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Gentle Healing Lesson 167, Text, Manual for Teachers. 9-30-19

LESSON 167
There is one life, and that I share with God.

“There is no death because what God created shares His Life. There is no death because an opposite to God does not exist. There is no death because the Father and the Son are one.”

“All sorrow, loss, anxiety and suffering and pain, even a little sigh of weariness, a slight discomfort or the merest frown, acknowledge death. And thus deny you live.”

“Death is the thought that you are separate from your Creator. It is the belief conditions change, emotions alternate because of causes you cannot control, you did not make, and you can never change. It is the fixed belief ideas can leave their source, and take on qualities the source does not contain, becoming different from their own origin, apart from it in kind as well as distance, time and form.”

“Death cannot come from life. Ideas remain united to their source.”

What all this is telling me so far is that death in all its forms cannot be real because I have not separated from my Source and I cannot be different than my Source. So, if I think I am sick or suffering in any way, I must be dreaming because it cannot happen. The solution to death and the effects of believing in death, is to remember who I am and where I exist. Once again, all ideas of suffering are the result of not believing that I am as I was created. God is Life and therefore so am I and Life cannot be death. As Jesus says, “As they were born, so will they then give birth. And where they come from, there will they return.”

“The mind can think it sleeps, but that is all. It cannot change what is its waking state. It cannot make a body, nor abide within a body. What is alien to the mind does not exist, because it has no source. For mind creates all things that are, and cannot give them attributes it lacks, nor change its own eternal, mindful state. It cannot make the physical. What seems to die is but the sign of mind asleep.”

This paragraph is very important. It is from reading this that I realized that not only am I not this body, I am not in this body. I am dreaming of bodies. This changes everything. It is the reason that very often now I can be at peace even when the dream has taken on a nightmarish quality. I can often watch while people I love seem to suffer and not be afraid for them. They are safe because they are among the Sons of God and danger does not exist in them. Yes, I am still a mind asleep and sometimes I get caught in the dream and forget the truth, but I also have periods of time now when the dream is lucid and I understand what is happening. Jesus says that mind is mind, awake or sleeping. I am not what I seem to make while I believe I sleep.

“God creates only mind awake.”

What this means is that I cannot create a mind asleep because I can only create as God creates. He did not give me mind asleep and so I cannot create mind asleep. He did not create death and so I cannot die or live death thoughts. I can only dream these things. And then Jesus says something else interesting. He says:

“Forever unopposed by opposites of any kind, the Thoughts of God remain forever changeless, with the power to extend forever changelessly, but yet within themselves, for they are everywhere.”

This give me an inkling of what we are. I am among the Thoughts of God. I have the power to extend forever changelessly. I am everywhere. Holy cow! When something like this comes into my awareness, I feel my heart expand and love overcome me. Sometimes it leaks out of me as tears of joy and I think I remember something of this though I cannot envision it. But it also scares me just a little and the fear closes off my heart. It’s OK, though, because it always comes back.

“It dreams of time; an interval in which what seems to happen never has occurred, the changes wrought are substance-less, and all events are nowhere. When the mind awakes, it but continues as it always was.”

And this passage evokes tears of relief and gratitude and I know this is true. I don’t remember it but I have absolutely no doubt that it is true and I long to return to that awakened state.

Regina’s Tips
Today’s workbook lesson defines death as an idea, and nothing more. It says this idea “underlies all feelings that are not supremely happy.” That is because happiness is a natural characteristic of life aware of itself. Whenever we are not supremely happy, our attention is distracted from our truth as life.

Let’s practice in this way today. Whenever you notice that you are not happy, take these steps:
1 – Look briefly to get some clarity regarding the specific feeling of unhappiness. (e.g., In the example above, the unhappiness was specifically a feeling of loss.)

2 – Look at the specific feeling, and notice it is a form of the wish for something different. You might ask yourself, “Do I think I would be happier if this was different than it is?” If the answer is yes, it is the wish for something different.

3 – Shift your attention to notice and appreciate awareness-life-presence for a few moments. During this time, let go of your thoughts about the situation related to your unhappiness. Give full, restful attention to noticing awareness-life-presence as it is.

4 – Next, look with reason to see if the specific feeling of unhappiness is a fact that was noticed in awareness-life-presence or just a thought in the mind. (For example, if the feeling is rejection, is there any rejection found in awareness-life-presence or is awareness-life-presence the same as it always is? If the specific feeling is guilt, is there any guilt found in awareness-life-presence? Etcetera.)

5 – With the recognition that there was no affect on awareness-life-presence, say to yourself, “There is one life, and that I share with God.”

Text
X. the Time of Rebirth, P 5

T-15.X.5. It is not necessary to follow fear through all the circuitous routes by which it burrows underground and hides in darkness, to emerge in forms quite different from what it is. 2 Yet it is necessary to examine each one as long as you would retain the principle that governs all of them. 3 When you are willing to regard them, not as separate, but as different manifestations of the same idea, and one you do not want, they go together. 4 The idea is simply this: You believe it is possible to be host to the ego or hostage to God. 5 This is the choice you think you have, and the decision you believe that you must make. 6 You see no other alternatives, for you cannot accept the fact that sacrifice gets nothing. 7 Sacrifice is so essential to your thought system that salvation apart from sacrifice means nothing to you. 8 Your confusion of sacrifice and love is so profound that you cannot conceive of love without sacrifice. 9 And it is this that you must look upon; sacrifice is attack, not love. 10 If you would accept but this one idea, your fear of love would vanish. 11 Guilt cannot last when the idea of sacrifice has been removed. 12 For if there is sacrifice, someone must pay and someone must get. 13 And the only question that remains is how much is the price, and for getting what.

Journal
What I understand now about fear is that no matter what form it takes, it is just the belief in fear. I still look at the forms as they show up in my life, but I don’t try to figure anything out. I used to try to see where that fear started. Was it when I was a child or maybe in a past life something happened that planted that fear in my mind? But now, I know that doesn’t matter.

The only time the belief in fear can be healed is right now and it is not done through therapy or understanding of the fear. It is done as I realize that fear is not real and is just a sensation in my body that occurs with the belief in it. Situations might trigger fear, but the fear was already there or there would be nothing to trigger. I have to decide to believe the truth, and that truth is that no matter what happens in the story, I am safe because I am innocent. I am as God created me.

4 The idea is simply this: You believe it is possible to be host to the ego or hostage to God.
This is why we don’t feel safe. We believe that God is not on our side, that he wants sacrifice from us. I can remember as a child trying to bargain with God. I would make outlandish promises to him if he would do some good thing for me. I believed that he did not particularly want me to have a good thing, either because he was not especially interested in my wellbeing or because I was not deserving of it.

Perhaps that is why I started studying the Course. Maybe there was still some of that frightened little girl in me that thought all this work was the sacrifice God wants of me in order to give me a good and happy life. But to be happy I had to grow up. I had to realize that the study of the Course was not to placate an uncaring or angry God; it was to mature my mind and to show me how I was hurting myself so I could stop. God has never wanted my sacrifice.

