It all starts in the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve move from spiritual oneness with God to seperation and individuation. After eating from the Tree of Knowledge, both Adam and Eve leave Eden to create their own Family Tree of Knowledge. Our spiritual journey and blessings come from embracing our family heritage, healing our ancestral and cultural wounds while uncovering the divine within us. If we learn how to recognize and embrace both Positive Love Bond and Negative Love Bond experiences with insight, love and acceptance, forgiveness and compassion, we can find the path that will lead us toward true peace and oneness with God. The God-Realization Process offers you the opportunity unravel the mystery of the divine light within and recieve the blessings from a thousand generations. The Ten Spiritual Keys (Commandments) were a gift from God to secure our relationships with him, to awaken the light within us, and to manifest and transform anything in our lives and most of all to heal our families and bless them and generations to come.

BLESSINGS FROM A THOUSAND GENERATIONS

What Our biblical Ancestors Can teach Us About Healing Our Families TodayBy Donna Evans Strauss

Balboa Press

Copyright © 2011 Donna L. Strauss
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4525-3192-2

Contents

Acknowledgments..................................................................xiSpecial Acknowledgments..........................................................xiiiForeword.........................................................................xvChapter 1 Realizing God Within the Family........................................3Chapter 2 Faith Required.........................................................11Chapter 3 The God-Realization Genogram...........................................19Chapter 4 The Ten Spiritual Keys.................................................33Chapter 5 The First Commandment: The Key to Wholeness............................45Chapter 6 The Second Commandment: The Key to Fulfillment.........................57Chapter 7 The Third Commandment: The Key to Meaning..............................65Chapter 8 The Fourth Commandment: The Key to Peace...............................75Chapter 9 The Fifth Commandment: The Key to Belonging............................81Chapter 10 The Sixth Commandment: The Key to Respecting Life.....................91Chapter 11 The Seventh Commandment: The Key to Unity.............................99Chapter 12 The Eighth Commandment: The Key to Potential..........................111Chapter 13 The Ninth Commandment: The Key to Ourselves...........................121Chapter 14 The Tenth Commandment: The Key to Manifestation.......................129Chapter 15 Restoring Your Divine Qualities.......................................141Bibliography.....................................................................151

Chapter One

Realizing God Within the Family

Embracing and healing our Family Tree of Knowledge is our journey home into oneness with God.

The sacredness of the family spiritual journey begins, and rightfully so, with the oldest story told in the Bible. We learn from this story that in the beginning, Adam and Eve stood naked before God without fear or shame (Genesis 2:25), as pure as the luminosity of God's unified love, seeing only God's blessings and grace. But when they listened to the serpent's words over the words of God, their relationship with God and the unified field of God's love was changed. By forsaking God's only Commandment, they betrayed God—and their deepest selves. They suddenly felt the need to lie, blame, and deny responsibility, and they began to uncover the mystery of the knowledge of good and evil. They would move from the spiritual world into the physical world.

With veils of separation now covering their eyes, Adam and Eve recognized their differences and wanted to hide themselves from each other and from God. They found fig leaves to cover their nakedness, which was a symbol of their individuality and descent into the physical world. They could now learn to discern the difference between good and evil, blessings and calamity. They were now responsible for their choices and the outcomes. As they tried to hide and then talked to God, Adam and Eve's behavior revealed their veils of illusion. Instead of seeing only unity, they now experienced separation, differences, and divisiveness: Adam blamed Eve, and Eve blamed the serpent. It was no longer possible to stay in the Garden of oneness with God. By turning away from God to follow their own desires, Adam and Eve had fallen from immortality and unified love into duality and illusion. God clothed them in skin and they became earthbound. They were sent out of the Garden of Eden to create their own family. Eve would now bear children while Adam would work the land. Their Family Tree of Knowledge would become our journey home to oneness with God.

In the fractured family relationships of today, you might see yourself or your family members suffering these same symptoms of disconnect that Adam and Eve felt. The experience of being banished from the garden mirrors the same journey and pain that is experienced when a family member becomes an outcast or a scapegoat. On your own journey, personality and character flaws (such as blaming others for your shortcomings) can be unconscious ways to cover internal and external feelings of separation from God. To heal these fractures and the separation, it makes sense that our first steps must be toward God. The journey home will be one of listening, prayer, and forgiveness, and it will provide us with hope, direction, and enlightenment toward communion with God. That unity is what I call God-Realization. Attaining God-Realization is the foundation for healing a family—and it is our goal in this book.

The God-Realization Process

Our search for truth, a deeper knowing of God, and the answer to the age-old question, "Who am I?" will require us to again become naked, uncovered, and undefended before God's omnipotent grace, love, and luminosity. Surrendering our separation, blaming, vanity, arrogance, defenses, and sinful nature, as well as taking responsibility for our actions, words, and deeds are key requirements to finding God's grace and compassion and releasing the blessings from a thousand generations.

On our journey toward God-Realization, we are meant to walk a certain path in the world, but each personal journey is unique. You are the only one who can dissolve the illusions that separate you from God. Spiritual leaders, teachers, psychotherapists, energy healing practitioners, or complete strangers may guide you toward the mystery behind the journey, but it is you who must make the ultimate choice to integrate your negative splits and embrace spiritual wholeness. Hidden beneath the veils of your perceptions, the immanent light calls you home. Your sweet surrender to the journey—embracing with love all that emerges, both positive and negative, and listening to the still, small voice that guides you—will lead you to knowing the greater mystery. This journey will help you to unravel the mysteries of your family and ultimately to find your spiritual destiny.

The image above illustrates the path in its simplest form. First, you must focus on your core, where you must connect with and claim your Divine heritage within. You are the light, and knowing this will support your very being. Second, you will bring that light into relationship with your partner and cultivate a Divine oneness that will include your children and then the rest of your family. Third, you will foster and bring your light and wisdom to your career choice and passion. And finally, you will serve your community from a place of balance and Divine service. You'll soon discover that when you are fully grounded and your life is balanced, the power of living in right order moves from your core Divinity outwards. However, when these four pieces are out of order, your life can become chaotic, leaving you, your family, your work, and your life imbalanced. For example, if you spend more time at work than with your family, your family life will suffer from the loss of your presence and guidance.

The key to maintaining the balance lies in our core—with maintaining our connection to Divinity. When issues turn up, this is most likely because a separation happened there first. It was the same with Adam and Eve. As they fell from immortality and omnipotent oneness, they forgot their deep connection with their Maker. Now the process of remembering our Divine...