“I need you as much as you need me.”
-A Course in Miracles, Chapter 8, Section V.
Time for a food post!
This pumpkin bread rocks the house. 3 cups of sugar and 1 cup of vegetable oil! LOL. Trust me, it’s delicious.
Pumpkin Bread
3 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs
small can of pumpkin (15 oz)
3 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp nutmeg
2 tsp baking soda
2/3 cup warm water add slowly.
Very easy to make:
1. Mix the first ingredients together in one bowl
2. Mix the second ingredients together in a different bowl.
3. Mix the two bowls of ingredients together
4. Add 2/3 cup warm water, slowly, and mix.
5. Pour into two greased bread pans.
Bake for 1 hour at 350.
Test doneness by inserting a sharp knife into bread. If the knife comes out clean, the bread is done.
Serve hot, warm or cold with lots of butter
All things I think I see reflect ideas.
Lesson 325 is is one of my favorite lessons. It flipped my mind the first time I read it. It continues to flip my mind. It’s trippy, exciting and true:
All things I think I see reflect ideas.
“This is salvation’s keynote: What I see reflects a process in my mind, which starts with my idea of what I want. From there, the mind makes up an image of the thing the mind desires, judges valuable, and therefore seeks to find. These images are then projected outward, looked upon, esteemed as real and guarded as one’s own. From insane wishes comes an insane world. From judgment comes a world condemned. And from forgiving thoughts a gentle world comes forth, with mercy for the holy Son of God, to offer him a kindly home where he can rest a while before he journeys on, and help his brothers walk ahead with him and find the way to Heaven and to God.”
The world is a hologram of light.
What if you knew you were dreaming?
“The end of dreaming is the end of fear, and love was never in the world of dreams” – ACIM, Chapter 28, Section 4
“There can be no salvation in the dream as you are dreaming it.” – ACIM Chapter 29, Section 10, The Forgiving Dream:
How can God’s Son awaken from the dream? It is a dream of judgment. So must he judge not, and he WILL awaken.
The real world still is but a dream. Except the figures have been changed. They are not seen as idols which betray. It is a dream in which no-one is used to substitute for something else, or interposed between the thoughts the mind conceives and what it sees. No-one is used for something he is not, for childish things have all been put away. And what was once a dream of judgment now has changed into a dream where all is joy, because that is the PURPOSE that it has. Only forgiving dreams can enter here, for time is almost over. And the forms which enter in the dreams are now perceived as brothers, not in judgment, but in love.
FOR TIME IS ALMOST OVER.
Our Father, Your ideas reflect the truth, and mine apart from Your but make up dreams.
!!!!!!!!!!
hahaha.
Lately, with these lessons, they make me laugh out loud. They make me soooo happy. How simple is salvation. God’s ideas reflect the truth, and my thoughts apart from God’s but make up dreams. It gets easier and easier and easier. Just think with God! All day long, think with God! Those thoughts reflect the truth.
Everything else but makes up dreams.
Father, Let me behold what only Your Thoughts reflect, for Yours and Yours alone establish truth.
What I see “out there” reflects only (and always!) the thoughts that are contained in my mind. What a gift. If I don’t like what I see, I can change my mind.
I merely follow, for I would not lead.
“Father, You are the One Who gave the plan for my salvation to me. You have set the way I am to go, the role to take, and every step in my appointed. I cannot lose the way.”
“I can choose to wander off a while, and then return. Your loving Voice will always call me back, and guide my feet aright. My brothers all can follow in the way I lead them. Yet I merely follow in the way to You, as You direct me and would have me go.”
A good friend said to me the other day that the simplicity of A Course in Miracles can be expressed in this way:
1. Show up.
2. Get out of the way.
LOL.
It’s so true. Just show up. Pay attention. Stay focused. And then get out of the way because the Holy Spirit leads. He moves me. He catapults me. I follow.
Lately “to follow” is not accurate. It’s more like I’m in the passenger seat with the Holy Spirit driving and we arrive somewhere and He announces: WE’RE HERE!
Honey, we’re here! Bags out of the car! We’ve arrived!
That’s more accurate. I follow in the sense that I have the willingness to go wherever He is going and to wherever He is taking me. I trust that He knows where He’s going. I am happy to go there with Him.
He leads. I follow.
It used to be that I would listen for instructions, for example: I would sit quietly and ask the Holy Spirit questions and he would answer and I would follow and do what He asked. But more and more there is no time for that. He’s in me now. He is me now. He moves me. There’s no Lisa asking a question. There is just the Holy Spirit leading.
