Tuesday, December 29, 2020

A course in miracles day 109

Lesson 109
I rest in God.

1 We ask for rest today and quietness unshaken by the world's appearances. We ask for peace and stillness in the midst of all the turmoil born of clashing dreams. We ask for safety and for happiness, although we seem to look on danger and on sorrow. And we have the thought that will answer our asking with what we request.

2 "I rest in God." This thought will bring to you the rest and quiet, peace and stillness, and the safety and the happiness you seek. "I rest in God." This thought has power to wake the sleeping truth in you, whose vision sees beyond appearances to that same truth in everyone and everything there is. Here is the end of suffering for all the world and everyone who ever came and yet will come to linger for a while. Here is the thought in which the Son of God is born again, to recognize himself.

3 "I rest in God." Completely undismayed this thought will carry you through storms and strife, past misery and pain, past loss and death, and onward to the certainty of God. There is no suffering it cannot heal. There is no problem which it cannot solve. And no appearance but will turn to truth before the eyes of you who rest in God.

4 This is the day of peace. You rest in God, and while the world is torn by winds of hate, your rest remains completely undisturbed. Yours is the rest of truth. Appearances cannot intrude on you. You call to all to join you in your rest, and they will hear and come to you because you rest in God. They will not hear another voice but yours because you gave your voice to God and now you rest in Him and let Him speak through you.

5 In Him you have no cares and no concerns, no burdens, no anxiety, no pain, no fear of future, and no past regrets. In timelessness you rest, while time goes by without its touch upon you, for your rest can never change in any way at all.

6 You rest today. And as you close your eyes, sink into stillness. Let these periods of rest and respite reassure your mind that all its frantic fantasies were but the dreams of fever that has passed away. Let it be still and thankfully accept its healing. No more fearful dreams will come now that you rest in God. Take time today to slip away from dreams and into peace.

7 Each hour that you take your rest today, a tired mind is suddenly made glad, a bird with broken wings begins to sing, a stream long dry begins to flow again. The world is born again each time you rest, and hourly remember that you came to bring the peace of God into the world that it might take its rest along with you.

8With each five minutes that you rest today the world is nearer waking. And the time when rest will be the only thing there is comes closer to all worn and tired minds, too weary now to go their way alone. And they will hear the bird begin to sing and see the stream begin to flow again, with hope reborn and energy restored to walk with lightened steps along the road that suddenly seems easy as they go.

9 You rest within the peace of God today and call upon your brothers from your rest, to draw them to their rest along with you. You will be faithful to your trust today, forgetting no one, bringing everyone into the boundless circle of your peace, the holy sanctuary where you rest.

10 Open the temple doors, and let them come from far across the world, and near as well-your distant brothers and your closest friends-bid them all enter here and rest with you. You rest within the peace of God today, quiet and unafraid. Each brother comes to take his rest and offer it to you.

11 We rest together here, for thus our rest is made complete, and what we give today we have received already. Time is not the guardian of what we give today. We give to those unborn and those passed by, to every Thought of God, and to the Mind in Which these Thoughts were born and where they rest. And we remind them of their resting place each time we tell ourselves,

12 I rest in God.

Sunday, October 18, 2020

Watch "Can you spot what looks like a shadow person that is in the corn maze! No BS!" on YouTube

Watch "Can you spot what looks like a shadow person that is in the corn maze! No BS!" on YouTube
https://youtu.be/o2mjMyX8bsM 

Watch "'tis the season of the witch" on YouTube

Watch "'tis the season of the witch" on YouTube
https://youtu.be/v2fHKBrj54M 

A course in miracles day 108

Lesson 108
To give and to receive are one in truth.

1 Vision depends upon today's idea. The light is in it, for it reconciles all seeming opposites. And what is light except the resolution, born of peace, of all your conflicts and mistaken thoughts into one concept which is wholly true? Even that one will disappear because the Thought behind it will appear instead, to take its place. And now we are at peace forever, for the dream is over now.

2 True light which makes true vision possible is not the light the body's eyes behold. It is a state of mind which has become so unified that darkness cannot be perceived at all. And thus what is the same is seen as one, while what is not the same remains unnoticed, for it is not there.

3 This is the light which shows no opposites, and vision, being healed, has power to heal. This is the light that brings your peace of mind to other minds, to share it and be glad that they are one with you and with themselves. This is the light which heals because it brings single perception, based upon one frame of reference from which one meaning comes.

4 Here are both giving and receiving seen as different aspects of one Thought Whose truth does not depend on which is seen as first, nor which appears to be in second place. Here it is understood that both occur together, that the Thought remain complete. And in this understanding is the base on which all opposites are reconciled because they are perceived from the same frame of reference which unifies this Thought.

5 One thought, completely unified, will serve to unify all thought. This is the same as saying one correction will suffice for all correction or that to forgive one brother wholly is enough to bring salvation to all minds. For these are but some special cases of one law which holds for every kind of learning if it be directed by the One Who knows the truth.

6 To learn that giving and receiving are the same has special usefulness because it can be tried so easily and seen as true. And when this special case has proved it always works in every circumstance where it is tried, the thought behind it can be generalized to other areas of doubt and double vision. And from there it will extend and finally arrive at the one Thought Which underlies them all.

7 Today we practice with the special case of giving and receiving. We will use this simple L e s s o n in the obvious because it has results we cannot miss. To give is to receive. Today we will attempt to offer peace to everyone and see how quickly peace returns to us. Light is tranquillity, and in that peace is vision given us and we can see.

8 So we begin the practice periods with the instruction for today and say:

9 To give and to receive are one in truth.
I will receive what I am giving now.

10 Then close your eyes, and for five minutes think of what you would hold out to everyone to have it yours. You might, for instance, say:

11 To everyone I offer quietness.
To everyone I offer peace of mind.
To everyone I offer gentleness.

12 Say each one slowly, and then pause a while, expecting to receive the gift you gave, and it will come to you in the amount in which you gave it. You will find you have exact return, for this is what you asked. It might be helpful, too, to think of one to whom to give your gifts. He represents the others, and through him you give to all.

13 Our very simple lesson for today will teach you much. Effect and cause will be far better understood from this time on, and we will make much faster progress now. Think of the exercises for today as quick advances in your learning, made still faster and more sure each time you say:

14 To give and to receive are one in truth.

Watch "Walkthrough of the Trail of Fear at Cold Springs Corn Maze in Mercer PA" on YouTube

Watch "Walkthrough of the Trail of Fear at Cold Springs Corn Maze in Mercer PA" on YouTube
https://youtu.be/v46zJkbPnko 

Monday, August 17, 2020

A course in miracles day 107

Lesson 107
Truth will correct all errors in my mind.

1 What can correct illusions but the truth? And what are errors but illusions that remain unrecognized for what they are? Where truth has entered, errors disappear. They merely vanish, leaving not a trace by which to be remembered. They are gone because without belief they have no life, and so they disappear to nothingness, returning whence they came. From dust to dust they come and go, for only truth remains.

2 Can you imagine what a state of mind without illusions is? How it would feel? Try to remember when there was a time—perhaps a minute, maybe even less—when nothing came to interrupt your peace; when you were certain you were loved and safe. Then try to picture what it would be like to have that moment be extended to the end of time and to eternity.

3 Then let the sense of quiet that you felt be multiplied a hundred times and then be multiplied another hundred more. And now you have a hint, not more than just the faintest intimation of the state your mind will rest in when the truth has come.

4 Without illusions there could be no fear, no doubt, and no attack. When truth has come, all pain is over, for there is no room for transitory thoughts and dead ideas to linger in your mind. Truth occupies your mind completely, liberating you from all beliefs in the ephemeral. They have no place because the truth has come, and they are nowhere. They cannot be found, for truth is everywhere forever now.

5 When truth has come, it does not stay a while to disappear or change to something else. It does not shift and alter in its form, nor come and go and go and come again. It stays exactly as it always was, to be depended on in every need and trusted with a perfect trust in all the seeming difficulties and the doubts that the appearances the world presents engender. They will merely flow away when truth corrects the errors in your mind.

