In this so-called life, decisions make up every minute of every day. Even my youngest grandson is choosing his state of mind minute by minute, second by second. I can see the impulses arise and cross his little three-month-old face like clouds. I can see the second he decides to smile instead of cry. I can see him struggle to give voice (and I mean voice) to his discomfort. Little Kai Joseph is just like us... choosing to react to external forms, or to interact with the Love that is in him and all around him, always.
We're not talking about will-power here. That's the mistaken belief that we can exert control over our bodies and other forms in the external world. As Mary Baker Eddy put it, "Will power is a product of belief... and is not a faculty of Soul. Hence it cannot govern man aright." And A Course in Miracles says it very simply: "There is no Will but God's."
So what are all the decisions we make every day? We have to first remember that all decisions are of the mind, and have nothing to do with form. My grandson's decisions may reflect in his face, but it's all in his mind. Similarly, our minute-by-minute decisions are mental processes. The illusion of a world arises from these mental projections. "Perception is a mirror, not a fact. And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward." (A Course in Miracles; Workbook 304, 1:3-4)
Decisions, decisions... how can we make decisions, then, if we're not in our right mind... if we think we've made a will other than God's? Again, A Course in Miracles gives us a way out: "Let us today be truly humble, and accept what we have made as what it is. The power of decision is our own. Decide but to accept your rightful place as co-creator of the universe, and all you think you made will disappear. What rises to awareness then will be all that there ever was, eternally as it is now. And it will take the place of self-deceptions made but to usurp the altar to the Father and the Son." (A Course in Miracles; Workbook 152, 8:1-5)
Decisions are continuous, and we are always looking at only two choices, two mental states. Our True Self, the Son of God Who is Peace and Love and Life and Reality... or an illusion of a separate self, which projects as fear and lack and limitation and death. We know which we're choosing by our state of mind.
"You who perceive yourself as weak and frail, with futile hopes and devastated dreams, born but to die, to weep and suffer pain, hear this: All power is given unto you in earth and Heaven. There is nothing that you cannot do. Then let the Son of God awaken from his sleep, and opening his holy eyes, return again to bless the world he made. In error it began, but it will end in the reflection of His holiness." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 191, 9:1-2 & 10:1-2
Showing posts with label Will. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Will. Show all posts
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Saturday, September 11, 2010
The Judge of What You Are
"Let Him be Judge of what you are, for He has certainty in which there is no doubt, because it rests on Certainty so great that doubt is meaningless before Its Face. Christ cannot doubt HimSelf. The Voice for God can only honor Him, rejoicing in His perfect, everlasting sinlessness. Whom He has judged can only laugh at guilt, unwilling now to play with toys of sin; unheeding of the body's witnesses before the rapture of Christ's holy face. And thus He judges YOU." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 8:1-4
Wow, in the last couple of days alone I have had five or six conversations with people who are judging themselves very harshly. This is of course my own journey as well, so it's a wonderful opportunity to see my projections in living color.
Who is the judge of who and what I am? I've taken it upon myself to judge my inadequacies at every opportunity. I've imagined I see the physical flaws, the mental limitations, the emotional vulnerability, the failures and the successes as I judge them. These are the false perceptions that begin within and are projected without as a flawed and struggling world full of flawed and struggling people. Whether I see them as enemies or friends is irrelevant. I don't see them at all. I see my projections, and nothing else. "You cannot judge. You merely can believe the ego's judgements, all of which are false. It guides your senses carefully, to prove how weak you are; how helpless and afraid, how apprehensive of just punishment, how black with sin, how wretched in your guilt." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 4:3-5
But we all know how very familiar and real this false sense of self and other seems to us. The compulsion to live our life as this false self dictates is nearly overwhelming at times. How do we stop this addictive and destructive behavior, this constant judging of everyone and everything, this constant assumption that we know who we are and what we're doing? ACIM says we must learn to doubt the evidence of our senses rather than our Self. As we cease to judge according to appearances, we "clear the way to recognize Self, and let the Voice for God alone be Judge of what is worthy of belief."
And so we come down to it, once again. Forgiveness is our function here, not judgment. We do not and cannot know the big picture while we walk about in this dream world. But we can forgive and release our judgments to One Who Knows, and allow Him to lead the way. "Let Him be Judge as well of everything that seems to happen to you in this world. His lessons will enable you to bridge the [seeming] gap between illusions and Truth. He will remove all faith you have placed in pain, disaster, suffering, and loss. He gives you Vision which looks beyond these grim appearances and beholds the gentle face of Christ in all of them. You will no longer doubt that only good can come to you who are beloved of God, for He will judge all happenings and teach the single lesson that they all contain." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 9:6-7, 10:1-3
And what is the single lesson that everything contains? "Let Him evaluate each thought that comes to mind, removing the elements of dreams, and give them back again as clean ideas that do not contradict the Will of God. Give Him your thoughts, and He will give them back as miracles which joyously proclaim the wholeness and the happiness God wills His Son, as proof of His eternal Love." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 13:4, 14:1
The single lesson is always that the Son of God that we are remains in God, sinless and eternally perfect and beloved and loving. And no dreams or fantasies have ever had the slightest effect on this Reality.
God is the only judge of what you are, and what I am, and what all creation is. And the single judgment is always the Truth about the Son of God.
"As each thought is thus transformed, it takes on healing power from the Mind which saw the Truth in it and failed to be deceived by what was falsely added. All the threads of fantasy are gone. And what remains is unified into a perfect Thought that offers its perfection everywhere. Your ministry begins as all your thoughts are purified. So are you taught to teach the Son of God the holy lesson of his sanctity." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 14:2-4, 15:2-3
Wow, in the last couple of days alone I have had five or six conversations with people who are judging themselves very harshly. This is of course my own journey as well, so it's a wonderful opportunity to see my projections in living color.
Who is the judge of who and what I am? I've taken it upon myself to judge my inadequacies at every opportunity. I've imagined I see the physical flaws, the mental limitations, the emotional vulnerability, the failures and the successes as I judge them. These are the false perceptions that begin within and are projected without as a flawed and struggling world full of flawed and struggling people. Whether I see them as enemies or friends is irrelevant. I don't see them at all. I see my projections, and nothing else. "You cannot judge. You merely can believe the ego's judgements, all of which are false. It guides your senses carefully, to prove how weak you are; how helpless and afraid, how apprehensive of just punishment, how black with sin, how wretched in your guilt." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 4:3-5
But we all know how very familiar and real this false sense of self and other seems to us. The compulsion to live our life as this false self dictates is nearly overwhelming at times. How do we stop this addictive and destructive behavior, this constant judging of everyone and everything, this constant assumption that we know who we are and what we're doing? ACIM says we must learn to doubt the evidence of our senses rather than our Self. As we cease to judge according to appearances, we "clear the way to recognize Self, and let the Voice for God alone be Judge of what is worthy of belief."
And so we come down to it, once again. Forgiveness is our function here, not judgment. We do not and cannot know the big picture while we walk about in this dream world. But we can forgive and release our judgments to One Who Knows, and allow Him to lead the way. "Let Him be Judge as well of everything that seems to happen to you in this world. His lessons will enable you to bridge the [seeming] gap between illusions and Truth. He will remove all faith you have placed in pain, disaster, suffering, and loss. He gives you Vision which looks beyond these grim appearances and beholds the gentle face of Christ in all of them. You will no longer doubt that only good can come to you who are beloved of God, for He will judge all happenings and teach the single lesson that they all contain." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 9:6-7, 10:1-3
And what is the single lesson that everything contains? "Let Him evaluate each thought that comes to mind, removing the elements of dreams, and give them back again as clean ideas that do not contradict the Will of God. Give Him your thoughts, and He will give them back as miracles which joyously proclaim the wholeness and the happiness God wills His Son, as proof of His eternal Love." -- ACIM; Workbook 151, 13:4, 14:1
The single lesson is always that the Son of God that we are remains in God, sinless and eternally perfect and beloved and loving. And no dreams or fantasies have ever had the slightest effect on this Reality.
God is the only judge of what you are, and what I am, and what all creation is. And the single judgment is always the Truth about the Son of God.
"As each thought is thus transformed, it takes on healing power from the Mind which saw the Truth in it and failed to be deceived by what was falsely added. All the threads of fantasy are gone. And what remains is unified into a perfect Thought that offers its perfection everywhere. Your ministry begins as all your thoughts are purified. So are you taught to teach the Son of God the holy lesson of his sanctity." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 14:2-4, 15:2-3
Monday, August 30, 2010
God's Will
First I want to let my readers know that I have a CD for sale, with proceeds going to The Claire Foundation Animal Sanctuary. All the hymns on it are Acappella, and recorded live at St. Vincent's-in-the-Vineyard. You can hear cuts from it on my YouTube channel. Thanks for supporting the animals! And FYI, you can download individual mp3s for only $1.99 each.
Now for the quote that inspired today's blog:
"God's Will is One, not many. It has no opposition, for there is none beside it." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 19, IV, 3:5-6
It's hard to find a phrase that instills such varied reactions as 'God's Will.' For many of us, it conjures pious, judgmental comments made after natural disasters or sudden deaths. For almost everyone it raises a sense of unease and fear... because hey, who the heck knows what God's Will for us is? It could be bad, it could be something punitive so we can 'learn our lessons.' Isn't that how most human parents operate? Don't we unconsciously model our ideas of God after our human notions of authority?
So this quote can be hard to take in. We may hear it, but gloss over it. God's Will is ONE, not many. IT HAS NO OPPOSITION, because there isn't anything else. Only God. We live and move and have our being IN THIS ONENESS. So logically there isn't my will and then God's Will imposed on me from without. There is only God, only God's Will, appearing AS me, and AS you. That we have convinced ourselves and each other that we are separate bodies and lives is irrelevant, because it's not true.
This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from the movie "The Matrix." A little psychic boy is bending spoons with his mind, and offers Keanu Reeves' character the chance to try it. He isn't having much luck, and the little boy simply says, "Don't try and bend the spoon. Know that there is no spoon." And then of course, the spoon bends.
Joel Goldsmith told a similar story. He was traveling and arrived at his destination only to hear that his luggage had been lost. He spent the next couple of days practicing scientific prayer, knowing that what belonged to him could never be lost, etc. But his luggage did not show up. Finally in meditation the answer came to him... there was no lost luggage! There are no opposites or oppositions in all God's Kingdom, there is only God! Of course, his luggage then 'showed up' unexpectedly.
Jesus taught us this Truth when he said, "Seek ye first the Kingdom (the Oneness of God) and all else will be added unto you." We just have it upside down and backwards, thinking that cause and effect lie within the world, in our actions and reactions, or even in our thoughts. If there is no Will but God's, it also holds that there are no real Thoughts but God's. Everything else is the dreaming of the mind that imagines itself to be separate. And no matter what we imagine in our dreaming, we remain safe in God, eternally.
There is great peace in this awareness. "Peace has replaced the strange idea that you are torn by conflicting goals. As an expression of the Will of God, you have no goal but His." (ACIM; Workbook 74, 1:5-6) We don't have to struggle humanly to figure it all out. God's Will is always Love, Goodness, Happiness, Peace, Abundance, Joy, and endless Life. And as we trust God with each holy instant of our lives, we are led by Grace.
