It may not be obvious, but A Course In Miracles is basically trying to get you out of a state of mortality, into a state of immortality. Think about all the ways that it does this.

That you are not at the effect of the world.

That nothing in the world causes you or brings oppression or makes you sick or afraid.

That you have the power to dominate everything you see.

That your body has no power over the mind and mind is stronger than the body.

That in the rusurrecetion you overcome death entirely.

That all forms of suffering are forms of mortality/death.

That you are to dis-identify from being an illusion such as believing in the body or the world.

The fact you are at home in God, immortal and permanent, merely having a dream of death.

The teaching that your attack thoughts attack your invulnerability, that you can be attacked by nothing but your thoughts, and that without attack thoughts you are invulnerable.

The secret of salvation, that you realize you are doing everything to yourself, have made a wrong decision which caused you to not be at peace, and now you want to choose immortality again.

The application of forgiveness which is the same thing as atonement and true perception and salvation and resurrection, nothing short of overcoming death and becoming absolutely transcendent of all suffering.

"Swear not to die, you holy Son of God", clearly indicates that you as an immortal child of God should never be choosing death, which means never choosing mortality. Which means claiming your immortality.

"Sickness is an attempt to prove you can be hurt", the entire teaching about what you use the body for, that death is a choice and you cannot die unless you choose to, and the use of the body to demonstrate your brother’s innocence or sinfulness, is all geared towards you acting like an immortal being not a suffering sinner.

Every single aspect of the Course is geared not merely towards you becoming peaceful and dying, or happier but sick, but in fact is aimed at taking you totally beyond all forms of suffering, death, sickness, unhappiness and vulnerability of every kind. To never again be affected by anything. Nothing short of immortality. Never again to suffer, never again to die.

This is the central core of the course. "There is no death, the Son of God is...." IMMORTAL!

Every lesson, every quote, every paragraph, is all speaking to the vast collage of illusions we have invented to try to PRETEND to be mortal in a dream of death. To pretend it is possible to die. To make-believe things that seem to crumble, decay, erode and end. An entire fiction of a world that seems to come and go, having beginnings and endings which clearly are not eternal.

"The world you see is an illusion of a world, God did not create it, for what He creates MUST BE ETERNAL as himself."

It’s not merely a matter of whether the world is real, it obviously cannot be because nothing in it has immortality. It is a dream of death, and there really is no world.

This is all over the course. Immortality, invulnerability, not being affected, permanence, peace that lasts forever, God’s creations and minds carrying on uninterrupted forever, nothing being able to attack or sin against God/reality, nothing real being affected, the Son of God being beyond death, it all points to IMMORTALITY being your totally natural state of being.

"You cannot die, but you can confuse yourself with things that do."

This is also why "the body cannot contain you who are life". It’s also why "God cannot enter a body, nor can you join him there." This is why God’s Kingdom is an IMMORTAL LIVING FOREVER WORLD OF LIGHT.

Any time we entertain ideas of suffering, sickness, death, fear, being affected, caused, threatened, anything that suggests or even hints at us not being invulnerable and immortal, we are "playing dead". Any time we take illusions of attack, vulnerability, suffering, or any kind of non-immortal activity seriously, we are believing we are NOT immortal. And we believe this about others too when we fear for their life. That condemns us both to death, or at least tries to. No-one can really die!

Because your are immortal, you ARE still as God created you. God did not create you capable of death. Or sin. Or attack. OR murder. You cannot do any of these things in reality. So you DREAM of being in a world where all FALSE things are possible, where IMPOSSBILITIES seem possible, where everything is subject to attack and impermanence, and where death seems to strike at every thing that moves. An entire fantasy world that runs against every law of God and opposes His Will, trying to prove His children can die.

"The laws of this world go against your nature." This world goes against your IMMORTALITY.Your natural condition is to live utterly free of all attack, impervious to all suffering, incapable of death, incapable of unhappiness, and absolutely permanent in all your ways. Absolutely incapable of being attacked ever! You are not RELATIVE to life, you are ABSOLUTELY ALIVE. Forever. Nothing can affect you against your will unless YOU WILL TO BE AFFECTED. And then you are FAKING IT, because your immortality CANNOT be affected. All sickness, suffering and death is FAKE. A huge lie.

You are as permanent as God. Any attempt to believe, perceive, suggest, portray, act, think, or live otherwise, is a denial of your immortality. It’s an attempt to make believe that you are not immortal and that you can suffer. And every single form of non-immortality or vulnerability is a self-chosen, self-inflicted attack and an attempt to prove you are not immortal. And because all such attempts to change your unchangeability can never work, they are absolutely futile make-believe.

Death is futile. It has no causal effect whatsoever upon the Son of God. It does not work. Everything you are doing to make yourself suffer is a waste of time. It has no effect on your immortal spirit. And you are only your immortal spirit. Every single way that you pretend to be afraid, sick, suffering and dead, is absolutely 100% chosen by you as part of your attempt to ACT AS IF YOU CAN DIE. It’s an attempt to prove death is real and happening to you. How can death happen to someone who is IMORTAL? How can an immortal being be SICK or suffer or even unhappy in any way, thinking that something can disturb its permanent peace?

Potent questions to ask oneself:

1) Am I using this to pretend to not be immortal?

2) Why am I trying to prove I am not immortal?

3) Why am I believing that my immortality can be affected by this?

4) Does this have any power whatsoever to change what God created?

5) Why am I lying by pretending I can suffer?

6) Why am I denying that I cannot be affected by anything?

You are an immortal being, temporarily hanging out in a dream world where everything is an illusion of mortality. A world of death is obviously not the natural environment for a being of eternal life.

