Daily Inspiration for Living A Course in Miracles

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Remembering We Are Spirit

You see the flesh or recognize the spirit. There is no compromise between the two. If one is real the other must be false, for what is real denies its opposite. There is no choice in vision but this one. What you decide in this determines all you see and think is real and hold as true. On this one choice does all your world depend, for here have you established what you are, as flesh or spirit in your own belief. If you choose flesh, you never will escape the body as your own reality, for you have chosen that you want it so. But choose the spirit, and all Heaven bends to touch your eyes and bless your holy sight, that you may see the world of flesh no more except to heal and comfort and to bless.

Are you invulnerable? Then the world is harmless in your sight. Do you forgive? Then is the world forgiving, for you have forgiven it its trespasses, and so it looks on you with eyes that see as yours. Are you a body? So is all the world perceived as treacherous, and out to kill. Are you a spirit, deathless, and without the promise of corruption and the stain of sin upon you? So the world is seen as stable, fully worthy of your trust; a happy place to rest in for a while, where nothing need be feared, but only loved. Who is unwelcome to the kind in heart? And what could hurt the truly innocent?

The truth in you remains as radiant as a star, as pure as light, as innocent as love itself. (A Course in Miracles,T-31.VI.1;6;7:4. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

The recognition that we are Spirit and not a body is a central lesson of the Course. It seems to be the most difficult lesson to learn because we have taught ourselves that the body is our identity. It seems that giving up this identity would hurl us into oblivion.

From the perspective of body identification, we cannot see our true Identity which shares the limitless Love and glory of our Creator. Because the body is illusion, to give up the body as our identity is to give up nothing. It is merely a shadow of misperception that hides our true Self, which is God’s Son.

As we give up the false image, our Reality as Spirit is revealed more clearly. This is our true Will, which we share with our Creator. Each time we bring a fearful or guilty thought to the Holy Spirit for His loving correction, we make a choice to recognize that we are Spirit. The Holy Spirit’s lessons are always lessons in Love, which is of Spirit.

Today we hold our minds open to the Holy Spirit’s lessons in Love in all our doing that we may remember we are Spirit.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Learning to See the Real World of Love

Neutral thoughts are impossible because all thoughts have power. They will either make a false world or lead me to the real one. But thoughts cannot be without effects. As the world I see arises from my thinking errors, so will the real world rise before my eyes as I let my errors be corrected. My thoughts cannot be neither true nor false. They must be one or the other. What I see shows me which they are.

What I see witnesses to what I think. If I did not think I would not exist, because life is thought. Let me look on the world I see as the representation of my own state of mind. I know that my state of mind can change. And so I also know the world I see can change as well. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 54,W-pI.54.1:2-8;2:1-6. See also ACIM Lesson 54 Insights.)

On page one of the Course, we are told that Love can have no opposite because It is all encompassing. This is why fear can only seem to exist in illusions. Thus the real world is the world of Love and nothing else.

When we see images and actions that seem to represent harm, loss, lack, pain, sickness, vulnerability, hate or fear, we are seeing the effect of thoughts based on our belief in being separate from Love. They seem real only because of thinking errors caused by our belief. They represent of our state of mind.

It is important to remember that we can change our beliefs. When we change our beliefs, our state of mind changes and what we see will change. As we practice being mindful of what we are seeing, we can become aware of when there is a need to let our errors be corrected.

They are cues that we need to bring these perceptions and thoughts to the Holy Spirit with willingness to receive His correction. This is how we learn to focus on the reality of Love and disregard the mistaken thoughts based on belief in separation. We change our state of mind as we learn to see the real world of Love’s oneness.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Awakening to Love Without Limit

Today’s idea [I walk with God in perfect holiness] but states the simple truth that makes the thought of sin impossible. It promises there is no cause for guilt, and being causeless it does not exist. It follows surely from the basic thought so often mentioned in the text; ideas leave not their source. If this be true, how can you be apart from God? How could you walk the world alone and separate from your Source?

We are not inconsistent in the thoughts that we present in our curriculum. Truth must be true throughout, if it be true. It cannot contradict itself, nor be in parts uncertain and in others sure. You cannot walk the world apart from God, because you could not be without Him. He is what your life is. Where you are He is. There is one life. That life you share with Him. Nothing can be apart from Him and live.

