I'm having a really hard time trying to put a simple truth into words. So... for now, an analogy...

If it's dark and there seems to be a scary shape behind the door, you might think there is a monster lurking.

You turn on the light and realize it's just some clothes hanging there.

This is the same as the transition from believing that the ego is real, to recognizing it was just a harmless illusion.

It simply was not true that it was a real monster.

You did not need to do anything to the clothing in order to make it not be a monster.

All you needed to do, was switch on the light.

Because it never WAS a real monster to begin with!

Light is ALL that you need in order to be awake to the truth and free of the ego. That's all. Absolutely nothing else.

When there is light, you can see correctly. You can see everything as it is, without having to modify the scene at all.

You did not need to defend yourself against the monster. And you did not need to fight it off once the light was turned on, even though you might've been afraid that turning on the light would prove that the monster is real ;-)

All you had to do was turn on the light so that you could see correctly. So that you could have True Perception. Vision.

The light itself shows you, by comparison to the light, that what you thought was a real monster, was just an illusion. There wasn't anything real there at all.

It is this way with the ego and the entire world. It is an illusion that isn't real. You think there are real monsters and real tragedies and real death. That's because you are not seeing clearly. You are in darkness. You just need more light.

"I cannot see in darkness but in light" - ACIM

"You are only afraid of darkness because you believe it has the ability to hide the truth." - ACIM

So you actually don't need to defend yourself against the ego, or against illusions, or against attack, or against death. You ONLY need to be in the light, and all of those things will be very obviously shown to be NOT what you thought they were.

You will see that death was just a weird illusion. Attack was not really happening. Sin wasn't true of anyone. There wasn't any real suffering. And even what you thought was a "real ego" was nothing more than an illusion of an ego existing. There WASN'T a real ego at all, it was just smoke and mirrors looking like one!

It was all just a trick that your mind played on you because you were in the DARK and could not see the whole scene properly.

Taking vision out of context and focusing on only parts of the scene, unable to see the whole (the whole is God), produces insane fears that objects are really monsters, that inanimate objects are out to get you, and that you are not safe.

Turn the light on!

Light is all you need. God is all you need. Be in God and everything else will become clear and obvious as day. There is no ego, there is no death. They existed as hallucinations in the dark while you didn't have enough light to see what was REALLY going on.

"Now the light has come." - ACIM

"Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and your way will be made straight" - ie, be in the light, and you will KNOW that there IS nothing that can ever be against you. There IS no real enemy, no real attacker, no real war, no real sin, no real sickness, and no real death.

SURPRISE! It was all a wierd dream trip you had while you could not see the big picture, conclusions you came to that were false, and made-up explanations for things you only had partial evidence for.

This is awakening. Waking up to the awareness (light) which allows you to SEE (vision) the truth (God - the whole picture), which shows you that you're just hanging around in an illusory room that isn't really anything at all. You thought it was a scary place, it's NOTHING!

You will just laugh when you realize all that fear and pretend suffering didn't happen at all, and all that's left is you hanging out with God in love forever! Perfectly at peace, perfectly happy, perfectly safe :-)

Not being fully aware of everything will lead to false conclusions. This is the state of insanity. Meanings will be read into, there will be hallucinations, there will be a twisting or purposes, relationships will be interrupted, and reality will become corrupted, making it seem as though everything is out to get you and you're experiencing a nightmare. Justifications will arise on a false basis and there will be many mistaken perceptions.

Unconsciousness, i.e. unawareness of the whole truth, HAS to lead to you trying to make sense out of what you are experiencing, and HAS to lead to you making a false conclusion about that experience. Until you are fully aware/enlightened, you will be making perceptual errors, deciding things which are false, and will believe that someone else is causing something against your will.

Anger seems perfectly rational and sensible IF, given a blockage to awareness, there is not enough awareness of what you are doing to yourself, what you have asked for, or how you have attacked yourself. This WILL give rise to the seemingly sensible/logical conclusion that you are justified in being angry, because someone else SEEMS to have been the cause of your problem. Blocks to awareness are the sole cause of this mistaken perception.

If you could see the whole picture and have access to all of the information, everything would be in its proper perspective and seen clearly for what it is. This would lead to no distortions or confusions. Perception would then be "true" and it would be impossible to believe, or perceive, that anything can ever happen to you against your will.

If someone else SEEMS "clearly wrong", or its their fault, or you're a victim in some way, you MUST be partly unconscious and partly insane. This is why anger is never justified. It can only seem justified when, based on all the available evidence, it seems as though someone did something that you did not do. This is a false conclusion. Some facts are hidden from awareness behind walls of denial.

