"Every loving thought that 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
"In Heaven there is no guilt, because the Kingdom is attained through the Atonement, which releases you to create. The word 'create' is appropriate here because, once what you have made is undone by the Holy Spirit, the blessed residue is restored and therefore continues in creation. What is truly blessed is incapable of giving rise to guilt, and must give rise to joy." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 5, Section V, 2:1-3
I woke up in the wee hours last night, inspired to search my mind for unforgiveness. I woke up with a new understanding of hidden places and grievances. I realized that every expectation of person, place, or thing is only in my mind, is all made up, and is a grievance. Every person or organization that I want or expect something from, every animate or inanimate form I look to for anything at all is a fictional mental veil across the face of Christ. I experienced a flood of gratitude for each insight, and pure joy at letting it all go. And then I heard the Voice speak the words "blessed residue." I knew that I was to write about these words, and remembered reading them in the Course, so I asked if I should write them down or look them up. I was told to go back to sleep, that I would remember. And I did.
Love is the blessed residue. When everything is forgiven, there is only the innocence of pure Love. When everything is forgiven, even the things you thought were problems are revealed as pure, innocent Joy. This is a spiritual alchemy that has been written about by mystics throughout time. The irony is that we already know this, but pretend that we don't. If we open our minds even slightly, the floodgates open and we can no longer pretend that the minutiae of our world is true or even really there. So we practice tunnel vision on worldly problems and details, and even spiritual questions, clinging to them as if they were our safety and survival. This is their only reality. "I have given everything I see... all the meaning that it has for me." (ACIM; Workbook Lesson 2)
An utter dependence on Love and the Holy Spirit is our true safety and security. We can safely give our every question and care to the Holy Spirit and know that Love can only give and expand and increase in joyous intensity. This is true creation. "Love created me like ItSelf," we are reminded in ACIM Workbook Lesson 67. We have only to give over (forgive) each thought, each judgment, each expectation to the Holy Spirit to be undone. And the blessed residue, which is pure Love and our true Self, is restored to creative awareness. It was here all along.
"You have not lost your innocence. It is for this you yearn. This is your heart's desire. This is the Voice you hear, and this the Call which cannot be denied." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 182, 12:1-4
Showing posts with label Release. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Release. Show all posts
Friday, May 10, 2013
Monday, December 20, 2010
The Victim of Myself
"Suffering is an emphasis upon all that the world has done to injure you... a dream of punishment in which the dreamer is unconscious... he sees himself attacked unjustly and by something not himself. And he cannot escape because its source is seen outside himself." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 27, Section VII, 1:1, 3, 7
"Now you are being shown you can escape. All that is needed is you look upon the problem as it is, and not the way that you have set it up." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 27, Section VII, 2:1-2
I've had a lot of opportunities lately to remember that there are no victims: "I am not the victim of the world I see." (ACIM Workbook 31). But I would make one addendum... we are ALL victims of ourselves. We are victims of our own distorted thoughts and emotions, which are projected over and over as a cast of thousands. I am only the victim of myself.
And who exactly is this self? It must be that this self is false, if it can project a story of a world that shifts and changes and suffers. If I can watch my thoughts, then my thoughts must be separate from me. If I can watch and be aware of emotions, then emotions are not me. If I can be aware of and notice feelings in a body, then that must not be me, either. Who is this Self who monitors and witnesses all these things? The Self that witnesses is beyond the ephemeral thought-forms of body, thought, or emotion. The Self that witnesses is eternal and perfect and innocent and whole... free of all limitation or judgement of any kind. It's only when I falsely identify thoughts, emotions, or physicality as my self that I become a victim... projecting a world that is as painful as it is occasionally beautiful... a world disturbingly like a grade B movie... a world that has a seeming beginning and end and that seems to happen TO me, when all along I am the dreamer of this dream.
"The body is the central figure in the dreaming of the world. There is no dream without it, nor does it exist without the dream in which it acts as if it were a separate person to be seen and be believed." (ACIM; Chapter 27, Section VIII, 1:1-2) As long as I identify with a particular body, with particular thoughts, emotions, and serial adventures with other bodies, then I am victimizing myself (and that self is thankfully false... not true). When the identification finally shifts to the larger Self, it is easily seen that none of it was ever true... and that I was only the victim of myself.
It's helpful to me to picture the true Self as the Ground of Being, like a White Board on which all the falsely identified thoughts, emotions, and stories seem to be written. The more stories and dreams we write on the White Board, the harder it is to see that it's even there. But as we practice forgiveness, forgiving and releasing every false identification and judgment and story (good or bad), we're erasing the White Board... and in seemingly miraculous ways we begin to remember Who We Are. The miracle is this return to sanity, as we begin to reflect a kinder, more loving world and become a source of healing for all.
