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A True Christmas Gift

I love Christmas. I love that we are celebrating Jesus’ birthday. I love the giving and receiving of gifts. But when I think about it, I realize that every day is a holy day because it is filled with gifts for me. Each person I meet today gives me the opportunity to love him or her completely. If I choose to take advantage of this opportunity, I will be given the gift of feeling completely loved. It is the law of giving and receiving. As I give, so shall I receive.

I don’t always give and receive wisely. I was thinking about something that happened when I was married. I wanted to buy something for my son at Christmas, but I knew if I asked Greg about it, he would say no. So, I didn?t want to ask. I just decided to buy what I wanted. It cost too much money and I felt guilty. It felt dishonest, and like a betrayal. It also expressed a depressing lack of trust in God as my Source, so I felt guilty for not having faith. I didn?t like this feeling, so I decided it wasn’t my fault.

All those feelings of guilt and betrayal felt so bad, I wanted them out of me so I just spewed them all over Greg. This is called projection. I projected the guilt and betrayal out of me and onto Him. Now I could imagine he was the one who was guilty and had betrayed me. Whew! That?s better. I prefer all that stuff be outside my self.

You might wonder how I managed to make this his fault. I decided that if he were a more loving father he would have wanted Toby to have this gift. If he were not so selfish and self centered he would have been ready to sacrifice for his child. After all, wasn?t I prepared to sacrifice? I must be the better parent. When you really look at it, I am the good guy here, and he?s the one who is wrong. My only option is to be sneaky, underhanded and dishonest. He made me do it. It?s all his fault. I have every right to act in my own best interest and every right to blame him for putting me in this position.

Wow! Am I clever, or what? I was able to completely exonerate myself from my bad behavior and at the same time place the blame outside myself. And, putting it outside me was the whole point. I think that if I project it out of me, I have gotten rid of it. It doesn?t actually work, though. It seems to be on him, but it remains in me, (remember the rule of giving; what you give you receive?) where it is now hidden and grows in the dark out of sight. It builds up and gathers other sins to it until I finally think there is no hope for me, leaving me believing I am a sinner, dark and evil, but no longer remembering why this is true.

This was an example of choosing to listen to the little ego voice in me. This voice always directs me against God. It is the part of me that thinks I betrayed God and it is very afraid of God. My ego self wants only to stay in this delusional state where, like an ostrich with its head in the sand, thinks it is safely hidden from God. It plays the same projection game with God, placing the blame for this sorry state of affairs on Him, by reasoning that it must be God?s fault that we are separated; that God is angry with me and wants retribution for all my imagined sins.

I don?t have to listen to the ego?s voice. I have two voices in me, because regardless of the ego version of things, God never left me. He placed His Voice, the Holy Spirit, in me so that I could always find my way back home to Him. I can decide for God. I can choose to listen to the Voice for God. I bring my anger and frustration about the gift to God. I tell Him the whole story; how I want this for Toby, how I know Greg will veto it, how angry I feel about this, how frustrated and trapped. I know there is another way to see this, and I ask the Holy Spirit for His vision.

This is hard to do at first, because I can?t imagine how a different outcome would be better. I have convinced myself that my happiness and the happiness of my son depend on the outcome. So, I start out by telling God what His answer should be, and then wait to have my desires granted. When that brought me no peace, I finally gave up. I was tired of feeling miserable and I wanted peace, so I told the Holy Spirit that I was ready to listen to Him. It was like I had unlocked the flood gates in my mind, and new ways of seeing this came pouring through.

I saw that I had decided in my own mind how Greg would react. I then reacted to my version of circumstances as if they had actually happened. He might, after all, decide with me on this, that Toby should have this gift. I might be robbing him of an opportunity to express his generosity.

I also saw that I had decided that Toby needed this particular gift. I made it such a big deal that I had lost sight of the fact that I didn?t even know for sure he wanted it. I saw that even if he wanted it, if I bought him something I couldn?t afford, I would be teaching him that things are important, more important than people and relationships. I would be teaching him that one more present is all he needs to make him happy.
 
These thoughts are not radical and I don?t know why I didn?t think of them before. I think it must have been that the power of my wanting was a like a clog in the floodgate. It was so firmly set in my mind that I needed this gift that nothing else could get past it. When I finally wanted something else more (that is, my peace of mind), the passage way to other thoughts was opened, and they came flooding in. Suddenly, I could see that projecting my fears onto someone else wasn?t the way to be rid of them. It was much more effective to look at these thoughts in the light and to allow the Holy Spirit to show me a different way to see them.

There are so many opportunities to bring my everyday life to God. Sometimes life seems so complicated.  It seems there are endless choices to make and endless variations to decide from. In truth, there are only two choices; I can choose to listen to my ego, or I can choose to listen to God. I will know which I chose by how that choice makes me feel. If I choose God, I will feel joy and peace. Any other emotions indicate that I have chosen wrongly. Of course, as I become aware of the error, I am always free to choose again.

Dan Joseph, who wrote “Inner Healing”, spoke of love as a free flowing river that runs through all of life. I don?t have to do anything to keep the river flowing. Flowing is what it does. However, there are things I can do to slow down or block the natural flow of love. I can choose against God by choosing against love. I know I have done this when I feel anger or fear or guilt. With each wrong choice, it is as if I placed a boulder in the river and now I am getting only a trickle instead of the strong flow I had before. It doesn?t mean that the river dried up and ceased to exist, but that I blocked its flow and am no longer aware of it. If it stays blocked long enough, I forget that it was ever available to me.

It happens as it did when I projected my unloving feelings onto Greg. I felt guilty about what I was doing, even when I didn?t consciously think about it. While I felt guilty, I didn?t feel loving toward him. I was too busy making him the bad guy to love him. Can you imagine how this might have played out? I have now convinced myself he is a selfish, self centered person who is intent on ruining my Christmas and my son?s Christmas. Do you think I could treat him in a loving way? Could I afford to feel love coming from him?

If I allowed myself to feel his love, I would have to reassess my reasoning around the Christmas gift, and then I might have to acknowledge my guilt and all my carefully constructed projections would be undone. So plop, another rock dropped into the stream, blocking my awareness of the endless flow of God?s love.

So, my job is to undo my blocks to love. If I choose to listen to the Voice for God, I could start doing this. I could see a new possibility and approach Greg with my intentions. Perhaps he would hear my reasoning and decide with me. Or perhaps he would, indeed, recognize that it is an extravagant gift we cannot afford, and veto the idea. But now, without the ego?s voice to muddy the waters, I see his point and recognize there are other gifts that will work as well and be better all the way around. I have removed the boulder from the stream and love flows freely.

I gave Toby a great Christmas gift that year, but no matter how terrific a gift is, it is just a thing, a material object with no real meaning outside what we give it. It has no lasting value of itself.  There was a true Christmas gift, though. It was the one I gave myself, and by extension, my family. This was the gift of love. I chose God when I chose to listen to the Voice for God over the ego’s voice. I chose love. I chose peace. Those are real Christmas gifts.

