Lesson 35: My mind is part of God’s. I am very holy.
I went off on myself last night. One of the things I can’t stand about myself is that I’m a bit clumsy. Without mindfully moving through simple tasks, such as giving my cats a treat, I will make a mess and do what I did last night – spill most of the contents of the container on the floor.
The cats, of course, didn’t mind. It was manna from heaven.
Me? I blew up at myself and called myself everything but a child of God.
I had to laugh out loud when I read today’s lesson: “My mind is part of God’s. I am very holy.”
Yeah, right. Clumsy, self-abusing me is part of God and very holy. Tell me another one, Universe.
The lesson is right that “today’s idea does not describe the way you see yourself now.” Not even a little bit, and this is my third year doing the workbook. Add “slow learner” to that pile of self-abasement.
The lesson, however, is seeking to get us out of the ego’s “abasement” and move us up into our higher-level thinking – into our right, divine mind. It does this by inviting us to stop using our minds to miscreate – to stop allowing the ego to tell us who we are and realize that God is our true Source.
“The idea for today presents a very different view of yourself,” the lesson says. “By establishing your Source, it establishes your Identity, and it describes you as you must really be in truth.”
How I must be in truth may still, in this bodily form, spill the cat treats – but if I truly believe my Source is God and my mind is always part of that Source, which is holy – then I can forgive my clumsy self, recommit myself to mindfulness in my movements, and laugh about the whole thing.
That’s gonna take me some time, I suppose, but the lesson understands this. As we begin to search our minds for the way we describe ourselves to ourselves, we’ll most likely come up with a lot of negative words – clumsy, stupid, idiot, helpless, failure. The list is practically endless.
We certainly have good qualities and the lesson invites us to bring those to mind as well. But, instead of feeling good or bad about these descriptions, the lesson encourages us to simply remind ourselves that our mind is part of God’s and we are very holy. The idea of “good” or “bad” or “wrong” or “right” don’t mean anything here. We’re no worse, or no better, than anyone else. All our minds are joined in God. That makes us all holy.
Hafiz would liken today’s exercise to panning for gold.
All day long you do this,
with movements and thoughts,
and then even in your sleep –
pan for gold.
We are looking to find something
to celebrate
with great enthusiasm,
wanting all our battles and toil
and our life to make sense
“I found it, I found it, I found it!”
a man once began to shout,
after having spent years in solitude,
meditating.
“Where?” a young shepherd boy nearby asked.
“Where?”
and the man replied, “It may take a while,
but I will show you. For now,
just sit near to me.”
Photo by Steven Arenas from Pexels
I am very holy.
Ah.
Thank you, friend.