No Forgiveness Necessary

Photo credit: Stephen Shogren

Living in acknowledgement of our unity shows us a new paradigm, a different perception of what we call reality. The opposite of unity, separation, can be described as anything which separates us from Love. Our separation becomes very apparent on occasions such as Valentine's Day. Numerous people I know expressed their disgust for this sweet day of celebration, supposedly because they are not "in love". Someone even said, "Happy too-bad-you're-not-in-love Day!" I had to burst out laughing, because I feel very much in Love! Every moment is an adventure in experiencing the Love which is my Source. I revel in waking up each day and spending time aligning my thoughts with divine Mind/Love. Through this centering, I feel as though I'm having a love affair with all of life. Yes, situations occur which tempt me to revert to a judgmental way of living, and that’s okay. It seems that recognizing this behavior, and reinterpreting my responses, are an important part of learning the metaphysical precepts I’m studying. With enough practice, I hope to have no need to forgive, because I have not condemned. 

“God does not forgive because He has never condemned. And there must be condemnation before forgiveness is necessary. Forgiveness is the great need of this world, but that is because it is a world of illusions. Those who forgive are thus releasing themselves from illusions, while those who withhold forgiveness are binding themselves to them. As you condemn only yourself, so do you forgive only yourself.” 

A Course in Miracles W-46.1:1-5

 "'God is Love.' More than this we cannot ask, higher we cannot look, farther we cannot go. To suppose that God forgives or punishes sin according as His mercy is sought or unsought, is to misunderstand Love ..." 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 6:17-21

Expressions of Love

 

Graphic created by Aaron Springston

On this day when we celebrate love, I am reminded of the amazing ways people are expressing Love all over the world. It's wonderful to hear stories of individuals who see a need and find a way to meet it! I read a story about a man who started a website to track refugees, in order to help others identify people in need and give assistance. Another man has dedicated his life to saving dogs by transporting them to areas of the country where they can find homes. I have vowed to find at least one incidence of good every day -- and good news is everywhere when we’re looking for it! I'm going to take time today to think of all the people I know who are expressing Love and living a life of grace. This grace doesn't need to be expressed in large ways, it only needs to be heartfelt and sincere. Happy Valentine's Day to us all!!

“Love alone can impart the limitless idea of infinite Mind.” 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health  Page 510:18-19

“Where, then, are your real thoughts? Today we will attempt to reach them. We will have to look for them in your mind, because that is where they are. They must still be there, because they cannot have left their source. What is thought by the Mind of God is eternal, being part of creation.” 

A Course in Miracles W-45.3:1-5 

“Every concept which seems to begin with the brain begins falsely. Divine Mind is the only cause or Principle of existence. Cause does not exist in matter, in mortal mind, or in physical forms.” 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 262:28-32

Light Passing Through a Windowpane

Photo courtesy of Alden Stallings

At a recent function, someone leaned in close to me and said something derogatory about another person. I was reminded of Olympia Dukakis in Steel Magnolias when she said, “If you don’t have anything nice to say about anybody, come and sit by me”.  I wanted to say just the opposite and ask this person to go away! But I also wanted to see her comments with the light of Love and interpret them purely rather than through my personal judgment of the words. So I just smiled at her. I was standing there asking Holy Spirit what to say in response, but nothing came to thought, so I didn’t nervously babble something meaningless, nor did I condemn her as I am wont to do. This experience helped me understand that a response is not always necessary. I hope to remember on a daily basis that light is within, not without. My work is to become a clearer transparency from which this light may flow!

“The manifestation of God through mortals is as light passing through the windowpane. The light and the glass never mingle, but as matter, the glass is less opaque than the walls. The mortal mind through which Truth appears most vividly is that one which has lost much materiality — much error — in order to become a better transparency for Truth. Then, like a cloud melting into thin vapor, it no longer hides the sun.” 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 295:16-24

“In order to see, you must recognize that light is within, not without. You do not see outside yourself, nor is the equipment for seeing outside you. An essential part of this equipment is the light that makes seeing possible. It is with you always, making vision possible in every circumstance.”

A Course in Miracles W-44.2:1-4

We Are More

Art by Jane Newland

“Don't abandon yourself. Not when you're sick. Not when you're tired. Not when you've lost the thread, the thought, or the thing you thought defined you. 

You will die many times in one life and create yourself anew. This is natural. This is a gift. I've died a few times now here in this world. The person I was: gone. 

Throw that older skin into the water. Give it to the sky. Step into what wants to emerge now. Nothing can hold you back when you are willing to be yourself.”

Jeannette Enchinias

"[We are] more than a material form with a mind inside, which must escape from its environments in order to be immortal. Man reflects infinity, and this reflection is the true idea of God."