6 When truth has come, it harbours in its wings the gift of perfect constancy and love which does not falter in the face of pain but looks beyond it, steadily and sure. Here is the gift of healing, for the truth needs no defense, and therefore no attack is possible. Illusions can be brought to truth to be corrected. But the truth stands far beyond illusions and cannot be brought to them to turn them into truth.

7 Truth does not come and go nor shift nor change, in this appearance now and then in that, evading capture and escaping grasp. It does not hide. It stands in open light, in obvious accessibility. It is impossible that anyone could seek it truly and would not succeed.

8 Today belongs to truth. Give truth its due, and it will give you yours. You were not meant to suffer and to die. Your Father wills these dreams be gone. Let truth correct them all. We do not ask for what we do not have. We merely ask for what belongs to us, that we may recognize it as our own.

9 Today we practice on the happy note of certainty that has been born of truth. The shaky and unsteady footsteps of illusion is not our approach today. We are as certain of success as we are sure we live and hope and breathe and think. We do not doubt we walk with truth today and count on it to enter into all the exercises that we do this day.

10 Begin by asking Him Who goes with you upon this undertaking that He be in your awareness as you go with Him. You are not made of flesh and blood and bone but were created by the self-same Thought which gave the gift of life to Him as well. He is your Brother and so like to you your Father knows that you are both the same. It is your Self you ask to go with you, and how could He be absent where you are?

11 Truth will correct all errors in your mind which tell you you could be apart from Him. You speak to Him today and make your pledge to let His function be fulfilled through you. To share His function is to share His joy. His confidence is with you, as you say:

12 Truth will correct all errors in my mind,
And I will rest in Him Who is my Self.

13 Then let Him lead you gently to the truth which will envelop you and give you peace so deep and tranquil that you will return to the familiar world reluctantly.

14 And yet you will be glad to look again upon this world. For you will bring with you the promise of the changes which the truth that goes with you will carry to the world. They will increase with every gift you give of five small minutes, and the errors that surround the world will be corrected as you let them be corrected in your mind.

15 Do not forget your function for today. Each time you tell yourself with confidence, "Truth will correct all errors in my mind," you speak for all the world and Him Who would release the world as He would set you free.

People who disappeared and never found

From the Dark Web...

These stories, taken from the files of the Charley Project, are chilling reading.

The most terrifying stories out there are often true. And the best versions of those are the ones where the answer can never truly be known. Why else do Jack the Ripper and the Zodiac Killer occupy such outsize places in our collective unconscious?

The Charley Project is a database that catalogs people who have disappeared without a trace. The site is a great resource and repository for modern cases, but if you look at its database chronologically, you will find cases from far earlier in the 20th century that will likely never be solved, simply because all involved have passed away.

It's these cases — from an older America where a disappearance was less likely to turn into a mass media sensation — that haunt the memory the most. They're a record of a time when so-called "stranger danger" wasn't a well-known topic, or when a woman could run a business selling kidnapped children to the rich.

Here are a handful of the best historical disappearances contained in the Charley Project's archives.

1) The Martin Family (Oregon, 1958)

Some of the best details in stories like these have to do with the lives of people the disappeared left behind. What actually happened to the Martin family isn't much of a mystery — they likely drove off the road on the way home, their car plunging into the river below — but the evocative snapshots of a life never resumed make this entry particularly eerie. It highlights all the mundane details of life that might flash before your own eyes in the instant everything changes.

2) Bobby Dunbar (Louisiana, 1912)

Fans of This American Life will recognize this story, as it was the center of one of the show's best episodes. When young Bobby Dunbar, just 4 years old, wandered off from his family on a group outing, he was never seen again. It's possible he fell from a railroad trestle and drowned. It's also possible he was abducted by a "strange man" who was seen lurking in the area. But we'll likely never know, because authorities thought they found Bobby Dunbar — and didn't realize it was another child entirely (who simply stepped into Bobby's life) until 2004, long after it would have been possible to solve the case.

3) Billy Gaffney (New York, 1927)

When 4-year-old Billy Gaffney was left to play with a 3-year-old friend in the hallway of his Brooklyn apartment building for just a few moments, the two boys disappeared. The 3-year-old was eventually found on the roof of the apartment building, and he said the "boogey-man," an elderly gentlemen with a gray mustache, had spirited Billy away. Serial killer Albert Fish (who fits the boogey-man description) confessed to Billy's murder years later, but Billy's remains have yet to be found.

4) Mary Moroney (Illinois, 1930)

Mary Moroney, just 2, is an example of a recurring motif in the Charley Project's archives: families desperate for cheap child care during the Great Depression who simply trusted the wrong person. Moroney disappeared after her parents allowed her to spend a day with a woman who called herself Julia Otis. A woman purporting to be Otis's cousin later wrote to the family to say Otis was "love hungry" after the loss of a husband and child and that she would care for Mary. Mary has never been found and would be in her 80s today. She may still be alive and have no idea who she is.

5) Georgia Weckler (Wisconsin, 1947)

The sad story of the disappearance of Georgia Weckler, 8, is haunting for one specific reason: "Curiously, prior to her disappearance, Georgia had made several remarks indicating that she especially feared being kidnapped." What prompted this, we'll likely never know.

6) Evelyn Hartley (Wisconsin, 1953)

The disappearance of Evelyn Hartley is straight out of a horror movie. The teenager was babysitting one evening when she didn't call to check in with her parents at the appointed time. Her father went to check on her and found a completely locked house with the lights and radio still on — and no Evelyn inside. Signs of a struggle and forced entry led to a desperate search for the girl, but she was never found. Pools of blood that may have belonged to Evelyn, as well as eyewitness accounts of a girl who might have been her, make this story all the more mysterious.

7) Bruce Kremen (California, 1960)

Bruce Kremen disappeared while attending camp. He was playing with a few other boys just a short distance from his group, when he became separated from them and was never seen again. Initially believing him to be lost in the San Gabriel Mountains, authorities mounted a massive search, but were unable to find either the boy or his remains. Now, however, authorities believe him to have come in contact with Mack Ray Edwards, one of America's least known yet most prolific serial killers, who worked on highway construction and perhaps buried the remains of his victims beneath the asphalt, where they would never be found.

8) Marjorie West (Pennsylvania, 1938)

The West family went out after church for an outing in the country, one that involved Marjorie, 4, and her 11-year-old sister going to pick wildflowers. The sister went to talk to their parents, and Marjorie disappeared from the middle of a wide-open field. This might seem like a standard-issue kidnapping story save for the fact that Marjorie's life might well have intersected with Georgia Tann, the woman who ran the Tennessee Children's Home Society. Praised for her ability to find homes for children who needed them, Tann actually abducted more than 1,200 children and then placed them with rich families in far-off states like California — often for a hefty fee. If Marjorie did somehow meet Tann or someone who worked with her, she could be alive today and unaware of her true identity.

9) The Sodder children (West Virginia, 1945)

By far the eeriest story in the Charley Project archives is that of the five Sodder children, who all disappeared under suspicious circumstances on Christmas Eve night. The children (five out of 10 siblings) asked their parents if they might stay up and play with their new toys, rather than go directly to bed. Their parents agreed and turned in for the night, and a series of strange events transpired.

First, the phone rang, the children's mother answered, and the voice on the other end asked for someone the mother had never heard of. When she said so, the voice laughed and hung up. The mother later realized all of the lights in the house were on, the shades were drawn, and the doors were unlocked. She awakened again by a sound on the roof, and then she woke up for the final time at 1:30 am with the realization that the house was on fire. She, her husband, and their other five children got out, but the five children who had asked to stay up late never emerged from the inferno. When their father went to climb his ladder up into their bedrooms on the second floor, he could not find it. It was later found dragged away from the house.

The official conclusion was that the children had died in the house fire, but the Sodders never stopped believing their kids were still alive, right up until the two parents died. And they were encouraged by a strange photograph mailed to them in the '60s, purporting to show one of their sons as a grown adult. Did the Sodder children die in a fire set by never-caught perpetrators? Perhaps. But the tantalizing thought that they might have been kidnapped — might still, indeed, be alive, perhaps in Italy — has kept some sliver of hope that this strange case might find resolution.

