Together, We Light the Way

Click link to go to:
Together We Light the Way Index

Study of the Text 12-11-12

12-11-12
2 Child of God, you were created to create the good, the beautiful and the holy. Do not forget this. The Love of God, for a little while, must still be expressed through one body to another, because vision is still so dim. You can use your body best to help you enlarge your perception so you can achieve real vision, of which the physical eye is incapable. Learning to do this is the body’s only true usefulness.

Thus far what I have learned here in this first part of the Course is that I am a child of God, created in His image, thus I am a creator as well. I create as God creates, that is as an extension of what I am, love. Or as stated here, I am created to create, the good, the beautiful and the holy. This is what I am to remember.

Because I have chosen to experience separation, my vision is too dim to create in this way, and so for now I express this love of God from one body to another. I do this until vision has increased. I do this through enlarging my perception, and learning to see, not with the body’s eyes, but with true vision. Another way to think of this is that I do this through learning to perform miracles.

Here is an example of what this looks like to me in my life. Last night I spent the evening with my daughter, Susan. We have a regular “date” for Monday nights and sometimes we meet at a restaurant, but often I cook supper at my house and that’s what we did last night. We ate supper and shared our life stories. Then Susan sat with me as I packed for the coming week and it turned into a “dress up” party.

Susan has an artist’s eye and is very creative. She helped me to put together some outfits differently in a way that would never have occurred to me. It was like going shopping and being surprised with what I found but better, because I never left my room and I didn’t have to spend any money.

She also helped me go through some of my clothes and decide if they looked good on me or I should give them away which was very helpful because I have a hard time deciding. Sometimes I become confused about what clothes are for and keep them because I don’t feel I got my money’s worth, or because I paid too much to admit I don’t really like it. We laughed as Susan pointed out I have a very complicated relationship with my clothes.

I told her that obviously I needed to forgive these clothes and my relationship with them because there was entirely too much guilt involved. It was a very light-hearted and humorous exchange and yet, it was also true and an example of guilt coming forward so I could forgive it. It was also an example to me of how easy it is to enlarge my perception when I have one unified goal. My goal is to forgive the world and awaken to the truth. So even a fun evening ending with an off-hand remark becomes a way to do that.

Susan and I have always loved each other very much, but for a long time my relationship with Susan was like my relationship with my clothes; it was very complicated. There was a lot of guilt in the relationship, which kept me from fully enjoying her company. This was true of all my relationships, not just the relationship with Susan. As long as I believe in guilt it will show up everywhere.

The guilt showed up as a response to my belief that I made mistakes raising her. I projected guilt onto the relationship in many ways. I would say something to her and watch her response, and because guilt was in my mind, I would perceive her response as a judgment of what I said. I loved her and wanted to be with her but it was hard, and because I was a regular projecting machine, I saw Susan as the problem. I told myself that she just was hard to be with because I never knew what was going to set her off.

It’s really funny now to look back on that and see how turned around I had it. Everything I saw in her was actually coming from my own mind. When I thought she was hard to be with, it was actually me that was hard for me to be with! As I forgave myself and forgiveness became the way I live, my perception of Susan, and everyone else, shifted. Perception expanded and my vision changed.

Now even if Susan were to respond with apparent judgment, it does not trigger anything in me. I know that it is about her, not about me. Because I know this, my reaction is more loving. I don’t need anything from her so I don’t expect her to be in a good mood all the time. And if she is not in a good mood it doesn’t affect my feelings about myself.

This healing of my own mind makes a whole different experience of being with Susan. I know that this change is about my expanded perception because Susan has not changed. She is the same delightful person she always was. It’s just that now I see her perfection clearly because forgiveness has purified my vision.

This is an ongoing process, this forgiveness work. It continues to happen in my relationship with Susan and in all my relationships. When I notice I feel someone is a difficult friend or what I used to think of as “high maintenance” I know that it is my mind that needs work. As my mind heals I become the friend I thought I needed the other person to be.

