You hear often that 'the world' as a term becomes substituted with terms like "its a dream", "its an illusion", "its not real", "we made it up", "its a projection" etc.

But, this doesn't really grasp what an illusion is. It's not just some word you can replace other words with.

The definition of an illusion is something appearing tobe something it is not, designed to deliberately deceive and block awareness of the truth. It is a device that lies to you and tricks you into believing something that isn't true. But in order to even KNOW that it is an illusion, you have to have enough awareness of what it's like to NOT be deceived by the illusion. You have to be aware of how the illusion works, what it's actually 'doing' to portray an appearance, how it is distracting you, and basically to 'see through it'.

Overlooking illusions is forgiveness. This means being aware of all of the 'tricks' that the illusion attempts to perform, but seeing through them and past them and not being fooled by them. And this is an entirely different state of consciousness and awareness, than to simply stay IN the ego illusion and start labeling it 'illusion'. That's like just switching out the term "planet earth" for "planet illusion". That doesn't really reveal HOW it deceives you.

So the big problem we have is that we do NOT realize how the illusion is an illusion. We do not recognize it AS an illusion. We do not see through it, or past it. We are fooled by it. We are made unconscious by it. It's like being hypnotized or put into an unconscious stupor, in which we take the illusion seriously, at face value, and listen to its appearance as if that is reality. Mistaking an illusion for reality is our only mistake.

Here's an example of an illusion. You are in the dark. The room is unlit. In the room there are objects. One of the objects you touch and it feels really strange and it seems to move as you touch it, and this makes you suddenly afraid that there's maybe a person in the room, and you scream. So you've fallen for the illusion, the impression, that there is something serious and frightening happening. But what happens when you switch the light on, suddenly you have MORE INFORMATION. You are now aware of more parts and pieces that you couldn't even see before, and were not aware of at all. Suddenly you realize that the thing you touched was in fact just a large house plant which you brushed up against, and it's completely safe and not scary at all. You feel relieved, right?

This is what it means to see through the illusion. It means, you have seen the truth, which has revealed to you, by shining a light of increased awareness, ALL of what is present, rather than only a narrow context or portion of what is present. When things are taken out of context they become a nightmare. Meaning becomes distorted. Reality becomes disjointed. We start to hallucinate that things might be happening that aren't really happening. This is how someone experiences insanity - losing touch with the bigger picture and becoming fixated on something whose relationship to real meaning has been distorted and blocked, such that you can no longer tell what anything really is and everything becomes frighteningly animated and motivated by bizarre nonsense forces that you don't understand.

The physical world, in the form that it appears, is an illusion. This does not mean that the physical world of form is being seen 'correctly' and fully, by seeing objects as they are. Or like, you become more aware of how all the objects contain beauty or contain God etc. That isn't seeing through the whole illusion. What you do not realize, because you have forgotten what it means to be NOT DELUDED AT ALL, is that the physical world of forms is, in its entirety, designed to block and distract away from the awareness of the presence of God. Even if you awaken to some 'stage' in which you see God in all things, if you are still seeing forms you are still deluded by the illusion.

"Nothing so blinding as sight of form" - ACIM

"Everything the body's eyes can see is a mistake, an error in perception, a distorted fragment of the whole without the meaning that the whole would give." - ACIM - "T-22.III.4."

Also.. "T-22.III.5. 3 The body's eyes see only form. 4 They cannot see beyond what they were made to see. 5 And they were made to look on error and not see past it. 6 Theirs is indeed a strange perception, for they can see only illusions, unable to look beyond the granite block of sin, and stopping at the outside form of nothing. 7 To this distorted form of vision the outside of everything, the wall that stands between you and the truth, is wholly true. 8 Yet how can sight that stops at nothingness, as if it were a solid wall, see truly? 9 It is held back by form, having been made to guarantee that nothing else but form will be perceived." - ACIM

What you may not realize is, this entire physical universe is a holographic projection, designed SPECIFICALLY and INTENTIONALLY, to distort and block all trace of the nature of God. It is deliberately designed to obfuscate, distort, give an opposite appearance to, and completely make it appear, that God does not exist at all. The form that it takes is DELIBERATELY designed by the ego to show you something that looks nothing like God, has no properties of God, completely diffuses and blocks God's character, and makes you completely BLIND to God. The body's eyes then can only see this form, the appearance of the absence of God, and cannot see past it TO God. The entire physical universe is a DECEPTION!

The way this works is, every 'form', every object, presents to your awareness the idea that all things are different. It presents the idea that all objects are separate from each other, none of them share anything at all including the same space or time, none of them truly are equal or perfectly alike, and all of them are in conflict. Does that sound like a picture of God? No. That's intentional. Form, the form of error, was deliberately made make God not apparent, and to make it seem to your awareness that God does not exist at all anymore. That's the ego's wish. That's why it made this illusion.

So the 'illusion' is, that forms present an image to you which is not the truth, which is extremely deceptive, and which you fall for easily. For example, consider problems. The ego presents to you a specific problem which is usually limited to a handful of forms. It tells you that only these forms are a problem, so you need to solve it. You solve it, but this has no effect on the 50 billion other problems in the world. The ego's solution to problems only seems to apply to a tiny portion of the world, and has no transfer value to other problems.

The ego absolutely hates the idea of it being possible to solve ALL problems with ONE solution - that is the Holy Spirit's attitude. It does not want that at all. So it keeps you focussed on looking at objects as being very DIFFERENT to each other. A dog is not a cat. A car is not a house. An attack by a coworkers is not an attack by a neighbor. The ego makes it all APPEAR different and separate. THAT is how it deceives you. Because in truth, there is only ONE problem and ONLY solution resolves the entirety of it completely.

The abstraction needed to SEE and to RECOGNIZE that all forms are THE SAME THING, the same illusion, takes some significant forgiveness and awakening. Being able to look at all forms and recognize, every single one of the deceptions and temptations that every one of these forms is trying to SHOW me, to try to convince me that they are TRUE, is the SAME LIE, and they are all using the SAME STRATEGY. Ultimately, the entire world is the same ONE illusion, presented by the ONE ego, using ONE set of seemingly diverse and apparently highly fragmented deceptions. Each time that you fall for one of its deceptions and think, hey, yes, this illusion is real and this problem is separate from others, and this object is not one with other objects, and that person is separate from this person etc... that's you FAILING to see through the illusion. That's you FALLING FOR THE TRICK!

