The Thing That I Seek

First, I want to send everyone infinite love and blessings for the New Year.  This is Who We Are!  May all Being remember this!

"I am the goal the world is searching for." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 318

"I am that I am." -- The Bible

"I am That." -- Nisargadatta Maharaj

Reading the above quotations, the natural response of the conditioned self is, "No, I'm not."  Or if you are a bit more open to the possibility, it may lead naturally into self-inquiry... "Who am I?" Or maybe even "What am I?" Am I what I seem to be, or am I beyond the seeming?  Am I what is experiencing the seeming, or what is noticing the seeming?  And if there is both, then are there two of me?  What is the truth of all of this???

For those of us that have been reading and studying and even teaching A Course in Miracles for a while, it is apparent that every sentence and even every word is pointing to this Truth.  "My mind is part of God's, and I am very holy."  I am.  I already am.  So who or what is it that is constantly trying to fix up an unholy, flawed self?  And who or what is that flawed self?  Who, what, and why?

This morning I turned in the Workbook to Lesson 47: "God is the strength in which I trusts." To the split mind, this is a dualistic statement of God and me, self and other.  But it is actually referring to God as our True Self.  

To trust in a false sense of self is to suffer, and to live in the constant fear that is the world we see every day.  But when we remember our shared God Self there is only Love, Goodness, Infinite Strength and Power and Security and Joy.  And there is no limit to the miracles that are revealed when this is truly known.  "I am the goal the world is searching for."  Try contemplating this statement between now and the new year.  Try remembering Who You Really Are throughout the new year, and always. 

"Let go all the trivial things that churn and bubble on the surface of your mind, and reach down and below them to the Kingdom of Heaven.  There is a place in you where there is perfect peace.  There is a place in you where nothing is impossible.  There is a place in you where the strength of God abides." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 47:7:3-6

Questions from a Reader

Dearest Friend:

I just wanted to share some thoughts about your questions yesterday, which are very similar to the ones you had last week.  The gist of it is (if I am hearing you correctly), there are thoughts you are having that you don’t like.  Last week you were having thoughts of judgment that you didn’t like.  So both of these are really the same seeming problem.

Forgiveness is key here, but not as you seem to be using it.  The thing is, forgiveness isn’t a tool to be used to make the human self feel better.  It is an act of completely surrendering judgment and being clueless, empty of judgment, unknowing and not needing to know.  As the Course teaches it, we give our thoughts to the Holy Spirit, which is our True Self, the communicative part of the Christ Mind we share.  None of this is true, but it is what the course calls a ‘happy fiction’ that moves us toward completely relinquishing the imagined separate self. The Absolute Truth is that we never left our right Mind.  But while seeming to live and move in the relative and dualistic dream world, the Holy Spirit will ‘translate’ all our thoughts into Truth (“Truth will correct all errors in my mind.” WB 107).  Translate actually doesn’t mean to change at all, but to make clear.  For example, if I say ‘hola’ to you and you don’t know Spanish, you don’t know what I mean.  But if I then say, ‘that means hello’ to you, I have made the true meaning clear to you.  I haven’t changed anything… I have simply made it clear.  

In the same way, the Course reminds us that if we give every thought to the Holy Spirit, all of it will be used to make clear and obvious what has always been.  The translation of every thought and every situation is the same:  the meaning is always Perfect Goodness, Happiness, Joy, and Infinite Love.  Our True Self has not been affected by any of our misperceptions, just as ‘hola’ means hello whether you know it or not.  

Forgiveness means letting go, not analyzing, worrying, getting angry, or any other form of judging thoughts and situations.  Judging your judgments is just another way of holding onto them, instead of giving them completely to Holy Spirit.  And thinking that you have to ‘do’ something, or to forgive them somehow differently, is another delaying strategy of the personal self.  The personal self will always see personal problems.  That is what holds the illusion of a personal self in place, so of course we are constantly judging.  We fear the loss of self.  Ironically, Our Real Self has no problems.  And from the standpoint of the Real Self, all problems not only disappear, but their relative reflection will either go away or be transformed somehow.  That’s the way projection works.  Either way, you will be happy, safe, and blissfully content resting in Truth.  

Happiness is the only Reality of all things. It’s not like we need to get rid of or change anything (what in the Allness of God could be deleted or changed?).  We simply need to let go of (forgive) our judgments and meanings and thinking we know.  Once that is given, we see that right where we thought there was a negative thought, there is only happiness.  Right where we thought we saw tragedy or disaster, there is only comfort, joy, and laughter.  This is what the Course means when it says our perceptions are upside down and backwards.  “To give up (forgive) all problems to one Answer is to reverse the thinking of the world entirely.” (Manual for Teachers 4:IX:1:6)

God’s Will for us is perfect Happiness, and there is no will but God’s.  (WB Lessons 74 and 101)  So you see, even the belief in outcomes has to be translated, because Happiness and Goodness and Love are what has always been and all that can ever BE.  The belief in laws of behavior and reciprocity have to be translated, because we are in Truth under no laws but God’s… which is another way of saying that the Love of God, which includes Perfect Joy and Peace, is ALL THERE IS. (WB Lesson 76)  So nothing else is ever going on but this Love, this Joy, this Happiness.  Nothing!

