If a child were playing make-believe and pretending that things were happening, would you believe it? If you knew better, if you knew that the toy car is just a toy, not a real car, but the child was whizzing it around making car sounds and saying "beep beep", would you believe there really was a car there?

Of course not. And the reason is, you know without any doubt, and have a clear awareness, that the toy is just a toy, not a car, that it isn't a "real car", and that the child is just pretending. You know that the car is only moving because the child is moving it. You know that the car is only making "beep beep" sounds because the child is making those sounds appear. So you see everything, you are aware of the whole scene, and so you smile and laugh at the gentle play that the child is performing, knowing it is completely unreal.

The thing is, in this big physical world, we do not realize that everything in it is also a toy. It is a toy that is being played with by the Son of God. And the Son of God is having a great old time making things move around, making sound effects, pretending that He is a multitude of difference characters. He is really versatile and clever. He even pretends to be multiple characters at once, and they even interact with each other and seem to do things to each other. And from the point of view within that pretence it sort of seems like certain characters seem to not know that this is all just a big made up fairytale that the Child of God is playing out. And even that not knowing is part of the play!

And the other thing is, the Son of God is so powerfully creative and expressive, and so intelligent, and so sophisticated at weaving pretend illusions to make things seem like they're really happening. He animates snowflakes falling from the sky. He causes trees to seem to grow. He makes the birds flap their wings. And he creates war. And he creates death and suffering too. Yes the Son of God made death (and can abolish it).

But even as He is make-believing these things, from His vantage point He knows that none of these are real. He is just playing, just pretending. He's having fun and laughing to Himself about how He is playing 'within' His own being, dreaming up fantasies and pretending to make them real. He even is capable of pitting one of His many personalities against another. And He is even capable of manifesting sickness and death, as though these are really happening, and yet all a long He is absolutely unaffected by these and they do not change Him at all. How could they when He is immortal? How could they when He, like the child playing with toys, knows all along that He is just making this all up?

The Son of God knows He cannot die. He knows he is immortal. He knows there cannot be a separation from God. He knows there is nowhere to go where God is not. He knows sin is not possible or real. He knows He is forever innocent. He knows all is forgiven because there is nothing to forgive, because nothing has REALLY happened. And so He is just playing with this 'tiny mad idea' of 'what if separation is possible'. It's just a toy. It's a mind toy. And nothing has really gone wrong. And even as he dreams about this extreme separation from God, and even as it seems to be a horrible nightmare, even the horrible nightmare He is making up on purpose, willingly, wanting it to happen, as part of His great pantomime that He is orchestrating every part of from a higher perspective. And it seems like 'we' are here on the receiving end of this 'chid' playing with illusions, making our lives hell, but 'we are Him and we chose this too. See how creative and imaginative we are, to invent a life of hell on purpose just to see what it's like?

If a child were playing and acting and pretending that they are some character, and if the child is at war with some other child, in this character, and this other child's character comes along with his mighty sword and attacks the child and the child pretend to fall down dead, do you believe it? Of course you don't. You know they are pretending. You know the child is not really dying. And you know this because you know who the child really is. You know their true identity. You see their real self. And so for you, you see their illusions from the outside, and recognize that they are not real or true, and not for a second would you take them seriously or think they are actually doing anything to the child.

But what SEEMS to be happening to 'us', as little Earth people in little bodies, is that us, as characters in Christ's dream, seem to be acting a role in which we seem unaware of who the dreamer even is. It seems like the Son of God has, somehow, even though this is IMPOSSIBLE, has somehow forgotten that He is just pretending, and has lost sight of His true identity, and has become unaware that everything that moves in this fantasy world is because He chooses to make it move. This absolutely cannot be true, but it can SEEM very much the case, and we SEEM to be finding ourselves in this situation, this role, where it SEEMS like we 'really' have gone and fricking done it this time.. where we've *actually* separated from God, where we're *actually* not the Son of God anymore, and where the stuff that seems to be happening really seems like we're not choosing it whatsoever.

This is the extreme prowess of the Son of God, that He is actually capable of making it seem, to Himself, that He is not even Himself anymore, that He doesn't even recognize that He is making up His own pretend dream, and that He is not the author of any of it. He is actually capable of creating WITHIN Himself, what appears to be the almost complete negation of Himself, to the point where He seems to 'die', even though some part of Him must still be existing in order to project this fantasy of 'death', and so He is not all the way dead and still continues to pretend. And even as He seems to experience what it is like to be an actor who has forgotten He is an actor, EVEN NOW He is still Himself and, very very subtly, STILL has not really lost touch with reality, or with the fact that He is STILL the author of this entire dream, even a dream of death. He is STILL the Son of God and He is STILL the one who is choosing and dreaming all this. The subtlety with which He has pretended to not be Himself is so extremely subtle that it is very easily overlooked and unrecognized.

So then the Son of God (you) then seem to even die. And you seem to experience this extreme state of stuff happening that you do not choose or want, like you have absolutely no power to choose otherwise or to stop death. And then it happens, and this SEEMS to prove that you are not the author of this dream. You have given an absolutely tremendous PERFORMANCE, you have totally fooled everyone even yourself (it seems, but not totally), that you have actually died. Once again, if there were an audience who knew better, they would erupt with rapturous applause at just how prolifically brilliant your performance of 'dying' was, and you would then stand up in costume yet identified now as an actor, at the end of the play, and take a bow.

Becoming aware of how this make-believe fantasy world has been turned into something that SEEMS like it is REAL, is the simple act of "waking up" from the dream. It's not that we're not the dreamer, it just that we're pretending not to be the dreamer, and doing a very good job of it. We cannot disconnect ourselves from God. And here's the good news.

Everything that we thought was really happening in this world, all the bad things, all the terrible things, the wars and tragedies, the sickness and death, all of it... every single horror, the absolutely hilarious news is... that all of this IS, absolutely, JUST a pretend play that the Child of God is pretending to enact, as part of an innocent play with toys, and the Child of God - which is who you really are - IS absolutely unharmed, undisturbed, untangled, undead, in your divine comedy of play and pretend. All of what you thought has gone wrong, is not really true. All of the things you thought could attack you, were coming from yourself. All of the things that upset you, you deliberately chose to be upset by. All of the things you thought were capable of keeping you from God, they never were - you just kept pretending they could.

And so ultimately, the gentle happy good news is, when you can come to realize it and see it, that everything is absolutely alright. Everyone is okay. Nobody has been hurt. The Son of God has not been defiled. There has been no real upset. Nothing real can be threatened, and nothing unreal exists. All of the elaborate pantomime of 'planet earth' is a hoax. All of the stories that have been told about who did what to whom, it was all part of childs-play. All of the supposed tragedies, terrors, horrors, disasters and upsets, were all being deliberately chosen and performed by a full cast of Sons of God. And we're all completely safe in Heaven with God right now in total joy and bliss and happiness, laughing our heads off at how much fun it was to invent such a wacky world of wonders.

If we can just realize this and just tap into this truth, that nothing has really gone wrong and that we're just fooled by the illusion of appearances and by our own role play and acting, we would stand up and laugh and feel so completely free. And we'd be free of the terror of fear, the ugly weight of guilt, and any belief at all that everything has truly gone wrong. We'd be free from the constant anxiety that we've gone off the rails, that life is unfair, that we're in danger, that there are threads and things that upset us, thats there is reason to be unhappy, that we're justified in being unhappy, and we'd be free from our own faked dying forever. The end of fear, the end of suffering, the end of death.

This is all just a SHOW! It's not a real world. It's not a real history. These bodies are not real people. There is nothing real happening here. The kids are just playing in the sandbox. It's make-believe. Don't buy into it or think it's real, remember they're the innocent Children of God to whom nothing can happen. And they're just having fun.

