Looking at the Looker

So as we go through our lives there is a sense in which we feel wronged, say, or blessed. Things happen, people do things, or don’t do things, and we experience those effects as good or bad, and then respond accordingly. But we never give much attention to the self that is experiencing these effects and formulating a response. We never look at the looker. We take the looker for granted, which is strange when you consider its apparent prevalence and influence.

What A Course in Miracles calls the “ego” and what it calls “separation” are closely related. You really can’t have one without the other. The separation occurred over millions of years (T-2.VIII.2:5), and so the ego has had that much time to evolve as well (T-3.IV.2:1-2). If we strip away the religious and poetic language of ACIM, then the ego is really just a habit of thinking, a mode of perception that is not very helpful, because it does not perceive reality as it is but rather how it would prefer reality to be. So the ego is always perpetuating an illusion through which we stumble, wreaking all kinds of havoc, because we think we have to. We think this is how life is. But it’s not. It’s just what the ego says life is. But the ego, properly understood, doesn’t know anything at all.

We don’t need A Course in Miracles, or any other spiritual path or tradition, in order to experience this. We really just need to give attention to our experience – patiently and non-judgmentally and in a sustained way. This is hard to do at first, but it’s worth a commitment.

If we look at the structure of thought, one of the things that we notice is that there is a “thinker” who is doing the thinking. There is a thought here, and a thinker there. We attribute the thought to this thinker, and so the thought has some validity to it, because why else would the thinker think it? Somebody talks a certain way to us and the thinker thinks “that’s a rude tone of voice – we are insulted” and voila! We feel insulted. We are hurt.

In other words, we take thought seriously because of the presumption that a thinker is “back there” handling it for us. The thinker is collecting data, collating it and so forth, and then relaying it to us through the medium of thought.

But who is the thinker? Most of the time we are looking at thought, rather than at the thinker. We don’t like thoughts that make us scared or sad or angry and we do like thoughts that make us happy and peaceful and contented. But we never really try to look at the thinker, this self who is both editor and publisher of thoughts.

So part of what I am saying that we can do when we are attentive to thought, is that we can see that thought is not really as interesting as it seems at first blush. What is really interesting is the source of thought – this thinker. It seems like it should be easy enough to look at this thinker, question this thinker, but oddly, it is not. The thinker is actually very slippery.

At first, we think that this slipperiness is because the thinker doesn’t want to be seen. This is a common idea, especially in ACIM circles where the ego is castigated the way it is. We think the ego blanches – “oh no! They’re looking at me again” and so it hides, the better to continue its evil machinations. I’ve thought this way and written this way a lot. But actually, the thinker is slippery not because it’s malicious or a trickster but simply because it’s not actually there. There really is no thinker.

This is pretty simple and not such a big deal after you’ve given it a bit of attention, but it seems very radical and even dangerous the first time we hear about it, or sense it in ourselves. No thinker? But that means there is no self . . . And so “Sean” or whomever begins to feel frightened and unhinged and grabs hold of whatever it can in order to right itself, ground itself, be stabilized. We fall back into the familiar pattern of thinker and thought, self and ego, observer and observed. We slip back into separation, because even though we are miserable and mired in conflict, it is familiar and, at least temporarily, not so scary.

But we have all had experiences where the familiar, despite its reassuring presence, is no longer sufficient. This happens in relationships a lot. We are settled with someone, and it worked for a long time, but then it doesn’t. We stay because it’s scary to leave. But sometimes we have to face that fear. Sometimes we have to step out.

So that is what happens with this business of looking at the looker, or the thinker. Eventually, we realize that the pain of not giving it attention is greater than the fear of giving it attention, and so we start to really look at it. We start to try and experience what it means that there is no thinker. We actually wake up and try to go through the day without the satisfaction of self and routine and habit and all of that.

What happens? Mostly, we see the degree to which we have been living an illusion – and asking others to live it as well. And we start to know the peace that comes from being willing to not know.

“Know” in this case means to experience fully and wholly without recourse to language – sort of the way we “know” love for a dog or a child or a sunset or whatever. It has no opposite. It is beyond the realm of “other.” Doubt doesn’t enter to it.

“Not know” in this case means letting things go without bothering to judge them or label them or insist that they be this way or that. It’s letting all our experience be the same: the hugs, the kisses, the fresh-baked cookies, the bee stings, the flat tires, the lost car keys. Who knows what it means? We don’t. We see that clearly and so we let it go. We let it be. Life is. What else can we say or do?

