Together, We Light the Way

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Lesson 210

I choose the joy of God instead of pain.

I was able to see this in my mind before I even began my lesson this morning. I was sitting at the computer thinking how much I have enjoyed my weekend and being home and I felt a sense of dread at having to leave next week to get back on the road with my job. Immediately I brought that thought to the Holy Spirit within and was gently reminded that I was not unhappy to be leaving and was not happy because I was home.

It is very easy to fall back into the habit of thinking that the world influences my feelings. I am grateful for the reminder that only my thoughts influence me because I don’t live in the world, but rather the world lives in me. Total responsibility is the beginning of the path out of pain and into joy. It feels heavy only when I am reluctant to accept it. Once I remember that responsibility is my way out, I am eager to accept it and to get on with it.

I have been doing this for a long time and am very happy with the changes that I have allowed in my mind. I am more vigilant today than I ever have been because I have practiced vigilance every day. At first it felt like a burden, but success is a wonderful motivator and now I am simply grateful to do it. It is hard for me to believe that such a simple thing as noticing the thoughts unlike what God would think and then being willing to have them changed is all that I need do. But apparently this is true. My life used to be a painful experience with brief moments of happiness. I had learned to exist on distraction and to call it happiness. This is no state for the Son of God to be in.

As I do this work I find that I experience success and feel so good I can hardly believe it. This is my motivation to continue when it seems difficult. Then I will be back in the muck of ego thinking and be in pain. This was always hard for me to accept. I felt like there was something wrong with me and that if every time I was lifted up I simply fell back down that I would never get any place. This weekend a friend talked about the path as hills and valleys. She said that this is a necessary part of the journey.

When we do the work we wind up on the mountain top, but that doesn’t mean we are through. We then have to go back down to do more work, to allow more stuff to surface and be healed. This was really a helpful analogy for me. I went back and looked at some of the encouraging thoughts I received from my Higher Self, and realized this is what I was being told. I was worried because it seemed that I had fallen and actually I had simply surrendered to the process and was doing exactly what I was supposed to.

Holy Spirit, more and more I am beginning to realize that once I put my foot on the path home, everything in my life became exactly perfect for that purpose. I suppose it always was, but before my path was not purposeful and so I failed to recognize the perfection. I am grateful for it all.

© 2007, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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My Current Understanding

Every so often I write down what I think about God and who I am and how it all works. It is interesting to see how it changes as I grow. It has also taught me that I don’t know anything. There used to be many times when I thought I had it all figured out. I just knew I was right. I laugh at that now. I’m sharing a version of like as Myron sees it and would love to hear about life as you see it.

God created His only Son who created His Son who created His Son, and on and on because extension of Its Self is what God does. He creates by extending Himself forever and so what He creates is exactly like Him. That is what extension is. It pushes Itself out in Love because It is Love and nothing else, and the Love returns to It and It is loved.

God is Love and nothing else. God is whole and complete. God is all that there is. So Love is all there is. Because there is only One and more of One, and nothing else, there is perfect undisturbed peace.

So everything is just rocking along when God’s Son had a creative thought. (Because the nature of God is creative and He creates through His thoughts, then all His thoughts are creative.) This thought was something like, “I wonder what it would be like to not be whole, to be something else.” This thought was discarded as impossible and everything went on in perfect peace as always.

However, the creative power of the mind of God’s Son, even in that small blip of time, made and considered a world of separation. In that bit of time, small as it was, the incredible mind of the Son figured out a way to make all of what we know as life, figured out judgment which had not existed before and how it could be used as a foundation on which to build this illusory world, worked out separation and time to separate events and to make separation seem real. It then had to decide… laugh this off or play in it awhile.

The Son forgot to laugh at it and played instead. He chose to consider this mad idea and realized that to make it work, he would have to forget that he made it up. Otherwise he would not get the full effect. To experience it, he needed to believe in it. So he did. His loving Father who would not conceive of limiting His Son, and so simply placed in the Mind a thought of Himself, a Correction of the Mind, so that when His Son was through with the game He could always find His way back.

And so we are. We had fun with separation and all its effects. We experienced lots of dramas, comedies, adventures, and tragedies. So what is all the guilt about? Well in the forgetting we set it up, we thought that we had destroyed God. God is whole and complete and here we have these entire worlds and billions of separate entities and so we made God what He is not. We destroyed Him. This is the horrible guilt that underlies everything we do. It is the source of every fear we have.

