"A sense of separation from God is the only lack you really need correct. This sense of separation would never have arisen if you had not distorted your perception of truth, and had thus perceived yourself as lacking."

Before the separation there were no problems. There was no sickness. No death. No war. No lack or suffering. No pain or fear. No guilt. No sin. Nothing. There was only joy and love and creation and peace and light and truth and celebration.

Recognize this then. ABSOLUTELY EVERY problem or difficulty in this world is symptomatic of what happens when you leave God. EVERYTHING.

Everything in this world is MADE OF "God’s absence". MADE OF IT. ***It IS the separation***. It is not something that was "tacked on" after separation, it is the separation ITSELF. The direct and unavoidable RESULT of trying to exist without love.

All sickness and all death are nothing more than an aspect of you being separate from God. These things did not happen for any other reason. There was NO CAUSE whatsoever other than the causality in Heaven, prior to the separation.

Problems, sickness, death, suffering, it is all a manifestation of "being without God". All needs that have arisen are there ONLY because we are LACKING GOD. Every form of sickness is the absence of God. All forms of death are the absence of Life, and God is life. Every war and every conflict is arising because of the absence of God.

To in any way suggest that your return to God/truth will entail the retention of ANY PROBLEM, any form of sickness, suffering, lack or death, or even this world itself, is absolute bullshit. ALL of this "stuff" IS THE SEPARATION. When there is no separation, there IS NONE OF THIS.

There is NO PROBLEM other than the separation from God. There IS nothing happening in this world that isn’t symptomatic of trying to be away from Him. EVERYTHING here is the RESULT, of pushing God away.

You do not have a problem paying bills. You do not have unfair sicknesses caused by improper diet. You do not have struggles with coworkers which is their fault. You do not have issues with people on facebook groups. The separation from God IS THE ONLY LACK YOU NEED CORRECT. You have a problem with GOD, not with this world. This world is the FORM of your problem with God. And there is **no problem** love cannot solve.

"Let me recognize my problems have been solved. If you are willing to recognize your problems, you will recognize that you have no problems. Your one central problem has been answered, and you have no other."

Every question that you have, every fear, every doubt, every problem, when you are EXPOSED to God, if you try to commune with God, none of those questions become answered. What happens instead, is all your questions DISAPPEAR. They simply vanish. Every question was a form of fear arising from the ABSENCE of God. When He shows up, the entire foundation for those questions no longer exists.

When you go to God, you are SOLVING every problem you have. When you join with God, His MERE PRESENCE is the SOLUTION to every issue in your life. Because every single issue in your life, no matter how it APPEARS, or how specific it seems to be, or how confined it seems to be, or how much it seems to be about specific people and not others, IT IS NOTHING TO DO WITH ANY OF THAT.

Pushing God away introduces lack. Pushing God away introduces fear. Pushing God away makes you feel guilty and want to die. Pushing God away is the source of ALL ILLNESS. Pushing God away is the source of every war and every single death that has even taken place in this dream.

Every aspect of every nightmare is the result of the "darkness" that seems to come about when light is absent.

All financial problems are a lack of God. Every argument arises from a lack of God. All injuries are a lack of God. Every disease is a lack of God. All problems in your job are the lack of God. Everything you attack or judge is the result of the lack of God. There is not a single problem in this world that is anything other than a symptom of God being absent. Upon his "return" to your life, it simply all will disappear because it was all made of his absence. This is a metaphysical fact.

Loving with God = eternal life. Trying to exist without God = suffering and death.

You do not have any other problem other than not being with God. All you have done is you have pushed away the provision of every need you could possible have. You have rejected life. You’ve separated yourself from effortlessness and from being natural. You’ve tried to deny eternal life and immortality. You’ve attempted to suppress all power and creative potential. You ONLY have a shit life because you’ve shut God out.

There is no other problem to solve. And this problem ONLY HAS ONE SOLUTION. The ONLY solution to EVERY problem in the world, is love. God Himself. The restoration of your willingness and awareness of the presence of God in your life, in your mind, in your heart, in your being. LOVE SOLVES EVERYTHING. Not only does it solve everything, it is THE ONLY WAY to solve ANYTHING. There is NO OTHER ANSWER.

You cannot be happy without God. You cannot live without God. And in truth, you cannot be separate from God either. So all of these problems you have, cannot be real problems. They must be illusions of "being separate from God". A dream of "what might it be like without love". This dream fortunately is NOT THE SAME THING as "separation really happening". It’s just a great big IDEA. Wake up. God still loves you and that’s forever. And that’s all you need.

"Death is the symbol of the fear of God. His Love is blotted out in the idea, which holds it from awareness like a shield held up to obscure the sun."

"It holds an image of the Son of God in which he is "laid to rest" in devastation's arms"

"All forms of sickness even unto death are physical expressions of the fear of awakening."

"One thing is sure; God, Who created neither sin nor death, wills not that you be bound by them. He knows of neither sin NOR its result."

"The shrouded figures in the funeral procession march not in honor of their Creator, Whose Will it is they LIVE. They are not FOLLOWING it; they are OPPOSING it."

"And what is the black-draped body they would bury? A body THEY dedicated to death, a symbol of corruption, a sacrifice to sin, OFFERED to sin to feed upon, and keep ITSELF alive. A thing condemned, damned by its maker, and lamented by every mourner who looks upon it as himself."