7 Sacrifice is so essential to your thought system that salvation apart from sacrifice means nothing to you. 8 Your confusion of sacrifice and love is so profound that you cannot conceive of love without sacrifice.
I could read that God loves me all day but if I believe that love and sacrifice go together, I would never be able to trust God because I could not trust love and God is Love. I grew up with this confusion as did we all. I experienced it in Catholic school and I experienced it at home. The implication I got in both environments was that sacrifice was a commodity that I could trade for love.

My parents often used either fear or guilt to control my behavior. If I was a good girl, I was loved. I understand that kind of parenting. It comes from fear, but fear teaches fear and guilt teaches guilt and it all calls for sacrifice. When I was married sacrifice was an assumption of love. I did things he liked and he loved me. He did things I liked and I loved him.

We each had to sacrifice what we wanted in order to please the other. If the balance was disturbed so was the relationship. This kind of relationship is fear-based and this kind of tradeoff is not love. It is attack. 10 If you would accept but this one idea, your fear of love would vanish.

How can we love one another when there is so much sacrifice, fear, and guilt in our relationships? How can we even know what love is when we have added these unnecessary beliefs to love? We must let these ideas die a natural death as we do our forgiveness work and learn to give love for love’s sake instead of using our relationships as a way to get.

12 For if there is sacrifice, someone must pay and someone must get. 13 And the only question that remains is how much is the price, and for getting what.

Manual for Teachers
Introduction, Paragraph 4

4 This is inevitable. There is no escape from it. How could it be otherwise? Everyone who follows the world’s curriculum, and everyone here does follow it until he changes his mind, teaches solely to convince himself that he is what he is not. Herein is the purpose of the world. What else, then, would its curriculum be? Into this hopeless and closed learning situation, which teaches nothing but despair and death, God sends His teachers. And as they teach His lessons of joy and hope, their learning finally becomes complete.

What a relief it is to read in paragraph 4 that there is a way to break the cycle of teaching what is the cause of our suffering.
Into this hopeless and closed learning situation, which teaches nothing but despair and death, God sends His teachers.
Helen, through her willingness to do the work given her and thereby bringing A Course in Miracles into the world, is an outstanding example of this. Regina Dawn Akers, Nouk Sanchez, and others are examples of this. As I have studied and practiced the Course, I have accepted that my role is one of teacher, and so I am an example of this.

We all are teachers of God as we allow our mind to be healed, and to the degree to which we allow that healing. All of us reading this are at least sometimes teaching for God because our mind is at least partially healed through our practice and our willingness. And as we teach, in whatever way our curriculum leads us, our healing becomes more and more complete.

I want to be a more consistent teacher for God and so I am going to keep my reminder handy: My every word, thought and deed is teaching me and everyone else. Is this what I want to teach? I am going to be especially vigilant to notice what I am actually teaching others and myself.
It is not really hard to do this. Are my words and my thoughts congruent? Am I saying that I am at peace while I try to smother the anxiety I feel as I think time is slipping away from me? (I’m laughing because I couldn’t immediately think of an example or how to say this and so I asked
Holy Spirit for something, and I was surprised by that last sentence. Evidently, I had been hiding this from myself.)

So, let me rephrase that. Are my words and thoughts and feelings congruent? My feelings will often help me become aware of the belief that is the source of the thoughts, words, and actions. My words are not always the measure of what I am teaching myself. Holy Spirit, please help me stay aware of the beliefs that are driving my life so that I can ask for healing where needed.

I will remember my gratitude today that as I teach my lessons of joy and hope my learning is becoming complete. Thank you, God.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Gentle Healing Lesson 165.  9-29-19

I skipped this lesson so I am making up for it now.
LESSON 165

Let not my mind deny the Thought of God.

Journal
“The Thought of God created you. It left you not, nor have you ever been apart from it an instant. It belongs to you. By it you live. It is your Source of life, holding you one with it, and everything is one with you because it left you not. The Thought of God protects you, cares for you, makes soft your resting place and smooth your way, lighting your mind with happiness and love. Eternity and everlasting life shine in your mind, because the Thought of God has left you not, and still abides with you.”

I know that the Thought of God is not just me thinking about God. It is the Creative Force that is Life. I could not have lost that or I would not live. It remains with me even in my dreams of separation. All the things that the Thought of God gives me, care, protection, happiness and love, are still there for me and if that is not my experience it is because I have turned away from them. My attention is on the ego’s gifts of pain, suffering and death. As I have released more and more of the ego beliefs, my experience is closer to my reality.

“Sureness is not required to receive what only your acceptance can bestow.”

It’s a good thing this is true. When I started asking for healing, I was not entirely certain I wanted it. I wanted to be free of the effects of choosing ego, but I sometimes still wanted to feel like a victim or unfairly treated. I often wanted to keep pointing at my brother as the guilty one so as to obscure my part. But that I asked, meant that I was answered. And, as I was able, I accepted the answer even if I had to do so a little at a time.

“Ask with desire.”

When I first began this journey, I asked out of desperation for a better life. It took a while before that asking changed to one of true desire. Now my heart longs for the memory of Self and the memory of the oneness of God. Now the answers come quicker and I embrace them faster and more completely.

“Now is all doubting past, the journey’s end made certain, and salvation given you. Now is Christ’s power in your mind, to heal as you were healed. For now you are among the saviors of the world.”

This isn’t 100% true for me 100% of the time, but it is truer for me than it ever has been, and true enough for me to know that the journey’s end is imminent. Abundance dwells in me and what deprivation is left in my mind is being undone even now as I write about this. It cannot cut me off from God’s sustaining Love.

“We count on God, and not upon ourselves, to give us certainty. And in His Name we practice as His Word directs we do. His sureness lies beyond our every doubt. His Love remains beyond our every fear. The Thought of Him is still beyond all dreams and in our minds, according to His Will.”

Regina’s Tips

Today’s workbook lesson encourages us to practice with hope, because hope counteracts doubt.

What if we replaced every thought of doubt with a thought of hope? For example, we could replace, “I do not want truth enough” with “I must want truth more than I think, because spirituality is an ongoing focus in my life.”

Which do you think benefits the purpose of awakening more: negative thoughts of doubt or positive thoughts of hope? Which do you think benefits the ego more?

Let’s do two things today:

1 – Pay particular attention to discover the thoughts of doubt that you listen to. Look at those thoughts with reason, meaning notice that those thoughts serve the ego and discourage spiritual aspiration. Look for reasonable thoughts of hope to replace them with, thoughts that encourage you instead of discouraging you.

2 – Continue to notice awareness-life-presence. Throughout the day, each time you remember, take a moment to notice that you are aware and you exist. Even when you are distracted from awareness-life-presence by doubt, you are still aware and you still exist. Doubt does not change the truth; it only denies it.

