Hope Johnson's Wisdom Dialogues
Hope Johnson's Wisdom Dialogues
A Course in Miracles Deep Dive - Chapter 2, Section XI, Paragraph 6, Sentence 2 through Paragraph 8, Sentence 5: Birth Trauma or Separation Trauma
What if everything we've learned about psychology and fear has been missing the essential truth? In this transformative ACIM Deep Dive, we venture into Chapter 2, Section 11, where Jesus directly addresses Freudian psychology—acknowledging its insights while revealing where it fundamentally missed the mark.
The conversation opens a revolutionary perspective on fear and healing. While Freud correctly identified mechanisms that protect consciousness from fear, he mistakenly believed these psychological compartments were necessary. Jesus reveals a more liberating truth: "It is essential not to control the fearful, but to eliminate it." This single insight transforms our approach to anxiety, trauma, and psychological healing.
We explore Otto Rank's concept of "birth trauma" and discover that physical birth itself is not traumatic—the real trauma is the mind's belief in separation from God, an event that never actually occurred. This revelation shifts everything, showing that fear originates not from life events but from a mistaken belief that can be completely undone.
The session takes a fascinating turn when examining Rank's "will therapy," which Jesus calls "potentially very powerful" but limited because it didn't extend to "its proper union with God's will." This leads to a profound exploration of the "deprivation fallacy"—the belief that another's success diminishes our own—which underlies all competition and defense.
Throughout our exploration, practical examples bring these concepts to life: from childbirth experiences transformed by mind-training to everyday fears seen through new eyes. Listeners will gain fresh insight into how we project our unconscious fears onto the world and how, with gentle patience, the Holy Spirit helps us bring these shadows to light for healing.
Ready to see beyond traditional psychology to miracle mindedness? This episode offers a roadmap for tracing all fear back to its source, where it can be completely undone rather than merely managed. Join us for this journey beyond the ego's protective mechanisms into the freedom of a mind unified in love.
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Yay, aloha, everyone, thank you for joining. This is our ACIM Deep Dive. Today we're going into Chapter 2, section 11, starting with Paragraph 6, and we did Sentence 1 last time and we're going to start on Sentence two. So let's just have a moment of breath and prayer before we begin. Ah, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who's joining. Thank you, jesus, for joining with us and showing us what you mean by these words, helping us to dive deeply beyond them, beyond what the words are, and to what the words are pointing toward Past, our egos, defensiveness, past fear, past worry, past doubt, so we can see the deep meaning of these words and know ourselves truly. Thank you for your patience, your enduring patience through all the loops that we go through, where we seem to know and then doubt again, and seem to know and then doubt again, knowing that we're always on the path like a river flowing through the ocean. Thank you for showing us that. Thank you for being with us. Thank you to all of our brothers and sisters, everyone for their willingness, however small. Thank you to the Holy Spirit for always holding the light for us and thank you, god, for creating us perfect and holy. Yay, let's begin. Yay, thank you. Thank you for joining. I love you. I'm so excited. This is such a fun deep dive for me. You know I deep dive ahead of you guys, so I'm prepared.
Speaker 1:So last week and oh, let me just tell you where we are for those of you who want to follow along with the text so this is the complete and annotated edition of A Course in Miracles, and this was published in June 2021. And we are beginning. Let's see what page this is page 96. And again, this is chapter two, section 11, paragraph six, and I'm just going to revisit sentence one, paragraph six, and I'm just going to revisit sentence one, which we did last week. It's just shortly, briefly, okay.
Speaker 1:So Jesus affirmed Freud's term pre-conscious for the superficial. This is a superficial unconscious. This is a layer where repressed thoughts, fantasies and judgments live right beneath awareness and they can be easily brought to light for healing and forgiveness. Here's the sentence Freud was right in calling this level pre-conscious and emphasizing that there is a fairly easy interchange between pre-conscious and conscious material. That's what we went over last, in our last session, and now we're starting with sentence two. He Freud again was also right in regarding the sensor as an agent for the protection of consciousness from fear. And there's a footnote here.
Speaker 1:In Freudian thought, the censor that's what we're looking at now. The censor, in order to protect the ego, blocks unconscious wishes from consciousness during the day and during the night transforms these wishes into disguised forms that appear in dreams. So this is in Freudian thought and this is what Jesus is talking about right now. So he's saying he was also right in regarding the censor as an agent for the protection of consciousness from fear. So let's break it down. Okay.
Speaker 1:So Jesus is continuing to acknowledge Freud's insights. There's no blank. He's not putting a blanket of rejection over Freud's framework. Instead, he's affirming what's accurate before he's correcting what's incomplete. Okay, and he's really gentle about it. So sweet. So this models this, what Jesus is doing here. This also also models how the Holy Spirit uses what's already in the mind as a starting point for healing. So it's like Jesus and the Holy Spirit, they'll use whatever it is that's in alignment and start from there.
Speaker 1:Okay, so he was also right in regarding the sensor. So here the sensor is referring to a mental mechanism that functions like a filter or a gatekeeper between what's conscious and what's just beneath the awareness, what Freud is calling the pre-conscious. So that's like a sensor. Okay, it's a mechanism that's like a filter between what's conscious and what's just beneath awareness. This is like a filter area. That's what the sensor is. And then it goes.
Speaker 1:The sentence goes on. It says he was also right in regarding the sensor as an agent for the protection. So this part as an agent for the protection. Freud saw the sensor as actively working on behalf of the conscious mind's stability. That's how he saw this sensor, what he's calling the pre-conscious. It's agent in maintaining order and shielding the ego's constructed self-image. So it's protecting this constructed self-image. That's what this sensor is all about. And the sentence goes on. Last part of the sentence. I'll read it all together.
Speaker 1:He was also right in regarding the censor as an agent for the protection of consciousness from fear. So this protection is specifically from fear-based content Guilt, shame, rage, any thought that threatens the ego's sense of self. So in ACIM terms, what this is meaning the ego's strategy. The ego doesn't want to remove fear. The ego wants to hide fear, not remove it. The sensor is part of that hiding system.
Speaker 1:So what Freud is calling the pre-conscious that's why Jesus is saying he's right about this there's this sensor that protects the ego, kind of keeps the fear hidden so it doesn't have to come up to the conscious level. Right, blocking certain thoughts from reaching conscious awareness. That way they stay in the unconscious. Remember, earlier we were talking about how unconscious equals unwatched. So this is what's keeping those thoughts unwatched. This sensor, all right. So it's preventing them from reaching awareness because the ego is fragile. It wants to keep its identity safe, it wants to feel safe. Okay, the safety is actually deception. It's more like keeping a rattlesnake in the basement, so you don't have to look at it, right, rather than just removing it. So this is the ego strategy to keep us feeling, you know, comfortable. So we don't need to look at the fear that's in the unconscious. That's what this sensor is all about. So it's got a temporary function.
Speaker 1:Jesus is acknowledging the function Freud describes it is a real experience within the split mind. He's saying this is a real experience within the split mind. He's saying this is a real experience, but from the Course in Miracles perspective, the sensor's purpose is ultimately illusory because it preserves separation. That's the purpose of it to preserve separation. So he was also right in regarding the sensor. This is what he's calling the preconscious as an agent for the protection of consciousness from fear. So what it's relevant for is recognizing that the sensor helps us understand why certain fears are unaccessible to us at first. Fears are unaccessible to us at first. So it's like down the road, as we open up to recognizing our fear, they become more accessible, and it's because of this sensor. So we want to get past this sensor. So, in miracle mindedness, it's not like we're trying to dismantle the sensor by force. We're just inviting the Holy Spirit to help us bring these hidden fears to the surface in a gentle, non-traumatic way. So it's like the sensor's useful at first because we don't want to see these things so fast that we get even more fearful. Just let the Holy Spirit bring them through in a gentle way. Okay, so the key insight with this sentence is that there's a mental mechanism that seems to protect us from fear by keeping it out of awareness. Jesus's deeper teaching is what Freud called protection is actually the ego's way of maintaining fear, since fear can't be healed if it's never seen. So if anyone has any questions about that, let me know. Yay, thank you for joining. I love you, okay.
Speaker 1:Next sentence His major error, talking about Freud, still his major error lay in his insistence that the preconscious is necessary at all in the psychic structure. So his major error, basically Jesus isn't dismissing Freud's entire framework, but he's pointing to the key flaw in this model. He starts with appreciation for what's accurate and then he pinpoints where the theory holds back healing. So his major error is laying in his insistence. So he's saying his error is accidental, this is insistence. It's foundational to his thinking. This is why it wasn't able to be miracle mindedness, because this was foundational to his thinking. He built his whole approach around the belief that this mental layer must exist, like it needs to persist, like it necessary for for us to have in any experience. So lay in his insistence that the pre-conscious is necessary. That's that sensor, again, the pre-conscious.
