"Forgiveness is the key to happiness." A Course In Miracles
Around 20 years ago a woman by the name of Helen Schuman channeled a set of books called, "A Course in Miracles". These books were written by Jesus Christ and then telepathically channeled to Helen much like the Alice A. Bailey books were channeled to Alice Bailey from the Master Djwhal Khul.
I can honestly say that in the last twenty two years these two sets of books have had a more profound effect on me than anything else I have ever studied. "A Course in Miracles" is basically a course in attitudinal healing. The basic premise of these books is that there are two ways of thinking or philosophies of life and only two.
Every person in the world falls into one or the other. There is the voice of the spirit or of the Christ, and then there is the voice of the ego. This could also be stated as the voice of your Higher Self or the voice of your lower self; the voice of the Self or the voice of the self; the voice of the big "I", or the voice of the little "i"; the voice of the Holy Spirit or the voice of glamour, maya, and illusion; the voice of the "Self" or the voice of the "not-self"; the voice of the Holy Spirit of the voice of the negative ego.
We are conditioned as children and by society to think and interpret life from the negative ego’s perspective This is why so many people are filled with so many negative feelings, emotions, and lack of inner peace.
"A Course in Miracles" teaches in a very systematic way, how to change and undo the negative ego’s thinking, and how to hence think with your Christ mind. Did not it say in the Bible, "Let this mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus." Jesus, as we know, was a man and human being just like you and I, who became the embodiment of the Christ by becoming one with the Christ consciousness.
The Christ consciousness is not just for Christians. The Christ consciousness, the Buddha consciousness, the Krishna consciousness, God consciousness, and the consciousness of all religions are all the same thing. Many people have a lot of negative programming behind their religious upbringing. It is important here not to get caught up in the words, or semantics. It is also important to understand that whatever religion, or spiritual path you are on, I suggest you keep it.
The new religion of the future is the one that honors and recognizes all religions and all spiritual paths, for they all lead to the same place. The introduction to "The Course in Miracles" states: "This is a Course in Miracles. It is a required course. Only the time you take it is voluntary."
Free will does not mean that you can establish the curriculum. It means only that you can elect what you want to take at a given time. The Course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love for that is beyond what can be taught. It does aim, however, at removing the blocks to the awareness of love’s presence, which is your natural inheritance. The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite.
A Course in Miracles, for most people, is a very difficult book to understand and read. One of my biggest purposes in writing this particular chapter is to take the essence of the Course’s teaching and make it very easy to understand. Even if you never read "A Course in Miracles" you will get the essence of it in this chapter.
I know in my personal spiritual path and evolution, a chapter explaining and summarizing the course in simple to understand language, would have been very beneficial to me. I think you will find this chapter extremely illuminating. I have also expounded on the Course’s teachings to make them more universalistic to all religions and all spiritual paths which a person may be exploring. I have also added many of my own ideas to give the reader a very complete understanding of what the "Christ consciousness" really means.
This course can be summed up very simply in this way:
"Nothing real can be threatened Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the Peace of God."
A Course in Miracles is a required course, the introduction says. What this means is not that everyone has to study "A Course in Miracles", but rather everyone has to learn to think with their Christ, Buddha, Krishna, Elohim, Allah, or God mind. The Lord Sai Baba has said that the definition of God is that "God equals man minus ego."
You cannot pass your spiritual initiations and realize God without transcending the selfish, separative, fear based mind of your ego. The curriculum is set, and "A Course in Miracles" is just one form, or tool, for learning these lessons.
The Course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love for that is beyond what can be taught. It does aim at removing the blocks to the awareness of love’s presence, which is your natural inheritance. This brings us to the core of "A Course in Miracles" teachings which is that God created us, and our true identity is the Christ.
In other words we are each sons and daughters of God, made in God’s image. God is love so we are love. We don’t have to become love, love is what we are. It is only the negative ego programming and conditioning that covers this in us.
We are each like diamonds with mud on us. Our path on earth is to clear away the mud so our true diamond nature can shine. Even Jesus said, in the New Testament, "Everything that I can do, you can do and more." I don’t think He was lying.
The fundamental Christian church has misinterpreted His message. Sure Jesus was the son of God, but so are we. In the Buddhist religion you would say that we each are the Buddha. In the Hindu religion we each are the Atma, or Eternal Self. In the old testament the Jewish prophets said, "Ye are Gods and know it not." They also said "Ye are Gods and children of the Most High." David, in the Psalms, said, "Be still and know, I am God."
This is why "A Course in Miracles" introduction says, nothing real can be threatened and nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the Peace of God. Your true identity as the Christ or the Buddha, or Atma, or Eternal Self cannot be changed. That is how God created you. You can think you are something other than this but this does not change reality. You are the Christ, the Buddha, the Atma, the Eternal Self, whether you like it or not. The reason you have no choice is that you didn’t create yourself, God created you. The spiritual path is really not trying to get any place, it is just the reawakening to who you are. The second step being the practice of being your "Self" in daily life.
Where Did the Negative Ego Come From?
The negative ego did not come from God, it came from man’s misuse of free choice. Man is the only creature that has the ability to think out of harmony with God. The fall that the Bible refers to occurred when we, as Monads, or individualized sparks of God, chose to come into matter. It wasn’t the coming into matter that caused the fall, it was the over-identification with matter. It was that moment when we thought we were a physical body rather than a God being inhabiting or using this physical body.
In thinking we were a physical body, then came the illusion of separation from God, and separation from our brothers and sisters. Then came selfishness, fear, and death as real. From these faulty premises a whole thought system developed that was based on illusion, maya, and glamour.
We have spent hundreds of incarnations caught up in this illusion. The amazing thing is that what "A Course in Miracles" teaches is that the fall never really happened. We just think it did. The basic law of your mind is that it is your thoughts that create your reality. Your feelings, emotions, behavior, and what you attract and magnetize into your life all come from your thoughts.
Is the glass of water half empty or half full? Are you optimistic or pessimistic? Do you look at what happens in life as teachings, lessons, challenges and opportunities to grow, or do you look at things as bummers, problems, aggravations, irritations, and upsets? It is how you think, and interpret, and perceive that will determine how you feel in any given situation.
We have always been the Christ, the Buddha, the Atma, the Eternal Self, and have always been one with God. All of our negative egotistical thinking has not changed this one single bit.
A good metaphor for this could be relating it to dreaming. When you have a nightmare or bad dream at night and wake up from it you are relieved that it was just a dream. When you were dreaming it, however, it seemed so real. Well, I say to you now in this "holy instant", WAKE UP!!!
Wake up from the negative hypnosis you have been living in, thinking you are unworthy, unlovable, inferior, separate from God, powerless… In this holy instant wake and realize that you are the Christ, Buddha, the Atma, the Eternal Self. You have always been and always will be.
The great saint from India, Ramana Maharshi, said that the spiritual path is like a person who comes to Him asking His help in finding a necklace she has lost for the last forty years. Ramana Maharshi says, well, what’s that you are wearing around your neck? The woman, all of a sudden, realized that she had been wearing the necklace all along. Well, that is how the spiritual path is. You don’t have to find God, you already are God and have been all the time. It is the insane voice of the ego, or separative mind that keeps us lost in glamour, maya, and illusion.
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