“Do you want freedom of the body or of the mind? For both you cannot have. Which do you value? Which is your goal? For one you see as means; the other, end. And one must serve the other and lead to its predominance, increasing its importance by diminishing its own. Means serve the end, and as the end is reached the value of the means decreases, eclipsed entirely when they are recognized as functionless. No one but yearns for freedom and tries to find it. Yet he will seek for it where he believes it is and can be found. He will believe it possible of mind or body, and he will make the other serve his choice as means to find it.” – A Course in Miracles; Chapter 22, Section VI, 1:1-10
This passage from A Course in Miracles asks us a direct question. It’s interesting how this blog seems to be taking a turn toward questions and answers, but then I realize that it is the nature of the unwinding mind. We ask questions until we exhaust ourselves, pretending there is some ‘answer’ missing still. In our exhaustion, if we’re lucky, we find the stillness, the emptiness, the freedom… the expansive Self.
Every seeming question is about Freedom. We may ask, “How do I get well?” if health is an issue. We may ask, “How do I make enough money?” if money is an issue. We may ask, “How do I feel good about myself again?” if guilt and self-condemnation are the issues du jour. But every single question is about freedom. Freedom for something, or freedom from something. All lies, you see. Because Real Freedom is completely expansive and includes everyone and everything. It is the Freedom of BEING that ironically results in freedom within the life we live, without even trying. Because the unified, expansive Mind reflects in unified, expansive life situations.
The question that the Course asks is very direct. Are we seeking this freedom of unified Mind, or are we just seeking for mental solutions to take care of the physical issues we really value? I can honestly say that most of my life, even much of my life studying and teaching the Course, was spent in searching for freedom of the body… for pleasure, for success, for recognition, for companionship, for accomplishment, for avoidance, for security… the list of seeming reasons goes on and on. But all were related to freedom for the imagined self in a body, in a world of bodies.
I had a dream the other night, and I won’t bore you with the plots, twists, turns, and weird associations. But the symbolic part was this enormous tree, vibrant and alive, but completely hollow. You could walk inside and never see the top… it was like a huge, dark, infinite unknown. Some part of me wanted to be afraid of the unknown part, but the wiser part knew it was completely safe, and somehow holy.
It was several days later that the Inner Voice clarified the symbol. Our True Self is vibrant, eternally Alive, but completely empty of everything but the spacious, infinite Altar of Self… Unified Mind Awake and Infinitely Free. And if this is the freedom we seek, we gladly give over every other aspect of our lives as means to find it… and find it we do. It is our True Self, the Reality of All that Is. The question of Freedom is answered the minute we ask a true question. “Do you want freedom of the body or of the mind? For both you cannot have!”
Showing posts with label Unified Self. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Unified Self. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 28, 2015
Friday, May 3, 2013
Daily, Effortless, and Natural...
"Each day should be devoted to miracles." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I, 15:1
Brushing my teeth is a daily, effortless and seemingly natural activity. But it is actually a learned behavior, and it is obviously a bodily activity. Nearly everything that is considered natural in our conditioned state is learned behavior associated with protecting or defending the body or a personal identity. When A Course in Miracles tells us that miracles should be daily, effortless, and natural, it is not referring to learned or bodily activity. The miracle is a state of mind that has always been here, unseen by the conditioned, sleeping mind. It is the state of One-mindedness. The recognition that there is only One that includes All, in perfect Love and perfect Security and Fulfillment.
"Every loving thought the Son of God ever had is eternal. The loving thoughts his mind perceives in this world are the world's only reality." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 11, Section VII, 2:1-2
Just as each day should be devoted to miracles, we're told that they are the natural, effortless expressions of the Love that we are. It is because Love is really All there is, that all miracles are all the same. All expressions of Love are maximal. So there is no ordering or ranking in Love, only the outpouring, extending, embracing qualities that are so far beyond our conditioned notions of love. The fact that we don't perceive or experience this daily is why forgiveness is our only purpose and function here within the dream we call life. We forgive each dual meaning, each limiting perception, every limitation we have placed on any aspect of creation, and allow the miracle to be revealed. It is always here, waiting only for our attention and willingness to let go of the mental obstacles we have cherished instead.
"The real world can actually be perceived. All that is necessary is a willingness to perceive nothing else. For if you perceive both good and evil, you are accepting both the false and the true and making no distinction between them. The ego may see some good, but never only Good." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 2:6-8 & 3:1
Everything we see in our supposedly normal and natural state is divided. There is always a flip side, a duality. Even the good that we do, we do because we want to avoid what we believe is not good. We equate protection and defense with love, though it is not. If we are protecting and defending anything, it is because we think there is something 'other' to defend it from. And there can never be two in perfect Love. Only through unified vision, through the Awareness of the Oneness of Self can Love be known.
"The perception of Goodness is not knowledge, but the denial of the opposite of Goodness enables you to recognize a condition in which opposites do not exist. And this is the condition of Knowledge. Without this awareness you have not met its conditions, and until you do, you will not know it is yours already." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 4:1-3
We are always forgiving duality. Whenever we perceive something in opposition to something else, we forgive. We bring to Awareness the compulsion or belief that is the origin of the duality we are perceiving. And it dissolves in the Light of Awareness. It was never there. Only the miracle of Love remains. This is our only purpose, regardless of the scripts our lives seem to follow. The Real world is the forgiven world, seen through the unified eyes of Love. Daily, effortless, and blessedly natural.
"The sole responsibility of the miracle worker is to accept the Atonement for himself." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 2, Section V, 5:1
Brushing my teeth is a daily, effortless and seemingly natural activity. But it is actually a learned behavior, and it is obviously a bodily activity. Nearly everything that is considered natural in our conditioned state is learned behavior associated with protecting or defending the body or a personal identity. When A Course in Miracles tells us that miracles should be daily, effortless, and natural, it is not referring to learned or bodily activity. The miracle is a state of mind that has always been here, unseen by the conditioned, sleeping mind. It is the state of One-mindedness. The recognition that there is only One that includes All, in perfect Love and perfect Security and Fulfillment.