Thursday, July 30, 2020

The earth isn't flat unless you think it is. #SimulationTheory

The earth isn't flat unless you think it is. #SimulationTheory
https://skeptiko.com/riz-virk-simulation-hypothesis-beyond-materialism-442/

Saturday, June 20, 2020

A course in miracles day 106

Lesson 106
Let me be still and listen to the truth.
1 If you will lay aside the ego's voice, however loudly it may seem to call; if you will not accept its petty gifts which give you nothing that you really want; if you will listen with an open mind, which has not told you what salvation is; then you will hear the mighty Voice of truth, quiet in power, strong in stillness, and completely certain in its messages.

2 Listen, and hear your Father speak to you through His appointed Voice, Which silences the thunder of the meaningless and shows the way to peace to those who cannot see. Be still today and listen to the truth. Be not deceived by voices of the dead which tell you they have found the source of life and offer it to you for your belief. Attend them not, but listen to the truth.

3 Be not afraid today to circumvent the voices of the world; walk lightly past their meaningless persuasion. Hear them not. Be still today, and listen to the truth. Go past all things which do not speak of Him Who holds your happiness within His hand, held out to you in welcome and in love. Hear only Him today, and do not wait to reach Him longer. Hear one Voice today.

4 Today the promise of God's Word is kept. Hear and be silent. He would speak to you. He comes with miracles a thousand times as happy and as wonderful as those you ever dreamt or wished for in your dreams. His miracles are true. They will not fade when dreaming ends. They end the dream instead and last forever, for they come from God to His dear Son, whose other name is you.

5 Prepare yourself for miracles today. Today allow your Father's ancient pledge to you and all your brothers to be kept. Hear Him today, and listen to the Word which lifts the veil which lies upon the earth and wakes all those who sleep and cannot see. God calls to them through you. He needs your voice to speak to them, for who could reach God's Son except his Father calling through your Self?

6 Hear Him today, and offer Him your voice to speak to all the multitudes who wait to hear the Word that He will speak today. Be ready for salvation. It is here and will today be given unto you. And you will learn your function from the One Who chose it in your Father's Name for you.

7 Listen today, and you will hear a Voice Which will resound throughout the world through you. The Bringer of all miracles has need that you receive them first and thus become the joyous giver of what you received. Thus does salvation start and thus it ends; when everything is yours, and everything is given away, it will remain with you forever. And the L e s s o n has been learned.

8 Today we practice giving, not the way you understand it now, but as it is. The longer exercises should begin with this request for your enlightenment:

9 I will be still and listen to the truth.
What does it mean to give and to receive?

10 Ask and expect an answer. Your request is one whose answer has been waiting long to be received by you. It will begin the ministry for which you came and which will free the world from thinking giving is a way to lose. And so the world becomes ready to understand and to receive.

11 Be still and listen to the truth today. For each five minutes spent in listening, a thousand minds are opened to the truth. And they will hear the holy Word you hear. And when the hour is past, you will again release a thousand more who pause to ask that truth be given them along with you.

12 Today the holy Word of God is kept through your receiving it to give away, so you can teach the world what giving means by listening and learning it of Him. Do not forget today to reinforce your choice to hear and to receive the Word by this reminder, given to yourself as often as is possible today:

13 Let me be still and listen to the truth.
I am the messenger of God today.
My voice is His, to give what I receive.

Thursday, June 4, 2020

A course in miracles day 105

Lesson 105
God's peace and joy are mine.

1 God's peace and joy are yours. Today we will accept them, knowing they belong to us. And we will try to understand these gifts increase as we receive them. They are not like to the gifts the world can give, in which the giver loses as he gives the gift; the taker is the richer by his loss. These are not gifts, but bargains made with guilt.

2 The truly given gift entails no loss. It is impossible that one can gain because another loses. This implies a limit and an insufficiency. No gift is given thus. Such "gifts" are but a bid for a more valuable return—a loan with interest to be paid in full; a temporary lending, meant to be a pledge of debt to be repaid with more than was received by him who took the gift.

3 This strange distortion of what giving means pervades all levels of the world you see. It strips all meaning from the gifts you give and leaves you nothing in the ones you take. A major learning goal this course has set is to reverse your view of giving, so you can receive. For giving has become a source of fear, and so you would avoid the only means by which you can receive.

4 Accept God's peace and joy, and you will learn a different way of looking at a gift. God's gifts will never lessen when they are given away. They but increase thereby. As Heaven's peace and joy intensify when you accept them as God's gift to you, so does the joy of your Creator grow when you accept His joy and peace as yours.

5 True giving is creation. It extends the limitless to the unlimited, eternity to timelessness, and love unto itself. It adds to all that is complete already, not in simple terms of adding more, for that implies that it was less before. It adds by letting what cannot contain itself fulfill its aim of giving everything it has away, securing it forever for itself.

6 Today accept God's peace and joy as yours. Let Him complete Himself as He defines completion. You will understand that what completes Him must complete His Son as well. He cannot give through loss. No more can you. Receive His gift of joy and peace today, and He will thank you for your gift to Him.

7 Today our practice periods will start a little differently. Begin today by thinking of those brothers who have been denied by you the peace and joy that are their right under the equal laws of God. Here you denied them to yourself. And here you must return to claim them as your own. Think of your "enemies" a little while, and tell each one as he occurs to you:

8 My brother, peace and joy I offer you,
That I may have God's peace and joy as mine.

9 Thus you prepare yourself to recognize God's gifts to you and let your mind be free of all that would prevent success today. Now are you ready to accept the gift of peace and joy which God has given you. Now are you ready to experience the joy and peace you have denied yourself. Now you can say, "God's peace and joy are mine," for you have given what you would receive.

10 You must succeed today if you prepare your mind as we suggest, for you have let all bars to peace and joy be lifted up, and what is yours can come to you at last. So tell yourself "God's peace and joy are mine," and close your eyes a while, and let His Voice assure you that the words you speak are true.

11 Spend your five minutes thus with Him each time you can today, but do not think that less is worthless when you cannot give Him more. At least remember hourly to say the words which call on Him to give you what He wills to give and wills you to receive.

12 Determine not to interfere today with what He wills. And if a brother seems to tempt you to deny God's gift to him, see it as but another chance to let yourself receive the gifts of God as yours. Then bless your brother thankfully, and say:

13 My brother, peace and joy I offer you,
That I may have God's peace and joy as mine.

Sunday, May 31, 2020

A course in miracles day 104

Lesson 104
I seek but what belongs to me in truth.
1 Today's idea continues with the thought that joy and peace are not but idle dreams. They are your right because of what you are. They come to you from God, Who cannot fail to give you what He wills. Yet must there be a place made ready to receive His gifts. They are not welcomed gladly by a mind which has instead received the gifts it made where His belong, as substitutes for them.

2 Today we would remove all meaningless and self-made gifts which we have placed upon the holy altar where God's gifts belong. These are the gifts which are our own in truth. His are the gifts which we inherited before time was and which will still be ours when time has passed into eternity.

3 These are the gifts which are within us now, for they are timeless. And we need not wait to have them. They belong to us today. Therefore we will to have them now and know in choosing them in place of what we made we but unite our will with what God wills and recognize the same as being one.

4 Our longer practice periods today, the hourly five minutes given truth for your salvation, should begin with this:

5 I seek but what belongs to me in truth,
And joy and peace are my inheritance.

6 Then lay aside the conflicts of the world that offer other gifts and other goals made of illusions, witnessed to by them, and sought for only in a world of dreams. All this we lay aside and seek instead that which is truly ours, as we ask to recognize what God has given us.

7 We clear a holy place within our minds before His altar, where His gifts of peace and joy are welcome and to which we come to find what has been given us by Him. We come in confidence today, aware that what belongs to us in truth is what He gives. And we would wish for nothing else, for nothing else belongs to us in truth.

