Dearest Friend:
I just wanted to share some thoughts about your questions yesterday, which are very similar to the ones you had last week. The gist of it is (if I am hearing you correctly), there are thoughts you are having that you don’t like. Last week you were having thoughts of judgment that you didn’t like. So both of these are really the same seeming problem.
Forgiveness is key here, but not as you seem to be using it. The thing is, forgiveness isn’t a tool to be used to make the human self feel better. It is an act of completely surrendering judgment and being clueless, empty of judgment, unknowing and not needing to know. As the Course teaches it, we give our thoughts to the Holy Spirit, which is our True Self, the communicative part of the Christ Mind we share. None of this is true, but it is what the course calls a ‘happy fiction’ that moves us toward completely relinquishing the imagined separate self. The Absolute Truth is that we never left our right Mind. But while seeming to live and move in the relative and dualistic dream world, the Holy Spirit will ‘translate’ all our thoughts into Truth (“Truth will correct all errors in my mind.” WB 107). Translate actually doesn’t mean to change at all, but to make clear. For example, if I say ‘hola’ to you and you don’t know Spanish, you don’t know what I mean. But if I then say, ‘that means hello’ to you, I have made the true meaning clear to you. I haven’t changed anything… I have simply made it clear.
In the same way, the Course reminds us that if we give every thought to the Holy Spirit, all of it will be used to make clear and obvious what has always been. The translation of every thought and every situation is the same: the meaning is always Perfect Goodness, Happiness, Joy, and Infinite Love. Our True Self has not been affected by any of our misperceptions, just as ‘hola’ means hello whether you know it or not.
Forgiveness means letting go, not analyzing, worrying, getting angry, or any other form of judging thoughts and situations. Judging your judgments is just another way of holding onto them, instead of giving them completely to Holy Spirit. And thinking that you have to ‘do’ something, or to forgive them somehow differently, is another delaying strategy of the personal self. The personal self will always see personal problems. That is what holds the illusion of a personal self in place, so of course we are constantly judging. We fear the loss of self. Ironically, Our Real Self has no problems. And from the standpoint of the Real Self, all problems not only disappear, but their relative reflection will either go away or be transformed somehow. That’s the way projection works. Either way, you will be happy, safe, and blissfully content resting in Truth.
Happiness is the only Reality of all things. It’s not like we need to get rid of or change anything (what in the Allness of God could be deleted or changed?). We simply need to let go of (forgive) our judgments and meanings and thinking we know. Once that is given, we see that right where we thought there was a negative thought, there is only happiness. Right where we thought we saw tragedy or disaster, there is only comfort, joy, and laughter. This is what the Course means when it says our perceptions are upside down and backwards. “To give up (forgive) all problems to one Answer is to reverse the thinking of the world entirely.” (Manual for Teachers 4:IX:1:6)
God’s Will for us is perfect Happiness, and there is no will but God’s. (WB Lessons 74 and 101) So you see, even the belief in outcomes has to be translated, because Happiness and Goodness and Love are what has always been and all that can ever BE. The belief in laws of behavior and reciprocity have to be translated, because we are in Truth under no laws but God’s… which is another way of saying that the Love of God, which includes Perfect Joy and Peace, is ALL THERE IS. (WB Lesson 76) So nothing else is ever going on but this Love, this Joy, this Happiness. Nothing!
“Forgiveness is the key to Happiness,” the Course reminds us. “Forgiveness is my only function here.” “Forgiveness offers everything I want.” “I will forgive and this will disappear.” Obviously, this is all we need to wake up. Not a tool, but the only practice in the dream that can never lead to suffering. Just give every thought to the Holy Spirit, and allow the Beauty and Joy of each moment, each action, each thought to be translated. Heaven is here and now. This Oneness of Being must include everyone, everything, and yes, every thought!
"Beloved Son of a wholly blessing Father, joy was created for you. Who can condemn whom God has blessed? There is nothing in the Mind of God that does not share his shining innocence. Creation is the natural extension of perfect purity. Your only calling here is to devote yourself, with active willingness, to the denial of guilt in all its forms." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 14, Section V, 3: 1-5
Blessings...
Mary
Showing posts with label Thoughts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Thoughts. Show all posts
Friday, October 16, 2015
Monday, April 8, 2013
The Key to Happiness
“You made this up. It is a picture of what you think you are; of
how you see yourself… Have you not wondered what the world is really like; how
it would look through happy eyes? The
world you see is but a judgment on yourself.
It is not there at all.” – A
Course in Miracles; Chapter 20, Section III, 4:3-4, 5:1-3
A friend recently asked me about the practice of forgiveness as the Course teaches it. It’s not really forgiveness as the world thinks about it, because it’s not about anything ‘out there’ at all. It’s a mental process, because everything I experience is in my mind, and then projected outward. And while our minds appear to sleep, there is a great need for reminders that the nightmares we project have no real effects. “What God has created follows His Laws, and His alone. Nor is it possible for those who follow them to suffer the results of any other source.” (ACIM 20, IV, 3:6-7) This means our insane projections, though scary, can have no real effects. Of course, as long as we’re asleep, we’re stuck in a nightmare thinking it’s really happening. So forgiveness is the way out of the dream.
Forgiveness as the Course teaches it makes use of the Holy Instant, the “little breath of eternity that runs through time like golden Light that is all the same; nothing before it, nothing afterwards.” The reality of God and the Holy Spirit (which is our reality) is always, now, and forever. “The past takes nothing from it, and the future will add no more. Here then, is everything. This gift returns the laws of God to your remembrance.”
Because our reality in God is already perfect, whole, and complete, there really is only one purpose to everything… to awaken from the dream we made up. So the Course reminds us repeatedly that forgiveness is our only function. Don’t bother judging the seeming situation, since trying to judge a dream is insane… it’s all made up. Practice forgiveness, and wake up to Perfection. Practice forgiveness, and be Happy.
“God’s Will for me is perfect happiness.” -- A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 101
Here is an example of how the function of forgiveness unfolds in the mind. Use your own words, and be specific and thorough with each individual person, situation, or feeling you are examining. Once you experience the deep peace this process brings, don't try and fill the clean and open space with concepts and stories again. Remember that it’s the false concepts and beliefs in your mind that project as the world you think you see. So step back and let Truth arise and lead the way. Ask the Holy Spirit whenever you need to make a decision. BE peace.
A friend recently asked me about the practice of forgiveness as the Course teaches it. It’s not really forgiveness as the world thinks about it, because it’s not about anything ‘out there’ at all. It’s a mental process, because everything I experience is in my mind, and then projected outward. And while our minds appear to sleep, there is a great need for reminders that the nightmares we project have no real effects. “What God has created follows His Laws, and His alone. Nor is it possible for those who follow them to suffer the results of any other source.” (ACIM 20, IV, 3:6-7) This means our insane projections, though scary, can have no real effects. Of course, as long as we’re asleep, we’re stuck in a nightmare thinking it’s really happening. So forgiveness is the way out of the dream.
Forgiveness as the Course teaches it makes use of the Holy Instant, the “little breath of eternity that runs through time like golden Light that is all the same; nothing before it, nothing afterwards.” The reality of God and the Holy Spirit (which is our reality) is always, now, and forever. “The past takes nothing from it, and the future will add no more. Here then, is everything. This gift returns the laws of God to your remembrance.”
Because our reality in God is already perfect, whole, and complete, there really is only one purpose to everything… to awaken from the dream we made up. So the Course reminds us repeatedly that forgiveness is our only function. Don’t bother judging the seeming situation, since trying to judge a dream is insane… it’s all made up. Practice forgiveness, and wake up to Perfection. Practice forgiveness, and be Happy.
“God’s Will for me is perfect happiness.” -- A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 101
Here is an example of how the function of forgiveness unfolds in the mind. Use your own words, and be specific and thorough with each individual person, situation, or feeling you are examining. Once you experience the deep peace this process brings, don't try and fill the clean and open space with concepts and stories again. Remember that it’s the false concepts and beliefs in your mind that project as the world you think you see. So step back and let Truth arise and lead the way. Ask the Holy Spirit whenever you need to make a decision. BE peace.
