From Fear to Faith – A Course in Miracles Conversation You Need to Hear (Ep. 68)

In this deeply spiritual and thought-provoking episode, Hannah is joined by close friend and Healing Portal member Stacey Guyon to explore the life-changing teachings of A Course in Miracles.

Together, they share their personal experiences studying the famous spiritual text over the past 9 months, discussing themes of forgiveness, fear, ego, love, healing, meditation, spirituality, self-discovery, and inner peace.

They dive into the mysterious origins of A Course in Miracles, why the book has been called both a spiritual masterpiece and controversial New Age philosophy, and how its teachings can help us move from fear into faith in everyday life.

Through honest conversation and real-life examples, Hannah and Stacey explore:

• How fear shapes perception
• Why forgiveness is central to emotional healing
• Parenting fears, anxiety & releasing control
• The role of meditation and spiritual practice
• Letting go of ego, judgment & comparison
• Learning to trust life and the Universe more deeply
• Practical ways to create more peace, love and presence
• Healing chronic illness through mindset shifts

Whether you’re already on a spiritual journey or simply curious about mindfulness, holistic health, personal growth, spiritual awakening, or A Course in Miracles, this episode offers grounded wisdom, relatable stories, and powerful insights for everyday life.

#ACourseInMiracles #Spirituality #HolisticHealth #SelfHealing #Mindfulness #SpiritualAwakening #Meditation #InnerPeace #PersonalGrowth #HealingJourney #SelfLove #Forgiveness #SpiritualPodcast #WellnessPodcast #FearToFaith #ConsciousLiving #HolisticLiving #SpiritualGrowth #Healing #PodcastEpisode

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Transcript

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Yes, welcome to the Holistic Health Sisters podcast with wellness and real-life sisters Hannah Carr and Sarah King from the Holistic Health Collective. In this podcast, we're going to be sharing our passion for, of course, holistic health, but also spirituality, healings, hormone, plant medicine, seasonal living, our love of nature, and our love of community. So we're gonna invite you to take a pause and take a nice deep breath. And join us on a path of healing, of self-discovery and self-love, and of stepping into the brilliance of who you really are. This is a podcast for the seekers out there, those of you who know there's more to life than just surviving or going through the motions, and you want more. More health, wealth, happiness, love, compassion, connection, trust, surrender, and more faith. And you want that for others too, so we can make this world a better place for us all. So go and grab a cup of ceremonial grade cacao and join us as we explore what moves through us, that which is divinely led, so we can all move from fear towards more faith. Thank you so much for being here with us today Welcome to this week's podcast. We're gonna be exploring the mysterious, the controversial, the influential, and the deeply spiritual book known as A Course in Miracles. And I'm introducing this week because I've been studying A Course in Miracles, of which I tell you more about, for the past nine months. It's a 12-month course, and I thought you might be interested to find out a little bit of stuff that maybe I do in the background or Sarah does in the background. And this particular course, some people call it a masterpiece, and some people call it New Age philosophy, and some people believe it was dictated literally by Jesus, but the critics obviously do not believe that. So whatever your opinion is, there is no denying its impact. So we're gonna explore a lot of things today, like who wrote it, how it came into existence, and really how it can help you in your life. So I'm gonna start right at the beginning, and then I'm gonna introduce a very special guest, who is my friend. I'll tell you more about her in a moment. But just let me just introduce this Course in Miracles. It was a book that was written in 1976. And I thought, "I wanna do a course in miracles," so I ordered the book, and a much bigger book than I expected turned up, okay? And it's because it comes in three parts. So there's the text, which is the actual book which, just for reference, I totally have not read. And then you get into the workbook, and the workbook is a daily lesson for 365 days. That's the bit that I'm on. I'm on around 270. And then the last part is a manual for teachers. So the complete work is over 1,300 pages long. But its central teaching is surprisingly simple. So I'll tell you that little bit in a moment, but I want to introduce my very special friend first. We've got Stacey Guyan. So some of our members of the Healing Portal will know Stacey as one of our members. Welcome, Stacey. Hello. And I met Stacey... How long ago did we meet? How long ago did you join the Healing Portal? Don't know. Million years ago Yeah. Yeah. And anyone who's in the portal will know Stacey because she's very vocal in our online moon circles, and you'll probably hear us laughing lots because that is basically our relationship It is Yeah. It's turned into a friendship, We're very blessed that it happens with a lot of our members. And, how are you today, Stacey? I'm good. I'm good, thanks. It's very impromptu. I just, WhatsApp you going- Yeah. "Are you free? Can you record a podcast with me?" I'm free. Because I am gonna share some of the, fundamental lessons in A Course in Miracles, but I thought you might wanna hear a little bit about our personal experiences and what we've learnt from it as well. I had come across A Course in Miracles from some other teaching, so Gabby Bernstein and I think Carl Gray. I've been trying to remember the teachers who had mentioned A Course in Miracles. I think that's who it was. And I'd tried to start it myself twice. I've shared this on my social media, so you may have seen this. And both times I wasn't able to get the consistency going, so I think I got a few weeks in and then I kept missing days, and you're not meant to keep missing days on A Course in Miracles. About a year later, Stacey asked me, "Hey, do you wanna study A Course in Miracles?" And I thought, "Well, third time lucky, but I've got an accountability partner." So Stacey, why did you come up with the idea of studying A Course in Miracles? I'd, also heard about it a lot, and I have not actually read many spiritual books at all. But this one, it sort of kept coming up, kept coming on my radar, and I just thought it might be a good