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Study of the Text 8-31-12

8-31-12
10 The use of miracles as spectacles to induce belief is a misunderstanding of their purpose.

I used to believe that miracles were absolutely supposed to wow everyone and make them true believers. It never occurred to me that this was not their purpose until I read this. So what is the purpose of miracles? I think that they are supposed to show me that I am not this limited being that I thought I was. They are supposed to show me that I stand outside time, space, and all limitations. They seem extraordinary at first because I have lived in the dark for so long, but the more I use them the more I understand that miracles are supposed to be the way I live my life.

11 Prayer is the medium of miracles. It is a means of communication of the created with the Creator. Through prayer love is received, and through miracles love is expressed. 

Prayer is the way we communicate with God. It is love being given and received. The Song of Prayer begins by saying:

Prayer is the greatest gift with which God blessed His Son in his creation. It was then what it is to become, the single voice Creator and creation share; the song the Son sings to the Father, Who returns the thanks it offers Him unto the Son.

It goes on to tell us that that while we are in time we use prayer differently. We use it to suit our need, which is to recognize our oneness. It is through miraculous living that we do this. Through prayer (communication with our Creator) we receive love, and through miracles we express that love in whatever way is most helpful at the time.

12 Miracles are thoughts. Thoughts can represent the lower or bodily level of experience, or the higher or spiritual level of experience. One makes the physical, and the other creates the spiritual.

Another thing we learn in A Song of Prayer is that every thought is a prayer. We continuously create through thought. It seems that we (as individual body beings) are doing this but that is not who we are. These selves we continually confuse ourselves with are the effects of the thoughts our true self has.

I know. It’s hard to keep it untangled at first, and until the truth becomes self evident and simple it is probably more helpful to work on this level and just keep in mind that it is not the truth. We are not that. Then as we live a more miraculous life, the confusion will simply fall away on its own, and we will know our self as Self. However you see yourself, thoughts are very important.

There are two kinds of thoughts; the ones that represent our bodily level of experience, and the ones that represent our spiritual level of experience. The first kind is how we make the body and everything to do with time and space.  Here is a good time to be reminded that we are not guilty for making the world.

It could be considered a playground made for the purpose of experience outside reality. Guilt entered into it as a result of the thought that we shouldn’t have, but there is nothing that we shouldn’t have done. We are unlimited beings and there are no boundaries we should not cross. We will be happier as we learn to drop the “shoulds” from our mind.

While we still live in fear of what we have done we limit our experience and it is an unfortunate cycle of desire stunted by guilt. We are trying to create a better world from within the world and it won’t work because the world is an expression of limitation. As we begin to awaken to this fact, we remember that we are not the self in the world, but the maker of the world, and then we see that we operate from outside these artificial boundaries.

Here is how I see this. My friend is sick and from inside time and from the point of view of being Myron I want to help. I look on the internet for possible solutions. I pray to a God I don’t really know using words hoping He will have pity and give us a miracle. Even if I have learned that this is wrong-minded thinking, I still do the same thing, really. I just use more accurate language, but until I know my Self, I don’t know God. Until I trust my Self, I cannot trust God.

The miracle I ask for is that the body be healed even though it doesn’t seem to be possible.  I believe I am Myron and I believe my friend is that sick body. I believe that when the body dies I lose my friend. My focus is on making a better world from within the world.

As I begin to see myself as being outside time and space and begin to see myself as the maker of the dream rather than the avatar I use for this experience, I see my part in the miracle differently than before. I realize that while the story is not real and nothing is actually happening, it is the story I have chosen to experience.

Within that story is an opportunity to lose myself or find myself. I find myself through expressing love. I find myself through joining with my other self, my friend, and knowing our oneness. I find myself through knowing that sickness is not real, by knowing that she is not limited by the laws of the world, by knowing who she really is while she is temporarily confused about that.

