Special Principles for Miracle Workers | 2/25/26 | A Course in Miracles Deep Dive | Chapter 3, Part II

Your mind keeps insisting there isn’t enough: not enough time, not enough space, not enough money, not enough safety. We slow that whole reflex down and look at a line from A Course in Miracles that cuts straight through it: “The miracle abolishes the need for lower order concerns.” Not the circumstances. The need. The inner urgency that makes the world feel like a threat.

We explore what “lower order concerns” really are (schedules, health anxiety, finances, logistics, status, outcomes) and why the miracle is a perceptual correction rather than a form-level fix. From there we move into the Course’s radical view of time and space: a miracle is “out of pattern,” not logically caused by the past, which means the script can break. When we choose right-mindedness, we stop treating limitation as primary, and the next practical step becomes cleaner, calmer, and often surprisingly obvious.

We also unpack the essential distinction between what is created (eternal spirit) and what is made (the body, the world, identity stories), plus a sharp warning for every would-be miracle worker: never confuse right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. If we meet miscreation with anything but a desire to heal, we reinforce the confusion. The miracle denies the error and affirms the truth, without repression and without spiritual bypassing.

If you want grounded spiritual practice, forgiveness that actually reduces fear, and a more peaceful relationship with “not enough,” press play. Subscribe, share this with a friend who’s drowning in urgency, and leave a review with the one lower order concern you’re ready to release.

Transcript

Welcome And Opening Prayer

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Aloha and welcome to a course in miracles deep dive with Hope Johnson. Coming to you from a Course in Miracles Deep Dive with Hope Johnson Johnson. Coming to you a course in miracles deep dive. That happens. Okay there. Ah welcome to a Course in Miracles Deep Dive. Coming from Lake Whatcombe, Washington. Thank you for joining. We're gonna be getting into paragraph or uh section two of chapter three, special principles for miracle workers.

SPEAKER_00 1:02

Let's just begin by tuning in.

Special Principles For Miracle Workers

Lower Order Concerns Explained

SPEAKER_01 1:11

Ah, so much gratitude for everyone who joins all these sweet open hearts to receive the message that Jesus was expressing through a course in miracles. Yeah. Joining together to see past the dream life we made with willingness to see only creation, however small that willingness may be. Thank you to everyone who joins, and thank you to Jesus for the patience and the beautiful poetic wording that defies anything this world can offer. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I love you, amen. Yay, everyone. Well, I'm so excited about this. So there's more principles here. We got the principles of miracles in the first chapter, and now we're going, we're in chapter three, and we have special principles for miracle workers. So this is interesting. So these special principles, I believe there are seven of them. Yes, seven specific principles in here. Uh, they're clarifying how miracles function, and also what's required of you, the miracle worker, to be working miracles. So our understanding of a few things is being refined here: the relationship between time and timelessness, also the distinction between creation and miscreation, and then the difference between correction and judgment. Also, the true meaning of forgiveness. So this is not focusing on outer chains, it's focus focusing on level correction, which we'll see. Miracles adjust the perception, and Jesus is saying he handles time and space. Our only responsibility is right-mindedness. Okay, so let's get into it. Paragraph one, sentence one. This is part two of chapter three of A Course in Miracles. This is the complete and annotated edition, came out in 2021. And we are on page hundred and nine. Here's the sentence. The miracle abolishes the need for lower order concerns. So this really is setting the tone for this section. The miracle abolishes the need for lower order concerns. Okay. Notice what this is saying. Well, let's say what it's not saying. It's not, it's not saying that the miracle abolishes form, it's saying it abolishes the need for lower order concerns. This is mental. It doesn't say the miracle is removing the circumstances in your life. It doesn't say it's fixing anything for you. It's specifically saying abolishes the need for lower order concerns. So the concern is what's being removed. The circumstance may still remain, but the concern is what's being removed. And that's really, you know, when I was coming to the miracle with regard to my relationship to my work and my relationship with my husband, um, when I was practicing the willingness and coming to that, it became really obvious to me that I was reacting to whatever it was that was a lower order concern. So I started to look in that direction, having the concern removed and actually experienced that miracle many times in a circular way until one day it was the kind of miracle where it collapsed time. I just saw, oh, there's no need for lower order concerns because the miracle is always now, and I could just live in the miracle all the time. I don't have to go back to getting concerned over anything. So lower order concerns are referring to any kind of time pressure, any kind of space limitation, financial stuff, physical arrangements. That was the one I was going through. Social, any social positioning, right? Your ambitions on how you want to help the world and teach the world and all that kind of stuff, status, reputation, bodily concerns, health conditions, anything like that? Any kind of logistical complexity that you uh might have in your any of your plans. And that's not saying that they're bad. Lower order doesn't mean bad, it means they're lower order, meaning lower than perception, secondary to perception. Okay, lower order concerns. I love you guys. Thank you for joining. So the ego loves to organize your life about managing these lower order concerns. Look at these kinds of thoughts. How will this work out? Do I have enough? Will I have enough later? What if I run out? What if this whole thing falls apart? See, those are all lower order concerns because they're about the illusion. They don't mean anything. So the miracles shifts your perception from fear to right-mindedness. And then that's how that urgency collapses. You see that? So let's go back to how this relates to uh circular miracles versus miracles that collapse time, right? So when you're just working the miracle to get some relief, just to get some relief, you actually keep the reason in your mind of why you're uh you're confined to this thing. Maybe a situation, time, space constraints, bandwidth, uh, not enough bandwidth on your a Wi-Fi. You know, it's just shifting to allowing those lower order concerns to be meaningless for you. Okay. This doesn't mean that you don't take any action. You don't know if you're going to be taking any action or not. You're allowing the urgency behind the thing to collapse, to completely collapse. Part of that, part of seeing it collapse is noticing whatever this is right now is perfect. Whatever's arising right now, it's perfect. Whatever your experience is, that is perfect. That that is a way to see, that's a helpful way to see this, that it's uh only made urgent by you because of your belief. So you would have your belief, uh, you have your belief corrected. Your miscreative belief makes internal urgency. So once that urgency collapses, the form, like the world and your relationships, they no longer feel like a source of safety. You know, that's what happened with me in my relationship with my uh business and my husband. Uh, once that urgency collapsed and I didn't see those things as a source of safety, there was nothing tying me to either of those things. I just found myself unwinding all that. So when the form isn't a source of safety anymore in your mind, then managing the form loses any kind of psychological charge. That's what's being abolished, okay? It's not your responsibilities in the world being abolished, it's your attachment to them. See, so it says the miracle abolishes the need for lower order concern. See, lower order concerns, plural.

SPEAKER_00 11:18

Let's get that right.

