Teachings of Christ Mind

Good afternoon. And welcome to everyone who is joining us on the internet as well.

So, we’ve been getting together for quite a while discussing the Course. Or let us say we’ve been discussing the Truth and seeing in what ways the Course supports the Truth, because there was something before the Course and what was before the Course was the Truth. And the Course is an expression of the Truth. The Course is not the end. The Course is not the point. The Truth is the point.

And I’m wondering, I’m not going to ask any of you to respond to this, but I’m wondering over the last year and a half, year and three-quarters that we’ve been reading, has your life been changing? Or better put, is the way you’re responding to life changing? Are you letting life just roll over you? Or are you realizing that, indeed, there is another way to look at this, and purposely and conscientiously [exercising] inquisitiveness to see it a different way, and then actually seeing it in a new way? Have there been healings?

I know, a miracle is quote “a sudden shift of perception” unquote. I’ve heard it said, “It’s not about healing. It’s about a sudden shift of perception in your mind.” [small laugh] Well, if that’s what you think, if that’s what you believe, that’s what you’ll get. And it won’t be worth much. What point is there in having a sudden shift of perception, let us say, so that pain doesn’t bother you, and pain continues? Ah, but you’re in bliss, and it doesn’t bother you that you’re in pain. If you think that’s what it’s about, you’re wrong.

What is the sudden shift of perception about? The sudden shift of perception is going to be about your experience. And when the sudden shift of perception that constitutes a miracle occurs, it’s a shift of perception in which, I’m going to say, God’s Truth registers with you. God’s Truth about what? God’s Truth about what you’re experiencing. God’s Truth about the Kingdom of Heaven that you’ve been looking at and calling the world, as though it has nothing to do with God. And so a sudden shift of perception is going to be accompanied with, accompanied by, a shift of experience.

And so, instead of seeing your perception of Creation, you will see Creation Itself. And that will be recognizable as healing. Cancer gone. Deformed joints reformed. The Beauty, the Exquisiteness, the Perfection of Creation is what will be embodied, instead of your perception being embodied. And so you will experience a new embodiment whether it’s of your body, what you call your body, or the dying tree in the yard, or whatever it is that isn’t manifesting all of the qualities of Creation Itself.

Some sudden shifts of perception are little ones so they don’t blow your mind. In fact, some shifts that occur, you don’t recognize until later on when you realize, “Wow! If that had happened a year ago, I would have been really upset. And now, no problem for me at all. I haven’t lost my peace. And I’ve been able to cope with it quickly, intelligently and well. And there’s been no drama or trauma.”

What’s my point? My point is that if all of this isn’t registering in your life as transformed experience, as the disappearance of physical problems, or the meeting of a physical problem quickly, then you’re up in your head, you’re up in your intellect, and you are not connected to your Right Mind yet.

A Course In Miracles. Well we’re not talking about causing miracles to happen. We’re not talking about causing physical regeneration to happen. What we’re talking about is your relinquishment of your very definite definitions. The definitions you have come to on your own or through mutual agreements about the Kingdom of Heaven that define it as not being the Kingdom of Heaven. We’re talking about abandoning those definitions so that What Each Thing Truly Is can register with you.

And the way you abandon your current definitions, as we’ve been talking about, is by going within to the Altar. Being willing for a moment to abandon your best theories and your best concepts, and saying, “Father, I want to know What The Truth Is here. I want You to tell me what it is, because I want to replace my definition with Your Perspective. Because I don’t want to hurt anymore. And I don’t want my Brother to hurt anymore. And I don’t want to see the tree dying in the yard. Father, I’m not asking to change the tree. I’m asking You to help me relinquish whatever it is in me that is insisting upon seeing something different from the Perfect Embodiment of Creation That You Must Be Being there, right where that tree is.”

And why? Because when the shift of perception occurs within you that has been illuminated by the Father, you will see a perfect tree. Not because you manipulated matter through magic, or the force of the power of miracle-making, but because you actually were willing to relinquish whatever you thought the tree was, and whatever you thought the condition of the tree was, and whatever you thought the conditions were that brought about the problem the tree was having. And, indeed, your willingness to relinquish the idea that the world and universe you’re seeing started from a big bang, a purely physical event, rather than It being the Visibility and Tangibility of the Movement of God that It has forever been.

