Miracle Distribution Center - A Course in Miracles Resource Center

You Have Something to Give

by Beverly Hutchinson McNeff

“Only what you have not given can be lacking in any situation.” (T368) What???? If we are confused or broke or sick, what can we give? With this quote A Course in Miracles is challenging us to realign our thinking with the truth. The last thing we think when we are experiencing a crisis in our lives is that we need to give something, and yet it’s exactly the answer that is needed.

When challenges occur we often have a knee-jerk reaction of fear, anger or hopelessness. We don’t seem to be the answer we think we need, and in some ways that’s true … and false. Our ego self that feels powerless and lost (and which we have become comfortable identifying with) may not be the answer, but our true Self is. Our true Self is the self that can never change no matter what distortions we project onto it. Much like a fun house mirror you find at a carnival that distorts your image by giving you an oblong head and squatty body, the reality of your appearance is not changed by the image you see. But, if you decide to identify with the image, your reality will be lost to you, even though it is still there.

We must correct our gaze, but we cannot do it alone. Of ourselves, we can do nothing because we have gotten so used to the illusions about ourselves, others and the world. But, with the power of God (which is our true Self), our minds can be corrected; we can realize that it is possible to heal and transcend these illusions. So we step back and let Him lead the way, but we have to follow. We are needed in this world right now. As one of the early private messages received by Helen Schucman said, “Teachers of God are needed now more than ever before.” And, as much as we may not believe it, it’s talking about us!

All you have to do is look around this world to see that the “experts” are not prevailing. In our free fall down the rabbit hole, we have finally hit bottom. Now we have to get up and be the solution. We can no longer point our fingers and say “let them take care of it!” Whether it is an oil spill off the Gulf of Mexico, contentious immigration laws, the Israeli Palestinian conflict, or the continuing financial challenges facing the world, we can do something. We can bring peace to our lives and the relationships we hold in our minds and know that the peace we foster will be the ripples that are needed in this world. As the Course tells us, “This world will change through you. No other means can save it…” (L125) Our hopelessness will accomplish nothing, but our awareness of the power of God’s love and peace to heal our lives, will show us the miracles that are here now.

When I was about six years old, my parents gave me a necklace with a mustard seed encased in a little glass vial. I can see that image so clearly in my mind even today. Of course the reminder was that with the faith of a mustard seed, we could move mountains. It was the metaphor Jesus used to explain to his disciples how little is needed for the healing of our lives. In the Course our mustard seed is “a little willingness.” I know we think we give a little willingness at times but we often take it back just as quickly. We get discouraged, frustrated or depressed. The Course reminds us that our sighs betray us and the world. Our awakening is not just for ourselves but for the world. It is time to stop running from our function in this world and realize that our faith, not our faithlessness, our faith, placed in the truth can move mountains.

We must “be vigilant only for God and His Kingdom.” (T108) We must start watching when we dwell in the “valley of the shadow of death” -- that unproductive, useless thinking -- and ask the Holy Spirit to help us realign our thinking with the truth. Will we fail? Yes, but then we will try again. Will we forget? Yes, but then we will remember and try again. Will we get discouraged? Yes, but we will have each other and our joint experiences to help us remember, and we will try again.

I once read that success is not that you never fall down, it is that you get up one more time than you fall down. The Course reminds us that teachers of God “are not perfect or they would not be here. Yet it is their mission to become perfect here, and so they teach perfection over and over, in many, many ways, until they have learned it.” (M2)

We each have an important role to play in salvation. As the Course assures us, “My part is essential to God’s plan for salvation.” (L100) There is always something we can do to effect healing because we do not do it alone.

Bill Thetford once asked Helen Schucman for some help in preparing for a speaking engagement he was to do. He was nervous about presenting in front of this particular audience and he wanted a prayer from Jesus. The prayer Helen received is a favorite of many Course students. It says…

I am here only to be truly helpful.
I am here to represent Him Who sent me.
I do not have to worry about what to say or what to do, because He Who sent me will direct me.
I am content to be wherever He wishes, knowing He goes there with me.
I will be healed as I let Him teach me to heal.

This prayer reminds us that our only purpose in any situation is to be truly helpful. The way to experience the help we need is to help others, not so much in deed and action (although that may be the case) but most importantly in thought and prayer. For we will be healed as we let Him teach us to heal.

It makes perfect sense. When we give, we become a channel to receive. But if you close down and look only to yourself and for yourself, you will lose. The Course reminds us that if we look only at ourselves, we cannot find ourselves, because that is not what we really are. Our power and glory are in each other. Give others their place in the Kingdom and we will have ours. (T142 paraphrased)

As told in the Bible, Jesus said that if we have done it unto the least of them, we had done it unto him. In the Course we are given even more clarity in the statement that as we see, think or treat others, we actually see, think and treat ourselves. That is why every encounter is holy because we find ourselves and the treasure we are by the gifts we offer, or we lose ourselves.

