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Study of the Text 3-11-13

3-11-13
6 It should especially be noted that God has only one Son. If all His creations are His Sons, every one must be an integral part of the whole Sonship. The Sonship in its Oneness transcends the sum of its parts. However this is obscured as long as any of its parts is missing. That is why the conflict cannot ultimately be resolved until all the parts of the Sonship have returned. Only then can the meaning of wholeness in the true sense be understood. Any part of the Sonship can believe in error or incompleteness if he so chooses. However, if he does so, he is believing in the existence of nothingness. The correction of this error is the Atonement.

This is the place in the Text where I discovered that I, too, am a Son of God. The mystery deepens as I am told that God has only one Son. I am a part of a whole, it seems and this does seem mysterious to me because I don’t know what this means. All I know, really, is separation and so it is hard to get a feeling for wholeness. And yet, the memory of what I am must be in my mind. This memory, though I cannot access it on a conscious level, is the reason I didn’t toss the whole thing at this point.

Though buried very deeply, the memory of my Self is in my mind and this memory draws me to the Course and keeps me reading it even though nothing in the world validates what I am reading. I try to imagine something that symbolizes this idea of being part of a whole. I think of cells in the body. Am I a cell in the body of Christ dreaming I have a life separate from the body?

It’s not a perfect metaphor but maybe the best I can do. Jesus says that I will not understand this until I return to wholeness, so there is little sense in trying. I will just continue to do my part in the correction of the error through accepting the Atonement. As I have been doing this practice the last few days my experience of it has expanded.

Quite honestly, the idea of accepting the Atonement has had little real meaning for me until very recently. I understood the words and intellectually grasped the meaning, but until I was ready I did not accept the meaning into my heart. As it turns out, “accept” is the key word. In the past I asked for the Atonement, but did not fully accept it. I kept it at bay with my defenses, and so did not really know what it was.

Quite suddenly, really, as I was doing the study and practice of this section of the Text, I accepted what was being offered. In the acceptance of it, I realized that Love came into my mind and healed me. That, evidently, is the Atonement. It is the Jesus’ plan for our salvation. We just keep looking at our thoughts and beliefs, learning to question their validity, and then when we are ready, we open ourselves to Love and all is corrected and the mind healed of its confusion.

Oh, dear Jesus, could it be that simple? Evidently, it is. Of course I still have to accept the Atonement. I still defend against it, but now I see what is happening more clearly than before, and with a startling clarity I see how the ego is undone. I have said before that it is not my job to heal my mind only to want it healed, but now I see it. I see the simplicity and perfection of the plan of atonement. It makes me cry in relief and gratitude as I write this.

Of course my mind is still split so the part that wants to think of itself as a solitary cell with its on little universe is not giving up the fight. In fact it keeps mounting these surprise attacks, some of them very subtle and some quite vicious. I remember something shameful from my past or I become obsessed with a worry thought about possible futures. Soon the ego is putting forth very reasonable presumptions, and I start to doubt reality (which now seems far fetched) and to believe the ego story.

But Jesus has given me the solution and even in my pain and doubt, I remember that this solution works, and now, after practicing it, I know I want the solution. I tell the Holy Spirit that I accept the Atonement in this situation. At first it is tentative and the ego kicks into high gear as it points out that these are just words and what do they mean anyway? But I know I don’t want to live in fear and guilt anymore and I open more fully to the solution.

I tell the Holy Spirit that I really want the Atonement. I stand there in the middle of the room with my arms outstretched. “Here I am God. I stand naked and defenseless against Your love. I accept Your offer. I invite Love into my mind, and I ask Love to heal me.” I feel a little foolish, but also giddy with relief. I have discovered the way out of this insanity.

I accept the Atonement in this situation where I believe I was guilty because I want it more than I want to hide from my guilt. I accept Atonement in this situation where I believe I am endangered because I want it more than I want to protect myself. I accept even in the face of my fear and doubt and uncertainty. I trust and so I accept.

Do you see where this is leading? I dream of my little cell floating nearer and nearer the body of which it is an integral part. “God, swallow me up. Take me in. Return me to my Home. Wake me from my dream of separation. I accept.” I trust that my prayer is answered. I look forward to discovering how much I am willing to accept today.

