What God creates must be permanent because He is permanence and can only create like Himself.

Therefore, if something is not permanent, if it changes at all in any way, if it is born or dies, or if it comes and goes, or transforms, or isn't always the same forever, then God did not create it.

Since God is reality, being the consistency and constancy needed for there to BE a "reality", some state which never wavers and is completely reliable, then anything that wavers or changes is not REAL.

Therefore, the physical world, the physical universe, everything in it, all bodies, everything you see here, and all forms of perceiving it, cannot be real.

Since what is real actually exists, permanently, and since what is unreal cannot possibly exist because it is not permanent and always changes, what changes cannot be REAL.

Therefore, because the physical universe is constantly changing, it CANNOT be real, and it MUST be an illusion. God cannot have created it, and it cannot really exist.

It is as plain and simple as this.

God is infinite. Infinite means in-finite, not finite. Finite means limitations, and limitations allow multiple possibilities. Infinity does not mean 'all possibilities'. It means all REAL possibility, but in terms of number, there is only ONE possibility. Infinity means oneness - one possibility, one reality, one way. This is how God is infinite. Infinite does not mean that God creates all kinds of forms and many multitudes of different things. God only creates ONE state of being and nothing else.

Nothing real can be threatened, because nothing unreal exists. God cannot be threatened because the physical world and all of its weapons of separation does not exist. This world is nothing but an ILLUSION that a world exists, and if you believe it and perceive it then you have fallen for the illusion and are not awake.

"There is no world." This is the central thought the course would aim to teach. - ACIM

Can I ACTUALLY do anything to change this outcome/situation whatsoever?

If the answer is NO: surrender and accept what is.

If the answer is YES: surrender to Holy Spirit and let Him inspire you what action to take.

Either way surrender brings peace of mind. Letting go of control.

Is there actually anything you can really do to change [xyz problem] right now? And be honest about it. Usually the answer is no. If you can't change it, then why have any upset about it? Why fret or worry about it? Why even get into a STORY about it? Why even try to wrestle with it, resist it, fight it, be angry about it? None of that will change it, right? So it is actually FUTILE. Why bother spending your energy doing what is completely futile? Your energy is better spent in what is productive and constructive and possible.

Otherwise you are fighting with impossibility, and you will lose.

Surrender.

This is somewhat the basis of the AA idea "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the power to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

You need *discernment* in order to be able to tell if you can REALLY do anything at all to change matters. Discernment requires Holy Spirit's thought system, because you need to decide based on TRUE or FALSE, rather than right/wrong/good/bad/happy/sad etc. And thus you need a lot of HONESTY and willingness to admit the truth.

So discern. Is it true that you can change this? If not, then you might as well just surrender and accept it. There is much more peace to be had there. Then join with Holy Spirit for inspiration and guidance and proceed from there. Fighting an impossible fight is a complete waste of time.

I suppose this is also in line with what Eckhart Tolle suggested (and others) ... 'resist nothing' or as the Borg in Star Trek say, "resistance is futile".

It's very helpful for me to keep in mind the key fact, that every time I am upset about other people I am using them to get rid of my own sin.

Each time I become angry or upset or annoyed, or see myself as being attacked by someone, or they are just "wrong", it can SEEM as though I do not want them to be this way. BUT I DO!

I absolutely want them to attack me, hurt me, offend me, annoy me, be opposed to me, be wrong to me, etc.

Each time I SEE them as falling into this category, I will believe I am JUSTIFIED in being angry and upset about them. And my justification will tell me I SHOULD be upset.

But it's a lie. I'm lying to myself and them. I want them to hurt me so that I have a way to justify projecting my own sin and guilt onto them.

It's not that they are wrong, or sinful, or guilty, it's that I believe *I* am. I want to SEE them as the one who is sinful, at any opportunity, so that I can get rid of my shit.

Each time I find myself going into this justified reaction, if I can be honest and remember that I actually WANT them to be this way so that I can use them to scapegoat, it stops me in my tracks.

Seeing that my reaction is NOT justified, because the purpose and reason for my reaction is an dishonest attack on my part, it deflates the reaction and makes it easy to not pursue further.

