"And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed... and all went to be taxed, every one to his own city." -- The Bible; Luke 2: 1-3
As I was listening to a reading of the Christmas story on Christmas Eve, it was as if a translation was going on in my awareness. The world of Caesar, in this story, is the illusory material world with all its laws and limitations that seem to bind us and burden us. The tax is the need to bow down to these laws, to sacrifice to them and obey them and suffer because of them. Whether these are laws about bodies or laws about finances (and taxes!) or laws about relationships, the result is the same. We are on a treadmill trying to keep up and we feel guilt if we don't measure up. So we stay on that treadmill trying to fix it, to change it, or to succeed in it. Sometimes we just feel the need to punish ourselves or someone else for not measuring up to those insane laws. It's all the same thing, and the end result is a dizzying sense of burden and unease and guilt, even in the best of times.
Then, in the midst of this story of all the world bowing down to Caesar and paying taxes in tribute, Mary goes into labor. There is of course no room for this innocence in the insanity of guilt and need that is the world of Caesar. No room in the inn, which is where that world says we must stay. But in this amazing story of joy and deliverance, Mary gives birth to baby Jesus (Emmanuel, God with us!) right where she finds herself, which in the world's view is the lowliest of circumstances. This birth is taking place right where we are, wherever we are! No special circumstances needed! The birth pains come from our clinging to stories of wrongness, guilt, blame, lack, and limitation. The actual birth is the act of forgiving, of letting go of the burden of believing we are subject to laws of guilt, lack, and limitation. And the baby (God with us!) is the dawning Awareness of our Eternal Innocence and abiding as expressions of the One Love and Light that is God. We are that new born Awareness, expressing Love and Joy and Peace. We are the Christmas Story. This new day, and every new day.
As 2018 approaches, we don't need health or relationship or financial or political or ecological miracles to experience security and fulfillment. "Perfect security and complete fulfillment are my inheritance." (A Course in Miracles; Workbook 56:1:5). True miracles are born of our perfect innocence (ALL of us!) and Infinite Love (ALL of us!) as pure Awareness. This Awareness is God expressing in the world of Caesar, and is the only miracle we ever need. This pure and innocent Awareness reveals the true hope and joy we all bring to the new year as Emmanuel, God with us! We are the Christmas Story. This new day, and every new day!
"There is one thought in particular that should be remembered throughout the day. It is a thought of pure joy; a thought of peace, a thought of limitless release, limitless because all things are freed within it." (A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 16:6:1-2)
"When they saw the star [when the Awareness of Emmanuel, God with us! dawned], they rejoiced with exceeding great Joy!" -- The Bible; Matthew 2:10
Showing posts with label Awareness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Awareness. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 26, 2017
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
The Guilty Identity
"Temptation has one lesson it would teach, in all its forms, wherever it occurs. It would persuade the holy Son of God he is a body, born in what must die, unable to escape its frailty, and bound by what it orders him to feel."-- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 1:1-2
Do you regularly find things about yourself or your surroundings that are lacking, or should be different? Are you ashamed of things you have done or even are doing? Are you judgmental of what others are doing, mentally shaming them? All of these mental attitudes and actions are part and parcel of the guilty identity we learn as part of a separate self, living in a separate body in this world. Do you know anyone who is free of this?
Even very happy people react and become apologetic if someone else is upset. This is the conditioned guilty response. "I am so sorry," we say, as if we could do something about it. Or as if we should.
A Course in Miracles helps us understand that guilt is how a sense of body awareness and a separate self is maintained. Without the judgment and guilt, there is only the unified Mind, where all things exist in the Light of Awareness and Love, pure transparencies for God. Without judgment and guilt, there is an Awareness of Oneness, which is All Good and only Good. Perfect Oneness is our natural state, which is always and only God, reflecting and radiating the Light of Goodness and Love.
It's interesting, don't you think, that a small upset or affront to our egoic identity can send us into a seeming tail spin, can make us so agitated and fearful that it seems as if a huge thing has really occurred. When in such a state, it's impossible to conceive of a unified Mind that radiates peace and joy. And yet we are always and only reacting to our own judgments and guilty verdicts, the story of a separate body-self and the fearful 'others'. And even in the midst of this story of separation and loss, all we have to do is forgive our judgments and let them go. Right where all seems hopeless or angry or sad or lost or any other version of guilt, there is pure joy and perfect love. Right where the problem seems to be, there is only Love, which is the only Law of God.
"There are no laws but God's... there is no loss under the laws of God. Payment is neither given nor received. Exchange cannot be made; there are no substitutes; and nothing is replaced by something else. God's laws forever give and never take." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 76, 9:1, 3-6
The story of the crucifixion and resurrection of God's Son is the story of everyone's life. The guilty identity that we have carefully protected for so long is not real. It can only seem fearful and shameful and wrong when we hang on to our 'laws' of judgment and refuse to forgive. A Course in Miracles gives us many ways to approach forgiveness, and all of them involve letting go of human laws of judgment and thus realizing what has always been true. The guilty identify was all made up, and has never been at all. This realization is the resurrection of the Son of God.
"Learn then the happy habit of response to all temptation to perceive yourself as weak and miserable with these words: I am as God created me. His Son can suffer nothing. And I am His Son. You are as God created you, and so is every living thing you look upon, regardless of the images you see. What you behold as sickness and as pain, as weakness and as suffering and loss is but temptation to perceive yourself defenseless and in hell. Yield not to this, and you will see all pain, in every form, wherever it occurs, but disappear as mists before the sun."-- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, VIII, 5:1-4, and 6:1-3
Do you regularly find things about yourself or your surroundings that are lacking, or should be different? Are you ashamed of things you have done or even are doing? Are you judgmental of what others are doing, mentally shaming them? All of these mental attitudes and actions are part and parcel of the guilty identity we learn as part of a separate self, living in a separate body in this world. Do you know anyone who is free of this?
Even very happy people react and become apologetic if someone else is upset. This is the conditioned guilty response. "I am so sorry," we say, as if we could do something about it. Or as if we should.
A Course in Miracles helps us understand that guilt is how a sense of body awareness and a separate self is maintained. Without the judgment and guilt, there is only the unified Mind, where all things exist in the Light of Awareness and Love, pure transparencies for God. Without judgment and guilt, there is an Awareness of Oneness, which is All Good and only Good. Perfect Oneness is our natural state, which is always and only God, reflecting and radiating the Light of Goodness and Love.
It's interesting, don't you think, that a small upset or affront to our egoic identity can send us into a seeming tail spin, can make us so agitated and fearful that it seems as if a huge thing has really occurred. When in such a state, it's impossible to conceive of a unified Mind that radiates peace and joy. And yet we are always and only reacting to our own judgments and guilty verdicts, the story of a separate body-self and the fearful 'others'. And even in the midst of this story of separation and loss, all we have to do is forgive our judgments and let them go. Right where all seems hopeless or angry or sad or lost or any other version of guilt, there is pure joy and perfect love. Right where the problem seems to be, there is only Love, which is the only Law of God.
"There are no laws but God's... there is no loss under the laws of God. Payment is neither given nor received. Exchange cannot be made; there are no substitutes; and nothing is replaced by something else. God's laws forever give and never take." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 76, 9:1, 3-6
The story of the crucifixion and resurrection of God's Son is the story of everyone's life. The guilty identity that we have carefully protected for so long is not real. It can only seem fearful and shameful and wrong when we hang on to our 'laws' of judgment and refuse to forgive. A Course in Miracles gives us many ways to approach forgiveness, and all of them involve letting go of human laws of judgment and thus realizing what has always been true. The guilty identify was all made up, and has never been at all. This realization is the resurrection of the Son of God.
"Learn then the happy habit of response to all temptation to perceive yourself as weak and miserable with these words: I am as God created me. His Son can suffer nothing. And I am His Son. You are as God created you, and so is every living thing you look upon, regardless of the images you see. What you behold as sickness and as pain, as weakness and as suffering and loss is but temptation to perceive yourself defenseless and in hell. Yield not to this, and you will see all pain, in every form, wherever it occurs, but disappear as mists before the sun."-- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, VIII, 5:1-4, and 6:1-3
Wednesday, July 1, 2015
In and Out
"In Him we live and move and have our being." --The Bible; Acts 17:28
"I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." -- The Bible; Galatians 2:20
"My mind is part of God's. I am very holy." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 35
Whether we talk about the Mind of God, or the Spirit of God, or the Allness of God, we are always speaking of Infinite Mind which is all-encompassing. The problem with our shared dualistic perspective is that even when we speak of God as All, we place ourselves inside that allness, as if we're sort of part of it, but still something 'other'. Arthur Corey spoke of this dilemma when he wrote, "AS Mind we live and move and have our Being -- not inside of Mind, like seeds in a watermelon!" We can't seem to help viewing everything as in or out.
I began this blog with some Biblical passages that have pointed me toward the Truth over the years. And of course, the famous Workbook Lesson from A Course in Miracles that reminds us we are as holy as God is, and never separate from this Infinite Awareness. Of course, it does so in language that we can understand, however imperfectly. And I have been reflecting on just how inadequate our language is to speak of what is forever One and indivisible.
In Hindu scriptures they compare our minds to waves in the Ocean of Divine Mind. In other words, waves are always and forever ocean... not IN the ocean, but ocean BEING ocean. Our minds are not just part of God's Mind. Our Minds are God's Mind, Infinitely Extending in Perfect Awareness. God BEING God.
"But..." I know. I know. The mind that sleeps seems to shrink in awareness until all it sees is imperfection and fragmented being, everywhere it looks. It is the act of focusing on this tunnel vision that creates the illusion of in and out. From the mountaintop, everything looks different. From a unified Mind, there is only the Beauty of Holiness.
So are both real? This is the question all of us have asked at some point. Immersed in dualism, we imagine there is a 'both', a 'two', an in and an out. The gift of A Course in Miracles is that it shows us how our tunnel vision perspective deludes and frightens us, when it is just a false sense of things, an insubstantial projection of the sleeping mind, and completely false. "Where is the darkness when the Light has come?" the Course asks us. "Nothing, and nowhere," is the reply.
We are forever pure Spirit, pure Mind, which is beyond all appearances that shift and change. We are neither in nor out.
"Unity alone is not a thing of dreams." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 12, 6:10
"I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." -- The Bible; Galatians 2:20
"My mind is part of God's. I am very holy." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 35
Whether we talk about the Mind of God, or the Spirit of God, or the Allness of God, we are always speaking of Infinite Mind which is all-encompassing. The problem with our shared dualistic perspective is that even when we speak of God as All, we place ourselves inside that allness, as if we're sort of part of it, but still something 'other'. Arthur Corey spoke of this dilemma when he wrote, "AS Mind we live and move and have our Being -- not inside of Mind, like seeds in a watermelon!" We can't seem to help viewing everything as in or out.
I began this blog with some Biblical passages that have pointed me toward the Truth over the years. And of course, the famous Workbook Lesson from A Course in Miracles that reminds us we are as holy as God is, and never separate from this Infinite Awareness. Of course, it does so in language that we can understand, however imperfectly. And I have been reflecting on just how inadequate our language is to speak of what is forever One and indivisible.