Speaker 1:Freud saw the pre-conscious, the accessible layer of hidden thoughts, as a structural requirement of the psyche, part of what keeps the mind functioning. So you see how, once you lay that down as your foundation, you're never going to see past it, because the mind is so powerful. Not never, I mean eventually, maybe not in that lifetime, but eventually everyone's going to see past it. That has to be set aside though, that foundational thought, and you know that's why bodies are being recycled. So it's like there's another opportunity to look again, because people get so set in their ways. Like you know, freud was just set in this way of looking at things and a stubbornness sets in. So you know, one of the things that we're asking, you know, jesus, let us see past our own stubbornness as far as any concepts that are preventing us from undoing this dream. Right? We're seeing that by these examples what goes on in the psyche?
Speaker 1:So his major error lay in his insistence that the pre-conscious is next necessary at all, so now at all. He's. Jesus is rejecting this. Absolutely no qualifier, no, no, sometimes, from a healed perspective, there's no need for a layer of hidden fear in the mind, from a healed perspective, right, and that's what we're aspiring to, that's what we're being led to by A Course in Miracles, this healed perspective, led to by A Course in Miracles, this healed perspective.
Speaker 1:So his major error lay in his insistence that the pre-conscious is necessary at all in the psychic structure. This refers to Freud's model of the mind, with his conscious, pre-conscious and unconscious compartments. That's how he set it up. Jesus is saying. In reality, the mind does not need compartments to be safe. He's saying it needs integration. That's what A Course in Miracles helps with.
Speaker 1:So the pre-conscious is not a divinely created part of the mind. It's a construct of the ego and it's meant to keep the ego safe. That's what it's for. We're not trying to just blow it out immediately, because the Holy Spirit can still use whatever it is we made to bring this fearful aspect of our mind gently to our consciousness. So we can't handle seeing it all at once. Similarly, we can't handle feeling all the pain that's projected onto our bodies. Right, that fear is projecting pain. We discover that in block therapy. When we're using a block and we're bringing up pain slowly, with a calm, relaxed breath, right, because we don't want to feel it all at once, we'd be screaming in pain and never want to look at it again, just keep on burying it.
Speaker 1:So the very existence of the preconscious implies that some fear must remain hidden for us to function, which keeps the separation belief intact. So it's recognizing that we don't need that for us to function. You know, we don't need that, maybe temporarily, but not to function as a son of God. True healing removes the need for a pre-conscious altogether because there is no longer anything to hide. So the practical implication of this is if we believe fear must be managed or contained. We will never let it be undone.
Speaker 1:The goal of the Course in Miracles is total transparency of our mind, where all thoughts are either extended in love or quickly given to the Holy Spirit for correction. So this is reminding us. Anything we keep in the psychic storage, so to speak, behind this sensor is something we're actually postponing our own healing. That's what's going on. So freud thought the mind needed a hidden layer to protect itself. Like it's like as if life cannot be without this hidden layer. And Jesus is saying the need is the ego's invention. And in truth, a healed mind needs no compartments. It's only open, unified awareness with God. So so much of what's going on here is hiding.
Speaker 1:And if you notice, you look in your own, you know in your own life, in your own psyche, notice what you try to do in your life and think alone, like without the Holy Spirit. And you know regular religion gives us a lot of this guilty thing like God is watching us and is going to punish us. So we try to do things without awareness, which means like without Jesus or without the Holy Spirit. I like to say just bring Jesus into everything, let him look, let the Holy Spirit look on everything that you seem to be doing, because none of it's guilty, it's just a matter of the looking is allowing you to reinterpret everything. So you're not apparently doing these things while generating more fear and hiding, basically hiding from yourself. Right Sentence three If the psyche contains fearful levels from which it cannot escape without splitting, its integration is permanently threatened.
Speaker 1:So if the psyche contains fearful levels, this means if there are parts of the mind holding fear, guilt or attack thoughts, these are not just passing thoughts, but they're sustained pockets of unhealed belief. That's what we're doing. We're sustaining pockets of unhealed belief in order to even project this thing where there's mortal bodies everywhere, in order to even project this thing where there's mortal bodies everywhere, where everything seems to be on a lifespan so from which it cannot escape. If the psyche contains fearful levels from which it cannot escape, that means the mind feels trapped by these levels. The mind feels like it has no pathway to bring him into awareness for healing.
Speaker 1:This is the condition Freud assumed was inevitable. You know, he had to be having a hard time with that belief structure. I mean, it seems like we're just destitute. We just have to do this. This is part of life, you know like we have to have these fearful pockets and we can't escape them. They're going to constantly keep on bringing fearful things to the surface and we're going to be protected from knowing that they're there. So they keep on manifesting. This is the ego's protection, totally. Freud assumed it was inevitable. Hidden fear we can't safely face. That was his idea that we can't safely face, and this is basically what modern psychology is based on these kinds of beliefs. It's fun, and apparently that hasn't been changed.
Speaker 1:So if the psyche contains fearful levels from which it cannot escape without splitting? So splitting is referring to psychological fragmentation, mentally dividing parts of the self to avoid direct confrontation with fear. That's what the splitting is. So in ego terms, this is a defense mechanism for maintaining functioning by keeping opposing beliefs or feelings separate. There's always this opposition in the mind.
Speaker 1:So if the psyche contains fearful levels from which it cannot escape without splitting, its integration is permanently threatened. So as long as any part of the mind is uh is like, compartmentalized it's kept separate by fear full unity is impossible. The self remains in a fragile, defended state, always vulnerable to collapse. When the hidden fear leaks out, it always leaks out into the conscious mind, right, it'll give us something to be afraid of. Anytime we're afraid of anything. Anytime we get a fear, like what, if that person's ripping me off, for instance? Right, that's the same thing. It's bubbling up from the subconscious mind and what the ego wants to do is keep us protected from knowing the fear that it's actually coming from. You know, in our last lesson, jesus was saying it's the source of fright. You're afraid of it because it's the source of fright.
Speaker 1:The unconscious mind, unwatched mind. So that sentence again. If the psyche contains fearful levels from which it cannot escape without splitting this is Freud's idea Its integration is permanently threatened, and that's what modern psychology is based on. So a split mind is the central problem. Acim addresses One part that chooses the ego. This is the split One part that chooses the ego and one part that remembers God. If fear is locked away to protect us, the split remains and peace can never be sustained. That's the idea modern psychology is based on.
Speaker 1:The holy spirit's work is to end the need for splitting it all by making it safe to face the fear in the light of the truth. That's what we're doing. It's like we're bringing the light into this darkened unconscious mind so the mind can be completely integrated again. Basically, what jesus is saying here is an unintegrated mind. So the belief. I can't handle seeing this. That's the ego's anchor.
Speaker 1:In miracle mindedness we realize there's no thought too fearful to bring to the Holy Spirit and the reason is because it's not defining you. This is not part of your identity. The fear is as if it's part of the identity. That's why there's fear to look on it. So truly, integration, which is what we're going here for here, is restored not by managing the fear. It's allowing it to be undone and it's got to be looked at for that to happen. So fear remains in a hidden compartment, the mind remains divided. That's the ego's goal to keep the mind divided.
Speaker 1:Healing means facing all fear with the Holy Spirit. And look, these fearful thoughts are bubbling up all day long Worry, concern. What if this happens? What does that person think of me? What if I don't have enough money? Any of those things? This is so common. I don't have enough money, any of those things. This is so common. So this will end the need for splitting and it will restore the mind to its natural wholeness, recognizing that we can handle seeing whatever's in there. We can expect that it's going to be fearful, and we can also expect that the Holy Spirit will bring it to us slowly, in whatever way we can handle it, but it's believing that whatever's there is too much or too fearful to look on. That's what keeps us in a split state of mind. We want to. You know, we end up identifying with the ego and wanting to be comfortable and not look at the shadows. Darkness, basically, murderous thoughts, is another way of saying it. All right, let's see what sentence are we on now? Sentence five Look at us.
Speaker 1:It is essential not to control the fearful, but to eliminate it. So it is essential. That means it's not optional. Jesus is stating a non-negotiable principle for healing the mind it is essential not to control the fearful. The ego's approach is to manage fear, suppress it, compartmentalize it, redirect it, channel it into acceptable outlets. This is what most psychological methods aim to do Lessen fear's impact without addressing its cause. That's why you know, if you had a question question why does the world seem the way it does? Why does everything seem to be operating off of fear? This is why, because these are the principles being used. Even when people go for help, they go to psychologists. And this is what they get. They're redirecting it, channeling it, making it acceptable, but still keeping it hidden.
Speaker 1:So it is essential not to control the fearful but to eliminate it. So the goal of A Course in Miracles is total removal of fear, total removal of it through forgiveness. That's what we're doing. That's why forgiveness is our function. As the light of the world. Forgiveness is our function. It's not by force or repression, it's seeing it as unreal, totally, whatever is there all of the fearful thoughts? They're going to be there in the unconscious. We can see the effects of it. We can perceive the effects of it in this world. We're going to see it as unreal in the light of truth. That's our goal and we're guaranteed that we're going to succeed. So elimination here, he's saying, but to eliminate it. It is essential not to control the fearful but to eliminate it. Elimination means undoing the belief that fear has any power or meaning. So fear isn't part of the mind of god at all. It only exists as an ego miscreation. So because of that that means it can be completely undone, because the ego isn't even real.
