Marathon Eve

• This is the way in which you must perceive God's creations, bringing all of your perceptions into the one line the Holy spirit sees. This line is the direct line of communication with God, and lets your mind converge with His.

On March 9, I was running in a park, thinking about running a marathon June 10. Then I tripped and fell on frozen ground and my arm went crunch. I thought that was the end of marathon training for a good while. In the emergency room, I lost it in tears. All my hopes dashed. They gave me morphine. On March 11, I had surgery. On March 27, I had surgery again. March 28. I lay in a hospital bed all day. I couldn't tear toilet paper. Two weeks later, I got the splint off and was put in a brace. I joked to the doctor about going running. He said that would be totally stupid. It hurt too much anyway. 6 weeks later, I got the brace off. I made a Bee-line from the doctor's office to the park and ran a lap.

I am crying right now as I write this. It was so powerful to run again. In June, I ran a half-marathon. In July, I ran a trail 25K. Now here I am in September, really gonna go in a marathon tomorrow.

I picked up my number and got interviewed by a reporter dude from the local paper.

I pray with the Text of ACIM using a technique learned in the Roman Catholic, Benedictine, monastery called lectio divina. Most people use this technique with the bible. I use it with ACIM. You can google it to find out what it is.

It is a way of listening directly to God. It is a way to get beyond words.

This evening, I was praying with the above bulleted text. I don't read commentaries for ACIM because I don't want someone else's impressions to mar the surface of my own listening. Like when I go out on to the beach or into a Zen garden, I don't want to see someone else's footprints in the sand and I certainly don't want to go the same way as everyone else.

The hardest thing is to just listen; letting go of expectations that some voice will come blasting out of nowhere. People read commentaries because they don't think they hear God or understand what God is saying. This is only impatience with the fact that God communicates with non-words and silent joy.

The World

Jesus' words from ACIM:

• "The Holy Spirit begins by perceiving you as perfect. Knowing this perfection is shared He recognizes it in others, thus strengthening it in both. Instead of anger this arouses love for both, because it establishes inclusion. Perceiving equality, the Holy Spirit perceives equal needs. This invites Atonement automatically, because Atonement is the one need in this world that is universal. To perceive yourself this way is the only way in which you can find happiness in the world. That is because it is the acknowledgement that you are not in this world, for the world is unhappy.
• How else can you find joy in a joyless place except by realizing that you are not there? "

Before finding A Course in Miracles (a little over a year ago), I tried everything to find happiness. I tried career success and money, relationships, approval of authorities, monastic life, Harley Davidson, positions of trust in organizations, service work and the new age. I've travelled all over the world. My family had a ski cabin and I was an expert skiier by the age of 10. I read books about the art of happiness. I tried it all and always came up short. Finally I quit.

I had decided at the age of 22 that God was the answer. Even though I sought happiness in "things" for another 20 years, I constantly had God and meditation on a parallel path. God and meditation have never ceased to be a significant part of my life; even without the enlightenment experience that causes most people to be interested in God.

Reading the above quote, I am off the hook. About 3 years ago, I disenfranchized and marginalized myself. I quit participating in normal human society. I no longer cared about it. What others were doing seemed fake to me and I couldn't stand it. I ran long distances. Meditated for hours a day. Fasted for up to 19 days. I practiced "lectio divina" for an hour a day. I continue to pray with the ACIM Text twice a day. I didn't do these things as discipline or punishment. I did them because they were what I like to do and what makes sense to me to do. The result of my renuncuation of society was it became possible for me to embrace ACIM. I no longer had to worry about anybody's approval; and, believe me, the teachings of ACIM are not compatible with what most people believe. In the past year, I've read the ACIM Text 3 times.

For awhile, I felt guilty for renouncing society. I was told it was wrong to just walk away and be by myself. Through ACIM, I'm off the guilt hook for participating in human affairs. But I am happily on the hook for finding happiness in the abstract. The Christ Self and The Holy Spirit reside in each of us and all of us. God created each of us and all of us. My only happiness is in practicing this reality. Seeing Christ is the only blessing I have to give. I put my faith in this and not in the world. I am off the hook. I don't have to go out and get anything or win at anything or care about anything. Social programming is nonsense and I am off its hook. This world is an illusion and I do not put my faith in it.

I live in a world where career goals are programmed into us. They don't matter to me. I live in a world where watching TV and over eating are normal. I cannot allow this into my thoughts or energy pattern. You see, it is by walking away from all the social programming that it was possible for me to find something else, ACIM. Now, I stand outside the box. I refuse to go back in. But I have to learn not to hate the box and its contents. This is what Jesus did. He was outside the box and helped other to get outside it.

I just learn the new way of perceiving and practice it. Nothing else matters. In the ordinary sense, I don't "have a life." In the extraordinary sense, I am learning to BE ALIVE!

