In heaven, we’ve had an innocent little idea. We’ve wondered, what it might be like if things weren’t the way they are.
Nothing happens. We just have an idea. Like a daydream. We use our "imagination" to imagine what it MIGHT be like. We visualize it.
As a human, I can similarly take a moment to IMAGINE what it might be like, if I were a different person. I can imagine myself perhaps from a different country, with a different body, a different lifestyle, doing different things. I can imagine it in a fair amount of detail, maybe even imagine sights and sounds and smells and experiences, which seem partly real to some degree.
But my imagining what that might be like, is a far cry from what it would mean to *actually* be another person. When I stop daydreaming, I come back to my senses and remember the obvious fact of who I "actually am". Who I imagined myself to be is simply dropped, like a discarded toy. My body didn’t actually turn into another person from another country. Who I seem to be is not changed at all. I was just having an idea.
When I wake up from my little visualization, it no longer exists. I was just dreaming. Imagining. There are no consequences to "this" reality from my little daydream. Everything in the daydream does not exist and never really did.
The Son of God is having a little dream like this. Except the Son of God’s mind is VERY powerful. It is able to have really, really big ideas. When the Son of God imagines He is not as God created Him, his little fantasy is *extraordinarily* sophisticated. Very, very elaborate.
He dreams of an entire universe, with billions of planets, all kinds of creatures and objects and strange things happening. A massive history of time spanning billions of "years’, and even an illusion of time passing very slowly.
He also dreams of planet Earth, complete with human bodies and plants and animals and mountains and oceans. He does this in such extraordinary detail, with such POWER, that it produces a massive massive dream. A huge visualization.
But remember, this is just an IDEA. He’s having a thought. He is not CREATING it for real, it is entirely him "wondering", exploring the idea, thinking about it, imagining it. This universe "showing up" is HIM THINKING. An idea.. what MIGHT it be like IF I were separate from God. This IDEA contains the entire physical universe and the Earth. It’s a huge idea. Everything that seems to happen is INSIDE that idea.
"Ideas leave not their source" ultimately means that the universe we made (this "world", containing Earth), did not LEAVE the IDEA. Nor did any causes in the dream leak out" and effect reality. Nor did any of that idea of separation *actually happen*. It ONLY IS AN IDEA. A "what if?"
This idea, did not ACTUALLY produce a separation. God is sitting there totally happy and unaffected. The Son of God is just a little bit asleep having this really really big idea. And that’s all. Nothing else is happening! Just an idea.
The entire "universe of separation" is inside of and part of that IDEA. It’s just a dream. A fantasy. Imagination.
There is a MASSIVE difference between, an IDEA of separation being dreamed, and an ACTUAL separation happening in reality. Separation does not happen in reality or in truth, at all. All that happens, is the Son has an idea. And everything he imagines INSIDE that idea, is still just part of the idea. It‘s got nothing to do with reality.
Since we as the Son are dreaming, having an IDEA, we are seeming to currently experience what it’s like INSIDE the idea. And inside the idea, it seems huge and elaborate and convincing. This makes us THINK, that "it is really happening". We even think, we really are a body. We even think, there really is a planet earth!
But the truth is, there is ONLY an idea of a body, there is ONLY an idea of a planet earth, and there is ONLY an idea of being separate from God. A visualization, an imagined image of what it MIGHT BE LIKE, *IF* it were to happen. Not *AS* it happening.
We are mistaken when we believe this idea is in fact HAPPENING. We are mistaken when we believe we are ACTUALLY a body. We are mistaken when we believe that the universe we are IMAGINING, is actually existing. We are mistaken when we think the PLANET EARTH, actually EXISTS.
All of this, is inside of an IDEA. Just a THOUGHT. Not a thought which "DID make something happen". Not a thought which "DID happen in reality". It’s a thought that DID NOT HAPPEN IN REALITY, or TO reality, or outside of the IDEA.
An idea of being separate from God, is NOTHING LIKE *actually* being separate from God. Being actually separate from God is IMPOSSIBLE. Being separate from God HAS NOT HAPPENED AT ALL! The *idea* has had no REAL consequences outside of itself. In other words, the DREAM of what separation *might* be like, did not cause anything to happen OUTSIDE of the dream. It had NO EFFECT on God, no effect on the Son of God, and no effect on reality.
Separation from God is just an idea. "We" as humans are living INSIDE A THOUGHT ABOUT SEPARATENESS! Not inside a real separation. Sin, the idea that we actually DID separate from God "for real" and that separation had "real consequences" on "reality", ie something *leaked out* of the dream/idea and did something IN REALITY. If this were true, God would have been affected, and you as the DREAMER would no longer be as God created you.
For example, in this dream, when something *seems* to happen, we tend to believe something REALLY happened. This is a belief that sin is real - that dreams affect reality. Then we believe there are "real consequences", that something "real" was affected and changed. And this of course produces guilt.
We therefore need to become able to recognize, that whatever seems to "happen" inside this huge IDEA, is not actually happening in REALITY. It is not happening TO reality. Nothing is REALLY happening. Therefore whatever appears to happen "as a sin", is not being done TO reality and has NO REAL CONSEQUENCES. God is not affected in the slightest. Your real self, which is dreaming this whole thing, has not been affected. Your real self, your dreaming self, having an IDEA, is STILL as God created you.
Since sin did not happen IN reality or TO reality, that must mean, that you are only having an innocent idea. Your idea has no reality. Your idea has no consequences. It’s FICTION. Which means, whatever you think you DID, you DID NOT DO IT in reality. You only do it INSIDE AN IDEA. Inside a dream. And it does not leave the dream. God is unaffected.
Which means....... drumroll...... that you are STILL 100% INNOCENT, you HAVE NOT sinned against God, there HAS NOT been a separation, there ARE no consequences, you are NOT guilty, you are STILL as God created you, and your idea is ONLY an idea.
When your dream ends, when you stop having the idea, when you stop imagining that you can be something you can never be, what has happened? Nothing. Just an idea. Just a thought. Just a little daydream where you wondered what separation might be like. You don’t return from a real separation. It was NOT a real separation. It was nothing more than an IDEA. And ideas ARE NOT in any way anything like THE REAL THING.
Your idea is an idea of impossibility. "It is the world you see that is impossible." This "world" is the content of EVERYTHING inside the idea. An entire universe of fantasy separation. That includes the entire planet Earth, the sun, the moon, and the whole rest of this universe. This is the world you MADE UP. You did not create it. You did not make it ACTUALLY EXIST. You just dreamed of it.
