In these notes, I (Bruce Rawles) explore the first 3 of the 4 obstacles to peace in section IV of chapter 19 of the text from A Course In Miracles (ACIM) in a class given for the School For A Course In Miracles (SFACIM) curriculum hosted by Lyn Corona and Tim Wise. (I highly recommend Lyn and Tim’s almost daily zoom classes!)
Here is an overview of the obstacles to peace from “The Journey Home” by Ken Wapnick:
…the savior’s vision, devoid of all interference to the truth, and therefore free from all judgment, asks to be told the meaning of what it beholds. As we ask for the corrected perception of the Holy Spirit, what we behold becomes some expression of forgiveness, some expression of the unity that is truly there but had been concealed behind the ego’s need to separate and to attack. However, once again, we are not the ones who give the answer. The answer is given us by the Holy Spirit. Our responsibility is simply to clear away all the obstacles to that answer, as we have already seen clearly expressed in this crucial statement from the text:
“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all of the barriers within yourself that you have built against it. ²It is not necessary to seek for what is true, but it is necessary to seek for what is false.” (T-16.IV.6:1-2)
Basically the four obstacles to peace represent these barriers, of which judgment is one way of understanding their basic ingredient: the judgment against God, others, and ourselves, seeing all of creation as separate individual beings, encased in bodies whose sole purpose is to attack and be attacked. All these interferences are undone by the gentle process of bringing the obstacles to the love that is underneath them, which then allows love to shine them away. Speaking of the holy instant, in which no body can exist, we choose to let these obstacles go—“the limits you have placed upon love”—and let love answer us:
“It [the holy instant] calls to you to be yourself, within its safe embrace. ⁴There are the laws of limit lifted for you, to welcome you to openness of mind and freedom. ⁵Come to this place of refuge, where you can be yourself in peace. ⁶Not through destruction, not through a breaking out, but merely by a quiet melting in. ⁷For peace will join you there, simply because you have been willing to let go the limits you have placed upon love, and joined it where it is and where it led you, in answer to its gentle call to be at peace.” (T-18.VI.14:3-7; italics mine).
And this lovely prayer from Part II of the workbook for students expresses our wish to let all interferences go so that we may “wait in quiet” beyond the ego’s “raucous shrieks” (W-pI.49.4:3)—that we may hear God’s loving answer. We no longer presume in our arrogance that we understand the world, and so can humbly wait to be told by the One Who does:
“Father, I come to You today to seek the peace that You alone can give. ²I come in silence. ³In the quiet of my heart, the deep recesses of my mind, I wait and listen for Your Voice. ⁴My Father, speak to me today. ⁵I come to hear Your Voice in silence and in certainty and love, sure You will hear my call and answer me.
Now do we wait in quiet. ²God is here, because we wait together. ³I am sure that He will speak to you, and you will hear. ⁴Accept my confidence, for it is yours. ⁵Our minds are joined. ⁶We wait with one intent; to hear our Father’s answer to our call, to let our thoughts be still and find His peace, to hear Him speak to us of what we are, and to reveal Himself unto His Son.” (W-221.1:1–2:6)
and another related quote:
“…we can trust nothing outside us, because everything is an illusion, projected by the ego to distract our attention from our minds. But the one thing in all the world we can trust is what is inside—in our right minds, the “resting place”—and that is the Holy Spirit. And so He is always asking that He be offered a place where He can rest. “
Here are some additional quotes from the Course that remind us how we all must look – without condemnation – at our resistance to what never changes:
“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all of the barriers within yourself that you have built against it. ²It is not necessary to seek for what is true, but it is necessary to seek for what is false.” (ACIM, T-16.IV.6:1-2)
“It calls to you to be yourself, within its safe embrace. ⁴There are the laws of limit lifted for you, to welcome you to openness of mind and freedom. ⁵Come to this place of refuge, where you can be yourself in peace. ⁶Not through destruction, not through a breaking out, but merely by a quiet melting in. ⁷For peace will join you there, simply because you have been willing to let go the limits you have placed upon love, and joined it where it is and where it led you, in answer to its gentle call to be at peace.” (ACIM, T-18.VI.14:3-7)
Since ACIM often uses words that are closely related, here are some similar to “obstacle”:
Obstacles (52 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=obstacle
“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)
Defense (163 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Defense
“True denial is a powerful protective device. ²You can and should deny any belief that error can hurt you. ³This kind of denial is not a concealment but a correction. ⁴Your right mind depends on it. ⁵Denial of error is a strong defense of truth, but denial of truth results in miscreation, the projections of the ego. ⁶In the service of the right mind the denial of error frees the mind, and re-establishes the freedom of the will. ⁷When the will is really free it cannot miscreate, because it recognizes only truth.” (ACIM, T-2.II.2:1-7) “Excluding yourself from the Atonement is the ego’s last-ditch defense of its own existence. ⁵It reflects both the ego’s need to separate, and your willingness to side with its separateness. ⁶This willingness means that you do not want to be healed.” (ACIM, T-5.VII.3:4-6)