This feeling
(fear, anger, hurt, pride, jealousy, frustration, pain, hopelessness or
whatever the unsettling emotion may be) that I feel toward and about you and
this situation seems to be about:
(Take time to
be honest about this, in detail)
I see that
every aspect of this is a projection of my belief that I am separate from God
and everyone and everything, which means I think I’m separate from this
situation and from the All, the Everything that is God, which includes all Goodness
and Love and Perfection and Completeness.
Because I think I’m separate, I’m projecting false images of conflict
and pain and lack instead of radiating the Wholeness and Peace that I am. I’m projecting false images of lack and
limitation instead of radiating the perfect Love and Completeness that I am.
I see that it’s
impossible to be separate from the Love of God, which is Everything and
All. I have never been separate and my fear is all
made up and projected as false images.
Everyone and everything that seems to be involved is also eternally One with the Love of God,
and so everyone and everything that seems to be in conflict is actually all Good
and only Good, Perfect, Innocent and Complete.
And so I
forgive myself and everyone and everything for what never even happened! I let it go, and overlook all the seeming
‘evidence’ of lack and pain and suffering.
I look instead to the Holy Spirit, and I give all these images to the
Holy Spirit to be dissolved in my perception throughout imaginary space and
time.
I know that as
I release these images to the Holy Spirit, they are completely undone
throughout the dream (past, present, and future… which are all made up, too)...
the false concepts and images dissolve in the Light like the dreams they are,
and now I know none of it ever happened in reality. All that remains is the Holy Instant of Light
and Love. There is only God, only innocence
and peace, only the clean and open space of Spirit… the Light, Perfection, Peace,
Love, and Joy that is our eternal Home.
By
being honest about our thoughts and feelings in this way, and giving them to
the Holy Spirit, we let Truth correct all such errors in our minds (which is where it all appears to be
happening!). We can then step back and
let our Wholeness (holiness) lead the way, and the symbols and projections in
the dream we call life begin to reflect this Wholeness. Innocence and Peace, Joy and Happiness… these
are the Reality behind everything. And
forgiveness is the way to remember the Reality behind it all.
“Forgiveness
is the key to happiness.” A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 121
Please join us for ACIM Teleclasses every Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. central time.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Real Freedom...
"There is no death. The Son of God is free. Death is a thought that takes on many forms, often unrecognized. It may appear as sadness, fear, anxiety or doubt; as anger, faithlessness, and lack of trust; concern for bodies, envy, and all forms in which the wish to be as you are not may come to tempt you. All such thoughts are reflections of the worshipping of death as savior and as giver of release." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 163, 1:1-3
It takes some quiet reflection to really take in the truth of this passage from ACIM. "Death takes many forms, often unrecognized." And it's all in the mind... the mind that imagines itself separate and vulnerable and at effect with the world around it. The mind that imagines that it would be somehow better off if someone or something were different. We want to delete whole parts of our lives and replace them with others. We want to delete some people, and acquire others. All of these things are the out-picturing of the idea of death, because they involve the coming and going of the transitory and inevitably unfulfilled. They all involve the serial adventures of a separate body that doesn't have a lot of time here on earth, so hey, we better make the most of it.
"There is no death. The Son of God is free." We are already the Son of God. We don't need to change the world around us for that to be true, or to escape from someone or some situation in order to realize it. The world is just the out-picturing of the belief we're not free. That we're imprisoned in a body, at the mercy of a separate world and a capricious God. There is no such world, except in our tortured minds and perceptions. Because as long as we cling to the notion of separateness and separate interests, we believe in death. We believe and experience as true that someone or something has to die so that someone or something else can live. Eat or be eaten. Stand up for yourself. You and me against the world. There are many versions of the story of me.
The Course tells us that "It's impossible to worship death in any form and still select a few you would not cherish and would yet avoid, while still believing in the rest. For death is total. Either all things die, or else they live and cannot die. No compromise is possible." What this means is that we are either aware of ourselves as One Mind and Spirit, the Sons of God, or we are believing that we're separate bodies in a dog eat dog world. We can't have it both ways.
There is no death, because God is All, and there is nothing and nowhere else. Where would death be? Outside of All? There is no death, because we live and move and have our being in and as this All. There is no death because there is One Infinite Self that we share for all eternity.
"What time but now can Truth be recognized? The present is the only time there is. And so today, this instant, now, we come to look upon what is forever True." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 164, 1:1-3
It takes some quiet reflection to really take in the truth of this passage from ACIM. "Death takes many forms, often unrecognized." And it's all in the mind... the mind that imagines itself separate and vulnerable and at effect with the world around it. The mind that imagines that it would be somehow better off if someone or something were different. We want to delete whole parts of our lives and replace them with others. We want to delete some people, and acquire others. All of these things are the out-picturing of the idea of death, because they involve the coming and going of the transitory and inevitably unfulfilled. They all involve the serial adventures of a separate body that doesn't have a lot of time here on earth, so hey, we better make the most of it.
"There is no death. The Son of God is free." We are already the Son of God. We don't need to change the world around us for that to be true, or to escape from someone or some situation in order to realize it. The world is just the out-picturing of the belief we're not free. That we're imprisoned in a body, at the mercy of a separate world and a capricious God. There is no such world, except in our tortured minds and perceptions. Because as long as we cling to the notion of separateness and separate interests, we believe in death. We believe and experience as true that someone or something has to die so that someone or something else can live. Eat or be eaten. Stand up for yourself. You and me against the world. There are many versions of the story of me.
The Course tells us that "It's impossible to worship death in any form and still select a few you would not cherish and would yet avoid, while still believing in the rest. For death is total. Either all things die, or else they live and cannot die. No compromise is possible." What this means is that we are either aware of ourselves as One Mind and Spirit, the Sons of God, or we are believing that we're separate bodies in a dog eat dog world. We can't have it both ways.
There is no death, because God is All, and there is nothing and nowhere else. Where would death be? Outside of All? There is no death, because we live and move and have our being in and as this All. There is no death because there is One Infinite Self that we share for all eternity.
"What time but now can Truth be recognized? The present is the only time there is. And so today, this instant, now, we come to look upon what is forever True." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 164, 1:1-3
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
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
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
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Decisions, Decisions
In this so-called life, decisions make up every minute of every day. Even my youngest grandson is choosing his state of mind minute by minute, second by second. I can see the impulses arise and cross his little three-month-old face like clouds. I can see the second he decides to smile instead of cry. I can see him struggle to give voice (and I mean voice) to his discomfort. Little Kai Joseph is just like us... choosing to react to external forms, or to interact with the Love that is in him and all around him, always.
We're not talking about will-power here. That's the mistaken belief that we can exert control over our bodies and other forms in the external world. As Mary Baker Eddy put it, "Will power is a product of belief... and is not a faculty of Soul. Hence it cannot govern man aright." And A Course in Miracles says it very simply: "There is no Will but God's."
So what are all the decisions we make every day? We have to first remember that all decisions are of the mind, and have nothing to do with form. My grandson's decisions may reflect in his face, but it's all in his mind. Similarly, our minute-by-minute decisions are mental processes. The illusion of a world arises from these mental projections. "Perception is a mirror, not a fact. And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward." (A Course in Miracles; Workbook 304, 1:3-4)
Decisions, decisions... how can we make decisions, then, if we're not in our right mind... if we think we've made a will other than God's? Again, A Course in Miracles gives us a way out: "Let us today be truly humble, and accept what we have made as what it is. The power of decision is our own. Decide but to accept your rightful place as co-creator of the universe, and all you think you made will disappear. What rises to awareness then will be all that there ever was, eternally as it is now. And it will take the place of self-deceptions made but to usurp the altar to the Father and the Son." (A Course in Miracles; Workbook 152, 8:1-5)
Decisions are continuous, and we are always looking at only two choices, two mental states. Our True Self, the Son of God Who is Peace and Love and Life and Reality... or an illusion of a separate self, which projects as fear and lack and limitation and death. We know which we're choosing by our state of mind.
