A couple of days ago I came across an article in The New York Times by a journalist, Sara Rimer, “Gatsby’s Green Light Beckons a New Set of Strivers.” Apparently, the novel, written over 80 years ago, is speaking to high school students now, particularly immigrants.
BOSTON — Jinzhao Wang, 14, who immigrated two years ago from China, has never seen anything like the huge mansions that loomed over Long Island Sound in glamorous 1920s New York. But F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel, The Great Gatsby, with its themes of possibility and aspiration, speaks to her.
She is inspired by the green light at the end of the dock, which for Jay Gatsby, the self-made millionaire from North Dakota, symbolizes the upper-class woman he longs for. “Green color always represents hope,” Jinzhao said.
“My green light?” said Jinzhao, who has been studying “Gatsby” in her sophomore English class at the Boston Latin School. “My green light is Harvard.”
Gatsby, of course, is the doomed dreamer in the novel who is obsessed with his love for Daisy, a woman he courted eight years previously, and now believes that he can repeat the past and win her love, again. When we first encounter him in the novel, he is staring at the green light at the end of her dock across the bay, symbolizing his romantic dream.
This article brought back memories for me because in March of 1965 I wrote a critical essay and lesson plan on The Great Gatsby, “A paper submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Teaching from The University of Chicago.” Over the years, through all the moves from city to city, I managed to keep a copy of that essay. I found it yesterday and read it for the first time since I wrote it so long ago. Just holding it in my hands takes me back. It is a copy of the original that was submitted, a carbon copy, thin, yellowing paper with gray carriage marks of the typewriter, dark, shadowy columns running down each page. Sometimes letters are hard to read because I had used Whiteout to type corrections on the original. I had typed it on my portable Remington, a thoughtful and practical gift from by parents for my high school graduation.
This seventeen-page essay actually holds up quite well after all these years. I can see that my young, scholarly self took his task seriously. In preparation for writing it, I had read Fitzgerald’s other novels, his short stories, and a dozen books of literary criticism. My young self argued his thesis rather tenaciously.
Now, there is only one reason for this nostalgic look at this past event, and the word “nostalgic” is just right, because the word means “a longing for home,” from the Greek nostos, meaning "homecoming," and algos, "pain." The home I am referring to here is being Home in God.
This world you seem to live in is not home
to you. And somewhere in your mind you know
that this is true. A memory of home
keeps haunting you, as if there were a place
that called you to return, although you do
not recognize the voice, nor what it is
the Voice reminds you of. Yet still you feel
an alien here, from somewhere all unknown.
Nothing so definite that you could say
with certainty you are an exile here.
Just a persistent feeling, sometimes not
more than a tiny throb, at other times
hardly remembered, actively dismissed,
but surely to return to mind again.
W-p1.182.1
One of my favorite themes is that we are always being spoken to by this Voice, whether or not we hear it. It is inevitable as God’s Son that we hear His Voice, even though we are doing everything in our power to defend ourselves against hearing His Voice. In fact, hearing it is completely natural, and not hearing, or defending ourselves against it, is completely unnatural.
It is quite possible to listen to God's Voice all through the day without interrupting your regular activities in any way. The part of your mind in which truth abides is in constant communication with God, whether you are aware of it or not. W-p1.49.1:1-3
The part that is listening to the Voice for God is calm, always at rest and wholly certain. It is really the only part there is. 2:1,2
Sink deep into the peace that waits for you beyond the frantic, riotous thoughts and sights and sounds of this insane world. You do not live here. We are trying to reach your real home. We are trying to reach the place where you are truly welcome. We are trying to reach God. 4:4-8
Now back to writing my essay on the novel.
The thesis that I tenaciously articulated is a result of hearing the Voice in the form of an idea that struck me. Across the years this has remains a vivid memory for me.
I remember facing a deadline and sitting down at my typewriter on a Saturday night in my room where I lived in a house on Harper Avenue, a few blocks from the University of Chicago campus. I had worked on the paper for five hours. But when I finished, I was in despair because I knew it had not come together. It lacked a clear focus, I had begun rambling and, basically, summarized the chapters as I went through the novel. I stood up, grabbed the sheets of paper and tore them up.
It was midnight, and out of fear and depression and despair, I decided to take a walk along the nearby beach of Lake Michigan, just across Lake Shore Drive. Of course, my critical voice was attacking me, telling me that I wouldn’t be able to graduate; I wouldn’t be able to move on with a career; I would just be stuck.
At that time, of course, I had no idea that I could ask for help. I thought that I was totally alone in the universe. I didn’t have the slightest idea that I was God’s Son, no idea that I was anything except this wild illusion, frantic and distraught, but without reality of any kind, constantly distracted, disorganized and highly uncertain. W-p1.49.2:3
Nevertheless, walking along the beach, my hands in my pockets, my head down, I was suddenly struck with an idea in the form of a soft voice, telling me to focus the entire paper on the question of the reliability of the first-person narrator, Nick Carraway. This just seemed to click. "Eureka!" My despair lifted, I looked up at the stars and felt renewed.
The next day I woke up running the idea, the gift, through my mind, and it felt just right. Since the reader is seeing all of the events through Nick Carraway’s eyes, I could focus on him, his value structure, and how he evaluated the behavior of each of the characters. With this key firmly in mind, I sat down the next day, after a peaceful sleep, and rather easily typed the essay.
Here are some excerpts from the essay, demonstrating the implementation of the idea that came to me on the beach, a gift from the Voice for God.
Nick Carraway, our guide in the form of a first-person narrator, is deeply involved with the other characters. Participating in the action and evaluating events with knowledge of what preceded and what followed them, Nick proves to be a completely reliable narrator. When he describes Tom and adds that “There were men at New Haven who had hated his guts,” we accept this as a significant appraisal of Tom. When he steps back and openly reacts to a character after describing him or her, he helps the reader see the character more clearly. For example, after describing Jordan Baker, he says, “Almost any exhibition of complete self-sufficiency draws a stunned tribute from me.” His response to Daisy, evident in his description of her, fixes her in the reader’s mind for the rest of the novel, “Her face was sad and lovely with bright things in it, bright eyes and a bright passionate mouth, but there was an excitement in her voice that men who had cared for her found difficult to forget.”
By gradually revealing more and more about Gatsby through Nick, whose judgments remain consistent with the reader’s, Fitzgerald manages to keep Gatsby unreal and mysterious. Had Fitzgerald revealed more about Gatsby in the beginning, this effect would have been lost. He had to maintain this effect to prepare the reader to accept Gatsby as the tragic dreamer who eventually “breaks up like glass against Tom’s hard malice.”
So there we are. In spite my limited self, I had heard the Holy Spirit speak to me. No mind training. No Bible training. No Transcendental Meditation. It is inevitable, meaning “something that is certain to happen,” from the Latin, inevitabilis, meaning “unavoidable.” It is completely natural. We are as God created us.
What am I?
I am God's Son, complete and healed and whole,
shining in the reflection of His Love.
In me is His creation sanctified
and guaranteed eternal life. In me
is love perfected, fear impossible,
and joy established without opposite.
I am the holy home of God Himself.
I am the Heaven where His Love resides.
I am His holy Sinlessness Itself,
for in my purity abides His Own.
W-p11.14.1
What is the Holy Spirit?
The Holy Spirit mediates between
illusions and the truth. Since He must bridge
the gap between reality and dreams,
perception leads to knowledge through the grace
that God has given Him, to be His gift to
everyone who turns to Him for truth.
Across the bridge that He provides are dreams
all carried to the truth, to be dispelled
before the light of knowledge. There are sights
and sounds forever laid aside. And where
they were perceived before, forgiveness has
made possible perception's tranquil end.
W-p11.7.1
So, I did graduate from the program, and my first job was teaching English in a junior high school in Westport, Connecticut. Pursuing my dream within a dream, my green light was to blend my passion for teaching with earning a living. Four years after I graduated from the Master’s Program, my Supervisor, Janet Emig, called me in Westport, telling me of a new opportunity at the University of Chicago. They were starting a new program called The Teaching of Teachers, and it led to a Ph.D. from the Education Department. She thought I would be a good candidate. And much to my surprise, she said that she found herself often using my critical essay as an example when she was assigning the paper to her students.
So, after four years of teaching in Westport, I continued pursuing my particular green light. I felt the nostalgia of returning to Chicago, and somehow the Voice on the beach and the writing of the essay and Janet’s remembering it and her call were all taking me home, in retropspect, taking me Home. In September of 1969, just after Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon, my wife, Kim, and our two children, Lori (4) and Stephen (6 months) jumped into our ’65 Volkswagen Beetle, and I followed them in a U-Haul Truck, heading for Chicago.
It’s all good. In spite of ourselves, it is inevitable that we are going Home, a journey without distance to a goal that has never changed. T-8.VI.9:7
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Saturday, February 09, 2008
Resting in the Expanded Consciousness of Holiness
Yesterday, it took four hours for my son, Stephen, and I to drive the 125 miles from the Wisconsin Dells to the Milwaukee Airport because of the record-setting snowstorm. We were totally stopped several times because of overturned semi-trucks. I learned the next day that over 800 motorists were stranded, and the National Guard was called out to help the motorists and clear the highway.
I dropped him off and decided to return right away because his Toyota Tundra had handled very nicely in the snow and ice. As he pointed out to me, because of the four-wheel drive and the tires, he could actually accelerate in the snowy passing lane, maintaining steady traction.
When I arrived on the outskirts of Madison, I was moving along rather well. Suddenly, I slammed on the brakes, and the Tundra became a huge sled, out of control on an icy, three-lane highway. I slammed on the breaks because I suddenly realized that I was about to back end a semi-truck. What happened is that ground suddenly became figure. What I saw as a car’s tail lights at a safe distance ahead suddenly became a semi’s tail lights a few feet in front of me. It was a perceptual distortion that often happens to me at night driving along the highway, staring at tail lights. Ordinarily, the sudden shift from ground to figure is trippy, but this time. . .well, I was completely present during the spin, my head staying completely calm and clear and alert. I said to myself, you just turned the steering wheel hard to the right, now you’re going to have to turn it hard to the left. I noted that there weren’t any cars coming up on me, and all I had to do is ride out the smooth slide, gliding down a three-lane highway. Finally, I came to a stop, facing three-quarters to the rear; I just turned around and proceeded on my way. My heart rate did not accelerate, and my head remained peaceful and clear, during and after the event. I just said, “Thank you, Jesus.”
This morning I was astonished to read the first paragraph of Lesson 38, There is nothing my holiness cannot do, from Jesus' Course in Miracles.
Your holiness reverses all the laws of the world. It is beyond every restriction of time, space, distance and limits of any kind. Your holiness is totally unlimited in its power because it establishes you as a Son of God, at one with the Mind of his Creator.
Two days before this event, I was completely inspired by reading a classic book given me by a friend, The Lazy Man’s Guide to Enlightenment by Thaddeus Golas (1924-1997), first published in 1972. I read it from cover to cover in a three-hour sitting, taking copious notes. I was so excited reading it because it is the Course with different metaphors. Golos uses the metaphor of contracted and expanded awareness, and holiness is expanded awareness.
Golas expresses it this way.
Contraction is felt as fear, pain, unconsciousness, ignorance, hatred, evil, and a whole host of strange feelings. At an extreme he has the feeling of being completely insane, of resisting everyone and everything, of being unable to choose the content of his consciousness. Of course, these are just the feelings appropriate to mass vibration levels, and he can get out of them at any time by expanding, by letting go of all resistance to what he thinks, sees, or feels. When we are completely expanded, we have a feeling of total awareness, of being one with all life. At that level we have no resistance to any vibrations or interactions of other beings. It is timeless bliss, with unlimited choice of consciousness, perception, and feeling.
Expanded awareness is speeded up vibration. When we are at this vibration level, everything around us in time and space moves slowly, and now we are truly in the world, but not of the world. That was my experience in the spinning sled.
Golas expresses the contrast of slow vibrations.
Note carefully that when your vibrations are slow, or contracted, events seem to happen fast, and you will feel that events are happening too fast for you to control them. And you may therefore feel impelled to try that much harder to exercise control. The slower your vibrations, the more unpleasant your life: you will contend with more conflict, mass, and pain. Events will happen too fast for control, yet time will seem interminable because you can see no way out. But the faster you are vibrating and the more messages you get back from your environment, the slower events will appear to be happening, and the more you will feel you are in control. The more you love, the faster you vibrate, then the less need you feel to control anything, and you are not fearful of change and variety. You experience everything deeper and slower and more lovingly.
The higher the ratio of expansion to contraction in yourself, the more expanded and loving you are, the faster you vibrate. And when you raise your vibration level, you can neatly sidestep collisions, both psychic and physical, and quite literally change the world for the better. Love is the strongest magic of all.
There is nothing my holiness cannot do because the power of God lies in it.
