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Gentle Healing Lesson 153 Part 2, Manual for Teachers, Text.  7-8-19

Gentle Healing Lesson 153 Part 2
“We look past dreams today, and recognize that we need no defense because we are created unassailable, without all thought or wish or dream in which attack has any meaning.”

Be still a moment, and in silence think how holy is your purpose, how secure you rest, untouchable within its light. … And who could be more mightily protected?

In my everyday life, I see that this holds true for me. When I am afraid and defending myself, I feel attacked even when there is no attack. I feel vulnerable to attack not yet seen. For instance, when I think about my mom and her sister dying from Alzheimer’s if I follow that thought, I begin to worry about myself.

I am attracted to articles claiming the latest research and maybe adding another supplement to my daily regime because the claim is that it might help prevent that disease. This kind of defense seems natural and necessary to the ego mind, but all that it is doing is destroying my peace of mind and leading me away from Heaven.

On the other hand, when I remember that it is in my defenselessness that my safety lies, I hand the future over to the Holy Spirit. I surrender my mind to His use and I don’t have to think about it anymore or worry about it. It is no longer in my hands, as if it ever were, really. I am at peace, and happy and closer to knowing my Self and living from that Self. Ultimately, living from my true Self all the time, I can be completely defenseless at all times and at all times I will be in peace.

“Now we cannot fear, for we have left all fearful thoughts behind.”
Jesus leaves us this major clue in case we are unsure how to ensure defenselessness. Can I stop thinking fearful thoughts? I have not achieved that state as of yet, but when I think back to what my life used to be, I see such a difference that I know it is possible. I used to be afraid of everything. I tried to defend myself from every possible bad outcome, being careful, always on the alert for disaster, buying more insurance. None of these defenses did anything for me other than to make me more nervous.

Now I have learned that I have choices about my thoughts. I notice a fear thought and I decide if I am going to follow that thought or let it go. As I do this more and more often, I see that it has made a difference in my peace of mind and that the fear thoughts have slowed down. I suppose that is because I am not so interested. The only way to stop them completely is to remember my Self. My Self knows Who it is and knows no fear. My Self knows my choices here will not hurt who I am.

“It is the function of God’s ministers to help their brothers choose as they have done. …For you will not see the light, until you offer it to all your brothers. As they take it from your hands, so will you recognize it as your own.”

Over and over throughout the Course, Jesus tells us that to have Heaven, I must help my brothers achieve Heaven. How do I help my brothers? The most helpful thing I can do is to remember my Self or as Jesus says, my only function is to accept the Atonement for myself. I know that when I interact with those who have done is, I feel stronger and more certain myself.

When I have a challenge and need help with it, I turn to those who no longer believe in problems.

But even now, though I have not awakened fully, I have the opportunity to be helpful. When someone shares their problem with me, I don’t commiserate. I don’t help them look in the world a solution. Instead, I offer what works for me. I help them find the root cause. I offer forgiveness solutions. I help them see another way to approach the issue, a way that does not foster more fear. As I do this, my faith grows stronger and it is easier for me to see the truth the next time I am challenged.

“Salvation can be thought of as a game that happy children play.”

The world is not real, it is an illusion, a virtual playground that we enter through our thoughts. With thoughts that are in alignment with the thoughts of God, we can enter through the fun house and play games of salvation. Or with thoughts of the ego, thoughts of guilt and fear, we can enter through the dark gate and into the creep show.

We buy the ticket we want with our thoughts. So, I watch my thoughts and I watch my words. They will tell me what it is I believe and what I believe is what I want. I have learned which thoughts to encourage and which thoughts to release. It doesn’t have to feel like a deathly serious game. We are perfectly safe no matter which choice we make. Death is not real.

But, if we want a more pleasant experience, we can play the game consistently choosing those thoughts which keep us going in the direction that brings us more happiness, and closer to the gate that takes us out of the game. I used to watch my thoughts and forgive the ones that were not true, but I did it with a vengeance as if my every poor choice was the sin that would condemn me to hell forever. I would make a choice for ego thinking and I would double-down on the error by feeling guilty for it.

Now, I spin the wheel and whatever comes up is good. Either I will choose the thought that will bring me closer to happiness, or I will choose the one that will bring me something I don’t want. Either way, I win because I learn through contrast. I choose God and I receive joy and peace. I choose ego and what I get causes me to suffer and I learn what it is I don’t want the next time. It’s a win-win. I don’t have a choice about playing the game, but I can choose to play it consistency with curiosity and with a light heart knowing that in the end, I cannot lose.

“Today our theme is our defenselessness. We clothe ourselves in it, as we prepare to meet the day. We rise up strong in Christ, and let our weakness disappear, as we remember that His strength abides in us. We will remind ourselves that He remains beside us through the day, and never leaves our weakness unsupported by His strength. We call upon His strength each time we feel the threat of our defenses undermine our certainty of purpose. We will pause a moment, as He tells us, “I am here.”

Manual for Teachers
I don’t understand the world. I don’t understand anything about it because I have been trying to understand with the ego thinking mind. The ego can’t help me see what is really here because the ego doesn’t know what is really here. It only knows what it wants to see here and so that is all it can show me. The ego is interested in only separation and separation breeds anger, fear, guilt, pain, suffering of every kind, and death. It offers small doses of fleeting pleasure, and just enough satisfaction to keep us from seeking elsewhere.

When I try to imagine what the world is like without the ego, I imagine all living things existing in harmony in the Garden of Eden, paradise. This is the real world, the world of peace, and it exists this very moment right behind the world of the ego. We can’t see paradise because we are focused outward at the illusion, and paradise is within. However, my experience has been that I can live a much happier, more peaceful dream as I learn to disregard the ego and focus on what the HS shows me instead. I heard Kevin Rice say it this way: Don’t follow that thought!!! It is thought believed that causes suffering, so don’t believe the ego thoughts and don’t give them your attention. If the ego is showing us hell and we want paradise, then we have to stop following the ego into hell.

