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Search1. How should I deal with my fear of ACIM? 2. Should I go back to my ex-girlfriend to attempt to transform it from a special relationship to a holy?
Question:
Every time I read ACIM material, I feel resistant to doing the work, because I'm afraid that if I start the Course I will be overwhelmed with all my fears and I won't be able to handle it. I'm afraid God will create the loss of my job, loneliness, hardship, and all my other fears, in order for me to be healed.
My other question has to do with a special relationship. I don't think I can handle my ego in the relationship, but every time I read the Course, I feel that she embodied everything I need to heal through. All those things that I interpreted as flaws in her were actually God saying,”Ok, here you go. Heal this. Forgive." Every time I read the Course, I feel I should get back with this girl, but when I remember what our relationship was actually like, which is ”special,” I don’t want it. Please help. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Answer:
Thanks for writing and sharing what's on your mind. The resistance you feel toward reading and applying the Course, and the fear of being overwhelmed and unable to handle the ego's fearful emotions, is common when you make the turn toward the Light. Authentic spiritual Awakening is going through the darkness of ego belief to the Light within. The ego belief system has projected a world in which you seem to exist as a body, and seem to be dependent upon a job and environment and people for survival. The true vastness of Divine Mind has been pushed out of awareness and forgotten. To turn this seeming situation around and bring an end to the amnesia about Heaven, it is necessary to forgive—to release the false beliefs and thoughts which seem to produce a fearful world that God did not create.
Since God did not create this world of separation, conflict, competition, and striving, there is no point in believing and fearing that God "will create the loss of my job, loneliness, hardship, and everything else I have fears about, in order for me to be healed." The ego made the world as you perceive it, and withdrawing faith and investment in the ego's belief system is how your perceptions are changed and your mind is healed. The ego would have you believe that the fear you experience is a fear of the loss of things in this world. Yet everything of this temporary, changing world was made by the ego to offer as a substitute or alternative to God's Eternal Love. The fear of God is the ego's fear of Eternal Love, and the mind that identifies with the ego IS afraid of Awakening to Eternal Love. The ego is the belief in loss and sacrifice, and it tells you that God demands the sacrifice of what is real and valuable. It tells you that you have fallen from Heaven, separated yourself from your Source, and can never go back without being punished for the sin of separation. None of this is true, for the ego is not true. Yet while the ego is believed to be true, the hallucination of fear seems to continue.
"A Course In Miracles" is one of many paths that can help one unlearn, undo, and release the ego. Awakening is inevitable and forgiveness is always the means, regardless of what the form appears to be. If you read and apply the Course you will discover that you have—and are—Pure Love, and that this recognition "costs" nothing. There is no loss in remembering Who You are. An insane belief in loss and sacrifice dissolves in the Light of Truth. God is unconditional Love, and to know God is to know One Self as Christ. It cannot be a sacrifice to give up nothing and to experience One Self as Everything.
Your second question, regarding the special relationship, relates to the same Awakening dynamics I have just spoken about. In Truth there is only One Mind, because Spirit exists as Perfect Oneness. Yet in this world, every "body" seems to have a private and separate "mind" of its own. The belief in private minds and private thoughts IS the ego. Each seeming interpersonal relationship, therefore, presents an opportunity to accept the Union or Oneness or Wholeness of the Divine Mind Which God creates Eternally. Spirit is All that can BE Known. The ego, an impossible belief, sponsors an illusory view of relationship: bodies together and minds apart. Given to the Holy Spirit's Purpose of forgiveness, all ego belief and misperception are exposed and released to the Light within.
You wrote: "Every time I read the Course, I feel that she also embodied everything I need to heal through. All those things I interpreted as flaws in her were actually God saying, ‘Ok, here you go. Heal this. Forgive.’” This is the Holy Spirit speaking to you. You cannot heal what has been pushed from awareness, or what you have not allowed yourself to feel. The ego is unconscious. The ego is what you believe about time, self, and the world. The ego is what is assumed to be true yet remains unquestioned. The relationship with this girlfriend is a wonderful opportunity to go through (or expose) the darkness and fear produced by false belief, and recognize the Light of Love within. The fear of Intimacy is the fear of Divine Mind, the fear of Union with God. The ego would have you believe that the fear is a fear of loss of self, because the ego IS the false identification of self. In Awakening the ego seems to be undone, yet the Joy of Being Awake reveals that the ego was never "done" in the first place. God did not create the ego. Only the Spirit God creates is real. Atonement is the realization that the separation never happened because an opposite to Love cannot exist. Accepting the Atonement is our sole responsibility.
If you choose to read and apply the Course and use the relationship opportunity which is before you, the ego will be rapidly flushed into awareness and exposed. This is an act of faith in the Holy Spirit. You will experience many miracles by accepting the Holy Spirit's Purpose as your own. The happiness and freedom of this Purpose is your healing. Be glad, for it is impossible to forgive or release the ego until it is raised to awareness. Darkness must be brought to Light to disappear. Error must be brought to Correction within. When the ego temptation arises to blame your girlfriend or yourself for intense fearful emotions, this is the Call to forgive and release the ego. This is the Call to release the illusion of a "self" that God did not create. The aim of all events, encounters, and circumstances is to forgive or release the belief in what never happened.
Love & Blessings forever Holy One,
David