Seek not outside yourself. For it will fail, and you will weep each time an idol falls. Heaven cannot be found where it is not, and there can be no peace EXCEPTING there. Each idol that you worship when God calls will never answer in His place. There IS no other answer you can substitute, and find the happiness His Answer brings. Seek not outside yourself. For all your pain comes simply from a futile search for what you want, insisting WHERE it must be found. What if it is not there? Do you prefer that you be right or happy? Be you glad that you are told where happiness abides, and seek no longer elsewhere. You will fail.
But it is given you to know the truth, and NOT to seek for it outside yourself. No-one who comes here but must still have hope, some lingering illusion, or some dream that there is something OUTSIDE of himself that will bring happiness and peace to him. If everything is IN him, this cannot be so. And therefore, BY his coming, he denies the truth about himself, and seeks for something MORE than everything, as if a part of it were separated off, and found where all the REST of it is NOT. This is the purpose he bestows upon the body; that it seek for what he lacks, and give him what would make himself complete.
And thus he wanders aimlessly about, in search of something that he cannot find, believing him to be what he is not. The lingering illusion will impel him to seek out a thousand idols, and to seek beyond them for a thousand more. And each will fail him, all excepting one; for he will die, and does not understand the idol that he seeks IS but his death. Its FORM appears to be outside himself. Yet does he seek to kill God’s Son within, and PROVE that he is victor over him. This is the purpose EVERY idol has, for this the role that is assigned to it, and this the role that cannot BE fulfilled.
Whenever you attempt to reach a goal in which the body’s betterment is cast as major beneficiary, you try to bring about your death. For you believe that you can suffer lack, and lack IS death. To sacrifice is to GIVE UP, and thus to be without, and to have suffered loss. And, BY this giving up is life renounced. Seek not outside yourself. The search implies you are not whole within, and fear to look upon your devastation, and prefer to seek outside yourself for what you are. Idols must fall BECAUSE they have no life, and what is lifeless IS a sign of death. You came to die, and what would you expect, but to PERCEIVE the signs of death you seek?
No sadness and no suffering proclaims a message OTHER than an idol found that represents a parody of life which, in its lifelessness, is really death, conceived as real and given living form. Yet each must fail and crumble and decay, because a form of death cannot BE life, and what is sacrificed cannot BE whole.
All idols of this world were made to keep the truth within from being known to you, and to maintain allegiance to the dream that you must find what is OUTSIDE yourself to be complete and happy. It is vain to worship idols in the hope of peace. God dwells within, and your completion lies in Him. No idol takes His place. Look not to idols. Do not seek outside yourself. Let us forget the purpose of the world the past has given it. For otherwise, the future WILL be like the past, and but a series of depressing dreams, in which all idols fail you, one by one, and you see death and disappointment everywhere. To change all this, and open up a road of hope and of release in what appeared to be an endless circle of despair, you need but to decide you do not KNOW the purpose of the world. You GIVE it goals it does not have, and thus do YOU decide what it is for. You try to see in it a place of idols, found outside yourself, with power to make complete what is within by splitting what you are BETWEEN the two.
You CHOOSE your dreams, for they are what you wish, perceived AS IF it had been given you. And idols do what you would have them do, and HAVE the power you ascribe to them. And you pursue them vainly in the dream, because you want their power as your own. Yet where ARE dreams, but in a mind asleep? And CAN a dream succeed in making real the pictures it projects outside itself? Save time, my brothers, Learn what time is FOR. And speed the end of idols in a world made sad and sick by seeing idols there. Your holy minds are altars unto God, and where He is NO idols can abide.
The fear of God is but the fear of loss of idols. It is NOT the fear of loss of your reality. But YOU have made of your reality an idol, which you must protect AGAINST the light of truth. And all the world becomes the means by which this idol can be saved. Salvation thus appears to THREATEN life, and offer death. It is not so. Salvation seeks to prove there IS no death, and ONLY life exists. The sacrifice of death is NOTHING lost. An idol CANNOT take the place of God. Let Him remind you of His Love for you, and do not seek to drown His Voice in chants of deep despair to idols of yourself. Seek not outside your Father for your hope. For hope of happiness is NOT despair.
What is an idol? Do you think you know? For idols are unrecognized as such, and never seen for what they really are. That is the only power which they have. Their purpose is obscure, and they are feared, and worshipped, both, BECAUSE you do not know what they are for, and why they have been made. An idol is an image of your brother, which you would value MORE than what he IS. Idols are made that HE may be replaced, no matter what their form. And it is this which NEVER is perceived and recognized. Be it a body or a thing, a place, a situation or a circumstance, an object owned or wanted, or a right demanded or achieved, it is the same.