Your Own Relationship

• What you consider worth cultivating, you will cultivate in yourself.
• Give "it (fill in the blank)" therefore to the Holy Spirit because it does not belong in your mind, which is part of God.

Are you enjoying this blog? A word of caution: you can not know the meaning of a Course in Miracles unless you read it yourself. This little series of sound bites is not understandable by itself.

You can NOT know anything about a Course in Miracles from reading Marianne Williamson.

You can only know by reading it yourself. Read it yourself to find out what Jesus is saying to you, personally. Don't you want to know? Go to the source. Don't rely on the filtered, dumbed down version. Stop and listen to Jesus. Even if you get through only one word; do it. One word may be all you need to hear for this lifetime. One word may be all you need to instantly enter Heaven.

Do it yourself.

Running in a Warm Wind

• Whatever you accept into your mind has reality for you.
• Unnatural thinking will always be attended with guilt.
• Nothing the ego perceives is interpreted correctly.
• Guilt feelings show that you believe you can think apart from God, and want to.
• What you want you expect. What do you want?
• The Atonement is the remedy for disordered thought.
• ...you must learn to think with God.

Today's blog was a waste of time so I erased it.

This morning, at 4 am, I went for a six mile run. It was warm and windy. I am going in a marathon on Labor Day. I am excited.

I have five days off work this weekend. I hope to enjoy the silence.

Peace and Perception

What you perceive is a choice. I can realize that I am mainly perceiving the negative and ask for help with more positive, higher , loving perception. I can go back and re-interpret what I perceived earlier. What ever happened to me today doesn't mean anything until I assign it a meaning.

I can choose to assign peace. Transcendence is that simple.

I have the option of hating today; boy was today a bitch of a day! But why hate? Why assign a hateful meaning? I don't have to assign a meaning. Jesus, as I sit here, I think it is possible that I was walking in a new pair of shoes today which you gave me so I could walk along not assigning meanings. It is possible for me to not assign hateful and fearful ego meanings. I no longer want any ego meanings. Jesus, help me perceive love; something I've always denied before.

Heaven would look on "things" somehow different than I ever have with my ego. I refuse to give today to my ego to make into a hateful resentment. I want Heaven to look through my eyes and see something different. I'm willing to let Heaven be my consciousness. I will step out of the way.

Really

The hate is not real.

Inventory

Words of Jesus from ACIM:

• The Holy Spirit is the idea of healing.
• Being the Call for God, it is also the idea of God.
• It is strengthened by being given away.
• Your brother does not have to be aware of the Holy Spirit in himself or in you for this miracle to occur. He may have dissociated the Call for God, just as you have. This dissociation is healed in both of you as you become aware of the Call for God in him, and thus acknowledge Its being.
• See him through the Holy Spirit in his mind, and you will recognize Him in yours.

I talked with Jesus this morning. I want to see the Holy in my brothers; but I am very aware of how my ego consciousness actually hates them, totally. I am aware that there are hidden areas inside my consciousness where the ego sits with loaded guns, ready to fire away. As I entered meditation, I asked for help with these defensive areas. As I tried to meditate, the list bubbled up. I wrote down many names and things. I would try to stick the knife in several people's backs. I fear my unexpected hair trigger reactions.

Now, this is exactly why I am so enamored with ACIM. It is the only place where I hope to grow and heal out of my defenses. Going to daily Catholic Mass (for several years) didn't do it. The ACIM principles are completely different than standard denominational Christianity. I have help from Jesus and the Holy Spirit. I have Atonement. I have a practice of Christ Vision and forgiveness to use with others.

But, in ACIM physical bodies are illusions and don't matter except as learning devices. So, to practice ACIM, I don't have to join the group. My life will never be devoid of people, so I don't mean totally getting away from others. I just mean that I don't have to join your church or ministry in order to practice. This is a good thing. Almost no church goers are interested in the spiritual life and no ACIM church would be different. In fact, the ideas in ACIM about creation, Jesus, the body, and sin are so radical that hardly anyone wants to accept them. Hardly anyone dedicates themselves to deep studying and practice. So, I don't want to join a church where all these fakers are grouped and in my face.

Obviously, I have more healing to do. Don't think my hate is worse than yours. I've just uncovered my so I can see it.

The Hand of Love

This morning, I woke up late, 6:30. I had been unable to get out of bed with the alarm at 4. So, the late rising meant a change of plans. I couldn't get in a three hour run and also make it to the city for a 10 am AA meeting. I decided: get up now, get in the car by 7, get to Parkville by 8, run 3 laps, buy your coffee and get to the meeting on time. No prayer and meditation on that schedule.

I started running about 7:50. During my run, I was watching my thoughts. I kept identifying thoughts that were clearly ego thoughts and grievances. These, I gave to Jesus and asked Jesus to guide my thinking. "Jesus," I thought, "I want to have the other consciousness. The one that recognizes the divinity in every other person. (an ACIM tenet) I pray for an intuitive thought, inspiriation of decision." I have a hateful attitude towards everyone. I work hard spiritually to get better, and I am; but I recognize that I have a long way to go in having God instead of my ego run my life.

