Together, We Light the Way

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

Gentle Healing Journal Day 51 11-15-18

Journal for Day 51
LESSON 48
There is nothing to fear.

The reason there is nothing to fear is very simple. Nothing I see with my eyes or experience through the body in any way is real. It is only an idea in my mind and has no reality whatsoever. And where I am and what I am cannot be endangered. I am in God and God is in me. What could there possibly be to fear?

Why is it then, that I am still afraid at times? It can only be that I would rather live in fear than give up the world I made. Sure, it’s insane. I mean, clearly it is insane. I am God the Son with all that implies, and yet, I am choosing to retain the images of pain and suffering and death instead of claiming my true heritage.

And yet, that is my right and God will not snatch me out of my dream. Love doesn’t do that. Instead, I will dream until I am done dreaming and when I am done, the Answer has been placed in my mind right next to the question so that I can choose Heaven myself. The Holy Spirit will gently lead me to my Home in God where I already reside. Self will meet Self and I will laugh at the whole idea of separation.

This is such an excellent practice, simple yet effective. I could be afraid that this week that I am going to fall behind on this work that is so important to me. But there is nothing to fear. I will get done what I get done and it will be fine. I could be afraid of what the tests might show, but I can’t because there is nothing to fear. Whatever happens to me is the perfect next step to my awakening.

Anyway, this is my script, why should I be afraid of it. If I didn’t want to experience it, I wouldn’t write it in. Fear is an idea the ego mind designed to add drama to our stories, that’s all. It is no more real than anything else we experience in our dream of separation. There is no fear in God; I am in God and God is in me; therefore, there can be no fear in me. Now that makes sense.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Gentle Healing Journal Day 50 11-14-18

Journal for Day 50
LESSON 47

God is the strength in which I trust.

“3 God is your safety in every circumstance. His Voice speaks for Him in all situations and in every aspect of all situations, telling you exactly what to do to call upon His strength and His protection. There are no exceptions because God has no exceptions. And the Voice which speaks for Him thinks as He does.”


I know that I cannot, with the separated mind, make any good decisions or effect any real change. I know that, but it is a hard habit to break. I still try sometimes, probably more than I realize. But, I am changing and not slowly anymore, but changing daily.  I am learning to turn to the Voice for God for His guidance. I ask for His interpretation, His evaluation in all circumstances, usually right away, but always soon. I call on His strength because I have seen that I cannot depend on mine. I call on Him to protect my mind from the darkness of the ego.

“6 The recognition of your own frailty is a necessary step in the correction of your errors, but it is hardly a sufficient one in giving you the confidence which you need, and to which you are entitled. You must also gain an awareness that confidence in your real strength is fully justified in every respect and in all circumstances.”

I notice that if I hesitate it is for one of two reasons. Either I think I want what I want, or I think I am guilty and don’t deserve His help. Neither of these things happens often, but sometimes it does. I used today’s meditations to look at the places in my mind that have cost me the peace of God and to sink past my own weakness to the Source of real strength. It happened very quickly and it felt wonderful.

“7 In the latter phase of the practice period, try to reach down into your mind to a place of real safety. You will recognize that you have reached it if you feel a sense of deep peace, however briefly. Let go all the trivial things that churn and bubble on the surface of your mind, and reach down and below them to the Kingdom of Heaven. There is a place in you where there is perfect peace. There is a place in you where nothing is impossible. There is a place in you where the strength of God abides.”

It is not my own separate mind that brought me peace. None of its attempts to find solutions to any of my problems have helped in any permanent way. It is recognizing that I have in me the strength of God because I am in God and God is in me. We are God the Father and God the Son. This is why I always have access to this strength and so always have access to the solution no matter what form it takes. But to find this useful, I must let go of any desire to find the solution “on my own.” To do that, I have to let go of the desire to be on my own. I must let myself surrender into God.

Regina’s Tips

We are spending two days with Lesson 47, because it represents an important shift. It represents a shift from trusting in ‘me’ to trusting in a mystery that the mind cannot begin to fathom.

Our part is the willingness, and practice is the action-quality of willingness. The results come through mystery.

My Thoughts

I can always practice. I can give my willingness and when my willingness is not strong then I can practice until my willingness grows.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Gentle Healing Journal Day 47 11-13-18

Journal for Day 47
Chapter 9
VII. The Two Evaluations

Within our mind are two evaluations of our selves. The ego is unaware of what we are. It does not love us and is mistrustful of us.

“The ego is therefore capable of suspiciousness at best and viciousness at worst. That is its range. It cannot exceed it because of its uncertainty. And it can never go beyond it because it can never be certain.”