This means, even the Earth, the sun, the galaxy, the universe, all bodies, all physical forms, all creatures here, the oceans and mountains, has never ACTUALLY existed in REALITY. It has only seemed to exist inside an IDEA. A dream. A fictional fairytale. An imaginative visualization of something impossible seeming possible.
So when the Course says, "there is no world", it is saying, this entire "world" - dream existence - that we thought about for an instant, and never actually created, DOES NOT REALLY EXIST. This world, including earth, does not exist. It does not exist IN REALITY. Dreams do not exist in reality. Sin does not exist in reality. "The Earth" does not exist in reality. This whole physical universe does not exist in reality.
Were just having a little idea. That’s all. The idea has no real effects. Having the idea doesn’t create the thing we’re having an idea about. The world we made-up is a figment of our imagination. It’s not there!
There is nothing in, or about, the Earth, which will ever be a part of reality. It is made of thought. IT’s an idea. And this tiny mad idea was over the instant it seemed to be thought. It’s already over. The thought of limitation has been limited. The idea of an end has ended. Not a single note in heaven’s song has been missed.
The really key thing to realize is, AT NO TIME did Heaven stop being Heaven. At no time did you stop being as God created you. At no time did God change. Your inncence was NEVER affected. You did not sin, requiring you to have to undo the sin. There is no sin. There is no death. There is no world. Your real self, did not stop being real. Even when you had this little idea, your true self did not change even slightly. It is as God created it RIGHT NOW, always has been, and always will be. Just because you are having a MAD LITTLE IDEA, doesn’t change anything real AT ALL.
When you dream at night of all manner of strange things happening, perhaps that you have a terrible disease and people are chasing you down a dark alley, you wake up the next day.... where is the terrible disease? Did it leak out of the dream and affect your body? Not at all. Where are the figures who seemed to chase you? They are nowhere to be found. They were fiction. A dream. NOT REAL. Not happening. Nothing. Just a temporary idea, which seemed convincing from inside it, but was utterly unconvincing from outside of it.
You are just inside a dream. IT’s not happening. There is no earth. There are no bodies. There is no death. The son of God is FREE! Separation has not happened. There is no sin. You simply had a little idea, and it is already over.
An idea of something happening is not the same as something happening. Nothing has happened. There is no world. Accepting this is the atonement. Stop dreaming. Wake up.
Such defenses are put in place on purpose. They are chosen. They have a purpose, to fulfill a perceived need. They have a function - a task that they are to perform in order to achieve a goal.
The goal of sickness is to defend you or protect you or counter-attack against something you have perceived which seems to threaten your existence. Isn't it strange that a retaliation against a perceived threat damages you?
Sickness is not just some thing that happens. It is a device, a deliberate mechanism or tool that you use for a specific purpose. Like a bandaid, you use it to help your little wounds to heal. Or a screwdriver, you use it to help screw screws into wood. Sickness helps you to be protected against what you perceive as an attack.
Sickness implements separation. It pushes away the attacker and creates a gap or distance between you, so that you feel a sense of perceived safety. You want to put distance between you and the threat. Or put up a really solid wall that blocks them. These blocks are blocks to awareness.
The result is what expresses as a materialization of physical form in a distorted configuration, which is what we usually refer to as "sickness", illness or disease. The mind is literally warping the body to try to turn it into a defense mechanism.
The ONLY purpose of sickness is to defend you. This is the only reason why you want it. And it is the reason why you really have an actual desire to keep it. If you were to remove the defense, and if the attacker is still present without having changed at all, then you will be in danger.
You will also go to great lengths to build an entire fictional story around the symptoms of sickness explaining and justifying why the sickness ITSELF is the problem that you want to get rid of, in order to DENY that you really want to KEEP it, because to truly get rid of it would expose you to your enemy. We will make a lot of noise about the unfairness of the sickness and about how we did not ask for it, in order to HIDE the fact that we did ask for it on purpose and we are the ones who put it in place. To admit that would threaten to undo it, which goes against the entire point of us creating the sickness in the first place.
You do not want to remove your defense because of this. It is creating an illusion of safety and protection, further covered-up by layer upon layer of denial and displacement of what the real problem is. Unfortunately, all defenses are attacks and your own defenses are attacking you as much as the other. Construct a razor-wire fence and you better be careful not to touch it!
The only purpose of that defense is to block a threat. You must look at what it is that you believe is a threat. Typically it is anything which your ego perception mis-perceives as the opposite or undoing of itself. Your sense of identity is at stake. Any suggestion of "truth" which implies that the ego does not exist, will threaten "you" when you are identified as the ego.
Your false beliefs are your artificial identity which you believe are the truth. You want to protect that truth as though your life depends on it. You see its opposite as false, evil, and an attack. So long as you remain loyal to those misperceptions you will defend them, even if doing so requires you to implement defenses which attack you as much as anyone else. All defenses are double-eged swords and you cannot escape their toxicity and potency.
What must be truly undone before you will be willing to let down your defenses, is to learn to accept the truth as it is and not as it appears to be when seen through the ego. This will have to mean that your sense of identity is mistaken and must be set free. It must shift from "I am this ego thing" to "I am holy and innocent". Forgiveness must happen of yourself, and healing must take place in terms of how you see yourself or who or what you regard yourself as.
You need to find a willingness to be open to being mistaken about who you thought you were, and what you thought was true, so that you can allow the truth to save you from this illusion. The truth will show you a new identity and reveal the truth about you. This will reveal how the ego is in fact the thing which is false, and that it is not who you are.
If you can accept the truth as helpful and welcome instead of as a threat to your existence, you will see no NEED to defend yourself against it. You will not see attack in it, having not attacked. You will see no justification for trying to prevent it or reject it. You will accept it and allow it to be in you. You will invite it in and it will be your Identity.
At this point you will be WILLING to accept that your device of defense and separation is no longer needed. It's function is irrelevant. The sickness was ONLY serving your purpose of trying to protect your "self". You no longer need this protection because who and what you are is not being threatened by the truth but is in agreement with it. The truth is your friend. You can now let down your defenses.
This means, you will now admit that the sickness only came into being because you put it there, wanted it, needed it, and it was helping you - or so you thought. You have now been corrected and you now RECOGNIZE that this sickness was just something you used to believe in and no longer do. It is now false. It is not the truth. It is not something you need. You have not purpose for it and you admit that it is just a way of attacking yourself more. You don't want it anymore and don't have any attachment to it.