Yet the body can become a sign of life to those grown tired of the fetid stench of death. It can become a symbol of immortality, representing eternal life. Through its loveliness and health it can teach by demonstration with a power greater than a thousand tongues that there has been no attack, no vulnerability, no damage, no mark of sin, no evidence or proof of viciousness and no sign of evil effects. It can represent wholeness and healing and innocence and invulnerability, and thus teach this to everyone.

To awaken fully is nothing short of waking up to immortality, to eternal life in Heaven, the end of all sickness and death, the cancellation of sin and guilt, and a return to unlimited permanence. It requires the end of the body, which is nothing. "Indeed, you cannot remain in this world, with this knowledge."

NOTHING REAL CAN BE THREATENED, because it is immortal! YOU are real. You cannot be threatened! You are totally permanently alive. Forever and ever. Why do you believe you can or have been affected by anything or anyone ever? You have done nothing but attack your own inherent invulnerability, trying to pretend you can suffer. Isn’t it time to own up to being immortal?

"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." - ACIM"There is nothing my holiness cannot do." - ACIMI want to be clear about this, because this is an often misunderstood matter. It's a question of who does what, who has the power, and who should get the credit. Is God the miracle worker? Are we? Both?First of all, let's tackle this term "of myself". Of yourself, you have and are nothing. This does not mean you do not exist. It means that what you are, YOU did not put there. You did not create yourself. What you have did not come from you. You did not originate it - it wasn't "of" (from) you. But this DOES NOT in any way mean that you HAVE NOTHING or that you can do nothing. Far from it.For example, children do not create themselves. Of themselves, they did not give themselves life. But they have life. They have life because their creator SHARED their life with them. Their parent EXTENDED life and GAVE life to them, creating them as a standalone life joined with the parent's life. The child is not devoid of life or incapable, but what they have was inherited.God extended his own will to us to create us. He shares the Kingdom with us. He put everything he HAS into us. He invested us with HIS POWER. His light is our light. His love and joy are shared with us. It's in us. We didn't put it there, but you sure as heck HAVE it. We are HOST TO GOD but this doesn't mean "only God exists and we do not".

God does not create weak beings who can do nothing. God creates POWERFUL beings of light. In fact, unlimited, holy beings who can do literally ANYTHING. They are fully equipped to CREATE. They are unlimited. They have been GIVEN the ABILITY to accomplish anything.

In fact, God has established his children as CO-CREATORS, which does NOT mean that God is the only one doing the creative act. It's not just God sitting there creating "through His children with His children doing nothing at all. His children MUST collaborate, MUST be included, MUST share, MUST exercise free will, and MUST CHOOSE to co-create with and like the father. BOTH of them produce creative ACTS together in collaboration.

God created the sonship, and the sonship is fully equipped with the ability to ADD TO the Kingdom. They create additional beings - "children of my will". But they create them WITH their brothers, AND with God. This doesn't mean any individual part of the Kingdom "does all the work". EVERY part of the Kingdom does all the work. Even the Holy Spirit participates in co-creation. So who gets credit? They all do.

So when we say that of ourselves we can do nothing, we have to be very careful not to imply that we do the OPPOSITE of doing something. Because it is absolutely NOT TRUE that we "do nothing" or that God is "the doer" through us, excluding us from the process. Without us God CANNOT act through us.

This is why ACIM says "Love goes out because of what it is, but you are needed that it can begin" and why "Love cannot enter where it's not welcome." YOU have to participate, not merely in an act of getting out of the way and allowing, but ACTIVELY WILLING in accord with God's will.

God has GIVEN YOU His power, making you a powerful co-creator with a powerful mind. That means there is stuff you can do. Not only is there stuff you can do, there is nothing you cannot do. You are unlimited in your power. YOUR power. But YOUR power is ALSO HIS. You don't OWN it exclusively, but you DO own it.

The point Jesus is making is not that you can't do anything or that God does everything. He's making the point that your symbiotic relationship with God means that anything you CAN do is BECAUSE you and God are working TOGETHER in unison. You are sharing in God's power. You are extending HIS love, AS your own. How could you even experience the ability to love another if you could not YOURSELF be capable of loving? YOU love others, along with God.

We need to be careful, indeed, not to believe that our power is "of ourself". This is an ego belief that everything we are and can do is because we independently have superpowers that do NOT depend on God, or that are not shared or accessible to all. It would be egoic and arrogant to claim that everything we do, we do WITHOUT God. We would be merely bragging at our prowess with our limited "skills."

This is why Jesus deferred "ownership" of miraculous acts to the Power of God through Him. But he did not mean that HE Himself had no power or did not participate or merely sat on the sideline and watched. Jesus's mind was powerful. HE was a powerful miracle worker. It's just that in terms of WHO does the act or WHO makes it possible, ownership is SHARED with God. Of Himself Jesus HAD nothing and WAS nothing. He was not OF Himself, He was an extended creation of God. But he definitely HAD power and DID acts. HIS mind was miraculous.

Here for example, Jesus explains that ownership to God does not mean "God gets all the credit and we get none". To Him, ownership is about SHARING, meaning that ALL created beings HAVE the power to USE as they see fit. And while God DOES deserve "full" credit, He is not the ONLY one who deserves credit. Omitting credit from yourself omits it from one of God's extensions, which in turn omits it from God.

"It is yours BECAUSE it belongs to Him, for ownership is sharing to Him."

