Miracles are Light, the True Nature of the Universe. Not Miracles at all. They are only perceived as such when seen through the filter of earthly existence. By standing in our Oneness we allow miracles to flow naturally as our co-creation with God showing up as manifestation.
I have had such a profound experience over the past few months that I’m not sure I can truly share what has happened to me. Being raised in a metaphysical family, I grew up with the understanding that my “body” was not me. This was not a foreign concept to me, but this statements true meaning has just become clearer to me.
ACIM Text page 390 – The Little Garden – describes this experience so beautifully. My body is not me. It encases a tiny sliver of light that radiates from my Whole Self. This tiny sliver of light believes it is the whole me, when in fact it is such a small portion of my totality that it’s delusion of greatness does not disrupt the perfect Oneness of my True Self in the least.
When I step out of the limitation of “believing” I am a body, I connect with the totality of All That Is, with God. This human speck is so unimportant when compared to the vastness of All… that is God. My true identity, my Higher Self is that I am Joy, I am Love, I am Peace, I am a part of God. Suddenly the confines and limitations of my earthly being seem so small an unimportant.
Somehow I always believed that if I ever truly understood that I am not my body that it would suddenly disappear and I would then become part of God. But as this concept starts to actualize itself in me I see that my body will not disappear. What has happened is that I have released my attachment to it. My body was never me, so therefore it will not disappear, only my idea/belief that it is me will disappear. It feels like my body has changed purposes, it is now more like my car or my house. It is where I temporarily reside, but it is far from being who I AM. And it does not limit me as before. Regardless of what is happening to my “body” my “earthly life,” it suddenly seems so trivial and unimportant. I KNOW that I AM at ONE with GOD, regardless of what appears to be happening around me on the physical realm. The earthly dream seems so unimportant that it seems detached from me. I feel I am living more from my Total Self, a part of God manifested. I am not this earthly being that is puttering through the days without a purpose. My purpose is to share Love and to be a Light. The true me is Joy and I am here to share that… only that. Share the Joy and the Love that is my (and your) true nature. That is who we are. We are Love.
As I reread this I realize that I have said these same sentences and phrases before, but never has their meaning been so alive in me as it is now. It’s as if I have stepped over a threshold of understand where suddenly the same words have a deeper, richer meaning. It’s like the difference between listening to a melody played on a single instrument then suddenly hearing the same piece played by an orchestra.
Thank you Father. I am home.
Excerpt from “The Seven Spiritual Laws”
Seven Spiritual Laws
Channeled through: Gail Best
The Law of Now
The Law of Belief
The Law of Intention
The Law of Grace
The Law of Being
The Law of Atonement At-One-Ment
The Law of Surrender
The “Law of Surrender” means letting go.
It means releasing your attachment to the outcome.
Think about that. “Release your attachment to the outcome.” What does that mean? How can we release our attachment to the outcome? What am I supposed to do… quit my job, go live on a mountain top? How can I do that? The waking dream has a myriad of reasons why you should not do this. “What will people think? What will happen? It would be total chaos.” Surrender does not mean “giving up.” Surrender means, “letting go.” There is a big difference.
Surrender to your One True Function.
Allow yourself to be who you truly are. This is not a giving up of anything. This is reaching toward your grandest purpose. Your one true function…. To be The Light of God. Do not confuse Your Function with a Job that you must do, or some earthly purpose you must fulfill… your Function is to experience God, experience Peace and experience Love in every moment. Your Function is to BE Happy, BE Love, BE Joy. Your Function is to see the Christ in yourself and in everyone around you. Surrender is letting go of the idea that you as an ego are in charge. Surrender is letting go of the small ”self” and letting yourself live from your center of being… form the larger True “Self” … which is God.
Surrender is no longer listening to the ego. Surrender moves the ego out of the way so that your Higher Self can lead you. Listen to the Voice of Peace within you and it will guide you.
You are never alone.
Listen to the Voice of Peace and allow yourself to Live On Purpose.
On Purpose.
On Purpose… In Light… In Now. LIVE. Experience your life. No longer let the voice of the ego be your guide, leading you haplessly through your life, never in the moment… always rushing franticlyfrom one “to-do” list to the next, or berating yourself over past mistakes or hurts. Release these frail human ego directions and move instead toward the Light of Love. Let that center of Peace glow inside you. Let it radiate and be the compass by which you live your life. It is who you are. It is your True BEing.
Be aware that the Ego will mislead you because it is afraid. It will guard against foreseen terrors because it does not feel safe. The ego will lie to you. Remember you are safe. You can never be Not Safe. You are the Light of The World. Your ego will laugh at this idea and tell you that you are not. How could you be? That is because the ego believes “it” is you, and it knows clearly that “it” is not the light of the world. That would be impossible. And it is correct, it is impossible. … The ego is NOT the light of the world. You are. Your Higher Self. ..The Christ within you. That is who you truly are. That is who you are underneath all the false beliefs the world has put on you. All the false beliefes you hold about yourself and the world. That is who you are. You are Oneness with The Creator. You are that presence of Love.
