Forgive and be forgiven. As you give you will receive...All the complexities the world has spun of fragile cobwebs disappear before the power and the majesty of the extremely simple statement of the truth.
ACIM-W-122:6
I rambled on and on about the need for "forgiveness" and I think it is important that we are reminded of what forgiveness is.
What is Forgiveness?
Forgiveness is simply releasing self and others from the prison of guilt and fear ego locks us in! It is a correction for mistakes that have been made...yes...but focuses on the mistakes that were made in perception, more than those that were made in deed.
A Mistake in Perception
It is recognizing that when one ego in one body acts unjustly against another...it is not a sin performed by an evil person that deserves punishment that we should focus on. What we look upon is merely a mistake in perception, both in the individual doing the injustice and the one at the receiving end. Ego focuses on the deed, Self on the perception.
If someone steals your car you may have a tendency to look at this person as a "thief", a "sinner" and demand justice from law enforcement because you feel this "evil person", separate from you, has attacked you and must pay. If he doesn't show remorse for this crime ( i.e. guilt) you will want even more vengeance. Right? Ego focuses on the deed and wants vengeance. You will not rest until you get it and you will likely live in anger, fear and frustration for many, many years.
Does this bring you peace, and a sense of safety? No. Does it stop the person from stealing more cars in the future? Statistics shows it doesn't.
A Cure in Undoing
The cure for such an act then isn't vengeance, more defense or counter attack, punishment or guilt...it is forgiveness which is a an undoing of this "misperception". Forgiveness does not use fear to undo fear.
Now let's look at undoing the perception of "That evil thief stole my car!!!"
What has the person really done? The body they are in got into a metallic, engine runned vehicle that is registered to a name you identify as and drove away from the property that is also registered to this name without asking the body you inhabit permission. Doesn't sound quite so gruesome, does it?
Seeing Clearly
This undoing can only happen by seeing clearly. We will never see clearly with these little orbs on our heads that are directed by ego's need for judgment and selective perception. We must go deeper to understand that "they know not what they do."
The body that borrowed your car without permission may have been hungry and at risk of perishing...this body may have been suffering from withdrawals and felt like it would perish if it didn't get some money quick...that body may have been pushed around and beaten down ...that body may have been acting on the direction of an unconscious mind who saw itself as a tiny little me deserving of what it thought you owned, angry and acting out. I highly doubt that that body or that mind that drove away in that car...was aware of who it was beneath this little me it identified with.
The Mind Needs Healing
Forgiveness, then...is asking for the mind to be healed. It is an appeal to God to heal their minds. ACIM-T-2:V:16:4
We will only see clearly when our minds are healed; when we realize who we truly are beneath these egos we assume we are and are able to look out upon the so called "sinner" and the world at large with the unconditionally loving eyes of Self. Then we will see no "wrong-doing" because we see no right or wrong distinction. We will see no evil because we will see no evil/good distinctions. We will see no villain because we will see no victim/villain distinction.
The Judgement
Your ego sees a villain in the other. It sees a wrong-doing. It sees evil. Your mind if it is controlled by ego's vision will make judgments, create story around those "wrong doings" and it will take you from your peace. You will suffer and not because this dude ran away with a car that you perceived as yours but because of how you judged the situation.
You judged the car as a part of you by attaching a "My" to it. You judged it as a loss. You judged the act as a violation against you...you therefore judged yourself as vulnerable. You judged yourself as vulnerable because you judged yourself as a separate little me....merely a body, a personality, a name, what you owned etc. You judged the other as a separate attacker, a threat. You judged the other as an enemy and a villain. You judged the situation as "wrong". You judged it as a "sin" and therefore you judged the need for guilt, and therefore punishment. You judged the world as unsafe. It was your judgment of teh situation that led to this suffering not the fact that another body drove away in a vehicle.
An End To Suffering
If you need a good reason to forgive, this one works...because it will end your suffering.
Forgiveness is a putting down of judgment. You have no idea of the tremendous release and deep peace that comes from meeting yourself and your brothers totally without judgment. When you recognize what you are and what your brothers are, you will realize that judging them in any way is without meaning. ACIM-T-3:VI:3:1-2
One Mind
Forgiveness is a healing of the mind...but not just of the individual mind of the so called "wrong-doer" but of the collective mind. When you give forgiveness, you receive forgiveness.
To offer forgiveness is the only way to have it, for it reflects the law of Heaven that giving and receiving are the same. ACIM-T-preface.
You see that being in that body and mind that drove away in that car is you. You and brother may appear to have separate bodies and separate personalities but who you are at the deepest level is a shared and unified consciousness. This separation is just an illusion. You stole your own car.
Forgiveness is the healing of the perception of separation. Correct perception of your brother is necessary, because ,minds have chosen to see themselves as separate. ACIM-T-3:V:9:1-2
Overlooking
Forgiveness is looking beyond the error to the harmless depth beyond ego. To forgive is to overlook. ACIM-T-9:IV:1:2
So you need to overlook what this body did with this vehicle. Not so easy to do is it? I am not saying you have to let him get away with it...there are social laws and rules we adhere to for a reason. By all means lock your cars at night if that makes you feel safe. Call the police and press charges if someone commits a crime.
Remembering Who You Are
But forgive at the same time. Recognize that they know not what they do...they...which represents humanity at large... actually know not what they are. They have yet to see themselves beyond the fragile little egoic mind to who they truly are. Make forgiveness your teaching mission by remembering first who you are.
Begin by remembering what you are not. You are not the car or the things you own, you therefore will not be diminished without them. You are not a vulnerable body and personality so you cannot be harmed nor can you harm. You are not an ego so you can put it down and be healed.
You may have forgotten who you truly are but there is a way to remember.
Forgiveness is the means by which we will remember. ACIM-preface.
All is well.
ACIM
Friday, March 6, 2020
Thursday, March 5, 2020
The Light of Truth Behind Appearances
Do you want peace? Forgiveness offers it. Do you want happiness, a quiet mind, a certainty of purpose, and a sense of worth and beauty that transcends the world? Do you want care and safety, and the warmth of sure protection always? Do you want a quietness that cannot be disturbed, a gentleness that never can be hurt, a deep abiding comfort, and a rest so perfect it can never be upset? All this forgiveness offer you, and more.
ACIM-W-122:1-2
I want all the above but my last few entries reflect that I am going in the wrong direction to achieve that.
Ohhh! I sound so blaming and so angry, don't I?
If dealing with this pain and bodily changes isn't enough, on top of all the other life issues...I decide to focus on the assumed behaviour of another. Imagine!
I go into defense and attack mode when I assume, however strongly, that someone has been "wrong" in their approach to this, that their priorities are mixed up, that they are protecting their right to decide when something gets done and how it gets done at the expense of others' well being. I imagine they want to come out of this on top...the one holding the golden ring in their hand. I assume they are protecting resources that they have attached "My" and "Mine" onto.
Little me tells me I "should" have access to these resources when ordered by another professional...that others, like me, should have access to them as needed ...not if and when this individual decides. I assume I and the others are being indirectly "harmed" by this egoic tendency, leading to unnecessary delays and lectures and token testing rather than what is necessary to assess and preserve wellness of body in another.
I stay on guard. I feed this idea with as much evidence as I can gather to support it...looking for and collecting evidence that proves to me, at least, that my assumption is valid. Why? Because I want to be right...I am choosing being right over being kind and therefore over being peaceful.
And all the while ego pumps me up into some righteous warrior and convinces me I have to "do something about it"...to expose it, punish, get revenge. I exploit it here. What a mess I am making when I don't have to.
I do want to see Truth, write about Truth, speak Truth. I want to see and expose ego when I see it, for the betterment of all , but I am not even sure that this assumption I am making about another's ego is true or something my mind is making up.
Even if it were true, who am I to judge the ego behaviour in another when mine is so wild, even if it impacts me? I do not want to hurt anyone. I don't want to use up my limited energy being angry and seeking revenge of some kind. I want peace!! There is a light of truth beneath appearances that will bring me peace.
I must look for the innocence in all. I somehow seen the innocence in this individual beneath the ego I perceive is in the way. That is what I want to focus on. I want the peace that comes from that, not this unease that comes from seeing only a negative ego.
And when I "attack" the person's ego here, however subliminally, with my assumptions it looks like an attack on the entire system, on a profession at large and I definitely don't want that. I have had wonderful, wonderful professionals in my corner. I have a very busy surgeon, I only seen once, who I feel has my back and the backs ( or fronts lol) of women like me...completely. I for whatever reason have complete faith in her. I have a GP who is kind, supportive and caring. I have been talking to nurses, techs and support staff who understand and help me to reach my goal of getting an answer as soon as possible. Even this individual has done positive things for me. This is not an attack on the system and I do not want it to be an attack on an individual ...even if it is only the ego dimension I am attacking.
I have to realize that even if my assumption is correct...ego cannot harm me because who I am is not vulnerable. My body may suffer some from these delays but my mind suffers worse when I put my attention on the cause for these delays by blaming someone for them. I need to refocus on what is going right through this experience not just what seems wrong. In the end there is no right or wrong about it...it just is!
Obviously the only ego, I need to focus on is my own. I need to forgive so I am forgiven for the errors of my ways.
