That kingdom Jesus talked about is now; if we are open to a new way of thinking, seeing, and being. “Metanoia (new mind),” as Jesus called it. We must talk less, and listen more. We must wake up.

In his later years, people would come to Buddha and ask, “Who are you? What are you?”

“Are you a God?” “No.” “An angel?” “No.” “A saint?” “No.” “Then what are you?”

He answered, “I am awake.” His actual name was Siddhartha Guatama; but he became know as Buddha – the “Enlightened One” or the “Awakened One.” In Sanskrit, the root budh means to wake up and to know.

All of humanity is in various stages of waking up. Some of us are holding on to our finite minds out of fear. Fear of our ego’s death, fear of letting go. Others are being pulled towards infinite Mind, loving the Unknown. As we wake from the “Adam dream,” what seemed real fades in the light of a new Reality. Our enemies become our friends, our problems become our challenges, our fears become our hopes.

We are in an observer created universe. If we are unhappy with the state of the world; many of us try to fix the world and are disappointed with the results. But if we change our mind, then the world changes. As Einstein put it, “No problem can be solved by the same consciousness that created it.” As we change, as we are born again; everything changes.

In the Hindu Upanishads it is said, “When a man finds his existence and unity in the Self – who is the basis of life, who is beyond the senses, who is formless, inexpressible, beyond all predicates – then alone does he transcend fear.”