My Thoughts

One of my common doubt thoughts was that I do not practice well enough or long enough to realize truth. That is no longer true for me. I have noticed the Holy Spirit’s nudge from time to time to give more time to meditation. It feels more like a strong desire to meditate or just an awareness that I am not as happy when I don’t give time for meditation. It is not that same feeling of dread that I used to have when I thought I was slacking off and my laziness or inability to do this right was going to keep me in hell. I am grateful for these gentle reminders.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Gentle Healing Lesson 166, Manual for Teachers, Text.  9-26-19

LESSON 166
I am entrusted with the gifts of God.

God has given us everything. The reason we are not aware of His gifts is because we do not see that our will is one with His. We made a world of our own with a separate will. The world is not real and neither is separate will.  “…but every mind that looks upon the world and judges it as certain, solid, trustworthy and true believes in two creators; or in one, himself alone. But never in one God.”

While we believe in our own separate will and while we prefer it to our true will which is one with God’s Will, we will believe that accepting God’s gifts will be capitulation. It would be a denial of the little self. And so we suffer and think the suffering is a small price to pay to preserve the world we made.

We are so confused. We are afraid to give up the world we know for the world that is our Home but is no longer in our conscious memory. We think we want to be human because we have forgotten what it is like to be Divine Beings. But even in this amnesiac state in which we find ourselves, God goes with us. We are lost in our own senseless wandering mind, but not lost to God who knows us and loves us.

No matter how tragic the story and now much we seem to suffer, we remain as we were created, we remain eternal and perfect. We are literally choosing to replace reality with this imagined world. We defend against Heaven and refuse to see the evidence that proves we are not what God created.

Here is something I wrote a short time ago. I said that I must be closer to awakening, to accepting the truth. I say this because I utter the truth such as I am as God created me. I am an eternal and divine being. I am in God and of God right now. And this time when I remind myself of the truth, I feel a frisson of fear pass through me. It’s hard to put into words. Maybe like, how could that be? What would that be like? I feel a desire to remain small because I know smallness and I don’t know greatness. After the fear passes, I smile because I am not interested. I know that shudder of fear is the ego and I am not the ego.

That fear passed and I became ready for the Christ to help me perceive my Self and to know my Self. I laugh at the perception of myself as small and insignificant, as fearful and guilty. I now know that I am not this body image and this sad little story. I know what is not true about me and I am letting the memory of what is true come in its own time. I simply stay open and receptive and trusting.

“God’s Will does not oppose. It merely is. It is not God you have imprisoned in your plan to lose your Self. He does not know about a plan so alien to His Will. There was a need He did not understand, to which He gave an Answer. That is all. And you who have this Answer given you have need no more of anything but this.”

People often wonder how it is that God could not know of our plan to lose our Self and choose an alien will with which to do this. If we are in God, and God is in us, then how could He not know about our life here and our fears and guilt? I like to remember that God does not believe, God knows and what He knows is eternal and unchangeable. If God knew of the world then the world would be eternal and unchangeable. Not something to wish for, is it?

I don’t know God the Father, and so I cannot know the actual answer to that question of how it is that we can be part of God and yet He not be aware of the world we made. The closest I can come is to think of our experience here as a dream. I am in God and part of the mind is dreaming. God knows that the dream is interrupting our communication and thus interrupting our joy and peace,  and so He placed His Voice within us so that we could awaken when we were ready. His Voice is the answer to our suffering.

“The gifts you have are not for you alone.”

The Voice for God is bringing us back to an awakened state so that we can remember who we are. But as we receive this call to awaken, we must also share it. We must learn to give. We become the teachers of God who help our brothers awaken with us. And how do we do that?

“Teach them by showing them the happiness that comes to those who feel the touch of Christ, and recognize God’s gifts. Let sorrow not tempt you to be unfaithful to your trust”

This is my commitment and I live up to it as much as I am able. When I fall short of being the living proof of what Christ’s touch can offer everyone, I correct my course and continue to walk the path. He has shared His joy with me and now my job is to share it with the world. That is my mission.

Regina’s Tips
NTI teaches that the ego began with the wish for something different than what is. Because that is the basis of the ego, that is a key element of the ego thought system. If you pay attention to your mind, you will see that this idea shows up in one form or another multiple times each day.

Today we will shift our attention from unhappiness to happiness, from the wish for something different to appreciation for the magnificent treasure that is always present.

Each time you notice the wish for something different in your mind today, pause. Shift your attention to awareness-life-presence, and spend a few moments appreciating it. Be as vigilant in this practice as you can be. I say this, because the wish for something different is a strong habit; it could occur many times during the day without you noticing it.

For example, the wish for something different may show up as the wish for more time to get things done, or as the wish for fewer things to do. It may show up as the wish for less traffic or a shorter line at the grocery store. It may show up as the wish that someone around you were different than he/she is. It may show up as the wish that you were different or that your body was different. It may show up as the wish that the world was different than it is.

Pay attention today for the wish for something different in whatever way it shows up in your thoughts, and then shift attention to notice the treasure. Let yourself feel appreciation for awareness-life-presence. Follow that by slowly saying to yourself, “I am entrusted with the gifts of God.”

My Thoughts
My mind is focused today on choosing to remember and love through my highest Self and to see myself as God the Son. It is also focused on my responsibility to share what I am given through the way I live my life. It has taken me a minute to shift my mind to another way to do this. I can also focus my awareness on the mind that wants to think things should be different.

I see the value in changing my mind about that. Thinking things should be different in my life is a reflection of the original tiny mad idea in which I wanted reality to change. So in a sense, my wish for something to be different is the same as the original wish I had for things to be different. Every day is Groundhog Day, and though the form is different, the basis of the form is the same, let today be different than reality.

So today, I will pay special attention to the desire for things to be different. I started out feeling a little frazzled so I stopped to examine my thoughts. I saw that I felt like Monday’s are too full and that I would not have time to get everything done. So, I wanted that to be different. I let that thought go by deciding that today is perfect as it is and I will get done what I get done. Interestingly enough, everything is getting done that I had planned and I am at peace while it is all happening. It just took a simple change of mind.

Text
X. The Time of Rebirth, P 4

4 It is in your power to make this season holy, for it is in your power to make the time of Christ be now. It is possible to do this all at once because there is but one shift in perception that is necessary, for you made but one mistake. It seems like many, but it is all the same. For though the ego takes many forms, it is always the same idea. What is not love is always fear, and nothing else.

Journal
I know that Jesus is right when he says that it is in our power to make the time of Christ to be now. I also know that I couldn’t do that all at once, not that it wasn’t possible but that I couldn’t do it. From a new perspective, I see how simple it really is. I recognize now that when I felt guilty for some parental error it was no different than when I felt guilty for an angry word, or that I seemed never to learn. That guilt is no different than if I had been a dangerous pedophile or a murderer. In our world of differences, there seems to be many kinds of guilt and some seem worse and some seem to hold greater importance. But that is not true. Guilt is guilt no matter what form it takes.

