Only salvation can be said to cure.
“The happy dreams the Holy Spirit brings are different from the dreaming of the world, where one can merely dream he is awake.”
Lately, everything is freaking me out a little. In a good way. I have been spending all my time LISTENING, and as I listen, I receive specific instructions that tell me where to go, what to say, and what to do.
I am in Chicago right now, and having the most fantastic time. This trip is a gift from God. Everything is so easy. I am in Evanston, 10 miles north of Chicago and I did not know such a beautiful place existed in the United States. It’s gorgeous here. The house I am staying in is right on Lake Michigan!
I also realize that I am completely different from the way I was a few years ago when I would race around like a chicken with its head cut off, trying to get people to learn about A Course in Miracles. Now, I’m doing nothing, except what ACIM is asking of me … being the happy demonstration of Jesus’ message … and everything is one big miracle. Today’s lesson says “only salvation can be said to cure.”
All that is needed is for me to accept salvation, accept Atonement, accept my perfection as God created me, and realize the world is in my mind. I don’t need to chase after people, places, situations or things. I simply need to keep aligning my mind back to truth, and the rest will be taken care of.
I have had internet service on my Mac for the past 2 days, but yesterday a voice said “email yourself the Admin URL for Gorgeous for God, along with your passcode” (all my websites are bookmarked, and passcodes are automatically saved in my Mac) so I did as instructed. I cut and pasted the URL and sent it to myself at my Yahoo address.
This morning, I couldn’t get a connection on my Mac! Had I not emailed the URL to myself last night, I would have zero clue how to get into this site to write my blog this morning.
But here I am! On the house computer, reminding myself of today’s lesson. Only salvation can be said to cure. What a joyous realization to find you have a Guide with you, who can see the the whole picture and can tell you what to do!
Again, it’s freaking me out a little. In a good way.
It’s a happy occasion to listen and follow the Holy Spirit’s voice. It takes no time to do what He asks. I don’t question. I simply follow.
“Peace be to you who have been cured in God, and not in idle dreams. There is no place where holiness is not, and nowhere sin and sickness can abide. This is the thought that cures.”
THIS IS THE THOUGHT THAT CURES!
Holiness is everywhere! And sin and sickness cannot withstand the light!
“There is no place where holiness is not, and nowhere sin and sickness can abide.”
Here is today’s practice:
“Today we seek to change our minds about the source of sickness, for we seek a cure for all illusions, not another shift among them. “
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“We will not be misled today by what appears to be sick. We go beyond appearances today and reach the source of healing, from which nothing is exempt.”
Healing is in your mind!
“It is not farther from us than ourselves. It is as near to us as our own thoughts; so close it is impossible to lose. We need but seek it and it must be found.”
“So do we lay aside our amulets, our charms and medicines, our chants and bits of magic in whatever form they take. We will be still and listen for the Voice of healing, which will cure all ills as one, restoring saneness to the Son of God.”
“Today, we hear a single Voice which speaks to us of truth, where all illusions end, and peace returns to the eternal quiet home of God.”
This I love:
“Our only preparation is to let our interfering thoughts be laid aside, no separately; but all of them as one. They are the same. We have no need to make them different, and thus delay the time when we can hear our Father speak to us. We hear Him now. We come to Him today.
We hear Him now. We come to Him today.
With nothing in our hands to which we cling, with lifted hearts and listening minds we pray:
Only salvation can be said to cure.
Speak to us, Father, that we may be healed.
This is the day when healing comes to us. This is the day when separation ends, and we remember Who we really are.
I will accept Atonement for myself.
Yesterday’s lesson was about choice. The choice between choosing heaven or continuing to stay in hell.
Today’s lesson is THE END OF CHOICE.
I will accept Atonement for myself.
Today you make a decision to accept yourself as God created you.
I love this next sentence: AND WHAT IS CHOICE EXCEPT UNCERTAINTY OF WHAT WE ARE?
That’s it, in a nutshell.
Any doubt you have about yourself (or any situation) is only because you are uncertain of what you are. That’s all. Once you accept yourself as God created you, you will have no problems.
“There is no conflict that does not entail this single, simple question ‘What am I?’”