Let Urgency Collapse Without Passivity

SPEAKER_01 11:25

So this doesn't mean that you're ignoring your practical realities or anything. A lot of people misread this and start believing that. But the ego looks at lower order concerns like this. Like if it doesn't manage them constantly, everything will collapse. That used to be my mind. That's how my mind worked all the time. If I didn't manage something all the time, something bad was gonna happen. Now the miracle says, though, correct your perception first. This is what Jesus is talking about. Correct your perception first. The lower order concerns then are not gonna be dominating your mind. He doesn't want your mind bogged down with ordinary concerns. He talked about that before in chapter two, I believe. So next we're gonna move into time and space. Um, these are some examples of lower order concerns, concerns that we'll talk about more. But also, let's get back to ignoring practical realities, right? This doesn't mean you stop planning. This doesn't mean you become passive. It's just that you're not experiencing lower order, meaning worldly concerns, as if they're any kind of threat. They just lose false authority over you at all. You know, you're you may still plan, adjust, take action, rearrange things. You're just not defined by the outcome. So the movement can actually look the same. Maybe it'll be a little less jerky because you're not attached to the outcome. So notice if something like these are occupying your mental space, like wondering how something will work out, wondering whether there's enough, whether you have time, right? Whether you have enough time, whether you're secure, financially secure, health-wise, whatever. These are lower order concerns. This is where you're being asked to perform the miracle, return to right-mindedness and let that urgency dissolve. Maybe you didn't think of performing miracles on things like this. So notice when lower order concerns feel pressing, and see if you would be willing to allow the miracle to remove any need around it. Any sense of need. Once order is restored, those lower order concerns they can be there. They just lose all their dominance. Because you know they're already taken care of. And that's sentence one, once again, the miracle abolishes the need for lower order concerns.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

Right. Sentence two.

Time And Space Are Handled

SPEAKER_01 15:39

Since it is an illogical or out-of-pattern time interval by definition, the ordinary considerations of time and space do not apply. So the it in here, since it, that's a miracle, taking from sentence one here, the miracle abolishes the need for lower order concerns. So, since it, the miracle, is an illogical or out-of-pattern time interval by definition, the ordinary considerations of time and space do not apply. And that comes with footnote 15. That the miracle is illogical means it doesn't logically follow from what went before. It is out of pattern, the occurrence of a new pattern rather than a continuation of past patterns. These past patterns include the laws of time and space. So Jesus is saying here the miracle is an illogical time interval. And then he defines what illogical means here. The ordinary considerations of time and space do not apply. So he's not saying it's irrational, he's saying it doesn't logically follow what went before. See, he's helping us get out of this mindset, too, that the past caused this moment or whatever it is we're perceiving here. So, see, the ego's whole system depends on the continuity it knows. Past is the cause, and then it projects into the future. The miracle doesn't come out of that chain from past to cause to future. The miracle's outside of that chain, even though uh it's a time interval, out-of-pattern time interval. It's a new pattern, it's the occurrence of a new pattern. That's what a miracle is doing. It's not refining the old one that's there. Its goal isn't a better outcome inside the old pattern, it's a totally different pattern altogether. And here's what I like that footnote fifteen made it radically explicit here. The laws of time and space themselves are out of the old pattern, or are part of the old pattern. The laws of time and space themselves are part of the old pattern. So the laws we know as far as the world goes, past, present, future, how outcomes work, how things work. You know, we know how things work, apparently, in the world. I know that if it's like this, then this happens. Those are laws of time and space. They are uh also part of the old pattern. So the miracle is a brand new pattern. So the old pattern is like this it's time as a sequence, time is accumulation, right? For one, you accumulate ears, you accumulate aging, apparently. You know, it's like we're we're being asked to see this differently. We're perceiving space as a limitation, we're perceiving distance as separation, right? We're seeing things that we've seen go on for a long time, like through a duration of time. We're seeing that as inevitability, like death, for instance, right? Seeing things as being inevitable, but really they're not divine laws. These laws of time and space are not divine laws, they're nothing but perceptual habits. Even to call them laws, you know, they have become laws out of being perceptual habits, and the ego maintains itself through predictability. See, so so notice as you perceive in the world, you gain all these apparent insights about predictability, like you know what's gonna happen, like you know what's supposed to happen, right? I mean, some of the things everyone agrees with you on. When you get old, you die, just about everyone. I won't agree with you on that, doesn't make any sense. Okay, no one gets old. This idea of time and accumulation, again, it's a habit, it's only a habit. So if the past governs the future, then the ego identity remains stable. This is what the Miracles interrupting. See that? This is exactly what the miracle's interrupting. This idea that the past governs the future. Right? Like we all know what's going to happen. This is what's going to happen, or these are the things that could happen. The miracle interrupts it because in your mind, right-mindedness becomes the new cause. See that? Instead of the past being the cause, your right-mindedness becomes the new cause. This is a new pattern. So when that cause shifts from the past, right, to being right-mindedness, the projection also shifts. That's why Jesus is saying here, ordinary considerations of time and space do not apply. So the miracle is still a time interval. It occurs within the dream where there's time and space, but it's not governed by the dream's rules for continuity. It's a break in the script. You know what else is a break in the script? Just saying a cuss word. It's hilarious. The script, look at in the script, we're all conditioned to get approval. And so we've been told certain words are bad. See? So even just saying a cuss word in a place where it's not expected is also breaking the script. And that's why it's said to be bad. Just things that break the script. You know, it's like you go back to right-mindedness, and a lot of the times for me, right-mindedness has been very natural just to be in right-mindedness. Just like noticing where it seems like uh there's a perception of separate people, and we're all looking uh seeming to maybe serious about something. All of a sudden, I'll just step right out of character. I'll step right out of uh of script and maybe say or do things it's something off script. And I can feel when it's off script. I can sense that and I love it. And a lot of the times it'll kind of shock people. And sometimes they'll think they don't like me, they don't want to be around me. And you know what? I'm telling you, that is fine because the right people just come around right at the right time. Um, no need to uh be concerned about stepping out of script, and you know, you'll automatically be used that way when your mind's going to right-mindedness, it's just automatic. Breaking the script, it's fun. So notice whenever the mind is saying, This is how it always goes, maybe this is how it always goes for me. You know, some of the things are just like really uh well accepted. You know, people will be like, oh hum, this is the way it always goes for me. Oh, yeah, I expected it to work out like that. That's how it always goes. See? Also, uh, here's some different things that your mind might say. Um, this is how it always goes, given what happened before, okay. At my age, that's a big one. With this history, it'll take years to fix, or that's just reality. That's the pattern, that's the pattern speaking. So, this is what we're being asked to look at. Isn't this fun? We're just noticing these thoughts. The miracle is saying, I'm willing for a new pattern to enter here. You don't have to calculate how that happens or anything. You don't have to try to manage any time, you don't have to try to choose what correction you want. Time and space just reorganize around the choice you make, either way, really. I mean, when you make the choice for illusion, time and space also organize around that. So notice where you're assuming that the past determines what's happening next. And see if you'd be willing to allow something that doesn't logically follow that. It doesn't logically follow what seems to have happened before. That's not how it works, anyways, is just believing about this logic in the world that makes it seem like everything proceeds like that, but really it's a perceptual habit and it's a it's a habit that's mean to you. You're being mean to yourself. You don't have to do that anymore. All right. Everyone's sitting pretty. Okay, let's go to sentence three. I do not regard time as you do, and your space problems are not mine. That's the sentence. It comes along with a long comes along with a long footnote. Footnote sixteen. Space problems almost certainly refers to the common meaning of not having enough space. The original phrase was, and Kolb's space problem is not mine. Lawrence C. Kolb was chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, where Helen and Bill worked. His space problem is mentioned, see Cameo 14. We've gone over that. Alongside a storage problem and referred to as a space problem. Okay. A storage problem is hardly more difficult. This is what Jesus is saying here. A storage problem is hardly more difficult for me to solve than a space problem. Okay, so cold space problem was simply someone having a space problem, i.e., not having enough space. The overall idea here, as we see in the next sentence, is that when you perform a miracle, this allows Jesus to rearrange time and space in order to take care of your lower order concerns, bringing them into line with the healing that just took place. He may, for example, solve a space problem you have been struggling with. So that footnote really is the whole thing to me. It just looks like it's pointing to how practical this is. It's a common problem of not having enough space. That's what he's referring to. He's saying, I do not regard time as you do, and your space problems are not mine. So you see, he what they're saying is he's not speaking abstractly about common dimensions in space, you know, cause cosmic dimensions in space. He's not speaking abstractly like that. He's talking about like a not enough space in a room. So when he's saying your space problems are not mine, he doesn't mean he's indifferent. He means he just doesn't perceive limitation as being causal. So you experience not having enough room, maybe not enough time, maybe not enough margin, maybe not enough money. Um he doesn't recognize or organize reality around scarcity. See. So so what is it means that time and space are handled. Okay. It's not meaning you're you're gonna sit still and wait for more space to appear. It doesn't mean you're gonna refuse to make any adjustments practically, right? You're not you're not denying the logistical constraints you seem to have. What it means is you correct perception first, and then when your mind shifts from fear to right-mindedness, then your action can be guided instead of being defensive, see? So you may you may still look for a larger space, you may still need to plan something or rearrange something on your schedule or reduce some commitment somewhere, call someone, right? Change your structure somehow. But the energy behind it isn't an urgency. There's not an urgency beyond uh behind it, there's not this attachment to outcome. A lot of it, what I perceive is uh is people playing out some low-grade panic over their lower order concerns. It's almost like they'll talk about it and they'll feel breathless about it. So the miracles removing those lower order concerns as a source of ego identity. See that? So it's not like it's removing the lower order concern itself, but it's being removed for you as a source of ego identity. Then the time and space adjust. The mind has changed. Sometimes that's a dramatic adjustment, and sometimes it's just something really simple. Oh, okay, I'm doing it like this now. And maybe it's like of what I notice in myself is it'll be a solution. It's like, wow, how did I not even see it before? It'll be just be so ordinary, and obviously, you're not seeing it because it's a miracle opportunity. And once the miracle is performed, you can see the solution. See, it just is not driven by scarcity, like when you identify, you use lower order concerns to identify yourself, like as if you have to figure these things out, as if you know how it's gonna go. People lock themselves in a cage this way. Time and space are like framework, the ego set up as a source of limitation. Both of them say the same thing. There isn't enough. There isn't enough time, there isn't enough space. But whenever you choose right-mindedness, see scarcity loses authority. Scarcity itself, the form might change or it might not. It's always the right amount of time, it's always the right amount of space. Those things don't even mean anything. Geez, it's a projection, it's not even there. Time or space, you know, it's like your mind's just organizing around these concepts. But when it takes the concepts as being real, then the concepts are like really pressing on the mind. But when your mind is no longer organizing, you're not mind's gonna continue to organize, but it's not gonna organize with this sense of lack. That's what makes the rearrangement possible. So notice when you perceive a space problem, maybe it looks like too much on your calendar. Maybe it looks like not enough physical room. Right? Any any kind of strain like that. Instead of trying to solve it immediately, be willing to have your perception corrected first, moved over to right-mindedness. Once you're in right-mindedness, once you're in love and not fear, you might cat. And if you do, that action will be clean of ego identification.