© 2004, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Accessing Inner Wisdom

ACCESSING INNER WISDOM

My daughter, Sheryl and I were talking about the twelve steps and particularly about step four which calls for a searching and fearless moral inventory. She was explaining to me the purpose of this step and why it is so important that an addict do this. I think it would be a really great idea for everyone to do it, though most people never do anything like it. I have never been in a twelve step program, but I have done similar work and one process in particular made me think of step four, because it calls for fearlessness as I look at my life, and surrender as I give what I find to God for healing, recognizing that I cannot do it without Him.

There are things I have done in my life that I am not proud of. The way I used to handle these things was through denial. What a great tool denial seemed to be. I just pushed the stuff way back into my mind and covered it up with other stuff. Pretty soon, it was like I couldn?t remember it. Oh sure, I would get triggered from time to time and it would pop up. Those sudden unexpected pop-ups could be pretty disconcerting, but with a little effort I could usually get it buried again.

Another useful tool was blame. Actually, I could always find a way to place blame for nearly anything, and as long as that place was outside me, I considered the job a success. If I wasn?t being a very good parent then it was surely because my mom didn?t do a good job modeling that for me. With the way I was raised who could expect me to know how to parent. Or, if I lost my temper during an argument with my partner, it was his fault. His behavior justified my response. I mean, who wouldn?t have lost it when faced with someone who acts like him.

Sometimes, my behavior was so bad that I really couldn?t afford to think about it at all. I just couldn?t look at it. If I accidentally looked, if for some reason looking was unavoidable, I could spend the next few days in a deep depression. Sometimes I could avoid a response by keeping frantically busy. I spent a period of my life so intent on keeping my dark secrets buried that I shopped myself into bankruptcy.

The problem with dark secrets is that they poison you. They poison the personality. The symptoms are extreme whininess, depression, joylessness. They poison your behaviors and cause you to spend too much money, drink too much alcohol, do drugs, practice obsessive behaviors of all sorts. They poison the way you see the world and how you react to it. Your secrets make you feel vulnerable and so you spend your time defending yourself through attack. It requires great vigilance to keep those secrets buried so you become very self absorbed. You start to feel isolated and alone.

Your dark secrets spread their poison to your body. The stress this constant vigilance puts on your body, leaves you vulnerable for all sorts of illnesses. You begin to experience migraines or stomach disorders. If you hold onto grievances long enough you invite in cancer or arthritis.

A few years ago, I began to see another way to do this. I was introduced to the idea that I can forgive all this stuff. It seemed like a pretty farfetched idea. I had been harboring some of these sins for a long time. They had seemed bad at first, now they seemed monstrous. I couldn?t even look at them. How could I forgive them. Well, that was the second part of the good news. I didn?t have to look at them alone and I didn?t have to forgive them. I just had to be willing to accept forgiveness.

I have talked about the forgiveness process before. In fact, I have talked about it more than once. It works in a lot of ways, but this is the first place I ever used it. Let me tell you about how this happened.

When my first two children were still very young, I chickened out of being a parent. I was just terrified of the responsibility. I gave them to their father who I thought would do a much better job without me there to screw it all up. I visited them and they visited me, but I didn?t have to make those day to day decisions and do the work it took to raise them.

Then I spent the rest of my life regretting that decision. I felt such smothering guilt that I could hardly stand myself. I tried everything to run away from myself. I tried drugs, alcohol, many unsuccessful relationships looking for someone who could restore my self worth. I tried over and over to make up for my early error. I tried to be a good parent to them in every way I could think of. I had other children and threw myself into motherhood with a ferocity, thinking that maybe this second chance would afford me salvation. I suffered all of the symptoms of denial that I talked about earlier. Even when I wasn?t thinking about the guilt, it was there in an unconscious way affecting how I felt and how I acted. I was able to gain only temporary peace broken by periods of intense grief.

By the time I had begun studying for the ministry, I had made an uneasy peace with my misery. That was when I was first began to understand true forgiveness. I had been reading about forgiveness in the Bible and in A Course in Miracles, but I just wasn?t opened to truly forgiving. A fellow ministerial student took me through a process called Accessing Inner Wisdom. It is a really simple spiritual process. She helped me to get comfortable and relaxed and guided me into a meditative state.

She helped to provide a safe environment for me to access the Holy Spirit. God placed the Holy Spirit in me so that I would always have His Voice, but I seldom took advantage of that. I didn?t think I could afford to talk to God about my errors. I was afraid to do this, as if He wouldn?t know about them unless I confessed all. It?s a pretty silly way to think, but that seems to be the way I was thinking all the same. Finally though, I was able to trust Him enough to tell Him my secrets. I told Him the whole story, and how I felt about it, and how hard it was to live with my guilt. I brought up all the deep dark secrets, every bad parenting decision I had made that I could think of. Together, we looked at each one.

At first it was so painful looking at all this stuff, saying it out loud, hearing myself enumerate each supposed sin. Then it got easier and even started feeling better. I felt lighter as I unburdened myself. But we didn?t leave it there. My friend took me further through the process as she brought me into the Light where I allowed God to heal me. Before now I had not been able to look at this alone, and when I accidentally glimpsed it I was left only with pain. But when I looked with the Holy Spirit, and when I invited forgiveness and healing through God, it was a miracle.

In the final part of the process, I was directed to ask the Holy Spirit for a personal message, a new focus from an aware perspective. He said to me that I had never made a mistake in my life. He said I was only learning lessons and that I needed to learn those lessons, and now I could pass them on to others as well as to my children. Through this healing I would be able to give them what they need.

This was the most extraordinary miracle. I was able to release a lifetime of shame, fear, and guilt. Being free of that also helped me to be a better parent. I was able to focus more on my children and their needs now that I wasn?t always focused on my guilt and my need to be forgiven.

I use this process all of the time now. I don?t always use the formal approach involving another minister, but I do the same thing by myself. When I feel I need to forgive myself, when I?ve made an error, I invite the Holy Spirit to look at it with me. I tell him all about it just as if I were speaking to you. I?ve learned that it doesn?t matter what I do, it is never so bad that I cannot freely speak of it with the Holy Spirit.

I think of it as bringing my dark thoughts into the light. And what happens when you shine a light into a dark space? The darkness disappears, doesn?t it? The light doesn?t beat it back. There is no battle. The light simply replaces the darkness. That is what happens for me when I look at my errors in the Light of the Holy Spirit. Then I ask the Holy Spirit to heal me. I ask Him to heal my thoughts and to show me another way to see. He always answers, and the change He creates in my thinking is a real miracle. Then I ask for God?s love and comfort.

I use this process in a lot of different circumstances. If I feel sad or angry, guilty or fearful, I bring these feelings to the Holy Spirit and I ask Him to help me sort them out. With His help, I trace these feelings back to the thoughts that caused them, and then to the belief behind the thoughts. Then I ask the Holy Spirit to heal these beliefs and to give me new beliefs, beliefs that will work in my life and bring me joy instead of sadness. There seems to be no circumstance in which this process isn?t helpful.

It took some courage to take that first look into the dark closet of my secret sins, but I am so glad I did it. I am especially glad that I did it with the Holy Spirit and I am so grateful for the miracle of forgiveness. Now I naturally surrender control of my life to God and I don?t know why I ever hesitated to do this.

© 2004, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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WHO IS THAT BEHIND THE MASK?

WHO IS THAT BEHIND THE MASK?