This same idea holds true for any other form of fear. Fear of heights is no different than fear that I will be late for the show. No matter how different it feels to me, it is just fear. Anger is another form of fear and anger that it is raining on the day I wanted to walk outside is no different than anger that a marriage failed or someone stole from me. If it is not love, it is fear.

I make a choice for Christ each time I reject the belief in fear in whatever form it takes in the moment. That is what I did and it brought me to the place I am now. It is possible to skip all the little steps I took to get to this place, but I didn’t do it that way. From this present perspective this kind of makes me laugh at how much time it took me to recognize what was right in front of me all along.

How much less painful it would have been to simply accept that if it wasn’t love it was fear and then decide I wasn’t interested in the fear. If I refuse to accept fear the only thing left is love.


Manual for Teachers
Introduction P 3
M-in.3. The curriculum you set up is therefore determined exclusively by what you think you are, and what you believe the relationship of others is to you. 2 In the formal teaching situation, these questions may be totally unrelated to what you think you are teaching. 3 Yet it is impossible not to use the content of any situation on behalf of what you really teach, and therefore really learn. 4 To this the verbal content of your teaching is quite irrelevant. 5 It may coincide with it, or it may not. 6 It is the teaching underlying what you say that teaches you. 7 Teaching but reinforces what you believe about yourself. 8 Its fundamental purpose is to diminish self-doubt. 9 This does not mean that the self you are trying to protect is real. 10 But it does mean that the self you think is real is what you teach.

I see that I am always teaching what I think I am, what I believe about myself and what I believe about you in relation to me. What I say may not be congruent with what I believe, but that will do nothing to change what I believe. This self I teach, and through teaching, constantly reinforce, may not be real, but if it is what I teach it becomes very real to me.

Here is an example, as I understand this. For a long time, I believed that I was a victim of the world I see. Because this was the belief in my mind, this was the interpretation I gave everything that happened to me. For instance, I did not know how to mother my first two children and did not do it well. I felt deeply ashamed and guilty, and I told myself that this was not my fault.

This was the story I told myself. My mother was a poor role model, so I was a victim of my circumstances, and of her failure as a mother. I needed to reinforce this story if I was going to believe it and convince others it was true, so I found a therapist who told me the same story. And I collected friends who were willing to witness to my victimization.

To appear even more innocent (to myself and others) I added martyr to my image as I made excuses for my mom, “she was just doing the best she could” stories. But though my words seemed charitable, they had nothing to do with what I believed, so what I was really teaching was that I was a victim, and she was guilty of victimizing me, but I was a charitable person so I was going to “forgive” her. Of course, this is not true forgiveness but rather “forgiveness to destroy”.

All the time I thought I was protecting (or maybe hiding) this image of myself through projecting blame; I was teaching victimization and learning victimization. And so, many victim stories followed. I was building this image of myself as a helpless victim with layers and layers of stories of being victimized. I often said I did not want to be a victim, and as I learned some psychology, I used different words that sounded good, but those words were hollow because I believed I was a victim and so this is what I taught.

And of course, every victim needs a victimizer so I collected those as well, and reinforced through my relationships with them that they were victimizers. What a sad and self-defeating cycle this is, and yet it is the cycle we all live in one form or another until we choose differently through choosing a different teacher. Now that I have chosen a different Teacher, my life is different so I am teaching differently.

My life doesn’t teach victimization because I can’t imagine ever again believing in victimization. The idea feels absurd to me now. My teaching in this is congruent with my beliefs and actions and so that teaching is the same in a formal situation that it is in what my life teaches. I recently let go of the belief in guilt and because this is recent, guilt thoughts still show up sometimes and my actions and words are not as free of guilt as they will be soon.

It is like I have cleaned my house, but once in a while, I notice something out of place or cobwebs I had missed, dust bunnies under the couch. I simply clean them away and enjoy the satisfaction of having done so. It is like that with guilt thoughts for me. A simple cleaning up of any fragments of the old belief. So, I am not yet teaching innocence perfectly, but will be as this process continues. As I teach myself that I am no longer interested in guilt, I teach others the same thing, and as I teach them, I reinforce the lesson for me.

© 2019, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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Gentle Healing Lesson 164, Manual for Teachers, Text.  9-25-19

Lesson 164
Now are we one with Him Who is our Source.

“What time but now can truth be recognized? The present is the only time there is. And so today, this instant, now, we come to look upon what is forever there; not in our sight, but in the eyes of Christ.”

I am one with God. Right now. Not at some later time, am I one with God. Not after I have done something to make this happen, or come to deserve this through effort on my part. The work and effort I put into this is merely to bring me to the point of acceptance. I am already and always have been one with God and so I am That in this present moment. Not through my eyes, but through the eyes of Christ I see this.

“Christ answers for you, echoing your Self, using your voice to give His glad consent; accepting your deliverance for you.”

Jesus says that Christ answers for me, echoing my Self. I am for a moment confused by this. How is Christ and Self different? I think I understand, though. Christ refers to the Sonship as a whole, the entirety of the Sonship. Self is that entirety but also is part of that entirety. So, I can say Self is Christ, but my Self is a part of Christ. The part that is most important, that really matters in this, is that my voice (my Self, evidently, and not my self) must give consent but the Christ will accept my deliverance for me. So my awakening is done by the Christ as my Self gives consent for it.

We will not judge today. We will receive but what is given us from judgment made beyond the world.

We do have a part in this. This part seems to be up to the ‘me’ that I most identify with. For a long time, this meant the self that appears to be residing in the world of time and space in this body. I don’t identify with this self nearly as much, hardly at all, but it is the self I am experiencing and to some degree still identify with.

So Myron practices non-judgment all the time. I am always aware of the tendency to judge both other people and myself, to judge situations, to have preferences because that is a judgment as well. When I notice this, I realize I am not interested in that anymore. I believe that I can stop judging people and myself. I believe that because I see how I have changed in that way. I just don’t have the desire to judge as often as I used to.

Maybe this personality I am using in this incarnation will always have preferences and maybe it will always have a tendency to judge. I don’t know. But I have seen that those judgmental thoughts and desires are lessened and that they don’t impact me the way they used to. I prefer vanilla ice cream over chocolate, but I will eat either or neither without caring very much.

Open the curtain in your practicing by merely letting go all things you think you want.

This is my constant practice. I let go all things I think I want. That brings up a question in my mind. What things do I still want? Those things obstruct what I could have instead, the remembrance of my oneness in God. I want my children to be safe. I want them to live happy lives. I want them to outlive me. The first thought is that there is nothing wrong with wanting this for them. It is the loving thing to do, and how could I want otherwise?

And yet, I have seen that wanting this for anyone is suffering. They have their script to play out and it is not likely to be any different than mine. It will look different, but it will still reflect the unhealed mind and so it will have its share of suffering and it will go where it goes. Wanting it to be different will not make it different and will only cause me suffering.