SPEAKER_00 36:18

That's one way time and space do get handled.

Miracle First Then Rearrangement

SPEAKER_01 36:30

So it's like don't treat limitation as if it's the primary. When you see time and space are secondary to perception, so are the perceived limitations, they're secondary to perception. So you're not responsible for managing the structure. You're only responsible for right-mindedness, and the structure that follows out of that is coherent, it's aligned. All right, we got to three sentences so far. How's everyone doing? You guys look awesome. Thank you for joining. I love you. Let me know if you have any questions. For now, I'm moving on. Paragraph one, still on paragraph one, sentence four. When you perform a miracle, I will arrange both time and space to adjust to it. So Jesus is saying that when you perform a miracle, he'll arrange time and space to adjust to the miracle. He talks about cooperation. So, you know, this speaks to that cooperation he's talking about. Really looks like a partnership to me. So it follows from these three. We're on sentence four now. So follows from three sentences. One is the the miracle is out of pattern. Ordinary time and space considerations don't apply. And he said, your space problems are not mine. So now he's talking about cooperation. He's saying your part is perform the miracle, his part arrange time and space. See the order there? You do not rearrange the structure of your dream, you just perform miracles. What's the miracle again? It's the shift from wrong-mindedness to right-mindedness. Another way of saying it is it's establishing in your mind that you dream a dream and none of its content is true. So when that shift occurs, the external configuration reorganizes to reflect the shift. Now, earlier on we were talking about circular miracles in chapter two. Remember that? They're the kinds of miracles that don't collapse time because the miracle doesn't actually get applied to the underlying structure. You're leaving a make-believe cause intact. And he said those kinds of miracles are fine. He loves for you to get relief, but he'd love for you to also collapse time so you don't have to keep replaying it. Now, if you didn't collapse time, the same thing is going to keep returning. Okay? Uh, until you see the cause and recognize that the cause that you made, the false cause underneath uh this upset feeling that keeps on recurring is not true. See, I'll give you an example. In my case, I felt confined to my life and my marriage and my business and everything like that. Okay. So I kept working those circular miracles that would just give me relief. It's okay. I can still listen to the spirit's guidance and perform miracles right here. See how that is a circular miracle. Do you know why? Because it's not getting to the underlying belief, the fear of what actually changed circumstance might bring. Like, oh my God, how would I survive and all that kind of stuff? Or what if this really hurts him? What if this really ruins something? See, just letting go of the false causes and seeing those false causes, that's what uh collapses time and allows the spirit to move through you unobstructed by meaningless beliefs. And if you know my story, it turns out that once I made those moves, it really helped. It really helped my husband, it really helped my uh my daughter, my kids. Um, and if there wasn't this kind of practice where there's willingness to see through, I would still be there in the same situation hating it. Okay, because it wasn't it wasn't meant to continue progressing in that way longer than it took for me to collapse time. Once I collapsed time, everything shifted. That's how the shifts occur. Real shifts, not through a bunch of effort, right? You just get free of the limitations you laid on yourself. So time and space are not causal, perception is causal. That's the that's the key here. When the cause shifts, the perception, the effects shift. Okay. Uh so what is the shift again? It's just in the moment, going from wrong-mindedness to right-mindedness. It's just in the moment, allowing it to be established in your mind that you're dreaming and none of this stuff actually means anything. So because time and space appear to be structured and complex, everyone agrees on them, right? The ego assumes they have to be managed. What Jesus is saying is you're not responsible for manipulating any outcomes, you're responsible for willingness to allow this correction to happen in your mind. And the rearrangements of your circumstances, even if that looks like you doing it, is really a byproduct of a healed perception. Now, of course, this doesn't mean you're passively waiting. For life to fix itself. That was actually where I was. Not that it's wrong to be like that. It's just that that's what happens when your understanding of it isn't integrated fully. Okay. It's like the kind of miracles where you're passively waiting for life to fix itself. You're just getting relief from the upset feeling, but you're waiting for something to happen. Some people are waiting for something to happen in the political realm.

unknown 44:33

Right?