way to help us deepen into love and some of the practices that we, you know, already mutually shared. Yeah, and why did you ask me? Did you know that I'd tried to study it before No, I didn't. That, that... I didn't know that you'd already studied it before. That was just, um, intuition. It was just a gut feeling that I've just... It was so random actually. I just thought, "I'm gonna ask Hannah," and I hadn't asked anybody else. I hadn't thought about anything like that. I just, just thought, "Yeah, I'm gonna do that. I've... It's come up and I'm gonna ask." And, and there we are. Thank you for asking. And that was nine months ago, and I think we was just saying before we started recording, like, we both said we couldn't have got this far without each other. No. Definitely not. Why could we not have got this far without each other? I think, I mean, it's, it's not the easiest text to read, for a start. It's definitely, it's quite scholarly. It's quite masculine in its wording. There's a lot of he and son mentioned, and I think, especially in the beginning we had to overcome the hurdles of the language. And we did because we knew and felt that, you know, there was, there was definitely some gold in the text, but the language like was a bit of a hurdle I think for us both at first. For sure. And also, do you remember that because we've been doing spiritual work for quite a few years, this treats you as an absolute beginner, Some of it seemed really obvious. Yeah. Yeah, and we were like, "Oh, we're being arrogant. We should be more open." Don't just read it and think I know this. There's definitely more depth to this. But we did know a little bit of it at the beginning, but we kind of had to persevere, didn't we? So we're sharing this bit for anyone who's done a bit of spiritual work for themselves. If you're interested in studying the text and you feel like you know all this, maybe you do know the beginning part, and a lot of the lessons keep repeating it. It's so repetitive, but it's to keep taking you to deeper layers, and sometimes you think you've got a teaching and then a situation comes up in your life where you realize it's really hard to apply that teaching, i.e. you're tested, and then you're kind of grateful for A Course in Miracles keep going over the same thing again and again and again 'cause you're like, "Oh, even this part in my life I need to apply it to." Did you find that, Stacy? Yeah, definitely. I think our conversations are always about the subtleties and, even though we might know things and apply them to maybe major events or major behaviors and beliefs in our lives, you can get to the real nitty-gritty I think, you know? Gritty. Yeah. And, the more subconscious stuff starts to come up I think as we read this book, and then, and you can work on that too. Yeah. And our conversations in term- in terms of, you know, why, why we've carried on doing it together, it's gotta be as well the conversations we've had. You know, if we've not actually understood a lesson or we think there's more to it or, you know, we've had experiences with certain lessons, then we've been able to share it with each other and discuss it and explore it, and that's probably the biggest reason I reckon why we've carried on together. We've only got three months to go. We can do it. We can do it. Let's share a little bit about how we're studying 'cause we're doing it in different ways. So how are you actually studying the text? Largely reading in the morning, so I have- The actual book, isn't it? Yeah, the actual book. I have a morning meditation practice, and I'll read the book and then go into meditation usually. It does vary. Yeah. And for me, once I saw that book And I put it on my bookshelf to collect dust, I downloaded the app. I think there's different apps available. So I read the daily lesson in the app, and then I meditate on that. And then I think at times we've both dipped into podcasts. There's various podcasts that are available when the text has been super wordy. And I would say the first half of the book at least some of the lessons are so long and wordy that it just felt really overwhelming some days, so I just listened to the podcast instead. Did you find the podcast helpful? I loved the podcast. I there was, there's one with a nice old lady, isn't there? And, yeah, I loved, the explanations because sometimes I think the meaning can be missed with the wording. Wording can be a bit complex but so yeah, it was good to get explanations, and also good for us to explore it ourselves, 'cause sometimes we had completely different ideas of what the lessons meant just between us, We did we did. So just to add to that's how Stacy, studies I use the app, and then we have a call. We haven't got, a set schedule, but it's probably, every other week we have a long two-hour phone catch-up. Stace is my phone friend. I don't actually like talking on the phone normally in real life. Stace is helping me overcome that resistance to phone talking, 'cause we just laugh for two hours. Yeah. But we also leave each other message friends, where we're like, "Ah, what's this lesson? What's going on here?" So let me just share a little bit about the core teachings. They are surprisingly simple. It's gonna sound so simple, but really you need the daily practice to understand these. But it's that fear is an illusion. So let me just repeat that. Fear is an illusion. Love is reality. And also forgiveness is the path back to peace. So the course teaches that us as human beings are trapped inside the ego, which they believe is a false identity, and it's built on, fear, guilt, judgment, and separation. And the spiritual journey is about undoing that illusion and remembering our unity. They use the word with God. And I just say for anyone who, if that word is, slightly triggering from any past experiences, that you could say universe. I think you could say Mother Earth. For me personally, those words are interchangeable. Are they interchangeable for you, Stacy? Do you get hooked up on the word God? How is that for you? No, not really. I mean, I don't... I would say that the book use quite, uses quite a lot of Christian language. Yeah, it does. But it's not, I wouldn't say it's, it's not, you know, properly Christian faith-based. It just uses that sort of language, doesn't it? That's it. Yeah. Um, no, I think- I think I've been all right with, with all that and more than that, and yeah, definitely interchangeable do you remember who wrote the book and how the story come about? Um, was it like some psychologists at, at university? That's it, yeah. Yeah. You remember