Being Perfect

"The children of God are entitled to the perfect comfort that comes from perfect trust.  God and His creations are completely dependent on Each Other.  He depends on them because He created them perfect." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 2, Section III, 5:1, 6-7

"Be ye therefore perfect, as your Father in Heaven is perfect." -- The Bible; Matthew 5:48

Definition of the word perfect:  

• being entirely without fault or defect 
• absolute; unequivocal
• faithfully reproducing the original
• lacking in no essential detail; complete 
  

Wow.  I can feel myself relaxing.  Relaxing in perfect trust.  Resting in perfection.  An unshakeable certainty of inseparable Oneness with the Love Intelligence and Infinite Goodness that is God. Completeness and fulfillment that never changes.  Wow.

Who are we, that we should be entitled to all this, and more?

"See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, NOW we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." -- The Bible; 1 John 3:1-2  

How many times a day do our thoughts about ourselves and others shift and change?  From liking to not-liking, from kindness and acceptance to judging and blaming, from grandiose aspirations to morose regrets, we are like mental yo-yo's in the ever-shifting concept of self and other. These images are not who we are!  They are mental constructs, projections with no substance.   

The good news is that Being Perfect has nothing to do with who and what we imagine ourselves to be as bodies and personalities.  Being and Perfection are the Reality of God, which is Principle.  Like an axiom in mathematics, it is a given, an unchanging Principle.  This is our Spiritual Reality!  Our Reality is forever perfect and unchanging in the Mind of God, radiant with Love and Light and Life.  Unchanging.  Joyous.  Free of all limits.  Pure Love.  Encompassing all with our Love and Light and Life.  Being Perfect is our natural state. 

"The Thought God holds of you is like a star, unchangeable in an eternal sky." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 30, Section III, 8:4 

In and Out

"In Him we live and move and have our being." --The Bible; Acts 17:28

"I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." -- The Bible; Galatians 2:20

"My mind is part of God's. I am very holy." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 35

Whether we talk about the Mind of God, or the Spirit of God, or the Allness of God, we are always speaking of Infinite Mind which is all-encompassing.  The problem with our shared dualistic perspective is that even when we speak of God as All, we place ourselves inside that allness, as if we're sort of part of it, but still something 'other'.  Arthur Corey spoke of this dilemma when he wrote, "AS Mind we live and move and have our Being -- not inside of Mind, like seeds in a watermelon!"  We can't seem to help viewing everything as in or out.

I began this blog with some Biblical passages that have pointed me toward the Truth over the years.  And of course, the famous Workbook Lesson from A Course in Miracles that reminds us we are as holy as God is, and never separate from this Infinite Awareness.  Of course, it does so in language that we can understand, however imperfectly.  And I have been reflecting on just how inadequate our language is to speak of what is forever One and indivisible.

In Hindu scriptures they compare our minds to waves in the Ocean of Divine Mind.  In other words, waves are always and forever ocean... not IN the ocean, but ocean BEING ocean.  Our minds are not just part of God's Mind.  Our Minds are God's Mind, Infinitely Extending in Perfect Awareness.  God BEING God.  

"But..."  I know.  I know.  The mind that sleeps seems to shrink in awareness until all it sees is imperfection and fragmented being, everywhere it looks.  It is the act of focusing on this tunnel vision that creates the illusion of in and out.  From the mountaintop, everything looks different.  From a unified Mind, there is only the Beauty of Holiness.

So are both real?  This is the question all of us have asked at some point.  Immersed in dualism, we imagine there is a 'both', a 'two', an in and an out.  The gift of A Course in Miracles is that it shows us how our tunnel vision perspective deludes and frightens us, when it is just a false sense of things, an insubstantial projection of the sleeping mind, and completely false.  "Where is the darkness when the Light has come?" the Course asks us.  "Nothing, and nowhere," is the reply.

We are forever pure Spirit, pure Mind, which is beyond all appearances that shift and change. We are neither in nor out.

"Unity alone is not a thing of dreams." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 12, 6:10

The Miracle

"Judgment is the weapon I would use against myself, to keep the miracle away from me." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 347

The miracle.  How often are those two words repeated in ACIM, always pointing to the wholeness and perfection that exist without an opposite.  It isn't really anything, doesn't really do anything, never changes and never opposes.  The miracle is what is revealed with a shift in awareness from physical sight (projection) to Spiritual Sight (extension).  It reveals the Spiritual Reality that is all there is, or ever will be. Only the perceptual mechanism of judgment made a world other than perfect and whole appear to exist.  When judgment is forgiven and released, only the innocence of Spiritual Perfection is here.  Only One, only God, only pure Spirit, Mind Awake and Aware of Its Infinite Beauty.

So why would any aspect of mind judge?  Why would any aspect of this Infinite I Am attempt to hide from Self-Awareness?  What part of One Self imagines that there is another to defend against or hide from?  How foolish this all sounds, and yet how familiar.

The great reversal, as ACIM calls the process of mind awakening to Itself, can seem long indeed.  Judgment is used in many forms, in many disguises, always to justify our addiction to the contracted mental state we call a self.  But no matter what we call this upside down perception, these inverted and projected images have no relationship to Reality.  They don't need to be changed or understood.  They simply need to be forgiven and released.

When all judgment is finally put aside, projected images fall away and reveal the miracle of One Spiritual Self abiding and unchanging, All-Loving and All-Whole, Encompassing all that appears to be with pure and radiant Joy.  This is the miracle, the coming of the Christ Child... your own Beloved Self.

"And the angel said unto them, "Fear not, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people." -- Luke 2:10

The Great I Am

"Death is a thought that takes on many forms, often unrecognized.  It may appear as sadness, fear, anxiety or doubt; as anger, faithlessness, and lack of trust; concern for bodies, envy, and all forms in which the wish to be as you are not may come to tempt you.  All such thoughts are but reflections of the worshipping of death as savior and as giver of release." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 163, 1:1-3

When I read this passage before my morning meditation it was like a cartoon light bulb lit up over my head!  When Jesus said the last thing we'll overcome is death, he wasn't talking about bodies!  He was talking about the wish to be something else... the desire for change.  How often have we heard that change is the only constant?  How often have we thought, "I just need a change."  Maybe it's a change of mates, a change of jobs, a change of scenery.  Maybe it's a diet or exercise plan, yoga, meditation, or a commitment to read the Course every day.  "But wait!" I can hear you all saying... "those are all good things!  It's good to focus on health, on awakening, on self-improvement!" But the one thing all of these good intentions have in common is the wish to be as you are not.

