Lesson 19: I am not alone in experiencing the effects of my thoughts.

Jan '24 • Feed

🎯 IDEAS LEAVE NOT THEIR SOURCE

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🪄 This lesson has a lot to unpack, so please buckle up... Let's start with this:

📘 "The idea for today is obviously the reason why your seeing does not affect you alone. ²You will notice that at times the ideas related to thinking precede those related to perceiving, while at other times the order is reversed. ³The reason is that the order does not matter. ⁴Thinking and its results are really simultaneous, for cause and effect are never separate." (ACIM, W-19.1:1-4)

🌟 As Kenneth Wapnick explains, this lesson states that not only our split minds are joined, but our minds and the world are joined too. This lesson is indeed a continuation of yesterday's idea. However, Jesus emphasizes that thought (CAUSE) and perception (EFFECTS) are simultaneous. And that's why the lessons sometimes introduce an idea by looking at what we see while they at other times start with what we think. "Thinking and its results are really simultaneous, for cause and effect are never separate." (illusion of time). So the order of things doesn't matter. What matters is to acknowledge the cause-effect relationship between what we think and what we see.

🔎 “Jesus extends the idea of one split mind, saying that not only are our minds joined, but our minds and the world are joined as well; the world being nothing but the projection of the mind’s thought of separation. This is another way of saying ideas leave not their source, a principle that is central to the teaching of A Course in Miracles." Excerpt from Journey through the Workbook of "A Course in Miracles", Kenneth Wapnick, Vol. 1, p 60.

🎯 WE MADE IT UP

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🌟 We are the author/source of the film/illusion of our lives. We are the writer, producer, director, actor, and viewer of the movie of our lives. We made it all up but don't want to see it. Our fiction is so convincing that we've forgotten we're the author, the source of it.

🌟 More than that, we don't want to acknowledge it, we want to disclaim responsibility for the result so we can blame others. We'd rather them, be responsible for destroying Heaven, rather than ourselves. That's why we need today's idea! By owning to the fact that we are not alone in experiencing the effects of our thoughts, we are implicitly accepting the idea that not only minds are joined, but that we are the ones giving the world we made up its purpose of proving we are separated when we think along with the ego.

📘 "What if you recognized this world is an hallucination? ⁴What if you really understood you made it up? ⁵What if you realized that those who seem to walk about in it, to sin and die, attack and murder and destroy themselves, are wholly unreal? ⁶Could you have faith in what you see, if you accepted this? ⁷And would you see it?" (ACIM, T-20.VIII.7:3-7)

🌟 If we would recognise this world as a hallucination, which is the purpose of these lessons, we would withdraw our belief in separation and complete the circle of atonement.

🎯 NO PRIVATE THOUGHT

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📘 "Today we are again emphasizing the fact that minds are joined. ²This is rarely a wholly welcome idea at first, since it seems to carry with it an enormous sense of responsibility, and may even be regarded as an “invasion of privacy.” ³Yet it is a fact that there are no private thoughts." (ACIM, W-19.2:1-3)

🌟 We touched on this idea, yesterday, that our great power, as creators, as thought-broadcasters (thoughts that are producing effects), comes with great responsibilities. Here, Jesus is touching on an aspect that we might resent about this "minds-are-joined" idea: if there is no private mind, there is no private thought. This is not a welcome idea because it defeats the ego's strategy of hiding our fear, shame, and guilt:

🔎 “Within the dream there certainly are private thoughts. We all have the illusion we have them. We think, for example: “Thank God I didn’t say that, so my friend doesn’t know what I really think.” On a conscious level that person may not know, but remember, we are all part of the one mind, and on that level another’s fear and guilt are reinforced by our thoughts, just as we are. Therefore, the effects of our thoughts may not show up right away on an individual level within the dream, but in the larger mind, of which all of us are an effect, thoughts have tremendous power as they reinforce the ego’s thought system. ” Excerpt from Journey through the Workbook of "A Course in Miracles", Kenneth Wapnick, Vol. 1, p 61.

🌟 We find this idea invasive because we're very anxious to conceal our negative thoughts, we want to hide the evidence of our guilt in the same way we seek to escape God's judgment. And the idea that our thoughts can actually affect someone, even without their knowledge, is frighteningly empowering. Yet it's true because all minds are joined, even in dreams and illusions. In our joined split minds, we share a collective hallucination instead of the blissful reality of our oneness, but we share this nothingness nonetheless.

🎯 THE ABSENCE OF PRIVATE THOUGHTS, A CONDITION FOR SALVATION

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🌟 One Problem - One Solution

📘 "Despite your initial resistance to this idea, you will yet understand that it must be true if salvation is possible at all. ⁵And salvation must be possible because it is the Will of God." (ACIM, W-19.2:4-5)

🌟 Despite the ego's reluctance to the idea, the absence of private thoughts is good news for those willing to heal. It is indeed a condition for salvation. The good news is that all problems, in their many forms, originate in a single tiny mad idea, thought up in the one mind of the Sonship. The crazy idea of separation can certainly be shared, but so can the idea of salvation through forgiveness.

🎯 FROM THE SPECIFIC TO THE NON-SPECIFIC

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📘 There is no order of difficulty in miracles. (ACIM, T-1.I.1:1)

📘 "The requirement of as much indiscriminateness as possible in selecting subjects for the practice periods should be quite familiar to you by now, and will no longer be repeated each day, although it will occasionally be included as a reminder. ²Do not forget, however, that random selection of subjects for all practice periods remains essential throughout. ³Lack of order in this connection will ultimately make the recognition of lack of order in miracles meaningful to you." (ACIM, W-19.4:1-3)

🌟 Deep down, we perceive multiple opportunities for forgiveness of the same original tiny mad idea. None of which is greater or more difficult than another. There is no hierarchy of illusions. Because they are all equally unreal, they can all be recognized for what they are, and forgiven. That's what miracles do. There's no order of difficulty in them because they all correct the same mistake. They replace guilt with love, whatever its form.

🌟 Everything we see is the same despite its diversity of forms (ONE CONTENT - MANY FORMS). This is what Jesus said in Lesson 4, "These thoughts do not mean anything. They are like the things I see in this room (on this street, from this window, in this place)". So Jesus let us know that after stressing during the first 19 lessons the importance of generalization and non-discrimination, when considering our thoughts or what we see, we must keep this in mind and continue to apply it, even if he won't repeat it as often in the upcoming lessons.

💙🪄 Ascendio! 🪄💙

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* My comment on this lesson follows my studying of the in-depth comment of the same lesson by Kenneth Wapnick in his published work, Journey through the Workbook of "A Course in Miracles". While it may sometimes contain my thoughts on it, it is essentially my humble take and summary of the masterful work of Kenneth. I share them here in the hope that someone might find them helpful.

** I also share, in these ACIM posts, the wallpaper images that I use on my phone and change every day to help me commit to my lesson, in the hope that some might enjoy them as well. Here is the link to a Dropbox folder where you can download the lessons's wallpaper for mobile I have uploaded so far.

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