Andy’s ACIM Summary God is Love. God created Christ Mind.
thoughts I think I think are meaningless. My thoughts are private: generated from my past associations and false beliefs. They create a dark cloud around my mind. I see only projected images.
Truth cannot be described or explained—only experienced. Content or True Meaning (Identity) is Abstract Light, and the world was made to keep it out of awareness. The Divine Principle: Wholeness is real and reality cannot be broken into parts. (The parts do not make up the whole.) Love is a State of Mind that transcends the belief in differences of any kind. Love is Sameness. Love is whole and complete and allencompassing. Love never deviates. Love never changes.
A mind that believes it is an ego, a separate mind, is attacking the unity of God, attacking the Christ within the mind. It uses the body for pride and pleasure (the attraction of guilt) in order to keep the mind distracted on the screen so as to conceal the belief in separation. Although these thoughts are called ‘attack thoughts’ in the workbook, they are not ‘real thoughts’ because they did not come from the mind of God. In reality, the mind cannot attack. God created my mind and I cannot make His Will destructive. There is nothing outside the One mind to attack. I am not a body. The body is only a means of communication.
The purpose of A Course in Miracles is to teach me how to correct my perception by changing my mind about the world. Accepting the Holy Sprint’s purpose of forgiveness brings me inner peace.
Wrong-mindedness is seeing causation in form (a mental sickness), a metaphysical error. It is experiencing the illusion as if it were real. For example, if someone steps on my foot and my toe hurts, the cause of the pain is really the guilt I feel about separation from God that I projected onto the situation and instantly forgot having done so. I did it to myself. I decided to feel pain in my toe so I could appear the victim and blame someone for attacking my innocence.
Mind Asleep The ‘tiny mad idea,’ separation from God, has become an unconscious belief that directs all subsequent decisions. The deceived mind, feeling tremendous guilt and fear about the imagined separation, fell asleep and dreamed. It now believes it is the ego, and projects guilt on the screen of the dualistic world, where it is perceived as an attack by the further fragmented mind that believes it is the projected image of a person, ‘me.’ What I project I believe.
My mind reads meaning into what it perceives. I believe that events happen to me. This is backwards thinking. My perceptual problem makes my life unmanageable.
There is one ego thought system, which I have adopted. The false self or ego is both an image-maker and the images it makes. It is based on the false premise that there are causes apart from the mind and that I, the person on the screen, am at their mercy. Everything in the cosmos is false. No form has individual existence. There is no mind in matter. No form is causative. Cause is not in the world. There is no world, only a hallucination. The body is just an image; it doesn’t live. The ego would keep me wrapped in time, the future a continuation of the past. The ego’s goal is hell and death.
Perception proceeds from the purpose the mind chooses. Purpose is my only choice. How I feel is the result of a present decision of mind; either • I choose to perceive with the purpose of the ego, separation or • I choose to perceive with the Purpose of the Holy Spirit, forgiveness. Whenever I am upset, I am choosing the purpose of the ego, choosing fear and separation. I need to heal the ego’s dark lens (belief system) that I use to look at the world. The correction of fear is my responsibility.
The ego believes in form and puts value on possessions. ‘I’ believe I can make my own reality by judging, picking and choosing. A hierarchy of illusions is the only grievance. All judgment is attack because it denies unity of mind. Preferences and opinions are statements of ‘my own version of reality.’ Nothing in form is good or bad. It is all the same, all one tapestry. It is all illusion. To label part of it good is to make part of the illusion real. All judgment invites fear. All thoughts of consequences, desirable or undesirable, are merely self-concept thoughts (judgments) about the dream. They have nothing to do with my Real Self. ‘I’ do not know my best interests. I do not know what anything means and the
The script is written. I see only past illusions. If anything in the script seems unsettling, it is just another chance to notice the mind’s attachment to the ego self concept. My one core problem is mis-identity. I think I am a separate self, a guilty usurper. I use the projected world of form as defense to hide from God. I forget the Light. As the subject/person/self construct I am lonely and afraid. I feel the need for something outside of myself to 1
project them, and they dissolve. Surrender every attempt to manipulate or control the world and to fix brothers and sisters—and hatred vanishes along with the belief that something 'needed' to be manipulated or controlled or fixed. Use the body only to reach other minds who believe they are bodies and teach them it is not so.
fill me up. ‘I’ equate my money and possessions with my self worth. A special relationship is a possessive attempt to find completion in another person, codependency, and it always includes hate. It is an attempted substitute for God’s Love and attempts to make God guilty of abandonment. To reach out in this world for love is an attempt to hold on to the past and try to make it work. It is an attempt to cover over the fear of aging and death (and separation). But these and all other idols are false. I still must face loneliness, illness and death. Even mild discomfort is the attraction of death.
