Sean, the synchronicities here in what you’re sharing are too numerous to say and I’m deeply grateful to be able to see them. In the past these gentle affirmations or Love nudges slipped by my awareness. None are earth shattering or worthy of shouting from the rooftops and yet they soften my heart.
This week’s observation for me has been in the peace of the ordinary, challenging the boring, the mundane and even the difficult daily tasks and choosing to see them in a new light of presence. And when there was no peace I said those very words….can I just experience no peace without judgement of it?
Was it Ken Wapnick that said the Course boils down to two principles (and I’ll get the wording wrong I’m sure)….1. I am never upset for the reason I think. 2. I could see peace instead of this. Both of those have been really experienced this week, not just words on a page that sound good but lofty and out of reach. This old heart has struggled to trust enough to let go of being ‘safe’ and the veil is lifting of that whole story.
Always so grateful to have companions along the way. Thank you.
Thanks for sharing, Liz. I really appreciate this and understand it as well. A lot of my energy of fixing things, self-improvement, study study study et cetera feels well-intentioned and all of that and yet it always ends up getting in the way of the quiet contentedness and happiness that seems always to be there, waiting for me to let go of my need to never let go :) Thanks for reminding that trust is an important part of that process - I forget that all the time.
And thanks for being here - companions are the answer, always, and you are a good one. Thank you 🙏🙏
There is gratitude for this sentence "For me, this often sugars out as a fear of the ordinary". Those words validate my experience. This ego mind has all kinds of grand stories about what forgiveness & peace will feel or look like, yet it is always a shock to experience it's ordinariness, as if peace has always been here, waiting.
Yesterday I was walking in the park with someone and they waved at another person as we walked by and I found myself making a negative comment about that person. This morning as I sit here I cannot describe the horrible pain in my heart because the attack on the other from yesterday boomeranged right back at me. I am soooooo very grateful to be able to begin experience and feel all that is not peace and forgive myself so that I can choose again. To me this is the ordinariness I have always avoided, me experiencing what I give out to others, forgiving myself and choosing again. Thank you Sean for your reflections, they are pure gold.
You're welcome, Glenda. Thank you for sharing that. I hear this so clearly - both the shared sense that peace and happiness need to have some extraordinary quality, like I'm a spiritual hero winning a war or something like that - but also the brief moment of negativity (not to mention the guilt over it later). It is not easy to be human. We forget that, especially when current events get so big and overwhelming. But it's the day-to-day where we live - and it's there that our mistakes occur and haunt us. Self-forgiveness and choosing again are atonement tools, given so we can build new lives of joy and peace together. It takes time - and, lucky for me - there's a lot of room for error and forgiveness :) Thanks for being here, Glenda - I'm always so grateful 🙏🙏
Yes!! I totally relate Glenda. It’s a shocking yet humbling experience and treasured in hindsight for the teaching but brutal at the time of ego awareness. I fall prey all the time and it shows how brutal I treat myself. The grace of choosing again is miraculous!!
In these politically and socially charged and destructive times, I experience internal struggle with forgiveness to those, including some family and friends, who support and even egg it on. To not mince words, after years now of watching these parts of humanity devolve into the stupidity, tyranny and the needlessness of it all, my faith - our faith - is supremely challenged. The Course reminds me that it’s not real, but it sure doesn’t feel that way. I have to persist in knowing that the core of even the most despicable players shares my core - our core - and that atonement is the only way forward… but boy is that hard!
I subscribe to “The Daily Word”, a brief daily spiritual thought that I’ve started my day with for years. Today’s was particularly relevant:
Divine Order
My life is unfolding in perfect order.
The chaos that can result from unsettling developments may prompt me to pray for divine order. When this happens, I remember order is a spiritual truth that I can claim for my life, not something that I need to hope or pray for. Understanding this, I pray and claim the divine idea of order. I relax into the truth that order begins in my own mind. I align my thinking with this truth and not with my immediate worldly circumstances.
As the idea of order fills my consciousness, I feel clarity about what needs to be done. I can appreciate how certain things need to fall into place before I can realize my desired result. My life is in divine order, and I am grateful.
Thanks for sharing & being here, Tom. I hear this. It's not an easy time - but attentive given to relationship, especially in trying to understand and accept to the other as they are right now, still feels like the answer. I agree - the daily thought you shared is very helpful. We don't have to fix the external but we are called to bring the internal to order - and doing so allows us to relate to the world, and everyone and everything in it, with a lot more grace and openness.