Knowing this has not completely alleviated the suffering I have experienced because to some degree I resist this knowing. But I am practicing acceptance. I think of something painful that could happen to one of my children and if I follow that thought I find myself in a story and all stories lead to suffering. However, if I have that thought and I am not interested in it, the thought falls away and I have just grown in willingness and understanding. And I can’t ignore the fact that what I want for them doesn’t change what they get so the whole exercise in wanting is a waste and helps no one.

Let not today slip by without the gifts it holds for you receiving your consent and your acceptance. We can change the world, if you acknowledge them. You may not see the value your acceptance gives the world. But this you surely want; you can exchange all suffering for joy this very day.

Text
X. The Time of Rebirth, P 3

3 We who are one cannot give separately. When you are willing to accept our relationship as real, guilt will hold no attraction for you. For in our union you will accept all of our brothers. The gift of union is the only gift that I was born to give. Give it to me, that you may have it. The time of Christ is the time appointed for the gift of freedom, offered to everyone. And by your acceptance of it, you offer it to everyone.

Journal

I suppose that I must have accepted my relationship with Jesus as real since I talk to him all the time and ask him for help and advice when that is needed. I take what he says in the Course very seriously and I strived to meet the goals he has placed before me until I had done so. It sometimes felt difficult but in retrospect, I would always understand it was only my resistance that made it feel hard. And I saw that it was never a sacrifice. He is a good friend, a good elder brother.

Now I look for him everywhere and in everyone, not the human form he took, of course, but the Christ he is. If I don’t see the Christ in someone, I know that I have blinded myself with ego thoughts and judgments, so I ask for correction and I ask for Christ’s Vision. It is a gift that is readily given to me as soon as I truly want it. That is why I ask for correction first. If I keep the judgment, I will not truly want to see differently. I cannot judge and see with Christ’s Vision. I cannot be in union with someone I judge. I cannot be free until I am in union with all. With a mind free of dark thoughts I will naturally seek union and naturally offer it to everyone.


Manual for Teachers
Introduction P 2

M-in.2. To teach is to demonstrate. 2 There are only two thought systems, and you demonstrate that you believe one or the other is true all the time. 3 From your demonstration others learn, and so do you. 4 The question is not whether you will teach, for in that there is no choice. 5 The purpose of the course might be said to provide you with a means of choosing what you want to teach on the basis of what you want to learn. 6 You cannot give to someone else, but only to yourself, and this you learn through teaching. 7 Teaching is but a call to witnesses to attest to what you believe. 8 It is a method of conversion. 9 This is not done by words alone. 10 Any situation must be to you a chance to teach others what you are, and what they are to you. 11 No more than that, but also never less.

Jesus begins by telling us that to teach is to demonstrate. I can teach kindness and love and union all day long but if I then live a selfish, fearful life in isolation, I have demonstrated the opposite of my words. This demonstration is more powerful than anything I simply say or write. I cannot demonstrate the characteristics that are in alignment with my true nature simply by believing I should. I have to release the belief that I must defend and attack, judge and hold grievances. As I do this, I am learning to be a teacher of God rather than a teacher of ego.

Jesus emphasizes that we teach and we do so all the time. We cannot avoid teaching because our words, actions and even thoughts are teaching whether we want them to or not. Jesus says we can use the Course to learn to teach what we want to learn. I want to learn love and peace and joy. I want that to be my life, and therefore, that is what I teach as much as I can. If I see myself drawn to a grievance or a desire to defend, I feel it as if it was a sickness and I reject it as quickly as I can because I have learned to be free and I can’t give that up.

10 Any situation must be to you a chance to teach others what you are, and what they are to you. 11 No more than that, but also never less. This passage intrigues me. My actions and words will reveal what I am rather than what I want people to think I am. I get that because I have experienced it with other people. I have seen Course teachers say one thing but then in unguarded moments they showed me that they didn’t live what they teach. I have done the same thing, I am sure. Sometimes we believe something to be true but we don’t yet know it and so it isn’t really ours yet. The Course teaches us how to achieve purification so that what we believe becomes what we know and then we will be consistent in what we teach.

The second part of that sentence says that we teach others what they are to us. Without even realizing it, I used to teach the people in my life that they were of use to me. I used them as a source of entertainment when I was bored. Sometimes, I used them to vent my frustrations. I used them to convince me I was loveable and then I used them to prove I was unlovable. It was the same with worthiness. I used others to prove whatever it was I chose to believe about myself. I used them to receive the darkness I couldn’t bring myself to acknowledge as mine, projecting my stuff onto them and pretending that it had nothing to do with me. There is no way to avoid doing these things until the mind is healed. Thank God, for A Course in Miracles.

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Gentle Healing Lesson 163, Manual for Teachers, Text.  9-24-19

Gentle Healing Lesson 163
There is no death. The Son of God is free.

“Death is a thought that takes on many forms, often unrecognized. It may appear as sadness, fear, anxiety or doubt; as anger, faithlessness and lack of trust; concern for bodies, envy, and all forms in which the wish to be as you are not may come to tempt you. All such thoughts are but reflections of the worshipping of death as savior and as giver of release.”

“For death is total. Either all things die, or else they live and cannot die. No compromise is possible.”

God is Life and God is all there is. There is nothing outside God and therefore death can only be an illusion. Temporary forms such as the body die, but what is of God cannot die even if it thought it wanted to. I was surprised when I learned that death takes many forms, but really, I shouldn’t have been. Anything that is not part of God, that is, part of Life, must be death. There is no opposite to God and God cannot be undone by an idea of an opposite so my belief in these ideas is a belief in nothing.

We experience these many forms of death leading to the inevitable “final” death of the body because we believe in death. I am pretty sure I don’t believe in death. I don’t seem to be afraid of the idea of dying to this world, not even a temporary death. But I still believe in sadness and anger and those other forms of death so I do believe in death. However, my desire for them is fading very quickly now as I look at these thoughts and beliefs without flinching and gladly drop them.

Regina’s Tips

Today’s lesson says, “Either all things die, or else they live and cannot die. No compromise is possible.” Yet, you can watch a flower come into being, live a short time and then wither and die.

What is this lesson talking about?

Today’s lesson is looking beyond form, which is temporary, to the spirit of all living things, which is eternal. Life itself, which is God and is all things, has no beginning and no end. For life, death is impossible. You can see that if you look beyond specifics.

For example, one flower may blossom and then wither and die, but if you look around, can you find life elsewhere once the flower dies? Is there life in the tree? In the insect? In you? Did life die when the flower died?

We all experience the death of loved ones in our lifetimes. This is a very sad event when it occurs. Yet, has life died when the loved one died? Or can we still find life living?

Temporary form comes and goes. That is the law of impermanence. But life lives. That is all it can do. That is its nature.

Awakening is the realization that you (and other living things) are not the temporary form. You are life itself.

My Thoughts

Regina refers to God as Life and since we are in God and part of God, we are Life as well. Temporary forms come and go but Life continues unaffected by the temporary. What I like about her perspective of God as Life is that it is helping to shift my thinking from the personal. It can be hard to remember that there is no personal, that we are One in God and of God. Reflecting on the continuousness of life-presence of which I, too, am a part, I begin to perceive myself in a more impersonal way.

