Jim Palmer's Blog, page 17

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT

THIS IS A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT BY JIM PALMER

Houston we have a problem! We’ve been trained to have the highest confidence in the false religious and worldly beliefs, mindsets, narratives and ideologies that have been programmed into our heads since birth. That’s only half the bad news. The other half is that we have been made to doubt and dismiss what is real in our deep feelings. We need inner anarchy! We must tear down those lies that have filled our heads, and start courageously lifting up what we know and feel is real. One day this world will stop thinking with its head, and start thinking with its heart. Why not us? Why not now?

The Sunday Morning Inner Anarchist

Sunday morning anarchist thoughts:

Someone asked me, “Do You FEEL there is something we can do MORE than throw off this “world,” live from the Heart, BE the example — never backing down ALL THE WHILE getting in people’s faces and gently screaming, “Dammit, get out of your head and get over yourself, and hurry up and become that simple child”?”

My response was:

“YES, YES, YES – that’s it!!! It’s simple isn’t it? But it’s hard as hell because of how we have been trained. It is also quite alien to what is happening in the world now.”

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Rather than appealing to or arguing against some religious or spiritual belief system or quoting what others have said about spiritual things or engaging in all kinds of heady/mental discussions about this or that spiritual belief or idea, or reading more books and joining more groups to accumulate more spiritual data, ideas and knowledge… what if we turned toward what is real in our deep feelings, and began speaking from those deep feelings to each other?

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The reason why there is needless suffering in the world is because people are operating out of that cosmos source – those false beliefs, mindsets, narratives and ideologies that rule within us. The only cure for this is turning toward that higher source within us that we connect with through those deep feelings that bubble up from within us. Nothing… NOTHING… is going to change until we turn toward that source and lift it up out of ourselves. How do we do this? We speak from those deep feelings to each other… we act on the authority of what those deep feelings show us. That is the only way things change. It’s so simple and natural that a child can do it, but we adults instead are all wound up in our head. Hatred, violence, injustice, greed, and bigotry is what happens when people are ruled within by those beliefs, mindsets, narratives, and ideologies. We aren’t helping matters if all we’re doing is plugging into the same source. That shift of source has to happen. This is the inner anarchy we need! It’s what Jesus said was the key to accessing the “kingdom of heaven” within us and birthing a reality where things are “on earth as it is in heaven.” It’s so simple but by golly we will do every other feasible thing but that!

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Years ago I started imagining what our reality and world would might like if we/humankind was “governed” by that higher spiritual source within us (pp. 196,197 in Wide Open Spaces). Every system of control instituted by man since the beginning of time wouldn’t be necessary – government, military, police… our current financial/fiduciary systems, etc… I think some of the alternatives that anarchy envisions – direct action, self-organization, mutual aid, free/voluntary association could be expressions of a new togetherness that breaks onto the scene. All of our human intelligence, brilliance and ingenuity means nothing if we don’t unshackle it from those false beliefs, mindsets, narratives and ideologies that are running the show within us.

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An FAQ was created for Inner Anarchy.

How do we get out of this mess?

Most of what we are currently believing and doing in our lives and world is nothing more than a reflection or manifestation of the false beliefs, mindsets, narratives, and ideologies that have been programmed into our heads by society, culture and religion. In other words, about everything you have believed and done throughout your life has been generated from that source. We have mostly, if not entirely, operated from those false ideas. We’ve prettied some of them up and devised kinder and gentler versions, which has only made our prison slightly more comfy for some people.

The reason why there is needless suffering in the world is because people are operating from that source of false beliefs, mindsets, narratives and ideologies that are ruling inside us. The only cure for this is turning toward that higher source within us that we connect with through our deep feelings that bubble up inside us. Nothing is going to change until we turn toward that higher source and lift it up out of ourselves. How do we do this? We speak from those deep feelings to each other, and we act on the authority of what those deep feelings show us. That is the only way things change. It’s so simple and natural that a child can do it, but we adults instead are all wound up in our head. Violence, greed, terrorism, racism and suffering is what happens when people are ruled within by those false beliefs, mindsets, narratives, and ideologies. We aren’t helping matters if all we’re doing is plugging into the same source. That shift of source has to happen. It’s what Jesus said was the key to accessing what he called the “kingdom of heaven” within us, and birthing a reality where things are “on earth as it is in heaven.” It’s so simple but apparently we are intent on doing every other feasible thing but that!

