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A Morning Prayer and an Opportunity to Use It

My mind is full of prayer this morning. Father, as I do this work, please help me to remember that there is nothing outside my mind and therefore all healing is done in my mind. Please help me to resist the desire to find someone else to blame and to remember that there is no one else.

Amen

I had an opportunity to put this prayer to work early this morning. Right before I left for work my brother called me to say he had bad news. I bought a house recently and there were a few things to do to get it ready to move in. One of those things was to replace the roof. My brother has been overseeing the projects and he got the shingles and other things needed for a roof delivered to my house at 9AM on Saturday. At 10AM the roofers showed up to work through the weekend, and the tiles were gone. In that one hour in broad daylight someone had stolen them. So I have to buy them all over again. I think its around $2500-3000.

After the initial surprise I realized that someone took my money but my peace is not for sale. I cannot change what has happened and I’m not going to worry about it. It will work out. Shortly later as I was leaving for work, I was closing the door behind me and looked back to see the things in my house. I had the thought that someone could take them, too. I cannot live like that. There is nothing in my home that is worth my peace. I let that go, too.

As I thought about having to buy the shingles again, I had a couple of stressful feelings that I gave to the Holy Spirit. I asked that He heal my mind and that He tell me what He wants me to know about this. The thought that came to me is that as long as I hold the belief in loss and lack in my mind this kind of thing will continue to happen. A belief held in the mind is like a prayer and all prayers are answered. So I asked that my mind be healed of the belief in anything that God did not create and He did not create lack or loss. 

I could easily have seen this situation as something done to me by someone else. I could have seen myself as a victim and the thief as guilty. I am so glad I began the morning with this prayer. It was like a beacon light that guided my mind to the helpful answer.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 12-17-12

Father, as I do this work, please help me to remember that there is nothing outside my mind and therefore all healing is done in my mind. Please help me to resist the desire to find someone else to blame and to remember that there is no one else.

Amen

12-17-12

Chapter 2: THE SEPARATION AND THE ATONEMENT

I. The Origins of Separation

1 To extend is a fundamental aspect of God which He gave to His Son. In the creation, God extended Himself to His creations and imbued them with the same loving Will to create. You have not only been fully created, but have also been created perfect. There is no emptiness in you. Because of your likeness to your Creator you are creative. No child of God can lose this ability because it is inherent in what he is, but he can use it inappropriately by projecting. The inappropriate use of extension, or projection, occurs when you believe that some emptiness or lack exists in you, and that you can fill it with your own ideas instead of truth. This process involves the following steps:

First, you believe that what God created can be changed by your own mind.

Second, you believe that what is perfect can be rendered imperfect or lacking.

Third, you believe that you can distort the creations of God, including yourself.

Fourth, you believe that you can create yourself, and that the direction of your own creation is up to you.

What a very clear explanation. I am created perfect and so am a perfect creator which means I create through the extension of what I am. This ability is inviolate. It cannot be lost. But I can also project Projection is the inappropriate use of my powers of creation. This occurs when I believe lack exists in me (even though I cannot lack because that would mean I was not a perfect creation) and I try to fill that emptiness with my own ideas instead of truth.

(I note that these points Jesus makes about my beliefs are not things I could believe or might believe or sometimes believe, or that my neighbor believes but I don’t. He says very clearly; you believe. It won’t be helpful to the healing of my mind if I go back into denial.)

This seems very strange and not really possible. I mean, I am perfect, and I am a creator. And yet, I have forgotten how to create, and use my powers to project instead. I do this because I feel empty and yet I cannot be empty. I think I have a better idea than God and so I try to fill up the imaginary emptiness with my own ideas of what things are and how they should be. Its all a mess and I feel guilty and afraid of what I have done, afraid to keep doing it and afraid to stop.

I feel a little better now because I am receiving an explanation for what happened and a way to undo what I have done. I am discovering that the truth is in my mind and has always been there. I am allowing that truth to be uncovered and to rise to the level of conscious awareness. I am grateful for the following explanation.

First I believe that what God created can be changed by my own mind. This must be the source of the deep well of unconscious guilt that keeps fueling the apparent guilt in my life. I think that I have singlehandedly undone God. Jeepers creepers! What a belief! I want to let this go but I keep getting distracted by all the apparent proof I have that this is true.

That proof shows me that I really have undone God and made myself different. I have distorted creation and am now in charge. Just look at the killing of those little kindergarteners. Either God did it or I did it in spite of God. Either way I am totally creeped out and don’t want to think about it.

