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.

God is always in a forgiving state, even though there is nothing to forgive, in order THAT there be nothing to forgive. God always has a forgiving attitude.

Forgiveness is not something you do to get TO God, it is your permanent, natural condition of expressing from love and being forgiving. The opposite of being forgiving is having an unforgiving (relentless, attacking) attitude ie ego.

God IS forgiving, at all times. And it is our natural function to be forgiving at all times. Not just as a process of undoing ego stuff. Forgiveness is a constant state.

"Forgive us our illusions, Father, and help us to accept our true relationship with You, in which there are no illusions, and where none can ever enter. Our holiness is Yours. What can there be in us that needs forgiveness when Yours is perfect? The sleep of forgetfulness is only the unwillingness to remember Your forgiveness and Your Love."

What can there be in us (Sons of God) when GOD'S FORGIVENESS IS PERFECT?

Also the correction of perception is a temporary measure in order to become able to recognize that perception is not needed and that knowledge is the truth, so correction of perception is NOT forgiveness either.

"It cannot be emphasized too often that CORRECTING perception is merely a temporary expedient. It is necessary ONLY because Misperception is a BLOCK to knowledge, while ACCURATE perception is a stepping-stone TOWARDS it. The whole value of right perception lies in the inevitable judgment which it necessarily entails that it is UNNECESSARY. This removes the block entirely."

In other words the only reason we are correcting perception is to come to realize that preception is fundamentally false and not needed at all, because we can have direct access to knowledge of truth, which is not perceived but known.

"What is not love is murder.

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

We are either loving ourselves and others or we are attacking ourselves and others.

It's either love, or a call for love. But it can be difficult to recognize that someone's attack is a call for love. It does not seem to take the form of "please love me" or "I need love". Usually it takes the form of inciting counter-attack, laden with temptation and conflict.

Especially for example if someone is using your name, using attributing words like "you", pointing a physical finger, looking at you in a certain way, or doing something that seems to be affecting you. It all seems to be a way to attempt to say "its about you" or "its your fault" or that they are attacking YOU, not themselves.

Can you recognize that this is them expressing "I need more love because I'm lacking love", when everything they are expressing appears at first to be murderous and unloving? When they seem to present a picture of "I do not love you", which is the same as "I do not want love", how do you see it as a call to be loved?

It's fairly accurate to say that almost everyone on the planet is sick in the mind and body. And that isn't an overestimate.

Anyone who is not being completely loving is not in their right mind. Anyone attacking is not in their right mind. No-one in their right mind would do anything other than love, because they are one with you and to attack you would attack themselves. No sane person would ever treat anyone else in any way other than lovingly. So if someone is not being wholly loving, they are sick.

The problem with this sickness is that the person's mind is in denial, awareness is blocked, and they are unconscious, they don't realize what they are doing otherwise they wouldn't do it.

Only someone who is unaware of the consequences of their attack, an attempt to cause effects in someone else and not themselves, would proceed to do it. It's an attempt to get away with murder, which is the whole ego system of thought - that something is true of another that is different than what applies to you.

So now their mind is denying their own light, they have attacked themselves, they are guilty and sinful and afraid, and now they are acting out. Almost certainly they are projecting onto scapegoats and looking for a target to create an illusion of alleviating their suffering. To try to escape from the responsibility of owning what they are doing to themselves. And by being in denial they do not really seem to want help, though deep down they do.

So what is your role now? Faced with a world full of mentally-ill and physically expressive nut jobs, how do you respond? The Holy Spirit would have you respond with love at all times. He would say, well, these people, they are forgiveable because they literally are not aware of what they are doing. They are insane. No-one sane would act this way and no-one sane would attack a brother. So if they're doing that, they are insane and need help.

The only help that can work is to fix the problem. The problem is the person is blocking love and so seems to be lacking love. What they need therefore is love. Love is the only thing that can be supplied to correct the only thing that's lacking. If someone is not being loving they are believing in a lack or absence of love, and the presence or supply of this love is the only remedy. This is why expressions of love are miraculous and can cure.