Thanks again for being here and sharing the light.
Thank you Tom and Sean. Ram Dass used to put photos of politicians he didn't "like" on his Puja table, next to his Guru, Jesus, Ramana Maharshi, etc. I am adopting this practice to help me dissolve any feelings that arise of separation and despair; to help me focus on love rather than fear. I too claim the divine idea of order! It is funny how insidious thoughts can be. I am learning to watch them come and go, and dismiss any that aren't "real thoughts". Then, any actions my body takes will be coming from Love. Present in the dream, I pray to be an instrument of peace. Let me not forget my function - Lesson 64.
I am a fan of Marianne Williamson, who is a longtime student and promoter, like you Sean, of ACIM. I subscribe to her email newsletter as well, and today’s letter is philosophically comforting, in an ACIM kinda way. Worth a read.
Sean, your words this morning helped me adjust my inner compass. Actually, I'm rather speechless at how deeply I've been affected. To use another quote from the Course, "Perception can make whatever picture the mind wants to see". I can choose again when I'm in line at the grocery checkout and I'm irritated because I have two items and the person in front of me has a whole basket full. I want to remember my irritation has blocked the Peace of God and it is a choice how I see the situation and I can choose again......it's those little situations that so easily slip by unnoticed. Thank you Sean, I will be reading today's entry again as you put it so perfectly.
Thank you April . . . this is such and helpful comment. As I said somewhere earlier in the comments, it's easy to forget in our world how small and local everything actually is. We have all this news and argument in our face all the time and it seems so big and unmanageable and yet our lives our filled, moment by moment, with countless opportunities for grace - to see our need for forgiveness, to offer and accept love, and to choose again, over and over and over. What saves it for me is the company - knowing I am not alone but have fellow travelers going with me. We may not be in the grocery store together but I can remember that you are sharing this path and it can give me a little boost. I think that's another important thing - just being grateful for those who share the path with us. It'd be too lonely and difficult otherwise . . .
Thank you for your column. Everything you say is true. For me, I find that inner peace comes to me very slowly. It never happens to me like your comment, "Give attention to peace, and peace will become you, always and forever." or "We give attention - here, now - so that the deep and abiding peace of God’s unconditional Love will illuminate us." Is this how you experience it? here, now, full?
I really like those comments and I hang onto them.... but, for me, inner peace is a slow process. I am thankful I have some inner peace, because it feels so good and now I will go for more. But it is using forgiveness every day with every possible thing that I can be conscious of.... which is about 10 times a day. But I guess progress is progress and I am thankful for every bit of it. It is just slow!! haha
Oh I think it's slow for me, too, Robyn. But over the years I've realized that the bad times aren't as bad and the good times tend to be more durable. Things that used to throw me to the wolves are now closer to just remembering to feed the dogs. I have grown to trust this process of healing, and the trust opens up a space of healing that is more or less consistently available.
But yes - it is clear to me that when I give attention to peace, I remember that I AM peace, and that this is not subject to my whim or choice (or anybody else's). I might forget it - I DO forget - and now and then I might get so stubborn and angry that I actively resist it (rare these days but not unheard of) - but I don't feel confused about what I am or what God is. And in terms of being illuminated by that love - yes, it is always available to fill our heart and minds.
But all of it is a practice for me - all of it is a daily showing up, a daily remembering, a daily praying, a daily spiritual inventory. I think there is just a lot of value to showing up - to making the commitment to the course, to the specific form in which the Holy Spirit is most accessible to us as a teacher, healer and therapist - and then doing it in a very "chop wood/carry water" kind of way.
I’m with you Robyn. Slow or reverse speed is my usual experience. Slow is ok. I read about those who awaken suddenly and see them as ‘special’ but I learn more from those who share their awkward journey and discover there’s no right way in this. There can only ever be our way.
Thanks Liz - I think this "only ever be our way" is actually true and very important. There is a point at the end of our formal ACIM practice - when we've done the reading, done the lessons - where we are essentially left in relationship with the Holy Spirit who (in my experience) becomes VERY specific about what our daily practice and curriculum should look and feel like. And it's very personal! And leaning into the personal nature is helpful - we are really called to become deeply happy and helpful people right here and now, in these bodies in this world!