There is a place in me that, while outwardly denied, is certain that this is not the work of God. If this is my work, my “creation” I messed up badly and so now I want to jump in and make it better. I suspect I feel desperate to make up for it. I have projected this bit of drama and now I further project by making it someone else’s fault.

This confused part of mind is probably very glad right about now that it thought to make a lot of bodies on which to project. It’s those self-centered gun mongers who are at fault. It’s the makers of the violent video games, the lack of funds for more mental health care, or maybe we should just lock up all the loonies before they get a chance to hurt anyone. One newscaster suggested we start keeping an eye on our neighbors for signs of aberrant behavior. (According to what is considered normal in our world, I’ll probably be the first one they take in.)

And so I have believed that what God created can be changed by my own mind. And because I believe it I see it as if it is real. I believe that what is perfect can be rendered imperfect or lacking. And because I believe it I interpret everything I see as not only real, but imperfect and lacking. I believe that I can distort the creations of God, including myself. And because I believe it, I seem to be distorted and my brothers even more so, and I provide, through my beliefs, all the proof you could want. And obviously, I believe that I can create myself, and that the direction of my own creation is up to me.

I also suspect that I don’t want to give up all this “power” to miscreate, and that I think giving it up would be a sacrifice. I am obviously very confused but I see signs that this is true. Thinking of this is very scary because I don’t see an acceptable way out of it and at the same time I see myself getting in deeper and deeper as the world goes to hell in a hand basket. Thank God for Voice in my mind that is leading me gently from my delusions back to truth.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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On the Killing of the Kindergarten Children

From yesterday: I fully and without exception accept responsibility for the whole world. I did this, and it is I who must undo it. I am not guilty for it and I have lots of help from my brothers who have already gone before me.

And so today as I think about the children killed at their school, I accept responsibility. We are one. We share the same mind. I contribute to the beliefs that are then projected onto the world as form. This man who killed his mom and then brought the guns to her school and shot those children and adults is an image, a projection of the angry, fearful and insane separation thoughts that live in the mind because they are supported by my continued belief in them.

I am not guilty for this, I am simply responsible for it. The way to end the slaughter of children is to heal my own mind. Is it a tragedy? In time, yes, it is. That is why Jesus wants us to end time. This is why we are here on this page, studying this book, practicing it’s lessons and watching our minds for the separation thoughts that keep time in place, and support the insanity of the ego thinking. We do this so that we can heal the one mind.

I’m clear on this. Here is what I find happening in my mind this morning. I feel very sad for the families of the shooter and the children. I notice that I still believe the world is real, because I cry when I think of them. This will take care of itself as I continue to do the work.

I notice as I read the postings on Facebook this morning that I want to step into the world and fix this problem with gun control. It just makes sense to me in so many ways, and seems to be supported by the facts. Then I remember that while this may or may not be true, it is not where I want to put my energy.

I can never fix the world within the world. I cannot control who has a gun or who does not. I cannot keep the more insane of us from acting on their distorted perceptions. I cannot gather all the children and safeguard them. And even if I could, I still would not do that. There is nothing outside my mind. All healing takes place in my mind and only in my mind, and as I accept the Atonement for myself, I do it for my brothers and sisters as well, just as Jesus did it for us.

We all suffer today with the families directly involved in this awful thing. We suffer with them because we are one with them. They are the expressions of our own fears and our belief in loss, in suffering and death. But in the midst of all this suffering, we are surrounded by angels who come to comfort us. May the families of the children and adults killed yesterday, and the family of the man who killed them, feel the love and comfort that is being offered them.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 12-14-12

12-14-12
5 A solid foundation is necessary because of the confusion between fear and awe to which I have already referred, and which is often made. I have said that awe is inappropriate in connection with the Sons of God, because you should not experience awe in the presence of your equals. However, it was also emphasized that awe is proper in the Presence of your Creator. I have been careful to clarify my role in the Atonement without either over- or understating it. I am also trying to do the same with yours. I have stressed that awe is not an appropriate reaction to me because of our inherent equality. Some of the later steps in this course, however, involve a more direct approach to God Himself. It would be unwise to start on these steps without careful preparation, or awe will be confused with fear, and the experience will be more traumatic than beatific. Healing is of God in the end. The means are being carefully explained to you. Revelation may occasionally reveal the end to you, but to reach it the means are needed.