No matter how many self-help books I read, or what therapist I see, or how grand my accomplishments, there is nothing I can do that will change the ego evaluation of me. So there will always be thoughts in my mind that are critical and self-defeating. It is up to me whether I believe them or not.

“His (Holy Spirit’s) evaluation of you is based on His knowledge of what you are, and so He evaluates you truly. And this evaluation must be in your mind, because He is.”

The Holy Spirit looks on us with love. He is not deceived by anything we do, because He never forgets what we are. He evaluates us truly and because He is in our mind, so is that evaluation. There is a part of our mind that knows we are as God created us, perfect, and wholly peaceful.

Our purpose, while we are here, is to choose which of those evaluations we want to believe and identify with. We cannot do this by asking the ego to help you see differently.

“You cannot evaluate an insane belief system from within it. Its range precludes this. You can only go beyond it, look back from a point where sanity exists and see the contrast.”

So how do we do this? I do it by noticing when I have asked the ego for its interpretation of myself and then I ask the Holy Spirit instead. I know my goal is peace and happiness because that is God’s Will for me. The contrast in those two evaluations and the contrast between the effects of the choices I make are what are teaching me the judgment I want and trust.

Here is an example. I have always hated to ask people to do things for me. I could only be comfortable getting help if I paid for it. But to ask a favor was so uncomfortable that I seldom did it. In the back of my mind, I questioned this reaction but never let myself see the cause. People who love me have formed the habit of insisting on helping me.

That is what happened recently. I have to go to MD Anderson in Houston to get a whole battery of tests done. I will be there for 3 days. I really didn’t want to go alone, but I didn’t want to ask anyone to go with me. My family all work and it would be a major inconvenience even if it were possible. But I know them and I figured someone would step up.

Sure enough, my daughter said she was going to take me. Even though she volunteered and even though I wanted her to go with me, I argued that it was not necessary. She stated emphatically that she was going with me. I noticed all of my resistance but I’m so used to this reaction from myself that I didn’t think much of it.

It turned out the tests and the surgery are not going to be on the same day so I am going to seriously need someone to come with me for the surgery as well, and my daughter doesn’t have any more leave. I had to ask my brother and his wife. My thought was that it was a lot to ask but maybe they would be willing. I had my usual resistance to asking, but it had to be done.

Not only did they say yes but also they were so very loving about it. They responded with statements like, “we are all yours,” and “we love you bunches,” and when I thanked her she said, “welcome with all my heart.” Now here is the interesting part and the part that finally answered the question I had been ignoring. My immediate thought was, “Why are they loving me so much?”

The next thought was, “Oh, this is why I don’t like to ask for anything. I don’t think I deserve to be loved.” It completely cracked open, no, it shattered a long held secret belief that I didn’t deserve love and so it wasn’t right that I should get it without earning it in some way. That was clearly the ego’s evaluation of me, and I had believed it all my life without letting myself realize it. What an extraordinary revelation! I don’t think I can believe that anymore now that I have seen how unreal it must be.

Thank you, so much, Holy Spirit.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Gentle Healing Journal Day 46 11-12-18

Journal for Day 46
LESSON 46
God is the Love in which I forgive.

What a remarkable lesson this is! First we are reassured that God does not forgive because God does not condemn. But no matter that; it is His Love that is the basis of all forgiveness. This means that even if I have something difficult to forgive, I can do it because I am not forgiving with my ego self, but with the Love of God, which is always available to me because what is of God is also of me.

I am also told that all forgiveness is forgiveness of self. I have learned to think of it this way; I never forgive the other person, I only forgive my projections onto them. We condemn ourselves with the fear thoughts that we choose to believe, and, seeking relief, we then project those thoughts onto others and see them as guilty.

So when we forgive the other we are really forgiving ourselves and in forgiving we are released from fear and so no longer condemn. “Those who forgive are thus releasing themselves from illusions, while those who withhold forgiveness are binding themselves to them. As you condemn only yourself, so do you forgive only yourself.” As we forgive, we are literally undoing the ego and releasing ourselves from he illusion.

I thought I would not be able to find anyone to forgive, but immediately someone I know came into my mind. It is a “small” thing, and by that I mean it is not something that impacts my life in such a way that I think of it much. But if there is unforgiveness of any kind in my heart, I am still bound to the world. So how could I say that it is a small thing or a large thing? This morning, I am eager to forgive.

