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Study of Text, C 14: VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 5. 5-24-17

VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 5

5 Light cannot enter darkness when a mind believes in darkness, and will not let it go. Truth does not struggle against ignorance, and love does not attack fear. What needs no protection does not defend itself. Defense is of your making. God knows it not. The Holy Spirit uses defenses on behalf of truth only because you made them against it. His perception of them, according to His purpose, merely changes them into a call for what you have attacked with them. Defenses, like everything you made, must be gently turned to your own good, translated by the Holy Spirit from means of self-destruction to means of preservation and release. His task is mighty, but the power of God is with Him. Therefore, to Him it is so easy that it was accomplished the instant it was given Him for you. Do not delay in your return to peace by wondering how He can fulfill what God has given Him to do. Leave that to Him Who knows. You are not asked to do mighty tasks yourself. You are merely asked to do the little He suggests you do, trusting Him only to the small extent of believing that, if He asks it, you can do it. You will see how easily all that He asks can be accomplished.

Journal

The Holy Spirit uses all we made that hurts us. He turns it into something that will help return us to our right mind. The way we use defense it is destructive. It blocks our awareness of truth. Given to the Holy Spirit, it becomes protective of the truth. This shift is impossible for us to do, but easy for the Holy Spirit. In fact, it was done the moment the task was given Him. We do have a part in it, which is the willingness and desire to be healed. Acceptance is our part.

Even that little bit can seem difficult. We have put great value in our own little kingdom and there is a reluctance to relinquish it. We put great value in defense and it seems scary to lay down our arms. The part of the mind that enjoys the stories and that wants to keep the self- identity it made up, is adamant in resisting the Holy Spirit. But there is so much waiting for us outside this illusion. Our reality is glorious and living that reality is bliss.

It would seem a simple, self-evident choice. So why don’t we just make it? The problem is twofold. First, we don’t remember our reality and so it feels like we are asked to sacrifice what we are for something that is just a vague promise. We are asked to accept on blind faith what we don’t remember. The answer to this problem is in our mind. As we begin to surrender to the Holy Spirit and do the little asked of us, the truth that has never left us is revealed.

The second part of the problem is that we don’t think we can do this. It seems too hard, too scary. We are asked to let go of everything that we know and every defense we have in faith that we will be saved. It is like we are being asked to step off the cliff in the promise that we will not, after all, fall to our death.

Even as we begin to do what it is asked, dismantling the belief system that blocks the truth, it seems like an endless task. Every time we remove a brick from that wall there is another to be removed. The answer to this problem is simple. We work at the task of removing the bricks one at a time, and this gives the Holy Spirit permission to heal our mind. We can’t wake ourselves up, but we can signal our willingness to be awakened by doing the simple tasks asked of us. Holy Spirit does the hard work, and for Him, it is not hard.

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Posted by Rev. Myron Jones.

Study of Text, C 14: VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 4. 5-23-17

VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 4

4 Our emphasis has been on bringing what is undesirable to the desirable; what you do not want to what you do. You will realize that salvation must come to you this way, if you consider what dissociation is. Dissociation is a distorted process of thinking whereby two systems of belief which cannot coexist are both maintained. If they are brought together, their joint acceptance becomes impossible. But if one is kept in darkness from the other, their separation seems to keep them both alive and equal in their reality. Their joining thus becomes the source of fear, for if they meet, acceptance must be withdrawn from one of them. You cannot have them both, for each denies the other. Apart, this fact is lost from sight, for each in a separate place can be endowed with firm belief. Bring them together, and the fact of their complete incompatibility is instantly apparent. One will go, because the other is seen in the same place.

Journal

This paragraph is very helpful in understanding why we must look at our thoughts and bring them to the Holy Spirit. It also explains why we exist in a nearly constant state of mostly unacknowledged anxiety. We believe in two realities and these realities are in no way compatible, and yet, we try to maintain a firm belief in both. It is a wonder we can function in this insanity.

