Lesson 2

Lesson 2

I have given everything I see in this room
[on this street, from this window, in this place]
all the meaning that it has for me.

The exercises with this idea are the same as those for the first one. Begin with the things that are near you, and apply the idea to whatever your glance rests on. Then increase the range outward. Turn your head so that you include whatever is on either side. If possible, turn around and apply the idea to what was behind you. Remain as indiscriminate as possible in selecting subjects for its application, do not concentrate on anything in particular, and do not attempt to include everything you see in a given area, or you will introduce strain.

Merely glance easily and fairly quickly around you, trying to avoid selection by size, brightness, color, material, or relative importance to you. Take the subjects simply as you see them. Try to apply the exercise with equal ease to a body or a button, a fly or a floor, an arm or an apple. The sole criterion for applying the idea to anything is merely that your eyes have lighted on it. Make no attempt to include anything particular, but be sure that nothing is specifically excluded.

Journal

This is the sentence that caught my attention:

“Make no attempt to include anything particular, but be sure that nothing is specifically excluded.”

I think this sentence is important because it helps me to remember that all things I see with my eyes are meaningless until I give them meaning. All things.

I followed the directions and looked at various things around me saying that I have given this thing and that all the meaning it has for me. I noticed that my mind often found the meaning I had given it. For instance, I looked at a knickknack and knew that I gave it the meaning of being a symbol of love because my brother gave it to me. It is also a symbol of loss because he never does stuff like that anymore.

I look at my router and felt both grateful for it and uneasy about it because I have had so much trouble with these things. I know that if my daughter looked at her router, she would have a different meaning attached to it. I know this because she likes her router and thinks it is the best one on the market and is proud of herself for finding it. I, on the other hand, question why I seem to be singled out for trouble with routers, and thus question my own worth. How strange this line of reasoning. But all of that ran through my mind as I glanced at this piece of electronics.

And so it goes for nearly everything I looked at. Clearly, I give meaning to all things I see, which implies that they have no meaning otherwise. It also implies that meaning is arbitrary and so I can change my mind about the meaning I give things. That is an important insight because it can mean the difference between happiness and suffering. It feels strange to me now that I didn’t know this before I studied ACIM. I thought everything had a particular meaning and that was that. What a painful way it was to live like that. It never occurred to me that I was the one assigning meaning and that I could change my mind and thus choose to be happy rather than to suffer.

Past Entries

I realize that if nothing I see means anything, and that if I think it does mean something, I must have given it that meaning. The tree outside my window has a lot of meaning for me. I see it as a thing of beauty. I love the leaves when they are green, and I love that they change color. I love the branches when they are bare and see them as a different kind of beauty.

Because I have given it that meaning, I feel protective of it. I would be terribly disappointed if it were no longer there, if it blew over in a hurricane or became diseased and died. If someone were responsible for its destruction, I would hold a grievance against that person. And yet, the tree has no meaning except as I give it. This means that if I am sad about the tree, I can change the meaning I gave it and no longer be sad.

Clearly, there is no reason in the world to not be at peace all the time. I am in charge of how I feel. If I am unhappy it can only be because I want to be unhappy, because I have given everything I see all the meaning it has for me. As I learn this lesson, I see my way out of the ego belief in suffering. Suffering is a choice I make, a desire, something I want. It is the only way it could occur in my life.

The mind wants to argue that this seems too inclusive to be true, and the mind wants to find exceptions (in fact, clamors with exceptions), but for this to be true at all it must be true always. Look at what he says in the lesson; he says everything I see, and all the meaning. I will not argue with the ego mind right now, but let it be enough that I trust Jesus and his Course to mean what is said and to be right about it.

There is a sentence in the Course that I never forget. It says that we but do this to ourselves. By lesson two we are learning that this is true. It feels like a burden, this responsibility, but at the same time, I glimpse my freedom in it. What has been done to me leaves me a victim. What I have done to myself, I can undo.