Hope Johnson's Wisdom Dialogues
Hope Johnson's Wisdom Dialogues
A Course in Miracles Deep Dive - Chapter 2, Section XI, Paragraph 8, Sentence 6 to Paragraph 11, Sentence 3: Fear Is Useful for Therapy
What if every problem you face—relationship struggles, health concerns, financial worries—stems from a single choice in your mind? In this illuminating deep dive into A Course in Miracles, Hope Johnson unravels the profound concept of "the basic conflict" between creation and miscreation, love and fear.
When psychologists like Freud and Rank developed theories about human suffering, they missed something crucial. They located the cause of our pain in physical events like birth trauma or childhood experiences, developing therapies that attempted to abolish fear directly. But as Jesus reveals through the Course, these approaches never address the real source of suffering.
"When you miscreate, you are in pain." This simple statement revolutionizes our understanding of suffering. Pain isn't random or inflicted from outside—it's a direct signal that our mind is choosing separation over love in this moment. Rather than an enemy to be eliminated, fear serves as a spiritual warning light showing us exactly where healing is needed.
The world can never satisfy us, and that realization might initially bring grief. I've recently experienced this myself—releasing the hope that special relationships or circumstances could fulfill me. There's a bittersweet freedom in recognizing that nothing external can give us what only love provides. When we stop seeking substitutes in the world for what only comes through alignment with truth, we discover a joy that doesn't depend on changing circumstances.
In truth, "cause is a term properly belonging to God, and effect is His Sonship." Everything else is temporary, illusory. By recognizing that our fear and pain signal miscreation rather than resulting from external events, we reclaim our creative power. This understanding collapses time by addressing the root cause rather than endlessly managing symptoms.
Ready to transform your approach to healing? Join our community and discover how to use every moment of discomfort as an opportunity to choose again, to align with love instead of fear. Together, we're learning that true freedom comes not from changing the world, but from changing our minds about the world.
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Aloha and welcome to ACIM. Deep Dive with Hope Johnson. Today we're starting with Chapter 2, section 11, paragraph 6. No, paragraph 8. Sentence 6.
Speaker 1:Yay, all right, let's start with a prayer of gratitude. Yay, you're joining live, on Zoom or Substack, or you're joining by listening later, or you're just joining in spirit. I know we're all joining together. I'm so grateful for the entire sonship and thank you to Jesus for demonstrating a healed mind, yay, and for standing at the end of the timeline with us, showing us that all we're doing here is looping around in nothingness, while we're learning that only love is real and the separation never happened. And thank you to God for holding the creation completely intact while we go through this process of undoing the dream of separation. Let us now begin our study of A Course in Miracles, where we deep dive past the words, using the words as pointers, past the words to deep understanding and in helping us release all fear and return to love. Amen and hooray. I love you guys. Thank you for joining. Okay, let's begin. So I have 25 pages of notes. I think this is probably a bit ambitious for what we're going to cover today, but let's see what happens here. Like I said, we're in. Well, I didn't tell you what book we're in yet. I say this every time in case anyone wants to follow along in the book. It's A Course in Miracles, the complete and annotated edition published, published June 17th 2021. And we are beginning, beginning on page 97.
Speaker 1:This is section wait, chapter 2, section 11, paragraph 8, sentence 6. So I summarized paragraph 8 for us up to sentence five, which we covered last week. So basically, jesus was talking about how ranks this is a psychotherapist rank ranks will therapy. But his acceptance of the deprivation fallacy led him to build a theory rooted in conflict and then defenses rather than true healing. So Jesus in this chapter, in this section, is going over different theorists, which is the foundation of modern psychotherapy. He's going over their theories and how they were valid and how they were still in conflict. So no one really got it right. And Jesus is showing us so we could see in our own mind how to see rightly Okay, in our own mind how to see rightly Okay. So we're still in paragraph eight, we're going on to sentence six and we're going to read the footnote first, because that will make more sense to us, and that is footnote 139. So here's the text from footnote 139.
Speaker 1:Rank's therapeutic goal of abolishing fear is criticized here, perhaps because, as the next paragraph implies, fear can only be abolished by undoing the underlying miscreation that is its source. Until then, the presence of fear has therapeutic value as an indicator of the miscreation that caused it. In contrast, rank saw fear, anxiety, as caused by a physical event birth. Remember. We went over that last time. He had this birth trauma idea, and so his therapy aimed at re-experiencing and understanding the birth trauma as a way to dispel fear. This is very common, in fact. One of my friends here in Ajijic is seeing a therapist and the therapist is telling her that her problems that she has right now came from her third some third trimester, I think, she said, while she was in the womb. Okay, so this is what Jesus is talking about. There's so much still based on this, and he's talking about how this is not really working. Okay, yay, I love you, christine. Okay, he's saying how this is not really working. So let's look at this footnote a little bit deeper.
Speaker 1:So why is Jesus critiquing abolishing fear? Okay, according to ACIM, fear can't be eliminated by directly targeting it. It has to be undone at the level of cause. The level of cause is the underlying miscreation, that's the belief in separation. So I told my friend, I go. You know, the issue is the belief in separation, not when you're in the womb, like you know. It's way more ancient than that, you know. To the ego, it's like, oh yeah, if we go back to when we're in the womb and take care of it there, this is just giving you some temporary relief. This is really. It's not working. Okay, it's temporary ego relief. That's what Jesus is saying here. So he's also saying there's a therapeutic value to fear. So, unless the cause is healed, fear actually serves a helpful function or not, unless until the cause is healed. Once the cause is healed, you're not going to have any fear at all anyways, but while the cause is unhealed, fear is serving a helpful function. So our goal isn't to just abolish fear without getting to the underlying miscreation. All right, fear is signaling the presence of a miscreation. This is so we can bring it to the Holy Spirit. So fear isn't the enemy at all. It's a messenger. It's pointing to a choice we're making for separation. We're actually choosing separation. That's why there's fear in the first place. All right, so rank this is auto rank. Uh uh.
Speaker 1:Theorists saw fear, slash, anxiety as caused by a physical event birth rather than the mind's choice for separation. This is going on all the time. I'm hearing of my friends, you know they're so hopeful too. They're like, yeah, now I'm seeing this therapist. They're taking me back to my childhood, where this first started. I'm like, uh-uh, that's not where it started. You're still running around and you know this always costs a shitload of money too. Did you notice that? Okay, healing is actually it's free. It's fucking free, because you're basically going to the underlying cause, which is separation. All right.
Speaker 1:So Rank's method is aimed at re-experiencing and understanding birth trauma. To resolve fear Doesn't work. That's what Jesus is saying here. So what Jesus is saying through ACIM, it's a reframe of the cause entirely. Fear is not rooted in any physical event. It's rooted in the mind's misalignment, denial of truth right now, there's only now. That's the thing. Healing does not come from revisiting any form birth, childhood, none of that shit but from undoing the belief in separation. Only. That's being upheld right now. Okay, he's making this very clear. It's really sweet, all right. So let's get to the sentence. That was the footnote. We were looking at this sentence once again. Let me go to my notes here, paragraph 8, sentence 6. Okay, this is chapter 2, section 11. Here's the sentence.
Speaker 1:He, rank also misinterpreted the birth trauma in a way that made it inevitable for him to attempt a therapy whose goal was to abolish fear. So let's take it phrase by phrase. Here he also misinterpreted the birth trauma. Jesus is returning to rank's theory that physical birth is a source of fundamental anxiety. Okay, this misinterpretation comes from thinking that the event is the cause rather than the mind's belief in separation. Okay, next phrase. He also misinterpreted the birth trauma in a way that made it inevitable. So his misunderstanding set his course. This is what happens. Misunderstanding set his course. This is what happens. See, it's like if we make a misunderstanding, then that sets the course of the next things that are coming. So he made a misunderstanding there. He misinterpreted birth trauma. And then that set his course. Once that cause was wrongly identified, the direction of his therapy was predetermined. That was it. The ego was in charge after that. All right, next phrase. So I'll start at the beginning of the sentence. He also misinterpreted the birth trauma in a way that made it inevitable for him to attempt a therapy. So his method followed logically from his premise If birth is the problem. Therapy must address its after effects, see Next phrase.
Speaker 1:He also misinterpreted the birth trauma in a way that made it inevitable for him to attempt a therapy whose goal was to abolish fear. So his therapeutic aim wasn't to reinterpret fear. Remember how ACIM frames it. We need a reinterpretation. We don't need a fight with fear, we need a reinterpretation.
