Ask: Advice on Sticking with the Path
From Ask ACIM Mentor:
…my question for you has to do with the effectiveness of the Course in waking up from this dream. Now, I've read of your own mind blowing experiences of God, which seem to have started early in your study. I've met a lot of people who have been working with the material for years (myself included) who have not had direct revelation. I've been studying other teachings that promise quicker results, but I still don't have anything earth shattering to report. Feeling a bit discouraged, but no matter how much I try to turn away from ACIM, I just seem to always be pulled back to it. Any advice you have on sticking with the path and releasing doubt would be greatly appreciated. Much love and thanks, Bryan in L.A.
Despite my early experiences of revelation, Bryan, I didn’t experience any comprehensive shift toward peace until I had been a student for over 20 years. A revelation is simply a glimpse of the Ultimate Goal of God. If I could stay There, I would not have returned to a perception of a world. Early on, I experienced Revelations as much as a curse as a blessing. On one hand, yes, they did reveal to me Truth and make it more difficult for me to deny Truth, but on the other hand, I sure did my best to deny Truth! Despite direct Revelations of God, I still had my doubts, maybe not about What was True, but about my wanting It. I was no less conflicted for having seen Truth; I was just less able to fool myself that the Truth wasn’t True. And, as well, I still seemed to have two realities, Truth, Which I had seen, and the world, which was still very real to me because I had not released all of the layers of deep-seated belief in, and attachment to, it. I am still bumping into those false beliefs and undoing them, on deeper and deeper levels.
I’m telling you this so that you know that it is a process, and that your doubt is not because you have not had a Revelation, but because, on some level, you do not yet wholly want God.
You answered yourself with regard to sticking with the path – you keep being drawn back to it. This is because you know, on some level, that it is your way to peace. You asked for it, and you received it. God is always in your mind, and you know God. This is what you have to trust. The doubt that you experience is the resistance of the ego, which will never accept Truth, and will always tell you to doubt. You may be listening to it now, but, as you learn to not identify with it, you will reach a point where you hear it, but you no longer listen to it, and, finally, when you completely release the personal thought system from your mind, you will not hear it at all!
Peace came for me after years of earnestly opening my mind to God each day and returning my mind to God throughout the day – just as the lessons in the Workbook teach us that first year. In other words, peace came when I made a commitment to peace by choosing it again and again throughout each day. Returning my mind to Truth became the focus and purpose of my mind (therefore, my life). This shifted my attention (identification) away from the ego, and the shifts toward peace that came were not earth-shattering, but subtle and profound, until one day I looked up and realized that peace had come to stay in my awareness. It was not time, nor was it direct Revelation, but willingness to keep Truth in my awareness, and to work through my obstacles to peace, that resulted in the comprehensive peace that I experience now.
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If you have a question that you would like answered in the ACIM Mentor Newsletter and Blog, contact me at Liz@acimmentor.com and be sure to note that you want it answered here.
Learn about The Plain Language A Course in Miracles at www.placim.com. The first volume (Text), The Message of A Course in Miracles is now for sale at www.amazon.com.
…my question for you has to do with the effectiveness of the Course in waking up from this dream. Now, I've read of your own mind blowing experiences of God, which seem to have started early in your study. I've met a lot of people who have been working with the material for years (myself included) who have not had direct revelation. I've been studying other teachings that promise quicker results, but I still don't have anything earth shattering to report. Feeling a bit discouraged, but no matter how much I try to turn away from ACIM, I just seem to always be pulled back to it. Any advice you have on sticking with the path and releasing doubt would be greatly appreciated. Much love and thanks, Bryan in L.A.