Spiritual thoughts are not thoughts of the world as real, but through spiritual thoughts the world is reconfigured to reflect truth more closely. This seems, in the world, to be a miracle of a healed body, but it is actually the miracle of a healed mind. It is a mind healed of a false belief, a mind that laughs at the idea of limitations and restrictions as absurd ideas that could not possibly be true. How could pain, suffering and death actually exist? They would have to be in God and that is just ridiculous. Miraculous thinking is not bound by the rules of the world, and miraculous thinking is reflected as a healed world.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 8-30-12

8-30-12
9 Miracles are a kind of exchange. Like all expressions of love, which are always miraculous in the true sense, the exchange reverses the physical laws. They bring more love both to the giver and the receiver.

In the world when something is given there is loss for the giver. If you are in financial straits and I give you money then you gain the money and I lose it. If you have had a hard break-up and I visit you and cheer you up, I lose that time and energy. Because “love” in the world more resembles a bargain than anything else, giving love is costly. I give my time and loyalty and expect my partner to give me something in return, perhaps some bit of his freedom.

Even if we are able to maintain this delicate balance of giving to receive, everything in the world ends, so this kind of love is always tinged with fear. The cost of even the most successful love in the world is loss of peace of mind, a kind of underlying anxiety as we wait for the other shoe to drop with some finality.

But when I give myself as a channel for the Holy Spirit, give my hands, my feet, my tongue for His use, the result can be a true miracle. The mind of the one receiving can experience a shift in understanding, or relief from suffering, or God’s love and comfort. In exchange, I receive love, certainty, joy. I cannot really find a word that describes it.

It feels so right, knowing that I am doing what I am guided to do, what we all came here to do, help each other wake up. The greatest gain is that as I allow their gift to pass from Spirit through me, it is my gift as well. In the giving, I receive. And the cost is. . . well, nothing. There is no loss at all.

If I were just giving from the ego, telling what I think I know, I might say something helpful. I might use the same language. I might help, but it would not be the miraculous exchange that occurs when Spirit is the giver and I am the channel. When I speak from ego I often feel drained of energy, and feel like the whole process was difficult and unsatisfying.

When I “give” through the ego, I feel like I gave and received nothing. I feel uncertain and wonder if I made things better or worse. If there is any satisfaction it is to the ego self, which for moment feels “better than” and this is short-lived because the ego gives only to get and takes away more than is given. Uncertainty and doubt take away even the little I think I earned.

The more often I stand aside and allow Spirit to speak and act through me, the more joyful life becomes. It is still a dream, but miraculous living makes it a happy dream. When the ego brings me disturbing thoughts I am more likely to recognize them as meaningless, and even if I am drawn to them I much more quickly realize I don’t believe them. Without the desire to listen to the ego chatter, the mind is quieter and more peaceful. Things that used to feel frightening and depressing are seen as meaningless as well.

This is what I receive in exchange for what I give. This is the miracle from my side of it. My family sometimes worries because I work all week, and all weekend I teach and counsel. They think this is a burden and will wear me down, because they are thinking in terms of the physical laws of the world. But they are mistaken. Miraculous giving has no cost and the gift is renewed energy and greater happiness. As I give, I receive; what I give I receive.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 8-29-12

8-29-12
8 Miracles are healing because they supply a lack; they are performed by those who temporarily have more for those who temporarily have less.

Ultimately we lack nothing and it is the belief that we do lack that the miracle heals. I think I need more money or better health, or a special love. The miracle is for the purpose of answering our needs as we see them. The gift He would give us is a healed mind, but He would have His answer be understood so it will come in a form that is most helpful to us at the level we find ourselves.

I remember one time years ago my daughter got suddenly very sick. She got a fever and it shot up high. She was hallucinating and I was scared to death. I didn’t know about the Holy Spirit, or about healing the mind. What I did know is that my daughter was in danger and that I could call on God for help, which is what I did. I felt very alone and because I was alone in this I was more frightened, so I called the prayer line at Unity. A very calm and soothing voice on the other end of the line promised me a miracle, and I believed her. The fever faded away very quickly and my darling daughter slept peacefully. When she woke she was completely healed.

