Together, We Light the Way

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Study of the Text, Chapter 8: I.The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph 5. 7-8-14

I. The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph 5
5 The curriculum of the Atonement is the opposite of the curriculum you have established for yourself, but so is its outcome. If the outcome of yours has made you unhappy, and if you want a different one, a change in the curriculum is obviously necessary. The first change to be introduced is a change in direction. A meaningful curriculum cannot be inconsistent. If it is planned by two teachers, each believing in diametrically opposed ideas, it cannot be integrated. If it is carried out by these two teachers simultaneously, each one merely interferes with the other. This leads to fluctuation, but not to change. The volatile have no direction. They cannot choose one because they cannot relinquish the other, even if it does not exist. Their conflicted curriculum teaches them that all directions exist, and gives them no rationale for choice.

I have established that my previous curriculum (the ego’s curriculum) has made me unhappy. Even what I perceived as happiness, I now see was just a temporary absence of unhappiness. The moments I thought of as my most precious were tainted by the fear of loss because that was the pattern established by ego.

Now I am ready to establish my new curriculum permanently. I have already chosen a new direction and have experienced moments of true happiness, but it has not been lasting. I see the reason as I read this paragraph. My curriculum is not meaningful yet, because I still have two teachers with diametrically opposed systems. They interfere with each other.

My mind becomes muddled as I try to listen to both, choosing to follow one and then the other. I laugh to myself as I imagine my GPS running two programs at once. One program takes me on an easterly path and the other chooses one that goes west. One turns me left and the other turns me right. My GPS would be, in effect, saying that all directions will take me to where I want to go, and that could not be true. I would experience frustration and unhappiness, and I would be a very long time getting to my destination, if I ever got there at all.

Fortunately, my Garmin has only one voice, only one director. It takes me surely and quickly to my destination as long as I follow its directions. This is as it can be for my path through life. I have a choice between two voices and I can follow either. It seems that I can also choose to follow both, but with the same dissatisfying results I would have if my GPS had two voices. I have already proven to myself that the Voice for God is consistent and that it takes me where I truly want to go.

I have been listening to the ego voice for a long time and sometimes I still, out of habit, choose that voice now. But when I do, I not only become confused, but I wind up where I don’t want to be. The ego voice as not gone away for me yet, but the Voice for God is strong in my mind and I hear it even as I hear the ego. I am learning to tune out the ego more often than not. My path is straighter and my journey more peaceful.

© 2014, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text, Chapter 8: I.The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph4. 7-7-14

I. The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph 4
4 Your past learning must have taught you the wrong things, simply because it has not made you happy. On this basis alone its value should be questioned. If learning aims at change, and that is always its purpose, are you satisfied with the changes your learning has brought you? Dissatisfaction with learning outcomes is a sign of learning failure, since it means that you did not get what you wanted.

I laughed when I read this paragraph. It is so simple that you would think we would have thought of it ourselves. Well, I guess we did, because consciously or unconsciously we became open to finding another way. That is why the Course is part of our life now. But it is not enough to learn about another way, we need to put it into practice.

We don’t just say there must be another way, find that way, then go back to making the same mistakes as always and expect our life to change. What works for me is to look at each outcome, day-by-day, moment-by-moment, actually, and notice if it makes me happy. If I am not happy, then I make a decision to do it differently because I didn’t get what I wanted. That makes sense, right?

A simple example of this occurred over the weekend. I said something to a friend and then regretted saying it. I felt like it was a stupid thing to say, that my friend noticed how stupid it was and judged me for it. I kept having judgmental thoughts about myself and then I would feel bad. I know this is foolish and not helpful and I asked for correction, but I would notice the thought again, and I would become anxious about it.

When I woke up the next day, the thought was right there waiting for me. What I did then was ask the Holy Spirit to show me what I needed to learn from this experience, and to help me let it go. I had the thought that I was upset because I was afraid I was being judged by my friend and coming up short. Then I had the thought that I believed that I need my friend to approve of me.

The next thought I had was of the lesson I had done recently. This was the lesson that I practiced knowing the peace of God is all I want. In this lesson I learned that in order to have the peace of God I have to let go of other goals. I realized that by having the goal of needing approval, I could not have the peace of God. Each time I did not get approval I would be out of peace.

