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Manual for Teachers, Shift in Perception. P 3 6-18-20

II. The Shift in Perception, P 3
3 What is the single requisite for this shift in perception? It is simply this; the recognition that sickness is of the mind, and has nothing to do with the body. What does this recognition “cost”? It costs the whole world you see, for the world will never again appear to rule the mind. For with this recognition is responsibility placed where it belongs; not with the world, but on him who looks on the world and sees it as it is not. He looks on what he chooses to see. No more and no less. The world does nothing to him. He only thought it did. Nor does he do anything to the world, because he was mistaken about what it is. Herein is the release from guilt and sickness both, for they are one. Yet to accept this release, the insignificance of the body must be an acceptable idea.

Healing is a shift in perception. When I chose healing, I changed my mind about what I thought was possible. My perception up to that moment was that my body responded to environmental conditions. Pollen, grass, most trees, molds, and a long list of foods would cause my body to have an allergic reaction. I decided that, although I didn’t know how it could happen, I was willing to be free of this belief. I asked the Holy Spirit to help me. And I became willing to let Him.

This was not a total reversal in my thinking. It was like putting my toes in the water to see what happened. But what happened changed my mind in a way that affected the rest of my life. From that point on I became more willing to realize that my mind is what needs healing, not my body, and not my circumstances. It is taking a good deal of time for me to accept the full implication.

I have had many experiences since then that helped me to accept that the world never rules the mind and that it is always the other way around. It took even more time for me to accept no compromise in the recognition that I am completely responsible for my life. Every time I noticed I was resisting this fact I turned my attention to the Holy Spirit for correction. This gentle process of mindfulness combined with willingness peeled away the layers of illusion that I used to keep the separation idea in place.

Soon, instead of trying to figure out what is wrong with my body, and what in the world caused it, I was reminding myself that I am experiencing illness because I have chosen it, and I am keeping this illness because I see some value in having it. Having established the source of the problem, I asked the Holy Spirit to heal my mind, believing the body would likely follow.

In the Text, Jesus reminds us that guilt and sickness are the same things. Sickness is the outward manifestation of the guilt that I am holding in my mind. It doesn’t matter if I think I am guilty or if I think the other person is guilty as it is the same belief and creates the same effects. As I am allowing the Holy Spirit to heal my mind, I am becoming more willing to look at the buried guilt. I am learning that I have not actually done anything, but only dreamed I did. I have nothing to feel guilty for.

So, what we have discovered about sickness so far is this.

We value sickness for what it can give us.
Decisions are of the mind, not of the body. If sickness is but a faulty problem-solving approach, it is a decision.
Because sickness is a decision of the mind, we decide if we will keep the sickness or let it go. We can use outside agents to give form to the decision for healing but, as we are ready, we can also decide that we have no use for the sickness and let it go.

To accept this release, the insignificance of the body must be an acceptable idea.
Could it be so hard to accept that the body is insignificant? It would seem so. It took me many years to do this. First, there is the belief that the body is who I was. I don’t know if this is still taught in the Catholic Church of if other churches teach it in one form or another, but when I was in Catholic school, we were told that cremation was a sin and that if the body was cremated, we would have no body in Heaven. My goodness, talk about making the body significant! If I believe I am the body, I will be reluctant to accept its insignificance. Perhaps this is one reason Jesus places such an emphasis on the fact that we are not the body.

Later, I decided that I am spirit occupying a body and that when I died, I would be set free from the body. But that was an error as well. This belief leaves me prisoner to the body and gives the body significance in this way. But Jesus tells us that we are not a body and are not in a body. My next step was to accept that I am spirit and I am pretending to be a body. I was much closer now because I was seeing my nature as being separate from the body.

Now, I see the body as a manifestation of a belief that I want to experience as if it is real. It is just energy condensed into form and I am interacting with that energetic object. Another way to say this is that the body is a thought-form projected outward from my mind in such a way that I can have an experience of being in the form. It is a mind game and I am the gaming master.

Being the maker of the experience of sickness and the maker of the experience of not sickness is a relatively new idea for me. I think that it began to jell for me in 2012, but I had to take this slow, letting my mind adjust to this idea. I had many extraordinary experiences with healing but for a long time, they remained isolated incidents.

Now that I am no longer attached to the idea of the body as real and important, and now that I no longer believe in guilt, I am ready for the next logical step. I am ready to merely rise up and say, “I have no use for this.” I wonder if this will be simple or if I will have to struggle against the ego resistance. We will see.

