Reflections 253 to 266

 

253/ A Case of Mistaken Identity

5^th January 2023

 

Lesson 253: My Self is ruler of the universe. (ACIM, W-253)

 

The lesson today suggests that it is only us who rule our destiny. What happens in our lives is because we have asked for it. We shape our futures by the way we think.

 

This is hard to accept when the days are difficult. In fact, it is difficult to believe regardless of how our lives have panned out. But then, A Course in Miracles does not pander to the ego. It dismisses the ego outright and takes us on another path.

 

Jesus tells us that we hate the body and try to disguise this fact by distracting ourselves.  We don’t understand the body is a symbol of our guilt. It is the outcome of a mind that is separate. Jesus implies that, when we dress the body up or offer our body to other bodies, we are missing the most important aspect of what we are - the mind.

 

Gifts are not made through bodies, if they be truly given and received. For bodies can neither offer nor accept; hold out nor take. Only the mind can value, and only the mind decides on what it would receive and give. (ACIM, T-20.II.2:1-3)

 

We offer love or we offer hate; we offer truth or we offer illusions; we offer peace or we offer agitation. We do this through the mind. The body, then, just follows its orders.

 

When we believe in the body, it is always a case of mistaken identity. We do not know who we are and what we are doing. A Course in Miracles simply states that we are perfect spirit, whole, pure and innocent. Nothing more and nothing less than this can ever be true.

 

Melissa Denyce and the Love Covered Life Podcast have a series of twelve videos in which near-death experiencers talk about life beyond the body. This is our real Identity. The theme of the first two compilations is how it feels to be in the light and presence of God. The two videos are below.

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254/ Truth Needs no Adjustment

6th January 2023

 

Lesson 254: Let every voice but God’s be still in me. (ACIM, W-254)

 

There is truth and only truth. This is the lesson for today.

 

What is truth? It is everything that the ego is not.

 

The ego is merely a thought that we are separate. It has been multiplied and magnified into a trillion different variations. However, the underlying emotion is terror. We are terrified of being alone.

 

Truth cannot change but the ego does. We are always in a prison cell if we are with the ego. We can also easily get out - except for one thing. The ego makes it difficult.

 

A Course in Miracles is therefore the key to the door. It points us in the right direction.

 

Knowledge requires no adjustments and, in fact, is lost if any shift or change is undertaken. For this reduces it at once to mere perception; a way of looking in which certainty is lost and doubt has entered. (ACIM, T-20.III.1:4-5)

 

The holy do not interfere with truth. They are not afraid of it, for it is within the truth they recognize their holiness, and rejoice at what they see. They look on it directly, without attempting to adjust themselves to it, or it to them. (ACIM, T-20.III.3:1-3)

 

A murderer is frightened, and those who kill fear death. All these are but the fearful thoughts of those who would adjust themselves to a world made fearful by their adjustments. And they look out in sorrow from what is sad within, and see the sadness there. (ACIM, T-20.III.4:5-7)

 

A Course in Miracles gently reminds us that we are lost but we can easily find ourselves again. All we have to do is follow the directions that stop our minds from adjusting within a vacuum of despair.

 

Truth needs no adjustment. Truth is absolute. This is all we need to know.

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255/ A Simple Correction

7th January 2023

 

Lesson 255: This day I choose to spend in perfect peace. (ACIM, W-255)

 

Nothing is outside of us. Everything we see arises from within.

 

The lesson today assures us that peace is here. We learn that, if peace is real, then anything other than peace is not. It is the same as Heaven and hell. If Heaven is real, then hell is of our making.

 

Heaven is therefore a friend and hell is a stranger. Heaven arises when our mind is free, and hell when it isn’t. Heaven is love in action while hell is simply the barrier to love.

 

Jesus tells us that hell is like an uninvited guest. It is impossible to find hell in perfect love.  If only we knew that perfect love is within us, then there is nothing in the world we could ever fear.

 

The world you see is but a judgment on yourself. It is not there at all. Yet judgement lays a sentence on it, justifies it and makes it real. Such is the world you see; a judgment on yourself, and made by you. (ACIM, T-20.III.5:2-5)

 

The world the holy see is beautiful because they see their innocence in it. They did not tell it what it was; they did not make adjustments to fit their orders. They gently questioned it and whispered, “What are you?” (ACIM, T-20.III.6:3-5)

 

Perfect love is therefore our birthright. Perfect love is the light of the world.