It is timeless bliss, with unlimited choice of consciousness, perception, and feeling.
The purpose of today's exercises is to begin to instill in you a sense that you have dominion over all things because of what you are.
Thank you, Father.
I dropped him off and decided to return right away because his Toyota Tundra had handled very nicely in the snow and ice. As he pointed out to me, because of the four-wheel drive and the tires, he could actually accelerate in the snowy passing lane, maintaining steady traction.
When I arrived on the outskirts of Madison, I was moving along rather well. Suddenly, I slammed on the brakes, and the Tundra became a huge sled, out of control on an icy, three-lane highway. I slammed on the breaks because I suddenly realized that I was about to back end a semi-truck. What happened is that ground suddenly became figure. What I saw as a car’s tail lights at a safe distance ahead suddenly became a semi’s tail lights a few feet in front of me. It was a perceptual distortion that often happens to me at night driving along the highway, staring at tail lights. Ordinarily, the sudden shift from ground to figure is trippy, but this time. . .well, I was completely present during the spin, my head staying completely calm and clear and alert. I said to myself, you just turned the steering wheel hard to the right, now you’re going to have to turn it hard to the left. I noted that there weren’t any cars coming up on me, and all I had to do is ride out the smooth slide, gliding down a three-lane highway. Finally, I came to a stop, facing three-quarters to the rear; I just turned around and proceeded on my way. My heart rate did not accelerate, and my head remained peaceful and clear, during and after the event. I just said, “Thank you, Jesus.”
This morning I was astonished to read the first paragraph of Lesson 38, There is nothing my holiness cannot do, from Jesus' Course in Miracles.
Your holiness reverses all the laws of the world. It is beyond every restriction of time, space, distance and limits of any kind. Your holiness is totally unlimited in its power because it establishes you as a Son of God, at one with the Mind of his Creator.
Two days before this event, I was completely inspired by reading a classic book given me by a friend, The Lazy Man’s Guide to Enlightenment by Thaddeus Golas (1924-1997), first published in 1972. I read it from cover to cover in a three-hour sitting, taking copious notes. I was so excited reading it because it is the Course with different metaphors. Golos uses the metaphor of contracted and expanded awareness, and holiness is expanded awareness.
Golas expresses it this way.
Contraction is felt as fear, pain, unconsciousness, ignorance, hatred, evil, and a whole host of strange feelings. At an extreme he has the feeling of being completely insane, of resisting everyone and everything, of being unable to choose the content of his consciousness. Of course, these are just the feelings appropriate to mass vibration levels, and he can get out of them at any time by expanding, by letting go of all resistance to what he thinks, sees, or feels. When we are completely expanded, we have a feeling of total awareness, of being one with all life. At that level we have no resistance to any vibrations or interactions of other beings. It is timeless bliss, with unlimited choice of consciousness, perception, and feeling.
Expanded awareness is speeded up vibration. When we are at this vibration level, everything around us in time and space moves slowly, and now we are truly in the world, but not of the world. That was my experience in the spinning sled.
Golas expresses the contrast of slow vibrations.
Note carefully that when your vibrations are slow, or contracted, events seem to happen fast, and you will feel that events are happening too fast for you to control them. And you may therefore feel impelled to try that much harder to exercise control. The slower your vibrations, the more unpleasant your life: you will contend with more conflict, mass, and pain. Events will happen too fast for control, yet time will seem interminable because you can see no way out. But the faster you are vibrating and the more messages you get back from your environment, the slower events will appear to be happening, and the more you will feel you are in control. The more you love, the faster you vibrate, then the less need you feel to control anything, and you are not fearful of change and variety. You experience everything deeper and slower and more lovingly.
The higher the ratio of expansion to contraction in yourself, the more expanded and loving you are, the faster you vibrate. And when you raise your vibration level, you can neatly sidestep collisions, both psychic and physical, and quite literally change the world for the better. Love is the strongest magic of all.
There is nothing my holiness cannot do because the power of God lies in it.
It is timeless bliss, with unlimited choice of consciousness, perception, and feeling.
The purpose of today's exercises is to begin to instill in you a sense that you have dominion over all things because of what you are.
Thank you, Father.
Monday, January 14, 2008
Happy New Year! Rest in God
I started the new year with an extraordinary experience. My wife, Christine, and I were staying with our friends, Carol and Dan, in Lansing, Michigan, at their C D Inn. As I was slowly waking up on New Year’s Day, I just lay there with my eyes closed for awhile. We would be driving back home soon, and I was pleasantly surprised that I could not visualize the house in Wisconsin Dells where we have been living for the past ten years; I simply could not bring it to mind.
I rather enjoyed this not knowing and wanted to prolong it as long as possible. This lovely state of formlessness was very peaceful. When I told a friend, Tanja, about this experience, she smiled and said, “It sounds like enlightened amnesia,” capturing exactly my response to this state of mind at that moment. This still state of mind served as a reference point for sentences from A Course in Miracles, for example:
I am not a body. I am free.
For I am still as God created me. W-p1.rVI.In.3:3
This state of mind where the reference point is not form but formlessness is the stillness of my creation as God’s Son. Being unable to formulate for a moment, this enlightened amnesia, is a refreshing, peaceful experience that runs counter to the normal, habitual, regular formulation of thought-images that we manifest in space and time. This experience serves as an example of stepping out of time and space. This is our true state of consciousness before coming into the world of form, while being in form, and after leaving.
This state is what is Real.
Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God. W-p1.In.2:2-4
This reality in my mind is the reference point for a variety of metaphors simply expressed in Lesson titles:
I am the light of the world. (Lesson 61)
The light has come. (Lesson 75)
Light and joy and peace abide in me. (Lesson 93)
I am as God created me. (Lesson 94)
I am one Self, united with my Creator. (Lesson 95)
I am spirit. (Lesson 97)
I rest in God. (Lesson 109)
Let me remember I am one with God. (Lesson 124)
The world I see holds nothing I want. (Lesson 129)
These metaphors provide a great way to enter a new year because on January 1st. I begin, again, the Lessons of A Course in Miracles. Ensconced in the state of mind of the peace and light of God, I am eager to read Lesson 1, Nothing I see means anything. From this reference point of the awareness of the peace of God, the falsity of what I see is readily apparent. It is a reminder that what I am as created by God has nothing to do with the physical form. I am God's Son regardless of the world I made up with separating thoughts.
It is from this perspective, meaning “to look through,” that I can look at the titles of Lessons 2-7 as reminders.
I have given everything I see in this room all the meaning that it has for me. (Lesson 2)
I do not understand anything I see in this room. (Lesson 3)
These thoughts do not mean anything. They are like the things I see in this room. (Lesson 4)
I am never upset for the reason I think. (Lesson 5)
I am upset because I see something that is not there. (Lesson 6)
I see only the past. (Lesson 7)
Jesus is simply telling us what we already know but forgot that we know. Because of our preoccupation with seeing in form, we stay unaware of our Real state of mind. That is why Jesus uses “see” in these titles, demonstrating the falsity of what we take for granted, the falsity of the premise that seeing is believing.
It is a done deal. What we are in Reality has nothing to do with what we see around us.
And now I am going to practice the awareness of our Reality by reading and commenting on the first five paragraphs of Lesson 109, I rest in God.
We ask for rest today, and quietness
unshaken by the world's appearances.
We ask for peace and stillness, in the midst
of all the turmoil born of clashing dreams.
We ask for safety and for happiness,
although we seem to look on danger and
on sorrow. And we have the thought that will
answer our asking with what we request.
Bringing my house into existence by remembering it is just an example of entering into the world's appearances with my thought-images. Recognizing the falsity of these thoughts enables me to shift into the awareness of the peace of God.
"I rest in God." This thought will bring to you
the rest and quiet, peace and stillness, and
the safety and the happiness you seek.
"I rest in God." This thought has power to wake
the sleeping truth in you, whose vision sees
beyond appearances to that same truth
in everyone and everything there is.
Here is the end of suffering for all
the world, and everyone who ever came
and yet will come to linger for a while.
Here is the thought in which the Son of God
is born again, to recognize himself.
When I have this thought, this recognition, I am, again, in my awareness, God’s Son, shifting away from thought-images, experiencing the truth.
"I rest in God." Completely undismayed,
this thought will carry you through storms and strife,
past misery and pain, past loss and death,
and onward to the certainty of God.
There is no suffering it cannot heal.
There is no problem that it cannot solve.
And no appearance but will turn to truth
before the eyes of you who rest in God.
Resting in God, I look out at a world through the eyes of Christ, seeing with vision, not seeing only with the physical mechanism of my eyes wired to my brain.
This is the day of peace. You rest in God,
and while the world is torn by winds of hate
your rest remains completely undisturbed.
Yours is the rest of truth. Appearances
cannot intrude on you. You call to all
to join you in your rest, and they will hear
and come to you because you rest in God.
They will not hear another voice than yours
because you gave your voice to God, and now
you rest in Him and let Him speak through you.
The winds of hate remind me of a metaphor of an anchor. On a sailboat, you can lower the sail and drop anchor. Now no matter how fierce the winds, or powerful the waves, you can ride out the storm safely anchored. I can ask for help to be safely anchored in the peace of God, forgiving the feverish thought-images that seem to be wreaking havoc in time and space.
In Him you have no cares and no concerns,
no burdens, no anxiety, no pain,
no fear of future and no past regrets.
In timelessness you rest, while time goes by
without its touch upon you, for your rest
can never change in any way at all.
You rest today. And as you close your eyes,
sink into stillness. Let these periods
of rest and respite reassure your mind
that all its frantic fantasies were but
the dreams of fever that has passed away.
Let it be still and thankfully accept
its healing. No more fearful dreams will come,
now that you rest in God. Take time today
to slip away from dreams and into peace.
I sink into the peace of God. This is what it means to be in the world but not of the world, walking through the world, all the time anchored in the peace of God.
I rather enjoyed this not knowing and wanted to prolong it as long as possible. This lovely state of formlessness was very peaceful. When I told a friend, Tanja, about this experience, she smiled and said, “It sounds like enlightened amnesia,” capturing exactly my response to this state of mind at that moment. This still state of mind served as a reference point for sentences from A Course in Miracles, for example:
I am not a body. I am free.
For I am still as God created me. W-p1.rVI.In.3:3
This state of mind where the reference point is not form but formlessness is the stillness of my creation as God’s Son. Being unable to formulate for a moment, this enlightened amnesia, is a refreshing, peaceful experience that runs counter to the normal, habitual, regular formulation of thought-images that we manifest in space and time. This experience serves as an example of stepping out of time and space. This is our true state of consciousness before coming into the world of form, while being in form, and after leaving.
This state is what is Real.
Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God. W-p1.In.2:2-4
This reality in my mind is the reference point for a variety of metaphors simply expressed in Lesson titles:
I am the light of the world. (Lesson 61)
The light has come. (Lesson 75)
Light and joy and peace abide in me. (Lesson 93)
I am as God created me. (Lesson 94)
I am one Self, united with my Creator. (Lesson 95)
I am spirit. (Lesson 97)
I rest in God. (Lesson 109)
Let me remember I am one with God. (Lesson 124)
The world I see holds nothing I want. (Lesson 129)
These metaphors provide a great way to enter a new year because on January 1st. I begin, again, the Lessons of A Course in Miracles. Ensconced in the state of mind of the peace and light of God, I am eager to read Lesson 1, Nothing I see means anything. From this reference point of the awareness of the peace of God, the falsity of what I see is readily apparent. It is a reminder that what I am as created by God has nothing to do with the physical form. I am God's Son regardless of the world I made up with separating thoughts.
It is from this perspective, meaning “to look through,” that I can look at the titles of Lessons 2-7 as reminders.
I have given everything I see in this room all the meaning that it has for me. (Lesson 2)
I do not understand anything I see in this room. (Lesson 3)
These thoughts do not mean anything. They are like the things I see in this room. (Lesson 4)
I am never upset for the reason I think. (Lesson 5)
I am upset because I see something that is not there. (Lesson 6)
I see only the past. (Lesson 7)
Jesus is simply telling us what we already know but forgot that we know. Because of our preoccupation with seeing in form, we stay unaware of our Real state of mind. That is why Jesus uses “see” in these titles, demonstrating the falsity of what we take for granted, the falsity of the premise that seeing is believing.
It is a done deal. What we are in Reality has nothing to do with what we see around us.
And now I am going to practice the awareness of our Reality by reading and commenting on the first five paragraphs of Lesson 109, I rest in God.
We ask for rest today, and quietness
unshaken by the world's appearances.
We ask for peace and stillness, in the midst
of all the turmoil born of clashing dreams.
We ask for safety and for happiness,
although we seem to look on danger and
on sorrow. And we have the thought that will
answer our asking with what we request.
Bringing my house into existence by remembering it is just an example of entering into the world's appearances with my thought-images. Recognizing the falsity of these thoughts enables me to shift into the awareness of the peace of God.