Our mind, even IF we think we are fully aware, fully ourselves, in our right mind, being sensible and logical, still has some pretty major blocks of denial. There is stuff which is unconscious that we do not even realize is there. Our denial has shut it out of awareness. We have no reason to suspect it is even there, and we don't want to. The purpose of the block to awareness was to implement denial, so that we would not be aware of the whole truth. This has left us with a sense of "fake innocence" which is unaware of the ways in which it is attacking and denying the Self and the Self of others.

If we seem innocent, or a victim, or justified in anger, or it's someone else's fault, or we're upset in any way, we MUST not have seen the whole truth. Even if we search our entire mind for any possible trace of evidence that WE are the one who made ourselves upset, sick, diseased or dead, we still will not find the evidence because it's been made unconscious. There are facts OUTSIDE YOUR AWARENESS, repressed by your ego's persona/mask, and hidden behind your belief that you are completely innocent and "whole" already.

Your wholeness of yourself, the extent of the awareness of your "self" right now, the limits that define the ends of you and the beginning of otherness, IS NOT the whole of who you are! Perceiving yourself as whole when you are in fact only partially conscious is an error that will lead to confusion and the "sensible answer" of finding others guilty for what you do not SEE that you did to yourself.

This fake mask or persona is a facade of denial which is covering up your mind, and was the entire reason you entered a body to begin with. The body, not created by love, and not innocent, yet pictured "as if" innocent, is a deliberate attempt to cover up the truth using denial. The body is a denial of Self, it is a denial of Life, and it is a denial of God. It must be undone and removed from awareness in order to remove all blocks in awareness and reveal the WHOLE TRUTH.

The truth of who you really are, is so whole and so full and expansive that it is literally unlimited and far-reaching and limitless. You are bigger than the universe. But you are pretending to be little so that you can escape through denial and keep your little private world of death.

God is everywhere. This is the common idea of omnipresence. But it goes further than this. To just say he's everywhere tends to be interpreted in terms of spacetime. Like, God is in the house and the tree and the car. It makes sense.

But there's a key component we need to consider. God can't be partly anywhere, because he is absolutely one within himself. Nor can only a part of him be somewhere, because all of him has to be there in completion.

So then think of it this way. The entirety of the whole of God is in the house, while simultaneously the entirety of the whole of God is in the car, while simultaneously the entirety of the whole of God is in the tree.

If you can visualize this at all in your mind, it is mind blowing. It defies and breaks all the laws of physics. We would claim, well, if all of God is in the car, how can he also be entirely and fully and completely in the house at the same time? Normal laws of spacetime would not permit this.

We'd normally say, well, if all of something is somewhere, none of it can be anywhere else. But this is spacetime reasoning. This is not how God thinks or how he functions and exists.

God transcends all the laws of separation. Therefore, God CAN be entirely in one place, and in another place, and in another place, all at the same time. And he is not only partly there, but totally there. His entire attention, if you will, all of his being, is fundamentally in EVERY location at the same time.

This is not the same thing as saying that he is just a very big object which has some parts of it spanning across space, where some of the outermost parts are in one location and some of the other parts are in another. It is not the same thing as saying God is a universe whereby it is very big and God's left hand is over here and God's right leg is over there. God is not space or time.

In fact God utterly transcends space and time, being omnipresent and eternal. The laws and limits of space have no effect or bearing whatsoever on his nature. All of God CAN BE ENTIRELY in one place, while also being ENTIRELY in another simultaneously.

This is somewhat akin to a "blur". If you take some object and you totally blur it, spreading it out, the object seems to be everywhere at once. You can't easily put a finger on it and see the original shape, it has lost all form in the blurring. But all of it is everywhere. It's sort of like being out of focus.

The thing is though, that it is the laws of spacetime that cause the object to not be identifiable in its clear form, at the same time as being distributed. And this does not apply to God.

God is not out of focus. He isn't sort of ... distracted and distributed and diffused and unlocalized. ALL of him, his entire attention, is in one place, AND all of his attention is in another place. He breaks all the laws and requirements of spatial separation. This means he is simultaneously abstract ie out of focus, AND entirely focused.

Ultimately not only is God everywhere, but ALL of God is everywhere. This in turn means that God is impersonal, AND fully personal, at the same time. He is impersonal in that there is no difference between who or what he is in any particular location or part of himself, treating everything in the same way. And he is ENTIRELY personal in that his entire being is in every part of himself and is fully present for every part.

Since God DID create a very large number of personal beings who each are a whole and fully created being, God has a COMPLETELY personal relationship with all of them individually and specifically. But at the same time, their relationship is open and shared with all others, and is equal to all others, making it entirely IMPERSONAL.