In Hindu scriptures they compare our minds to waves in the Ocean of Divine Mind. In other words, waves are always and forever ocean... not IN the ocean, but ocean BEING ocean. Our minds are not just part of God's Mind. Our Minds are God's Mind, Infinitely Extending in Perfect Awareness. God BEING God.
"But..." I know. I know. The mind that sleeps seems to shrink in awareness until all it sees is imperfection and fragmented being, everywhere it looks. It is the act of focusing on this tunnel vision that creates the illusion of in and out. From the mountaintop, everything looks different. From a unified Mind, there is only the Beauty of Holiness.
So are both real? This is the question all of us have asked at some point. Immersed in dualism, we imagine there is a 'both', a 'two', an in and an out. The gift of A Course in Miracles is that it shows us how our tunnel vision perspective deludes and frightens us, when it is just a false sense of things, an insubstantial projection of the sleeping mind, and completely false. "Where is the darkness when the Light has come?" the Course asks us. "Nothing, and nowhere," is the reply.
We are forever pure Spirit, pure Mind, which is beyond all appearances that shift and change. We are neither in nor out.
"Unity alone is not a thing of dreams." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 12, 6:10
Saturday, August 2, 2014
The Illusion of Differences
"This world
seems to hold out many purposes, each different and with different
values. Yet they are all the same. Again there is no order; only a
seeming hierarchy of values." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 20, Section VIII, 8:8-10
I have had several conversations with friends in the past week about wanting something different in their lives. Of course, this is a familiar feeling and story for all of us. Something is perceived as wrong or lacking or uncomfortable or simply unsatisfying, and so we think that something different is the answer. Not this, but that. Not here, but there. Not now, but someday. Not that person, but this person, or no person. Something different, which will hopefully be something better.
The illusion of differences is the ego's maintenance plan. This body is different from that body, that car is different from this car, that job is definitely different than this job! And on and on and on and on... there's no end to the ego's litany of needed improvements (translation: differences).
A Course in Miracles gives us many simple and direct ways of seeing through this chaos. One of my favorites is: "Make this year different by making it all the same." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 15, Section XI, 10:11
And how can we make it all the same, when the very nature of our lives seems to be the constant focus on shifting challenges and victories, failures and successes, pleasures and pains? I had a glimpse of this yesterday while filling the water tank for the horses. I only had a few minutes between coaching calls, and went out to make sure the water tank was full. It was a summer mid-afternoon, with rain clouds in the distance, but no air stirring. My focus on the details and differences dropped, and there was crystalline, All-Inclusive Awareness. Silent but Alive. Still but including all movement. Awareness ItSelf. Then the water tank began overflowing and my awareness contracted to take care of business. This is the way of it as we practice letting go of differences. I can focus on the water tank, knowing that The Self that I Am is the Reality of even this seeming. I have only to drop the contracted focus, and my True Self that is Everything, and knows ItSelf as the All where all differences fall away. No matter, just pure Awareness, pure Spirit, pure Mind that includes All.
To the Unified Mind, there are no differences! Perception is a contracted point of view, happening IN you, not TO you. YOU ARE THE SEER AND THE SEEN. There are no differences. And forgiveness, the dropping of the addictive need to project differences, is our unified purpose. A Unified Mind with Unified Purpose returns us to the Awareness of Perfect Oneness (Heaven!) that is Our Reality.
"I will forgive, and this will disappear." A Course in Miracles; Workbook 193, 13:3
I have had several conversations with friends in the past week about wanting something different in their lives. Of course, this is a familiar feeling and story for all of us. Something is perceived as wrong or lacking or uncomfortable or simply unsatisfying, and so we think that something different is the answer. Not this, but that. Not here, but there. Not now, but someday. Not that person, but this person, or no person. Something different, which will hopefully be something better.
The illusion of differences is the ego's maintenance plan. This body is different from that body, that car is different from this car, that job is definitely different than this job! And on and on and on and on... there's no end to the ego's litany of needed improvements (translation: differences).
A Course in Miracles gives us many simple and direct ways of seeing through this chaos. One of my favorites is: "Make this year different by making it all the same." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 15, Section XI, 10:11
And how can we make it all the same, when the very nature of our lives seems to be the constant focus on shifting challenges and victories, failures and successes, pleasures and pains? I had a glimpse of this yesterday while filling the water tank for the horses. I only had a few minutes between coaching calls, and went out to make sure the water tank was full. It was a summer mid-afternoon, with rain clouds in the distance, but no air stirring. My focus on the details and differences dropped, and there was crystalline, All-Inclusive Awareness. Silent but Alive. Still but including all movement. Awareness ItSelf. Then the water tank began overflowing and my awareness contracted to take care of business. This is the way of it as we practice letting go of differences. I can focus on the water tank, knowing that The Self that I Am is the Reality of even this seeming. I have only to drop the contracted focus, and my True Self that is Everything, and knows ItSelf as the All where all differences fall away. No matter, just pure Awareness, pure Spirit, pure Mind that includes All.
To the Unified Mind, there are no differences! Perception is a contracted point of view, happening IN you, not TO you. YOU ARE THE SEER AND THE SEEN. There are no differences. And forgiveness, the dropping of the addictive need to project differences, is our unified purpose. A Unified Mind with Unified Purpose returns us to the Awareness of Perfect Oneness (Heaven!) that is Our Reality.
"I will forgive, and this will disappear." A Course in Miracles; Workbook 193, 13:3
Saturday, September 7, 2013
THIS is the Glory
"You are not saved from anything [there is nothing but God], but you are saved for glory [the extending of the Light of God that we are]. Glory is your inheritance, given you by your Creator that you might extend it." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section IV, 1:4-5 (brackets hold the whispers of Holy Spirit about this quote)
Last night I dreamed about a trio of friends, a girl and two boys. They were part of some much larger community, a typical hierarchical organization of some sort, which was transitioning from an old building and format to a much newer building and organization. It was a big deal, with a new head administrator and gala celebration in the works. And as in all group situations, everybody wanted to be in charge, everybody had personal ideas and preferences, and everybody had an agenda. Somehow (in the way of dreams) my characters decided to kill off the new administrator and take his place, since no one really knew him yet. The ringleader took on that appearance and persona, with the other two going along and making sure everyone believed it. Then ensued a series of such ‘take-overs’, where one of them would kill someone else off and morph into that appearance and persona to take their place. I kept wanting to wake up, but felt powerless to do so until the impostors were somehow ‘safe’. I kept hoping they would just be happy with what they had done, but they kept it up until they started killing each other off to be in charge. I only woke up when my dog-alarms woke me, and I felt hung-over and desperately bad and guilty, as if ‘I’ had been the one doing all the killing, posturing, and deception. And of course, I had been the one. What other one could there be? Whose mind dreamed this?
The Course says in the Manual for Teachers that it takes great learning to understand that ALL things, events, encounters, and circumstances are helpful. Our nightmares are gifts that bring the buried guilt to the Light to be forgiven. What is the source of this guilt? Nothing real, but a lifetime (or lifetimes) of believing the impossible… that we are separate and in competition with many others and with God. Who knows how many dreams we have projected onto the screen of the sleeping mind, with casts of thousands of players, some seemingly innocent and some obviously guilty. But all simply perpetuate this insane desire to kill off what gets in the way of our seeming preferences, and to cast as innocent our desire to do so. All the while we are generating the smoke screen of many separate and sleeping parts, when there is only the One, and that One forever Awake and Aware.
This compulsion to create multiple forms and meanings and needs and versions is hell. Heaven is the unified Awareness of our Eternal Self, the Oneness of Perfect Wholeness and Love without limits. This is not boring sameness, but Infinite Creation, Infinite Bliss. The extension of Love is Our only Purpose, and this Love has no object and no agenda. It is eternally free and isn’t limited to or by imagined forms. It doesn’t need to get rid of anything, or change anything, or keep anything.
Every Sunday in my little church, we sing these words:
“Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: World without end, AMEN, AMEN.”
Glory is the sheer joy of reveling in the Truth, the Source, the One, that shines and extends and includes ALL.
The Son is ALL that extends in and as the Awareness of that One.
The Holy Spirit is the extension of this Glory even within the dream, as the Awakening and Quickening of this Awareness.
This Glory, this ALLNESS, this Quickening of Awareness of Self is the only Purpose of every dream, whether by night or by day (because make no mistake, everything sensed with the body is a dream). How is this Purpose lived? By shedding every judgment, every preference, every personal agenda, every belief in limits and limitations of form. THIS is true forgiveness and the Atonement. THIS is the Glory.
Last night I dreamed about a trio of friends, a girl and two boys. They were part of some much larger community, a typical hierarchical organization of some sort, which was transitioning from an old building and format to a much newer building and organization. It was a big deal, with a new head administrator and gala celebration in the works. And as in all group situations, everybody wanted to be in charge, everybody had personal ideas and preferences, and everybody had an agenda. Somehow (in the way of dreams) my characters decided to kill off the new administrator and take his place, since no one really knew him yet. The ringleader took on that appearance and persona, with the other two going along and making sure everyone believed it. Then ensued a series of such ‘take-overs’, where one of them would kill someone else off and morph into that appearance and persona to take their place. I kept wanting to wake up, but felt powerless to do so until the impostors were somehow ‘safe’. I kept hoping they would just be happy with what they had done, but they kept it up until they started killing each other off to be in charge. I only woke up when my dog-alarms woke me, and I felt hung-over and desperately bad and guilty, as if ‘I’ had been the one doing all the killing, posturing, and deception. And of course, I had been the one. What other one could there be? Whose mind dreamed this?
The Course says in the Manual for Teachers that it takes great learning to understand that ALL things, events, encounters, and circumstances are helpful. Our nightmares are gifts that bring the buried guilt to the Light to be forgiven. What is the source of this guilt? Nothing real, but a lifetime (or lifetimes) of believing the impossible… that we are separate and in competition with many others and with God. Who knows how many dreams we have projected onto the screen of the sleeping mind, with casts of thousands of players, some seemingly innocent and some obviously guilty. But all simply perpetuate this insane desire to kill off what gets in the way of our seeming preferences, and to cast as innocent our desire to do so. All the while we are generating the smoke screen of many separate and sleeping parts, when there is only the One, and that One forever Awake and Aware.
This compulsion to create multiple forms and meanings and needs and versions is hell. Heaven is the unified Awareness of our Eternal Self, the Oneness of Perfect Wholeness and Love without limits. This is not boring sameness, but Infinite Creation, Infinite Bliss. The extension of Love is Our only Purpose, and this Love has no object and no agenda. It is eternally free and isn’t limited to or by imagined forms. It doesn’t need to get rid of anything, or change anything, or keep anything.
Every Sunday in my little church, we sing these words:
“Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: World without end, AMEN, AMEN.”
Glory is the sheer joy of reveling in the Truth, the Source, the One, that shines and extends and includes ALL.
The Son is ALL that extends in and as the Awareness of that One.
The Holy Spirit is the extension of this Glory even within the dream, as the Awakening and Quickening of this Awareness.
This Glory, this ALLNESS, this Quickening of Awareness of Self is the only Purpose of every dream, whether by night or by day (because make no mistake, everything sensed with the body is a dream). How is this Purpose lived? By shedding every judgment, every preference, every personal agenda, every belief in limits and limitations of form. THIS is true forgiveness and the Atonement. THIS is the Glory.
