Notes by Doug Muder (1997)

Spiritual power "is the capacity to make decisions with maximum awareness. … The experience of spiritual power is basically a joyful one. … Such a loss of self brings with it always a kind of calm ecstasy, not unlike the experience of being in love. Aware of their intimate connectedness to God, they experience a surcease of loneliness. There is communion." [pages 286-287]

"Unlike the popular notion of it, omniscience does not make decision-making easier; rather , it becomes ever more difficult. The closer one comes to godhood, the more one feels sympathy for God. To participate in God's omniscience is also to share His agony." [page 287]

"There is another problem with spiritual power: aloneness. … Presidents and kings will have their friends and cronies. But the person who has evolved to the highest level of awareness, of spiritual power, will likely have no one in his or her circle of acquaintances with whom to share such depth of understanding. … It is such a burden that it simply could not be borne were it not for the fact that as we outdistance our fellow humans our relationship to God inevitably becomes correspondingly closer. In the communion of growing consciousness, of knowing with God, there is enough joy to sustain us." [pages 288-289]

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