For an example of this, look at nature. If you dam up a lake and stop the flow of water coming in and going out, life in the lake will begin to putrefy and die. Life is a constant flow. The same is true for our spirits; we must nourish our spirits and extend God’s gifts so we might experience the fullness of our spirit. If we don’t we won’t know ourselves and our Self will seem to whither way and die. We will feel lost in the world, hopeless and afraid even though our help is all around us.

In this world, we need help to remember the truth; we need each other. When I founded Miracle Distribution Center (MDC) 32 years ago it was a natural outgrowth of my desire to learn, understand and apply the Course. It wasn’t because I thought I was a great humanitarian; I did it for myself. The thing is, the “self” I thought I was doing it for (me alone) was my true Self (the aspect of me that is same in each of us…the Christ). It was in giving that I found my Self.

We can always give, even when we feel we have nothing to give -- there is no limitation on a loving thought. Every morning as Paul drives Jeffrey to school, Jeffrey rolls down the passenger side window and I say/pray with him this simple thought from the Course, “I will arise in glory, and allow the light in me to shine upon the world throughout the day.” (L237) This is the reason all of us are here to remember our true Self … to arise in glory every day and let that truth, that light shine forth throughout our day. It is not about the “successes” of life but about the happiness of life, the joy we experience when we share from love.

In about two months, you will be receiving a letter from me asking you to share from love. Every year I turn to you and ask you to join with me in support of the work of MDC. I ask you to be a channel of giving so you will receive. To continue the flow of spirit to you and all who are touched by this work.

I know times have been tough and I know many of you want to give but feel you cannot. There are no small acts of giving; every act of giving blesses us and the world. It is only our limiting thoughts that harm us.

Don’t live in limitation. Whatever gift you give, whether it be financial or a thought, give with your full heart. Let us look straight in the eye of the limiting thoughts of the ego and fear no longer. God is greater than any problem you or I or the world may have.

Together we do not have to cower in fear but arise in glory and allow the light in us to shine upon the world. The gift we give will be the gift we receive. Aren’t we worthy of glory? God thinks so and so do I. God bless you, my dear friends.

Click here to receive a current copy of The Holy Encounter

Click here to read about our 2011 Conference

Think About What You’re Thinking About

by Jacob Glass

“You are much too tolerant of mind wandering, and are passively condoning your mind’s miscreations.” (T-2.VI.4.6)

In A Course in Miracles, Jesus has no problem telling us that we are basically mentally lazy and often very sloppy in what we allow ourselves to focus on. In fact, that whole section on “fear and conflict” is really about putting a mirror up to us and then kicking us in the butt to take responsibility for our own thoughts and perceptions. In many ways He is saying, “Stop whining to me about the things that you are doing to terrify yourself! I cannot save you from yourself because YOU have the responsibility that comes with free will. The calls are coming from inside the house! I AM helping you by reminding you of YOUR responsibility and power over your own mind!”

I like tough Jesus. I love the unambiguous tone that is throughout so much of the Course because without it, I tend to get very lazy and sloppy in my thinking. When I surrender my responsibility and become lazy, what I want is for the world and everyone around me to fall in with MY plan for salvation. My plan in the one in which everyone and everything around me performs in exactly the way I want them to so that no matter what my eyes fall on, it brings me pleasure and adds to my happiness. No poverty, no sickness, no one making a choice that I would not make, no one voting differently than I do, no one being mean, no murder or stealing, no wars, no lines to stand in or traffic anywhere, money to burn and plenty of time to do whatever I want to do, and of course every time I look in the mirror I would see myself getting younger, stronger and healthier every day! Oh, and I’d like God to smite all my enemies too if you don’t mind. (okay, I don’t even have enemies, but sometimes my ego tries to tell me I do if there is someone who actually disagrees with me about something.)

The ego is much more interested in controlling the circumstances of the world than in taking responsibility for controlling the mind. We would rather control the universe than control our own thinking or what we focus on. But our healing begins when we let go of the illusion of control of the world and instead start to practice awareness of the power of our own thoughts. As I frequently say in my lectures, “Think about what you are thinking about. Don’t just leave your mind unguarded and open to whatever you are seeing on TV, in books, magazines, and the conversation around the water cooler. Thoughts create our feelings and experiences of life and they deserve our mindful attention so that we can CHOOSE the ones we want to keep.”

Now of course, I don’t expect that any of you are as tough a case as I am, but personally I need a nice short mental leash in order to keep my thoughts in line with the peace and joy of God. Our mind can be our best friend or our worst enemy, depending on what we are focused on and how we’re seeing it. I always tell people, we don’t have a good mind or a bad mind, just a trained mind or an untrained mind. The mind is like a puppy in that way. You don’t have a good puppy or a bad puppy – just a trained puppy or an untrained puppy. And the best way to train puppies or minds is with love, patience, boundaries, CONSISTENCY and rewards – absolutely no punishment or guilt whatsoever.

The mind wants to be right and it wants to do its job well. It simply follows whatever we BELIEVE. If we teach it to believe in fear, it will prove us right and show us all the legitimate reasons to be afraid. If we teach it to believe in the peace of God, it will prove us right by showing us all the legitimate reasons to feel peaceful. This is what I love about the “mind training” of the Course. It makes no special exceptions or exemptions anymore than gravity makes exceptions. The laws of mind are spelled out so clearly and repeatedly throughout the Course that you begin to realize there simply is no loophole, no getting out of personal responsibility for what we are thinking.

“You may still complain about fear, but you nevertheless persist in making yourself fearful. I have already indicated that you cannot ask me to release you from fear. I know it does not exist, but you do not. If I intervened between your thoughts and their results, I would be tampering with a basic law of cause and effect; the most fundamental law there is. I would hardly help you if I depreciated the power of your own thinking.” (T-2.VII.1)

Through the Course we learn to make friends with our mind and to make peace with our thoughts. There is no need to “get rid of” all those negative fear based thoughts because that simply gets us focused on the problem rather than on the Answer. Instead, we are merely to spend time each morning aligning ourselves with the thinking of God and directing our mind with our proactive goals rather than letting our attention go to whatever is in front of us. The mind wants a goal and if we do not consciously set the goal, then the ego secretly sets the goal with disturbing “secret thoughts” and “hidden beliefs” which it goes about proving all day long. And since the mind cannot serve two masters, if we consciously set a goal each morning, the mind will serve that goal very well, though it often takes gentle but firm reminders throughout the day.

The Course gives us all kinds of ideas for positive goal setting, things like: to be truly helpful, to experience the peace of God, to be healed together, to see things differently, to share God’s will for happiness for ourselves, to have the comfort of our own teaching, holiness, to laugh at the illusion, to remember the Truth, to forgive and release, to perform miracles, to rest in God, to practice defenselessness, to listen, to learn, to do, and so on.

How wonderful that Jesus does not let us off the hook for this powerful responsibility of setting our own goals each and every moment. We are treated like equals and He is always there ready to give compassionate counsel, wise advice, and also to give us a little kick in the butt when we start to get lazy in our thinking again. It’s never mean spirited but is often quite funny. He makes fun of our ego thoughts all throughout the Course so that we can learn to laugh at them too, and in doing so take back the power that we gave to those insane images of separation and fear. I’ll leave you with my favorite little insult from our big Brother:

“You who cannot even control yourself should hardly aspire to control the universe.” (T-12.VIII,5,4)

Click here to receive a current copy of The Holy Encounter

Click here to read about our 2011 Conference

The Key Marked 'Kindness'

by Jon Mundy, Ph.D.

Therefore, God’s teachers are wholly gentle. They need the strength of gentleness, for it is in this that the function of salvation becomes easy. (M-4.IV.2:1–2)

What is the first quality we think of when we think of Mother Teresa; Gandhi; Martin Luther King, Jr.; or the Dali Lama? Is it not their kindness? Jesus says in the gospels that he is “gentle and humble in heart and for this reason his yoke is easy and his burden light” (Matthew 11:29–30). Jesus was kind to the poor, the sick, to children, to prostitutes, to tax collectors, to his accusers, and those who tried and crucified him. He was kind to the soldiers who stood at the foot of his cross and jeered at him and to the thief who died next to him on the cross.

When kindness has left people even for a few moments, we become afraid of them, as if their reason had left them. -- American Author, Willa Cather (1873–1947), in My Mortal Enemy

If we are angry, we are insane — our reason has indeed left us. Whenever we are upset, disturbed, perturbed, envious, jealous, or projecting in any way, we are not functioning from our right mind and another way of looking at the world is called for. Whenever we’re unkind, we see ourselves as separate. When we are kind, we see ourselves as one.

Kindness is impossible, if you believe in separation. -- Dr. Kenneth Wapnick

When I perform funerals and interview relatives before the service to gather information for a eulogy, I notice that the first, most positive and powerful thing anyone can say about another human being after they are dead is not that they made a lot of money, built a lot of buildings, or wrote a bunch of books; the main thing is that they were kind: to children, to animals, to everyone. Acts of kindness, gentleness, and benevolence are the best parts of anyone’s life. What would you like said for your eulogy? Can you think of anything better than he or she “was kind or gentle?” The best moments in life are those in which we are kind to someone else, or someone is kind to us. Kindness is so big, so beyond us, so powerful, that it is greater than all wisdom of the wise.

