Long time no see

I can't believe I haven't posted anything here since 2011. Can that be right? Apparently so, yet it astonishes me. A year or two maybe I'd left off, I thought, but here it is 2015.

I came here today in search of a story. A story I was sure I'd told here. But I can't find it now.

It was a story about misery and discord, about how my work had gotten almost unbearable. I didn't understand it; I'd had a good relationship (I thought) with my manager. I loved her. We'd spent years working together in close quarters. But all of that seemed like it had just gone to hell. I remember feeling so confused and lost. Wondering what I'd done wrong, but scared to ask.

This was almost 6 years ago. So all that is left are the bones.

I'd been working, here and there, on my ACIM workbook lessons. And also spending some time wandering around in the grassy patch behind the office trying to get my emotions under control. And asking a lot of "Why me" kinds of questions.

One day, I got an answer, and it just astonished me. I realized that the ONLY reason I was there, the only real reason, was to love these people. That was it. It was a big relief, in a way. It made everything very simple.

After I had that realization, it didn't solve everything, but my perspective changed. I started to feel like maybe it would be OK to stay. Within a month or two, my position was cut and suddenly I was out the door.

I felt some shock about it, of course. Some concern, about paying the bills and all that. But there was also part of me that was like, "You learned what you needed to learn here. Now it's time to move on."

Within a short time, I'd gotten a job offer from the organization I'd dreamed of working for for years. Not that it's been all roses, of course. (And how could it be, when it is life in this world?) It meant a big cut in salary and major upheaval in my life and my family's lives. And working with some amazing human beings—but human beings still. There are still plenty of forgiveness lessons to be found. And crazily enough, I feel thankful for that. Because I know in that is my hope—of awakening, of release.

In our ACIM study group, we read this text yesterday that I thought was so lovely:

When you have looked on what seemed terrifying, and seen it change to sights of loveliness and peace; when you have looked on scenes of violence and death, and watched them change to quiet views of gardens under open skies, with clear life-giving water running happily beside them in dancing brooks that never waste away; who need persuade you to accept the gift of vision? And after vision, who is there who could refuse what MUST come after? Think but an instant just on this. You can behold the holiness God gave His Son. And never need you think that there is something else for you to see. (T-20.VIII.11)

Sounds pretty damn good to me. Holy Spirit, let me see with your eyes, that I may be healed of my illusions and blessed with the sight that brings peace and wholeness. Amen.

A funny thing

So, it's been an interesting last week or so. Hard to know where to start exactly with this story, but I guess a good starting point is to talk about a couple of books I've been reading.

I read the book Fringeology recently (very fun read, about the problems with the sort of extreme rationalism that dominates much of science; the kind of uber-rationalism that refuses to look at things that are not easily explained and writes off those who do investigate phenomena on the fringes as kooks, that ends up being closer to dogmatism than what science in theory is all about: discovery); the author is not a "true believer," but he's curious and open-minded. The book was fascinating on many levels, but one immediate result was that it piqued my interest about a therapy called EMDR.

I guess EMDR is nothing new, but it was new to me. I got a book about it written by the woman who first started developing the treatment protocol, Dr. Francine Shapiro, called EMDR: The Breakthrough "Eye Movement" Therapy for Overcoming Anxiety, Stress, and Trauma. The book is written with counselors in mind, so I found myself skipping parts of the book that were too dense and technical to be interesting to me. But the case studies were fascinating, of how a very short series of treatments could allow people who've experienced trauma to integrate and move past the pain of these experiences.

I didn't really think I was reading the book for myself. I've never thought of myself as a victim of trauma or anything like that. Sure, I've had some things happen that were difficult, things that I've struggled with through the years. But I was more interested in how this could help other people, people who've experienced "real" trauma. But then I picked up a book we had in the house about raising emotionally intelligent children, by John Gottman. I've read a number of his other books about relationships, and I picked it up because my kid is navigating the start of middle school and something he'd said made me think that perhaps the book could be helpful. He saw it, picked it up, and asked who was reading it. I told him that I was, so he started flipping through it and came to a page that talked about the three types of parenting styles that Gottman's lab work had helped identify that were not helpful in raising children with emotional intelligence. He told me that he thought I was a "dismissing" parent. Which is not something that I would have thought. So I kept reading.