Only love is real.

"I heard one voice because I had learned that learning is attained BY teaching. I understood that I COULD NOT ATONE FOR MYSELF ALONE."On the one hand, we're asked to accept atonement for ourselves. This is because our own mind needs to accept God's truth and become sane, in and of itself. But the fact is that you also share everything with others. Your mind is plugged into other minds. So that now means that you can't accept your own atonement, unless you're also willing accept other people's atonement.

I could say, well, I find myself to be innocent and holy. But if I can't also have that same perspective about EVERYONE, then I can't really claim it either. This is due to the Golden Rule, that what is true of me is true of the whole sonship. Either both of us are innocent, or both of us are guilty.

"Now need you but to learn that BOTH of you are innocent OR guilty."It's not possible to see myself as innocent while seeing someone else as guilty. This means that secretly I find myself to be guilty as well, and am now projecting sin onto another in order to deny that I find myself sinful. I now see the guilt seemingly outside myself in another as if it applies to them and not me. This is how the ego always thinks in a dissociated way.

Nothing true can apply ONLY to myself. Truth has to apply to everyone at once. The truth is that whatever applies to me applies to everyone, because we were all created equal in God. If I believe in guilt I will find both myself and others to be guilty and will see a guilty world. If I truly and genuinely believe in my own innocence, it can't be that I simultaneously hate others and find them to be sinners. No one can love and hate at the same time. So you can't accept atonement just for yourself and leave everyone out of it. Just as you can't be in holy relationship while excluding anyone.

Even though I'm tasked with accepting atonement "for myself", being responsible for using my own free will to choose it, this actually means that I have to be willing to let it APPLY to everyone simultaneously. I cannot in fact accept it for MYSELF at all, if I am not willing for this same truth to be true everywhere. If I fail to recognize its universal application, I have not learned it. Only by SHARING the atonement with the ENTIRE sonship, can I accept it for myself.

This means I have to find EVERYONE to be innocent and accept the atonement FOR everyone. I can't JUST find myself to be innocent and leave others dangling. The truth I claim for myself HAS to be also claimed for everyone. I have to see the holiness of christ in everyone at the same time otherwise I can't see it in myself. And I cannot be true to or know myself without being true to the known reality of everyone's true nature. Only ego would think it can accept atonement exclusively, because it wants everything at the expense of everyone else.

"Atonement as a Lesson in Sharing. Atonement is for all, because it is the way to UNDO the belief that ANYTHING is for you ALONE."

"Holiness MUST be shared, for therein lies everything that makes it holy."

"To the Holy Spirit, it is the fundamental law of sharing, by which you give what you value in order to keep it in your OWN minds."

"Redemption is recognized ONLY by sharing it."

So yes on the one hand, since we "rule" our own mind, which God created in us individually along with our soul, our natural condition is that we are ALSO fused intimately with every child of God. You CANNOT accept the atonement "just for" yourself. It is absolutely impossible and runs completely opposite to the nature of love and of all things God.

The atonement is a reflection of heaven, and of heaven's laws. Those laws are laws of absolute sharing, equality and union. You are literally in and like all your brothers, and thus there is an aspect of you which is completely shared with them all. The entire sonship is your self, just as you are the christ along with everyone. For YOU to accept atonement means, in effect, that you AS THE SONSHIP is accepting it FOR the sonship.

"My mission was simply to UNITE the Will of the Sonship WITH the Will of the Father by being aware of the Father's Will myself."

"Peace be unto you who rest in God, and in whom the whole Sonship rests."

"Every decision is made for the WHOLE SONSHIP, directed in and out, and influencing a constellation larger than anything you ever dreamed of."

"What you give through Him is for the whole Sonship, NOT FOR PART OF IT."

"To heal, then, is to correct perception in your brother AND yourself by SHARING THE HOLY SPIRIT WITH HIM. This places you both WITHIN the Kingdom and restores ITS wholeness in your minds."

"The Kingdom of Heaven (the sonship/one son/christ) IS you. What else BUT you did the Creator create, and what else but you IS His Kingdom? This is the whole message of the Atonement"

You see, you are not just you. You are also everyone else. All your siblings in the sonship are part of you and you of them. We are all together a collection of individual souls who share absolutely everything with each other openly. And so what applies to you applies to everyone and includes everyone. Everyone is included in your self and in your mind, just as you are included in them. And so you CANNOT do anything alone!

The ego is the idea of being alone, separated off, independent of or isolated from others. It's the idea of being "only you" and "not others". It's the rejection of your union with your brothers and an attempt to confine and limited yourself to ONLY what appears to be your individual self. It's an attempt not to share anything with anyone. And it is OUT of this state of exclusivity and imprisonment that you are rising INTO a state of TOTAL sharing and inclusion. So you have to learn that you ARE the whole sonship and everything you do is for everyone.

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

This doesn't in a any way violate the free will of others. You accepting atonement for "yourself" does in SOME WAY and in some part, accept it FOR others and gives it to them. It lifts them up to the degree they're willing to allow it. You becoming lighter lightens everyone's load. "When I am healed I am not healed alone."

Just as Jesus accepted the atonement for himself AND FOR everyone, this did lift everyone into light, but each individual was only lifted to the degree they allowed themselves to be included in it. Not that Jesus didn't GIVE it to everyone through unlimited sharing, just that they did not full RECEIVE it.

As EACH of us accepts atonement truth for ourselves, we ARE radiating it throughout the sonship and every mind is illuminated by it. This is the same thing that happens when you work miracles. They can touch people far beyond your awareness because we are all joined. We're sort of like a network of individuals. We each can raise up to the highest heights which pulls everyone upward as well, but each has to also be willing to be pulled to fully embrace what is offered them.

So while your "only responsibility" is to accept atonement for yourself, YOUR SELF is not JUST yours. You must accept it for everyone otherwise you cannot have it. "To have all, give all to all." The way by which you share atonement with everyone reflects the holographic nature of the Kingdom, in which everyone has everything simultaneously because every individual is the whole. Atonement, just like miracles, are holographically connected and must be shared in order to be experienced for yourself.

"The purpose of the Atonement is to restore everything TO you. (That is, to restore the awareness. Later clarification.) You had everything when you were created, just as everyone did. Having been restored to your original state, you naturally become part of the Atonement yourself. You now share MY inability to tolerate the lack of love in yourself and in everyone else, and MUST join the GREAT CRUSADE to correct it. The slogan for this Crusade is "Listen, Learn, and DO."

"As peace extends from deep inside yourself to embrace all the Sonship and give it rest"

"For it is the complete equality of the Atonement in which salvation lies."

"My only gift to you is to help you make the same decision FOR YOURSELF. The will for this decision is the will to SHARE it, because the decision itself IS the decision to share. It is MADE BY GIVING, and is therefore the one act of mind that resembles true creation."

"Let the Holy Spirit remind you always of His fairness, and let me teach you how to share it with your brothers. How else can the chance to claim it for yourself be given you?"

"You who share His Life must share it to KNOW it, for sharing IS knowing."

"He leaves you no one OUTSIDE yourself, alone WITHOUT you. And so He gives you what is yours, because your Father would have you share it WITH him"

"I desire this holy instant for myself that I may SHARE it with my brother, whom I love. It is not possible that I can have it WITHOUT him, nor he without me. Yet it is WHOLLY possible for us to SHARE it NOW."

"To have faith is to heal. It is the sign that you HAVE accepted the Atonement for yourself, and would therefore share it. By faith, you OFFER the gift of freedom from the past, which you have RECEIVED.""Salvation IS His Will BECAUSE you share it. NOT for you alone, but for the Self which IS the Son of God."