"Every loving thought the Son of God ever had is eternal. The loving thoughts his mind perceives in this world are the world's only reality." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 11, Section VII, 2:1-2
Just as each day should be devoted to miracles, we're told that they are the natural, effortless expressions of the Love that we are. It is because Love is really All there is, that all miracles are all the same. All expressions of Love are maximal. So there is no ordering or ranking in Love, only the outpouring, extending, embracing qualities that are so far beyond our conditioned notions of love. The fact that we don't perceive or experience this daily is why forgiveness is our only purpose and function here within the dream we call life. We forgive each dual meaning, each limiting perception, every limitation we have placed on any aspect of creation, and allow the miracle to be revealed. It is always here, waiting only for our attention and willingness to let go of the mental obstacles we have cherished instead.
"The real world can actually be perceived. All that is necessary is a willingness to perceive nothing else. For if you perceive both good and evil, you are accepting both the false and the true and making no distinction between them. The ego may see some good, but never only Good." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 2:6-8 & 3:1
Everything we see in our supposedly normal and natural state is divided. There is always a flip side, a duality. Even the good that we do, we do because we want to avoid what we believe is not good. We equate protection and defense with love, though it is not. If we are protecting and defending anything, it is because we think there is something 'other' to defend it from. And there can never be two in perfect Love. Only through unified vision, through the Awareness of the Oneness of Self can Love be known.
"The perception of Goodness is not knowledge, but the denial of the opposite of Goodness enables you to recognize a condition in which opposites do not exist. And this is the condition of Knowledge. Without this awareness you have not met its conditions, and until you do, you will not know it is yours already." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 4:1-3
We are always forgiving duality. Whenever we perceive something in opposition to something else, we forgive. We bring to Awareness the compulsion or belief that is the origin of the duality we are perceiving. And it dissolves in the Light of Awareness. It was never there. Only the miracle of Love remains. This is our only purpose, regardless of the scripts our lives seem to follow. The Real world is the forgiven world, seen through the unified eyes of Love. Daily, effortless, and blessedly natural.
"The sole responsibility of the miracle worker is to accept the Atonement for himself." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 2, Section V, 5:1
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Level Confusion: The Projected World
"2. A sense of separation from God is the only lack you really need correct. This sense of separation would never have arisen if you had not distorted your perception of Truth, and had thus perceived yourself as lacking. The idea of order of needs arose because, having made this fundamental error, you had already fragmented yourself into levels with different needs. As you integrate you become one, and your needs become one accordingly. Unified needs lead to unified action, because this produces a lack of conflict.
3. The idea of orders of need, which follows from the original error that one can be separated from God, requires correction at its own level before the error or perceiving levels at all can be corrected. You cannot behave effectively while you function on different levels. However, while you do, correction must be introduced vertically from the bottom up. This is because you think you live in space, where concepts such as 'up' and 'down' are meaningful. Ultimately space is as meaningless as time. Both are merely beliefs." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section VI, 2-3
The Projected World and the entire universe as we imagine it is simply mind-stuff, consciousness. It all takes place in the mind and is seen as if it were ‘outside', making it the original virtual reality. But the appearing world is simply effect, a continual out-picturing of the mind’s desires, filtered through beliefs, thoughts, and emotions. The world has no objective reality... it is effect, not cause.
3. The idea of orders of need, which follows from the original error that one can be separated from God, requires correction at its own level before the error or perceiving levels at all can be corrected. You cannot behave effectively while you function on different levels. However, while you do, correction must be introduced vertically from the bottom up. This is because you think you live in space, where concepts such as 'up' and 'down' are meaningful. Ultimately space is as meaningless as time. Both are merely beliefs." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section VI, 2-3
The Projected World and the entire universe as we imagine it is simply mind-stuff, consciousness. It all takes place in the mind and is seen as if it were ‘outside', making it the original virtual reality. But the appearing world is simply effect, a continual out-picturing of the mind’s desires, filtered through beliefs, thoughts, and emotions. The world has no objective reality... it is effect, not cause.
Even after you get in touch with the power of your own emotions and thoughts, you can believe things about your thoughts and feelings that aren’t true. Most people believe their thoughts are ineffectual or powerless, or that their feelings don't really matter, and so they are experienced as such. We have been taught, and so believe, that the world mysteriously exists first and is thus the source and cause of our emotions, thoughts, beliefs, and ultimately, our desires.
There is little hope for real change in such a world where we have no control, and where the real cause remains mysterious. No wonder prayer as practiced by the world has no real effect. It is just a belief in magic, belief in a mysterious something outside ourselves and our world that may be called upon to rescue us. Forgiveness in such a world makes no sense, and has been mostly practiced out of a fear of an invisible, magical force that judges us.
Forgiveness as taught by A Course in Miracles is a belief too, because in the perfection of our True Self there is nothing to forgive. We have never left the Mind of God. But while we experience ourselves as split from Source, forgiveness has the power to release the false and hidden beliefs and blockages within the mind. This is the process of what the Course calls Atonement, the interlocking chain of forgiveness that is the correction for all false beliefs and thus erases their images or effects from the mind. Because the problem is not out there… it’s in the mind of the perceiver.
Atonement is the correction for false beliefs. When we practice true forgiveness and give our perceptions to the Holy Spirit for correction, we accept the Atonement and allow all layers of mind to be corrected, healed and aligned with Truth… so all that remains is Unification, One Mind, Wholeness. This is what Jesus called seeking first the Kingdom of God, and He promised that all else that we need will be given when this becomes our primary vocation in life. The Course tells us plainly that forgiveness is our only function in the world (and that forgiveness, happiness, and joy are synonymous).
