ACIM ~ Video. Dis-Ease is NOT part of the plan

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Permalink Reply by Eugene OV member Admin on April 9, 2012 at 6:00pm

Thank you Sébastein for sharing this with us.

For the record let me apologize for neglecting the invites of late. For the first part of this long weekend I had no connection and when I finally had it restored I realized that our service providers set us to a slow crawl over the long weekend. When I open a page it times out.

Hopefully they will reset it when the workday begins in another two hours.

warm regards.

Permalink Reply by Sébastien on April 9, 2012 at 9:01pm

Eugene, no need to apologize, I am grateful you gave me the opportunity to redo the Workbook which I hadn't done in 4 years, by inspiring this group, and to share with others. Forgiveness opportunity abounds, including with internet providers :-). be well, Sebastien

Permalink Reply by Christiane Morin on April 9, 2012 at 6:44pm

here is Easter now...Long week, with people complaining...Even so, the situation here ( Greece) will get worst...I will pass Easter in meditation...Just decided!  :-)

Permalink Reply by Sébastien on April 11, 2012 at 4:34pm

From ACIM perspective, that's what the thought system of separation (ego) wants us to believe: that our body exists, has an intelligence of its own, separate from our mind and our true reality, which is perfect Spirit. While appearing to be in a body is indeed our experience, the Course teaches us that this experience is not true, and invite us to look at the Cause (our mind, seemingly separated from its Source) rather than the Effect (our experience of suffering, sickness and death as a body), and to make a correction: to change our mind and return to God. 

here are some Q&A from Facim on this topic:

http://www.facimoutreach.org/qa/indextoquestions.htm

Q #14: Please explain the many passages about healing that seem to refer to healing of the body. It seems to me that, although the Course is very clear about the process of healing our minds of the misperception of our reality, it is equally clear that a healthy body is an effect of a mind that is healed. How does this translate into our personal lives as Course students? I would be satisfied to totally disregard my body and it's condition were it not for these many passages. I am left wondering, that although the goal of a healed body is not the point of the teachings, it seems to be something that we can expect as we follow the voice of the Holy Spirit. Why does Jesus even bother to mention this, if it is not something that we should consider?

A: You are correct in saying that a healed body is not the point of Jesus’ teachings, nor should it be the goal of our practice of the Course. Jesus talks about the body so much not because he thinks it is important or real, but because wethink it is important and have not recognized its purpose in the ego’s strategy of keeping us away from our minds. A major part of the ego’s strategy is to have us think that our bodies are completely vulnerable to outside forces -- that both sickness and healing come from the outside. Jesus therefore is correcting this by teaching us about the cause and effect relationship between the mind and the body. That is the point of all of his references to a healed body. The focus really is on the power of our minds, not on having a healed and whole body: "The miracle is useless if you learn but that the body can be healed, for this is not the lesson it was sent to teach. The lesson is the mind was sick that thought the body could be sick; projecting out its guilt caused nothing, and had no effect" (T.28.II.22:6-7). This is his point.
But he is teaching us about the Holy Spirit’s thought system in the context of what we know best and can relate to best; and for just about all of us that is the world of bodies. He thus uses our bodies to teach us, ultimately, that we are not our bodies. That awareness, however, comes at the end of a long process, which for most of us, takes many, many years to complete. To simply disregard our bodies, therefore, would be to deny ourselves a multitude of opportunities to learn and apply the principles of the Course. Our physical / psychological needs and experiences constitute the curriculum that Jesus can use to teach us how to interpret and perceive our bodily experiences in a way that will help us undo the separation rather than reinforce it. As long as we still think that without oxygen and food we will die, then we still believe we are bodies, and it would be detrimental to our spiritual advancement to ignore or disregard what we still think is real. As Jesus cautioned us in this regard, "The body is merely part of your experience in the physical world. Its abilities can be and frequently are overevaluated. However, it is almost impossible to deny its existence in this world. Those who do so are engaging in a particularly unworthy form of denial" (T.2.IV.3:8,9,10,11).
The focus, once again, is always on the training of our minds and the way we think, so that at the end, we simply will no longer choose to be limited. This is quite different from merely disregarding the body. As he says in the section "Beyond the Body" in Chapter 18: "What really happens is that you have given up the illusion of a limited awareness, and lost your fear of union." He is teaching us how to get to this stage.