The angry reaction just stops when the truth is introduced, because anger is a false reaction to a lie. Just this one simple little truth is leading me to give up every case of finding others guilty. Anger and blame was a TOOL I was using for a secret purpose.

It literally takes a step in the undoing of the ego, and marks the beginning of the end of all anger forever.

1) You already have eternal life because God creates only that which is permanent and lives forever.

2) It is not possible to change eternal life or to bring an end to it.

3) You do have the freedom however to DENY whether you have eternal life by PRETENDING that you don't.

4) Denial of eternal life does not stop it. All it does is it puts you into a mindset of blocking out awareness of the fact that eternal life is still there, causing you to HIDE it from your awareness as if to pretend it is not there.

5) Denial of eternal life shows up as death. It's a fictional attempt to make it SEEM as if eternal life is not true, doesn't exist, or has ended.

6) Death as "denial of life" is not END OF LIFE, it is an illusion PRETENDING that real eternal life can be affected in any way whatsoever.

7) You can become quite accomplished in making it look like you are mortal and can die. But it is fake. And it can therefore be easily reversed, because it has no truth in it. Death is a lie.

8) Given that you already have eternal life and are just pretending otherwise, at some point you might as well stop being in denial and just return to being eternal. Immortality is your natural inheritance.

9) When you stop being in DENIAL of eternal life, you will simply accept it and "live with it" and experience it, allowing it to be your truth without resistance or denial.

10) When you accept the atonement you are accepting the pre-existing truth that you already have eternal life, it cannot be removed, it's always been true of you, and you literally are incapable of really dying. In this, you are accepting that you are immortal and therefore CANNOT die and never did. And in this acceptance, death is recognized as and becomes impossible for you.

What if miracles are practically nothing, just brief moments of correction, like brushing a piece of dust off some furniture?

What if you can just have Jesus heal something right now and be done with it and move on like nothing happened?

What if miracles were so natural and normal that they weren't anything special at all?

What if miracles were happening all the time, and to perform one was effortless and could be done at any time without strain?

What if all the drama that accompanies tolerance of suffering were cut through like a knife in a matter of seconds, no longer to be dwelled on or fought with?

What if you were miraculous all the time?

I am gradually learning that there is POWER in making decisions. And I don't just mean some kind of self-help "make more decisions to be productive" kind of thing. I mean, literally it has a supernatural kind of power to it. It's tied into miracle working. It accesses and wields the power of the mind to CAUSE.

Everything in the course points towards becoming more decisive, empowered, certain, clear about what you do or do not want, being responsible for choice, ending victimhood, realizing that nothing can happen to you against your will, and reclaiming the ability to CHOOSE. And in that choosing, you actually CAUSE stuff. And what you do not choose, you do not cause.

Here is what "My self is ruler of the universe" says from Lesson 253:

"It is impossible that anything should come to me unbidden by myself. Even in this world, it is I who rule my destiny. What happens is what I desire. What does not occur is what I do not want to happen. This must I accept. For thus am I led past this world to my creations, children of my Will, in Heaven where my holy Self abides with them, and Him Who has created me."

It is also very clear that being in fear is being in indecision. Fearfulness is an attempt NOT to choose, just as "death is an attempt to make no decisions at all." The opposite of that is to make ALL decisions or to be aware that you choose everything that happens to you. ie nothing happens to you, it happens FROM you.

This is the secret to salvation - that you are doing this to yourself. And the secret to salvation, and forgiveness, and atonement, and miracle working, all recognize that you have a POWER in you to choose. And whatever you DECIDE, you CAUSE TO HAPPEN.

Let's put it this way. YOU ARE ALWAYS CHOOSING.

Everything is a choice. "Heaven is a decision I must make". "No one dies without their own consent."

The problem is that we do not believe we are always choosing. When we say things like "such and such is going to happen to me" as though we are not choosing it, we are actually choosing it. When we lay down and just accept that we're in for stormy weather, we are actually choosing it. "I have no neutral thoughts" - because you are always using thought to choose what you will experience.

The whole thing about perception and projection stems from the fact that you perceive what you CHOOSE to perceive, having put it there yourself through your decision.