Let not their form deceive you. Idols are but substitutes for your reality. In some way you believe they will complete your little self, for safety in a world perceived as dangerous, with forces massed against your confidence and peace of mind. They have the power to supply your lacks, and add the value which you do not have. No-one believes in idols who has not enslaved himself to littleness and loss. And thus must seek beyond his little self for strength to raise his head, and stand apart from all the misery the world reflects. This is the penalty for looking not within for certainty, And for a quiet calm which liberates you FROM the world, and lets you stand apart in quiet and in peace unlimited. An idol is a false impression, or a false belief; some form of antiChrist which constitutes a gap BETWEEN the Christ and what you see. An idol is a wish, made tangible and given form, and thus perceived as real, and seen OUTSIDE the mind. Yet they remain ideas, and CANNOT leave the mind that is their source. Nor is their form apart from the idea it represents. All forms of antiChrist oppose the Christ. And fall before His Face like a dark veil which SEEMS to shut you off from Him, alone in darkness. Yet the light is there. A cloud does not put out the sun. No more a veil can banish what it seems to separate, nor darken by one whit the Light Itself.
This world of idols IS a veil across the Face of Christ, BECAUSE its purpose is to separate your brother from yourself. A dark and fearful purpose, yet a thought without the power to change one blade of grass from something living to a sign of death. Its form is nowhere, for its source abides within your mind, where God abideth not. Where IS this place, where WHAT is everywhere has been excluded, and been kept apart? What hand could be held up to block God’s way; whose voice could make demand He enter not? The “more-than-everything” is NOT a thing to make you tremble and to quail in fear. Christ’s enemy is nowhere. He can take NO form in which he EVER will be real.
What is an idol? Nothing! It must be believed BEFORE it seems to come to life, and GIVEN power that it may be feared. Its life and power are its believer’s gift, and this is what the miracle restores to what HAS life and power worthy of the gift of Heaven and eternal peace. The miracle does not restore the truth, the light the veil between has NOT put out. It merely LIFTS the veil, and LETS the truth shine unencumbered, being what It is. It does not NEED belief to be Itself, for It HAS BEEN created, so It IS. An idol is ESTABLISHED by belief, and when it is withdrawn, the idol “dies.”
This is the antiChrist; the strange idea there is a power PAST omnipotence, a place BEYOND the infinite, a time transcending the eternal. Here the world of idols has been set by the idea this power and place and time are given form, and shape the world where the impossible has happened. Here the deathless come to die; the all-encompassing to suffer loss; the timeless to be made the slaves of time. Here does the changeless change; the peace of God, forever given to all living things, give way to chaos. And the Son of God, as perfect, sinless, and as loving as his Father, come to hate a little while; to suffer pain, and finally to die.
WHERE is an idol? Nowhere! Can there be a gap in what is infinite, a place where time can INTERRUPT eternity? A place of darkness set where all is light, a dismal alcove separated off from what is endless, HAS no place to be. An idol is beyond where God has set all things forever, and has left no room for anything EXCEPT His Will to be. Nothing and nowhere MUST an idol be, while God is everything and everywhere. What purpose has an idol, then? What is it FOR? This is the only question which has many answers, each depending on the one of whom the question has been asked.
The world BELIEVES in idols. No-one comes unless he worshipped them, and still attempts to seek for one that yet might offer him a gift reality does NOT contain. Each worshipper of idols harbors hope his SPECIAL deities will give him MORE than other men possess. It MUST be “more.” It does not really matter more of what; more beauty, more intelligence, more wealth; or even more affliction and more pain. But MORE of SOMETHING is an idol FOR. And when one fails another takes its place, with hope of finding more of something ELSE. Be not deceived by forms the “something” takes. An idol is a means for getting MORE. And it is THIS that is against God’s Will.
God has not many sons, but only One. Who can have more, and who be given less? In Heaven would the Son of God but laugh, if idols could intrude upon his peace. It is for HIM the Holy Spirit speaks, and tells you idols HAVE no purpose here. For MORE than Heaven can you never have. If Heaven is within why would you seek for idols which would make of Heaven less, to give you MORE than God bestowed upon your brother AND on you, as One with Him? God GAVE you all there is. And to be sure you could not lose it, did He ALSO give the same to every living thing as well. And thus IS every living thing a part of you as of Himself. No idol can establish you as MORE than God. But YOU will never be content with being LESS.