Now that we have chosen to wake up, God’s Correction is reminding us that God is love and that we cannot change that no matter how many dreams we have. We are allowing the message of the Holy Spirit to come to awareness in our holy mind through our dream characters. We are indeed waking up. The characters of this little group are among the first to do so on such a large scale I think, and it is very encouraging. Each character in the dream will wake up when the Mind is ready for it to do so.

In the meantime, back at the ranch, everything continues as it has been and always will be. Eternity is not disturbed by our little foray into time. God is not mad at our dream, and only honors whatever His Son chooses to create. Our dreams of guilt and fear are meaningless to God Who knows only love and perfection. We dream God is angry with us and God continues whole perfect and only pure Love. How could anger, disappointment, and punishment arise from pure Love. It is laughable.

As the Holy Spirit uses what we made in the ego to undo the ego, we begin to awaken and as we do so, we remember to laugh at this tiny mad idea. We remember not to take it seriously; not to be upset when we judge, not to berate ourselves when we lose our temper, and not to blame our brothers for these things. We release the need to project. We once again become aware that we are the observer rather than a victim of our own story.

When we accept the full truth of who we are, we live awhile in our lovely creation without the guilt of thinking we sinned. We will be able to enjoy and revel in our creative powers because without guilt there will be no projections of anger, fear, frustration, hatred and the like. Once all of the aspects of the Mind have awoken to this lovely truth, the Mind will be purified and God will reach down to His Son and pull him up, as is so poetically expressed in the Course.

There was never anything wrong with the Son expressing His creativity by making up this story. It was not a sin and God is not angry. The error was in taking it seriously and believing we had destroyed our Creator by changing His creation which is in itself impossible. And even if that is what we intended, it is hardly a sin, but only a mistake. It is easily undone as we choose the Holy Spirit as our Guide rather than continuing to listen to the ego.

This is my present vision of who we are and how we got here. It changes a bit as I go along and I am sure it will change again. I do not know anything. Knowledge is of the Kingdom and my awareness is not on the Kingdom while I see myself as a body hurtling through space-neither of which exists! What an absurd but interesting story I have written. But the truth is in my mind and I am learning to want it. In not knowing, I empty my mind and make a place for the truth to come into my awareness.

© 2007, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Some Thought on Relationships

It can be very hard for some of us to let go of the need to fix. I understand this, because it has been a problem for me. What I always ask myself is this; what is my purpose? My salvation, accepting the Atonement for myself is my only purpose. As it happens, doing this for myself, I am doing it for all. I cannot save anyone else. I don’t need to save anyone else. To suggest that someone else needs my efforts on their behalf is to attack them. It is an attack on their invulnerability. If someone thinks they cannot live without me, I understand their pain because being in denial of their Divinity is painful. But I would never think I can restore them to their sanity. To think that someone needs me is to think that I need someone. I don’t want to teach that lie to them or to me.

A special relationship is one in which a trade is made. The two people agree to meet each others needs. When one or the other outgrows their need, or discovers the other person is no longer meeting that need, the relationship usually ends. If one or both of the couple feel that something is missing at that time, they can be sure that it wasn’t a loving relationship, but rather an exchange of needs. I don’t want to teach anyone that they are needy and that I am the one who can supply that need and make them feel whole because that isn’t true. And what I teach them I teach myself.

I always want to do the most loving and helpful thing at all times. This is good as long as I don’t become confused about what is the most helpful thing; what is loving. If I love someone I want them to be strong. I want them to know they are perfect and whole and without needs of any kind. I do not want them to think they are in any way needy. I do not want them to see me as special or different from them. I want all of my special relationships to be transformed by the Holy Spirit into holy relationships. This can be done at any time and under any circumstances. I don’t have to be with the person anymore. They don’t even have to be still in the body for it to happen. In fact healing takes place across all sorts of ego boundaries like time and space.

All that is required of me is to notice the thoughts and beliefs that indicate a special relationship, and to be willing to see it differently. This is the most loving thing I can do for myself, the other person and the Sonship as a whole. More importantly, it is the only loving thing I can do, and everything else is not loving regardless of how I have learned to see it.