8 So do we clear the way for Him today by simply recognizing that His Will is done already and that joy and peace belong to us as His eternal gifts. We will not let ourselves lose sight of them between the times we come to seek for them where He has laid them. This reminder will we bring to mind as often as we can:

9 I seek but what belongs to me in truth.
God's gifts of joy and peace are all I want.

Tuesday, May 19, 2020

A course in miracles day 103

Lesson 103
God, being Love, is also happiness.
1 Happiness is an attribute of love. It cannot be apart from it, nor can it be experienced where love is not. Love has no limits, being everywhere. And therefore joy is everywhere as well. Yet can the mind deny that this is so, believing there are gaps in love where sin can enter, bringing pain instead of joy.

2 This strange belief would limit happiness by redefining love as limited and introducing opposition in what has no limit and no opposite. Fear is associated then with love, and its results become the heritage of minds that think what they have made is real. These images, with no reality in truth, bear witness to the fear of God, forgetting being Love, He must be joy.

3 This basic error we will try again to bring to truth today and teach ourselves:

4 God, being Love, is also happiness.
To fear Him is to be afraid of joy.

5 Begin your longer practice periods for today with this association, which corrects the false belief that God is fear. It also emphasizes happiness belongs to you because of what He is.

6 Allow this one correction to be placed within your mind each waking hour today. Then welcome all the happiness it brings, as truth replaces fear, and joy becomes what you expect to take the place of pain. God being Love, it will be given you. Bolster this expectation frequently throughout the day, and quiet all your fears with this assurance, kind and wholly true:

7 God, being Love, is also happiness.
And it is happiness I seek today.
I cannot fail because I seek the truth.

Wednesday, May 6, 2020

A course in miracles day 102

Lesson 102
I share God's Will for happiness for me.
1 You do not want to suffer. You may think it buys you something and may still believe a little that it buys you what you want. Yet this belief is surely shaken now, at least enough to let you question it and to suspect it really makes no sense. It has not gone as yet but lacks the roots that once secured it tightly to the dark and hidden secret places of your mind.

2 Today we try to loose its weakened hold still further. And to realize that pain is purposeless, without a cause, and with no power to accomplish anything. It cannot purchase anything at all. It offers nothing and does not exist. And everything you think it offers you is lacking in existence like itself. You have been slave to nothing. Be you free today to join the happy Will of God.

3 For several days we will continue to devote our longer practice periods to exercises planned to help you reach the happiness God's Will has placed in you. Here is your home, and here your safety is. Here is your peace, and here there is no fear. Here is salvation. Here is rest at last.

4 Begin the longer practice periods today with this acceptance of God's Will for you:

5 I share God's Will for happiness for me,
And I accept it as my function now.

6 Then seek this function deep within your mind, for it is there, awaiting but your choice. You cannot fail to find it when you learn it is your choice and that you share God's Will.

7 Be happy, for your only function here is happiness. You have no need to be less loving to God's Son than He Whose Love created him as loving as Himself. Besides these hourly five minute rests, pause frequently today to tell yourself that you have now accepted happiness as your one function. And be sure that you are joining with God's Will in doing this.

Friday, May 1, 2020

A course in miracles day 101

Lesson 101
God's Will for me is perfect happiness.
1 Today we will continue with the theme of happiness. This is a key idea in understanding what salvation means. You still believe it asks for suffering as penance for your "sins." This is not so. Yet you must think it so while you believe that sin is real and that God's Son can sin. If sin is real, then punishment is just and cannot be escaped. Salvation thus cannot be purchased but through suffering.

2 If sin is real then happiness must be illusion, for they cannot both be true. The sinful warrant only death and pain, and it is this they ask for, for they know it waits for them and it will seek them out and find them somewhere, sometime, in some form which evens the account they owe to God. They would escape Him in their fear. And yet He will pursue, and they cannot escape.

3 If sin is real, salvation must be pain. Pain is the cost of sin, and suffering can never be escaped if sin is real. Salvation must be feared, for it will kill but slowly, taking everything away before it grants the welcome boon of death to victims who are little more than bones before salvation is appeased. Its wrath is boundless, merciless, but wholly just.

4 Who would seek out such savage punishment? Who would not flee salvation and attempt in every way he can to drown the Voice Which offers it to him? Why would he try to listen and accept Its offering? If sin is real, its offering is death and meted out in cruel form to match the vicious wishes in which sin is born. If sin is real, salvation has become your bitter enemy, the curse of God upon you who have crucified His Son.

5 You need the practice periods today. The exercises teach sin is not real, and all that you believe must come from sin will never happen, for it has no cause. Accept Atonement with an open mind which cherishes no lingering belief that you have made a devil of God's Son.

6 There is no sin. We practice with this thought as often as we can today because it is the basis for today's idea. God's Will for you is perfect happiness because there is no sin, and suffering is causeless. Joy is just, and pain is but the sign you have misunderstood yourself.

7 Fear not the Will of God. But turn to it in confidence that it will set you free from all the consequences sin has wrought in feverish imagination. Say:

8 God's Will for me is perfect happiness.
There is no sin; it has no consequence.

9 So should you start your practice periods, and then attempt again to find the joy these thoughts will introduce into your mind. Give these five minutes gladly to remove the heavy load you laid upon yourself with the insane belief that sin is real.

10 Today escape from madness. You are set on freedom's road, and now today's idea brings wings to speed you on and hope to go still faster to the waiting goal of peace. There is no sin. Remember this today, and tell yourself as often as you can:

11 God's Will for me is perfect happiness.
This is the truth because there is no sin.

Thursday, April 30, 2020

A course in miracles day 100

Lesson 100
My part is essential to God's plan for salvation.
1 Just as God's Son completes his Father, so your part in it completes your Father's plan. Salvation must reverse the mad belief in separate thoughts and separate bodies which lead separate lives and go their separate ways. One function shared by separate minds unites them in one purpose, for each one is equally essential to them all.

2 God's Will for you is perfect happiness. Why should you choose to go against His Will? The part that He has saved for you to take in working out His plan is given you that you might be restored to what He wills. This part is as essential to His plan as to your happiness. Your joy must be complete to let His plan be understood by those to whom He sends you. They will see their function in your shining face and hear God calling to them in your happy laugh.

3 You are indeed essential to God's plan. Without your joy, His joy is incomplete. Without your smile, the world cannot be saved. While you are sad, the light which God Himself appointed as the means to save the world is dim and lusterless. And no one laughs, because all laughter can but echo yours.

4 You are indeed essential to God's plan. Just as your light increases every light that shines in Heaven, so your joy on earth calls to all minds to let their sorrows go and take their place beside you in God's plan. God's messengers are joyous, and their joy heals sorrow and despair. They are the proof that God wills perfect happiness for all who will accept their Father's gifts as theirs.

5 We will not let ourselves be sad today. For if we do, we fail to take the part that is essential to God's plan as well as to our vision. Sadness is the sign that you would play another part instead of what has been assigned to you by God. Thus do you fail to show the world how great the happiness He wills for you. And so you do not recognize that it is yours.

6 Today we will attempt to understand joy is our function here. If you are sad, your part is unfulfilled and all the world is thus deprived of joy along with you. God asks that you be happy so the world can see how much He loves His Son and wills no sorrow rises to abate his joy; no fear besets him to disturb his peace.

7 You are God's messenger today. You bring His happiness to all you look upon, His peace to everyone who looks on you and sees His message in your happy face. We will prepare ourselves for this today in our five minute practice periods by feeling happiness arise in us according to our Father's Will and ours.

8 Begin the exercises with the thought today's idea contains. Then realize your part is to be happy. Only this is asked of you or anyone who wants to take his place among God's messengers. Think what this means. You have indeed been wrong in your belief that sacrifice is asked. You but receive according to God's plan and never lose or sacrifice or die.

9 Now let us try to find that joy which proves to us and all the world God's Will for us. It is your function that you find it here and that you find it now. For this you came. Let this one be the day that you succeed! Look deep within you, undismayed by all the little thoughts and foolish goals you pass as you ascend to meet the Christ in you.

10 He will be there. And you can reach Him now. What could you rather look upon in place of Him Who waits that you may look on Him? What little thought has power to hold you back? What foolish goal can keep you from success when He Who calls to you is God Himself? He will be there. You are essential to His plan. You are His messenger today. And you must find what He would have you give.