Why do we need forgiveness and the Atonement? Because we see the phenomenal world as the cause of our emotions, thoughts, and beliefs, and see our desires and prayers as attempts to countermand external causes. Forgiveness is the reversal of the mind, where we discover happiness and joy as the core of our Being, and effortlessly radiate this state of mind outward, to reflect only the Love that we are.
As we willingly accept the function of forgiveness as our only purpose here, we gradually shed the layers of indoctrinated belief, thought, and emotion. Yes, the world still appears to be here. But as we become clear of the images generated by false beliefs, thoughts, and emotions, we reflect only the Light of Truth, the Light of Love, the Light of the One Mind rather than the lie of fear and separation. This is what the Course calls the Happy Dream of the Holy Spirit, which is the earthly experience of Awakening and Enlightenment. Level confusion has vanished in the unified Awareness of Self. We now hear only One Voice, think only the thoughts of the One Mind, and so reflect this Light on earth, as it is in the Heaven of Enlightened Awareness.
"Heaven is not a place nor a condition. It is merely an Awareness of perfect Oneness, and the knowledge that there is nothing else; nothing outside this Oneness, and nothing else within." -- A Course in Miracles; 18, VI, 1:5-6
ACIM Teleclass every Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. Central time. For call-in number and access code, click here.
"Heaven is not a place nor a condition. It is merely an Awareness of perfect Oneness, and the knowledge that there is nothing else; nothing outside this Oneness, and nothing else within." -- A Course in Miracles; 18, VI, 1:5-6
ACIM Teleclass every Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. Central time. For call-in number and access code, click here.
Monday, April 22, 2013
Sharing and Ownership
"There are no strange images in the Mind of God, and what is not in His Mind cannot be in yours, because you are of One Mind, and that Mind belongs to Him. It is yours because it belongs to Him, for to Him ownership is sharing. And if it is so for Him, it is so for you." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 10, Section IV, 6:2-4
It's always amazing to me that after all these years, I still find sections of the Course that blow me away, as if I've never read them before. And this in spite of the heavy underlining and highlighting that shows I did indeed read it and find it important. But how could I miss the import of the statement, "It is yours because it belongs to Him, for to him ownership is sharing." There's no putting a spin on this statement. And then this morning I read in Workbook Lesson 106, "Thus does salvation start and thus it ends: when everything is yours, and everything is given away, it will remain with you forever." It doesn't say some things are given away... it states everything. And promises that because we give it away, we have it forever.
This is obviously not the way the world seems to work, and it certainly is not the way we have been taught to understand giving and receiving. It's radical and blunt... whatever we have must belong to all, because to God ownership is sharing, and so it must be for us. The Course tells us over and over in so many ways that to have, we have to give. Not giving to get, but giving because it's Who We Are... the outpouring of unconditioned and unconditional Love that simply extends for eternity.
I've always had the tendency to be idealistic and non-materialistic, as a child of the 60's and a life-long lover of the Spiritual. I remember as a youth being inspired by the book, Stranger in a Strange Land, with its message of Love without limits and sharing without boundaries. But all of my ideas and concepts through the years still centered on the notion of me in a body, and other people in the form of their bodies, attempting to share and love in a world of limitation and competition. It never works. These are the strange images the opening quotation refers to... images of discrete forms that seem to divide and limit the Oneness of Spirit. But no such strange images exist in the Real World.
The Course reminds us that we are not bodies... we are pure Spirit, the image and reflection of God: "I am as God created me." (ACIM Workbook Lesson 110) and "Spirit am I, a holy Son of God; free of all limits, safe and healed and whole; free to forgive, and free to save the world." (ACIM Workbook Lesson 97, 7:2) The dream world of strange images seems to come and go, seems to enjoy or seems to suffer. But consider all your night dreaming over the years. You have had dreams of every description, and have lived and died many times and in many ways. You have defied the seeming laws of the world, and failed and triumphed again and again. And yet, what real effects have any of those dreams had? Not one dream was ever cause of anything, and none of the seeming effects survived your waking. No dream analysis has ever done anything except give us a new story to tell. Our 'past lives' in dreams have absolutely no effect.. they are just dreams.
The really good news is that our supposed waking life is another layer of dreaming. "Hear the one answer of the Holy Spirit to all the questions the ego raises: You are a child of God, a priceless part of His Kingdom, which He created as part of Him. Nothing else exists and only this is Real. You have chosen a sleep in which you have had bad dreams, but the sleep is not real and God calls you to awake. There will be nothing left of your dream when you hear Him, because you will awaken. Your dreams contain many of the ego's symbols, and they have confused you. Yet that was only because you were asleep and did not know. When you wake you will see the Truth around you and in you, and you will no longer believe in dreams because they will have no reality for you." (ACIM Chapter 6, Section IV, 6:1-7)
Our Reality is the unified Oneness of Spirit, the unconditioned Awareness of One Self, One Mind, One Life and Love. Competition and ownership cease to have meaning in Oneness, for who would have more than another? Who in Oneness could possibly know anything other than perfect sharing with All? And what could be lacking in All? Our dreaming mind has imagined a self that is split into infinite pieces, projecting infinite dreams of competition, striving, ownership, and struggle... always in the vain attempt to reclaim for the split self the sense of wholeness and completion that seems to be lost in separation. The joke is that we never lost the Wholeness and Perfection we seek. And we regain our memory of our True Self by giving... as we give, as we share, as we no longer seek to divide and keep divided bits of life to ourselves through ownership, we re-discover the infinite Being that we are.