From the Introduction to the Clarification of Terms:
This course remains within the ego framework, where it is needed. It is not concerned with what is beyond all error because it is planned only to set the direction towards it. Therefore it uses words, which are symbolic, and cannot express what lies beyond symbols. It is merely the ego that questions because it is only the ego that doubts. The course merely gives another answer, once a question has been raised. However, this answer does not attempt to resort to inventiveness or ingenuity. These are attributes of the ego. The course is simple. It has one function and one goal. Only in that does it remain wholly consistent because only that can be consistent.
Amazing. I’m laughing. All the questions, including all those contained within A Course in Miracles, are set within the ego’s framework.
Even the most lofty spiritual questions to be helpful are set within the ego’s framework:
What would You have me do?
What would You have me say?
And to whom?
At a certain point, questions cease and then there is only action, which comes from God.
In Heaven, there is no need for help. And yet while I find myself here there is work to do.
Lesson 169: By grace I live. By grace I am released.
We have repeated several times before that you but make a journey that is done. For oneness must be here. Whatever time the mind has set for revelation is entirely irrelevant to what must be a constant state, forever as it always was; forever to remain as it is now. We merely take the part assigned long since, and fully recognize as perfectly fulfilled by Him Who wrote salvation’s script in His Creator’s Name, and in the Name of His Creator’s Son.
There is no need to further clarify what no-one in the world can understand. When revelation of your Oneness comes, it will be known and fully understood. Now we have work to do, for those in time can speak of things beyond, and listen to words which explain what is to come is past already. Yet what meaning can the words convey to those who count the hours still, and rise and work and go to sleep by them?
Suffice it, then, that you have work to do to play your part. The ending must remain obscure to you until your part is done. It does not matter. For your part is still what all the rest depends on. As you take the role assigned to you, salvation comes a little nearer each uncertain heart that does not beat as yet in tune with God. Forgiveness is the central theme which runs throughout salvation, holding all its parts in meaningful relationships, the course it runs directed, and its outcome sure.
And now we ask for grace, the final gift salvation can bestow.
So let us follow One Who knows the way. We need not tarry, and we cannot stray except an instant from His Loving Hand. We walk together, for we follow Him. And it is He Who makes the ending sure, and guarantees a safe returning home.
We walk together, for we follow Him.
I love you.
I gladly make the “sacrifice” of fear.
These lessons are so perfect and systematic. It’s freaky-deak on some days.
I am laughing my ass off over here at the sheer mathematics of these workbook lessons. They always equal my thoughts. Lesson 323 = where I am right now in my mind. These lessons add up. They subtract fear thoughts. They balance, restore, and harmonize.
It’s like science.
Today I gladly make the “sacrifice” of fear.
I obviously pushed some buttons yesterday, hit a few nerves, with the post about my cat.
You guys only get to see the public comments posted here on the blog … I get to see all the private comments sent to my email box! I love it because you guys get to see where I am in my own mind, and when you write to me I get to see where you are in your own mind. I love comments! Keep them coming!
Total exposure.
I love the practice of A Course in Miracles. It includes everything – all my ideas, all my thoughts, all the activities going on in my life, every interaction … it is all-inclusive. The bible says you gotta cross every t and dot every i.
Turn over every single rock and expose whatever thoughts are under it to the light.
Have the willingness to look at your fears in order to let them go.
Be honest.
Be yourself.
Today’s lesson is a great reminder that I am only asked to let go of suffering – ALL SUFFERING – all sense of loss and sadness, all anxiety and doubt, and freely let God’s Love come streaming into my awareness, healing me of pain, and giving me eternal joy.
All.
I am asked to let go of ALL suffering, ALL sense of loss and sadness, ALL anxiety and doubt.
These lessons are uncompromising.
These lessons are not asking me to give up a cat or not give up a cat … but rather to use the cat to see where I am still holding onto to ideas of suffering, loss, sadness, anxiety and doubt.
That’s all! Everything is a lesson God would have me learn!
There is no sacrifice. There is no loss.
I am laughing like crazy.
How the story will end??
It will end in joy, in peace, in benediction, with a blessing, in a blaze of bright light.
The story ends in laughter.
So that’s the HOW, but what about the WHEN?
“The world will end when its thought system has been completely reversed. Until then, bits and pieces of its thinking will still seem sensible. The final lesson, which brings the ending of the world, cannot be grasped by those not yet prepared to leave the world and go beyond its tiny reach.”
WHAT, THEN, IS THE FUNCTION OF THE TEACHER OF GOD IN THIS CONCLUDING LESSON?