SPEAKER_01 44:33

It's almost like everything's on pause, waiting for something to get fixed. All right. That's also part of a hook, part of the hook to keep you in dreaming. It doesn't mean you're refusing to take action again. It doesn't mean you're avoiding responsibility. That's not what this means.

SPEAKER_00 44:54

Right? Here's the sentence again.

SPEAKER_01 45:04

When you perform a miracle, I will arrange both time and space to adjust to it. Okay, he's saying you're not responsible for manipulating any outcomes. Just the just the healed perception. A lot of people try to use this to avoid responsibility in the form. And it's like it's not a real responsibility, okay. Uh, but you believe in that thing. And so you have to naturally play out those responsibilities that you seem to believe in, otherwise, it's going to induce fear. And when you induce fear, that's a that makes healing uh more difficult when you induce more fear. So after the miracle occurs, you may be guided to make a phone call. You know, you feel at ease. You don't feel like you care about the outcome anymore. You're releasing unnecessary burdens. You might take a different practical step than you did before. You might discover that the problem itself just dissolved. It wasn't even really a problem in the first place that needed anything. It just dissolved. So you just cooperate with reality, basically. What the truth is. You know, when the ego says, if I don't control things, everything's gonna fall apart. And Jesus is saying, if you correct perception, I'll adjust time and space accordingly. So this removes the burden of management. Basically, perform miracles. When you perform a miracle, I will arrange both time and space to adjust to it, and it places full responsibility on the mind, responsibility for performing miracles. So before getting in any problem solving, ask yourself have I already performed the miracle? Have I released any judgment around this? Any attachment to outcomes? Am I in fear or am I in love? Have I already chosen right-mindedness here? I've seen that work so many times in business situations, too, where it seems like uh something crazy is happening. And it's only because that's a habit of perception. So I started to notice it as a habit of perception, and things lost their urgency.

SPEAKER_00 48:10

Things like that just lost their urgency.

Created Versus Made Level Clarity

SPEAKER_01 48:17

So notice when you're trying to rearrange time and space before performing the miracle, and notice what happens when you reverse that order. When you perform the miracle first, your perception gets corrected first, you move to right-mindedness first, and then what happens? Reverse it instead of trying to rearrange time and space first, perform the miracle, and then you can notice how you're guided for rearranging time and space if that's necessary. So, sentence four. That was sentence four of paragraph one, and basically uh paragraph one is sealing in this principle. The miracle comes first, rearrangement follows. Oh, excuse me. The miracle comes first, and rearrangement follows. That's the order. Remember that, and you're good to go. You're gonna be cruised through everything. Right today, right now, decide that you're gonna let a miracle be performed first before you try to fix anything that's out of order. That'll change everything for you if you haven't done that already. Yay! On to paragraph two. This is paragraph two, sentence one. Here's the text: a clear distinction between what was created and what is made is essential. A clear distinction between what was created and what is made is essential. So this is about level confusion. Course in Miracles makes a very consistent distinction. Created means of God, eternal, real, changeless. That's created. When the word made is mentioned, it means of the ego. It's temporary, it's perceptual, it's changeable. Creation is spirit, creation is extension, creation is what you are. What's made includes the body, the world, time, space, identity stories, psychological structures, laws of the world, all laws of the world, all forms. They're not sinful, they're just not creation. And what Jesus is saying here is that the miracle worker should not confuse these levels. When the miracle worker confuses these levels, there's no miracle. All healing depends on the distinction between what's created and what is made. When we treat what what is made as if it were created, we give it ontological weight. What does that mean? It means being, as if it's being, as if it's eternal. For instance, treating the body as if it's yourself, or time as if it's the ultimate reality.

SPEAKER_00 52:41

Treating form as if it's causing something.

SPEAKER_01 52:49

Treating circumstances as if they define you as if that's your identity. See, the miracle worker can find themselves in any circumstances, and it won't shut them down to making miracles. Any circumstances, you're not judging the circumstances, right? You're not treating your perception as if it's the truth, that's the error. The miracle corrects the perception by restoring level clarity. You're created, the world is made. That's the level clarity. If those are confused, then healing becomes like a magical trick to you. If they're distinguished clearly in your mind, then correction's natural. So Jesus uses the word essential in this sentence. A clear distinction between what was created and what was made is essential. So why is it essential? Why is this distinction essential? Because we try to one fix form while being in wrong-mindedness. We defend our illusions like I have diabetes, for instance. I need this medication because I have diabetes. Defending an illusion, that's defending an illusion. One way to say it. I can't leave my marriage because my husband will suffer. See, it's like we're trying to make the illusion true. We fear losing something that wasn't never created.

SPEAKER_00 55:12

And whenever we grieve, we grieve something that's not eternal. See, this is what happens when we confuse the levels. We attempt to save something that's just made. An illusion that we made. What's created can't be harmed.

SPEAKER_01 55:45

And what's made is never gonna be made eternal. That clarity, let that clarity remove fear about outcomes.

SPEAKER_00 56:02

You see how that how practical that is?

