By Jenny Nkebemiso | ONEBEING Living
The Question That Has Haunted Every Soul
What is LIFE?
This question has confronted the world since the so-called beginning of time. It has driven philosophers to madness, mystics to mountaintops, scientists to laboratories, and ordinary people to their knees in the dark hours of the night — searching, aching, praying for an answer that satisfies.
The answers are as plentiful as there are people on Earth. Every religion has one. Every philosophy has one. Every self-help book, every guru, every therapy model, every ancient tradition has one. Billions of answers. Centuries of searching.
And yet — here you are. Still asking.
Not because you haven’t tried. You have tried everything. You’ve prayed. You’ve meditated. You’ve gone to church, to therapy, to retreats. You’ve read the books, followed the teachers, done the inner work. And still — beneath all the answers — something quietly persists. A low hum of incompleteness. A feeling that something fundamental is wrong. That you are, at some deep level, broken.
But what if that feeling — the very feeling that has driven your entire spiritual search — was never based in Truth?
What if you were never broken at all?
Why Every Answer Has Failed You
Here is something no teacher, no preacher, no philosopher has dared say plainly:
The fact that billions of answers exist is not evidence of wisdom. It is evidence of collective confusion.
If even one answer had been truly, definitively satisfying — the question would have stopped being asked. The search would have ended. The suffering would have ended. But the search continues. The suffering persists. And with it, a haunting suspicion: What if we’ve all been wrong?
Each person has his or her own sense of what LIFE is. A sincere sense. A deeply felt, personally meaningful sense. But sincerity does not equal Truth. A million people sincerely believing the same wrong thing does not make it right. And a single soul recognizing the Eternal Truth — even alone — does not make it less True.
There IS a correct definition of LIFE. Not another opinion. Not another perspective. A revelation — of what has always been, Unchangeably, Eternally so.
That is what this is.
First — What LIFE Is NOT
Before we can receive this Eternal Truth, we must clear the ground so you can see what lies beneath. Because most of what you’ve been taught about LIFE is not just incomplete — it is fundamentally misdirected.
And we must begin with something crucial that almost no one names directly:
When most people talk about LIFE, they are actually talking about themselves — their personal self-identity. Their history, their body, their feelings, their story.
This is the first and most foundational confusion. Because there is an Eternal difference between the would-be personal self-identity — the ego-self assembled from experience, culture, religion, and belief — and THE INDIVIDUAL ETERNAL EXISTENCE THAT IS THE ONE AND ONLY SELF OF ENTIRETY: THE INSEPARABLE BEING CALLED SPIRIT.
LIFE — true LIFE — IS A SINGLE INDIVIDUAL ETERNAL EXISTENCE THAT IS THE ETERNAL SELF OF THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM. This INDIVIDUAL ETERNAL IDENTITY OF GOD’S I-AM cannot be turned on or off. It cannot be separated, divided, blotted out, bypassed, shunted to one side, or shunned. It is not a feature of you. It is not something you possess. It is WHO AND WHAT YOU ARE AS THE SOUL OR GOD’S IMAGE AND LIKENESS — Eternally, Completely, NOW.
Here is the summary of the distinction: The INDIVIDUAL SELF IS THE SELF OF THE I-AM OPERATING AS A SPIRIT BEING WITHIN THE ETERNAL MIND OF THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM AS THE I-AM.
The other self is the ego’s personal, individual self-identity, a pretend self created on the premise that the Spirit and the Soul are separated because of sin. As a result, the Soul is lost and hurting because it fell from grace. Personal self-identity is tied to the theological and superstitious beliefs of sin and death, to human conditioning, and hence to biology.
Once you make this distinction, everything else becomes clear. And everything the world has called “LIFE” is exposed as something far smaller than Eternal Truth.
LIFE Is Not a Spark That Animates Bodies
The world has largely agreed — across science, medicine, even much of spirituality — that LIFE is a force. A spark. An energy. Something that enters a body at birth and exits at death. Something that animates matter from the inside, the way electricity animates a light bulb.
