[acimlessons_list] LESSON 335 - DECEMBER 1

[Sue Roth]

LESSON 335 - DECEMBER 1

"I choose to see my brother's sinlessness."

PRACTICE INSTRUCTIONS 

See complete instructions in separate document.
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.

Practice suggestion: The practice I will suggest now is a very powerful one,
which I have used many times. I recommend using it with a number of people
who come to mind. The idea behind it is that we see sinfulness in another
<because> that will make us see sinfulness in ourselves, and that, crazily
enough, is what we are after, what our ego wants. Just let one person after
another come to mind, and apply the following lines to each one:

	I chose to see [name's] sinfulness
	Because I wanted to see my own.
	I choose to see [name's] sinlessness
	Because I want to see my own.

COMMENTARY

This continues the thought from yesterday's lesson about decision and
choice. Yesterday we read about choosing to follow God's Voice, and
beholding our brother as sinless. Today we read: 

	Forgiveness is a choice. I never see my brother as he is, 
	for this is far beyond perception. What I see in him is
	merely what I wish to see, because it stands for what 
	I want to be the truth.	(1:1-3)

In other words, what we see results from choices we have made about what we
want to see. The Text speaks about "the decision for guiltlessness"
(T-14.III). It says (see the fourth paragraph in that section) that we need
to make the choice to see innocence and not to see guilt. If we make that
decision, that is what we will see.

It is startling to be told that we <never> see our brothers as they are
(1:2). Seeing, or perception (which is a dualistic form of knowing,
requiring a seer separate from what is being seen), simply cannot apprehend
the reality of what we are. What we are seeing is always a symbol, an
imperfect representation. No wonder it is so easy for perception to be
<mis>perception.

Misperception in terms of guilt and innocence happens like this: I see guilt
in myself. I want to get rid of it, so I project it onto a brother. I see
him as guilty because I want to, I have chosen to. I think this will get rid
of my guilt.

Correction of perception happens in reverse: I realize that I am not at
peace and therefore I must have decided wrongly. I decide to see my brother
as innocent. When I have truly made that choice, I will see his innocence.
That is a law: "You see what you believe is there, and you believe it there
because you want it there" (T-25.III.1:3). When you want only love, love is
all you will see (T-12.VII.8:1).

What we are seeing is always what we <choose> to see because we want to see
it. "It is to this alone that I respond, however much I seem to be impelled
by outside happenings" (1:4). The Course is obviously aware that the way it
describes perception is definitely not how it seems to us. We are utterly
convinced that we are seeing what we are seeing because <that's the way it
is>. We believe it is the happenings outside of us that are forcing this
perception upon us. When we see someone as guilty, it isn't because we are
choosing to see them that way-they <are> guilty! We think we are just seeing
what is the truth. The Course hears our objections and replies, "No matter
how much it seems that way to you, I am telling you, you are wrong; you are
responding <only> to what you want to see, not what is really there."

"Forgiveness is a choice" (1:1). We can see our brother	as guilty, or as
innocent, and the choice is one hundred percent up to us; it has nothing to
do with what he did	or did not do.

My willingness to see my brother as innocent is the harbinger of my
willingness to see myself as innocent (1:6-7). When I am ready to choose to
see my brother as innocent, it shows that I have begun to let go of the
guilt in my mind that caused me to desire to see him as guilty.

Seeing one another as innocent, seeing one another as sinless, restores the
memory of God to us (2:1). There is a formula that runs through the Course:
First, we see the face of Christ in one another; then we remember God. "In
him I find my Self, and in Your Son I find the memory of You as well" (2:3).
So if I want to remember God, what can I do? <Make a choice> to see my
brother as innocent instead of guilty. We find our way to God through our
brothers.

WHAT IS THE EGO?

Part 5: W-pII.12.3:1-3

	The Son of God is egoless.	(3:1) 

This begins a contrast between the ego and the Son of God, our true
Identity. The Son of God, which is what I really am, has no ego! The ego is
the sign of a limited and separated self. The Son of God is not limited or
separated from God. The Son is unlimited, and coextensive with the Father;
wherever God is, the Son is. They are One. There is no ego; no self that is
apart from, and held distinct from, God.

Our true Self does not know the madness of the ego; the concept of the death
of God (or victory over Him) is inconceivable because the Son lives (abides)
in God (3:2). He lives in eternal joy, and does not know sorrow or
suffering.

Insanity, God as enemy, sorrow, and suffering are all consequences of the
ego delusion. They are as delusional, and as unreal, as the ego itself.
Having been locked in this delusion of a separate self for so long, we can
barely begin to imagine a state of mind in which these things simply do not
exist. Yet that is where the Course is taking us: beyond the ego, beyond the
madness, back into the oneness that has always been and will always be. This
is our true state of mind, and it calls to us in our isolation, drawing us
to return.