ACIM Chapter 8. VII. The Body as a Means of Communication, P 14-16
ACIM Chapter 8. VII. The Body as a Means of Communication, P 14-16
VII. The Body as a Means of Communication, P 14
14 You are not limited by the body, and thought cannot be made flesh. Yet mind can be manifested through the body if it goes beyond it and does not interpret it as limitation. Whenever you see another as limited to or by the body, you are imposing this limit on yourself. Are you willing to accept this, when your whole purpose for learning should be to escape from limitations? To conceive of the body as a means of attack and to believe that joy could possibly result, is a clear-cut indication of a poor learner. He has accepted a learning goal in obvious contradiction to the unified purpose of the curriculum, and one that is interfering with his ability to accept its purpose as his own.
This reminds me of the idea of being in the world but not of the world.
I see that I am being told to use the body while not confusing myself with the body. Just a short time ago, I would see my reflection in the mirror, and I did not like how I was beginning to get wrinkles. It would remind me that I was getting old and unattractive. I felt like this meant people would think of me differently than they used to when I was young and more attractive. This is confusion. I thought I was the body, and so was limited by and to the body.
This morning, I felt differently about this. I looked in the mirror, and I saw a body that was getting older. It has wrinkles, and the skin no longer holds its shape like it used to. It’s interesting. Then I got dressed. There is no sadness or regret because this morning, I don’t think I am the body. I see it as the useful device it is, and I see myself moving through it but not being limited by it.
This paragraph reminded me of a time at work.
There was someone I seemed to annoy a lot, and I, in turn, would become annoyed by him. This eventually, with mind healing, turned around for me. I wanted him to be free of the pain of separation, and I asked for words or actions to facilitate this. Sometimes, asking for freedom gave me a nearly instant miracle. But not this time.
I could still hear the ego objecting, not wanting to lose, not wanting to possibly look foolish, insisting that he should be the one to give in to me. But it was just a buzz in my ear. As I followed the love and moved past the body/ego to reassure my brother, the right words were there when I needed them. And this is how I can be in a body but not be of the body, so to speak. This is how I move past the limitation of the body and allow it to be the way I communicate the love that I am.
Not all problems feel the same, though they are.
Strangely enough, the problems I have with seeing past the body to the spirit are not the ones that feel big and important. That seldom happens now, and when it does, I can release them quickly. It is the seemingly small, truly unimportant irritations that I stumble over. For instance, a friend is late for an appointment, or I clean the kitchen before bed, and dishes are in the sink when I wake up.
Not really earth-shattering upsets, right? They are fleeting thoughts, but there is a ripple in the mind. It is like water in the pond that is disturbed by a rock tossed in it. The ripple goes out and touches all it meets, and then it returns and touches me again with a loss of peace. I want to be free of every thought that disturbs my peace, so I am forming the habit of looking at these thoughts with the Holy Spirit until they are gone, and I can laugh at the absurdity.
VII. The Body as a Means of Communication, P 15
15 Joy is unified purpose, and unified purpose is only God’s. When yours is unified it is His. Believe you can interfere with His purpose, and you need salvation. You have condemned yourself, but condemnation is not of God. Therefore it is not true. No more are any of its seeming results. When you see a brother as a body, you are condemning him because you have condemned yourself. Yet if all condemnation is unreal, and it must be unreal since it is a form of attack, then it can have no results.
God’s purpose is joy and when I interfere with that purpose, I have condemned myself. The good news is that this is not possible. While I believe it is, I will suffer, but since only God’s purpose has reality and what is His is mine, I can be saved from my suffering. Its very unreality is my salvation. To know that I am saved only requires my desire to know this.
It is God’s Will that I be saved from my mistaken beliefs, and so everything I need to have this is provided for me. I was led to A Course in Miracles when I was ready for it. When I needed a new teacher one would appear. When I needed to hear the truth differently, it was given to me in the form of a different course. And when I was ready for a more direct experience, I was shown how I was to listen to the Voice within.
At one point, I had a different experience.