Helen, I think it you say Schuman, if I've got that right? And she had Do you remember she had a fallout with a colleague, and they kept arguing all the time? This is the beginning of the book. And one of them said, "Oh, there must be a better way." Yeah, I do remember that, yeah. And then what I think the la- was it the lady, she sat down and wrote it, then the man come along, and he helped her edit it. And they sat together for years, you know, putting it all together into this massive book. Yeah. So after Helen announced the words, "There must be a better way," born from her frustration with these, arguments with her colleague, she then heard an inner voice which she'd not heard before, and she heard the words, "This is a course in miracles. Please take notes." And I think she found it, a bit mind-bending at the time, but she was like, "Okay, then I'll start making notes." So she showed it to her colleague, this guy that she'd fallen out with, He's known as Bill. And when he read it, he said, "Wow, this, this information's, amazing. Let's carry on." So he was editing it, so it was a joint effort between these two. And I think it took seven years to write. From 1965 to 1972. And Helen believed the voice came directly from Jesus. So some people might believe this is just an inner voice. She thought it was literally a download straight from Jesus. the course itself never straightforwardly says, "I am Jesus." Instead, it speaks of a spiritual and symbolic voice using Christian terminology. Yes, you're absolutely right there, Stacy. The language is difficult. So for anyone that opens it the first time, and this has definitely been, our experience of the book, you feel like, "Why is it written like this? It's so repetitive. It's almost biblical. Why is it so long?" There's lots of terminology like salvation, atonement, Holy Spirit, Christ, sin, Heaven, forgiveness, but it does redefine a lot of those words as well. What would you know about sin before you studied the Course in Miracles? What is a sin, would you say? Just something that you perceive as wrong. Yeah, evil. Yeah, wrong, evil. It's an illusion, isn't it? Because nothing's a sin, it teaches in the book. That's right. Yeah. I think it says that, sin is not real. That there's never been any sin, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. 'Cause that's the, one of the things that we found quite hard to grasp at first, which was that fear is an illusion. And but, you know, the way we act when we're in the illusion of fear is, can be, perceived as sin. That's it. And I think we could share one of our early conversations about this. And we had quite a long call actually of going, "Fear's an illusion. So if you walk through a war zone, well, that's not an illusion, is, is it?" And we're like, "Okay, but the book says it is." Yeah. No, we definitely took a while to, get to grips with that one. So the point I brought up with you at the time was, yeah, okay, so we worry about war, and then I said, "But we haven't, me and you ourselves, have not directly experienced it." But it's because we've seen it through media or heard it through other people that we're even aware of that concept. Like, us right here in England at the moment, we're not experiencing that. So actually, is it the thoughts about it that are creating it, and therefore creating the fear? Do you remember anything else that we spoke about at the time to do with that? Just that we were really grappling with what was real and what wasn't real. Because obviously I think we were taking it quite literally and we're saying like, "Well, if fear is an illusion, that means everything done in fear is an illusion." But that's not the case. So it's not that, that war is an illusion. War is happening, but it's happening because people are under the illusion of fear. You know? So it was... It, it's not that the actions are illusions, it's the fear that's the illusion, but we act on our fears. Yeah, okay. All right. So what could you share with us that, like, what have you got from the course? I know it's been nine months, so obviously a lot, Why would you recommend it to someone? How has it helped you? It's definitely helped me, deepen into love a lot more. And I would say I already, I had already, had heart-opening experiences, and had already, recognized fear states and love states. But I feel like this has really helped me, deepen into the love states and let go of fear a lot more. In, big ways, but also just in really small ways, like being able to recognize that in my life and being able to let go of it almost without even realizing. It's like the more we've gone through it, it's like, oh, I don't, don't actually fear that anymore, or I don't feel that anymore. I'm just all right now. So that's been excellent. And I think we could all do with a bit of that in the world. In the world. Not just us, but, every being in the whole entire world. Literally. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, yeah, definitely, definitely that. The course repeatedly teaches that fear is an ultimately an illusion while love is reality. And one of the most famous ideas is that every action is either an expression of love or a call for love, and that alone has deeply influenced, spiritual psychology I would agree with that. So I had an experience that I had to phone Stacy and tell Stacy about, where I went to our local woods with a walk with my husband and there was, like, a really awful noise coming from the woods. It sounded like a horse being tortured. And I felt that fear in my body, and I know that in the past I would've gone like, "Oh, let's not walk towards that. Don't really wanna find out what's happening over there." But I really feel that the Course in Miracles helped me overcome that and notice the fear. So first of all witness it, and then remind myself that fear's an illusion, even though it didn't feel like it in that moment. And then get curious, like, "Oh, I wonder what that sound is. I'm not gonna let that stop me walking into the woods now." And then as we got closer towards this, terrifying, torturous noise, I actually got really curious, and I was like, "No, but what is it, and where i- is it actually coming from?" And I noticed I'd started to move towards it because that fear had been lifting over the past, it was probably six months that we'd been studying the course. And then as I got closer to the noise, basically it was a really huge dog, almost the size of a horse. That's why it sounded like a horse. And the dog seemed like it was lost, and it was, like, really probably terrified, looking for its