You know, we talk about waking up and going Home. Well, what’s the purpose of our getting together and reading the Course and discussing the ideas? The purpose is to bring it home, to bring the point home. So, we’re talking about bringing it home right into this room. Bringing it home right into your house. Illuminating the Truth right where you are and seeing what could only be called physical transformations. Transformations that would register in a photograph. And if you’re not seeing changes, you’re not bringing this stuff home. And if you didn’t realize that that was the point, I’m telling you that’s the point so that you will be inquisitive and attentive in the right place.

In other words, all of this is relevant right now, right here. As someone else said, “It’s not pie in the sky after you die.” And if it isn’t relevant to you right now, you’re missing it. I’m not suggesting that all of you are missing it, but it’s essential for me to make this point. And if you do say, “Well, you know, I haven’t seen much difference,” don’t ask yourself, “What have I been doing wrong?” Let the fact that you’re aware that there hasn’t been a lot of difference simply suggest to you that there is more for you to see, there is more for you to look forward to in this moment. That this moment is pregnant with illumination, transformation, sudden shifts of perception, expectancy.

When a woman is pregnant, you say she is expecting. And when you’re in a pregnant moment, which every moment is until you’re fully awake, you should be expecting. When you’re awake, every moment is pregnant, but it’s not pregnant with the abandoning of illusions and the replacement of them by the Truth. It’s every moment is pregnant with the Movement of the Mind of God that never stops to repeat itself and therefore is always new, always vitally, significantly awesomely alive, awesomely new.

But for the time being as you are bringing yourselves more and more into alignment with God, with your Real Mind which is the Holy Spirit, your expectancy needs to be to have the revelation of Truth that you haven’t been experiencing because you stifled it the moment you said, “Father, I would rather see it my way. Father, I would rather do it my way. I would like to try being the author of my experience for a while.” And as they say in television, when you did that you cut the feed. You lost the feed. You lost the connection. Okay.

Expect your sudden shifts of perception to be relevant to where you are and to be experienced as transforming in a healing way where more perfection is manifest. There is more perfection that can be recorded in a photograph. That there is more perfection that everyone can see. So that where you limped before, you don’t limp now. And where your fingers moved difficultly and were misshapen by arthritis, they now move flawlessly and are not misshapen. What are you going to have a new perception of if it isn’t everything you’re currently having misperceptions of? Just think about that. Okay.

We’ll go to the book. And as I’ve said before, I’m reading from the transcript as it was completed by Bill Thetford.

You know, I’ve said it before. When we sit down to have a Gathering, Paul says, “I allow only for that which expresses the Christ Consciousness and only that which is in harmony with the Purpose of capital ‘B’ Being, the Father’s Will.” In other words, “Let the reign of Divine Truth, Life and Love be established in me and rule out of me all self will. And may Thy Word enrich the affections of all mankind and govern them.”

Now, the key words here are the words “only.” “I allow only for that which expresses the Christ Consciousness and only that which is in harmony with the Purpose of capital ‘B’ Being.” This is the only way he, or any of you, can relinquish attack, because if you realize it, anytime you are not yielding to the Father, you are being the author of thoughts on your own.

And as long as you are attempting to act as an independent agent, a thinker, you are reaffirming this bill of divorcement from the Father, which is a denial of God and as we’ve said before ends up being a denial of What You Truly Are. Everything that follows is based upon a misapprehension of yourself, a misperception of yourself. And therefore, everything that follows is an illusion. Being an illusion, it has no possibility of being real, of being truly effective, of being truly present. And because it arises out of an act of denial, it cannot express or embody Love. Now the fact is, if it’s not embodying Love, it’s embodying nothing at all.

But since you all engage together in being independent in this way, and you come to mutual agreements, and you base your behavior with each other on those agreements, and you base your interpretations of everything that you’re aware of on this belief that you can actually be something functioning on its own, everything that you do must be recognized as unconstructive, unintelligent. But most importantly and perhaps the most difficult thing to accept, it is an act that can have only one effect—destruction, chaos. It isn’t just unproductive, it hurts. It isn’t just meaningless, it causes you pain. It isn’t just not loving, it finds expression in your relationships in forms that have as their intent your Brothers’ and Sisters’ distraction from What They Divinely Are. That is not just unkind, it’s destructive.

