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Manual for Teachers: IX. Faithfulness, P 1. 12-20-17

IX. Faithfulness
1 The extent of the teacher of God’s faithfulness is the measure of his advancement in the curriculum. Does he still select some aspects of his life to bring to his learning, while keeping others apart? If so, his advancement is limited, and his trust not yet firmly established. Faithfulness is the teacher of God’s trust in the Word of God to set all things right; not some, but all. Generally, his faithfulness begins by resting on just some problems, remaining carefully limited for a time. To give up all problems to one Answer is to reverse the thinking of the world entirely. And that alone is faithfulness. Nothing but that really deserves the name. Yet each degree, however small, is worth achieving. Readiness, as the text notes, is not mastery.

Journal

Faithfulness is the teacher of God’s trust in the Word of God to set all things right; not some, but all.

I started out turning things over to the Holy Spirit when I had tried everything and failed at everything. In desperation, I turned to the Holy Spirit. But doing so, even it was only when I was at my wit’s end, was helpful. I learned that I could trust Him to help me navigate life, and more importantly, I was teaching myself that He was healing my mind and that this was the only answer that was going to work in all things.

After a while, I learned to trust God with my problems and understanding that they came from my confused mind, I learned to trust Him with my mind as well. But I still would pick and choose what I would give to Him. I still did not fully trust and so I decided what I would try to take care of and what I would turn over to God. I still valued the separate will and the me that it represented.

Now there is nothing I think I must hold apart from God. I occasionally come across a belief that has taken root in my mind and that I must turn over and then turn it over again and maybe again. But I know where my healing occurs and I know that I want my mind to be healed. I am not so concerned with the outcome as I used to be, I just want a healed mind. My purpose is not to have a better story, but to undo the story altogether. I am never confused about how this happens, and I know my part is to notice the error and desire that it be corrected. The Holy Spirit does the rest.

I have gone through the period of readiness, and I have gone through the period of achieving trust. Now I am in the period of gaining mastery.

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Study of Text, C 15: IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 43, 12-19-17

IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 4
4 Would you learn how perfect and immaculate is the holy altar on which your Father has placed Himself? This you will recognize in the holy instant, in which you willingly and gladly give over every plan but His. For there lies peace, perfectly clear because you have been willing to meet its conditions. You can claim the holy instant any time and anywhere you want it. In your practice, try to give over every plan you have accepted for finding magnitude in littleness. It is not there. Use the holy instant only to recognize that you alone cannot know where it is, and can only deceive yourself.

Journal

Over and over, Jesus is emphasizing the importance of letting go of our plans for finding magnitude in littleness. God has a plan that works and we can know His plan and live His plan if we let go of our own plan. This time of the year with the holidays upon us, we have a perfect opportunity to notice if we are looking for salvation in our own plan or if we are allowing God to lead us to peace.

I measure my level of surrender by whether or not I am feeling some degree of frantic. This year has been pretty calm for me. I used to make the biggest deal out of Thanksgiving and Christmas. We used to have a big party at our house for New Years. All of that effort, not just the doing of it, but the anxiety in trying to do it perfectly, was beyond stressful.

For one thing, I used these holiday occasions to get something from family and friends and giving to get always takes me out of peace. I wanted to cook the perfect meal at Thanksgiving and buy the perfect gifts at Christmas. I wanted my family to prove their love for me by being there and participating and making me feel special. Of course, I didn’t think of it that way, but clearly, that was my intent.

It put so much pressure on me to do everything perfectly so that I gave enough to get what I needed from them, reassurance that I was OK and that I was loved. Now that I don’t need anything from them the holidays are a different experience. Thanksgiving was a perfect experience of working together to create a meal we enjoyed together. No stress and worry because there was no neediness involved, just love and togetherness.

This year I bought gifts and wrapped them and even sent out a few Christmas cards but there was no stress involved. Getting this right is not my salvation. I have had a few thoughts about whether or not I got a satisfactory gift for this one or that one, but I also noticed the constriction around those thoughts and I chose again.