This view makes LIFE:
- Temporary — something that arrives and departs
- Fragile — something that can be lost, drained, diminished, extinguished
- Dependent — on a body, on conditions, on a stimulus
But think carefully about what that means. If LIFE is just a spark inside a temporary body, then your existence is fundamentally precarious. You are, at best, a brief flame in darkness. Something that flickers, burns, and goes out.
Is it any wonder so many people live in quiet terror?
LIFE Is Not Energy, Vibration, or Frequency
Modern spirituality has refined this view — instead of a physical spark, LIFE becomes energy. Vibration. Frequency. The invisible motivating urge behind all movement, all growth, all consciousness.
Better language, still the same trap — but still not Truth.
Because if LIFE is energy, you can raise or lower it. Cultivated or depleted. In abundance or in lack. And once again — you are left dependent on the ego-mindset. On your practices. On your personal mindset. On your spiritual discipline. On how well you manage your energy today. A LIFE that has to be maintained isn’t LIFE. It’s another performance metric, dressed up as spirituality.
This is still a LIFE that can be lost.
And a LIFE that can be lost is not LIFE at all.
The Truth is far more radical, far more stable, and far more liberating than any of these definitions have dared to be.
What LIFE Actually IS — The I-AM-THAT-I-AM Revealed
Now. On cleared ground. The Truth.
LIFE IS SPIRIT + SOUL FUNCTIONING TOGETHER AS ONE SINGLE “I” — I-AM-THAT-I-AM COMPLETE OMNIPRESENT ACTION, GOD, PRESENT IN TOTAL ACTION.
Not a force behind Existence and not an energy inside things. This SINGLE EXISTENCE is called BEING, or the I-AM-THAT-I-AM: the Eternal BEING underneath LIFE AND EXISTENCE infact IT IS EXISTENCE ITSELF, prior to any ego-construct, any history, any label attached to God’s Image and Likeness or the Soul.
This is Eternal SINGLENESS, the OMNIPresent NOW. It expresses how BEING—or THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM, the Soul, the “I-AM” God’s Image and Likeness—feels when the searching soul steps outside the ego-construct of self-identity, the human mind, limiting beliefs, and limitations like time, space, and ego, and experiences Existence from the Perspective of Pure, SINGLENESS OF SPIRIT BEING.
This is not a mystical destination. This is not an advanced Spiritual state reserved for the enlightened few. This is YOUR original, Eternal, Uninterrupted Nature — right NOW.
To fully receive this Eternal Truth, let us unfold IT in IT’s Completeness:
THE SINGLENESS OF THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM— There Is Only ONE BEING
SPIRIT + SOUL = BEING-I — inclusive of everything in the universe.
The I-AM-THAT-I-AM is THE SINGLE ETERNAL EXISTENCE THAT IS THE SINGLE UNDIVIDED SPIRIT BEING within which everything in the universe IS. All of the universe is within this ONE SINGLE UNDIVIDED EXISTENCE.
A few of its properties, stated plainly:
Here, there is no duality: “me” and “you.” There is no “God up there” and “human down here.” There is no seeker and sought. There is ONLY this ONE ETERNAL BEING — expressing, knowing, and discovering ITSELF throughout all of Eternity.
It is single. There is no “you” and “God” as two things in a relationship. This SINGLENESS cannot be separated, divided, or chopped into portions. For IT IS AN INDIVIDUAL EXISTENCE — SINGLE only, SINGLENESS ( SPIRIT+SOUL=BEING-I) in IT’s Numerical ONENESS, ETERNITY in IT’s Eternal Undivided Totality.
To separate or divide SPIRIT + SOUL — to establish another self-identity, on any basis, through any assumption or thesis or belief — would require either an addition to the ONENESS OF THE SPIRIT+SOUL AS ONE SINGLE BEING FUNCTIONING TOGETHER AS ONE or a taking away from the COMPLETENESS of the I-AM-THAT —- THAT I-AM ( SELF OF THE I-AM). It means the subtraction of the Soul or God’s Image and Likeness from the I-AM-THAT-I-AM-IS.
The Soul, God’s Image and Likeness, IS not becoming — IT already IS. Why? Because IT IS THE “I-AM-OF-GOD’s Image and Likeness, the Soul IS the “I-AM-SELF” of the I-AM-THAT ETERNALLY IS.
