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Study of Text, Chapter 13: VI. Finding the Present, P 1. 8-29-16

VI. Finding the Present, P 1
1 To perceive truly is to be aware of all reality through the awareness of your own. But for this no illusions can rise to meet your sight, for reality leaves no room for any error. This means that you perceive a brother only as you see him now. His past has no reality in the present, so you cannot see it. Your past reactions to him are also not there, and if it is to them that you react, you see but an image of him that you made and cherish instead of him. In your questioning of illusions, ask yourself if it is really sane to perceive what was as now. If you remember the past as you look upon your brother, you will be unable to perceive the reality that is now.

Journal
I have really been practicing staying in the now and have small success, but I’m not giving up. I keep practicing. Here is another way to practice. I can start to notice my thoughts about the people in my life. Then I can notice if they have anything to do with the person I perceive in front of me at this moment, or if they are just past thoughts carried forward. And that is on the level of form, because if I saw him without any of my projections I would see his Divinity.

I am sometimes jarred from sleeping mind as I realize that I have been cherishing an image of a person rather than the person that they are. For instance, I have suddenly seen one of my children, really seen them, and realized that not only had I fixed in my mind an image of that one, but it was an image of my own making. It was really an image of my thoughts about that one. Those thoughts are no longer relevant, if they ever were, and if I keep cherishing them, I will not ever know this person I love.

As I think about this, the illusion I seem so fond of gets blurry and seems to waver. Could everything I have believed was real and indisputable be just images projected from my mind, just like Jesus has been saying? Ha ha ha. Yep. I was thinking about a friend of mine. There was a “fact” about her that I absolutely believed, and one day she said something that shattered that “truth” about her.

Again, I was startled to realize that I don’t really know this person either. I just know my thoughts and beliefs about her, just like I do with my children. How deep does this go? Is there anything about her that I didn’t make up through my I thoughts? Does everyone she knows have an image of her that is entirely different than mine? I know for sure that some of the people in her life think of her differently than I do. I can almost guarantee that she knows herself differently than I know her. I made her up out of my thoughts and beliefs and she made herself up out of her thoughts and beliefs. Gosh the world I see continues to shimmer in and out of focus.

And so now I have to ask myself if I am courageous enough to let the images go entirely so that I can see what stands behind them, what is actually real and true.

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Study of Text, Chapter 13: II.The Two Emotions, P 110. 8-25-16

V. The Two Emotions, P 11

11 The Holy Spirit is the light in which Christ stands revealed. And all who would behold Him can see Him, for they have asked for light. Nor will they see Him alone, for He is no more alone than they are. Because they saw the Son, they have risen in Him to the Father. And all this will they understand, because they looked within and saw beyond the darkness the Christ in them, and recognized Him. In the sanity of His vision they looked upon themselves with love, seeing themselves as the Holy Spirit sees them. And with this vision of the truth in them came all the beauty of the world to shine upon them.

Journal
I really long for the day that I look within and see only Christ. When that happens, I will then look without and see only Christ. I will see that there is nothing but God. Oh holy day! I know this can and will happen. I have periods of time in which I feel perfectly at peace and in which I feel loving, loveable and loved. I feel so much love welling up in me and as me that it obliterates the ego darkness for awhile. So I know this can happen, and that it will happen and eventually the darkness will be a shadow of a memory.
In the meantime, I continue my process of noticing the dark thoughts and allowing them to be healed. I notice how my body feels and if it isn’t healthy and pain free I take that as a symbol of the unhealthy, painful thoughts in the mind and I ask for healing.

If I look at my bank account and notice it is dwindling, I watch my thoughts. Maybe I just wonder how the numbers will get larger and wait with curiosity and anticipation to see that happen. But if I get upset about the numbers then I recognize this upset as a fear of lack and loss and I bring that belief to the Holy Spirit to be undone.

If a relationship is imperiled I ask the Holy Spirit to look with me and see what it is I have done. Have I used this friend, or have I projected onto her or him? How does this relationship crisis make me feel? Am I sad or angry or maybe guilty? Does it trigger memories of relationships from the past that remained unforgiven? Whatever I find in my mind, I look at with Holy Spirit, and I accept healing to the best of my ability at this time.