The slave of idols is a WILLING slave. For willing he MUST be, to let himself bow down in worship to what has no life, and seek for power in the powerless. What happened to the holy Son of God, that this could BE his wish; to let himself fall lower than the stones upon the ground, and look to idols that they raise him up? Hear, then, your story in the dream you made, and ask yourself if it be not the truth that you believe that it is NOT a dream: A dream of judgment came into the mind that God created perfect as Himself. And in that dream was Heaven changed to hell, and God made enemy unto His Son.
How can God’s Son AWAKEN from the dream? It is a dream of judgment. So must he judge NOT, and he WILL waken. For the dream will seem to last while he is PART of it. Judge not, for he who judges WILL have need of idols, which will hold the judgment off from resting on himself. Nor CAN he know the Self he has condemned. Judge not, because you make yourself a PART of evil dreams, where idols are your “true” identity, and your salvation from the judgment laid, in terror and in guilt, upon yourself. All figures in the dream are idols, made to save you FROM the dream. Yet they are PART of what they have been made to save you FROM.
Thus does an idol KEEP the dream alive and terrible, for who would wish for one UNLESS he were in terror and despair? And this the idol REPRESENTS, and so its worship IS the worship of despair and terror, and the dream from which they come. Judgment is an INjustice to God’s Son, and it IS justice that who judges HIM will not escape the penalty he laid upon HIMSELF within the dream he made. God knows of justice; NOT of penalty. But in the dream of judgment, you attack and are condemned. And WISH to be the slave of idols, who are interposed BETWEEN your judgment and the penalty it brings.
There CAN be no salvation in the dream, as YOU are dreaming it. For idols MUST be part of it, to save you from what you believe you have accomplished, and have done to make you sinful, and put out the Light within you. Little children, It is there. You do but dream, and idols are the toys you dream you play with. Who has need of toys but children? They pretend they rule the world, and give their toys the power to move about, and talk and think and feel, and speak for them. Yet everything their toys appear to do is in the minds of those who play with them. But they are eager to forget that they made up the dream in which their toys are real, and recognize their wishes are their own.
Nightmares are childish dreams. The toys have turned against the child who thought he made them real. Yet CAN a dream attack? Or CAN a toy grow large and dangerous and fierce and wild? This does the child believe BECAUSE he fears his thoughts, and gives them to his toys instead. And their reality becomes his own, because they seem to SAVE him from his thoughts. Yet do they KEEP his thoughts alive and real, but seen OUTSIDE himself, where they can turn against him for his treachery to them. He thinks he NEEDS them that he may escape his thoughts, because he thinks the THOUGHTS are real. And so he makes of ANYTHING a toy, to make his world remain outside himself, and play that HE is but a part of it.
There is a time when childhood should be passed and gone forever. Seek not to retain the toys of children. Put them all away, for you have need of them no more. The dream of judgment is a children’s game, in which the child becomes the father, powerful, but with the little wisdom of a child. What hurts him is destroyed; what helps him, blessed. Except he judges this as does a child, who does not KNOW what hurts and what will heal. And bad things seem to happen, and he is afraid of all the chaos in a world he thinks is governed by the laws he made. Yet is the real world unaffected by the world he thinks is real. Nor have its laws been changed because he did not understand.
The real world still is but a dream. Except the figures have been changed. They are not seen as idols which betray. It is a dream in which no-one is used to substitute for something else, or interposed between the thoughts the mind conceives and what it sees. No-one is used for something he is not, for childish things have all been put away. And what was once a dream of judgment now has changed into a dream where all is joy, because that is the PURPOSE that it has. Only forgiving dreams can enter here, for time is almost over. And the forms which enter in the dreams are now perceived as brothers, not in judgment, but in love.
Forgiving dreams have little need to last. They are not made to separate the mind from what it thinks. They do not seek to prove the dream is being dreamed by someone ELSE. And in these dreams a melody is heard which everyone remembers, though he has not heard it since before all time began. Forgiveness, once complete, brings timelessness so close the song of Heaven can be heard, not with the ears, but with the holiness that never left the altar which abides forever deep within the Son of God. And when he hears this song again, he knows he NEVER heard it not. And where IS time, when dreams of judgment have been put away?