God loves YOU fully, and loves your brother's the same way.He therefore has an entirely personal AND impersonal relationship with all his creations.

"Revelation is intensely personal." - "They represent the original form of communication between God and His Souls" (personal communication between father and sons).

"God is everything and everywhere."

"Your brothers are everywhere."

"God Himself goes everywhere with us."

"God is still everywhere and in everything forever."

Safety is an important aspect of reality. Where there is fear you can't feel safe. Where there is love you are safe and protected.

We might not realize it, but if you are separate or distanced from God in any way, you will start to feel unsafe. The more you go away from love, the more you go into fear. And the fear will seem justified because unreal threatening things will seem real.

The world has no safety to offer. It doesn't matter how many defences you put up how many walls, layers, boundaries or defences you erect. In fact, the more that you believe you need profound levels of defences to protect you, the more you will believe in being vulnerable, weak, afraid and in danger. The more you are visible and undefined and open and exposed, the safer you will become. A king or queen locked in the highest tower in their most fortified castle walls is most terrified.

"If I defend myself I am attacked."

"In my defencelessness my safety lies."

"My attack thoughts are attacking my invulnerability."

The world has no safety to offer because of its constant format of war, conflict, differences and limits. You can barely get through a day without something going wrong or being threatened in some way. If you look for safety on a physical level you will not find it anywhere. The world is a system of murder and suicide.

Safety can only be experienced psychologically as a result of joining with God in light and love and wholeness, in which you are no longer attacking yourself or believing in murder and suicide. Only your self attack could truly make you feel unsafe. In fact, it's the belief that you've sinned and deserve to die that threatens you.

When you become honest and admit to the truth of reality, you are no longer living a lie or living in a state of deception. And without this deception you are not in conflict with your reality. This lack of conflict brings a feeling of peace and safety. The ego can never experience safety because it relies on conflict and deception which undermines its perception of reality.

To feel safe, join with God, receive his love, and remember who you are.

"The world provides no safety. It is rooted in attack, and all its "gifts" of seeming safety are illusory deceptions. It attacks and then attacks again. No peace of mind is possible where danger threatens thus."

"For we would not return again to the belief in sin, which made the world seem ugly and unsafe, attacking and destroying, dangerous in all its ways and treacherous beyond the hope of trust and the escape from pain."

"Nothing in madness is dependable. It holds out no safety and no hope. But such a world is not real. I have given it the illusion of reality, and have suffered from my belief in it. Now I choose to withdraw this belief, and place my trust in reality. In choosing this, I will escape all the effects of the world of fear because I am acknowledging that it does not exist."

"There IS no safety in a battleground. You can look down on it in safety from above, and NOT be touched. But, from within it, you can find NO safety. Not one tree left standing still will shelter you. Not one illusion of protection stands against the faith in murder. Here stands the body, torn between the natural desire to communicate, and the unnatural intent to murder and to die."

"As evening comes, let all my thoughts be still of You and of Your Love, and let me sleep sure of my safety, certain of Your care, and happily aware I am Your Son."

"God is with me. He is my Source of life, the life within, the air I breathe, the food by which I am sustained, the water which renews and cleanses me. He is my home, wherein I live and move; the Spirit Which directs my actions, offers me Its Thoughts, and guarantees my safety from all pain. He covers me with kindness and with care, and holds in love the Son He shines upon, who also shines on Him. How still is he who knows the truth of what He speaks today!"

"I am in danger nowhere in the world."

"But God Himself has protected EVERYTHING He created BY His laws. Therefore, everything that is not under them does not exist."

"And thus has God protected still His Son, even in error."

"He protected both your creations AND you together, keeping one with you what you would EXCLUDE."

"Even in sleep has Christ protected you, ensuring the real world FOR you when you wake."

"The Kingdom is perfectly united and perfectly protected, and the ego will not prevail against it. Amen."

"You will identify with what you think will make you safe. Whatever it may be, you will believe that it is one with you. Your safety lies in truth and not in lies. Love is your safety. Fear does not exist. Identify with love, and you are safe. Identify with love, and you are home. Identify with love, and find your Self."

A lot of people interpret forgiveness to be some kind of process you do to fix your mind.

But ACIM seems to say something different. For example:

"Only Christ forgives, knowing His sinlessness. His vision heals perception and sickness disappears."

So, hang on a minute. Joe Smith doing ACIM thinks he's "doing forgiveness", and has a little procedure he practices and tries to take back projections and undo judgements and so on and he thinks he is forgiving. But ACIM say, ONLY Christ forgives. So isn't Joe's ego claiming to be doing forgiveness?

