Resistance

“All suffering is the resistance of reality.  All awakening and healing is the letting go of resistance.  Forgiveness.  Allowance.”(“The Way of Transformation,” The Way of Mastery,  Chapter 21, Page 259)

What we resist becomes stronger, and when we resist pain, turning it in suffering, we are on the wrong track.  

Acceptance is the way for suffering to be eased, though this is  a hard teaching to wrap our minds/hearts around.  But healing is in its wings.  A healing of emotions, perhaps, or maybe a healing of the physical pain as well.

God will answer.  Remember that the pain is at least partly mental, and this mental healing is what will transpire first.  Then ideas will come about healing the physical pain as well.

Relax into the pain.  Let it come.  This is true allowance.

Dedicate All Thought to Union

“If you will remember that the one exercise for your mind is dedicating all thought to union, you will keep your mind engaged and less resistant to unlearning.  When you feel resistance–and of course your mind will resist unlearning what it has striven to learn–return your dedication to union.  Acknowledge your mind’s resistance as a sign that unlearning is going on.  Acknowledge it but do not engage it.  (A Course of Love, 23.25)”

Affirmation:  “I would focus on union today.”

Reflections:

1 – Union

Union is the fact that all relationship is One.  We are one with God, with our Selves/Christ, and with our fellow human beings–not to mention the world itself and the universe of which the world is a part.  There seem to be many parts to what surrounds us, but all are united as One.  And that is the unlearning that we must choose to focus upon today.

2 – Resistance

When we resist this axiom, then we can know that we are actually in the process of unlearning.  We are actually on the way home.  The resistance from the ego, mightily weakened by now, is strong, but it is not insurmountable.  We do not have to add our resistance to that in which our ego is engaged.  We can simply turn aside from resisting, just choose a different pathway, and all will be well.

3 – Turn to the Heart

The mind is the home of the ego, and we would do well to turn to our heart today.  We need to truth of the heart to carry us through the mind’s resistance.  If the mind questions, “How can this be?,” we can counter with our own heart’s response:  It does not matter “how,” just that it is true.  This is what the passage means when the words say, “Acknowledge it but do not engage it.”

4 – Be Patient

We need to listen to our hearts more and more as time passes.  Eventually, in A Course of Love, we will join mind to heart, in wholeheartedness, and all will be well.  We are getting there, but we have not arrived yet.  In this in between time, let us be patient.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

I would unlearn some of what I have tried, in my ego, to learn–and I have striven mightily.  Help me to recognize union when I see it.  Help me to acknowledge that union is what I want more than anything, most especially union with You.

Be with me as I seek to unlearn those things that would hold me back from Awakening.  I know that Awakening is Your blessing for me, and I wait in patience.

Amen.

End the Chaos

“You who have so filled your mind with senseless wanderings and thoughts that think of nothing that is real, rejoice that there is a way to end this chaos.  The world you see is chaos and nothing in it, including your thoughts, is trustworthy.  (A Course of Love, 5.2)”

Affirmation:  “I would turn aside from the chaos of this world.”

Reflections:

1 – Don’t “Resist” Chaos

It would be wrong to “resist” the chaos of this world, for in the resistance, the chaos becomes strong.  The ego is strong in strife.  We need merely to turn aside, gently, to say to ourselves that we long for harmony in our live, and that we choose to avoid chaos.  Then love will work its blessing upon us.

2 – Ego

We cannot trust too much our own thoughts, for the ego has a toehold in us.  The ego is always wrong, for it is a part of ourselves that seeks to live as though God were not real.

3 – God’s Action

And God is very real.  We will know His love when we turn to Him in communion, and when He reaches down (metaphorically) and lifts us up in Awakening, we will be certain that the elevated Self of form has been our “journey without distance” (a quotation from ACIM).

4 – Awakening

This world is not trustworthy because this world is illusory.  This world is a dream that we have bought into.  And the best that we can hope, before Awakening comes, is to dream the happy dreams that the Holy Spirit brings (from the Workbook of A Course in Miracles).  These happy dreams will prepare us further for the Awakening, an Awakening that will come to all of us, though the all-inclusive nature may be a very long time in the future.  We are not to be disheartened by this wait, for God gives blessings to those of us who wait.  His blessings are not limited to any few who believe in Him.  His blessings are also for non-believers, for He would not leave anyone out.

5 – Commune with God

But there is great joy for those of us who commune with God, who communicate with Him.  We have taught ourselves the most unnatural habit of not communicating with our Creator.  And A Course in Miracles and A Course of Love would change all of this unfortunate thinking.

Prayer:

Dear Father/Mother,

Thank You for promising that You will finally reach down and lift me up to Awakening.  This is Your choice, and I would be patient while I wait.  May I do my part, in that I refuse to encourage egoic thinking just by turning aside from such thinking.  I would not resist anything, because resistance makes the ego strong.  The ego is strong in strife.

But the ego is powerless against me when I commune with You.  As I live in the present moment, looking to You for guidance through my intuition, I am assured that this is all that You ask of me.  Your guidance is all that I need, and if I stay true to it, then You will respond at the time You feel is best.

Amen.