I have always been struck by that line: "A universal theology is impossible, but a universal experience is not only possible, but necessary.". Thanks for reminding me of it.
The other day, I was being judgemental of nearly everyone I saw in the grocery store. It then struck me that all of us are part of the whole, and I will be "seeing" each of these people again, so I might as well accept them as best I can here/now. Nothing revolutionary happened that day, but I was grateful for the insight.
Thanks Farrell. I like that line as well (though I go back and forth on the nature of my agreement with it). It was very important to me early on in my course practice because I really needed a practice that was not based on what Tara Singh called "the lovelessness of I get it and you don't." It was very helpful to just realize this was one path and the only real question was, does it work for you? If yes, continue. If no, shuffle on.
Your grocery store experience is similar to mine. Nothing earth-shattering - no channeled masters - just some basic common sense around being more open-minded and open-hearted. I always wish it was more dramatic (and every once in a while God humors me and I get a lightning bolt) but that's basically it - remembering there's another, better way and then making a deliberate attempt to practice it.
This post felt like you placed a warm blanket around my shoulders. Now I’m going to read it again and experience it once more.
Funny, an image came to mind just now. The story of Mary and Martha where Martha complained to Jesus that Mary wasn’t helping her. Jesus answers that, “Mary chose the better part which will not be taken away from her.” Like a disciple, that’s where today’s post landed me, at the feet of Jesus.
It’s early morning and in the dark of this new day I will allow the words you offered to sink in and center me before I head off to work. First the Word (which I will equate with Mary) then the action (which will be represented by Martha) the day should follow peacefully…
“always and forever”.
The always and forever was like a kiss on the forehead.🥰
And also, thank you for evoking the Mary and Martha story. I really appreciate that - the old biblical stories are a comfort to me (talk about warm blankets and kisses on the forehead) and that is one of my favorites. I've always felt torn between them, forgetting that only together do they make a family and a home that welcomes Jesus. Thank you again - that was very helpful.
I hope all is well, Annie - thank you for being here 🙏🙏
Sean, the synchronicities here in what you’re sharing are too numerous to say and I’m deeply grateful to be able to see them. In the past these gentle affirmations or Love nudges slipped by my awareness. None are earth shattering or worthy of shouting from the rooftops and yet they soften my heart.
This week’s observation for me has been in the peace of the ordinary, challenging the boring, the mundane and even the difficult daily tasks and choosing to see them in a new light of presence. And when there was no peace I said those very words….can I just experience no peace without judgement of it?
Was it Ken Wapnick that said the Course boils down to two principles (and I’ll get the wording wrong I’m sure)….1. I am never upset for the reason I think. 2. I could see peace instead of this. Both of those have been really experienced this week, not just words on a page that sound good but lofty and out of reach. This old heart has struggled to trust enough to let go of being ‘safe’ and the veil is lifting of that whole story.
Always so grateful to have companions along the way. Thank you.
Thanks for sharing, Liz. I really appreciate this and understand it as well. A lot of my energy of fixing things, self-improvement, study study study et cetera feels well-intentioned and all of that and yet it always ends up getting in the way of the quiet contentedness and happiness that seems always to be there, waiting for me to let go of my need to never let go :) Thanks for reminding that trust is an important part of that process - I forget that all the time.
And thanks for being here - companions are the answer, always, and you are a good one. Thank you 🙏🙏
~ Sean
There is gratitude for this sentence "For me, this often sugars out as a fear of the ordinary". Those words validate my experience. This ego mind has all kinds of grand stories about what forgiveness & peace will feel or look like, yet it is always a shock to experience it's ordinariness, as if peace has always been here, waiting.
Yesterday I was walking in the park with someone and they waved at another person as we walked by and I found myself making a negative comment about that person. This morning as I sit here I cannot describe the horrible pain in my heart because the attack on the other from yesterday boomeranged right back at me. I am soooooo very grateful to be able to begin experience and feel all that is not peace and forgive myself so that I can choose again. To me this is the ordinariness I have always avoided, me experiencing what I give out to others, forgiving myself and choosing again. Thank you Sean for your reflections, they are pure gold.