I am not suggesting this experience is the end of anything. Or that it represents some super intense spirituality or holiness. It’s more in the nature of simply understanding the way thought works, and choosing to no longer associating ourselves with it. We simply let it run the way we let photosynthesis run, or gravity. It is peaceful, because we are no longer resisting so much. We are no longer trying to force reality to fit some pre-determined mold.

Again, the way I talk about this is not precisely consistent with A Course in Miracles. Lots of thinkers and traditions have explored this through the years – David Bohm, Buddhism, ACIM. We find a certain expression that resonates for us and we give attention to it and we learn it and then we bring it into application. I got to a point where I would reach for ACIM and think, “no, instead of reading, let me try to experience it today.”

That is what I mean when I write about giving attention. I mean that we stop letting other people tell us what is what, and we learn for ourselves what is what. There is a time and a place for instruction and instructors, and I am grateful for both indeed, but there is also a time when we have to step out and make it work for ourselves. Giving attention means literally being still with what is, right in the moment. Most of us know enough now to do that – we’ve go the tools, we’ve got the intellectual framework, so we’re ready. It’s time.

When we set out into unknown territory, it’s good to have maps. When I was younger, I spent a lot of time with compasses and topographical maps. They’re fun and helpful. But as been pointed out countless times the map is not the territory. So you use the map, but then at some point, you have to start to explore the territory on your own. You have to climb the trees, sip from the brooks, sleep beneath the stars, track the bears, and so forth. The map can’t do it for you, so you have to put it aside.

That is the old metaphor, and it’s still useful. A Course in Miracles can be very helpful in equipping us for the interior journey, but then you have to actually go and take that journey. You have to step off the familiar and into the unknown and see what happens. As Tara Singh used to say, “there is nothing to do, and nobody else can do it.”

Following Jesus in A Course in Miracles

It is a mistake, I think, to approach A Course in Miracles as if it were merely a light-hearted picnic en route to the Gates to Heaven. It is not that an emphasis on inner peace and joy is wrong per se, but that it can distract one from the actual forgiveness inherent in the course’s healing process.

To adopt A Course in Miracles as one’s spiritual path is to undertake a serious and challenging interior journey from grim forgetfulness to remembrance of God. It is to look closely at an interior landscape and thought system that resists being looked at and literally stops at nothing to avoid being seen for what it is.

Why does it so viciously and tenaciously defend itself from being known? Because it correctly perceives that to see it is to to simultaneously see what it is not and – because our longing for God, though hidden, is greater than our longing to be separate from God – exchange it for Truth. The ego knows it is doomed when we see it offers us nothing but pain.

Grandeur is of God, and only of Him. Therefore it is in you. Whenever you become aware of it, however dimly, you abandon the ego automatically, because in the presence of the grandeur of God the meaninglessness of the ego becomes perfectly apparent (T-9.VIII.1:1-3).

A Course in Miracles, through the text, workbook and Manual for Teachers, restores to our memory God’s grandeur, and the ego is dissolved accordingly.

But it does not go quietly nor willingly! And, for most of us, it does not go without the help of a devoted guide. Thus, the course, in addition to providing a means by which to remember God, provides a friend with whom to bring that means into application.

My brother you are part of God and part of me. When you have at last looked at the ego’s foundation without shrinking you will also have looked upon ours . . . I give you the lamp and I will go with you. You do not take this journey alone (T-11.In.4:1-2, 5-6).

In a sense, those words are metaphorical – Jesus is not actually going to show up with an oil lantern and escort us through our personal Boschian drama, the way a friend might walk with us through the streets of Boston or Baton Rouge with a flashlight and map.

On the other hand, if we cannot take those words literally – if we reduce them merely to a good idea – then we are quite likely bereft. So a question emerges and presses on us: How do we make contact with Jesus in a real and practical way with respect to “looking at the ego’s foundation without shrinking”?

The answer has to do with the reverence that naturally flows from giving careful and sustained attention to that question, which in part has to do with not rushing to answer it. It is easy to substitute intellectual verbosity for spiritual experience. One way to avoid that trap is to willingly stay in the insecurity of not-knowing, which in a sense is to trust not knowing – or to trust that we are not alone in the state of not-knowing.

In his Commentary on Jesus and the Blind Man, Tara Singh observed that “a sincere question has the ability to relate you to life instantly and brings you to the direct perception of Reality” (79).

