Lesson 227
This is my holy instant of release.
Father, it is today that I am free, because my will is Yours. I thought to make another will. Yet nothing that I thought apart from You exists. And I am free because I was mistaken, and did not affect my own reality at all by my illusions. Now I give them up, and lay them down before the feet of truth, to be removed forever from my mind. This is my holy instant of release. Father, I know my will is one with Yours.
And so today we find our glad return to Heaven, which we never really left. The Son of God this day lays down his dreams. The Son of God this day comes home again, released from sin and clad in holiness, with his right mind restored to him at last.
INITIAL INSIGHT: In the first paragraph Jesus says that I thought to make another will but nothing I think is real. How does this relate to laying down my dreams? When my mind is free of any thought that I believe and place my attention on, I am in the present moment. When I am listening to the thoughts in my mind, I am in my imagination and I miss the present moment altogether. I am living an illusion and bound by my illusion.
The chatter in my mind is about the past or is a plan for the future. It has nothing to do with what is happening. I have watched my mind for years now and this is nearly always true. I have thoughts that I deliberately choose that represent the truth. I have thoughts that are necessary to live in the world, instructional thoughts like when to cross the street, and how to cook chili. But most of the chatter in my mind is useless and often painful. At the very least, it prevents me from knowing the truth, that I am innocent, that I am a divine being.
It seems impossible to stop the chatter but I have slowed it down. Now, I am aware of the thoughts that persist, the few that still catch my attention and that keep my attention. Those are the ones that I look at with the Holy Spirit, and release to Him. Those are the ones that I turn away from, shifting my attention to the moment that is actually occurring. In this way, I lay these beliefs at His feet and today I accept the holy instant of release. It does not matter that I must do this repeatedly. The repetition is my way of declaring my freedom and I have proven to myself that this is how I go ever deeper into my awakening.
DAILY APPLICATION: Reading my journal this morning was interesting. The first posting I am sharing was made at a time I was learning that I don’t know anything and was just beginning to taste the freedom in that. It also has a discourse between me and Jesus about how split my mind was when it comes to union. It was easy to be ashamed and discouraged when I discovered the more petty thoughts in my mind, and Jesus helped with that, too.
The Dream
My holy instant of release seems to come as I empty my mind of all I think I know. I say to the Holy Spirit that I don’t know anything. I don’t know how to pray anymore. I don’t know what anything means. I am empty-headed, at least for this brief moment before the ego thoughts once again flood my mind. With the ego thoughts comes the mistaken idea that I actually know stuff. I compare what I think I know with what other’s think they know. I judge whether what I know is enough, is right, is helpful.
But for just an instant I rest my mind in the truth that I don’t know anything and I am released from judgment and chaotic thinking. Could I but live this way! This must be heaven. This must be what it is like to exist as Jesus and other Masters exist. To be empty of all but the Love that is God. I offer my mind in this moment of release that I might be a simple conduit for God’s Love. What more could I ask? What more could I want?
I awoke from a dream in which my sister was trying to be helpful and I was telling her that I have vast experience and was carefully enumerating that experience, proving to her that her help was not needed and that she was being foolish to think it was. It was a discouraging dream and I immediately asked the Holy Spirit to help me with this thought. It might seem like only a dream, but it is in my mind or it would not be in my dream.
The thoughts I was given are this.
INSIGHTS FROM JESUS: My friend, the ego thinking is that you can have or she can have. In the ego, there is no shared experience, or shared love, or shared interest. Either she is higher or you are higher. In this mind set it is important to stay ahead, and if she thinks she can help you then you see her as trying to get ahead of you. Imagine that you see yourself leading her up the mountain and suddenly there she is reaching down to give you a hand. Your mind boggles a moment as you try to figure out how she got ahead of you, then the ego thinks how to put her back below you on the mountain where you think you need her to be.
Me: Jesus, I don’t want to see her below me, and I don’t want to put her back down. I don’t want to push her away and I see that clearly in my dream that I was pushing her away, and that I did not want her so close to me that she thought she had a right to love me. I don’t want this to be who I am.
Jesus: Of course, you do not want this to be who you are. Your holy mind balks at the thought your brother is in any way different or separate from you. Your holy mind knows that her words were words of love however they may have sounded. But there was that energy within you that was in opposition to your holiness. It came up in your dream that you might look at it with your holy mind and forgive it. Look with love and with compassion on your errors. They are only errors and not real. There is no reason to be fearful of ego thoughts or to hate yourself for entertaining them.
To be upset is to give power to the idea that they are real. I assure you they are not real, just clouds in the lovely sky of your mind. Look with the Holy Spirit at them as they pass through your mind. Do not be afraid of them; do not judge them; do not make them real. Just be grateful for the opportunity to forgive them and allow them to pass out of your mind.
Me: Thank you for your help in seeing this differently. I woke up with my mind buzzing with disparate thoughts and feeling heavy with self-judgment. Thank you for another way to see this. My heart feels light and in love, and blessedly, in peace.
In the next posting, I see that my mind is clearer and I have developed a process to help me let go of the ego belief that I am guilty of my thoughts.
Guilt Is Just Another Ego Illusion
I notice that my mind is clearer than it used to be, and I notice that when something comes up for healing now I am quick to see it and quick to give it to the Holy Spirit for healing. I am happy to lay them down at the feet of truth, to be removed forever from my mind. What I see that I still need to watch is that if I have a moment of confusion in which I believe the unbelievable, I sometimes still listen to the ego thoughts of guilt and fear.
