You Do Not Choose Ego or Spirit

I hear often from students of A Course in Miracles, “I am experiencing ego so I must want it and I must be choosing it.”

A corresponding lament I hear is, “I feel I do choose Spirit, but nothing happens.”

To both statements I say, “So ego would have you believe.”

Consciousness is the expression of the Atonement (correction of the perception of separation from God) unfolding over time. God, being All, must contain the idea of Its Own opposite. But being All, God cannot have an opposite. So, the idea of not-God arose and was simultaneously undone by God’s All-encompassing nature, so there was no wanting or choice involved. The Atonement just is as God just is. But what it is, is false.

You experience the idea of not-God as ego, yes, but it is an experience passing through your mind, or bit of consciousness. It is not you. Ego wants ego and ego chooses ego, so if you feel you want or choose ego, you are simply experiencing ego.

You are Christ, God’s Extension. Christ is beyond consciousness. It does not interact with ego. It lets it be. But Christ’s Spirit (Essence or Idea) extends into consciousness. It passively observes ego without judgment, or with only one, it is not real. So, if you feel any other judgment on or resistance to ego, you are experiencing ego as well.

Ego is resistance to Truth, so it never wants, chooses, or becomes Spirit. When you feel the movement toward Spirit as want or choice, you feel your Self; you feel the Atonement (correction) manifesting through you.

The experience of vacillations between ego and Spirit is the Atonement expressing through your mind. It is not you and has no effect on your Reality, Christ. As the Atonement was over as soon as it arose, and you only watch it unfold in time like a story, how it unfolds through your mind is predetermined.

Another question I get from students when they hear everything is predetermined is, “Then why do the Course and other teachings say that we must choose?”

All spiritual teachings are expressions of the Atonement. So is a student’s response, feelings of choosing, resisting, or rejecting, for now, or for the rest of their lives. Think of the person with which you identify as a character in a story playing out its predetermined part. Every thought and feeling passing through your mind and every action the person takes expresses the Atonement. And none of that is you. You are the Stillness through Which they pass without touching you, because they are false.


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If you have a question the answer to which you feel may be helpful to others, send it to Liz@acimmentor.com and I will answer it in this newsletter/blog. 

Comments

will said…
There is enlightenment and not enlightened. Two levels. Our original choice at the separation was ego not atonement. The power of this choice is the power of God. It is not of God but was made by the Son of God. Our entire experienced day to day awareness is ego. There is no way out of this choice except through the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirits/Jesus atonement is the plan created for the way out of this dream, out of the illusion, out of pre enlightenment. The original pre atonement solution at the separation was ‘Only Potential’. There would be no need for this Universal Curriculum if it was not so. "We are only experiencing the Atonement” may be an awareness in enlightenment but in pre enlightenment it is only a postponement of taking the required course. Are you enlightened?
9:39 AM
will said…

A Gentler Illusion

T-25.VI
10:31 AM
will said…
At the point of separation God would never force an atonement on a choice being made by the Son of God.
10:45 AM
ACIM Mentor said…
There is no force involved. The correction was simultaneous with the false idea of not-God arising because God cannot have an opposite. Consciousness is the expression of that instant of false idea arising and being undone spread out over time so that it seems it arose long ago and will be completely undone in some indefinite future. But the Atonement is complete and you only experience the undoing unfolding through you. This undoing is what you experience as choice, but it is not an autonomous choice.
9:23 AM
will said…
"Yet is this magnitude beyond the scope of this curriculum. Nor is it necessary we dwell on anything that cannot be be immediately grasped ." The Borderland
11:45 AM
will said…
The last comment was a reminder for me. Not to wander off into the scrub and get lost. Much of ACIM is understood only in enlightenment but not accessible in pre-enlightenment.
11:57 AM
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