© 2013, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 3-8-13

3-8-13
5 Nothing and everything cannot coexist. To believe in one is to deny the other. Fear is really nothing and love is everything. Whenever light enters darkness, the darkness is abolished. What you believe is true for you. In this sense the separation has occurred, and to deny it is merely to use denial inappropriately. However, to concentrate on error is only a further error. The initial corrective procedure is to recognize temporarily that there is a problem, but only as an indication that immediate correction is needed. This establishes a state of mind in which the Atonement can be accepted without delay. It should be emphasized, however, that ultimately no compromise is possible between everything and nothing. Time is essentially a device by which all compromise in this respect can be given up. It only seems to be abolished by degrees, because time itself involves intervals that do not exist. Miscreation made this necessary as a corrective device. The statement “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” needs only one slight correction to be meaningful in this context; “He gave it to His only begotten Son.”

Fear is nothing and love is everything. I can believe in only one at a time. I cannot hold the idea of fear in my mind and still believe in love. I can jump back and forth, but I believe in only one or the other in any given moment. This is the reason it seems so hard to let go of a fear thought. While I hold the fear in my mind, I cannot believe that it is not real. And if I believe in the fearful image in my mind it becomes real to me.

I believe in the separation and so the separation is true for me. It would not be helpful for me to stand here in the face of fear and say that the separation isn’t real. That is the truth, but I don’t really believe it. If I believed it, I wouldn’t think I was here. Since I believe the separation is real, it is real for me. Yikes! I’m stuck in this cycle of false thinking.

Jesus shows us the way out of it. We cannot take ourselves out of it, but we can be released when that is our desire. First we see evidence that we believe in separation, that is when we experience fear, guilt, sickness, pain, rage, grievances, jealousy, depression or any of the other feelings that come from believing we are separate from God. We acknowledge what is happening. Then we immediately go to the correction. We accept the Atonement and allow love to heal our mind.

It may seem like a subtle difference, saying that fear does not exist as opposed to saying I am experiencing fear and fear does not exist so I accept the Atonement or I accept healing, but in my experience it is a very important difference. The first is denial of what is obviously true for me and will produce conflict in my mind and this will bring me deeper into fear.

Jesus asks us to look with the Holy Spirit at the thoughts in our mind. He asks us to keep nothing from Him. This is what we are doing when we acknowledge our erroneous thinking. The ego likes to step in at that moment and make a lifetime study of the thought, but Jesus warns against this. He says that while pretending it has not happened is using denial inappropriately, to concentrate on error is only a further error. So look at the error, acknowledge it, and then go straight to the correction.

I think for some people, this business of looking at the fear or anger or guilt, or whatever form the separation takes, is simple. For me it was hard to get the hang of it. I had a problem with expressing emotion, which caused me to repress it or to stuff it. And if I repress the emotion, I also repress the cause. This doesn’t work, of course, and even if I deny the fear for a while, it just pops back up.

I would then try to control it by finding solutions. This doesn’t work either as any attempt to control fear just makes it seem more real. I tried to go straight from a fear thought to healing without looking at it or acknowledging it. I saw the error in this when I read that Jesus could not take my fear from me.

At first that was an upsetting thought, but eventually I understood that he was not abandoning me to my fear, but helping me to see what needed to be done to eventually be healed of the belief in fear altogether.  Now when I feel fear I look at it straight on, I feel what is happening to me, I become willing to know anything about it that would be helpful in releasing it. I am not afraid of the fear anymore. I know that this process of looking with the Holy Spirit is safe.

So for awhile now we have placed ourselves in a situation that demands we acknowledge as real something that does not exist so that we can make a different choice about it. Eventually, as Jesus says, we are going to have to make the ultimate decision and accept that there is only God and nothing else exists. This might take a long time as we look at one fear thought after another and allow each to be healed. But finally, we will notice the pattern and the mind will click, I guess. ~smile~

Or maybe it will not take a long while. Maybe we will just, one day accept the truth. I know it is really that easy. If I can let go of a fear thought simply because I want to then I can let go of all fear thoughts, or the belief in fear, simply because I want to. The moment I want this, wholly want this, it is done.