Right Mindedness Versus Wrong Mindedness

Meeting Miscreation With A Desire To Heal

SPEAKER_01 56:05

It's like if you have fear about outcomes, then all of your energy is going toward perpetuating that fearful outcome. But the miracle removes fear, replaces it with love. So then the movements can be orchestrated in a way that's in alignment with love. So let's look at, let's just notice some different ways we might treat something made as if it's created. So when the mind says, if I lose this person's love, I lose something real. Or if I lose this form of support, I lose something real. If I uh if I lose this comfort, I lose something. If this body changes, I diminish. My value diminishes. If I don't seize this opportunity, I'm less. See, this is how marketing works. It gets to these, it hooks you with these thoughts that are going on in your mind that you're believing. If this structure collapses, I am unsafe. Reminds me of identity protection uh ads and marketing. If this structure collapses, the structure of my identity collapses, I'm not safe. So ask yourself, is this created or is it made? Created cannot be threatened. Made seems to be able to be threatened. It seems to be able to be threatened only because of allowing it to define yourself. So the distinction between created and made restores right-mindedness. That's why miracles are natural if you're if you're always seeing that distinction between created and made. Isn't that sweet? It's so easy. Once you see it, oh, oh, I see why Jesus has been saying miracles are natural. Your kid is a slob. That's awesome, Akasha. I love that thought. That's a good one. Oh my goodness. Yeah. So so again, you know, that's a that's a fun one too. Kids, I know myself having lived with kids many years, you know, you might perceive them doing something that you don't want them to do. Wow, what a relief it is to recognize that that is made and not created. I write about that in my book, Unschooling for Parents, right? You get the relief because, you know, for me, you know, one of the things, Akasha, about the slob thing, I looked at it and I go, what is the fear around this? Okay, my kid might grow up to be a slob in their own house. Uh okay, why is that relevant? That doesn't really matter. Okay, what isn't what is another fear? I might have to clean up everything. And then I looked at that and I go, okay, in the moment, who gives a shit? It's just now, right? Is there's only now. So uh so what I noticed is what I was afraid of was having to do too much work, but everything just worked out. You know, some things would be um messier sometimes, but it would always be working out. Everything would be um clean enough, let's say, to where mom wasn't having to work all day long. Bless their sweet little messes, yeah. So the miracle isn't about changing your kids from being a slob to all of a sudden uh being some clean angels. It's just that your your concern over their being a slob is removed, right? And when you know, really when it collapses time within you, you see, oh, what is the underlying cause of me even having this perception in the first place that they're a slob? I mean, look at the way it comes out like that. So it's like I would just start seeing my kids in in a different light, like they're giving me something, they're giving me a gift all the time, right? Because their being is created. This idea that they're messy or anything like that, that is make-believe. Yeah. All right. So without level distinction, miracle work collapses. It's just it just ends up trying to manage form. And with the level distinction, correction becomes very precise. Paragraph two, sentence two, everyone. All forms of correction or healing rest on this fundamental correction in level perception. So the previous sentence says a clear distinction between what was created and what is made is essential. And then it says all forms of correction or healing in parentheses rest on this fundamental correction in level perception. So this is the fundamental correction in level perception, that you have a clear distinction in your mind about what was created and what is made. And now he's explaining why. Because every form of healing depends on that distinction. Wow, that just makes it really simple, doesn't it? So if you not, if you do not correct that level confusion, nothing's getting corrected. Level perception again means knowing what is created, eternal, real spirit, and knowing what is made, temporal perceptual form. When those are confused, when form is considered being and being is considered form, we attempt to heal at the wrong level. We attempt to heal within the dream, right? We're not actually bringing our illusions to the truth, we're just using illusions to try to solve illusions, and that doesn't work because level confusion is the root error. That's what this is saying. It's the root error, right? Let's read it again. All forms of correction or healing rest on this fundamental correction in level perception. What is the correction? A clear distinction between what was created and what is made. So here's examples of level confusion trying to fix the body to solve fear, right? That's that's one thing. Let's say you're going for some kind of beauty treatment. Maybe you're getting one of those shots in your lips to like blow your lip up like a fish. I don't know. You might get it, get it mildly, so it just looks like some little bee stings, whatever. It doesn't mean this is a wrong thing to do, to go, you know, get or get plastic surgery or do some kind of regimen or anything like that. It's how you're using it. Are you using it to solve fear? All you have to do is look at the thoughts. Does it seem like it will get you something better? Right? See, you can you can notice if it's coming from excitement or if it's coming to get a particular outcome. Trying to change anyone's behavior so you'll feel safe. That's another example. Notice when you're trying to do that. You know, one way I practice with that, you know how lots of times parents tell their kids, don't tell anyone about this. This is a family secret, something like that. So when my kids were coming up and there would be anything that I'd feel I didn't want them to tell anyone, I'd sit with that and just notice how it feels. And I'd never ask them to not tell people anything because just noticing that uh that that in itself is level confusion. It's as if I can do something uh to protect myself from fear, to make myself feel safe. Another one is trying to secure money to eliminate anxiety. Hmm. Yes. Yes, yes. Not uh you don't have to do that. It's a lower order concern, even money is a lower order concern. You don't have to do anything out of anxiety. A lot of people are going to their whole job out of anxiety, right? He's saying you don't need to do that. Trying to preserve youth, to preserve identity. That's another one. See, we don't even need to try to preserve youth. There's no uh there's no reason to do that because the body is used for awakening the mind. That's what it's useful for. And you know, it may uh it may be projecting as youthful, it may be projecting as uh elderly or somewhere in between. It's always not your identity. Okay, that this doesn't mean, see, people take this to mean that they shouldn't work out or something, or they shouldn't uh look after their health, so to speak. And uh that's not what it means. It's just that you don't have any concern over those things, you know, anything that you seem to do out of a sense of urgency, that's telling you it's level confusion. So trying to fix the body to solve fear, trying to change someone's behavior to feel safe, for instance. These are attempts to heal what was made as if that is the cause. But the cause is always in the mind. That's the thing, the the mind that made the fear that they might say something. So your healing rests on recognizing that the problem, the apparent problem that you perceive is not really at the level of form, it's not really there. That's why it can't be managed at the level of form because it's not really there, it's at the level of perception. Once that's made, the form's gonna naturally reflect it. So, why this is pretty radical, there's no such thing as form-level healing. This is very radical for people. It can't, no form-level healing can occur. Uh, mind-level correction can occur, and it could reflect and will eventually reflect in all form. Uh, because perception, as it shifts, it takes away the guilt which causes form to deteriorate and stuff like that. If perception hasn't shifted, nothing has been healed. Because that's where the perception is mental, it's in the mind. Nothing's been healed unless the perception shifted. So that's another reason why you know this sounds so radical, because it's like you can go to the doctor and let's say get a hip replacement, and all of a sudden you feel way better from the hip replacement, but nothing has been healed. You know, you shifted things around in the perception, but the perception itself didn't shift. Or if you take some kind of uh medical drug or herbal supplement or whatever to try to get rid of something, you may get that result you were looking for, but that's not the same as healing. It's just a shift of appearances. You modified appearances, temporarily relieved symptoms of mental illness, rearrange the structure. But without this level correction, the fear is still intact. And that's why Jesus is saying all forms of correction rest on this, not some, all forms of correction rest on this. What is this? A clear distinction between what was created and what is made. All right, that's levels, that's the levels, and not to confuse the levels. Yay. So when something appears wrong, the ego immediately immediately might go to how do I fix this? So you might ask, what level am I addressing? Is this a form problem? There aren't any form problems really, or a perception problem. Always come back to it. Is a perception problem, so that you can go to what actually can be corrected. You're not what was made, you are what was created, and your mind is causal, the form reflects the causal mind. That's where correction begins. Causal mind and ends. So noticing where you're attempting to heal at the level of form instead of correcting perception. You know, that should just give you a breath of relaxation. Doesn't mean anything changes. You may still take your blood pressure pills or whatever you're doing. You're just noticing that the blood pressure pills now, just using that as an example, are like magic tricks. Only way for healing to occur is for the perception to be corrected. So notice what changes when that distinction in your mind is restored. That distinction from what's created and what is made. This sentence basically protects you from magic. Right? It's telling you exactly how correction occurs. A clear