This is a miracle and it is the purpose the Holy Spirit has given bodies. We made them to allow the illusion of separation, and now that we are ready to wake up from that dream, the Holy Spirit has given them the purpose of joining. This is done through forgiveness and the resultant miracle of a changed mind. It shows up in my life in the most delightful ways. It shows up as two people joining for the purpose of sharing the love of God even if it looks like two people amusing themselves playing in my closet.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Study of the Text 12-10-12

12-8-12
VII. Distortions of Miracle Impulses
1 Your distorted perceptions produce a dense cover over miracle impulses, making it hard for them to reach your own awareness. The confusion of miracle impulses with physical impulses is a major perceptual distortion. Physical impulses are misdirected miracle impulses. All real pleasure comes from doing God’s Will. This is because not doing it is a denial of Self. Denial of Self results in illusions, while correction of the error brings release from it. Do not deceive yourself into believing that you can relate in peace to God or to your brothers with anything external.

I was helped, this morning, to see some instances of distorted perceptions producing a dense cover over miracle impulse, and how this leads me to misdirect my miracle impulses. The following are some examples that came to me.
The desire to heal distorted by the desire to lay on hands or to give medical advice or medical treatment. This does not mean that Reiki and other forms of energy work, or the medicine I take, nor the medical treatment I use when needed are wrong, bad or should not be done. This is not about behavior in the world. This is about understanding, intent, and motivation.

I used to practice Reiki for a bit, and while doing so I had the opportunity to work with a woman who had cancer all over her body. The next day she told me that she had slept all night. This was the first nights sleep for her in a very long time. I was so happy to hear that I had given her this gift. That it came through Reiki didn’t matter. It was not my hands that gave her relief from pain, but the intention to be a blessing to her. It was God working through my body to ease her body, because this is where she thought she had a problem.

The misperception is that my body did anything to her body. Both of our bodies are illusions and neither body does anything. My body does not heal another body, and her body was not sick. The mind was sick and that sickness was projected as a sick body. My hands hold no magical power to heal, but in my mind was the love that offered healing to the extent we were both willing to accept it, and that healing was reflected as a body relieved of pain, if only temporarily.

The desire to join with a brother or sister is distorted as trying to connect physically, trying to emulate or become like another, or follow another. To express love through affectionate behavior, gifting, praising or pleasing. Again, there is nothing wrong with any of these behaviors. I am certainly not going to stop hugging my friends because it is a distorted miracle impulse. That would not represent healing of the mind.

Instead, I realize that any physical expression of love is a pale reflection of real love. I ask the Holy Spirit to guide me in helpful ways to use my body to express love while I am still identified with the body. I notice when I have used the body in an attempt to gain something I feel I am missing, and I ask the Holy Spirit to heal my mind when this happens.

The desire to be a teacher of God can be distorted as the attempt to direct another’s spiritual progress. I am a teacher of God. When I act as a messenger and allow Spirit to teach through me, I am a true teacher of God. When I forget that a messenger does not write the message, but simply delivers it, and I think that I know what the other person needs to hear or how they need to understand it, I am no longer a teacher of God. That impulse to be a clear a channel has become distorted, and the body is no longer an instrument to be used to perform miracles.

The innate abundance that we know we are can be distorted as the desire for more material gain. It is my Divine nature to be complete, to lack nothing. In separation this is not my experience, but there is a knowing that it should be. Abundance tries to express through me. This impulse to express abundance is distorted because as I see myself as separated I will feel inevitably feel lack. The miracle impulse becomes an impulse to collect things against the loss I feel is unavoidable.

I plan for the future, save money, buy more stuff, and insure it against that expected loss. Instead of feeling my innate abundance, this behavior or even the belief I should be behaving like this, increases the feelings of lack and loss. I can never buy enough stuff or protect my “wealth” to the degree I feel abundant. If I had more money than I could ever spend, I would worry that the economy would tank and my money would be worthless.

If I were financially abundant, I would feel impoverished in my relationships, or my health. It is not what I have or don’t have that enriches me, and so it cannot satisfy in me the desire to have nor salve my fears of loss. Abundance is not having more, it is the certainty that whatever is needed will be provided in that moment. Trying to prepare for that moment only erodes that certainty because it implies that needs may not be met and so it is necessary to do something about it.