When I took the test in the book (with some prompting from said kid; it was late at night and I was sleepy), it turns out that although my score wasn't super-high for "dismissing," it wasn't, well, super-low either. Reading the description made me realize that I do have some aspects of that in myself; that some things from my childhood had made me very uncomfortable with anger. Although I knew that, and that I've certainly gotten more in touch with my angry side as an adult, still it hadn't occurred to me to think that this had caused me to sometimes shut him down, to downplay his emotions, especially the ones that I found threatening. His dad was often more angry than I could handle, which was one factor leading to the end of our marriage. More times than I can count, I've worried that he had his dad's temper, his dad's habit of shifting blame. Sometimes I think it's felt safer to try to distract away the anger than to face it and deal with it head on. When I was talking to him about it, I remembered that much of my terror around anger had come from the scary fights that went on in my house between my sister and my parents. I was afraid of my sister for a long, long time after that.

And then yesterday, I was telling a new friend something about my painful experience in the church I used to belong to, and how my heart rate and breathing used to accelerate when I heard the word "Jesus." And it occurred to me in that moment that this was a PTSD response. That I'd conditioned myself past that reaction, but that perhaps there was still some place where that trauma, and perhaps others, are still locked up in my body, or my brain. That maybe there might be something there to explore, whether there might be an expedited way to really heal that trauma, and perhaps some others that I'm not even consciously aware of but that perhaps I still hold within this body.

Today my workbook lesson was Lesson 222: "God is with me. I live and breathe in Him." I was doing my meditation on this lesson and suddenly I was sobbing. And then calm, and then sobbing again, and yet again.

Now I don't cry too often, unless I'm doing watching something emotional (like the "Born This Way" episode of Glee I watched yesterday—totally made me cry), and even then it's just the tears. So this took me somewhat by surprise. I asked the Holy Spirit for help, and guidance.

Now, according to ACIM, we are not bodies, we are projections of separation, cooked up by the delusional Mind to help us hide from God. So...I think part of me has thought, well, all I should need is the Course. I shouldn't need hocus-pocus to heal me, if the real problem is with this Mind anyhow and the body is just a mistaken idea. Especially when it comes to the emotional stuff. The Course has done a lot to help me suspend judgment, and to practice forgiveness.

But the body is a persuasive illusion. If my mind were healed, I wouldn't need any form of magic. But it is not healed. If I sometimes will take pain capsules, or homeopathic tablets, or immune-supporting supplements, and I can justify that to myself, then how really is it different to seek treatment for a trauma that seems to be real? This treatment may be magic, but I think that sometimes (and maybe most of the time), we aren't really ready to handle Reality yet, and that magic (in the sense that the Course talks about it, as using anything that isn't knowledge of our oneness with God) is sometimes what we need.

I thought I'd moved past this stuff. But maybe not, maybe mostly what I did is just stuffed it into a box and told myself that it didn't matter. That I'm a grown-up now, I've moved past these things, forgiven my parents for their neglect, the boys who said mean things to me growing up, the church people who thought they were doing the will of God by weeding me out...haven't I? Maybe not as much as I'd thought.

Crazy

So in the last week or so I've started back with the workbook. So far I think I've made it through about 4 lessons in about a week. Not stellar progress, but considering how long it had been since I'd done anything at all with the workbook, it is something.

I think I went just a little off the deep end there. Just a bit. I think I got really afraid of the Course. Felt like I just wasn't ready to deal with what I thought it was going to put me through. Was scared for my health. Just kind of wanted to put it on the back burner. It didn't occur to me until very recently just how nutso my reasoning was there.

I just re-read Carrie Triffet's book, and have been re-reading The Disappearance of the Universe. And I got a Kindle, and started reading the Text (somehow it seems less intimidating on a screen than with that big fat blue book). Somewhere between all of those things I realized a couple of things. First, that if I was going to face some challenges with my health, I'd be much better off keeping these teachings close at hand. And second, that this ego which is so roiling with anger and wrath that it would sooner make me sick and kill me off than have its own existence threatened...that it really has no power on its own. That I am holding it up between me and God, as a form of protection from the punishment that I fear. That it has no power in an of itself, because all it is, at its core, is a mistaken thought. Yes, working with the Course did start to stir up a bunch of ugly and vicious stuff. I thought I was basically a nice person. I had NO idea a lot of this stuff was lurking there right beneath the surface. In some ways it felt easier to set it aside and try to live a normal life, like I could fool this nasty ego into leaving me alone if I did it.

