The Ego Is Self-Imposed Darkness

We all make an ego for ourselves – a self, an identity – and, critically, we also make one for every other person that we perceive (T-4.II.2:1). This is important! It’s not just our self that we’re fogging with bad ideas and guilty thoughts, but everyone else too. It’s not an ideal approach to inner peace – not for us and not for our brothers and sisters.

It is helpful sometimes to make contact with this fact: to sit quietly with a cup of tea and look closely at the egos we have made for others. This person is attractive. That person “gets us.” This person is mean, that one is generous. She makes too much money while he is too self-righteous. Irish people drink too much and Germans are too efficient. Buddhists are peaceful, Catholics are repressed. Men are from Mars, women are from Venus.

We all do it and we all do it for the same reason: we want something. We are raging oceans of emptiness and darkness and want other people to fix it. We want them to love us, comfort us, feed us, entertain us, console us. We assign roles – lover, parent, friend, soul mate, student, teacher – and expect everyone to dance accordingly. When they do, we think we’re happy because we’re getting what we want. When they don’t, we are poor victims of unjust external forces. Either way the ego wins.

This is the root of conflict. It’s not money and it’s not sex. It is the false self we believe we are that creates false selves for every other being we perceive.

So what do we do? We need to see the total futility of ego-based thinking. When we do, we will reach the point that Bill Thetford reached: we will declare that there must be another way.

Belief that there is another way of perceiving is the loftiest idea of which ego thinking is capable. That is because it contains a hint of recognition that the ego is not the Self (T-4.II.4:10-11).

That point is a sort of surrender. It reflects the shred of willingness that is all the Holy Spirit needs to begin to teach us “the other way.” We begin to perceive our brothers and sisters without bringing our own needs and wants into it. It’s not that our needs and wants aren’t there – they are and they will be so long as we believe we are bodies in the world – but that they are no longer as powerful. They float up and we know they aren’t the only game in town. So their stranglehold on us loosens.

It is an incredible gift to look at a person and leave – or will to leave – your predetermined sense of them behind. It liberates them. It validates them at the level of spirit. And it releases us a little as well, because only spirit can perceive spirit. So when we make this effort to put aside the egos we make for everybody, we are also putting aside our own ego.

This is the practice of right-mindedness which leads naturally to right perception – a critical step in our awakening journey. Right perception is the ground from which on the One-mindedness of the Holy Spirit springs (T-4.II.10:1-2).

The ego cannot survive without judgment, and is laid aside accordingly. The mind then has only one direction in which it can move (T-4.II.10:3-4).

Often, when I am interacting with others, I make a point of giving attention to the ego I make for them. As importantly, I make a point of remembering that they have made one for me. It reminds me to breathe and relax. We are all sort of fumbling through this self-imposed darkness. The best I can do is rein in, as much as possible, my own projections. Really, what else is there to do?

Beginning Again (Hand in Hand)

Beginnings matter. Beginning again matters. This is the promise of A Course in Miracles: that at any moment we might begin again. It doesn’t matter what kind of student we were yesterday or an hour ago. What matters is our willingness in this moment to accept the Holy Spirit’s judgment of Life.

In a sense, that is all the course does for us: renders us capable of making better decision within the complete and utter hash we make of our lives. It teaches us that we are not mistaken when we long for a better way, and then it gives us very practical steps by which to experience that better way.

You will undertake a journey because you are not at home in this world. And you will search for your home whether you realize it or not. If you believe it is outside you the search will be futile, for you will be seeking it where it is not. You do not remember how to look within for you do not believe your home is there. Yet the Holy Spirit remembers it for you, and He will guide you to your home because that is His mission (T-12.IV.5:1-5).

Is it hard to be a follower? I wonder sometimes. When we insist that we know the way or that Truth is outside of us – in a relationship, in a job, in social status, in a cultural identity – we are not really followers. Or we are the ego’s followers.

Following Jesus or the Holy Spirit is simpler than following the ego. Following the egoic self – no matter how smooth and cool and proficient we are – is always a bit like the proverbial bull in a china shop.