This makes sense because anything created is FULLY given EVERYTHING that its creator has. Through extension, what is God's IS YOURS. This is YOUR INHERITANCE!!! Which means you are a divine, holy, powerful, creative being, because God has created you to be this. It's just that your power isn't yours ALONE, exclusive to you, special, different, or something that God doesn't ALSO SHARE. God has equipped and enabled to you to be miraculous WITH him.

So what we need to say more clearly perhaps is, what we have did not come from ourselves. Of (from) ourselves, we have and are nothing. There is nothing IN us that WE put there. We didn't create ourselves. God made everything that WE can do possible. God gave us the power TO perform miracles, because HE is miraculous and is involved in the miracle. "Miracles are a universal blessing from God". Yet WE are powerful miracle workers as well.

We should be very careful not to transition from the ego position of "everything I have is mine alone", to "I have and do nothing. And we should be careful not to transition from "I believe I am powerful" to "I have no power". It is in fact the EGO that thinks this way, jumping to what seem to be opposites. To go from one state of exclusivity to another, because it does not understand inclusive thinking.

It is NOT an improvement to switch from the ego position of "I exclusively have power" to "God exclusively has the power". That is NOT correct. That's an ego conclusion. God does not think this way. God thinks INCLUSIVELY. We need to transition from "I exclusively have power" to "WE SHARE ALL POWER WITH GOD."

It would be ridiculous to say Jesus, a Son of God, had NO power. Jesus was immensely powerful and strong minded with an undivided constructive will, aligned with God's will, working in unison with the Holy Spirit. His own mind was miraculous BECAUSE he shared His mind with God. It's fine to have the humility to not "claim exclusive ownership" of miracle working, but this does NOT mean Jesus himself had no power or ability.

In order for a "separate God" to work through us, and for us to be a passive conduit, which is also NOT how it works, you'd have to be NOTHING. You are not nothing. You become loving in order that love can move through you. This means still that YOU have to be loving. This is why you are NEEDED by love so that it can go out. On its own it is blocked if you do not cooperate. God sends the love, you must RELAY it by ALSO loving like and with God, amplifying the signal. Your will must ACT and be INCLUDED, FREELY.

"Miracles are expressions of love" and "All expressions of love are maximal" and "Miracles are everyone's right but purification is necessary first" is telling us that miracle can only function "through you" with YOU being miracle minded and miraculous, by YOU entering a state of WILLING TO LOVE in a maximal and powerful way, SO THAT you are OPEN to RECEIVE love from God, acknowledge the love that is IN you because God put it there, and in turn willingly EXPRESS it as miracles. YOU have to be miraculously minded AND maximally loving in order to perform them. If YOU are not, YOU are not "doing your part", and then the miracles do not happen because "something has gone wrong" (ie you are blocking love).

We need to drop the idea that we merely "step aside". Yes we need to get our EGO out of the way, but not our SELF. We need to get our selfishness out of the way, but not our soul. We need to BE very loving in order to BE miraculous. And WE MUST have miracle mindedness in order to perform miracles. But miracle mindedness does not mean "a mind that cannot do anything." It means a mind that cannot do anything WITHOUT God, and CAN do EVERYTHING WITH God.

By being open to receive and admit and aknowledge and allow God to work THROUGH us, it does not mean that WE aren't doing something. That again is ego exclusive thinking. "God or me" is EGO thinking. "God AND me" is divine thinking. "God does it all" is TRUE, but NOT if you make that exclusive. "God does it all and no one else does anything" is an ego conclusion. You are a CO-CREATOR, not just a medium.

We need to acknowledge that we didn't give ourselves the power to heal. But we do have it, and we need to acknowledge that also. We need to admit we cannot heal WITHOUT God, but this does not mean that WE do not do anything. Our function is to SHARE in the state of power. And that means WE have to be powerful, healed, whole beings of love and light, which in their own right are very capable.

"Teachers of God will take over the world because of their strength."

"Now must you share His function" "You share His function only by judging as HE does"

"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. What you cannot see becomes real to you only through the witnesses who speak for it. For you can be AWARE of what you cannot see, and it can become compellingly real to you, as its presence becomes manifest ***THROUGH you***. ***Do His work, for you SHARE in His function.*** 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."

Your function is not "be passive". It's not to "just let God work through you". God CAN'T work through you unless YOU DO SOMETHING AS WELL. Your function is to be a miracle worker, a DOER, to DO HIS work WITH Him. To SHARE His function, not to have Him do all the function. Your mind's condition is VITAL and IMPORTANT in the equation of how miracles happen. Your WILLINGNESS is absolutely required. Your power to love is mandatory. You choosing to DO miracles WITH Him makes them possible.

This is not about giving God 100% credit and giving us zero. That is false humility and false thinking. We must give God 100% credit AND give ourselves 100% credit. This flies against ego thinking. What we can do did not come from us, but we nevertheless are powerful beings. Thinking it is ours exclusively IS ego. Thinking we have NO power is ALSO ego and is NOT true humility. The children of God are not puppets. YOUR strength, shared with Him, enables miracles to happen. Miracles express from YOUR mind. YOU are the miracle worker.

"What the Holy Spirit enables you to do is clearly not of this world." (a shared state of collaboration)

"The creative power of both God AND His Creations is limitless" (God's children have unlimited power)

"It was only my DECISION that gave me all power in Heaven and earth. My only gift to you is to help you make the same decision FOR YOURSELF." (Each of us HAS all of the power of heaven to use as we see fit)

"All power and glory are yours because the Kingdom is His." (YOU deserve glory, not just God. The ONLY problem is you claiming the glory without sharing it)

"By teaching the power of the Kingdom of God Himself, He teaches you that ALL POWER IS YOURS." (see, ALL power is yours. YOU are powerful - it's just that it's not ONLY you that's powerful)

"You who perceive yourself as weak and frail, with futile hopes and devastated dreams, born but to die, to weep and suffer pain, hear this: ***All power is given unto you in earth and Heaven. There is nothing that you cannot do.***" (There is nothing YOU cannot do because all power has been GIVEN to you).