Whenever you feel fear in any form, – and you ARE fearful if you do not feel a deep content, a certainty of help, a calm assurance Heaven goes with you, – be sure you made an idol, and believe it will betray you. For, beneath your hope that it will save you, lie the guilt and pain of self-betrayal and uncertainty, so deep and bitter that the dream cannot conceal completely all your sense of doom. Your self-betrayal MUST result in fear, and fear IS judgment, leading surely to the frantic search for idols and for death. Forgiving dreams remind you that you live in safety, and have NOT attacked yourself.
So do your childish terrors melt away, and dreams become a sign that you have made a new beginning, NOT another try to worship idols, and to KEEP attack. Forgiving dreams are kind to everyone who figures in the dream. And so they bring the dreamer full release from dreams of fear. He does not fear his judgment, for he has judged no- one, nor has sought to be released THROUGH judgment from what judgment MUST impose. And all the while he is remembering what he forgot when judgment seemed to be the way to SAVE him from its penalty.
INTRODUCTION
W-in.1. A theoretical foundation such as the text provides is necessary as a framework to make the exercises in this workbook meaningful. 2 Yet it is doing the exercises that will make the goal of the course possible. 3 An untrained mind can accomplish nothing. 4 It is the purpose of this workbook to train your mind to think along the lines the text sets forth.
W-in.2. The exercises are very simple. 2 They do not require a great deal of time, and it does not matter where you do them. 3 They need no preparation. 4 The training period is one year. 5 The exercises are numbered from 1 to 365. 6 Do not undertake to do more than one set of exercises a day.
W-in.3. The workbook is divided into two main sections, the first dealing with the undoing of the way you see now, and the second with the acquisition of true perception. 2 With the exception of the review periods, each day’s exercises are planned around one central idea, which is stated first. 3 This is followed by a description of the specific procedures by which the idea for the day is to be applied.
W-in.4. The purpose of the workbook is to train your mind in a systematic way to a different perception of everyone and everything in the world. 2 The exercises are planned to help you generalize the lessons, so that you will understand that each of them is equally applicable to everyone and everything you see.
W-in.5. Transfer of training in true perception does not proceed as does transfer of the training of the world. 2 If true perception has been achieved in connection with any person, situation or event, total transfer to everyone and everything is certain. 3 On the other hand, one exception held apart from true perception makes its accomplishments anywhere impossible.
W-in.6. The only general rules to be observed throughout, then, are: First, that the exercises be practiced with great specificity, as will be indicated. 2 This will help you to generalize the ideas involved to every situation in which you find yourself, and to everyone and everything in it. 3 Second, be sure that you do not decide for yourself that there are some people, situations or things to which the ideas are inapplicable. 4 This will interfere with transfer of training. 5 The very nature of true perception is that it has no limits. 6 It is the opposite of the way you see now.
W-in.7. The overall aim of the exercises is to increase your ability to extend the ideas you will be practicing to include everything. 2 This will require no effort on your part. 3 The exercises themselves meet the conditions necessary for this kind of transfer.
W-in.8. Some of the ideas the workbook presents you will find hard to believe, and others may seem to be quite startling. 2 This does not matter. 3 You are merely asked to apply the ideas as you are directed to do. 4 You are not asked to judge them at all. 5 You are asked only to use them. 6 It is their use that will give them meaning to you, and will show you that they are true.
W-in.9. Remember only this; you need not believe the ideas, you need not accept them, and you need not even welcome them. 2 Some of them you may actively resist. 3 None of this will matter, or decrease their efficacy. 4 But do not allow yourself to make exceptions in
For more ACIM resources visit:
http://livingacourseinmiracles.com
Home
…….
A Course in Miracles
A Course in Miracles – Workbook Lesson 1 ~ Intuitively unpacked and explained …
ACIM- Daily Lessons
A Course in Miracles
by Carol Howe –
Lesson 1
A Course in Miracles ACIM: Living Miracles ACIM
Lesson 1
David Hoffmeister
https://www.youtube.com/live/KobdYJ-LYxs?feature=share
A Course In Miracles
http://a.courseinmiracles.com/workbook-lessons/workbook_lessons_introduction.php#gsc.tab=0
A Course In Miracles pdf
http://photo.goodreads.com/documents/1289404405books/9672393.pdf
A Course in Miracles
https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=toc&fwv=true&tocVol=manual
http://www.acimessentials.com/downloads/
A Course in Miracles
Workbook for Students
Introduction
1. A theoretical foundation such as the text provides is necessary as a framework to make the exercises in this workbook meaningful. ²Yet it is doing the exercises that will make the goal of the course possible. ³An untrained mind can accomplish nothing. ⁴It is the purpose of this workbook to train your mind to think along the lines the text sets forth.
