As explained earlier in the bathtub analogy (Part One here), Jesus was the first to completely overcome the ego’s central dream of death through His resurrection. He was also the first to complete the Atonement principle on behalf of us all. Within the one mind of the Son of God (which includes us all), He was the first to awaken completely from the ego’s birth/death cycle. He did this while appearing in a body. The Holy Spirit therefore called upon Jesus to carry out His plan of Atonement:

“He has established Jesus as the leader in carrying out His plan since he was the first to complete his own part perfectly.” C-6.2:2

Jesus demonstrated that He overcame the body/world by reversing the laws of this world. He did this through the recognition and embodiment of His own absolute guiltlessness. And as He knew His own guiltlessness, He therefore knew the guiltless state of everyone and everything.

In His acceptance of all-inclusive guiltlessness, all blocks to the awareness of Love’s presence fell away forever. God’s unlimited power was returned to His awareness. This is how He took dominion over both the body and world, reversing the ego’s cause and effect. And this is how He invoked miracles and healing.

There have been many saints and sages who awakened in the dream, but did not awaken from the dream completely. Their knowing was incomplete; they were not fully able to reverse the ego’s cause and effect. They still perceived a hierarchy of illusions and were therefore unable to demonstrate that there is no order of difficulty in miracles.

The ego’s dream of death appeared to overpower their will, resulting in sickness and physical death that claimed their bodies. They had not yet accepted their total guiltlessness, and therefore did not claim divine immunity from ego phenomena. If they had, they could have simply laid the body aside in perfect health when their purpose was complete. In so doing, they would have awakened from the ego’s dream altogether, breaking free of the ego’s birth and death cycle.

“There have been many healers who did not heal themselves.They have not moved mountains by their faith because their faith was not whole. Some of them have healed the sick at times, but they have not raised the dead. Unless the healer heals himself, he cannot believe that there is no order of difficulty in miracles.” T-5.VII.2:1-4 

COLLAPSING THE DREAM OF DEATH DIAGRAM

NOTE: The star’s path depicts Jesus  showing us the way out of the ego’s dream of death

 THE INNERMOST RING: EGO’S BODY AND WORLD

In the diagram Collapsing the Dream of Death, there are three concentric rings. The innermost ring represents this ego paradigm where we seem to experience pain, conflict, illness, loss, scarcity and death. The so-called laws of nature also are found here. As you can see, the concept of death holds all of these ego laws together; it appears to give them their structural integrity.

The innermost ring is filled with dots. These represent all human beings since the beginning of time. The star symbolizes Jesus as Christ, the risen Holy Self within us who has already undone the ego’s dream of separation. When Jesus resurrected, we were there with Him. When He recognized and accepted He was the Son of God, and therefore the Kingdom of Heaven, we were also with Him.

Our one Holy Self has already overcome the ego’s world and laws. This was accomplished on behalf of us all. Yet we don’t experience this as our own truth, because we still value the ego. Our own power of choice is paramount. The instant we no longer desire the ego’s thought system, our awareness will be restored to all-encompassing Love with no opposite.

As the diagram shows, the star of Christ has leapt beyond the dream of death. While Jesus was here in a body, He lived out from the Christ within; this means He lived out from His awareness of the Real World, which is what enabled Him to heal the sick and raise the dead. He did this by recognizing the total reversal of ego cause and effect.

These “worlds” do not truly inhabit separate physical spaces; they’re all one. Yet the Real World was immediately revealed to Him as He chose total forgiveness, allowing all things to be reinterpreted for Him.

There are many levels of awakening in the ego dream. Some may become Self-realized or enlightened, which is immensely helpful to all of us. But to become enlightened in the dream is not the same as awakening from it altogether. Once we truly know all cause and effect is in our mind, we will demonstrate that nothing in the ego’s illusory world of external phenomena can possibly hurt us, including our own body. We can no longer be victimized by the body or the world.

 THE SECOND RING: RING Of DEATH

The second ring represents the ego’s dream of death. Notice how this ring completely encases our world. The dream of death acts as a very solid barrier to attainment of the Real World. While any belief in death is held, regardless of its form, the Real World is kept from our awareness.

Note that in this ring of death, a constant “recycling program” is in effect. Another name for this is reincarnation. If the dream of death is not overcome within our lifetime, we simply recycle back into form for yet another experience of birth, amnesia and death.