Regina’s Tip

The human idea of love is typically very different from the love of God. Since our ideas about love can be mistaken, we can also misunderstand a lesson that uses the word ‘love.’ So, let’s take a minute to look at ‘love.’

Love may be best defined as openness. Other words that help us grasp the meaning of love are allowance, non-judgment, non-interference. An example of love is the space in the room where you are sitting now (or the space outside, if you are outside now). If you contemplate the space around you, notice it is open, allowing, non-judgmental, and non-interfering. For example, if two lovers decide to make love in the space around you, the space does not get in the way of that. Its openness naturally allows that. Likewise, if one person violently murders another person in the space around you, the space does not get in the way of that. Its openness is as equally open to murder as it is to making love. The openness of space is so naturally open, it can’t be anything but open. Judgment and interference are impossibilities for the space around you.

God (our true nature) is exactly the same. It is completely open and it cannot be anything but completely open.
Love = openness.

My Thoughts
This was very interesting to me. It is another way altogether to see love. I wondered how I could see my own true nature as openness and Regina talked about that, too. She says that our natural openness is not the mind that judges, rejects and condemns, etc. She says this about our intrinsic openness.

You might notice that your intrinsic openness allows all sounds and all sensations. Notice there is no block to anything in your openness. It is simply openness. If the mind begins to chatter, look to see the openness that allows the chatter. This openness is completely natural for you. It’s an openness you cannot close.

Here is a process she recommends.

Forgiveness is open-allowance-without-clinging. It might look like this:

~ Someone insults me. (Happening)
~ I get angry. (Effect of believing the mind’s judgment of the previous happening.)
~ I see my anger. (Awareness)
~ I remember my purpose. (Heart)
~ I practice Rest – Accept – Trust. (Open-allowance-without-clinging)
~ The temporary event ends as all temporary events do.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Gentle Healing Journal Day 45 11-8-18

Journal for Day 45
LESSON 45

God is the Mind with which I think.

First, I re-read Lesson 44, God is the Light in which I see. I was reminded, “While you practice in this way, you leave behind everything that you now believe, and all the thoughts that you have made up. Properly speaking, this is the release from hell. Yet perceived through the ego’s eyes, it is loss of identity and a descent into hell.” This fear of losing my identity is the reason the ego fights so hard to keep my attention on its thoughts.

Here is what stood out to me this morning in Lesson 45.

“You think with the Mind of God. Therefore you share your thoughts with Him, as He shares His with you. They are the same thoughts, because they are thought by the same Mind.”

Yesterday, I learned that God is the light in which I see, and I was attempting to reach Him. What an astounding idea! I was attempting to reach God! Today, I am told that I share the Mind of God. We think the same thoughts. I think with the Mind of God. God’s Mind is my mind. I keep writing this in different ways because I want never again to lose sight of this fact. I am not this body with its brain. I am not this ego mind with its thoughts.

What I am is beyond comprehension to the ego mind. I approached this meditation with awe. I did not feel like I reached my real thoughts, the thoughts I think with God, but my desire to do so has taken on a sacredness of purpose that was not there before. I can do this because of what I am.

My failure to achieve my goal this morning was the result of the belief I am something else, something less. But this false identity is falling away because I am losing my interest in it. What did happen, is that my mind became very calm and peaceful with few thoughts. When the meditation was over, immediately thoughts began to enter my mind and the contrast was stark.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Gentle Healing Journal Day 44 11-7-18

Journal for Day 44
LESSON 44

God is the Light in which I see.

To be honest, I was dreading this lesson. I have always found meditation so hard. This time, as I approached the lesson, I felt my heart sink. What if I still cannot do this lesson successfully? What will that mean for me? I recognized those as dark ego thoughts. Heavy thoughts. Discouraging thoughts. I asked Jesus to help me see this differently.

“God is the light in which you see. You are attempting to reach Him.”

That is the sentence that was most meaningful to me this morning. It was also intimidating. In attempting to reach the light, I am attempting to reach God. I felt fear course through me and again, I realized that is just old ego thoughts trying to darken my mind to the possibility, even to the desirability of success.

So I went to my sanctuary and I sat in my meditation chair. I bought it last year and it’s still like new. ~smile~ I began the meditation and I did notice so many ego thoughts showing up, but I repeated that God is the Light in which I see each time I noticed the thoughts. I remembered that when I say the name of God the angels surround the ground on which I stand. They are here to keep me safe and to shelter my mind from every worldly thought.

Around you angels hover lovingly, to keep away all darkened thoughts of sin, and keep the light where it has entered in (T-26.IX.7:1).

