Day 107: Truth will correct all errors in my mind.

Truth will correct all errors in my mind,

And I will rest in Him Who is my Self.

As we move ahead from yesterday in better understanding the Truth, we are assured that its quiet strength will heal our wounds and realign our misguided thoughts.  Remember that Truth resides in Light, and light shines away the darkness with graceful ease.

The Course tells us today, "Illusions can be brought to truth to be corrected.  But the truth stands far beyond illusions, and can not be brought to them to turn them into truth."  Truth, then, must be sought, but as A Course in Miracles adds, "It does not hide.  It stands in open light, in obvious accessibility.  It is impossible that anyone could seek it truly, and would not succeed."

When we seek Truth, we find it.  Sometimes, oftentimes, we must make the trek through the murky darkness before we reach it.  This is precisely why the pathway to Truth does not come easy when we first decide to embark upon it.

Every lie we make veers us off course as we become lost in the fog of our dark illusions.  It takes a certain vigilance to continually persist toward Truth.  The only way this vigilance will come is if we have an awareness of what awaits.  For what good is Truth if it only appears to lead us into darkness?

This is why we must remember Who We Are.  This is the meaning behind the second part of today's meditation: "I will rest in Him Who is my Self."  "I will rest," in this circumstance, can be rephrased as "I will be at peace."   "Him Who is my Self" is the Truth of our being - the Christ within us, our Higher Self.  This is what Truth has to offer us.

As we continue to understand the inherent Peace of our nature, we will continue to move closer to ultimate Truth, ever more vigilant to push past the darkness.  To fully understand our own inner Peace, we must demonstrate it wherever we go.  We cannot wait for World Peace to befall upon us.  We must bring it to the world.  As we covered in yesterday's lesson - through our giving, we will receive.

So let us be a Beacon of Peace and stand in the Light of our Higher Self wherever we go and to everyone we meet.  Let us extend the Peace of Love to our earthly brethren that we may know it ourselves.  As we do, we move closer toward the Light of Truth.  We stay our course in the presence of even the grimmest illusions and remain steadily vigilant as we trust in the exaltation God's Truth will provide.  When we arrive, Truth will wipe away any remaining errors in our minds.  We will be healed and Perfect again, resting safely in the loving arms of our Lord - at One with our True Self... forever at Peace, and forever in Joy.

And so it is.  Thank you, and Amen.

Until tomorrow,
Journeyman

Day 106: Let me be still and listen to the truth.

Stillness is often hard to come by as the world seems to become evermore fast-paced.  There are bills to pay, mouths to feed, errands to run, blogs to write... Yet if we pause for a moment, if we give ourselves a chance to sit quietly and calmly for just a few minutes, the anxiety these "duties" bring will melt away.  Truth will take the place of the stresses in our lives, and we will become open to receiving and giving God's gifts freely.

In the hourly five-minute practice periods, we are asked to meditate on the following: 

I will be still and listen to the truth.
What does it mean to give and to receive?

In addition to our five-minute meditations every hour, A Course in Miracles advises that we tell ourselves frequently throughout the day:

Let me be still and listen to the truth.
I am the messenger of God today,
My voice is His, to give what I receive.

It is incredible what insight one can achieve by simply being still.  If you can, for just a moment before you read on, take one or two minutes to close your eyes and focus only on your breathing.  Breathe deeply in and out as you let all outside distractions fade away into the outer rim of your consciousness.  Let any thoughts that come pass through your mind without placing any attention upon them.  For just one or two minutes, take a moment to do this now...

...

Welcome back.  Do you feel better?  Of course you do.  When we let the distractions of our thoughts and the outside world go for just a moment, we return, if even for an instant, to the Truth of our Being.  We are Peace and we are Joy, for we are Love.  Nothing can change that.  These are the Holy Gifts God has given us.  When we are open, when we let the distractions go and allow ourselves to be still, we are able to receive them.  When we reside in True Joy and True Peace we naturally want to give these Gifts to others, for in that space we recognize one another as our Brothers and Sisters.