This is beyond the ego’s understanding. That is why you must “surrender” to it because the go can not understand it. You have to move beyond the small ego’s understandingand release yourself to something higher and grander than the small ego could ever know. Trying to get your ego to understand that you are part of God is like trying to get a two year old to do calculase. It is beyond it’s understanding. The two year old is not wrong, or unintelligent. That would simply be too much to ask of it. Do not ask this of your ego. You must quite the ego; your human mind, and listen instead to what lies beyond it. There is the voice of peace, the music of heaven. The experience of your Oneness is here. It is just outside the ego’s grasp but it can be yours… because it is you! When you find yourself floating in the vast ocean of surrender you will know, you will experience that not you are a part of All There Is… and you will know that so is your brother. We are all One. You will see beyond the small I of “t
he ego” and into who we truly are… a perfect soul, a perfect light of God. And you will KNOW, experience that we are All One. We Are One. There is no separation of the Divine. God Is. Love Is. Peace Is. To experience this will release you from the earthly dream… even if only briefly at first. To experience this moment will light your path and you will surrender to the truth and your rightful place. The gentle humming of this rhapsody will call to you and the memory of this moment of surrender will be the light to guide you home. Wait in Silence and you will hear the voice of peace. You will know that this voice is the music to a song you have always known. You will recognize it as if you are coming home. You will be remembering your rightful place in Heaven.
The Little Willingness
Nov 17, 2008
Monday
I opened up the Course this morning to “The Little Willingness” Text page 380 and “The Light In The Dream.” Text 378
“The holy instant is the result of your determination to be holy. It is the answer. The desire and the willingness to let it come precede its coming. You prepare your mind for it only to the extent of recognizing that you want it above all else. It is not necessary for you to do more; indeed, it is necessary that you realize that you cannot do more. Do not attempt to give the Holy Spirit what He does not ask, or you will add the ego to Him and confuse the two. He asks but little. It is He Who adds the greatness and the might. He joins with you to make the holy instant far greater than you can understand. It is your realization that you need do so little that enables Him to give so much.
Trust not your good intentions. They are not enough. But trust implicitly your willingness, whatever else may enter. Concentrate only on this, and be not disturbed that shadows surround it. That is why you came. If you could come without them you would not need the holy instant. Come to it not in arrogance, assuming that you must achieve the state its coming brings with it. The miracle of the holy instant lies in your willingness to let it be what it is. And in your willingness for this lies also your acceptance of yourself as you were meant to be.
Humility will never ask that you remain content with littleness. But it does require that you be not content with less than greatness that comes not of you. Your difficulty with the holy instant arises from your fixed conviction that you are not worthy of it. And what is this but the determination to be as you would make yourself? God did not create His dwelling place unworthy of Him. And if you believe He cannot enter where He wills to be, you must be interfering with His Will. You do not need the strength of willingness to come from you, but only from His Will.
The holy instant does not come from your willingness alone? It is always the result of your small willingness combined with the unlimited power of God’s Will. You have been wrong in thinking that it is needful to prepare yourself for Him. It is impossible to make arrogant preparations for holiness, and not believe that it is up to you to establish the conditions for peace. God has established them. They do not wait upon your willingness for what they are. Your willingness is needed only to make it possible to teach you what they are. If you maintain you are unworthy of learning this, you are interfering with the lesson by believing that you must make the learner different. You did not make the learner, nor can you make him different. Would you first make a miracle yourself, and then expect one to be made for you?
You merely ask the question. The answer is given. In preparing for the holy instant, do not attempt to make yourself holy to be ready to receive it. That is but to confuse your role with God’s. Atonement (At-One-Ment) cannot come to those who think that they must first atone, but only to those who offer it nothing more than simple willingness to make way for it. Purification is of God alone, and therefore for you. Rather than seek to prepare yourself for Him, try to think thus:
I who am host to God and worthy of Him.
He Who established His dwelling place in me created it as
He would have it be.
It is not needful that I make it ready for Him, but only
that I do not interfere with His plan to restore to me my
own awareness of my readiness, which is eternal.
I need add nothing to His plan.
But to receive it, I must be willing to substitute my
own in place of it.
And that is all. Add more, and you will merely take away the little that is asked. Remember you made guilt, and that your plan for the escape from guilt has been to bring Atonement to it, and make salvation fearful. And it is only fear that you will add, if you prepare yourself for love. The preparation for the holy instant belongs to Him Who gives it. Release yourself to Him Whose function is release. Do not assume His function for Him. Give Him but what He asks, that you may learn how little is your part, and how great is His.
It is this that makes the holy instant so easy and so natural. You make it difficult, because you insist there must be more that you need do. You find it difficult to accept the idea that you need give so little, to receive so much. And it is very hard for you to realize it is not personally insulting that your contribution and the Holy Spirit’s are so extremely disproportionate. You are still convinced that your understanding is a powerful contribution to the truth, and it makes it what it is. Yet we have emphasized that you need understand nothing. Salvation is easy just because it asks nothing you cannot give right now.
