Lesson 66
My happiness and my function are one.
You have surely noticed an emphasis throughout our recent lessons on the connection between fulfilling your function and achieving happiness. This is because you do not really see the connection. Yet there is more than just a connection between them; they are the same. Their forms are different, but their content is completely one.
The ego does constant battle with the Holy Spirit on the fundamental question of what your function is. So does it do constant battle with the Holy Spirit about what your happiness is. It is not a two-way battle. The ego attacks and the Holy Spirit does not respond. He knows what your function is. He knows that it is your happiness.
Today we will try to go past this wholly meaningless battle and arrive at the truth about your function. We will not engage in senseless arguments about what it is. We will not become hopelessly involved in defining happiness and determining the means for achieving it. We will not indulge the ego by listening to its attacks on truth. We will merely be glad that we can find out what truth is.
Our longer practice period today has as its purpose your acceptance of the fact that not only is there a very real connection between the function God gave you and your happiness, but that they are actually identical. God gives you only happiness. Therefore, the function He gave you must be happiness, even if it appears to be different. Today’s exercises are an attempt to go beyond these differences in appearance, and recognize a common content where it exists in truth.
Begin the ten-to-fifteen-minute practice period by reviewing these thoughts:
God gives me only happiness.
He has given my function to me.
Therefore my function must be happiness.
Try to see the logic in this sequence, even if you do not yet accept the conclusion. It is only if the first two thoughts are wrong that the conclusion could be false. Let us, then, think about the premises for a while, as we are practicing.
The first premise is that God gives you only happiness. This could be false, of course, but in order to be false it is necessary to define God as something He is not. Love cannot give evil, and what is not happiness is evil. God cannot give what He does not have, and He cannot have what He is not. Unless God gives you only happiness, He must be evil. And it is this definition of Him you are believing if you do not accept the first premise.
The second premise is that God has given you your function. We have seen that there are only two parts of your mind. One is ruled by the ego, and is made up of illusions. The other is the home of the Holy Spirit, where truth abides. There are no other guides but these to choose between, and no other outcomes possible as a result of your choice but the fear that the ego always engenders, and the love that the Holy Spirit always offers to replace it.
Thus, it must be that your function is established by God through His Voice, or is made by the ego which you have made to replace Him. Which is true? Unless God gave your function to you, it must be the gift of the ego. Does the ego really have gifts to give, being itself an illusion and offering only the illusion of gifts?
Think about this during the longer practice period today. Think also about the many forms the illusion of your function has taken in your mind, and the many ways in which you tried to find salvation under the ego’s guidance. Did you find it? Were you happy? Did they bring you peace? We need great honesty today. Remember the outcomes fairly, and consider also whether it was ever reasonable to expect happiness from anything the ego ever proposed. Yet the ego is the only alternative to the Holy Spirit’s Voice.
You will listen to madness or hear the truth. Try to make this choice as you think about the premises on which our conclusion rests. We can share in this conclusion, but in no other. For God Himself shares it with us. Today’s idea is another giant stride in the perception of the same as the same, and the different as different. On one side stand all illusions. All truth stands on the other. Let us try today to realize that only the truth is true.
In the shorter practice periods, which would be most helpful today if undertaken twice an hour, this form of the application is suggested:
My happiness and function are one, because God has
given me both.
It will not take more than a minute, and probably less, to repeat these words slowly and think about them a little while as you say them.
Journal
God gives me only happiness.
He has given my function to me.
Therefore my function must be happiness.
I fully accept this chain of logic. I have also witnessed the truth of it. As my commitment to my purpose has grown stronger, I am much happier than I ever have been in my life. I also find that I do not miss any of the other things I used to do in the hopes of finding happiness, so no sacrifice was asked of me. Nothing in the world is responsible for my happiness. The ego wants me to think that my function here is to make decisions and win, basically. It thinks that things will make me happy and pushes its agenda.
I remember when I was a sales person that I thought the best feeling in the world was getting a new customer and if I took my competitors customer that was a cherry on top. What I quickly discovered is that what the ego gives, the ego takes away. The idea that I could take his customer left me open to the realization that he could do the same thing to me and so pleasure was quickly replaced by anxiety. My babies brought great joy and at the same time, great anxiety because what was given could be taken. This is typical ego.
What God offers is permanent happiness, happiness that does not vary or change in any way, and that does not come with a downside. What He gives is given completely and forever. If my happiness wavers it is because my dedication to my function wavered. This is a good way to stay on top of things. If I notice that I am not happy, I immediately look at my thoughts. What was I thinking that was not true?
Regina’s Tips
Every time you disengage from ego and bring your attention fully to the present, you are happy. You may make the mistake of thinking it was the fruit or candy (or hike or playing with your grandchildren, etc) that made you happy. However, in actuality you are happy because you temporarily disengaged from ego, so there was nothing to block your natural state.
In the language of A Course in Miracles, the act of removing your attention from ego is called forgiveness. A Course in Miracles teaches that forgiveness is your function. Since disengaging from ego returns you to your natural state, our function (forgiveness) and happiness are one.
In order to see that this is true, pay attention to your experience. Notice that whenever you are not happy, there is a thought or story present that is driving your experience. Whenever you are happy, notice you are being present with your current experience and not caught up in ego ideas in that moment. By observing this in yourself, you will come to see that ego blocks happiness and happiness is natural when we are not lost in ego’s thoughts or perceptions.
My thoughts.
Regina mentioned something I had not taken into consideration. She says that when I am disengaged from the ego, I am happy. This is because without the ego there is nothing to block my natural state, which is happiness. When I disengage from the ego this is forgiveness. I think her wording is helpful to my understanding.