Illusions recognized as such MUST disappear. All of the symptoms and consequences of that so-called "sickness" must disappear. "He will undo the consequences of my wrong decision if I will let Him" - meaning that your willingness now to admit the truth (allow Holy Spirit access) can and will supernaturally UNDO and make disappear all forms and signs and symptoms and content of sickness. All of the expressions - consequences - of deciding poorly will be undone. Your lack of support or need for the sickness will let it go and it will just vanish.
Properly recognized as completely false, unhelpful, unneeded, unwelcome, pointless, futile, purposeless, meaningless, and utterly useless, the sickness will be recognized as having no reality or truth or validity and this will make it disappear. Literally. All symptoms will go if this is truly deeply accepted.
The sickness was nothing more than a temporary protective device which you wanted and needed. If you don't need it, you WILL drop it. If your will is genuine and you've become really really honest with yourself, that sickness will be undone. And sickness is nothing more than a belief that separation is the answer to God, or that separation can save you from the truth. Undoing sickness heals your mind.
Once the sickness - as mental illness - as belief in separation - AND as symptoms of defense - is gone, THEN you will be at peace. Not before. No-one can be at peace when they are at war with themselves or with the truth. No-one can be at peace who believes sickness is real and must just be accepted. No-one can be at peace who is using death as a defense against the wrath of God. True peace can and must be experienced as complete and total perfect "health" in mind and all the expressions of mind.
If you truly do not believe in separation from the truth, you will have no defenses and you will not exhibit symptoms of sickness. You will walk your walk and not just talk your talk. And you will demonstrate therefore, by example, living example, that you are immortal and invulnerable because you do not believe in separation or sickness and they are not real. You will thus teach others that sickness is not the truth and the truth needs no defense. If signs of sickness remain, you are teaching the exact opposite because, in all honesty, you have not completely undone your belief in separation.
Sickness must go. Disease must be healed. Death must be undone. Resurrection is the only truth. If you are sick you are attacking yourself, everyone else, and God. A guiltless mind cannot suffer, and a guiltless mind exhibits no symptoms of sickness or damage. A broken body is a sign that the mind has not been healed. Complete healing is not only possible but necessary. You must teach that nothing has happened to you and you can't do that intellectually. You must show it and act like it.
To accept the Atonement is to accept that God's truth is the truth. It also means accepting that nothing else is true.
Jesus demonstrates this when He speaks of His own state of Atonement:
"There is nothing about me that you cannot attain. I have nothing that does not come from God. The difference between us now is that I have nothing else. This leaves me in a state which is only potential in you."
We would be perfectly willing to accept God's truth, IF we did not believe that something else is true. We have been listening to another "voice", the voice of the ego (untruth) rather than the Voice of God (truth).
If we believe the ego has some truth to it, it means we agree with it. We will defend it, protect it, want to keep it, and will shield it from God. We'll use it as justification for "why" we believe we cannot accept God's truth as true. This literally makes us perceive that God's truth is NOT true.
This is the meaning of "He who would not forgive MUST judge to justify his failure to forgive." We are busy justifying WHY we cannot accept atonement/forgiveness, in order to keep and protect the ego that we believe is sacred and true and worthy of us.
No-one in their right mind would want to accept something they believe is not the truth. No-one would want anything to do with something they regard as "false". The ego attributes all qualities of falseness to God, including perceiving Him as evil, as a threat, as an attacker, and as willing that we be dead. That's quite a lot of false belief to "reverse" - thought reversal - if we are to become genuinely WILLING to want to be with God.
An unwillingness to accept God's truth comes solely from a willingness to accept the ego's truth. Another way the Course puts this is in terms of faith. We have "faith" in the ego, we have come to TRUST it, we think it is helping us, protecting us, defending us, acting in our best interests, and is "working" for us. We think we WANT what it is offering. This is because we do not RECOGNIZE the ways that the ego is deceptive, a lie, a form of attack, self defeating, suicidal and fixated on death.
When we believe the ego is the truth, we literally become "blind" to the truth, and incapable of discerning that God's truth is true. We see falseness IN it, because there is falseness in our perception. We see reflected in God our own "evil" content, thinking it is his.
For example, whenever we misperceive the truth through the ego, we see it as attacking us, we put up a defense, which implements blocks to life, which produces sickness and death. This production of sickness is an attempt to "save our life" by protecting us from life. This is obviously insane. The ego's efforts to "help" us is actually an attempt to deceive us, to trick us into hurting ourselves "in the name of" helping ourselves. In other words, the ego's advice produces the opposite result from what it promises.
While we believe the ego has truth to it, we will not be WILLING to accept the atonement. In fact we'll not be able. We can't ACCEPT it, to really deeply abide in it and feel it and welcome it and want it and admit its truth and ALLOW IT to love us. That's because we have allegiance to the ego and "want" what it is offering instead. AND YOU CAN'T HAVE BOTH! You have to choose. This valuing of the ego's offering produces DOUBT. Being in two minds, or even entirely in ego, will make us very uncertain about whether the truth even IS true, and whether we even DO want it.
Failure to discern what IS true, and what IS false, forms the basis of this confusion, which makes us unwilling and unable to accept it. No-one wants to accept what they think will destroy them. It's just that, believing the ego we will believe GOD is the one who is going to destroy us, and the ego is our savior. It simply "makes sense" to us not to accept God's version of events, because His truth does not "make sense" when the ego perceives it.
If we believe there is really death, really punishment, really fear, really victimhood, really guilt, really sin, really separation, really sickness, really suffering, we will not be WILLING to accept the atonement. The atonement says the exact opposite is true. This means we WILL have to become willing to RECOGNIZE all of these illusions for what they ARE, how we are using them to support the ego, and how they are not TRUE or real.
So we are going to have to systematically let go of all belief that there is such a thing as real sickness, real death, real sin, real guilt, real fear, real suffering, real victims, etc. To do this, we will have to be a LITTLE WILLING to believe that the ego beliefs do NOT contain truth, they in fact are FALSE, and something else is MORE TRUE. If any of this ego stuff - illusions appearing to be real - is within our perception, i.e. within our attitude or beliefs about ourselves, it has to GO, BEFORE we will genuinely, deeply, feel WILLING and READY to accept the truth of God.