To truly give is to also receive.  If we give freely from our hearts, we will receive back that which we give, and in magnification.  If we receive Love, Joy and Peace with openness and understanding for What It Is, it would be impossible for us to not share it, for in order to receive these Holy Gifts we must give them.  In this state we are an Open Channel.  We are aligned with God and with our Brothers and Sisters.  Anything given us by God is then immediately extended to everyone else.  As they receive it, so does God, and so it is given back to us... This is what it means to give and to receive.

Sharing is perhaps a more comprehensive term for what it means to truly give and receive.  When we share, we increase in degree whatever it is we are sharing.  In sharing, there is no loss, as it is when we truly give.  In sharing, there is no taking away, as it is when we truly receive.

One of the lessons outlined in the text of A Course in Miracles is particularly appropriate to today's lesson:

To have, give all to all.

Another way I interpret this is as such: Give all you have, to have all you give.  Now, does this mean that we should empty our bank accounts and give all our money away?  Should we clear out our closets and donate every piece of clothing we own?  Well, no.  Those are just "things" anyway.  They are illusions of the physical world and have no real value.  To give all we have is to give of what is eternally ours.  It is by doing so that we recognize we already have it.  Give Peace and Joy to all so that we may know we have it.  If giving Peace and Joy manifests as donating money or providing someone with clothes, so be it.  But those things are just representations of the Real Gifts of God.  They never entail sacrifice, for nothing truly given is lost to us.

The challenge here comes when we are confronted with someone whom we are angry or afraid.  This is when forgiveness is paramount.  After all, the purpose of forgiving is for giving.  It is only when we forgive, when we are able to look past the anger and the fear surrounding the situation, that we can truly give to the other.  The converse is true as well: When we give Joy and Peace to the person who has engendered anger and fear within us, we are forgiving them.  By doing so, the anger and fear we had perceived will melt away.

Let us remember today that when anxiety begins to run high, we always have a sanctuary to which we can return.  Through stillness, we will align ourselves with our Creator, and we will be open to receiving His Gifts for us to share with the rest of His Beloved Children.  This is the Truth of our Being.  Whenever we forget, let us close our eyes, take a deep breath, and let the distractions of our thoughts and this world fade away.  In so doing, we will surely remember our greatness once again.

Until tomorrow,
Journeyman

Day 105: God's peace and joy are mine.

God's peace and joy are mine.

Here is the first paragraph in A Course in Miracles describing today's lesson:

God's peace and joy are yours.  Today we will accept them, knowing they belong to us.  And we will try to understand these gifts increase as we receive them.  They are not like to the gifts the world can give, in which the giver loses as he gives the gift; the taker is the richer by his loss.  Such are not gifts, but bargains made with guilt.  The truly given gift entails no loss.  It is impossible that one can gain because another loses.  This implies a limit and an insufficiency.

I would like to elaborate on the notion that gifts of Joy and Peace - and really any gift equatable with Love - are only increased in measure by both the person giving and the person receiving.  This is true by the nature of Love, which is God.  We even have physical proof that this is so, as our universe is steadily expanding.  God encompasses All, including the far-reaching cosmos.  And the extension of God is manifested physically in the expansion of our universe.

When you feel joyous, and you bring joy to another, are you not happier as a result?  You haven't given anything away.  You have simply shared the greatest of gifts God has bestowed upon you and magnified that gift by including your Brother or Sister.

Another way to look at it is to remember that we are each a reflection of one another.  As such, each of us is a reflection of God Himself.  Every gift given by God is a gift of Light.  When a light meets its reflection - when it is held up to a mirror - its brightness doubles.  We, as Beings of Light and reflections of one another, are no different.  If we shine our light upon another by sharing our gifts of Joy and Peace, they will be mirrored right back to us, and we will see the sacred place where we share our light grow brighter.

To shine one's light upon another is to forgive.  In the meditation practices for today's lesson, we make the connection between Forgiveness and Joy.  The Course instructs us to recite the following as we think of each of our supposed "enemies" in need of our forgiveness:

My brother, peace and joy I offer you,
That I may have God's peace and joy as mine.

