The Holy Meeting Place

If you’re having trouble warming to the ABSOLUTE TRUTH that the world is a school for salvation, then try thinking of earthly life as a game of choices aided by the instructive symbols all around us. Growing up in the 1960s, I sometimes played “The Game of Life,” a popular board game originally created in 1860 by Milton Bradley. The game simulates our travels through life, from college to retirement, with jobs, marriage, and possible children along the way. The original version, called “The Checkered Game of Life,” was popular in America during the Victorian era. In the modernized mid-century version, re-released in 1960, players drove little plastic cars around the board. They, their spouses, and their children were represented by tiny pegs that fit inside the car. The one who got to the end first won the game, despite having learned almost nothing from the experience.

“The Game of Life” depicts the ego’s version of our purpose here: constructing a “special” or “individual” identity in accord with the Laws of Chaos. We go to school, get a job, and perhaps buy a house, get married, and/or have children. Eventually, if we’re lucky, we retire from working, retain our good health, and maintain a comfortable level of income into old age. In the end, we die and, depending on our beliefs, will go to either “Heaven” or “hell.” For better or worse, we will spend the rest of eternity reaping what we sowed in that single lifetime.

Is it any wonder so many people in the world suffer from depression?

Is this, in fact, all there is to life on earth? Sat-an (a Sanskrit word meaning not of God, not Christ, or not part of Holy Creation) would have us believe that it is, and that to win “The Game of Life” we should focus our attention on acquiring the things it deems valuable: education, money, mortal love, family, pleasure, prestige, popularity, and perhaps even a non-threatening relationship with God. We might, for example, accept Jesus as our “savior,” go to church, pray, read the Bible, and refrain from overindulging in “vices,” erroneously believing these behaviors will gain us entrance into “Heaven” in the end.

When we play “The Game of Life” at this level of understanding, we are wasting our time, because, at the end, we’ve gained nothing. If we’ve been “good” we won’t go to “Heaven,” nor will we go to “hell” if we’ve been “bad” or “sinful.” Contrary to what most organized religions teach, “Heaven” and “hell” aren’t places we “go”—or physical destinations at all. Rather, both are states of mind we choose between in the dream of separation. If we choose to stay asleep, by listening to the serpent’s lies, we live in hell. If we choose to awaken, by listening to the Holy Spirit’s Voice for Truth, our awareness of Heaven and/or the Kingdom of God is restored to us through the Atonement process.

It’s that simple.

Properly understood, life on earth is a different kind of game. It is, in fact, a multi-dimensional, virtual-reality learning simulator for our seemingly separated Souls. It’s a game not of chance, but of choices. Those who choose wisely remember Heaven sooner. Those who choose foolishly remain in the desert-nightmare for a longer stretch.

Hear this now, my sleeping brother: there is no fiery pit into which Souls are cast by their Loving Creator-Father to punish sin and wickedness. There are no pearly gates or Elysian Fields, either. We’re in hell RIGHT NOW, and will remain here as long as we CHOOSE to ignore the spiritual lessons life is meant to teach us. To enter the Kingdom of Heaven, where we live in our Right or “Righteous” Minds, we must accept the Truth that the world is a dream and seek to rise above the illusion. Not at the level of behavior or action, but at the level of thought.

We must, as Jesus puts it in the Gospel of John, “Be in the world, but not of the world.” We may be here in body, in other words, but not here in spirit or mind.

This much of John’s gospel is true, as are many other parts. Not all of it’s deceptive; but neither is it “the Truth, the whole Truth, and nothing but the Truth,” as generally translated and interpreted by unilluminated preachers. Nor are the gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, for that matter. They were chosen, as I’ve explained, precisely because they omitted Christ’s imperative teachings about seeking the Kingdom of Heaven within—at the level of mind, thought and/or spirit.

To help you understand how “The Game of Life” is supposed to be played, I’ve devised a parallel model called “Escape from Perdition.” The goal of the game, as the name implies, is to escape the illusion, not to make ourselves more comfortable within it.