Some of us hit a wall around mid-life, although it occasionally comes earlier. This is when the ego, the false self developed by our parents, culture, media and education finally cracks under the weight of its own deception. Suicide is a common attempt to escape this dilemma, but physical death is not the remedy— because death is not the end of the ego’s cycle.

           “For death is seen as safety, the great dark savior from the light of truth, the answer to the Answer, the silencer of the Voice that speaks for God. Yet the retreat to death is not the end of conflict.” T-19.IV.C.7:2-3

“There is no death because what God created shares His life. There is no death because an opposite to God does not exist. There is no death because the Father and the Son are One.” W-167.1:5-7

“There is no death because the living share the function their Creator gave to them. Life’s function cannot be to die. It must be life’s extension, that it be as one forever and forever, without end.” T-29.VI.4:9-11

A period of disillusionment occurs when we have exhausted everything the ego offers. A type of breakdown takes place, in order to break through. This breakdown or disillusionment phase is the pivotal point at which we can change the purpose of our life. From what to what? From the ego’s goal of separation and death to Spirit’s goal of awakening and Life. This new choice heralds the awakening from fear, because it offers us the reversal of our life’s purpose, and therefore our body’s purpose as well.

Reaching this phase of disillusionment usually precipitates— or accelerates—a search for deeper meaning or purpose in life. At this point some may take up a spiritual path. Others may make the unconscious choice to get sick and die. Whichever course we take, if there remains a belief that death is the certain outcome of life, we will surely manifest death as our outcome. And the recycling will continue: Death, birth, amnesia, building a bigger ego, disillusionment and finally death again.

The birth/amnesia/death cycle ensures the illusion of time will drag onward ad infinitum. This long, arduous cycle has been rendered unnecessary by Jesus’ resurrection and Atonement. Each time we forgive, accepting the miracle of Atonement instead of its opposite, a literal collapse of time, and therefore suffering, occurs.

           “The miracle substitutes for learning that might have taken thousands of years.” T-1.II.6:7

“Be still and listen to the truth today. For each five minutes spent in listening, a thousand minds are opened to the truth and they will hear the holy Word you hear.” W-106.9:1-2 “The function [of God’s teachers] is to save time. Each one begins as a single light, but with the Call at its center it is a light that cannot be limited. And each one saves a thousand years of time as the world judges it.” M-1.2:11-13

 THE OUTER RING:  THE REAL WORLD DREAM

When forgiveness is complete, our perception is healed. No one and nothing is left to hurt us. We have forgiven our self completely for having used others, the past, the world and our body to attack our self. We are no longer victims of the illusory world in our mind. Cause and effect have been completely reversed, and recognized for what they are. We realize everyone and everything, including the body, dwells within our mind, and are not the external projections we think we see. We now see with God. And everything we see with God is healed.

Only the laws of God prevail here in this Happy Dream, because the body’s purpose has become Holy. While the body might still exist a little while longer until its purpose is complete, it harbors no sickness, pain, scarcity, conflict, aging, loss, sacrifice, struggle, suffering or death.

When the Holy Self recognizes the body’s purpose has been fulfilled, the body is joyfully, peacefully laid aside. It’s the unzipping of a “skin suit” for the very last time.

The body is in perfect health as this decision is carried out. Having finally broken our ancient vow of separation and suffering, the Christ within takes dominion over everything the ego made. The body and world have been returned to God’s purpose. All dreaming is complete. The cycle of death and destruction ends at last, as the Holy Self is lifted into God. This final step is taken by God, in what Jesus calls the transfer or return from perception to knowledge. I call it the Ascension.

“The central lesson is always this; that what you use the body for it will become to you. Use it for sin or for attack, which is the same as sin, and you will see it as sinful. Because it is sinful it is weak, and being weak, it suffers and it dies. Use it to bring the Word of God to those who have it not, and the body becomes holy. Because it is holy it cannot be sick, nor can it die. When its usefulness is done it is laid by, and that is all.” M-12.5:1-6

“And you will lay aside the world and find another. This other world is bright with love which you have given it. And here will everything remind you of your Father and His holy Son. Light is unlimited, and spreads across this world in quiet joy. All those you brought with you will shine on you, and you will shine on them in gratitude because they brought you here. Your light will join with theirs in power so compelling, that it will draw the others out of darkness as you look on them.” T-13.VI.11:5-10

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