Each time that we are attempting to perform a "forgiveness", i.e. we're upset and suffering in some way and we want to get back to the truth, to apply the Course principles and heal ourselves, it's going to have to entail the UNDOING OF FALSE BELIEFS. i.e. the undoing of listening to the ego's interpretation, stopping listening to its voice, stopping believing its bullshit is true, discerning HOW and WHY it is not true, and RECOGNIZING the illusions - i.e. the lies - that you are perpetuating. This can take tremendous radical HONESTY. Honesty admits the truth - allows the truth to enter.
Applying forgiveness SHOULD also therefore mean, that you start with wherever you're at, with whatever you are experiencing now, and you need to transition from there ALL THE WAY TO THE ATONEMENT. If you do not go all the way, if you stop short and keep some beliefs, you will not "complete" the forgiveness because you're not getting to the point where you FULLY ACCEPT the truth and FULLY LET GO of the ego.
While over time you generally will move gradually towards truth, on the whole, you actually can take yourself ALL the way to the atonement at any time, on a SPECIFIC topic. For example if you have issues with a parent or a coworker or something, some belief that is getting triggered... to FULLY forgive that issue, or at least a big chunk of it, you need to look at the beliefs involved and undo them, ALL the way until you get to "sin did not happen in reality, there is no sin at all, therefore I'm still innocent".
Taking back a projection, for example, is only a FIRST STEP in forgiving. It only means then that you recognize some measure of responsibility, that it's actually "about you" and not "about" another person. That's a vital step, and taking of responsibility is essential to any application of forgiveness. But that's not the end of the story.
The problem is, even if you can recognize it's not about other people, you may still believe you are afraid, you are guilty, and you are sinful. These beliefs have to be uncovered as well. Part of the problem is, there are various stages of separation: sin > guilt > fear > punishment > death and each stage entails a shitload of DENIAL. That denial makes content in your mind UNCONSCIOUS. That means you don't even REALIZE that you have this stuff in your mind somewhere, buried, behind a wall of illusions.
So if all you do is take back a projection and then sit with it and don't really realize how you have unconscious guilt lurking in your mind, which your state of victimhood was made to cover up and distract away from, you may not even get to the stage of becoming AWARE of that guilt, to undo it. And even if you get to where you are undoing the guilt, you may not even be aware - there is such a things as UNCONSCIOUS SIN. That has to be undone as well. Only when all of these layers of DENIAL in the mind are undone, ONLY then will you find yourself actually WILLING and able and ready to wholeheartedly ACCEPT that the Atonement is true. That is the point where forgiveness is COMPLETE.
You can do this on any given topic. It doesn't have to just be the overall whole issue of separation. Every time you forgive all the way to the atonement you receive a miracle, and then can offer it. Every time you make a genuine effort to becoming WILLING to accept the truth - your innocence, that literally nothing happened in reality - your mind gets healed one more giant leap towards God. As much as you can accept at the time. This will have PROFOUND healing effects on your perception.
There was a woman that I couldn't stand, a social worker, who had poor sense of boundaries and was always overstepping her role. I had fear about seeing her, anger about her behavior and various other upsets. I thought she was the problem. Later I became willing to see how I was actually seeing some unhealed stuff about ANOTHER person, in this person. I applied forgiveness through various steps and went all the way to atonement on this issue about that person. This was a strong healing.
Later, when I saw this woman again, my entire perception of her was so different. She seemed like a completely different person, as though I'd never seen her before. I had no reaction to her and saw no "sin" in her. She didn't seem to bother me and I knew that I'd been accusing her of something that I thought someone else was guilty of, but which *I* was guilty of. The interesting thing is, when you lift off of other people your own sin, it doesn't necessarily make that person disappear. Instead, you see them more clearly for what is there, and what is theirs. It's interesting then how their OWN call for love suddenly becomes obvious, distinct from anything going on in yourself.
Anyway. I have many other examples where when I've gone all the way to really thoroughly undoing false beliefs and accepting God's truth, it's healed my mind in a major way and really cleared up my perception. It has allowed me to see "truth" where once I saw a distortion. Or rather, to see correctly and accurately where I once only saw what I wanted to see.
If you have been forgiving in some way but not going ALL the way to atonement, I recommend giving it a try. Even if it's on just one small topic. Forgiveness is only complete when you recognize there literally has not been a "real sin" in reality, that whatever it was only took place in a dream, and therefore has had no real effects.
Atonement DOES cure everything. There was an accident that happened years ago where I hurt someone. It produced tremendous guilt. A lot of things happened because of it including a major depression, ostracision from society and various other nightmares. I healed a lot of it over the years and rationalized in various ways why it was ok or not ok or whatever. But I could never QUITE really let go of it. That is, until I went to the atonement with it.
Going to the atonement on this, I FINALLY got to the point of realizing that what I thought happened DID NOT HAPPEN in reality. It only happened as part of a dream. All of my other healing efforts had been to somehow justify "what happened" or to explain "why" it was ok. That never healed me fully. I had to undo the belief it happened AT ALL. When I finally could accept and SEE and RECOGNIZE that it is TRUE, and makes sense, that I REALLY DID NOT DO ANYTHING, and nothing real can be threatened, I could actually willingly ACCEPT that God's truth is true. I could ACCEPT how God sees me. I could ACCEPT that I must still be innocent. And then there were tears of joy at FINALLY being able to LET GO of this "sin" and RECEIVE GOD's LOVE!
Only atonement can be said to cure. Miracles express from the atonement.
A desire to affirm what is true or spiritual or more positive, can actually be a form of denial.
What you are actually doing is you are trying to make the bad stuff go away, not by its proper undoing, but by glossing over it, replacing it, trying to create an illusion of peace or happiness, or trying to attack it with images of something you prefer.
Years ago this was my only strategy to deal with long-term unhappiness - to try to pull myself out of the mud temporarily and yearn toward the light and try to be positive and look on the bright side and act as if it wasn't there. And then it pulled me right back into it, because I was being a spiritual ego. I was in denial and using denial to try to make stuff go away rather than dealing with it.
So if you are thinking that you just need to repeat what the Course says, or say your favorite quotes, or use certain magical phrases, in an attempt to "deal with" the problem, what you are doing isn't so much correctional as it is a reaction and a way to try to make the bad stuff go away.
It is not our job to make bad stuff go away. This was an ego strategy and it is the ego's attempt at being spiritual. It will try to cover up bad stuff with a glossy surface layer, painting pretty pictures and having positive thoughts and trying to strive towards a happy-go-lucky attitude, all the while keeping depression and self hatred and thoughts of suicide buried underneath.