The ego says I should not be thinking these thoughts and if I believe that. even for a minute, it can send me whirling into guilt with almost a feeling of panic. This panic is caused by the thought that I was wrong to think that I could be free of the ego and this is proof. Then I remember that there is no guilt. Guilt is just another ego illusion. I remember that these thoughts come from the ego thinking mind. Why would I choose to give credence to the ego? Why would I ask the ego for advice? It is such a silly idea that it snaps me out of my delusion.
I remind myself to let the feelings be. Let them move through without interference. If I try to do anything with them, if I try to analyze my feelings or my thoughts, if I try to make them go away or suppress them, I am really just holding them close and convincing myself they have some great meaning. If I just sit and watch them, they pass on through.
I think this is the reason I love this prayer, Holy Spirit, “Come into my mind and undo what I have done.” This is the same as laying the thought at the feet of truth so it can be forever removed from my mind. I notice that in this lesson it does not say that I should try to fix my illusions then lay them down; it just says to lay them down and let them be removed. Today I gladly and in gratitude lay aside the idea that I have a will that is not God’s Will.
From this posting, I see that the ego is getting more subtle as it tries to discourage this whole awakening thing.
Ego Doesn’t Want Awakening
This morning, I noticed that I was reading the words without conviction. I had no expectation of this being the morning that I would be my holy instant of release. I asked myself what I had to do today that was more important than awakening. I stopped and let my mind empty and found my sincere desire to awaken. I sat with it and realized that this is a good day to awaken. I felt emotion welling up in me. It was joy and it is impossible for me to put into words what that felt like. Just saying it is joy is not really describing it.
Then I quickly squelched it. Jeez, why did I do that? I felt afraid at first, the ego-mind saying that this means I don’t want to awaken, I shouldn’t have turned from it, now I can’t have it, I don’t deserve it, the usual ego stuff. But I really don’t believe the ego anymore, so I asked the Holy Spirit to remove from my mind the thoughts that cause fear of waking up. I don’t think of awakening as something far away anymore.
I read my previous postings and I saw how much has changed. I saw a line I thought would be good to use for my twitter today. I copied it and pulled up Safari, which opens in Facebook. I saw a posting on using sunscreen and followed it to the video, which led me to another. I was watching it for a moment or two and suddenly realized what had happened. The ego-mind offered me a distraction to take me away from the idea of awakening today. Reading Facebook is the thing that is more important than awakening, evidently.
The ego-mind wants to stay with the boring, but predictable life. It feels safe in this place of “normalcy,” that meets its small expectations. That little peek behind the veil where joy springs up so unexpectedly and with such power, is something it doesn’t understand, and it scares it very badly. It wants to slip back into the life that is less threatening. This is just fear and fear is not real.
I stand before you again today, Spirit, open and defenseless. I am in gratitude to have seen what you showed me. I am also ready to let this belief in fear and guilt be removed from my mind. I want today to be my day of release. I want the holy instant. I lay at the feet of Truth all the ego doubts and all the ego fear that is in my mind and I wait in patience and certainty as You heal my mind. I trust myself to let go as quickly and completely as I can, and I trust You to do the rest.
And this is from the year when I began to really see the effect of my practice.
I Will Not Compromise
And this year I stand ready for the Holy Instant in which I lay the whole ego belief in separation at the altar and let it be removed. Will it happen today? I don’t know. Yesterday I had three instances of choosing grievances over peace, but I did not get lost in them. I kept returning my mind to my only true desire, the desire for the peace of God. I had just a moment when I questioned how long this was going to take, and heard the quick answer that it takes as long as it takes. My impatience melted away.
What is the difference this year? I am so much happier and more peaceful than I ever have been. I am absolutely certain of my purpose and I am learning to take joy in that purpose. I hear all the ego chatter and I fall for the ego distractions, but they are meaningless and I return my mind to my purpose, and I am at peace and in joy again.
Yes, I know that in spite of the evident senselessness of it, I still value some ego beliefs, but not much. And I am willing to look with the Holy Spirit at each one or all of them together. I will do this as Holy Spirit directs. I am ready to return my mind to Love regardless of what the ego mind wants. I continue to be guided by two things Cate Grieves said. Even the slightest desire for something in the world will pull me out of my peace, and, I will not compromise. These two ideas are the guiding lights that keep me on track.
GRATITUDE: This path seemed really difficult and filled with discouraging failures, but now I see that it was perfect and even my apparent failures helped me see what needed done next. I am ever so grateful.
REGINA’S TIPS
Today’s lesson says, “I thought to make another will. Yet nothing that I thought apart from You exists.”
NTI Romans calls this other will the wish for “something completely different” than reality. That would be something completely different from life-awareness-presence. If something is completely different from life-awareness-presence, it has no life. Therefore, it does not exist.
Our thoughts have no life. They are the other will. When we remove attention from our thoughts and place attention with life-awareness-presence, we “lay them down before the feet of truth, to be removed forever from my mind.”
Both of our primary practices remove attention (meaning and value) from thoughts. We practice forgiveness (inquiry, rest-accept-trust, right-reason, etc) and awareness-watching-awareness. Both are critical components of “our glad return to Heaven, which we never really left.”