owner. So I was trying to guide the dog out of the woods. We couldn't get ahold of it unfortunately. But anyway, he found his way out of this deep woodland, and I really noticed that shift in, the perception, and then therefore my reality of there was nothing to fear. That it really would've been made up in my mind, and I really... That would've impacted my day, like, it would've impacted the route I would've taken. I wouldn't have been able to, help that dog. I wouldn't have been able to face my fear. So I really do feel like, a lot of the fears we've got... Well, I know this from the course that we've been studying, but we're not even aware of half of the fears that are actually there. Mm. So it starts to, bring them out of the shadows into the light a little bit more so you can maybe, examine them or face them a little bit. Do you feel like you've had e- any experiences of that? Yeah, definitely. Just bringing them up to the surface, and then being able to let them go. I remember you telling me about that actually. And then I felt like that was a really big marker because it's, it's moving, moving into that space of curiosity rather than meeting everything with fear, right? I've definitely, had a lot of experiences in that too. Especially, especially things like with my son, I think I had a lot of fear and anxieties around, like the way he was growing up. Am I doing everything right? Mum fear, you know? Totally know, yeah yeah. You know, just about his wellbeing and all sorts of things like that. And I've noticed now that I just don't have that so much anymore. Obviously, like I, I care about him and I love him deeply, but not to the point where I'm fearful about, you know, like decisions I'm making or, you know, things he's doing. I am able to trust a lot more and have faith in his soul. Yeah. I agree with that. I'm catching a lot more fear thoughts about my children. So anyone who's a parent, and if you're not a parent maybe you're a parent of, you know, pets or you've got elderly parents, there'll be people that you love, and maybe you have some background fears about their safety or their, their wellbeing in the future. And I've been able to catch a lot more of those fears, and then realize that they just loop. These thoughts can loop for years, even decades. And actually they just drag you down. It doesn't solve anything, it just feeds into the fear mongering really, and maybe even your controlling nature, where you're trying to control an outcome. And I've noticed when those thoughts come in, specifically about my children now, Stacy, I try and replace them with an affirmation instead. Yeah. Where I think, well, that's actually bringing something positive and useful in. So again, catching those thoughts and just, yes, moving out of the paradigm of fear just even in your mind day to day. It is because, the biggest thing is that we fear the fear, right? And, and I think that, the Course in Miracles has really helped with that because now, you know, I can see those fears and, acknowledge them a lot more. And, and I was doing that in the past, but I feel like it's been, since we've been studying this, it's been made a lot easier and it's happening a lot quicker, where I will just be able to see, I have a thought, and be like, "Oh, that's fear. Thank you for, trying to protect me," and saying to it, not being scared of it but actually saying to it, "Thank you for trying to protect me," or, "Thank you for letting me know that that is a possibility, but I don't think so. Actually, I'm gonna replace it with this loving thought," or, "I'm gonna replace it with this more positive thought of an outcome." And just being able to do that really simply and really quickly, has been, transformational. Brilliant Are you able to share anything about our very imperfect practice? Like, the facts that, we don't have a certain time of day necessarily, or maybe what you aim to do but what the reality looks like. Because anyone who's interested in studying this, or even committing to anything in their life, I think sometimes we don't even begin things because we don't trust ourselves to continue with it. So could you share about a bit about our imperfect practice, how that looks- Yeah how we, how we've both managed it amongst, family life? Yeah. I remember actually in the beginning you said to me, "Oh, I think if you, if you miss a lesson you have to go back to the beginning." And I was like, "No." "No, we're not doing that. We're not gonna be that harsh on ourselves that we're doing that." And actually I feel like we've had a really relaxed and forgiving approach. And the whole book is about forgiveness as well, right? We haven't used the word forgiveness yet. I know. I'm just reading some of my notes that I've written for this podcast, it's like forgiveness is key. Oh, yeah. So we have had forgiveness for ourselves, so we come back to forgiveness. Yeah. But tell us, tell us a bit more about the practice. Yeah, so just, just being really forgiving and kind with ourselves and knowing, that it's okay if we miss a day. We're not gonna go back to the beginning. We are dedicated in our practice, but we're also human and, you know, sometimes the days are busier than others. Sometimes, unexpected things happen, and that's okay. Sometimes you have a little run of, of days where, maybe you've missed it or we haven't... More likely that we haven't given it enough attention, and we've just read it quickly and not really, let it,, give us, give ourselves the time to contemplate. But, either way, we've always just been really honest with each other about it, and been like, "That's okay, I'll go back to, whatever lesson and do that with you." And, I think that's worked really well for us, right? Yeah, just repeating lessons, picking up where we left off. I've just had my biggest blunder, which is I've just... I'm five days behind Stacy, so I had to text her, say what day I was on, and then she was like, "Oh, I'm five days ahead." So she's come back to meet me where I'm at, repeating those lessons. And we've both found value in that, haven't we? In one repeating lessons, 'cause that's, it's no bad thing, but also, it's just been really nice just to have a friend who's patient and loving and understanding and that, what word do you use? Like, forgiving, of your imperfections. But, and it's two-way, yeah., So we've been able to find- In fact- more love and acceptance for ourself in this imperfect journey of studying A Course in Miracles. Yeah. There's no place for judgment here. Okay, so forgiveness is key, right? We'll go back to this point now, but forgiveness