There is an old saying that one comes into this world with nothing and he leaves taking nothing with him. This is not by any means an accurate saying. One coming into this world as a traveler brings many things with him and when he leaves he should take more things with him. He brings his habit patterns, his individuality, his personality, ego, intellect and his mind developed to whatever degree he has perfected himself. When one leaves, he should leave with these aspects more highly developed. He also brings his dharma and his karma, and upon leaving he should take with him all of the valuable lessons learned from his karma and his dharma. Certainly the most valuable thing he can take with him is greater spiritual development. All these things one takes along. The only thing one leaves behind in this world is the physical body, which stays with the earth. However, one takes along a blueprint, or seed atom, which determines what the next body will be like. When one reaches the gate to eternity he discovers that the only thing he can pay the gate keeper with is spirituality.

You may amass great wealth while on this earth, but when you leave not one penny goes with you because it is of this earth and has no meaning beyond here. The body dies and returns to the earth, or the elements, and it is the soul and spirit that lives on. One certainly takes along the lessons learned here, the experience he has gained and the growth he has attained and the memories he has acquired, but that is all. We come onto this earth as a helpless baby in order to take up the next leg of our long journey. Also, it is we who decide how long the journey will be and who and what we will encounter along the way. Then when the journey is finished and the body has grown old and tired we again leave this world of the waking dream behind. We go to a higher world to contemplate and evaluate the results and effects of our journey here, how well or how poorly we fared. Then we rest for an age or so in a world of peace and bliss before we return and start our next journey here on earth.

It is the human who has willingly embarked on the long, long journey through life in order to learn and to absorb all that the universe has to offer. However, his home is the earth.

The plan for us was to start as a child of nature to grow and to raise our mind to its full potential, to raise it up through life after life of gaining knowledge and experience up to the fully matured divine mind. So, each lifetime here on earth is, so to speak, one more school year of education, mentally, physically, and spiritually for the student of life. And this goes on until the student graduates, not only from human life, but from relativity itself.

We were not created for this earth; rather the earth, the galaxies, the constellations and even the universe itself were created for us. It is like a vast university that has many colleges contained in it, within a country with many universities. So the universe is like this. We as students with a divine status must learn all that all of the universities could teach us. We are here on this earth as students of life, temporal and divine. God has always had far greater plans for us than we have ever had for ourselves. So each lifetime we take on new lessons as well as pick up the ones we didn’t master in our last life.

Along with this we also have our karma to work out, or balance out, as the case may be. When we were children of nature on earth, the Gods came down and shepherded us until we were able to fend for ourselves. Then the Gods returned from whence they came and we left the Garden of Eden and we started our long journey through life. From that time to now we have learned much and we have learned very little. We have learned how to destroy ourselves. We have not learned to live together on this earth in peace. So again, nature will step in and say: the New Age of peace and progress is now upon us and anyone who is unable to conform to the New Age will not be here to disturb the New Age because what the New Age must accomplish is a vast leap forward in human evolution.

We like to think that much of the evil attended upon this earth comes from the unseen forces, but this is not true since much of it comes from those we see, those who would mold this earth to their own selfish and destructive ends. Those with such motivations are the ones who will not participate in the New Age of Heaven on Earth that is now phasing in and becoming a reality. No one builds a beautiful school and then allows a few destructive students to destroy the school. So, nature will not allow this to happen to this earth. Any student that chooses not to adjust will find the school of life very hard and sometimes cruel. The school does not make it this way. It is the student that does that. The student can learn as much as he wishes to learn. Some students may be slower learners than others, but they do learn in time and with greater effort. No school gives a student lessons he cannot hope to learn.

This is why a suicide is not given much understanding on the other side. In the first place, the student planned his own life, for the most part, and secondly, there were no lessons given him greater than his ability to master the lesson. So, one who kills himself gets very little sympathy on the other side.

Religion points out the rules and regulations of the school of life; the do's and don'ts to follow in order to adjust to the school's curriculum and become a well adjusted student. However, it is Transcendental Meditation that charms the mind, increases the intellect, cultures the heart and balances the body, mind and soul that allows the student to sail through the school and graduate with honors far ahead of his fellow classmen. When we learn to appreciate what the school of life offers us and we take advantage of it, then we are way ahead in our evolution.

As long as one fights life, one will be injured and bruised and filled with resentment toward life. But, when one learns to love life, to serve life and to learn from life then one will become a model student and life in return will give all it has to offer to help the student to graduate and go on to eternal life. So, we can make of life just what we wish to make of it. In ignorance, we make very little of it and some even attempt to destroy those who understand and try to teach us life's purpose. Yet, if we choose to, we can make life a great and beautiful experience. We as human beings have free will and so it is our choice.

So, in ignorance one destroys and in wisdom one constructs. The real mortal sin is that as we grow in life we know better, but we continue to destroy. It is axiomatic that as we grow in knowledge and experience we should grow closer to God and to love. However, some blindly continue their destructive ways, groping after power and control. Those who are truly on the spiritual path have gone beyond any desire to control or destroy. But the fact remains, that there are many who are still on the path of destruction and the world suffers as a result.

However, no one can be forced onto the spiritual path as this is solely a matter of self-determination and self-growth with eyes and heart fixed on the goal of realizing God. The end realization will be that the God’s shall again walk on the earth, not with the children of yesteryear, but now with God-men who are fully awakened and on their way home to an eternal life.