I often think of Jill Frazier (Fear Falls Away). She had a moment of looking at her fear and considered the thought that there could be a way of doing this without fear. After a lifetime of fear, it was her moment of complete release. By the way, reading her story I was struck by the fact that she didn’t know she was doing this, she wasn’t trying to let go of fear. The Holy Spirit doesn’t need our help, only our permission.

The Holy Spirit will always heal my mind to the degree I am willing. Why I hold onto fear when I don’t have to is a mystery to me. But as a matter of encouragement, I will tell you that doing it the slow way does work. I don’t have fear like I used to and when I do, I look at it with less anxiety and choose the Atonement quickly.

I see that one day, maybe soon, maybe later, I will be ready to accept the Atonement completely and permanently. I don’t know when but I see it is inevitable. Jesus says it only seems like it is being abolished in degrees because I believe in time. Well, I can’t do anything with that but go with the program.

As a last thought, I know that the “program” is unique to each of us. Jan Frazier had her program and so did Byron Katie and others. Some seemed to have experienced their awakening suddenly and without any effort on their part. Mine seems to be a slow progressive experience as I do the work and take small gentle steps and share my progress with others. I didn’t choose this. None of us choose our path. We just seem to.

© 2013, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 3-7-13

3-7-13
4 It has already been said that you believe you cannot control fear because you yourself made it, and your belief in it seems to render it out of your control. Yet any attempt to resolve the error through attempting the mastery of fear is useless. In fact, it asserts the power of fear by the very assumption that it need be mastered. The true resolution rests entirely on mastery through love. In the interim, however, the sense of conflict is inevitable, since you have placed yourself in a position where you believe in the power of what does not exist.

In one sentence, Jesus lets me know why I have not yet let go of fear. I have been trying to master fear. I am beginning to notice when I do this and to choose differently. Here is the way it can happen. A common source of fear for me is that I will lose my source of income. This fear is not real strong in me, that is, it is no longer is a driving force in my life. However, there is still fear because it pops up now and then as it did yesterday, so I will use that example.

This is the way it has progressed for me. When I was young, if my income was threatened, I would panic and if things didn’t resolve soon, or even if they did resolve, I would become very depressed and feel hopeless until something changed in my life that cheered me up.

Later, after I discovered Unity and began to realize I had some control over my life through controlling my thoughts, I reacted differently. I would panic, then I would remember that I could think differently and sometimes that helped. I would start using mantras and replacing negative thoughts with positive ones. If it seemed to work, I felt exultant and encouraged. When it didn’t seem to work, I felt afraid because I didn’t know what else to do and because it was scary to think my new hope was unfounded.

Then after I found ACIM I went through a different progression of changes as my understanding grew. I slowly learned that healing took place in my mind, not in the world, though often a healed mind did reflect a changed world. I began to realize that praying for a certain outcome was a mistake because I didn’t understand what anything was for. I learned to ask for a perfect solution and to trust that the Holy Spirit would know what needed to happen.

But what I did not learn for a long time was how to approach fear without trying to control it. I learned not to try to control fear through manipulating circumstances. I learned that I could not control fear through praying it away. I learned I could not control fear through confronting it with a force of will, even if I used all the spiritual words in the world.

I did have moments when fear would dissolve away, but for a long time I didn’t see that it was the moment when I gave up trying to control. I didn’t connect the healing to moment that I surrendered completely to the Holy Spirit. It was in that moment of surrender that I stopped trying to control fear and allowed fear to be healed by Love.

So going back to my example of being afraid of losing my income, this is how it looked.
• I would try to manipulate the world to make things safe.
• I would try to manipulate God to get Him to make things safe.
• I would try to control the fearful conditions through controlling my thoughts.
• I would try to control my fear through controlling my thoughts.
• And finally, I stopped trying to control the fear and accepted the atonement solution. I accepted the Atonement in that situation, or I accepted Love or God or healing. I asked the Holy Spirit to heal my mind or to undo what I had done. All of these are the same thing. I completely surrender the problem to Love and allow it to be undone without my input or help or direction.

Because the mind is split, there is the belief in loss and lack, and there is the belief in Love which does not know of loss or lack. As I have progressed through the steps that have led me to the place I am now, my focus has been drawn away from the ego mind and toward the mind I share with God.

