10,11,12,del 3er

A Course of Love talked much of remembering. Now we must talk about forgetting. While nothing need be given up to enter the house of truth, or to encounter the truth, you must realize that while meaninglessness exists within your mind, you will be working still to replace it with meaning rather than allowing the meaning that exists in everything to be remembered or known. Thus are more practical lessons needed in regard to the life of the body that you now will let serve our cause of creating heaven on earth.

10.2 The first lesson is offered as an exercise in forgetting. As often as is possible within your daily life, I ask you to forget as much of what you have learned as you are able.

10.3 The first thing I ask you to forget is your need to find a place where blame can be placed. You who have been waiting to get to the “hard part” of this course of study may find it here. The idea of blame is incongruous with the idea of a benevolent creator and a benevolent creation and as such is the only blasphemy. To blame yourself is as senseless as blaming others and your inclination to place blame upon yourself must be given up. When it is said that you are the cause, it is not meant that you are to blame for anything. Although many a child has been blamed for his or her failure to learn, blaming yourself is as uncalled for as is blaming a child for lessons yet to be learned.

10.4 Taking away the idea of placing blame will change your thought processes beyond your wildest imagining. You will be
surprised at how many times you will recognize blame where before you saw it not, just as in the beginning, you came to recognize fears that you previously hadn’t seen as fears. And, just as when you recognize what it is you fear you can bring those concerns to love, you can now do so with blame. All you need do is catch yourself in the act of placing blame and say to yourself, “I was placing blame again and I choose to do so no longer.” You need not spend any more time with blame than this and I offer you no word or sentiment to replace it. I ask you simply to take the thought of it from your mind as quickly as it enters.

10.5 You would find this easier if a replacement were offered, for ridding your mind of blame will leave an empty space you will long to fill. This act of consciously choosing not to place blame will short-circuit the many thoughts that you would attach to this idea, thoughts that have formed a chain-reaction of situations and events, feelings and behaviors that you had no realization were birthed from the idea of blame. Although I offer it not as a replacement, what you will find will come in the place of blame is an idea of acceptance of what is, an idea that is needed now.

10.6 Acceptance of what is, is acceptance that whatever is happening in the present moment is a gift and a lesson. What comes as a lesson may not seem like a gift, but all lessons are gifts. While some of these lessons may come in forms that make them seem like lessons of old, they will not be repeats of lessons that have come before. They will not be lessons that you find difficult or distressing if you accept them as lessons and realize that all lessons are gifts. What you have struggled to learn in the past you have struggled with only because you did not realize the nature of the situation as a lesson or recognize that all lessons are gifts.

10.7 This relates to our exercise in forgetting for you must forget the ways in which you have formerly reacted to every situation. Not one situation coming to you now will be a repeat of the past. How can it be, when the past was lived in the house of illusion and the present is lived in the house of truth? Being cognizant of this is the only way that the simultaneous learning and unlearning that was spoken of earlier will be able to be realized. You have passed through your time of unlearning what the past but seemed to teach you. Now, while life may seem much unchanged in its outward appearance, it is up to you to become aware of the total change that has, in truth, taken place.

10.8 Along with forgetting there is another practice that will help you to become aware of this change. While much the same as forgetting, it will seem to have a different process in practice. This is the practice of ceasing to listen to the voice of the ego. While the ego is gone, many of its messages remain within your thoughts like echoes of a former time. These thoughts are remembered messages and so must, like all the rest, be forgotten. The process of forgetting these thought patterns will be only slightly different from forgetting your former reactions to people and situations, and much like forgetting to place blame.

10.9 The first step in being able to forget such thoughts is in recognizing them as separate and distinct from the thoughts of your right mind or Christ-mind. This will be easy because the thoughts of the ego-mind were always harsh with you or with others. The Christ-mind and the thoughts that come from the voice of the Christ-mind will be gentle. The thoughts of the ego-mind will come as disguises to certainty. Given just a little practice, these disguises will be easily seen through and the uncertainty behind them revealed. Thoughts of the Christ-mind will hold a certainty that cannot be disguised. Remember that all doubt is doubt about yourself. You are no longer called to doubt yourself for your Self is now your Christ-Self.

10.10 You will feel for a while as if constant certainty is impossible. This feeling will remain only as long as you remember your past uncertainty. Uncertainty, like the rest of the ego’s thought system, was learned. Your true Self has no cause for uncertainty. Thus you are called to forget the uncertainty of the past.

10.11 While these may seem like remedial lessons, they are not. You are no longer called to a time of uncertainty to learn through contrast the lessons of certainty. Realize that this is how you have learned in the past and that all that is from the past is what you are being called to forget. When uncertainty arises, you need but remind yourself that the time for uncertainty is past. Uncertainty will not now come to teach you lessons you have already learned but will only visit you as an echo from the past. It is a habit, a pattern of the old thought system. All you must do is not listen to it. Its voice will not be gentle or full of love. Its voice will hold the unmistakable edge of fear.