Friday, July 19, 2013
This World of Light
"This world of Light, this circle of brightness is the real world, where guilt meets with forgiveness. Here the world outside is seen anew, without the shadow of guilt upon it. Here are you forgiven, for here you have forgiven everyone. Here is the new perception, where everything is bright and shining with innocence, washed in the waters of forgiveness, and cleansed of every evil thought you laid upon it. Here is your innocence waiting to clothe you and protect you, and make you ready for the final step in the journey inward. Here are the dark and heavy garments of guilt laid by, and gently replaced by purity and love." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 18, Section IX, 9:1-7
"Freedom must be impossible as long as you perceive a body as yourself. The body is a limit. Who would seek for freedom in a body looks for it where it can not be found. The mind that serves the Holy Spirit is unlimited forever, in all ways, beyond the laws of time and space, unbound by any preconceptions, and with strength and power to do whatever is asked... It has been given to the Source of Love... It rests in God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 199
Love, Light, Limitless Awareness... all of these are words, symbols twice removed, that have been used to describe the experience of our unified Self, the Field of Light and Love and Intelligent Awareness that is called God. The Christ is the Light of this Awareness, and the Holy Spirit is Its Voice. But it is the Christ Light that we speak of here.
This Light is the only Body we have. It is formless, but includes everything. It has no boundaries or limits, and is the only Reality behind every appearance in the world of projection. It is the only Reality wherever we appear to be, wherever we appear to go, whatever we appear to do. It is the only Reality of ALL, because it is literally ALL. There is no other Cause, and no other Effect.
The Christ Light is our only Mind. It's not a physical light, since all seeming physicality is ephemeral projection. This Light is pure Awareness, boundless Love, and limitless Mind. It is Mind Awake.
A Course in Miracles repeatedly reminds us that "I am not a body. I am free." (Workbook Lesson 199) And what in the collective delusion we call form is ever free? The illusion of time seems to hold everything in form in bondage, as does the very nature of everything that comes and goes. The fixation of the so-called egoic mind cannot even conceive of Freedom. It is always trying to be free from. Awakening occurs when the fixation loosens through constant forgiveness and release, when the mind opens and finds no boundaries at all. True Freedom is not subject/object. True Freedom is One, and is limitless and boundless, without a beginning and without an end. It shines, and shines forever. It is the Real World of endless Light and Love.
"This world of Light, this circle of brightness is the REAL WORLD." Yes, where guilt meets with forgiveness all seeming boundaries and limits are released, and our eternal, unified nature of pure Innocence and Freedom is remembered.
"You are God's Son. In Immortality you live forever. Would you not return your mind to this?" -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 199, 8:1-3
"Freedom must be impossible as long as you perceive a body as yourself. The body is a limit. Who would seek for freedom in a body looks for it where it can not be found. The mind that serves the Holy Spirit is unlimited forever, in all ways, beyond the laws of time and space, unbound by any preconceptions, and with strength and power to do whatever is asked... It has been given to the Source of Love... It rests in God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 199
Love, Light, Limitless Awareness... all of these are words, symbols twice removed, that have been used to describe the experience of our unified Self, the Field of Light and Love and Intelligent Awareness that is called God. The Christ is the Light of this Awareness, and the Holy Spirit is Its Voice. But it is the Christ Light that we speak of here.
This Light is the only Body we have. It is formless, but includes everything. It has no boundaries or limits, and is the only Reality behind every appearance in the world of projection. It is the only Reality wherever we appear to be, wherever we appear to go, whatever we appear to do. It is the only Reality of ALL, because it is literally ALL. There is no other Cause, and no other Effect.
The Christ Light is our only Mind. It's not a physical light, since all seeming physicality is ephemeral projection. This Light is pure Awareness, boundless Love, and limitless Mind. It is Mind Awake.
A Course in Miracles repeatedly reminds us that "I am not a body. I am free." (Workbook Lesson 199) And what in the collective delusion we call form is ever free? The illusion of time seems to hold everything in form in bondage, as does the very nature of everything that comes and goes. The fixation of the so-called egoic mind cannot even conceive of Freedom. It is always trying to be free from. Awakening occurs when the fixation loosens through constant forgiveness and release, when the mind opens and finds no boundaries at all. True Freedom is not subject/object. True Freedom is One, and is limitless and boundless, without a beginning and without an end. It shines, and shines forever. It is the Real World of endless Light and Love.
"This world of Light, this circle of brightness is the REAL WORLD." Yes, where guilt meets with forgiveness all seeming boundaries and limits are released, and our eternal, unified nature of pure Innocence and Freedom is remembered.
"You are God's Son. In Immortality you live forever. Would you not return your mind to this?" -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 199, 8:1-3
Friday, May 3, 2013
Daily, Effortless, and Natural...
"Each day should be devoted to miracles." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I, 15:1
Brushing my teeth is a daily, effortless and seemingly natural activity. But it is actually a learned behavior, and it is obviously a bodily activity. Nearly everything that is considered natural in our conditioned state is learned behavior associated with protecting or defending the body or a personal identity. When A Course in Miracles tells us that miracles should be daily, effortless, and natural, it is not referring to learned or bodily activity. The miracle is a state of mind that has always been here, unseen by the conditioned, sleeping mind. It is the state of One-mindedness. The recognition that there is only One that includes All, in perfect Love and perfect Security and Fulfillment.
"Every loving thought the Son of God ever had is eternal. The loving thoughts his mind perceives in this world are the world's only reality." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 11, Section VII, 2:1-2
Just as each day should be devoted to miracles, we're told that they are the natural, effortless expressions of the Love that we are. It is because Love is really All there is, that all miracles are all the same. All expressions of Love are maximal. So there is no ordering or ranking in Love, only the outpouring, extending, embracing qualities that are so far beyond our conditioned notions of love. The fact that we don't perceive or experience this daily is why forgiveness is our only purpose and function here within the dream we call life. We forgive each dual meaning, each limiting perception, every limitation we have placed on any aspect of creation, and allow the miracle to be revealed. It is always here, waiting only for our attention and willingness to let go of the mental obstacles we have cherished instead.
"The real world can actually be perceived. All that is necessary is a willingness to perceive nothing else. For if you perceive both good and evil, you are accepting both the false and the true and making no distinction between them. The ego may see some good, but never only Good." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 2:6-8 & 3:1
Everything we see in our supposedly normal and natural state is divided. There is always a flip side, a duality. Even the good that we do, we do because we want to avoid what we believe is not good. We equate protection and defense with love, though it is not. If we are protecting and defending anything, it is because we think there is something 'other' to defend it from. And there can never be two in perfect Love. Only through unified vision, through the Awareness of the Oneness of Self can Love be known.
"The perception of Goodness is not knowledge, but the denial of the opposite of Goodness enables you to recognize a condition in which opposites do not exist. And this is the condition of Knowledge. Without this awareness you have not met its conditions, and until you do, you will not know it is yours already." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 4:1-3
We are always forgiving duality. Whenever we perceive something in opposition to something else, we forgive. We bring to Awareness the compulsion or belief that is the origin of the duality we are perceiving. And it dissolves in the Light of Awareness. It was never there. Only the miracle of Love remains. This is our only purpose, regardless of the scripts our lives seem to follow. The Real world is the forgiven world, seen through the unified eyes of Love. Daily, effortless, and blessedly natural.
"The sole responsibility of the miracle worker is to accept the Atonement for himself." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 2, Section V, 5:1
Brushing my teeth is a daily, effortless and seemingly natural activity. But it is actually a learned behavior, and it is obviously a bodily activity. Nearly everything that is considered natural in our conditioned state is learned behavior associated with protecting or defending the body or a personal identity. When A Course in Miracles tells us that miracles should be daily, effortless, and natural, it is not referring to learned or bodily activity. The miracle is a state of mind that has always been here, unseen by the conditioned, sleeping mind. It is the state of One-mindedness. The recognition that there is only One that includes All, in perfect Love and perfect Security and Fulfillment.
"Every loving thought the Son of God ever had is eternal. The loving thoughts his mind perceives in this world are the world's only reality." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 11, Section VII, 2:1-2
Just as each day should be devoted to miracles, we're told that they are the natural, effortless expressions of the Love that we are. It is because Love is really All there is, that all miracles are all the same. All expressions of Love are maximal. So there is no ordering or ranking in Love, only the outpouring, extending, embracing qualities that are so far beyond our conditioned notions of love. The fact that we don't perceive or experience this daily is why forgiveness is our only purpose and function here within the dream we call life. We forgive each dual meaning, each limiting perception, every limitation we have placed on any aspect of creation, and allow the miracle to be revealed. It is always here, waiting only for our attention and willingness to let go of the mental obstacles we have cherished instead.
"The real world can actually be perceived. All that is necessary is a willingness to perceive nothing else. For if you perceive both good and evil, you are accepting both the false and the true and making no distinction between them. The ego may see some good, but never only Good." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 2:6-8 & 3:1
Everything we see in our supposedly normal and natural state is divided. There is always a flip side, a duality. Even the good that we do, we do because we want to avoid what we believe is not good. We equate protection and defense with love, though it is not. If we are protecting and defending anything, it is because we think there is something 'other' to defend it from. And there can never be two in perfect Love. Only through unified vision, through the Awareness of the Oneness of Self can Love be known.
"The perception of Goodness is not knowledge, but the denial of the opposite of Goodness enables you to recognize a condition in which opposites do not exist. And this is the condition of Knowledge. Without this awareness you have not met its conditions, and until you do, you will not know it is yours already." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 4:1-3
We are always forgiving duality. Whenever we perceive something in opposition to something else, we forgive. We bring to Awareness the compulsion or belief that is the origin of the duality we are perceiving. And it dissolves in the Light of Awareness. It was never there. Only the miracle of Love remains. This is our only purpose, regardless of the scripts our lives seem to follow. The Real world is the forgiven world, seen through the unified eyes of Love. Daily, effortless, and blessedly natural.
"The sole responsibility of the miracle worker is to accept the Atonement for himself." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 2, Section V, 5:1
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Give All to All
"Only those who have a real and lasting sense of Abundance can be truly charitable. This is obvious when you consider what is involved. To the ego, to give anything implies that you will have to do without it. When you associate giving with sacrifice, you give only because you believe that you are somehow getting something better, and can therefore do without the thing you give." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 4, Section II, 6:1-4
Whoa... this is really true, isn't it? I pay my cable bill because I think I'm getting something for it. I buy feed for the horses and dogs and cats because I think I'm getting a sense of satisfaction taking care of all these animals. I give to my children because I think it gives me a sense of satisfaction and connection.
Now the Course is not telling us to stop paying our bills or giving to our children. But it is pointing out the way the egoic mind works. Our conditioned self only gives to get. Because getting is what the ego does to maintain the illusion of separate self, and to make sure guilt stays repressed and hidden.