"Having been restored to your original state, you naturally become part of the Atonement yourself. 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 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.***

***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 (shared function). Conviction really comes through accomplishment. Remember that ability is the potential, Achievement is its expression, and Atonement is the Purpose."

EGO: I have the power, God does nothing. I gave myself this power, it's special and exclusive.

HOLY: God and I share all power and together we can do anything. What I have God has, and we perform miracles together.

Think of the physical body as having a purpose. It has a purpose, because it has a USE, because it has a USER. It is being used FOR something, other than the body in and of itself - because the body is not an end in itself. It is a tool.

"It is still true that the body has no function of itself. This is because it is NOT an end."

The ego - ie insanity in your mind - can use the body for a negative purpose. This purpose is attack and destruction. When you are using the body for this purpose, the mind uses the body like it's a weapon.

It actually transforms the form of the body into what looks like "a picture of crucifixion." This is a picture of body which has things like damage, sickness, disease, signs of death, cancers and deformities and so on. Basically various forms of DEATH, to try to GIVE DEATH to others.

These are USED by the ego mind to send a message to those who look upon the body. At the same time the ego is using the body to try to ATTACK others. The sickened states that it invents in the body are themselves attempts to reach out and "infect others" with suffering.

"The sick are merciless to everyone, and in contagion do they seek to kill. Death seems an easy price, if they can say, "Behold me, brother, at your hand I die." For sickness is the witness to his guilt, and death would prove his errors MUST be sins."

Not to induce guilt in anyone who might be doing this or experiencing the difficulties of sickness, but the course is indeed teaching that when the ego USES the body it uses it as a weapon to try to inflict suffering on others.

Its primary method is to put sickness "symptoms" into the body so that the body itself, physically, becomes a way to "spread death" to others. In particularly virile forms the body becomes contagious and capable of causing to others what seems to have happened to itself, thus extending sickness and death.

When the body is sick, it also sends a kind of visual physical message to those who witness it, that says "look what you did to me." It induces guilt, it accuses of sin, it projects an egoic message of the proof of sin, and we hold this suffering up for others to see so that they will be accused of causing it. And thus by our own desire to make our own body sick, we're willing to suffer if it means others are accused of sinning against God and can take on the guilt and the punishment.

In effect, a sick mind uses the body to make the body sick so that the body can make others sick. But the mind can also be healed of its sickness and its attempts to attack or to make guilty. And then the mind is more healed and now the mind is still USING the body but it is now using it for a higher purpose.

A healed mind USES the body not as a weapon or to try to project guilt or to scapegoat or to prove others to be the sinful cause of its symptoms. Instead a healed mind sends healing through the body. This healing love literally heals the body and removes from it the signs and symbols of attack and death.

As the body is healed, it now changes its symbolic message, and instead of now showing a picture of crucifixion to another it instead shows a symbolic image of something "unharmed", something innocent and free from attack. Such a healed healthy body sends a broadcast, visually, symbolically, that other people have not done anything to it, and therefore they cannot have sinned. This "physical message", a literal physical embodiment of the mind's belief in wholeness, exonerates those who look upon it, and in turn CAUSES their minds and bodies to be also healed.

"Now in the hands made gentle by His touch, the Holy Spirit lays a picture of a DIFFERENT you. It is a picture of a body still, for what you REALLY are can not be seen nor pictured. But THIS one has NOT been used for purpose of attack, and therefore never suffered pain at all. IT witnesses to the eternal truth that you can not BE hurt, and points BEYOND itself to both YOUR innocence and HIS."

In effect, a sick body provides a powerful TEMPTATION to others to believe that they are guilty because of its suffering. While a healed body provides a powerful LIBERATION to others to believe that they are NOT guilty because the body is obviously unharmed.

What actually happens is an interesting repurposing of things. Given that a person with an ego will believe the body is real, and give a great amount of weight to the FORM that the body takes, they will tend to derive MEANING from the form of the body. As such we might say, because the body has the shape of a cancerous growth, "that means" there has been an attack and a sickness.

And by thus deriving meaning from the body based on its appearance, the mind of the viewer BELIEVES and gives POWER TO that body, making it real to them. And now it cannot escape being at the EFFECT of that body. The unhealed mind of the viewer now sees that body as confirming their guilt, providing their sinfulness, suggesting they must have attacked it, and they basically AGREE with its condition. Entering into false empathy, they cannot help but feel personally responsible - guilty - that the other "real body" is sick. And this cannot be escaped while the person believes bodies are real.

The result of this is that those with egos view sick bodies as offensive and accusatory and harmful and not to be trusted and as attacking and threatening them. I couldn't find the exact quote wording but the course does say the ego hates sick bodies and feels threatened by them.

"That is really why you recoil from the demands of the dependent, and from the sight of a broken body. Your ego is threatened, and blocks your natural impulse to help, placing you under the strain of divided will."

What then happens when your mind is more healed, and thus removes the sickness from the body, is that you TAKE ADVANTAGE of the fact that other people are making your body real still. They still have an ego, their minds are still sick, they still need healing.

When they look upon your body with the same mentality of "making it real", and believing that its FORM defines MEANING, it looks there and sees no evidence of attack, no suffering, no pain, no proof of sin. Because your mind has truly forgiven and has PROVED forgiveness by healing the body of any side effects.