Forget not that it has been your decision to make everything that is natural and easy for you impossible. If you believe the holy instant is difficult for you, it is because you have become the arbiter of what is possible, and remain unwilling to give place to One Who knows. The whole belief in orders of difficulty in miracles is centered on this. Everything God wills is not only possible, but has already happened. And that is why the past has gone. It never happened in reality. Only in your mind which thought it did, is it’s undoing needful.”
“Truth has rushed to meet you since you called upon it. If you knew Who walks beside you on the way that you have chosen, fear would be impossible. …..”
“…..All that was necessary was merely the wish to understand. That wish was the desire to be holy. The Will of God is granted you. For you desire the only thing you ever had, or ever were.
Each instant that we spend together will teach you that this goal is possible, and will strengthen your desire to reach it. And in your desire lies its accomplishment. Your desire is now in complete accord with all the power of the Holy Spirit’s Will. No little, faltering footsteps that you may take can separate your desire from His Will and from His strength. I hold your hand as surely as you agreed to take your brother’s. You will not separate, for I stand with you and walk with you in your advance to truth. And were we go we carry God with us.
I love these two passages. This is the idea that carries me when I feel weak and small and helpless.
These two messages only can carry you to heaven. They can help you wake from the dream and see your place as part of God.
The world is experiencing change. Often the upheavel of change is experienced as catastrophe in the early stages, but what we need to remember is that this is not a catastrophe, but is instead an “undoing” of a failed system of greed. We are experiencing the transformation of the frightened ego’s fears. The ego believes that there is “lack” in the world and that there is not enough to go around for everyone. Therefore, the ego feels it must have more and more at the expense of others to insure that it will always have enough. This is a false belief.
The motto of the corporate world is “Don’t take it personally – It’s just business. And Business is Business.” Similar to “All’s fair in Love and War.” But as the presence of Love has become stronger, its voice has begun to be heard and the world is being transformed. As we see our economic structures begin to crumble, what we are seeing is the old notions and belief systems beginning to unravel because they can no longer be believed. The ideas of kindness and caring are taking its place.
The presence of Peace has touched too many people now for the ideas of greed to continue to reign. The world has begun to see the error of greed and its power can no longer be believed. This is good news because it means part of the illusion of the waking dream is beginning to disappear. For those who believe in the waking dream, this can be very frightening. That is why the presence of the bringers of Light is so important. We are here to balance the feelings of fear and loss with the presence of Peace and Love and the knowledge that “Nothing real can be threatened and nothing unreal exists. Therein lies the Peace of God.”
The bringers of the Light are here serving their purpose because the voice of Truth and the Light Love has pierced the darkness and the towers of power and greed are starting to fall. The earthly ego trembles in fear of being crushed in the collapse. The change is here and in the undoing it will appear to destroy many earthly idols, but this will serve only to open a pathway for the Light to enter and illuminate what has been a dark world.
The Light enters and darkness comprehends it not.
Remember, we are all here NOW for a reason. We need DO NOTHING except let the Light flow through us and REMEMBER who we are. We Are One with the Holy Spirit and we are safe in God’s Love. “Nothing real can be threatened and nothing unreal exists. Therein lies the Peace of God.”
Time is an invention of the earthly waking dream. While it is as unreal as the waking dream, it does serve a purpose on the level of learning and remembering your “Function” – To Be Love, Express Love and Experience Love.
Our purpose is so far removed from what the earthly dream world teaches us…. We are here to be a Light - We need “DO” nothing but live in the awareness of our Holiness and the Holiness of everyone and everything around us. Simply by living from and through that place of Love we fulfill our function.
It is a constant process of remembering who we are… remembering to look past the dream into the awareness of God’s presence all around us. We are NOT part of the dream… eventually we will awake from the dream and see it as the nothingness that it is … God’s Love is constant. Always! That is the true reality.
Trust is living past the ego’s chatter of fear and staying in what our heart knows is true.
Prayer For Direction
Please God,
Not my will but thine.
My heart sings in your presence,
My soul floats on your music,
My spirit is alive with the colors of your Love.
I want to follow where you lead.
Please help me to listen to your voice and silence the voice of the ego.
Help me to remember that it is afraid.
Give me the Wisdom to understand when the earthly dream is confusing me.
Give me Strength when the ego’s dream attempts to rattle my resolve.
Give me Courage when the ego’s fits of fear rage in my ear.
Give me Understanding when the confusion of the world attempts to pull me off my path.
Stay with me and fill my heart with your presence.
I know I can never be outside your loving protection.
Thank you Father Mother God.
Amen.