"He leadeth me in paths of righteousness, for His Name's sake." -- Psalm 23
"Today I will recognize that all this has not occurred. I am safe because there is no will but God's." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 87, 3:5-6
Now for the quote that inspired today's blog:
"God's Will is One, not many. It has no opposition, for there is none beside it." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 19, IV, 3:5-6
It's hard to find a phrase that instills such varied reactions as 'God's Will.' For many of us, it conjures pious, judgmental comments made after natural disasters or sudden deaths. For almost everyone it raises a sense of unease and fear... because hey, who the heck knows what God's Will for us is? It could be bad, it could be something punitive so we can 'learn our lessons.' Isn't that how most human parents operate? Don't we unconsciously model our ideas of God after our human notions of authority?
So this quote can be hard to take in. We may hear it, but gloss over it. God's Will is ONE, not many. IT HAS NO OPPOSITION, because there isn't anything else. Only God. We live and move and have our being IN THIS ONENESS. So logically there isn't my will and then God's Will imposed on me from without. There is only God, only God's Will, appearing AS me, and AS you. That we have convinced ourselves and each other that we are separate bodies and lives is irrelevant, because it's not true.
This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from the movie "The Matrix." A little psychic boy is bending spoons with his mind, and offers Keanu Reeves' character the chance to try it. He isn't having much luck, and the little boy simply says, "Don't try and bend the spoon. Know that there is no spoon." And then of course, the spoon bends.
Joel Goldsmith told a similar story. He was traveling and arrived at his destination only to hear that his luggage had been lost. He spent the next couple of days practicing scientific prayer, knowing that what belonged to him could never be lost, etc. But his luggage did not show up. Finally in meditation the answer came to him... there was no lost luggage! There are no opposites or oppositions in all God's Kingdom, there is only God! Of course, his luggage then 'showed up' unexpectedly.
Jesus taught us this Truth when he said, "Seek ye first the Kingdom (the Oneness of God) and all else will be added unto you." We just have it upside down and backwards, thinking that cause and effect lie within the world, in our actions and reactions, or even in our thoughts. If there is no Will but God's, it also holds that there are no real Thoughts but God's. Everything else is the dreaming of the mind that imagines itself to be separate. And no matter what we imagine in our dreaming, we remain safe in God, eternally.
There is great peace in this awareness. "Peace has replaced the strange idea that you are torn by conflicting goals. As an expression of the Will of God, you have no goal but His." (ACIM; Workbook 74, 1:5-6) We don't have to struggle humanly to figure it all out. God's Will is always Love, Goodness, Happiness, Peace, Abundance, Joy, and endless Life. And as we trust God with each holy instant of our lives, we are led by Grace.
"He leadeth me in paths of righteousness, for His Name's sake." -- Psalm 23
"Today I will recognize that all this has not occurred. I am safe because there is no will but God's." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 87, 3:5-6
Friday, April 17, 2009
Being True to what is True
"Everyone stumbles over the truth from time to time, but most people pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened." -- Winston Churchill
"What can correct illusions but Truth? And what are errors but illusions that remain unrecognized for what they are? Where Truth has entered errors disappear. They merely vanish, leaving not a trace by which to be remembered. They are gone because, without belief, they have no life." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 107, 1:1-5
How often in this world have you stumbled onto the truth about something or someone, and yet continued on as if it weren't true, in complete denial? How often have we ignored what we know to be true in order to fit in, or to please someone else? How dearly we have paid for our unwillingness to face the truth in the dream. Yet the real Truth is the real issue. Our sacrifice of self in the dream is nothing. The seeming sacrifice of Our True Self is why we all seem to suffer.
Our serial dreams and stories, our serial relationships, and all that seems to occur... these are simply the smokescreen, the projection to cover our real denial. We have denied Who We Are and Where We Are. We have all had moments of remembering God. And yet we pick ourselves up and promptly forget about it, and act like nothing happened. We remain true to our stories and our addictions. We have not been true to what is True. Our attention and our time return to what is false, again and again. And so we suffer. We suffer until we WILL to remember. We suffer until we return our time and attention to what is True. We suffer until we cease to value the false.
We will continue to walk in dreams and their stories for a while. But when our love and attention remain on what is True, the stories have a different meaning. And our projections are returned to Oneness, to Truth. Now the Awakening of the Son of God is what all dreams are for. We go where Self leads us, and listen to the Voice of Truth within us. We value our Awareness of God, of Good, of Oneness... and the stories of the dream are simply many ways to forgive and return to this Awareness.
There's nothing difficult or complex about it. Being true to what is True is the only simple, natural thing in all this seemingly complex dream.
"Complexity is not of God. How could it be, when all He knows is One? He knows of One Creation, One Reality, One Truth, and but One Son. Nothing conflicts with Oneness. How, then, could there be complexity in Him? What is there to decide? For it is conflict that makes choice possible. The Truth is simple; it is One, without an opposite. The Truth makes no decisions because there is nothing to decide between. What is Everything leaves room for nothing else." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 26, Section III, 1:1-8, 10, 12
"What can correct illusions but Truth? And what are errors but illusions that remain unrecognized for what they are? Where Truth has entered errors disappear. They merely vanish, leaving not a trace by which to be remembered. They are gone because, without belief, they have no life." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 107, 1:1-5
How often in this world have you stumbled onto the truth about something or someone, and yet continued on as if it weren't true, in complete denial? How often have we ignored what we know to be true in order to fit in, or to please someone else? How dearly we have paid for our unwillingness to face the truth in the dream. Yet the real Truth is the real issue. Our sacrifice of self in the dream is nothing. The seeming sacrifice of Our True Self is why we all seem to suffer.
Our serial dreams and stories, our serial relationships, and all that seems to occur... these are simply the smokescreen, the projection to cover our real denial. We have denied Who We Are and Where We Are. We have all had moments of remembering God. And yet we pick ourselves up and promptly forget about it, and act like nothing happened. We remain true to our stories and our addictions. We have not been true to what is True. Our attention and our time return to what is false, again and again. And so we suffer. We suffer until we WILL to remember. We suffer until we return our time and attention to what is True. We suffer until we cease to value the false.
We will continue to walk in dreams and their stories for a while. But when our love and attention remain on what is True, the stories have a different meaning. And our projections are returned to Oneness, to Truth. Now the Awakening of the Son of God is what all dreams are for. We go where Self leads us, and listen to the Voice of Truth within us. We value our Awareness of God, of Good, of Oneness... and the stories of the dream are simply many ways to forgive and return to this Awareness.
There's nothing difficult or complex about it. Being true to what is True is the only simple, natural thing in all this seemingly complex dream.
"Complexity is not of God. How could it be, when all He knows is One? He knows of One Creation, One Reality, One Truth, and but One Son. Nothing conflicts with Oneness. How, then, could there be complexity in Him? What is there to decide? For it is conflict that makes choice possible. The Truth is simple; it is One, without an opposite. The Truth makes no decisions because there is nothing to decide between. What is Everything leaves room for nothing else." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 26, Section III, 1:1-8, 10, 12
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Understanding Forgiveness
"Love must give, and what is given in His Name takes on the form most useful in a world of form. These are the forms which never can deceive, because they come from Formlessness ItSelf. Forgiveness is an earthly form of love, which as it is in Heaven has no form. Yet what is needed here is given as it is needed. In this form you can fulfill your function even here, although what love will mean to you when formlessness has been restored to you is greater still. Salvation of the world depends on you who can forgive. Such is your function here." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 186, 13:5, & 14: 1-6
"Do as God's Voice directs. And if It asks a thing of you which seems impossible, remember Who It Is that asks, and who would make denial. Then consider this; which is more likely to be right?" -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 186, 12:1-3
Forgiveness is primary to being able to hear the Voice for God, a.k.a. the Holy Spirit, the part of our Mind that remains Awake and Aware of the Allness of God and our Oneness with God. Whatever images and stories are claiming time and attention have to be forgiven and released, to leave the mind clear and open to remembering. Understanding the importance of forgiveness is the biggest challenge, since our human self is always all about 'me'. Forgiveness cleans the slate, and returns the mind to natural, organic Self, which is formless and all-inclusive. From this unconditioned Awareness, we are able to hear the Voice. Why is this important? Because the Holy Spirit is our Translator and Guide through the maze of the dream we call life. The Voice of the Holy Spirit will encourage and inspire and guide us to forgive every aspect of the world. We have to be willing to forgive, and turn to the Holy Spirit for help. But it is the Holy Spirit who translates and removes the hurtful perceptions that have blocked our Awareness of God.
Removing all the obstacles to Awareness (true forgiveness) is our only function within the dream. We have to let go of all the thousands of ideas and stories that populate our separated minds, and return our minds to Oneness. These illusory ideas, with no more substance than a mist that blurs our vision, still give rise to the experience of illusion and to all the illusory world of separate bodies with separate interests.
Understanding forgiveness isn't about an academic or intellectual understanding. We're talking a qualitative shift here, not a quantitative one. We begin to truly understand as we experience the quality of release that true forgiveness brings. We are always letting go of limits, which are all illusions. God is our Life without limits. God is our Reality, and the Ground of Being.
True forgiveness is the purest form of Love that this world offers. It gives away all the obstacles to remembering Who We Are, all the illusions of separateness, and returns us whole-heartedly to innocence and peace. Understanding forgiveness is an experience, and it comes as we practice it, day in and day out releasing all that is not true... and revealing the Love at the heart of All.
"If God's Will for you is complete peace and joy, unless you experience only this you must be refusing to acknowledge His Will. His Will does not vacillate, being changeless forever. When you are not at peace it can only be because you do not believe you are in Him. Yet He is All in All. His peace is complete, and you must be included in it. His laws govern you because they govern everything." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 8, Section IV, 1:1-6
"Do as God's Voice directs. And if It asks a thing of you which seems impossible, remember Who It Is that asks, and who would make denial. Then consider this; which is more likely to be right?" -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 186, 12:1-3
Forgiveness is primary to being able to hear the Voice for God, a.k.a. the Holy Spirit, the part of our Mind that remains Awake and Aware of the Allness of God and our Oneness with God. Whatever images and stories are claiming time and attention have to be forgiven and released, to leave the mind clear and open to remembering. Understanding the importance of forgiveness is the biggest challenge, since our human self is always all about 'me'. Forgiveness cleans the slate, and returns the mind to natural, organic Self, which is formless and all-inclusive. From this unconditioned Awareness, we are able to hear the Voice. Why is this important? Because the Holy Spirit is our Translator and Guide through the maze of the dream we call life. The Voice of the Holy Spirit will encourage and inspire and guide us to forgive every aspect of the world. We have to be willing to forgive, and turn to the Holy Spirit for help. But it is the Holy Spirit who translates and removes the hurtful perceptions that have blocked our Awareness of God.
Removing all the obstacles to Awareness (true forgiveness) is our only function within the dream. We have to let go of all the thousands of ideas and stories that populate our separated minds, and return our minds to Oneness. These illusory ideas, with no more substance than a mist that blurs our vision, still give rise to the experience of illusion and to all the illusory world of separate bodies with separate interests.