One common thread in my thinking this morning was "What AA meeting should I go to?" I didn't really want to go to Parkhill, where every body loves eachother and they read from the Daily Reflections and talk about their issues. But, Northtown, where they read from the Big Book and only talk about getting sober, is so stiff and smells like smoke. I turned this over to Jesus. A guy from Parkhill was walking in the park. Having been seen, my ego piped up again, "What will he think if you don't go to the meeting at Parkhill?" The dilemma continued. I was running well and got 4 laps (10.8 miles) done by 9:40. As I finished the last lap, I asked Jesus again to direct my thinking about which meeting to go to.

Laying on the ground by my car was somebody's ipod ear set. I thought, "Hey! Take that to Parkhill, maybe A. will be there and you can play a joke on her (another story that)." So, I picked up the head set and planned to tease someone. Thats how I made my choice.

At Parkhill, they read, "It may be possible to find explanations of spiritual experiences such as ours...I know the feeling it gave me and the results it has brought, but I may never fully understand its deeper why and how."

Somehow, this took me back to when I first got sober. I was able to see and feel the hand of God all throught the past 23 years, right up to that morning, and I was able to feel like I loved all the other people at the meeting (even though I usually hate them). I felt gratitude. I almost never feel gratitude. As I felt gratitude for God and these people, I felt love. I never feel love.

So, through prayer, I felt gratitude and love for others this morning. I want to shout it to the world as a momentous occasion. Thus...a blog.

Decisions

What a morning. I was so confused and in turmoil. First I will affirm my choice and then tell my story of how I got there.

The race I am running today is to choose listening to the Voice for God and not defending my ego or taking any sort of ego gratification. My race today is to hang on to my soul; that is the thing of value which I choose.

Now, here is my story. I wanted to go in an unlta-marathon today. The race was to be 50K. I have trained for this and I wanted to prove I could do it. But, on Monday, laying on the floor stretching, I stretched my arms over my head and clinched my abdominals; and something went clunk in my ribs and I was suddenly in pain. The pain is still with me right now, but it is relieved with anti-inflammatories. So I could have taken drugs and gone in the race (31 miles) regardless.

I have been trying to decide about this race all week but I've had a feeling of dread. I had the ribs and hot humid weather hanging over my head. I got out of bed this morning at 4:15 and sat at my table with a cup of coffee and the Course in Miracles Text. Outside was a severe thunderstorm. I was "painfully" aware that I wanted to go in the race to save my ego. If I didn't go in the race, I wanted a good enough excuse to save my ego's face. I could see I was caught in a situation where my ego was arguing with itself. I was trapped with feeling crummy either way I went. How do I choose?

I looked at the ACIM Text: "God Himself keeps your will alive by transmitting it from His mind to yours..."

I allowed myself to contemplate this. It reminded me of what it says in the AA Big Book: "Deep down in every man, woman and child is the fundamental idea of God."

I reached out to the fundamental idea of God and the thing of value which I wanted above all else. In the AA Big Book, when we are in indecision, we are to sit before the Father of Lights and wait. In ACIM it says, "...you need a new light. The Holy Spirit is the radiance that you must let banish the idea of darkness."

I realized I needed a third choice. My turmoil over going in a running race had lead to an exercise in choosing the Voice for God. "His (Holy Spirit's) is the Voice that calls you back...It is possible even in this world to hear only that Voice and no other. It takes effort and great willingness to learn. It is the final lesson that I (Jesus) learned..."

My third choice is to listen to the Voice and not defend my ego. So I have to somehow live through today and the rest of my life choosing the Voice for God and not defending my ego. My ego want to use this third choice to save face. So the third choice has to be a choice for nothing, no ego gratification.

"The Voice of the Holy Spirit does not command...It merely reminds. It is compelling only because of what it reminds you of. It brings to your mind the other way, remaining quiet even in the midst of turmoil you may make. The Voice for God is always quiet, because It speaks of peace. Peace is stronger than war because it heals...If you listen to the wrong voice you have lost sight of your soul."

So I will go to the city, go to an AA meeting, buy my organic groceries, come home and go for a short run. I must make a decision of purpose: hang on to my soul and not give face to my ego.

Silent Before Truth

• The Voice of the Holy Spirit is the Call to Atonement, or the restoration of the integrity of the mind.
• The Holy Spirit is the Mind of the Atonement.
• The Holy Spirit is the motivation for miracles-mindedness; the decision to heal the separation by letting it go.
• The Holy Spirit, the shared Inspiration of all the Sonship...
• He (God) also blessed his children with a way of thinking that could reach back to Him...He (Holy Spirit) represents a state of mind close enough to One-mindedness that transfer to it is at last possible.
• The Holy Spirit is within you in a very real way...