This White Board of Self, the unconditioned and eternal Self, is always pristine and perfect, always innocent and free, always loving and giving without thought or limitation. It's natural and it's our true Home. What's un-natural is this playing at being the victim of myself.
"The secret of salvation is but this: that you are doing this unto yourself. No matter what the form of the attack, this still is true. Whoever takes the role of enemy or of attacker, still is this the truth. Whatever seems to be the cause of any pain and suffering you feel, this is still true. For you would not react at all to figures in a dream you knew that you were dreaming. This single lesson will set you free from suffering whatever form it takes. The Holy Spirit will repeat this one inclusive lesson of deliverance until it has been learned, regardless of the form of suffering that brings you pain. The form affects His answer not at all, for He would teach you but the single cause of all of them, no matter what their form. And you will understand that miracles reflect this simple statement: "I have done this thing, and this I would undo." Salvation is a secret you have kept but from yourself. How differently will you perceive the world when this is recognized! When you forgive the world your guilt, you will be free of it. This is the only secret yet to learn." -- ACIM Chapter 27, Section VIII, paragraphs 10-13.
"Now you are being shown you can escape. All that is needed is you look upon the problem as it is, and not the way that you have set it up." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 27, Section VII, 2:1-2
I've had a lot of opportunities lately to remember that there are no victims: "I am not the victim of the world I see." (ACIM Workbook 31). But I would make one addendum... we are ALL victims of ourselves. We are victims of our own distorted thoughts and emotions, which are projected over and over as a cast of thousands. I am only the victim of myself.
And who exactly is this self? It must be that this self is false, if it can project a story of a world that shifts and changes and suffers. If I can watch my thoughts, then my thoughts must be separate from me. If I can watch and be aware of emotions, then emotions are not me. If I can be aware of and notice feelings in a body, then that must not be me, either. Who is this Self who monitors and witnesses all these things? The Self that witnesses is beyond the ephemeral thought-forms of body, thought, or emotion. The Self that witnesses is eternal and perfect and innocent and whole... free of all limitation or judgement of any kind. It's only when I falsely identify thoughts, emotions, or physicality as my self that I become a victim... projecting a world that is as painful as it is occasionally beautiful... a world disturbingly like a grade B movie... a world that has a seeming beginning and end and that seems to happen TO me, when all along I am the dreamer of this dream.
"The body is the central figure in the dreaming of the world. There is no dream without it, nor does it exist without the dream in which it acts as if it were a separate person to be seen and be believed." (ACIM; Chapter 27, Section VIII, 1:1-2) As long as I identify with a particular body, with particular thoughts, emotions, and serial adventures with other bodies, then I am victimizing myself (and that self is thankfully false... not true). When the identification finally shifts to the larger Self, it is easily seen that none of it was ever true... and that I was only the victim of myself.
It's helpful to me to picture the true Self as the Ground of Being, like a White Board on which all the falsely identified thoughts, emotions, and stories seem to be written. The more stories and dreams we write on the White Board, the harder it is to see that it's even there. But as we practice forgiveness, forgiving and releasing every false identification and judgment and story (good or bad), we're erasing the White Board... and in seemingly miraculous ways we begin to remember Who We Are. The miracle is this return to sanity, as we begin to reflect a kinder, more loving world and become a source of healing for all.
This White Board of Self, the unconditioned and eternal Self, is always pristine and perfect, always innocent and free, always loving and giving without thought or limitation. It's natural and it's our true Home. What's un-natural is this playing at being the victim of myself.
"The secret of salvation is but this: that you are doing this unto yourself. No matter what the form of the attack, this still is true. Whoever takes the role of enemy or of attacker, still is this the truth. Whatever seems to be the cause of any pain and suffering you feel, this is still true. For you would not react at all to figures in a dream you knew that you were dreaming. This single lesson will set you free from suffering whatever form it takes. The Holy Spirit will repeat this one inclusive lesson of deliverance until it has been learned, regardless of the form of suffering that brings you pain. The form affects His answer not at all, for He would teach you but the single cause of all of them, no matter what their form. And you will understand that miracles reflect this simple statement: "I have done this thing, and this I would undo." Salvation is a secret you have kept but from yourself. How differently will you perceive the world when this is recognized! When you forgive the world your guilt, you will be free of it. This is the only secret yet to learn." -- ACIM Chapter 27, Section VIII, paragraphs 10-13.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
My Only Need
"God has already done all things that need to be done. And I must learn I need do nothing of myself, for I need but accept my Self." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 337, 1:5-6
There has long been a virtual cult in self-help circles, a cult of the virtues of self-esteem. And it's true that we can build our ego up and feel better about ourselves attitudinally. But it's not real self love. The love of an illusion of self can only give us the illusion of love, an illusion that comes and goes. It's the same with loving (or hating) another person... loving (or hating) the illusion we've projected can only breed more illusion.