Retain your gifts in clear awareness as you see the changeless in the heart of change; the light of truth behind appearances. ACIM-W-122:13:4
All is well
ACIM Workbook
ACIM-W-122:1-2
I want all the above but my last few entries reflect that I am going in the wrong direction to achieve that.
Ohhh! I sound so blaming and so angry, don't I?
If dealing with this pain and bodily changes isn't enough, on top of all the other life issues...I decide to focus on the assumed behaviour of another. Imagine!
I go into defense and attack mode when I assume, however strongly, that someone has been "wrong" in their approach to this, that their priorities are mixed up, that they are protecting their right to decide when something gets done and how it gets done at the expense of others' well being. I imagine they want to come out of this on top...the one holding the golden ring in their hand. I assume they are protecting resources that they have attached "My" and "Mine" onto.
Little me tells me I "should" have access to these resources when ordered by another professional...that others, like me, should have access to them as needed ...not if and when this individual decides. I assume I and the others are being indirectly "harmed" by this egoic tendency, leading to unnecessary delays and lectures and token testing rather than what is necessary to assess and preserve wellness of body in another.
I stay on guard. I feed this idea with as much evidence as I can gather to support it...looking for and collecting evidence that proves to me, at least, that my assumption is valid. Why? Because I want to be right...I am choosing being right over being kind and therefore over being peaceful.
And all the while ego pumps me up into some righteous warrior and convinces me I have to "do something about it"...to expose it, punish, get revenge. I exploit it here. What a mess I am making when I don't have to.
I do want to see Truth, write about Truth, speak Truth. I want to see and expose ego when I see it, for the betterment of all , but I am not even sure that this assumption I am making about another's ego is true or something my mind is making up.
Even if it were true, who am I to judge the ego behaviour in another when mine is so wild, even if it impacts me? I do not want to hurt anyone. I don't want to use up my limited energy being angry and seeking revenge of some kind. I want peace!! There is a light of truth beneath appearances that will bring me peace.
I must look for the innocence in all. I somehow seen the innocence in this individual beneath the ego I perceive is in the way. That is what I want to focus on. I want the peace that comes from that, not this unease that comes from seeing only a negative ego.
And when I "attack" the person's ego here, however subliminally, with my assumptions it looks like an attack on the entire system, on a profession at large and I definitely don't want that. I have had wonderful, wonderful professionals in my corner. I have a very busy surgeon, I only seen once, who I feel has my back and the backs ( or fronts lol) of women like me...completely. I for whatever reason have complete faith in her. I have a GP who is kind, supportive and caring. I have been talking to nurses, techs and support staff who understand and help me to reach my goal of getting an answer as soon as possible. Even this individual has done positive things for me. This is not an attack on the system and I do not want it to be an attack on an individual ...even if it is only the ego dimension I am attacking.
I have to realize that even if my assumption is correct...ego cannot harm me because who I am is not vulnerable. My body may suffer some from these delays but my mind suffers worse when I put my attention on the cause for these delays by blaming someone for them. I need to refocus on what is going right through this experience not just what seems wrong. In the end there is no right or wrong about it...it just is!
Obviously the only ego, I need to focus on is my own. I need to forgive so I am forgiven for the errors of my ways.
Retain your gifts in clear awareness as you see the changeless in the heart of change; the light of truth behind appearances. ACIM-W-122:13:4
All is well
ACIM Workbook
Wednesday, March 4, 2020
"Precious"
It's mine, I tell you. My own. My precious. Yes, my precious.
JR Tolkien , Lord of the Rings
The word "precious'' has been stuck in my head since my waking last night. I don't know why but I can't seem to get rid of it. It was kind of pulling me here too. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do with it. If it was to be the muse to a poem I was supposed to write or was I supposed use it to get into a topic on clinging??? I just have to share, I guess, that it is in my head.
All I know, is that the word is somehow symbolic to what I am experiencing right now...it connects me to my health seeking. I sense...do not know...but sense that it is a word that would have great significance to someone I encountered during the process. This someone, I perceive( possibly erroneously) has an agenda that differs from my desire to get to the end of my health seeking as quickly as possible. The ego of another, therefore, seems to be in the way of what I am looking for. And when I close my eyes, I can see the individual standing there before me with a golden ring tucked and hidden away in a closed hand. It is a ring I want!
Then I think, "OMG...The Lord of the Rings."
I read the trilogy when I was in my teens and I absolutely adored the books and the beautiful imagery and wisdom within them. I seen the first movie and was very impressed but I still prefer the books. My bad. I didn't become a devote follower.
So ...I am not sure why that word has been haunting me and why I have this persistent image of this person in my head when I close my eyes. I am not saying this individual, I see holding the ring, is a Gollum any more than I can say I am a Gollum. Truth is, Gollum represents all of us, doesn't he, in Tolkien's description?
We all have the tendency to get blinded by ego and to cling to things we feel we need to have to be complete. When we attach the word "My" and "Mine" to something we all have the potential to become lost, putting all our energy into defending and attacking for this thing, whatever it may be: a material possession, money, a person we have a relationship with, a role or title, a responsibility, power, resources, reputation, body, image, a belief system or opinion. We cling so possessively because we fear we will be nothing without this "thing". We put all our energy into protecting, defending and attacking in order to keep this thing close to us. We can become crazily obsessed, can't we...not seeing how this thing is destroying us rather than giving us any semblance of joy or peace?
"My precious!" haunts me probably for no more reason than I am sleep deprived in a body experiencing pain. :) I know I am as cranky as h#$% too. :)
I may never know for sure why, when I close my eyes and still myself, I see this person standing over me holding this ring in a clasped hand as I am told I do not need any more of " their" tests because it is all just normal tissue. Behind the individual is the MRI image that I didn't get to see during my appointment as I was told I would. In my vision, it is anything but normal.
This is just my imagination, I know. My vision could be no more than an ego creation used to keep me fearful and distrustful, trapped in an an idea of being vulnerable and separated, away from Truth and away from Self and away from the reality where none of us can harm or be harmed.
What we all fail to see is that what we often cling to so tightly is just a ring...a thing that holds no more power than the thoughts we place upon it. Reaching for it, hiding it away or refusing to share it ...serves no body, least of all Self. Peace only comes when we break the spell and let go of the need for the ring in the first place.
All is well
JR Tolkien , Lord of the Rings
The word "precious'' has been stuck in my head since my waking last night. I don't know why but I can't seem to get rid of it. It was kind of pulling me here too. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do with it. If it was to be the muse to a poem I was supposed to write or was I supposed use it to get into a topic on clinging??? I just have to share, I guess, that it is in my head.
All I know, is that the word is somehow symbolic to what I am experiencing right now...it connects me to my health seeking. I sense...do not know...but sense that it is a word that would have great significance to someone I encountered during the process. This someone, I perceive( possibly erroneously) has an agenda that differs from my desire to get to the end of my health seeking as quickly as possible. The ego of another, therefore, seems to be in the way of what I am looking for. And when I close my eyes, I can see the individual standing there before me with a golden ring tucked and hidden away in a closed hand. It is a ring I want!
Then I think, "OMG...The Lord of the Rings."
I read the trilogy when I was in my teens and I absolutely adored the books and the beautiful imagery and wisdom within them. I seen the first movie and was very impressed but I still prefer the books. My bad. I didn't become a devote follower.
So ...I am not sure why that word has been haunting me and why I have this persistent image of this person in my head when I close my eyes. I am not saying this individual, I see holding the ring, is a Gollum any more than I can say I am a Gollum. Truth is, Gollum represents all of us, doesn't he, in Tolkien's description?
We all have the tendency to get blinded by ego and to cling to things we feel we need to have to be complete. When we attach the word "My" and "Mine" to something we all have the potential to become lost, putting all our energy into defending and attacking for this thing, whatever it may be: a material possession, money, a person we have a relationship with, a role or title, a responsibility, power, resources, reputation, body, image, a belief system or opinion. We cling so possessively because we fear we will be nothing without this "thing". We put all our energy into protecting, defending and attacking in order to keep this thing close to us. We can become crazily obsessed, can't we...not seeing how this thing is destroying us rather than giving us any semblance of joy or peace?
"My precious!" haunts me probably for no more reason than I am sleep deprived in a body experiencing pain. :) I know I am as cranky as h#$% too. :)
I may never know for sure why, when I close my eyes and still myself, I see this person standing over me holding this ring in a clasped hand as I am told I do not need any more of " their" tests because it is all just normal tissue. Behind the individual is the MRI image that I didn't get to see during my appointment as I was told I would. In my vision, it is anything but normal.
This is just my imagination, I know. My vision could be no more than an ego creation used to keep me fearful and distrustful, trapped in an an idea of being vulnerable and separated, away from Truth and away from Self and away from the reality where none of us can harm or be harmed.
What we all fail to see is that what we often cling to so tightly is just a ring...a thing that holds no more power than the thoughts we place upon it. Reaching for it, hiding it away or refusing to share it ...serves no body, least of all Self. Peace only comes when we break the spell and let go of the need for the ring in the first place.
All is well
Three a.m.
The unforgiving mind must learn through your forgiveness that it has been saved from hell. And as you teach salvation, you will learn. Yet all your teaching and your learning will be not of you, but of the Teacher Who was given you to show the way to you.
