All things are lessons God would have me learn.
It is possible to experience peace in this world, a facsimile of what we will know when we remember again that what we are in truth is not separate from what God is. The means of peace is forgiveness: the sharing of our perception with the Holy Spirit, that it might be directed toward Heaven rather than the ego’s self-serving hell.
Lesson 193 of A Course in Miracles is a clear and explicit statement of this principle: there is nothing in this world that cannot serve the purpose of salvation if we will simply share it with the Holy Spirit and Jesus. Given to the Teacher who knows the way Home, all things facilitate that longed-for return.
However abstract or unrealistic or even complicated this idea might seem, it is in reality quite simple: the only lesson that we really need to learn is “forgive and you will see this differently” (W-pI.193.3:7).
The form of the lessons changes constantly, but its content – the healing power of forgiveness – never does. Thus, we might be forgiving a spouse for being impatient or angry. Then we might be forgiving the President of the United States for advancing a policy with which we disagree. Then we might be forgiving the neighbor’s dog who barks too loud. Then the homeless guy outside our office. Then the rain. Then daylight savings. Then chocolate . . .
How do we know that these things – and myriad others need to be forgiven in the mode of A Course in Miracles? By the degree to which we still experience pain – if we are upset or angry or wracked with need or sad or grieving, then it is certain that we have not yet fully shared with the Holy Spirit.
Don’t let this become yet another source of guilt! Jesus and the Holy Spirit are models of truly infinite patience. They merely await our willingness, healing as much as we are able to share with them, and then quietly resting while we summon the willingness to offer yet more seeming strife and anguish. It’s not a crime to take this by degrees.
But when we are ready to be free of suffering – and to know the peace that surpasses understanding – we can begin to approach our lives with the earnest diligence of the student who is ready – like really ready – to graduate.
Let mercy come to your more quickly. Do not try to hold it off another day, another minute or another instant. Time was made for this. Use it today for what its purpose is. Morning and night, devote what time you can to serving its proper aim, and do not let t time be less than meets your deepest need (W-pI.193.10:2-6).
Our deepest need is to end the seeming separation and return to God. Nothing will satisfy us – nothing – but to restore to our memory the Source of our Creation and to know ourselves again as what we are in Truth.
The way to do this is to see in each form that presents itself – in work, in family, in friends, in the news, in our reading, our dog walks, our seeming idle thoughts, our dreams, our longings, our memories – as yet another opportunity to forgive and thus see differently.
God would not have you suffer thus. He would help you forgive yourself. His Son does not remember who he is. And God would have him not forget His Love, and all the gifts His Love brings with it (W-pI.193.8:1-4).
Joy is a daily thing – and peace is sure when we refuse to cling to the ego, the frail and malicious self, that seeks to replace God and control all things. Let go. Let the Holy Spirit teach you how to see the forest, how to see the other drivers, how to see children and cats, and sunsets and cheesecakes.
The purpose of our existence is merely to practice forgiveness that we might remember we are wrong about what we are and thus deeply confused about our true existence. We are given a Teacher who can lead us home as surely as a river finds the sea. In this lesson, Jesus urges us to avail ourselves of that Guide – and to give salvation as much of our willingness as we possibly we can.
Heaven waits on us. And we want nothing less.
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Again, thank you. It never ceases to amaze me how just what I need, when I need it, is provided for me. I needed to read this today.
I’m glad it was helpful, June! Thank you for being here.
Sean
Traveling to the West Coast today to spend some time with family. Stashing this in my “carry on” …
“Joy is a daily thing – and peace is sure when we refuse to cling to the ego, the frail and malicious self, that seeks to replace God and control all things”
Thanks, as always, for investing your time and energy in these messages.
They are, as always, appreciated more than you know…..
You’re welcome, Cheryl – and thank you for the kind words. Safe travels west!
