As you know by now one of the main themes of the website is the idea of looking at practical problems to see how choosing the miracle can lead to inner peace of mind. But it is often not clear how metaphysical understandings help in a practical way. To be told that metaphysically “there is no real choice to make even in our minds because the separation never really happened”, is not very helpful when we are experiencing the effects of a seemingly real problem. Two of the “Ten Rules of Choice” (link on the homepage) address the metaphysical aspect of choice.
Before we come to the metaphysical awareness that our problems are not real we need to see that not only do we believe in them but we also want them! Our worldly problems serve the purpose of keeping us separate from our true reality. We want to believe in them because they protect our personal separate selves. We have chosen to see ourselves as weak and at the mercy of forces seemingly beyond our control. Why did we choose weakness over strength? Why do we want to be on our own and solve problems our way?
Our littleness is hiding our greatness. Choosing to fly with the wings of a sparrow rather than with the wings of an eagle does not serve us or anybody. We need to tire from the effort of doing things all on our own.
Who would attempt to fly with the tiny wings of a sparrow when the mighty power of an eagle has been given him? M4.I.2:2
Yet maybe we don’t realize that we have chosen loneliness over innocence, our personal selves over the oneness of Christ. We have forgotten that we are responsible for choosing wrongly. Our parents, our education system our circumstances have not molded us into a miserable little self no matter how much we would like to think so! Accepting responsibility is a stepping stone to awareness of the metaphysics of choice.
Yet we hang on to our identification with our belief in the ego. In a perverse way we prefer our lonely existence over true love because having identified with our personal selves we think we will loose if we let go. We do not realize that we “loose” by protecting and hanging on. We “loose” because we are not at peace. Where is the joy in our lives?
The word you see but shows you how much joy you have allowed yourself to see in you, and to accept as yours. And if this is its meaning then the power to give it joy must lie within you. T21in2:7&8
Ultimately by experiencing the pain of our belief in loneliness and deciding our individual littleness is no longer of value we can overlook it with the help of the Holy Spirit and welcome in an experience of love. We can’t do this tomorrow or the next day but only Now.
I love that David Hoffmeister speaks of “Now” and the “Present” as a gateway or window to eternity.
So the present isn’t in between the past and the future, the present is before time was. ..The wrong mind cannot perceive the present. Now is back farther, beyond time. Awakening Through A Course in Miracles p310
So the words “now” or the “present” in A Course in Miracles refer to a holy instant outside of time and do not have the same meaning as how they are used for example in Gestalt therapy or in most self help teachings.
When we are finished with clinging onto the past and worrying about the future we can embrace out true Self in the present moment. We can be in an argument with our children. partner, boss, employee or friend and in a moment of Present choice decide to experience peace, joy or love.
We need to see how our false beliefs about life lead to our perception of events. By choosing the miracle we can allow the Holy Spirit to guide our perception. Conflict and pain is dissolved in the Present Awareness of Spirit.
Metaphysics help explain why we don’t want to choose the miracle. We hang onto our seeming important choices in our little personal lives and believe that if we choose the miracle we will loose the little we have got. We do not want accept responsibility for choosing the separation over the oneness of God because we think the choice we made was real and therefore deserving punishment. We have to make the choice for separation real in our mind because then and only then is our individual identity protected. We do not want to embrace the metaphysical idea that the seeming wrong choice we made was immediately corrected by the Holy Spirit. We don’t want to recognize that this world was over long ago because that means we don’t exist in time and space.
Gradually and gently we have to be willing to let the metaphysics seep into our everyday lives until we find personally meaningful “metaphysical stepping stones”. We need to follow these stepping stones because they will lead us from illusion of choice to real choice to beyond choice.