“He need merely learn how to approach it; to begin to go in its direction. He need merely trust that, if God’s Voice tells him it is a lesson he can learn, he can learn it. He does not judge it either as hard or easy. His Teacher points to it, and he trusts that He will show him how to learn it.”
Just this second Enzo walked in through the window, walked across the computer, and is now chowing down on food over there. LOL. Everything is good. God is good. I don’t have to worry about a thing. I don’t have to plan anything. I can be here just for today and do the lesson. Nothing more than that is asked.
I am asked to “sacrifice” my limited ideas, and fear-based thoughts.
Such is the “sacrifice” the Holy Spirit asks of me, and one I gladly make; the only “cost” of restoration of God’s memory to me, for the salvation of the world.
Good Lord Almighty.
This is awesome.
I am laughing.
“And as we pay the debt we owe to truth – a debt that merely is the letting go of self-deceptions and of images we worshipped falsely – truth returns to us in wholeness and in joy. We are deceived no longer. Love has now returned to our awareness. And we are at peace again, for fear has gone and only love remains.”
I love this (from the Teachers Manual, How Will the World End?):
“To turn hell into Heaven is the function of God’s teachers for what they teach are lessons in which Heaven is reflected. And now sit down in true humility and realize all God would have you do. Do not be arrogant and say you cannot learn His Own curriculum. His Word says otherwise. His Will be done. It cannot be otherwise. And be you thankful that it is so.”
Absolutely!
I joined Facebook last week and just now I was adding a friend and it makes you type in two words to make sure you are a human being and the two words given to me were like a direct message from Jesus to me:
shine listen
I can give up what was never real.
My cat Enzo comes instantly to mind. I’ve been trying to figure out what to do with him as I cannot take him to the house with me. It’s a bed & breakfast with terrifically beautiful furniture and it’s not the place for pets.
And yet … he’s the love of my life. What am I gonna do? The past few days I’ve been thinking: well Lisa, here you are with another lesson that is challenging your ideas of what you still value in the world.
I was thinking how much joy Enzo brings me, how I physically get excited when he walks into the room, how peaceful I feel when he sits on my lap, how I wake up feeling happy when he jumps up on the bed and camps out near my head.
It shows me that I am capable of these emotions – extreme joy, fantastic happiness, eternal peace. And yet, I still think I need a cat to generate these feelings of excitement, peace and joy. Can I do it without the cat? Obviously, these strong emotions are within me as I have already displayed them numerous times on a daily basis. Can I let go of the external stimulation and still feel exactly the same way?
Extreme joy, fantastic happiness, eternal peace.
Is it possible to feel this way consistently and constantly? Without the cat?
Yes, it would have to be so.
Here is one of those situations that I cannot sort out by myself. All I can do is practice today’s lesson:
I can give up but what was never real.
I find it fascinating that this is today’s lesson – I can give up but what was never real – as it’s all I was thinking about yesterday: the cat’s not real, the cat’s not real, the cat’s not real … but then immediately came the thought: BUT I LOVE HIM!!
And then I drove back to the Dells, all excited that I was going to get to see him again. As if he was my lover or something. Special relationship. It’s doomed to fail at some point, in some way. But for now, my God, he makes me happy.
Right now, my task is to simply look at these ideas of loss and attachment.
“I can give up but what was never real.”
“I sacrifice illusions; nothing more. And as illusions go I find the gifts illusions tried to hide, awaiting me in shining welcome, and in readiness to give God’s ancient messages to me.”
“His memory abides in every gift that I receive of Him. And every dream serves only to conceal the Self which is God’s only Son, the likeness of Himself, the Holy One Who still abides in Him forever, and He still abides in me.”
Father, to Your all sacrifice remains forever inconceivable. And so I cannot sacrifice except in dreams. As You created me, I can give up nothing You gave me. What You did not give has no reality. What loss can I anticipate except the loss of fear, and the return of love into mind?”
That last paragraph actually has a few sentences that make me start pulling out the justifications to keep the cat. I feel like God did give the cat to me. He came out of nowhere as a kitten just when I needed him the most. I was taking a walk one day and he ran out and climbed the length of my body and sat on my shoulder, purring. I always felt like he’s not a cat, but a gift from God.
But obviously, he’s still causing me pain as I think about losing him. So there is a lesson in here for me to learn.
I can give up but what was never real.
Father, my freedom is in You alone.
The house I am now living in is big and beautiful and quiet.