"You who perceive yourself as weak and frail, with futile hopes and devastated dreams, born but to die, to weep and suffer pain, hear this: All power is given unto you in earth and Heaven. There is nothing that you cannot do. Then let the Son of God awaken from his sleep, and opening his holy eyes, return again to bless the world he made. In error it began, but it will end in the reflection of His holiness." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 191, 9:1-2 & 10:1-2
We're not talking about will-power here. That's the mistaken belief that we can exert control over our bodies and other forms in the external world. As Mary Baker Eddy put it, "Will power is a product of belief... and is not a faculty of Soul. Hence it cannot govern man aright." And A Course in Miracles says it very simply: "There is no Will but God's."
So what are all the decisions we make every day? We have to first remember that all decisions are of the mind, and have nothing to do with form. My grandson's decisions may reflect in his face, but it's all in his mind. Similarly, our minute-by-minute decisions are mental processes. The illusion of a world arises from these mental projections. "Perception is a mirror, not a fact. And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward." (A Course in Miracles; Workbook 304, 1:3-4)
Decisions, decisions... how can we make decisions, then, if we're not in our right mind... if we think we've made a will other than God's? Again, A Course in Miracles gives us a way out: "Let us today be truly humble, and accept what we have made as what it is. The power of decision is our own. Decide but to accept your rightful place as co-creator of the universe, and all you think you made will disappear. What rises to awareness then will be all that there ever was, eternally as it is now. And it will take the place of self-deceptions made but to usurp the altar to the Father and the Son." (A Course in Miracles; Workbook 152, 8:1-5)
Decisions are continuous, and we are always looking at only two choices, two mental states. Our True Self, the Son of God Who is Peace and Love and Life and Reality... or an illusion of a separate self, which projects as fear and lack and limitation and death. We know which we're choosing by our state of mind.
"You who perceive yourself as weak and frail, with futile hopes and devastated dreams, born but to die, to weep and suffer pain, hear this: All power is given unto you in earth and Heaven. There is nothing that you cannot do. Then let the Son of God awaken from his sleep, and opening his holy eyes, return again to bless the world he made. In error it began, but it will end in the reflection of His holiness." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 191, 9:1-2 & 10:1-2
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Nothing But My Thoughts
"Father, Your Son is perfect. When I think that I am hurt in any way, it is because I have forgotten Who I Am, and that I am as You created me. Your Thoughts can only bring me happiness. If ever I am sad or hurt or ill, I have forgotten what You think, and put my little meaningless ideas in place of where Your Thoughts belong, and where they are. I can be hurt by nothing but my thoughts. The Thoughts I think with You can only bless. The Thoughts I think with You alone are true." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 281
It's all literally made up... nothing but thought-stuff... there is nothing I'm interacting with but my own thoughts. There's no one to fight with, no one to blame, no one to look up to or to save me. There's no one who knows more or less, or who has more or less than I do. Reality is here, now, whole, and complete. And it's always loving.
This reminds me of an old Outer Limits episode, where this woman wakes up to her normal world with its normal shapes and forms, with one big exception... there's nobody there but her! So she spends the entire time freaking out and panicking and trying to find the 'others' that must be 'out there' too. This is particularly funny when you think about how our egos are always trying to get others to think and be like we want them to. And they are! They are!
Does this mean that we are alone in all the universe? Does this mean that I am just this isolated ego, imagining and dreaming over and over and over? No... we live and move and have our being in God, in the One, in the Infinite and All-Good. It's the dream of isolation and separation that is false, that is a projected misconception in a million different forms.
In the dream of separation from each other and God, there is nothing real. But there is Reality... and the one measure of the Real is that it is eternal, unchanging, infinite, boundless, all-embracing Love. There is no place or time or living thing that is separate, wrong, flawed, lacking, or in need of change or adjustment. What appears to be so is the false projected as if it were true.
There is only one lie: that we are separate from the All. And this is simply an error about who and where we are, a misconception. And conceptions can be changed, to align more nearly to what is true. Nothing but my misconceptions, my thoughts, can hurt me. Nothing but my thoughts of separation and autonomy could project this illusion of a world that God did not create.
The Thoughts of God remain in the Mind of God. This is where we are, and where we will always be... One God, One World, One Beloved Self, perfect and holy and forever.
It's all literally made up... nothing but thought-stuff... there is nothing I'm interacting with but my own thoughts. There's no one to fight with, no one to blame, no one to look up to or to save me. There's no one who knows more or less, or who has more or less than I do. Reality is here, now, whole, and complete. And it's always loving.
This reminds me of an old Outer Limits episode, where this woman wakes up to her normal world with its normal shapes and forms, with one big exception... there's nobody there but her! So she spends the entire time freaking out and panicking and trying to find the 'others' that must be 'out there' too. This is particularly funny when you think about how our egos are always trying to get others to think and be like we want them to. And they are! They are!
Does this mean that we are alone in all the universe? Does this mean that I am just this isolated ego, imagining and dreaming over and over and over? No... we live and move and have our being in God, in the One, in the Infinite and All-Good. It's the dream of isolation and separation that is false, that is a projected misconception in a million different forms.
In the dream of separation from each other and God, there is nothing real. But there is Reality... and the one measure of the Real is that it is eternal, unchanging, infinite, boundless, all-embracing Love. There is no place or time or living thing that is separate, wrong, flawed, lacking, or in need of change or adjustment. What appears to be so is the false projected as if it were true.
There is only one lie: that we are separate from the All. And this is simply an error about who and where we are, a misconception. And conceptions can be changed, to align more nearly to what is true. Nothing but my misconceptions, my thoughts, can hurt me. Nothing but my thoughts of separation and autonomy could project this illusion of a world that God did not create.
The Thoughts of God remain in the Mind of God. This is where we are, and where we will always be... One God, One World, One Beloved Self, perfect and holy and forever.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
The Judge of What You Are
"Let Him be Judge of what you are, for He has certainty in which there is no doubt, because it rests on Certainty so great that doubt is meaningless before Its Face. Christ cannot doubt HimSelf. The Voice for God can only honor Him, rejoicing in His perfect, everlasting sinlessness. Whom He has judged can only laugh at guilt, unwilling now to play with toys of sin; unheeding of the body's witnesses before the rapture of Christ's holy face. And thus He judges YOU." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 8:1-4
Wow, in the last couple of days alone I have had five or six conversations with people who are judging themselves very harshly. This is of course my own journey as well, so it's a wonderful opportunity to see my projections in living color.
Who is the judge of who and what I am? I've taken it upon myself to judge my inadequacies at every opportunity. I've imagined I see the physical flaws, the mental limitations, the emotional vulnerability, the failures and the successes as I judge them. These are the false perceptions that begin within and are projected without as a flawed and struggling world full of flawed and struggling people. Whether I see them as enemies or friends is irrelevant. I don't see them at all. I see my projections, and nothing else. "You cannot judge. You merely can believe the ego's judgements, all of which are false. It guides your senses carefully, to prove how weak you are; how helpless and afraid, how apprehensive of just punishment, how black with sin, how wretched in your guilt." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 4:3-5
But we all know how very familiar and real this false sense of self and other seems to us. The compulsion to live our life as this false self dictates is nearly overwhelming at times. How do we stop this addictive and destructive behavior, this constant judging of everyone and everything, this constant assumption that we know who we are and what we're doing? ACIM says we must learn to doubt the evidence of our senses rather than our Self. As we cease to judge according to appearances, we "clear the way to recognize Self, and let the Voice for God alone be Judge of what is worthy of belief."