Another way I have tried in the past to fill the sense of emptiness that separation engenders is with food or shopping. Some people use drugs and alcohol. These are all distorted miracle impulses. There is a knowing in us that we should be abundantly happy and lack nothing. We know, deep down, that we should have peace of mind and joy. We know that there is something wrong with the feeling of being alone even when we are with others, and we know that this is not right.

When I feel this discontent I can become temporarily confused and think that there is something out there I need to soothe myself, to fill up the empty place in my heart that longs for satisfaction. Maybe I will try to find a good book to read, or a friend to visit. Maybe I will have a drink or eat some cake. Maybe I will go shopping even though I don’t need anything. 

Gambling, sex, TV, the list is endless, but, ultimately unsatisfying. The real impulse is the miracle of a healed mind that knows it is forever whole and with no needs of any kind. The attempt to fill the emptiness with things is a distortion of that impulse. I used to believe in those magical solutions, but now that I don’t I only need to be vigilant for the ego’s desire to use them.

When I feel a sense of lack of any kind, I ask Spirit what He wants me to know about this. I ask for His guidance and clarity. If the impulse for a miracle becomes distorted through misperception, I just return to the miracle as soon as I come to my senses. There is nothing external to me that can bring me the peace that is my inheritance.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Study of the Text 12-7-12

12-7-12
5 All aspects of fear are untrue because they do not exist at the creative level, and therefore do not exist at all. To whatever extent you are willing to submit your beliefs to this test, to that extent are your perceptions corrected. In sorting out the false from the true, the miracle proceeds along these lines:
Perfect love casts out fear.
If fear exists,
Then there is not perfect love.
6 But:
Only perfect love exists.
If there is fear,
It produces a state that does not exist.
Believe this and you will be free. Only God can establish this solution, and this faith is His gift.

I spoke to my son again yesterday. He had gone to the doctor and was telling me what he learned about his injury and about possible solutions. Each time I speak to him about this, I get a chance to see what I believe. I get a chance to see if I am free. Yesterday I saw that I am not free. I felt his frustration and fear as if it were my own because it was. I can only feel what I believe, not what someone else believes.

This morning I was asking for more clarity about this.

Me: Jesus, I want to understand how my fear does not exist. I want to know, really know, that fear does not exist. Here are my thoughts about this situation with Toby and his back injury. I accept that he is not that body and that who he really is cannot be injured, in pain or suffer in any way. But he believes he is this body and he believes it is injured.

His belief is strong and it is causing him to suffer terribly, and the more he suffers the harder it will be for him to not believe in suffering. His suffering while not real in eternity is very real to him in time. My prayer is not that his body be healed. I am clear on this. His body does not actually exist and is just a thought in the mind. I pray that his mind be healed of the belief in pain and suffering. This would take a miracle and it is for this miracle I pray.

Jesus: I understand how you suffer when you think of your precious son in pain. You open your mind to be healed and you see clearly that what he believes about himself cannot be true, then you see the evidence of his belief and you cannot remember the truth. Do you see, my sweet one, that you and your son reflect each other? He believes in pain and suffering and this belief is projected outward onto the body. You believe in pain and suffering and this belief is projected outward and you see his body in pain and suffering.

Me: No I didn’t see that. Kind of obvious, isn’t it? Ok, back to accepting the Atonement for myself, right? My prayer is that my mind be healed of the belief in pain and suffering. I have been led to this correction and sometimes I think this is done. My mind feels so clear on this. Then I see a reflection of that belief in myself or someone else and I realize I still believe in it. How do I let go of the belief in pain and suffering?

Jesus: This is what you are doing. Do not be discouraged because you return to the belief. Simply choose again when that happens, just as you have been doing. You can see that the belief in pain and suffering, which is the same as the belief in fear, is fading for you. Even when you feel the belief strongly, you never believe in it completely. You always remember to ask for healing. It is like you are erasing a dark smudge on your mind and each time you erase some more of it. Soon you will have no darkness at all.

Because it seems you must return again and again to this belief to experience complete healing, it makes it feel more real to you, but this is not the case. Either something is true or it is not. It cannot be more true or less true. Fear is not real. Pain is not real. Believing in it does not make it real, so resisting the truth and holding onto the belief, does not make it real. Feeling a lot of pain does not make it real. Not being able to see a way out of suffering does not make it real.

