When I read this lesson I think about Jesus and how those who witnessed the crucifixion saw a picture of suffering and loss. Yet that is not how Jesus saw it. He saw it as an opportunity to teach forgiveness as well as to show us that his reality was not that of a body and neither is ours. He offered us a symbol of a world where suffering is over and loss becomes impossible. He also showed us that anger makes no sense. (1.1)  When he was attacked he showed nothing but love in return. And the reason that this was possible for him, according to his teaching in the course, is that he could see the world from outside of this dream, knowing that his reality was not as a figure in the dream.

The world we seem to live in is one where we see suffering and loss all around us and anger and attack do seem to make sense as it is a world that is defined by winner and losers. Attack and defense is the cycle of our relationships where we want to win at the expense of others and defend ourselves against the constancy of attacks coming our way. And we do suffer pain when we see ourselves as figures in this dream.  But forgiveness offer us the means to step above the battleground, outside of the dream and see the unreality of this world. What we see in the world is a projection of the attack thoughts in our own mind. By seeing them in the world, we take no responsibility for them as originating in our mind. Forgiveness shows us that all attack starts with us and when we take responsibility for it and look at it, it can be transformed.

Attack is what causes suffering and loss. And when we suffer, we want to attack. This is the solution that the ego proposes to the problem that we have created. All of our suffering is unforgiveness even though we may attribute it to something else. When we hold grievances, it is because we want something in the world to be different than it is. Notice how often this is simply about the rules we have for everything. When our rules are broken, grievances arise. As we have often discussed as part of this process of healing, we need to bring every grievance, every thought of attack, every judgment, all conflict to the Holy Spirit. It is important that we take back our projections, any blame we put on others and see that the thought system of attack is in our own minds.

Our hate scares us so we deny and rationalize it.  The course talks about the importance of not denying these feelings because  when we do, we then can't bring them forward for release. Neither should we feel guilty about them. Be grateful that they are showing up. Look at them dispassionately and release them. We need to do this work or we suffer and suffering takes us from the joy and peace that is in the mind. Yes, we will feel what we are feeling and experience pain as we go through the darkness but pain is unnecessary even though it is part of our experience here. 

I had a dream last night that I said something untrue in order to aggrandize myself. But the lie was about to be revealed and I suffered immensely wondering how I could manage trying to keep a lie under wraps that was about to be exposed.   Waking up, I realized, with relief, that it was all a dream but thought how interesting it was how I had created my own suffering. Isn't that what we do all of the time? It may not seem that forgiveness is the answer for all suffering but we need to recognize that Course-based forgiveness is different than what we think of forgiveness in the world. Why is that? Because from our Course perspective, we recognize that this world is a dream. It is all illusion and nothing real has happened. In this context then, attack is gone because like my night time dream, when we wake up from this one, nothing has happened. But this requires that we return our minds to God. And this can only be done through release of all of our attack thoughts. And then we see that anger has no justification. If I am angry at you for what you did in my nighttime dream you would have to think that this is nothing but insanity.  Nothing has happened. In the same way we must recognize that what seemed to be done in this worldly dream as an attack on us, does not justify our anger. We can instead bring it back to our own mind and see it as a projection of our own attack thoughts. It also offers us an opportunity to see it as a call for love and understanding. That is what time is for when used for our healing. 

According to this lesson, when we are unforgiving we frighten ourselves. Our minds are now in the grip of bitterness which really is self torture. This is why we are motivated to ask for help in bringing peace to our minds. When we give up the issues that keep our minds in bitterness, we then replace suffering with joy, loss with abundance, attack with charity and lack with endless giving. So with forgiveness, we release feelings of anger and hurt. We release the sense we have that we are not loveable enough. We release the past. It is only in the present that we can grow, expand and truly shine. It is that place where we are truly born again.

But, for those of us who have done work in this area, we know it is not always that simple. We may have to really go deep into our experience and feel the pain. And when we do experience the suffering, calling in the loving support of the Holy Spirit becomes essential. That support is always available waiting for our willingness and readiness to open ourselves to it. And with each release the "world becomes a place of joy, abundance, charity and endless giving".  (1.5) It is not that the world actually becomes this, but we see in it only a reflection of Heaven when our minds become joyful. And thus we will know ourselves as God created us, perfect and unlimited.

So forgiveness is about our own self interest. When someone seems to have offended us we think we need to defend ourselves. But as Byron Katie says, defense is the first statement of war. Instead, just as Jesus showed us, attack is just a call for forgiveness. It is a matter of motivation on our own behalf so that we are not betraying our own minds and leading them into this place of self attack and fear. So today, give yourself the opportunity to find peace, happiness, abundance and joy through your forgiveness. Free your mind from anger and attack by focusing on anyone that crosses your mind or your day today as an opportunity for forgiveness. Pray the prayer with the intent to truly return your mind to God through your forgiveness. This releases the imprisoned  mind. Be specific with your lesson on who you offer forgiveness to. As the lesson says, anger makes no sense. There is no justification for it. Again, it is not about denying it. It is about looking at it and being willing to forgive and thus bringing peace back into our minds.

 Love and blessings, Sarah

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³⁸ When you come to the place where the branch in the road is quite apparent, you cannot go ahead. You must go either one way or the other. For now if you go straight ahead, the way you went before you reached the branch, you will go nowhere. The whole purpose of coming this far was to decide which branch you will take now. The way you came no longer matters. It can no longer serve. No one who reaches this far can make the wrong decision, but he can delay. And there is no part of the journey that seems more hopeless and futile than standing where the road branches and not deciding on which way to go.