When a brother behaves insanely, you can heal him only by perceiving the sanity in him. If you perceive his errors and accept them, you are accepting yours. If you want to give yours over to the Holy Spirit, you must do this with his. (T-9.III.5:1–3)

Miracle-mindedness knows nothing of fault and error. It is not seen. It is not amplified. It is not lifted out, examined, and placed on display for the world to see. To perceive error and then to react to it is to make it real to ourselves. If in doubt about the correct response in any situation, try kindness. It will never fail. Kindness is always appropriate and the moment is always now. To make guilty is to be guilty. Likewise, we cannot do good to another and not benefit ourselves. What we want for a brother — we receive.

To accuse is not to understand. (T-14.V.3:6)

There is a wonderful story about a prison where they allowed men on death row to have pets. A man with a reputation for hardness and cruelty was given a kitten. He loved and cared for the kitten with tremendous kindness and all because he said, “It was the only thing that ever loved me.” The inclination to kindness is easy to give to our pets because they so easily show kindness to us. There is a joke which asks, “If you want to find out who your best friend is, lock your wife and your dog in the trunk of your car. Go away for an hour, come back, open the truck and see which one is happy to see you.” As someone once observed, “There is no psychiatrist in the world as good as a puppy licking your face.”

When someone is sick, we treat them with kindness. When people are old and crippled, we treat them with kindness. If kindness is the best way to deal with animals, the dumb, the deaf, the lame, the blind, the old, and the sick — why should we think that anger and attack are ever appropriate with our family, friends, and colleagues? God, in the Course, is spoken of as “the maker of the world of gentleness” (T-25. III.8:1). Just as the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate. Kindness breeds kindness.

Forgiveness’ Kindness

There is a section in The Song of Prayer entitled Forgiveness of Yourself, which talks about true forgiveness’ kindness (S-2.I.1:4). We beat up on ourselves more than anyone else does and, we’ve not been completely forgiving unless we can, in all kindness, also forgive ourselves. It is a kindness to ourselves to hear God’s word and learn His simple lessons instead of trying to dismiss His words, and substitute our own in place of His (W-198.5:3). Being kind to ourselves, we abandon the tyrannical laws of the ego and allow the Holy Spirit to guide our lives.

Kindness is such a simple thing. It is not hard to practice. Just as we would be kind with animals, or with the crippled, we can be kind to the customer who just took advantage of our generosity, the discourteous gas station attendant, the thoughtless taxicab driver, the harried waitress, the seemingly inconsiderate driver ahead of us on the road. Abraham Joshua Herschel (1907–1972), a Warsaw born American Rabbi and one of the leading Jewish theologians of the twentieth century said, “When I was young, I used to admire intelligent people; as I grow older, I admire kind people.”

Are You Jesus?

A group of salesmen who went to a regional sales meeting in Chicago, assured their wives that they would be home in time for dinner on Friday evening. One thing lead to another and the meeting ran over. The men had to race to the airport. As they barged through the terminal, they inadvertently kicked over a table supporting apples being sold by a young girl. Without stopping, they all reached the plane in time and boarded it with a sigh of relief — all but one. He paused, waved goodbye to his companion and returned to help the girl. He then noticed that she was blind. The salesman gathered up the apples and noticed that several were bruised. He reached into his wallet and said to the girl. “Here, please take this money for the damage we did. I hope we didn’t spoil your day.” As the salesman started to walk away, the bewildered girl called out to him — “Are you Jesus?”

No matter how confused we are — no matter how upset or how much we may think the world has mistreated us — there is always an exit. There is a simple law of kindness. It may go by the name of courtesy, charity, mercy, grace, hospitality, or accommodation. The key marked “kindness” can open any door. Love is home. Home is the where the heart is. Eventually, the path of destiny leads us Home. We may get confused in this journey — there are many things to pull us off track — but getting back on track is simple. It just requires the application of one simple law of happiness: the law that says, kindness always works.

Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier. Be the living expression of God’s kindness: kindness in your face, kindness in your eyes, kindness in your smile, kindness in your warm greeting. Albanian Catholic Nun Mother Teresa (1910–1997)

Holiness created me holy. Helpfulness created me helpful. Perfection created me perfect. Kindness created me kind. (W-pI.67.2:3–6)

Click here to receive a current copy of The Holy Encounter

Click here to read about our 2011 Conference

Walking with the Monks

by Dick Gayton

I wore my orange Ralph Lauren polo shirt and cannabis leaf-patterned shorts as I carried an alms food bag and trailed the four saffron-robed Thai Monks. I’m over six feet tall and they were all five footers. My orange shirt and their orange robes were about the only thing similar looking about us — other than we were all totally bald. We had just walked out of the small temple where I had been staying in Sikui (about three hours north and into the interior of Thailand) to go begging in the neighborhood. The five of us walked single file down the dirt road at 6 am just as the blazing heat of Southeast Asia was about to come up with the sun. We were the size of an infantry squad — a small band of spiritual warriors out to meet the people. Each monk carried a stainless steel begging bowl which he cradled in his arms like a sacred object.