I did or I didn’t choose the best gift, but I know for sure that I chose the right plan when I let mine go and went with God’s plan. I’m pretty sure He just wants me to go with love. So I bought my gifts with love, I give my gifts with love and I accept my gifts with love, understanding that these objects given from the heart are just symbols of the love I have for these family members.

As a result, I bought and wrapped gifts in peace and joy this year. Even the thought that I spent more money than I intended is just a passing thought. I may not yet be following God’s plan exclusively, but I can tell by the level of peace and happiness I am experiencing that I am learning to make that choice now. I am learning that I want His plan and not my own. This moment that I am in, the only moment there is, is a holy moment in which I feel Love’s Presence. Surely, this is a holy instant.

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Manual for Teachers: VII. Generosity, P 2. 12-14-17

VII. Generosity, P 2
2 The teacher of God is generous out of Self interest. This does not refer, however, to the self of which the world speaks. The teacher of God does not want anything he cannot give away, because he realizes it would be valueless to him by definition. What would he want it for? He could only lose because of it. He could not gain. Therefore he does not seek what only he could keep, because that is a guarantee of loss. He does not want to suffer. Why should he ensure himself pain? But he does want to keep for himself all things that are of God, and therefore for His Son. These are the things that belong to him. These he can give away in true generosity, protecting them forever for himself.

Journal
And now we get past the forms of love such as giving money and other material things. Yes, we can show love in this way, but the source of this love is what we value as teachers of God. Let me ask for what cannot be quantified by the world, that which is in the mind of God and therefore in my mind as well. Let me be aware that I have the truly valuable, love, peace, kindness, patience, trust, tolerance. I protect this awareness through giving them.

When I lose my awareness of the attributes of love that are mine, I simply bring them into awareness again. Sometimes it happens like this. Maybe I’m experiencing lack as not enough money. I never ask for more money. I ask that I might know my abundance. If I experience loneliness, I don’t ask for another body to be with me, but that I become aware of my connection to all beings. How could I be lonely then? If I am sick, I don’t ask that the body be healed, but that I know my perfect innocence.

Another way I protect my knowing is to want for others what I temporarily lose sight of. Last night as I was laying in bed hoping sleep would come soon, I texted my son to see how he was doing. He mentioned that he had been sleepless for a couple of nights, a common problem for him. I immediately envisioned sleep finding him every night. I knew this must be true because suffering is never God’s Will. I saw him lying down in his comfy bed and drifting off into sweet dreams, and suddenly it was morning and I realized that in giving what I wanted, I received it.

All the things that really matter, the things that are real are already ours. They have been in our mind since creation and we can enjoy them if we choose to. All we need to do is place our awareness on what we want instead of what we dread or fear. And those things that matter cannot be lost through giving. I can give away money, and that money is gone, but the idea that sourced the money cannot be lost in the giving.

Ideas are not used up, and, in fact, they increase in the giving. And ideas leave not their source. So I can give and give the idea of abundance or even the effects of the belief in abundance and I as long as I trust in abundance, the idea will produce more effects as needed. Those who hold an awareness of God’s Love in them and as them, can, indeed, afford to be generous. In fact, they could not be anything else.

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Study of Text, C 15: IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 3, 12-13-17

IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 3
3 Be humble before Him, and yet great in Him. And value no plan of the ego before the plan of God. For you leave empty your place in His plan, which you must fill if you would join with me, by your decision to join in any plan but His. I call you to fulfil your holy part in the plan that He has given to the world for its release from littleness. God would have His host abide in perfect freedom. Every allegiance to a plan of salvation apart from Him diminishes the value of His Will for you in your own mind. And yet it is your mind that is the host to Him.

Journal
Be humble before Him, and yet great in Him.

What I think this means to me is that it is God in me that is great and that works through me. It is not the ego in me that is holy, but rather it is in undoing the ego that I am released from littleness and can take my place beside Jesus in saving the world. Yes, the power of God is in me and it is through this power that we perform miracles as is His Will and our will, too. But I cannot use that power if I am trying to manipulate the world using the ego mind.