Yet who could ask this question except one who has refused to recognize himself? Only refusal to accept yourself could make the question seem (SEEM!) to be sincere.
Ha!
This lesson really speaks for itself today: Uncertainty about what you must be is a self-deception on a scale so vast, its magnitude can hardly be conceived.
**“We have a mission here. We did not come to reinforce the madness that we once believed in. Let us not forget the goal that we accepted. It is more than just our happiness alone we came to gain. What we accept as what we are proclaims what everyone must be along with us. Fail not your brothers, or you fail yourself. Look lovingly on them, that they may know that they are part of you, and you of them.”
You are perfect as God created you, and so is every living thing, along with you.
That’s the Atonement.
Acceptance of your perfection in God.
Atonement is the reparation of a wrong or injury – and what could be more injurious than the separation???? In worldly terms it is a doctrine based on Christianity and Judaism which describes how sin can be corrected by God. It is based on forgiveness.
So Atonement is correction in your own mind about the separation. God doesn’t know anything about separation or the world … all he knows is one perfect Son … you.
So you forgive yourself.
You never separated from God. You are still One with Him. The mistake has been corrected. You are whole and perfect as God created you.
Here is the end of choice.
Heaven is the decision I must make.
Yesterday I was with a friend – my sweetest, dearest, most adorable friend in the world – and she was crying her eyes out, sobbing, choking out some miserable story through her tears. I couldn’t barely hear the story through all her wailing. I was driving, she was in the passenger seat, and all I could think to do in that moment was to let her cry and talk.
There was absolutely no way to respond to her.
She’s been with A Course in Miracles for a very long time, even longer than me. She knows what to do. But sometimes … often … even when you have all the lessons … even when you hold the key in your hand … even when you know the solution to your problems … you still get lost and trapped in your own dramas.
I remember a teaching by a guy named Hector and he said “be careful you don’t land in a world where there in no Course in Miracles.”
This means if you are not vigilant, you can stray very very far away from the truth, and land yourself in a world of complete darkness. So be careful!
In Chapter 5, in the Text, it says: “The first step in the undoing is to recognize that you actively decided wrongly.”
In Chapter 3, in the Text, it says: “Questioning delusions in the first step in undoing them.”
In Chapter 23, in the Text, it says: “Brother, take not one step in the descent to hell. For, having taken one you will not recognize the rest for what they are.”
In other words … Be careful you don’t land in a world where there is no Course in Miracles.
The Course uses the word “step” 126 times. To see all 126 references, click HERE.
I said to my friend, “Okay, now breathe.”
And that was all she needed to hear. Her crying stopped. Her sob story stopped.
Then I said, “Okay, breathe again.”
And we got to Starbucks (I go there a lot!) and she was completely calm. We got inside, got our coffees, and she started asking me how I’ve been. LOL. She immediately switched gears and took the focus off of herself, and began looking outward. I told her what is going on with me lately, and you could see she instantly forgot about her own story. What a laugh! It’s a miracle what happens when you take the focus off yourself for a minute! You forget all about your problems.
So then I said: Look, it is your responsibility to STOP yourself when you are in the middle of fear. No one is going to do it for you. You have to do it. There is not going to be a miracle that’s going to come out of nowhere. You have to make a conscious decision to catch yourself and stop.
She said: I don’t know how.
And I said: I use the word STOP. Just catch yourself when your mind is in the middle of a dramatic chaotic episode, and say the word STOP. Say it out loud. STOP. And then immediately, your mind will go back into the story again, catch yourself again, and say the word STOP again. Keep catching yourself. Keep interrupting the story.
I said: the Master Teacher is not here anymore to disrupt us. You have to do it for yourself now. It’s like being in the military. You have to be firm with yourself. You can’t wait for the discipline to come miraculously. You must discipline yourself! No one is going to do it for you!
She immediately began laughing, restored back to her natural state of perfection.
And that’s today’s lesson: Heaven is a decision I must make.
Your peace of mind is NOT going to be delivered to you on a silver platter. You must choose for it. You must decide that peace and happiness is what you want.
You’re not going to wake up one morning and be free of all problems and worries. It doesn’t work like that.