You're welcome, Glenda. Thank you for sharing that. I hear this so clearly - both the shared sense that peace and happiness need to have some extraordinary quality, like I'm a spiritual hero winning a war or something like that - but also the brief moment of negativity (not to mention the guilt over it later). It is not easy to be human. We forget that, especially when current events get so big and overwhelming. But it's the day-to-day where we live - and it's there that our mistakes occur and haunt us. Self-forgiveness and choosing again are atonement tools, given so we can build new lives of joy and peace together. It takes time - and, lucky for me - there's a lot of room for error and forgiveness :) Thanks for being here, Glenda - I'm always so grateful 🙏🙏
~ Sean
Yes!! I totally relate Glenda. It’s a shocking yet humbling experience and treasured in hindsight for the teaching but brutal at the time of ego awareness. I fall prey all the time and it shows how brutal I treat myself. The grace of choosing again is miraculous!!
Thank you for your honesty
In these politically and socially charged and destructive times, I experience internal struggle with forgiveness to those, including some family and friends, who support and even egg it on. To not mince words, after years now of watching these parts of humanity devolve into the stupidity, tyranny and the needlessness of it all, my faith - our faith - is supremely challenged. The Course reminds me that it’s not real, but it sure doesn’t feel that way. I have to persist in knowing that the core of even the most despicable players shares my core - our core - and that atonement is the only way forward… but boy is that hard!
I subscribe to “The Daily Word”, a brief daily spiritual thought that I’ve started my day with for years. Today’s was particularly relevant:
Divine Order
My life is unfolding in perfect order.
The chaos that can result from unsettling developments may prompt me to pray for divine order. When this happens, I remember order is a spiritual truth that I can claim for my life, not something that I need to hope or pray for. Understanding this, I pray and claim the divine idea of order. I relax into the truth that order begins in my own mind. I align my thinking with this truth and not with my immediate worldly circumstances.
As the idea of order fills my consciousness, I feel clarity about what needs to be done. I can appreciate how certain things need to fall into place before I can realize my desired result. My life is in divine order, and I am grateful.
Thanks for sharing & being here, Tom. I hear this. It's not an easy time - but attentive given to relationship, especially in trying to understand and accept to the other as they are right now, still feels like the answer. I agree - the daily thought you shared is very helpful. We don't have to fix the external but we are called to bring the internal to order - and doing so allows us to relate to the world, and everyone and everything in it, with a lot more grace and openness.
Thanks again for being here and sharing the light.
~ Sean
Thank you Tom and Sean. Ram Dass used to put photos of politicians he didn't "like" on his Puja table, next to his Guru, Jesus, Ramana Maharshi, etc. I am adopting this practice to help me dissolve any feelings that arise of separation and despair; to help me focus on love rather than fear. I too claim the divine idea of order! It is funny how insidious thoughts can be. I am learning to watch them come and go, and dismiss any that aren't "real thoughts". Then, any actions my body takes will be coming from Love. Present in the dream, I pray to be an instrument of peace. Let me not forget my function - Lesson 64.
I am a fan of Marianne Williamson, who is a longtime student and promoter, like you Sean, of ACIM. I subscribe to her email newsletter as well, and today’s letter is philosophically comforting, in an ACIM kinda way. Worth a read.
https://open.substack.com/pub/mariannewilliamson/p/a-strange-calm?r=ypy0u&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
Sean, your words this morning helped me adjust my inner compass. Actually, I'm rather speechless at how deeply I've been affected. To use another quote from the Course, "Perception can make whatever picture the mind wants to see". I can choose again when I'm in line at the grocery checkout and I'm irritated because I have two items and the person in front of me has a whole basket full. I want to remember my irritation has blocked the Peace of God and it is a choice how I see the situation and I can choose again......it's those little situations that so easily slip by unnoticed. Thank you Sean, I will be reading today's entry again as you put it so perfectly.
Thank you April . . . this is such and helpful comment. As I said somewhere earlier in the comments, it's easy to forget in our world how small and local everything actually is. We have all this news and argument in our face all the time and it seems so big and unmanageable and yet our lives our filled, moment by moment, with countless opportunities for grace - to see our need for forgiveness, to offer and accept love, and to choose again, over and over and over. What saves it for me is the company - knowing I am not alone but have fellow travelers going with me. We may not be in the grocery store together but I can remember that you are sharing this path and it can give me a little boost. I think that's another important thing - just being grateful for those who share the path with us. It'd be too lonely and difficult otherwise . . .
Thanks again April 🙏🙏
~ Sean
Thank you for your column. Everything you say is true. For me, I find that inner peace comes to me very slowly. It never happens to me like your comment, "Give attention to peace, and peace will become you, always and forever." or "We give attention - here, now - so that the deep and abiding peace of God’s unconditional Love will illuminate us." Is this how you experience it? here, now, full?