Imagine that you believe the sky is green. You also believe the sky is blue. You believe that 1+1=2, and your belief that 1+1=3 is just a firmly fixed in your mind. This is what is happening to us all the time. We believe in our Divinity, that we are love as is our Creator. We believe in our innocence and our perfection and our oneness. At the same time, we have an equally strong belief in our guilt, in fear and hatred. We believe we are limited and vulnerable. We believe in projection as defense. How can we believe in both of these pictures of our self at the same time?

We maintain the two visions through dissociation. We keep them apart. When we believe in our ego self, we keep our true self in the closet with the door firmly closed. Like most people, for most of my life dissociation was so thorough that I acknowledged my ego-self most of the time and ignored the true self. This did not obliterate my true self, but through dissociation, I kept the knowledge of my true self hidden. With A Course in Miracles, I began to acknowledge both and eventually, my true self began to take precedence in my mind.

I did this by deliberately bringing the two visions together and looking at them both. This forced me to see they were incompatible and forced me to decide between them. This is the purpose of looking at a belief and then asking the Holy Spirit for another way to see it. The other way is the vision I had ignored up until that time. When the Holy Spirit brought it out of hiding and showed it to me, I was able to see clearly that the ego choice was not ever going to make me happy. Thus the choice for truth was inevitable.

It sounds like it would be very simple and straightforward, and that I would choose the truth once and for all. But what I noticed right away is that I had given a great deal of value to the ego way of thinking. It was not always so straight-forward and not always clear, and a lot of time it was frightening to think of letting the old way go. That voice in my head kept warning me that defense was necessary, and all this talk of love and invulnerability was nonsense and was going to get me hurt. So it took awhile but now I am delighted to find the hidden false beliefs lurking around in my mind. I am happy to bring them to the truth so I can make a decision for God, which is a decision for my true self and for happiness.

© 2017, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of Text, C 14: VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 3. 5-22-17

VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 3

3 It is not possible to convince the unknowing that they know. From their point of view it is not true. Yet it is true because God knows it. These are clearly opposite viewpoints on what the “unknowing” are. To God, unknowing is impossible. It is therefore not a point of view at all, but merely a belief in something that does not exist. It is only this belief that the unknowing have, and by it they are wrong about themselves. They have defined themselves as they were not created. Their creation was not a point of view, but rather a certainty. Uncertainty brought to certainty does not retain any conviction of reality.

Journal
I was once married to a man who suffered from paranoid schizophrenia. In this delusional state of mind, he saw and heard things that no one else could see or hear. Think about that for a moment. What if you saw someone coming after you with a knife? It would be terrifying as he drew closer and closer to you. You would run for your life!

Now suppose I grabbed you and said, “Slow down! Why are you running? Why are you afraid? There is nothing chasing you.” You look behind you and the knife-wielding man is gaining on you. Would you stand there and think to yourself that this crazy person trying to hold you back probably has a point? Or would you throw him off, and take off running again?

Schizophrenia is a harsh path. Not being able to trust your own senses, and being afraid to trust anyone else’s. But, really, this is where we all are right now. We are looking out our eyes and letting them convince us of the craziest stuff, stuff that could not possibly be true. We have allowed ourselves to believe everything the eyes tell us even though the eyes themselves are part of the hallucination we call life.

What happened with my ex-husband is that over time we built up trust between us. He began to sometimes come to me to ask if what he was seeing was real. He brought his hallucinations to someone he could trust, and so was able to accept that there was another way to see the situation. This was not always true and after awhile it became necessary for us to go our separate ways, but when he was able to do this, it helped him navigate the world his misfiring brain showed him.

We are learning to bring our hallucinations to the Holy Spirit. It usually starts off slowly and the trust builds over time until we turn to Him all the time. The Holy Spirit knows what we see, but he also knows what is really there. He helps us reinterpret what the eyes are showing us. The more we do this, the more clarity we have.

There was no way that Charlie could have looked at the danger he seemed to be facing and convinced himself there was nothing chasing him. How could he? He could see the danger, but he couldn’t see what I saw. It took trust for him to accept help. In the same way, we cannot dismiss what we see and what we feel and hear unless we have help. We have to build trust and we do that by bringing our thoughts to the Holy Spirit over and over. Eventually, our trust pays off and we begin to see differently, too.