We play the game to perfect ourselves, so that we can go home to God—or rather, awaken to the Truth that we are and shall always remain God’s One Holy Son, who, in the world of form, wrongly perceives himself as separate minds and bodies.

The Levels of Play

We play Escape from Perdition not in three dimensions, but in at least nine, as I’ll explain one of these days. To win, we have to “go back to the beginning.” To do this, we must 1) stop listening to the ego’s lies, 2) give up all the attachments that chain us to the virtual environment the Ego Mind created, maintains, and imprisons us within, and 3) correct or forgive all our perceptual errors until we uncover and reverse the “original error” of concupiscence — a word meaning “the desire for self-creation.”

Simple, right?

In theory, yes. In practice, not so much.

Our Souls enter “Escape from Perdition” at Level Zero. At this lowest or most inverted level of perception, we have zero spiritual awareness. We operate in complete darkness because we buy into the Ego Mind’s illusion wholeheartedly. We see only physical reality, perceive ourselves and others as separate bodies with separate interests, and are focused on physical survival and self-preservation. We see others as competition for limited resources. We fear death and believe anger and attack are justified responses to perceived threats to our safety, well-being, possessions, or “territory.” To empower ourselves, we might form alliances in the form of like-minded groups, tribes, or gangs. 

At this level of play we use and abuse other people to get what we want or think we “need” from them. When others have outlived their usefulness to us, or fail to meet our egoic expectations, we punish, blame, or cast them aside. We believe the “bad” things that happen to us are beyond our control, undeserved, and unfair. Thus, we fault other people, God, and/or “bad luck” for our self- manifested problems and failures.

On Level Zero, we see the world as cut-throat. We’re either a ruthless, blood-thirsty wolf or a helpless victim of wolf-like behavior. If we’re a wolf, we find it necessary and perfectly acceptable to cheat, steal, lie, engage in criminal activities, and even commit murder to “win.” We have no idea that what we perceive as “winning” is actually LOSING BIG, because we’ve thoroughly misconstrued the goal as well as the rules of play.

If we’re a victim, we whine, complain, and blame others for our misery. We take zero responsibility for what happens to us. We don’t see that we’re doing everything to ourselves by 1) radiating magnetic negativity into the world and 2) attacking ourselves with our own feelings of guilt, unworthiness, helplessness, despair, scarcity, sacrifice, separation, and self-hatred. 

Whether a wolf or a victim, our perception is wholly upside-down, ego-dictated, and completely insane.

At Level Zero we equate our personal happiness with acquiring wealth, power, possessions, prestige, mortal love, corporeal pleasures, and material comforts. We perceive other people mainly as the means to these ends. They’re either opponents to be vanquished or objects from which to gain emotional support or to gratify our desires. We see the world as competitive and the good things it offers as limited commodities to be greedily hoarded and vigilantly defended.

If you recognize yourself in the above descriptions, you’re not alone. Most people in the world today operate at Level Zero—not surprisingly, since this is the level of “unreality” the Ego Mind perpetuates. We’ll talk about how the Evil One craftily maintains the dark illusion in upcoming posts.

In the teachings of Theosophy, Level Zero is the probationary path below the first initiation of “spiritual birth.” In Hinduism, this is the “mode of being” known as Tamas–a Sanskrit word meaning “darkness.” At this level, we operate outside the Temple of the Holy Spirit in the dark void of spiritual denial, “untouchable” by the Holy Helpers eager to lend their support.

This is, incidentally, the true meaning of the Sanskrit word Dalits, the name assigned to the historically marginalized caste of people in India, based on a completely upside-down interpretation of a teaching in the Rig Veda (Hinduism’s oldest and most sacred scriptural text). The word Dalits is a compound of the syllables da (a word with many meanings, including “giving,” “fear,” and “sound”) and lit (meaning “providing artificial light”). So, Dalits describes those living in the darkness produced by the Voice of Fear, falsely perceiving the worldly light they see as real. Like sunlight, for example, which Sat-an (the Alien Mind apart from Holy Creation) uses to support the illusion.

