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Study of the Text, Chapter 7: IX.The Extension of the Kingdom, Paragraph 3. 5-30-14

IX. The Extension of the Kingdom, Paragraph 3
3 The extension of God’s Being is spirit’s only function. Its fullness cannot be contained, any more than can the fullness of its Creator. Fullness is extension. The ego’s whole thought system blocks extension, and thus blocks your only function. It therefore blocks your joy, so that you perceive yourself as unfulfilled. Unless you create you are unfulfilled, but God does not know unfulfillment and therefore you must create. You may not know your own creations, but this can no more interfere with their reality than your unawareness of your spirit can interfere with its being.

This paragraph is very clear. My only function is to extend God’s Being, and this is true creation. The ego blocks this function and so blocks my joy and I am unfulfilled. But, God does not know unfulfillment and so I must create. This reminds me of the Introduction to the Course which tells us that nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal can exist.

The ego mind resists this logic but Jesus tells us that we must create. He tells us in other places in the Course that we are creating. We are unaware, but that does not interfere with reality. I have ways to think about this, stories that I tell myself to make it easier for me to accept. But I don’t really understand, not with my ego mind.

There is a part of me, however, that knows the truth and this knowing is stronger than the not knowing. I accept that I am still as God created me and that nothing I believe in can change reality.  I am, right now, creating as God creates. This is true even though I am not aware of it. I don’t want to sleep through this anymore. Wake up, Myron, wake up!

© 2014, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text, Chapter 7: IX.The Extension of the Kingdom, Paragraph 2. 5-29-14

IX. The Extension of the Kingdom, Paragraph 2

2 Spirit knows that the awareness of all its brothers is included in its own, as it is included in God. The power of the whole Sonship and of its Creator is therefore spirit’s own fullness, rendering its creations equally whole and equal in perfection. The ego cannot prevail against a totality that includes God, and any totality must include God. Everything He created is given all His power, because it is part of Him and shares His Being with Him. Creating is the opposite of loss, as blessing is the opposite of sacrifice. Being must be extended. That is how it retains the knowledge of itself. Spirit yearns to share its being as its Creator did. Created by sharing, its will is to create. It does not wish to contain God, but wills to extend His Being.

Jesus is telling us something about our Self. We are created by God as an extension of Himself. That is, God created us through sharing Himself. That means that we are equal in perfection and power with our Creator. This is so hard to take in because we have made a self that is opposite of Reality and so we feel small and weak and vulnerable.

What we feel is exactly the opposite of what we are. This is why we must let go of what we think we know before we can take our place in the Kingdom. What we think we know is blocking our awareness of our Reality. Recently, I have begun to respond to ego feelings by telling myself, “That can’t be right.”

Yesterday, I spent the day with my sister-in-law at the emergency room. She is experiencing Restrictive Lung Disease. Her lungs just won’t let her exhale breath so there is a build up of carbon dioxide. At least this is what I understood the doctor to say. There were a lot of emotions going on as I was there with my family.

When I would feel that hospital personnel were guilty for not responding quickly, I would remind myself of the truth, “That can’t be right.” There is no such thing as guilt. It is just one of those ego things we made up to keep separation in place. When I felt helpless and didn’t know what to say, I could remind myself, that can’t be right. The Holy Spirit is in my mind and always ready to respond through me as I step back and allow that to happen. Why should this be any different.

The ego is always going to react with fear and guilt because that is how it was made, from fear and guilt. But, as Jesus says, the ego cannot prevail against a totality that includes God and any totality must include God. I am beginning to see things differently now. I am beginning to see everyone as part of me, not separate people with separate needs, but one whole thing of which I am a part. And all of us are in God. This changes everything.

What I noticed yesterday is that I still sometimes react to the unknown as if it is the enemy. I feel afraid and uncertain. Because I feel so at sea, not knowing how to feel, I grab onto any familiar anchor and that is sometimes the ego. But my connection with Spirit is firmly rooted through years of practice as I have turned to Him for guidance and clarity over and over.

So what that looked like is this. I would see myself agreeing with fear stories, or finding fault with the medical system. I would hear myself telling stories to support this fear. I could see myself doing it as if it was someone else. I even saw the reason I did it, how it was like a drowning person grabbing the first solid object to keep afloat. That was how I felt, like I was drowning in uncertainty and it was better to be egocentric than to drown. 

I watched all this happen and it was ok. I knew what was happening and why and I knew to let it go. This is so much better than when I would stay in it for a long time and when I finally came to my senses, would feel guilty and beat myself up for not doing better. It was also very reassuring to see that the Holy Spirit is still there even when I am confused, stronger than the ego in my mind. When I was finding fault I was seeing us as separate, and I was allowing fear to block the extension of love, which is creation.