The miracle seemed to be the healing of my daughter that I prayed for, but it was greater than that. What I learned from that situation was that I could trust God, that the world’s laws could be superseded by God’s laws, and that if I joined in prayer with someone else the prayer was strong and I felt better. My mind was healed to the extent that I was willing to accept the healing and in a way that made the healing understandable to me. The person who answered the prayer line represented the one who temporarily had more. In form, she was my Holy Spirit. She saw that I believed I had a need and she responded to that need without believing that what I believed was true.

Right now there is a hurricane over New Orleans. It is not especially strong, but it is very large and it is not moving. There have already been people needing to be rescued in its wake. My son and his fiancé are in their little apartment in New Orleans and as my friend was telling me all this I could feel my heart start to race. So I sat still and watched my mind.

This is a very helpful process. It allows me to be in touch with my feelings, to watch my thoughts and yet, to be detached from them to the degree I am able. It helps me to remember that I am not the story, but the watcher of the story. The more personal I make the story, the harder it is to remember the truth. At times when I am unable to fully disengage from what seems to be happening it is helpful to ask someone who is certain of themselves to remember my certainty for me. If they temporarily have more certainty they can support me while I temporarily have less.

The truth is that I (and my son) are infinite beings and are never in any danger. We are experiencing a dream, a story with elements of danger and excitement, but we are doing so from a safe distance, you might say. It is such a compelling story that we get completely lost in it and forget that it’s not real. When that happens the scary parts get real scary and it’s helpful to have someone to tap me on the shoulder (through words, or simply through prayer) to call me back to reality. Later, I may do the same for them when our roles are reversed.

Remembering the truth is a miracle. Remembering who I am is a miracle. In the world if you get cancer you suffer and maybe die. In the world if you lose your job and your savings you suffer poverty unless you can regain your status. In the world if someone you love dies, they are gone and you suffer that loss. A miracle corrects that thinking. It sets aside the laws of the world and puts the law of God back into place in your mind. As the story beliefs are undone, the truth becomes obvious and your true identity is uncovered. That is the true miracle, the miracle we are ultimately receiving even when it seems to take physical form. The truth behind the physical healing, or the financial relief or relationship correction, is the miracle of awakening.
 
We help each other as we wake up. When my mind is clear and my intent is strong you call on me to know the truth for you. When I am confused and afraid and unable to remember the truth for myself, I call on you and ask you to pray for me and you remember the truth for me. Whoever is strong in the truth is the one offering the miracle. Not because they are holier or more advanced or in anyway different than the other one, but because they are not different or separate and right this moment they know it. Later, I will be the one who knows it, until one day, we all join in this knowing and it is so strong and clear in our mind that we laugh at that the thought we could ever forget who we are.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 8-28-12

8-28-12
  7 Miracles are everyone’s right, but purification is necessary first.

I often ask the Holy Spirit to purify my thoughts. I will notice that I am thinking thoughts that are not thoughts I think with God and so I ask the Holy Spirit to purify them, that is, to take from those thoughts all that is not truth. Right now there is a tropical storm in the gulf and at the moment it is headed right to New Orleans. It is due to hit on the 29th which is exactly when Katrina made landfall. The timing is creepy and my mind has been filled with thoughts about this.

Here is what I am thinking that is true. There is a tropical storm in the gulf that might hit New Orleans tomorrow. When it does there will be high winds and heavy rainfall. That is the only thing that is actually happening right now. There is nothing in that thought to cause undo alarm or worry. It is something to keep an eye on is all.