"You who believe you can condemn the Son of God to this ARE arrogant."

"The arrogance of sin, the pride of guilt, the sepulchre of separation, all are part of your unrecognized dedication to death. The glitter of guilt you laid upon the body would KILL it. For what the ego loves, it kills for its obedience."

"Death, were it true, would be the final and complete disruption of communication, which IS the ego's goal."

"Those who fear death see not how often and how loudly they CALL to it, and bid it come to SAVE them from communication. "

"For death is seen as SAFETY, the great dark savior from the light of truth, the answer to the Answer, the silencer of the Voice that speaks for God."

"Yet the retreat to death is NOT the end of conflict. Only God's Answer is its end."

"My brothers, children of our Father, this is a DREAM of death."

"In its exaltation (the body), you COMMANDED it to die, for only death COULD conquer life. And what but insanity could look upon the defeat of God, and think it REAL? "

"Let me not see it as a sign of sin and death, nor use it for destruction."

"What seems to be FEAR of death, is really its ATTRACTION."

"You are not sick, and you cannot die. But you CAN confuse your self with things that do. Remember, though, that to do this IS blasphemy"

"Death is the thought that you are separate from your Creator."

"You cannot die unless you choose to do so."

"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. No one dies without their own consent. Nothing occurs but represents your wish, and nothing is omitted that you choose."

"Would you not rather live than choose to die? Living is joy, but death can only weep. You see in death escape from what you made. But this you do not see; that you made death, and it is but illusion of an end. "

"Death is a thought which takes on many forms, often unrecognized. It may appear as sadness, fear, anxiety or doubt; as anger, faithlessness and lack of trust; concern for bodies, envy, and all forms in which the wish to be as you are not may come to tempt you."

"Here is the Will of Father and of Son defeated finally, and laid to rest beneath the headstone death has placed upon the body of the holy Son of God."

"Unholy in defeat, he has become what death would have him be. His epitaph, which death itself has written, gives no name to him, for he has passed to dust. It says but this: "Here lies a witness God is dead." And this it writes again and still again, while all the while its worshippers agree, and kneeling down with foreheads to the ground, they whisper fearfully that it is so."

"The idea of the death of God is so preposterous that even the insane have difficulty in believing it. For it implies that God was once alive and somehow perished, killed, apparently, by those who did not want him to survive. Their stronger will could triumph over His, and so eternal life gave way to death. And with the Father died the Son as well."

"There is no death, for death is not Your Will."

"But if he chooses death himself, his weakness is his strength."

"For death is not of the real world, in which everything is eternal."

"How can some forms of murder NOT mean death? Can an attack in ANY form be love? What FORM of condemnation is a blessing?"

"Men are afraid of blasphemy, but they do not know what it means. They do not realize that, to deny God, is to deny their own identity, and in this sense, the wages of sin IS death. The sense is very literal; - denial of Life perceives its opposite, as ALL forms of denial replace what IS, with what is NOT."

"Sickness and death entered the mind of God's Son against His Will."

"If the intent is death, what matter the form it takes? Is death in any form, however lovely and charitable it may seem to be, a blessing and a sign the Voice for God speaks through you to your brother?"

"Here stands the body, torn between the natural desire to communicate, and the unnatural intent to murder and to die. "

"For the wages of sin is death, and how can the immortal die?"

"Death is a human affirmation of a belief in fate."

"You but choose whether to go TOWARDS Heaven, or away to nowhere."

"Death cannot be escape"

"A dream of death is not left by death but by truth."

Separation is really about trying to do everything alone, without God. After all, if you separate yourself off from God, who was essentially doing everything for and with you, you end up in a position where you have do it all yourself. You then start to depend on yourself in every respect.

Depending on your own thinking, your own efforts to assign meaning, to figure out what things are, what to do and when to do it, making plans, making decisions, interpreting everything through your own personal beliefs, trying to single-handedly do everything without help.

It's as if we say, "I don't need God". And then we start developing all kinds of needs, lacks and limitations. And now we seem to have to fend off the attacking world single-handedly. And then we develop pride and prowess and abilities and skills and information and all manner of defenses to try to bolster our ability to survive.

But the fact is this. All of our efforts to do everything alone, has made us miserable and exhausted. It has produced every conceivable form of suffering and sickness. It has eroded all relationships and trust. It has made us seem small and weak and helpless.

We've basically tried to take on this huge burden of managing "our own life" to the exclusion of depending on God, and we've found that we're horrendously under-equipped. We've been just carrying a heavy weight of burden trying to be "the one" that does everything. And then to top it off we've framed our efforts at "independence" as something to be celebrated, complete with victories and successes, and all manner of self-appointed empty awards.

What I see ACIM telling me now is that basically, I have orphaned myself, and put myself in a position of loneliness and isolation, such that I've ended up having to carry the weight of the world. To do alone everything that I should be allowing God to do for me. It's like someone who refuses to accept any help and prides themselves on their seeming "abilities" to accomplish goals on their own.

But the course is saying hey, the Holy Spirit is here to do all this for you and through you, to mange your life for you, to look after your body and health for you, to think and inspire and heal for you. But it's going to require two things - a willingness to give up your position of autonomy, and a willingness to surrender to trusting in being dependent on a higher power.

It really boils down to a question of, do you want to be separate anymore? Do you want to be alone in everything you do? Do you really want to have to be the one that figures everything out and makes all decisions and solves all problems and heals all wounds?