ACIM-W-121:7:5-7
The Warning
It is three in the morning and I awoke with the pain and this intense warning like feeling in my gut as the missing pieces of memory from yesterday's appointment became so vivid. The pain experience, the realization that there are ego agendas at play here, the remembering of details, all come together like a clanging fire alarm. I could almost hear that clanging, click by click, against my pillow as I lay there, eyes wide open, my stressed heart echoing that very same warning.
Everything in that three a.m. moment seemed to be shouting without making a sound , "You know what this is! Do something!"
I didn't know what to do, so I came here. As soon as I sat down the feeling settled but it is still there.
Not of the Ego
It all sounds so dramatic ...I know...so crazy ego like... but this warning isn't coming from that superficial part of me. I don't even know where it is coming from. Though there is a very real but mild physiological fear response here associated with it ...the realization of this truth, I do not quite understand fully yet, comes from a calm place, a fearless place, where there is no drama.
I am being warned from a place where there is no concept of harm, by the Self that resides there...the Self that is completely invulnerable there. It is telling me in some way and some form...that the vulnerable parts of me (my body, reputation, health seeking..) are at risk of being harmed by an unconscious ego in another. It shows me what I need to know through these vivid details of memory I was unaware I recorded. It wants me to take notice. It wants me to do what I can to prevent/stop this from happening, not just to me, of course, but to others.
Ego is certainly present in the background of all of it, feeding me with a lot of "It is your fault. Oh...why didn't you think to say something, ask to see, question that, get evidence instead of laying there like a stupid little complacent patient wanting nothing more than to escape before you were shamed? Fool!"
How does that saying go? "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."
Pseudo-Peace
Truth is, I was fooled . I was fooled by more than an individual's expressed intentions which, on hind sight, differ so greatly from the reality of their actions. I was also fooled by that jpeg function of my mind that kicks in during stressful situations when I choose the desire for peace over truth. Though a desire for peace can guide us to truth...I am being shown that in the un-evolved mind a need for pseudo- peace, in the form of selective perception, can often obscure the truth.
That day, I slipped back into an ego mind that more than anything wanted to avoid more of the health seeking shaming I have experienced in the past. The outer situation appeared to offer an experience where I was being validated rather than shamed for seeking health on some level. The ego was happy and peaceful with that, shutting down the noise of all the other factors occurring in those moments, blurring the background, diminishing depth of field. By focusing only on that I could almost trust that all was over and okay...that there was nothing in body but "normal tissue". I seen and heard what ego wanted to see and hear...nothing more. So on the most superficial level, truth was obscured for ego reasons, leaving me, for the most part, with a pseudo type of peace.
Genuine Peace
Superficial data, was also obscured for other reasons. Amongst the pseudo- peace, I felt moments of genuine peace and faith. There were moments during that appointment and afterwards that I was operating at a higher level. I was unknowingly seeing, not only the forgiving part of Self, but I was seeing the essence of Self in others. In those moments, I was, without any conceptual input on my part, recognizing something so innocent, so harmless in the experience and in the others involved. I recognized that the true Self cannot be harmed by the unconscious intentions of others. I also realized that the true Self I share with others has pure intentions. It does not want me unwell because It does not want to be unwell. It was that that gave me peace more than anything...even though I couldn't process it conceptually in those moments.
It was not a test, I believe, to further investigate the changes that showed up on MRI. It was not a test meant to benefit me in any way by bringing me closer to an answer. How could it be? It was, I believe, a test meant protect an ego.
My health seeking experience is offering another superficial truth to be dealt with...this is that part of the outer reality that extends beyond me to others. There is something bigger going on than "me" and "my" body....If this is happening with me, it is happening with others.The deeper part of truth comes with recognizing and understanding the universal effects of unconsciousness in self and others. My warning directs me here more so than anywhere else.
The deepest of all truth, however, comes from the reality that exists beneath what the body and other egos are doing to me, to others, to themselves or the world at large. It comes with the realization that we truly cannot be harmed. Though a warning usually comes when there is a potential threat of harm, with the faint understanding of this truth, I am being told that no harm can be done. So I am being warned of potential harm from a place that does not see harm and knows that I cannot be harmed. Is that not an oxymoron?
I am realizing, as I sit here pondering, that this must be more of a call for learning and teaching than a warning at this level. Hmm! I am being given a bit of a mission, I suppose.
Fulfilling a Function
In order to fulfill this function, however, I must deal with the superficial and deeper truths until I can get beyond them completely. I can not learn and teach if the vehicle I need to get around in, that I need to communicate with, is not functioning. I have to take care of the body.
I cannot speak for others or be an advocate for others if I am not an advocate for my own little self. I must heal at this egoic level before I can help heal others in whatever way I am meant to. I need , therefore, to transcend my shame and fear before I can show others how to do it.
What is really important though...goes beyond these truths, which are not really truths at all but mere perception. The real truth is I cannot be harmed. How can I be afraid, then, to do what I am called to do...which is face the superficial truths and help wake myself and others up to the deeper and deepest truth?
The pain is still there but the bells have stopped clanging. I think I can fall back to sleep now as I leave what I wrote here up like I feel so compelled to do.
It is all good.
ACIM-W-121:7:5-7
The Warning
It is three in the morning and I awoke with the pain and this intense warning like feeling in my gut as the missing pieces of memory from yesterday's appointment became so vivid. The pain experience, the realization that there are ego agendas at play here, the remembering of details, all come together like a clanging fire alarm. I could almost hear that clanging, click by click, against my pillow as I lay there, eyes wide open, my stressed heart echoing that very same warning.
Everything in that three a.m. moment seemed to be shouting without making a sound , "You know what this is! Do something!"
I didn't know what to do, so I came here. As soon as I sat down the feeling settled but it is still there.
Not of the Ego
It all sounds so dramatic ...I know...so crazy ego like... but this warning isn't coming from that superficial part of me. I don't even know where it is coming from. Though there is a very real but mild physiological fear response here associated with it ...the realization of this truth, I do not quite understand fully yet, comes from a calm place, a fearless place, where there is no drama.
I am being warned from a place where there is no concept of harm, by the Self that resides there...the Self that is completely invulnerable there. It is telling me in some way and some form...that the vulnerable parts of me (my body, reputation, health seeking..) are at risk of being harmed by an unconscious ego in another. It shows me what I need to know through these vivid details of memory I was unaware I recorded. It wants me to take notice. It wants me to do what I can to prevent/stop this from happening, not just to me, of course, but to others.
Ego is certainly present in the background of all of it, feeding me with a lot of "It is your fault. Oh...why didn't you think to say something, ask to see, question that, get evidence instead of laying there like a stupid little complacent patient wanting nothing more than to escape before you were shamed? Fool!"
How does that saying go? "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."
Pseudo-Peace
Truth is, I was fooled . I was fooled by more than an individual's expressed intentions which, on hind sight, differ so greatly from the reality of their actions. I was also fooled by that jpeg function of my mind that kicks in during stressful situations when I choose the desire for peace over truth. Though a desire for peace can guide us to truth...I am being shown that in the un-evolved mind a need for pseudo- peace, in the form of selective perception, can often obscure the truth.
That day, I slipped back into an ego mind that more than anything wanted to avoid more of the health seeking shaming I have experienced in the past. The outer situation appeared to offer an experience where I was being validated rather than shamed for seeking health on some level. The ego was happy and peaceful with that, shutting down the noise of all the other factors occurring in those moments, blurring the background, diminishing depth of field. By focusing only on that I could almost trust that all was over and okay...that there was nothing in body but "normal tissue". I seen and heard what ego wanted to see and hear...nothing more. So on the most superficial level, truth was obscured for ego reasons, leaving me, for the most part, with a pseudo type of peace.
Genuine Peace
Superficial data, was also obscured for other reasons. Amongst the pseudo- peace, I felt moments of genuine peace and faith. There were moments during that appointment and afterwards that I was operating at a higher level. I was unknowingly seeing, not only the forgiving part of Self, but I was seeing the essence of Self in others. In those moments, I was, without any conceptual input on my part, recognizing something so innocent, so harmless in the experience and in the others involved. I recognized that the true Self cannot be harmed by the unconscious intentions of others. I also realized that the true Self I share with others has pure intentions. It does not want me unwell because It does not want to be unwell. It was that that gave me peace more than anything...even though I couldn't process it conceptually in those moments.
The Seemingly Different Levels of Truth
We tend to believe that truth comes in many forms and many levels. I can relate that to my own experience.
Superficial Truth
There is the superficial truth and the deeper truth operating here wanting to be heard. The superficial truth involves what is going on in my body. I need to come to the truth of what that is...prevent it, stop it or manage it somehow. What I was told after the ultrasound, the same thing I was told three times before by this individual, after repeating the very same test that revealed nothing the other two times, does not change anything. The test was just a a consolation prize used to distract others from the golden ring it is much too attached to. It was a means of sloppily proving ego right without having to give into the demands of others that the ego feels will somehow diminish it. (I realized as I wrote this initially that I am harboring anger and wanting to attack...I step back ...breathe and begin again).It was not a test, I believe, to further investigate the changes that showed up on MRI. It was not a test meant to benefit me in any way by bringing me closer to an answer. How could it be? It was, I believe, a test meant protect an ego.