Forgiveness is actually the state of TRUE perception, which is the end goal of the course, and not exactly something that someone is in white they're undertaking the course, especially not in earlier stages.

How about the fact that we're also told that forgiveness is a form of LOVE ... how often do you hear people saying that forgiveness is the SAME thing as love? Hardly ever. But full maximal love is quite a highly advanced spiritual state. Forgiveness and love are basically the same thing, but who ever describes forgiveness as love?

"Forgiveness is an earthly form of love which as it is in Heaven has no form. Yet what is needed here is given here as it is needed. In this form you can fulfill your function even here, although what love will mean to you when formlessness has been restored to you is greater still."

Then we're also told that it is perhaps not even our FUNCTION at this point to forgive. For example:

"The Holy Spirit forgives everything, BECAUSE GOD CREATED EVERYTHING. Do not undertake HIS function, or you will forget YOURS."

So we're being asked not to take over the Holy Spirit's function of forgiving. And it even suggests that in terms of us being forgiven, it is not US that forgives ourselves. More to the point, it says that we ARE forgiven already - as far as the Holy Spirit is concerned, and our work is more to do with acceptance of this truth rather than the production of this truth. WE don't put forgiveness in place!

"Never attempt to OVERLOOK your guilt BEFORE you ask the Holy Spirit's help. That is HIS function. Your part is only to offer Him a LITTLE willingness to LET Him remove all fear and hatred, and to BE forgiven."

Essentially, forgiveness is a final state of true perception which is the same thing as accepting atonement and achieving salvation and resurrection. It isn't a step along a path. It isn't a process or procedure or technique. It's the end result natural state of a healed mind that is loving, and BE's FORGIVING toward everything. It is the nature of a loving mind expressing and relating from love with love.

When you're IN that state of mind you are being one with Christ, and with the Holy Spirit, which is why you then can claim to "be forgiving." But really until you reach that state, and you're still in false perceptions trying to undo your hell, what you're DOING isn't really forgiveness.

What if every reference to forgiveness in the course is a reference to the END STATE, and not a process?

What if we're being asked to "practice forgiveness" only in the sense of trying to get ourselves TO the state of forgiveness? And what if we should not be calling that practice "forgiveness", but rather perhaps - purification, or mind training? Or accepting that we've been forgiven already?

I think the term forgiveness has been rather hijacked by a lot of people, students and teachers alike. It really refers to the purified state of miracle mindedness, whole perception, true perception, a healed mind and heart, a state filled with love, identified with Christ, and the perfect enlightened recognition that there is nothing LEFT to be forgiven - that only innocence exists.

We can practice moving toward that state as our goal, but what we're doing to get there must not take over the Holy Spirit's function or presume that we are "being forgiving" when all that we're doing are a few basic steps to reclaim slightly less insanity. Forgiveness is really on the level of miracle working.

"Miracles are natural expressions of total forgiveness. Through miracles, man accepts God's forgiveness by extending it to others."

Forgiveness that is not COMPLETE forgiveness is not really forgiveness. COMPLETE forgiveness immediately BE's forgiving toward everything without need for thought or practice or procedure or technique. It is loving relationship.

"In His perception of the world, nothing is seen but justifies forgiveness and the sight of perfect sinlessness. Nothing arises but is met with instant and complete forgiveness."

"And that, in COMPLETE forgiveness, in which you recognize that there is nothing to forgive, YOU are absolved completely."

"Remember that you who want peace can find it only by complete forgiveness."

"Forgiveness, salvation, Atonement, true perception, all are one. They are the one beginning with the end to lead to Oneness far beyond themselves. True perception is the means by which the world is saved from sin, for sin does not exist. And it is this that true perception sees."

What it claims is that if you will not say certain things, or do certain things, other people will be less hurt and less offended and less victimized. And that therefore, this is more loving and supportive.

This is not true.

What is really happening is that we're saying that people are affected by what is happening outside of them, that events and words and people's actions cause them harm, that they are therefore vulnerable, offendable, hurtable. And that therefore, because they are hurtable, we must aim to not hurt them.

But this completely assumes that it's true, normal, and natural for people to be hurtable. People are not hurtable. Someone who believes they are hurtable are in denial of their immortality. They are being a victim. They are scapegoating and blaming. They are putting responsibility for their life and their happiness into the hands of other people, in an attempt to disown themselves, to BE irresponsible, and to MAKE other people guilty.