The fact is this. The more you separate off from God, the less power you have. The more you isolate from help, the smaller and weaker you become. The more distance you put between you and God, the less capable you are of doing anything at all. You basically lose everything by moving away from him. You THINK that you're gaining everything, but it's really an illusion, and you end up with literally nothing. Or as Jesus puts it, you will think you are gaining the whole world, but will lose touch with your soul.

What we call an "ego" is just some soul who is trying to be separated off from the shared dependency of relationship with God. It's a self that doesn't want to share and doesn't want to be part of the whole. It's a self with an attitude problem of selfishness, autonomy, specialness and every aspect of the ego mindset that comes with that. It's just someone who is alone and afraid, lost and confused, and doesn't know how to get out of it.

The more you try to gain in terms of what you can do on your own, the more you lose in terms of what you share with God. The more you think you are becoming strong in your independence, the more strength you lose. The more you think that you are so confident on your own that you don't need anyone, the more afraid and vulnerable and limited you become.

The only thing that we're really being asked to do is to come home and rejoin the family. To stop being an outsider or a loner. To open up to sharing with God again. To re-establish your dependency on God for everything, and learn to not want to do anything alone any more. It's God's heart just reaching out and saying, hey son, I love you, come back to me, you're still welcome. Come home.

And so this whole thing is indeed like the prodigal son, running away from God believing you are so capable of going it alone, until you run into pain and misery and suffering, and then finally realize it is utterly impossible to live without him. And then you return to him, willing to surrender and let go of all efforts to do everything without him. To give up all judgment and all evaluation, all decisions and all plans, all interpretations and all meanings, and everything you thought you had to do when you had no-one else to depend upon.

Just to let yourself be a part of God again. Supported and protected, nourished and cared for, guided and directed, loved and made whole.

In the Authority problem, there is a great reversal of roles, and a confusing of levels.

Jesus refers to this as being the source of sickness ("all sickness comes from confusing the levels").

He also says that miracles realign the 'levels of perception' into their proper order. Miracle principle 30:

"By recognizing spirit, miracles adjust the levels of perception and show them in proper alignment." - ACIM

What this means is, awareness is supposed to begin in God and extend outward, and any 'perception' you have is supposed to flow outward from God. Like, there is a level of perception higher than the physical level, and then there is a lower level of perception to which you are most accustomed. They are supposed to flow in the order/sequence of higher-flowing-to-lower. The light within illuminating perception.

When you have an authority problem, it means that down here in lala land you have turned around 180 degrees and now instead of facing outward extending God's love from within, you are effectively 'out of your mind', looking back toward God with the suggestion that there is nothing 'backing you up'. Your perception then seems to run against God's extension and collides with it head on. Mis-creation! You start to see yourself as the source of everything, with God as your opponent opposite you, to which you are now opposed, and as such you develop a sense of being an authority opposed to God.

It also means that when I have an authority problem, an ego problem, I will not be willing to lay down my ego and allow myself to be owned by God, I will not allow myself to extend God, I will not allow myself to love, I will not allow myself to let God be the authority, I will not allow myself to receive from God, I will not allow myself to follow God's guidance, I will not allow myself to listen to God, and I will not allow myself to surrender. Instead I stand against God in everything I do and try to go off and control everything all by myself.

This is the fundamental action of the ego, being opposed to God. This is why we think we have an authority that we do NOT have. And it is this false sense of authority that builds up as what you're familiar with - that sense of an 'inflated ego', or a sense of self that is righteous, or a sense of you being important in ego ways, or a sense of entitlement, or a sense of having power that you do not really possess, etc... all false idol worship and forms of ego trying to be in charge, in control, in power, ruler of the universe.

WE HAVE TO LEARN TO DROP AND REVERSE THIS ATTITUDE.

This is what I am learning now. The orders of perception are working against each other, and I have level confusion, and I am in sickness, precisely because I am functioning WITHOUT GOD. I am opposed to God and I need to surrender my 'trying to be God' position, turn back around 180 degrees so that I am flowing WITH God and extending WITH God, and I need to therefore ADMIT TO AND RECOGNIZE !!!!!!. .. that GOD is the one who is the authority here.

This is quite a powerful turning point. It means letting down all of those opposing ego attitudes in myself, learning to put them aside and to recognize that they interfere with God, learning that all love and POWER flows FROM God, that God is the one who is in charge, and becoming WILLING to ALLOW this to be true. It's really part of accepting the truth of the atonement - the truth that God is the primary authority. We can join him in it and SHARE in it, but we can't take it over and use it against Him or ourselves or others.

This is a complete flip, really, to the ego. My little ego is all hell-bent on being God, being a savior, fixing everyone, being a hero, being responsible for and carrying the weight of the world, and trying to be some kind of spiritualized exalted ego. This is the COMPLETE OPPOSITE of the 'natural' "divine order". The divine order has me properly positioned as God's SON, extending His love, sharing in His creation, flowing His love, sharing His miracles. And that means, JOINING God in His kingdom, in awareness of His spirit, and facing the same direction as Him, flowing WITH His will, recognizing that His will and my will are One (that's an ACIM theme too), and that I can now share in God's truth and power and healing.