When a sick mind looks upon a healed body, the sick mind still believes the body is real and that its form is meaningful, and thus is "giving its power away" to that body to define FOR IT what is true. When you thus show an egoic mind a HEALED BODY, it taps into THEIR belief that they've given power to your body, THEIR belief that your body defines the truth, and because your body is depicting a healed FORM, they now automatically derive a MEANING from its form that "there's nothing wrong with it."

Because of their own giving away of their own power to your body, they can't help now but be AFFECTED BY your healed body, having given it power over them. And thus your healed body now taps into this dynamic in their mind and gives them the message "I have the power to inform you that you have not sinned."

And by this kind of indirect "back door" in a way, a re-purposing of their belief that your body DEFINES their guilt or innocence, your healed body TEACHES THEM, through its repurposed use of symbolic FORM, that they must be innocent because there is no sign of suffering. That they cannot have done anything. The impact of this teaching has massive amounts of POWER to educate them that, because your body is healed, THEY ARE INNOCENT.

And thus by witnessing that their nightmare has turned into a happy dream, your body has turned into a herald of harmlessness, their mind is now ACCEPTING the message - on their own terms - that they must be innocent. And thus, indirectly, their mind will now allow your body to exonerate them and this (by their own causation) causes them to believe they are innocent.

Thus does a healed body become a messenger to the sick, to tell them that they are not sick, because there is no evidence of them having caused sickness. It shows them they are not guilty, and uses their belief in your body's "power" to tell them what's true, to correct their view of themselves. So they think, I cannot have done anything because your body is in great condition and it is literally inspiring me to believe in life and health and wholeness.

As such their mind now accepts healing, becomes itself more whole, is lifted up, resurrected, and it in turn facilitates the side-effect that it also heals their own body. Thus the miracle of healing which was given to YOUR mind to heal YOUR body, extends and transfers to the minds of OTHERS as they witness your miracle. And thus is your brother HEALED ALONG WITH YOU. And now HIS BODY HEALS AS WELL!

"And as you let yourself be healed, you see all those around you, or who cross your mind, or whom you touch, or those who seem to have no contact with you, healed along with you."

"Whoever says, "There IS no gap between my mind and yours," has kept GOD's promise, NOT his tiny oath to be forever faithful unto death. And by his healing IS his brother healed."

"What you would prove to him you will believe. The power of witness COMES from your belief. And everything you say or do or think but testifies to what you teach to him. Your body can be means to teach that it has never suffered pain because of him. And in its healing can it offer him mute testimony to his innocence. It is THIS testimony that can speak with power greater than a thousand tongues. For here is his forgiveness PROVED to him. A miracle can offer nothing LESS to him than it has given unto you. So does your healing show your mind is healed, and has forgiven what he did NOT do. And so is HE convinced his innocence was never lost, and healed along with you."

It can be very therapeutic to just listen and be still and judge not while someone expresses themeslves. This is the essence of being forgiving.

"Forgiveness … is still, and quietly does nothing. … It merely looks, and waits, and judges not" - ACIM

When we all have egos, we're all so busy not listening. We're too busy broadcasting and transmitting illusions and stories to make ourselves special.

Even if you're in a conversation with someone and you're supposedly listening, you're probably still not FULLY listening because you're not in a state of forgiveness.

Instead you're starting to mentally engage with what was said, are starting to process it, are chewing on it, judging it, judging the person, thinking about what to say, having memories of your own personal story, resisting the person and hoping they will shut up soon, etc. All of these activities mean you are not being forgiving, but it also means you are not fully listening. You're not paying full attention. You are not being fully present because you're lost in your own ego.

So then when the person speaks, they sense this. They know in the mind/energetic level that they are not being heard. They know that there are limits and boundaries in place, which you put there, which are your attempts to make them stop and shut up. Especially if you start to offer advice or talk over them or try to stop their expression. Maybe their expression is very ego and it triggers you and you just want it to stop because you can't just be still.

The result of this is that the person does not feel permitted to fully express themselves. They don't feel that you are listening, that you recognize them deep down, that you really care unconditionally, or that you even want them to continue. They will take these cues, consciously or not, and it will stop them fully expressing.

We are all so used to walking around in a world where everyone is always broadcasting that we feel terribly constipated with ego energies, feelings and expressions, which are not being ALLOWED to fully express. Nobody is listening! And that's because everyone has egos and are not in a state of forgiveness. Forgiveness is a state of mind of stillness and listening and allowing and presence and non-judgement. That's the state that we're sorely lacking in this world.

This state is a state of "holding space". It means that you are so still and clear and non-judging and present that you simply allow and listen and permit everything. You do not resist, you do not get caught up in your own thoughts, you don't get lost in your own reactions, and you don't try to stop the person. If you do this for someone and you let them just express, you will notice something really interesting happens.

Not only will they express themselves and all their ego stories, feelings and thoughts, but they will seem to really go overboard, over the top with major ego expression. Given permission that it's okay to express fully, as proven by your forgiving willingness to listen and be present, it all just comes flooding out. The person doesn't even quite know why they are doing this. They can seem to become "very ego" while they do this. YOU MUST NOT try to stop that. It's good. They are venting. Maybe for the first time someone is finally fully listening to their heart's pain and they can therefore finally let it out and let it go all the way.

People are natural expressers. Even if it's ego shit coming out and totally bullshit, they still need to express it, and not being in a situation where it's safe and okay - unconditionally okay - to be as ego as they like, it just stays stuck inside.

Also when you are in a state of holding space and being fully present with the person, where you are actually giving your FULL ATTENTION while simultaneously backing totally off from expressing anything of your own, this creates a kind of "space". That is, your intense attention connects to the person where they are, and the fact that you are totally withholding your own expression creates "space" in between the two of you. It's a space that you're not flooding with your own expressions, because you are RECEIVING.