Holy Relationship is holding the Purpose of acceptance and non-judgment firmly in mind. In the world, the ‘self’ is seen to be important. Everything is used to maintain the subject-object split. The ego is very attached to its personhood and fearful of letting it go. “Who would I be?” My self-concept is a construction: male, English-speaking, etc. that makes it different from all the others. This leads to comparison, competition or compromise. My need for career goals and concern for my appearance spring from this same subject/object split. I must step back and let go of constructs and futile expectations.
My mind is split, attempting to hold two opposing thought systems: the ego and the Holy Spirit. This is chaos. My mind tries to bring order by ordering the thoughts/projected images. This is stressful.
Gentle Awakening
The Observer (of thoughts) is the mind. I can let go of the ‘self’/person/observer seeing objects. Although mind at first will say, “I can’t let go; I am those thoughts,” mind can be trained to watch thoughts without the assumption of personhood and personality traits. I can close my eyes, focus on a Course lesson and watch the frantic nature of the mind. With persistence, there is a calming down. The outer world and the inner world are not different. I can watch the thought-forms without attachment, step back, and dis-identify from the script of the world. My Witness/Observer will see form as a mere construct.
I need to step back and see that what I perceive is simply thoughts in my mind projected out. I can observe those thoughts without believing in them. I can watch them as a stream of thoughts without ordering them or giving them meaning. The world is made up in my mind by my association of isolated thought forms, e.g. that chair is made for a body to sit in. The ego ‘self’ has all kinds of meanings for each thought form. I can let go of all of those associations because they are not real. The ego uses the world as q distraction device so that I will not look within.
The split is in the mind, not out in the world. As a ‘person’ I am invested in the ‘self’ construct because I fear loss of it. I am tied into ways of the world like upward mobility. I believe the ‘self’ serves me. (It doesn’t.) My peace turns to upset. I need to honestly look at my emotions and question all constructs. I step back and dis-identify: “I thought that was me, but that’s not true.” It is the ‘self’ that asks questions such as “What’s wrong with my life?” The construct is asking the question! So it is not a question. It is a statement by the construct that it is real. The problem is non-existent. When I see the ‘self’ construct as a construct in the mind, not as reality, the split is healed.
God placed the Holy Spirit, the voice for God, in my mind. The mind is whole when in pure abstraction. It has no association of thought forms. Love is the Thought behind the form. All is perfect right now. I am not the ‘subject’ person perceiving a problem in the objective world. The problems are actually perceptual problems in the mind. Many unconscious assumptions come along with the belief that I’m a ‘person.’ I am preoccupied with my self-image/self-concept and work at it continually. If I see something in the world infringing on me, my defensiveness comes up. Identity confusion, or the Authority Problem, is the root of all anger. When I identify with the ego, I feel its emotions. The ego is angry with God for not granting reality to the time/space cosmos. This, and the related belief that it is in competition with God, are too threatening for the ego to allow into awareness. So the ego uses events in form, such as the unreturned "love" of the special relationship to attempt to justify anger until the deeper hatred at God and fear of God is exposed. In looking deeper, the "original error" is uncovered and the ineffectiveness of the special relationship becomes acute in awareness. Let angry feelings come up. Look with the Holy Spirit at the beliefs that produce anger so as to go past them and be free of them. Do not protect or
The mind can embrace the idea of letting go of the ‘self’ and of linear time simultaneously, right now. In the Holy Instant all is perfect. All associations of thought forms are in the past. Ordering of thought is what makes future worries seem real and fearful. Give up ordering right now and all my problems have been solved! Now I see the hope of bringing all upset to an end. I am called by Jesus to be a teacher of God. The Holy Spirit will use the world for the purpose of healing and my awakening. The Holy Spirit will tell me what to do. This higher calling gives meaning to my life, inspires me 2
illusion be accepted: forgiveness of what never happened in Reality. Forgive illusions and hatred has vanished. Yet to forgive, it must be recognized that illusions are one, for there is no partial forgiveness in Atonement. Either forgiveness is complete or illusions are believed to be real.
and brings intrinsic joy, making it easy to let go of attachments and false beliefs. Forgiveness gives me the purpose of healing, a meaning in the mind given to everything in form. Forgiveness reveals the impossibility of the belief in ordering thought-forms or a hierarchy of illusions. I withdraw my focus from appearances. The abstract unified goal of peace defines a state of being that is beyond belief, in which I see constructs as illusions and nothing real as outside of me. All is one, all the same, no choices, nothing to defend. I experience unity and joy in the present moment.