So yes, there is a way of seeing, which doesn't just overlook illusions but which is AWARE ONLY OF GOD. There is a way of recognizing everything that is false for what it is - false. There is a way of no longer believing a single thing that any appearance of object or form or separation or expression of fragmentation/multiplicity suggests to you in any way. There is a way of COMPLETELY IGNORING what the senses are shown via external signals. There is a way of absolutely not listening to a single shred of ego consciousness whatsoever. And there is a way of SEEING GOD DIRECTLY AND FULLY. And guess what? God does not look ANYTHING like how the physical world looks, and they have nothing in common at all.

In revelation, the entire world disappears. The entire illusion disappears. All physical objects disappear and are replaced with brilliant bright light and total awareness of love. That is all. This is reality. This is an experience of no illusions. Compare that to the PURPOSE of the world that the ego made, and recognize that forms looks like forms FOR A REASON, and separate objects appear to be separate FOR A REASON, and separate problems appear to be distinct and unique FOR A REASON, and all temptations and deceptions are designed to distract you and lead you into unconsciousness FOR A REASON.

The ego's use of the world is NOT that it is neutral. The ego's use of the world is to create a 'veil', an illusion, a huge TRICK, a distortion of consciousness, a BLOCK to awareness, over your awareness, so that you can no longer fully experience God or recognize His nature. God is the same everywhere. God is in all parts equally. All of God is in every part of God. When you are presented with objects which appears to only contain distinct separate parts in each part and there is no sign of any sharing or oneness whatsoever, in form, THAT is the illusion that there is no God. You have to learn NOT TO BELIEVE YOUR EYES!

This is what illusion means. You have to get out of the illusion to know that it is an illusion. You have to awaken to a greater reality in which you are aware of how God is everywhere, God shares everything, God is in everything fully, all of God is in all parts of existence, there is no separation, and all appearances are a LIE. Lies are not meant to be paid attention to, you are meant to discern that they are lies and not listen to them and not take what they present to you seriously or as though it is even real. Recognize the entire physical universe was made to SHUT OUT GOD, and not just in terms of you having a separate perception OF the world that has errors in it, but that the world ITSELF is an error and has taken on a multitude of forms to completely deceive your comprehension of 'what is'. We fall for this every single day and every time we believe in any kind of differences whatsoever.

There are no forms in God, not even forms that seem like they have God in them. NO FORMS. Complete formlessness. Forms are separation and separation is not real.

Every time we think one thing is not something else. Every time we think one object is not another object. Every time we experience separate problems and separate solutions. Every time we believe that we are separated from other people by bodies. Every time we don't recognize that there is only ONE problem, and only ONE solution is needed once and for all to solve them all, permanently. Every time we fall for this grand illusion and can't find a vantage point in awareness from which we can see 'the whole', the one, we fall for the ego's deception. Truly this world is not just a 'thing' and not just a 'place', it is a mechanism for reality distortion, consciousness obstruction, enforced unconsciousness, fragmentation of mind, and loss of life. This is what we have to see past and not believe what our senses are saying is out there.

"There is no world. This is the central thought the Course would attempt to teach." - ACIM - think about that deeply, the entire physical world is a magic trick aimed at stopping Creation, stopping awareness, and stopping God.

We are immortal Spirit. We are God's creation. We are infinite and unlimited by form. We are equal everywhere. And we are real. And we have no differences. And we are not separate objects. And we are not limited by space or time.

"I cannot see in darkness but in light" - "I am not an illusion but a reality." - ACIM

Holy Spirit's suggestion to take the next step in a healing, was to "cancel".

This means that you cancel, as in undo, your belief that an illusion is a reality. Whatever has been asserted by the ego as true or real, you cancel it. You confirm it is false and delete it from your mind.

So if someone seems to be sick, initially you probably believe that the sickness is real in various ways. You've seen it, heard about the symptoms, know the story, believe in the body, think it's actually happening, give it value, attribute it to various fake causes, etc. All of that needs to be collapsed because it is not God's truth.

So to cancel it, you first need to forgive, i.e. undo the delusions. You need to come to recognize that all of it is an illusion, NOT a reality. There is NOT a real sickness. The person is NOT a victim. The symptoms are NOT real. It is NOT really happening. The story is NOT the proof of how it happened. The explanation for it is NOT the real cause.

Cancel out all those false beliefs. Just reverse them. If they seem true, and if it's not God's truth, it is FALSE. This undoes all of the belief in the reality of the problem in your mind so that you're not SUSTAINING the sickness. Believing the sickness is real, at all, empowers it, fuels it, feeds it, keeps it, protects it, desires it, and chooses it.

So negate, cancel, undo, collapse, disappear, dissolve, make vanish, all of everything about 'it'. Get every single belief about the sickness being real out of yourself and out of your life. Get rid of all beliefs in sickness in yourself and others, let there be no permission for sickness to stay, reject all suggestions by everyone that sickness is real or true or permanent or justified, and do not believe in it.

Cancel the lies in whatever way that seems to be needed to get your mind to a place where you find yourself starting to state the core truths... like, there isn't even a sickness there, the sickness does not exist, there is no sickness, IT IS ALREADY GONE.

As you approach the truth, you are empowering yourself, by undoing those illusions. And you may (should) start to experience a building up of POWER in you. That's the Holy Spirit. Because you're aligning yourself with God's truth, you should start to feel His flow of 'electricity'. Your words are becoming more powerful, they are starting to contain Spirit, and you're expressing a higher vibration of love.

This is kind of like a prayer that ascends up to the truth of the Atonement: there is no real sin, nothing has happened, the sickness cannot exist because God did not create it. Or even, recognizing the sickness was a defense against the Atonement, there is no real NEED for the sickness, therefore the need for it was the problem that caused it, the need is unfounded, therefore the symptoms are unnecessary defenses. Illusions recognized as illusions must disappear.