Sigh. We are truly in a state of confusion that we need Jesus to take such pains to explain to us our relationship with each other, with him and with God, and that it is further necessary that he tell us the appropriate response to each. My brothers and I are equal in every way and therefore it would be inappropriate that we look with awe on anyone. I look on certain of my brothers and sisters with deep gratitude because of their devotion to this work and I look to some for guidance because they have stepped forward to a place I have not yet gone. But never is awe appropriate.

I think I love Jesus more than I have ever loved him because I understand that I am not to look with awe on him. Like most folks with a religious background, this came as a surprise to me and I was, for awhile, uncomfortable with this lack of “respect” for Jesus. I understand differently now. I love Jesus because he is my brother. I respect him and am grateful to him because he has gone before us and made the path clear. My gratitude to him for this is immense, but it is not awe. I am devoted to Jesus because he is devoted to me.

I said that I love Jesus more now that I am not in awe of him, and this is because I do still confuse awe with fear. I have, through the study of the Course and the practice of it, uncovered a deep and abiding love for God, but there is still much fear covering that love. I can truthfully get in touch with that love only rarely, but kept this a secret from myself. For a long time I said that I didn’t understand all this talk about fear of God.

Then as I studied the Course I understood the theory; I must fear God because I am still here when I could be with Him instead. I even understood the reason for the fear, the underlying unconscious guilt for my attack on God. I mean, who wouldn’t be afraid when you think about attacking God by withdrawing yourself from Him and leaving Him less than He was? And then I realized I am still doing it, doing it every day as I see myself differently than He created me, as I choose ego over God. And yet, I didn’t feel a lot of fear, and this is scary for me to admit, I didn’t really feel love either.

Eventually, I realized that I was hiding the fear of God from myself because I just couldn’t face it.  It was too horrifying to allow myself to see the fear of God, and thus to look at my own perceived guilt. This is the reason I have become such an excellent projecting machine; I have learned to make all sorts of experiences the cause of my guilt, and nearly anybody can become the holder of my guilt. I am so good at this that the interchange is seamless and fools even me.

I began to look, really look, at my plan to avoid guilt and to avoid God, by doing the lessons and practicing what Jesus gave me through the Course. I allowed my willingness to grow and became more accepting of the truth. I let more light into my darkened mind. I learned that to accept responsibility for everything was not the same as being guilty for it, and this opened the door to more freedom to explore what actually happened and what I could do about it.

I have come a long way. I fully and without exception accept responsibility for the whole world. I did this, and it is I who must undo it. I am not guilty for it and I have lots of help from my brothers who have already gone before me. I am sometimes still confused about my guilt, but I accept it as well, and am happy to see an opportunity to let more of it go. I also recognize that none of this is personal and it is done for the whole. Personal is just another word for separation.

Something really big is happening now. (Sorry, Jesus. I know there are no levels and no degrees but I am sure you will forgive me for my distorted perception if you remember the first time this happened to you.) I have been going deliberately toward God. In the past I have been working on the blocks to Love’s presence and skirting God while I did it. Now I am asking to be brought before God. My friend did it first, and that helped push me over the invisible line I had drawn.

I have had a taste, just the tiniest taste of being in the presence of God. It feels like… well, what can I say? But definitely feels. It is all about feeling and, oh my dear God, what a feeling! I wanted to stay in it so bad, but how could one function in the world in that state? Why would anyone even want to? And once I moved out of it, I wanted it back, but I also didn’t want it back. I think that reluctance is the fear of God which still exists in my mind. After all, if I couldn’t continue to exist as before, wouldn’t that mean “I” would not exist? Common sense tells me that this is insane reasoning but evidently I’m not entirely interested in sanity.

I am encouraged, though, with each bit of success, each rare moment of touching God. I suspect that my experience is nothing compared to the real thing and a part of my mind longs so deeply for the experience that I cry to think of not having it right now. I’m just waiting for the rest of my mind to catch up. As Jesus tells us in this paragraph, “Revelation may occasionally reveal the end to you, but to reach it the means are needed.” So I continue to do the work that will bring me to the end.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 12-13-12

12-13-12
4 This is a course in mind training. All learning involves attention and study at some level. Some of the later parts of the course rest too heavily on these earlier sections not to require their careful study. You will also need them for preparation. Without this, you may become much too fearful of what is to come to make constructive use of it. However, as you study these earlier sections, you will begin to see some of the implications that will be amplified later on.