Speaker 1:So his aim was not to reinterpret fear, but to get rid of it without addressing the real source, which is belief in separation. So this makes fear seem like an enemy to be destroyed, which, ironically, keeps it real in the mind. So that's what Jesus is saying is the problem with what's going on here. So trying to abolish fear is actually a form of resistance. It's still rooted in the belief that fear has reality. See, they're treating fear as real and then trying to abolish it and people are considering this as awakening, this as healing. It's not. It's a temporary fix and it's coming back because the fear is remaining active in the mind. So, of course, in miracles, approach is different. Fear is undone by looking at fear without judgment, recognizing it has no cause. No cause, that means it's not caused by birth, it's not caused by anything that went on in your childhood. It's just being propped up now. It's your belief in separation, which also isn't a real cause.
Speaker 1:So Rank's therapy was bypassing this reinterpretation step. He's aiming at eradicating rather than understanding, which, in ACIM terms, is the ego's attempt to fight fear instead of forgiving it. You see that that's how the ego keeps fear, as if it's a reality. Okay, durga has a comment here. I absolutely love this perspective.
Speaker 1:After past interest in psychology and my experience in therapy, this ACIM interpretation helps me to see differently. Yes, yes, yes, Miraculous. Yes, this is miracle-mindedness, don't we love it? Yay, thank you for your comment, our guy. Okay, so here's the practical implication If we see fear as something to be eliminated, we end up pushing it down or battling it. Okay, this is the ego's way. This is how we strengthen fear.
Speaker 1:Actually, true healing is looking past the content of fear to its underlying cause, which is not even a real cause, right, bringing that cause to the Holy Spirit for correction. Okay, so here's the self-inquiry you can use Am I trying to fight fear or am I willing to see it differently? Okay, the ego keeps me in this game. Right, this next therapy. Oh, now I met a person who's going to help me look at my childhood in a different way and try to fix it that way. Okay, so seeing it differently is really what's aligning us with miracle mindedness. That's what we want to do. We want to see it differently.
Speaker 1:So the bottom line is rank ranks misunderstanding of birth trauma led him toward a therapy that aimed at abolishing fear, and this is an approach that really kept fear real. That's what it was doing. It was keeping fear real in the mind rather than undoing the belief system that produces it. So the Holy Spirit's belief system or you could say thought system, however you want to look at it also, an illusion is an illusion that undoes the illusions we made, which is the ego's whole belief thought system. So, unless you guys have any questions or comments, we are going now. To where are we going? Sentence seven, paragraph eight, sentence seven. Sentence seven, paragraph eight, sentence seven.
Speaker 1:This is characteristic of all later theorists who do not attempt, as Freud did in his own form of therapy, to split off the fear. Ok, so this is characteristic of all later theorists. This is referring to Rank's therapeutic aim of abolishing fear directly rather than dealing with its cause. So Jesus is saying this approach became the norm in psychological theory after Rank. That's why they have you sit on a couch and talk about all your stuff and then try to address the fear like that Doesn't work. Okay, so most later therapists are following this similar pattern.
Speaker 1:Next phrase this is characteristic of all later theorists, of all later theorists who do not attempt so they make no effort to use Freud's strategy for managing fear, which was splitting off the fear. Even though that strategy itself was incomplete, jesus liked it better. Apparently. We'll see down the road too, where he discusses it a little bit more. So this is characteristic of all later theorists who do not attempt, as Freud did in his own form of therapy. So Freud's method was to split off fear, separating it from the conscious mind, so the person could function without being overwhelmed. Now, this was avoiding directly confronting fear, which Jesus is saying it doesn't work. Okay, it did not undo fear, it just kept it hidden so the person could keep on functioning without being confronted by the fear. All right, so the next phrase, last phrase of this sentence this is characteristic of all later theorists who do not attempt, as Freud did in his own form of therapy, to split off the fear.
Speaker 1:Splitting off is a defense mechanism. Okay, it's isolating fear. That's what Freud was doing isolating fear. So it was quarantined from awareness. This is still an ego solution. It keeps the fear intact and it prevents true healing.
Speaker 1:But what Jesus is saying is that it at least acknowledges fear's presence enough to manage it. So what Jesus is saying is he would have rather seen later theorists go off that and try to expand that way. But instead they went down a different path that's trying to address, kind of like fight fear, address it directly, instead of going, whoa, there's a presence of something here and fighting it directly doesn't work. But Freud was a little bit misguided there because he just wanted to keep it hidden. So later theorists, unlike Freud, didn't try to split off from fear, they tried to abolish it directly at the symptom level. So Jesus is saying both approaches are ego-based and A Course in Miracles is offering us a third way not split off or dealt with as a reality, but brought to the light of truth right when it could be undone entirely. So the only lasting release comes from exposing fear without judgment and letting the Holy Spirit reinterpret it. So here's the self-reflection Am I trying to cut fear out of my awareness? That's Freud's. Abolish it, that's Rank's. Or am I willing to see it fully so it could be undone. That's the Holy Spirit's way and the way Jesus is pointing to. So most theorists abandon Freud's method of splitting off fear and instead try to abolish it outright. So this is missing the true healing, the real healing that we can have with fear, fear being therapeutic and real healing only comes from bringing it to the light for forgiveness, and we'll get into that more fully so we can see what that means.
Speaker 1:Okay, we're on to the next paragraph, that's paragraph 9, sentence one. And no one as yet has fully recognized either the therapeutic value of fear or the way in which it can be truly ended. That's the sentence no one as yet. Jesus is speaking in the context of psychological theory and therapy, saying no one as yet. At the time he was saying this, I think it was sometime in the 60s, 1960s up to this point and in the frameworks he's referencing, no one has fully understood fear and its proper function or its proper undoing. But guess who is? We are Yay because we have this to go off of. Next phrase no one as yet has fully recognized. There may have been partial insights, like Freud recognizing the need to manage fear, or ranks seeing fear's impact, but not the complete picture. Next phrase no one as yet has fully recognized either the therapeutic value of fear.
Speaker 1:Okay, here's somewhat a surprising part for some of us. Maybe right, the therapeutic value of fear. Fear has value in the healing process, but only when it's seen correctly. Okay, in ACIM terms, fear is a signal that the mind is miscreating. It's like a spiritual warning light. It's pointing to the need for correction. You know, without fear as a warning light, the ego's miscreation might go unnoticed forever. This is to help us notice we're miscreating. That's why it has therapeutic value. That's what Jesus is saying, See. So these ways of trying to address the fear, to undo it at the symptom level, it's not working because it's a spiritual warning light. It's not being regarded like that by theorists and therapists for the most part. So, last phrase of the sentence no one as yet has fully recognized either the therapeutic value of fear or the way in which it can truly be ended.
Speaker 1:The only way to end fear is to undo the miscreation. That's the cause, which is belief in separation. This is how ACIM is reversing Ranks and other people's approaches. You don't abolish fear directly. You dissolve its cause Through forgiveness and alignment with the truth. So from ACIM's perspective, fear's therapeutic value is just a pointer. It's not a problem to be eliminated. See, that's the automatic knee-jerk reaction. I don't want to be in this fear. It's meant to direct the mind. It's meant to point it toward what actually needs healing. The only true ending of fear comes from undoing its cause, releasing the thought of separation through miracle-mindedness. So any attempt to manage, suppress, abolish fear without undoing just leaves the root completely untouched. It guarantees it's coming back again. This is why we are projecting time. So we have time to see this. See how this collapses time and we actually undo the root.
Speaker 1:So the teaching is you're not asked to dispel your fear, you're asked to change your mind about its reality. Practically speaking, we can learn to meet fear without resistance. You know asking what is this showing me about where I'm choosing separation right now? It's only now, it's not in the past, that I'm choosing separation. I'm only projecting a past, even my childhood. What is this showing me about how I'm choosing separation?
Speaker 1:Fear, in this sense, it's like it's becoming a helpful feedback mechanism. It's like hooray, there's fear. It's showing us where we're off course. It's not showing us an enemy to be fought. That's the ego's way. So this means we're not rushing to remove fear, we're not rushing to remove that feeling like, well, I just want to get back to feeling better. It's like, no, not rushing to remove that feeling like, I just want to get back to feeling better. It's like no rest. Notice this is a pointer, okay, and use it for guiding back to truth. So fear's value is in revealing where we've chosen against love. It's not going to end by attacking it or suppressing it. The goal is to heal its cause, that belief in separation. You know it doesn't have a real cause because the separation didn't happen. It's just belief in separation. It's way simpler than everyone's making it. It's just forgiveness and acceptance of the truth.