Eventually, Level Zero players will either obtain everything they desire and still be dissatisfied, repeatedly crash-and-burn, or both. However they arrive at the moment of reckoning, they must choose spiritual over ego goals before moving to Level One. 

Only when players exercise their free-will choice to seek “another way” to live in the world, can the game’s helpful forces work on their behalf. At Level One, players begin to shop around for a spiritual path and may jump around among several before they find one that feels “right” to them. It will still be some time, however, before they accept that the purpose of the game is to escape the illusion.

At Level One, players enter the first quadrant of the Temple. That quadrant is called DHARMA in Hinduism, because it is on this first leg of the journey that our Souls begin the circle-walk back to Eden, so to speak.

In Hindu teachings, the First Quadrant of the Circle is guarded by Bhumi, a significant goddess representing the earth or, rather, the earth-bound Soul (Lakshmi). In the lore, she is typically portrayed as a supplicant, oppressed by evil forces, demons, or corrupt rulers. These stories frequently depict her appealing to Vishnu, the Holy Spirit, for assistance. In response, Vishnu intervenes to alleviate her distress by taking the form of ten different avatars representing, I believe, the ten sephirot or emanations lighting the Path of the Return (to use Cours terminology) or Path of the Flaming Sword (in Jewish mysticism).

At Level One, we typically seek spiritual guidance through external means, like going to church or participating in ritualistic worship practices. Not until we consistently turn within (to Vishnu) for answers do we advance to Level Two, the second leg of ARTHA or Holy Purpose. To reach this level of play, we must hear the Holy Spirit’s vibratory “voice” or “song” (the ever-present echo of the Om vibration) and choose to take our part in the Cosmic Choir forming the Holy Circle of Atonement/Forgiveness. Rightly understood, the Om vibration IS what Jesus identifies as “the Atonement” in the Course. Ergo, we must receive it for ourselves (hear the sound) before we can give it to others (by meditating on the Holy Name of Om). Ego thinking will still shadow our perception at Level Two, however, until we allow the Voice for Truth to burn away ALL the dark veils of inverted perception Satan uses to block the Truth of our Being.

In Hindu cosmogony, the second quadrant is protected by Vayu, who is said to be the god of wind. Vayu is, in fact, the wind or breath of God, making him the Indian equivalent of Ruach in the Hebrew Bible. The second aspect of Lakshmi, meanwhile, is called Satyabhama, a Sanskrit name meaning “the Light of Truth,” more or less

Before advancing to Level Three, we must achieve “resurrection” through “ego death” by overcoming the fear of physical death. Jesus explains very clearly what “death” represents in the following passages from Workbook Lesson 163 (There is no death. The Son of God is free).

Death is a thought that takes on many forms, often unrecognized. It may appear as sadness, fear, anxiety or doubt; as anger, faithlessness and lack of trust; concern for bodies, envy, and all forms in which the wish to be as you are not may come to tempt you. All such thoughts are but reflections of the worshipping of death as savior and as giver of release.

Embodiment of fear, the host of sin, god of the guilty and the lord of all illusions and deceptions, does the thought of death seem mighty. For it seems to hold all living things within its withered hand; all hopes and wishes in its blighting grasp; all goals perceived but in its sightless eyes. The frail, the helpless and the sick bow down before its image, thinking it alone is real, inevitable, worthy of their trust. For it alone will surely come.

All things but death are seen to be unsure, too quickly lost however hard to gain, uncertain in their outcome, apt to fail the hopes they once engendered, and to leave the taste of dust and ashes in their wake, in place of aspirations and of dreams. But death is counted on. For it will come with certain footsteps when the time has come for its arrival. It will never fail to take all life as hostage to itself. 

When Jesus said, during his earthly ministry, that he came to teach us to overcome death through resurrection, this is what he meant. As usual, he was speaking metaphorically. He meant he came to teach us to overcome the false belief in death, which takes many forms, through the “resurrection” or “reawakening” of our Higher Selves or Souls.

