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