11 Do not forget the idea for today between your longer practice periods. It is your Self Who calls to you today. And it is Him you answer every time you tell yourself you are essential to God's plan for the salvation of the world.

Monday, April 20, 2020

A course in miracles day 99

Lesson 99
Salvation is my only function here.
1 Salvation and forgiveness are the same. They both imply that something has gone wrong—something you need to be saved from or forgiven for, something amiss that needs corrective change, something apart or different from the Will of God. Thus do both terms imply something impossible but yet which has occurred, resulting in a state of conflict between what is and what could never be.

2 Truth and illusions both are equal now, for both have happened. The impossible becomes the thing you need forgiveness for, salvation from. Salvation is the borderland between the truth and illusion. It reflects the truth because it is the means by which you can escape illusions. Yet it is not truth because it undoes what was never done.

3 How could there be a meeting place at all where earth and Heaven can be reconciled within a mind where both of them exist? The mind that sees illusions thinks them real. They have existence in that they are thoughts. And yet they are not real because the mind that thinks these thoughts is separate from God.

4 What joins the separated mind and thoughts with Mind and Thought which are forever one? What plan could hold the truth inviolate, yet recognize the need illusions bring and offer means by which they are undone without attack and with no touch of pain? What but a Thought of God could be this plan by which the never done is overlooked and sins forgotten which were never real?

5 The Holy Spirit holds this plan of God exactly as it was received of Him within the Mind of God and in your own. It is apart from time in that its Source is timeless. Yet it operates in time because of your belief that time is real. Unshaken does the Holy Spirit look on what you see—on sin and pain and death, on grief and separation, and on loss. Yet does He know one thing must still be true—God still is Love, and this is not His Will.

6 This is the Thought which brings illusions to the truth, and sees them as appearances behind which is the changeless and the sure. This is the Thought which saves and which forgives, because it lays no faith in what is not created by the only Source it knows. This is the Thought whose function is to save by giving you its function as your own.

7 Salvation is your function with the One to Whom the plan was given. Now are you entrusted with this plan, along with Him. He has one answer to appearances regardless of their form, their size, their depth, or any attribute they seem to have:

8 Salvation is my only function here.
God still is Love, and this is not His Will.

9 You who will yet work miracles, be sure you practice well the idea for today. Try to perceive the strength in what you say, for these are words in which your freedom lies. Your Father loves you. All the world of pain is not His Will. Forgive yourself the thought He wanted this for you. Then let the Thought with which He has replaced all your mistakes enter the darkened places of your mind which thought the thoughts that never were His Will.

10 This part belongs to God, as does the rest. It does not think its solitary thoughts and make them real by hiding them from Him. Let in the light, and you will look upon no obstacle to what He wills for you. Open your secrets to His kindly Light, and see how bright this Light still shines in you.

11 Practice His Thought today, and let His Light seek out and lighten up all darkened spots and shine through them to join them to the rest. It is God's Will your mind be one with His. It is God's Will that He has but one Son. It is God's Will that His one Son is you.

12 Think of these things in practicing today, and start your longer practice periods with this instruction in the way of truth:

13 Salvation is my only function here.
Salvation and forgiveness are the same.

14 Then turn to Him who shares your function with you, and let Him teach you what you need to learn to lay all fear aside and know your Self as Love Which has no opposite in you.

15 Forgive all thoughts which would oppose the truth of your completeness, unity, and peace. You cannot lose the gifts your Father gave. You do not want to be another self. You have no function that is not of God. Forgive yourself the one you think you made. Forgiveness and salvation are the same. Forgive what you have made, and you are saved.

16 You have a special message for today which has the power to remove all forms of doubt and fear forever from your mind. If you are tempted to believe them true, remember that appearances cannot withstand the truth these mighty words contain:

17 Salvation is my only function here.
God still is Love, and this is not His Will.

18 Your only function tells you you are one. Remind yourself of this between the times you give five minutes to be shared with Him Who shares God's plan with you. Remind yourself:

19 Salvation is my only function here.

20 Thus do you lay forgiveness on your mind and let all fear be gently laid aside that Love may find Its rightful place in you and show you that you are the Son of God.

Saturday, April 11, 2020

Friday, April 10, 2020

Thursday, April 9, 2020

A course in miracles day 98

Lesson 98
I will accept my part in God's plan for salvation.
1 Today is a day of special dedication. We take a stand on but one side today. We side with truth and let illusions go. We will not vacillate between the two but take a firm position with the one. We dedicate ourselves to truth today and to salvation as God planned it be. We will not argue it is something else; we will not seek for it where it is not. In gladness we accept it as it is and take the part assigned to us by God.

2 How happy to be certain! All our doubts we lay aside today and take our stand with certainty of purpose and with thanks that doubt is gone and surety has come. We have a mighty purpose to fulfill and have been given everything we need with which to reach the goal. Not one mistake stands in our way, for we have been absolved from errors. All our sins are washed away by realizing that they were but mistakes.

3 The guiltless have no fear, for they are safe and recognize their safety. They do not appeal to magic nor invent escapes from fancied threats without reality. They rest in quiet certainty that they will do what it is given them to do. They do not doubt their own ability because they know their function will be filled completely in the perfect time and place. They took the stand which we will take today that we may share their certainty and thus increase it by accepting it ourselves.

4 They will be with us—all who took the stand we take today will gladly offer us all that they learned and every gain they made. Those still uncertain too will join with us and, borrowing our certainty, will make it stronger still. While those as yet unborn will hear the call we heard and answer it, when they have come to make their choice again. We do not choose but for ourselves today.

5 Is it not worth five minutes of your time each hour to be able to accept the happiness that God has given you? Is it not worth five minutes hourly to recognize your special function here? Is not five minutes of the hour but a small request to make in terms of a reward so great it has no measure? You have made a thousand losing bargains at the least.

6 Here is an offer guaranteeing you your full release from pain of every kind and joy the world does not contain. You can exchange a little of your time for peace of mind and certainty of purpose with the promise of complete success. And since time has no meaning, you are being asked for nothing in return for everything. Here is a bargain that you cannot lose. And what you gain is limitless indeed!

7 Each hour today give Him your tiny gift of but five minutes. He will give the words you use in practicing today's idea the deep conviction and the certainty you lack. His words will join with yours and make each repetition of today's idea a total dedication, made in faith as perfect and as sure as His in you.

8 His confidence in you will bring the light to all the words you say, and you will go beyond their sound to what they really mean. Today you practice with Him as you say:

9 I will accept my part in God's plan for salvation.

10 In each five minutes that you spend with Him, He will accept your words and give them back to you all bright with faith and confidence so strong and steady they will light the world with hope and gladness. Do not lose one chance to be the glad receiver of His gifts, that you may give them to the world today.

11 Give Him the words, and He will do the rest. He will enable you to understand your special function. He will open up the way to happiness, and peace and trust will be His gifts, His answer to your words. He will respond with all His faith and joy and certainty that what you say is true. And you will have conviction then of Him Who knows the function that you have on earth as well as Heaven. He will be with you each practice period you share with Him, exchanging every instant of the time you offer Him for timelessness and peace.

12 Throughout the hour, let your time be spent in happy preparation for the next five minutes you will spend again with Him. Repeat today's idea while you wait for the glad time to come to you again. Repeat it often, and do not forget each time you do so, you have let your mind be readied for the happy time to come.

13 And when the hour is gone and He is there once more to spend a little time with you, be thankful and lay down all earthly tasks, all little thoughts and limited ideas, and spend a happy time again with Him. Tell Him once more that you accept the part which He would have you take and help you fill, and He will make you sure you want this choice, which He has made with you and you with Him.

Wednesday, April 8, 2020

A course in miracles day 97

Lesson 97
I am Spirit.
1 Today's idea identifies you with your One Self. It accepts no split identity, nor tries to weave opposing factors into unity. It simply states the truth. Practice this truth today as often as you can, for it will bring your mind from conflict to the quiet fields of peace. No chill of fear can enter, for your mind has been absolved from madness, letting go illusions of a split identity.