The lovely words of the ACIM Text...Yet, I hear my ego continue to inform me of my failings. I feel fear. I stand silently before the punishing ego. Something is scaring the hell out of it and it has gone berzerk with fear, even causing physical pain. It must be love. I must be becoming successful with my healing and that is dissolving the ego's hold. Only transcendence would cause the ego to redouble its efforts to defeat my healing.

God has "blessed me with a way of thinking that could reach back to Him." The Holy Spirit within me "represents a state of mind close to One-mindedness..." I choose to listen to this truth instead of my punishing ego.

Another ego deal is this: my ego doesn't know how to let go. I may say to myself, on the one hand, "I've decided to heal the separation by letting it go." But, my ego will refute the decision by saying that I don't know how to let go and then prove it by taking my conscious thought to a grievance. Then we start this back and forth game of ego vs consciousness; until I ask for help. Then I get help; but the help is not ego staisfying. What happens is that I just move on a forget whatever the ego was yammering about.

The Atonement is the undoing of the separation; accepted moment to moment. Sometimes I imagine my self as light. Then I look down and see an inky black source spewing out black liquid. The liquid is dissolved and disappears in the light. It has no effect. The ink pollution is neutralized as soon as it appears. This is my visualization of the Atonement. The source of the pollution is the tiny mad idea of separation from God. The light is my true nature. The light dissolves the darkness and I can laugh at it.

Awesome God Lesson

Last evening I was sitting at my kitchen table with a cup of tea. This is my customary location for spiritual reading (lectio divina) which I practice with the ACIM Text. Except for I noticed the barest little suggestive thought, I might not have been there. The little thought was preceeded by a louder thought, "you don't need to study." Then the little thought, "just take your cup of tea to the table and sit down." I chose to follow the little thought.

My ACIM Text is always open on the table. I glanced down at it.

• The ego exerts maximal vigilance about what it permits into awareness...raises control rather than sanity to predominance.

This sentence caused me to pause. The ego is merely a part of my belief system. It is split off from the majority of my mind. But, my world consciousness pays attention mostly to the ego and not the rest of my mind. I paused thinking, "Wow. I wonder what I am keeping out of my awareness." It was awesome to think that I am just ignoring and distorting many things; probably the spiritual things. I wondered and began to enter contemplation...

At that moment, I got a call from a customer service representative from a local car dealership where I had recently purchased a car. She invited me to have my first service there. Now, I had already received a coupon from them for a free oil change, but every time I tried to use it, they said I would have to wait two hours. So I had thrown it away and gone to Jiffy Lube where I could get out in 20 minutes. When the dealer girl called me, I let her know what I thought of their service department and how the only way to use it was to rent a car and leave mine there all day and I wouldn't do it for an oil change.

After I hung up, I paused again. Wow! You would think I had been sitting in my kitchen with guns loaded and aimed just waiting for that dealer to call. I was surprised. How much resentment am I carrying, just waiting to fire at some unsuspecting person? I shared this with Jesus. I glanced again at the ACIM Text:

• By becoming involved with tangential issues, it (the ego) hopes to hide the real question and keep it out of your mind.

It went on to mention ego diversionary tactics as characteristic busyness. Suddenly I had a moment of clarity. My normal consciousness is taken up with tangential issues, characteristic busyness and diversionary tactics which the ego throws out like flac, which is how the ego keeps the spiritual out of my awareness and hides the real question. My whole world is made of the ego's tangential issues, characteristic busyness and diversionary tactics. This is how the ego separates me from God. I took my inventory (AA step 10) and made a list of these things:

1. Should I visit the monastery on Sunday?
2. How hot will it be for the 50k race this Saturday?
3. Will the guy from alcohol shipping call at 4 am.
4. I hate work, and I am afraid of everybody there.
5. How much money?
6. I can't.
7. I'm a failure.
8. I'll never be perfect enough for God to send a revelation.
9. That girl in kindergarten shouldn't have taken my pencil.
10. etc., etc, etc.

I gave all these things to Jesus (the list was long). I glanced again at the ACIM Text:

• When you make a decision of purpose, then, you have made a decision about your future effort; a decision that will remain in effect unless you change your mind.

And there you have it. I have never really made a decision of purpose. I just make decisions about characteristic busyness and tangential issues and diversionary tactics. I really have never had a decision of purpose that hasn't gotten lost each day or which I haven't changed my mind about an hour later. Example of a decision: don't eat any junk today. Changed my mind: well now I think a packet of cheezits would be ok.

The ego's thoughts are at the level of control not sanity: junk food will kill me, why ever eat it? To find sanity, I have to ask the question which the diversionary tactics hide: What for? What is the purpose? The ego's purpose is boredom and resentment. I can choose to ask Jesus everything and let Jesus guide me in everything. I can decide that I don't want to live an entire life stuck in resentment and busyness and issues. I can decide!!!!

