An Unknown Future

"A healed mind does not plan. It carries out the plans that it receives through listening to wisdom that is not its own. It waits until it has been taught what should be done, and then proceeds to do it. It does not depend upon itself for anything except its adequacy to fulfill the plans assigned to it. A healed mind is relieved of the belief that it must plan, although it cannot know the outcome which is best, the means by which it is achieved, nor how to recognize the problem that the plan is made to solve. It is, perhaps, not easy to perceive that self-initiated plans are but defenses, with the purpose all of them were made to realize. They are the means by which a frightened mind would undertake its own protection, at the cost of Truth." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 135, 11:1-4, 12:1, 14:1-2

The thought of an unknown future is one of those fear-filled images that plagues us. Where will I be? Who will I be? What will I do? What does that look like? How can I grasp it and hold it? How will I live? What will I do for income and health care? How can I know it will be alright? Who will be with me? Who will take care of me? Who can I serve? What is my purpose? How can I grow and become more... and on and on and on. Trying to figure out the future and plan for it is the preoccupation of the dream-self we each call 'me'.

ACIM tells us that "The mind engaged in planning for itself is occupied in setting up control of future happenings. It does not think that it will be provided for, unless it makes its own provisions. It overlooks the present, for it rests on the idea the past has taught enough to let the mind direct its future course. The mind that plans is thus refusing to allow for change. Its past experience directs its choice of what will happen. And it does not see that here and now is everything it needs to guarantee a future quite unlike the past, without a continuity of any old ideas and sick beliefs. Anticipation plays no part at all, for present confidence directs the way." (ACIM; Workbook 135, 15:1-4, 16:1-5)

All of this is based on several illusory assumptions. First, that we are separate from God, from Good, and must somehow acquire our good because we don't have it. Second, that there are multiple forces or powers operating in the world that we must individually align with or defend against. And third (and the most difficult to see as the lie that it is), that we have to personally do it... that it's up to us to set goals and plan and pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. People who don't set goals and reach for their dreams in our world are considered sorry specimens. We look on them with pity and wonder how life seems worth living. What nonsense it all is!

All of these lies can be answered with One simple Truth: God. God is Omnipresent, the Allness of Being. Good is a synonym for God. So Good is All-Encompassing, All-in-All. God is Omnipotent, the only Power. So there can be no other forces or powers to defend against or to align with. Finally, God is Omniscient, the only Knower. There can be no other who knows and does anything. This is not personally insulting, it's liberating. And it's what Jeshua be Joseph meant when he said, "Of myself I do nothing."

God IS. "What could you not accept, if you but knew that everything that happens, all events, past, present, and to come, are gently planned by One Whose only purpose is your Good? Your present Trust in Him is the defense that promises a future undisturbed, without a trace of sorrow, and with joy that constantly increases, as this life becomes a Holy Instant, set in time, but heeding only immortality. Let no defenses but your present Trust direct the future, and this life becomes a meaningful encounter with the Truth that only your defenses would conceal." (ACIM; Workbook 135, 18:1, 19:1-2)

God IS. There can be no unknown future when we remember this. For we are the Holy reflection of the Oneness, the Allness, the Goodness of God. There IS no other.

"Heaven asks nothing. It is hell that makes extravagant demands for sacrifice. You give up nothing when, undefended, you present yourself to your Creator as you really are. What little plans or magical beliefs can still have value, when you have received your function from the Voice for God HimSelf?" -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 135, 24:3-5, 25:6