Jason: A friend of ours, Camille made this for us and we just kind of use
it in Moodle and people ask, “Can you give me the metaphysics and a picture?”
You could say this is who we really are, here. Just abstract. Like the son of God,
our true nature. And this is the lens that we look through. And you could say that the goal of the
Course is to look through this lens with the Holy Spirit. Or in a very egoless way, where there’s no
blurry images that produce these images. So Like in a movie screen you know how you’ve got the,
what do you call that stuff that goes around it? The reel? The reel with the tape. You know the
tape has like images printed on it. Those images are the beliefs and the concepts in the mind,
and as the light shines through those images and concepts you end up seeing a world based on those
images and concepts, which include bodies and other bodies. And we have written here,
attack - defense as if attack and defense were between bodies but really the attack
and defense is back here when we choose to look through the ego’s distorted filter which makes
projection. So really our job all the time is to notice when there is irritation but only
clean it back here. We’re always cleaning the concepts and the filters. It may start out here,
that’s why we always deal with specifics. Like what I believed happened. And we don’t just say,
“Ah, it’s all an illusion,” like we just talked about. We really look at what we
believed happened. But always to come back to the point where we can clean the mind. And the
Holy Spirit may guide the bodies to do certain things to help put it in a position where it
can see these concepts and beliefs in a new way. That’s always the purpose, always the purpose.
And even the idea of guidance as if it’s really about a body going and doing certain things,
that’s just the stepping stones to come to see that we are the Holy Spirit back here. That’s the
ultimate goal so this collapses. And then another thing we can go into which I always have a lot of
fun talking about is the idea of projection. In typical psychological terms they’ll say,
“Well you’re projecting on your partner or your partner is projecting on you and that’s your
stuff and that’s her stuff.” We can use that in a helpful way but when you start to use the
metaphysics of the Course and you say, “Wait a minute, projection, how is this really working?”
You can’t really understand projection the way the Course talks about it in those psychological
terms because this is the projection. The whole thing is the projection. This doesn’t
project on to there. Partners don’t project on to each other. So that’s a big time saver
to be able to allow the mind to pull back and not try to figure out what that whole dynamic.
David: Ya, when you carry it on, once you start to see that that whole thing is the projection
then you can see that the Spirit will still use words and talk about it in personal terms.
And even A Course in Miracles talks about special relationship in terms of people,
even though it’s really the special relationship is the lens, the ego is the specialness. But the
Holy Spirit reaches the mind where it believes it’s at, like on the screen up there. It uses
terms and then the more you work with it the more mystical it gets you realize that the
people really don’t do anything. There is no causation going on on that screen at all. It’s
just like going to a movie and seeing the shadows on the screen. They aren’t really
doing anything to each other, they're just a bunch of shadows that are being projected.
So when you work with this stuff over time and you keep working with it and working with it
it starts to dawn in your mind that people don’t really learn. That's a big one. I was in education
seemingly for all that time till I saw that it was just a concept. People don’t learn, people
don’t really act, people don't do things. Even the doer of believing that you are a human being,
a person, a doer that starts to fade and fade and fade as you start to work these metaphysics,
work the forgiveness process over and over and over. It just gets to be more and more surreal
as you’re just watching it. Because your mind is emptied of the concepts, the images, that’s down
there on the lens. Your mind becomes clean of all those concepts and images and therefore you don’t
literally see the world in the same way that you would. And you're in a place of peace. I remember
one time at my little peace house in Cincinnati we had a cat or two there at the Peace House and then
this woman came over and she brought another cat and the cat, the cats just started just hissing,
hissing at each other. And then they’d turn into these cat races. They would be chasing each
other at high speeds around there all, [Upset cat sounds and hissing.] And I’m in the kitchen eating
like my meal and drinking [Drinks a sip of water.] Drinking, and the people are running around trying
to separate the cats and do something. But to me it was just like that was like the musack that
was like the soundtrack for my lunch. It just had some [Hissing noises] just all kinds of things on
it. And you can see that you can apply it to cats, but then you can start to apply it to human beings
as well. You could come home and people could be screaming and shouting in your kitchen or your
living room. You could just go right in and get your milkshake, you know whatever you’re doing,
just kind of go about it you know, because you don’t need to respond and react to it in a
sense of it being some kind of a drama. Whether it’s a cat drama or people drama or whatever,
unless you are ascribing meaning to it. And that’s the beautiful thing. When you start to practice
this more and more you feel that peace goes with you wherever you go. It doesn’t matter whether,
I mean, I’ve been in countries where gunshots, [boom, boom.] You start hearing gunshots,
this and this. I’ve been off in rural areas of third world countries with there’s Civil
Wars going on and this and this. And it’s like I just go about my day. Oh well, it’s just a dream
because you don’t give any validity or reality to the environment. You really do get settled into
this thing that you’re just watching this thing. You know and it really can not touch you. You have
a sense of invulnerability. When you actually follow this out and you do the mind training
with it you feel peace, you feel invulnerability, you feel a sense of deep strength, and connection
with God. And you can literally watch anything through the body's eyes. You’re not watching
through the body's eyes you’re just watching what they are reporting. So, it works. But
it just takes a lot of practice. If you make exceptions then you’ll still will find situations
where you’re tempted to believe that it’s real and then get into a fearful reaction with it.