"I rest in God." This thought will bring to you
the rest and quiet, peace and stillness, and
the safety and the happiness you seek.
"I rest in God." This thought has power to wake
the sleeping truth in you, whose vision sees
beyond appearances to that same truth
in everyone and everything there is.
Here is the end of suffering for all
the world, and everyone who ever came
and yet will come to linger for a while.
Here is the thought in which the Son of God
is born again, to recognize himself.
When I have this thought, this recognition, I am, again, in my awareness, God’s Son, shifting away from thought-images, experiencing the truth.
"I rest in God." Completely undismayed,
this thought will carry you through storms and strife,
past misery and pain, past loss and death,
and onward to the certainty of God.
There is no suffering it cannot heal.
There is no problem that it cannot solve.
And no appearance but will turn to truth
before the eyes of you who rest in God.
Resting in God, I look out at a world through the eyes of Christ, seeing with vision, not seeing only with the physical mechanism of my eyes wired to my brain.
This is the day of peace. You rest in God,
and while the world is torn by winds of hate
your rest remains completely undisturbed.
Yours is the rest of truth. Appearances
cannot intrude on you. You call to all
to join you in your rest, and they will hear
and come to you because you rest in God.
They will not hear another voice than yours
because you gave your voice to God, and now
you rest in Him and let Him speak through you.
The winds of hate remind me of a metaphor of an anchor. On a sailboat, you can lower the sail and drop anchor. Now no matter how fierce the winds, or powerful the waves, you can ride out the storm safely anchored. I can ask for help to be safely anchored in the peace of God, forgiving the feverish thought-images that seem to be wreaking havoc in time and space.
In Him you have no cares and no concerns,
no burdens, no anxiety, no pain,
no fear of future and no past regrets.
In timelessness you rest, while time goes by
without its touch upon you, for your rest
can never change in any way at all.
You rest today. And as you close your eyes,
sink into stillness. Let these periods
of rest and respite reassure your mind
that all its frantic fantasies were but
the dreams of fever that has passed away.
Let it be still and thankfully accept
its healing. No more fearful dreams will come,
now that you rest in God. Take time today
to slip away from dreams and into peace.
I sink into the peace of God. This is what it means to be in the world but not of the world, walking through the world, all the time anchored in the peace of God.
Saturday, December 22, 2007
God's Word
This little ditty came to me this morning after reading "What Am I?" in the Workbook of Jesus' unworldly masterpiece, A Course in Miracles.
God's Word
You are My Son.
You and I are One.
On earth it's done,
as in Heaven.
And now have fun.
God's Word
You are My Son.
You and I are One.
On earth it's done,
as in Heaven.
And now have fun.
Saturday, December 08, 2007
Prose and Poetry in A Course in Miracles
A Course in Miracles, Jesus’ unworldly masterpiece, provides us with the offering to train our minds, systematically, to undo, by forgiveness, the dream of the false self and come into the direct awareness of our true Self.
While reading the sentences and paragraphs of the Text and doing the lessons in the workbook, we become aware of the perfect blend of medium and message, structure and content, sound and sense. For example, just look again at the Introduction.
This is a course in miracles. It is a required course. Only the time you take it is voluntary. Free will does not mean that you can establish the curriculum. It means only that you can elect what you want to take at a given time. The course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love, for that is beyond what can be taught. It does aim, however, at removing the blocks to the awareness of love's presence, which is your natural inheritance. The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite. This course can therefore be summed up very simply in this way:
Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.
This is a precise summary of 31 Chapters, 365 Lessons, and 29 sections of A Manual for Teachers, and it is only the beginning, simply and profoundly, an introduction.
In the regularly published version of the Course, the entire book appears to be in prose, although extraordinary poetic prose. What is astonishing is that Jesus makes a dramatic and clear shift from prose to poetry in both the Text and the Workbook. It is almost impossible to see this in the prose version. A close study by my friend, Steve Russell, reveals that the shift occurs in Chapter 26 of the Text, and in Lesson 98 of the Workbook. Thereafter, Chapters 26 through 31 and Lessons 98 through 365 are in blank verse, the verse that Shakespeare used for 80% of the lines of his 37 plays. Blank verse is a form of poetic meter called iambic pentameter. An iamb consists of two syllables, the stress on the second syllable, for example, chris TINE. Pentameter means five sets of iambs, or ten syllables. It is called blank verse because it is a form of verse that does not rhyme. (The term used for Shakespeare’s 154 Sonnets, for example, is iambic pentameter because they do follow a definite rhyme scheme.)
In Chapter 26, incidentally entitled, The Transition, Jesus makes the shift. In Section VII, The Laws of Healing, appears His last prose paragraph of the Text.
This is a course in miracles. As such, the laws of healing must be understood before the purpose of the course can be accomplished. Let us review the principles that we have covered, and arrange them in a way that summarizes all that must occur for healing to be possible. For when it once is possible it must occur.
The next paragraph, and all subsequent paragraphs in the Text, are aligned on the pages in blank verse.
All sickness comes from separation. When
the separation is denied, it goes.
For it is gone as soon as the idea
that brought it has been healed, and been replaced
by sanity. Sickness and sin are seen
as consequence and cause, in a relationship
kept hidden from awareness that it may
be carefully preserved from reason's light.
Do you hear it?
all SICK ness COMES from SEP ar A tion. WHEN
the SEP ar A tion IS de NIED, it GOES.
Now, Dear Reader, you can rhythmically read the rest of the stanza.
In the Workbook, Jesus uses blank verse for the first time for an entire lesson in Lesson 98, I will accept my part in God’s plan for salvation, and for every lesson, thereafter. (For some reason, Lesson 78, Let miracles replace all grievances, suddenly appears completely in blank verse.)
While pondering Jesus’ shift into blank verse, I found a sentence coming into my mind from Lesson 336:
For sights
and sounds, at best, can serve but to recall
the memory that lies beyond them all.
This is a perfect blend of sound and sense. As far as sense, the sentence reminds me that the highest level of perception simply serves to evoke the memory of God. It does not serve to make a better dream. When we learn through the mind training to undo the dreams of the false self, all we are ever doing is living in anticipation of remembering God, our natural inheritance. This phrase also comes to mind from today’s Lesson 340.
I was born into this world but to achieve this day.
I am here only to learn to see through the eyes of Christ, remembering God. The highest function that sights and sounds serve is to elicit this inherent, abiding memory of God.
As far as sound, the rhythm of Jesus’ poetry evokes His memory.
My heart is beating in the peace of God. (Lesson 267 , Title)
Just listen.
Find your pulse in your neck or on your wrist. Simultaneous with each beat of your pulse, say HEART, BEAT, IN, PEACE, GOD.
Now say the sentence aloud, filling in between the beats with my, is, ing, the, of.
Now, all together.
my HEART is BEAT ing IN the PEACE of GOD.
Try this one.
The hush of heaven holds my heart today. (Lesson 286, Title )
And finally.
and SOUNDS, at BEST, can SERVE but TO re CALL
Simply reading Jesus’ poetry that aligns with the beating of your heart can transport you beyond this world by remembering God.
As far as sights, look at this passage from What is a Miracle?
Miracles fall like drops of healing rain
from Heaven on a dry and dusty world,
where starved and thirsty creatures come to die.
Now they have water. Now the world is green.
And everywhere the signs of life spring up,
to show that what is born can never die,
for what has life has immortality.
(Paragraph 5)
I am so grateful to my friend, Steve Russell, who gives us a much more thorough explanation of the shift in the Introduction to his book, The Rhythm and Reason of Reality. He shows us precisely where Jesus makes the transitions from prose to poetry in the Text and in the Workbook.
He told me some time ago, that he found himself hearing the iambic pattern while studying the Course, and then he, systematically, began to examine the entire prose version by sitting down at a computer with a CD of the Course, reading each paragraph aloud. I realize now that with his musician’s highly-trained ear, he was able to listen for the ten beats in the prose paragraphs, and then he hit the Enter key, and resume reading the next line, and much to his joy he saw the pages fill up with sheer poetry, paragraphs of prose transforming into stanzas of blank verse.
I invite you now to take a look at Steve Russell’s wonderful book, a gift to us all.
Click Here:
While reading the sentences and paragraphs of the Text and doing the lessons in the workbook, we become aware of the perfect blend of medium and message, structure and content, sound and sense. For example, just look again at the Introduction.
This is a course in miracles. It is a required course. Only the time you take it is voluntary. Free will does not mean that you can establish the curriculum. It means only that you can elect what you want to take at a given time. The course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love, for that is beyond what can be taught. It does aim, however, at removing the blocks to the awareness of love's presence, which is your natural inheritance. The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite. This course can therefore be summed up very simply in this way:
Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.
This is a precise summary of 31 Chapters, 365 Lessons, and 29 sections of A Manual for Teachers, and it is only the beginning, simply and profoundly, an introduction.
In the regularly published version of the Course, the entire book appears to be in prose, although extraordinary poetic prose. What is astonishing is that Jesus makes a dramatic and clear shift from prose to poetry in both the Text and the Workbook. It is almost impossible to see this in the prose version. A close study by my friend, Steve Russell, reveals that the shift occurs in Chapter 26 of the Text, and in Lesson 98 of the Workbook. Thereafter, Chapters 26 through 31 and Lessons 98 through 365 are in blank verse, the verse that Shakespeare used for 80% of the lines of his 37 plays. Blank verse is a form of poetic meter called iambic pentameter. An iamb consists of two syllables, the stress on the second syllable, for example, chris TINE. Pentameter means five sets of iambs, or ten syllables. It is called blank verse because it is a form of verse that does not rhyme. (The term used for Shakespeare’s 154 Sonnets, for example, is iambic pentameter because they do follow a definite rhyme scheme.)
In Chapter 26, incidentally entitled, The Transition, Jesus makes the shift. In Section VII, The Laws of Healing, appears His last prose paragraph of the Text.
This is a course in miracles. As such, the laws of healing must be understood before the purpose of the course can be accomplished. Let us review the principles that we have covered, and arrange them in a way that summarizes all that must occur for healing to be possible. For when it once is possible it must occur.
The next paragraph, and all subsequent paragraphs in the Text, are aligned on the pages in blank verse.
All sickness comes from separation. When
the separation is denied, it goes.
For it is gone as soon as the idea
that brought it has been healed, and been replaced
by sanity. Sickness and sin are seen
as consequence and cause, in a relationship
kept hidden from awareness that it may
be carefully preserved from reason's light.
Do you hear it?
all SICK ness COMES from SEP ar A tion. WHEN
the SEP ar A tion IS de NIED, it GOES.
Now, Dear Reader, you can rhythmically read the rest of the stanza.
In the Workbook, Jesus uses blank verse for the first time for an entire lesson in Lesson 98, I will accept my part in God’s plan for salvation, and for every lesson, thereafter. (For some reason, Lesson 78, Let miracles replace all grievances, suddenly appears completely in blank verse.)
While pondering Jesus’ shift into blank verse, I found a sentence coming into my mind from Lesson 336:
For sights
and sounds, at best, can serve but to recall
the memory that lies beyond them all.
This is a perfect blend of sound and sense. As far as sense, the sentence reminds me that the highest level of perception simply serves to evoke the memory of God. It does not serve to make a better dream. When we learn through the mind training to undo the dreams of the false self, all we are ever doing is living in anticipation of remembering God, our natural inheritance. This phrase also comes to mind from today’s Lesson 340.
I was born into this world but to achieve this day.
I am here only to learn to see through the eyes of Christ, remembering God. The highest function that sights and sounds serve is to elicit this inherent, abiding memory of God.
As far as sound, the rhythm of Jesus’ poetry evokes His memory.
My heart is beating in the peace of God. (Lesson 267 , Title)
Just listen.
Find your pulse in your neck or on your wrist. Simultaneous with each beat of your pulse, say HEART, BEAT, IN, PEACE, GOD.
Now say the sentence aloud, filling in between the beats with my, is, ing, the, of.
Now, all together.
my HEART is BEAT ing IN the PEACE of GOD.
Try this one.
The hush of heaven holds my heart today. (Lesson 286, Title )
And finally.
and SOUNDS, at BEST, can SERVE but TO re CALL
Simply reading Jesus’ poetry that aligns with the beating of your heart can transport you beyond this world by remembering God.
As far as sights, look at this passage from What is a Miracle?
Miracles fall like drops of healing rain
from Heaven on a dry and dusty world,
where starved and thirsty creatures come to die.
Now they have water. Now the world is green.
And everywhere the signs of life spring up,
to show that what is born can never die,
for what has life has immortality.
(Paragraph 5)
I am so grateful to my friend, Steve Russell, who gives us a much more thorough explanation of the shift in the Introduction to his book, The Rhythm and Reason of Reality. He shows us precisely where Jesus makes the transitions from prose to poetry in the Text and in the Workbook.
