Rest in Peace

"Rest in Peace" is a blessing for the living, not the dead, because it comes from waking, not from sleeping.  Sleep is withdrawing; waking is joining.
ACIM-T-8:IX:3:5-6

Wow! I am getting so much from this very small section of ACIM...pages that were just inexplicably open on my desk at a time I needed them the most. This passage is so significant to me now.

Resting in Peace

"Rest in peace," were words that I was actually reciting in my head, feeling in my heart and body and owning as I left the ultrasound department today.  I felt I was resting in peace for the first time in a long time and I cannot explain it.  I felt so much peace.  I felt hope.  Why?

I mean I was told by the same person that whatever it is, and that is still inconclusive, does not appear to be of concern...no obvious malignancy. Kind of heard that before and it didn't fill me with ease. This time I felt a certain peace with it.

The MRI revealed changes...validating what I was feeling when I palpated....same direction, same size, same area.  At least it proves  I am not crazy and no one can call me a liar this time. There is something there in that area I have been palpating.  Can't see it on ultrasound or mammogram  but you can on MRI? It is recorded on an MRI report.

Steps to Finding Peace and Wellness in an Illness Perception

Step One

 I think that is what gave me relief...the fact that it is objectively recorded somewhere.  In the physical world sense,  there is evidence that takes the weight from my subjective reporting to something tangible, measurable and observable to others...something of form.   I needed that as the first step to my healing from this illness perception....to have my physical experience observable in form.  So I guess, I felt relief, hope and peace all at the same time because the first step was behind me. It was a step I had a very hard time reaching in past health seeking.  Even when I felt I had recorded evidence then  others discounted it.  I assumed the same thing was going to happen here but it didn't.  I have evidence of my reported findings. Whew!!!

Step Two

The second step is determining what this recorded evidence means in physical world sense.  What does it mean to medicine?  What does it mean to my body? My future in this body? I am told I am creating  medical confusion. I am presenting with  signs & symptoms that the mammogram partly supports ( retraction) , ultrasounds do not support at all  but that the MRI validates. 

So what they are finding is inconclusive; they do not know what it means  They cannot, therefore,  place it all in a neat diagnostic container or slap a clear label on it. That is a relief in one way...the label that could have been placed on it, if things were much clearer, is not a label I want. Yet at the same time there is a need to label it with something, to explain both the subjective and objective findings.  This is, after all, what science does, is it not? But I am not worried about that as I was...for some unknown reason.  I am not worried.  I am not judging, condemning, frustratingly waiting.  I am just letting science do what science does as I skip  to step three without closure in step 2.

Step Three

Step 3 is  recognizing that the so called problems are not of the body but the mind. This "problem" I have been dealing with for the last four months is in my mind , not my body.  It is important that we recognize the body for what it is.  It is merely a vehicle for us to get around in, a tool of communication, a manifestation of something greater. It is not who we are. Knowing that,  I can, I am discovering,  transcend body worry for mindful calm and peace.  I can rest in peace regardless of what is happening to me or around me. Hmmm!

I also think of the body  as car I travel in.  I want to take care of it to ensure I am able to do what I need to do while I am here, to get around, but I  don't identify with it as me. I am just in it. Like any vehicle, I know it will get scratched up from time and if I don't take care of it, it could rust away quicker than it was meant to.. But because it isn't me I am not too attached to it. 

I also know that the  car cannot drive itself.  It isn't going  to randomly drive itself into a tree or bang itself up.  The driver of the car (the mind), if he/she doesn't stay alert and awake while driving can do damage but as long as the driver is conscious and committed to living peacefully...he/ she can drive the car with ease for a long, long time.

Step Four

So step four then is being willing to wake up and stay conscious behind the wheel.  I love seeing myself as the driver behind the wheel of this amazing piece of machinery! Every time I catch myself doing the driving, the more I realize I am waking up.

Step Five

The next step is to recognize that what I am experiencing at this level is not real.  Body illness is of the dream state...health is of the waking. Though the body and these changes in it appear real and others can see them in the physical world...it does not make them real in the "real  waking" world.. Regardless of what the label is when they ( the body mechanics) manage to slap one on me...I won't be harmed by it.  I know in my heart of hearts, it will just be a label, a thought, a concept, an idea...lacking in substance and meaning to what is real.

Any diagnosis we get is just an "opinion" ...an opinion that can be written as words on a piece of paper in a chart and filed away.  It is nothing more substantial than that. How can that hurt? Why would we fear that?

Step Six

Finally, if we want to see the unreality of illness,  we choose God over ego,  Love over fear and the invisible over the visible.  We ask for the  miracle of right perception and we stay open to receive it. We transcend the body for the vastness of something far greater. We join with God's will for us which is perfect health and wholeness.

Miracles transcend the body.  They are sudden shifts into invisibility, away from the bodily level.  that is why they heal.  ACIM-T-1:I:17:1-3

All is well.

ACIM