We approached a small farm house and could see a neatly dressed, middle aged women kneeling in the dirt with a plastic bag of vegetables and meat in one hand and a rice bowl in the other. As our little group stood in front of her, she raised the plastic bag above her head with great solemnity, offering it to my friend, the abbot of the monastery. Then she scooped rice into each monk’s bowl. Simple acts of devotion and charity. My friend blessed her in Thai and then our little group moved on to the next parishioner kneeling on the road. When we had enough food for the day, we returned to the Temple for breakfast, meditation, chores and watching the Buddhist channel on a widescreen in the middle of the temple.

I traveled again to Thailand because I had been taking the world very seriously with prostate cancer and its aftereffects. A few months ago in the midst of treatment with a particularly nasty drug combination, (See the column “My Life as a Eunuch” in the May/June 2011 issue of this publication) I was feeling so bad I didn’t want to talk to anyone but God. I finally listened to the voice within and ran away from home for 48 hours, hopping a train to Santa Barbara. Across from the Santa Barbara train station, I checked into a Hostel and the desk guy asked me if I minded staying in a room with a monk. It felt like one of those Holy Spirit interventions. I met the monk and was pleased to find he was visiting from my favorite place on earth, Thailand. One thing led to another — as the Holy Spirit took charge. The monk immediately invited me to visit his temple in Sikui. We spoke very briefly and somehow my mind completely changed about the physical misery I was in. God knows where to send me and who I am to meet whether I am in pain or joy.

A few months later I called the monk in Thailand and before long I was watching the Buddhist channel in Sikui and feeling the peace of God so powerfully I did not want to leave the monastery. I slept on a woven mat on the floor in the same room with one of the monks. My friend included me in the small service he conducted for the people who came to the temple to meditate. He and I chatted in English during the service about A Course in Miracles’ teachings on forgiveness and then he translated our conversation into Thai for the people gathered. Some of the ladies of the Temple took me out that evening to the best Thai food I have ever tasted. The monks and the ladies would accept no payment for any of this. I had been delivered into the arms of God for my healing. What a gift of love.

What does one make of such love, such joy and peace when we find it? It is tempting to attribute it to circumstances -- something outside ourselves. For example I have a persistent sense that I need to live in that monastery as if my peace were there and not inside me, because when I was there, I had no fear of cancer, less attachment to material things, true spiritual community. One of the ladies noticed my affinity for the monastery and suggested to the abbot that I be ordained as a monk. I think about that possibility. One purpose united everyone around me — peace. And I was swept up in the embrace. But if my mind thinks there is a special peace and love in Thailand, then it believes love is outside of us. And then it must be in those monks, not in me. The ego always responds to peace to co-opt it for its purpose. If I can just think my salvation is outside myself, no matter how kind the people or beautifully exotic the environment, then specialness and separation have entered into consciousness and I have left home.

Is it a mistake to travel to places and be with people where it is easy for us to feel peaceful? Of course not. Going where and to whom we are guided is the fulfilling gift of our dependence on spirit. The error is in believing we have to be with particular people, in special circumstances, in order to be at peace. Peace exists in the Holy Instant under any circumstance, with any person, when we realize fully that we are children of God. We can experience this when we are alone in meditation, and when we are in fellowship with others, and when we are begging food, and being treated for cancer, and when we are in prison, and when we are dying, and when we are reading these words. All human experience can be life in the spirit. I hold to that promise.

It is with joy and thanks that I join my hands in the traditional Thai wai and bow to the monks and to the Holy Spirit and to all of you who have joined with me and contributed to my continued healing.

Click here to receive a current copy of The Holy Encounter

Click here to read about our 2011 Conference

How to Find Quiet During a Health Challenge

by Lee Jampolsky, Ph.D.

The period of facing a health challenge is certainly not typically a quiet time, but rather is full of important decisions and overwhelming emotions. Yet quiet is exactly what is needed during much of this time.