Think carefully about this... the only reason to improve something is if it is somehow lacking.  It is this that is impossible.  God created only God, everywhere and always.  There can be no other substance or existence.  What would it be made of?  Where would it be?  And the continual search for improvement is the same as saying, "I am not" instead of "I Am."

While we dream of a world that seems imperfect and in constant flux, we have great need of forgiving the desire to be as we are not.  As we let go of wanting things to be different, as we let go of wanting ourselves or them or it to change, we discover the unchanging I Am as the very Ground of Being. When Buddha said that desire is the source of all suffering, he was pointing out that it is the desire or wish for change that spins the wheel of samsara, the dream of life as change and suffering and death.  Awakening from the dream is simply recovering our Awareness of Self, of I Am without a fluctuating object.

Ironically, there can never be a change in Reality.  As Jesus pointed out, "Before Abraham was, I Am."  Before and after are dream-concepts, meaningless to the radiating Bliss that I Am.  What we call the Christ, the birth of the Awareness of Changeless Oneness we celebrate as Christmas, is "the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow."  We are perfect ideas, extensions in pure Spirit, forever in the Mind of God.  Emmanuel, God with Us, is the Great I Am. 

"God Wills you learn what always has been true: that He created you as part of Him, and this must still be true because ideas leave not their Source.  Such is Creation's Law; that each idea the mind conceives but adds to its abundance, never takes away." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 26, Section VII, 13:2-3

All Loving and All Worthy

I have a human pattern of judging a situation and then feeling wrong, or then concluding that I'm not good enough for whatever.  I know this is a familiar story for some of you, too.  Human beings are always feeling bad about something, and either blaming self or someone else for the feelings.  But the Atonement reveals that even these feelings bear unexpected spiritual fruit.  When we're willing to suspend judgment through forgiveness, the still, small Voice of Truth is heard in the midst of the sadness, the anxiety, the hopelessness.  And it always returns the Mind to the Awareness of ever-present Joy.  It always reveals that the images of judgment are simply false.  The feelings the ego conjures have no meaning, because they have no substance.  They are simply not there.

"When you are sad, know this need not be.  Depression comes from a sense of being deprived of something you want and do not have.  Remember that you are deprived of nothing except by your own decisions, and then decide otherwise.  When you are anxious, realize that anxiety comes from the capriciousness of the ego, and know that this need not be.  You can be as vigilant against the ego's dictates as for them.  When you have given up this voluntary dis-spiriting, you will see how your mind can focus and rise above fatigue and heal.  Yet you are not sufficiently vigilant against the demands of the ego.  This need not be.  The problem is not one of concentration; it is the belief that no one, including yourself, is worth consistent effort.  You are a mirror of Truth, in which God Himself shines in perfect Light.  To the ego's dark glass you need but say, "I will not look there because I know these images are not true."  Then let the Holy One shine on you in peace, knowing that this, and only this, must be." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 4, Section IV

So am I worth the time and attention it takes to reverse these human patterns?  Certainly not as I imagined myself, nor is anyone else that I've imagined worth the effort.  But Who AM I?  Christ appearing as me is far beyond any human measure of worth.  I AM worth consistent attention and effort, because I AM is the Truth about me and thus about all that Is.  I AM a mirror of Truth, where God shines in Perfect Light and Joy.  Only this IS.  As the Course says, "This, and only this, must be."

I was reading a transcript of a workshop given three decades ago by Herb Fitch, and this passage transported me: “Whenever you are reverting to the opinion that you are a human being, you’re blocking the Light, you’re blocking the Voice.  The Voice does not come except where there is purity.  And purity means not a divided concept of matter and Spirit.  So please examine your deeper feelings and know that you are not both Christ and a human being.  You are not both Spirit and a human being.  You are pure Spirit, Christ and no other. The greatest thing I have is the assurance that I and the Father are One. If I and the Father are One that means I am not human.  I must learn how to accept this in the quietness of my own Being, resting there, waiting for the inner impulse that tells me Who I AM, feeling the nature of my true Being and trusting what I feel and hear enough to LIVE it, and act upon it. ” – Herb Fitch

So purity means not having a split mind, not seeing the projected concepts of separate bodies and separate things we call matter as if they were the truth.  Because we cannot see two worlds.  We are unable to know Self as Infinite, as Pure and Perfect Spirit, as long as we believe in the limited forms we call matter.  Knowing Who I AM means knowing I am not both Christ and a human being.  And if I and the Father are One, there is nothing but Spirit.  Consistent effort is needed only to return my attention to this Awareness in my own Being.  I must remember Who I really AM, and that I AM worth it.  There are no human beings here.  Only the Christ We Are and Our Infinite Expressions.  All Loving and All Worthy.

THIS is the Glory

"You are not saved from anything [there is nothing but God], but you are saved for glory [the extending of the Light of God that we are].  Glory is your inheritance, given you by your Creator that you might extend it." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section IV, 1:4-5 (brackets hold the whispers of Holy Spirit about this quote)

Last night I dreamed about a trio of friends, a girl and two boys.  They were part of some much larger community, a typical hierarchical organization of some sort, which was transitioning from an old building and format to a much newer building and organization.  It was a big deal, with a new head administrator and gala celebration in the works.  And as in all group situations, everybody wanted to be in charge, everybody had personal ideas and preferences, and everybody had an agenda.  Somehow (in the way of dreams) my characters decided to kill off the new administrator and take his place, since no one really knew him yet.  The ringleader took on that appearance and persona, with the other two going along and making sure everyone believed it.  Then ensued a series of such ‘take-overs’, where one of them would kill someone else off and morph into that appearance and persona to take their place.  I kept wanting to wake up, but felt powerless to do so until the impostors were somehow ‘safe’.  I kept hoping they would just be happy with what they had done, but they kept it up until they started killing each other off to be in charge.  I only woke up when my dog-alarms woke me, and I felt hung-over and desperately bad and guilty, as if ‘I’ had been the one doing all the killing, posturing, and deception.  And of course, I had been the one.  What other one could there be? Whose mind dreamed this? 

