Please take time this morning to read, “What is Salvation,” to contemplate Lesson 233, and to spend time in meditation. If you have 30-minutes for meditation and would like a gentle audio to guide you, I recommend this meditation by Michael Langford and Karen Worth:
I give my life to God to guide today.
Nisargadatta Maharaj said that in order to realize the Self, you need the right teacher. He went on to say:
“Generally speaking, there are two ways: external and internal. Either you live with somebody who knows the Truth and submit yourself entirely to his guiding and shaping influence, or you seek the inner guide and follow the inner light wherever it takes you. In both cases your personal desires and fears must be disregarded. … If you are earnest, whatever way you choose will take you to your goal. It is the earnestness that is the decisive factor.”
Most of us don’t have a spiritual teacher that we can hang out with all day, and every day. Most of us don’t have someone who we can submit ourselves to entirely so that we are in constant receipt of guidance. Therefore, if we are not finding direction from external teachers like ACIM or our own personal guru, we can find what we are looking for from our Inner Guide.
Be aware however that whichever way you seek, “You cannot make decisions by yourself.” According to ACIM, Rules for Decision, “The only question really is with what you choose to make them. You will not make decisions by yourself whatever you decide.”
Our inner guide can be either Inner Wisdom or the ego. “[A]nd which you choose will join with you, and tell you what to do.” Thus, the question that we should ask ourselves is “What is it for?” This question lets us know with whom we are making our decisions.
Today’s workbook lesson begins with a prayer of surrender of our thoughts and our acts and our will. Surrendering our thoughts and actions to Inner Wisdom requires trust. We have to trust in wisdom beyond our own so that our personal desires and fears are no longer our guide for decision making. Trusting means that you choose not to be the judge of what you do and you choose not to judge the situations you find yourself in or even the response that you will have. True surrender transcends the personality-mind entirely.
We seek the guidance of the inner teacher by asking, “What am I to do now?” Then we need to ask if we are following the intuition we receive or are we judging whether or not we want to follow. Awakening requires us to commit to following the guidance we receive. Making exceptions to following guidance only prolongs our suffering and makes it difficult to disengage from our misdirected goals.
Yesterday we recommitted to following the instructions laid out by one of our external teachers, A Course in Miracles Workbook for Students. Today, we recommit to seeking guidance from the inner teacher, and we commit to follow the guidance we receive.
