ACIM Mentor

“I do therefore I am”, says the ego. When you are ego-identified you are defined by what you do . When you follow the Holy Spirit’s guidance you say, “God is, therefore I AM.” What you do is merely an expression of your relationship with the Holy Spirit and the doing is itself unimportant. The Holy Spirit is not concerned with what you do, but it is natural that your connection with the Holy Spirit will be expressed in the world in some form. As always, your connection to the Holy Spirit is what is important, not the form of the expression of this connection. The ego always emphasizes form; the Holy Spirit content. For example, let’s say you got a job as a construction worker. Depending on its mood or the overall story it has made for you, the ego will use this as a source of pride or shame. It may say, “You are doing valuable work building this city. You are an important contributor to society” or “You are in a lowly, blue collar job. People of real value work in an office”. However, ...

Recently I had a birthday. The way I like to spend my birthday is as a usual day followed by a quiet dinner out at a restaurant of my choice with my partner, Courtney. My family drops off my presents during the day if they have not already given them to me before. On or before my birthday Courtney and I go out and get my present from her, which is usually something I have chosen. That’s it. This year we have a roommate. One of Dean’s favorite forms of entertainment is to go out to dinner and he especially likes to gather up a group to go with him. His funds have been low for a while, and will be for a while more, so for now he does not get to indulge his passion for eating out. So I invited him to join Courtney and I. The week before my birthday Dean started suggesting people to invite along, starting with his best friend, Jack, and moving on to my family. I am not social at all; I am a loner who, if there have to be people, prefer them one or two at a time. Going out in groups is not...

One of the hardest concepts to grasp in A Course in Miracles is what it means by “world”. When we think of the world we think of bodies and their physical environment. When we are ego-identified, it is “my” body and the world is nature, buildings and other physical structures and other bodies. Yet when the Course mentions the “real world” it becomes clear it is not talking about the physical world at all. Sit quietly and look upon the world you see, and tell yourself: "The real world is not like this. It has no buildings and there are no streets where people walk alone and separate. There are no stores where people buy an endless list of things they do not need. It is not lit with artificial light, and night comes not upon it. There is no day that brightens and grows dim. There is no loss. Nothing is there but shines, and shines forever." The world you see must be denied, for sight of it is costing you a different kind of vision. You cannot see both worlds , for each of the...

What could you not accept, if you but knew that everything that happens, all events, past, present and to come, are gently planned by One Whose only purpose is your good? (W-135.13) There is a statement I make when I talk about my relationship to God that when I picked up A Course in Miracles and began reading it that I knew it was the whole reason I came into the world. That and the quote above are examples of figurative language that sometimes confuse students. If God didn’t make the world and individuality isn’t real, how could I feel I had a reason to be here? How could our lives be planned out ahead of time? The idea of a Part of God being not-God was over the instant it was thought. We look at the world as a story unfolding in time, but what is really happening is that instant playing over and over and over again. Each instant you have the choice between separation and Oneness. This is what the Holy Spirit knows. What is planned by the Holy Spirit is to use every instant to tea...

Every now and then a student asks me why they should follow the Holy Spirit’s guidance if the world isn’t real and if it has nothing to do with God. What difference does it make how you live in the world, then? All that you made can serve salvation easily and well. The Son of God can make no choice the Holy Spirit cannot employ on his behalf, and not against himself. (T-25.VI.7) The world is your perception that you are separate from God. Calling on the Holy Spirit to guide you in it corrects this misperception. You are no longer separate from God when you are following the Holy Spirit. What you ask the Holy Spirit and what the Holy Sprit answers is not important. What is important is that you asked and that you accepted an answer . When you follow the Holy Spirit the purpose of every circumstance becomes a means to be with the Holy Spirit. The world that was made to make separation from God real to you becomes a means of remembering you are One with God. It doesn’t matter to God ho...

While meditating a couple of weeks ago I slipped over to the other side for a moment and knew God as Reality and I had this insight: All of this – the world, bodies, egos, etc. – is unnecessary . What I saw was how all this was an attempt to make another reality – to make another God. God already is and there is no need to make anything. All making is what gets in the way of knowing God is . The fact that truth and illusion cannot be reconciled, no matter how you try, what means you use and where you see the problem, must be accepted if you would be saved. Until you have accepted this, you will attempt an endless list of goals you cannot reach; a senseless series of expenditures of time and effort, hopefulness and doubt, each one as futile as the one before, and failing as the next one surely will. (W-96.2) When I experience God, it is an experience completely apart from the world. There is no relationship whatsoever between God and the world. This is liberation! But for years I refu...

My life-partner, Courtney, has returned to her spiritual path (twelve steps) and the changes in her have been miraculous. The other day she was discussing her beliefs about God which happen to be diametrically opposed to my beliefs about God. I asked her if, now that she was back to her spirituality, she was still comfortable with us having very divergent beliefs about God. She said yes and explained again how she believes there are many paths to God. Neither of us can deny the miraculous effect of each other’s relationship with God. It reminded me again how theology is nothing and the experience of God is everything. Beliefs do not transform; a direct experience of God is all that does. Sometimes students ask me which teachers of the A Course in Miracles I have read and which of the interpretations of the Course I follow. My teacher has been the Holy Spirit and my reading of the Course is based on my own experience. My interpretation of the Course has evolved with my relationship ...

Some students have expressed confusion about the terms Jesus, Christ and Holy Spirit in A Course in Miracles . Is there a distinction between them? Do you have to believe in Jesus and His story to be a student of the Course ? Why do some teachers of A Course in Miracles refer to Jesus and others to the Holy Spirit? Christ is the part of your mind that is Part of God. It is also referred to in the Course as the Son of God. Christ is your True Mind, completely unchanged and untouched by your sense of separation from God. The Holy Spirit is the teaching part of your Christ Mind. Jesus, being wholly identified with Christ, has become a symbol of the Christ Mind in all of us. So Jesus, Christ and the Holy Spirit are all One and the Same. Some students find the idea of “Holy Spirit” to be too abstract to feel any connection to It. They find a personal connection with Jesus to be helpful. A concrete image, a “person”, representing their Christ Mind is something to which they can relate. Oth...