Daily Inspiration for Living A Course in Miracles

Tweet

Subscribe

View all articles • Article index

Dealing with Feelings of Sadness and Depression

Yesterday someone asked us about how we deal with feelings of sadness and depression. When we went to Spirit with this, we were guided to read A Course in Miracles Text Chapter 4, Section IV: “This Need Not Be” on pages 62-65 and ACIM Text, Chapter 8, Section VII on pages 151-154. These sections were very helpful to us in dealing with our feelings of impatience and frustration about the delay in the selling of the property in Kiel, WI.

We know that whenever we join with another for mind healing, we are always helped. After our reading, we went to Spirit and this is what came to us:

When you look out through the body’s eyes and believe that what you see is real, depression is inevitable. The reason that this happens is because what the body’s eyes show you are just images that reflect the unconscious choice to be different from your unlimited Source. The ultimate truth is that you are still perfect unlimited Love and have not made separation real. You are just experiencing a delusion. You are trying to be what you are not. This creates fear, depression and all the rest that comes with it. 

The answer lies in your willingness to step back from these illusions and go to your Source for what is true about you and everyone you see in the dream now. In this place of inner quiet, as you open more and more to God’s gift of peace, you will feel an inner sense of comfort and well being. There may be no words, but just an inner knowing and a strong feeling of inner contentment and quiet inner joy. When you allow this into your mind, you are returning Home to the truth of your natural beingness in God. Your natural beingness is formless because you are pure Spirit. 

Use every experience of anxiety, dread, fear and depression as stimulus to help you return to your beautiful, peaceful, natural state of Love. It is always there, waiting for you to accept It. You are blessed and extend blessing to others as you are willing to forgive or let go of the ego’s images of separation.

This is how you use everything you experience in the dream for the purpose of returning Home. You have the means right in your own mind to allow this to be accomplished through you.

Yesterday I had physical body symptoms of discomfort. I chose to make it a day of light activity. I took time to rest. During that time I focused on thoughts from the Course that reminded me of the truth of what I am such as: “I am not a body. I am free. I am still as God created me.” “This body is just an image. It has nothing to do with What I am. I am God’s Son, complete and healed and whole, shining in the reflection of His Love.” I focused on these and similar thoughts until I fell asleep. I used these same thoughts while I was awake when the physical discomfort got my attention. 

This practice, stimulated by discomfort, helped me to refocus my attention on the truth of What I am and What everyone Is. Today I feel much better. Thanks to yesterday’s practice, the thoughts that reminded me of the truth are still in the forefront of my mind, helping me keep my focus on what I want to remember about myself and everything I see. It is helping me to look past the body and the images it presents to the Light of Love that is everywhere. What seemed like a discomforting experience has become a lesson in awakening. I am truly grateful.

© 2011, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Make Way for Peace

I want the peace of God. To experience it I must be willing to see my brother as he is — Love and nothing else. To see this requires that I forgive all illusions of separate images, of guilt and fear.

Today I would be vigilant for all thoughts of judgment and offer them to the Holy Spirit. He will lovingly take my misguided thoughts and show me the truth of Love that lies beyond them. This is how I forgive. This is how I make way for peace. This is how I make way for happiness. Forgiveness is my function today.

Today my practice is to step back from all I think is real and let the Holy Spirit shine a Light on all the false ideas that rise up to be healed. I let go of all I think I know and let it be replace by the truth.

© 2011, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Healing Artificial Values

My function here is to let my mind be healed by the Holy Spirit. I have bought into artificial values and have suffered from my belief in them. My opportunity now is to open my mind to a total thought reversal. My true Self knows that the world of separate bodies I see is not the truth. My true Self is not deceived by these children’s toys.

I see now that I find true and lasting happiness as I am willing to open to the healing perspective of the Holy Spirit, which shows me that nothing can really happen but the extension of God’s Love because only God’s perfect Love is real. Today I am willing to be shown the Light of truth behind every illusion of separation. I let myself open to the truth of God’s Love today.