Dark shit is not healed this way. It doesn't go away, it merely goes out of awareness. The ego's strategy for dealing with anything has always been to make stuff go out of awareness, in an attempt to create the illusion that it no longer exists. This is how it "got rid of God". This is how it denied sin and covered it up with fake guilt instead of undoing it.
This is how it turns guilt into fear and fear into punishment and punishment into death. It uses a form of denial and replaces it with something which looks, on the surface, to be something initially better or more promising or which creates an illusion of things having improved.
But all this does is KEEP the underlying belief, does not correct anything, and in fact makes things worse, because now you have a solid belief in sin covered over with a nice layer of fake innocence, so now you have two layers of problems.
Don't think that denial only looks like denial. Denial takes on whatever form is necessary in order TO deny the truth, and so it is always deceptive in its appearance. It can look like salvation. It can look like peace and light. It can look like becoming more spiritual or being happier. It is the ego's coping mechanism for trying to "deal with" the underling problem in a way which DOES NOT REALLY WORK, but which SEEMS to work.
So if you are trying to combat the bad stuff with quotes and sayings and phrases as if to say these things is getting your mind to believe them more, you are not really directly tackling the problem. You are not looking at the problem squarely and asking yourself, is this even true? Is it even real? Why am I even believing this in the first place? Just assuming it is true and then using denial to make it go away, does not work. At all. Ever.
We come to the course with the ego, and that means we come to it with the ego fully functional in its efforts to cope with life and to manage what it thinks are problems. Its mechanisms for doing this need to be uprooted. If you have always tried to be light and positive and happy while burying your belief in sin and guilt, then you're going to be in for a surprise when someday that 'body of pain' erupts in your mind and cannot be ignored.
When something happens or someone seems to upset us or something goes wrong, if our response to this is to quote course at it or try to be positive or to "see it a different way" (ie see only the good in it, even though we still believe it's happening), then we are using the ego to do the course and are in denial.
Denying what we've already made real does not undo it and this is not forgiveness. Forgiveness is willing to look directly at the dark shit, with truth and light, and examining what it is made of, where it came from, whether there is any real truth or reality to it, and upon recognizing that it is FALSE, letting it go, rather than hiding it.
If your bath is overflowing and there is water all over the floor and it's starting to leak through the floorboards and go all over the place, the solution is not to fetch a magical mop and bucket or to throw down some towels to soak up the water, or to just shut the door and deal with it later. It's to turn off the fricking tap! The problem must be addressed at its CAUSE, its SOURCE, not in terms of its effects or things further down the line.
This is why we have to QUESTION EVERY ASSUMPTION about the ego or about what's seeming to happen. To question even whether it is even really happening at all. To question whether sin is even POSSIBLE, yet alone whether someone sinned. Accepting anything of the ego as a "given" is a mistake, and all of the reactionary band-aids that you use to try to cope with the "effects" of those "real causes" are not going to work. The only thing that will work is to correct the problem at its source by learning to recognize what it is and what it is not.
When Jesus says that nothing can happen without our consent, and that nobody can die without their own consent, what he's saying seems pretty extreme.
We are so used to living in such a way that we constantly believe things happen by accident, or that something can "go wrong", or that there is unfairness and injustice, or that victims have nothing to do with asking to be victimized, or that war is a haphazard chaos.
Yes these are very common perceptions and this is what we're up against, these beliefs and ways of perceiving which fall for all kinds of illusions and trickery. On the surface it definitely appears that all of these things are true, that nobody wants to be victimized, that bad stuff just happens, that things go wrong, and that we don't want to die.
But that's the challenge, you see. That's the spiritual challenge, because what many do not know is that this entire world is a big trick, a set up, orchestrated by those to whom nothing happens by mistake, and who have such power of creation that if they so choose it, it will happen, and nothing else will happen. I know this sounds like some kind of 'God' pulling the strings. But in truth you are God-like.
So all these beliefs about having not chosen, about not having freedom, about being affected, about stuff happening that we don't want, and about the horrible idea that death is just going to happen to you against your will, ALL of these have to be questioned and undone completely. Because they are all false. They are all lies, that everyone is falling for 24/7. Yet as Jesus says in ACIM, you made sickness and death and you can abolish both.
This is why A Course in Miracles is so radical. The Truth flies in the face of how everything appears in this world. It goes against how everything is set up and how everything was deliberately designed to look like it proved we did not choose this. This entire world is a cover-up in which the Son of God is pretending to hide from a made-up enemy, and He very much is responsible for animating every single character and event in this dream regardless of whether He appears to suffer at His own hand.
Attempting to 'wake up' from the illusion of this world does not seem to be easy. It's a huge mind-fuck. As the Course says, we do not escape this illusion through death, but by TRUTH. Only the real Truth can set you free. And as a certain movie says, "you can't handle the truth".
Well, you can handle it... when you're ready to accept it. Because it's a pretty huge Truth that is not at all like what this world seems to suggest is true. And to go there, to be open to it, seems like a huge journey somewhat 'against' the world. But everyone is making this journey, and sooner or later everyone will come to realize what the Truth really is, and this entire universe will disappear.
Sometimes when an old hurt is coming out, you'll start to project it onto someone else. It's kind of as if you switch on a movie projector, you fetch an old tape from your vault, load it up and press play. The movie starts to project and you start to see it and experience it. Except now it's mapped onto other people who probably were totally unrelated to causing it, which starts to make it seem like they are causing it.
As you project, you are kind of hurling the pain at someone else. Whatever the issue is, let's say you are angry at someone for how they treated you or that they acted a certain way that was hurtful. As this hurt comes up in your mind, it will find a target and project toward it. It actually tries to turn that person INTO the person that you are upset about, and you start interpreting their actions as though they're doing exactly what that person did.
And as you do this projecting, it's kind of like you are judging, condemning and attacking the person with this stuff. You're trying to turn them into this stuff, to fill the role. And for most people this actually influences them and may cause them to start acting in a way that fits the 'role' that you are projecting. And this makes it even more plausible that all of this upset is because of them.
In the midst of such hallucinations you can really get to believing that this person is doing this to you, and at the same time you are feeling the old hurt, and putting two and two together you think its because of them. But what's really happening is the person is just triggering your old hurt and you're not really dealing with it.
Whatever the person seems to be doing, it likely is similar to what someone else did in your past. Form-wise it may not be similar at all. It could be that the person has the same attitude, or reminds you of how someone was a certain way when around you, even though their physical behavior and appearance may be different. The psychological 'content' seems to match and this creates a connection.