“Forgiveness is the key to Happiness,” the Course reminds us.  “Forgiveness is my only function here.” “Forgiveness offers everything I want.”  “I will forgive and this will disappear.”  Obviously, this is all we need to wake up.  Not a tool, but the only practice in the dream that can never lead to suffering.  Just give every thought to the Holy Spirit, and allow the Beauty and Joy of each moment, each action, each thought to be translated.  Heaven is here and now.  This Oneness of Being must include everyone, everything, and yes, every thought! 

"Beloved Son of a wholly blessing Father, joy was created for you.  Who can condemn whom God has blessed?  There is nothing in the Mind of God that does not share his shining innocence.  Creation is the natural extension of perfect purity.  Your only calling here is to devote yourself, with active willingness, to the denial of guilt in all its forms." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 14, Section V, 3: 1-5

Blessings...
Mary

Everyone, Everywhere, and Always

"The reflections you accept into the mirror of your mind in time but bring eternity nearer or farther. You will turn from time to holiness, as surely as the reflection of holiness calls everyone to lay all guilt aside.  Reflect the peace of Heaven here, and bring this world to Heaven.  For the reflection of Truth draws everyone to Truth, and as they enter into it they leave all reflections behind." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 14, Section X, 1:2-7

"I will forgive, and this will disappear." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 193, 13:3

I woke up this morning from a nightmare.  It was a convoluted dream, complete with an evil nemesis who took away everything I loved.  Interestingly, such dreams don't make me afraid anymore.  I just wake up from them feeling muddy and tired... but unafraid.  I know that this is a very good sign.  It means that all the remaining hidden beliefs and obstacles to Love's Presence are finally coming to the surface to be forgiven and released.  As the Course reminds us, "I will forgive, and this will disappear."  Not because forgiveness is magic, but because as soon as we let go of the judgment (which is all the reality or meaning that it has), there is nothing there.  It's all made up, just like my convoluted dream.

"Perception is a mirror, not a fact." -- A Course in Miracles;

Everything I see and experience in the life called Mary is in my mind, and nowhere else.  No matter how much I project it 'out there' it remains in my mind, since ideas can't leave their source.  True forgiveness is the process of recognizing that all of these thoughts and experiences are images I have made, and so I can let them go.  The Reality of our shared experience is beyond these perceptual images we call our lives.  Our Reality is One, unified, safe, and sure.

"In Heaven reality is shared and not reflected." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 14, Section X, 2:1

I love that I can awaken from every dream of hatred or dissatisfaction or pain or even pleasure (all based on projected judgments of self or others... no difference), and find myself instantly in Joy, unconditioned and free.  I love that my judgments are nothing.  I love that salvation is always present, in every Holy Instant of Now.

"A dream of judgement came into the mind that God created perfect as Himself.  And in that dream was Heaven changed to hell, and God made enemy unto His Son.  How can God's Son awaken from the dream?  It is a dream of judgement.  So must he judge not, and he will waken.  For the dream will seem to last while he is part of it." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 29, Section IX, 2:1-6

The nightmare seemed to last while I was part of it.  But as I became aware that I was dreaming, I was able to stop judging the figures in the dream, and so it disappeared.  Then I was able to let go of analysis or judgment of self, and remembered: "I will forgive, and this will disappear."  This clearing process is our only function in the world.  "Reflect the Peace of Heaven here, and bring this world to Heaven." My vocation is to forgive and release all perception (the good included).  What remains is a clear Reflection of Truth.  What remains when all is forgiven is the Luminous Mind of God and the Reflection of Heaven, which is everyone, everywhere, and always.

The Illusion of Differences

"This world seems to hold out many purposes, each different and with different values.  Yet they are all the same.  Again there is no order; only a seeming hierarchy of values." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 20, Section VIII, 8:8-10
 
I have had several conversations with friends in the past week about wanting something different in their lives.  Of course, this is a familiar feeling and story for all of us.  Something is perceived as wrong or lacking or uncomfortable or simply unsatisfying, and so we think that something different is the answer.  Not this, but that.  Not here, but there.  Not now, but someday.  Not that person, but this person, or no person.  Something different, which will hopefully be something better.

The illusion of differences is the ego's maintenance plan.  This body is different from that body, that car is different from this car, that job is definitely different than this job!  And on and on and on and on...  there's no end to the ego's litany of needed improvements (translation: differences).

A Course in Miracles gives us many simple and direct ways of seeing through this chaos.  One of my favorites is: "Make this year different  by making it all the same." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 15, Section XI, 10:11

And how can we make it all the same, when the very nature of our lives seems to be the constant focus on shifting challenges and victories,  failures and successes, pleasures and pains?  I had a glimpse of this yesterday while filling the water tank for the horses.  I only had a few minutes between coaching calls, and went out to make sure the water tank was full.  It was a summer mid-afternoon, with rain clouds in the distance, but no air stirring.  My focus on the details and differences dropped, and there was crystalline, All-Inclusive Awareness.  Silent but Alive.  Still but including all movement.  Awareness ItSelf.   Then the water tank began overflowing and my awareness contracted to take care of business.  This is the way of it as we practice letting go of differences.  I can focus on the water tank, knowing that The Self that I Am is the Reality of even this seeming.  I have only to drop the contracted focus, and my True Self that is Everything, and knows ItSelf as the All where all differences fall away.  No matter, just pure Awareness, pure Spirit, pure Mind that includes All.

