Lesson 107
Truth will correct all errors in my mind.
There is a Truth that is present in every breath. It pervades our mind, body, and spirit. It can also be seen waving to us from afar in our outer world, encouraging the end of our slumber. This Truth is comforting, peaceful, and guaranteed. How easily we have been fooled by the tricks of the mind following them like a servant to a master that is never satisfied, only feeling solace in suffering.
We are here to break free from the chains of the mind, noticing that it was only ourselves that put on the chains in the first place. We have been the jailor and the jailee. What we once thought was our entrapment, we now see as without substance.
“And so [illusions] disappear to nothingness, returning whence they came. From dust to dust they come and go, for only truth remains” (ACIM Lesson 107 1:7).
I am sure like many of you, I often find myself wrestling with the truth of a situation. There are 7.4 billion people in the world, of course, our energies are going to bounce into one another as we journey Home, causing us to question the validity of ourselves, our experience, and our surroundings. And really, this is the gift of existence, this bumping into one another, as this is the potentiality of awakened moments.
When I get into such a quandary I feel like Sherlock Holmes with all the pieces of my puzzled situation laying out in front of me, knowing that the Truth must be in here somewhere. I also liken it to trying to find my keys in my purse….they are in there somewhere! In my most recent opportunity to wrestle with the truth of a situation, my body could feel that it was somewhere close by I was continually overpowered by my thoughts regarding the situation. I felt shaky. It is rather apropos as it is said of the muscular body, if a muscle shakes due to use, it means something is changing and growing. I sat with this shaky energy in and around my body, asking for the Truth to be revealed. I would find peace for a moment then my mind would start another highlight reel of all the fearful things that could happen in my current circumstance. When I got carried away with playing with all the potential scenarios, I realized I yearned for the peace I had felt earlier for a brief moment. That’s the thing about peace, when you have felt it, you desire to get back there.
I came back to peace but would again be swayed by the deadly threats of the mind. I felt the complete damnation of the mind. But what I told myself was simple, “I am not running away.” I decided that my commitment was to my Self and that I would wait out this feeling as long as I had to. Like a muscle grows under the shakiness of tension, I knew my consciousness would do the same.
In my commitment to Truth, in this instance, it meant a sleepless night, overcoming desires to overt my attention to the Internet or TV, and not calling anyone for reinforcement to vomit my “shaky” energy on. I knew what was happening, that I was resisting Truth, and I just needed to be patient. I knew that I needed to see that my thoughts could not kill me and that I was truly safe lying in a bed of Truth. I knew in this stillness that something would arise. And then a small voice said to me, “Can you see that there is another possibility beyond what the mind is telling you?” My reply was, “Yes.”
And so I sat with the option that there as another way of seeing my situation, I had no clue what that was nor could I picture it, but my heart said it was so. Then the scenarios I had created started to become quiet and vanish, poof, like a cloud. I could walk into my mind and touch the vaporized remnants but see that nothing was really there. Then the Truth revealed Itself, that I can never be harmed, and peace was Her gift. I feel this is what we are asked to do today, can we truly see there is another possibility, peace, offered in each moment?
“Without illusions there could be no fear, no doubt and no attack. When truth has come all pain is over, for there is not room for transitory thoughts and dead ideas to linger in your mind” (ACIM Lesson 107 3:2-3).
Nothing can harm us, there is no exception to this rule. The illusions that we believe bind us, are merely a thought system we have created and bought into. Our experience may seem real but if it so “real” how can there be another option, like for that which is “Real?” As it says in the preface of the Course,
“Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.
(ACIM Preface x)”
Stillness has been our guide recently as it is only when we pause can we be aware to what is Real. When we pause, we release ourselves from the momentum of the world. When we pause, we relinquish the hold of the mind. When we pause, we allow another possibly to emerge. It is in that pregnant pause that is the birthing of the Christ, the Truth of our being.
“Truth does not come and go nor shift nor change, in this appearance now and then in that, evading capture and escaping grasp. It does not hide. It stands in open light, in obvious accessibility” (ACIM Lesson 107 6:1-3).
Stillness is key as the patient heart awaits her Truth. Nothing more is asked of us. We do not have to say twenty Hail Mary’s or do a five-minute headstand or go to the depths of the Himalayas in order for this Truth to be revealed. As we descend into stillness and silence, Truth ascends to meet us.
“We do not ask for what we do not have. We merely ask for what belongs to us, that we may recognize it as our own” (ACIM Lesson 107 7:1-2).
Won’t you take another bold step, today, and claim what is rightfully yours? Suffering need not be your experience any longer when Truth is present in each breath. Go beyond the limited mind and play in that peace that is yours always.
Namaste.