PS: Well, now it is a few years later and it seems that this is a process as well. I have a few small but problematic body issues and I am working with Jesus to understand what they are for so that I can change my mind. I thought this would be easy and it turns out that I’m wrong about that. I’m not worried about it, though. All things come to those who wait and as a teacher of God, I have learned patience and trust. I am curious about this but not concerned about it.

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Focusing on the Error

The following is something I wrote about while doing 920: Being a Miracle Worker

How is the perception of focusing on the errors of another holding me back?

I don’t do that very often anymore. However, sometimes I worry about my child’s behavior and for the length of time I do that, I am holding myself back from being a true miracle worker. I can’t believe in their errors and be a conduit for miracles at the same time. Believing in their errors is my error and needs to be healed before I can be helpful.

My daughter just sent a text. The news announced that the governor would be making a big announcement at 4:00. Susan is experiencing a sense of dread. She is very afraid of the virus and thinks the governor will loosen the rules too much. I want to tell her not to waste her time being afraid but that won’t make sense to her and will just increase her fear.

So, what I am doing instead, is to love her. I love her like God loves her. He adores her just as she imagines she is. Her fear fantasies do not change His love for her any more than her fantasies change her reality. So I just keep adoring her, too. Her fear fantasies don’t concern God because He knows who she is, so they don’t concern me either. I know who she is. This is the way I shift my worries and concerns so that I no longer focus on the error. I just love instead.

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Manual for Teachers, Shift in Perception. P 2 6-12-20

II. The Shift in Perception, P 2
2 The acceptance of sickness as a decision of the mind, for a purpose for which it would use the body, is the basis of healing. And this is so for healing in all forms. A patient decides that this is so, and he recovers. If he decides against recovery, he will not be healed. Who is the physician? Only the mind of the patient himself. The outcome is what he decides that it is. Special agents seem to be ministering to him, yet they but give form to his own choice. He chooses them in order to bring tangible form to his desires. And it is this they do, and nothing else. They are not actually needed at all. The patient could merely rise up without their aid and say, “I have no use for this.” There is no form of sickness that would not be cured at once.

We have looked at some of the ways in which we use sickness of the body and it is absolutely necessary that we accept the responsibility for sickness if we want to be healed. This is equally true for healing in all forms, for instance, the healing of relationships, of loss and lack of every kind, and for suffering of any kind. We must accept that these things do not just happen to us and we are not acted on by anything outside our own minds.

Jesus emphasizes our responsibility for both sickness and recovery when he tells us it is our decision to remain sick or to recover. We are actually the physician. I like my doctor very much. I tell him if I am concerned about a symptom and he might tell me not to worry about it, I’m fine. Or he might send me for a test if it is needed, or prescribe medicine if he things that would help. But we are the ultimate decision maker. If the medicine works, it is because we decided we want to be healed and this is the way we choose to make that happen. However, if we still see value in the sickness, we will keep the illness and nothing the doctor does will help.

Jesus says these special agents we use are not actually needed at all. He says that we could decide that we have no use for this and we would be healed immediately. I wonder why we don’t always do this? Well, that is besides the need we have for sickness as a defense against God. But once we make a decision for healing, why go to the trouble of using outside agents to affect this when we could just be done with it? Evidently, healing can be as threatening as sickness to the unhealed mind.

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This Morning With the Holy Spirit

As we are experiencing the pandemic, there are a lot of fear thoughts in our collective mind and when I join with anyone, the first thing we do is to expose those thoughts. By sharing with each other, we are allowing the light of truth to disperse at least some of the darkness if not all of it. I keep my own mind as healed as possible. I do this by watching my thoughts and feelings as always and by accepting the Holy Spirit’s healing. I also do this by deliberately moving my mind from the darkness to the light.

This morning, I asked the Holy Spirit to help me with this and one of the things he told me was to count my blessings, to focus on gratitude rather than on the bad news the media offers. Obsessing about possible outcomes is not helpful at all. It doesn’t change anything and only makes the experience worse. Focusing on gratitude, however, actually does make things better, if not in the illusion itself, certainly in how I experience it. It helps everyone because in focusing on gratitude, I am putting gratitude into the collective mind rather than fear.

I could worry about my son who lives in a city that is turning into the next New York. He is in a high-risk group. I could think about how devastating it would be to me if something happened to him. Or, I could remember what it was like the last time we visited and I saw past his image to his reality. I saw his beauty and perfection. I saw with Christ Vision. My eyes fill with tears of wonder when I think of it. That vision is what is real. His body and his story of being my son are the illusion. I choose to see him rather than his image. I choose to let the story of his life as Toby unfold as it must and keep my eye on his awakening soul knowing that everything is in his best interest.