To the Unified Mind, there are no differences!  Perception is a contracted point of view, happening IN you, not TO you.  YOU ARE THE SEER AND THE SEEN.  There are no differences.  And forgiveness, the dropping of the addictive need to project differences, is our unified purpose.  A Unified Mind with Unified Purpose returns us to the Awareness of Perfect Oneness (Heaven!) that is Our Reality.
  
"I will forgive, and this will disappear."  A Course in Miracles; Workbook 193, 13:3
 

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.

Level Confusion: The Projected World

"2. A sense of separation from God is the only lack you really need correct.  This sense of separation would never have arisen if you had not distorted your perception of Truth, and had thus perceived yourself as lacking.  The idea of order of needs arose because, having made this fundamental error, you had already fragmented yourself into levels with different needs.  As you integrate you become one, and your needs become one accordingly.  Unified needs lead to unified action, because this produces a lack of conflict. 
 3. The idea of orders of need, which follows from the original error that one can be separated from God, requires correction at its own level before the error or perceiving levels at all can be corrected.  You cannot behave effectively while you function on different levels.  However, while you do, correction must be introduced vertically from the bottom up.  This is because you think you live in space, where concepts such as 'up' and 'down' are meaningful.  Ultimately space is as meaningless as time.  Both are merely beliefs." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 1, Section VI, 2-3

The Projected World and the entire universe as we imagine it is simply mind-stuff, consciousness.  It all takes place in the mind and is seen as if it were ‘outside', making it the original virtual reality. But the appearing world is simply effect, a continual out-picturing of the mind’s desires, filtered through beliefs, thoughts, and emotions. The world has no objective reality... it is effect, not cause.

Even after you get in touch with the power of your own emotions and thoughts, you can believe things about your thoughts and feelings that aren’t true. Most people believe their thoughts are ineffectual or powerless, or that their feelings don't really matter, and so they are experienced as such.  We have been taught, and so believe, that the world mysteriously exists first and is thus the source and cause of our emotions, thoughts, beliefs, and ultimately, our desires.

There is little hope for real change in such a world where we have no control, and where the real cause remains mysterious. No wonder prayer as practiced by the world has no real effect. It is just a belief in magic, belief in a mysterious something outside ourselves and our world that may be called upon to rescue us. Forgiveness in such a world makes no sense, and has been mostly practiced out of a fear of an invisible, magical force that judges us.

Forgiveness as taught by A Course in Miracles is a belief too, because in the perfection of our True Self there is nothing to forgive.  We have never left the Mind of God.  But while we experience ourselves as split from Source, forgiveness has the power to release the false and hidden beliefs and blockages within the mind. This is the process of what the Course calls Atonement, the interlocking chain of forgiveness that is the correction for all false beliefs and thus erases their images or effects from the mind. Because the problem is not out there… it’s in the mind of the perceiver.

Atonement is the correction for false beliefs. When we practice true forgiveness and give our perceptions to the Holy Spirit for correction, we accept the Atonement and allow all layers of mind to be corrected, healed and aligned with Truth… so all that remains is Unification, One Mind, Wholeness. This is what Jesus called seeking first the Kingdom of God, and He promised that all else that we need will be given when this becomes our primary vocation in life.  The Course tells us plainly that forgiveness is our only function in the world (and that forgiveness, happiness, and joy are synonymous).

Why do we need forgiveness and the Atonement? Because we see the phenomenal world as the cause of our emotions, thoughts, and beliefs, and see our desires and prayers as attempts to countermand external causes.  Forgiveness is the reversal of the mind, where we discover happiness and joy as the core of our Being, and effortlessly radiate this state of mind outward,  to reflect only the Love that we are.

As we willingly accept the function of forgiveness as our only purpose here, we gradually shed the layers of indoctrinated belief, thought, and emotion. Yes, the world still appears to be here.  But as we become clear of the images generated by false beliefs, thoughts, and emotions, we reflect only the Light of Truth, the Light of Love, the Light of the One Mind rather than the lie of fear and separation. This is what the Course calls the Happy Dream of the Holy Spirit, which is the earthly experience of Awakening and Enlightenment. Level confusion has vanished in the unified Awareness of Self.  We now hear only One Voice, think only the thoughts of the One Mind, and so reflect this Light on earth, as it is in the Heaven of Enlightened Awareness.

"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; 18, VI, 1:5-6

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The Awareness of Being One

"All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation." -- Mary Baker Eddy

"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; Chapter 18, Section VI, 1:5-6

I love the way Life continually presents us with opportunities to see Truth everywhere.  Truth being, of course, simply another name for Oneness.  Discovering that Good is the Reality of this Oneness, no matter how it appears, is so flipping exciting I have a hard time writing about it coherently.  After all, we've all heard this a million times:  "It's all good," we say hopefully... all the while noticing how not good it appears to be.  

The above quote from ACIM helps... there is nothing outside Oneness, and nothing else within.  How could there be?  So with only the One, there is only, well... the One!  All Good, only Good... in Principle and in manifestation.

The thing is, this all sounds good, but I see riots in Egypt and people going hungry and pets being mistreated, etc., etc., etc.  I see my bills mounting and donations falling short.  I see people judging one another and arguing over things that don't matter.  So how does Oneness even matter, in Principle or in manifestation? 