This is the message I’m trying to get across in Inner Anarchy. This world is in trouble and on a collision course with destruction and extinction. There is a reason. There is a solution. It’s not even a difficult solution but we are going to have to get over ourselves to embrace it.

Help me get this message out. Read Inner Anarchy. If it resonates with you, encourage someone else to read it. Kick out those false beliefs, mindsets, narratives and ideologies that have been programmed into your head your entire life. Turn to what is real inside you, and courageously lift that up out of you regardless of how contrary it is to what everyone else is believing and doing. We have an Inner Anarchy Facebook Group for folks who have read the book and want to walk this path. Leave a comment or email me if this is something you’re interested in being part of.

It’s best we all give up

11 Ways to Make Certain That Nothing Much Will Ever Change and We Keep Perpetuating a World that is Not Working and Ultimately Doomed:

1. Don’t think for yourself. Let others do the thinking for you.

2. Don’t question things. Assume that the way things are is more or less the way it’s just always going to be.

3. Okay, maybe question a few things… at least find a bandwagon or two to jump on… but just don’t look too far into yourself and question anything that would challenge or threaten your own sacred cows.

4. Disagree and argue with others as much as possible. Make it your job to find something wrong and lacking in about everything. Find something… anything… to be right about. In all things, assert your superiority.

5. Don’t listen to your deep feelings. When you have those moments when those homecoming-type sensations rise up in you, and what seems most real is love, harmony and togetherness, squash it! Pass it off quickly as some flighty, sentimental, feel-good nonsense. Return to your head as quickly as possible and resume thinking all that stuff that has been programmed into your head.

6. Okay, let’s say you mess up and allow yourself to actually feel those deep feelings, then at least vow never to express them. Shut them up. Stuff them back inside. Speak them? Are you crazy? Who says that stuff??? What would people think? Send those deep feelings packing and return to your regularly scheduled and safe life.

7. Live a concept-laden life. Have lots of wonderful and beautiful concepts and quotes about the way the world could be. Pontificate often about these concepts. But whatever you do, don’t take any concrete or direct actions to birth that world into reality. You may notice that the world’s division, hatred, injustice, turmoil, and suffering doesn’t quite line up with your beautiful concepts but assume that’s something for others to figure out and return to the comfort of your nice-sounding concepts.

8. Accept your inadequacy and powerlessness. Say to yourself, “I’m only one person.” Run through your mind all the ways you feel you are lacking and use it as a rationale for concluding that you can’t really make any difference.

9. Don’t buck the system. So you’ve had a few thoughts about courageously stepping out and living from those deep feelings and an entirely different way of being. Haha! Seriously? Who do you think you are? If it was that easy everyone would be doing it. What, you’re just gonna stop doing the way everyone else does anymore? Good luck!

10. Write off all this inner anarchy crap. Nothing is ever really going to change. Live your own life the best you can and don’t worry about the rest. One day you’ll die and then that’s it and it’s all over.

11. Forget you ever read this post.

Graffiti by Banksy

Is Jesus real? (And why do I insist upon talking about him?)

It’s a bit absurd that I find myself these days advocating for the historicity of Jesus given the fact that I just released a book with the sub-title: “Dethroning God and Jesus to Save Ourselves and the World.”

If you have followed my journey through my five books, you know that since 2005 I’ve been sharing my story out of organized religion and particularly Christianity. The story was tolerable to my Christian publisher through Divine Nobodies and Wide Open Spaces. But Being Jesus in Nashville was too much to take, and they rejected my manuscript and abruptly cancelled my publishing contract under the charge of heresy. So my last two books Notes from (Over) the Edge, and the newly released Inner Anarchy have been independently published works. These last few years I have deconstructed, dismantled and discarded my Christian belief system, which was an interesting path for a guy who has a Master of Divinity degree and spent many years preaching the Christian message.