 

Hell has a different vision.  Hell is anything and everything that perfect love is not.

 

So, when our worlds collapse and our lives crumble, we fumble around and pick up the pieces. But really, nothing changes. Perfect love just stays as it is.

 

All it takes is a simple choice. It is a simple correction. Being the love that we are shapes the world we see.

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256/ Our Little Part

8th January 2023

 

Lesson 256: God is the only goal I have today. (ACIM, W-256)

 

The lesson today is about forgiveness. It tells us we are asleep to the truth. Forgiveness, then, helps us to rekindle our innocence. In reality, nothing has happened that we ever need to forgive.

 

Our whole existence is simply a dream of separation from God. This is what we are being told today.

 

How, then, do we then get back to what we have never left?

 

In a similar vein to the story of Noah’s ark, A Course in Miracles tells us that we are only able to do this by taking the hand of our brother: The arc of peace is entered two by two, yet the beginning of another world goes with them (ACIM, T-20.IV.6:5). By seeing what is real in each other, we can’t help but see a world that is also real.

 

A Course in Miracles is completely unequivocal. It tells us we are whole and complete. We need to join instead of separate. Our own completion lies in each other.

 

Power is of God, given by Him and reawakened by the Holy Spirit, Who knows that as you give you gain. (ACIM, T-20.IV.1:4)

 

In him is Heaven. See sin in him instead, and Heaven is lost to you. But see him as he is, and what is yours shines from him to you. (ACIM, T-20.IV.2:3-5)

 

We don’t need to understand this perfectly. We only need to trust that there is a deeper meaning behind everything we see.

 

Equally, we can come to an understanding that there are some things we just can’t understand.

 

We are simply asked to play our own little part. We do this by extending love to others, not taking it away.

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257/ Lost and Found

9th January 2023

 

Lesson 257: Let me remember what my purpose is. (ACIM, W-257)

 

A Course in Miracles tells us that vision or judgement is our only choice. It is always one or the other.

 

The lesson today arises out of our split mind’s confusion. It is pretty self-evident that the ego has no idea what vision is.

 

Our goal is therefore to discover our clear sight. It is to unify our thinking. What we are, and what we think we are, then becomes one.

 

Jesus has this advice. He tells us that we need each other, but we don’t need the body. Everything we need is in the mind.

 

Each miracle of joining is a mighty herald of eternity. No one who has a single purpose, unified and sure, can be afraid. No one who shares his purpose with him can not be one with him. (ACIM, T-20.V.1:6-8)

 

We need to unveil what is veiled. We need to find what has been lost.  This can only be done now because there is no other moment. Each moment that passes is another moment lost.

 

Truth, then, is found only through presence. Just a twinge of anger, a flicker of envy, and it is clear that our minds have focused on the past.

 

Everything is perfect when the mind is present. Stillness arises and all fear is gone.

 

Jesus guides us to find this stillness. It is in this moment that what we thought we lost is really found.

 

You look upon each holy instant as a different point in time. It never changes. All that it ever held or will ever hold is here right now. The past takes nothing from it, and the future will add no more. Here, then, is everything. (ACIM, T-20.V.6:1-5)

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258/ The Fear of Love

10th January 2023

 

Lesson 258: Let me remember that my goal is God. (ACIM, W-258)

 

Nothing exists other than the relationship of the Son of God with his Creator. This is the underlying message behind the whole of A Course in Miracles.

 

Our goal, then, is to train our minds to remember this. This is the lesson for today, as well as the whole purpose of the Workbook.

 

A Course in Miracles repeatedly states that there is the ego and the Holy Spirit, but only one is real. Both can be found within the mind. Both are mutually exclusive because there is absolutely no connection between the two. A brief summary could be as follows.

 

The ego has its temple within the body. The ego demands that the body panders to its every need. The body is therefore a tool of the ego. It does what it is asked just like a puppet obeys its master.

 

The Holy Spirit has its temple within a relationship of minds. It instils love into all minds that join. The body, then, becomes a channel for giving. It has no other purpose apart from extending what is.