We achieve “resurrection” by consistently articulating and demonstrating Spiritual Truth through, to borrow Buddhist terminology, Right Living (Dharma), Right Understanding (Artha), and Right Thought (Kama or True Perception). On this leg of the circle-journey, we awaken to our Reality as One Spirit. Once this is accomplished, we rightfully become “Teachers of God” or Self-Realized or Soul-Realized, but still remain vulnerable to Ego Mind corruption. We must be vigilant, therefore, to prevent the “Evil One” from dragging us back down to the lower levels of play.

In Hinduism, the third quadrant is called Kama, a word generally defined as “desire” or “lust.” What Kama actually represents is the Love of God pouring forth from the fountain, wellspring, or “cistern of love” — all of which are mentioned many times in the Bible and the Rig Veda (as we’ll see). That Divine Love flows down from the third quadrant — the Land of the Living God, where our Souls dwell within the dreamscape. The guardian of the Third Quadrant is Ishana, the face of Elohim-Sadashiva personified as Shiva, who is revered in Hinduism as the “destroyer” (of illusion, obviously, since Holy Creation is indestructible) as well as the transcendent power of Brahman (God). Ishana/Shiva is, therefore, the power of Grace, which frees our Souls through the forgiveness that restore at-one-ment.

Ishana is typically identified as the “guardian” of the northeast direction — the area, land, or realm between the northern and eastern cardinal directions, which forms the third quadrant (when rightly interpreted). Adi Laksmi, the primordial or original form of the Soul, is associated with this leg of the journey. This makes perfect sense, given that this is the level of Soul or Atman Realization, which occurs after Ego death.

Adi Lakshmi or, oftentimes, Dhyana Lakshmi is said to aid the seeker in reaching their source–the Soul, Atman, or Adam. She is believed to proffer dhyana, which is described as “a meditative state of absolute silence, bliss, and peace.” And that explains why this aspect of the Soul-goddess is said to further the quest for spiritual (not material!) wealth and well-being.

It also explains the Biblical command to “Be still and know that I am (is) God.”

Not until we reopen the Soul’s “Spiritual Eye”—do we advance to Level Four (Moksha, enlightenment, or Christ-Realization). When we reach this level, we see the Real World through “spiritual vision,” “spiritual sight,” Christ’s Vision, or “True Perception.” At this stage, we are “in the world, but no longer of it.”

At Level Four, we operate as “Christs,” “Saviors,” “healers,” “Advanced Teachers of God,” or “miracle-workers.” At this stage, we must fulfill the special purpose assigned to us in God’s Plan for Salvation. At Level Four—the level at which Jesus lived as “the Christ”—we recognize our oneness in the Christ Self, radiate the healing power of Grace, think only the Holy Spirit’s thoughts and speak only His Truths. We have no personal identities or thoughts apart from the Christ Mind. Our minds and Christ’s are wholly yoked or joined in the Golden Circle representing the Wholeness of Holy Creation.

The guardian of the fourth quadrant (or southeast direction) is Agni, who is commonly misidentified as the Hindu God of Fire. In actuality, Agni represents the Fire of God, the eternal flame arising from the Sacred Heart of Christ. That flame or fire represents the Presence of God (in the dream-realm), which makes our resurrection or “Escape from Perdition” possible.

This is the level of awareness for which Christ’s Course and other forms of the “universal curriculum for awakening” prepares us. At Level Four, we are “enlightened,” having learned what we came here to learn, as Jesus confirms in the following passage from his Manual for Teachers.

Here the curriculum ends. From here on, no directions are needed. Vision is wholly corrected and mistakes undone. Attack is meaningless and peace has come. The goal of the curriculum has been achieved. Thoughts turn to Heaven and away from hell. All longings are satisfied, for what remains unanswered or incomplete? The last illusion spreads across the world, forgiving all things and replacing all attack. The whole reversal is accomplished. Nothing is left to contradict the Word of God. There is no opposition to the truth. And now the truth can come at last. How quickly will it come as it is asked to enter and envelop such a world!”