So in a way we have to learn, to reframe everything we see happening, and all expressions coming from people. Either they are being christly and loving, in recognition that that is their real self, OR they are being unconscious, lost in the ego, lacking love, are mentally ill and need healing. Being in denial they DO NOT KNOW what they are doing and are mistaken.

If we can remember that people are "not being themselves", that they are "sick" and that they are not aware of what they are doing or why, and if we can remember that they WOULD NOT act this way if they were healed and whole, this makes it easier to not "hold it against them", take it personally, think of it as true or serious, and helps you to stay out of the ego response.

Really this is what forgiveness is about. Faced with an insane attacking ego-driven person, we need to OVERLOOK all of these appearances and remember the person's divinity, which is hidden behind their call for love, which is showing up as a call to be unloved. They seem to WANT to be attacked, they seem to WANT suffering, but this is only because they have rejected the very thing that would give them the sanity to make a wiser choice.

We have to laugh at people's insane behavior because it's not really true of them. This is part of realizing this is just a dream and the nutjobs it's populated with don't even know they are dreaming. No-one in their right mind would deliberately be unloving. Their lack of love is sickness that appears to ask for love to be withheld but is mistaken in that request. What they really want and need is love. And this love has to overlook and shine past all of these obstacles.

Not just for their benefit, but also to keep your own mind sane. Because if you yourself have stopped being loving and have slipped into reactions, counter attacks, taking it personally or seriously, being tempted or distracted to engage their ego, then you now also have joined the ranks of the insane and you yourself now need healing as well.

"You cannot enter into real relationship with any of God's Sons unless you are willing to love them all AND equally."

"Forgiveness recognizes that what you think you brother did has not OCCURRED."

"Only Atonement can be said to cure."

"There is no sin."

If it is true that we are still as God created us, and we are still immortal spirit, and nothing has happened, then if we were to fully express this truth in this world, we would show up in a "perfect" healthy form with no sign of corruption or decay or sickness.

Jesus asks that we do this, because if we are not showing up this way, we are demonstrating that we can be hurt, and so are accusing our brother and ourselves of sin.

So let's say that you have this `perfect self` which is SUPPOSED to be expressing and showing up here temporarily, to prove that Heaven is real and God's laws override the ego. So now, if that is not happening, if there is a problem showing up or a sickness or some kind of symptom, then we have attempted to ADD on top of our perfection, something artificial, and are now seeking outside of ourselves, and this is materializing as visible symptoms of decay and sickness and damage.

So now we need to reverse that, undo that, and allow our true light to shine. If our true light is not shining, then we have blocks to awareness. If form seems to demonstrate that we are not divinely healthy, then something is blocking awareness. It means we're trying to prove otherwise.

What you use the body for it becomes to you. If you use it to project attack then it is attacked and it becomes sick and shows up as physical sickness. If you use it to bring the word of God (the word being, the nature of God), to those who seem to have it not, the body is being used for extending love and so is restored to perfect health and demonstrates perfection

This "symbol of immortality" as Jesus puts it, proves that you cannot have been affected against your will, therefore your brother is innocent. And your immaculate body teaches him that he cannot have attacked you, since there are no effects.

Are you willing to bring forth a "living demonstration" that God's laws are true, and that you can be affected by nothing?

As you approach closer to what's in your heart, to be true to yourself, to be authentic and real, expressive and uncensored, you're going to come face to face with blocks to love.

These will come up inside you with an emotional charge likely from past events. This stuff doesn't just go away.

In your past, particularly in childhood, when you were expressing yourself more openly and freely, if you did something that other people decided was "bad" or wrong or that you should be guilty for, and especially if you were punished in some way or love was withheld, then you'll store this belief that being yourself will lead to pain. That unless you censor yourself and stay within the lines, you will likely make mistakes and will suffer for it.

Other ways it comes up is that you can't do what you want or express how you'd like because someone will disapprove, or you're only supposed to do what you were told to do (which is a common parenting style), or that if you do what you want you will displease people, or will experience rejection again.