Swans George and Gracy
Sept 23, 2008
The course says that all events in the waking dream or opportunities to forgive. Well, I am in the midst of a huge one. I can’t help but see the similarities between this and when my exhusband left me and my life fell apart. I had to forgive him and “the other woman” – I saw her as the source of my destruction. But, I had to remember that “Nothing happens to us that we do not ask for and receive as we have asked.” I am again, working on that same lesson of “seeing things differently.” My life may appear to be falling apart… but nothing is “really” happening. What appears to be happening is part of the dream… and is just and opproturnity to forgive and choose Peace instead of this.
I need to remember the Law of Now. “I do not know what anything, including this, means. And so I do not know how to respond to it. And I will not use my own past learning as the light to guide me now. By the refusal to attempt to teach yourself what you do not understand, the guide whom God has given you will speak to you.” T.277
” I am responsible for what I see. I choose the feelings I experience, and decide upon the goal I would achieve. And everything that seems to happen to me I ask for, and receive as I have asked.” T. 448
Here is what I need to remember. I am Now and will always be In this Moment. I am not in the past or in the future. At this moment. I am part of God. Everything outside of me is an expression of the ego’s dream.
My error is, that I keep thinking I need TO DO something to regain my peace. I want the peace back that I experienced after the angel moment in the hospital. All there is is Peace. All there is is God’s Love. I have been focusing my attention on my problems, my frustrations and my feeling that “I need to DO SOMETHING.” …… I need do nothing, but be still and know that All is God and All is LOVE. I can not be separate from God’s Peace. If I am feeling something other than Love or Peace… I am experiencing the dream. I need do nothing accept what is already so. God is present in this moment. His peace is mine for the asking, for the accepting. As Dad told me a few weeks ago, “There is no separation of the Divine.” All is God. I cannot be outside of God. (note: my father passed away a year ago… but a few months ago I heard his voice as plan as if he were sitting here talking to me. His words were of comfort over the process I have been going through.)
I keep thinking about how the day before the storm (Hurricane IKE), I suddenly remembered my swans on the lake and I was so worried about them. I said a fervent prayer, “Oh please God. Take care of my swans.” I wanted to go and capture them and put them somewhere safe. I felt the Holy Spirit’s response. It was almost as if he was chuckling at me the way you would be amused at a child who misunderstands something beyond their experience. He said, “You don’t need to worry about the swans. They are fine. Let me worry about the swans. You just take care of you.” There was almost humor in his voice. There was also a feeling of “Now you on the other hand… You, you can worry about… because you do not understand that you can not be outside the loving protection of your Heavenly Father. The swans know. They do no worry or fret. They are just BEING… they are in perfect TRUST. You could learn from them. It is them that should be worried about you.”
The next day after the storm, when I drove back into the neighborhood with trees and powerlines down everywhere… the obvious destruction everywhere…. there they were… my beautiful swans, right at the front part of the lake… floating as serenely and smoothly as ever. Two perfect examples of peace, gliding effortless across the water. They seemed totally untouched or affected by the storm.
He was right (duh, of course!). They were perfect. All the birds on the lake appeared totally unaffected by the storm. All the baby ducks were just fine.. following behind their mother in a line. All the animals seemed totally a peace amid all the downed trees and fences.
The error in my thought process is that I keep wanting to plan. I want to DO Something! I find it hard to just Let Go and Trust. Especially now that the house has sold, we have no income and no idea where we are going to go or how we are going to support ourselves. I would like to know where I’m going. Aha… the voice just said… “You are not going anywhere. You are already there. You are safe in God’s Love. Just like the swans.”
I want to nest. I want to know where I’m going to live. Are we going to Dallas? Moving in with Mom? Moving into my deceased Grandmother’ falling down house, because there would be no rent there?
I know, I am still focusing on my earthly world… when I should be focusing on the Truth… that God is all there is… I just feel that I have all this anger and frustration inside of me and by not letting it out… all I am doing is “stuffing” it when I don’t look at it. I feel like I need to cleanse the anger out of me… not just cover it over with pretty words – I know the pretty words happen to be true – but until they “feel” true inside me… I have not demonstrated the truth. I am not experiencing it. I am merely white washing it. Underneath is all my old belief’s – which are not true – but they are still there – affecting my NOW, and how I experience NOW.
Steve keeps telling me I need to practice what I preach. I need to walk the walk, not just talk the talk. God, I’m trying. Just because I know it’s true… doesn’t make it any easier to live it.
My ego is trying very hard to put me back in the angry cynical place I was before Mamaw went into the hospital. I don’t think I’m going to let that happen this time… because I have a light with me this time… I wont get trapped in the dark.
I want the Peace back. Just over a week ago. I had so much Joy inside of me. I really did not care what happened with the job, with the house… All I wanted was to be of service. That’s still all I want…. I want to release this feeling of frustration. The Course says that all that is required is a”little willingness.”
