Inspirational Writing Experiment Subject THE SOUL

please note this was where I'd just sit and type my thoughts onto page without any editing at all. I did my best to not consciously think of what I was writing so I would not stop the flow or influence the content. I found it today in some writings and thought I would share it with you. I hope you find it interesting and if so maybe I will post more of what I found. Thank you for your time in reading it.

The subject of whether animals have a group soul is a delicate one. Most people do not like to dwell on the subject if they find the answer makes them address issues they are uncomfortable with. For instance, if it were found to be true, would you still slaughter animals for their meat and furs?

It is not necessarily a question that is easy to answer, the definition of the soul is an important consideration. In terms of a person, every human being is blessed with a soul. It is the seat of our understanding, of what makes us unique an energy force indelibly inscribed with the passage of our lives.

We have the ability to record it all, but with the physical constraints of our bodies, the mind only senses a fraction of this information. The brain is used only in fraction and the soul too has far more to it than we ever use or give it credit for.

The soul is unique to us in the impressions it holds. This is who we are, what we want from our lives and how we perceive that we are going to get it. It is a never ending, adaptable, flexible and nurturing force. As the body dies the soul continues and retains the personality that has been shaped by its experiences. Our lives and experiences may come to your awareness, but they are all relatively unimportant, because what matters is the way you are now, who you have become and what you intend to do to develop yourself and improve upon what exists.

This self awareness is evident to us all, but for some the life experiences means that it takes time to come to terms with ourselves. The soul records everything and makes us who we are. For some, that realisation is not a blessing but a burden. Those who cannot love themselves, or do so in a selfish egotistical way face much time and effort to improve their lot. Every soul is a life force, an energy that shares much in common. When the body is gone the question of race, gender and faith are all meaningless except in how they have shaped us. The barriers imposed by man are all man-made, and they are stripped away by death. If you wish to go with them, for after years of indoctrination even habitual habits take some breaking, then no-one will stop you. But why try to self-impose any sort of divisions that may lead you away from a path of progression?

As regards gender or colour, I believe the soul has none. The soul of both man and woman, Chinese Indian, white or black is from the same spark of life, part of the same source of eternal waters. The only separation that is truly evident to each other is how bright we have become, how far we have progressed. For the soul glows with a spiritual intensity that we all realise we can achieve and aspire to. To see this enthuses hope and love, so there is no real bitterness at this simple division. After all, we are all at various stages along the path of our progression. It seems true that some seem to have a preference to be either male or female. It is not important, as one is no better than the other, one is neither stronger or weaker, more intelligent or dominant. What we choose to be depends on how we feel, and life experiences shape our understanding. What we were in the body may be how we see ourselves in the psychic/spiritual sense. We naturally have inclinations towards the form that we are most comfortable with. But it doesn't really matter. You should not approach anyone any differently be they man, woman, old or young. Every soul is unique and every soul is equal in that it can progress to the same extent that wealth can. How we help each other to do that and whom we are drawn to in order to achieve it is also very much down to personal choice. In helping others we invariably begin to help ourselves. In seeing in others what we have failed to see in ourselves comes understanding. Thoughts become our actions, what we do and say, how we treat ourselves and others are just as important in the Spirit plane as it is on the Earth plane. That is the human soul, the life force which is the energy that holds Our self-awareness. The thing which is created and then moulded by ourselves and the patterns of life it then experiences. No two are alike and yet all are akin.

For animals the soul does exist as a life force, and though some would argue, this very essence is also from the same pool as our own. But somehow it is different and the same all at once. Like our energy is from a great ocean and theirs is from a river. One is salt water, the other fresh water but aren't they both water, termed the same, considered the same in general despite their different properties? Ultimately doesn't the river tend to flow back into the sea, to find the place which it had originally come from? This is why I deem our life forces to be the same, as I do with any living thing. It has a life force, it has awarenes to a degree. It may not have a consciousness as we interpret it, but as it lives it enjoys a natural progression, is influenced by outside sources and dies just as we do. But this life essence is not destroyed, it is refashioned, re-used, re-born in the Spirit World ready to flourish and progress as far as its natural limitations will take it.

Yet animals have that special life force that can be considered an elementary soul. Perhaps we didn't consider neolithic man to be more developed than ourselves, more cultured or self-aware - but it didnt mean that he didn't possess a soul. If you can believe that these early descendents of ape could house a soul in their bodies, then why not an animal? The terminology, the distinction as to what separates man from the beasts is another man-made belief. A way of accepting superiority over our fellow creatures and the rest of the planet. It was even proclaimed by the white man over many races, the black brethren, the Indians, one nation over another. They may have claimed superiority but they never proved it by the actions of their souls.

It is not a question of do animals have a life-force, a spirit, as we all do, as every living thing does. It is a question as to when does this turn into a soul, as it can surely do? At some stage the animal or creature gets to a point of self-awareness and the evolution of the life energy has happened - a soul is born. How that soul then shapes itself is also dependent on outside forces, on life experiences. It is just as malleablen as our own. But its natural progression is to survival of the physical, as in any plant, its life-force urges it to survive. But those animals that develop this awareness, this self of l am, even though rudimentary they have shown evidence of a soul, of independence in amongst similar life-forces.

When that creature dies, the life-force moves onto the Spirit plane. Like our souls, we naturally find ourselves amongst like minded people. We tend to gravitate around what we know and feel comfortable with. But in our search for progression, something inevitably leads our soul on to search for more, something better than we are. Likewise, the life essence is re-created again retaining what it knows itself to be before but free of the physical constraints and influences of the Earth plane. As we have a Spirit body fashioned form that which we saw ourselves, so too does every life-force. Those elements that were physical return to the Earth, those elements that were psychical return to the Spirit. But what of that distinction, that term of natural progression, where the life-force had become a soul, an animal soul.

This soul too may seek a progression within its natural confines. Why should it wish to progress to a human level when it is seeking progression as an animal? Even the basic soul of an animal will do as we do, seek out those it feels comfortable with. It will continue to grow and develop, create for itself more self- awareness and perhaps gain its own individuality. Beyond that I am not certain. The natural order is perhaps for the herds and flocks, unburdened by the physical the compulsion to kill etc may take some getting used to. We suffer because we are self-aware of the injustices we do to our fellow man and our World too. We cannot choose to physically hurt anyone after our death although the intention may be there, they have no physical body so we must accept it cannot be done. The animals too must come to realise this. And with this realisation they must come to naturally progress and develop in other ways open to them. Logically, we do not have any conception of how far we are going, and neither do I think do they. But as their soul is created it eventually develops and takes them forward towards their Natural Law, their own evolutionary state.

I would like to think, as I mentioned before, that as all rivers return to the sea then so too can souls become greater than what they were - perhaps towards the development of self-awareness that the human soul has. But that is conceited. What right do we have that ours is the evolutionary perfection that all life-forces should aspire to. Like it or not, we are governed by the Natural Law, something brought us where we are, keeps things as they should be, holds this and all worlds together at the same time. A life-force itself perhaps, with a consciousness an awareness of self even beyond that of the human soul?

So you see, animals can have souls. Many domesticated pets who have been around humans seem to have self-awareness and would be thought to have a soul. Apes and dolphins have all shown an intelligence, sometimes beyond our own understanding, and seem to have an awareness of self. Wild or domesticated the soul has no preference, much like our own colour of skin. It exists, possibly in each and every one no matter what state of dormancy it could be in - maybe at its basic it is merely a life-force determined to stay alive for its natural life - and at its best it is self-aware and living and enjoying its life to its full potential within its natural confines. Much like ourselves, for we too are animal.

In some cultures it is believed that we are re-incarnate, possibly to human bodies, possibly to animal and maybe even to an living form. All of these possibilities can be believed if you accept that we all share the very same life force. It is only the development and extent of our souls that differ. No two souls could inhabit the same body nor do I feel they would want to, but consider that this could indeed happen when Natural Law goes awry. For instance, when Siamese twins are born, their body co-joined but their personalities different. Could each not have a soul, for indeed when separated do not both twins survive, hence a soul lived in each. If so, where was it housed, surely not in any particular part of the body. For if so only the twin with that part would survive. No, the soul, the life-force which animates the whole and perfect body, whether limbs are missing or organs etc, inhabits the whole of the physical. It cannot leave the body until death permanently, though it is possible that it can leave temporarily but retain a connection to that body, as in astral projection where a silver or invisible cord connects the two. If there is a connection between the soul and the body. perhaps it is with the brain, because that is the organ which shapes our understanding of the world about us, that then goes to imprint itself upon our souls. But even during clinical death, where the brain stops temporarily our soul seems to survive. Perhaps it ingers only until all our brain activity ceases, which is often later than the heart is pumping. Perhaps we return only when the brain starts functioning again. In the case ofa coma victim, their brain still has electrical energy regardless of consciousness. Their souls are still there, even though they may be elsewhere in a semi-permanent state of astral projection/out of body experience, until their brain activity returns to recall their soul back to its host.

If there is a Natural Law, I am not sure if it includes coming back as anything other than another human. In theory I believe it is possible, purely from the theory that our life forces are identical. But what would our souls gain by being trapped in another from other than human - maybe there would be much to learn to give us an understanding of all our brethren that share our worlds. In knowing them by experience maybe we can get to know ourselves better, and appreciate ourselves more in that knowledge. For my own part, I cannot recall ever being a plant or animal, though I recall many connections to such in previous times.

Whether that was on Earth or in Spirit I cannot be sure. It was still me, my soul, just a different journey, another path along the same road. of course, we may not be able to remember it. If life-force can permeate any body, maybe the soul stays dormant because of the Natural Law and remains unaware of the specifics-just recalls part of it. For example, perhaps for some reason I love swimming, the sea and sea life and yet my family had never taken me. It fills me with joy to see pictures etc and I can almost feel or sense what it is like. So many times our souls feel this way. Maybe that sense of joy and feeling of comfort is the very sense of what an animals soul progresses towards and beyond.

The body dies and the life-force continues. Natural Law sees you, places you, reshapes and re-deposits you as you are to be. If it places you back in Spirit, or re-houses you back in a human body, or leaves you remaining in the hills, plains or seas - it matters not. We must accept there is an order to things, a Natural Force, that governs the life-force, as our souls would govern us. Maybe the knowledge of what or who that order is, an understanding of Natural Law is what we are aspiring towards. The bigger picture. There are so many questions and we may never know all the answers. Our soul holds more knowledge than we realise and it is a gift, a blessed thing, a life force which we share with everything around us, both on Earth and in Spirit.