Thus, it is not necessary to know but rather to inquire of Jesus in a serious and attentive way, and to bring all of one’s desire to awaken to bear on the inquiry. In a way, it is reminiscent of Lesson 27 in the ACIM workbook: “Above all else I want to see.” Think of nothing but your yearning to see, says Jesus, and vision will be given you because it is already given to you. But be honest: what else will you think of? What else do you want?

The real question is, how often will you remember? How much do you want today’s idea to be true? (W-pI.27.4:1-2).

So it is a question of our commitment, of the energy that we are ready and willing to bring to our practice. Part of studying A Course in Miracles means facing our unwillingness to practice A Course in Miracles. We are asked to give vision priority amongst our many competing desires (W-pI.27.1:2). Tara Singh said that when we do that – when we sincerely give attention to Jesus – then we are met by Jesus in the present moment, and there is nothing metaphorical about it.

If you are present, then the Master is here, because what He said is eternal and always accessible. In the present, the past and future meet. Jesus said, “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away” (79).

To give our attention to Jesus without expectation – I will perceive him this way, he will answer this way, et cetera – is to become radically open and Jesus responds to that openness in a real and tangible way. Our reverence – which is a form of gratitude that simplifies and purifies attention – makes it possible.

Nobody can give attention for us, and the internal egoic drama that must be undone will feel utterly personal for a long time. Yet a state comes when we begin to perceive – beyond the specificity of images an idols – the fear and guilt that is common to all of us and shared by all of us. But before that, we have to share the seeming specificity of our spiritual journey with Jesus. We look at what we are frightened to look at, and we ask him to look with us and – when we are ready to no longer be alone – he will be with us, and his presence will be transformative at every level. His presence is a transformed way of seeing; He is vision.

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 (W-pII.325.1:4-6).

Thus, I don’t want to avoid the work of looking at the ego’s foundation, however intimidating and even terrifying it might seem. It is essential to our shared freedom, because only by looking at the foundation can the rest of the egoic edifice be toppled.

This work – this looking – is not a solo gig: A Course in Miracles repeats over and over that Jesus shares the way, that the Holy Spirit is within us, and that you and I walk the path to Heaven together. Those are words that point to an important truth: we are not alone in any way and our companions are our salvation.

It is not necessary to know in advance what it means to avail oneself of Jesus’ help and to be so helped. In fact, it is more helpful to simply rest in the not-knowing. To be with Jesus is not acquisitive but rather receptive. Why? Because he is already here: our inquiry of him makes it so.

On Attention to Thought

When I say “give attention to thought” I mean literally sitting quietly and observing what is happening in the interior. A thought about moonlight arises and I look at it – does it have an edge? Where did it come from and where does it go? Can I stay with it? Does it respond to my direction?

The point of this exercise is twofold. First, it allows me to directly experience the truth of “the observer and the observed are one.” I am familiar with this through the writing of Krishnamurti, but it is not an idea that began with him, and it is not limited to him. It’s more in the nature of a fact, and it is a helpful fact to know in an experiential way.

In order to learn this – to experience it – I have to be able to perceive thought without judgment. That is, I have to let thought arise and be able to explore it without simultaneously saying “this thought is bad,” “this thought is shameful,” and “this thought is likely to be productive.”‘

For me, this is where A Course in Miracles has been especially helpful. I look at thought with the Holy Spirit and trust the Holy Spirit to guide me – I let the Holy Spirit do the judging. The part of my mind that longs to judge and separate steps back and allows the part of my mind that remembers God to lead the way.

Please understand that I am not saying this is the right way to use A Course in Miracles, or even that you should use it this way. I am simply talking about what works for me, what has been most helpful.

Sooner or later, when one is giving nonjudgmental attention to thought, one begins to see the way in which the looker – the questioner – is implicated in what is being seen and questioned. That is easy to write but hard to express: you really have to have the experience. It’s trippy at first but then it becomes natural; it’s just another way of thinking but one that is maybe a little more helpful because it’s not inherently separative. It perceive wholeness because it is wholeness; it’s not really trying to be or do anything else.

In other words, you become aware that thought is just looking at itself – that is all one movement – and the idea that there is a “you” watching or directing or whatever is just another part of that movement, neither more or less important than any other part.

[t]hought has come to attribute itself to an image of an observer, a thinker. This gives it much greater authority, because it then apparently comes from a being who should know what to think. On the other hand, if it’s just going on mechanically, it might have no more significance than a computer (David Bohm On Dialogue 81).