Text
T-15.X. The Time of Rebirth, P 2

2 The holy instant is truly the time of Christ. For in this liberating instant no guilt is laid upon the Son of God, and his unlimited power is thus restored to him. What other gift can you offer me, when only this I choose to offer you? And to see me is to see me in everyone, and offer everyone the gift you offer me. I am as incapable of receiving sacrifice as God is, and every sacrifice you ask of yourself you ask of me. Learn now that sacrifice of any kind is nothing but a limitation imposed on giving. And by this limitation you have limited acceptance of the gift I offer you.

Journal

How do we regain our power as Sons of God? We do this by giving up guilt. We have to give up projecting it onto ourselves and onto others. Considering how destructive guilt is you would think this would be an easy choice. And yet, we cling to guilt as if it is our savior. I can remember being unwilling to give up making someone guilty because I thought I needed to remember not to trust them. This seemed like a way to defend myself from that person.

I also remember thinking that I had actually hurt others and that it wasn’t fair that I should be free of guilt while they remained damaged by my actions or words. It took me 70 years to finally see the insanity in my thinking and finally let go of the belief in guilt. The ego doesn’t give up and it still tries to entice me back to guilt but I am not interested anymore.

The moments that are free of guilt are holy instants and are the time of Christ. Jesus sees us free of guilt. That is his gift to us. He knows who we are and he is never confused about that. It is my deepest desire to know this for everyone as thoroughly as does Jesus, to never even for an instant, be distracted by the image they have projected.

We project onto the world our beliefs in the form of images that play out these beliefs. In this way, we can see the effects of those beliefs and make a decision to keep the belief or to release it. Either way is fine, we are never guilty for our choices but we do suffer as a result of keeping the ego beliefs. No worry, though. There is only so much pain we can tolerate and so eventually we will choose again. Why not avoid the pain and do it now?

Never be fooled by what the body’s eyes show you. Ask for Christ’s Vision so you can see that love is the only thing that is actually there. Giving up guilt is not a sacrifice no matter how stridently the ego argues that it is. You are never asked to sacrifice and to believe that guilt is a sacrifice is to limit the acceptance of Christ’s gifts to you.


Manual for Teachers
1 The role of teaching and learning is actually reversed in the thinking of the world. The reversal is characteristic. It seems as if the teacher and the learner are separated, the teacher giving something to the learner rather than to himself. Further, the act of teaching is regarded as a special activity, in which one engages only a relatively small proportion of one’s time. The course, on the other hand, emphasizes that to teach is to learn, so that teacher and learner are the same. It also emphasizes that teaching is a constant process; it goes on every moment of the day, and continues into sleeping thoughts as well.

We all teach all the time. We teach with our words, with our actions, with our thoughts. We teach to learn, and though we seekers study and study, it is really only through our practice (which is our teaching) that we learn. So, what we do every day, what thoughts we entertain are very important. They are teaching us what we are, or they are teaching us what we are not.

Because to teach is to learn, the teacher and student roles are fluid. Actually, when I teach, I learn, every time. This means that teacher and learner don’t actually switch roles but that they are the same. Because of the courses I offer and my writing, I am very fortunate. Not only do I teach through my life, but I teach in a more formal way and so I am offered so many opportunities to learn. I am very grateful for that.

Jesus says something very interesting in that last sentence. He says that teaching continues into sleeping thoughts as well. In another place in the Course he stresses that we should give our sleep to the Holy Spirit and in another place he says that we can tell who we gave our sleep to by how we feel when we wake up.

I have had a couple of interesting dreams in which I woke up with a fragment of the dream in my mind. In one, I was walking with someone who was teaching me. In another, I was clearly teaching someone. Neither of those dreams felt like dreams. I wonder how often this happens and I simply don’t have a waking memory of it.

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Gentle Healing Lesson 162, Manual for Teachers, Text.  9-17-19

LESSON 162
I am as God created me.


“These words are sacred, for they are the words God gave in answer to the world you made. By them it disappears, and all things seen within its misty clouds and vaporous illusions vanish as these words are spoken. For they come from God.”

I am absolutely convinced that this is the only thing we need to know in order to awaken. If this is completely and without exception accepted into the mind, awakening would be inevitable. What is there to forgive when you know who you are and who your brother is? What is there to defend and who would we as divine beings attack if we knew we were part of one Whole and that Whole was God Itself? Everything we are learning from studying and practicing the Course is leading to this one thing, remembering that we are as we were created, nothing more and nothing less.

I think this is beginning to sink in for me. I have had a couple of occasions to recognize a shift. For instance, I have noticed that I am enjoying watching shows and reading books where there are couples loving each other. I was a little surprised to see this in myself. It is not something that interests me much, but now I am feeling happy when I see this on the screen or read about it. Maybe that means a lot of old stuff from past relationships in this life and maybe others have been truly and finally released.

So, the other night I am watching this show where a couple falls in love and they are feeling so close to each other and so happy an I began to feel lonely. The feeling I had was that this part of my life was probably over. I have been celibate for nearly 20 years now and have not even had a date in all that time. I haven’t been interested and am not interested now, but here I was grieving the loss of something I don’t even want. I guess that’s why it is we keep returning to this world, we like some of it and want to try again.

I went with the feelings that were coming up and sat there crying for a little while just letting the sadness and regret wash over me. Then I asked the Holy Spirit to help me see this differently. I know the solution to any problem I have is not going to be found in the world. I want the real solution. Suddenly, a thought dropped into my mind. “I am not this 70 year old woman sitting alone in her living room feeling lonely.”

It was an absolute revelation! I mean, sure, I understand this concept and even believe it, but receiving it like that I knew it. I just laughed out loud. Of course, I am not that. I am watching and participating in a virtual reality show, but I am the one who is aware of the woman sitting in the chair. I am not a human being, woman or otherwise. I am not alone. I could never be lonely. I am as God created me. I have been floating on a cloud of peaceful happiness ever since. I wonder what happens next.

Regina’s Tips

Yesterday we focused on self-inquiry by looking at our anger. Today we will focus on Self-inquiry.

The single thought that has the power the Course speaks of is not the intellectual idea, ‘I am as God created me.’ It is the realization ‘I am as God created me.’

Pause and ask yourself, “Do I exist now?” And then relax and notice that you do. Ask, “Am I aware now?” And then relax and notice that you are.

When you have a few minutes for a little deeper practice, sit quietly and notice how much awareness can be aware of at once. Notice that it is aware of sounds ahead of you, behind you and to each side simultaneously. Notice it is aware of sensations in the body. It is aware of thoughts in the mind. Notice it is aware of both the outer world (sights & sounds) and the inner world (sensations and thoughts) simultaneously. And as you notice this, notice you are awareness. You are that which is aware of the outer and inner world. Stay a few moments more, resting as awareness.