As you hook yourself up to the truth, plugging your mind into God on one end, out of the other end you can utter miraculous healing words - commands of what MUST be, given God's truth. Dispel illusions, replace them with a higher order, something more symbolic of divine health. Speak LIFE into people. Stop them from constantly reinforcing, repeating, reiterating and compounding the reality of their problems. Someone needs to stop the madness and step in and make a statement of THE REAL TRUTH.

Later, you will then find that because you undid your own illusions about the sickness being real, you will not need to make much effort to defend against ego assertions that the healing didn't work etc... those thoughts mostly will not arise, and if they do you won't believe them. Because you already got done undoing the belief in those truths. This puts you on a much firmer footing for being convinced that, believing, that the healing has been accomplished by God and that the person MUST be healed.

Cancelling the delusions about sickness being real automatically cancels out the foundation for doubt, and doubt defends against miracles.

Think of yourself not as confined to a small body, but think of yourself as, in your natural state, being expansive and the size of the universe. You are omnipresent, you are everywhere and in all things. You share the entirety of existence with all other children of God. You overlap with everyone. You exist in the same space, share all of your being with other beings, and commune intimately in a state of oneness.

What happened to that self, which was a universe-sized fully sharing being, in the separation idea, is you attempted to withdraw from immersion in the whole, you confined yourself, you shrunk down, you limited yourself, you withdrew yourself from the communal experience, and so made yourself show up as an isolated body person.

You became small and little and weak and frail, fenced off from the rest, not wanting to share with anyone, wanting to have something special just to yourself, something exclusive, something that only you have, which makes you different and unique and selfish. Instead of being everywhere you decided to be somewhere, restricted in spacetime to a small tiny spot, around which you defend against the entire universe from entering.

This is what happened in the separation. This is how you took your pre-existing sharing self, and "made it separate". You separated it from its communal experience with other infinite beings, putting yourself in a corner and walling yourself in, in order to keep them out and you in. You did not want to share in them, and you didn't not want them to share in you. This was the purpose of the body idea, a separation device and a wall of flesh around the mind.

This produced what is termed "the separated self" which is a self who used to share with everyone, who now does not want to share at all. This imprisoned self, is still a real self, but has placed itself under limitations. And these limitations are made of illusions, which seem to now substitute for a sense of real, full self, making it seem as though you "made up a self" to replace the fullness of your soul. You made the body, and identified with and as it, in an attempt to isolate and exclude. This is all that happened in the separation. You just became selfish and special and different.

The restoration of your true nature simple entails the willingness to drop the walls, remove the isolation, transcend the body separation device, return to being the size of the universe, re-immerse yourself in creation, rejoin the community of the Sonship, and resume a state of perfectly unselfish sharing. The willingness to let others share you, as much as you share them. Restored to being your natural self as God created you, a self who is equal to all real brothers and who shares everything with everyone.

Once you can see what you were like BEFORE the separation - a limitless universal being who shares everything with every other limitless universal being - the family of God - you can easily contrast this against the position you now find yourself in, and realize that it was the attempt not to share that put yourself into this situation. Where you are now inside a body, everyone else is kept outside, you seem to inhabit it alone, and now no-one shares anything with you inside your little fence. Being kept apart and separated off and unwilling to join, is a lonely and isolating experience.

The walls of separation, the body itself, all physical matter, all illusions, the ego, body identification, forms, the world, all things little, every prison wall which keeps you from sharing and immersing yourself in communion with God and Sonship, which occurs only in Heaven, keeps you from being IN heaven, and keeps you imprisoned. This is why the body cannot contain you who are love, any more than God can enter a body or join you there. You must expand. You must become unlimited. You must return to being an eternal being who is everywhere and sharing with all other eternal beings in an unlimited, open and unselfish way.

"The ego is the idea of selfishness. The soul is the idea of self-fullness."

As far as I grasp it now, our task is to overlook and sort of "gloss over" the various separations of the physical world of form. To be in a state of mind - right mindedness - which is symbolic of the one mind of oneness - which is centred in wholeness and unconditionality, looking out upon the separated world and basically "ignoring" the separations. Not buying into appearances of form or differences or the ways that things seem to be separated off.

The mind in this state doesn't pay much attention to the form that anything takes because it's recognised as not meaning anything different to anything else. The mind here is looking toward Christ, and the physical is only seen sort of indirectly on the side.

Everything about the physical is immediately met with forgiveness, like a deflector shield, which bounces off all illusions and temptations and is dismissed as false and nothing and not important. This is sort of like transcending the illusion while keeping the illusion - still in a dream state (happy dream) but not buying into it. In the world but not of it.

A reflection of heaven is thus seen across the chaos, while the chaos is still there. Sort of like a symbolic state of oneness underlying the forms, but while still keeping the forms. Almost complete transcendence of the world. This is the real world state which doesn't 'contain' physical objects at the transcendental level, but the forgiven world still has them. The seeming formlessness of the real world seems to be lightly covered by the forms of the world, as though a second layer, but the real world isn't the same as the state of heaven.

This would be akin to the old model suggesting that everything in this world is real and yet is unified in a oneness at a deeper level. It's just that the forms are a dream and the underlying oneness is a DREAM of oneness. Then when we go beyond the real world, which is the symbol of forgiveness/face of christ, we enter into heaven proper. This completely takes you out of the world, out of the dream, beyond the real world entirely, and into God's Kingdom.

That's a movement totally out of dreaming and of spacetime and beyond the 'dream of oneness' into what would seem to be practically a whole other dimension - the great and shining circle of God's kingdom.

"This world of light, this circle of brightness, is the real world, where guilt meets with forgiveness. Here, the world OUTSIDE is seen anew, WITHOUT the shadow of guilt upon it."

"Nothing arises but is met with instant and complete forgiveness. Nothing remains an instant, to obscure the sinlessness that shines unchanged, beyond the pitiful attempts of specialness to put it out of mind, where it MUST be, and light the BODY up INSTEAD of it"

"Christ's vision has one law. It does not look upon a body and mistake it for the Son whom God created. It beholds a light beyond the body; an idea beyond what can be touched, a purity undimmed by errors, pitiful mistakes, and fearful thoughts of guilt from dreams of sin. It sees no separation. And it looks on everyone, on every circumstance, all happenings and all events, without the slightest fading of the light it sees."