Most of us if we consider what Bohm is saying – that thought is essentially a machine, just reflexive – then we are going to resist it. Of course my thoughts matter! But that is just ego talking – ego insisting that its thoughts are reality. But as Tara Singh has pointed out over and over, thought is interpretative. It’s never the fact but always the perception, the interpretation of the fact.

So when we give attention with the Holy Spirit, we begin to right-size thought – we see what it can do and what it can’t do and – most importantly – we see that what we are in truth is not thought.

If you look closely at the lessons of A Course in Miracles, especially the earlier ones, they are often urging us to move beyond the shallow levels of thought to the thoughts that we think with God (see, for example, lesson 74). I am suggesting that what this means is simply that we let go of the egoic mode of thought – which is so heavily invested in and attached to the egoic I, the narrative I – and align our thoughts with Truth as God created it.

If we let go of judgment, and do so in a spirit of willingness to learn how God thinks, then quite quickly it will be given us to experience Truth in this way. Why? Because that is all that really is – everything else is the busy chatty smoke screen that we throw up. Stop giving attention to it, give it a while to dissipate, and see what remains.

Tara Singh gives a beautiful example of this in Moments Outside Time. He is taking a taxi through rural India for the airport, and the taxi breaks down. The driver leaves and there is Tara Singh, sitting by the road, clock ticking.

I observe anxiety entering into my nervous system and thought promoting horror. There is a part of the mind that is ever still; I can deal with emotion and senses (305).

That is a couple of wise and insightful sentences! He is recognizing the existence of anxiety – there is no denial – but simultaneously acknowledging that he has the inherent capacity to respond to it. He doesn’t have to be carried away by it; the anxiety is not what he is in truth.

That is why he can say that “to observe and be aware of what goes on within is one of the great gifts of Heaven” (305).

So when we give attention with the Holy Spirit, we begin to right-size thought – we see what it can do and what it can’t do and – most importantly – we see that what we are in truth is not thought. So we are no longer regulated by it, and thus, no longer regulated by what is external.

This takes time to learn and bring into application. It is not hard to learn, but undoing patterns and habits of thought that have built up over a lifetime – that have thousands of years of separative energy behind them – is not easy. A Course in Miracles is a way of saying that we are not alone – that Jesus has done this and is here now to be our model, and that the Holy Spirit is within us in a tangible way, and that it too has only the goal of helping us.

When this is all clear and operative, there is really nothing left but an exuberant gratitude, which of course is Love. “I stayed with the spirit of gratefulness all through,” said Taraji. “Since I would not deviate, all would have to be well” (306).

That is because all is well, because it was created perfectly. That is the gift we are learning to accept; that is the Truth which we are learning to align.

Alienation is not God’s Will

It is worth remembering that God’s will is not hidden, but that we have interposed our will before it, and thus are confused about what we are. A Course in Miracles is clear: alienation from awareness of God is not of God. It is simply the reflection of our decision to think apart from God.

God’s Will is your salvation. Would He not have given you the means to find it? If He wills you to have it, He must have made it possible and easy to obtain it (T-9.VII.1:1-3).

The confidence in those sentences is infectious, which it has to be because left to our own inclination, we make God a stern taskmaster who not only hides His Will but also makes it conditional. Failure, not success, becomes the salient characteristic of the relationship. But A Course in Miracles insists that what God is is not up to us and – more than that – that our ideas about God are wrong.

When I am attentive to the course’s clarity in this regard, and when I allows its confidence a place in my mind, there is great joy and gentle peace. A space opens in which I can remember that what God is and what I am are not separate but unified.

In other words, it becomes possible to remember love.

Thus, my practice of A Course in Miracles becomes: slow down, give attention, be grateful and love will extend itself through me, reminding me that I am not alone.

The course’s insistence that God is here and that opportunities to remember God’s will abound hinges on the simple truth that our brothers and sisters are everywhere around us (T-9.VII.1:4-6). Even when we are physically alone, they are with us. And they are the means by which God and love are remembered. Thus, you are my salvation, as I am yours, and this realization is what saves us (M-1.1:2).

Accept your brother in this world and accept nothing else, for in him you will find your creations because he created them with you. You will never know that you are co-creator with God until you learn that your brother is co-creator with you (T-9.VI.7:8-9).

