Do Not Reconsider

"In everything be led by Him, and do not reconsider.  Trust Him to answer quickly, surely, and with Love for everyone who will be touched in any way by the decision.  And everyone will be.  Would you take unto yourself the sole responsibility for deciding what can bring only good to everyone?  Would you know this?" -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 14, Section III, 17:4-8

A friend asked why, when forgiveness is practiced, it sometimes seems to not be working... in other words, why there is still no peace with the situation, or why there is still fear, etc. The answer lies in the passage above... "In everything be led by Him, and do not reconsider."  All of us have the experience of going through the motions of forgiveness, of completely giving over the situation to Holy Spirit, and then continuing to think about it and what we will do.  This is reconsidering. 

This habit of reconsidering is so ingrained that it's easy to forget that you are choosing to do it.  Like all habits, it is a choice that has been relegated to the subconscious so it's automatic.  But like all choices, it can be brought to awareness, so you can change your mind.  It simply involves the choice to stay present with your own mind.

"You do not guard your thoughts carefully enough.  You are not used to miracle-minded thinking, but you can be trained to think that way.  All miracle workers need that kind of training.  Miracle working entails a full realization of the power of thought in order to avoid miscreation.  The miracle worker must have genuine respect for true cause and effect as a necessary condition for the miracle to occur." -- ACIM; Chapter 2, Section VII

Open your mind and heart to the Holy Spirit, the part of your Self that has never gone unconscious.  Give everything over to the Holy Spirit, which is your very own sane Christ Mind.  Let this Presence of pure Divine Love decide for you.  Let this Divine Love care for you.  Let this Divine Love take care of all the details.  And because it is your true Self, you will always know if there are actions to take or words to be spoken.  You can absolutely trust this Self, which is all-loving because it is pure Love.  This Love is You, the Holy Son of God. 

Reconsidering is a deliberate decision to forget Who You Are, in an attempt to maintain autonomy, to stay separate.   Never doubt the power of your own holy mind to choose... and it is really good at hiding.  When the Son of God chooses to hide, he convinces even himself that he is lost.  It reminds me of small children when they first learn to cover their face and play peek-a-boo.  When their face is covered, they are convinced no one can see them either!  Such is the power of the mind!

Only when we insist on reconsidering can we not experience the ever-present Peace and Joy forgiveness reveals.  Which really means we have still not made the decision to stop hiding.  Our Reality remains ever-present, simply awaiting our decision to Awaken.

"This is the only thing that you need do for vision, happiness, release from pain, and the complete escape from sin, all to be given you.  Say only this, but mean it with no reservations, for here the power of salvation lies:
          I am responsible for what I see.
          I choose the feelings I experience, and I decide
              upon the goal I would achieve.
         And everything that seems to happen to me
              I ask for, and receive as I have asked.
Deceive yourself no longer that you are helpless in the face of what is done to you.  Acknowledge but that you have been mistaken, and all the effects of your mistakes will disappear." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 23, Section II, 2:1-7

Misplaced Trust

"Your faith is placed in the most trivial and insane symbols... influence, prestige, being liked, knowing the 'right' people, and an endless list of forms of nothingness that you endow with magical powers.  All these things are your replacement for the Love of God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 50

It's pretty appalling to realize that every interaction I have in my daily life has some element of misplaced trust.  At the same time, it's very liberating to realize that because I am actually seeing this, I am able to withdraw my investment in what perpetuates the insanity.  In every situation, I have the opportunity to empty myself of assumptions, and listen to the Inner Teacher.  In every situation, I have the opportunity to be a transparency for the Voice of God, the Holy Spirit.  In every situation, I can trust in what is True and Eternal.  In all things, I can trust Love to move through me and all concerned, whenever I cease to trust in the judgements I have made, the illusory mental constructs of the world.

"The real basis for doubt about the outcome of any problem that has been given to God's Teacher for resolution is always self-doubt.  And that necessarily implies that trust has been placed in an illusory self, for only such a self can be doubted." -- ACIM Manual for Teachers, 7:5:1-2

When trust is placed in an identity (my own perceived self, or the perceived self of another) I have denied the Real Self, which lives and moves and has Its Being in God, Divine Love.  One Self, wholly undivided and wholly Trustworthy.  The Love of God is tangible and ever-present.  It surrounds us and holds us, fills us and leads us, empowers us and gives us endless joy.  We can truly trust the Love of God in all things and in all ways, because it is the Reality of all that is. 

"Put all your faith in the Love of God within you; eternal, changeless and forever unfailing.  This is the answer to whatever confronts you." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 50

The Will to Awaken

"The real world is the state of mind in which the only purpose of the world is seen to be forgiveness.  No rules are idly set, and no demands are made of anyone or anything to twist and fit into the dream of fear.  Instead, there is a wish to understand all things created as they really are.  And it is recognized that all things must first be forgiven, and then understood." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 30, Section V, 1:1 & 4-6

I've been thinking a lot this year about the seeming process of awakening, and the shedding of the false self that is required.  As St. Paul put it, "I die daily" so that "I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me."  This beautiful thought is beloved in Christianity, but is also largely revered as a poetic and idealistic sentiment, not as a literal process that requires our willingness.  Even those charismatic Christians who see it as literal still hang on to the notion of a little self that is saved by the God/Man, Jesus Christ.  They don't see that this simply perpetuates their false view of themselves as separate from God, weaker and imperfect. 

And whose will was it that these imperfect creatures exist?  Certainly not God, Who creates all things in His Holy Mind and so eternally extends HimSelf.  The Spirit of God did not and could not create imperfection.  How could the imperfect exist in the absolute harmony and perfection of God, the eternally One and Whole?  So what seems imperfect must be an imperfect perception only, a false sense of what eternally IS.  

The will to awaken is the willingness to constantly release each and every perception that arises, and give it to the part of our mind that remains aware of our eternal Oneness with God... the Holy Spirit.  This is what forgiveness is... and this is the process of Atonement, the interlocking chain of forgiveness that results in the Awakening of the One Son of God, even within the dream separation.

So what is the will to awaken?  And why do so very few seem to have it?  ACIM tells us that "The Call is universal.  It goes on all the time everywhere.  Many hear it, but few will answer.  Everyone will answer in the end, but the end can [seem] a long, long way off." -- (ACIM; Manual for Teachers 1.2:4-5 & 7-9)  In other words, we have a vested interest still in the dream.  After all, it's our dream... and we continue to question how these very beautiful and desirable parts could need our forgiveness and release.  Can't we just forgive all the bad stuff and keep these parts we like, the parts that we're comfortable with, the parts that speak to us of tradition and continuity within the dream?

Our teacher and guide is uncompromising.  Jeshua said, "A man must lose his life in order to save it."  Yikes.  This is not what our egos want to hear. 

How do we find the will to awaken?  How do we release the mental resistance that flails about and questions our very sanity?  I'd like to tell you there's an easy way through this passage, but the Truth is that the only way out is through.  You will pass through this fire, and you will not be burned. 

