Excerpt from ‘The End of Death’
Copyright 2013 Nouk Sanchez
There is only one Power, God’s all-encompassing Love. Anytime we see or feel anything other than this then we are believing in illusions. God’s Love is eternally changeless, just like our Holy Self. Jesus’ message is uncompromising. In order to bring about consistent miracles we must cultivate a single-minded conviction in only ‘one’ Power – God’s Love. While we still retain our belief in a hierarchy of illusions we will reject knowing and demonstrating that there is no order of difficulty in miracles.
What we seem to see in this ego-made paradigm is constantly changing. The body appears to be born, it grows and matures and then it seems to wither and die. All this we take to be reality. Yet true Reality is changeless. The things we see in this paradigm are always changing. This unconscious propulsion for constant change comes from the ego’s beguiling intent to keep us forever running from God’s Love.
Everything we seem to see here is purely an ‘appearance.’ And appearances, because they do change, are not God’s changeless Reality. Appearances are projected by the ego to hypnotize us into believing they are real. While we believe the ego’s appearances of pain, sickness, loss, conflict, scarcity and death, we remain spell-bound by an hallucination. And instead of waking up from it, we go deeper into it by: 1) searching for pleasure, fulfillment and remedies within the hallucination. And 2) By defending ourselves against illusions within the hallucination.
There are two diametrically opposed realities and only one of them is real. There is this fear paradigm we experience here as an epic and ceaseless loop of change. And there is God’s changeless Reality that remains quietly but powerfully active beneath every ‘appearance’ that we choose to see. We choose which of these two realities to manifest depending on the one we value.
To most, what the body’s senses report is taken as truth. Once the hallucination is believed then no healing can take place. However we can invoke the miracle in any instant that we question reality; in that instant we become lucid. We remember that what we see is not God’s Reality. We must be hallucinating. We stand fast, choosing to look past ‘appearances’ and we trust in God’s changeless Reality; a Reality that cannot be accessed nor activated while we still prefer to be mesmerized by illusions.
This insane world with all its demented laws based on fear and death, is clearly not of God. It’s as if we placed a veil of terror over our eyes. The veil holds images of the ego’s most cherished gifts, guilt, pain, sickness, conflict, loss, scarcity and death. So when we look out through this veil at our body, others and the world, we cannot see them as they really are. Everything we see is superimposed with terror. We fall for the images of terror that seem to dance in the veil. And we plan our entire lives around attempting to navigate through it.
It’s just a veil! It has no reality. And look, who is holding the veil over our eyes. We are!
While we live our lives reacting to the illusory images on the veil, we cannot see nor feel Love. We can’t give it and we can’t receive it. We remain empty no matter how much we seem to achieve according to the rules and laws of the veil.
The veil of terror made its own laws apart from God’s Love. It’s central commandment, the one that supports every other law, is the concept of ‘death’. But once the concept of death is questioned, the center of the veil is pierced and the veil of terror loses its hypnotic conviction.
When we recognize that the world we seem to see with the body’s senses is really this veil of terror then we can decide with Spirit to be vigilant only for God’s Reality. This means that we consciously choose to look past (forgive) the images we see. We look past appearances whatever they may be. Our body’s eyes might see the veil of terror in the form of cancer, pain, financial loss, divorce or death, but we remain vigilant to keep our vision on God’s changeless Reality beyond what the ego’s senses report.
While we choose to look past illusions, we place our trust in Truth. This trust is what invokes the miracle. And the miracle can heal anything and everything. We must choose only one Power though. Just like the healing of the lesion on my leg in the summer of 2012. It took a while, but eventually I was able to truly surrender it to Spirit in full trust while knowing that it was ‘already’ healed. Some weeks later it just disappeared.
When Tomas had cancer in 2010, I did not have the level of trust that I have now. So I was not able to see completely past the veil of terror. I did see the tumors and I did feel fear which is an indication that I still believed in what my body’s eyes saw; instead of God’s Reality. To the degree that we continue to fear then to that extent we will ‘expect’ and manifest what we fear. This is the attraction of fear.
