Our current goals:

• Widen the horizons of our vision
• Take direct approaches to uncover the blocks that keep our vision narrow
• Lift those blocks, however briefly, in order to experience the sense of liberation that comes when the blocks are removed
• Intensify our motivation for freedom

“It can be but myself I crucify. When this is firmly understood and kept in full awareness, you will not attempt to harm yourself, nor make your body slave to vengeance. You will not attack yourself, and you will realize that to attack another is but to attack yourself.”

It may be helpful to read this first paragraph (above) from today’s lesson slowly several times.

There is a crazy idea in the mind that our salvation lies in attacking someone (or something) outside of our self. Today’s lesson calls this idea a “form of madness you believe.”

The best way to see this is true is to pay attention. Pay attention when you attack someone (or something), regardless of whether you attack physically, verbally or with your thoughts. Pay attention for the feeling or idea that you can gain something through attack. Maybe you think you can get your way, and that will make you feel safe or happy. Maybe there is a feeling that you rise up as you put others down. Maybe you feel you are protecting someone or some important value. Regardless of what it is that you think you may gain, notice that you believe your salvation lies in attack.

Next, notice that you actually crucify yourself whenever you attack. Pay close attention to how you feel when you attack. Is that joy? Peace? Love? Or are your emotions more negative? You probably feel anger, jealousy, lack, annoyance, resentment or some other type of upset. At best you may feel righteous indignation. Aren’t those feelings types of suffering? Aren’t you actually creating your own suffering through attack?

Attack is not salvation. Attack is a form of self-sabotage. To see this clearly is the first step in letting go of attack forever.

Today’s lesson says, “Today’s idea is one step we take in leading us from bondage to the state of perfect freedom.” When you see how you keep yourself in bondage through attack, you also see how sensible this statement is.

The lesson also says, “It is not time we need for this. It is but willingness.”

Time has nothing to do with giving up attack. Willingness is everything. Without willingness, we can go a very long time with no change in our attack habits. With great willingness, we can give up attack instantaneously. We can become willing to give up attack when we see that we do not gain through attack; we increase our own pain.

If you have an attack habit, it is helpful to pause every hour and look back on the last hour to see if there were any recent attacks. If there were attacks in the last hour, inquire into them. What did you think you’d gain through attack? What did you actually receive, happiness or prolonged agitation?

At the very least, review the day at the end of each day, and inquire into the attacks you find in your review.

By bringing right-awareness to your attack habit, the willingness to let go of the habit will increase. As willingness increases, you will begin to find ways (feel intuitive guidance) to let go before you attack.

Our current goals:

• Widen the horizons of our vision
• Take direct approaches to uncover the blocks that keep our vision narrow
• Lift those blocks, however briefly, in order to experience the sense of liberation that comes when the blocks are removed
• Intensify our motivation for freedom

Today’s lesson is a simple one. We are asked to be grateful today. However, in order for our gratitude to “pave the way to Him, and shorten our learning time by more than you could ever dream of,” we need to be sure our gratitude is right-gratitude instead of mistaken gratitude.

Mistaken gratitude has judgment (comparison) in it. For example, mistaken gratitude might be grateful that my family is healthy as compared to sick, with plenty of food or money as compared to not enough, etcetera.

Right-gratitude has no judgment in it. It is not grateful for one circumstance as compared to another. It is simple gratitude for awareness-life-presence as it is.

Today’s lesson says, “We thank our Father for one thing alone; that we are separate from no living thing, and therefore one with Him. And we rejoice that no exceptions can ever be made which would reduce our wholeness, … We give thanks for every living thing …”

The lesson points out that right-gratitude is healing. That’s because right-gratitude does two things:

1 – It focuses our appreciative attention on truth (awareness-life-presence).

2 – It bypasses judgment, which is a key element of the ego thought system.