In this state of semi-consciousness it's pretty hard to realize that this is what is going on, especially when you're convinced it's all to do with this other person. But what you're feeling is your own stuff, for which you are responsible, and this projection is just hurting the other person. You are accusing them of what you believe someone else did to you so that you have a way to scapegoat the energy and seem to get it out of your mind. Which doesn't work.
The only way is to realize that you are triggered, you are reacting, you are re-experiencing old stuff, it's nothing to do with anyone else, and you need to own it and heal it. Taking the burden off the shoulders of the other person is a good start.
Often when I'm in the middle of some kind of upset, or a pain, or a sickness, or a struggle with someone or whatever, Jesus or Holy Spirit will simply say "its a lesson".
When they say this, they aren't saying "its a punishment", even though that's what I'm interpreting it as - some kind of unfair treatment. By saying its a lesson, it lets me know I have something to learn.
But it also lets me know, that this isn't something that they're trying to hide from me. They're not being assholes and concealing the answer to the lesson. It's totally available, and I'm aware somehow that the only reason I'm having the lesson is because *I* need to change in some way. There's something about my perception that is faulty, or something is unforgiven, or some healing is needed.
At the same time, I get this feeling like, there is a prize... a gift... there's something valuable that is 'mine' but its hidden from me, like a buried treasure or something. I can have it, and there's nothing stopping me from having it, other than that I need to learn the lesson. It's not a lesson in punishment or how I need to suffer. So then this makes it feel more like a challenge.
Also knowing it's a lesson helps me to not see it as 'against me' or 'unwanted' like I was before. If its just a lesson then things are happening for a reason, and there's just something I don't accept or don't realize/recognize yet. This sort of makes it almost an exciting challenge to find out what it is that I'm not 'getting' yet. This then sends me on a journey of discovery to look within and investigate what's really going on here. It's a call to do some radical honesty and inquire within.
And actually it's not like Jesus or Holy Spirit are mean school teachers who put up walls or reprimand you or anything. They are actually willing to HELP, with the lesson. But it entails a certain amount of willingness on my part. I can even ask them for guidance and they can provide some.. sort of like clues... because they don't often just outright reveal the 'answer' or solution or truth. But they're there to help as much as I'm willing to learn. Ultimately, how quickly I learn the lesson is up to me.
See we each have our own curriculum and like ACIM says, we get to decide when to learn - ie we can delay or be willing - but we don't necessarily set what the curriculum contains. And usually when lessons come along they are always unwanted at first. That's why they happen, lol. But they're there to help. They're nudges toward God. So if something seems to have gone wrong I need to become willing to at least accept that this is trying to help me somehow, and that I need to open up to something because I've made some mistakes. I need to learn the lesson. It's not there to torture me but to free me. My mighty companions just want the best for me.
Thanks Jesus/Holy Spirit.
There's the truth, and then there's trying to decide on your own what the truth is.
The truth really can only be surrendered to and accepted, not made.
In your attempt to learn the truth, you will divert away from the truth and try to interpret it your way. Your version of it will pass for what you believe the truth is, because you want to be the one who makes it true.
But the truth is stone-cold factual. Verbatim. As is. We don't get to manipulate it or change it.
We knew before the separation that the truth could not be changed. The separation was an attempt to DENY that it could not be changed, which would seem to give us the perception that it COULD be changed.
The truth still has not been changed. We are just in denial. Sleeping. Unaware of what it means. Believing it says something else.
It is only our misinterpretation of the truth that has led to the nightmare we're having. The dream of separation, seeming to be real and containing things which seem like truth.
We've tried to make true what is inherently impossibly false. We've tried to turn illusions into realities. We've tried to give meaning to the meaningless.
This is the only reason why we are upset and frightened, because we believe there is truth to things which are not true or real.
Thankfully, all of these untrue things are still not true and NEVER will be. All you need is "a little willingness" to surrender to reality.
Your truth has to be given up. You can't keep being a truth-maker. Being a seeker of the truth has turned you into a dreamer about what the truth is. You're trying to find it, which is an attempt to move away from it.
Surrender your willingness to have truth be something other than God Created. Accepting the truth about yourself is healing and life-giving. It is the freedom you've been seeking. It is love.
Truth is the Word of God, and it is permanent.
Your natural condition is that you are a powerful, loving, mind-causal, capable, miraculous being, who can do literally anything.
"There is nothing my holiness cannot do."
"There is no order of difficulty in miracles."
That "nothing" is utterly literal and all encompassing. Anything you can possibly imagine you can do, no matter how radical.
When there are blocks to awareness, these blocks are blocks to this natural ability. It is a block to love, a block to power, a block to will. A block to awareness is a form of denial, which is part of a split mind. And a split mind is willing against itself, which cancels out the power of the will because it's now a divided will, working against itself instead of being undivided and unopposed and powerfully causal.
There is a lot of emphasis in ACIM on removing these blocks. In fact, most of the course is aiming towards the removal of the blocks rather than the "teaching of the meaning of love" which it says is impossible. "Love goes out because of what it is, but you are needed that it can begin" speaks to how you need to give back your willingness to love so that you aren't blocking it, but the love and power in you naturally EXPRESSES when it is unblocked.
The thing is, a vast majority of course folk see this emphasis on block removal and think it is the entire course. To the point where they are constantly focusing on "shifting perception", undoing their false beliefs, stopping judgements, etc to try to heal their minds. Which is valid, and we are supposed to be doing that. But the emphasis on this process, which is "the work" that needs to be done one way or another using whatever process, the REASON for doing this work starts to become eclipsed and forgotten and denied.
What happens when the blocks are removed, is that the flood gates are opened and the power of God starts to stream out. The will becomes unopposed, whole and powerful. Thought begins to express causally with the power to make things happen. The blocks are literally like resistances to allowing the power to come out. They are a reluctance to EXPRESS love. When the blocks are removed you NATURALLY become more loving. The lovingness and power are already there underneath or behind the blocks. When the blocks go, the love expresses and you get back in touch with being miraculous, powerful and capable. Capable of moving mountains with your mind.
"Miracles are natural and should be happening all the time. When they don't, something has gone wrong" (awareness is blocked).
"Miracles are everyone's right but purification is necessary first" (block removal - purification - must be done first in order to REVEAL the miracle working power).