Now here are the thoughts that have been in my mind off and on since Monday.
  It has to be significant that this hurricane is predicted to make landfall on the anniversary of Katrina. (There are many, many thoughts that are triggered by that thought, and none of them are neutral to me.)
  Even if it does not turn into a hurricane the rainfall itself is enough to cause huge problems, maybe even disaster in New Orleans. They cannot pump water out of the city fast enough to keep up with a heavy rain much less a hurricane.  (New Orleans is practically an island sitting below sea level and its infrastructure is not up to date so things like the pumping system are inadequate)

  The levees built to keep the gulf and Lake Pontchartrain out of the city are antiquated as well and have proven to be weak and inadequate. They could give way and the city would be underwater and everyone there killed. (My son is one of those people and that thought is enough to send me into panic mode.)

  My son should leave right now, just in case. Something terrible is going to happen. I can’t stand the thought of the terror and panic that those who stayed would feel and in picturing this happening to my son I am able to vividly imagine this. I am helpless to influence the outcome and helpless to influence my son. I don’t want to be a fear monger, and I don’t want to teach fear, but I also want to do those things.

So which thoughts do you think are the thoughts I am thinking with God? Can you imagine God sitting around biting his nails, wishing He could influence people to panic and run? ~smile~  I don’t doubt that I am not the only one who has thoughts very similar to these right now, but that does not make them true thoughts. Could any of them happen in the story? Yes, they could. But no matter how dramatic and tragic the story becomes, it is still just a story. When things get tough I get to gauge my identification with the story.

There are two ways to experience these thoughts. The first is the way I have done in the past. I see the thoughts and believe them to one degree or another. The more I focus on these thoughts, the more likely they become. Eventually I feel compelled to act on them. Acting from fear is never a good idea and often when I have done so I regretted it. And acting from fear just increases fear and my belief in fear. I add to the ego.

The other way to experience these thoughts is to recognize them as ego thoughts and to give them to the Holy Spirit for purification. In doing this I am undoing the ego and adding to the Kingdom. I am teaching myself, and others through the example of my living fearlessly, that fear is not real.

As I allow the Holy Spirit to heal my mind, I realize that all the thoughts after the one fact of a tropical storm are just ego. As I focused on those thoughts I suffered, not from anything that is real, but from my thoughts about what is happening and when that’s not dramatic enough to hold my attention, the ego brings me thoughts about what could happen.

As the Holy Spirit purifies my thoughts my mind clears and becomes quiet. I am left with true thoughts and I remember that I am not living this story but observing this story. I watch the play with interest and I wait for instructions. Is there something for me to do? I won’t have to figure out what that should be, I will simply know.

The panic thoughts return again and again and I watch them, too. I know they do not originate with me, nor do they define me or in any way affect who I am. I am not a bad Course student because they appear in my mind. I am not dooming the Sonship to unending dreams of suffering because I notice these thoughts in my mind.  It is my purpose, my job to notice them and to allow them to be healed in the mind. They are nothing. They are meaningless.

I watch as Myron feels drawn to them and I see how believing an untrue thought causes so much suffering. There is only one useful thing to do with these thoughts and so I give them to the Holy Spirit when I notice them, and I ask Him, once again, to purify them. I do this over and over again as often as I am aware of the thoughts. Each time I do this I am healing the entire Sonship. I am chipping away at the ego belief system.

It is important that the purification take place because without it, the fear that fills the mind blocks the awareness of Love’s presence. Choosing fear over love is the same as saying, “No miracles, please.” Miracles are our right, but they are never forced on us and we can say no if we prefer the drama of the story. Choosing to give these thoughts to the Holy Spirit and asking Him to purify the mind is how we say yes to miracles.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 8-27-12

8-27-12
6 Miracles are natural. When they do not occur something has gone wrong.

Miracles should be natural and expected, and yet, when someone experiences a miracle it seems to be an extraordinary event.  So what constitutes a miracle? A miracle is something that surprises us by defying the laws of the world.