I have spent nearly all of my life in a kind of spiritual amnesia. I had forgotten who I was. From the moment I was born into this illusion that I think of as my life, I began to look for a separate identity for myself. I was born with one question on my mind: Who am I?

In my search for my identity, I played many roles, and wore many masks. On his website, Dan Joseph tells a story about the roles we play and the masks we wear.

The Costume Ball
Imagine that you are invited to a masquerade ball. You spend weeks choosing a costume for the event. Should you dress up as royalty? As a villain? As someone famous? As an angel?
You eventually settle on a costume, and go to the ball. There you find hundreds of other people, dressed in the widest variety of outfits. The party is all in good fun, and you play through the night in your chosen role.
Then, around midnight, a strange thing happens. Everyone in the costume ball suddenly falls asleep. When they awake, their memories have vanished. Where am I? everyone asks. And silently, they wonder: Who am I?

People look around the room, and begin to sort out the situation. Over there is someone dressed in gold finery, with a crown. She must be the queen of this place. And look at him over there ? he has knives and swords. He must be dangerous. And look at that one: she looks like some sort of animal. Maybe she?s crazy.

There?s a great scramble. People flock to the “good” people, away from the “bad” ones. Some of the good people bravely begin to round up the bad ones, using the weapons at their disposal. For a while there?s a chaotic melee. Eventually, after a struggle, things settle down. The bad people are subdued, and they sit ? tied together ? in the middle of the room.
Then, abruptly, part of a man?s costume falls away, and a woman cries out. “Wait,” she says, “I remember now. That pirate ? he?s my husband. He isn?t really a pirate.” The memories begin to return. “She isn?t a queen ? she?s just dressed that way. And he?s no priest, I?ll tell you that.”

As the costumes come off, people begin to remember their true relationships. “I?m sorry, I didn?t recognize you,” they say as they untie their friends and family. “Please forgive me ? I forgot who you were.” “I don?t know what came over me.”

The party-goers shake their heads at the strange turn of events. They tear off their costumes as they walk out of the party, concerned that they might forget again.
“How easily we are fooled,” remarks a man as he tosses away a mask. “A little cardboard, a little paint, and our loved ones are gone.”

This illustrates perfectly what happens to me as I go through life. I try on different masks. That I tried these masks on and even wore them for awhile did not make them real, nor change who I am. But I am easily fooled into thinking I have become the role I am playing. The role becomes so real, I am so accustomed to the mask, that I forget I have a true identity.

As a very young child I tried to separate myself from my mother, demanding my independence even though I wasn?t ready for it. It was very frustrating for my mom as it was for me when my children entered that stage of their development. At each stage I thought I was developing into an independent, separate person.

As I grew older, the need to complete this separation process became more acute. I needed to know who I was. I tried on a lot of masks as I moved through the process. As a teenager, I traded one mask for another as quickly as I discovered them. I tried being more mature, more glamorous, more hip. I tried being sophisticated. Periodically, I tried going back to being a child.

Even as I moved into adulthood, I kept trying on masks, trying to find one that ?fit?; that felt like me. I wore a student mask off and on for awhile. I saw myself as a college student with all that implied for me. I saw myself as an intellectual, but also as a party person; a combination that was not easy to balance.

I tried on the mask of a more mature wife and mother and when I looked into the mirror, I didn?t recognize that person and was really scared of the responsibility represented by that mask. I took that one off for awhile and threw on a mask easier to wear. I pretty much liked the free spirit mask. There was lots of alcohol, drugs, free sex, hard rocking music, burning my bra, paying lip service to saving the rainforest, and stopping the war, if not actually doing much about it. I liked the thought of connecting myself with these lofty ideas, but it is a little hard to do a lot about it and keep up with the partying.

Well, that pretty much got me through the sixties and into the seventies, but that mask became a little too dangerous to wear. It also became heavy with guilt and regrets, so I put it aside. I wandered around trying first one mask then another, feeling uprooted and uncertain. There was a lot of depression going on as I tried to discover myself, and nothing seemed a good fit.

What I couldn?t see at the time was that I wasn?t alone in my search; that all along there was a guiding hand.  Even as I tried these things, there was a guide showing me another way. I ignored my guide for so long that I no longer recognized His help when it came my way, but it was always there and helped me to, eventually, get where I am now.

I was looking, in my mind?s eye, at the discarded pile of masks and thinking what a waste of time all that was. But then I thought, no, not a waste of time. Every role I played, every mask I tried on, taught me valuable lessons. I learned through my errors and the personal guilt they brought me to feel compassion for others as they look for their own path. I learned to forgive others and myself for what I thought were horrible mistakes, and to accept that they were only learning experiences.

For a long time, I was unable to discern my true Self. I thought I was the mask, not the person wearing the mask. But as I discarded the masks I was brought closer to the realization that I am not any of these roles I play. As I took off the mask of one role and picked up the mask of another, I didn?t cease to exist. Who was I in that interim? What I learned is that I have a true identity that the roles I choose to play in my life are masking. I have spent the last several years of my life, learning about my true Self.

What I have learned is this: My true Self is me as God created me, perfectly preserved, waiting for me to notice. And what else could be there? How could I have ever thought differently? To think that I could be different than what God created me to be is arrogance of a degree as to be almost comical. What am I saying here? Am I suggesting that I have the power to un-create what God created? God created me like Himself, so I am powerful, but I am not more powerful than my Creator. Even in my most foolish moment, I could not really believe that. The closest I could come is to pretend that I can?t see the obvious.

So here I am, a child of God, created like Him, therefore powerful and holy; powerful enough to move mountains, holy enough to heal the sick and raise the dead. Didn?t Jesus promise that I could do all he did and more? Why does this sound so unlikely? It even sounds scary to think of it.

I think it is because I have spent so much time making small the power my Father has given me. Instead of playing the Child of God, I have been playing little roles. I have been trying to be something I am not. I have allowed this behavior to obscure the truth of who I am. The most damaging thing I have done to myself is to obscure the truth that I am whole, that I am a part of you and a part of God. I have believed that I exist in a separated state, little me in defense against evil. No wonder I have been afraid and depressed in my life. No wonder I have been guilty and regretful. I thought I had thrown away my birth right. I thought I had thumbed my nose at God and made myself into something He doesn?t know.

I am truly the prodigal son spoken of in Luke 15. I have squandered the gifts of my Father, but He doesn?t care about my foolish mistakes. He only wants me to remember who I am. He doesn?t forgive me because He never condemned me. It is only I who condemned myself to a life without the peace and love of my Father. It is only I who can set aside all those roles I chose to play and all the masks I have worn in this illusion and choose instead to recognize the truth of who I really am; God?s holy child, forever perfect as He created me.

Just as I have been easily fooled into believing in the role I am playing, into thinking I am the mask I wear, I have been equally fooled by your mask. I have thought you were what you did. I have thought the role you are playing defines you and identifies you. But it is not true. You are not a gay couple. You are not a recovering addict. You are not a student, a father, a black man. There are no thieves, no liars, no cowards. There are no strong people, no weak people, no leaders, no followers. There are only children of God, still just as He created them. When they slip out of their masks, and walk away from the roles they have chosen, I will recognize them for who they are and wonder how I could have been so fooled by such flimsy evidence.