 

Love wishes to be known, completely understood and shared. It has no secrets; nothing that it would keep apart and hide. It walks in sunlight, open-eyed and calm, in smiling welcome and in sincerity so simple and so obvious it cannot be misunderstood. (ACIM, T-20.VI.2:5-7)

 

Love has no darkened temples where mysteries are kept obscure and hidden from the sun. It does not seek for power, but for relationships. The body is the ego’s chosen weapon for seeking power through relationships. And its relationships must be unholy, for what they are it does not even see. (ACIM, T-20.VI.4:1-4)

 

We are in a state of isolation if we cling to the body. Jesus tells us throughout A Course in Miracles that love has no division, and neither does the mind.

 

The fear of love is what keeps us separate. Overcome this and we know that love is all that exists.

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259/ Maintaining Purpose

11th January 2023

 

Lesson 259: Let me remember that there is no sin. (ACIM, W-259)

 

A Course in Miracles tells us that no one who loves can judge. In this one statement we have the complete dismissal of the ego.

 

The lesson today is another version of the above. It states that sin is the source of guilt. The ego loves this. It needs us to feel the effects of sin. If there is no sin, then the ego has no control.

 

When we see sin, we see the body. This is a major part of the ego’s thought system.  The ego judges consistently and it loves to find fault. It may not be totally familiar with the vernacular that A Course in Miracles uses, but the ego only wants us to see through the filter of what the world holds dear.

 

It is impossible to see your brother as sinless and yet to look upon him as a body. Is this not perfectly consistent with the goal of holiness? For holiness is merely the result of letting the effects of sin be lifted, so what was always true is recognized. (ACIM, T-20.VII.4:1-3)

 

Within the Text, there is a line that the ego hates and it is this: This course requires almost nothing of you. It is impossible to imagine one that asks so little, or could offer more (ACIM, T-20.VII.1:7-8). The very premise of what Jesus is teaching us - of seeing everyone as though they are being seen through the eyes of God - is one that the ego can never understand.

 

Within us, however, is always the answer. It simply requires a certain stillness to know it.

 

The mind just needs the discipline to accept this. The Workbook is the application of that discipline.

 

Every lesson within the Workbook therefore shines a simple spotlight on the truth. Each lesson becomes the means to find the end.

 

Maintaining our purpose is essential and crucial. The ego may want to sidetrack us but today’s instruction is that there is no sin. If we really understood its meaning properly, all judgement would drop away and all suffering would finally end. The ego - our fear - would therefore be gone.

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260/ A Statement of Fact

12th January 2023

 

Lesson 260: Let me remember God created me. (ACIM, W-260)

 

The lesson today is about Identity. It is about knowing who we really are.

 

A Course in Miracles states that we always have our Identity but it can’t be seen by a mind at war. Jesus wants us to know that we have to be committed in our resolve to find it.

 

Do you not want to know your own Identity? Would you not happily exchange your doubts for certainty? Would you not willingly be free of misery, and learn again of joy? Your holy relationship offers all this to you. (ACIM, T-20.VIII.2:1-4)

 

Within a relationship, then, we find ourselves or lose ourselves. We either extend love or we judge and receive accordingly; we either know we are joined or we set parameters and keep our distance.

 

Everything we do in life therefore has a ripple effect. We do a good turn and it spreads outwards; we hurt someone and so does that. What we do always initiates a response.

 

A Course in Miracles is a statement of fact. If we want something badly enough, then we will get it.

 

Truth is restored to you through your desire, as it was lost to you through your desire for something else. Open the holy place that you closed off by valuing the “something else,” and what was never lost will quietly return. (ACIM, T-20.VIII.1:2-3)

 

The life review, often mentioned in the near-death experience, is a perfect example of experiencing everything that we have done in our lives. We see the good and the bad - the rights and the wrongs. We discover how much love we have spread, which is really the only reason why we are here on earth. The next two videos from the Love Covered Life Podcast are compilations that cover this topic.

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261/ Playing with Toys

13th January 2023

 

Lesson 261: God is my refuge and security. (ACIM, W-261)

 

The lesson today is about safety and a sense of peace. Where we place our trust is how we find our stability.

 

There is the ego and the Holy Spirit; there is the body and there is the mind; there is vision and there is judgement. We always have two choices and what we see is how we feel.

 

A Course in Miracles looks into mind. We begin with minds that have been clouded by detail. Then, as we continue, the detail diminishes. The real power of the mind is what becomes abundantly clear.