There are two groups of people who are likely to be bothered by my book Inner Anarchy: those who have fixed Christian beliefs about Jesus, and those who have written him off.

Jesus got robbed by institutional Christendom. He needs a new PR Director because the Christian religion has too often given him a bad name. Jesus did not start the Christian religion. It’s not Jesus’ fault that he got hijacked by a religious ideology that preaches God’s wrath and eternal hell. Speaking of hell, if Jesus were alive today, he would raise hell against the Christian establishment much the way he did with the religious establishment of his day. I’ve been sharing these ideas for years now, which includes the 15 Things Jesus Didn’t Say post, which went viral. I also recently did a post about how I have separated Jesus from Christianity – Why I Believe in Jesus (Why I’m Not a Christian). In my most recent book Inner Anarchy I take Christianity to task, and show how the Christian religion has in many cases misrepresented and twisted the life and teachings of Jesus.

Jesus has a message and I believe it’s worth considering. In fact I believe he bore witness to and demonstrated a truth that has the power to save ourselves and a world that is careening down a path of doom. In my view, as a reaction against the absurdities of the Christian religion, people want to write Jesus out of history itself.

There is near unanimity among scholars that Jesus existed historically, although biblical scholars differ about the beliefs and teachings of Jesus as well as the accuracy of the details of his life that have been described in the Gospels. There are countless resources that delve into the matter of the historicity of Jesus. Here are a few I’ve read:

1. The Classical World: An Epic History from Homer to Hadrian by Robin Lane Fox

2. Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth by Bart D. Ehrman

3. Jesus and the Politics of his Day by E. Bammel and C. F. D. Moule

4. The Historical Jesus in Context edited by Amy-Jill Levine

5. Beyond Belief by Elaine Pagels

6. Jesus: An Historian’s Review of the Gospels by Michael Grant

7. Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth by Reza Aslan

Over the years, all kinds of non-Christian spiritual writers have spoken of the significance of Jesus. Sylvia Browne comes to mind. A couple interesting perspectives on the topic are: An atheist defense of the historicity of Jesus and The irreligious assault on the historicity of Jesus. I think one of the challenges in sorting all this out is how the Christian religion has added quite a few extracurricular ideas and teachings about Jesus that aren’t historically verifiable.

Another problem the Christian religion has caused with respect to Jesus is making Jesus’ truth and teachings exclusive. According to this mindset, one has to “become a Christian” and “accept only Jesus” in order to have the truth. So either you belong to the Christian club, or you’re out of luck, doomed, and destined for Hell. Seriously??? The truth Jesus bore witness to and demonstrated has universal significance and it doesn’t require one to become a Christian. Jesus never intended for himself or his teaching to become a religion. Instead, Jesus confronted the problem with the religious mindset altogether, and lifted up truth that any person can embrace if they are willing to look inside themselves.

It is not the “sinners” of the world who need to “accept Jesus,” it’s the Christians. They are the “unbelievers” who turned Jesus into a religion and failed to embrace his truth. Accepting the truth that Jesus bore witness to and demonstrated will make you a heretic like he was. That’s the kind of inner anarchy we need now. I count myself as one of those who had done just that. I had to apply inner anarchy to myself.

I wrote in Inner Anarchy:

“As I write this book, I send rough drafts of chapters to a few ex-Institutional-Christian friends for input and feedback. That was humbling! A few of them were like, “Seriously, Jim; we’re back to quoting Bible verses?!” That didn’t go over too well! It wasn’t easy convincing them that this was not just a rehash of their old religion. Having just spent years shedding religion, they were fearful of getting sucked right back into it. Maybe others of you felt the same.

Hopefully I succeeded in persuading them that what this book is about is nothing like that. But to lift up what is real and shine the light on where all this is going, it was necessary to untangle the mess the Christian religion had made of Jesus and his teachings. It was critical to see that Jesus taught that the God and heaven we have all been waiting for up in the sky have been in us all along. Once we get that, we can let that entire mindset and system die off and become obsolete.”

