"18. A miracle is a service. It is the maximal service that one soul can render another. It is a way of loving your neighbor as yourself. The doer recognizes his own and his neighbor's inestimable value simultaneously."

This touches on the essence of A Course in Miracles and the Golden Rule. Jesus is literally telling us that YOU ARE ONE WITH OTHERS. This means you are literally IN THEM. And therefore the way that you treat them is the SAME as the way you treat yourself.

There is no exception to this. You treat BOTH yourself and others the same way at the same time. To recoil for another is to recoil from yourself. To not love another is to not love yourself. To hate another is to hate yourself. There is no escaping this because fundamentally, by the Law of God, you ARE them.

"One brother is all brothers. One mind is all minds. Such is the truth."

So per the Golden Rule, that means that every person you encounter, you should love them, IF you want to be loved and if you love yourself. You should SEE YOUR SELF in them. Because both you AND them are Christ. And your love of them IS your love of yourself, directly. What you give to them you receive. What you transmit to them, you transmit to the part of you that is in them.

The "part of you" that is "in them" is the target of everything you give to them, so you have a VESTED INTEREST - a shared interest, in treating them well in order for YOU to be treated well. This is not a play on words or an option. This is how minds share and relate. This is how they were created. This is the dynamics of the laws of God which are always applying.

It is always the ego that suggests, the way you treat another is NOT the way you are treating yourself. Or that you can attack without being attacked. Or you can be murderous without experiencing the consequences. Or you can judge without being judged. Or you can hate without being hated. Or you can be right and they can be wrong and there is no equality between you.

These are all LIES because they fly in the face of the inescapable LAW. It can SEEM as if you can treat someone differently to how you treat yourself, but all of that MUST be an illusion. Because the only truth is that ALL of God's children are perfect EQUALS. Making them perfect brothers in the sonship. And this is permanent fact.

Any kind of inequality is an illusion. And that not only means that you and your brother are SEPARATELY EQUAL as individuals, like two identical twins standing next to each other. It in fact means that you SHARE EVERYTHING, which means you OVERLAP with each other, are ONE with each other, JOINED with each other, IN each other. You literally are in your brother's mind with him. Even if that means part of you seems to be "over there" in another person, from a separated point of view.

This is really the only thing to be learned. How to love yourself AND others equally. How to recognize that you are ONE with all people. To realize that, you cannot GET AWAY WITH anything. You cannot hurt without being hurt. You cannot attack without being attacked. Scapegoating and blame are delusional and denial. When you attack anyone you are hurting yourself, and you have to ask yourself, do you want to keep hurting yourself?

Anger and attack towards "others" drives a RIFT into your mind between the part of your mind which seems to be isolated to "inside your body" and the part of you which seems to be "inside other people's bodies". The more you attack what you THINK is a "separate them", the more you are SPLITTING OFF part of you which is in "you" (as a body identified self) and the part of you which is ONE WITH THEM. Which means you are directly attacking yourself and splitting your mind.

The split mind is divided by bodily boundaries, and as you focus on the ways in which you are NOT ONE, by emphasizing the solidity and reality and restriction of bodily obstacles, it simply SPLITS your mind and causes you to disassociate from yourself. And now you think you are literally two selves, with one part of you trapped in your body and the other part of you trapped in another person's body. You've now made an ego for both of you. And now you want to attack another to steal back from them the part of your SELF that you believe they have kept from you. As discussed in "the laws of chaos", everyone is looking for the self they think they lost.

So this seems to be a catch. The catch is, that if you choose to attack someone, you WILL be attacked, and you will suffer consequences, directly inflicted BY YOURSELF upon yourself. This is the secret of salvation, that you are doing it to yourself. And the only way to alleviate this suffering is to LOVE the other person. If you love them you will be loved. If you hate them you will be hated. By yourself. You cannot escape this "clause". It is the law of God. It is the Golden Rule. It is both a curse if ignored, and a clue to how to be happy if embraced.

The Golden Rule doesn't just mean that if you might treat someone as you would have them treat you, they MIGHT elect to treat you in a similar fashion. If there is any possibility that cause and effect breaks down and they MIGHT NOT treat you how you are treating them, then the law is breakable, and it is not a law, and it has devolved to the level of physical behaviors. The true nature of the Golden Rule is the oneness you always have with everyone in the mind, whereby you LITERALLY are DIRECTLY treating yourself the way you are treating them, because you are IN THEM.

"Do unto others because you ARE doing unto yourself." is what it should say.

If there is a person you hate, you will drive a separation between you. In this separation you will believe that person is completely separate from you, and you want to have as much distance and dis-association between you as possible. You do not want to be associated with them. You want to destroy them and have them not exist. And in this intensity of hatred and rage and attack and anger, you believe THEY ARE NOT YOU. And as such you can hurl as much blame and condemnation upon them as you can muster, and it seems to be 100% about their faults, and 0% about yours. This is a state of insanity.

This is a great way to split your mind, leading to states of personal suffering, unlove, a total lack of peace, and literal self destruction. Those who murder are trying to kill themselves. And those who attack are undermining their own integrity. And those who hate do not love themselves. Just as those who are sick have made themselves sick in an attempt to accuse OTHERS of sin as well as themselves.

"You but accuse your brothers of your own sin."

"Damaged bodies remain accusers."

The only solution, and the only option, and the only law which you HAVE to abide by, and cannot escape, is the law of God, that how you DO treat others IS how you are treating yourself, because YOU ARE ONE WITH THEM. And being literally part of that person, anything you hurl at them you are hurling at yourself. And you WILL experience the consequences. So really, your hands are tied and you do not have any loopholes or ways to get out of it.

Either you love BOTH you and your brother, or you hate both you and your brother. Either you love both you and your brother, or you attack both you and your brother. Either you attempt to make both you and your brother sick, or you HEAL both you and your brother. When you suffer you suffer along with him. The truth that applies to you applies to them equally and to the same degree. And not simply because they are your equal, but because THEY ARE YOU.

"Healing is when two minds recognize their oneness and become glad."When this is recognized as true, when cause and effect are reunited so that anything you cause you also experience the effects of instantly, and when there is no way to attack without attacking yourself, you now have shared interests and the only option is to love. The only sane choice is to love. If you don't love you will hurt yourself and others. If you do love you will uplift and heal yourself and others. And "when I heal I am not healed alone."

It is by recognizing that you have a vested interest in loving others, because it allows you to be loved, that you will automatically steer clear of attack upon yourself. You will realize that you CANNOT attack another person WITHOUT suffering the consequences. And there is no way to hurt them without being hurt. So your only sane choice is to love unconditionally, so that you will be loved. Otherwise a failure to recognize your oneness leads to it seeming plausible, justifiable and warranted, that you can attack without consequence. And then you are on the slippery slope to hell.

"Salvation requires the acceptance of but one thought, you are as God created you, not what you made of yourself."

I'm seeing this is the vital key to salvation. To be saved you merely need to accept that you are in whatever condition God created you to be, you are only that, and you're not anything else.

It's like accepting an "off the shelf" solution. Letting God be the one who is the author of you, is the undoing of the authority problem. It is the acknowledgement that God is your creator and source, and that you have inherited from God. That you are only what he wants you to be.

It's a willingness to stop trying to define yourself, invent yourself, change yourself, establish yourself, or be the one who in any way has any say in who and what you are. It's a willingness to just accept a self, an identity, a nature and a condition, that someone other than you has given.

What you are was GIVEN to you, not made by you. Someone other than you, God, decided what you would be. He is the one who has the privilege of deciding what is true of you. Only he can create you. Only he can cause you. Only he has the authority to cause you to be what you are.

So this means you have to give up ALL efforts in trying to define what is true of you. WHO YOU ARE IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS. Who you are is God's business. All you have to do is be willing to just be what you were appointed to be, what you were created to be. To be okay with trusting that God has done a great job of creating you to be perfect and that you're totally happy with that.

This is acceptance of atonement. Simply accepting the self God GAVE you to be. Being of God. Being only what he wants. Being fully wanted by him, and being willing to let yourself be wanted by him. Recognizing that you have never really had any say in who and what you are at all. You've only been denying who and what you are and pretending you can define yourself. Who and what you are has nothing to do with you.

Surrender your drive to keep redefining yourself, trying to convince yourself that you're something you're not. Resign as your own teacher, in this regard. Stop trying to teach yourself what you are and just accept that you are what God created. That you are as he created you to be still, and you have not changed since he created you. You're still the raw original fresh new self that God wills. You ARE THE WILL OF GOD.

All you have to do is find out who you really are, who you were created to be, what your given true nature is like, and simply "know thyself" as God intended. Just be you. Be the divine beautiful soul that God created you to be forever. And drop all efforts to be something else - a body, a separated ego self, a special self, a deprived self, a guilty self, a fearful self, all these other fake identities that you make up. Just be christ. Be what God wants you to be.

If you can "do a forgiveness" and get to where you can accept that the sin was not real, therefore didn't really happen, and that therefore you are still innocent, it will reveal something to you.

It will reveal that God is always loving you, does not believe you're sinful, and sees you as permanently innocent. When this is true, it must mean that God has always been this way, always loving you, always finding you innocent.

That means that God's will is already accomplished. He has already given life. He has already given forgiveness and love. He has already provided healing.

This then gives you a secret piece of the miracle-working puzzle, which is that God has ALREADY healed. His will is ALREADY accomplished.

A nice analogy I heard was that after the World War, even though peace was declared, some Japanese soldiers had not received the news that the war was over. They kept fighting, and going around killing people, for over 30 years. They didn't get the memo!

So it is similar with God. The war is already over. Jesus has already overcome death and has claimed the atonement for everyone. He recognizes nothing has happened, sin is not real, there is no death and no world. That's why He came to tell us this.

And yet, here is this "world", which seems to be a bit lagging behind the news. It hasn't quite got the memo. The people still think there is a war going on. There are still people who believe that sickness and sin and death are real, and are still defending themselves against an enemy that isn't even there.

People are still producing defenses against the truth, people are still creating sickness, people are still at war, and it still *seems* like the war is not over yet. But according to God, the war is definitely over, and never even really began! We just didn't get the memo.

So this applies to how we work miracles. Part of the miracle entails the recognition that God's will is already accomplished, that healing has already been given, that God does not change His mind, that God isn't deciding whether to heal or not, and therefore, we need to focus on and believe that the miracle HAS been accomplished. That it WILL be received. Sooner or later.

All that we're kind of doing now is a cleanup job, tidying up loose ends and bringing the "good news" to people to tell that the war is already over. They can be pretty entrenched! Still believing heavily that the battle is still waging and that it might actually be won or lost, by themselves or the enemy. It's not true.

Miracles bring the news of God's truth into this world, albeit an illusory world, to infuse it with light and help to dispel, heal, and clean-up the mess left by the conflict. As in Heaven so on Earth. This doesn't as such mean the Earth is heaven or that it will remain, just that Heaven will appear to "descend" here as everyone becomes awakened in Christ, and then the whole place will fill with tremendous light and vanish.

So... miracles... the result is already accomplished... this is a key to proper prayer, focusing on the receipt and the knowing that it must be true because God already willed it. You're not making new laws, you're just enforcing the law.

The war is over.

The belief that sin is real, leads to all kinds of behavior modifications. If sin is real, i.e. certain activities or behaviors are "actually sinful", this will force you to have to avoid certain things, not do certain things, be instantly sinful if you did certain thing sin the past etc.

You will start to prepare yourself in behavioral ways for "the lord" and you will sacrifice. You will see certain behaviors are "good" and other behaviors are "bad". Sins apparently won't apply to ALL of the things in the world, only special select things. The special good things will be "spiritualized".

If sin is real, then all of the world is sinful. But this seems to escape people. Reason being that they believe the world is real, so they can't have the whole world being sinful, they instead section part of it off as sinful and call the other part "good".

They then strive to become "more good" by getting rid of, denying, literally avoiding, condemning, and judging the things which are considered sins. There will even be a list of what is a sin and what is not a sin. There may even be alleged commandments given by God which tell you what you can and cannot do.