All forms of fear are banished by the perfect love that is God. Open your heart and all darkness will vanish in the brilliance of that love. The separated ones are afraid of the light. They fear they will vanish with the darkness, but that is not true. My heart opened and I was cleansed of every form of fear and yet, here I am, talking to you.  Again I say to you, do not be discouraged. I, too, backed away from love before my final acceptance. I am here to help you, and together we will succeed.

Me: Thank you, Jesus, for your words of encouragement and for your help. I feel you in my mind and it helps my faith. I heard the ego words of discouragement, of doubt and uncertainty, but I did notice that while they pulled on an old belief in my mind, they could not hold my attention. I see signs of healing in this and in other ways. I do suffer still when I see my son suffer, but I also know that this is another opportunity to heal the mind. And I notice that the suffering does not grip me like it used to, that I turn from it more easily and more quickly. I give my faith to You, God, and I trust that You will answer that faith. Thank you.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Study of the Text 12-6-12

12-6-12
4 The real purpose of this world is to use it to correct your unbelief. You can never control the effects of fear yourself, because you made fear, and you believe in what you made. In attitude, then, though not in content, you resemble your Creator, Who has perfect faith in His creations because He created them. Belief produces the acceptance of existence. That is why you can believe what no one else thinks is true. It is true for you because it was made by you.

I feel reassured by this paragraph because it affirms my belief that my job here is to use the story I am experiencing to undo my belief in it. I made this world and all the stories in it and because I made them I believe in them. As Jesus says, I am like my Creator in this way. He created me and has perfect faith in me. I made the world and all I believe about the world and so have faith in it.

The difference is the content. What God created is real and what I made is illusion. What God created is perfect and whole and joyful and peaceful, invulnerable and eternal. What I made is none of these things. It is uncertain and fluctuating. It is fearful and induces guilt, anger and jealousy. Pain suffering and death are the inevitable outcomes. Quite a difference!

Regardless of the difference in content, it remains that our faith in our creation is strong and so we need help to correct our thinking. We need something outside the mind to do the healing. This is the reason I readily ask the Holy Spirit to heal my mind. I notice the effects of my beliefs. I accept responsibility for the effects of those beliefs, then I ask the Holy Spirit to undo what I have done.

This is really very simple. What is it in my life that seems to be causing me distress? Is it that my boss is critical of my recent work? I recognize that his criticism is not frightening, but rather it is my thoughts about his criticism that scares me. My thought is that I will be fired and that thought leads to the thought that I will no longer have the means to take care of myself.

If I follow that thought far enough I will see the belief that I am unworthy and that God does not love me. I will see that I feel separate from God and guilty for that separation. In the end there is only that one belief that needs to be corrected. A sense of separation from God is the only belief that I need heal. But it is the everyday occurrences in life that bring me to that belief so that it can be healed.

If I think it is my job to fix this, I will start trying to do better at work hoping my boss notices and changes his mind about me. At the next level I try not to think thoughts of unworthiness and fear of God. I hope I will be able to do this and that I won’t be guilty of failing. At a higher level I realize these solutions will not work. I have no control over what my boss thinks or what he does.

I have no control over the way the script unfolds. I cannot control fear either, because the more I think of that which I fear, the greater the fear seems to be. That which we focus on grows. Sort of the opposite effect I was hoping for. I do have control over my choices. I have two choices, and can make either one.

I can continue to try to manipulate and control, from the level of Myron’s story, a script not written on this level. Or seen from another perspective I can try the same thing through attempting to undo what I made from within the system I set up. I have tried both of these approaches but neither has worked so far. Jesus says that it is because I have placed my faith in what I made and so believe in it.

My second option is much simpler. I can choose to be healed by the Healer placed in my mind for that purpose. This will work and nothing else will work. All of time has been for the purpose of experiencing what I have made and for the purpose of discovering that there is only one workable option for undoing what I have made. It seems I have finally accepted this foregone conclusion. I am systematically looking at the results of mistaken beliefs, realizing I am no longer interested in them, and asking the Holy Spirit to do His job and heal my mind.