The Course says in the Manual for Teachers that it takes great learning to understand that ALL things, events, encounters, and circumstances are helpful.  Our nightmares are gifts that bring the buried guilt to the Light to be forgiven.  What is the source of this guilt?  Nothing real, but a lifetime (or lifetimes) of believing the impossible… that we are separate and in competition with many others and with God.  Who knows how many dreams we have projected onto the screen of the sleeping mind, with casts of thousands of players, some seemingly innocent and some obviously guilty.  But all simply perpetuate this insane desire to kill off what gets in the way of our seeming preferences, and to cast as innocent our desire to do so.  All the while we are generating the smoke screen of many separate and sleeping parts, when there is only the One, and that One forever Awake and Aware.

This compulsion to create multiple forms and meanings and needs and versions is hell.  Heaven is the unified Awareness of our Eternal Self, the Oneness of Perfect Wholeness and Love without limits.  This is not boring sameness, but Infinite Creation, Infinite Bliss.  The extension of Love is Our only Purpose, and this Love has no object and no agenda.  It is eternally free and isn’t limited to or by imagined forms.  It doesn’t need to get rid of anything, or change anything, or keep anything. 

Every Sunday in my little church, we sing these words:
“Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.  As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: World without end, AMEN, AMEN.”

Glory is the sheer joy of reveling in the Truth, the Source, the One, that shines and extends and includes ALL.

The Son is ALL that extends in and as the Awareness of that One.

The Holy Spirit is the extension of this Glory even within the dream, as the Awakening and Quickening of this Awareness.

This Glory, this ALLNESS, this Quickening of Awareness of Self is the only Purpose of every dream, whether by night or by day (because make no mistake, everything sensed with the body is a dream).  How is this Purpose lived?  By shedding every judgment, every preference, every personal agenda, every belief in limits and limitations of form.  THIS is true forgiveness and the Atonement.  THIS is the Glory.

As Common as Grass

"Therefore the Master says... I let go of all desire for the common good, and the good becomes common as grass." -- Tao te Ching, p. 57; Stephen Mitchell Translation

"Miracles are natural.  When they do not occur, something has gone wrong." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section I, 6:1-2

What seems to come naturally in our lives is evidently not really natural.  For example, babies aren't born with the ability to sing an Aria, or a pop song.  But singing feels natural to me.  If I inquire honestly though, it took a lot of practicing as a child and then as an adult to get to the point where it feels so automatic.  Reading the above quotations has me thinking about just what is natural, what is common and ordinary?  If Goodness and Miracles are actually what is common and natural, then we have done a bang-up job of obscuring the Truth with a lot of the un-natural and un-common.

A Course in Miracles explains that defenses are the costliest of habits.  They obscure the ever-present Goodness and perfection of our true Self.  And what are defenses?  They are thoughts, perceptions, habits, projections... all to distract the awareness and attention from the perfection of Self.  All with the common attribute of dividing and dissecting the awareness into multitudes of judgements about what is good, what is bad, what is me, what is them, what is here, what is there... and on and on and on.  It's the original and ultimate defamation of character. 

But what remains when these defenses are forgiven and released is the natural perfection of our Christ Self.  The miracle is natural because the Christ is our reality.  The miracle reveals what has always been effortlessly true, and so is the most natural thing in the world.  All that is required of us is the willingness to let our judgements go, to forgive our false witness to the Son of God.  We can twist ourselves into un-natural and un-worthy caricatures, but we can never make them true.  Who we are remains holy... wholly innocent and free, eternally One in the Mind of God.

"All your difficulties stem from the fact that you do not recognize yourself, your brother, or God." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 3, Section III, 2:1

The Other

I remember years ago when I attended Loving Relationships Training with Sondra Ray.  She had us all looking for our personal lies.  If we could let that one lie go, she insisted, then all our false beliefs about ourselves and the world would fall away.  She used the image of a hand (the personal lie) holding a bunch of balloons (our beliefs about ourselves and the world).  If the hand is released, the balloons are too.  It's a great image.  However, the reason it didn't appear to work for anyone for any length of time might be because it was based on belief.  A belief about beliefs is still belief.  What lies behind all beliefs?  What is the original lie?

What I mean is that Truth, being True, just IS.  It doesn't need belief to BE.  Who We Are in Reality must be True, because when every thought and belief is released, I Am.  The only accurate statement I could make about this is that I Am Awareness ItSelf.   So are you.  What has been termed the Christ of Our Being is Whole, with no other.  Oneness, Aware of ItSelf as I Am.

The original belief, the original lie that projects all other lies is that I am Other.  I am other than God.  I am other than you, or them, or it.  The Other belief is then projected onto the screen of the mind as a host of others, with a host of issues and problems and longings and sorrows.  The Other is never complete... how could Completeness be experienced in such a fragmented state?  When I am the Other, then everything is experienced as other.  Nothing is ever whole, never here, never complete.

A Course in Miracles tells us, "My function here is to forgive the world for all the errors I have made."  This is a way of taking back the responsibility for all the otherness we seem to experience, instead of the projected pretense that it's happening to us.  Once released, it's possible to return to the awareness of I Am, instead of I am with an otherly object.  In the Great I Am, there is no other.

When I recognize the Other in my life, I need only forgive and release.  Behind every seeming lies the perfection and holiness and beauty that we are... that I Am.  This is the Miracle.

"...Say, 'Will ye first the Kingdom of Heaven' and you have said, 'I know what I Am'... " -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 3, Section VI, 11:8

Truth

"Truth is a savior and can only will for happiness and peace for everyone.  It gives its strength to everyone who asks, in limitless supply.  It sees that lack in anyone would be a lack in all.  And so it gives its light that all may see and benefit as one." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 92, 5:3-6

"And you shall know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free." -- The Bible; John 8:32

What is Truth?  John Keats waxed poetic on this subject while pondering things that come and go... his "Ode on a Grecian Urn" faces his own mortality in the frozen images on an ancient vessel, and in his poetic way he discovered that the ideas and images embedded in the ancient urn are exactly like the images in any given life, the faces and bodies and scenery and relationships.  What is true about any of them?  Keats put it this way, as if the urn itself were speaking: "Beauty is truth, truth beauty... that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."  Keats was spiraling upward in his quest for Truth.  He saw that is exists not in the physical, but in the silent spiritual.  He saw that Beauty and Truth are synonyms for the One, and are not dependent on the physical or the form of things that come and go, but that everything reflects Beauty and Truth when it is truly seen, beyond form.