I cannot be a powerful healer, super spiritual hero, mega savior, ultra do-it-yourselfer conqueror. I T D O E S N O T W O R K ! :-) Try fixing something which absolutely cannot be fixed by you and you'll soon encounter just how flawed your fix-it power-over-everything attitude is.

The only way that works is turning around and getting aligned to, open to, accepting of, flowing with, and being with God's will and God's love. That's where miracles flow from. But it means you have to stop trying to do this all by yourself. You have to admit you cannot do ANYTHING by yourself. And it's true. And that means a) surrendering, b) admitting God is in charge not you, c) this opens the doorway to the RELIEF of FINALLY connecting with God and being willing to LET GOD WORK THROUGH YOU. Yay.

Here come the miracles.

One thing people in the world don't realize, is that when you make one part of the world 'special', it HAS to make other parts of the world rejected.

So if I say, I really love Mac computers, it tends to make me feel that I dislike PC's. Or if I say, I like sporty-looking cars, it tends to make me believe that other cars are 'uglier'. Or if I say, I like the summer, it tends to make me feel antagonistic toward winter.

We do this every day, but we just don't really realize how we are actually *creating* the enemies that we despise, indirectly, by elevating various other things to special/hero/idol-worshipped status.

If I worship an idol and put something on a pedestal and believe it is my savior, that's all well and good but I don't realize that simultaneously I've created a nemesis somewhere else. It may not even seem to be in my conscious awareness, but I can't MAKE something an idol without using a tool of attack on everything the idol is not.

So people are going around for example trying to be good, trying to people please, trying to have the right behavior, trying to choose the right political candidate, trying to be in love with a special something, trying to save a special group of individuals, trying to stand up for some kind of social justice, or trying to eat the right foods etc. And what does this do?

What happens in the mind when we say "only this part of the world is acceptable?". We reject the rest of it, which is an act of denial, which is an attack, which throws all kinds of darkness and secret hate onto the 'rest' of the world. And since this is all really about the MIND, it basically creates an unconscious mind filled with everything we don't want.

And then this unconscious mind turns around and projects into the world and manifests as enemies, examples of what we hate, examples of the kind of people we think are sinners, examples of behaviors and actions that we consider not allowed, etc. And the more we try to really intensely focus on what is 'right', we inadvertently keep CREATING what is 'wrong' and reinforcing it.

Then all this extra wrong stuff shows up in the world and we hate it more and try to separate from it more, which is secretly an ego ploy to reinforce and keep it. We go on our crusade and blow our trumpet in defense of 'all that is good' which is exactly what actually creates and manifests 'all that is bad'.

If we're not being neutral, if we're attached to outcomes, it we're judging something as right or wrong, if we're invested in seeing a certain thing be kept while other things are destroyed, we just keep creating a greater TENSION between 'right and wrong' rather than actually undoing what's wrong. And this tension grows the more we try to separate from what's 'wrong', because the pursuit of what's 'right' ISN'T a pursuit of the truth - its a pursuit of one-sidedness and is a spiritualizing of the world.

So everyone's on this ego rollercoaster of chasing after what they have decided means 'right' and 'correct' and 'not sinful' and not realizing that this is directly and explicitly creating even more of the stuff they are trying to get away from. Because all that they're really doing is trying to escape from, deny, and shut out, everything they consider bad. You can't have a happy life by being in FUCKING DENIAL!

The world is neutral. It's we who give it all the meaning it has and label it with all our made-up labels of 'oh that's ok' and 'oh thats not ok'. And this constant effort to separate out the ok from the not-ok is just more ego separation which leads to war, hate, anger, and attack. It does not WORK. And it does not lead to progress. If you want the kind of progress where you create a world where everything is only 'good' and nothing 'bad' happens, you will never attain it, because the very desire to do so is a desire to DENY that 'bad' exists and therefore create it. And so the world is spinning its wheels. Isn't it horrifying to realize that YOU are creating the very enemies that you hate the most, and that you will keep doing so while you keep trying to reject a part of yourself?

Have you ever had a dream at night where you're being chased by someone and you're running away in fear and you just can't seem to get away, and the more you run away or fight with the person the stronger and more adamant they seem to become? This is exactly this dynamic, because the person chasing you is YOURSELF who is only appearing as an attacker because you keep rejecting yourself. In your dreams, when you stop running, and you surrender, and you do what the ego would say is 'letting yourself be caught', the person stops chasing you, and they stop attacking you, and all of a sudden you are friends. How about that?

We have to become able to ACCEPT and ALLOW everything. Not split it out and say one part is ok and one part isn't. This is true equality. This is a value worth pursuing. Unconditional love, not conditional love. Not a love that's only given to friends and not enemies. Not a love that, in being given only to friends, turns everyone else INTO an enemy, for the sake of being able to reject them further.

What would Jesus do? He would overlook all sin and recognize the innocence and equality of everyone.

Ok.. stepping off the righteous soap-box for now.

On the level of the ego mind, let's call it "level 1", cause and effect are separate. This is entirely based on the notion that the Son of God (who is the effect of God) is separate from cause (from God). Everything about the ego's thought system is based on this foundation.

The ego mind perceives that causes produce completely separate effects. Whoever causes something is separate from the effects they produce. All kinds of ego bullshit comes from this:

- You can do something to someone else without it affecting yourself

- Other people can do something to you without affecting themselves

- You can be hurt or have something happen to you without you willing it yourself

- You can hurt or do something to other people or objects against their will

- Events happen seemingly against your will at all times with no power to stop them

- You can get away with murder

It is a thought system in which cause seems to be power but effect seems to be powerless. This is because the Son of God (effect) has be disconnected from Power (God).