I don’t care what thought it is you might have, if you’re having it alone, if you’re having it without any Conscious Awareness of your connection with the Holy Spirit, if you’re having it without any Conscious Connection with your Guide, with your Brother or Sister who is awake, it constitutes one further emphasis, one further act of maintenance of your bill of divorcement.

The relinquishment of this kind of behavior—which can appropriately be described as attack, attack on Reality, attack on the Kingdom of Heaven, attack on God because you are denying all of these things—the one thing that can cause the relinquishment of this attack is your willingness to abandon every single one of your thoughts that you’ve had by yourself, even if the thought is, “I really like that woman,” or “I really like that beautiful garment,” and you know that it is truly an acknowledgement of beauty.

You must be willing to abandon every single thought that you are having on your own. And as I’ve said before, this seems to mean that you are bringing, you’re narrowing your attention down, because you’re narrowing it down from all, all of the thoughts you’re able to think and all of the potential thoughts that remain for you to think up, in order to give your attention to only one thing. “I allow only for that which expresses the Christ Consciousness.” What is that which only expresses the Christ Consciousness for you? It’s nothing more than your right Mind which is the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit speaks for the Father.

“I allow only … ” It’s like saying, “I allow only for what is essential. I allow only for What Is Real.” Like the sculptor, I chipped away everything that wasn’t part of the statue. I was only interested in only that which was part of the statue. “Hey, he could have had the whole block of marble. Wasn’t that more than what he was left with after he finished?” You see?

The thing is that as you go through your day, if you will be willing to let go of everything that isn’t necessary, and you choose to look at everything only with the Christ Consciousness, only with your right Mind, only with that which embodies the Father’s Perspective, you’re not going to end up having a narrow experience. The Kingdom of Heaven will be given to you. The Kingdom of Heaven will be revealed to you in everything you had already been seeing, and more. And your aloneness, your separation from everyone in this room as well as all of the Brotherhood that you’re not experiencing at this moment because it doesn’t fit into your definitions. “Oh, well they passed on, you know. Someday I’ll see them.” You see, that’s your definition. It’s not true.

Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and all these things will be added unto you. Separate yourself from God, choose to be an independent authorizer of the definitions of your world, and all of these things will be taken away from you. Actually, you will have abandoned all these things, because you wanted for a while to play with being god all by yourself, when God was Being All There Was of you all along and you were being All That God Was Being right where you were.

So, again, the one sentence we’ve succeeded in reading so far today.

your And lives are demonstrations of the Truth of that sentence. No compromise is possible in this. You try just a little bit to be an independent thinker and you are absolutely shut out from the experience of your Wholeness as you. And what happens is that the experience of your Wholeness is divided up into a little bit that you have said is you, and everything else that isn’t you. A world and universe that started with a big bang. Brothers and Sisters who aren’t you, who don’t think like you, can’t think like you, won’t think like you. And you certainly don’t want to think like them. If anything, you want them to think like you. But you sure don’t want to think like them, do you? Oooo!

Continuing …

It’s absolute. It will hurt you by causing you to be ignorant of the Truth about you, and you will behave as though you aren’t What You Divinely Are, and every step will be a misstep. Every step will be fraught with danger and threat. Existence will be frightening. Not because it truly is, but, quote:

In other words, it’s not absolute. Your learning is temporary. It can’t be anything else because it’s the entertainment of a mad idea, of an insane idea, and that can’t be eternal. There will come a point where you will decide not to embrace it, and you will abandon it and it will be over. And what is immortal will be in your face to accept and honor.

… How?

Isn’t that utterly simple?

Continuing …

Now, here the word “projection” is being used in its positive sense.

… Peace …

… which means the extension of it without putting it outside of yourself …

What you have projected outside yourself.

Continuing …

You threw away something when you said, “Father, I’d rather explore this imagination that I have that says I can do things on my own. And I’m going to explore it with all the power of my Being as the Christ.”

Continuing …

… not put outside of yourself.

Sharing is something that’s always done with embrace, isn’t it? When you’re truly sharing, you’re embracing the one you’re sharing it with. You’re including them in your space, in your acknowledgement.

An idea that you share, you cannot lose.

Continuing …

You extend what is established in you. And extending it illumines the fact that it is established in you.