Speaker 1:So I asked this question to AI. I said has anyone done this since the 1960s? And it came back right away not in mainstream psychology. This still is not going on. Modern therapies are using fear in the symptom-focused ways. Is what AI told me like exposure, desensitization, meaning-making. That's what they're doing. But they're not recognizing fear as a spiritual pointer to separation. They're not recognizing that yet in modern psychology. Or proposing healing by undoing separation. Okay, I was pretty sure that was the case, but I asked anyways, just in case something else happened. Okay, let's see.
Speaker 1:Dorga has a question here. Is fear's therapeutic value in keeping with everything you say and do is 100% helpful, 100% of the time? Yes, it's all helpful, because it's all exposing whatever it is you need to see. See, when I'm talking about, like that, it's 100% helpful, 100% of the time. This abolishes this idea of guilt, like you know, then that's the ego's main stronghold. It's like you should be guilty, you know. And another thing that A Course in Miracles says okay, so everything you're saying, everything you're thinking, it's all well, everything you're saying, the manifestations, all manifestations, they're all neutral. Okay, the way you're thinking about it, a Course in Miracles saying is it's not neutral, it's never neutral the way you're thinking about it, because you're either choosing to think with the ego or you're choosing to think with the Holy Spirit. That's what's not neutral.
Speaker 1:And they're both making something, making or creating. One's making illusions and one is creating because it's through forgiveness, miracle-mindedness, healing. So it's basically collapsing time and undoing illusions. So, yeah, everything, and when you look at it like that, everything is 100% helpful to me, 100% of the time. You can use everything that arises in the field. So, everything you say, everything you do everything. Anyone says everything, anyone does every single circumstance. You can use everything like that for healing instead of projecting. See, that's what's going on. That's why I'm saying it's helpful, because what the ego is doing is saying the reason I feel this way is because of what this person said or what this person did. It's not saying the reason I feel this way is because I'm projecting, right now, separation, the thought of separation. I'm believing in, fear, I'm miscreating. Basically, we're going to get into that a little bit more. The next sentence actually, it's coming up with the next sentence Paragraph 9, sentence 2. And in case you are just joining us, let me see what page we're on Paragraph 9, sentence 2. We are on page 97, in case you're just joining us. It's a short and sweet sentence.
Speaker 1:When you miscreate, you are in pain. So when you this is addressing us personally, whoever, whoever's listening. This isn't an abstract principle, it's a direct reminder that this is true for the one hearing it right now okay. When you miscreate, okay. Miscreation is using the mind's creative power to make illusions, thoughts, perceptions, experiences that are out of alignment with God's will. So you're using creative power to make illusions. That's miscreating. It's not absence of creation, it's the reding creative power towards making separation. That's miscreation. So when you miscreate, you are in pain. So pain is the inevitable result of miscreation. That makes it real easy to see Pain. And this is any kind of pain emotional pain, physical pain. It could be a bug bite, right, it could be irritation with a person. That's it. When you miscreate, you are in pain. This is not punishment. This is just the natural outcome of using the mind against truth.
Speaker 1:So the moment we choose fear instead of love, we're feeling a contraction, we're feeling guilt, we're feeling separation that that choice brings right. So when you look at it, you go back to this is 100% helpful. This manifestation like look, so say, you perceive yourself saying something and then you feel guilt about it. Right, and so you look at it. Oh wait, a minute, what I said was actually 100% helpful, because it's bringing up guilt, which is basically fear, and that's pointing to miscreation. So you go back to the actual cause. Is you miscreating? It's not the thing that you said. See what I mean. It's not the thing that you said that's causing the upset feeling no, no, no, you felt guilt ahead of time based on the thought of separation, and then that's what made you say the thing that now you seem to be feeling guilt over. See that, but really the guilt was first.
Speaker 1:So the ego makes cause and effect. It switches it around. It's as if the manifestation is causing the fearful feeling. But no, it's a fearful feeling in the first place. That's causing the manifestation. Okay, the miscreation. You can say so, it's always helpful.
Speaker 1:So, in this perspective, pain is always an effect, it's not a cause. The cause is always a thought out of alignment with love. That's the cause. Okay. So this sentence, again, this sentence says when you miscreate, you are in pain. So simple when you miscreate, you are in pain.
Speaker 1:So this is linking directly to the previous sentence about the therapeutic value of fear, both fear and pain. Well, fear causes pain. Both fear and pain are signals that the mind has miscreated. They're just signals. So in this way, pain isn't meaningless, it's a wake-up call. It's like wake up, like when I'm experiencing something like bug bites. I'm looking, I'm going. Okay, this is caused by fear, this is just caused by fear.
Speaker 1:Right now I'm holding up a thought of separation, any kind of irritation, and in fact I love it. Like there'll be a, like a mosquito buzzing around my head at night when I seem to be trying to go to sleep and I'm like thank you, because it's pointing to something. It's like a wake-up call. It's like thank you, and I don't put any pressure on myself like I need to see it right away, I'm just recognizing what the actual cause is. It's pointing to the fact that my mind is using creative power destructively right now and correction is needed. What's actually bothering me, right? So this is very practical. When we feel any emotional or psychological or physical pain, the ego tells us it's caused by an outside circumstance.
Speaker 1:I had friends just telling me last night that they're irritated by another friend and I was like, well, you know, that's a healing opportunity. You know, let that be really good news. One of them was saying you know, I feel sorry for her. I'm like, wow, that's a good opportunity for you. There is no her. It never. You know, the cause is always coming from your own mind. There's no her, there's no one, no mosquito, nothing to be irritated with. And this is good news because it's showing you have the power to change this. You have the power. You have all the power. You're either creating or miscreating. So the healing response isn't to fight the pain I mean, you can find yourself using some bug spray, or you can find yourself, you know, telling the person hey, will you please shut the fuck up? You know, no problem.
Speaker 1:It's a matter of recognizing where the irritation is coming from. Right, you may choose to go a different direction, to hang out, not hang out with that person, but that's only an illusory choice. It's always remember all the choices on the the surface. They're never right or wrong. You can just choose to see them as helpful so that you can recognize the cause, where the miscreation is actually coming from. So, tracing it back to the choice that caused it and offering that to the Holy Spirit. Okay, pain isn't random. It's never, never, ever random.
Speaker 1:I love that Because, like, I'll be walking or something and I'll trip a little bit and I'll be like, oh, and I'll see it as not something random. There's nothing random and it's not a guilty thing. I'm not trying not to hurt myself, trying not to trip, I'm completely careless. I just am like, trying not to hurt myself, trying not to trip, I'm completely careless. I'm just like show me, just show me. This is a built-in signal that we've misused our mind's creative power. They're not pointless. It shows us exactly when and where to choose again. Okay, I'm tuned in, I'm ready to choose again. Okay, I'm tuned in, I'm ready to choose again. Checking on you, sweeties. Yay, thank you for joining, I love you.
Speaker 1:Okay, so I've taken a little bit of a segue here because I had a question here. After going over this, I was like, okay, what about human error and dysfunction being passed on to future generations? Right, what about that? Because I was reading a different Jesus channeling in another book, love Without End I've been talking about that. It's called Love Without End by Glenda Green, and in that one, jesus was saying that much human error and dysfunction have been passed on to future generations. So I was like, hmm, okay, so how does this reconcile with right now and that's something I wanted to address because that's a common question, right?
Speaker 1:So when we're looking at this in ACIM terms, this is describing a form in which the ego's thought system appears over time, in which the ego's thought system appears over time, beliefs, roles, defensive patterns getting modeled and reinforced within the dream. Okay, they seem to be inherited, but really they're being modeled and reinforced. So what ACIM? It's always reminding us that the cause is never in the past, the only way we can experience that quote inherited dysfunction is by choosing it now. We have to be choosing it now. Okay, we see it modeled, but then we are also choosing it. Okay. So we're accepting the same thought system of separation that previous generations chose by choosing it over and over and over. Still, the past has no power at all, except the power we give it in the present. Even if the form of the miscreation looks like it's passed down, the decision to believe it and therefore make pain from it is always happening now, there's only now. This means we're never victims of our history. Okay, we can choose for truth in this moment and end those patterns. We don't have to keep on doing it. And you know, it may seem difficult, but that's only a seeming thing.
Speaker 1:A Course in Miracles also teaches there's no what is it? Levels of difficulty in miracles. Okay. So it's not like we're victims of this just because we've seen it modeled and we've chosen it again and again and again. It's kind of like a well-patterned groove in the mind, but that doesn't matter, because when a miracle is performed, it just eliminates that You're out of that groove.
Speaker 1:So, oh, I have a personal experience relating to this too, to kind of share this with you so you could see how to use it practically, because I was like, okay, I want to get into this. When you miscreate, you are in pain, because I've been having a perception of pain over time, recurring. I'll seem to get some relief from it and then it'll come back again. And I've had my eye on this for a little while and it came to the point, you know, there was a sense of loss, a sense of heartbreak, right? So I've been looking at this and it came to me more recently that it was based on a belief, which is the belief in separation, that this world can give me anything that I want, all right.