Understanding forgiveness isn't about an academic or intellectual understanding. We're talking a qualitative shift here, not a quantitative one. We begin to truly understand as we experience the quality of release that true forgiveness brings. We are always letting go of limits, which are all illusions. God is our Life without limits. God is our Reality, and the Ground of Being.
True forgiveness is the purest form of Love that this world offers. It gives away all the obstacles to remembering Who We Are, all the illusions of separateness, and returns us whole-heartedly to innocence and peace. Understanding forgiveness is an experience, and it comes as we practice it, day in and day out releasing all that is not true... and revealing the Love at the heart of All.
"If God's Will for you is complete peace and joy, unless you experience only this you must be refusing to acknowledge His Will. His Will does not vacillate, being changeless forever. When you are not at peace it can only be because you do not believe you are in Him. Yet He is All in All. His peace is complete, and you must be included in it. His laws govern you because they govern everything." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 8, Section IV, 1:1-6
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Comfort and Joy
"The fulfillment of spiritual selfhood takes place within, not without, although it becomes apparent without. There is no mistaking the man or woman who has found inner joy and satisfaction, who is at peace with himself and the world. Even though such a person might come to a place where some outer circumstance throws him off balance for a time, he quickly recovers from it because he realizes that the outer is not of too much importance." -- from God, the Substance of All Form, by Joel Goldsmith
"God's Will for me is perfect happiness." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 101
Hello to all of you... it has been a little over a month since I last posted... a busy month indeed. The appearance of busyness, at any rate. Beneath it all is a current of quiet joy and an invisible comfort that is always here. When I get caught up in the current of life, there is a discontentedness that alerts me... I'm not happy when I go unconscious and forget. This little mechanism is invaluable to me. Restlessness and discontent no longer means that the outer world needs to be changed. It means that I need to go within and remember Who I Am. When I do, all is indeed very well. And the outer story becomes completely irrelevant and completely precious at the same time.
Where are you looking for comfort and joy? There is only one place that it will ever be found... and that is within your very own consciousness. As A Course in Miracles reminds us, "... You can't have what you're not willing to be." You are the embodiment of spirit, of the very Being of Spirit. And when you forget that, you look for comfort and fulfillment, for joy and happiness in the people and circumstances around you. It is not there.
So whenever that lovely alert system tells you that you are feeling discontented, whenever you think someone or something else needs to change, reverse yourself. Be still, and become Aware of what is always here. You remain as God created you, and will forever be living and moving and having your very Being in God. Comfort and Joy and Goodness and Mercy, all the days of our lives.
"Seek not outside yourself. For all your pain comes simply from a futile search for what you want, insisting where is must be found." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 29, VII, 1:6-7
"God's Will for me is perfect happiness." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 101
Hello to all of you... it has been a little over a month since I last posted... a busy month indeed. The appearance of busyness, at any rate. Beneath it all is a current of quiet joy and an invisible comfort that is always here. When I get caught up in the current of life, there is a discontentedness that alerts me... I'm not happy when I go unconscious and forget. This little mechanism is invaluable to me. Restlessness and discontent no longer means that the outer world needs to be changed. It means that I need to go within and remember Who I Am. When I do, all is indeed very well. And the outer story becomes completely irrelevant and completely precious at the same time.
Where are you looking for comfort and joy? There is only one place that it will ever be found... and that is within your very own consciousness. As A Course in Miracles reminds us, "... You can't have what you're not willing to be." You are the embodiment of spirit, of the very Being of Spirit. And when you forget that, you look for comfort and fulfillment, for joy and happiness in the people and circumstances around you. It is not there.
So whenever that lovely alert system tells you that you are feeling discontented, whenever you think someone or something else needs to change, reverse yourself. Be still, and become Aware of what is always here. You remain as God created you, and will forever be living and moving and having your very Being in God. Comfort and Joy and Goodness and Mercy, all the days of our lives.
"Seek not outside yourself. For all your pain comes simply from a futile search for what you want, insisting where is must be found." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 29, VII, 1:6-7
Saturday, June 14, 2008
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
"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
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Vigilance
"Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His Righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." -- The Bible; Matthew 6:33
"When the illusion of sickness or sin tempts you, cling steadfastly to God and His idea. Allow nothing but His likeness to abide in your thought." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 495, Lines 14-16
"The question is: are we willing to put in the hours of devotion; are we willing to make the effort required to train ourselves to be conscious of the Presence of God, instead of seeking some form in which God is to appear? There is the whole secret. It is up to us." -- Joel Goldsmith
"Belief does not require vigilance unless it is conflicted. If it is, there are conflicting components within it that have led to a state of war, and vigilance has therefore become essential. Vigilance has no place in Peace. It is necessary against beliefs that are not true, and would never have been called upon by the Holy Spirit if you had not believed the untrue. When you believe something, you have made it true for you. When you believe what God does not know, your thought seems to contradict His, and this makes it appear as if you are attacking Him. While you believe two totally contradictory thought systems share truth, your need for vigilance is apparent." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 7, Section VI, 7:3-8, 8:11
It has taken a lot of seeming time and apparent attention, i.e. a lot of vigilance, to experience the lie of the world as fragmented and lacking and suffering. It takes a lot of vigilance to keep up the illusion of this fictional world that is the opposite of God, the antithesis of Good. What is this supposed power made of, if not God? And when we drop our guard for even a moment, where is it? Isn't it funny how moments of Peace and Reality sneak up on us in spite of ourselves? They are the ground of our True Being all along, always the Truth. What comes and goes and comes to pass is the fiction, the sleight of hand. Let it go.
To be vigilant only for God requires an act of will at first, simply because we have worked so long and hard to NOT be aware of the Truth. As the old Rodgers and Hammerstein song goes, we have been 'carefully taught' to believe and value the cultural fictions of the world. So even though resting in God and our Awareness of the Kingdom of Self is the most natural, effortless thing in the world, the closest we come to Reality while in the world... still, in order to reverse ourselves within the dream it requires not only willingness, but vigilance and commitment.
So what do we really want? As Joel Goldsmith's quote asks, what are we devoted to? Whatever gets the lion's share of our time and attention is where we believe the power is... these are the idols that populate our personal pantheon of false gods. Idols are illusions that we are devoted to. Devotion is time and attention. So what do we really want? And are we willing to reverse ourselves?
No one else can make this decision for us. We may be long-time veterans of spiritual paths and still be primarily devoted to physical forms and results. We may be very intellectually aware of the 'truth', and yet we use it only to re-enforce our human identities, to make ourselves more comfortable. It's not that this is bad or wrong. It's that, except for short term illusions, it's not possible. The nature of illusions are that they are unstable and temporary.
The reason Jesus and Joel and Mrs. Eddy all tell us to 'seek first the Kingdom,' to have no other gods or devotions, is of the utmost practicality. By giving our mind and heart only to God and the Divine Ideas that continually radiate through us as His children, we reflect only the Good and Eternal even in this world of illusion. Only God is Real, only Divine Love is the currency of Life and so it is the currency of our True Devotion. This devotion and commitment means that we have no other gods, no other needs but to know God, and thus our True Self, aright. And the Good that is then reflected in our life and world is the icing on the cake... the added things spoken of in Scripture. But the shadow or reflection can never be mistaken for Reality.
"Be vigilant only for God and His Kingdom." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 6, Section V, C
"When the illusion of sickness or sin tempts you, cling steadfastly to God and His idea. Allow nothing but His likeness to abide in your thought." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 495, Lines 14-16
"The question is: are we willing to put in the hours of devotion; are we willing to make the effort required to train ourselves to be conscious of the Presence of God, instead of seeking some form in which God is to appear? There is the whole secret. It is up to us." -- Joel Goldsmith
"Belief does not require vigilance unless it is conflicted. If it is, there are conflicting components within it that have led to a state of war, and vigilance has therefore become essential. Vigilance has no place in Peace. It is necessary against beliefs that are not true, and would never have been called upon by the Holy Spirit if you had not believed the untrue. When you believe something, you have made it true for you. When you believe what God does not know, your thought seems to contradict His, and this makes it appear as if you are attacking Him. While you believe two totally contradictory thought systems share truth, your need for vigilance is apparent." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 7, Section VI, 7:3-8, 8:11
It has taken a lot of seeming time and apparent attention, i.e. a lot of vigilance, to experience the lie of the world as fragmented and lacking and suffering. It takes a lot of vigilance to keep up the illusion of this fictional world that is the opposite of God, the antithesis of Good. What is this supposed power made of, if not God? And when we drop our guard for even a moment, where is it? Isn't it funny how moments of Peace and Reality sneak up on us in spite of ourselves? They are the ground of our True Being all along, always the Truth. What comes and goes and comes to pass is the fiction, the sleight of hand. Let it go.
To be vigilant only for God requires an act of will at first, simply because we have worked so long and hard to NOT be aware of the Truth. As the old Rodgers and Hammerstein song goes, we have been 'carefully taught' to believe and value the cultural fictions of the world. So even though resting in God and our Awareness of the Kingdom of Self is the most natural, effortless thing in the world, the closest we come to Reality while in the world... still, in order to reverse ourselves within the dream it requires not only willingness, but vigilance and commitment.
So what do we really want? As Joel Goldsmith's quote asks, what are we devoted to? Whatever gets the lion's share of our time and attention is where we believe the power is... these are the idols that populate our personal pantheon of false gods. Idols are illusions that we are devoted to. Devotion is time and attention. So what do we really want? And are we willing to reverse ourselves?
No one else can make this decision for us. We may be long-time veterans of spiritual paths and still be primarily devoted to physical forms and results. We may be very intellectually aware of the 'truth', and yet we use it only to re-enforce our human identities, to make ourselves more comfortable. It's not that this is bad or wrong. It's that, except for short term illusions, it's not possible. The nature of illusions are that they are unstable and temporary.
The reason Jesus and Joel and Mrs. Eddy all tell us to 'seek first the Kingdom,' to have no other gods or devotions, is of the utmost practicality. By giving our mind and heart only to God and the Divine Ideas that continually radiate through us as His children, we reflect only the Good and Eternal even in this world of illusion. Only God is Real, only Divine Love is the currency of Life and so it is the currency of our True Devotion. This devotion and commitment means that we have no other gods, no other needs but to know God, and thus our True Self, aright. And the Good that is then reflected in our life and world is the icing on the cake... the added things spoken of in Scripture. But the shadow or reflection can never be mistaken for Reality.
"Be vigilant only for God and His Kingdom." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 6, Section V, C
Thursday, June 5, 2008
What is a Grievance?