"The ego never gives out of abundance, because it was made as a substitute for it. That is why the concept of 'getting' arose in the ego's thought system. Appetites are 'getting' mechanisms, representing the ego's need to confirm itself. This is as true of body appetites as it is of the so-called 'higher ego needs'." -- ACIM; Chapter 4, II, 7:3-6
What is giving out of Abundance, then? Abundance is an attribute of God, and therefore of our true nature since we exist as extensions of the Mind of God. God has given us EVERYTHING, because God IS EVERYTHING... literally. There is no other. All means all. So what exists that could be lost, or needed? Giving out of Abundance is just being natural. The Course gives the first teaching of the Holy Spirit as "To have, give all to all." We know that we have because we have it to give. :-))
How do we make such a shift in perception? How do we change our minds to such an extent? Our self-concept, our egoic notion of a self, says we are limited, with limited resources, and only those that are careful with their resources have enough in this world. In other words, our egoic notion of self-esteem is tied up with what we think we have acquired by what the Course calls the 'getting' mechanism. "Self-esteem in ego terms means nothing more than that the ego has deluded itself into accepting its reality, and is therefore temporarily less predatory." (ACIM; II, 4, 6:8) So we think we have by getting, and temporarily think we are safe, as long as we don't have to give. Ha!
True Abundance is the Awareness of God. The overflowing of Being that is our True Self, living and moving and having being in God. By learning to listen only to the Voice for God, the Holy Spirit... by learning to walk in the Awareness of God's ever-Presence... we come to realize we are the Abundance of Spirit. Giving is the only natural extension of this realization, because all giving is mental, and of the mind. We are pure Spirit, reflecting the Mind of God.
"To have, give all to all." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 6, Section V: A
Whoa... this is really true, isn't it? I pay my cable bill because I think I'm getting something for it. I buy feed for the horses and dogs and cats because I think I'm getting a sense of satisfaction taking care of all these animals. I give to my children because I think it gives me a sense of satisfaction and connection.
Now the Course is not telling us to stop paying our bills or giving to our children. But it is pointing out the way the egoic mind works. Our conditioned self only gives to get. Because getting is what the ego does to maintain the illusion of separate self, and to make sure guilt stays repressed and hidden.
"The ego never gives out of abundance, because it was made as a substitute for it. That is why the concept of 'getting' arose in the ego's thought system. Appetites are 'getting' mechanisms, representing the ego's need to confirm itself. This is as true of body appetites as it is of the so-called 'higher ego needs'." -- ACIM; Chapter 4, II, 7:3-6
What is giving out of Abundance, then? Abundance is an attribute of God, and therefore of our true nature since we exist as extensions of the Mind of God. God has given us EVERYTHING, because God IS EVERYTHING... literally. There is no other. All means all. So what exists that could be lost, or needed? Giving out of Abundance is just being natural. The Course gives the first teaching of the Holy Spirit as "To have, give all to all." We know that we have because we have it to give. :-))
How do we make such a shift in perception? How do we change our minds to such an extent? Our self-concept, our egoic notion of a self, says we are limited, with limited resources, and only those that are careful with their resources have enough in this world. In other words, our egoic notion of self-esteem is tied up with what we think we have acquired by what the Course calls the 'getting' mechanism. "Self-esteem in ego terms means nothing more than that the ego has deluded itself into accepting its reality, and is therefore temporarily less predatory." (ACIM; II, 4, 6:8) So we think we have by getting, and temporarily think we are safe, as long as we don't have to give. Ha!
True Abundance is the Awareness of God. The overflowing of Being that is our True Self, living and moving and having being in God. By learning to listen only to the Voice for God, the Holy Spirit... by learning to walk in the Awareness of God's ever-Presence... we come to realize we are the Abundance of Spirit. Giving is the only natural extension of this realization, because all giving is mental, and of the mind. We are pure Spirit, reflecting the Mind of God.
"To have, give all to all." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 6, Section V: A
Monday, March 25, 2013
As Common as Grass
"Therefore the Master says... I let go of all desire for the common good, and the good becomes common as grass." -- Tao te Ching, p. 57; Stephen Mitchell Translation
"Miracles are natural. When they do not occur, something has gone wrong." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I, 6:1-2
What seems to come naturally in our lives is evidently not really natural. For example, babies aren't born with the ability to sing an Aria, or a pop song. But singing feels natural to me. If I inquire honestly though, it took a lot of practicing as a child and then as an adult to get to the point where it feels so automatic. Reading the above quotations has me thinking about just what is natural, what is common and ordinary? If Goodness and Miracles are actually what is common and natural, then we have done a bang-up job of obscuring the Truth with a lot of the un-natural and un-common.
A Course in Miracles explains that defenses are the costliest of habits. They obscure the ever-present Goodness and perfection of our true Self. And what are defenses? They are thoughts, perceptions, habits, projections... all to distract the awareness and attention from the perfection of Self. All with the common attribute of dividing and dissecting the awareness into multitudes of judgements about what is good, what is bad, what is me, what is them, what is here, what is there... and on and on and on. It's the original and ultimate defamation of character.
But what remains when these defenses are forgiven and released is the natural perfection of our Christ Self. The miracle is natural because the Christ is our reality. The miracle reveals what has always been effortlessly true, and so is the most natural thing in the world. All that is required of us is the willingness to let our judgements go, to forgive our false witness to the Son of God. We can twist ourselves into un-natural and un-worthy caricatures, but we can never make them true. Who we are remains holy... wholly innocent and free, eternally One in the Mind of God.
"All your difficulties stem from the fact that you do not recognize yourself, your brother, or God." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 3, Section III, 2:1
"Miracles are natural. When they do not occur, something has gone wrong." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I, 6:1-2
What seems to come naturally in our lives is evidently not really natural. For example, babies aren't born with the ability to sing an Aria, or a pop song. But singing feels natural to me. If I inquire honestly though, it took a lot of practicing as a child and then as an adult to get to the point where it feels so automatic. Reading the above quotations has me thinking about just what is natural, what is common and ordinary? If Goodness and Miracles are actually what is common and natural, then we have done a bang-up job of obscuring the Truth with a lot of the un-natural and un-common.
A Course in Miracles explains that defenses are the costliest of habits. They obscure the ever-present Goodness and perfection of our true Self. And what are defenses? They are thoughts, perceptions, habits, projections... all to distract the awareness and attention from the perfection of Self. All with the common attribute of dividing and dissecting the awareness into multitudes of judgements about what is good, what is bad, what is me, what is them, what is here, what is there... and on and on and on. It's the original and ultimate defamation of character.
But what remains when these defenses are forgiven and released is the natural perfection of our Christ Self. The miracle is natural because the Christ is our reality. The miracle reveals what has always been effortlessly true, and so is the most natural thing in the world. All that is required of us is the willingness to let our judgements go, to forgive our false witness to the Son of God. We can twist ourselves into un-natural and un-worthy caricatures, but we can never make them true. Who we are remains holy... wholly innocent and free, eternally One in the Mind of God.
"All your difficulties stem from the fact that you do not recognize yourself, your brother, or God." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 3, Section III, 2:1
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Every Single Thought!
"Every thought you have contributes to truth or illusion; either it extends the Truth or it multiplies illusions. You can indeed multiply nothing, but you will not extend it by doing so." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 16, 2:3-4
Today's blog post is very short. Perhaps it will help you (as it helped me through the writing of it) to rest and to trust.
The above passage from A Course in Miracles is most comforting to me, although to my conditioned self it does at first seem overwhelming. What's comforting is that when I lose myself in my daily routine, or am momentarily shocked or fearful because of seeming events, I haven't really done more than multiply zero. And no matter how large a number you multiply by zero, the result is still nothing.
Similarly, I don't have to do anything to extend the Truth except be Aware. When I'm Aware, I see that the infinite, all-encompassing Truth of Being is all that is ever going on. It extends because it IS. I am safe because I am living and moving and having my being in, as, and through the Infinite Self. I acknowledge this Presence, and It extends through me.
"In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths." -- The Bible; Proverbs 3:6
Today's blog post is very short. Perhaps it will help you (as it helped me through the writing of it) to rest and to trust.
The above passage from A Course in Miracles is most comforting to me, although to my conditioned self it does at first seem overwhelming. What's comforting is that when I lose myself in my daily routine, or am momentarily shocked or fearful because of seeming events, I haven't really done more than multiply zero. And no matter how large a number you multiply by zero, the result is still nothing.
Similarly, I don't have to do anything to extend the Truth except be Aware. When I'm Aware, I see that the infinite, all-encompassing Truth of Being is all that is ever going on. It extends because it IS. I am safe because I am living and moving and having my being in, as, and through the Infinite Self. I acknowledge this Presence, and It extends through me.
"In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths." -- The Bible; Proverbs 3:6
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Full Focus
"To be in the Kingdom is merely to focus your full attention on it." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 7, Section III, 4:1
A long time ago, one of the greatest teachers the world has ever known told us that if we would simply seek what he called the Kingdom of God, and make it our number one priority, then everything else would fall into place. His words, as quoted in The Bible, were, "Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you." For years I have turned to this Biblical passage when in distress or in seeming need. The 'added things,' the things of this world, have always shown up... though often (O.K., usually) not in the ways or forms I would have expected. Similarly, as a long-time student of A Courses in Miracles, I have turned to the Workbook Lessons like, "There is no will but God's" and "God's Will for me is perfect happiness." Over the years my very human fear and distress over happenings in the world and especially in my personal life have always been stilled by these Truths. So imagine my surprise at reading, for perhaps the hundredth time, the passage above, and finding myself absolutely humbled.
As always, this 'revelation' is nothing new. I simply saw it anew. And that is what Awakening is... seeing with eyes that no longer focus on the separate and limited, but allowing the focus to expand to Wholeness. With full attention. All the time. Not just grudgingly giving that attention at certain times of day, or when things seem less than perfect. So I am humbled to realize that I regularly give the Kingdom less than my full attention. And also relieved, because I can see how foolish I have been, and how simple is the solution!
When we fall in love in this world, it seems so easy to give our full heart and mind to the beloved, whether that is an amorous partner or a new child or grandchild... or even a pet. But how many of us have ever sustained that expanded attention? Once we know that person is here and part of our life, we tend to take them for granted much of the time. Sometimes it takes a near loss to remind us how important they are to us, and to jolt us into full attention again. Well, I have been taking the Beloved for granted, in a much larger sense. And although this doesn't matter from the perspective of eternity, it matters to me and my quality of life NOW... just as our neglect of our loved ones negatively impacts our human lives. So I am simultaneously humbled and grateful for the resulting awareness of how simple our lives are meant to be. "Seek first the Kingdom..." "Focus your full attention on it..." "All these things will be added..."
Vigilance and full focus aren't a chore... they are our natural state of Awakened Awareness, which effortlessly remains aware of the Allness of Self, and yet focuses on all that lives and loves, providing and sustaining all. "When you have given up this voluntary dis-spiriting, you will see how your mind can focus..." (ACIM; 4, IV, 6:3)
"You need be neither careful nor careless..." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 5, Section VII, 1:4
"Those who choose freedom will experience only its results." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 20, Section IV, 4:1
A long time ago, one of the greatest teachers the world has ever known told us that if we would simply seek what he called the Kingdom of God, and make it our number one priority, then everything else would fall into place. His words, as quoted in The Bible, were, "Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you." For years I have turned to this Biblical passage when in distress or in seeming need. The 'added things,' the things of this world, have always shown up... though often (O.K., usually) not in the ways or forms I would have expected. Similarly, as a long-time student of A Courses in Miracles, I have turned to the Workbook Lessons like, "There is no will but God's" and "God's Will for me is perfect happiness." Over the years my very human fear and distress over happenings in the world and especially in my personal life have always been stilled by these Truths. So imagine my surprise at reading, for perhaps the hundredth time, the passage above, and finding myself absolutely humbled.
