Miracles Principles #11—Prayer is the medium of miracles. It is a means of communication of the created with the Creator. Through prayer love is received, and through miracles love is expressed.“ This principle introduces the idea of prayer, a word not often used in CIM. The Text, Ch. 3, section V, says “the only meaningful prayer is for forgiveness” because forgiveness heals our minds. When we pray to God for something to happen on the level of the body—ours or someone else’s—we are making the body and the world real, which means we’re falling into the ego’s trap. When we say, “This is my problem, God, and I want you to take care of it,” this is the arrogance of the ego speaking. God has already given us All That Is; it is only our thinking that makes that seem not so. A miracle is the “little willingness” to join with the Holy Spirit that thereby joins us with our brother and heals the mind of both—from the ego’s way of seeing to Spirit’s.
Lesson 68—“Love holds no grievances.” This lesson doesn’t try to “lay down the law” or make us feel guilty. It simply tries to motivate us to want to let grievances go by showing us, first, how much pain they bring to our minds and, second, by helping us experience how wonderful it feels to let them go. Because our Self is Love, holding grievances is an act of betrayal. Our Source is Love, and we are created like that Source. When we hold a grievance, we seem to be different from our Source and, therefore, feel cut off from Him. However, the mind can’t quite conceive of a source and its effect being totally different; therefore, to logically cope with the dilemma, we make God over in our own image: angry and vindictive. We dissociate, forget who we are, to ease the pain of constant Self-betrayal. That‘s why CIM teaches that forgiveness is not something we do for others but something we do for ourselves.
Lesson 69—“My grievances hide the light of the world in me.” I am the light of the world, but my light can’t shine out because grievances hide it. When I let my grievances go, it simultaneously releases the light in my brother and in myself. Today’s practice is another attempt to become aware of our Self as God created it. The form of the practice is repeated often in the Workbook. The pattern is one of attempting to move through or past the thoughts that normally occupy our minds and to settle into deep stillness to the Self we’re not normally aware of. This is a CIM method of meditation and one of the tools given to us that can be used even after Workbook practice per se has ended.
Lesson 70—“My salvation comes from me.” It is tempting to lay the blame for my problems somewhere outside myself, and the idea that all of them are in my mind and nowhere else seems preposterous. However, if the source of my problems is outside of me, I am the helpless victim of these outside forces. I can only rant and rave about them. If, however, my problems lie solely in my own mind, then I am capable of doing something about them. In fact, only I can do anything about them and nothing outside of me can prevent me from doing it. I (capital S!) am in complete control and therefore I am already free. The cost of this truth is the realization that the “cavalry” isn’t coming to rescue me. Nor can my position, my money, my spouse, my analyst or my guru. Not even Jesus will do it for me. Jesus is simply a part of my wakened mind. He is me, remembering and reminding me.
Lesson 71—“Only God’s plan for salvation will work.” After being told yesterday that salvation comes from me and only me, it’s a little annoying to be told that only God’s plan will work. But this isn’t really saying anything different. The ego’s plan involves looking outside myself; God’s plan is wholly centered on my change of mind. In God’s plan, salvation comes from me; in the ego’s plan, it comes from any place except me. In the ego’s view, I’m the innocent victim. In the ego’s plan, the mind’s only function is to determine what, outside of me, has to change for me to be saved. The ego looks in every place except where the answer is: in my own mind. God’s plan is that I look for it where it is: in myself.
Lesson 72—“Holding grievances is an attack on God’s plan.” This is a long, tough lesson. The scope of ideas presented here is daunting, even to an experienced CIM student. One primary truth the lesson tries to get across is that we are not bodies. The general thrust of the message is that grievances imply a certain view of life, in which the body is the real source of happiness and God is to be feared because He appears to command us to sacrifice our happiness. In this view, grievances are always about how another body has mistreated us; our happiness depends on how others treat us. This view also implies that God is a body and is intensely focused on getting treated right by other bodies. He demands that we serve Him, obey His commandments, and forego the pleasures of the body as sinful. In the end, He requires us to pay our debts by dying. Given this view, the natural impulse is to run from Him. That’s how grievances attack God’s plan—by inducing us to run from Him.
Lesson 73—“I will there be light.” The desire to attack cannot be our will; it can only be the idle wish of the ego. Our will and God’s will are identical. The wishes of the ego, which oppose the will of God hold limited power. This is why affirmations, based on the ego’s desire to “get” something, at best bring sketchy results. The will of our Self, however, is all-powerful. These lessons attempt to get us in touch with that Self through forgiveness. Forgiveness erases the dark places in our minds that are being projected as dark places in the world, just as a dust mote in a movie projector throws a dark blotch on the screen. The ego sees through a glass darkly. Forgiveness clears that glass so that we can again see God’s perfect creation. That is the will of our eternal Self. That is the will of God.
Lesson 74—“There is no will but God’s.” There is nothing apart from God and His creation. There is no devil, no “evil force” that opposes God. Nothing exists that is independent of Him and therefore capable of having a different will. How can we explain then our common experience of wanting things we think are opposed to God? Or even more down to earth, the experiencing of being torn between conflicting desires? If there is no will but God’s, how is this possible? It isn’t! Unless illusions are involved. When there seems to be a will opposed to God, we are seeing illusions. When we realize our minds cannot be in conflict incredible peace results. (Note the difference [par. 5] between true peace and false peace.)
Included in these lessons:
How to Listen for Guidance
1.
Listen in patience. Don’t give up too soon. Once you have asked Holy Spirit a question, wait patiently. And while you wait, periodically repeat your request. Not to remind a forgetful Holy Spirit, but to renew your own focus and your confidence that you will hear.
2.
Listen with confidence. God wills with you that you hear. Claim what belongs to you!
3.
Listen in deep silence; wait for Him in quiet expectancy. Success in hearing Spirit boils down to this: How still can you get your mind? This stillness, however, should not be passive or lax. Rather, it should be an alert, attentive expectant stillness. Combining a quiet restfulness with a poised alertness is central to the art of listening. Of course, holding your mind in this state is something most of us can’t do for more than a half a minute in the beginning. This is why the Workbook instructs us to draw ourselves back again and again to our focus—as often as we need to—while we develop the art.
Assignment: Text: Read Miracles Principle #12 and read/review Chapter 30, The New Beginning, pp. 625-630 (Introduction, Rules for Decision, and Freedom of Will).
Practical Application: Whenever something or someone disturbs your peace this week, silently say, “Thank you for this opportunity to learn to let go/forgive.”
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