There is only one way to know the Truth... we have to release what isn't true, and see what is always here, always effortlessly present. Like the huge dome of the sky, God is what is always here, regardless of the thought clouds and projections that come and go. To accept that my real Self is One with God and all that Is... and that God is the Source and I am One with Source... and that creation is seamless, whole, and complete, no lack or limitation possible in all of God's Being... this acceptance allows me finally to simply BE. I need do nothing.
In this lies freedom... because it also means that I am free to do whatever arises through the spontaneous inspiration that emanates from our One Being. I am not obligated or coerced or in bondage to anyone or anything. I co-create with all of Self in joy and love. Like the sun shines, we ARE. My only need, and yours, is to accept this and live it.
There has long been a virtual cult in self-help circles, a cult of the virtues of self-esteem. And it's true that we can build our ego up and feel better about ourselves attitudinally. But it's not real self love. The love of an illusion of self can only give us the illusion of love, an illusion that comes and goes. It's the same with loving (or hating) another person... loving (or hating) the illusion we've projected can only breed more illusion.
There is only one way to know the Truth... we have to release what isn't true, and see what is always here, always effortlessly present. Like the huge dome of the sky, God is what is always here, regardless of the thought clouds and projections that come and go. To accept that my real Self is One with God and all that Is... and that God is the Source and I am One with Source... and that creation is seamless, whole, and complete, no lack or limitation possible in all of God's Being... this acceptance allows me finally to simply BE. I need do nothing.
In this lies freedom... because it also means that I am free to do whatever arises through the spontaneous inspiration that emanates from our One Being. I am not obligated or coerced or in bondage to anyone or anything. I co-create with all of Self in joy and love. Like the sun shines, we ARE. My only need, and yours, is to accept this and live it.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Awake in the Dark
"There is nothing you can hold against reality. All that must be forgiven are the illusions you have held against your brothers. Their reality has no past, and only illusions can be forgiven. God holds nothing against anyone, for He is incapable of illusions of any kind. Release your brothers from the slavery of their illusions by forgiving them for the illusions you perceive in them. Thus will you learn that you have been forgiven, for it is you who offered them illusions." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 16, Section VII, 9:1-6
I lay in bed in the dark, in the wee hours, unable to sleep. Thought upon thought weaves through my awareness, everything murky and uncomfortable. Nothing awful, mind you... simply the haziness of illusion, weaving itself in a downward spiral into stories and projections of judgment and separation. None of it true. How do I know that none of it is true? Because it is restless, murky, and unclear. There is no peace. When a thought arises that is in alignment with the Reality of God, there is an immediate lightening in consciousness. And that thought leads to another, and then another, on an upward spiral back to peace.
Remembering that all my judgments are nonsense helps a lot. "Forgive your brothers from the slavery of their illusions by forgiving them for the illusions you perceive in them." Yes, I'm the perceiver... whenever I see a problem, I'm always the one naming it and weaving a story about it in my mind. So I'm the only one who can forgive it. "Thus you will learn that you have been forgiven." Yes, all the judgments about me were in my mind, too. They are all my stories.
Everything is mind... mind asleep, or Mind Awake. Mind asleep is not really doing anything or creating anything... simply dreaming, even when it seems to be awake. Our One Mind Awake is the Source of All that is Real. It is the Mind of God, and it is my real mind. And yours. And everyone's. In Reality, there's only One of Us.
The One Awakened Mind, the Mind that created us and lives us, is joyous and free and at peace. It has always been. "The sleep of forgetfulness is only the unwillingness to remember." (ACIM; Chapter 16, Section VII, 12:4)
Why do we seem to prefer our dream stories and problems? Why do we worship them with our time and attention, when only a little sigh of release will return us to sanity and peaces? Forgiveness offers this and so much more. "Remember that you always choose between Truth and illusions." Minute by minute we get to choose. So every holy instant is a new beginning. Awake in the dark, I remember.
"Seek and find His message in the holy instant, where all illusions are forgiven. From here the miracle extends to bless everyone and to resolve all problems, be they perceived as great or small, possible or impossible. There is nothing that will not give place to Him and to His Majesty. The Truth lies here and nowhere else. You choose this or nothing." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 16, Section VII, 11:1-3, 6-7
I lay in bed in the dark, in the wee hours, unable to sleep. Thought upon thought weaves through my awareness, everything murky and uncomfortable. Nothing awful, mind you... simply the haziness of illusion, weaving itself in a downward spiral into stories and projections of judgment and separation. None of it true. How do I know that none of it is true? Because it is restless, murky, and unclear. There is no peace. When a thought arises that is in alignment with the Reality of God, there is an immediate lightening in consciousness. And that thought leads to another, and then another, on an upward spiral back to peace.