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 258:9-12

“Perception is not an attribute of God. His is the realm of knowledge. Yet He has created the Holy Spirit as the Mediator between perception and knowledge. Without this link with God, perception would have replaced knowledge forever in your mind. With this link with God, perception will become so changed and purified that it will lead to knowledge. That is its function as the Holy Spirit sees it. Therefore, that is its function in truth.”

A Course in Miracles W-43.1:1-7

Pure Vision

Unknown Photographer

"Gut feelings" are often discounted as being invalid, for numerous reasons. Some say they're no more than paranoid thoughts, others may think of them as wishful thinking, but few think of them as divine vision. In this familiar world, we must reinterpret everything we see. Looking at our surroundings with human eyes, hearing with mortal ears, brings to us a false projection of Truth. Discord and inharmony are but misinterpretations we perceive. Through right identification and reinterpretation, we see with a pure vision. As an example, when we see train tracks coming together in the distance, we immediately reinterpret that into the truth of the situation. We know that those tracks aren't coming together and that it will not be dangerous to travel on the train which carries us toward that end. We have been taught to translate many similar situations, and we do not fear them. The metaphysical studies we've embarked upon are doing the same thing: teaching us to recognize misidentification and translate it into Truth. Translating erroneous thought is a present possibility!

“Rise in the strength of Spirit to resist all that is unlike good. God has made man capable of this, and nothing can vitiate the ability and power divinely bestowed on man.”

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 393:12-15

“God is indeed your strength, and what He gives is truly given. This means that you can receive it any time and anywhere, wherever you are, and in whatever circumstance you find yourself. Your passage through time and space is not at random. You cannot but be in the right place at the right time. Such is the strength of God. Such are His gifts.” 

A Course in Miracles W-42.2:1-6

One is a Whole Number

Art by Marianne Faguy

“Deep within you is everything that is perfect, ready to radiate through you and out into the world. It will cure all sorrow and pain and fear and loss because it will heal the mind that thought these things were real, and suffered out of its allegiance to them.” A Course in Miracles W-41.3:1-2

“The capacity to be alone is the capacity to love.

It may look paradoxical to you, but it's not. It is an existential truth: only those people who are capable of being alone are capable of love, of sharing, of going into the deepest core of another person, without possessing the other, without becoming dependent on the other, without reducing the other to a thing, and without becoming addicted to the other.

They allow the other absolute freedom, because they know that if the other leaves, they will be as happy as they are now.

Their happiness cannot be taken by the other,

 because it is not given by the other.”

~ Osho

“Today's idea will eventually overcome completely the sense of loneliness and abandonment all the separated ones experience. Depression is an inevitable consequence of separation. So are anxiety, worry, a deep sense of helplessness, misery, suffering and intense fear of loss.” 

A Course in Miracles - Workbook Lesson #41

“Wilderness: Loneliness; doubt; darkness. Spontaneity of thought and idea; the vestibule in which a material sense of things disappears, and spiritual sense unfolds the great facts of existence.” 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 597:16-19

I Am an Eternal Creation of Love

Beaver Bridge in Beaver, Arkansas

Photo by Stephen Shogren

Why can’t we all just be happy? I’ve heard this question voiced numerous times, and I’ve probably said it a time or two myself. People may tell you that poverty and abuse keep many people from being happy. On the flip side, what of people who have everything a person could want, but yet they are terribly unhappy? When I was a teenager, a friend of the family had a series of unfortunate events occur in her life. In a three-year period, her husband passed on, their house burned down, and then her daughter was in a car accident which left her in a coma for over a year before she died. And she had also lost an infant daughter years before. This woman lived well into her 80s, always happily helping others, and I was told she died with a smile on her face. At the time, I wondered how she did it. I see now that she knew the open secret of Life. With each loved one who passes on, with each beloved animal I’ve known and loved through the years, something is growing more certain within me: they haven’t gone anywhere. Never born, never dying. If there was a beginning, then there must be an end. Seeing myself as a blessed eternal creation of Love brings me joy!

“Can you imagine how beautiful those you forgive will look to you? In no fantasy have you ever seen anything so lovely. Nothing you see here, sleeping or waking, comes near to such loveliness. And nothing will you value like unto this, nor hold so dear. Nothing that you remember that made your heart sing with joy has ever brought you even a little part of the happiness this sight will bring you. For you will see the Son of God. You will behold the beauty the Holy Spirit loves to look upon, and which He thanks the Father for. He was created to see this for you, until you learned to see it for yourself. And all His teaching leads to seeing it and giving thanks with Him.” 

A Course in Miracles T-17.II.1:1-9

“As the reflection of yourself appears in the mirror, so you, being spiritual, are the reflection of God. The substance, Life, intelligence, Truth, and Love, which constitute Deity, are reflected by His creation; and when we subordinate the false testimony of the corporeal senses to the facts of Science, we shall see this true likeness and reflection everywhere.”

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 516:2-8