A Course in Miracles Workbook Daily Lesson 253, Year 2022

ACIM Lesson 253 My Self is ruler of the universe. 1. It is impossible that anything should come to me unbidden by myself.

Lesson 253

My Self is ruler of the universe.

1. It is impossible that anything should come to me unbidden by myself. ²Even in this world, it is I who rule my destiny. ³What happens is what I desire. ⁴What does not occur is what I do not want to happen. ⁵This must I accept. ⁶For thus am I led past this world to my creations, children of my will, in Heaven where my holy Self abides with them and Him Who has created me.

2. You are the Self Whom You created Son, creating like Yourself and One with You. ²My Self, which rules the universe, is but Your Will in perfect union with my own, which can but offer glad assent to Yours, that it may be extended to Itself.

The first paragraph is an abridged version of Lesson 152, The power of decision.

I do fully accept that everything in my world comes from my desire to have it there, and nothing I want is missing. I love that my world is changing because it witnesses my change of mind. What I look forward to is a complete change of mind and a return to Heaven and my creations, the children of my will. Wake me up, Father! I miss You.

The second paragraph is profound in its implications. It seems to me to say that I am One with God, and God is One with me. God created me, but He created me as an extension of Himself, and thus there is no difference and no separation. This is, of course, referring to my Self, not to the self of my imagination.

My choices matter.

When I first read in A Course in Miracles that I am doing this to myself and that I am solely responsible for everything in my life, it felt like an impossible burden. I couldn’t understand how this could be. Why would I deliberately choose to have some of the experiences that were so painful? Over time, I have come to understand that our beliefs cause what happens.

If I believe in guilt, I am inviting situations that cause suffering. If I attack, I am inviting situations of attack. And if I hold grievances, I will be judged as I have judged. My choices matter because, for every variation of the life experience of Myron, there is the corrected version of that life experience. My choices as to what beliefs I continue to support determine the version of this life I live, as well as affecting the Sonship as a whole. This is why I focus my practice on becoming aware of my beliefs and releasing those that are not true.

I can flip the switch.

This is easier to understand if you accept that all that was made by our sleeping mind exists as it was made. Within the story of Myron that I have chosen to learn from, all possible beliefs and their effects are available to me. Remember, ¹⁴All thinking produces form at some level. (ACIM, T-2.VI.9:14). The belief I presently experience is the one I choose to focus on.

Kenneth Wapnick, in his book, A Vast Illusion Time According to A Course in Miracles, describes it like this. “We have available to us in our minds a “switch” whereby we can instantaneously interchange these smaller tapes, either within the ego’s or the Holy Spirit’s scripts, or move from one to the other, “tuning in” to either the ego’s or the Holy Spirit’s thoughts.”

I keep in mind that I am watching something from a point at which it has already been completed, so my choice of what I want to believe will determine the script I experience. This is not to say I am thinking into existence a new script. I am simply choosing from what has already been thought, the script I am interested in.

I must accept responsibility for my choices if I want to be fully awakened.

This is necessary before I can be led past this world. Again, Jesus mentions our creations, the children of our will. He calls this awareness of what is beyond this world Heaven, and this is where our holy Self abides along with God. For a long time, I could not stretch my mind to take in that which is beyond the story of Myron, and that was fine. I needed to give all my attention to the healing of the mind. Now, I discover that I have become more interested in what comes next.

I don’t think too much about what that is like, and I cannot see that doing so would be particularly helpful. But I have begun to open my heart to the idea that I am something else, something far greater than I can presently imagine. These lessons in the second half of the Workbook encourage me to accept what I do not understand and cannot remember. I do not, from this perspective, know, but I am guided by One Who does know. I surrender to that.

Regina’s Tips on What is Sin?

Our special theme says, “The body is the instrument the mind made in its efforts to deceive itself. Its purpose is to strive. Yet can the goal of striving change. And now the body serves a different aim for striving. … Truth can be its aim …”

Actually the mind strives, and the body follows. The mental chatter that you experience is striving—it is not rest. It is striving to accomplish the ego’s “idle wish” for separation.

Admittedly, spiritual practice is also striving. However, it is striving with a different purpose. It is striving to let go of the striving that creates illusion and to return to the state of rest in which the truth is realized.

My Thoughts

Regina offered some quotes to contemplate throughout the day. My favorites were these.