I still get distracted by the ego thoughts and sometimes respond to them, but I never entirely lose sight of the part of my mind that knows this cannot be true. Even when I get entangled in the ego beliefs, I do so only briefly. I know how to be free now. I stop trying to disentangle myself, and I simply accept the solution. I accept the Atonement and allow Love to heal my mind.

© 2013, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 3-5-13

3-6-13
3 Both miracles and fear come from thoughts. If you are not free to choose one, you would also not be free to choose the other. By choosing the miracle you have rejected fear, if only temporarily. You have been fearful of everyone and everything. You are afraid of God, of me and of yourself. You have misperceived or miscreated Us, and believe in what you have made. You would not have done this if you were not afraid of your own thoughts. The fearful must miscreate, because they misperceive creation. When you miscreate you are in pain. The cause and effect principle now becomes a real expediter, though only temporarily. Actually, “Cause” is a term properly belonging to God, and His “Effect” is His Son. This entails a set of Cause and Effect relationships totally different from those you introduce into miscreation. The fundamental conflict in this world, then, is between creation and miscreation. All fear is implicit in the second, and all love in the first. The conflict is therefore one between love and fear.

There is actually only one Cause and that is God, the Effect is His Son, and there is only love in this creation. Through our misperception of everything, we have set into motion another set of cause and effect relationships, this one based on fear. So beneath every conflict we experience there is the fundamental conflict, that is, between creation and miscreation or, said another way, between love and fear.

We are creators and when we miscreate we are afraid of what we have done because it is unnatural. We have misperceived God and are afraid of our miscreation. In an effort to be rid of the fear we project it and so we have these stories going on. It seems that it is easier to believe that we are afraid of not having enough money or that someone we love is dying or could die than it is to own up to our misperceptions.

As long as we keep the miscreations in the world we can always tell ourselves that we can fix it, or that this too shall pass, or if it doesn’t kill us it will make us stronger. Or a personal non-favorite is that we suffer for God. That must be right up there with the most misguided of the miscreations. God is Love Itself and we have, through our faulty thinking, made of Him an idol to fear.

Yesterday I lost a customer, which for me means I lost income. Immediately, ego goes into panic mode. I feel a rush of adrenaline. Then I remember that this is only a mistaken thought, a miscreation and I ask for the Atonement in this situation. I feel better immediately because I know I made the right choice, but then the ego begins its usual rant.

What could I be thinking? How could this not matter? I am going to wind up without enough money to pay for my house I just bought. Then what? What will my boss say? The ego can go on and on until it sees me living huddled in a card board box eating out of dumpsters. But for the moment, all the objections seem to make sense and I am confused. But I know one thing. I know that I am not meant for fear and this cannot be truth.

For just this one moment, I am willing to disregard appearances and open my mind to the Holy Spirit. I ask for the Atonement in this situation and I accept it. I am at peace. The peace may not be permanent, fear may rise in my mind again, but every time I do this the fear is not as strong and it does not last as long. This time the fear did not even last long enough for me to project it onto others. I never even looked for someone to blame.

As my mind began to calm I remembered something important. Nothing is really happening. I am not afraid because I lost a customer. I lost a customer because I am afraid. The fear comes first and is then projected as a story in this life I seem to be living. Yesterday, in spite of my fear, I looked at my story with the Holy Spirit and I saw it for what it was, a misperception, a miscreation, just a mistaken thought. When I refused to accept the lies and asked for healing, the fear simply went away. Fear is only a mistaken thought and peace is a true thought.

What followed was an idea that may help me recover that customer. I passed it on to one of my workers and he acted on it. It may work out just fine, but if it doesn’t that’s ok, too. I am always just a thought away from perfect peace and perfect joy, just a thought away from a healed mind. As a fearful mind projects fearful stories, a healed mind projects peaceful stories so I am always only a thought away from living the happy dream.

© 2013, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 3-5-13

3-5-13
2 I cannot let you leave your mind unguarded, or you will not be able to help me. Miracle working entails a full realization of the power of thought in order to avoid miscreation. Otherwise a miracle will be necessary to set the mind itself straight, a circular process that would not foster the time collapse for which the miracle was intended. The miracle worker must have genuine respect for true cause and effect as a necessary condition for the miracle to occur.