"You will first DREAM of peace, and THEN awaken to it. Your first exchange of what you made for what, you want is the exchange of nightmares for the happy dreams of love. In these lie your true perceptions, for the Holy Spirit corrects the world of dreams, where ALL perception is. Knowledge needs NO correction. Yet the dreams of love lead UNTO knowledge."

"All this beauty will rise to bless your sight, as you look upon the world with forgiving eyes. For forgiveness literally TRANSFORMS vision, and lets you see the real world, reaching quietly and gently across chaos, and removing all illusions that had twisted your perception, and fixed it on the past. The smallest leaf becomes a thing of wonder, and a blade of grass a sign of God's perfection. From the forgiven world, the Son of God is lifted easily to his home. And there, he knows that he has ALWAYS rested there in peace."

A Course in Miracles, the book, unfortunately does not contain everything there could ever be said on every subject.

It's important to recognize this. Since there is so much "truth" in the book, or conveyed through its words, many people come to believe that truth is ITS FORM. Ie the specific words it uses is the "entire truth".

This is especially because the course is trying to communicate to us "the whole truth", the exact perfect truth, and nothing but the truth. But if we start to think that the words used, the form of the book, and its limitations, constitutes what the whole truth is, we become obsessed over the specific words.

Then there are debates about what the words say with a quote-war erupting, competition between versions and so on. People will say "where did Jesus say that" or "where does the course say that".. and things will allegedly not be "proven" unless you can find specific words which "say it" in a specific form.

Words themselves are not meaning. They are symbols, carriers of meaning, and there are many ways to say the same thing. In the course Jesus does the best He can, but he's working with a language based on limitation. He can only put a certain amount of words into the book and only a certain amount is said on given subjects. But even moreso, the MEANING that he intended is sometimes lost or not seen at all if a person focuses solely on the form of the words.

Meaning is always deeper than the words. If you are a course student who is always trying to find out what the words explicitly say as in, the exact words used, as if this gives you the meaning of the course, then you will become limited right along with those limiting words.

There are parts of the Course which Jesus later "clarified" necessarily, such as in the clarification for terms. He even said some things later in the "notes to helen" about how He made his body disappear, which was not mentioned anywhere else in the course and those who have not read it would likely come to some other conclusions about how the dream is overcome.

Jesus did NOT speak at "great length" on every topic, and some topics he barely even touched on, giving us precious few words representing colossal subjects, such as the definition of very large terms like "world" and what exactly the real world is or is not, and what he exactly means by the world being "translated" into heaven, and so on. Or what he means by a "universe". There are many many areas of the course where we really could've used a Q&A session to really get into the details of these things and become much clearer about them. This lack of clarity results in a lot of debate and arguments and speculation.

It is not possible to make accurate conclusions based on this limited material at times. You can't just point to some quoted piece of text and say, that's what the course says, or means, or teaches. The meaning is beyond the words. And I've seen plenty of people putting their own meaning onto the verbatim quotes and claiming that this is what the quote "clearly says and means". .but it doesn't.

Don't be deceived that the FORM of the course holds all of the truth in it. It is just a set of symbols trying to point to an experience or meaning that runs deeper. Learning what the truth is and what the course really means or intends, requires you to generalize the learning. You have to take something Jesus said over here and something he said over there and make sense of how it fits together. And in that area, you will find a lot of people disagreeing.

At some point we are to leave the course behind and go to God with empty hands. That's because the course itself is a MEANS to get there, not the end. Don't put the course on a pedestal and worship its glorious words or the idol worship of anyone who wrote or edited it. That's not what it is FOR or about. Beware of the FORM.

"Nothing so blinding as sight of form."

What we really need to do is learn the core truth and how to apply it and work with it to produce miracles and healing and awakening. And to develop TRUST in Holy Spirit and Jesus as our teachers and to let go of the ego.

In this passage from "creation and communication", Jesus talks about how God created us as individual beings and minds. There are more than *35* references to multiple sons/minds/creations/individuals in this section alone. These mentions are not metaphors or concepts. Heaven actually DOES contain multiple minds, and each mind is responsible for choosing freely to do God’s will. This is why heave and "non-duality" or "oneness" concepts are a poor fit for the Reality of Creation.

"This communication IS the will of God. Creation and communication are synonymous. God CREATED EVERY MIND by communicating His Mind to it, thus establishing it forever as a channel for the reception of His Mind and Will. Since only BEINGS of a like order can truly communicate. His CREATIONS naturally communicate with Him and communicate like Him. This communication is perfectly abstract, in that its quality is universal in application, and not subject to ANY judgment, ANY exception, or ANY alteration. God made YOU BY this and FOR this. The mind (of a soul) can distort its functions, but it cannot endow itself with those it was not given. That is why the mind cannot totally lose the ability to communicate, even though it may refuse to utilize it on behalf of being. Existence as well as being rests on communication."

"Existence is SPECIFIC in how, what, and with whom communication is worth undertaking. Being is completely without these distinctions. It is a state in which the mind IS in communication with everything that is real, including its OWN SOUL. To whatever extent YOU permit this state to be curtailed, YOU are limiting YOUR sense of your OWN reality, which becomes total only by recognizing ALL reality in the glorious context of its real relationship to YOU. This IS YOUR reality. Do no desecrate it or recoil from it. It is YOUR real home, YOUR real temple, and YOUR REAL SELF."

"God, who encompasses ALL Being, NEVERTHELESS CREATED SEPARATE BEINGS WHO HAVE EVERYTHING INDIVIDUALLY, but who want to share it to increase THEIR joy. Nothing that is real can be increased EXCEPT by sharing it. That is why God Himself created YOU. Divine Abstraction takes joy in application, and that is what creation MEANS. How, what, and to whom are irrelevant, because real creation gives everything since it can only create like itself. Remember that in being, there is no difference between having and being, as there is in existence. In the state of being, the mind gives everything always."