Friday we sold some of my jewelry and made $285. Part of that money was to pay the yard guy to move the fallen tree and buy wood to repair the fence. Sunday my wallet dissappeared with all the money we had left inside it. … We looked everywhere in the house. We drove back to the gas station we stopped at on the way home from church. (Used what little expensive gas we had left.) When I asked them if someone had turned in a wallet, they looked at me like I was out of my mind. “Lady, ya gotta be kiddin’ me right?” All the while, I’m trying to tell myself… maybe there will be a miracle… maybe God will show up and show me he’s here.
I know… that’s not the way I’m supposed to think. I’m supposed to know that God was always there… He does not need to show up. He did not go anywhere. I am trapped in a bad dream. I want to wake up. I don’t want to be in this dream anymore. I want to change it to a good dream.
So, I started looking for the symbolism in this… what does this mean? What am I trying to show myself here? My answer is: What is my source of supply? Where does all my supply come from? Not from me or my husband. I am not my supply, my husband is not my source of supply. The voice says: ”I need to take no worry about what I shall eat or what I shall drink or what I shall wear. I should be like the foul of the air or the fish of the sea, for they know that their Heavenly Father is the source of all their good. (The swans.) Your Heavenly Father know every hair on your head, and watches after ever sparrow in the air. He knows of your needs even before you ask of him.” I know this all these negative things only “appear” to be happening, so I can release my worry to Him. I need to trust. Get out of the boat and walk on the water. He is calling to me.
I am here only to be truly helpful.
I am here to represent him who sent me.
I do not need to worry about what to say or what to do,
for he who sent me will direct me.
I am content to go wherever he wishes
knowing he goes there with me.
I will be healed as I let him teach me to heal.
I stand here now
in the moment of forever
joined in quiet Oneness
the lilies among the clover.
I am a perfect child of God, an expression of God’s Love on earth.
I am whole and perfect
I need worry for nothing as All is here and All is NOW.
I am just as God created me
He is my source
my strength and my life.
I am but a ray of his light shining on this path
sent here to express him and his love
by being One with him in all that I do and all that I say
I can be a Light for Oneness in my expression of peace
in my expression of his Love on earth.
I am his light.
I am here only to be truly helpful.
Yeah though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death
I will fear no evil
For thou art with me.
Thy rod and thy staff (God’s truth and guidance)
they comfort me.
I can NOT be separate from my Father
I am as he created me.
By living my function I will remember who I am
By living my function,
by giving I will receive
By living my function
by expressing His Love
By Giving I will receive
My receiving will be an expression of my living out my function.
I have a function as a Light
My function is to live a life of Oneness
and be a Light of Love
My function is to give.
I am trapped in a never ending maze of wrong thinking.
How can I give when my only concern is receiving?
When all my thoughts are focused on me and what/how can I get what I think I need?
I must release the focus on where is my money coming from?
Where is my job coming from? Where is my living coming from?
Where is my peace coming from? Where is my safety coming from?
As long as I focus on these things I am focusing outside myself,
outside the realm of God and looking in the realm of the “world.”
I will not find Peace there… for my Peace is inside
Peace is my function as the Light of the world.
As I express my oneness
I am living my function.
As I express His Love
I am living my function
As I express His Peace
I am living my function.
My function is to be a light unto the world
To be an expression of his peace.
By doing this
By living my function
All my supply will be met in joy and harmony and in peace
Just as the fruit on the trees comes from its function.
It takes no thought of how or when
It all takes place in harmony with All that IS.
God is Love.
God is All
I am one with God
I am One with ALL.
I need not fear
there is no reason for fear
I need not worry
there is no reason for worry
I and the Father are one
I am living my purpose out.
I am living my function.
I need not ask, “Father which way should I go.”
For all the answers are given unto me as I listen to his voice
He will guide me.
He will put a light unto my feet and show me the path.
All I need do is trust and walk in peace as my function.
The dream serves no purpose other than to allow you to wake from it.
It is valueless. It is nothing.
Wisp of smoke to be blown away by knowing that God is All
and none that the world holds dear matters.
“There is no separation of the Divine.” When I first heard Dad’s voice say that to me. The use of the word “of” puzzled me. I thought shouldn’t it be from, instead of “of”? The response back was … “Yeah, the word “from” works but that is not the same. That is not what I said.”
I have thought about this many times, but I did not understand the difference. Over the past few weeks I have returned to this prase many times, using it as a comfort. At first I would say “There is no separation from the Divine.” And every time the voice would always correct me…” no “OF” the Divine.” I did not get it. That just did not sound right. I kept questioning….. “Of?” Are you sure? It’s not “From?’
AHA! Now, I get it. Now I understand the difference. The word “from” implies that “we” are somehow separate from God… so he therefore must pull us into him to includes us… but that implies TWO things… Him and Us… God and us. There is NOT two things… There is only ONE. There is no separation “OF” the Divine… because there is ONLY GOD! We are a part of the Divine. There is Only One consciousness… only ONE reality. We are part of that ONE. God does not need to pull us in and protect us… because we are NOT separate from Him. We are One with him. There is no separation OF the DIVINE. That is all there is. ALL THERE IS IS THE DEVINE!
Thank you Dad!