It seems pretty crazy when I think about it now.

Part of the lesson I've been working on for the last couple of days (Lesson 204) says this, which I think is so beautiful:

God’s Name reminds me that I am His Son, not slave to time, unbound by laws which rule the world of sick illusions, free in God, forever and forever one with Him.

Sick illusions is right. The more I look out at the world, the more it confirms the central message of the Course. A world of sickness and death, of frailty and apparent lack, where loss is inevitable, is so far from perfection it's laughable. And yet we long for that perfection, don't we? From the moment I started to learn about the problems of the world, it never made sense to me. Why would we all together create this world which would seem to be nothing that any of us (in our right minds) would choose? The answer that we are NOT in our right minds...well, it makes a certain kind of sense. But no matter how crazy the world looked, I always thought I was pretty smart and pretty...sane. It's a hard idea to accept that you might be rather crazy, along with everyone else. But once you start to see it, really see it, it starts to open up some cracks in the veneer, and some light starts to shine through.

So...back to the lessons. I've been a good student most of my life, but this has been a different journey. Fits and starts. But I'm so grateful for all of the people who've helped me so far, and for God who has been faithful through everything.

I AM, the Movie

Just got back from Tom Shadyac's movie, "I AM". It was quite a moving experience, as it was designed to be. In fact, we were meant to be moved to prove an important point: that we are human in relationship to one another. That we face many problems in this modern world, but that while the causes may seem disparate, our problems all stem from the fact that we think that we are separate from one another, and that we've been taught that satisfaction comes from winning, not from connection. The conclusion? That love is the answer. Not romantic love, but the kind of love that says "I am connected to you; you are an inseparable part of the fabric of life that we share. As I love you I love myself." All this was delivered against the background of quantum physics and our new understandings of how we influence the world.

An example: at the HeartMath facility, we see a petri dish of yogurt react to Tom's thinking about his agent, his lawyer, and a question about his marital status. This is hard to believe until you see it. We hear how random event generators around the world react to—and perhaps even anticipate—big events. Like 9/11, and the tsunami in 2004. This should be impossible. But this is what cutting-edge science is saying.

Now...how does this relate to the Course? The movie touches on a number of things the Course teaches. That we are One, not just in some touchy-feely feel-good sense, but quite literally. When the movie talked about how love is hard-wired into our DNA, it made me think about the introduction to the Course that says "The course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love, for that is beyond what can be taught. It does aim, however, at removing the blocks to the awareness of love's presence, which is your natural inheritance. The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite."

But in contrast to the Course, which is not the easiest thing to jump in and grasp, as beautiful and amazing as I think it is, I think the movie is tremendously accessible. Tom Shadyac tells his own story, which is the story of someone who's touched "success" in a way that few of us ever will, touched the depths of despair and agony in way that few of us will either, and come out of it to say, "We can change the world. We change it every day by our every thought and every small action. We can do life a lot better than we have been doing, not by having to recreate ourselves, but by embracing what we really are." So it's a great opening, which I think will touch a lot of people.

The Course deals in cause, and not effect. This film doesn't talk about forgiveness, really, or much about the illusory nature of what we like to call "reality" (although he does touch on it), but I think that it still gets us to ask some important questions and has the potential to help many people to open up to a new vista of possibilities.

My New Favorite Book

Long Time No See by Carrie Triffet is a must-read for anyone wanting inspiration about practicing the Course. She is very funny, and the story is a whirlwind adventure with Spirit. Basically it's the story of her journey from reluctant Jew to chanting Buddhist to practitioner of A Course in Miracles. Born sensitive to things that most of us are not, Carrie struggled with her fears for many years. This is the story of how she heard the voice of Spirit and how it helped guide her on this journey.

I have to say I felt a bit jealous, like why doesn't Spirit talk to me like that and take me on these wild rides? Why can't that be my path? While at the same time I think that if what I think of as "reality" were to go curvy on me at this point I just might not be ready for that. Maybe Spirit knows what it's doing. I have heard--Something. Something that has reminded me of certain truths. I can't always hear it equally well. Sometimes I suspect it's just my own wishful thinking. I think this book is helpful in sorting out what might be the voice of Spirit from what is likely the voice of Ego.