Jesus said we can and will know the Truth.  He said it is our very freedom.  The Bible, A Course in Miracles, Buddhism, Vedanta... they all use the word Truth as a synonym for enlightenment and our Real Being.  Some use the word God, others Self or Atman, but the meaning is One.

A Course in Miracles puts it very bluntly: "The Truth is true, and nothing else is true."  In this world where all truth seems relative, such a statement can seem as cryptic as a zen koan.  But let's look at mathematics.  No matter how you turn it, 2+2 will always and forever equal 4.  It is an unchanging truth, a mathematical principle.  In the same way, the Truth of Being underlies everything that seems to appear and seems to disappear.  It is the unconditioned awareness of Self, an all-inclusive awareness that is always here, always available, and is the very ground of Being.  It is the Source and the Substance of all that is.

So why bother even talking about such things?  We know 2+2 equals 4, but we don't think about it when we're picking out 4 apples or oranges at the store.  Talking about Truth is just philosophy, impractical and not grounded in 'real' life. 

Well, our daily life isn't always as benign as picking out a few apples.  Its very impermanence drives us inward, seeking to understand and to know, and this is a gift.  All struggles and challenges are really our best friends, because they move us beyond the complacency of everyday comforts to the inner awareness that is the Truth of Being.  This awakening to Self, to the Oneness of God, is our only purpose for being here.  This is the Truth that sets us free.

"Salvation is the recognition that the Truth is true, and nothing else is true.  Truth cannot have an opposite.  As God created you, you remain unchangeable, with transitory states by definition false.  And that includes all shifts in feeling, alterations in conditions of the body and the mind; in all awareness and in all response.  This is the all-inclusiveness which sets the Truth apart from seeming falsehood." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 152

Merry Christmas!

"You Who remember what I really am, remember what I really want.  And all I want is what You offer me, in just the form You choose that it be mine.  Let me not forget, my self is nothing, but my Self is all." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 358, 1:1, 4, 7

As I sit waiting for the dawn on Christmas morning, I'm filled with gratitude for the Self we share, the Christ-Self that is born again and again as each holy mind awakens it ItSelf.  And I know that no story of Santa Clause, however sweet and wonderful, can compare to the miracles we experience through remembering our Christ-Self.

Our way is lit by miracles... the healed perceptions that lift us to remembrance.  And each holy instant becomes sacred, regardless of form or appearance.  "All I want is what You offer me, in just the form You choose that it be mine."  Yes!  Such freedom and grace in this effortless and radical reliance on what is True.  "Let me not forget, my self is nothing, but my Self is all."

May the merriest of joy-filled moments be yours on this Christmas morning, as we remember Who We really Are.

"The sign of Christmas is a star, a light in darkness.  See it not outside yourself, but shining in the the Heaven within, and accept it as the sign the time of Christ has come." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 15, Section XI, 2:1-2

A New Creation

"Therefore if anyone be in Christ, he is a new creation; old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new!" -- The Bible; 2 Corinthians 5:17

"Let me remember that there is no sin.  Sin is the only thought that makes the goal of God seem unattainable.  What else could blind us to the obvious, and make the strange and distorted seem more clear?" -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 259, 1:1-2

It's very early morning, after a rainy night.  The earth smells fresh and clean, and breathes with peace, the way I feel after an early morning shower.  Everything feels new, although most would argue that it is the same world I went to bed looking at last night.  That is not my experience.  

Every minute of every day we are awakening to a new creation.  And only the thoughts of limitation and adjustment that we insist on bringing with us obscure each holy instant of release and freedom.  A Course in Miracles calls these limiting thoughts and conditioned beliefs 'sin'.  And then reminds us that it's all made up.  There is no sin.  There is only mind that imagines itself separate from its Source, and therefore separate from everything that is.

What does it mean to be 'in' Christ?  ACIM puts it this way: "Christ is God's Son as He created Him.  He is the Self we share, uniting us with one another, and with God as well.  He is the Thought which still abides within the Mind that is His Source.  He has not left His holy home, nor lost the innocence in which He was created.  He abides unchanged forever in the Mind of God." -- ACIM; Workbook Part II, 6.

This is our Reality, our true Self.  To be a new creation in Christ is simply to remember Who We are as God created us.  And how does this make all things new?  "The Holy Spirit reaches from the Christ in you to all your dreams [false perceptions], and bids them come to Him, to be translated into Truth."  This is the process of forgiveness which ACIM calls the Atonement.  "For when forgiveness rests upon the world and peace has come to every Son of God, what could there be to keep things [seeming] separate, for what remains to see except Christ's face?" -- ACIM; Workbook Part II, 6.

So every minute of every day we are awakening to Who We Are.  This awakening feels like rebirth, again and again, and we literally are become a new creation.

"Home of the Holy Spirit, and at home in God alone, does Christ remain at peace within the Heaven of your holy mind.  This is the only part of you that has Reality in Truth.  The rest is dreams.  Yet will these dreams be given unto Christ, to fade before His glory and reveal your holy Self, the Christ, to you at last." -- ACIM; Workbook Part II, 6.

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

This is My Father's World

"This is my Father's world; He shines in all that's fair.  In rustling grass I hear Him pass; He speaks to me everywhere." -- from the hymn, "This is My Father's World"

"All things are echoes of the Voice for God." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151

I love singing the old hymns I grew up with... every Sunday for over three years I've been doing one of them Acappella during communion at St. Vincent's-in-the-Vineyard (which is what gave me the idea for the CD).  Some of my ACIM friends have questioned how I can reconcile the thought systems, especially my latest YouTube posting.  This is a valid question, and I am never one to shy away from deeper inquiry.  I've learned the hard way over the years to beware of trying to shine up my illusions with Truth, trying to spiritualize or 'fix' what I am already identified with.  And by illusions I mean all conditioned thought and habitual behavior, including beloved traditions.  They are all made up, and we give them all the meaning they have for us.

At the same time, when we have forgiven and released the meanings we learned from our families, or that we took on as part of an identity... when we have ceased to judge any of our projections and former judgments as good or bad... then God becomes the only meaning of all things.  All the forms and aspects of life take on one purpose and one meaning... awakening to the Presence, and to our true Self.  We have given the world of our projection to God: "Give Him your thoughts, and He will give them back as miracles which joyously proclaim the wholeness and happiness God wills as proof of His eternal Love.  All the threads of fantasy are gone.  And what remains is unified into a perfect Thought that offers its perfection everywhere." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 14:1, 3-4

Whether it's the words of a beloved hymn or the words of scripture, unless we forgive and release the past we are only reading and listening through conditioned response, and have no eyes and ears to hear.  It's the same with the natural world... unless we forgive and release our fixed belief in a concrete, material world we can't hear the Voice and see the Love of God reflected here.  A forgiven world reveals the face of Christ everywhere, and the Love of God as the only meaning of all things.