That is the difference between God’s plan for salvation and my ego plan. In my ego plan, I look at the effects of the ego thinking and try to save these effects using more ego thoughts. Today, in doing Lesson 347, I was reminded of how we misunderstand salvation. Here is what I wrote.

Something that helped me to see what I have been doing is a message from the Holy Spirit shared by Regina Dawn Akers, in which He was helping her see that she uses her body as a depository for her sense of unworthiness. The way she explained it is that she looks at her body and feels unworthy and thinks it is the body that makes her feel this way. The Holy Spirit helped her to see that it works the other way around. She feels unworthy, projects it onto the body and then she can hope to improve the body and thereby become worthy. It is her plan for salvation. When I read this it was like a bright light came on in a darkened room.

When I first heard Regina say this, I understood how it is that I try to find salvation fixing the effect rather than correcting the cause. I make the problem with my ego thoughts and then I try to fix the problem by manipulating what I made with those thoughts, like trying to diet or use other means to enhance the body and thus feel more worthy. Wouldn’t it be more effective to let the Holy Spirit heal my belief in unworthiness instead, and then I won’t use the body to prove my unworthiness.

I once used this faulty reasoning with relationships and lack and loss, and all the ego effects in my world. I have learned to spot that and to choose differently. Now, if I feel attacked by someone, I immediately turn inward to the Holy Spirit to look at what is going on in my mind rather than trying to change how I am seen by that one, or to try to stop him from attacking me.

If I am in a difficult situation, I don’t use my ego mind to find a way out of it. I turn inward to see how I got into it, what were my thoughts, what is the lesson in this situation? Then, I find that no one is at fault, and I am not the victim of the world I see. I ask the Holy Spirit to heal my mind of any remaining beliefs like these, and thus, through the power of God in me, I am truly saved.

The more I do this, the more I am able to take my place in God’s plan for salvation. When I am defenseless in the face of attack, I am teaching the other that he is innocent. If I defend myself I am teaching him he is guilty. Clearly, it is not God’s plan to have us teach guilt. Guilt is not salvation. Before I can teach innocence, I must be willing to allow my mind to be healed of guilt. Sometimes I have noticed that the healing of my mind is simultaneous with teaching innocence. Perhaps it occurs because of the heart’s desire for innocence.

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Manual for Teachers: VII. Generosity. 12-12-17

VII. Generosity, P 1
1 The term generosity has special meaning to the teacher of God. It is not the usual meaning of the word; in fact, it is a meaning that must be learned and learned very carefully. Like all the other attributes of God’s teachers this one rests ultimately on trust, for without trust no one can be generous in the true sense. To the world, generosity means “giving away” in the sense of “giving up.” To the teachers of God, it means giving away in order to keep. This has been emphasized throughout the text and the workbook, but it is perhaps more alien to the thinking of the world than many other ideas in our curriculum. Its greater strangeness lies merely in the obviousness of its reversal of the world’s thinking. In the clearest way possible, and at the simplest of levels, the word means the exact opposite to the teachers of God and to the world.

Journal
I like being generous. I like giving to friends and loved ones. It is one of the reasons I have always enjoyed Christmas so much. I like giving to someone in need whether I know them or not. I give money, clothes, attention, love, a shoulder to cry on, a listening ear, whatever form love takes at the time.

I am about half way to generosity. I am not entirely generous because I pick and choose where I will be generous. I sometimes decide who deserves my generosity. I hold back when I think I don’t have enough. Sometimes I am miserly in my giving, sharing a little or with resentment. My trust is not yet complete so I cannot afford to be generous in the way Jesus speaks of it.

What I do when I notice these behaviors is to ask for healing, to ask for help in trusting completely. I want to be completely surrendered so that in all things I ask for direction and follow it without exception. I want to do this without fear and without a sense of sacrifice, but because it brings me joy to do so. This will happen only as I develop trust.

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Study of Text, C 15: IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 2, 12-11-17

IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 2
2 Your practice must therefore rest upon your willingness to let all littleness go. The instant in which magnitude dawns upon you is but as far away as your desire for it. As long as you desire it not and cherish littleness instead, by so much is it far from you. By so much as you want it will you bring it nearer. Think not that you can find salvation in your own way and have it. Give over every plan you have made for your salvation in exchange for God’s. His will content you, and nothing else can bring you peace. For peace is of God, and no one beside Him.