Even the properties of the physical world are based on this principle. Object A seems to do something to Object B, causing Object B to be affected in some way, but the effects on Object B are not the same as Object A. Object A may appear to be completely unaffected (e.g. using hard diamonds to cut metal).

Every interaction of physical objects/forms in the physical universe follows this principle of separation of cause and effect. The entire physical universe itself IS an expression of this idea of the Son being separate from the Father, and therefore is that He is "disconnected" from God by being in a body.

It's also a way for us to disown sin and go into denial. There has to be denial present in order for Object B to be "affected" by Object A in any way whatsoever, without those effects applying also to object A. Physical matter itself is therefore an expression of the denial of God, and every separation between every particle of matter or energy is also an expression of denial of God.

The physical world is really a state of denial and once there is no longer denial, there can be no more physical world! Separation is a state of differences - different forms - all of which are illusions of differences and do not really exist but in a state of denial of the truth.

The Holy Spirit's thought system, which we could call "level 2", is a thought system of total oneness, wholeness, sharing and equality. In it, what applies to oneself must apply both in its cause and its effects. It's a mindset where the Son of God is One with the Father. In it there is no separation, and therefore the One Mind shares equally in cause and effect. This leads to perceptions such as:

- What I do unto others I literally am directly doing to myself

- It is impossible to hurt anyone else without it hurting yourself, which is a profound incentive to never hurt anyone

- What applies to you applies to the entire Sonship equally

- If it is true for you, it is true for everyone everywhere

- In an all-or-nothing way, since what applies to you applies everywhere, either you and your brother are both guilty or you and your brother are both innocent.

- You cannot get away with murder because your attempt to bring about death (of God) destroys your own self. You cannot have God be affected by your sin but not yourself. Your belief in attack attacks yourself, and all attack is therefore self-attack.

- It is absolutely 100% impossible to be a victim or a victimizer.

So in the right mind or One Mind, cause and effect are reunited and therefore all of the laws of God come into effect. This includes ideas like "to have all, give all to all", or "give and receiving are one", or "who but myself can I crucify" etc. There are thoughts of oneness and universal equality.

This also means that in Holy Spirit's thought system, openness to this mindset of equality means you are able to now receive love as well as extend it, you are able to have shared interests, you're able to love others as yourself literally etc.

But it also means, that mind is capable of undoing, erasing, correcting, and repairing (healing) the mind of separation between cause and effect. That means this mind is able to overthrow and override all of the apparent physical laws such as the ways that one object seems to inflict "separate effects" on another, the way that disease and sickness unfolds as a state of victimhood, etc.

All of these things are healed and corrected by the mind of truth. This is why Holy Spirit's mind is miraculous, why absolutely nothing physical has power over it, and why absolutely ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE. And by that I mean in the EXTREME, the most extremely unlikely unimaginable extraordinary supernatural fantastic fucking amazing things are possible, because anything is possible when you have holiness (wholeness of mind).

The unified mind which both gives and receives is far more powerful and empowered than the separated mind. In separation, cause is power and effect is powerless. In unity, cause is power and effect is power also. This means having power over all effects, and really realizing that all physical effects are actually states of powerlessness, and therefore should be EASY to manipulate by someone who is empowered with love.

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

Actually think about why this makes sense. God is infinite, unlimited, omnipresent, He exists in a totally expanded abstract state in which He is everywhere. Totally spread out to infinity. He is not localized anywhere. There is no way that God can be "only" in one location, and not another.

The idea of a body, is the idea in SPACE and TIME to being spatially and temporarily separated out from the whole. It's the idea of limitation, confinement, imprisonment. "The body is a device for separation". The body was made to represent the idea that you are NOT everywhere, and therefore your mind is trapped in your brain. That you are "located" inside the body, not outside the body.

God, however, who is everywhere, cannot be squeezed down and inserted into the insides of a body, in exclusion of being also outside of the body. He cannot separate off a part of himself and put it "into" a body separately from being outside the body or in all other bodies also. Being everywhere means NOT being in any specific location to the exclusion of any others. Nor does that mean he is in all bodies. He cannot be in ANY bodies.

"God cannot enter a body"

Similarly, you who are trying to be One with God, to experience God, to express God, so long as you confine yourself to a body, limit your awareness to only the body's senses, regard yourself as being "in" or "having" a specific body, or in any way are not experiencing yourself as being infinite, unlimited, larger than the universe, all-expansive, all-encompassing and omnipresent, you are NOT experiencing the fullness of what you are.

And the fact is that God is not going to ever narrow himself down and put himself into a body. He remains in an expanded, abstract state at all times. The only way for you to MEET him and to be in total communion with Him, is to expand your self, expand your awareness, to go beyond the size of the universe, to infinity, to such an extent that you become just as ever-present and transcendent of space, place, location, or time, that you exist EVERYWHERE with Him.

That is the only way that you can be One with God. That is the only way that you can commune with Him, join with Him, be IN him, and experience Heaven. You literally cannot do that by being in ANY WAY limited, in any way less than WHOLE, in any way smaller than the entire magnitude of infinite creation. You are vast, unlimited, and only complete when you are EVERYWHERE. Not confined to your little body, not confined to only one body, not confined to ANY bodies. Larger than the planet. Larger than the solar system. Larger than the galaxy. Aware of EVERYWHERE simultaneously. That is who you are.

