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Manual for Teachers, Development of Trust, P 8. 2-5-20

A. Development of Trust, P 8
8 And finally, there is “a period of achievement.” It is here that learning is consolidated. Now what was seen as merely shadows before become solid gains, to be counted on in all “emergencies” as well as tranquil times. Indeed, the tranquility is their result; the outcome of honest learning, consistency of thought and full transfer. This is the stage of real peace, for here is Heaven’s state fully reflected. From here, the way to Heaven is open and easy. In fact, it is here. Who would “go” anywhere, if peace of mind is already complete? And who would seek to change tranquility for something more desirable? What could be more desirable than this?

For a long time, I had periods of undisturbed peace and I had times when joy simply welled up in me, joy that is not attached to anything, that simply was. For a very long time, the peace and the joy didn’t last. I would suddenly feel anxious or sad or guilty. There seemed always to be a reason for this, something that happened in my life that pulled me out of this happy state.

Of course, this could not be the case. I don’t actually react to what happens in my life. What happens in my life is a direct result of what happens in my mind. I then create the fiction that I don’t know why life picks on me, and I am just the innocent victim of circumstances. But I knew better, even as I lied to myself there was a place in me that knew better. I alone am responsible for everything in my life, so it must be that I kicked myself out of paradise. Again.

I’ve been teaching from The Obstacles to Peace, specifically, The Fear of God, and this week we were on The Lifting of the Veil. We stand before the veil that seems to hide from us the face of Christ, and yet we do not move it aside. We stand trembling in terror at the fear of God. And yet, this is what we have come for, to move the veil aside and remember God.

What remains undone? How do we overcome the fear of God? This is what the Course tells us.
Before complete forgiveness you still stand unforgiving. You are afraid of God because you fear your brother. Those you do not forgive you fear. And no one reaches love with fear beside him.

And so, I saw that my learning was not complete, my beliefs were not consistent if I still looked on my brother from time to time and saw him as the enemy. I realized that I would not awaken while I look at him with the body’s eyes and believed what they told me, completely forgetting that they only report back to me what I want to see.

I had to accept that I and I alone am responsible for everything in my life and I had to forgive all grievances if I were ever to awaken. I did this. I forgave the idea that there was anything to forgive. I forgave the idea that guilt is real. My final forgiveness was to release the guilt I held against myself and I did that with the help of Jesus. When that was done, when that miracle occurred, everything changed.

I awoke to the realization that this is not my life and I am not this character. Sure, I had been learning and teaching this for years and I believed it, but believing something is true is not the same as knowing it is true. The ego mind is like a clingy ex-boyfriend and tries to re-establish our relationship any time I give it a chance, so I have to remain vigilant for its insane thoughts. It’s not hard to reject them anymore because I’m not fooled by them and not interested. This state of being while in the world is worth everything it took to get here.

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions, I. True Empathy, P 5. 2-5-20

I. True Empathy P 5
T-16.I.5. The triumph of weakness is not what you would offer to a brother. 2 And yet you recognize no triumph but this. 3 This is not knowledge, and the form of empathy which would bring this about is so distorted that it would imprison what it would release. 4 The unredeemed cannot redeem, yet they have a Redeemer. 5 Attempt to teach Him not. 6 You are the learner; He the Teacher. 7 Do not confuse your role with His, for this will never bring peace to anyone. 8 Offer your empathy to Him for it is His perception and His strength that you would share. 9 And let Him offer you His strength and His perception, to be shared through you.

Journal
Sympathy, constructed from the Greek “sym,” meaning together, and “pathos,” referring to feelings or emotion, is used to describe when one person shares the same feelings of another, such as when someone close is experiencing grief or loss. Empathy is a newer word also related to “pathos,” but there is a greater implication of emotional distance. With “empathy” you can imagine or understand to how someone might feel, without necessarily having those feelings yourself.

I seldom feel sympathy because I don’t believe in the world and because I know that the feelings that are triggered by the story we are reviewing are for the purpose of healing. I tend to feel happy for the person who now has a chance to be healed of some painful belief knowing that this is what it is for and that it is always possible to accomplish healing.

On the other hand, I do feel empathy in that I know how resistant we can be when faced with these deeply rooted beliefs and how painful it is when we resist. The problem is that the waters can be muddied in certain circumstances, especially if I, too, have the same belief, or if I had it for a long time and the healing is still new. The mind can slip back into old thinking if triggered. Then there is conflict in my mind. Part of my mind wants to feel bad and part knows this is not helpful.

This paragraph helps to deal with this kind of reaction. In fact, it can prevent the confusion altogether. Now when I notice I feel empathy, I am going to give it to the Holy Spirit straight away. I will let Him teach me how to perceive it and I will rely on His strength when I share. Now I never have to worry about what to say or do in any situation because I will be told. I will never add to someone’s confusion with my own. I will never weaken when I could strengthen. This is such a relief knowing I am not on my own; I always have Help.