So there are really two parts to this. You first remove the blocks by doing "work" (purification)and THEN when the mind is free enough the light is free to shine. The Holy Spirit can extend through the body. Mind can extend to and join with other minds. Separation can be undone and erased. And it is this EXPRESSING (all expressions of love are miraculous) that a vast majority of ACIM students are missing, ignoring, hiding from, even not wanting.
It has resulted in a widespread belief that all you have to do is basically do this work, undo the blocks, and then sit on a cloud in a state of happiness and peace DOING NOTHING. NOT EXPRESSING. NOT BEING MIRACULOUS. It's a very "safe", self-help-ish way of going about it. People think you just need to get rid of these false beliefs and attain a STATE of mind in which you will dwell with no further need to do anything. This state of mind is "miracle mindedness". Right mindedness, true perception, atonement etc. And the course very much DOES focus on attaining that state. And you could say it's a state of acceptance.
But the part that a lot of people are missing, afraid of, avoiding, in denial of etc, is the EXPRESSING. The stuff that happens when the blocks are gone. The fact that you become part of the atonement plan and perform miracles all the time every day. The fact that you now regain the power of the mind and will OVER the body and the world. The fact that you can now move mountains, heal the sick and raise the dead. That you can DO ANYTHING. Even things which BREAK the laws of physics.
"Miracles break all the laws of this world." "What the holy spirit allows you to do is clearly not of this world." "You cannot see the Holy Spirit but you can see his manifestations." "Your mind has the power to make worlds."
This is the aspect which I find very commonly LACKING in a vast majority of teachings and interpretations, especially those that focus on "accepting the world" or "accepting what's happening".
The "going within" and "doing nothing" becomes a trap, which completely ignores the outward expression, miraculous power, ability to heal others, the performing of miracles etc. I just don't see enough people talking about this part of it. The whole REASON for doing "the work" AT ALL is to get the blocks out of the way so that you can perform miracles all over the place! It's not just about you and about your ego becoming peaceful.
It's almost as if people think they have this state of "peaceful non-activity" lurking buried underneath a stockpile of ego stuff, and all you need to do is uncover it and then settle into this peaceful, non-expressive state, where you dwell forever. This is a complete failure to recognize the real NATURE of that peaceful state, the fact that it entails the POWER OF GOD, the fact that it EXTENDS naturally, the fact that it goes out and expresses and HEALS, and the fact that you naturally WANT to share it with everyone and help them to experience this natural state as well. THAT is what the Great Crusade is about.
"The purpose of the Atonement is to restore everything TO you. (That is, to restore the awareness. Later clarification.) You had everything when you were created, just as everyone did." (your natural state isn't just peace and non-action, it's having everything and being able to do everything)
"Having been restored to your original state, you naturally become part of the Atonement yourself." (you accept the atonement NOT to ignore everyone, but to become PART OF A LARGER PLAN TO HELP OTHER INDIVIDUALS).
"You now share MY inability to tolerate the lack of love in yourself ***and in everyone else***, and MUST join the GREAT CRUSADE to correct it. The slogan for this Crusade is "Listen, Learn, and DO." (this is not voluntary, Jesus says you MUST help others)
"This means: Listen to MY Voice, Learn to undo the error, and DO something to correct it. The first two are not enough. The real members of MY party are ACTIVE workers." (It is not ENOUGH to not "do something"! You must ACT in the world).
I cannot comment on whether particular teachers are doing this or not. Maybe some teachers are in support of this also but often it sounds not to be the case. Many avoid the supernatural aspect of the course. There is a lot of fear surrounding the power of the mind.
"It is hard to recognize that thought and belief combine into a power-surge that can literally move mountains. It appears at first glance that to believe such power about yourself is merely arrogant, but that is not the real reason why you don't believe it. People prefer to believe that their thoughts cannot exert real control because they are literally AFRAID of them. "
I just want to make sure we're not JUST focusing on purification/work, we're also clearly focused on what is NATURAL to us, the expression of the power of love and the willingness to help others. It's not just about attaining miracle mindedness, it's about MIRACLE WORKING. And you don't even BEGIN to perform miracles until AFTER a large amount of blocks to awareness have already been removed. Until love can express, you are not miraculous. But when the blocks are gone, you ARE miraculous. And now you can be OF SERVICE TO OTHERS.
When you contrast what is true in God's reality, versus what seems to be true or possible in this world, you will find a great discrepancy. A HUGE contradiction.
In God's truth, nothing real can be threatened. God is permanence. He is absolute factual reality. He is changeless and can never be destroyed. He is purely creative and constructive and totally devoid of suffering. And he can never die. Anything he creates MUST share all of these attributes, because they are extensions of his own nature and kind.
Then look to the physical world you are familiar with. Look at the fact that there is death happening. There are leaves falling from the trees and rotting. Someone's dog just got run over by a car. People are being shot. There are graveyards filled with decaying bodies. You can go there and look at the graves for yourself. You can go visit a morgue perhaps and see death in the flesh.
However, if God's reality is TRUE, and always true, as it must be to BE true, how is it POSSIBLE that there is death or attack of any kind? Can it BE true, that there is attack and death and murder in any form at all, if God's reality is that REAL THINGS are unattackable? How is it possible that you can look at a dead body? How is it possible that you can see leaves falling from trees? How is it possible that you can attack someone's body or be attacked by another?
It cannot both be true, that attack is impossible, and that attack is possible. There is no sense or sanity in that. ONLY ONE of them can be true. When it is blatantly obvious that everything in heaven is utterly immortal, invulnerable, eternal, permanent, and completely incapable of being changed by anyone against God's will. .... what then are the implications of that for the things which appear to COMPLETELY CONTRADICT that truth?
If you hold in your mind the FACT that in reality nothing real can ever be threatened or harmed or made to suffer or die, and then you quickly look at this world and see all of that happening ALL AROUND YOU, HOW "on earth" can you justify that IT IS POSSIBLE AT ALL? How can there be ANY TRUTH to this world at all?
Now we're not merely talking here about states of perception. You can be in false perception and believe very strongly that DEATH IS POSSIBLE. Even though this is obviously in TOTAL VIOLATION of God's reality. Death is UTTERLY impossible to God and his Kingdom.
"Nothing can prevail against our united wills, because nothing can prevail against God's."
"NOTHING can prevail against a Son of God who commends his Spirit into the hands of His Father."
"Be confident that your creations are as safe as you are. 12 The Kingdom is perfectly united and perfectly protected, and the ego will not prevail against it."
