Day 121

Today's Lesson:

Forgiveness is the key to happiness.

Today's idea is the answer to our search for peace. It is the key to meaning in a world that seems to make no sense. It is the way to safety in apparent dangers that appear to threaten us at every turn, and bring uncertainty to all our hopes of ever finding quietness and peace. Here are all questions answered; here the end of all uncertainty ensured at last.

When we see the world through unforgiving eyes and with an unforgiving mind, we are doomed to a life of fear, doubt, sadness, suffering, misery, despair and hopelessness. The unforgiving mind sees no future except one of continuing fear and despair. It thinks it cannot change, for what it sees proves that its judgment is correct. It does not ask, because it thinks it knows. It does not question, certain it is right.

Forgiveness is acquired. It is not inherent in the mind, which cannot sin. We teach ourselves sin, and forgiveness must be learned by us as well, but by a Teacher other than ourselves, Who represents the other Self in each of us. Through Him we learn how to forgive the self we think we made, and let it disappear.

Each unforgiving mind presents us with an opportunity to teach our own how to forgive themselves. Each one awaits release from hell through us, and turns to us imploringly for Heaven here and now. They have no hope, but we become their hope. As as their hope, we become our own hope. The unforgiving mind must learn through our forgiveness that it has been saved from hell. And as we teach salvation, we will learn. And all our teaching and our learning will not be of us, but of the Teacher Who was given us to show the way to us.

Today we practice learning to forgive. If we are willing, we can learn today to take the key to happiness, and use it on our own behalf. We will devote ten minutes in the morning, and at night another ten, to learning how to give forgiveness and receive forgiveness, too.

As we learn to see our enemies and our friends as one, we will extend today's lesson to ourselves, and see that their escape includes our own.

We are to begin today's practice periods by thinking of someone we do not like, who seems to irritate us, or to cause regret in us if we should meet him; one we actively despise, or merely try to overlook. Now we are to close our eyes and see him in our minds, and try to see some light in him somewhere. Try to find some little spark of brightness shining through the ugly picture that we hold of him. Look at him until we see a light, and then let this light extend until it covers him, and makes the picture beautiful and good.

Now we are to do the same thing with one we consider a friend. Try to transfer the light we saw around our former "enemy" to him. Perceive him now as more than a friend to, for in that light his holiness shows us our savior, saved and saving, healed and whole.

Then we are to let him offer us the light we see in him, and let our "enemy" and friend unite in blessing us with what we gave. Now we become one with them and they with us. Now we will have been forgiven by ourselves. Every hour we are to tell ourselves:

Forgiveness is the key to happiness. I will awaken from the dream that I am mortal, fallible and full of sin, and know I am the perfect Son of God.

Miracles I'm noticing:

I got a phone call yesterday afternoon that really caught me off guard. A couple of years ago I began corresponding with a woman who worked for the international headquarters of a professional organization I belong to. We connected because of an idea I had to help the organization build buzz by reading "Creating Customer Evangelists," and eventually the organization hired me to come down and speak for them, and later the entire organization at an international convention in North Carolina. I remained in touch with my contact and even began e-mailing and calling on a social basis in addition to our professional connection. I ended up informally coaching her through some troubles in her personal life, but had kind of lost touch over the past year until she began e-mailing again in March to tell me that she was no longer employed by the organization through which we had first connected, had a new job, and was very recently divorced (I knew she had been having trouble in her marriage even when I met her and met her then-husband when I spoke for her organization in the city she lives).

The call I received yesterday was from one of her former co-workers at the organization I spoke. She had evidently spoken of me to her co-workers, and this person called to let me know that she died yesterday of liver and kidney failure due to an intentional overdose of Tylenol.

It really got me thinking about a lot of things related to what I'm learning in the Course. Of course I had the initial feelings of wondering if there were something else I could have done. I had no idea she was as troubled as she evidently was. She reconnected with me most recently by e-mail two weeks ago and said how much she missed our philosophical talks and hoped we could talk again soon, but that she knew I was very busy with my business. I did not reach out even though her last e-mail gave me her new phone number.

I am taking all of this information as data without meaning or judgment and am being reminded of the amazing power of forgiveness, as today's lesson states. Forgiveness is the key to happiness. I can forgive my friend for choosing a permanent solution to a temporary problem, leaving behind a grieving ex-husband who truly loved her, a 5-year-old son, a 24-year-old daughter and 21-year-old son from a previous marriage, a sister and parents who cared deeply about her and were able to travel from England to be with her when she died. I can forgive myself for not reaching out more. I can learn that any little gleam I see in anyone who is troubled can be extended until it covers them, and makes the picture beautiful and good. I can be more conscious of the effect of my loving energy, even when I'm not physically present in their lives and be more intentional about spreading that love and light.

Forgiveness is the key to happiness. I will awaken from the dream that she and I are mortal, fallible and full of sin, and know we are perfect Children of God.

Today's text adds to the lesson by reminding us that as we ask, we will receive. If we ask to learn of the reality of our brother, that is what we will perceive in him, and we will see our beauty reflected in his. We are not to accept our brother's variable perception of himself for his split mind is our own, and we will not accept our healing without his. We share the real world as we share Heaven, and his healing is ours. To love ourselves is to heal ourselves, and we cannot perceive part of us as sick and achieve our goals. We heal together as we live together and love together.

I can use this event with my friend as a reminder to love everyone every day, even if I'm not physically present. Healing energy heals regardless of perception - by our brothers or ourselves. As I choose love even in the midst of what could be considered a sad or negative or tragic event, I find that there is no meaning to the events themselves - only data, although I must admit that it is difficult not to question a self-inflicted and self-directed act like this. I will choose love and light and trust that I don't need to know the reasons.

Today's text goes on to say, "would you not exchange your fears for truth, if the exchange is yours for the asking? For if God is not deceived in you, you can be deceived only in yourself. Yet you can learn the truth about yourself from the Holy Spirit, Who will teach you that, as part God, deceit in you in impossible. When you perceive yourself without deceit, you will accept the real world in place of the false one you have made. And then your Father will lean down to you and take the last step for you, by raising you unto Himself."

Trust, listen and allow. Choose love over fear. This is my mantra for today and I know I will see a miracle.