It seemed very slow going there for awhile and I was discouraged to see how long it was taking. In fact I didn’t see any end in sight, but I gave my willingness and my trust to the Holy Spirit and now I am beginning to see that grace is shifting me out of the world more quickly than I could have imagined possible. I still fall back into fear when it seems I am moving too quickly.

I think that is the meaning of dreams I had for awhile. I would be driving too fast over a bridge, feeling out of control and frightened of the speed I was going. Then I would notice that I had no steering wheel or that it didn’t work. I would wake up afraid. With more understanding of the work going on within me I see the symbolism of the dream as my ego discouraging me from waking up, and my fear of doing so.

But I can now see that my destiny lies ahead and not behind me, and though I stall out occasionally, there is no going back. I see that my destiny is set and always has been. I see now that I have absolutely no control over how life unfolds or when I stop watching the show. I don’t care. It’s more fun this way. As long as I remember my part I am good. I observe what is going on in the story. I notice how it makes Myron feel. I ask the Holy Spirit to heal what needs healing. I wait to discover what happens next. Whooeee! Hold on tight because who knows where this ride is taking me! But I believe it is perfectly safe. Holy Spirit, please undo all my unbelief.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Study of the Text 12-5-12

12-5-12
3 The idea of orders of need, which follows from the original error that one can be separated from God, requires correction at its own level before the error of perceiving levels at all can be corrected. You cannot behave effectively while you function on different levels. However, while you do, correction must be introduced vertically from the bottom up. This is because you think you live in space, where concepts such as “up” and “down” are meaningful. Ultimately, space is as meaningless as time. Both are merely beliefs.

I get that space and time do not exist. We made this up for the purpose of creating an experience of separation. If we were to have that experience of being separate we needed certain things to be in place. We needed bodies so that one could appear as many. We needed space so that these bodies could appear separate from each other, so that each one could be in a “here” that is different than the other one. We needed time so that we could experience occurrences as if they did not happen all at once.

Levels are not as clear to me. I can think of myself as Myron being one level, and maybe myself as the one who is still living when the body of Myron is gone, and will choose another body/personality. There is the level of the observer, the one who is watching the life of Myron and the one who is writing the script and directing it. The one who thinks she is living the story, the one watching the story being lived, the one who is directing the story. And the One. And maybe that is not at all what is meant. I don’t really know. But I understand that in reality there are no levels. Obviously that is not my experience.

It’s ok that I am having this experience of separation. It’s the experience that was desired and there is nothing wrong with that. I wanted time and space and bodies. I wanted levels of experience. I did that, and now I want reality again. It seems I have to back out of this slowly, a step at a time. I have to start from the place I find myself, where I believe I am.

Orders of need come first. I mostly know that there is no order of needs. All needs are symbolic of one need. On some level (there is that word again) I know this is true, but it seems I need practice with this. When my son was in pain I felt very strongly that I needed him to be well. I was wrapped up in that need so completely that, for awhile, all other needs disappeared for me.

That need was so big that it eclipsed the universe. Only because of my deepest desire, the desire to awaken, did I realize this was an error. My desire to awaken led me to ask for clarity and I was able to allow my mind to be corrected. I then remembered that there is only one need and in the solution are all needs met. I did see that I still believe in order of needs, but I also saw that I am ready to let that illusion go.

So here I am at the bottom, working my way up. From this place it seems like an endless job requiring more time than I can imagine. If I believed in time this would be discouraging. But I have seen that, from time to time, as I plug away at this work, I experience a shift which changes everything. This I think of as time being snipped out of the film and left on the cutting room floor. This shift moves me further along than I could account for through my experience.

One day I will shift into a completely different awareness. It will not be anything Myron did, and in fact, going by what others have experienced, I will leave the idea of Myron behind while still inhabiting the space and life that is her script. I look forward to that, but cannot even imagine what might come next. Isn’t it exciting!

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Study of the Text 12-4-12

12-4-12
2 A sense of separation from God is the only lack you really need correct. This sense of separation would never have arisen if you had not distorted your perception of truth, and had thus perceived yourself as lacking. The idea of order of needs arose because, having made this fundamental error, you had already fragmented yourself into levels with different needs. As you integrate you become one, and your needs become one accordingly. Unified needs lead to unified action, because this produces a lack of conflict.

