Living from Wholeness

"Routines as such are dangerous, because they easily become gods in their own right." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 16, 2:5

"Time is but another phase of what does nothing. It works hand in hand with all the other attributes with which you seek to keep concealed the Truth about yourself. Time neither takes away nor can restore." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 28, Section I, 6:1-3

Our daily schedules and routines are very seductive. We feel safer with them, as if they make us somehow more valid as human beings, more in control of our lives. We are dependent on each little aspect of routine, as if these things in themselves were life. These are the idols we have made, the gods we worship each day.

ACIM reminds us that we are really not doing anything at all with these habits and schedules and routines. We think we are actually doing something... if I brush my teeth, I'm protecting them. If I eat healthfully, my body won't get sick (and when has THAT ever worked?). A dream figure cannot cause anything, or be the effect of anything. There are no laws within the dream that hold consistently. Like all dreams, little anomalies pop up all the time that make us wonder... but not too hard. We don't want to know. We willingly fall back into our routines and pretend, like everyone else, that they make sense.

As ACIM points out, time does nothing. Time is just another god we have created in the dream, an imaginary comforter. "Remember nothing that you taught yourself, for you were badly taught. What you remember never was. It can deserve but laughter." (ACIM; Chapter 28, Section I, 7:1, 9:1,3) It is this awareness that brings true forgiveness of our illusions. And once forgiven, our illusions no longer obscure our Wholeness of Being.

The miracle of forgiveness reveals that we are and have always been safe and innocent and free, perfect and whole and complete. We cause nothing, because we are the holy Effect of God. We haven't done anything at all. And so we are free of our dreams of guilt and blame. "This world is causeless, as is every dream that anyone has dreamed within the world. No plans are possible, and no design exists that could be found and understood. What else could be expected from a thing that has no cause? You may dream a dream, but never will you give it real effects." (ACIM; Chapter 28, Section II, 6:1-3, 5)

Living from Wholeness requires that we allow the miracle of healed perception, by forgiving the dream. "The miracle establishes you dream a dream, and that its content is not true. This is a crucial step in dealing with illusions. No one is afraid of them when he perceives he made them up." (ACIM; Chapter 28, Section II, 7:1-3) Whenever we think we are doing it, whatever it is, we are lost in a dream. As Jeshua ben Joseph said, "Of myself, I do nothing." We are the Effect of God, and so whatever we think we are doing and causing is false, illusory... we are dreaming. We don't need the false security of dreaming imaginary comforters. We are forever the Effect of God. Living from the Wholeness that is our True Self, we reflect the Love of God even in the the dream.

"The miracle reminds you of a Cause forever present, perfectly untouched by time and interference. Never changed from what It IS. And you are Its Effect, as changeless and as perfect as ItSelf. It is not revealed in miracles. They but remind you that It has not gone. When you forgive It for your sins, It will no longer be denied. Your innocence has not been lost. You need no healing to be healed. In quietness, see in the miracle a lesson in allowing Cause to have Its Own Effects, and doing nothing that would interfere. The miracle comes quietly into the mind that stops an instant and is still." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 28, Section I, 9:4-6, 8, 10:7-9, 11:1

"The world is full of miracles. They stand in shining silence next to every dream of pain and suffering, of sin and guilt. They are the dream's alternative, the choice to be the dreamer, rather than deny the active role in making up the dream." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 28, Section II, 12:1-3