You must consciously choose for your happiness.
You must consciously choose for Heaven.
You must consciously choose to stop being a victim.
You must consciously choose to stop being afraid.
No one is going to do it for you. You can come to this blog and be reminded. You can open A Course in Miracles and be reminded, but there are FIVE HUNDRED TWENTY FIVE THOUSAND SIX HUNDRED MINUTES in a year.
So you might spend 10 minutes a day at this blog or reading the Course, feeling happy, remembering the truth … but what about the other 1430 minutes in a day? What do you do then?
You – YOU! – are the one that is responsible for catching the thoughts you think and interrupt them. No one is going to do it for you.
“The conscious choice of Heaven is as sure as is the ending of the fear of hell, when it is raised from its protective shield of unawareness and brought to light.”
!!!!!!!!!!
That’s it.
Read that again.
“The conscious choice of Heaven is as sure as is the ending of the fear of hell, when it is raised from its protective shield of unawareness and brought to light.”
A Course in Miracles is about becoming CONSCIOUS. You start to see how you’ve been blindly stumbling through life, falsely thinking people are doing things to you, events happening that are separate from you … and now you are becoming conscious. You are beginning to realize that YOU ARE DOING THIS TO YOURSELF.
And the moment your realize you are harming yourself, you will simply STOP. You will interrupt your story right smack in the middle of it.
And you choose again. Choose for a different thought. Start telling yourself a new story.
You’re the light of the world. That’s a good story. I have a function God would have me fulfill. That’s a good story.
“Heaven is the decision I must make. I make it now, and will not change my mind, because it is the only thing I want.”
You have five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes in a year. How are you spending them?
Click picture to listen to the song Seasons of Love, from the movie Rent:
“When I am healed I am not healed alone.”
The reason this is true is because there is no world.
The world is just a thought, contained within your mind. There are no solid bodies. There is no past or future. Time is an illusion. The world is a holographic reflection of the thoughts you think about yourself and the world. It’s not there at all! And as you heal all thoughts of guilt, sickness, blame, attack IN YOU, the world is healed along with you.
“Sickness is a retreat from others, a shutting off of joining. It becomes a door that closes on a separate self, and keeps it isolated and alone.”
Amazing, right?
SICKNESS IS ISOLATION.
That’s it. It’s not anything more complicated.
Sickness is isolation.
If you are sick, your solution is to begin reaching out to others. That’s it. How simple. Start moving your energy.
Call someone. Write someone. Reach out. Smile at a stranger. Hold someone’s hand. Give a hug.
It could even involve something as simple as going outside more, and doing nothing more than being in a public place out in the open. You might be so terrified of people that you cannot imagine holding someone’s hand or smiling. This is a terrifying prospect for many people! Immediately they think: WHERE WILL THAT LEAD?
They think if they hug someone, they will be bound for life.
This is the fear that needs healing. This is the sickness that needs to be looked at.
You are learning to move your energy. You are learning to extend it. You are no longer arresting it within your body. You are letting it pour out through you. This is healing.
“Those who become healed become the instruments of healing. Nor does time elapse between the instant they are healed, and all the grace of healing it is given them to give.”
ASK THE INEVITABLE TO OCCUR, AND YOU WILL NEVER FAIL.
Asked to be healed. Ask to know God’s Will. Ask to see it.
Today …
“Today we ask only that truth will occupy our minds; the thoughts of healing will this day go forth from what is healed to what must yet be healed, aware that they will both occur as one.”
“We will remember, as the hour strikes, our function is to let our minds be healed, that we may carry healing to the world, exchanging curse for blessing, pain for joy, and separation for the peace of God.”
Is not a minute of the hour worth giving to the receive a gift like this?
Sickness is a defense against the truth.
Are you doing these lessons? Practicing?
At a minimum (if you come to this blog), then you should at least own a copy of A Course in Miracles and you should be reading the daily lessons every single day. You should not miss a day. THAT’S THE MINIMUM THAT IS ASKED OF YOU.
An online teacher who writes a daily blog called Gorgeous for God is probably not the most effective way to disrupt your old fear-based thought system.
But you have A Course in Miracles, and that’s all you need.