A Deeper Truth
My health seeking experience is offering another superficial truth to be dealt with...this is that part of the outer reality that extends beyond me to others. There is something bigger going on than "me" and "my" body....If this is happening with me, it is happening with others.The deeper part of truth comes with recognizing and understanding the universal effects of unconsciousness in self and others. My warning directs me here more so than anywhere else.
The Deepest And Only Truth
The deepest of all truth, however, comes from the reality that exists beneath what the body and other egos are doing to me, to others, to themselves or the world at large. It comes with the realization that we truly cannot be harmed. Though a warning usually comes when there is a potential threat of harm, with the faint understanding of this truth, I am being told that no harm can be done. So I am being warned of potential harm from a place that does not see harm and knows that I cannot be harmed. Is that not an oxymoron?
I am realizing, as I sit here pondering, that this must be more of a call for learning and teaching than a warning at this level. Hmm! I am being given a bit of a mission, I suppose.
Fulfilling a Function
In order to fulfill this function, however, I must deal with the superficial and deeper truths until I can get beyond them completely. I can not learn and teach if the vehicle I need to get around in, that I need to communicate with, is not functioning. I have to take care of the body.
I cannot speak for others or be an advocate for others if I am not an advocate for my own little self. I must heal at this egoic level before I can help heal others in whatever way I am meant to. I need , therefore, to transcend my shame and fear before I can show others how to do it.
What is really important though...goes beyond these truths, which are not really truths at all but mere perception. The real truth is I cannot be harmed. How can I be afraid, then, to do what I am called to do...which is face the superficial truths and help wake myself and others up to the deeper and deepest truth?
Nothing real can be harmed,
Nothing Unreal Exists
Herein lies the peace of God.
ACIM
How exactly am I to heed this warning? I am not sure yet. I do know the first step was coming here. The second step is recording the details I remember. which I have. I will wait to be told by "the Teacher" what the next step will be and I will proceed accordingly. I know I will be shown the way.The pain is still there but the bells have stopped clanging. I think I can fall back to sleep now as I leave what I wrote here up like I feel so compelled to do.
It is all good.
Tuesday, March 3, 2020
Jpeg and RAW: Slots in the Mind
Photography, as a powerful medium of expression and communications, offers an infinite variety of perception, interpretation and execution.
Ansel Adams ( https://www.brainyquote.com/topics/perception-quotes)
Hmmm! The mind is a very amazing thing to observe and observing it cannot only be highly entertaining, I am discovering, but very, very much growth enhancing. We can begin true healing of the world, I believe, when we are first willing to step into the only place where fixing takes place ...in the individual mind.
I love observing my mind. I have been observing it nd over the last 24 hours and was surprised to see how it so neatly relates to photography and camera function.
WTF (front)?
Bear with me....
I have a camera with a double card slot. Because I am still learning and comparing as a photographer, one of my cards I reserve for JPeg images, the other for shooting in RAW.
Jpeg and the Camera
The camera does most of the work with JPeg images...it selectively filters out the unnecessary visuals that are happening around me while I am shooting and distorts the image truths in a way that is most aesthetic and appealing to the eye. Even if I shot in manual mode, Jpeg images reveal that a lot of the work is done by the camera, not me, by blurring backgrounds, flattening dimensions, creating contrast or eliminating noise.
It leaves a lot of what the camera deems unnecessary out! The data file is therefore reasonably small and easy to work with. When I am shooting and want to get quick feedback on my images on my monitor, JPeg allows me to see the image in a mostly processed form. It's goal is to create the most appealing image, not necessarily the most honest one.
There is a down side to this. Because the camera already processed and left so much of the information out of the image, I have very little ability to alter that image afterwards in post processing. I have very little control over the perception of the world the camera offers me.
RAW and the Camera
RAW on the other hands is, as the name appears...honest and real. It picks up and stores everything around me even if I cannot pick it up with these poorly seeing eyes on my head. Every colour variation, every highlight, or shadow, every line is picked up onto the card in the slot assigned to RAW.
It picks up so much information that the camera does not have the capability of processing it and making sense of it. If I want to get feedback while I am shooting, I get little help. The RAW images that show up on my monitor are blurry and unclear. They won't even show up on a regular photo program when I download them to a computer. They need a special program that is equipped, open and receptive to handling such photos.
Lightroom is such a program. When I go to Lightroom with my RAW images I see so much more than I did when I was shooting . There is so much vivid detail! After downloading the detailed images , I can do as the camera did with the JPeg images. I, instead of the camera, can process the photos and determine how much shadow or light I want, how much clarity, noise or sharpening etc. I can take that information and rework it in a way that allows me to create what I consider to be the most appealing image. I, in a sense, can determine how I see and express the world.
What the heck does this have to do with the mind, crazy lady?
I have mentioned before how my mind works, right? How sometimes, in a heightened experience, I seem to be confused, picking up and perceiving only a limited amount of information and then later ...boom ...I am bombarded with vivid detail? It feels like those vague and shallow moments were re- opened in Lightroom...and I see and remember with intense clarity and detail the raw truth of what went down.
My mind, like my camera, has two slots for how I perceive the world and therefore determines what I can do with those perceptions. I want to use yesterday's experience to illustrate.
Jpeg and the Mind
While I was having the ultrasound done and later discussing the results ...my mind was using the Jpeg slot. I was just allowing the mind to decide what it wanted to pick up from the experience, what it wanted to store and what it wanted to do with the information. The goal was to create the most appealing perception.
Of course, I wanted peace of mind. I wanted to feel that others were taking care of this and that it was out of my hands. I wanted to know it was coming to an end! I wanted to feel that sense of trust! I wanted to hear that I did not have cancer...that the boulder was being rolled out of the way.
"Click! Click! Click!" went the mind and it only picked up information that would support that. It left everything else out! That was why I left feeling such peace. As I viewed my images during shooting (in that moment) they looked so good. It was a successful shoot. It was a successful appointment. I left feeling peace.
RAW and the Mind
I kept this Jpeg induced peace for most of the day, forgetting that I also shot in RAW. Pain is usually a reminder that I have a memory card to down load. An increasing amount of discomfort, since the ultrasound, became like a click of the mouse to open Light room on my mental computer. At three O'clock in the am...boom...I was transported into the program. I was looking at those moments in vivid detail showing everything the Jpeg part of my mind missed. It was kind of overwhelming and more than a bit disheartening to see that peace I so longed for shrivel up in the noise of what I was looking at.
Basically all I could do, if I wanted the honesty of RAW memories, was process the reality that nothing has really changed. Why would I perceive that another ultrasound ...the same test I had done three times, that totally missed this area each time ...be the end to all this?? Why was it even repeated? That just didn't make sense to me. You think the MRI would have been repeated?? How did my mental camera capture peace in that?
How could I assume that the exact same non-committal explanation I received four times before was this time the positive answer I was looking for , when if anything there is more evidence to support that it isn't?
What I missed in Jpeg mode that showed up in RAW, was what has changed. I now have evidence of that area on an MRI. It is there? The MRI did pick up something. What has changed is the amount of pain I am experiencing. It has been pretty much nonstop since the ultrasound. Even though the tech was gentle...the probing instigated something. It is more in the side and under the arm than it was. I am now willing to call it pain rather than discomfort.
And I was asked to palpate the area regularly. I hadn't palpated since the MRI...feeling no need to. When I palpated last night...I was not surprised to discover, it is still there. It isn't any smaller. And when I palpate now it leaves me with an increased intensity of discomfort afterwards. Something is going on there. I do not know what it is but it is not "normal tissue"!!!
Jpeg or RAW?
Man...in RAW's version of the experience I am no further ahead am I? I much prefer Jpeg's limited, sweet and positive version. So what do I do? Which one do I choose?
The Happy Medium
When I look at this experience, I need to find some place in the middle. I need to find a happy medium where Life is allowed to be Life, and the mind is allowed to perceive what it perceives. But I don't have to wait for the mind to offer me its version of reality. I don't have to believe what it shows me, I don't have to settle for its limited vision. Nor do I have to become overwhelmed with too much information and detail. I can instead create a better picture of what truth and clarity sees with the tools and the skills I have gained over the years.
Yes there is something there...but I do not have to constantly point my lens in that direction.
I can, instead, focus on the Greater picture hidden beneath these JPeg and Raw images, picture no camera would ever be able to pick up. That is what I need to put in the center of my mental frame. Even though it is formless and invisible, it is still very real and worthy of my camera's and my minds full focus. It is the only truth.
All is well.
All is well.
Monday, March 2, 2020
The Unforgiving Mind
The Unforgiving Mind
The unforgiving mind is full of fear,
and offers love no room to be itself;
no place where it can spread its wings in peace
and soar above the turmoil of the world.
The unforgiving mind is sad,
without the hope of respite or release from pain.
It suffers and abides in misery,
peering about in darkness, seeing not,
yet certain of the danger lurking there.
The unforgiving mind is torn with doubt,
confused about itself and all it sees;
afraid and angry, weak and blustering,
afraid to go ahead, afraid to stay,
afraid to waken or go to sleep,
afraid of every sound,
yet more afraid of stillness;
terrified of darkness,
yet more terrified at the approach of light...
The unforgiving mind sees no mistakes, but only sins.
It looks upon the world with sightless eyes,
and shrieks as it beholds its own projections
rising to attack its miserable parody of life.
It wants to live, yet wishes it were dead.
It wants forgiveness, yet it sees no hope.