So then as you go to do what you feel you'd love to do, you'll stop yourself with fear or sickness (as a defense), because you know that based on the past, if you go ahead in this way, someone is going to get hurt. You.

So you fear the same unforgiving attitude, the same unloving response, and the same guilt-trip, pain or suffering. When you believe that being yourself will make you unloveable, how are you going to be yourself?

Making mistakes should lead to forgiveness, be responded to with love, and reassure you that you are still innocent. Especially since "nothing really happened." If they don't, and if something negative happens, and you form a false self image based on this pain (which you do to yourself), then it stays lodged in your mind/emotional body until such a time as you attempt to do something in life that confronts it.

If you're intent on waking up or healing or forgiving etc, then sooner or later you will be pushing the envelope of your beliefs and comfort zones and you're going to come face to face with your pain again. If you want to move forward rather than hit a wall again, healing is going to have to happen. Whether you will have a catharsis or cry your eyes out or do a massive forgiveness or receive a miracle, one way or another the baggage has to go.

But then you will be set free.

Jesus says in the miracle principles, that miracles should be happening ALL THE TIME, and that when they are not happening, something has gone wrong.

What this MUST mean, is that miracles are not simply shifts in perception TOWARDS truth, but they are expressions OF truth. The expression OF truth may well shift perception if perception needs shifting, but the miraculousness of the miracle is an expression from a higher place of LOVE.

When there is love, there is miraculousness. When there is love, supernatural "abilities" are absolutely unlimited. When love is not blocked, there are NO LIMITS to what the mind can do. There is nothing that your miraculous holiness cannot do. Being miraculous is a PERMANENT CONDITION.

Being miraculous is not something that just happens in the dream while we are waking up and then STOPS. Bullshit. Miracles are supposed to be happening ALL THE TIME, and when they are not happening, something has gone wrong. Therefore, the only time where miracles are NOT happening is when something has gone wrong, meaning we are in the ego. When we are NOT in the ego, MIRACLES WILL BE CONSTANT.

YOU are also a miracle of God. God's CREATION is a miracle. Miraculousness is NATURAL. It is the natural way that an immortal spirit is able to create using the UNLIMITED power of the mind, at any time, in any way. It is an expression of LOVE. Love is always expressing "supernaturally", in comparison to this world's unnatural nature.

You will not put miracles aside when you wake up. When Jesus woke up to God he did not STOP being able to perform miracles! In fact he is now utterly UNLIMITED in what He can do. There is nothing your holiness cannot do. ALL EXPRESSION OF LOVE ARE A MIRACLE. When you return to being loving you will RETURN to being miraculous.

Permanently miraculous. You will become "miracle minded". A miracle worker.

Miracles shift perception towards God and atonement, IF that perception is unhealed and "needs a miracle". When perception is all the way SHIFTED, and is IN the atonement, the mind does not suddenly drop its ability to perform miracles or to heal. It becomes EVEN MORE ABLE. AND then its focus will be more on performing miracles for OTHERS, because miracles are the MAXIMAL SERVICE that you can render to others. Ie, loving others unconditionally and fully is healing and helpful to the absolute maximum degree possible. Meaning, unlimited.

Miracles are an EXPRESSION of the atonement. Miracles are love. Love is natural. Miraculous love should be happening all the time.

In order to perform a miracle, your mind has to be in a state of love, because miracles are expressions FROM love. Miracle mindedness is a state of love, and when you express from that state your expressions have power, capable of healing others. Love is strong and "there is nothing my holiness cannot do." Being miracle minded is the same thing as being right minded, which is equated with true perception. It's quite an "advanced state".

It's not enough to be slightly loving. It's also not enough to just be caring for someone or feeling enamored. Love has to be felt deeply and strongly. I have to admit that I spend almost all of my time not in this state. I can at times push myself to receive love and experience it, but typically there is too much fear and blocks to awareness. It's not possible to perform miracles in these states, and people who are working on purifying their minds are not miracle workers. "Miracles are everyone's right (in a state of love), but purification (to get to that state) is NECESSARY first."