THIS is my Father's world... forgiven and thus transformed to what is so close to Heaven that the transition to Christ's Vision is easily made, through Grace. 

"Through your transfiguration is the world redeemed, and joyfully released from guilt." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 151, 16:3

A Long Time Coming...

First, all links are working on the CD website, and I have also posted a new YouTube video.  Enjoy!  And don't forget to purchase mp3s or order the whole CD, and support the animals at The Claire Foundation Animal Sanctuary. 

All quotes today are from the Manual for Teachers in A Course in Miracles.  Where no reference is given, quotes are from section 10, "How is Judgment Relinquished?"

"And now must [you] attain a state that may remain impossible to reach for a long, long time.  [You] must learn to lay all judgment aside, and ask only what [you] really want in every circumstance." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 4, I, A, 7:7-8

Of course, time is an illusion.  What seems like a long time coming is just how it seems to us, as we cling to the remnants of personal judgment, guilt, and fear.  We cling to our personal judgments and conditioned self-image (which is nothing but a collection of judgments) because we think it is who we are... and it seems that giving up judgment would be the death of our identity and individuality.  In fact, the false identity keeps us blind to our true Self and individuality in God.

Every snowflake, every grain of sand is unique and individual... no two are ever the same.  And yet their only identity is in the collective.  A snowflake is nothing without the snowfall or the snowbank.  A single grain of sand is useless, but the sand dunes create shelter and habitat.  Each of us is unique, too, but not in the ways we imagine.  We each reflect God and only God in this world, each in a unique way that only has meaning within the Whole.  When we judge what we or anyone else should be, or what we should be doing or saying based on human perspectives (which are simply the memories we carry around as if they were true), we are projecting a false image over the face of Self... which is the face of Christ.

So how in the heck do we give up judgment?  How in the heck do we let go of who we think we are, or should be, or will be?  A Course in Miracles gives us clear direction:  "It is necessary... to realize not that he should not judge, but that he cannot.  In giving up judgment, he is merely giving up what he did not have.  He gives up the illusion; or better, he has an illusion of giving up.  He has actually become more honest.  Recognizing that judgment was always impossible [which of us could ever know or be aware of the full spectrum of possibilities or circumstances, past, present or future?], he no longer attempts it.  This is no sacrifice.  On the contrary, he puts himself in a position where judgment through him rather than by him can occur.  And this judgment [of the Holy Spirit] is neither 'good' nor 'bad'.  It is the only judgment there is, and it is only One: "God's Son is guiltless, and sin does not exist."     

Whenever we're confronted with decisions or problems, it may seem excruciatingly hard not to judge it 'practically'... but there is nothing practical about the world of suffering that arises from these false projections we call judgments.  Each of us will "lay it down happily the instant he recognizes the cost.  All of the ugliness he sees about him is its outcome.  All of the pain he looks upon is its result.  All of the loneliness and sense of loss; of passing time and growing hopelessness; of sickening despair and fear of death; all these have come of it [judgment].  And now he knows that these things need not be.  Not one is true.  For he has given up their cause, and they, which never were but the effects of his mistaken choice, have fallen from him.  Therefore lay judgment down, not with regret but with a sigh of gratitude.  Now are you free of a burden so great that you could merely stagger and fall down beneath it.  And it was all illusion.  Nothing more."

I am writing this blog today because giving up judgment has seemed to be a long time coming for me.  I thought I was a very judgmental person, even very recently.  I thought I had to struggle to somehow 'overcome' judgment.  But Grace has a way of correcting our false perceptions of ourselves in the unlikeliest of circumstances.  I am so grateful for every false judgment I ever thought I made... because I now know that it was all made up, including all self-judgment.  Every circumstance has become a happy dream, another way to remember God, and my Self.

"His sense of care is gone, for he has none.  He has given it away, along with judgment.  Now he makes no mistakes.  His Guide is sure.  And where before he came to judge, he comes to bless.  Where now he laughs, he used to come to weep." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 10, 5:7-13

Our Name and Our Inheritance

"This is a Course in how to know your Self.  You have taught what you are, but have not let what you are teach you." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 16, Section III, 4:1-2

"Repeat the Name of God and call upon your Self, Whose Name is His.  Repeat His Name and all the tiny nameless things on earth slip into right perspective." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 183, 5:1-2

It is becoming clearer and clearer each day.  The only thing that matters is remembering and remaining anchored in Who I Am.  All problems, issues, and challenges point to one thing only: the false self.  Only the false self, the conditioned persona, can be victim of illusions.  The True Self remains changeless, all powerful and all loving, lacking nothing, confronted with nothing other than Self, in the heaven of endless Oneness and Completion.  It is such a joy-filled ride, awakening.  Such a kick to relax and realize I Am, and have always been, right here in God, God appearing as and through me, always new, always expanding, yet always complete and whole.  There really aren't words in our vocabulary to describe this Beingness and this process of Awakening.  Many have tried, simply because the joy of it can't contain ItSelf, and wants to be shared with Self.  So forgive me the inadequate symbols, and listen instead to the Truth that shines unimpeded through these words.

The news that we are One and the same as God is not new.  Even the Bible has it stated quite clearly:  "I say,"You are gods, children of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless you shall die like mortals, and fall like any prince." (The Bible; Psalm 82:6-7)  Because we insist on embracing the false identities of separateness and lack and limitation, we die as if we're NOT sons of God, NOT One and forever Whole.  And why do we insist on hanging on to a fiction of self that seems to suffer and die?  Because it seems safer in our insanity to pretend we're small and at the mercy of our own dream, than to take responsibility for our choice to live in endless illusion, in a shadowy world of projection and skewed perception.  Because for as long as the dream has seemed to be, people have been threatened by the Truth of Who We Are.