Remembering that all my judgments are nonsense helps a lot. "Forgive your brothers from the slavery of their illusions by forgiving them for the illusions you perceive in them." Yes, I'm the perceiver... whenever I see a problem, I'm always the one naming it and weaving a story about it in my mind. So I'm the only one who can forgive it. "Thus you will learn that you have been forgiven." Yes, all the judgments about me were in my mind, too. They are all my stories.
Everything is mind... mind asleep, or Mind Awake. Mind asleep is not really doing anything or creating anything... simply dreaming, even when it seems to be awake. Our One Mind Awake is the Source of All that is Real. It is the Mind of God, and it is my real mind. And yours. And everyone's. In Reality, there's only One of Us.
The One Awakened Mind, the Mind that created us and lives us, is joyous and free and at peace. It has always been. "The sleep of forgetfulness is only the unwillingness to remember." (ACIM; Chapter 16, Section VII, 12:4)
Why do we seem to prefer our dream stories and problems? Why do we worship them with our time and attention, when only a little sigh of release will return us to sanity and peaces? Forgiveness offers this and so much more. "Remember that you always choose between Truth and illusions." Minute by minute we get to choose. So every holy instant is a new beginning. Awake in the dark, I remember.
"Seek and find His message in the holy instant, where all illusions are forgiven. From here the miracle extends to bless everyone and to resolve all problems, be they perceived as great or small, possible or impossible. There is nothing that will not give place to Him and to His Majesty. The Truth lies here and nowhere else. You choose this or nothing." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 16, Section VII, 11:1-3, 6-7
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Blessing or Curse?
"The mind can think it sleeps, but that is all. It cannot change what is its waking state. It cannot make a body, nor abide within a body. What is alien to the mind does not exist, because it has no source. For mind creates all things that are, and cannot give them attributes it lacks, nor change its own eternal, mindful state. It cannot make the physical. What seems to die is but the sign of mind asleep." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 167, 6:1-7
I've been reflecting on what I seem to be seeing and hearing from people around me... stories of struggle with what is really happening or what is really true, with spiritual paths, with physical symptoms, with sticky relationship problems. I know that all of it is my perception, and that nothing is as it appears. And so I forgive and release these projections to Holy Spirit (which is another name for my True Self), ask for healed perception, and accept the healing of Atonement. And as I do, I'm led to reflect on the blessing (or curse?) of this. To the world around me, including clients, family and most friends, this non-dual view of the world would seem a curse... because I am no longer apparently in alignment with any popular thought-system in the world, including much of religious thought. They might ask how I could possibly see such an (apparently) aberrant world-view as anything but a curse.
Upon reflection, I find it extraordinary that the Truth is aberrant to people. We would rather see a world of opposites, with mysterious bad things happening without a source. We would rather believe that bad stuff really does happen, and then try to forgive it even while we think it's real. Do we think God creates bad things and punishes us? Or do we think we somehow usurped the power of God and created it ourselves?! Do we think all this crap is really happening? And if it is really happening, what allegiance do we owe to a divine Parent who would treat us this way, or even allow it to exist as creator of all? If it were an earthly parent, we would report them for child abuse. But friends, God is the All-Good. God is the Source of All, and All is Love and Light and Truth. Where would the darkness or the mistakes come from? What would be their source?
"There are not different kinds of life, for life is like the Truth. It does not have degrees. It is the one condition in which all that God created share. Like all His Thoughts, it has no opposite. There is no death because what God created shares His life. There is no death because an opposite to God does not exist. There is no death because the Father and the Son are one." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 167, 1:1-7
There is no opposite to God... there cannot be God and anything. Why would we not find this Truth comforting? Why do we prefer a dream of opposition to God, of illusory suffering and death, of struggle and lack and limitation? In India they call this compulsive dream 'samsara', which roughly translates to the wheel of suffering. The wheel turns, the characters and situations seem to change, but the stories are all the same. And every awakened soul who has walked this dream has come to tell us that it's our dream, and it's up to us to snap out of it. With such good news, wouldn't we rather be happy than right?