I've had a few times where, for whatever reason, I've felt especially filled with love. In those moments I also feel strangely powerful and miraculous, as if the love itself is capable of doing anything. Without love, miracles are impossible. Love is literally an absolutely required ingredient for miracle working. It's through being intensely loving and EXPRESSING from that place of strength, that you can literally perform miracles. You can heal the sick and raise the dead.

I used to think miracle working entailed far more complexity, saying the right words, having the ego be more aggressive, being adamant, being commanding etc, but without love nothing happens. Holy Spirit became very excited one time when I was sending love to someone and He said "that's all you need!". It seems too simple but it's not. Real love has a POWER in it. It's a supernatural power. It can cause really extraordinary things to happen. A mind in a state of love is very strong.

The challenge then, is getting yourself into a state where you are loving enough. It's not merely an intellectual state. Strong love must be present and being felt. Often it is quite difficult to get into that state, to really really love, because of all the blocks and fears that we have. It might even be quite an alien state seemingly so far out of reach that we just can't seem to be loving enough. It requires a suspension of fear, which is love's absence, for long enough to be able to perform the miracle. Jesus even says that you might well go back to being afraid afterwards, but so long as you can get yourself into a loving state, you can work miracles.

Miracle DOING is an active expression, an act, FROM a state of love. Miracle mindedness is the readiness to express love, by being in a state of love. Love is wholeness. The perceptual content of miracles is wholeness. Perception has to be whole, purified, and true, in order to be loving enough to be miraculous. It's really so simple... all you need is love and you instantly are capable of performing incredible miracles, but getting yourself into such a holy state is all of the "work" of purification, learning to forgive, healing and letting go of past hurts and all the rest of it. All of the workbook lessons, which aimed toward developing Christ Vision, are trying to get your mind to be loving enough that it is miraculous.

Miracles EXPRESS only from love and love is powerful.

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

"The love of God, for a little while, must still be expressed through one body to another."

"The value of the Atonement does not lie in the manner in which it is expressed. In fact, if it is truly used it will inevitably BE expressed in whatever way is most helpful to the receiver, not the giver. This means that a miracle, to attain its full efficacy, MUST be expressed in a language which the recipient can understand without fear. It does not follow by any means that this is the highest level of communication of which he is capable. But it DOES mean that it is the highest level of communication of which he is capable NOW."

"Miracles ... They occur naturally as an expression of love."

"ALL expressions of love are maximal."

"Miracles are a kind of exchange. Like all expressions of love"

"Prayer is the medium of miracles. Prayer is the natural communication of the Created with the Creator. Through prayer, love is received, and through miracles love is expressed."

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

"The power to work Miracles BELONGS to you. I will create the right opportunities for you to do them. But you must be ready and willing to do them, since you are already able to. Doing them will bring conviction in the ability. I repeat that you will see Miracles through your hands through MINE. Conviction really comes through accomplishment. Remember that ability is the potential, Achievement is its expression, and Atonement is the Purpose."

"Expressed through you, the Holy Spirit will accept this gift which you received of Him, increase its power and give it back to you."

"We have emphasized that the miracle, or the EXPRESSION of Atonement, is always a sign of real respect from the worthy TO the worthy."

"The miracle is an expression of an inner awareness of Christ and acceptance of his Atonement. "

"Be confident that you have never lost your identity and the extension which maintains it in wholeness and peace. Miracles are AN EXPRESSION OF THIS CONFIDENCE. They are reflections both of your own proper identification WITH your brothers, and of your own awareness that YOUR identification IS maintained by extension. The miracle is A LESSON IN TOTAL PERCEPTION. By including ANY part of totality in the lesson, you HAVE included the whole."