Jason: I can share one of the stories where I was practicing with this. I was
driving on the highway down to the Kentucky house and this ambulance drove by and I always get this
feeling when an ambulance drives by. Like this emotion, almost like, I don’t know I was like
a doctor in a past life and just loved to be of service in a helpful way in terms of the world.
Like fixing bodies and this emotion, oh I’ve got to… And I’m like, “Oop, not this time.” okay Holy
Spirit, help me see this differently.” And the ambulance was going by and I watched the emotion
come up and didn’t take me over, I just saw it. “Okay, Holy Spirit be with me.” I kept driving,
and I was driving by this accident had just happened. I don’t know how the ambulance got
there so quick. The tire was still spinning on one of the cars that was upside down. And
the policeman, that was like bodies on the ground another car still spinning,
got up as I was driving by with my window open and he looked up to me and he reached
to his hand and goes like this [salutes] as I’m going by, and then nods his head. And I’m like,
‘woow’, and he goes back to his work like he was just playing his part. You’ve done a good
job. This is no longer a serious matter with this scene. And I just kept going.
Friend: I’d like to ask a question. I worked a lot on giving the Holy Spirit my whole mind
and all my emotions and thoughts. The wording you put to it that everything is a symbol and I
have a little trouble I realize with the idea that it always has to be like this peaceful,
tranquil thing on the outside that is shown. I experience that most often, not always,
but most often, I had that on the inside and I’m willing to have the outside be whatever
is of service. Can you just comment that? Am I not getting something or because I’m not sure.
David: Yeah, that’s actually beautiful because you know we start off with symbols of peace,
and we can describe those and the Holy Spirit uses those during the mind training. But,
actually that’s where this is all heading. It’s heading to a place where you come into an
actual experience and the symbols all just merge together. It’s just the screen is the screen and
it looks however it looks. It’s actually what this is all about. It’s not like you’re, it’s
not like you’re aiming to have symbols of peace or that peace would ever look a certain way, because
it doesn't have a look to it. It doesn't have a form to it, but it is a qualitative experience
that is there. And in the end there’s like the merge for that to be consistent then the final,
we could say duality, that leaves this inner outer thing, where you lose the idea of that something’s
outside and somethings inside. So then the peace just is peace. It’s not like an inner peace or an
outer peace. It doesn’t have to do with the body. Like a soft heart or a feeling calm within your
body while flames rage, while chaos seems to rage outside. it’s just like this merging in together
where it’s just all peace. And there's no inside and outside to it. It is continuously a letting
go, a letting go, of any kind of interpretation or meaning that’s given to anything. Including
the body. So in the end peace of mind is a state of mind that is literally that transcends or
is independent of the body. We’ve used examples like with Ramana Maharshi, or saints who seemed
to have been diagnosed with a tumor or so on and so forth. And then some of those pictures
of Ramana Maharshi’s final hours where people say, “My Gosh, the body is so thin and the face
it’s almost like you can almost start to see the bone structure appearing because of how thin,
and these glowing eyes almost kind of stand out.” Almost like it’s been airbrushed an old
Ramana Maharshi picture that has been airbrushed because the eyes are so bright. They're just so
sparkly. And then his final words, “Why are you sad, where could I go?” The beautiful blessing
of the words is right there and it’s tuned in with the bright eyes. And yet the rest of the
body doesn’t appear as what someone may say, “That doesn’t look very peaceful to me.” Or, “Looks like
he could use a good meal.” Or something whatever the ego will kind of read on to it. But it is down
that way you just go deeper and deeper with the peace and you just let go of every scrap of idea
about how things look, appearances, the position of the body whether it’s up or down. All those
different interpretations that are tied into the body. They have to be washed away completely.