© 2007, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Figure and Ground

Something I picked up from a Kenneth Wapnick book was the terms figure and ground. You may remember them from Psych 101. As I understand it, figure is what you are focused on and ground is the stuff in the background that you are aware of, but not focused on. What I have been doing is shifting my awareness so that I am seeing a different figure. If there is a psychologist out there somewhere reading this he is probably wondering where I studied. I am taking great liberties with the idea, but what it means to me in actual usefulness is that I can use the idea to remind myself where to focus my attention.

Let’s say that I begin my day with my lesson which tells me that it is in my defenselessness that my safety lies. Later that morning I am talking to a customer and realize that he is considering buying from someone else. For me the figure, that is what I am focused on, is trying to convince him to stay with me, and the ground, the program running in the background, is the idea that it is in my defenselessness that my safety lies. The more I focus on the figure, the further the ground fades from my awareness.

In the middle of all this, I notice that I have lost my peace and I start thinking about my lesson, so the ground comes a little into focus. I keep talking to my customer but at the same time, my mind is bringing the thought of defenselessness more into focus. It becomes my figure, and the customer is now my ground. In other words, the lesson becomes the most important thing in my life, and the circumstances surrounding this encounter at work become the background or the playing field or the school room, however I want to think of it.

While the customer interaction was the figure, the lesson was the ground. I chose to see this differently, and the lesson became the figure. What happens then? Well, I regain my peace and maybe through my peaceful approach I am able to say something to keep my customer, or maybe not. But I kept my peace, I practiced my lesson. My peace is a gift I give my customer as well. Anyway, thinking of it as figure and ground is just a clever way to visualize it and to remind me to make that all important shift in vision.

I was thinking about how this has worked in my life.  I started out with the figure being my poor pathetic life and the ground being how everyone seemed to be attacking me. Slowly over time this shifted to where my figure is still my poor pathetic life, the ground was everyone attacking me, but the ground is catching my attention more because I began to study the Course and am learning to think of attack differently.

Then I began to notice that my life and the attack syndrome are related and the ground becomes what I am learning from the Course. I become vaguely aware of the underlying cause of my unhappiness. I get to the point that my life and its dramas are still my focus,
but the ground is more defined as the Holy Spirit’s vision. It is still in the background but my attention is drawn to it more and more.

Now my figure is my life a lot of the time, but it actually shifts quite often to where my figure becomes the expression of the Holy Spirit, and my ground is the drama of the dream. They are more and more changing places. My goal is to always have the Holy Spirit as the figure, and “life” as the ground. I am very grateful for this change.

© 2007, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Lesson 139

I will accept Atonement for myself.

What does this lesson mean to me?
This lesson addresses the idea that I think I do not know what I am.
This is clearly impossible. What I am is in my mind. I decided to not
be aware of this and so made two parts of my mind; the part that
knows and the part that doesn’t. The Atonement undoes the part the
doesn’t know who it is. I only need accept the Atonement for myself,
and I will be accepting it for all.

How can I apply this to my life right now?
I will be aware today of when my thoughts are doubtful and fearful.
These thoughts come from the part of my mind that is in denial about
my true self. When I notice these thoughts I will bring them to the
right side of my mind so they can be corrected.

My message from Holy Spirit
Truly Myron, you know who you are. Thinking that you do not is a
decision you made, and then forgetting that you made the decision was
also a decision on your part. That is why Heaven must be a decision
you make. You decided against Heaven and so to have Heaven you must
change your mind and decide for it. The Atonement is the way you do
this. The Atonement is the undoing of your decision against Heaven.
Decide for the Atonement and you decide for Heaven.

To return to an idea from yesterday, this is not about your behavior,
or about changing any part of the illusion. It is not about doing
anything. You are learning to allow correction without experiencing
it as painful. This is another chance to practice this. Yesterday you
practiced relinquishing your need to be in control, and today a
similar process will be useful. Yesterday you visualized opening your
hands and allowing the pages of your Day Timer to gently fly away.
You were left with open and empty hands as you came to Me.

Today allow your hands to open and release the specialness that you
think of as yourself. Think of all the words that you use to describe
yourself. Imagine these self concepts resting on the palms of your
hands and then gently floating away from you. Do not be afraid that
there will be nothing left. These concepts are not who you are. They
are hiding who you are. Not one of them approaches the true glory of
your Self. I will be with you as you do this.

My message to Holy Spirit
I notice that there are some self concepts that I am reluctant to
release. I am willing to see this differently.

© 2007, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Let Me Remember I am One With God.