"The answer is NEVER perform a miracle without asking me IF you should. This spares you from exhaustion, and because you act under direct communication the trance becomes unnecessary. Because miracles are expressions of love, it does NOT follow that they will always be effective. I am the only one who can perform miracles indiscriminately, because I AM the Atonement. You have a ROLE in Atonement, which I will dictate TO you."

"Those who witness for me are expressing, through their miracles, that they have abandoned deprivation in favor of the abundance they have learned BELONGS to them."

"We once said that there is no order in miracles because they are all maximal expressions of love."

"Help and healing are the normal expressions of a mind which is working THROUGH the body but not in it."

"I KNOW that miracles are natural, because they are expressions of love."

As a child of God, God has placed himself in you, as an extension of his mind, will and power. You don't really "have" anything "of your own", or exclusive to you, because everything God gives is given to everyone equally. But you do nevertheless have everything that God has given to you, just as everyone does. Which mean that you have inherited from him his mind, will and power.

"To say, "Of myself I can do nothing" is to gain all power. And yet it is but a seeming paradox. As God created you, you have all power."

When this power is interpreted as belonging ONLY to you, then you are trying to have it for your own, excluding others, which cuts you off from God, and disables the power. When it is interpreted as belonging to everyone, and being FROM God, FOR you, and FOR everyone, it is regained and you become all powerful.

"I am not afraid but all powerful."

"The miracle-worker begins by PERCEIVING light, and translates HIS perception into sureness by continually extending it, and ACCEPTING ITS ACKNOWLEDGMENT. Its EFFECTS assure him IT IS THERE. The therapist does not heal; he LETS HEALING BE. HE can point to darkness, but he CANNOT bring light OF HIMSELF, for light is NOT of him. But being FOR him, it MUST be for his patient."

What this means is that in the "arrangement" of how you are "set up" in terms of relationship to God, function, and what you must give, God has placed himself in you, and now you have everything that is OF or from God, as yours, but only so long as you share it. And in order to have it you have to give it, and to share it it must be extended. And so now the love that is given to you from God, is given through you, by YOU participating in its extension, by expressing the love that is yours - which is also his.

So it's kind of like a "pay it forward" kind of thing, where God gives love and power and will and miracles to you, then you in turn pass on and give and share the love and power and miracles to others.

"Miracles are a universal blessing (for all) from God, through me (christ, sonship) to all my brothers."

God loves you. You love your brothers and your creations. Similarly...

"Through prayer love is received. Through miracles love is expressed."

This means fairly simply that you need to "express God" ie to express love. Which is why "Miracles are expressions of love." Or as Jesus often says to me, "shine". Shine the light that is in you, give it, share it, express it, pass it on, so that you acknowlege that you have it. And thus by expressing it, it flows into you.

If you think you don't have love to express, because you don't love enough, or feel lacking or deprived, there is a simple fix. Start loving anyway, try to push the love out, feel it coming out of you, send it to someone, even if it's just a little bit.

You'll find that this "unclogs the pipes" and gets the juices flowing. As you do this, you actually start to RECEIVE more love, heaven comes to help you, and you start to get healed as well. As you give healing you are healed.

"I will heal as I let him teach me to heal."

So in a sense, we are sort of "channels" for God. But being a channel for God doesn't entail strange trance states or going unconscious or having your body be possessed. You can remain fully aware and participatory, shining a light, joined with God, in which both of you shine together. This is part of the arrangement of you being a co-creator with God. You create in parallel, you love in parallel, you heal in parallel.

What is your function? Your function on earth is healing, and in heaven it's creating, and both are very similar. The healing function lines up and mirrors the creative function. You extend God's love and shine your light, a the light of the world, and your mind extends out and unites with other minds to bring about miracles. You share this function with the Holy Spirit while you're on earth, and you hare it with God when you're in heaven.

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

"The Holy Spirit is invisible, but you CAN see the results of His Presence, and through them, you will learn that He is there. What He enables you to do is clearly NOT of this world, for miracles violate every law of reality, as this world judges it. Every law of time and space, of magnitude and mass, of prediction and control, is transcended, for what the Holy Spirit enables you to do is clearly beyond ALL of them. Perceiving His RESULTS, you will understand where He MUST be, and finally KNOW what He is."

