It only takes One

That One is you/me. The wonderful thing about the teachings of Jesus in A Course in Miracles is that he reminds me that my brother and I are One Being, One Son of God, who is healed wholly when I am wholly healed.  Knowing our shared needs, is knowing that the only thing that stands between us is a tiny gap that can be bridged by a simple act of loving kindness.  It is just being open to see that my interests and my brother’s are the same.  A single act of kindness can end a war.

“To heal is the only kind of thinking in this world that resembles the Thought of God, and because of the elements they share, can transfer easily to it. 2 When a brother perceives himself as sick, he is perceiving himself as not whole, and therefore in need. 3 If you, too, see him this way, you are seeing him as if he were absent from the Kingdom or separated from it, thus making the Kingdom itself obscure to both of you. 4 Sickness and separation are not of God, but the Kingdom is. 5 If you obscure the Kingdom, you are perceiving what is not of God.” (T-7.II.1.)

“To heal, then, is to correct perception in your brother and yourself by sharing the Holy Spirit with him. 2 This places you both within the Kingdom, and restores its wholeness in your mind. 3 This reflects creation, because it unifies by increasing and integrates by extending. 4 What you project or extend is real for you. 5 This is an immutable law of the mind in this world as well as in the Kingdom.” (T-7.II.2.)

In other words, I am made whole and healed by changing my own perception of my brother, by seeing him as whole and one with God. I do not need to explain this to him, he does not need to understand it. He does not need to cooperate, or want it or anything else. It is all up to me, and through the miracle of my own changed mind, I have healed the world.

It is all up to me, and through the miracle of my own changed mind, I have healed the world. 

“When you heal, that is exactly what you are learning. 2 You are recognizing the changeless mind in your brother by realizing that he could not have changed his mind. 3 That is how you perceive the Holy Spirit in him. 4 It is only the Holy Spirit in him that never changes His Mind. 5 He himself may think he can, or he would not perceive himself as sick. 6 He therefore does not know what his Self is. 7 If you see only the changeless in him you have not really changed him. 8 By changing your mind about his for him, you help him undo the change his ego thinks it has made in him. “ (T-7.V.8.)

The Good of the One

Think about someone you love.  What is it you see in them that fills your heart with joy? Is it their sweet nature or inviting smile? Is it their open heart and willingness to share?

Now think about someone you don’t like so much.  What is it in them that fills your heart with pain? Are they depressed and self-involved?  Are they short tempered? Do you feel judged and diagnosed, like nothing you do can ever live up to their expectations?

In both cases, it is “ego” looking through an ego lens an another “ego”.  A dreamer, dreaming a dream of differences and competition.  Dreamers relating in a dream to an idea that has replaced the Truth.

Everything I see when I look at you is a reflection of a thought in my own mind.  It cannot be anything else, because my thoughts are my own. No one is in my mind telling me things about you, I am making it all up in accordance with the rules of the thought system I choose.  The ego thought system tells me that you are different than  me, and I need to protect and defend myself from you.  Spirit tells me that you are the same thing as I am, and that I can trust you.  My reaction to you shows which thought system I am listening to.  If I see that we are the same, I know that when I help you, I help myself.  This is why the good of the One outweighs the good of the many.  “When I am healed, I am not healed alone”  is not just a nice idea – it is a fact.

Like you, your brother thinks he is a dream. 2 Share not in his illusion of himself, for your Identity depends on his reality. 3 Think, rather, of him as a mind in which illusions still persist, but as a mind which brother is to you. 4 He is not brother made by what he dreams, nor is his body, “hero” of the dream, your brother. 5 It is his reality that is your brother, as is yours to him. 6 Your mind and his are joined in brotherhood. 7 His body and his dreams but seem to make a little gap, where yours have joined with his. – A Course in Miracles – T-28.IV.3.

This is why the good of the One outweighs the good of the many.  “When I am healed, I am not healed alone”  is not just a nice idea – it is a fact. 

Do I Have a Purpose?

Do you ever feel a sense that there is something more to your life? You don’t know what it is, but you are haunted by the feeling that you have a purpose?  And that purpose is somehow greater than what you are doing now?  Even if you are successful in your life, have a great job, terrific family, friends and colleagues who love and admire you, you still feel like something is missing?