It’s what I always wanted – a big house with tons of guests rooms for friends and family, a place of peace, joy and happiness – and yet it’s strange to be here. It’s immense how quickly the scenery changed.
I always wanted a big house and I thought it would be years down the road. You know, first you need a job, then you need money, probably a huge bank loan, then the whole process of physically moving in, getting a UHaul truck, buying furniture, contacting the gas, electric, and telephone companies, etc.
But it didn’t happen that way at all. One day I was penniless without a job, and then next day I’m living in a 5-bedroom house that is heated, warm, and filled with love.
I’m wandering around the rooms, feeling isolated. This place is huge. It’s interesting to observe myself walking around the house, trying to find peace.
Last night I noticed how restless I am. I can’t sit still. I can’t get a proper internet connection (it disconnects within 3 minutes) so I am face-to-face with myself. There’s nowhere to go! There’s no distractions! I don’t watch tv so I don’t have that. I try to read a book and immediately I’m walking around, rearranging the furniture, opening the fridge but there is nothing to rearrange (as everything is perfect here) and I’m not hungry so I’m just opening and closing the fridge door looking for something.
It’s so funny when you begin to observe yourself!
My freedom is in God alone.
I’m having major deja vu. It’s wild. I’ve seen all this in dreams. It’s so quiet here. I love the first floor – I got rid of all the tvs from the main floor and there are two living rooms, one with a fireplace and another living room that is my own private space with french doors but I am going to make this room available for guests as a library with all my favorite books. It’s the best room in the house, sunny and bright, with huge windows overlooking a dam, a pond and 200 geese (what are they still doing here in November??)
The Holy Spirit moves me and God’s Voice directs me.
“Now I would guide myself no more. For I have neither made nor understood the way to find my freedom. But I trust in You.
But I trust in You.
“You Who endowed me with my freedom as your holy Son will not be lost to me. Your Voice directs me, and the way to You is opening and clear to me at last. Father, my freedom is in Your alone. Father, it is my will that I return.”
Today, we answer for the world, which will be freed along with us. How glad are we to find our freedom through the certain way our Father has established. And how sure is all the world’s salvation, when we learn our freedom can be found in God alone.”
I would love to hear from you about your favorite books so I can buy them for the new library. Right now I am thinking Tolstoy, Emerson, Thoreau, Kierkeegard, A Course in Miracles, Emmet Fox, Anne Lamott, Jerry and Esther Hicks, Carlos Castaneda, and Laurie Colwin’s cooking books.
I can probably fit 4 bookcases in here.
So please let me know your favorite books.
Creation is all I ever wanted.
Creation is the goal of all my searching and seeking. My whole life I’ve been “building” things, turning nothing into something, and transforming ugliness into beauty. It’s what makes me happy. I love walking into an empty space and creating something beautiful there … just for my own satisfaction.
I have spent the vast majority of my life alone, by my own preference. I am an artist in the sense that I enjoy the landscape of my mind. I like an empty canvas. I like quiet. I like open spaces. I love the act of creation. It is the sum of all God’s Thoughts, in number infinite, and everywhere without limit.
“Only love creates, and only like itself.”
That’s interesting. Only love creates, and only like itself. Which means that anything that is NOT love doesn’t do anything. Only love creates, and only like itself.
Wow. Do you hear what that says? A Course in Miracles could be summed up in that one sentence: Only love creates, and only like itself.
That is revolutionary. All other emotions and thoughts do nothing. Confusion, sadness, doubt, and anger do nothing. Only love creates, and only like itself. That makes life easier. That just simplified everything.
Might as well just stay in love. Might as well be happy because only love creates, and only like itself.
A good friend wrote to me asking how she can manifest a house and money to pay rent comfortably.
I wrote back: “My suggestion is to take your focus off the house and off of money and to put your full attention … your heart, mind and soul … into doing God’s Will.”
That’s the best advice I can give. Forget about this world. Forget about manifesting. Focus your full attention on letting God’s Will be done. That’s creation. Forget about stuff here in the world. It’s all temporary and fleeting anyways. It fades away, crumbles or breaks at some point. It will disappoint you eventually, so don’t waste your time chasing after something that will only fail you in the end.
Focus only on the eternal. Focus only on God. This will bring you immense happiness … and it is given to you today. This is creation.
Creation is remembering that you are as God created you. You are unchanged by time, mistakes, delays or illusions. You are a child of God, His most holy Son.
This is creation.
You are creation.
God calls to you. Hear His Voice.
