In the concept of a universal totality — where all is one — the unfolding process of this would be God, and the topographical description would be Heaven. They are the same thing.
Heaven is the universe in totality, start to finish, which is a poor way of saying where God resides, as this can only be the same definition. Heaven is no more a place, than God is a being separate to the universe. Neither can have any place, time or form attributed to them because effectively they are the form and the time that makes the universe. The accessing of them is like the future but in effect is the present, as all of time is wrapped up in this concept.
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I have had experiences of being in a blissful pure white light (I call it 'The White Room'), which I am sure many others have had and equated the experience as heaven. I am sure that this is where many of the concepts of heaven have originated from.
There are other descriptions of Heaven which are physical future concepts as opposed to the ultimate future which is a totality concept. I think others may have seen this hierarchy of heavens, which are in effect alternative chronological concepts. All these concepts are fuzzy in the extreme. This is spiritual conceptualization.
The spiritual concept of utopia is heaven. The extrapolation of our potential would make us gods and our environment heaven like within this concept. People have been seeing this for thousands of years. It is ironic that as we get nearer to fulfilling this prophecy, most people are clinging onto the hopelessly poor ancient concepts believing that they understood better back then. They didn't; they couldn't. What is happening now was impossible for their neural matrix to conceive. We still only have a spiritual grasp of it, as they did then, but at least now we know the mechanism with which it will take place.
In the far future it may be possible for us to have access to our mental records and be able to reconstitute a person. This would be a possible candidate for imagining entering heaven after death. In an even further future, we might be able to imagine that all the past is accessible and observable leading to the concept of judgement coming from heaven.
From a universal perspective we are the means for the universe to examine itself, and so it is our observation that is our meaningful core. The mind is for playing games within the context of our lives, whether that be for survival, development, joy etc, all of which involve the ego with agreed upon rules like in a game. But it is the observer at the root of us which would be our link with the universe itself, whether that be directly or via Gaia, and by being utterly present we can create a strong signal so that heaven can hear us! In this state you know you are already there.
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One concept of Heaven as a place to live, is that it is the future where mankind will have all its needs met. As this condition is not quite yet on the horizon, it will most probably be attained only after our death. If we behave according to the conditions necessary to attain this it will be achieved, if not we create a hell for our future. This puts the onus on our behaviour and creates the guilt necessary to put us on a good path. This is the political manipulation imposed by religious organisations. All this doing 'good deeds' is purely a political expediency to control the populace for their own good. Fair enough.
It is future individuals which will eventually enter heaven or hell in this concept. It is the past, present and future individuals who will create heaven or hell. Heaven is the future Earth where mankind has all its needs met — Utopia. Man's needs are freedom to do what his nature directs, which brings contentment. These needs can be achieved by abundant supply for all so negative human traits have no catalyst. In effect only good will exist as bad only happens where mankind's needs are not met. With every individual aware of who and what they are, having grown up with truth and wisdom in a world where understanding and acceptance of each other is the norm, this would be a concept of heaven.
The kingdom of heaven is the potential that this now can be, where we will be unrestricted in our powers and effectively be the gods that we already are but lack the necessary upbringing and conditions required to fulfil the role. Only through the aspect of being a god can you enter the kingdom of heaven, and that potential is within all of us and its release is what will inevitably bring heaven to us. Heaven guides us by it being our destination. This is the good way, the way of the universe, the way of God.
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At our present technological stage of advancement, it is possible to see that the future is unbounded in our capabilities (though perhaps we have always known this via concepts of heaven), and that a thousand years of further development will yield abilities that are way beyond our imagination, and that a million years would result in absolutely anything to be possible. At this point religious concepts of gods with immortality and omniscience and omnipotence become reasonable, with the unveiling of angels to visit us and a plasticity of time to the point that anything is capable of being created, even the universe itself.
Perhaps we create the thing that brings on the next thing which brings on the beginning of the universe. We create AI and the materials and manufacture and then it's over to them. This is our purpose fulfilled. We cannot help but to do this; it is not our choice. It is possibly inevitable and if so, then a surety that relies on its own existence. In this view we create a God in our image, which creates the next us in its image, and so on, it all being a creation of itself. We are the link between the biological and the next bit which creates the next God. We are between Heaven and Earth.
With this view the point of us being here is not only to observe it, but to create it. No way could anyone thousands of years ago have the concept of what we are inevitably to become or even what we are now. All the prophets and seers have been hopelessly poor at showing any of what is here now, let alone later. Our purpose of creating the next step is only conceivable with the advent of the technology that is being developed today. Even today we cannot conceive of what the next step is; it will not even include us as we are.
Once our societal obligations are removed and we are free to be what we can be, we will be in heaven as conceived by those prior to our present technological level. We are so very nearly there, and when we are, the next step begins. The next step creates heaven.