My thoughts

Regina’s writings about awareness watching awareness has been helpful to me in my practice. Probably, the most important thing I have done in a long time is to sit in silence even for short periods of time waiting to know my Self. Maybe that is what she means. Anyway, it is paying off.

Text
T-6.1.19 Remember that the Holy Spirit is the communication link between God the Father and His separated Sons. If you will listen to His Voice you will know that you cannot either hurt or be hurt, and that many need your blessing to help them hear this for themselves. When you perceive only this need in them, and do not respond to any other, you will have learned of me and will be as eager to share your learning as I am.

When someone is attacking me, there might be a temptation to defend myself. But to defend is to attack. Let’s say that I post something on Facebook and someone else strongly disagree, and maybe their comment stings. The only way to defend myself is to make him wrong and no matter how I cloak my words in silken tones, I am attacking and attack is cruel.

What if, on the other hand, I realize that this person thinks it’s important to be right about this and to be proven wrong would be to teach him he is guilty of being wrong. If I argue my point it must be because I think I am hurt by his post. This is not something I want to teach anyone and not something I want to teach myself. What would be my alternative? Why not just let it be?

In the past, I would have felt compelled to say something or do something. Now, I don’t do that. If it is a question, I will answer it. But if it is a straightforward statement, I allow it to be what it is. I cannot be hurt by someone’s opinion, only by my thoughts about their opinion. I watch my feelings and my thoughts to see if I feel hurt or defensive, and if I do, I ask the HS for correction.

Manual for Teachers

M-20.5:7 7 Forgive the world, and you will understand that everything that God created cannot have an end, and nothing He did not create is real.

We accept God’s Will when we accept God’s peace. God’s peace comes when we remember that there is no world.

I do believe now that there is no world. I know this is true because the world is not eternal and therefore it does not exist. I don’t deny that we made a world and that we experience the world, but not being real, none of what we experience is real either and that’s good news. As my mind continues to heal to new levels of understanding, I see the impossible world differently and thus my experience of it is different. As more and more of us awaken, we will begin to see the world literally transform into a world based on God’s laws rather than ours. Ultimately, we will lose interest in the world even in its perfect reflection and God will lift us up into Him. The world will cease to exist, just as it has never existed.

How does this new perception help me now? I used to believe the world was an illusion, but now I know it is so nothing that happens here has the same impact on me. This allows me to remain calm and peaceful even while the story unfolds in unexpected and undesirable ways. I might have an emotional response to what is happening, but I also know that everything is fine.

If someone is acting from their ego in such a way as to impact my life, I know that this one is just playing out their script and that in a very short time we will be in the next dimension sharing thoughts on what we learned from it and sharing love for each other so I can’t really hold onto a grievance against them. It seems silly to do so now.

Another thing that has changed with this new perception is that there are not many big deals. I used to be a bit frantic about trips, worrying about what to bring, what time to leave the house so I didn’t miss my flight, and worrying about forgetting something important. I feel the old stuff trying to get a hook into me, but that’s not possible anymore. I remind myself that everything will be fine and the thoughts fade away.

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Gentle Healing Lesson 161, Manual for Teachers, Text.  9-9-19

LESSON 161
Give me your blessing, holy Son of God.

“Complete abstraction is the natural condition of the mind. But part of it is now unnatural. It does not look on everything as one.”

Do you ever wonder what you would perceive if your mind was closer to its natural state? Well, here it is. You would see that everything is one. I don’t see this yet, but as my mind has healed, I am closer to seeing this way. I feel the oneness far more than I used to. I am aware of a sense of separation, but then I feel a shift. I feel love and then a realization that this one is not separate from me. It wavers and it can be affected by my ego thoughts, but once realized, it can never be entirely lost.

“The purpose of all seeing is to show you what you wish to see. All hearing but brings to your mind the sounds it wants to hear.”

This sentence is key to understanding and to changing my mind. Whatever I see, however I see it, it is showing me what I want. From there, I can decide if my desire fulfilled is bringing me peace and happiness. If not, then I can make a different choice.

If I have trouble letting go of the belief that is being manifest as this experience, I can ask for another way of seeing and my Inner Guide will help. To see differently, I must desire a different interpretation, be willing to be wrong about the present interpretation, be open and receptive to something I do not currently believe. Doing this frequently has taught me to trust a guide not of my little self which has led me astray too often.

Reality is whole but in order to have this experience, we made specifics and so that is what we must use in our practicing. This is why it is important to start with the situation, the person, the thought when we ask for a different way to see. What happens is that we learn something often enough and the mind begins to grasp that this learning applies to everything.

My experience was that I forgave (undid) many thoughts and then I saw that those thoughts came from a limited number of beliefs, so I began to forgive the beliefs. Now, something else is happening. I am beginning to accept that all those beliefs are the same belief, that is not my Self, and so this is what I am forgiving. I am not my beliefs, I am the Self that I was created.

“One brother is all brothers. Every mind contains all minds, for every mind is one. Such is the truth.”

I find it helpful to think of the Sonship as holographic, which is just a way to visualize what Jesus tells us in this sentence. It’s funny to me now that for years I have read this expressed in many ways all through the Course and really didn’t get the full implications. As Jesus says, “not understood nor understandable.” It’s funny to me now because once understood it seems so clear. How could I have been confused before? I didn’t get smarter, my IQ higher, I simply became willing to know this.

I still pretend we are separate somehow and not whole, and this is most apparent when I get caught in the story of victimhood and feeling unfairly treated. Seeing separation is the only way to support these feelings. I love that I can snap out of it now, and am delighted that it is easier to do so, and that I want to do so more quickly than before. This is what practice of the Course accomplishes. Eventually, it will lead me to awakening completely.

“It seems to be the body that we feel limits our freedom, makes us suffer, and at last puts out our life. Yet bodies are but symbols for a concrete form of fear.”

Oh, yes! I went through a protracted period of projecting my guilt onto the body. The body was my symbol of all that was wrong. This led to feeling guilty for having chosen to experience the body as myself. After a while, I realized what I was doing. The body is a neutral event. It is the effect of a decision. It is not anything of itself so how could simply experiencing a body be the cause of anything. Now, I no longer feel guilty about having a body, but I still project guilt onto the body in a variety of ways. Now that I understand what I am doing, I can stop.

Jesus tells us that if we think we are the body we will experience everything the body does. So if I identify with the body as myself, when the body experiences pain, so will I. When the body attacks or is attacked, I will feel that attack as personal and will suffer the effects of believing I am a victim or a victimizer. Because the body is a separation device, if I believe I am the body, then I will believe that I am separate. Bodies die and so if I am a body, I will believe that I die.

“Hate is specific. There must be a thing to be attacked.”

The body is that specific thing that can be hated and feared and attacked in defense of another body. When I see my brother as a body, I see him as fear’s symbol. This sets up the awful cycle of guilt/fear/attack/defend. And around and around it goes. The way out is to realize the body is as meaningless as any of our thoughts. We give it all the meaning it has for us. We could stop using it as a symbol of fear and as proof of guilt. We could give it to the Holy Spirit for His use instead.

