Commentary on ACIM Lesson 104

©2010 Rev. David Seacord

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I seek but what belongs to me in truth.

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What am I teaching?  When I asked myself the question in the shower this morning, I was surprised to hear back an answer I'd forgotten....  That I was teaching that being vulnerable is what makes me invulnerable.  It's a fundamental principle of the Course.  And, there is a direct relationship between vulnerableness, intimacy, and happiness, right?  

 

Some of the feedback I've gotten on these Commentaries lately has  been that what makes them powerful (for those readers) is the way I share how I deal with myself.  It wasn't my intention when I started writing three plus months ago to be providing my internet course group readers a soap-opera confessional, but I can get that I can't teach what I haven't learned, and the best way to learn it is to teach it.  And that the most valuable authenticity is honesty.  Werner Erhard gave me the maxim that "The beginning of mastery is always the telling of the truth".  It's a good thing to know.  Anyway, it is up to you to make use of my shares, which I am clear you are doing.  My job is to be responsible for being straight with myself as I do my spiritual growth work, and then language my 'report on my learning' as well as I am able.  

 

Continuing with being straight with myself, today (as I went about having a pleasant, fully functional, and NOT LONELY :-) day repairing and repainting props for my upcoming art show at Earthday in San Diego this Sunday) was the arrival of the realization that underneath all the addictive relationship dramas of my life was my mother.  The actual thought that arose was a very young memory file that just suddenly opened:  'I want my mama'.  And I saw that then, when I got her, I was OK.  Next, I saw more clearly than ever before that somewhere in early adolescence I had 'lost her' and that that loss I had never recognized or acknowledged.  And I realized that 'the loss' had felt like a betrayal, and that the sense of the most important female person in my life betraying me has been reoccurring ever since.  I am very freed by these insights..... 

 

When I was young I was the second child to come out of my mom's womb (of an eventual eight).  During my early years, my mom was my best friend, and I shared everything with her.  We were intimate. And she was almost always thrilled at who I was.  Then somewhere getting close to puberty, I must has shared feeling or actions (that were probably 'sexual') and she stopped being so thrilled.  Suddenly she was not my Safety, my Go To, my Refuge.... she became the one who was saying 'NO', instead of YES.  That's where I felt betrayed, because of that reversal, that loss of her Safety.  

 

Mom was then and is now a simple (meaning completely without worldly sophistication of any kind), good hearted, very religious, intuitively intelligent woman, and her morality back then in my childhood was quite puritanical and religiously judgmental.  I definitely got the message that sex before marriage was completely unacceptable to the morality beliefs of my parents.  When I did violate their morality standards and have experimental sex as a teenager, I knew I could not confide that to my mother.  So I confided in my younger sister (because they were hitting us at public indoctrination (school) with a lot of VD scare stuff, and I was a little worried about with whom I had done what I had done).  Wrong thing to do, as she told my mom.  The ensuing uproar ended my intimacy with my mom.  From then on, I withheld, and from then on, wherever I had a date as a teen living at home, she gave me her warning look of 'you watch it, young man'.  By the way, she was 107 lbs. and 5' 2" when she married my dad (a young seminary student), she had a great figure, sang church hymns beautifully all the time while doing housework, and had the most amazing healing touch.  You can guess what I looked for physically in women as a young man, right?  And, today when my insights opened up, I got that all I have been really looking for in a woman emotionally was the safety (intimacy) that I'd had with my mom, before I lost it.  In other words, profound deep harmonious'best' friendship.   Somehow I know this is very important for me to see, as I have a pattern of hasty hook-ups based on sexuality rather than compatible friendships.  Well, as I am still alive, the games are still on.  We'll see how I do from here.  And you'll probably hear about it.  If I don't just stay a celibate monk/artist/Rev. etc....  ha ha ha.... :-).  

 

By the way, it's not lost on me that here I am with my Mom and Dad, taking care of them.  Perfect timing, right?  Right-- no accidents....  Right now though, lets look at the Course work for today....

 

Namaste, 

 

David

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First Person Revised Version  (and, I have added some 'notes' below it that may be useful too.)

 

Lesson 104

I claim but what belongs to me in truth.

Today's idea continues with the thought that joy and peace are not everidle dreams. They are my right, because of what I am. They come to mefrom God, Who cannot fail to give me what He wills. Yet, there must be a place made ready to receive His gifts, as they are not welcomed gladly by a mind that has, instead, received the gifts it made itself (where His belong), as substitutes for God's gifts.

Today I would remove all meaningless and self-made gifts which I have placed upon the holy altar where God's gifts belong. His are the gifts that are my own in truth. His are the gifts that I inherited before time was, and that will still be mine when time has passed into eternity. His are the gifts that are within me now, for they are timeless. And I need not wait to have them. They belong to me today.

Therefore, I choose to have them now, and know, in choosing them in place of what I made, I but unite my will with what God wills, and recognize the same as being one. My longer practice periods today, the hourly five minutes given truth for my salvation, will begin with this:

I claim what belongs to me in truth, 
And joy and peace are my inheritance.

Then, I will lay aside the conflicts of the world that offer other gifts and other goals (which are made of illusions, witnessed to by them, and sought for only in a world of dreams).

All this I lay aside, and claim instead that which is truly mine, as I chooseto recognize what God has given me. I clear a holy place within my mind before His altar, where His gifts of peace and joy are welcome, and to which I come to find what has been given me by Him. I come in confidence today, aware that what belongs to me in truth is what He gives. And I would desire nothing else, for nothing else belongs to me in truth.

So do I clear the way for Him today by simply recognizing that His Will is done already, and that joy and peace belong to me as His eternal gifts. Iwill not let myself lose sight of His gifts between the times I come to seek for them where He has laid them. This reminder will I bring to mindfrequently and often today:

I claim what IS mine in truth.
God's gifts of joy and peace are mine.

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Notes on Lesson 104 (First Person Edited Version)

 

The principles I am basing the revision on I learned as part the CONSCIOUS LANGUAGE teaching of Robert Tennyson Stephens (who currently travels the USA leading powerful transformation seminars).  His website is www.masterysystems.com.  (This is called honoring [crediting] your source.)

 

Basically, I am converting the lesson to an affirmation (or, if you will, a degree).  This adds (activates) the power of my will and intention, and as I said, my own experience has been that that deepens the 'installing of the lesson' in my being.  

 

I very much like the idea of an internal 'alter' 'to which I come'.  I think it is very helpful. It's kind of like formatting a computer drive, where different files are assigned places.  An alter is a symbol of a sacred place.  Since it is mental, it can be anywhen and anywhere imaginable.  But is is a place you go to drink in your soul, find your peace, come into the presence of holiness.  

 

Also, to desire nothing but what God gives is simply the path of sainthood.  It is a very pure path, and is based on absolute trust that you/I can rely on God as our sustainer.  If we look, it is clear we already do, as we receive each next breath of life (that we didn't create).  In this example, because it is 'so close' we simply don't normally pay it a lot of attention.   However, there is a direct relationship between Attention (and our development of our capacity to give it) and Awareness (and our development of our capacity to Be).  And a lot of spiritual traditions offer very deep breath work practices (all based on Attention) which I encourage you to explore.  Or simply 'sing a whole lot'.  (But not using 'garbage lyrics', as that is 'installing unconsciousness'. [in my opinion])

 

One thing I have noticed for myself is that if I read the revised version first, and then read the original, the original is much more 'in focus' and in a subtle way, enhanced.  Perhaps that will be your experience also.  I think this is because the more ways something is said, the more clearly we/I can grasp it.