Real, in the dictionary sense: actual, not potential. Not arriving someday. Already complete.
The Soul IS Aware of ITSELF. This isn’t an unconscious force. Spirit knows IT IS Spirit. This Awareness isn’t something you achieve through practice — it’s what LIFE already IS.
It operates at full capacity, always. Not the human mind, with its doubts and blind spots — the I-AM-THAT-I-AM underneath it, undiminished, without error or lack.
And neither is possible.
You cannot add to All. You cannot subtract from Complete.
SPIRIT AND UNENDING HAPPINESS, INNER PEACE— A State Beyond Physical Limits
This describes your Spirit State of Existence — a state entirely beyond physical boundaries.
It speaks of existence within the Eternal MIND of the I-AM-THAT-I-AM — outside of linear time, outside of historical narrative, outside of the ego’s story of past and future.
This SPIRIT state exists entirely in BEING OR THE-I-AM-THAT-I-AM— in the Eternal NOW.
It never grows old. It never becomes stagnant or repetitive. Strip away the idea of time and separation, and what’s left isn’t a static, distant transcendence. It’s a Single, Total, ever-fresh Existence — ONE that is fully Present, right NOW, underneath the noise of your ego’s story about who you are and what you’re missing.
Every instant in this state feels completely alive, vibrant, and brand new. Not because something is constantly changing — but because the I-AM-THAT-I-AM is Eternally, INexhaustibly ITSELF, and ITSELF is ETERNAL.
OMNIPOTENTLY DISCOVERING — Eternal Power Knowing ITSELF
“Omnipotent” means All-Powerful.
This Eternal Singular I-AM-THAT-I-AM uses ITS ETERNAL POWER to perpetually explore and uncover ITS own Nature — again and again, endlessly, joyfully, without repetition, without exhaustion.
This is not God searching for something lost. This is God reveling in the inexhaustible richness of what God IS.
And this is the LIFE that you are — not a desperate search for something missing, but the Eternal, joyful, Omnipotent unfolding of BEING knowing ITSELF.
When you strip away the illusions of time and separation, this is what remains: a joyful, Eternal burst of Pure Existence. Not a boring or static emptiness — but a thrilling, ever-fresh experience where the I-AM-THAT-I-AM constantly discovers ITSELF in the Eternal NOW.
Discovering The LIFE OF THE SOUL, GOD’s IMAGE & LIKENESS — Definition, Meaning By The I-AM-THAT-I-AM
LIFE IS BEING, REAL EXISTENCE, SPIRIT AWARENESS, SOUL AWARENESS, MIND FUNCTIONING TO THE FULL.
Let each one land:
BEING — Not a mortal being. Not a creature, not a person in a body, not an ego with a history. BEING is Pure Existence — THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM ITSELF. What IS before any ego-construct, any human history, any body, or any label is applied to the Soul or God’s Image and Likeness.
THE INDIVIDUAL ETERNAL EXISTENCE — Perhaps the most radical concept available to human understanding. It simply IS. No repentance required. No explanation needed. No beginning to trace, no end to fear. THE INDIVIDUAL ETERNAL EXISTENCE IS SELF-EVIDENT, SELF-SUSTAINING ETERNAL TRUTH. You cannot ask why God IS — the I-AM-THAT-I-AM IS IT’s own only Eternal Answer.
REAL EXISTENCE — According to Merriam-Webster, the quality or state of BEING — true and factual rather than imagined or possible. Not potential. Not possibility. Not becoming someday. Already actual. Already Whole. Already HERE. The LIFE of the Soul, the LIFE of God’s “I-AM” Image and Likeness, does not need to arrive — IT IS AN ETERNAL BEING whose LIFE is not related or connected to biology nor to the ego construct of self-identity or “being.” It is undeniably, unquestionably, completely a SPIRIT BEING.
SPIRIT AWARENESS — LIFE is not unconscious matter. Spirit knows IT IS Spirit. God knows IT IS God. This Awareness is not a human achievement to be earned through practice — it is the I-AM-THAT-I-AM, SELF-knowing the Nature of LIFE ITSELF.