“This do the body’s eyes behold in one whom Heaven cherishes, the angels love and God created perfect. This is his reality. And in Christ’s vision is his loveliness reflected in a form so holy and so beautiful that you could scarce refrain from kneeling at his feet. Yet you will take his hand instead, for you are like him in the sight that sees him thus. Attack on him is enemy to you, for you will not perceive that in his hands is your salvation. Ask him but for this, and he will give it to you. Ask him not to symbolize your fear. Would you request that love destroy itself? Or would you have it revealed to you and set you free?”

How do I do this? How do I see past my brother’s body? The most certain and permanent solution is to remember my Self as who I am and then I will remember who my brother is. Jesus admonishes us to not let our sight be arrested at the body. In other words, don’t look at his body, his personality, his behavior and think that is who he is. That is just a mask, a separation experience and has nothing to do with his reality. Insist on knowing this one as the Holy Spirit knows him. This is what today’s practice involves. It gives us a very specific way to practice this.

Regina’s Tips

This is another tip that I recommend you read in its entirety. But here is the part I am using because it is such a clear example of how to do this lesson and get the most out of it.

So today we will focus on anger.

Depending on your personality, you may experience anger in one way or another. Some people allow themselves to experience outright fury and hatred. Others repress that, so that anger might be experienced as mere annoyance. The first practice of the day will help you tune into your anger, regardless of how you experience it. You are asked to “Select one brother.” Let that one be one that you feel some grievance with, and this will give you a chance to look at your anger.

The lesson asks you to “See his face, his hands and feet, his clothing.” Etcetera. I ask you to go a little further. Look at what angers you about him/her. Let your mind temporarily dwell on those characteristics, but as you do, keep one eye turned inward so that it is looking at your thoughts and noticing they are your thoughts. Let me demonstrate:

I am thinking of Cassie. She is big in size. Tall and over-weight. She smiles all of the time, like she’s happy to be better than everyone else, happy to know more than others know. She talks all of the time as if she’s right about everything. She never listens. Whenever I try to speak, she cuts me off after half a sentence. She thinks she knows what I was going to say, and then she goes on to tell me how I’m wrong. She doesn’t ever listen to me. She’s wrong about everything because she never listens to anyone else. She only knows her point of view, which is extremely narrow-minded. I really don’t like being around her at all.

Okay, now looking back at what I wrote: I see that I focused on her as a body, “tall and over-weight.” From there, I went directly into her smile, and I interpreted its meaning. I decided she smiles because she thinks she is better than everyone else. I see that I believe this. I see that I think I know what she is thinking. I see that I believe I am right. I see that when I look at her in this way, I think I am better than her. I notice that I feel annoyed by how much she talks. That is my anger. I’m also angry that she never listens to me. I must be afraid of something there. What am I afraid of?

Why am I angry at Cassie? Because she talks all of the time as if she is right about everything, and she never listens to me even when I know more than she does.

Why does that bother me? Because I think she should listen to me.

Why does it anger me (scare me) that she doesn’t listen to me? I’m afraid that I am not as valuable or as important as I would like to appear. Maybe I am meaningless, not needed.

Through the process of looking at anger with one person, we can uncover fear thinking that we are identified with. For example, “I’m afraid that I am not as valuable or as important as I would like to appear. Maybe I am meaningless, not needed.”

The lesson asks us to say to this one, “Give me your blessing, holy Son of God. I would behold you with the eyes of Christ, and see my perfect sinlessness in you.”

I ask you to go a little further. Ask yourself, “What is really upsetting me? Is it him/her or is it the thinking that I have just uncovered in my own mind?”

I recommend journaling to look at your thoughts in the way I just demonstrated. I think it is easier to see thoughts clearly when they are written down.

Manual for Teachers
Judgment by Me Is Impossible. When I make the world real, I am battling with God’s Idea of Who I AM and where I am.

Every time I attempt to judge, I am at war with God. The Creator created me and when I judge what and who I am, I am, in essence, creating myself. I am saying that I am no longer as God created me, but have made of myself something I prefer. It is pure insanity. I can only be as God created me.

So, if I identify with the body and the body is sick, this is my way of saying I am something that can be sick. I am something that can die. This cannot be true because God does not create unlike Itself and God does not have a body that can be sick and God is not insane and therefore could not choose sickness, and God is eternal and cannot know death.

I cannot have something that God does not have. This is why Jesus tells us in the Course that sickness is a defense against the truth. My feeble attempts to prove I am a creature of my own design by making the body sick is one of the ways I battle God for supremacy. Or I might use the sick body as a way of punishing myself before God can do it to me. I judge myself guilty and then I take God’s prerogative as my own and punish myself. I think I am my own savior.

If I judge someone else, I am again at war with God, in the same way, I did when I judged myself. If I judge what I should do and where and when I again am at war with God. I have a choice, I can decide for myself with the ego-mind, or I can decide with the Holy Spirit. The first pits me against the Truth, the latter aligns my mind with Truth.

Text
T-8.7:16

There are two sentences in paragraph 16 that feel really meaningful to me this morning. “One is that freedom from illusions lies only in not believing them.” I love this for its simplicity. Yes, it can feel difficult not to believe in what seems so real, but then that is the purpose of the illusion, to feel real. So, when I experience the effects of believing in the illusion, I pay attention to what I had been thinking, and then I ask the Holy Spirit to remove those thoughts from my mind.

Here is an example. I felt harassed one day. There seemed to be too much work for one day and I felt overwhelmed. These are illusions. They affected me because I believed them. I could easily have questioned them, but I didn’t. Normally, when I feel like I have too much to do, I ask that Holy Spirit decide for me what to do and what to let go. I remind myself that it is just a thought in my mind that I have more to do than I can do. For some reason, that day I didn’t question my thoughts and so I suffered until I changed my mind about that.

“The second sentence that stands out to me says, “Do not arrest your thought in this world, and you will open your mind to creation in God.”

When I accepted the idea that I was harassed and overwhelmed and did not question that thought, it was because I had arrested my thought in this world. I looked at the world (my busy day) and decided the work I had to do was my problem. When I finally realized what I was doing, and I asked for correction, the barriers that seemed to hold me hostage to my suffering fell away. I was in immediate peace and I was given ideas that corrected some of the errors I made while confused.

What I have discovered is that I can always choose to not believe the illusion. It used to feel hard and I had to talk myself into letting go. Sometimes I would have to ask for help over and over, not because I had to talk the Holy Spirit into helping me, but because I had to talk myself into accepting the help. Having practiced this for a long time, now it is easy for me to do it.

I can, with the help of the Holy Spirit, free my mind from the belief in illusions and the process is very simple. I notice I am not happy and I ask that my mind be healed, then I allow the aberrant thought to be removed from my mind. I remind myself that I am not this body or this story. I am spirit. I am the Thought of God, created by Him, like Him. This silly moment cannot be reality. Then I allow my mind to fly free of this world.

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