A Course in Miracles Complete & Annotated (CE) Edition Week Two Study Guide 1
Week 2 Reading Schedule Day 8: T-1.20-23 Day 9: Cameo 5: The Shield Report Day 10: T-1.24 Day 11: Cameo 6: Letting Him Take Charge of Minutiae Day 12: T-1.25-27 Day 13: Cameo 7: An Experience of Revelation Day 14: T-1.28-34 Course Companions - Congratulations! You made it through the first week. :) I know you may be feeling a little overwhelmed or confused by the Text at this point and that s perfectly fine. The miracle principles are not the easiest section to read and they certainly lack the soaring, elegant language that becomes increasingly prevalent from the second chapter onward. Even so, the principles set the stage for what comes later in the Text and so it s worth taking this time to really explore the message of each one. I m still experimenting with the format of these study guides and so, this week, the commentary for each day is from Robert Perry, editor of the Complete and Annotated (CE) Edition of the Course. I know you will benefit from Robert s words as much as I have - and I welcome your thoughts in our Facebook group. Sincerely, Emily Bennington CourseCompanions.com 2
Day 8: T-1.20-23 Today s reading is so rich it s hard to know where to begin. First there is the idea (under principle 21) that we can go through life in an involuntary way, through our abilities being controlled by the right involuntary Guide. In this sense, all behavior would be like our heartbeat: doing its job perfectly yet without any conscious control from us. Amazing. Also under Principle 21: "Your abilities will be very useful when they come under involuntary control rather than involuntary lack of control." How great is that? Then there is the idea (miracle principle 22) that if we accept forgiveness for ourselves, that light will naturally want to extend and shine away the darkness in others. In fact, the light in us will find it intolerable not to extend. Then there is that whole discussion of darkness and hiding. It s true that we want to hide our darkness, but the Course s answer is that we can t hide it, and that we really don t want to, since there s nothing we truly want to hide. There is that sense in miracle principle 23 that we have dominion over all the things that seem to have dominion over us: time and tide, sickness and death, etc. What allows us to exercise this dominion? Simply expressing love to others (giving miracles). There is so much to take in there. There is also that beautiful song of praise to our real identity in principle 23. This is where we really start to see the eloquence of Jesus words, something that isn t as obvious in this early stage of the Text, but will become very evident later. And finally, there is the statement no effort is wasted. The exact passage is this: Meanwhile, remember that no effort is wasted. Unless you remember this, you cannot avail yourself of my efforts, which are limitless. (T-1.22.5:6-7) The idea is that we go through our journey from the first stage (realizing that darkness cannot hide) to the second stage (realizing that there s nothing we want to hide, even if we could) and while we re in this process, we are still divided. We are in an in-between place. Our commitment is not yet total. In this place, we need only to remember that no effort is wasted. This last line is a good reminder that every foothold, even the tiny ones, bring us incrementally higher. Sometimes it doesn't feel like a step the world rewards or even notices, but we do - and evidently God does - or we wouldn't have the knowing to push forward in our practice. 3
Day 9: Cameo 5: The Shield Report The material in this cameo is enormously important because it is so clarifying as to what a miracle is. It is the perfect test case between miracles as shifts in perception and miracles as expressions of love in that Helen didn t even have a shift in perception and yet Jesus repeatedly affirms that she did perform a miracle. In spiritual circles, we tend to put a lot of focus on internal practices like prayer and meditation (which are important obviously) but here it s good old-fashioned doing that Jesus praises. And because the doing, being motivated by love (for the children, for the Shield) was a miracle, its blessing was not limited to its immediate target. The miracle blessed everyone concerned, and presumably its ripples just kept spreading outward, influencing a constellation larger than anything you ever dreamed of (T-14.IV.1:5). If your actions can do that, then surely they are worth the effort. This cameo is also important because it gives us an introduction to the Course s reframe on forgiveness. We tend to believe that people only grow from being faced with the consequences of their actions. If someone makes a wrong choice, for example, and they get away with it, why would they ever do things differently in the future? They would have no motivation to do so. As such, we often find ourselves divided when it comes to forgiveness, i.e. If we forgive, will they ever learn? What we see here is that forgiveness in the Course does not tell someone they did the right thing. By definition, it infers they did the wrong thing, but that there is grace for that anyway. For example, before Esther could really hear Jesus message that she had been forgiven, she had to face the fact that she had done things to be forgiven for. So even though forgiveness lets her off the hook, the message is not one that reinforces the original errors. In addition, the message here is far more than just excusing someone who did something wrong. The ultimate message is that they themselves are right, that their innocence and wholeness is still intact, no matter what they did. In other words, the goal is to offer mercy, not justice. EXERCISE: How often do we find ourselves in situations similar to Helen's and look for retribution - if only in the form of credit - for our work? Instead of worrying about whether others are getting away with more than they should, however, what if we focused on turning other people's arrows into flowers as the cameo suggests? In the Shield report, notice that Helen is released by releasing others. She loved the children at the Shield and so realized that she was her brother s keeper. That s the love she expressed in her miracle. This a different way to think of forgiveness, isn t it? How can you apply this reframe to your own life? 4