"This is the light which brings your peace of mind to other minds, to share it and be glad that they are one with you and with themselves."

"Such is your mission now. For God entrusts the giving of His gifts to all who have received them. He has shared His joy with you. And now you go to share it with the world."

"Forgiveness shows us that Godʹs Will is one, and that we share It.""And I accept this vision in its name, both for myself and for the world as well."

"And I, who would be saved, would make it mine, to be the way I live within a world that needs salvation, and that will be saved as I accept Atonement for myself"

In the physical world, events seem to happen where physical objects and bodies are involved. Coupled with the illusion that some objects cause effects on other objects, it seems as though we live in a world where some thing or person does something to someone else.

It seems as though these causes produce real effects, which you can see with your eyes and touch with your hands. The effects seem very tangible and convincing. You could be standing there looking at the effects of an action, proving that it happened because of what has been changed.

The ego uses these physical events to demonstrate and prove its belief that things have really happened, that there has been real sin with real consequences. This can all be very convincing to the body's eyes.

When you witness these things, if you look on them as real and believe in what you are seeing, your mind is actually entering into a belief in illusions. It is not actually true that any of these has happened for real, because it is only a dream. Taken seriously, it seems to be true, proved by what the body is sensing about what has taken place.

Perceiving that, and trusting that to be true, your mind aligns itself with these illusions and therefore is mis-perceiving. This becomes a trap, because by believing in what seems to have happened, you join in the ego's thought system and become convinced of a lie.

Believing that what we see happening in the world is real and true, this leads to a host of psychological deceptions. For example, in this world, scenarios happen where it seems blatantly obvious that one person is wrong and another person is right. If there is a green tree in the yard and one person is claiming the tree is purple, and the other is claiming the tree is green, the person seeing a green tree may see themselves as "right". According to the physical ego evidence, they are right.

But this then becomes a trap for that person. If they are perceiving the illusion of a green tree and are believing they are right about what they are seeing, and that the other person must be wrong, because the tree is "real", that person is still in the ego mind. They will start to become righteous. They will believe they are completely justified in being righteous because of what is obviously a green tree. And so the physical evidence proves that they are justified in being right.

Believing they are "right" is now a trap because their mind is now trying to make the other person wrong, and is believing in an illusion. It's a very subtle trap because, in terms of the physical scenario or events that seem very real, the structure of the events makes it really seem as though they are right. There is physical proof. In this situation, they are correct. But this is a "temptation", to believe psychologically that they are right as well.

Even though it seems true that you are right, in that what is happening in the dream seems to prove that you are the one who is right, if your ego gets involved in this you will use it to become righteous. So the challenge is, that even though you are right, technically, based on what the dream is doing, to be careful not to use it as an opportunity to bolster your ego.

If your mind starts to psychologically align with the physical events and appearances, you will start to defend your position and get into the ego. Being willing to not make yourself right, when technically in this situation you are right, requires some subtle discernment and honesty. When the physical events seem to prove that you are right, and the proof is staring you in the face, you must learn to detach from appearances and stay centered in the real truth.

The real truth is that you do not need to be "right", even if you are right. It's easy enough to realize that you're being egotistical if you are "wrong" and are trying to defend a position which even the physical situation doesn't prove or support, but when the physical situations seems to agree that you are right, it is now much easier to be tempted to fall into its trap.

There is also another way that this subtle temptation happens. When situations arise where it seems like you are innocent, and it seems that someone else really is doing something against you which seems uncalled for, your belief and perception that you are innocent is a trap.

It becomes very easy to believe that you are innocent because, according to what's happening in the physical world, what the person is doing, what your are not doing etc, physical events seem to "prove" that you are innocent. If you're sitting at home and someone comes along and throws a ball through your window, breaking the window, it seems, based on the physical evidence, that that person is guilty and you are innocent. This then is a significant temptation by the ego for you to believe what you're seeing - they are guilty, you are not.

Because the situation seems to physically prove your innocence, it then becomes very easy for your ego to use that as the basis for justifying your anger and counter-attack. If you're not careful, you will use the physical proof to justify retaliation and upset. If events transpired where you were the one who broke the window and were guilty, it would be perhaps a clearer contrast for you to notice the ego at work. But when the ego seems to agree with what you want to believe about yourself, that you're the innocent one, the slippery slope is much harder to stay away from or even notice.

It becomes again a subtle trap, where the physical proof aligns with your ego mind, and you become almost blind to the possibility of being mistaken. When physical events correlate to the ego's beliefs, there is a blindness or unconsciousness. When physical events are in contrast or opposite to what the ego believes, it is more noticeable and discernible. It's easier to be honest and unconditionally loving, it seems, when events support it, than when they don't. It is easier to love someone when they are giving you love, than when they are seeming to attack you.

Our lesson then is to detach ourselves from all appearances, which includes appearances and events which seem to be in our favor, as well as events and appearances which seem to be against us. Even the ones which seem to be on our side, or show us as right, or prove we are innocent, are just as much a trap to fall into. You do not want to be found innocent or guilty by the ego's world. Neither is the truth.

In some ways, when things in the physical world seem to align with your interests, be on your side, support your case, prove your innocence and finds someone else guilty, it's a much bigger temptation than when the world is finding you guilty. If the world says you are guilty, it ties straight into your unconscious guilt, bypassing your ego's fake facade of innocence. It blows the ego's cover-story about why you are not guilty, given that it really believes you are guilty deep down.

So beware of things going your way in this world. Beware of physical situations, evidence and proof, seeming to imply that you are the one who is right or innocent, and someone else is not. It's a temptation to believe the ego and to align with and support its dream. It's an attempt to get you to want to keep the world and stay on the ego's side and maintain allegiance with it.

We have to be honest enough, consistently aligned with the real truth, that even when it seems like we are receiving the long end of the stick, we dispel that and ignore it and find both yourself and others equally innocent. We need to overlook all occurrences of illusions which portray either ourselves or others as either innocent or guilty, based on appearances or physical evidence. None of it is truth.

Neither the ego-proven innocent or the ego-proven guilty are really either. We are all beyond the ego's verdict. We need to learn not to define who we are or what is true based on what is external or physical or proven with evidence. Our innocence lies in the Holy Spirit's viewpoint, which is that none of the ego's illusions are true. We are all equally innocent because nothing that seems to happen physically in a dream is real. No-one is the winner in a world of lies.

Decouple yourself from depending on the world to define whether you are right or wrong, or innocent or guilty. Get your truth and your verdict from the Holy Spirit, who will find you unconditionally innocent, and everyone else along with you. Then in that view, no-one can be considered righteous and no-one is guilty, because nothing has really happened.

Physical events are illusions. They are part of the ego's thought system. Part of the ego's mind. Objects and people and bodies and events and happenings are all part of this dream which isn't real. We need to learn not to depend on or trust or believe any of it. God is the greater reality in which we can trust, and in which our faith is justified.

Physical evidence doesn't prove anyone's guilt or innocence, because physicality is not reality. In God's eyes, everyone is innocent, and unconditional love and forgiveness is always justified.

In truth, the self that is real and the self that we really are, is our soul, which is part of the sonship in/as heaven. That self is perfect already and is incapable of being imperfect. The soul needs no salvation or healing or resurrection.

The thing is, the soul also has a mind, and it is in the mind that we have a problem. We've used our minds against ourselves, against the soul, to deny the soul. This means we've put our minds into a state where we re denying having a self.

This is also reflected in the authority problem which is a rejection of being authored by God, and brings with it a doubts as to whether we have even really been created, or exist at all. Denying God as our father makes us wonder who we even are.