Speaker 1:Controlling fear is what keeps it in place, because control assumes fear is real and dangerous. It's assuming this is dangerous. Like, let's say, someone, someone has murderous thoughts. It's like, okay, well, you know, we'll just redirect that, we'll just channel that into something else, right, instead of oh, that's, oh you, oh, you, oh, you can see that there's a murderous thought. Oh great, let's go into it. Now I've seen that in my mind. Wow, wild. Most people don't talk about this, right, if they do see it, they'll cover it up.
Speaker 1:I never had the intuition or the call to go to any kind of psychoanalyst about it or anything like that. I was actually practicing A Course in Miracles at the time and I had these murderous thoughts where I'm killing my own kid in my mind and I'm going. Oh, you know, fortunately for me, I was already practicing A Course in Miracles and I was asked the Holy Spirit to look at it with me. It was very fearful, it was interesting because it was so intense, but it went fast. It went really fast because I was willing to look at it. So it took, you know, the course of one night just watching these thoughts arise and watching with the Holy Spirit and having them be resolved, because you're looking at them and looking.
Speaker 1:These aren't helpful. There's nothing helpful about this stuff, and you know, when I'm looking at it I'm like, oh, it's not really fearful because it's unreal. It's not true. It's not true that it would be of any benefit to be killing someone. See, it's like, underneath in the unconscious mind is as if it would be a benefit if someone was killed. So I could look on those thoughts with calmness and see that, no, these thoughts don't benefit me at all. How ridiculous are these thoughts.
Speaker 1:And you may have had, you know this, this kind of fearful, murderous thoughts bubbling up in your own mind, just in a passing thought that you know it would be better if that person wasn't on the earth, any person, right, this is, this is how it comes up. It would be better if they were just eliminated from my life. My life would be better if they weren't here. So controlling fear keeps it in place because it assumes it's real and dangerous. Right, and that's how people end up doing murderous things because they're repressing murderous thoughts, they don't want to look at them, and it always comes up and always acts. It's like it acts right through you. Not necessarily with murder, everyone's not doing that. But you know, there's certain people who are doing it for everyone. They're representing everyone else's fear. There's all kinds of apparent murders going on in this life. Right, they're represented. It's like oh, thanks for doing that.
Speaker 1:For me, the Holy Spirit's method is to expose fear and reinterpret it. It's a miscreation. You basically look on it and go, oh, it's a miscreation. Sure did help all my relationships. When I saw that as a miscreation. It was really fast too. Just willingness to look, dissolving it at its root by restoring the mind to love. That's what happens, okay, okay.
Speaker 1:So the moment you try to control fear, you're agreeing with the ego's premise that fear has substance like oh, no, no, no, I don't want to look at that. I'm going to have a drink or something, right, I'm going to eat some food instead. I'm going to do some art instead. Whatever it is, it could seem to be productive or unproductive. Either way, what you really want to do is look at what's in the unconscious mind. It's unwatched. Really, when fear arises, the healing question is not how do I manage this? Am I willing to see this differently? Is what it is. Am I willing to see this differently?
Speaker 1:Truly, elimination happens by withdrawing belief from fear, letting the Holy Spirit show you it has no cause. In reality, we're just projecting this thing. Managing fear is always ego maintenance. Eliminating fear is miracle mindedness. So the only way fear disappears is by recognizing that nothing real can be threatened and nothing unreal exists. That's really when we recognize that If you guys study A Course in Miracles, that's like the main foundation of A Course in Miracles. It's right in the introduction yeah and so and so throughout A Course in Miracles showing you how it gets lied over and over again. Okay, we got someone who wants to talk. All right, unmute yourself.
Speaker 2:Thomas.
Speaker 1:Yay, do you want?
Speaker 2:to go on Tessa Sure, yes, okay.
Speaker 1:That way people can see you.
Speaker 2:Okay, Join us panelists. Let's see here Okay.
Speaker 1:All right, aloha, aloha.
Speaker 2:So I really appreciate this idea about hiding fear, and it dawns on me that the Course in Mir miracle says that sickness is a defense against the truth and hiding fear would be a defense against the truth too. And you know, there's this, isn't there, isn't there? Interesting that there's an assumption of survival and that's it starts with that. We think we have to survive, so being safe and hiding fear is a way of survival. But man, none of that's true. So I appreciate that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we don't need it at all.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but becoming conscious of it, like you're doing with this, with these kinds of discussions, allows us to not have to hide it and just catch ourself hiding it. And why not just say I'm afraid, and let it be out of the bag, let it be out from under the carpet and um and deal with it. It's a human thing right To have fear, but not to hide it or repress it or make it into something or blame others for my fear. Just own it. Yeah, just own it.
Speaker 1:Yeah or blame anything in the field, like like, let's say, you know you get some kind of sickness symptom and then you seem to be afraid because of the symptom. That is not the reason you're afraid. You know that you're afraid first and then you manifest the symptom. The symptom is an effect of fear. It's not the other way around. So when you're looking like that, you're actually opening up to see what you're projecting in the unconscious mind and you know what what it comes down to all of us is murderous slash, suicidal thoughts is at the bottom of what's going on here. That's why I feel so blessed that I got to see that in 2014, because just seeing that within my own mind changed so much for me.
Speaker 1:I was in duality with everyone in my household. It was hard to live in my house because I was completely feeling victimized by everyone. I felt like I needed to run away all the time. Not only that friends, extended family, whatever. I was only able to really get along with people that I never developed a personal relationship with because I saw too much of a reflection of myself. And once I saw those murderous thoughts and I had probably about 120 days into A Course in Miracles by that time, plus Vipassana meditation, and I just go oh, here it is, right away.
Speaker 1:When I came on, you know, my son said something to me. I forgot what it was. I'm sure it wasn't. It wouldn't even be perceived as a big deal by anyone to have a 12 year old tell you whatever he told me and and I just went into complete murderous rage.
Speaker 1:But I didn't express it outward, I laid down on my couch and I told everyone to leave me alone and it went on all night. I just stayed awake all night and watched like play of murdering this kid and feeling guilty for, as a role of mother wanting to murder their son, right. So that guilty feeling is preventing me, is trying to prevent me from looking at it at all At all. Right, Like trying to get the pull was to go for some marijuana or go for some food or get drunk or something like that, and try not to look at it because it, because it was such a guilty thing and I'm like no way, no way, I'm going to go through this, right. So when I went through it I saw the thought that said I'd be better off if he would.
Speaker 2:He was dead when it was just when it was just your fear. The whole time it was just your fear that was causing all that, and you said something just a second ago that's really important. I'm noticing fear is when it makes me unaligned with God. I'm not in alignment. And when I'm not in alignment, everything goes wrong. My cellular system goes wrong, my disease is possible. So just calling it out and laughing at it like it's just fear, no problem, and allowing it to move so I can stay aligned again with truth. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, that's a really important point too is laughing about it. You know the ego can't stand that. This is serious You're. You know you're having thoughts of murdering your kid. You know it's like if you can't laugh about it, then it's. It's really made real right now. It's important. But if you can laugh about it it's like oh, how stupid is that. You know it first.
Speaker 1:It first started, uh, when I first noticed it was when, uh, when, when he was a little baby and he was crying, and it was the middle of the night and I got this sense like I wanted to throw him out the window. But he was a little baby. And you know, at that point this is way before A Course in Miracles all I could do was laugh at that. At that point I was like what in the world, where's that coming from? You know, it's like I always had a sense of humor about it, sort of even before I started A Course in Miracles, and you know I also wasn't afraid to express that even to people around me. You know it was like you know what? I just got a thought that I could just throw it out the window, right? So so if you laugh at it, you take away all danger. It's making these things serious and real that makes us feel like we need to repress them. Oh, don't tell anyone that. What are people going to?
Speaker 2:think Right. One more thing I've been following you for about 10 years and the one thing, a theme of yours that's so powerful is isn't this fun? Because I say that now? Because when my senses are all heightened and I got adrenaline, I got hot flashes, I go whew, isn't this fun? I mean my body's reacting. I must be in something you know, passionate, and I'm just. It's not, it's me, it's not them, I'm just having an experience in my body right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I love that expression. I use it all the time.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm so glad. Thank you, yeah, all the time. Oh, I'm so glad, thank you, yeah, that's fun. Yeah, 10 years, wow, thank you, so fun. Thanks a lot. Yeah, this is the guy I'm going to visit in Sedona, by the way. That's so fun. He's very nice and he's super tuned in. He's a real sweetie.
Speaker 2:Yeah, looking forward to that, making up some fun things to do.
Speaker 1:Oh, cool, okay yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm looking. I'm really charged up about it. So bring your presence here. Oh yeah, bring your love being here to Sedona.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, you know what I'm going to do. I'm just going to mute you for now, but I'll keep you on as an analyst. That way, if you want to just come back on and talk, you'll already. Let's see, I'm going to stop your video.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Start it back up easily.
Speaker 2:Perfect, thank you.
Speaker 1:Thanks, Thomas.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, all right, so we're moving on. Let me just make sure no one else has any questions. Oh, durga, sometimes it's so clear that it is fear. Sometimes it's like being so drunk you think you're sober. How do I become more aware of unconscious fear? Okay, so the way to become more aware of unconscious fear recognize anytime you feel any kind of fear, and that's anything from concern all the way down to murderous rage. Recognize that that is coming from the unconscious mind. It's something that you're choosing now. We're going to get more into this too, through this session. We're going to get more into this. It's something that you're choosing right now. Just being aware of that.