But, I still wasn't able to focus on a decision of purpose. My wandered off and I began reading a book. I hope I get into decisions today. I'll have to ask Jesus and decide to follow guidance. I glanced again at the Text:

• Your gratitude to your brother is the only gift I (Jesus) want. I will bring it to God for you, knowing that to know your brother is to know God. If you are grateful to your brother, you are grateful to God for what He created. Through your gratitude you come to know your brother, and one moment of real recognition makes everyone your brother because each of them is of your Father.
• Salvation is a collaborative venture. It cannot be undertaken successfully by those who disengage themselves from the Sonship, because they are disengaging themselves from me. God will come to you only as you will give Him to your brothers. Learn first of them and you will be ready to hear God.

Now, I had to stop. No, I am not grateful. I want to hear God, but I want to throw away the rest of the Sonship. Jesus, we need to talk. I need your help.

Happiness

• If you cannot hear the Voice for God, it is because you do not choose to listen.
• You can change your mind.
• Your mind is one with God's.
• Leave the "sins" of the ego to me (Jesus). That is what Atomement is for.
• The habit of engaging with God is easily made if you actively refuse to let your mind slip away.
• The problem is not one of concentration; it is the belief that no one, including yourself, is worth consistent effort.
• Your mind and mine (Jesus') can unite in shining your ego away, releasing the strength of God into everything you think and do.
• You are a mirror of truth, in which God Himself shines in perfect light.

Many words in ACIM mean different things than the dictionary meanings we were taught in school. Atonement, miracle, forgiveness, ego, Jesus and Son of God are examples. What this world and our bodies are is another example. Careful study of the ACIM Text reveals marvelous new meanings; so beautiful as they are beyond the ego imagination.

This morning, I was able to list out several ego beliefs that I harbor which keep the light of God out of my consciousness. I talked to Jesus about these. So deeply do I believe "I can't." After making my inventory list, it came to me that I have a quiet sanctuary into which I can retreat for healing and love. The sanctuary is made of Atonement and forgiveness. I believed Atonement meant I was off the hook; all my mistakes (sins) can be turned over to Jesus. Forgiveness because I could think of others and myself as "a mirror of truth, in which God Himself shines in perfect light."

So often I don't allow myself to be a part of the wonderful creation that God shines in and through. ACIM talks about the separation. My concept of separation is that I have separated myself from God; and I mainly do this by thinking I am a worthless failure. God never thought this about any of His creations. As I accord myself the worth that God gave me, I also accord it to other sons of God (forgiveness); and I get along better.

ACIM strictly says that no one is a sinner. But since we do think we are sinners, we have Atonement. I love that I can rely on Jesus to undo my mistakes. I need merely see in myself and in others the glorious creations of a glorious Father (forgiveness). This thought is an extremely safe thought. It is part of the forgiveness that builds my sanctuary. This thought is easily turned to at all times. Why do I forget? Jesus has said that this is because I don't think I am worth consistent effort. But, I can talk to Jesus about this also. So, I am safe at all times.

Being safe in God is huge. It is the only place I can truly relax and find peace. Safe in God is where there is only light/love.

I am blabbing on and on today. I am really just talking to myself (there is only one Self). I guess I am actually feeling happy, or maybe joy. Joy and happiness are unusual for me. But as I think of the moment of clarity this morning when my sanctuary became visible, and for another moment I experienced its peace; I think that made me happy. For all the degradation my ego throws at me, I have a sanctuary for peace. I guess that is what caused me to start babbling!

Processing

• You who identify with your ego cannot believe God loves you.
• Your belief in darkness and hiding is why the light cannot enter.
• It has never really entered your mind to give up every idea you ever had that opposes knowledge. You retain thousands of scraps of fear that prevent the Holy One from entering.
• Those who call truly are always answered.
• I (Jesus) will come in response to a single unequivocal call.

I take my inventory and give it to Jesus.

Ego

• Thinking about another ego is as effective in changing relative perception as is a physical interaction. There could be no better example that the ego is only an idea and not a fact.
• All attitudes are ego based.
• Self esteem in ego terms means nothing more than that the ego has deluded itself into accepting its reality, and is therefore temporarily less predatory.
• The ego literally lives by comparisons.
• Appetites are getting mechanisms, representing the ego's need to confirm itself. This is as true of body appetites as it is of the so-called higher ego needs...The ego regards the body as its home, and tries to satisfy itself through the body. But the idea that this is possible is a decision of the mind, which has become completely confused about what is possible.
• The ego is the mind's belief that it is completely on its own.

In another book, unrelated to ACIM, is says, "By going back in our drinking [ego] histories, we could show that years before we realized it we were out of control, that our drinking [egotism] even then was no mere habit, that it was indeed the beginning of a fatal progression."