distinction between what was created and what is made is essential. It keeps you from giving uh spiritual power to things that are make-believe. Without clarity about the levels, miracle work, it just gets reduced to this management of things in the field, management of illusions. When you have level clarity, healing becomes simple, simple and direct. One friend told me uh they were coming over here to be at a Course in Miracles deep dive, and their car ran into a ravine. And the reason the car ran into a ravine is because two people in a car in the car started getting into a fight. And see, that's assigning cause and effect to things right there. That's not the most of the time when you say because it's not true. So maybe you might notice from now on when you're saying because it's not true. All right, checking in on you, sweeties. Thank you for joining. All right, everyone's doing good. All right, so now paragraph two, sentence two. Yay! Wait a minute. We just did paragraph two, sentence two. Okay. No wonder my notes are so long. All right, there's only two sentences in that paragraph. One, two. All right. We're going on to sentence three or paragraph three. Paragraph three, sentence one. Another way of stating the second principle is this. Never confuse right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. Okay, so the second principle he gave was a clear distinction between what was created and what is made is essential, what we just went over. And then all forms of correction or healing rest on this fundamental correction in level perception. So now he's saying another way of stating the second principle is this never confuse right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. This is just another way to say the same exact thing. Never confuse right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. So that's the second principle referred to this essential distinction between what was created and what was made. He's saying another way to say that is don't confuse right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. Okay. Right-mindedness is aligned with the spirit. Right-mindedness recognizes innocence, it remembers the levels, it refuses projection, and it sees correctly. Wrong-mindedness, see, he's saying don't confuse these two. Wrong-mindedness is ego-based, confuses levels, it projects guilt, it treats form as causal, and it defends separation. So he didn't say, he didn't even say here, don't do wrong-mindedness. He says, never confuse right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. Now, what I've seen is when my mind goes wrong-minded and I'm just aware that it is wrong-minded, it comes back. But if you try to make right-minded or wrong-minded right-minded, then you're listening to the ego and you're going to become fearful. That's how you know. Like you're going to get a sense that something is wrong, something is off. That's telling you you're confusing it. And it might take you a little bit to recognize that signal. Um, if you've applied so much belief in your wrong-mindedness being correct, right-mindedness reflects creation, wrong-mindedness reflects what was made. So when we confuse those two, we grant the illusion legitimacy. Make illusions true. Here's an example: calling judgment discernment. Right? That person is evil, for instance. That's not discernment. There's no evil. See how uh see how creation that's not a that's not a creative thought that someone is evil, for instance. It's innocence. Creation is innocence. So judgment, calling judgment is dis uh calling judgment discernment is one. Calling fear intuition. That is a common one. Nothing real can be threatened. What is there to be intuitive about fear for? Makes no sense. Calling attack honesty. I'm just being honest. I'm just being honest that you're evil, for instance. I'm just being honest that you did this to me, for instance. I'm just being honest that you're not good enough for that particular thing or person. Calling control, taking control, responsibility. That's another one. Calling acting out your grievances boundaries. So the miracle, the miracle worker can't be blurring the line between what's created and what's made. Otherwise, they're not working a miracle, which is natural for the miracle worker. Correction requires this clarity. Never confuse is a firm way of saying it. He said, another way of stating the second principle is this never confuse right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. Why is he so firm on that? Why do you think he's so firm? Because the ego distortion disguises itself as wisdom. It sounds reasonable, it feels justified, it appears intelligent, but it's still wrong-mindedness if it reinforces separation, if it validates guilt, if it makes form primary, not the mind as cause, or it defends identity. Right-mindedness is really simple. It doesn't defend, it doesn't accuse, it doesn't dramatize, it just corrects. So before acting, you can ask: is this wrong-minded or right-minded? Not is it justified. See that? Not is it understandable or logical. Is this logical? Uh-uh. That's worldly thinking. You only want to know if it's right-minded or wrong-minded. Does the perception align with love? If not, it's wrong-minded. I'm not talking about tough love, I'm talking about actual love. Okay, love is uh also peaceful. Okay, it coincides with peacefulness, it coincides with inclusivity, a desire to heal only. So this clarity prevents subtle self-deception, which is that's who we're always deceiving, the self. When we listen to the ego, we're engaging in self-deception. So notice wherever you're spiritualizing wrong-mindedness and calling it wisdom. Am I willing to let this distinction be simple? The distinction between what was created and what is made. This is meant to sharpen you as a miracle worker. Yay! Without this clarity, you know, your miracle worker, your miracle working is compromised. But with this clarity, the difference between what was created and what is made, that stabilizes your perception, lets you live in the miracle. You're no longer questioning, am I living in the miracle? This is supposed to live in the miracle, stabilizes your perception in that distinction between what's created and what's made. So yay. Paragraph three, sentence two. Responding to any form of miscreation with anything except a desire to heal or a miracle, that's in parentheses, is an expression of this confusion. So responding to any form of miscreation with anything except a desire to heal or a miracle is an expression of this confusion. So when it says miscreation, it's referring to expressions of wrong-mindedness. So that includes attack, and this may be coming from your own mind to yourself, from yourself to another person, or another person to you. Miscreation. Okay. Attack, projection, fear-based behavior, manipulation, guilt, defensive patterns, ego expressions. Okay, we're gonna put those in all one, all in one bucket and call it miscreation. So when you encounter miscreation in yourself or in another, there's two possible responses: right-mindedness, which is the desire to heal, or wrong-mindedness at anything else. If you're responding with judgment, retaliation, superiority, withdrawal and grievance, spiritual condemnation, self-attack, blame, guilt, shame, you have confused right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. You're answering illusion with illusion. So people might say, oh, that they deserve that, they should get that. The thing is, for you as a miracle worker, you don't want to get into miscreation, you know, especially as strongly as Jesus is talking about it here, where he's saying all forms of correction rest on this fundamental correction in level perception, right? And then in this sentence that we're on, responding to any form of miscreation with anything except a desire to heal or a miracle is an expression of this confusion. Okay, that's the confusion between right-mindedness and wrong-mindedness, also the confusion of levels between what's created and what's made. That's what the levels are. What's created and what's made. Right? Miscreation is never a cause, it's just an error in perception. Again, look at what miscreation is, okay? Attack, projection, fear-based behavior, etc. Right? To respond with anything except healing is to treat the miscreation as if it's real and it has a real cause. That's why it reinforces level confusion when you do that. So the miracle worker's only proper response is correction. It's not fixing someone's behavior, it's not approving their behavior, it's not ignoring their behavior, for instance. It's actually perceptual healing, the desire to heal. Jesus talks about the desire to heal here. The desire to heal restores level clarity. Uh, it's it's awareness that the mind was mistaken. The person is not guilty. The error is correctable. Why is the error correctable? Because it's a mental error, it's self-diminishment, it's miscreation. That's why it's correctable. And this is right-mindedness. What it doesn't mean, here's what it doesn't mean, because I know people get tripped out. I know I have. You tolerate abuse. It does not mean you tolerate abuse. It does not mean you allow harmful behavior, it doesn't mean you deny discernment, it doesn't mean you refuse any boundaries. It just means your internal response is for correction rather than condemnation. It's really that simple. Your internal response. So it's like if you're making a boundary to show someone, or you're making a boundary to protect yourself, that's not not making it for correction. Okay. It's a you want what you want is to have that interpretation that anything's being threatened, healed first, and then let boundaries, discernment, that kind of stuff arise. So you're not making anyone guilty in it, really. Of the main things. You're not making anyone guilty. You're recognizing that everyone is pure being spirit. So you may still find yourself taking some practical action, but it's just not fueled by judgment. So the miracle addresses the cause that's in the mind. That's perception. It changes perception. Action addresses form. These are distinct. These two things are distinct. And that, you know, it's very precise here. The sentence is removing gray areas from our mind. If your response isn't healing, it's confusion. And what is healing? He's saying it's a desire to heal. Now, someone might not realize what healing means by this point. Go, desire to heal. Okay, well, I of course I have that. I have the desire to heal. You know, but in this case, he's referring to Jesus is referring to desire to heal as a miracle. It's in parentheses here. Like desire to heal is the miracle. And what is the miracle? Again, it establishes in your mind that you're dreaming a dream and none of its content is true. It's also a shift from wrong-mindedness to right-mindedness.