It wants escape, yet can conceive of none
because it sees the sinful everywhere.
The unforgiving mind is in despair,
without the prospect of a future
which can offer anything but more despair.
Yet it regards its judgment of the world as irreversible,
and cannot see it has condemned itself to this despair.
It thinks it cannot change, for what it sees
bears witness that its judgment is correct.
It does not ask, because it thinks it knows.
It does not question, certain it is right.
The unforgiving mind does not believe
that giving and receiving are the same.
The unforgiving mind must learn through your forgiveness,
that it has been saved from hell.
ACIM
ACIM-W-121:2-9
This is what popped out of the pages of Lesson 121 as I was reading it. Amazing and definitely worthy of some solid consideration.
So let's begin!
In this lesson we are given the poetic definition of the unforgiving mind which is a mind that has identified with ego rather than with Spirit/Soul/ higher Self/ Awareness/ Presence. The unforgiving mind is the un-evolved mind that most of us travel through life using as our guide. That is pretty sad considering:
- That it is so full of fear it prevents Love from expanding within us and from us, as it naturally wants to do
- That it keeps us so contracted and restrained we can not feel the peace that is our birthright and cannot seem to get beyond the earthly "problems" we encounter.
- That it is sad and hopeless giving into the pain it feels it will never escape
- That it suffers and is miserable unable to see in the darkness it created and fearing what lurks in those shadows.
- That it is confused and doubtful about everything it sees including itself.
- That it is angry, weak and blustering.
- That it is always afraid: fearing everything ...afraid to go or stay; to awaken or go to sleep; afraid to be in darkness, yet afraid to go into the light.
- That it sees all mistakes as sins.
- That it lacks clarity using the body's sightless eyes to see, it only sees a threat in everything it has projected all around it.
- That it wants to live but would rather die; that it wants forgiveness but sees no hope; That it wants escape from the prison it has created but can not conceive of freedom because it sees the sinful everywhere.
- That it is deeply depressed and only sees more despair in the future.
- That it looks about the world in judgment and does not understand it created the world it sees and can escape it
- That it constantly searches for evidence of how it is stuck in this prison it created, how things will never change.
- That it is so connived of its limited pitiful version of reality that it doesn't question if there is a better way to live.
- That it does not see that giving and receiving are the same; that if it gives forgiveness, it will receive forgiveness.
Wow! This is what an unforgiving mind will do for us. Pretty brutal, eh? Yet most of us are living under the guidance of one and doing what it bids us to do: collecting grievances, picking out the wrong doings of others, holding onto anger and self righteousness, attacking and defending and living in fear.
Why do we live like this when we can live in ultimate safety, peace, Love and joy? All we have to do is learn to forgive others for their infractions. Through forgiveness of another we will receive the gift of freedom. We will awaken!
Forgiveness is the key to happiness.
All is well!
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
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
Sunday, March 1, 2020
Exchanging a Belief in Illness for Faith in Our wellness
All forms of sickness, even unto death, are physical expressions of the fear of waking up.
ACIM-T-8:IX:3:2
I woke up tired this morning after about four hours of sleep, with a headache. I want to crawl back into bed but I need to clean this house before my yoga classes today. Sigh!
Learning About Illness Perception From My Dog
Last night we had to take our dog to the animal hospital two hours away. She was in Addisonian crisis ( we didn't know she had Addison's). Addison's is a disease that effects the adrenal glands and leads to an inability to produce enough steroids needed to fight inflammation among other things and aldosterone which is needed to keep fluid in the body. Over the last two days, I was concerned by her lethargy and lack of appetite but what really got me were how her once healthy gums suddenly appeared to be fiery red and inflamed. I mean red! Even though she didn't seem to have a fever, I feared it was a serious bacterial infection that was becoming systemic thus the anorexia and lethargy...so that prompted the emergency visit at ten O Clock at night to the only clinic in the province open 24 hours.
Can you hear the fear and drama when I talk about this illness. We tend to add these two elements to any discussion or thought of illness, don't we?
When we got there her gums seemed to be the least thing of concern for others. The vetenarian staff had seen worse and I probably seemed like an over dramatic dog mother making too much of the minor. I was almost embarrassed about insisting we bring her in and was apologizing to D. for another failure in my gut instinct that said something was wrong when the vet came down with the news.
It didn't turn out to be a serious bacterial gingivitis. It was worse.
Thanks to the sharp diagnostic ability of the vet we seen ...she was diagnosed and treated quickly before things started to shut down. In the end, I see the gum inflammation was just her body's way of saying...she couldn't produce enough of her own natural anti-inflammatories! I realize now that though they were not the medical emergency I thought they were, if I didn't notice them and if I wasn't concerned about them we might have waited until Monday...in which case there would likely have been a fatal outcome. Thank God for those red gums!!
The Human Need For Illness Passed Onto our Pets?
What was ironic about this, was that my dog had no idea what diagnostic label was placed upon her, nor did she care. She had no idea her gums were red and that her adrenal glands were shutting down. She did not see herself as sick even though her body showed obvious signs of illness. "Sickness" is not a thought a dog holds in their head, is it? It is like we as humans are manifesting disease onto our beloved pets ????
You see, there was a very brief time in my life that others thought I might have adrenal insufficiency and that it was the cause of my bradycardia, hypotension and fainting. I was even prescribed flourinef which I didn't end up taking. I didn't take it because I knew my potassium tended to be too low most times, rather than too high as it is in Addison's, and the last thing I needed was for it to go down further. Anyway, I just thought that was ironic how my dog was getting a label that was nearly placed on me...like it had to go somewhere in this learning puzzle. The experience brought me back to how I looked at illness then and still do, obviously, now.
Though my dog isn't, I am ascribing to ego's old doctrine of illness...big time.
It is challenging to break free of it...to see that we can get beyond our physical limitations to a place/state of mind where there are no limitations. It just seems like magic to be able to do so...impossible magic.
Yet that is what A Course calls a Miracle and teaches that we are all capable of miracles. It instructs, throughout its many text and workbook pages, that the only thing that limits us or makes us sick is of the mind, a perception and an adherence to a worldly belief system.
Yet it is one so many of us adhere to and believe to our dying day to be the only reality. It seems so "normal" to believe that attack, illness, suffering and death are unavoidable things in our experience out to get us, that we will always be vulnerable to, that we cannot escape. It seems that "fear" in its many, many forms, then, is a given for humanity and something we just need to accept, listen to and obey.
Questioning Ingrained Belief
To think differently than this or to even have the audacity to question such a thought structure is considered completely abnormal, somehow "blasphemous," and insane. How can we prevent or stop the body from getting sick? How can we heal the body without external measures like medicine after it gets sick? It is just not possible, is it? We are at the mercy, we believe, of ancient viruses and bacteria, random cell mutation, environmental or cellular trauma, and our genes, right? Our avoidance of getting sick, if we are lucky enough to do so as we progress through our life cycle has to be due to our vigilant "fight against" these things, our collaboration with medicine and/ or just a stroke of " pure luck"...nothing more.
We are just so vulnerable to illness. Or are we?
A Course and many other spiritual doctrines teach that we need not succumb to fear, to suffering, to illness and even this idea we have of death. We can instead "wake up" to the truth of who we are seeing that there is a higher power within us that sees no harm but heals when we "believe" or "perceive' we have been harmed. It is "wrong perception" that creates illness...a distorted belief that it can be so, not the reality of who we are. It is a change in that perception to miracle-mindedness that will heal us.
Reality is Harmless
Our reality is harmless The reality of everything is totally harmless, because total harmlessness is the condition of its reality.ACIM-T-8:IX:2:2 Adhering to this, rather than ego's mixed up version of reality, will keep us healthy and whole, the way we are.
What we need then is not necessarily diagnostic labels, drugs and external treatments, (which definitely serve an important function while we still succumb at all to any of ego's thought structures about illness....as many of us will do to one degree or another until the day we die) but faith. Replacing tired old beliefs with Faith can indeed save us. As long as we believe in sickness and have little faith in miracles we will get sick and we will not heal.
We need Faith!!!
For truly, I say to you, if you have Faith like a grain of a mustard seed , you will say to this mountain "move from here to there" and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you. Matthew 17: 20 ESV
Great healing can happen with faith,
Then Jesus answered, "O woman, Great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire." And her daughter was healed instantly. Matthew 15:28 ESV
Miracles happen all the time
I know that when we hear of people spontaneously healing from life threatening diseases or bodily limitations without medical intervention, we call it a fluke of nature, a lucky coincidence, an improperly labelled condition. We find it so hard to believe. We discount it. Analyze it scientifically or dismiss it as a lie. We even fear what accepting that possibility could mean about the way we see the world at large. We often refuse, then, to consider the possibility that there could be more to us than the limited vulnerable version we buy into. We would rather live fearfully following the ego's guidance, be sick and to suffer than to wake up to who we really are.
We fear our own magnificence.
Yet there are so many occurrences out there of people who were guided past this fear, woke up and were able to express their own magnificence and thus heal against insurmountable odds! It does happen. Two such cases are that of Eben Alexander III and Anita Moorjani. You need to read their stories.
What we can learn from them and all the wonderful teachings out there...is that illness is not our birthright! It is not what is intended for us. It is only because we see wrongly that we suffer and become ill.