He told me some time ago, that he found himself hearing the iambic pattern while studying the Course, and then he, systematically, began to examine the entire prose version by sitting down at a computer with a CD of the Course, reading each paragraph aloud. I realize now that with his musician’s highly-trained ear, he was able to listen for the ten beats in the prose paragraphs, and then he hit the Enter key, and resume reading the next line, and much to his joy he saw the pages fill up with sheer poetry, paragraphs of prose transforming into stanzas of blank verse.
I invite you now to take a look at Steve Russell’s wonderful book, a gift to us all.
Click Here:
Sunday, November 25, 2007
The Colors of Christmas
I am writing this in late November, roughly 30 days before winter officially begins on December 22, the winter solstice. Last night, my wife, Christine, and I had a bonfire, probably the last one of the year before it turns too cold, inviting friends over to roast hot dogs and marshmallows. In a way, it was really quite primitive, sitting around the fire, huddled against the chilly night, surrounded by evergreen trees, listening to the wind gusting through the trees. We were confident that, although it was getting darker and colder every day, there would be a spring, and in six months it would be lighter and warmer.
It did bring to mind, though, our ancient ancestors, the Neolithic farmers, sitting around fires thousands of years ago. For them, though, it was quite different, because they huddled in fear, having observed that the sun was sinking below the horizon much earlier each night and returning much later each morning. What if the sun no longer came up? They were afraid that the sun might disappear completely, leaving only the darkness and the permanent cold. Their fears increased as they neared the winter solstice. From vast experience and keen observation they knew of the movement of the sun across the sky, knowing that it would be much darker before it became lighter, but what if it stayed completely dark this time? Motivated by magical beliefs and superstition, they performed rituals to ensure that the sun would be reborn this time. Over the centuries, their rituals seemed to work because during the longest night and shortest day of the year, the sun did, indeed, stop its southerly journey and begin heading north. That is the meaning of the word solstice, from the Latin solstitium, sol meaning sun, and sistere, meaning “to stand still.” The days gradually became longer and the nights shorter for the next six months, until the summer solstice when the sun stood still, again, and then began its journey south.
Early man’s superstition triggered his rituals, encouraging the rebirth of the sun. Superstition shares the same Latin root as solstice, sistere, meaning “to stand,” in this case the prefix super means “to stand over.” Early man thought that perhaps his magical rituals would enable him to stand beyond, or over, the events, having a positive effect, encouraging the rebirth of the sun. Through the centuries these rituals became ceremonies involving the colors red and green, symbolizing the fertility of the earth. People gathered wreaths and holly with its red berries and evergreen boughs and ivy and mistletoe and built fires, and these practices were carried on in various forms by the Greeks and early Christians and Romans and Celts and other cultures throughout the world.
And now it is necessary to account, briefly, for the connection between the winter solstice and the birth of Jesus and Christmas celebrations. December 25 was set four hundred years after the birth of Jesus. Church Fathers, having no exact reference of Jesus’ birthday, borrowed a festival the Romans celebrated, called the Birth of the Unconquered Sun, declared to fall on December 25 by Emperor Aurelian in 270 AD. Our Neolithic ancestors would see the connection, having prayed that their sun conquer the night, again.
Today, although we have long forgotten the superstitious reasons for the colors, we have green and red candles and Christmas trees lights and bulbs and decorations and Yule logs and gifts wrapped in red and green paper and ribbons and bows and Christmas wreaths and holly and mistletoe and candy canes and Christmas cards and stockings, and we wear red and green sweaters and shirts and blouses and pants and skirts and scarves and earmuffs and mittens because these are the colors of rebirth.
It did bring to mind, though, our ancient ancestors, the Neolithic farmers, sitting around fires thousands of years ago. For them, though, it was quite different, because they huddled in fear, having observed that the sun was sinking below the horizon much earlier each night and returning much later each morning. What if the sun no longer came up? They were afraid that the sun might disappear completely, leaving only the darkness and the permanent cold. Their fears increased as they neared the winter solstice. From vast experience and keen observation they knew of the movement of the sun across the sky, knowing that it would be much darker before it became lighter, but what if it stayed completely dark this time? Motivated by magical beliefs and superstition, they performed rituals to ensure that the sun would be reborn this time. Over the centuries, their rituals seemed to work because during the longest night and shortest day of the year, the sun did, indeed, stop its southerly journey and begin heading north. That is the meaning of the word solstice, from the Latin solstitium, sol meaning sun, and sistere, meaning “to stand still.” The days gradually became longer and the nights shorter for the next six months, until the summer solstice when the sun stood still, again, and then began its journey south.
Early man’s superstition triggered his rituals, encouraging the rebirth of the sun. Superstition shares the same Latin root as solstice, sistere, meaning “to stand,” in this case the prefix super means “to stand over.” Early man thought that perhaps his magical rituals would enable him to stand beyond, or over, the events, having a positive effect, encouraging the rebirth of the sun. Through the centuries these rituals became ceremonies involving the colors red and green, symbolizing the fertility of the earth. People gathered wreaths and holly with its red berries and evergreen boughs and ivy and mistletoe and built fires, and these practices were carried on in various forms by the Greeks and early Christians and Romans and Celts and other cultures throughout the world.
And now it is necessary to account, briefly, for the connection between the winter solstice and the birth of Jesus and Christmas celebrations. December 25 was set four hundred years after the birth of Jesus. Church Fathers, having no exact reference of Jesus’ birthday, borrowed a festival the Romans celebrated, called the Birth of the Unconquered Sun, declared to fall on December 25 by Emperor Aurelian in 270 AD. Our Neolithic ancestors would see the connection, having prayed that their sun conquer the night, again.
Today, although we have long forgotten the superstitious reasons for the colors, we have green and red candles and Christmas trees lights and bulbs and decorations and Yule logs and gifts wrapped in red and green paper and ribbons and bows and Christmas wreaths and holly and mistletoe and candy canes and Christmas cards and stockings, and we wear red and green sweaters and shirts and blouses and pants and skirts and scarves and earmuffs and mittens because these are the colors of rebirth.
Saturday, November 10, 2007
What I Know About Forgiveness, I Learned from Jesus
Yesterday, I read in the current issue of the AARP Bulletin a column entitled, "What I really know..." This brief article described an incident that occurred in a department store at Christmas time when a long line of children was waiting to see Santa, and a boy emerged from an elevator in a wheelchair pushed by his grandfather, and the children one by one offered to let the boy go in front of them in line. Apparently, this story has something to do with forgiveness, but what caught my eye at the end of the column was this:
YOUR TURN! Tell us what you really know about forgiveness in 400 words or less and submit it by e-mail to AARP.
This is what I submitted, coming in at 400 words.
What I know about forgiveness I learned from Jesus. He implored from the cross:
Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.
Luke 23: 34
He was referring to the people and the rulers and the soldiers, asking that they be forgiven because they were dreaming, living falsely in a world they made up, thinking they were bodies, punishing another body, not realizing that they were as God created them, children of God, their spirits created by God.
For a moment in His suffering, Jesus also forgot His heritage as God’s Son. That’s why He cried out:
My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Mark 15: 34
This cry was met with silence because God did not forsake him, knowing not of this world; Jesus forsook His true identity in His forgetting. This was simply a mistake, not a sin.
Yet, soon after, He remembered His true identity, saying:
Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.
Luke 23: 46
He is proclaiming that the will of God is now all He wants to follow, not His false will, not mine, but Thine.
Finally, after His resurrection, He says to His followers on the way to Emmaus that He fulfilled the prophecy by resurrecting:
Thus it is written and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day.
Luke 24: 46
True forgiveness is the recognition that you are as God created you, not as you dream yourself to be.
Today, Jesus is alive and well, giving us His unworldly masterpiece,
A Course in Miracles, dictating it over a seven-year period (1965-1972) to Helen Schucman, a psychologist at Columbia University. Believing in the reality of the body in the dream and forgetting your Source as the Son of God is simply a mistake, albeit a mistake with grave consequences, and recognizing this mistake is called forgiveness, as expressed in this passage from Jesus’ Course:
Father, I was mistaken in myself,
because I failed to realize the Source
from which I came. I have not left that Source
to enter in a body and to die.
My holiness remains a part of me,
as I am part of You. And my mistakes
about myself are dreams. I let them go
today. And I stand ready to receive
Your Word alone for what I really am.
A Course in Miracles, Lesson 228
YOUR TURN! Tell us what you really know about forgiveness in 400 words or less and submit it by e-mail to AARP.
This is what I submitted, coming in at 400 words.
What I know about forgiveness I learned from Jesus. He implored from the cross:
Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.
Luke 23: 34
He was referring to the people and the rulers and the soldiers, asking that they be forgiven because they were dreaming, living falsely in a world they made up, thinking they were bodies, punishing another body, not realizing that they were as God created them, children of God, their spirits created by God.
For a moment in His suffering, Jesus also forgot His heritage as God’s Son. That’s why He cried out:
My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Mark 15: 34
This cry was met with silence because God did not forsake him, knowing not of this world; Jesus forsook His true identity in His forgetting. This was simply a mistake, not a sin.
Yet, soon after, He remembered His true identity, saying:
Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.
Luke 23: 46
He is proclaiming that the will of God is now all He wants to follow, not His false will, not mine, but Thine.
Finally, after His resurrection, He says to His followers on the way to Emmaus that He fulfilled the prophecy by resurrecting:
Thus it is written and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day.
Luke 24: 46
True forgiveness is the recognition that you are as God created you, not as you dream yourself to be.
Today, Jesus is alive and well, giving us His unworldly masterpiece,
A Course in Miracles, dictating it over a seven-year period (1965-1972) to Helen Schucman, a psychologist at Columbia University. Believing in the reality of the body in the dream and forgetting your Source as the Son of God is simply a mistake, albeit a mistake with grave consequences, and recognizing this mistake is called forgiveness, as expressed in this passage from Jesus’ Course:
Father, I was mistaken in myself,
because I failed to realize the Source
from which I came. I have not left that Source
to enter in a body and to die.
My holiness remains a part of me,
as I am part of You. And my mistakes
about myself are dreams. I let them go
today. And I stand ready to receive
Your Word alone for what I really am.
A Course in Miracles, Lesson 228
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
When Words Spark on the Page: Catching Reflections of My True Self
My friend, Lucy, knowing that I love to read Emerson, e-mailed me a link to his address delivered to the senior class of the Harvard Divinity School on Sunday evening, July 15, 1838. Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), the kindred spirit of Teachers of A Course in Miracles, wrote essays of poetic prose that come to us from across the generations, expressing the truth of who we are, the holy Sons of God.
Before reading the address on the internet, I was curious to see if I had read it as a sophomore at Kalamazoo College in the fall of 1960, when I took an American Literature class, my first class as a recently-declared English major. Over the years through all the moves, I kept a copy of one of the texts for that class, The Selected writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson, (Modern Library Edition, 1950). This precious, dog-eared book has weathered the years, the pages browning at the edges.
Sure enough, a few paragraphs into the essay, I saw the first faint pencil under-linings made by me as a nineteen-year-old kid. I was amazed that he even read the entire essay, thirty-four paragraphs spread over seventeen pages. As I leafed through the pages, I was astonished at what he had thought significant. I could not believe that the passages that he underlined, asterisked, and circled still stood out as highly significant to me today, almost fifty years later. I only remember a young, lean athlete with a crew cut, five feet nine inches tall, 165 pounds primarily concerned with playing football, running track, his physical conditioning, and delighting in the delicious cafeteria food that was dished out generously with an “all you can eat” policy. This was two years before foreign study in France, two years before his first serious romantic relationship (ending with a broken heart), and three years before graduation.
Before I take a look at the sparks that he saw in the words and phrases and sentences of Emerson’s address, I want to outline briefly what Emerson was expressing in his address. He tips his hand in the third word of the first sentence, “refulgent.”
In this refulgent summer, it has been a luxury to draw the breath of life.
It means “shining brilliantly” from the Latin refulgere, “ to shine back, reflect.” Emerson is seeing a reflection of his own bright mind. He is seeing through the eyes of Christ, standing before the seniors who invited him to speak, experiencing the light of his true Self.
This is one way Jesus expresses it in His Course in Miracles.
The world becomes a place of joy, abundance, charity and endless giving. It is now so like to Heaven that it quickly is transformed into the light that it reflects. And so the journey which the Son of God began has ended in the light from which he came. W-p.II.249:5-7
And here is another.
In this world you can become a spotless mirror, in which the holiness of your Creator shines forth from you to all around you. You can reflect Heaven here. T-14.IX.5
And now let us enjoy what Emerson sees all around him in his magnificent first paragraph.