Your progress is really going to have to depend on you.
You need vigilance to stay present.
You need someone who keeps you on your toes, and who does not let you relax, and who has the ability to hold your attention in the present moment.
That’s the Holy Spirit.
You have an internal guide who is with you wherever you go … and now you have me if you need additional help.
There’s a whole list of links over there in the right sidebar, of teachers that can help you.
I had a teacher who pounded these workbook lessons into my head, every day for 7 years. He would quiz us: WHAT’S TODAY’S LESSON??? DID YOU DO IT?
Some people thought he was a little rough around the edges. They thought he should be kinder and more gentle. They thought a spiritual teacher/leader was supposed to be compassionate and “loving.”
I can’t think of anything worse.
I asked for a teacher who had the ability to shake the sleep off me. To wake me from dark nightmare. Hugs and kisses and flowers were not going to do it for me. I never wanted the “let’s all get together and talk about our feelings” kind of group. Blah! I wanted to know there is no world. I wanted to know the truth. I wanted to wake up. I knew I needed to be disrupted. I wasn’t interested in sugar-coating my life with nice sounding phrases, by a teacher who made me feel good. NO THANK YOU!!
I wanted a military drill sargeant! Preferably a Marine!
To see him the way I know him, click here to watch:
A Course in Miracles with the Master Teacher
I wanted a teacher that challenged me.
I asked and I received.
I didn’t need someone to make me feel good. I needed someone who could push me past my comfort zone.
I wanted to know what it meant to live without sickness.
Period.
“Sickness is a decision.”
HUH???????
I wanted to see that with my own eyes. I wanted to see that “time is an illusion.”
I wasn’t interested in having a good time, or having more friends, or being part of a fun group. I was interested in waking up.
And so, the best I can ask of you – at this point in time – is to do the lessons. DO THEM.
Go get the book right now. What else do you have going on that is so important? Go get your book and read your daily lesson. If you already read it once today, read it again.
You need constant reinforcement.
And if you don’t have A Course in Miracles yet, then buy it now.
Buy Gorgeous for God.
Of course, you don’t need these books at all if you can accept the truth about yourself in this moment. I find that most people have no clue how to do this. So I’m here to help. If there is sickness (doubt, pain, suffering) in your life, then there is still work to be done.
I’m telling you that it doesn’t take time.
Here is a “healing prayer”, to “help us rise above defensiveness, and let truth be as it has always been:
Sickness is a defense against the truth. I will accept the truth of what I am, and let my mind be wholly healed today.”
TODAY!
You are healed of sickness as you accept the truth of who you are! That’s it.
Look at how simple this is.
“Healing will flash across your open mind, as peace and truth arise to take the place of war and vain imaginings. There will be no dark corners sickness can conceal, and keep defended from the light of truth. There will be no dim figures from your dreams, nor their obscure and meaningless pursuits with double purposes insanely sought, remaining in your mind. It will be healed of all sickly wishes that it tried to authorize the body to obey.
“Now the is the body healed, because the source of sickness has been opened to relief. And you will recognize your practiced well by this: The body should not feel at all. It you have been successful, there will be no sense of feeling ill or feeling well, of pain or pleasure. No response at all in in the mind to what the body does. It’s usefulness remains and nothing more.”
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Love it. Love it. Love it.
If you:
1. let your mind harbor attack thoughts
2. yield to judgment or
3. make plans against uncertainties to come …
… YOU HAVE AGAIN MISPLACED YOURSELF, AND MADE A BODY IDENTITY WHICH WILL ATTACK THE BODY, FOR THE MIND IS SICK.
Give instant remedy, should this occur, by not allowing your defensiveness to hurt you any longer.
Do not defend yourself.
Do not be confused about what must be healed, but tell yourself:
“I have forgotten what I really am, for I mistook my body for myself. Sickness is a defense against the truth. But I am not a body. And my mind cannot attack. So I can not be sick.”
Everything feels soooooooo different to me now that the Master Teacher is gone!!
I feel really alive.
Now that he’s not limited by his body, I really feel his presence, like he is standing over me, sitting with me, watching me … 24-7 … smiling in that way that he does.
