ACIM Chapter 13. II. The Guiltless Son of God, P 1, 2

ACIM Chapter 13. II. The Guiltless Son of God, P 1, 2

II. The Guiltless Son of God

1 The ultimate purpose of projection is always to get rid of guilt. Yet, characteristically, the ego attempts to get rid of guilt from its viewpoint only, for much as the ego wants to retain guilt you find it intolerable, since guilt stands in the way of your remembering God, Whose pull is so strong that you cannot resist it. On this issue, then, the deepest split of all occurs, for if you are to retain guilt, as the ego insists, you cannot be you. Only by persuading you that it is you could the ego possibly induce you to project guilt, and thereby keep it in your mind.

What I want, what I really want, is God, and guilt keeps me from God.

I want to get rid of guilt once and for all, so why don’t I? It is not real, and I made it up. So, getting rid of it should be as simple as changing my mind, and it is. But still, I don’t do it. Why is that?

The ego wants to keep guilt. Guilt keeps the story going and keeps the idea of separation (ego) alive in my mind. Ridding the mind of guilt leaves it vulnerable to God, and the ego cannot tolerate that idea. If we open our hearts to God, we will never look back at the ego. It would cease to exist. And yet, if we accepted the guilt that ego claims for us and accepted it fully, we could not stand it and would find a way back to God.

It seems that the ego’s solution to this is to first convince us that we are the ego. This makes the idea of losing the ego sound like total annihilation. If we believe we are ego and then embrace the idea of releasing that belief, it is going to create a lot of fear in us. It encourages us to believe the thoughts in our mind are ours and thus we are the thoughts. In this way, when we have dark thoughts, we think we are those thoughts and so think we are dark. This darkness is the ego; ergo, we are the ego. This is why it behooves us to look at our thoughts without judging them, which is forgiveness. In this way, the Holy Spirit heals our minds of any darkness, and we begin to remember our true identity.

The solution the ego offers is to project guilt onto others.

Secondly, the ego offers us some relief from guilt so as not to push us so far that we do something about the ego anyway. We make everything someone else’s fault and thus see ourselves as a little less guilty, thus making guilt tolerable. At the same time, seeing guilt anywhere, in ourselves or in others, strengthens the belief that guilt is real. 

The problem with the ego’s solution is that it doesn’t work very well. The thought of God is still in our minds. This thought of God cannot be eradicated; it will always be there, calling us home. So, there is no way the ego can succeed in keeping us forever in its thrall. We continue the separation story only as long as we can tolerate it, and then we turn to the Voice for God rather than the ego.

As we do this, we discover that guilt has to go.

We cannot know ourselves and know God if we continue to believe in guilt. I think of it this way: I cannot bring guilt into God, so guilt has to go. The biggest shift occurred for me when I began to realize that I was not just letting go of the idea that someone or something was guilty but letting go of the belief in guilt itself.

I began to understand that seeing another brother as guilty was just an effect of believing in guilt. Now, when I think someone is guilty, it is an indication that I still think guilt is a valid belief in my mind. I ask that this false belief be healed while giving the story of a guilty brother as little of my attention as possible. I am not so interested in doing anything about the story. I want the source of the problem to be undone, and the source is my belief that guilt is real. Guilt is not real because God did not make guilt. It is just a part of the separation idea, a part of the ego. When we undo guilt, we have undone the ego. Do you see how important it is that we let the belief in guilt be healed?

II. THE GUILTLESS SON OF GOD, P 2

2 Yet consider how strange a solution the ego’s arrangement is. You project guilt to get rid of it, but you are actually merely concealing it. You do experience the guilt, but you have no idea why. On the contrary, you associate it with a weird assortment of “ego ideals,” which the ego claims you have failed. Yet you have no idea that you are failing the Son of God by seeing him as guilty. Believing you are no longer you, you do not realize that you are failing yourself.

What a mess this is!

I don’t know who I am. I think I am Myron and all that entails. There is a deep-seated belief in unworthiness. Thus, there is a lot of guilt in my mind, and when that guilt becomes too apparent, I try to get rid of it by projecting it onto someone else. This used to make me feel better for a while because I thought I was rid of it. What I learned is that the guilt was not gone, just hidden, and I was left with uneasiness that I didn’t understand or know what to do with.

For a long time, even though I understood what was going on, the desire to project guilt was very strong. Part of it was a habit, and I suspected that part was desperation and fear. But becoming free of some guilt, even though it is not complete freedom, makes the guilt I do feel all the more painful. What I know is that I can let go of guilt. I have done it in many areas of my life, and it is just a matter of desire to release it altogether. My desire grows daily.

In the meantime, I do what I can, and what I know works. I notice the belief in guilt, and I ask for another way to see it. I remind myself that, above all else, I want to see differently. I remind myself that I am not alone in my efforts and that my efforts are heavily reinforced. One thing that motivates me very strongly is that I am not doing this for Myron, though that is how I experience it. I am doing this for the Sonship, and my every effort helps the Family of God awaken to the truth.

As a minister of God, I teach through the words given me.

But I teach even more effectively through my healed mind, which reflects my healed life. As guilt falls away in my mind, the ego is undone, and this becomes apparent to those who are ready to see it. Since teaching is my function and the best way to teach is through demonstration, I must first accept the Atonement for myself. Then, I can be the Atonement in action so that I motivate others to desire it for themselves.

I first wrote about this some years ago and was surprised by it. I had never thought of it like that before, and as I read what I had written, I wondered if that was true. I sat with it for a moment to allow Spirit to correct me if necessary, but all I felt was a warmth around my heart at the thought of helping my brothers as I help myself. It felt uplifting and joyful.

If someone were to ask me how I handle guilt, I would say that first, I learn to recognize it in all its forms, some of which are subtle. For instance, if I wish something or someone were different, then I am judging and thus making myself guilty. If I am sad because of someone or something, I have judged and thus made myself guilty. There are a lot of ways guilt shows up, such as fear and worry. Becoming proficient at recognizing these ways helps me to do this work.

The next thing I do is notice if being aware of guilt is making me feel afraid or guilty for being guilty.

Then I remind myself that I am just looking, not guilty. Looking is my job, and looking with the Holy Spirit is the means of healing the mind of the belief in guilt. If I become impatient that nothing seems to be happening, or if it is happening too slowly, I remind myself that this is just another way of saying I am guilty. “Let it go. Just let it go, Myron.” It is counterproductive to become guilty about undoing guilt.

My part is to acknowledge guilt, look at it with the Holy Spirit, desire freedom from guilt, give the Holy Spirit permission to heal it in my mind, and then accept that healing. My behavior is just a picture of where I am in the healing process, letting me know what needs to be done next. I don’t try to change the picture; I just go back to the source of the problem, that is, what I am choosing to believe. I change my mind as many times as it takes.

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