On the other side of all seeming turmoil is the perfect peace of realizing that there never was a problem... we have always been right here, safe in God.  On this side, we simply keep giving our perceptions to the Holy Spirit and following the directions of the Voice within.  This perfect trust will be reinforced as we are willing to follow the Holy Spirit's Voice instead of our own fearful imaginings.  Forgive and follow the Voice.  Forgive and follow the Voice.  This is the will to awaken.

"A major hindrance in this aspect of learning is the teacher of God's fear about the validity of what he hears.  And what he hears may indeed be quite startling.  It may also seem to be quite irrelevant to the presented problem as he perceives it, and may in fact confront the teacher with a situation that appears to be very embarrassing to him.  All these are judgments that have no value.  They are his own, coming from a shabby self-perception which he would leave behind." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 21. 5:1-5

The Willingness to Give

"To have all, give all, to all." -- A Course in Miracles

"Supply is infinite, but there must be receptivity.  We can have all the supply we will give.  But that is where the barrier is... we must have the willingness to give.  That is where the lack and limitation is." -- Joel Goldsmith

The issue of supply, of income, is a very popular topic for all of us, and for the media.  There seems to be a lack of supply for a lot of us at any given moment.  So the question that arises is this:  how can there be a lack of anything in what is infinite and ever-present and ONE?  This apparent conflict is the age-old struggle of the illusory separate self to maintain its apparent existence through fear and self-created lack.  This illusion can be illustrated by the following story:

A little boy was given a package of cookies to take to school and share with his classmates.  But the little boy, fearing there wouldn't be enough for him, chose to hide them in his desk and have a few each day for himself.  Was there a lack of cookies in that classroom?  No, but it appeared that only one child had cookies.  The reality was, they were given to him to SHARE... and if he opened his desk and shared them, all the children would have cookies.  And where would more cookies come from?  From the same place... because the little boy's parents loved giving, too.  And many of the other children would then ask their parents for cookies or treats to share, too.  Sharing is fun, and much more natural than hoarding.

So when the little boy was afraid, he hoarded.  When he trusted in the love that gave him those cookies to share, he shared and experienced an abundance of cookies and other treats.  And so it is with us.

Does this seem too simplistic?  It's simple alright, but not easy to be willing to pour yourself out to all of life.  Our egos resist, insisting that we can't, or we won't have enough.  We're not talking just about money, or about anything specific.  We're talking about the unwillingness to give that is the nature of the egoic, illusory self that hoards and takes in the name of  I, me, mine.  Our true Self gives without condition, pours out of the infinity of Being. "We must begin to pour, to start the outflow. The damming up of supply results from our failure to pour in some manner." -- Joel Goldsmith

So what is it that we are unwilling to unconditionally give?  Our time?  Our love?  Our presence?  Our attention?  Our honesty?  Our devotion?  Our commitment?  Our money?  Our unwavering support?  Our talents and abilities?  Our acceptance and approval?  Our forgiveness?  Our companionship?  Our diligence?  A non-judgmental listening ear?  If we are lacking in any of these, it is certain that it is our own unwillingness to give that is appearing as the illusion of lack.  All of these are IN us... we ARE the infinity of God pouring forth in the world.  We can only appear to lack what we are unwilling to give.
 
"The subject of supply plays a major role in our lives.  Until we begin to live as if we are One with God, as if all the Father has is ours, and act that out by sharing our resources, sharing forgiveness, cooperation, understanding, patience, whatever it is... until we are willing to give in this way, spiritual consciousness has not yet touched us." -- Joel Goldsmith

Need/Obligate

"There is no miracle you cannot give, for all are given you. Receive them now by opening the storehouse of your mind where they are laid, and giving them away. Christ's Vision is a miracle. Christ's Vision is the miracle in which all miracles are born." -- A Course in Miracles; Lesson 159, 2:4-5, 3:1, & 4:1

"The substitution of the spiritual for the material definition elucidates the meaning." -- Mary Baker Eddy

I love the lessons our dreams provide us, always dreams of forgiveness. Forgiving the material, apparent meanings we have superimposed on Reality... and remembering once again the Allness of God and our eternal Oneness with all Good.

In the above quotes from A Course in Miracles, it's easy to see ourselves doling out physical or fiscal miracles in the world... in the self-aggrandizement of our egos, we co-opt the meaning of miracles to suit our belief in the material. So it's really, really important to remember that only the spiritual meaning of the word miracle applies, ever. Notice the above quote talks about opening the storehouse of our mind. A miracle is always and forever healed perception, and always involves a shift from the separated, material illusion to seeing through the eyes of pure Spirit, our Oneness with God, which ACIM calls the Atonement, Christ's Vision.

Our egoic, separated, illusory self sees every act of giving as an act somehow for itself. This is why Jesus urged us not to let our right hand know what our left hand is doing. We haven't really done anything by giving a material thing or substance, or even by giving bodily acts of service. There's certainly nothing wrong with them... but there is also nothing right about them. This belief in martyrdom and self-sacrifice is all an egoic tool, part of the story in the endless, serial dream of separate bodies and their nonsensical heroic journeys.

Over and over I have seen, in my own dream and the dreams around me, this co-opting of the idea of love by the ego. It's really just the "I'll scratch your back and you scratch mine" mentality, thinly disguised with platitudes and pseudo-spirituality. Real Love IS. It needs nothing, and yet gives everything by simply BEING. It doesn't give out of need, or out of pity. It doesn't give out of a feeling of guilt. It doesn't give in the usual sense at all... It simply IS, and so it radiates and overflows with Abundance of Being. This Abundance of Being is what reflects in the dream as needs being met. It is not need/obligate. It needs no recognition and no return on investment.

I know what it's like to be lost in a dream of lack and loss. I know what it's like to feel like there is absolutely nowhere to turn. And I also know what it's like to awaken from that dream... and I know what it's like to feel so very much gratitude for that very dream, and the Awakening it facilitated.

Yesterday in church, the benediction was unusual, but so appropriate: "May you know hunger and thirst and lack, so that you may know the Abundance of God." A blessing paraphrased straight from the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus didn't say "Blessed are the manifesters," or "Blessed are those who demonstrate abundance in the world." He said, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled." As Mary Baker Eddy pointed out, it's always and only the spiritual meaning that is true. The spiritual meaning of the experience of lack is the blessing of our true hunger and thirst for Awakening, without a story. It's not physical, and it's certainly not fiscal. And it's only when we give up the outer search for fulfillment of any kind (with all its rationales) that the true meaning of giving and receiving becomes apparent, within Self, with absolute freedom... and need/obligate becomes an archaic relic from a bygone era.

