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July-September, 2011

Accepting God’s Perfect Plan

by Rev. Larry Glenz, O.M.C.

Do I accept that God has a perfect plan for me — just waiting for my consent? 

I have been a Pathways minister for more than three years and I have been taking the Miracles Practitioner courses ever since my ordination. These courses seem to strengthen me at the most difficult of times. These Pathways courses have kept me focused on turning to the Source of all strength for guidance.

There have been many changes and dramatic events in the last few years. These events have not always been that easy to accept as part of God’s perfect plan for me. Losing my 27 year old son, Kevin, to a heroin overdose last year has been the most challenging. The Holy Spirit never told me that my son would recover during his seven years of addiction, recovery, and relapse. He did, however, tell me that I would be given the strength to handle whatever came my way. 

Can I accept and receive Heaven’s messages concerning the loss of Kevin?  Can I recognize that there truly is no death and that only the love is real in this dream of the world?  Is my being a Pathways of Light minister all part of God’s perfect plan? 

I admit that I do not understand God’s perfect plan for me — only that He has one and is waiting for my consent. I am continuing to learn to trust God’s plan and not my own. Accepting God’s plan is what time is for. 

I am grateful for the trust that I have developed in accepting that God’s plan works and mine does not. Forgiveness is the tool He has given me so I can learn to feel an inner strength as my guilt and its projection dissipate. It brings me an awareness of the union and safety. 

All of us are part of the one Self together — no exceptions! I want to accept God’s perfect plan for me without attaching to the outcome. It is that kind of trust I want to develop — so I keep practicing turning to Holy Spirit. And I am so grateful for all the love that I have been able to experience and share with others at this time.

I recognize that the principles of ACIM can best be taught by demonstration. I want to demonstrate that I can accept all the love from my 27 years with Kevin and let go of the rest. Feeling the love from Kevin has allowed me to handle his loss with strength. I have been able to receive the love of so many others because I am open to God’s perfect plan. Through Holy Spirit’s guidance, I am hoping that our story — Kevin’s and mine — serves to help others. That would be a great way to honor Kevin but I’ll turn that over to a Higher Power.

Rev. Larry Glenz is a Pathways of Light minister living in Long Beach, New York.
Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

© 2011, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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July-September, 2011

Come Home to Your Inner Light

by Rev. Michael Ciavarella, O.M.C.

This was given to me in a very powerful dream early this morning. If He says it to me, He’s saying it to you. Let’s all find this place. I have been there today. There is no place in the illusion that compares.

I take you to the place of Light. I bring you here because this place has been abandoned and neglected for a very long time.

I give this place to you. Come here often and sit in the stillness. Absorb the Eternal Light that comes down upon you. Listen to the silence as it enfolds you and caresses your soul.

Let your world fade away into the background. Do not allow anxiety or worry to get in your way while you are here.

This place is sacred. This place is holy. You make this place holy, because you are holy. You are the Light of the world. You hold the Light for the world. Lift high the Light that all who dwell in darkness may see.

Forgiveness is your function as the Light of the world. Hold this place of Light and silence and stillness for the world you think you see. Learn the true meaning of forgiveness and simply forgive yourself and your brother.

Cleanse your soul of the body’s restraint. Shower away the form and the structure of your illusion. Strip yourself of all that you think is dear to you. You will find that you have lost nothing. A world of wonder and enlightenment awaits you.

Each time you enter this place, know that you are being transported to your true Home. Know that you are no longer of this world, nor are you in it. Come here often and be transported away from your illusion. I will be there with you. I will hold your hand. I will carry you that you do not have to toil and tire yourself to be worthy of this Place you have been given.

You are worthy of this Place because I have said so. Let no one tell you differently.

I will be looking for you. I trust I will see you here often. I look forward to spending eternal moments together with you.

Sit and stay as long as you like. Think on the things that I have been telling you. When you walk from this Place, you can keep It with you deep in your heart. Never lose sight of what you have been given today.

Rev. Michael L. Ciavarella is a Pathways of Light minister living in Oak Lawn, Illinois.
Read more of his inspiring Healing Journal articles on the Pathways of Light web site. Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

© 2011, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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July-September, 2011

I Am Not a Victim

Daniel Nelson

One of the biggest mistakes we make as humans is to give away our power. We claim someone or something else is to blame for our problems. I refuse to buy into this idea that I am a victim. The definition of victim I am primarily speaking of is: One who is made to suffer from the act of another. Only I can make myself suffer. Pain may be inevitable, (though I’m not convinced of that), but suffering is definitely optional, for suffering of any sort occurs only in the mind of the sufferer, a mind to which nothing is done but by itself.

