The Way

The Way

“Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.”
—Immanuel Kant

The Way

“The Tao that can be told is not the true Tao.” In Chinese, The Tao (also known as Dao) literally means The Way. The Japanese have a similar flavor of spirituality known as Zen Buddhism, and Jesus also taught “The Way.” But what is it, and why can’t it be told?

Taoism’s main focus is non-forcing flow. It’s non-attachment to outcomes and letting things occur naturally while riding the current. One should trust that things will unfold better when in sync with this current. What this does, is it reduces negative streams of emotion which, by the dualistic nature of the streams, means adhering to positive streams of peace, love, hope, and joy.

Zen Buddhism is similar. Stop overthinking. Let go of harmful concepts and labels that attach us to outcomes and distort reality around us. Be fully present with the here and now. Let go of anger and fear, embrace the joy of the present in peace and love.

Jesus taught loving love and loving others. Find the humanity in people and flow effortlessly in a current of love, promoting love, and fighting evil tendencies through loving tendencies. Trust that this love of love and detachment from worldly concerns will bring you everything you need and work out best for you in your life. Don’t focus on rituals and religiosity, and focus entirely on love and things that align with love.

In the end, these messages are one and the same. Jesus perhaps had a lot more going on with his message, but it was a Taoist and Zen message with the additions of spiritual warfare and a hope to bring about a Kingdom of God. Lest we forget, spiritual warfare would equate to emotional warfare. “We do not fight against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness.”

Jesus taught that we serve love or we serve material things of this world which bind us to negative streams. It’s a dichotomy of mood currents. As he also taught, love is not followed by adhering to laws and rules—it’s a flowing, living force to be followed much like one who follows the wind—wherever it takes you.

This following of love with trust and flow, listening to the moment and living in the present is indeed the same “The Way” in all three practices. This law-lacking flowing in love is in opposition to blindly following written rules irrespective of emotion. Laws do not bring about the intended purpose of love. This is exactly why The Tao cannot be told and why we often distinguish between the letter of the law and the “spirit” of the law.

Saying do not lie, do not cheat, do not steal, and do not murder is not the path to love. One who is following love will not do those things (generally speaking) but not doing them does not equate to being loving. Jesus emphasized time and again that those who belong to his kingdom are those who hear and listen to the living guidance of love rather than falling back to the pattern of the religious Pharisees of his day.

Notably, this is entirely aligned with what I have been sharing in this book. My own message, though informed by heartless science and logic, leads us exactly to the same messages and lessons that we would find in The Tao, Zen Buddhism, and the original, non-corrupted teachings of Jesus. The Way truly is the way.

So then, seeing as Jesus was fully in line with the science, what else did he have to say? While much of Christianity holds onto a concept of Heaven that comes after death, and many others expect heaven to come down from the sky similar to the report in Revelation, Jesus is actually recorded as saying exactly the opposite. He said the kingdom is not something one can point to like “there it is over there.” He said it is in and among us.

Early Christians, prior to the dogmatic takeover, were encouraged to grow in their ability to walk in the spirit of love. By so doing, they would grow a kingdom from among themselves. This was the goal. This was the hope. And this kingdom would come with powers that surpass what Jesus is reported to have done: miracles that transformed reality itself. Jesus boasted on our behalf that we would do greater things than even he had done. If true, that clearly has yet to pass, but he also said that truth and lies would grow together until the right time.

This appears to have been his plan all along. Jesus was playing the long game. He said he spoke in parables so that “only those with ears to hear could hear.” In other words, only those aligning with higher ways of thinking (aka love) would get the message while those without such loving ears would regurgitate his parables through religious vigor held in perpetuity. Until now, perhaps?

Once again, it’s perfectly sane to take all this with a heaping pile of salt. Without knowing the nature of reality fully, it’s not possible to conclude for sure what is true. This idea, as awesome as it is, does not change much regarding our activities. True or not, we should still seek to flow in the river of love. What it does change, however, is our hope.

What an amazing thing to hope for where alignment with love can bring about miracles and a new earth with just enough science to make it seem plausible or even likely. This isn’t as silly as pulling a random thought out of our heads like the invisible teapot or flying spaghetti monster. It’s repeated continually throughout time and then seemingly covered up—buried in immense amounts of useless data, but retained over the centuries.