Every morning I begin my day with my Daily Lesson. The format I use is from Revs Deb and Paul Phelps book “Illumination Journal” which has been an invaluable tool for me. I have come to love these early morning conversations with the Holy Spirit. I post them on my website: www.forgivenessisthewayhome.org. This is one that I found very helpful.

What does this lesson mean to me?
I am truly one with God and this means that I am joyful and peaceful and nothing can change that. It means there is no fear, guilt, pain, loneliness, or death. It is important to note that the lesson says let me remember. I don’t know this is true right now. If I did, I would not need this Course.

In order to remember I am one with God I must look at what I now believe instead and be willing to let it go. I bring the thoughts of anger and other ego thoughts to the truth that I am one with God and allow myself to know the truth. This is the same thing as choosing the Holy Spirit as my teacher instead of the ego.

Jesus lets us know that we are going to have trouble with this lesson but that it is ok. We should not judge how it seems to be going, but just do our part and let Him do His knowing that we will accept what healing we can and the rest will wait for our readiness.

How can I apply this in my life right now?
I have a hard time not judging myself for not doing better. When I do judge myself I am making the ego more real in my mind because I seem to be saying that it is powerful, more powerful than the Holy Spirit. Every time I feel discouraged about failing to meet my expectations I will bring this disappointment to the Holy Spirit and let Him help me see it differently.

My message from Holy Spirit
Holy Spirit, I am getting that feeling of being overwhelmed again. I am working on releasing the idea that I am in control, and allowing you to be in control of every facet of my life rather than choosing where I want you and keeping the rest for myself. Now I am also thinking about how much more practice I need to be aware of errors in my mind that keep me from knowing I am one with God. It all seems like too much and I don’t know where to start.

Start with the fear thoughts in your mind right now. The ego would have you believe this is an impossible task and that you are certain to fail. Would you be willing to release that thought to me?

Yes, but I have to admit that I felt reluctance to do so.

The reluctance is your fear of success. If you give me your thoughts of failure and I correct them, you will be left with the certainty of success. You have been saying for years now that you will one day be free of the ego thought system. It feels safe enough to know that it will happen and it gives you hope. It also guarantees that hope is all you will have because you are keeping it in the future. As long as you keep it ahead of you it is safe; something to look forward to, but nothing you have to worry about because it is never here in the present.

You could wake up from the dream right now, in this instant if that is what you wanted to do. But to do that, you would have to be ok with not existing any more; at least the you that you recognize-the personality, body that you identify with-would no longer exist. This is your goal, and also your greatest fear. This is the source of your reluctance. Look at it without judgment and without fear or guilt. This is the condition of the separated sons.

Holy Spirit, I see what you mean. When you said I could wake up in this very instant, I felt paralyzed. I thought about not seeing my son graduate and missing my grandchildren growing up. I see how attached I am to story of my life. I cannot imagine anything else except as a vague abstract thought.

Yes, Myron, you cannot imagine unending bliss. The closest you have come to happiness is temporary lack of pain.

Holy Spirit, I have to tell you that you are not making me feel any better.

Myron, this may not feel like progress to you, but I assure you that it is important that you look at this. It is important that you recognize your fear of God and that you do so with Me so that you will not be afraid to look. Myron, the truth is, you are not reluctant to wake up; you are terrified to wake up. You are determined not to wake up. You do not believe me when I tell you that God does not want your sacrifice. And it is a great step forward that you are willing to see this is so.

Let me remind you not to judge your progress by your behavior. Do not become discouraged because you do not see a difference in yourself. Nothing that happens in the dream matters. When you see someone else making what seem to be errors, remember that it doesn’t matter. What you see in the dream are just reflections of errors in your mind. The world is useful only in that it helps you become aware of those errors and offers you the opportunity to have them corrected.

Continue to do what you are doing, Myron. Think often of God today and let me remind you of how much He loves you. If you feel discouraged, tell Me and I will dissolve the thought of discouragement with the light of God’s love in your mind. While you do not see yourself as ready to wake up in this moment, you are ready to see that you are resisting your own good. You are very close to being ready. What you do not know for yourself, I know for you. Give me your trust.

My message to Holy Spirit
Thank you so much for giving me Your thoughts this morning.