"God gave you all there is. And to be sure you could not lose it, did He also give the same to every living thing as well. And thus is every living thing a part of you, as of HimSelf." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 29, Section VIII, 9:7-9
It's always amazing to me that after all these years, I still find sections of the Course that blow me away, as if I've never read them before. And this in spite of the heavy underlining and highlighting that shows I did indeed read it and find it important. But how could I miss the import of the statement, "It is yours because it belongs to Him, for to him ownership is sharing." There's no putting a spin on this statement. And then this morning I read in Workbook Lesson 106, "Thus does salvation start and thus it ends: when everything is yours, and everything is given away, it will remain with you forever." It doesn't say some things are given away... it states everything. And promises that because we give it away, we have it forever.
This is obviously not the way the world seems to work, and it certainly is not the way we have been taught to understand giving and receiving. It's radical and blunt... whatever we have must belong to all, because to God ownership is sharing, and so it must be for us. The Course tells us over and over in so many ways that to have, we have to give. Not giving to get, but giving because it's Who We Are... the outpouring of unconditioned and unconditional Love that simply extends for eternity.
I've always had the tendency to be idealistic and non-materialistic, as a child of the 60's and a life-long lover of the Spiritual. I remember as a youth being inspired by the book, Stranger in a Strange Land, with its message of Love without limits and sharing without boundaries. But all of my ideas and concepts through the years still centered on the notion of me in a body, and other people in the form of their bodies, attempting to share and love in a world of limitation and competition. It never works. These are the strange images the opening quotation refers to... images of discrete forms that seem to divide and limit the Oneness of Spirit. But no such strange images exist in the Real World.
The Course reminds us that we are not bodies... we are pure Spirit, the image and reflection of God: "I am as God created me." (ACIM Workbook Lesson 110) and "Spirit am I, a holy Son of God; free of all limits, safe and healed and whole; free to forgive, and free to save the world." (ACIM Workbook Lesson 97, 7:2) The dream world of strange images seems to come and go, seems to enjoy or seems to suffer. But consider all your night dreaming over the years. You have had dreams of every description, and have lived and died many times and in many ways. You have defied the seeming laws of the world, and failed and triumphed again and again. And yet, what real effects have any of those dreams had? Not one dream was ever cause of anything, and none of the seeming effects survived your waking. No dream analysis has ever done anything except give us a new story to tell. Our 'past lives' in dreams have absolutely no effect.. they are just dreams.
The really good news is that our supposed waking life is another layer of dreaming. "Hear the one answer of the Holy Spirit to all the questions the ego raises: You are a child of God, a priceless part of His Kingdom, which He created as part of Him. Nothing else exists and only this is Real. You have chosen a sleep in which you have had bad dreams, but the sleep is not real and God calls you to awake. There will be nothing left of your dream when you hear Him, because you will awaken. Your dreams contain many of the ego's symbols, and they have confused you. Yet that was only because you were asleep and did not know. When you wake you will see the Truth around you and in you, and you will no longer believe in dreams because they will have no reality for you." (ACIM Chapter 6, Section IV, 6:1-7)
Our Reality is the unified Oneness of Spirit, the unconditioned Awareness of One Self, One Mind, One Life and Love. Competition and ownership cease to have meaning in Oneness, for who would have more than another? Who in Oneness could possibly know anything other than perfect sharing with All? And what could be lacking in All? Our dreaming mind has imagined a self that is split into infinite pieces, projecting infinite dreams of competition, striving, ownership, and struggle... always in the vain attempt to reclaim for the split self the sense of wholeness and completion that seems to be lost in separation. The joke is that we never lost the Wholeness and Perfection we seek. And we regain our memory of our True Self by giving... as we give, as we share, as we no longer seek to divide and keep divided bits of life to ourselves through ownership, we re-discover the infinite Being that we are.
"God gave you all there is. And to be sure you could not lose it, did He also give the same to every living thing as well. And thus is every living thing a part of you, as of HimSelf." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 29, Section VIII, 9:7-9
Monday, January 9, 2012
Back to the Basics
This morning I heard quite clearly to begin blogging again... and to title this entry 'back to the basics.' What exactly did I hear? In my understanding and interpretation of it, I heard my Self. In another interpretation it might be called inspiration. What I do know is that True experience always inspires and motivates me to inquire more deeply, to be more fully present in authentic ways, and to enjoy every minute of it.
As I inquire without an agenda, without a spiritual or scientific preconception or predisposition, these are the basics that occur to me as essential to experience the Truth of Being in my life:
1. Ask open questions... and be willing to hear different answers.
2. Be fully present with life, and appreciate it just as it is... even when it isn't comfortable or pleasant.
3. Be willing to be surprised and delighted and transformed.
4. Take joy in the simple and everyday... but don't be a slave to it.
5. Take joy in the unusual and abnormal... but don't be seduced by it.
6. In other words, take joy in letting everything be as it is, without judging it... and then...
7. Be willing to see it all differently.
8. Most of all, be willing to see your self differently, without definition or preconception.
9. Be willing to see through the eyes of the inclusive Self.
These are the basics I return to every day, whether it's through meditating, walking in the woods, sharing a meal with friends or family, working on a thorny computer issue, writing about technology or music or spirituality, or playing with my animals or grandchildren. It's all of a piece. There is no real separation... just categories of mind and consciousness that I have defined and that weave in and out of experience. It's up to me to return to the basics so I can live fully in an awareness of inclusivity, of my true Self that is all of it and more. How do I know? Back to the basics... inquiry and experience are the only true tests. Everything else is simply hearsay.