Speaker 1:Whatever it seems you seem to be afraid of, it doesn't matter what it is. So I worked with a therapist that said my personality would split if I looked at my childhood. Okay, yeah, your childhood is also projected now. You don't really have to go that far. It's not really necessary. It's all right now. Your child's good comes up right now. That's cool, you know, it's all now. So, yeah, the split mind is what keeps the ego safe. That's what keeps the ego safe. So you just take it as it comes. Any kind of fear that's being projected into the field. It's your recognizing that that's coming from your unconscious mind and that you do want to see it. You want to see its origin, you want to look at it with the Holy Spirit so that it could be resolved.
Speaker 1:Okay, so let me see if I can change this split screen thing. Maybe not. Let me see. If I put on hold, what does that do? Oh, okay, thomas, I want to make sure you can still hear me. I put you on hold so it wasn't a split screen. Just send me a little note and make sure so I can make sure you can hear me. If not, I'll take you off hold and put you back to, uh, attendee. Oh, yeah, I think I just like I just muted him out. Okay, I'm moving you back to attendee because I don't know how to get you without a split screen. Okay, okay, that's better. All right, we'll get to everything here.
Speaker 1:Okay, so what I'm going to do with sentence one of paragraph seven is I'm going to read the footnote first and we'll get into. It is about Otto Rank. He's another psychoanalyst, I guess you would call it. Otto Rank was one of Freud's closest colleagues until their break in 1926.
Speaker 1:Rank was the only early psychoanalyst to emphasize the centrality of will in human psychology. In Rank's system we are not merely determined by unconscious and biological forces but determine ourselves through our will, artistic creation and the function of will in creating one's individual self as differentiated from parental influence. He also emphasized will conflicts, a term that Jesus just used right here in chapter 2. So we went over this. It was chapter two, part 10. This is probably two sessions ago. Such is the conflict between the will to separate and the will to unite. So will conflicts. That's something that Otto Rank introduced. So I made notes about this footnote. So it's showing that Rank's contribution was unique amongst early psychoanalysts because he placed the will was about self-determination, differentiation from parental influence and navigating will conflicts like the will to separate versus the will to unite. So this helps us see why Jesus called Rank's concept particularly good.
Speaker 1:This is in the next sentence that we're getting to. He's calling it particularly good. It already had echoes of A Course in Miracles' idea that the will matters but also why Jesus said it needed extending into union with God's will rather than staying at the level of individual human creativity. So here's the sentence, paragraph seven, sentence one. So Jesus is saying here rank's concept of the will was particularly good, except that he preferred to ally it only with humanity's own truly creative ability but did not extend it to its proper union with God's basically God's will. So let's break it down. It says here Rank's concept of the will was particularly good. So Jesus is giving credit to Otto Rank for his understanding of the will. Rank saw the will as a positive creative force in human beings, a step in the right direction. So Jesus is saying this is a step in the right direction, compared to Freud's more deterministic view, except that he preferred to ally it with humanity's own truly creative ability. That's what it says in the sentence.
Speaker 1:So here, rank's concept of the will was particularly good, except that he preferred to ally it with humanity's own truly creative ability. Rank limited the scope of the will to human self-expression. So here's where he went wrong. He limited it to human self-expression and personal creativity, art, ideas, individuality. He saw it as an inherent power of the human psyche rather than a function of a higher source. See what Jesus is telling us that our will is actually a function of a higher source. See what Jesus is telling us that our will is actually a function of a higher source. Okay. So back to the sentence. Here Rank's concept of the will was particularly good, except that he preferred to ally it only with humanity's own truly creative ability, but did not extend it to its proper union with God's. So this is where Jesus says rank fell short.
Speaker 1:True will is not independent of human power. It's God's will, expressed through us. Our creative ability is real only when it's in alignment with God's creation. See, you know, it says other places in A Course in Miracles too, that all we have left of our creative ability here is the ability to will with God and forgive our illusions. We're not creating here, we're making shit up, right. We're not creating here, we're making shit up right. So it's not when it's separated into human-centered framework. So he's still using it. Otto Rank is still using it for dreaming.
Speaker 1:So A Course in Miracles is teaching us that there's only one will. It's God's will, the ego's will really doesn't exist. It's God's will, the ego's will really doesn't exist. What we call our will is either in harmony with miracle mindedness or it's in opposition to it, which is basically we're listening to the ego. So Rank's version of the will was still ego based, because it stopped short of acknowledging the source of all creativity.
Speaker 1:Creativity that's divorced from God's will becomes misperception of acknowledging the source of all creativity. Creativity that's divorced from God's will becomes misperception. Still powerful, but used to reinforce separation instead of extending love, we want to use it only for extending love. All right, everyone's doing good, yay, yay. So the practical implication of this is, when we rely on our own creative powers apart from God, we're going to mix truth with illusion. Okay, when we align with God's, will we bring clarity, purpose, joy, because it restores our creations to their rightful function, which is only extending love. That's what forgiveness does. It restores all of our creations to their rightful function, which is extending love. Which is extending love? It's truth. So a simple self-check Does this creative impulse feel like it comes from joy and peace or from striving and self-definition? Are we trying to define ourselves? That's what people are going through.
Speaker 1:A friend asked me the other day what do you aspire to do when you're over there in Sedona? Nothing, I don't aspire to do anything. I'm just being. I don't need to do anything. Anything that I need to do will just arise spontaneously. I don't have any. How are you going to make money? I'm like I don't need to make money. I'm sustained by the love of God Right, I don't have to think about that anymore, and everyone's sustained by the love of God, but for the most part, people don't know it. So there's all this. There's this using the creative impulse to try to make ourselves something. How can I define myself so I can be important in this world and people can pay me for one thing? How can I move to define myself?
Speaker 1:What I see, since I had that come with such clarity that I'm sustained by the love of God pretty much last year, that came with great clarity after going and becoming a realtor. Apparently I was thinking I need to do something. And going through all that, what I see is, whatever it is that seems to make money. It just arises spontaneously as it needs to and there's no way I'm going to be needing anything that I don't have. That's just. It's just really clear. You know, and I've been looking in that direction for a really long time and bringing my illusions to the truth and going through the pain of it and looking at the fear and all that for a while and then eventually it just that's just the way it goes. It comes to clarity, it just comes to clarity. So this self-check.
Speaker 1:Does this creative impulse feel like it comes from joy and peace, being sustained in God and loved by God, or from striving and self-definition? Am I trying to get attention? Am I trying to score another body? Or, you know, is it needy? So a creative impulse can point to union with God's will or to an ego substitute. Just notice, it's not a matter of making yourself bad. You're just getting better at noticing these things. So you're seeing, you're recognizing your tendencies, so they can be looked on with the Holy Spirit and resolved. So back to Otto Rank.
Speaker 1:Otto Rank rightly saw will as creative and powerful, but by keeping it human-centered, he missed its true strength Union with God's will. He missed its true strength Union with God's will. This is where all creativity begins and ends, you know. It reminds me of the verse seek first the kingdom of heaven and all else will be added onto you. It's like you're just using that creative impulse to constantly do God's will. Let everything else fall into place, it'll all work out. Let everything else fall into place, it'll all work out, whatever way, you know, not trying to define ourselves, just letting ourselves be defined by this creativity. This is God's will, and God's will for us is perfect happiness. We certainly don't need to be afraid. All right, everyone's doing good. I love it. I'm always checking on you, so feel free to write me if you need anything or raise your hand, all right.
Speaker 1:So we're on to paragraph seven, sentence two, and we got another footnote. We're going to start with a footnote. This is about birth trauma. Note this is about birth trauma. So in the trauma of birth this is from 1924, otto Rank put forward the idea that the shock of separation from the mother at birth is the basis of all anxiety and neurosis. Don't you guys totally see that in psychology today, even spiritual stuff, right, right, we're always going back to that. We're doing rebirthing and all this kind of stuff, right, so let's so. So here Jesus is going to talk about it, but, but here it is about this footnote, his theory of birth trauma.
Speaker 1:Auto ranks, their theory of birth trauma, proposed that physical birth is the first and most significant source of anxiety. He described it as a universal human experience of being forced from the safety of the womb into a world of separation where we must now breathe and exist independently. He linked this trauma to later psychological struggles, believing that it set the pattern for anxiety and the longing to return to an earlier state of unity or security. So you know, think of trying to go back to the womb where you're just completely taken care of in there, right? I've definitely heard that concept before, heard that concept before. So he also connected birth trauma to creativity, suggesting that artistic expression was, in part, an attempt to overcome or work through the psychic shock of birth. So let's see what Jesus has to say about that.
Speaker 1:Okay, so this sentence his speaking of Otto, otto Rank, his birth trauma, another valid idea was also too limited in that it did not refer to the separation, which was really a false idea of birth. See, separation is a false idea of birth. We talked about this before. Actually, it was last week at Namaste. You know, when God created us with individual awareness to have individual awareness, we perceived it as a sort of birth, like we're separate from the source. Now, we didn't view it as this great gift of having individual awareness in God. We viewed it as being an individual, a separate and, yeah, kicked out Good, I like that. Yes, kicked out of heaven. That's what we viewed it as. But that wasn't what it was. It was actually a great gift, this individual awareness, and it is it still. Is this great gift right? So he's saying this was a false idea of birth. So Otto's birth trauma another valid idea. So we're looking at that part of the sentence now.
Speaker 1:He proposed that physical birth itself was a traumatic event for the psyche, our first experience of loss and separation. Jesus acknowledges the idea has some truth. The sense of being torn from a prior state of unity does cause fear. So there's some truth to that. But he's saying it was also too limited. The concept is valid but not complete. Rank stopped at the level of the body and did not recognize the metaphysical root. And then here's the sentence continues In that it did not refer to the separation.
Speaker 1:So his birth trauma another valid idea was also too limited in that it did not refer to the separation. So here Jesus is shifting the cause from physical birth to the mind's belief in separation from God. This is the real birth trauma. It was not a physical event. That's not what it is, you guys. So going back to the physical events, you're still. You're not touching it. You're not touching what it was. What's going on here? What you're making real now? It was not a physical event but the original misperception that we could possibly exist apart from our source. That is not a possibility. So the sentence goes on His birth trauma. Another valid idea was also too limited in that it did not refer to the separation, which was really a false idea of birth. So which was really a false idea of birth? So which was really a false idea of birth? The separation never actually happened. So this birth into an independent self was an illusion from the beginning.
Speaker 1:All we're doing, by recreating this birth, is just projecting this idea that we've been kicked out of heaven. It's the same thing, the same feeling. And you get kicked out of the womb. You're all nice and warm in there, right, and then you get kicked out. You're like what the fuck is this? Right, it's just recreating that same thing. It was the ego's invention of a false beginning.
Speaker 1:And imagine starting point of a self that's separate from God. It's not the starting point of a self that's separate from God, it's just the start of self-awareness in God. That's the reframing of it. It's a self-awareness in God. It's where you've been created, as a divine abstraction, a distinct divine abstraction. It seems to have a beginning, but there's no end to it. It's eternal. It doesn't die. The self that you're created to be does not die, it's eternal, does not die, it's eternal.
Speaker 1:So to summarize that sentence, physical events, including birth, can remind us of the separation they do. They remind us of the separation, but they are not the cause of our fear. Physical birth is not the cause of our fear. That's what Jesus is saying here. The true trauma is the instant the mind entertained the idea of being separate. That's what Jesus is saying here. The true trauma is the instant the mind entertained the idea of being separate. That's the true trauma. It was a choice to imagine life apart from God, and since the separation is unreal in itself, its birth is equally unreal, and so it can be completely undone, where we don't have to keep on recreating these imaginary births into a separate world like this. Our reality is far more beautiful and joyful. It's not separate like this.
Speaker 1:So, for healing, for practical implication and healing, if we believe our fear comes from physical events, which is look how common that is you guys, everyone's trying to go back and try to get rid of birth trauma. Physical birth, though, not separation from God. That's the true trauma our belief that that happened. But Jesus is revealing a deeper truth here. Okay, so we will try to heal at the level of the body, but it can only bring temporary relief. That's the ego's plan. Keep bringing temporary relief. That's what all psychology is based on. Even still, I checked with AI. I said has that changed since Jesus said this stuff in the late 60s? Has that changed in modern psychology? No, it hasn't. It is still based on these same kind of theories. So, yeah, we're going for temporary relief for the most part. That's why we use A Course in Miracles. We're doing true psychology here. This is true psychology.
Speaker 1:So healing requires tracing all fear back to the mind's belief in separation. That's all it is. That's what it requires. Back to belief in separation. Oh, this is belief in separation, this thought about murdering someone, belief in separation. That's all Allowing the Holy Spirit to show us that this birth never even happened, as in getting kicked out of God. So Rank was right that birth can feel like trauma, but Jesus is revealing a deeper truth. Our only real birth trauma was believing we separated from God and that's an event that did not happen. That's why we trace the fear back to that event. We get healing for it and over time which is what time is for we actually eliminate that belief that we ever separated altogether. That's what we're doing. That's what we're doing through forgiveness and being the light of the world.
Speaker 1:Okay, so Thomas made a comment here your will is God's will. Yes, he says he, she, uh God, he, she says he, she, uh God apparently wanted to go to Mexico for six weeks and it turned out being three months. If it promotes unity and oneness, it is God. Yes, we know we. We know. If it feels like separation, we just go inside to know. Yeah, we recognize when it feels like separation. Yeah, anywhere that I seem to go, it's God's will for spreading unity, extending unity and love and forgiveness. That's all it ever is. And I look at everything like that. Doesn't matter. Whatever I seem to do, whatever apparent choices I seem to make, you know I go with God's will in mind, even if it seems like it's something terrible, even if it seems like it has bad results, for me, for instance. All right, so we're going to the next sentence. Thank you, thomas.
Speaker 1:The next sentence, paragraph seven, sentence three physical birth is not a trauma in itself. What a sweet sentence. Physical birth is not a trauma in itself. So, what a sweet sentence. Physical birth is not a trauma in itself. So then you look at that and you go, what the fuck is everyone doing then Trying to heal that trauma? That's not even a trauma. Physical birth is basically the body's entry into the world. This is the event that Rank based his birth trauma theory on Bodies entering into the world. Physical birth is not.
Speaker 1:Jesus completely removes the assumption that the act of being born into a body is inherently damaging. It's nothing, it's really nothing, he says, especially an underwater birth. Yeah, I mean whatever it could be the most traumatic birth. Let's say you know, you got the uh it seems like to me right Cords wrapped around the neck. You know, from my perspective, the most traumatic one that I gave birth with was where they induced me. There just seems to be a lot more pain going on there. So let's say you know, whatever you can imagine is the most traumatic thing. Jesus is saying physical birth is not a trauma in itself. So it's not a trauma in itself. That means there's nothing intrinsically harmful or fearful about the process of birth. There really isn't. That's what I learned by the third one.
Speaker 1:I did this thing called hypno babies, where I just hypnotize myself to see the whole thing differently, and it was wonderful. I felt no pain. It was amazing and I wasn't on anything. I had no, any kind of nothing, not even marijuana, nothing at all. To try to limit pain, I just use this thing called hypnobabies and basically this is very enlightening for me. This was way before A Course in Miracles. It was 2008 when my third kid was born and it just showed me the power of the mind there.
Speaker 1:The whole practice of hypnobno babies was to see the whole birthing experience as different. Instead of calling it contractions, we called it birthing waves and something easeful and beautiful. And everything is going right and I'm opening and I oh yeah, I feel pressure. Yeah, there's some pressure, downward pressure, a head is moving through a canal, but it wasn't anything fearful. We made it that way. That showed me that and that just by by going through that birthing of my son with a different point of view, after having, you know, a lot of pain in birth before, it's a totally different point of view and you know, after he, after he popped out, the whole thing took an hour because I was just so calm and I was just experiencing completely different Afterwards. I was having such a spiritual experience because I was, like, so amazed at the power of the mind to see things differently. And, like I said, this is like six years before I ever opened A Course in Miracles.
Speaker 1:I hadn't been involved in very much, my guess is you could say, like more modern spirituality. I was raised a Christian missionary. I didn't really learn about the power of the mind, I don't feel throughout that, but it just came to me through this birthing that, wow, can I just apply this to everything? That's what arose in my mind Emotions, can I just apply this to emotions and everything? That was the question in my mind and I'm sure that's why you know, all these other things started coming to me, because that was the question I had and that definitely there was hope that that and faith that that definitely could occur.
Speaker 1:So physical birth is not a trauma in itself. There's nothing harmful or fearful about the process of birth. Any distress experienced is not caused by the event giving birth. Look at that. That's another way. Durga, you were asking about how to recognize fear. Look, we automatically think that birthing is painful and what Jesus is telling us here is any distress experience is not caused by the event itself. That's basically what he's saying. He's saying physical birth is not a trauma in itself. It's by the meaning our mind is giving to it. I saw that firsthand. It's totally in our own mind giving meaning to this shit.
Speaker 1:So, in A Course in Miracles, the body's neutral. It does not cause pain or trauma. It doesn't cause pain or trauma, only the mind. This is how we learn to see. Only the mind, through interpretation, can make any event fearful. There's no fearful event. Go into the dentist, for instance. Just apply it, recognize it.
Speaker 1:Any pain you perceive I was just getting some skin treatments where they're actually burning me with a laser right, and the whole time that's what I'm doing. I'm noticing any pain that I'm experiencing. That's just fear, and it's not to try to like eliminate the pain like that. It's to recognize what is held in the subconscious mind. So I'm approaching that with deep breath and approaching the whole thing like that. It's simple. The practice is really simple. So, since birth is a physical occurrence, it has no power in itself to create any lasting fear. See that it has no power to create lasting fear in us.
