Religion vs. Hollywood

It starts with your need to safeguard our children and a desire to promote wholesome, life-affirming values and develop the intellect, empathy and artistic appreciation of our society. This desire makes you sit and pay attention to the voices of religious critics of Hollywood. So you initially feel drawn to read Brent Bozell III’s blog and decentfilms.com.

It ends when you realize the “Family Friendly” common ground you thought you shared with the religious critics disguises another mission entirely.
What mission is that? Well it becomes rather obvious after a while.

All Must Serve Our Objectives

All religious fundamentalists would prefer if all forms of artistic expression acted in service of their doctrines, values and their preferred socio-economic/political paradigm.

Just like Al Jezera acts in service of fundamentalist Muslim doctrines and values, in our western society, the Christian fundamentalists want Hollywood to do the same. In a society that promises free speech and free enterprise, they cannot compete with Hollywood’s volume and mass audience. So, the only way is to seek to infiltrate and plagiarize. When that does not work, they use boycotts and when that does not work, they seek to overthrow the entire industry by seeding mass suspicion of Hollywood through constant condemnation.

Why do religious entities have this far-fetched presumption that artistic expression should serve them?

Well, who says it’s far-fetched? At one point in time, all art did was serve religion.

When Religion Owned And Dictated Everything



There was a time when religious advancement was the only purpose for which art would be sanctioned, whether music, drama, poetic verse, art, sculpture and architecture. It was not just art but any discipline which could influence the individual materially, intellectually, physically, socio-politically or emotionally. The religious empires must have realised early one that if one controlled these aspects, it was easier to also influence the spiritual lives of human beings.
From the Middle East to Europe, religion controlled everything, from finance to scientific research and education to the practice of medicine to law to governance to philosophy and of course art.

This was not the case everywhere though.

Art for art’s sake was already practiced in many parts of the East in ancient Japan, China and India and among many indigenous cultures that did not view the physical world as less “hallowed” than the spiritual world but a valid continuation of it. Creativity was recognized as Divine expression and there was just as much reverence for a poem about the cherry blossoms as there was for a song about the Goddess that created them. The act of being creative was seen as a spiritual act no matter if the art created was inspired by religion, sex or nature. The first European visitors to the Orient were astounded by the vibrancy, the colour, the creative energy that seemed to effuse every waking moment.



Back in church ruled Europe, a composer was expected to compose religious music. A painter was expected to be commissioned by the Church. Anything outside of that was considered “folk”, “heathen” and severely censored. In Islamic territories art and what could be represented, written or composed was restricted even more. The hand, heart and head were intended to serve God in everything. Of course the catch is, “God” and “the man-made religious bureaucracy” were essentially one and the same thing. If you dared to question that, it would be the gallows, chopping block, stoning hill, iron maiden or pyre for you!

However, man would soon discover that religion was not the ultimate source of truth and fulfillment of the material, intellectual, physical, socio-political or emotional needs of mankind.

Religious Control Challenged



It happened with science (intellectual & physical) first when people like Galileo saw that science was its own authority. The laws that govern our universe cannot be religiously mandated or interpreted only through a narrow religious doctrine from an ancient “holy” book. Of course, he paid an awful price for challenging the Church on their inaccurate stance about the sun revolving around the earth.
Other disciplines that quickly followed were medicine (intellectual & physical) and the discovery of germs and rejection of demons being the cause of illness. Next came governance, law, philosophy (intellectual & socio-political) which re-birthed (it was already born in Greece centuries ago) the concept of democracy, equality, just cause, trial by jury and paved the way for our secular (Church is separate from State) societies today.

Once we began objective research, observation of the human condition and governance of human society free from religious superstition and supposition, art, which is a reflection of life, quickly followed.



Art for art’s sake took off during the Renaissance. By the time the Post Revolutionary Bohemian movement and Age of Reason dawned, it was already fully emancipated from the Church. New doorways opened as absinthe, marijuana and opium found their way into the intellectual and artistic communities of Europe. It finally dawned on Europeans that that just like philosophy and science, art can, all by itself be a means of seeking, questioning and answering the deepest dilemmas of the universe without any slavish devotion to religion. If a person was creative enough to explore independently, truth and enlightenment would find them eventually.
In Islamic societies, the restrictions remained and still remain to this day.



The religious war against artistic expression and fight for ultimate control of it is fully demonstrated by the Muslim Fundamentalists in Somalia want to ban all music because it is “un-Islamic”.

The religious establishment hates competition.

Although most denominations gave up the battle for science and medicine, they are still fighting for control of the way we govern ourselves, think about ourselves, think about others, relate to others and how we express all of this through art.
The ascendance of art as its own authority presented a challenge to the religious status quo, especially because artistic expression in all its forms proved to be a profound, popular and powerful influencer and trigger rivaling even religious devotion. Can you imagine the affront when people began flocking to the theatre more than they did to the churches and leaving vast sums of money to the arts? Can you imagine the outrage when people got moral lessons from plays by Shakespeare and Oscar Wilde instead of their parish priest?

Artistic expression has the power to evoke the same emotional high and spiritual transcendence on which religious devotion once had the monopoly.

Art has no master and no limits. Painters, musicians, playwrights, sculptors and writers began setting their imagination free and it would not be long before they imagined worlds where religion did not figure and situations where the morality expounded by religion was inferior to bourgeoning human wisdom. Art was universal, anarchic and a tool available to radicals to challenge the status quo on which religion depends.

When moving images (motion picture) and the industry around it was discovered and implemented it was not by devout Christians or Muslims. The founders of Hollywood’s top studios were worldly, Deistic, atheistic, Masonic or Jewish. The new art-form was founded in a still young country whose founding fathers lay the foundation for a New World where no religious belief was to be given special dispensation by the State. All were guaranteed free speech as they were freedom of belief.

The founders of Hollywood’s top studios, Warner Bros, Twentieth Century Fox, Paramount, Columbia were not devout Christians or Muslims.

A war between religion and Hollywood for the hearts and minds of people was inevitable.

Hollywood is certainly not the only or most perfect model of independent, revolutionary artistic expression. Fundamentalist Christians and Muslims also protest visual art exhibitions, literature, television, plays and music that do not serve their interests. However Hollywood is the most powerful force of artistic exploitation and conveyance in our world. It also refuses to aid the survival of the religious status quo even though that was not how their relationship started off.

How The Relationship Went Sour



There was a time when Hollywood took the religious preferences and status quo of America very seriously.

There was a time when Hollywood still pandered heavily to religion and the status quo police in America. It not only produced scores of religious films which brought fantastic tales of the bible to life, it often found itself presenting to America a picture of herself that was not actually true or even right. The fifties were not as wholesome as Hollywood portrayed. Fortunately, not all art-forms in the 1950s fell short of authenticity. The literature, poetry, art and underground music of that time revealed women suffering in quiet desperation; no longer content to be girly, subservient sycophants. The happy dancing “negroes” content to be the help was not the norm. Young people weren’t just chastely kissing in the backseat while listening to Perry Cuomo and America was not doing heroic things abroad in Africa and Asia. A storm more chaotic than a Jackson Pollock painting was brewing.