“God’s memory is in our holy minds, which know their oneness and their unity with their Creator. Let our function be only to let this memory return, only to let God’s Will be done on earth, only to be restored to sanity, and to be as God created us.”
Let our function be only to:
1. let this memory of God and oneness return
2. only to let God’s Will be done on earth
3. only to be returned to sanity
4. and to be as God created us
Amen.
How could you be depressed, sad or angry with a lesson like this?
All power has been given to you. You are free to change your mind, free to create.
You are a miracle worker.
All power has been given to you in Heaven and on earth.
There is no need (or time!) for sadness or fear. It’s a tremendous waste of energy. Literally! It wastes your energy. It sucks you dry and then you wonder why you feel miserable.
It’s easy to patch up energy leaks and to consciously extend your energy and light. That’s really the difference:
-you are wasting your energy when it UNCONSCIOUSLY leaves you (self-importance, anger, defense, judgment)
-you are increasing your energy when you CONSCIOUSLY extend yourself.
You will feel the difference. When you start consciously thinking of yourself as light and energy and consciously make a decision to extend it, you will feel the power in it.
But if you start wallowing in your own guilt and sadness, I assure you:
a. it is unconscious
b. you’ll feel like shit
c. you’ll have no energy
So, given these choices … to be awake or to be asleep … what do you do?
Obviously, to be awake simply means that you are conscious and aware. That’s all! It’s not complicated. You became aware of your thoughts and actions. How simple.
To be asleep means to be unconscious, to be UNAWARE of what you are doing, to think you are a victim of events and people outside of you.
Once you are conscious that you have all power to change your mind, and that you know that God is with you, your life will change drastically.
A change of mind IS a miracle.
All power is given to you. There are no limits on your strength, your peace, your joy, nor any of the attributes God gave you in your creation.
Father, Your Will can do all things in me, and then extend to all the world as well through me.
I came from the salvation of the world.
I am on the wrong lesson again today! Ooops. Sorry. Let’s try this again:
I came for the salvation of the world.
Father, Your Will is total.
Yes.
The main thing lately for me is constancy and consistency. That my will be total because God’s Will is total. That my actions be total. That my giving be total. That my light be total. That my love be total. That I allow everything to be 100% and not linger in a middle place.
I came for the salvation of the world.
“Here is a thought from which all arrogance has been removed, and only truth remains. When there is no arrogance, the truth will come immediately, and fill up the space the ego left unoccupied by lies.”
How beautiful!
ONLY TRUTH REMAINS.
Here there is only love.
All images = love.
All expression = love.
Here is humility, grace, peace, joy and everlasting love forever.
It is the Will of God that I learn that what one gains is given unto all.
Father, Your Will is total. And the goal which stems from it shares totality. What aim but the salvation of the world could You have given me? And what but this could be the Will my Self has shared with you?
My Father gives all power unto me.
“The Son of God is limitless. There are no limits on his strength, his peace, his joy, nor any attributes his Father gave in his creation. What he wills with his Creator and Redeemer must be done.”
I love it.
There are no limits on my strength, joy, peace, and grace.
I don’t see a difference anymore between “the world” and “Heaven.” It’s all the same thing to me. There are no distinctions. There is no difference anymore to me between “physical” and “spiritual.”
It’s all one thing. I’ve been restored to my whole mind. A complete merging of Heaven and earth into an experience of God. I look at the illusion and I see God. Total transfer.
I read what you write and it reminds me of God.
I look at your face and I see Christ.
I think of you and I am happy.
Jesus has changed me, moved me, and restored me.
Thank the Lord.
I am he in whom the power of my Father’s Will abides.
God’s Will can do all things in me, and then extend to the world through me.
Max did a great radio interview with me this past Monday and he said that at a certain point he realized his mind was sufficiently changed and that he thought differently. That’s exactly how I feel. I know I’m different, yet I’m exactly the same.
I am myself.
My personality is the same as it has always been but I don’t organize my thoughts in the same way that I used to. I don’t hold onto grievances. Nothing bothers me. And if something does bother me, it lasts for 5 seconds and then I know how to change my mind and be happy again. This is the goal I was always seeking for – to arrive at a place finally where peace has been restored and there is only joy.
Where I abide in Jesus and rest in God, day and night.
I read a great quote by Anne Lamott last night from her book “Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith”:
“My coming to faith did not start with a leap but rather a series of staggers from what seemed like one safe place to another. Like lily pads, round and green, these places summoned and then held me while I grew. Each prepared me for the next leaf on which I would land, and in this way I moved across the swamp of doubt and fear.” – Anne Lamott
