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Study of Text, Chapter 13:Guiltlessness and Invulnerability, P 8. 5-25-16

I. Guiltlessness and Invulnerability, P 8

8 You are invulnerable because you are guiltless. You can hold on to the past only through guilt. For guilt establishes that you will be punished for what you have done, and thus depends on one-dimensional time, proceeding from past to future. No one who believes this can understand what “always” means, and therefore guilt must deprive you of the appreciation of eternity. You are immortal because you are eternal, and “always” must be now. Guilt, then, is a way of holding past and future in your mind to ensure the ego’s continuity. For if what has been will be punished, the ego’s continuity is guaranteed. Yet the guarantee of your continuity is God’s, not the ego’s. And immortality is the opposite of time, for time passes away, while immortality is constant.

Journal
Jesus has told us that guilt is the cause of all sickness, and now he tells us that we are invulnerable because we are guiltless, and also that guilt is the reason we made time. If we are to be punished for our sins, and we will believe this if we believe in guilt, then the punishment is to come and therefore a linear time-line is needed.

But we are immortal because we are eternal. So there cannot be time, though we will not really understand this if we keep our belief in guilt. I used to think that eternal meant time would continue forever, but that is not it all. Eternal is not something that continues in the since that it goes on year after year and never ends. Eternal is now, and now is constant. It goes nowhere and never changes.

Sometimes I try to experience now as if I didn’t believe in time. I let go of thinking and just exist in this now moment with no thought as to the next moment and no retreat into a past. I am not very good at this and it never lasts long, but it is a peaceful exercise. Trying to accept timelessness is very hard. My mind is solidly fixed in time. So what I am doing instead is letting go of guilt and this is leading me to let go of the belief in guilt. Without guilt there will be no need for time.

There are two owners of the company where I work. One of them is my brother and he is over sales and marketing. I like working for him and appreciate his forward thinking as well as his knowledge. The other boss is over operations and his approach is very different, but they make a good balance and everything has been mostly fine. Until tomorrow. Then my brother is retiring and I will be under the other boss.

I had no idea that Paul was retiring this soon and it came as a shock when he made his announcement. I immediately went into fear and have had a hard time extricating myself. What I notice in this situation is that the fear (and subsequent blame and judgment) is based on a non-existent future. I have no idea what tomorrow will bring. I have no idea what the next moment will bring. So why should I be afraid?

This morning I was sitting outside on my patio. The birds were singing to me and the weather was still pleasant. It was a lovely way to begin my day. As I sat there drinking my coffee, I decided on the day I would have. I asked for help in this decision, and I thought that I wanted today to be guilt free and that I would be fearless no matter what the circumstances were.

As I sat there thinking appreciating this decision and feeling thankful for the guidance, I imagined for a moment that I was guiltless, and so was everyone else. I imagined that this moment was the only one. I saw that I was completely at peace. The moment was perfect, nothing was wrong, I was happy.

Then I had the thought that I wish Paul had waited just a few more months to retire. This was the same thing as saying he was guilty of retiring too soon and causing me problems. The spell was broken. I was back in time and no longer at peace. Guilt put me back in time and I lost all appreciation for immortality and eternity, and therefore of peace.

It seemed sad to me at the time, but now contemplating it, I see how lucky I am. I understand this paragraph perfectly because I watched it happen. I had a few moments of timelessness and sold it for a grievance. But having seen how this happens, I am ready to let go of the guilt associated with this change and this brings me much closer to being willing to give up guilt altogether.

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