When my kids were little and we went places, they always took my hand. Have you held a child’s hand? It is very natural. They sort of reach for you and your hand opens to meet theirs. Their trust is complete, as if your guidance were perfect. They rest safely in the field of your attention. It is a form of Love, of giving and receiving simultaneously, in one fluid motion.

That is what following the Holy Spirit is like. There is nothing intellectual about it. It’s not a negotiation – I’ll go with you this far but then I get to walk in front for a few yards. It is an utter surrender to the safety of Love. We don’t trust that yet or we would have done it lifetimes ago but that’s okay. We are learning.

As [the Holy Spirit] fulfills His mission He will teach you yours, for your mission is the same as His. By guiding your brothers home you are but following Him (T-12.IV.5:6-7).

Again, this is not hard! We make it hard, but it’s not. We are forming a sort of daisy chain, each of us reaching out to the other with one hand as the other is enveloped in the Infinite. And together we step through the illusory world to our true home in Christ, in Heaven.

It is not a hard journey because there is nowhere to go. We are already Home – we already have everything for which we long because we are everything.

Your inheritance can neither be bought nor sold. There can be no disinherited parts of the Sonship, for God is whole and all His extensions are like Him (T-12.IV.6:7-8).

Our awareness of oneness – the journey that goes nowhere because there is no place to go – happens in an instant. It is a moment in which we allow the remembrance of Christ to dawn in our minds. “Your inheritance awaits only the recognition that you have been redeemed” (T-12.IV.7:5).

That is what it means to begin again – to be born again: in any moment we might choose to see that we are redeemed, that salvation is already accomplished. And that recognition is facilitated by accepting the sure guidance of the Holy Spirit: not in abject surrender but joyous surrender: we are taking the hand of the one who knows the way Home.

Forgiveness (With A Lower Case F)

I have been thinking a great deal lately about forgiveness with a lowercase f. I mean the ordinary – the traditional – experience of forgiveness. Of accepting apologies, letting grudges go, and moving on with our brothers and sisters.

That is a different understanding of forgiveness than that espoused by A Course in Miracles (which is why I distinguish it with a lowercase f). In terms of the course, forgiveness is a way of seeing, or a shift in perception, by which we see our brothers and sisters not as enemies but as friends (e.g., T-17.9:1-3).

In that sense, forgiveness essentially undoes our specialness – our uniqueness – by allowing us to perceive everyone equally (e.g., T-25.IX.8:1). Since we cannot really do this on our own, we turn to Jesus and the Holy Spirit to help us, adopting their sight in place of our own (e.g., T-5.I.3:1-2, T-5.II.11:1).

Thus, as students of A Course in Miracles, we do not take note of the so-called wrongs other people do to us, then agree to overlook them because we are following a spiritual path, have evolved to a higher understanding of love, and so forth. Doing that just makes the error real (e.g., T-30.VI.4:1). And the course emphasizes that what we actually are cannot  hurt or wronged or injured (T-in.2:2-3). To believe otherwise is literally what it means to be separated, and it inevitably forces our brothers and sisters into separation-based thinking and experience as well.

That’s well and good – better than well and good, actually – but how are we to handle the fact that we aren’t always in that space? What do we do when we believe that we have been treated unfairly or poorly? That we have been wronged?

In this world – in these bodies – that is going to happen from time to time, even to those of us who are maybe starting to feel consistently peaceful and happy, and for whom applying ACIM principles is our default mode of behavior.

I think in those situations, forgiveness with a lowercase “f” – just accepting that bad stuff happens, people screw up, including us from time to time, and so why not just let it go – isn’t a bad policy.

That is, we can just enact basic, traditional forgiveness with the understanding that A Course in Miracles proposes another way that we have yet to fully and functionally embrace.

And that is okay, so long as it reminds us to remain committed to our ACIM practice.

Really, what I am saying here, is that even traditional forgiveness – ordinary forgiveness – can be a form of love.

“I forgive you.” We don’t even have to say it out loud. We don’t have to make a big production out of it. But we can let our hearts enter that space of forgiveness as love. It’s okay; it’s more than okay.