One of the main problems we encounter when beginning to pursue the Course, or what I sometimes call Life-centered thinking, is that we are simply unaccustomed to having a calm and quiet mind. We may actually be a bit uncomfortable with tranquility, feeling that we should be doing something at all times. We don’t trust the quiet. We may even be bored, because we are limited in our physical and daily activities. We may have become so used to a busy mind that anything else seems abnormal. But until we recognize that we are avoiding quiet, we will find problems to be solved, drama to be a part of, resentments to build, worry to be consumed by, and self-condemnation to collect, none of which serves our health and healing and all of which is created by the ego.

When dealing with a health challenge, we need to treat our tranquility as though it were a beautiful estate for which we are the caretakers. Anytime weeds or unwanted intrusions present themselves, we must be quick to deal with them in order to maintain our tranquility.

Although being with other people is important, it is also important that we spend time alone. Indeed, with the busy schedules that can accompany a health challenge, many people spend very little time alone. And even when they do, they are often task oriented, spending their solitude reading or learning about their condition.

In our society today, we have books, movies, the Internet, and endless other entertainment options. We are often quick to fill our free time with some form of task or amusement. During a health challenge, when it is easy to either be busy dealing with the logistics of appointments and medication, or to zone out with entertainment of some kind, we need to recognize what the real reason is why we might constantly need to be entertained and/or distracted — to be taken away from ourselves, or Truth as God would have us see. It may be that we have become fearful of being alone and uncomfortable without distractions. This is the way of the ego: it convinces us that we should be afraid of what is inside of us — of Love, of Life, of our inner wisdom — in order to keep us searching outside ourselves.

Though many of free-time choices are certainly helpful (because they are creative expressions), they can also distract us from saying yes to Love, to Life. You may have heard financial planners suggest, “Take at least ten percent of your income and set it aside for savings and investments. Do this no matter what is going on financially, and when you sit down to pay your bills, always pay yourself first. If you do this, along with deciding to live more simply, financial freedom will come.” While there is much more to financial investing, without this basic approach, the goal of financial freedom is hard to achieve. The same ingredients of this straightforward financial advice apply to saying yes to Life.

Exercise: Invest Five Percent of Your Time in Settling Down With Love

Take at least five percent of your waking hours — more on some days — and set it aside for being with God, settling down, and turning within, without any task to do or entertainment to distract you. Your sole purpose during this time is to settle down with Love. Do this no matter how chaotic your life is, how much you have to do, how bad you feel, or how behind you think you are. When you schedule your day, always set time aside for yourself first. Though there is much more to your healing path and to saying yes to Life, making this simple commitment will enable you to find much more quiet and calm in the midst of chaos. Just as you need a charged battery on a cell phone to pick up signals and transmissions, you need a receptive and quiet mind to hear the guidance of Love that is always available to you. Although Love is with us at all times and in all places, we typically need to have a quiet mind to receive it.

To develop trust in Love, commit to spending time — contemplative time — without distractions. Be willing to begin to spend time settling down with Love. The ego is very skilled at creating both external and internal distractions. Make the five percent commitment, and your life will be ninety-five percent improved. Now that’s the best investment deal going.

When my daughters were small, they used to be enraptured with the magic of snow globes. When the snow globe was shaken, the scene inside turned to a snowy wonderland; flecks of white fell over the town inside the liquid world. They watched with fascination as the snow slowly settled, and then, just before stillness, they would shake it up again, laughing and giggling.

Our ego and fear-based thinking do something similar. They are always shaking up our minds, for no other reason than that stillness is as dangerous to the ego as water is to fire. If you get close to stillness, the ego will surely find a way to entice you to shake things up.

Love comes to us in the stillness of our mind. The ego knows this and is threatened by it, so it is always throwing distraction in our way. With a health challenge, the ego appears to have an endless supply of material to use to shake up our minds. The moment we may begin to feel some stillness, the ego will try and pull our attention to some physical concern, pain, or worry.

Lead Feelings

In our healthcare culture, people facing a health challenge are met with a blitz of distractions. But our healthcare culture provides very little, if any, time and support for people wanting to find and explore their inner life or develop a Life-centered focus. As a result, people are living longer, but are less happy, and many are “lost souls” as they transition from this life.

I know what this lost, unhappy state is like because I was one of these people. There were times during my early health challenges when trying to feel something other than depression, numbness, anger, or resentment would have been nearly impossible.

It is difficult to experience healing when we are full of fear and have no trust in Love, and our minds are full of worry and dread.

During the process of settling down, we begin to be more aware of all aspects of ourselves and our lives, even though our health challenge remains a central focus. In particular, our feelings become more available to us, because we do not have the thoughts and distractions that previously kept us from experiencing them.

In many personal-growth experiences, a great emphasis is put on what the individual is feeling. I agree with this emphasis in part. Yet so often, as was the case with me, when we are asked, “What are you feeling?” the question might as well be, “What does the other side of Mars look like?” Many people are so out of touch with their feelings, especially in the midst of facing a health challenge, that they don’t even know where to start or why they should bother exploring their feelings.