This space is held by the mind and can actually be an energetic presence. You form it with your EMPATHY. In True Empathy you are listening intently and sharing awareness and unconditional acceptance, WITHOUT ENTERING INTO the person's problem. This is TRUE empathy. Empathising without engaging or joining in or making real the illusions that flow out in any way. And that doesn't just mean be quiet on the outside, you must be totally present and attentive INSIDE your mind as well, otherwise you are distracted with ego and are not listening.

And because there is a kind of law that nature fills a vacuum, their ego is SUCKED OUT. It pours out to fill the space. Or to put it another way, your willingness to FULLY RECEIVE allows them to FULLY EXPRESS. The person may not even realize they are really digging deep and sharing all their deep dark secrets and even stating embarassing egoic "secrets" that they never told anyone. Onlookers might judge them and label them as evil! But you have to let it just flow out into the space. Just listen, fully. Give your full attention in silence.

After the person has "finished" expressing, having been heard deeply perhaps for the first time ever, and having aired tons of dirty laundry and guilt and everything in between, they will tell you... if you succeeded in this .... they'll tell you, they feel TREMENDOUSLY PEACEFUL. They got it out! They finally could let it all out and let it go instead of having it shoved halfway down their throat by everyone else who is too self-absorbed to ever give them permission to fully express.

I have done this before, by accident. I didn't know what I was doing, but I was doing it. I recall a person at an old job who started to brag. He was a natural bragger. But as he did, instead of wanting to shut him up as such, I just paid attention and let him get on with it. I held space, sort of accidentally. And he just kept going, and going, and going. He really really vented, and started even telling me about all these secret exploits and perversions that he'd been doing, just a great big giant ego brag. He didn't even know why he was expressing so much, he just kept going! An onlooker judged him, not understanding what was happening, telling him that he should stop talking because he was making a fool of himself. But it was a HEALING.

And then,..... he wound down, and he said, he couldn't believe how peaceful he felt. He was shocked at how calm he was. It was simple. Pay full attention and be fully present without your own mental noise.

Also, if a person is quite shy or sensitive, introverted or has difficulty or fear expressing themselves, this is like GOLD. If you are like this, you know that you are very much put off by the loud intensity of everyone else's expressions, and usually you will only express yourself to one individual in a secret corner when no-one else is looking. Only if there is near silence do you feel permitted to make sound, to speak, or to express yourself. You are really sensitive and everyone's just "regular" level of expression is experienced as like LOUD. Like, they're shouting all the time and don't really want to hear you at all. And especially if the person is domineering or controlling or takes over expressing for everyone, you can bet you will just shrivel up into a hole of loneliness.

That's why sensitive people become so quiet and shy. In their spectrum of expression, they are drowned out. Loud intense or even just regular people can "shut down" sensitive people and make them even shyer, because they're never really given an opportunity to BE HEARD. People won't shut the fuck up for long enough to let them express their soft gentle expressions!

If you say to a shy sensitive person, that you're going to be totally quiet and just listen and that they can go ahead and just talk and tell you anything... anything at all, just go ahead and I'll listen quietly.... that's like GOLD. If you will trust that as a sensitive person, you will then start to express yourself, and you'll keep going, and going, and you'll explore and uncover all kinds of things that you could never tell anyone. It's SO healing and cathartic. To be heard in this overly broadcasting ultra-loud ego-screaming world, it's absolutely treasure. It touches a person. It heals them. Sometimes as a sensitive person I wish the whole world would SHUT THE FUCK UP for long enough for me to express myself.

(I WILL BE HEARD! Thanks for letting me express that, lol)

This is also partly why my expressive energies have diverted themselves into the silent, unhurried expression through typing and writing.. ... people don't shut you up when you put it down on paper.Mostly. Until they start reading it, hah. Then it's "that's too long to read, shut up". .. ie, I can't read all that text... when will *I* be able to talk about myself! lolol

Anyway. Hold space for people. It is thoroughly deeply healing. We should have healing circles where we do nothing but let people express silently. This is partly how it's set up in Alcoholics Anonymous and AlAnon and other programs with a "no cross-talk" rule... although it should be extended to a "no mental chatter either" rule. No ego.

Be quiet. Be present. Listen. Let people be fully acknowledged. This is an expression of true forgiveness.

Remember, this is part of being truly forgiving. And having the opportunity to PRACTICE this is an opportunity to be forgiving. As Jesus said:

"Forgiveness … is still, and quietly does nothing. … It merely looks, and waits, and judges not" - ACIM

Wishful thinking. ... really a form of denial, wanting things to be other than how they are right now. Isn't that the same thing as attacking and judging?

Saying ... hey, I don't like how you are right now, you shouldn't be this way, you should be some other way. I can't accept you like this. How you are is wrong, so you are sinful and guilty, because you're now how I want you to be.

Wishing that things were different, is a lack of acceptance. An unwillingness to face how things actually are right now. It doesn't mean you have to put up with it or not make changes still, it just means at least being willing to look and see and accept how it is now.

Wishful thinking is also a form of resistance, which is a form of fear. It's also a form of dishonesty. It's not wanting to admit to the apparent truth of the situation or accept the facts. This again doesn't mean you have you see yourself as hemmed in by the "physical truth", but having an issue with "how it is" is an attempt to lie about it.

Wishing that things were not how they are, doesn't change anything. It's a form of complaint and victimhood. It's you having a temper tantrum believing that you can skew things towards how you would prefer them. But preferences are another form of denial.