Look at the following passage from The Bible:  "Jesus replied, "I have shown you many good works from the Father.  For which of these are you going to stone me?"  The Jews answered, "It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you, but for blasphemy, because you, though only a human being, are making yourself God."  Jesus answered, "Is it not written in your own law, "I said, you are gods?" (The Bible; John 10:32-34)

We stone ourselves now, each time we let the inner voice that says, "Who do you think you are?" or "What are you, God?" throw us back into unworthiness and guilt.  We are the Sons of God, and God has ONE SON.  That is US... not separate little selves, but the Self we are collectively, with all of creation.  This Self has a Voice that speaks so clearly in our hearts and minds that it can never be mistaken or forgotten, unless that is what we want and what we choose. 

"Sooner or later must everyone bridge the gap he imagines exists between the selves.  Each one builds this bridge, which carries him across the [imaginary] gap as soon as he is willing to expend some little effort on behalf of bridging it.  You will go through this last [imaginary] undoing quite unharmed, and will at last emerge as your Self." (A Course in Miracles; Chapter 16, Section III, 8:2-3 & IV, 2:3)

There is no gap!  How can there be any separation in what is eternally whole and One?  If there is One God, and we are gods, then each of us must be a transparency for the One, and for nothing else.  All that is required, as ACIM reminds us, is to expend a little effort to remember as we go about our lives.  For nothing else is real, and we are not who we thought we were.  The Christ, the Son of God, reflects only God.  This is our name and our inheritance.

"The Name of God is my inheritance.  God's Name reminds me that I am His Son, not slave to time, unbound by laws which rule the world of sick illusions, free in God, forever and forever One with Him." -- A Course in Miracles, Workbook Lesson 204, 1:1-2

Gang Wars

"You always choose between your weakness and the strength of Christ in you.  And what you choose is what you think is real.  Simply by never using weakness to direct your actions, you have given it no power.  And the light of Christ in you is given charge of everything you do." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 2:3-6

I was watching some crime drama on T.V. (don't ask me why!) and I saw very clearly the choices that led a young man from a good family to become a member of a street gang... and not just a member, but an active participant in an ongoing war against other street gangs.  The choices he made were always based on who he thought he was, and where his safety and fulfillment could be found.  Wrong choice after wrong choice led him to a nasty ending.  Does this sound familiar?

I love how extreme examples in our lives and cultures serve to show us our own mental choices.  We project them and create cultural stories and tragedies to pretend they are 'out there.'  We live in perpetual cultural gang wars... clashing ideas, values, stories, all seemingly competing for our time, our allegiance, our money, and our very souls.  What gang do you belong to?  What are your colors?

I used to belong to the 'spiritual' gang.  We tend to act like we're not a gang, but we are.  We pretend we're lacking enlightenment, so we have to perpetually seek fulfillment.  We attack the culture and society that seem to prevent us from living as we want to live, that doesn't seem to honor us or understand us.  We pretend to be 'better' and more evolved, and so we are entitled to judge the other gangs.  We think our safety and fulfillment lie in these games.  We are no different than any other gang.  We are mentally at war with the world.

Every country, every culture, every political party, every passionate cause, and even every family has its colors and its gang culture.  We all belong to gangs within gangs, and sometimes our gang wars overlap and intertwine with each other.  But make no mistake... every conflict, no matter how mild, is the result of gang wars, always based on choosing to value a weak and fictional self as real.  "Trials are but lessons that you failed to learn presented once again, so where you made a faulty choice before you now can make a better one, and thus escape all pain that what you chose before has brought to you.  In every difficulty, all distress, and each perplexity Christ calls to you and gently says, "My brother, choose again."  He would not leave one source of pain unhealed, nor any image left to veil the Truth." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 3:1-3 

How simple to realize that we are always choosing between the false self, the gang member, or our True Self, the Christ in us!  The false self is like that boy in the crime drama... he thought he was weak and limited, thought he needed to belong to a gang to be strong and protected.  Was he ever wrong!  And so are we.  "The images you make cannot prevail against what God HimSelf would have you be.  Be never fearful of temptation then, but see it as it is; another chance to choose again, and let Christ's strength [your True Self] prevail in every circumstance and every place you raised an image of yourself before.  You are as God created you, and so is every living thing you look upon, regardless of the images you see.  What you behold as sickness and as pain, as weakness and as suffering and loss, is but temptation to perceive yourself defenseless and in hell.  Yield not to this, and you will see all pain, in every form, wherever it occurs, but disappear as mists before the sun." -- A Course in Miracles, Chapter 31, Section VIII, 4:1-2 & 6:1-3

Wow.  This seems too good to be true, doesn't it?  And besides, we are loyal to our gangs.  Our family is still our family.  We should be grateful to belong to (fill in the blank).  Our family, country, church, school, group, etc.  is so much better, isn't it?  What if we belonged to that country?  What if we had those people as relatives?  What if, what if, what if... an endless litany of justification for our choices of misplaced allegiance and mis-identification.  We feel safe and protected by the numbing familiarity of belonging.  And we never question.

But we can always choose again.  As Scarlett said, "Tomorrow is another day."  Each instant is new, fresh, infinite in possibility and beauty.  We have only to choose again.  Gang wars only go on as long as we think there are separate, conflicting gangs.  When we remember that we are collectively One Self, one with God and everything that lives, there can be no more war... only endless love, appreciation, and joy.  We have simply awakened to the Truth, safe in God.

"Learn then the happy habit of response to all temptation to perceive yourself as weak and miserable with these words:  I Am as God created me.  His Son can suffer nothing.  And I Am His Son.  Thus is Christ's strength invited to prevail, replacing all your weakness with the strength that comes from God and that can never fail.  And thus are miracles as natural as fear and agony appeared to be before the choice for holiness was made.  For in this choice are false distinctions gone, illusory alternatives laid by, and nothing left to interfere with Truth." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 31, Section VIII, 5:1-7

Real Freedom

"Think of the freedom in the recognition that you are not bound by all the strange and twisted laws you have set up to save you.  There are no laws except the laws of God.  This needs repeating, over and over, until you realize it applies to everything.  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.  Hear Him Who tells you this, and realize how foolish are the 'laws' you thought upheld the world you thought you saw." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 76, 3:1, 6:1-2, 9:3-6, 10:1

How did your day begin today?  Is your mind clear and clean of all thoughts of what has been or what will be?  Is your mind free?  The realization that none of our man made laws or rules has any real effect or hold on us is the beginning of real freedom.