Service is a form of attention given to our brothers and sisters, and all it sees is our mutual need to remember Christ. The form this attention takes in the world will vary – hugs, monetary donations, careful listening, leaving alone, baking cookies, building a house. Yet the content never varies. It is always love responding to the call for love. That is what it means to be home in God.

How do we know what form this love or attention should take? In a sense, we don’t. The ego can never know it, because the ego doesn’t offer love, and it doesn’t hear calls for love, and it isn’t interested in healing itself. This is why we need to be in relationship with the Holy Spirit, which does know, and will teach us, so long as we are humble and open and willing to learn.

The Holy Spirit – which is inherent in us as healed or unsplit mind – remembers God’s Will and naturally extends it, so long as we can get out of its way.

With the grandeur of God in you, you have chosen to be little and to lament your littleness. Within the system that dictated this choice the lament is inevitable (T-9.VII.6:5-6).

The ego shrinks us. Spirit enlarges and lifts us into love. When we are complaining and bitter, it is a sign that we are heeding the ego’s teaching. The answer is not to fix what seems to be the problem in the world. The answer is to listen to the Teacher who speaks for God and thus offers us a new way of seeing, one that is predicated on acceptance, forgiveness, and love.

The ego cannot help us out of this mess, because it made this mess, and needs this mess for its survival (e.g., T-9.VII.5:3). It is the ego who creates a sense of alienation from God; it is spirit who teaches that alienation is not God’s Will.

We need, then, a sense of quiet and attentiveness in which the Holy Spirit can come gently forward to remind us of our status as children of a loving God. In that reminder, we also remember that God’s Will is love. But not love on the world’s terms, which is always premised on getting something at another’s expense, but rather love on Heaven’s terms, which is premised on eternally giving everything away, which is the only way to actually have anything worth having.

It’s okay that this sound confusing or idealistic or naive. If we are being honest, it cannot really sound otherwise. To the ego, radical love and equality is nonsensical and even dangerous. It is only when we make space for the Holy Spirit that the clear and constructive wisdom of A Course in Miracles is revealed.

There is nothing complicated about awakening. It may be unfamiliar and even frightening at first, but it’s not complicated. It’s natural and certain because it has already happened. It already is. We are not inventing a new state; we are simply remembering the natural unity and harmony that already prevails, just outside our awareness.

So we slow down, give attention, manifest gratitude and notice the way love extends itself through us, enlarging our awareness in ways that make clear God’s love and our fundamental joy and peace.

In this gentle and holy mode of being, we are able to welcome the lost and forsaken, who are own self, and whose salvation is not separate from our own.

Understanding the Seventh Principle of Miracles

Miracles are everybody’s right, but purification is necessary first (T-1.I.7:1).

The seventh principle of A Course in Miracles is both lovely and confounding. It reflects the course’s semantic affinity for Christianity and – I say this carefully and lovingly – the Course’s sometimes maddening habit of being poetic and abstract to the point of convolution.

In traditional Christianity , to purify or become pure was to cleanse one’s body through ritual, usually washing of some kind. Baptism is a classic example. Washing one’s feet or hands before a meal or upon waking are another. These rituals can be very meaningful and helpful in religious context, but they are not what A Course in Miracles is taking about.

In the context of the Course, “purification” does not refer to the body. It has nothing to do with waking early, sleeping in hair shirts, becoming celibate or vegetarian, praying more, studying the Course more, washing up before prayer or anything like that.

Rather, purification reflects our increasing capacity to discern between the thoughts that we think with God – which are loving thoughts, which are extensions of Creation – and those that we think with the ego. Thoughts that have an egoic root induce guilt and fear, loneliness and angst, while those we think with God induce inner peace.

To become purified is simply to discern between ego and the Holy Spirit, and to give attention only to the latter.

Do not attept to give the Holy Spirit what He does not ask, or you will add the ego to Him and confuse the two. He asks but little. It is He Who adds the greatness and the might . . . It is your realization that you need do so little that enables Him to give so much (T-18.IV.1:6-8, 10).

Miracles reflect a shift away from thinking with the ego and towards thinking with God, through the Holy Spirit. This is a matter of giving attention to what is going on inside us, at the level of mind. The Course is about the interior rather than the exterior landscape.

When we are aware of our thoughts we naturally become aware of what impedes love because it is not love. We become aware of those habits of thinking that lock us into fear and guilt and we become interested in an alternative because we no longer want the pain and grief associated with thinking that way.