Again, A Course in Miracles helps to discern the false from the True: "Perception is a mirror, not a fact.  And what I look on is my state of mind reflected outward." (ACIM Workbook 304, 1:3-4)  Obviously, when the mind is unaware of Oneness, it projects duality in person, place, and thing.  The awareness of Oneness is the Principle that reflects the wholeness and perfection that is Reality.  The awareness of Oneness reflects the All-Good in all ways.

I have experienced, and continue to experience, many miracles of healed perception.  Always what occurs is that I have, at least momentarily, accepted the One Mind as All.  This is the healing... and the healed mind reflects wholeness, abundance, and endless Good in all possible forms.  As I mature spiritually, it becomes more and more comforting to rest in the awareness of Being One, which is the miracle for everyone and everything, in every situation.  There is nothing else.  The seemingly hidden Presence of Good awaits only our recognition.

"In all thy ways acknowledge Him [Biblical speak for the One] and He shall direct thy paths." -- Proverbs 3:6

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

Personal Investment

"No one with a personal investment is a reliable witness, for truth to him has become what he wants it to be." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 12, Section I, 5:2

"One thought, completely unified, will serve to unify all thought. This is the same as saying one correction will suffice for all correction, or that to forgive one brother wholly is enough to bring salvation to all minds." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 108, 5:1-2

I've been an impatient person much of my life, with a personal investment in hurrying conversations along. On top of that, I like to be right. So I've learned that I'm not a reliable witness to anything at all. Trusting my personal self to judge a person or a situation is totally ridiculous. Thank God there is One in me who has no personal investment. There is One Self in us all that will judge truly and inclusively, with love and forgiveness of every error, if we only release our personal investment and ask. That is how salvation works. That is how our thought becomes impersonal and unified.

The impersonal, inclusive, all-encompassing perspective of Our True Self doesn't require us to become zombies or robots. We still have an apparent life-stream, an apparent persona, who will continue to make apparent mistakes. But since none of this is ever true, nor has ever been true, forgiveness becomes the way we walk in the world. Forgiveness becomes what everything is for. This makes our personal experiences a heck of a lot more enjoyable, and releases us from the narcissistic tendencies that plague us all... to tell our own stories our way, to judge others as the enemy, to always be right, to be on top, to be seen by others the way we want to be seen... the list of narcissistic tendencies is quite long. Ask any mental health professional. What most of us don't realize is that all of us have a personal investment in how we see things. And so all of us are caught in a narcissistic dream. We see ourselves as separate from others and from God. We are lost in dreaming.

Forgiveness is all about realizing that our perceptions are simply false. Period. And as we ask the Holy Spirit, the Voice of Our True Self within each of our minds, to help us awaken by releasing our personal investments, we find a new world rising before us. In this world there are no separate interests. There are no competitions. There is only Love, and sometimes a cry for Love. And nothing else.

"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; Chapter 18, Section VI, 1:5-6

"Let us learn of the real and eternal, and prepare for the reign of Spirit, the Kingdom of Heaven; the reign and rule of universal harmony, which cannot be lost nor remain forever unseen." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 208, Line 19

The Only Content

"There are no powers of evil external to yourself. Discords have no external existence. Resolve them within your own consciousness." -- Joel Goldsmith

"Perception can make whatever picture the mind desires to see. Remember this. In this lies either Heaven or hell, as you elect." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 19, 5:2-4

"The kingdom of God is within you." -- The Bible; Luke 17:21

Such responsibility. To know that we're not victims of circumstances or people. To realize that we're the dreamer of our own dream. To really know that our reality has always remained untouched and perfect and pure, within our very own consciousness. The form doesn't matter... the content is always God. Remembering this is our responsibility... and when we do remember we're dreaming, there is such freedom! As Joel Goldsmith put it, "There is an insight in man that visions through all appearances."

We decide every moment of every day where our holy attention lies... where we think we are in consciousness. This affects nothing in reality, but affects everything in the dream. We are only the decider within the dream. Safe in God, all is changeless and free and eternal. So the only real choice, ever, is to remember or not. When we know we're safe in God, when we remember who we are as emanations of God, then the dream will reflect that. And that's all that really matters. That's our only purpose here.

We may be artists or teachers or factory workers... but our purpose is united and one. We're all here to reflect Heaven on earth, to remember who we are, as One in God. Whatever we do, wherever we go, we can make remembering who we really are in God our motive. Then everything is translated in the dream into a holy journey with a holy purpose. The form doesn't matter. God is the only content.

"I will give you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in Heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in Heaven." -- The Bible; Matthew 16:19

Life Eternal

"Do not perceive anything God did not create or you are denying Him. If you would remember eternity, you must look only on the eternal. If you allow yourself to become preoccupied with the temporal, you are living in time. As always, your choice is determined by what you value. Time and eternity cannot both be real, because they contradict each other. If you will accept only what is timeless as real, you will begin to understand eternity and make it yours." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 10, Section V, 13:1 & 14:5-9

"This is a spiritual universe, an eternal universe which God made and which He found Good. The discords, the inharmonies, and the injustices are not in the world; they are in our misperception of the world, in what we think we are seeing and hearing with our human senses. One of the deepest truths of the Bible is that to know God aright is life eternal." -- Joel Goldsmith

I love how our minds just shut down when we think about the word eternity. Maybe when we're star gazing at night we have glimpses, but it's too overwhelming... in no time at all we find our mind has popped on to other things, like what we're having for dinner, or who we need to call, or what he or she did or said.

Our preoccupation with the temporal, the changing, the unreal is pretty much deliberate. We obsess about the trivial and unreal because the vastness of the Truth scares us. Our own eternal reality, the limitless reality that we reflect and are, scares us. It scares us because we know we can't have it both ways. In order to even begin to perceive a reflection of limitless God as flawed and limited and small, we have to close our eyes to Reality and fall asleep and dream. We know we're making an illusory choice, over and over, but we can't seem to help ourselves. We're addicted to this dream, to our imagined limits and pain... it's like an addiction to a bad relationship... we know it's not what we're pretending it is, that it's not really love, but we can't seem to help ourselves. As a matter of fact, the relationships in the dream we call life simply reflect this relationship of denial we have with Reality.

There is no easy answer on how to start valuing the Real again; it's simple (only two choices!), but definitely not easy, since we are addicted to fantasy and illusion. We want what we want, not what is. So the first step in returning to sanity is to begin to want only the Truth in every situation, not what we want to be the truth. Valuing the Truth above all human desire and beyond imagined emotional investment is how we come to know God aright.

The long and the short of it is that we can't know Life Eternal while obsessing about the details of this temporal life. That's why Jesus told us very succinctly to 'take no thought' for the things of the world. He told us instead to 'seek first the Kingdom.' Everything that is Real exists in eternity, and has no limits and no end. By remembering our Eternal Self in God, we begin to reflect only the eternal here in the dream, 'on earth as it is in Heaven.'

So how do we see only what God created, see only what is true and real? We empty ourselves of the trivial and and the unreal. We empty our hands and hearts of the false loves we have cherished. We come with open minds and hearts to God, and ask for the miracle of healed perception, that we might see the world as God sees. This is the only miracle there is. And this is Life Eternal.

"Take no thought for your life, saying, what we shall eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? But seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added unto you." -- The Bible; Matthew 6:31 & 33

The Substance of All That Is

"Let all things be exactly as they are. Only reality is free of pain. Only reality is free of loss. Only reality is wholly safe." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 268, 2:2-4

"Be alert to catch this next point, because it is the secret of healing work, although of course it is not really a secret. We have said that God is the substance of all form, that God is the reality of all that is. Are we then to understand God as the substance of the body, trees, flowers, sun, moon, stars, and all that we cognize with the material senses? No; this is a spiritual universe. It is true that God is the substance of all that is; but remember, when I see you or your body or a tree or a flower, I am not seeing God's creation. I am not seeing the spiritual reality, the spiritual universe. I am seeing only a finite material concept of it. This concept is referred to as the Adam-dream, the illusion which Jesus referred to when he said, "My kingdom is not of this world." (The Bible; John 18:36) This does not mean there are two universes, the real and the unreal. It means that the only universe there is, is the spiritual universe... but what I am seeing is only my concept of it. Therefore its unreality lies in my misperception, in my false concept of it." -- God, the Substance of All Form by Joel Goldsmith; Pages 53-54

"God being Spirit, His language and meaning are wholly spiritual." -- Miscellany by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 238, Lines 9-12

In dealing with an apparent problem this morning, I realized that all apparent problems are simply mistaken identity. I dream a dream, conceive of a separate self that can be limited and suffer in ways that don't even exist in the Reality of Spirit. In Reality, there is only Oneness, Omnipresence, and endless Love that shines forever. Mrs. Eddy said, "You can never demonstrate spirituality until you declare yourself to be immortal and understand that you are so." (Miscellany; Page 242, Lines 3-5) There IS nothing but the Allness of God! A Course in Miracles reminds us that "He Who is changeless shares His attributes with His creation. All the images His Son appears to make have no effect." (Workbook 186, 9:3-4)

I sometimes dream at night, but when I wake up in the morning I don't usually try to fall back asleep to change or improve on the dream, or even to continue it. It feels good to shake the cobwebs from my mind, and become aware of the birds, the smell of fresh-mown grass, and the beauty of my summer flowers. All this takes place in my waking from the fog of sleeping dreams to the apparent reality of the five sensory world. What we haven't fully accepted is that we are simply dreaming a different type of dream... a dream of concepts and projections, that keeps us trapped in our ideas and beliefs, our self-limiting labels and imaginary relationships within the waking dream. The mind weaves a story of separation and meaning in this illusion, and has a sick investment in not wanting to awaken. The mind knows it is not even necessary. "The father of illusions is the belief that they have a purpose; that they serve a need or gratify a want. Perceived as purposeless, they are no longer seen." (ACIM; Manual for Teachers 14, 1:6-7)

We don't have to drop our concepts and stories. We just have to admit to ourselves that they are nonsense, not one any truer or more noble than any other one. As we see that everything, including our self-concepts, are fiction, we have no need for them anymore. We can continue in the dream, "in the world but not of it," as Jesus said. "The concept of the self has always been the great preoccupation of the world. Salvation can be seen as nothing more than the escape from concepts." (ACIM; Chapter 31, Section V, 14:1,3) Or, as the Indian sage Ramana Maharshi taught, ask, "Who am I?"

Please always remember that we've done nothing wrong... we simply suffer the torment of the imaginary separate self when we believe our own stories and get lost in the sensory dream. We long for Home... the state of Awakened Awareness that Jesus called the Kingdom of Heaven: "Heaven is not a place nor a condition. It is merely an Awareness of Perfect Oneness, and the knowledge [not the concept, but the experience of aware knowing!] that there is nothing else; nothing outside this Oneness, and nothing else within." (ACIM; Chapter 18, Section VI, 1:5-6) Since God, Spirit, is One and All-in-All, this knowing of Self as One is the only Spiritual Reality there is.

So whenever problems appear to arise in my waking dream, I remember that God is Spirit, and is the Substance of All that Is. That means the only thing I need to do is forgive my false concepts, beliefs, and perceptions and not take them so seriously... and to remember that whenever I'm willing to inquire, the Truth of Being is Self-evident. And what more could there be to know than the Substance of All that IS?

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

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

Our Only Function

"There can be no form of suffering that fails to hide an unforgiving thought. Nor can there be a form of pain forgiveness cannot heal." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 198, 8:5-6

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

Our lives seem to be incredibly hectic and complicated. We can admit that we are the ones who have orchestrated it... we chose the job, the mate, the children, the activities... though sometimes it feels like we inherit a lot of it by default. But make no mistake... you always have the life you want. All of your attitudes and feelings are your own choice. The forms they take are secondary. As long as you are judging any aspect of your own life or any of the lives you think you see around you, then you can be sure you are not fulfilling your true and only function. And so you will experience the erratic ups and downs of the dream, here today and gone tomorrow.

There is another way to live in the world, within the dream but not caught in it. By letting go of all judgement, through forgiveness, nothing sticks to us. We navigate freely and with the joy and peace that are our True Self. Forgiving is letting go, releasing the need to define and control meaning and reality. As ACIM puts it, "Protect all things you value by the act of giving them away, and you are sure that you will never lose them. Yet value not its form . For this will change and grow unrecognizable in time, however much you try to keep it safe. No form endures. It is the thought behind the form of things that lives unchangeable. Give gladly. You can only gain thereby." Forgiveness offers everything we want because as we release our fearful grasp on our own illusions, they dissolve and reveal the eternal beauty that has always been our True Self.

For some reason, we fight this. We look for solutions and fulfillment everywhere but in our own function of forgiveness. Why do we seek answers other than the answer that will answer everything? Why do we always insist that we have to do something else, be someone else, find something or someone else? Forgiveness is THE answer, and our only function here. Why do we fight it? Our only function is forgiveness. Regardless of what it looks like or what it feels like or who did what to who, our only function is forgiveness. Regardless of the intensity of the illusion or the attachments or aversions that arise out of it, forgiveness is our only function. Regardless of persons, places, times, or situations, forgiveness is THE answer, and offers everything I want in every circumstance, and is ALWAYS my only function.

What is revealed when we actually perform our only function and let go of all illusions? Nothing less than the eternal, omnipresent, radiant Love of God, and our True Self.

"Here is the perfect answer, given to imperfect questions, meaningless requests, halfhearted willingness to hear, and less than halfway diligence and partial trust. Here is the answer! Seek for it no more. You will not find another one instead. Here is the answer! Would you stand outside while all of Heaven waits for you within? Forgive and be forgiven. As you give you will receive. Forgiveness offers everything you want. Today all things you want are given you." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 122, 4:2-5, 6:1-4, 13:1-2

The Fullness of God

"Know the Love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God." -- The Bible; Ephesians 3:19

"Jesus represented Christ, the true Idea of God. Man is idea, the image of Love; he is not physique. He is the compound Idea of God, including all right ideas; the generic term for all that reflects God's image and likeness; the conscious identity of Being in which man is the reflections of God, or Mind, and therefore is eternal; that which has no separate mind from God; that which has not a single quality underived from Deity; that which possesses no life, intelligence, nor creative power of his own, but reflects spiritually all that belongs to his Maker." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 316, Line 12, & Page 475, Lines 13-22

"Your holiness reverses all the laws of the world. It is beyond every restriction of time, space, distance, and limits of any kind. Through your holiness the Power of God is made manifest. There is nothing the Power of God cannot do. Your holiness, then, can remove all pain, can end all sorrow, and can solve all problems. It can do so in connection with yourself and with anyone else." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook 38, 1:1-2, & 2:2-6

When we talk about God, we talk about Her/Him as a separate entity, who may be present or not. We act as though we can be apart from God. We act as though it is up to us to communicate with God or not. We act as though we are grown up children who have left our father's house and get to decide whether we want to talk to him or not. Actually, we are like cocky little fish who claim we can walk and breathe air. Who needs water?

In Reality, we live and move and have our being in God just as a fish does the water. We're not talking about physical being here... that's a misperception. We can't see clearly when we think we see with the physical eyes, because "sight is related to His Holiness, not to your ego, and therefore not to your body." What we perceive as our life on earth takes place only in our own minds and stories. Given to the Holiness that we are, our perceptions are purified and illumined... and we find the Fullness of God is literally everywhere. As ACIM puts it: "Your life is not as you imagine it."

What does it mean to know that the Fullness of God envelopes and enfolds me? What does it mean to know that I Am One with the Fullness of God? These are two questions that will transform every aspect of my life, if I will ask them with an open mind and heart. We are so willing to see ourselves as guilty and wrong and separate. But as ACIM says, "If guilt is hell, what is its opposite? My holiness is my salvation from this."

