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October-December, 2021

Manual for Teachers — Steps to Awakening

by Rev. Myron, Jones, Ordained Ministerial Counselor

Step 1. “A period of undoing. This need not be painful, but it usually is so experienced. It seems as if things are being taken away, and it is rarely understood initially that their lack of value is merely being recognized.”

When I first began the undoing process, I did not have the certainty I do now. I had to develop trust as I did the practice. When I was unsure that this was for my best good, undoing was indeed painful. It is surprisingly hard to put the difference into words.

Imagine that you had the ability to levitate, but you didn’t know about the ability, had no idea you could levitate. I come along and tell you to step off a cliff. I tell you that you cannot imagine the freedom you will feel when you realize you don’t have to worry about falling ever again. And to know this extraordinary freedom all you have to do is step out.

Even though you might trust me, or know you should trust me, you would be reluctant to give up the “safety” of the ground that seems to support you and keep you from certain death. You would value this sense of safety and be reluctant to let it go, and yet this trustworthy person is offering you the chance to be forever free of your fear of falling.

The true change being offered is that you would be giving up the sense of loss, vulnerability, and fear. But the outward appearance is that you would have to give up the safety of the ground under your feet. It would probably feel very frightening and very painful to contemplate and no matter how much you trusted me, extremely hard to take that first step into air.

Imagine now that you did finally step out and discovered that you really could levitate. The next time I told you that you could do something extraordinary you might experience fear, but you would have developed some trust and it would not be nearly so hard. You would have seen that I mean you only good. Suppose the next thing I tell you is that you can walk through fire and be unharmed. You will still be reluctant to let go of the safety of the place that has no fire, but you will consider my words with less trepidation than when you had the first experience of undoing a belief.

After many experiences of undoing, I know that they are all for my good, and I do trust the Holy Spirit. I have learned that I have valued all the wrong things. I have developed trust to the degree that this process is not seen as being as painful as it used to be and it is not protracted.

Step 2. “A period of sorting out. This is always somewhat difficult because, having learned that the changes in his life are always helpful, he must now decide all things on the basis of whether they increase the helpfulness or hamper it. … It takes great learning to understand that all things, events, encounters and circumstances are helpful. It is only to the extent to which they are helpful that any degree of reality should be accorded them in this world of illusion.”

For me the period of sorting out was mostly me arguing for what I wanted to keep. The hardest thing for me to relinquish was the desire to project blame. I really thought I needed this and that it was of great value to me. I didn’t put it in those words of course, but would argue that circumstances proved that it was clearly someone else’s fault and so in this case I was the victim.

My ex-husband was a heavy drinker and would often go out with his buddies and not come back until the early hours. I would not know where he was or if he was OK. I would imagine him driving drunk and getting into a wreck, maybe leaving the road and hitting a tree, sitting injured in the car unable to help himself. Many a night I lay awake playing out this nightmare in my imagination.

I would go through all the scenarios in my head and also through all the emotions. I would be afraid for him, afraid for us if he was injured or died. I would feel resentful and angry, thinking how unfair this was, and how unloving that he would put me through this. I could not see how this could be anything but his fault. I wasn’t the one who was behaving so thoughtlessly and I wasn’t the one who was causing so much grief for his family.

What had to be done to get out of this nightmare of my own making was to look past the apparent circumstances to the truth. He is innocent. I am innocent. No matter what it might look like, and no matter how I might feel, this is the truth. While circumstances shift appearances, our innocence remains the only true and unchanging fact.

From that place of clarity, I was able to see that my reluctance to withdraw my projections and accept responsibility for how I felt was the result of thinking that having him to project on was too valuable to give up. I really wanted my feelings to be caused by his behavior and the circumstances I found myself in. I was as afraid of giving up projecting blame as I would be if asked to step off that cliff I spoke of before.

I had to go through many such scenarios before I was fully convinced that there is no value in projecting blame. Now the temptation arises from time to time, or the old habit tries to reinstate itself, but I am not interested because I know it is not true. I place no value on that behavior, and in fact, I see it as detrimental to my peace, so even if I fall for it briefly I quickly let it go.

