Thanks for your reply Paul,
Yes, it certainly is not the only method - more than one way of climbing a mountain.
I was thinking about what Steve said about multiple perspectives:
"Every book offers its own perspective. A perspective is not truth. It is merely a tool for exploring reality. One of the biggest mistakes we can make in life is equating any fixed perspective with truth itself."
I think that this makes the assumption that what is being explored is reality. If The Disappearance of The Universe is to be believed, then ACIM is a gift brought from beyond perspective (from reality). The Great Illusion may have different perspectives, but ultimately 'they are all the same in their unreality'.
For anyone who is interested , ACIM says that this unreality in which we seem to reside is a metaphor for the seperation from God. Everything, if you look carefully, is playing out that seperation (e.g. babies been seperated from their Mother's at birth, every object seperate from each other, the very fact that everything seems to be outside of you is backwards to reality, we are all going to die). The reason that folks create and really cling to this reality is the unconscious fear of punishment from God and the guilt of giving up heaven. It is an egoic (insane) notion that is not at all real or based in reality. The world is a panic response to an imagined punishment. Something which we are all familiar with when we make decisions based on fear - they are usually the opposite to what we should do. To rid this massive guilt we create 'others' who we dump our guilt onto to make it seem as if its outside of us.
Does this not make any effort to better the illusion (Ask and It Is Given) an egoic action? Does it not reinforce the idea of seperation for us? Is it not better to stop exploring what we think of as reality - surely that reinforces this original mistake?
The stark truth that ACIM points to is that this illusion means nothing. In our fear of it having no meaning, we rush in with an explanation and so lose God and reinforce the illusion. This is why we are trapped here.
This isn't very positive (i.e. it does not honour the illusion) but hasn't that been our mistake. We have abandoned God to try and do things on our own. We are unconsciously and insanely terrified of God and so cling to our dying reality for fear of falling into a pit of fire (or however people have represented hell).
When I was studying Ask and It Is Given I found myself looking at people who were in war torn countries, and looking at people less fortunate than myself. It was their choice to be here, I said to myself, and they have attracted this violence, hate etc. I have chosen to attract positive things and I will ignore them and let them continue with their own misguided creations. Okay, this was mostly unconscious on my part, but the thoughts were still there.
That incompassionate reaction is necessary, I think, if you want to create big houses, cars, better organistions etc. If you see somebody suffering, look away and think of a happy thought. Is that not what your ego would want you to do? The world is dying and people are dying. Why is that? Its the complete opposite to what we are and is completely unsatisfying to us. We can learn not to be affected negatively by this, but that involves bringing the opposite of the illusion (the formless) into our lives.
Eckhart says that enlightenment is the merging of happiness and sadness into one and realising that there is neither. How are we to do that if we are running away from our pain. Moving Up the Emotional Scale is very empowering but it does not deal with why we feel this pain in the first place. i.e. it recognises pain then moves away from it. Eckhart teaches us to boldly face our pain and see through it. That seems more intelligent than running away.
I welcome any further comments or discussions.
Wow, long rant there, hope it makes sense!
Mikey  |