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The Space Between – Heaven on Earth is a companion podcast to Awakening – Heaven on Earth.
Through intimate, heart-centered conversations, this series explores the lived experience of awakening — the questions, integrations, paradoxes, and sacred pauses where transformation truly occurs.
This is the space between knowing and becoming…
where Heaven meets Earth through honest dialogue.
Welcome to the space between heaven on earth.
Jeffrey Aylor:This is a companion podcast to awakening heaven on earth created as a space for reflection, conversation, and lived experience. Here, we enter the pause between knowing and becoming, between insight and embodiment, between heaven and earth.
Jeffrey Aylor:These conversations are not about answers or conclusions.
Jeffrey Aylor:They are about presence,
Jeffrey Aylor:about listening,
Jeffrey Aylor:about reasoning together,
Jeffrey Aylor:about meeting one another honestly in the unfolding journey of awakening.
Jeffrey Aylor:I'm your host, Jeffrey Aylor.
Jeffrey Aylor:Again, welcome and thank you for entering The Space Between with us.
Jeffrey Aylor:Welcome to this episode of the Space Between. Today's episode is called Heaven is now, The Fulfillment of Unity, and this is a solo episode, and it marks a very important point in our journey together. Throughout the space between, we've asked what unity means not only as a spiritual idea, but as a lived reality. We've explored unity with God, unity within ourselves, unity with one another, unity with the earth, the body, and the spirit moving through all life. We have asked how unity enters our families, communities, systems, leadership, stewardship, and our spiritual understanding.
Jeffrey Aylor:And now all those conversations bring us to one final question. What happens when unity is no longer merely something that we seek, discuss, or believe, but something that we begin to live? Perhaps that is exactly where heaven begins to become visible. Not only after death, not only in some distant future, not only after the world becomes perfect, but here now in this moment, in the space between us, in the way that we see, in the way that we choose, in the way that we love. This isn't a claim that suffering has disappeared or that the world is already complete or perfect.
Jeffrey Aylor:It's an invitation to recognize that heaven may be much closer than what we've been taught to imagine. So to frame this personally, this understanding did not come to me all at once. It grew through grief, through searching, through travel, through relationships, through extensive spiritual study, and many many conversations that eventually became awakening heaven on earth. I once thought of heaven primarily as somewhere we went after we die, somewhere out there, somewhere separate from us, and I now understand it's increasingly a reality we are invited to reveal from within. Many of us were taught to think of heaven almost entirely in future terms.
Jeffrey Aylor:Again, somewhere out there, somewhere distant. Heaven was where the believers, the faithful went after they died, and that earth is temporary. The world is fallen. The goal was often framed as an enduring of this life just so that we can reach the next life. You know, that understanding may offer and can offer some comfort, especially when you're facing loss, you're in the throes of grief.
Jeffrey Aylor:You know, I don't dismiss that hope. I don't dismiss the value that those things bring to people. The possibility that life continues beyond this physical body remains very deeply meaningful to me. But I began to wonder whether something important, something essential had been left out. If heaven is only somewhere else, then what's that say about this life?
Jeffrey Aylor:What's that say about this experience? If all we're doing is enduring this to get to that, then why do we have to deal with this? You know, if the sacred is reserved for some other world, what what's the purpose of this world? So if our purpose is simply to leave Earth, then then why did Jesus devote so much of his time and his teaching and the examples that he gave on how we are to live here? How we're to live with the poor, the forgotten, the stranger, the enemy, and just one another.
Jeffrey Aylor:You know, slowly over time, that question really did change me. It was no longer simply how
Jeffrey Aylor:do I
Jeffrey Aylor:get to heaven? You know, it became how might heaven become visible through my life that I'm living now? You know, when heaven is postponed entirely, then transformation or the requirement for us to go through transformation can also be postponed. Justice is someone else's responsibility. Reconciliation can wait.
Jeffrey Aylor:Creation is disposable. The suffering that another person is experiencing is less urgent, but when heaven is understood as something that we participate in, every single ordinary moment takes on a sacred significance. A meal can become communion. Listening, really listening, can become prayer. Forgiveness can become resurrection, new life.
Jeffrey Aylor:A garden can become a partnership with creation, with our earthly mother. A family table can become a beautiful circle of belonging. A compassionate decision can become a doorway through which heaven is experienced and enters our world here. When I returned to the teachings of Jesus in my study of scripture with new eyes, I began to notice how often he spoke of the kingdom of God as something that was already here, already near, present. It was already emerging.