"Love holds no grievances. My grievances hide the light of the world in me." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 68 & 69
"With your own wrists manacled, it is hard to break another's chains." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 449, Lines 1-2
What is a grievance? A Course in Miracles says that, "You who were created by Love like ItSelf can hold no grievances and know your Self. To hold a grievance is to forget Who You Are. To hold a grievance is to see yourself as a body. To hold a grievance is to let the ego rule your mind and to condemn the body to death. It seems to split you off from your Source and make you unlike Him. It makes you believe that He is like what you think you have become, for no one can conceive of His Creator as unlike himself. Shut off from your Self, which remains aware of Its likeness to Its Creator, your Self seems to sleep, while the part of your mind that weaves illusions in its sleep appears to be awake. Can all this arise from holding grievances? Oh, yes! For he who holds grievances denies he was created by Love, and his Creator has become fearful to him in his dream of hate." (ACIM; Workbook 68, 1:1-7, & 2:1-4)
Whew. That pretty much covers life as we know it, doesn't it? The symptoms of holding a grievance are clearly given in the above quote: seeing ourselves as physical beings; seeing ourselves as ruled by our ego reactions and emotions; seeing ourselves as separate and cut off from Love; seeing death as a part of life; seeing others, including God and His world, as punitive and vengeful, when it is always and only our own grievances we are projecting and seeing. An isolated mind sees only its lonely and miserable self. Thank God it's all made up. Thank God it's not Who We Are.
We can awaken from dreams. We can wallow in them and remain fascinated by them as long as we choose... but we can awaken. Forgiveness of grievances is the key. No matter what appears 'wrong' in our life and world, we can forgive and let the dream go. God created nothing unlike HimSelf. And as ACIM says, "God is still Love, and this is not His Will." Mary Baker Eddy calls grievances 'sins.' To sin is to 'miss the mark.' We miss it completely when we project our separated mind as emotional baggage, physical suffering, and death. We let it go by forgiving, and having the courage to hold fast to what is True. "God is still Love, and this is not His Will."
The willingness to indulge our grievances, to nurse them as if they were precious to us, is the greatest sin of all. We miss the mark completely, and are lost in the dream. The courage to forgive and let them go, to allow the Holy Spirit in us to do Its perfect work, is our only task in the world. There is not one illusion of suffering that will not fall away in the presence of true forgiveness. What is Real is always effortlessly Present. "My grievances hide the Light of the world in me." And yet, "God is still Love, and this is not His Will."
So no matter what lies before us today, no matter what form our seeming problems take, we know that they are simply some form of grievance we are hanging onto, projected out so it doesn't seem like we are doing it at all. The good news is that we can forgive. We can ask for Light, and for courage to forgive and forgive again, seventy times seven, to infinity and beyond. We can be willing to bare our hearts and minds to God, and cleanse them of all selfish desires and self-interest. We can return Home to Self.
What is a grievance? It is the unwillingness to be Whole, the desire to be special and separate, fragmented and wounded and autonomous to the end. We may only have this little identity, but we insist that at least it is ours. And we nurse and cherish it and struggle to maintain it against every perceived grievance, not recognizing that every grievance (every person, place, or situation) is a fragment of Self that must be welcomed Home through forgiveness. And that everything we truly long for lies in this Re-membering of the Son of God.
It is impossible to really care about anyone or anything when we are drowning in our own grievances. We can't be a true friend or a true lover or a true parent when our grievances rise like a wall between us and what we supposedly love. Until we forgive every grievance, until we release our stories of grievances (no matter how self-righteous and subtle), we will continue to project our own stories of sin and suffering onto other people and situations, and onto our own bodies.
What is a grievance? It is the insistence that we are not the cause of the world we see, and that guilt lies outside of us. As ACIM puts it, "You see neither guilt nor salvation as in your own mind and nowhere else. When you realize that all guilt is solely an invention of your mind, you also realize that guilt and salvation must be in the same place. In understanding this you are saved." Truth remains, quietly shining in the part of your Holy Mind that has never slept. The world is not as we imagine it, for as God's True Creations we remain forever Whole and Loving and Free.
"Love holds no grievances. I would wake to my Self by laying all grievances aside and wakening in Him." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 68, 7:5-6
"With your own wrists manacled, it is hard to break another's chains." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 449, Lines 1-2
What is a grievance? A Course in Miracles says that, "You who were created by Love like ItSelf can hold no grievances and know your Self. To hold a grievance is to forget Who You Are. To hold a grievance is to see yourself as a body. To hold a grievance is to let the ego rule your mind and to condemn the body to death. It seems to split you off from your Source and make you unlike Him. It makes you believe that He is like what you think you have become, for no one can conceive of His Creator as unlike himself. Shut off from your Self, which remains aware of Its likeness to Its Creator, your Self seems to sleep, while the part of your mind that weaves illusions in its sleep appears to be awake. Can all this arise from holding grievances? Oh, yes! For he who holds grievances denies he was created by Love, and his Creator has become fearful to him in his dream of hate." (ACIM; Workbook 68, 1:1-7, & 2:1-4)
Whew. That pretty much covers life as we know it, doesn't it? The symptoms of holding a grievance are clearly given in the above quote: seeing ourselves as physical beings; seeing ourselves as ruled by our ego reactions and emotions; seeing ourselves as separate and cut off from Love; seeing death as a part of life; seeing others, including God and His world, as punitive and vengeful, when it is always and only our own grievances we are projecting and seeing. An isolated mind sees only its lonely and miserable self. Thank God it's all made up. Thank God it's not Who We Are.
We can awaken from dreams. We can wallow in them and remain fascinated by them as long as we choose... but we can awaken. Forgiveness of grievances is the key. No matter what appears 'wrong' in our life and world, we can forgive and let the dream go. God created nothing unlike HimSelf. And as ACIM says, "God is still Love, and this is not His Will." Mary Baker Eddy calls grievances 'sins.' To sin is to 'miss the mark.' We miss it completely when we project our separated mind as emotional baggage, physical suffering, and death. We let it go by forgiving, and having the courage to hold fast to what is True. "God is still Love, and this is not His Will."
The willingness to indulge our grievances, to nurse them as if they were precious to us, is the greatest sin of all. We miss the mark completely, and are lost in the dream. The courage to forgive and let them go, to allow the Holy Spirit in us to do Its perfect work, is our only task in the world. There is not one illusion of suffering that will not fall away in the presence of true forgiveness. What is Real is always effortlessly Present. "My grievances hide the Light of the world in me." And yet, "God is still Love, and this is not His Will."
So no matter what lies before us today, no matter what form our seeming problems take, we know that they are simply some form of grievance we are hanging onto, projected out so it doesn't seem like we are doing it at all. The good news is that we can forgive. We can ask for Light, and for courage to forgive and forgive again, seventy times seven, to infinity and beyond. We can be willing to bare our hearts and minds to God, and cleanse them of all selfish desires and self-interest. We can return Home to Self.
What is a grievance? It is the unwillingness to be Whole, the desire to be special and separate, fragmented and wounded and autonomous to the end. We may only have this little identity, but we insist that at least it is ours. And we nurse and cherish it and struggle to maintain it against every perceived grievance, not recognizing that every grievance (every person, place, or situation) is a fragment of Self that must be welcomed Home through forgiveness. And that everything we truly long for lies in this Re-membering of the Son of God.
It is impossible to really care about anyone or anything when we are drowning in our own grievances. We can't be a true friend or a true lover or a true parent when our grievances rise like a wall between us and what we supposedly love. Until we forgive every grievance, until we release our stories of grievances (no matter how self-righteous and subtle), we will continue to project our own stories of sin and suffering onto other people and situations, and onto our own bodies.
What is a grievance? It is the insistence that we are not the cause of the world we see, and that guilt lies outside of us. As ACIM puts it, "You see neither guilt nor salvation as in your own mind and nowhere else. When you realize that all guilt is solely an invention of your mind, you also realize that guilt and salvation must be in the same place. In understanding this you are saved." Truth remains, quietly shining in the part of your Holy Mind that has never slept. The world is not as we imagine it, for as God's True Creations we remain forever Whole and Loving and Free.
"Love holds no grievances. I would wake to my Self by laying all grievances aside and wakening in Him." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 68, 7:5-6
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Incapable of Suffering
"Only the eternal can be loved, for Love does not die. What is of God is His forever, and you are of God. Would He allow HimSelf to suffer? And would He offer His Son anything that is not acceptable to Him? If you will accept yourself as God created you, you will be incapable of suffering. Your Father created you wholly without sin, wholly without pain, and wholly without suffering of any kind. If you deny Him you bring sin, pain, and suffering into your own mind. Your mind is capable of creating [illusory] worlds, but it can also deny what it creates because it is free." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 10, Section V, 9:1-5, 9-11
"Controlled by the Divine Intelligence, man is harmonious and eternal. Whatever is governed by a false belief is discordant and mortal. We say man suffers from the effects of cold, heat, fatigue. This is human belief, not the Truth of Being, for matter cannot suffer. Mortal mind alone suffers; not because a law of matter has been transgressed, but because a law of this so-called mind has been disobeyed. I have demonstrated this as a rule of Divine Science by destroying the delusion of suffering from what is termed a fatally broken physical law." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 184, Lines 16-
"There are no laws but God's. You are not bound by all the strange and twisted laws you have set up to save you. It is insanity that thinks these things. These are not laws, but madness. The body is endangered by the mind that hurts itself. The body suffers just in order that the mind will fail to see it is the victim of itself. The body's suffering is a mask the mind holds up to hide what really suffers. Only what it is meant to hide will save you." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 76
I am incapable of suffering. Here I sit, in the throes of what seems like a really bad case of the flu, listening to Truth and asking that my perception be healed. Not so I can stop suffering... I know that is not true, and I'm not trying to get rid of anything. I am asking that my Right Mind be in charge, that my perception be cleansed and translated... so I can see what IS, and remember what is always and eternally True. My mind, as a part of God's Mind, is very holy... and wholly incapable of suffering. The mind that thinks it's in a body thinks it is an effect of the body and of all things physical. It's the kind of closed feedback loop at which the ego excels. In this delusional story, the body tells the mind whatever it wants to hear, and the mind gives the body the illusion of reality. And on and on it goes.
So I'm choosing to see this little jaunt into illusory bodily suffering as the gift of sight... I am being given an opportunity once again to see the utter practicality of Jeshua ben Joseph's words and teachings. "Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the Peace of God." (ACIM; Introduction, 2:2-4)
In the middle of the night, in what seemed to be feverish dreams and fitful sleep, I noticed my will... I felt determination, the proverbial girding of the loins in the face of appearances. I realized this is nothing at all. As it says in The Bible, "Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils. For wherein is he to be accounted of?" (Isaiah 2:22) The physical is illusory; appearing healthy or appearing sick, it is nothing at all. Used only to communicate Truth, the body will be able to take me where I need to go, and do what needs to be done. And what else would I use it for? Like my car, it's not who I am. Like my car and my home, the body is not a measure of my worth or indicative of anything at all except the ego's preferences, its fears and its loves. No difference to the ego. Attachments and aversions are the same in motivation and result.
So I am at peace. Health and Peace are always present, eternal attributes of the Holiness and Wholeness of God's Son. I am as God created me, and this Truth is Eternal. As a radiation of the Love of God, I am incapable of suffering. And all the stories that judge what occurs as pleasurable or painful have no more meaning than a leaf blowing by in the wind. All the stories of suffering and lack and loss are simply elaborate ego devices... and without judgement, seen through the eyes of forgiveness, Truth and Joy and Self are always revealed. Without judgement, through the eyes of forgiveness, I am incapable of suffering.