"Christ's Vision is the bridge between the worlds. And in Its power can you safely trust to carry you from this world into one made holy by forgiveness. Things which seem quite solid here are merely shadows there; transparent, faintly seen, at times forgot, and never able to obscure the Light that shines beyond them. Holiness has been restored to Vision, and the blind can see. This is the Holy Spirit's single gift; the treasure house to which you can appeal with perfect certainty for all the things that can contribute to your happiness." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 159, 5:1-4, & 6:1

Our Treasure House

"My treasure house is full, and angels watch its open doors..." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 316, 1:4

"We find that whatever blesses one blesses all, as Jesus showed with the loaves and the fishes... Spirit, not matter, being the Source of supply." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 206, Lines 15-18

In moments of peace, resting in God, there is such an indescribable sense of wholeness and peace, of divine fulfillment and contentment. "My treasure house is full" is an apt description... or as the Psalmist said, "My cup runneth over." This has nothing to do with material structures or economic ups and downs. This sense of wholeness and fullness is Who We Are.

This treasure of wealth and wholeness is not dependent on anything at all... in fact, it is often most readily turned to and recognized when we feel most separate from it. As William Shakespeare said, "Sweet are the uses of adversity, which like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in its head; and this our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything." Our challenges drive us to remember Who We Are.

Let's keep this in mind, regardless of economic swings or financial challenges. God is All, and our treasure house remains full, eternally.

"Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever." -- The Bible; Psalm 23:6

"God is lavish, unfailing abundance; the rich, omnipresent Substance of the universe." -- John Randolph Price

Breathless and Beautiful

There must be always remaining in every life,
some place for the singing of angels,
some place for that which in itself is
breathless and beautiful.
-- Howard Thurman

That which in itself is breathless and beautiful. In itself. Not because of someone or something. Not because of the sunset or the innocent baby. Not because of that certain person, place, or thing. Not because life is going the way we want it to. In itself.

What does it mean to experience being breathless and beautiful in ourselves? In moments of revelation, glimpses of our Oneness with God, the breath stops and there is complete joy and rest and beauty, whole and complete, breathless and beautiful beyond description. I love the very phrase 'breathless and beautiful,' because it reminds me that any holy instant I choose to be aware, I am at rest in God, the eternally breathless and beautiful. And what else is there?

"I rest in God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 109

Everyday Miracles

"Seek and find His message in the holy instant, where all illusions are forgiven. From there the miracle extends to bless everyone and to resolve all problems, be they perceived as great or small, possible or impossible." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 16, Section VII, 11:1-2

"There is no order of difficulty in miracles. One is not "harder" or "bigger" than another. They are all the same. All expressions of love are maximal." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I,1:1

Every day is filled with miracles. Everywhere I look, every day, there are miracles everywhere. The miracle of healed perception reveals the Allness of God in every single aspect of creation. Busy or resting, talking or silent, indulging in preferences or moving through aversions, there is absolutely no difference, not the slightest difference at all. The ego's conceptual sense of things is made up of mental constructs that I project, like a movie, with no reality of its own, and absolutely no influence on Reality at all. God remains, All-in-All.

A Course in Miracles reminds us that we remain eternally as God created us... a perfect idea in the Mind of God, Holy and Eternal as God. We are the Holy Son of God, and we are One. It is the dreaming mind that imagines itself separate, projecting dreams within dreams and getting lost in our dreaming. It doesn't matter at all if the dreams are ones we like or ones we don't. If we make the outcome of dreams our goal, we are lost in the dream. The Bible tells us to "Awake, thou that sleepest!"

Every perception in this dream world hides a miracle, the spiritual Reality of God. Every perception. The most mundane task is transformed into a Holy Sacrament when we forgive and release our perceptions, revealing the miracle of God in all that is. Everyday miracles are always right here and right now.

"The sleep of forgetfulness is only the unwillingness to remember Your Forgiveness and Your Love." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 16, Section VII, 12:4

The Path Home

"What we see is not what is really there. We see only our concept of what is there." -- Joel Goldsmith

"You have no guide to appropriate action, and no way of judging the result. What you do is determined by your perception of the situation, and that perception is wrong." -- A Course in Miracles, Workbook Lesson 24, 1:2-3

"I see nothing as it is now." -- A Course in Miracles, Workbook Lesson 9

Now can always and only mean one thing. God. God is omnipresent, forever, and Now. So whatever our conceptual sense of things in the moment, it is never true. Good, bad, right, wrong, all concepts. Not truth. The subtler our egos get, the more we hide our ego machinations behind spiritual concepts, the more true this is.

How willing are we to question our every concept? As A Course in Miracles reminds us, the only question we need to ask ourselves is 'What is it for?' In other words, why am I saying this, doing this, wanting this? The ego can only be exposed by such self-inquiry. Self-discomfort is all ego. And it is easy to let go of, once we see it for what it is.

Beneath the grandiosity of the ego lies our true being, forever One with God, forever at peace and needing no ego-gratification. This is the narrow path Jesus spoke of... the path Home. In truth, we never left.

"I will be still an instant and go Home." -- A Course in Miracles, Workbook Lesson 182

The Inner Voice

"The experiences that come to us when we live in obedience to the inner Voice are miracles of beauty and joy. Let us not be afraid to follow that Voice even if at first we are so poorly attuned to it that we do not hear it correctly. There is no need to be afraid of mistakes or even of failures. Any mistakes which may be made by a person who is obedient to the still, small Voice will be few, and he can quickly pick himself up again and soon be wholly immersed in the Spirit of God. Mistakes of the personal sense are not fatal; not one is forever. Success in God is forever, but human failure is only the illusion of a day." -- Joel Goldsmith

"The 'Divine Ear' is not an auditory nerve. It is the all-hearing and all-knowing Mind, to Whom each need of man is always known and by Whom it will be supplied." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 7, Lines 23-26

Oh, what a misunderstood and abused phrase: the Inner Voice. It is a made-to-order tool for the ego, a perfect way to do what we want by 'following guidance.' We can follow our fears and say, "I heard a 'no,' so I am not doing it." Or we can indulge in fantasy and say we are following our hearts. The personal self is a maze of vested interest and self-justification. Which voice are you listening to? How can you know?

The Inner Voice is not personal. It is closer than personal. It never indulges the personal self, yet it always leads us in ways of utter fulfillment. Yes, this seems like a paradox. But if we can even for a moment release all need to define or justify or weave a story about whatever the Voice says, the transmission is clear and we can simply trust that within the big picture, even the little self is fulfilled.

One way to know which voice you are following is this: how much of your time and attention goes into the comfort and indulgence of the personal self? In other words, how much time and attention goes into taking care of the physical body (this includes your 'personal' environment, care of the home, gardens, and yard, your car, your family, your animals, your stuff), of the emotional body (intimate relationships, talking on the phone to friends, e-mails, escapist reading or watching movies, recreational eating and drinking, even playing music and other artistic endeavors, wanting to be humanly good or successful, etc.), or of the mental body (our work, our so-called spiritual reading, study, thinking, trying to figure it out, rationalizing, etc.)? All of these are feeding aspects of the illusory notion of a personal self. All of these take up pretty much 100% of the time in our dream, even those of us who are supposedly on 'spiritual' paths.