More than once I notice how I felt, tired and weepy, and reminded myself that it is ok to feel whatever I feel. This is an important reminder for me because I can start to feel guilty for not being “stronger” and when this happens I know that it is the ego wanting to be strong. Over all, I am happy that even though I was caught up in the ego story of Brinda in the emergency room, I was also detached enough to see what was going on. The ego will not prevail. It is not possible. Even when everything seems crazy and scary, part of me knows it is just a story and that it can’t be true.

© 2014, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text, Chapter 7: IX.The Extension of the Kingdom, Paragraph 1. 5-28-14

IX. The Extension of the Kingdom, Paragraph 1
1 Only you can limit your creative power, but God wills to release it. He no more wills you to deprive yourself of your creations than He wills to deprive Himself of His. Do not withhold your gifts to the Sonship, or you withhold yourself from God! Selfishness is of the ego, but Self-fullness is of spirit because that is how God created it. The Holy Spirit is in the part of the mind that lies between the ego and the spirit, mediating between them always in favor of the spirit. To the ego this is partiality, and it responds as if it were being sided against. To spirit this is truth, because it knows its fullness and cannot conceive of any part from which it is excluded.

I was standing at my window watching the rain pour down and thinking about an earlier section of the Course that said, “God Honored even the miscreations of His children because they had made them.” I realized that all these times when I have been feeling guilty for something in my life, I have failed to honor my miscreations and if God honors them so should I. I choose not to identify myself as my miscreations, but I honor them because of what I am.

I am asking Spirit to help me remember this today as ego thoughts rise up in my mind calling me to guilt. Can I trade guilt for honor? I think I can do that now that I understand honoring my freedom and my power even in my miscreations will not cause more miscreations. In fact, honor above guilt will break me out of the paralysis of my self-condemnation and return my mind to the Kingdom.

I read today’s paragraph and it begins by reminding me that only I can limit my creative power, and that this is not God’s Will. He wants me to create and to create fully. My creative power will be released as I release myself from my self-imposed prison of guilt and fear. I release myself through releasing my brothers. Again I am reminded that I am one with all my brothers, and what I release in them is released in me.

My sister-in-law is at the emergency room right now. Because she is in a weakened state, each time she has an emergency like this we know she might not recover. This is her miscreation, and there was a time when I blamed her for it. I thought she was guilty for the state she is in, that she should have quit smoking, and that she should have taken better care of herself.

I know that guilt is not real and is just something the ego thought up to bind us to the illusion, so I asked that my mind be healed. I accepted the Atonement for that and I am so grateful that I did. But now I am taking it a step further and I am honoring her miscreation. I honor her choices knowing that her life is her way Home regardless of how it appears in the world. I stand amazed at our power; even when misused, it is astonishing.

Can you imagine what our true creations must be? If we can make an entire world, if we can make it to be the impossible, and make it so real we believe in it, I am unable to visualize what we are creating right now in our true mind. The Holy Spirit was given to us to help us find our way back to the Kingdom where we already are. He is the intermediary between the parts of the mind, the part that remains with God and the part that imagines itself outside of God.

How hard can this be, really? We are powerful creators, we are as we were created, and we have never been anything else. We are only waking up to the truth that we have not gone anywhere and nothing has happened. How funny this predicament will seem when we wake up from it!

© 2014, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text, Chapter 7: VIII.The Unbelievable Belief, Paragraph 7. 5-27-14

VIII. The Unbelievable Belief, Paragraph 7

7 The whole purpose of this course is to teach you that the ego is unbelievable and will forever be unbelievable. You who made the ego by believing the unbelievable cannot make this judgment alone. By accepting the Atonement for yourself, you are deciding against the belief that you can be alone, thus dispelling the idea of separation and affirming your true identification with the whole Kingdom as literally part of you. This identification is as beyond doubt as it is beyond belief. Your wholeness has no limits because being is infinity.

I began this little adventure I think of as my life with an unbelievable idea. I believed that I could be separate from All That Is. I believed I could be alone. Since I did this with belief, I need a solution that is outside the belief. The Solution I need and can have simply by choosing it is the Atonement.

I think of the Atonement as that which undoes all I have done and restores the Kingdom to my awareness. That is just the way I think of it so that it makes sense to me, but I don’t think that is completely accurate. Still, I only need to know that the Solution is there and waiting for my acceptance. I don’t need an intellectual understanding to allow it to work for me.

The Atonement dispels the idea that I am separate, but that entails more than a realization I am not alone. Jesus says that the Atonement affirms that the whole Kingdom is literally part of me. Literally. I, in my wholeness, have no limits. I am infinite. My vision of my self is nothing like this. I am, however, becoming willing to step into my Self, or rather to allow my Self to rise in my consciousness. When I do this, when I allow my true Self into my awareness, I doubt I will have any interest in the little ego I made to take its place.