"I must have decided wrongly because I am not at peace" - the entire prayer and the text prior to it clarifies that if you are not experiencing joy *YOU* MUST have DECIDED NOT TO. And we are supposed to own up to 100% responsibility for that. And to then reclaim that power of decision, and CHOOSE AGAIN. But if we don't recognize that we are always choosing or have the power TO choose, and that choosing MAKES STUFF HAPPEN, then we will just remain in a state of half-baked victimhood and uncertainty and things just seeming to happen on their own.

Since we've been immersed in fear and uncertainty and victimhood for so long, it has become "normal" to us. We've become used to it. We don't realize that we HAVE a choice in every situation and that the things we are experiencing are precisely what we ASKED FOR. We do not realize that we are, as the song of prayer says, ALWAYS PRAYING and thus always asking AND always being answered in accordance with what it is we are asking for. And if we are asking for suffering, we will make suffering. And if we are asking for joy, we will receive joy.

It's all too easy to be lost in states of fearful-mindedness where it does not seem like you have any say in the matter. That you have no power, are not choosing, stuff is happening outside of your decision, things happen that you do not want, you don't seem to be able to do anything about it, and then you start to believe that you don't even HAVE any kind of "power". Like, if you even DID make a decision, you think that the making of the decision ITSELF - the making up of your mind - has no power to CAUSE anything to occur. But this is not true.

"The mind is very powerful, it is always creating and lever loses its creative ability." The whole thing about rendering the faculties of decision ineffective in an attempt to block the mind's power speaks to this. We do not want to admit that THOUGHT HAS POWER. And in fact, "who would have imagined that thought and belief could combine in a power surge strong enough to literally move mountains." This comes about through DECISIVENESS, certainty, confidence, wholeness, strength, truth, love. The qualities of a healed mind is a POWERFUL mind which chooses and is AWARE that it chooses, and that in making choices CAUSES stuff to occur. Miraculously. Powerfully.

I am still struggling with this myself because all too often I am in the egoic sleeping state of not realizing that I CAN CHOOSE something else. But I've also been finding that when I DO make a decision, it immediately DISPELLS fear. Just last night I was cleaning the bathroom and using chemicals and was getting a bit nauseated from the fumes, and after becoming anxious about it for a few minutes I DECIDED with a firm "I am...." decision... "I am not threatened, I am safe". Instantly a whole cloud of fearful energy around me vanished.

Also not long ago I was seeing signs of a sickness showing up and I got mad about it. I REFUSED that it would be allowed to happen. Jesus said "decide". I decided FIRMLY that THIS WILL SIMPLY NOT HAPPEN. Then I walked away. Next day there was no sign of it. And I had no fear or doubt or second-guessing or wondering about it because of the certainty with which I decided. The firmness or assertiveness and power of making a clear decision.

There is more to this than simply choosing which direction to go on a path. It's not some weak little change of plans. When you become decisive and fearless and certain "I am not doubtful but certain, I am not afraid but all powerful", you become quite POWERFUL and that power actually can CAUSE. It can cause stuff to happen. It can cause stuff to not happen. Just as "my self is ruler of the universe" says. Nothing can come to you unbidden by yourself. You choose it all! No-one dies without their own consent. Nothing happens to you that you do not choose. The world contains no causes, nothing can bring oppression or make you ill or weak or afraid.

We are constantly CHOOSING. We need to step into this power, into this state of "consciously choosing". Being decisive. DECIDING. I had another example just recently where I had some heartburn and was worried about it. Out of the blue, while talking to Holy Spirit, I DECIDED "I am healed." I have no idea where it came from. Instantly Holy Spirit went to work doing some kind of miracle in my body and the heartburn was healed.

Jesus also says that when the PURPOSE of any sickness is recognized as being NOT NEEDED (no defense needed) there is no sickness that will not disappear and be healed instantly. That such healing is automatic. That simply by DECIDING to accept truth without fear and being WILLING to let go of suffering, it can simply vanish. This is the power of our mind. Getting in touch with your WILLINGNESS puts you in touch with the Power of God's Will!