Now I feel I have two Father’s watching over me. My Dad and my Heavenly Father. Wow, how could I be afraid now? How could I ever be afraid?
I think I’ve got it back. I feel wonderful.
Thank you Father Mother God!
I feel the Light inside me again.
Peace Be Still.
Think and know that I and the Father are ONE.
Amen.
The first thing I heard when I woke up this morning was the Holy Spirit’s voice say, “Today is a day that will give you opportunities to forgive.”
Now, isn’t that a lovely way to start the day… knowing something is going to happen today that is going to need to be forgiven? Wonderful. Yes… I’m being sarcastic.
My meditation this morning was all about releasing the ego’s value and interpretations of “the Dream.” Nothing I see matters… nothing is as it seems. While I feel like I am in the midst of my worst failure… this could be my greatest growth. This could be the lesson I have been preparing for all my life… or many lifetimes. This is certainly a lesson in Trust and Forgiveness, AND SURRENDER.
I am trying to release my ego concerns and KNOW that I can NOT be outside God’s Love.. All that I observe around me in the earthly world is NOT real…. I need to remain centered in my Peace… allow Love to be my guide… and remember that nothing is as it appears to me. I am asleep. I am actually at Home with my Heavenly Father. I never left… I only believe that I have.
Despite what I see around me… this is an illusion…. I am part of God… A Part of LOVE.
I am here to be a Light. As I go through my day letting this Light of Love shine through me…. no matter what appears to happen around me… I will experience Oneness.
Peace be still.
All There Is
The past year has been a total “wringing out,” an “undoing” of my earthly life. I have watched it completely unravel and I felt powerless to do anything about it. I found myself with no savings and very little money coming in. I went from a good stable career to NOTHING. Despite my best efforts to turn my business around, nothing seemed to change the situation, no matter how hard I worked. I had quickly gone through my savings in an attempt to wait out the dry spell. To make matters worse, it was not just the lack of finances, but it seemed every area of my life was crumbling. My soul ached with the weight of the problems I was carrying.
My faith was shaken, and I was brought to my knees. I experienced a true dark night of the soul. I felt as if God had deserted me. This was an unbelievable occurrence to me because God has always been at the center of my being. It was hard for me to believe that I could ever doubt God, and even harder to believe that He would abandon me this way.
It turns out, I would find out later, that He had never abandoned me; it was me who abandoned Him. The shift from being a spiritual person immersed in my Oneness with God to being lost in my ego was a slow subtle one. It happened so gradually that I did not see what was happening to me until I looked around one day and realized I was lost, and it appeared, alone.
Unfortunately, the events of the past year had served only to dig me deeper into my misinterpretation of my life. The more my life fell apart, the more I tried to keep it together. The more painful it became, the faster I worked to fix the problem. I was so completely sucked into the illusions of the ego that I had forgotten that none of this is real. The more my life slipped away from me, the faster I ran to catch it. I had forgotten that what I needed to do was release it to the Holy Spirit. I needed to remember that this is all an illusion. Only Love is real. I was not actually loosing anything of value. As the Course says, “Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Therein lies the peace of God.”
All my life, I have listened to (and sometimes avoided) the “still small voice.” It has always been with me, a part of me, something I knew I could always count on. It was unthinkable to me that I could ever reach this place where I could wonder if I was alone.
I was fortunate to grow up in a fourth generation metaphysical family. I grew up believing in the possibilities of miracles and I knew that we create our reality. What we focus on is what we create and receive. Armed with this knowledge, I could not understand how this could be happening to me. My “positive thinking” and “affirmations for good” did not appear to be working. I wondered how God could hang me out to dry like this. I also knew from my study of the Course In Miracles that “Nothing happens to me that I did not ask for and receive as I have asked.” But, for the life of me I could not see the purpose in all this. I wanted order and safety above all else. Why was my life falling apart?
When I reached the very depths of this agony, I found myself becoming bitter and short tempered with those around me. My family was almost afraid to be around me, because I was snapping at everyone and had little patience with the slightest infractions. This was not me. I was being my lowest self. At this point, there was no way my “Inner Voice” could speak to me because the only voice I heard was the voice of the Ego. And my Ego was angry, hurt; abandoned and afraid.
I was reaching my breaking point. I was so hurt and disappointed that I actually wished that I could loose my grip on reality and disappear into insanity. I wanted to go catatonic and wait for the people in the white coats to come get me and put me in a quiet room, where I could deny the world and give up on life. I wanted all the pain to stop! I wanted to “check out!”