So how is it possible in this world to hear a different Voice? We are so accustomed to the strident demands of the illusory self, the contrived fears and lusts and indulgences, the fragmented and split allegiance and attention, that we mistake them for the real. In A Course in Miracles Jeshua ben Joseph tells us: "The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Joy. He is the Call to Return with which God blessed the minds of His separated Sons. It is possible even in this world to hear only that Voice and no other. It takes effort and great willingness to learn this. Hear only this through the Holy Spirit within you, and teach your brothers to listen as I am teaching you. The Holy Spirit is the call to Awaken and be glad." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 5, Section II

You see, the alleged personal self is never glad. It is reactively pleased when it gets something it wants, and reactively displeased when it doesn't. But it is incapable of joy. Joy has no edges, no boundaries. It's not attached to anything. It IS. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Joy, is the Voice that is your True Self. It is not personal because YOU are not personal. Who you are has no edges, and no personal interests. Who you are is not limited to the vested interests of one tiny speck of creation. Who you are is Infinite, Limitless, Omnipresent Love.

So which voice are you following today? The illusory personal, which always weaves deeper illusion as it goes, until we don't know where we are or how we got there? Or the only real Voice, the Voice for God, which brings Peace and quiet Joy and utter certainty of Self? The choice is not hard; but as Jesus said, it takes effort and great willingness to reverse ourselves in this way. The momentum has been in the direction of illusions for so long. The Inner Voice leads us in a new direction, and is the only trustworthy guide out of the pain and forgetfulness of the personal dream.

"Our meditation is a quietness, a stillness, a state of receptivity, in which we open our consciousness to the impartation of the Spirit. Then, when the Spirit answers--when we receive the impulse that gives us that sense or awareness that God is present--the Spirit which we have touched, lives our lives." -- Joel Goldsmith

What Hinders You?

"For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation." -- The Bible; Romans 4:15

"I saw that the law of mortal belief included all error, and that, even as oppressive laws are disputed and mortals are taught their right to freedom, so the claims of the enslaving senses must be denied and superseded." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 227, Lines 3-7

"The illusion of material sense, not divine law, has bound you." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 227, Lines 26-27

"There are no laws but God's. There is no loss under the laws of God. Payment is neither given nor received. Exchange cannot be made; there are no substitutes; and nothing is replaced by something else. God's laws forever give and never take. The laws of God make free." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 76, 9:1, 3-6, 7:5

It took me a long time to realize that human laws are all made up. We live in a world of human constructs based on the belief in a punitive God, and the corollary belief that humans have to be limited or they will screw up and do evil things.

Human law is all about what we must not do. Even laws that say we must do certain things, like pay taxes or stop for red lights, are based on not running into somebody and not being a bad citizen. They are all some version of 'thou shalt not.' This is insanity. And by looking around at our world, we can see, plainly, it just doesn't work.

The good news that Jesus brought is that there are no laws but God's... and God's law is the Law of Love, and Love alone. God is All, and His Love is All. He told us that "God is no respecter of persons. He makes his sun (His Love) shine on the evil and the good." We don't have to earn God's Love by toeing the line. His law is One. "Thou shalt love God with all your heart, and mind, and soul, and strength; and your neighbor as your Self. This is the Law." It can't get much simpler.

Yet the simple can be the most challenging. Who among us is willing to leave our old ways, to shift focus from the material laws we have believed and valued, to the Truth of Being in the Allness of God's Love? Who among us is willing to question the so-called laws of health, behavior, and livelihood that we have been taught? Who among us is willing to love, not our personal lives and the people and things that populate our personal world, but God as All, above All?

What laws seem to hinder you? Are they the laws of diet and health? Are they the laws of being a 'good' person? Are they the laws of success and failure? Are they they the laws of human love and relationships? Whatever the human laws we believe in, they are the limits of our life. And when we don't live up to these self-imposed laws, even if no one else knows, we suffer. They are laws of fear and punishment... even the ones in the disguise of love and attachment. If there are no other laws but God's Love, what are all these things that get our heart and mind and soul and strength every day? What are all these things we think demand our time and allegiance? And what do we think will happen if we don't obey these laws of matter and material life? Thou shalt not fail to do this, because if you don't, something horrible will happen! Thou shalt not fail to do that, because you if you don't, you will never be happy! Thou shalt not fail to please them, because if you don't, you will be a bad, bad friend, a bad person. Thou shalt not fail to obey the rules of matter, because if you don't, you will die! Held hostage to the belief in so many fictional laws, we can't see that we are not just the prisoner, we are the jailer and the jail.

Your freedom depends on the courage and the vigilance to question even your most cherished beliefs, your most valued illusions. Whenever you take the time to question the many laws of behavior that seem to hold you hostage, you will always discover there is nothing there but unquestioned beliefs. What hinders you? Your own fear of self-inquiry and self-discovery. And nothing else. For God's Love is All, and the only Law there is.

"So I would liberate all things I see, and give to them the freedom that I seek. For thus do I obey the Law of Love, and give what I would find and make my own." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 349, 1:1-2

It's Not Magic

"Question: What is the scientific statement of Being? Answer: There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter. All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all. Spirit is immortal Truth; matter is mortal error. Spirit is the real and eternal; matter is the unreal and temporal. Spirit is God, and man is His image and likeness. Therefore man is not material; he is spiritual." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 468, Lines 8-15

"Miracles bear witness to Truth. They are convincing because they arise from conviction. Without conviction they deteriorate into magic, which is mindless and therefore destructive; or rather, the uncreative use of mind." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I, 14:1-3

"Sickness, or 'not-right-mindedness' is the result of level confusion, because it always entails the belief that what is amiss on one level can adversely affect another. We have referred to miracles as the means of correcting level confusion, for all mistakes must be corrected at the level on which they occur. Only the mind is capable of error. The body can act wrongly only when it is responding to misthought. The body cannot create, and the belief that it can, a fundamental error, produces all physical symptoms. Physical illness represents a belief in magic. The whole distortion that made magic rests on the belief that there is a creative ability in matter which the mind cannot control." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 2, Section IV, 2:2-9

Hmmm... the belief in a creative ability in matter which the mind cannot control... the big bang, supernovas, the conception and birth of a child, the sprouting of a seed... all of these seem to prove an innate creative ability in matter that the mind definitely cannot control. Let's look more closely at this common error.

From the broader perspective of wholeness, everything is idea... there is a corresponding spiritual idea for every form and experience within the dream of materiality. When our minds are open and aware of our Oneness with God, with All, there is always and only harmony between the many spiritual ideas and their thoughts that populate our mind and experience. When our minds are contracted and we imagine ourselves as separate, then our ideas, too, are distorted and inverted, so that our corresponding forms and experiences are unstable and unpredictable and often unpleasant.