Jesus walked the earth with this liberated awareness.  He didn't always wash his hands before he ate.  He healed on the Sabbath, to the horror of the other rabbis.  He hung out with people who were social and political outcasts.  He precipitated food and coin and wine out of thin air when needed, seemingly from out of nowhere.  He didn't work for a living, and told his disciples that to follow him meant "the son of man has nowhere to lay his head."  He didn't need to own anything, because he knew that the Allness of God is omnipresent.  He knew that God's laws forever give, and never take.  He knew that in the awareness of Allness, whatever is needed is already present.

Questions arise for us:  "How can I be expected to live like this?  I have to be practical, don't I?  It's not freedom to live in fear of what tomorrow will bring, is it?"  The Voice of Christ speaks quietly but firmly in answer to our fears: "Peace, be still.  Beloved, I am with you always, and all that I have is thine.  Not some, but ALL that I have, infinitely and forever, unchanging and always."

Each of us must face these conditioned fears of lack and loss in our own lives, in our individual circumstances.  Some might look bigger or scarier than others... some might seem inconsequential in the scheme of things.  But don't be fooled.  There is no hierarchy of illusions, and there are no projected beliefs that are more or less important than any others, or any more or less true or real.  They are all made up, learned, conditioned... all mental constructs without any substance.  We may live and move in the world as if they were true, but when we remember God and our true life in God, we remember the infinite freedom in which we live and move and have our being.  We are always safe, always fulfilled, and always home.  Where else would we be, since God is All? 

Every day my prayer is to return to the Truth of Being... that there is only God, and God is All and only Good. That God is Love, and only Love.  My prayer is for a deeper awareness of what the omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence of Spirit IS... and for a deeper knowing of the nothingness of all our projected fears and lacks and limitations that make up the so-called laws of the projected world... an illusory world of thought-forms, dreams and imagination without substance.  In Reality there is nothing but God, and we live and move and have our Being in God's Oneness.  What does that make us?

"Here is the perfect statement of my freedom.  I am under no laws but God's.  I am constantly tempted to make up other laws and give them power over me.  I suffer only because of my belief in them.  They have no real effect on me at all.  I am perfectly free of the effects of all laws save God's.  And His are the laws of Love and Freedom." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 88, 3:2-8

The Forgiveness of Sins

"Which is easier to say: "Your sins are forgiven you," or to say, "Arise and walk"?  But that you may know that the son of man has power on earth to forgive sins (then he said to the paralytic), "Arise, take up your bed, and go to your house." -- The Bible; Matthew 9:5-6

"I believe in the Holy Spirit [the Voice for Our True Self, One with God], the holy [whole, or One] catholic [universal] church, the communion [Oneness] of saints [those Who Remember our Oneness], the forgiveness of sins [the release of all that appears separate from God], the resurrection of the body [the redefinition of its purpose, the return to God], and the life everlasting [the only Life there is].  Amen." -- The Apostles Creed, with my translation (-:

One of my soul-friends recently asked me to help her to move beyond a literal interpretation of church liturgy.  But when I was inspired to write this during morning prayer, I had no idea how to approach it or even what to say.  I've learned, though, to trust the movement of inspiration, which simply means "filled with spirit."  The Holy Spirit, the only real part of our mind, the Voice for Self that has never lost its Awareness of Self as One with God, always inspires and guides us as we listen... and will always translate the words and symbols of our lives to help us return our whole mind to Self, and to God.

This morning I was contemplating a Workbook Lesson from A Course in Miracles: "Let me not forget my function."  In this lesson, we are told to examine each and every thought that arises, and to realize that each one represents a goal, an activity, a function that we have decided is necessary for life and salvation.  This can be as mundane as thinking we have to eat, that we need to clean our house, or as complicated as looking for employment or relief from suffering through a medical procedure.  We are then gently reminded that these are false goals, and have no real meaning of themselves.  Our only function is the One God gave us.  This lofty function is simply that we are forever Being a transparency for God, Being One with God in every aspect and every way.  That is our eternal reality, and cannot change.  It is incorruptible. 

But in this dream we call life, the way we remember this Self Who is One, the way we return our whole mind to God, is through forgiveness.  The forgiveness of sins is the letting go of every goal, every judgment, every function that we have decided is necessary or good or worthy... the letting go of every fear and every effort and every personal love or hate... the forgiveness of our desire to be separate and live in a world of appearances, where we are at the mercy of the gods of this world... and most of all, forgiveness for our worship of the personal: self-control, self-love, self-aggrandizement, power over others, money, food, medicine, human love and approval, or of any form that seems to say that there is any power or cause that is real or necessary other than God.

Jesus told us that we have power on earth to forgive sins.  Jesus asked us which is easier, to say 'your sins are forgiven,' or to say 'get up and walk?'  He showed that when you really know Who You Are, you can just say 'get up.' But if you don't fully remember Who You Are and you just say 'get up and walk,' the person who's getting up probably will still be ascribing the ability to do it or not to a body, to medicine, or to some physical circumstance.  But if you say 'your sins are forgiven you' and are aware of the Oneness of God and the Oneness of our minds, then you are released immediately from ascribing power or ability or cause to anything other than God...  God, in whom we live and move and have our Being... God, in whom there is no darkness, no sickness, no lack, and no suffering.

In the final words of The Apostles Creed, as quoted above, we affirm "I believe in... the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting."  We've already talked about the forgiveness of our allegiance to false gods and illusory powers.  But what about the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting?  We are told in 1 Peter: 1:23: "...having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the Word of God which lives and abides forever."  When we forgive, we are resurrected from the illusory Adamic dream of separation from God and the death and suffering it demands. Through forgiveness we Awaken to One Self, safe in God, forever One with All, forever One with infinite Life and Love.  This is the reality that our forgiveness reveals... and the resurrection of the body means the body has been given a new purpose that is incorruptible, as we Awaken through the Word of God, the Voice of the Holy Spirit in us.  As we are a transparency for the eternal and perfect, the world (including our body), reflects only God.

This does not mean, of course, that our bodies will reflect egoic notions of perfection.  It means they will reflect true perfection, which is spiritual and inclusive and whole.  The body's new meaning is as a communication device, a transparency for Truth through forgiveness.  And like all devices, it can be laid down when it is no longer useful.  Our true Self, our incorruptible Being, lives on, uninterrupted.

We have the power to release the whole world, through the forgiveness of sins.  And as we forgive, we Awaken. 