Many who over-depended on Hollywood were caught completely off-guard by the civil rights, women’s and hippie movement. The new rock and roll rebellious culture seemed to come out of nowhere. Then, all of a sudden, rather than censure it, Hollywood started to embrace the youth culture, new age thinking and changing status quo. That was a betrayal many conservative Christians still have not forgiven. In fact there seemed to be a new fraction in Hollywood that became almost desperate to regain authenticity and be the voice of the young and innovative instead of the voice of the establishment.



Hollywood chose to embrace the changing culture rather than cling to the establishment and instantly won lifelong enemies among America’s conservative values base.

This would only add to the outrage and post traumatic stress disorder of many from that “Good Ole 50’s” generation who had their comforting status quo rug unexpectedly and violently pulled from beneath them. The same outraged voices who protested Elvis’ swinging hips and white Petula Clark singing with black Harry Belafonte during primetime television are the forbearers of the anti-Hollywood brigade. They were unprepared for the loss of their “lily-white” television, traditional gender roles and simple morality where everyone knew their place. They are not going to make that mistake again.

What Religion Wants From The Media



If Christian fundamentalists had their way could have their way, we’d all be watching “Christian films” and if Muslim fundamentalists had their way, we’d be watching "Muslim films".

Of course when artistic expression is dictated by religion it quickly becomes contrived, creatively unoriginal and uninspiring. It’s the reason why Renaissances happen! The human spirit simply cannot contain its need to engage in true, uncensored reflection or exploration of life in all its diverse, complex glory. Religious dictated art can never serve the imagination’s yearning to entertain all the billions of universal possibilities that exist in the future. Religious dictated art cannot risk being thought-provoking and open ended to allow for personal interpretation and spark debate.

For although that is purpose of art. It is not the purpose of religion. It never has been!

To illustrate, sometimes there moments when Hollywood actually gets it right! They come out swinging for environmental conservation; break down prejudices, crush gender and sexual stereotypes, convey profound messages against greed, violence, colonialism, fundamentalism, apathy, fear and encourage healthy skepticism, investigatory mind-set and creative thinking. Plus they do it with poignancy, sophistication in a way that is entertaining and most importantly age appropriate for the intended audience. Sometimes Hollywood gets it so right, the film is downright spiritual on a universal level.

So you think, wow, the religious critics must love this film!

Only to find out, they HATE it.

And you go, “What? I thought we were on the same page here?”

Well no, you’re not.

Join the ranks of those baffled by religious critique of Avatar as “evil promotion of paganism and the hippie Green movement”; American Beauty as “a blatant attack on traditional family values”, Crash as “morally suspect” and Happy Feet as "sneaky and dangerous message to children about society accepting homosexuality and young ones knowing better than their elders.”

When many of us see reviews like this, we are just as shocked to learn we were momentarily associated with the kind of loons who rant about Harry Potter being evil or declare fatwa on a Danish cartoonist.

What are we missing here?
What we are missing is knowledge the religious fundamentalist’s real motivations.



Even when Hollywood gets it right for you and me, the religious right is still outraged.

Christian and Muslim fundamentalists will naturally oppose ANY source that seeks to influence any opinions or behaviours that challenge or contradict their doctrines and dominance as the only, unchallenged, undisputed voice of authority. This is essential to having influence over a large population that can be mobilized to defend the socio-economic and political systems that best serves their organizational needs.

Therefore you can trust a fundamentalist Christian or Muslim to nix a film that has even the smallest iota of:

• Sympathetic or positive portrayal of non-Abrahamic/Judeo Christian beliefs, especially magic (Harry Potter), indigenous Shamanism (Avatar), Hinduism etc.
• Skepticism about religious doctrines (Da Vinci Code, Stigmata, Fitna)
• Positive portrayal of sexual relationship constructs outside what they believe to be the only right one- e.g. romance and sex between unmarried straight couples(Pretty Woman, Ghost, and thousands more)
• Tolerance, acceptance, understanding of those who do not fit their ideal of human sexuality (Philadelphia, Mrs. Doubtfire, The Laramie Project)
• Portraying women as self-determined, sexually liberated, vocal and proud and able to demand and enjoy good sex free of all male-dominated religious constructs (Sex And The City, Bridget Jonses Diary)
• Less than flattering portrayals of their preferred family construct- domestic abuse, unhappy, unfulfilled housewives, domineering, insensitive husbands, poor sex life, adultery, divorce etc. (American Beauty, The Hours, Revolutionary Road, The Stoning of Soraya M)
• Promoting defiance of authority, rejection of the status quo, tradition and elders not being always being right especially directed at youth (Footloose, Happy Feet)
• Any messages about embracing different cultures, accepting diversity, respecting foreign cultures especially directed at children (Rabbit Proof Fence, Little Princess)
• Negative portrayals of their religious organizations or communities, historical or present-day (Joan of Arc, The Kingdom, Deliver Us From Evil, Submission {a film about abuse of women in certain Islamic communities which cost the Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh his life at the hands of a Muslim extremist})
• Negative portrayals of the political/economic systems with which the religion enjoys a comfortable symbiosis (see my next blog post) (Bowling For Columbine, An Inconvenient Truth)
• Any promotion of earth-loving, hippie, one-love, universality where their religion enjoys no superiority over any other beliefs systems (Who Is God?)
• Shows a future world, fantasy world or our world where their religion plays no role (Too many films to count)

So while a film may pass your artistic, intellectual or even parenting standards it may not pass those of the religious fundamentalist. This is so obvious when it comes to one thing in particular…sex.

Sex, Hollywood And The Religious Right



Sex is the one thing Abrahamic-Judeo-Christian religions have always regulated with an iron fist. The artistic urge has also compelled us to explore this aspect of our human existence. Some of the first pictures we drew on rock walls were of the naked human form and sexual organs and similarly some of the first images to be captured by the earliest motion picture camera were the naked human form and sexual intercourse. The fascination has never stopped. Hollywood cannot portray enough of sex and it does so with no regard for what the religious status quo may prefer. Take homosexuality for example.

Remember that art reflects life. Our human societies have been given new insights about sexuality thanks to science which like Galileo proved, speaks the truth even if it contradicts what the various holy books and holy men say. Scientific research has revealed that homosexuality is not unnatural. Nature favours diversity in everything, including gender and sexuality. So it is actually unnatural to expect 7 billion individuals to have a uniform sexuality, uniform gender construct and unilateral form of sexual expression.



Those who are religiously proud are understandably offended and affronted because their views on homosexuality are being openly contradicted now that the findings of independent scientific and medical research and human rights activism changed what the mainstream knows to be true.