Similarly in denying reality we have put ourselves out of touch with reality, which is an insane state of mind. This state of mind is filled with ego, and ego is literally the denial of self/soul. Ego isn't really a self, it's a lack of real self. It's like a sense of self that has parts missing and is unstable and changeable and lacks reality.

Ego is more like a temporary sense of "self-consciousness", in which you feel like the centre of the universe and under attack by everything. It's a tight contraction of fear, holding on for dear life, small and weak, separated off and exclusive, seeming to peer out upon an insurmountable world which it sees as a threat, divorced from itself and alien to it. But this is all due to a kind of 'lack of wholeness', ie a lack of soul.

When we're doing the course, applying forgiveness, trying to wake up, we might think that we - our self - is waking up. That's because we think that the way that we are, in our ego, in a body, not yet awakened, is our "self". That we're somehow having a self right now. And that we're taking that self and transforming it into an awakened state.

But this isnt' really the case. We're not even really being ourselves right now. And we're not really taking ourselves into reality. Our real self/soul is already in reality and is already perfect, it can learn nothing and needs no correction, it cannot grow and it cannot sleep.

So what are you - who are you - what is this sense of "my self" that you're having? Who or what it is that thinks about waking up?

Really we have a problem in the mind, where the mind is confused and has lost touch with reality and with the self/soul. This has made the mind selfish, rather than wholly self. Selfishness makes everything revolve around being separate and isolated, while the self-wholeness of the soul revolves around sharing everything with everyone.

Mind is that which is varying. Mind is that which is changing its mind about itself. Mind is that which is seeming to sleep, or seeming to wake up. Mind is that which needs correction. Mind is what is learning and unlearning. Mind is the realm of nightmares and happy dreams. It's all something to do with the mind.

But mind is not the self. Mind is a medium that the soul/self uses for creative expression and decision making. The will is part of the mind, which the soul uses TO will things, but the mind isn't the self itself.

So who or what is trying to wake up? Mind is trying to wake up, but mind is not a self. Instead we need to shift a bit in how we think of what is happening.

First we need to recognize self is really the soul/spirit/christ which is in God in/as heaven. It is already perfect and whole and immortal. It doesn't need any learning or fixing.

Then we need to recognize that mind is where something has gone wrong, and it's mind that is confused. Soul has used mind against itself to deny self. So now mind is in a state where it is not serving the soul, it is not recognising that the soul IS the self, and it is thinking that self is something else - such as an ego or a body or a fluctuating transitioning self, or an image of a self.

Mind changing is not about 'you' becoming and growing and learning and transforming into an awakened being. It's more about mind recognising the pre-existing presence of the soul/self and identifying that it IS the self. That you are a soul, not a body or an ego. This mind recognition though isn't a matter of a 'you' that shifts into being a soul, it's more to do with accepting and recognising and seeing the soul and knowing it as self.

That said, as the mind changes and opens up to awareness of the soul, its "sense of self" changes, and that sense of having or being a self or what the self is like seems to change, and that makes 'you' think that 'you' are changing and growing and expanding your self. But really you are tapping onto more and more of a self that is already fully formed in God, and its your degree of awareness of it that changes.

Part of that entails also recognising that 'who or what' you are seeming to be right now, your sense of self, is a mixture of some sense of 'me' and a whole bunch of things which are not the soul. Believing you are a body, or an ego, or a made-up sense of identity, or identification with emotions or relationships or the world. Things which are not the spirit, which you have mistaken for a self.

So really it's not that 'you wake up', it's more that the mind reconnects with and receives input from the soul and aligns with it and comes to recognize that the soul is the self that you forgot you had. And to get there, other senses of self, and other senses of it being 'your self' that is changing, has to go out the window. Really your self doesn't change at all - false senses of self shift and change and seem to grow and transform but they are not really what you are. You wake up FROM senses of self that are mistaken, returning TO the only self you ever really had.

You are a soul, safe in God, dreaming of exile with the mind and within the mind, lost and confused and unsure of who or what you are, temporarily believing that the self is the ego or the body or other things you made up, but gradually coming to recognize that the self is none of these things and was the perfect soul all along, merely hidden by blocks to awareness, and finally revealed as having been you all-along.

"Your Soul does not need salvation, but your mind needs to learn what salvation IS." UrT10E1

"The Soul never loses its communion with God. Only the mind and body need Atonement." URT1B27E

"The forgiven are filled with the Soul, and their Soul forgives in return." UrT1B29A

"The soul is in a state of grace forever. Man's reality is ONLY his soul. Therefore, man is in a state of Grace forever." UrT1B300

"It should be quite apparent to you by now why the ego regards the Soul as its "enemy." The ego arose from the Separation, and its continued existence depends on your continuing belief in the Separation. Reducing the Soul impulses to the unconscious, the ego has to offer you some sort of reward for maintaining this belief. All it CAN offer is a sense of temporary existence, which begins with its own beginning and ends with its own ending. It tells you that this life is YOUR existence because it IS its own." UrT4D9

"The ego is trying to teach you how to gain the whole world, and lose your own Soul. The Holy Spirit teaches that you CANNOT lose your Soul and there IS no gain in the world, for OF ITSELF, it profits nothing." URT11G1

"The Soul does not need healing, but the mind DOES." UrT3F10

"The term "salvation" does NOT apply to the Soul, which is not in danger and does not need to be salvaged." UrT4C23

"The Soul is therefore unalterable because it is ALREADY perfect, but the mind can elect the level it chooses to serve." UrT1B37C

"Free will is the attribute of the mind, NOT the Soul. The Soul always remains changeless, because it never leaves the sight of God." URT1B37F

Imagine you go into a room which is just completely empty, with pure white walls, ceiling and floor. There is nothing in the room.

This room is a holo-deck, or a holographic projection room, in which very believable and real-seeming objects can show up. They can even have physical properties like weight and inertia and can be moved around and interacted with.

So you're standing there in this empty room and suddenly a chair appears out of nowhere. You go over to it and it looks incredibly realistic. You actually believe it's a "real chair". You're like, how did this chair get in here? You touch it and it feels solid, and you pick it up and move it a bit. It makes a slight noise as the legs scrape on the floor, and then you sit on it. It supports you. Very realistic. Very lifelike.

Except that it's just a hologram. It's just an illusion of a chair, being projected there by some kind of "system" that's running unseen. But it's so convincing, you're certain it's a real chair.

Another chair appears out of nowhere and sitting in this chair, there suddenly appears some person. This person must've been there all along, you reason, trying to justify how your perception can have not noticed them before, because they seem real. Their body looks real, it moves and breathes and has a pulse. The person is looking around, fidgeting and wondering what's going on.

The thing is, this other person is someone you know and that person is sick, or they have a disease, or a problem, or some kind of suffering or lack, or maybe they are dying, or are very emotionally upset. You see them, and you're like, wow, that seems so real. It really seems like that person is there, having these issues, and that it's all very tangible and realistic. You're so convinced you don't even remember that they are being projected by the same unseen system.

So then, because you know this person and they are unhappy or unhealthy in some way, you have this reaction, or a whole bunch of reactions about them. You believe their sickness is real, because it looks real, and you can maybe even see and touch it, or can see how it seems to be affecting them. And your reactions compel you to want to help or have sympathy or fix them or do something to make their suffering stop. All of these are reactions to the belief that they really are sitting there, having an unhappy time, and yet all along you don't realize - that person is not even really sitting there. It's a holographic projection of a body, just like an image in a dream. It's coming from somewhere else.

You build up this whole set of reactions and counter-measures and attempts to solve the real-seeming problem, so convinced that it's really happening and there's a real danger or threat to that person. But there isn't. It's just an image. It's not a real sickness, it's a holographic sickness. It's not real damage to their body, it's just a projected image. It's not real suffering, it's just a fictional suffering. Some system somewhere unseen is projecting all of this and making it seem very real and convincing. It's totally made-up.