Jeffrey Aylor:The kingdom of God is among you. The kingdom of God is within you. He revealed a different way of seeing and living, and this is the way that we're supposed to follow, how we're supposed to follow him. When he says I am the way, the truth, and the life, he's saying I am the example. What you see in me is also in you, And you have the ability to have these same things.
Jeffrey Aylor:He welcomed those people in our society that society rejected. He told he showed us a completely different way of of seeing and living. He restored dignity. Before he demanded conformity. He crossed over boundaries that religion and culture.
Jeffrey Aylor:Had. Considered permanent. These walls, and he was breaking these walls down. He touched the untouchable. He ate with people that had been socially excluded.
Jeffrey Aylor:He forgave those that wounded him. Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. He saw beyond their behavior and could see into their sacred identity, their true self we talk about, the higher self that is within all of us, that presence of God in all of us. Whenever that consciousness or that awareness appeared, then separation began to dissolve. That to me is a glimpse of heaven.
Jeffrey Aylor:That to me is an experience here of heaven. The king of Jesus embodied was not built through domination. He did not build this kingdom through conquest. He built it, and it appeared through love, healing, inclusion, service, truth, mercy, and a radical recognition of the divine value, the divine worth within another person. When Jesus thought that the kingdom was within us or among us, he was giving us more than some vague theological idea.
Jeffrey Aylor:He was inviting us into participation. The kingdom becomes visible between us. It emerges from us through us and then through relationship. It appears whenever our awareness of separation, our consciousness of separation, our acknowledgment that of separation gives way to the awareness, the consciousness of love. To say that heaven is now, though, I want to make sure we we point this out, is not saying that everything that is happening now is heavenly.
Jeffrey Aylor:But it is to say that the seeds of heaven, the opportunity to experience heaven, is already present. The divine reality is available. It is already available. The invitation has already been given to participate. The question is whether or not we will embody it.
Jeffrey Aylor:Will we choose it? Will we embody that in our everyday life, in our decisions, in the way that we walk in this world? You know, heaven is now can sound really beautiful, but it can also be misunderstood. It there are some things it doesn't mean. It does not mean we're gonna pretend that pain is unreal.
Jeffrey Aylor:It does not mean that we're gonna tell someone who's grieving that everything is fine. It does not mean we're just going to ignore war or injustice or illness or abuse or poverty or loneliness or fear. It does not mean that positive thinking makes every condition disappear. That would be what people would call toxic positivity. Heaven on Earth is not denial.
Jeffrey Aylor:It is a very courageous presence that enters suffering without becoming defined by the suffering. It's the love that sits right next to us when we're in a state of grief. Instead of explaining grief away. It's the truth that protects the vulnerable. It's the compassion that establishes boundaries without hatred.
Jeffrey Aylor:It's the courage to speak out about what is broken while we refuse to dehumanize the people that are involved in it. It's the choice to create something that's more whole rather than strictly condemning what is incomplete. Heaven is not perfection imposed on reality. Heaven is divine love expressed within reality. So there's a paradox here.
Jeffrey Aylor:Heaven is already present, but it's also still becoming or forming. Unity is already the deepest truth, yet it's still waiting to be fully lived. We are already one, yet still learning how to treat each other as though that was true. The fulfillment of unity is both revelation and responsibility. We awaken to what it is, and then we begin building lives that reflect it, that show it, that embody it.
Jeffrey Aylor:So let's kind of look back at this journey we've been on in this first season called unity. You know, we touched on unity with God. We began with unity with God. The recognition that source, the divine source, is not distant from creation. The divine source is within
Jeffrey Aylor:all creation,
Jeffrey Aylor:And if we arise within the divine, then our spiritual lives are not attempts to reach an absent or separate God. They are actually the act of remembering that divine presence that is already within us, that's holding us. From there, we then touched on unity with self. We turned inward, and we started to encounter and acknowledge and deal with the divided self. The idea that we're the roles we perform, that we're the wounds that we're protecting, or that we're the parts that we judge, or the sacred identity beneath them.
Jeffrey Aylor:You know, heaven becomes present when that inner war begins to end. That tug of war between the divided nature. Then we touched on unity with others. Here we explored what we call sacred vision, the ability that Jesus demonstrated to see beyond labels, titles, history, social positions, and behavior. He could see beyond those things.
Jeffrey Aylor:He could see on the inward heart of all that he touched and all the people that he encountered. You know, heaven appears whenever another person is no longer reduced to some category or defined as a problem or has some political identity or failure or are identified as an enemy. You know, and then we moved into unity with the earth and our bodies, which is a microcosm of the earth. We remembered that we are not spirits temporarily stranded in a disposable world. We are actually embodied participants in a living creation.