© 2017, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of Text, C 14: VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 2. 5-18-17

VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 2
2 The search for truth is but the honest searching out of everything that interferes with truth. Truth is. It can neither be lost nor sought nor found. It is there, wherever you are, being within you. Yet it can be recognized or unrecognized, real or false to you. If you hide it, it becomes unreal to you because you hid it and surrounded it with fear. Under each cornerstone of fear on which you have erected your insane system of belief, the truth lies hidden. Yet you cannot know this, for by hiding truth in fear, you see no reason to believe that the more you look at fear the less you see it, and the clearer what it conceals becomes.

Journal
It is interesting to me that the lesson I am doing today (Lesson 138) says much the same thing. Truth is true and nothing else is true. We don’t really have to seek out truth, but merely uncover it, because truth is all there is. What interferes with truth is not real, simply something we believe.

My experience has been that once I decide I want to see the interference, it is completely obvious. When I don’t want to see it, everything is murky and confusing. Since it cannot be both obvious and murky, it must be that it appears as I want it to appear. Why is it that I would ever choose to be deliberately confused?

Jesus says that we hide it because we are afraid of the truth. I know a young girl who has lived a terrifying life. Now she is in a safe place where she is loved and protected, and yet, though she wants to be loved, she is afraid of love and resists it. When love is too overwhelming, she lashes out at the one loving her. She has been taught that she doesn’t deserve love and so when she receives it, her sense of unworthiness keeps her from accepting love, and it even triggers fear.

Watching her behavior, seeing her defend against love, helped me to understand that we all do the same thing. We all defend against the Love that is God. Who feels worthy of such unconditional, universal love? I think I can say that I feel worthy of this love, and yet, if I did then why would I hide from it? Why would I believe in guilt and fear if I knew that the truth is I am loved beyond measure by my Creator, that I am forgiven all things and that I am the only one who thinks I need forgiveness?

So I search honestly for everything that interferes with truth. I watch my mind for any thought that I am unworthy, that I am judged, that I am unforgiven. When I find those thoughts, I give them to the Holy Spirit and allow them to be corrected. This is how I uncover the truth that is in me, and therefore could never actually be lost to me.

© 2017, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Posted by Rev. Myron Jones.

Study of Text, C 14: VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 1. 5-17-17

VII. Sharing Perception with the Holy Spirit, P 1

1 What do you want? Light or darkness, knowledge or ignorance are yours, but not both. Opposites must be brought together, not kept apart. For their separation is only in your mind, and they are reconciled by union, as you are. In union, everything that is not real must disappear, for truth is union. As darkness disappears in light, so ignorance fades away when knowledge dawns. Perception is the medium by which ignorance is brought to knowledge. Yet the perception must be without deceit, for otherwise it becomes the messenger of ignorance rather than a helper in the search for truth.

Journal

Even though perception is never truth, it can come very close and it is what we have to work with here in time. As a matter of fact, as long as we are in time it is essential. As Jesus tells us, it is the means by which ignorance is brought to knowledge. And, ignorance must be brought to the truth. In keeping them apart, we keep ignorance in place and truth remains obscure to us.

If someone has done something unkind to me and I think they are guilty of doing it, this is an example of ignorance. If I hold onto that grievance, I will suffer. I might not connect the suffering with the grievance, but that will not prevent the misery. But if I realize that my unhappiness is caused by a belief in my mind, then I can ask for clarity and for healing.

This is how I bring the ignorance to knowledge, and knowledge reminds me that I but do this to myself and no one is guilty. Peace is restored to my mind and thus to my life. It is a simple, reliable process. On the other hand, if I hold the grievance away from the truth, it is equally certain that I will remain in a hell of my own making. It becomes a simple matter of deciding what I want, light or darkness.