Fear separates us from God’s Love and help; from miracles. The Atonement is the undoing of fear. That is why Jesus says that the one responsibility of the miracle worker, is to accept Atonement for himself. We can’t help ourselves or others while we ourselves remain fearful, anxious or concerned. When we accept Atonement we accept healing. Then we can truly give what we know we already have.
Miracles ~ All Appearances Can Change!
Jesus speaks strongly about miracles and how they can heal any and every appearance.
“What is temptation but a wish to make illusions real? It does not seem to be the wish that no reality be so. Yet it is an assertion that some forms of idols have a powerful appeal that makes them harder to resist than those you would not want to have reality. Temptation, then, is nothing more than this; a prayer the miracle touch not some dreams, but keep their unreality obscure and give to them reality instead. And Heaven gives no answer to the prayer, nor can a miracle be given you to heal appearances you do not like. You have established limits. What you ask [is] given you, but not of God Who knows no limits. You have limited yourself.” T-30.VIII.3.
“Reality is changeless. Miracles but show what you have interposed between reality and your awareness is unreal, and does not interfere at all. The cost of the belief there must be some appearances beyond the hope of change is that the miracle cannot come forth from you consistently. For you have asked it be withheld from power to heal all dreams. There is no miracle you cannot have when you desire healing. But there is no miracle that can be given you unless you want it. Choose what you would heal, and He Who gives all miracles has not been given freedom to bestow His gifts upon God’s Son. When he is tempted, he denies reality. And he becomes the willing slave of what he chose instead.” T-30.VIII.4.
What is temptation but the wish to make ‘some’ illusions real? He says here that within our hierarchy of illusions, we choose which illusions we want to make real. We get sick; an illusion that we don’t like. We fall in love (special relationship); and form an idol with powerful appeal, but it’s one that we do like.
Jesus says here that ‘temptation’ is nothing more than a prayer that the miracle bypasses our treasured idols, while transforming the ones we hate. Yet all our idols, the pleasurable ones and the painful ones are spawned by guilt and therefore share the same purpose, unconscious self-attack. We do not know our own best interests!
When we have compartmentalized our idols this way, we exclude them from healing. As he says, “And Heaven gives no answer to the prayer, nor can a miracle be given you to heal appearances you do not like. You have established limits. What you ask [is] given you, but not of God Who knows no limits. You have limited yourself.” T-30.VIII.3:5-8
Reality is changeless. And miracles show the dancing images we see in the veil of terror that we hold over our eyes, are unreal and cannot interfere with Reality. The cost of believing that there are some ‘appearances’ beyond the hope of change is that the miracle cannot come forth from you consistently! Look at this. Look at how we mindlessly segregate our illusions. A cold or a toothache might be healed but how about a complete and spontaneous healing from a so-called irreversible illness? Or even the throes of death, like what happened to Anita Moorjani. (Click here for an excellent interview with her)
“There is no miracle you cannot have when you desire healing.” Sit with this deeply; there is no miracle you cannot have when you desire healing of the only cause of all suffering – unconscious guilt. “But there is no miracle that can be given you unless you want it. Choose what you would heal and He Who gives all miracles has not been given freedom to bestow His gifts upon God’s Son.” In other words when you select a specific ‘form’ to heal while excluding another, then you reject true healing of both the cause and the effect (symptom).
The reason why we never heal the one cause of our particular problem/s is because we attempt to heal them at the level at which they appear (body and world). Yes, we may succeed temporarily with changing the ‘appearance’ of the problem. But because we’ve isolated the ‘effect’ or symptom, we have separated it from its one cause; guilt. And now the cause remains free to manifest again either in the same form or perhaps a different one.
***
Sickness and pain are idols because they are something we defend against, thereby assigning them power and reality over God’s Love; God’s changeless Reality. Health (ego healing) is an idol too, because it’s something that we attempt to achieve independently, apart from God’s Love. Anything we want ‘more’ than God’s Love is an idol. We may want to be disease or pain-free. But if we want this more than God’s Love, we reject healing the only cause of all suffering, unconscious guilt as self-attack.
There is nothing ‘more’ than God’s Love and there is nothing ‘other’ than God’s Love. So if we want something more than God’s Love, or something other than it, then it’s obvious that we desire an illusion, a substitute for God’s Love as our Holy Self. And for this desire we will accumulate guilt as unconscious self-attack.
