Before beginning our new special theme, let’s review each of the special themes that we’ve already contemplated.
What is Forgiveness? Forgiveness is recognizing yourself as the unaffected Self. Therefore, “what you thought your brother did to you has not occurred.” Forgiveness “looks, and waits, and judges not.”
What is Salvation? Salvation is healing by “failing to support the world of dreams … it lets illusions go. By not supporting them, it merely lets them quietly go down to dust. And what they hid is now revealed …”
What is the World? It is a “false perception” where “mechanisms of illusion … go to find what has been given them to seek.” Yet, “all perception can be given a new purpose. … Let us not be satisfied until forgiveness has been made complete.”
What is Sin? Sin is ignorance or outward focus. “Sin is the home of all illusions, which but stand for things imagined issuing from thoughts that are untrue.”
What is the Body? “The body is a fence” that seems to separate us from everything else. It makes duality seem real and makes it seem as if we experience duality directly. Therefore, it is a device of deception. However, it is also a neutral device, which means its purpose can be changed if we choose to change its purpose.
What is Christ? Christ is consciousness. It is the process of creation and the unaffected witness of creation. It is what we are. It is our Self. It is as it says in NTI Colossians:
“The Christ is your truth.
It is the law of Love.
It is the process of creation.
It is That Which is you.
What are you, then, if you are the Christ?
You are the flow that is the first and the last, the beginning and the end, the creator of all things within time. You are the heavens and the earth, the bees and the sunshine. You are the process that made all things and is all things, so that they live through the process that created them. You are the flow of Life and separate from nothing that is Life, for that which flows through them is the process that you are. You are beyond concepts and differences and form, and within the Life Force that is all things.“
What is the Holy Spirit?
Our new special theme says, “The Holy Spirit mediates between illusions and the truth. … The goal the Holy Spirit’s teaching sets is just this end of dreams.”
The term “Holy Spirit” is a Judeo-Christian term for spiritual intuition. All humans have intuition. However, not all intuition is spiritual intuition. For example, I could have an intuitive feel that the person I am talking to on the phone is a con artist. That intuition is very helpful, and I serve myself well by listening to that intuition and ending the telephone conversation. However, that intuition was not focused on helping me see the difference between illusions and truth. That means that intuition wasn’t spiritual intuition.
Spiritual intuition has a very specific purpose—awakening us to truth.
All humans have basic intuition. All humans who have some readiness for awakening have spiritual intuition. If a human is not yet ready for awakening, spiritual intuition lies dormant within them. It will awaken to its call, when they are ready to awaken to theirs.
When we practice surrender as it is taught in The Teachings of Inner Ramana, we are tuning into both everyday intuition and spiritual intuition. In fact, spiritual intuition guides us to listen to everyday intuition instead of the thinking mind, because when we listen to the chatter of the thinking mind, we enliven it. If we live by intuition instead, the thinking mind is not fed with our attention.
It might not be important to know that everyday intuition is the intuition that informs you that someone is attempting to scam you and spiritual intuition is the intuition that guides you to love even that experience, but it might not hurt to be clear on this difference either. Everyday intuition makes our life in the world simpler, if we listen to it. Spiritual intuition awakens us from the ego’s dream of the world.
I can be hurt by nothing but my thoughts.
Today’s lesson says, “When I think I am hurt in any way, it is because I have forgotten who I am, … I will not hurt myself today. For I am far beyond all pain.”
This is a reminder that we are the unaffected Self.
What makes the unaffected Self believe that it is a body affected by duality?
Today’s lesson says that our thoughts are the culprit. However, that is not entirely true.
Thought is certainly deceptive, but just as you can hang up the telephone when a con artist calls you, and therefore not be attracted into a scam, you can turn attention away from thoughts.
Thoughts are not really the problem. The problem is choosing to give attention to thought.
If you like, you can change today’s workbook lesson in order to be a little more clear on the problem. Remind yourself throughout the day today, “I can be hurt by nothing but my choice to give attention to thought.”
When we are clear on the problem, the solution is also clear.
If you have 30 minutes for meditation, I recommend this meditation today:
