"Into eternity, where all is one, there crept a tiny, mad idea, at which the Son of God remembered not to laugh. In his forgetting did the thought become a serious idea, and possible of both accomplishment and real effects."

The idea of separation is madness, because what it implies is impossible. It is not possible to be separate from God. But the mad idea was the idea that you CAN be separate from God, even though it is impossible.

To insist it is possible, must be madness, because to believe it you have to deny reality and truth and blind yourself to sanity and sense. This belief makes the mind insane, because it now believes impossible things are possible. This is why the separation from God was an entry into a state of mental illness, ie insanity.

"When the "lies of the serpent" were introduced, they were specifically called lies because they are not true. When man listened, all he heard was untruth."

"The instant that the mad idea of making your relationship with God unholy seemed to be possible, ALL relationships were made meaningless. In that unholy instant time was born, and bodies made to house the mad idea, and give it the ILLUSION of reality."

The mad idea gave rise to a mad world, based on insane notions and crazy laws, devoid of meaning and empty of truth. And into this insane world we projected our insane beliefs, producing a mad and false world to reflect our inner madness. And all who participate in it are mentally ill.

"The world you see is the delusional system of those made mad by guilt. Look carefully at this world, and you will realize that this is so. For this world is the symbol of punishment, and all the laws which seem to govern it are the laws of death."

What we've ended up with then is a fictional world which insane people believe exists. And it is populated with people who have insane beliefs about who and what they are. They do not know themselves, are out of touch with their own reality, and think they are something they're not. This especially is entwined with the belief that they are physical bodies, which their immortal souls could never be. And they see themselves as limited and lacking.

"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 should be, and where it really is. Sin gave the body eyes, for what is there the sinless would behold?"

Realize then that the world as we know it is populated by beings who originally were, and in truth still are, wholly immortal, perfect, innocent, loving, healthy, happy and completely invulnerable. Beings who God created to live forever in divine perfection, who lacked nothing and were capable of anything.

In the separation, these beings gave belief to impossible nonsense and thus moved their minds into insane states. This produced the anti-christ or otherwise known as the ego, which is an idea of what you THINK you are, as a kind of wishful thinking or denial of your true nature. Thus each person developed a SECOND self for themselves, which they identified with and as, and thought to be the whole of who they are.

"This is the anti-Christ; ... Here the deathless come to die; the all-encompassing to suffer loss; the timeless to be made the slaves of time. Here does the changeless change; the peace of God, forever given to all living things, give way to chaos. And the Son of God, as perfect, sinless, and as loving as his Father, come to hate a little while; to suffer pain, and finally to die."

"The body is the symbol of WHAT YOU THINK YOU ARE."

So now you have a world seemingly populated by individual beings who strongly believe they are NOT as God created them. They've added an entire layer of lies on top of themselves, to cover themselves up. They've invented a second self to suit their preferences.

They have profound denial which means they actively resist admitting to the truth about themselves and each other, and instead participate in lies and fantasies about what they are. They want to be a body and they want to suffer and they want to die, and they think this is normal because they think the hell they created is heaven.

"He has come to save me from the evil self I made."

"They DO believe that Heaven is hell, and ARE afraid of love. "

"For your definition of Heaven IS hell and oblivion, and the REAL Heaven is the greatest threat you think you COULD experience."

This has thrown these individuals into states of mind that are distorted and unnatural. They are mentally ill. They believe they are something or someone they are not. They have associated with being a physical object. They think they came into existence with the body. They believe they are limited and lacking and insufficient and defective and broken and sinful and guilty and in need of fear. And they relate to others through specialness and selfishness and mistrust and victimhood.

"the self-accusing shrieks of sinners mad with guilt."

On the level of the world then it always seems that you're interacting with a whole person, who is egoic, and who has major selfishness issues, and who relates in special ways, and strikes bargains, and wants to get, and sees themselves as limited and lacking and defective. And it seems this is ALL THERE IS to the person. As if they ACTUALLY ARE a limited dysfunctional individual.

You see this appearance as the whole truth about the person, and people seem to really be in states of "becoming", of "growing", of transformation, learning, progression, acquisition and so on. As if they have started out with nothing and are lacking and little and weak and frail. And so the whole world seems to be populated with egoic individuals who are all far less than magnificent and most of whom find themselves to be unworthy of love or life. Which drives them all to self-punishment and suicide.

"...the sense of loneliness and abandonment which all the separated ones experience. Depression is an inevitable consequence of separation. So are anxiety, worry, a deep sense of helplessness, misery, suffering, and intense fear of loss."

"the delusions of the Separated ones."

"All the separated ones have a basic fear of retaliation and abandonment. This is because they BELIEVE in attack and rejection, so this is what they perceive and teach and LEARN. "

It seems then that we're living in a world where people represent varying degrees of ability, accomplishment, skill, confidence, and a very wide range of personalities and potentials. And in all cases no-one is perfect and everyone is lacking in some way. And everyone is trying to improve themselves because they all think they were created broken. And now there is competition and everyone fights to be better than all the other defective ones, while the defective ones lick their wounds and want to die.

If you take this at face value, if you think this is normal and natural, then you'll think that the EGOS that you interact with ARE people. That their egotism is NOT a mental illness, but is in fact just some normal psychological structure. A personality trait perhaps. And that it's completely normal for people to hate themselves, to attack others, to be angry, to worship idols, to take from others, and to seek for exclusive relationships. As if this is what completely natural mentally-sane people do. So normal because it's so common.

What we have to realize is that this is NOT sanity. And these ego people, the way they present themselves, is NOT really their self. It's not their real identity. They in fact are pretending to be something they're not. They present themselves as fictional characters, with traits and behaviors that aren't even natural. With beliefs about themselves that are unfounded and false. In denial of their own self and repressive of their own freedom.

"If to love oneself is to HEAL oneself, those who are sick do NOT love themselves. Therefore, they are asking for the love that would heal them, but which they are DENYING TO THEMSELVES. If they knew the truth about themselves, they could not be sick."

They don't even know who they really are. They don't know where they came from or how they got here. And they certainly don't even suspect that they even have a real self. And even think that maybe they don't exist at all, have no real creator, invented themselves, and maybe aren't even real.

"The dispute over authorship has left such uncertainty in the minds of man that some people have gone so far as to doubt whether they were ever created at all."

What we're looking at, when we look at the world, is in fact a place where a very large number of mentally ill people are gathered together. And all of their mental illnesses are regarded as largely normal and natural, ie not an illness at all. We don't even recognize insanity when we see it. We think it's normal that people relate the way they do, think of themselves in such unnatural ways, and are completely lost and out of touch with their own reality. On a planet filled with suffering, how can you remember what it's like not to suffer?

If we don't suspect that there is a higher, larger truth about people, then it's going to make it seem like their ego self is REAL, that it is the WHOLE truth of them, and there is nothing more to it. And in that view you will relate to their EGO in terms of special relationship, and with no sense of forgiveness. Anything they do in insanity will be a sin, and you will justify holding it against them. Because you don't recognize they are mentally ill. And all their twisted behaviors are in fact part of their illness.

If you had only ever known someone in an ill condition, and had never known them when they were healthy, you would have great difficulty seeing past their illness. If you had only met them after they became dysfunctional, you'd have a hard time having any notion of what they are REALLY like when they're not sick. And if the whole planet is sick, how can you know what society is supposed to be like, when no-one can even remember a time when there was no suffering at all?

If we have no sense of the actual REALITY of each person, then this is what we're going to do. We're going to BUY INTO their illusions of who and what they are, fall for the same temptations, go into false empathy, join them in suffering, and compound their ego. This keeps them imprisoned and does not offer any kind of healing. And they need healing because they are not sane. Falling for this means YOU are insane, because you've failed to recognize that the illusion of sanity is not sanity, and so think that you are sane when you're not.

Everyone, when sane, is a loving, powerful, supernatural, immortal, eternal being of light, filled with joy and laughter and miracles. Such a person is invulnerable, cannot be sick, cannot die, cannot be upset, has no grievances, doesn't judge or blame anyone, is perfectly innocent and holy, knows God intimately, depends on God for everything, and has no authority problem. This is what EVERY person in the world was like when they were created. This is the kind of self they ARE behind their mental illness. And if their mental illness was cured, this is how they would be. A world of christs!

To not RECOGNIZE that people's egos are not their real self, is to fail to forgive. To forgive requires having in mind an awareness BEYOND THE LIES, of what the person's souls is really like, as created by God. The original self. The real self. The holy self. The higher self. That is their true self. And that self has no limitations or lacks or failures or malfunctions or depressions or sicknesses or lies about themselves or others.

So then we have to realize that we join with the Holy Spirit as therapists in the world, as healers, come to offer SANITY to those who are insane, and to lift them up and resurrect them to truth and light, so that they are restored to their true function and true abilities. To their real identity. To remember who they are, to know themselves and to live out from the love that God put in them.

"Now must you share His function, and forgive whom He has saved, whose sinlessness He sees, and whom He honors as the Son of God."

"your function in this world is healing"

"As your function in Heaven is creation, so your function on earth is healing. God shares His function with you in Heaven, and the Holy Spirit shares HIS with you on earth."

The only way you can forgive someone is to know the real truth about them on a higher level. The bigger picture. Their true nature as established by God. And this truth has to STILL be true, even if it is covered up by their own mind, and obscure and hard to see. Even if they themselves don't know it's there, and even if they themselves deny that it's true of them. Because people are in fact out of touch with their own souls and don't even remember what their real identity is. It is our task to REMEMBER FOR THEM, so that they might remember also and wake up to their true nature.

"Remember for everyone your Father's power, that He has given them"

"He must HIMSELF withdraw that power, remembering that all power is of God. YOU CAN REMEMBER THIS FOR ALL THE SONSHIP. Do not allow your brother not to remember, for his forgetfulness is YOURS. But YOUR remembering is HIS, for God cannot be remembered alone. THIS IS WHAT YOU HAVE FORGOTTEN. To perceive the healing of your brother as the healing of yourself, is thus the way to remember God. For you forgot your brothers WITH Him, and God's answer to your forgetting is but the way to remember."

"Do not allow your brother to be sick, for if he is, have YOU abandoned him to his own dream, by SHARING it with him."

Since the ego is really a smokescreen of lies, it is not true of a person. Even if they are holding it up strongly in front of your face as an obstacle to peace. To forgive is to OVERLOOK it, and see BEYOND it, beyond their body, and beyond their false sense of identity. To recognize who they are in spirit, and to acknowledge the PERMANENT TRUTH about them. To hold them in the light and acknowledge that they ARE in the light.

This means in fact bypassing their illusory ego beliefs, their ego self, and realizing that on a higher level their mind is SANE. Only a small portion of their mind is insane and their soul is still perfect. By tapping into the higher self and truth of the person, you JOIN with them in love. This bypasses the ego and increases the wholeness within the mind, which in turn undoes the false ego identification - the sickness - the mental illness. Because "all sickness is mental illness." This is how miracles are performed.

Don't be deceived. People are not who they say they are. Everyone has an imposter in them. The Holy Spirit knows who we really are, and will awaken this truth in us if we will let him.

"Seek not to make the Son of God ADJUST to his insanity. There IS a stranger in him, who wandered carelessly into the home of Truth, and who will wander off. He came WITHOUT a purpose. But he will not remain before the shining light the Holy Spirit offered, and you accepted. For there the STRANGER is made homeless, and YOU are welcome. Ask not this transient stranger, "who am I?" He is the only thing in all the universe that does not know."

THE BODY'S EYES ***CANNOT SEE REALITY*** EVER!

THIS IS A VITAL A COURSE IN MIRACLES TEACHING!!!

THE BODY CANNOT AND NEVER WILL BE ABLE TO LOOK AT REALITY. YOU HAVE TO DEVELOP AN ENTIRELY NEW WAY OF SEEING - VISION - WHICH DOES NOT LOOK AT BODIES OR THE WORLD **AT ALL**.

THIS ALSO WHY THERE ARE NO BODIES IN HEAVEN! THEY ARE ***USELESS***. "To sense is NOT to know."

Many people are trying to "see" Heaven in the world and to look at this world WITH the body, keeping the body, and supposedly SEE reality. YOU CANNOT. The body's eyes are permanently fixated on hell. You have to use an entirely different kind of vision to SEE reality BEYOND the world.

Too many are getting lost in believing this world - Earth - is to be "looked at" in a loving way. It is supposed to be LOOKED PAST. If you look AT IT and SEE IT you are blinded by sight of form. The world WILL NEVER be Heaven. The body will never show you God's Kingdom. Spiritual vision requires mind-to-mind awareness which completely bypasses ALL forms, bodies and planets.

Check out these vital statements from Jesus about how the body is completely limited and CANNOT SEE. You cannot USE IT to see Heaven or reality. You cannot see your brother if you see a body. "To see a sinless body is impossible."

You must choose your method of sight, and what you will look upon. If you choose the body, you will see ONLY hell (Earth). If you choose the spiritual eyes/Christ Vision, you will see ONLY Heaven. You cannot see two worlds. Sight of one denies the other.

The entire PURPOSE of the Workbook is to train you to develop A NEW WAY OF SEEING that doesn't rely on the body!!!! IT says so in the workbook introduction! "The workbook is divided into two main sections, the first dealing with the undoing of the way you see now, and the second with the acquisition of true perception" "The very nature of true perception is that it has no limits. 6 It is the opposite of the way you see now." True perception is not just an alternative perception, it's based on the holy spirit's thought system which is spirit-based and it transcends the laws of the world!

"Be not deceived by the illusions it presents of size and thickness, weight, solidity, and firmness of foundation. Yes, to the body's eyes it looks like an enormous, solid body, immovable as is a mountain. Yet, within you, there is a force which no illusions can resist."

"You look still with the body's eyes. And they CAN see but thorns. But you have asked for AND RECEIVED another sight. Those who accept the Holy Spirit's purpose as their own, share also His vision."

"Your chosen home is on the other side, beyond the veil. It has been carefully prepared for you, and it is ready to receive you now. You will not see it with the body's eyes."

"Here is a world established that is sick, and this the world the body's eyes perceive. Here are the sounds it hears; the voices which its ears were made to hear. Yet sights and sounds the body can perceive are meaningless. It cannot see nor hear. It does not know what seeing IS; what listening is FOR. It is as little able to perceive as it can judge, or understand, or know. Its eyes are blind, its ears are deaf. It can NOT think, and so it cannot HAVE effects. "

"Let not the body's ears and eyes perceive these countless fragments seen within the gap that YOU imagined, and let THEM persuade their maker his imaginings were real."

"The barren sands, the darkness, and the lifelessness are seen only through the body's eyes. ITS vision IS distorted, and the messages IT transmits to you, who MADE it to limit your awareness, ARE little and limited, so fragmented that they are meaningless. From the world of bodies, MADE by insanity, insane messages seem to be returned to the mind which made it. And these messages bear witness to this world, pronouncing it as true. For YOU sent forth these messengers, to bring this BACK to you."

"The body cannot see this, for the body AROSE from this for its protection, which must ALWAYS depend on keeping it NOT seen. The body's eyes will NEVER look on it."

"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. "

"What can the body's eyes perceive, with power to CORRECT? Its eyes ADJUST to sin, unable to overlook it in any form, and seeing it everywhere, in everything. Look through its eyes, and everything will stand condemned before you. All that could save you, you will never see. "

"It is your world salvation will undo, and LET you see another world your eyes could never find."

"Is it not evident that what the body's eyes perceive FILLS YOU WITH FEAR? Perhaps you think you find a hope of satisfaction there. Perhaps you fancy to attain some peace and satisfaction in the world as YOU perceive it. Yet it MUST be evident the outcome DOES NOT CHANGE. Despite your hopes and fancies, ALWAYS does despair result. And there is NO exception, nor will there ever be."

"And what is this decision, but the choice whether to see him through the body's eyes, or let him be revealed to you through vision?"

"And you can want to see a sinless world, and let an "enemy" tempt you to use the body's eyes, and change what you desire. "

"The body's eyes are therefore not the means by which the real world can be seen, for the illusions that they look upon must lead to more illusions of reality. And so they do. For everything they see not only will not last, but lends itself to thoughts of sin and guilt. While everything that God created is forever without sin and therefore is forever without guilt."

"Faith sees him only NOW, because it looks not to the past to judge him, but would see in him ONLY what it would see in YOU. It sees NOT through the body's eyes, nor looks to bodies for its justification. It is the messenger of the NEW perception, sent forth to gather witnesses unto its coming, and to return their messages to YOU. "

"The body's eyes are closed, and as you think of him who grieved you, let your mind be shown the light in him beyond your grievances. "

"But what is there to see by searching for your Savior, seeing Him through sightless eyes? "

"And this will be your concept of YOURSELF, when you have reached the world beyond the sight your eyes alone can offer you to see."

"Let not the dream take hold to close your eyes. It is not strange that dreams can make a world that is unreal. The WISH to make it IS incredible."

"That is because your idea of what seeing means is tied up with the body, and its eyes and brain."

"These are among the many magical beliefs that come from the conviction you are a body, and the body's eyes can see. You also believe the body's brain can think. If you but understood the nature of thought, you could but laugh at this insane idea. "

"It is your weakness that sees through the body's eyes, peering about in darkness to behold the likeness of itself; the small, the weak, the sickly and the dying, those in need, the helpless and afraid, the sad, the poor, the starving and the joyless. These are seen through eyes which cannot see and cannot bless."

"The strength in you will offer you the light and guide your seeing, so you do not dwell on idle shadows that the body's eyes provide for self-deception."

"Leave, then, the dark a little while today, and we will practice seeing in the light, closing the body's eyes and asking truth to show us how to find the meeting place of self and Self, where light and strength are one."

"You do not seem to doubt the world you see. You do not really question what is shown you through the body's eyes."

"How can you judge? Your judgement rests upon the witness that your senses offer you. Yet witness never falser was than this. But how else do you judge the world you see? You place pathetic faith in what your eyes and ears report. You think your fingers touch reality and close upon the truth. This is awareness which you understand, and think more real than what is witnessed to by the eternal Voice of God Himself."

"He will not tell you that your brother should be judged by what your eyes behold in him, nor what his body's mouth says to your ears, nor what your fingers touch reports of him. He passes by such idle witnesses, which merely bear false witness to God's Son."

"Properly speaking, this is the release from hell. Perceived through the ego's eyes, it is loss of identity and a descent into hell."

"Let me not look to my own eyes to see today. Let me be willing to exchange my pitiful illusion of seeing for the vision that is given by God. Christ's vision is His gift, and He has given it to me. Let me call upon this gift today, so that this day may help me to understand eternity."

"Beyond His Will lie only illusions. It is these I choose when I think I can see apart from Him. It is these I choose when I try to see through the body's eyes. Yet the vision of Christ has been given me to replace them. It is through this vision that I choose to see."

"You closed your eyes to shut him out."

"How can you become increasingly aware of the Holy Spirit in you, EXCEPT by His EFFECTS? You cannot see Him with your eyes, nor hear Him with your ears."

"You dream of isolation, BECAUSE your eyes are closed. You do not SEE your brothers, and, in the darkness, you cannot look upon the light you GAVE to them. "

"Anger but screeches, "Guilt is real!" Reality is blotted out as this insane belief is taken as replacement for God's Word.The body's eyes now "see"; its ears alone can "hear." Its little space and tiny breath become the measure of reality. And truth becomes diminutive and meaningless."

"And you look up and on toward Heaven, with the body's eyes but serving for an instant longer now. "

"You do not doubt that the body's eyes can see. You do not doubt the images they show you are reality. Your faith lies in the darkness, not the light."

"Miracles are seen in light. The bodys eyes do not perceive the light. But I am not a body. What am I?"

"The dream of crucifixion still lies heavy on your eyes, but what you see in dreams is not reality. "

"Sin gave the body eyes, for what is there the sinless would behold? What need have they of sights or sounds or touch? What would they hear or reach to grasp? What would they sense at all? To sense is not to know. And truth can be but filled with knowledge, and with nothing else.The body is the instrument the mind made in its striving to deceive itself."

"It is because the thoughts you think you think appear as images that you do not recognize them as nothing. You think you think them, and so you think you see them. This is how your "seeing"was made. This is the function you have given your body's eyes. It is not seeing. It is image-making. It takes the place of seeing, replacing vision with illusions."

"Real vision is not only unlimited by space and distance, but it does not depend on the body's eyes at all. The mind is its only source."

"What you see of His Son through the eyes of the ego is a demonstration that His Son does not exist, yet where the Son is, the Father MUST be. "

"There has been some controversy (in human terms) as to whether seeing is an attribute of the eyes, or an expression of the integrative powers of the brain. Correctly understood, the issue revolves around the question of whether the body or the mind can see (or understand). This is not really open to question at all. The body is not capable of understanding. Only the mind KNOWS anything. "

"But eyes deceive, and ears hear falsely."

"Here are the sounds it hears; the voices which its ears were made to hear. Yet sights and sounds the body can perceive are meaningless. It cannot see nor hear."

"This is because you actually cannot see anything, and it is easier to recognize that no matter how vividly you may picture a thought, you are not seeing anything."

"It is indeed a senseless point of view to hold responsible for sight a thing that cannot see, and blame it for the sounds you do not like, although it cannot hear."

"His vision cannot SEE the body, because it cannot look on sin."

"You cannot see the invisible. But if you see its effects, you KNOW it must be there."

"YOU CANNOT SEE BOTH WORLDS. For each of them involves a different kind of seeing, and depends on what you cherish. The sight of one is possible because you have DENIED THE OTHER. "

"We said before that the spiritual eye cannot see error, and is capable only of looking beyond it to the defense of Atonement."

"Sin is a block, set like a heavy gate, locked and without a key, across the road to peace. 3 No one who looks on it without the help of reason would try to pass it. 4 The body's eyes behold it as solid granite, so thick it would be madness to attempt to pass it. 5 Yet reason sees through it easily, because it is an error. 6 The form it takes cannot conceal its emptiness from reason's eyes."

"Everything the body's eyes can see is a mistake, an error in perception, a distorted fragment of the whole without the meaning that the whole would give."

"The body's eyes see only form. 4 They cannot see beyond what they were made to see. 5 And they were made to look on error and not see past it. 6 Theirs is indeed a strange perception, for they can see only illusions, unable to look beyond the granite block of sin, and stopping at the outside form of nothing. 7 To this distorted form of vision the outside of everything, the wall that stands between you and the truth, is wholly true. 8 Yet how can sight that stops at nothingness, as if it were a solid wall, see truly? 9 It is held back by form, having been made to guarantee that nothing else but form will be perceived."

"These eyes, made not to see, will never see. 2 For the idea they represent left not its maker, and it is their maker that sees through them. 3 What was its maker's goal but not to see? 4 For this the body's eyes are perfect means, but not for seeing. 5 See how the body's eyes rest on externals and cannot go beyond. 6 Watch how they stop at nothingness, unable to go beyond the form to meaning. 7 Nothing so blinding as perception of form. 8 For sight of form means understanding has been obscured."

"Let not the vision of his holiness, the sight of which would show you your forgiveness, be kept from you by what the body's eyes can see. 3 Let your awareness of your brother not be blocked by your perception of his sins and of his body. 4 What is there in him that you would attack except what you associate with his body, which you believe can sin? 5 Beyond his errors is his holiness and your salvation."

"Any split in mind must involve a rejection of part of it, and this is the belief in separation."

What is a WHOLE mind? A whole mind is at least as large as the universe. As Jesus states, "both heaven and earth are in your mind" and "you maintain the world in your mind with your thoughts". Realize that your mind has to be LARGER than planet Earth in order for Earth to be in your mind. It's not appropriate to try to imagine that your tiny little self inside your body is projecting this entire world. In fact, "the world" is this entire universe, and so let's say a WHOLE mind is large enough to contain THE WHOLE of everything.

A SPLIT mind, is a mind which believes in separation. The split is like a division, which literally seems to divide your mind into TWO halves. The division is upheld by some kind of "wall of sin", which comes between the two halves. This wall is made of illusions. This wall IS THE WORLD YOU SEE and the world you made. It is the physical matter of this universe. "The world is a picture of the crucifixion of God's son."

So if your whole mind is larger than the universe, what does a split mind mean? It means you place a wall WITHIN the universe, to separate off one part of your mind from another. What is that wall? It's all physical matter, actually, but more symbolically it is your BODY. Your body is the wall of flesh that you surround a part of your mind with.

The body is a device for separation. It has two functions. It keeps part of your mind INSIDE, and keeps the other part of your mind OUTSIDE. Remember you were WHOLE before, you were unlimited in size, and now you've SECTIONED OFF only a PART of your mind and placed it "inside the body", so all the stuff outside the body is THE REST OF YOUR MIND. You, who seem to be in a body, are only PART OF YOURSELF.

You're used to thinking in terms of everything applying only to the mind that seems to be inside the body, as if that is "you". And as if everything outside the body is "not you". And THEN you think that the whole of ACIM applies only to this "is me" that's inside the body. But it DOES NOT! THAT is part of the illusion of the split. It's a state of massive disassociation. In fact this is also part of how you pretend to be a figure in a dream.

When you dream, you dream an entire ENVIRONMENT. A world. But then you divide up that world, you fence off part of it as a body, and then place a fragment of the mind seemingly INSIDE that body. That part of mind now peers out through the body's eyes upon the environment, but because it is a DISASSOCIATED part, it does not believe that the environment is part of ITSELF. It thinks it is "not me". And it also does not believe it PUT IT THERE.

It doesn't see itself as the DREAMING mind, only as PART of the dream. And you in your human body right now experience exactly the same disassociation - you do not believe or perceive that this ENTIRE WORLD is inside your mind, or that you are dreaming it from a larger mind. You think you are ONLY the thing "inside" the body. This is part of being a split mind.

When you have a split mind, one half of your mind disassociates from the other. The ego splits off some parts of you and labels them as sinful, guilty, wrong, bad, and tries to destroy them. It does this in order to try to only preserve the appearance of being "good" and successful and perfect and innocent. In psychology terms, this is the PERSONA, which is ONE HALF of your mind and yet believes it is ALL of yourself. This is to do with where the course talks about the sunbeam believing it is the sun. This split off part of mind thinks it is ALL of you.

The parts of your mind that it disassociates FROM, and keeps believing is "not myself", it sees as "outside of me". Separate from me. And the wall of flesh that is the body acts as the divider between your persona and the REST of you. The rest of you is OUTSIDE the body. Due to disassociation you do not believe that the outside world is you AT ALL, or has anything to do with you. That you didn't put it there nor is it the location of your SELF. But it is, and you did put it there. You needed to make a world outside the body in order to be able to have a world to disassociate from.

What then happens is, within your mind, within the whole of your mind, there are now two seeming selves. There is the part that you think is all of you, and there is another part that you think is not you at all. That "not me" part is hidden behind a wall of denial, which is a block to awareness, which makes the REST of your mind unconscious. Since your persona self sees the REST of your mind as "outside of me", or separate from itself, it regards the "shadow" as OUTSIDE the persona. Now, the BODY IS the persona. Within the dream, it represents this fake "face of innocence", and everything OUTSIDE the body is YOUR UNCONSCIOUS MIND.

Within your mind, then, since "ideas leave not their source", everything that your mind can ever experience HAS to be within your mind, otherwise the mind cannot be aware of it. So that means your "inside self" is in your mind, your BODY is in your mind, and the outside WORLD is in your mind. And your mind is larger than all of them.

Within your mind, you will experience that there is war happening between one half of you and the other half. There will be a perception of "your self" (one half) as "the innocent victim", and it will seem that "the not me" self (outside "you") is the sinful victimizer. Your will is going to be divided against itself, because both parts of your mind are not in agreement. They conflict. And so the inner you, your persona, believes that it is under attack by "an alien will", that it THINKS is "outside of it", but which really is just another part of the mind.

You have this fully INTERNAL war with yourself, between these two parts, but because of the disassociation, your inner part BELIEVES that the "other me" is OUTSIDE the body. That your enemy is out there and is "not myself". So it is seen as "beyond yourself". And since your idea of yourself is confined within the body, that means you think it's outside the body. Even though it's in your mind.

It then becomes very EASY, to "project" or map this dynamic of a split mind, ONTO The world. Whereby you seem to "project" your sin onto your brother. But it's not really projection as such. It's more like, your mind actually believes that YOUR sinful parts are separated off from your "self" and are SEEN outside of you, beyond the body, and so you see them IN the world as if they are external. Your mind locates them externally because that seems to make sense in terms of them being disassociated from what's inside your body.

And so if you're believing/perceiving that the sinful part of YOUR mind, your "inner enemy", the "not me self", is OUTSIDE of your body, it's VERY VERY easy to assign or associate that with OTHER BROTHERS in the dream, whose bodies are walking around the same environment having split minds. Since you already believe "the sin is not in me, it's outside me", and since you believe" I am inside the body", you'll easily believe "the sinners are outside the body". And so there's a very small step from there to actually being deluded that some actual OTHER brother is the separate self who is sinful. And so you attach your split mind TO him and accuse him of your sins.

But in truth, all of this is really taking place inside your larger mind. Both what is inside your body and what is outside your body is WITHIN the confines of your larger mind. The innocent seeming victim that you see your PARTIAL self as, and the external victimizer evil sinful menace, are BOTH parts of YOUR mind. And this is what the secret of salvation is designed to show you. To merely look and realize that your brother has NOTHING to do with you being attacked, there is actually ANOTHER PART OF YOUR MIND ATTACKING THIS PART OF YOUR MIND. You are at war with yourself, and you literally are your enemy.

ACIM: "The secret of salvation is but this: That YOU are doing this UNTO YOURSELF. No matter what the form of the attack, this STILL is true. Whoever takes the role of enemy and of attacker, STILL is this the truth. Whatever seems to be the cause of any pain and suffering you feel, this is STILL true." - that external attacker IS PART OF YOUR MIND.

So that means you are ACTING the part of being the victim, AND you are acting the part of the victimizer. You are BOTH. You are the inside and the outside. And until you can recognize that what you see in another is part of your own larger mind, you won't stop projecting it onto them. When you own it, and take responsibility for it, that means realizing that this "separate enemy" is actually a character IN your larger mind, seeming to interact with this other persona character IN your mind, and BOTH of them are like puppets that your LARGER mind is operating. Your larger mind is pitting parts of ITSELF against each other.

What makes it SEEM as if there are two identities or characters, is illusions. Illusions present a picture of images and appearances and behaviors that SEEM to make it look like there are TWO distinct persons, two wills, two minds, to selves. But the challenge you have, is to OVERLOOK (forgive) those illusions. When you do so, you should come to realize that your larger mind is responsible for playing the roles of BOTH of those two characters. That who YOU are, as a whole, is WITHIN BOTH of them. If you can see that YOU are literally playing BOTH sides and ARE both of them, that "unity" will transcend the illusions, and it will dissolve the split.

You won't be able to believe in the split, or in being only one of the two halves of the split, if you can see how your WHOLE mind is in BOTH sides. It's like owning up to being one who has been pulling all the strings, MAKING THE DREAM ENVIRONMENT, and causing all things to happen. That means moving UPWARDS, from a position of "I am only this little self in a body" to " I am the whole of everything everywhere". And it is from that larger WHOLE mind that you are the DREAMER OF THE WORLD.

ACIM: "For you would not react at all to figures in a dream (as a smaller part of mind) you knew that YOU (your larger mind) were dreaming. Let them be as hateful and as vicious as they may, they COULD have no effect on you (your larger self), unless you failed to recognize it is YOUR (whole mind's) dream. This single lesson learned will set you free from suffering, WHATEVER form it takes." - this is a shift in identity from "I am a PART of mind in a body" to " I am ALL of mind everywhere."

If your mind transcends the separation, ie you stop believing illusions of separation, you will become aware of your wholeness. That's a transition from being two selves on a lower level, to being one unified self on a higher level.

What that also means in terms of the fact that your mind is the size of the universe, is that you should eventually heal the separation that is DIVIDING THE WORLD, which means removing the WALLS that the world is made of, which means undoing physical matter which is the illusion of separation, and that also means ERASING THE BODY. The body IS the device that acts to implement the split mind, WITHIN the larger scope of what you are.

In order NOT to have a split mind, your body HAS to be undone. It acts like a wall that is literally keeping part of you inside it and the rest of you outside it. It is made of illusions. "The body cannot stay without illusions". That means without the idea of being PART OF the world and not ALL of it, there cannot be a body there, representing the split in the mind and dividing and separating your universe-sized mind into two parts.

The body must vanish. It must be transcended and it must disappear. It is made of the illusion of separtion. "The body is a dream." And it is also the way by which the whole dream is maintained. There is no dream WITHOUT the body, because you have to MAKE a separation - a split in your larger mind, in order to go INTO dreaming. A split mind is a dreaming mind. And MAKING that split in your mind MAKES a body. It puts a wall there. Therefore when this dream of "opposition" and "competition" and "taking sides" is ironed out and ends, so too does the body wall disappear, and so too does the dream disappear, and that includes the Earth.

In effect, the undoing of the belief in separation is the undoing of the WALL within your split mind which IS the body, and this cancels out the differences between the inner and outer parts of mind, makes the mind WHOLE, and a whole mind CANNOT BE ASLEEP DREAMING. A whole mind cannot have a body. And a whole mind cannot be IN a dream world. The dream world only lasts so long as there is an illusion of separation, which depends ENTIRELY on having a split in your universe-sized mind. And this is also why "you cannot remain in this world, with this knowledge." Knowledge collapses spacetime.

As you return to being whole, you will also return to a state of mind where what is inside you is also seen outside you. ie it is everywhere the same. That means seeing the holy spirit in all your brothers because he is in your mind. Seeing God "in the world" because God is in your mind. Your wholeness reunites you with THE REST OF YOURSELF WHICH IS IN YOUR BROTHER. Your wholeness rejoins and reconnects YOUR mind, to the REST of your mind, which is currently believed to be "not inside you". Your sense of SELF, therefore, has to expand from "I am that which is inside the body" to "I AM EVERYWHERE". That results in oneness with all brothers.

To be whole is to be restored to an awareness that YOU are everywhere, you are larger than the universe, you are unlimited and infinite and immortal, you are not partial, you are not located in space or time, and you are beyond the dream of death. You are beyond the world. The world was merely YOUR SPLIT MIND, while you were dreaming. It's forms were YOUR SPLITS. Its walls were your illusions of disassociation. Without you having a split mind there can be no dream world. Waking up is waking up to WHOLENESS. Wholeness is reality. In wholeness, there is no world and there are no bodies and no walls.

You are unlimited. You made this entire world as a result of splitting your mind. When your mind is whole, the world will disappear. You are a huge, unlimited, spiritual being and this TINY world is nothing against your magnitude.

There is a myth in the ACIM community relating to how perception works. It's based on the belief that we only have one perception, one outlook. There's us, in the body, perceiving. We read stuff about how perception shifts and how it changes what we see.

So we think ok, my one perception will shift and it will show me a different world. In other words, the bad stuff I was seeing will seem to disappear and I will see good stuff. We read about the spiritual eye and christ vision and we start to think that our entire perception is going to shift to ONLY seeing perfection and beauty.

This of course then implies that all the bad stuff, all the sickness, the wars, the conflict, the decay, it's all going to magically disappear from my perception and I will not see it at all. Which in turn means, all the hospitals will be empty, everyone with broken limbs will magically be fixed, it's my dream so the entire physical contents of the world will transform into a heavenly condition.

This is not what ACIM teaches.

Perception is a little more complicated because there are actually two perceptual mechanisms involved, and Jesus goes to great lengths describing them.

One perception mechanism, the spiritual eye, is direct "mind seeing", also referred to as the eyes of Christ or Christ Vision. This seeing does not rely on or depend on the body whatsoever. It is not limited by space or time or distance. The mind can be anywhere, go anywhere, see anywhere. It can see through walls.

In fact, the spiritual eye does not really acknowledge what ACIM refers to as "the veil" of physical matter, the granite block of sin. It looks right THROUGH it as if it's not even there and looks to the light of the real world beyond. This fixation on the face of Christ is one way of perceiving. But there is another.

The body has its own perceptual mechanism. It has physical eyeballs. Its form of perception depends entirely on illusions. And the body's perception is not capable of seeing anything else.

"Everything the body sees is an illusion."

"These eyes made not to see will never see"

"The body's eyes are therefore not the means by which the real world can be seen, for the illusions that they look upon must lead to more illusions of reality."

"The body's eyes behold it as solid granite"

"Nothing the body's eyes seem to see can be anything but a form of temptation"

"This is the function you have given your body's eyes. 5 It is not seeing. 6 It is image making. 7 It takes the place of seeing, replacing vision with illusions."

The body's perception relies entirely on the laws of physics, which the spiritual eye completely transcends. They rely on photons of light, concentrated particles of finite energy. Light has to collide with surfaces of physical forms, objects, matter, and be "denied" by the form. The light is thus "reflected" rather than passing through it. This reflected light then enters the body's eyes and passes images to the mind for interpretation.

This is a fundamental difference between the two types of perception. What Jesus refers to as "physical sight" can only "see" when vision is blocked. In other words, seeing has to stop at the surface of objects, in order to see them as being there. This seeing is therefore blinded by physical objects. "Nothing so blinding as perception of form." Your eyes cannot see through matter.

Spiritual vision is the opposite, in that it does not stop at physical objects, it is not limited by matter or surfaces, it looks right through them as though they are just a very thin transparent veil. It overlooks the physical world because "to forgive is to overlook", looking beyond to the light.

Christ vision sees past the illusion of physical form to something beyond it - the face of Christ. Vision therefore doesn't really pay attention to what we would call physical stuff or the world of bodies, nor dose it function based on "seeing photons".

"This world of idols IS a veil across the Face of Christ"

"the veil of sin that hangs between you and the face of Christ"

"Christ's vision has one law. It does not look upon a body, and mistake it for the Son whom God created. It beholds a light beyond the body"

"The fourth obstacle to be surmounted hangs like a heavy veil before the face of Christ."

"Real vision is not only unlimited by space and distance, but it does not depend on the body's eyes at all"

Essentially, body vision is blinded by perception of the form of physical objects/matter, but to the body this causes it to "see" them. ie my vision "stopped at" the surface. Spiritual vision does not use photons of light, does not depend on physical matter, and sees directly with the mind.

The thing is this. For anyone who has a body or is in a body, BOTH mechanisms for seeing are simultaneously functioning. It does not matter how asleep or awake you are, whether you have false perception or true perception. It does not matter if your mind is sick or healed. If you still have a body, the body's eyes STILL will continue to report images of the PHYSICAL ONLY world to the mind, at the same time as the mind trying to see past it. It will still see the forms of matter, bodies, wars, sickness and death.

This is also why for example you can read the ACIM workbook and STILL READ THE WORDS, even if you are making progress in opening christ vision, because you are still using the body's eyes at the same time. Those who wake up in the world are still perfectly capable of watching tv and choosing food and navigating around a building and driving a car.

This "double vision" of body sight and mind vision, will occur as a kind of parallel perception. As the spiritual eye opens, as your mind opens up to direct vision, as you overlook (forgive) the world of matter, your body is still going to function in exactly the same biologically limited manner. It is still going to relay messages to the mind as to what it senses and sees. And the mind has to sort out what these messages mean to it.

Mind, as the only seer ("only the mind sees"), is therefore receiving impressions either directly (the real world, face of Christ), or indirectly (via the body's eyes). It is experiencing TWO inputs for a while. In order to open the spiritual vision, investment in physical sight has to be diminished. But this only means that the images coming from the body are recognized as illusions not to be believed. Visions of reality are accepted as true, visions of the physical are recognized as false. There are two levels of perception:

"Pain thresholds can be high, but they are not limitless. Eventually, everybody begins to recognize, however dimly, that there MUST be a better way. As this recognition is more firmly established, it becomes a perceptual turning-point. This ultimately reawakens the spiritual eye (which is now a second way to perceive), simultaneously weakening the investment in physical sight. The alternating investment in the ***two types or levels of perception*** is usually experienced as conflict for a long time, and can become very acute."

"The body's eyes will continue to see differences. 2 But the mind ***that has let itself be healed*** (has christ vision AND is using the body) will no longer acknowledge them. 3 ****There will be those who seem to be "sicker" than others (seen with the body's eyes still), and the body's eyes will report their changed appearances as before****. 4 But the healed mind (having true perception, accurate recognition) will put them all in one category; they are unreal (recognized as false)."

This does not mean the mind is blind to sick bodies. NOR does it mean that seeing sick bodies is proof that your mind is sick! You see them because your BODY shows them to you, but your mind decides whether to BELIEVE what the body sees.

You still see physical signs of sickness because you're still USING the body. Even when the body is used by the Holy Spirit for communication and healing, even when your spiritual eye is very open, physical sight STILL functions and the mind DOES still SEE the images of the physical world. But it categorizes these images as "these are not reality, they are illusions." It is not tempted by them, deceived by them, nor does it believe they depict the truth. This means you are AWARE that you are in a dream ie "awake in the dream."

"Awareness of dreaming is the real function of God's teachers. ***They watch the dream figures come and go, shift and change, suffer and die*** (via physical eyes).Yet they are not deceived by what they see (because the mind is not tempted and doesn't believe the physical is real)."

So you see (pun intended), while having a body, your mind is going to be in a state where you keep seeing the physical world, in its continued condition of constant inescapable corruption and death, complete with sick broken bodies and suffering and time and everything going wrong. BUT, the condition of your mind will be such that the MEANING of these images will be different. How they strike your mind will be different. And what you recognize them AS will be different.

You WILL still see the same FORM of physical matter, people with missing limbs, rotting leaves, dead carcasses, the signs of decay and weathering, rot and animals eating animals etc. But your mind will not regard them as true, real, valid, wanted, heaven, or God-created. They are simply recognized as an illusory dream. You will be aware that it is a dream. This doesn't mean you are blind to them, it means you see them accurately for what they are. True perception produces ACCURATE perception, which correctly interprets body visions, and is therefore NOT an INABILITY to see bodies.

Being in this position, where your mind can see beyond the physical world to the light of reality, where all differences and forms and shapes are not given credence, but where the physical is STILL included in what is seen due to still having eyeballs, you are now above the battlefield, in the world but not of it, aware of dreaming. And now you are in a position to be truly helpful.

What that means is, you can discern accurately what others are doing in the world. You can see their physical ailments. You can recognize their emotional and mental sickness - their call for love. And you are in a position to offer them help, WITHOUT making their sickness real. It's because you DO NOT believe the sickness (that you do see) is real, that you CAN help.

"But forgiveness looks past bodies. This is its holiness; this is how it heals."

This is what makes you a teacher of God. Being in a position of greater truth YET STILL IN THE WORLD. Able to still REACH those who are still in bodies, able to heal both the minds AND bodies of others, able to see sickness and famine and war and death, and able to offer help. Able to heal the sick, transform matter, raise the dead, move mountains, etc.

This sets you up for the situation where there is a ground for performing miracles. Because only if you can be "more healed" (have opened christ vision, mind seeing past bodies) while simultaneously being exposed to those who are "less healed" (can still see them with the body's mechanisms), do you have any way to HELP anyone. You are still "where the sickness is" but are not sick yourself.

And miracles are a service. They are given by those who temporarily have more to those who temporarily have less. They supply a lack. This is ONLY possible if you can be in the world in a healed state, NOT disappearing into a state of perfection. This is the function of a teacher of God. They help those who are less loving than themselves. They dissipate the fear in others. They raise the dead and heal the sick. This is ONLY possible because you have simultaneous Vision and body sight.

Christ needs your body to reach those who need reaching at a PHYSICAL level. Miracles are needed to demonstrate PHYSICALLY symbols of truth and to prove to those whose eyes are not open that there is a better way. The body is used to communicate to those who see only bodies, that their spiritual vision may open. And miracles are performed to liberate their minds from being blinded by perception of form. To demonstrate that the laws of the world can be broken.

ONLY when the face of Christ is FULLY seen, at the instant of atonement, is the investment in physical sight COMPLETELY undone. And investment only means dependence upon and belief in. The "veil" of physical matter, which the body alone can see ("only the body makes the world seem real"), appears as thin and transparent to the healed mind. It is seen through like x-ray vision to the light beyond.

And then eventually it vanishes from sight completely as the real world is seen but for an instant. Only as the world is not seen AT ALL do you stop seeing sick bodies. Because only as the BODY ITSELF is utterly transcended and let go does the mind awaken to a body-less reality. This means the mind goes beyond being awake in the dream (vision + body vision), and returns to a state of ONLY seeing with the mind (and only seeing the Kingdom of God). That's what it means to wake up FROM dreaming, in which for you the world ends.

This is why Jesus was able to walk the Earth in a highly healed state of mind, HELP OTHERS, perform miracles, SEE LEPERS, SEE THE DEAD, and demonstrate the laws of God. Without his BODY'S SIGHT, he would not have been able to see OR communicate with those who were limited to bodies. And because He had both christ vision and body sight, he could act as a Teacher of God in this world, before he woke up FROM the dream of death entirely.

"But the face of Christ is the great symbol of forgiveness. It is salvation. It is the symbol of the real world. Whoever looks on this ***no longer sees the world***."

"For what appears to hide the Face of Christ is powerless before His Majesty, ***and disappears*** before His holy sight."

"Now there are no distinctions. Differences have disappeared and Love looks on Itself. ***What further sight is needed***? What remains that vision could accomplish? We have seen the face of Christ, His sinlessness, His Love ***behind all forms***, beyond all purposes. "

"Where destruction was perceived the face of Christ appears, and ***in that instant is the world forgot***, with time forever ended as the world spins into nothingness from which it came."

"Gone is perception, false and true alike. Gone is forgiveness, for its task is done. And ***gone are bodies*** (sick ones and healthy ones) in the blazing light upon the altar to the Son of God. God knows it is His Own, as it is his. And here They join, for here the face of Christ has shone away time's final instant, and now is the last perception of the world without a purpose and without a cause. For where God's memory has come at last there is no journey, no belief in sin, ***no walls, no bodies***, and the grim appeal of guilt and death is there snuffed out forever."