In this refulgent summer, it has been a luxury to draw the breath of life. The grass grows, the buds burst, the meadow is spotted with fire and gold in the tint of flowers. The air is full of birds, and sweet with the breath of the pine, the balm-of-Gilead, and the new hay. Night brings no gloom to the heart with its welcome shade. Through the transparent darkness the stars pour their almost spiritual rays. Man under them seems a young child, and his huge globe a toy. The cool night bathes the world as with a river, and prepares his eyes again for the crimson dawn. The mystery of nature was never displayed more happily. The corn and the wine have been freely dealt to all creatures, and the never-broken silence with which the old bounty goes forward, has not yielded yet one word of explanation. One is constrained to respect the perfection of this world, in which our senses converse. How wide; how rich; what invitation from every property it gives to every faculty of man! In its fruitful soils; in its navigable sea; in its mountains of metal and stone; in its forests of all woods; in its animals; in its chemical ingredients; in the powers and path of light, heat, attraction, and life, it is well worth the pith and heart of great men to subdue and enjoy it. The planters, the mechanics, the inventors, the astronomers, the builders of cities, and the captains, history delights to honor. (To read Emerson's essay in its entirety, click on the link at the end of this post).
But, and Emerson does begin his second paragraph with a “But,” because he recognizes that, although he is seeing a bright reflection of his Self, the members of his audience are most likely seeing only a projection of the self, a small speck of their mind that has no source in reality, a small part that serves as an instrument to interpret the world in which our senses converse. But when their minds open to the state of mind of the peace of God, when they experience themselves as created by God, then the mind opens. Thus, he begins his second paragraph in this way.
But when the mind opens, and reveals the laws which traverse the universe, and make things what they are, then shrinks the great world at once into a mere illustration and fable of this mind. What am I? and What is? asks the human spirit with a curiosity new-kindled, but never to be quenched.
In this opening of the mind, man can recognize this huge globe a toy, and fable of the mind, simply the result of a small part of his mind that is projecting, interpreting the world with the senses.
In the third paragraph, he goes on to amplify what he means by the mind opening, revealing the laws which traverse the universe, beginning with this sentence.
A more secret, sweet, and overpowering beauty appears to man when his heart and mind open to the sentiment of virtue.
“Sentiment” comes from the Latin, sentire, meaning “to feel.” “Virtue” comes from the Latin virtus, meaning “worth.” When a man feels his worth as the son of God, that he is truly as God created him, his instruction begins.
Then he is instructed in what is above him. He learns that his being is without bound; that, to the good, to the perfect, he is born, low as he now lies in evil and weakness. That which he venerates is still his own, though he has not realized it yet. He ought.
Even though man is on a journey lying in evil and weakness, he can, now, recognize that he is virtue, that his is light.
And so the journey which the Son of God began has ended in the light from which he came.
W-pII.249:5-7
He knows the sense of that grand word, though his analysis fails entirely to render account of it. When in innocency, or when by intellectual perception, he attains to say, — `I love the Right; Truth is beautiful within and without, forevermore. Virtue, I am thine: save me: use me: thee will I serve, day and night, in great, in small, that I may be not virtuous, but virtue;' — then is the end of the creation answered, and God is well pleased.
Within this context, this point of view, Emerson goes on to warn the seniors who are about to graduate from divinity school of two defects of traditional Christianity.
The first:
In this point of view we become very sensible of the first defect of historical Christianity. Historical Christianity has fallen into the error that corrupts all attempts to communicate religion. As it appears to us, and as it has appeared for ages, it is not the doctrine of the soul, but an exaggeration of the personal, the positive, the ritual. It has dwelt, it dwells, with noxious exaggeration about the person of Jesus. The soul knows no persons.
The second defect of the traditionary and limited way of using the mind of Christ is a consequence of the first; this, namely; that the Moral Nature, that Law of laws, whose revelations introduce greatness, — yea, God himself, into the open soul, is not explored as the fountain of the established teaching in society. Men have come to speak of the revelation as somewhat long ago given and done, as if God were dead. The injury to faith throttles the preacher; and the goodliest of institutions becomes an uncertain and inarticulate voice.
Now we can see why Emerson was objectionable to so many clergymen that the officers of the School disallowed responsibility of his address. Nearly thirty years passed before Emerson was invited again to speak at Harvard. However, Brooks Atkinson noted in his Introduction to Emerson’s Selected Writings:
Not everyone understood what he was talking about, or approved. Young people seemed to follow him more easily than their elders. A Boston attorney said Emerson’s lectures are utterly meaningless to me, but my daughters, aged 15 and 17, understand them thoroughly.”
With this context established, I can now turn to a sampling of the under-linings of my young self as he noted the particular words and phrases and sentences that caught his eye, sparking from the pages.
Here is the first.
The sentiment of virtue is a reverence and delight in the presence of certain divine laws. It perceives that this homely game of life we play, covers, under what seem foolish details, principles that astonish.
And a couple of pages later.
So much benevolence as a man hath, so much life hath he. For all things proceed out of this same spirit, which is differently named love, justice, temperance, in its different applications, just as the ocean receives different names on the several shores which it washes.
This sentence deserved a circle.
Life is comic or pitiful, as soon as the high ends of being fade out of sight, and man becomes near-sighted, and can only attend to what addresses the senses.
This passage was circled and asterisked.
Alone in all history, Jesus estimated the greatness of man. One man was true to what is in you and me. He saw that God incarnates himself in man, and evermore goes forth anew to take possession of his world. He said, in this jubilee of sublime emotion, `I am divine. Through me, God acts; through me, speaks. Would you see God, see me; or, see thee, when thou also thinkest as I now think.'
These lines drew under-linings and and circles.
The spirit only can teach. Not any profane man, not any sensual, not any liar, not any slave can teach, but only he can give, who has; he only can create, who is. The man on whom the soul descends, through whom the soul speaks, alone can teach. Courage, piety, love, wisdom, can teach; and every man can open his door to these angels, and they shall bring him the gift of tongues.
Finally, he circled God is.
It is the office of a true teacher to show us that God is, not was; that He speaketh, not spake.
As I said above, when I perused the under-linings throughout the essay, my first thought was astonishment, but my second was why be astonished? Since we are walking around in the world, but not of the world; since we are as God created us; since we are the light of the world, it is the most natural thing in the world to experience light sparking.
Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High. (Psalm 82:6)
It is inevitable that our Godliness break through, that we see sparks, that we see our light reflected, that the thin veil part between our self and our Self, that we experience the holy instant.
In the holy instant nothing happens that has not always been. Only the veil that has been drawn across reality is lifted. Nothing has changed. Yet the awareness of changelessness comes swiftly as the veil of time is pushed aside.
T-15.VI.6:1-4
In the holy instant, in which you see your Self as bright with freedom, you will remember God. For remembering Him is to remember freedom.
T-15.I.10:7,8
During the time I was writing this essay Peg, my musician friend, came up to me, eager to tell me about her recent experience. She said that the other afternoon, while listening to music in her apartment, she remembered a powerful experience she had in college while playing in the school orchestra.
When I was in college, I had an undeniable experience of God while performing with our orchestra. We were playing Shostakovich's 5th symphony. During the slow (Largo) movement, I became aware of a moment of intense focus, where everyone in the hall, performers and audience alike, was completely joined in the event. I was barely breathing. It seemed as though the performance would fall apart, and yet it felt that we were playing perfectly. I could hear every part, and the music was gorgeous! There was nothing else happening at that moment -- just the music and everyone's experience of it. At that time, I called this an experience of extreme intensity. Now, I think it's more accurate to call this a holy instant, simply a personal experience of God.
The reason she was so eager to tell me of this holy instant is because, in the same moment, she had thought of me reading Emerson, knowing that I probably had similar experiences. I looked at her in utter amazement and said to her, "Yes. I am writing about it right now!"
Again, on the one hand, I am truly amazed; on the other, this communication, this communion, is the most natural thing in the world, joining with your brother who is also in the world but not of it.
That Peg and the young guy experienced these sparks demonstrates the inevitability of recognizing our birthright.
It is certain because it is impossible.
This motto is one of the first things you see when you cross the threshold into the lobby of Endeavor Academy. It is certain that you are as God created you because it (what you have made of yourself) is impossible.
It does not surprise, nor astonish me, to remember that Kalamazoo College’s official motto is Lux esto, “Let there be light.”
Here is today’s lesson.
The Son of God is my Identity.
My Self is holy beyond all the thoughts
of holiness of which I now conceive.
Its shimmering and perfect purity
is far more brilliant than is any light
that I have ever looked upon. Its love
is limitless, with an intensity
that holds all things within it, in the calm
of quiet certainty. Its strength comes not
from burning impulses which move the world,
but from the boundless Love of God Himself.
How far beyond this world my Self must be,
and yet how near to me and close to God!
Father, You know my true Identity.
Reveal It now to me who am Your Son,
that I may waken to the truth in You,
and know that Heaven is restored to me.
W-pII.252
There is a plan.
To read Emerson's address, click here.
Before reading the address on the internet, I was curious to see if I had read it as a sophomore at Kalamazoo College in the fall of 1960, when I took an American Literature class, my first class as a recently-declared English major. Over the years through all the moves, I kept a copy of one of the texts for that class, The Selected writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson, (Modern Library Edition, 1950). This precious, dog-eared book has weathered the years, the pages browning at the edges.
Sure enough, a few paragraphs into the essay, I saw the first faint pencil under-linings made by me as a nineteen-year-old kid. I was amazed that he even read the entire essay, thirty-four paragraphs spread over seventeen pages. As I leafed through the pages, I was astonished at what he had thought significant. I could not believe that the passages that he underlined, asterisked, and circled still stood out as highly significant to me today, almost fifty years later. I only remember a young, lean athlete with a crew cut, five feet nine inches tall, 165 pounds primarily concerned with playing football, running track, his physical conditioning, and delighting in the delicious cafeteria food that was dished out generously with an “all you can eat” policy. This was two years before foreign study in France, two years before his first serious romantic relationship (ending with a broken heart), and three years before graduation.
Before I take a look at the sparks that he saw in the words and phrases and sentences of Emerson’s address, I want to outline briefly what Emerson was expressing in his address. He tips his hand in the third word of the first sentence, “refulgent.”
In this refulgent summer, it has been a luxury to draw the breath of life.
It means “shining brilliantly” from the Latin refulgere, “ to shine back, reflect.” Emerson is seeing a reflection of his own bright mind. He is seeing through the eyes of Christ, standing before the seniors who invited him to speak, experiencing the light of his true Self.
This is one way Jesus expresses it in His Course in Miracles.
The world becomes a place of joy, abundance, charity and endless giving. It is now so like to Heaven that it quickly is transformed into the light that it reflects. And so the journey which the Son of God began has ended in the light from which he came. W-p.II.249:5-7
And here is another.
In this world you can become a spotless mirror, in which the holiness of your Creator shines forth from you to all around you. You can reflect Heaven here. T-14.IX.5
And now let us enjoy what Emerson sees all around him in his magnificent first paragraph.
In this refulgent summer, it has been a luxury to draw the breath of life. The grass grows, the buds burst, the meadow is spotted with fire and gold in the tint of flowers. The air is full of birds, and sweet with the breath of the pine, the balm-of-Gilead, and the new hay. Night brings no gloom to the heart with its welcome shade. Through the transparent darkness the stars pour their almost spiritual rays. Man under them seems a young child, and his huge globe a toy. The cool night bathes the world as with a river, and prepares his eyes again for the crimson dawn. The mystery of nature was never displayed more happily. The corn and the wine have been freely dealt to all creatures, and the never-broken silence with which the old bounty goes forward, has not yielded yet one word of explanation. One is constrained to respect the perfection of this world, in which our senses converse. How wide; how rich; what invitation from every property it gives to every faculty of man! In its fruitful soils; in its navigable sea; in its mountains of metal and stone; in its forests of all woods; in its animals; in its chemical ingredients; in the powers and path of light, heat, attraction, and life, it is well worth the pith and heart of great men to subdue and enjoy it. The planters, the mechanics, the inventors, the astronomers, the builders of cities, and the captains, history delights to honor. (To read Emerson's essay in its entirety, click on the link at the end of this post).
But, and Emerson does begin his second paragraph with a “But,” because he recognizes that, although he is seeing a bright reflection of his Self, the members of his audience are most likely seeing only a projection of the self, a small speck of their mind that has no source in reality, a small part that serves as an instrument to interpret the world in which our senses converse. But when their minds open to the state of mind of the peace of God, when they experience themselves as created by God, then the mind opens. Thus, he begins his second paragraph in this way.
But when the mind opens, and reveals the laws which traverse the universe, and make things what they are, then shrinks the great world at once into a mere illustration and fable of this mind. What am I? and What is? asks the human spirit with a curiosity new-kindled, but never to be quenched.
In this opening of the mind, man can recognize this huge globe a toy, and fable of the mind, simply the result of a small part of his mind that is projecting, interpreting the world with the senses.
