ACIM Workbook
Healing Perspectives

Lesson 86

Review: “Only God’s plan for salvation will work.” and
“Holding grievances is an attack on God’s plan for salvation.”

These lessons about grievances are for me lessons about patience. When the ego latches on to a grievance it is like a dog with a bone. I watch the grievance come up again and again, and I know that’s not who I am. And through patience and following Guidance eventually I walk through the cloud and back into the sunlight.

If I perceive a friend appearing to become distant, this calls for salvation, not grievance (attack). In truth, we are joined in Love and there is no distance between us. I could only perceive distance if I perceived separation. If I am looking for some behavior or some signal in form to indicate friendship, I am forgetting the true Friend that we share and are together. Bodies being together in the same room or talking on the phone or writing letters does not make joining. If I look to those forms for indication of connection, I have forgotten what truly joins us. I am looking for unity where unity cannot be found.

This perception of distance I take to the Holy Spirit. As He shines His Light on it, the form fades away and I see the Light we share. I feel the Love that we are. It extends from me to my friend and from my friend to me, for Love is always extending Itself. My heart overflows with joy and gratitude. There is no separation. There is no lack. There is only the sheer joy of remembering the Love we share in God. Love’s song sings in my heart and I remember we are one. Together we are God’s Son. We are one Light. There is no distance between us. No longer do I seek for empty symbols in place of the fullness of Love that we share and are. Grievances have disappeared and only the joy of unity remains. And I thank God.

If I think I have a problem, or if I think I have a grievance, the only way out of this grievance or problem is to return to Love. I must be willing to open to my true Self for the answer, not my projections of a world outside me. As I am willing to quiet my mind and open up to the truth of my reality and everyone’s reality, I receive a change of mind that truly works. When I receive this change of mind, I recognize the Love behind all perceived forms of separation. As I am willing to focus on the Love, the changeless truth, I see that there is nothing to do to change something in the outside world. It has all been in my mind.

As I am willing to open to the truth, I see what is really eternally true. What a body does or says becomes meaningless. What I receive from the one Christ mind becomes all that is meaningful. The problem or the grievance disappears. It was only in my mind and I let it go because it doesn’t mean anything. It was just a false idea I carried for a while. Only God’s plan for salvation will work. It is only as I am willing to open to God’s Love that I receive the real answer to every problem, every grievance, that appears as outside my mind.

This process of going to God with every grievance really does work every time. My misperceptions of a world outside will never bring me peace, will never bring me happiness. My expectations of any behavior from anyone in the outside world mean nothing. It’s just a silly idea. And the only thing to do in God’s plan is to let go of that silly idea. Let it go! It’s nothing. Remembering the truth about everything and everyone brings me happiness. That’s the only thing that will bring me happiness.

Only God’s plan for salvation will work. All real power lies in God’s universal Love. Holding a grievance is a denial of the power of Love, of the power of my one Self. The power of Love is always there in my mind waiting for my return, waiting for my acceptance. Today I choose to accept the power of Love.

Today's lesson has been a wonderful help to me. I started by just listing all of the many ways I attempt to save myself and forgiving each one before going onto the next. I thought it might help to just get them out there and look at them, and yes, it did help.

Then all through the day as I went back to some of those false saviors, I would use one of the forms of help suggested in the lesson and would bring myself back to sanity. I feel so good!

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