Suddenly you see in the corner of the room a doorway, outside of which sits a computer, and this computer is actually projecting the images that are in the room. You can see beams of light coming from it, making the person appear, making the chairs appear, and then you notice it even making your own body appear. Your own body is even a holographic image coming from somewhere, and it's not even really there.

Realizing this, you RECOGNIZE that these images are just illusions being projected, and are not REAL. They are made up. The joke was on you. You believed them and fell for it. The other person isn't even really that body that you saw. YOU aren't even the body that you thought you were. The chairs don't even exist. It's all a trick. What you thought was real sickness was just an illusion of sickness, a holographic projection of sickness. It was nothing more than a flickering image like from a movie projector. It had no reality to it, no truth to it. It wasn't doing anything, or causing anything. It could've been switched on or off in an instant, or even removed entirely at the flip of a switch.

A little light lights up on the computer and the image of the other person suddenly disappears. In their place, another body shows up - the same person, but in a state of perfect health. This remains for a moment as you marvel at it, thinking that they are now a "real healthy body", and you have another reaction - a positive reaction but a reaction nonetheless, that the other person has been saved. But this is false as well.

And a second later the computer projects yet another image of the person back to being a sick body again. Your heart sinks, as though the whole terrible nightmare is happening over again. But then 2 seconds later, it flips back to a healthy body again. You suddenly realize again, all of these body images are not reality. None of them are true. None of them are who the person is. And the appearance of sickness is completely fictional and meaningless. If it can be switched on and off at will, there is no victimhood whatsoever.

Seeing where the dream images are coming from, who is projecting them, the falseness of their illusions, and not buying into the deception that they are REALLY THERE, frees the mind to SEE and RECOGNIZE illusions for what they are. That other person you know who you think is really sick, is not sick at all. Their body is part of a dream you are dreaming. Their sickness is not even really a real sickness. It's just a made-up image. It could be switched off in an instant. In fact Jesus tells us in the course that if we were to stop believing the lie, there is not a single sickness which would not be cured instantly.

We need to learn to recognize the nothingness of what IS nothing - this entire dream world and everything in it. It's all just a big dream. We're DREAMING! This is not reality. It is not real at all. Nothing in this world is true. It's all pretend. There is nothing of any more importance than anything else, hence no order of difficulty in miracles, because it's all just "movie" that's being projected. The mind projecting it can chop and change any part of it in an instant. It can flip between images of health and sickness simply because the body is an illusion, and what lies beyond the illusion is free of all sickness.

This is why we need to learn to recognize that sickness/disease/suffering/upset/death etc is not REALLY HAPPENING. And there is nothing about it which is so heavy and fixed and irreversible and seemingly insurmountable, that it can't be just flipped on or off at will. We need to learn to BELIEVE and PERCEIVE that all forms, and as a lesser group, all sick forms, are nothing but temporarily momentary images projected by a mind, and given the appropriate willingness and clarity of perception, those forms can be changed fully and instantly right now. We must overlook the illusions of how these forms of sickness/distortion are difficult or severe or life-threatening. That's all an illusion. Death is no more "difficult" an illusion to change than a pimple on your face. The FREEDOM to do this is what Jesus is teaching us, by helping us to SEE clearly that illusions of difficulty are completely false and don't mean anything.

Nothing I see means anything, because nothing I see in this dream is anything at all. It's all one thing. One dream, one illusion, showing up as illusions of forms and differences and a hierarchy of illusions. The hierarchy is FLAT! There is no real hierarchy. Cancer should be no more difficult to correct than a bloody nose. It should be effortless to change a car into a tree. This world has no power to prevent this capability. But while we believe the illusions that have been projected and are convinced there is such a thing as "real sickness", or "real death" or reasons "why you can't", then we are believing in the ego thought system and have not restored cause and effect to its proper order (your mind causes, the world obeys). And if we can't do this, we still have level confusion, and are sick ourselves.

"What if you looked within and saw there IS no sin?"

Fact: God is permanent, nothing real can be changed.

Fact: You cannot change God's will.

Fact: You cannot produce effects in God against His will.

Fact: You cannot sin against His will or cause Him in any way.

Fact: You have not caused God, you cannot cause God, and you never will cause God.

Fact: You have not sinned in reality, against reality, to reality, or in any real way.

Fact: It is IMPOSSIBLE to sin. It is IMPOSSIBLE to affect God. You have NOT done so. Nothing real has happened.

So, the question we now have is... what is this state that we're in, where it seems like something went wrong and we're suffering?

There was this tiny mad idea which basically was the idea that something impossible is possible. Even though you knew it was IMPOSSIBLE to affect God, you tried to BELIEVE it was actually possible. You wanted to believe you COULD sin, and that you HAD done so, and that it had produced ACTUAL real effects in reality against God. However, the impossible remains impossible so you HAVE NOT DONE IT AT ALL. Believing that you have, is an obvious ERROR.

So all that this separated state entails is BELIEVING IN something which isn't true. Believing and investing "reality" into and trying to MAKE REAL, something which is not real and never will be. You are trying to convince yourself that you can, and have, sinned. All your states of suffering, sin, guilt, fear, punishment, sickness, death, are all attempts to prove that you CAN DO what you cannot do. That you CAN kill God and His son. Or that you have. You cannot. And you have not. And you never will.

So you are immortal and you're trying to prove that you can be mortal, but you can't. Nothing you do can change the facts. You cannot actually sin. You cannot change God or His Creation. It is literally impossible. So all this other stuff that you BELIEVE, all the ways that you think you should be suffering, all the fear that comes from the guilt, all the guilt that comes from believing you DID sin, it is in fact TOTALLY UNFOUNDED AND UNNECESSARY.

It's kind of like, a long time ago you THOUGHT that you HAD committed some terrible crime, or that you tried to attack God, and in the scuffle you IMAGINED that you had in fact lashed out at Him and hurt Him. And it seemed to happen so quickly you took one glance and thought you SAW evidence or proof that you had actually inflicted harm. And then you suddenly recoiled and went into the sin belief and then into guilt and then into fear and suffering. You went off by yourself hanging your head low and BELIEVING that you had done something REALLY BAD back there. That you committed a terrible crime and all of reality was affected.

But here's the good news. In your moment of attempted attack you were ONLY MISTAKEN in believing that you DID actually do something. You made an ERROR in believing that a sin was committed. The good news is, God was in fact NOT AFFECTED, you DID NOT change Him, and there HAS NOT been any harm done. So now here you are, suffering and hating yourself and hurting yourself ONLY because you think that you deserve it because you THINK that you actually DID commit a sin. But in truth... this is the good bit... YOU DID NOT SUCCEED.

So if you could turn back time and go look at that moment where you thought you attacked God, you'll be surprised to find out, that YOU DIDN'T. And God has been happy and healthy all this time. And He's not even mad at you. He isn't holding any grievance and He just wants to love you. He sees in fact that you became horrified by your own belief in your own attack, which DIDN'T DO ANYTHING, but you didn't realize that it didn't do anything. You THOUGHT it was real. You put reality into it and believed in it. You convinced yourself you were a sinner, when in fact you've been innocent all along.

So this state we find ourselves in, in this world, suffering and unhappy, is ENTIRELY a case of mistaken identity, mistaken criminality, and being TOTALLY IN ERROR about what we think happened. NOTHING HAPPENED. You DID NOT SIN. NOTHING HAS CHANGED. REALITY IS NOT AFFECTED. GOD IS HAPPY WITH YOU. And yet here you are believing, in a dream, that you did in fact commit a sin.

