The Little Will and Fear

(This was supposed to go out last week, on April 3, when I was out of town, but for some reason it didn't post...)

Last week I wrote about the little will, which is what I call my exertion of a will apart from my True Will. It is a left over habit from ego-identification; probably the chief one. One of the most important insights I’ve had about the little will is that when I am fearful, I am exerting the little will.

            The ego (personal thought system) is a thought system of guilt and fear. That is the experience you have when you are ego-identified. There is no guilt/fear without the ego and no ego without guilt/fear. Yet, I always thought of fear as an emotion that had its source in something I considered fearful, for example, some anticipated loss. So I thought I was afraid “of” something. But now I see that fear is simply the condition of a thought system and fear and all of its manifestations have as their source that thought system and nothing else. When I am fearful it is not because I am afraid “of” something; I am simply in a fearful thought system. And I experience that thought system because I exert will in its favor. My fear then increases, not because of what it tells me to fear, but because it is fear itself.

            This idea, of course, is not new. It’s all over A Course in Miracles. I had simply never seen it so clearly before. I was always so distracted by the ego’s fears that I could hardly see that I was experiencing them only because I was standing in the ego. I thought “choose once again” was about asking for another way to see, rather than changing out thought systems. And it was, for a while, as I learned there is another thought system. Eventually, though, choosing again was not about learning there is another way to see, but choosing that way of seeing.

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Why be confused or doubtful on the way to inner peace? Speak with someone who walks the path a little ahead of you. Email me at Liz@acimmentor.com to set up an appointment for mentoring. Learn more at www.acimmentor.com.