“Mere listening, even memorizing, is not enough. If you do not struggle hard to apply every word of [the teaching] in your daily life, don’t complain that you made no progress.”

“When you are dead earnest, you bend every incident, every second of your life to your purpose.”

I do both these things. I strive to apply and I know my goal and use everything to that purpose. The quote I need to work with is this one.

“You are the infinite focused in a body. Now you see the body only. Try earnestly and you will come to see the infinite only.”

Regina’s Tips on the lesson

There is a simple way to see the teaching above.

If I want illusion, I get illusion.
If I want truth, truth is realized.

How do I know what I want?

What is my life about? What am I applying myself toward?

My Thoughts

Ever since I realized that I needed to choose one goal and stick to it, awakening has been easier, and the shifts I have experienced have come more quickly. My one goal is the peace of God. It is my aim, my purpose, and my function. In this way, I have a clear-cut path to walk. If I notice a desire that will not move me toward the peace of God, which is the same as awakening, then I’m not interested. I give it away because it is not relevant to my goal. Sometimes I have to talk to myself about it, but always, I give it away.

Again and again, Jesus tells us that we are powerful creators.

He tells us that we are completely responsible for everything we experience in the world. “This must I accept.” A few years ago, I asked for help with this because, at that time, I was not quite ready for that level of responsibility. I love the message I was given, and it set me firmly on the road to acceptance, and gladly so.

While I may sometimes wish that my life is someone else’s fault, I know this is not true. And really, I only wish to abdicate responsibility briefly because I understand that I can do something about it only because I am responsible. As always, the only solution to every seeming problem is to choose the Holy Spirit as my teacher. Holy Spirit, I feel like I understand this lesson and accept it. Is there anything you care to share with me about this?

This is my message from the Holy Spirit.

Holy Spirit: Dear one, be very vigilant for the subtle ways the ego mind would have you place responsibility outside yourself, and be very vigilant for signs of guilt when you notice these moments. Guilt is not a helpful response. Notice your thoughts and release them. Think of guilt as holding tightly to what you don’t want.

The thing to remember always is that you are the source of your experience. This is always true, and there are no exceptions. While your experience is comfortable for you, it is easy to think about this. When you feel physically ill, your bank account is low, or when the children are in trouble, and you feel helpless to do anything, the ego will argue that you did not do this.

Me: Ah, Holy Spirit, I am thinking about last night when I was playing with the baby and thinking that it would be most inconvenient if I were to get her cold right now. That thought indicates it would be out of my control, that something outside me could be my cause.

Holy Spirit: Yes, those are the thoughts to watch for.

 Nothing is outside your holy mind, so how could something outside you give you anything? Remember that you seek to master your thoughts, not control your world. Watch closely as the world shows you a picture of your thoughts. Be sure that it is your responsibility if it is in your awareness. If what you see is not a reflection of truth, acknowledge and release. I cannot take from you what you value and want to keep, but I will always purify those thoughts that you give to me.

Me: Holy Spirit, where my mind balks is when I think of those things in my awareness but outside my immediate control, like what is happening in Ukraine and when my child is having a problem. It is hard to understand what to do about any of that.

Holy Spirit: Precious child, the confusion you experience is caused by being uncertain who you are.

It is so easy yet to forget that you are the Christ because you are not experiencing yourself as the Christ. You most often still feel like you are Myron, that you are a single body living among many other single, separated bodies on a planet in a solar system. When you make this mistake, you feel very small and very helpless, which is exactly what you want to feel when you identify with the ego. The ego is the thought of separation, and separation is the thought of helplessness and hopelessness. But it is, in the end, only a thought, and it is a lie.

Remember that the need to control is a reaction to fear.

It is not control that is the goal, nor is it your environment that is the problem. What is happening in Ukraine is your responsibility because it mirrors the conflict in your mind, and that is something you can correct through me. The same is true of what happens in the lives of your children. The ego would run around trying to influence politicians. The ego would be frantically seeking solutions to everyone’s problems. Of course, this would ultimately fail, and the ego would have proven the point that you are helpless and hopeless.

Me: Thank you, Holy Spirit, for helping me to see this. I am willing to release all conflict. And I am willing to take total responsibility for everything in my awareness. I trust that I will be given the opportunities that I am ready for, which will be most helpful to my awakening.

Contemplation 2025

To enjoy the Pathways of Light Insights on ACIM Lesson 253 click here.