"Here is the thought in which the Son of God is born again, to recognize himself. "I rest in God." Completely undismayed, this thought will carry you through storms and strife, past misery and pain, past loss and death, and onward to the certainty of God. There is no suffering it cannot heal. There is no problem that it cannot solve. And no appearance but will turn to Truth before the eyes of you who rest in God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 109, 2:6, 3:1-5
"Controlled by the Divine Intelligence, man is harmonious and eternal. Whatever is governed by a false belief is discordant and mortal. We say man suffers from the effects of cold, heat, fatigue. This is human belief, not the Truth of Being, for matter cannot suffer. Mortal mind alone suffers; not because a law of matter has been transgressed, but because a law of this so-called mind has been disobeyed. I have demonstrated this as a rule of Divine Science by destroying the delusion of suffering from what is termed a fatally broken physical law." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 184, Lines 16-
"There are no laws but God's. You are not bound by all the strange and twisted laws you have set up to save you. It is insanity that thinks these things. These are not laws, but madness. The body is endangered by the mind that hurts itself. The body suffers just in order that the mind will fail to see it is the victim of itself. The body's suffering is a mask the mind holds up to hide what really suffers. Only what it is meant to hide will save you." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 76
I am incapable of suffering. Here I sit, in the throes of what seems like a really bad case of the flu, listening to Truth and asking that my perception be healed. Not so I can stop suffering... I know that is not true, and I'm not trying to get rid of anything. I am asking that my Right Mind be in charge, that my perception be cleansed and translated... so I can see what IS, and remember what is always and eternally True. My mind, as a part of God's Mind, is very holy... and wholly incapable of suffering. The mind that thinks it's in a body thinks it is an effect of the body and of all things physical. It's the kind of closed feedback loop at which the ego excels. In this delusional story, the body tells the mind whatever it wants to hear, and the mind gives the body the illusion of reality. And on and on it goes.
So I'm choosing to see this little jaunt into illusory bodily suffering as the gift of sight... I am being given an opportunity once again to see the utter practicality of Jeshua ben Joseph's words and teachings. "Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the Peace of God." (ACIM; Introduction, 2:2-4)
In the middle of the night, in what seemed to be feverish dreams and fitful sleep, I noticed my will... I felt determination, the proverbial girding of the loins in the face of appearances. I realized this is nothing at all. As it says in The Bible, "Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils. For wherein is he to be accounted of?" (Isaiah 2:22) The physical is illusory; appearing healthy or appearing sick, it is nothing at all. Used only to communicate Truth, the body will be able to take me where I need to go, and do what needs to be done. And what else would I use it for? Like my car, it's not who I am. Like my car and my home, the body is not a measure of my worth or indicative of anything at all except the ego's preferences, its fears and its loves. No difference to the ego. Attachments and aversions are the same in motivation and result.
So I am at peace. Health and Peace are always present, eternal attributes of the Holiness and Wholeness of God's Son. I am as God created me, and this Truth is Eternal. As a radiation of the Love of God, I am incapable of suffering. And all the stories that judge what occurs as pleasurable or painful have no more meaning than a leaf blowing by in the wind. All the stories of suffering and lack and loss are simply elaborate ego devices... and without judgement, seen through the eyes of forgiveness, Truth and Joy and Self are always revealed. Without judgement, through the eyes of forgiveness, I am incapable of suffering.
"Here is the thought in which the Son of God is born again, to recognize himself. "I rest in God." Completely undismayed, this thought will carry you through storms and strife, past misery and pain, past loss and death, and onward to the certainty of God. There is no suffering it cannot heal. There is no problem that it cannot solve. And no appearance but will turn to Truth before the eyes of you who rest in God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 109, 2:6, 3:1-5
Thursday, April 24, 2008
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,
"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,
Monday, April 21, 2008
God is My Inheritance
"The Thought of God created You. It left You not, nor have You ever been apart from it an instant. It belongs to You. By it you Live. It is your Source of Life, holding You One with it, and everything is One with You because it left You not. The Thought of God protects You, cares for You, makes soft Your resting place and smooth Your way, lighting Your mind with happiness and Love. Deny not Heaven. It is yours today, but for the asking." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 165, 2:1-6, 4:1-2
"What makes this world seem real except your own denial of the Truth that lies beyond? What but your thoughts of misery and death obscure the perfect happiness and the eternal life your Father wills for you? And what could hide what cannot be concealed but illusion? What could keep from you what you already have except your choice to see it not, denying it is there? Your mind has come to lay aside denial, and accept the Thought of God as your inheritance." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 165, 1:1-4, 5:6
We all accept and take pride in our heritage. Even when we come from the humblest of earthly origins, we are fascinated with our ancestors, who they were and how they lived, as if somehow that gives meaning to us, that we can figure out what we have inherited from them. And now with DNA testing, we are eager to explore whether we share dysfunctional tendencies for disease. But really, what's the difference if we're looking for admirable qualities or dysfunctional ones? It's all a mockery of our true heritage.
The fact that we are not who we think we are, not bodies that come from the earth and return to it, is central to Awakening. And it's a sticking point for most of us. Who am I? Who are my parents? Where did I go to school? What are my personal habits? What are my spiritual beliefs? These are the types of things people want to know about us when getting to know us... and we do the same with them. But none of this matters, none of it has anything to do with my reality, or yours. Jeshua ben Joseph could walk among total strangers from vastly different socioeconomic and religious groups without differentiating. To Him, all were Perfect Ideas in the Mind of God, longing to Remember their true Inheritance. End of story.
God is my true heritage, my True Inheritance. I am as God created me, and have not left the Mind of God. In Him I live and move and have my Being. As do You.
"Would God consent to let His Son remain forever starved by his denial of the nourishment he needs to live? Abundance dwells in him, and deprivation cannot cut him off from God's sustaining Love and from his Home." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 165, 6:5-6
"What makes this world seem real except your own denial of the Truth that lies beyond? What but your thoughts of misery and death obscure the perfect happiness and the eternal life your Father wills for you? And what could hide what cannot be concealed but illusion? What could keep from you what you already have except your choice to see it not, denying it is there? Your mind has come to lay aside denial, and accept the Thought of God as your inheritance." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 165, 1:1-4, 5:6
We all accept and take pride in our heritage. Even when we come from the humblest of earthly origins, we are fascinated with our ancestors, who they were and how they lived, as if somehow that gives meaning to us, that we can figure out what we have inherited from them. And now with DNA testing, we are eager to explore whether we share dysfunctional tendencies for disease. But really, what's the difference if we're looking for admirable qualities or dysfunctional ones? It's all a mockery of our true heritage.
The fact that we are not who we think we are, not bodies that come from the earth and return to it, is central to Awakening. And it's a sticking point for most of us. Who am I? Who are my parents? Where did I go to school? What are my personal habits? What are my spiritual beliefs? These are the types of things people want to know about us when getting to know us... and we do the same with them. But none of this matters, none of it has anything to do with my reality, or yours. Jeshua ben Joseph could walk among total strangers from vastly different socioeconomic and religious groups without differentiating. To Him, all were Perfect Ideas in the Mind of God, longing to Remember their true Inheritance. End of story.
God is my true heritage, my True Inheritance. I am as God created me, and have not left the Mind of God. In Him I live and move and have my Being. As do You.
"Would God consent to let His Son remain forever starved by his denial of the nourishment he needs to live? Abundance dwells in him, and deprivation cannot cut him off from God's sustaining Love and from his Home." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 165, 6:5-6
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Playing Our Part
"As you share My unwillingness to accept error in yourself and others, you must join the great crusade to correct it; listen to My Voice, learn to undo error, and act to correct it. The power to work miracles belongs to you. I will provide the opportunities to do them, but you must be ready and willing." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section III, 5:6-8
"Each day should be devoted to miracles. Miracles reawaken the awareness that Spirit, not the body, is the Altar of Truth. This is the recognition that leads to the healing power of the miracle. Only the creations of Light are real. The Holy Spirit is the mechanism of miracles." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I, 15:1, 20:1-2, 24:4, 38:1
Playing our part in the Great Awakening of the Son of God is our true purpose in life. Each of us moves within the dream that ACIM calls the great projection, each with individualized issues and dramas. These don't really matter. What matters is that wherever and however we find ourselves today, every moment of every day can be devoted to restoring our minds to Truth. We don't have to go to a deserted island or a cave to do this... in fact, many who have done so have found their unhealed perceptions simply morphed and stayed with them. We are simply asked to bring ALL our perceptions to the Holy Spirit ALL the time, every Holy Instant, where Truth enfolds our errors and projections and restores our holy awareness to Oneness, undoing the effects of our errors omnidirectionally, throughout imagined time and space. This is the healing aspect of the miracle.
The miracle is a corrective device, since the reality of Spirit is forever whole and perfect and complete. The Holy Spirit, the part of our minds that remains in perfect communication with God and Truth, is the mechanism of miracles. In other words, the Holy Spirit is like the cooking pot... our perceptions and problems and fears are the ingredients we put into the cooking pot... and the Truth that remains eternally in the awareness of the Holy Spirit is the alchemical ingredient that transforms all ingredients into their eternal and essential Truth.
There is another way to look at how we play our part, using analogies within the world as we know it. In acoustics, there is a phenomenon called phase cancellation. For every frequency of sound, there is an opposing frequency, its mirror opposite. When these two frequencies of sound are brought together, there is no sound. You could say that they have achieved the perfect balance and become One. Using this idea, we can see that the Holy Spirit holds within it the balancing frequency for every thought, every error that could possibly exist. By bringing these errors to Truth, we allow the error to meet with its mirror opposite, and so it is no more. Out of this marriage of error and its opposite, there emerges the miracle. In my book (http://www.thelittlebookoforganicabundance.com), I call this spontaneous emergence within the dream Vibratory Kinesis.
A Course in Miracles reminds us that "Miracles are habits, and should be involuntary. They should not be under conscious control." (ACIM; Chapter 1, Section I, 5:1-2) In other words, playing our part is simply to bring all our perceptions, without exception, to the Holy Spirit, all the time. The alchemy of miracles is not our function. Our part is to bring all that we think we are to the Holy Spirit, all the time. The Holy Spirit holds the Truth that corrects all errors, all the time. So playing our part is entirely the willingness to do this, all the time.
Are we willing to play our part? This is not an exercise for the faint of heart. It will cost you the world as you have known it. But, as Dr. Phil might say... how's that working for you?
"Whatever is True is eternal, and cannot change or be changed. Spirit is therefore unalterable because It is already Perfect, but the mind can elect what it chooses to serve. The only limit put on its choice is that it cannot serve two masters. The miracle is a sign that the mind has chosen to be led by Me in Christ's service. The Abundance of Christ is the natural result of choosing to follow Him. Truth is always Abundant." A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section IV, 5:1-3,6:1-2, 3:4
"Each day should be devoted to miracles. Miracles reawaken the awareness that Spirit, not the body, is the Altar of Truth. This is the recognition that leads to the healing power of the miracle. Only the creations of Light are real. The Holy Spirit is the mechanism of miracles." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I, 15:1, 20:1-2, 24:4, 38:1
Playing our part in the Great Awakening of the Son of God is our true purpose in life. Each of us moves within the dream that ACIM calls the great projection, each with individualized issues and dramas. These don't really matter. What matters is that wherever and however we find ourselves today, every moment of every day can be devoted to restoring our minds to Truth. We don't have to go to a deserted island or a cave to do this... in fact, many who have done so have found their unhealed perceptions simply morphed and stayed with them. We are simply asked to bring ALL our perceptions to the Holy Spirit ALL the time, every Holy Instant, where Truth enfolds our errors and projections and restores our holy awareness to Oneness, undoing the effects of our errors omnidirectionally, throughout imagined time and space. This is the healing aspect of the miracle.