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Manual for Teachers, Development of Trust, P 7. 1-28-20

A. Development of Trust, P 7
7 The next stage is indeed “a period of unsettling.” Now must the teacher of God understand that he did not really know what was valuable and what was valueless. All that he really learned so far was that he did not want the valueless, and that he did want the valuable. Yet his own sorting out was meaningless in teaching him the difference. The idea of sacrifice, so central to his own thought system, had made it impossible for him to judge. He thought he learned willingness, but now he sees that he does not know what the willingness is for. And now he must attain a state that may remain impossible to reach for a long, long time. He must learn to lay all judgment aside, and ask only what he really wants in every circumstance. Were not each step in this direction so heavily reinforced, it would be hard indeed!

My problem when I was at this step was that I thought I could do this on my own. Later, I came to realize that there is no me alone; there is me with the Holy Spirit and me with the ego. When I think I am doing something on my own, I am actually using the split mind to do my thinking. I have learned to use the holy mind instead.

Another problem I had was that I wanted to decide what was valuable and what was valueless. I wanted to decide what I would keep and what I would release. This, of course, brought the ego into the process and derailed it. I learned that I want the Holy Spirit to decide for me because I have no other way of making good decisions. I no longer say, “Here is an idea, please help me decide if I want to keep it.” I say instead, “Here is an idea. Is it helpful? If not, please remove it.”

I have learned that I don’t even know what anything is for and so how could I make good judgments? I am lost in my mind, dreaming of a world that could never exist. Christopher Nolan’s film Inception features a classic optical illusion called the Penrose staircase, which folds back upon itself in space. You can walk it forever and never get anyplace but on the staircase. This is a perfect metaphor for our life here. Until we choose to allow ourselves to be led out of illusion, we are just walking the Penrose staircase.

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions, I. True Empathy, P 4. 1-28-20

I. True Empathy P 4
T-16.I.4. True empathy is of Him Who knows what it is. 2 You will learn His interpretation of it if you let Him use your capacity for strength, and not for weakness. 3 He will not desert you, but be sure that you desert not Him. 4 Humility is strength in this sense only; that to recognize and accept the fact that you do not know is to recognize and accept the fact that He does know. 5 You are not sure that He will do His part, because you have never yet done yours completely. 6 You cannot know how to respond to what you do not understand. 7 Be tempted not in this, and yield not to the ego’s triumphant use of empathy for its glory.

Journal
What is required of me is full surrender. I don’t know what to say or do in any situation. I don’t know what anything means or what it is for. There have been times when I thought I did know. Someone was suffering and I thought that I knew how they felt and why. What I meant was that I knew how I would feel in that situation. And even then, I did not have what it would take to answer their fear based on my own feelings and my past experiences.
What a relief it is to know that I am not alone in responding to suffering. The sad fact of the matter is that I still believe in suffering. Not so much as I used to, but once in a while, I feel an answering pain and for that moment, I have joined in their suffering and made it stronger. This is not a helpful response, not for them, for me or for the Sonship. I remember that I am never alone in experiencing the effects of my thoughts and so I want to offer my brothers healing and love, not pain and suffering. I want to teach strength, not weakness.

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Manual for Teachers, Development of Trust, P 6. 1-20-20

A. Development of Trust, P 6
6 Now comes “a period of settling down.” This is a quiet time, in which the teacher of God rests a while in reasonable peace. Now he consolidates his learning. Now he begins to see the transfer value of what he has learned. Its potential is literally staggering, and the teacher of God is now at the point in his progress at which he sees in it his whole way out. “Give up what you do not want, and keep what you do.” How simple is the obvious! And how easy to do! The teacher of God needs this period of respite. He has not yet come as far as he thinks. Yet when he is ready to go on, he goes with mighty companions beside him. Now he rests a while, and gathers them before going on. He will not go on from here alone.

It is at this step that I began to see that not only did I suffer when I made certain choices, but that I suffered every time I made those choices. It was the previous step that helped me to discern what was valuable and what was not so that I could make choices that would eventually enlighten me. Each choice for God brought more light into my mind. It really is simple. When faced with making a choice, I only have to ask if this choice will awaken me? If not, I would lose interest in it. Eventually. 

I also began to notice that the form didn’t matter, but was just an ego distraction that I used to keep me unaware that I was making the same error over and over. I was dressing the same error in various costumes and pretending they were, therefore, different and so needed to be investigated. Here is an example of this.

I used to feel guilty when I thought of a mistake I made raising my children. So, I would notice how this makes me feel, realize that it wasn’t bringing me closer to God and so accept the Atonement for this judgment. In other words, I forgave it. Then later, I would remember a time I was thoughtless and noticing that I felt guilty, I would bring this to the Holy Spirit for correction, too.