You then will try to make yourself as good as possible, which emphasizes the persona, which, btw, reinforces the shadow, which produces evil. Oops!

This polarizing idea of sinfulness has produced so much LEVEL CONFUSION it's crazy.

If you believe in sin AT ALL, i.e. sin is real, and you can really sin, and that if you really sin God will not love you, you're going to be in for a shock. IF sin were real, it WOULD mean God could not love you because the real sin would prove WHY. So then you will avoid doing real sins to try to avoid having God not love you.

Well, here's the news. God permanently loves you and cannot find you sinful or guilty for any reason whatsoever.

So what does that say about sin?

SIN IS NOT REAL.

There are no sins. There is no real sin. The world is not real. Anything you seem to do in the world is not real. None of it is really happening because the world is entirely an illusion. And therefore, YOU CANNOT BE SINFUL.

God is already completely loving you 100% right now, with absolutely no unforgiveness, absolutely no judgement or condemnation. The concept of judgement and condemnation (to hell) by God is purely based on the idea that sin is real.

The idea of sin being real is a form of crowd control invented by the ego and expressed through religious dogma.

God isn't waiting for you to stop sinning in order for you to be forgiven. God already finds you worthy, innocent, holy, lovable.

The thing that God is actually waiting for you to get done with, is for you to STOP BELIEVING THAT ILLUSIONS ARE REAL.

Stop believing that the illusion of sin is real! That's what God wants. And as soon as you drop the belief in "real sin", innocence MUST follow. THAT is why and how you are innocent.

"What if you looked within and saw there is no sin?" - ACIM

It can be very important for your life to totally fail sometimes. It's good for the ego to totally fuck up.

It is important that you come to realize that what you've been trying to do DOES NOT WORK.

You will initially feel like this is absolutely the worst case scenario, where everything is falling apart and going to shit, and nothing is working how it's supposed to.

BUT...

This is very important.

It means you will come face to face with the fact that your ego method of dealing with things is completely flawed. And, there is an extremely powerful (yet painful) potential in that.

Only when you can fully ADMIT to yourself that your ego behavior is flawed - such as an attitude of trying to fix and save everyone - believing you are the source of everything - thinking you have authority and control over your life - believing you are in charge of your existence - when these FAIL you STOP BELIEVING that these approaches work.

You surrender them. Possibly on your knees. In tears.

And it seems right then that you are absolutely at your worst, BUT, you are mere millimeters away from something truly marvelous.

Because, when you DROP the ego tools that you have come to realize do not work, you surrender trying to do this all yourself, you withdraw all of your conviction and value and faith from these broken lifestyles, and this puts you in a position for SOMETHING ELSE.

And guess what... that something else is then ready to come flooding in. If you've seen clearly that trying to fix everyone is fundamentally totally flawed because it just makes the situation WORSE, then.... naturally... the opposite must be true. Stopping fixing must HELP.

But it's more than this. Ultimately it means, you are coming face to face with your authority problem over God, the power you think you have over your life, and you are FORCED to surrender it.

You think this is terrible, like your life is destroyed. But then you realize... wait a minute.... there is another option open to me. What if I let God be the authority? Wait a minute.. what if God has the power I've been trying to have and I can share it with Him? Wait a minute... what if I can actually be happy if I stop trying to do this myself and I instead align with His will? .... all these popcorn insights start to fire off as you suddenly realize that your ego strategy was actually a CLOSED DOOR which was shutting out the EASE of being with God, making your life difficult and driving you nuts.

So now you rip the door off its hinges, the light floods in, you suddenly realize THERE IS A BETTER WAY, and hey presto, suddenly you find real relief and your will has become aligned with God's will. And now you can actually enjoy the journey of returning to God and heading in the direction of union with God, rather than always trying to run the other way. Yay!

So your life fails... its a blessing in disguise. Looks awful, feels crap, you don't want it, but you don't realize what it's leading to. It NEEDS to fail, so you can be set free.

The idea of separation from God MUST ALWAYS lead to a physical universe, bodies which suffer, and death.

Physical matter is the CONSEQUENCE of believing in separation, causing there to be illusions of separation, which gradually intensify and become more extreme and differentiated, to the point where it turns into what WE call physical matter.

Physical matter is the solidification of the idea of separation. It is the idea taken to its extreme, yet completely logical conclusion. If there is separation from God, there is sin. If there is sin, there must be death. Death will be expressed as the pursuit of making the illusions ever more heavy, dense, attacking, unlike each other, at war with each other, and eventually will produce an entire universe of physical matter.

The objects in this physical universe will also not have completed the ego's "thought" of separation, until they have coalesced further to produce physical bodies, which will then be used to bind the Son of God to the body, and to then attack the body to kill it to try to COMPLETELY DESTROY the Life of the Son of God. That was the purpose of the whole idea of separation to begin with, and death - physical death in a physical world - is the completion or enactment of that idea.

A physical universe HAD to arise from the tiny mad idea. Illusions HAD to continue to fight with each other, because the establishment of sin demanded that there be punishment. The conflict produced by the idea of separation was automatically a state of WAR, and this war HAD to play out, and in doing so it led to a huge fragmentation of the mind, a diversification of illusions, and eventually a THOUGHT FORM which we regard as physical matter. The entire physical universe is a NATURAL RESULT of the idea of separation, and is all that COULD come from it.

Physical matter is nothing more than a very strong illusion. It is a "thought form". It is a very BIG thought of separation appearing in the mind of the Son of God. In all its ways, it is designed to cover up awareness of God and to block sight of the truth. Bodies are a specific outcome of the logical conclusion of the ego thought system, demanding a concentrated target to receive punishment in the dream, and their destruction is the "success" or final statement that attempts to make the illusion COMPLETELY REAL. Or more succinctly, it is the nail in the coffin.

All of this is illusion. All of it is thought. It is just an IDEA. It's an idea of being separate, and therefore dead. As dead as death could ever possibly show up or seem to happen in illusions. The most intense, believable, seemingly real death possible. To use it seems very real, but it is not.

This is the metaphysical truth of A Course in Miracles. Separation from God results in the eventual, inevitable "manifestation" of a physical universe, a universe of death and destruction, simply as the most extreme expression of an illusion of being separate possible. Regardless of whether the Course text itself has used the term "physical universe", this is still the truth about this place we inhabit. It is the lower end of the dream of death, and physical matter is a death thought.

And yet, none of it is really happening because separation was never really possible to begin with.

The physical universe is an ILLUSION. God did not create it or make it. OUR idea of separation made it.

For a while I'd thought that by asking Holy Spirit to decide for or asking Jesus to decide, it meant sort of a 'giving up' of deciding.

Lately especially in light of free will I've been seeing it a bit differently, that instead of sort of a subservience or obedience, it could be looked at more as a collaboration or joint agreement kind of thing.

e.g. "Today I will make no decisions by myself".... could mean, let someone entirely separate do all deciding. OR it could mean, make a decision WITH guidance. The course does say that guidance is not coercive, it is only supposed to point you in the right direction and it's up to YOU to FOLLOW the guidance willingly.

I think in a way, the way I was doing this before was somewhat SACRIFICIAL, in that I would attempt to put "all responsibility" into their hands. The course does say that if you choose with Jesus and your will is IN ACCORD with His, there can be no fear, but it does not say like... "do whatever Jesus tells you you must do". Jesus in fact often tells me "you are free". He does not impose upon my free will. Because I used to view Jesus and Holy Spirit as even more of a kind of tyrant or "authority" or dominating power, I would become quite afraid and reluctant to channel or write their words etc, turning it into an arduous task, precisely because I thought I was serving some kind of powerful dominant being.

This kind of thinking of sort of "surrendering self" and being a slave or servant to some higher decider, was I think part of the "one son, one self, one mind, one will, one dreamer" bullshit paradigm taught by others, which I bought into before. All the implications of "you have no self" and "you do not exist" and "there is no one else" etc CAN lead to these kind of interpretations, that you simply have to sort of "die" and put aside all of your own will or decision-making and hand it over to someone else.

