The Way of Immanuel is love. Love is the essential element of our message and the foundation upon which our entire belief system is based. Love is our motivation for getting up in the morning. It is the glue that binds us to each other and we are all connected. Love is the light that guides our footsteps on the path of life’s journey. It begins with love of self because, if you don’t love yourself, you do not believe yourself worthy of being loved and are therefore incapable of receiving love from or giving love to anyone else. If you don’t love yourself, you are not capable of achieving the success you say you want, no matter what the field of endeavor you are involved in because you don’t feel worthy of that success. Loving yourself is the cornerstone of everything you can do or achieve in life.

Loving your self means knowing your self, understanding your self, liking your self, respecting your self, serving your self, and protecting your self. Love of self can be manifested through our pursuit and maintenance of mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual fitness. Mental fitness is achieved through reading, observation, study, and discourse. Physical fitness comes through exercising the body, in work and in play. We endorse the practice of all sports, to achieve and maintain that physical fitness. Emotional fitness is a product of us loving ourselves, each other and everything that lives, life itself. Spiritual fitness can only come through the consciousness raising inward journey of reflection. We must reflect on who we are, where we are, and why we are here. Then, we must reflect what we found to all who would see.

Some of us choose to reflect this through the visual and performing arts. Some of us do this through sports and some through martial arts. Others do it through motivational speaking, guidance, and counseling. Still others do it through their practice of various trades and the professions. Whatever we do, we do it better if we do what we love and love what we do.

What is knowledge of self? We must learn who we are and who we are not. The key to our happiness and peace of mind is not blending in, doing the same thing everyone else is doing, and becoming unnoticeable. Nor, is it attempting to copy someone else and duplicate the achievements, real or imagined, of anyone else. It is discovering what we really want, who we want it with, and how to achieve it. We must learn our strengths and our weaknesses. We’ve got to know our limitations and set realistic goals for ourselves to achieve.

Awareness of self is that state of consciousness in which we are attuned to our bodies and the universe surrounding our bodies. We become aware of the relationship between ourselves and the universe around us, and our place in that universe. That consciousness brings a level of contentment and serenity.

Respect of self means treating our bodies as though we understand that they are the houses of our lives. We live in these bodies. So, it only makes sense that we take care of them. We need to feed our bodies, exercise our bodies, rest our bodies, and not pollute our bodies with toxins and poisons.

Appreciation of self means becoming comfortable in our own skins and enjoying our selves. There is no formula for the “perfect human being”. So, there is no point in wasting our time trying to fit ourselves into the “box” of someone else’s idea of what “perfection” is. We are obliged only to be the best us we can be and enjoy the process and the journey.

Then, love incorporates loving others and being loved by others. No man or woman is an island. We are social animals and see ourselves in the context of how we relate to others. Peer approval tends to be very important to us. We want to be loved. But, we sometimes forget that we must give love in order to receive love and first, we must love ourselves. Loving others means sharing love with others. That does not mean the same thing as “possessing” others. Human beings cannot “possess” or own each other. We can share moments of our lives, whether those are brief moments or lifelong moments, with each other, but that does not give us any proprietary claims on each other. We cannot live our lives loving only one person. That’s not love. It’s fixation. No other individual completes us. We must complete our selves before becoming involved with anyone else. We must learn to love ourselves, and then all others.

Finally, it extends to encompass loving life and every living thing. When we reach the consciousness of loving all others, we understand that it is the life in others that we love and we love all life. Life is God and God is life. So, if we love life then we love God, the God that is in us and every other living thing. The Earth is alive. The oceans that make up more than seventy percent of the Earth are alive. The air we breathe, our atmosphere, is alive. We all share the same life, along with every animal that walks this Earth, and every creature that swims in the oceans, or flies through the air. We are all just different manifestations of the same life, all interconnected parts of the same eco-system.

Understanding this leads to happiness and peace of mind because it removes the need to pursue illusions, imitations of success, and false idols. We are all God and we must each find our own path to connect with that God in us and manifest that.

Even those of us who are not in a physical prison can feel locked in by our fears, anxieties, desires, and anger. When life is getting so closed in that we don’t know what to do, and we feel like we are in prison of our own making, we must look within ourselves to find the path to our freedom. We can travel on that path together, but we must each find our way to that path, individually.

We already know everything we need to know in order to find our way. Sometimes, however, our past experiences can cloud our understanding and prevent us from remembering what we already know. When that happens, we need to empty our minds of everything we think we know and allow our true hearts to lead us in the right direction. We can accomplish this in the stillness of quiet reflection through the practice of meditative prayer. This is the Way of Immanuel.

All of the world’s great wisdom traditions and spiritual masters gave us practical tips on how to go about finding our way:

‘Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and everything else will be added unto you.’ And when someone asked Jesus just where to find this spiritual kingdom, He said: ‘Neither shall you say ‘Lo, here, or Lo, there but the Kingdom of God is within you.’”

Immanuel means God within us. The Way of Immanuel strives and seeks to find and embrace the God within us so that we can manifest that in all that we think, say, and do.

We believe in God and that, by whatever name you choose to call God, there is only one God, the Living Spirit within all of us. We believe that God is neither male nor female and is not an individual personality with a physical address like someplace called Heaven. We believe that man has no proprietary claim to being “made in the image of God” because everything that lives is a reflection of God.

God is life. The difference between a living tree and a piece of wooden furniture is that, although the furniture came from the tree, it no longer has life in it. The life in the living tree is God. Life is life, whether it is found in a tree, a bird, a fish, a dog, or a human being. Because God is life and everything that lives has God in it, everything that lives is a part of God.