Speaker 1:So, and and this is this is what it's talking about here, this is what I've been going over here about this this belief that's been modeled and believed and believed and believed right, this is. You know, when I expressed that I'm releasing the idea, I'm releasing any hope that this world can give me anything that I want, a few people thought I was suicidal, because that's the way the world would say. You know, the world's thought system is oh, we love this world because it can give us something that we want. So that sounds like to some people that I want to harm my body because I'm releasing hope that this world can give me what I want. Of course that's not the case.
Speaker 1:The thought system, this is a thought system that runs in the world. It's very, it's like a deep groove in worldly thinking, right? So what I'm noticing within myself and you know it myself, and it's not coming up it hasn't been coming up the past few days any of this grieving, but I notice within myself this grieving as if it's something real, this idea that the world can give me anything that I want. Right, it's like it was never truly there, there was never anything that the world could give me. But I've, you know, it's a thought system that I've been running.
Speaker 1:So there was a sense of grieving over it, and then there was also a sense of joy in seeing that, oh, what a relief that the world can't give me anything I want and I'm seeing that it never could give me anything I want. And I'm seeing that it never could give me anything I wanted. But in believing and putting that belief and putting that pressure on myself, you know it had me running toward things that could only ever cause pain. So when we saw Jesus say no one had fully recognized the therapeutic value of fear or pain. That's what I'm doing. That's what I've been doing. I've been recognizing the therapeutic value of this pain, this sense of grief for losing this thing right.
Speaker 1:So the value here is pointing to the exact place in the mind where miscreation is active. So where I was experiencing the grieving over giving up hope that the world can give me anything, that was actually pointing to the place in the mind where that miscreation was still active. There was still this trying to hold on to it. So the pain I was experiencing was actually showing me the misbelief. It's not an event that happened to me before, right, it's the misbelief that this world could satisfy me. That's exactly what it was pointing me to and that's what the Holy Spirit was ready to undo for me. Because I was willing, right, I just kept on being willing, even though there was kind of like this push, pull going on. It was like but maybe there's some hope in the world. It's like, no, there's not. All it's doing is leading to more grief. There's no need for it.
Speaker 1:So, instead of trying to push the grief away, I was letting it be an expediter. Letting the grief be an expediter, seeing it, recognizing its cause and offering the cause, which is the belief that the world could satisfy me in some way, offering the cause, not the symptom, but the cause to the Holy Spirit. So, creation versus miscreation basically, this is the basic conflict that jesus is talking about creation versus miscreation. So we've been hearing about this basic conflict lately, right? So when you look to the world for forget, for our, when you look to the world for fulfillment, something that can satisfy you, what you're doing is engaging in miscreation, making illusions as if they're your source of fulfillment, but when we're choosing to let it go, we're actually turning toward creation, allowing love to extend in this natural, impersonal, universal way.
Speaker 1:So for me, it was a sense of you know, I could have that special person who could give me what I want. Right? It's like, okay, the last people I made special didn't give me what I want in whatever way I thought I should have it. And, you know, maybe there's some hope that there will be someone that'll actually give me. That's, that's what it is, right, that's exactly what it is. Maybe I'll meet someone that will. You know, that's that's what it is. It's showing you that somehow this world can give us what we want.
Speaker 1:So that's why there's this paradoxical mix of sweetness and pain. Part of the mind is mourning the loss of its favorite illusion this is the ego's favorite illusion that the world can satisfy me in some way. And the other part is rejoicing that I'm not trying to drink from an empty cup anymore. Right, and I talked about it being light and comical. Feeling light and comical feels so true now. So the decision to be relating with everyone light and comical, not deep and personal. It's reflecting the recognition that special love is just part of miscreation. So it's a choice to align with love's true nature shared, universal, not possessed, not possessive with a single person. So that's moving out of specialness. That's why there's some grief that goes along with it, because there's still compartments in the mind that are trying to hold on to it. I can see it. It's like but, but, but what if? Can it just be this? So, in ACIM terms, it's not like I'm actually letting go of anything real. I'm not letting go of anything real because it was never real that this world could satisfy me. That's the belief. That's the miscreation. The grief is just the ego's way of reacting. It's just a reaction to the loss of this illusion, that's the ego's favorite illusion, that the world could satisfy us. So I'm seeing that the joy is the truer indicator, though this remembering that only God create, creating through me, can be fulfilling to me. And you know, the love isn't about personal property. So that's giving you guys. Thank you, margarita, I, you. So that's giving you guys an example, like a practical example of what I've been going through recently. That's showing me what you know, how to do this, like really how to do this. When you miscreate you are in pain and this is seeing through it All right. So let's see you guys are doing good. Thank you for joining. I love you all right.
Speaker 1:Next sentence, paragraph nine, sentence three the cause and effect principle here is temporarily a real expediter. This is a really good pointer here the cause and effect principle. So in this context, cause is miscreation, the mind's choice for separation right. Effect is pain. In this context, the cause and effect principle Cause is miscreation, effect is pain. Cause is never whatever someone else did, cause is never the mosquito, cause is never the circumstance, cause is miscreation, the mind's choice for separation. Effect is pain. Jesus is pointing out a direct and immediate relationship between the two. So the cause and effect principle here. The word here refers back to the prior statement. When you miscreate, you are in pain. This is the here in which the cause and effect are operating clearly. Okay, the cause and effect principle here is temporarily. This clarity is only temporary. Okay, this is temporary Because once the mind adjusts to the pain or rationalizes it, the connection may fade from awareness.
Speaker 1:Okay, so the pain itself doesn't last on the tip of consciousness, right, like that notice, it comes and goes. It's kind of like arises, peaks, falls away, goes beneath the level of awareness right there, pops back up again. See, it's temporarily being an expediter here, so we want to catch it while it's on in this arc, like this. I've talked about this for a while. We don't want to just like bear through it and wait for it to go away, because it's going to come on back again. You know that saying this too shall pass, it will, it'll pass away. You want to catch it while it's on that arc so you can see it, use it as a temporary expediter.
Speaker 1:Over time, the ego covers up this cause and effect link with defenses, making it harder to see. Okay, so you might just say, uh, like in my case. Oh, that was just the wrong person. He was an immature asshole. He was an immature asshole, a better one will come along. That's the ego's defenses. Okay, I heard it put another way Someone grieving over the death of a child and someone going oh it's okay, you can have more children. So that's another way. You know, you're making it harder to see. We're not seeing what the real cause and effect are. We're seeing the ego's cause and effect and that's why it'll just get covered up and go back below the level of consciousness, into the unconscious, come back again, maybe in the same form, maybe in another form.
Speaker 1:Okay, so the last little phrase here of this sentence, the cause and effect principle here, is temporarily a real expediter. So the directness of the pain that follows miscreation can speed up the healing process, and this is what I want to do with it. I want to use it to speed up the healing process. I don't want to just keep on going around and around like this. I want to use it to speed up the healing process. I don't want to just keep on going around and around like this. I want to use it. There's nothing here for me in the world except for pointing me back to truth. There's nothing to get here If we're willing to see the connection. This is the willingness. Are you willing to actually see the connection or do you want to see a false connection? Pain in this sense is accelerating recognition that a mistaken choice has been made. This is what's prompting us to choose again. That's why Jesus is calling it in this sentence a real expediter. Yay, yay, carla has a question here. That's how I see recovery from grief of a son and loving the beautiful family I have now. That's how I see recovery from grief of a son and loving the beautiful family I have now. Okay, so maybe you want to elaborate on that, carla. I don't know if that's a question or anything. Yeah, let me know.
Speaker 1:Durga is saying I am feeling a great joy, almost giddy freedom. I have not known to this depth. How do you keep this amazing perspective? You know what? Keep doing it Every time pain arises. That's the thing it's like. Yeah, it's a great joy. This is the happy dream really, every time, any kind of grief or pain, physical, emotional, anything just being willing to go back to the cause. The cause is belief in separation, projected right now, and you know the Holy Spirit will lead you according to your willingness will show you what it is. Okay it's, it's so beautiful, you'll see over and over again.
Speaker 1:For me, when I just saw that, it was like, oh my goodness. And you know I had to. I had to exercise willingness over time because at first it was just like there were all these thoughts about you know, I just made the wrong decision, wrong person, but I just kept on taking the no. That can't be it. You know, like what I'm saying about everything is helpful, right? So looking at it all as being helpful, it keeps on bringing me back to what is the cause of pain. It must be a projection, and the projection that I was seeing is that I propped this world up as if it could somehow satisfy me. It can't satisfy me, there's nothing here.