From the contracted, uncreative level of the unawakened ego, the story is that matter has it's own creative power... and we find evidence for it everywhere. From the awakened, expansive level of the awakened Self, we see that there is only One Power and One Creator, All-in-All. As emanations of the One, we are fully supplied with an abundance of Divine Ideas. These ideas are what reflect in the dream of matter as health, wholeness, and prosperity... Life, and Life more abundant and harmonious than we can now imagine. But the dream-forms are not the point, or the object, since they are nothing at all, nothing but shadows of the Real.

The Awakened Mind knows there is only One Power, One Self... for God is All-in-All. In Oneness there is only harmony and peace and joy. So the conception of life, the sprouting of a seed, the beauty of nature... these are shadow reflections of the Divine Harmony, the One Power that is Our Reality. This is not magic. This is Reality.

"All I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all I have not seen." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Happy Learner

"The Holy Spirit needs a happy learner, in whom His mission can be happily accomplished. You who are steadfastly devoted to misery must first recognize that you are miserable and not happy. The Holy Spirit cannot teach without this contrast, for you believe that misery is happiness. This has so confused you that you have undertaken to learn to do what you can never do, believing that unless you learn it you will not be happy. You do not realize that the foundation on which this most peculiar learning goal depends means absolutely nothing. Yet it may still make sense to you. Have faith in nothing and you will find the 'treasure' that you seek. Yet you will add another burden to your already burdened mind. You will believe that nothing is of value, and will value it. A little piece of glass, a speck of dust, a body or a war are one to you. For if you value one thing made of nothing, you have believed that nothing can be precious, and that you can learn how to make the untrue true." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 14, Section II, 1:1-11

"It is helpful to keep in mind that if you are serious about learning this course, you must realize that the creation of God is One. Therefore, any thoughts that separate you from anyone else constitute a consciously chosen attempt to deny your Identity. If you think your happiness or pain come from outside, you are denying the principle of the Atonement, which means you do not want to remember it. This is not a sin, but a correctable mistake once you know you have made it. Therefore, you need to become increasingly vigilant for when your special thoughts and actions attack the Oneness of God's Son. The idea is not that you feel guilty over your specialness, but that you become aware of it. Jesus' purpose is to help us do just that, for it is in looking at the ego that we learn to accept the Atonement for ourselves, remembering the glorious thought that throughout the ego's insanity we have remained as God created us." -- Kenneth Wapnick

I laugh really hard when I read the above quote from Ken Wapnick. It is so completely true... and is a great example of how there is always One Who Knows, the Awakened Self, regardless of what the ego says and does. The reason I find it so incredibly funny is that Ken Wapnick has been the object of a whole bunch of lawsuits for being an ACIM Nazi, and for invalid copyright of what many people feel should be public domain, like The Bible. He and Judith Skutch lied under oath and said that Jesus was not the author of ACIM in order to get the copyright, since only literary works by living entities can be copyrighted. Of course, who am I to say what I would do in his shoes? I know Mary Baker Eddy endured lawsuits, too, with people accusing her of plagiarizing, among other things. It's not easy to live in this world yet not be of it.

The point is that the happy learner is one who doesn't take any of it personally. The happy learner accepts that it is all nothing. As ACIM puts it, "A little piece of glass, a speck of dust, a body or a war are one to you. For if you value one thing made of nothing, you have believed that nothing can be precious, and that you can learn how to make the untrue true." It's not personal, and it's not true. Whether we're fighting for or defending a book or a way of life or the desire to be right, we are mistakenly valuing nothing. End of story.

What happens when we value something outside of ourselves? What happens when we would rather be right than happy? What happens when something shiny in the dream catches our eye, and we value it and long for it? What happens when we lose ourselves in our not-so-hidden agendas? Over and over we immerse ourselves in the story of the dream, coming up for air only when our suffering gets too intense. Only when we can't stand it anymore do we think that there might be another way.

The happy learner doesn't have to wait until the lawsuits are flying. The happy learner isn't dependent on the who, what, where, or why of it all. The happy learner is willing to let the Holy Spirit lead the way, and to value only what is Always and Everywhere, for everyone. The happy learner has given up the need to indulge personal comfort and desire... and most of all, the happy learner has given up the compulsive need to be smug and comfortable and right.

"Seek not outside yourself. For all your pain comes simply from the futile search for what you want, insisting where it must be found. What if it is not there? Would you rather be right, or happy? Be you glad that you are told where happiness abides, and seek no longer elsewhere. You will fail. But it is given you to know the Truth, and not to seek for it outside yourself." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 29, Section VII, 1:6-12

Moral Courage

"Moral courage is 'the lion of the tribe of Judah,' the king of the mental realm. Free and fearless it roams in the forest. Undisturbed it lies in the open field, or rests in 'green pastures, beside the still waters.' In the figurative transmission from the Divine Thought to the human, diligence, promptness, and perseverance are likened to 'the cattle upon a thousand hills.' They carry the baggage of stern resolve, and keep pace with highest purpose. Tenderness accompanies all the might imparted by Spirit. The individuality created by God is not carnivorous, as witness the millennial estate pictured by Isaiah: The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion, and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 514, Lines 10-25

"I am the Holy Son of God HimSelf. I cannot suffer, cannot be in pain, cannot suffer loss, nor fail to do all that salvation asks." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 191, 7:3-4

I love the thought of moral courage. It is like a shot of vigor, like standing in the face of whatever seems to be with calm assurance that all is, and has forever been, very well. It is a complete letting go of the seduction of arguing for lack, limitation, and mortality as real. As the Son of God, we emanate and radiate God, and only God. A ray of sun radiates sunlight, and only sunlight. A Course in Miracles says it this way: "Ideas leave not their source."

As the Son of God, we cannot be unlike God... therefore we cannot suffer, cannot be in pain, cannot be inflamed or depleted, cannot suffer lack, loss, or limitation of any kind. We radiate all the attributes of God, and only God. Moral courage is the willingness to simply Be as God created us, without any need to embellish. No needs at all.

I have had some experiences lately that have given me the opportunity to experience this more fully. The willingness to fully engage with whatever God asks of me in any moment, without judgement or rationalization, without argument or trying to change it... this is the moral courage Mary Baker Eddy speaks of, like the lion roaming the forest without fear, in perfect freedom. And this lion truly isn't carnivorous, and exists peacefully with every other idea. There is no competition among the radiant thoughts of God. "And a little child shall lead them." As the Son of God, I am also like a little child, walking without fear among all people and all experiences, and willing to go wherever my Father leads me. Like that ray of sunlight, I shine where I am shone.

There is no self-consciousness in Being the Son of God, because there is no separate self that needs to look a certain way or appear this way or that. There is One Self, shining through the prism of Life as myriad colors and expressions, Infinite Love and Variety, all so very Good. As Yogananda put it, "God is ever-new Joy." There's nothing dull about being as God created me.