Another Way to Look
There is another way to look at the world and our selves. There is another way of looking at the body that is more real than what we experience now. The miracle of healing is possible for all of us when we see ourselves beyond our bodies and mind. When we see we are spirit above all else. Are you willing to at least consider that possibility.
Miracles rearrange perception and place all levels in true perspective. This is healing because sickness comes from confusing the levels...By recognizing spirit, miracles adjust the levels of perception and show them in proper alignment. This places spirit at the center, where it can communicate directly. ACIM-T-1:I:23 & 30
Begin Now
Though ending this fear and accepting a new reality of miracles may take a life time for many of us to accomplish, we can begin today by at least becoming willing to address this fear we have of waking up, of looking beyond to a possibility of something greater. We can exchange our belief in illness for faith in the power of our wellness.
Begin now.
All is well
ACIM
ACIM-T-8:IX:3:2
I woke up tired this morning after about four hours of sleep, with a headache. I want to crawl back into bed but I need to clean this house before my yoga classes today. Sigh!
Learning About Illness Perception From My Dog
Last night we had to take our dog to the animal hospital two hours away. She was in Addisonian crisis ( we didn't know she had Addison's). Addison's is a disease that effects the adrenal glands and leads to an inability to produce enough steroids needed to fight inflammation among other things and aldosterone which is needed to keep fluid in the body. Over the last two days, I was concerned by her lethargy and lack of appetite but what really got me were how her once healthy gums suddenly appeared to be fiery red and inflamed. I mean red! Even though she didn't seem to have a fever, I feared it was a serious bacterial infection that was becoming systemic thus the anorexia and lethargy...so that prompted the emergency visit at ten O Clock at night to the only clinic in the province open 24 hours.
Can you hear the fear and drama when I talk about this illness. We tend to add these two elements to any discussion or thought of illness, don't we?
When we got there her gums seemed to be the least thing of concern for others. The vetenarian staff had seen worse and I probably seemed like an over dramatic dog mother making too much of the minor. I was almost embarrassed about insisting we bring her in and was apologizing to D. for another failure in my gut instinct that said something was wrong when the vet came down with the news.
It didn't turn out to be a serious bacterial gingivitis. It was worse.
Thanks to the sharp diagnostic ability of the vet we seen ...she was diagnosed and treated quickly before things started to shut down. In the end, I see the gum inflammation was just her body's way of saying...she couldn't produce enough of her own natural anti-inflammatories! I realize now that though they were not the medical emergency I thought they were, if I didn't notice them and if I wasn't concerned about them we might have waited until Monday...in which case there would likely have been a fatal outcome. Thank God for those red gums!!
The Human Need For Illness Passed Onto our Pets?
What was ironic about this, was that my dog had no idea what diagnostic label was placed upon her, nor did she care. She had no idea her gums were red and that her adrenal glands were shutting down. She did not see herself as sick even though her body showed obvious signs of illness. "Sickness" is not a thought a dog holds in their head, is it? It is like we as humans are manifesting disease onto our beloved pets ????
You see, there was a very brief time in my life that others thought I might have adrenal insufficiency and that it was the cause of my bradycardia, hypotension and fainting. I was even prescribed flourinef which I didn't end up taking. I didn't take it because I knew my potassium tended to be too low most times, rather than too high as it is in Addison's, and the last thing I needed was for it to go down further. Anyway, I just thought that was ironic how my dog was getting a label that was nearly placed on me...like it had to go somewhere in this learning puzzle. The experience brought me back to how I looked at illness then and still do, obviously, now.
Though my dog isn't, I am ascribing to ego's old doctrine of illness...big time.
It is challenging to break free of it...to see that we can get beyond our physical limitations to a place/state of mind where there are no limitations. It just seems like magic to be able to do so...impossible magic.
Yet that is what A Course calls a Miracle and teaches that we are all capable of miracles. It instructs, throughout its many text and workbook pages, that the only thing that limits us or makes us sick is of the mind, a perception and an adherence to a worldly belief system.
Yet it is one so many of us adhere to and believe to our dying day to be the only reality. It seems so "normal" to believe that attack, illness, suffering and death are unavoidable things in our experience out to get us, that we will always be vulnerable to, that we cannot escape. It seems that "fear" in its many, many forms, then, is a given for humanity and something we just need to accept, listen to and obey.
Questioning Ingrained Belief
To think differently than this or to even have the audacity to question such a thought structure is considered completely abnormal, somehow "blasphemous," and insane. How can we prevent or stop the body from getting sick? How can we heal the body without external measures like medicine after it gets sick? It is just not possible, is it? We are at the mercy, we believe, of ancient viruses and bacteria, random cell mutation, environmental or cellular trauma, and our genes, right? Our avoidance of getting sick, if we are lucky enough to do so as we progress through our life cycle has to be due to our vigilant "fight against" these things, our collaboration with medicine and/ or just a stroke of " pure luck"...nothing more.
We are just so vulnerable to illness. Or are we?
A Course and many other spiritual doctrines teach that we need not succumb to fear, to suffering, to illness and even this idea we have of death. We can instead "wake up" to the truth of who we are seeing that there is a higher power within us that sees no harm but heals when we "believe" or "perceive' we have been harmed. It is "wrong perception" that creates illness...a distorted belief that it can be so, not the reality of who we are. It is a change in that perception to miracle-mindedness that will heal us.
Reality is Harmless
Our reality is harmless The reality of everything is totally harmless, because total harmlessness is the condition of its reality.ACIM-T-8:IX:2:2 Adhering to this, rather than ego's mixed up version of reality, will keep us healthy and whole, the way we are.
What we need then is not necessarily diagnostic labels, drugs and external treatments, (which definitely serve an important function while we still succumb at all to any of ego's thought structures about illness....as many of us will do to one degree or another until the day we die) but faith. Replacing tired old beliefs with Faith can indeed save us. As long as we believe in sickness and have little faith in miracles we will get sick and we will not heal.
We need Faith!!!
For truly, I say to you, if you have Faith like a grain of a mustard seed , you will say to this mountain "move from here to there" and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you. Matthew 17: 20 ESV
Great healing can happen with faith,
Then Jesus answered, "O woman, Great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire." And her daughter was healed instantly. Matthew 15:28 ESV
Miracles happen all the time
I know that when we hear of people spontaneously healing from life threatening diseases or bodily limitations without medical intervention, we call it a fluke of nature, a lucky coincidence, an improperly labelled condition. We find it so hard to believe. We discount it. Analyze it scientifically or dismiss it as a lie. We even fear what accepting that possibility could mean about the way we see the world at large. We often refuse, then, to consider the possibility that there could be more to us than the limited vulnerable version we buy into. We would rather live fearfully following the ego's guidance, be sick and to suffer than to wake up to who we really are.
We fear our own magnificence.
Yet there are so many occurrences out there of people who were guided past this fear, woke up and were able to express their own magnificence and thus heal against insurmountable odds! It does happen. Two such cases are that of Eben Alexander III and Anita Moorjani. You need to read their stories.
What we can learn from them and all the wonderful teachings out there...is that illness is not our birthright! It is not what is intended for us. It is only because we see wrongly that we suffer and become ill.
Another Way to Look
There is another way to look at the world and our selves. There is another way of looking at the body that is more real than what we experience now. The miracle of healing is possible for all of us when we see ourselves beyond our bodies and mind. When we see we are spirit above all else. Are you willing to at least consider that possibility.
Miracles rearrange perception and place all levels in true perspective. This is healing because sickness comes from confusing the levels...By recognizing spirit, miracles adjust the levels of perception and show them in proper alignment. This places spirit at the center, where it can communicate directly. ACIM-T-1:I:23 & 30
Begin Now
Though ending this fear and accepting a new reality of miracles may take a life time for many of us to accomplish, we can begin today by at least becoming willing to address this fear we have of waking up, of looking beyond to a possibility of something greater. We can exchange our belief in illness for faith in the power of our wellness.
Begin now.
All is well
ACIM
Saturday, February 29, 2020
Not of the Body
Yet sickness is not of the body, but of the mind. All forms of sickness are signs the mind is split, and does not accept a unified purpose.
ACIM-T-8:IX:8:6-7
What the heck does that mean?
We may ask that question upon reading those words. How could this belly ache, this stroke, this cancer or this cold be of the mind when it is so obviously that our body is feeling these things? It is in the body, is it not?
Yes and no. Your so called disease, cellular change or physical symptom is manifesting in the body but it is not of the body. The mind created it. More accurately, the split mind created it.
Say what crazy lady?
A course teaches that The body exists in a world that seems to have two voices fighting for its possession. (ACIM-T-8:VIII:2:1) The Spiritual part of our minds , the only part actually, sees the body as here to serve a function as assigned by Love. It knows the body cannot be sick, it is invulnerable, because of this divine purpose.
The ego which is fear, however, has a "profound investment" in sickness. It is convinced that we are vulnerable and at the mercy of attack. It will do whatever it can to convince us of that so we do not listen to the truer part of our Self. It uses sickness to prove this point. Sickness is a way of demonstrating that you can be hurt. (8:VIII:6:1)
So when we see both health and illness as being possible we are believing there are two wills . We have God's Will for us and the body and we have ego's. We have Love and we have fear. Our mind will go back and forth between the two. When it does this, it is split and illness can show up in our bodies.
