The body is the central figure in the dreaming of the world. ²There is no dream without it, nor does it exist without the dream in which it acts as if it were a person to be seen and be believed. …⁵[The body’s] safety is its main concern. ⁶Its comfort is its guiding rule. ⁷It tries to look for pleasure, and avoid the things that would be hurtful. ⁸Above all, it tries to teach itself its pains and joys are different and can be told apart.
How willing are you to escape effects of all the dreams the world has ever had? ²Is it your wish to let no dream appear to be the cause of what it is you do? …⁴No one asleep and dreaming in the world remembers his attack [wish for specialness] upon himself. ⁵No one believes there really was a time when he knew nothing of a body, and could never have conceived this world as real. ⁶He would have seen at once that these ideas are one illusion, too ridiculous for anything but to be laughed away. ⁷How serious they now appear to be! ⁸And no one can remember when they would have met with laughter and with disbelief. ⁹We can remember this, if we but look directly at their cause. ¹⁰And we will see the grounds for laughter, not a cause for fear.
In gentle laughter does the Holy Spirit perceive the cause, and looks not to effects. …³He bids you bring each terrible effect to Him that you may look together on its foolish cause and laugh with Him a while. ⁴You judge effects, but He has judged their cause. ⁵And by His judgment are effects removed. ⁶Perhaps you come in tears. ⁷But hear Him say, “My brother, holy Son of God, behold your idle dream, in which this could occur.” ⁸And you will leave the holy instant with your laughter and your brother’s joined with His. A Course in Miracles, T-27.VIII.1:1-2,5-8;5:1-2,4-10;9:1,3-8. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)
While we believe the dreams of the world are real, we need Help from outside the dream to recognize we are believing in a false idea. We need to let the Holy Spirit be our Interpreter for everything we experience in the dream. We have taught ourselves to interpret the effects we perceive. This habit shields us from looking at the cause of our experience.
But release from the dream will only come when we choose to no longer want to be separate from our brothers in the world. When we accept the Holy Spirit’s interpretation of our perceptions, we will learn that the effects we perceive are based on a belief that could never be true.
In truth we could never be separate from the Love that is the true Self of our brother and ourselves. We are one Self, the holy Son of God. As we accept this unity as our reality, we awaken from the dream.
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