in A Course in Miracles is very different from, ordinary forgiveness. It's not you hurt me, but I let it go. It's closer to the deeper truth of who you are was you that you're never actually damaged. So it's like someone else can't actually hurt you. It's one of the hardest teachings for most people because it sounds abstract and unrealistic, but supporters say the practice of forgiveness is meant to free the mind from resentment and fear. What do you think about this teaching? I think, initially when we were reading about it and I was like, "Oh, yeah, we've, you know, I can forgive. That's fine." But actually it does go deeper than that, and you're right. So what it was really telling us is that actually the, actually there is nothing to forgive because nobody has ever done anything wrong against you, and it's just that your perception of wrong and what you've allowed yourself to absorb and feel attacked about, and then the responsibility's on you, right? And I do remember that one being a bit of a like for us. Yeah. Like, okay. And having to, and having to have many conversations about that. But, uh, but I feel like we grasped it, and, and once we grasped that it was, uh... We came on leaps and bounds. But- Absolutely but yeah. The, but forgiveness, forgiveness is really about just recognizing that the world is mirroring things that you need to see in yourself. It's about lessons that you need to learn, about realizing that nothing's ever personal. And, there's some really big lessons in just that one word, and that's why it keeps being repeated in the book is just because there's so much depth to it. But I, I feel like we're grasping that now. We're getting there, and I think you maybe over time start applying it to more and more challenging situations where you're like, oh, even, even in this aspect it's about forgiveness. Yeah. I can share a really small example of forgiveness this week. And it was... I'm gonna use my husband. Don't know if he's gonna listen to this. We're really excited 'cause we are thinking about buying a motor home, having some freedom, getting out on the road, and we found this motor home that we loved. My daughter had seen it. She loved it. It was just down the road. My husband felt like it was all meant to be. And I went to see it, and I liked it, and he said to the guy, "Yeah, I want to get it, but I just need to get a loan for the money. And so I'd definitely get it." And, then in between us getting the money ready, the guy sold the motor home and emailed my husband to say it was gone, and "Do you want me to help you find another one? I'll keep my ears out for another one." And my husband, to be honest, was... He said he wasn't offended, but listening to the tone of his voice, he was really offended. Like, "Uh, I already told him that I wanted to buy this, and it was like, "He's gone behind my back." He didn't use those words, but that was the feeling of the words. And "No, I don't want this from him now." But I've done a lot of work with A Course in Miracles, right? This is when we can laugh 'cause life starts to feel easy. And I said, "Oh, you sound offended." And he said, "No, not offended. Just disappointed." And I was sort of in the trust of everything's fine, and, like, we don't need to judge. We don't need to be disappointed. Anyway, long story short, we found another one, and it's even better than the first one. That's often the story- Yeah when you lose a house, isn't it? Then the next one comes along, and it's even better. So we found this one that's even more suited to us, which we're really, really excited about. And it's like all of that disappointment or that negative energy, you might say, or just heaviness, it's almost like a waste of time and energy. That's how I see it now. Because you could quickly just move on and think, "Oh, well, that wasn't the one. If it's not there, that's not the one for us, so we're just moving on," until you receive this one that is even more aligned. Or maybe you wasn't meant to get the thing, the motor home, the home, whatever it was, in the first place. When one door closes, another one opens. You're simply being redirected. But it's to have that forgiveness immediately because no one's actually done anything to you. So if we look at it from the guy's point of view, he's got a business to run. He probably needs to bring income in to support his own family. You know, he's probably tied up in this motor home, and he's, very excited to make a sale. He doesn't know us from Adam. He doesn't know we're coming back. He doesn't know we're actually sorting the money, even though that was our intention, and we knew that. We didn't have that kind of relationship where we've built that trust with one another. So I just feel that it just helps you have a much more peaceful life. Is that how you'd describe it, yeah, definitely., Even down to the really little, times when you feel mildly irritated by somebody. We've had big con- big conversations about is anything mild though? Because it, you know, you're either in fear or you're not in fear. You're either forgiving or you're not forgiving. So e- so even if you're just having especially at home, you know, with family life, somebody says something, you feel a tiny bit irritated by that. Well, you've gone into fear, right? Right. You feel on some level, you feel attacked and you've absorbed or you've absorbed, whatever emotion. And either way, you've moved out of love in that moment. And just noticing those. So when you are able to deal with that regularly with the bigger issues, you start to notice it with the really subtle ones as well, and then you realize that actually it's not subtle, it's all forms of fear, and it's just perpetuating throughout your life on different levels. So then you can start to really work with it. Although whenever we first notice these things, they did always seem bigger to us. Like we've had plenty of conversation where we're like, "Oh, this has happened and that has happened," and we've had to work through it, together to, to come to this, understanding, right? Yeah. So that, so that's been really helpful. But yeah, and you know, and the other big thing you said there was trust. It's really, really helped, trust in, in, ourselves, in the love that we are, in God, in our divine support. All of that has helped., All of the, A Course in Miracles lessons has just constantly helped, to deepen in trust and the knowing that you're always safe and you're always held, and that it's okay to let go of fear. It's okay to let go of all of that conditioning, yeah, 'cause sometimes it feels irresponsible, doesn't it? Yeah. Sometimes holding on to fear feels like you're being responsible, but actually I think we're learning even that's an illusion. It's an illusion to keep you trapped in the fear. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely, yeah. So A Course in Miracles also teaches that a miracle is just a change in perception. That's all a miracle is. So according to the course, it's not necessarily a supernatural event, it's simply an internal shift. So it's a movement from fear to love. So as simple as the camper van example there, it's like just staying in that vibration of love, in that trust that everything's gonna work out. It is all working out perfectly as it's meant to. You're moving from judgment to understanding, and you're moving from separation back to connection, 'cause Separation's also an illusion, right? We're under this huge illusion of separation. But really, we are all one. We are all- Yeah connected And I think the book uses the, the word Christ a lot, but it's not referring... Well, I mean, you know, it's, it's difficult to tell whether it, we're actually talking about Jesus. But I think in the context, especially in the lessons, we've just been looking at, so we're on, uh, about 260, 70-ish now. Yeah. Christ, Christ is a term for, us as a, a collective. Our collective souls is Christ, I believe. And just this really pushing home that idea of that we are not separate. We are, we're all one energy. We're all one love, basically. I sounded a bit Bob Marley, but I just want you to go into a song then. Absolutely. Thank you, Bob. So these are the main teachings, the main takeaways, of A Course in Miracles, is fear distorts perception. Okay? Fear is like a lens that we're looking through, but it's not the lens of truth, it's a distorted lens. Judgment separates us from peace. So just take a moment and just feel into that, and maybe think into it as well. When you judge something or someone or a situation, do you feel peaceful at the same time? I think it's impossible that those two can go hand in hand. The next one is forgiveness heals the mind more than the other person. So we don't forgive for the other person. We're not letting them off the hook. The book teaches they've never done anything in the first place. But it's healing your mind, and therefore your body as well. Because if we keep holding things in our mind, then it affects our body. It's the ego thrives on conflict and comparison. And I would say that about actually ego, maybe we can talk about that for a moment, Stacy. I would say that the course has taught me to recognize my ego in ways that I didn't know it was my ego. So say, for example, you feel less than in comparison to someone. So for me, before the course, I might think being egotistical is, one example is, like, you feel better than everyone else. Well, actually, if you feel less than everyone else, that is also ego, which I didn't know that before. So I feel like ego can be quite sneaky, and it sort of hides and I don't know it's showing up in those ways. Yeah. But another way that ego might show up is, feeling like you've not done enough or feeling like you should help even if you don't really want to. Like a lot of shoulds comes- Yeah with the ego. What would you say that you've learned or would you wanna add onto about the ego? Yeah. I would say the ego is, just trying to protect you all the time, and it does that by keeping you small. That it's a safety thing, but it's, it's a, it's an illusion that you even need to be safe, right? So the, so the ego is thinking like, yeah, we, we need to keep safe, and that means don't be seen, don't be heard, play small. Definitely don't take risks or get out of your comfort zone. Uh, so all, all of those sorts of things, that's your ego just trying to protect you from an illusion, from fear, right? That, that isn't even real. And yeah, I would say I, a lot of that was, has been uncovered since we've been doing this in definitely in ways that I Look, I, that I haven't even,, I hadn't even considered. But I suppose the biggest one's probably self-worth. That self-worth wound is, you know, I felt like I'd already done quite a bit of work on it and then realized, oh yeah, there's still a huge amount of work to do. And but that's been unfolding naturally as we've been moving through the course. I've sort of naturally had, had things come up and then have to address those. Yeah. And it's led, led to me to being, braver. You know? Like, so I, I've had, chronic illness, which I would say I'm probably recovered from now, but,, the fear and anxiety that it induced and the quality of life, and just the things that, I felt I was able to do had been drastically reduced. But in these few months... And, and obviously I was get- I was getting over that, and you know that as well, Hannah. Like, you That I had that journey of, of getting over that over the last few years. But I've been a lot braver, I think, since then, doing A Course in Miracles. And there, there's been things that I've just done without even considering them to be anxiety-inducing at all, without any fear around them, whereas in the past, I would've, been really scared and not even tried. So there's been definitely, lots of that. I'm smiling 'cause I've witnessed so much of that this year, and I was wondering if you was gonna mention any of that on this call. So I'm absolutely celebrating your bravery, your courageousness to step out there more in the world, and if A Course in Miracles has had any part to play in that, I'm just so happy for you with that. All right. The other key takeaways are love is not weakness, it's clarity. Love is all that is, so it absolutely is clarity, and if you can remember that and keep returning to that, yes, then you're seeing things clearly. That's what the book does. It clears up the lens of perception. That's an easy way to say it. And the last one here is inner peace is possible, even in a chaotic world. Have you got any examples of that, where maybe you've had, a chaotic day or a chaotic situation where you was able to keep your inner peace, or maybe even a time where you wasn't able to but you noticed it? Yeah. Quite a lot recently. As I said about, being a bit braver, so with the condition that I had, it was, bringing on a lot of dizziness, and that meant that I couldn't, handle, busy situations, if they're bright, busy, noisy. So all of those sort of situations, maybe like a supermarket or, busy environments like a festival or something like that, I wouldn't have approached because it- it would feel too chaotic for me, and then, and then fear