I think this is a great book to share with anyone who is seeking. It includes a "Crash Course," a clever and funny, yet helpful, introduction to what the Course says. Can't recommend this book highly enough!

Here is the website for the book: UnlikelyMessenger.com. There is also a page for the book on Facebook.

What A Course in Miracles has given me so far

I think I'm only on the first leg of what may be a long, long journey, although my lesson today (Lesson 122) did assure me that things are about to get easier:

Begin in hopefulness, for we have reached the turning point at which the road becomes far easier. And now the way is short that yet we travel. We are close indeed to the appointed ending of the dream.

Very glad to hear that.

At any rate, I have a dear friend who has tried to study ACIM and not gotten too far; she has asked me on more than one occasion why I would want to believe that the universe is an illusion. What's the point? she asks. How on earth could believing that help?

So now that we're here at the beginning of a new year, the second year of my journey with ACIM, I figure it's as good a time as any to think about what I feel like the Course has brought me so far. Other than a sure-fire way to make other people think that I'm nuts, that is!

1. I've been able to let God off the hook for the insanity of this world. I have never been able to understand why the world was so crazy; why we chose to create a world where so many people are hurt; why so many are hurt by disasters and disease. ACIM says "Yes, the world is crazy. It's a crazy, bad dream where although good things appear to happen and beauty still lives, you believe you can die." I always had a hard time reconciling the world as it is and the idea that God had created it (although I never thought it was utterly random; I've been a theist pretty much all my life), especially once the idea of hell and eternal judgement was thrown in. God being love and God being creator of this crazy, mixed up world didn't seem to be able to add up for me on any count.

2. I've found a way to manage hatred and anger like I almost couldn't imagine was possible. I received a challenge a few years ago, with the group I was with, to love George W. Bush. Love him? I thought. Impossible! He's brought war, he's a greedy bastard, he steps all over innocent people for fun. How could I love that? But now...well, I won't say that I like what he did. But I don't feel the animosity that I once did. It's just gone. Some sadness still lingers. But the hot, easy-to-stir-up anger is gone. I still struggle with this from time to time, but when I do, I'm faster now at recognizing that those feelings are just showing me another opportunity to forgive.

3. I just don't sweat the small stuff as much. I used to worry. A lot. Climate change. Would the economy collapse, and take down civilization with it? Would I get sick? Would my kid? I worried about car accidents and all manner of things. I haven't conquered this one, but my anxiety level has certainly fallen. That feels like a kind of miracle too.

4. I have a secret source of joy. This kind of goes along with the last one, I suppose. Smiles are easier to come by; my smile lines have deepened noticeably in the last year. Partly my age, probably, but I think it reflects that I smile and laugh more than I once did.

I'm sure there are more, but this is a start. Happy 2010! May it be a year of growth, of connection, and of much joy.

Experimenting

I saw this template and just thought it was lovely. Don't like how it displays the post time, but I suppose beggars can't be too picky. If you hover, it tells you the whole date and time. I don't know if anyone cares about that but me, so I think I can live with it.

Switching templates meant a lot of rework. So some things that were here aren't here anymore. We'll see if I miss them.

It's been more than a year since I started this adventure. It's been an interesting ride.

Sometimes now I feel kind of like a stranger in a strange land, but I find that I don't mind too much.

I still get tired and cranky sometimes, and sometimes I have even been known to yell. But I don't tend to beat myself up about it too much. That feels like progress, even though of course I'd rather be, as Bridget Jones said, a "perfect saint-style person." (Of course, I think she was mostly referring to laying off the booze, or the cigarettes, or perhaps it was the calories?) But that's all part of wanting to carve up the world into good and bad, right and wrong. It's perfectly natural to do—to not do it is downright weird. But oddly liberating when you have some success.

The instructions for this week of lessons had an interesting departure from the ones that have come before: to not judge my failure to follow the recommendations perfectly, and to not let that derail me (as has been the norm—I try, I "fail", I try again the next day, or the next week, and next thing you know more than a year has gone by and you are still on Lesson 97).

Spirit am I, a holy Son of God, free of all limits, safe and healed and whole, free to forgive, and free to save the world.

That was today. I could have done better. But I have to trust it was enough for this day. That is my lesson to learn.