The miracle becomes immediately and consistently available to heal all appearances, each time we’re willing to look past the appearance and seek to heal the one cause within, being guilt. We withdraw the ego’s belief that the problem’s cause is anywhere but in our mind no matter whether it be disease, financial scarcity or any other form of guilt.
” [Because] reality is changeless is a miracle already there to heal all things that change, and offer them to you to see in happy form, devoid of fear. It will be given you to look upon your brother thus. But not while you would have it otherwise in some respects. For this but means you would not have him healed and whole. The Christ in him is perfect. Is it this that you would look upon? Then let there be no dreams about him that you would prefer to seeing this. And you will see the Christ in him because you let Him come to you. And when He has appeared to you, you will be certain you are like Him, for He is the changeless in your brother and in you.” T-30.VIII.5.
Miracles are already here to heal all things that do change. As they heal the guilty cause, they must also transfer to the effect and heal the appearance. Cause and consequence always remain together in the mind and can never be separated. But if I hold un-relinquished judgments or beliefs, I won’t be open to the miracle.
So if I believe another is sick, or in pain, then I reject the miracle on behalf of us both. It means that I would reject God’s changeless Reality in favor of what the ego’s senses see. I trust in illusion rather than Truth. And by this judgment, I would not have him healed and whole. We would not have our self healed and whole. Jesus explains that the Christ in him is perfect. Wouldn’t we want to see only this? Because if we did, we would see the Christ within our self. And our guilt would fall away to reveal the unimaginable innocence and perfection that we always were.
“This will you look upon when you decide there is not one appearance you would hold in place of what your brother really is. Let no temptation to prefer a dream allow uncertainty to enter here. Be not made guilty and afraid when you are tempted by a dream of what he is. But do not give it power to replace the changeless in him in your sight of him. There is no false appearance but will fade, if you request a miracle instead. There is no pain from which he is not free, if you would have him be but what he is. Why should you fear to see the Christ in him? You but behold yourself in what you see. As he is healed are you made free of guilt, for his appearance is your own to you.” T-30.VIII.6.
You will see the perfect Christ within when you decide there is not one ‘appearance’ that would replace the Truth of what your brother really is. You may see disease, pain, conflict and even death in another. But let no temptation to allow the veil of terror block you from witnessing the changeless in him. Do not give the veil of terror any power. And do not feel guilty or fearful by the threat of temptation.
When you do this, there is no false appearance that can withstand your request for a miracle instead. There is no pain he can suffer if you desire to see his changeless Reality instead of what the ego sees. As you look past the ego’s veil of terror for another, you do so for yourself. As he is healed you are made free of guilt because his appearance is your own to you. This is indeed powerful stuff!
“The miracle is means to demonstrate that all appearances can change because they [are] appearances, and cannot have the changelessness reality entails. The miracle attests salvation from appearances by showing they can change. Your brother has a changelessness in him beyond appearance and deception, both. It is obscured by changing views of him that you perceive as his reality. The happy dream about him takes the form of the appearance of his perfect health, his perfect freedom from all forms of lack, and safety from disaster of all kinds. The miracle is proof he is not bound by loss or suffering in any form, because it can so easily be changed. This demonstrates that it was never real, and could not stem from his reality. For that is changeless, and has no effects that anything in Heaven or on earth could ever alter. But appearances are shown to be unreal [because] they change.” T-30.VIII.2.
Jesus says here that the miracle is the means to ‘demonstrate’ physically, that all appearances can change because they are appearances only. They are not changeless Reality. He states that the miracle attests deliverance or recovery from appearances by showing that they can change. Appearances, as illusion, are not fixed. Our brother has a changelessness in him that is far beyond the appearance of deception. But this is blocked by our own changing and erroneous perception.
He goes further to mention the happy dream (Real World) here, declaring that in this state, ego appearances of suffering are exchanged for Spirit’s appearances of joy, health and healing. He says the happy dream about our brother takes the form of perfect health. And perfect freedom from all forms of lack, and safety from disaster of all kinds.