The fourth aspect of Laksmi is called Santana (eternal) Lakshmi or, sometimes, Gaja Lakshmi. Though commonly defined as “elephant,” gaja actually means born from, arising from, or produced by “ga.” What is “ga”? The sacred syllable or guru-word, which is Om.

Ergo, the Christ Self is reborn in us through the Om vibration, as I keep saying, as do all true scriptural texts. And, just for the record, OM is a marriage of two letters with shorthand meaning in Sanskrit. O represents the Name of God (Brahman, not Brahma), while M means “time.’ So, Om literally translates as “the Name of God in time,” just as YHWH actually means “the Name of God in Israel” (the realm of the Circle-Journey of At-one-ment).

So, don’t believe the charlatans who claim God has no name. God has no name in Heaven, but here, in the dream of time, his Holy Name is our sacred inheritance, as Course-Jesus explains. God, in fact, has many names. Om, Elohim, Amen, Jesus Christ, and Allah are but a few examples of what is essentially the vibration of God’s Thoughts rippling across the Cosmic Ocean underneath the illusion of matter. And that’s why YHWH can’t be spoken.

As I’ve explained.

Ergo, YHWH and OM are synonymous representational terms for the Name of God. So, put that in your pipe and smoke it. Or, better yet, inhale it deeply to share its healing power with others.

We move to Level Five (Knowledge or Super Consciousness) when God lifts us out of the dream-world entirely. When this happens, Christ tells us, “the body will not be long maintained.” Having achieved “perfection” (thinking like God again), our Souls awaken in Heaven to help with the Atonement Plan from the Celestial Planes (as Ascended Masters or the Teachers of Teachers, presumably).

Are you still with me?

How the game is wired

I hope so, because now that I’ve covered the levels of play, we’re going to explore how our Souls operate within the learning simulator. The first thing you need to know is that the body isn’t who you are—it’s only the gaming suit through which you perceive the material illusion. In the game, our personal identities are the “characters” our Souls have chosen to play this time around to improve their karmic records, learn their forgiveness lessons, and move up the levels.

Before we’re done, we’ll each have played thousands of roles from different perspectives. In one role, we might be rich and live in a mansion in Beverly Hills; in another, we might be poor and live in a tin shack in India. Likewise, we’ll all play the counter-point parts of male and female, majority and minority, liberal and conservative, royal and commoner, oppressor and oppressed, soldier and pacifist, renowned and obscure, and abuser and abused. Back-and-forth we’ll bounce in the game, like the proverbial ping-pong ball, until we realize that all the differences we perceive aren’t, in fact, REAL. Through this process, we also learn that all perceived forms of “injustice” and/or “unfairness” are simply two sides of the same counterfeit coin. 

In Celestial Reality there are no opposites because there can be no conflict or “sides” of any kind in oneness. Stripping away the perception of opposites is, therefore, a crucial step on the ladder to awakening, as Course-Jesus repeatedly explains.

And on that note, let’s bring the familiar Chinese symbol known as “yin-yang” into the discussion. The Bing co-pilot tells us (erroneously) that “Yin and yang is a fundamental concept in Chinese philosophy representing the duality of nature, where opposite forces are interconnected and interdepen-dent, creating balance and harmony in the universe.”

According to ancient Chinese teachings predating the I Ching, yin and yang represent the “unyielding” or eternal creations of God (Sat) and the “yielding” or ever-changing miscreations of the Ego Mind (Sat-an). As Jesus explains in the Course, only the yin or eternal and unchanging things of God are REAL and TRUE. We must, therefore, withdraw our belief-investment in the “yang” or “unreal” things we falsely perceive to escape the delusion of DUALISTIC perception.

Makes sense, right?

Eventually, we start to see that everything within the game-scape is symbolic— and that many of those symbols are helpful learning aids. Below are a few examples, some of which we’ve already covered.

Some of these symbols are commonly misidentified. Rather than the crucifixion of Jesus, the cross represents the escape from the limiting ego-body self-concept that imprisons our Souls in Hell or Perdition; the Menorah represents the Lamp of God or Inner Instrument through which our Souls make the Journey; and the Chi Rho represents the Name of God as Jesus Christ, which powers the Circle-Journey.