Again, Jesus emphasizes that it is our thoughts that cause the effect (the world) and it is our thoughts that initiate the miracle (the undoing of the world). As I watch my thoughts and ask the Holy Spirit to heal my mind, I see how true this is. I notice something happening in my mind that is obviously ego thinking and I realize that the resultant fear and guilt are caused by these thoughts.

When I decide I want to have the belief behind those thoughts healed, it all goes away as if it had never happened and I return to peace. Sometimes when the thoughts have been especially virulent, and have caused a lot of fear in my mind, I am absolutely amazed at the process. It feels like magic and yet, it is the opposite of magic.

I no longer doubt that the problem is in my mind, but at one time I still had trouble seeing how this could be true at certain times. I looked at the effects as proof that the problem was real, instead of seeing that the thought produced the effect. I just couldn’t make the jump from believing the story to understanding that I was the maker of the story.

During this period I found The Work (Byron Katie) to be very helpful. Through this work I learned to question my thoughts and not to believe them simply because they were in my mind. I learned, through turning them around, that these thoughts did not have a fixed meaning and that I could see them differently and when I did, I would have a different experience of them. It is still helpful to me when my mind becomes confused. That one question, “is it true?” is often enough to snap me back to reality.

When I was ready, I realized that what I was reading in the Course was telling me the same thing, but it was telling me more. Learning to see the situation differently was a step in the right direction, but it was only a step. Jesus wants us to understand how very powerful the mind is. It not only determines how we experience things, but it determines what we experience. We make this world up with our thoughts. That’s a little scary, isn’t it? That’s why we hide this power from ourselves. It scares us because of what we have done with our thoughts.

We can make a different choice from the ones that make up the world of pain, suffering and death. The mind that made this can make other things as well, and eventually will remember Itself and stop making up stories and return to true creation. Each of us reading, studying and practicing the Course right now is in the process of doing this. We are in the process of waking up to our truth. We will practice on the dream world we made and when we have brought that world into alignment with truth, we will enjoy it a bit and then let it go. Then we will return to our true vocation, which is creating alongside God.

The way all of this happens is through the simple process of watching our minds for the errors in our thinking and accepting correction. Because we are confused about reality we need help with this. We cannot undo the ego from within the ego, so we have been given the Holy Spirit Who works from outside the ego. His function is to undo what we have made. He will respond to our slightest invitation to do so. As we watch the seeming magic of pain and suffering dissolve into peace and joy, we become more and more motivated to ask for His help. And our world begins to transform.

Holy Spirit, I would not forget my function today. I would remember my single purpose as I guard my thoughts and ask that you heal my mind. 

© 2013, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 3-4-13

3-4-13
VII. Cause and Effect
1 You may still complain about fear, but you nevertheless persist in making yourself fearful. I have already indicated that you cannot ask me to release you from fear. I know it does not exist, but you do not. If I intervened between your thoughts and their results, I would be tampering with a basic law of cause and effect; the most fundamental law there is. I would hardly help you if I depreciated the power of your own thinking. This would be in direct opposition to the purpose of this course. It is much more helpful to remind you that you do not guard your thoughts carefully enough. You may feel that at this point it would take a miracle to enable you to do this, which is perfectly true. You are not used to miracle-minded thinking, but you can be trained to think that way. All miracle workers need that kind of training.

I am glad we are starting this section talking about fear again. It really does feel very hard to let go of fear. Jesus recognizes that we will find this hard and maybe even think it is impossible. He says that we think it would take a miracle and that we would be right. But that is what we are doing here. We are learning to become miracle minded.

He is also reiterating that our minds are very powerful and that our thoughts make the world we see. Another way to say this is that our world is the effect of the thoughts we hold and believe. Jesus knows that we want him to just wipe our mind’s clear of the fear, but he can’t do that. He cannot interfere with cause and effect. And certainly he does not want us to believe that our mind is powerless because this is not true.

However, Jesus does not leave us on our own to figure this out. He tells us what to do about the fear. We learn to watch our minds carefully for thoughts that are not true. These untrue thoughts are the cause of every fearful situation we experience in this life. When we notice a thought that is not true, we then allow that thought to be corrected.

Could it really be that simple? Yes, it is. It requires vigilance and willingness, but it is simple. When it is not easy, it is only because we do not truly want it.  I have noticed that sometimes I want to be free of the fearful feelings, but I do not want to let go of the belief that has caused those feeling to rise in me.