So I hear some people saying, believing, thinking, interpreting, that they are having experiences of being one with God in a body, being awake in a body, experiencing the fullness of God in a body. They are mistaken. It is literally impossible to have a FULL complete total experience of God while maintaining the body. Because the body is localization. It is limitation. You cannot keep localization and be infinite and unlimited. You cannot be finite and specific and located in space or time and be simultaneously infinitely abstract.

"The body cannot stay without illusions." "The body cannot remain." "To be WITHOUT a body is to be in your natural state." "The body is clearly a device for separation and therefore does not exist." "You are not a body." "The body is a limit."

"And gone are bodies in the blazing light upon the altar to the Son of God."

You can approach God, you can get closer to God, you can feel the warmth of the light, you can radiate love and joy into the world as though joined with God, but you cannot FULLY, TOTALLY, COMPLETELY immerse yourself in God while maintaining isolation, localization, temporal separation in one moment of time. To be eternal is transcendent of time and space. It means you not only exist EVERYWHERE you also exist EVERYWHEN. You exist in and beyond all moments of time. It makes you a time traveler, transcendent of the temporal order, not merely "I'm in 2019".

Do you really how VAST you are? Do you realize how VAST God is? How totally utterly unlimited? Then look at the body, look at how it IS a limitation, and that having one, using one, seeing one, or believing one exists at all, is causing you to NOT BE WITH GOD.

"You cannot behold the world and know God."

"To see a sinless body is impossible."

"God did not create the body."

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

You HAVE TO LEAVE THE BODY to be with God. You have to leave the body entirely, permanently, never again to need a body EVER. You have to overcome reincarnation. You have to overcome death. You have to overcome the NEED to be in a body AT ALL, if you want to be with God. You cannot KEEP the body and maintain that kind of abstract infinite knowledge. "You cannot remain in the world with this knowledge." You cannot STAY HERE in this fictional world, and be totally joined with God. You can perceive him perhaps, you can see him perhaps, you can love with him perhaps, but you cannot be ONE with Him in a body.

Is Jesus in a body? Nope. I rest my case.

"The world you see (with ANY kind of perception) is the delusional system of those made mad by guilt. Look carefully at this world, and you will realize that this is so. For this world is the symbol of punishment, and all the laws which seem to govern it are the laws of death."

This is talking about THIS world, Earth, its physical nature, its inherent cruelty. Jesus goes on to say something which COMPLETELY bypasses any idea of having thoughts ABOUT the world, it being merely an emotional statement, or something to do with perceptual states...

"***Children are born into it*** through pain and in pain. Their growth is attended by suffering, and they learn of sorrow and separation and death. ***Their minds are trapped in their brain***, and its power declines if their bodies are hurt. They seem to love, yet they desert, and are deserted. They appear to lose what they love, perhaps the most insane belief of all. And ***their bodies wither and gasp and are laid in the ground***, and seem to be no more. Not one of them but has thought that God is cruel. "

"If this were the real world, God WOULD be cruel. For no father could subject his children to this as the price of salvation, and be loving."

Notice here the profoundly obvious references to things happening on a PHYSICAL level, within an environment He is referring to as "the world". He isn't speaking in metaphors or poetry or internal interpretative states. He's referring to this PLANET.

He mentions children being born "into it". This has absolutely nothing to do with your perception or attitude about the world. He's talking about child birth. The PHYSICAL birthing of human babies.

He mentions minds being trapped in brains. This CLEARLY distinguishes that the MIND, which might be the realm where you claim to have an attitude "about the world", is completely distinct from "the brain". And I think we all know that the brain is NOT a reference to an ATTITUDE. It's talking of the physical blob of brain tissue in the physical head of the physical body. And these bodies, which house these brains, are part of the physical world that is being referred to as THE WORLD THAT IS CRUEL.

Further He mentions about how the bodies become frail, wither, suffer and die, and are laid in the ground. Unless you have a graveyard IN YOUR HEAD, this is again a direct reference to MULTIPLE bodies (not just yours) being laid in the PHYSICAL SOIL of the ground. As an aspect of this WORLD that he is making reference to as CRUEL.

All of these references are clearly speaking of a world, the PHYSICAL world, where children are born through human child birth, people's minds seem trapped in their physical human brains, and their physical bodies grow old and die and are buried in the physical soil of the ground. None of this is metaphorical, poetry, fluffly language or indirect. It is totally literal and plain as day.

THAT WORLD, where all this stuff happens, is being referred to as CRUEL, and NOT a world that God would create. For God to create a world where children are BORN, where minds are stuck in BRAINS, and physical bodies become sick and die and are buried in the GROUND, God would have to be a CRUEL FATHER. Because all of this IS cruel. At the PHYSICAL level. This has nothing whatsoever to do with perception or attitude or meanings you give to things.

"If this were the real world, God WOULD be cruel."

This is fortunately NOT THE REAL WORLD. It is not reality, God is NOT cruel, God does NOT subject His children to this madness, and REALITY is nothing like this hellish world. The dream of death is not God's will. It was made to oppose His will. "The world was made as an attack on God." IT IS madness to think of life as being born, suffering, and dying in the end. It is completely unnatural.

