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I wish to ask you about what A Course in Miracles means by Holy Relationship. In one part of the book it discusses "entering the ark" together, and it almost sounds like you'll need an added specific person in order to awaken. Therefore, I think I approach each new person with the expectation that maybe THIS could possibly be the connection that reflects enlightenment if you ask me, and I for them! Am I taking this too literally? Or do you really need another to assist you awaken?
I appreciate your own time so much and many thanks for the help if you ask me and others. I many thanks and I thank God for you. Namaste.
David Hoffmeister: Thanks for the openness and your willingness to check deeply at what is underneath these topics and issues. A Course in Miracles teaches that the split mind contains both the situation (the ego) and the Solution (the Holy Spirit). When they're brought together, only One remains.
Your body and the planet are usually the focus of ego's perspective, for it seeks to make real problems and struggles in the world and to prevent the inner Healing Correction of the Holy Spirit teacher of teachers. The ego's distorted world is the item of identity confusion, an outpicturing of the belief that it's possible to make an identity which God didn't create. The ego is this identity problem and it was Answered or forgiven by the Holy Spirit the instant it seemed to arise. That one problem could possibly be described as an authority problem or a confusion in who's the writer of Reality. The mind that believes in the reality of the time-space cosmos has a get a grip on issue, for it believes that it can create itself. This ego mind also thinks it's in competition with God, although this really is pushed out of conscious awareness. This unconscious ego thought system is exposed in the A Course in Miracles Workbook lessons, and Lesson 13 contains a great example of this unveiling:
"A meaningless world engenders fear because I think I am in competition with God."
That is the start of training your head to forgive, for the focus is brought back to your head, back again to thinking, and taken away from your body and the world. Anorexia, weight issues, body image issues, and interpersonal relationship issues are examples of projection, of seeing the situation where it's not: in the world. The mind cannot tolerate the belief in a war with God, so this belief is pushed out of awareness. The deep-seated control issue this type of belief entails is then projected to your body and the world. Weight control, like any attempt to control the script or your body, is an attempt to control the past. The Holy Spirit teaches that days gone by can only be forgiven or released or regarded as false—not fixed or controlled or changed.
The same ego dynamic is underneath interpersonal relationship struggles of power and control, of wanting to repair or change an individual or a self-image. Personal relationships may seem to sail happily along for awhile, the make-believe self-concept IS the personal perspective and thus is obviously on shaky ground. Decisions are continuous. The Holy Spirit is just a decision. The ego is just a decision. Atonement is your choice that ends all decisions, an acceptance of the changelessness of Mind. The ego is your choice to think that your head could be separate from God. Once your head believed that it had separated and built this time-space world, this time-space world of bodies became its substitute identity, because it believed it had thrown away the Kingdom of Heaven. The world was created up as an alternative identity. The sleeping mind is split on your choice of identity. The Holy Spirit says, "This world is not Identity. This world is an illusion." And thus the Holy Spirit reminds your head constantly, "This world is not your Home. This world is not your Identity. This world is not real." As the mind is split it's hearing another voice (the ego) that's saying: "You've done it. You've separated from God. You'd better make the very best of it and find something of the planet to recognize with. You can never return for God will punish you."
Thought-form associations seem becoming a substitute identity. The ego mind seems to be identified with your body, with family, with environments that appear to surround it (i.e., I'm an American, Japanese, I'm male, I'm female, I'm from a rich family, from a poor family, I'm Catholic, Jewish, Protestant, etc.) Most of these are thought-form associations. And these seeming other persons and places surrounding the small personal self are part of this construction. The mind is extremely shaky about any of it small identity, this small self, this little me. So the small me is shaky, and it looks like other persons give the small me reality and importance (i.e., you're my son, my daughter, you're my boss, you're a loving father, etc.) and all the different items that these images appear to be telling this little me appear to be really important. Praise thus seems essential (i.e., you're an individual and you're a good one!).
Praise and acceptance from others SEEM to stabilize this very shaky thing (i.e., you're a good lover, you're a good provider, you're great with the children, you've an excellent intellect, you've this type of heart, you help serve so many others, you're a good team-player, on and on). This part of the self-concept says that you are an individual and you've most of these positive attributes that really allow you to an invaluable and worthy person, that produce you be noticeable above the crowd. You're not merely anyone—you're somebody special. The flip side is criticism, which directly reflects the shaky sense of self. Criticism will be: you're not as great as you believe you're, you're not this type of good team player, this type of good provider, so good in bed—everything which can be taken as insults to the personal self-concept). That's the flip side of the strokes. To this ego self-concept that believes both parties (the positive and negative) of thinking are real, the Holy Spirit is perceived as a good threat, for the Holy Spirit results in the ability of forgiveness or the realization that none of the tiny images perceived as separate have any reality.
When the criticism seems in the future, the ego attempts a substitution. It thinks, "I don't need this. I'll go elsewhere and start other relationships with people who will appreciate my talents and skills and abilities, appreciate my personhood. I will avoid those negative influences in the world and those negative people. I'll find another person or join a group where individuals are like-minded and forget about the remaining world. These new people will like me and stroke me and praise me." The attempt at substitution is an attempt to steadfastly keep up an expression of specialness, an expression of separation, an expression of individuality (a private mind with private thoughts). Those attempts are special love relationships. They seem to strengthen worth and value and to validate personhood. And they offer a false witness for clinging to the ego as identity. To the ego, past associations serve to give personhood some sense of stability and consistency and value. Yet, the Holy Spirit shows that past associations offer nothing of value, for these were produced by the ego to deny the facts of God's Love.
Holy relationship emphasizes and reflects Content (right-minded thinking) and posseses an awareness of the meaninglessness of form. As the ego's believed relationships will appear to be specific, yet each one of these will present a way to release the belief in specifics. Divine Mind is Abstract and Universal. Forgiveness could be the bridge to the remembrance of Christ and God, Divine Abstraction. Thus the Holy Spirit teaches in A Course in Miracles:
"When you meet anyone, remember it is just a holy encounter. As you see him you will dsicover yourself. As you treat him you will treat yourself. As you consider him you will consider yourself. Always remember this, for in him you will see yourself or lose yourself. Whenever two Sons of God meet, they're given another chance at salvation. Don't leave anyone without giving salvation to him and receiving it yourself. For I am always there with you, in remembrance of you.
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