2 We state again the truth about your Self, the holy Son of God who rests in you, whose mind has been restored to sanity. You are the Spirit lovingly endowed with all your Father's love and peace and joy. You are the Spirit which completes Himself and shares His function as Creator. He is with you always, as you are with Him.

3 Today we try to bring reality still closer to your mind. Each time you practice, awareness is brought a little nearer at least; sometimes a thousand years or more are saved. The minutes which you give are multiplied over and over, for the miracle makes use of time but is not ruled by it. Salvation is a miracle, the first and last; the first that is the last, for it is one.

4 You are the Spirit in whose mind abides the miracle in which all time stands still; the miracle in which a minute spent in using these ideas becomes a time which has no length and which has no end. Give, then, these minutes willingly, and count on Him Who promised to lay timelessness beside them. He will offer all His strength to every little effort which you make.

5 Give Him the minutes which He needs today to help you understand with Him you are the Spirit that abides in Him, and Which calls through His Voice to every living thing; offers His sight to everyone who asks; replaces error with the simple truth.

6The Holy Spirit will be glad to take five minutes of each hour from your hands and carry them around this aching world, where pain and misery appear to rule. He will not overlook one open mind that will accept the healing gift they bring, and He will lay them everywhere He knows they will be welcome. And they will increase in healing power each time someone accepts them as his thoughts and uses them to heal.

7 Thus will your gift to Him be multiplied a thousand-fold and tens of thousands more. And when it is returned to you, it will surpass in might the little gift you gave as much as does the radiance of the sun outshine the tiny gleam a firefly makes an uncertain moment, and goes out. Yet will the steady brilliance of this light remain and lead you out of darkness, nor will you be able to forget the way again.

8 Begin these happy exercises with the words the Holy Spirit speaks to you, and let them echo round the world through Him:

9 Spirit am I, a holy Son of God,
free of all limits, safe and healed and whole,
free to forgive, and free to save the world.

10 Expressed through you, the Holy Spirit will accept this gift which you received of Him, increase its power, and give it back to you.

11 Offer each practice period today gladly to Him. And He will speak to you, reminding you that you are Spirit, one with Him and God, your brothers and your Self. Listen for His assurance every time you speak the words He offers you today, and let Him tell your mind that they are true.

12 Use them against temptation, and escape its sorry consequences if you yield to the belief that you are something else. The Holy Spirit gives you peace today. Receive His words, and offer them to Him.

Friday, April 3, 2020

A course in miracles day 96

Lesson 96
Salvation comes from my One Self.
1 Although you are One Self, you experience yourself as two—as both good and evil, loving and hating, mind and body. This sense of being split into opposites induces feelings of acute and constant conflict and leads to frantic attempts to reconcile the contradictory aspects of this self-perception. You have sought many such solutions, and none of them has worked. The opposites you see in you will never be compatible. But one exists.

2 The fact that truth and illusion cannot be reconciled, no matter how you try, what means you use, and where you see the problem, must be accepted if you would be saved. Until you have accepted this, you will attempt endless lists of goals you cannot reach; a senseless series of expenditures of time and effort, hopefulness and doubt, each one as futile as the one before and failing as the next one surely will.

3 Problems that have no meaning cannot be resolved within the framework they are set. Two selves in conflict could not be resolved, and good and evil have no meeting place. The self you made can never be your Self, nor can your Self be split in two and still be what it is and must forever be.

4 A mind and body cannot both exist. Make no attempt to reconcile the two, for one denies the other can be real. If you are physical, your mind is gone from your self-concept, for it has no place in which it could be really part of you. If you are Spirit, then the body must be meaningless to your reality.

5 Spirit makes use of mind as means to find its Self-expression. And the mind which serves the Spirit is at peace and filled with joy. Its power comes from Spirit, and it is fulfilling happily its function here. Yet mind can also see itself divorced from Spirit and perceive itself within a body it confuses with itself. Without its function then, it has no peace, and happiness is alien to its thoughts.

6 Yet mind apart from Spirit cannot think. It has denied its Source of strength and sees itself as helpless, limited, and weak. Dissociated from its function now, it thinks it is alone and separate, attacked by armies massed against itself and hiding in the body's frail support. Now must it reconcile unlike with like, for this is what it thinks that it is for.

7 Waste no more time on this. Who can resolve the senseless conflicts which a dream presents? What could the resolution mean in truth? What purpose could it serve? What is it for? Salvation cannot make illusions real and solve a problem that does not exist. Perhaps you hope it can. Yet would you have God's plan for the release of His dear Son bring pain to him and fail to set him free?

8 Your Self retains its thoughts, and they remain within your mind and in the Mind of God. The Holy Spirit holds salvation in your mind and offers it the way to peace. Salvation is a thought you share with God, because His Voice accepted it for you and answered in your name that it was done. Thus is salvation kept among the thoughts your Self holds dear and cherishes for you.

9 We will attempt today to find this thought, whose presence in your mind is guaranteed by Him Who speaks to you from your One Self. Our hourly five minute practicing will be a search for Him within your mind. Salvation comes from this One Self through Him Who is the bridge between your mind and it.

10 Wait patiently, and let Him speak to you about your Self, and what your mind can do, restored to it and free to serve its will.

11 Begin by saying this:

12 Salvation comes from my One Self. Its thoughts are mine to use.

13 Then seek its thoughts, and claim them as your own.

14 These are your own real thoughts you have denied, and let your mind go wandering in a world of dreams, to find illusions in their place. Here are your thoughts, the only ones you have. Salvation is among them; find it there.

15 If you succeed, the thoughts that come to you will tell you you are saved and that your mind has found the function that it sought to lose. Your Self will welcome it and give it peace. Restored in strength, it will again flow out from Spirit to the Spirit in all things created by the Spirit as Itself. Your mind will bless all things. Confusion done, you are restored, for you have found your Self.

16 Your Self knows that you cannot fail today. Perhaps your mind remains uncertain yet a little while. Be not dismayed by this. The joy your Self experiences It will save for you, and it will yet be yours in full awareness. Every time you spend five minutes of the hour seeking Him Who joins your mind and Self, you offer Him another treasure to be kept for you.

17 Each time today you tell your frantic mind salvation comes from your One Self, you lay another treasure in your growing store. And all of it is given everyone who asks for it and will accept the gift. Think, then, how much is given unto you to give this day, that it be given you!

Thursday, April 2, 2020

A course in miracles day 95

Lesson 95
I am One Self, united with my Creator.
1 Today's idea accurately describes you as God created you. You are one within yourself and one with Him. Yours is the unity of all creation. Your perfect unity makes change in you impossible. You do not accept this and you fail to realize it must be so, only because you believe that you have changed yourself already. You see yourself as a ridiculous parody on God's creation—weak, vicious, ugly and sinful, miserable and beset with pain.

2 Such is your version of yourself—a self divided into many warring parts, separate from God, and tenuously held together by its erratic and capricious maker, to which you pray. It does not hear your prayers, for it is deaf. It does not see the oneness in you, for it is blind. It does not understand you are the Son of God, for it is senseless and understands nothing.

3 We will attempt today to be aware of only what can hear and see and what makes perfect sense. We will again direct our exercises towards reaching your One Self, which is united with its Creator. In patience and in hope we try again today.

4 The use of the first five minutes of every waking hour for practicing the idea for the day has special advantages at the stage of learning in which you are at present. It is difficult at this point not to allow your mind to wander if it undertakes extended attempts. You have surely realized this by now. You have seen the extent of your lack of mental discipline and of your need for mind training. It is necessary that you be aware of this, for it is indeed a hindrance to your advance.

5 Frequent but shorter practice periods have other advantages for you at this time. In addition to recognizing your difficulties with sustained attention, you must also have noticed that, unless you are reminded of your purpose frequently, you tend to forget about it for long periods of time. You often fail to remember the short applications of the idea for the day, and you have not yet formed the habit of using it as an automatic response to temptation.

