Introduction, P 2
2 Yet what would you say to someone who believed this question really involves conflict? If you made the ego, how can the ego have made you? The authority problem is still the only source of conflict, because the ego was made out of the wish of God’s Son to father Him. The ego, then, is nothing more than a delusional system in which you made your own father. Make no mistake about this. It sounds insane when it is stated with perfect honesty, but the ego never looks on what it does with perfect honesty. Yet that is its insane premise, which is carefully hidden in the dark cornerstone of its thought system. And either the ego, which you made, is your father, or its whole thought system will not stand.
Journal
“The ego, then, is nothing more than a delusional system in which you made your own father. Make no mistake about this.” Ugh. Here it is again. I made a thought system, a delusional thought system, so that I could make my own father. My first thought is to remind myself this is not cause for guilt. It reminds me of when I was a kid and my friends and I would play at being a family. One of us would be the mother and one the father and the rest would be the children. It was play and it was innocent. My actual mother was not hurt by my play, nor was she angry that for awhile, I usurped her role. Nor is God upset with us for our play.
In another place in the Course, Jesus talks about us taking a detour into fear and guilt, and that is what we did. We made a decision not to laugh and we took our decision to replace our Father very seriously. Thus, fear and guilt were made and experienced. This, necessarily led to projection, and to amnesia. Now Jesus is helping us to understand that the ego is the system that allowed us to replace our Father, with one of our own making.
But now we had a quandary. How can the ego be the maker of us when we made the ego? We seem to have many conflicts in our life, but this authority problem is the source of all conflict, and the conflicts we are aware of are just reflections of that one conflict, just different forms of the same problem. All conflict, all problems, are corrected as we accept that the ego is only a delusional thought system, that we made this thought system to be our father, that this is impossible and meaningless, and that we are through playing and that it can easily be undone as we acknowledge God as our Father.
The solution is so simple and I really think that I am ready for the solution. But then I notice how quickly I turn to the ego for my answers. I want to lose weight so I look for a good diet that will make this happen as quickly as possible. This is asking the ego for an answer. My friend tells me about being sick and there is an urge to tell her about an article I read about a good way to get well quick. This is asking the ego for answer. I see an article about saving for retirement and I feel stupid because I never thought to make those plans. That decision that I am stupid is the answer the ego gave me when I asked.
My Father has answers to my problems, too, loving answers, but to hear His answers, I must stop asking for and listening to the answers from the ego. This is not hard, but it does take consistent vigilance. I pay attention to what I am doing, and I give my willingness to be corrected when I forget and turn to the ego as if it is my father. I stop kidding myself that the ego could actually be my father when I am the one that made the ego.
I remind myself that not only do I have a Father, but my Father is Love and so can only love me. I read, I study, I do the Lessons, and all of this brings me to the one thing that actually heals my mind; it brings me to desire. I realize that I desire to acknowledge God as my only Father. As my desire for God becomes whole, the ego thought fades from my mind.
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