As always, this 'revelation' is nothing new. I simply saw it anew. And that is what Awakening is... seeing with eyes that no longer focus on the separate and limited, but allowing the focus to expand to Wholeness. With full attention. All the time. Not just grudgingly giving that attention at certain times of day, or when things seem less than perfect. So I am humbled to realize that I regularly give the Kingdom less than my full attention. And also relieved, because I can see how foolish I have been, and how simple is the solution!
When we fall in love in this world, it seems so easy to give our full heart and mind to the beloved, whether that is an amorous partner or a new child or grandchild... or even a pet. But how many of us have ever sustained that expanded attention? Once we know that person is here and part of our life, we tend to take them for granted much of the time. Sometimes it takes a near loss to remind us how important they are to us, and to jolt us into full attention again. Well, I have been taking the Beloved for granted, in a much larger sense. And although this doesn't matter from the perspective of eternity, it matters to me and my quality of life NOW... just as our neglect of our loved ones negatively impacts our human lives. So I am simultaneously humbled and grateful for the resulting awareness of how simple our lives are meant to be. "Seek first the Kingdom..." "Focus your full attention on it..." "All these things will be added..."
Vigilance and full focus aren't a chore... they are our natural state of Awakened Awareness, which effortlessly remains aware of the Allness of Self, and yet focuses on all that lives and loves, providing and sustaining all. "When you have given up this voluntary dis-spiriting, you will see how your mind can focus..." (ACIM; 4, IV, 6:3)
"You need be neither careful nor careless..." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 5, Section VII, 1:4
"Those who choose freedom will experience only its results." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 20, Section IV, 4:1
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
The Other
I remember years ago when I attended Loving Relationships Training with Sondra Ray. She had us all looking for our personal lies. If we could let that one lie go, she insisted, then all our false beliefs about ourselves and the world would fall away. She used the image of a hand (the personal lie) holding a bunch of balloons (our beliefs about ourselves and the world). If the hand is released, the balloons are too. It's a great image. However, the reason it didn't appear to work for anyone for any length of time might be because it was based on belief. A belief about beliefs is still belief. What lies behind all beliefs? What is the original lie?
What I mean is that Truth, being True, just IS. It doesn't need belief to BE. Who We Are in Reality must be True, because when every thought and belief is released, I Am. The only accurate statement I could make about this is that I Am Awareness ItSelf. So are you. What has been termed the Christ of Our Being is Whole, with no other. Oneness, Aware of ItSelf as I Am.
The original belief, the original lie that projects all other lies is that I am Other. I am other than God. I am other than you, or them, or it. The Other belief is then projected onto the screen of the mind as a host of others, with a host of issues and problems and longings and sorrows. The Other is never complete... how could Completeness be experienced in such a fragmented state? When I am the Other, then everything is experienced as other. Nothing is ever whole, never here, never complete.
A Course in Miracles tells us, "My function here is to forgive the world for all the errors I have made." This is a way of taking back the responsibility for all the otherness we seem to experience, instead of the projected pretense that it's happening to us. Once released, it's possible to return to the awareness of I Am, instead of I am with an otherly object. In the Great I Am, there is no other.
When I recognize the Other in my life, I need only forgive and release. Behind every seeming lies the perfection and holiness and beauty that we are... that I Am. This is the Miracle.
"...Say, 'Will ye first the Kingdom of Heaven' and you have said, 'I know what I Am'... " -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 3, Section VI, 11:8
What I mean is that Truth, being True, just IS. It doesn't need belief to BE. Who We Are in Reality must be True, because when every thought and belief is released, I Am. The only accurate statement I could make about this is that I Am Awareness ItSelf. So are you. What has been termed the Christ of Our Being is Whole, with no other. Oneness, Aware of ItSelf as I Am.
The original belief, the original lie that projects all other lies is that I am Other. I am other than God. I am other than you, or them, or it. The Other belief is then projected onto the screen of the mind as a host of others, with a host of issues and problems and longings and sorrows. The Other is never complete... how could Completeness be experienced in such a fragmented state? When I am the Other, then everything is experienced as other. Nothing is ever whole, never here, never complete.
A Course in Miracles tells us, "My function here is to forgive the world for all the errors I have made." This is a way of taking back the responsibility for all the otherness we seem to experience, instead of the projected pretense that it's happening to us. Once released, it's possible to return to the awareness of I Am, instead of I am with an otherly object. In the Great I Am, there is no other.
When I recognize the Other in my life, I need only forgive and release. Behind every seeming lies the perfection and holiness and beauty that we are... that I Am. This is the Miracle.
"...Say, 'Will ye first the Kingdom of Heaven' and you have said, 'I know what I Am'... " -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 3, Section VI, 11:8
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Begin Again
"Routines as such are dangerous, because they easily becom gods in their own right, threatening the very goals for which they were set up. Broadly speaking it can be said that it is well to start the day right [i.e., giving the day to God]. But it is ALWAYS possible to begin again, should the day begin with error." [emphasis mine] -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 16, 2:5-7
We're pretty hard on ourselves. We set unrealistic expectations for our bodies and our minds, all of which are based on goals and actions out there, with the world as we imagine it. The problem is, they're unrealistic because they're not true, not because we didn't do it right. Even the goals and actions we seem to acheive or approve of will disappoint sooner or later, because they're based on the false gods referenced in the above quote... earthly rituals to the gods of diet, relationships, pleasure, or finance. But we can begin again. Any instant.
One way we remain in bondage to egoic pursuit is the lie that it's not possible to begin again, so we might as well make the best of what we've got. We'd better make this body work well, because we won't get another one. We'd better subsume ourselves to this dysfunctional relationship or we'll be alone. We'd better be frugal and only spend on necessities for ourselves, because the economy shows no mercy. It's every man (or woman) for themselves.
How might this perspective soften and change if we felt innocent? If we knew that every holy instant we are born anew? If we really stopped for an instant... really allowed the Real to shine from everyone and everything? If we stopped writing the script of unrealistic and false expectations? All we're giving up is the illusion of protecting illusions about ourselves and the world we think we see.
I've come to realize that the only task I have before me every day, no matter what it looks like, is to let go of everything I think I know, to let the Real shine through every appearance. In the words of Mary Baker Eddy: "... depart from the material sense, into the spiritual sense of Being." A Course in Miracles calls this process 'forgiveness', the shedding of the false self. What does that mean? It means letting go of the evidence of the thinking mind, the evidence of the physical senses, and being fully present and aware NOW. In the midst of that awareness is our true knowing, our Spiritual Self. Everything that seems to be happening out there is actually a play of consciousness within the One Mind, the Self, the Allness of what we sometimes call God. Fully present awareness, without condition, is key.
So we begin again, every holy instant, by forgiving, by releasing, by letting go of every routine and conditioned response, every bit of sensory data. What remains is pure Awareness, and the Grace of our true Self.
We're pretty hard on ourselves. We set unrealistic expectations for our bodies and our minds, all of which are based on goals and actions out there, with the world as we imagine it. The problem is, they're unrealistic because they're not true, not because we didn't do it right. Even the goals and actions we seem to acheive or approve of will disappoint sooner or later, because they're based on the false gods referenced in the above quote... earthly rituals to the gods of diet, relationships, pleasure, or finance. But we can begin again. Any instant.
One way we remain in bondage to egoic pursuit is the lie that it's not possible to begin again, so we might as well make the best of what we've got. We'd better make this body work well, because we won't get another one. We'd better subsume ourselves to this dysfunctional relationship or we'll be alone. We'd better be frugal and only spend on necessities for ourselves, because the economy shows no mercy. It's every man (or woman) for themselves.
How might this perspective soften and change if we felt innocent? If we knew that every holy instant we are born anew? If we really stopped for an instant... really allowed the Real to shine from everyone and everything? If we stopped writing the script of unrealistic and false expectations? All we're giving up is the illusion of protecting illusions about ourselves and the world we think we see.
I've come to realize that the only task I have before me every day, no matter what it looks like, is to let go of everything I think I know, to let the Real shine through every appearance. In the words of Mary Baker Eddy: "... depart from the material sense, into the spiritual sense of Being." A Course in Miracles calls this process 'forgiveness', the shedding of the false self. What does that mean? It means letting go of the evidence of the thinking mind, the evidence of the physical senses, and being fully present and aware NOW. In the midst of that awareness is our true knowing, our Spiritual Self. Everything that seems to be happening out there is actually a play of consciousness within the One Mind, the Self, the Allness of what we sometimes call God. Fully present awareness, without condition, is key.
So we begin again, every holy instant, by forgiving, by releasing, by letting go of every routine and conditioned response, every bit of sensory data. What remains is pure Awareness, and the Grace of our true Self.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
A Different Use in Everything
Yes, I'm still here! I know this is the longest I've gone without posting since this blog began in 2007. And thanks to those of you who e-mailed, wondering where the blogs have gone. As I said in the beginning... I will only post when inspired, led by the Voice of Self. And Self has had other things in mind for me for the past two months... fun stuff, busy stuff, transformational stuff.
Let's start with the quote that inspired today's post:
"Complete abstraction is the natural condition of the mind. But part of it is now unnatural. It does not look on everything as one. It sees instead fragments of the whole, for only thus could it invent the partial world you see... Thus were specifics made. And now it is specifics we must use in practicing. We give them to the Holy Spirit, to employ for a purpose different from the one we gave them. He can use what we made, to teach us from a different point of view, so we can see a different use in everything." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 161, 2:1-6, & 3:1-4
The fun, busy, transformational stuff that has filled my life recently is very, very specific... lots of details that make it easy to get lost in thinking it all means something. Whether you create beautiful gardens, write elegant XHTML code and create new websites, or learn to create art through Adobe Photoshop, it's easy to think the specific is the point. But I'm very sure the reason I'm being led down this path is to see that the easiest and most joyful route through the briars of details is to stay in the abstract knowing of the Self, the Awareness of Oneness.
When new details threaten to swamp the mind with busyness, there is only one purpose in it... to remind us that there is another point of view that will help us remain open and expanded in the Oneness of Self, right here in the midst of it. I've come to treasure that this is the only purpose anything has, and its only value. A different use in everything.
Let's start with the quote that inspired today's post:
"Complete abstraction is the natural condition of the mind. But part of it is now unnatural. It does not look on everything as one. It sees instead fragments of the whole, for only thus could it invent the partial world you see... Thus were specifics made. And now it is specifics we must use in practicing. We give them to the Holy Spirit, to employ for a purpose different from the one we gave them. He can use what we made, to teach us from a different point of view, so we can see a different use in everything." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 161, 2:1-6, & 3:1-4
The fun, busy, transformational stuff that has filled my life recently is very, very specific... lots of details that make it easy to get lost in thinking it all means something. Whether you create beautiful gardens, write elegant XHTML code and create new websites, or learn to create art through Adobe Photoshop, it's easy to think the specific is the point. But I'm very sure the reason I'm being led down this path is to see that the easiest and most joyful route through the briars of details is to stay in the abstract knowing of the Self, the Awareness of Oneness.
