The End of Longing

"The ego sees all dependency as threatening, and has twisted even your longing for God into a means of establishing itself." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section V, 6:8

All definitions of longing agree that it is the strong desire for something unavailable or distant. It could be defined as "I want..." rather than, "I am." Whether the longing is for some experience, some person, some place, or some thing in the world, it is always something separate, not immediately available, and distant. Some have sublimated all such longings into the longing for God... but this is ego, insisting that it is separate and distant and distinct from God. Some have celebrated human longing, and followed it as far as it will lead. This too is ego, feeding a contracted sense of self that imagines its own autonomy and demands its desires be fulfilled.

All longing is the attempt to fill a need or resolve a difference... and only the imagined self has needs or sees differences. The real Self is whole and complete, a state of awareness where "differences have disappeared, and Love looks on ItSelf." (A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 28, 5:2) ACIM reminds us again and again that in reality, having and being are one and the same. You can't have what you're not willing to be. So the experience of longing, "I want..." has no meaning in reality. As God said to Moses, "I Am that I Am."

In our Awareness of perfect Oneness, there is nothing missing. Here in the dreamworld we call life, even when we love there is something missing, and the inevitable longing for completion is a constant companion. Longing can never be fulfilled in the dream. The end of longing is remembering God. Remembering our Oneness with God is remembering our eternal Self. The end of longing is the acceptance that (always and forever), I Am.

"Let all things be exactly as they are. Only reality is free of pain. Only reality is free of loss. Only reality is wholly safe." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 268, 2:2-4