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Study of Text, Chapter 13: II.The Two Emotions, P 10. 8-24-16

V. The Two Emotions, P 10

10 You have but two emotions, and one you made and one was given you. Each is a way of seeing, and different worlds arise from their different sights. See through the vision that is given you, for through Christ’s vision He beholds Himself. And seeing what He is, He knows His Father. Beyond your darkest dreams He sees God’s guiltless Son within you, shining in perfect radiance that is undimmed by your dreams. And this you will see as you look with Him, for His vision is His gift of love to you, given Him of the Father for you.

Journal
We have only two emotions, love and fear. God gave us love and we made fear. When we are fearful we see a scary world. When love is our vision we see a loving world. I noticed how true this is the other day. My brother was my boss and I had little to do with his partner. When my brother retired and his partner became sole owner of the business, a lot of things changed. I looked at it through fear and everything that was said and done brought up fearful thoughts.

My new boss seemed to micro-manage everything and he seemed to have no faith in me even though I had been doing a good job for the company for many years. I pushed against this and I figured I was going to get fired at any time. I felt like he resented me and just kept me there until he got someone more suitable to his way of doing things. Everything he said seemed to prove my worst fears. I was miserable and felt trapped in this situation.

I hated not being at peace and yet everything that happened at work reinforced my fearful thoughts. But I kept using the Rules for Decision and I kept asking for another way to see. The only other way to see is through love. So I began to say “I love you” each time I thought of him or had a resentful or fearful feeling about him. Things began to change.

What changed was not his management style or how he thought of me or treated me. What changed was my vision. I began to feel loving toward him. It was the darndest thing. I began to say I love you because that was my guidance. I didn’t really mean it at first, but I knew that it made sense. If I am unhappy hating him then another way to see would lead to love, so I started moving in that direction. And lo and behold, I wound up there!

He called me into his office to talk about something and I heard myself saying to him that I liked him. I told him that I liked that he was so involved. I told him that even though I would be retiring soon, I hoped he would continue to do well, and that I would do what I could to make the transition easier. I didn’t know I would say these things, but I felt the truth of them as they came out of my mouth. And I felt love rise up in me as we spoke.

I went from resenting his interference to seeing it as involvement and enthusiasm. As I listened to him I saw how hard he was trying to be a good boss and a good person. And the only thing that changed was my vision, not him and not my job, and not my work, just my vision. I chose to see through love rather than fear and the Holy Spirit helped me to do that even though I didn’t understand how it would happen or even how it could happen.

Will he fire me before I retire on my own terms? I don’t know. Maybe. Without looking at the world through fear I am not worried about that anymore. If I get fired I will just see what happens next. He has a vision for the company and it is one that I don’t agree with, but instead of resenting him for that, I can ask for another way to see the situation. I can ask for a way to see it through love rather than fear. My world can appear depressing and scary, or it can appear interesting and loving. Up to me!

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Study of Text, Chapter 13: V. The Two Emotions, P 9. 8-23-16

C 13: V. The Two Emotions P 9

9 Do not seek vision through your eyes, for you made your way of seeing that you might see in darkness, and in this you are deceived. Beyond this darkness, and yet still within you, is the vision of Christ, Who looks on all in light. Your “vision” comes from fear, as His from love. And He sees for you, as your witness to the real world. He is the Holy Spirit’s manifestation, looking always on the real world, and calling forth its witnesses and drawing them to you. He loves what He sees within you, and He would extend it. And He will not return unto the Father until He has extended your perception even unto Him. And there perception is no more, for He has returned you to the Father with Him.

Journal
I have to laugh because as I read this I thought about doing the Lessons for the first time. I read those early lessons and I would squint my eyes and hold my head just right in the hopes of seeing everything differently. I never saw anything with my eyes except the world as I knew it, a world of separate bits of form, kept apart by my naming and my insistence that there be gaps between each named thing.

Now I understand that I don’t see reality with the eyes. I perceive reality with the mind. I don’t do this consistently or ever, really. Though I do get peeks beneath the veil, and sometimes I feel something akin to reality as love rises up in me and takes me over. But at least I can accept that there is reality and that it is here in me, and I can know it and feel it if I want to give up the idea of separation completely and for all time.