Speaker 1:And that was where whoa, that was some intense grief I was recognizing, but at the same time, the joy, and I just stuck with the joy and go okay, I'm just going to feel all this grief and keep on having the Holy Spirit look at it with me. You know, sometimes I'll find myself walking around here in Ahiheek and I'll notice a wish, you know, a wish for something to satisfy me here in the world, and I'll just be like Holy Spirit, look on this with me. And then, you know, I'll be walking around with a huge smile on my face, sometimes laughing, and just feeling the peace of God because of the willingness to bring any of these ego wishes that something's going to pop up and satisfy me. You know, maybe some illusion that you know someone's going to going to surprise me and go here, I am to be with you, and it's like, you know, just smiling at that thought, because it's always the ego masquerading as some kind of, some kind of real wish. Any wish, any wish for anything to occur is not a reality, and this could be for better finances, this could be for more meaning in the world, more respect from people, anything like that. It's all just seeking for what can never satisfy. So, yay, thank you for joining. Can never satisfy. So, yay, thank you for joining me and feeling this great joy. Ah, I know what willingness it takes, thank you.
Speaker 1:So, from ACIM's perspective, this is where cause and effect in the dream are simple Choose separation, feel pain. In most ego experiences, though, cause and effect are confused or reversed, making it seem like something out there is causing the pain. Right, the mosquito is causing the itch. No, no, no, no, no. It's an itchy thought in the first place, projecting a mosquito to come around right.
Speaker 1:So, while the mind still believes in the ego, this acts as a catalyst. It's helping us, this pain, fear. It's acting as a catalyst. It's helping us recognize that we're the ones making the choice, and this is great, because then we can unmake it. That means we can also unmake it. We're returning all the power to the mind. The mind always has all the power, but we've been making illusions that make it seem like we're dealing with a powerless mind and shit's just happening to us.
Speaker 1:So pain doesn't mean we're being punished. We're not being punished. It's just a natural signal. It's showing us that our mind is misaligned. Right now. We can use it as a real expediter. That's a quote from the sentence Real expediter. I love that. I love those two words. The pain is a real expediter.
Speaker 1:It means we can respond quickly. Respond quickly, don't wait. This hurts and this hurt is going away. It's rising and it's passing away. This hurts. Therefore, I must have chosen wrongly. I can choose again.
Speaker 1:You know, this came up for me in Vipassana meditation. I believe that was part of the discourse. At least that's the way I took it. It's like everything is arising and passing away. So when it's arising, that's where you recognize I've chosen wrongly because it's going to pass away. You're not going to have that opportunity. Once it passes away, it's going to come up again. You're going to get endless opportunities. You're going to get endless opportunities when you use it. While it's on that arc, that's where you're collapsing time. You're willing to choose again. The faster we recognize this link, the less time we're going to spend trying to fix effects in form Fix a person, for instance Can you just act better please and the more quickly we're going to correct the cause, the actual cause in the mind. Let me see, I'm getting some messages here. Let me see if anyone's trying to get in. No, all, right, we're doing good Bottom line when miscreation leads to immediate pain, this cause-effect clarity, this is the clarity that we're going for.
Speaker 1:Cause-effect, remember, remember what it is. Let's say it again, because I know this needs repetition. As simple as it is, let's say it one more time here. When you miscreate, you are in pain, right? So this cause-effect clarity, this is what speeds healing If we use it to remember the pain is self-chosen and can be undone. Now, that's how it speeds healing.
Speaker 1:Okay, here's Carla again Carla saying I'm seeing that missing him is revealed in the beauty of the resulting family. Okay, so notice that, that sense of missing him, so let's say missing, and you know, this is the. This is the same kind of thing. Uh, as you know, it's is the same kind of thing. As you know, it's really the same kind of thing that what I've been going for going through. Carla's talking about the loss of a son. It sounds to me like maybe someone passed away, all right, it's the same kind of thing.
Speaker 1:There's a sense of heartache, right, and there's this sense of something in the field can replace that heartache. That's the ego's way. So what A Course in Miracles is talking about here, what Jesus is talking about through A Course in Miracles, is don't try to replace that, don't try to replace it with something else in the field. Look at this the idea that there's been a loss, because anything that you seem to have is passing away, anything that you seem to have in the field is passing away. Notice, this sense of loss is actually coming from the thought of separation. What the ego wants to do is find a substitute in the field. So that makes it that hides it temporarily because everything's passing away, right, even the resulting new family, let's say. Or in the case of a resulting new love in the field, a new partner, let's say in the field, a new child, whatever, a new family, anything like that, recognizing that the pain itself is actually pointing back to the cause of separation.
Speaker 1:You know that doesn't mean you can't find joy in relating with the new family. Of course doesn't mean you can't find joy in relating with the new family. Of course you know you can find joy in anything, because the joy comes from you, whether or not there are other people popping up or not. That's one thing that I noticed. You know, yesterday I was hanging out by myself, apparently by myself, but I'm always with the Holy Spirit, I'm always with Jesus and God, right. So there's a sense of apparently hanging out by myself and I have a friend's voice in my ear going did you find another person to hang out with? Like that, I saw you being so happy with this person. Whenever I saw you two, you were just so joyful. You're so in the joy of life to you were just so joyful, you're so in the joy of life. Did you meet anyone else. Yet Right, and I saw that I knew it was a reflection of my own mind, looking for a substitute. And you know the way I answered her is like, no, I'm not looking for a substitute for that. What I'm doing right now is looking at any sense of loss of something I might have thought that I had so I could notice what thought is making the grief, what thought is projecting the grief. No, I'm not looking for a substitute for it. I want to actually see what's causing the grief, right? So, yeah, thank you, carla, I'm glad you can see that. That's awesome. Yeah, and in the event that someone does pop up that wants to engage with me in that way, it's not going to be as a substitute. I'm not going to run, I'm not going to be running the same patterns again, right, because the goal is to actually collapse the patterns, right? Not to re-experience the same grief over and over again is what the ego would have us do in making substitutes. So, yay, all right, let's see where are we now?
Speaker 1:Paragraph nine, sentence four actually, cause is a term properly belonging to god, and effect, which should also be capitalized, is his sonship. So let's break that down phrase by phrase. Let's start with just the word actually. So actually is signaling a shift. We were just talking about cause and effect, right? We were just talking about the cause being the sense of separation and the effect being pain. Belief in separation equals pain, right? So this is signaling this miscreation belief in separation as the cause and pain being effect. This is signaling a shift from that okay, that's a temporary cause and effect to the ultimate cause and effect, eternal meaning, in truth.
Speaker 1:So actually, cause is a term properly belonging to God. In the highest sense, cause refers only to God, the creator. God is the cause, god is the source of all that's real. God is unchanging, eternal, perfect love. Nothing else has the power to cause anything that's real, all right.
Speaker 1:So actually, cause is a term properly belonging to God and effect effect, here capitalized is the direct result of cause, because the cause is God. Effect is equally real. God is the real cause. Your miscreation is not a real cause, it's a temporary cause, right? And the effect of miscreation is what? Pain? That's not a real cause, it's a temporary cause Because the cause, the real cause, is God. The effect is equally real, eternal and perfect.
Speaker 1:So actually, cause is a term properly belonging to God and effect, which should also be capitalized. It says the capitalization signals that we're talking about a reality. That's why it should be capitalized. That's why he said that, because we're talking about reality. This isn't the dreams distorted version of cause and effect. This is real effect. This is you actually. Okay. So actually, cause is a term properly belonging to God and effect which should also be capitalized. Capitalized is his sonship. The sonship all of us as one is the effect of God's creation. We exist because God is our cause. In truth, we are the unalterable, unchanging, unchangeable outcome of God's will. We share God's nature completely. That's what this sentence is saying. Actually, cause is a term properly belonging to God. An effect which should also be capitalized is his sonship.
Speaker 1:Okay, so in the illusion, cause and effect seem fragmented, reversal, reversed, distorted. Okay, we think cause. Uh, we think effects cause other effects. In the illusion, we think effects cause other effects. For instance, uh, the sun dying causing grief, the lover being a dumbass causing a sense of heartbreak, right, the mosquito biting causing the effect of itch. These are effects causing other effects. Okay, and the illusion? That's what it seems like.
Speaker 1:In reality, cause and effect are perfectly joined. God is the cause, creating a sonship, there's the effect and the sonship shares in God's creative extension. This is why A Course in Miracles teaches that nothing real can be threatened. If God is the cause and his effect is us, then we can't be harmed. We can't be altered, we can't be separated from God. So, practically speaking, remembering true cause and effect restores our certainty. We're safe because our cause is changeless. That makes us changeless.