Yet where He is, there must be holiness as well as life. No attribute of His remains unshared by everything that lives. What lives is holy as Himself, because what shares His life is part of Holiness…. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 156,W-pI.156.1:1-3:3. See also ACIM Lesson 156 Insights.)

Our true Self is a Thought in the Mind of God that has not left Its Source. It shares all of God’s attributes because thoughts do not leave their source. This fact is the foundation upon which release from guilt is built.

The world of separation we perceive with the body is the effect of the belief that we have separated from our Source. Since this could never be true, the world we perceive is illusion and therefore meaningless. All meaning it seems to have, all perception of loss, lack, guilt and fear, comes only from our mistaken belief separation is true. This belief that we have separated from our Source must be healed for us to experience the fact that we walk with God in perfect holiness.

The purpose of the Course is to teach us that what we have believed about ourselves and others is untrue and meaningless. As we accept this teaching under the Holy Spirit’s tutelage, we awaken to the Life we live in God. We awaken to perfect peace, boundless joy and Love without limit.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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How to Change Our World

The relationship of anger to attack is obvious, but the relationship of anger to fear is not always so apparent. Anger always involves projection of separation, which must ultimately be accepted as one’s own responsibility, rather than being blamed on others. Anger cannot occur unless you believe that you have been attacked, that your attack is justified in return, and that you are in no way responsible for it. Given these three wholly irrational premises, the equally irrational conclusion that a brother is worthy of attack rather than of love must follow. What can be expected from insane premises except an insane conclusion? The way to undo an insane conclusion is to consider the sanity of the premises on which it rests. You cannot be attacked, attack has no justification, and you are responsible for what you believe.

You have been asked to take me as your model for learning, since an extreme example is a particularly helpful learning device. Everyone teaches, and teaches all the time. This is a responsibility you inevitably assume the moment you accept any premise at all, and no one can organize his life without some thought system. Once you have developed a thought system of any kind, you live by it and teach it. Your capacity for allegiance to a thought system may be misplaced, but it is still a form of faith and can be redirected. (A Course in Miracles,T-6.in.1-2. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

In truth we cannot be attacked because our true Self is only Love and Love has no real opposite. But if we believe in the premise that we are separate in a world of separation, everything we perceive conforms to our belief. We see what we believe because our “seeing” is a projection of our belief.

Fortunately beliefs can be changed. Our belief in being separate must be let go and the recognition that we are Love and nothing else must be accepted if we would receive the peace and happiness God wills for us. We cannot look to our perceptions based on separation to find our way out of our mistaken belief. We need to be willing to turn to the Guide given us by our Creator to learn the truth of What we are.

Our inner Teacher sees our mistaken beliefs and projections, but does not believe them. He uses our perceptions to teach us that these perceptions are not real. Through His guidance, we journey on a path of awakening that leads us out of the forest of confusion into the simplicity of Love’s oneness. We need only be willing to consider that our perceptions may be mistaken and open our minds to the Holy Spirit’s reinterpretation. He will show us the changeless Love behind the perceptions of separation. As our beliefs change, the world we perceive changes.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Identifying with the Oneness of Love

Think not you made the world. Illusions, yes! But what is true in earth and Heaven is beyond your naming. When you call upon a brother, it is to his body that you make appeal. His true Identity is hidden from you by what you believe he really is.

God has no name. And yet His Name becomes the final lesson that all things are one, and at this lesson does all learning end. All names are unified; all space is filled with truth’s reflection. Every gap is closed, and separation healed. The Name of God is the inheritance He gave to those who chose the teaching of the world to take the place of Heaven. In our practicing, our purpose is to let our minds accept what God has given as the answer to the pitiful inheritance you made as fitting tribute to the Son He loves.

Father, our Name is Yours. In It we are united with all living things, and You Who are their one Creator. What we made and call by many different names is but a shadow we have tried to cast across Your Own reality. And we are glad and thankful we were wrong. All our mistakes we give to You, that we may be absolved from all effects our errors seemed to have. And we accept the truth You give, in place of every one of them. Your Name is our salvation and escape from what we made. Your Name unites us in the oneness which is our inheritance and peace. Amen. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 184,W-pI.184.8:1-5;12;15. See also ACIM Lesson 184 Insights.)