At the zenith of all this turmoil, my 97 year old Grandmother suffered a massive stroke. She had become my responsibility after my Father’s death a year ago. It was ironic to me that he had asked me to take care of her after he was gone, because she and I had never been close. But he asked me, and I stepped up to the plate. As I spent time with her, I found her to be an absolute delight. Even at her age, her mind was still sharp and she had a wonderful wit. It made me wish that I had gotten to know her sooner. She was an amazing woman; strong and independent, and she came from a time when women were not supposed to be strong and independent. It amazed me how, even after a broken hip forced her to be bed-ridden, she maintained a joy and a zest for life despite the fact that her eyesight and hearing were very limited. The guilt I felt over the emptiness of her life was almost unbearable for me. I moved her to a nursing home closer to my home and tried to visit her several times a week. This was made doubly difficult due to the amount of hours I was putting in at work and how, at the same time, every drop of my energy was being eaten up by my rapidly collapsing life.
At this point, my failing life was not just my financial situation. It was everything. My marriage was in trouble, my oldest son’s mental illness issues were becoming more difficult and I could no longer afford the payments on my mortgage. I had to put my house (that I dearly loved) up for sale, and the guilt over my Grandmother’s loneliness was eating me alive. I was afraid. There was no money coming in and the thought terrified me that I was going to lose everything.
After my Grandmother’s stroke, she was in the hospital for six days before she made her final transition. She never regained consciousness after the first few hours in the emergency room. I stayed with her as much as I could. Even though she was not conscious, I did not want her to be alone. I set up shop in her hospital room. I had my cell phone, two laptops, a box of my “live” files and I continued to work, conducting business from the bed next to hers. At least, I thought I was working, but what I was really doing was keeping busy. I was running from my life and running from what I had forgotten.
On the fifth day of her transition, I was no longer trying to busy myself with work. The enormity of what was happening to her consumed me. It was a very spiritual but lonely process. Most of the time, it was just the two of us alone in her room, wrapped in solitude. It’s an unimaginable, unexplainable experience to wait for death to come bring someone home. It’s not an experience you can tell someone about. It’s one you have to live through to know how it feels. Words can’t explain the depth of the emotions that wash over you. It is a moving, dynamic, spiritual, touching, lonely, frightening experience. Nothing prepares you for it. As I watched her breath get slower and shallower, I watched her labor to make the final transition; I couldn’t help but think about the similarities between this and the process of giving birth. It seemed to me that we labor to bring life into the world and then we labor to leave it. I tried to remember that she was not really leaving, but going home. I tried to remain focused on the fact that this was not an ending for her but a beginning. She would no longer be trapped in that frail ailing body. She would soon be free to join her loved ones who had gone on before her.
The one thing I can say about spending hours alone in a hospital room … you can really hear yourself think, even if you don’t want to. There in that awesome silence, I could no longer run from my thoughts. My life was screaming at me. I could not escape it. Sitting alone with her, my soul ached for relief from all the pain my life had become. There had to be a better way. I knew God would not desert me, but I was so lost and alone I could not remember my way home.
As the night wore on, I sat beside her bed and held her hand. In the shadow of the enormity of what was happening to her, I felt even more powerless and alone. I begged God to help me. I did not want to wonder if he existed, I did not want to feel so hurt and alone and I did not want to be angry anymore.
I was saying, “God, how did I get here? I can’t take any more of this. I am at the end of my rope. Please, help me!” This is a very powerful phrase. This phrase; this level of desperation allows us to surrender, and in surrender we can finally listen beyond the screams of the ego and hear instead to the still small voice of the Holy Spirit.
At this powerful moment, God will send us what we need. My miracle appeared to me in the form of my Grandmother’s Hospice Doctor. He came into her room and began to talk to me about God. At first I was shocked. I couldn’t believe that in this day and age, where it’s politically incorrect to talk about God with strangers, here was this man, this stranger sitting there lovingly sharing his faith with me. He talked to me about God’s Love, and Faith and Trust. He told me the bible story where Jesus calmed the angry seas and walked on the water, then turned to his disciples and asked them to get out of the boat and come to Him, but they were afraid. Jesus was asking them to have faith.
This doctor, this beautiful soul had no way of knowing that he was saving me. He was reminding me that we cannot be separate from God. We can let go and trust. We can have faith. We can walk on water when we need to, because we are never alone.
The Doctor’s intention was to comfort me through loss of my Grandmother. But, I knew God had sent him to me for many reasons. He was saying exactly what I needed to hear. He was sent to remind me that I am a child of God. He was there in answer to my desperate prayer. “God, please help me!”
This angel of mercy came out of nowhere and shined a light into my soul. He reminded me of who I am. It wasn’t as much what he said that touched me, as much as it was who he was BEING. It was the light that shown out of his eyes. This man’s soul filled the room with joy and love.
When he left the room, I could not stop thinking about the light in him, the way God’s love glowed from his eyes. As he walked out of the room, I found myself thinking, I use to have a glow like that. I use to have that sense of peace. Then, I wondered, “Where did that go?” As ridiculous as it may seem, until that moment, I had not even realized how I far I had gotten from the truth. I knew that I was terribly unhappy and that something was missing, but I had been so wrapped up in the ego for so long that I had forgotten that I had ever had joy and peace inside of me. I was so far from my “true self” that I did not even know I had left.
But God was not through with me.
