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Study of Manual for Teachers 3-16-12

Day 76
4 God’s teachers can have no regret on giving up the pleasures of the world. Is it a sacrifice to give up pain? Does an adult resent the giving up of children’s toys? Does one whose vision has already glimpsed the face of Christ look back with longing on a slaughter house? No one who has escaped the world and all its ills looks back on it with condemnation. Yet he must rejoice that he is free of all the sacrifice its values would demand of him. To them he sacrifices all his peace. To them he sacrifices all his freedom. And to possess them must he sacrifice his hope of Heaven and remembrance of his Father’s Love. Who in his sane mind chooses nothing as a substitute for everything?

Jesus assures us that we will not regret giving up the world of our dreams. He says that no one who has escaped this world will miss it, nor will they condemn it. That is an interesting statement. I can’t speak from personal experience about what it is like to no longer be confused. I have read books by those who have become self-realized, and they seem to find more joy and beauty in the world now that they no longer see it the way I do.

Byron Katie (in A Thousand Names for Joy) speaks of washing dishes as if it is a sublime pleasure. It makes me long for that experience. I even tried it. I tried to open to an experience of being one with the dish, the soap, the water… but evidently you can’t fake it.  It just felt like washing dishes to me. But then I have all sorts of stories attached to dishwashing and none of them are particularly joyful. As Katie often asks, I wonder what it would be like to be me without my stories.

Jan Frazier (in When Fear Falls Away: A Sudden Awakening) talks about what it is like to be suddenly awakened and she too has experienced this world in a much different way since fear fell away for her. She doesn’t hold any grudges against the world that used to be such a source of fear and suffering for her.  Seeing the world without her stories projected onto it seems to be a real joy for her. She says: There is a presence within you that has never suffered. It lives in joy that has no cause. It is who you most deeply are.

It doesn’t sound like either of these women miss the world they no longer see one bit. They don’t sound like they regret their awakening either.

I find their books helpful in many ways, especially A Thousand Names for Joy, which I listen to in its audio version often. I cannot make their experience mine by reading about them, but it has helped me accept that I am not being asked to sacrifice anything to experience spiritual liberation.

I know that Jesus has been saying this all along in the Course (that God does not want my sacrifice) but somehow I have had a hard time shaking lose of this idea. I don’t understand this stubborn belief in myself. I could swear that I don’t believe that awakening requires any sacrifice on my part, and that I want it more than anything. And yet, if that were true, I would be writing my own book about the experience of living awake, instead of writing about the process of letting go.

Holy Spirit, I have said to you that I am tired of suffering and that I am ready to fully surrender to You. You have since helped me to see the beliefs I still cling to and I am grateful. This has been harder than it needs to be, and I am sure it is because I am having trouble going with the flow. I seem to be trying to swim against the current as I try to escape from the feelings associated with these beliefs. Please help me to let go of my resistance and just let it be. I am willing to go wherever you would have me go, but I don’t want to prolong the trip anymore than necessary.

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