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Lesson 249: ”Forgiveness ends all suffering and loss.”

Reframe: Forgiveness restores wholeness and releases pain.

Suggested Practice: 

From now on: 
Once in the morning and once in the evening for however many minutes feels sufficient. Then every hour remember/recite the idea for the day. 

Prayer For today: 
(feel free to swap out the wording to whatever resonates with you best)

“Father, we would return our minds to You. ²We have betrayed them, held them in a vise of bitterness, and frightened them with thoughts of violence and death. ³Now would we rest again in You, as You created us.” (ACIM, W-249.2:1-3)

OR… “Give my mind a rest.”

For Lessons 241-250: What is the World? is the theme. Read the whole article here.
”The world is false perception. ²It is born of error, and it has not left its source. … The world was made as an attack on God. ²It symbolizes fear. ³And what is fear except love’s absence? … ⁵Yet everything that they report is but illusion which is kept apart from truth. … As sight was made to lead away from truth, it can be redirected. ²Sounds become the call for God, and all perception can be given a new purpose by the One Whom God appointed Savior to the world [that’s us]. ³Follow His light…Hear His Voice…let Him give you peace and certainty…⁴We must save the world.

From the PART II Introduction: Read the whole introduction here.

“Words will mean little now. ²We use them but as guides on which we do not now depend. ³For now we seek direct experience of truth alone. ⁴The lessons that remain are merely introductions to the times in which we leave the world of pain, and go to enter peace. ⁵Now we begin to reach the goal this course has set, and find the end toward which our practicing was always geared.” (ACIM, W-pII.in.1:1-5)

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Message

From the Lesson:

“Forgiveness paints a picture of a world where suffering is over, loss becomes impossible and anger makes no sense. ²Attack is gone, and madness has an end. ³What suffering is now conceivable? ⁴What loss can be sustained? ⁵The world becomes a place of joy, abundance, charity and endless giving. ⁶It is now so like to Heaven that it quickly is transformed into the light that it reflects. ⁷And so the journey which the Son of God began has ended in the light from which he came.(ACIM, W-249.1:1-7)

That’s all wonderful, but how, you may ask, do we get there? How to we forgive someone or a situation we’ve determined is unforgivable? Well, first we have to back up a bit to when we declared that this person or situation is unforgivable. Most of the time, and I know this to be true for me, we were unaware that we made that decision. We were probably operating on automatic pilot and just reacted without giving ourselves a moment to fully assess the situation or person.

I’m reminded of a major argument I had with my father. He’d gone into one of his long-winded rant-rages because I had mis-interpreted some driving directions which meant we missed a turn. I really wanted to maintain my peace. Not wanting to get into with him, I just kept telling myself “it’s just words”, “he’ll calm down if I just stay quiet”, “breathe”, “don’t react”…“don’t react”… “don’t react”. I don’t remember exactly what was said that broke the last straw, but I snapped and lost my peace. It was ugly for me—sobbing, suffering, and feeling terribly wounded. Just writing about it now, still gets me emotional—this happened 16 years ago.

When we arrived at our destination, he acted is normal happy-go-lucky self with the people we were meeting for dinner—as if nothing had happened. I was devastated and had to retreat to the ladies room where a couple of my friends helped console me. I was suffering.

Somewhere along the line, I made the decision to be angry with him and refused to forgive him for what he did—sadly, this wasn’t the first or the last time he’s done this. During the 90-minute ride home, I maintained my silent unforgiving self, while he tried to strike up a conversation or make funny comments about something he just saw.

That night, knowing that I didn’t want to feel this way anymore but not knowing how to fix it, I prayed to God/Universe/Source/Holy Spirit asking that they help me see this differently because I don’t see a way out of this. With that I was able to go to sleep.

The next morning as I was starting to wake up, I heard this voice in my head say “Does a bear reveal itself on the bright side?” What would seem like an odd thing to say for most people, made perfect sense to me in that instant. And in that instant, much of my anger and locked-in unforgiving-ness lost its grip on me. So much so that I was able to calmly face him and have a lovely breakfast with him, where he actually shared some of his WWII experiences that he rarely talked about.

I share that story to show both ego and Divine minds in action. The ego mind ruled the fear and rage for both of us. Divine mind helped me recognize this and ask for help in seeing it differently, trusting I would get an answer. When I got mine, my suffering and loss of peace ended.

What “Does a bear reveal itself on the bright side?” Means

I often feel like I’m about to be attacked by a bear when he goes into his rages. Not so much physically, but verbally. When he gets to yelling, it’s so loud it could easily be interpreted as the roar of a charging bear.

Ok. So that explains the bear part. Here’s what “reveal itself on the bright side” means. He’s never been one to share what’s going on with him emotionally. He locks it in. When he goes into a rage, we rarely know what triggers him. I would call it the “secret word of the day” game, where no one knows what the trigger word is—including him. But, when he does get triggered, he shares hidden gems about himself and what his issues are. We’re usually to shellshocked after his rages to ever look more closely at what set him off.

Reviewing his rant from the day before, his biggest issue was that he hates to be late because it makes him look stupid. And there it was: his fear of looking stupid. This is something I know he wouldn’t share casually—mainly because I don’t think he even realizes it.

“…no matter how it looks on the outside, there is always a greater story going on.”
— “The Course in Miracles Experiment” by Pam Grout

Blessings & Peace,

Maureen,
The Mandala Lady

transforming soul whispers into mandalas & channeled messages
for clarity, peace, and joy

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