In the world we have laws that govern the body. We have laws that govern every little thing having to do with the body. If I go to the doctor and he says my body is riddled with cancer and tells me to get my life in order because there is no hope, then I could expect die. I’m not a doctor and may not be able to explain in scientific language the reason this is so, but everyone hearing about the situation would expect me to die.

If I were to refuse to accept the validity of those rules and choose life instead, and so were to have an immediate and total recovery, that would be called a miracle. It would be a miraculous recovery because it happened outside the laws of the world. There is nothing in those laws that explains or allows the body to do that.

Can this happen? Absolutely! Perhaps you have read the story of Anita Moorjani, who had this very experience. She wrote about it in her book, Dying to Be Me. How does something like this happen? It happens when we realize that we are under no laws but God’s. When we stop, at least for a moment, believing that we are a body with all its inherent limitations and laws, we experience something different.

Jesus says we can raise the dead and heal the sick because we made death and sickness. We are not bound to the laws of the world because those laws are immutable, but because we choose to be bound. We can be free of them simply by making another choice. So why cling to these rules which hold us hostage to sickness, suffering and death? Why indeed!

The miracle proves we don’t have to and Jesus tells us that we are not supposed to be bound to the world and its laws. What would have to occur to allow me to live a life of miracles? Well, I would have to let go of the laws of the world, and its those laws that seem to be all that prevents me being thrown into chaos.

What if gravity no longer held? What if time were not really an absolute and linear event? What if I woke up one morning to discover that I could reach out past my body, and I realized that familiar and “safe” boundary no longer existed for me? I was thinking how unsettling it is for me to be in a place I’ve never been. I once visited Mexico briefly. I was near the border and wanted to say I had been to another country and so we crossed the border and walked around for awhile.

I had never been to a place where no one understood the language I speak. I tried to communicate and couldn’t. Everything looked different. I didn’t know the rules here, not the rules of law so I could inadvertently get into legal trouble, nor the cultural rules, which were surely different than the ones I was familiar with, and so I might inadvertently offend.

I was very uncomfortable and my discomfort overcame my curiosity and so I left. I know that if I had stayed longer I would have discovered a new comfort level, something that I could live with, but I got something from that short visit that was more important. I discovered how disturbing it is when the familiar rules are no longer in force, when things are not as I thought they were.

This gives me an idea of why I might not freely embrace the idea of a life of miracles.  An occasional miracle might be ok, but if I were no longer bound by the laws I made up to govern my little kingdom, this could for awhile be very disturbing. This is why the Holy Spirit guides me gently and gives me little tiny steps to take as I travel that road.

As I let go of the idea that I am this body and that this world is my home, it becomes easier to let go of the rules that no longer apply to me. The screwdriver I am using slips and gouges out a bit of flesh on my finger and I grab it bracing myself for the pain. Then I remember that pain is not real and nothing happens. I don’t feel pain and I marvel that this could happen.

I am writing in my journal and the Holy Spirit is speaking to me through my writing. I am vaguely aware that I need to stop because I have an appointment, but I really want to finish so I give time to Him and trust that He will manipulate it to my advantage. I write for a long time it seems, but my trust holds and when I finish I look at the clock and almost no time has passed. I do my posting and get to my first customer right on time.

In little ways like this I am learning to accept that the laws of the world are meaningless. I put them in place and I can ignore them. These are small things, but they are piling up. The sheer volume of miracles are making an impact on my consciousness, and the less identified I am with the story, the body, the character of Myron, the less I seem to need the reassurance of those laws.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 8-24-12

8-24-12
5 Miracles are habits, and should be involuntary. They should not be under conscious control. Consciously selected miracles can be misguided.

One time I was with a customer and his wife. She had some very serious physical problems and was in a lot of pain. She was seated at a table and he was seated next to her. I went up to say hi to him and had the impulse to place my hand on her shoulder to allow healing to take place. My hand immediately became very warm and I felt some energy or something pass through me to her.