And so we come down to it, once again. Forgiveness is our function here, not judgment. We do not and cannot know the big picture while we walk about in this dream world. But we can forgive and release our judgments to One Who Knows, and allow Him to lead the way. "Let Him be Judge as well of everything that seems to happen to you in this world. His lessons will enable you to bridge the [seeming] gap between illusions and Truth. He will remove all faith you have placed in pain, disaster, suffering, and loss. He gives you Vision which looks beyond these grim appearances and beholds the gentle face of Christ in all of them. You will no longer doubt that only good can come to you who are beloved of God, for He will judge all happenings and teach the single lesson that they all contain." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 9:6-7, 10:1-3
And what is the single lesson that everything contains? "Let Him evaluate each thought that comes to mind, removing the elements of dreams, and give them back again as clean ideas that do not contradict the Will of God. Give Him your thoughts, and He will give them back as miracles which joyously proclaim the wholeness and the happiness God wills His Son, as proof of His eternal Love." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 13:4, 14:1
The single lesson is always that the Son of God that we are remains in God, sinless and eternally perfect and beloved and loving. And no dreams or fantasies have ever had the slightest effect on this Reality.
God is the only judge of what you are, and what I am, and what all creation is. And the single judgment is always the Truth about the Son of God.
"As each thought is thus transformed, it takes on healing power from the Mind which saw the Truth in it and failed to be deceived by what was falsely added. All the threads of fantasy are gone. And what remains is unified into a perfect Thought that offers its perfection everywhere. Your ministry begins as all your thoughts are purified. So are you taught to teach the Son of God the holy lesson of his sanctity." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 14:2-4, 15:2-3
Wow, in the last couple of days alone I have had five or six conversations with people who are judging themselves very harshly. This is of course my own journey as well, so it's a wonderful opportunity to see my projections in living color.
Who is the judge of who and what I am? I've taken it upon myself to judge my inadequacies at every opportunity. I've imagined I see the physical flaws, the mental limitations, the emotional vulnerability, the failures and the successes as I judge them. These are the false perceptions that begin within and are projected without as a flawed and struggling world full of flawed and struggling people. Whether I see them as enemies or friends is irrelevant. I don't see them at all. I see my projections, and nothing else. "You cannot judge. You merely can believe the ego's judgements, all of which are false. It guides your senses carefully, to prove how weak you are; how helpless and afraid, how apprehensive of just punishment, how black with sin, how wretched in your guilt." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 4:3-5
But we all know how very familiar and real this false sense of self and other seems to us. The compulsion to live our life as this false self dictates is nearly overwhelming at times. How do we stop this addictive and destructive behavior, this constant judging of everyone and everything, this constant assumption that we know who we are and what we're doing? ACIM says we must learn to doubt the evidence of our senses rather than our Self. As we cease to judge according to appearances, we "clear the way to recognize Self, and let the Voice for God alone be Judge of what is worthy of belief."
And so we come down to it, once again. Forgiveness is our function here, not judgment. We do not and cannot know the big picture while we walk about in this dream world. But we can forgive and release our judgments to One Who Knows, and allow Him to lead the way. "Let Him be Judge as well of everything that seems to happen to you in this world. His lessons will enable you to bridge the [seeming] gap between illusions and Truth. He will remove all faith you have placed in pain, disaster, suffering, and loss. He gives you Vision which looks beyond these grim appearances and beholds the gentle face of Christ in all of them. You will no longer doubt that only good can come to you who are beloved of God, for He will judge all happenings and teach the single lesson that they all contain." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 9:6-7, 10:1-3
And what is the single lesson that everything contains? "Let Him evaluate each thought that comes to mind, removing the elements of dreams, and give them back again as clean ideas that do not contradict the Will of God. Give Him your thoughts, and He will give them back as miracles which joyously proclaim the wholeness and the happiness God wills His Son, as proof of His eternal Love." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 13:4, 14:1
The single lesson is always that the Son of God that we are remains in God, sinless and eternally perfect and beloved and loving. And no dreams or fantasies have ever had the slightest effect on this Reality.
God is the only judge of what you are, and what I am, and what all creation is. And the single judgment is always the Truth about the Son of God.
"As each thought is thus transformed, it takes on healing power from the Mind which saw the Truth in it and failed to be deceived by what was falsely added. All the threads of fantasy are gone. And what remains is unified into a perfect Thought that offers its perfection everywhere. Your ministry begins as all your thoughts are purified. So are you taught to teach the Son of God the holy lesson of his sanctity." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 14:2-4, 15:2-3
Monday, August 30, 2010
God's Will
First I want to let my readers know that I have a CD for sale, with proceeds going to The Claire Foundation Animal Sanctuary. All the hymns on it are Acappella, and recorded live at St. Vincent's-in-the-Vineyard. You can hear cuts from it on my YouTube channel. Thanks for supporting the animals! And FYI, you can download individual mp3s for only $1.99 each.
Now for the quote that inspired today's blog:
"God's Will is One, not many. It has no opposition, for there is none beside it." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 19, IV, 3:5-6
It's hard to find a phrase that instills such varied reactions as 'God's Will.' For many of us, it conjures pious, judgmental comments made after natural disasters or sudden deaths. For almost everyone it raises a sense of unease and fear... because hey, who the heck knows what God's Will for us is? It could be bad, it could be something punitive so we can 'learn our lessons.' Isn't that how most human parents operate? Don't we unconsciously model our ideas of God after our human notions of authority?
So this quote can be hard to take in. We may hear it, but gloss over it. God's Will is ONE, not many. IT HAS NO OPPOSITION, because there isn't anything else. Only God. We live and move and have our being IN THIS ONENESS. So logically there isn't my will and then God's Will imposed on me from without. There is only God, only God's Will, appearing AS me, and AS you. That we have convinced ourselves and each other that we are separate bodies and lives is irrelevant, because it's not true.
This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from the movie "The Matrix." A little psychic boy is bending spoons with his mind, and offers Keanu Reeves' character the chance to try it. He isn't having much luck, and the little boy simply says, "Don't try and bend the spoon. Know that there is no spoon." And then of course, the spoon bends.
Joel Goldsmith told a similar story. He was traveling and arrived at his destination only to hear that his luggage had been lost. He spent the next couple of days practicing scientific prayer, knowing that what belonged to him could never be lost, etc. But his luggage did not show up. Finally in meditation the answer came to him... there was no lost luggage! There are no opposites or oppositions in all God's Kingdom, there is only God! Of course, his luggage then 'showed up' unexpectedly.
Jesus taught us this Truth when he said, "Seek ye first the Kingdom (the Oneness of God) and all else will be added unto you." We just have it upside down and backwards, thinking that cause and effect lie within the world, in our actions and reactions, or even in our thoughts. If there is no Will but God's, it also holds that there are no real Thoughts but God's. Everything else is the dreaming of the mind that imagines itself to be separate. And no matter what we imagine in our dreaming, we remain safe in God, eternally.
There is great peace in this awareness. "Peace has replaced the strange idea that you are torn by conflicting goals. As an expression of the Will of God, you have no goal but His." (ACIM; Workbook 74, 1:5-6) We don't have to struggle humanly to figure it all out. God's Will is always Love, Goodness, Happiness, Peace, Abundance, Joy, and endless Life. And as we trust God with each holy instant of our lives, we are led by Grace.
"He leadeth me in paths of righteousness, for His Name's sake." -- Psalm 23
"Today I will recognize that all this has not occurred. I am safe because there is no will but God's." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 87, 3:5-6
Now for the quote that inspired today's blog:
"God's Will is One, not many. It has no opposition, for there is none beside it." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 19, IV, 3:5-6
It's hard to find a phrase that instills such varied reactions as 'God's Will.' For many of us, it conjures pious, judgmental comments made after natural disasters or sudden deaths. For almost everyone it raises a sense of unease and fear... because hey, who the heck knows what God's Will for us is? It could be bad, it could be something punitive so we can 'learn our lessons.' Isn't that how most human parents operate? Don't we unconsciously model our ideas of God after our human notions of authority?
So this quote can be hard to take in. We may hear it, but gloss over it. God's Will is ONE, not many. IT HAS NO OPPOSITION, because there isn't anything else. Only God. We live and move and have our being IN THIS ONENESS. So logically there isn't my will and then God's Will imposed on me from without. There is only God, only God's Will, appearing AS me, and AS you. That we have convinced ourselves and each other that we are separate bodies and lives is irrelevant, because it's not true.