Despite my early experiences of revelation, Bryan, I didn’t experience any comprehensive shift toward peace until I had been a student for over 20 years. A revelation is simply a glimpse of the Ultimate Goal of God. If I could stay There, I would not have returned to a perception of a world. Early on, I experienced Revelations as much as a curse as a blessing. On one hand, yes, they did reveal to me Truth and make it more difficult for me to deny Truth, but on the other hand, I sure did my best to deny Truth! Despite direct Revelations of God, I still had my doubts, maybe not about What was True, but about my wanting It. I was no less conflicted for having seen Truth; I was just less able to fool myself that the Truth wasn’t True. And, as well, I still seemed to have two realities, Truth, Which I had seen, and the world, which was still very real to me because I had not released all of the layers of deep-seated belief in, and attachment to, it. I am still bumping into those false beliefs and undoing them, on deeper and deeper levels.
I’m telling you this so that you know that it is a process, and that your doubt is not because you have not had a Revelation, but because, on some level, you do not yet wholly want God.
You answered yourself with regard to sticking with the path – you keep being drawn back to it. This is because you know, on some level, that it is your way to peace. You asked for it, and you received it. God is always in your mind, and you know God. This is what you have to trust. The doubt that you experience is the resistance of the ego, which will never accept Truth, and will always tell you to doubt. You may be listening to it now, but, as you learn to not identify with it, you will reach a point where you hear it, but you no longer listen to it, and, finally, when you completely release the personal thought system from your mind, you will not hear it at all!
Peace came for me after years of earnestly opening my mind to God each day and returning my mind to God throughout the day – just as the lessons in the Workbook teach us that first year. In other words, peace came when I made a commitment to peace by choosing it again and again throughout each day. Returning my mind to Truth became the focus and purpose of my mind (therefore, my life). This shifted my attention (identification) away from the ego, and the shifts toward peace that came were not earth-shattering, but subtle and profound, until one day I looked up and realized that peace had come to stay in my awareness. It was not time, nor was it direct Revelation, but willingness to keep Truth in my awareness, and to work through my obstacles to peace, that resulted in the comprehensive peace that I experience now.
>>>>>
If you have a question that you would like answered in the ACIM Mentor Newsletter and Blog, contact me at Liz@acimmentor.com and be sure to note that you want it answered here.
Learn about The Plain Language A Course in Miracles at www.placim.com. The first volume (Text), The Message of A Course in Miracles is now for sale at www.amazon.com.
Comments
Your response to Bryan touched me. It is clear, personal and profound--not to mention encouraging. Thank you for sharing your journey with us.
Jo
So many gems in your response to me, will reread this, slooooowly, to take it in.
You wrote: "...because, on some level, you do not yet wholly want God."
That sentence really struck me. Thanks for cutting through the BS, now I guess it's just up to me to continue to apply this stuff on a moment by moment basis ;)
Love and thanks,
Bryan
It is a fact that no one can be separated from God. It is impossible. So if you are not experiencing God, then yes, in fact, you have separated yourself from god with your beliefs.
It is almost impossible to do, but there is a simple way to escape the godless experience.
Do not do anything that is not inspired by the direct immediate experience of the joy of god.
Thats it. You wanted something easier? The easier ways take longer.
From my experience, I can tell you that if you make the irrevocable decision to not do anything that is not inspired by and illuminated in each moment by the joy of god, that you will live in the joy of god in every moment.
You will also probably lose your job, lose all financial security, feel certain that you are in danger of immanent physical collapse, probably feel that suicide is a viable option, and temporarily live with a despair so deep that everyone you know will abandon you because they will not know what the hell is going on with you.
But, if you are committed to doing everything inspired by the joy of god, you will not care. You will not care if you live or die. Maybe you will die. You won't care because you know that you are becoming one with god.
But in my case, I discovered that I did not die. I stopped carrying myself and something carried me, maybe it was god, I don't know.
Anyhow, I am still here and I refuse to listen to any motivation other than the inspiration of the joy of god. Other motivations always present themselves. I refuse to listen to them. People pressure me to "get with the program". I only have joy as my guide.
The joy builds in me. I become closer to Oneness with joy. If you decide that it is all, it becomes all and everything else drops away. It is intensely painful to let everything fall away. For me, there is no other way. I want nothing else.
Joy is all there is.