Speaker 1:The ego's cause and effect chain fear, miscreation, pain operates only within the illusion. It really has no impact on our reality. So meditating on this truth can undo fear. Okay, we could return our mind to its source. If God is my cause, then my reality can never be in danger. I'm only making this danger up. I'm only making this danger up. I'm only making these things up. So meditating on this can reveal things very quickly. In the ultimate sense, cause only belongs to God and His effect capitalized is the United Sonship. There's only one of us. Knowing this, being certain of this demonstrates that nothing in the illusion can alter or threaten what God created. We are his extension. There's nothing else but that. So we're on to paragraph nine, sentence five.
Speaker 1:This entails a set of cause and effect relationships which are totally different from those which humanity introduced into the miscreation. So, phrase by phrase, this entails this refers back to the previous definition of capitalized cause and capitalized effect God as cause, the sonship as effect that's what he means by this entails. This entails a set of cause and effect relationships, the relationships in reality that are eternal, consistent and wholly loving. There's no reversal, confusion or conflict between the true cause and effect. This entails a set of cause and effect relationships which are totally different. Jesus is drawing a sharp contrast here. They're totally different. God's cause and effect is nothing like the ego's version. They're different not in degree. They're different in nature. Their nature is different. So this entails a set of cause and effect relationships which are totally different from those which humanity introduced into the miscreation. So humanity's cause and effect, which was introduced into the miscreation, and ego made imitation of cause and effect. It's built on separation.
Speaker 1:Okay, in this false system which Jesus is talking about, causes are seen in the body or in the world instead of in the mind. For instance, a friend was sharing with me just yesterday that because of her age, being in the 80s, she's sluggish, she's slowing down, things aren't working. I go ah, that's not a true cause. You're no age. See what I mean? This is the ego's thought system. It doesn't matter what effects you perceive. You're perceiving effects based on giving false credence to this in the first place, and you know most people are going to agree with you. Oh yeah, in the first place. And you know most people are going to agree with you. Oh yeah, shit, you're doing good for your age. For instance, right Effects are believed to be outside of us and beyond our control.
Speaker 1:This is what I mean. Oh, you should be feeling like that because this particular thing happened. For instance, believing sickness causes fear instead of fear causing sickness. See, oh yeah, the doctor said you had cancer. You should be afraid. Actually, it was fear in the first place that caused the effect. The doctor telling you you got cancer. Effect, the doctor telling you you got cancer. Okay, so that sentence again.
Speaker 1:This entails a set of cause and effect relationships which are totally different from those which humanity introduced into the miscreation. So, god's cause and effect always creative, always extending love. God's cause and effect always creative, always extending love, unchangeable, wholly beneficial. Cause and effect are inseparable and they can't be in conflict. They're never in conflict.
Speaker 1:The ego's cause and effect is invented. It's invented within the dream. It's meant to obscure the real cause, god, and the real effect, his sonship. It's characterized by fragmentation, conflict, sickness. Its effects are independent of their true cause. Okay, it's as if that's the case. This is the illusion. This is why A Course in Miracles is repeatedly warning us against confusing the two systems.
Speaker 1:Confusion of cause and effect is the ego's main defense against awakening. So if it seems like someone or something is irritating you, that's the ego's cause and effect. That's not a real cause and effect. So notice, when you've slipped into the ego's cause and effect, thinking that event made me feel this way, for instance, that's false, because the cause is always the mind's choice. For instance, if I fix this symptom, I'll fix the cause. The symptom is the effect. Is really the effect of misbelief? Okay, cause that's leaving the mind unhealed. So truly healing requires going back to the, the real chain of cause and effect. I am God's effect. Nothing outside of this chain has any reality, any sickness I'm presenting, any conflict, any loss, any heartbreak. I am just believing in the thought of separation In some way. It's my belief in separation being a true cause. It doesn't have anything to do with anything that happened in the past. It doesn't have to do with anything that seems to be happening right now thing that seems to be happening right now. So the true cause and effect relationship God and his sonship is nothing like the ego's counterfeit version in the dream. Confusing the two is what keeps us in miscreation. Remembering the truth returns us to love. So our goal is to remember the truth all the time. That's what we want to do. You guys are so beautiful. Thank you for joining, thank you for staying with me. I love you. All right.
Speaker 1:Paragraph 10, sentence 1. The fundamental opponents in the real basic conflict are creation and miscreation. The fundamental opponents Jesus is naming two forces in the mind that are in true opposition. This is what he's saying. This is the basic conflict. This is the name of this sentence the basic conflict or the name of this section, not the sentence. The name of this section the basic conflict or the name of this section, not the sentence. The name of this section. Section 11, the basic conflict. Jesus is naming the two forces in the mind that are in true opposition. This isn't a conflict between people. This isn't circumstances or anything in the world. It's between two uses of the mind's creative power. The fundamental opponents is what he says is the real basic conflict. So the basic conflict is the root level of struggle, the choice between truth and illusion, love and fear, god's will and the ego's will, joy and pain.
Speaker 1:The fundamental opponents in the real basic conflict are creation and miscreation.
Speaker 1:These are the opponents creation and miscreation and miscreation. These are the opponents Creation and miscreation. Creation is the extension of God's love, aligned, eternal, always real. Miscreation is use of that same creative capacity to make illusions, separation, fear and all forms of lack. So the mind has only one real power, that's to create like God. But this can be used in two ways. One power, one real power, to create like God can be used in two ways Creation, that's extending love, truth, joy. This is reality. Or miscreation, using the same power to invent illusions. It's not real, but it still has effects within the dream. So it's not between two real forces. It's not like that. The conflict is between two real forces. Creation is real, miscreation is unreal. But while we believe in miscreation, it feels like a genuine struggle.
Speaker 1:This is what he's calling the basic conflict. So all fear belongs to miscreation, all love belongs to creation. This is why later on in A Course in Miracles, it says you're either expressing love or you're calling for it. Okay. So this has a practical implication for healing Every moment. We're given a choice point Am I creating, am I extending love, or am I miscreating, which is projecting fear?
Speaker 1:Am I asking for a substitute, right? Am I asking for a substitute right now, instead of bringing this call for love, which is any sense of pain, to the truth? Am I creating or miscreating really what it is? This is how we practically look at it. Am I projecting fear or am I extending love, recognizing that this basic conflict is always, always at this level, dissolving the temptation to fight battles in form. You know this, recognizing this as the basic conflict. Am I creating or miscreating? This is always going to help us dissolve the temptation to fight against form.
Speaker 1:You know, one of my friends was expressing she had this kind of thing going on, some kind of rash. So she was you know, I was watching her fight the form. Right, she's like oh, I'm told I have to eat this certain diet so I can get rid of it, and you know, that's the. That's what I mean by fighting the form. I don't really want to do it, and but I but I think you know, you're thinking, you're getting to the cause that way, but no, the cause is right now you're miscreating, you're projecting fear, that's all. Right now you're just projecting fear. When you go back to okay, the cause is in my mind, then there's no Form can take care of itself. It could still play out like that, you know, like if it seems like you need a special diet or whatever, but then you don't have to suffer over it because you're recognizing that your mind is actually projecting the whole thing, the person telling you that now you need to eat shit you don't like so you can get rid of this thing and the thing that's arising. You know you can just hold it really lightly and comically and kind of like be laughing about it, because you know your mind is actually miscreating. That's why you're perceiving anything in the first place, any kind of sickness or anything. So bringing awareness to this here, this basic conflict, is the fastest route to correction, because the holy spirit can only really heal at the level of cause, not effect, and the cause being once again propping up the belief in separation, as if this world can satisfy. So the only real conflict in the mind is between love and fear. Everything else is just a symptom of this one choice and that's why, of course, in miracles always talks about I can choose again. You just keep on choosing again. You choose love over fear.
Speaker 1:All right, paragraph 10, sentence 2. All fear is implicit in the second, just as all love is inherent in the first. Let's break that down. All fear is implicit in the first. Let's break that down. All fear is implicit in the second. The second is referring to miscreation A previous sentence, okay, that's referring to miscreation in the previous sentence. Every form of fear, whether it's subtle anxiety, concern, worry to outright terror or murderous rage, it's all rooted in the choice to misuse the mind's creative power. Miscreation is a decision for fear. So all fear is implicit in the second. All fear is implicit in miscreation. Miscreation is a decision for fear, even if the fear is temporarily hidden. It may be hidden. You don't see it, it's okay. Just recognize that. That's the case. Second part of the sentence.
