up in a Christian cult, I try to put as much distance between me and deity or God as I can.  I still haven't come to terms with the abuse I suffered although I've done a lot of healing over the past several years.   

PS: The caterpillar is supposed to be reminiscent of a little green worm. 

[tresss]

I like your thoughts, tresss.   

Growing up in a Christian cult, I try to put as much distance between me and deity or God as I can.  I still haven't come to terms with the abuse I suffered although I've done a lot of healing over the past several years.   

PS: The caterpillar is supposed to be reminiscent of a little green worm.

Yes, sorry to hear that. Seems very common! Glad that in the UK, Christianity as an organised religion is fairly weak. The British are brought up to be much more individual, I feel. They tend to have more freedom to choose their own path..

Never seen a green worm before! ;-)

[marisol]

Yes it's a cute little green worm, it still suits you pg, lol

[marisol]

pg how can you be an atheist, but believe in a universal consciousness?

[The Pet Goddess]

pg how can you be an atheist, but believe in a universal consciousness?

My definition of Atheism is not believing in deity that one petitions for favor or worships in order to obtain favor in this life or in a supposed afterlife.

The question I ask is... Did life evolve consciousness or did consciousness evolve life?

I like to think consciousness evolved alongside life.  As I said earlier, all existance... material or otherwise... is the exploration and expression of a universal consciousness.

Of course, then there's the view of those like tresss that universal consciousness is deity.  It all boils down to definition. 

[tresss]

It all boils down to definition.

Personally I don't choose to recognise (Don't know if that is the right term) hierarchy...In the sense of a dominant + submissive. I think that leads to violence and unrest. So no God has power over me, because I am God; I am that power. So is everyone. But I consciously choose to manifest HER presence in the here and now, either through visualisation or just by being empty enough so her love/my love emanates. Praying for me is just part of that acknowledgement and devotion. But prayer is also a meditation, communion, and has tangible physical effects.

[tresss]

Also, I never use the term 'patron gods'. It makes me think of a big, old, authoritarian-type figure in society. lol.

Anyway, having a living deity (Giving energy to the consciousness of what 'Goddess' embodies for you... a symbol of sorts), gives real creative power! :-) it really works. God is not just impersonal and undetectable (of course, it also has a transcendendent aspect).

[The Pet Goddess]

I like a lot of what you have to say, tresss.   

Not to derail the thread, but I guess you could say practicing magick is my religion/god. 

Magick is empowerment of my inner self.  A meeting of my conscious and subconscious minds.  It is a bringing forth and bubbling over of all I know I can be.  Magick is empowerment of the self.  It is wholeness of the self.  The real and true me.  The attainable me.

Abby Willroot says (in part)... "She Who Creates (the Spiral Goddess) is about claiming your power and allowing the magick and uniqueness within you to express itself in the world.  Look into yourself and claim that part of yourself that is deep at your core.  ...It is your true self, it is where your power resides.  Dare to claim that part of yourself and spiral it into the world, and be the strongest, most brilliant, shining you that there is."

[The Pet Goddess]

...I consciously choose to manifest HER presence in the here and now, either through visualisation or just by being empty enough so her love/my love emanates.

I like how you said that.   

I don't believe in love or in evil or in a source of either.  Love is an emotion, a need.  Evil is simply the other end of the scale.   But to express it the way you did is something I can buy into.

[tresss]

I like how you said that.   

I don't believe in love or in evil or in a source of either.  Love is an emotion, a need.  Evil is simply the other end of the scale.   But to express it the way you did is something I can buy into.

Looks like you have a more psychological explanation of the divine..? :-) Maybe you read a lot of Jung. I've read a little, and his language was more palatable before I began embracing words like 'God' (I was not brought up religious at all). Terms like 'the self' still mean sonething to me though. 'Magic' on the other hand is new to me! I encountered it in a book on Wicca. I just say 'Creation', 'Creating' or 'Manifestation' usually. Magic sounds more fun though. :-)

It took me a few months or so to get used to saying 'God', and a little bit longer to really understand what that meant.

Love the quote! Spirals are so beautiful and dizzy.

'Love' is how I describe the feeling because it is blissful. But I also feel the 'law of love' which to me is how the earth keeps spinning, how we all stay on the ground ('gravity'), and how everything just seems to.. survive. Love I feel is tge glue of the universe; how things ATTRACT to other things.

[tresss]

Love is also focus! When we give our full, conscious attention to a person or thing then that is giving up yourself for the other. But focus is also literally energy. It's the unconscious energy focused through mind. Hard to explain. Like the sun's rays through a magnifine glass.

[The Pet Goddess]

But focus is also literally energy. It's the unconscious energy focused through mind.

Now that speaks to me.  As a reiki practitioner and a student of energy medicine, my focus is all about energy.

[Earthbound Spirit]

TPG, your not an atheist, imho.