"The Bible repeatedly states that you should praise God. This hardly means that you should tell Him how wonderful He is. He has no ego with which to accept thanks, and no perceptions with which to judge your offerings. But unless you take your part in the creation, His joy is not complete because YOURS is incomplete. And THIS He does know. He knows it in his own Being and ITS EXPERIENCE OF HS SON’S EXPERIENCE. The constant GOING OUT of His love is blocked when HIS CHANNELS are closed, and He IS lonely when the MINDS HE CREATED do not communicate fully with Him."

"God HAS kept your kingdom for you, but He cannot share His joy with you until you know it with your whole mind. Even revelation is not enough, because it is communication FROM God. But it is not enough until it is shared. God does not need revelation returned to Him, which would clearly be impossible, but He DOES want revelation brought to OTHERS. This cannot be done with the actual revelation, because its content cannot be expressed, and it is INTENSELY PERSONAL TO THE MIND WHICH RECEIVES IT. But it can still be returned BY THAT MIND through its attitudes TO OTHER MINDS which the knowledge from the revelation brings.

God is praised whenever ANY MIND learns to be wholly helpful. This is impossible without being wholly harmless, because the two beliefs cannot coexist. The truly helpful (many) are invulnerable, because THEY are NOT protecting THEIR EGOS (individual egos), so that nothing CAN hurt THEM. Their helpfulness IS their praise of God, and He will return their praise of Him, because they are like Him and can rejoice TOGETHER. God goes out to THEM and through THEM, and there is great joy throughout the Kingdom. EVERY MIND THAT IS CHANGED adds to this joy with ITS OWN INDIVIDUAL WILLINGNESS to share in it.

The truly helpful are God’s MIRACLE WORKERS (many), whom I direct until we are ALL UNITED in the joy of the kingdom. I will direct YOU to wherever YOU can be truly helpful, and to WHOEVER can follow my guidance through YOU.

Lesson 14 simply says that God did not create physical things because they are not real. For example.

"God did not create that war, and so it is not real."

"God did not create that airplane crash, and so it is not real."

"God did not create that disaster (specify) so it is not real."

"God did not create that illness (specify with name of person) and so it is not real."

If you notice it says that God did not create an airplane crash. So let's think about that for a moment. It isn't saying that there's an airplane crash that can be looked at with a different kind of perception which somehow sees that God DID create the airplane. It isn't saying that the airplane is REAL. It isn't saying that the airplane has any kind of existence at all.

It's saying literally that there IS NO airplane, and there is NO CRASHED airplane, and the whole thing DOES NOT exist because God DID NOT create it.

While yes in the short term you might have a changed perception which allows you to look upon the airplane crash and not label it as a tragedy, or not think of it with fear, or not regard it as a problem, in some bigger perspective, this still does not change what the lesson is teaching. The lesson is simply teaching that the ENTIRE THING DOES NOT EXIST.

What does that tell you?

It tells you that planet earth, all physical objects, all physical bodies, all matter, all galaxies, the whole contents of space and time, every form of matter, ever shape and object, all of it IS NOT created by God. It does not say that we are merely failing to recognize it as God's creation. It does not say that if you look at it properly you'll see that it is made of God. It does not say that forgiveness will show it to you differently than the ego shows it, although that will happen. But even a true perception of it will NOT change the facts of what the lesson is teaching.

The lesson is teaching you that God does not create airplanes, or crashes, or the potential for crashes, or objects with metal wings, or motorized propellors, or air conditioning units, or oxygen tanks, or any other such physical things. Not even the physical bodies of the pilots or the passengers, or their luggage. NONE OF IT.

The simple lesson is that the whole thing IS NOT REAL. It is NOT THERE. It DOES NOT EXIST.

And on that basis, it is implying clearly and obviously that planet earth does not exist. Not that we're merely mis-perceiving earth, or mis-perceiving something that God DID create. It's telling you that he had absolutely nothing to do with airplanes whatsoever, on any level, in any way. And therefore because these things are not real, they DO NOT exist, have NOT been created, are NOT part of God, and are NOT THERE.

It could have simply gone on to say "God did not create that planet earth and therefore it is not real."

This in turn tells you that there must be some OTHER WORLD which is there, which God did create, some kingdom of God which is like God's nature and DOES NOT contain airplanes that crash or airplanes of any kind. Who needs airplanes when you can be anywhere you want with a thought? Who needs crashes when you are immortal spirit?

It's not merely that we're misperceiving earth, as though there is a real earth beneath our ego projections. There is NO EARTH. It's an entirely un-created, un-real world on all levels and in all ways. And that is where it is part of a second system of thought, secondary to God's system of thought - which is heaven, and which is a kingdom NOT OF THIS WORLD, and NOTHING to do with earth at all.

This should be very simple to understand and accept, and it is statement like this that should tell you one and for all the earth is not only not real and not a creation of God, it does not exist in reality at all. Hence the teaching "there is no world."

This is an absolutely bullet-proof teaching. It is impossible to conclude anything else about it without states of denial and twisting of meanings and distortions of truths.

It should also be obvious that even in a practical sense God did not create airplanes because PEOPLE make them out of piles of parts. And God did not create the parts, or the materials that they're made from. God had nothing to do with it. YOU MADE THIS UP!

The body was made to separate you out from the whole and make you seem like you are DIFFERENT to "others".

If you believe that this "difference" represents your IDENTITY, you are confining yourself to a physical object.

If you also believe that the different appearances of others is "their identity", that it is true of them, and who they are, you are NOT seeing the whole of them. Especially if, having made their APPEARANCE OF DIFFERENCES real, you HAVE attacked them, and yourself.

This does not mean, that you look at a person's body and try to overlook it to some kind of small little self that's hiding inside of it. You are too accustomed to seeing littleness.

You have to realize that you are THE SIZE OF THE UNIVERSE, and so is your brother.

This also means then that if you're not identifying with YOUR body, it's because you recognize that any of the "differences" or "forms" of the body, how it's showing up, MUST be illusions.

Forgiveness, literally does entail, the OVERLOOKING of differences. Overlooking ALL FORMS and bodies and believing that God's Children ARE bodies.

So that means, while you are doing your "forgiveness processes", you need to ultimately get to a mindset that literally is able to in a sense, "ignore" the body or at least not FIXATE on it, but rather look PAST it and not be BLOCKED by it. And the same is true for how you view your brothers.