As I inquire without an agenda, without a spiritual or scientific preconception or predisposition, these are the basics that occur to me as essential to experience the Truth of Being in my life:
1. Ask open questions... and be willing to hear different answers.
2. Be fully present with life, and appreciate it just as it is... even when it isn't comfortable or pleasant.
3. Be willing to be surprised and delighted and transformed.
4. Take joy in the simple and everyday... but don't be a slave to it.
5. Take joy in the unusual and abnormal... but don't be seduced by it.
6. In other words, take joy in letting everything be as it is, without judging it... and then...
7. Be willing to see it all differently.
8. Most of all, be willing to see your self differently, without definition or preconception.
9. Be willing to see through the eyes of the inclusive Self.
These are the basics I return to every day, whether it's through meditating, walking in the woods, sharing a meal with friends or family, working on a thorny computer issue, writing about technology or music or spirituality, or playing with my animals or grandchildren. It's all of a piece. There is no real separation... just categories of mind and consciousness that I have defined and that weave in and out of experience. It's up to me to return to the basics so I can live fully in an awareness of inclusivity, of my true Self that is all of it and more. How do I know? Back to the basics... inquiry and experience are the only true tests. Everything else is simply hearsay.
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Self to Self
Wow, it's been nearly a month since I posted last. I have had many inspired thoughts, but no inspiration to write about it. This morning I read a great quote from Margaret Laird that expresses this perfectly: "There was a time I believed that I read or listened to others to find out what others thought. Now I know I read and listen to another's speaking to discover what I am [the I AM] thinking. We cannot expect to find Truth outside of our own awareness." This past month, I spent a lot of time looking inward, listening to the Voice of I Am, and inquiring deeper into the appearance of things. It's been fruitful, though challenging.
The challenge is the deeper recognition that duality in all its forms is only appearance, and that appearance is always and only my own conceptualization of what appears. Mary Baker Eddy said, "Can you see an enemy, except you first formulate this enemy and then look upon the object of your own conception?" Without those concepts, duality (subject and object consciousness) dissolves or resolves (words are inadequate here) into Truth, which is experienced as Oneness, a unity, a whole, with no opposites or contraries or negations.
This going deeper involves seeing that everything we perceive in the phenomenal world is a duality: I perceive goodness, but it is my concept of goodness, which is based on the opposite of what I perceive as badness. I perceive supply, or income, but it is my concept of income, based on the opposite of what I conceive as lack or poverty. I perceive kindness, but it is my concept of kindness, based on what I conceive of as unkind or hateful or spiteful. I'm really just wandering around in a world of concepts, rather than experiencing Goodness, Supply, or Kindness (Love), which are a unity without opposite because they are All-Inclusive. We can't conceive of Oneness. But we can become Aware of It, since It is the Truth of everyone and everything.
A Course in Miracles puts it this way: "When you decide upon the form of what you want, you lose the understanding of its purpose. Wholeness has no form because it is unlimited." In duality thinking (which is all thinking), what we lose is the Awareness of Wholeness. And as we gradually glimpse the deeper meaning of the oft-misunderstood Biblical statement: "Take no thought," we become explorers of this dawning Awareness, which includes everything but is not defined by any of it. It heals and blesses, but not for any reason we could give conceptually. It simply IS the Reality of All.
How do you write about this? How do you speak of It? Which is why I haven't been inspired to write much over the past month. And then I read Margaret Laird this morning, as she explained that the only reason anyone writes is to know their own mind. So I'm writing this morning, to clarify for myself this deepening Awareness of Self.
To paraphrase Margaret Laird again, the individual living Self-consciously as Mind (Unconditioned Awareness, Oneness... concepts fail here) evolves an apparent ego-image never afraid for itself, never taking thought for itself as 'I', as well as a physical body that is self-restoring as long as it is apparently needed. The ego-image which evolves from this Awareness (that the only 'I' is the Mind of Unconditioned Awareness, our very Self) never reacts to concepts and situations, but always acts with intelligence. It has no power to save itself, fix itself up, or transcend itself. The Mind (the Unconditioned Awareness of 'I' that is Self) is its existence and its power for constant newness and freshness. In this Light everything takes on the loveliness of perfection, beyond all concepts.
Of course, all of this exercise in giving voice to the unspeakable is just a smokescreen... the inclusive Reality is that only the 'I' is writing and reading this, and only the 'I' knows its Self. There's only One.
"The world can teach no images of you unless you want to learn them. There will come a time when images have all gone by... It is to this unsealed and open mind that Truth returns, unhindered and unbound. Where concepts of the self have been laid by is Truth revealed exactly as it is." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section V, 17:1-4
The challenge is the deeper recognition that duality in all its forms is only appearance, and that appearance is always and only my own conceptualization of what appears. Mary Baker Eddy said, "Can you see an enemy, except you first formulate this enemy and then look upon the object of your own conception?" Without those concepts, duality (subject and object consciousness) dissolves or resolves (words are inadequate here) into Truth, which is experienced as Oneness, a unity, a whole, with no opposites or contraries or negations.
This going deeper involves seeing that everything we perceive in the phenomenal world is a duality: I perceive goodness, but it is my concept of goodness, which is based on the opposite of what I perceive as badness. I perceive supply, or income, but it is my concept of income, based on the opposite of what I conceive as lack or poverty. I perceive kindness, but it is my concept of kindness, based on what I conceive of as unkind or hateful or spiteful. I'm really just wandering around in a world of concepts, rather than experiencing Goodness, Supply, or Kindness (Love), which are a unity without opposite because they are All-Inclusive. We can't conceive of Oneness. But we can become Aware of It, since It is the Truth of everyone and everything.
A Course in Miracles puts it this way: "When you decide upon the form of what you want, you lose the understanding of its purpose. Wholeness has no form because it is unlimited." In duality thinking (which is all thinking), what we lose is the Awareness of Wholeness. And as we gradually glimpse the deeper meaning of the oft-misunderstood Biblical statement: "Take no thought," we become explorers of this dawning Awareness, which includes everything but is not defined by any of it. It heals and blesses, but not for any reason we could give conceptually. It simply IS the Reality of All.
How do you write about this? How do you speak of It? Which is why I haven't been inspired to write much over the past month. And then I read Margaret Laird this morning, as she explained that the only reason anyone writes is to know their own mind. So I'm writing this morning, to clarify for myself this deepening Awareness of Self.
