Truth comes through this filter of mind, thus may appear to contradict itself. Earlier, I spoke of Self as multi-layered, but there are no layers. This is a simple distortion, and the reader should be able to tell the difference. In this writing, this book of essays, I am a man, writing of his true Self, using the small self to do so. I have many issues, resentments...in short, I am a person. But this person has learned to move aside as much as he can in order to receive the message...the person I seem to be is not my true Self, it is the self I put on to hide from God.
That is the basic reason we are "here". We desire to hide from our Creator. So powerful is mind, that this desire formed the world in the blink of an eye.
The individual can rise above the shouting of the small self, because there is nothing there. This shouting makes no sound, thus cannot be heard. Simple images cannot harm us...nothing can harm us. There exists nothing that can harm. There is whatever God is, and everything "He" created. The more we can understand this, the more we can move through the filter that is not there, and see more clearly, and by seeing more clearly, comprehend what "All is well" means. "Yes, but the suffering...the cruelty..." We have hypnotized ourselves into thinking it is kind to express in such a way, but in truth we are keeping our eye on the very thing we wish to end. We are demanding its "reality" because by the virtue of suffering, we have a "reason" to keep hiding. A Course In Miracles teaches that everything in the world can hurt us.
This is the dichotomy. This is what we must understand as completely as possible, if we wish to stop hiding. Everything in the world has the potential for pain. There is this two-edged-sword attribute to everything. The electrical power that allows me to write here can also burn this house down. The gas we use to cook can kill us if we breathe it. I invite the reader to go slowly, and sense the reaction to these words. Listen for that still voice. Often the simplest idea is the one we bypass.
Our true state of being is abstract, non-specific, yet we are obviously capable of focus. Our true state has no gradations, no mood swings...oddly, perhaps, this quality is why we are able to perceive gradations, but only as gradations, levels, opposing attributes (illusions).
Each individual knows these things. Each knows the power of mind. Herein lies our freedom. I do not speak of freedom to turn away from (ignore) suffering because we know it is not real, but to heal it through our love. But by clucking the tongue, and declaring, "How sad", we are healing nothing. Again, we are upholding the very thing we claim to want ended.
It seems too big, too complicated, but it is the simplest thing. If what I say is true, what ACIM teaches is true, added to all our other yearnings for understanding, then we know as well that we need do nothing. This is where our understanding must come to its highest. "Do nothing" does not mean what our small self tells us it means. It means turn from the condition, or more clearly, turn to truth. Knowing truth does not preclude caring, but clears away the debris of old attitudes, to allow our sight its vital clarity. Knowing the truth is as it is, we need do nothing, because the truth is the truth (ACIM: "Only the truth is true, and nothing else is true.")
Our promised heritage cannot be but true. If I lend someone a hand, I am helping, not holding an image of "Poor thing." I am knowing the glorious truth of that person, and thus we are helping one another. This one temporarily has less, and I temporarily have more. This means that in our collective terms, our joined consciousness, there is always need, and this goes back to our idea of that double-edged-sword. I once gave a pair of winter gloves to a sleeping man; I wanted to know (after I had gone) that he awoke, and wondered, "Where did these come from?" I wanted that image in my mind, because herein lies our connectedness. All of us. I did not think, "Oh, poor thing." Can you sense the superior attitude there, in those words? This is why we must learn to help and at once know the truth that lies beneath appearances. Herein thrives our strength.
Giving and receiving are the same. Helping and knowing the truth are the same. It is not so that we cannot see these things.
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