What I see now, especially in light of God clearly having created many souls/sons and giving each free will, is quite a different picture, that while Jesus is an older brother and is due respect for his position and accomplishment, he is still a brother. He also speaks of how we are not to awe him, and also how he is equal with us in our awe of God, and that there is nothing he has that you cannot attain.

This sounds a lot more like EQUALITY than it does being dominated or submissive or under the thumb or obedient in a kind of... "because I don't matter" kind of manner. I'm finding MORE freedom and MORE willingness to trust and open up to this guidance BY ACKNOWLEDGING my free will and recognizing that Jesus acknowledges it also. Thus there is less FEAR involved in "having to do" whatever commandment comes down from heaven in a lightning bolt. Without that pressure or coercion or sense of God's impending punishment if you don't comply, there is much less to FEAR and thus far greater WILLINGNESS to actually trust the guidance and follow it freely!

So much more freeing and mutual and cooperative than I used to think was possible or intended.

There is a reason why the Holy Spirit is invisible to the body's eyes. There is a reason why Heaven is invisible to the body's eyes. There is a reason why Christ is invisible to the body's eyes. The body's eyes CANNOT SEE REALITY and they never will. That which is invisible "to the Earth" is real. What has "become" visible - this planet, is FAKE VISIBILITY. It is a block to sight, crammed in front of your face so that you will be distracted by illusions and NOT SEE. The time will come when all things VISIBLE will end. That includes this planet. Christ Vision is how you see the invisible, which MUST ENTAIL no longer seeing that which you THOUGHT was visible, which is in fact non-existent.

"When you made what is NOT true visible, what is true became invisible. But it cannot be invisible in ITSELF, for the Holy Spirit sees it with perfect clarity."

"What witness to the wholeness of God's Son is seen within a world of separate bodies, however much he witnesses to truth? He is INVISIBLE in such a world. Nor can his song of union and of joy be heard at all. Yet is it given him to make the world recede before his song, and sight of him REPLACE the body's eyes."

"The Thought God holds of you is like a star, unchangeable in an eternal sky. So high in Heaven is it set that those outside of Heaven know not it is there. But still and white and lovely will it shine through all eternity. There was no time it was not there; no instant when its light grew dimmer or less perfect ever was. Who knows the Father knows this light, for He is the eternal sky which holds it safe, forever lifted up and anchored sure. Its perfect purity does not depend on whether it is seen on earth or not. The sky embraces it, and softly holds it in its perfect place, which is as far from earth as earth from Heaven. It is not the distance nor the time which keeps this star invisible to earth. But those who seek for idols cannot know this star is there. "

"How can man "come close" to others through the parts of him which are really invisible? The word "invisible" means "cannot be seen or perceived."

"By making him invisible, the world of retribution rose in the black cloud of guilt which you accepted, and you hold it dear."

"Judge not what is invisible to you, or you will NEVER see it. But wait in patience for its coming. "

"What love would look upon is meaningless to fear, and quite invisible."

"For, in the NEW perception, the mind CORRECTS it when it SEEMS to be seen, and it becomes invisible."

"These might be called the Teachers of teachers because, although they are no longer visible, their image can yet be called upon."

"For the little spark that holds the Great Rays within it, is ALSO visible, and this spark cannot be limited long to littleness."

"But the time will come when all things visible will have an end. The body's eyes are therefore not the means by which the real world can be seen"

"Here is what is really here made visible, while all the shadows which appeared to hide it sink to obscurity."

"Nor will what you saw before be even faintly visible to you. Today we are trying to use the new kind of projection."

To experience peace, there must be no conflict. It's just not just some state where you can still be ego and expect to have peace happen to you. Peace is the absence of war and attack. Just as love is a lack of sin. You have to be done waging war if you want to be peaceful.

If attack and war are the battleground, then to be above the battleground is to be outside of the war, in a state of peace, in which you are not warring or attacking in any way.

Beyond the war, above the battle, away from the conflict, the peaceful self that is you is not within the fight. It is not the fighter or the soldier or the defender. It is out of reach of attack because it does not attack.

And so peace is your safety because it removes you from the realm of war. And now you are far away from the war zone, untouchable and undisturbed. Peace transcends war, and is your only escape.

"Yet when peace is found, the war is meaningless. And it is conflict now that is perceived as non-existent and unreal." UrM21A3

"A tranquil mind is not a little gift. Would you not rather live than choose to die?" UrM21A4

"Every response to the ego is a call to war, and war DOES deprive you of peace." UrT8A3

"The memory of God comes to the quiet mind. It CANNOT come where there is conflict, for a mind at war against itself remembers not Eternal Gentleness. The means of war are NOT the means of peace. And what the warlike would remember is NOT love." UrT23B1

"Peace looking on itself EXTENDS itself. War is the condition in which fear is born, and grows and seeks to dominate. Peace is the state where love abides, and seeks to share itself. Conflict and peace are opposites; where one abides, the other CANNOT be; where either goes, the other disappears." UrT23B12

"In peace he needed nothing, and asked for nothing. In war he DEMANDED everything, and FOUND nothing." UrT12C12

"The holy instant is the miracle's abiding-place. From there, each one is born into this world, as witness to a state of mind which has TRANSCENDED conflict, and has reached to peace. It carries comfort from the place of peace into the battleground, and DEMONSTRATES that war has no effects." UrT27F3

"How strange indeed becomes this war against Yourself! You will believe that EVERYTHING you use for sin can hurt you, AND BECOME YOUR ENEMY. And you will fight AGAINST it, and try to weaken it, BECAUSE of this." UrT23A2

"Yet peace is stronger than war, because it heals. War is DIVISION, not increase. No-one gains from strife." UrT5D6

"What COULD you choose between, but life or death, waking or sleeping, war or peace, your dream or your reality?" UrT27H10

"Healing will flash across your open mind as peace and truth arise to take the place of war and vain imaginings." UrW136L16

Sometimes things go terribly, terribly wrong. And this wrongness compels you to seek and try to find answers as to why it went wrong. And if the thing is really, really wrong, you will not be able to find answers. And you'll keep looking and looking and completely FAIL to come up with a wholly satisfying truth.

And eventually with enough failure, not for want or trying, you will perhaps start to realize that you are not finding truth because THERE IS NO TRUTH in this illusory problem, and this problem is not REAL.

Failure therefore can lead you to awakening, and can be a blessing, because it shows you very very clearly how utterly ridiculous the ego is, how obviously un-God like the world is, how completely opposite to God this experience is, and that therefore this CANNOT be what God wills.

This then gives you a powerful contrast, in which on the one hand you have a sucky life filled with disaster which seems to beg you to die, and on the other hand, there is God, who is pure love, who could not possibly have wanted this for you.

One of them must be true. They cannot both be true. So which is it going to be? Is your world of failure and loss and tragedy and despair and wrongfulness the truth, meaning that love is false? Or is love the truth? And if love is the truth, what does that say about all of this failure and fault? Either bad stuff means there is no God or that God doesn't give a shit, OR, it means it CANNOT BE REAL *because* God is loving.

So when shit happens and things go wrong it can be a very painful experience BUT it can also lead you so much failure and impossibility that it starts to become clear to you that it CAN'T be really happening.

When horrible things happen and people say "I can't believe this is happening"... indeed... it is a dream, and it is not happening. But then people quickly forget just how UNREAL the problem is and start to take it seriously, as though this "reality" of the problem overtakes their initial KNOWING that this cannot be reality. We need to keep in touch with that.

This world is not real and everything that happens here is driven by the ego. It is not made by God. And it is not really happening.

The answer isn't to the question "why is this happening" or "what caused this".... to which there is no satisfying answer (similarly, why did the tiny mad idea happen - no answer).... but simply that the REAL ANSWER is the UNDOING of the question, which is the Holy Spirit, which is God's answer to the ILLUSION that anything has gone wrong at all.

Nothing has gone wrong because God is the truth. And this truth is the source of miracles.