SOUL AWARENESS — The SOUL OR GOD’S Image and Light IS the light by which everything is known. IT IS THE LENS OF PERCEPTION through which LIFE is to be lived. LIFE doesn’t have Spirit — LIFE IS SPIRIT. Eternally seeing ITSELF through ITSELF, knowing ITSELF as ITSELF, being ITSELF as ITSELF.
If you, dear lost and hurting soul, aren’t seeing and perceiving LIFE through BEING, then the ego is operating and controlling your life. So you live and operate from a false, pretend mindset.
MIND FUNCTIONING TO THE FULL — Not the human brain, with its doubts, its limitations, its fears, and its unanswered questions. The Eternal Mind — I-AM-THAT-I-AM — always operating at Complete, Undiminished capacity. No error. No confusion. No lack. No malfunction. Always Whole. Always Entire. Always NOW.
The Equation That Contains Everything
TOTAL COMPLETENESS OF SPIRIT + SOUL = BEING-I, ALIVE TO ITS OWN FULLNESS, HAPPINESS, BLISS, INNER PEACE, REST OF GOD.
This is the I-AM-THAT-I-AM — Entirely, Eternally Operative. Wholly Present throughout Immensity, Totality, Wholeness, Allness. Not contained by space. Not interrupted by time. Not diminished by anything. Not self-improved upon by anything.
There simply is nothing but INDIVIDUAL ETERNAL EXISTENCE “being.” Existence ITSELF Existing. Omnipresence: Totally Present — everywhere, always, completely.
The Soul — God’s Image and Likeness — that is the “I” of God’s “I AM” — cannot be separated, divided, taken from or added to anything. For the Soul IS the ONE AND ONLY BEING, the SPIRIT + SOUL functioning together as ONE SINGLE INDIVIDUAL ALL — the only BEING God made.
THIS BEING IS ETERNAL. COMPLETE. TOTAL.
The only MIND of the I-AM-THAT-I-AM — where the SOUL is the only Awareness, the SPIRIT is the only Substance, Identity and Existence ITSELF — Eternally NOW.
The Lie/Belief That Installed Your Suffering
Now we must speak plainly about something that every sincere seeker of God, The Nature of God’s Eternal Truth, deserves to hear.
There is a belief — installed by centuries of theological indoctrination and human conditioning — that sits underneath all human suffering; it is the singular source of all suffering. Not sin itself. Not karma. Not trauma. Not your past choices or failures.
The belief. This one, specifically:
That you, the Soul— God’s Image and Likeness— are separated from God.
The belief itself: that you are separated from God.
Religion taught you that something happened. A fall. A sin. A transgression so catastrophic that it severed the Soul from the Spirit, the human from the divine, you from God.
And ever since that original fracture — you are lost. Fallen. In need of redemption. Striving, praying, performing, confessing — trying to return to a wholeness you forfeited.
Religion taught you a story — a fall, a transgression, a fracture that severed your soul from the source of your own life. Ever since, you’ve been cast as a lost soul, striving to earn your way back to a Wholeness you supposedly forfeited. That story feels compassionate. It hands you a path. But it rests on a premise that doesn’t hold:
This teaching feels compassionate. It offers a path. A solution. A way back.
But it is built on a premise that is — plainly, irreversibly, absolutely — not true.
Here is why, stated without apology:
Since LIFE is OMNIPRESENCE — everywhere, always, total — there is no location where separation could occur. There is no outside of God where a fallen soul could land. OMNIPRESENCE leaves no gap. No void. No exile. No address for separation to exist.
Since SPIRIT + SOUL function as ONE SINGLE ETERNAL SINGLENESS, the division between them that religion describes never happened. Not once. Not partially. Not temporarily. Never.
Since THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM is UNCHANGEABLE, God’s Image and Likeness cannot have become something God is not. The Unchangeable cannot change. The Perfect cannot become imperfect. The complete cannot become broken.
So: separation never happened. Not because it’s a comforting story to tell you — because the logic doesn’t leave room for it to be true. There is nothing besides this ONE ETERNAL EXISTENCE, which means there was never anywhere for your soul to have fallen to.