When new details threaten to swamp the mind with busyness, there is only one purpose in it... to remind us that there is another point of view that will help us remain open and expanded in the Oneness of Self, right here in the midst of it. I've come to treasure that this is the only purpose anything has, and its only value. A different use in everything.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Truth
"Truth is a savior and can only will for happiness and peace for everyone. It gives its strength to everyone who asks, in limitless supply. It sees that lack in anyone would be a lack in all. And so it gives its light that all may see and benefit as one." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 92, 5:3-6
"And you shall know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free." -- The Bible; John 8:32
What is Truth? John Keats waxed poetic on this subject while pondering things that come and go... his "Ode on a Grecian Urn" faces his own mortality in the frozen images on an ancient vessel, and in his poetic way he discovered that the ideas and images embedded in the ancient urn are exactly like the images in any given life, the faces and bodies and scenery and relationships. What is true about any of them? Keats put it this way, as if the urn itself were speaking: "Beauty is truth, truth beauty... that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." Keats was spiraling upward in his quest for Truth. He saw that is exists not in the physical, but in the silent spiritual. He saw that Beauty and Truth are synonyms for the One, and are not dependent on the physical or the form of things that come and go, but that everything reflects Beauty and Truth when it is truly seen, beyond form.
Jesus said we can and will know the Truth. He said it is our very freedom. The Bible, A Course in Miracles, Buddhism, Vedanta... they all use the word Truth as a synonym for enlightenment and our Real Being. Some use the word God, others Self or Atman, but the meaning is One.
A Course in Miracles puts it very bluntly: "The Truth is true, and nothing else is true." In this world where all truth seems relative, such a statement can seem as cryptic as a zen koan. But let's look at mathematics. No matter how you turn it, 2+2 will always and forever equal 4. It is an unchanging truth, a mathematical principle. In the same way, the Truth of Being underlies everything that seems to appear and seems to disappear. It is the unconditioned awareness of Self, an all-inclusive awareness that is always here, always available, and is the very ground of Being. It is the Source and the Substance of all that is.
So why bother even talking about such things? We know 2+2 equals 4, but we don't think about it when we're picking out 4 apples or oranges at the store. Talking about Truth is just philosophy, impractical and not grounded in 'real' life.
Well, our daily life isn't always as benign as picking out a few apples. Its very impermanence drives us inward, seeking to understand and to know, and this is a gift. All struggles and challenges are really our best friends, because they move us beyond the complacency of everyday comforts to the inner awareness that is the Truth of Being. This awakening to Self, to the Oneness of God, is our only purpose for being here. This is the Truth that sets us free.
"Salvation is the recognition that the Truth is true, and nothing else is true. Truth cannot have an opposite. As God created you, you remain unchangeable, with transitory states by definition false. And that includes all shifts in feeling, alterations in conditions of the body and the mind; in all awareness and in all response. This is the all-inclusiveness which sets the Truth apart from seeming falsehood." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 152
"And you shall know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free." -- The Bible; John 8:32
What is Truth? John Keats waxed poetic on this subject while pondering things that come and go... his "Ode on a Grecian Urn" faces his own mortality in the frozen images on an ancient vessel, and in his poetic way he discovered that the ideas and images embedded in the ancient urn are exactly like the images in any given life, the faces and bodies and scenery and relationships. What is true about any of them? Keats put it this way, as if the urn itself were speaking: "Beauty is truth, truth beauty... that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." Keats was spiraling upward in his quest for Truth. He saw that is exists not in the physical, but in the silent spiritual. He saw that Beauty and Truth are synonyms for the One, and are not dependent on the physical or the form of things that come and go, but that everything reflects Beauty and Truth when it is truly seen, beyond form.
Jesus said we can and will know the Truth. He said it is our very freedom. The Bible, A Course in Miracles, Buddhism, Vedanta... they all use the word Truth as a synonym for enlightenment and our Real Being. Some use the word God, others Self or Atman, but the meaning is One.
A Course in Miracles puts it very bluntly: "The Truth is true, and nothing else is true." In this world where all truth seems relative, such a statement can seem as cryptic as a zen koan. But let's look at mathematics. No matter how you turn it, 2+2 will always and forever equal 4. It is an unchanging truth, a mathematical principle. In the same way, the Truth of Being underlies everything that seems to appear and seems to disappear. It is the unconditioned awareness of Self, an all-inclusive awareness that is always here, always available, and is the very ground of Being. It is the Source and the Substance of all that is.
So why bother even talking about such things? We know 2+2 equals 4, but we don't think about it when we're picking out 4 apples or oranges at the store. Talking about Truth is just philosophy, impractical and not grounded in 'real' life.
Well, our daily life isn't always as benign as picking out a few apples. Its very impermanence drives us inward, seeking to understand and to know, and this is a gift. All struggles and challenges are really our best friends, because they move us beyond the complacency of everyday comforts to the inner awareness that is the Truth of Being. This awakening to Self, to the Oneness of God, is our only purpose for being here. This is the Truth that sets us free.
"Salvation is the recognition that the Truth is true, and nothing else is true. Truth cannot have an opposite. As God created you, you remain unchangeable, with transitory states by definition false. And that includes all shifts in feeling, alterations in conditions of the body and the mind; in all awareness and in all response. This is the all-inclusiveness which sets the Truth apart from seeming falsehood." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 152
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Hoarding
"Hoarding: Amassing money or valued objects and hiding or storing it away, typically in a carefully guarded way." -- The New Oxford American Dictionary
"Hoarding: Gathering things together in the external. This is a vain effort to avert an imagined lack or shortage in the future." -- from The Revealing Word by Charles Fillmore
"Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." -- The Bible; Matthew 6:19-21
I didn't particularly want to write about this topic today. It sort of chose me, as the topic of hoarding has been in my face lately, and there are no accidents in consciousness. So I am looking more closely at the literal and metaphysical teaching here, because I know it's always pointing me to what is True.
As many of you know, I run an animal sanctuary on my farm. I'm very careful not to take more animals than I can care for, and I've largely outgrown the notion that it's my job to save all the creatures of the world. So I don't have the hoarding mentality of some animal rescue workers. But recently a no-kill shelter nearby was shut down and all the animals taken because they developed a hoarding mentality... in other words, they kept taking animals even when they had no room for them. They thought that saving their bodies meant something. And I used to feel that it was about saving bodies, too.
Now, I do stop for every turtle I see on the road. And if I see an animal in need, I do my very best to find help for it. If someone calls me with an animal that has been abandoned or abused and I don't have room, I help them find someone who does. But the caring for these beautiful creatures has taught me that bodies don't mean so much... they come and go. But the spirit, the divine idea of each creature is so perfect and permanent. The divine idea of every animal that's ever lived or died here remains, in all its perfection. Their being is my being. Their spirit nurtures and teaches my spirit. We are quite literally One. I've come to realize that real Sanctuary is of and for the Spirit. It can't be lost, nor can it ever be lacking.
Hoarding shows up in so many ways. We are a culture of hoarders. Our medical communities hoard bodies... keeping a body alive becomes more important than the Reality of Being, the Spirit that is the essence of each person. It's easy to see this kind of hoarding in nursing homes and hospitals.
Our financial communities hoard money, of course. But not just money. What is hoarded is the destructive idea of competition and winning, of having or being more because of what is accumulated. Again, the form of hoarding is pretty secondary... it's the thought that I am more, or validated, or better because I've collected some paper or metal or some iou's. We're like a culture of little children playing a really bad game of Monopoly. And our sports and media cultures hoard everything from celebrity to information.
Even those of us without much money manage to hoard. We may hoard friends or relationships, memorabilia from our families, old photographs, old books or writing or ideas that we think we might want to look at 'later.' We may hoard old musical instruments or guns or tea cups or anything in the name of 'collecting.' I've seen street people with shopping carts full of hoarded junk that they think they might need sometime. And those of us with clutter have to acknowledge that clutter is a form of hoarding. If we're not hanging on to the clutter for some reason, why haven't we cleaned it up? What is it for? What is any of it for?
A Course in Miracles says that 'more' is the motto of the human ego... and that it doesn't even matter more of what. Hoarding is the nature of the self that thinks it is a body. And I've come to discover that the worst form of hoarding is the hoarding of concepts, because we don't see ourselves doing it. We tell the same stories, using the same concepts of self, over and over and over... and these concepts we hoard are always false ideas about a self that's in a body. We're carefully taught these stories, these concepts, by parents and teachers and media. But we're willing slaves to this hoarding... we eagerly accumlate the false sense of identity it gives us, even when that identity is tied to a seemingly miserable or flawed self. We hoard these false self-concepts because we think it's who and what we are, and that we would somehow be lacking existence and life without them. That this fear is largely unconscious makes it the most insidious form of hoarding.
So by now we've all reached the same conclusion... that simply living in this world means we're hoarders. We're all trying to accumlate a sense of self that is safe, healthy, financially sound, and autonomous... and in our efforting, we'll settle for a self that is fairly safe, sort of healthy, getting by financially, and isolated from other scary people. It's this very efforting that Jesus referred to in the above quote from Matthew. It's this very efforting that hides the Presence of the Kingdom from our Awareness, right here and right now.
A safe and autonomous self can never be. Only bodies appear separate, and we are not our bodies. Where would a separate self be, in Oneness? Nothing and nowhere. But our Self, our infinitely unique and varied Self, is always safe and whole and uniquely expressing, in and as each of us. We are Spirit, and we are One, and we are individually unique and precious in this Oneness. Animals can be animals and still be One with me. You can be uniquely you and still be my Self. I can let go of literally everyone and everything and still be One with it All. Nothing is lost or lacking in Oneness, ever. This is the nature of our God-Self, and of the Kingdom. And this awareness is the end of hoarding, and the beginning of our Real Life in and as Spirit.
"Take no thought, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'Wherewithal shall we be clothed?' But seek ye first the Kingdom of God... and all these things shall be added unto you." -- Matthew 6:31-33
"Hoarding: Gathering things together in the external. This is a vain effort to avert an imagined lack or shortage in the future." -- from The Revealing Word by Charles Fillmore
"Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." -- The Bible; Matthew 6:19-21
I didn't particularly want to write about this topic today. It sort of chose me, as the topic of hoarding has been in my face lately, and there are no accidents in consciousness. So I am looking more closely at the literal and metaphysical teaching here, because I know it's always pointing me to what is True.
As many of you know, I run an animal sanctuary on my farm. I'm very careful not to take more animals than I can care for, and I've largely outgrown the notion that it's my job to save all the creatures of the world. So I don't have the hoarding mentality of some animal rescue workers. But recently a no-kill shelter nearby was shut down and all the animals taken because they developed a hoarding mentality... in other words, they kept taking animals even when they had no room for them. They thought that saving their bodies meant something. And I used to feel that it was about saving bodies, too.
Now, I do stop for every turtle I see on the road. And if I see an animal in need, I do my very best to find help for it. If someone calls me with an animal that has been abandoned or abused and I don't have room, I help them find someone who does. But the caring for these beautiful creatures has taught me that bodies don't mean so much... they come and go. But the spirit, the divine idea of each creature is so perfect and permanent. The divine idea of every animal that's ever lived or died here remains, in all its perfection. Their being is my being. Their spirit nurtures and teaches my spirit. We are quite literally One. I've come to realize that real Sanctuary is of and for the Spirit. It can't be lost, nor can it ever be lacking.