That means, literally, that since you are an expansive being of light who is larger than this entire universe, which cannot POSSIBLY be housed by a finite form, in order to RECOGNIZE YOURSELF you have to STOP seeing yourself AS being this physical object you call a body.

Seeing your BODY and thinking it is YOUR SELF and that you *recognize yourself* when you see it, or that you shape in and change it and dress it up in order to change YOURSELF or your self image, you are FAILING to recognize yourself and are actually replacing yourself with an illusion.

"The body is NOT attacked, but merely PROPERLY PERCEIVED. It does not limit you, merely because YOU would not have it so. You are not really "lifted out" of it; it cannot CONTAIN you. You go where you would be; GAINING, NOT losing, a sense of self. In these instants of release from physical restrictions, you experience much of what happens in the holy instant; the lifting of the barriers of time and space, the sudden experience of peace and joy, and, above all, the LACK of awareness of the body, and of the questioning WHETHER OR NOT ALL THIS IS POSSIBLE. It IS possible, BECAUSE YOU WANT IT."

The picture I get coming to me is of Jesus who completely, totally, did not believe He was his body. He knew he was PROJECTING IT, but he did not regard it as HIMSELF, nor did He see it as limiting who He is, or SEPARATING HIM OFF from others. This really means that in order not to identify with YOUR body, you have to also not identify OTHER bodies as capable of "confining identity" either. That means not believing in ANY bodies, and therefore reclaiming a sense of the expansiveness of what you really are.

The more that you identify AS or with the body, you are confining yourself to it. When you create sickness, you do so in order TO BIND yourself to the body even more, to make you dwell on it, focus on it, pay attention to it, and escape from THE MIND, so that you can think of yourself as intensely experiencing or being SUBJECT TO *this* form. Doing this is nothing short of attempting to kill the Son of God, by associating his SELF with a physical object, and thus BINDING him to it, and therefore making it possible that through attacking IT, HE is attacked and killed. EVERY DEATH DEMONSTRATES THIS BELIEF.

You are WHOLE, not some little form of a human. You are not little, you are magnificent. When you RESTRICT yourself to "one body", you are trying to kill yourself AND you are trying to separate yourself off from being joined to OTHER MINDS. This act INDUCES sickness and is the sole cause of all sickness, suffering and death. Death doesn't happen "because you are a body". Death happens because you BELIEVE you are a body.

When you are in the ego, you will experience various symptoms. You will:

* Feel afraid, confused, indecisive, uncertain, doubtful.

* Be in a state of questioning, trying to find answers.

* Believing there are multiple possible truths, explanations, diagnoses and possibilities outside of you in the world.

* Trying to find "the correct" possibility from all the possibilities, as if to do so will bring salvation and an answer.

* Feel like something in the world might actually be true, and therefore you are afraid, and can't quite trust the truth.

I often find myself in this state. Once I'm in this state, hallmarked by fear and questioning, I will BELIEVE that I am trying really hard to find an answer. BUT, I will be looking in all the wrong places, looking with the ego, using my separate "abilities" such as the intellect or past experiences, and I will just be going around and around frantic to find "the answer".

I will think that if I look hard enough I will find out what the truth is. But it's going to be one of many possible truths, which is confusing in its own right. So then I think that if I can just "figure out" on my own, know on my own, which one of them is the "real answer", then I will find it and can then get salvation. It never works, because the ego's rule is "seek and do not find", which means to seek passionately, to question everything, to reject all real answers, and to just stay in a state of fear.

When I get like this, there IS no truth out there. There IS no answer that I will find, from an "objective world", which will be "the" truth. But I will be perceiving not only that there IS an objective world, which is real, but that it therefore MUST contain the truth. If the world is real, it automatically has truth in it, so I just need to figure out where it is. Trouble is that NEVER works, because the world is NOT really real, it does NOT really contain any truth, and nothing I figure out about it will undo the FEAR.

Fear is produced BECAUSE I've made the world real. "I am upset because I see something which is not there", i.e. I've made an illusion real, am deluded, and MUST now experience fear because it seems like something UNTRUE has taken on a life of its own. Who wouldn't be afraid if imaginary monsters suddenly seemed real?

In this state of egotism, victimhood, fear, confusion and questioning, I am NOT really making any headway towards salvation. I'm not really getting closer to the answer. I'm actually doing the opposite. It is because I have moved AWAY from the answer, that I am even feeling this experience of "questioning" at all. The experience of questioning is really a state of being answerless, lacking in all certainty, knowing nothing, failing to be at peace, a complete loss of clarity, total victimhood, and is terrifying.

When I get like this, Jesus often now prompts me with a single wise word: "decide".

At first, I do not know what what this means or why the heck it is even relevant in the situation. If I'm stuck in the middle of trying to understand HOW or WHY "something has happened", or how or why "something really is this way", it seems to make no sense as to why deciding something would help, or what the decision even is.

But what I gradually come around to is this. The state that I'm in, as a state of victimhood and ego, is only happening BECAUSE I'm believing that stuff can happen to me against my will, that I have no choice, that I have to put up with whatever this external truth is, and that I need to find out what that "external law" is so that I can do something about it. It's not a decisive state at all. It's a loss of decisiveness. A loss of confidence. A loss of clarity and certainty. In other words, it is FEAR.

To get out of fear, and to get out of the entire game of "what if its this" "what if its that"..... which is all entirely terrifying, you have to SHIFT your perspective to something entirely different. A whole different model for what things are and how stuff happens. You've got to get out of victimhood into EMPOWERMENT. That means:

1) Owning up to you being totally responsible for everything

2) Reclaiming your power, in that whatever you choose will happen, nothing will happen unless you choose it, and therefore whatever you choose WILL BE your experience

3) Realize then that you do not need to defend yourself against illusory threats, because NOTHING IS HAPPENING TO YOU against your will

4) You are decisive, confident, powerful, certain and creative. You can CHOOSE AGAIN. And that means

5) You can choose to align yourself with God's truth, and to make a statement of what the truth IS, instead of attempting to "find out" what the truth is. Thus

6) If you choose NOT to create enemies, fears, disasters, problems, sickness, death, monsters, etc... THEY WILL NOT EXIST and will not be able to do anything to you.