Can I see my true Self now? Can I see you as you really are? Is it really only a matter of choosing to recognize the truth of who we are? Could it really be that easy? Well, I never said it was easy. It is that simple, but I have not found it to be so easy. It requires great vigilance to remember my true identity. It also requires that I remember your identity as well. God created you perfect just as He did me. He did not favor me over you. In fact, He created us just the same and that is the secret of our strength. We are strong in our sameness, in our wholeness. We experience our wholeness only when we recognize that we are one. It is in our unity that we know our true self and experience our perfection.

So, if I look at you and see only the mask you wear, I am teaching myself that I am only the mask I wear. What do I see when I look at someone else? This is where my vigilance is important. When I went to visit my friend in the hospital, it would have been easy to see her has sick, weak and vulnerable, but that is only the role she was playing now. ?Sick person? is the mask she was wearing. I give that vision of her to God and ask that I might see her as she truly is. I ask to see her as God sees her, brilliant and beautiful and perfect and very very holy. This picture of her whole and healed is the vision I hold for her until she is able to look past her own role playing and see this for herself. This is my healing prayer for her.

Sometimes the picture I see of the other person is too vivid for me to see past. This often happens when fear becomes part of the equation. Imagine that you were fired from your job and you could not see that you had done anything wrong. Wouldn?t you be angry with your boss? Wouldn?t you think he was jerk? How hard would it be to see him as a child of God instead?

It would be hard for me because I would be feeling fear at the loss of income. In my fear and frustration, I would want to lash out. It would be hard to see this differently. Luckily, God has provided me with the help I need to change my perspective. I have His Voice and I can ask for help. I can give all this fear, and all the thoughts around the fear, to the Holy Spirit and ask Him to show me another way to see it. I can ask Him to show me the reality of my boss; the real person behind the mask.

Even if I am not entirely willing to see him differently, I can give what willingness I have and then ask that the Holy Spirit help my unwillingness. In the one case, I would be looking out of a victim mask and into an attacker mask. The Holy Spirit will change my vision if I let Him. He will help me take off the victim mask so that I can see I am my Father?s Son and then I can see the boss?s true identity and know he is my Father?s Son as well. He is not the attacker that his mask is showing me; he is my brother. Together we are One.

I look at my children and see them as the roles they play for me, which are different than the roles they play for their friends, the roles they play for their bosses and co-workers, for their own children. Sometimes I get a glimpse of one of their other roles, and I have a flash of realization. For a moment, I recognize how flimsy are the trappings that define their different roles. And right beneath these masks, these costumes, is something else for me to see. As Dan Joseph puts it: For a moment, our hearts are touched by a flash of beauty ? perhaps we see it in a friend or family member; perhaps a stranger. But for a moment, we find a glimmer of something that we didn?t know was there.

For a moment, there?s a shimmering of glory that makes the costume seem ridiculous. It might be gone an instant later, but we saw it. And we can see it again. As we let our vision be led past the outer trappings, the light within begins to emerge.

© 2004, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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The Greatest of These is Love

The Greatest of These is Love

1 Corinthians talks about love. In 13.2 it says: And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.

It is pretty clear that there is nothing more important than the expression of love. Most of us save true expressions of love for those we are closest to, and yet, that is not what this verse is telling us. Nowhere are we told to love only those who are of our blood, or those who have personalities we like. It doesn?t suggest that we save our love for special people or special occasions.

The kind of love spoken of here is a universal love. Just as God loves us all without special favor, raining His love on the unjust as well as the just, we are to love everyone in that same way. In T-1.V.3:2-3, the Course tells us:  God is not partial. All His children have His total love, and all His gifts are freely given to everyone alike. The trick of course, is how to express our love in this way. I can?t begin to tell you how you should accomplish this, I can only tell you how I try to do it.

The most basic tenet of the Christian religion is that God is Love. I also know that God created me like Himself, so I must be love also. The Course says: You are the work of God, and His work is wholly loveable and wholly loving. T-1.III.2:3 Then why do I have so much trouble expressing myself as love? It is a lot easier to tell you of those times when I fail to express my true nature as love than it is to come up with examples of love. It really shouldn?t be so hard to do. I must be making some basic mistake, putting up some block to my awareness of my true nature that prevents me from seeing the value of love.

Who am I supposed to love? Everyone that God sends my way is someone I am supposed to love. All of these people are lessons in love; opportunities for me to remember who I am. If I express love to you, I am teaching myself that I am love. I am removing one of those blocks to my awareness of my true nature.

I will be given many opportunities for practice. There are lifetime relationships such as I have with my children. These relationships are rich in opportunity. I am so deeply bound to my children that the ties are virtually unbreakable, so I have to find ways around our seeming differences and disagreements. If this were any other relationship I might be able to run from it rather than repair it, so it is very good that I have lifetime relationships because if I could run, I probably would. Then I would rob myself of the chance to learn that I am love.

I have long term relationships. These relationships, while not lasting a lifetime, are sustained and have their own teaching and learning values, and there is usually enough time to learn to use love to work out conflicts. Then there are short term relationships like the ones I have at work with people who come and go. There are shorter lessons to learn with these people, but it doesn?t mean that they are not just as important. One lesson well learned is enough.

Then there are the people who just pop into my life briefly. They are given me so that I can teach love and learn love. Someone pulls out of traffic right in front of me. I can make a rude gesture, or I can smile in understanding. After all, I have done the same thing because I was in a hurry, frustrated, or just misjudged my timing. One response teaches me that I am love, the other doesn?t. Each lesson, no matter how simple or how brief, is of equal importance in its value as a teaching aid.

So, now I am clear about who I am to love. I am to love everyone that God sends to me. How about the ones I don?t actually meet? The people I see on TV or read about in the paper? Surely they don?t count? But, yes they do. Even if I don?t verbally express my thoughts, they still count.  The Course says: What you decide in this determines all you see and think is real and hold as true. T-31.VI.1.5 What I think is who I am, so I can?t discount these opportunities.

That is a lot of people to love, but on the other hand, there is nothing to figure out. I can?t confuse the issue by arguing that some people deserve my love and others don?t.  I have one rule only to follow. If they are here in my life, they are here for me to love.

Then there is the question of how to love. I have often been mistaken when I thought I was being loving and really that wasn?t the case. When my son, Toby said he wanted to go sky diving, I wanted to convince him not to. I felt that it was the loving thing for me to protect him. Or was it? Perhaps I was trying to protect myself from fear. Perhaps, the loving thing to do was to teach him to be fearless and faith filled. I could teach fear or I could teach love.  Doesn?t the Course tell us that:  Perfect love casts out fear.  If fear exists, then there is not perfect love. T-1.V.5:4-5

Nor am I talking about love in a romantic or physical sense. In fact, we call a lot of things love, when often we could more accurately replace the word love with desire or want. I might tell you that I love chocolate, and I do feel pretty strongly about chocolate, but that isn?t really love.

I have thought that strong feelings I?ve had for certain people was love, but it was really neediness. I thought I loved them, but what I felt was a need for their approval and affection. I thought they had something I didn?t have and that I wanted. That isn?t love either.

Let me give you an example of this. One of the things I was attracted to in my ex husband was his ability to socialize with so many people. Everyone liked to be around him. He was fun and had lots of friends. I found that intriguing because that was never true for me. I wasn?t very good at socializing and wasn?t what you would call a fun kind of person. I probably wasn?t the first person you would think of if you were looking for someone to liven up your party. I really wanted to be like him in that way.