Ahh! Now I understood the problem, and I knew the solution. I was upset because I had put another goal before the only goal that would make me happy. I wanted this friend to approve of me and this goal is doomed to failure. At some point, my friend is bound to disapprove of something I did or said. Even if she didn’t, I would project my self-judgment onto her and it would appear as if she disapproved of me.

There is no way I could keep this goal and experience the peace of God. The solution is simple. Needing approval doesn’t make me happy. If it doesn’t make me happy, it has no value to me. I can easily let it go on that basis alone. Peace makes me happy, and so has value to me. It only makes sense to remember that my only goal is the peace of God. All the anxiety I had felt when I thought I needed approval just dissolved away instantly. When I looked at the whole situation from that peaceful place I could laugh at what a big deal I had made of nothing.

© 2014, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text, Chapter 8: I.The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph3. 7-4-14

I. The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph 3
3 Every response to the ego is a call to war, and war does deprive you of peace. Yet in this war there is no opponent. This is the reinterpretation of reality that you must make to secure peace, and the only one you need ever make. Those whom you perceive as opponents are part of your peace, which you are giving up by attacking them. How can you have what you give up? You share to have, but you do not give it up yourself. When you give up peace, you are excluding yourself from it. This is a condition so alien to the Kingdom that you cannot understand the state that prevails within it.

As I read this, I thought of my last marriage. Toward the end, I spent a lot of my time responding to ego thoughts in my mind and so it was more a war than a joining. It’s kind of funny when I think of it, but I divorced him because I wanted peace. It is kind of a metaphor for ego. The ego says if we want to be happy we must separate ourselves from God and from each other.

God on the other hand is Wholeness. If we want to be happy we choose peace over war. We choose sharing rather than attacking. When I was married, I listened to the ego tell me that I needed to defend myself against my husband’s selfish behavior, that he was the cause of my unhappiness. And yet, peace is the condition of the Kingdom and in choosing to separate myself in order to gain peace, I was asking that the Kingdom be something it is not. I was asking that it be separation rather than Wholeness. It was a ridiculous request.

I’m not saying that I am guilty for choosing divorce or even that I wish I had chosen differently. I am just noticing that I was looking for peace where I could not find it. After the divorce I spent several years learning how to have the peace I did not achieve through divorce. I had to forgive myself and him, and that took awhile because I often hid from myself my true feelings and so they couldn’t be healed.

Eventually, I did look at it all and allow it to be healed. The final piece came when it was completely healed and I spontaneously apologized for my part without any sense of loss or any need to defend myself. I apologized without expectation or need for a response from him. I doubt he ever saw his part in it, but that is none of my business and does not affect me.

I am completely at peace with that relationship. That means I don’t think he is responsible for how I feel. I don’t blame him for anything he did or any effect his actions had on anyone. I freed him from my grievances and so I freed myself. Now I understand that the reason forgiving him freed us both is that we are each a part of the other’s peace. We are one and if we continued to separate through anger and blame, we would both suffer.

Was this hard to do? I had many compelling reasons to hold a grievance against him. And it took a long time to work my way to this point that I realized there was nothing to forgive. In spite of this, I know it was not hard. All I had to do was let it go, knowing that I wanted peace more than I wanted the grievance.

That it took so long, and that I felt like it was hard was testament to my desire to be right rather than happy. But, no, it wasn’t hard to do. It required only that I choose peace and that I recognize that my peace is dependent on my desire to hear the Voice of God Which speaks for Wholeness. I only need to answer that call, with the certainty that nothing else is more important.

© 2014, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text, Chapter 8: I.The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph 2. 7-3-14

I. The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph 2

2 The distractions of the ego may seem to interfere with your learning, but the ego bas no power to distract you unless you give it the power to do so. The ego’s voice is an hallucination. You cannot expect it to say “I am not real.” Yet you are not asked to dispel your hallucinations alone. You are merely asked to evaluate them in terms of their results to you. If you do not want them on the basis of loss of peace, they will be removed from your mind for you.

For awhile now I have been experiencing major shifts in my understanding. My connection with Spirit has grown stronger and stronger. I am more peaceful, and happier. Frustrating periods of confusion, and sometimes, unnecessary suffering has preceded many of those shifts, as I looked at the false beliefs in my mind. But I am happy to do it, and it passes much more quickly now because my willingness is stronger than my resistance.