In offering Peace and Joy to our "enemies" and recognizing them as our Brothers and Sisters (our fellow Children of God) we are forgiving them.  We are opening ourselves up to be available to God's Holy Gifts, which we, at the moment of forgiveness, have already received.  If we hadn't, we would be unable to share them with another.  This is the method by which we become the Vessel for God's Love and Light.

As we go about our day today, let us remember that what is God's is also ours.  He wishes us only Love - It is all He can offer, for it is all He is.  Let us accept the Love He gives us in all the miraculous forms it takes - Joy, Peace and Forgiveness are but a few of Love's Holy Virtues.  As we give them freely to one another, so shall we too bask in their Glorious Light.

Until tomorrow,
Journeyman

Day 104: I seek but what belongs to me in truth.

Today's meditation in A Course in Miracles begins with the following:

I seek but what belongs to me in truth.
And joy and peace are my inheritance.

We are also told to remind ourselves as frequently as we can throughout the day:

God's gifts of joy and peace are all I want.

The idea of "inheritance" particularly struck me today.  An inheritance is that which has been passed on to us from our ancestors.  It is a birthright.  God is the Ancestor of us all.  We, His Children, have inherited the gifts He has bestowed upon us by the simple fact that we are His creations.  The inheritance is ours for the taking.  It is given freely.  There is no work required, save the effort we must make to undo the illusions we have made, that we may behold God’s gifts for us.

God's gifts, as today's lesson points out, are Joy and Peace.  These are derived from Love, and are Seen in Light.  We have hidden these Holy Gifts behind the dark illusions we have chosen to produce on our planet, yet they are there, even amidst the darkness.

In improvisation (a la Whose Line Is It Anyway?), the actors must accept whatever it is their partners give them, good or bad.  For instance, one actor may say to the other, "We're hitting some pretty rough waves on this sailboat," and her partner must accept that they are on a sailboat and move on with the scene.  Each circumstance an actor presents is called a “gift,” and the cardinal rule of improv is saying “yes” and accepting those gifts.  God’s gifts work the same way.

God is our partner here on earth, forever with us, eternally ensuring that we are never alone.  Situations come our way, some of which appear to be “bad.”  This is merely our faulty perception.  There is a gift in every circumstance God provides for us.  If we say “yes” to it, we are readily available to receive that gift.  If we say “no,” we are just pushing it away.

Have you ever noticed that if a situation isn’t going so well, and you try to reject it, it just keeps coming back - and oftentimes, it gets worse?  That is precisely because we haven’t accepted the gift which that apparently “bad” situation holds.  Accept, rather than except.  Remember that Joy and Peace abide in all things, in all people and in all situations.  Sometimes we need to work a little to find it (and this is only because our minds have been re-programmed by the faulty ways of the world), but there is always a gift awaiting us.

In a situation that appears to be lacking in Joy, in Peace and in Love - in a situation where we find it particularly difficult to forgive - we must surrender it to God.  Trust in His Strength.  Like an onion, the layers of darkness must be peeled away one by one, which will eventually reveal the Light within.  A situation like this occurred for me just this evening.  I was in a disagreement where I saw no solution.  After I realized this, I said calmly to the other person, "There is Joy in this. We may not be able to recognize it now, since we are in the process of peeling away the outer layer.  But it is there."  Then we surrendered it to God.

We are prone to forget, living in the world we do.  The Real World is blind to us here, yet if we look deeply enough, we can feel it.

Imagine a world where we could actually see with our physical eyes the Joy and Love around us.  Imagine if we could gaze at the Energy connecting each one of us together.  Imagine if we could look at the Strength of Peace we all possess, which binds us all to one another.

We may not be able to see these things with our frail, human eyes, but we can sense them, and we can feel them, and we can bring their effects into the physical world we inhabit.  Joy and Peace are our inheritance.  They are ours to take freely, they are ours to give openly - they are ours to share unconditionally.  So let us make manifest the Glory of God.  Let us bring Joy and Peace, Love and Light, and their unparalleled Strength into all that we create here on earth, and we will behold Beauty like we never imagined possible.