I really like those comments and I hang onto them.... but, for me, inner peace is a slow process. I am thankful I have some inner peace, because it feels so good and now I will go for more. But it is using forgiveness every day with every possible thing that I can be conscious of.... which is about 10 times a day. But I guess progress is progress and I am thankful for every bit of it. It is just slow!! haha
Oh I think it's slow for me, too, Robyn. But over the years I've realized that the bad times aren't as bad and the good times tend to be more durable. Things that used to throw me to the wolves are now closer to just remembering to feed the dogs. I have grown to trust this process of healing, and the trust opens up a space of healing that is more or less consistently available.
But yes - it is clear to me that when I give attention to peace, I remember that I AM peace, and that this is not subject to my whim or choice (or anybody else's). I might forget it - I DO forget - and now and then I might get so stubborn and angry that I actively resist it (rare these days but not unheard of) - but I don't feel confused about what I am or what God is. And in terms of being illuminated by that love - yes, it is always available to fill our heart and minds.
But all of it is a practice for me - all of it is a daily showing up, a daily remembering, a daily praying, a daily spiritual inventory. I think there is just a lot of value to showing up - to making the commitment to the course, to the specific form in which the Holy Spirit is most accessible to us as a teacher, healer and therapist - and then doing it in a very "chop wood/carry water" kind of way.
Thanks for being here, Robyn 🙏🙏
~ Sean
I’m with you Robyn. Slow or reverse speed is my usual experience. Slow is ok. I read about those who awaken suddenly and see them as ‘special’ but I learn more from those who share their awkward journey and discover there’s no right way in this. There can only ever be our way.
Thanks Liz - I think this "only ever be our way" is actually true and very important. There is a point at the end of our formal ACIM practice - when we've done the reading, done the lessons - where we are essentially left in relationship with the Holy Spirit who (in my experience) becomes VERY specific about what our daily practice and curriculum should look and feel like. And it's very personal! And leaning into the personal nature is helpful - we are really called to become deeply happy and helpful people right here and now, in these bodies in this world!
Thanks again, Liz 🙏🙏
~ Sean
I have always been struck by that line: "A universal theology is impossible, but a universal experience is not only possible, but necessary.". Thanks for reminding me of it.
The other day, I was being judgemental of nearly everyone I saw in the grocery store. It then struck me that all of us are part of the whole, and I will be "seeing" each of these people again, so I might as well accept them as best I can here/now. Nothing revolutionary happened that day, but I was grateful for the insight.
Thanks Farrell. I like that line as well (though I go back and forth on the nature of my agreement with it). It was very important to me early on in my course practice because I really needed a practice that was not based on what Tara Singh called "the lovelessness of I get it and you don't." It was very helpful to just realize this was one path and the only real question was, does it work for you? If yes, continue. If no, shuffle on.
Your grocery store experience is similar to mine. Nothing earth-shattering - no channeled masters - just some basic common sense around being more open-minded and open-hearted. I always wish it was more dramatic (and every once in a while God humors me and I get a lightning bolt) but that's basically it - remembering there's another, better way and then making a deliberate attempt to practice it.
Thanks for being here and sharing 🙏🙏
~ Sean
This post felt like you placed a warm blanket around my shoulders. Now I’m going to read it again and experience it once more.
Funny, an image came to mind just now. The story of Mary and Martha where Martha complained to Jesus that Mary wasn’t helping her. Jesus answers that, “Mary chose the better part which will not be taken away from her.” Like a disciple, that’s where today’s post landed me, at the feet of Jesus.
It’s early morning and in the dark of this new day I will allow the words you offered to sink in and center me before I head off to work. First the Word (which I will equate with Mary) then the action (which will be represented by Martha) the day should follow peacefully…
“always and forever”.
The always and forever was like a kiss on the forehead.🥰
Thanks, Annie - I appreciate those kind words.
And also, thank you for evoking the Mary and Martha story. I really appreciate that - the old biblical stories are a comfort to me (talk about warm blankets and kisses on the forehead) and that is one of my favorites. I've always felt torn between them, forgetting that only together do they make a family and a home that welcomes Jesus. Thank you again - that was very helpful.
I hope all is well, Annie - thank you for being here 🙏🙏
~ Sean