A Course in Miracles offers simple yet elegant tools to awaken from the dream. But we have to be willing to shed our fixation with the world as real. It is not. Often I awaken from my night time dreams to hear the Voice reassuring me that these dreams are just like my daytime dreams, and all of them are easily released and transformed. This has been my experience. There is no order of difficulty in miracles because only God is real, and nothing else is at all. There is no hierarchy of illusions, and there are no steps to take to awaken. Mind is asleep and believing its own dreams or it is awake in God. And only one of these seeming choices really exists at all.
While we dream, forgiveness and Atonement allow our dreaming perceptions to be healed and released, day by day. More and more we walk through our life as one awakening from a deep sleep, where the dreams make no sense at all. There is no real curse to be found, anywhere. There is only our true Self in God, and endless blessing.
"Let us today be children of the Truth, and not deny our holy heritage. Our life is not as we imagine it." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 167, 10:1-2
I've been reflecting on what I seem to be seeing and hearing from people around me... stories of struggle with what is really happening or what is really true, with spiritual paths, with physical symptoms, with sticky relationship problems. I know that all of it is my perception, and that nothing is as it appears. And so I forgive and release these projections to Holy Spirit (which is another name for my True Self), ask for healed perception, and accept the healing of Atonement. And as I do, I'm led to reflect on the blessing (or curse?) of this. To the world around me, including clients, family and most friends, this non-dual view of the world would seem a curse... because I am no longer apparently in alignment with any popular thought-system in the world, including much of religious thought. They might ask how I could possibly see such an (apparently) aberrant world-view as anything but a curse.
Upon reflection, I find it extraordinary that the Truth is aberrant to people. We would rather see a world of opposites, with mysterious bad things happening without a source. We would rather believe that bad stuff really does happen, and then try to forgive it even while we think it's real. Do we think God creates bad things and punishes us? Or do we think we somehow usurped the power of God and created it ourselves?! Do we think all this crap is really happening? And if it is really happening, what allegiance do we owe to a divine Parent who would treat us this way, or even allow it to exist as creator of all? If it were an earthly parent, we would report them for child abuse. But friends, God is the All-Good. God is the Source of All, and All is Love and Light and Truth. Where would the darkness or the mistakes come from? What would be their source?
"There are not different kinds of life, for life is like the Truth. It does not have degrees. It is the one condition in which all that God created share. Like all His Thoughts, it has no opposite. There is no death because what God created shares His life. There is no death because an opposite to God does not exist. There is no death because the Father and the Son are one." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 167, 1:1-7
There is no opposite to God... there cannot be God and anything. Why would we not find this Truth comforting? Why do we prefer a dream of opposition to God, of illusory suffering and death, of struggle and lack and limitation? In India they call this compulsive dream 'samsara', which roughly translates to the wheel of suffering. The wheel turns, the characters and situations seem to change, but the stories are all the same. And every awakened soul who has walked this dream has come to tell us that it's our dream, and it's up to us to snap out of it. With such good news, wouldn't we rather be happy than right?
A Course in Miracles offers simple yet elegant tools to awaken from the dream. But we have to be willing to shed our fixation with the world as real. It is not. Often I awaken from my night time dreams to hear the Voice reassuring me that these dreams are just like my daytime dreams, and all of them are easily released and transformed. This has been my experience. There is no order of difficulty in miracles because only God is real, and nothing else is at all. There is no hierarchy of illusions, and there are no steps to take to awaken. Mind is asleep and believing its own dreams or it is awake in God. And only one of these seeming choices really exists at all.
While we dream, forgiveness and Atonement allow our dreaming perceptions to be healed and released, day by day. More and more we walk through our life as one awakening from a deep sleep, where the dreams make no sense at all. There is no real curse to be found, anywhere. There is only our true Self in God, and endless blessing.
"Let us today be children of the Truth, and not deny our holy heritage. Our life is not as we imagine it." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 167, 10:1-2
Saturday, September 18, 2010
The Will to Awaken
"The real world is the state of mind in which the only purpose of the world is seen to be forgiveness. No rules are idly set, and no demands are made of anyone or anything to twist and fit into the dream of fear. Instead, there is a wish to understand all things created as they really are. And it is recognized that all things must first be forgiven, and then understood." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 30, Section V, 1:1 & 4-6
I've been thinking a lot this year about the seeming process of awakening, and the shedding of the false self that is required. As St. Paul put it, "I die daily" so that "I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." This beautiful thought is beloved in Christianity, but is also largely revered as a poetic and idealistic sentiment, not as a literal process that requires our willingness. Even those charismatic Christians who see it as literal still hang on to the notion of a little self that is saved by the God/Man, Jesus Christ. They don't see that this simply perpetuates their false view of themselves as separate from God, weaker and imperfect.