We have converging spiritual practices of love aligning with what science has shown us about emotions, behavior, and outcomes. We have a past filled with confusion, gaps, data wipes, and stories of magic and otherworldly beings. We have many messages regarding love shaping our reality mingled with corruption directly related to confusing and subjugating the believers of such messages and pointing them away from love. It is all very fascinating and it is entirely rational to investigate spiritual claims without assuming that one false claim somehow negates them all. People lie—this is true—but not all people are liars simply because we found one, two, or even thousands. The only needed filter for wild claims is return on investment through alignment with love or else mere curiosity. If it makes it through the filter, it can remain as an option with no need to dismiss.

Again, the goal is to diminish our ego. We cannot be as certain as we often claim we are. That lack of certainty diminishes the authority of negative voices and opens a door to hope. With the door cracked, let’s at least take a peek inside. That said, I shall begin to provide my own explorations and where they have taken me. I have been a student of “The Way” for more than I had realized, and I’d like to think it’s a great starting point for the curious.

I began my journey in earnest about 27 years ago in 1999 through the lens of Christianity. My internal voice eventually led me right out of it as I began to see the corruption Jesus had warned about—the Christian faith had revolted against the very Jesus they claimed to love. I tried speaking up about it and restoring his message, but I was far too focused on the message itself and failed to learn how to live by it.

I published a book on the topic in 2016 but became an atheist in the midst of it for the very reason that Christians were not following his teachings. I had concluded that if I were right in my understanding, I wouldn’t be having so much trouble. God would have had my back. I remained an atheist for 9 years with absolute conviction that I would never come back. I was bitter. I had twice been taken in by the charms of Christianity and I wanted nothing more than to put away such childish fantasies.

I titled that first book Christians Are Revolting: An Infidel’s Progress, and I walked the reader through my life as I discovered these things about Christianity. The disconnect between Jesus and his followers led me to become a science-driven atheist as I rejected the whole thing. I’ve since retitled the book as simply An Infidel’s Progress and republished it. It turned out nobody liked my play on words. I no longer agree with everything I wrote, but this is exactly why I keep it on the shelves.

We are allowed to grow, and in fact, I believe that is the whole point. Throughout the book, one could see my first-hand experiences following the voices which led me to these very same conclusions of love over religion.

My story serves as a level of evidence for myself that following my internal voices works. The evidence only works for me, however, since no one else can experience it. And no one should consider me or anyone else an authority on such matters. Using a human as an authority rather than love itself is exactly what created the current mess of religion. Still, it provides an account that could be interesting if one cares to read it. The voices led me to The Way before I knew how to live it.

I followed the voices and learned things that no one else was teaching—at least, none that I could find. In frustration from my own misunderstanding, I locked all spiritual voices away and feared listening to them ever again. Nine long years I numbed myself entirely to any spiritual voices so that I could simply live. I listened only to the voices of logic and science—and fear.

I studied all manner of psychology and realized just how silly and foolish all this religion was while also recognizing the futility of hate. I determined that religion was all a ploy. It was all business and money. I began to believe it was for fools who needed to feel like they belonged somewhere and couldn’t think rationally. And boy did I use to be that fool. I despised myself for it. I had wasted years of my life on what I deemed as nonsense—twice.

I then continued the rat race like a normal human and found it survivable. At least I wasn’t crazy anymore. Same thing, day in and day out I continued for those 9 years. I wondered if this was truly all there was: a boring, numbing, repetition of motions to keep moving and alive until it all ended—not a particularly delightful existence. I had to begin anti-depressants to keep me further numbed so that I wouldn’t feel the lows but also never the highs. I could still laugh and joke, but I couldn’t take joy in anything like others could.

In my quest for knowledge, understanding, and general exploration—or just anything that might make me feel again—I began to experiment with a fungal supplement that research was just beginning to take seriously for the treatment of depression. And not just treatment, but possibly curing it entirely. And not just a supplement, but psychedelic mushrooms. This is what unlocked my desire to research all of this yet again.