This is not the only thing I liked about him, but it is a good example of the kind of thing we look for in others and hope to make part of ourselves through our union with them. The problem with this is that when the other person fails to produce this special behavior, or when you decide it isn?t important to you anymore, you become disillusioned with the relationship. Suddenly, you decide the other person isn?t what you thought they were, and you are ready to throw them over for someone with something more to offer. This isn?t love. This is a bargain that went bad. It may have been an unconscious bargain, but it was a bargain none the less. In 905: Special Relationships vs Holy Relationships, we read: If the truth were to be known it is saying, ?I?m looking for you to help me feel more special to make up for the feelings of lack and unworthiness I experience in myself.?

Another way to see this is in co-dependent relationships. I was in a relationship with a man who was emotionally immature. He needed someone to support his need to remain so. I needed someone who could support my need to feel worthy and important. So that was our bargain. It was such a good fit. He could be forever an emotional child, and I could be forever needed. It felt right and good. We called it love.  Then, I grew out of that need, and suddenly the relationship was one sided.  It became clear that what we had called love was really mutual need.

Love is not really an emotion, either; it is a decision. Contrary to romance novels people do not fall in love and fall out of love. People decide to love and they decide not to love. If I am experiencing an emotional response to someone, that is not love. It is something else, probably having to do with a sense of need on my part. The emotions that accompany this decision are not love. They are related to our perceived needs. If we are getting our perceived needs filled by our partner we feel strong positive emotions. If we don?t feel fulfilled by the other person, we feel strong negative emotions that can run from disappointment to rage.

I have decided to love everyone because it is what I must do to experience the peace of God. This kind of love is often referred to as Universal Love. It is unconditional love. We often speak of unconditional love as if it were a kind of love. Actually, unconditional is the only kind of love. If my feelings about someone are conditional, then they are based on something other than love.

I have a friend who is in and out of treatment for drug abuse. Do I love her any less because she does not stay clean? No, because that would be putting a condition on my love. If my partner were unfaithful to me, would that be reason to stop loving him? No, because, once again, I would have put a condition on my love. If my child grew up and moved away and seldom came to see me or contacted me, would I stop loving that child? No. My love has no conditions.

I don?t say to my friend that I will love you only if you are clean and sober. I might be sad to see her hurt herself. I might ask her not to bring her drugs into my life. But, I would not love her any less. I might decide that I did not want to share a home with an unfaithful partner, but that doesn?t mean that I would stop loving him.  I might feel very sad to lose the company of a beloved child, but I would not stop loving him. Love, real love, has no conditions.

Now take unconditional love and apply it universally. If I apply this same kind of love to everyone, I am loving as we are told to love. So, how does this work in my daily life? Well, this is where it gets a little tricky. When the towers came down, universal love required that I love the terrorists who crashed the plane into them. This was hard. I wanted to hate them. But I cannot. 1 John 4:20 says, ?If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?? I at least wanted to put some pretty basic conditions on my love of these people. Quit killing people, or I won?t love you. Is this asking too much?

I am certain that the world was full of people who did evil things when Jesus was here. In fact, if you read your history you know there were some terrible people, but Jesus did not say, love only those who do good. In fact, he went to some trouble to emphasize that we should love everyone in every circumstance. He said: But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you. Matthew 5:44

So, I must love Osama Bin Laden. Does this mean I must condone his actions? No, but I must separate his actions from who he is. I do not love what he does and if I could stop him, I would, but he is a child of God and so I love him. This is spiritual love. It is loving each person exactly the same and with no conditions.

Love is Universal and its laws are universal. If I am not expressing love always and in every circumstance, then I am not expressing Love. If I am not expressing Love, then I don?t know who I am. Because God created me like Himself, if I don?t know who I am, I don?t know who God is. It becomes clear why love is the most important principle of all; why none of the others mean anything without love.  Love is the key not only to my understanding of who I am, but to my understanding of my creator, and to our relationship with each other.  As it says in I John 4:8 : He who does not love does not know God, for God is Love.

I would like to share with you this ?Prayer of Patience?.  I wish I could give credit where credit is due, but I don?t know who wrote it.
 
Help us remember that the jerk who cut us off in traffic last night could be a single mother who worked nine hours that day and is rushing home to cook dinner, help with homework, do the laundry and spend a few precious moments with her children.

Help us to remember that the pierced, tattooed, disinterested young man who can’t make change correctly is a worried 19-year-old college student, balancing his apprehension over final exams with his fear of not getting his student loans for next semester.

Remind us, that the scary looking bum, begging for money in the same spot every day (who really ought to get a job)! is a slave to addictions that we can only imagine in our worst nightmares.

Help us to remember that the old couple walking annoyingly slow through the store aisles and blocking our shopping progress are savoring this moment, knowing that, based on the biopsy report she got back last week, this will be the last year that they go shopping together.

Lord, please remind us each day that, of all the gifts you give us, the greatest gift is love. It is not enough to share that love with those we hold dear. Please remind us to open our hearts not to just those who are close to us, but to all humanity. Once again reminding us to be slow to judge and quick to forgive, show patience, empathy and love.
 

© 2004, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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MY MIND IS NOT IN MY BODY

My Mind Is Not In My Body

I used to be embarrassed by how much trouble I had with some of the simple spiritual concepts. It seems I work on the same issues forever. This became especially noticeable when I started writing. I found that I was writing about the same thing over and over. But I can see with the progression of the writing that this is just my learning curve.

I have written several times about my efforts to control my weight. I felt kind of funny writing about it at all. After all, I shouldn?t care what my body looks like. It is just an illusion. There are lots of things more important than my body size. Perhaps I should concentrate on some of those things and relegate my body to the unimportant pile.

But no, I don?t think so. I think everything I encounter in my illusion is an opportunity to practice forgiveness. I don?t think my body is important; I don?t think anything in the illusion is important, except as how I choose to use it. In that way all things are equally important, and to line them up in any other order is a mistake. On one side I have the Atonement, forgiveness. On the other I have tools with which to work toward Atonement.

After years of dieting and fretting over everything I eat, I decided to use this issue for spiritual growth and started asking the Holy Spirit to show me a new way to see it. It has seemed like a slow process to me, but I understand that I have a lot of ingrained beliefs about food and my body that I have been unwilling to relinquish all at once. I have made some progress, though.

My most recent step up the ladder has been a decision to give up all dieting of any kind. I am asking the Holy Spirit to guide my eating. My prayer is something like this: ?I don?t know what anything means. I won?t decide for myself. I ask the Holy Spirit to decide for me.? I do not do this perfectly. Sometimes I forget all about my new intention. I eat without asking first for help in choosing. I worry about what I ate and how it will affect my body. I forget that I don?t know what my body should look like and that I have surrendered that outcome to the Holy Spirit. But, the more I do remember, the easier it becomes and the more automatic it is.

It is interesting to see how this works. I never seem to want the same type of food twice in a row, and I don?t eat very much unless I am not paying attention. It feels good to eat like this and it feels peaceful. I had not realized how much at war I was with my body. I am learning that we can choose peace in everything we do, even in our eating choices.