6 Structure, then, is necessary for you at this time, planned to include frequent reminders of your goal and regular attempts to reach it. Regularity in terms of time is not the ideal requirement for the most beneficial form of practice in salvation. It is advantageous, however, for those whose motivation is inconsistent and who remain heavily defended against learning.

7 We will therefore keep to the five minutes an hour practice periods for a while and urge you to omit as few as possible. Using the first five minutes of the hour will be particularly helpful since it imposes firmer structure. Do not, however, use your lapses from this schedule as an excuse not to return to it again as soon as you can.

8 There may well be a temptation to regard the day as lost because you have already failed to do what is required. This should, however, merely be recognized as what it is—a refusal to let your mistakes be corrected and an unwillingness to try again.

9 The Holy Spirit is not delayed in His teaching by your mistakes. He can be held back only by your unwillingness to let them go. Let us therefore be determined, particularly for the next week or so, to be willing to forgive ourselves for our lapses in diligence and our failures to follow the instructions for practicing the day's idea.

10 This tolerance for weakness will enable us to overlook it, rather than give it power to delay our learning. If we give it power to do this, we are regarding it as strength and are confusing strength with weakness. When you fail to comply with the requirements of this course, you have merely made a mistake. This calls for correction and for nothing else.

11 To allow a mistake to continue is to make additional mistakes based on the first and reinforcing it. It is this process that must be laid aside, for it is but another way in which you would defend illusions against the truth. Let all these errors go by recognizing them for what they are. They are attempts to keep you unaware you are One Self, united with your Creator, at one with every aspect of creation, and limitless in power and in peace.

12 This is the truth, and nothing else is true. Today we will affirm this truth again and try to reach the place in you in which there is no doubt that only this is true. Begin the practice periods today with this assurance, given to your mind with all the certainty that you can give:

13 I am One Self, united with my Creator,
At one with every aspect of creation,
And limitless in power and in peace.

14 Then close your eyes and tell yourself again, slowly and thoughtfully, attempting to allow the meaning of the words to sink into your mind, replacing false ideas:

15 I am One Self.

16 Repeat this several times, and then attempt to feel the meaning which the words convey. You are One Self, united and secure in light and joy and peace. You are God's Son, One Self with one Creator and one goal—to bring awareness of this oneness to all minds, that true creation may extend the Allness and the Unity of God.

17 You are One Self, complete and healed and whole, with power to lift the veil of darkness from the world and let the light in you come through to teach the world the truth about itself. You are One Self, in perfect harmony with all there is and all that there will be. You are One Self, the holy Son of God, united with your brothers in this Self, united with your Father in His Will.

18 Feel this One Self in you, and let it shine away all your illusions and your doubts. This is your Self, the Son of God Himself, sinless as its Creator, with His strength within you and His Love forever yours. You are One Self, and it is given you to feel this Self within you and to cast all your illusions out of the one Mind which is this Self, the holy truth in you.

19 Do not forget today. We need your help, your little part in bringing happiness to all the world. And Heaven looks to you in confidence that you will try today. Share, then, its surety, for it is yours. Be vigilant. Do not forget today.

20 Throughout the day do not forget your goal. Repeat today's idea as frequently as possible and understand each time you do so, someone hears the voice of hope, the stirring of the truth within his mind, the gentle rustling of the wings of peace. Your own acknowledgment you are One Self, united with your Father, is a call to all the world to be at one with you. To everyone you meet today be sure to give the promise of today's idea and tell him this:

21 You are One Self with me,
United with our Creator in this Self.
I honor you because of what I am,
And what He is, Who loves us both as one.

Tuesday, March 31, 2020

Monday, March 30, 2020

A course in miracles day 94

Lesson 94
I am as God created me.
1 Today we continue with the one idea which brings complete salvation; the one statement which makes all forms of temptation powerless; the one thought which renders the ego silent and entirely undone. You are as God created you. The sounds of this world are still, the sights of this world disappear, and all the thoughts that this world ever held are wiped away forever by this one idea. Here is salvation accomplished. Here is sanity restored.

2 True light is strength, and strength is sinlessness. If you remain as God created you, you must be strong and light must be in you. He Who ensured your sinlessness must be the guarantee of strength and light as well. You are as God created you. Darkness cannot obscure the glory of the Son of God. You stand in light, strong in the sinlessness in which you were created and in which you will remain throughout eternity.

3 Today we will again devote the first five minutes of each waking hour to the attempt to feel the truth in you. Begin these times of searching with these words:

4 I am as God created me.
I am His Son eternally.

5 Now try to reach the Son of God in you. This is the Self that never sinned nor made an image to replace reality. This is the Self which never left its home in God to walk the world uncertainly. This is the Self which knows no fear nor could conceive of loss or suffering or death.

6 Nothing is required of you to reach this goal except to lay all idols and self-images aside, go past the long list of attributes, both "good" and "bad," you have ascribed to yourself and wait in silent expectancy for the truth. God has Himself promised that it will be revealed to all who ask for it. You are asking now. You cannot fail because He cannot fail.

7 If you do not meet the requirement of practicing for the first five minutes of every hour, at least remind yourself hourly:

8 I am as God created me.
I am His Son eternally.

9 Tell yourself frequently today that you are as God created you. And be sure to respond to anyone who seems to irritate you with these words:

10 You are as God created you.
You are His Son eternally.

11 Make every effort to do the hourly exercises today. Each one you do will be a giant stride toward your release and a milestone in learning the thought system which this course sets forth.

Sunday, March 29, 2020

A course in miracles day 93

Lesson 93
Light and joy and peace abide in me.
1 You think you are the home of evil, darkness, and sin. You think if anyone could see the truth about you he would be repelled, recoiling from you as if from a poisonous snake. You think if what is true about you were revealed to you, you would be struck with horror so intense that you would rush to death by your own hand, living on after seeing this being impossible.

2 These are beliefs so firmly fixed that it is difficult to help you see that they are based on nothing. That you have made mistakes is obvious. That you have sought salvation in strange ways—have been deceived, deceiving, and afraid of foolish fantasies and savage dreams and have bowed down to idols made of dust—all this is true by what you now believe.

3 Today we question this, not from the point of view of what you think, but from a very different reference point from which such idle thoughts are meaningless. These thoughts are not according to God's Will. These weird beliefs He does not share with you. This is enough to prove that they are wrong, but you do not perceive that this is so.

4 Why would you not be overjoyed to be assured that all the evil that you think you did was never done, that all your "sins" are nothing, that you are as pure and holy as you were created, and that light and joy and peace abide in you? Your image of yourself cannot withstand the Will of God. You think that this is death, but it is life. You think you are destroyed, but you are saved.

5 The self you made is not the Son of God. Therefore, this self does not exist at all. And anything it seems to do and think means nothing. It is neither bad nor good. It is unreal and nothing more than that. It does not battle with the Son of God. It does not hurt him nor attack his peace. It has not changed creation nor reduced eternal sinlessness to sin and love to hate. What power can this self you made possess when it would contradict the Will of God?

6 Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God. Over and over this must be repeated until it is accepted. It is true. Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God. Nothing can touch it nor can change what God created as eternal. The self you made, evil and full of sin, is meaningless. Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God, and light and joy and peace abide in you.

7 Salvation requires the acceptance of but one thought—you are as God created you, not what you made of yourself. Whatever evil you may think you did, you are as God created you. Whatever mistakes you made, the truth about you is unchanged. Creation is eternal and unalterable. Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God. You are and will forever be exactly as you were created. Light and joy and peace abide in you because God put them there.

8 In our longer exercise periods today, which would be most profitable if done for the first five minutes of every waking hour, we will begin by stating the truth about our creation:

9 Light and joy and peace abide in me.
My sinlessness is guaranteed by God.

10 Then put away your foolish self-images and spend the rest of the practice period in trying to experience what God has given you in place of what you have decreed for yourself.

11 You are what God created or what you made. One Self is true; the other is not there. Try to experience the unity of your One Self. Try to appreciate its holiness and the love from which it was created. Try not to interfere with the Self which God created as you by hiding its majesty behind the tiny idols of evil and sinfulness you have made to replace it. Let it come into its own. Here you are. This is you. And light and joy and peace abide in you because this is so.