I was approaching the one mind, and the part of my mind that resisted this insisted that I not make this approach. The resistance took the form of doubt that led to depression. I had a very clear understanding that depression is not part of my life now, even though it used to be very much a part of my identity as I saw it. So, this was confusing and upsetting to me.
I wasn’t as deeply depressed as I used to be, and for most of the day, it was not there. But it kept occurring, and my doubts turned into fear. The biggest difference was that I did not fall headlong into it but remained in touch with my healed mind, constantly asking for help. I was led to the simple passage from the Course where Jesus says that I only need to ask the Holy Spirit to decide for me, and it will be done. So, I started that practice.
It quickly deepened until I was asking that He decide for me even what I was thinking and how I felt, and I realized that in so doing, I was letting go of the ego mind altogether, allowing my Self to rise in its place. At the same time, the dying ego was filling my mind with doubts and fear, and this kept the depression in place. Finally, I told Jesus I needed help, that I could not overcome this alone and I didn’t know what to do about it.
The Holy Spirit always answers.
In typical miraculous fashion, the answer came that very day in a form I was certain to notice. Nouk Sanchez sent me a message saying she felt I should read something she wrote. That article and a conversation with her helped me to see this differently. Everything changed in two short days. I felt the doubts and fears come to me, but this time, I saw how unreal they were. I easily let them go and turned my attention to the truth.
Even though it had only been a couple of days, everything felt different. It is also very important to me that I told Jesus I needed help, and he nudged Nouk to share with me what she had written. I saw Nouk’s writings all the time, and sometimes I read them, but often I didn’t take the time. Because she said this was a nudge (and mostly because I felt Jesus nudging me to read), I stopped what I was doing and read it. I realized that we are not alone. We are guided. We are helped. Whatever we need is provided.
VII. The Body as a Means of Communication, P 16
16 Do not allow yourself to suffer from imagined results of what is not true. Free your mind from the belief that this is possible. In its complete impossibility lies your only hope for release. But what other hope would you want? Freedom from illusions lies only in not believing them. There is no attack, but there is unlimited communication and therefore unlimited power and wholeness. The power of wholeness is extension. Do not arrest your thought in this world, and you will open your mind to creation in God.
Two sentences feel really meaningful to me this morning. One is that freedom from illusions lies only in not believing them. I love this for its simplicity. Yes, it can feel difficult not to believe in what seems so real, but then that is the purpose of the illusion – to feel real. So, when I experience the effects of believing in the illusion, I ask the Holy Spirit to remove those thoughts from my mind, that is, the thoughts I believe that could not be real.
I felt harassed yesterday. There seemed to be too much work for one day, and I felt overwhelmed. I noticed that I was projecting. These are illusions. They affected me because I believed them. I could easily have questioned them, but I didn’t. Normally, when I feel like I have too much to do, I ask that the Holy Spirit decide for me what to do and what to let go. I remind myself that it is just a thought in my mind that I have more to do than I can do. For some reason, yesterday, I didn’t question my thoughts, and so I suffered until I changed my mind about that.
The second sentence that stands out to me says, do not arrest your thought in this world.
When I accepted the idea that I was harassed and overwhelmed and did not question that thought, I arrested my thought in this world. I finally realized what I was doing and I asked for correction. Then the barriers that seemed to hold me hostage to my suffering fell away. I was in immediate peace, and I was given ideas that corrected some of the errors I made while confused.
What I have discovered is that I can always choose not to believe the illusion. Sometimes, it feels hard, and I must talk myself into letting go. Sometimes, I have to ask for help over and over. It is not because I have to talk the Holy Spirit into helping me. It is because I have to talk myself into accepting the help. But this is something that I can do.
I can, with the help of the Holy Spirit, free my mind from the belief in illusions, and the process is very simple. I notice I am unhappy and ask that my mind be healed. Then, I allow the aberrant thought to be removed from my mind as I remind myself that I am not this body or this story. I am spirit. I am the Thought of God, created by Him, like Him. This silly moment cannot be reality. Then, I allow my mind to fly free of this world.
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