I choose the world I wish to see and if the world doesn’t conform to my wishes I must have been mistaken as to what those wishes were.

Victimhood seems to convey advantages, such as freedom from responsibility, righteous indignation, and isolation. Isolation may not seem to be an advantage, but isn’t that what the purpose of the ego is, to prove we are a separate identity, disconnected from the world and from our brothers and sisters?

So if I see a world where I am a victim, that view gratifies and strengthens the ego, and apparently I wish to be a separate egoic entity, rather than a connected spiritual being.

The idea that we choose to be a victim is not some right wing bootstrapping propaganda. It is not an excuse to withhold compassion from our brethren, nor to perpetrate pain or inflict loss upon them. It is the idea that our mind is a powerful creative force capable of altering our attitudes and even the world itself.

When someone cuts us off in traffic we say, “He made me mad.” But the truth is we chose to respond with anger to the actions we perceive, to judge it an insult, to think “He shouldn’t have done that to me.” The birds covered in oil in the Gulf of Mexico do not create sadness in our mind. We choose it because we identify with their seeming frailty. We take on this apparent suffering because we think “It shouldn’t have happened.” Genocide in Kosovo, earthquakes in Haiti, miners trapped underground for weeks, all those situations in the world do not make us angry, distraught, or horrified. We choose these responses because we tell ourselves the story that these situations shouldn’t occur. Yet obviously they should happen, or they wouldn’t be happening.

In no way am I suggesting that you shouldn’t feel any emotions. I am merely saying that the events don’t cause the emotions. We choose to feel them because we believe the stories we tell ourselves. And we believe them because that is the world we wish to see, a world of powerful forces with tragic and catastrophic consequences, before which we must bow in littleness, unworthiness and shame, a world with guilty humans subjugating human and animal victims for profit. I believe the reason we do this is to elevate our own egos, so we can feel superior to all those ‘sinners’ out there, projecting our feelings of greed and grandiosity onto others. We even do it to feel superior to God, who we believe inflicts these punishments on us for our ‘original sin,’ or is at least letting us down by allowing all these ‘horrible tragedies’ to occur.

I am not poverty stricken because the economy is in a recession. It’s not even clear that my absence of disposable income is tied to this decline. There is a wealth of things I could do to raise my income level but for reasons of (false) pride and indolence, I do not do them. The decision to forgo picking strawberries or delivering newspapers was not foisted upon me by outside agencies but by my misconception that I am somehow ‘better’ than working those jobs implies to my inner snob. But it is certain that my ‘poverty’ is the result of the thought that I lack. I am ‘stricken’ by this because I think I should have everything my heart (or more accurately ego) desires, when this is obviously not in the cards at this time, nor even necessarily in my best interests. These thoughts of lack I subscribe to lead to despair. The ridiculous choice of self-pity precludes the rejuvenating choice of gratitude, denying the abundance about me. The presence of a secure roof, indoor plumbing and refrigeration already puts me ahead of 2/3’s of the world’s population. Kings don’t have this much in some countries. There is no way in which I could be said to actually need cable TV, a brand new car, more clothes, steak twice a week or home Internet service.

The day that I was first exposed to the idea that we are not victims I ended up waiting at a bus stop for almost an hour, in gusty, sub-freezing winds, clad only in a thin shirt and pants. As I shivered I berated myself for my poor planning and thought ill of the transit authorities for inconvenient scheduling. Then I remembered the lesson that I am not a victim, of weather, circumstance or my ego, and focused on my invulnerability. By failing to agree with my thoughts that I was a miserable, put upon idiot, and replacing them with the belief that I am neither the body nor the ego which appeared to be suffering, but am instead immortal Sprit, the holy extension of God, One with the Source, I ceased to experience my situation as discomforting. I quit shivering and became content with the circumstances. I did not still the wind or raise the ambient temperature. I didn’t even try to change the world. I merely changed my mind about the world, quit resisting the experience and quit telling myself it shouldn’t be happening. By seeing the miracle of perception behind a seeming problem of the world I entered the first truly peaceful moments of my life.

It is such an insidious process to believe that the world causes our suffering. It ‘proves’ to us we are weak, incapable and powerless, so we choose to become angry and thereby feel powerful. But that anger actually limits our ability to affect change, since the nearly universal human response to anger is more anger. Unless you are the Dalai Lama, if someone appears to attack you, you will defend your position, not consider whether you may have been in the wrong. We don’t need to get ‘mad as hell’ not to take it anymore. We just need to refuse to be victims.