God's Will for us is perfect health, Love, joy. Ego's will for us is pain, illness, suffering and death. When we ascribe to the latter, as most of us do, we will have the potential to get sick
This is how Anita Moorjani describes how she got cancer. She invested in ego's doctrine of fear and self loathing rather than in God's doctrine of Love. It took dying to realize that she could never be a part from God's will. If she followed God's vision for her healing she could heal. She did.
There is a lesson in that.
All is well.
ACIM
Anita Moorjani (2014) Dying to Be Me. Hay House.
ACIM-T-8:IX:8:6-7
What the heck does that mean?
We may ask that question upon reading those words. How could this belly ache, this stroke, this cancer or this cold be of the mind when it is so obviously that our body is feeling these things? It is in the body, is it not?
Yes and no. Your so called disease, cellular change or physical symptom is manifesting in the body but it is not of the body. The mind created it. More accurately, the split mind created it.
Say what crazy lady?
A course teaches that The body exists in a world that seems to have two voices fighting for its possession. (ACIM-T-8:VIII:2:1) The Spiritual part of our minds , the only part actually, sees the body as here to serve a function as assigned by Love. It knows the body cannot be sick, it is invulnerable, because of this divine purpose.
The ego which is fear, however, has a "profound investment" in sickness. It is convinced that we are vulnerable and at the mercy of attack. It will do whatever it can to convince us of that so we do not listen to the truer part of our Self. It uses sickness to prove this point. Sickness is a way of demonstrating that you can be hurt. (8:VIII:6:1)
So when we see both health and illness as being possible we are believing there are two wills . We have God's Will for us and the body and we have ego's. We have Love and we have fear. Our mind will go back and forth between the two. When it does this, it is split and illness can show up in our bodies.
God's Will for us is perfect health, Love, joy. Ego's will for us is pain, illness, suffering and death. When we ascribe to the latter, as most of us do, we will have the potential to get sick
This is how Anita Moorjani describes how she got cancer. She invested in ego's doctrine of fear and self loathing rather than in God's doctrine of Love. It took dying to realize that she could never be a part from God's will. If she followed God's vision for her healing she could heal. She did.
There is a lesson in that.
All is well.
ACIM
Anita Moorjani (2014) Dying to Be Me. Hay House.
Friday, February 28, 2020
On Creativity and Staying Open
Obey the impulse....Stay open...Be the vehicle ready for the process to flow into....knowing that it isn't yours...let the energy flow through you, let it out.
Eckhart Tolle...paraphrased from a collection of words he shared in the below videos.
I started this entry yesterday and I was all keen to write about creativity and the thrill of being divinely inspired before I got my head space into something that was tugging at me a bit more. What led me to that inspiration was watching a movie about a young boy who reported he went to heaven
In that movie a young artist named Akiane was mentioned who also supposedly had a connection with the divine through dreams and images. She even reports that she went to Heaven one day and thus was divinely inspired to create the most amazing art. I looked her up on You tube...was blown away by her artistic ability, even at the age of four, and throughout her life. It is "beyond human". There is obviously Something greater than her behind those brush strokes.
I thought of other geniuses like Mozart, Einstein, Michelangelo, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Milton to name a few. I became convinced of divine inspiration.
So my inspiration came from a movie and this very interesting topic of NDE...(which by the way led me to begin reading Proof of Heaven by Eben Alexander III and Dying to Be Me by Anita Moorjani.)
The Poem
I had written the poem below, the day before, in a fifteen minute rush of something from within. I am not saying it was channelled or inspired. I am not saying it was spirit rather than ego that brought me to the page and made me pour out my outer and inner world experience . I am not saying the poem is good or bad, something to be proud of or something to be ashamed of.
It simply is what is... born of something or Something I quite don't understand. I questioned: Is this ego or divine?
The Human in Creativity
Of course, the subject matter wreaks of ego...fear ...and I wonder why would creativity, something greater than ego, reduce itself to an expression of such an experience.
Hmmm?
Maybe because it is a human experience, something we all can relate to, therefore connecting rather than separating? It is honest, as embarrassing as it is to be that honest. That is how I feel when the phone rings when I know the call has something to do with getting me closer to an answer. I still find myself stuck in fear whether it is rational or irrational to be so. The poem shows how "not quite evolved" I am. It also shows how aware I am...how connected I am to this experience of being human, how vivid each moment is for me.
Divinely Inspired?
I was just sitting on the couch, hours after the phone call, remembering how afraid I was to pick up that phone and the thought popped into my mind, "Poem". I got up, walked to the computer, sat down and began to write about that emotional experience I had. It did not come out rhyming so I automatically thought this is "little me" doing something uninspired...but the more the images took form with little effort from me...the more I thought "Wow! Maybe this is divinely inspired! Something is helping me here." I obeyed the impulse and I let it happen.
Regardless of how that poem got on the page, why it did or how awful it may sound to someone else...it was meant to be. It was an energy I needed to let in and then let out.
Letting The Energy Flow Through
When we don't let this energy in, allow it to flow though us and eventually let it out ...we suffer. It stays on the outside of us pounding on our flesh until we let it in or it gets stuck inside of us when we refuse to let it out, damaging our outer and inner walls.
I believe that is why the body "gets sick". ( or we perceive the body to get sick) . Maybe I have resisted creativity too many times when it came knocking at my door with a message it wanted me to share...or maybe when I did let it in, I refused to let it out. It was ego mind that refused to open the door in fear of the stranger, revealing our association to a judging world if I let it out. I did not honor the nature of this flow. I closed the windows to it and on it.
Like a breeze, creativity needs a way in and a way out. We need to keep our windows open.
We also have to know it is not ours. I cannot call the breeze that blows through my house "mine". It is just an energy belonging to Something Greater than me. I let it in and I let it out...in that way it flows through me not against me.
Stay open!
All is well.
Eckhart Tolle ( Aug, 2018) How to Be Creative.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-whVSGbDeAA
Eckhart Tolle ( Oct, 2019) Do I own my idea? The nature of creative manifestation? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-whVSGbDeAA
Eckhart Tolle...paraphrased from a collection of words he shared in the below videos.
I started this entry yesterday and I was all keen to write about creativity and the thrill of being divinely inspired before I got my head space into something that was tugging at me a bit more. What led me to that inspiration was watching a movie about a young boy who reported he went to heaven
In that movie a young artist named Akiane was mentioned who also supposedly had a connection with the divine through dreams and images. She even reports that she went to Heaven one day and thus was divinely inspired to create the most amazing art. I looked her up on You tube...was blown away by her artistic ability, even at the age of four, and throughout her life. It is "beyond human". There is obviously Something greater than her behind those brush strokes.
I thought of other geniuses like Mozart, Einstein, Michelangelo, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Milton to name a few. I became convinced of divine inspiration.
So my inspiration came from a movie and this very interesting topic of NDE...(which by the way led me to begin reading Proof of Heaven by Eben Alexander III and Dying to Be Me by Anita Moorjani.)
The Poem
I had written the poem below, the day before, in a fifteen minute rush of something from within. I am not saying it was channelled or inspired. I am not saying it was spirit rather than ego that brought me to the page and made me pour out my outer and inner world experience . I am not saying the poem is good or bad, something to be proud of or something to be ashamed of.
It simply is what is... born of something or Something I quite don't understand. I questioned: Is this ego or divine?
The Human in Creativity
Of course, the subject matter wreaks of ego...fear ...and I wonder why would creativity, something greater than ego, reduce itself to an expression of such an experience.
Hmmm?
Maybe because it is a human experience, something we all can relate to, therefore connecting rather than separating? It is honest, as embarrassing as it is to be that honest. That is how I feel when the phone rings when I know the call has something to do with getting me closer to an answer. I still find myself stuck in fear whether it is rational or irrational to be so. The poem shows how "not quite evolved" I am. It also shows how aware I am...how connected I am to this experience of being human, how vivid each moment is for me.
Divinely Inspired?
I was just sitting on the couch, hours after the phone call, remembering how afraid I was to pick up that phone and the thought popped into my mind, "Poem". I got up, walked to the computer, sat down and began to write about that emotional experience I had. It did not come out rhyming so I automatically thought this is "little me" doing something uninspired...but the more the images took form with little effort from me...the more I thought "Wow! Maybe this is divinely inspired! Something is helping me here." I obeyed the impulse and I let it happen.
Regardless of how that poem got on the page, why it did or how awful it may sound to someone else...it was meant to be. It was an energy I needed to let in and then let out.
Letting The Energy Flow Through
When we don't let this energy in, allow it to flow though us and eventually let it out ...we suffer. It stays on the outside of us pounding on our flesh until we let it in or it gets stuck inside of us when we refuse to let it out, damaging our outer and inner walls.
I believe that is why the body "gets sick". ( or we perceive the body to get sick) . Maybe I have resisted creativity too many times when it came knocking at my door with a message it wanted me to share...or maybe when I did let it in, I refused to let it out. It was ego mind that refused to open the door in fear of the stranger, revealing our association to a judging world if I let it out. I did not honor the nature of this flow. I closed the windows to it and on it.
Like a breeze, creativity needs a way in and a way out. We need to keep our windows open.
We also have to know it is not ours. I cannot call the breeze that blows through my house "mine". It is just an energy belonging to Something Greater than me. I let it in and I let it out...in that way it flows through me not against me.