So moral courage is the willingness to Be as God created us, not as we imagine ourselves. "Stand and see the salvation of the Lord." Truly, there is nothing else.

"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. You play the game of death, of being helpless, pitifully tied to dissolution in a world which shows no mercy to you. Yet when you accord it mercy, will its mercy shine on you. 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, 9:1-4, & 10:1-2

Reverse Your Self

"Reverse the case. Stand porter at the door of thought. Admitting only such conclusions as you wish realized in bodily results, you will control yourself harmoniously. The issues of pain and pleasure must come through mind, and like a watchman forsaking his post, we admit the intruding belief, forgetting that through Divine help we can forbid this entrance." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 392, Lines 24-27, & Page 393, Lines 1-3

"If you are willing to renounce the role of guardian of your thought system and open it to Me, I will correct it very gently and lead you back to God." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 4, Section I, 4:7

These two quotes go hand in hand. We do indeed have to take responsibility for our own thoughts. Yet if we try to do this from the same old separate, illusory identity that we have mistaken for self, we will ultimately not be able to make real changes. Only the mind that knows its Oneness with God is even open to this kind of vigilance and change. When we are Aware of Being One with the Allness and Oneness of God, with All Good, we are allowing our True Self to stand porter at the door of thought... not our contracted ego identity.

It's through the Divine that we reverse our thinking and return to sanity. The problem with positive thinking and affirmations and all mental attempts at change is that they are not dealing with cause. The thoughts that make up the dream are not cause... they are always effects, reactions within the dream, witnesses to what we are doing and seeing and believing. The Thoughts of God are the only Real Cause... and these we can turn to at any moment, and return to the Peace and Love and Joy that are Who We Really Are. This has nothing to do with the dream and its seeming physical evidence. When we return to our Right Mind, everything changes. Whether it looks any different to the physical sense or not is irrelevant and not a true measure.

Let's talk a moment about the evidence of the physical senses. If you were presenting a legal case, would you trust a witness who would say whatever they were told? That's pretty much what the five senses do... they present evidence for the thoughts we have aligned ourselves with. When we align ourselves with the seeming reality of the world, our physical senses show us over and over that we are right. And yet, when we give our allegiance to God, and allow the Thoughts of God to have ascendance in our minds and hearts, we gradually reverse ourselves, and eventually even our sight and hearing and taste and touch and smell and emotions become witnesses only to Reality and Oneness. But never are these evidence of change. These are simply what Jeshua ben Joseph called 'the added things.' "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and His Righteousness," he told us, "and all these things will be added unto you." Does the heart need evidence to know ItSelf? Does the Light need a mirror to know it Radiates?

Reversing the direction of our thoughts seems a daunting and overwhelming task to the ego self, and so it is. But to the Self aligned with God, it is as easy and natural as breathing seems to be in this dream world. The reorganization of thoughts and motivations takes place spontaneously when our only intention is Awakening to Our True Self.

"Your Holiness reverses all the 'laws' of the world." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 38, 1:1

Intentions or Willingness

"Trust not your good intentions. They are not enough. But trust implicitly your willingness, whatever else may enter. Concentrate only on this, and be not disturbed that shadows surround it. That is why you came. If you could come without them you would not need the Holy Instant. The miracle of the Holy Instant lies in your willingness to let it be what it is. And in your willingness for this lies also your acceptance of yourself as you were meant to be." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 18, Section IV, 2:1-6, 8-9

"The Holy Instant is the result of your determination to be Holy. It is the answer." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 18, Section IV, 1:1-2

There is a lot of hype about intentions in contemporary spiritual books. From Wayne Dyer to Lynn McTaggert to Harry Palmer, there is a collective belief (which is not new) that we decide the course of the dream through supposedly conscious intention. Like most persistent lies within the dream, there is a kernel of truth in it, though well-hidden because it's upside down and backwards. All our intentions show us is our ego-agendas. But the one power of decision that we do have as the dreamer of a dream is to align ourselves with what IS, beyond all dreaming. This is the determination and willingness to BE as God created us, without interference from our very human, illusory agendas.

Like everything that is True, this makes no sense to our list-making ego-selves. If we don't do it, who will? If I don't choose to do something, nothing will get done! Right? Well, it's amazing but true that if one ant in the anthill stops or dies, the anthill still goes on. It's the same in all aspects of this dream we call life. Forms of people, places, animals, and things all come, only to pass. Everything and everyone is expendable in the dream. Haven't you ever asked yourselves why we work so hard to be somebody, to be important, to have money, to have security, when all those who have gone before us and achieved supposedly 'great' things have one thing in common: they are all dead, and all their great achievements go the way of all things within the dream. Even if we still tell stories about certain of these people, that is only to justify our own insane search for meaning within the dream. Talk about your no-win situation.

The mystery is that when we let go of planning and intending and goal-setting, and forgive all our illusions, the dream unfolds as if we had done a great deal of planning and intending. It's so funny to see yourself being completely fulfilled and happy in unexpected and blessed ways. Who would have thought? A Course in Miracles tells us that "humility will never ask that you remain content with littleness. But it does require that you be not content with less than greatness that comes not of you." (ACIM; Chapter 18, Section IV, 3:1-2) And Jesus said that "of myself I do nothing." The effortless life is not one in which we do no work and sit gazing at our navels. It's one in which we don't decide from our false ego-perspectives. Instead, we are willing to stop, to listen, and to follow. We are willing to be nothing, so that we can remember we are Everything.

"Do not attempt to give the Holy Spirit what He does not ask, or you will add the ego to Him and confuse the two. He asks but little. It is He Who adds the greatness and the might. He joins with you to make the Holy Instant far greater than you can understand. It is your realization that your need do so little that enables Him to give so much." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 18, Section IV, 1:6-10

Imaginary Comforters

"Know, then, Who abides with you merely by recognizing what is there already; and do not be satisfied with imaginary comforters, for the Comforter of God is in you." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section II, 7:8

"Jesus demonstrated Christ; He proved that Christ is the Divine Idea of God -- the Holy Ghost, or Comforter, revealing the Divine Principle, Love, and leading into all Truth." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 332, Lines 19-22

Have you ever wondered how Jeshua ben Joseph did all that he did without being anything at all? He healed the sick, but never claimed to be a healer. He fed the multitudes, but never claimed to be a philanthropist. He directed his disciples where to fish to get the biggest catch, and to find the money for taxes in the mouth of a fish, but he never claimed to be a manifester or a magician. When people asked him if he was this or that, he said things like, "you have said it." When the spiritually ambitious wanted to follow him and learn what he knew (the ego always enters relationships to get something), he told them, "the son of man has no place to lay his head." In other words, if you're looking for a better identity, you've come to the wrong place. His job was to show us the end of all earthly identities, the end of getting. At other times, when people praised him and tried to make him special, he said, "why do you call me good? There is none good but God." He wisely modeled for us how to walk in the world with the Beloved, as Oneness ItSelf. He showed us how to be truly happy and free in a world of sorrow and bondage. What a gift.