Speaker 1:The trauma only comes when the mind uses the event to reinforce the belief in separation. That's what we're doing. We're using it. When we're blaming the pain on the event, we're really using it to reinforce the fear of separation. The real cause of fear is always the mind's choice to see itself as separate. It's not the body's experiences. There's no experiences that's right or wrong either. It's so fun when I get the, when I well, I think I'm done with all those, those burning so-called skincare treatments. You know, it always has like a deeper, a deeper layer. You know something that you're you may be going through and seeing and willingness to see. But you know, as I was going through it, I was like really aware, like staying awake to what I'm projecting, that I'm projecting this pain. It's like, wow, I'm really projecting some pain, because even the burning of the skin, like that with a laser, can't cause any pain. So it's really just recognizing that that's fear. All pain is fear, it doesn't matter what it is. So if we attribute our distress to physical events, if we attribute our distress to physical events, even something as primal as birth, we keep the cause of fear outside the mind, where it can't be healed. It's as if something can cause us pain. So that's making the fear separate from our mind and really we're compartmentalizing that fear and keeping it hidden. So recognizing that physical birth is not inherently traumatic, allows us to stop defending against it, not inherently traumatic, allows us to stop defending against it and instead look at the thought system that uses birth as a reminder of separation.
Speaker 1:You hear all the screaming in the hospitals if you're in the birthing ward. I went there three. Well, I went there two times. The third time I was in a midwifery, but two times that I went there I'd hear people screaming, and both times, you know. The second time hear people screaming and both times, you know. The second time was a lot more pain, apparently, you know, because I apparently got induced. Still, it's my mind even bringing about the induction so I could have an experience of more pain. It's still not outside of my mind, it's still fear. At the time I didn't know that, but still, at the time I wasn't loud about it and I would hear people scream. I'm like, why are they doing that? Like how does that help anything? Like how is that really helping? And what I see is that screaming is really just reinforcing the same thing. It's like, ah, this is causing this to me, even when it seemed like it was really intense, I would just breathe through it and not knowing that it's just fear. At that time I didn't know. Now we're talking about all the way back to 2001, way before I tried A Course in Miracles.
Speaker 1:So physical birth is actually neutral and any sense of trauma we're associating with it comes from the ego's interpretation, the ego's interpreting it as trauma, and it's not coming from the event itself. This is just something to recognize. Whenever you get an experience of pain, you stub your toe, anything. This applies to physical and emotional pain. All pain is fear. All pain is fear.
Speaker 1:You know, when I found myself in a really dire situation where it seemed like the pain was so great, like after I apparently fell off a cliff, the pain in my tailbone was so great it felt like in the thought that came to me, I need to be knocked out by some kind of drug or like killed right now because this pain is so intense. And you know that was 2022. So I'd been practicing A Course in Miracles by that time for eight years, so it was just second nature to me to go into pain is fear. That's what I went to, right, you know, in my mind with those thoughts and I even asked my brother to come and hold my hand and look into my eyes so we can agree on that together. And when that happened the pain was just gone. There was some shaking like seemed like the body went into a convulsion and then there was just comfort in laying there. It's like, oh, thank goodness. But it was right at the end of holding hands and looking in each other's eyes and saying pain is fear. It has no cause aside from fear and just being really adamant about that. So if that arises for you headache anything you know I had a friend I say had because I haven't talked to her in a long time, but she's still my friend.
Speaker 1:I have a friend who, quite a while ago, used to take pharmaceutical drugs for a headache. And I go, you know you can go through the headache and recognize that it's fear. And so eventually she did that. She sat through it, recognizing that the headache is fear. You know she just totally eliminated the need to take any pharmaceutical drugs about it. That's another example. Just use it like that. So the bottom line is physical.
Speaker 1:Birth is neutral and any sense of trauma we associate with it comes from the ego's interpretation. It does not come from the event. True healing is remembering that nothing in form, including birth, can separate us from God. That's truly the miracle, whether you're getting relief from pain right there or not. You know, in my case I had relief from pain, immediate relief, I mean. Still there was the ongoing. It seemed like I had nerve damage and my butt went flat for about a year. I had nerve damage and my butt went flat for about a year. But you know, there's still more unseen, unconscious fear in my mind. Obviously, otherwise I would not be projecting a body that I didn't have complete command over, right. So hooray to that. And isn't this that? And isn't this fun, isn't this fun? So let's go to paragraph eight, sentence one, and we have another footnote to start out with so we can see what. What's going on with this sentence. So footnote 138 in paragraph 8.
Speaker 1:Ranks this is Otto Rank. Again Ranks' Will Therapy, originally published as two works in 1929 and 1931, published in English as Will Therapy in 1936, emphasized choice, responsibility and action. He said Thus my concept allows for operation of the patient's own will as the most constructive force in the therapeutic process. He taught that neurosis is due to poor will organization and that patients can regain their authentic will through analysis in a process of self-creation. So key notes about this footnote. So his emphasis is choice, responsibility and action is central to healing. He saw the patient's own will as the most constructive force in therapy. And here's his definition of neurosis a result of poor will organization. His cure was to help patients regain their authentic will through analysis of a process of self-creation. So this is why Jesus would affirm the potential.
Speaker 1:The focus on will recognizes the mind's power to choose which is essential to a course in miracles the power to choose, the mind's power to choose. Where it falls short. Rank kept will therapy centered on human self-determinism and self-creation rather than extending will to its true union with God's will. God's will is our true will. That's another teaching of A Course in Miracles. From the Course's view, self-creation apart from God is totally impossible. So that's where he's going awry. True creation is always with God. So let's go to the sentence.
Speaker 1:Back to Jesus channeling here and this is paragraph eight the idea of quote will therapy was potentially a very powerful one. But rank did not see its real potential because he himself used his mind, partly to create a theory of the mind, also partly to attack Freud. This is an interesting topic too. So the idea of will therapy was potentially a very powerful one. So Jesus is acknowledging that Rank's therapeutic focus on the will had significant promise. Since the will is the mind's decision-making faculty, working with it could have led directly to miracle-mindedness if it was correctly understood and applied. So then he says but Rank did not see its real potential. The limitation wasn't in the concept, it was in Rank's perspective. His interpretation did not reach the level of aligning the will with the will of God. So it didn't align with the will of the person with the will of God, the will of the person with the will of God, because he himself used his mind partly to create a theory of the mind. So this shows that Rank's approach was partially constructive. He was genuinely trying to understand human psychology and offer a framework for healing. So Jesus goes on.
Speaker 1:Here's the sentence in whole. The idea of will therapy was potentially a very powerful one, but Rank did not see its real potential because he himself used his mind partly to create a theory of the mind, but also partly to attack Freud. So here Jesus is exposing an ego motive beneath rank's work. This is what prevented him from seeing. Because he wanted to attack Freud Instead of focusing purely on the truth. His energy was divided. Now look at how we tend to do this. Just watch this. Using his intellect both to create and to oppose this. Using his intellect both to create and to oppose, this competitive stance diluted the healing potential of his insights, because attack is always a use of the mind that reinforces separation. So that's where he fell short. He was at odds with Freud. So the will can be used for creation aligned with love. It has to be aligned with love, right or miscreation aligned with attack. So his divided purpose shows how even a good idea and you know Jesus is saying that this is a particularly valid idea loses power when it's mixed with attack thoughts In ACIM terms, a pure purpose. This is free of judgment, competition or the need to be right. Do you need to be right? It's always an idea. This is what allows an idea to be fully used for the Holy Spirit If it's free from all these things. So any attempt to prove another person wrong, like in this sentence, to attack Freud Jesus says he used it to attack Freud is a decision for separation that's blocking the miracle. So here's the practical implication of this sentence.
Speaker 1:Even in spiritual or psychological work, it's easy to mix creative intention with the impulse to oppose or prove your own superiority. Isn't that fun just to watch? You know, we got to be fun about it, because if we're not, we're trying to pretend like it's not happening. We're trying to pretend like we're not doing that. This is just an ego tendency. Being aware of your tendencies light and comical about it really helps. It really helps. Oh, look at that. See, the ego's competitive drive can subtly hijack our most inspired ideas, making them vehicles for defense instead of healing. Okay, here's a helpful self-check defense instead of healing. Okay, here's a helpful self-check.
Speaker 1:Am I sharing this insight? To extend love or to prove someone else wrong? I check myself on that all the time, especially being on social media, because people will come on and basically disagree with me, sometimes in a forceful way, and you know what I'll do. I'll use that. I won't be in a rush to answer them, right. I'll use that to feel into it. Okay, where is this coming from? I'll ask Jesus, I'll ask the Holy Spirit to be with me, to be guiding me. What would you have me say? To extend love, to share what's true and also extend love and not be opposed, because it's so easy to be opposed, to be argumentative, right, and you know, I know this from experience because I argued for many years. You know it's like you got to go through it to see it. I know from experience. I did it for a long time.
Speaker 1:The guidance to go on social media was in 2009, well before opening A Course in Miracles. And it took till well after opening A Course in Miracles before I was able to see oh, that's trying to prove people wrong. No wonder it feels so weird. No wonder it's got this anxious kind of feeling. And just touching him with, how do I feel? Notice how I feel? Does this feel peaceful to communicate, or do I have this anxious thing going on? I'm going to tell them right. This really hits home for me. I love it.