This paragraph begins by telling me that I have not actually separated from God by telling me I only have a sense of separation. He says that this happened when I distorted my perception of truth. So what I am experiencing as actuality is not real. I have to wonder what the world would look like if I had not distorted my perception of the truth. I would have had a happy dream, I think, and I will still have that happy dream as I allow my perception to be corrected and brought nearer the truth.

When I distorted my perception so that I could see myself as something other than one and whole this created a sense of lack. Of course it did! I had never known anything other than wholeness, and now I was less than that. This fragmentation of Self appeared as many levels with different needs. Then I began to organize these needs according to some order, fragmenting them further as I decided which was most important and which I felt more compelled to fill.

Awhile back a very large rock hit my windshield. It cause a big round crack which I have been watching as it slowly creeps across the windshield in various directions, taking on different designs as it does so. It began in a confined area with a specific shape and now there are cracks going off in different directions and each of those cracks has its own design.

I can imagine my error in thinking having similar effects. Maybe it went something like this. First I imagine a setting for something entirely different, which sets up perception because “entirely different” is not truth so I needed a way of making it all happen. Instead of creating something different, I am now using the mechanism of perception to experience it as if it is different. Maybe I could think of that as imagining it different, or as the Course says, I am dreaming.

But then I want a more intense experience, something more believable, so I distort perception until it no longer resembles the truth in any way. Now I have the seeming experience of being separate from God. That’s when it all got away from me. Like the crack in my window the fragmenting didn’t stop with the one break, but continued on and on, fragmenting over and over, making many things, many bodies, many desire and needs, until seemingly becoming endless and hopeless. I became so far from Wholeness that I cannot imagine getting back.

Good thing this was planned for and the Holy Spirit is the Voice and the guide that keeps me forever connected to God. So here I am on the outer edges of this incredibly complex fragmentation and beginning to wake up to the truth that I am not this and don’t want to hang out here as if I am. I am beginning to listen to that Voice and work my way back home. It seems like an impossible and endless journey because I see all those needs stretching before me, all those errors, some impossibly big and others smaller, some urgent and some just waiting its turn, and I cannot imagine coming to the end of them.

It is very reassuring to read that there are not really a lot of needs, nor are there levels to those needs. There is just one lack I need to correct, the belief that I have separated from God. All the distorted fragmentation is dissolved in that one correction. This is my only true goal, my real destination and I am excited to know this. As I continue this study of the text, and as I listen closely to the Voice for God, I will receive more clarity, and more instructions and guidance on how to reach my one goal.

Today the Holy Spirit has asked me to remember what everything is for. When I feel I need something, no matter how minor or how important the sense of lack is, I will remember that I have one lack only, and that this seeming need is a symbol of that one lack. A sense of separation from God is the only lack I really need correct. I am being asked today to open my mind to that simple thought and become willing to accept it.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Study of the Text 12-3-12

12-4-12
VI. The Illusion of Needs
1 You who want peace can find it only by complete forgiveness. No learning is acquired by anyone unless he wants to learn it and believes in some way that he needs it. While lack does not exist in the creation of God, it is very apparent in what you have made. It is, in fact, the essential difference between them. Lack implies that you would be better off in a state somehow different from the one you are in. Until the “separation,” which is the meaning of the “fall,” nothing was lacking. There were no needs at all. Needs arise only when you deprive yourself. You act according to the particular order of needs you establish. This, in turn, depends on your perception of what you are.

In the beginning there was everything, and nothing was lacking. There was not even a concept of lacking, or of needs. Then came the “fall” or the “separation from God,” in which we began to imagine that things were different. We experienced ourselves in a state of separation, separate from God, separate from each other, each thing separate from us and from every other thing.

Space and time seem to exist and everything is further separated. Now I can be different from you and I can be in a different place, at a different time, and I can have some thing you don’t have. This had never been possible until now because before there was only one whole and there was no separation. Separation feels wrong and I want everything back. And it seems like that other one has it.