would kick in, and then maybe symptoms would k- kick in. But I would say probably since we've been, since we've been reading A Course in Miracles, I've just gone into some of those situations without any thought or doubt or fear at all. So going to, shows, went to the cinema. I haven't told you about that, Hannah. I went to the cinema this week for the first time in nine years. Oh my gosh. I need to hear all about this. I know, yeah. We'll talk about that after the podcast. Yeah. So of course the cinema is, it's dark but yet bright, and it's loud and, it's a lot, there's a massive screen. And so that's the sort of thing that would have, triggered symptoms and that, I've avoided for nine years, and this week I just went without any fear and had a great time. So yeah. So that's one. But there are, there are so many situations like that. I'll tell you actually one I had, recently, which was, I went to a flower show with my mom. That doesn't sound like it's gonna be a chaotic situation, but, there was a huge traffic jam, to get into this flower show, and you would've thought it was end of days the way people were acting. And I'm like, "This is a flower show." Peaceful flowers. And people were gridlocked. They were cutting each other up. They were being angry with each other. A woman had hit another person, like the car had maybe shot forward or something. There was so much chaos, and it was definitely, road rage, right? It's, there's a lot of road rage, and it was definitely a time where I could have been easily caught up in that and easily started to get irritated and maybe a bit angry or maybe even scared. Some of these people were acting crazily. But I just laughed. I just laughed at it, all right? It was just, I could not let myself get caught up in this mess. I was like, "What is this?" And it was a completely different, perspective of,, "Oh well, we'll get through this," really, really easy, really calm, "It'll be fine. When we get there, it'll be fine, and now we can just laugh about it." I went with my mum, she had some sweets, we were, like, eating these jelly dinosaur things, you know? And just, and just, having a really light-hearted time about it. And sometimes she was getting a little bit angry, but then I was just making fun of the situation, and I could see, even just a few months ago, we would've got to that show seething, "Ugh, that was awful. Ugh, never doing that again." But we weren't. We got there, we laughed at it, and we had a lovely time, so yeah, definitely. I think everyone can resonate with the traffic situation, right? Yeah. Everyone has that occasionally. It's a real, real good test of our patience. And also, what I love about that example that you've just shared is when we can hold our center and we can keep looking at things through the eyes of love and we just see the funny side, like you did, it actually impacts other people. So it's directly impacted your mum, her experience, and also your experience together for the day. But probably also without you knowing, the collective, we're impacting the collective of people on Earth. And as you're walking in and you've got a certain frequency and vibration as you're walking around that show, that's impacting other people as well, and it's great that if you can do this work and you can hold your center in the face of something chaotic going on, especially, someone maybe, being triggered in front of you, and you can keep looking through the eyes of love, going, "Okay, this is just their ego. This is not them. I am not personally offended. I am in forgiveness right now." That I think if we can all do a part of that work in the world, that we are literally healing the world day by day, right? Yeah, absolutely. And that is another thing that A Course in Miracles teaches us, that again, I think we both embodied a little bit, but we've really deepened into this, is that you can choose what you see in people. Yeah. You can choose to see their suffering, their anger, their hurt, their guilt and blame and shame. Or you can choose to see the love that they are and the light that they are and the beautiful, pure, and innocent soul that they are. And you can make that switch in perspective at any given moment. And and the more you do that, you just start to naturally see that and see the good and the, the love and the wonderful things in life. I think that's, that's like the, a real game changer. Absolutely. And you can also- see perhaps that it might be their ego, look through the lens of love, and realize that it's not serving you, and it won't keep serving you to keep being in this situation. And I may have found that difficult to walk away from in the past, and had a lot of guilt, which would be the ego again, right? Yeah. And that fear, I was thinking guilt of, walking away from a situation. But I think A Course in Miracles for me personally has helped me, just really know what's good for me. And what's good for me is really good for everyone else as well, and if that means walking away from a situation, then I'm absolutely entitled within my rights to do that. And do it without the fear, guilt, and shame, without any resentment towards the person or holding any ill thought towards them. Just knowing that you're over there having your life, and I'm over here having my life and, and that's all perfectly okay. Yeah, definitely. And there's no sort of obligation to, get involved in the drama. That's it. So just before we wrap up, what I would like to just say, just reiterate really, is the language is quite complicated in this book. That's not to put anyone off, it's just to say if you was to start A Course in Miracles, maybe expect that. Maybe be open to that in the beginning. I just wanted to mention another trilogy of books that I've personally read which are called, Conversations with God. This was a text written by Neale Donald Walsch, It was the same sort of thing. He downloaded the wisdom in his, in his own words. It was, like, a direct conversation with God. That's what he believes. And this book really addresses human questions like why are we here, why do we suffer, what is God really like, how do we create a better life? And I would say it's written in a lot more plain English. The audio version's really good. It's on Spotify or on Audible, I'm sure on other platforms as well. But this one is, a lot of the messages are the same, so like love is unconditional, there is no judgment, you can't do anything wrong, there is nothing to forgive. It's a lot of the same messages, but I feel that the books are a little bit easier to digest. I know that you've come