Speaker 1:So the bottom line here with this sentence is that will therapy could have been a profound bridge. This is Otto Rank's baby here. Will therapy could have been a profound bridge to aligning the mind with God's will. But Rank divided his intention, creating while also attacking. That's what limited its power. And for me I can see that's what limited my power all those years to communicate, because I was partially. There was a part of me that was sincere, that wanted to share the love of God and share the truth. And then there was also another part of my mind that was attacking other points of view. See, so that's limited my power to communicate. So, in a course, in miracles terms, the will's full potential emerges only when it's unified in purpose. Unified in purpose and free of attack. Hooray, all right, everyone's doing good. Thank you for hanging All right. Yeah, we got less than a half hour left, right. Time goes fast when you're having fun with this stuff. Huh, I mean, that's what I feel. I'm like, wow, all right. So the next sentence, paragraph eight, sentence two His reactions to Freud stemmed from his own unfortunate acceptance of the deprivation fallacy.
Speaker 1:This is what his reactions stem from his acceptance of this deprivation fallacy, which itself arose from the separation. So let's get into the sentence His reactions to Freud. This points to Rank's personal and professional response. After their break, they had a breakup. They were working together and then they had a breakup. Rather than being purely about ideas, his reactions were influenced by deeper, unhealed belief. It says. Stemmed from His reactions to Freud. Stemmed from. This indicates cause. His stance toward Freud wasn't just intellectual, it originated in a specific thought system. So his reactions to Freud stemmed from his own unfortunate acceptance of the deprivation fallacy. Now, the deprivation fallacy is the belief that something real can be taken from you. Isn't it that loss is possible, right, something real can be threatened, or that another's gain is your loss. So this is what, why he was having trouble. It assumes lack is real and resources whether love, recognition, creativity are limited. Okay, so his reactions to Freud stemmed from his own unfortunate acceptance of the deprivation fallacy, which itself arose from the separation. Okay, these are Jesus's words. That's the sentence.
Speaker 1:This false belief in deprivation comes from the mind's original acceptance of the separation from God. Okay, so you know. You can get confused by this sentence if you're not familiar with the Course in Miracles, because it says which itself arose from the separation. Jesus didn't even clarify right there that the separation never happened. You kind of have to draw that based on what the rest of A Course in Miracles is saying. There is no separation. So let's just reaffirm that right now.
Speaker 1:This false belief in deprivation comes from the mind's original acceptance of separateness from God. It doesn't come from the separation, it's acceptance of the separation, because there is no separation. Believing in separation automatically brings the perception of scarcity and competition. That's what he was dealing with. That's why he felt like he had to attack Freud In order for his points to be valid. He felt like he had to invalidate Freud. That's what keeps us locked. So we don't have to focus like that on what anyone else is saying. We don't have to invalidate anything. Anyone else is saying it's fine, acim perspective, okay.
Speaker 1:So in ACIM terms, the deprivation fallacy is central to the ego's thought system. If you're separate, you must compete for what you need. Notice that in business right, others can harm you or diminish you. That's the idea others can harm you or diminish you. This belief is what fuels rivalry, jealousy and defensiveness, even in intellectual and creative arenas I would say especially in intellectual and creative arenas. All forms of competition are rooted in this error. That God's love and your true creative power can be diminished. Okay, that God's love and your true creative power can be diminished, okay. So here's practically the moment we see another's work, talent or success as threatening to our own. That's when we're in the deprivation fallacy. Nothing is threatening us, we're making it all up.
Speaker 1:Healing comes from remembering that we share one creative source. Nothing real can be lost or taken away. Reactions based on deprivation will always contain some attack energy. This is how they did. This is how it was for Rank and Freud, which dilutes the healing potential of our work. So rank's rivalry with with freud was not about ideas alone. It was rooted in the false belief that another's creative contribution could diminish our own. This belief, born of separation, is undone simply by remembering that all creation is shared and cannot be lost. This is how we truly contribute with our ideas, with our insights. This is how we truly contribute, not by competition, by going against anyone else.
Speaker 1:I notice that nowadays, you know, when someone comes on, especially social media, that's a common thing Someone will come on with an idea that seems to be an opposing idea. I'm able to include. See people you know going off getting aha moments where at first they they seem to be coming in an attack energy, but they seem to get oh oh, now I see what you actually mean. Oh, okay, they don't have to necessarily agree, but then this attack kind of thing is just resolved and that is that leads to creativity and healing. True creative, true creativity is forgiving our illusions, at least in this dream. So you guys are looking good. Everyone seems to be uh, everything, everyone seems to be chilling. Don't have any questions. Thank you for hanging with me. I appreciate you. We'll go on to the next sentence. This is sentence three of paragraph eight.
Speaker 1:This led him to believe that his own mind's creation could stand only if the creation of another's fell. So this led him to believe this is auto Rank again, acceptance of the deprivation fallacy that belief naturally produces. That belief naturally produces competitive, defensive thinking that his own mind's creation, his theories, insights and psychological models, his intellectual and creative work. So this led him to believe that his own mind's creation could stand only if the creation of another's fell. So this is the core of competitive perception. Again, for one person's work to be validated, another person's work must be diminished or disproven.
Speaker 1:In ego logic, the success of another threatens one's own ability and worth, of another threatens one's own ability and worth. So in the thought system of the ego, creativity is seen as a zero-sum game. Resources, recognition and truth itself are limited, according to the ego. That's why, in truth, creation is unlimited and shared. The success of anyone's work extends your own. It extends anyone's success in their work extends your own. So you know that idea was like oh, they're doing so much and I'm doing. No, it's all ours, it's all us. We don't need to do anything. Just let creativity roll through you, because all real creation comes from the same source, and believing your work is upheld by another's downfall is a complete inversion of God's law, like if you get happy about another person's downfall. That's where you're just inverting God's law, because all creation strengthens the whole, because all creation strengthens the whole.
Speaker 1:So anytime we feel the need to critique or dismantle anyone's contribution before our own can be valued, look what Jesus is doing here too. He's giving a demonstration here. He's pointing out where these psychoanalysts went wrong, but he's not diminishing them. Right, he's not diminishing, he's not attacking them. In miracle-mindedness, we welcome all expressions of truth. So we look for the expressions of truth within everything. Within everything, we're going to find expressions of truth, because they affirm our shared reality. That's why we want to see it like that.
Speaker 1:This is especially relevant in teaching, counseling or any kind of spiritual work. The moment we see a colleague's insight as competition, we've stepped out of our own purpose. Notice, if you're seeing anything as competition, this is really the teaching here that Jesus is giving about. You know, in our own minds stepping out of competition, not allowing that to be the thing. So Rank's belief that his work could stand only if Freud's fell is the ego's formula for success. That's how the ego divines success. Look at that like in soap operas. That's a good place to look at it, right? You know how everyone I don't know if you guys ever watched soap operas. My grandma used to have them on all the time, you know so.
Speaker 1:I would Someone's cheating yeah.
Speaker 1:And they, they're and they're going to get really happy when someone else is has a downfall. I notice that in family dynamics sometimes you know when they'll be doing some uh, when, when they'll be doing gossiping there's this underlying sense of of like, almost this relief, that someone else is suffering all right, that someone else is suffering All right, that someone else is going through financial loss or a breakup or they broke their arm. There's some kind of relief in a feeling like someone else is suffering. Watch, that that's the ego. You don't have to shame yourself about it or shame anyone else about it, just notice that when I notice that like, I'll notice I don't notice in my mind that occurring, but you know, when I notice that kind of energy, I'll notice. I don't notice in my mind that occurring, but you know, when I notice that kind of energy, I'll just automatically extend love through my mind and that's basically just recognizing what's going on and not holding it against the other person right, and just recognizing that's an illusion, bringing it to the truth. It's not really true, that's not really helpful. All right, that thought is not helpful and it's not true. And also it has no real power. The mind is blank when it's projecting, something like that. So whatever's real in the creation in another's mind, whatever's actually real, can only reinforce and support the truth in our own. So we want to look for what's true. All creation is shared. So durga says yikes, making something or someone bad or wrong to ensure your righteousness? Yeah, it's just tendency. You know, it's not something to be afraid of, just noticing the tendency, it's really helpful. Okay. Sentence four of paragraph eight In consequence, his theory emphasized rather than minimized the two-edged nature of defenses.
Speaker 1:That's back to Jesus channeling. Again, this is the sentence. In consequence, his theory. This is Otto's theory, otto Rank. His theory emphasized rather than minimized the two-edged nature of defenses. So he says in consequence, this is flowing directly from the previous sentence where Rank believed his work could stand only if Freud's fell. So he's talking about this is the consequence of that.
Speaker 1:His theoretical framework was influenced by competition and defense. So, in consequence, his theory emphasized. That means his published ideas reflected and reinforced his personal mindset. Theory and personal belief were intertwined. In consequence, his theory emphasized rather than minimized. Instead of reducing the role or impact of defenses okay, as healing would require right His approach actually gave them more weight. He gave defensiveness more weight by doing this. In consequence, his theory emphasized, rather than minimize so it flowed right to his work the two-edged nature of defenses.