Science is now getting closer to confirming that sexual diversity is written into our genetic code. After extensive research, the medical community also agrees and their peer-reviewed studies have confirmed homosexuality is not a mental illness and gays and lesbians can be just as healthy, well-adjusted, contributing members of society in every way as straight people. However the biggest shift in thinking came from gays and lesbians coming out and speaking their truth no matter what condemnation they faced. By presenting a human face, they became harder to demonize as a result.

Just as it did interracial romance in times past with films like Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner and Star Trek (which scandalized the Southern Baptist Convention who sent hate mail in droves), Hollywood now pioneers positive portrayals of gays and lesbians. Those who are religiously proud are understandably offended and affronted because their views on the subject are being openly contradicted and no longer being presented as the absolute authority on the matter.

The religious right continues to expect the public to accept without proper scientific substantiation that they are the final authority on all matters concerning our sexuality.

Surprisingly, I fully support their right to air their grievances. Free speech, remember? What I do not support is that they do not use the same privilege of free speech that emboldens Hollywood, to prove to the public that their religious views on homosexuality are more valid and well-founded. Instead, the religious right’s first response is always advocacy of censorship with the assumption all should obey because they are the final authority on the matter. However, they are yet to properly substantiate this.

Judging What Is Truly Harmful To A Society

Many Christian critiques of Hollywood’s portrayal of sex only focus on, HOW NUDE were the couples and was it WAS IN KEEPING WITH OUR STANDARDS OF BIBLICAL SEXUAL MORALITY. A traditionalist Muslim most likely would share those concerns just (substitute Koran for bible) plus have an emphasized condemnation of any portrayals of female sexual satisfaction if they are the kind of Muslim that practices female genital mutilation.



Look I don’t care if you want to have Christian sex or Muslim sex and I don’t expect you to have sex informed by my spiritual outlook. That is none of my business. But the things that are far more universally important to society are my business. Ironically they are hardly ever the things religious fundamentalists focus on.

The rational, reasonable concerns we should have with Hollywood and its portrayals of sex and gender roles should transcend anyone’s particular religious beliefs and apply to all people universally.

For example, it is everyone’s business that every adult engages in CONSENSUAL SEX and only WITH ANOTHER ADULT. NO FORM OF SEXUAL VIOLENCE should ever be glamorized in film nor should UNSAFE SEXUAL BEHAVIOR as sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancy are also everybody’s business. The proliferation of any UNFAIR, EXPLOITATIVE, OPPRESSIVE OR INHUMANE GENDER ROLES that robs men and women of their sexual self-esteem are also societal concerns. Growing up with constant INACCURATE portrayals of men automatically knowing the very first time, what a woman likes in bed can lead to so many unfair expectations and sexual problems in marriage which are the leading cause of divorce which often inhibit couples with children from parenting properly during and afterwards.

“Lot and his daughters” the “Holy Books” are rife with sexuality, including incest, rape, polygamy, mutilation and worse.

We should all want everyone to have fulfilling sex lives so they can be good contributors to society whether they are Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, atheist. Thankfully we have more than enough knowledge through objective science and research to know what works best for the sexual health, happiness and well-being of men and women regardless of their personal faith-based beliefs.

Sex and human sexuality is a natural part of life. It even features prominently in “holy books” which require religious people to explain to children about incest, polygamy, adultery, forced marriages, attempted same-sex gang rape and worse but somehow cannot manage their children’s exposure to the slightest bit of sexuality in films that requires similar explanation of the context.

There is absolutely no need to throw a hissy fit about cinematic portrayals of nudity, homosexuality, or the sexual act itself. It is part of real life. Art reflects real life. The issue should be the intention. Does it serve a loftier purpose whether artistic, spiritual, educational (Romeo & Juliet, Blue Lagoon, Victor Victoria) or is it just for cheap thrills? The issue should be age appropriateness. How much sexual realism is okay for what age? Can the context be discussed and explained properly.

So when should you throw a hissy fit? Let me illustrate:

Today, we know from countless peer reviewed studies how important self-esteem is for young girls to help them make responsible and rewarding sexual choices.



A movie like Twilight where the female lead is weak-minded, aimless, self-absorbed and allows her life to be compromised literally all for a boy who is walking death, stalks her and wants to drink her blood, sends a dangerous message to young girls. Sure, in future films (based on the novel) the female protagonist waits till marriage to have sex, but it leaves her bruised and battered and pregnant with a baby that could kill her, which she insists on having regardless. What a wonderful message for young girls! Only a boy can add meaning to your otherwise empty life and your desperate teenage crush based purely on superficial attraction trumps your own self-preservation.



Now take a movie like Juno where the female lead is strong minded, intelligent, confident and actually has goals and talent but makes a common irresponsible mistake and gets pregnant out of wedlock. She handles it astutely by making lofty and shrewd choices, showing wit and spirit. She experiences a dramatic learning curve about love, life and trusting people, emerging stronger and wiser at the end.

Which movie do you think will contribute more to blind, love-sick, irresponsible sexual choices among teenage girls? For me and teen development experts and most discerning parents, it’s Twilight, not Juno.


Put your shame aside and be honest and open with your children about sex.

Religious film critics would have us measure every inch of exposed flesh. They want us to time the length of every teenage French kiss and meticulously scan fingers for wedding bands. I advise looking at movies through a more discerning lens. Do not judge based on your own sexual shame. That is not going to help your kids. It will only distract you from more important issues and more important values that influence our young people about sex and sexuality. It will only make you miss valuable opportunities to engage in meaningful dialogue with them about these issues.

If we truly got honest, empowered and enlightened about sex and were able to pass that on to our kids, religion would no longer be the final authority on the matter. That is what they truly fear.

Sex is not even the most important factor to me when it comes to Hollywood.

It’s violence.



Superfluous violence should outrage us with a passion that far exceeds our prudery!

Yet Christian and Muslim film reviewers excuse more violence than sex. It shows where people’s hang-ups truly are in our society. So no matter what, we could always use a little more serial killer slashers, renegade cops shooting out in the streets, people blowing up things and cinematic reenactments of passion plays whose original purpose was meant to incite Jewish hatred in ancient times. But more kissing and lovemaking? No thanks. Religious movie critics expect me to buy that nihilistic or gore filled violence just to sicken, shock and scare is less of a threat to young people and society than watching two men fall in love. Please.

Have we forgotten the tragic history of our humanity through the ages?

A buxom starlet in the throes of orgasm should delight us! She is doing something nature intended her to experience, something that does not violate the universal principle of “Do unto others”. A buxom starlet in the throes of gory agony at the hand of a sadistic killer is what should disgust us! Audiences watching it and laughing should outrage us. Have we no respect for the victims and families of the real life versions of these monsters? The gangsta lifestyle is not glamorous! Have we lost sight of the young lives snuffed out in the street and the mothers wailing with grief? War is not a fun adventure and good rollicking time! It is a tragedy.
When it comes to spilling the blood of another human being, it is never entertainment. It was wrong when the Romans did it in their coliseums. It is wrong now. I don’t have to overemphasize why it should concern us as a society regardless of religious belief.

