PART ONE  

An Excerpt from ‘The End of Death’

by Nouk Sanchez

Copyright 2012 Nouk Sanchez

Please Note: This is Part One only

In this ego dream we have an almost endless hierarchy of illusions with the body being the ego’s chief idol and the last that we wholly surrender to God’s Purpose. The body is by far our greatest idol, our fiercest defense against remembering our dominion and invulnerability in God’s Love. The world was made to reinforce the ego’s version of the body in defense against God’s Love. All its illusory laws including the laws of nature were made to keep its central dream of death cycling in the wheel of time and suffering.

While we believe that the body is who we are, we unknowingly fear God. What we fear we defend ourselves against. And whatever we defend against we unconsciously attract. The body thus is a replacement for the infinite Love, abundance and security that we will eventually recognize ourselves to be. But while under the ego’s reign, the body appears to have many needs and is at the mercy of a multitude of threats.

It took me a very long time to accept that the body is inside my mind; and that the mind is not inside the body as the ego’s perception projects. Yet learning to see the body this way was extremely important in my own healing. As we undo our blocks to Love we begin to generalize our lessons, seeing only one purpose in everything being forgiveness. I recognize now that everything in this ego dream is neutral. I give it all the meaning it has for me. Through the ego, everyone and everything seems to have a different purpose. But all these seemingly separate purposes are always an attempt to supply the false sense of lack that the ego projects. Remember the ego’s mantra is, ‘seek but do not find.’

While we feel as if we are in the body, we must remember that our body and the world itself remains inside our mind. That is where the cause and the effects of the body and the world always reside. Recall that the brain is simply another body part. It is not the brain from which we manifest our dream. The mind is the singular source of all we perceive; and everything we perceive is inside the mind. Think about that. So there is literally nothing out there that is apart from our mind. We project it all.

The mind is split and depending upon which inner teacher we choose to perceive with, we will see either the ego’s world of scarcity, sickness and death or Spirit’s Real World of Love. The brain is simply a tool that the mind uses to carry out its function just like any other body part.

We project the body by beaming its image in each moment. And the image we appear to perceive is always an effect of our belief, which is the cause in our mind. We can gauge the degree of our investment in a particular ego belief by observing the level of emotional charge that it triggers. Some examples might include, losing your wallet, being criticized, being sick, being in emotional or physical pain, etc. To the extent that you feel threatened, then to that degree you can be sure your own unconscious guilt (self attack) needs to be forgiven.

When we begin to accept that the body is inside our mind, that we beam the body in every minute, it gives us some distance from the ego belief that we remain hostage to a body run by the tyranny of ego’s biological laws. These are biological laws that demonstrate the illusions of sickness, pain, scarcity, aging and death are certainly not God’s Laws.

Opening to the idea that our body is in our mind, gives us a much needed buffer. One that serves as a refuge helping us to return to right-mindedness when we feel emotionally or physically attacked by our self, another or the world. In the buffer zone, we can choose again. We are not the body. We are the mind behind the body. If we feel attacked regardless of appearances, we can recall it as self-attack and thereby forgive the only cause of attack which is always in our own mind.

Recognizing When we Still Believe in the Body and the World 

In my earlier study of the Course, I was adamant that I was not a body, that I was free. But now I see this was an intellectual, spiritual ego bypass that set me up for improper denial of the body. And what I didn’t know back then was that whatever I denied would be used unconsciously by the ego for attack. Consequently the body became the target for self attack. The body eclipses God’s Love while we remain in defense of it. In other words, we are fearful of God while we continue to believe that we are independently responsible for sustaining and protecting the body. Sustaining and protecting the body are both defenses. The independent urge to ‘save our life’ is a defense against God’s Love.