He uncompromisingly told the Truth of our Oneness with God. He knew It, and he lived It. He never passed a suffering person or avoided pain by saying, "oh, it's not real." He knew it wasn't real, and so he fed the hungry, healed the sick, and comforted the sorrowing with Truth. He didn't see himself as having a body or a home or an identity to protect. The forms were irrelevant. And he told us that unless we do the same, we can never truly remember Who We Are. "Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." Likewise, he said that when we ignore the suffering around us, we are doing it to him, to our Self... and we suffer accordingly.

We spend our days with imaginary comforters, instead of listening to the Voice for God that is our true comfort. We look for roles, activities, ego enhancement, emotional or intellectual questions and preoccupations, or just bodily and emotional comfort, all in service to an imaginary 'I'. These all lead to suffering, since we are serving a false god (our self) and ignoring the longing for wholeness that is always present.

The Comforter of God is what The Bible calls the Holy Spirit. A Course in Miracles refers to the Holy Spirit as the Voice for God, the part of our holy mind that has never lost touch with God, our True Home, our True Self. This Comforter always alleviates suffering whenever and however possible, with the forms involved totally irrelevant, knowing that, "God is still Love, and this is not His Will... and so it cannot be at all." Even Jesus, with His Perfect Love and Perfect Knowing, urged us to love one another in tangible ways in order to remember, and to trust the Voice for God in all things. We don't need to fear the forms of suffering that present themselves, individually and collectively. We can fearlessly meet them with Love and Acceptance, knowing that the Truth of Love is only momentarily obscured by the lie of separation and suffering. And remember, Jesus fed them while knowing the Truth. He healed them while knowing it wasn't real. He did not abandon them while saying, "they're not really there."

It takes courage to leave behind our imaginary comforters, what ACIM calls the dark companions. These companions tell us that we have to take care of ourselves first, and that others have their own lives, their own stories. We see separate people and separate interests, and are comforted by our false autonomy. We enter into relationships (even spiritual ones) to get something, to figure out something, to acquire knowledge to better navigate our own personal dream, all in the service of a fictional, separate 'I'. We stay lost in the dream. And yet, the Comforter of God is in us. This is the Truth. The Voice for God is our salvation.

"Only God's Comforter can comfort you. In the quiet of His temple, He waits to give you the peace that is yours. But be Holy in the Presence of God, or you will not know that you are there. For what is unlike God cannot enter His Mind, because it was not His Thought. You cannot enter God's Presence with the dark companions beside you, but you also cannot enter alone. All your brothers must enter with you, for until you have accepted them you cannot enter. For you cannot understand wholeness unless you are whole, and no part of the Son can be excluded if he would know the Wholeness of His Father." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section III, 7:1-2, 4-5, 8-10

Awakened Imagination

"Watch the images your imagination presents to your awareness." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 32, 3:4

"You are not the victim of the world you see because you invented it. You can give it up as easily as you made it up. You will see it or not see it, as you wish. While you want it you will see it; when you no longer want it, it will not be there for you to see. This applies to your inner and outer worlds, which are actually the same." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 32, 1:2-5, 2:1

"God is in everything I see because God is in my mind." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 30

"According to Christian Science, the only real senses of man are spiritual, emanating from Divine Mind. Thought passes from God to man, but neither sensation nor report goes from material body to Mind. The intercommunication is always from God to His idea, man. God's Thoughts are perfect and eternal, are Substance and Life." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 284, Lines 28-32, & Page 286, Lines 21-22

Oh my, this is a rich topic! Have you noticed how we minimize and ridicule the imagination as something that must be just for children... once we grow up, we are told, we have to accept the 'real' world. How funny! There is no real world... only the worlds within worlds that arise out of the thought that we could be separate from God, Who is our Source. God is Pure Spirit, the Clear Mind of Awareness in which everything lives and moves and has its being. God is very literally in everything I see, because even my false sense of a separate mind cannot possibly leave its Source.

Everything emanates from God. We are Perfect Ideas radiating from the Mind of God. Yet by imagining ourselves as separate, we see our error reflected, like refracted (bent or distorted) light. It's as if a beam of sunlight decided it knew how to be the sun. As radiance from its source, it is perfect and complete, but when separated from its source, where is its radiance? It either distorts the radiance of its source through refraction, or it no longer appears to be at all. That pretty much describes the world we dream, when we imagine ourselves separate from God.

Like all things in this distorted world, imagination has a higher purpose. It can radiate the Light of God, Our Source, within the dream. As Awakened Imagination, we know that the images we see are not separate from our own mind, but simply projections and extensions of the mind who dreams. Awakened Imagination aligns itself so completely to Source that it receives its images directly from Source, instead of from the fragmented and distorted images of the separated self. These Perfect Ideas, the Thoughts of God, are always here and available, as a part of the Radiance that emanates from God through us. We simply aren't aware of them in the contracted state of mind that thinks it's separate.

One of the experiences that is common as we awaken is the tendency to not trust ourselves. We have lost our way in egoic desires and delusions so many times that we won't let ourselves imagine anything! This is simply another ego defense. What passes for imagination in the ego's dream is a set-up to keep us forever seeking and never finding. Always on the journey, always imagining that some other place, some other person, some other way will give us what we imagine we want. Truly, there is nothing to trust in a separated mind. On the other hand, Awakened Imagination is completely Trustworthy. It never excludes or avoids anything. It is an expansive state that sees literally everything as a part of its fulfillment. The ideas that flow from Awakened Imagination flow directly from God, and are the intercommunication with our Source, a vital part of our happiness and fulfillment. The expansive ideas of Source simply embrace and dissolve whatever distorted ideas and images appear to be in the mind, transfiguring them into True Ideas.

Awakened Imagination is the reflection of our complete dependence on God, our True Self. The imagination of the egoic self is "false, mortal belief; it is illusion, without spiritual identity or foundation, and it has no real substance." (Science and Health; Page 287, Lines 22-23) Both are reflections, not source... yet One reflects its Source without distortion or separation, while the other is fragmented and completely distorted... and so, completely false.

It's up to us how we dream this dream. Will we stop pretending we are doing it autonomously, with our fragmented images of suffering and sorrow? Will we realize, like Jeshua ben Joseph, that God is the only Source and Radiance of All Light, in the dream and beyond? As we forgive our willful and imaginary autonomy, we return the awareness in our holy minds to the One Mind of Awakened Imagination. And so is Heaven reflected on earth at last.