(Image by Gregilnero/deviantart.com)

Trusting and speaking our deep feelings

Since the book was released a few weeks ago, an inner anarchy group has been growing. It started as a Facebook group but we are expanding to a LiveJournal community to better support the level of interaction and conversations we are having in the group. One thing we are doing is discussing the book, chapter by chapter. What follows is the post related to the first chapter. Would love to hear your thoughts.

In Chapter One of Inner Anarchy I start hitting on a particular underlying theme, which is the need to shift to a different source than we’ve been operating under.

Here are a couple excerpts:

“We have put our faith in government, religion, philosophy, psychology, philanthropy, science, technology, and economics, but a quick scan of the daily news shows that none of those are working. Is trying harder really the answer? Some of our planet’s best-intentioned, most brilliant, passionate, dedicated people have poured themselves into every field imaginable. If those avenues could have solved our dilemma, they would have by now.”

“The people who made the promises, societal institutions, and structures that were to solve our problems and make things work and the ideas and knowledge that were supposed to carry us forward into a grand future have not delivered. Many people are now seeing that our God explanations don’t make logical sense. There is no shining light on the horizon that we can look toward with real hope. No . . . not anywhere.”

Of course it’s true that our human ingenuity and brilliance has in many cases improved how we are getting along within our current parameters, but they have not and cannot transform the parameters themselves. Meanwhile, those parameters are like walls closing in on us and choking the life right out of humankind and our planet.

Operating like this has become so ingrained in us that we hardly know any other way other than dipping into that same well over and over and over again. In the book I refer to that well as the ideas, mindsets, narratives and ideologies that rule us from within. There are many different flavors of this, but in the end it’s all the same thing because it’s coming from the same source – that “cosmos” reasoning that I discuss in the book. Even people who “shed religion” and become more liberal and progressive/enlightened in their thinking are often still operating under the same source.

The inner anarchy I call for in the book is fundamentally a shift in source. The shift is turning toward that Spirit-mind within us, which we connect with through our deep feelings. When Jesus said “the kingdom of heaven is within us,” he was referring to this dimension and source inside us. This is where the power is. This is where our salvation and the salvation of the world lies. It doesn’t require some special sort of enlightenment, only that we become elemental like children ad start listing to and trusting what bubbles up inside us through those deep feelings.

Rather than appealing to or arguing against some religious or spiritual belief system or quoting what others have said about spiritual things or engaging in all kinds of heady/mental discussions about this or that spiritual belief or idea, or reading more books and joining more groups to accumulate more spiritual data, ideas and knowledge… I want to encourage us to focus on this shift of source, turning toward those deep feelings within us, and speaking from those deep feelings to each other.

What makes this shift of source and listening to and following our deep feelings so difficult? Are we willing to operate in an entirely different way than what we’re used to? How can we encourage and support one another in this? What would it look like to start speaking to one another from those deep feelings in our own words? How can we break our dependency and attachment to that old way of operating?

The secret anarchy group

We started an Inner Anarchy Group on Facebook, and the group is growing. It is a “secret” group by invite only. Facebook groups have some limitations and we are currently scouting out some community forum platforms so we can organize the many conversations happening in the group right now, and make it a little easier for folks to search out topics and conversations of interest and participate. If you have read Inner Anarchy, comfortable with the content and want to be in the group, leave me a comment or send me an email with your email address, and I will send you an invite.

There is no cost to be in the group. It’s a great group of people so far – lots of fun and creative folks, free-thinkers, and people who are serious about the path of inner anarchy. It’s a diverse group with a lot of openness, understanding, empathy and a encouraging/supportive spirit. In a nutshell, the group is for those are compelled to dethrone the false mindsets that have been ruling us from within, and to turn toward what is real in our deep feelings and that Spirit/”heavenly” dimension within us. This is a group about nurturing a real an authentic togetherness among us, and supporting one another as we operate out of that deep-feeling dimension within us and courageously lift that reality out of ourselves and into the world.