As today’s lesson says, “Walk, then, in gratitude the way of love. For hatred is forgotten when we lay comparisons aside. … Today we learn to think of gratitude in place of anger, malice and revenge. … Gratitude becomes the single thought we substitute for these insane perceptions.”

Whenever you experience any wrong-minded thought or emotion today, pause. Focus attention on awareness-life-presence, and let yourself feel gratitude for it. You can use your own awareness-life-presence to shift into right-gratitude, you can use the awareness-life-presence of another, such as a child or a pet, or you can notice awareness-life-presence in nature—in a bird, a flower, the breeze or in the sound of flowing water, etc. Whatever will help you make a genuine shift into gratitude for awareness-life-presence is acceptable.
Another helpful option may be to pause each hour, look back on the hour and remember the wrong-minded perceptions you experienced in that hour. Then, pause with each wrong-minded perception remembered and replace it with right-gratitude.
As today’s lesson says, “Gratitude goes hand in hand with love, and where one is the other must be found. For gratitude is but an aspect of the Love which is the Source of all creation.”

Therefore, when we experience right-gratitude, we experience an aspect of our true Self. We are in genuine right-perspective when we feel right-gratitude.

Our current goals:

• Widen the horizons of our vision
• Take direct approaches to uncover the blocks that keep our vision narrow
• Lift those blocks, however briefly, in order to experience the sense of liberation that comes when the blocks are removed
• Intensify our motivation for freedom

Reading A Course in Miracles and repeating the day’s lesson to yourself hourly is not the path to freedom. Putting the teachings into practice is the path to freedom.

Today we are given another practice to add to our very useful repertoire.

I place the future in the Hands of God.

This isn’t something that we say to ourselves. This is something that we do.

Today’s lesson says, “Today’s idea takes another step toward quick salvation, and a giant stride it is indeed! … If you can see the lesson for today as the deliverance it really is, you will not hesitate to give as much consistent effort as you can, to make it be a part of you.”

“I place the future in the Hands of God,” means ‘I do not know what is in my best interest or in the best interest of others, and so I let go of worry and control, and I trust the unfolding as it is.’

Again, this is not something that we say. This is something that we do. We need to actually let go of worry and control, and trust the unfolding as it is. The way to do this is right-reason, through realizing that we do not know what is in the best interest of others and ourselves.

Thinking we know what is best and thinking we are right is the problem. With a little bit of right-reason, we can see that we are wrong about both of those assumptions.

As of this writing, there are more than 7,400,000,000 people in the world, each with a unique point of view. How can any one point-of-view out of 7,400,000,000 points-of-view be right and know what is in the best interest of everyone?

You might agree that you can’t know what is in the best interest of everyone, but still feel that you know what is in your own best interest.

Is that true? Have you ever been wrong about that?

I remember when I was 17 years old. I met this sweet boy who I thought was the love of my life. His name was Scott. Scott and I were separated when his mother sent him to another state to live with his older brother. At the time, I thought she ruined my life. We loved each other so much!!

A few years ago, I became reacquainted with Scott through Facebook. We are so different from one another now that I felt grateful our lives went separate ways when they did, although I couldn’t see that at all at the time.

I’m sure you’ve had those types of experiences too.

If we become really honest with ourselves through right-reason, we see that we don’t know what is in our best interest or in the best interest of others. With this genuine realization, we can let go of worry and control, and simply trust the unfolding as it is.

I place the future in the Hands of God.

“As it becomes a thought that rules your mind, a habit in your problem-solving repertoire, a way of quick reaction to temptation, you extend your learning to the world.”

The lesson says, “Who entrusts himself to God has also placed the world within the Hands to which he has himself appealed for comfort and security.”

Pause and contemplate that for a moment. Doesn’t it make more sense to entrust the world to the Hands of God than it does to try and take control ourselves?

“For in God’s Hands we rest untroubled, sure that only good can come to us.”

Here’s a fun song that will help us remember that we are wisest when we trust the unfolding as it is: