A Reflection of Ideas. Part 2
This is salvation’s keynote: What I see reflects a process in my mind, which starts with my idea of what I want. From there, the mind makes up an image of the thing the mind desires, judges valuable, and therefore seeks to find. These images are then projected outward, looked upon, esteemed as real and guarded as one’s own. From insane wishes comes an insane world. From judgment comes a world condemned. And from forgiving thoughts a gentle world comes forth, with mercy for the holy Son of God, to offer him a kindly home where he can rest a while before he journeys on, and help his brothers walk ahead with him, and find the way to Heaven and to God. Lesson 325
First I understand how I make the world I see.
It is a reflection of a process in my mind.
It starts with a desire.
I make an image of that desire. I judge it valuable. I seek to find it.
I project it outward. I look upon it. I decide it is real and I guard it as my own.
I also see that, just as these insane thoughts make an insane world, forgiveness makes a gentle world. I can change the world I see when I change my thoughts. So I am continually creating the world I see.
Knowing this, I started using these ideas. The first thing I did was to begin looking at things differently. I would look at a lamp and the thought in my mind was that this thing is a lamp. I would change that to, “This is an image I have made that I call lamp.” I did this often during the day to help me shift my thinking about the things I see.
The next thing I did was to change the way I see circumstances in my life. The old way of viewing these circumstances went like this. I would have a headache and the ego mind would think of why my head hurts. I would think about the weather, what stress I am under, or if I had enough sleep. I would nervously wonder if this was the beginning of a migraine, and start thinking of possible triggers.
Now, when I noticed something like this, I would stop the process and shift my perspective. I would remember that this headache is an image I have made. It is not real and it did not begin in the world, but began in my mind, and remains in my mind with the rest of the world I have made. I would then ask to see the original desire that sourced the image of Myron with a headache. It is this desire that will point me to the belief that needs to be healed.
I saw the desire to prove the body is real. That desire was coupled with the desire to prove the body is stronger than the mind through making an image of Myron helpless against a migraine. I saw that sometimes the desire was to ground Myron in the illusion by making an image of her running around looking endlessly for solutions to the migraine problem. This, of course, led me to a deeper desire, which was to keep the illusion in place and the ego self strong in the mind.
In order for all of this to be effective as a believable story that keeps the mind engaged so as not to remember it is only a story, it must be consistent. It doesn’t have to make perfect sense, but it must be logical and coherent. So each time I make an image of a headache, I make that image something believable and something that makes sense to the story.
I make certain triggers, like not enough sleep makes the head hurt. I do this often, and soon, the idea that not enough sleep causes a headache is so fixed in the mind that it seems like an undeniable fact. Now it is harder than ever to refute. That I found a trigger for the headache reinforces that the headache is real and is something separate from my will, and that I must battle it with all my resources.
When, after every effort on my part, I still get headaches, I have proven to myself that I am victim to the body. I have convinced myself that I get headaches and there is nothing I can do about it. I am a frail and weak body and each headache brings to doubt the words I read in the Course that tell me I am God’s Holy Son.
But now that I understand the process, now that I understand why it is that this world I see represents my every wish, I am not fooled by my images. I ask to be shown the original desire, and the belief that desire represents. I have seen how this desire is keeping me in the dream, and is hurting me. I ask that my mind be healed.
Seeing it all so clearly has helped me to truly desire something else. Now that I see what I don’t want, I am asking the Holy Spirit to remove from my mind those beliefs and the desires that source the images I make. And I am learning to make images from the desire to awaken. I will share some other examples later, because I notice that in true ego fashion the mind wants to separate out and make this true for some things, but confuse other things and make it seem like there are exceptions. There aren’t.
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