The miracle is a corrective device, since the reality of Spirit is forever whole and perfect and complete. The Holy Spirit, the part of our minds that remains in perfect communication with God and Truth, is the mechanism of miracles. In other words, the Holy Spirit is like the cooking pot... our perceptions and problems and fears are the ingredients we put into the cooking pot... and the Truth that remains eternally in the awareness of the Holy Spirit is the alchemical ingredient that transforms all ingredients into their eternal and essential Truth.
There is another way to look at how we play our part, using analogies within the world as we know it. In acoustics, there is a phenomenon called phase cancellation. For every frequency of sound, there is an opposing frequency, its mirror opposite. When these two frequencies of sound are brought together, there is no sound. You could say that they have achieved the perfect balance and become One. Using this idea, we can see that the Holy Spirit holds within it the balancing frequency for every thought, every error that could possibly exist. By bringing these errors to Truth, we allow the error to meet with its mirror opposite, and so it is no more. Out of this marriage of error and its opposite, there emerges the miracle. In my book (http://www.thelittlebookoforganicabundance.com), I call this spontaneous emergence within the dream Vibratory Kinesis.
A Course in Miracles reminds us that "Miracles are habits, and should be involuntary. They should not be under conscious control." (ACIM; Chapter 1, Section I, 5:1-2) In other words, playing our part is simply to bring all our perceptions, without exception, to the Holy Spirit, all the time. The alchemy of miracles is not our function. Our part is to bring all that we think we are to the Holy Spirit, all the time. The Holy Spirit holds the Truth that corrects all errors, all the time. So playing our part is entirely the willingness to do this, all the time.
Are we willing to play our part? This is not an exercise for the faint of heart. It will cost you the world as you have known it. But, as Dr. Phil might say... how's that working for you?
"Whatever is True is eternal, and cannot change or be changed. Spirit is therefore unalterable because It is already Perfect, but the mind can elect what it chooses to serve. The only limit put on its choice is that it cannot serve two masters. The miracle is a sign that the mind has chosen to be led by Me in Christ's service. The Abundance of Christ is the natural result of choosing to follow Him. Truth is always Abundant." A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section IV, 5:1-3,6:1-2, 3:4
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
One Answer
"To give up all problems to One Answer is to reverse the thinking of the world entirely." -- A Course in Miracles
"When this Power has once been experienced, it is impossible to trust one's own petty strength again. Who would attempt to fly with the tiny wings of a sparrow when the mighty power of an eagle has been given him?" -- A Course in Miracles
One problem, one solution. A Course in Miracles makes it so clear and so simple that only the deliberately delusional could call it confusing. Our problem is always some version of a separated self, exiled from God, surrounded by the idols that are our individual projections and illusions, in the deceptive forms of people, places, and things. Our One Answer is always remembering that God is One, not many... and that there is no place or time or situation where God is NOT. One Power, All Power... One Intelligence, All Intelligence... One Love, All Love... and everything that appears as 'other' is simply, well, NOT.
So what are you certain of? We may think we are certain our bodies are real, for example... but where is the body you were so sure of when you were a teenager? Where is the body you were so sure of yesterday? If it dissolves and vanishes like a dream, as if it never existed... then how can you call it real? Where are the 'great' civilizations of the past? All that remain of them are the stories we tell... no reality in stories. All stories are simply, well, STORIES.
What is True is always True. It is a principle on which we can stand. ACIM says, "The Truth is True, and nothing else is true." Can't get much clearer than 'nothing else.' Nothing means, well, NOTHING.
Bodies are not true. Personalities are not true. Feelings come and go like weather and so are not true. Judgments are simply mental constructs and so not true. Possessions are not true. Time and space come and go and are not true. What comes and goes and dissolves like smoke and mirrors is simply, well, NOT.
The One Answer to whatever confronts us today and all days is this knowing. "Hear O Israel, the Lord Your God is ONE." This Truth lights the Way, corrects all projections and errors, and escorts us safely through every fire and every challenge within the world of dreams. There is nothing else.
"All this complexity is but a desperate attempt not to recognize the problem. If you could recognize that your only problem is separation from God, no matter what form it takes, you could accept the answer because you would see its relevance. There is only one problem, and One Answer." -- A Course in Miracles
"When this Power has once been experienced, it is impossible to trust one's own petty strength again. Who would attempt to fly with the tiny wings of a sparrow when the mighty power of an eagle has been given him?" -- A Course in Miracles
One problem, one solution. A Course in Miracles makes it so clear and so simple that only the deliberately delusional could call it confusing. Our problem is always some version of a separated self, exiled from God, surrounded by the idols that are our individual projections and illusions, in the deceptive forms of people, places, and things. Our One Answer is always remembering that God is One, not many... and that there is no place or time or situation where God is NOT. One Power, All Power... One Intelligence, All Intelligence... One Love, All Love... and everything that appears as 'other' is simply, well, NOT.
So what are you certain of? We may think we are certain our bodies are real, for example... but where is the body you were so sure of when you were a teenager? Where is the body you were so sure of yesterday? If it dissolves and vanishes like a dream, as if it never existed... then how can you call it real? Where are the 'great' civilizations of the past? All that remain of them are the stories we tell... no reality in stories. All stories are simply, well, STORIES.
What is True is always True. It is a principle on which we can stand. ACIM says, "The Truth is True, and nothing else is true." Can't get much clearer than 'nothing else.' Nothing means, well, NOTHING.
Bodies are not true. Personalities are not true. Feelings come and go like weather and so are not true. Judgments are simply mental constructs and so not true. Possessions are not true. Time and space come and go and are not true. What comes and goes and dissolves like smoke and mirrors is simply, well, NOT.
The One Answer to whatever confronts us today and all days is this knowing. "Hear O Israel, the Lord Your God is ONE." This Truth lights the Way, corrects all projections and errors, and escorts us safely through every fire and every challenge within the world of dreams. There is nothing else.
"All this complexity is but a desperate attempt not to recognize the problem. If you could recognize that your only problem is separation from God, no matter what form it takes, you could accept the answer because you would see its relevance. There is only one problem, and One Answer." -- A Course in Miracles
Monday, February 18, 2008
The Circle of Atonement
"The Circle of Atonement has no end. Joy is Its unifying attribute, with no one left outside. The Power of God draws everyone to Its safe embrace of Love and Union. Stand quietly within this Circle, and attract all tortured minds to join with you in the safety of Its Peace and Holiness. Judge not except in this Quietness which is not of you." -- A Course in Miracles
Quietness that is not of me. Quietness that has Joy as its unifying attribute. Quietness that is Love and Oneness ItSelf. This all-embracing, inclusive stillpoint, the Oneness that We Are, is the Atonement. A Course in Miracles tells us that "everyone has a special part to play in the Atonement, but the message given to each one is always the same; God's Son is guiltless. Your only calling here is to devote yourself, with active willingness, to the denial of guilt in all its forms."
There are several unequivocal points here. When it says 'your only calling here,' there is no way this can be misinterpreted. Only means only. And when it says that calling is to devote oneself, devotion means complete and utter commitment. And when it says with active willingness, it closes the backdoor (the con of separating the earthly life from Truth) that the ego likes to keep open. Active willingness means active in all parts of one's imagined life, not just the occasional foray into Truth. So here, in this one sentence, is it all laid out in perfect simplicity and clarity. My only calling in this world is to devote my heart, mind, soul, and strength (and all other imagined resources) to knowing the Innocence and Oneness of All, and thereby remembering God, my One Self. This is the Atonement. And this is why ACIM says over and over and over that forgiveness is my only function here. Only the mind that has released all imagined grievances can see the Truth... that All is One and forever Innocent and Free of anything unlike Love.
So we have the answer to the great preoccupation of the ego: what am I supposed to do? And we are given clear instructions to "judge not except in quietness which is not of you." So we know that our job is the easiest one in the world... to forgive, to release, and to listen to the Voice for God. Everything else is given us.
The hard part is the devotion and active willingness. We have given our devotion and our willingness to the world of illusions for so long it has become an ingrained, conditioned pattern of behavior. And it takes great willingness to shift your entire world; heart, mind, soul, and strength; your entire devotion and all your resources; your entire identity. Again, you don't have to DO it... in fact, who you think you are is incapable of it. As we are told, we DO have to be actively willing to turn our entire world over to the Voice for God, and to devote our world to this. And we DO have to be willing to listen and follow the Voice. The willingness to forgive and release it all and to follow the Voice... this is our only calling and function. Period.
You and I are the hands and feet and voice of the Atonement... every minute of every day we are willing to forgive, release, and listen to the Voice. You don't get a more important purpose and calling than this. Our willingness to be true to this and only this is crucial. Together, we ARE the Circle of Atonement.
"Merely by Being What It Is, does Truth release you from everything that It is not. The Atonement is so gentle you need but whisper to It, and all Its Power will rush to your assistance and support. You are not frail with God beside you. Yet without Him you are nothing." -- A Course in Miracles
Quietness that is not of me. Quietness that has Joy as its unifying attribute. Quietness that is Love and Oneness ItSelf. This all-embracing, inclusive stillpoint, the Oneness that We Are, is the Atonement. A Course in Miracles tells us that "everyone has a special part to play in the Atonement, but the message given to each one is always the same; God's Son is guiltless. Your only calling here is to devote yourself, with active willingness, to the denial of guilt in all its forms."
There are several unequivocal points here. When it says 'your only calling here,' there is no way this can be misinterpreted. Only means only. And when it says that calling is to devote oneself, devotion means complete and utter commitment. And when it says with active willingness, it closes the backdoor (the con of separating the earthly life from Truth) that the ego likes to keep open. Active willingness means active in all parts of one's imagined life, not just the occasional foray into Truth. So here, in this one sentence, is it all laid out in perfect simplicity and clarity. My only calling in this world is to devote my heart, mind, soul, and strength (and all other imagined resources) to knowing the Innocence and Oneness of All, and thereby remembering God, my One Self. This is the Atonement. And this is why ACIM says over and over and over that forgiveness is my only function here. Only the mind that has released all imagined grievances can see the Truth... that All is One and forever Innocent and Free of anything unlike Love.
So we have the answer to the great preoccupation of the ego: what am I supposed to do? And we are given clear instructions to "judge not except in quietness which is not of you." So we know that our job is the easiest one in the world... to forgive, to release, and to listen to the Voice for God. Everything else is given us.
The hard part is the devotion and active willingness. We have given our devotion and our willingness to the world of illusions for so long it has become an ingrained, conditioned pattern of behavior. And it takes great willingness to shift your entire world; heart, mind, soul, and strength; your entire devotion and all your resources; your entire identity. Again, you don't have to DO it... in fact, who you think you are is incapable of it. As we are told, we DO have to be actively willing to turn our entire world over to the Voice for God, and to devote our world to this. And we DO have to be willing to listen and follow the Voice. The willingness to forgive and release it all and to follow the Voice... this is our only calling and function. Period.