Until tomorrow,
Journeyman

Day 103: God, being Love, is also happiness.

God is Love.  God is Peace.  God is Truth.  And God is Happiness.

God, being Love, is also happiness.
To fear Him is to be afraid of joy.

The Course continues: 

Happiness is an attribute of love.  It cannot be apart from it.  Nor can it be experienced where love is not.  Love has no limits, being everywhere.  And therefore joy is everywhere as well.  Yet can the mind deny that this is so, believing there are gaps in love where sin can enter, bringing pain instead of joy.  This strange belief would limit happiness by redefining love as limited, and introducing opposition in what has no limit and no opposite.

The only reason to fear joy is if we believe it comes at a price.  This is a belief in sin, in something which opposes God's Kingdom.  This is a futile notion.  Do you really think God, the Origin of All tihngs, would create something that would (or could) oppose Him so?

What appears as opposition is actually an opportunity, for there is a pearl of Joy awaiting if we make the effort to look deeply enough - in every situation.  Peel away the darkness you perceive layer by layer until you reach the gem within.  See opportunity where you once saw opposition, and you will be blessed with Joy in every moment of your life.

Since God is Happiness, and we are part of God, we, too, are Happiness.  We often forget this, and focus instead on what we are not.  We have made many shadows in this world, but there cannot be shadow without light.  All we must do, then, is turn around to behold the Light that surrounds us.  The shadow, in fact, is only an illusion.  It can do us no real harm.  It's only a shadow, after all.  But light is something else entirely.  Light allows us to See.  And though shadow requires light for its presence, light does not require shadow.  Light is everywhere, in everything and everyone.  When we perceive darkness, it is only because we have turned our backs on the Light.  In Truth, the darkness is not there, nor was it ever - nor could it ever be.

So what do we do?  How do we exude Light and Joy wherever we go?  Must we smile a minimum number of times a day?  Must we set a goal of good samaritan deeds?  What do we do if we are in a place where happiness does not appear to be ever-present (perhaps a place, for instance, like the DMV)?  Many times, most of the times, it isn't necessary to do anything, but simply to Be - Be Joy, Be Love, Be Peace, and watch as the Miraculous unfolds all around you.  Where happiness appears to be absent, bring yourself and your inherent Joy to it, and it will light up all the happiness hidden in the apparent shadows.

For today then, let us remember Who We Are and from Where We Come.  We are Beings of Light.  We are Beings of Love.  We are Beings of Joy.  Let us simply Be, and Happiness will surely shine all around us.

Until tomorrow,
Journeyman

Day 102: I share God's Will for happiness for me.

As we have learned in previous lessons, our sole function here is forgiveness, which is the same as our salvation.  Though we have mentioned this before, today A Course in Miracles confirms that Joy is our function - for it is one with Forgiveness and Love, and the means to our Salvation.

I share God's Will for happiness for me, and I accept it as my function now.

The concept of "share" conjoined with "happiness" in today's meditation reminded me of an important moral in one of my favorite films of 2007, Into the Wild.  At the end of the movie, the main character, based on the real-life Christopher McCandless, learns an important truth.  He writes in his book before dying alone in the abandoned camper where he had been sleeping, "Happiness only real when shared." 

Aha, I thought.  This is the reason for our creation.  As I noted in yesterday's blog post, our purpose here on earth is to experience Joy in as many facets as we possibly can.  This is because we are a conduit for God, an individuated Aspect of Divinity.  We are part of Him, and our existence is for the purpose of experiencing the infinite levels of Joy.  God, as the Origin of All, already knows this.  But it could not become Real, it could not be actualized, until He shared it.  In order to share his Sublime Happiness, He created us, His Children (or as A Course in Miracles refers to us, the Sonship).  To be sure the Sonship remained forever connected to Him, God created the Holy Spirit, entrusted with the duty to keep us joined to Him and to one another.  And so the Holy Trinity came to be.

In the same way God experiences Happiness by sharing it with us (and through us), we experience our highest degree of happiness by sharing it with others.  There is no greater joy than bringing joy to another.  By doing so, we actualize it, and we magnify our own inherent happiness within us.