10.12 Remember that, while gentle, these are and will be practical lessons that simply come to show you a new way of living, the way of living in the house of truth. You will not need to learn a foreign language to dwell in this new house, but you will need to learn what will at first seem to you a foreign thought system. This thought system recognizes no fear nor judgment, no uncertainty nor doubt, no contrast and no division. It is the thought system of unity. It is your true thought system and will be easily remembered once you begin to let it automatically replace the old.

10.13 Think of this for a moment as you would a learned language. If you learned Spanish as a child and then learned and spoke English for many years, you might believe your Spanish to be forgotten. Yet if you were to return to a dwelling where those within it spoke only Spanish, soon your knowledge of Spanish would return to you. For a short while you would have two languages constantly running through your mind and you would be translating one into the other. But eventually, if this situation went on for many years, you might think you had forgotten your ability to understand English.

10.14 What we are doing now is much like translating the learned thought system of the ego into the thought system of the Christ-Self that you but think you have forgotten. As you dwell in the house of truth, if you do not resist unlearning the ego thought system, the thought system of your true Self will quite simply return to your memory. You will soon forget the thought system of the ego-self even though, when encountering those who still use that thought system, you will be able to communicate with them. The ease with which you communicate with them will, however, diminish over time, and you will find yourself continuously teaching the language if you will, of the new thought system, for you will have no desire to communicate with anything less.

10.15 You will find that your new language will gather people to you in much the way people will gravitate toward beautiful music. Many will be eager to learn what you have remembered because they will realize that the memory of this language also exists within them. It will come naturally to you to welcome these back to the common language of the mind and heart joined in unity. You will desire more than anything for everyone you encounter to share this remembered language. Some, however, will be resistant.

10.16 This is why we have called these “lessons in forgetting” practical lessons for the life of the body. They are lessons that will soon be translated in another way. These lessons that will enter your mind and heart will, of necessity, need to be translated into the language of the body. While your human form remains, you will be dwelling among those in human form. While the house of illusion still exists, you will continue to encounter those who exist within it. While you continue to encounter those who exist in the house of illusion, you will continue to encounter temptations of the human experience. These are what we will now address.
chapter 11
the Temptations of the Human Experience


11.1 Consciousness is a state of awareness. The statement “I am” is a statement of awareness. It has been seen as a statement of awareness of the self. Those existing within the house of illusion are aware of the self, but are unaware that the self of illusion, the self that exists in illusion, is an illusionary self. This could be further stated as those who exist in the house of illusion are aware of the personal self alone and believe the personal self to be who they are. Further, they believe the personal self to be the truth of the statement, “I am.”

11.2 Those existing within the house of truth also feel an awareness of self. Without necessarily being able to put it into words, they no longer feel the statement of “I am” as a statement of the personal self or the self alone. For those existing in the house of truth, “I am” has become something larger, an encompassing recognition of the unity of all things with which the Self co-exists in truth and peace and love.

11.3 These words, truth and peace and love, are interchangeable in the house of truth as their meaning there is the same. These words, like the words house of truth represent an awareness of a new reality, a new dwelling place.

11.4 The word house as used in the house of truth does not represent a structure but a dwelling place. The word house as used in the house of illusion does represent a structure. The house of illusion is a construction meant to shield the personal self from all that it would fear. The house of truth is the dwelling
place of those who no longer live in fear and who have no need for a structure of seeming protection.

11.5 The house of illusion is the stage on which the drama of the human experience has been acted out.

11.5 During the time I spent on earth I did not dwell in the house of illusion but in the house of truth. What this means is that I was aware of the truth and lived by the truth. I was aware of the Peace of God and lived within the Peace of God. I was aware of the Love of God and the love of God lived within me.

11.7 This is what you are now called to do:

11.8 Be aware that the love of God lives within you.
Live within the Peace of God.
Live by the truth.

11.9 This could be restated as you are love, you live in peace, you live by or in accord with the truth.

11.10 I have called the Kingdom of God the House of Truth rather than the House of Peace for a reason. What you are learning is no longer that the Kingdom of God or the House of Truth exists, but how to live within it. The question of how to live within it is best addressed by concentrating on living according to the truth.

11.11 While a lack of judgment has been stressed many times and we have adhered to the precept of not judging by denying any right or wrong, the difference between truth and illusion can no longer be denied. To realize the difference between truth and illusion is not to call one right and the other wrong but to simply recognize what they are. This is an important distinction that must be kept in mind as we proceed so that you are not tempted to judge those living in illusion or their reality. Their reality does not exist. Believing in the reality of illusion will never make it the truth.

11.12 Thus we begin to address the temptations of the human experience. Two are spoken of in tandem here. The temptation to judge and the temptation to accept the existence of a reality other than the truth.

11.13 If I can tell you in truth that you are no different than I am, then you must see that you cannot begin to think of yourself as different than your brothers and sisters. All exist in the house of truth. The house of illusion exists within the house of truth because it is where your brothers and sisters think they are. The house of illusion is not a hell to which anyone has been banished. It can at times be a chosen hell, just as it can at times, be a chosen heaven. Choice, and the awareness of the power of choice that exists within, is all that differentiates one from the other.