to a lot of your spiritual learnings just through your own time in meditation really rather than reading books, haven't you, Stacy? Yeah. I've not, I'm not a big... Well, I've not been a big spiritual book reader. I'm on probably the third book at the moment. The other one that, that I'm reading you're, you've already read, haven't you? The, Soul Mastery Sonia Choquette book. Yeah. I'm finding that, really helpful and, um, really deepening into these practices, and actually quite complimentary to A Course in Miracles, like you said about Conversations with God. But yeah, largely with me it's just been really giving myself the time and space to- go into meditation to allow whatever inner work needs to be done, be done. And the wisdom just streams in, right? It just comes in because I'm giving myself that time and that much needed connection. And let's face it, that's what everybody that has, written the spiritual books we've just spoken about, has already done. They haven't come to these conclusions from reading books themselves., it's a channeled experience, right? These people have had, channeled experiences and writing these books. So yeah, would say most things that I have,, come to embody have happened naturally through doing inner work and meditating. But A Course in Miracles, has really helping me deepen into that and understand myself more. And it's definitely, obviously been worthwhile. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. So all of the information, all of the wisdom that we need, that we want, is within, right? But we need to create the time and the space to actually be able to hear that. I heard it once that it's like all the ideas are just some, just got my hand here above my head, but all the thoughts, all the ideas are just above your head, but you need to be quiet enough to allow them to drop in. And it reminded me, I've watched the Michael film recently, which was Michael Jackson. I'd already heard this quote, but he got in the recording studio often at, like, 3:00 in the morning. And what he said was that when he had an idea, he had to act on it quickly 'cause if he didn't, it would go to Prince. And he was sort of referring to ideas aren't necessarily our own. They're kind of dropped in from perhaps a higher consciousness. It depends the way that you look at it. Yeah. But they're dropped in. And they do, they're dropped into multiple people who are open and to listening, because people often receive the same messages. Yeah. Scientific experiments can happen across the world, and they can get the same result at the same time. So the information- Yeah is there, but we need to allow the time for it to drop in. So just to wrap up, Stacey, who would you say this book might suit? Would it suit someone right at the beginning of their spiritual journey I think it would, as long as you, as long as you can get to grips with the language, barrier. In the beginning, we were already a bit further on with our spiritual journeys and we felt like it was addressing a beginner, right? So I think it absolutely would benefit, somebody that had never even read a spiritual book before. But also, we were a little on, a little bit further along in our path than that, and it's helped us out immensely. So I would say wherever you are on your, um, path to embracing your spirituality, it would be helpful and help you deepen into the practices. And basically, it's universal wisdom. That's what we're, that's what we're saying, right? There's universal wisdom out there ready for us to acknowledge and channel if we give ourselves the space and time. And reading A Course in Miracles just helps you deepen into that and embody it even more. And we could all benefit from that regardless of where we are in our path in life. Yeah, absolutely. I'd add to that, that I think sometimes we want to commit to something a little bit more. So say you want to commit to a little bit more quiet time or meditation time or learning time, committing to a course that has 365 days to it, ours might be a little bit longer than that where we've missed days here and there, it can actually help you commit if you're looking to do something like that. So really it's for anyone who's ready- Yeah to learn a little bit more, commit a little bit more, and apply it to their daily life. Yeah. Meditation goes hand in hand with A Course in Miracles. I don't know if it necessarily tells you to meditate with the lessons, but it does tell you to sit quietly and contemplate and to have a quiet mind, and it's basically guiding you into meditation sometimes. So I feel like if you want a meditation practice, and you want to, you wanna create that habit, then A Course in Miracles would be really good for that, to read the lesson, to sit in quiet contemplation and let yourself drift into meditation from that is, is excellent. Thank you, Stacy, for sharing all of that with us today, for coming on the podcast, and for being my partner in crime for the past nine months studying- A Course in Miracles together. It's been such a pleasure to do it together. And for any of you that are interested in studying it, would definitely recommend having an accountability partner. I think there are different courses and groups that you can find online as well if you haven't got- Yeah a like-minded friend at the moment who's like, "Yeah, I wanna do it with you at the same time," don't let that stop you. You could find a course or a group online and join one of those too. And don't let it put you off if you start once and you don't quite get off those starting blocks I didn't at the beginning. Mine was third time lucky. Yeah. Third time a charm, I think they say. Yeah, let that be part of the process. And I've noticed that taught me about a few other things in life, that there's other things that I've tried before and not been able to commit to, and it's been my second or third attempt that I have been able to commit to things. So don't let, that put you off if you can't commit to things first time round. Timing's everything, and sometimes we don't know when the time's exactly right until it is. That's something else that we've learnt, like it isn't... until it is. So, any questions, you can drop us a message, an email, or, an Instagram message. We'd love to hear from you. And thanks so much for listening to this episode, and see you soon, Stacy. Bye. Thank you. Bye. Bye. Thank you a million times over for joining us on this podcast episode. You can support the show by giving us a follow on any podcast platform you're listening to this on. 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