I think that sometimes people have some confusion around the idea we read later in the Course which says that “You need do nothing.” It is true that we need do nothing to be who we really are. We are divine beings, children of God and heirs to all that is God. That is a done deal and needs nothing from us. However, there is quite a bit of work we need to do to remember that this is true, to let go of all the ideas we have put in the place of truth. There is much we need to do to reach a state of full willingness to accept the truth.

Jesus did a bang up job on putting this Course together. He gave us an excellent text that begins with these very important chapters. I remember when I started reading the Text that I was absolutely intrigued with what I found here, but that it seemed a bit disjointed, and seemed to be often jumping around from topic to topic right in the middle of a paragraph. Later it smoothed out and became beautiful to read.

However, now that I am going back and reading carefully from a fuller understanding, I realize that these first few chapters are giving us the basic information for the Course. One reason it didn’t always make sense to me is because I did not at first understand how it all comes together. Now I see that it is actually perfect, and I know that the Course is written in kind of a spiral of information. It comes back to the central ideas repeatedly and each time goes deeper and adds more information.

As Jesus says, this is a course in mind training. My mind has been systematically trained to believe that everything my eyes are showing me is true, and nothing else is true. I’ve been trained to believe that I am small and separate and very vulnerable, and that I must always be on the defense because it’s a matter of me or them. Now with A Course in Miracles, everything I have ever believed is being turned upside down. My mind needs to be trained differently to accept and use what I am being given. Without this training I will not be able to experience my life differently and having glimpsed something better but not having access to it, I will be more confused and distressed than before.

I have been using A Course in Miracles for a long time now, but I it has taken me quite awhile to fully absorb what it says and even longer to put it to work in my life on a consistent basis. It was only in the last twelve years that I have made what I have learned through the Course my single unified purpose. Using this information in my life, practicing it every single day in every circumstance without exception, is the way my life has changed. I have always been the Son of God, perfect, powerful, loving and beloved. Now I am beginning to believe that and to act like it is true.

Doing this study of the Text, paragraph by paragraph, and sharing it with those who are also ready to wake up, is helping me move more completely into the truth of who I am. Sometimes I cannot believe how lucky I am to have found this information and to have made that choice to put it to work in my life. I think how easy it would have been those years ago to have missed this opportunity. Actually, considering the mess I was, it’s an obvious miracle that I did choose to study the Course.

But then, it could not have happened any other way. This is my story, my script, and while it seems I am making it all happening, I am really just watching it unfold, and choosing how I feel about it. I don’t know why I bother to read fiction or watch movies. Life is the most extraordinary and interesting story out there. I can hardly wait to see what happens in the next moment. Whatever it is, I am learning to say yes to it. I am learning to trust the writer of the script and to know that it, whatever it looks like, it is there to support my awakening, or to let me continue to dream, whichever I choose. I am safe and I am free.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 12-12-12

12-12-12
3 Fantasy is a distorted form of vision. Fantasies of any kind are distortions, because they always involve twisting perception into unreality. Actions that stem from distortions are literally the reactions of those who know not what they do. Fantasy is an attempt to control reality according to false needs. Twist reality in any way and you are perceiving destructively. Fantasies are a means of making false associations and attempting to obtain pleasure from them. But although you can perceive false associations, you can never make them real except to yourself. You believe in what you make. If you offer miracles, you will be equally strong in your belief in them. The strength of your conviction will then sustain the belief of the miracle receiver. Fantasies become totally unnecessary as the wholly satisfying nature of reality becomes apparent to both giver and receiver. Reality is “lost” through usurpation, which produces tyranny. As long as a single “slave” remains to walk the earth, your release is not complete. Complete restoration of the Sonship is the only goal of the miracle-minded.

Everyone in this fantasy life fantasizes. That is how we got here, and that is how we stay here. The moment we give up fantasy completely, the world as we know it ends. The way I am teaching myself to offer miracles instead of more illusion is to work with whatever thought is brought to my attention. One experience I had was with pain, which I have written about before.

I was having a lot of sciatica pain in my hip and leg that I associated with driving. Driving is a big part of my job. I drive about 1000 miles every week. I took medicine for the pain and went to chiropractors. I would get temporary relief but the pain would always come back and it was getting worse and worse, to the point that I seriously considered quitting my job.

At the same time this was happening, I was also feeling the effects of working outside which is the other part of my job. It was incredibly hot the last couple of years, and between the heat and other hazards of my job like discovering that I was standing in fire ants, dodging spiders and poison ivy and hoping the mosquitos swarming around me were not carrying West Nile, I had convinced myself that I was a victim to this job.