We don't realize how powerful our minds are. We don't recognize it because we're been hanging out in the ego land for too long, drifting from one victimy reaction to the next. Just allowing stuff to happen, going along with it, passively aggressing against ourselves, just laying down and "letting" stuff occur - through our own unconscious choices. It's not that we are not MAKING choices all the time, it's that these choices are being made from an UNCONSCIOUS DEATH WISH and it's causing all kinds of havoc. We need to become AWARE of our decision making moments, our moments of decisiveness and choosing. We can choose what we experience!

I find this choosing to be powerful especially in relation to some kind of statement about myself, termed as "I am..." or "I am not". You don't have to just let stuff carry on "by itself". That's an illusion. Nothing happens "on its own". There isn't any kind of alien will or external causality. You ARE already making everything happen that you experience, you are just doing it outside of awareness. This is part of why we must remove blocks to awareness so that we can stop unconsciously making bad choices that hurt ourselves.

There is power in decision. It is the antithesis of fear and death. YOU CAN CHOOSE NOT TO DIE. And in fact, if you do die, you still chose it. "No-one dies without their own consent." It's just a matter of whether or not you get in touch with that CHOOSING and you USE that power of decision to choose otherwise. You want to choose otherwise because you want to be at peace. You can CHOOSE that. Death is a decision that you make, just as "heaven is a decision I must make." And when you choose Heaven, death becomes IMPOSSIBLE because it cannot happen WITHOUT your consent. If you do not choose it, you are free from it forever.

There is a whole workbook lesson on this as well, Lesson 152 - "The power of decision is my own." Lesson 152. Here's how it starts:

"No-one can suffer loss unless it be his own decision. No-one suffers pain except his choice elects this state for him. No-one can grieve nor fear nor think him sick unless these are the outcomes that he wants. And no-one dies without his own consent. Nothing occurs but represents your wish, and nothing is omitted that you choose. Here is your world, complete in all details. Here is its whole reality for you. And it is only here salvation is.

You may believe that this position is extreme, and too inclusive to be true. Yet can truth have exceptions? If you have the gift of everything can loss be real? Can pain be part of peace, or grief of joy? Can fear and sickness enter in a mind where love and perfect holiness abide? Truth must be all-inclusive if it be the truth at all. Accept no opposite and no exceptions, for to do so is to contradict the truth entirely.

Salvation is the recognition that the truth is true and nothing else is true."

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.

ALL problems are ONE problem - you believe you are separate from God.

There IS no other problem.

The ego, however, has been extremely clever in making the illusion that there are many many many separate problems. It has tried to fragment the problem, ie introduce separation into the separation.

What you've ended up with is a world where the FORM of the problem appears to be different. All 'forms' (objects etc) are the 'form of error'. The error is the separation from God. The FORM that the separation is taking varies greatly. The ego also has you use the body's senses to look upon form and to regard its form AS the problem. So it tells you like...

"The kitchen sink is broken therefore there is a problem with the kitchen sink".

"The car battery has died so there is a problem with the car battery".

This completely covers over what the problem really is. These are fake problems. They are decoys. They are MEANT to distract you and fixate you on FORMS - physical matter - so that you will not look to the mind where the real problem is. Like, right now as I look out the window, it just started snowing. So now there's a problem - it's snowing out, so if I go out there it's going to be cold. So now I have a problem, and I must problem solve THIS form of a problem by fetching my jacket. That seems to then SOLVE the problem - this problem at least. But it doesn't solve world hunger. It doesn't solve drought. It doesn't solve your favorite TV show ending before you're ready to be done with it.

The ego keeps all problems completely separate by identifying problems as forms, so that unique forms of problems need unique solutions. And it appears you CAN solve unique problems with unique solutions. Except that this a) makes you think you've really solved the real problem (which is not true), and b) ensures that there is no "transfer value" between problems. You fix this problem, another one will pop up. You fix your toaster, your fridge melts. You fix your car, your window breaks. Whatever it is. Endless separate problems, all designed to DISGUISE the ONE PROBLEM.

The ONE PROBLEM is that you believe your relationship with God has gone to the shits and its broken and now you are separate from the only One you can ever fully love - God and His Creation. That's the ONLY problem that ever exists.

