ACIM Mentor

             A Course in Miracles tells us that ego fears oneness. But ego is simply the experience of fear. The stories it has as to “why” it is afraid are, first, to project the source of fear away so that ego can deny it is fear, and second, to seem to be real. Elaborate stories make up ego’s world, filling what it feels is the “void” of consciousness. Ego is the idea in consciousness that is opposed to truth, or pure consciousness. Its denial of truth results in it denying what it is, too. But as truth rises toward conscious awareness, the contrast with ego illuminates all that ego is. Ego’s fear seems to increase but it is really just being exposed. So, it can seem that ego is “afraid of” truth (or anything else it points to), but that’s just a way for ego to project and explain away the exposed fear to itself. Last week’s articl e was about the various ways that oneness can show up in one’s perception, and it mentioned how ego cannot know tr...

              It turns out, the perception of oneness shows up in many ways. As truth rises to conscious awareness (your immediate awareness, your living experience), ego takes the information that comes with this and turns it into what it can understand. This is how we get our spiritualities and religions. Truth rising to conscious awareness is not happening for the world, it is not happening for ego, but ego tries to make it so and pieces the information it has into a narrative that makes sense for it. There is no doubt that the rising of truth affects the mind’s perceptions, no matter what ego does with it. Sometimes the veil of ego slips entirely and the purest oneness, the onlyness of truth , or pure consciousness, the space in which ego and its world appear, is seen in conscious awareness. This is considered a mystical experience because it is out of the norm. When this occurs, it is clear that conscious awareness is part of the onlyness o...

             In keeping with recent articles on how A Course in Miracles students torture themselves, here’s another common mistake I encounter: “I know I’m not supposed to think about the past, but the other day I remembered this funny thing that happened…” or “I know I’m not supposed to think about the future, but I’m concerned I won’t have enough money to put my son through college…” The Course does not say you should never think about the past or future, but rather living there is not helpful. It asks you to see that the past and future are only ideas in your mind now . And it points out one of ego’s chief illusions that causes you so much pain is seeing the past in the present. For example, you have a strong response, positive or negative, to someone you just met, and this likely indicates they remind you of someone from the past. You are not seeing them, but your own projection from your own past. You feel you know something about them, but...

              After last week’s article about A Course in Miracles and fundamentalism , I heard from some readers and clients about teachers who assert that you should not enjoy anything in the world, that you must give up all attachments, that all personal relationships, especially romantic ones, are special and should be avoided, you shouldn’t take medicine or supplements or treatments for the body, etc. Like fundamentalism, this kind of puritanism is also inevitable when a spiritual text is in the hands of ego. Did the first people to handle A Course in Miracles , Helen Shucman, Bill Theford, or Ken Wapnick, stop enjoying life, give up their relationships and all attachments, and stop using helpful treatments when they were ill or hurt? I mean, if anyone would, you’d think it would have been them because the Course came through Helen, it was for Bill, and Ken was right there as the second student and closely handled the material with Helen. But ...

             Sometimes clients are surprised when I warn them against “ A Course in Miracles fundamentalism”. They say they never thought they would hear that word associated with the Course . But fundamentalism refers to an approach, not a specific religion or spirituality. We are used to the term being applied to the distorters of Islam that have taken over whole swathes of the world or to Christians who took over one of the major political parties in the US in the 1980s and are at this time trying to force their   distorted view of Christianity on the whole country. Anyone paying attention sees little daylight between Islamic and Christian fundamentalism not because they use the same symbols but because they use the same approach to same effect. Google defines fundamentalism as “a strict, literal adherence to sacred texts or traditional ideologies and a rejection of modern secular interpretations”. Fundamentalists interpret their sacred tex...

             Clients and readers who have not had mystical or nonduality experiences want to know if they can still practice forgiveness as A Course in Miracles teaches it since in the Course ultimately forgiveness is coming to recognize that nothing real is occurring. Yes, you can. You can come to see and release (forgive) ego’s illusions, which are projections of meaning and expectations. The Course teaches the source of your pain is your own thoughts, so you don’t need to forgive others or situations but rather your unmet expectations and false projections of meaning. So, if in situations where you are in pain you look for how you contribute to your pain by looking at your expectations and projections of meaning you are practicing forgiveness. Simply acknowledging that you are the source of your upset is stepping into forgiveness.   Zia had an abusive mother. Sometimes the abuse was physical, but the verbal and psychological abuse was ...

             A traveler who has never been in a desert is crossing one. In the distance, they see an oasis of water. They move persistently toward it but never reach it. It is always ahead of them. This is because they do not see water but rather heat shimmering off the sand. They were sure they saw water, but it was a mirage—an illusion. An illusion is something that is taken to be real that is not. For illusions to be illusions, they must be convincing. This is their seeming power and why they can seem hard to overcome. To pure consciousness (truth), ego, the material world, thoughts, and feelings are merely appearances. They are not real. They have no meaning. They have no effect on pure consciousness. But for ego, ego, the material world, thoughts, and feelings are reality. Since they are not true but ego believes they are, for ego they are illusions. Ego is delusional. After The Break, this mind (this conscious awareness) went through a long...