You can perceive for example that leaves are falling from trees right now. That IS DEATH. The leaves are going through a process of change. They are affected by the weather. They are under attack by the cold. They are PROVING that death is possible.
Then, you can move into what we call true perception. Supposedly this true perception is going to lift away the BELIEF or MEANING that leaves falling from trees "is real death". It's going to lift away the "proof" that falling leaves succeed in violating God's reality. But even if this is so, even if you interpret them to "not mean death", to see THROUGH their illusion of death, to not BUY INTO their death, you should really NOT SEE THEM AT ALL.
Leaves falling from trees IS STILL a process of dying, no matter how you interpret it or what meaning you give to it. A body laying in the ground ROTTING, is still actually "proof of sin". Why isn't the body upright and moving around, symbolizing life? Why does it not have vitality and strength and health? Why does it SYMBOLIZE attack and suffering and decay? No matter HOW you look at it, the body is still in a FORM which represents the idea "attack is possible." EVEN IF you see it from a healed perspective.
"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. Yet they are not deceived by what they see."
True perception merely shows you a reinterpretation of the PROOF OF DEATH, in which the proof is disregarded. You RECOGNIZE that it is NOT REAL. That there CANNOT BE death because of God's truth that death is impossible. You OVERLOOK the death and do not buy into it. You do not BELIEVE in it or give it the meaning of fact, truth, or reality. You WITHDRAW reality from it and take back its seeming power to do anything. And this renders it nothing more than an ILLUSION OF A LIE OF A WORLD. It is the recognition that TRULY, IT IS IMPOSSIBLE.
What is impossible, in truth, simply CANNOT EXIST. It CANNOT HAPPEN. It CANNOT BE THERE TO SEE. If you see it, if you perceive it, in ANY way, you are seeing somethign which violates God's reality. This is why "you cannot behold the world and know God."
"The world can add nothing to the power and the glory of God and His holy Sons, but it can blind the Sons to the Father if they behold it."
If you behold the world, if it seems to be THERE AT ALL, you are blinded to God. Because in God, the things of this world are NOT POSSIBLE. There are no falling leaves in God. There are no burial sites. There are no mass graves from war. There is no decay or loss or famine or disease. There is no attack or murder or guns or violence. These are NOT POSSIBLE.
So you have to really deeply ask yourself. When it boils down to it, IF IT IS TRUE that in God's truth all forms of attack and death ARE UTTERLY IMPOSSIBLE, that they cannot even show up in ANY WAY, with any interpretation ..... CAN IT BE POSSIBLE that the things you're seeing as "a world", as earth, is even POSSIBLE AT ALL? Can it exist? Can it BE there to be seen? Can it even SEEM to exist? Should it even be HAPPENING?
The honest and sane answer to this is NO. The world CANNOT EXIST if God's reality is true. IMPOSSIBLE THINGS cannot be existing, or happening, or showing up, or being perceived in any manner, if God's reality is true. There cannot be graves or guns or gangs or guilt or regurgitation or garages or gargoyles. There cannot be forms. There cannot be objects. There cannot even be planets. There cannot even be EVENTS of any kind. Because there is no time in God.
"What seems to be the opposite of life is merely sleeping. When the mind elects to be what it is not, and to assume an alien power which it does not have, a foreign state it cannot enter, or a false condition not within its Source, it merely seems to go to sleep a while. ****It dreams of time; an interval in which what seems to happen never has occurred, the changes wrought are substance-less, and all events are nowhere. ****When the mind awakes, it but continues as it always was."
1) What seems to happen has NOT OCCURRED. ("Forgiveness recognizes that what you think your brother did has NOT OCCURRED."
2) The changes wrought are substanceless. ANY KIND OF CHANGE is an illusion. "They can be easily be changed BECAUSE they are illusions." All illusions are changeable, reality is not. Anything which changes IS NOT REAL. They have no real substance or meaning.
3) All events are nowhere. There is no history. There is no time. There is no past and no future. There are no elections, no wars, no celebrations, no tv shows being watched, no food being eaten, no forests burning, no snow melting, no fish swimming in oceans, no people arguing other meaningless piffle, no clouds parting, no sunsets, no puppies and kittens, no icea cream falling on the ground, nothing. NO EVENTS ANYWHERE.
This is because there is no world. That there is no world is the ONLY SANE CONCLUSION you can come to, when you examine that this world is utterly IMPOSSIBLE. Nothing in it can POSSIBLY be happening if God's reality is true. And if you are seeing it happen, if you are believing your eyes, YOU ARE INSANE.
So long as there are graveyards, there is the illusion of something impossible seeming to be possible. Something not true seeming to be true. There CANNOT BE graveyards. Nothing in God can ever die, so what are graveyards for but to try to PROVE that something IMPOSSIBLE is happening? Death is a lie. "There is no death, the son of God is free."
"Without the idea of death there is no world."
What do you WANT to be true? That dying is possible, or that it is not? Your choice. And I am under no laws but God's.
"***Perhaps you think you did not make the world, but came unwillingly to what was made already*** (earth is not objective reality), hardly waiting for your thoughts to give it meaning. Yet in truth you found exactly what you looked for when you came. There is no world apart from what you wish (you wished it into being with wishful thinking), and herein lies your ultimate release. Change but your mind on what you want to see, and all the world must change accordingly.
Ideas leave not their source. This central theme is often stated in the text, and must be borne in mind if you would understand the lesson for today. It is not pride which tells you that you made the world you see, and that it changes as you change your mind. But ***it is pride that argues you have come into a world quite separate from yourself*** (the idea that earth exists objectively and independently from your mode of perception), impervious to what you think, and quite apart from what you chance to think it is.
***There is no world!*** (earth does not exist because IT IS IMPOSSIBLE!) This is the central thought the course attempts to teach. Not everyone is ready to accept it, and each one must go as far as he can let himself be led along the road to truth. He will return and go still farther, or perhaps step back a while and then return again.
But healing is the gift of those who are prepared to learn ***there is no world***, and can accept the lesson now. Their readiness will bring the lesson to them in some form which they can understand and recognize. Some see it suddenly on point of death, and rise to teach it. Others find it in ***experience that is not of this world, which shows them that the world does not exist because what they behold must be the truth, and yet it clearly contradicts the world.*** And some will find it in this course, and in the exercises that we do today."
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in experience that is not of this world, which shows them that the world does not exist because what they behold must be the truth, and yet it clearly contradicts the world.
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