"Forgiveness offers everything I want." - A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 122 

One Son

"It should especially be noted that God has only one Son.  If all His creations are His Sons, every one must be an integral part of the whole Sonship.  Any part of the Sonship can believe in error or incompleteness if he so chooses.  However, if he does so, he is believing in the existence of nothingness.  The correction of this error is the Atonement." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 2, Section VII, 6:1-2, 7-9

"Our emphasis is now on healing [God's Son].  The miracle is the means, the Atonement is the principle, and healing is the result." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 2, Section IV, 1:1-2

As a coach and spiritual director, every single client I have ever worked with has mirrored this one error... and according to every spiritual tradition, it's our only error.  The split mind that results from believing ourselves to be separate from God and each other and all creation... this fragmented perception is the source and sum of all the problems we think we have.  We're always focused on the fragments, on what is irreparable... "and all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again."  It's not possible to 'fix' what amounts to fictional perceptions.  Just as it's not possible to 'fix' the delusional perceptions of the mentally ill.  What heals them is the dawning awareness that they are delusional. 

ACIM reminds us that all of this belief in our own fragmented perception is the belief in magic.  "The whole distortion that made magic rests on the belief that there is a creative ability in matter which the mind cannot control.  This error can take two forms; it can be believed that the mind can miscreate in the body, or that the body can miscreate in the mind.  When it is understood that the mind, the only level of creation, cannot create beyond itself, neither type of confusion need occur." (ACIM; Chapter 2, Section IV, 2:8-10)  The Course calls the correction of these errors the miracle, and the principle on which all this is based is the Atonement, our Oneness with our Source.  This Oneness is principle, unchanging, the rock on which the healing of all our holy minds depends.

There is a Light in each of us that can be seen and remembered.  The way to return to this wholeness of perception is through the regular, habitual forgiveness and release of our false perceptions, and the habitual asking for the miracle of true perception instead.  This is the willingness to see through the eyes of Christ.  It's through seeing the Light in each other, and in every aspect of creation, that we again see the face of Christ, the One Son of God, in all things.  "The Atonement can only be accepted within you by releasing the inner Light." (ACIM; Chapter 2, Section III, 1:1)

We are One Son... the very Light of God, pure Spirit, safe in the Mind of God, as are all things.  

"The Thought God holds of you is like a star, unchangeable in an eternal sky." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 30, Section III, 8:4

The Son of God Awakes!

Joel Goldsmith was a great twentieth century Christian mystic.  His writings have been companions of mine for many years now, and I return to them from time to time for their wisdom, clarity, and uncompromising honesty.  So today, I want to look at three quotes from his writings, and what these words mean for us here and now.

First, what do we know about who we are?
"There is an existence, eternal in the heavens, eternal in divine consciousness, which has existed even before Abraham was.  Do you see?  I AM, infinite individuality, cannot be wiped out or destroyed or absorbed into another being.  I AM simply IS, forever.  As we find our true Self, as we come more and more into the realization of our spiritual individuality, we find a certain groove or rhythm in consciousness in which we individually 'fit'.  And when so located we find ourselves in outer circumstances or places or conditions of eternal peace and harmony.  This peace is not a static peace, but a vital state of spiritual being and activity.  This peace is sometimes a deep stillness within, a quiet joy in worldly affairs.  But sometimes it may appear temporarily as warfare, which represents the battle for the surrender, sometimes painfully, of our false sense of self with the realization of spiritual harmony and spiritual Selfhood.  In meditation, in quiet contemplation of the soul, we achieve or attain this groove or spiritual rhythm.  Then, and only then, do we know the government of the realm of Spirit, the recompense and activity of the Christ.  Then our values are no longer based on material estimates, but rather are measured by the infinite standards of the Kingdom, which is Love."

I love the idea of a divine groove or rhythm that is uniquely ours... and I love the awareness that uniqueness and individuality are not exclusive.  They are inclusive attributes, like the uniqueness of each snowflake is inclusive of the entire snow bank!  Only a false sense of egoic self sees separateness and exclusivity and competition among the unique ideas of God that we are.

Next, what do we know about Who God Is?
"We must come to know the nature of God, and to do that we must experience God.  We cannot go on talking about God; the time has come when we must experience God.  This is the most important part of our journey.  We must know God, really know God now, without waiting to know more or do more or to die.  We must experience God now, and this we do directly through our periods of silence, our periods of peace... the quiet listening to the still, small Voice within that reveals Itself to us." 

How willing are we to be quiet?  How willing are we to set aside frequent times during each day to simply be still?  Do we really want to experience God, or do we want to just talk and theorize, to look spiritual?  The Bible tells us to "Be still and know that I Am God."  We are all destined to directly experience God, the Truth of our Being.  

And what must we do to experience God?
"We read in the gospel of John, "Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is of God, he hath seen the Father."  There is the crux of the whole matter.  No human being can see God or know God.  Only the Son of God, the Christ consciousness of you and of me, can ever witness and behold the presence of God.  In other words, it is not our human mind that will know God.  Never with the human mind will we see or know or understand God or spiritual living.  But the Son of God, the Christ consciousness, our spiritual sense, can behold the Truth that is God.  This is where the human world has failed... trying to know God through thinking, trying to know God with the intellect, trying to explain God.  It cannot be done.  God is discerned and known only through spiritual sense."

Our human attempts to know things by objectifying and intellectualizing are really egoic methods of maintaining our illusory separateness and autonomy.  We think if we can grasp something intellectually we are controlling it while keeping it at a distance.  These imaginary exercises are entertaining, and we have built enormous institutions and social constructs on these self-impressing edifices.  But ultimately there is only one thing to be known, truly.  And that is to return to our right mind, to the awareness of Oneness, the Christ consciousness that is called the Son of God.  This awareness is already sleeping within us, like the Christmas story of the innocent babe lying in a manger.  We have only to be quiet and gently awaken our sleeping innocence... and then, behold!  The Son of God awakes!  The awareness of the Allness of God dawns on us like the radiance of the Christmas star... the most natural awareness in the world.  Glory to God in the highest!  The awakening of the Son of God is our only real purpose in all the illusory undertakings of this weary world.

"The power of decision is our own.  And we accept of Him that which we are, and humbly recognize the Son of God.  To recognize God's Son implies that all self-concepts have been laid aside and recognized as false.  Their arrogance has been perceived.  And in humility the radiance of God's Son, his gentleness, his perfect sinlessness, his Father's Love, his right to Heaven and release from hell, are joyously accepted as our own." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 152, 10:1-5