Last night I was sitting on my bed, playing with my cats – I was really happy – and I could feel him with me, watching in amazement, like “wow, she is not in conflict anymore. It worked. They heard me!”
I feel like he’s watching me type right now and he is thrilled that his job is accomplished. He did it! We learned what he was teaching! He got through our thick skulls!!
The darkness is gone!
I feel like he is laughing out loud, realizing that all his teaching efforts were a total success. I am happy with no grievances!!
A few years ago he said: “I can’t leave until I know at least one of you gets it. I need a sufficiency.”
He would always say: “No one wants to do this” (to let go of your grievances and to be as God created you: pure light).
Then he would say (um … yell): TALK TO ME! I can’t know where you are in your own mind if you don’t talk to me!
And then always: “No one is hearing this. You’re not hearing me.”
And it’s true: I’d be at peace for a moment, and then back to my conflict. I couldn’t hear a word he was saying. I didn’t have a clue what was being asked of me.
Until finally .. one fine day … I could hear everything clearly! I saw in its utter simplicity was what being asked of me! Just love! Give and Forgive! Let go of your grievances! Shine bright! Be happy!
The Master Teacher is a Teacher of teachers. He was here only to extend his knowledge to us that we would accept Jesus’ message in its totality in order that we could begin extending this message to reach others.
It’s not about teaching words, it’s about accepting and living the message of Jesus in your own life where you suddenly one day realize there is no fear in you anymore, and that your mind has been completely changed, and that you offer only love.
In the Teachers Manual, it says: “The teachers of God come from all over the world. They come from all religions and from no religion. They are the ones who answered. The Call is universal. It goes on all the time everywhere. It calls for teachers to speak for It to redeem the world. MANY HEAR IT, BUT FEW WILL ANSWER. Yet it is all a matter of time. Everyone will answer in the end, but the end can be a long, long way off. It is because of this that the plan of teachers was established. Their function is to save time.
“It is because of this that the plan of teachers was established.”
Last night I was reading Chapter 3 and it says that “right perception is necessary before God can communicate directly to his altars, which He established in His Sons.”
It says in the 50 Miracle Principles: “Miracles are everyone’s right, but purification is necessary first.”
I never knew what that meant, until quite recently. Nothing really happens until you are completely purified of all your fear-based human attack thoughts. “Innocence is not a partial attribute. It is not real UNTIL it is total.” You must be purified of the grievances and all the fear.
A Course in Miracles is a systematic purification program.
Of course any path will work – eventually – but it is my experience that A Course in Miracles is a fast track. It undoes all your fears by the simplicity of you reading and practicing the lessons of the workbook. What could be simpler??
A lot of people “wait” to have an experience. They are waiting for angels to appear in their living room or for God’s Voice to speak to them in some dramatic booming way. But for the mass majority of people, this never happens. 99% of the population do NOT have a death experience, and enter into the light, and then come back to live it. Most people have no idea how to reach this state.
The lessons of A Course in Miracles will bring you there. Guaranteed to work every time, for anyone with some willingness to practice.
That’s why I love it.
Because it works consistently.
But do you want it????? Do you want to be at peace?
Last night at Starbucks, I asked one of the baristas what it would be like to be happy all the time, and she scrunched up her face and said: THAT WOULD BE WEIRD!
LOL.
I used to have some experiences of peace and joy when I would meditate, but the experience was never consistent and not always dependable. I was always “reaching” for some other “higher” state, but I never really knew if I would attain my goal. Meditation did not always make me joyful. Sometimes it just frustrated me. Sure, I always felt more peaceful, but it never really brought me any dramatic experiences.
I WANTED SOMETHING BIG TO HAPPEN!
And that’s why I love A Course in Miracles, because big dramatic things happen all the time.
Yesterday I was talking to a friend and were were saying how before we got to the Academy we both used to be really good at manifesting and attracting. I was great at it. I was used to attract all sorts of cool things: money, shoes, and plane tickets were my specialty.
But then I got to the Academy, and I stopped having the ability to manifest and attract things. It all just stopped dead in its tracks. All my “prayers” for things no longer worked for me. Suddenly I seemed to find mysef in “poverty” and “limitation” even though I was mostly happy all the time. It never really bothered me, because things never brought me much satisfaction anyways.