Step 3. “A period of relinquishment. 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.”

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.

What have I relinquished that I thought would be a sacrifice? Of course, there is the idea of projecting blame which I already talked about. I really believed this would be painful, and yet it was freeing, and I never miss it now.

I valued making plans on my own, but I thought this would be easy to give up. I hopped out of the boat on that one and went skipping across the water to Jesus, but then I would begin planning how my day should go, what I should do about a problem, where I should live, so many things that need my attention. That’s OK, Jesus, I’ve got this one. I’ll let you know if I need your help. And there I was, sinking back into the ego.

It turns out this one was more subtle. Projecting blame was obvious because I felt the fear and reluctance to abandon it so very strongly. But there were so many “little” ways to make plans that it hardly seemed necessary to bring Jesus into this. What did he care what I had for supper or whether I went shopping? Obviously, I need to help my daughter who is in financial trouble so I’ll just move in with her and we’ll fix up the little house on her property for me to stay in. No problem. I’ll let you know when I need your help, Jesus.

I’m learning that not asking what He would have me do and say, and where He would have me go is the way I keep the ego in place. It’s the way I feed the ego and help it grow stronger in my mind. It’s the way I slip more deeply into the dream.

I loved being with my daughter and her family, and will never regret that time, but it became obvious that I had not asked for guidance when I made those plans. Getting everything done was like trying to move upstream without a paddle. Everything that could go wrong did go wrong.

Of course, if I make an unnecessary turn, the Holy Spirit goes with me and so I learned lessons, primarily that making plans on my own is not freedom. Instead, it is a way to stay imprisoned within a closed system of separation, in which attack, defend, fear, and guilt are my constant companions. You could say that all of this was perfect since it was so rich in opportunities to sort out and relinquish the valueless. I am quicker now to notice any tendency to make decisions on my own and no longer make that sorry choice very often.

Step 4. 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. … ‘Give up what you do not want, and keep what you do.’ How simple is the obvious! And how easy to do! … He will not go on from here alone.”

I don’t know about anyone else’s path, but mine has meandered a bit. I am reminded of a comic that I used to follow in the paper called Family Circle. The mom would send the little boy to another part of the house to get something and you could follow his circular route as he became distracted with all sorts of interesting but unrelated things. I’m sure his mom wondered how it could take him so long to go such a short distance.

Well, this has been me, too. I have been given this short and direct path to salvation. All I have to do is give up what I do not want, and keep what I do. But for a long time, I would see something up ahead that looked interesting and I would follow it, forgetting to notice if it was going to bring me closer to my goal, or take me away from it. In this way I wandered in and out of the first three steps, periodically stopping at step four to relax awhile and look back on what had happened.

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. I noticed 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.

The first couple of times I got to this place of relative peace and contemplation, I thought I was through. Having come through so much confusion and fear, and having made so much progress, that suddenly feeling this peace and having these insights was heady stuff. I was not through. I was taking a coffee break. ~smile~

This step is important because it allows me to rest and to see that I am, indeed, making progress. I began to see that the promises in A Course in Miracles are real. And it is at this step I began to gather my mighty companions. Some embodied and some unseen, these companions will be with me from now on, encouraging and supporting me, and helping me in ways I do not always discern, but only experience.

Step 5. “A period of unsettling. …The idea of sacrifice, so central to his own thought system, had made it impossible for him to judge. (Still believe in sacrifice sometimes) … 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!”

I cannot imagine how hard this step would be without Heavenly help. It was hard enough as it is. Jesus says that sacrifice is central to our thought system and I have learned that this is true, and I learned that it does not have to remain true. I have been guided out of suffering as I did my practices.

I began by learning to be aware of my thoughts so that I could realize how egocentric they were and become willing to be healed. I seemed to be sorting them out, separating what was valuable from what was valueless, and to some degree I was. But as Jesus says, I was not a good judge because I still believed in sacrifice, and this prevented me from choosing correctly.