            Every now and then someone asks me why these articles are not about forgiveness. All these articles are about forgiveness! Oh, this may not be spelled out and that word may not be used but every article deliberately contains something to bring relief to at least some readers. In A Course in Miracles , forgiveness is recognizing that a sense of separation from God (the whole) is an illusion. So, anything that appears to cause you to feel autonomous and isolated is an illusion. These feelings are caused by mistaken perceptions that can be changed; therefore, they are not true. Since they are not true, they are not sin. Since there is no sin, there is no justification for guilt. Since there is no sin or guilt, you do not need forgiveness from God, but you need to forgive (release) your own false perceptions that make you feel you have sinned, that you have made yourself separate from God. Only false perceptions lead you to feel you are separate ...

             A discomfort often reported to me by clients and readers is their confusion over why certain spiritual experiences, like shifts in perception and mystical experiences, are not consistent or why these experiences don’t seem to make discernable progress. They may grow through these experiences and in that sense they progress, but the experiences themselves do not seem to grow or develop. For example, someone may have a mystical experience revealing truth beyond ego and the world and never have another. Others feel the nearness of truth often, but it doesn’t break fully into their conscious awareness. Some have reported living in a lovely awareness of truth for months or even years only to have it fade. The problem isn’t truth (pure consciousness), of course, but the nature of ego. Ego thinks everything that happens in consciousness is for it and its person. That is its reality and it knows no other. It makes stories, and in doing so, deve...

              It’s always worth revisiting this modern-day parable now and then. Comments afterward.   ** The Old Man and the Flood   An old man lives in a town where a flood comes through. The water rises to his porch, and a fire truck comes by.   “Get in,” the firemen call to him. “We’ll get you to higher ground.”   “No, thanks,” says the old man. “God will take care of me.”   The next morning the water had risen to his second story. He’s hanging out a window when a rescue boat comes by.   “Get in,” the would-be rescuers call to him. “We’ll take you to higher ground.”   “No, thanks,” says the old man. “God will take care of me.”   The next morning finds the old man on his roof as the water has all but covered his house. A helicopter flies over and drops down a ladder.   “Climb up,” his would-be rescuers call to him. “We’ll take you to higher ground.”   “No, th...

             A  common question clients and readers ask when they begin to see the way to peace is, “How can I be happy when others are unhappy?” Sometimes, the “others” are distant people, in war torn countries, for example. Other times, the “others” are people close to them. They feel it is selfish to choose peace. A Course in Miracles states at least three times that your only responsibility is to “accept the Atonement” for yourself . In the Course , Atonement means “correction of the perception that you are separate from God.” That correction means to lead to your happiness. But in many ways, the Course tells you that your shift in perception away from separation toward unity also helps others. It is not difficult to see how this works if you think in terms of energy. Your joining others in their unhappiness only increases the amount of misery in the room—or in the world. And certainly, if someone cares about you, they don’t want you to ...

              A confusion this mind had as a new student and that Liz here sometimes hears from clients and readers is, “Is A Course in Miracles saying the world is an illusion or how I’m seeing it is an illusion?” This mind loved the idea that the world isn’t real. This was radical, yes, but also completely liberating. However, this made ego uncomfortable, so there were times it asserted that, no, the Course is saying only your perceptions are illusions. This was not as liberating, but ego was a bit more comfortable. Actually, the Course says both are illusions and it all comes together in Lesson 132 in the Workbook, “I loose the world from all I thought it was.” (For those confused by the word loose here, change it to release .) Paragraph 4 begins, “The world is nothing in itself. Your mind must give it meaning.” This is the awareness that the Workbook of the Course fosters from the start. The world is a neutral appearance, so any meaning ...

            “I would like to see a discussion on: Does God understand our words? Since words have been invented as a communication device in the illusion, does God even know they exist? I have seen people agonize over what words to use in prayer. Does it matter?” – HC   “Strictly speaking, words play no part at all in healing. The motivating factor is prayer, or asking. What you ask for you receive. But this refers to the prayer of the heart, not to the words you use in praying. Sometimes the words and the prayer are contradictory; sometimes they agree. It does not matter. God does not understand words, for they were made by separated minds to keep them in the illusion of separation. Words can be helpful, particularly for the beginner, in helping concentration and facilitating the exclusion, or at least the control, of extraneous thoughts. Let us not forget, however, that words are but symbols of symbols. They are thus twice removed from reality.”...

           “I have noticed a kind of embodiment of something…Holy Spirit, the Heart…not sure how to articulate, but an energetic indwelling…have not seen any reference to this in ACIM…another egoic experience or something aligning with HS, Source, etc.? Have you experienced anything similar?” – MG   “Energetic indwelling” is rather vague, but I know these experiences are hard to describe. I assume you mean that you are experiencing something within that is out of the ordinary. The fact that you initially want to describe it as the embodiment of the Holy Spirit or the Heart, by which I think you mean it feels loving, means that you are pretty sure it is something aligned with truth, but you have your doubts. Here’s how you can tell the difference between an experience of truth or of something new from ego that you think might be truth: Truth is quiet and unmoving. It just is . You use the word “energy”, but many use that word when they want to expr...

             This is about what is labeled God and how sometimes in spiritual teachings contradictory things are labeled God , which leads to confusion. So, here’s some sorting out. There is what is going to happen in your person’s life and there is ego thinking it is autonomous and has free will and that it determines what happens in the person’s life. Even if you cannot accept that everything is predetermined, objectively you can see that your person does not exist in a vacuum. Their life is influenced by others and circumstances, often people and circumstances that are far away. Your person’s life is part of a greater unfolding. Adjusting to this fact is what is called maturing . Spirituality accelerates maturity by fostering acceptance of what is unfolding, often through the idea that what happens is the “will” of a supreme being, often called God . Ego senses things beyond itself and these it tends to label God or a like term. The supreme be...