To wish that things were different, without willing and causing them to be different, is a form of unwillingness. A desire to reject what has apparently been willed, to demand and require it be willed differently, but not actually doing anything constructive to will it yourself.

And so wishing is dreaming, and faking, and lying, and deceiving, and denying, and not accepting, and attacking, and judging, and being dishonest, and avoiding reality. It was wishing for something other than God that got us into this mess in the first place.

"The world is nothing in itself. Your mind must give it meaning. And what you behold upon it are your wishes, acted out so you can look on them and think them real."

"We have already said that wishful thinking is how the ego deals with what it wants, to make it so."

"We once said that to will contrary to God is wishful thinking, and not real willing."

"You CAN wish for the impossible, but you can only WILL with God. This is the ego's weakness and YOUR strength."

"Now is vengeance all there is to wish for."

"But the WISH for other experience will block this, because God's Will CANNOT be forced upon you, being an experience of total WILLINGNESS."

"The Son of God could NEVER sin, but he CAN wish for what would hurt him. And he HAS the power to think he CAN BE hurt. What could this be EXCEPT a misperception of himself?"

"It is not Will for Life, but wish for death, that is the motivation for this world."

"The tiniest of dreams, the smallest wish for values of the world is large enough to stand between you and the sweet release that God would offer you." "It is in the special relationship, born of the hidden wish for special love from God, that the ego's hatred triumphs."

"To wish for guilt in ANY way, in ANY form, will lose appreciation of the value of your guiltlessness, and push it from your sight."

This was something that our spiritual guides often told us years ago, and at the time it seemed to have some meaning. But I didn't realize just how far reaching it is.

You get to choose... everything. Total responsibility.

Part of our problem, being unconscious, is that we have attempted to HIDE the fact that we are responsible, and that we have a CHOICE. We seem to not even realize that we have a choice. The hallmark of the disempowered, victim mindset is the apparent absence of the freedom to choose.

In the victim mindset, it seems the victim didn't choose what's happening to them. And death is the ultimate expression of this where, allegedly, it "just happens" on its own. Not only that, there's nothing you can do to stop it or resist it. No choice whatsoever, or at least, that's how it appears.

So if you're in a situation where you are "being a victim", you for sure will in some way believe you do not have a choice. Instead, you'll talk about how such-and-such is going to happen and how you can't do anything about it.

An example of this is the weather. The weather is forecast and then everyone goes apeshit about how such-and-such a weather "is going to happen" (to me) because "they said". This is the victim mindset. You don't want to own the fact that you are responsible for the weather, or that you have power over it, or that you can choose it, or that you ARE choosing it. The weather forecast is just reflecting back to you what YOU already set in motion.

It always boils down to the belief, and the perception, that you do not have any choice and that choice has been taken away from you by some outside force and there's nothing you can do to change it. And these proclamations about how disempowered you are will always be loud and convinced as though you're saying, I don't want this to happen, but at the same time, really not doing ANYTHING to change it. This is "complaint".

Complaining is the act of making a situation real, seeing yourself as victimized by it, completely disowning your power to do anything to change anything, and yet making a great big tirade about why its unfair and who's fault it is and how there's nothing you can do about it. So you basically stay... STUCK. That's why complaining about the situation only KEEPS it, compounds it, and makes it worse. Complaint that you have no choice is a CHOICE to NOT have a choice.

You DO have a choice! But you're not going to be able to access the POWER of that state of "freedom" unless you're willing to drop all the victimhood shit and OWN up to actually having power. Why don't people want to own up to being responsible, or having freedom, or having a choice, or being able to make a change? There's no downsides to that, other than that it means less allegiance to the ego.

So you're not stuck. You can choose again. You have the power. You are free. And everything that's happening NOW is your choice. And if you don't like it, RECLAIM your power to choose and choose something else.

There are two worlds before your eyes.

1) An illusory world

2) Your belief that the illusory world is reality.

You are meant to correct your misperception of the ILLUSORY world, by undoing your belief that it is REAL.

That's what it means when the Course says "seek not to change the world, but seek to change your mind about the world."

It does not mean, change your mind about a REAL world. It means, your idea that the world even IS real, IS your misperception of the illusion, and that in TRUTH, this world is ONLY an illusion, not a reality.

Seeking to change your mind about the world, to fix your perceptual errors, should NOT lead to a state where you are still seeing the world as "real" but with some kind of "peace" happening.

If you deeply and fully have removed the insanity from your mind, have undone your perceptual errors, and are no longer mistaken, you MUST be in a state of mind that recognizes the world is NOT REAL. You MUST be seeing that it is in fact an illusion, through and through.

Many people are very deluded in their comprehension of what the Course means by this, and therefore develop this attitude that the world is objectively real and you should therefore just change how you look at it. That you should "look at the real world from a peaceful perspective".

That leads to tremendous POWERLESSNESS, whereby you think that you only need to fix your misperception of a REAL world, so that you will see a REAL world correctly. NO!

THE WORLD IS NOT REAL!!!!!!!!!!!

If you do that, and your goal is to see this "real world" in a perfect way, you will HAVE to at some point become stuck. At some point, your belief in its "reality" is going to put a ceiling on how much awakening you can have, because if you were to go further, you would have to question whether the world is real or not. And since you believe IT IS real, that means you can ONLY fix your interpretations of stuff happening outside your control, and basically will WELCOME DEATH with open arms as though - you know... it's a part of life, meant to happen, inevitable, etc. Then you will "die in peace". COME ON!!!!