"Yet here is also a great channel of hope and healing in the Holy Spirit's service."

"Whenever a teacher of God has tried to be a channel for healing he has succeeded."

"About His yearning for His only Son, created as His channel for creation"

"Let us today open God's channels to Him, and let His Will extend through us to Him."

"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."

"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."

"And so He has kept this Channel open to receive His communication to you, AND YOURS TO HIM."

"Your minds are not separate, and God has only one channel for healing, because He has but one Son. His remaining communication link with all His Children joins them together, and them to Him. To be aware of this is to heal them, because it is the awareness that no one is separate, and so no one is sick."

"I repeat that I do not choose God's channels wrongly. The Holy One shares my trust and always approves my Atonement decisions, because my will is never out of accord with His."

"I have told you several times that I am in charge of the whole Atonement. This is ONLY because I completed my part in it as a man, and can now complete it through other men. My chosen receiving and sending channels cannot fail, because I will lend them MY strength as long as theirs is wanting."

"Only God's own holy children are worthy to be channels of his beautiful joy, because only they are beautiful enough to hold it by sharing it. It is impossible for a Child of God to love his neighbor EXCEPT as himself. That is why the healer's prayer is, "let me know this brother as I know myself.""

"What God DOES know is that His communication channels are not open to Him, so that He cannot impart His joy and know that His Children are wholly joyous."

"While he is IN the body, however, man can choose between loveless and miraculous channels of creativity. He can create an empty shell (see previous reference), but he DOES NOT create nothing at all. He can wait, delay, paralyze himself, reduce his creativity almost to nothing, and even introduce a real developmental arrest or regression. But he CANNOT abolish his creativity. He CAN destroy his medium of communication, but NOT his potential."

If there is a pain in my hand, and if I believe there is a pain in my hand, I will begin to experience reactions about the pain.

This is simply because I see there being some kind of causality coming from the pain. I think it has a power over me. I see it as happening to me. I seem to be experiencing it as though it has happened without me asking for it. And so it seems unfair, malicious, unwanted, unwelcome, as though these sentiments are somehow justified expressions of me being holier or more innocent than this.

And if this pain in the hand continues or increases, then I will likely increase in my perception of victim hood, and simply by the reversal of cause and effect, seeing cause as outside of myself, I am actively creating responsive conditions inside of myself which show up as reactions, having threatened my own self with my own mistaken perception of this pain.

I myself am creating my own reactions, including fear which begins to mount in response, as though the pain is causing me to be afraid - what does it mean, what is it leading to, why is it happening, but simply also the sheer apparent fact (albeit unreal) that it is even happening at all, is enough to provide an upset.

"I am upset because I see something that is not there." - ACIM

And so as my fearful reaction increases, so too does my conviction that this is a more serious problem than before, that it calls for magical curative measures which will attack it and manipulate it and try to make it go away. And the more strongly I feel passionate about the need to be rid of it, the more I will actually add empowerment to it, seeing it as being so strong and mighty as to deserve serious counter-measures.

These perceptions of the need for a counter measure, a retaliation, a reaction of any justified kind, a fear, or any sense of taking this seriously or treating it as real, simply shows the extent of my mistakedness and the fact that what I am ACTUALLY doing is CREATING THIS. I create it with my fear of it, I create it with my rejection of it, I create it with my desire to be rid of it, and I create it with my attempt to fix it.

And the more real of a problem it seems to become, the more certain I will be that I really need to get something done about this because it's very very serious indeed. And yet in perceiving it, describing it, envisioning it, interacting with it and making it be serious as such - believing in its appearance - I am merely choosing to manifest it, to give energy to it, to feed it.

The reason that we do this is because when we are using the mind incorrectly and are entering into illusions, false perceptions and errors, we start to experience the opposite of what we attempt to achieve. We think that we do not want pain in the hand, but this means that we will put it there. We think the pain in the hand should not be happening, and such intensify its happening. We think that it is making us very afraid, and as such we literally are causing it to become more monstrous.

