Lesson 216: Review: “I am not a body.  I am free.  For I am still as God created me.”  “It can be but myself I crucify.

This lesson says, “But if I forgive, salvation will be given me.” 

The Course teaches us how ideally to have our internal emotional processes.  We may or may not respond any differently in the world when we hear attack around us, but we will definitely do the work of feeling the difference in our own minds.

The Course instructs us to create the habit of looking at ourselves first and sometimes only.

We are always playing a part of the problem; the ego commonly leaves us out of what is a call for love within ourselves.  

Our ego makes all kinds of inner turmoil because the ego validates itself in this incredible rush of emotional drama.  The Course says that our task is to get to a place where we see what the ego is doing, we acknowledge it and we then sit with it long enough to hear what the Holy Spirit says.

The Holy Spirit guides us about what to do to proceed in a way that feels authentic for who we are and how we feel about ourselves. 

Problems happen in the world and this may make the ego feel and urge to attack back when we perceive an attack.

This is the best the ego knows how to do.

The ego only knows its own version of resolution- which is then making the problem bigger by way of lashing out with attack energy. 

Then we suffer more.  When we perceive an attack the ego makes us think that attacking back is some how going to soften the blow we are feeling externally, which becomes internal too.  The Course asks us to see this level of insanity.  When we attack back, we suffer, without any question.  The attack energy just feeds on itself exponentially.  Thus, if we feel it we make it bigger as a result.

The Course teaches that attack energy does not serve us because it is contrary to God’s energy and Will.  

The Course teaches us the only other alternative that works in this situation.  We are given the gift of forgiveness to apply to the situation for the absolute most ideal outcome.

When we forgive, forgiveness entails the saturation of love to a situation that appears to be lacking love. 

This is the perfect way to heal our wounds if we have perceived some injury coming our way.  When we forgive we end the cycle of violence and this serves and feeds everyone.

What we must learn to not reject to is how forgiveness serves us most when we give it. 

Often the ego exclaims that forgiveness just lets the other person with the challenging behavior off the hook.  Then we aren’t getting back at them- which is what the ego thinks is an effective response.  The Course teaches us that forgiveness above anything else serves us.

When we feel the attack energy from someone else then we get consumed with attack because we feed this feeling. 

It gets bigger when we get blocked with our inability to forgive. 

This is why we feel so badly when this happens.  Our own energy gets stifled because our flow of love gets blocked by the attack.  This is why we want to make certain we end the cycle within our own minds.  Only this is where we can change it.

The Course also teaches us that while we forgive, this does not mean we have to accept the unwanted behavior from the person who triggers us without a word of communicating how that felt for us.  We can absolutely tell that person what we felt as a result from that attack coming from them.

We can express our discomfort and ideally offer them some options of rather what they could have said that would have felt less distressful for us.  We can sit with no attack energy in our hearts and offer them clear and helpful dialogue about why we do not want to repeat this in the future.

Forgiving the attack while we express our clear desire for that person to treat us more respectfully in the future is what the Course teaches. 

This just takes practice and our desire to do so.