All I really want is to remember Love. I want to remember that I remain Love as Love created me. Since only Love is real, all real value lies in Love. The appearance of anything else cannot be real, and therefore has no value. Letting go of the belief that it is possible to be separate from Love is how I let go of artificial values. My function is to offer all my perceptions to the Truth in me, my true Self, with an open mind willing to see differently. This is forgiveness.

Today, as I go about my activities in the world, I will practice holding my mind open to the inner vision of my true Self. Inner vision looks past the form to how everything serves Love’s purpose. As I let Love be my guide today, I will see how the things of the world can be used in the service of Love. This is my practice today.

© 2011, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

The Quiet Answer

We read the section “The Quiet Answer” in Chapter 27, Section IV of the Text of A Course in Miracles today. It reminded me that no meaningful answer can be found within the thought system of separation. All ego-based answers will always be based on the premise that separation is real. Thus ego answers always offer another illusion. The exchange of an illusion for an illusion accomplishes nothing.

If I want to heal and awaken from the dream, I need to replace illusion with true perception. Because I believe I am in the world of separation, true perception cannot come from me. It comes from the Holy Spirit, Who does not believe in separation and is always there to remind me of the truth.

My job is to offer every question to the Holy Spirit with an open mind. An open mind means that I am not placing limits on Holy Spirit’s answer. If I ask, “Which car should I buy?” I am attempting to limit Holy Spirit’s answer to some form of car. Maybe the best answer in the world might be a truck or motorcycle or nothing at all.

Beneath these forms is still another answer and that is to remember that my only need is for Love and I know that need is met by accepting and extending Love. So whether or not to buy a car needs to be answered within the question of what is it for as the Holy Spirit sees it.

This brings me back to the early lesson which says that I do not know what anything means. The Course’s mind training program is a guide to help me let go of my preconceived ideas and beliefs so that I can come with wholly empty hands to the Holy Spirit and receive the answer that will help me loose the world from all I think it is. This is how I remove the barriers to Love’s presence and awaken to Love.

The first sentence of this section is “In quietness are all things answered, and is every problem quietly resolved.” (T-27.IV.1:1) This sentence has been very helpful to me and I have returned to it again and again when I got caught up in thinking I had a problem. This reminds me that the answer does not lie somewhere in the world. The answer lies in opening to another state of mind — the Holy Spirit’s state of mind.

The ego mind always brings up conflict. It always brings up problems. It always thinks in terms of differences and time and distance. It thinks that individual minds are real. It thinks this world is real. It thinks in terms of constantly building defenses against outside dangers.

Because I still get caught up with the ego mind, I need the practice of stepping back frequently into quietness and remembering once again that I do not know what anything means. I need to allow this mind to quiet and open to the Holy Spirit’s state of mind. This is my true Self. It is everyone’s true Self. It calls to all of us to return Home where we belong.

Today my practice is to answer that call and give the Holy Spirit the opportunity to reverse all the false ideas I am holding on to. With the Holy Spirit I once again return to the awareness that I am still safe in the Mind of God. The whole Sonship is still one with God because nothing has happened to change God’s one Son. Illusions of separation change nothing.

Handing over all my thoughts to the Holy Spirit is the only way that my perceived problems are quietly resolved. And I am so thankful that we could never really leave God and make a world of specialness, constant change and death. The Holy Spirit reminds me in quietness, “It is not so. You, along with every brother, are still Love and nothing else is true.”

© 2011, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Vigilance for Peace

Today my practice is to be vigilant for peace. This means paying attention to when I am not at peace and offering my disturbed thoughts to the Holy Spirit for His kind and loving correction. His vision will show me the truth beyond the misperception so that I can see truly with Christ’s vision. This is how I will accept my part in God’s plan for salvation of the world.

My practice for today is to pay attention to what is happening in my mind. Right now, am I joined with ego thoughts or am I experiencing God’s peace? Right now, in this present moment, which hand am I holding?