Again the statement Paul begins with says, “Let the reign of Divine Truth, Life, and Love be established in me, and rule out of me all self will.” All self-authorizations. And when you join with the Holy Spirit, or the Father, or your Guide, and you be with each other from that joined place, letting the Holy Spirit or your Guide give you the words with which to be together with your Brothers and Sisters, Love is shared and simultaneously established in you in a manner that you can recognize as you.

And so the Truth about you is strengthened by your sharing. It’s strengthened because it uncovers to you more fully what has been established in you since the beginning, but which you apparently lost the Conscious Experience of when you tried to play with the idea of being independent.

Continuing …

That’s like saying: If A = C and B = C, [then] A = B.

See?

You can manage to do that intellectually, but the real meaning and value of it hasn’t registered with you until the last part of the sentence dawns on you.

You could say: Teach only what God reveals to you, and learn that What God Is, is yours.

But the crowning point of it all is the discovery that you are God. And when I say that I mean that you are All That God Is Expressing of Himself Infinitely without reservation is What You Are. In that experience, you come back into your Right Mind. And the world and the universe will become so illuminated to you that you will recognize that it is, and always had been, the Kingdom of Heaven in all of Its Glory.

And I know you’re familiar with these kinds of words like, “in all Its Glory.” But some words have to be used, and the purpose of using the words is so that you might have a hint that the experience that you’ve been missing out on is unbelievable, is something to desire. I could say, is something to look forward to, but I don’t want you to think in terms of time, and so I’m saying is something that is available to you in the moment so bring your attention fully into the moment without your best definitions accompanying your awareness in the moment. And be curious.

The next section is entitled:

That’s like saying: I am the way, not the rut.

I am the Way, not the rut. I am the Truth, not the lie. I am the Life and not the misperception of It.

Ooo! Who’s its maker? Who made your egos? You did. And your ego does not mean you well. It does not mean the One That You Divinely Are well. It’s task, once you imagined it into being, is to keep you so distracted that you forget that there is a Place in you, a Place of Excellence called the Altar where you can re-access your Right Mind.

Repeating …

Well, if it shut up long enough, you might have enough silence to not be distracted any longer and remember the Truth about yourself. So the ego is always ready with an answer, except the answer is a lie and not the Truth, and therefore, is not a real answer.

Again …

Meaning the Divine One That You Are.

So the ego doesn’t give you a moment of peace [laughing] in which to remember and make the transition.

Continuing …

The Divine One That You Are.

You see? God projected Himself without projecting it outside of Himself, which meant that His Creation was part of Him. You were part of Him. The word “part” is not the best word because God embodies All Of What He Is in everything He Creates. And so the Whole of Him is You. But without it going outside of What God Is, it remains a Conscious Experience of All That God Is. That’s your Function—to be the Conscious Experience of All That God Is.

Again …

… and, of course, you didn’t make the ego until after you said, “Father, I’d rather do it my way,” got the bill of divorcement, and acted independently. And independently, you have no capacity to act with Love because that’s derived from your Source. And if you were connected with your Source, you wouldn’t have lost your Identity, and you wouldn’t be engaged in an attempt to act independently, with self-authority.

It’s like I said last week. You send out messengers based upon a lie, the lie being that you are independent. And the messengers will go out into what? The only thing there is to go out into, the Kingdom of Heaven, and it will bring you back reports that say it’s not the Kingdom of Heaven. They will bring back lies. They’re incapable of telling the Truth because a lie launched them on their quest.

Continuing …

… meaning the Divine One That You Are …

… except in your mind it was translated into, “What am I?”

Something totally foreign and impossible to experience when you’re in your right Mind.

Listen to this …

Now let’s get a little practical here. What does that mean? It means that you as you currently perceive yourself to be are afraid of What You Divinely Are. You are afraid that if you will pay attention to what I’m saying, and you will be willing to abandon your definitions and lean into this something called the Holy Spirit within you that’s your right Mind, that you will lose your identity.

Do you see the irony of it? You said, “Father, I’d rather do it myself. I’d rather see it my way. I am enacting a bill of divorcement.” And you lost your Identity! And you created one for yourself that’s purely imaginary. And now I come along. The Truth reveals itself to you and says abandon your definitions and lean into the Holy Spirit within you. There is a Place of Excellence in you that doesn’t require you to authorize anything, that doesn’t require you to be responsible for anything, that puts you in a place of being the constant Acknowledgement of What Is Real with an awareness that you are not separate from Its Reality and It is not separate from yours. That It’s All One.