Stay open!
All is well.
Eckhart Tolle ( Aug, 2018) How to Be Creative.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-whVSGbDeAA
Eckhart Tolle ( Oct, 2019) Do I own my idea? The nature of creative manifestation? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-whVSGbDeAA
The Answer?
The Answer?
Maybe the end
to my waiting
Dale-Lyn, February 2020
hides in the tiny
spaces of silence,
trapped in the
awkward breaks
of persistent buzzing
of persistent buzzing
that wakes me
from my restless dreams?
The pointed end
of mystery's arrow
could be lurking
behind
the flimsy veil
of No caller ID,
making a noisy target
of my pounding chest.
I can feel the hum
of its unravelling
dancing off the cool glass,
tickling my fingertips
with its coveted revelation,
urging me to put an end
to the prickliness
of not knowing
by picking up the vehicle
it is locked within.
I hesitate.
I swallow hard.
I slide my trembling thumb
across the screen
to offer my meek and pitiful ,
“Hello…this is she…”
to the hollow ears
on the other end.
And I wait….breathless
As slow moving lips
I cannot see
whisper back
the secrets
I will never
be ready to hear .
Only Perception Can Be Sick
Only perception can be sick, because only perception can be wrong. ACIM-T-8:IX:1:7
I came here this morning with the intention to write about divinely inspired creativity. ACIM was open to these pages on my desk and it was like the words just popped out and grabbed me, pulling me into some knowing I can barely explain. I felt immediately compelled to put these words here because they spoke to me so loudly at this moment in my life. If they spoke to me they will speak to all.
I needed /need them in my mind/ the joined mind right now for whatever reason, maybe as a gentle reminder to re-establish meaning and right perception, to replace fear with love. These words want to be heard/read exactly as they are so I put them here as I feel so very compelled to do.
If you are sick you are withdrawing from me. Yet you cannot withdraw from me alone. You can only withdraw from yourself and me. ACIM-T-8:IX:7:5-6
Yet sickness is not of the body, but of the mind. All forms of sickness are signs that the mind is split, and does not accept a unified purpose. ACIM-T-8:IX:8:6-7
Wholeness heals because it is of the mind. ACIM-T-8:IX:3:1
All forms of sickness, even unto death, are physical expressions of the fear of awakening. ACIM-T-8:IX:3:2
When the ego tempts you to sickness do not ask the Holy spirit to heal the body, for this would merely be to accept the ego's belief that the body is the proper aim of healing. Ask rather, that the Holy Spirit teach you the right perception of the body, for perception only can be distorted. ACIM-T-8:IX:1:5-6
"Rest in peace" is a blessing for the living, not the dead, because rest comes from waking, not from sleeping. Sleep is withdrawing: waking is joining.
ACIM-T-8:IX:3:5-6
The re-establishing of meaning in a chaotic thought system is the way to heal it. ACIM-T-8:IX:9:3
Healing is release from fear of waking and the substitution of the decision to wake. The decision to wake is the reflection of the will to love, since all healing involves replacing fear with love. ACIM-T-8: IX:5:1-2
All is well!
I came here this morning with the intention to write about divinely inspired creativity. ACIM was open to these pages on my desk and it was like the words just popped out and grabbed me, pulling me into some knowing I can barely explain. I felt immediately compelled to put these words here because they spoke to me so loudly at this moment in my life. If they spoke to me they will speak to all.
I needed /need them in my mind/ the joined mind right now for whatever reason, maybe as a gentle reminder to re-establish meaning and right perception, to replace fear with love. These words want to be heard/read exactly as they are so I put them here as I feel so very compelled to do.
If you are sick you are withdrawing from me. Yet you cannot withdraw from me alone. You can only withdraw from yourself and me. ACIM-T-8:IX:7:5-6
Yet sickness is not of the body, but of the mind. All forms of sickness are signs that the mind is split, and does not accept a unified purpose. ACIM-T-8:IX:8:6-7
Wholeness heals because it is of the mind. ACIM-T-8:IX:3:1
All forms of sickness, even unto death, are physical expressions of the fear of awakening. ACIM-T-8:IX:3:2
When the ego tempts you to sickness do not ask the Holy spirit to heal the body, for this would merely be to accept the ego's belief that the body is the proper aim of healing. Ask rather, that the Holy Spirit teach you the right perception of the body, for perception only can be distorted. ACIM-T-8:IX:1:5-6
"Rest in peace" is a blessing for the living, not the dead, because rest comes from waking, not from sleeping. Sleep is withdrawing: waking is joining.
ACIM-T-8:IX:3:5-6
The re-establishing of meaning in a chaotic thought system is the way to heal it. ACIM-T-8:IX:9:3
Healing is release from fear of waking and the substitution of the decision to wake. The decision to wake is the reflection of the will to love, since all healing involves replacing fear with love. ACIM-T-8: IX:5:1-2
All is well!
Thursday, February 27, 2020
Asking the Wrong Teacher
Sickness is merely another example of your insistence on asking guidance of a teacher who does not know the answer. The ego is incapable of knowing how you feel...
ACIM-T-8:VIII:7:4-5
I got a call today for another appointment, another test. When the phone rang with a "No Caller ID" I was too frightened to pick it up. I waited for the individual on the other end to leave a message. I was needing a few minutes to process before I called back. And when I did, I discovered it was just for another appointment, for another test...one I already had done twice before.
My mind automatically went into "Why? Why repeat this same test? Was the MRI inconclusive? Or was it so conclusive it showed absolutely nothing of concern and this is simply the test that I was told was going to be done in four months time, almost four months ago...one final investigation before a file is closed?"
That explanation felt right to the intuitive part of me and gave me both a sense of relief as well as a little concern. I want this to mark the end of this particular health seeking journey, I do, I just do not want to be left with, "We do not know what it is but it doesn't seem to be serious." Though that would fit beautifully into the life story of my health seeking, it will not give me peace.
I ask the question, "What is going on in my body?" But who am I asking it too?
A Need to Know and Asking the Wrong Teacher
I want to know what is causing the pain and the visible changes. I do not want another inexplicable and invalidated physical disruption to add to my list of many. Just like I feel the pelvic pain, the chest pain ...I feel this pain and I want to be told what is causing it on the physical level. I don't want it dismissed like the others were for so very long. I focus on the body and feel I need to hear what is creating this perception of illness on this level. My mind tells me that is what I want and what I have a right to. Yet, I also somehow know that if it is health I seek... I am in the wrong classroom and asking the wrong teacher that question.
Health is the beginning of the proper perspective on life under the guidance of the one Teacher who knows what life is, being the Voice for Life itself.
ACIM-T-8:VIII:9:10
I realize that as long as I am assuming or fearing illness in my body, my mind is not yet healed and am I not seeing clearly. I am following and listening to a teacher who does not have the answer and who will never know (or care) how I feel. That teacher is ego.
As long as I seek the guidance of ego through this body focus I am not able to hear the answers from the only Teacher Who truly knows. What is going on in my body is not nearly as important as what is going on in my mind. I should put my questions and my healing focus there.
Once your mind is healed, it radiates health, and thereby teaches healing. ACIM-T-6:V:C:9:7
All is well.
ACIM
ACIM-T-8:VIII:7:4-5
I got a call today for another appointment, another test. When the phone rang with a "No Caller ID" I was too frightened to pick it up. I waited for the individual on the other end to leave a message. I was needing a few minutes to process before I called back. And when I did, I discovered it was just for another appointment, for another test...one I already had done twice before.
My mind automatically went into "Why? Why repeat this same test? Was the MRI inconclusive? Or was it so conclusive it showed absolutely nothing of concern and this is simply the test that I was told was going to be done in four months time, almost four months ago...one final investigation before a file is closed?"
That explanation felt right to the intuitive part of me and gave me both a sense of relief as well as a little concern. I want this to mark the end of this particular health seeking journey, I do, I just do not want to be left with, "We do not know what it is but it doesn't seem to be serious." Though that would fit beautifully into the life story of my health seeking, it will not give me peace.
I ask the question, "What is going on in my body?" But who am I asking it too?
A Need to Know and Asking the Wrong Teacher
I want to know what is causing the pain and the visible changes. I do not want another inexplicable and invalidated physical disruption to add to my list of many. Just like I feel the pelvic pain, the chest pain ...I feel this pain and I want to be told what is causing it on the physical level. I don't want it dismissed like the others were for so very long. I focus on the body and feel I need to hear what is creating this perception of illness on this level. My mind tells me that is what I want and what I have a right to. Yet, I also somehow know that if it is health I seek... I am in the wrong classroom and asking the wrong teacher that question.
Health is the beginning of the proper perspective on life under the guidance of the one Teacher who knows what life is, being the Voice for Life itself.
ACIM-T-8:VIII:9:10
I realize that as long as I am assuming or fearing illness in my body, my mind is not yet healed and am I not seeing clearly. I am following and listening to a teacher who does not have the answer and who will never know (or care) how I feel. That teacher is ego.
As long as I seek the guidance of ego through this body focus I am not able to hear the answers from the only Teacher Who truly knows. What is going on in my body is not nearly as important as what is going on in my mind. I should put my questions and my healing focus there.
Once your mind is healed, it radiates health, and thereby teaches healing. ACIM-T-6:V:C:9:7
All is well.
ACIM
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