We are currently working through Inner Anarchy, chapter by chapter, and today I posted the topic for conversation related to the third chapter. I have it posted below to give you a feel for the kinds of conversations we are having.

“You could sum up Chapter Three of Inner Anarchy this way:

No person, no God, no religion, no belief-system or ideology, no political philosophy or party, no scientific discovery, no medical or technological advancement, no amount of humanitarian aid or effort… can save us or our world.

It’s not that none of these have any merit. Of course they do. Modern medicine, science and technology have made extraordinary contributions to humankind, and humanitarian aid has alleviated a lot of human suffering. But despite all our advancements and efforts in every field and endeavor, the underlying condition of the world remains unchanged. In other words, all those efforts are not touching the root problem.

I wrote in Inner Anarchy:

“It makes no difference where you turn. Religion is no different from politics, which is no different from science, which is no different from our education system, which is no different from pop culture, which is no different from . . . you name it! They have all been infected by the same false premises, and we have been indoctrinated by them. The enemy is not someone or something out there, but is inside each of us in the form of these beliefs.”

And…

“We have to wake up! It is time to overthrow the system of ideas that rules our world and fills our heads.

Instead, what we have done so far is replace old ideas with new ones, but the new ideas are as contaminated as the old ones, because they originate from the same source. The inner anarchy we need is a change in source.”

Let me give you an example. If right now we began to lift up out of us those deep feelings that bubble up from that Spirit/”heavenly” dimension within us, than our world would experience an authentic and powerful togetherness like we have never seen or known, and the problems that are afflicting humankind and our world today would be gone. However, no amount of religion, politics, science, and humanitarianism can substitute. Without that true togetherness we are just spinning our wheels and postponing the inevitable hardship, crisis, tragedy and doom that are constantly cycling through despite all our efforts.

Nothing is going to truly change in our world until this switch in source happens. I keep beating this drum but it’s difficult to get this point across because people have an over inflated appraisal of what can be done through our human knowledge, efforts and good-intentions. Once we transform the essential parameters of our world, than our efforts in fields such as science and cosmology will explode in ways we never imagined. But until we transform those parameters we are only beating our heads against the wall… doing the same thing over and over and over and over again, and expecting a different result.

This is the challenge before us. It’s too easy to get all locked up in our heads even in our spiritual and enlightened conversations. This is not going to get worked out in our heads and trying to cobble together the most enlightening ides we can come up with. All we have to do is become like children, turn to those deep feelings within us, and lift them out of us. This is all very disappointing to our egos, which want to work it out the other way.

How can we go about this? What would it look like to become those children and start lifting those deep feelings out of us?”

**Edit to add: the group has grown quite a bit as of this blog post, and we may need to move to a community forum platform as soon as we can work one out. If you are interested in the group but don’t get an invite right away, just give it a day or two. Thanks for your patience :)

Why I believe in Jesus (Why I’m not a Christian)

Why do I insist on continuing to talk about Jesus?

Believe me; it’s not a very popular thing to do! On the one hand there are those who have “shed religion” and shed Jesus with it. For many of these folks, the mention of Jesus reminds them of everything that was wrong and even damaging about their beliefs and involvement related to the Christian religion. There are also those who may have never been Christians but crossed paths with enough of them to know that the whole Jesus-thing is something to steer clear of. Many atheists and agnostics don’t really see any point in giving a lot of credence to Jesus. After all, there’s not a very kind historical record of what has often happened in the name of Jesus. The Crusades of the Middle Ages come to mind. Westboro Baptist church is another. There is no shortage of examples of how Christian religious fundamentalism has done great harm in our world.

All of this hubbub over someone who some say never even lived and whose existence is just a myth.  So there’s definitely an anti-Jesus or feeling of indifference toward Jesus that is prevalent. There are many contemporary spiritual teachers who say we need to forget about Jesus and adopt more progressive and enlightened understandings, going forward.