Try this just for today: Say to yourself repeatedly, "The Fullness of God envelopes and enfolds me (this person, this situation). I Am One with the Fullness of God." Again, we are not talking about the physical self or personality. We're talking about our True Self, the Self that is pure Spirit, Perfect, Whole, and Complete in every way, that has never been apart from God and All Good. "The Fullness of God envelopes and enfolds me. I Am One with the Fullness of God." This Awareness of Self corrects all errors of perception within my life dream, and returns me to sanity. "There is nothing my holiness cannot do."

"Your holiness is the answer to every question that was ever asked, is being asked now, or will be asked in the future. Your holiness means the end of guilt, and therefore the end of hell. Your holiness is the salvation of the world, and your own."

Shiny and New

"Behold, I make all things new." -- The Bible; Revelation 21:5

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

"And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away." -- The Bible; Revelation 21:1

"The world as you perceive it cannot have been created by the Father, for the world is not as you see it. God created only the eternal, and everything you see is perishable. Therefore, there must be another world that you do not see. The Bible speaks of a new Heaven and a new earth, yet this cannot be literally true, for the eternal are not re-created. To perceive anew is merely to perceive again, implying that before, or in the interval between, you were not perceiving at all. What, then, is the world that awaits your perception when you see it?" -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VII, 1:1-6

"The Revelator had not yet passed the transitional stage in human experience called death, but he already saw a new heaven and a new earth. Through what sense came this vision to St. John? The Revelator was on our plane of existence, while yet beholding what the eye cannot see; that which is invisible to the uninspired thought. The heavens and earth to one human consciousness, that consciousness which God bestows, are spiritual; while to another, the unillumined human mind, the vision is material. This shows unmistakably that what the human mind terms matter and spirit indicates states and stages of consciousness." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 572, Lines 23-26, & Page 573, Lines 3-12

Have you noticed that the human mind loves shiny, new things? Shiny, new ideas. Shiny, new toys. Shiny new clothes and shoes. Shiny new jewelry. Shiny new cars or appliances. Shiny new jobs. Shiny new relationships (supposedly) without old baggage. A shiny new diet or exercise plan. The concept of a fresh start is not a new one. Of course, in the way of this dream world, everything that is new now will soon grow old and pass away. "And it came to pass..." is the story of literally everyone and everything in the dream we call the world.

Every spiritual tradition and teacher agree that God is Creator, and that God is Omnipotent and Omnipresent. This means that all that IS created exists eternally within the Mind of God. Nothing unlike God could be created by God, since that would mean there is something other than God, in a place and time where God is not. Like Light, God radiates Self everywhere, omnidirectionally, omnipresently. God creates by extension, and so creates only like HimSelf, infinite, eternal, loving, and free. These are not adjectives we could reasonably apply to the world as we know it. As A Course in Miracles puts it, no matter how crazy things look, we must remember that "God is still Love, and this is not His Will." We are told to remember that "God's Will for us is perfect happiness." Love and Perfect Happiness are attributes of the Awareness of our Oneness with God.

In the quote from Mary Baker Eddy, she points out the impossibility of our human eyesight ever seeing anything real or lasting or true. Only spiritual sight reveals our Oneness with God and Our True Self. The new heavens and new earth spoken of so frequently in The Bible are what A Course in Miracles calls the Happy Dream, the shiny and new perception that leads to direct and experiential knowledge of Truth and God.

Even in the dream we are looking for our true perceptions... we just don't realize it. We think we are looking for people, places, things, and experiences outside ourselves, and we settle for shiny, new and supposedly improved versions of old stories over and over and over again. And yet the journey continues, because we can never be satisfied with less than everything. We can never be content with less than wholeness. And it is not out there. Our perceptions are in US. When the world is seen through loving and forgiving eyes, everything is translated and becomes shiny and new. And this is not just a figure of speech. This is literal. Through forgiveness the world is literally saved from our false perceptions, and what we begin to see revealed is simply what was always, eternally Present and always, eternally True.

"Everything you made will be forgotten; the good and the bad, the false and the true. For as Heaven and earth become One, even the Real World will vanish from your sight. The end of the world is not its destruction, but its translation into Heaven. The reinterpretation of the world is the transfer of all perception to knowledge." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 11, Section VIII, 1:6-9

The Tree of Knowledge

"KNOWLEDGE: Evidence obtained from the five corporeal senses; mortality; beliefs and opinions; human theories, doctrines, hypotheses; that which is not Divine and is the origin of sin, sickness, and death; the opposite of spiritual Truth and understanding." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 590, Lines 4-8

"Question: What is Substance? Answer: Substance is that which is eternal and incapable of discord and decay. Truth, Life, and Love are Substance. The Spiritual universe, including individual man, is a compound idea, reflecting the Divine Substance of Spirit." -- Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy; Page 468, Lines 17-18, 23-24

Have you ever heard someone say that a book or a dissertation has no substance? We look at knowledge as having substance if it is new or novel, or if it presents 'acceptable' theories in a new light, with tons of physical and theoretical evidence. There is a saying in academe that we must do research to 'add to the body of knowledge.' Hmmmm... as Mary Baker Eddy wrote, "There is no Life, Truth Intelligence, nor Substance in matter." And we might add, no knowledge in the affairs of matter, nor in the ideas that swirl around and around in the dream we call life.