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Manual for Teachers, Shift in Perception. P 1. 6-6-20

II. The Shift in Perception, P 1
1 Healing must occur in exact proportion to which the valuelessness of sickness is recognized. One need but say, “There is no gain at all to me in this” and he is healed. But to say this, one first must recognize certain facts. First, it is obvious that decisions are of the mind, not of the body. If sickness is but a faulty problem-solving approach, it is a decision. And if it is a decision, it is the mind and not the body that makes it. The resistance to recognizing this is enormous, because the existence of the world as you perceive it depends on the body being the decision-maker. Terms like “instincts,” “reflexes” and the like represent attempts to endow the body with non-mental motivators. Actually, such terms merely state or describe the problem. They do not answer it. 

I am open to letting go of any value that I have in the idea of sickness. If it holds no value to me, I will not want this idea and without the idea sickness will be impossible. As I stated yesterday, I see that we find value in sickness in two ways. Within the story, it can garner sympathy and a show of affection as well as be a way to avoid certain people or situations. It allows us to feel like victims and to feel unfairly treated.

I let go of the need to garner sympathy and affection by letting my mind be healed of the belief that I am unworthy of love. I notice the ego jumping in with that idea still, but I am not interested and if I feel the least bit interested, I ask the Holy Spirit to heal my mind of such nonsense. I let go of the need to avoid saying no when I don’t want to by pleading sickness by recognizing that this is another example of the perhaps hidden belief in unworthiness. Now I just say no when I mean no and there is no need for an excuse.

The other use for sickness is as a defense against God. There is, first, a belief that God is angry with us for splitting off from Him and going our own way. This is not possible to do since God is all there is, so He cannot be angry with us for doing it. Then there is the reality that God is Love and Love is not anger. So, there is no reason to defend against God.
Another part of the defense against God is that we fear merging into Him and thus losing our sense of individuality. This feels like the ultimate sacrifice. Once we reach a certain level of healing, the idea of existing as our Higher Self feels good. By this time, we have learned to love peace and joy and to find drama distasteful.

But then there is the idea of giving up the Higher Self for the God Self and that feels scary because we can’t remember what it is like to be the Divine. We have felt separate for so long and have come to value individuality so deeply that we think it is the ultimate achievement with nothing more treasured than this. The idea of surrendering completely, letting go of this final illusion and merging into God is scary indeed.

Sickness feels like a small price to pay for the survival of the self. I think this is why Jesus puts such a strong emphasis on God’s Love and care for us. He says we are God’s own treasure, that God gave all of Himself to us in our creation. We are reminded over and over of our holiness and our perfection as part of God. Here is what he says in section 14. What Am I?

W-pII.14.1. I am God’s Son, complete and healed and whole, shining in the reflection of His Love. 2 In me is His creation sanctified and guaranteed eternal life. 3 In me is love perfected, fear impossible, and joy established without opposite. 4 I am the holy home of God Himself. 5 I am the Heaven where His Love resides. 6 I am His holy Sinlessness Itself, for in my purity abides His Own.

And in the beautiful Lesson 326, he says this.
W-pII.326.1. Father, I was created in Your Mind, a holy Thought that never left its home. 2 I am forever Your Effect, and You forever and forever are my Cause. 3 As You created me I have remained. 4 Where You established me I still abide. 5 And all Your attributes abide in me, because it is Your Will to have a Son so like his Cause that Cause and Its Effect are indistinguishable. 6 Let me know that I am an Effect of God, and so I have the power to create like You. 7 And as it is in Heaven, so on earth. 8 Your plan I follow here, and at the end I know that You will gather Your effects into the tranquil Heaven of Your Love, where earth will vanish, and all separate thoughts unite in glory as the Son of God.

W-pII.326.2. Let us today behold earth disappear, at first transformed, and then, forgiven, fade entirely into God’s holy Will.

These are the kinds of things I read from the Course to relieve the fear of change and to help me as I let go of any desire to be something I am not. Who on earth would treasure the frail and vulnerable body-self when God-hood is the alternative? It is only the ego mind that clings to the body as if it were a treasure. I am not the ego and I am completely willing to be purged of such ego thoughts. I long for my real life.