Then on the other hand, the typical person who holds a strong belief in Jesus, namely Christians, aren’t too fond of me talking about Jesus either. This is because what I say about Jesus doesn’t support the beliefs, mindsets and orthodoxy of the Christian religion. I ran into this pretty early in my writing career when my Christian publishing house rejected the manuscript for my third book, immediately cancelled my writing contract, and accused me of heresy. My most recent book Inner Anarchy sent Christian folk through the roof. I receive emails daily from Christians who condemn me to hell, call down God’s wrath upon my head, and liken me to David Koresh and Jim Jones.

So, talking about Jesus these days is a dangerous thing to do for lots of different reasons. So why do I continue?

There are a lot of people for whom their rejection of or ambivalence toward Jesus is because the Jesus they were exposed to came through the filter of the Christian religion. That’s unfortunate. It’s unfortunate because the Christian religion (at least the one I was once associated with) does not accurately represent the life and message of Jesus. Jesus did not start the Christian religion, and if Jesus were alive today he certainly would not be one. If Jesus came around today and lived and taught the way he did 2,000 years ago, Christian folk would be the first ones to crucify him. Jesus was not a religious person, and vehemently opposed religion and the way it separated people from God, and divided them against each other. Once speaking to a group of religious leaders, Jesus called their “God” an impostor, a liar, and a murderer—even the Devil!

The Christian religion does not own Jesus, and until a person separates the person Jesus from the religion that claims his name, the truth that Jesus bore witness to and demonstrated will not get out. This is the reason why I wrote Inner Anarchy.

Regardless of one’s religious faith there is little doubt among contemporary historians that Jesus was a real person who lived in Palestine in the First Century. Historians agree that Jesus was an itinerant teacher who traveled and taught throughout Palestine gathering followers around him through the force of his personality and the compelling nature of his message.  There is general agreement that Jesus was perceived by the Roman occupiers of Palestine as a dangerous religious radical and a disturber of the peace. It didn’t help that Jesus infuriated the religious establishment for refusing to legitimize it. Consequently, he was arrested by the local authorities and summarily executed by the Romans in a public crucifixion, the standard method used by the Romans to deal with political troublemakers. There have been a few books written about this Jesus; a more recent one is, Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth by Reza Aslan.

A re-interpretation of Jesus outside the Christian religion is necessary, and in my view we owe this to Jesus and his true legacy.

There are people who have found Jesus to be significant outside the box of the Christian religion. For example, there is a very robust tradition of “Christian humanism,” emphasizing the humanity of Jesus, his social teachings and belief in universal human dignity, and his propensity to synthesize human spirituality and the material world. There has also been a “Christian anarchist” movement, most notably championed by Leo Tolstoy, that claims that anarchism is inherent in the life and teaching of Jesus. Jesus is far more radical than many would have you believe, and for good reason – it threatens the status quo and all religious and cultural institutions of authority and power.

Jesus’ primary message was about what he referred to as the “Kingdom of God” or the “Kingdom of Heaven.” When people questioned Jesus about when this Kingdom would arrive, Jesus said it already had and was within them. Jesus taught that this “Kingdom” was a real dimension and reality that we experience naturally deep within us. You don’t have to be a religious scholar or enlightened guru to access it. Jesus said instead you have to become like a child and be willing to trust and follow what bubbles up from your deep feelings. What Jesus was saying to his generation was that the Kingdom of God was not a future political kingdom to anticipate but was rather a present reality to the degree that his message was heard and acted upon by his disciples. His teaching was not to anticipate a future kingdom but rather to bring about the Kingdom of God in the present through one’s actions and commitments, and lifting those deep feelings up out of us and into the world. That “heavenly dimension” within us is the source of the power, authority, love, freedom and togetherness that can transform our current human situation.

I wrote Inner Anarchy because I believe that reconsidering Jesus and the truth he bore witness to and demonstrated can birth a new world. That truth is not a religious truth or contingent upon any religious ideology – it is universally significant and accessible to any and every human being. It’s the Christian religion that wrongly made it all about Jesus rather than his message. Jesus died but his truth is still alive in each and every one of us, waiting to be born and brought out into our world if we are willing to embrace it naturally like a child. There are 2.5+ billion Christians on our planet. I sometimes wonder how different our world would be if we stopped worshiping Jesus and started trusting and following what we all know is true and real deep inside us that Jesus told us to listen to.