SPEAKER_00 1:29:33

That's the same thing, really.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:42

So if your response isn't healing, it isn't the desire for healing, then it's confusion. And that doesn't mean you're bad or anything. You're just recognizing it's confusion. You've temporarily believed that miscreation is real. And once you remember only perception needs correction, the miracle can unfold. So when miscreation appears, just pause. Ask, what's my desire right now? Look at what the ego wants to do. The ego wants to win, the ego wants to be right, defend, withdraw, punish, prove something. So is yours, is your desire right now aligned with the ego, or is it aligned with the desire to heal? If it's not healing, the correction begins with your mind. It's not a bad thing. It's just showing you, okay, correction begins in your mind. And then the action can take place. See that? It's really coming back to that in these principles. This reminds me of the Old Testament. Now there's the Old Testament, and then there's the Ten Commandments, and then Jesus comes along and he's like, okay, now you guys only have two, and they're totally different from the other ten, I think. I don't know, maybe they're the first two. Uh love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, all thy mind, and all thy spirit, and love thy neighbor as thyself. Now, in a course in miracles, we had fit, I think 50 or 52 principles of miracles. Now, by chapter three, we're down to these ones. And this makes it really simple. I mean, it was definitely awesome to learn all the principles of miracles. I mean, I didn't memorize them or anything, but I've been through them slowly. And then to come to this point, and it's like, oh wow, that's just so simple. All I have to do is not confuse the levels. All I have to do is not confuse uh wrong-mindedness with right-mindedness. Oh, this is easy. So notice in yourself, when you encounter error, let's say miscreation, attack, meanness, judgment, toward you coming from you, whatever. Do you move toward heal healing? Do you actually move toward healing? Oh, this is something that I desire to heal. My desire is healing. Go into right-mindedness, or do you move toward reinforcing the error? Check that out. Look, look when someone cuts you off in traffic, for instance. You can use it right there. Are you willing to let healing be your only response? And this is basically telling you you cannot respond from ego and have it be correction. It's not gonna happen. The only two the only true response to error is healing.

SPEAKER_00 1:33:06

Okay, got a question here from Durga.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:10

An extension of Marvin Gay's song, I am having a perceptual healing instead of a sexual healing. That's fun. I love it. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:33:26

All right, let's see where we are.

Deny Error Affirm Truth And Closing

SPEAKER_01 1:33:31

Oh, did we already make it to paragraph four, sentence one? I think we did. Let's see. Yeah, that's where we are. Paragraph four, sentence one. The miracle is always a denial of this error and an affirmation of the truth. Okay, what was the error again? Responding to any form of miscreation with anything except a desire to heal or a miracle is an expression of this confusion. Then the miracle is always a denial of this error and an affirmation of the truth. Okay. The miracle is always a denial of this error and an affirmation of the truth. Okay, so here's the context. The error is referring to confusion that was just described, confusing right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness, responding to miscreation with something other than healing. Treating illusion as if it has, as if it's causative, right? Illusion meaning what's made, treating what's made as if it's causative. Now Jesus is defining what the miracle really does. The miracle does two things simultaneously, he says. It denies error and it affirms the truth. So this is not denial in uh in like a physical sense, it's denial in metaphysical sense. So refusing to grant reality to illusion. The miracle says this miscreation is not the truth. This behavior does not define this person's identity. This error is not ultimate. This perception is mistaken. At the same time, it affirms. See, so it both denies, that's what it denies. It affirms innocence is real, creation is intact, love is here, and the mind can choose again. So it's not fighting an error, it's withdrawing any belief from it. See how it's a denial, too. So it denies the error, it affirms the truth. This miscreation is not the truth. So the ego is always attempting to make error real, make guilt the truth, making separation seem like it's inevitable, and making attack seem like it's justified or meaningful. The miracle refuses that ego frame. It does not analyze the error, it does not justify the error, it does not punish the error, it denies ontological status, meaning anything relating to being existing or existence or reality. So in denying status of reality to error, the miracle also affirms what is real. The truth doesn't need any defenses, it actually needs recognition. The miracle helps with that. Why do both of these movements matter? If you deny error without a turn rey error without also affirming the truth, you're gonna get repression. And that does not feel good. If you affirm the truth without denying the error, you get spiritual bypassing. See that you need both. The miracle does both. See, one of the ego's tricks is to get you not to look on the error, but you need to look on the error to deny it. You don't need to get all mucked up in it, you just need to look on the error. You need to be aware of what the error is to deny any truth to it. The miracle needs both, it sees the illusion clearly and it refuses to grant it authority. See that restores level clarity to your mind. So whenever you encounter miscreation, instead of arguing with it, you can say this isn't the truth. And then affirm to yourself the truth is innocence. You may see, like for me, I see patterns really easily. You may see people playing their patterns and trying to play them on you, and you just recognize that's perceptual, that's not the truth. The truth is innocence. That doesn't mean you're spiritually bypassing it, though. You're recognizing that's a pattern. The only truth is love. So then you don't end up finding yourself inside of that pattern with them. You don't try to fix it, you don't try to make them aware unless they want to be made aware. You know, you'll know because being guided really feels like a joyful movement. It feels like a joyful, clear, peaceful movement. You're just refusing to energize illusions when you're being miracle-minded. So notice wherever you grant reality to error instead of denying it. Are you willing to affirm what's really true without defending it? So look at this. You know, say someone is uh stepping on your toe on purpose. Let's let's use that example for this, okay? And you want them to stop stepping on your toe, let's say. Now, so to affirm the truth is you're not being threatened at all. Everyone is innocent, right? To deny the error, you don't have to make any kind of judgment about it. You know, you might end up like that kung fu guy doing a kung fu on the guy, you don't know, but all the solutions and any kind of action that needs to take place manifests naturally when you're willing to do both. Okay, if the person is intentionally stepping on your toe, okay, they're acting from wrong-mindedness. Okay, how do you meet that? Right? It's a desire for healing.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:26

The truth is innocence, and only love is real.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:36

Removes all anger, justification, anything like that from your mind.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:55

So look at that sentence again.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:00

The miracle is always a denial of this error. Okay, the error is confusing right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness, responding to miscreation with anything other than healing. See, you're not really capable of doing anything like this. This error, the reason why you would deny this error is because it has no power. But it needs to be with an affirmation of what's actually true.

SPEAKER_00 1:42:37

Only innocence.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:43

So, in the back to the example of someone stepping on your toe, it's like they're not really capable of miscreation, except in their own dream, of course.

unknown 1:42:59

Right?