So you're not really dealing here with real sin, at all. Reality, is kind of "over there", unharmed, unchanged, completely the same as it always was. Even your own holy self is there, innocent as ever. And then "over here", where you're hanging out, you're immersed in this cloud of confusion and self deception, believing that you did a crime YOU DID NOT COMMIT, and becoming suicidal and beating yourself up for it, when in fact you DIDN'T EVEN DO IT! You're living in a fantasy world of believing you DID, and trying to PROVE that you COULD, but you can't and NEVER WILL prove it. "You've made a bargain you cannot keep."

So you're just a bit confused. You're in error. You're mistaken, to believe that you can or have sinned. It's JUST A MISTAKE. You are mistaken ABOUT sinning. That's why it is TOTALLY FORGIVEN and forgivable, because you HAVE NOT DONE ANYTHING REAL. You've frightened yourself and reacted and gone into self loathing purely on the basis of a misunderstanding. And so now our work with A Course in Miracles is all to do with coming to realize that you DIDN'T DO what you think you did. This is the basis of forgiveness, learning to recognize THERE IS NO SIN. Sin is NOT REAL. There is no such thing as real sin because it's impossible. And this whole dream has had NOTHING to do with real sin, and everything to do with IMAGINED SIN.

We're just cleaning up the mess and confusion which came from BELIEVING an illusion is real, BELIEVING that the impossible is possible, BELIEVING that you've done something that you could not POSSIBLY do. The innocent cannot sin. You cannot leave your innocence, nor can you stop being innocent because it's God's will that you be innocent forever. You CANNOT DESTROY GOD'S CREATION. And you have done NOTHING to change it. All you worry and guilt and self-attack and punishments and sinfulness and fear is all FOR NOTHING, because it's all founded on a LIE. A totally false premise. You were MISTAKEN to BELIEVE that you can or did sin. YOU DIDN'T.

This whole "problem" is not to do with healing a sin, it's entirely to do with waking from BELIEVING that you did. From thinking it happened. From thinking it was possible at all. This is why the whole thing is merely an ERROR, as seen by the Holy Spirit. He knows you cannot sin and never have. He knows that this error, this entire illusion of trying to make sin real, is completely a lie. Totally false. You never will separate from God. You never will attack Him. You never will kill His Son - yourself. You never will lose your innocence. You are just dreaming of being a sinner, while all along you are not one.

"But we can dream we have forgiven him in whom all sin remains impossible, and it is this we choose to dream today."

"True perception is the means by which the world is saved from sin, for sin does not exist. And it is ... Forgiveness proves it is impossible because it sees it not."

"Sin is insanity. It is the means by which the mind is driven mad, and seeks to let illusions take the place of truth. And being mad, it sees illusions where truth was"

"Today s idea but states the simple truth that makes the thought of sin impossible."

"For it is impossible to think of sin as true and not believe forgiveness is a lie."

"What faith you give to sin, you TAKE AWAY from holiness."

"It is not inherent in a mind, which cannot sin. As sin was an idea you taught yourself, forgiveness must be learned by you as well, but from a Teacher other than yourself".

"Do I DESIRE a world in which I have no enemies, and cannot sin?"

"The Self Which God created cannot sin, and therefore cannot suffer."

"And what is wholly sinless cannot sin. Such is the simple truth."

What if our mind has the power to modify the world, given we are the dreamer and it is a dream - our effect? What if by mental intention you can cause events to proceed differently? What if you can steer outcomes? What if you can change physical matter? What if the world is really NOT the seemingly fixed, closed, solid, permanent-seeming thing that we think it is, and that's all an illusion?

This is the next area of exploration for me having recently focused very much on how the world is very locked into its nature. By realizing the world is stuck being the way it is, I had to then naturally ask myself, how does one go about escaping its impossible ways, forgiving it, and being free of it? How can it be overridden? And this is now leading to me to the simple progression of QUESTIONING the world, what it is, and what our minds can do to CHANGE IT DIRECTLY. And the fact that IT IS THE EFFECT OF MY DREAMING.

Jesus says in ACIM that if you change your mind about the world, ALL THE WORLD MUST CHANGE. He also says the world is an effect, and therefore, that if you change the CAUSE in your mind the world MUST change. Like LITERALLY PHYSICALLY change. He also tells us we are the dreamer of the dream. To me what he is actually getting at is that our minds are powerful, thought exerts real influence, the physical is not really physical but dream-stuff, and we have the POWER to modify it.

I've seen some evidence for this INFLUENCE of mind over the "physical world". so I'll tell you some stories.

At my job, I deal with computer stuff, as a sort of IT-department fix-it person at times. But it would turn out that very often the problems people came up with would seem to "fix themselves" when I showed up. They definitely had the problem beforehand, but then suddenly it seemed like something "in the world" just happened out of the blue to changed the course of events. The problem became seemingly "magically" (miraculously really) solved. It usually took the form of someone realizing something, a change of mind, some fact that was overlooked comes to light, or even literally physical devices which were not working suddenly work and no-one could explain why.

Over time some people called me "the computer whisperer" because it literally seemed uncanny that when I came along to help them the problem just melted into "not a problem any more". And I mean on a physical level. Something kept transpiring in terms of the FORM of how it seemed to change, something tangible or what you might call what APPEAR to be natural changes in circumstances, environmental factors, whatever, but although it LOOKED LIKE just normal "reasons why" stuff got fixed, it was actually due to something in my mind that caused a change.

There are also some times where in my mind I am not interested in playing into a problem or having to deal with an issue. So my mental attitude is one of "I do not agree with this", not like in an annoyed wanting it to go away sense, but like I don't believe in this - not buying it. I hold firm somehow to another truth, or perhaps to another intent or desire, and somehow this has a power in it. And this power seems to alter the course of events and cause problems to go away.

A boss approaches with some issue and then I mentally reject it or want nothing to do with it and suddenly he seems to realize something or changes his mind or things just suddenly resolve themselves. And I can't tell you how man times when I've needed some "time to myself" he just seems to have somewhere else to be. What I'm literally saying here is along the lines of .... when you walk through a dying forest flowers start springing up around your feet out of nowhere. That would be a very vivid example and I'm not at that level but it seems like that is possible.

"Miracles fall like drops of healing rain from Heaven on a dry and dusty world, where starved and thirsty creatures came to die. Now they have water. Now the world is green. And everywhere the signs of life spring up, to show that what is born can never die, for what has life has immortality."

Mind can have such power and influence that it can actually produce real changes in what we call "physical stuff". In effect, your mind can "dream" a different dream and have power over what the dream contains. And as I read about how the physical world/earth IS A DREAM, and see Jesus's references to us dreaming of worldly events and how he calls it a dream, it seems to make so much sense that our mind ACTUALLY IS dreaming and producing the environment in realtime, AND it can change the environment to another form at will. And behind material happenings there are "mind forces" at play, including the atonement plan.

"But your defenses did not let you see His loving blessing shine in every step you ever took. While you made plans for death, He led you gently to Eternal Life."

Some years ago some people were walking down a path and it was spring, so the blossom petals on a tree were falling across the path. The couple walked under it and the petals fell onto them and for some reason this was a happy thing to me. I watched this from inside a room with a closed window, from probably a couple-hundred feet away. I had a sudden feeling of joy in my mind out of nowhere, and suddenly literal blossom petals materialized in front of my face, inside the closed window in the room with me.

Another time I was looking for money in a coin box, in which there was no "pound coins". There were only 1p a 2p bronze coins left (british). I rifled through insisting that there must be higher value money there. I did this for some time maybe even a minute, and somehow in my mind I was convinced and insistent that there MUST be some higher currency in there. Suddenly in front of my eyes as if they had been there all along, yet out of nowhere, two pound coins appeared on the top of the pile. There was no magical effect of anything to them being there, they were just not there one moment and the next they were there. And they were definitely not in the coin box hidden before.