To paraphrase Margaret Laird again, the individual living Self-consciously as Mind (Unconditioned Awareness, Oneness... concepts fail here) evolves an apparent ego-image never afraid for itself, never taking thought for itself as 'I', as well as a physical body that is self-restoring as long as it is apparently needed. The ego-image which evolves from this Awareness (that the only 'I' is the Mind of Unconditioned Awareness, our very Self) never reacts to concepts and situations, but always acts with intelligence. It has no power to save itself, fix itself up, or transcend itself. The Mind (the Unconditioned Awareness of 'I' that is Self) is its existence and its power for constant newness and freshness. In this Light everything takes on the loveliness of perfection, beyond all concepts.
Of course, all of this exercise in giving voice to the unspeakable is just a smokescreen... the inclusive Reality is that only the 'I' is writing and reading this, and only the 'I' knows its Self. There's only One.
"The world can teach no images of you unless you want to learn them. There will come a time when images have all gone by... It is to this unsealed and open mind that Truth returns, unhindered and unbound. Where concepts of the self have been laid by is Truth revealed exactly as it is." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section V, 17:1-4
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Magnification
"Trusting your brothers is essential to establishing and holding up your faith in your ability to transcend doubt and lack of sure conviction in yourself. When you attack a brother, you proclaim that he is limited by what you have perceived in him. You do not look beyond his errors. Rather, they are magnified, becoming blocks to your awareness of the Self that lies beyond your own mistakes, and past his seeming sins as well as yours." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 181, 1:1-4
"Magnify (mag-ni-fi) verb: To enlarge in fact or appearance; to cause to be held in greater esteem or respect." -- Merriam-Webster Dictionary
I've always loved the Magnificat, Mary's Song as she becomes impregnated by the Holy Spirit: "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit doth rejoice in God my Savior." (The Bible; Luke 1:46) These words have come to mind many times in my life, when no other words could express the awe and wonder of the moment. I've often reflected on the concept of magnification, and when I re-read the above passage from A Course in Miracles, I realize that it's really all about focus.
We are transparencies for the Light and Love of God... a sort of spiritual lens, meant to magnify and reflect only God, which is of course all there really is. The problem seems to be that we are intent on magnifying the false, the transitory... the antithesis of God, as if there could be anything other than God. This is the collective compulsion of the world we have projected, for the simple reason that it's our compulsion and our projection!
We are very much like children intent on living in fantasy. We train our children carefully to live in fantasy. We encourage them and provide them with endless toys and tools to do this... another projected magnification of our own compulsions. So you see that all perception has a focus, and it is always an intentional magnification of what we want to project. This seems to be less than conscious. But notice how your experience of any situation changes as your focus changes... whatever you're focusing on is magnified in your experience. It's this selective tunnel vision that dictates your experience at any given moment.
Forgiveness is the process of changing our focus. We cease to focus on the flaws, the problems, the sins... we refocus on what is true. We release our insistence on worshipping the projected problems and discomforts, and magnify instead the innocence and peace of God that is really here, this very now. Changing focus in this way requires a commitment to Truth instead of our habitual perceptions. To magnify God in our lives instead of our fantasies means we have to stop glorifying our imagined self and its serial adventures.
The good news is that this really requires nothing at all... even the re-focusing is a symbol within the dream of separation from God. We can't be separate from what is forever One. We can't magnify what isn't there. Like children being brought in from imaginary play to the loving arms of their family, we return to our Self in God through the magnification of our own innocence and perfection.
"Nor do we ask for fantasies. For what we seek to look upon is really there. And as our focus goes beyond mistakes, we will behold a wholly sinless world. When seeing this is all we want to see, when this is all we seek for in the name of true perception, are the eyes of Christ inevitably ours. And the Love He feels for us becomes our own as well. This will become the only thing we see reflected in the world and in ourselves." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 181, 8:1-6
"Magnify (mag-ni-fi) verb: To enlarge in fact or appearance; to cause to be held in greater esteem or respect." -- Merriam-Webster Dictionary
I've always loved the Magnificat, Mary's Song as she becomes impregnated by the Holy Spirit: "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit doth rejoice in God my Savior." (The Bible; Luke 1:46) These words have come to mind many times in my life, when no other words could express the awe and wonder of the moment. I've often reflected on the concept of magnification, and when I re-read the above passage from A Course in Miracles, I realize that it's really all about focus.
We are transparencies for the Light and Love of God... a sort of spiritual lens, meant to magnify and reflect only God, which is of course all there really is. The problem seems to be that we are intent on magnifying the false, the transitory... the antithesis of God, as if there could be anything other than God. This is the collective compulsion of the world we have projected, for the simple reason that it's our compulsion and our projection!
We are very much like children intent on living in fantasy. We train our children carefully to live in fantasy. We encourage them and provide them with endless toys and tools to do this... another projected magnification of our own compulsions. So you see that all perception has a focus, and it is always an intentional magnification of what we want to project. This seems to be less than conscious. But notice how your experience of any situation changes as your focus changes... whatever you're focusing on is magnified in your experience. It's this selective tunnel vision that dictates your experience at any given moment.
Forgiveness is the process of changing our focus. We cease to focus on the flaws, the problems, the sins... we refocus on what is true. We release our insistence on worshipping the projected problems and discomforts, and magnify instead the innocence and peace of God that is really here, this very now. Changing focus in this way requires a commitment to Truth instead of our habitual perceptions. To magnify God in our lives instead of our fantasies means we have to stop glorifying our imagined self and its serial adventures.
The good news is that this really requires nothing at all... even the re-focusing is a symbol within the dream of separation from God. We can't be separate from what is forever One. We can't magnify what isn't there. Like children being brought in from imaginary play to the loving arms of their family, we return to our Self in God through the magnification of our own innocence and perfection.