SPEAKER_01 1:42:59

And the affirmation of the truth, it's like they are innocent. See, when you have both of those together, then that's healing. But if you're just going, if they're stepping on your toe and you're just going, the affirmation is a truth of the truth, is this isn't really happening, and then they're just continuing to do that, that's uh repression, right? Or if you're looking at the error and you're and you're denying that the error is there, that they're having a miscreative thought, right? You want to deny that the error means anything and recognize that here healing can take place here and now. So there is an error uh in the perception, but you're denying that that error really has any effects. The ego attempts to make the error real, whether the error seems to be coming from you or then, they're them. They're evil, they're bad, they're guilty, make separation real, make attacks seem meaningful. So we need both of those movements. So instead of arguing it with it, say internally, this is not the truth, and then affirm the truth is innocence. Or the truth is that only love is real. So you're not fixing the illusion, you're really just not energizing it.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:52

All right, let's see where we are now.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:55

The miracle is always a denial of this error and an affirmation of the truth.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:07

Okay. Right mindedness. Next sentence is about right-mindedness. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:22

So only right-mindedness can create in a way that has any real effect.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:41

That makes sense, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_01 1:45:44

We've just been told the miracle denies error and affirms the truth. What has no real effect has no real existence. Now, this sentence is coming in to clarify causation. Only right-mindedness can create in a way that has any real effects. The key word here is real. Wrong-mindedness can appear to create effects, conflict, drama, emotional turbulence, body sensations, body reactions, shifts in circumstances. But these things are not real. They're not real effects, they only occur in the perception, they don't alter creation at all. So wrong-mindedness has no real attempt uh effects. Back to uh stepping it on the toe. Their wrong-mindedness is not making this, it's not even making this effect as you're perceiving it. Wrong-mindedness has no real effects, they occur within the perception, they don't alter creation at all. But right-mindedness is different, it aligns with the truth, so it actually participates in creation by extension, it restores your awareness to what is true. Only that, only your awareness restored to what is true has any real effect. That actually touches the eternal. Right-mindedness doesn't create in the way the ego likes to create. Your alignment with what's true is helping to extend that which endures forever. So this sentence, only right-mindedness can create in a way that has any real effects. The ego believes that it's anger has impact, right? It's a good thing I got angry over there. I got what I wanted. I was angry, I got what I wanted. Their mistake changed everything. I was fine, they made that mistake, and then I got angry. Or this event ruined something. This thing that happened ruined something that's real. Here, Jesus is correcting this belief. Only right-mindedness can create in a way that has any real effects. Only love has a real effect. Only right-minded perceiving participates in the lasting, in what's lasting.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:08

Everything else is like real rearranging shadows.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:19

I like the I like the example of someone stepping on the toe. It's like a practical application here is like something's feeling powerful or destructive, right? Ask, does this alter anything that's eternal?

SPEAKER_00 1:49:37

Okay, there's no real effects, then choose right mindedness. Only right mindedness creates anything that's true.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:54

Notice where you're attributing creative power. Ah, they won't stop. It's because their mind is whatever. It's because their mind that is hurting me. It's because of them arguing in the car that I crashed into a rip ravine, for instance. Only right-mindedness can create in a way that has any real effects.

SPEAKER_00 1:50:39

Thank you for joining, sweeties. I love you.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:43

We're going on to paragraph four, sentence three. Pragmatically, what has no real effect has no real existence. So he just said only right-mindedness can create in a way that has any real effect. Now he's saying if something has no real effect, then pragmatically speaking, it has no real existence. Reality is defined by what's eternally effective. If it doesn't have effects in creation, it's not even real. Only right-mindedness has effects in creation. You don't need anything but right-mindedness, meaning you don't need the ego to interpret anything. Wrong-mindedness only appears powerful, and the ego loves it because it wounds or divides or damages or distorts or separates, makes someone wrong. But if it doesn't alter what's what's created, it has no real effect.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:02

And that means it has no real existence. Right?

SPEAKER_01 1:52:13

Like your stepping on my toe actually has no real effect on my toe. Does that mean I shouldn't do some kung fu move to get you off my toe? No, that could occur. And none of this stuff alters what is created. Only right-mindedness does. Anything that doesn't have a real effect only exists in perception, has no real existence. That's why a Course in Miracles defines illusion as that which has no effects on reality. Reality is changeless. Only extension of love actually participates in reality. Everything else is a misperception. Okay, this is interesting here. He says pragmatically, pragmatically, what has no real effect has no real existence. So pragmatically means for practical purposes. Here he's talking about practical purposes of healing. Pragmatically, for practical purposes of healing, let's say, what has no real effect has no real existence. So don't build your identity around it, what has no real effects. Don't defend it, don't grieve it as if it's the ultimate thing. Don't fear it as if it's powerful. Because it has not altered reality. What has no real effect has no real existence. Doesn't mean pain does not seem real. That's why I'm giving the example of stepping on a toe. Right?

SPEAKER_00 1:54:28

Perception does have emotional weight in the dream. Okay. It means nothing true has been altered.

SPEAKER_01 1:54:44

Nothing has been changed in creation. Nothing has affected yourself. That's the foundation of miracle workers. So when something appears devastating to you, say it's devastating someone stepping on your toe. Has this changed what's eternal? If not, it doesn't even have any real existence. It's a perception awaiting correction. Would you see their mind as wholly innocent? Deny the illusion. Affirm the truth. The illusion is as if that they're bad or evil or wrong for stepping on your toe. Affirm the truth. The truth is innocence. Remember, everything in the in the field, your your concerns, right? Your uh your lower level concerns, that's the level that's below perception, are already taken care of. Your only function is working miracles. And this is how it's done. So notice where you're granting any existence to things that have no real effect. And notice what shifts when you define your reality by what's eternal rather than by what is experience. What's experienced is only your projected reality. If you define reality, though, by what's eternal, that affects your experience. The ego's argument is that what it's saying is the truth. And this is putting it into light. None of that is actually real. You know, the only reason we would even want to look on error is because of the desire for healing. That's the only reason to do it, not to make it real. So we have just two minutes left. Let's just look at what we went over. The miracle abolishes the need for lower order concerns. Yeah, this is basically what this been all about. Jesus doesn't regard time as we do. They're not, or they're not real concerns. Time and space. When you perform a miracle, he'll arrange both time and space to adjust to it. A clear distinction between what's created and what's made is essential. All forms of correction or healing rest on this fundamental correction in level perception. And another way to say this is never confuse right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. Nice. He's not even saying don't do wrong-mindedness. He's saying don't confuse the two. Okay, it's a denial of confusing uh right-mindedness with wrong-mindedness. Only right-mindedness can create in a way that has any real effect. And what has no real effect has no existence. So hooray. We made it through sentence three of paragraph four in chapter three, section two, special principles for miracle workers. Yeah. Thank you so much for joining everyone. I'll be back again on Monday for wisdom dialogues. And then next Wednesday again, I'm chilling out here in Lake Watcom. I'm so excited to share with you and all the different ways that it gets to come through. Oh, Celeste, emotion holds perceptual weight in the dream. That's a potent phrase for me. Yay, I'm glad you enjoyed that phrase, Celeste. I love you. It's so fun to hear from you. It's so fun that uh to join with everyone. I really appreciate you. Thank you for doing deep dives with me. We'll do it again next week. And until then, please visit hopejohnson.org. Yay, Glenn, I love you. Aloha.

SPEAKER_00 1:59:38

Woo!