We, as the little individual personality selves we think we are, are not making any decisions here on the level of form. We are not deciding to do something or not do something. We are not deciding where to live, what job to have, what people to be in relationship with, whether to go to college or not, what clothes to wear, or even whether to have pizza or Chinese for dinner. All of these seeming decisions are being made by the mind as it weaves its stories. The little ego personality self is a puppet of the mind. By choosing to believe that your personality self is making decisions off of its preferences, opinions and judgments is a delusion. Your choosing to believe that delusion makes the whole illusion seem real. Your belief fuels the illusion, keeping it and the separation alive.

The mind, colluded with the collective ego and made a thing called a body. The purpose of the body is so that we could have something to be special and separate in. Then we, as mind, made up birth, sickness, pain, aging and death to make the body seem real. We added a personality self for more separation and specialness. We now have individual bodies that we decorate in our own special ways and individual selves that have their individual opinions, likes and dislikes, goals, stories and “experiences.” Every time we, as mind, made up some new “cool” things to make this whole dream seem real and “protect” ourselves from the truth, we immediately forgot we made them. This is what the Course calls dissociation or the decision to forget.

The body would not be that particular body without a personality self. When you see the word body in the Course it includes the idea of the personality self. I am not a body. I am free. I am not this personality self named blank. I am free. When talking about bodies the personality self is implicit.

What these bodies do, say, think, feel is directed by the wrong mind. The collective ego mind in collusion with our individual minds makes up all sorts of stories for our individual body personality selves to “experience.” These stories are all a replay of the original separation story. At their core they are based on the ideas of fear, sin and guilt. And then the mind forgets it made them up. But the mind is not making up death and sickness stories maliciously. It actually thinks that they are a good idea. The ego enrolls the mind that it has attacked God and that defenses are needed to protect itself. These stories are defenses against the truth, defenses against God. In order to retain the deluded experience of specialness and separation and stay safe from a wrathful God, the mind must continue to choose to believe that the separation is real.

We, as the collective seemingly separate mind, made the ego. We made it in our own image. When we first fell asleep, we thought that we were a self that had rebelled against their Father wanting autonomy and specialness. In essence we, in the dream, wanted Our Father dead. So guess what? The ego we made rebelled against its father, us. It wants to be autonomous and wants us dead. The ego has the same mind bending problem we had. If we want our Source dead we too would die. If the ego wants the mind, its source dead, it too will die. So our rebellious child, has twisted and turned, maneuvered and deceived until it too has made up a dream world where it seems to get what it wants. So if you think about it, this whole sordid dream is the story of a rebellious child who left his father and gave birth to another rebellious son, the ego, who then gave birth to more rebellious sons, our personal egos or personality selves. Our little personality selves are spawns of the devil covered by the face of innocence.

We have so many stories about how these little personality selves, these heroes are in loving relationship with each other, are communicating with each other, are capable of goodness and kindness, are enjoying themselves, and are engaged in harmless fun. But that is not their nature. They are by nature murderous. Carl Jung identified the dark side of the human psyche. The Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde phenomenon. But it seems as if the little personality self is all Hyde with a fake covering of Jekyll. At its core it too is the idea of separation, a murderous thought. You can dress it up and have fantasies of its potential goodness but it is what it is. Believing that fantasy is what keeps the illusion going.

So how do we stop “making it real” and get the  hell out of here. One of the biggest stumbling blocks to the return is our continued collective belief that the world is benign and that our personality selves are mostly Jekyll with a tiny bit of Hyde. This is a place where we came to die. This is a place where we suffer, not from the happenings of the world, but from our continued agonizing seeming separation from God. That suffering is just reflected in the worldly stories. No matter what seems to be happening on the surface, all seemingly separated selves operate from panic, terror, self-loathing, guilt and fear. The mind attacked itself and wants to die. The process of return presently will take millions of years. Maybe more. Some accelerated time collapse might be in order.

The Course is a tool for an accelerated awakening. But there is an accelerated tool within the tool. If Heaven is the awareness of perfect Oneness then we must climb the ladder of awareness to get home to God. Our awareness of reality is blocked by two things  Our dissociation of realty and our choosing to believe in the unreal is real. The study of the Course, doing the lessons, practicing true forgiveness and learning to listen to and take direction from the Holy Spirit all support our climb up the ladder. But there are those ready for more acceleration.

No more specific lessons are assigned, for there is no more need of them. Henceforth, hear but the Voice for God and for your Self when you retire from the world, to seek reality instead. He will direct your efforts, telling you exactly what to do, how to direct your mind, and when to come to Him in silence, asking for His sure direction and His certain Word. His is the Word that God has given you. His is the Word you chose to be your own. (W-ep.3:1-5)

What does it mean to retire from the world, to seek reality instead? I will not participate in the world except at the explicit direction of the Holy Spirit for His purpose. I give my body and my ego, personality self to the Holy Spirit to be used solely for the purpose of communication, healing.  I will not believe my physical eyes. I will only that the Holy Spirit flow effortlessly through me unhindered by any blocks to His presence.

Into this empty space, from which the goal of sin has been removed, is Heaven free to be remembered. Here its peace can come, and perfect healing take the place of death. The body can become a sign of life, a promise of redemption, and a breath of immortality to those grown sick of breathing in the fetid scent of death. Let it have healing as its purpose. Then will it send forth the message it received, and by its health and loveliness proclaim the truth and value that it represents. Let it receive the power to represent an endless life, forever unattacked. And to your brother let its message be, “Behold me, brother, at your hand I live.” (T-27.I.10:1-7)

Welcome to the Holy Spirit script. Welcome to the supernatural. Welcome to salvation.

To achieve this we must see the world and its seeming inhabitants clearly. We must let the Holy Spirit teach us of their insane origins and the thought system that spawned them. We must recognize  salvation as our only function and abandon all other goals we have made for ourselves. We must make the world and its stories, the body and the personality self insignificant. We must learn to hear only the Holy Spirit. We must support our brothers, who are ourselves, in awakening. Each part of our separated mind must return. If you have learned of a way, the Course, to have that happen, at the instruction of the Holy Spirit, share it. We will learn not to take instruction from the ego, which we are addicted to. The ego has such a grip on our thinking that it literally controls us. Part of our journey home is becoming sober of that addiction. If you think you have, think again. Not listening to the ego reflexively is as important as listening to the Holy Spirit because one precludes the other.

We gave the ego the power to weave all these deceptions and we can take it back. We can stop playing the game of sickness and death. We can stop playing all of the ego’s illusory games and running after illusory goals. We can put down our childish toys. We can rise above the battlefield of the natural into the world of the supernatural. The Holy Spirit knows the way but it is all or nothing.

The FIRST illusion, which must be displaced before another thought system can take hold, is that it is a sacrifice to give up the things of this world. (M-13.1:6-7)

That is just the first. Down the rabbit hole we go!