11.14 You must not, however, see your brothers and sisters within the house of illusion, but must see them where they truly are — within the house of truth. As soon as you would “see” the house of illusion, you would make it real, and with its reality, judgment would be upon you…not any judgment of God, but judgment of your own mind.

11.15 I remind you here that you are not being asked to see anything that is not the truth. This is why the word see is consciously used here and why we now refrain from use of the word perceive. Perception is gone as soon as you truly see.

11.16 You will, of course, continue to be aware that very few realize that they exist in the house of truth. You will, in truth, for quite some time, be striving to remain aware even that you have changed dwelling places. There is a reason for this time of varying degrees of awareness. As the old continues to help you to learn lessons of the new, you will be seeing how the lessons of the illusion can be useful in a new way. Never forget that what was made for your use can serve in a new way and produce a new outcome. Do not be afraid to use anything available within the house of illusion to promote the recognition of truth. Do not be afraid of the house of illusion at all. What illusion can frighten those who know the truth?

11.17 This first lesson on the temptations of the human experience comes in truth as a warning against righteousness. It comes to remind you, as you replace the thought system of illusion with the thought system of the truth, that having remembered the truth of who you are, you are called to forget the personal self who would find this cause for righteousness. You are not right and others wrong. This temptation will not long be with you, for once the old thought system is thoroughly translated to the new, such ideas as right and wrong will be no more. It is only for this transitional phase that this, and all such reminders regarding the temptations of the human experience, are necessary.
chapter 12
the Physical Self in the House of Truth


12.1 Consciousness is a state of awareness. The statement “I am” is a statement of awareness of consciousness. Awareness preceded the statement of “I am.” “I am” preceded the creation of the Self. The Self preceded the establishment of the personal self.

12.2 You exist within the time of consciousness of the personal self. Thus we begin our work with the personal self while also realizing that the personal self is a step in the chain of consciousness. The steps that came before that of the personal self did not come within time. The creation of time was simultaneous with the creation of the personal self. Because the steps that came before that of the personal self did not come within time, they are eternal; eternal levels of consciousness that still exist and have always existed.

12.3 Temptations of the human experience exist only in time. What we are about to do is move the human experience out of the realm of time. For this to happen, we must remove the temptations of the human experience of the personal self.

12.4 Matter and form are bound by time. Spirit is not. The house of truth cannot be bound by time and be a house of truth. How then can the personal self begin to realize the human experience outside of time? The answer is thus: by changing the consciousness of the personal self from a time-bound state of consciousness to an eternal state of consciousness. This change is the miracle. This miracle is the goal toward which we now work.
12.5 Realize that prior to this point our goal was returning to your awareness the truth of your identity. By changing our goal now, I am assuring you that you have become aware of the truth of your identity. The goal of this Course has been accomplished. Yet while your consciousness remains time-bound, your awareness is still limited. In order to remove the limits that continue to exist, we must remove all time-bound temptations.

12.6 These temptations are not temptations of the body. They may seem to be, but the body is neutral. All temptations originate in the mind and are but transferred to the body. Temptations do not originate from love. While some temptations will seem to be of love they are not.

12.7 As it dawns upon your once slumbering mind that change on a grand scale awaits, you will grow fearful if you do not realize that what is being proposed to you here is something completely new, something you have not even dreamed of. This state you have not even dared to dream of is a state in which only God’s laws of love exist, even within the realm of physicality. What this means is that all that in this human experience has come of love will be retained. All that will be lost is what has come of fear.

12.8 Let’s return a moment to the choice that was made for the human experience, the choice to express who you are in the realm of physicality. You were not “better” or more “right” before this choice was made than you are now. You made a choice consistent with the laws of creation and the steps of creation outlined above. From this choice, many experiences ensued. Some of these experiences were the result of fear, some the result of love. The choice to express who you are in physical terms was not a choice made of fear but made of love. A physical self is not inconsistent with the laws of God or of creation. It is simply a choice.
12.9 The life of the physical self became a life of suffering and strife only because the physical or personal self forgot that it exists in relationship and believed itself to be separate and alone. In its fear, it made an ego-self. Because the ego-self sprang from fear it was not consistent with the laws of love or of creation. Knowing it existed in a state inconsistent with the laws of God, it made of God a being to be feared, thus continuing and being unable to find release from the cycle of fear.

12.10 What would be a greater step in all of creation than a physical self able to choose to express the Self within the laws of love? A physical self able to express itself from within the house of truth in ways consistent with peace and love is the next step in creation, the rebirth of the Son of God known as the resurrection.

12.11 While this would seem to say that mistakes may occur within creation, remember that creation is about change and growth. There is no right or wrong within creation but there are stages of growth and change. Humankind is now passing through a tremendous stage of growth and change. Are you ready?