So, here I think I am. I am in this point in space and in this time. I am reduced to a bit of flesh and bones and further differentiated by sex, by shape, by size, and with the idea of time, by age. I see someone over there with a slimmer body, a younger body, and I feel deprived. I want what that person has. I have a whole list of preferred conditions having to do with the body, with circumstances and with relationships. In each one I seem to fall short of someone else. I have needs. I lack.

I am discontented, alone, and afraid. I want my needs to be met and yet I feel a vague discomfort about it because it seems that my needs are met often at the expense of someone else. I would think that this endless dividing of the whole would make more, but instead, it seems to produce a state in which there is only so much and I have to grab my bit before someone else does.

This incessant need to take from others what we feel we must have to be happy sometimes takes on global proportions and we have world wars, but really, we are at war in every moment of our lives. We are always jostling for a better place, a bigger piece of the pie. We see winning as the effect of someone else losing. And no matter how much we accumulate, we are left feeling needy because we don’t know what it is we lack.

Since I don’t know what I need I spend my lives assigning that role to each and every separated thing. I need a better body, a better mate, a better job, a better car, a better friend. The list is endless because no matter what I get it fails to satisfy. At some point I have to believe there must be a better way. At some point I absolutely will choose to find that better way.

This is my time. This is the time in which I realize that I am seeking for happiness and peace in the wrong places. I will never find peace through war. I cannot achieve happiness at the expense of someone else. I stopped trying to get more customers from my competitors, and started trying to find ways to help the people in my industry. I lost interest in having a fancier car, a bigger house, nicer clothes; I lost interest in things, and I have stopped needing to be superior to someone else.

I stopped trying to make more money than the other guy and started trying to do the best job I could do. I stopped being envious of the younger, slimmer body someone else has. I stopped using this body as a way to get what I thought I lacked.  I stopped using this body to reward myself or to punish myself. I stopped using this body to make myself feel better than or less than. I began to ask Holy Spirit to use this body in a way that would help us all, as a communication devise, a tool to help us awaken.

I was unhappy, not because of any actual lack, but because I had a certain perception of myself, and from that perception I decided what I needed to improve that perception. Each time I achieved something it would be at the expense of another and the guilt of taking and of further separating that which God made whole, would leave me feeling more deprived than ever. So I was doing this to myself.

The solution is full forgiveness. I start with whatever is happening in my life at the moment and I forgive it. I forgive the other person for appearing prettier, happier, richer, and more satisfied than me. I forgive myself for wanting what they have, and for coveting what I seem to lack. I forgive myself for the war I am waging within my own mind. I forgive myself for believing I am separate, separate from everyone and everything else, separate from God.

Without this sense of endless neediness driving my thoughts and actions, I am open to another way. I begin to see things differently. Instead of looking at a competitor I see a man who is confused, just like I used to be confused. He thinks he needs my customer in order to be happy and so sees me as the source of his discontent. He and I want the same thing. We both want to be happy, to be peaceful and to feel safe. I used to be confused about what would help me achieve those goals, and so I understand his confusion. I forgive us both.

The more areas to which I apply this in my life the more peaceful and happy I become. This is because forgiveness removes the barriers to our wholeness. As I forgive the false needs I placed on the body I am content with it. I don’t need it to be the way I receive attention or the way I punish myself for my perceived sins. I forgive myself and forgive my body, and that war is over. Without war there is peace.

As I forgive my relationships and I forgive myself for using these relationships as a way of getting more of what I think I need, I am free to simply love. I love the one who stands before me. This is so simple to do because I don’t need him to be anything for me, therefore he cannot disappoint me. As I get better at this and do more forgiveness work I see that no one is special. Each person receives all my love. It seems ridiculous that I have spent my life singling out individuals to love according to their ability and willingness to fulfill my needs, needs which I made up.

I want peace. I am willing to completely forgive. Holy Spirit, please help me to see clearly. Please help me when I become distracted. Please help me to wake up. I forgive myself for believing I am separate from my brothers and sisters and from God. Please help me to see where I still believe in separation so that I can let that be healed.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Page 210 of 271 pages ‹ First  < 208 209 210 211 212 >  Last ›

<< Back to main page of Together, We Light the Way