Day 10: T-1.24 There are so many terms repeating and interacting here: miracles, forgiveness, Atonement, cancel / dispel / undo / correct, fear, freedom, sin, absence of love / lovelack, vacuum, darkness / light, learning, learning patterns, new / old, inhibition, overlearned. In some way they all go together, but how? About the principle itself, the story told in the Shield Report cameo really helps to clarify what s happening. In terms of getting the concept, it s beneficial to start with the interlocking chain of forgiveness. Forgiveness here means the canceling of someone s mistake (i.e. sin or error). The interlocking chain of forgiveness is a chain of such cancellations and it may help to picture this as a grid or a web. The basic idea is that my forgiveness of you doesn t stop there because you will then forgive others, and so on. In other words, none of the links in the chain are isolated. They are all inextricably connected to other links. So what happens when you perform a miracle? Picture it lighting up one of those links making that link go live if you will. Each miracle activates a sector of the overall grid and, when the entire grid is activated, then the Atonement is complete. Another important aspect of this principle is how serious Jesus is about undoing our previous learning. He really wants those old, overlearned patterns of love-lack to be gone. This, of course, is because old learning inhibits new learning. The new learning then becomes much harder to absorb, harder to retain, and harder to act on. And then we wonder why the Course itself is so hard. Jesus wants you to undo the love-lack in yourself and he wants you (through your miracles) to undo it in others. Can you do that? 5
Day 11: Cameo 6: Letting Him Take Charge of Minutiae There s so much to say about this cameo and about miracle principle 25. Both are drawn from the fur coat guidance that Jesus gave to Helen, about her purchasing a winter coat by following Jesus guidance. This is significant because he is dividing our days into the trivial - e.g. buying a winter coat - and the important - i.e. doing miracles - and he is asking us to do the same. So how do we deal with the minutiae? Again, by following guidance. Not because the minutiae is so important in itself, but because it s part of life and has to get done. Accordingly, we can do it our way and let it soak up all our time, or we can let his guidance speed us through it so we have more time for what really matters: giving love to others. As we see here though, this where he has gone too far for Helen. She was struggling with performing the miracles he was asking her to do and not doing the ones he wasn t asking her to do. She was struggling with letting him be in charge of the important. And now she was supposed to let him take charge of the trivial, too? Was there nothing that was hers alone? Couldn t she just enjoy her shopping, for God s sake, without Jesus intruding on that? This is why the whole discussion around will is fascinating, especially the distinction between free will and true will. Free will (i.e. making our own decisions) is what we want to defend, but would we fight so hard if we knew we did it as the expense of our true will, i.e. performing miracles? Exercise: How do you feel when faced with this way of navigating your days: first, dividing them into the important (giving miracles) and the trivial (everything else); and second, letting Jesus speed you through the trivial so you can spend more time doing miracles for him? Perhaps asking Jesus to be involved in the minutiae of life feels odd. Perhaps you just assume he has bigger things to handle than where we should be buying coats, for instance, and so you would never think to ask about something so insignificant. In addition, perhaps you find this idea somewhat threatening despite Jesus claim that "I am not intruding on your will, but I am trying to free it." This is where our task of keeping our own conscience clean and not trying to decide for ourselves what is trivial and what is important takes the pressure off. There is freedom in that but, again, we have to ask (turn over our thoughts) in order to receive it. Otherwise, we're the ones making the decisions - which is energy that could be much better spent on being miracle workers in the world. 6
Day 12: T-1.25-27 Today we get to read all the guidance that Helen received about the fur coat incident. There s such a strong emphasis here on letting Jesus take charge of the trivia so that our will doesn t get trapped in endless minutiae. This is so that our true will, which is to give miracles, can finally get out. So today we are going to focus on this. Can we let him help us past the trivia, so we have more time for our true vocation? Again, it s interesting to note how Jesus flips this issue around. In other words, when we think of letting him take charge of the minutiae, our initial response is usually that he s trying to intrude on our free will. His answer is that our true will is to give miracles and so while we are bogged down in the trivia (because we are doing it our way), our will is actually imprisoned. We may think he is trying to imprison our will, but his response is that s what we ve been doing to ourselves all along. He is the one trying to free our will. Also, it s important to note that the backstory of this section centers around buying a coat versus manifesting one. To say Let me speed you through this buying-a-coat trivia so you can get on to the real stuff of helping others is worlds apart from saying Let me teach you the all-important secret of how to manifest a coat (and money and romance, etc.) for yourself. It s also interesting that Helen and Bill distance themselves from this teaching through doubt and skepticism, which is a mask for the fact that, deep inside, they are actually feeling the pull of spirit so intensely it scares them. How many of us can relate to that? Exercise: Even if you don t love the idea of turning over the minutia, it s important to keep in mind that "willingness is part of readiness, without which learning cannot occur." What this means is that it doesn't really matter how you feel. All that is asked is that you have some willingness to turn over the "little" things (regardless of how small at first) which will not only save you time, but it will also condition you to turn over the big things. Along that line, there s an important statement in the Manual that says, If you have made it a habit of asking for help when and where you can, you can be confident that wisdom will be given you when you need it (M-29.5:8). 7