Healing is right-mindedness, which is seeing only the mind as causative. Trust in the Holy Spirit is always rewarded by peace of mind. Trust would settle every problem now. True meditation is emptying the consciousness of all its contents. I let the Holy Spirit purify my heart. I follow His voice. Prayer is a giving up of myself to be at one with Love. The Holy Instant is a Still Thought in God.
To heal the ego belief system I unlearn it from the bottom up and retrain my mind. Applying the workbook lessons helps me to transfer the Divine Principle to everything I experience. I watch my mind and bring all my problems, questions and decisions to the Holy Spirit, who helps me to forgive, to see the false as false. I let go of all judgments; I let go of all meaning I have given everything. I let go of the self-concept. I undo the ego. I cease to invest in it. I discern and vigilantly follow the Holy Spirit’s Purpose of forgiveness. I ask to see peace and experience miracles, kind, gentle glimpses of all as one. A miracle is the opposite of the ego in every way. The miracle, however, sees the sameness of the thoughts and images. When 100% detached, there is no longer a subject and there is peace.
Past and future do not exit. Now is the only time there is. Now is my point of power. Heaven is the awareness of Perfect Oneness. Perfection is here and now. I relax into it. As a teacher of God I keep my purpose in mind: maintaining the Holy Spirit’s unified perspective in which all things work together for good, watching my mind and forgiving any judgment, upset, defense, ordering of thought, preference, wrong-mindedness or any other attack on God. I am healed as I help others to heal. “There is one thought in particular that should be remembered throughout the day. It is a thought of pure joy; a thought of peace, a thought of limitless release, limitless because all things are freed within it.” M-16.6
I trace back my false beliefs to speed up my unlearning. I see that I am not a figure in the dream but the dreamer of the dream. The happy dream is like a lucid dream in which the dreamer is aware of dreaming. The Holy Spirit would have me look lovingly upon the present, free of the past, in the blissful reality of now.
“Do not see error. Do not make it real. Select the loving and forgive the sin by choosing in its place the face of Christ. For as you see the Son you see yourself, and as you see yourself is God to you.” S-2.I.3.
Although goals and ambitions seem practical in the world, they aim at future outcomes, and hence are clearly ego motivations. Present Peace is the only goal worth desiring. The experience of Present Peace results from listening only to the Spirit within, and to the Spirit there is no tomorrow. I give faith to a unified Purpose and remember One Self as Spirit. If I feel driven to do things, it is because I have a fear of consequences. So I examine what I believe. As long as I hold fearful beliefs as true, my thoughts and actions will be fear-driven.
“Once you accept His plan as the one function that you would fulfill, there will be nothing else the Holy Spirit will not arrange for you without your effort.” T-20.IV.8. “It is at this moment that complete salvation is offered you, and it is at this moment that you can accept it. This is still your one responsibility. Atonement might be equated with total escape from the past and total lack of interest in the future. Heaven is here. Heaven is now.” M-24.6.
Forgiveness is a miracle and it releases the mind from fear of consequences. I let the Holy Spirit’s Purpose of healing and awakening gently guide me, and ‘I’ll never feel driven again!’ Value not one belief the ego sponsors and enjoy the experience of Divine Ease. Not one seeming difficulty but will melt away before I reach it. Accept Present Bliss as my Purpose, and watch how bright the world seems in awareness. “Seek not to change the world, seek rather to change your mind about the world.”
I desire to awaken. I forgive all illusions. True forgiveness is the complete relinquishment of judgment. I turn all decisions over to the Holy Spirit. My decision is made for the whole Sonship. Atonement, the correction of perception, is the experience that the separation never happened; accepting myself as God created me. I am God’s Son, complete and healed and whole, shining in the reflection of his love. Atonement is a lesson in sharing and the gateway to heaven. I accept the Atonement for myself, and everyone goes with me.
Only acceptance is asked, that Christ may recognize Christ. And for this it is only necessary that the last 3
I awaken now!
Divine Silence simply Is. Time is simultaneous. Clarity is now. The happiness of the Real Me is the experience of this moment; it is everlasting joy!
Wrong Mind (Split/deceived mind) fear of God belief in separation, which includes: - wanting to be the author of myself - believing I am a body/person - projecting images, then perceiving - judging separate parts - ordering thoughts and preferences (These make the subject/object split seem real)
Right Mind (My function, m y purpose and m y happiness) I am mind. (Dreamer of dream) I watch m y mind and become aware of these problems.
(Their cause is wrong-mindedness)
I see they are false constructs of a false belief system, and I accept the undoing of them. I forgive them and m y Self by asking the Holy Spirit for a miracle. I experience peace.
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