Text
Be humble before Him, and yet great in Him.

What I think this means to me is that it is God in me that is great and that works through me. It is not the ego in me that is holy, but rather it is in undoing the ego that I am released from littleness and can take my place beside Jesus in saving the world. Yes, the power of God is in me and it is through this power that we perform miracles as is His Will and our will, too. But I cannot use that power if I am trying to manipulate the world using the ego mind.

That is the difference between God’s plan for salvation and my ego plan. In my ego plan, I look at the effects of ego thinking and try to save these effects using more ego thoughts. Today, in doing Lesson 347, I was reminded of how we misunderstand salvation. Here is what I wrote.

Something that helped me to see what I have been doing is a message from the Holy Spirit shared by Regina Dawn Akers, in which He was helping her see that she uses her body as a depository for her sense of unworthiness. The way she explained it is that she looks at her body and feels unworthy and thinks it is the body that makes her feel this way. The Holy Spirit helped her to see that it works the other way around. She feels unworthy, projects it onto the body and then she can hope to improve the body and thereby become worthy. It is her plan for salvation. When I read this it was like a bright light came on in a darkened room.

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Gentle Healing Lesson 153, Manual for Teachers, Text.  7-1-19

Gentle Healing Lesson 153
In my defenselessness my safety lies.

“You who feel threatened by this changing world, its twists of fortune and its bitter jests, its brief relationships and all the “gifts” it merely lends to take away again; attend this lesson well. The world provides no safety. It is rooted in attack, and all its “gifts” of seeming safety are illusory deceptions. It attacks, and then attacks again. No peace of mind is possible where danger threatens thus.”

Anyone who has had a sudden inexplicable disease or accident knows that the world provides no safety against this. It is the same with finances. You can have the best plan in the world and save and invest wisely, and still, have it all come tumbling down even though there was no flaw in your strategy. Relationships crumble, people you love die. The world provides no safety and that is just a fact.

“The world gives rise but to defensiveness. For threat brings anger, anger makes attack seem reasonable, honestly provoked, and righteous in the name of self-defense. Yet is defensiveness a double threat. For it attests to weakness, and sets up a system of defense that cannot work. Now are the weak still further undermined, for there is treachery without and still a greater treachery within. The mind is now confused, and knows not where to turn to find escape from its imaginings.”

When things seem to go wrong with our plans, we can become angry or depressed, which is two sides of the same coin. In anger, we project our guilt outward in an attempt to defend ourselves. In depression, we project the guilt on ourselves which is a different kind of defense, one in which we punish ourselves in hopes of preventing further punishment from without (from God).

When we think we are victimized and unfairly treated we feel justified in defending ourselves. We think this is going to get us something we want, but the only thing it gets us is more unhappiness and more fear because the need for defense seems to prove we need defense. Not only do we feel attacked from without, but now we feel attacked from within because nothing we do helps and we are left confused.

“It is as if a circle held it fast, wherein another circle bound it and another one in that, until escape no longer can be hoped for nor obtained. Attack, defense; defense, attack, become the circles of the hours and the days that bind the mind in heavy bands of steel with iron overlaid, returning but to start again. There seems to be no break nor ending in the ever-tightening grip of the imprisonment upon the mind.”

How have we endured this for so long? How could we have been so blind to what was actually happening for so long? In my past marriage, it seemed to me like my husband was the cause of all the misery I felt and I was constantly defending against his attacks on my peace. Even as a Course student, I failed to see the obvious, that whatever he did it was my mind that was making me miserable. It was my defenses that were binding me to the misery I suffered. It was my own thoughts and my continual defenses causing the confusion that was keeping me from seeing my part and thus releasing myself.

“You do not realize what you have done to sabotage the holy peace of God by your defensiveness. For you behold the Son of God as but a victim to attack by fantasies, by dreams, and by illusions he has made; yet helpless in their presence, needful only of defense by still more fantasies, and dreams by which illusions of his safety comfort him.”

This was me in my marriage. I felt attacked and attacked in return as if my defenses could somehow save me from my own thoughts. This world is my illusion, the image of beliefs in my mind projected outward, seen as real and defended as true. Then I pretend that I don’t know where it all came from as if it has nothing to do with me.

Instead, I pretend that I am being acted upon by someone else and so it must be their fault. This is what I was doing to my husband. I was using him as the scapegoat for my own choices, and at the same time, I was teaching us both that we are helpless against the dreams of our desires. This is what I do every time I defend myself. I scare myself and I lose myself and I feel helpless against a hopeless situation.

“Defenselessness is strength. It testifies to recognition of the Christ in you. Perhaps you will recall the text maintains that choice is always made between Christ’s strength and your own weakness, seen apart from Him. Defenselessness can never be attacked, because it recognizes strength so great attack is folly, or a silly game a tired child might play, when he becomes too sleepy to remember what he wants.”

This was the answer to the self-made prison in which I found myself in my marriage. I was not able to come to this realization while I was in the marriage, but once out of it, I did the work necessary to heal the relationship. I remembered that defenselessness is strength. I remembered that I had been choosing my own weakness but that I could choose Christ’s strength because it is mine to choose.

Once I realized this and made up my mind that the peace of God was far more important to me than being right, it was just a matter of letting the grievances come up and meeting them armored in love instead of blame. Through the strength of God in me, I was able to release my defenses and see all of the acts that I had once decided were unforgivable as simply unimportant.

“For our true purpose is to save the world, and we would not exchange for foolishness the endless joy our function offers us. We would not let our happiness slip by because a fragment of a senseless dream happened to cross our minds, and we mistook the figures in it for the Son of God; its tiny instant for eternity.”