I fantasized the problem then I fantasized the solution. I would get a different job in which I would make good money but without all the draw backs of this job. I had a hard time with this fantasy because I couldn’t imagine a job I would like and that would give me the income I had come to enjoy. My fantasy life was suffering from a lack of imagination on my part. ~smile~

When my imagination failed me I fantasized about winning the lottery and never having to work again. I reasoned that this was a good fantasy as far as fantasies went. I could do all kinds of good with the money. I wouldn’t be wasteful or crazy with it (implying of course that my brother would be and so I deserved it more than he). I could write and teach all the time and that would be a better use of my time. The implication here is that I am here to teach, not to learn.

I’ve done this work too long to fool myself like this. I began to see the pattern in my fantasies; I am a victim of my story and need to write a better one. Or as people say, “The ship is sinking. Quick, help me rearrange the deck chairs.” So since I couldn’t think of a way to fantasize my way out of this without that did not lead me more deeply into the illusion, I finally surrendered the attempt. I asked the Holy Spirit to show me what He wanted me to do with this.

He brought me to Lesson 190 which tells me that pain is not real. I worked with this idea for months, using the pain in my leg to remind me of the truth, that this pain is not real. This led me to realize that pain includes all forms, not just physical. Guilt can’t be real either, nor can fear. It is all a part of my fantasy of being separate from God.

As long as I believe in it and continue to attempt manipulation of the dream as a solution to the effects of my belief in separation, I am going to remain caught in this cycle of temporary relief and then more pain. The form may change but the content will remain the same. Working with Lesson 190 brought me startling results and caused a sea change in my thinking.

I began to realize that my pain and exhaustion and all my discomforts were not the cause of my discontent, they were the effects of my discontent. They were the out-picturing of my belief in pain, suffering and death. Trying to change the way the effect looked was only keeping me in pain because the very act of trying to escape it was reinforcing my belief that pain is real. I learned that nothing God created caused pain and so if I was experiencing pain of any kind, I was experiencing nothing. If God did not create it, I must have made it up.

That was the key to my salvation because it brought me to the cause and so finally I was able to effect real change. It was not an overnight change. I worked with this idea for many months, first overcoming my resistance to the idea I but did this to myself, then allowing myself to recognize the many ways I used the belief in pain to keep me from waking up. The scariest and so hardest realization I had to face was that I was using pain as a defense against God. This meant I had to look at my deep fear of God which I had been steadfastly denying.

The outcome was a shift in awareness which also resulted in a shift in form. I no longer have that excruciating sciatica pain and I no longer get to the hotel at night exhausted and shaky. I know longer think of myself as a victim to my job and have returned to being grateful for it. Nothing about my job has changed other than the way I see it and so experience it.

Nothing about my job needed to change because the job was not my problem. My problem was my beliefs. Jesus tells us that there is nothing outside our minds, so the only thing we need to change is our mind. This change of mind is the miracle and our changed experience is a sign of a miracle.

I started out offering the Sonship more illusion as I got deeper and deeper into my belief in victimhood and my belief in pain, suffering and death. I thought the solution would be to change my circumstances so my prayer (wishes and thoughts) was for a change in jobs, or better yet, a winning lottery ticket. I thought that would be the only reasonable solution because I was focused outward.

When I brought my focus inward to the source of the problem, the Holy Spirit showed me that I did not need a new job; I needed to learn that pain is not real. This meant that only God is real and God is not pain and suffering. This was the only thing worth learning and the only thing worth striving for. I had not even realized that I had strayed from my one unified purpose until I returned to it.

Now I am offering the Sonship truth instead of illusion. I am helping us all wake up. Not one can be left behind because that one lost soul would make us incomplete and wholeness is the condition of salvation. We are one. Fantasy of any kind creates more separation and so imprisons the mind. Fantasizing about having no more problems is a prison. Learning to use my problems to discover the happy truth that I have no problems is my way out of prison.

Today I still work with the idea of pain not being real, returning to different forms of that fantasy. I find I am resistant to giving it up completely, holding onto it in case I need it again. Strange, isn’t it? Why would I hold so tightly to that which hurts? But I will never again believe in my pain and so I find it easier to continue to do the work until my mind is completely healed. “Holy Spirit, I have been blinded by my fantasy, thank you for giving me the vision that allows me to truly see.”

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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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
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