For me, that message is worth sharing… even with the hate mails I receive each day and being called Jim Jones.

The art of inner anarchy

My good friend and artist Donna Willis Kinnaird created the first painting (see above) to express the spirit of the book Inner Anarchy. There are a few symbols in the painting that have special significance, including the raven. It’s a 24 x 24 x 2 acrylic on canvas. 

There are some out there who are declaring war on the world in the name of God, religion, politics, power and personal gain. What we need instead is to declare war on those beliefs, mindsets and ideologies that are ruling us from within, dividing human beings each other, and putting our planet and people at risk of extinction. This is why I wrote Inner Anarchy, and what I’m sharing everywhere I go.

We have to tear down the one, and lift up the other. We have to push away the stone that is blocking the way and lift up out of ourselves what saves ourselves and the world.

This is not for the faint of heart. Jesus got killed for doing this and living this way. It’s not going to be a bed of roses. You become a threat the minute you begin start questioning and discarding those religious and cultural narratives, and start turning to that authority inside yourself.

The “inner anarchy” I am talking about is a shift in source. Shifting from those cultural and religious narratives programmed in our heads, and turning toward those deep feelings that emanate from that “kingdom of heaven” within us. Don’t get hung up on the words identifying it. I think Jesus used these words to point out that it is a very real persona, dimension, source, mind, consciousness within us. A new world unfolds as we speak to each other from those deep feelings, and lift them up out of us into the world. We can lift those feelings out in our talking to one another. We can lift those feelings out through art, music, poetry, and many many other ways. I want to challenge us all to do this today and every day – to life those deep feelings out of us in concrete ways.

If you’ve read Inner Anarchy and are interested in joining a group of folks who are encouraging and supporting one another on this path, let me know.

On being called Jim Jones (and the need for inner anarchy)

Hello, friends.

Just popping in with a brief update on things. So, it’s been a few weeks since Inner Anarchy has been released. The responses span the full spectrum, including the accusation of being a cult leader and likened to David Koresh and Jim Jones.

What’s been particularly interesting is how the book is getting around the globe. This morning I received an email from someone who runs an outdoors adventure lodge in New Zealand. One of the river guides got the book and is passing it around to his friends there. Currently Inner Anarchy is being translated into French, Slovak, and Portuguese. The Inner Anarchy Facebook Group has folks from all over the world, which makes it especially meaningful and lots of fun. I’m focusing quite a bit on that group. The plan is to develop and expand it in some different ways. Anyone can be in the group. The only prerequisite is that you’ve read Inner Anarchy, and feel comfortable with the content. The group isn’t about arguing and debating theology, and more about supporting one another in true togetherness and the kind of inner anarchy I talk about in the book.

I’ve been in conversations with folks who are humanists and Atheists, and we are finding lots of common ground to discuss and ponder. To be honest, in many ways I connect with these folks better than most because they are not all hung up in religion, and tend to be more free and independent thinking types. One thing I’m finding is that most of the world understands Jesus only through the lens of the Christian religion. In most cases this is quite unfortunate for Jesus and the world. Inner Anarchy offers a very different picture of Jesus that I believe matters for the whole world and our current situation, whatever your religious tradition or no belief in “God” at all.

I was asked to participate in a new/different social media platform that is currently in its beta testing phase. I’m really liking the idea behind it and how it’s working. It’s related to my friends over at TED.

I would say give Inner Anarchy a chance. I know the book has been the center of much controversy but I want to ask you to read it with an open heart and mind, and see what you come up with. It’s available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle.

The Inner Anarchy Group is a “secret” group on Facebook. If you read it, and want to be in the group, send me an email or private FB message, and include your regular email address so I can send the invite.

Here are a few posts about the book you might find useful:

About Inner Anarchy

A five step plan for reading Inner Anarchy without being caught