This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from the movie "The Matrix." A little psychic boy is bending spoons with his mind, and offers Keanu Reeves' character the chance to try it. He isn't having much luck, and the little boy simply says, "Don't try and bend the spoon. Know that there is no spoon." And then of course, the spoon bends.
Joel Goldsmith told a similar story. He was traveling and arrived at his destination only to hear that his luggage had been lost. He spent the next couple of days practicing scientific prayer, knowing that what belonged to him could never be lost, etc. But his luggage did not show up. Finally in meditation the answer came to him... there was no lost luggage! There are no opposites or oppositions in all God's Kingdom, there is only God! Of course, his luggage then 'showed up' unexpectedly.
Jesus taught us this Truth when he said, "Seek ye first the Kingdom (the Oneness of God) and all else will be added unto you." We just have it upside down and backwards, thinking that cause and effect lie within the world, in our actions and reactions, or even in our thoughts. If there is no Will but God's, it also holds that there are no real Thoughts but God's. Everything else is the dreaming of the mind that imagines itself to be separate. And no matter what we imagine in our dreaming, we remain safe in God, eternally.
There is great peace in this awareness. "Peace has replaced the strange idea that you are torn by conflicting goals. As an expression of the Will of God, you have no goal but His." (ACIM; Workbook 74, 1:5-6) We don't have to struggle humanly to figure it all out. God's Will is always Love, Goodness, Happiness, Peace, Abundance, Joy, and endless Life. And as we trust God with each holy instant of our lives, we are led by Grace.
"He leadeth me in paths of righteousness, for His Name's sake." -- Psalm 23
"Today I will recognize that all this has not occurred. I am safe because there is no will but God's." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 87, 3:5-6
Saturday, July 10, 2010
The Two Selves
In working with clients and with prayer requests (and with my own life) I have observed a persistent phenomenon that I will call the two selves. This seems to be the delusion that all who walk the earth share. We believe (and have a lot of sensory evidence to validate this belief) that we are human, weak, lacking, and subject to suffering. At the same time, we believe we have infinite potential, that we are created in the image of the Divine. So we all have a kind of split personality... there's the imaginary historical self that thinks we're a product of heredity and hierarchy and environment, that sees flaws in ourselves and every other living thing, that judges, criticizes, and condemns. And there's the quiet true Self that loves and blesses, that takes joy in life, that gives of itself naturally and freely, that knows wholeness and freedom and love are all words for the same thing.
If you were suffering from multiple personalities, a good therapist would find a way to help you become unified again... because a house divided against itself cannot stand. So spiritually, our task in healing and awakening is always a return to unified consciousness, to Oneness. This is enlightenment... the realization that we are not two selves.
To say we're created in the image of God is to perpetuate this split. To say that we're a shadow, an image, a mere potential, is to put our becoming into the future, into perpetual process. And where's the peace in that? Where is the being? If we are endlessly processing and becoming, we must still be incomplete, lacking in some way, still subject to suffering and failure. This is the set-up we're born into. It's a lose/lose proposition, and always has been.
There is good news. We are not created in the image of a god... a mere shadowy image of some nebulous force that all are subject to. We are living and moving and having our being in God, reflecting God, and nothing else. Not a nebulous force that bosses us around, but the very Ground of our Being, and Source and Substance of Self. There isn't anything but God.
And what is God, my skeptical readers will ask? GOD IS AN IDEA we share about the Source of all that is. We can have false thoughts about this Source, but Source ItSelf can't be false. We can have incorrect understanding of multiplication. We might think that we can multiply ten thousand times a zero and still have ten thousand. But the principle, the idea of multiplying anything with zero remains the same... it's always zero, no matter how you try to make it something else. And anything multiplied by one always remains the same, remains itself. Ideas are principles, and they are unchanging and true. Thoughts are stories about ideas, they involve judgment, and can often be false, or at least only relative (two-sided, not unified).
Webster defines idea as "a transcendent entity that is a real pattern, of which existing things are imperfect representations." Thought is defined as "the action or process of thinking, or something that is thought." So we can say, as did Mary Baker Eddy, that GOD IS PRINCIPLE... the Idea that is the Ground of All Being, in Truth and in Love. A Course in Miracles tells us that "God is Idea" and "Ideas leave not their Source." When we allow this transcendent Idea to take root, we realize that we cannot and have never left our Source. We remain rooted and grounded in God. And then our thoughts, our judgments and stories about the world begin to reflect the Truth of Being, rather than the weak and imperfect (and insubstantial!) image of self our stories have perpetuated up until now.
We are not two selves. This is the root of all our struggles. No matter how we attempt to prove that our weak and human image of self is real, it's still multiplying by zero. So take some time listen to the Real, the True, the God-Self that we all share. It is very quiet, because It doesn't need to defend ItSelf, being wholly true and forever our Reality. Thank God!
If you were suffering from multiple personalities, a good therapist would find a way to help you become unified again... because a house divided against itself cannot stand. So spiritually, our task in healing and awakening is always a return to unified consciousness, to Oneness. This is enlightenment... the realization that we are not two selves.
To say we're created in the image of God is to perpetuate this split. To say that we're a shadow, an image, a mere potential, is to put our becoming into the future, into perpetual process. And where's the peace in that? Where is the being? If we are endlessly processing and becoming, we must still be incomplete, lacking in some way, still subject to suffering and failure. This is the set-up we're born into. It's a lose/lose proposition, and always has been.
There is good news. We are not created in the image of a god... a mere shadowy image of some nebulous force that all are subject to. We are living and moving and having our being in God, reflecting God, and nothing else. Not a nebulous force that bosses us around, but the very Ground of our Being, and Source and Substance of Self. There isn't anything but God.
And what is God, my skeptical readers will ask? GOD IS AN IDEA we share about the Source of all that is. We can have false thoughts about this Source, but Source ItSelf can't be false. We can have incorrect understanding of multiplication. We might think that we can multiply ten thousand times a zero and still have ten thousand. But the principle, the idea of multiplying anything with zero remains the same... it's always zero, no matter how you try to make it something else. And anything multiplied by one always remains the same, remains itself. Ideas are principles, and they are unchanging and true. Thoughts are stories about ideas, they involve judgment, and can often be false, or at least only relative (two-sided, not unified).
Webster defines idea as "a transcendent entity that is a real pattern, of which existing things are imperfect representations." Thought is defined as "the action or process of thinking, or something that is thought." So we can say, as did Mary Baker Eddy, that GOD IS PRINCIPLE... the Idea that is the Ground of All Being, in Truth and in Love. A Course in Miracles tells us that "God is Idea" and "Ideas leave not their Source." When we allow this transcendent Idea to take root, we realize that we cannot and have never left our Source. We remain rooted and grounded in God. And then our thoughts, our judgments and stories about the world begin to reflect the Truth of Being, rather than the weak and imperfect (and insubstantial!) image of self our stories have perpetuated up until now.
We are not two selves. This is the root of all our struggles. No matter how we attempt to prove that our weak and human image of self is real, it's still multiplying by zero. So take some time listen to the Real, the True, the God-Self that we all share. It is very quiet, because It doesn't need to defend ItSelf, being wholly true and forever our Reality. Thank God!
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Repeat the Sounding Joy!
"Metaphysics is above physics, and matter does not enter into metaphysical premises or conclusions. The categories of metaphysics rest on one basis, the Divine Mind. Metaphysics resolves things into thoughts, and exchanges the objects of sense for the ideas of Soul." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 269, Lines 11-15
"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
Joy to the World! It's the time of year that we hear that phrase (and the word joy) a lot. To most people, though, it seems like just a word. Ask yourself, what is joy? Don't most of us think about personal gratification, about getting something we want? We think of enjoyment, good consumers that we are. But joy is a metaphysical reality, and has nothing to do with physical enjoyment or gratification. Joy is pure BEING... or to quote Paramahansa Yogananda, "God is ever-new Joy." So Joy is an attribute of God, and of our Being as we reflect our Source.
