My mind holds only what I think with God.
In quiet I receive God’s Word today (Lesson 125).
All that I give is given to myself (Lesson 126).
“Quiet” in this context refers to what is going on in our minds, not what is happening externally. You can practice this lesson on a bench in Times Square or a mountain Zendo equally.
It’s true setting up a space in which to pray can be helpful. It’s true waking a little earlier in order to be alone is often helpful. Those conditions can help our as yet-untrained minds settle.
But they are not necessary. They are not required. What is necessary is to give attention to what is happening in our minds. What are we thinking about? What can we not help but think about? What should we think more about and who decided? How do thoughts drive feelings and vice-versa? Isn’t everything we do an effect of thought? Isn’t the world just a thought upon a thought upon a thought?
When we see the tangled skein these questions weave and never quite leave behind via that elusive thought named “answer,” we might get curious if there is anything beyond or outside thought. If thought doesn’t know, what does? We might look into this nonconceptual awareness we hear about. We might discover what Tara Singh called the space between thoughts.
When we do this over and over – this is a very rigorous process until it’s not – we might find a kindness and an intelligence that is not of thought and not of the body either. What is it? Can we be in dialogue with it? Does it know us? How?
The answers to these questions are subsumed by what A Course in Miracles calls “God’s Word.” It doesn’t matter what we call it. What matter is our willingness to listen and to understand. Our willingness is our declaration that there must be another way.
When we make this declaration we do not make it alone. We make it for all our brothers and sisters, from the dust motes to tiger sharks to quasars. And some of them – channeling Helen Schucman unto Bill Thetford – will answer us. They will say: yes, I will help you find this other way. Let’s begin right now.
Does it make sense? You are not sitting quietly alone today – you are sitting with everyone, and everyone is sitting with you. Everything you give is given to yourself and all I can say is thank you. Thank you.