All of my life, I have had the feeling that I was meant to do something else, something more useful and meaningful.  Even when I had a great job and a great career, performing a function that seemed helpful and loving, I still felt like something was missing.

As I began to examine my life, I recognized that no matter how much I tried, I never had enough!

Not enough power, not enough money, not enough approval, not enough fun, not enough joy… as hard as I worked, I could never find the success I wanted.  As I looked at my dissatisfaction, I began to notice a pattern.  It seemed like every time I got close to reaching a goal, I saw that goal as being small, unworthy, never big enough.  I knew that I would not be satisfied when the goal was accomplished, and I would set another goal.  The new goal would be challenging, difficult, and it would take a lot of work to accomplish.

Have you had that experience?  Think about it, has any job ever paid you enough?  Do you come home from work every day thinking, “WOW!  What a great day, what a great job!  I accomplished everything I wanted to do, everybody loves me!  I can hardly wait to go back tomorrow and do it all again!”?  I am guessing this is not your usual experience.  I know it is not mine.

Would you be surprised to learn that it is not the purpose of this world to make you happy?  In fact, the world is a place to see that what I really want is not here.  The world is an ILLUSION –  made to remind me that I am something more than the body, the personality and the brain that I think I am.  I am an infinite and eternal being, created by a Source that is infinite and eternal.  How can an infinite and eternal being be confined to a body, a personality and a brain?  Those things are temporary, small and finite.  When the body dies, I will go on without it.  But if that is true, why do I feel so small, limited and dissatisfied?  Why am I fooled by this illusion, to the extent that I have lost all remembrance of what I am?

Without knowing my true purpose, everything I do seems like a futile effort.  I am never satisfied, because I always think there is something more, something else I should be doing.  No matter how successful I become, there is still the nagging feeling that I am not doing enough, and so I move from goal to goal, never finding what I seek.  I am lost in a world of illusion, and I want to give my whole heart and soul to finding my purpose.

Why am I seeking to break free?  Is it because I believe that the world I see is not what I want?  Is it because I do not like what is happening and I want to make something else to happen?  Looking at my thoughts about this, I see that it is true.  The world I see is not making me happy, and I wonder – is it my purpose to be happy?  Do I really have a purpose?

As I write these words I become increasingly restless, nervous and upset.  Why?  Because deep inside I believe that I am not worthy of having a higher purpose.  I believe there is something I need to do to prove my worth.  Is that my purpose?

In A Course in Miracles Workbook Lesson 25, it says “Purpose is meaning. 2 Today’s idea explains why nothing you see means anything. 3 You do not know what it is for. 4 Therefore, it is meaningless to you. 5 Everything is for your own best interests. 6 That is what it is for; that is its purpose; that is what it means. 7 It is in recognizing this that your goals become unified. 8 It is in recognizing this that what you see is given meaning.

W-pI.25.2. You perceive the world and everything in it as meaningful in terms of ego goals. 2 These goals have nothing to do with your own best interests, because the ego is not you. 3 This false identification makes you incapable of understanding what anything is for. 4 As a result, you are bound to misuse it. 5 When you believe this, you will try to withdraw the goals you have assigned to the world, instead of attempting to reinforce them.”

So I have given myself the only purpose I know, it is a small and unworthy purpose, because it is the ego’s purpose.  I do have a Real Purpose though, and that is the one given to me by God.  And it is by allowing the ego’s purpose to be replaced by God’s purpose that I retrieve my natural inheritance.  No amount of wishing, manifesting or hoping can do this for me.

When I remember my purpose, I will have nothing else to look for.

God, I am confused and angry. I am shaking my fist at you. I feel abandoned and afraid.

Healing can be defined simply as forgiveness, for no healing can be anything else.  The unforgiving are sick, because they believe they are unforgiven.  Only forgiveness heals an unforgiveness, and only an unforgiveness can possibly give rise to sickness of any kind.  Healing occurs when we begin to question the validity of our sickness. Questioning, then, is the first step in true healing.