I lost a beloved canine companion this week... Claire, my soul-friend for nearly 15 years (http://www.clairefoundation.ws/). As her transition drew near, the cats and other dogs would check on her frequently, and lay quietly nearby. I noticed that the sadness I felt at seeming to lose her was transformed shortly before she passed. The very air felt lighter and freer. The Divine Idea that Claire IS had expanded and was free... and I could FEEL the joy she felt, that she feels. The Christmas Carol sings: "While fields and floods, rocks, hills, and plains repeat the sounding joy, repeat the sounding joy, repeat, repeat the sounding joy!" That's what it felt like... that all of creation was a little lighter, a little brighter, through her passing. The joy of remembering Who We Are... and the Christ is born again.
Thank God for all of creation, to remind us... the rocks and hills and plains, the animals, and each other... repeat the sounding Joy!
"God's Will for you is perfect happiness, because there is no sin, and suffering is causeless. Joy is just, and pain is but the sign you have misunderstood yourself." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 101, 6:1-2
"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
Joy to the World! It's the time of year that we hear that phrase (and the word joy) a lot. To most people, though, it seems like just a word. Ask yourself, what is joy? Don't most of us think about personal gratification, about getting something we want? We think of enjoyment, good consumers that we are. But joy is a metaphysical reality, and has nothing to do with physical enjoyment or gratification. Joy is pure BEING... or to quote Paramahansa Yogananda, "God is ever-new Joy." So Joy is an attribute of God, and of our Being as we reflect our Source.
I lost a beloved canine companion this week... Claire, my soul-friend for nearly 15 years (http://www.clairefoundation.ws/). As her transition drew near, the cats and other dogs would check on her frequently, and lay quietly nearby. I noticed that the sadness I felt at seeming to lose her was transformed shortly before she passed. The very air felt lighter and freer. The Divine Idea that Claire IS had expanded and was free... and I could FEEL the joy she felt, that she feels. The Christmas Carol sings: "While fields and floods, rocks, hills, and plains repeat the sounding joy, repeat the sounding joy, repeat, repeat the sounding joy!" That's what it felt like... that all of creation was a little lighter, a little brighter, through her passing. The joy of remembering Who We Are... and the Christ is born again.
Thank God for all of creation, to remind us... the rocks and hills and plains, the animals, and each other... repeat the sounding Joy!
"God's Will for you is perfect happiness, because there is no sin, and suffering is causeless. Joy is just, and pain is but the sign you have misunderstood yourself." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 101, 6:1-2
Thursday, September 24, 2009
A Way of Being
"Quantum systems imply that undivided wholeness is not only the content, but also the manner of working." -- Physicist David Bohm
This is the longest I've gone without posting on this blog, so apologies to those of my readers who have contacted me out of love and concern. I've been consumed with writing and editing, preparing a manuscript for publication. This has me thinking about the principle of wholeness, an attribute of God. It's very true that as I edit, even when I'm working with specific words or parts or sections, I'm really working with the idea of the whole. Good editing can only happen within this awareness of wholeness. It's really a way of being.
When I cook I experience the same thing. There is a field of awareness of the dish I'm making, and within that awareness there are individual things to do, ingredients to add, substitutions to be made. But it's all done within the awareness of the dish I'm creating... the manner of working is with the wholeness of the end result as the field of awareness in which everything else takes place. This is not done in a linear, control manner... the dish, the book, whatever is being created is not defined or limited in any way. It may look or taste completely different than I initially conceived it. But the wholeness of the divine idea emerges in its completeness. The form is irrelevant. It's the content that is eternally whole.
Wholeness is a manner of working, a way of being. A Course in Miracles says, "You can't have what you're not willing to be." If we return in awareness to the completeness of being that we are in God, then we have and are everything. We can lack nothing. We can't lack initiative. We can't lack inspiration. We can't lack ability. We can't lack opportunity. We can't lack fulfillment. We can't lack knowledge. We can't lack support. We can't have screwed it up. All of the areas in which we may have seen ourselves lacking are impossible... we live and move and have our being in God, in Wholeness ItSelf. We are God's Son, and we are eternally whole, as God Is One and Whole and unchanging. We are whole and beloved and provided for out of the fullness of God's Being every moment of every day.
Every perception of lack is also a manner of working and a way of being, even though it's ultimately not true. We can conceive ourselves to be lacking, and then experience it as being wholly true. Just as we can lose ourselves in a good book or good movie... and when we wake up, or simply return to the awareness of the room around us, we find we had experienced the drama as if it were true. But we know that it's not. In the same way, when we return to awareness of Self, in God, we find that we have simply been having an experience of lack based on a mere concept of self, a mere thought form... an illusion.
Awareness of God and of Self is not a concept... it's the Way of All Being, an unconditioned awareness without thought or concept. It is the Ground of All Being, and is what we are and what we know when all thoughts and concepts are forgiven and released. It's Home.
"Remember always that you cannot be anywhere except in the Mind of God." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 9, Section VIII, 5:3
This is the longest I've gone without posting on this blog, so apologies to those of my readers who have contacted me out of love and concern. I've been consumed with writing and editing, preparing a manuscript for publication. This has me thinking about the principle of wholeness, an attribute of God. It's very true that as I edit, even when I'm working with specific words or parts or sections, I'm really working with the idea of the whole. Good editing can only happen within this awareness of wholeness. It's really a way of being.
When I cook I experience the same thing. There is a field of awareness of the dish I'm making, and within that awareness there are individual things to do, ingredients to add, substitutions to be made. But it's all done within the awareness of the dish I'm creating... the manner of working is with the wholeness of the end result as the field of awareness in which everything else takes place. This is not done in a linear, control manner... the dish, the book, whatever is being created is not defined or limited in any way. It may look or taste completely different than I initially conceived it. But the wholeness of the divine idea emerges in its completeness. The form is irrelevant. It's the content that is eternally whole.
Wholeness is a manner of working, a way of being. A Course in Miracles says, "You can't have what you're not willing to be." If we return in awareness to the completeness of being that we are in God, then we have and are everything. We can lack nothing. We can't lack initiative. We can't lack inspiration. We can't lack ability. We can't lack opportunity. We can't lack fulfillment. We can't lack knowledge. We can't lack support. We can't have screwed it up. All of the areas in which we may have seen ourselves lacking are impossible... we live and move and have our being in God, in Wholeness ItSelf. We are God's Son, and we are eternally whole, as God Is One and Whole and unchanging. We are whole and beloved and provided for out of the fullness of God's Being every moment of every day.
Every perception of lack is also a manner of working and a way of being, even though it's ultimately not true. We can conceive ourselves to be lacking, and then experience it as being wholly true. Just as we can lose ourselves in a good book or good movie... and when we wake up, or simply return to the awareness of the room around us, we find we had experienced the drama as if it were true. But we know that it's not. In the same way, when we return to awareness of Self, in God, we find that we have simply been having an experience of lack based on a mere concept of self, a mere thought form... an illusion.
Awareness of God and of Self is not a concept... it's the Way of All Being, an unconditioned awareness without thought or concept. It is the Ground of All Being, and is what we are and what we know when all thoughts and concepts are forgiven and released. It's Home.
"Remember always that you cannot be anywhere except in the Mind of God." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 9, Section VIII, 5:3
Friday, July 17, 2009
Breaking the Shell
"If you want the kernel you must break the shell." -- Meister Eckhardt
We don't much like to talk about what's uncomfortable in our lives. Or if we do like to complain about it, it's to project it outward and blame it on others. It usually never occurs to us that these uncomfortable places are the shells that hide the Truth in us. And we certainly don't want to admit that these shells are our own creations, or that our greatest fear is the loss of them.
Sometimes we call these shells identities. Sometimes we call them stories. Sometimes we call them viewpoints, or perspectives. Usually we call it all ego. But we never, ever take full responsibility for it. We'll grasp for other opinions and viewpoints, look for other ways to talk about it and escape our discomfort... but we don't really want to break the shells. We don't really want to change. We don't really want to know the Truth.