Therefore — with absolute, unassailable logic:
God’s Image and Likeness has never sinned. Sin never occurred. Separation never happened. The fall was never real.
This is not permissiveness. This is not spiritual bypassing. This is not a comfortable reassurance designed to bypass accountability.
This is the most rigorous, logically airtight Eternal Truth available to the lost and hurting Soul, God’s Image and Likeness or anyone hurt and suffering:
There can be nothing besides God — for Perfection cannot be self-improved upon.
And if there is nothing besides God — there is nowhere for you to have fallen to.
The suffering you have or are still carrying appears real, but it is an illusion. This means you are living within a false consciousness that does not exist in reality. It’s like having a terrible nightmare. When you wake up, you realize it was just a dream. The reality or ego-mindset operating your life is an error. The confusion appears real. The pain appears real, but it’s still the ego playing its game. But its cause was never sin. Its cause was never God’s punishment. Its cause was a false belief —conditioning—and a belief, once clearly seen through the perspective of the INTELLIGENCE THAT BROUGHT EXISTENCE INTO BEING, THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM, the ego loses all its power, control and influence over all its victims.
The Bridge — From What You’ve Been Told to What Is Eternally True
You came to this article carrying something. Perhaps you didn’t name it. But it has been with you — a quiet, persistent weight. A sense that you are behind, below, or apart from where you should be.
Let us name it now. And set it down.
| What You’ve Been Carrying | What Is Eternally True |
|---|---|
| “I am a sinner, separated from God” | God’s Image has NEVER sinned — sin never occurred |
| “I need to find my way back to God” | OMNIPRESENCE leaves no gap — your Soul was NEVER separated from the Spirit. You have never left |
| “Something is fundamentally wrong with me” | SPIRIT + SOUL are ONE ETERNAL SINGLENESS — Always! It is the emptiness of the belief that your Soul is mortal that creates the emptiness you feel |
| “I need to earn God’s presence through effort” | The I-AM-THAT-I-AM is already Wholly, Totally Present |
| “LIFE is something I must protect and hold onto” | LIFE is what you ARE — it cannot be lost |
| “I am incomplete — still becoming whole” | BEING-I is already alive to its own fullness and Happiness |
The movement from the left column to the right is not a new belief layered on top of old ones. It is the dissolution of a belief that was never grounded in the I-AM-THAT-I-AM — and the simple, clear-eyed realization of Who and What You ARE IS always already so.
This is what I-AM-THAT-I-AM calls Living in BEING.
You do not need to be healed. You need to see that you were never wounded as you were told. You were never who they told you you are. Your Soul does not need to return to God. You need to realize that the I-AM-THAT-I-AM has never been anywhere but HERE — as the very LIFE, the very Awareness, the very Existence that you ARE.
LIFE Cannot Be Separated From ACTION — And Neither Can You
One more thing must be said — because the Eternal Truth we are uncovering is not passive.
LIFE is not a state of serene, distant, untouched transcendence. LIFE is not meditation. LIFE is not stillness as opposed to motion. LIFE is not withdrawal from the world into mystical silence.
LIFE is ACTION ITSELF.
Not movement. Not motion. Not commotion or reaction. Not the frantic, ego-driven doing of a self trying to prove itself, earn itself, or rescue itself.
SPIRIT + SOUL = BEING-I, THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM ITSELF — Totally Operative, Wholly Present, Fully being All that EXISTENCE.
This means your true nature — the “BEING-I or “the I-AM-SELF” that you are — is not sitting somewhere outside of life, waiting to be awakened by the right teacher, the right practice, or the right spiritual breakthrough. It is Already Totally Operative. Already Wholly Present. Already fully being everything that EXISTENCE IS.
The I-AM-THAT-I-AM is not a future state to be attained. It is your Present, Eternal BEING — right NOW, underneath the noise of the ego’s confusion, beneath every story of sin and death, separation, beneath every belief that told you something was missing.