Past Entries
Jesus is going to a lot of trouble here to be sure I understand that accepting my function is going to make me happy. He needs to do this because I have always been taught that God wants sacrifice. Jesus says this is not true. Also, I have always believed that my happiness nearly always entailed someone’s loss. Jesus says that is not true either. It is pretty simple, really. God gave me my function. God wants only my happiness. My function, which is forgiveness, must, therefore, make me happy.
Another thing Jesus says in this lesson is that we only have two parts of your mind, the ego and Holy Spirit. The ego will guide you to fear and the Holy Spirit will guide you to love. Later in the Course, Jesus tells us that all decision must be made in union if it is to have any power. We make the decision with ego or we make it with Holy Spirit. There is no third option. There is no you without the two parts of your mind or a third part of your mind. So if you think you should not ask Holy Spirit’s guidance in all little things, realize that you are, by default, asking the ego.
Doing My Job with Purpose
I was thinking about work and how sales is, by its very nature, competitive. I have noticed a difference in the way I feel when I get a customer from a competitor. For a long time, I would be elated if I won a customer from someone else. I thought this was happiness. But it wasn’t the kind of happiness Jesus is talking about. If someone has to lose for me to be happy, then I have not won.
First, it is reinforcing my belief that we are separate and that is not a happy result. Also, it is the kind of pleasure that is very short lived. If I take from someone, I believe I have attacked and can only expect attack in return. This is not a happy thought either. But this is my job and if I don’t pick up customers, soon I won’t have that job. I wonder how I am supposed to see this.
My message from Holy Spirit
Holy Spirit: Do you remember yesterday’s lesson, Myron? It is not about what you are doing or not doing. The question is what are you using it for? Are you using your job to increase your stature by being a better sales person, and by winning more customers? Are you seeing your position as who you are? Are you making getting more customers your goal in life, your purpose, and is your happiness dependent on that success?
It is possible to do the same job without making the doing of it your goal. You are kind and thoughtful to the people you visit. You accord the same respect to the people who can never benefit you as you do the ones who buy from you. You sincerely care about the people you meet on the job. You lift them up with words and thoughts.
You are peaceful and joyful when you visit and they are drawn to that and want it for themselves. You don’t have a lot of customers because you are a great salesperson. You have customers because you are remembering your true function. In this way, everyone wins as you have opportunity after opportunity to choose the Voice for God, and they are given opportunities to see what that looks like and to make the same choice for themselves.
Me: Please help me to remain mindful of my true purpose all day. Seeing my work in this way creates a sense of excitement and joy in me to do the work. I was beginning to lose interest in work thinking that I should be doing more with my ministry. It is good to be reminded that my ministry is where ever I am.
Everything Changed After That
I wrote the above and received Holy Spirit’s answer in 2007. Yesterday I was visiting a customer that used to buy from another company. I remembered how competitive I felt at the time. I thought about the excitement of winning, and I realized that I did not win at all. I did not understand what winning was. At one time the way I did business was more akin to war. I saw what I wanted, planned my strategy, and attacked. When I seemed to win, I felt elated, but only briefly, because winning comes with an opposite; losing. Attack brings fear of being attacked. Winning a customer creates the fear of losing a customer.
As I spoke to that customer, I thought of the competitor who used to sell to them. I remembered the resentment and anger I used to feel when I thought of this company. I remembered the fear when I saw them talking to my customer. I can hardly believe I felt such animosity toward these people, these children of God. How could I ever have thought that it was my function to cause harm to someone, and how could I have ever thought it would make me happy to do so. Holy Spirit, thank you for the clarity I have received from you over the years. Please continue to help me remember my true function.
Truly Grateful
My prayer now when I go see a potential customer, is not that I should make a sale, but that I might be truly helpful to this person. I surrender myself to the Holy Spirit in this case as I do in any other as I ask, “What would you have me do? What would you have me say? How would you have me respond? Please make me a blessing to this person.” My job is so much more peaceful and joyful than it used to be. When I think back and realize the stress I inflicted on myself when I thought my job was about winning, taking, and seeing others as guilty and myself as victim, I am amazed I could tolerate it as long as I did. I am truly grateful for the healing of my mind.
Practice Makes Perfect
This lesson seems incredibly simple to me now. As I forgive the world I have made with my untrue beliefs, the world of my true beliefs begins to reveal itself to me. And I am happy. This is still very much a work in progress. I continue to notice a lot of untrue thoughts and reactions in my mind, and sometimes the forgiveness comes quickly, almost instantaneously. Sometimes though, I see that I still believe in and value an untrue thought. When this happens it takes longer for me to forgive it and let it go. Then I am not happy.
I now have enough experience doing this that it is perfectly clear to me that it doesn’t matter what form the situation takes, only God’s function makes me happy. I am no longer uncertain about this the way I used to be. There used to be certain stories that I felt were exceptions to the rule. I felt like I had to “do” something about this problem or that one. I felt like some things mattered so much that I could not let them go. I was just confused. Now I know that forgiveness is the solution for all problems.
Now that I understand what needs to be done and now that I am convinced that my function and my happiness are one in the same, all that is left to do is practice this until I make no other choice. I think of this as mastering my decision. It is so much easier now and I feel so much lighter, so much freer. Still, for now it seems that the habit is not ingrained, and I must be conscious in my choice. I am willing, more than willing, I am determined to master this. I like being happy.
The work is paying off!
I have spent the last year practicing what I know, that forgiveness is my function and it is also my happiness. I experience the result of failing to forgive, and immediately I want to return to my function because I am not happy. I have only a few areas of my life where I sometimes become temporarily confused about what I think makes me happy. Each time I work diligently with Holy Spirit to have this confusion cleared.