It is particular loving and helpful when we can yoke it to the metaphysics behind A Course in Miracles. That is, we can have a forgiving heart here in the world while remembering that there is another way to understand the experience.

If we do that, sooner or later, we are going to be enable to enact that experience – forgiveness with a capital F, if you will.

More and more one appreciates the importance of kindness in ones practice. It is a kind of service unto our brothers and sisters, and the world that together we bring forth. When we are kind, our mind is less boxed in by the ego. There is more room to remember that what we actually are is formless and cannot be injured or harmed.

This, in turn, undoes our sense of vulnerability, and the accompanying need to defend oneself. It testifies to the truth of “nothing real can be threatened” (T-in.2:2).

Forgiveness in the world isn’t going to bring us to Heaven, to that pre-separation state of formlessness and love. But there can be a gentleness to it, a lovingkindness. It is a way of saying to our brothers and sisters, “we are in this together and I don’t want to get hung up on the little things. I don’t want to forget you or forsake you.”

Really, this is just about being nice! It sounds so simple but it’s hard. If you look around, you can see this. People are scared and stressed and sad. They are impatient and overwhelmed. I am too. It happens.

The question is: what can we do about it?

Well, we can be nice. In ordinary, common sense ways, we can be helpful and gentle and kind. Why not? It opens a little space in which we can remember – and maybe even share – that this world is not our home.

Response, Reaction and A Course in Miracles

Response is not often called for. Things happen, both internally and externally, but we don’t have to respond to them. We don’t have to act.

Often, when we sit quietly and do nothing in particular, we notice that life goes on. If we are really attentive, then we will also see that what goes on includes us. It even includes our attention. It is like a river, a movement which enfolds us at every level. It is hard to talk about intelligently or clearly.

Response is different from reaction. Reaction is what we notice after: the bee stings us and we react and then after we see what occurred. Or somebody steps on our toe and we shout “how dare you step on my toe! I am going to hire a lawyer!” And then – a moment later, an hour later, a year later – we see what happened.

It is not that reaction is outside our control – it is not – but that we are only aware of it after the fact.

Response, on the other hand, follows deliberation – at least a little. Something happens and instead of reacting, we give it space. There is a moment or two – sometimes more – of reflection. We see the potential for anger or self-righteousness or whatever and we just sit with it. Maybe we will do something and maybe we won’t.

It’s important not to confuse response as being somehow better than reaction. It’s not, at least not inherently. Both are actions. Both can emerge from either right- or wrong-minded thinking. They’re just different, that’s all. And it’s a good difference to notice.

There is a quality of attention that nurtures our practice of A Course in Miracles. It is a way of sharing awareness with our healed mind. The field of our awareness picks up so much: sunlight on brooks, black bears in trees, hurt feelings when people don’t respond the way we want, anger when the government does this instead of that. We’re hungry, we have to be in a meeting in ten minutes, the lawn needs to be mowed . . .

What A Course in Miracles calls the ego – a self made to substitute for our healed mind – adopts a judgmental approach to this. Sunlight and black bears are good. Mosquitoes and ATVs are bad. Hunger is okay when there’s a rhubarb pie waiting; it’s bad when we’re driving on the highway. And so forth.

That is what passes for attention in the world: but it is merely judgment based on desire. It is merely the body giving credence to perceived orders of need, all of which place it at the center.

There is another way to be attentive and that is to allow the healed mind – the Holy Spirit – to manage the flow of our awareness. This is the opposite of judgment because the healed mind is focused not on appetite but on what is real vs. what is false. And because it can effortlessly distinguish between them, it is unafraid. It is never overwhelmed. There is never any basis for guilt.

When we give attention to the healed mind, there is only inner peace. We do not feel stressed or upset. Whatever enters our awareness is gently lit by Love. It’s hard to write about, but you know the feeling. You cannot be disturbed. It’s very simple and natural.

When we are in that space, there is no question of “what should I do?” Doing flows in that space, surely and naturally.

Why aren’t we always in that space? What happens?

The habit of engaging with God and His creations is easily made if you actively refuse to let your mind slip away. The problem is not one of concentration; it is the belief that no one, including yourself, is worth consistent effort (T-4.IV.7:1-2).