I am also receiving insights as I am willing to consider them. I trust that this is moving along at the speed that is best for me. I accept that if I could be aware of all truths at once I would, and that if I don?t know everything at once, then it is because I need to take it a step at a time. The trust feels peaceful, too. I like it better than warring with myself about how fast I should be learning and what it meant that I wasn?t living up to that expectation.

One day recently I was talking to the Holy Spirit about my body. I was thinking that I would be more comfortable if I lost a few pounds and wondering if this is something that I could do without dieting. The thought that came to me is that my mind is not in my body. My body is in my mind. My body is just a figment of my imagination. It has no power of its own.  My body cannot do anything without my mind. It cannot get sick or get fat unless I make that decision. Workbook Lesson 152 says, ?Nothing occurs but represents your wish, and nothing is omitted that you choose.

Of course I can be thinner. What am I thinking? If my body is in my mind, then all changes to the body are made in my mind. Losing weight has nothing to do with what I eat. It is a natural result of what I think. It is a decision I make. I decided that my body will be this size, so now I change my mind and decide differently. It may take me a while to become comfortable with this new thought and to picture it in my body because I am not used to making these decisions consciously, but it is really no different than what I have always done unconsciously. So, why do I get sick? Why do I get fat? Could this really be what I decided? Am I insane?

Well, in a word, yes. I did decide this and I am insane. As long as I continue to see the world through the eyes of my ego, I will continue to be insane because the ego is insane. Once I accept the premise that I am acting insanely because I am acting through the ego, all becomes clear. (Well, a lot of it becomes clear.)

I think I choose sickness and death over healing and life all the time. If I am still in the illusion, I can be sure that I am doing this at least some of the time. Sometimes when I make this choice, I do it in a very obvious way. I decide that if I eat certain things I will get fat or get sick and then? I eat them. Is that insane? Did I just choose illness and eventually death? Well, yeah, obviously I did.

Other times, my choices are not so obvious. I choose to use my body for attack. I attack my brother and I attack myself. I do this verbally, mentally, physically, with my beliefs. In the past I have attacked my partner with words in the heat of an argument. I have thought unkind things about someone and thought it didn?t count because I didn?t voice the words. It was still an attack and it attacked me first. I haven?t attacked anyone physically in a while, but when my kids were little I spanked them when I ran out of imaginative ways to get their attention. I have attacked those I love the most with my beliefs when I didn?t trust them.

All of these attacks on others is an attack on myself. If I don?t trust them, I am teaching myself that I am not trustworthy either. If I attack them in any way, I am teaching myself that I am vulnerable. Attack is always against my self and it is always seen in the body. So, I am constantly attacking my body. When I decide to attack, I am deciding on illness and death.

How do I correct these errors in thought? The Course tells us to remember that only the mind can create and that creation belongs at the thought level. Just knowing that my body is only a realistic representation of a thought in my mind is helpful in getting me started on this.  It is a truth that can be hard for me to hold in my mind. The body seems so real and is so compelling. When I feel pain in my body, it is very hard to remember that the pain is really in my mind.

Of course that is the purpose of the body. It is the home of the ego and is supposed to keep me engaged so that I cannot remember that I am a powerful and very holy Son of God. My body does, indeed, engage my attention. Hardly an hour goes by that I don?t lavish some attention on my body. It seems to call out for my care and love (or hate-the ego doesn?t really care as long as it has my attention) all day long.

For most of my life I thought that how my body looked depended mostly on what I put on it and into it. I thought the condition of my body was a reflection of my weakness as I failed at one diet after another. I thought that I was my body. I thought I was weak. That is what I was teaching myself with all those failed attempts to control my body through the manipulation of form. I was teaching myself that I was weak, helpless, and less than. It was a perfect ego set up; seek but do not find. Try and fail.

It was all because I was listening to the wrong voice. My mind is so powerful, but I have been denying that power by listening to the ego as it tries to convince me of my fallibility. I convinced myself that I have no control over my body as I listened to that voice. It is time for a new Voice. The Holy Spirit speaks to me of my power, of my holiness, of my invulnerability and I can hear this Truth if I choose to listen. How the Universe must chuckle at the idea that the Son of God is somehow imprisoned in this little body.

I?ve been dreaming such a life. The most powerful force in the universe, standing on a little scale hoping the needle went down today instead of up. Gulping down pills thinking they would protect this body illusion from harm. Queuing up for a flu shot (Gosh, I hope they don?t run out before I get mine) to protect against microorganisms so tiny they can?t be seen with my eyes and yet capable of slaying this body I have come to call myself. Truly, this is a nightmare. But a nightmare is just a dream after all, and a dream is not truth.

My mind is not in this body. This body is in my mind. This body is just a mistaken thought. The Course tells us that health is the result of relinquishing all attempts to use the body lovelessly.  There is a way to use the body that will lead me back to God. All things the ego has made for its own purposes the Holy Spirit will use for God if I let Him. I invite the Holy Spirit into my mind and I ask that He heal my thoughts. I will step back and let Him lead the way in this as in all things.

© 2004, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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The Peace of God Is All I Want

The Peace of God Is All I Want

What value do you place on your peace of mind? I think sometimes I sell my peace too cheaply. How many times have I traded my peace for anger that I thought was justified? How many times have I walked away from a peaceful mind so that I could wallow in self pity? How many times have I decided I would rather stay in fear than be peaceful. I had reason to think about this the other day.

I had been shopping at Albertsons and when I presented my check to pay for my groceries, they turned it down. The cashier explained to me that they use a service to cut down on bad checks, and that service advised them not to take mine. I must have looked totally shocked, because she reassured me that it was probably a mistake and these mistakes happen all the time. I paid for my groceries with a credit card and went home.

On the drive home I kept telling myself that there was no way I could have made such a big mistake with my account that it didn?t have money in it, and that it has been many years since I bounced a check, so that couldn?t be it. Why then did they turn me down? It had to be a mistake I reasoned, but what if it wasn?t? What if someone had taken a checkbook and was using it to finance their vacation? What if someone had stolen my identity? Finally, I gave it all over to God, and felt reassured.

I thought I was pretty calm about it by the time I reached the house. I checked my bank account over the internet and saw that all my money was still there. Then I called the company that denied my check and told them what happened. After asking a lot of personal questions they finally admitted it was an error on their part, and apologized. What I realized was that I had not entirely released this whole thing. I was still upset. I was angry at that company for the embarrassment and inconvenience it had caused me. I was not mean to the woman on the phone, but neither was I kind to her.

After I had hung up, I felt bad that I had been so sharp with her. After all it was not her fault this happened. I wanted to call Albertson?s and give them a piece of my mind. If this company makes mistakes, why were they using them? I wanted someone to be at fault. I wanted someone to take responsibility for this error. I wanted someone to blame.

Suddenly, I stopped what I was doing and asked the Holy Spirit to look at this with me. He showed me that I had given away my peace. I didn?t like the way I felt. I didn?t like being out of peace. The Holy Spirit helped me to see that I was trying to make myself feel better by making it someone else?s fault and then insisting that they fix it. He also helped me to see that this would never work. If I make my peace, or lack of it, someone else?s responsibility I would forever be dependent on forces outside of myself for my happiness.

