Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Lesson 300: “What is the Real World?” “Only an instant does this world endure.”
The Course gives us practice at seeing time differently. The Course says about time for instance that we can relearn our concepts about time entirely. The Course says that for example we can use all the time we seemingly want or need in order to accomplish whatever is our goal. We experience in the world’s terms that accomplishing goals, be they emotional or spiritual or physical, can all take as much time as needed. We learn that these processes can take sometimes what seems indefinitely. We often don’t realize that time is simply an idea in our current world and lifetime- and what that means is that whatever we are trying to do could take lifetimes. We may not be able to imagine the extent of time something can take.
The Course says on the other hand, any goal at all that we so desire, can also be accomplished in a split second. We can move mountains in a heartbeat if we are so moved and move with the purpose of God’s will. What we need to do is stop using time as an excuse to halt our efforts toward our spiritual awakening. One of our common human misconceptions is that we believe something we want to accomplish such as our salvation from God will actually take so much time it seems like an impossible task.
A common ego trap is the ego will tell us this lie about time so we get overwhelmed emotionally about the goal. Then we simply stop trying because it seems like such an out of reach goal. Our egos don’t want to suffer the disappointment of continually not reaching this goal once we set it and put some effort into it. It feels like such a downer to find out that it may be so very difficult. Therefore, we simply stop putting forth effort to meet this goal. This is the tragedy.
By our experience in the world, we get an idea of how long some goal will take- we can appreciate that this is how our minds piece together the projected lengths of our processes. The Course teaches us that even the goals can be fully met and accomplished when we come with a mind that knows time in no way limits us. When we decide we really care about awakening for example in our current lifetime what our ego often do instead is simply negate this goal because it seems too hefty a price in time and effort. We let go of our cherished dreams and intentions to reach the goal because it seems too far from where we appear to be today.
What we are taught to do in the Course is understand that time can seemingly take forever for something to change. But it is equally possible for something to change instantly. All we have to do is pray and show up in our certainty and trust that God is available to accomplish whatever we may think is as far off a miracle- such as moving mountains. God can do this, we just need to bring our total faith that God is ever ready to accomplish whatever task we so desire. We are asked to show up with our faith that God is the ultimate power in the universe, so if God wills to move our mountain for us, this is what comes in this very moment now.