[acimlessons_list] Lesson 236 - August 24

[Sue Roth]

Lesson 236 - August 24

"I rule my mind, which I alone must rule."

PRACTICE INSTRUCTIONS

See complete Part II practice instructions. 
A short summary:

* Read the commentary paragraph slowly and personally.

* Pray the prayer, perhaps several times.

* Morning and evening: Repeat the idea and then spend time in Open Mind
Meditation.

* Hourly remembrance: Repeat the idea and then spend a quiet moment in
meditation.

* Frequent reminders: Repeat the idea often within each hour.

* Response to temptation: Repeat the idea whenever upset, to restore peace.

* Read the "What Is" section slowly and thoughtfully once during the day.

COMMENTARY

If the "secret of salvation" is that "I am doing this to myself"
(T-27.VIII.10:1), the reason that is "salvation," or good news, is that it
means there are no inimical external forces imposing themselves on me. It's
just my own mind screwing up. And if that is true, there is hope. Because
nobody is running my mind but me! Therefore, I can turn things around. My
mind is my kingdom, and I am king of my mind. I rule it; nobody and nothing
else does.

Yes, it's true that "at times, it does not seem I am its king at all" (1:2).
At times! For most of us it seems more like most of the time. My "kingdom"
seems to run me, and not the other way around, telling me "what to think,
and what to do and feel" (1:3). <A Course in Miracles> is a course for
kings; it trains us how to rule our minds. We've been letting the kingdom
run wild instead of ruling it. We've made the problem, projected the image
of the problem, and then we've blamed the image for being the problem. As
the Text says, we've reversed cause and effect. We are the cause, we made
the effect, and now we think the effect is causing us (see T-28.II.8:8). So
we need a course in "mind training" that teaches us we are the rulers of our
minds.

The mind is a tool, given to serve us (1:4-5). It does nothing except what
we want it to do. The problem is that we have not been watching what we've
asked the mind to do. We've asked for separation, we've asked for guilt, and
being guilty, we've asked for death, and the mind has delivered as asked.
We've given it over to the wild insanity of the ego, and the result is the
ego's world we live in. So we need to see that, stop doing it, and give the
mind's service to the Holy Spirit instead.

That raises a question for me. If I am supposed to rule my mind, how is
giving it to the Holy Spirit doing that? To give the mind to the service of
the Holy Spirit is said, here, to be the way "I thus direct my mind" (1:7).
The answer is actually quite simple. There are only two alternatives: ego or
Holy Spirit, fear or love, separation or union. The Holy Spirit is not a
foreign power ruling over me, He is the Voice of my own Self, as well as the
Voice for God. He is the Voice of both Father and Son because Father and Son
are one, with one Will. The call to rule my mind is not a call to total
self-reliant independence, the king as me-all-by-myself. That is the <ego>
version of ruling the mind. The call to rule my mind is a call to total
dependence, to total <Self> reliance; reliance upon the Self that is shared
by us all.

I have the choice between the illusion of independence, in which my mind is
actually enslaved by its effects, and real freedom, in which my mind is
given to its divinely intended purpose, serving the Will of God. Who can
deny that our experience of being independent minds is actually an
experience of slavery, with our "kingdom" telling us what to think and do
and say? Let us today realize there is an alternative, and gladly give our
minds to God. Let us enter with willing hearts into the process of
retraining our minds to think with God.

WHAT IS SALVATION?

PART 6: W-PII.2.3:4

When we stop supporting the mind's illusions, and they fall down into dust,
what is left? "What they hid is now revealed" (3:4). When illusions are
gone, what remains is the truth. And the truth is a wonderful reality within
ourselves. Instead of the malice, pettiness, and evil we fear to find within
us, we find "an altar to the Holy Name of God whereon His Word is written"
(3:4). The truth that lies behind all the masks, the misdirection, the
subtle deceptions of the ego, is an altar to God within my own heart, a
sacred place, an ancient and eternal holiness.

There are treasures lying before this altar. And they are treasures I have
put there! They are the gifts of my forgiveness. And it is only a short
distance, a moment of time, from this place to the memory of God Himself
(3:4).

The discovery of the holy altar to God within my mind is the result of doing
nothing; of failing to continue my support of the ego's illusions, of
refusing any longer to give my mind to the ego and its purposes. The
discovery of what is true about me, and the memory of God that follows from
it, all grow out of my willingness to question the illusions and let them
go. I do not need to build the altar or rebuild it; it is there, behind the
mists of self-deception. The way to truth is through the exposure of the
lies that hide it. Deep within me, communion with God continues
uninterrupted, waiting only that I turn from the lies that tell me
otherwise. I can turn to that altar now. I can brush past the curtains that
hide it, and enter God's Presence, and find my Self waiting there.