When my husband and I were married there was absolutely no way either one of us could have acted differently, working from the beliefs we both held at that time. More importantly, none of it was Reality. It was all a dream, an ancient memory we had put before our eyes so we could perhaps see it differently this time. And even the first time around it was just thoughts of something impossible, thoughts of something different from Reality.

There are moments within the day in which I play those childish games of defense, but I am very aware of them now and so change my mind as quickly as possible. For instance, I have times, though rarely, when I start to worry about money and my defense is to plan ways to earn more or spend less or something else within the world. I can even become angry with (defend against) someone who owes me money and has not paid me or may not pay me. But when this happens, I recognize it for what it is. I am not letting my happiness slip by because a fragment of a senseless dream happened to cross my mind.

Manual for Teachers
Because I desire healing and to heal and because I am willing to do my part to achieve this, I am vigilant for judgments in my mind and as quickly as I can I let them go. The peace I experience and the peace that those around me tend to experience is witness to my role as healer.

Here is something that has been important to me in this process. If I find myself judging a person or a situation the temptation is to remove myself from what I am judging to relieve myself of that discomfort. But I don’t do that. The person or situation is my savior and I will lose my opportunity to be saved if I distance myself.

Text
I am as God created me, and I am this eternally without exception. I am like God because God created me like Him. Nothing that is unlike God exists. “Nothing beyond Him can happen, because nothing except Him is real.” So all the things I see and do and believe cannot be real if they are unlike God. I must be dreaming, living an illusion.

Because of what I am as God’s Son, I can choose to experience even that which is not real. If I am experiencing something, it is because I chose to do so.  My holy mind establishes everything that happens to me. My responses to what happens to me are determined by my perceptions and my perceptions are determined by my mind. I am completely responsible in every way for all that I see and how I see it.

Perhaps at one time this would have felt oppressive. I do remember feeling overwhelmed at times and asking Holy Spirit to help me. Two things happened that helped me to see it all differently, and to accept the responsibility that is clearly mine. The first was that I realized I am responsible for the world I see, but I am not guilty for it.

The only reason I was running from the responsibility, trying to project it onto others is because I thought I was guilty. It was the guilt that was oppressing me, not the responsibility. Once I realized that I could not be guilty, and could accept at least to some degree that I am the completely free Son of God and can have any experience I want, I felt the burden of guilt lift and I could breathe again.

Once I was not afraid of my responsibility I could see that this knowledge was my salvation. If I am responsible for everything that means I can change my mind and undo what has been done. If my holy mind established everything I presently see, it can establish that which I now prefer to see. I do this through the Holy Spirit in my mind.

And that brings me to the second really important understanding. I do not heal my mind; the Holy Spirit does that on my behalf. I have an essential role to play, and that is to understand I need healing and then to desire and accept that healing. The rest is accomplished without my help. I think of this as setting aside all thinking, all active participation. I sit quietly in God and invite healing to take place. I open to healing and I allow it to happen.

It sounds so easy, and it is easy. Yet, I still some resistance, but not much. I see the ego mind trying to take a bigger part, but I don’t fall for that anymore. I used to fear that nothing this easy could be valuable but I have through practice come to realize the value of doing my simple part. I used to see myself choosing to stay in the story, trying to find a solution there, being the one who succeeds. But now more often than not, I see myself returning, over and over, to that quiet place in my mind, inviting the truth to join me there.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Gentle Healing Lesson 152, Manual for Teachers, Text.  6-28-19

LESSON 152
The power of decision is my own.

“Here is your world, complete in all details. Here is its whole reality for you. And it is only here salvation is.”

This is one of my favorite lessons, one I refer to frequently because it is the answer to why I am having any particular experience. Jesus is completely uncompromising in his words in this lesson. If something is in my life, it is there because I made a decision for it. Nothing is exempt from this. And if there is something missing, it is because I chose to omit it. The responsibility for my life lies in my decisions, the choices I make.

When I first started using this lesson, I turned it on myself. I saw my error and I felt guilty for it. I learned to think of this differently, though, and to realize that I am 100% responsible but 0% guilty. This freed me up to make good use of this lesson. Understanding that I am responsible for everything in my life means that if I don’t like my life, all I have to do is change my mind about what I have decided. I can always choose differently. What is not to like about this lesson!

“Salvation is the recognition that the truth is true, and nothing else is true.”

It is essential that we accept the second part of this sentence if the first part is to be true. This is where we tend to go astray in our thinking. In order for this to be true we must accept that we are exactly as God created us. Nothing has changed about that. What I am is a Thought in the Mind of God. I am not subject to sickness, to suffering, to death. If any of these things occur and they do occur in the illusion, I have chosen to experience them. They could not happen otherwise because God did not create them therefore, they cannot be part of anything He did create.

Even if we believe this there is a tendency to deny responsibility for certain things that occur in life. The ego response is to look outward for a cause and to project blame for the event on what we find there. I have had situations in my life that I could swear were caused by others. There was a time when I was betrayed by someone close to me and I could not, for the life of me, see how that was my doing. And yet, when I chose to forgive the whole situation, I began to see it differently, and what I saw was not betrayal at all. Even if someone wanted to betray me and believed they had done so, I cannot be betrayed if I don’t believe in betrayal.

“You but accuse Him of insanity, to think He made a world where such things seem to have reality.”

We made this world for the very purpose of experiencing duality. We wanted to have opposites so that is what we have. In this world we made there is good and bad, happiness and sadness, sickness and health, etc. But in God there is only God and God is Love, God is Life. This is how we know that God could not have created the world. There are no opposites in God. If my experience is not one of love, joy, health, life, and other attributes of God, then I know that I must have made it. God creates through extension of Himself. He does not create what does not exist within Himself. He is not insane. We are.