I have trouble accepting the Holy Spirit’s vision of me as Christ, but I want to. My desire grows stronger every day. Even when I am going through a difficult period of undoing that feels like I descended into hell and scares me, I am never completely out of touch with truth. There is a bit of light guiding me through these dark and unpleasant, but necessary. experiences.

It will all be worth it one day when I have fearlessly, and without guilt, looked at the hatred in my mind that made this world, and have firmly rejected it as not me and no longer mine. In the meantime, I look at the hate in my mind that I see reflected as the world, and I let the Holy Spirit heal my mind. The Christ that is in me will see for me and I will know the real world. He will call forth its witness and bring them to me. He will not stop until this is done. Oh holy and faithful Holy Spirit, I am so grateful.

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Study of Text, Chapter 13: V. The Two Emotions, P 8. 8-22-16

C 13: V. The Two Emotions P8

8 Vision depends on light. You cannot see in darkness. Yet in darkness, in the private world of sleep, you see in dreams although your eyes are closed. And it is here that what you see you made. But let the darkness go and all you made you will no longer see, for sight of it depends upon denying vision. Yet from denying vision it does not follow you cannot see. But this is what denial does, for by it you accept insanity, believing you can make a private world and rule your own perception. Yet for this, light must be excluded. Dreams disappear when light has come and you can see.

Journal
We have given ourselves a body with eyes that show us our projections. These eyes also show us light, but it is not real light, it is like the rest of what we see, an illusion. Light is not seen with the body’s eyes, nothing real is seen with the body’s eyes. This is such a hard thing for the ego mind to understand because everything it knows is seen with those eyes, and yet eyes do not see, they only report what the mind hallucinates.

Real seeing is done in real light. It is done not with a body but within the mind that it is. This is the reason that when people awaken in the dream they can see what the eyes show them, but they also see what is real. They are still here and still using a body so they are aware of the illusion, what we make up. But now they also see the light and love that makes up everything, and this is not done with the eyes but in their awareness. So I am told. ~smile~ This is what Jesus is talking about here, true perception.

If there is a real world, and there is real light and as Jesus says, we can actually see it, then why don’t we? We have closed our minds to the light and denied it is there. Instead we are mesmerized by the stories we made up, and have forgotten they are not real. We have made a place in the mind with a stage on which we can act out our fantasies. We have gotten so involved in our fantasies, have denied reality for so long, that we have lost our minds.

All the world’s a stage and that is all it is. We gave ourselves form and walked upon the darkened stage, and made a private world just for ourselves. And then we gave our forms eyes and said let there be light and let our eyes reveal our stories. Now, eons later, we are still watching the play that was over almost before it began. We watch and in our watching we deny the vision that would allow us to see what is really happening.

But Jesus tells us this: Yet from denying vision it does not follow you cannot see. We can see, but to see we must let go of the darkness, let go of our dream of a separate little world we rule with our insane laws. We cannot know light while we long for darkness. A Course in Miracles, the practice of A Course in Miracles, is bringing us to the brink of sanity.

We are beginning to understand what is going on, and beginning to glimpse the truth we have been hiding from ourselves. Now we need only desire reality more than illusions and we will leave the insanity behind. Once we understand and decide for God, there is nothing we need do. We stand at the brink and when our desire is whole, we fall into God.

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Study of Text, Chapter 13: II.The Two Emotions, P 7. 8-18-16

V. The Two Emotions, P 7

7 Little child, would you offer this to your Father? For if you offer it to yourself, you are offering it to Him. And He will not return it, for it is unworthy of you because it is unworthy of Him. Yet He would release you from it and set you free. His sane Answer tells you what you have offered yourself is not true, but His offering to you has never changed. You who know not what you do can learn what insanity is, and look beyond it. It is given you to learn how to deny insanity, and come forth from your private world in peace. You will see all that you denied in your brothers because you denied it in yourself. For you will love them, and by drawing nigh unto them you will draw them to yourself, perceiving them as witnesses to the reality you share with God. I am with them as I am with you, and we will draw them from their private worlds, for as we are united so would we unite with them. The Father welcomes all of us in gladness, and gladness is what we should offer Him. For every Son of God is given you to whom God gave Himself. And it is God Whom you must offer them, to recognize His gift to you.