The presupposition to alcoholism or drug addiction is the ego. Many do not take their egotism to alcohol, but they take it other places just as deadly. The start of the ego in the human psyche is where the fatal progression begins. Most of us, being children, don't realize what is happening at the human level. But when we get older, we do have the capacity to understand what has happened and take our ego backwards, deflate it at depth. Almost no one wants to do it. Only the most desperate will even try to begin. Only those willing to be rigorously honest with themselves will continue the ego deflation program after some degree of comfort has been achieved. Complacency means the ego has won. Continued intentional ego deflation brings healing of the mind.

Somehow, in this life, I have been given tools to use to work on my ego. Somehow, I have been trying to use them. I have had some success and some failure. When my ego totally ran my life, I was extremely unhappy. Now, the occasional mistake bothers me. The hope of ego transcendence draws me on. I continually have reminders in my worldly life that there is more work to do. I continually have reminders that I am accepting ACIM Atonement for myself. I would do anything to escape my ego prison and become the well lighted potential that I am.

And so...one day at a time.

Jail

• Listen only to God.


• I (Jesus) will substitute for your ego if you wish...I can be entrusted with your body and your ego only because this enables you not to be concerned with them, and lets me teach you their unimportance.

I learned a lesson this week in what really makes me insane; situations and institutions which are my projection of parental authority. Religion is for me an authority figure and I cannot stand it because it feels stifling, confining, like being in a paper bag, controlled, judged and censored. Any management system set up for the promotion of a spiritual theory makes the theory into a set of religious rules and social regulation; which utterly kills the direct action of Jesus in anyone's life.

Here is a picture of a fancy jail; but still prison none the less:

In the house where I grew up, the kid's rooms had lock bolts on the outside of the door, above kid height. I don't know how often I was locked in; but I remember one time vividly. In this case, my parents weren't home and it was my brother who had locked me in. I went berzerk. I went totally berzerk with throwing furniture and slamming my body into the door. Of course, this didn't help so I had to just sit quietly and wait. What a thing to learn at the age of 5; stay away from the restraint because it is not moving and anything short of silent sitting makes the situation worse.

This is how control authorities feel to me. So...all of civilized life is to me a big prison. If you have money, you can pretend to be comfortable. If you stay away from the walls, you can pretend they are not there. This doesn't work for me because I am a person who withdrew from society and worked spiritually on re-programming my brain. So I clearly see that this world is a big prison. I see the walls. I feel like I am in a straight jacket.

My choices are to learn extreme patience, never moving against the restraints in order to avoid becoming berzerk. Or, I learn that this world is an illusion; that there is a world of the spirit which is accessible to anyone if they do the work of deflating their ego and seeking spiritual help.

Spiritual help does not come from an earthly spiritual director, guru, teacher or minister. Nothing short of Spirit can give spiritual help. Any indirect contact is necessarily corrupted.

Listen only to God.

Laws and Teachers

• Laws are set up to protect the continuity of the system in which the law maker believes.
• Your worth is established by God...
• If you are willing to renounce the role of guardian of your thought system and open it to me (Jesus), I will correct it very gently and lead you back to God.
• I (Jesus) will teach with you and live with you if you will think with me, but my goal will always be to absolve you finally from the need for a teacher.

This Blog Reality

This place right here, this blog, is an awesome place to be. I am alone; an ego talking to itself. I am with my God; an existence in communion with the Universe. What could be more wonderful? Here, I don't have to worry about being judged: so what if I didn't interpret the meaning of a Text correctly. Here, I cannot judge: no one else is here. Here, I can freely muse and pray. Here I am free: able to release conditioning and programming and be what I really am.

I am not a girl or a boy. I am not a friend or spouse or enemy or daliance. I am neither rich nor poor. I am not of any race. I have no religion. I think I am human, but I do not know what that is. I have words and a language. I have a history: look there is a long scar on my right arm. I do not know what that means or what having a body means.

But I have mentioned "my God." It is this idea which needs to be probed. Is it my knowledge? Is it memory? Is it wishful thinking? Is it the last vestage of society's programming? Here...it is possible I was never born and can dismiss what I see and say. I can dismiss it and just be silent and still.

The dog and the Light

• Your starting point is truth, and you must return to your Beginning.
• As you approach the Beginning, you feel the fear of the destruction of your thought system upon you as if it were the fear of death.

A mainstay of my ego's thought system is the belief that I am a pile of crap. Listening to this message has made my life unhappy. Uncovering this message took quite a number of years. Even uncovered, not believing it is still difficult. It affects my behavior towards others. It has developed into an angry rabid inner dog. Whenever I deny that this message is true, no matter what seems to have happened in the ego world, then I am defending Atonement.

ACIM Atonement says that the bad dream never happened; whatever tiny mad idea that thought I had left God was immediately undone. None of us ever sinned. This ego world is an illusion, a bad dream; including our physical bodies. No one is a sinner. We are just stuck in this bad dream.