If what I say offends someone, that's their fault. If what you say offends someone, that's their fault. If you are offended by what someone else says, that's your fault. It means you are secretly and not so obviously being irresponsible, are projecting ownership and blame for your existence onto others, are holding other people accountable for your happiness, are requiring and controlling other people to be a certain way in order to "make your ego happy", which means you are trying to get your way. It is manipulative, deceitful and controlling.

So what actually ends up happening, is that if someone avoids saying a particular word or doing a particular thing in order to not displease you, ie to please you, this is the ego persona at work. The persona tries to get rid of all unpleasant things by chopping out parts of yourself that it disapproves of, which eventually will leave nothing left, and is actually an attempt to destroy you. People pleasing is suicide.

So while on the surface it might seem like, well, we're being kind, we're taking other people's needs into consideration, we're placating, we're being gentle, we're trying to have compassion, we're understanding other people's insecurities, etc... all well and good, but this isn't AS good for people as to get them to be more responsible for their own existence. If it's up to me to change my expressions in order to not offend someone who is particularly touchy about certain subjects, then who really has the problem? Its the person who is touchy about the subject. They're actually playing a victim game, are projecting fault onto me, are trying to get me to change to satisfy their agenda, and they want me to stop being a certain way so that they can be justified in defending their beliefs.

If we're all going to 'get along' harmoniously, it is only going to happen when everyone grows up and takes full responsibility for everything they are experiencing, even if its fear or guilt or offense or hurt or whatever. It's each person's responsibility. And never is your life anyone else's responsibility. And nobody else is to blame for making you upset. If you want that, go ahead... it will make you weak and even more afraid and vulnerable to believe that.

So ultimately "PC" turns you into a victim. It attacks your invulnerability. It assumes that you are affected by the world and that therefore, as part of the world, everyone else has to tone down what they are doing to you. It's entirely based around a victim mentality. It strips people of their power. It actually disempowers people. It also makes everyone be in DENIAL. You are in denial of yourself because you're trying to not show all of yourself to others, and everyone else is in denial because they want to keep pretending you are responsible for their reactions.

It doesn't make people happier, because all it means is you are not being AUTHENTIC or HONEST toward them, and are baby'ing them, and are placating them and putting on a facade for them, likely in order for YOU to "not get hurt" through your own victimhood. So PC is really invented by victims, for victims, to continue victimization, and has NOTHING to do with helping people to be stronger or more powerful or less hurt or more respected. The ego wants to be respected, because it is disrespectful.

Yes if someone is upset, it may be compassionate to comfort and be gentle with them and empathize and help support them. But what is support REALLY? Support means also reminding them that all the reasons they are upset are not real or true, that they are actually victimizing themselves, that they are doing this all to themselves, that they can become much more empowered by owning up to this, and that there is a better way than to see themselves as affected by someone.

Is political correctness love? No. It's an ego agenda of misery and victimization and inescapable vulnerability. It worships suffering, it perpetuates fear, and destroys people.

Suck on that whether you like it or not.

Your natural state of being is:

1) God is the source of love and extends you

2) You receive everything from God and extend it further

3) Your own creations receive from you

Another way of putting it is:

1) God is the Father and extends you as His Son

2) Since he shares everything He is with you, you also inherit the ability to be a father

3) You therefore father your own creations which are your Sons

And another way of putting it is:

1) God is the source of love and love is miraculous

2) God creates you miraculously and shares miraculousness with you

3) You extend God's miraculous love and perform miracles

In this arrangement, which is the way things are in Heaven, and which is the perfect condition of your relationship with God, you RECEIVE everything from God. God just loves you unconditionally all the time for no reason other than to love you. You receive that, and appreciate the awesome gift that it is, and you joyfully extend it.

Now, when the 'separation' happened, the Fatherhood of God was separated from the Sonship of the Son. The son stopped experiencing Himself as the Son of God because, having cut off God's role as His father, He no longer could see Himself as a Son. However, the former Son of God retained the outward creative fatherhood properties He was given. So He continues to try to create, except that having disconnected from the Father he is no longer EXTENDING God's creation, but instead tries to be the SOURCE of what He creates. That means creating without God, which is MAKING.

The former Son of God also then sees Himself as orphaned from God and, having no source for Himself, is left only with 'Himself' to deal with His situation. Instead of receiving love and support from God, this 'separated self' has to invent its own support and its own substitute or love. Having separated from God, this separated self is now alone and afraid and lacking and limited. He is also powerless and weak. He attempts to continue the behavior of extension but without sourcing 'what to extend' in God. So instead he INVENTS, makes up, dreams and projects an imaginary creation (the world) which does not really exist, which is not sustained by God's love, and which therefore must perish.