The ego is autonomous, being totally independent from God’s Love, from the incorruptible Holy Self that we are beneath the illusory ego. We place our allegiance with ego laws, including biological laws, above God’s Laws when we make decisions independently from Spirit. For example, for many years I took an array of supplements in defense of the threat of illness. However now, as I release my fear of Love, I find my dependence upon outer idols to save me, is falling away. And the realization that is flooding my awareness now is that God’s Love is all there is, is all that sustains me…so when I perceive threat, what exactly am I defending myself from? It can only be Love in truth. Recently I saw a truly enlightening quote that really says it all. A student asks the Master, “What is Love?”

“What is Love?”

“The total absence of fear,” said the Master.

“What is it we fear?”

“Love,” said the Master.

So we see here that our greatest unconscious fear… is Love itself. As Jesus tells us in the Course’s introduction, removing the blocks to the awareness of Love’s presence involves undoing our perception of the body and the world. As we undo our beliefs and values, we begin to overcome the body and the world as the Holy Self recovers awareness of its power and dominion in God’s Love.

“The course does not aim at teaching the meaning of love, for that is beyond what can be taught. It does aim, however, at removing the blocks to the awareness of love’s presence, which is your natural inheritance. The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite.” T-in.2:6-8

Overcoming the body and the world demand that we learn to be mindful of the instances we perceive threat. These are always opportunities for our perception to be healed. And as the cause of the ego world is healed in our mind, the effects which are together in the mind, are reinterpreted. Thus are ego’s laws undone in our mind first and then in our experience. This is the healing of the dream and all the symbols within it. What was previously made to demonstrate separation and attack is now used to demonstrate dominion in Christ and to extend Love. Thus is the body’s real and only purpose.

So the happy dream or Real World is the result of healing our mind; and not of attempts to change the effects, being the world the ego projected. We overcome the body and the world by healing the mind, and not by falling victim to the body or the world. The right mind heals the body because the body’s purpose is no longer dictated by the ego.  The sacred purpose behind healing the body (through healing the mind) is to prove illusions are not true. The healed mind heals the body in its sacred purpose to prove through demonstration, that illusions are simply not true.

The body is dethroned as having power over the mind and Love is restored to our awareness. We cannot fully embody the power of God as our Holy Self until we renounce our victimhood to the body and the world. Otherwise we remain split between two totally irreconcilable powers, the ego and God. When we invite healing of the body as a result of Atonement (miracle), we decide to be a witness to the world of its innocence. In sickness the ego seeks to witness to its guilt. Below Jesus tells us the importance of the body’s healing as a result of a healed mind.

 “Now in the hands made gentle by His touch, the Holy Spirit lays a picture of a different you. It is a picture of a body still, for what you really are cannot be seen nor pictured. Yet this one has not been used for purpose of attack, and therefore never suffered pain at all. It witnesses to the eternal truth that you cannot be hurt, and points beyond itself to both your innocence and his. Show this unto your brother, who will see that every scar is healed, and every tear is wiped away in laughter and in love. And he will look on his forgiveness there, and with healed eyes will look beyond it to the innocence that he beholds in you. Here is the proof that he has never sinned; that nothing which his madness bid him do was ever done, or ever had effects of any kind. That no reproach he laid upon his heart was ever justified, and no attack can ever touch him with the poisoned and relentless sting of fear.” T-27.I.5  “Attest his innocence and not his guilt. Your healing is his comfort and his health because it proves illusions are not true.” T-27.I.6:1-2

A major step in the Atonement plan is to undo error at all levels, both the cause in the mind and effects in the body and the world…as Jesus teaches in the Course.

“A major step in the Atonement plan is to undo error at all levels. Sickness or “not-right-mindedness” is the result of level confusion, because it always entails the belief that what is amiss on one level can adversely affect another.” T-2.IV.2:1-2 Jesus also tells us that, “A miracle of healing proves that separation is without effect.” T-27.II.5:2

Note: If you found PART ONE helpful, please read PART TWO of HOW DO WE UNDO THE BELIEF THAT WE ARE A BODY?

FOR “THE END OF DEATH” TOPIC INDEX – A VALUABLE & FREE RESOURCE, click here 

The End of Death is available via www.endofdeath.com

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