*YOU* HAVE THAT POWER! You get what you ask for! There is no such thing as stuff happening that you did not ask for and do not want!!!!

BE THE TRUTH!

If you think that you will become free of a belief if you can figure out why stuff "really happens", or why someone "really does something", or "why evil is evil" or "why people are sick" etc.... you will not only fail to find a peaceful answer, you will also CREATE THOSE THINGS. This is why in your MASTERY of yourself, you have to come to realize that nothing can happen to you against your will, and that the only thing you've really been doing wrong is believing that something can be true WITHOUT YOU CHOOSING IT.

So when Jesus says decide, he means, flip into a state of confidence and DECIDE whether you believe the ego's truth or God's truth. Which one of these realities will you ALIGN yourself with. Which one of these two truths is going to be TRUE for you and are you going to believe in?

See, you think you have a choice beyond the ego and God. You think there is a third choice. You think that somehow there is 1) God, 2) Ego, 3) Your selective ability to pick and choose what the truth is. You do not have that ability really. You ONLY have the ability to decide which thought system you will BE a part of. If you choose to be part of the ego's thought system, you will choose to believe that everything about the ego is REAL for you. If you choose to be part of God's thought system, you will choose to believe that everything about GOD is REAL for you. And believing one, you will disbelieve in the other. And that IS your protection!

So recognize this. Fear that the ego is true, MUST disappear, IF you choose to believe in God's truth, BECAUSE they are opposite and mutually exclusive. They cannot coexist. If you want to be safe from evil, CHOOSE GOD, SO THAT *YOU* do not create your own evil. YOU are the one who empowers it. YOU are the one who give reality to it. YOU are the one who makes yourself vulnerable by trying to become at peace or saved from a "real threat".

If the ego's world of threats and dangers is real for you, there is NO WAY that you will ever find peace. You simply cannot find salvation, truth, a peaceful answer, a resolution, a cure, a magical description, a satisfactory diagnosis, or any kind of convincing TRUTH if you are CHOOSING to believe the ego is real. Because even if you think that you are in a state of questioning and NOT having a choice, you actually ARE choosing the ego. You are never not choosing.

Choose the ego and you'll believe you have no choice and that you don't want to choose what the ego is offering.

Choose God and you will believe you are free to choose but you only want to choose God after all.

So get out of your ego's attempt to intellectually discover the truth in the world, or explain sickness, or figure out why evil happens, or why someone did something. There is NO TRUTH there. Choose instead to reclaim your POWER OF DECISION, get out of the victimy complete lack of confidence, become decisive, be determined you will MAKE A DECISION about what you believe, and MAKE IT!

I CHOOSE THAT GOD'S TRUTH IS TRUE AND NOTHING ELSE IS TRUE!

THAT is your immortal protection against all illusions, all evil, all suffering, and all death. Going back into fear to "check" if evil is gone simply will make more evil. Going back into fear to "prove" that something is true, will just invalidate the truth again. This is why you must TRUST in God's truth, SURRENDER your belief that the ego's world is real, and become fully committed to the REALITY that God has already decided FOR you.

Choosing for yourself, versus accepting God's decision. That's all.

There are two thought systems based on two entirely different logical reasonings, and it has produced "two worlds." And only one of them is real.

A AND B = Heaven/God's Creation/Reality.

A OR B = Hell/Earth/ego/the world you made/a dream.

The two thought systems are entirely different. They are run on different laws. Heaven is one thought system. Earth and this universe is another.

The two thought systems produce entirely different consequences and "natures". The nature of Earth runs entirely contrary to your true nature as a heavenly being.

"The laws of this world run against your nature."

Your nature, of Heaven, is to share. Whatever you have, you share it with others. Whatever God has, He shares it with you. Everyone shares everything. I have it, and you have it. That is heaven's logical system. A AND B. Me and you. Both.

Earth, this universe, and everything about physical matter and objects, is run inside and part of the ego thought system. It is a system based on the logical of A OR B, where NOTHING IS SHARED. No two things have everything. Nothing has full access to anything. Everything is partial and incomplete. There is no wholeness.

Here, when I have an ice cream, I do not share it with you. You are 100% denied the ice cream. If I let you have all of the ice cream, there is none left for me. This is driven by a basic LAW of nature which drives this entire universe and applies everywhere to all planets and stars and galaxies.

In Heaven, when you give something, you share and extend it. You do not lose it. Someone else can share ALL of it, and have all of it, and yet you also STILL have all of it. That sounds nuts to the ego thinker. How can I give you all of my ice-cream, while still having all of the ice-cream? How could Jesus feed 5000 people from a few fish and loaves, in a demonstration of GOD'S LAWS? That we can all SHARE in defiance of physical limitation?

On Earth, when I try to share, all I do is sacrifice. I must give something up, have less, lack and have nothing myself. This is BUILT IN to MATTER. It is built into spacetime. Everything within spacetime, including planet Earth, OPERATES based on this principle of sacrifice and scarcity. When one part of the world is over here, and another part of the world is over there, and they are different, and kept apart, that is NOT sharing, that is NOT wholeness, and that is NOT love.

"The world is the insane thought system of those driven mad by guilt."

Realize this. This planet ITSELF, its physical matter, its nature, the laws that keep its particles suspended in space, is based in the idea of SEPARATION. It is based in the idea of NOT SHARING. My left arm is not where my right arm is. They do not share space. I cannot join or merge with anyone. Bodies, objects, people, animals, are kept apart by this material of rejection, separation, lack, scarcity, sacrifice and limitation. This is what RUNS THE WORLD. This is even more fundamental and deeper than the laws of physics. It's the EGO's law.

The world was made this way, by you, as an attack on God and on his NATURE. It was made to function OPPOSITE to His nature. If His nature is that everything is openly shared by everyone, the opposite is that NOTHING IS SHARED. That is the nature of this world. To give you half of my pizza is NOT SHARING. It is sacrifice. Neither of us gets a whole pizza. I cannot throw a ball to you and have you hold it while I also receive it and hold it. We cannot both own the same property.