In the third paragraph, he goes on to amplify what he means by the mind opening, revealing the laws which traverse the universe, beginning with this sentence.
A more secret, sweet, and overpowering beauty appears to man when his heart and mind open to the sentiment of virtue.
“Sentiment” comes from the Latin, sentire, meaning “to feel.” “Virtue” comes from the Latin virtus, meaning “worth.” When a man feels his worth as the son of God, that he is truly as God created him, his instruction begins.
Then he is instructed in what is above him. He learns that his being is without bound; that, to the good, to the perfect, he is born, low as he now lies in evil and weakness. That which he venerates is still his own, though he has not realized it yet. He ought.
Even though man is on a journey lying in evil and weakness, he can, now, recognize that he is virtue, that his is light.
And so the journey which the Son of God began has ended in the light from which he came.
W-pII.249:5-7
He knows the sense of that grand word, though his analysis fails entirely to render account of it. When in innocency, or when by intellectual perception, he attains to say, — `I love the Right; Truth is beautiful within and without, forevermore. Virtue, I am thine: save me: use me: thee will I serve, day and night, in great, in small, that I may be not virtuous, but virtue;' — then is the end of the creation answered, and God is well pleased.
Within this context, this point of view, Emerson goes on to warn the seniors who are about to graduate from divinity school of two defects of traditional Christianity.
The first:
In this point of view we become very sensible of the first defect of historical Christianity. Historical Christianity has fallen into the error that corrupts all attempts to communicate religion. As it appears to us, and as it has appeared for ages, it is not the doctrine of the soul, but an exaggeration of the personal, the positive, the ritual. It has dwelt, it dwells, with noxious exaggeration about the person of Jesus. The soul knows no persons.
The second defect of the traditionary and limited way of using the mind of Christ is a consequence of the first; this, namely; that the Moral Nature, that Law of laws, whose revelations introduce greatness, — yea, God himself, into the open soul, is not explored as the fountain of the established teaching in society. Men have come to speak of the revelation as somewhat long ago given and done, as if God were dead. The injury to faith throttles the preacher; and the goodliest of institutions becomes an uncertain and inarticulate voice.
Now we can see why Emerson was objectionable to so many clergymen that the officers of the School disallowed responsibility of his address. Nearly thirty years passed before Emerson was invited again to speak at Harvard. However, Brooks Atkinson noted in his Introduction to Emerson’s Selected Writings:
Not everyone understood what he was talking about, or approved. Young people seemed to follow him more easily than their elders. A Boston attorney said Emerson’s lectures are utterly meaningless to me, but my daughters, aged 15 and 17, understand them thoroughly.”
With this context established, I can now turn to a sampling of the under-linings of my young self as he noted the particular words and phrases and sentences that caught his eye, sparking from the pages.
Here is the first.
The sentiment of virtue is a reverence and delight in the presence of certain divine laws. It perceives that this homely game of life we play, covers, under what seem foolish details, principles that astonish.
And a couple of pages later.
So much benevolence as a man hath, so much life hath he. For all things proceed out of this same spirit, which is differently named love, justice, temperance, in its different applications, just as the ocean receives different names on the several shores which it washes.
This sentence deserved a circle.
Life is comic or pitiful, as soon as the high ends of being fade out of sight, and man becomes near-sighted, and can only attend to what addresses the senses.
This passage was circled and asterisked.
Alone in all history, Jesus estimated the greatness of man. One man was true to what is in you and me. He saw that God incarnates himself in man, and evermore goes forth anew to take possession of his world. He said, in this jubilee of sublime emotion, `I am divine. Through me, God acts; through me, speaks. Would you see God, see me; or, see thee, when thou also thinkest as I now think.'
These lines drew under-linings and and circles.
The spirit only can teach. Not any profane man, not any sensual, not any liar, not any slave can teach, but only he can give, who has; he only can create, who is. The man on whom the soul descends, through whom the soul speaks, alone can teach. Courage, piety, love, wisdom, can teach; and every man can open his door to these angels, and they shall bring him the gift of tongues.
Finally, he circled God is.
It is the office of a true teacher to show us that God is, not was; that He speaketh, not spake.
As I said above, when I perused the under-linings throughout the essay, my first thought was astonishment, but my second was why be astonished? Since we are walking around in the world, but not of the world; since we are as God created us; since we are the light of the world, it is the most natural thing in the world to experience light sparking.
Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High. (Psalm 82:6)
It is inevitable that our Godliness break through, that we see sparks, that we see our light reflected, that the thin veil part between our self and our Self, that we experience the holy instant.
In the holy instant nothing happens that has not always been. Only the veil that has been drawn across reality is lifted. Nothing has changed. Yet the awareness of changelessness comes swiftly as the veil of time is pushed aside.
T-15.VI.6:1-4
In the holy instant, in which you see your Self as bright with freedom, you will remember God. For remembering Him is to remember freedom.
T-15.I.10:7,8
During the time I was writing this essay Peg, my musician friend, came up to me, eager to tell me about her recent experience. She said that the other afternoon, while listening to music in her apartment, she remembered a powerful experience she had in college while playing in the school orchestra.
When I was in college, I had an undeniable experience of God while performing with our orchestra. We were playing Shostakovich's 5th symphony. During the slow (Largo) movement, I became aware of a moment of intense focus, where everyone in the hall, performers and audience alike, was completely joined in the event. I was barely breathing. It seemed as though the performance would fall apart, and yet it felt that we were playing perfectly. I could hear every part, and the music was gorgeous! There was nothing else happening at that moment -- just the music and everyone's experience of it. At that time, I called this an experience of extreme intensity. Now, I think it's more accurate to call this a holy instant, simply a personal experience of God.
The reason she was so eager to tell me of this holy instant is because, in the same moment, she had thought of me reading Emerson, knowing that I probably had similar experiences. I looked at her in utter amazement and said to her, "Yes. I am writing about it right now!"
Again, on the one hand, I am truly amazed; on the other, this communication, this communion, is the most natural thing in the world, joining with your brother who is also in the world but not of it.
That Peg and the young guy experienced these sparks demonstrates the inevitability of recognizing our birthright.
It is certain because it is impossible.
This motto is one of the first things you see when you cross the threshold into the lobby of Endeavor Academy. It is certain that you are as God created you because it (what you have made of yourself) is impossible.
It does not surprise, nor astonish me, to remember that Kalamazoo College’s official motto is Lux esto, “Let there be light.”
Here is today’s lesson.
The Son of God is my Identity.
My Self is holy beyond all the thoughts
of holiness of which I now conceive.
Its shimmering and perfect purity
is far more brilliant than is any light
that I have ever looked upon. Its love
is limitless, with an intensity
that holds all things within it, in the calm
of quiet certainty. Its strength comes not
from burning impulses which move the world,
but from the boundless Love of God Himself.
How far beyond this world my Self must be,
and yet how near to me and close to God!
Father, You know my true Identity.
Reveal It now to me who am Your Son,
that I may waken to the truth in You,
and know that Heaven is restored to me.
W-pII.252
There is a plan.
To read Emerson's address, click here.
Monday, August 20, 2007
A Sleeping Dream and Waking Up
Last night I had this remarkable dream.
I am at some sort of a conference, and then we are leaving. I am riding in a car with Ramona and Monty, Monty’s driving. Suddenly, he drives off the road, I mean really off the road, and we are in the air looking down at the ground a couple of miles away. Somehow we have become separated from the car and we are slowly floating to the earth.
The thing is there is absolutely no fear, no apprehension, we are just falling to the end of this particular existence.
I did not experience the impact of hitting the ground; the next thing is that I am walking around looking for Monty and Ramona, and I run into Ramona and we are so happy to see each other, and she says, “Isn’t that amazing, there are no regrets.” Then we run into Monty, happily embracing.
Then I look around and see other people in the same situation, and there is a sense that we are gathering for whatever is next, and there is only joy.
I am writing this the morning after the dream. After reading today’s lesson, Now will I seek and find the peace of God, (Lesson 230) I decide to open the Text at random and read a section. I opened to The Temple of the Holy Spirit. (T-20.VI) “At random”. . . highly unlikely. These sentences, in particular, caught my attention, still basking in the memory of the dream.
Then lay aside the body and quietly transcend it, rising to welcome what you really want. And from His holy temple, look you not back on what you have awakened from. For no illusions can attract the mind that has transcended them, and left them far behind. (9:5-7)
Ramona’s comment, “Isn’t that amazing, there are no regrets” is echoed in this phrase, look you not back on what you have awakened from.
The fact that we are walking around in bodies at the end of the dream reminds me that we are in the world but not of the world. At every moment in this world, now, we have an opportunity to remember the truth of who we are, the holy Sons of God, even though we are tempted to believe that the body is real. The moment of remembering is the holy instant, and in this moment we are free to look for each other with the eyes of Christ and see in our brother’s face the face of Christ.
You who are learning this may still be fearful, but you are not immobilized. The holy instant is of greater value now to you than its unholy seeming counterpart, and you have learned you really want but one. This is no time for sadness. Perhaps confusion, but hardly discouragement. Perhaps you fear your brother a little yet; perhaps a shadow of the fear of God remains with you. Yet what is that to those who have been given one true relationship beyond the body? Can they be long held back from looking on the face of Christ? And can they long withhold the memory of their relationship with their Father from themselves, and keep remembrance of his love apart from their awareness? (T-20.VI.12)
Finally, the dream is especially powerful because of the irony that it is a fall into eternity, unlike Adam’s fall to earth, as described in elementary school primers,
“In Adam’s fall,
we sinned all.”
. . .Then I look around and see other people in the same situation, and there is a sense that we are gathering for whatever is next, and there is only joy.
The song of rejoicing is the call
to all the world that freedom is returned,
that time is almost over, and God’s Son
has but an instant more to wait until
his Father is remembered, dreams are done,
and only Heaven now exists at all.
W-p11.2. What is Salvation? 5:2
I am at some sort of a conference, and then we are leaving. I am riding in a car with Ramona and Monty, Monty’s driving. Suddenly, he drives off the road, I mean really off the road, and we are in the air looking down at the ground a couple of miles away. Somehow we have become separated from the car and we are slowly floating to the earth.
The thing is there is absolutely no fear, no apprehension, we are just falling to the end of this particular existence.
I did not experience the impact of hitting the ground; the next thing is that I am walking around looking for Monty and Ramona, and I run into Ramona and we are so happy to see each other, and she says, “Isn’t that amazing, there are no regrets.” Then we run into Monty, happily embracing.
Then I look around and see other people in the same situation, and there is a sense that we are gathering for whatever is next, and there is only joy.
I am writing this the morning after the dream. After reading today’s lesson, Now will I seek and find the peace of God, (Lesson 230) I decide to open the Text at random and read a section. I opened to The Temple of the Holy Spirit. (T-20.VI) “At random”. . . highly unlikely. These sentences, in particular, caught my attention, still basking in the memory of the dream.
Then lay aside the body and quietly transcend it, rising to welcome what you really want. And from His holy temple, look you not back on what you have awakened from. For no illusions can attract the mind that has transcended them, and left them far behind. (9:5-7)
Ramona’s comment, “Isn’t that amazing, there are no regrets” is echoed in this phrase, look you not back on what you have awakened from.
The fact that we are walking around in bodies at the end of the dream reminds me that we are in the world but not of the world. At every moment in this world, now, we have an opportunity to remember the truth of who we are, the holy Sons of God, even though we are tempted to believe that the body is real. The moment of remembering is the holy instant, and in this moment we are free to look for each other with the eyes of Christ and see in our brother’s face the face of Christ.
You who are learning this may still be fearful, but you are not immobilized. The holy instant is of greater value now to you than its unholy seeming counterpart, and you have learned you really want but one. This is no time for sadness. Perhaps confusion, but hardly discouragement. Perhaps you fear your brother a little yet; perhaps a shadow of the fear of God remains with you. Yet what is that to those who have been given one true relationship beyond the body? Can they be long held back from looking on the face of Christ? And can they long withhold the memory of their relationship with their Father from themselves, and keep remembrance of his love apart from their awareness? (T-20.VI.12)
Finally, the dream is especially powerful because of the irony that it is a fall into eternity, unlike Adam’s fall to earth, as described in elementary school primers,
“In Adam’s fall,
we sinned all.”
. . .Then I look around and see other people in the same situation, and there is a sense that we are gathering for whatever is next, and there is only joy.
The song of rejoicing is the call
to all the world that freedom is returned,
that time is almost over, and God’s Son
has but an instant more to wait until
his Father is remembered, dreams are done,
and only Heaven now exists at all.
W-p11.2. What is Salvation? 5:2
Friday, July 13, 2007
If Your Brothers Ask You For Something "Outrageous," Do IT.
The other day I came across this very puzzling opening sentence of a paragraph in Chapter 12, Section III, The Investment in Reality in Jesus’ Course in Miracles.