Accepting our own attachment to the shell we call self is one of the final steps in Awakening. To really see the depth of our own compulsion to identify with a fiction and cling to it... this is the cracking of the shell. Often a dark night of the soul can follow this, which is simply a last-ditch effort to remain identified with what isn't real, to continue to pretend to be finite and lacking, or lost and misunderstood. It's all made up. There is no self that has ever been separate or lost. There is no sinner, no victim. Ever. And the ocean of infinite Awareness that is revealed as the shell breaks open is the Allness of God, Truth ItSelf. What is revealed is our very own Self... eternal, perfect, and forever free.
So if you find yourself telling the same stories with different trappings, engaging the same types of people with different names or faces, having the same experiences with different surroundings, it's simply because it's your fiction, your creation... it's the projection and reflection of your ego identity, your shell. Who you think you are is reflected in your projected experiences. This may be experienced as good, or it may be painful. There isn't any difference. Because if you think you are anything less than One with God, if you are identifying yourself as needing to be or become anything other than Self, then you are simply fantasizing and building a harder shell and defending against the Truth of Being. And that is always, and will always be, uncomfortable.
So the uncomfortable places, the things and people we avoid, the fears of loss or lack or abandonment we run from, the changes we refuse to make, the relationships we cling to, the truth we avoid telling... these are our own ego-tools for self-enhancement, the illusory substance of our fictional shell-selves. They are the defenses we use to keep spinning, spinning, spinning in the shell without becoming aware of it. Because once we become aware of the depth of our own self-deception, the imaginary shell simply vanishes.
"The choice you fear to lose you never had." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 27, Section III, 7:4
We don't much like to talk about what's uncomfortable in our lives. Or if we do like to complain about it, it's to project it outward and blame it on others. It usually never occurs to us that these uncomfortable places are the shells that hide the Truth in us. And we certainly don't want to admit that these shells are our own creations, or that our greatest fear is the loss of them.
Sometimes we call these shells identities. Sometimes we call them stories. Sometimes we call them viewpoints, or perspectives. Usually we call it all ego. But we never, ever take full responsibility for it. We'll grasp for other opinions and viewpoints, look for other ways to talk about it and escape our discomfort... but we don't really want to break the shells. We don't really want to change. We don't really want to know the Truth.
Accepting our own attachment to the shell we call self is one of the final steps in Awakening. To really see the depth of our own compulsion to identify with a fiction and cling to it... this is the cracking of the shell. Often a dark night of the soul can follow this, which is simply a last-ditch effort to remain identified with what isn't real, to continue to pretend to be finite and lacking, or lost and misunderstood. It's all made up. There is no self that has ever been separate or lost. There is no sinner, no victim. Ever. And the ocean of infinite Awareness that is revealed as the shell breaks open is the Allness of God, Truth ItSelf. What is revealed is our very own Self... eternal, perfect, and forever free.
So if you find yourself telling the same stories with different trappings, engaging the same types of people with different names or faces, having the same experiences with different surroundings, it's simply because it's your fiction, your creation... it's the projection and reflection of your ego identity, your shell. Who you think you are is reflected in your projected experiences. This may be experienced as good, or it may be painful. There isn't any difference. Because if you think you are anything less than One with God, if you are identifying yourself as needing to be or become anything other than Self, then you are simply fantasizing and building a harder shell and defending against the Truth of Being. And that is always, and will always be, uncomfortable.
So the uncomfortable places, the things and people we avoid, the fears of loss or lack or abandonment we run from, the changes we refuse to make, the relationships we cling to, the truth we avoid telling... these are our own ego-tools for self-enhancement, the illusory substance of our fictional shell-selves. They are the defenses we use to keep spinning, spinning, spinning in the shell without becoming aware of it. Because once we become aware of the depth of our own self-deception, the imaginary shell simply vanishes.
"The choice you fear to lose you never had." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 27, Section III, 7:4
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Constant Comfort
"The miracle establishes you dream a dream, and that its content is not true. This is a crucial step in dealing with illusions. No one is afraid of them when he perceives he made them up." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 28, Section II, 7:1-3
"The world is full of miracles. They stand in shining silence next to every dream of pain and suffering, of sin and guilt. They are the dream's alternative, the choice to be the dreamer, rather than deny the active role in making up the dream. Beginning here, salvation will proceed to change the course of every step in the descent to separation, until all the steps have been retraced, the ladder gone, and all the dreaming of the world undone." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 28, Section II, 12:1-3, 7
When I was very small, comfort was hanging out under the trees, or in the barn with the animals. There was no pressure to be or do anything there... just the constant comfort of natural rhythms and living in the moment. Now I realize that the comfort I experienced was the miracle of the holy instant... a glimpse of reality that is always available to us. Miracles show us the constant comfort of reality behind every appearance.
What we consider our normal, everyday perceptions and activities are the dreams we choose to immerse ourselves in, to absorb our attention so completely that we aren't aware of our true Self. It's like immersing yourself in a good book, a good story (or a scary one); you become so involved you're no longer conscious or aware of who or where you really are. It's interesting, isn't it, that we live in a world that so values the ability to lose oneself in a book or a movie? Dreams beget dreams... worlds within worlds...
There is constant comfort in knowing that none of it is true. There is constant comfort in resting in what IS. There is constant comfort in knowing Who We Are: "You are One Self, united and secure in light and joy and peace. You are God's Son, One Self, with One Creator and one goal; to bring awareness of this Oneness to all minds." (ACIM; Workbook Lesson 95, 12:1-2) To remember this, and to make it primary in our lives... this IS the miracle. And it extends beyond our imagining.
"You are One Self, and it is given you to feel this Self within you, and to cast all your illusions out of the One Mind that is this Self, the holy Truth in you." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 95, 13:3
"The world is full of miracles. They stand in shining silence next to every dream of pain and suffering, of sin and guilt. They are the dream's alternative, the choice to be the dreamer, rather than deny the active role in making up the dream. Beginning here, salvation will proceed to change the course of every step in the descent to separation, until all the steps have been retraced, the ladder gone, and all the dreaming of the world undone." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 28, Section II, 12:1-3, 7
When I was very small, comfort was hanging out under the trees, or in the barn with the animals. There was no pressure to be or do anything there... just the constant comfort of natural rhythms and living in the moment. Now I realize that the comfort I experienced was the miracle of the holy instant... a glimpse of reality that is always available to us. Miracles show us the constant comfort of reality behind every appearance.
What we consider our normal, everyday perceptions and activities are the dreams we choose to immerse ourselves in, to absorb our attention so completely that we aren't aware of our true Self. It's like immersing yourself in a good book, a good story (or a scary one); you become so involved you're no longer conscious or aware of who or where you really are. It's interesting, isn't it, that we live in a world that so values the ability to lose oneself in a book or a movie? Dreams beget dreams... worlds within worlds...
There is constant comfort in knowing that none of it is true. There is constant comfort in resting in what IS. There is constant comfort in knowing Who We Are: "You are One Self, united and secure in light and joy and peace. You are God's Son, One Self, with One Creator and one goal; to bring awareness of this Oneness to all minds." (ACIM; Workbook Lesson 95, 12:1-2) To remember this, and to make it primary in our lives... this IS the miracle. And it extends beyond our imagining.