Angels light the way, so that all darkness vanishes, and you are standing in a light so bright and clear that you can understand all things you see (W-pI.131.13:2).

This was very comforting and it was encouraging. I started doing what the lesson said. I would notice thoughts and sink below them. In about 20 minutes, I achieved something I have never done before. I felt the Light of God surround me. I stayed with it for a couple of minutes longer and then I reemerged into the world. It was an extraordinary experience. I thanked Jesus for His help and the angels that they protected my mind from darkness.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Gentle Healing Journal Day 43 11-5-18

Journal for Day 43
LESSON 43

God is my Source. I cannot see apart from Him.

“3 You cannot see apart from God because you cannot be apart from God. Whatever you do you do in Him, because whatever you think, you think with His Mind. If vision is real, and it is real to the extent to which it shares the Holy Spirit’s purpose, then you cannot see apart from God.”

I don’t actually see anything; I perceive, and there is not perception in God so there is not seeing in God. Reality is such a mystery. It is so very different than what we experience in the world that it is impossible to imagine what it must be like and just as hard to understand. We made the world to be different than reality, and oh boy, did we ever succeed!

The world is not meant to be eternal and so perception is not meant to be eternal. Perception is not knowledge and can never be knowledge and as God’s Son, we are meant for knowledge. It’s ok, though, because we have the Holy Spirit in our mind and that is our link with God. The Holy Spirit’s function is to purify our perception and to bring it as close to truth as we can experience while human.

God is a mystery to us. We are even a mystery to ourselves. How is it that in God we cannot see and yet, we cannot see apart from Him? The Holy Spirit is the answer to that question. As I look about me and as I remember situations and people I have thoughts about it all. These thoughts are my perceptions of them, perceptions from the ego mind.

When I remember that God is my Source and that I am in God and nowhere else regardless of these images I have made from my thoughts, I can remember also that I cannot see apart from God. I can then open my mind to the Holy Spirit’s interpretation of what I see and He will bring it more into alignment with truth. This occurs only because I am in God and therefore I think with His Mind.

I was at the mall the other day and saw that they had something new. It was a gaming area that uses virtual glasses to play the games. I watched the kids for a few minutes as they moved their bodies in a way that made sense only to them because they saw what no one else saw. They saw what was not real. What if they played the games so long that they forgot that what they were viewing wasn’t real? What if they thought the world of their game was reality.

The fact is that the rest of the world was not seeing what they were seeing and would not do so because we were not wearing their glasses. So the world does not see as they see and yet, they remain in the world and can think only with the same mind that the rest of us think with. This is what I imagine it is like for us.

We are using our eyes to see this virtual world and have gotten lost in the stories it shows us. But we haven’t gone anyplace and our Source, our Home, remains untouched by our play. Just as I cannot share in what the kids are seeing, God does not see in the way we see. And yet He did not leave us any more than we left Him.

Just as I could help talk the playing children back to reality so that they would be willing to remove their glasses and rejoin us, God placed in our minds a Guide who can do this for us. So when I say that God is my Source. I cannot see this desk apart from Him, I am acknowledging that my eyes are not showing me what is actually there.

Just as those kids were fighting opponents that only they could see, I am, through these virtual eyes of mine, sitting at a desk that only exists in my imagination. There was nothing before the kid’s eyes, and there is nothing before mine. At least, there is nothing that is as I see it. The Holy Spirit cannot make my world real, but He can reinterpret it for me so that I can get closer to reality, close enough that I can remember who I am.

After Reading Regina’s Tips

Regina says, “It is possible that your ego will tell you that you are only making up the related thoughts that come to you as you practice the workbook lessons, but if you remember that you don’t make up thoughts, YOU RECEIVE THEM, then you will know the thought about making up related thoughts is just a lower vibration thought trying to pull you back into the lower vibration thought stream again. Stay high.”

Reading this reminded me of when I first began doing the lessons. I had exactly that thought, that I was just making these thoughts up. I learned to accept that these thoughts were given to me by something outside my ego mind, and later still that I learned that all thoughts just show up rather than being made up by me. That was a very important lesson. I am not my thoughts and knowing that is what helped me shift out of guilt and into something more helpful.

© 2018, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this notice is included.

Tell a friend about this article.

Printable Page

Page 33 of 264 pages ‹ First  < 31 32 33 34 35 >  Last ›

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

Has this page been helpful to you?
Your contribution to support this site is greatly appreciated. To make a tax deductible contribution with a credit/debit card, click here.
Click here to donate from your PayPal account.
Or send a check to Pathways of Light, 12530 Lions Chase Court, Huntley, IL 60142.