This is a world of selfishness, ownership, exclusivity, isolation and separation. And it's going to STAY THAT WAY for as long as it appears to exist. It cannot show up AS Earth and follow ANY other laws. It has to keep following the same laws of the ego thought system. To remain a physical three dimensional planet it has to be maintained by an idea of SPACE. Space is an attack thought.

Space is the OPPOSITE of "everywhere". It is an attack on omnipresence. Time similarly is an attack thought. It is an attack on eternity, or "always". It forces the ILLUSION that things change "naturally", which is wholly unnatural, as an expression of the idea that one moment was Heaven and then something changed. Time is an attempted attack on God.

"Reality is a constant state."

So now you have a problem, because the fact is, no matter how much you change your mind, no matter how much you heal your perception, no matter what your beliefs are ABOUT the world, it does NOT CHANGE the underlying LAW that this world ENTIRELY DEPENDS ON for its three dimensional existence - a law of separation and death. It depends on spcaetime. It depends on separate objects, not sharing with each other. It depends on loss and change and a lack of permanence. Permanence is of God, and this world HAS NONE. Permanence is love. "Never was love in the world of dreams." (earth).

So the fact is, no matter how much you change your mind here, you CANNOT alter the fundamental FUNCTIONING of this planet. You cannot change the law that it relies on for it to BE a planet. To sustain its spatial occupation or its reliance on time for growth. Without THE EGO, there cannot BE a planet. There cannot BE bodies. There cannot BE this world or this universe. Without the ego, it is NOT POSSIBLE to have a three dimensional form. Without a fundamental law of separation, there cannot BE objects, forms, bodies, appearances, images, animals, humans, or anything else you recognize as what you think is life.

Here is the clincher then. The ego's thought system is a thought system of death. Death is the one illusion from which all others stem. Death is the last illusion to be overcome. And the fact is, the ego is the idea of death - an opposite to life, an opposite to heaven, and an opposite to God's nature. And death has PRODUCED PLANET EARTH. Earth is made of death. It is not made of life. It was made to OPPOSE LIFE. It is OPPOSITE to Heaven's nature in EVERY WAY. Heaven is a system of pure extension of eternal life. Earth is a system of limitation, dead ends, temporary existence and death.

"Without the idea of death, there is no world."

"There is no world. This is the central thought the course would attempt to teach."

This is literally true folks. Planet Earth DOES NOT REALLY EXIST. It cannot exist, because it is MADE OF THE EGO, and the ego is not real. This whole system, this whole universe, is inside the tiny mad idea. Without the mad idea, there is no world. Without death, there is no world. This is not a world of LIFE. IT is not eternity. And quite literally, the forms and appearances that seem to be in it, are NOTHING but a dream of death. At best, they seem like a symbol of life, at worst like death and suffering. But NEVER are they truly ALIVE FOREVER.

"The body neither lives nor dies. It is nothing."

"There is no life outside of Heaven."

"God did not create the body."

"God can not enter a body, nor can you join him there."

Heaven is ELSEWHERE. It is not this planet. It will NOT EVER BE this planet. If you think it CAN, then you are really not seeing the clear distinction between the two thought systems. You cannot have one set of LAWS, from which EXISTENCE springs, and have a world which completely OPPOSES those laws exist based ON those laws. Earth simply cannot REMAIN when Heaven has come. It HAS TO DISAPPEAR. Heaven and Earth are incompatible systems. The ego system and the Holy System are exclusive and incompatible.

"There is total communication failure between the ego and the Holy Spirit."

Ego world = Earth. Holy world = Heaven. They CANNOT coexist. Love has no opposite. Earth does not exist.

Earth's NATURE cannot exist IN HEAVEN. Heaven cannot contain a world that opposes it's nature.

"The world will spin into the nothingness from which it came."

This is all very very clear and consistent in the course.

Now, some people recognize that, in a sense, God being a "container of everything" seemingly must contain the Earth. And some will reason that this means God made the Earth. This is in complete contradiction to what ACIM says, and is completely against God's nature. It is not GOD'S WILL to produce a world LIKE THIS ONE. He would not, and cannot, express Himself and his divinity, as bodies, objects, planets and galaxies. He simply does not. Ever. Think about it. Divine holy infinite unlimited LIFE, can only create that which lives forever, not things which FAIL TO GIVE LIFE, which is true of ALL PHYSICAL OBJECTS. God did not create the world. This is the world YOU MADE. It has not been CREATED and it does not EXTEND life at all.

It is possible for your mind to transcend this dream world and recognize that it IS a dream. Nothing more than an illusion. It is possible for you to experience increased love and peace and joy, or at least a sense of it, while you are "in a body." But it is NOT possible to 100% fully completely EXTEND GOD while in a body. God cannot be in or through a body. Bodies are THOUGHTS, maintained by MINDS, who DO NOT WANT GOD. The body MUST END and disappear in order to be in total awareness and knowing of God.

"The body is a limit."

"The body is the idea of sin made flesh."

"To see a sinless body is impossible."

"The body is clearly a separation device and therefore does not exist."

The body can be given a holy purpose, but a holy purpose does not MAKE the body "holy". What is NOTHING cannot be endowed with the properties of Christ. You can use it as a LIMITED TOOL, temporarily, but its limits are EXTREME. It prevents you from knowing God, from being the size of the universe, and from wielding unlimited power. You CANNOT experience Heaven while you are in a body! God has to take the last step to scoop you up and take you HOME, where you BELONG, which is NOT HERE.

Heaven is HERE NOW.

Earth is NOT HERE NOW and is the idea of NOT EXISTING. It is the idea of NOT BEING ALIVE. It is the IDEA OF DEATH. And without the idea of death, THERE IS NO WORLD.

"A world that attacks itself and denies its own existence is not of God."

Heaven is here, but "here" does not include Earth. Earth is an illusion. It is NOT HERE. It is a thought of darkness. Light SHINES IT AWAY. It doesn't continue as an opposite to Heaven because Heaven HAS no opposite, and Earth NEVER REALLY HAPPENED in the first place. It is just a dream of pretending Earth exists.

"There is no world."

"The world was over long ago."

"It takes great learning to realize this world has nothing to give."

"This world holds nothing that I want."

"Together we will watch the world disappear."

"Heaven remains your ONE ALTERNATIVE to the strange world YOU MADE."