When the Mind Attacks.
I have forgotten what I really am, for I mistook my body for myself. Sickness is a defense against the truth. But I am not a body. And my mind cannot attack. So I can not be sick.
In lessons 135 through 137 in A Course in Miracles, we begin to understand that the body is limited, is not carrying this spirit nor can it contain “what” we are.
What’s made very clear, as in Non-Dual practice, is that the reason for this suffering is the belief that we are separate; the cause, as Buddhism confirms in the Four Noble Truths, is in the quality of the thought.
Here’s how it works:
This thought (without awareness of “what you are”), can pull you so far away from “what you are” that you believe you are separate; and so you are forced to defend this body, which reinforces the feeling that you are alone and separate.
In turn, you create a wall that separates you from others and the world - take actions that reinforce that belief, which creates thicker and more elaborate walls.
So now you're even farther away from the truth.
In this way, this idea of “who” you think you are is very limited - not what's going to lead you toward what you desire most - peace, love, happiness. What's going to lead you is called by many names - Loving Awareness, God’s Being, the Inner Teacher, or Christ Consciousness.
Do not confuse the flavor of the name with the essence of returning home. This is an embodiment, not a cognition.
I inhabited this Isness a while back during a Trusted Source meditation led by Tim Kelly that really challenged my idea and beliefs about this essence that misappropriated the meaning that kept me from finding my way home.
In it, I sat at the ridge of a delta, encircled by a threshold of twigs and stones, and saw in the distant horizon, Christ rising out of a valley of wildflowers - in each hand, he held a “part” of me - a “certain” memory of myself.
On his right was my seven-year-old girl on the cusp of losing her emotional innocence and connection with nature. And on his left, my 11-year-old girl was on the cusp of losing her spiritual innocence and her connection with her body.
This experience intimately revealed the sickness that kept me from the ways that made me holy.
What became clear to me was that there was a man named Jesus, and he walked this earth and he had a story just like you and me and anyone else: he was a carpenter just living his dharma until one day he saw great hypocrisy in his world. And what he realized was that he would not be able to recognize the hypocrisy of others unless it existed in himself - that this was the only way to change that world. And the way back home to that Self was through forgiveness, compassion, and courage.
In this way, his story is the investigation and the return to the Enlightened Self.
The resonance of this awakening far exceeds the “idea” of Christ - is eternal not just bound in his body - and is something that we share (regardless of religion or language or belief). This is what the Course is pointing toward - that if we believe that Christ is separate from us, then he becomes a belief - becomes a religion that we need to defend in all sorts of ways and we miss the blessing altogether.
That’s when we get all “up in everybody's business” - telling them “who” they should love and “what” is sanctioned by God and “what” is not - and “who” is chosen and “who” is not - what is murder and what is “not” - not realizing that each time we judge another, or believe that we are here to save another, we are redefining this separation and simultaneously attacking ourselves. We are making ourselves “sick”.
The more we tell the story, the deeper it gets.
And we do this in all sorts of ways:
By organizing the present, like on New Year's Eve when I had an unexpected guest for dinner that “disrupted” my perfectly set table, which is something that I really “pride” myself upon.
Though I stumbled, again, and wasn’t as graceful as I would wanted to be, I was met with loving acceptance from my friends. As I fiddled with the settings, they forgave me, which put me at ease and returned me to grace.
Or by activating the past, the way I was gripped on my birthday again this year when my oldest friends forgot for days; or how guilt disguised itself as regret on the anniversary of my mother’s death and pulled me into its rip tide.
We cannot escape deeply ingrained beliefs if we do not bring them into the light.
And how about in the ways that we attempt to plan for the future without guidance, being drilled by a taskmaster?
I did that recently. It was right before Thanksgiving, and I was feeling the force of the holidays and end of the year coming and was looking around myself, as Bill wrote up his resolutions - comparing (ugh!), like, “What have I done this year? I've done nothing. Nothing! I haven’t taught. I haven't written a word of this “book’. I haven't even begun!”
And, all the things that I haven't done came spilling in and this mind couldn't take it (where was Moses when I needed him!)
So, what did I do?
I attempted to plan this class without a guide. Who was the leader? My ego. I did it out of fear. I did it because the voice in my head that said, “If you go another year without teaching - what does that mean?” was louder than the Silence that was available to lead me to where I am meant to be. And that just brought me back to the realization that I have a choice on “who” to listen to and “what” everything means.
If that meaning doesn't serve me then I need to investigate.
That's what I'm doing here in these words, in these stories, in these intentions. On the outside, it looks like I'm doing “nothing”, though I'm really doing a lot of work on the inside — this work is helping me to connect to my wisdom and awaken to my True Identity - the one we share.
Don’t forget, wisdom is connected to intuition - we can't access wisdom without it. Intuition is the portal and it ain’t got nothing to do with the knowledge that I have, though it becomes a golden path that returns me to OZ and the realization that I have always been whole, healed, and available.
And, to be clear, it is a metaphysical portal into the physical - not a physical portal into the metaphysical - which tells us something of great import, that, as Pierre Teilhard de Chardin pointed out, “We are not human beings having a spiritual experience,” rather, “We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”
So, we have to start shifting the way that we see and do things - to recognize that “trying” to change the outside is futile when you’re disconnected from the inside. I could keep changing my clothes and I could lose weight, or I could have a wildly successful Course or even win the Lotto, but inevitably, when I “get” to that place that my head “wants” to be - when I keep putting “that” above “what” I am right Now - I keep myself separate: I put that “want” above what I already AM.
Sound Familiar? Yup! This pings us right back into the illusion of Happiness!
And it's this realization that becomes the key, door, and threshold of intuition. It’s a process: as curiosity grows, courage rises and we start investigating the past, and then we start recognizing that our beliefs were really “less than”, and, “Hey, that's why life feels ‘less than’”.
And then we really recognize the purpose of sickness - how it perpetuates the separate state and ego which veils our True Nature; there is great strategic quality to this attack!
The body is a soldier and will question no command.
I’m not talking about dis”ease”. I’m not saying that if there's something going on in the body - physiologically, organically, or psychologically - that it shouldn't be addressed with medicine.
It must not be ignored for the benefit of some idea!
However, like soil that has a lot of clay in it obstructing new growth, maybe we need not address it initially with chemicals - maybe those chemicals disrupt the natural process - maybe we “should” aerate it or let in some weeds to break it open — maybe we need to actually dig, do it mechanically.
There are certain things that cannot be a stand-in for the original - a card or gift is only an idea of what it is that we want to give, as an emotion is only the energy of that idea that wants to be received.
The way we are human beings: we cannot replace that with a computer. Can we facilitate more accuracy with a computer? Absolutely. Can computers relieve us from physical burdens? Yes!
However, if we begin to replace our stories of humanity, with some programming from the external, (which is happening in all sorts of ways) then the plains will flood, and we will forget again; and we will continue to get “sick” and to believe that we are that sickness - my anxiety, my ADHD, my stress - me, me, me with no concrete path of reconciliation!
We will believe that we are all these separate parts and we will become captive - captivated - and even haunted by this script, this illusion that won't allow for the change that “we are”.
The trap is in believing the thought. The release is in being aware of the trap. And the healing is in the courage to see how you have been participating in the game all along.