Clearly, what's gone wrong in the separated Son's life is the disconnection between Himself and God... the shutting off the FLOW that comes FROM God to sustain Him, to provide for Him, to protect Him, to nourish Him, and to give abundantly to Him and to BE everything for Him. That's what the separation shut out of His mind. So now His mind seems intent on going off on its own tangent, running its own life, deciding everything alone, doing everything alone, and generally failing and suffering a lot. There is only one problem - separation from God, and there is only one solution - repairing the separation from God.

So now we find ourselves in this dreamworld of unreality, with separated lives and separate wills, with everything going to shit, and we wonder why. And we wonder how to get back to peace. And then we start doing our forgiveness and our thought management and so on, but you need this bigger picture in order to realize WHY you are doing all this and what the overall goal is. The goal is to UNDO THE SEPARATION FROM GOD completely. And that must mean, the restoration of the dynamics of the relationship that you had with God before the separation.

So this means, your mind/self now needs to transition from being alone, separate, making up lies and doing everything yourself, to RECONNECTING to God, opening up to receive supply/abundance/safety/love/protection/guidance FROM God again, becoming willing to extend what GOD has created (His love), allowing Him to be the source/God/origin instead of you having to invent stuff on your own, and then EXTENDING that outward to all of creation, acknowledging that this 'ex Son of God' is once again THE Son of God, restored to perfection.

So this means having to learn to surrender all of the side-effects that came about from becoming a separate self, which includes surrendering thinking for yourself, deciding for yourself, controlling life, regarding your life as 'your life' that you own in exclusion/exile, giving up the ways that you block the flow of love/miracles, undoing all sense of judgement/attack/separation/sin/guilt/fear that comes between you and God, opening your mind to RECEIVE from God His guidance and love and support, and weaning yourself off of all the ARTIFICIAL SOURCES of support and coping and replacements for what you lost (special love etc), which you MADE to take the place of God.

So as we RECLAIM our rightful place as Son of God again, and restore the relationship with God, and re-open ourselves to receiving the flow/extension of God's love/miracles, we are returning to being Christ and we're letting go of the 'circumstances' of how things ended up after separating from our Father. All the ways that we 'coped' with the separation need to be undone and replaced with getting our supply from God again.

A few quotes coming to mind...

"God goes with me all through the day"

"I am sustained by the love of God"

You might think that, you only need to perform a forgiveness when something seems upsetting, something goes wrong, someone is attacking, or there's a problem.

In particular the ego in us might seem "partly committed" to forgiveness, willing to forgive "part time", only when things are extreme, or when we can find enough willingness. We might only "do it" when we want something, to get a selfish need met, to make the bad stuff go away so we can carry on as an ego. We might only forgive when pushed, or when things become unbearable.

So you might think that some person walking along a street that you don't know, doesn't need you to "forgive" them. That you don't need to forgive the sunsets and the puppies. That you only forgive when something is wrong, or you're not at peace. And if that person on the street doesn't appear to be attacking, hurting, acting viciously or demonstrating ego traits, what reason is there to forgive?

What we need to realize though is that even the states and activities that we think are normal, commonplace, everyday kinds of behaviors, etc, or aspects of the false world which we seem to like, are in fact still unnatural. Someone seeming to coast along in a body having a life is still not living in the mind and spirit of God as God intended. And the world is always an illusion.

A person can seem relatively harmless and not presenting any problems, but that doesn't mean that aren't separating from God. It doesn't mean they're sane or healed or healthy. They very likely have identified with their body, their mind is likely split and confused, they probably believe in separation and have all kinds of ego stuff going on.

What that means is that pretty much anyone in the world in any state is, to some degree, in a state of suffering, a state of despair, a state of confusion and insanity, a state of mistaken identity, a state of separation and a state of attack. Pretty much everyone in the world is in a state of lack and fear.

Because of this, if someone is essentially still in a body and distanced from God, then yes indeed they need to be forgiven. Because that is an attack and also because they are suffering. And not because they're doing anything to you overtly or obviously, but because they themselves are not in a state of love. Anyone not in a state of love is calling out for help.

So then what it comes down to is that you have to start recognizing whether a person is totally living by God's will, being as God created them, identified with spirit, and completely sane, or are they distanced from that? And if they are distanced, then they need healing and help and love and miracles.

It also then becomes clear that forgiveness isn't merely some process that you do "part time". It's not something you switch on and off, which you apply to a situation and step away from. It isn't a temporary action or some procedure that you perform as a one-off. It should be ongoing and permanent.