This world is not the Kingdom of Heaven. Regardless of how you look at it, perceive it, think of it, interpret it, project onto it, or have attitudes or meanings given to it, it STILL remains what it IS, which is an unnatural artificial world of cruelty. Even teachers of God look upon it and RECOGNIZE THIS, and are NOT DECEIVED BY IT'S LIES.

"God's teachers choose to look on dreams a while. It is a conscious choice.For they have learned that all choices are made consciously, with full awareness of their consequences.The dream says otherwise, but who would put his faith in dreams once they are recognized for what they are?Awareness of dreaming is the real function of God's teachers. They watch the dream figures come and go, shift and change, suffer and die.Yet they are not deceived by what they see."

Why are they not deceived? Because they RECOGNIZE that the world MUST BE A LIE, is NOT showing them reality, and does NOT contain the truth. They look upon THE DREAM (this world) and recognize it is FALSE. It is the ego's world of cruelty and hell. And even when forgiven it remains nothing but an ILLUSION of a world.

"Unity alone is not a thing of dreams. And it is this God's teachers acknowledge as behind the dream, beyond all seeming and yet surely theirs."

"The world you see (in any way) is an ILLUSION of a world. ***God did not create it***, for what He creates must be eternal as Himself. Yet there is ***nothing*** in the world you see that will endure forever. Some things will last in time a little while longer than others. But the time will come when ***all things visible will have an end.***"

Jesus describes this physical world as nothing, and the body as nothing. There are many references to it being no thing at all. And because it is not really anything, it does not actually have ANY kinds of attributes, neither positive or negative. The world is meaningless.

"You think that what upsets you is a frightening world, or a sad world, or a violent world, or an insane world. All these attributes are given it by you. The world is meaningless in itself."

"The idea for today is, of course, the reason why a meaningless world is impossible. What God did not create does not exist." (He did not create the world because it IS meaningless).

"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"

Because the world and body are nothing, they are neutral, and act like a mirror. This is why it's all a matter of purpose here - you can take something that is natural and either use it "for good" or "for evil." There are multiple ways to interpret and see the world and the body precisely because in and of themselves they have no meaning. You can hate them, you can love them, but neither attitude changes the fact that IN AND OF THEMSELVES, they are nothing with no meaning.

"At no SINGLE instant does the body exist at all."

"YOU DO NOT WANT THE WORLD. The only thing of value in it is whatever part of it YOU look upon with love. This GIVES it the only reality it will ever have. ITS value is NOT in itself, but yours IS in you."

This is why the course says the world is meaningless and the only meaning it seems to have is the meaning you give it temporarily. And the only reality it seems to have is the love you see in it, as a result of projecting that love onto it, because it has none of its own. As such the world acts like a mirror. A mirror has no image of its own, no meaning of its own. It reflects what is projected onto it. This is why perception has the law that you see "in" things what you put there to see.

In terms of the body for example the body is not negative, but it is also not positive. If we have hate toward it, fear of it, anger at it, etc, we'd say those are negative things to get rid of and undo because they seem ego. But most people don't realize that ego ALSO entails giving POSITIVE attributes to illusory meaningless things. That includes idolising the body, worshipping it, putting it on a pedestal, giving it magical properties, imagining that it is eternal or a creation of God's, thinking of it as your real identity, trying to make it live forever, regarding it as holy etc.

These are all attempts to give GOD'S (and Christ's) attributes to things which are unreal and have no attributes. For example believing the world is real is an attempt to give God's attribute of reality to the unreal. THAT has to be undone, because it is an attempt to make the world take on a positive attribute. If you "love rainbows" for example you're investing an illusory dream empty nothing rainbow with attributes of specialness and idolisation and magical powers and so on, to try to make it something you want, something you value, something positive. But it has none of that.

Even things that "give you pleasure" or "make you happy" in the world, are artificial meanings given to things to frame them as positive and desirable. That includes attraction to bodies, little cute babies and kittens and puppies, worshipped celebrities, favourite colours, preferred locations, toys and treasures, and so on. These things are not positive or holy or good. They are neutral and have been given artificial meanings.

True holiness and reality are truly positive because positivity is about giving and extending something real. Creation "positively adds" to creation through creative extension. Illusions and sin are SUBTRACTIVE not additive, causing them to LOSE MEANING. It is a MYTH that ego is purely "negative" only and that we have to simply get rid of all our negativity in order to stop being ego. Ego can easily be framed as what SEEMS like an ILLUSION OF POSITIVITY, including illusions of spirituality and awakening.

Given that the world is literally NOTHING, it's not really there, which is the whole teaching that there is no world. This entire physical space, this planet, these bodies, space and time, are all made up in the mind and don't really exist. They appear to exist but they don't have the same substance of presence and creative power and immortality that real existence has. They are empty, illusions of symbols in a dream. If you think they are more than that, that they are "something", then you will start giving them attributes, and that will be a distortion of what they are - a delusion about them. That must be undone, regardless of whether the meanings you're giving seem positive or negative.

"What is the ego? Nothingness, but in a form that seems like something."

"To see a SINLESS body is impossible. For holiness is POSITIVE, and the body is merely neutral. It is NOT sinful, but neither is it sinless. As nothing, which it IS, the body cannot meaningfully be invested with attributes of Christ OR of the ego. EITHER must be an error, for both would place the attributes where they cannot BE. And BOTH must be undone, for purposes of truth."