Those are potentially liberating sentences! They suggest that engagement with God is natural, a sort of default state from which we can stray but which we can never impair or denigrate. The problem isn’t that God is distant or hard to reach or demanding but that we are unwilling to make the consistent effort to ensure the divine contact.

And why do we not make that effort? Because we believe that we aren’t worthy of it. If we question this – our worthiness or lack thereof – we will see that it, too, reflects our sense of separation from God. If we aren’t worthy, then we must be something other than a Creation of God.

We all believe this on some level. We wouldn’t be here – reading, writing – if we didn’t. And yet it’s worth questioning, isn’t it? It’s worth considering there might be another way – a gentler way, a more natural way. That is the premise of A Course in Miracles: are we ready to try a different approach to God? Are we ready to question our separation?

Thus, when we find ourselves vexed by the question of right action – of what response, if any, is required under any given circumstances – we are really staring squarely at our separation from God. So long as we insist on action, on choosing this action vs. that one, then we are working from the assumption that we are not what God created.

To be in the mind of atonement is to give over one’s attention: to let go of the way of thinking that says “we” know what’s best and it’s “our” job to do it. The separation is simply a habit of thinking that God is not present and so it’s up to us to handle things. When we are ready, we can let that go. Nothing is required but willingness: to accept there is another way, and to wait as it reveals itself.

Atonement is Collaborative

I am often reminded – always at fortuitous times – that we wake up together. A Course in Miracles means this at both the gross physical level and at the spiritual level. Atonement is collaborative.

Accepting the Atonement for yourself means not to give support to someone’s dreeam of sickness and death. It means you share not his wish to separate, and let him turn illusions on himself. Nor do you wish that they be turned, instead, on you. Thus they have no effects (T-28.IV.1:1-4).

Attention is an important aspect of studying A Course in Miracles. In order to offer separation-based thinking to the Holy Spirit (which is our healed, or unsplit, mind), we have to be aware that we are thinking that way. We have to see it.

The Holy Spirit is not an abstract entity floating in space. It is, rather, our capacity to be attentive without judgment. In a sense, when we are aware that we are thinking in a way that God would not, and we are not upset or disturbed by this fact but can simply let it pass, then we can be sure we are thinking with the Holy Spirit.

The course’s devotion to Freud – and by extension, to the psychotherapy model – is neither an accident nor an afterthought. At its best – and very generally speaking – psychotherapy aims at a level of self-awareness sufficient to alter undesirable or unhelpful behaviors. We realize that we are repeating patterns and that recognition allows us to adopt new strategies or shift gears or what have you.

We are doing something similar when we practice A Course in Miracles. We are becoming aware of habits of thought (from which behavior proceeds) that are predicated on a perceived separation of God. We learn that there is another way to perceive and, in time, adopt that new perception. We begin to identify with the Holy Spirit.

That is what the course means when it asks us not to indulge one another’s dream of separation. You and I are having the same bad dream: the course invites us to look past that, to accept the possibility – and then to see the possibility as firm reality – that we are joined as a single radiant extension of God’s Love.

[S]eparation is but an empty place between the ripples that a ship has made in passing by. And covered just as fast, as water rushes in to close the gap, and as the waves in joining cover it. Where is the gap between the waves when have joined, and covered up the space which seemed to keep them separate for a little while? (T-28.III.5:2-4)

Our perception of ourselves as separated bodies leading personal and highly differentiated lives is literally the space between what is in Truth already joined. Inner peace comes when we accept that space as illusory .

Where are the grounds for sickness when the minds have joined to close the little gap between them, where the seeds of sickness seemed to grow? (T-28.III.5:5)

Attention helps us to become aware of that space. Expressions of love dissolve it.

For a little while, our expression of love must assume a form. That is not a detriment but a gift! We can actively seek out those forms of existence in which God’s love is perceived most clearly and joyfully and then extend them. This not effortful but natural – in line with how one wave joins another on the sea.

What is the simplest and most natural expression of love of which you are capable? There is a way that God’s Love shines through you in very practical ways, blessing everyone it encounters. What is it?