Sean
Hi Sean,
Loved reading this:) I have just had a BIG forgiveness lesson and was feeling very disappointed with myself for not being able to truly forgive for 4 days! It was so painful, so I kept taking it to the Holy Spirit for help. That helped for a while and then the resentment would build up again. The thing is I didn’t give up and just kept taking back to HS and finally he has helped me see with true vision. The thing is I see it so differently now and the pain that was so intense just is no longer there. If just amazes me that somthing so hurtful to me could now be seen so differently. The point to this is don’t give up, I am not proud that it me took 4 days to see the truth behind it all I admit, but thank goodness we can rely on the Holy Spirit to help us see how it really is.
Thanks again Sean,
Love Suzy
Hi Suzy,
Thanks so much for sharing – I hear you. In fact, holding onto a resentment for just 4 days seems positively holy to me – I think I’m still working through stuff that happened forty years ago! But yes, absolutely, we are not doing it alone – we have the Holy Spirit and even one another as we work our way towards Light!
Thanks for being here –
Sean
HI SEAN
CAN YOU REWRITE THE COURSE IN THE LANGUAGE OF SEAN. I WOULD REALLY LOVE THAT
PEACE AND LOVE
YOUR FRIEND ALWAYS
MARY
🙂
Thank you Mary . . . that brought a big smile to my face – I needed that today!
🙂 Mary IS just telling like it is for many of us, and I see it as the Holy Spirit provided us with another brother named Sean to help us make it easier by simplifying the Truth in various ways like using Mother Nature and the many unreal examples that we can relate to in our dream. I’m especially appreciating the way Sean, put the words together in that 6th paragraph, after the very helpful 5 preceding it. God Bless us all still awake and at Home, as we wait to realize it. Warm HUGZ2ALL, sally
Thank you Sally – hugs back to you!
Sean
Sally, your comment made me go back and re-read Sean’s post. (I think I sometimes breeze through Sean’s post – it’s my resistance that doesnt let me read his posts carefully all the time, my ego fearful of being even more totally melted away !).
Now, thanks to your comment, I went back and re-read the 5th and 6th paragraph. and I “learnt” something afresh. That brief ah-ha moment.
Thank you, Mary and thank you, Sean ! (:
Anil
Although this was posted on the 5th, I only got around to it today and it turns out that TODAY is the day that I really needed to read it! Miracles within miracles! Thank you, Holy Spirit, and thank you, Sean, for your willingness and time in representing the Voice that we all need to hear (read)!
You’re welcome, Aleta – glad it was helpful!
oops, it was posted on the 3rd (not the 5th). Even more miraculous!
Hi Sean, thank you so much for this, and all of your wisdom! It is so truly helpful!
A little question and curiosity towards this lesson… Are we instructed to apply forgiveness to the feelings/emotions we are experiencing, as well as our thoughts?
🙂
You’re welcome, Daniel.
An interesting question is where does a thought begin or end and a feeling/emotion begin (or end)? They seem to intersect in some fundamental way.
So, in that sense, and in the sense of forgiveness as clear-seeing-in-order-to-know-the-truth-and-respond-to-it-creatively-and-helpfully, yes. I think extending our forgiveness pratice in ways that encompass feeling and emotion makes sense.
More basically, for me, thoughts can be hard to see clearly, especially the ones that are deep down. Freud was onto something when he observed the subconscious as a reservoir of being to which we are mostly unaware!
And so the feelings – because they are more primitive, live differently in the body, and make different demands on my sense of self – become excellent pointers to the thoughts that are especially hard to notice, either because they are buried so deep or because they are masquerading so effectively (e.g., anger as righteousness).
Does that make sense?
Always our rule of thumb is: does it work? Does it help? If we feel called – and being curious is a form of the Holy Spirit speaking to us – to practice a lesson or sequence of lessons in a certain way – it’s not a bad idea (no pun intended) to try and see what happens.
Even our errors have teaching value – sometimes especially so!
Thank you for reading and sharing this path with me, Daniel.
~ Sean
Sean, thank you so much. This is a truly wonderful reply.
Very appreciative and grateful!
🙂