There have also been other times where if I am fairly centered in my mind and in what I believe is true, or perhaps what Jesus calls "being strong in the truth" or at least clear about when someone is bullshitting, if I mentally stand my ground and do not buy into someone projecting or scapegoating me, it actually has an influence on them. Something changes in their mind and they suddenly become self-aware of what they're doing as if they adopted my view of them, and will suddenly realize there's something about what they said which isn't true. And then they will take it back and reconsider what their position is, because somehow the truth-focus in MY mind influenced theirs.

"People prefer to believe that their thoughts cannot exert real control because they are literally AFRAID of them."

"The mind is a very powerful creator, and it never loses its creative force. It never sleeps. Every instant it is creating, and ALWAYS as you will."

I've had to pick up subtle clues and nuances to come to realize this and this is definitely still new territory, but it seems clear that this world we're calling a physical solid world IS NOT THAT. It is in truth actually just a bunch of dream images. And our minds are not just inert little observers, they are powerful and quite capable of CAUSING the dream to change. And by dream I am NOT talking about projected meanings and interpretations of perception, I'm talking about the PHYSICAL MATERIAL WORLD. It can be changed by the mind. Mind literally has power over matter. It can steer events, cause objects to materialize, can manipulate weather, and can do all kinds of stuff - including healing sickness and reversing death and decay.

My wife has a strong will also and she has this ability too. In the past we would joke about having power to control the weather, which has proven a number of times. If I ask her to pray for me for example, my whole inner experience lights up and becomes far more happy and light and energized. She is quite capable of having a powerful influence, even at a distance. One time that we went to visit the UK for example usually the weather is crap and very consistently cloudy, but for like 3 days solid as soon as we arrived it became very clear and sunny non-stop which was very unusual. Also I know I've had influence in calming storms a couple times that I've tried to do that.

I am also convinced from some stories other people have shared that our minds influence each other including each other's bodies. Such as that for example a person was in fear and this fear was affecting the other person they were with and causing a medical condition. And then as this was pointed out the fear lifted and the medical condition just went away quickly. How is that possible unless mind has the power to influence the minds and bodies of others? That it can actually cause a different dream to just emerge out of nowhere?

Are we to really believe that the world is literally this kind of paper-thin fragile tentative sort of "material only" existence, in which everything is just the laws of physics holding it together and there's nothing else to it besides solid form? Because that's just how it APPEARS to be. The world is not actually that, because it's a dream, and it is an illusion, and it presents an illusion of a world, and this illusion CAN BE CHANGED BY THE MIND.

"Appearances deceive BUT CAN BE CHANGED."

"Yet nothing in the world of dreams remains without the hope of change and betterment, for here is NOT where changelessness is found."

"You CAN change form, BECAUSE it is not true. It COULD not be reality, BECAUSE it can be changed."

We are being asked to become aware that the world is an EFFECT of our mind. Jesus literally says "You maintain the world in your mind with your thoughts" and "Both heaven and earth are in your mind." The whole planet, the whole dream, is a mental construct. It's a fairytale of imagination in the mind, and the mind is literally projecting an imaginary world complete with all its "physical" details. And even though it LOOKS physical and as if it has laws that govern it and reasons why it cannot BE changed, that's all illusions, because it can EASILY be changed by a mind that knows it is dreaming.

"But hold out your JOINED hands and touch this heavy-seeming block, and you will learn how easily your fingers slip through its nothingness. It is no solid wall. And only an illusion stands between you and the holy Self you share."

So imagine the physical world is in fact like a LUCID DREAM. A dream in which you are awake and aware that IT IS a dream. And then you are aware that even though it appears solid and fixed, it is in fact your dream, and you CAN DO ANYTHING. "There is nothing my holiness cannot do." You can literally put your hands through physical matter, you can materialize objects, you can fly if you want to. You can change one thing into another. This is all a totally malleable dream environment, NOT really a hard solid fixed physical reality.

Do not be deceived by its illusion of hardness, solidity and so on. "What He (Holy Spirit) enables you to do is clearly NOT of this world, for miracles violate every law of reality, as this world judges it. Every law of time and space, of magnitude and mass, of prediction and control, is transcended, for what the Holy Spirit enables you to do is clearly beyond ALL of them."

And as MIRACLE WORKERS we are being trained and asked to adopt a position as the "dreamers of the dream", where we recognize it IS coming from us, and WE CAN CHANGE IT in any way we see fit at any time, just by the power of the mind. The Holy Spirit is capable of manipulating the atoms of the world, just as Jesus also says that space and time are under his control.

"If the mind can heal the body, but the body cannot heal the mind, then the mind MUST BE STRONGER. Every miracle demonstrates this."

Jesus was masterful at this "dream manipulation". His mind was in touch with being THE CAUSE (the dreamer), and knew the world was HIS EFFECT. Therefore he was not a victim of it in any way, and had power OVER IT. He recognized he was not affected BY IT in any way because he was DREAMING it - putting it there. This is what resurrection is about, the SURMOUNTING of death - the ability to have POWER OVER DEATH. Which includes the ability to reverse "physical death" and to manipulate bodies by the mind, into any state, and any form.

He was able to give body parts that were missing, he could walk on water, calm storms, change outcomes, turn objects into other objects, multiply and materialize objects out of nowhere, appear in different body forms, could likely levitate and fly if he so willed it, and pretty much NO LIMIT to what he could do. The examples of his USE OF his power only paints a limited picture of the fact that he was able to do literally anything. And so can you, because this world is NOT a fixed solid world, it's totally at your whim and under your power!

We have barely begun to realize the sheer power of our minds, the influence our minds have on the world, the ability of our minds to change matter, the ability of our minds to heal both mind AND body, and the influence we have on ALL THE WORLD when we change our mind. Our healing literally heals the world. Our focus on truth literally awakens our brothers. And our broadcast signal of love literally transforms the dream in unlimited ways.

Miracles as expressions of love are expressions of love from a powerful mind. I think in ACIM terms perhaps miracles are actually a SUBSET of what the mind can do. When mind is aware and expresses, which must also be a loving state, it has tremendous power, and this can CHANGE THE DREAM. It can cause literal physical transformations, impossible changes, violation of laws, breaking of space and time and distance and possibility. It can heal the sick and raise the dead, produce and change objects, and even move entire mountains.

This is not even a difficult feat for such a power, but so many people are afraid and skeptical and not even suspecting that such a power of POSSIBLE, yet alone that it is in their own minds. "While expressions like "think big" give some recognition to the power of thought, they still come nowhere near the truth. You do not expect to grow when you say it, because you don't really believe it. It is hard to recognize that thought and belief combine into a power-surge that can literally move mountains."

"Why is it strange to you that faith can move mountains? This is indeed a little feat for such a power."

Resurrecetion and salvation is all about finding freedom from GUILT. Which means reclaiming your INNOCENCE. Guilt is the subtrate of the ego, of all sickness, all forms of suffering, the world, and even death. Without guilt there is no separation, no misery, no spacetime and no ego. Guilt is death just as innocence is life. The attraction of guilt is the opposite to the attraction of God. Guilt is hell, innocence is heaven. We must purge ALL GUILT from our minds and reclaim the innocence that was hidden!

"****Release from guilt is the ego's whole undoing.****" "And once all guilt is gone what more remains to keep a separated world in place? For place has gone as well, along with time."

"Teachers of innocence, each in his own way, have joined together, taking their part in the unified curriculum of the Atonement. There is no unity of learning goals apart from this. There is no conflict in this curriculum, which has ONE aim, however it is taught. Each effort made on its behalf is offered to the single purpose of RELEASE from guilt, to the eternal glory of God and His creation."