I’m looking forward to delving into this Lesson further tomorrow.

Regina’s Tips
Here are few examples of the types of decisions you may see yourself make as you watch for the decisions that shape your experience.
I don’t want to do this.
I hate … (traffic, this heat, mean people, stupid people, myself, etc.)
I will never be able to …
I don’t have enough …
I’m tired of this.
He/she is … (annoying, wrong, stupid, lazy, etc.)
I’m so … (stupid, lazy, ugly, etc.)
I have too much to do.
They think … about me.
This situation is unacceptable.
I’ll be happy when I get …
I’ll be safe when I get …
I won’t ever … (understand this, be able to do this, get to go there, etc.)
No one ever pays attention to me.
This always happens to me.
This is too good; something bad is going to happen next.
This isn’t fair.

As you watch for the decisions you make, notice both the decisions and how those decisions affect your experience. Ask yourself, “If I made a different decision about this, how would my experience be different?” Look both at the circumstance and your emotional experience to see if you can find at least one way your experience would be different if you made a different decision.

My Thoughts
As I read that list of decisions that people commonly make and that affect their experience, I saw some that sometimes apply to me. On the other hand, I saw many that used to apply to me but that I have stopped doing because I didn’t like the effects. This is why my life is so much happier than it used to be. I’ve learned to make better decisions. I continue to watch my mind for those decisions that have not yet been changed.

Gentle Healing Lesson 152 Day 2
“The power of decision is my own. This day I will accept myself as what my Father’s Will created me to be.”

“Then will we wait in silence, giving up all self-deceptions, as we humbly ask our Self that He reveal Himself to us.”

Does it sound arrogant to think of yourself as the Son of God? Arrogance is of the ego that thinks it is its own creator, that it can usurp God and distort what He made. Humility is laying all we made aside and accepting our true nature, accepting our self as God created us. This means that we must lay aside all self concepts. Those self concepts are every little thing we think of our selves after we say I am. The only descriptive words that apply to us are those that apply to God.

In the past when I got to this part I would feel uneasy. I was afraid to ask, afraid that it wouldn’t happen and what that might mean about me and about the truth. Then later, I was afraid because I didn’t expect it to happen, the past proved it wouldn’t happen and I felt guilty for my lack of faith. Now, I just wonder if today I will know my Self. Maybe I will. I prepare my mind to accept this as I release what I think I know and what I think I need and as I apply the power of decision toward this goal. Then I wait and let Him do what must be done, the part that is not mine. I trust my Self to know the right time.

Manual for Teachers
Why it is healing should never be repeated.
When we heal a patient, the only reason we would repeat it is if we looked at the patient and decided that the outward appearance indicates a failure to heal. This is lack of trust and lack of trust is an attack. I bet that everyone has had this experience at one time or another. I know that when my friend was drinking, I asked for healing for him and it seemed like nothing was happening except more drinking, more trips to the emergency room, more near-death experiences.

I lacked trust because I believed what my eyes showed me. I forgot that the eyes show us only the illusion. Eventually, I was able to disregard what I saw with my eyes and to trust that Love heals. It took me a while because I let fear distract me from the truth and so I had to accept healing for myself first, then I could offer healing. This is just an error and not a sin. An error can be corrected and it was. That is why Jesus tells us that our function is to accept the Atonement for ourselves. We can’t give what we don’t have.

Text
Thinking about reality and limits
I have been thinking a lot about the world not being real. I have been paying attention to how it shifts according to my beliefs and my thoughts. Sometimes it is quite remarkable to see this. I have even experimented with controlling bodily things that should be out of my control. Because, after all, if the body is just a projection of an idea, then I should be able to change it at will.

So what are the arbitrary limits I am placing on myself? I think that some pain and some injuries are not real and I watch them disappear. But some pain and some injuries seem real to me, too real for me to control. This doesn’t make sense, but there you are. I believe that I will always have the money and the things I need even though I can’t tell you where it will come from. But I put a limit on that. For instance, I would like to go to Hawaii, but I don’t seriously plan it because my imagination doesn’t stretch my budget that far. However, it is not a strict limit. I can imagine that somehow it could happen. Who knows?

I want to wake up and I think I can accept that, but so far, no go. Maybe I have a limit there. Maybe I can be close and almost there, but not all the way. I don’t know. I also believe it could happen. Maybe it has and I just forgot to notice. LOL.

I want never again to experience guilt, but when I look in my mind, I see that I must be limiting that as well, but it is easier to let it go when I do find it and it doesn’t show up as much as it used to. I think it is a good idea to check in with myself and see where I have placed limits. Does it matter that this character, Myron, has limits? Not really, but her life is a good classroom in which to work at removing the limits I have arbitrarily chosen to believe in.

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Gentle Healing Lesson 151, Manual for Teachers, Text.  6-18-19

LESSON 151
All things are echoes of the Voice for God.

“You cannot judge. You merely can believe the ego’s judgments, all of which are false.”

I read this lesson then stopped to do my meditation. I began the meditation by asking to be enlightened to how this lesson helps me to know my Self. This is how I begin all my meditations, with a request to know my Self. I used a guided meditation to lead me into the process. This meditation guided me to rest and was very effective in doing so.

When I was fully rested, it was pointed out that this is my natural state and is my presence that I was experiencing. From there I sat in silence for a while. At one point, a disturbing thought crossed my mind and I felt myself contracting. Because I had been at rest, this contraction was apparent in a way that I might not have immediately noticed otherwise. I let the thought go and I went back into rest. This showed me how different it is to experience the ego as opposed to the presence.

Jesus begins this lesson by pointing out that we judge on partial evidence which is not really judgment and that we protect this judgment because we know it is wrong. The Bible has told us that we must not judge and now we know why. We cannot judge. We don’t have complete information on which to judge. What is actually happening is that we are asking the ego for an interpretation of what seems to be happening and then we believe the ego’s judgment, all of which are false.