A name is a symbol used to define differences. In the oneness of Love, there is no need for a name because there are no differences in what is one. That is why, in truth, God has no name.

But we believe in a world of differences. We dedicate our life to learning and using names for all the differences. Most importantly, we believe the differences we have labeled are real and have meaning. Differences conflict and compete with each other. But because only the oneness of Love is real, these differences must be illusions, and therefore meaningless.

This belief in the reality of differences hides the truth of Love’s oneness that is everywhere. The Name of God is a unifying symbol as we accept His Name as the one Identity we all share. The fact that His Name is our inheritance makes us all one as His Creation. There are no differences in God, so there are no differences in our inheritance.

To accept our inheritance, we need to replace all the labels and identities that we assign to differences in the world with the one Identity given us by God. This means we withdraw our belief in the reality of differences. As we do this, the seeming importance of differences fades and the eternal presence of Love shines forth. We accept the reality of our Identity as Love in place of the made up illusions of differences in the world.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Awakening from Our Limited World View

You are as God created you. The sounds of this world are still, the sights of this world disappear, and all the thoughts that this world ever held are wiped away forever by this one idea. Here is salvation accomplished. Here is sanity restored.

If you remain as God created you, you must be strong and light must be in you. He Who ensured your sinlessness must be the guarantee of strength and light as well. You are as God created you.

Today we will again devote the first five minutes of each waking hour to the attempt to feel the truth in you. Begin these times of searching with these words:

I am as God created me.
I am His Son eternally.

Now try to reach the Son of God in you. This is the Self that never sinned, nor made an image to replace reality. This is the Self that never left Its home in God to walk the world uncertainly. This is the Self that knows no fear, nor could conceive of loss or suffering or death. (A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 94,W-pI.94.1:2-5;2:2-4;3. See also ACIM Lesson 94 Insights.)

Our true Self is what God created. It shares all of God’s attributes, for It remains united with Its Source. This is why we are still as God created us. God does not change, so the Self that remains united with Him cannot change.

The self that we believe we are in the world denies our unity with God. Thus it seems that we are different, loveless, capable of harm and being harmed. This belief makes us feel we are guilty for the harm we think we have done and fearful of retaliation. But this belief in what we are is a false image and could never be true.

As we remind ourselves that we remain as God created us, His Son eternally, we loosen the belief in the false image of a limited, loveless self. We open the door to the recognition that God’s strength and Light is ours. Our belief in the false self fades as the Light of our true Self shines brighter in our mind. Today’s practice leads us on the path of awakening to our true Self.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Accepting Our Unity with Love

Seek and find His message in the holy instant, where all illusions are forgiven. From there the miracle extends to bless everyone and to resolve all problems, be they perceived as great or small, possible or impossible. There is nothing that will not give place to Him and to His Majesty. To join in close relationship with Him is to accept relationships as real, and through their reality to give over all illusions for the reality of your relationship with God. Praise be to your relationship with Him and to no other. The truth lies there and nowhere else. You choose this or nothing.

Forgive us our illusions, Father, and help us to accept our true relationship with You, in which there are no illusions, and where none can ever enter. Our holiness is Yours. What can there be in us that needs forgiveness when Yours is perfect? The sleep of forgetfulness is only the unwillingness to remember Your forgiveness and Your Love. Let us not wander into temptation, for the temptation of the Son of God is not Your Will. And let us receive only what You have given, and accept but this into the minds which You created and which You love. Amen. (A Course in Miracles,T-16.VII.11-12. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)

The dream of a world of separation is an attempt to limit Love. Since Love cannot be limited, this dream is the denial of Love.

To wake up from the dream, we need to let go of (forgive) the belief in separation and accept our true relationship with God. In truth, we remain united with our Creator. All His Love, His joy and His peace are ours. This relationship can never be broken because it is the Law of Love.

In every moment we choose between the “gifts” of the ego, which are meaningless, empty forms (illusions), and God’s eternal gifts of all that is real. We choose between nothing and everything. The temptation to believe the world offers something of value is strong because we have taught ourselves that the dream is real. Now it is time to turn to God’s Teacher within for help to see past the meaningless illusions and accept our unity with Love.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. http://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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