I don’t know why her or why then. I don’t know what that was for or why it was for me to do. I don’t know if it made a difference or if it did what that difference was. I was just following guidance. I wonder how often we make a difference to someone without ever being aware of it simply because we are in a state of miracle readiness, a desire to be used without interfering.

I showed up at a customer’s office one day expecting to visit with someone I liked and enjoyed being around. However, she was very unwelcoming and I suspected something was wrong with her. She gave off a strong vibe of wanting to be left alone and my every intention was to say hello-goodbye and leave. My brain was telling my body to turn when my mouth opened and I asked if she needed to talk.

She looked like she was about to send me on my way when suddenly, if not still a little reluctantly, agreed that she did. We went to the back room where we wouldn’t be disturbed and she shared some disturbing news, an upset both physical and emotional. I had no idea what to say. She is not a Course student or even someone I know on a personal level, which was a good thing because since Myron had nothing to say, she had to step back and let Spirit speak.

I wondered what I was supposed to say and it seemed that I was to say very little, and simply listen. Then I was directed to pray with her and Spirit gave me the words to use. Afterwards she expressed her gratitude and I knew that I had been helpful, not because of anything I did, but because of what I had allowed to happen through me. I was in a state of miracle readiness and everything else happened without my conscious assistance.

I’ve had this kind of experience often, but I have had the opposite experience also. I have had times when the ego mind decided it knew what was needed and what should be said. There is an arrogance to that kind of thought even when the arrogance is disguised as helpfulness. I think that miracles should not be consciously guided because that would mean thinking and the ego is in charge of that activity.

If I am ready and willing to be the vessel through which the miracle occurs, then that will happen smoothly, effortlessly, and perfectly. The miracle may happen without my awareness and often happens through me without my understanding of why or how. It’s all rather lovely.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 8-23-12

8-23-12
4 All miracles mean life, and God is the Giver of life. His Voice will direct you very specifically. You will be told all you need to know.
Ok, this is one of my favorite principles. It is my experience that I am being directed very specifically and told all I need to know. Since I started paying attention I am even more aware of this Voice. I don’t always discern directions but more often than not, I do. Sometimes I hear the direction and choose not to follow it. I don’t know why I do that because I always regret it. That Voice is for me, the instructions are always for my good.

I learned to listen first through writing. Keeping a journal while asking the Holy Spirit to guide my words set my intent and kept my attention focused long enough to get a clear answer. I had to get past the belief that only special people hear the Voice for God, and that I was not deserving of this communication. 

I also had to let go of the belief that It came and went and that sometimes for some strange reason It was quiet. The Holy Spirit told me that He speaks to me all through the day as the lesson says, and that it is I who fails to listen at times. I also had to let go of my expectations of what It would sound like or rather how I would experience this Voice. For me it is a thought that comes through the mind but not from the mind, a thought Myron would not have had. Sometimes I go back and read His message from a past journaling and it is like I am reading it for the first time.

Reading NTI and the Inner Ramana has helped me to practice focusing my attention on that Voice rather than on the ego voice, to let go of self will so I could embrace the Will of God that is my true will. Now I hear the ego less and recognize it more quickly. The best change is that I don’t usually get upset when I am aware of the ego voice, don’t think it means anything. I just ask that the Holy Spirit heal that thought in the mind.

I am going into detail about my experience about learning to hear the Voice for God and learning that I want to follow Its direction knowing it always wants only my good, because I want everyone to know that this is available to you whenever you are ready for it. Everyone can hear this Voice and everyone is meant to.

We are given this Helper because God wants us to return to our Self. God wants us to live and what we are experiencing now is not life. We pretend to be born and we pretend to live, then we pretend to die. All the while Life continues unabated and death is a strange concept that is unknown to Life. But while we are caught up in our stories of separation Life continues outside our awareness, and so we suffer an imaginary but painful separation from our Father. We don’t have to, and it is this Helper, this Voice for God, that will direct us very specifically to gently undo what we have done so we can return Home.

© 2012, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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