Your savior waits for healing, and the world waits with him. Nor are you apart from it. For healing will be one or not at all, its oneness being where the healing is . . . There is no middle ground in any aspect of salvation (T-28.VII.2:3-5, 7).

And so we choose love: at the level of spirit, where we know we are Love, and at the level of form, where the tired world awaits our kindness in order to remember we are One.

The Holy Instant and Inner Peace

That we have problems in the world perhaps goes without saying. We get a flat tire or we don’t have enough  money to pay the mortgage or we can’t find a library book that’s due. A Course in Miracles does not deny our experience of problems like this, but it does suggest that we are trying to solve them in ways that do not lead to inner peace.

For example, if our tire is flat, and the spare is flat too, and our phone battery is dead, and it starts to rain, we are perhaps going to call the situation problematic. Inherent in calling it a problem is our idea of a solution: we need someone to help us fix the tire so we can get to where it’s dry (and plug in our phone).

At an even simpler level, if we say the problem is we are hungry, then the solution is that we must eat.

In other words, as soon as we judge something as “a problem,” we have expressed a preference for its solution.

The world asks but one question. It is this: “Of these illusions, which of them is true? Which ones establish peace and offer joy? And which can bring escape from all the pain of which this world is made?” Whatever form the question takes, its purpose is the same. It asks but to establish sin is real, and answers in the form of preference (T-27.IV.4:4-9).

The real problem with solutions on worldly terms to the world’s problems is that they are not solutions at all. We can fix the flat tire today but the spark plug is going to go tomorrow. The body is always hungry for something: food, water, sex, meditation, dancing, sleep, poetry and so forth.

The world’s solutions are not permanent but rather expressions of preference. I’d like to not be standing in the rain with a dead phone. I’d rather be writing poems and drinking coffee than heading in to work. And so forth.

None of that is to say that we can’t feed ourselves or enjoy our relationships or take care of our cars. We can and we should. But it is important to see how those things can never – of themselves – bring us to inner peace.

It is possible to have an answer to every problem the world offers right now. In fact, right now is the only time in which God’s answer is possible.

Jesus recognizes our quandary perfectly. On the one hand, the world in which we find ourselves as bodies is a place of endless and unsolvable conflict. Hence our problem-laden lives. On the other hand, God has given us the answer which means that we have no problems.

Thus it must be that time is not involved and every problem can be answered now. Yet it must also be that, in your state of mind, solution is impossible. Therefore, God must have given you a way of reaching another state of mind in which the answer is already there (T-27.IV.2:1-3).

That state of mind is the holy instant. When we are in the present moment, free of past worries and future fears, all our problems dissolve. Judgment always involves time: we compare the present to the past, find the present wanting, and so project an improved future.

Attempt to solve no problem but within the holy instant’s surety. For there the problem will be answered and resolved (T-27.IV.3:1-2).

How do we do this? First, we can ask for help. We seek a space of interior quiet and ask for help in seeing things differently. We can simply say to Jesus or the Holy Spirit, “I’m having a hard time here and if you can lend a little light in whatever form makes sense to you, that’d be great. Thanks.”

Prayer can quiet troubled minds. It almost always reminds us that we are not alone.

The other thing that we can do is simply notice that we’re not in the holy instant. We want things to be different – a better car, a better phone, a better driving companion, whatever. We don’t beat ourselves up for that. We simply notice it. We give attention to the fact that we are in a place of separation, not atonement.

Those two steps almost always restore to us some measure of inner peace. Prayer and attention are witnesses to our deep willingness to be transformed, to give way to the light of Christ. In the end, that is the only answer: to accept that we are extensions of God’s Love, the way roses and whales and starlight are extensions of God’s love. This love has always been and will always be and so nothing – not even death – can affect it.

Yes, that seems to be far down the road. I get that. I feel that way too sometimes. But I can also tell you that as we deepen our practice and commitment, guided by A Course in Miracles, we begin to sense that peace is not far off at all. Rather, it is what we are in truth, and all we are doing now is remembering. At any moment – even this one if you want – you can experience all there is to know of God’s deep, abiding and perfect Love.