The Holy Spirit is the Ultimate Spin Doctor, revisited
From May 26, 2007:
For a long time, one of my obstacles to accepting what A Course in Miracles was teaching was that I thought it was trying to make us all into goody-two-shoes. I thought what it is saying is that we are supposed to look at “bad” situations and simply choose to see them in a “nice” way. I couldn’t see that in every situation I was interpreting what was occurring. I thought that the way that I saw the world was fact, and that changing how I see the world was repression, when in fact the world itself, and the events in it, are neutral.
I learned that the world is neutral through my absorption in politics, and by watching the talking heads on television. At first, I noticed how an event was interpreted differently by different people, depending on their political point of view, each claiming that the way that they saw things was the truth. Then I saw the “spin doctors” after political events, like debates, deliberately “spinning” the event toward their particular political views. Various news shows, all claiming to be “impartial”, also “spun” the news in a particular direction. I finally understood what the Course teaches: All events have no meaning in themselves, and our experience and thoughts about them are our own internal choice, depending on our goals. This is how we each make our own individual worlds.
“The value of deciding in advance what you want to happen is simply that you will perceive the situation as a means to make it happen. You will therefore make every effort to overlook what interferes with the accomplishment of your objective, and concentrate on everything that helps you meet it. It is quite noticeable that this approach has brought you closer to the Holy Spirit's sorting out of truth and falsity. The true becomes what can be used to meet the goal. The false becomes the useless from this point of view. The situation now has meaning, but only because the goal has made it meaningful.” (T-17.VI.4)
The Holy Spirit is the ultimate “spin doctor”, teaching you to see the world through the lens of your goal of spiritual awakening. My story above is a case in point: The ego’s “spin” on all that I was seeing is that separation from God is real, but my goal is spiritual awakening, so when I was absorbed in the “news” the Holy Spirit used it to teach me about perception. That aspect of what I was seeing helps me toward my goal; the rest has fallen away to such an extent that I don’t bother to watch the “news”, knowing it has no meaning in itself.
“In any situation in which you are uncertain, the first thing to consider, very simply, is "What do I want to come of this? What is it for? The clarification of the goal belongs at the beginning, for it is this which will determine the outcome.” (T-17.VI.2)
The world is your classroom; you choose which teacher will “spin” the world toward the goal that you want. You only have two choices: the ego, who will teach you that you are powerless in the face of all that happens to you in a hellish world, or the Holy Spirit, Who will use the world to awaken you to your Oneness with God.
>>>>>
You can read The ACIM Mentor Articles for free at www.acimmentor.com under "Answers by Topic" or buy them in a bound book here.
Learn about The Plain Language A Course in Miracles at www.placim.com.
If you have a question that you want answered in the ACIM Mentor Newsletter/Blog, contact me at Liz@acimmentor.com and indicate that you want your question answered here.
For a long time, one of my obstacles to accepting what A Course in Miracles was teaching was that I thought it was trying to make us all into goody-two-shoes. I thought what it is saying is that we are supposed to look at “bad” situations and simply choose to see them in a “nice” way. I couldn’t see that in every situation I was interpreting what was occurring. I thought that the way that I saw the world was fact, and that changing how I see the world was repression, when in fact the world itself, and the events in it, are neutral.
I learned that the world is neutral through my absorption in politics, and by watching the talking heads on television. At first, I noticed how an event was interpreted differently by different people, depending on their political point of view, each claiming that the way that they saw things was the truth. Then I saw the “spin doctors” after political events, like debates, deliberately “spinning” the event toward their particular political views. Various news shows, all claiming to be “impartial”, also “spun” the news in a particular direction. I finally understood what the Course teaches: All events have no meaning in themselves, and our experience and thoughts about them are our own internal choice, depending on our goals. This is how we each make our own individual worlds.
“The value of deciding in advance what you want to happen is simply that you will perceive the situation as a means to make it happen. You will therefore make every effort to overlook what interferes with the accomplishment of your objective, and concentrate on everything that helps you meet it. It is quite noticeable that this approach has brought you closer to the Holy Spirit's sorting out of truth and falsity. The true becomes what can be used to meet the goal. The false becomes the useless from this point of view. The situation now has meaning, but only because the goal has made it meaningful.” (T-17.VI.4)
The Holy Spirit is the ultimate “spin doctor”, teaching you to see the world through the lens of your goal of spiritual awakening. My story above is a case in point: The ego’s “spin” on all that I was seeing is that separation from God is real, but my goal is spiritual awakening, so when I was absorbed in the “news” the Holy Spirit used it to teach me about perception. That aspect of what I was seeing helps me toward my goal; the rest has fallen away to such an extent that I don’t bother to watch the “news”, knowing it has no meaning in itself.
“In any situation in which you are uncertain, the first thing to consider, very simply, is "What do I want to come of this? What is it for? The clarification of the goal belongs at the beginning, for it is this which will determine the outcome.” (T-17.VI.2)
The world is your classroom; you choose which teacher will “spin” the world toward the goal that you want. You only have two choices: the ego, who will teach you that you are powerless in the face of all that happens to you in a hellish world, or the Holy Spirit, Who will use the world to awaken you to your Oneness with God.
>>>>>
You can read The ACIM Mentor Articles for free at www.acimmentor.com under "Answers by Topic" or buy them in a bound book here.
Learn about The Plain Language A Course in Miracles at www.placim.com.
If you have a question that you want answered in the ACIM Mentor Newsletter/Blog, contact me at Liz@acimmentor.com and indicate that you want your question answered here.
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