And whose will was it that these imperfect creatures exist? Certainly not God, Who creates all things in His Holy Mind and so eternally extends HimSelf. The Spirit of God did not and could not create imperfection. How could the imperfect exist in the absolute harmony and perfection of God, the eternally One and Whole? So what seems imperfect must be an imperfect perception only, a false sense of what eternally IS.
The will to awaken is the willingness to constantly release each and every perception that arises, and give it to the part of our mind that remains aware of our eternal Oneness with God... the Holy Spirit. This is what forgiveness is... and this is the process of Atonement, the interlocking chain of forgiveness that results in the Awakening of the One Son of God, even within the dream separation.
So what is the will to awaken? And why do so very few seem to have it? ACIM tells us that "The Call is universal. It goes on all the time everywhere. Many hear it, but few will answer. Everyone will answer in the end, but the end can [seem] a long, long way off." -- (ACIM; Manual for Teachers 1.2:4-5 & 7-9) In other words, we have a vested interest still in the dream. After all, it's our dream... and we continue to question how these very beautiful and desirable parts could need our forgiveness and release. Can't we just forgive all the bad stuff and keep these parts we like, the parts that we're comfortable with, the parts that speak to us of tradition and continuity within the dream?
Our teacher and guide is uncompromising. Jeshua said, "A man must lose his life in order to save it." Yikes. This is not what our egos want to hear.
How do we find the will to awaken? How do we release the mental resistance that flails about and questions our very sanity? I'd like to tell you there's an easy way through this passage, but the Truth is that the only way out is through. You will pass through this fire, and you will not be burned.
On the other side of all seeming turmoil is the perfect peace of realizing that there never was a problem... we have always been right here, safe in God. On this side, we simply keep giving our perceptions to the Holy Spirit and following the directions of the Voice within. This perfect trust will be reinforced as we are willing to follow the Holy Spirit's Voice instead of our own fearful imaginings. Forgive and follow the Voice. Forgive and follow the Voice. This is the will to awaken.
"A major hindrance in this aspect of learning is the teacher of God's fear about the validity of what he hears. And what he hears may indeed be quite startling. It may also seem to be quite irrelevant to the presented problem as he perceives it, and may in fact confront the teacher with a situation that appears to be very embarrassing to him. All these are judgments that have no value. They are his own, coming from a shabby self-perception which he would leave behind." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 21. 5:1-5
I've been thinking a lot this year about the seeming process of awakening, and the shedding of the false self that is required. As St. Paul put it, "I die daily" so that "I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." This beautiful thought is beloved in Christianity, but is also largely revered as a poetic and idealistic sentiment, not as a literal process that requires our willingness. Even those charismatic Christians who see it as literal still hang on to the notion of a little self that is saved by the God/Man, Jesus Christ. They don't see that this simply perpetuates their false view of themselves as separate from God, weaker and imperfect.
And whose will was it that these imperfect creatures exist? Certainly not God, Who creates all things in His Holy Mind and so eternally extends HimSelf. The Spirit of God did not and could not create imperfection. How could the imperfect exist in the absolute harmony and perfection of God, the eternally One and Whole? So what seems imperfect must be an imperfect perception only, a false sense of what eternally IS.
The will to awaken is the willingness to constantly release each and every perception that arises, and give it to the part of our mind that remains aware of our eternal Oneness with God... the Holy Spirit. This is what forgiveness is... and this is the process of Atonement, the interlocking chain of forgiveness that results in the Awakening of the One Son of God, even within the dream separation.
So what is the will to awaken? And why do so very few seem to have it? ACIM tells us that "The Call is universal. It goes on all the time everywhere. Many hear it, but few will answer. Everyone will answer in the end, but the end can [seem] a long, long way off." -- (ACIM; Manual for Teachers 1.2:4-5 & 7-9) In other words, we have a vested interest still in the dream. After all, it's our dream... and we continue to question how these very beautiful and desirable parts could need our forgiveness and release. Can't we just forgive all the bad stuff and keep these parts we like, the parts that we're comfortable with, the parts that speak to us of tradition and continuity within the dream?
Our teacher and guide is uncompromising. Jeshua said, "A man must lose his life in order to save it." Yikes. This is not what our egos want to hear.
How do we find the will to awaken? How do we release the mental resistance that flails about and questions our very sanity? I'd like to tell you there's an easy way through this passage, but the Truth is that the only way out is through. You will pass through this fire, and you will not be burned.
On the other side of all seeming turmoil is the perfect peace of realizing that there never was a problem... we have always been right here, safe in God. On this side, we simply keep giving our perceptions to the Holy Spirit and following the directions of the Voice within. This perfect trust will be reinforced as we are willing to follow the Holy Spirit's Voice instead of our own fearful imaginings. Forgive and follow the Voice. Forgive and follow the Voice. This is the will to awaken.
"A major hindrance in this aspect of learning is the teacher of God's fear about the validity of what he hears. And what he hears may indeed be quite startling. It may also seem to be quite irrelevant to the presented problem as he perceives it, and may in fact confront the teacher with a situation that appears to be very embarrassing to him. All these are judgments that have no value. They are his own, coming from a shabby self-perception which he would leave behind." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 21. 5:1-5
Saturday, September 4, 2010
This is My Father's World
"This is my Father's world; He shines in all that's fair. In rustling grass I hear Him pass; He speaks to me everywhere." -- from the hymn, "This is My Father's World"
"All things are echoes of the Voice for God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151
I love singing the old hymns I grew up with... every Sunday for over three years I've been doing one of them Acappella during communion at St. Vincent's-in-the-Vineyard (which is what gave me the idea for the CD). Some of my ACIM friends have questioned how I can reconcile the thought systems, especially my latest YouTube posting. This is a valid question, and I am never one to shy away from deeper inquiry. I've learned the hard way over the years to beware of trying to shine up my illusions with Truth, trying to spiritualize or 'fix' what I am already identified with. And by illusions I mean all conditioned thought and habitual behavior, including beloved traditions. They are all made up, and we give them all the meaning they have for us.
At the same time, when we have forgiven and released the meanings we learned from our families, or that we took on as part of an identity... when we have ceased to judge any of our projections and former judgments as good or bad... then God becomes the only meaning of all things. All the forms and aspects of life take on one purpose and one meaning... awakening to the Presence, and to our true Self. We have given the world of our projection to God: "Give Him your thoughts, and He will give them back as miracles which joyously proclaim the wholeness and happiness God wills as proof of His eternal Love. All the threads of fantasy are gone. And what remains is unified into a perfect Thought that offers its perfection everywhere." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 14:1, 3-4
Whether it's the words of a beloved hymn or the words of scripture, unless we forgive and release the past we are only reading and listening through conditioned response, and have no eyes and ears to hear. It's the same with the natural world... unless we forgive and release our fixed belief in a concrete, material world we can't hear the Voice and see the Love of God reflected here. A forgiven world reveals the face of Christ everywhere, and the Love of God as the only meaning of all things.
THIS is my Father's world... forgiven and thus transformed to what is so close to Heaven that the transition to Christ's Vision is easily made, through Grace.
"Through your transfiguration is the world redeemed, and joyfully released from guilt." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 16:3
"All things are echoes of the Voice for God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151
I love singing the old hymns I grew up with... every Sunday for over three years I've been doing one of them Acappella during communion at St. Vincent's-in-the-Vineyard (which is what gave me the idea for the CD). Some of my ACIM friends have questioned how I can reconcile the thought systems, especially my latest YouTube posting. This is a valid question, and I am never one to shy away from deeper inquiry. I've learned the hard way over the years to beware of trying to shine up my illusions with Truth, trying to spiritualize or 'fix' what I am already identified with. And by illusions I mean all conditioned thought and habitual behavior, including beloved traditions. They are all made up, and we give them all the meaning they have for us.
At the same time, when we have forgiven and released the meanings we learned from our families, or that we took on as part of an identity... when we have ceased to judge any of our projections and former judgments as good or bad... then God becomes the only meaning of all things. All the forms and aspects of life take on one purpose and one meaning... awakening to the Presence, and to our true Self. We have given the world of our projection to God: "Give Him your thoughts, and He will give them back as miracles which joyously proclaim the wholeness and happiness God wills as proof of His eternal Love. All the threads of fantasy are gone. And what remains is unified into a perfect Thought that offers its perfection everywhere." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 14:1, 3-4
Whether it's the words of a beloved hymn or the words of scripture, unless we forgive and release the past we are only reading and listening through conditioned response, and have no eyes and ears to hear. It's the same with the natural world... unless we forgive and release our fixed belief in a concrete, material world we can't hear the Voice and see the Love of God reflected here. A forgiven world reveals the face of Christ everywhere, and the Love of God as the only meaning of all things.
THIS is my Father's world... forgiven and thus transformed to what is so close to Heaven that the transition to Christ's Vision is easily made, through Grace.
"Through your transfiguration is the world redeemed, and joyfully released from guilt." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 16:3
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Beginning Again
"Behold, I make all things new." -- Revelation 21:5
Beginning again each day, each newborn day, we carry with us an entire world of past associations. We know how to brush our teeth, how to shower, how to make our tea, from memories of our childhood, or from our dentist, or from our parents or grandparents. Everything we do carries ghosts of the past. We're not really beginning again. We're repeating the past, with twists and turns, day after day. We're reacting to our own conditioned beliefs and ideas, our own mental constructs about how the day should be, what we should be doing, and who we should be doing it with. It's the wheel of endless action and reaction. We may resolve something today, but tomorrow it will rise again in a slightly different form. The grass will need cutting again. The dishes always need washing. And our teeth always need brushing.