So then because you're so distracted by the ego's illusion of problems, when problems 'happen' you get all caught up in how you need to 'forgive this problem' and 'forgive that person' and 'forgive my body' and all this bullshit. Its' all kind of at a surface level because your attention is really distracted by all this external stuff. It's meant to distract you. Ego doesn't want you realizing there is only one problem and one solution.

When you car breaks down it is because you believe you are separate from God.

When your house catches fire it is because you are separate from God.

When your cat dies its because you are separate from God.

When it rains on your wedding day its because you are separate from God.

When the wrong politician wins an election its because you are separate from God.

When you run out of your favorite food its because you are separate from God.

NONE of these thing could even EXIST if you weren't separate from God. EVERY single problem in the entire physical universe is the direct result of you separating from God. The physical universe ITSELF is the FORM of your being separate from God - it is a depiction of your broken relationship. And your separation from God IS the problem. Not your cat, your car, your house, your job, your friends, your upsets, your fears, bla bla bla... endless list of bullshit. You only have ONE problem.

Your relationship with God. Something seemed to happen to damage your relationship with God, and the RESULT was that you ended up in hell. Hell - this world - is ONLY the symptoms of a blocked relationship with God. It has NO other basis. There aren't any other sources of problems or causes of problems anywhere in the entire universe. All other sources are fakes and decoys and cover-ups and false origins.

It all stems from you believing that you've had a lover's tiff with God and now you're not on speaking terms and you've gone off in a huff all pissed off and at the same time upset and ashamed and feeling bad about it, because you believe you've hurt God and destroyed the only meaningful relationship you ever had.

What are you going to do to solve this problem?

How are you going to REPAIR and HEAL this ONE problem?

How are you going to get yourself BACK to God? How are you going to clear the air, forgive everything that seemed to happen, let go of all 'bad blood' and get back to where you and God are IN LOVE again? How are you going to get there if you are not directly addressing and undoing your belief in separation?

Yes you can work on it by addressing how the separation shows up in tiny fragments. You can address individual little problems in your life like your toaster blew up and singed your hairdo. You can forgive that little bit of upset. Or you can forgive that political candidate that you despise and undo a bit of separation there. But that's just scratching the surface. That shows how deeply embedded you are in the APPEARANCE of problems in the world, which is just a surface coat of distraction. Why not TARGET your efforts at DIRECTLY repairing your relationship with God - which IS what this is all about?

If you want to undo separation, it means you are going to have to get back to being ONE with God. It means you're going to have to have a REUNION. It means you're going to have to COMMUNE with Him. It means you need to take all the reasons that you think you are separate from Him, all the problems that you think are coming between you, and offer them up with a willingness to let them go. Because all your grievances and all your problems are grievances against God. Period. You think it's about other people. It's about you and God. That's all there is.

So ask yourself, as you forgive, exactly how much DISTANCE is there between you in that forgiveness effort, and God? Is it scratching the surface and skirting around the real problem? Is it actually bringing you closer to God? Are you becoming aware of the way that you are trying to avoid and deny God and stay far away from Him? This is what it is all about. You need to heal your separation from God, and nothing else.

You're not going to heal it if you're not willing to GO TO GOD and make an effort to reunite. You're not going to heal it if you're not willing to admit everything is about your relationship to God and that this relationship needs to be healed. You're not going to heal if you think your job is to just `forgive illusions` or `see my brother correctly` or whatever. Those are just tools and stepping stones. The huge elephant in the living room that people don't want to touch with a barge pole is GOD. God loves you and wants to be with you again and you're having this stand-off and making up all these extraneous complicated reasons why it is 'other stuff' that you have to deal with.

There is nothing you need to do other than to heal your connection to God and release absolutely everything that comes between you. If you want to totally simplify the Course, simply work on what's happening between you and God that keeps you apart, and remove that stuff with Holy Spirit so that you can be with God again. It's that simple. Being with God is all you really want. It's the only thing that means anything to you in reality. It's your heart's desire. You would be hugely relieved and overjoyed to learn that God still loves you and you CAN be together again. All other goals are fake goals and distractions.

