VI. The Illusion of Needs. A sense of separation from God is the only lack you really need correct.
VI. The Illusions of Needs, P 2, 3
Photo by John Gardiner of Whangarei, New Zealand
2 VI. The Illusion of Needs, P2
2 A sense of separation from God is the only lack you really need correct. This sense of separation would never have arisen if you had not distorted your perception of truth, and had thus perceived yourself as lacking. The idea of order of needs arose because, having made this fundamental error, you had already fragmented yourself into levels with different needs. As you integrate you become one, and your needs become one accordingly. Unified needs lead to unified action, because this produces a lack of conflict.
This paragraph begins by telling me that I have not actually separated from God. It says that I have a sense of separation, not that I am actually separate from my Creator. This happened when I distorted my perception of truth. Thus, I am not experiencing reality. I know I am not because my experience is one of shifting perceptions, whereas reality is unchanging.
I have to wonder what the world would look like if I had not distorted my perception of the truth. Perception is not truth, so it would still be a dream world, but it would have had a happy dream, I think. I will still have that happy dream as I allow my perception to be corrected and brought nearer the truth. I accomplish this as I question all my beliefs and allow the Holy Spirit to purify them.
Fragmentation
When I distorted my perception so that I could see myself as something other than healed and whole, this created a sense of lack. Of course, it did! I had never known anything other than wholeness, and now I was less than that. This fragmentation of Self appeared with many different needs. Then I began to organize these needs fragmenting them further as I decided which was most important and which I felt more compelled to fill.
A while back, a very large rock hit my windshield. It caused a big round crack which I have been watching as it slowly creeps across the windshield in various directions, taking on different designs as it does so. It began in a confined area with a specific shape, and now there are cracks going off in different directions, and each of those cracks has its own design.
I can imagine my error in thinking having similar effects. Maybe it went something like this. First, I imagine a setting for something entirely different. For this, I needed perception because “entirely different” is not truth and so not possible. Instead of creating something different, I am now using the mechanism of perception to experience it as if it is different. Maybe I could think of that as imagining it differently, or as the Course says, I am dreaming.
A Guide Home
But then I want a more intense experience, something more believable, so I distort perception until it no longer resembles the truth in any way. Now I have the seeming experience of being separate from God. That’s when it all got away from me. Like the crack in my window, the fragmenting didn’t stop with one break. It continued on and on, fragmenting over and over, making many things, many bodies, many desires, and needs, until seemingly becoming endless and hopeless. I became so far from Wholeness that I cannot imagine getting back.
Fortunately, our Creator placed the Holy Spirit in our minds to guide us back to reality when we were ready. He keeps me forever connected to God. So here I am on the outer edges of this incredibly complex fragmentation. I am beginning to wake up to the truth that I am not this and don’t want to hang out here as if I am.
Listening to that Voice, I am working my way back home. At first, it seemed like an impossible and endless journey because I see all those needs stretching before me. And all those errors, some impossibly big and others smaller, some urgent and some just waiting their turn, and I could not imagine coming to the end of them.
One Need, One Correction
It is very reassuring to read that there are not really a lot of needs, nor are there levels to those needs. There is just one lack I need to correct, the belief that I have actually separated from God. All the distorted fragmentation is dissolved in that one correction. This is my only true goal, my real destination, and I am excited to know this. As I continue this study of the text and as I listen closely to the Voice for God, I will receive more clarity.
Daily, I receive more instructions and guidance on how to reach my one goal. Today the Holy Spirit has asked me to remember what everything is for. When I feel I need something, no matter how minor or how important the sense of lack is, I will remember that I have one lack only. This seeming need is only a symbol of lack. And it is not real.
A sense of separation from God is the only lack I really need correct. Now that my needs have been unified, so has my action. When I feel lacking in some way, I will ask the Holy Spirit to correct that belief. I was created complete and whole. I could not lack anything. The apparent lack is an illusion, a part of the dream of separation. I am being asked today to open my mind to that simple thought and become willing to accept it.
VI. The Illusion of Needs, P 3
3 The idea of orders of need, which follows from the original error that one can be separated from God, requires correction at its own level before the error of perceiving levels at all can be corrected. You cannot behave effectively while you function on different levels. However, while you do, correction must be introduced vertically from the bottom up. This is because you think you live in space, where concepts such as “up” and “down” are meaningful. Ultimately, space is as meaningless as time. Both are merely beliefs.
I get that space and time do not exist. We made this up for the purpose of creating an experience of separation. If we were to have that experience of being separate, we needed certain things to be in place. We needed bodies so that one could appear as many. We needed space so that these bodies could appear separate from each other so that each one could be in a “here” that is different than the other one. We needed time so that we could experience occurrences as if they did not happen all at once.
It’s ok that I am having this experience of separation. It’s the experience that was desired, and there is nothing wrong with that. I wanted time and space and bodies. I wanted levels of experience. I did that, and now I want reality again. It seems I have to back out of this slowly, a step at a time. I have to start from the place I find myself, where I believe I am.
Beliefs Are Not Truth
Orders of need come first. I mostly know that there is no order of needs. All needs are symbolic of one need. On some level, I know this is true, but it seems I need practice with this. For instance, I have learned that I am not sad because someone doesn’t love me. I am sad because I believe I am rejectable. Beliefs are not truth; they are just perceptions. That is, perceptions are only a way of seeing something. I can easily change a belief. That was a major shift.
Another major shift was when I realized that it is always my thoughts that hurt me rather than something from outside disturbing me. I don’t need my circumstances to change in order to be happy. I just need to see them differently, and the Holy Spirit will do this for me if I ask.
When my son was in pain, I felt very strongly that I needed him to be well. I was wrapped up in that need so completely that, for a while, all other needs disappeared for me. That need was so big that it eclipsed the universe. Only because of my deepest desire, the desire to awaken, did I realize this was an error.
My desire to awaken led me to ask for clarity, and I was able to allow my mind to be corrected. I then remembered that there is only one need, and in the solution of that need are, all needs met. I am not separate from God, and neither is my son. Even with that healing, I saw that I still believed in order of needs. And I also saw that I was ready to let that illusion go.
Starting at the Bottom
So, we start at the bottom and work our way up. From this place, it seems like an endless job requiring more time than I can imagine. If I believed in time, this would be discouraging. But I have seen that as I plug away at this work, I periodically experience a shift that changes everything. This shift moves me further along than I could account for through my experience. It also saves time because corrections are made, and there are lessons that are no longer needed.
One day I shifted into a completely different awareness. It was not anything Myron did. This happens at another level. I am not Myron. It seems I am because I feel what she feels. But what I am is the observer of the life of Myron. From this place, as the observer, I make decisions about what I want to believe and what I am willing to release. I came to understand this, and then I came to experience it more and more.
At some point, I experienced a more significant shift, and everything changed. It was an inner change. I doubt anyone else even noticed. The change was one of identity. I began to identify with my Self more than with my story of Myron. I still slip back into the story from time to time, but I know what to do with that. I look at it with the Holy Spirit and let Him correct the error. In this way, I heal, and the whole Sonship heals with me. I look forward to the next shift, whatever that is.
ClICK HERE to read or listen to Regina Dawn Akers teaching on letting go of the belief in rejection.