Recognize what does not matter, and if your brothers ask you for something "outrageous," do it because it does not matter. T-12.111.4:1
I find this sentence puzzling because, certainly, my brothers often do ask for what, at the moment, seems outrageous, meaning “to exceed the bounds of what is reasonable, or expected.” So, according to this sentence, in the face of these unreasonable requests, I am supposed to be just a “patsy” and say “Yes” no matter what? I should just walk around being passive, a victim of their whims? My refusal would be somehow wrong? And if it does not matter, why do it in the first place?
(Dear Reader, I suggest that you bring to mind the most recent "outrageous" brother request).
I kept re-reading the paragraph and slowly began to catch a glimpse of Jesus’ teaching.
Refuse, and your opposition establishes that it does matter to you. 4:2
There it is. Understanding the sentence depends on the point of reference for the second “it,” it does not matter. It does not matter because your brother is in the wrong state of mind. And, the point is, if it does matter to you, then you, too, are in the wrong state of mind. This “it” refers to the false world projected by the split mind. This split mind, having no source in reality, projects a world of fear; this is the illusion, the dream, the world made up by an ego that is a substitute for the Kingdom of Heaven.
So, if I automatically refuse, it means that for a split-second I, too, have identified with “it,” and because I am not in my right mind, I am in lack. That is why Jesus begins this section with this paragraph, establishing a context for what is to follow.
I once asked you to sell all you have and give to the poor and follow me. This is what I meant: If you have no investment in anything in this world, you can teach the poor where their treasure is. The poor are merely those who have invested wrongly, and they are poor indeed! Because they are in need it is given you to help them, since you are among them. Consider how perfectly your lesson would be learned if you were unwilling to share their poverty. For poverty is lack, and there is but one lack since there is but one need. T-12.111.1
There. If my response to my brother’s request is an automatic outrage, then I have impoverished myself, and therefore, reinforced his poverty. Now, back to the third sentence of the paragraph I began with.
It is only you, therefore, who have made the request outrageous, and every request of a brother is for you. Why would you insist in denying him? For to do so is to deny yourself and impoverish both. 4:3-5
Now, for a moment I remember, and it’s always a matter of remembering and forgetting, that it is all going on in my mind, and it all depends on what state of mind I am in. If I am experiencing my split mind, I cannot join with my brother, and I see him as impoverished. If, however, I am in my whole mind, the state of mind of the peace of God, this is salvation for both of us, and I will automatically offer to him this gift of salvation.
Poverty is of the ego, and never of God. No “outrageous” requests can be made of one who recognizes what is valuable and wants to accept nothing else. 4:7,8
Let’s look at the complete sentence, again:
Recognize what does not matter, and if your brothers ask you for something “outrageous,” do it because it does not matter.
I realize that the once puzzling sentence comes together now when I understand that the entire sentence pivots on the first “it,” do IT because it does not matter. IT stands for, Herein lies the peace of God, and because of that recognition, I know that:
Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists. T-Intro.2:2-4
And
“Will ye first the Kingdom of Heaven,” and you have said, “I know what I am and I accept my own inheritance.” T-3.V1.11:8
I am reminded of something I overheard years ago in a mall when two women walked by and one said to the other, “Well, it’s a case of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.” When I am in my right mind, “it” does not matter because I know the truth of what I am, the Holy Son of God. The thing to watch for is, even if I am in my right mind, how quickly, automatically, habitually, unconsciously I can be drawn into split mind. Vigilance is all. Recognition. Recognize what does not matter. This is doing IT.
IT is salvation, meaning to step back for a moment, ask for help, and experience the truth of what I am, and what my brother is, the holy Sons of God. It also helps me to remember that he is also asking for salvation.
He is asking for salvation, as you are. Salvation is for the mind, and it is attained through peace. This is the only thing that can be saved and the only way to save it. 4:6, 5:1,2
IT is the heart of A Course in Miracles, and IT is expressed in a variety of ways, as Atonement, Self, Identity, the Holy Instant, and Forgiveness.
Atonement remedies the strange idea
that it is possible to doubt yourself,
and be unsure of what you really are.
This is the depth of madness. Yet it is
the universal question of the world.
What does this mean except the world is mad?
Why share its madness in the sad belief
that what is universal here is true?
Nothing the world believes is true.
It is a place whose purpose is to be a home
where those who claim they do not know themselves
can come to question what it is they are.
And they will come again until the time
Atonement is accepted, and they learn
it is impossible to doubt yourself,
and not to be aware of what you are.
W-p1.139.6,7
If you will recognize that all the attack you perceive is in your own mind and nowhere else, you will at last have placed its source, and where it begins it must end. For in this same place also lies salvation. The altar of God where Christ abideth is there. You have defiled the altar, but not the world. Yet Christ has placed the Atonement on the altar for you. Bring your perceptions of the world to this altar, for it is the altar to truth. There you will see your vision changed, and there you will learn to see truly. From this place, where God and his Son dwell in peace and where you are welcome, you will look out in peace and behold the world truly. Yet to find the place, you must relinquish your investment in the world as you project it, allowing the Holy Spirit to extend the real world to you from the altar of God. T-12.111.10
Once I shift into a state of Oneness, I experience my Self and offer IT to my brother, and in our joining is the experience of what is Real.
My holy brother, think of this awhile:
The world you see does nothing. It has no
effects at all. It merely represents
your thoughts. And it will change entirely
as you elect to change your mind, and choose
the joy of God as what you really want.
Your Self is radiant in this holy joy,
unchanged, unchanging and unchangeable,
forever and forever. And would you
deny a little corner of your mind
its own inheritance, and keep it as
a hospital for pain; a sickly place
where living things must come at last to die?
And so again we make the only choice
that ever can be made; we choose between
illusions and the truth, or pain and joy,
or hell and Heaven. Let our gratitude
unto our Teacher fill our hearts, as we
are free to choose our joy instead of pain,
our holiness in place of sin, the peace
of God instead of conflict, and the light
of Heaven for the darkness of the world.
W-pI.190.6,11
And here IT is expressed as Identity.
Deny your own Identity, and you
will not escape the madness which induced
this weird, unnatural and ghostly thought
that mocks creation and that laughs at God.
Deny your own Identity, and you
assail the universe alone, without
a friend, a tiny particle of dust
against the legions of your enemies.
Deny your own Identity, and look
on evil, sin and death, and watch despair
snatch from your fingers every scrap of hope,
leaving you nothing but the wish to die.
Yet what is it except a game you play
in which Identity can be denied?
You are as God created you. All else
but this one thing is folly to believe.
In this one thought is everyone set free.
In this one truth are all illusions gone.
In this one fact is sinlessness proclaimed
to be forever part of everything,
the central core of its existence and
its guarantee of immortality.
W-pI.191.3,4
You experience IT by an action of your mind, shifting from illusion to truth, experiencing the Holy Instant.
Then is each instant which was slave to time
transformed into a holy instant, when
the light that was kept hidden in God's Son
is freed to bless the world. Now is he free,
and all his glory shines upon a world
made free with him, to share his holiness.
W-pI.194.5:3
Finally, and firstly and always, what is required is Forgiveness.
Be merciful today. The Son of God
deserves your mercy. It is he who asks
that you accept the way to freedom now.
Deny him not. His Father's Love for him
belongs to you. Your function here on earth
is only to forgive him, that you may
accept him back as your Identity.
He is as God created him. And you
are what he is. Forgive him now his sins,
and you will see that you are one with him.
W-pI.192.10
Forgive, and you will see this differently.
These are words which give
you power over all events that seem
to have been given power over you.
You see them rightly when you hold these words
in full awareness, and do not forget
these words apply to everything you see
or any brother looks upon amiss.
W-pI.193.5:1, 6:3,4
Even though this is reasonable and clear in my mind, in the next moment, I will probably forget, and strike out again when I am given an opportunity by my brother to remember. In fact, while writing this essay for the past few days, I have often found myself outraged by brothers' requests, forgetting to see them as opportunities. But that’s all right. Even 3 out of 10 would not be a bad average, .300 is a solid average for a Big League baseball player. In perspective, Ted Williams, the Splendid Splinter, averaged .406 in 1941, and that record has lasted for 66 years.
So, here’s the pep talk.
Take it easy on yourself.
You have choice.
Step up to home plate.
Take your stance.
Ask for help.
Keep your eye on the ball.
Swing freely.
Remember where you are already standing,
Home.
Recognize what does not matter, and if your brothers ask you for something "outrageous," do it because it does not matter. T-12.111.4:1
I find this sentence puzzling because, certainly, my brothers often do ask for what, at the moment, seems outrageous, meaning “to exceed the bounds of what is reasonable, or expected.” So, according to this sentence, in the face of these unreasonable requests, I am supposed to be just a “patsy” and say “Yes” no matter what? I should just walk around being passive, a victim of their whims? My refusal would be somehow wrong? And if it does not matter, why do it in the first place?
(Dear Reader, I suggest that you bring to mind the most recent "outrageous" brother request).
I kept re-reading the paragraph and slowly began to catch a glimpse of Jesus’ teaching.
Refuse, and your opposition establishes that it does matter to you. 4:2
There it is. Understanding the sentence depends on the point of reference for the second “it,” it does not matter. It does not matter because your brother is in the wrong state of mind. And, the point is, if it does matter to you, then you, too, are in the wrong state of mind. This “it” refers to the false world projected by the split mind. This split mind, having no source in reality, projects a world of fear; this is the illusion, the dream, the world made up by an ego that is a substitute for the Kingdom of Heaven.
So, if I automatically refuse, it means that for a split-second I, too, have identified with “it,” and because I am not in my right mind, I am in lack. That is why Jesus begins this section with this paragraph, establishing a context for what is to follow.
I once asked you to sell all you have and give to the poor and follow me. This is what I meant: If you have no investment in anything in this world, you can teach the poor where their treasure is. The poor are merely those who have invested wrongly, and they are poor indeed! Because they are in need it is given you to help them, since you are among them. Consider how perfectly your lesson would be learned if you were unwilling to share their poverty. For poverty is lack, and there is but one lack since there is but one need. T-12.111.1
There. If my response to my brother’s request is an automatic outrage, then I have impoverished myself, and therefore, reinforced his poverty. Now, back to the third sentence of the paragraph I began with.
It is only you, therefore, who have made the request outrageous, and every request of a brother is for you. Why would you insist in denying him? For to do so is to deny yourself and impoverish both. 4:3-5
Now, for a moment I remember, and it’s always a matter of remembering and forgetting, that it is all going on in my mind, and it all depends on what state of mind I am in. If I am experiencing my split mind, I cannot join with my brother, and I see him as impoverished. If, however, I am in my whole mind, the state of mind of the peace of God, this is salvation for both of us, and I will automatically offer to him this gift of salvation.
Poverty is of the ego, and never of God. No “outrageous” requests can be made of one who recognizes what is valuable and wants to accept nothing else. 4:7,8
Let’s look at the complete sentence, again:
Recognize what does not matter, and if your brothers ask you for something “outrageous,” do it because it does not matter.
I realize that the once puzzling sentence comes together now when I understand that the entire sentence pivots on the first “it,” do IT because it does not matter. IT stands for, Herein lies the peace of God, and because of that recognition, I know that:
Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists. T-Intro.2:2-4
And
“Will ye first the Kingdom of Heaven,” and you have said, “I know what I am and I accept my own inheritance.” T-3.V1.11:8
I am reminded of something I overheard years ago in a mall when two women walked by and one said to the other, “Well, it’s a case of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.” When I am in my right mind, “it” does not matter because I know the truth of what I am, the Holy Son of God. The thing to watch for is, even if I am in my right mind, how quickly, automatically, habitually, unconsciously I can be drawn into split mind. Vigilance is all. Recognition. Recognize what does not matter. This is doing IT.
IT is salvation, meaning to step back for a moment, ask for help, and experience the truth of what I am, and what my brother is, the holy Sons of God. It also helps me to remember that he is also asking for salvation.
He is asking for salvation, as you are. Salvation is for the mind, and it is attained through peace. This is the only thing that can be saved and the only way to save it. 4:6, 5:1,2
IT is the heart of A Course in Miracles, and IT is expressed in a variety of ways, as Atonement, Self, Identity, the Holy Instant, and Forgiveness.
Atonement remedies the strange idea
that it is possible to doubt yourself,
and be unsure of what you really are.
This is the depth of madness. Yet it is
the universal question of the world.
What does this mean except the world is mad?
Why share its madness in the sad belief
that what is universal here is true?
Nothing the world believes is true.
It is a place whose purpose is to be a home
where those who claim they do not know themselves
can come to question what it is they are.
And they will come again until the time
Atonement is accepted, and they learn
it is impossible to doubt yourself,
and not to be aware of what you are.
