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As to finding God. You know you and I disagree on this. You say to look inwards and it may take many lifetimes to find. I know that God is not just a part of myself, but that He is someone I can rely on. Someone who can save and restore a person, and do so when they couldn't do it for themselves.

Have a good one Yuyutsu. Hope you find God at least once in your life. But here is some encouragement. As a kid, When I was in need and in prayer, God comforted me. A few other times in my life I know I've found God again. It isn't something that you need multiple life times to achieve and to eventually become part of God's essence once again. You can find Him in this life and cling to Him as best that you can while still alive. After all if I can find Him, when I was a child, then so can anyone else too.

Dear Not_Now.Soon,

"Worthy is the Lamb that was slain... to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and blessing"

One might think, "isn't this too much?", "riches and honour together?", "power and wisdom together?", etc. "They don't go too well", "let me only ask for Wisdom" or "Let me only ask for Blessing"...

Yet in God, all good things combine, in God nothing is to be shy or ashamed about, in God there is not a trace of undeservedness.

One who perfects ANY of the following (among others) qualities has also perfected all the others: Love, Wisdom, Truth, Peace, Steadfastness, Compassion, Goodness, Charity, Purity, Surrender to God, Contentment, Knowledge of God... and Happiness too.

Now to attain all this, one has to start somewhere, perhaps pick just one or two or three of the above qualities and work on them. Perfecting these will, in time, perfect the others as well.

I suggest that Jesus knew his disciples and what would best forward their spiritual journey, so for them he prescribed - Love!

For example, due to their Jewish culture of the time, attempts at Purity or Surrender to God might have led them to fanaticism instead; for Charity, they were too poor (except for Mary Magdalene); Wisdom and Knowledge were beyond these simple peasants and fishermen; these low-class people had no clue of Happiness - but Love suited them well, so Jesus taught them to Love.

The Dalai-Lama, OTOH, lives in a very different culture, a Buddhist culture: they have no concept of God, certainly not of following His Laws, but unlike Jews (and many Westerners), their desire for happiness is not suppressed at all, they have no shame of it, therefore the Dalai-Lama recognises Happiness as probably the best attribute they should progress with, thus tells them how to achieve true lasting happiness as opposed to just the small and fleeting happiness they may get when fulfilling their selfish or sensual desires. Once they achieve true Happiness, they will also know God, even while they may still have no name to call Him.

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They will also be Loving everyone, even without the need to rationalise why. Perhaps they will just explain that "Happiness is infectious"!

«As to finding God. You know you and I disagree on this. You say to look inwards and it may take many lifetimes to find.»

You never know how much homework you have already completed in previous lifetimes, so never despair: work hard, study hard, concentrate hard, love hard - and this may well be your final lifetime!

As for looking inwards, this is something I probably recommend to most contemporary people who instead look outward at glass screens. But this does not mean that they should gaze at the in-side of their navels: those who are not yet ready to really look inside and beyond their minds, rather than at their inner-navels, would actually do better to look at nature and at other people and animals and their sufferings, concentrating on service until such time that they are ready to turn their gaze inward.

You had glimpsed God - what a blessing!, but still through some veil, thinner and clearer than the veils we all see God through every moment, but still a veil. Keep praying, practice Love and Purity, Wisdom and Steadfastness, until by His grace, His Glory shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together, Amen!