The Atonement is a difficult concept. I have not explained it here (go read the ACIM Text if you want to know). I only bring it up because it is my way out of the hateful ego world. I am either doomed to a consciousness that thinks it is a pile of crap; or using my mind to defend the fact that this never happened. I am really not a body but a Thought in the Mind of God.

I look at it like this. In my consciousness there is a vast expanse of light. There is also a small area which thinks and acts like a rabid dog. Unfortunately, I spend almost all my time being the rabid dog. I keep myself wrapped in chains and behind bars so I don't hurt anyone. But, most of the time, I think I am the growling dog, snapping at the bars of my cage and dripping froth from my mouth. I want to attack everyone. I hate everyone. The dog hates God for making it thus. I hate the dog and feel guilty and feel like the pile of crap. This is my tiny mad idea. But this is just a tiny portion of my being. The rest, the vast expanse of light is available to me. When I am alone, I return to the light as who I truely am. ACIM is a mind training course. I am training my mind to know itself as light, not as the rabid dog.

I can return to my Beginning if I am willing to give up my dog habit. Being the dog is just a habit. No matter what the dog does, it is a dream. This mindset is defending the Atonement. The Atonement is truth. Accepting Atonement returns me to light. My Beginning is light. If I defend it instead of believing I really am the dog, I am free. I wake up.

Angry Misfit finds Inner Peace

Yesterday I was in emotional turmoil because someone didn't like my critical and forceful attitude (read politically incorrect). I took some words from their e-mail to me and thought, "They think I am an angry misfit (toward their organization)." I went to meditate and listen to some thoughts other than my own. After a brief while, I became happy that I had been labeled an angry misfit. Ifelt elated and at peace. "Yes I am," came screaming our of my psyche.

I am a long distance runner; not an over-weight, pansey assed, donut eater. I have an attitude which incessantly pushes my personal performance envelope; instead of living in comfortable mind-numbing complacency. Other people do not like to encounter this attitude because it pushes and doesn't give. It feels rigid because it has standards. The attitude is one of insisting on vibrant life; not mediocrity.

I felt free and peaceful with this realization because I was finally accepting of myself. All my life, I've tried to hem myself in because my attitude scares others; especially since it is combined with a quick intelligence and dry wit. But, hemming myself in has produced anger. Accepting the attitude as the very power and life blood of my essence helped me to feel free and well towards myself. I am in inner peace because I've accepted my essence.

As I accepted my essence, I realized that I had been carrying around some egotized and dogmatic programming of what a peaceful person appears to be. Say the word peace and I project some quiet person who always says nice things and never gets upset. This image is based on society's programming because society doesn't want any boat shakers around. I realized that just because you rock the boat doesn't mean you don't have inner peace. Inner peace and outer peace are not the same thing. Outer peace, the image of perfection, is an ego invention. Inner peace is truth. Inner peace simply exists. Inner peace is found by accepting yourself exactly as you are; ceasing to fight. As I cease to fight myself, I won't appear angry to others.

Emotional Misfit

• Ingenious thinking is not the truth that shall set you free, but you are free of the need to engage in it when you are willing to let it go.
• The prayer for forgiveness (looking beyond the ego world) is a request that you may be able to recognize what you already have.

I don't fit into human groups. Often I'm too smart for them. Often I can't participate in self destructive behavior like overeating, especially the eating of preservatives. I am not interested in superficial conversations. I see movies and TV as "programming" and guard my mind from it. I don't belong to a standard religion. I don't have family activities. I consume very little. I really believe this ego world is a bad dream, an illusion.

I am a person who has allowed emotions which others hide to surface into my conscious mind. This means I am aware of my hatred and fear of others. This means I react less violently than others because I pray about the emotions before hand. Really, emotions and "ingenious thinking" feel the same and perhaps they are. Or, the ingenious thinking is an inner expression of defensiveness coming from fear and hatred.

But, the option of asking Jesus to direct my thinking is very much in the forefront of my consciousness too. I am willing to give up my human thinking in favor of an intuitive thought inspiration or decision.

In this way, I live moment to moment; staying alive in relative peace; not accomplishing anything; putting in the miles of my life's self transcendence race; hoping to arrive in the Hands of my Self.

The Long Road

This week I ran 78 miles (126 k). Yesterday I ran 23 miles and today I ran 16 miles.

One stretch of road was long flat and straight with 8 foot corn on both sides. It was hot by then and my legs were tired. It was then that the Universe got my attention. I realized how I've been thinking that this week at work will be the week from hell. I realized I'd already decided that; but in a metaphysical reality, I can change my mind. If I change my mind and turn my mind over to Something Bigger, I don't have to live in a hellish prison of anger, hate and fear this week.

The anger hate and fear are mine. I have help as soon as I face them head on (consciously) and ask Something Bigger for some other way of thinking. I have to quit pretending they are not there. I have to quit denying the hateful thoughts or they tear me up from the inside with the eventual bad reaction to some real person.