I have been playing with the idea that my mind is powerful and that I am constantly choosing, deliberately choosing what I will believe. As I make this choice, I see its affects as my life. Jesus has been telling us this all along but even though I read what he says, I have seemed determined to not really believe it. Now I am changing my mind about this.

At first I just watched my mind and saw how my thoughts became my life. Mostly I noticed how my negative thoughts were projected onto the world. This was important and encouraged me to allow my mind to be healed. I was learning through contrast. I had thoughts of anger and I saw that this projection brought me stories of conflict and it felt really bad. So I asked for healing and I saw how my stories became peaceful stories and it felt good.

Now I am taking this a step further. I am becoming willing to recognize that everything in my life is a reflection of a thought in my mind and that each thought I have is a deliberate choice I have made. Here is an example of what I mean. I went to bed early last night and got up early this morning. This means that I have more time to sit with Spirit, to allow Him to guide my thoughts and to write what I get.

I was thinking how much I enjoy this and how much more enjoyable it is when there is no sense of hurry. I had the thought that I wish I could do it like this every day. I’ve tried to arrange my day like this before and it only works occasionally. I felt the wish like it was something just out of my reach. Then another thought rose up in my mind and it was that I can decide for this. I don’t have to wish for it, I can will it to be.

I will always give myself the gift of a leisurely morning with Spirit. If this is what I want, there is nothing that can keep it from me. My mind is part of God, part of the whole, and it is powerful. It is so powerful it could choose to believe what is not true and through this belief I made an entire world. As I choose to stop believing in the unbelievable I am remembering that I can join my will with the Will of God with far more favorable results than I achieved in joining with ego.

The Will of God is that I am whole and my wholeness is infinite. The Will of God has no opposite so this must be true of me. I choose to experience my limitless Self every morning. It may not seem like a big deal, but every time I choose for strength instead of weakness I convince myself that this is what I want and what I am. I hear the ego in the background reminding me how small I am and suggesting I stay low. I think its too late for that.

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Study of the Text, Chapter 7: VIII.The Unbelievable Belief, Paragraph 6. 5-26-14

VIII. The Unbelievable Belief, Paragraph 6
6 The Holy Spirit will teach you to perceive beyond your belief, because truth is beyond belief and His perception is true. The ego can be completely forgotten at any time, because it is a totally incredible belief, and no one can keep a belief he has judged to be unbelievable. The more you learn about the ego, the more you realize that it cannot be believed. The incredible cannot be understood because it is unbelievable. The meaninglessness of perception based on the unbelievable is apparent, but it may not be recognized as being beyond belief, because it is made by belief.

It is really helpful for me to realize that the reason I believe the ego is because it was made by my belief. That is why it is so hard for me to let it go even though I see that I it makes no sense and even though I feel the truth of the Course. I feel the certainty that I am not the ego, that the ego is not real because it is not God. I am real because I am God, in that I am as He created me and He created me like Himself.

I made the ego through believing in it and this makes it impossible for me to withdraw from ego without help. I need something outside that belief to help me, and this is the function of the Holy Spirit. However, because of what I am, that is because I am the Son of God, nothing can take from me what I want. So the Holy Spirit can heal the part of the mind that believes in the ego, but only if I do not obstruct Him.

This is my part, and it is very small. I simply decide that I want to believe only the truth and it is done. Jesus is helping me to make that decision as he helps me to see how unbelievable the ego is. As the ego is seen more clearly through what I am learning as I read the Course, I see that it is meaningless and I don’t want it anymore.

This has been happening a little at a time. I see one thing about the ego that doesn’t make sense and I become willing to let go and so my mind is healed. But then I think some other part of the ego thought system has value to me and I want to keep it. Eventually, as I see the effects of this belief I realize it is not something I want and my mind is healed of this. This will continue until finally I have generalized the lesson and realize that the entire thought system is unbelievable and I let it go altogether.

Mostly I know this. Mostly I am convinced that the ego is not to be believed and that I am not the ego. But for a couple of weeks now, and especially in the last few days, I have seen old beliefs come back up for me to look at again. Someone seems to attack my spiritual beliefs and I feel attacked and try to defend myself. I feel the fear and anxiety that arises as this is going on. I feel small and vulnerable.

Then I remember the truth and I let it go. I give permission for the Holy Spirit to undo this in my mind. It is like I am being questioned about my decisions. Do I really want to let this go? Am I really through with this belief? It feels awful while I am feeling it, but it also feels good because I keep choosing the truth over the ego. Does this mean that I am ready to wake up from the ego belief system? I don’t know, but I am willing and I am also willing to forgive whatever needs forgiving. I am willing to bow to the Holy Spirit’s judgment on this.