After the Doctor left the room, I sat and held my Grandmother’s hand as she moved into the final phases of earthly life. At this point, the transition started to seem more difficult for her. I hurt for her. It didn’t seem fair that this transition had to be so difficult. I wanted to help her but felt powerless. I pulled my chair next to her bed and held her and hand, then I put my head on our hands and I cried. I felt so lost, alone and afraid. Again, I begged God to help me. I did not want to feel alone any longer.
At that moment, my blackberry cell phone buzzed in my pocket. My first impulse was to ignore it, but something inside me told me to check it. It was an email message from someone that I had not heard from for months. I reluctantly opened the email, and a picture of a beautiful glowing angel appeared on the screen with the acronym P.U.S.H. written across the top. At the bottom it said, “Pray Until Something Happens.” I can’t begin to tell you how dramatically this hit me. I felt the presence of God fill the room. I felt totally in awe. I stared at the screen and a peace came over me. When I looked up, I fully expecting to see Jesus standing in front of me, the presence was that strong.
Within a few hours of my desperate prayer, God had sent two messengers to me. How could I wonder if I was alone any longer? How could I feel alone with two such profound experiences happening so close together? My tears of sorrow changed to tears of joy. I have never experienced such warmth, such love.
Almost instantly my Grandmother’s breathing became less labored and within a few short hours she made her final transition and, although I will miss her sense of humor and her joy in life, I was glad to see her released from her earthly body and able to return home.
This experience has changed me forever. From somewhere deep inside me, I heard the voice of the Holy Spirit calling me home. I heard the part of me that is part of the I am, the part of me that I had forgotten.
That night, as I drove home from the hospital, my mind reeled with all that had transpired. The thought crossed my mind that maybe there was a reason my business was not making money. Maybe it was not because I was not doing something right, but was, instead, because I was not doing what I am supposed to be doing. I was not living my purpose, my function. Maybe God was freeing me up to do something else.
Then I remembered my years of studying A Course In Miracles. I wondered, how did I ever get this far away from the Light. I had been A Course In Miracles facilitator for several years before I moved to Houston. Since then I had been so busy trying to make a living and rebuild my life after my divorce that I had let all of my Peace slip away.
Then I realized where the light in my eyes had gone, and I knew in that moment, that no amount of looking for happiness in my career or in material achievement or in all the other things that the world holds of value was ever going to bring me happiness. But thankfully, I also knew that I could have it back as easily as returning to God.
Almost as if someone had flipped a switch, I remembered, “Nothing real can be threaten, nothing unreal exists. Therein lies the peace of God.” I knew in that instant that no mater what happened to me, to my earthly life; if had to sell my dream house, if I never made another dime, if my marriage fell apart, it did not matter. Nothing would change who I am. I am part of God. I am a perfect Child of God and nothing can change that. Nothing of value was threatened. I was losing nothing. As a matter of fact I was gaining everything. I was gaining the Peace of Heaven.
During the next few days I was very introspective as all that had transpired began to sink in. It started to change me in a very profound way. I gradually released my earthly plans. I Surrendered. Surrender is a very powerful thing. It is very freeing. All the fear and worry and oppression lifted as I realized I was not giving up anything of value, I was instead gaining the only thing of real value, the Peace of God. I was returning home, a place I never actually left. I can never be outside God’s Love because God’s Love is All There Is.
At this point I had no idea where my earthly life was headed or what God had in store for me, but I knew I was going to be ok, no matter what. Nothing of value was threatened. I was losing nothing.
My feeling of total desperation was replaced with a profound sense of peace and gratitude. I felt truly grateful that God had called me home. I kept finding myself saying, “Thank you Father for calling me home. I had gotten so lost. Thank you.”
Note: My Grandmother passed away in mid August. It is now mid September. As I finished this article, I felt the pull to open the Course. See below the page I opened to.
ACIM Workbook
Lesson 157
This is a day of silence and of trust….This day is holy, for it ushers in a new experience; a different kind of feeling and awareness…. Today you learn to feel the joy of life… This is another crucial turning point in the curriculum…. It leaves us here an instant, and we go beyond it, sure of our direction and our only goal.
Today it will be given you to feel a touch of Heaven, though you will return to paths of learning…. He will direct your practicing today, for what you ask for now is what He wills…. From this day forth, your ministry takes on a genuine devotion, and a glow that travels from your fingertips to those you touch and blesses those you look upon….
Today we will embark upon a course you have not dreamed of. But the Holy One, the Giver of happy dreams of life, Translator of perception into truth, the holy Guide of Heaven given you, has dreamed for you this journey which you make and start today, with the experience this day holds out to you to be your own….
Into Christ’s Presence will we enter now, serenely unaware of everything except His shinning face and perfect Love. The vision of His face will stay with you, but there will be an instant which transcends all vision, even this, the holiest. This you will never teach, for you attained it not through learning. Yet the vision speaks of your remembrance of what you knew that instant, and will surely know again.
Hurricane Ike Sunset Pics