W-p1.139.6,7
If you will recognize that all the attack you perceive is in your own mind and nowhere else, you will at last have placed its source, and where it begins it must end. For in this same place also lies salvation. The altar of God where Christ abideth is there. You have defiled the altar, but not the world. Yet Christ has placed the Atonement on the altar for you. Bring your perceptions of the world to this altar, for it is the altar to truth. There you will see your vision changed, and there you will learn to see truly. From this place, where God and his Son dwell in peace and where you are welcome, you will look out in peace and behold the world truly. Yet to find the place, you must relinquish your investment in the world as you project it, allowing the Holy Spirit to extend the real world to you from the altar of God. T-12.111.10
Once I shift into a state of Oneness, I experience my Self and offer IT to my brother, and in our joining is the experience of what is Real.
My holy brother, think of this awhile:
The world you see does nothing. It has no
effects at all. It merely represents
your thoughts. And it will change entirely
as you elect to change your mind, and choose
the joy of God as what you really want.
Your Self is radiant in this holy joy,
unchanged, unchanging and unchangeable,
forever and forever. And would you
deny a little corner of your mind
its own inheritance, and keep it as
a hospital for pain; a sickly place
where living things must come at last to die?
And so again we make the only choice
that ever can be made; we choose between
illusions and the truth, or pain and joy,
or hell and Heaven. Let our gratitude
unto our Teacher fill our hearts, as we
are free to choose our joy instead of pain,
our holiness in place of sin, the peace
of God instead of conflict, and the light
of Heaven for the darkness of the world.
W-pI.190.6,11
And here IT is expressed as Identity.
Deny your own Identity, and you
will not escape the madness which induced
this weird, unnatural and ghostly thought
that mocks creation and that laughs at God.
Deny your own Identity, and you
assail the universe alone, without
a friend, a tiny particle of dust
against the legions of your enemies.
Deny your own Identity, and look
on evil, sin and death, and watch despair
snatch from your fingers every scrap of hope,
leaving you nothing but the wish to die.
Yet what is it except a game you play
in which Identity can be denied?
You are as God created you. All else
but this one thing is folly to believe.
In this one thought is everyone set free.
In this one truth are all illusions gone.
In this one fact is sinlessness proclaimed
to be forever part of everything,
the central core of its existence and
its guarantee of immortality.
W-pI.191.3,4
You experience IT by an action of your mind, shifting from illusion to truth, experiencing the Holy Instant.
Then is each instant which was slave to time
transformed into a holy instant, when
the light that was kept hidden in God's Son
is freed to bless the world. Now is he free,
and all his glory shines upon a world
made free with him, to share his holiness.
W-pI.194.5:3
Finally, and firstly and always, what is required is Forgiveness.
Be merciful today. The Son of God
deserves your mercy. It is he who asks
that you accept the way to freedom now.
Deny him not. His Father's Love for him
belongs to you. Your function here on earth
is only to forgive him, that you may
accept him back as your Identity.
He is as God created him. And you
are what he is. Forgive him now his sins,
and you will see that you are one with him.
W-pI.192.10
Forgive, and you will see this differently.
These are words which give
you power over all events that seem
to have been given power over you.
You see them rightly when you hold these words
in full awareness, and do not forget
these words apply to everything you see
or any brother looks upon amiss.
W-pI.193.5:1, 6:3,4
Even though this is reasonable and clear in my mind, in the next moment, I will probably forget, and strike out again when I am given an opportunity by my brother to remember. In fact, while writing this essay for the past few days, I have often found myself outraged by brothers' requests, forgetting to see them as opportunities. But that’s all right. Even 3 out of 10 would not be a bad average, .300 is a solid average for a Big League baseball player. In perspective, Ted Williams, the Splendid Splinter, averaged .406 in 1941, and that record has lasted for 66 years.
So, here’s the pep talk.
Take it easy on yourself.
You have choice.
Step up to home plate.
Take your stance.
Ask for help.
Keep your eye on the ball.
Swing freely.
Remember where you are already standing,
Home.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
It's Your Decision: Either Old Experiences, Beliefs, Perceptions, or New Experiences, Beliefs, Perceptions
If you were completely honest with yourself, you would have to admit that no matter how much you have tried to put together a life, there are times when you say to yourself, “There’s something seriously wrong here, and there must be a better way.”
Fortunately for you, for all of us, not only is there a better way, but this way has been mapped out in a how-to-manual that appeared on this planet in 1975, A Course in Miracles. This unworldly masterpiece was scribed by Helen Schucman who heard an “internal voice,” Jesus’ voice, say to her on October 21, 1965, “This is a course in miracles, take notes.” For the next seven years, she dutifully transcribed the Text, Workbook, and Manual for Teachers. (Kenneth Wapnick, Absence from Felicity: The Story of Helen Schucman and Her Scribing of A Course in Miracles, Foundation for A Course in Miracles, 1991, p. 199.)
You are in the fix you’re in because you faithfully followed the instructions of an unwritten manual, folklore passed down through the generations, teaching you that seeing is believing. You eagerly learned early on to trust as real what you see, hear, taste, smell and touch. Whatever was not sensed was unreal. This way of seeing seems completely natural.
Let’s test out this belief by being real specific. Let’s take a look at what is around us. I’ll go first.
I am sitting on my couch looking out of my window, gazing at the landscape bathed in the sunlight of a beautiful day in June. I close my eyes and make the decision that when I open them, I want to see only the objects before me.
I see the cylindrical, mesh bird feeder containing black sunflower seeds. A Cardinal alights and pecks at the seeds. I am reminded of an incident when I was 6 or 7, and a friend and I were shooting at birds with BB guns. We wounded a Blue Jay, and we were chasing it through the neighborhood, when an old lady came running out of her house, chastising us for killing birds, and we said it was a Blue Jay, and she immediately let us off the hook because that was OK by her, Blue Jays menaced other birds.
And other associations immediately flooded in. At that time, my mother, father, sister and I lived in a little village, Moorepark, Michigan—my parents owned a general store, and we lived in the back in one room separated from the store by a curtain; no running water, only well water from a pump, an outhouse in the back; we went to a one-room schoolhouse, grades K-8, one teacher, Mrs. Steininger; across the street was a gunsmith, Bergie Hughey, who also ran a one-pump gas station; my friend, Rudy, and I played in the fields and swamps all day, exploring and hunting frogs with bows and arrows.
Whew. Now, I am back from that trip down memory lane, and I am going to try it again. This time, I will close my eyes, and when I open them, I will make the decision to look at only the space between objects, wanting to see, in effect, only the air.
Now I am looking with soft eyes, in fact, I am not seeing as much as experiencing. Gazing in this manner, I find that my mind is peaceful, still, unoccupied, and tranquil. I am scanning what is before me, but I am not naming objects, and since I am not naming things, I am not flooded with associations. I am simply content; my mind is empty. When I do look at something, like a bird at the feeder, I experience only love. I continue gazing with soft eyes, becoming increasingly mellow, content, tranquil, loving, peaceful, unified and free. A tree branch, laden with green leaves, lifts and falls in the soft breeze, the leaves shimmering, the tops green and the undersides flashing gold.
While writing the draft of this essay, I did the exercises and then wrote about my experience, and at this point, I went so far out, losing all sense of being a body, fading into a state of consciousness of oneness, of light, so that what was inside my mind and what was outside were blended together. At this point, I just decided to stay there, and I put down my pen for the day.
Now I am back, and this passage comes to mind.Beyond this world there is a world I want.
I choose to see that world instead of this,
for here is nothing that I really want.
Then close your eyes upon the world you see,
and in the silent darkness watch the lights
that are not of this world light one by one,
until where one begins another ends
loses all meaning as they blend in one.
W-p1.129.7:3-5
This is seeing through the eyes of Christ.
And so today, this instant, now, we come
to look upon what is forever there;
not in our sight, but in the eyes of Christ.
W-p1.164.1:2,3
The world fades easily away before
His sight. Its sounds grow dim.
W-p1.164.2:1
There is a silence into which the world
can not intrude. There is an ancient peace
you carry in your heart and have not lost.
W-p1164.4:1,2
Now, Dear Reader, you try it.
First, close your eyes and decide when you open them that you will want to see only objects, name them, and let your mind be flooded with associations.
* * *
Thank you.
Now, close your eyes and decide when you open them that you will look only at the space between objects, wanting to see only the air, if you will, allowing your mind to be free.
* * *
Thank you.
If you managed to let it all go, you may find it difficult to come back to reading this essay. Good!
Take your time.
What you may have experienced is a paradox, that seeing and naming objects now seems unreal; while looking at the air seems more Real.
A “paradox” is defined as “a situation that seems to be absurd or contradictory, but in fact may be true.” It comes from the Latin paradoxum, “contrary to opinion,” from dokein, meaning “to think.”
Here is the paradox that underliesthe making of the world. This world is not
the Will of God, and so it is not real.
W-p1.166.2:1,2
In the Course Jesus teachers you to recognize that what you unconsciously, habitually, take for granted is not so. And in this recognition is an opportunity to experience something else, that which is Real.
You do not seem to doubt the world you see. You do not really question what is shown you through the body's eyes. Nor do you ask why you believe it, even though you learneda long while since your senses do deceive.
That you believe them to the last detail
which they report is even stranger, when
you pause to recollect how frequently
they have been faulty witnesses indeed!
Why would you trust them so implicitly?
Why but because of underlying doubt,
which you would hide with show of certainty?
W-p1.151.2
All along you have been trying with underlying doubt to make the unreal, objective world, Real, thereby preventing yourself from experiencing what is Real. That is why you are in the fix you’re in, and indeed, there is another way.
Complete abstraction is the natural condition of the mind.“Abstraction” is defined as “a state in which one is deep in thought and not concentrating on the surroundings.” “Abstract” comes from the Latin abstrahere, meaning “to drag away.” Our objective world seems to be natural, but in fact, it is unnatural, and our natural condition is to be dragged away from the objective world, from our surroundings.
Complete abstraction is the natural
condition of the mind. But part of it
is now unnatural. It does not look
on everything as one. It sees instead
but fragments of the whole, for only thus
could it invent the partial world you see.
The purpose of all seeing is to show
you what you wish to see. All hearing but
brings to your mind the sounds it wants to hear.
Thus were specifics made.
W-p1.161.2,3:1
. . . what you wish to see. Remember, in your practicing you closed your eyes and instructed yourself in what you wished to see. You have the power of decision to see either the unreal, or the Real. When you choose to see the unreal, you carve it out of unity.
You live by symbols. You have made up namesfor everything you see. Each one becomes
a separate entity, identified
by its own name. By this you carve it out of unity.
W-p1.184.1:1-3
Now, everything is in place for you to begin to experience a better way. The word “experience” comes from the Latin experiri, meaning “to try out.” You just “tried out” seeing objects. This experience of seeing leads to beliefs and beliefs lead to perception. For your entire life, objects have seemed Real, leading you to trust that seeing is believing. Then, a moment ago, you practiced seeing with soft eyes. This experience could lead you to seeing something more real than objects, and this can lead you to a belief in the Real beyond the objective world.
T-11.V1.1:4,5
The good news is that you can begin, right now, to change your beliefs by having new experiences, resulting in new interpretations and new beliefs, leading to new perceptions.
Experience does teach.
This course is perfectly clear. If you do not see it clearly, it is because you are interpreting against it, and therefore do not believe it. And since belief determines perception, you do not perceive what it means and therefore do not accept it. Yet different experiences lead to different beliefs and experience does teach. I am leading you to a new kind of experience that you will become less and less willing to deny. Learning of Christ is easy, for to perceive with him involves no strain at all. His perceptions are your natural awareness, and it is only the distortions you introduce that tire you. Let the Christ in you interpret for you, and do not try to limit what you see by narrow little beliefs that are unworthy of God's Son. For until Christ comes into his own, the Son of God will see himself as Fatherless.
T-11.V1.3
You no longer have to tire yourself out by maneuvering in your surroundings that have no source in Reality. You can be aware of new experiences that will lead to new beliefs and new perceptions.
You can practice by looking at the space between objects.
Finally, you are always looking into a mirror, what is first “inside” is then “outside.” You see what you decide to see, as the preceding exercise demonstrated. If you decide to see old beliefs projected out, you will see in your mirror an objective world. If you decide to see through the eyes of Christ, you will see the reflection of love and peace that is your natural inheritance.
This is the way Jesus expresses it in a sonnet.
to you. And somewhere in your mind you know
that this is true. A memory of home
keeps haunting you, as if there were a place
that called you to return, although you do
not recognize the voice, nor what it is
the voice reminds you of. Yet still you feel
an alien here, from somewhere all unknown.
Nothing so definite that you could say
with certainty you are an exile here.
Just a persistent feeling, sometimes not
more than a tiny throb, at other times
hardly remembered, actively dismissed,
but surely to return to mind again.
W-p1.182.1
This is not your Home, but you can learn to experience Home here by deciding to see in a better way by looking through the eyes of Christ.
It is always your decision.
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