Interference: (77 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Interference
“The distractions of the ego may seem to interfere with your learning, but the ego has no power to distract you unless you give it the power to do so. ²The ego’s voice is an hallucination. ³You cannot expect it to say “I am not real.” ⁴Yet you are not asked to dispel your hallucinations alone. ⁵You are merely asked to evaluate them in terms of their results to you. ⁶If you do not want them on the basis of loss of peace, they will be removed from your mind for you.” (ACIM, T-8.I.2:1-6)
Difficulty: (63 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Difficulty
“There is no order of difficulty in miracles. ²One is not “harder” or “bigger” than another. ³They are all the same.” (ACIM, T-1.I.1:1-3)
Block (49 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=block
“The course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love, for that is beyond what can be taught. ⁷It does aim, however, at removing the blocks to the awareness of love’s presence, which is your natural inheritance.” (ACIM, T-in.1:6-7)
Barriers (33 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=barrier
“The reason you need my help is because you have denied your own Guide and therefore need guidance. ⁵My role is to separate the true from the false, so truth can break through the barriers the ego has set up and can shine into your mind. ⁶Against our united strength the ego cannot prevail.” (ACIM, T-4.III.2:4-6)
Walls (25 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=wall
“Light cannot penetrate through the walls you make to block it, and it is forever unwilling to destroy what you have made. ⁴No one can see through a wall, but I can step around it.” (ACIM, T-4.III.7:3-4)Le Petomane Thruway: (toll booth in the movie Blazing Saddles): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbWg-mozGsU
The obstacles we’ve imagined are trivial in truth, but we are so fixated on them, we can’t even imagine any other option besides the barricade ego presents to keep us from looking at the contents of our mind without condemnation.
Bar (19 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Bar
“Christ is at God’s altar, waiting to welcome His Son. ²But come wholly without condemnation, for otherwise you will believe that the door is barred and you cannot enter. ³The door is not barred, and it is impossible that you cannot enter the place where God would have you be. ⁴But love yourself with the Love of Christ, for so does your Father love you. ⁵You can refuse to enter, but you cannot bar the door that Christ holds open. ⁶Come unto me who hold it open for you, for while I live it cannot be shut, and I live forever. ⁷God is my life and yours, and nothing is denied by God to His Son.” (ACIM, T-11.IV.6:1-7)
Hindrance (13 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Hindrance
“A little hindrance can seem large indeed to those who do not understand that miracles are all the same.” (ACIM, T-26.V.1:1)
Shield: (11 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=shield
“Who but yourself evaluates a threat, decides escape is necessary, and sets up a series of defenses to reduce the threat that has been judged as real? ²All this cannot be done unconsciously. ³But afterwards, your plan requires that you must forget you made it, so it seems to be external to your own intent; a happening beyond your state of mind, an outcome with a real effect on you, instead of one effected by yourself.
5. It is this quick forgetting of the part you play in making your “reality” that makes defenses seem to be beyond your own control. ²But what you have forgot can be remembered, given willingness to reconsider the decision which is doubly shielded by oblivion. ³Your not remembering is but the sign that this decision still remains in force, as far as your desires are concerned. ⁴Mistake not this for fact. ⁵Defenses must make facts unrecognizable. ⁶They aim at doing this, and it is this they do.” (ACIM, W-136.4:1–5:6)
Catch: (11 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Catch
“There is no inconsistency in what the Holy Spirit teaches. ²This is the reasoning of the sane. ³You have perceived the ego’s madness, and not been made afraid because you did not choose to share in it. ⁴At times it still deceives you. ⁵Yet in your saner moments, its ranting strikes no terror in your heart. ⁶For you have realized that all the gifts it would withdraw from you, in rage at your “presumptuous” wish to look within, you do not want. ⁷A few remaining trinkets still seem to shine and catch your eye. ⁸Yet you would not “sell” Heaven to have them.” (ACIM, T-21.IV.6:1-8)Interruption (11 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=interrupt
“When we are all united in Heaven, you will value nothing that you value here. ²For nothing that you value here do you value wholly, and so you do not value it at all. ³Value is where God placed it, and the value of what God esteems cannot be judged, for it has been established. ⁴It is wholly of value. ⁵It can merely be appreciated or not. ⁶To value it partially is not to know its value. ⁷In Heaven is everything God values, and nothing else. ⁸Heaven is perfectly unambiguous. ⁹Everything is clear and bright, and calls forth one response. ¹⁰There is no darkness and there is no contrast. ¹¹There is no variation. ¹²There is no interruption. ¹³There is a sense of peace so deep that no dream in this world has ever brought even a dim imagining of what it is.” (ACIM, T-13.XI.3:1-13)