Forgiveness is in fact a constant state that you are trying to enter and maintain continuously. That means being constantly "on" as a healer. Being in a state of continuous love and power. This is what Jesus calls "miracle readiness", ie being in a state where you are "ready, willing and able." Poised to work miracles ALL the time. And where you recognize and are willing to be loving towards, thus forgiving, everyone you meet.

Essentially, while anyone is left walking the face of the earth in any state short of total enlightenment, you have miracle-working to do. Miracles are EXPRESSIONS FROM a state of miracle mindedness, and are "miracle-doing". They are the process which heals and restores and uplifts, and you perform them from a CONSTANT state, if possible, of "being a forgiving person." Of being a healer.

"Those who are healed become instruments of healing."

A forgiving person isn't a person that "does forgivenesses" now and then. It's someone who has a forgiving attitude, a forgiving state of mind, sane and miraculous, having already healed and received atonement. And now that person is a walking-talking healing machine. And everyone they meet they give the love of God to. Including the random strangers on the street who seem at first to not be calling out for love at all.

"The distinction has also been made here between "miracle-mindedness" as a STATE, and "miracle-doing" as its expression.

The former needs YOUR careful protection, because it is a state of miracle-READINESS. This is what the Bible means in the many references to "Hold yourself ready" and other similar injunctions. Readiness here means keep your perception right side up, (or valid), so you will ALWAYS be ready, willing, and able. These are the essentials for "listen, learn, and do." You must be

READY to listen

WILLING to learn

and ABLE to do

Only the last is involuntary, because it is the APPLICATION of miracles which must be Christ-controlled. But the other two, which are the voluntary aspects of miracle-mindedness, ARE up to you."

"Miracles are natural. When they do NOT occur something has gone wrong."

"That is what we meant when we once said that miracles are NATURAL, and when they do NOT occur, something has gone wrong."

Miracle working entails the use of PRAYER. "Prayer is the medium of miracles." "Through prayer love is received. Through miracles love is expressed."

Miracles are NOT a shift in perception. The only way perception is involved is that perception must be loving (as close to true perception as possible), and fear must be suspended. "Wholeness is the perceptual content of miracles." Wholeness of perception is not a shift. It is miracle mindedness, resting on forgiveness, which sees with MAXIMAL love.

Miracles, in a course in miracles, are expressive acts of power which can heal others. And they are performed through PRAYER. However, this doesn’t mean you have to pray using words. God does not understand words. Prayers are requests made in your HEART, in awareness of LOVE. Love is essential for miracle working. Your heart requests and receives and experiences, in certainty and decisiveness.

Some parts of ACIM speak specifically to "how to perform miracles." Here is one of them:

21. What Is the Role of Words in Healing?

M-21.1. Strictly speaking, words play no part at all in healing. 2 The motivating factor is prayer, or asking. 3 What you ask for you receive. 4 But this refers to the prayer of the heart, not to the words you use in praying. 5 Sometimes the words and the prayer are contradictory; sometimes they agree. 6 It does not matter. 7 God does not understand words, for they were made by separated minds to keep them in the illusion of separation. 8 Words can be helpful, particularly for the beginner, in helping concentration and facilitating the exclusion, or at least the control, of extraneous thoughts. 9 Let us not forget, however, that words are but symbols of symbols. 10 They are thus twice removed from reality.

M-21.2. As symbols, words have quite specific references. 2 Even when they seem most abstract, the picture that comes to mind is apt to be very concrete. 3 Unless a specific referent does occur to the mind in conjunction with the word, the word has little or no practical meaning, and thus cannot help the healing process. 4 The prayer of the heart does not really ask for concrete things. 5 It always requests some kind of experience, the specific things asked for being the bringers of the desired experience in the opinion of the asker. 6 The words, then, are symbols for the things asked for, but the things themselves but stand for the experiences that are hoped for.

M-21.3. The prayer for things of this world will bring experiences of this world. 2 If the prayer of the heart asks for this, this will be given because this will be received. 3 It is impossible that the prayer of the heart remain unanswered in the perception of the one who asks. 4 If he asks for the impossible, if he wants what does not exist or seeks for illusions in his heart, all this becomes his own. 5 The power of his decision offers it to him as he requests. 6 Herein lie hell and Heaven. 7 The sleeping Son of God has but this power left to him. 8 It is enough. 9 His words do not matter. 10 Only the Word of God has any meaning, because it symbolizes that which has no human symbols at all. 11 The Holy Spirit alone understands what this Word stands for. 12 And this, too, is enough.