And this Totality — this solidarity of SINGLENESS — leaves nothing out:
- ✓ No separation of Spirit and Soul
- ✓ No sin, no death, no division
- ✓ No opposition, void, or emptiness
- ✓ No suffering that has its source in Truth
It leaves only what the UNCHANGEABLE I-AM-THAT-I-AM made — which is Eternally, Completely, Perfect GOODNESS and SPIRIT EXISTENCE.
What This Means for You — Right Now
You do not need another spiritual practice to earn what you already are.
You do not need to heal a separation that never occurred.
You do not need to forgive yourself for a sin that God’s Image is incapable of committing.
You do not need to find God — because OMNIPRESENCE means God has never been anywhere but here, as the very LIFE, the very Awareness that you are.
What you need — what this moment offers you — is the realization of what is TRUTH from what is fiction.
Realization that the suffering, though it appears real, is equally an illusion — but its cause was a belief, not a Truth.
Realization that the search was sincere; its premise was wrong— but its premise was and still is a lie. You are not a person trying to become spiritual enough. You are BEING ITSELF.
Realization that you are not a mortal human trying to become spiritual — you are BEING-I, Eternal and Whole, temporarily hypnotized by the ego’s story of separation, now waking to what has always been true. You are BEING itself, temporarily convinced by the ego’s story that you’re separate — and that conviction loosens the moment you stop defending it.
And Realization—once it genuinely lands—requires no effort. It does not require years of practice. It does not require a guru’s approval or a religion’s endorsement.
It requires only the willingness to stop defending and protecting the very belief that keeps you in pain and suffering.
You Were Never Broken
Not once. Not partially. Not temporarily.
God’s Image and Likeness — which is what you are — has never sinned; your Soul has never fallen from Grace, never been separated from the Spirit that IS IT’s Eternal STAND and SUBSTANCE.
The I-AM-THAT-I-AM is UNCHANGEABLE. And you are IT’s Image and Likeness.
Which means — you are Unchangeably Whole. Unchangeably Present. Unchangeably LIFE ITSELF.
LIFE is not something you lost and need to recover.
LIFE is what you ARE — the I-AM-THAT-I-AM, Wholly present, Totally Complete, Alive to IT’s own Eternal Fullness and Happiness.
This is the ETERNITY Truth that religion never told you.
Not because Eternal Truth was hidden or withheld — but because Theological superstitious beliefs, religion and humanity can NEVER know the I-AM-THAT-I-AM under any circumstances. Hence, they cannot give what they do not have. Neither can they interpret or identify God’s Image and Likeness or the Soul.
They can ONLY speak of personal self-identity because personal self-identity is ego-limiting-belief programming and conditioning fed to the personal self through theological and superstitious beliefs and human conditioning, into a self-concocted or dreamed-up subjective self-identity called personal self mindset.
Religion never told you this — not because this Eternal Truth was hidden or withheld, but because religion was never in a position to hand it to you. You cannot give what you do not have, and no theology built on the premise of separation can identify what it has already assumed doesn’t exist.
What religion and human conditioning can speak to — with real authority — is the personal self. The résumé, the roles, the story of who you are based on what happened to the ego’s construct of self. That identity isn’t who and what you are authentically. It’s just not what’s doing the looking. It’s a construct, assembled out of belief and conditioning, and mistaken for the whole of you. Theology can describe that construct in exhaustive detail. It simply can’t see past it, because it was built from the same premise the construct runs on.
So no — this wasn’t withheld from you. It doesn’t exist in the human void or emptiness; no one could ever locate THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM in the human mind. Just as the human mind or ego-mind does not exist in the Eternal MIND OF THE I-AM-THAT-I-AM. Why? Because the I-AM-THAT-I-AM did not create the ego, personal self-identity or humanity.
It can only be realized.
And perhaps — in this very moment — something in you is beginning to realize it.
Not as an idea. Not as a new belief to adopt. But the ONE AND ONLY SINGLENESS— the quiet, unshakeable knowing of what you have always been.
Ready to go deeper?
Soul Care — ONEBEING Living’s Spiritual Wellness Boutique — is where this recognition becomes your lived reality. Not through more seeking. Not through more striving. Through the definitive revelation of who you have always been — the I-AM-THAT-I-AM, Eternally Whole, Eternally Present, Eternally Free.