"You are holy because your mind is part of God's. And because you are holy, your sight must be holy as well. Your sight is related to His Holiness, not to your ego, and therefore not to your body." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 36, 1:2, 3,

Complete Dependence on God

"Yours is the independence of creation, not of autonomy. Your whole creative function lies in your complete dependence on God, Whose function He shares with you." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section V, 6:1-2

"The belief in ego autonomy is costing you the knowledge of your dependence on God, in which your freedoms lies. The ego sees all dependency as threatening, ad has twisted even your longing for God into a means of establishing itself. But do not be deceived by its interpretation of your conflict." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section V, 6:7-9

Complete dependence on God is a thought so alien to the foundations of our world that we can't even conceive of it. We have been taught to be dependent on so many people and things within the world, while pretending that we're not. We're not dependent on the grocery stores or gas stations. We're not dependent on our next paycheck. We're an independent, self-sufficient people. Right.

The name of this game is that it's O.K. to be dependent on anything or anyone outside of you, because then you are still playing the game of the ego. The name of the game is to be an effect of the world while striving for and never finding autonomy. All of this is a reversal, a negation of the Truth... that we are forever the Effects of God, never apart from Him, and that as a part of the Mind of God we are simultaneously without limits and completely dependent on God. Completely ONE with God, Who is Our Self.

I love the passage I quoted at the beginning of this blog: "The ego sees all dependency as threatening, and has twisted even your longing for God into a means of establishing itself. But do not be deceived by its interpretation of your conflict." In other words, in order to preserve its imagined independence, the ego uses even our spiritual yearning, our budding awakening to establish itself. It takes the longing for Truth and dissects it, in the name of trying to 'understand.' ACIM puts it this way: "The ego analyzes; the Holy Spirit accepts. The appreciation of wholeness comes only through acceptance, for to analyze means to break down or to separate out. The attempt to understand totality by breaking it down is clearly the characteristically contradictory approach of the ego to everything." (A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section V, 13:1-3)

For those of you that have read my book (http://www.thelittlebookoforganicabundance.com), you will remember the three rules. Rule Number Two is that we don't need to understand. As a matter of fact, what could ego-understanding have to do with what is forever True and forever Whole? "Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding." (The Bible; Proverbs 3:5) The ego will find lots of ways to pretend it's doing this while making itself look good (and therefore knowledgeable). "I finally get it," we say. Or we automatically say "I know that," when knowing is as far from what the ego does as night is from day.

We are not separate from God, nor could we ever be. We dream a dream of fear and separation, covered by a thing veneer of illusory pleasures and fulfillments. Isn't this the definition of hell? "Your recognition that whatever seems to separate you from God is only fear, regardless of the form it takes and quite apart from how the ego wants you to experience it, is therefore the basic ego threat. Its dream of autonomy is shaken to its foundation by this awareness." (A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section V, 10:1-2)

So the game is exposed. The fear of loss of autonomy that underlies all desires and activities in the world is seen. The dream is shaken. Now what? How do we reverse ourselves, when we can't trust anything in our own mind? We have dreamed a world to justify and project our delusion. So we have to stop looking at the projection as evidence of anything, either. "Do not underestimate the appeal of the ego's demonstrations to those who would listen. Selective perception chooses its witnesses carefully, and its witnesses are consistent. The case for insanity is strong to the insane." (A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section V, 16:1-3)

The answer lies in the Truth, of course. And in forgiving. When we see the world as our own dream, our own projection, and forgive it and ourselves, we open to the Truth of Our Being. We're like little children, so intent on our games of make believe that we have not seen our Mother Who is always here, loving us. God is Mother and Father, the Source of All. And we have not left Our Source, nor been abandoned by It.

In The Bible , we are told to "Honor thy Father and thy Mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee." (Exodus 20:12) It's not talking about our earthly parents, nor about the dream. Remembering Who We really are, and Where We really come from, is our only function here. Forgiveness is the function that tears away the heavy veils of delusion, and returns us to complete dependence on God.

"All Power is of God. What is not of Him has no power to do anything." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section V, 3:6-7

The Temptation of Christ

"Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert, to be tempted by the devil. After fasting forty days and forty nights he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread." Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’" -- The Bible, Matthew 4:1-2

"Man cannot love God supremely and set his whole affections on spiritual things, while loving the material or trusting in it more than in the spiritual." -- Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 326, lines 9-11

"To say, "Of myself I can do nothing" is to gain all Power. And yet it is but a seeming paradox. As God created you, you have all Power. The image you made of yourself has none. The Holy Spirit knows the Truth about you. The image you made does not." -- A Course in Miracles, Manual for Teachers, 29:4:2-7

Regular readers of this blog will notice that I am actually citing specific passages, rather than simply quoting them as usual. This is at the request of some readers who wish to go deeper into the passages that are referenced.

I love the Biblical story of the Temptation of Christ. It has symbolic meaning on so many levels. When working with a mentor of mine a while back, she pointed out that this story has deep personal significance for each of us. We have been fed thus far with teachings and the experiences around these teachings. There is a deeper, more spiritual answer. Reality is so much more than any teaching. We are all being guided and pushed into the land of the Allness of Spirit.

Jesus was tempted before he began his ministry. All of the solutions he was tempted with were material answers. His reply was, "Get thee behind me, Satan, for you are a liar and the father of all lies." Satan is the material sense, the great projection that is the world. As Mary Baker Eddy points out in the reference above, as long as the material sense holds the majority of our love and loyalty and fear, we cannot know the Christ as Self. We then live and move and have our being in the false gods of mortal bodies, and lack and limitation and illusions of every sort.

Who are we, really? Who do we trust and serve? A Course in Miracles says, "Remember, you are His completion and His Love. Remember your weakness is His Strength. But do not read this hastily or wrongly. If His Strength is in you, what you perceive as your weakness is but illusion. And He has given you the means to prove it so. Ask all things of His Teacher, and all things are given you. Not in the future, but immediately; now. God does not wait, for waiting implies time and He is timeless. Forget your foolish images, your sense of frailty and your fear of harm, your dreams of danger and selected 'wrongs.' God knows but his Son, and as He was created so He Is."

The Temptation of Christ is relived every day that we continue in the dream. We are tempted always with the material sense and material solutions to what appear to be our problems or our goals. Same mistake. Looking outside Self for anything at all is the devil itself.

We are told in all scripture, whether The Bible or Science and Health or A Course in Miracles, that all of our perceived needs are met instantly and effortlessly as we Remember Who We Are. Not as reward for doing anything. Not because we had an insight, as in "oh, now I get it." There's nothing to get. Who We Are is Whole and Complete, and can only reflect and mirror completion. Form is completely irrelevant. We are the Light of Awareness, the Radiance of the One, shining and radiating the Truth. We simply have to put down the illusions we generate to block this Awareness. And the instant we ask, the Light shines and the darkness of illusions is simply not.

The Temptation of Christ is the allegory of your Awakening, and mine. Our hunger is for the Truth, as we Awaken to our True Self.

"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled." -- The Bible, Matthew 5:6

"You need only recognize that everything you learned you do not want. Ask to be taught, and do not use your experiences to confirm what you have learned." -- A Course in Miracles, Text, Chapter 14, Section XI, 6:4-5