The reason we bother is because feelings and beliefs are very closely related. It is important to see how what I call lead feelings and core beliefs can create a life of happiness and healing or a life of suffering and illness. We’ll talk more about this in the next issue of The Holy Encounter, so stay tuned!

Click here to receive a current copy of The Holy Encounter

Click here to read about our 2011 Conference

Miracle Musings of a Recovering Fundamentalist

by Paul McNeff

My wife, Beverly Hutchinson McNeff, has been after me for some time now to share with you, in a continuing series of articles in The Holy Encounter, some of my story. In our 23 years together, I have learned to listen when she speaks and try to heed her wisdom?! Well, most of the time anyway. And so, I invite you to join me in each issue as I muse on life's issues from the vantage point of a recovering fundamentalist. You may or may not have had a similar path but we will all have a similar spiritual destination.

As you can probably tell, from the title of this column, for the first 35 years of my life, I was an entrenched in the Christian evangelical fundamentalist community. At age 28, I was ordained into the Baptist church along with three sibling brothers of mine. But, as for so many of us, when faced with life's big events, a divorce and leaving the church ministry in my case, one starts to vigilantly search for answers. And, if your current spiritual path is not providing you with those answers, then you keep searching.

As a fundamentalist, I had always been uncomfortable with the idea of eternal damnation and separation from God so eventually my search took me into unchartered territory. Through a circuitous route of Eastern religions, my search ended with A Course in Miracles. I found it to be the perfect combination of Eastern and Western thought. I resonated to it from the moment I picked it up. It had the answers I was looking for, but not in the same way I had been used to before. The Course requires a real synthesis of head and heart. It trains you to experience God as you gently allow his presence to be uncovered within you where it never left.

A Course in Miracles defines a miracle as simply shifting your perception. Big difference from how a traditional Christian defines it. To a fundamentalist Christian, shifting your perception really does not mean much. I mean, we want something momentous….something big, like raising the dead or at least a little . . . turning the water into wine. But, as in any great metaphysical thought system, the Course would have us relate this raising from the dead event, to something more on a metaphorical level. Did Jesus really raise Lazarus from the dead or did he raise Mary and Martha's consciousness from the dead thoughts they were buying into? When we have a little willingness to allow the Holy Spirit to help us shift our perception, that is when we truly experience miracles…raising our dead thoughts to the glorious reality of who we really are . . . God's holy, innocent children.

I was born the 3rd of 11 children to my parents who were poor farmers in south central part of the State of Nebraska. What we lacked in possessions as a very poor farm family, my parents made up for with a solid work ethic and committed spiritual lives to their fundamentalist Christian beliefs. They were anything but hypocrites. They practicing what they preached, which included a behavioral laundry list a mile long of Christian do's and don'ts. The more you could attain perfection at that list, the more spiritual you were. You were only "worthy" because Jesus had bought you with his blood sacrifice on the cross. This ultimate "act of love" paid for your sins so you could eventually get into God's holy heaven as your final destination. Otherwise, there was hell to pay, literally.

The fundamentalists relate everything related to that final destination or a moment in time event. The Course never really deals with time because time is just part of the illusion. Everything you learn is NOW. Lesson 191. ."I am the holy Son of God Himself." Lesson 190 … "I choose the joy of God instead of pain." Always the now.

At the very young age of four; I was taught that I had a "sinful" nature which would manifest from time to time at being disobedient of my parents. From this, we needed to be "saved" by confessing Jesus as our savior and claiming the promise from scripture that his blood would wash us clean. . .all wrapped up into a nice package that ended with Jesus' return to this old world in an event that has come to be known in fundamentalist circles as the "Rapture," or "Jesus second coming." He will come as a "thief in the night" to take his children (fundamentalists Christians only) with him to reign with him forever in heaven. Sorry, no non-christians were allowed in this exclusive club.

Funny this about this Rapture concept. Recently a television pastor predicted the Rapture would take place on May 21. This type of prediction has been going on for a long time, but what made this one unique was the one million dollar billboard campaign that he waged promoting the date. As you know, it did not happen and now he has recalculated for October 21, 2011. So, mark your calendars!

From the Course’s perspective your salvation is secured…you are and have forever been one with God. No religion is needed to neither guarantee this truth nor will any particular religious belief get you to that place. You have the opportunity to have Jesus come to you everyday. Conversely, this illusion called the world can actually end everyday too, if we claim the miracle perception that is our inheritance.