© 2020, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Self-Identity

T 8: VI. 4, 2 This son of a loving father left his home and thought he had squandered everything for nothing of any value, although he had not understood its worthlessness at the time.

Lesson 166. 5, 3-4 But he will not look at what is given him. He wanders on, aware of the futility he sees about him everywhere, perceiving how his little lot but dwindles, as he goes ahead to nowhere.

L 166. 6, 3 Yet is he really tragic, when you see that he is following the way he chose, and need but realize Who walks with him and open up his treasures to be free?

While working on a Pathways of Light course, I was thinking about ways that we hold onto a limited self-identity when we could be free instead. Here is something I wrote two years ago and it was helpful to me.

I am doing more work on my 4th step with my Al-Anon sponsor and the topic is finances. I have been putting it off because I feel hopeless when it comes to finances. I spend money without thinking it through. I do save, but not enough nor consistently. I can’t look at my expenses vs my income and tell you much about it. Investments are beyond my ability to process and make choices.

All of these things have been true for me for all of my life and I take them for granted. But really, they are true for me because I believe they are. These beliefs are part of the way I identify myself. I could say that I am one who is not good with finances. That is a declaration of identity. When I think about letting that go, I feel uneasy. I feel like I am being asked to become something else and I don’t know how to do that.

However, when I think of it, a lot of things have changed around this idea of finances. I used to be afraid all the time about money because I “knew” I was inept with my finances. I was always afraid of not having enough or losing what I had. But as I began to study ACIM and as I learned that the Holy Spirit would remove unwanted beliefs from my mind, I let go of the belief that there is not enough and that I could lose what I have. Those thoughts come back up sometimes, but I have little interest in them and so they flow out of my mind as quickly as they come into it.

I know something now that I didn’t know before. I know that I am Love as is God. I know that Love will take care of all things if that is my choice, so I ask Love to provide what I need and I trust that it is done. Occasionally, I forget and I pick up that load again, but I let it go pretty quickly because why would I want that responsibility back?

I don’t know what is best for me or anyone. I don’t know what might happen in the future and, therefore, how could I prepare for it? Each thing that happens in my life has a purpose if I care to use it that way and I cannot know how to use it to serve that purpose. But Love does know all these things and will arrange everything for me if I just step back. Sure, I will have to give up a layer of self-identity, but look at what I gain! I am quickly losing interest in a personal self and so I don’t need a self-identity.

© 2020, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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From Hopelessness to Peace 6-1-20

This morning I listened to the meditation, The Power to Work Miracles Belongs to You from 920: Being a Miracle Worker, I was helped by the sentence that says this: You refuse to make any of the illusionary stories founded on separation real. The reason this caught my attention is that I read something on Facebook by Rev Tony. He was arguing against social distancing. He talked about how it was hurting the most vulnerable people in our society, some of them already losing their jobs, their homes and even the ability to provide food for themselves and their families. He was arguing it would be better to end this now.

I began to feel anxious after reading this. It made sense. So did the idea of social distancing. So, I asked the Holy Spirit to help me see this differently. I asked for help to sort out what was really behind my anxiety. I saw right away that I am upset because I am confused about what to even think. I am concerned about the vast number of Americans who will suffer terribly from the loss in income, my oldest son being one of them since he was laid off on Good Friday. Am I causing this kind of suffering just so that I can keep this body alive?

When I let my mind focus on the story, I was sliding down the rabbit hole and I knew it. That is why I turned to the Holy Spirit right away. Seeing what was behind the fear in my mind helped me to remember that I am never upset for the reason I think. I was upset because I felt helpless and the more I looked at this helplessness, the more hopeless I felt. Then I remembered that the only way I could feel like this is if I believed in the story.

For this to occur in my mind, I must believe the story is real and happening now and that we are all truly suffering and that we are all going to suffer because we affect each other. What came to me when I asked for clarity is that this is not really happening now. We are putting an ancient memory before our eyes so that we can decide if we want to keep playing the game, keep watching past memories, keep trying to change the story, to direct it into something we prefer. That is all that’s happening.

Knowing this, I realize that the only helpful thing I can do is to stay in a state of love so that I can be a channel for miracles wherever they are needed. I don’t even have to figure out what miracle is needed by whom or how to perform that miracle. I just have to love and the rest is done without my effort. I can’t love if I am fearful. Where fear has entered love cannot operate. Where love has entered, fear cannot remain. So, I chose love and waited for the fear to evaporate and it did. This is all I can do but it is enough. It is my part.

© 2020, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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