This moment of clarity produced a moment of prayer and gratitude (I am off the hook of my own thinking). Funny how it takes 2 1/2 hours of running in the hot sun to finally wear away the ego control and hear what Something Bigger has to say.

• It is essential that you realize that your thinking will be erratic until a firm commitment is made to light. The strength to bring your mind under Jesus' guidance comes from your undivided decision.
• This is a Course in mind training.
• An imprisoned mind is not free because it is held back by itself. The mind can only miscreate when it believes it is not free.
• The way to correct distortions is to withdraw your faith in them and invest it only in what is true.
• Nothing can prevail against a Son of God who commends his spirit into the hands of his Father. By doing this the mind awakens from its sleep and remembers its Creator.

The Day After 08/08

• When everything you retain is lovable, there is no reason for fear to remain with you. This is your part in the Atonement.

Meeting makers only make it if they understand why they went to the meeting.

I ran 23 miles this morning. It was great weather, cloudy and 70F. This evening, I might go to a meeting. I've gone to meetings for 23 years. Something must have happened there or I wouldn't be here.

Time

I am wandering in a corridor of time. The corridor has various rooms which can be entered. When I was younger, I went into various rooms. Some were called "successful career," "Harley Davidson," "monastery," "somebody's girlfriend," or "be somebody." Many people go in these rooms, find they like them and stay there. I never became satisfied with any of these rooms. Now I view them as forms of unconsciousness, mind-numbing entertainment. Now I view unconsciousness as a hinderance or a jail for growth of the mind.

But, if you refuse these rooms of entertainment, you are left with a corridor of nothing. I am not involved in anything. Sure, I go to work everyday and have a few other activities; but my time is often spent staring at nothing. I listen to silence. I don't relieve boredom by shopping, eating, reading, talking on the phone, TV or even internet surfing. I just let the time go by with as empty a mind as possible. Time goes past. I have ceased accomplishing anything.

I have reached the heights of human experience. This is it: nothing, silence, waiting, wandering an endless corridor of sameness. No one knows what love is.

I am not bound to the world. What a remarkable thing that is. Yet, I do not know what I am. I cannot translate the condition of freedom into words (as yet).

My Dream

I always wanted to be a mystic. Somehow this dream got started in my teenage years as I read Dune and Carlos Castaneda. It continued on into college as I smoked dope and dreamed of finding a higher consciousness in Strawberry Fields. "Who are you" rang forever in my head. "I am woman" was often the answer; inless it was "I don't want to live like a refugee." Or there were other answers provided by Jefferson Starship or Tom Petty or ELO. Anything from Mick Jagger was a nightmare. Mainly I felt jealous of others who seemed to be making it. On the outside, I appeared to be making it. I was president of a student association, awarded outstanding senior at a large university, awarded scholarships, ran a marathon, graduated with honors and got a job. Yet, on the inside I was an emotional disaster. It would have ended there in a pool of alcohol except...


After my senior year and before my graduate year, I spent six weeks in Israel on an archaeological dig. I certainly had my fill of beer while I was there. But I also discovered religion and I came home wondering who God was.


That question about God consumed all of my life after that, and it still does. I searched standard Catholic Christianity. I searched John of the Cross. I searched new age channelers. I searched Harley Davidson. I searched illicit sex. I searched monastic life (4 years in a monastery). I searched money and power and things.


I now have a practice of silence and a study of A Course in Miracles. I have been sober for 23 years. I run ultra-marathons. I work in a crummy chemical plant as an environmental engineer and sole female in operations management among a bunch of red necks. I live in a dinky house in a dinky town. I marginalize myself in every possible way. My modus is to shamelessly follow Jesus; which means to lose your life through renunciation of the ego world, including religion.


My one unique thought I got in a dream: Love is the predominate mode of existance.

• ...inducing the mind to give up its miscreations is the only application of creative ability that is truly meaningful.

Not-going-along

In real life I am a law abiding taxpayer. Perhaps the purpose of this blog is to give me a place where I can break the rules. I am already marginalized, but I rarely say what I want; there is always someone to dis-believe Truth. So here, I can just say it and not care.

The spiritual world really does exist and anyone really can focus their awareness there instead of here in this crummy ego world. Just do it.

Nothing to Call Myself

Father, I pray for an intuitive thought, inspiration or decision.

• The Atonement is a total commitment.
  
• The Atonement can only be accepted within you by releasing the inner light.

You will notice I make no attempt to properly quote my sources. This is a blog and in it I am free. Take what you want and leave the rest. It must not be important for you to know where I got anything. I will say that I hardly ever have an original thought. The one thing I want, an original thought, has been conditioned over so well by society. I am left with silence and nothing; with no attempt to grasp.

August 2, 2008 - A Start

• To change your mind means to place it at the disposal of true Authority.
• The miracle is a sign that the mind has chosen to be led by me (Jesus) in Christ's service.
• All shallow roots must be uprooted.
• Only perfect love exists.
• Offer miracles.