Q #149: If one is terribly ill and in pain with cancer and, as a student of A Course in Miracles, strives to have the Holy Spirit help with forgiveness and peace in the matter, but still suffers physically, what does this mean? The Course indicates that when our mind is healed we will feel no pain.

A: You already know the answer to your question! When our mind is healed, we will feel no pain. Until our mind is healed, we will feel pain. And because our mind is not healed, we will experience pain as if it were in the body, caused by factors outside of our control, rather than recognizing that it is in the mind that has thought it could separate itself from love -- a very painful state. And that is how we protect the thought of separation in our split mind.

We use pain to convince ourselves that the body is real, for we still want the body to be real. Jesus tells us that "pain is a wrong perspective. When it is experienced in any form, it is a proof of self-deception… Pain is but witness to the Son's mistakes in what he thinks he is… The body is the Son of God, corruptible in death" (W.pI.190.1:1,2; 2:3; 3:7).

What is most important though is that, while we continue to experience pain -- whether it’s the pain of cancer or the pain of a broken leg or the pain of emotional abuse or any other form of pain we experience -- we do not judge ourselves for feeling it. That would serve no purpose but the ego’s. Because of our fear of losing ourselves, we heal the pain in our mind through forgiveness in small steps.

And in those moments when we accept that we do not know the truth about ourselves but there is a Comforter Who does, with Whom we are always joined in perfect peace and joy, then the seemingly painful concerns of the body will fade from our awareness. Because of our fear, we will most likely not be ready to embrace fully the healing in the mind and release our limited bodily identity, and so we will turn again back to pain for the defense that it provides. But with each moment of recognition, shared in the holy instant of healing, our investment in guilt and pain will diminish. And we will never again be totally convinced that the world, or anything outside our mind, can cause us pain.

Q #142: I have been a keen student of A Course in Miracles for a good 12 years and find it the most appropriate spiritual path for me. Thinking of Jesus and his teachings has become a part of my life, a way of consciously forgiving myself and thus of course others as well. I also accept fully that all pain is some form of unforgiveness (“Certain it is that all distress does not appear to be but unforgiveness” [W.pI.193.4:1]). Now regardless of my practice, which is almost on a continual and absolutely unforced basis, parallel to whatever else I may be occupied with, various aches and pains and other ailments do occur at a level which makes me question the efficacy of my practice -- my only choice then remaining the same old magic, usually a pain killer. Even ardently repeating a maxim like “I am not a body. I am free. For I am still as God created me” [W.pI.rVI.3:3,4,5] during an attack seems quite ineffective. Is it basically still a very fearful subconscious that is at the bottom of this, or is it the ego taking me for a ride and having me believe that I have forgiven myself more than I really have?

A: You’re trying so very hard, but you also want to be gentle and patient with yourself. It would be helpful not to try to evaluate your progress based on any feedback you feel your body is giving you. Aches and pains always reveal unhealed areas in the mind, and in that sense it is helpful to pay attention to them, but not as a yardstick against which to judge how well you are practicing forgiveness and whether you are passing or failing the Course.

Yes, there is still fear, as well as guilt, buried in your subconscious mind, and yes, your ego will always want to fool you about your progress, but also your lack of progress (T.18.V.1:5,6). All of that is to be expected while you still identify yourself as the body which has the name you answer to. For seeing yourself as a body means you still believe that the separation and its accompanying guilt are real and you still believe you need a defense against that guilt, which is the purpose the body serves. The pain, apparently in the body, is intended to distract you from its real source in the mind. So if you are willing to make the connection back to the mind and see the cause -- unforgiveness -- that is all you really need do.

If there is a pain killer that seems to be helpful in relieving your pain, by all means continue to use it. So what if it is not the ultimate healing? Know that Jesus is not judging you for what you may see as your weakness and inability to forgive completely. Taking medication is a gentler and more loving way of dealing with your pain than trying to persuade yourself that the pain is not real by using words from the Course as affirmations to shout down the ego and cover over what you still believe about yourself -- that you are a body. It will always be more helpful simply to get in touch with what you still believe and why, knowing, as you suggest, that it is only fear that holds you in those beliefs. By acknowledging and looking at the fear, you will be doing your part in its healing.