Friday, March 20, 2015
Lesson 79: “Let me recognize the problem so it can be solved.”
What we recognize we can do something with. We have to first get in touch with what is going on within us emotionally or energetically. We have to feel it, experience, meet it. We need to spend time with it enough so it can be noticed. This is the way we create intimacy with ourselves because we are just gaining deeper awareness about how we think and feel and behave. This expanded self-awareness is always a blessing because it is the first step to discovering how we function. With this greater insight then we can in fact make choices about how we do things.
I love this lesson because it reminds us to have emotional tools in place that are God’s. Be willing to get to know ourselves- this is the first big task. We often hide the inner workings of ourselves because the ego has all kinds of baggage about being seen for what is truly happening there. Our egos feel afraid of being seen and guilty about what is occurring. The ego is usually making great gestures to bury what comes up.
The ego tries to be so quick in keeping the emotions buried that we can not even notice what is within. This is why the Course teaches us lots of different ways to reach our inner selves. It gives us great techniques about learning how to raise the buried issues up into our hearts and minds, and get the movement of uncovering simply regularly occurring. This is the way to keep things from being piled up within and then not being processed because our ego is guilty about what it thinks is a problem within us.
This is why we have to simply give space in our minds to see any issue we might be concerned about or get triggered about. We have to do the work of keeping our minds clear by noticing any insanity that the ego tries to manifest in our dream. We have to invite it into our awareness. We need to give it space as it is a valued part of us. When we shut down our feelings, we often end up feeling embattled with them because the ego claims they are problematic.
Jesus asks us to be ever so delicate and gentle with our feelings that we may have reacted harshly to in the past. Love these feelings even if they are not wanted in the long run, we still want to give them space and respect so they can be heard and acknowledged. We want to know that they are free to be heard and then to pass through our minds and eventually disappear into unreality. But let’s remember to love them along the way. Even if our feeling we may not think is suitable for long time stay in our hearts, and if we pass them into God’s altar instead of leaving them within, we still want to have peace with them.
Let’s recognize the problems we have within and let’s have peace with the problems along the way. This is the way to ensure our equanimity is constant.
And we are asked to suspend all judgement about what we might uncover. We in fact have no idea what something is because God is the only one with perfect vision. Our task is to bring it to light without labeling it.