While we’re clearing up common misnomers, let me say a few words about the Sanskrit term pranava (the Om, basically). The word is a compound of prana and va. Although commonly misidentified as the breath of the body, prana actually refers to the Breath of Life, Breath of God, or Cosmic Breath, which connects us eternally to God, Christ, and each other in the dream. Va, meanwhile, is shorthand for vahana, a word meaning “vehicle” or “transport,” in essence. So, pranava — the Om vibration or Family NAME of Creation’s indivisible Wholeness — is the vehicle for God’s Breath, which the Bible calls Ruach and the Vedas call Vayu.

Got it? Good.

It’s important to get it right, because these symbols ACT are guiding lights reminding our Souls why they’re here. Generally, they symbolize the separation, the errors that brought it about, and the thinking we must correct to end the dream.

Let’s get back to my game allegory. As I’ve explained, the world is a learning simulator. What we perceive through our senses reflects our thoughts and beliefs. We project those thoughts onto the neutral screen of the world. The movie we see is the movie we made through right or wrong perception. Because all thought is reciprocating under the Rule of Love. Our projections take form “out there” in the dream before returning to us as symbols reflecting the error.

Our thoughts and beliefs are the cause; what we experience is their effects. If we don’t like what we see, we have to change the movie—not on the screen, but on the projector—by choosing error-correcting forgiveness over inverted ego reasoning. Changing what we made at the level of form is as futile—and completely insane—as trying to change what’s playing in a cinema by asking the actors on the screen to change their scripts.

We change the movie by scraping away the layers of fear, guilt, judgment, blame, desire, hatred, ignorance, unkindness, and bigotry that block the Soul’s memory of Its True Self and God. Changing our behavior isn’t enough, because what we do is driven by what we think.

If we do good things, but still think evil thoughts, we’ll sail through life in the same barnacle-crusted boat. We’ll still project the movie of our lives through the grimy lens of ego misperception. If we want more peace in the world, we must think peace, be peace, and give peace to others in the Holy Circle of Om. If we want more love, we must think love, be love, and give love to others in that same endless circle. 

It’s that simple.

This is what Jesus teaches in A Course in Miracles. It’s also what he preached during his earthly ministry. These truths are in the canonical gospels; they’ve simply been misinterpreted, misunderstood, twisted, and mistranslated so many times that their original meaning is hidden from those lacking spiritual illumination.

In the Sermon on the Mount (a mini-sayings gospel within the larger narrative ones), Jesus said, “You are the light of the world. You cannot hide a city that has been built upon a mountain. And they do not light a lamp and set it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all those who are in the house. Thus your light will shine before the children of men that they may see your good works, and may glorify your Father who is in Heaven.”   

 When Christ said “see your good works,” he didn’t mean the good deeds we do to make others beholden, gain recognition and gratitude, or feel better about ourselves. He means the good we do in the world by letting the Light of God (OM) shine through us into the sleeping minds of our brothers.

Jesus made his meaning crystal-clear in Matthew 6:2 when he said to his disciples, “Be careful not to perform your righteous acts before men to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in Heaven. So when you give to the needy, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. Truly I tell you, they already have their full reward. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.”

To state it more plainly, we shouldn’t attach ego motives (the left hand) to our spirit-inspired gifts of charity (the right hand) or they will do nothing to help our Soul reawaken to its perfection. The “full reward” the hypocrites received is the praise and recognition they sought by giving the gift. Such selfishly motivated gifts—and their rewards—gain us nothing in the spiritual scheme of things.

Later, in Matthew 5, Jesus says: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Show kindness to your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and bless the one who curses you, and do what is beautiful to the one who hates you, and pray over those who take you by force and persecute you. So that you will become the children of your Father who is in Heaven, for his sun rises on the good and upon the evil and his rain descends on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what benefit is it to you? Behold, do not even the Tax Collectors do the same thing? And if you pray for the peace of your brethren only, what excellent thing are you doing? Behold, are not even the Tax Collectors doing the same thing? Be therefore perfect, just as your Father who is in Heaven is perfect.”