We do not realize that as soon as we have stepped away from real truth and have entered into mistaken truth, we've lost our mind and our way, have become deceived, and are now operating our mental powers 'inversed' or back to front.

The ego is an entire thought system based on this back-to-front inversion of truth, and when we are in this mind, we quite literally ask for what we do not want, attract what we are trying to get away from, try to fix what is not even a problem, and generally compound the very issues that we suffer from, not realizing all along that we are inadvertently causing ourselves to prolong the suffering, simply because we're applying ourselves through an inverting filter, a reality flip, which gives us back the exact opposite of what we think we are asking for. And this is simply because once in the ego perception, we are in opposition to the real truth, and therefore are bringing about opposite effects.

Indeed the incorrect form of forgiveness correlates to the ego activities and behaviors of believing that you are sincerely attempting to rid the world of that which is wrong with it, by taking a purer or more innocent standpoint, all the while actually reinforcing, manifesting, increasing and generally adding to the conditions of sinfulness. Such forgiveness then becomes an attack rather than a correction of error, a judgement instead of a miracle.

True forgiveness therefore must entail the cessation of all of the above egoic behaviors, reactions, self-caused chaos, and general inversion of truth and opposition to it. All of these symptoms are expressing merely because you are using the mind backwards, expressing opposition and resistance instead of unity, order and health.

True forgiveness entails the complete UN-doing of all of these egoic thought patterns, attitudes that reinforce the reality of the monster, reactions to it founded in fear which really are created by your own self as part of your psychological reversal and belief in threat, and the cessation of "making real" this problem. To lend reality to it, to believe in it, dwell upon it, give it credit, think of it seriously, forget to laugh at it, mistake it for real danger (which does not exist), and to generally actually side with it while claiming and portraying yourself as doing the exact opposite, is simply to keep the problem and make it worse.

We need to learn to forget this world. As Jesus says, forget this world and come with wholly empty hands unto your God. To forget is to literally pay no further attention, knowing that the thing was unreal, and requires no upkeep to defend against it.

We need to learn to stop learning the wrong things. We keep teaching ourselves with the ego, we keep learning that sickness is real, that sin is irreversible, and that death is inevitable. This must all be corrected and undone and vanquished from the mind, replaced with the Holy Light of the Truth, which comes to set you free.

The truth does set you free, literally, actually, and in reality. Because the Truth is God and only Love is Real.

"Prayer is the medium of miracles. Prayer is the natural communication of the Created with the Creator. Through prayer, love is received, and through miracles love is expressed."

Ok so... we talk about GIVING something in a miracle - expressing love. But there is another half to this - the RECEIVING of love. We are actually all quite averse to RECEIVING FROM GOD because we denied that God is our father, threw away our inheritance, and tried NOT TO RECEIVE in the separation. And the only reason we are all so miserable and suffering is because we are not willing to RECEIVE AND EXTEND. God's gift is to simply "give what you have been given."

This is really about the higher level of prayer. In lower prayer, you see yourself or others as lacking and in need, and so you make the need real and then ask for its removal. You pray "God, please take this away" or "God, please help them stop being so whatever."

But these are requests based on a belief that something is wrong. And believing something is wrong with ANYONE is the same as believing they are guilty and dysfunctional. "God, please help my enemy stop being such an asshole." Or, "God, please help my team to win the match." Or, "God, that person is so defective, please heal them."

This isn't miracle working. Miracles operate at the much higher level of true prayer. Real prayer is not based on believing that something is wrong and then asking that it be fixed. It is an acknowledgement and a recognition that NOTHING is wrong, God has ALREADY GIVEN what is needed, and NOTHING is lacking.

This high state of prayer is a willingness to RECEIVE LOVE from God, to acknowledge he is the cause of you, that you have received effect from him, and is a reclaiming of your inheritance.