Restriction (7 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Restriction
“Your holiness reverses all the laws of the world. ²It is beyond every restriction of time, space, distance and limits of any kind.” (ACIM, W-38.1:1-2)
Obstruction (6 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Obstruction
“As each obstruction seems to block the vision of our sinlessness, we seek but for surcease an instant from the misery the focus upon sin will bring, and uncorrected will remain.” (ACIM, W-181.7:3)
Stumbling (4 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Stumbling
“Never forget the world the sightless “see” must be imagined, for what it really looks like is unknown to them. ²They must infer what could be seen from evidence forever indirect; and reconstruct their inferences as they stumble and fall because of what they did not recognize, or walk unharmed through open doorways that they thought were closed. ³And so it is with you. ⁴You do not see. ⁵Your cues for inference are wrong, and so you stumble and fall down upon the stones you did not recognize, but fail to be aware you can go through the doors you thought were closed, but which stand open before unseeing eyes, waiting to welcome you.” (ACIM, T-21.I.1:1-5)
Hamper (4 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Hamper
“…your salvation comes from you, and nothing but your own thoughts can hamper your progress.” (ACIM, W-70.10:1)
Handicap (3 instances in ACIM): https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=search&fwv=true&q=Handicap
“You have learning handicaps in a very literal sense. ²There are areas in your learning skills that are so impaired that you can progress only under constant, clear-cut direction, provided by a Teacher Who can transcend your limited resources. ³He becomes your Resource because of yourself you cannot learn. ⁴The learning situation in which you placed yourself is impossible, and in this situation you clearly require a special Teacher and a special curriculum. ⁵Poor learners are not good choices as teachers, either for themselves or for anyone else. ⁶You would hardly turn to them to establish the curriculum by which they can escape from their limitations. ⁷If they understood what is beyond them, they would not be handicapped.
6. You do not know the meaning of love, and that is your handicap. ²Do not attempt to teach yourself what you do not understand, and do not try to set up curriculum goals where yours have clearly failed. ³Your learning goal has been not to learn, and this cannot lead to successful learning. ⁴You cannot transfer what you have not learned, and the impairment of the ability to generalize is a crucial learning failure.” (ACIM, T-12.V.5:1–6:4)
Disincentive, Hardship, Hitch, Hurdle, Snag, Clog, Crimp, Encumbrance, Hang-up, Vicissitude (0)
The First Obstacle: The Desire to Get Rid of It (ACIM, T-19.IV-A)
We are being mentored by Holy Spirit to restore our function of being a conduit for peace, holding the vision of innocence for all, not just the partial “face of innocence” for some at the expense of others. Our mind will again become a resonator for the uncompromised thought of peace by forgiving ourselves and each other for what was impossible in truth.
Why would we desire to get rid of peace? The identity we made up – silly, seemingly separated selves – doesn’t merit or deserve everything, since deep down we know that fake identity, stolen from ego’s god of differences, is nothing!
“The habit of engaging with God and His creations is easily made if you actively refuse to let your mind slip away. ²The problem is not one of concentration; it is the belief that no one, including yourself, is worth consistent effort. ³Side with me consistently against this deception, and do not permit this shabby belief to pull you back. ⁴The disheartened are useless to themselves and to me, but only the ego can be disheartened.”(ACIM, T-4.IV.7:1-4)
The Second Obstacle: The Belief the Body is Valuable for What It Offers (ACIM, T-19.IV-B)
Letting HS undo the belief the body gives us something of value is to exchange excruciating pain (the belief in separate interests) for the exquisite peace of shared Inclusive Innocence-our Truly Shared Interest – the experience ACIM reminds us “is not only possible but necessary”
“A universal theology is impossible, but a universal experience is not only possible but necessary.” (ACIM, C-in.2:5)
The Third Obstacle: The Attraction of Death (ACIM, T-19.IV-C)
When we see – with Holy Spirit’s gentle guidance – that we’ve never left Perfect Oneness, we will see the folly of trying to make peace where it can never be found – in dreams of birth and death into individuality (separation) and form.
“…a shadow cannot kill. ²What is a shadow to the living? ³They but walk past and it is gone. ⁴But what of those whose dedication is not to live; the black-draped “sinners,” the ego’s mournful chorus, plodding so heavily away from life, dragging their chains and marching in the slow procession that honors their grim master, lord of death? ⁵Touch any one of them with the gentle hands of forgiveness, and watch the chains fall away, along with yours. ⁶See him throw aside the black robe he was wearing to his funeral, and hear him laugh at death. ⁷The sentence sin would lay upon him he can escape through your forgiveness. ⁸This is no arrogance. ⁹It is the Will of God.” (ACIM, T-19.IV-C.2:1-9)
This class was held online May 9, 2021.