2. The exercises are very simple. ²They do not require a great deal of time, and it does not matter where you do them. ³They need no preparation. ⁴The training period is one year. ⁵The exercises are numbered from 1 to 365. ⁶Do not undertake to do more than one set of exercises a day.
3. The workbook is divided into two main sections, the first dealing with the undoing of the way you see now, and the second with the acquisition of true perception. ²With the exception of the review periods, each day’s exercises are planned around one central idea, which is stated first. ³This is followed by a description of the specific procedures by which the idea for the day is to be applied.
4. The purpose of the workbook is to train your mind in a systematic way to a different perception of everyone and everything in the world. ²The exercises are planned to help you generalize the lessons, so that you will understand that each of them is equally applicable to everyone and everything you see.
5. Transfer of training in true perception does not proceed as does transfer of the training of the world. ²If true perception has been achieved in connection with any person, situation or event, total transfer to everyone and everything is certain. ³On the other hand, one exception held apart from true perception makes its accomplishments anywhere impossible.
6. The only general rules to be observed throughout, then, are: First, that the exercises be practiced with great specificity, as will be indicated. ²This will help you to generalize the ideas involved to every situation in which you find yourself, and to everyone and everything in it. ³Second, be sure that you do not decide for yourself that there are some people, situations or things to which the ideas are inapplicable. ⁴This will interfere with transfer of training. ⁵The very nature of true perception is that it has no limits. ⁶It is the opposite of the way you see now.
7. The overall aim of the exercises is to increase your ability to extend the ideas you will be practicing to include everything. ²This will require no effort on your part. ³The exercises themselves meet the conditions necessary for this kind of transfer.
8. Some of the ideas the workbook presents you will find hard to believe, and others may seem to be quite startling. ²This does not matter. ³You are merely asked to apply the ideas as you are directed to do. ⁴You are not asked to judge them at all. ⁵You are asked only to use them. ⁶It is their use that will give them meaning to you, and will show you that they are true.
9. Remember only this; you need not believe the ideas, you need not accept them, and you need not even welcome them. ²Some of them you may actively resist. ³None of this will matter, or decrease their efficacy. ⁴But do not allow yourself to make exceptions in applying the ideas the workbook contains, and whatever your reactions to the ideas may be, use them. ⁵Nothing more than that is required.
Next Section (https://acim.org/acim/en/s/401#1:1-9:5 | W-in.1:1–9:5)
A Course in Miracles
Part I
Lesson 1
Nothing I see in this room [on this street, from this window, in this place] means anything.
1. Now look slowly around you, and practice applying this idea very specifically to whatever you see:
²This table does not mean anything.
³This chair does not mean anything.
⁴This hand does not mean anything.
⁵This foot does not mean anything.
⁶This pen does not mean anything.
2. Then look farther away from your immediate area, and apply the idea to a wider range:
²That door does not mean anything.
³That body does not mean anything.
⁴That lamp does not mean anything.
⁵That sign does not mean anything.
⁶That shadow does not mean anything.
3. Notice that these statements are not arranged in any order, and make no allowance for differences in the kinds of things to which they are applied. ²That is the purpose of the exercise. ³The statement should merely be applied to anything you see. ⁴As you practice the idea for the day, use it totally indiscriminately. ⁵Do not attempt to apply it to everything you see, for these exercises should not become ritualistic. ⁶Only be sure that nothing you see is specifically excluded. ⁷One thing is like another as far as the application of the idea is concerned.
4. Each of the first three lessons should not be done more than twice a day each, preferably morning and evening. ²Nor should they be attempted for more than a minute or so, unless that entails a sense of hurry. ³A comfortable sense of leisure is essential.
Next Section (https://acim.org/acim/en/s/403#1:1-4:3 | W-1.1:1–4:3)
A Course in Miracles
https://acim.org/acim/en?wid=toc&fwv=true&tocVol=text
https://acourseinmiraclesnow.com
For more ACIM resources visit:
http://livingacourseinmiracles.com
Home
…….
A Course in Miracles
A Course in Miracles – Workbook Lesson 1 ~ Intuitively unpacked and explained …
ACIM- Daily Lessons
A Course in Miracles by Carol Howe –
Lesson 1
A Course in Miracles ACIM: Living Miracles ACIM
Lesson 1
David Hoffmeister
WisdomIsWealthThree co 