The ego has an agenda and its agenda is to prove that we are sinful, helpless and afraid. It uses the body senses to convince us that this is true. And in spite of the fact that we have ample evidence that this proof is unreliable, we just keep believing it. Again, we believe it because we have this underlying doubt and are afraid of this doubt. There is a memory of something else in our mind and that memory, though nearly hidden is what sources the doubt. It is the Voice for God.

This sad being that the ego shows us as ourselves is really just the ego itself. We are not the ego. That is a fact and that fact, when we accept it, undoes all the ego tries to project onto us. The ego continues to convince us that it is us and we keep falling for it, but that does not have to continue. We can learn to recognize our Self, to remember and know our Self and this is why every day now I ask to know my Self.

This lesson is to be done for two days so I am going to stop here and look at it again tomorrow. In the meantime, I will look at Regina’s tips.

Regina’s Tips
Regina said that she read some paragraphs from Chapter 14 of “The Most Direct Means to Eternal Bliss.” Part of that reading was a story about a planet where people are born and raised in a movie theatre, and they never question if the movie on the screen is reality; they simply assume it is. The story tells the different reactions to this and to the first person to bravely find the projector. It’s a good story.

After relating the whole story she says this:

“You do not seem to doubt the world you see. You do not really question what is shown you through the body’s eyes. Nor do you ask why you believe it …”

We do well to contemplate Michael Langford’s analogy of the movie theatre and today’s Course lesson together. Isn’t it true that ever since we can remember our attention has been focused outward on thought and the world? Isn’t that like the people in the movie theatre who were born and raised with their attention on the movie screen? Isn’t it true that, just as they did not question the reality of the movie, we have not questioned the reality of our thoughts and perceptions? Isn’t it at least possible that what we have always believed to be reality is not reality? Doesn’t this possibility deserve genuine investigation? Isn’t it worth our time to find out what is true?

My Thoughts
I understand why Regina wants us to do this lesson for two days. This is the crux of the Course. We have listened to the ego for eons and believed everything it said to us and even believed it when it said the voice in our head was our own when really it was the ego. Now it is time to remember the truth. We are not the voice in our head and we are not the body with its senses that lie to us.

It is time to remember that the body is no more real than anything else in the world of form, so we are using an illusion to convince our self that illusions are real. It is time to wake up and look around for the “projector” that has a convinced us of the reality of illusions.

We can begin by questioning the ego voice and by meditating on our Self to help bring it into our awareness. We can practice placing our attention on what we truly want rather than on where the ego mind says we should place it. It is time for a rebellion, time to throw off the chains that we have allowed to imprison our minds.

Manual for Teachers
Key points in Section 6

We are assured that all healing is accomplished when it is given and it is accomplished in both giver and receiver. So what does it mean when we have prayed for healing in another and yet nothing seems to have happened. The ego says that healing is a lie or that the patient is guilty of not accepting the gift of healing. In this section, we are assured that neither is the case.

Healing is always certain, however, if healing would be seen as a curse, then it waits until the patient is able to see it as a blessing. I can imagine how this could happen. If someone feels unworthy and guilty, a sudden healing would be frightening since in his mind this would leave him open to a worse punishment from God. Or if a person doesn’t believe in healing or believe in God, sudden proof he is wrong might turn his life upside down and leave him so confused and upset he might opt for death.

This seems extreme but as Jesus has told us before, we cannot be suddenly awakened. It would be too frightening for us. I know that when I have a student who is new to the Course, I can offer him a shortcut to get straight to where he wants to go, but this is useless. He will choose not to understand or he will not hear what I am saying. I have seen this many times. He, like me, must take this a step at a time. One step leads naturally to the next step and understanding dawns gradually. So, if someone is sick and they don’t believe in healing, it cannot be forced on them. Who knows, their suffering might be just the motivation they need to open their minds to the next step.

We have been told that healing is a shift in perception and that we can help facilitate that in another by knowing the truth about the patient. If we try to judge how well we have done by what we see in the world, we have made an error. “It is not the function of God’s teachers to evaluate the outcome of their gifts.” Trust is an essential part of giving and if we are going to hang around judging whether or not our gift has been received, this is a limitation on the giving itself and neither the giver nor the receiver would have the gift.

It is the relinquishing of all concern about the gift that makes it truly given. 2 And it is trust that makes true giving possible.

Our job is to know the truth and hold to that vision regardless of what seems to be happening in the world. It is not our job to accomplish the healing. That is the Holy Spirit’s job. We are just the channel. Why on earth would we doubt the Holy Spirit? That doesn’t even make sense. Sometimes a healing requires time for reasons we can’t know, but we can be absolutely sure that if we offered the gift of healing, then that healing is done.

The Holy Spirit is not confused about His part. The healing will show up when it is time. It will be accepted when it is time. I also like to remember that the real healing is the perception that is the cause of the problem. Generally, as the perception is corrected, the body shifts to reflect that correction, but if it does not, there is a reason for it. And I know that the change in perception is what matters. 

Text
T12-IV. Seeking and Finding
4 Do you realize that the ego must set you on a journey which cannot but lead to a sense of futility and depression? To seek and not to find is hardly joyous.

Perhaps like me, you thought you could not really depend on the Bible quote, “Seek and ye shall find.” Years of seeking had brought me very little in the way of peace and happiness. I didn’t see where it brought me any closer to God, either. Now I know why. It was because I was asking the ego to show me the way. I was seeking happiness through the ego, and the ego’s directive is to seek and do not find.

Once I began to study the Course, all of that turned around. I was seeking through the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit loves me with the Love of the Father. The Holy Spirit wants me to find and so makes it possible for me to do so, actually assures that I will do so. Through the study of the Course, I learned how to ask and was given the process that would bring me the peace and happiness I longed for.