"His real escape from guilt can lie only in the recognition that the guilt has gone. And how can this be recognized as long as he hides it in another, and does not see it as his own?"

"From everyone whom you accord release from guilt, you will INEVITABLY learn YOUR innocence. The circle of Atonement HAS no end."

"Only the Resurrection became my part in it. THAT is the symbol of the RELEASE from guilt, by guiltlessness." "With everyone whom you release from guilt, great is the joy in Heaven, where the witnesses to your fatherhood rejoice." "The Atonement has always been interpreted as the release from guilt, and this is correct, if it is understood."

"The real world is the state of mind in which the ONLY purpose of the world is seen to be forgiveness. Fear is NOT its goal, and the ESCAPE from guilt becomes its aim."

"The world does nothing to him. He only thought it did. Nor does he do anything to the world, because he was mistaken about what it was. Herein is the release from guilt and sickness both, for they are one. Yet to accept this release, the insignificance of the body must be an acceptable idea."

"Through your transfiguration is the world redeemed and joyfully released from guilt."

"In the crystal cleanness of the release you GIVE, is YOUR INSTANTANEOUS escape from guilt. You MUST be holy, if you OFFER holiness."

"The ego teaches you to attack yourself BECAUSE you are guilty, and this MUST INCREASE the guilt, for guilt is the RESULT of attack. In the ego's teaching, then, there IS no escape from guilt. For attack MAKES GUILT REAL, and if it is real there IS no way to overcome it. The Holy Spirit dispels it simply through the calm recognition that it has never been."

"Nothing can keep FROM you what Christ would have you see. His will is like His Father's, and He offers mercy to every Child of God, as He would have YOU do. RELEASE from guilt, as you would BE released"

"How just are miracles! For they bestow an equal gift of full deliverance from guilt upon your brother AND yourself. YOUR healing saves HIM pain, as well as you. And YOU are healed BECAUSE you wished him well."

"God's Son could never be content with LESS than full salvation, and ESCAPE from guilt."

"The Holy Spirit KNOWS that ALL Salvation is escape from guilt. You have no other "enemy," and against this strange distortion of the purity of the Son of God, the Holy Spirit is your ONLY friend."

Projection is the natural law of ALL mind at ALL levels, by which the mind lives and extends itself, creatively. It projects out or forward, that which is within it.

"We said before that WHAT you project is up to you, but it is NOT up to you WHETHER to project, for projection is a law of mind."

"We once said that without projection there can be no anger, but it is also true that without projection there can be no love. Projection is a fundamental law of the mind, and therefore one which ALWAYS operates. It is the law by which you create and were created. It is the law which unifies the Kingdom and keeps it in the mind of God. To the ego, the law is perceived as a way of getting RID of something it does NOT want. To the Holy Spirit, it is the fundamental law of sharing, by which you give what you value in order to keep it in your OWN minds."

This happens in heaven just as it happens in this world. When it happens in the purity of mind in heaven, we call it "extension", because it is the pure unitnerrupted outpouring of that which is within. It is the sharing of love. The whole Kingdom depends on it.

In this world, with ego thought in the mind, the ego uses the same law of projection to project separation. This is an attempt to attack and not join, or to hold back. What is projected is not love, but fear and guilt. It is disowned and disassociated from rather than shared.

Now, in the course Jesus gives a passage where he clarifies a more appropriate wording for this. Essentially, proper use of the law of projection we can call pure projection or extension. But when the mind is going into ego, it is going into opposition. It therefore does the opposite of project.

The opposite of PRO is CON. Meaning that if you are not fully projecting (extending), then you are CONjecting. This means conjecture. TO conject is to guess, to make stuff up, to invent, to theorize, and to NOT KNOW. Conjecting is the opposite of knowing. To extend is to project knowledge. To oppose projection is to project conjecture. Ie to make up ideas opposite to knowledge and try to give them away.

This fits well because anything the ego "projects" is made-up lies and falsehoods, stuff it has invented and believes in but does not know to be true. It forms conjecture, sort of a kind of libel or slander, and then hurls it out trying to get rid of it.

This is the egos use of the mind's projective mechanism. To formulate its own ideas of what is true and real, and then project it out, to picture a made-up world which does not exist. A guess of a world. A pretend world. A world the ego asserts is real, but which is not.

"It should be noted that the opposite of pro is con. Strictly speaking, then, the opposite of projecting is conjecting, a term which referred to a state of uncertainty or guess work." He also goes on to give some other definitions of words that are along similar lines, such as dejection (which produces depression), injection (which is to do with inserting interruption), and rejection (which is another aspect of separation from God and the rejection of truth).

"Other errors arise in connection with ancillary defenses, to be considered later. For example, dejection, which is obviously associated with depression, injection, which can be misinterpreted readily enough, in terms of possession fallacies (particularly penetration), and rejection, which is clearly associated with denial. It should be noted also that rejection can be used as refusing, a term which necessarily involves a perception of what is refused as something unworthy."

When you're upset, you're having an experience. It seems very real to you. It's frightening. It seems that something has happened or something is true, and because it seems true it's scaring you.

But what you need to realize is that "you are not upset for the reason you think."

You think you're upset because of what a person did, or didn't do, or what happened, or what you saw. You think something other than yourself caused it, or that something's happening beyond your control. But this isn't really why you are upset.

You're having an experience right now of upset and fear and guilt and anger and shame, and that is inside of you. Its yours. But the main problem is you've placed the cause of this experience into something separate from you. You think it's that person who put these feelings there. You think it was that thing happening that caused this upset. And you see yourself as having been unfairly victimized by them. And now you're suffering and you can't get out of it.

Well all of this experiencing is inside you because it's yours, and it was already inside you BEFORE this person or event came along. You had it stored away in the back of your mind, unhealed. You are already full of all the upset and fear that you could possibly need to account for all of your upsetting experiences in every lifetime. You don't even need to find extra causes for adding "new stuff".

This upset that's in you wasn't put there by anyone else. It wasn't just created in you by some event that just happened. Nobody made you feel this way. Nobody is doing anything to you.

This is old stuff. It's always old stuff. Its the sense of sin and guilt from separating from God that you buried in your mind long ago, coming up inside of you to remind you of how you feel. And yes, it was maybe "triggered by" someone or something happening, or what they did, and because it was triggered by them you mistook this to mean it was caused by them. But all they did was mirror to you how you already felt, deep down, and so it popped into your awareness. And you asked them to do this for you.

Its not their fault.

This is about you. Its your stuff. Your feelings. Your experience. Your attitude. Your beliefs. Your way of looking at yourself. This is about your sense of separation from yourself and God and how you haven't forgiven yourself for what you think you did. That's what needs to be forgiven. You CAN'T forgive anyone else because nobody else is capable of doing anything to you!

You need self forgiveness. And that entails admitting that all of this stuff is self-inflicted and self-chosen and it's all your own stuff. It's not anyone else's fault. Nobody has made you feel this way. You agree that you should feel this way.

And so then, why do you feel this way? What is it you believe about yourself, in relationship to God, that has brought about this nightmarish experience? This fear, and guilt, and sin? Is it really true of you? Is God really against you or upset with you? Is he really abandoning you? Do you really need to be afraid of his revenge? Are you really a sinner?

Will you forgive yourself and recognize that you have NOT done what you thought you did, that it has had no effect on God whatsoever, that you are still innocent and loved? How about some relief, in knowing that nothing's gone wrong and you're still worthwhile? Or that God still unconditionally loves you right now and always will? That you haven't made Him go away and He isn't bearing any grudge or anger toward you? All you really want is to love and go Home.