Mind Wandering

“The correction of fear is your responsibility. When you ask for release from fear, you are implying that it isn’t. You should ask, instead, for help in the conditions which have brought the fear about. This always entails a willingness on the part of your separated mind. At this level, you can help it. You are much too tolerant of mind wandering, thus tacitly condoning your mind’s miscreations. The particular result never matters, but this fundamental error does. The fundamental correction is always the same. Before you will to do anything, ask me if your will is in accord with mine. If you are sure that it is, there will be no fear.” (ACIM, COA ed., T-2.IX.5:1-10)

The most important sentence in this quotation, I think, is the following: “You are much too tolerant of mind wandering.” Is this not just about everybody’s problem?

We need to discover how to wipe clean our minds, put problems on the back burner, and (as A Course of Love says) let our inner Christ-Self come up to the surface with an Answer, a divine Answer. This is the same as looking to the Holy Spirit, Who is within us also. Of course, we need the patience to allow this to happen. If we persist in wiping our minds clean of pesky problems, letting a wiser Wisdom surface, the results will be the proof. We really will find that the Self knows better, for it draws from Divinity, God Himself, to lead us, ever so gently, to the resolution of those matters that threaten to disturb our peace of mind.

We need not be fearful, but it does take an ego-free mind to realize this. And many of us are not there yet. As we make decisions, if we allow Jesus to influence us, we will know that the process by which we come to a decision is divinely led. This may not completely remove the fear, for we are used to fretting over trifles, and sometimes we are confronted with more than trifles in this life.

Let guidance from within lead. It will not fail. And we will rejoice when we know that this is so.