"Nor do we ask for fantasies. For what we seek to look upon is really there. And as our focus goes beyond mistakes, we will behold a wholly sinless world. When seeing this is all we want to see, when this is all we seek for in the name of true perception, are the eyes of Christ inevitably ours. And the Love He feels for us becomes our own as well. This will become the only thing we see reflected in the world and in ourselves." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 181, 8:1-6
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Never Alone
"This world is but the dream that you can be alone, and think without affecting those apart from you. To be alone must mean you are apart. It is like the house set upon straw. It seems to be quite solid and substantial in itself. Yet its stability cannot be judged apart from its foundation. If it rests on straw, there is no need to bar the door and lock the windows and make fast the bolts. The wind will topple it, and rain will come and carry it into oblivion. What can be safe that rests upon a shadow?" -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 28, Section VII, 5:2-3, 7-11, 6:3
It's interesting that the above passage from A Course in Miracles points to the concept of aloneness as a house built on straw. The idea of being alone is the belief that all things are separate, because we imagine ourselves to be separate from our Source. This tiny false idea is the basis of a whole world of prodigal sons, trying to make their way home to what they never left.
On the other hand, ACIM reminds us that a solid foundation is based on our relationship with every living thing, for as we acknowledge the innocence and perfection of our brothers and sisters, we remember our own. "Your home is built upon your brother's health, upon his happiness, his sinlessness, and everything his Father promised him. The winds will blow upon it and the rain will beat against it, but with no effect. The world will wash away, and yet this house will stand forever, for its strength lies not within itself alone. It is an ark of safety, resting on God's promise that His Son is safe forever in Himself." Not alone.
We can no more be separate from the rest of life than we could ever be separated from our Source, from God. We are literally reflections of the Light shining in God's Mind, and have no being or will or qualities apart from God. We are God in expression, innocent and free as God created us... all of us together. This Principle of Oneness is the Ground of Being... our Home built upon the unshakable foundation of Truth. For we are One with God and with each other. And we are never alone.
"There is no time, no place, no state where God is absent. There is nothing to be feared. There is no way in which a gap could be conceived of in the Wholeness that is His. God asks for nothing, and His Son, like Him, need ask for nothing. For there is no lack in him." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 29, Section I, 1:1-3, and Chapter 28, Section VII, 1:1-2
It's interesting that the above passage from A Course in Miracles points to the concept of aloneness as a house built on straw. The idea of being alone is the belief that all things are separate, because we imagine ourselves to be separate from our Source. This tiny false idea is the basis of a whole world of prodigal sons, trying to make their way home to what they never left.
On the other hand, ACIM reminds us that a solid foundation is based on our relationship with every living thing, for as we acknowledge the innocence and perfection of our brothers and sisters, we remember our own. "Your home is built upon your brother's health, upon his happiness, his sinlessness, and everything his Father promised him. The winds will blow upon it and the rain will beat against it, but with no effect. The world will wash away, and yet this house will stand forever, for its strength lies not within itself alone. It is an ark of safety, resting on God's promise that His Son is safe forever in Himself." Not alone.
We can no more be separate from the rest of life than we could ever be separated from our Source, from God. We are literally reflections of the Light shining in God's Mind, and have no being or will or qualities apart from God. We are God in expression, innocent and free as God created us... all of us together. This Principle of Oneness is the Ground of Being... our Home built upon the unshakable foundation of Truth. For we are One with God and with each other. And we are never alone.
"There is no time, no place, no state where God is absent. There is nothing to be feared. There is no way in which a gap could be conceived of in the Wholeness that is His. God asks for nothing, and His Son, like Him, need ask for nothing. For there is no lack in him." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 29, Section I, 1:1-3, and Chapter 28, Section VII, 1:1-2
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Gang Wars
"You always choose between your weakness and the strength of Christ in you. And what you choose is what you think is real. Simply by never using weakness to direct your actions, you have given it no power. And the light of Christ in you is given charge of everything you do." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 2:3-6
I was watching some crime drama on T.V. (don't ask me why!) and I saw very clearly the choices that led a young man from a good family to become a member of a street gang... and not just a member, but an active participant in an ongoing war against other street gangs. The choices he made were always based on who he thought he was, and where his safety and fulfillment could be found. Wrong choice after wrong choice led him to a nasty ending. Does this sound familiar?
I love how extreme examples in our lives and cultures serve to show us our own mental choices. We project them and create cultural stories and tragedies to pretend they are 'out there.' We live in perpetual cultural gang wars... clashing ideas, values, stories, all seemingly competing for our time, our allegiance, our money, and our very souls. What gang do you belong to? What are your colors?
I used to belong to the 'spiritual' gang. We tend to act like we're not a gang, but we are. We pretend we're lacking enlightenment, so we have to perpetually seek fulfillment. We attack the culture and society that seem to prevent us from living as we want to live, that doesn't seem to honor us or understand us. We pretend to be 'better' and more evolved, and so we are entitled to judge the other gangs. We think our safety and fulfillment lie in these games. We are no different than any other gang. We are mentally at war with the world.