What became clear to me was that this was a big mistake. The only way I could be sure of having peace was to take responsibility for it in every circumstance. It was so tempting to blame the check cashing company for my unhappiness. After all, they made the mistake that caused my upset, didn?t they? And what about Albertson?s? Weren?t they culpable as well? Didn?t their decision to hire an incompetent company figure in my loss of peace?

I could see that I was very angry about this. I wondered why I was so angry and the Holy Spirit helped me to see that I was feeling attacked. He led me to a course I took through Pathways of Light that talked about understanding attack. Here is how they explain it.

You build a house with your beliefs. It is your mental construction, your mental house (your state of consciousness).

When someone doesn?t agree with your mental house, you may feel that they are trying to attack it, which stimulates a need to build a fence around the house to protect against attack.

You can come from another perspective to see that when someone attacks your house, they are merely reflecting their belief about the house you are identifying with.

You can see it as an attack or merely a reflection of their belief.

It doesn?t have to be looked at as an attack.

OK now, I see that this is exactly what happened to me. I had a mental construct in which I saw myself as a person who didn?t write hot checks; as a person who is trustworthy. It was important to me that I be seen as the kind of person who has enough money to cover the cost of my groceries. Perhaps because this wasn?t always true about me, that image did not feel unassailable, so I felt a strong need to defend it. So, when I was told that they did not trust my check, I felt attacked. I felt like they were attacking my mental house. I wanted to defend that house.

Holy Spirit was helping me to see this differently. The clerk at the store and the woman who worked for the check cashing company were reflecting their belief about my check. Even if they carried it further and saw me as a person who would pass a bad check, they were still just reflecting their belief about me. I don?t have to own this belief, do I? I can choose to see this not as an attack on who I am, but just as a reflection of something these people think.

Did they take my peace? No one can take my peace unless I am willing to give it to them. My peace is my responsibility. Nothing anyone says or does to me can touch my peace unless I willingly allow it. As soon as I realized that peace is not a result of what happens to me, but is a decision I make, all of the anger went away. I realized in that moment, that I would rather have peace of mind, than have someone to make guilty. It was a simple choice. Choose for guilt, blame, and anger, or choose for peace, joy and happiness. Choose to listen to God?s Voice or choose to listen to my own little ego.

After I got clear of the anger, I could see how foolish my first choice had been. What good would choosing to place blame have done? It could not have changed what happened. It could only rob me of my joy, and of the chance to be a teacher for God. I wished I had made that decision earlier, I could have saved myself all that worry. I could have been a teacher of God when I spoke to that woman on the phone. Still, I managed to stop the ego insanity long enough to hear the Holy Spirit speak to me. I heard him remind me that I could have had peace instead of this. At least I was able to use this opportunity to strengthen my spiritual muscles.

I was talking about this to a good friend and she told me about an incident that happened with her. She was having an argument with her husband when suddenly in a sane moment, she was able to say, ?No, I don?t want this.? She was able to say to her husband that she wanted peace instead. Saying it out loud allowed them to break the cycle of attack and defend. From there they were able to change their focus from one of blame and guilt to one of problem solving. She was able to see, just for a moment, that peace was her real goal, and in that moment she chose for God, and God responded to her call.

What a gift we give ourselves when we choose peace.  It is also a gift to everyone else as well. As we allow God to lift us higher up the ladder, we are doing this for our brothers as well. They too, are lifted up that ladder. Being a teacher for God isn?t always about what you say. Your example in the face of a crisis is teaching. During the recent hurricane I heard about a man with a camp ground who offered through his local radio stations, openings for campers with all the amenities-free of charge for those who were fleeing the hurricane. This man is a teacher of God. He is extending God?s Love and is teaching others to do the same through the example of his life. In the stress and anxiety of dealing with catastrophe, He was an island of peace; a reminder that we are comforted and loved, and one of God?s own.

Sometimes I feel overwhelmed with problems and find it difficult to choose peace instead. Or I will choose peace and then find myself picking up the problems again. When this happens, I may need to take some time out and ask for help. There is a process that I find helpful. Perhaps you, too, could use a way to clear your mind and give the Holy Spirit an invitation to heal your thoughts. Why don’If we try this process right now.

Get comfortable in your chair, close your eyes and relax. ?Envision yourself in the basket of a hot air balloon, sitting on the ground. Jesus is standing with you in the basket. You can see the blue sky above you, and other balloons drifting among the clouds. You wonder why you can?t join them. Looking down at your feet, you see all around you in the basket the concerns of the day… . You imagine that you can pick up one of those concerns, and you hold it up to the light. ?You and Jesus look at the problem, and in his love and acceptance you watch as that problem seems to shrivel up and turn to dust.

Choose another problem, or perhaps a guilty secret, a depressing moment of regret, an offending personality. Do you see some fear thoughts, some anxiety provoking situations?Whatever you find hiding in the dark at your feet, I invite you to bring into God?s comforting Light. ?.As you give this over to Jesus as well, he smiles gently and shows you that it, too is nothing as it dries to dust and blows away. ?As you continue to give Jesus all of your burdens, you notice that without the weight of these problems, your balloon is lifting into the sky. You are lifted and held aloft by God?s Love.

As you revel in the delight of this gentle flight, Jesus places his arm around your shoulders. He lets you know that the peace of God is always yours for the asking. He asks if you have a question that you need to voice, and assures you that you will receive an answer in a way you can hear and understand. Ask your question now, and wait with Jesus for an answer. ?.When you are ready, gently return your attention to the room around you.

Here is what I have learned about peace.
1. No one can take my peace. I can lose it only if I voluntarily give it up.
2. Peace is not about what happens around me. Peace is a decision I make.
3. I can always have peace because this is what God wants for me.
4. I choose peace when I choose the Voice for God over the voice of the ego.
5. Living in peace is my gift to my brother. It is the way I teach for God.
6.        The peace of God is all I want.

As long as I am in this world I will be faced with distractions, with people who feel the need to attack, with fearful situations, because that is what the world is. I do have a choice though, about how I respond to this. I can choose to spread strife and unhappiness, or I can choose to give the gift of peace. It is up to me. Regardless of what is happening in my life, I can decide that the peace of God is all I want. I can quit selling my peace cheaply. I set my intention, right this moment, to choose peace and I invite you to join me in that choice. I choose the peace of God.

 

© 2004, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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A Grain of Mustard Seed

A Grain of Mustard Seed

For most of my life, I thought that only what I did mattered. It never occurred to me that what I thought had any effect on my life. Over the years I have come to understand that what I do is a direct result of what I think. The thought always comes first. I also became aware of how powerful my thoughts are.  Mathew 17:20 quotes Jesus as saying that, ?If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you?. Let?s think about that for a moment. how do we express that faith? It is through our thoughts. Our thoughts may lead to action, but the thought must come first. Since our faith moves mountains, it follows that there is great power in our thoughts.

I must ask myself: Where do I place my faith? Do I have faith that I am as God created me? Do I have faith that I am created in God?s image; that I am like God, that I am good, and that I am all that this implies? I would have to be faithful to the image of myself as a perfect child of God created in His image and like Him if I am to believe that I can move mountains through my faith.

Or have I placed my faith in something entirely different? Have I placed my faith in my ego, that little self that I made to take the place of the perfect child God created me to be? Am I placing my faith in the image I made that shows me a sad, pathetic, and angry being, weighted with an intolerable burden of guilt and fear? 