My part in this process is my willingness, my sincere desire to awaken. I do not dispel my illusions alone. The Holy Spirit undoes them for me as that becomes my desire. It happens slowly, a small step at a time when my willingness is weak. As it strengthens, the transformation is quick. There is a big difference for me now. I used to believe the ego had power over me. I used to doubt and become fearful when I seemed to temporarily fail.

Now I know that I made the ego; the ego did not make me. Therefore, the ego is powerless before me, and if it seems to rule me, it is only because I desire to keep it in place. I am no longer trying to lie to myself about this because I no longer feel guilty about it. Foolish, maybe, and frustrated with myself sometimes, but not guilty.

Recently while reading a past entry in my journal, I was reminded of this passage from The Holy Spirit’s Interpretation of the New Testament. It says:

“The choice you make will seem to be made many times in complete sincerity and truth of heart. And then you will seem to slip and forget the choice you have made. Do not let this distress you. Simply make the choice again.”

That really helped me to let go of the concerns I had about my seeming failures. In fact, reading this and accepting it was a turning point for me.

Evidently, I am also learning to evaluate everything on the basis of loss of peace. I notice that I am very sensitive now to loss of peace, and when it happens, I immediately look at my thoughts to see what precipitated the loss. When I see the thought I evaluate it. What is its value to me? Do I want this belief more than I want peace of mind?

Sometimes I become temporarily confused and think I need to make the thought go away, or somehow fix my ego with my ego. But as Jesus says: The ego’s voice is an hallucination. You cannot expect it to say “I am not real.” Eventually, I always come to my senses and allow Holy Spirit to do His job and my mind is corrected and my peace is restored.

© 2014, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text, Chapter 8: I.The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph 1. 7-2-14

Chapter 8: THE JOURNEY BACK

I. The Direction of the Curriculum, Paragraph 1

1 Knowledge is not the motivation for learning this course. Peace is. This is the prerequisite for knowledge only because those who are in conflict are not peaceful, and peace is the condition of knowledge because it is the condition of the Kingdom. Knowledge can be restored only when you meet its conditions. This is not a bargain made by God, Who makes no bargains. It is merely the result of your misuse of His laws on behalf of an imaginary will that is not His. Knowledge is His Will. If you are opposing His Will, how can you have knowledge? I have told you what knowledge offers you, but perhaps you do not yet regard this as wholly desirable. If you did you would not be so ready to throw it away when the ego asks for your allegiance.

First, I appreciate that Jesus is pointing out to us that knowledge is not the motivation for learning this course. I was confused about that at first. I thought it was all about learning new stuff. It was only much later that I realized that peace was my goal. I am learning this course because I want peace. Before I could understand this, I had to learn to value peace.

Now I understand that peace is the condition of the Kingdom. As the Course tells us, if we want the Kingdom we must give up conflict for all time. There is no compromise in this. Since peace is the condition of the Kingdom, we cannot bring conflict into the Kingdom. Therefore if conflict is in the mind, we cannot be in the Kingdom. It makes perfect sense when I think of it like this.

Knowledge is the Will of God, and if I seem to be opposing His Will, that is if I am entertaining conflict in my mind, then I cannot have knowledge. In the ego world, we learn knowledge. This is not really knowledge, this learning we do. It is merely the gathering of assorted perceptions that we call knowledge. In reality, knowledge is not something learned; it is something revealed when I remove the block that keeps it from me. Lack of peace, which comes from conflict, is the block that must be removed.

I have learned a lot about the value of peace, and I have learned that I want the Kingdom. But I have not realized that it is all that I want. I know that I have not made this total commitment yet, because I still sometimes toss it away in favor of the ego’s meager offerings. I think the peace of God is all I want and then the ego thought that more money, weighing less, getting my way, being appreciated, etc, etc, etc, would be really nice. And off I go in search of a better illusion.

But here is the thing. I don’t really believe that anymore. The ego still attracts my attention, and sometimes I get distracted, but I never lose sight of my only purpose. The peace of God may not yet be all I want, but it is all I want to want, and I never forget it. Thank you, God for that!

© 2014, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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