M-21.4. Is the teacher of God, then, to avoid the use of words in his teaching? 2 No, indeed! 3 There are many who must be reached through words, being as yet unable to hear in silence. 4 The teacher of God must, however, learn to use words in a new way. 5 Gradually, he learns how to let his words be chosen for him by ceasing to decide for himself what he will say. 6 This process is merely a special case of the lesson in the workbook that says, "I will step back and let Him lead the way." 7 The teacher of God accepts the words which are offered him, and gives as he receives. 8 He does not control the direction of his speaking. 9 He listens and hears and speaks.

M-21.5. A major hindrance in this aspect of his learning is the teacher of God's fear about the validity of what he hears. 2 And what he hears may indeed be quite startling. 3 It may also seem to be quite irrelevant to the presented problem as he perceives it, and may, in fact, confront the teacher with a situation that appears to be very embarrassing to him. 4 All these are judgments that have no value. 5 They are his own, coming from a shabby self-perception which he would leave behind. 6 Judge not the words that come to you, but offer them in confidence. 7 They are far wiser than your own. 8 God's teachers have God's Word behind their symbols. 9 And He Himself gives to the words they use the power of His Spirit, raising them from meaningless symbols to the Call of Heaven itself.

When you see yourself as lacking in some way, whether it be that you're tired and spent, nothing left to give, stressed out, overwhelmed or whatever, you'll see yourself as "in need".

The world will now start to appear to you as being needy. It will seem other people are being needy and trying to take from you. That they are being selfish. They seem to demand attention and want something from you and you seem not to be able to give it, because you think you don't have it.

And so then you'll become angry and crabby, because why the hell are these insensitive selfish people demanding my energy when I don't have enough for myself?

But people will appear this way only because you're actually seeing yourself this way. By believing you are lacking, YOU are being needy, and woe betide that anyone else be needy at the same time.

Now, in your neediness, you are seeing yourself as needing to TAKE from them in order to fulfill your lack. And if they too are being needy, they are trying to take from you. And this produces a sucking inward on both your parts, which is a withdrawal on both your parts, which is producing a gap of separation between you and increasing the war.

In neediness we'll blame other people easily for seeming to be "so needy right now", so insensitive to your plight and so oblivious to your lack. How could they not recognize that you're the one who needs?

Instead of admitting that you want THEM To fulfill your needs, in an unspoken way, you are now angry that your hidden desire to be served is not being attended to by them. They seem not to be following through in supporting you. And now they're being all "me me me" at the exact wrong time.

Thus your desire to have others fulfill your needs, which is all part of your perception that you are lacking, becomes projected or mapped onto them as if THEY are the ones who are being needy and taking selfishly, and not you. You thus deny your neediness and pretend not to be needy, yet are still upset by their lack of supply.

What needs to happen is YOU need to move into the state where you do not have needs any more. And at first this will appear to mean you need to "get" your needs met. Typically by others or some external salvation or pleasure. But so long as the dynamic of perceiving yourself lacking is maintained, you'll expect that what someone or something else does TO you, for you, is the only way that your needs are going to be met.

This needs to be moved beyond, so that you realize the only reason you think you NEED them at all, is because you are seeing yourself as lacking. Perhaps your own perception of yourself as lacking is the real issue here. And maybe if you would not see yourself as lacking, you'd see yourself as whole and complete, needing nothing, therefore having everything to give.

And so there is the key. When you are needy, it's because you do not want to give. You are in need because you are unwilling to give. You are in need because you don't want to give to others what you yourself need to receive. And yet the only way TO receive it is to give it. The ego says, no, if you give, you're going to lack. Spirit says, if you give, you will be supplied.

And so as you step out in faith to give even more, strangely suddenly you find your needs are being met. Maybe your tiredness suddenly vanishes. Maybe your stress melts. Because you decided to adopt the role of doing God's will and loving instead of attacking yourself.

As you say, hey, I'm going to put Spirit first and act as if I have everything, Heaven comes in to support you and gives you strength. A willingness to put aside your needs in the trust that Spirit will back you up and give you the strength to go on, you might be surprised at the supernatural effect of all your limitations melting away.

A miracle worker is not in need because they recognize God is their supply, His strength is their own, and they cannot be lacking when they are doing His work. Unplugging yourself from Him is the only cause of a sense of lack in the first place. Is it the many forms of needs that you need to meet, such as food or energy or sleep, or is it God that you need?

If all states of neediness are really the absence of God or love, then the presence of God or love will fulfill the lack and remove the need. Or in essence, you cannot exist without God. You need nothing when you have everything. Open up to receive God's support and all your separate little made-up needs fall away. His light is all that's missing. Without it you ARE in lack. But with it you have the power to live forever.

"He seems to be whatever meets the needs you think you have. But He is not deceived when you perceive your self entrapped in needs you do not have."