Every country, every culture, every political party, every passionate cause, and even every family has its colors and its gang culture. We all belong to gangs within gangs, and sometimes our gang wars overlap and intertwine with each other. But make no mistake... every conflict, no matter how mild, is the result of gang wars, always based on choosing to value a weak and fictional self as real. "Trials are but lessons that you failed to learn presented once again, so where you made a faulty choice before you now can make a better one, and thus escape all pain that what you chose before has brought to you. In every difficulty, all distress, and each perplexity Christ calls to you and gently says, "My brother, choose again." He would not leave one source of pain unhealed, nor any image left to veil the Truth." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 3:1-3
How simple to realize that we are always choosing between the false self, the gang member, or our True Self, the Christ in us! The false self is like that boy in the crime drama... he thought he was weak and limited, thought he needed to belong to a gang to be strong and protected. Was he ever wrong! And so are we. "The images you make cannot prevail against what God HimSelf would have you be. Be never fearful of temptation then, but see it as it is; another chance to choose again, and let Christ's strength [your True Self] prevail in every circumstance and every place you raised an image of yourself before. You are as God created you, and so is every living thing you look upon, regardless of the images you see. What you behold as sickness and as pain, as weakness and as suffering and loss, is but temptation to perceive yourself defenseless and in hell. Yield not to this, and you will see all pain, in every form, wherever it occurs, but disappear as mists before the sun." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 31, Section VIII, 4:1-2 & 6:1-3
Wow. This seems too good to be true, doesn't it? And besides, we are loyal to our gangs. Our family is still our family. We should be grateful to belong to (fill in the blank). Our family, country, church, school, group, etc. is so much better, isn't it? What if we belonged to that country? What if we had those people as relatives? What if, what if, what if... an endless litany of justification for our choices of misplaced allegiance and mis-identification. We feel safe and protected by the numbing familiarity of belonging. And we never question.
But we can always choose again. As Scarlett said, "Tomorrow is another day." Each instant is new, fresh, infinite in possibility and beauty. We have only to choose again. Gang wars only go on as long as we think there are separate, conflicting gangs. When we remember that we are collectively One Self, one with God and everything that lives, there can be no more war... only endless love, appreciation, and joy. We have simply awakened to the Truth, safe in God.
"Learn then the happy habit of response to all temptation to perceive yourself as weak and miserable with these words: I Am as God created me. His Son can suffer nothing. And I Am His Son. Thus is Christ's strength invited to prevail, replacing all your weakness with the strength that comes from God and that can never fail. And thus are miracles as natural as fear and agony appeared to be before the choice for holiness was made. For in this choice are false distinctions gone, illusory alternatives laid by, and nothing left to interfere with Truth." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 5:1-7
I was watching some crime drama on T.V. (don't ask me why!) and I saw very clearly the choices that led a young man from a good family to become a member of a street gang... and not just a member, but an active participant in an ongoing war against other street gangs. The choices he made were always based on who he thought he was, and where his safety and fulfillment could be found. Wrong choice after wrong choice led him to a nasty ending. Does this sound familiar?
I love how extreme examples in our lives and cultures serve to show us our own mental choices. We project them and create cultural stories and tragedies to pretend they are 'out there.' We live in perpetual cultural gang wars... clashing ideas, values, stories, all seemingly competing for our time, our allegiance, our money, and our very souls. What gang do you belong to? What are your colors?
I used to belong to the 'spiritual' gang. We tend to act like we're not a gang, but we are. We pretend we're lacking enlightenment, so we have to perpetually seek fulfillment. We attack the culture and society that seem to prevent us from living as we want to live, that doesn't seem to honor us or understand us. We pretend to be 'better' and more evolved, and so we are entitled to judge the other gangs. We think our safety and fulfillment lie in these games. We are no different than any other gang. We are mentally at war with the world.
Every country, every culture, every political party, every passionate cause, and even every family has its colors and its gang culture. We all belong to gangs within gangs, and sometimes our gang wars overlap and intertwine with each other. But make no mistake... every conflict, no matter how mild, is the result of gang wars, always based on choosing to value a weak and fictional self as real. "Trials are but lessons that you failed to learn presented once again, so where you made a faulty choice before you now can make a better one, and thus escape all pain that what you chose before has brought to you. In every difficulty, all distress, and each perplexity Christ calls to you and gently says, "My brother, choose again." He would not leave one source of pain unhealed, nor any image left to veil the Truth." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 3:1-3
How simple to realize that we are always choosing between the false self, the gang member, or our True Self, the Christ in us! The false self is like that boy in the crime drama... he thought he was weak and limited, thought he needed to belong to a gang to be strong and protected. Was he ever wrong! And so are we. "The images you make cannot prevail against what God HimSelf would have you be. Be never fearful of temptation then, but see it as it is; another chance to choose again, and let Christ's strength [your True Self] prevail in every circumstance and every place you raised an image of yourself before. You are as God created you, and so is every living thing you look upon, regardless of the images you see. What you behold as sickness and as pain, as weakness and as suffering and loss, is but temptation to perceive yourself defenseless and in hell. Yield not to this, and you will see all pain, in every form, wherever it occurs, but disappear as mists before the sun." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 31, Section VIII, 4:1-2 & 6:1-3
Wow. This seems too good to be true, doesn't it? And besides, we are loyal to our gangs. Our family is still our family. We should be grateful to belong to (fill in the blank). Our family, country, church, school, group, etc. is so much better, isn't it? What if we belonged to that country? What if we had those people as relatives? What if, what if, what if... an endless litany of justification for our choices of misplaced allegiance and mis-identification. We feel safe and protected by the numbing familiarity of belonging. And we never question.
But we can always choose again. As Scarlett said, "Tomorrow is another day." Each instant is new, fresh, infinite in possibility and beauty. We have only to choose again. Gang wars only go on as long as we think there are separate, conflicting gangs. When we remember that we are collectively One Self, one with God and everything that lives, there can be no more war... only endless love, appreciation, and joy. We have simply awakened to the Truth, safe in God.
"Learn then the happy habit of response to all temptation to perceive yourself as weak and miserable with these words: I Am as God created me. His Son can suffer nothing. And I Am His Son. Thus is Christ's strength invited to prevail, replacing all your weakness with the strength that comes from God and that can never fail. And thus are miracles as natural as fear and agony appeared to be before the choice for holiness was made. For in this choice are false distinctions gone, illusory alternatives laid by, and nothing left to interfere with Truth." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 5:1-7
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!
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