Journal
God loves us all. He wants us to be happy. He knows we are perfect because He created us perfect, because we are an extension of Him. God does not hold grievances because God is not a person and so has no ego. That is our hallucination, not God’s. We have nothing to fear from God. H offers us only love. When we offer ourselves insanity we offer it to Him, but He does not accept it because it is unworthy of Him and thus unworthy of us.

These are true statements, but we don’t actually know this. If we did, we would be having a different experience. We would be awake having a happy dream and then we would wake up from the dream and know our Divinity and the Love that we are and the Love that God is. Jesus says the way we know Him is to come out of our little private worlds and meet our brothers in love instead of judgment. Offer our brothers God and we will know God.

We practice this in our everyday life as we treat others as if they were dear to us, closer to us than our breath, a part of us. Last night I received very poor service where I ate supper. Instead of asking blessings on the overwrought waitress, I resented her. That is me in my own little world, separate from her, separate interests, separate goals.

I could easily have forgiven the whole situation and spent my time knowing that each and every one of the wait staff and the other patrons are part of the Sonship along with me. I could have reveled in that sweet knowing and been a blessing to everyone. Well, perhaps I will remember the next time. And the next time comes very quickly as thoughts of “others” come into my mind, as I interact with dozens of people today.

Here is another truth, I love them, even if, caught up in the story of being separate from them I have forgotten that, I do love them. In loving them, I draw close to them and I draw them out of their private worlds. Jesus says this:

I am with them as I am with you, and we will draw them from their private worlds, for as we are united so would we unite with them.

Yes, Jesus, my brother, I am ready to spend this day with you, saving the world, bringing us all home. What I give to myself, I give to God. What I give to my brothers, I give to myself and I give to God.

© 2016, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Study of Text, Chapter 13: V. The Two Emotions, P 6. 8-9-16

V. THE TWO EMOTIONS, P 6
6 As you look with open eyes upon your world, it must occur to you that you have withdrawn into insanity. You see what is not there, and you hear what makes no sound. Your manifestations of emotions are the opposite of what the emotions are. You communicate with no one, and you are as isolated from reality as if you were alone in all the universe. In your madness you overlook reality completely, and you see only your own split mind everywhere you look. God calls you and you do not hear, for you are preoccupied with your own voice. And the vision of Christ is not in your sight, for you look upon yourself alone.

Journal
I will be honest; it feels pretty depressing as I look at the world I made, depressing and sometimes hopeless. I want to let this all go. I want to look at a world that has been purified of my projections. I want to see people for who they are in truth rather than see my sick mind projected onto them. I want to hear the words that come from their heart rather than giving their words meaning that comes from my unhappy and confused mind.

I am doing the work I need to do, and still I feel like I am pushing that great stone uphill only to have it roll back down again. And I know that God is speaking to me all through the day but that I listen to Him only occasionally. However, I also know that I am beginning to see things differently and that when I hear His Voice, I hear it clearly. I see that no matter how discouraged I might get, and how afraid I am of my own stubborn insistence on holding attack thoughts in my mind, I always remember that I don’t have to do this and that I have help to stop. I remember my purpose.

I have a support group. I have my fellow Course students and very helpful teachers. I have my quiet time in the morning as I read and listen and write what I hear. I have my Course groups and I have my students and mind healing partners. I have my classrooms where I practice and where I learn much needed lessons through experience, which is the best teacher, after all.

I also have much unseen help. I have the Holy Spirit, and I have Jesus, my dear brother. I have angels and guides and other non-physical beings who have much to offer me. Mostly I am unaware of their help except that I will have sudden insights and clarity. I will move inexplicably from sadness or anger and into peace simply because I called out for help. I don’t see them and mostly don’t hear them, but I know they are there. They want me to help awaken me and I welcome their help.

I am not alone. I am so thankful for that. I am beginning to see that Jesus is right that we but do this to ourselves, and that there are no accidents, and that our day is not at random. As I learn more about projection and perception I begin to see how I do it to myself. I see how I use the ego mind to perceive situations, and then I project what I perceive onto the world. Then I use the body’s eyes to prove my insane conclusion is real. My new clarity about how all this works motivates me to push through my episodic periods of discouragement to ultimately reach my goal.

Thank you, Jesus, for A Course in Miracles.

© 2016, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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