Another error I made at first was to misunderstand my role. I thought it was my job to think differently, that is, to control my thoughts. This is not possible and only caused suffering. My task was not to control thinking, but only to notice that my thoughts were not my true thoughts, and to relinquish these thoughts to the Holy Spirit for correction.

What I learned during this period of sorting out was that I was not good at it, and that I needed help. I began by telling Holy Spirit, “Here is a belief that I have judged as valueless. Please correct it.” Over time I began to withdraw all judgment and asked the Holy Spirit to judge for me.  I would say, “Here is a belief. Is it valuable?”

I spent a long period of getting used to this way of practicing. The ego mind is very resistant to giving up what it considers is its domain. It wants to judge and will do so all the time without regard to the lack of helpfulness. I have learned to disregard its judgments.

At the beginning of this step my willingness was still pretty weak and I spent this time strengthening that willingness through desire. Willingness is not a matter of effort or doing, and the ego finds this confusing. It wants to do something to make all this happen and so I still remain vigilant noticing when the ego mind is taking over and letting that effort go.

In NTI, the Holy Spirit encourages us to become empty vessels through which He can communicate. I do this as I learn to disregard thoughts in the mind and experience more and more silence. As I have been able to give up ego thinking, my true thoughts, the thoughts I think with God, rise up in my mind without any effort on my part. I do not think them, really; I simply become aware of them.

I knew I was a beginner, a toddler taking my first shaky steps. My mind was quieter and I more peaceful, but I still had a ways to go before I was that empty vessel. I learned not to struggle. I saw that I achieved each step in its own time. I reminded myself frequently that there is nothing for me to do to make this happen faster except to desire it, to be willing for it, and to disregard the ego’s temper tantrums when I relinquished judgment and control.

Step 6. “A period of achievement. It is here that learning is consolidated. … This is the stage of real peace, for here is Heaven’s state fully reflected.”

I had to laugh when I looked back at previous evaluations of this step. The first time, all that I wrote was, “Sigh.” Ha ha ha.

I now have long periods of undisturbed peace and I have times when joy simply wells up in me, joy that is not attached to anything, that simply is. 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 cannot 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 would not awaken while I looked at him with the body’s eyes and believed what they told me, completely forgetting that they only report back to me what I wanted to see.

I am reminded of spring cleaning. I completely take apart a room so that I can clean under and behind everything. It might take a long while to do this job and if you come in while I am in the middle of it you might think it looks a lot worse than when I started. This is the way it seemed to me when I began this process. Everything was turned upside down and my life seemed more chaotic than ever.

At some point in my cleaning, everything starts going back into place and it looks a lot better. It’s neater, more organized and cleaner. The work is paying off. My process of awakening mirrors this as well. I have reached the point where the appearance of chaos is past and there appears to be order most of the time. I have cleaned up my act.

The final phase in spring cleaning is to go through the room looking for little things still out of place, looking for what I have missed as I put things in order. That is what I am doing now in my mind. I have done the work and I recognize when something is out of place, that is, when it doesn’t belong in my mind. I don’t worry that it is there; I simply remove it.

Holy Spirit, I am so very grateful for the shift in my mind that has occurred. And now, I am ready to completely awaken from this crazy dream and return my awareness to only God. Jesus said that it is possible even in this world to hear only the Voice for God. I am nearly there and it is my Heart’s desire that this be true for me all the time. I choose to know my brother as he is, not as I have had him be. Please help me to see when I forget my purpose so that I can quickly return to it. Please help me to remember that I need forgiveness of my brother, for we will share in madness or in Heaven together. And we will raise our eyes in faith together, or not at all.

Rev. Myron Jones, O.M.C., is a Pathways of Light minister living in Westlake, Louisiana. Read her inspiring Healing Journal articles on the Pathways website. Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Myron’s website:
http://www.forgivenessisthewayhome.org

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