We dedicate ourselves to gaining knowledge. Even if you're someone who never picks up a book, you try to gain street smarts or skills that will serve you in the world. We literally worship what we call education. But what exactly are we educating ourselves for? What are we trying to gain? Jesus said, "What profit is it to gain the world if you lose your soul?" A Course in Miracles says that all appetites, whether for food or love or knowledge (temporal or spiritual) are "appetites [which] are 'getting' mechanisms, representing the ego's need to confirm itself. This is as true of bodily appetites as it is of the so-called higher order needs." (ACIM Chapter 4, Section II, 7:5-6)

So we come to the crux of it. What are we gaining knowledge for? In The Bible allegory of the Garden of Eden, God said, "Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." (Genesis 2:16-17) We think that the more we know the more we can keep ourselves autonomous, separate, and safe. We think that we can gain the ability to call certain things good, certain things bad, certain things right, and certain things wrong. In other words, we think we can KNOW something, anything, apart from the whole. What nonsense! What happens to a hand that is cut off of the body that is its life? What happens to a leaf pulled off of a tree branch, or a flower pulled from its stem? These are all projections within the dream of death, projections of our insistence on an imaginary existence apart from God, separated from Omnipresent Goodness and Love. And so we experience, over and over in the dream, the death and suffering of the separated illusory self.

Did you notice that in the allegory, God said that EVERY tree in the garden was O.K.? And then God said not to mess with the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? Which implies that this tree, the tree of knowledge wasn't in the garden. The alleged tree of knowledge is the symbol of the crazy notion that we can think and dream apart from God, and judge what is what. It's an illusion, and as soon as we begin to think we know and judge, we fall from the garden all over again. That's the dream of samsara, the wheel of suffering. As ACIM says, "How can God's Son awaken from the dream? It is a dream of judgement. So must he judge not, and he will awaken." (ACIM Chapter 29, Section IX, 2:2-5)

We can return to innocence any day, any time. And it has nothing to do with knowing anything at all. Judgement, the need to see projected separation and differences wherever we look, can be released. This is called forgiveness, and is the happy dream that the Holy Spirit holds out to us continually. We forgive and let go of all need to know... and we are restored to the garden. The need for differences and drama is again the illusory self clamoring for existence. And it was doomed before it started. The Holy Spirit will translate every dream of knowledge into a happy dream of Awakening to the Oneness of Self. We have only to ask.

"You will not remember change and shift in Heaven. You have need of contrast only here. Contrast and differences are necessary teaching aids, for by them you learn what to avoid and what to seek. When you have learned this, you will find the Answer that makes the need for any differences disappear. Truth comes of Its Own Will unto Its Own." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 13, Section XI, 6:1-5

"Heaven is not a place, nor a condition. It is an awareness of perfect Oneness." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 18, Section VI, 1:5-6

Our Riches in Glory

"Those who would see the witnesses to Truth instead of to illusion merely ask that they might see a purpose in the world that gives it sense and makes it meaningful. Without your special function [forgiveness] has this world no meaning for you. Yet it can become a treasure house as rich and limitless as Heaven ItSelf." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 26, Section I, 5:1-3

"But I have all, and abound; I am full... my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in Glory." -- The Bible; Philippians 4:18-19

Like everything else in this upside down and backwards world, the notion of wealth and riches has been co opted by the ego, the imagined autonomous self. Wealth and riches have become a symbol of greed and separate, special interests. We have to work, fight, struggle, and grab to get what is ours. And sharing with another separate ego means there is less for us. Do you see how this aberrant idea is mirrored in every aspect of the ego's story? Separate interests, separate lives, separate assets... it's mirrored everywhere.

Nothing could be further from the Truth of God's Kingdom. The Kingdom of Heaven is "an awareness of Perfect Oneness, and the knowledge that there is nothing else; nothing outside this Oneness, and nothing else within." (ACIM; Chapter 18, Section VI, 1:6) But as long as we are caught in the ego story of separate interests, there is never enough. We can't know the Wealth of Our Being, when who we think we're being is a fragment, a little sliver of our True Self.

In the Allness of God our true wealth lies. In the Allness of God there is nothing missing, nothing absent... that's the meaning of Omnipresence. Since we are One with God, the Omnipresent, Omniscient Awareness of Being is IN us in a very real sense... not in an illusory separate body, or in our imagined sense perceptions... but in the Spirit of God that is Our True Self. Being Omnipresent and Omniscient, this Awareness sees everyone and everything as they are, a part of the One Self, and not what they appear to be in the dream of sense perception. In other words, the Awareness of Self sees FROM Being Oneness, AS Oneness.

All-encompassing Love and Goodness without measure is Our True Wealth. As we forgive each separate dream, our awareness returns to Christ, the Oneness that has always been. The living Wealth of God has never left us. Our Riches in Glory are eternal and free.

"Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest... God would make known what is the Riches of the Glory of this mystery... Christ in you, the hope of Glory." -- The Bible; Colossians 1:26-28

"In God's Own Justice does He recognize all you deserve. It is His special function to hold out to you the gifts the innocent deserve. And every one that you accept brings joy to Him as well as you. He knows that Heaven is richer made by each one you accept. And God rejoices as His Son receives what loving justice knows to be his due. For Love and Justice are not different. Because they are the same does Mercy stand at God's right Hand, and gives the Son of God the Power to forgive himself of sin." -- A Course in Miracles; Chapter 25, Section VIII, 9:5-11

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,

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