Catia ask me to join her Portuguese Miracle Choice webinar last week. So I thought I would brush up a bit on my rusty Portuguese. I was to talk about the “3 Steps of the Miracle” from Workbook Lesson 23 in A Course in Miracles (ACIM), and so I got out our Portuguese Edition of the Course. This is the short sentence that contains the 3 steps that allow a change from thoughts of fear to an experience of love:
This change requires, first, that the cause be identified (step1) and then let go (step 2) so that it can be replaced (step3). Workbook Lesson 23. 5:2
Step 1: Identify the cause of your pain as the fearful thoughts in your mind rather than the external world.
Step 2: Let go, give up or abandon your fear.
Step 3: Love will replace your fear because love is all that remains when fear is gone.
I discovered that the Portuguese translation of “let go” in Step 2 is “abandonada.” The verb “abandonar “ also means to abandon.
The idea of abandoning fear caught my attention. Abandon is to “cease to support or look after (someone); desert.” (online dictionary). I immediately ask myself the questions:
How do I support my choice for fear?
Does fear give me something that I think I want?
Am I ready to desert fear completely?
Then what came to mind was a section in ACIM called “The Obstacles to Peace” that describes graphically how you don’t want to abandon fear.
And now you stand in terror before what you swore never to look upon.
Your eyes look down, remembering your promise to your “friends.” The “loveliness” of
sin, the delicate appeal of guilt, the “holy” waxen image of death, and the fear of
vengeance of the ego you swore in blood not to desert, all rise and bid you not to raise
your eyes. Text 19. IV.D.6:1-4
Deserting “friends” or abandoning ideas you once supported is not an easy process.
Yet deep down you know fear is not your home and you will eventually leave behind anything that is not love. Not because fear is wrong or bad, but only because you are love and to fully claim your identity everything else needs to drop away.
Love will come and help you as you choose to abandon fear. It will happen gently as you see the replacements for fear light up your life. You are not alone as you do steps 1 and 2.
By James Kelly
News
Over the years most of our blog quotations have been from A Course in Miracles (ACIM). This year Juliana, Catia and James have started reading and living “A Course of Love” (ACOL) which is related to a Course in Miracles. (Juliana is actually the Brazilian Portuguese translator of ACOL). A Course of Love speaks to the heart and sees wholeheartedness as both embracing the heart and the mind. Your mind when it reads ACOL will see inconsistencies and differences compared with ACIM and then you need to remember that reading ACOL is an experience of connecting to your heart, not your intellect, and so words are used for that purpose. We will be sharing our experience of both A Course of Love and A Course in Miracles in future blogs.
For more information on ACOL:
https://acourseoflove.org/
http://www.centerforacourseoflove.org/
Much love, James, Catia and Juliana.
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