Right now, my practice is to be willing to remember that I am eternal Spirit, along with every brother. My practice is to remember that Heaven is here. Heaven is now. There is no other place. This practice today will take vigilance and patience, remembering that I always have all the help I need from the Holy Spirit as I go through this day.

© 2011, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Accepting the Light in You

This morning we were guided to A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 61, “I am the light of the world.” As I did the practice of the lesson, this is what came to me:

I am the light of the world. Light is in me.
Wherever I go, Light Is, so I can only see Light.
If I perceive anything but Light,
I am perceiving something that is imaginary, not real.

Light as we know it in the world never limits itself. It continually extends. We can put up barriers against the light to make a place of darkness, but the light continues to shine. It does not battle against the barrier. Light always joins with other light. If darkness is brought to light, light fills the darkness and the darkness is dispelled.

This is why light is an effective symbol for the Love of God, which also is unlimited and unaffected by false images of lack of Love. As light does not battle against barriers to the light, Love does not battle against barriers to Love. But Love always enters where It is welcome.

Being reminded that I am the light of the world tells me that I can never be without light, without Love. I can be unaware of Love because of barriers I have made against it. But Love is still in me, extending eternally, whether I am aware of it or not. This same Love is in everyone and joins us as one.

I welcome Love by letting go of judgment. Judgment is a defense against Love. As I am willing to turn over my judgments to the Holy Spirit and to receive Holy Spirit’s reinterpretation, I clear away the barrier and welcome Love. This is the gift forgiveness offers. Today is a day to practice bringing all my judgments to the Holy Spirit for His reinterpretation.

This ACIM quote comes to mind: “The sight of Christ is all there is to see. The song of Christ is all there to hear. The hand of Christ is all there is to hold. There is no journey but to walk with Him.” (T-24.V.7:7-10)

I am being reminded to be willing to remember the truth that nothing has happened to change God’s one Son. God is but Love, and therefore the whole Sonship is only Love and nothing else. If I am seeing something other than the Light and Love of God, it is merely coming from the false ego mind that is trying to replace God with ideas of separation and uniqueness.

Today it is my opportunity to be shown the difference between the real and the unreal, between truth and illusions. Just because I have believed in illusions of separation does not mean I have to continue making the same mistake. I can step back and let my mind be corrected. I can return from fear to Love. I can let my mind be healed today.

© 2011, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

We Are All Safe in God

When I went into a place of quiet this morning, what came to me is the thought that no matter what we are dreaming, the truth is that we are still safe in God. We share the one Mind of God and our beingness in God is eternal.

We can relax and open up to the truth of our eternal safety in God. We can feel the peace of God and the sense of well being that comes with accepting our true Mind’s beingness in peace. All this awareness of our true happiness comes with our willingness to accept the truth about ourselves and every brother.

My practice for today is to accept my inheritance as part of God. God’s Love is shared equally with all. And because God’s Love is my Love, my Love is shared with all equally. Letting this constant truth be in my mind is my practice for today.

When I let myself relax deeply into peace, I do feel the connection of Love with all my brothers. There is little distinction between those who I do not know such as someone I may pass in the grocery store and someone I may feel in close relationship to. The sense of Love connection is the same. The individual characteristics do not get my attention when I am in this place of peace. The connection at the level of Love brings with it a feeling of quiet joy and gratitude. There is a sense of being among friends which reflects the truth that we are all joined in one loving Self.

Today I will remind myself frequently, “peace first.” As I put peace first, I make way for the memory of our oneness in Love to return to my mind.

© 2011, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Page 712 of 847 pages ‹ First  < 710 711 712 713 714 >  Last ›

<< Back to main page of Daily Inspiration.

Has this page been helpful to you?
Your contribution to support this site is greatly appreciated. To make a tax deductible contribution with a credit/debit card, click here.
Click here to donate from your PayPal account.
Or send a check to Pathways of Light, 12530 Lions Chase Court, Huntley, IL 60142.