You and I are the hands and feet and voice of the Atonement... every minute of every day we are willing to forgive, release, and listen to the Voice. You don't get a more important purpose and calling than this. Our willingness to be true to this and only this is crucial. Together, we ARE the Circle of Atonement.
"Merely by Being What It Is, does Truth release you from everything that It is not. The Atonement is so gentle you need but whisper to It, and all Its Power will rush to your assistance and support. You are not frail with God beside you. Yet without Him you are nothing." -- A Course in Miracles
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Infinite Resources
"Soul has infinite resources." -- Mary Baker Eddy
"Man is sustained by God, the Divine Principle of Being." -- Mary Baker Eddy
"I am sustained by the Love of God." -- A Course in Miracles
What does it feel like to know that the ground you're standing on is holy ground? What does it feel like to know that the Love and Resources of Infinity are what you live and move and have your Being IN? What does it feel like to know, really know, that 'underneath are the everlasting arms?'
Only life lived with the Awareness of the Infinite can be lived without fear. Only life lived with this knowing can be lived in innocence and trust. Only this can be called life at all. Everything else is settling for an illusion of life... prostituting oneself in the dream and to the dream, believing that the source of your life and being and happiness could lie within the limited and fearful world of your cherished illusions.
Like looking at a 3-D picture, when we soften our focus and stop looking at the limited details of our seeming life, we find the Infinite landscape opens before us. This inclusive vision is the gift of our True Self, which is eternally present as the Ground of Being. But the shifting of our allegiance and attention is an act of free will. We created the dream of separation by imagining a world apart from God with great tenacity and vigilance... and now we must return our holy attention through equal vigilance. What will we give our attention to this day? Who are we aware of BEING?
The Awareness of Being One with God is simply the Grace of Who We Are. We are as unlimited as God, whose Image we reflect. But we live and die like men, because we choose live in the awareness of being limited. We live and love our illusions and our limits, which A Course in Miracles calls our idols: "Idols are limits."
Our resources are as Infinite as God. As Mary Baker Eddy said, "Nothing can interfere with the harmony of Being." Nothing except our bad dreams. Time to wake up.
"Wholeness has no form because it is UNLIMITED." -- A Course in Miracles
"Man is sustained by God, the Divine Principle of Being." -- Mary Baker Eddy
"I am sustained by the Love of God." -- A Course in Miracles
What does it feel like to know that the ground you're standing on is holy ground? What does it feel like to know that the Love and Resources of Infinity are what you live and move and have your Being IN? What does it feel like to know, really know, that 'underneath are the everlasting arms?'
Only life lived with the Awareness of the Infinite can be lived without fear. Only life lived with this knowing can be lived in innocence and trust. Only this can be called life at all. Everything else is settling for an illusion of life... prostituting oneself in the dream and to the dream, believing that the source of your life and being and happiness could lie within the limited and fearful world of your cherished illusions.
Like looking at a 3-D picture, when we soften our focus and stop looking at the limited details of our seeming life, we find the Infinite landscape opens before us. This inclusive vision is the gift of our True Self, which is eternally present as the Ground of Being. But the shifting of our allegiance and attention is an act of free will. We created the dream of separation by imagining a world apart from God with great tenacity and vigilance... and now we must return our holy attention through equal vigilance. What will we give our attention to this day? Who are we aware of BEING?
The Awareness of Being One with God is simply the Grace of Who We Are. We are as unlimited as God, whose Image we reflect. But we live and die like men, because we choose live in the awareness of being limited. We live and love our illusions and our limits, which A Course in Miracles calls our idols: "Idols are limits."
Our resources are as Infinite as God. As Mary Baker Eddy said, "Nothing can interfere with the harmony of Being." Nothing except our bad dreams. Time to wake up.
"Wholeness has no form because it is UNLIMITED." -- A Course in Miracles
Friday, February 8, 2008
The Unanswered Question
"Your questions have no answer, being made to still God's Voice, which asks of everyone one question only: "Are you ready yet to help me save the world?" Ask this instead of what the ego is, and you will see a sudden brightness cover up the world the ego made. No miracle is now withheld from anyone. The world is saved from what you thought it was. And what it is is wholly uncondemned and wholly pure." -- A Course in Miracles
"Do I desire a world I rule instead of one that rules me? Do I desire a world where I am powerful instead of helpless? Do I desire a world in which I have no enemies and cannot sin? And do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?" -- A Course in Miracles
The universal smokescreen of the unanswered question is one we all know very well. Why is the world the way it is? Why me? Why did this happen when I have done everything right? Why did they treat me that way, when I have been so good to them? Or why did I say or do that, when I knew better? Why was I so stupid? Why did I, why did they... blah, blah, blah... the wheel of samsara continues to turn, turn, turn. Questions like these have no answer. They are not real questions, but rather a way of seeing the world. A way of being. When we ask such questions, we are being victims, reactive effects of some other cause. We are being powerless.
A Course in Miracles tells us that there is only one real question in any circumstance: "Is this what I would see? Do I want this?" This is usually immediately and impatiently answered by the ego... of course I don't want this! But there is another question, and one that remains unanswered behind the smokescreen of many seemingly unanswered questions that are not really questions: "Do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?"
Be vigilant now, because it's easy to get lost in the maze of words. As ACIM puts it, we can never have what we are not willing to BE. We are always experiencing exactly what we are being. Not what we are pretending to be, as in the identities of the ego. It's not about being a nice person or being right. It's the core of it. Who are you being when you ask a question? And as we know, there are always and forever only two choices in this world, no matter how many there appear to be. And only one of them is true. Thank God.
We are always either being One with God, being our True Self... or we are being an illusory, victimized, limited fiction within the dream. This decision is seemingly complicated in the world by all of our unanswered questions. Why would we not want to know the Truth? Why, indeed.
In order to answer what ACIM calls the last unanswered question, "Do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?" we have to see that the world itself is meaningless. We give it all the meaning it has for us. We are the dreamer. And regardless of what we decide to do and no matter how we shift roles, it remains a world of illusions. It will never give us what we want. Because, "Elusive happiness, or happiness in changing form that shifts with time and place, is an illusion that has no meaning. Happiness must be constant, because it is attained by giving up the wish for the inconstant. Joy cannot be perceived except through constant vision."
We come here to dream awhile, always with the false hope that yet another dream will satisfy the endless desires that arise out of the dream itself. It never ends. Nothing will ever fill or satisfy our imagined lacks and empty places. And yet, within this very dream, another Voice calls us. Do you want to know the Truth? Are you willing to be ruthlessly honest with yourself? Are you ready yet to help Me save the world? The last unanswered question: "Do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?" is the call to freedom and sanity and peace. And what more could we ever want?
"The constancy of happiness has no exceptions; no change of any kind. It is unshakable as is the Love of God for His creation." -- A Course in Miracles
"Do I desire a world I rule instead of one that rules me? Do I desire a world where I am powerful instead of helpless? Do I desire a world in which I have no enemies and cannot sin? And do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?" -- A Course in Miracles
The universal smokescreen of the unanswered question is one we all know very well. Why is the world the way it is? Why me? Why did this happen when I have done everything right? Why did they treat me that way, when I have been so good to them? Or why did I say or do that, when I knew better? Why was I so stupid? Why did I, why did they... blah, blah, blah... the wheel of samsara continues to turn, turn, turn. Questions like these have no answer. They are not real questions, but rather a way of seeing the world. A way of being. When we ask such questions, we are being victims, reactive effects of some other cause. We are being powerless.
A Course in Miracles tells us that there is only one real question in any circumstance: "Is this what I would see? Do I want this?" This is usually immediately and impatiently answered by the ego... of course I don't want this! But there is another question, and one that remains unanswered behind the smokescreen of many seemingly unanswered questions that are not really questions: "Do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?"
Be vigilant now, because it's easy to get lost in the maze of words. As ACIM puts it, we can never have what we are not willing to BE. We are always experiencing exactly what we are being. Not what we are pretending to be, as in the identities of the ego. It's not about being a nice person or being right. It's the core of it. Who are you being when you ask a question? And as we know, there are always and forever only two choices in this world, no matter how many there appear to be. And only one of them is true. Thank God.
We are always either being One with God, being our True Self... or we are being an illusory, victimized, limited fiction within the dream. This decision is seemingly complicated in the world by all of our unanswered questions. Why would we not want to know the Truth? Why, indeed.
In order to answer what ACIM calls the last unanswered question, "Do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?" we have to see that the world itself is meaningless. We give it all the meaning it has for us. We are the dreamer. And regardless of what we decide to do and no matter how we shift roles, it remains a world of illusions. It will never give us what we want. Because, "Elusive happiness, or happiness in changing form that shifts with time and place, is an illusion that has no meaning. Happiness must be constant, because it is attained by giving up the wish for the inconstant. Joy cannot be perceived except through constant vision."
We come here to dream awhile, always with the false hope that yet another dream will satisfy the endless desires that arise out of the dream itself. It never ends. Nothing will ever fill or satisfy our imagined lacks and empty places. And yet, within this very dream, another Voice calls us. Do you want to know the Truth? Are you willing to be ruthlessly honest with yourself? Are you ready yet to help Me save the world? The last unanswered question: "Do I want to see what I denied because it is the truth?" is the call to freedom and sanity and peace. And what more could we ever want?
"The constancy of happiness has no exceptions; no change of any kind. It is unshakable as is the Love of God for His creation." -- A Course in Miracles
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
By My Spirit
"Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts." -- The Bible
"No law the world obeys can help you grasp Love's meaning. What the world believes was made to hide Love's meaning and to keep it dark and secret. There is not one principle the world upholds but violates the Truth of what Love Is, and what you are as well." -- A Course in Miracles
Whenever we are confronted with a situation, whether in relationships or at work or with finances... no matter what situation is in our face, we universally look for solutions. We feel there is something else we should do or say, some secret technique that will manipulate things to our liking, or some prayer mantra that will save us. We look to human principles and techniques for our salvation. What is so funny is that throughout human history people have been coming up with solutions that seemed to work for them for a while... just long enough to hook us into thinking, "This is it!" But then they don't work for the next one. On and off, on and off, working and not working, here and gone... the wheel of samsara, the nonsense of the dream spins and turns, disguising itself in the newest and most promising of ideas.
What all illusory solutions have in common is that they are an attempt to find power and authority in what is simply not true. "Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts." A Course in Miracles says it this way: "All power is of God. What is not of Him has no power to do anything." No power to do anything in reality. Only a formula for sleeping and dreaming that we are powerful or powerless in the dream... and there is really no difference. When you awaken, it is all simply gone.
Awakening is why we're here. There is no other purpose. Whatever our path within the dream we call life, when this becomes its only purpose in our mind and heart it becomes a beautiful journey home. And whatever seems to confront us becomes some version of what ACIM calls the happy dream... because it always and only serves the Love that calls us to awaken, because It is Who We Are.