The miracle is proof, a physical demonstration that he (and you as well!) is not bound by loss and suffering of any form…because it can be changed. He makes a point here. Stating that the miracle ‘demonstrates’ at the form level, that suffering, loss and death were never real. And that they could by no means stem from his reality. This is exactly what Jesus demonstrated while he was in a body 2,000 years ago. He calmed storms, healed the sick and raised the dead. Now, he is calling us to consciously join him in deciding what we want to see. Do we want to believe what our bodies eyes see in the veil of terror? Or do we deeply desire to focus our heart’s vision on God’s changeless Reality, looking clear past all ego appearances?
NOTE: To ‘look past appearances’ is forgiveness. It is done with Spirit and not with the ego. To align with God’s changeless reality and to invoke the miracle, I do the following: I remember that if someone or something upsets me, I am not seeing God’s Reality but an illusion, an idol. Therefore my own perception requires healing before I can heal myself or help another. I remember to accept Atonement, click here for the Forgiveness/Atonement Process
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This longer declaration of uncompromising Truth seems to make ego restless. Truth comes into mind, then more unconscious guilt rises up to be looked at with Holy Spirit. Hurray for the opportunity to choose for God with Spirit rather than staying with ego painful deception! Infinite love and gratitude, Nouk.
Thanks Triskana. Yes…it does make the ego restless. That’s why it seems to be bubbling up within me, yearning to get out onto paper so to speak. Lots of UN-learning, lots of trust yet to be gained. But all so miraculous and perfect!
Hugs and Love,
Nouk
I have no other words but thank-you Nouk.
Wow, Nouk, this teaching is like dynamite for the ego! So uncompromising! In this state of lifting the veils, we are really pure, pure, pure innocence. Thank you, with deepest gratitude. LOVE always
Rodolfo
Hi Nouk… thank you
How does the Course explain illness in babies and children? Is it still attributed to guilt? I have just been through a hard physical test and in the midst of pain and suffering it was hard so hard to not be fearful. And if it be true that I chose it by worsiping something less than God I certainly want to know:)
Blessings
Paul
Hi Paul,
Every being within the ego dream has guilt. Otherwise they could never suffer. Remember that all guilt and all suffering that issues from that guilt, is a symptom of the belief that we are separate from God’s infinite Love, Healing and Joy. There’s always just one problem (that we feel separate from God’s Love) and there’s just one Answer…to accept the healing that God always Wills for us. There is no suffering, no pain in God’s Love. All suffering comes from our belief in the ego.
If you’d like to learn more about helping to heal another (baby or child included), I suggest you read the following excerpt, HELPING OTHER TO HEAL THROUGH THE MIRACLE: http://undoing-the-ego.org/noukblog/?p=338
The most important thing to recall when we seem to see another suffering is this: How much does their suffering trigger us? If it’s triggering us then it is OURS to heal. As we genuinely accept this healing, we help to heal the other and our self. We can do the full Atonement process on it, here: http://undoing-the-ego.org/noukblog/?p=231 And a helpful prayer here: http://undoing-the-ego.org/noukblog/?p=550
And although this next piece is not yet published…it might help you some. It’s titled, Innocent Babies, Sickness, Mental Illness or Handicap
What about the innocent babies born into sickness or handicap? Or the mentally ill? How do they heal? First up, we need to realize that this lifetime (birth to death) is just a single frame in a long reel of film that has been playing out since the beginning of time (separation). The mind that is responsible for decisions including the state of our body when we enter birth, lies outside the body. After all, it’s the mind and not the brain, that projected the body. It is not the other way round. Remember that the body and the world are both in our mind.
The mind is eternal and is immune to all the ego made. So the mind will never taste death. However, our mind is split. The intent within it is split. We are now two-minded instead of one-minded. The whole, healed Mind is who we are; this is God’s Will that extends itself forever in Joy. The false part of our mind is the ego; un-relinquished guilt that seeks to perpetuate itself in the illusion of an existence governed by the opposite of God…being death and all kinds of unimaginable suffering in between.