"You are One Self, and it is given you to feel this Self within you, and to cast all your illusions out of the One Mind that is this Self, the holy Truth in you." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 95, 13:3
Saturday, April 25, 2009
One Forever
"The separation [from God] is merely a faulty formulation of reality, with no effect at all. This is the miracle of creation; that it is One forever. Every miracle you offer to the Son of God is but the true perception of one aspect of the whole. Though every aspect is the whole, you cannot know this until you see that every aspect is the same, perceived in the same light and therefore One." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 13, Section VIII, 3:5 & 5:1-3
"Man is tributary to God, Spirit, and to nothing else. God's Being is infinity, freedom, harmony, and boundless bliss." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 481, Lines 2-4
"Man is tributary to God, Spirit, and to nothing else. God's Being is infinity, freedom, harmony, and boundless bliss." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 481, Lines 2-4
The thought that anything unlike God, unlike Good, unlike Love, is simply an aberrant formulation of reality... this seems unlikely, an unrealistic and idealistic philosophy at best. Our practical, worldly selves base our judgements on experience and the views of other wiser people and their experience. We base our judgements on numbers, too... we love statistics as 'evidence.' What we don't take into account is that numbers are neutral... they are simply another mental construct to attempt to quantify reality. And they are only 'evidence' for what we already believe to be true. This is why statistics are used to justify both sides of pretty much every issue at one time or another. What we fail to realize is that Reality, what is True, cannot be quantified. What is One cannot be divided, cannot be compared, cannot be opposed. It is One forever.
We think that we experience what is already manifest. So we're always trying to judge and quantify the manifest world. But A Course in Miracles reminds us, "What I experience I will make manifest." The world that appears to be outside is simply the reflection of our own consciousness, our own inner experience. It is the fragmented perception of the Son of God, where what is One appears to be many... where what is forever whole and harmonious and loving appears to be divided and at war with itself.
Our Reality is One forever. We are collectively One Self, and reflect One Being which we call God. We are emanations, reflections of all that is Good. We can have no qualities but those of our Source. And so we come to question the 'rational' self, with its hidden agendas and skewed perceptions... and all it takes is a truly questioning mind to begin to glimpse Reality. Self-inquiry is the key to moving beyond the false perceptions of the human mind. Self-inquiry makes it possible for us to forgive, to really let our false perceptions go, and welcome the miracle of true perception in every circumstance, with every person.
Our Reality is One forever. But we can't know that until we see that every single aspect, every single person, every single situation as the same. The miracle of forgiveness returns our healed perception to this sameness... the awareness that God is All-Inclusive, and Everywhere. There is nothing else.
"You cannot enter into real relationships with any of God's Sons unless you love them all and equally. Love is not special. You can only love as God loves." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 13, Section X, 11:1-2 & 4
Friday, January 16, 2009
Multiplying Nothing
"There is no more self-contradictory concept than that of "idle thoughts." What gives rise to the perception of a whole world can hardly be called idle. 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 Lesson 16, 2:1-4
"Light is a symbol of Mind, of Life, Truth, and Love, and not a vitalizing property of matter." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 510, Lines 27-28
The above quotes are so mind-boggling. Today is my 58th birthday... talk about multiplying nothing! We multiply years and seasons, and call it age and wisdom. But we're really only weaving stories around an illusion of self. All Life is eternal, and knows no age or limitation. All Wisdom is an eternal aspect of Mind, without beginning or end. And this Mind is the Source and Substance of our mind. Of course, we can only know this when we're in our right mind So let's shed Light on this, shall we? Since Light is also an eternal, unchanging aspect of Mind, and has nothing to do with the physical.
A Course in Miracles speaks of this as two ways of thinking. Only one is actually happening, so this is tricky. How do you talk about illusory experiences without making them real? "Thoughts can represent the lower or bodily level of experience, or the higher or spiritual level of experience. One makes the physical, and the other creates the spiritual." (ACIM; Chapter 1, Section I, 12:2-3) Notice that the illusory, lower-level thoughts are made... while the real, spiritual thoughts are created.
We can make up stories, and we all enjoy doing this. But nothing has really happened. We didn't really create anything. It seems there is no harm done unless we start confusing what we've made with what is Real. But there are no idle thoughts. When we make up stories or believe other people's stories, we're lost in the dream, lost in what ACIM calls wrong-mindedness. Right-mindedness doesn't involve making up more stories. It involves allowing what IS to extend through us. What is True is already effortlessly present. What IS radiates and extends naturally and effortlessly, when we forgive and release our wrong-minded stories. This is the experience of the miracle, the shift from false perception to Awareness of the True and Real, even in the midst of the dream we call life.
It takes great courage to want to wake up from our stories. There is absolutely no support for this within the dream we call life, since everyone has a vested interest in the stories they're living. And there is absolutely no support for it within our own story, since our own ego has a vested interest in the survival of its stories. But through Grace, the Truth is true and nothing else is true. Through Grace, stories come and go. Through Grace, we can make lots of stories, but not one of them is created, and so they are not true, and so they will not last. Even if we resist this Awakening as hard as we can, we inevitably come face to face with the Truth of Who We Are. Nothing else even exists. Sooner or later everyone wakes up.
So there are no idle thoughts. We can hasten our own Awakening (as ACIM dryly puts it, since you believe in time, why waste it?) by remembering this, and forgiving and releasing our thoughts and stories of a material world and separate bodies. This allows the True thoughts that continually extend, radiating from the Mind of God, to shine in and through us. And even though that seems like a really hard thing, the really good news is that we can multiply nothing... zero to the zero power... and we can keep doing this over and over, and be fascinated by the results. But nothing has ever happened... and we remain safe in the Mind of God, where we have always been. Thank God.
"The Thought God holds of you is like a star, unchangeable in an eternal sky." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 30, Section III, 8:4
"Light is a symbol of Mind, of Life, Truth, and Love, and not a vitalizing property of matter." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 510, Lines 27-28
The above quotes are so mind-boggling. Today is my 58th birthday... talk about multiplying nothing! We multiply years and seasons, and call it age and wisdom. But we're really only weaving stories around an illusion of self. All Life is eternal, and knows no age or limitation. All Wisdom is an eternal aspect of Mind, without beginning or end. And this Mind is the Source and Substance of our mind. Of course, we can only know this when we're in our right mind So let's shed Light on this, shall we? Since Light is also an eternal, unchanging aspect of Mind, and has nothing to do with the physical.
A Course in Miracles speaks of this as two ways of thinking. Only one is actually happening, so this is tricky. How do you talk about illusory experiences without making them real? "Thoughts can represent the lower or bodily level of experience, or the higher or spiritual level of experience. One makes the physical, and the other creates the spiritual." (ACIM; Chapter 1, Section I, 12:2-3) Notice that the illusory, lower-level thoughts are made... while the real, spiritual thoughts are created.
We can make up stories, and we all enjoy doing this. But nothing has really happened. We didn't really create anything. It seems there is no harm done unless we start confusing what we've made with what is Real. But there are no idle thoughts. When we make up stories or believe other people's stories, we're lost in the dream, lost in what ACIM calls wrong-mindedness. Right-mindedness doesn't involve making up more stories. It involves allowing what IS to extend through us. What is True is already effortlessly present. What IS radiates and extends naturally and effortlessly, when we forgive and release our wrong-minded stories. This is the experience of the miracle, the shift from false perception to Awareness of the True and Real, even in the midst of the dream we call life.
It takes great courage to want to wake up from our stories. There is absolutely no support for this within the dream we call life, since everyone has a vested interest in the stories they're living. And there is absolutely no support for it within our own story, since our own ego has a vested interest in the survival of its stories. But through Grace, the Truth is true and nothing else is true. Through Grace, stories come and go. Through Grace, we can make lots of stories, but not one of them is created, and so they are not true, and so they will not last. Even if we resist this Awakening as hard as we can, we inevitably come face to face with the Truth of Who We Are. Nothing else even exists. Sooner or later everyone wakes up.
So there are no idle thoughts. We can hasten our own Awakening (as ACIM dryly puts it, since you believe in time, why waste it?) by remembering this, and forgiving and releasing our thoughts and stories of a material world and separate bodies. This allows the True thoughts that continually extend, radiating from the Mind of God, to shine in and through us. And even though that seems like a really hard thing, the really good news is that we can multiply nothing... zero to the zero power... and we can keep doing this over and over, and be fascinated by the results. But nothing has ever happened... and we remain safe in the Mind of God, where we have always been. Thank God.
"The Thought God holds of you is like a star, unchangeable in an eternal sky." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 30, Section III, 8:4
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