The single most challenging concept related to A Course in Miracles is the idea that the world is not real. It’s a projection from our thoughts.

The reason that it’s nearly impossible for us to grasp is because our experiences suggest otherwise. All our senses convince us that the world, our bodies, and everything going on around us is very real.

But our senses lie. Everything in our body and the world has one purpose - and that’s to keep us mindless.

By remaining mindless, we believe that all our problems - and all our sources of joy - come from things in the world. And when we believe that’s true - we’ll keep seeking externally to fulfill our sense of lack.

However, when we remember that our true identity is not this body but rather within our mind, then we can begin to understand and practice what the Course - and many other non-dualistic thought systems - teach.

These lines from the Course help us understand what reality is really like:

“Seek not escape from problems here. The world was made that problems could not be escaped.”

When we return to our mind, we can now address the source of all our problems - which is the choice for the ego. And as the Course gently encourages us, “My brother, choose again.”

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The beginning of this lessons explains why we don’t know what’s best - for ourselves or for anyone else.

"In no situation that arises do you realize the outcome that would make you happy. Therefore, you have no guide to appropriate action, and no way of judging the result. What you do is determined by your perception of the situation, and that perception is wrong."

The reason our perception of any and every situation is wrong is because we’ve chosen the ego as our guide. The course teaches us that in every moment we are either choosing the mind of ego or spirit.

The ego always leads to the perception of separation, differences, and conditional emotions: I’m happy because such-and-such; I’m upset due to this-and-that.

The mind of spirit always leads to the experience of peace, and our response is always one of love.

This lesson is teaching us that by realizing that we don’t perceive our own best interests, we can finally be taught what they are.

https://livebeyondtheillusion.com/acim-lesson-24/

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While all 365 lessons are powerful, this one is instrumental in helping us understand the relationship between thought and experience.

“Every thought you have makes up some segment of the world you see.”

In other words, things don’t “just happen” in the world. We create our experiences with our thoughts. Just like in dreams at night. The drama doesn’t randomly occur - we make it up in our mind, project it into the dream, and then totally forget we set it all up.

That’s why this lesson goes on to say, “It is with your thoughts, then, that we must work, if your perception of the world is to change.”

This Lesson 23 pretty much echoes, coincidentally, Proverb 23 which says, “As a man thinketh, so is he.”

This lesson also contains one of the clearest passages regarding how we effect change in our life:

“There is no point in trying to change the world. It is incapable of change because it is merely an effect. But there is indeed a point in changing your thoughts about the world. Here you are chasing the cause. The effect will change automatically.”

The more we practice observing our thoughts, the easier it becomes to recognize when we’ve chosen the unhelpful teacher of the ego and can then make a different choice.

https://livebeyondtheillusion.com/acim-lesson-23/

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Today let’s unpack anger a bit.

Every one of us feels justified in our anger. Meaning that when we get angry, we feel there is a good reason for it.

Somebody did or said something they shouldn’t have. A situation didn’t work out the way we wanted it to. Or maybe we even got angry at ourselves for our own misstep.

The why we’re angry doesn’t really matter. What matters is that we are angry.

This question from A Course in Miracles makes it so clear: “When you are angry, is it not because someone has failed to fill the function you allotted him?”

The key phrase in this question is “the function you allotted him.”

We allotted a function to another person, and they didn’t fulfill their function.

And that’s why we’re angry.

I really has much less to do with them and everything to do with us. We set them up.

When we stop allotting functions to others, we have no grounds for any judgment, especially anger.

The key is not tying our sense of peace and wellbeing with what others say and do. People will always trip and fall - as will we.

But when we can instead see everyone (including ourselves) through the judgment-free lens of love, we’ll never feel anger again.

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In this lesson, we’re asked to say to ourself the following thoughts:

I see only the perishable.
I see nothing that will last.
What I see is not real.
What I see is a form of vengeance.
Is this the world I really want to see?

Thankfully, as we’ve been learning in these lessons, we can see differently. We can see from “above the battleground” as the Course says.

From this perspective, we don’t feel any negative emotions. In fact, all we experience is peace - and what we see is either love being extended or love being called out for.