Hoarding shows up in so many ways. We are a culture of hoarders. Our medical communities hoard bodies... keeping a body alive becomes more important than the Reality of Being, the Spirit that is the essence of each person. It's easy to see this kind of hoarding in nursing homes and hospitals.
Our financial communities hoard money, of course. But not just money. What is hoarded is the destructive idea of competition and winning, of having or being more because of what is accumulated. Again, the form of hoarding is pretty secondary... it's the thought that I am more, or validated, or better because I've collected some paper or metal or some iou's. We're like a culture of little children playing a really bad game of Monopoly. And our sports and media cultures hoard everything from celebrity to information.
Even those of us without much money manage to hoard. We may hoard friends or relationships, memorabilia from our families, old photographs, old books or writing or ideas that we think we might want to look at 'later.' We may hoard old musical instruments or guns or tea cups or anything in the name of 'collecting.' I've seen street people with shopping carts full of hoarded junk that they think they might need sometime. And those of us with clutter have to acknowledge that clutter is a form of hoarding. If we're not hanging on to the clutter for some reason, why haven't we cleaned it up? What is it for? What is any of it for?
A Course in Miracles says that 'more' is the motto of the human ego... and that it doesn't even matter more of what. Hoarding is the nature of the self that thinks it is a body. And I've come to discover that the worst form of hoarding is the hoarding of concepts, because we don't see ourselves doing it. We tell the same stories, using the same concepts of self, over and over and over... and these concepts we hoard are always false ideas about a self that's in a body. We're carefully taught these stories, these concepts, by parents and teachers and media. But we're willing slaves to this hoarding... we eagerly accumlate the false sense of identity it gives us, even when that identity is tied to a seemingly miserable or flawed self. We hoard these false self-concepts because we think it's who and what we are, and that we would somehow be lacking existence and life without them. That this fear is largely unconscious makes it the most insidious form of hoarding.
So by now we've all reached the same conclusion... that simply living in this world means we're hoarders. We're all trying to accumlate a sense of self that is safe, healthy, financially sound, and autonomous... and in our efforting, we'll settle for a self that is fairly safe, sort of healthy, getting by financially, and isolated from other scary people. It's this very efforting that Jesus referred to in the above quote from Matthew. It's this very efforting that hides the Presence of the Kingdom from our Awareness, right here and right now.
A safe and autonomous self can never be. Only bodies appear separate, and we are not our bodies. Where would a separate self be, in Oneness? Nothing and nowhere. But our Self, our infinitely unique and varied Self, is always safe and whole and uniquely expressing, in and as each of us. We are Spirit, and we are One, and we are individually unique and precious in this Oneness. Animals can be animals and still be One with me. You can be uniquely you and still be my Self. I can let go of literally everyone and everything and still be One with it All. Nothing is lost or lacking in Oneness, ever. This is the nature of our God-Self, and of the Kingdom. And this awareness is the end of hoarding, and the beginning of our Real Life in and as Spirit.
"Take no thought, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'Wherewithal shall we be clothed?' But seek ye first the Kingdom of God... and all these things shall be added unto you." -- Matthew 6:31-33
Friday, March 11, 2011
In Our Own Image
"No one can conceive of his Creator as unlike himself." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 68, 1:7
I have been practicing self-inquiry as taught by A Course in Miracles for a long time now. It's a version of self-inquiry very similar to "Who am I,"the form given by such advaita masters as Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj. The drill goes that as you examine your body, you realize that if you're looking at it, it's not 'I' but a projected image. The 'I' is actually what is looking and witnessing. As you look at the senses and their subject/object relationship with the world, you realize the senses are not 'I'. As you look at your thinking mind, you realize that there is some 'I' looking even at the thoughts that come and go. And so you gradually refocus the mind to Source, the 'I Am' at the heart of all Being. As A Course in Miracles teaches it, you reverse the process of projection to return to Self with a capital 'S.' This Self is All-Inclusiveness, a Oneness or Singularity without an object.
This is a very effective tool for those who really want to remember who they are. But for most of us, the desire and self-discipline is pretty much lacking. We can't focus for any length of time on who is looking because we're too distracted by what we're looking at... and that is because we don't really want to know. We're enamored of our own images... and why wouldn't we be? We projected them... they're our babies, and we're attached to our own images and thought-forms. And so we pretend they're real. As A Course in Miracles reminds us, "Projection will always hurt you. It reinforces your belief in your own split mind." (ACIM; Chapter 6, Section II, 3:1-2) Our imagined separateness seems to defend and protect that separateness by forgetting, and by projecting outward the images of the sleeping mind.
The real problem, though, is also the good news. Because our sleeping minds are constantly projecting, the projected world appears as divided as our minds. We can have lovely dreams, but we also will have nightmares. The experience of one guarantees the experience of the other. Or you could say that suffering is implicit in pleasure, and pleasure is implicit in suffering. And how is this good news, you may well ask? Because the unstable nature of our projections sooner or later drives us to self-inquiry. Sooner or later our undisciplined minds seek meaning beyond the appearance of our own projections.
The real Truth is that the projected world is a collection of thought-forms in our own image. We project who we think we are, divided into a cast of thousands. The quote I used at the beginning of this blog points out that for the mind asleep, even our conception of Source is projected and experienced in our own image. This is why the God of Christianity and Islam is so often seen as violent, judgmental, vindictive, etc. It's not our Source that we're seeing, but our own sleeping minds.
The even better news is that our actual Source is not the sleeping mind, but Mind Awake. This Mind is One, All-Inclusive, All-in-All. As the Tao te Ching puts it: "There is a Being, All Inclusive, Who surrounds everything with Its Love like a garment. I do not know Its name, and so I call it Tao, the Way, and I rejoice in Its Presence." Source doesn't project... it IS. The refocusing of the mind through self-inquiry returns us to this primal Awareness. And this Awareness then is reflected in the seeming individual mind as Self, a Oneness that is reflected in the projected world as unified vision and experience. In this Awareness of Self there is only Perfection, only Love, and a Joyous Peace that includes everything.
So whose image am I projecting? As long as we live in this dream world, we will always be projecting a world and its imagined source in our own image. So the real question is: Who am I?
"The concept of the self has always been the great preoccupation of the world. And everyone believes that he must find the answer to the riddle of himself. Salvation can be seen as nothing more than the escape from concepts [images]. The world can teach no images of you unless you want to learn them. There will come a time when images have all gone by, and you will see you know not what you are. It is to this unsealed and open mind that Truth returns, unhindered and unbound. Where concepts of the self have been laid by is Truth revealed exactly as it IS." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section V, 14:1-3, 17:1-4
I have been practicing self-inquiry as taught by A Course in Miracles for a long time now. It's a version of self-inquiry very similar to "Who am I,"the form given by such advaita masters as Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj. The drill goes that as you examine your body, you realize that if you're looking at it, it's not 'I' but a projected image. The 'I' is actually what is looking and witnessing. As you look at the senses and their subject/object relationship with the world, you realize the senses are not 'I'. As you look at your thinking mind, you realize that there is some 'I' looking even at the thoughts that come and go. And so you gradually refocus the mind to Source, the 'I Am' at the heart of all Being. As A Course in Miracles teaches it, you reverse the process of projection to return to Self with a capital 'S.' This Self is All-Inclusiveness, a Oneness or Singularity without an object.
This is a very effective tool for those who really want to remember who they are. But for most of us, the desire and self-discipline is pretty much lacking. We can't focus for any length of time on who is looking because we're too distracted by what we're looking at... and that is because we don't really want to know. We're enamored of our own images... and why wouldn't we be? We projected them... they're our babies, and we're attached to our own images and thought-forms. And so we pretend they're real. As A Course in Miracles reminds us, "Projection will always hurt you. It reinforces your belief in your own split mind." (ACIM; Chapter 6, Section II, 3:1-2) Our imagined separateness seems to defend and protect that separateness by forgetting, and by projecting outward the images of the sleeping mind.
The real problem, though, is also the good news. Because our sleeping minds are constantly projecting, the projected world appears as divided as our minds. We can have lovely dreams, but we also will have nightmares. The experience of one guarantees the experience of the other. Or you could say that suffering is implicit in pleasure, and pleasure is implicit in suffering. And how is this good news, you may well ask? Because the unstable nature of our projections sooner or later drives us to self-inquiry. Sooner or later our undisciplined minds seek meaning beyond the appearance of our own projections.
The real Truth is that the projected world is a collection of thought-forms in our own image. We project who we think we are, divided into a cast of thousands. The quote I used at the beginning of this blog points out that for the mind asleep, even our conception of Source is projected and experienced in our own image. This is why the God of Christianity and Islam is so often seen as violent, judgmental, vindictive, etc. It's not our Source that we're seeing, but our own sleeping minds.
The even better news is that our actual Source is not the sleeping mind, but Mind Awake. This Mind is One, All-Inclusive, All-in-All. As the Tao te Ching puts it: "There is a Being, All Inclusive, Who surrounds everything with Its Love like a garment. I do not know Its name, and so I call it Tao, the Way, and I rejoice in Its Presence." Source doesn't project... it IS. The refocusing of the mind through self-inquiry returns us to this primal Awareness. And this Awareness then is reflected in the seeming individual mind as Self, a Oneness that is reflected in the projected world as unified vision and experience. In this Awareness of Self there is only Perfection, only Love, and a Joyous Peace that includes everything.
So whose image am I projecting? As long as we live in this dream world, we will always be projecting a world and its imagined source in our own image. So the real question is: Who am I?
"The concept of the self has always been the great preoccupation of the world. And everyone believes that he must find the answer to the riddle of himself. Salvation can be seen as nothing more than the escape from concepts [images]. The world can teach no images of you unless you want to learn them. There will come a time when images have all gone by, and you will see you know not what you are. It is to this unsealed and open mind that Truth returns, unhindered and unbound. Where concepts of the self have been laid by is Truth revealed exactly as it IS." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section V, 14:1-3, 17:1-4
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
The Awareness of Being One
"All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation." -- Mary Baker Eddy
"Heaven is not a place nor a condition. It is merely an awareness of perfect Oneness, and the knowledge that there is nothing else; nothing outside this Oneness, and nothing else within." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 18, Section VI, 1:5-6
I love the way Life continually presents us with opportunities to see Truth everywhere. Truth being, of course, simply another name for Oneness. Discovering that Good is the Reality of this Oneness, no matter how it appears, is so flipping exciting I have a hard time writing about it coherently. After all, we've all heard this a million times: "It's all good," we say hopefully... all the while noticing how not good it appears to be.
The above quote from ACIM helps... there is nothing outside Oneness, and nothing else within. How could there be? So with only the One, there is only, well... the One! All Good, only Good... in Principle and in manifestation.
The thing is, this all sounds good, but I see riots in Egypt and people going hungry and pets being mistreated, etc., etc., etc. I see my bills mounting and donations falling short. I see people judging one another and arguing over things that don't matter. So how does Oneness even matter, in Principle or in manifestation?