© 2017, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of Text, C 14: VI. The Light of Communication, P 8. 5-15-17

VI. The Light of Communication, P 8

8 The Holy Spirit’s function is entirely communication. He therefore must remove whatever interferes with communication in order to restore it. Therefore, keep no source of interference from His sight, for He will not attack your sentinels. But bring them to Him and let His gentleness teach you that, in the light, they are not fearful, and cannot serve to guard the dark doors behind which nothing at all is carefully concealed. We must open all doors and let the light come streaming through. There are no hidden chambers in God’s temple. Its gates are open wide to greet His Son. No one can fail to come where God has called him, if he close not the door himself upon his Father’s welcome.

Journal
This paragraph is such good news! The Holy Spirit will remove from my mind all that interferes with communication as long as I don’t prevent him from doing so. Jesus says that He will not attack my sentinels, so I have to give him my thinking errors, my dark thoughts, and not defend them from His help.

I don’t have a lot of sentinels because I don’t have a lot I would defend. I used to defend my special relationships, but I seldom do that anymore. The way I used to do this, was to deliberately not ask Holy Spirit to decide for me what my relationships mean and how to use them. This was especially true with my children.

If my daughter asked me to do something, I would not ask for guidance about the answer. I didn’t want to take a chance that the answer I was given would be no. I didn’t think I could say no to my daughter. I was too invested in my daughter’s opinion of me to take that gamble. When I finally let the Holy Spirit heal that relationship, I was able to open that part of my mind to Him. I still loved and enjoyed my daughter, but did not need her to love and enjoy me. What freedom!

I’m sorry it took me so long to trust the Holy Spirit. The reason I waited as long as I did is because I thought I had to guard this need to be loved and appreciated. It seemed so very important to me, that I could not chance doing anything to upset the delicate balance. With trust growing within me, I let the Holy Spirit in and He showed me that I was guarding nothing.

Now, this relationship is stronger and happier for both of us without this needless burden projected onto it. All of my mind can be this free and love filled if I only open the door to the Holy Spirit. He will do what is necessary to restore communication.

© 2017, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of Text, C 14: VI. The Light of Communication, P 7. 5-12-17

VI. The Light of Communication, P 7

7 You know not what you say, and so you know not what is said to you. Yet your Interpreter perceives the meaning in your alien language. He will not attempt to communicate the meaningless. But He will separate out all that has meaning, dropping off the rest and offering your true communication to those who would communicate as truly with you. You speak two languages at once, and this must lead to unintelligibility. Yet if one means nothing and the other everything, only that one is possible for purposes of communication. The other but interferes with it.

Journal

As I read this, I think about talking to a friend of mine about her life. First I listen to what she is saying to me. If I listen with the ego, I will hear only what I understand through my ego mind. For instance, she might tell me about a dear person in her life who died, and what I hear are my beliefs about death. I will hear how I would feel if it happened to me. My response to her might be helpful or it might now help at all.

If on the other hand, I step back as my ego self and allow the Holy Spirit to interpret her words, I will discern the meaning that she is really trying to convey. I will hear the Holy Spirit’s interpretation of her words, and when I respond, I will say something that will actually help or comfort her.

This applies to all communication. On Facebook, I saw someone attacking people he does not agree with. I had many thoughts about this. I could see his error and based on my own experiences and beliefs, I imagined myself contacting this person and convincing him to see this differently. But, I have had enough experience with ego thinking to recognize it when I see it in myself. I let it go.

Evidently, I just let it go in form, because when I began my prayers, I found myself thinking of this person again, and wishing I could somehow help in this situation. Perhaps because I was already in my right mind and open to Holy Spirit, something truly helpful was communicated.

In my prayers, I visualize myself standing in the circle of Atonement with Jesus. I think of each person who has asked for prayers and knowing that no one should be left alone in their guilt, I see them standing with us in that holy circle. There in the circle, all is healed by Love. On this morning when that man came into my consciousness, I felt such love for him and such desire for his inclusion in the circle, that I knew I was offering a miracle.

There was no ego desire to change him. I simply could not imagine leaving him alone in his guilt, and all I wanted was for him to know how loved and perfect he was. That is the difference between communication directed by ego, and communication through the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit went through my mind discarding all egocentric thoughts based on fear, and all that was left was love. This love is what He communicated through me.

© 2017, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.