 

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Study of the Text, Chapter 7: VIII.The Unbelievable Belief, Paragraph 5. 5-23-14

VIII. The Unbelievable Belief, Paragraph 5
5 Do not be afraid of the ego. It depends on your mind, and as you made it by believing in it, so you can dispel it by withdrawing belief from it. Do not project the responsibility for your belief in it onto anyone else, or you will preserve the belief. When you are willing to accept sole responsibility for the ego’s existence you will have laid aside all anger and all attack, because they come from an attempt to project responsibility for your own errors. But having accepted the errors as yours, do not keep them. Give them over quickly to the Holy Spirit to be undone completely, so that all their effects will vanish from your mind and from the Sonship as a whole.

The first sentence is in italics. I take the hint that this is important. I have no reason to fear the ego. I made it and it derives its power from my mind. It cannot exist unless I choose that it exists. The moment belief is withdrawn from ego, it ceases to exist. How can I fear something that is powerless against me?

The second very important point that Jesus is making in this paragraph is that I am responsible for the ego. I am responsible for the world and everything I see in the world. I am responsible, though not guilty, for all that I see, hear and feel. This tells me that if it is in my awareness it is there for me to heal it.

I am reminded of Dr. Hew Lin who healed an entire institution for the criminally insane through an ancient Hawaiian practice of Ho’oponopono. His use of this practice is a little different than the traditional method, but he proved that it worked. He healed these people without even seeing them. He read their files and healed within himself what he saw there.

This is what Wikipedia says about it:  It is based on Len’s idea of 100% responsibility,[41] taking responsibility for everyone’s actions, not only for one’s own. If one would take complete responsibility for one’s life, then everything one sees, hears, tastes, touches, or in any way experiences would be one’s responsibility because it is in one’s life.[42] The problem would not be with our external reality, it would be with ourselves. To change our reality, we would have to change ourselves. Total Responsibility, according to Hew Len, advocates that everything exists as a projection from inside the human being.[43] As such, it is similar to the philosophy of solipsism, but differs in that it does not deny the reality of the consciousness of others. Instead, it views all consciousness as part of the whole, so using parts of the idea of holism: any error that a person clears in their own consciousness should be cleared for everyone.

The prayer that Dr Lin uses to clear is this:

“I love you. I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you.”

You can read about this in Zero Limits, co-authored with Joe Vitale. There is a lot about it on the web and I write about it on my website at this link: http://www.forgivenessisthewayhome.org/index.php/articles/on-healing/53-hooponopono.html.

I agree with Dr. Hew Lin. I am solely responsible for my life and everything in it. I gladly take the next step in which as I notice what needs healing anywhere in my world, I quickly give it over to Spirit to be healed so that it will vanish from our mind.

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Study of the Text, Chapter 7,VIII.The Unbelievable Belief P 4

VIII. The Unbelievable Belief, Paragraph 4

4 You cannot perpetuate an illusion about another without perpetuating it about yourself. There is no way out of this, because it is impossible to fragment the mind. To fragment is to break into pieces, and mind cannot attack or be attacked. The belief that it can, an error the ego always makes, underlies its whole use of projection. It does not understand what mind is, and therefore does not understand what you are. Yet its existence is dependent on your mind, because the ego is your belief. The ego is a confusion in identification. Never having had a consistent model, it never developed consistently. It is the product of the misapplication of the laws of God by distorted minds that are misusing their power.

The ego is the product of the misapplication of the laws of God by distorted minds that are misusing their power. That is an excellent definition of ego. We are powerful and we exist under the laws of God, but through our power we have misused these laws and so have distorted our minds. We think we have done the impossible. We think our minds have been fragmented.

Everything we see with the body’s eyes is a reflection of a thought in the mind. So the separate bodies we see are a reflection of the thought of fragmentation. We look out from these bodies and think what we see proves our belief when actually all it proves is that we believe something that isn’t true. In believing we can fragment the mind we believe we have attacked God.

This belief in attack is reflected in the world as attack on our brothers and defense from our brothers, thus further distorting our oneness. This belief in fragmentation extends to ourselves as well. We like this about ourselves and hate that. We sometimes love ourselves and sometimes hate ourselves.

I have started a love campaign. I love myself. I love my body regardless of how it looks or feels. I love my personality even when it seems off kilter. I love my mind even when it is split. I love the food I eat without regard to any meaning I have ever given it. I love the environment regardless of temperature or weather or my comfort level with it.

I love the people I meet every day whether they respond to me in a positive or negative way. I love the person who checks me in at the hotel even when he puts me in the wrong room. I love the clerk who talks to her friend while I wait to be checked out. I love the banker who puts my money in the wrong account. I love my customer who chooses to buy from someone else.

The illusion of fragmentation causes fear and guilt and the solution to fear and guilt is perfect love. Perfect love is the Atonement. I ask for and receive the Atonement. My campaign of love is preparing my mind to accept the Atonement in every situation. I am learning consistency through loving consistently. My campaign of love is helping me remember what I am.

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