© 2007, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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A Special Uncaring Relationship

There is a man who comes by my house every so often asking for money. The first time he asked, he gave me a sad story which I took to be part of his scam to get a handout, but he seemed to need the money so I gave him some. Of course he came back. He had another story for me, and each time he showed up I got a different story. Sometimes I was amused by the whole thing, and sometimes I regretted ever giving him anything. I figured it was a lot like feeding a stray dog. After awhile you find the dog has adopted you and you�re stuck with him.

Our relationship started out like this, but it began to change. At some point he had been by so many times that he got curious about me. He asked me what I do. I never know what to say when asked this question. Do they want to know what I do for a living? I am in sales. Or do they want to know what I DO? I do God. I�m a minister and I minister in everything I do, and my weekends are dedicated to ministering. But most people don�t want the long answer so I try to decide which answer they want before I tell them.

I went for the shortest and truest answer with Fred. I told him I am a minister. He was delighted to hear it and started telling me about his struggle with religion. Suddenly, Fred was not the guy who comes around for a handout. He was a real person to me. I looked at him differently and so our relationship began to change. Now when he came by with his story, I listened more carefully. I began to see that he was not making this stuff up. I was getting the story of his life, one problem at a time. And now that he was looking to me as a spiritual link, I was getting more of the details, and not just why he needed financial help.

Around Thanksgiving Fred got an opportunity to work out of town and needed help getting there so I gave him enough money for a bus ticket out of town. He did not intend to come back, but then he had said that before. Still, I found myself wondering about him. Then he showed up again. He got a job here in town but needed enough money to stay to hold him over until payday. He wanted to assure me that he really had prospects and showed me his work voucher.

Each time he came by we had a little spiritual pep talk, but only as he initiated it. I did not want to be the kind of person who gives with strings. I was not going to make him pay for his money by listening to me talk about God. He seemed to want to talk, though, and so we did. I won�t say that I thought of him as a friend, or even that I was glad he came by. In fact, I was never glad to see Fred, but I had started taking him more seriously and I quit worrying about whether he was taking advantage of me and if I should quit encouraging him by giving him money. I just accepted him as part of my life.

Then one night he shows up telling me the next chapter in his life. He desperately needed money, and the reason why is not important. I had spent too much money at Christmas and didn�t have a lot extra, but I gave him some of what I had. I knew it wasn�t enough, and thought briefly that since he needs the money to leave town I should give it to him. Maybe this would be the last time. But, I didn�t do it. He seemed to want to talk about what was happening, but I had my grandkids and did not encourage him.

He asked for a drink of water or a coke and mentioned how bad his feet hurt. Looking at him I thought he really did look exhausted. I gave him a coke and watched him hobble off, obviously in pain. I thought that maybe I should offer him a ride, but I really didn�t want to get any more involved with him than I was. I didn�t want to leave my grand kids either, so I let the moment pass.

That night as I fell asleep I experienced some regret that I had not given Fred a ride. He really had needed it. The next morning, after I had been doing my lesson for the day, I thought about Fred again. I thought about how tired he had been. I thought about his feet hurting him so badly he could hardly walk. I thought about how I could have done so much more to help him. Why didn�t I?

I had a special relationship with Fred. I had never realized it before. I know I have special love relationships with my children. I form special hate relationships from time to time. But Fred didn�t fit into either category. That is why I didn�t recognize it as a special relationship. I had a special uncaring relationship with him. I didn�t care enough about Fred to love him or hate him.

Opening my mind to the Holy Spirit I was able to see clearly for the first time, how I was maintaining a sense of separation by failing to see Fred as a holy Son of God.  Would I have turned a Son of God away from my door if I had recognized him as such? Yes I gave him $20.00, but that was just pay off money. I paid him to go away is what I did. In my mind I saw once again his sadness, and his pain. I saw him as God�s precious child and part of my One Self. I sat and cried.

I cried first out of sorrow for missed opportunities. Then I cried out of shame for my thoughts and my behavior. Some minister I am. Then I cried out of gratitude and relief that I opened my mind and allowed the Holy Spirit to show me a different way to see this. I am grateful to the Holy Spirit for never giving up on me, and I am so full of gratitude to Fred, my �special� teacher.

I gave the Holy Spirit the guilt that the ego wanted to attach to this healing and I am left with joy to be so blessed through this lesson. It is now my intention to look, first, for the Christ in everyone. That is why they are in my life. That is what they are for. I don�t ever want to form another special uncaring relationship.

© 2007, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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