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Gentle Healing Lesson 150, Manual for Teachers, Text.  6-12-19

LESSON 150
My mind holds only what I think with God.

(139) I will accept Atonement for myself.

(140) Only salvation can be said to cure.

There is only one way out of this virtual reality, and that is to know the Self. That is salvation and that is accepting the Atonement. I cannot do this for anyone else, only for myself. However, in doing it for myself, I affect all others through the one mind. I continue to remain open to the Self, the Holy Spirit that I am. In doing so, there is a change, subtle at the moment, but definitely a change occurring in my mind.

In doing this, it doesn’t matter what the circumstances in my life, something little, something insignificant, something that seems big and important. It’s all the same, and anyway, it is never about what it seems to be about. Each circumstance is only an image of a belief in the mind. If someone in my life seems to disapprove of me, that is just an image of the belief that I am not worthy and that sense of unworthiness is the effect of feeling separate from God.

If I accept the Atonement for the situation in which I seemed to have been dissed by a friend and recognize that there is nothing to forgive because nothing happened, I am accepting the Atonement for the belief that I could be other than God and someplace outside God. I accept the Atonement for both beliefs because they are the same belief. My Self has no belief in unworthiness, cannot imagine unworthiness. Accepting the Atonement is knowing that I am my Self and knowing nothing but worthiness.

One of the challenges of the body I made for this foray into the virtual reality of time and space is that I seemed to have programmed into it a tendency to gain weight. This tendency has created many opportunities for me to evolve spiritually as I learned to see the body differently and to recognize through the body issues my hidden desires such as to be a victim. It continues to be a teaching device.

One of the most upsetting things about the relationship I have developed with this body is that it seems at times to be in charge. Here is what that looks like. I seem to get a craving for something sweet and even though I tell myself I am not giving in to those cravings, I often do.

Then I am left feeling like I am weak and vulnerable to my body desires and that I can’t do anything about it. This feels frightening. If I cannot even control my sugar addiction how can I expect to succeed at anything else? It is an ego story that I must love because I tell it all the time. I tell it to others and I tell it to myself.

When I decided to act as if I am my Self even when I don’t feel like I know my Self, I ran up against this old story. So, I am watching TV and I decide I want something to eat, something sweet if I can find it in my house. I can’t, so I eat something salty. But it’s not satisfying, so then I find myself on my feet going back to the kitchen. I watch this behavior a couple of more times as it repeats itself. I place my awareness on it and on the thoughts that drive it. I look with interest and with curiosity.

I am aware that I can say no to feeding the ego appetites in all its forms. I am also aware that I don’t want to say no. After watching it a while, I realize that I no longer want to eat anything. I also notice that at first when this eating desire and fulfillment occurred, I felt like I was giving in to something out of my control and so I felt uneasy.

Later as I merely observed what I was choosing to do without concern about the choice, the uneasiness was gone. It was like watching someone else making choices. It was not someone else exactly. It was my ego construct. My excellent discovery is that this construct is still mine and I still make choices for it and I can choose from my higher Self if I want to.

I am not a victim and I am not out of control. I am controlling it all the time. It is just that sometimes I make the choice with my higher mind and sometimes my lower mind and thus sometimes I am satisfied with my choice and sometimes I regret it. Always, my choices have something to teach me if I care to learn.

Choosing to eat for some reason other than to nourish the body doesn’t seem like a big deal in the scheme of things, but within everything, there is an opportunity for salvation, an opportunity to accept the Atonement and to awaken more fully to my Self. This experiment with placing my awareness where I wanted it and doing so without judgment wasn’t really about whether or not to eat. It was the opportunity to come a step closer to knowing my Self as Awareness.

Manual for Teachers
Through the study of Manual for Teachers I have been given clarity about death. What I understand now (and this is something I feel to my core) is that Jesus meant what he said, there is no death. How can death exist if God does? It is not possible. God is Life, God is Love, and it is not possible that God could have an opposite. The belief in an opposite of God is the ego at its essence and the ego is not real. It is the belief in the ego that we are here to undo. I will not be distracted by the imagined effects that we think of as our world and our life. The truth lies just beneath that, and the truth is, death has never occurred.

Death is just another imagined attack. I have tried to protect myself against it. I have tried to out-maneuver it. I have projected blame onto innocent people and innocent circumstances. I imagined death and then blamed God as the cause. Then I defended God with all sorts of convoluted reasoning because the belief that God was attacking me was too painfully fearful to bear. I have been fighting an illusion, a mirage, a thought form. Nothing is there. I am the Son of God, I am eternal, and death is just another false idea borne of unfounded guilt.

Text
The Course talks about the Father and son, and of the Will of the Father and the Son as being the same, and it speaks of a perfect creation of a Perfect Creator. I think of it this way. The Father creates through extending Himself, so the Son is an extension of the Father. The Son, in His turn, creates through extending Himself so that His creation is an extension of Himself and a further extension of God. It is Perfection creating more Perfection, which creates more Perfection, without end.

Now I see myself dreaming I am outside of this perfection. I see myself using my power of creation to make imperfect things rather than creating perfectly. I have placed limits on creation through my decision to experience something else. I have forgotten how to return to the flow of Perfection and even that I want to do so.

But Perfection does not leave a question unanswered, so the Holy Spirit was placed in my mind. Its function is to wait patiently for the son to ask for His Father, then It answers with Love and Peace and Comfort and guides us out of the wilderness of our imagination. As we answer our holy function, the perfection of Creation continues without interruption.

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Gentle Healing Lesson 149, Manual for Teachers, Text.  6-9-19

LESSON 149
My mind holds only what I think with God.

(137) When I am healed I am not healed alone.