We realize, as this lessons points out, “All that you fear does not exist.”

https://livebeyondtheillusion.com/acim-lesson-22/

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This lesson asks us to search our mind for anger. And it introduces a very challenging thought: there is no difference between a mild twinge of annoyance and murderous rage.

The reason they are the same is because they are both the result of the choosing the ego mind. We think there is a hierarchy - rage being “worse” than annoyance. But everything of the ego is a projection of sin, guilt, and fear - regardless of the form it takes.

So as this lesson asks us to focus on a willingness to see things differently, what it means is that we recognize that any negative thought - regardless of its intensity - is of the ego. And if we want to see differently, then we need to choose a different teacher - namely, choosing against the mind of the ego and for the mind of spirit.

https://livebeyondtheillusion.com/acim-lesson-21/

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Year ends and year beginnings are times many people think about goals and what they want to accomplish in the coming weeks and months.

And goals essentially suggest that there is a desired state we haven’t yet achieved - but with careful planning and execution, we can make it happen.

But as we think about what will bring us happiness, we want to be sure we are looking in the right place. If we think that a certain level of money, health, societal position, family relationships, or anything else external to our core being-ness will bring us joy, then we will be disappointed.

Consider these lines from the Course: “Seek not outside yourself. For it will fail, and you will weep each time an idol falls.”

Nothing external will ever bring us lasting joy. Temporary satisfaction at best, but often at the cost of increased fear.

Instead, we’re encouraged to return to the “stately calm within” - which is our choosing the mind of spirit instead of the ego.

That’s where our true treasure resides, and that’s where we remember our connection with the infinite.

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An important thought in this lesson is this line: “Your mind is totally undisciplined, and you cannot distinguish between joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain, love and fear.”

That is very hard for us to accept. We believe we can definitely tell the difference between happiness and sadness. Yet the Course is teaching us that these are two sides of the same coin.

What we consider to be “good” is a result of the world and our body being in a certain state where our needs and desires are met. It’s a conditional sort of happiness that can evaporate as soon as conditions change: our body (or the body of a loved one) gets sick; our financial security is threatened, people disappoint us, and so on.

When we’re willing to accept that we really can’t tell the difference between joy and sorrow - then we open ourselves to a new way of seeing. One not driven by the ego mind.

The Course teaches us that “your decision to see is all that vision requires.”

So our practice consists in reminding ourselves that we do want to see. And now we allow a different teacher to guide our journey.

https://livebeyondtheillusion.com/acim-lesson-20/

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There are two important lines I want to share from this lesson. The first is this: “Thinking and its results are really simultaneous, for cause and effect are never separate.”

Our experience always reflects whatever we are thinking. There is no exception to this. That’s why the Course puts all its emphasis on changing our mind, not on changing the world or bodies or situations.

The second line I want to highlight is this: “Minds are joined.” It goes on to say “This may even be regarded as an ‘invasion of privacy’ - yet it is a fact that there are no private thoughts.”

Think about that. “There are no private thoughts.”

Why?

Because minds are joined. Even though we have the experience of separate bodies with separate thinking apparatuses - our brains simply do whatever the mind instructs them to do.

And there is just one mind. One Mind in Heaven - which is our true reality. And one mind in the illusion - which we call the ego.

This lesson is helping us begin the practice of carefully watching our thoughts. This will lead us back to the mind where we can make the choice for peace.

https://livebeyondtheillusion.com/acim-lesson-19/

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A prominent theme in A Course in Miracles is that we are all the same. The challenge is that it doesn’t seem that way to us.

When we look at other people, we see them as separate from us. We are “here” and they are “there”. We have “this” combination of personality, skillset, dreams, and fears. And they have “their own” way of relating and being in the world.

And most significantly, we are “we” and they are “they”.

But as the Course points out, “differences are only of the body.” We all share the same mind. The same split mind consisting of the wrong-mind of the ego, the right-mind of spirit, and a decision making ability to choose between them.

And when we are in our right mind, we see the shared purpose that unites all of us. While their body may look and act differently than ours, they share the same earnest desire (even if it’s mostly unconscious) to awaken from this dream of death.

There is no real difference between us. We are one. And as we practice seeing our brother as ourselves, we loosen fear’s grip that tarnishes all our experiences in the world.

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