Speaker 1:All fear is implicit in the second, just as all love is inherent in the first. The first refers to creation. That's from the previous sentence. True creation can only extend love because it shares the nature of its source, which is God. Creation shares the nature of its source, so it only extends love. That's why we're creating here and we're extending love. Forgiveness is a sign of that. When the mind is aligned with creation, there's no fear at all. It's not that. Love is just present. It's the only content possible in your mind, just present, it's the only content possible in your mind. So all fear is implicit in the second, just as all love is inherent in the first. So what he's saying is love and fear are mutually exclusive. The mind cannot create in love and also contain fear, like in that moment. It can't miscreate in fear and also hold on to love in the same moment. Fear doesn't exist in creation. Creation is eternal and changeless and there's absolutely nothing to threaten it. In the same way, what he's saying is love doesn't exist in miscreation, because miscreation itself is denying the source of love. So that's how you know.
Speaker 1:Your mind needs correction whenever there's any perception of pain in any way. So practically, this is offering a compass for self-inquiry. If I feel fear, I am miscreating, choosing against my true function. Pain is also fear. If I'm creating, fear is impossible. In creation, fear is impossible. So whenever I notice fear, I can be certain I've shifted from creation to miscreation and that I can choose again. Pain is an effect of fear. I've seen this. I've seen pain be released instantly when there's recognition that all this is is miscreation.
Speaker 1:Fear always signals miscreation, just the same as love always flows from creation. So by us just recognizing which one is present right now Is it creation or miscreation? Is it love or miscreation, is it love or fear we can immediately know whether we're presently aligned with truth or illusion, knowing when we've strayed, asking for correction, any sense of conflict, even Any sense of conflict, even any sense of guilt. It's not the manifestation that needs correction, it's the direction of the thought. Even a thought, even an ego thought, let's say even an ego thought is helpful because it's signaling that you can choose again. In that way, it's helpful too, because it's signaling to you you can choose again. Paragraph 10, sentence three it's always how you would look at it. All right, paragraph 10, sentence three.
Speaker 1:Because of this difference, the basic conflict is one between love and fear. So, because of this difference this is referring to the prior sentence distinction All fear belongs to miscreation, all love belongs to creation. This is the polarity that sets the stage for understanding the mind's real battle. Because of this difference, the basic conflict, this is the same, the real basic conflict. Jesus named earlier the mind's core decision point beneath all surface problems, all surface problems. This just breaks it down so simply from my point of view. I'm like man. This just makes it so easy. Any kind of problem, it has the same basic conflict. It's kind of like that lesson that let me see that my problems have already been solved. Right. The same basic conflict. So, because of this difference, the basic conflict is one between love and fear. This is the distilled essence of the conflict. All apparent struggles, relationship, financial worries, health concern they're all disguises. Loss, heartbreak. There are all disguises for this one inner choice align with love, which is creation, or align with fear, miscreation. The sentence again because of this difference, the basic conflict is one between love and fear. So this is one of A Course in Miracles' so this is one of A Course in Miracles' central teachings.
Speaker 1:Okay, here's something from the text in chapter 15. Every decision you make stems from what you think you are and represents the value that you put upon yourself. Okay, and every moment you're either expressing love or you're calling for it. It's basically what it's saying. Fear is not a real power, it's just the absence of love, and that's the same thing. As you know, death, believing in death. It's the let's say it's the absence of love. Let's say it's the denial of love, because love can't really be absence, but it seems like it's absent because you're denying it. So it's like darkness is the absence of light. It's not really absent, but you're denying it. Let's say you're turning your back on it.
Speaker 1:As long as the mind is believing in fear, it feels like it's a competing force. So healing is simply recognizing the choice for love is always available now and that's regardless of any past choices for fear. The past is also being projected now. So, whatever the issue is being presented, whatever it seems to be, you can always pause and ask am I in love or am I in fear right now? Okay, this short circuits the ego's complexity, because it's so simple. It's so simple. Whatever the issue seems to be, am I in love or am I in fear? Am I feeling pain? Right, fear is pain, whether emotional or physical pain. Am I in love or am I in fear? This is just so simple and you see how it just eliminates the need for all these complex psychoanalysis, all these complex therapies. The ego always wants to complicate the simplest thing Am I in love or am I in fear? This totally short circuits the ego's complexity it brings to focus in our mind. This is a way of focusing the only question that matters in healing the mind am I in love or am I in fear?
Speaker 1:Right now, choosing love and thought, word and action is choosing creation. Choosing fear is choosing miscreation. See, it's like the choice for love generates the effects. Choice for fear has its own effects that it generates. So every conflict boils down to just one choice love or fear. Love is creation, Fear is miscreation. The Holy Spirit's only role, all it ever does, is guide you to choosing love until conflict is gone entirely, to choosing love until conflict is gone entirely. The Holy Spirit is only an illusion here, temporarily. It's a temporary illusion While you believe in illusions to guide you to choose love until all conflict is gone completely. What a blessing. Thank God for the Holy Spirit. Thank God for giving us the Holy Spirit. We're so blessed. So on to paragraph 11. Sentence one so much then, for the true nature. Let's break that down. So much then.
Speaker 1:Jesus here is signaling a pause or a completion of a point. This is where he's like okay, I've covered this, let's move on. He's basically saying we've covered this foundation now. Thank you to those of you who have covered this with me. It's been amazing. And he's saying let's move on now. So much, then, for the true nature.
Speaker 1:This phrase is highlighting that what's been explained, this is what's been explained so far in this chapter, in this section Creation versus miscreation, love versus fear. Okay, this is not the distorted versions put forward by psychology this is what he's been going over or ego theories. He's covered it now. He's saying he's covered this. So much, then, for the true nature of the major opponents. So he's identified the only true opponents that matter not people, not parents, not childhood, not trauma, not external circumstances, but the inner split between love and fear. So he's saying he's covered that, enough now. So much, then, for the true nature of the major opponents in the basic conflict. So this is the root struggle, what he's saying, okay, so it's like he wants you to keep this in mind and now move on.
Speaker 1:All right, the root struggle and the human condition is this seeming war in the mind, the basic conflict. It isn't about behavior or neurosis. It's the ongoing choice between truth and illusion. So we're stripping away all complexity. This is what Jesus is doing here, stripping away all the complexity so we can move on. The conflict in the mind has only two sides creation, which is love, and miscreation, which is fear. And every psychological theory that fails to see this is trying to solve the wrong problem. It's chasing symptoms instead of cause. Okay, by naming it clearly here, this is a step in recognition. This is an important step in recognition that it's just these two. This is the basic conflict.
Speaker 1:Jesus is grounding, the teaching so that the rest of the section can build on it without confusion. So he's talking here. He wants us to get this first as a foundation so that he can build on it without confusion. So that's why, you know, so many people are reading the course, reading the course, reading the course, reading the course and misinterpreting it. I mean, I'm seeing people who have been on the course for so many years and they're still misinterpreting it because they're not getting what this basic conflict is. And that's why Jesus here has been so repetitive about it, because he wants us to get this as a foundation, because it has a practical implication for healing.
Speaker 1:We don't need to resolve endless personal conflicts in the world. I'm hearing people just last night, you know, convincing themselves that there is conflict in the world by telling me that someone is irritating them, someone has irritating behavior, and they feel sorry for that person. That's what Jesus is saying here. This is he saying. You know, you need to get this first before we can even build on this, because you guys are misunderstanding what's going on here. So healing happens when we stop identifying with symptoms and bringing awareness back to the root choice in the mind. This includes whatever seems to come from the past, patterns that appear to have developed in childhood. They're just different forms of the same root choice for fear. The same root choice for fear. That's all they are.
Speaker 1:Healing doesn't come from analyzing those stories. It comes from recognizing in the present moment that the only decision is between love and fear. This is the foundation that Jesus wants us to get before we go on, before he starts talking about something else. Next thing he's going to be talking about is psychic energies, but he wants us to get this first. So the Holy Spirit's whole function is to help us reinterpret our experiences in the light of truth, leading us from miscreation back to creation. So Jesus is closing out this point, but he wants you to get that the only true conflict is between love and fear, which is creation and miscreation. Having named this clearly, he can now turn to the question of psychic energy, where it comes from and how creation and miscreation are both drawing upon it. So let's continue, shall we? Did we get that? Did we get that point? We spent some time on it. We definitely spent some time on it. He was very repetitive about it Because it's a foundation for what's following. We can't just gloss over this. He's saying you got to understand what true cause and effect is, what the true basic conflict is. Okay, so here we go On to the next one, paragraph 11, sentence 2.
