Only Love's Plan for undoing fear will work Do you ever have one of those days where your entire day seems to be orchestrated around your ACIM Workbook Lesson? Today has been such a day for me. My lesson is #71: “Only God’s plan for salvation will work” (Salvation means “undoing of fear” or “undoing the belief that we are separate from Love”).

Excerpt from Lesson 71: “The ego’s plan for salvation centers around holding grievances. It maintains that, if someone else spoke or acted differently, if some external circumstance or event were changed, you would be saved. Thus, the source of salvation is constantly perceived as outside yourself. Each grievance you hold is a declaration, and an assertion in which you believe, that says, “If this were different, I would be saved.” The change of mind necessary for salvation is thus demanded of everyone and everything except yourself.”

This morning I was on the phone with a family member when we entered into a familiar communication pattern, which angered me.  I felt I was being given unsolicited advice, and that I was not being heard.

This pattern has come up many times before, and I’ve quietly given it to Spirit. But have I really? Here it was again, and this time my usual patience was gone. I got off the phone before lashing out, but I felt like crap and couldn’t get the situation out of my head. Getting quiet with Spirit felt next to impossible.

“Trials are but lessons that you failed to learn presented once again, so where you made a faulty choice before you now can make a better one, and thus escape all pain that what you chose before has brought to you.” (FIP T-31.VIII.3)

I knew I didn’t want to stuff my feelings or lash out with attack, but I also felt incapable of truly bringing the situation to Spirit.  I remembered something that I often say to others, “the only way through our lessons is through them.” So I became willing to go through my lessons WITH Spirit. This meant that I was willing to allow myself to be where I am at (needing to express my feelings and anger), but that I was willing to still bring the entire situation to the Holy Spirit. So I called this family member back and proceeded to get angry, cry, and state how our pattern of communication was not working for me. Then, after we got off the phone, intense guilt arose for having possibly hurt this person. But I was still willing to bring the whole experience to Spirit.

Again:

“The ego’s plan for salvation… maintains that, if someone else spoke or acted differently, if some external circumstance or event were changed, you would be saved.” (From Lesson 71)

Here it was, rising smack in my face, an unexamined part of the “ego’s plan of salvation.” Although I was quietly giving all previous pattern-filled phone calls to Spirit, I still held a thread of a belief in my mind that, “if this person were different to me on the phone, then everything would be OK.” That tiny thread is all the fuel that the ego needs, and it is enough to unconsciously choose for the ego. I was clearly putting the source of salvation outside of myself and onto this person: “It is THEY who need to change, not me!”

I needed to see this clearly WITH Spirit, as this form of the ego’s plan for salvation came to the surface of my mind. There are no mistakes that this situation came up today (brought to light by Lesson 71!). It was an opportunity to look at everything WITH Spirit in order to heal.

I knew that the aftermath of the guilt I felt was a reflection of the unconscious guilt that I have in my mind. And I couldn’t heal that guilt by simply getting my family member to tell me everything was OK.  This guilt I had to take to Spirit as well, and by doing so, I’m allowing “God’s plan for salvation” to do it’s thing.

So I sat on my couch, with the feelings of guilt firmly in my awareness, and a steadfast willingness to look at that guilt WITH Spirit.  I kept my mind fixated on the feeling of guilt, looking at it WITH Spirit, determined not to move until the peace returned. And as if a thousand butterfly wings moved through my body, I felt the guilt evaporate and lift. It fizzled away.

“Only God’s plan for salvation will work.”

Making Corinne’s little ego world OK is not going to bring me salvation or peace. Accepting the undoing of guilt in my own mind, through Spirit, will.

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