When I thought someone else was guilty, I felt just as bad as when I thought I was guilty. So, I would let that belief go as well. I continued to bring these guilt thoughts one at a time until finally I realized that no matter how you experience guilt; it is just guilt. The circumstances don’t change this basic fact. Transfer of learning was occurring and finally, I was able to forgive the belief in guilt itself.

When one gets to this place of relative peace and contemplation, it is an error to think it’s done. Having come through so much confusion and fear, and having made so much progress, then suddenly feeling this peace and having these insights is heady stuff. But one begins to see that all is not done. This was just a coffee break. ~smile~ It was also interesting to me that while passing through these various stages, it was not clear to me where I was. It was only in retrospect that I could discern the changes. I had to be out of it to see where I had been.

© 2020, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions, I. True Empathy, P 3. 1-20-20

Chapter 16: I. True Empathy P 3
T-16.I.3. Your part is only to remember this; you do not want anything you value to come of a relationship. 2 You choose neither to hurt it nor to heal it in your own way. 3 You do not know what healing is. 4 All you have learned of empathy is from the past. 5 And there is nothing from the past that you would share, for there is nothing from the past that you would keep. 6 Do not use empathy to make the past real, and so perpetuate it. 7 Step gently aside, and let healing be done for you. 8 Keep but one thought in mind and do not lose sight of it, however tempted you may be to judge any situation, and to determine your response by judging it. 9 Focus your mind only on this:

10 I am not alone, and I would not intrude the past upon my Guest.
11 I have invited Him, and He is here.
12 I need do nothing except not to interfere.

Journal
I used to say that relationships are hard. This is because I was trying to define the relationship and to control it so that it became something I thought I wanted. My relationships always suffered from my efforts to do this and so I was always working on them until I gave up and let them go. But then there were the relationships with my children. I couldn’t give up on them, and didn’t know what to do to repair them.

My problem was that I was always trying to heal the rifts that were there or that I imagined were there. But I didn’t know how to do this. I would hear my child say something that felt like an attack and then I would think of ways I had failed them in the past and I would feel like they were justified in their attack. I would try to do something to make up for the past but nothing seemed to work. I always felt separated from their love.

Eventually, I stepped aside from my desire to fix my relationships and from my desire to make up for past errors. I stepped aside and allowed the Holy Spirit to correct and heal. A strange thing happened. My children showered me with love. I didn’t do anything outwardly to cause this. Honestly, I think there was nothing wrong with the relationships in the first place. It was my guilt for imagined wrongs that was haunting me and overshadowing what was right before me.

Sure, I made lots of mistakes in the past and many of those mistakes involved my children, but I was the only one keeping score. Evidently, I was the only one who was judging me. My judgment of myself and my belief that my past sins were affecting my present relationships kept me from seeing what was right before me. Because of my distorted vision, I could not do anything to heal my mind and thus my relationships, but the Holy Spirit sees clearly and knows the truth about us. Stepping back and letting Him do His job corrected my thinking and healed my mind and what I discovered was love everywhere I looked.

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Manual for Teachers, Development of Trust, P 5. 1-16-20

A. Development of Trust, P 5
M-4.1.A.5 The third stage through which the teacher of God must go can be called “a period of relinquishment.” If this is interpreted as giving up the desirable, it will engender enormous conflict. Few teachers of God escape this distress entirely. There is, however, no point in sorting out the valuable from the valueless unless the next obvious step is taken. Therefore, the period of overlap is apt to be one in which the teacher of God feels called upon to sacrifice his own best interests on behalf of truth. He has not realized as yet how wholly impossible such a demand would be. He can learn this only as he actually does give up the valueless. Through this, he learns that where he anticipated grief, he finds a happy light-heartedness instead; where he thought something was asked of him, he finds a gift bestowed on him.

Studying A Course in Miracles I have come to appreciate how Peter felt when Jesus called him to get out of the boat and walk on the water toward him. And like Peter, I have often stepped out onto the water only to become overcome by fear and to sink back into the ego, doubt and uncertainty seeming to pull me under.

But what I did was to recognize my mistake in choosing the ego as my advisor and my interpreter. I would then choose again, though reporting this makes it seem simple and easy. It may have been simple but it was hardly easy. Giving up the idea that I was making my own choices outside either ego or Holy Spirit was hard. At first, it felt dangerous to consciously submit even to the Holy Spirit. What did He know about my happiness and about what was important to me?

Eventually, though, as my willingness grew from repeated practices, I began to surrender willingly, recognizing that, after all, Jesus was right. Everything is in my best interests. More and more frequently, I let go of trying to direct my life. Eventually, I came to understand that this charade I call my life was just a way to closely observe the effects of the beliefs I held, and that relinquishing a belief that brought me suffering was not a sacrifice at all.

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