Giving Attention to Wholeness

The Shared Grace of Shifts in Perception . . .

This is the miracle of creation; that it is one forever (T-13.VIII.5:1).

What we long for is already given; what we believe is lost and must be recovered is here. It cannot be lost. Seeking reinforces separation because it directs our attention away from the Source of Life.

Creation cannot be interrupted. The separation is merely a faulty formulation of reality, with no effect at all (T-13.VIII.3:4-5).

What we call the separation is simply our insistence that life appear separated, that it appear fractured. Creation is given wholly and we divide it into parts, segment it into moments, reject some aspects and embrace others.

Our suffering - all suffering - arises from this division.

So the separation is a confused way of thinking to which we are adjusted. We think it reflects reality, but it doesn't. It reflects our private distortion of reality. A Course in Miracles offers a way to realign our thinking with wholeness, step by step, relationship by relationship, until even the idea of separation has vanished.

All we can do is give attention, notice when we exclude something from attention and then gently bring it back. This is forgiveness. When thoughts arise that are troubling, we let them be. We don't reject them or analyze them. We let them be. And we do this for the so-called good thoughts, too.

Nothing can be excluded because nothing is that isn't God. Whatever offers itself to our attention contains in it the essence of God because it can be forgiven.

Aspects of reality can still be seen, and they will replace aspects of unreality. Aspects of reality can be seen in everything and everywhere (T-13.VIII.3:7-8).

Attention reveals reality but often in ways that we cannot anticipate and sometimes in ways that we cannot seem to manage. How often have I fallen to pieces - angry pieces, confused pieces, manipulative pieces - before Love! And what is there to be done but go on: slower and slower, as attentively as possible? What else could healing be?

Christ's vision looks on everything with love . . . The golden aspects of reality that spring to light under his loving gaze are partial glimpses of the Heaven that lies beyond them (T-13.VIII.4:4, 6).

We have to discover what it means to give attention in this way. It is the simplest, most natural action one can imagine because it is effortless. We cannot help but do it, because we are it. That is all we are going to discover: and when we discover it, we will see that we always knew it, because what else was there to know?

Thus we become - through the gift of attention - witnesses unto Creation, which is the course’s happy dream, where we rest briefly before God takes the final step and restores us to the Oneness which is now - was always and ever will be - our reality.

Thank you, as always, for reading and sharing with me.

Love,

Sean