So, I again invite you to join me on this adventure of striving to incorporate all the goodness and joy the Course is trying to have us experience. With only a little willingness, the Course can transform our lives and powerful healing can occur. I'm still a "fundamentalist." I realize my goal of joining with all God's children will be attained as I learn to apply the fundamental principles of the Course in my life. Blessings along the path. See you next time.

Click here to receive a current copy of The Holy Encounter

Click here to read about our 2011 Conference

You are the Light of the World: Taking your Pain into Promise

by Tama Kieves

The wisdom tradition of A Course in Miracles, teaches us, “I am the light of the world. That is my only function. That is why I am here.” When I first read that line part of me stood at attention as though its true name had been called through a fog and cobweb of centuries. The other part of me felt screwed.

At the time, I looked around at my life of half-written manifestos, unused yoga videos, and abrupt tectonic shifts of doubt and fear, and thought humanity could definitely benefit from a more reliable guide. But I have come to see that limitation is spirit calling my name. Limitation puts pins in my sofa and lumps in my pillow so that I do not fall asleep in my life. Limitation calls me to seek for strength, focus, achievement, and liberating powers I did not know I had. And, in the end, limitation gifts me with a one-of-a-kind credential in this world. It’s because as I come to experience freedom in the midst of defeated circumstances, I become a hope and light to others.

We, who are questioning our lives and our abilities, are the light of the world. We will be a beacon of comfort, hope and direction to those who need us. We are in the soup, but it is healing broth. We are the ones who are learning to find joy and full expression in the midst of bruised conditions. Every spiritual tradition teaches us that freedom is not being liberated once the job comes through, the check comes in or the skinny jeans fit. Freedom is learning how to be at peace no matter what, no matter when.

Our world is changing. The old ways are falling apart. Some talk about being in a revolutionary evolution of consciousness. We are the ones. We are the ones who are discovering our sacred resources and responses and bringing them to the table. We are the ones who write poems or sing praises to the divine, even as the stock market crumbles. Our dark days and stumbles are our training grounds. We are learning how to recognize a magnitude that is never threatened or taken away. We are discovering the river of faith in the dryness of our desert. We are the ones. We may not get it right every single day or even for weeks on end, but we are the ones.

Your pain is your relentless guru. How do you gain instruction from the sting? How do you resist the urge to curse it, deny it, or lie down in a ball for a thousand years? How do you love yourself? How do you forgive yourself? How do you sit down right now and trust the perfection of where you are? This is the juncture of your freedom. This life is not about just sweeping the kitchen one more time, or sending in a resume. It’s about feeding the wild blue bird in your heart on berries not of this world. It’s about feeding the wild blue bird so that it flies free no matter what.

I do not wish you pain or suffering. But I know that pain will cause you to seek freedom and freedom will teach you who you are and why you’re here. You are the light of the world, and you have love, talent, and healing to offer us. Because of the sand, the oyster yields the pearl. Peacocks grow their signature colorful feathers by eating thorns. “What is to give light, must endure burning,” wrote Viktor Frankl, who taught about how he found liberation, through mental focus, in the harshest hours of living in a concentration camp. And Buddhist nun Pema Chodron says, “Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible be found in us.” You are the light of the world. And it’s pain that reminds you, like a ferocious drill sergeant, to abandon your useless definitions of security, and penetrate the limitless grace within you.

We may not have easy lives at this time. But it’s not because we’re failing, falling, or inadequate. It’s because our souls demand healing more than coping, soaring more than just reaching cruising altitude. We are the teachers, healers, visionaries, social entrepreneurs and architects of the coming bright times. We are the sensitive ones, the canary in the mines. We have never truly been fit for this world. That’s why we are the ones who will change it.

We will change it with our compassion. We will change it with our twigs of peace. We will change it by sitting in our dark corners until the pain passes and transmutes into new energy that can sustain the rest of our lives-- and we have a new stronghold to offer our brothers and sisters.

We will turn darkness into hope, as humanity has always done. We will prove that pain passes and leaves strong alchemy in its wake. We will run a new mile, inspire new actions, bring clean water to the needy, or paint images of wonder and faith. We will find our unique way to channel inexhaustible strength to hungry conditions. We will bring the new into the world by expanding our minds, communing with our creativity, and opening our boundless hearts. We are in the study halls now. Many of us are getting ready for our certifications.

We are the light of the world. We are the ones who have mercy for others. We are the ones who lend a hand. We are the ones who share a bit of writing, a dance, a reiki session, a vibrant expression filled with courage and forgiveness. We are the ones who question limitation and habits and demonstrate the raw and formidable power of love and alignment with our source. We are the ones who believe there is enough here to work with and we are about the business of working with it. Jesus walked on water. We may be doing something far more electrifying in these times. We are walking in this world.

Click here to receive a current copy of The Holy Encounter

Click here to read about our 2011 Conference