The brain is not the mind. The brain is simply a body part just like a finger or a leg. It has no special power other than as a means for decision making. And there is always only one decision to make regardless of what appears before us. And that is to follow the inner teacher that it chooses, either the ego or the Holy Spirit.
In the case of being born into a sick or handicapped body, the decision for this was made consciously (as is all sickness, only we choose not to remember) by the mind, the unhealed and split mind – before birth. As for mental illness and depression, these too are decisions that we make in the grand scale of the ego dream. By the way, Jesus refuses to classify any form of illness. While we seem to see a hierarchy of pain and illness, they are all the same, a mistaken choice made with the ego mind. If we make one form of illness more difficult to heal then we’ve made it real and ‘special’, excluding it from true healing.
Recently I saw an ACIM public group discussion on dementia, which appears to be a prolific form of disease in many aging folks. My mother and grandmother suffered from dementia at a relatively early age. Both were in their late 60’s when it began and I remember well how debilitating it was for them. The discussion was meant to point out the positive side of dementia. It was suggested that dementia afforded people a greater sense of peace as their cognitive powers decreased. They were no longer plagued by the incessant ego need to control their lives, their bodies and the world.
And while this outlook served to reframe a sad affliction, it did so within the context of the ego’s dream and did not reflect true perception. Dementia is a state of mindlessness. Undoing the ego demands a vigilant state of mindfulness. Dementia is a form of powerlessness like any other form of sickness.
It is possible that mental illness acts as a kind of double security against awakening to the Love and power that we are. The awakening process calls for alert, mindful decision making. We need to be alert and aware, so we can unlearn the ego’s beliefs and values. And to clearly distinguish between the ego and Spirit in our mind. To awaken from the ego dream involves accessing our own inner decision maker. How can we do this when we have exercised our ego will to dull our decision making faculty?
Yet even with this kind of seeming helplessness, it does not by any means make these afflictions irreversible – now. Let me explain.
There is only one whole, healed mind. In the dream of separation, we split that one mind. Although it appears to be split into billions of bodies, nevertheless, there is still only one mind in truth. This translates to there being only one ego and one Holy Self despite appearances. If I am emotionally triggered by another’s state of sickness, as I was with my mother’s state of dementia, e.g. concern, anxiety, sadness, fear, grief, anger, remorse, etc., then the un-forgiveness that spawned all sickness lies in my mind.
My own mind is either the source of sickness or healing for all minds, because we are one mind. There is no reality outside or apart from my own mind. And the fact that I believe sickness is real (a threat to another or myself), means that ‘I’ need healing. I am the perceiver, the source of the perceived. All illusion and all reality are in my own mind. And if I see or feel pain or sickness then my mind is sick in itself. I have chosen to see illusion from the split mind, instead of seeing reality from the whole, healed mind. They both reside in my mind in any now moment that I choose. This is where the Atonement comes in; where miracles are waiting to be invoked. To heal another or myself – I accept the Atonement for myself, thus correcting the error in both our minds simultaneously; healing another and myself. Note: for the entire Atonement/forgiveness process, go to page ?
If I desire to help another to heal the cause of their affliction, I can do so by accepting Atonement for myself thus healing us both. Remember there is no hierarchy of illusions. They are all illusions and not one of them is harder to heal. Jesus demonstrated this in all the healings that he did and asks us to do the same…and more. There is no hierarchy of illusions, because all of them are equally unreal. Thus, Jesus is asking us to accept and to demonstrate the number one Miracle Principle: “There is no order of difficulty in miracles.”
” No one can ask another to be healed. But he can let [himself] be healed, and thus offer the other what he has received. Who can bestow upon another what he does not have? And who can share what he denies himself?” T-27.V.1:6-9.
The ego cannot grasp that all healing lay in our own mind. In its deranged perception, it says that you are the cause of another’s illness. And they are the cause of yours. And daring to look at the source of all as being in your mind, provokes the ego to lay a monumental guilt-trip on you, hoping you’ll project it outward. It just has to see guilt as out there in someone else. When you bring the light of awareness within and witness the guilt within (to release it), it does everything to repel your gaze. Because once you begin to take true responsibility, to witness and release the guilt within, the ego is busted and has no ground upon which to sustain your allegiance any longer.