Life is energy. Energy is what allows living things to grow and to move. That growth and movement is the manifestation of God in our bodies.

Energy is spirit. Our spirit is the living part of us, that which resides within the husk of our bodies. Our spirit is what lives on when our bodies are withered and decayed. It is our will to live while we live.

Spirit is essence. The essence of a thing, any thing, is the nature of that thing. It is the core of the thing, whether the thing is an inanimate object, or a living thing, like a tree, a bird, or a human being. Essence is God. The essence of living things is God because God is the life within us. Our nature is to be God.

We believe in Christ Consciousness that enlightened state of being in which we are at one with the God in us. Jesus realized Christ Consciousness and challenged us to do the same. He said: “Do not worship me because I am not God. Walk with me and worship God, as I do.” ‘Walking with’ Jesus means following the path He illuminated for us and living our lives according to the principles which He exemplified, principles that are based upon the Universal Truths which have been held by all of the world’s great wisdom traditions and taught by all of the true spiritual masters.

Jesus said: “When you come to know yourselves…you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living father. But, if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty.” (Thomas-3)

This reflects the Gnostic concept that self-consciousness of one’s own divinity (rather than a new awareness of sinfulness and need) is the first step to salvation.

We don’t need to start at the same place in order to follow the same path. We begin our lives in different places and have unique and different experiences that shape our lives. We can begin our journey from whatever point we are at when we realize that this is the path for us to take.

We believe in the Universal Truths, which have been held by all of the world’s great wisdom traditions:

The first objective of any living organism is to survive

Surviving, living, and thriving do not require conquering, controlling, or colonizing others

Be at one with the forces of nature

Treat others the way you yourself want to be treated

You must love yourself before you can love anyone else, or allow yourself to be loved by anyone else.

We believe that we must love our neighbors as ourselves.

We believe that the Earth is our Mother that she must nurture and sustain us all. That is why we must practice sustainable living, not polluting the Earth and leaving as light a footprint as possible on her. This includes natural and organic food production and waste disposal. Why sustainable living? Why must we meet the needs of today without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs? The answer is that, if future generations do not have the ability to meet their own needs because we have squandered all of the world’s resources, our species will not survive and survival is the first law of nature. We need to change the way we produce and consume our goods and services. In order to do that, we need to change the way we think.

We believe that it is our responsibility to care for those who are less fortunate. Those of us who can must help the very old, the very young, the infirm, the hopeless, and the disenfranchised. Are we our brothers and sisters keepers? Yes! A wise man once said: “You cannot blame a person for what they don’t know. But, once we know, we are responsible for acting like we know.” There is no faith without acts consistent with that faith. We manifest our faith through our commitment to the mission of Anbessa Foundation. We should not have worse race problems now than we did fifty years ago. We should all be part of a world where everyone has the milk of prosperity and the honey of equality flowing through them. All of our children should grow up in the sunlight of opportunity. We should not have unemployment and under-employment for masses of people. Clean water, clean air, clean land, and clean food are things that we all must have to sustain ourselves on this planet.

We believe in the spiritual and medicinal healing properties of the Tree of Life, but we do not require that all members must partake of the flower of the tree. If one is suffering from any mental, physical, emotional, or spiritual deficiency, we recommend that they either: eat it, drink it, smoke it, or rub an ointment containing its essence onto the affected area. Biblically cannabis is a seed-bearing plant. Botanically cannabis is an herbaceous annual plant. Botanically and scripturally cannabis is an herb, a food. It is one of the finest of foods. Of all the plants in the world the seed of cannabis is second in protein only to soybeans. Cannabis seeds are the only food that provides essential amino acids and essential fatty acids in the ratio that is optimal for the human body. Humans can and have survived in robust health by eating cannabis seeds. The oil that is pressed from the seed has more polyunsaturated essential fatty acids than any other known oil.

We believe that “No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path”.

We believe that “The way is not in the sky. The way is in the heart.”

“With every single person you come into contact with, you are either giving love or you’re not. And what you give is what you will receive.”

“Relationships are your biggest channel to give love, and so you can change your entire life just through the love you give in your relationships.”

“At the same time though, relationships can be your biggest downfall, because they are often your biggest excuse for not giving love!”

“What You Give to Others, You Give to Yourself. The most enlightened beings throughout history told us to love others, most of us never knew why. It’s because they were giving us the secret to having an amazing life.”

Do these words sound familiar? Love your neighbor as yourself. Understand it now?”





“In generosity and helping others

BE LIKE A RIVER

In compassion and grace BE LIKE SUN

In concealing other’s faults BE LIKE NIGHT

In anger and fury BE LIKE DEAD

In modesty and humility BE LIKE EARTH

In tolerance BE LIKE A SEA

EITHER EXIST AS YOU ARE OR BE AS YOU LOOK.”



We live in a world that teaches us that individuality is a bad thing that peace and happiness in our lives come from blending in with everyone else. In order to feel whole/complete and therefore worthy of being loved, respected, valued, and honored, we must possess certain things. Newspapers, magazines, radio, television, and movies constantly drill that same message into our heads over and over again. Conveniently, in addition to telling us which things we need to possess, they also tell us where to find those things and how much we need to pay to acquire them.

What they don’t tell us is that we only need those things if we believe that those things are a prerequisite to peace and happiness, that they represent success and security.

Knowledge of self and awareness of self, means understanding that we don’t need to possess “things” in order to be who we are. We are worthy of love, respect, admiration, happiness, and success just because we are. We must, however, learn to define such things as happiness, success, and security for our selves, based on what resonates in our own hearts, rather than allow our happiness to be defined by anyone else. We must each find our own path.