In this video recording of a class (shared in one of the ongoing School For A Course In Miracles – SFACIM classes graciously hosted by Lyn Corona and Tim Wise) we read and reviewed 2 adjacent sections from the Text of A Course In Miracles: The Difference between Imprisonment and Freedom (T-8.II) and The Holy Encounter (ACIM, T-8.III)
We started this conversation with an opening meditation, consisting of this quote from chapter 22 of ACIM’s text:
“Take pity on yourself, so long enslaved. ²Rejoice whom God hath joined have come together and need no longer look on sin apart. ³No two can look on sin together, for they could never see it in the same place and time. ⁴Sin is a strictly individual perception, seen in the other yet believed by each to be within himself. ⁵And each one seems to make a different error, and one the other cannot understand. ⁶Brother, it is the same, made by the same, and forgiven for its maker in the same way. ⁷The holiness of your relationship forgives you and your brother, undoing the effects of what you both believed and saw. ⁸And with their going is the need for sin gone with them.” (ACIM, T-22.in.1:1-8)
Here is the first paragraph of this section The Difference between Imprisonment and Freedom (T-8.II) – with a clear, concise reminder that – as always – trusting our Inner Kindness Teacher (a.k.a. Holy Spirit = HS) is vitally important for removing the obstacles to the awareness of Love’s presence in our minds:
“There is a rationale for choice. ²Only one Teacher knows what your reality is. ³If learning to remove the obstacles to that knowledge is the purpose of the curriculum, you must learn it of Him. ⁴The ego does not know what it is trying to teach. ⁵It is trying to teach you what you are without knowing what you are. ⁶It is expert only in confusion. ⁷It does not understand anything else. ⁸As a teacher, then, the ego is totally confused and totally confusing. ⁹Even if you could disregard the Holy Spirit entirely, which is impossible, you could still learn nothing from the ego, because the ego knows nothing.” (ACIM, T-8.II.1:1-9)
Then, looking at some of the relevant terms used in the first section, we see that freedom from the mental prisons we fabricate is of vital importance:
prison (60): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=prison
classroom (1): “Learning itself, like the classrooms in which it occurs, is temporary.” (ACIM, T-2.II.5:3)
freedom (222): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=freedom
confuse (166): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=confuse
glory (84): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=glory
Here are a few comments about each paragraph in this section:
paragraph 1: Ego “teaches” confusion, chaos, duality, denial, and oblivion, since ego is a thought of oblivion, and mindlessness whereas HS teaches one thing; forgive all; look at ego with clarity and without condemnation.
paragraph 2: Look at the ego’s track record vs. HS’s (refer to marketing brochure comparison); being self-imprisoned doesn’t speak well for ego’s motivational strategy, but we’re all masochists until we question ego’s assessment of our worth, identity, and innocence.
paragraph 3: This is a 100% free will curriculum; no coercion, manipulation, or compromised motivations, since HS has nothing to lose being unassailable (no opposition to Truth); ego has nothing to lose because it is and has nothing!
paragraph 4: Locking on to HS’s tractor beam of total trust (the gentle, patient discipline of consistent forgiveness), we find we’re free because we’re stopped believing in the cause of imprisonment, chaos, specialness, conflict, and misery.
paragraph 5: HS teaches us to discern real “differences” on the vertical axis with forgiveness above and ego’s pain/pleasure coin below on the battleground of superficial differences.
paragraph 6: HS links and equates us with our Creator, since our Creator has never forsaken us; our real Identity is eternally safe, free, and joyously non-specific, non-conceptual, pure, and undifferentiated.
paragraph 7: Each seemingly separate self, seen with HS’s vision is the WHOLE, not a part, and not apart. The Will of God is the ecstatic union of our completely shared, all-inclusive, all-encompassing Identity transcending any pathetic specific dream we could possibly muster. This isn’t to make us feel bad, but to remind us we’re needlessly suffering and delaying unimaginably profound peace. We have so deeply adjusted to the ego’s miserable self-incriminating self-imprisoning constraints, that we need a gradual, happy classroom of awakening; a gentle dream where we forgive what never happened, specific by specific, by specific until we generalize completely.
paragraph 8: “… you have acknowledged everyone.” (ACIM, T-8.II.8:3) We acknowledge everyone when we acknowledge ALL of Spirit, a complete, undivided All-Inclusive Omnipotent Self in any specific “part”. “You have forgiven them entirely or not at all.” (ACIM, W-46.3:5)
The “natural response” is simple and feels completely easy when we allow HS to direct us completely.