Speaker 1:Defenses are two-edged because they seem to protect but they also harm. They protect the ego's image but block the awareness of truth. Right, this is the two-edged nature of defenses. They shield our imaginary self from perceived threats, but they also keep love out. In ACIM terms, they defend the mind against God, which is the ultimate self-attack. Okay, so, in consequence, his theory emphasized it ended up being his theory that he's producing out in the world. Right, that people are doing based on this theory? Still, it emphasized, rather than minimize, the two-edged nature of defenses.
Speaker 1:So any focus on defending inevitably makes the defense system seem necessary and important, strengthening the belief that we're vulnerable. Isn't that what we're going through? Right, everyone's vulnerable, right, in the Course's view, the only real safety comes from what, woo? Defenselessness, that's it. Ding, ding, ding, because only love is real and nothing unreal can threaten us. So by emphasizing the necessity or complexity of defenses, which is what his work did, rank's theory inadvertently kept the mind oriented towards separation rather than true release. That's what modern psychology is based on and that's why we're still seeing a bunch of killing, killing, conflict, scarcity, all that stuff.
Speaker 1:Practical implication of this sentence for healing If we study or analyze our defenses without the intention of undoing them, we're reinforcing the idea that defenses are integral to our survival. See that and see how common that is. Right, defenses are intact. We got to be defensive. If we're going to survive, we got to go to war. For instance, if we're going to survive, right, how many people believe that If a whole shitload of people didn't believe it, it wouldn't be happening. Right, it's not really happening, but we wouldn't perceive it's happening.
Speaker 1:Okay, so it's just the belief that we need defenses to survive that's even causing any apparent need for war. It's causing apparent leaders that would go to war, that would say war is the solution to this. You know people, pretty much any person you ask it's very few of us at this point in time right, that would say there's no. Plus, war is profitable. We got that. Well, of course, you know, of course there's people who can also profit off of it. But it's the people, it's the constituents, right, it's the mind that's going. Yes, there are instances where war is helpful, where killing people is helpful, okay. So healing asks that we notice defenses in order to let them go it. Just, you know, even in our life, notice defenses. One of them is insurance.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying you shouldn't get insurance in a physical sense, it's mentally recognizing oh, I don't need any defenses, what would I? You know my mindset my place got run over by lava in 2018. I didn't have any insurance. It's not that I couldn't get insurance in Hawaii I could but the idea it just showed me right away. Why would I need insurance? Whatever way it goes, is perfect for me. How is that going to protect me? It didn't make any sense to me. How would that protect me against anything? You know, it just really didn't make any sense to me. And I'm not saying to tempt the ego. If you don't have the faith, I have the total faith for it. I'm like, whatever I need to get, whatever needs to come, it's going to come one way or the other way. I put insurance up or not.
Speaker 1:Seatbelt law is another thing like that, right, and you know, of course I'm not saying like physically you should try to tempt the ego, but all these things that we're getting a perception of that we do it's because we believe that defenses are necessary and that somehow these things are going to protect us. They're not All right. So if we study or analyze our defenses without the intention of undoing them, we're reinforcing the idea that defenses are integral to our survival. Healing asks that we notice defenses in order to let them go, not to perfect or fortify them. Notice how the defenses just keep on getting more perfected as we go along. Oh, that wasn't defensive enough. Let's kick it up enough. Let's have bars on windows that are basically on the third floor. Someone would have to be Spider-Man to get up to that window, right? Because maybe at some point someone actually got in there. I don't know. It's a while just to see how much more things become fortified against perceived threats.
Speaker 1:So a self-check-in. Am I exploring this pattern to be free of it or to get better at defending myself? Am I trying to get better at defending myself? How much insurance do you need? The first leads to the truth. The second leads to the two-edged nature. Okay, one more Paragraph eight, sentence five. Well, this paragraph goes on. It goes all the way to seven. We'll get to five.
Speaker 1:So Jesus says this is an outstanding characteristic of his concepts, because it was outstandingly true of him. So this refers back to the previous idea, rank's emphasis on the two-edged nature of defenses, okay, is an outstanding characteristic of his concepts. So this trait wasn't incidental, it was a defining feature of rank psychological theories. That's what Jesus is saying by an outstanding characteristic of his concepts. His focus on defense is as necessary and double-edged, ran through his work as a central theme. So this is an outstanding characteristic of his concepts because it was outstandingly true of him. So here Jesus is linking the quality of his theory directly to his own personality and inner condition. His work mirrored his own inner conflicts. He was valuing defenses, not recognizing their harm. Actually, valuing defensiveness is harmful.
Speaker 1:So in A Course in Miracles metaphysics, the idea in form always reflects the state of mind of their maker. So, whatever it is, it's reflecting the state of mind. Do you need to lock your door? Do you need to do an alarm? All that kind of stuff. It's reflecting a state of mind always. That doesn't mean we're making it wrong. We're not making it wrong. We're not saying we shouldn't do that, not at all, not at all. We will find eventually that we don't need any of those things, right. But it's not to try to like rush it, it's not to tempt the ego. For instance, a theory born from a mind still invested in defenses will inevitably present defenses as significant and necessary. This is why ACIM stresses that healing comes from the healed mind. You can't teach freedom from what you're still defending. Rank's personal investment in defense made it a prominent theme in his thought system, just as it was a prominent dynamic in his own life. So practical implication of this sentence what we teach through words, theories or example always broadcasts our own belief system.
Speaker 1:I noticed myself when I was at the spa, right and I just check in, do I have the faith for this? So I had my backpack. My backpack basically has in it my wallet with cards that let me get money here in Mexico. You know we use a lot of ATMs to get money, to get cash, to do anything around here. I also had my cell phone in it. It was like, do I have the faith for this?
Speaker 1:No, I find myself running a locker for my wallet and my cell phone right, not making it guilty or anything like that, just noticing that that particular action is an effect of a state of mind and I want to see it clearly. You see, I'm not trying to manage my actions and trying to make myself do something that feels fearful, which is just leave my shit around at a spa that's packed, that ends up getting packed with people, right. So it's not about trying to manage whatever you seem to be doing, but recognizing it's coming from a state of mind when does it seem like you have to defend yourself and noticing, oh, I want to see past that, I actually want to feel that defenseless, right. And so again, you're extending this willingness, you're asking the Holy Spirit to look at it with you, and this just occurs without, like, any break in activity or anything like that. It's not like, oh darn, I'm still defensive, or something like that. It's just simple noticing. So healing requires not just conceptual clarity but willingness to let our own inner alignment be the foundation for whatever we share.
Speaker 1:So Rank's focus on the two-edged nature of defenses was not just an intellectual position, it was a personal truth for him. His theories reflected his own investment in defense, showing that what we hold in mind inevitably shapes what we teach. So I could feel what it would be like to just go oh, it's not saying that no one's going to steal my stuff in my dream, but it's saying if someone steals my stuff, that's an adventure, right, it was kind of like with the lava flow. It's like, oh, if my house gets run over by lava and there's no insurance, I felt completely open and willing for that adventure to occur. And, sure enough, lava did flow and did take the place in my dream and it was a great adventure. I loved it. It was a wonderful adventure because I had the faith for it, right? So it's not saying to set yourself up for something where you're just going to be really scared. You know and I got the sense if I was, if I found myself here in Mexico with no phone and no way to get to any money, that that would be a sense of great fear that I wasn't ready for yet, right? So it's like, am I game for the adventure? It's not like putting some kind of hex on it, saying this will not happen. But you know, when we have complete command over everything, we just know that nothing like that would occur anyways, because we have complete command over everything, which is where we're going toward.
Speaker 1:So thank you for joining everyone. I love you, kai. Thank you for joining right here at the end, you know, two hours earlier next week and you'll get to hear a lot more. Thank you Also. It'll be recorded so you guys are going to be able to find it on Substack. It's going to be there once I publish it, which will probably be later tonight or sometime tomorrow, and then it'll also be on YouTube. Now they're automatically going over to YouTube. You could look for Hope Johnson Wisdom Dialogues over there and I'll be back. Next time I'll be live will be Monday, where I'll be doing a wisdom dialogue. That's like satsang sangha, where I just talk and talk and talk, totally unrehearsed, totally unstudied. I was studying for this one so I can give you guys more of an insight. Aloha Kai. Thank you too, doriga. Thank you, glenn, I appreciate you and thank you for joining me here live. I appreciate you joining me in person, joining me online, so you can go to hopejohnsonorg.
Speaker 1:All of this is funded by donations. If you want to donate to me, you can donate a one-time donation or you can set it up on a monthly. Any amount is totally helpful. You know you can do like 10 bucks a month if you feel like. You know you want to just donate to this and keep it going, or you can do lump sum, whatever you want, or you can book with me. You could also book with me. Thank you, laura, I appreciate you. You can book one-to-one sessions with me there, 15 minutes all the way up to however long you like. Also, I offer live-in. That's another thing that I am offering is I can come and stay with you and basically help you with all aspects of your life, go through the things that you're going through in your life and keep your mind focused on miracles. So hooray everyone. Thank you for joining. I love you so much. Mahalo aloha and a hui hou.