Again, A Course in Miracles helps to discern the false from the True: "Perception is a mirror, not a fact. And what I look on is my state of mind reflected outward." (ACIM Workbook 304, 1:3-4) Obviously, when the mind is unaware of Oneness, it projects duality in person, place, and thing. The awareness of Oneness is the Principle that reflects the wholeness and perfection that is Reality. The awareness of Oneness reflects the All-Good in all ways.
I have experienced, and continue to experience, many miracles of healed perception. Always what occurs is that I have, at least momentarily, accepted the One Mind as All. This is the healing... and the healed mind reflects wholeness, abundance, and endless Good in all possible forms. As I mature spiritually, it becomes more and more comforting to rest in the awareness of Being One, which is the miracle for everyone and everything, in every situation. There is nothing else. The seemingly hidden Presence of Good awaits only our recognition.
"In all thy ways acknowledge Him [Biblical speak for the One] and He shall direct thy paths." -- Proverbs 3:6
"Heaven is not a place nor a condition. It is merely an awareness of perfect Oneness, and the knowledge that there is nothing else; nothing outside this Oneness, and nothing else within." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 18, Section VI, 1:5-6
I love the way Life continually presents us with opportunities to see Truth everywhere. Truth being, of course, simply another name for Oneness. Discovering that Good is the Reality of this Oneness, no matter how it appears, is so flipping exciting I have a hard time writing about it coherently. After all, we've all heard this a million times: "It's all good," we say hopefully... all the while noticing how not good it appears to be.
The above quote from ACIM helps... there is nothing outside Oneness, and nothing else within. How could there be? So with only the One, there is only, well... the One! All Good, only Good... in Principle and in manifestation.
The thing is, this all sounds good, but I see riots in Egypt and people going hungry and pets being mistreated, etc., etc., etc. I see my bills mounting and donations falling short. I see people judging one another and arguing over things that don't matter. So how does Oneness even matter, in Principle or in manifestation?
Again, A Course in Miracles helps to discern the false from the True: "Perception is a mirror, not a fact. And what I look on is my state of mind reflected outward." (ACIM Workbook 304, 1:3-4) Obviously, when the mind is unaware of Oneness, it projects duality in person, place, and thing. The awareness of Oneness is the Principle that reflects the wholeness and perfection that is Reality. The awareness of Oneness reflects the All-Good in all ways.
I have experienced, and continue to experience, many miracles of healed perception. Always what occurs is that I have, at least momentarily, accepted the One Mind as All. This is the healing... and the healed mind reflects wholeness, abundance, and endless Good in all possible forms. As I mature spiritually, it becomes more and more comforting to rest in the awareness of Being One, which is the miracle for everyone and everything, in every situation. There is nothing else. The seemingly hidden Presence of Good awaits only our recognition.
"In all thy ways acknowledge Him [Biblical speak for the One] and He shall direct thy paths." -- Proverbs 3:6
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Self to Self
Wow, it's been nearly a month since I posted last. I have had many inspired thoughts, but no inspiration to write about it. This morning I read a great quote from Margaret Laird that expresses this perfectly: "There was a time I believed that I read or listened to others to find out what others thought. Now I know I read and listen to another's speaking to discover what I am [the I AM] thinking. We cannot expect to find Truth outside of our own awareness." This past month, I spent a lot of time looking inward, listening to the Voice of I Am, and inquiring deeper into the appearance of things. It's been fruitful, though challenging.
The challenge is the deeper recognition that duality in all its forms is only appearance, and that appearance is always and only my own conceptualization of what appears. Mary Baker Eddy said, "Can you see an enemy, except you first formulate this enemy and then look upon the object of your own conception?" Without those concepts, duality (subject and object consciousness) dissolves or resolves (words are inadequate here) into Truth, which is experienced as Oneness, a unity, a whole, with no opposites or contraries or negations.
This going deeper involves seeing that everything we perceive in the phenomenal world is a duality: I perceive goodness, but it is my concept of goodness, which is based on the opposite of what I perceive as badness. I perceive supply, or income, but it is my concept of income, based on the opposite of what I conceive as lack or poverty. I perceive kindness, but it is my concept of kindness, based on what I conceive of as unkind or hateful or spiteful. I'm really just wandering around in a world of concepts, rather than experiencing Goodness, Supply, or Kindness (Love), which are a unity without opposite because they are All-Inclusive. We can't conceive of Oneness. But we can become Aware of It, since It is the Truth of everyone and everything.
A Course in Miracles puts it this way: "When you decide upon the form of what you want, you lose the understanding of its purpose. Wholeness has no form because it is unlimited." In duality thinking (which is all thinking), what we lose is the Awareness of Wholeness. And as we gradually glimpse the deeper meaning of the oft-misunderstood Biblical statement: "Take no thought," we become explorers of this dawning Awareness, which includes everything but is not defined by any of it. It heals and blesses, but not for any reason we could give conceptually. It simply IS the Reality of All.
How do you write about this? How do you speak of It? Which is why I haven't been inspired to write much over the past month. And then I read Margaret Laird this morning, as she explained that the only reason anyone writes is to know their own mind. So I'm writing this morning, to clarify for myself this deepening Awareness of Self.
To paraphrase Margaret Laird again, the individual living Self-consciously as Mind (Unconditioned Awareness, Oneness... concepts fail here) evolves an apparent ego-image never afraid for itself, never taking thought for itself as 'I', as well as a physical body that is self-restoring as long as it is apparently needed. The ego-image which evolves from this Awareness (that the only 'I' is the Mind of Unconditioned Awareness, our very Self) never reacts to concepts and situations, but always acts with intelligence. It has no power to save itself, fix itself up, or transcend itself. The Mind (the Unconditioned Awareness of 'I' that is Self) is its existence and its power for constant newness and freshness. In this Light everything takes on the loveliness of perfection, beyond all concepts.
Of course, all of this exercise in giving voice to the unspeakable is just a smokescreen... the inclusive Reality is that only the 'I' is writing and reading this, and only the 'I' knows its Self. There's only One.
"The world can teach no images of you unless you want to learn them. There will come a time when images have all gone by... It is to this unsealed and open mind that Truth returns, unhindered and unbound. Where concepts of the self have been laid by is Truth revealed exactly as it is." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section V, 17:1-4
The challenge is the deeper recognition that duality in all its forms is only appearance, and that appearance is always and only my own conceptualization of what appears. Mary Baker Eddy said, "Can you see an enemy, except you first formulate this enemy and then look upon the object of your own conception?" Without those concepts, duality (subject and object consciousness) dissolves or resolves (words are inadequate here) into Truth, which is experienced as Oneness, a unity, a whole, with no opposites or contraries or negations.
This going deeper involves seeing that everything we perceive in the phenomenal world is a duality: I perceive goodness, but it is my concept of goodness, which is based on the opposite of what I perceive as badness. I perceive supply, or income, but it is my concept of income, based on the opposite of what I conceive as lack or poverty. I perceive kindness, but it is my concept of kindness, based on what I conceive of as unkind or hateful or spiteful. I'm really just wandering around in a world of concepts, rather than experiencing Goodness, Supply, or Kindness (Love), which are a unity without opposite because they are All-Inclusive. We can't conceive of Oneness. But we can become Aware of It, since It is the Truth of everyone and everything.
A Course in Miracles puts it this way: "When you decide upon the form of what you want, you lose the understanding of its purpose. Wholeness has no form because it is unlimited." In duality thinking (which is all thinking), what we lose is the Awareness of Wholeness. And as we gradually glimpse the deeper meaning of the oft-misunderstood Biblical statement: "Take no thought," we become explorers of this dawning Awareness, which includes everything but is not defined by any of it. It heals and blesses, but not for any reason we could give conceptually. It simply IS the Reality of All.
How do you write about this? How do you speak of It? Which is why I haven't been inspired to write much over the past month. And then I read Margaret Laird this morning, as she explained that the only reason anyone writes is to know their own mind. So I'm writing this morning, to clarify for myself this deepening Awareness of Self.
To paraphrase Margaret Laird again, the individual living Self-consciously as Mind (Unconditioned Awareness, Oneness... concepts fail here) evolves an apparent ego-image never afraid for itself, never taking thought for itself as 'I', as well as a physical body that is self-restoring as long as it is apparently needed. The ego-image which evolves from this Awareness (that the only 'I' is the Mind of Unconditioned Awareness, our very Self) never reacts to concepts and situations, but always acts with intelligence. It has no power to save itself, fix itself up, or transcend itself. The Mind (the Unconditioned Awareness of 'I' that is Self) is its existence and its power for constant newness and freshness. In this Light everything takes on the loveliness of perfection, beyond all concepts.
Of course, all of this exercise in giving voice to the unspeakable is just a smokescreen... the inclusive Reality is that only the 'I' is writing and reading this, and only the 'I' knows its Self. There's only One.
"The world can teach no images of you unless you want to learn them. There will come a time when images have all gone by... It is to this unsealed and open mind that Truth returns, unhindered and unbound. Where concepts of the self have been laid by is Truth revealed exactly as it is." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section V, 17:1-4
Saturday, January 1, 2011
A Real Commitment
For those of you who really want to remember Self, the Christ... for those of you who really want to be a blessing and a healing presence... I urge you to make a very simple but real commitment this year. A Course in Miracles is a tool that can help keep you sane, and can return you to sanity when you forget. But like any tool, you have to pick it up and actually use it for it to be useful.
"The purpose of the workbook is to train your mind in a systematic way to a different perception of everyone and everything in the world." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Intro
"The workbook is divided into two main sections, the first dealing with the undoing of the way you see now, and the second with the acquisition of true perception." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Intro
Simple, logical... in order to put clean sheets on the bed, I first have to take off the dirty sheets. I have to clear my mind first, before I can reveal the True Thoughts that are always available. ACIM calls this process forgiveness, and in the early lessons of the Workbook it prepares us for what true forgiveness is. It leads us always to begin taking 100% responsibility for our thoughts and perceptions and the meanings we ascribe to them. It also leads us to remembering that we made all of it up (thank God!). And so, we make the only change that leads to real change... we change our minds about Who We Are and Who our brothers are.
This year, I urge you to make a real commitment to doing the lessons in the Workbook and actually applying them to everyone and everything. Why put off what will bring you real and lasting joy and peace? And if you need support in this, you can always contact me.
Sending all of you so much love, joy, peace, and abundance... Happy New Year!
Mary Alberici
"The purpose of the workbook is to train your mind in a systematic way to a different perception of everyone and everything in the world." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Intro
"The workbook is divided into two main sections, the first dealing with the undoing of the way you see now, and the second with the acquisition of true perception." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Intro
Simple, logical... in order to put clean sheets on the bed, I first have to take off the dirty sheets. I have to clear my mind first, before I can reveal the True Thoughts that are always available. ACIM calls this process forgiveness, and in the early lessons of the Workbook it prepares us for what true forgiveness is. It leads us always to begin taking 100% responsibility for our thoughts and perceptions and the meanings we ascribe to them. It also leads us to remembering that we made all of it up (thank God!). And so, we make the only change that leads to real change... we change our minds about Who We Are and Who our brothers are.
This year, I urge you to make a real commitment to doing the lessons in the Workbook and actually applying them to everyone and everything. Why put off what will bring you real and lasting joy and peace? And if you need support in this, you can always contact me.
Sending all of you so much love, joy, peace, and abundance... Happy New Year!
Mary Alberici
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