The next section The Holy Encounter (ACIM, T-8.III) – begins with:
“Glory to God in the highest, and to you because He has so willed it. ²Ask and it shall be given you, because it has already been given. ³Ask for light and learn that you are light. ⁴If you want understanding and enlightenment you will learn it, because your decision to learn it is the decision to listen to the Teacher Who knows of light, and can therefore teach it to you. ⁵There is no limit on your learning because there is no limit on your mind. ⁶There is no limit on His teaching because He was created to teach. ⁷Understanding His function perfectly He fulfills it perfectly, because that is His joy and yours.” (ACIM, T-8.III.1:1-7)
It also contains, 3 paragraphs later, this oft-quoted distillation of ACIM’s emphasis on relationships to undoing the belief in separation:
“When you meet anyone, remember it is a holy encounter. ²As you see him you will see yourself. ³As you treat him you will treat yourself. ⁴As you think of him you will think of yourself. ⁵Never forget this, for in him you will find yourself or lose yourself.” (ACIM, T-8.III.4:1-5)
Here are comments about each paragraph in this section:
paragraph 1: The light (glory) is ALREADY in our mind; we’re just sitting here with lampshades over our heads. Our task is to see how un-fun it is to hoodwink ourselves and pretend it’s fun behind our dark masks of individuality.
paragraph 2: To fulfill the Will of God is to unblock the complete acceptance of our real Identity which is identical with that of everyone else as we would see it, although there is no one else! Our task is to deny the denial of the extension of joy to ALL as ALL. We need to trust HS more and more and more until that trust is second nature, implicit, automatic, and the default with no other option available or desired. Sharing our real Identity requires no effort because minds are already joined.
paragraph 3: We fulfill our “lab assignment” by “… “placing no limits upon it (ACIM, T-8.III.3:5); it is the unconditional acceptance of the eternal beauty of Spirit in each seeming fragment or aspect.
paragraph 4: We meet anyone whenever we think of anyone, not just physical proximity since there is no physical and no distance or lack of proximity in Truth. We’re all co-located in the Mind of God, dreaming of exile. This oft-quoted distillation of ACIM’s emphasis on relationships to undoing the belief in separation:
“When you meet anyone, remember it is a holy encounter. ²As you see him you will see yourself. ³As you treat him you will treat yourself. ⁴As you think of him you will think of yourself. ⁵Never forget this, for in him you will find yourself or lose yourself.” (ACIM, T-8.III.4:1-5)
Such a clear statement about the importance of choosing the sane rather than insane thought system every moment! Don’t squander any opportunity to undo unkindness and let peace permeate!
paragraph 5: “Everyone is looking for himself and for the power and glory he thinks he has lost.” (ACIM, T-8.III.5:3) … Fortunately, it’s impossible to lose our Self, but we can believe in separation as long as we want until we’re intolerably miserable and give up on that silliness! The imprisonment and freedom options – always only two choices – are again highlighted to keep our mind focused on the only important decision – our one remaining freedom as a seeming prisoner of ego’s world; we can walk right out the dungeon door!
paragraph 6: Forsooth! The idea of loneliness is a cruel denial of the soothing nature of Truth by ego which should tip us off that it’s absurd, but its offer of specialness needs to be clearly seen as murder and rejection of peace before we choose against that absurdity. Seeing everyone who plays a character in my dream (whether nighttime or daytime dreams) as completely innocent I see myself the same and our shared interest dissolves distance and differences, revealing the eternal embrace of All Creation.
paragraph 7: Everyone must be an equal and complete “part” of God because there are no differences in the pure non-dual Identity of Creation. What benefits “one” benefits “all”. We only suffer when we fight our forgiveness opportunities, be we won’t always do this; it is this happy inevitability to which we are all drawn, regardless of whether we study ACIM or any other “path” or not. We need abundant practice to transcend our mental prisons:
“Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery
None but ourselves can free our minds.” – Bob Marley and the Wailers, Redemption Song
paragraph 8: Power and glory belong to ALL of us as ONE, but within the dream of separation, we seem powerless and inglorious, indeed! “Giving of yourself is the function He gave you.” (ACIM, T-8.III.8:4) We give our our Self, by letting our Inner Kindness Teacher guide our thinking which reflects in what we extend to the world, undoing the grievances we previously projected onto it. What we all ARE and HAVE is identical in pure non-duality, but hardly so in the dastardly delusional dream we made up.
We ended this session with paragraph 8 serving as a closing meditation:
“Power and glory belong to God alone. ²So do you. ³God gives whatever belongs to Him because He gives of Himself, and everything belongs to Him. ⁴Giving of yourself is the function He gave you. ⁵Fulfilling it perfectly will let you remember what you have of Him, and by this you will remember also what you are in Him. ⁶You cannot be powerless to do this, because this is your power. ⁷Glory is God’s gift to you, because that is what He is. ⁸See this glory everywhere to remember what you are.” (ACIM, T-8.III.8:1-8)
This video was recorded on May 7, 2023.
(I highly recommend Lyn and Tim’s almost daily SFACIM zoom classes!)