Jeffrey Aylor:Our breath, food, water, our bodies, and lives arise. They come with a relationship with the earth. Heaven becomes visible when matter, creation, material is no longer treated as something separate, but treated as something that is sacred. From there we moved into unity in relationships between family and community. We discovered that unity is often tested and revealed between people.
Jeffrey Aylor:I always like to think of it this way. There's unity within, and then there's unity without, and there's also unity between. You know, this isn't an abstract agreement. It it's not it's not something that boundaries, repair, forgiveness, belonging, you know, and the willingness to it's our willingness to remain human with one another. I think sometimes the greatest lessons we learn about unity come through relationships, through the complexity we experience within those relationships.
Jeffrey Aylor:And then we started to touch on unity in systems and in leadership and in stewardship. You know, we asked whether organizations and the structures we create can reflect compassion and dignity and service and wholeness and not be designed in a way that takes advantage, that extracts from, that takes and not gives, that loves. You know, heaven on earth cannot remain just personal. The consciousness we embody eventually shapes the things that we build. Then we touched on one source and the concept of Christ in all.
Jeffrey Aylor:You know, we opened ourselves to the light shining through humanity's many different spiritual paths, and in that we also return deeply to the concept of the Christ, the Christos, the anointed one, the the very spark of God, the offshoot of God, the offspring of God that is within all creation. It's within all of us. And as we return to that Christ consciousness, that awareness has really shaped. It's really changed my own journey. We think and consider, you know, what it means to see that divine presence, only in those who believe the same way we do, but in all, even those that disagree with us, even those that, for whatever reason, are in a position of difference and at odds with us.
Jeffrey Aylor:And then finally, in fulfillment. So the fulfillment of unity is not one final idea. It's actually the integration of all these different circles. God, self, others, earth, body, spirit, family, community, humanity, creation. It's not separate truths.
Jeffrey Aylor:All of this is one living reality. You know, my understanding of heaven, my deep interest in understanding it better changed profoundly after our daughter's passing. Our daughter Katie. It was a turning point, as I mentioned several episodes back. And you know, at first heaven was connected to the desperate questions I had as a grieving father.
Jeffrey Aylor:Where is she? What is she doing? Does she still exist beyond that beautiful tiny little body that I could no longer hold? You know, and that led me then into my exploration of near death experiences and consciousness and a deep dive into the scriptures and of understanding the soul, the eternal soul, and and that led me then into seeing and understanding the beautiful principle of reincarnation, which expanded what I believed way beyond what I ever thought is possible. But, eventually, all of this and this search led to another very deep realization.
Jeffrey Aylor:If Katie continues and lives still within a reality of love and unity, then my relationship with her cannot be expressed only through waiting to see her again, again, somewhere out there, somewhere in the future. It must also be expressed through how I live now. You know, we show our connection to her in a number of different ways in how we live now, and that is things like through the scholarship that we've been able to give since her passing over the last twenty four years in her name, through compassion that we feel and that we share with others that was awakened by grief through the commitment that we have to build something life giving from what could easily have been only devastation. I know my wife and I very early in our experience became very clear that we were gonna have to make a choice. We were either gonna choose in this deep grief to either be constructive or destructive.
Jeffrey Aylor:And in that, we chose to be constructive. Not that we haven't experienced destructive emotion and destructive feelings and even had some destructive behaviors that that you give over to from time to time as a result to try to numb pain or but, you know, through this, we've made a commitment to build something life giving. Through this work, you know, her life continues. Through this work, her life continues to call me toward heaven, not not just as a future future reunion with her, but as a present experience and a present responsibility. You know, the other thing that so dramatically impacted me has been my world travel.
Jeffrey Aylor:What a blessing to be able to travel all over the world and to experience so many different cultures and so many different people, and to recognize and come to understand that we are a one, we are one world. We are shared humanity. All the separation, all the division, all the lines, the walls, all of it is created in our minds, and it is not real. So as I traveled the world, you know, I was often trying in some way to escape or outrun my grief. I encountered people across all these different languages and cultures and nations and and traditions.
Jeffrey Aylor:You know, outwardly, we were different. But as parents, we all love our children. All over the world, regardless, people long to be seen. They laughed. They grieved.
Jeffrey Aylor:They worked, celebrated, feared, hoped, dreamed. The divisions that seem to be so absolute from a distance truly dissolved when I experienced them in direct relationship. I really started to see that unity was not just some pie in the sky or sentimental ideal. It truly was present beneath the surface all along. But the veil was in the way, the veil of forgetting, the veil of separation that we learn to see.
Jeffrey Aylor:We learn to see it. That veil is covering up something that has always been there. We have never been without it. It has always been within us, but we have forgotten. And now, you know, as I enter retirement And a time of what I think is alignment with.
Jeffrey Aylor:True purpose and higher purpose and. And now, you know, in this season and transition, I really am experiencing heaven in a totally different and beautiful way. When I'm creating this work, when I'm doing this podcast work or the books or the music or the art that is part of this awakening heaven on earth platform, when I'm writing or recording or just imagining or I'm serving and allowing heaven on earth to take form, I am experiencing flow. Time changes. Hours can pass without me feeling like anything's been taken from me.
Jeffrey Aylor:The work gives me energy rather than consuming energy. There's a sense of harmony between what I'm doing and who I am. Now I know the difference because I've also experienced what it feels like to continue doing only what the world says I can or what the world says I should be doing. I know the heaviness of living from expectation after a deeper purpose has been calling on me or tugging at me. I felt that dissonance.
Jeffrey Aylor:I felt that incongruity. I have felt that resistance. For me, heaven is present whenever I'm in alignment, whenever I'm moving according to the flow and the way of the spirit. Not because the work I'm doing is necessarily easy, and not because every question I have is answered or is being answered, but because the inner life, my inner life, and my outer life are now moving together. They're not at odds with each other.
Jeffrey Aylor:As within, so without. As above, so below. The Hermetic Principle. That concept, whenever you have your inner world in alignment with your outer world, that is the opportunity to experience flow or heaven. There's less division.
Jeffrey Aylor:And where division ends, unity becomes real. It becomes tangible. You can feel it. You experience it. You know, I also think that our perception shapes our reality.
Jeffrey Aylor:As we think, so we live and so we experience. And whenever you change the way you see, you change your world. And how often do we miss heaven in the ordinary? You know, I I also experience heaven in much simpler places. You know, maybe it's a quiet morning with my wife Carol, a simple breakfast and sitting outside or inside and just some quiet time.
Jeffrey Aylor:It could be the laughter we experience with Joel and his family and our grandchildren. I experience heaven in memories of our daughter Katie that we carry without needing to possess those things. Our grandchildren, as they discover the world, as they experience the world, and when they get excited, I get excited. And to me, that's a beautiful piece of heaven. Whenever I'm outside working in the yard and touching soil and trees and plants and feeling that in my hands.
Jeffrey Aylor:You know, a tree that you see recovering from something and healing, it's in food. As a chef, I love food, and I love good drink, and I do believe that one of the greatest gifts we have in this life is to eat and to drink and to be of a merry heart or a strong heart. Sometimes it's just in a honest conversation, you know, where no no one has to pretend music that can say things that words just can't. You know, those moments, they appear ordinary, but perhaps that ordinary moment is actually where heaven has always been. It's been waiting just to be recognized in those moments.
Jeffrey Aylor:So the fulfillment of unity, it's not merely seeing that everything is connected. It's living according to that truth that everything is connected. You know, if god is present in all, then there is not a single person that's disposable. If god is in the earth, then the earth is sacred. Then creation is not merely a raw material to be consumed.
Jeffrey Aylor:If the body is a vessel of consciousness, if the body is a temple, which is the dwelling place of God, then it deserves partnership rather than hatred. If every spiritual path contains sincere seekers, then the differences should not be a threat. They should not be a source of division. If the Christ, which is the seed of god, the very essence of god in all, if Christ is in all, then the stranger, the enemy, the opponent, those that are forgotten, those that have been wounded, they cannot and they should not remain spiritually invisible. Heaven becomes present.
Jeffrey Aylor:It becomes apparent. It becomes experienced when belief becomes embodiment. This knowledge has to move from your head to your heart. So here's some practical examples of embodying this principle. Heaven is now when we listen to someone else without planning our response or defense.
Jeffrey Aylor:Heaven is now when we apologize without worrying about or protecting our image. Heaven is now when a leader uses their authority to empower, to build up people rather than to dominate or control. Heaven is now when a family interrupts a generational wound instead of passing it forward when they become chain breakers. Heaven is now when food is grown with reverence, when it's shared with dignity, and when it's understood as relationship. You've heard the term we are what we eat.
Jeffrey Aylor:Heaven is now when a community makes space for someone who has forgotten that they belong. Heaven is now when conviction remains strong, but contempt and anger and hatred is released. Heaven is now when someone sits beside grief and those that are grieving without trying to fix it. Heaven is now when we stop waiting for another person to become the answer, and we start asking how might love, how can love take form through me, through us? You know, this doesn't have to be grandiose.
Jeffrey Aylor:None of this requires you or me to become some kind of spiritual hero. Heaven usually manifests itself quietly through the next choice you make, through the next word, through the next person you experience, the next opportunity to remember, The fulfillment of unity is cumulative. Just think millions of ordinary acts of recognition gradually will create a totally different world. So now I wanna ask you as you listen to turn inward. Before we close, I wanna invite you to just pause with me.
Jeffrey Aylor:Take a slow deep breath in. Release. Let your body settle. Release for a moment the idea that you have to reach somewhere else, some other place, or some higher plane. Notice what is here now.
Jeffrey Aylor:The very breath in you. The presence of God in that breath. The surface that supports you, the life you feel it moving within and around you. Now ask yourself, where is heaven already present in my life? But maybe it's been unnoticed.
Jeffrey Aylor:Where do I experience love without needing to earn it? Where do I feel most aligned with who I truly am? Who helps me remember that I belong? Where is life inviting me to become more present? Is there something is there a relationship in which heaven could become more visible through me listening, through forgiveness, truth, or maybe a healthy boundary.
Jeffrey Aylor:Is there something that has been entrusted to me, my time, my gifts, my influence, my land, my family, my work, that I am being invited to hold more sacredly? Where am I still waiting for the world to change before I allow myself to be the change, to live from love? And finally, what is one way heaven can take form through me today? You don't have to search for a grand answer. In some cases, let the smallest, most honest answer or response be enough.
Jeffrey Aylor:You know, as we complete this first season of awakening heaven on earth called unity, I returned to the central truth that has carried us from the very beginning. We never have been. We were never ever truly separate. Not from God, not from one another, not from the earth, not from those who love that we love beyond the the boundary of this physical life or presence. We're not separate from the light that moves through all creation.
Jeffrey Aylor:Separation has been the veil. Unity is what remains when the veil becomes transparent, when we learn to see. Heaven is not just a reward awaiting us after this life. It is the divine reality asking to become visible within this life. It is already here.
Jeffrey Aylor:It is already here as a possibility, already here as a presence, already here in every single act of love. And still, it waits for us to participate. So perhaps the big question here is no longer when will heaven come, But perhaps the big question is, how will heaven live through me now, today, through my hands, through my voice, through my choices, through the systems that I work in and help shape, through the people that I welcome, through the life I honor, through the love I am willing to become. Heaven is now. Not because the world is finished, but because love is present.
Jeffrey Aylor:Unity is fulfilled, not because all differences disappear, but because difference no longer prevents us from recognizing and experiencing unity. And the kingdom is here, not as some kind of empire that's imposed on the earth, but as a an awareness, an awakening within our heart, within the human heart, and expressed between all of us. I wanna thank you for walking this journey with me, with my dear friends that have joined me throughout this season. I wanna thank you for entering into the questions. Thank you for bringing your own life into this shared space.
Jeffrey Aylor:You know, my prayer is that we no longer we no longer wait for heaven as though it's absent. My prayer is that we recognize it, that we embody it, that we create from it, and I hope that we can offer it freely to each other. You know, because heaven is not somewhere else. Heaven is here. Heaven is now, and heaven is ours to reveal.
Jeffrey Aylor:And with that, we'll let the space between continue. As we come to a close,
Jeffrey Aylor:remember that this journey continues in many expressions. This podcast is part of a family of partner podcasts. Awakening heaven on earth. The space between heaven and earth and living heaven on earth are three companion podcasts exploring spiritual awakening from complementary perspectives. Awakening Heaven on Earth offers the core teachings and mystical reflections on unity, love, and conscious living.
Jeffrey Aylor:The space between creates room for dialogue, reflection, and lived conversation around those teachings. Living heaven on earth focuses on basic spiritual practices that help embody these insights in daily life. Together, they form a unified journey of understanding,
Jeffrey Aylor:experience,
Jeffrey Aylor:and integration, inviting listeners to remember their connection with the divine, with one another, and with the living world. You can find all of them available on the same podcast streaming platforms wherever you listen. And if music helps carry these teachings deeper into the heart, the unity. Awakening Heaven on Earth album is available on all major music streaming services as a musical companion to this journey. Wherever you engage,
Jeffrey Aylor:through listening,
Jeffrey Aylor:reflection, conversation,
Jeffrey Aylor:or music.
Jeffrey Aylor:May it gently remind you,
Jeffrey Aylor:you are not separate.
Jeffrey Aylor:You belong to the one life
Jeffrey Aylor:and heaven is already unfolding within you.
Jeffrey Aylor:Until next time. Walk gently,
Jeffrey Aylor:love deeply, and embody heaven on earth.