(138) Heaven is the decision I must make.

This morning as I meditated, I began with a guided meditation in which I called on Spiritual help to discern my deepest desire and to ask for assistance in bringing that desire into manifestation. The desire that came to me is to think, act and speak from my highest Self, to do this as if I already remember my Self. I know this can happen because it does happen sometimes and it feels so right and so good when it does. I opened my heart and mind to this assistance and agreed to do whatever was needed on my part to bring it fully into manifestation.

After that, I sat in quiet as much as I could. When a thought came into my mind, I let it and I mostly chose not to follow it. When I noticed that I was caught up in a story again, I remembered that I had a choice as to where I would place my awareness and I brought it back to my silent presence and just enjoyed that until the next time I followed a thought to a story. I did this several times. This used to frustrate me but now I just think of it as good practice. Something I have noticed is that even when not meditating my mind can now be very quiet for periods of time.

I think when I am in the silence, I am closer to knowing what I think with God. It is confusing to the ego mind to think without words. Without words there are no concepts, no thinking as we are familiar with thinking. The mind doesn’t go into stories. Even when I am doing things, like writing words or talking to someone, there can be a silence in the mind, and that was an odd discovery.

I see that I can write and think about what I am writing or have random thoughts come into the mind while I write. Or I can write without the mind wandering, not thinking of anything else. At those times I am in the present moment and while I am focused on what I am doing and so thinking, it is not the same kind of thinking as is common in the mind. It is more like awareness than thinking. I am aware of what I am writing and my awareness is nowhere else.

This learning to consciously place my awareness where I want it is a form of healing, and it doesn’t just heal me, it heals the Sonship. Thus, as Jesus says, I am never healed alone. When I place my awareness within on the Presence that I am, that is healing as well and is healing the Sonship at the same time. I imagine others who are struggling with this challenge finding it just a little easier now because of my success, little as it is. I take heart that others are a little ahead of me and their success is helping mine. Then there are those ascended masters who are transmitting to me because I am open to receive and they are helping. We are not alone.

All of this requires that I make a decision. That is the most basic thing that I need to do. First, I make a decision that I want to awaken, then I make a decision to accept that I can and will awaken. I make a decision to do what is necessary in study and practice. I make a decision to accept all the help offered to me. This is how I return to Heaven even while I am still dreaming of separation and that I am in this body. Heaven is a decision I make.

Regina’s Tips
When I am healed I am not healed alone. In Chapter 1 of A Course in Miracles, Jesus says, “I have nothing that does not come from God. The difference between us now is that I have nothing else.” That is healing, having nothing but that which comes from God. I trust when I am healed, that healing helps others. However, my focus now must be on reaching that healed state, that permanence of “only what I think with God” and nothing else. This is my commitment to myself and everyone.

Heaven is the decision I must make. This decision is not made once, but repeatedly. It is made each day, and it is made throughout the day. Anything that reinforces this decision in me is helpful. Anything that weakens this decision in me needs to be looked at and questioned. A partial decision or a ‘sometimes’ decision is not a decision. Total unwavering commitment is the sign of true decision.

My Thoughts
What I enjoyed most in Regina’s tips is the emphasis on my decision being a minute to minute project. I absolutely agree with that. It is another reason I am so glad that I have learned to be vigilant for my thoughts. Catching these thoughts quickly makes it much easier to change my mind. I understand that a decision is not a decision if it has exceptions and if it wavers according to circumstances.

Manual for Teachers
14. HOW WILL THE WORLD END? P 5
5 The world will end in joy, because it is a place of sorrow. When joy has come, the purpose of the world has gone. The world will end in peace, because it is a place of war. When peace has come, what is the purpose of the world? The world will end in laughter, because it is a place of tears. Where there is laughter, who can longer weep? And only complete forgiveness brings all this to bless the world. In blessing it departs, for it will not end as it began. To turn hell into Heaven is the function of God’s teachers, for what they teach are lessons in which Heaven is reflected. And now sit down in true humility, and realize that all God would have you do you can do. Do not be arrogant and say you cannot learn His Own curriculum. His Word says otherwise. His Will be done. It cannot be otherwise. And be you thankful it is so.

Journal

“And only complete forgiveness brings all this to bless the world.”

“And now sit down in true humility, and realize that all God would have you do you can do. Do not be arrogant and say you cannot learn His Own curriculum.”

For the longest time, I read and studied the Course and I tried to practice what I studied. I could not imagine how I would ever undo the ego that seemed so strong in my mind. I didn’t even aim for that. I just tried to undo the ego thoughts that were predominant in my mind at the moment. That seemed like the most I could hope for.

Actually, that was a better plan than I realized at the time. I still do that. I deal with whatever is in front of me. The thing that changed is that I began to succeed and with each success my trust in what Jesus wrote her and my ability to do what is asked of me increased. I never thought I would say this but now I can honestly say that I am grateful for the challenges because I know that each one met will bring me closer to ending the world. I also realize that what I thought was humility when I used to think I could not be that teacher of God he talked about was really arrogance. How could I not be what God wills that I be?

Text
I understand that peace is the condition of the Kingdom. As the Course tells us, if we want the Kingdom we must give up conflict for all time. There is no compromise in this. Since peace is the condition of the Kingdom, we cannot bring conflict into the Kingdom. Therefore if conflict is in the mind, we cannot be in the Kingdom. It makes perfect sense when I think of it like this.

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Gentle Healing Lesson 148, Manual for Teachers, Text.  6-8-19

LESSON 148
My mind holds only what I think with God.

(135) If I defend myself I am attacked.

(136) Sickness is a defense against the truth.

One day I was spending time with my family. Two things happened that were part of my lesson for the day. I was watching my older daughter cooking and she was trying to get cornbread out of the muffin pan and was having trouble. I knew a better way to do it and told her to let me do it for her. She just said, “Mom.”