The ego would say, in order to give something you have to lose it, and so giving is not receiving, and if you give love you will use up your love and run out. That in order to heal another, you have to sacrifice and lose what you have, and they better be grateful for transferring their lack to you.

But in this there is no receiving and no inclusion in what is being received. The golden rule says what you give you receive and all you give is given to yourself. But it also means, you have to be willing to RECEIVE LOVE FROM GOD, in order to HAVE LOVE TO GIVE.

So you cannot work miracles without first receiving God for yourself, because you then have to EXTEND what you have received and GIVE GOD in order to perform a miracle for another. That means a recognition, acknowledgement, and gratitude, that God HAS GIVEN EVERYTHING ALREADY.

Everything was given you in your creation. It is your natural inheritance. You threw that inheritance away by denying it when you bought into the mad idea and adopted an authority problem. The authority problem has to be undone so that you recognize 1) God is your creator 2) You are not God's creator, and therefore 3) God has given something to you.

Recognizing that everything has been given to you should inspire natural gratitude to God, and where there is gratitude there is love. To THANK GOD for what God HAS ALREADY given, and is giving now, is to RECEIVE LOVE. And THAT is what the highest form of prayer really means.

It is more aligned with an experience of a COMMUNION with God in which you are sharing with God, receiving from God, and giving what you receive. It is your natural state. In this state, you are open to BOTH GIVE AND RECEIVE, not just to give.

In this state of what we're calling prayer you are not really asking for something that you DON'T have, or that another LACKS. You are looking to the light and recognizing IT IS THERE already, because God has put it there already. He has fore-given (given ahead of the need) in order to prevent a state of need.

So you be grateful to God and thank God for having already given perfect love to you, and you open to RECEIVE that love and LET yourself BE loved. And then you receive that love from God, which heals your mind in a way like nothing else can. And then you GIVE that love as a miracle.

Once you have love, expressing yourself is miraculous. Every way that you then express the love you have received and shared with God, is a way of EXTENDING and SHARING that love. God is given, and is allowed to extend THROUGH you to another. This also entails recognizing that the light and love that is IN another IS ALREADY THERE, and IS NOT MISSING.

You receive God within yourself, acknowledge and be grateful that God HAS GIVEN IT ALREADY, and so you are blessed with it. And then you recognize that it is ALREADY IN ANOTHER - seeing past all sense of lack and damage and brokenness and sickness as UNREAL and NOT TRUE, seeing past it (which is forgiveness - to overlook), to the light. To see the Holy Spirit IN THE OTHER ALREADY, because God ALREADY PUT IT THERE.

Then you continually extend God from the prayerful awareness of having been given God within you, as love and light and power, and you extend it (unconditionally give it with no strings attached) to the other who HAS IT, in order to amplify the awareness that it is ALREADY IN THEM. And so the light in them intensifies as you strengthen the idea of the Holy Spirit in them, and their mind becomes healed also.

The completed sequence then is simply: "A miracle is a Universal Blessing from God (received in prayer) through Me (extended by me) to all My Brothers (acknowledging they already have it also)." This is achieved through higher prayer, which is now a MEDIUM through which God is extended, in recognition of a pre-existing perfection that overrides any notion that something is wrong.

"The miracle-worker begins by PERCEIVING light, and translates HIS perception into sureness by continually extending it, and ACCEPTING ITS ACKNOWLEDGMENT. Its EFFECTS assure him IT IS THERE."

"I give the miracles I have received." "God is but love, and therefore, so am I."

"However, we also noted that prayer is the medium of miracles, and also the natural communication of the Creator and the Created. Prayer is always an affirmation of knowledge, not of accurate perception."

"Prayer is a way of asking for something. When we said that prayer is the medium of miracles, we also said that the only meaningful prayer is for forgiveness, because those who have been forgiven HAVE everything. Once forgiveness has been accepted, prayer in the usual sense becomes utterly without meaning. Essentially, a prayer for forgiveness is nothing more than a request that we may be able to recognize something we already have."