But what do we do when we seem to be stuck in an unhappy situation?  How do we retain that feeling of joy, which is our function here?  Again, we must see the sadness, the loneliness, the anger and the fear for what it really is - an illusion.  There is a miracle if we have the will to join with God and look beyond what we initially perceive.  And in that miracle there awaits the gift of Joy.

The darkness will fall away in time.  That is one of the gifts the construct of time provides.  In Reality, there is no time.  But time is necessary in our world in order that we may extract as much and as many joyous experiences as possible.  Think about our memories.  Once we have "gotten over" a particularly negative situation (which is the same as having forgiven it), we no longer recall any emotion when revisiting it.  We can list off our past traumas as monotonously as we do a grocery list.  That is because their emotional value is not retained, because it has no value.  If we do get emotional when revisiting these old wounds, then we can consider it a message that we still have forgiveness to do in that area.

The memories that do incite emotion, no matter how much time has passed, are the joyous ones.  The reason for this is simple: Only Joy is Real.  Only emotions that spring from Love are eternal.  Once we have seen past the darkness of our illusory emotions, they can no longer haunt us.  We learn from them, and by doing so, we can access the Happiness that lies beyond.

Let us consider today's lesson yet another step in leading a completely happy life.  We are getting closer to understanding how it all works.  Let's get a head start and begin experiencing our God-given Joy by sharing our triumphs, our laughter and our smiles with all those around us.  And let us watch that happiness magnify ten times over, and even more until the whole world is singing with glee.

Until tomorrow,
Journeyman

Day 101: God's Will for me is perfect happiness.

Today we are reminded that God created us with Love, and that the expression of that Love is joyous.

God's Will for me is perfect happiness.

The workbook lesson in A Course in Miracles elaborates on this message of good tiding:

God's Will for you is perfect happiness because there is no sin, and suffering is causeless.  Joy is just, and pain is but the sign you have misunderstood yourself.  Fear not the Will of God.  But turn to it in confidence that it will set you free from all the consequences sin has wrought in feverish imagination... There is no sin; it has no consequence.

God wills for us to have perfect happiness, because our purpose of being created is to experience every multitude of Joy we can extract in our existence.  We are a part of God, so why would He have us experience anything less than the grandest and happiest experiences?

We have been given free will in order to yield an infinite number of joyful experiences.  If we had no free will, we would be limited in our ability to experience the Divine in as many ways as we could conceive.  The unfortunate aspect of free will is that we may also choose to have fear-based experiences, which we only do when we forget Who We Really Are.  These negative experiences are the result of what we call sin.  But they do not exist.  They are illusions, and as such, there is no such thing as sin.  In actuality, even the good things we experience on the physical plane of earth are illusions, but the emotional response we have to each experience – that quality of the experience which moves our spirit – is retained by us and by God in a very Real place, forever awaiting us in Heaven.  These are the pearls of Delight we have been sent here to retrieve.

Our purpose of being here is to experience Joy, Love, and Peace in as many ways as possible.  We are incarnated as trillions of different life-forms on this planet alone, and an infinite number more on other planets, because no one physical being could possibly experience all of the aspects of Joy that God is capable of.  We are His messengers of Joy, and for Joy.  And where His individuated Aspects of Divinity have forgotten Who They Really Are – where they have begun to make physical manifestations of fear over Love – we are here to remind them.  We do this through Forgiveness, which is also our salvation.  This, too, is a unique experience of Joy, for what else could produce such a feeling of warmth and care and satisfaction than being of service to your Brothers and Sisters?

Let the Happiness which God has bestowed upon you well up within and radiate outward all throughout your days.  Let the Spirit of your Joy be infectious, so that others may recognize within themselves the Perfect Joy of God residing in the core of their Being.  We can do no wrong, so let us forgive ourselves and one another for any perceived transgressions from the past.  The pain is an illusion, but the Joy we feel when we See past the pain is kept safe for us in the Reality of our Lord in Heaven.  It is ours eternally.

Be blessed, be well, and bear Light unto your Brothers and Sisters here on earth.

Until tomorrow,
Journeyman