But lately … my friend and I both agreed … everything is exploding! The manifesting and attracting is back, but now it is purified! Now it’s huge. Mind boggling things have been happening to me over the past two weeks. Synchronicity that is leaving me breathless and speechless.
And so what I feel like is that YES, YOU HAVE THE POWER OF MIND TO ATTRACT. Absolutely. Everyone has this ability. But it’s so limited.
And so you ask for something new to occur, and you begin a process of purification, and during the process – all the things you used to attract stops. It looks like the program you are following is failing miserably!!!
But it’s like you are being re-wired. Like all your circuits has been disrupted. All systems shut down. You are being rebuilt!
And then when it is finished, you’re like a live wire! I’m over here laughing because my life has entered the twilight zone these past few weeks. I’m attracting big things now, but these “things” are not for me alone anymore … they are for the greater good of all.
So, it’s a very exciting time right now.
A tremendous shift is occurring for the whole world – and it has been slow coming but now it is exploding. KA-BOOM! We are standing right smack in the middle of the shift, witnessing it first hand.
I love it.
If I defend myself I am attacked.
“The body is in need of no defense. This cannot be too often emphasized.”
“The body has no needs but those which you assign to it. It needs no complicated structures of defense, no health-inducing medicine, no care and no concern at all.”
This is a great lesson.
“The body, valueless and hardly worth the least defense, need merely be perceived as quite apart from you, and it becomes a healthy, serviceable instrument through which the mind can operate until its usefulness is over.”
Amazing, right?
Your body becomes a healthy, serviceable instrument through which the mind can operate until its usefulness is over.
WHO WOULD WANT TO KEEP THE BODY WHEN ITS USEFULNESS IS DONE?
(not me)
Quite an appropriate lesson for the day after the Master Teacher passes away!
Who would need the body when its usefulness is done???
A healed mind does not plan.
“The mind engaged in planning for itself is occupied in setting up control of future happenings. It does not think that it will be provided for, unless it makes its own provisions. Time becomes a future emphasis, to be controlled by learning and experience obtained from past events and previous beliefs. It overlooks the present, for it rests on the idea the past has taught enough to let the mind direct its future course.”
The mind that plans is thus refusing to allow for change.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If there are plans to make, you will be told of them.
This lesson is so juicy. Did you read it? Lesson 135. It’s unbelievable. It’s one of my favorite lessons. I suggest you read it.
It’s awesome.
My teacher – Master Teacher – passed away last night.
I am really going to miss him. He’s something else. But I know he is with me now and forever.
Dear One, I love you.
I was wrong. I HIT HER.
I accept responsibility. It feels wonderful to be wrong!!!!
I emailed the woman from my car crash to ask if she was backing out, and she said she was starting to, and then she looked in her rear view mirror and saw me coming straight at her, and said to her mother in the passenger seat: “that car is not stopping!” and then crash.
So, there you have it.
I have zero idea what happened, but I’m sure it’s my fault.
Total responsibility is an amazing thing.
Communication is an amazing thing.
Let me perceive forgiveness as it is.
I love this lesson.
Get ready to practice:
“Choose one brother as He will direct, and catalogue his “sins” one by one as they cross your mind.”
Briefly consider all the evil things you thought of him, and each time ask yourself “Would I condemn myself for doing this?”
Isn’t this great? Free your brother and free yourself.
“If you have been practicing thus far in willingness and honesty, you will begin to sense a lifting up, a lightening of weight across your chest, a deep and certain feeling of relief.”
And this really is the core work of A Course in Miracles: forgiveness, forgiveness, forgiveness.
Release, release, release.
I make mistakes all the time. I do. I say things that I later wish I had said in a different way. I act in ways that perhaps is not the most graceful in that particular moment. I sometimes lash out. Sometimes I charge ahead. Sometimes I eat too much. Sometimes I’m jealous. Sometimes I’m angry. Sometimes I’m greedy.
But, through it all, I have a willingness and honesty to allow myself to be gently corrected. To not condemn myself for my own “sins” and to not condemn my brother for his “sins.”