Journal
There is only the peace of God. I cannot find peace on my own. I have tried many times to bring peace to my mind on my own and none have worked. I have tried to manipulate the world and accommodate to the world, but no lasting peace has come from that effort. I have tried every form of distraction from what robbed me of peace and that gave me only a brief respite. Every attempt I made eventually fell through and left me feeling small and insignificant in the face of my suffering.

Now, Jesus is telling me that I must let go of the littleness that plagues me, that I can let it go, and that I only need desire magnitude to dawn on my mind and it is done. After all the failed attempts to save myself, it seems unlikely the answer could be so simple. After teaching myself false humility or equally false arrogance, the simple fact of magnitude seems an impossibility. But Jesus says otherwise and I am willing to believe him.

Here is something I have noticed. When I am immersed in my study or in my teaching, or when I am fully surrendered to God, and when I am in gratitude, I feel the magnitude that Jesus is talking about. It doesn’t make me feel arrogant as I first thought it would. In fact, I feel humbled by it. When I let my story draw my attention away from God, I become confused and I feel little again.

At first, I didn’t really put this together as cause and effect, but studying this part of the Course made it obvious. The ego argues that this elevated feeling cannot possibly last. One cannot go around thinking about God and love all the time. One cannot be a channel for God all the time. Life requires attention and decisions and plans. But I don’t think so.

I think that I can do all that the story demands of me and still know that I am in God and of God. I think that I can spend this life extending God rather than writing more ego script. I am willing for that. Father, I am willing to do what You would have me do and willing not to do what You would have me not do. I think this is a real expression of magnitude. I accept my magnitude as simply that which I am as a creation of God. I welcome the peace of God that is a natural consequence of that acceptance.

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Study of Text, C 15: IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 1, 12-07-17

IV. Practicing the Holy Instant, P 1
1 This course is not beyond immediate learning, unless you believe that what God wills takes time. And this means only that you would rather delay the recognition that His Will is so. The holy instant is this instant and every instant. The one you want it to be it is. The one you would not have it be is lost to you. You must decide when it is. Delay it not. For beyond the past and future, where you will not find it, it stands in shimmering readiness for your acceptance. Yet you cannot bring it into glad awareness while you do not want it, for it holds the whole release from littleness.

Journal
I want to remind myself of what the holy instant is. I think a very inclusive definition can be found in the Glossary –Index of A Course in Miracles by Ken Wapnick. It says this. It is the instant outside of time in which we choose forgiveness instead of guilt, the miracle instead of a grievance, the Holy Spirit instead of the ego; the expression of our little willingness to live in the present, which opens into eternity, rather than holding onto the past and fearing the future, which keeps us in hell; also used to denote the ultimate holy instant, the real world, the culmination of all the holy instants we have chosen along the way.

So now I am going to look at the first sentence, which tells me that this course is not beyond immediate learning. Then I am going to have a little laugh before I go on. Ok, I am sure that Jesus is right. I could have chosen to know that God’s Will is immediate and therefore it is so right now. I just did not.

As Jesus says, the holy instant is this instant and every instant according to my decision. It is any instant I want it to be. And if I accept the first meaning, that I have chosen forgiveness over guilt in this instant, then, yes, I have done that. I have done that many times. And I have chosen the miracle rather than the grievance. I have even chosen many moments in which I existed in the present rather than the past or future.

It is only when I look at the second meaning that I laugh at the idea I might have chosen complete freedom, the real world once and for all, and that I could have done so at any time. For a long time, it seemed so far from a possibility for me. Now it doesn’t so far-fetched and yet, I find it hard to accept that all I have to do is decide for it and it is mine. How is it that I do not want it?

That is so crazy. I have had many holy instants over the years and many more than that in the last year or so, and still, I have not fully accepted it though it stands in shimmering readiness for my acceptance. I don’t want to delay it longer and so I am excited about this section on practicing the holy instant.

Here I am, Lord.

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