"His body's nothingness releases yours from sickness and from death"

This for example tells you that when you recognize your brother's body as NOTHING, and NOT HIM, this recognition also extends to you and allows you to see your own body as nothing and not yourself. And it is by seeing the body AS NOTHING that it becomes healed because it is no longer being distorted and twisted and forced to try to be something it is not.

"Lesson 294 "My body is a wholly neutral thing."

"I am a Son of God. And can I be another thing as well? Did God create the mortal and corruptible? What use has God's beloved Son for what must die? And yet a neutral thing does not see death, for thoughts of fear are not invested there, nor is a mockery of love bestowed upon it. Its neutrality protects it while it has a use. And afterwards, without a purpose, it is laid aside. It is not sick or old or hurt. It is but functionless, unneeded and cast off."

Here again Jesus reiterates that the physical human body IS NOTHING, and being nothing is it only NEUTRAL. Its neutrality, recognized, "protects it", because if your mind realises the body is neutral it stops giving it magical powers, level confusions, and thus sickness. Sickness is a form of believing that the body level has the power to miscreate in the mind, for example. It can only do that if your mind believes the body is SOMETHING (and not nothing) that has attributes. Those attributes you give it it does NOT have, and giving it attributes makes it sick.

"The body is hardly worth the least defense"

"The body's health is fully guaranteed because it is not limited by time, by weather or fatigue, by food and drink, or any laws you made it serve before. You need do nothing now to make it well, for sickness has become impossible."

If you try to defend the body you attack it and make it sick. If you let it be nothing, it will not be sick. If you make up laws about what it is or isn't, and give it labels, and start calling it holy or beautiful or immortal or innocent, you are delusional. The body cannot be either innocent OR guilty.

This is where I think this whole area is misunderstood or not recognized by many people. We think in either/or terms that something has to be EITHER guilty OR innocent. If it's innocent it must not be guilty. And if ego is guilt, then we think that by taking away guilt from the body and the world we make them innocent. Or if we take away ego we must be removing guilt and that must result in innocence. But that innocence is in the mind, NOT the world or the body. And if we start believing that we pivot on an axis ranging from "the world is guilty" to "the world is innocent" and think that applies to the physical, we will be mistaken. That axis is in our mind only, not on the physical level.

Thus the world doesn't go from being guilty to being innocent, and it doesn't go from being unforgiven to being forgiven. It goes from being SOMETHING TO NOTHING. And that's very different. The body goes from being something to nothing also. While our mind might become more innocent and loving and holy and see from that loving holiness a reflection of love and holiness seemingly "in the world", because the world is a mirror and perception functions like a mirror, that does NOT mean that the world ITSELF has become innocent and holy. That is NOT POSSIBLE because it isn't a true creation or a truly existing present immortal substance.

Jesus is asking us to stop giving the world ANY attributes at all. To withdraw from it ALL the meanings we have given it, regardless of whether we think of those meanings as spiritual and loving and good, or evil and negative and bad. Trying to turn the world - which is nothing - into a "something" IS EGO. Regardless of the form or meaning or whether it seems to symbolize life or death or evil or holiness. Making the world ANYTHING is the problem, because the world is not really there.

"Hallucinations serve to meet the goal of madness. They are the means by which the OUTSIDE world, projected from within, ADJUSTS to sin, and SEEMS to witness to its reality. It still is true that nothing IS without. Yet, upon nothing, are ALL projections made. For it is the PROJECTION which gives the "nothing" ALL the meaning that it holds. What has NO meaning, cannot BE perceived. And meaning ALWAYS looks within, to find itself. And THEN looks out. ALL meaning that you give the world outside, must thus reflect the sight you saw WITHIN. Or better, IF you saw at all, or merely judged AGAINST."

"Earth can reflect Heaven or hell; God or the ego. You need but leave the mirror clean, and clear of all the images of hidden darkness you have drawn upon it. God will shine upon it of Himself."

"What is meaningless is neither good nor bad. Why, then, should a meaningless world upset you? If you could accept the world as meaningless and let the truth be written upon it for you, it would make you indescribably happy. But because it is meaningless, you are impelled to write upon it what you would have it be. It is this you see in it. It is this that is meaningless in truth. Beneath your words is written the Word of God. The truth upsets you now, but when your words have been erased, you will see His. That is the ultimate purpose of these exercises."

"God's teachers can have no regret on giving up the pleasures of the world. Is it a sacrifice to give up pain? Does an adult resent the giving up of children's toys? Does one whose vision has already glimpsed the Face of Christ look back with longing on a slaughter house? No-one who has escaped the world and all its ills looks back on it with condemnation. Yet he must rejoice that he is free of all the sacrifice which its values would demand of him. To them he sacrifices all his freedom. To them he sacrifices all his peace. And to possess them must he sacrifice his hope of Heaven and remembrance of his Father's Love. Who in his sane mind chooses nothing as a substitute for everything?"

"This interpretation of the body will change your mind entirely about its value. Of itself it has NONE."

"Let us today behold earth disappear, at first transformed, and then, forgiven, fade entirely into God's holy Will."

"The body disappears, and no longer hides what lies beyond. It merely ceases to interfere with vision. To roll the stone away is to see beyond the tomb, beyond death, and to understand the body's nothingness. What is understood as nothing must disappear."