Often, I don’t even understand my convoluted thinking about it. I don’t know exactly what thought it is that I am holding onto so tightly, or why. That does not matter. Why bother trying to understand the meaningless? When I am in fear it is because I am thinking and believing something that is not of God.

I ask the Holy Spirit to correct my thinking, to heal my mind, to undo what I have done. I ask for the miracle and because I ask, and to the degree I really want it, this is what I receive. I may not be absolutely certain I am ready to give up that belief and if I am not, the thoughts will return and I will have to begin again. But that’s OK. I simply continue the process until I am fully convinced that I want to believe only the thoughts I think with God.

Now I will share with you the reason I am glad Jesus is talking about fear with us this morning. I woke up happy and in gratitude. I feel thankful for all the ways I am learning to be a miracle worker, and for the healing that is taking place in my mind. I am letting go of fear and guilt and I am learning that I want to make my life available to the Holy Spirit for His use. I am learning that all of these things are what I truly want. I am highly motivated to do this work.

As I was making my coffee I had a thought about my younger son. It was not a thought with words, but just a thought that was more of a feeling. If I put it into words, it would be something like this. What if something really bad happened to him? What if he died? I felt fear grip me. My stomach clinched and my jaw tightened.

Where do these thoughts come from? It didn’t feel like I asked for it and yet, there it was. What am I supposed to do with it? Trying not to think about it just makes it appear bigger in my mind. Deliberately entertaining the thought allows the ego to come up with reasons this could happen, and to imagine how it would feel. I don’t want to try to suppress the thought because I can’t. I don’t want to indulge the thought because it just makes it worse.

So I question the thought. I evaluate it for the truth. This feeling of dread and fear, is it from God? Is God fear? Did God create me like Himself, and if He did, did He create me fearful? If God created me fearful then He would have to be fearful and that makes no sense. This is not a thought of God and so is not a true thought.

I know this is not truth and I know that I don’t want to make anymore untrue effects. I want to undo the illusion, not go deeper into it. The world I see is the effect of my thoughts. If I want to see a different world I must think different thoughts. I already know that from within the dream I cannot control my thoughts, but I also know that I have access to help outside the dream.

I have the Holy Spirit and can ask Him to correct my thinking for me. He can heal my mind, and He will do so at the slightest invitation. So I invite Him into my mind and ask that He undo what I have done this morning. I ask for the miracle of a healed mind. All that is required of me now is that I accept the healing.

I notice the ego thoughts being thrown at me, and they are fear thoughts to pull me back into the story. The ego reasons that being released from fear does not protect my son from death. It accuses me of leaving him to suffer just so I feel better for the moment and warns me that if I do this I will suffer even more later. As if worrying about him would prevent something, anything, from happening. But I am no longer interested in the ego’s rants. The miracle has healed my mind. I am free.

I am, again, happy and grateful. Thank You, God. I love You, God.

© 2013, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of the Text 3-1-13

3-1-13
9 Everyone experiences fear. Yet it would take very little right thinking to realize why fear occurs. Few appreciate the real power of the mind, and no one remains fully aware of it all the time. However, if you hope to spare yourself from fear there are some things you must realize, and realize fully. The mind is very powerful, and never loses its creative force. It never sleeps. Every instant it is creating. It is hard to recognize that thought and belief combine into a power surge that can literally move mountains. It appears at first glance that to believe such power about yourself is arrogant, but that is not the real reason you do not believe it. You prefer to believe that your thoughts cannot exert real influence because you are actually afraid of them. This may allay awareness of the guilt, but at the cost of perceiving the mind as impotent. If you believe that what you think is ineffectual you may cease to be afraid of it, but you are hardly likely to respect it. There are no idle thoughts. All thinking produces form at some level.

From the moment I read this the first time, back in 1981, I was stunned. I had been attending a Unity Church and they emphasize the power of your thoughts so it was not a new idea. But this paragraph is so uncompromising. I had been learning that my thoughts matter, but I had never been willing to accept this level of effect. It was a long time before I truly embraced these words from Jesus. I can still slide into forgetfulness when I am not thinking about it.