12 You may not be willing or even able to use the first five minutes of each hour for these exercises. Try, however, to do so when you can. At least remember to repeat these thoughts each hour:

13 Light and joy and peace abide in me.
My sinlessness is guaranteed by God.

14 Then try to devote at least a minute or so to closing your eyes and realizing that this is a statement of the truth about you.

15 If a situation arises that seems to be disturbing, quickly dispel the illusion of fear by repeating these thoughts again. Should you be tempted to become angry with someone, tell him silently:

16 Light and joy and peace abide in you.
Your sinlessness is guaranteed by God.

17 You can do much for the world's salvation today. You can do much today to bring you closer to the part in salvation which God has assigned to you. And you can do much today to bring the conviction to your mind that the idea for the day is true indeed.

Saturday, March 28, 2020

A course in miracles day 92

Lesson 92
Miracles are seen in light, and light and strength are one.
1 The idea for today is an extension of the previous one. You do not think of light in terms of strength and darkness in terms of weakness. That is because your idea of what seeing means is tied up with the body and its eyes and brain. This is why you believe that you can change what you see by keeping little bits of glass or other clear material before your eyes held in a frame or placed against the eye.

2 These are among the many magical beliefs that come from the conviction you are a body and the body's eyes can see. You also believe the body's brain can think. If you but understood the nature of thought, you could but laugh at this insane idea. It is as if you thought you held the match that lights the sun and gives it all its warmth or that you had the universe imprisoned in your hand, securely bound until you let it go. Yet this is no more foolish than to believe the body's eyes can see, the brain can think.

3 It is God's strength in you that is the light in which you see, as it is His Mind with which you think. His strength denies your weakness. It is your weakness that sees through the body's eyes, peering about in darkness to behold the likeness of itself—the small, the weak, the sickly and the dying, those in need, the helpless and afraid, the sad, the poor, the starving, and the joyless. These are seen through eyes which cannot see and cannot bless.

4 Strength overlooks these things by seeing past appearances. It keeps its steady gaze upon the light that lies beyond them. It unites with light, of which it is a part. It sees itself. It brings the light in which your Self appears. In darkness you perceive a self that is not there.

5 Strength is the truth about you; weakness is an idol falsely worshipped, and adored that strength may be dispelled and darkness rule where God appointed that there should be light. Strength comes from truth and shines with light its Source has given it; weakness reflects the darkness of its maker. It is sick and looks on sickness, which is like itself.

6 Truth is a savior and can only will for happiness and peace for everyone. It gives its strength to everyone who asks, in limitless supply. It sees that lack in anyone would be a lack in all, and so it gives its light that all may see and benefit as one. Its strength is shared that it may bring to all the miracle in which they will unite in purpose and forgiveness and in love.

7 Weakness, which looks in darkness, cannot see a purpose in forgiveness and in love. It sees all others different from itself and nothing in the world that it would share. It judges and condemns but does not love. In darkness it remains to hide itself and dreams that it is strong and conquering, a victor over limitations that but grow in darkness to enormous size. It fears and it attacks and hates itself, and darkness covers everything it sees, leaving its dreams as fearful as itself. No miracles are here, but only hate. It separates itself from what it sees, while light and strength perceive themselves as one.

8 The light of strength is not the light you see. It does not change and flicker and go out. It does not shift from night to day and back to darkness till the morning comes again. The light of strength is constant, sure as love, forever glad to give itself away because it cannot give but to itself. No one can ask in vain to share its sight, and none who enters its abode can leave without a miracle before his eyes and strength and light abiding in his heart.

9 The strength in you will offer you the light and guide your seeing, so you do not dwell on idle shadows that the body's eyes provide for self-deception. Strength and light unite in you, and where they meet, your Self stands ready to embrace you as Its own. Such is the meeting place we try today to find and rest in, for the peace of God is where your Self, His Son, is waiting now to meet itself again and be as one.

10 Let us give 20 minutes twice today to join this meeting. Let yourself be brought unto your Self. Its strength will be the light in which the gift of sight is given you. Leave, then, the dark a little while today, and we will practice seeing in the light, closing the body's eyes and asking truth to show us how to find the meeting place of self and Self, where light and strength are one.

11 After the morning meeting, we will use the day in preparation for the time at night when we will meet again in hope and trust. Let us repeat as often as we can the idea for today and recognize that we are being introduced to sight and led away from darkness to the light, where only miracles can be perceived.

Tuesday, March 10, 2020

A course in miracles day 91

Lesson 91
Miracles are seen in light.
1 It is important to remember that miracles and vision necessarily go together. This needs repeating and frequent repeating. It is a central idea in your new thought system and the perception which it produces. The miracle is always there. Its presence is not caused by your vision; its absence is not the result of your failure to see. It is only your awareness of miracles that is affected. You will see it in the light; you will not see it in the dark.

2 To you, then, light is crucial. While you remain in darkness, the miracle remains unseen. Thus you are convinced it is not there. This follows from the premises from which the darkness comes. Denial of light leads to failure to perceive it. Failure to perceive light is to perceive darkness. The light is useless to you then, even though it is there. You cannot use it because its presence is unknown to you. And the seeming reality of the darkness makes the idea of light meaningless.

3 To be told that what you do not see is there sounds like insanity. It is very difficult to become convinced that it is insanity not to see what is there and to see what is not there instead. You do not doubt that the body's eyes can see. You do not doubt the images they show you are reality. Your faith lies in the darkness, not the light.

4 How can this be reversed? For you it is impossible, but you are not alone in this. Your efforts, however little they may be, have strong support. Did you but realize how great this strength, your doubts would vanish. Today we will devote ourselves to the attempt to let you feel this strength. When you have felt the strength in you which makes all miracles within your easy reach, you will not doubt. The miracles your sense of weakness hides will leap into awareness as you feel the strength in you.

5 Three times today, set aside about ten minutes for a quiet time in which you try to leave your weakness behind. This is accomplished very simply, as you instruct yourself that you are not a body. Faith goes to what you want, and you instruct your mind accordingly. Your will remains your teacher, and your will has all the strength to do what it desires. You can escape the body if you choose. You can experience the strength in you.

6 Begin the longer practice periods with this statement of true cause and effect relationships:

7 Miracles are seen in light.
The body's eyes do not perceive the light.
But I am not a body. What am I?

8 The question with which this statement ends is needed for our exercises today. What you think you are is a belief to be undone. But what you really are must be revealed to you. The belief you are a body calls for correction, being a mistake. The truth of what you are calls on the strength in you to bring to your awareness what the mistake concealed.

9 If you are not a body, what are you? You need to be aware of what the Holy Spirit uses to replace the image of a body in your mind. You need to feel something to put your faith in, as you lift it from the body. You need a real experience of something else, something more solid and more sure, more worthy of your faith, and really there.

10 If you are not a body, what are you? Ask this in honesty, and then devote several minutes to allowing your mistaken thoughts about your attributes to be corrected, and their opposites to take their place. Say, for example:

11 I am not weak, but strong.
I am not helpless, but all powerful.
I am not limited, but unlimited.
I am not doubtful, but certain.
I am not an illusion, but a reality.
I cannot see in darkness, but in light.

12 In the second phase of the exercise period, try to experience these truths about yourself. Concentrate particularly on the experience of strength. Remember that all sense of weakness is associated with the belief you are a body, a belief that is mistaken and deserves no faith. Try to remove your faith from it, if only for a moment. You will become accustomed to keeping faith with the more worthy in you as we go along.

13 Relax for the rest of the practice period, confident that your efforts, however meager, are fully supported by the strength of God and all His Thoughts. It is from Them your strength will come. It is through Their strong support that you will feel the strength in you. They are united with you in this practice period in which you share a purpose like Their own. Theirs is the light in which you will see miracles because Their strength is yours. Their strength becomes your eyes that you may see.

14 Five or six times an hour at reasonably regular intervals remind yourself that miracles are seen in light. Also, be sure to meet temptation with today's idea. This form would be helpful for this special purpose:

15 Miracles are seen in light. Let me not close my eyes because of this.