³⁹ It is but the first few steps along the right way that seem hard, for you have chosen, although you still may think you can go back and make the other choice. This is not so. A choice made with the power of Heaven to uphold it cannot be undone. Your way is decided. There will be nothing you will not be told if you acknowledge this.

⁴⁰ And so you stand, here in this holy place, before the veil of sin that hangs between you and the face of Christ. Let it be lifted! Raise it together, for it is but a veil that stands between you. Either alone will see it as a solid block, nor realize how thin the drapery that separates you now. Yet it is almost over in your awareness, and peace has reached you even here before the veil. Think what will happen after! The love of Christ will light your faces and shine from them into a darkened world that needs the light. And from this holy place He will return with you, not leaving it nor you. You will become His messengers, returning Him unto Himself.

⁴¹ Think of the loveliness that you will see who walk with Him! And think how beautiful will each of you look to the other! How happy you will be to be together after such a long and lonely journey where you walked alone. The gates of Heaven, open now for you, will you now open to the sorrowful. And none who looks upon the Christ in you but will rejoice. How beautiful the sight you saw beyond the veil which you will bring to light the tired eyes of those as weary now as once you were. How thankful will they be to see you come among them, offering Christ's forgiveness to dispel their faith in sin.

⁴² Every mistake you make the other will gently have corrected for you, for in his sight your loveliness is his salvation which he would protect from harm. And each will be the other's strong protector from everything that seems to rise between you. So shall you walk the world with me, whose message has not yet been given to everyone. For you are here to let it be received. God's offer still is open, yet it waits acceptance. From you who have accepted it is it received. Into your joined hands is it safely given, for you who share it have become its willing guardians and protectors.

⁴³ To all who share the love of God, the grace is given to be the givers of what they have received. And so they learn that it is theirs forever. All barriers disappear before their coming, as every obstacle was finally surmounted which seemed to rise and block their way before. This veil you lift together opens the way to truth to more than you. Those who would let illusions be lifted from their minds are this world's saviors, walking the world with their Redeemer and carrying His message of hope and freedom and release from suffering to everyone who needs a miracle to save him.

⁴⁴ How easy is it to offer this miracle to everyone! No one who has received it for himself could find it difficult. For by receiving it, he learned it was not given him alone. Such is the function of a holy relationship-to receive together and give as you received. Standing before the veil, it still seems difficult. But hold out your joined hands and touch this heavy-seeming block, and you will learn how easily your fingers slip through its nothingness. It is no solid wall. And only an illusion stands between you and the holy Self you share.

VI. Weakness and Defensiveness

⁴⁵ How does one overcome illusions? Surely not by force or anger nor by opposing them in any way. Merely by letting reason tell you that they contradict reality. They go against what must be true. The opposition comes from them and not reality. Reality opposes nothing. What merely is needs no defense and offers none. Only illusions need defense because of weakness. And how can it be difficult to walk the way of truth when only weakness interferes? You are the strong ones in this seeming conflict. And you need no defense. Everything that needs defense you do not want, for anything that needs defense will weaken you.

⁴⁶ Consider what the ego wants defenses for-always to justify what goes against the truth, flies in the face of reason, and makes no sense. Can this be justified? What can this be except an invitation to insanity to save you from the truth? And what would you be saved from but what you fear? Belief in sin needs great defense and at enormous cost. All that the Holy Spirit offers must be defended against and sacrificed. For sin is carved into a block out of your peace and laid between you and its return. Yet how can peace be so fragmented? It is still whole, and nothing has been taken from it.

⁴⁷ See how the means and the material of evil dreams are nothing. In truth you stand together with nothing in between. God holds your hands, and what can separate whom He has joined as one with Him? It is your Father Whom you would defend against. Yet it remains impossible to keep love out. God rests with you in quiet, undefended and wholly undefending, for in this quiet state alone is strength and power. Here can no weakness enter, for here is no attack and therefore no illusions. Love rests in certainty. Only uncertainty can be defensive. And all uncertainty is doubt about yourself.

⁴⁸ How weak is fear-how little and how meaningless! How insignificant before the quiet strength of those whom love has joined! This is your "enemy"-a frightened mouse that would attack the universe. How likely is it that it will succeed? Can it be difficult to disregard its feeble squeaks that tell of its omnipotence and would drown out the hymn of praise to its Creator which every heart throughout the universe forever sings as one? Which is the stronger? Is it this tiny mouse or everything that God created? You are not joined together by this mouse but by the Will of God. And can a mouse betray whom God has joined?

⁴⁹ If you but recognized how little stands between you and your awareness of your union! Be not deceived by the illusions it presents of size and thickness, weight, solidity, and firmness of foundation. Yes, to the body's eyes it looks like an enormous solid body, immovable as is a mountain. Yet within you there is a Force which no illusions can resist. This body only seems to be immovable; this Force is irresistible in truth. What, then, must happen when they come together? Can the illusion of immovability be long defended from what is quietly passed through and gone beyond?

⁵⁰ Forget not, when you feel the need arise to be defensive about anything, you have identified yourself with an illusion. And therefore feel that you are weak because you are alone. This is the cost of all illusions. Not one but rests on the belief that you are separate. Not one that does not seem to stand, heavy and solid and immovable, between you and your brother. And not one that truth cannot pass over lightly and so easily that you must be convinced, in spite of what you thought it was, that it is nothing. If you forgive each other, this must happen. For it is your unwillingness to overlook what seems to stand between you that makes it look impenetrable and defends the illusion of its immovability.

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