Forgiveness is really about letting go.
It sounds like such a cliche, but it’s really true.
Forgiveness is about letting go.
Yesterday while at Starbucks, I hit a car while backing out of the parking lot. I was really upset. I thought I hit a parked car, which didn’t make any sense to me, how I could have pulled over that far to hit a car that was parked?? But no matter. I thought that’s how the story went. So I pulled over, and I was visibly shaken and the woman and her mother were there and she was SOOOOOOOOO NICE to me. I mean, so nice. I was apologizing like crazy, saying OMG, it was totally my fault, I’ll pay for the damages, please forgive me etc.
And she was hugging me, and she was really sweet, and we got it all resolved. She called a cop to get a report (some paint scratches) and we decided to resolve it ourselves without insurance. She will get her car fixed and will send me the bill for damages.
So last night I’m sitting in bathtub, right? It’s 10pm. I’m relaxing. I’m calm and all of a sudden – IN A FLASH – I saw the scene again. SHE WAS PULLING OUT! She hit me! I laughed for a full hour. It was so funny to me. I saw the scene perfectly. She was pulling out.
I couldn’t believe it. I saw it entirely differently. By the time I parked my car, and got out, she was already out of the car (so I thought she had come out of one of the restaurants, and had seen me hit her parked car). I didn’t realize she was already in the car, backing out. Then she said “Let me move my car up”. I was so shaken and I said “okay”. It didn’t occur to me, in that moment, that she had been backing out. She got in, and drove the car back into the parking space. I’m standing there apologizing profusely.
Then when the cop came, we were standing next to her open car door and that’s when I realized her mother was already in the car, with her seatbelt on, which sent off this signal throughout my body … but I ignored it.
One thing I was thinking while standing there: how the hell did I hit a car in the opposite lane???
I’ve pulled out of that Starbucks parking lot every day for the last 7 years. I’ve never in my life been in an accident. I’m the most cautious driver, ever.
But really, I thought I must have just pulled over too far and hit a parked car and that it was my fault. I am always happy to take full responsibility.
So to actually see the whole scene in my mind last night was a marvelous gift to me.
It was like the Holy Spirit was flashing me a glimpse, to look again. I saw the scene perfectly. And then I couldn’t stop laughing. I laughed for over an hour. I pray at night on my knees, and it is usually in semi-seriousness – going over the events of the day, being in gratitude, etc. – and last night I couldn’t stop laughing. My cats were lying there on the bed in front of me, and I had my hands clasped in prayer and I kept bursting out giggling.
She must have known she was backing out. She must know that she hit me. I am actually wondering how she is telling the story to people.
I seriously thought I hit a parked car. Honestly, it didn’t make any sense to me. I was just about to put the car in DRIVE when Boom!! And then it was: oh shit, shit, shit, I hit a car, I hit a car. Oh no, Oh no. Oh no.
That’s never happened to me. It was really shocking. It came out of nowhere. There was no one behind me, the path was clear, and then Boom! I can’t imagine how it must be for people who get into real car accidents.
One thing I’ve learned is that you cannot escape the effects of your thinking. You might be able to fool other people, but you cannot fool yourself. You know when you’ve done something wrong. You know when you are at fault.
I love the scene from the movie The Family Man where Don Cheadle is an angel working in a convenience store, and a girl gives him $1 for a soda and he gives her back $9 (as if she had given him a $10 bill) and she pauses, looks at the money, realizes that she is being dishonest, and then takes the $9 anyways. And then he shakes his head and says to Nicholas Cage “did you see that? For $9.”
You could see the guilt in her. For $9, she lost her innocence.
And this is the place where you start becoming honest for all of your actions – not because you are trying to be a good person – but because guilt and dishonesty is literally poison in your system. It’s the reason people get sick.
You know when you are being dishonest. You can fool other people, and make other people believe your story … but you are actually pouring poison into your system.
I am happy to keep things the way they are, and to take full responsibility, but I cannot help but think “this must be affecting her.”
Meeting her was the highlight of my day. She was so nice. It felt like we were destined to meet, like God set up an encounter for us, and the only way to get us to meet was to crash our cars into each other.