The decision to value Truth over illusions is not a minor one. It is the only decision you ever really make. And you make it not by struggling, not by analyzing, not by techniques or by more information... you make it by valuing what is True only, and being willing to question whatever arises from the standpoint of Truth. What remains when everything else is revealed as untrue and simply falls away? What remains is what is eternally Real and True. And it is revealed "not by might, not by power..." It is always and only by My Spirit.
"My mind is part of God's. I am very holy." -- A Course in Miracles
"No law the world obeys can help you grasp Love's meaning. What the world believes was made to hide Love's meaning and to keep it dark and secret. There is not one principle the world upholds but violates the Truth of what Love Is, and what you are as well." -- A Course in Miracles
Whenever we are confronted with a situation, whether in relationships or at work or with finances... no matter what situation is in our face, we universally look for solutions. We feel there is something else we should do or say, some secret technique that will manipulate things to our liking, or some prayer mantra that will save us. We look to human principles and techniques for our salvation. What is so funny is that throughout human history people have been coming up with solutions that seemed to work for them for a while... just long enough to hook us into thinking, "This is it!" But then they don't work for the next one. On and off, on and off, working and not working, here and gone... the wheel of samsara, the nonsense of the dream spins and turns, disguising itself in the newest and most promising of ideas.
What all illusory solutions have in common is that they are an attempt to find power and authority in what is simply not true. "Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts." A Course in Miracles says it this way: "All power is of God. What is not of Him has no power to do anything." No power to do anything in reality. Only a formula for sleeping and dreaming that we are powerful or powerless in the dream... and there is really no difference. When you awaken, it is all simply gone.
Awakening is why we're here. There is no other purpose. Whatever our path within the dream we call life, when this becomes its only purpose in our mind and heart it becomes a beautiful journey home. And whatever seems to confront us becomes some version of what ACIM calls the happy dream... because it always and only serves the Love that calls us to awaken, because It is Who We Are.
The decision to value Truth over illusions is not a minor one. It is the only decision you ever really make. And you make it not by struggling, not by analyzing, not by techniques or by more information... you make it by valuing what is True only, and being willing to question whatever arises from the standpoint of Truth. What remains when everything else is revealed as untrue and simply falls away? What remains is what is eternally Real and True. And it is revealed "not by might, not by power..." It is always and only by My Spirit.
"My mind is part of God's. I am very holy." -- A Course in Miracles
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Being Human
"Today we practice making free your mind of all the laws you think you must obey; of all the limits under which you live, and all the changes that you think are part of human destiny." -- A Course in Miracles
"Idols are limits. They are the belief that there are forms that will bring happiness, and that by limiting is all attained. It is as if you said, "I have no need of everything. This little thing I want, and it will be as everything to me." And this must fail to satisfy, because it is your will that everything be yours. Decide for idols and you ask for loss. Decide for Truth and everything is yours." -- A Course in Miracles
"Hence Christianity and the Science which expounds it are based on spiritual understanding, and they supersede the so-called laws of matter." -- Mary Baker Eddy
Being human is what we have drilled into us from the time we enter the world. "You're only human," becomes the catch-all for limitation of every description. Being 'superhuman' is idolized with larger than life celebrities and sports figures. But even those Olympic athletes that inspire are limits placed on the rest of us... they are somehow special and apart as we revere them. So it’s easy to see that the definition of idols that A Course in Miracles uses is very apt. Idols are limits we place on ourselves, to keep our little kingdoms intact, at least in illusion.
When I come from a place limitation, of human apparancy, I find only evidence for that. When I come from knowing the Allness of God to be the only Truth and my only Home, the illusion of the human viewpoint becomes self-evident. The Allness of Love means that we are IN Love... and as ACIM puts it, "Love created me like ItSelf." So not one belief in human need or limitation can possibly be real, no matter what it looks like. The Bible passage, "Cease ye from man whose breath is in his nostrils" refers to this. It's not that we are asked to withdraw from our apparent humanness... it's that when we see that we are not limited to the human we are a transparency for the Limitless which is our true home. "Man whose breath is in his nostrils" does not know himself as a Son or Daughter of God.
Being human is only another aspect of the dream... nothing special and nothing to be proud of or ashamed of. As ACIM reminds us, there is no hierarchy of illusions. We forgive our illusions and remember that Love created us like ItSelf... and there is no Will but God's. Only One.
"Spirit is the life, substance, and continuity of all things." -- Mary Baker Eddy
"Idols are limits. They are the belief that there are forms that will bring happiness, and that by limiting is all attained. It is as if you said, "I have no need of everything. This little thing I want, and it will be as everything to me." And this must fail to satisfy, because it is your will that everything be yours. Decide for idols and you ask for loss. Decide for Truth and everything is yours." -- A Course in Miracles
"Hence Christianity and the Science which expounds it are based on spiritual understanding, and they supersede the so-called laws of matter." -- Mary Baker Eddy
Being human is what we have drilled into us from the time we enter the world. "You're only human," becomes the catch-all for limitation of every description. Being 'superhuman' is idolized with larger than life celebrities and sports figures. But even those Olympic athletes that inspire are limits placed on the rest of us... they are somehow special and apart as we revere them. So it’s easy to see that the definition of idols that A Course in Miracles uses is very apt. Idols are limits we place on ourselves, to keep our little kingdoms intact, at least in illusion.
When I come from a place limitation, of human apparancy, I find only evidence for that. When I come from knowing the Allness of God to be the only Truth and my only Home, the illusion of the human viewpoint becomes self-evident. The Allness of Love means that we are IN Love... and as ACIM puts it, "Love created me like ItSelf." So not one belief in human need or limitation can possibly be real, no matter what it looks like. The Bible passage, "Cease ye from man whose breath is in his nostrils" refers to this. It's not that we are asked to withdraw from our apparent humanness... it's that when we see that we are not limited to the human we are a transparency for the Limitless which is our true home. "Man whose breath is in his nostrils" does not know himself as a Son or Daughter of God.
Being human is only another aspect of the dream... nothing special and nothing to be proud of or ashamed of. As ACIM reminds us, there is no hierarchy of illusions. We forgive our illusions and remember that Love created us like ItSelf... and there is no Will but God's. Only One.
"Spirit is the life, substance, and continuity of all things." -- Mary Baker Eddy
Monday, February 4, 2008
Two Directions
"There are but two directions you can take, while time remains and choice is meaningful. For never will another road be made except the way to Heaven. You but choose whether to go toward Heaven, or away to nowhere. There is nothing else to choose. Nothing is ever lost but time, which in the end is meaningless. For it is but a little hindrance to eternity, quite meaningless to the real Teacher of the world. Yet since you do believe in it, why should you waste it going nowhere, when it can be used to reach a goal as high as learning can achieve? Think not the way to Heaven's gate is difficult at all. Nothing you undertake with certain purpose and high resolve and happy confidence, holding your brother's hand and keeping step to Heaven's song, is difficult to do. But it is hard indeed to wander off, alone and miserable, down a road that leads to nothing and that has no purpose." -- A Course in Miracles
"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
We all know the two directions referred to in the above quote. How many times have we come to this crossroads, and how many times have we chosen the path to nowhere? The anxiety, dissatisfaction, and meaninglessness that arises from this choice is inevitable. How can We, Who live and move and have our Being in Love ItSelf ever be satisfied with an illusion of ourself? We will keep coming to this crossroads over and over until we consistently remember Who We Are. This is Grace.
We can wander a while in our illusions and the world of dreams. We can keep thinking we've found comfort and satisfaction in the world, only to lose it again. We can settle for illusions of love and security that leave us feeling like a prostitute, selling our soul for what we think the illusions will give us. But never in Reality can we be other than Home in God. The real question is, why do we insist on maintaining these cyclical, serial dreams of pain and suffering? Like Bill Murray in the movie Groundhog Day, we keep thinking we will find a way to make the dream exactly what we think we want... or failing at that, how to escape the damn dream. None of it works.
Every day, every hour, every minute, every second we are choosing. This is our only point of real choice in a world of insanity. When we finally choose to listen only to the Voice that teaches us Who We Really Are, it is always loving, kind, and completely non-judgmental. Always. It's the voice of the illusory self that is hateful, vengeful, and always judging everyone and everything, including and most especially our self. Everything is found wanting by this voice... and if we manage to maintain the illusion of a cheerful self, we become martyrs or prostitutes in the dream. No real difference... as ACIM points out again and again, there is no hierarchy of illusions. And forgiveness offers everything we want, without exception
"An unforgiving thought is one that makes a judgment that it will not raise to doubt, although it is not true." This means that everything that is not the Oneness and Unity and Love and Peace that is our true Being is what needs forgiving. This means everything in the world, without exception. So here we are again today, with two directions unfolding before us. Which will we choose now? The Heaven of our true Self, the Allness that includes all love and joy and fulfillment, complete forgiveness of ourselves and the world? Or the hell of trying to make the damn illusion work?
"There is no conflict here. No sacrifice is possible in the relinquishment of an illusion recognized as such. Where all reality has been withdrawn from what was never true, can it be hard to give it up, and choose what must be true?" -- A Course in Miracles
"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
We all know the two directions referred to in the above quote. How many times have we come to this crossroads, and how many times have we chosen the path to nowhere? The anxiety, dissatisfaction, and meaninglessness that arises from this choice is inevitable. How can We, Who live and move and have our Being in Love ItSelf ever be satisfied with an illusion of ourself? We will keep coming to this crossroads over and over until we consistently remember Who We Are. This is Grace.
We can wander a while in our illusions and the world of dreams. We can keep thinking we've found comfort and satisfaction in the world, only to lose it again. We can settle for illusions of love and security that leave us feeling like a prostitute, selling our soul for what we think the illusions will give us. But never in Reality can we be other than Home in God. The real question is, why do we insist on maintaining these cyclical, serial dreams of pain and suffering? Like Bill Murray in the movie Groundhog Day, we keep thinking we will find a way to make the dream exactly what we think we want... or failing at that, how to escape the damn dream. None of it works.
Every day, every hour, every minute, every second we are choosing. This is our only point of real choice in a world of insanity. When we finally choose to listen only to the Voice that teaches us Who We Really Are, it is always loving, kind, and completely non-judgmental. Always. It's the voice of the illusory self that is hateful, vengeful, and always judging everyone and everything, including and most especially our self. Everything is found wanting by this voice... and if we manage to maintain the illusion of a cheerful self, we become martyrs or prostitutes in the dream. No real difference... as ACIM points out again and again, there is no hierarchy of illusions. And forgiveness offers everything we want, without exception
"An unforgiving thought is one that makes a judgment that it will not raise to doubt, although it is not true." This means that everything that is not the Oneness and Unity and Love and Peace that is our true Being is what needs forgiving. This means everything in the world, without exception. So here we are again today, with two directions unfolding before us. Which will we choose now? The Heaven of our true Self, the Allness that includes all love and joy and fulfillment, complete forgiveness of ourselves and the world? Or the hell of trying to make the damn illusion work?
"There is no conflict here. No sacrifice is possible in the relinquishment of an illusion recognized as such. Where all reality has been withdrawn from what was never true, can it be hard to give it up, and choose what must be true?" -- A Course in Miracles
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