God... please help me to be with you.

God... I give this belief in body sickness to you because it's just coming between us and I want to be with you.

God... I've been all pissed off at my coworker and have been trying to forgive them and its not working, because I know its not really about them its about us, and the anger I feel is anger at you, and I don't want to be angry at you any more. Please forgive me and correct me so we can be One.

God... I recognize this lack of money is directly a symbol of us being separate and I have no real interest in money, all I want is to be with you. Please heal this absence of you in my life and replace it with symbols of our togetherness, until I'm able to be with you fully.

God... please heal my mind of the belief that I am separate from you, which is showing up in my body as disease and threat. I know it's because I believe our relationship is diseased and that I am threatened by you. Please help me to feel safe with you and know that I'm mistaken for believing we're at war.

God... help me undo my belief that we are not loving toward each other. I was mistaken for thinking I hurt you in any way and I recognize and accept your unconditional love and forgiveness.

Go to town on it. Include God in everything. This is the purpose of the Course.

What appears to be the physical world is not actually "direct reality". It is in fact once removed. It is an effect of an entirely other layer of causality which seems hidden. Just as in the holographic model, the underlying "source" of the appearances you see, is obscured by "sight of form" and you end up believing that this physical world is "verbatim", ie this is all there is.

In understanding why miracles are supernatural, it is very important to recognize this. In order to be supernatural there has to be an order or layer of reality deeper or higher than what appears to be the physical surface of this universe. We have to recognize that bodies and objects are not "immediate reality", they are once removed, and are EFFECTS caused by some other hidden level of causality. There is a whole other layer of causality, and everything in this world is "coming from" that hidden realm, making this world entirely an secondary effect.

When observing just the appearances of the surface of this world, there is a tremendous vast illusion before your eyes, which seems to operate in terms of "horizontal cause and effect". It seems as if some parts of the world cause and effect other parts. But this IS entirely an illusion. It's not what is happening. Anything which looks like being "different" in this world, ie one thing is a cause and another thing is an effect, is an illusion.

What secretly is happening is a higher, hidden level, a more immediate level of reality, is causing this entire universe all at once. Causality moves in a "vertical" direction from above, downwards, projecting the universe below. This means that there is a realm where you are "outside of" or above the entire field of horizontal illusions, outside the dream, where you are under absolutely none of the illusory horizontal laws and free of ALL limitations.

In that realm, you essentially are like a movie editor, someone who can reach into the movie and rearrange parts of it, orchestrate what goes where, and make significant changes. While within the movie itself it seems there is this consistent "story" playing, which utterly depends on the existence of many limitations and props and illusions of things which "must" happen according to certain rules or laws, realize that all of these stories of causality are entirely a fiction, where nothing seems to betray the illusion, nothing hints at this not being all there is, and nothing "blows the illusion" of horizontal or linear causality.

An example is a movie that you go to the cinema to watch. When you watch the movie you believe it is a single seamless story, in which certain limits and rules have been put in place in order to paint a seemingly "consistent" picture. But the fact is, if you could've been in the studio when the movie was being created, you would realize it was simply a bunch of people "acting" and a bunch of computers producing CGI special effects, working "behind the scenes". You as as a miracle worker as a BEHIND THE SCENES OPERATOR who orchestrates and produces the second-hand "effects" or "results" of a creative process. We used this same process initially when FORMING the physical universe, which is an entire order of reality removed from those who pull the strings.

When expression is made from the higher level, the more immediate level of causality, that expression is able to cause changes to the expressed world below. Just as an editor would make changes to a movie sequence from outside the movie which has the potentially to "break the illusion" of linear consistency within the movie itself. And when it DOES "perform a miracle", it literally BREAKS the illusion of linear cause and effect - the horizontal consistency or predictability of one thing leading only to another specific consequence. It's like someone editing the movie, and to those observing from WITHIN the movie, it will look like reality just did something "impossible".