Jesus says that our thoughts when believed can literally move mountains. Literally? Really? That is so hard to imagine, and yet, why would he say it if it were not true. He also says that there are no idle thoughts and that all thinking produces form at some level. When I first read those two sentences I felt a surge of adrenal all through my body. It was, frankly, frightening to think of all my thoughts having effect.

Through Unity I had learned that my thoughts could influence my life. That seemed big enough, but now I was learning that all my thoughts, even the idle ones I hardly even noticed, were producing form. I didn’t understand (and still don’t) what Jesus means when he says form is produced at “some level.” Evidently, there is more happening than meets the body’s eye.

It is this passage in the Course, more than any other, that influenced me to begin watching my mind and allowing my thoughts to be corrected. If my thoughts are powerful (and Jesus says they are) then I need to be more mindful of where I let my mind wander. I need to be very mindful. I also understand what he means when he says we are afraid of our thoughts.

Many of the thoughts in my mind trigger guilt when I think about them. I certainly don’t want to think about some of them producing form at any level. Since I have no choice about that because it is simply true that my thoughts are very powerful, I want to allow the Holy Spirit to heal my mind. I want my thoughts to be as close to truth as possible.

Two very important things I have learned through the practice of mind watching are these. First, if I am going to insist on being mindful of my thoughts, then the ego is going to say I am guilty for them. If I fall for that, then I will feel really bad about myself and this is not bringing me closer to God. Guilt is not Love. At the very least, feeling guilty when I notice a mistaken thought will discourage me from looking.

When I first started mind watching it felt very hard. Obviously, when I think about it, there is nothing hard about noticing thoughts that are not love and then asking the Holy Spirit to correct my thinking. What could be simpler? And yet it felt hard. The reason it was hard is that I judged myself and felt guilty for my thoughts. The guilt made me afraid of my own thoughts. This is why I had so many unacknowledged thoughts. I just thought of it as “idle” chatter that didn’t matter which felt better than the guilt. I was very wrong about that.

When I stopped judging myself for my thoughts, the process of mind watching did actually become easy. I seldom feel guilty for thoughts now, and when I do, I notice what has happened and give that to the Holy Spirit as well. I realize now that the thoughts are not personal. They are shared by all of us. No one has original thoughts.

We don’t make the thoughts up. They just seem to be floating around and suddenly we notice one and become interested in it. Then we think, “That is my thought.” The fact is, the person next to us could be looking at the very same thought and thinking it is theirs.  Now, instead of feeling guilty because I have noticed a mistaken thought in my mind, I feel happy to have found it and to have this chance to let it be healed. I do this, not just for myself, but for all of us. Without guilt, it is simple and painless.

The other thing that makes it feel hard to mind watch is the mistaken belief that it is my job to stop thinking untrue thoughts. This is a very painful error, because I cannot stop thinking anything. The harder I try the more I think it. I have tried replacing one thought with a different, truer thought, and that didn’t work either. The reason it doesn’t work is that it is not my job to heal the mind. It is only my job to desire healing.

I notice the thought that is not love, and then I ask the Holy Spirit to correct my thinking and heal my mind. That is my part. When I try to do more, I just suffer because I am trying to do something that can’t be done.  Since I have learned those two things, that I am innocent regardless of the thoughts I find in my mind, and that it is not my job to heal the mind, but only to desire healing, this whole mind watching practice is so much easier.

Jesus says that even our idle thinking produces form. So with all the years of practice you might wonder if I have noticed a difference in my life. In other words, have I noticed the effect of a more healed mind in my life? Yes! Absolutely! I am so much more peaceful and happy than I used to be. I am never depressed anymore. (This coming from someone who spent most of her life depressed) My life is just easier.

Another thing I have noticed, is that when I do entertain ego thoughts, I experience the effect of those thoughts much more quickly. And conversely, when I notice something in my life that is not a reflection of love, I immediately realize I must be holding onto and believing untrue thoughts, and I ask the Holy Spirit to help me see differently. It’s all very quick now, almost automatic. Seldom do I have trouble letting go of thoughts anymore.

A really nice consequence of all this mind watching is that letting go of the ego thoughts has resulted in a much quieter mind. I don’t experience a silent mind or an empty mind, yet, but it is much quieter. This is very pleasant, and now when the ego mind starts its chatter I am quick to notice. It seems crazy that for all of my life I hardly noticed the chatter and just tolerated it.

© 2013, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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