The End of Fear is Our Responsibility

On becoming Apostles of Love

The correction of fear is our responsibilityn (T-2.VI.4:1). This is the foundation of practicing A Course in Miracles. Undoing fear is the way to peace.

the way is always clear

The undoing of fear is a correction of the conditions that give rise to fear (T-2.VI.4:3). If you're repeatedly hitting yourself in the head with a hammer, you don't need aspirin or a helmet. You need to stop hitting yourself.

Correction means learning what is really going on, and responding to it as it is. It means seeing the underlying mistake and the truth, and bringing them together so that what is true can dissolve the mistake, leaving only truth.

When you are fearful, you have chosen wrongly. That is why you feel responsible for it. You must change your mind, not your behavior, and this is a matter of willingness. You do not need guidance except at the mind level (T-2.VI.3:2-5).

The mistake - where "wrongly" enters the equation in a useful way - is believing that the error will have irrevocable consequences. We take the error literally, which leads to further error. Miscreation doesn't suddenly produce love instead of fear, accidentally or otherwise. We have to see we are miscreating and then choose otherwise.

Imagine the following scenario. You suggest karaoke for the holiday party and one of your co-workers doesn't just say "no thanks," they condemn the whole idea. Then they condemn you for even thinking of the idea. They're doing stand-up and you're the punchline. Everybody laughs.

What is the problem here? You did nothing! Why should you feel bad?

And yet . . .

You feel bad because you chose wrongly (T-2.VI.3:2). You chose to perceive in a way that reinforces the illusion of separation rather than in a way that brings forth the fundamental unity inherent in Creation. You did this. You want a victim in this story? It's the co-worker. You didn't think twice about making them yet another bad guy in the decades-long pity party the ego insists you pretend is your life.

Making the co-worker (or the spouse / neighbor / ex) the bad guy is a defense, right? That's what projection is, a defense against seeing that we are doing this to ourself. We want peace, fine, we can have it but we can't also have suffering. We can't carve out a little island of hate and call the ocean love. Love doesn't work that way.

God reigns forever, and His laws alone prevail upon you and upon the world. His Love remains the only thing there is. Fear is an illusions, for you are like Him (M-18.3:10-12).

I understand that you "understand" what is being said here. But do you also understand that "understanding" is an ego fable designed to distract you from actual change? We try to destroy our brother and we think understanding how we did it means we're forgiven. It doesn't. It just means we think we know what we need to be forgiven for. Which somehow translates into allowing the same "unforgivable" behavior to continue.

Funny how that works.

When we know, we don't need to ask questions. We don't need to tell stories. When we know, there is nothing to correct. There is nothing to defend against. This leaves us free to create. The extension of love becomes our praxis - the application of understanding - because there is literally nothing else to do.

You are much too tolerant of mind wandering,and are passively condoning your mind's miscreations. The particular result does not matter, but the fundamental error does (T-2.VI.4:6-7).

That last sentence is the key to actual forgiveness. The problem isn't that we psychologically assaulted our co-worker by forcing them to play the role of bad guy - that's the "particular result." It doesn't matter. The "fundamental error" is our belief that the particular result does matter. We think miscreation has real effects. It doesn't. It can’t.

None of these errors is meaningful, because the miscreations of the mind do not really exist . . . it is essential to remember that only the mind can create, and that correction belongs at the thought level (T-2.V.1:5, 7).

Fear brings forth a world in which suffering appears to be real. The solution is not to try and fix the suffering but to choose Love instead of fear, and forget about the apparent effects. In truth there is no such thing as choice but in the context of separation, choice appears meaningful and important. It feels essential. Don't fight this. Use it.

If we want to no longer feel fear, then we have to choose against fear, in all the contexts it appears. Gardening, driving, parenting, writing, all of it. We have to choose. The choice is here; it is now. It is before us always, inviting us to choose again.

In every difficulty, all distress, and each perplexity Christ calls to you and gently says, "My brother, choose again." He would not leave on source of pain unhealed, nor any image left to veil the truth. He would remove all misery from you whom God created altar unto joy (T-31.VIII.3:2-4).

Therefore, try to see every moment as an opportunity to choose love instead of fear. When we do, we are joined to the strength of angels, lifted by the winds of Christ, and transmuted to holiness by God Who is Love.

That is what the Course is pointing at when it teaches us that the secret to salvation is realizing that we are doing this to ourselves (T-27.VIII.10:1). Once we realize that we are doing it, then it is impossible to hold anyone else responsible. Then change - from fear to love - becomes something we have to do. And the means to do it perfectly once and for all are given in each and every moment.

Fear is a sign that we are valuing wrongly, and valuing wrongly is a sign that we have forgotten what we are. When we remember, what we remember is that we are Christ together. That is the law. If you aren't then I can't be, and vice-versa. That is why, more than anything, our work is to help the other remember that they are Christ.

And we do that by choosing to be joyful apostles of Love, not miserable agents of fear.

Thank you as always for helping me remember.

Love,
Sean