If you seem to be living in the movie and you think that all that can happen is what's inside the movie, then suddenly a spaceship appears out of nowhere because the movie director decided to insert one, you will "witness" what appears to be a miracle. Something happening that seems impossible based on the linear laws. If you think of The Truman Show - a great movie, the same laws and rules and limitations had to happen day after day to maintain an illusion that nothing could happen outside the law, but when the main character started to "wake up" and see through the limitations, the world around him started to "break" and he eventually stepped outside of the whole illusion, coming face to face with the "directory" of the movie. You as a miracle worker are a director of the physical movie.

Or similarly, if it appears that there is a law of gravity where, over time, objects are attracted towards the center of the earth, and therefore human bodies are almost glued to the surface (you can jump, but only so high before you are attracted back down), and if suddenly a human body were to fly up in the air or walk on water, this would BREAK the illusion of horizontal laws. That means, the laws "within" the linear dream, within appearances of horizontal causality, could not have "resulted in" this effect, and it must have required someone to reach in from OUTSIDE of the laws and make an adjustment that the laws themselves are incapable of producing.

The key point to realize is that all of the linear laws are VERY LIMITING. We are confined by them. We are trapped by them. They seem to play out as if having a force or power over us. We don't seem able to escape gravity, time seems to proceed in one direction, one object seems to collide with another, no objects share the same space, very large heavy objects like mountains seem completely immovable, even sickness seems to have a causality in the body or due to external forces. These are all very limiting illusions of things on the SAME LEVEL causing other things on the SAME LEVEL to change.

From the point of view of the miracle worker, who is under no laws but God's, there are NO LIMITS. And so when the miracle worker manipulates the limitations in ways which defy and BREAK the linear laws, this appears to those in the horizontal dream as SUPERNATURAL MIRACLES. Things which should technically be "impossible" according to the limits we have accepted, suddenly become possible. Things we have assumed to be "normal" or "natural" are shown to be ARTIFICIAL LIMITATIONS.

Since we don't generally recognize that we LIVE IN WORLD OF LIMITATIONS, we don't realize that there are additional FREEDOMS and flexibilities that we have decided are off-limits or impossible. Miracles are capable of exercising that freedom and of PROVING that you are NOT BOUND by the horizontal laws of the ego's illusory world. This is why miracles are super-natural, they have a freedom of potential way beyond what any physical law in this second-hand universe suggests is possible.

There is therefore literally NOTHING that they cannot do. We have to open our minds to see past the limitations of physical illusion and realize that even the things we think are impossible are perfectly possible. There is NO REASON why you cannot do anything you can imagine. "There is nothing my holiness cannot do."

So the main keys to this are:

1) This physical world is once removed from true cause, it is not immediate reality

2) This world has no real causes in it, they are all effects of a higher reality

3) Cause-and-effect in this world are totally fictional illusions designed BY a higher level causer, to create a "story" in which limited things happen according to limited rules

4) Miracles wield a freedom way beyond the limitations of this world and express and demonstrate that ANYTHING is possible because they originate in the FIRST ORDER of causal reality, and therefore can BREAK and OVERRIDE any of the limitations or laws present on the physical level, since those laws are limitations PUT IN PLACE BY someone from the more primal level of reality. This is why Jesus says "you made sickness and death and therefore can abolish both."

Here's what ACIM says:

"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."

"Your holiness reverses all the laws of the world. It is beyond every restriction of time, space, distance and limits of any kind. Your holiness is totally unlimited in its power because it establishes you as a Son of God, at one with the Mind of his Creator. Through your holiness the power of God is made manifest. Through your holiness the power of God is made available. And there is nothing the power of God cannot do."

"You cannot see the Holy Spirit, but you can see His manifestations. And unless you do, you will not realize He is there. Miracles are His witnesses, and speak for his Presence."

It's very simple.

God is love and we are to have a loving relationship with God.

In love, everything is perfect, holy, immortal, safe and alive.

If you reject God's love, you will introduce hell into your mind. You will invent all forms of suffering, and all forms of objects, and all forms of death. Every conceivable problem exists only within the realm of "God is absent".

God is everything and all truth and all perfection. In God there are no problems.

The ONLY problem is that if you reject God ("The denial of God is the ego's religion"), you invent a false experience of suffering, riddled with problems.

