New beginnings are moments that are free from the karma of past failures. New beginnings give us a chance to regain our lost innocence, and the heartfelt, passionate conviction that all things are possible. New beginnings give us the opportunity to rediscover trust in the creative mystery that is animating the entire universe – to liberate ourselves from the self-limiting chains of fear, doubt and hesitation.

New beginnings can be found both in time and beyond time. In time, they are experienced when we move to a new location, start a new job, begin a new relationship or go on a new adventure. But when we pursue the spiritual process in earnest, we discover that beyond time is a liberating freedom of a different kind. We find infinite renewal in timeless, formless, beginningless and endless Being. We become immersed in the transcendental freedom of what the Buddha called the Unborn, Ramana Maharshi called the Self and Meister Eckhart called the God Within.

New beginnings in time offer our bodies, minds and personalities the opportunity to grow and evolve. New beginnings beyond time reawaken us to eternity, where we can abide in a state of infinite renewal at the level of the soul. One is about relative change within time; the other is about an absolute leap into a dimension beyond time.

When we awaken to enlightened awareness in a way that is deep and profound, we become grounded in the truth that from an absolute perspective, every moment is a new beginning, radiating with the presence of the infinite. This life changing discovery becomes our North Star – our guiding light through every high and low, and the endless ebb and flow of the relative world.

Now it becomes possible to live in a perpetual state of positive tension between absolute and relative, between manifest and unmanifest. No matter what our bodies, minds and personalities may be experiencing in the relative dimension, in the domain of the absolute and at the level of the soul, every day is the first day of a New Year.

In this talk, Andrew Cohen invites us to bring in the New Year in a new light, taking this festive season as an opportunity to mark the deep spiritual relevance of rediscovering and celebrating our own deepest nature – a perennial New Beginning for the heart and soul.