Sometimes that’s the way God works, and that’s why you don’t have to be upset about anything … because everything is a gift from God.
What a blessing.
I will not value what is valueless.
Today’s lesson says we are moving from what seems theoretical back to practical concerns.
Haven’t we been doing that all along?
Practice, Practice, Practice.
Apply, Apply, Apply.
No matter. Lesson 133 says that today we will list the criteria by which to test all things you think you want.
THIS IS A TEST.
1. Think of what you want.
Now here is the way to see if what you want has value or is valueless.
1. First, if you choose a thing that will not last forever, what you chose is valueless. A temporary value is without all value.
2. Next, if you choose to take a thing away from someone else, you will have nothing left. This is because when you deny his right to everything, you have denied your own.
3. Your next consideration is one on which the others rest. Why is the choice you make of value to you? What attracts your mind to it? What purpose does it serve? Here it is easiest of all to be deceived. For what the ego wants it fails to recognize.
4. And so we come to the criterion for choice that is the hardest to believe, because its obviousness is overlaid with many levels of obscurity. IF YOU FEEL ANY GUILT ABOUT YOUR CHOICE, YOU HAVE ALLOWED THE EGO’S GOALS TO COME BETWEEN THE REAL ALTERNATIVE.
All things are valuable or valueless, worthy or not of being sought at all, entirely desirable or not worth the slightest effort to obtain.
Wow. This is great.
Lately, everything has been chaotic in my life. I said a prayer to God about a month ago that I be MORE ACTIVE FOR HIM and then everything happened all at once. Things suddenly seem to be happening out of my control. Decisions appear to be made without my participation. I am looking at all this swirling activity, the way a person witnesses a tornado.
I ASKED FOR THIS!!!!
But all of a sudden it feels like there are too many cooks in the kitchen.
What I am realizing this morning is the necessity to be FOCUSED. Really focused on my goal. Focused on God. What do I want? It is valuable or valueless?
I want to inspire you. I want to extend light. I want to bring joy to you. I want to give you a new experience and offer a new way of thinking.
Last night I was realizing that what I really want is to be helpful & happy. To keep things simple. To be available. I was thinking about Marianne Williamson and how sad her new book The Midlife Miracle is. The writing is beautiful, but she basically admits her life has been a failure since the publication of A Return to Love. She says that now, in her midlife, she can try again. That this is a new beginning, a time of hope. Time to change the world from our rocking chairs.
??
Where is the Marianne I knew from the 90s? I attended practically every one of her talks in NYC in the 90s. That girl was on fire! She didn’t care about appearances. She just gave, gave, gave, gave. She said things I’d never heard before. There is no world! She wasn’t afraid of anything. She invited people to ask questions, to come right to the stage and speak to her. She didn’t care what people thought of her. Her book A Return to Love, published in 1992, was the catalyst for change in my life. She brought me to A Course in Miracles. She filled me with a new hope.
I remember one time, after she had given a whole talk about there being no world, a guy stood up and sarcastically asked her “what about all the starving children in Africa”
And without skipping a beat, she responded: “What the hell are you doing here? If you are worried about children not being fed in Africa, GO FEED THEM!”
LOL.
She was a force.
But then something happened to her.
I’ve read stories that at a certain point, as she started to become famous and successful, her life started to spin out of control. People started to want things from her, to use her for their own advancement. I don’t really know what happened. She admits herself that she began to build a wall around her to protect herself. She herself wrote she stopped trusting people.
My favorite teacher of A Course in Miracles stopped trusting people!!
When TRUST is the first characteristic of a Teacher of God.
I was thinking about all this, and feeling a terrific amount of gratitude for what she has given to me, and remembering how much this world can beat you down if you do not keep your PRIMARY GOAL in mind.
Her goal is to be helpful. I know it, because I was there in the beginning.
This is a reminder to me that I must constantly, every single day, keep bringing myself back to my original goal (I am here only to be truly helpful. I am here to represent Him who sent me) and to not get swept up in the swirling activity of this world.
Because … everything … and I do mean everything … is designed to blind you.
And everything … and I do mean everything … is designed to wake you up.
Every situation is an opportunity to love and forgive.
This is great news.