In that one expressive word she was saying “let me do it myself” and “really, I’m 48 years old. I think I can do this without help.” Haha. I backed off remembering how often I tried to do things for my kids when it would have been better to let them learn from their efforts. Probably there was a time when I would have been hurt or embarrassed by her reaction, but this time I just smiled. I did not feel any desire to defend myself. A lot has changed for me over the last few years.

On the other hand, my son said something that felt unkind and disrespectful and I worried over that for most of the day, turning it over in my mind and wondering what it meant about our relationship. Finally, I released it to the Holy Spirit to be reinterpreted for me. Probably it didn’t mean anything, just his weird sense of humor.

But no matter what it meant, it was a problem for me only if I defended myself from it. When I do that, it feels frightening because there is really nothing to defend against and no way to defend myself against nothing that feels like something. In defending myself, even just in my mind, I was attacking my peace. In retrospect I realize that I am never upset for the reason I think and so it was doubly ridiculous for me to defend myself. I am not completely free of the belief I need to defend myself but I am free of the belief that it is a good idea.

Another useless form of defense is sickness. It is a deliberate attempt at self-deception. When I am sick it is because I want to be. I use it to hide from the truth of what I am. If I am sick, my first question to myself is why did I do this? The answer is always the same; I did this so that I could go on pretending that I don’t know who I am. That is how I heal myself and the healing proceeds according to my desire to lay my defenses aside and accept the truth.

Regina’s Tips
My mind holds only what I think with God.

I have noticed since beginning this review that something is shifting in me. There is greater confidence than there was before in the efficiency of the direct path and in my desire and ability to remain focused on it. I feel as if I am learning now to “claim again” my inheritance.

My Thoughts
I feel the same way as Regina. I feel like this is happening for me as the result of this gentle healing process as well as a focus on meditating on accepting who I am. I am also receiving transmissions from my beloved brother, Jesus and this is helping as well. Add that to the work I do daily with students and some very helpful work I do with some Pathways of Light courses and it is all working together to help me wake up. And I feel the difference.

Manual for Teachers
14. HOW WILL THE WORLD END? P 4
4 The world will end when its thought system has been completely reversed. Until then, bits and pieces of its thinking will still seem sensible. The final lesson, which brings the ending of the world, cannot be grasped by those not yet prepared to leave the world and go beyond its tiny reach. What, then, is the function of the teacher of God in this concluding lesson? He need merely learn how to approach it; to be willing to go in its direction. He need merely trust that, if God’s Voice tells him it is a lesson he can learn, he can learn it. He does not judge it either as hard or easy. His Teacher points to it, and he trusts that He will show him how to learn it.

Journal
“What, then, is the function of the teacher of God in this concluding lesson? He need merely learn how to approach it; to be willing to go in its direction.”

This is how I approach each new lesson. I talk to Jesus about it, how I feel, my uncertainty, whatever is coming up in my mind about a current lesson. Then I tell him that I have no idea how to do this but that I trust that I will be guided. I had this opportunity recently when I was feeling annoyance with someone and seemed unable to let it go.

I turned to my Teacher in trust that it would be done because I want peace more than I want my way. He directed me to love the person and the situation as I have been taught to love all things. I didn’t know how to do that, but I knew I could because He said I could. My trust opened me to the miracle of a changed mind.

Text
III. Littleness versus Magnitude, P 1
1 Be not content with littleness. But be sure you understand what littleness is, and why you could never be content with it. Littleness is the offering you give yourself. You offer this in place of magnitude, and you accept it. Everything in this world is little because it is a world made out of littleness, in the strange belief that littleness can content you. When you strive for anything in this world in the belief that it will bring you peace, you are belittling yourself and blinding yourself to glory. Littleness and glory are the choices open to your striving and your vigilance. You will always choose one at the expense of the other.

Journal
We are an extension of God, and even here we are expressions of God, and we can reflect that if we choose to do so. It isn’t easy at first. We have the intention of doing this, of being a clear reflection of our divinity, but at our birth, we forget who we are and we forget our intention. We spend the rest of our lives striving to remember why we came. That true desire to live big gets twisted into striving for something in the world that mimics magnitude but keeps us small.

From the moment we decide for God, we receive all the help we need to live our intention. We find A Course in Miracles and the teachers that are meant for us. And in each experience, we find a lesson that brings us closer to our goal. But before we get to that help, we have already built an ego construct that we quickly come to identify as our self.

We are taught from birth who we are by people who don’t even know who they are. We gather layer after layer of identity and when we are ready to remember our true identity, we must first loosen our acquired identity. We must learn to turn aside from our learned preferences, from the distractions of the world, and from all that we have come to value, that which props up our construct.

Imagine how hard that must be for people who have constructed a powerful or famous or wealthy self-identity. So many of them are obviously not happy, they get sick just like the rest of us and they lose people they love; their carefully constructed identity cannot protect them from the inevitable effects of separation. Their efforts fail them if they are trying for magnitude through littleness. Everything of this world is little because nothing of this world is real.

It can be just as hard for those of us who live ordinary lives. We gather family so we feel loved and they disappoint us or die or leave. We get educations, but no matter what level of education we receive, what accolades are heaped on us for our efforts, we still feel that something is missing. We fall in love and out of love and into heartache. We get good jobs and lose them or regret them or squander our life on them.

No matter what we do, what we buy, who we impress, we still are not satisfied because we are meant for so much more, and there is that secret knowing buried in our minds that we are not living up to our potential. There will come a time for each of us to remember, though. We are not meant for littleness. We did not come here to live small. We are magnificent beings, children of a magnificent God. When we decide to put aside our striving to make something of nothing, we will open our minds and hearts to the magnitude that we are meant for.

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