 

What if you recognized this world is an hallucination? What if you really understood you made it up? What if you realized that those who seem to walk about in it, to sin and die, attack and murder and destroy themselves, are wholly unreal? Could you have faith in what you see, if you accepted this? And would you see it? (ACIM, T-20.VIII.7:3-7)

 

This is the bare bones of what A Course in Miracles is teaching us. Its main thrust is that we project out our internal world onto a big screen, and then fully believe that everything we see is real.

 

The meaning, then, that we put onto anything we see comes from within. We look inside first, attach a meaning, and then label what we are looking at as good or bad.

 

Jesus fully understood the nature of the body. He knew that the ego gave us nothing but pain. Today, he tells us both are completely synonymous; they fit together like a hand in a glove.

 

Within A Course in Miracles, Jesus states that judgement is always our downfall. We are playing a game of death in our minds. The alternative is to turn to the Holy Spirit whose job is to stop us judging. The Holy Spirit knows we’ve become like children playing with toys.

 

Only two purposes are possible. And one is sin, the other is holiness. Nothing is in between, and which you choose determines what you see. (ACIM, T-20.VIII.9:1-3)

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262/ Unseeing Eyes

14th January 2023

 

Lesson 262: Let me perceive no differences today. (ACIM, W-262)

 

The lesson today is quite clear. God has one Son and one creation. Essentially, if we don’t see God’s Love everywhere, we are seeing what does not exist.

 

A Course in Miracles states that the knowing of this is in the mind.

 

Projection makes perception. (ACIM, T-21.in.1:1)

 

Perception is a result and not a cause. (ACIM, T-21.in.1:8)

 

The world you see is what you gave it, nothing more than that. (ACIM, T-21.in.1:2)

 

Therefore, seek not to change the world, but choose to change your mind about the world. (ACIM, T-21.in.1:7)

 

Jesus wants us to develop the vision we need in order to see a world that is holy. A holy world is a healed world. Holiness is wholeness, arising from a mind that has no limits in which to be.

 

The world we see now therefore demonstrates how much joy we have in our minds.

 

The ego damns and judges; the Holy Spirit celebrates and sets free. The split mind only does the first.

 

Jesus tells us our minds need healing. A Course in Miracles is the means for unseeing eyes to see.

 

You do not see. Your cues for inference are wrong, and so you stumble and fall down upon the stones you did not recognize, but fail to be aware you can go through the doors you thought were closed, but which stand open before unseeing eyes, waiting to welcome you. (ACIM, T-21.I.1:4-5)

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263/ Identifying with the Lot

15th January 2023

 

Lesson 263: My holy vision sees all things as pure. (ACIM, W-263)

 

A Course in Miracles is a reminder that Heaven is just a state of awareness. It is with us now. What is not Heaven does not actually exist.

 

To be told that we are complete - that we are one with God - and then to not experience it is one of the main reasons why A Course in Miracles remains of the bookshelf. It is a cross that is hard to bear.

 

The lesson today does not help in this regard. If we are in pain, feeling hungry, on the end of someone’s anger, then how can we see this with a holy vision? Since we are outside the gate of Heaven, as the lesson implies, then we are experiencing what can only be described as hell.

 

Jesus keeps reminding us to question the ego. He wants us to look into the mind and see the nonsense that is there. Jesus categorically states that there is no need for us to learn through pain.

 

The essence of A Course in Miracles is to look beyond the body. It is to look within and find out what we really are. Consciousness is everywhere; we are pure spirit; anything that is not created by Love is the product of a mistaken mind.

 

You can be shown which doors are open, and you can see where safety lies; and which way leads to darkness, which to light. Judgement will always give you false directions, but vision shows you where to go. Why should you guess? (ACIM, T-21.I.2:4-6)

 

The ego provides some of what we need. The Holy Spirit gives everything. There are no in-betweens.

 

When peace is absent, we suffer - we are identifying with what we’re not. When peace is with us, we’re happy and the reason is simple. We’re identifying with the Lot.

 

What is a miracle but this remembering? And who is there in whom this memory lies not? The light in one awakens it in all. And when you see it in your brother, you are remembering for everyone. (ACIM, T-21.I.10:4-7)

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264/ Effect and Source

16th January 2023

 

Lesson 264: I am surrounded by the Love of God. (ACIM, W-264)

 

Disappointment, despair and disgust all arise by way of a certain line of thinking.