To know where my faith is, I have only to examine my thoughts. I look at some of the thoughts around my sense of worthiness, for example, and I see that often I am unsure that I am worthy, and at times I am certain that I am unworthy. For instance, when I first decided to dedicate my life to being a teacher for God, I was overwhelmed with uncertainty and doubt. I felt I was not worthy.

My thoughts were influenced by what I learned as a child, by things people in authority have said to me, and by times I seemed to have failed and have let that seeming failure convince me that I must be unworthy. I say, seeming failure, because often those times that seemed to be a step back, turned out to be the very thing that helped me to grow. I have learned not to judge what happens to me. I guess this is a place in my life where my faith is stronger.

When I decided to become a minister, my thoughts went something like this: ?I must be out of my mind. Why would I think I could do this? Who am I to think I can help others when I have trouble helping myself??  Well, you get the picture. Perhaps you too have experienced this kind of thinking when you contemplated something new in your life. Maybe you understand how I felt.

If ever I needed my faith to be strong, it was at this time in my life. So, I asked myself, ?What do these thoughts mean? What is the belief I am holding that created these thoughts?? I obviously believed that I was unworthy of great things. I believed that I was different than God created me; not really like Him, not really good. I believed that some people are worthy of this, but certainly not me. I believed that I would fail. I believed that other people would disapprove and that they would be expecting me to fail.

Now I had a choice. I could support these beliefs, or I could choose to believe something else. I read a quote by Alan Cohen. It said, ?Agreement is powerful, and creates the reality you experience. Take care what you agree on, with whom, and why.? I could agree with these thoughts, these beliefs, if I chose to. But I had better be careful because my agreement is very powerful. My thoughts are a direct reflection of my faith and Jesus was very clear about the power of my faith wasn?t he?

I could choose, instead, to put my faith elsewhere. Since I am standing here before you, following my guidance to be a teacher for God, I obviously chose to place my faith in God?s vision of me. I asked Holy Spirit to help me see my thoughts of unworthiness differently. He showed me that I was mistaking arrogance for humility. He showed me that when I think I can make myself different from what God created, that is true arrogance.

After all, what am I saying when I see myself as unworthy? I am saying, ?God, I know that you think you created me in your own image and that you declared me good, but I have decided differently. I have decided that I will be something else.? Sounds insane doesn?t it? But, I do it all the time. No wonder I have a lot of fear and guilt to deal with. I think I am in competition with God over who I am.

The truth is that I am as God created me and I am not what I thought I had made of myself. Lesson 93 says this: Whatever evil you think you did, you are as God created you. Whatever mistakes you made, the truth about you is unchanged. Creation is eternal and unalterable. Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God. You are and will forever be exactly as you were created. Light and joy and peace abide in you because God put them there.

The Holy Spirit, Who is the Voice for God, went on to let me know that I can easily change my mind about this. I don?t have to do anything to make myself worthy. That was done by God in my creation. I only have to be vigilant against those thoughts which suggest a reality not in line with God. Then I take those thoughts to God and ask that they be corrected. Who I am is God?s perfect child, and that cannot be changed no matter what I think. However, I can think I have changed this and my belief in it makes the change seem real.

This world is full of small ego thoughts which bombard me constantly. Wall Street wants me to think that I am so vulnerable that using the wrong deodorant is going to be my undoing. The fashion industry would like me to think that no one will like me if my clothes are out of fashion. Television commercials constantly try to convince me that if I am not sick at this very minute, I soon will be and I need to buy some of their magic potions to protect myself.

Well meaning friends suggest that there is something wrong with my spiritual life because it isn?t like everyone else?s.  If I say that I am God?s perfect child created in His image and that nothing I can say or do will change what God created, they gently (or not so gently) suggest I am deluded, or worse.

If someone treats me unkindly and I choose to see it as a call for love instead of attack, someone is sure to tell me that I should be angry and that I should defend myself. When Susan was younger she asked me to go bungee jumping and I said yes. Some people looked at me like I was either nuts or irresponsible. I saw it as an act of faith; they saw it as foolish.

I know many people who are in twelve step programs. Some of them think of themselves as weak and as failures. I look at them in awe. I can hardly believe the power and strength it takes to do what they have done. It heartens me when I am feeling weak, to think of these friends and know that if they can overcome their addictions, I can do what I need to do. Some people have moved mountains in their lives and don?t even know that is what they have done.

I have a friend, another minister, who invited me to share in his joy at celebrating his 35th year sober. He says that he tells fellow substance addicts, that ?we are not weak-kneed impotent wimps but that we are very powerful and spiritually advanced beings.? I agree with him. I cannot imagine anyone who has gone through this as being weak. What strength it takes to do this! I have a friend who gets on the wagon only to fall off. She has done this repeatedly. Is she a failure? Good grief, no! What incredible strength it takes to keep trying even though everything in your life, and most people, are telling you that you can?t do it. Where does this strength come from? It was given you in your creation. It comes from your Father.

Everywhere we turn someone is saying we lack, we are vulnerable, we are weak, we are guilty. It takes great effort on our part to remain strong in our faith. It would be impossible except that it is God?s Will that we be as He created us, and therefore we have powerful help.

Archimedes said, Give me one firm thought upon which to stand, and I will move the earth. Well, my one firm thought is that I am as God created me. I hold to that one firm thought. I use it as a measuring stick against which I judge all other thoughts. If I find myself thinking that I can?t possibly succeed at something, I ask myself if God created me to fail. If I am afraid of anything, I ask myself if God created me fearful.  If I feel guilty because of something I said or did, I ask myself if God created me guilty.

The nay sayers will insist that I need fear to keep me from getting hurt and that I need guilt to keep me from behaving badly, and that I am being arrogant to think I am worthy of success. But I say to them, that my Father is God. The only thing I need is faith in Him. I don?t need to be afraid to protect myself. I only need to practice taking everything to God and following His guidance. That is true protection. I don?t need guilt to keep me from doing what is wrong. If I make a mistake, I take that to God for correction and let Him heal the thoughts that caused me to make the mistake. There is no need for guilt.

So, how much faith do I need to do this? How much faith does it take to fly in the face of convention? How much faith does it take to believe I am exactly as God created me? How much faith does it take to change the way I have thought all my life? It takes the faith of a grain of mustard seed. I believe, (even if my faith is small,) I believe that I can, and my faith will be bolstered by Jesus, by the Holy Spirit, by the angels. Heaven will send me all the help I need.

So, how do I go about making this change? It?s as simple as one, two, three. One, I become aware of my thoughts. Two, I take the false, mistaken thoughts to God for healing. Three, I feel the gratitude and comfort of knowing God is there for me and loves me and wants only the best for me. It isn?t hard or complicated. It just takes practice. Sure, at first it seemed strange and even impossible, but the more often I do it, the more natural it becomes and the more quickly I see my life change for the better.

Perhaps moving mountains seems more dramatic, but changing my life for the better is far more satisfying. And surely, there are times when the first seems no more out of reach than the other. But I am steadfast in my determination and persistence. I have faith, and I practice that faith, and I enjoy the fruits of that faith. Can all of you experience the joy of being as God created you? I know you can. I have faith!

 

 

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