And you can grasp the possibility that this experience of indivisible unity might be bliss. But you are afraid that if you lean into this and yield to it, that you will lose your identity. Why weren’t you afraid of losing your Identity when you said, “Father, I’d rather see it myself, my way.” Do you see the irony of it? Because if you do, it will make it easier for you to make a new decision.

Continuing …

How do you get someone to answer the phone? You call them. How do you get an answer from the Holy Spirit, from that which is nothing more than your right Mind? By asking a question.

“Oh yeah, but if I do that, He might really answer, and that would prove to me that my state of independence is not Real. And his answer might cause me to move into a new space wherein I wouldn’t be able to pull off this really excellent business deal next Tuesday afternoon in which I will make a lot of money, but you know unfortunately a few heads will drop along the way. But nevertheless, you know, if I dare to ask the Holy Spirit and abandon my determined isolation and let Him in, it might spoil all of the deals I have gotten set up for myself by getting everybody to join me in mutual agreements that they don’t realize is going to take advantage of them. I’ve set it up in such away that it looks to them like it’s a good deal for them. But man, I might have to sacrifice.” You see?

The ego sense of self that you identify as you is afraid of the Divine One That You Are. Can you see that? You may not be able to see it in all of its ramifications, but you can see the principle of it.

Continuing …

… interesting. Let that sink in. Because if any of you have gotten an answer from God, if any of you have experienced revelation, if any of you have experienced the Holy Spirit responding to you and healing you, it was the Christ That You Are that heard it. I bring that out so that you might realize that right now you are the Christ. You are right now the Divine One that the Father set into motion, you might say, Created by having an Idea that He identified as You and recognized Himself in. If you have ever experienced communion with the Holy Spirit, that experience was absolute proof of your Christhood here and now in this lifetime, if you wish. And it is not something that you will attain in the future.

“Oh, no. No. The ego’s my best friend. I promise you. The ego is my best friend.” No, it’s not. “Well, if it weren’t for my ego, I wouldn’t exist today. I wouldn’t have survived all the experiences I’ve had. If I hadn’t been smarter than the bastard down the street, or if I hadn’t played dirtier than he did, I wouldn’t be here today. Thank God for my ego!” Bullshit. All your ego has ever done is to reinforce the little willingness you had to play with the idea of being independent and to cause you not to remember Who You Are. It isn’t the best friend you’ve ever had. The whole ego structure is a self-substantiating process in which ignorance is extended. That’s all.

And as long as you don’t challenge that, every day will be groundhog day. Every year will be groundhog year. Every lifetime will be groundhog lifetime. What’s this all about? It’s all about breaking the rut! I am the Way, not the rut. The Holy Spirit that is your Right Mind is the Way. And your commitment to your ego is the rut.

I promise you every time we meet and every time I share with you, your commitment to the state of independence is dissolving a little bit more. It may not register with you, but I can tell that it’s as though the Energy of your Being begins to glimmer and glisten. There is more Light moving in you. The Light of you is increasing. And it’s a joy for us to see.

I want you to believe what I’m saying. You’re not stuck. You’re not stuck. And you know what? If no one else recognizes what’s happening with you, and if no one else seems to be being blessed by the good that is happening to you, don’t become distracted by it. Because by damn it, every little bit of diminishing determination to be independent weakens everyone else’s resolve to be independent as well.

Don’t become discouraged if what you have to give by being more in alignment with the Father isn’t received, because it will be in your following through that those who can’t relinquish their determination, their obsession with independence, will be freed. You will not be able to go out there and take them by the shoulder and say, “Be free. Be free.” But you will, by becoming free yourself with commitment and resolve, be the absence of support for obsessive determination that weakens obsessive determination in your Brothers because there’s no longer confirmation from you of their point of view. And because your obvious Embodiment of Perfection and Harmony and Love will further promote healing for them.

I love you. And I like the Light I’m seeing glimmering. It’s a joy. And I look forward to being with you next week. And between now and then, come chat with me once in a while within yourself. Make the connection. Break the allegiance to self-determination.

Okay.