How do we find peace in a world that is an endless chain of reaction to form and belief and thought? How do we begin again?
Over 2000 years ago Jeshua ben Joseph said, "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God." (John 3:3) How are we born again? How do we begin again? Let's read more of this same passage: "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; that which is born of the Spirit, is Spirit." (John:5-6) It's clear that we are talking about consciousness here... being born again in consciousness. The spirit is invisible, and unattended to by the physical, material man. Being born again, really beginning anew is an act forgiveness and release of the past, an act of consciousness. It doesn't have anything to do with the forms that seem to populate our world, although the forms will reflect these shifts in awareness.
A Course in Miracles teaches that all such shifts in perception come through forgiveness, through letting go of all past referral. The miracles that result are actually perceptual shifts that occur as our mind is changed. ACIM puts it this way: "To be born again is to let the past go, and look without condemnation on the present. If you would have it past and gone, you must not see it now." How the heck do we do that??? ACIM goes on: "Time can release as well as imprison, depending on whose interpretation of it you use. Past, present, and future are not continuous, unless you force continuity on them. You can perceive them as continuous, and make them so for you. But do not be deceived, and then believe that this is how it is. You would anticipate the future on the basis of your past experience, and plan for it accordingly. Yet by doing so you are aligning past and future, and not allowing the miracle, which could intervene between them, to free you to be born again. The miracle enables you to see your brother [and thus yourself] without his past, and so perceive him [and yourself] as born again." - ACIM Chapter 13, Section VI, 3:5-6 and 4:1-7, 5:1
Beginning again is a conscious act of forgiveness... but the release and perceptual shifts that result from our conscious acts of forgiveness are effortless and free.
"Judgment and condemnation are behind you, and unless you bring them with you, you will see that you are free of them. Look lovingly upon the present, for it holds the only things that are forever true." - ACIM Chapter 13, Section VI, 6:1
Beginning again each day, each newborn day, we carry with us an entire world of past associations. We know how to brush our teeth, how to shower, how to make our tea, from memories of our childhood, or from our dentist, or from our parents or grandparents. Everything we do carries ghosts of the past. We're not really beginning again. We're repeating the past, with twists and turns, day after day. We're reacting to our own conditioned beliefs and ideas, our own mental constructs about how the day should be, what we should be doing, and who we should be doing it with. It's the wheel of endless action and reaction. We may resolve something today, but tomorrow it will rise again in a slightly different form. The grass will need cutting again. The dishes always need washing. And our teeth always need brushing.
How do we find peace in a world that is an endless chain of reaction to form and belief and thought? How do we begin again?
Over 2000 years ago Jeshua ben Joseph said, "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God." (John 3:3) How are we born again? How do we begin again? Let's read more of this same passage: "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; that which is born of the Spirit, is Spirit." (John:5-6) It's clear that we are talking about consciousness here... being born again in consciousness. The spirit is invisible, and unattended to by the physical, material man. Being born again, really beginning anew is an act forgiveness and release of the past, an act of consciousness. It doesn't have anything to do with the forms that seem to populate our world, although the forms will reflect these shifts in awareness.
A Course in Miracles teaches that all such shifts in perception come through forgiveness, through letting go of all past referral. The miracles that result are actually perceptual shifts that occur as our mind is changed. ACIM puts it this way: "To be born again is to let the past go, and look without condemnation on the present. If you would have it past and gone, you must not see it now." How the heck do we do that??? ACIM goes on: "Time can release as well as imprison, depending on whose interpretation of it you use. Past, present, and future are not continuous, unless you force continuity on them. You can perceive them as continuous, and make them so for you. But do not be deceived, and then believe that this is how it is. You would anticipate the future on the basis of your past experience, and plan for it accordingly. Yet by doing so you are aligning past and future, and not allowing the miracle, which could intervene between them, to free you to be born again. The miracle enables you to see your brother [and thus yourself] without his past, and so perceive him [and yourself] as born again." - ACIM Chapter 13, Section VI, 3:5-6 and 4:1-7, 5:1
Beginning again is a conscious act of forgiveness... but the release and perceptual shifts that result from our conscious acts of forgiveness are effortless and free.
"Judgment and condemnation are behind you, and unless you bring them with you, you will see that you are free of them. Look lovingly upon the present, for it holds the only things that are forever true." - ACIM Chapter 13, Section VI, 6:1
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