The ugly truth is, the gory horror and violent action film industry serves the religious agenda very well. If we actually were to become peace-loving, they will have a harder time selling intolerance and violent condemnation to us.

Then again, if we human beings began to really sensitize ourselves to have a low tolerance for violence it would threaten the religious status quo. Read the Old Testament lately? Ever listened to a impassioned sermon about hell? Ever listen to the hate-filled vitriol of a radical Imam? How can you sell death and destruction in a religion if people have no stomach for it and no admiration for a God that sanctions it? How can you instill a fear of evil if you cannot constantly point to pointless blood soaked portrayals of it?

The ugly truth is, the gory horror and violent action film industry serves the religious agenda very well. They can always point to it and go, “See? Demons, demons everywhere! That’s why you need us to protect you!” And once we continue to stimulate that reptilian part of our brain with violent film, it makes it easier for them to stimulate it when they need us to put aside all compassion in order to hate and commit acts of violence in “Gods” name against those who threaten their supremacy.

In the 1940s, a boy would gaze in wonder at in his comic book or movie screen or a Jules Verne novel as he saw science fictional tales of space travel, robots, hand held computer devices, super cars and brain scanners. Today, all of these things are reality. What we imagine we can make real. We self-fulfill our fantasies. Today’s science fiction is tomorrow’s reality. So does it not behoove us to have uplifting film portraits of the future of our earth and human society? They can still be filled with complexity, conflict and challenges but we should be learning more advanced lessons that evolve us further and faster as a species (Minority Report, Bicentennial Man). The last thing we want is for the films portraying a zombie-filled, violent, hopeless, pointless future where global apocalypse is inevitable to actually come to pass. And yes, they all could…easily.

If we really care about our evolution as a species away from the primitive, fear-driven animal to towards enlightened beings, the only violence we should ever tolerate in film should be:

Mythical/Symbolic- only to demonstrate the universal struggle of good versus evil and executed with an emphasis on the tragedy of war; forgiveness trumping revenge and violence always being the least preferred, least noble solution (Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Spiderman)



Historical/Documentary- so we never forget and never make the same mistakes again (The Pianist, Hotel Rwanda)

Farcical/Blatantly Ridiculous- Obviously for laughs, the characters remain unhurt despite it (The Jerk, Bruce Almighty, Finding Nemo)

Hollywood is not the total saint.



It often foregoes excellent cinema for the sake of easy money through focus-group inspired, condescending drivel, what I call “junk films” based on the same formula as junk food. It needs to pay more attention to age appropriate entertainment and stop promoting sexuality among little girls way too early. It must address the superficiality which breeds insecurity about body image in both men and women. It needs to tackle over-reliance on sex for the sake of cheap thrills and not true artistic poignancy. It must take a long hard difficult look at any continued glamorization of violence, irresponsible drug abuse, non-consensual sex and harmful racial, gender and sexual stereotypes.

However religion is not the total saint either (we’ll save that for the next blog)

The fact is they are both simply two competing forms of “show-business”.
And you know how ruthless “show business” can be to ensure it has a captive and compliant audience.

There is all that soul-sucking, in-humane, greedy power-hungry, and unenlightened bullshit. However in all fairness amidst all that grime there are also breakthrough concepts, true creative genius, lofty collaboration, humanitarian intentions and yes sometimes even meaningful spirituality that advances us forward as a species. However it requires you to look at both religion and the world of art, media and film with a more discerning eye. Most of all, abandon the thinking that any form of “show-business” is the absolute authority on anything.

Time To Grow Up Spiritually!

Joy/Gratitude/Generosity VS. Lack/Discontentment/Selfishness.



Those of us who come from a Christian background often hear much about the sin of pride. Problem is, very few people truly understand what exactly it is and so in trying to combat the sin of pride, they go after healthy thought patterns needed to ensure self-esteem. This results in believers who always feel the need to demonstrate a false kind of humility to mask their confidence and/or people who constantly feel undeserving no matter what.

"Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall." Proverbs 16:18

So to be clear, the kind of infantile pride we speak of is not confidence, self-esteem or courage to challenge, explore and demand the best from the world around you. That kind of pride is healthy.

Unhealthy pride is actually not pride at all. It is discontentment.



It stems from a fearful feeling of lack. It results in us having an unmerited sense of entitlement based in: I AM NOT ENOUGH AND THERE IS NOT ENOUGH FOR ME THEREFORE I MUST TAKE.

I know what you are saying, if we just become content with how things are, nothing will change. It is not surprising we feel this way. After all it was a very real, primal urgency that drove our survival as a species when we were constantly challenged by the wild elements. We had to be faster, braver, stronger and take as much as we could before another primitive clan or a wild animal or the natural elements took it from us. It may have helped us survive in prehistoric times when we were still finding our place in the world. So does this mean a little discontentment is a good thing?

Healthy ambition is driven by understanding one’s Divine purpose. Discontentment is driven by fear and lack.

Well, no it isn’t. Do not confuse discontentment with healthy ambition. Always remember that healthy ambition stems from understanding your Divine Purpose and being driven to become more empowered to fulfill it. You will never be complacent when you are actively working on self mastery. You do so with complete trust that the Universe will provide you with all you need for you are working in harmony with it. Discontentment on the other hand is driven by fear and lack. Now that we understand a lot more and have so much control over our world, it has become an outmoded pattern of thinking. Sensing this, spiritual teachers came into our midst to free us from this primitive, childish mode of thinking. They urge us, “Let go! Let God/Universe take care and work through us. There is abundance! God/Universe provides! Be joyful just to breathe! Be joyful just to be!”

Allowing your life to be governed by this exaggerated survival instinct will render you forever a spiritual infant. For those of us forced to de-evolve back into that discontented, survival thought pattern because of slavery and racial oppression, our challenge to rise above it is even more arduous. Those who live according to the untruth: I AM NOT ENOUGH AND THERE IS NOT ENOUGH FOR ME, have to constantly invent ways to compensate for whatever lack they feel in order to “entitle” themselves to get whatever it is they want. We have a popular name here in the Caribbean for this entitlement. My granny called it: False Pride This is the kind pride that comes before a fall. It does so by hindering our ability to be grateful. I’ll explain how.


False Pride, feelings of entitlement are all based on low self esteem stemmed from discontentment and lack. It is a syndrome we here in the Caribbean are all too familiar with and it not only inhibits our spiritual maturity but our ability to serve others wholeheartedly without feeling subservient to them.