In a sense, when we do this, we are “purifying” our mind. We are bringing it into greater alignment with its natural inclination to love.

There is another aspect to this principle that bears mention. It emphasizes a critical idea in A Course in Miracles: miracles are inclusive. They are for everybody. To think otherwise is to confuse the healing intention of the Course.

It is easy to get caught up with traditional notions of “purity” and “purification.” They imply that we are insufficient and dirty, that some people are more spiritual than others, that a spiritual hierarchy has value (people who make rituals, people who enforce them) and so forth. But valuing this kind of thinking is really just another form of resistance. It is another way of keeping at bay the very help for which we long in our loneliness.

So as always, our focus is not on what keeps the mind looking at external problems but rather on what is inside of us: the egoic thoughts that one by one, two by two, we bring to the Holy Spirit in order that what is loving in them might be saved, and what is unloving might be set aside as illusory.

There is no peace in illusions: only in surrender of illusions that enable us to encounter reality as God created it.

ACIM and the Face of Jesus

Recently, someone raised a question about the historical Jesus and his relationship to A Course in Miracles. This subject has fascinated me for years; Jesus has held my attention for as long as I can remember. It’s interesting. It’s also important.

Yet as I tried to scribble out an answer, no answer came. Or rather it came but in a sort of disconnected way. It wanted to be a small book or a long poem and wrangling clarity proved too much to handle. Sometimes writing happens that way. You pick up and move on.

But the question itself did not move on and so earlier today, while doing a little video for another site, I just found myself rambling about Jesus and A Course in Miracles. When I was done I thought, what the heck? I’ll post it.

Basically, I am seeing three faces of Jesus: the first is historical. This is the man who walked around lower Palestine teaching and healing and who was subsequently executed by the Romans around Passover. John Crossan (and scholars like him) have gotten pretty close to a sense of who that man was, which requires a delicate and scholastic analysis. I’m grateful to them all.

The second Jesus is the traditional Christian Jesus – the one who emerged from the brief life of the historical man. It is hard sometimes to talk about this Jesus without offending people, and I do not want to hurt or offend anyone. I can say with relative confidence that I think the historical Jesus would by and large be disappointed with the church that emerged in his wake. It’s not that Christianity hasn’t had its moments – it clearly has, and will likely continue to for a time, but this was not in the end a positive or fruitful place for me to be (and it took a while to see that with some clarity).

Finally, there is the Jesus inherent in A Course in Miracles. Again, it’s easy to slip into conflict here. For me, the Jesus that allowed Helen Schucman to scribe such a beautiful, helpful scripture is not a man but a symbol. He is a symbol of love and complete surrender to the Holy Spirit. He is a symbol of our potential to remember perfectly our unity with God. I am not especially interested in past lives that revolve around the historical Jesus, and I am not troubled by whether or not the course is “real” or a scam because of Jesus. For me it works. And for me it offers a Jesus that is helpful in remembering that Heaven is both here and now. I know that others feel differently and I see no other way for it to be, given the breadth and depth of the subject and its importance. Like you – like all of us – I am figuring it out as I go.

Two other quick things: first, I believe that a personal relationship with Jesus is essential to one’s practice of A Course in Miracles. That relationship can take a lot of shapes and sizes and it can evolve over time but it is always deeply personal. Thus, when someone starts talking about Jesus, and what they’re saying doesn’t resonate for you in a helpful way, it’s okay – it’s more than okay – to just turn tail and leave. Certainly there are no hard feelings on my end.

I’m not especially interested in debates about Jesus. Dialogue – in the sense of a gentle, thoughtful and informed exchange of ideas – yes. But debate no. Why bother? The issue isn’t getting someone else to the right place viz. Jesus. The issue is ensuring that we are there. It’s an inside job and only you – and I – can do it.

The second thing is simply to say that these off-the-cuff videos I sometimes do are not intended as anything other than hopefully interesting and maybe helpful chats. I wish that we were sitting together drinking tea. Or that a lot of us were together in a circle sharing about the course. I have an idea someday that will happen but for now, this is what is.

Thus, as I hope is clear in the video, or at least in these quick notes, I am not trying to present myself as an authority on anything (other than, perhaps, the importance of recognizing one is not an authority on anything). I am just a student of A Course in Miracles with a wordy bent and a touch more intensity than is sometimes good for me. I’m glad you’re here, the oddities of electronic discourse notwithstanding. Without you, it wouldn’t mean a thing.