The world is an illusion. All sin is an illusion. All death is an illusion. All bodies are illusions. The entire world AND the entire universe is an illusion! This is not REALITY that you're in. It's a delusional hallucination. At most it is an illusion, but you've been trying to make more of it... to "make it real". If forgiveness is the undoing of "making the problem real", then that should tell you, that forgiveness leads to the awareness that IT IS NOT REAL.

The only way you can claim the atonement for yourself or anyone, is if you are prepared to be aware that this entire world is an ILLUSION. You must be willing to accept this or you CANNOT wake up from it.

If the world is real, you cannot be innocent, you cannot be sinless, you cannot be guiltless, and you cannot be free from fear. AND, you cannot be forgiven. The only way you are innocent, and the only way you can claim the atonement, is if this is all just an illusion. Reality is elsewhere! This is just a dream.

Forgiveness is nothing more than seeing correctly.

It means recognizing that illusions ARE illusions, and not falling for them.

It means overlooking illusions and seeing past them, rather that taking them at their appearance and thinking they are real.

This extends all the way to the illusion of death, which is where the Son of God in all HIs divine freedom and power creates the ILLUSION that He has absolutely no freedom or choice left, or that things can happen to Him against His will.

This is of course impossible, so it is an illusion, bit it APPEARS on the surface to be an unwanted death, happening to someone who didn't seem to ask for it. But the Son of God is faking it.

If and when you can recognize and see that this is in fact an illusion of death, not a real death, then you are now over-looking and not falling for the trick. Believing it's real is a complete mistake.

You will only believe illusions are real when you forget to forgive, which puts you into so-called "judgement", which is really to do with attacking appearances and making them out to be the truth.

Illusions are not the truth. Death is not truth. But as soon as you are convinced that it's real you've become blinded, you've been tempted and you've succumbed to the deception. You didn't notice that it was the Son of God, infinite and immoral, who was pretending He can die.

And so because you didn't look past the ILLUSION of death, to see its Author, which would reveal to you plain as day - this is absolutely pretend - so you enter into the illusion yourself and go unconscious.

All you need realize then is that all you need to do to 'wake up' is to see correctly, ie have your perception corrected, so that you are not falling into the lie, are not believing the trap, and didn't go along with the story. It means fixing your vision on the truth, on what is really going on here, not buying into any form of victimhood or suffering or accidental events, and staying very certain that the immortal Son of God cannot be harmed. Death cannot be real. And nothing is really happening.

To overcome an illusion, ie "forgive", you must learn to see past the deception that you've fallen for, remember the truth, and stop taking it seriously. It's like some old trick that someone keeps playing on you and finally you figure out that someone is behind it and it's not just some random bizarre thing going on, his cover is blown and the illusion is broken, and now you can no longer fall for it. That's all it is, just learning to recognize and see the truth and stop being deceived by appearances.

All false appearances are your interpretation of the 'illusion of separation' as though it is not an illusion. Behind this misinterpretation there is still an illusion being created by the Son of God, but it has no power to convince you it's real unless you choose to play along with it. Then it's just something you can't believe anymore and you know is false. As such you escape death, because death is just part of believing that illusions are the truth.

Last night I used the below process, but in a different way. I did it VERY slowly. I re-stated each phrase several times over and really let it sink in before moving on to the next one. I actually found this to be quite powerful.

For example, in saying that I decided wrongly.. when I really dwell on that I come to realize that I actually DECIDED and I get in touch with that sense of responsibility and decision-making at having been the one who not only put in place this upset, but actually chose it myself.

There is tremendous power in getting in touch with your power of decision. Your decision making is not just a neutral act, it has power to it. It is causal. And I've also started to dabble in the idea of... .instead of just reacting to stuff and going along with it, instead, stopping and DECIDING... "I am" or "I am not" .... and feeling a kind of instantaneous change simply by making a firm decision.

I also inquired about the last sentence... letting Him decide for God for me. Jesus clarified that this really means allowing Holy Spirit to 'favor' or 'choose FOR rather than AGAINST' God, on my behalf. Allowing Him to favor God and to then accept His viewpoint. In this way, "for God" really means "towards God" or "in agreement with God". That made more sense to me.

"I must have decided wrongly because I am NOT at peace.

I made the decision myself, but I can also decide otherwise.

I WILL to decide otherwise, because I WANT to be at peace.

I do NOT feel guilty, because the Holy Spirit will undo ALL the consequences of my wrong decision IF I WILL LET HIM.

I WILL to let Him by allowing Him to decide for God for me."

It's also quite important to keep in mind the statement Jesus makes just prior to this prayer:

"But let me first remind you of something I told you myself. Whenever you are not wholly joyous, it is because you have reacted with a lack of love to some Soul which God created. Perceiving this as sin, you become defensive because you EXPECT ATTACK. The decision to react in that way, however, was YOURS, and can therefore be undone. It CANNOT be undone by repentance in the usual sense, because this implies guilt. If you allow yourself to feel guilty, you will reinforce the error, rather than allowing it to be undone FOR you.

Decisions CANNOT be difficult. This is obvious if you realize that you must ALREADY have made a decision NOT to be wholly joyous if that is what you feel. Therefore, the first step in the undoing is to recognize that YOU ACTIVELY DECIDED WRONGLY, BUT CAN AS ACTIVELY DECIDE OTHERWISE.

Be very firm with yourselves in this, and keep yourselves fully aware of the fact that the UNDOING process, which does NOT come from you, is nevertheless WITHIN you because God placed it there. YOUR part is merely to return your thinking to the point at which the error was made, and give it over to the Atonement in peace. Say to yourselves the following, as sincerely as you can, remembering that the Holy Spirit will respond fully to your slightest invitation:"