Discontentment breeds distrust. When someone is unable to see unconditional abundance and are constantly grasping for more they are simply unable to simply surrender and accept Divine love. They just cannot trust it can be given so easily, so freely, so redundantly and seemingly blindly. In the back of their minds, there must be a catch! Or at least some way they can guarantee they can hold on to it or have it exclusively. They live in a fearful mind-space where nothing will be fair, unconditional and empowering unless they take control they invent ways to feel like they “earned” everything fair and square because of their own brilliance or physical strength or race, belief system or lifestyle choices.

Now, if you have earned something, if you believe it came by your powers or your entitlement what is there to be thankful for? All the credit goes to you not so?

How often we have heard at a funeral service,
“She earned Divine reward because she lived a good life.” Truth is, we puny beings cannot “earn” what is already freely and unconditionally given. Realizing this is the first step away from sanctimoniousness and false pride and towards real gratitude.

When you believe God loves you only through conditional means that you can satisfy, you have just taken all the wind out of the sail of raison d’être to be grateful and truly happy about your life- YOU WERE CREATED OUT OF AND INTENDED FOR DIVINE LOVE FROM THE VERY BEGINNING...NO STRINGS ATTACHED! You sumbit to the biggest human scam of our existence, following organizations, processes and human authorities who make you pay a price for a FREE GIFT, just so it can satisfy your mistrustful ever-lacking ego. By hindering your joyful surrender to the bliss of unconditional love, you have also given your mind, body and soul a whole heap of unnecessary stress.


I recommend watching Chocolat and paying special attention to the character played by Alfred Molina.

You have decided that you are so influential and special you can make the Almighty Creator who gave you life and in whose body you dwell, mad and not love you anymore! Now you have to become compulsive about being the best example of whatever it is you deem to be that special entitled beneficiary and perhaps it is no coincidence, I am writing this during Lent. How many of us would go, “Why should God treat me, who forgoes pleasures of the flesh on equal footing as those hedonistic people! No! God must love me more! I earned it!” That’s spiritual infantilism speaking.

Since you live in an illusionary world where there is only a limited amount of love to go around and God’s forgiveness has a time schedule and God’s patience has a breaking point (funny how God starts to resemble your infantile self eh?) it makes it all that harder for you to accept God shares this unconditional love with others and so your false pride leads to the next infantile spiritual road-block….

Selfishness/Envy


“It is not enough that I have, someone else must be deprived in order for me to feel special about having.”

This is a feeling we understand all too well isn’t it. It is so childish! Remember when you used to torment your siblings, cousins and friends by eating your treat slowly so you can show off you still had after they finished theirs? Remember showing off your toys and when it inspired enough envy and lack in our siblings, cousins and friends making them beg us to play too, we delightfully denied them? This was our infantile way of boosting our self-esteem and some of us have never outgrown it. We continue to need to invent illusionary ranking mechanisms to inspire envy in others so we can feel good about ourselves.

There mere thought of universal wealth fills many people with dread! If everyone has more than enough, how do they show off and evoke envy in others? What good is being rewarded unless someone else is punished? We even apply this limited thinking to our Deities. Look at the reaction of a religious extremist when you suggest that since God can do anything God wants and according to their own scriptures, God often surprised many with a “change of heart”, so it is not outside the realm of possibility God can once again surprise them and welcome into His loving arms in the afterlife those the extremist condemns. The reaction of the extremist is almost like a petulant child forced to share a toy.



This is what lies at the scummy centre of a selfish heart stunted by conditional thinking about God, the Universe, Love, Life, Everything. If false pride was the original shortcoming, then envy and selfishness was the resulting original sickness. Yes, envy is a sickness. It is even represented by a sickly green colour. If you have ever felt jealousy you know it is painful. Your skin prickles, the stomach acidifies throwing off the pH balance in the body, your heart beats irregularly, appetite, breathing and your sleep patterns are thrown off balance. Prolonged envy withers the body from the inside out, like a prune. The reason it is so toxic is because it is rooted in falsehood.

You see, truth is there is more than enough for everyone. So for example, there is no real, spiritual need for a wife to feel jealous because her husband is captivated by a passing gorgeous woman, not if she is truly grateful for her body, her life and the fact she even has a husband and his male libido is healthy and active. She laughs it off,
“Honey you naughty, naughty boy! You are going to get such a spanking when we go home!”
“Promise?” he responds playfully.

If on the other hand she is experiencing lack and low –self esteem, his unintentional biological predisposition to be visually stimulated will drive her absolutely paranoid with jealousy and here is the really nasty thing about jealousy, like its cousin guilt, it always seeks to punish. When jealous people turn the punishment on themselves we feel sorry for them and their low self-esteem and lack. But we must also learn how to feel sorry for the jealous person who turns the punishment outside on others as a mutated form of hatred. Believe it or not, they are suffering too. Do not mistake their aggression and acting out as strength.



Anyone who finds it necessary to deny someone else freedom, equality, justice and oppress another is acting from a place of severe spiritual weakness. Their stomachs are boiling with green, sickly jealousy. Every time the racist sees happy inclusion or interracial romance, acid rushes up his esophagus. Every time the fanatical religious leader sees those he condemns gain acceptance and happiness and humane treatment his heart is stabbed with green rage.

Those who accept the Law of Attraction and Consequence is in effect in our Universe know that there is actually no need for any human to punish another human being for anything at all. There are already mechanisms in place to do so. We were given the privilege of being like self-destined stem cells in God’s Universe. We have free-will to become whatever we’d like to be. We are free to become the lofty brain cells or the stinky asshole cells. We can even choose to become malignant if we want and seek to destroy ourselves and everything else. Whatever we choose, nothing in the Universe is wasted and it has its own built-in, superior immune system that will recycle our energy in the “universal subduction zone” if need be. When we exact an eye for an eye, it actually an illusion of justice we receive. We cannot actually, “harm or kill a soul,” the best we can do is end their current stint in this body. Like The Terminator, “They will be back,” and they will still have to repay their karmic debt and so will we.


The interracial couple holding hands walking down the street aren’t deliberately seeking to hurt the racist. The racist feels “false hurt” anyway because it is motivated by false pride; feeling specially entitled to exclusive access to every white woman or every black man.

Seeking revenge for being truly wronged, while understandable, is taking out more than what is fair and increases our karmic debt. But if you really want to go into karmic bankruptcy the only thing worse is vengeance for a bogus sense of being “wronged” because of your infantile false pride, whether it is religious, racial or whatever illusionary ranking system you have bought into to boost your self-esteem and “deservedness” of Divine blessings. It is the most parasitic kind of punishment ever! Oppressing or denying someone so you can feel better is the ultimate form of gluttony. Then again, what do you expect? Gluttony/greed is yet another child of discontented ingratitude.


The upward learning curve of a Spiritual Adult when faced with pain.


The never-ending spiral of False Pride

Greed/Gluttony


Our life on Planet Earth School is like an All You Can Eat Buffet that does not allow you to take home doggie bags. We must leave all our material wealth behind and return just as we were born, naked and unfettered.