EVERY problem in the ENTIRE universe of space and time is a SYMPTOM of the absence of God. It is entirely logically composed of the attempt to oppose God's love. It exists only while God's love seems to be absent, just as darkness exists SOLELY as an illusion of the absence of light.

You either have God, or you do not. If you lack God, you produce every imaginable problem. Every imaginable problem is made of the belief that God is not one with you, sharing love with you. An entire world of spacetime has been produced within this mad idea.

If all problems are symptoms of the lack of God or love, then REUNION WITH GOD is the ONLY solution to this problem. And union with God will solve ALL problems. Union with God will UNDO the separation. Union with God is the atonement, the acceptance of God and the restoration of oneness with God, recognizing you are in God and never left or changed.

You live in God. If you try to live without God you live in a nightmare. When you choose God again the nightmare ends. The nightmare IS the denial of God's love. When you stop denying God's love the nightmare disappears.

God is the ANSWER to the LACK of God. If God is lacking, the ONLY SOLUTION is to get God back. To rejoin with Him. To commune. To repair the rift in your relaitonship. To close the gap between you. And to become one again.

God GAVE HIMSELF as his answer to the separation, because the Holy Spirit symbolizes his love, power and truth. The Holy Spirit answers the separation by recognizing and holding in mind the fact that you ARE STILL as God created you and are STILL one with Him.

Love solves ALL problems because all problems are the absence of love. When love or light comes along, all problems melt and darkness vanishes. The entire universe of spacetime is UNDONE by love.

It boils down to one simple thing. The cause of, or the whole separation, is the ONLY PROBLEM. One problem, with one solution. A sense of separation from God is the ONLY problem you need correct. Which means, rejoining with God and loving God and letting yourself receive God's love again.

To love God, or not to love God, that is the question. Your ONLY GOAL should be to love God again.

"The ego's logic is as impeccable as that of the Holy Spirit, because your mind has all the means at its disposal to side with Heaven or earth, as it elects."

"Our efforts will be directed toward recognizing that there is only one problem and one answer. In this recognition are all problems resolved. In this recognition there is peace."

"Today I would remember the simplicity of salvation by reinforcing the lesson that there is one problem and one solution. The problem is a grievance; the solution is a miracle." (miracles are expressions of love)

"Above all, remember that you have one problem and that the problem has one solution. It is in this that the simplicity of salvation lies. It is because of this that it is guaranteed to work."

"Salvation does depend on recognizing this one problem, and understanding that it has been solved. One problem -- one solution. Salvation is accomplished. Freedom from conflict has been given you. Accept that fact, and you are ready to take your rightful place in God's plan for salvation."

"Your Father created you Wholly without sin, wholly without pain, and wholly without suffering of any kind. If you deny Him, you bring sin, pain, and suffering into your OWN mind, because of the power He gave it. Your mind is capable of creating worlds, but it can also DENY what it creates, because it is free."

"And so again we make the only choice that ever can be made; we choose between illusions and the truth, or pain and joy, or hell and Heaven."

"It still remains within him to project as God projected his own Spirit to him. In reality, this is his ONLY choice, because his free will was made for his own joy in creating the perfect."

"Sin is the only thought that makes the goal of God seem unobtainable."

"The goal of God is lost in the quest for lesser goals of any kind, and prayer becomes requests for enemies."

"Within the world of opposites there is a way to use forgiveness for the goal of God, and find the peace He offers you."

"In your holy relationship is your Father's Son. He has NOT lost communion with Him. NOR WITH HIMSELF. When you agreed to join each other, you acknowledged this is so."

"Communion is another kind of completion, which goes beyond guilt BECAUSE it goes beyond the body. Communion comes with peace, and peace MUST transcend the body."

"The miracle sets validity where it belongs. Eternal validity belongs only to the Soul. The miracle acknowledges only the Truth. It thus dispels man's illusions about himself, and puts him into communion with himself and with God."

"The Soul never loses its communion with God. Only the mind and body need Atonement. The miracle joins in the Atonement of Christ by placing the mind in the service of the Spirit. This establishes the proper function of mind, and abolishes its errors."

"Oh come ye faithful, to the holy union of the Father and Son in YOU."