Speaker 1:Since all such theories lead to a form of therapy in which redistribution of psychic energy results, it is necessary to consider our concept of psychic energy next. What fun. So, since all such theories this refers to Freud's therapy and later psychological approaches All of them are dealing with fear by shifting energy around, instead of addressing the real conflict which we just covered creation versus miscreation. Since all such theories lead to a form of therapy, so these systems produce methods of treatment. That's what it means by lead to a form of therapy Systems producing methods of treatment, but they remain within the ego's framework, never healing at the level of cause, only managing effects. Never healing at the level of cause, only managing effects. So, since all such theories lead to a form of therapy in which redistribution of psychic energy results. So here's where I'm going to weave, in footnote 140, because, in which redistribution of psychic energy results.
Speaker 1:So, according to Freud this is footnote 140, psychic energy, which he calls libido, is the primal force that drives the psyche, expressing itself in desires that seek satisfaction and release. Do we see that Therapies based on this idea don't undo miscreation? All they're doing is redistributing the energy. They're channeling it into more quote acceptable forms of behavior. Okay, that's the footnote. Let me go to footnote 140. So, in Freudian thought, psychic energy, also called libido, is the primal energy that powers the psyche. This is in his thought. This energy takes the form of various drives that naturally move towards satisfaction and release. Notice that, in your mind, therapies based on this idea are not undoing miscreation. They're just redistributing the psychic energy, channeling it into what the mind believes is more acceptable forms of behavior, such as like art or something like that. From ACIM's perspective, this could include, this could provide some temporary relief, but it's always leaving the root cause, and that's the mind's misdirection of its creative power untouched. So carrying on with this same sentence. It's a rich sentence, since all such theories lead to a form of therapy in which redistribution of psychic energy results.
Speaker 1:It is necessary to consider our concept of psychic energy next. So here's where Jesus is shifting the discussion. Rather than accepting Freud's model, he's going to reveal a higher understanding of psychic energy, not rooted in instinctual drives but in the mind's divine creative capacity. He's going to show us what this psychic energy really is and how to use it. Are you guys ready for this? I'm excited about it, I am excited.
Speaker 1:So psychic energy isn't merely libido or instinct. It's the creative power of the mind. When it's aligned with creation, it's extending love. When it's misdirected into only shuffle this energy around, it shuffles psychic energy around. True healing is requiring giving the mind back to its source, so that the energy flows only toward love. So Freud saw psychic energy as libido to be redirected. Jesus is reframing it here as the mind's creative power and must be redeemed. Healing doesn't come through redistribution of psychic power. It comes through aligning that energy with creation rather than miscreation. So let's go on. So let's go on.
Speaker 1:Paragraph 11, sentence 3. In this respect, freud was more accurate than his followers, who were essentially more wishful. So in this respect, this is referring to the understanding of psychic energy Freud at least recognized that energy had to be accounted for, even if he saw it only in terms of libido and instinct. In this respect, freud was more accurate because his view was closer to the truth. He acknowledged this existence of a primal force driving human behavior. He saw that energy can't be denied. It must be expressed somehow. That was what Freud was saying. It can't be denied, it's got to be expressed somehow. That's why he's trying to redirect. It got to be expressed somehow. That's why he's trying to redirect it. In this respect, freud was more accurate than his followers. So his followers are later theorists and Jesus is saying they strayed further away from accuracy. Freud was the most accurate.
Speaker 1:They tried to reinterpret or reframe the problem and this is why we're having this, like birth trauma and trauma that you experienced in childhood and all that bullshit. It's bullshit, it's just a way to cover things up. They tried to reinterpret or reframe the problem instead of facing it honestly. This diluted the clarity that Freud had. But you say Freud at least partially achieved clarity. In this respect, freud was more accurate than his followers, who were essentially more wishful. And he's saying that because their theories leaned into wishful thinking, trying to make the conflict this basic conflict love and fear seem less stark and more palatable. Instead of confronting the split in the mind, they softened it, leaving the real problem unresolved. The way they're softening it is they're saying, hey, it's not, they're just denying that it's a split. At least Freud was saying there's a split. They're saying no, it's just because you know you had birth trauma or there's some trauma in your childhood, we can help you with that. So Jesus is saying that's more wishful actually. So Freud was more accurate.
Speaker 1:He perceived that psychic energy actually exists and cannot simply be abolished. He was trying to redirect it. So this is aligning in a limited way with A Course in Miracles teachings that all mind activity has power. That's what A Course in Miracles is teaching, right, that all mind activity has power. It's either aligning with love or it's aligning with fear. It's aligning with the Holy Spirit or it's aligning with the ego. So Freud's limitation was that he saw this psychic energy as libido or instinctual drives, rather than seeing it as the mind's divine creative impulse. So that's what Jesus is pointing us to here. Now he's saying this psychic energy, it's the mind's divine creative impulse.
Speaker 1:So later theories, theorists they went either even further off course, they minimized or reinterpreted the energy split, sliding into more denial. They're denying the split instead of having it corrected. They're denying a split in the mind. They're saying that what you're feeling right now, this fear that you're feeling right now, it's caused by your childhood or it's caused by your birth. It's caused by something someone did to you, some experience you had. No, that's denial. This is what Jesus is saying Listen here. If you listen here and you get this, you're going to save lifetimes of stupidity. Just going around and around and around and around and around, like this experience can either take you circular or it could take you vertical, all right.
Speaker 1:So this is cutting through both of these errors the error that psychic energy is real, okay, and it must be, and that it's a, it's a power of creation, right, right, it's just cutting through these errors. Uh, psychic energy is real, or that it's a, it's something, uh, it's something that you have to, um, that you can abolish straight on, okay, uh, it must be directed by love. It's the, it's a power of creation itself. Psychic energy, it's a power of creation itself. Psychic energy. It's the power of creation itself. So splitting it off and trying to redirect is one of the errors, and the other errors is approaching it straight on and saying, oh it's because of this, so we're going to work on it like this, it's only now. So if it's redirected in a way that it's directed by love, then it's truly healed.
Speaker 1:So the practical implication for one thing honesty, being honest about it. You can't just pretend that the split is not there. It's something that we made real, we were talking about earlier on. We were discussing how there's this sensor that keeps us from recognizing this split in the mind. So pretending that it's not there is a form of denial. So pretending that it's not, there is a form of denial, and that's what Freud's followers did. They're pretending that the split is not there. That's what Jesus is calling wishful. Facing fear directly with the spirit, is what allows its energy to actually be reinterpreted and truly redirected, truly redirected Instead of suppressed or ignored. Okay, so healing is beginning with willingness to see this conflict without distortion. So what he's saying is Freud at least acknowledged psychic energy, honestly. That's where the honesty comes in. His followers, the ones that came after drifted into wishful denial.
Speaker 1:So A Course in Miracles is honoring honesty as a first step, but then going further, redefining this psychic energy as the mind's creative power. See, freud was looking at it as something negative. That's why he wanted to compartmentalize it like kind of like keep it away from us. So when we align with love rather than fear, that's what takes care of it. All right, so do we have one more or two? Well, there's actually two more, okay, so we'll pick up next week with paragraph 11 sentence and we're going to break it down from here.
Speaker 1:So I'm so excited and thank you so much for joining. I really appreciate you guys. Thank you for being here, thank you for going through this. I see that this is really rarer than anyone even wants to see what's going on here, and that's going to change because the more of us join and looking at it like this and seeing what's going on, what we just cover right now is huge Just our willingness to see this basic conflict, creation and miscreation and apply that to everything across the board. Now we can start to look at psychic energy and how we could see how it does determine behavior, how the psychic energy is determining behavior, and we're going to see, better than any of the psychotherapists, better than any of the theorists that have gone before, because now we have Jesus showing us phrase by phrase, through A Course in Miracles, in the way that we're looking with an open mind to see the difference between creation and miscreation, seeing how we're choosing between love and fear. I'm so blessed, thank you.
Speaker 1:So I'll be back again and we'll be starting up next week, next Wednesday. This is my last week, next Wednesday, until I don't know when, because I'll be traveling, but it might be a couple more weeks before we come back, I don't know. But we'll start off with paragraph 11, sentence four, next week. And, unless you guys have any questions, yay, thank you too, durga. I'm so glad you're willing. I love you. Thank you for joining me on this Such a blessing. Thank you to everyone and until next time, yay. Visit hopejohnsonorg for more information or to donate to this work, or to set up a one-on-one with me or to get my book Unschooling for Parents and more. You can even connect to me on Substack from there or connect with any of my audios. This particular talk is going to all of the podcast stations. It's also on Substack and it's also on YouTube. It'll be posted there too. So thank you so much, until next time. Mahalo aloha and a hui hou. Thank you.