Day 13: Cameo 7: An Experience of Revelation This cameo features Helen having a revelation, which is the mystical experience of union with God. Jesus explains that Helen has a great propensity for revelation because she attained a high level of communion in past lives, but that her usual state of fear always drags her back down to earth. Bill, by contrast, is too fearful to be ready for revelation and so he is suspended between Helen s extremes of true revelation and extreme fear. The line that really captures it is this one: Miracles are the essential course of action for both of you. They will strengthen him and stabilize you. In other words, performing miracles expressing love will ultimately undo the fear in both of them since fear is what keeps Helen from more long-lasting revelation and what keeps Bill from revelation altogether. Thus, miracles are what they both need to focus on. This is interesting to note because so many spiritual paths are all about revelation, i.e. experiencing the highest state possible (by whatever name), and then experiencing it more and more until it becomes permanent. That approach seems to make perfect sense but where does is leave the Bills of the world, i.e. the ones with low propensity for revelation? Are they just out of luck, reduced to a cycle of constantly trying and feeling inadequate always searching for a Helen so they can be part of revelation by association? Moreover, where does this leave the Helens of this world? Are they to be judged as superior? After all, they can go to the spiritual mountaintop while others can t. How could this not subtly suggest that their ego is just a footnote because their ability to reach the summit of revelation proves it s under control? If that s the case, then perhaps those who experience revelation will lose interest in watching their ego, while at the same time having it activated by their unusual ability. Clearly, this is a highly combustible state of affairs. Jesus message to both Helen and Bill is beautifully inclusive. For those who aren t ready for revelation (the Bills), what you really need to do is give miracles express love to others. For those who have a high propensity for revelation (the Helens), what you really need to do is give miracles express love to others. Here, then, is a path for everyone. There are many abilities that the Course values: the ability to experience revelation, the ability to hear the Holy Spirit, the ability to miraculously heal others, the ability to have holy instants, the ability to exercise (as Helen could) a superhuman will. We could even add the ability to master the Course on an intellectual level to this list. All of these help and, to a certain degree, the rest of us should lean on those who have these abilities in unusual measure. But the main ability that we as a community should prize is, always, the ability to express love to others. 8
Day 14: T-1.28-34 The material in the Course around sex never left Helen s notebooks because she was very uncomfortable with it. In fact, this is a subject that makes many students uncomfortable - and yet it s also a big part of our lives so why wouldn t Jesus address it? We naturally assume that sexual impulses are what s inherent to us while higher impulses, i.e. the desire to be with God or what the Course calls the superconscious impulse, are what needs to be cultivated. But Jesus is saying we ve got it all backward. He s saying the superconscious impulse is natural; however, we ve just distorted it down into a sexual impulse. Accordingly, we can t satisfy our natural impulse to express love in this distorted form - which is why our relationships are often so problematic. We want them to fill a void they simply weren t meant to fill. Also, as you read principles 29-34, when you keep in mind that miracles here are expressions of love, here is what you get: When you genuinely give love to another person, you are honoring their perfection, and thus praising the Creator of that perfection (principle 30). You are affirming that they are not their body and all the self-centered things their body has done. Rather, you are affirming that they are spirit (principle 30). You are thereby honoring their innate holiness, which can be hidden but not lost (principle 31). Your miracle is thus interceding for their holiness (principle 32), honoring them because they are lovable (principle 33). And what effect does this have on the receiver? He is healed (principle 30). His level confusion is undone as he sees that in his true identity, spirit is at the center and the body is at the periphery (principle 30). His illusions about himself are dispelled and his holiness is brought to light (31). Thus, on the manifest level, he is made holy (principle 32). He is placed beyond the tyranny of physical laws and raised into the sphere of celestial order where he is complete and whole (principle 32). He is freed from his nightmares about himself (principle 33). He is released from a prison in which he has imprisoned himself (principle 33). He is no longer possessed by evil thoughts that seem beyond his control (principle 33), but is once again in his right mind (principle 33). His mind is restored to the fullness of spirit (principle 34). And what does this do for you? This is your way of earning release from fear. Every spiritual path, it seems, is offering us a way out of fear. And the answer always seems to be some form of find the peace within. That answer, of course, is a major part of the Course. But here in this material, there is another answer: Be a miracle worker. 9