What anything means

The Course says:

“When your peace is threatened or disturbed in any way, say to yourself:

I do not know what anything, including this, means.
And so I do not know how to respond to it.
And I will not use my own past learning as the light to guide me now.

By this refusal to attempt to teach yourself what you do not know, the Guide Whom God has given you will speak to you. He will take His rightful place in your awareness the instant you abandon it, and offer it to Him” (T-14.XI.6:6-11).

I am going through some distressing times at the Unity Church of which I am a member, with co-ministers at odds with one another, and a Board that accepted the resignation of one minister and then turned around and terminated the other. I happen to love one of the ministers and feel the other was the real problem, but as my Course group meets at the church, and I have been studying for the last five years to become a Licensed Unity Teacher (sponsored by the other minister), I find myself trying to figure out what I should do.

This is just the kind of situation that makes it clear how wise the Course is. I can't possibly know everyone's motives. I can't evaluate every factor and determine what is the one best possible outcome for all concerned. But the Holy Spirit can! I need to "step back and let Him lead the way." I need to realize that I don't know what anything means, nor how to respond to it, and nothing I have learned from the past makes me capable of knowing how to respond. I need to go within, to consult the Guide, and to act from that place of inner wisdom. That is the only way I can proceed, and it is a way that takes all the pressure from me. Just step back, and let Him lead. Ah! Peace!

A Clean Slate

"Every loveless thought must be undone" (T-5.VI.9:2).

Mark 2:21   ‘No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on to an old garment; if he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and leaves a bigger hole. 22 No one puts new wine into old wineskins; if he does, the wine will burst the skins, and then wine and skins are both lost. New wine goes into fresh skins.’ (Revised English Bible)

A Course in Miracles insists that every last ego thought must be erased in order for the Truth of our Identity to fully dawn upon us. When Jesus lived in the flesh, his teaching about old garments and old wineskins was saying much the same thing. You can't take a new thought and patch it into your old thought system. Like the unshrunk cloth patch, trying to graft a fresh thought into your old thought system will just tear a hole in that thought system and leave you with nothing usable. Same with the wine; "wine (new thought) and skins (old thought system) are both lost."

When I first began reading the Course, I tried to take parts of it and fit them into my then-current thought system, a Christian evangelical thought system based on a view of the Bible as inerrant. The result was that the Course's thoughts tore holes in that old thought system. But at the same time, I could not really grasp hold of the Course. I could not really "get" it. It wasn't until I was willing to let go of the old and embrace the new that the Course started to become clear to me. The Course says this in another even more emphatic way:

"This course will be believed entirely or not at all. For it is wholly true or wholly false, and cannot be but partially believed. " (T-22.II.7:4-5).

As we read the Course, then, let us release our old thoughts. As Jesus admonishes us,

"Simply do this: Be still, and lay aside all thoughts of what you are and what God is; all concepts you have learned about the world; all images you hold about yourself. Empty your mind of everything it thinks is either true or false, or good or bad, of every thought it judges worthy, and all the ideas of which it is ashamed. Hold onto nothing. Do not bring with you one thought the past has taught, nor one belief you ever learned before from anything. Forget this world, forget this course, and come with wholly empty hands unto your God" (W-pI.189.7:1-5).

Let us strive to be "fresh skins," with minds that are flexible, stretchable, and ready to grow. If we come with nothing, we will find everything.

Happy Learners

Accepting myself where I am in my growth

I'm supposedly trying to lose weight, but overnight, I went up two pounds. Obviously I didn't watch what I was eating very well yesterday! My ego wants me to feel guilty about it. But the Course teaches us that guilt is never helpful. "...you must learn that guilt is always totally insane, and has no reason" (T-13.X.6:3). " It tells us that we must be happy learners, and that "learning is living here" (T-14.III.3:2).

To me, that means that when we "fail" to do something we know we should do, like blowing the diet, our self-forgiveness needs to be immediate. The ego want us to learn that we are guilty; the Holy Spirit wants us simply to learn that what we did didn't work, and we no longer want to do it.

"Living here," in this world in which we have mistaken ourselves for bodies, has only one purpose: learning. Learning that we are not bodies, that we are not guilty, and that we have never changed ourselves. We are still God's perfect creations.

Where to buy my books

I've set up an Amazon author's page. You can find all of my books that are currently available on Amazon here:

https://www.amazon.com/author/allenwatson

You can also find these book, plus e-book versions of more books that are out of print, at Circle of Atonement's bookstore website: http://www.circleofa.org/bookstore/index.php

You won't find all my books by searching on my name; you'll need to scroll through the books and e-books to find them all. Soon, I will be providing links on this site for all my books, but until then, this is the best way to go.

New URL for this blog

You may now access this blog through its own URL: www.miraclethoughts.net.

This is part of a process I am engaging in to beef up my Internet presence. I also have another website where I am currently posting my commentaries on the Text, which are a work in progress. That site is http://allen-watson.com.

It's about time to re-activate this blog and to start posting things on a somewhat regular basis. Today, just this note to WATCH THIS SPACE. I'll be posting fairly regularly from now on.

Just checking in

It's been a long time (March) since I posted anything here, and I figured I should at least plunk down a place-holder message saying I'm still alive and the blog isn't dead. I'm in the process of starting a private blog for a group of Unity Church students who took a class and are now doing some spiritual practice as follow-up, and need a place to share experiences and thoughts. That reminded me that I had not said anything here for months.

The major thing of note, for me, is my involvement with Unity classes, with a view to becoming a Licensed Unity Teacher. This will authorize me to teach classes in Unity churches and at Unity School in Missouri. There's a chance I will put together a 10-hour class on an Intro to ACIM and teach it both locally and at Unity Village. I'm also mulling over various possible classes and writings involving the relationship of the Course with the Bible, or on interpreting the Bible from an ACIM viewpoint. I've been rather amazed at how well Unity metaphysics dovetails with the Course, even to the point of stating that God did not create the physical universe. I'm more comfortable in this group than I've been in any other for a long time.