Recognizing that our thoughts precede emotions, in fact that our beliefs engender them, is the first step out of victimhood. Anxiety, shame, frustration, hatred, rage, all devolve from fear, and fear, being the antithesis of Love, is present in any mind that is not being loving. The truth is that our ego fears Love above all else because our true nature is Love and that is what the ego was designed to obscure. It offers us the substitutes of lust and possessiveness. But all these substitutes reinforce the illusory separation of our existence. These substitutes hide true Love, which has nothing to do with sex, romance, desire, control or psychological addiction. True Love is the will to share our Self, to extend our spirit in joyous communion. The rest are shabby facsimiles made to accentuate our isolation by giving brief glimpses of connection.

If we believe we are this ego consciousness, we will see a world composed of separate entities in opposition to each other, a world of perpetual conflict that seeks to deprive us of everything we value, up to and ultimately concluding with life itself. Whereas if we believe we are spiritual beings, the holy extension of God, we will see a world of harmony beauty and grace.

We can change the world by extending Love rather than projecting fear. If you want to be a victim, the opportunities are endless. But if you choose to be responsible for your perceptions and realize the world is a mirror of your beliefs, and you believe that Love, Joy, Peace and Truth are our inherent qualities, and that Light (which is not the absence of darkness) and not darkness (which is the absence of Light) is the intrinsic state of existence, then that is the world you will experience. That is the world you will create.

There is no value judgment in any of what I am saying. This is far beyond the concepts of right and wrong. In fact those concepts are the basis of the victim mentality, which is the basis of the ego’s thought system. There are only two options, ego or Spirit. Every thought you identify with reinforces this hell on earth we have made, or moves us closer to remembering our union with God. The choice is always there for us to make.

Daniel Nelson is a student of A Course in Miracles living in Vancouver, Washington. E-mail: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

© 2011, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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July-September, 2011

Mistaken Concepts

by Rev. Mary Manke, O.M.C.

I opened to Holy Spirit when I woke: Holy Spirit, I feel so hopeless; discouraged; alone. I want to start over. I want to stop thinking that I know anything. Where do I begin?  

Spirit: Dear one, you have chosen again. Yes, of course you can begin again — it is this you do whenever you choose again. You misunderstood your task, believing that you had to change every single thought of fear when it appeared. All that you really need do is to let go of any thought that discomforts you, allowing that it be given to Me. That is My function; I am here to relieve you of the burdens and the mistaken concepts that you hold. I am here to show you what is valuable and what is not.

You asked, “What am I here to learn?” Dear one, your only purpose is to let go of fear. Fear thoughts do not serve you, not in any way, shape or form. Any instant that you let go of fear, the Light flows through you from Heaven and touches all the sleeping minds. In letting go of fear thoughts, you fulfill your function. By letting go of what is unreal, the real is revealed to you. You allow the Truth to fill the spot that fear once held. All you need do is give the fear thought to me. Your little willingness has all the strength of Heaven upholding it. When you let go of the meaningless (fear), the whole beauty of Truth radiates through and around you. Love extends without end, without disruption. Your true Heart abides in the radiance of Love.

Return to your Workbook lessons. Start at number one. Observe the thoughts that pop up and do not be tempted to use them as an excuse to retreat or stop the lessons. You deserve to be wholly in peace. You deserve to be wholly happy. You deserve complete, unshakable Love. As you choose to let go of fear, Love will comfort you. You truly have nothing to lose, only the removal of false ideas. By letting Me remove fear thoughts, you allow in the truth that you have it all and you are still as you were created. You allow Love to be as It is and as you Are.

To be as you Are is to be as Love created you. This is to leave the past behind, to let the past go, for it cannot be here at all. The past is gone. What is gone can have no effects. Therefore, do not bring the past with you. Dispel the notion that the past makes you what you are today. You made not your Self. Your belief in what never happened has made a seemingly solid world, a seemingly separate life. Your belief in the impossible has made the unreal seem real.  

I can help you if you ask. I can relieve you of the thoughts of the past when you are aware of them. Your only real responsibility is to accept your Self as Love created you.

Rev. Mary Manke is a Pathways of Light minister who lives in Wautoma, Wisconsin. Read more of her inspiring Healing Journal articles on the Pathways of Light web site. Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

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

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