God’s sun is the solar logos — the radiant word that is Elohim, shining within all living beings. His rain is the Living Water of Grace — the only alms worth giving to others. And we give those alms by listening in meditation– NOT at the level of light-blocking matter. Lakshmi shows us this in all her aspects — and Mohammed also tells us this in the Holy Qu’ran, as the meme below demonstrates.

In the Course, Jesus expresses the same ideas. We become “perfect” by thinking like God, who sees all of His “children” or Souls as one. Until we also see ourselves and our brothers as one Soul with the shared purpose of reawakening, we remain in the game. In the meantime, we simply see the same symbolic story repeating on a cyclical background. Satan’s sun rises and sets each day; the moon cycles through its phases every month; and the seasons change on the same schedule year after year. Everything that lives eventually dies, and from the resultant decay, “life” APPEARS to spring anew.

Everything in perceptual unreality eventually ends. Nothing here, apart from our Souls, the Holy Spirit, and His GreaT Rays, is permanent, or has the least value in Celestial Reality. Nothing here exists in harmony or oneness. Those who see God in nature are deceived by the illusion. Far from reflecting “Creation,” the natural world symbolizes separation and the struggle for survival. We can’t live a single day without killing something in the dog-eat-dog game-scape Sat-an created to deceive God’s Son.

Nature only appears miraculous until we examine its workings more closely—and see past the façade of “natural beauty.” Don’t be fooled, my sleeping brother. Nature doesn’t reflect Divine Order in any way, shape, or form (pun intended); it represents upside-down perceptual miscreation. God had nothing to do with it because He only creates perfect and eternal thought or spirit. And change, cycles, death, destruction, imperfection, and decay are NOT in God’s wheel-house.

Let me repeat; The only Real aspect of nature is the Light of Elohim, the Logos, shining within the lifeforms we perceive in nature.

In the so-called natural world, “life” begins with physical birth.

In Celestial Reality, Eternal Life began when God created the Sonship. Like everything God creates, that Life is perfect, unchangeable, holy, whole, and everlasting.

To state it in the plainest terms possible:

–When we choose to identify with the Soul, we choose Life.

–When we choose to identify with the Ego, we choose death.

Are you getting the picture? 

I hope so, because recognizing this Unassailable Truth is a major step toward winning the game. If it’s still not clear, let me break it down for you the way Jesus breaks it down in his course:

–Every perceived problem must be fixed at the level of thought (cause)

–No problem on earth can be fixed at the level of form (effect)

This includes poverty, global warming, pollution, racism, sexism, school shootings, hate crimes, political infighting, war, genocide, terrorism, cancer, COVID-19, and any other “problem” you can name. They’re all in our minds, my brother. We spread COVID not through germs, but by fearing it could hurt us—and then sharing that fear with other minds. COVID is, as it happens, a perfect example (symbol) of how the Ego Mind operates in the dream-world.

As always, the Holy Spirit used what Sat-an made in fear to advance the Atonement Plan.  Some of us wisely used the time to strengthen our spiritual practice and prepare for our future ministries. My students invariably complain to me that they don’t have time to meditate or do the Workbook lessons. COVID gave them that time, by freeing them from their usual worldly distractions. Did they use that “gift” to step up their spiritual practice?

Did you?

I, for one, thought 2020 was a GREAT year, because I used the quarantine to study True Yoga, from which I learned the Name of God, and how to hear it.

If you’re still resisting the idea that we create the world we see with our thoughts, I advise you to meditate on one or more of the following Workbook exercises daily for at least seven days:

Lesson 15: My thoughts are images that I have made.

Lesson 31: I am not the victim of the world I see.

Lesson 32: I have invented the world I see.

Lesson 33: There is another way of looking at the world.

Lesson 79: Let me recognize the problem so it can be solved.

Thanks for listening. Hope you found my insights useful. Until we meet again, Om Hari Om.