Imagine you are invited to an All You Can Eat buffet. You go there with a healthy appetite and take your time to thoroughly take in the visual delight of the food on display and the decor. You praise those responsible for it. You allow others hungrier or less healthier than you, like the old granny to go ahead to the front of the buffet line. No worries, it is an All You Can Eat buffet after all that promises the food will be there for everyone. You take your time and choose carefully what you would like to eat, based on what is best for your health along with a little of what you enjoy just for an extra treat. You try a new taste sensation or two. You praise the chefs! When you are satisfied, you stop eating. When you have had your full of the experience, you thank the host and you leave peacefully and joyfully. You are a Spiritual Adult.

Unfortunately, there are also Spiritual Infants at the All You Can Eat buffet. They show up and loudly declare that everyone had better get out of their way because they are super hungry or have really big stomachs and therefore are entitled to eat more than everyone else! They do not even stop to enjoy the colours and smells of the food. They dig in with zero etiquette, destroying the nicely garnished displays and pile their plates high. They eat as if the food will run out at any minute.



They shovel food into their mouths without tasting it; then go back in line for more. These Buffet Bullies start knocking old ladies, children out of the way to get to the head of the line. They spit on entire portions of food to mark it as theirs. They even begin to enforce silly rules as to who gets to eat what and when like…
“All black people must stand to the back of the line and only get the leftovers!” or “Women should not get to eat as much as the men do. The men will choose what we prefer the women to eat!”

They don’t give a fuck who the chef is! Whoever he is, he had better keep the food coming and nobody had better challenge their takeover of the All You Can Eat Buffet. They eat until they make themselves sick. They throw up and eat some more. They even try to hoard food. Unfortunately, they realize only too late that eventually all guests, even they, will have to leave the All You Can Eat Buffet and return home and guess what? The All You Can Eat Buffet does not allow you to take home doggie bags. All the food you piled on your plate and hoarded on your table you have to leave it RIGHT THERE and depart.

Of course, you can return to the All You Can Eat Buffet tomorrow but unlike the Spiritual Adult, the Infant does not realize this. He thinks this life is all there is and of course remember he also thinks: THERE IS NOT ENOUGH FOR EVERYONE SO I MUST TAKE ALL I CAN!

So here you are at the All You Can Eat Buffet, really trying to be a Spiritual Adult but are surrounded by these greedy Infants who are making life miserable for you and all the other diners. This is where we come to the hard part! How can you see others gobbling up all the food and depriving others and still hold on to your trust, that there is enough? How do you feel confident that there is no need to get anxious and join in the desperate scramble to grab everything at the expense of someone else, incurring karmic debt! How do you stop comparing the amount of food you have on your plate with what other people have on theirs? How do you trust that two loaves and seven fishes will feed everyone! Where does that trust come from?

It comes from gratitude. Let me explain.


Amazingly enough, slowing down and truly appreciating what the Divine Chef has provided is not only a sign of a Spiritual Adult, but practicing this with actual food also prevents obesity in the physical sense as well.

Imagine that because of the unfair actions of the gluttonous Spiritual Infants at the Buffet Table, all you got to eat on your first trip to the buffet line is a single sprig of broccoli. However, you still savour it. Then you personally seek out the chef whom the gluttons have ignored and you say,

“Thank you so much chef! It was just a morsel of broccoli but I can tell it was wonderful and my body will benefit from the vitamins and fibre it has!”
It is then the chef says,
“You think that was so wonderful? Ha! Let me show you what wonderful really is!”

You see, as it turns out, this “chef” is a Divine Master chef and really passionate about their work and likes nothing more than to give you as much food satisfaction and nourishment as you can stand. Now that you have proven that you are ready, the chef will work out a personalized, truly appetizing daily menu that will nourish and astound you. In fact, you soon discover that the gluttons and their defeated starving victims at the All You Can Eat Buffet are actually fighting over scraps left over from the chef’s many personally catered meals made special daily for Spiritually Adult people like you. After all, nothing in the Universe goes to waste.

But wait! I can already hear you saying,
“Hold up! So are you saying being privately catered to by the Divine is conditional on gratitude? I thought you said that the Divine gives to EVERYONE unconditionally! How come the private catering is not available to everyone unconditionally?”

My answer is…IT IS! The chef’s private catering service is available free of charge for everyone! PLUS In addition all the food at the All You Can Eat Buffet was prepared by the same chef who lovingly and unconditionally makes food available to all: the good, bad and ugly. But if you are too distracted by the negative, infantile behavior at the All You Can Eat Buffet, you will never know or even wonder to ask if such a thing as private catering exists.

Obligated, calculated “Praise de Lawds!” cannot be used as currency in exchange for Divine favour. So many spiritual teachers made this very clear.
That primitive bartering mentality is not how gratitude works. How it works is that when you are grateful, you just tend to stop, appreciate and notice life with new lenses. Gratitude amplifies and aims your vision more accurately on the Divine. That is how you see the abundant, free, Divine privileges all around you. They were always there the whole time, just waiting to be embraced with joy.

It was when you were savouring and meditating with deep appreciation on the flavor of that sprig of broccoli that you truly looked around the All You Can Eat Buffet. That was how you first noticed that all this time, there was a sign on one of the doors that read:
“CHEF’S KITCHEN COME ON IN FOR A CHAT!”

The chef was so thrilled you actually noticed that subtle hint of garlic and touch of chili oil in the single sprig of broccoli even if you were the only one who did that day. Your sophisticated taste buds and epicurious tendencies inspire them and indicate you are ready for the special privilege of premium one on one catering. Without sounding condescending, some people just aren’t at your level yet. Not today anyway.

How come? Well, believe it or not, some people, even those who are starving and victimized by the gluttons actually still prefer jostling up amidst the mad food grabbing, hoarding, fighting, hunger, greed, at the All You Can Eat Buffet Table. They still hold out hope they can pack up their plate using spiritually infantile techniques. It is what they are accustomed to and they are too scared to change that paradigm. So what good is serving them personalised five star cuisine when they will just shovel the food into their mouths without truly appreciating the artful plating, the freshness of the produce and the delicate balance of textures and flavors?

Then there are some who are simply too discontent and mistrustful to give up control to a personalised chef to make food and wine choices for them every day. Keep in mind, once you go on the chef’s one on one catering plan, you will have to trust their culinary expertise and long term nutritional plan. The chef will not be hurried or dictated to. What Cordon Bleu chef wants to cook personally for someone who will try to tell them how to cook and never accept any of their culinary recommendations and constantly turn up their nose at what is served?


Believe it or not, both the glutton and the defeated starving are on the same continuum of discontentment and equally lack the ability to truly enjoy Divine cuisine.

Sometimes, the chef will make you wait hours before serving you and there is usually a very good reason. Sometimes they will surprise you or serve up a vegetable you always found yucky but if you are brave enough to try it again, you will be amazed at how your taste-buds have matured and how much better it is to face this difficult taste test with a Divine chef’s expert touch. Food that you hated or feared as a child now becomes your new delicacies. You will never starve but neither will you be over-fed by this chef. However you will be allowed to share morsels of your special food to those who want to taste it and you are free to spread the news about this truly Divine personal catering service. But in the end, you cannot feed them all your food, it was made specially for YOU.


Not everyone is ready to place full trust in the Divine Chef to select what is best for them. They actually prefer to jostle up at the All You Can Eat Buffet.

Every person, no matter how starving and desperate they are, must find that door to the chef’s kitchen themselves and get their own personalized menu. Gratitude is not something you can "make" someone feel. It must come unprompted and unconditionally from free will or else it does not result in a Spiritual Adult who has a true appreciation for what is prepared by that chef. Conversion and coercion into a spiritual path based on promises of reward or fear of eternal punishment cannot be the activity of a Spiritual Adult. All you can do is unconditionally share morsels of truth, inspire as much joy and comfort as you can, then leave it up to the individual to find the true source as you once did.

Beware, there are many Gluttons at the All You Can Eat buffet posing as "representatives" of the Divine Chef and selling food they have hoarded from the buffet as "special spiritual succor". They have a very recognisable profile and again, many spiritual teachers have given us clues for our protection. One you may be familiar with is in the gospel of Matt Chapter 23. Some of my favourite tell-tale signs:

...but do not ye after their works: for they say, and do not. Verse 3

For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers. Verse 4

...hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone. Verse 23

Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel Verse 24

Also as we previously discussed, they use fear and guilt to win customers. However the real "Chef's Kitchen Door" can only be accessed through joyful gratitude and the Chef deals one on one with grateful customers...NO bureaucracy at all!

As a creative person, even as I write this analogy, it just rings so close to home for me. Perhaps my Muse wanted to remind me of the two inner paths I can take as an artist. I can create motivated purely by the overwhelming need to express the joy and inspiration I feel unconditionally OR I join the mad scramble at the All You Can Eat Buffet Line and create motivated by a need to “make it big” because I feel so inadequate otherwise.

Many artists do not wait for the Universe to give them, they take…often from someone else far more talented to bring their art to the world. Others use deception to foist their mediocre work on the public. We have producers who turn terrible singers into musical sensations in the studio, all for money and fame. That is how whether you like it or not, you get some annoying pop tune ringing in your ears, cluttering your mind-space. Sometimes the person being taken from is the artist. True talent can be exploited so that it becomes another commodity for gluttons at the All You Can Eat Buffet, leading to celebrity tragedies we know all too well.

However, if music is your Divine voice then you will sing, you will play, you will perform whether there is a crowd of supporters or not, whether there are record deals or not, whether there are Grammy awards and private jets or not. Why? The sheer joy and gratitude you feel to open your mouth and sing is just too wonderful. You do it from love and love alone and leave it up to the Universe to decide if your fan base should be ten people or ten million. Regardless of the figure, you feel like you are giving something valuable to this world.


In the movie Ratatouille, Remy's superior appreciation for food, allows him to savour while the other rats just gobble. This is what prompts him to want to add something to the world through his talent instead of just taking and taking like the other rats.

A friend of mine just so happens to make the most exquisite black fruit cakes I have ever tasted. I cannot eat it around company because I do an obscene amount of moaning and groaning with delight while I savour a slice. It’s embarrassing! She has been pressured so many times to make these cakes to sell.
“You’ll make a fortune!”

However she is content to bake just a few cakes every year for those she loves. There is no race to “get somewhere” or “do something serious” with your gifts. There is only simple joy in using them and perfecting them and however big your, natural circle of influence, you share your healing, love and joy with them. While you do, you feel just like a celebrity chef or perhaps even better. That’s the power of gratitude! It leads to true, meaningful happiness and fulfillment independent of the illusionary infantile ranking systems we have invented.


True success, satisfaction and deep self-esteem that come naturally and in perfect balance with the Universe and in harmony with the Divine will is what gratitude brings into your life.

Gratitude for the privilege of being a teacher and a true passion for it, makes a high school teacher who earns a piddling salary feel like a million bucks over a lawyer who chose the profession just to get rich quickly and grows more disillusioned with life.

Now that you see what a little gratitude can do, are you ready to access this power-up? That’s next.

Time To Grow Up!

This “Grow Up” series begins with the most important (in my book) facet of our lives that needs to advance…our spirituality. All the other facets (emotional and socio-political) that I will explore later on in the year, hinge greatly on our spiritual maturity.


Grow up yes, but keep your child-like curiosity, silliness, humility and a sense of wonder and genuine, honest expression.

The use of, “Grow up!” in this series must also be explained. Many of us have a twisted understanding of what it means to be “grown-up”. Much of it is tied to acting like a superior rather than demanding a superior standard of ourselves. We who descend from a legacy of slavery and colonialism, struggle especially with this. So, to be clear to be “grown-up” in this exploration, has nothing to do with abandoning child-like curiosity, silliness, humility and a sense of wonder and genuine, honest expression. It also has nothing to do with status whether economic, educational or social. It has nothing to do with age either. In fact some children are more spiritually grown up than their parents.

You and I know of regular Sunday church attending grannies who constantly pray for the ability to forgive yet continue to harbor grudges till their deathbed. The meaning of Christ on a cross has become such a fetish they expect forgiveness to be miraculously bestowed upon them just fingering the rosary. Seventy plus years and they still don’t get it. Meanwhile, in a much shorter time span, it is quite possible for their grandchild to fully grasp what the actual power-up of forgiveness is and begin to implement it.


How many grudge-bearing yet church going grannies do you know?


While their kids express far more spiritual advancement in their ability to forgive from true understanding of what forgiveness is? It is proof that being a spiritual grown-up has little to do with age.

Growing up simply means to evolve away from the primitive animal mind and advance closer in consciousness of the Divine mind. In doing so, one becomes empowered and enlightened enough to effect massive karmic resolution and soul advancement regardless of their environment, upbringing or circumstances.

On Planet Earth School, it takes guts to be an independent grown-up. It is much easier to be a child completely at the mercy of your environment, peers and those you have designated as your “parents” be they priests, pundits, pop culture idols or political leaders. It’s funny, almost every religious text from the bible to Koran says, “narrow is the path and few are on it”. Yet so many people place great stock in the popularity of their chosen path and making it as congested as possible with childlike followers. If you are one of those taking comfort in the popularity of being one of billions in a religion and converting more members globally and trying to get the entire world to conform to your path, you like the aforementioned forgiveness-challenged granny, still do not “get it”.

Any person doing intricate, individual soul-evaluation every day could never easily conform to be one of billions of followers. The more spiritually enlightened you become, the more your unique Divine spark shines through and the more immune you become to peer pressure and compromises needed to fit in. Even if you came from a class of billions, you just naturally become the weird, indefinable outcast rather than one of the popular ordinary kids on Planet Earth School. You also have neither the time nor the energy to preoccupy yourself so much with the lives of others like a distracted Class President or Hall Monitor who neglects their own school work.

Yes, you are eager to save the world. But if you want to truly do so, you must allow all wider familial, community, political concerns to fall nicely into place around your focused attention on your spiritual development.

For a spiritually mature person, their goal and only goal, is to graduate from this Earth School with full marks. Not for reward. Not to avoid punishment. Not to impress anyone, including God. They do it because they deeply desire and are ready for more power in their next leg of their eternal journey to God. They understand fully that with great power comes great responsibility and being alive in the Divine One is being in the service of the Divine One, a rare and wonderful privilege. So out of share gratitude for this, they seek the power to do even more of Its will within Its Universe.

All wider familial, community, political concerns fall nicely into place around you when you keep that focus. You will never find yourself infringing on someone else just to validate your own path. Yet, the way you inspire others will be almost effortless and always unconditional. What is more, if you goal is self-mastery first before trying to master anyone or anything else, you will by this very fact, make our Earth School a better place to live and learn on during your stint here. This is the path of a Spiritual Grown Up.

By the way, all spiritual visionaries throughout the ages have always urged for their listeners to cease being childish, petty and foolish and to well…GROW UP! They leave many powerful tools to aid us to mature in our understanding and directly combat the primitive infantilism within us. These are namely:

Love/Compassion/Forgiveness / Vs. Hate/Suffering/Vengeance

The Spiritual Adult has deeply rooted total trust their soul is unharmed, immortal and the Universe/God is just and love is unconditional. They can afford to be generous with their love and able to forgive E.g. Christ forgiving those who crucified him, the Buddhist path of non-violence even sacrificing oneself in protest instead of others.




The Spiritual Infant still believes they need to earn Divine love and eye for an eye is the only way to seek justice because they do not trust the immortality of their existence and fear death and so loathe any kind of impediment to trouble-free existence in what is to them a frightfully short lifetime. They also do not trust that the Universe is already designed to deliver equal and just output for what we input and must act as vengeance enforcers for the Divine which is truly a redundant, karmically backward post to fill.

Divine Knowledge/Power & Purpose/Inner Peace Vs. Fear/Karmic & Environmental Constraint/Suffering

The Spiritual Adult knows this existence is one leg of an eternal journey and they are part of a Higher Divine Purpose. This gives them power to purposefully fulfill their goals without fear or the need to incur negative karma. Freedom from fear leads to more inner peace, even when a whirlwind of confusion and pain swirls around them the spiritual lessons and path ahead is never lost on them. E.g. Hinduism’s focus on self-mastery and self-awareness to awaken power from knowledge.



The Spiritual Infant lives in constant fear. Fear is what motivates them to do what is right or wrong. Fear drives their relationships, even their relationship with their Divine Parent. Fear drives how they try to fit into society. They feel absolutely powerless and victimized constantly by outside forces(either God is testing or punishing them or a devil or its minion is tempting them) and are unable to take responsibility for their life. Pain from challenges, loss or change in no way sparks their growth but makes them wallow in suffering. Loss of faith often results when they can no longer justify the suffering in light of their faithful and fearful devotion to what becomes to them, a seemingly uncaring Deity.

Joy/Contentment/Gratitude Vs. Lack/Envy/Greed

For the Spiritual Adult, happiness comes naturally from self-awareness that we are Divine and the universe is abundant and everlasting and this is reason alone to rejoice and feel content. Wanting and grabbing is not necessary. All that is required and attracted will be given freely and unconditionally in perfect balance. E.g. Rastafarianism’s “Jah will provide”, Christ’s rejection of materialism at the expense of another’s humanity or distraction from one’s focus on their eternal soul.



The Spiritual Infant has an unquenchable hunger, over active ego and a blind spot that prevents them from seeing all the ways they are Divine, provided adequately for and unconditionally loved. Much more on this later on!

It is easy to wax philosophical on these virtues. It is much harder to shine that glaring spotlight, regardless of our religious/spiritual path on the unpleasant realities that show we have allowed spiritual infantilism to hinder us. Most of us, myself included are far from grown-up but a lot of us are hitting puberty after an arduous childhood of false fears and petty resentments.



After many millenia in this mindset it is hard to evolve to...



this mindset.

Some forms of infantile behaviour stems from echoes of our primitive past, natural inclinations that aided our survival 100,000 + years ago but are now hindrances to our advancement and must be sloughed off. For evolution is not just about our physical brains and bodies but our spiritual ones as well. Unfortunately, many forms of infantile behaviour, we refined in ever more destructive ways, justifying them sometimes even in the name of God, family and country. For example fear has been refined into so many spiritually destructive by-products, the leading one being guilt.


Yes, guilt is a form of fear. It has nothing to do with true acknowledgement of a misstep and feeling genuine, active responsibility that results in self-forgiveness, growth and change. Guilt is just fearful self-pity that has the same paralyzing effect as trepidation does. It even feels the same- the stomach sinking feeling, rapid heartbeat and a fight or flight response in the form of either defensiveness or a defeatist self-punishment mode. As destructive a trait as it is, many who call themselves spiritual leaders use fear based guilt to control and corral followers. They are counting on the defeatist self-punishment mode to create enough need and desperation that paves the way for a highly emotional conversion.


Have you allowed yourself or another to load up the spiritually paralyzing burden on guilt on your shoulders? Remember guilt is not true remorse and a sense of responsibility. It is nothing more than fearful self-pity that leaves you vulnerable to predation by religious predators.

Many of us just hitting spiritual puberty are also realizing guilt and fear based faiths are for Spiritual Infants who don’t want to go through the troublesome process of analyzing why they made mistakes and taking responsibility for learning and growing from them. It is much easier to just chalk it up to a “sin nature” and the “devil”; the infantile spiritual equivalent of the boogie man. Then you just take a magic potion of Jesus blood and we can forget everything! Now just pay me 10% of your salary every month please! Spiritual Adults can sniff these wolves in sheep’s clothing out a mile away who load you up with guilt and then offer to relieve the load conditional of course on your demonstration of the proper amount of devotion! Don’t worry, they will let you know through subtle at first then not so subtle means what is the “proper” amount.

In previous essays, I have explored Love/Compassion/Forgiveness as well as Divine Knowledge/Power & Purpose and Inner Peace. Perhaps it’s my recent move back to St. Lucia. Perhaps it’s my experience recently with trusting the Universe and my Creator and seeing that trust answered tangibly resulting in me feeling intense joy and gratitude. So the spiritual virtue I will like to focus on is Joy/Contentment/Gratitude and the infantile thinking that hinders us from truly experiencing this essential spiritual power-up.



Stay tuned!