 

Joy, inspiration and wonder arise out of another.

 

Our choice, then, informs our decision and we do this every moment of the day. A Course in Miracles tells us that our minds are powerful beyond measure. We are responsible for everything we see.

 

Our thinking therefore begins and ends with us. Truth is simple but we make it complicated.

 

The essence of A Course in Miracles can therefore be summarized as follows. There is no source but Love. This is the lesson for today.

 

No accident nor chance is possible within the universe as God created it, outside of which is nothing. Suffer, and you decided sin was your goal. Be happy, and you gave the power of decision to Him Who must decide for God for you. (ACIM, T-21.II.3:4-6)

 

The ego, then, is simply the crazy idea that we can make things happen that are against our will.

 

The Holy Spirit is the part of the mind that makes room for truth. Nothing more than this is required.

 

We have complete power with no limits. We make our own reality with every thought that we think.

 

Effect and source go together. Joy is ours when we connect to the Source of what we know as Truth.

 

What you desire, you will see. And if its reality is false, you will uphold it by not realizing all the adjustments you have introduced to make it so. (ACIM, T-21.II.9:5-6)

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265/ A Big Brick Wall

17th January 2023

 

Lesson 265: Creation’s gentleness is all I see. (ACIM, W-265)

 

Today’s lesson states we have misunderstood the world. It suggests that every problem we see is merely a blip. If we had a peaceful mind, we would see the world quite differently.

 

A Course in Miracles tells us we consistently bargain with reality. We set limits. It seems we constantly want to be what we are not.

 

When we make room for truth - when we look at everything peacefully with the Holy Spirit - we are accepting reality as it is. There are no exceptions to this.

 

The source of sin is gone. You may imagine that you still experience its effects, but it is not your purpose and you no longer want it. No one allows a purpose to be replaced while he desires it, for nothing is so cherished and protected as is a goal the mind accepts. (ACIM, T-21.III.2:2-4)

 

Our minds focus on something - anything - and we get it; where we put our attention is where we find our desire. Another way of putting it is that we reap what we sow.

 

The Workbook is a huge lesson in changing how we think. The ego will guide us into alleyways and cul-de-sacs but, at the end of the road, there is always the big brick wall that we call death.

 

The Holy Spirit is about facing that brick wall. It is about looking at it and being able to climb up and over it. Ultimately, it is about learning that it is not there.

 

If we were to look back on our lives, it is likely we would find many examples of creation’s gentleness. For example, maybe a stranger appeared when we needed help, or a book appeared in our hands completely by chance? Help tends to come when we least expect it.

 

Everything happens for a reason. A Course in Miracles states that there are no accidents in the universe. We might be looking at a big brick wall but the Holy Spirit knows that we are not. For the Holy Spirit, there is only one truth. The path is always clear.

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266/ Intention Is in the Mind

18th January 2023

 

Lesson 266: My holy Self abides in you, God’s Son. (ACIM, W-266)

 

The lesson today unites the mind with our Self. When we know our Self, we become perfect, certain and completely fulfilled.

 

When we only identify with our little self, we can be none of the above. We are always searching, never realising our security is right where we are.

 

A Course in Miracles tells us that we can have faith in one or the other - the Self or the little self - but never in both. Faith determines belief.

 

The intention is in the mind, which tries to use the body to carry out the means for sin in which the mind believes. Thus is the joining of mind and body an inescapable belief of those who value sin. And so is sacrifice invariably a means for limitation, and thus for hate. (ACIM, T-21.III.10:5-7)

 

We have to know insecurity, limitation and disorder in order to look beyond our little self. Our little self - the ego - thinks it has us in its power. Most of us believe we are its controlling voice.

 

If we have known pain consistently throughout our lives, then it becomes our greatest teacher. Without it, we would never need to move forward; we would never want to find what lies beneath the surface. We are scared of facing pain because we see an ogre staring back at us. We run from it and pain keeps us running. The key is to face it. We look at it without flinching.

 

A Course in Miracles tells us that we started out as love, we are love and we have never left love. All pain is simply a thought. Our little self is just a belief. Nothing exists outside of love because love is all there is.

 

The Workbook disciplines the mind so that it can focus on hearing this love - the Holy Spirit. The little self only wants to distract us with thoughts that can literally bring us to our knees.

 

Intention is always in the mind and this will never change. We are what we believe.