Does A Course in Miracles Teach That I Desire a Holy Relationship in Order to Awaken?

I do want to ask you about what A Course in Miracles means by Holy Relationship. In one the main book it covers "entering the ark" together, and it almost sounds like you will need an added specific person to be able to awaken acim teachers. Therefore, I think I approach each new person with the expectation that maybe THIS could possibly be the partnership that reflects enlightenment if you ask me, and I for them! Am I taking this too literally? Or do you really need to have another to assist you awaken?

I appreciate your own time so much and thanks for your help if you ask me and others. I thanks and I thank God for you. Namaste.

David Hoffmeister: Thanks for your openness and your willingness to check deeply at what is underneath these topics and issues. A Course in Miracles teaches that the split mind contains both the problem (the ego) and the Solution (the Holy Spirit). When they're brought together, only One remains.

The human body and the world are always the focus of ego's perspective, for it seeks to produce real problems and struggles on the planet and to prevent the inner Healing Correction of the Holy Spirit. The ego's distorted world is the item of identity confusion, an outpicturing of the belief that it's possible to produce an identity which God didn't create. The ego is this identity problem and it was Answered or forgiven by the Holy Spirit the instant it appeared to arise. That one problem could possibly be described as an authority problem or even a confusion in who's the author of Reality. The mind that believes in the truth of the time-space cosmos has a get a grip on issue, for it believes so it can cause itself. This ego mind also thinks it's in competition with God, although that is pushed out of conscious awareness. This unconscious ego thought system is exposed in the A Course in Miracles Workbook lessons, and Lesson 13 contains an excellent example of the unveiling:

"A meaningless world engenders fear because I think I am in competition with God."

This is the beginning of training your brain to forgive, for the focus is brought back to your brain, back again to thinking, and recinded from your body and the world. Anorexia, weight issues, body image issues, and interpersonal relationship issues are types of projection, of seeing the problem where it's not: in the world. The mind cannot tolerate the belief in a battle with God, which means this belief is pushed out of awareness. The deep-seated control issue such a belief entails is then projected to your body and the world. Weight control, like any attempt to manage the script or your body, is an attempt to manage the past. The Holy Spirit teaches that the past can just only be forgiven or released or seen as false—not fixed or controlled or changed.

Exactly the same ego dynamic is underneath interpersonal relationship struggles of power and control, of wanting to fix or change an individual or even a self-image. Personal relationships may seem to sail happily along for awhile, yet the make-believe self-concept IS the personal perspective and thus is obviously on shaky ground. Decisions are continuous. The Holy Spirit is just a decision. The ego is just a decision. Atonement is your decision that ends all decisions, an acceptance of the changelessness of Mind. The ego is your decision to trust that your brain can be separate from God. Once your brain believed so it had separated and built this time-space world, this time-space world of bodies became its substitute identity, because it believed it had discarded the Kingdom of Heaven. The entire world was created up instead identity. The sleeping mind is split on your decision of identity. The Holy Spirit says, "This world is not Identity. This world is an illusion." And thus the Holy Spirit reminds your brain constantly, "This world is not your Home. This world is not your Identity. This world is not real." While the mind is split it's hearing another voice (the ego) that's saying: "You've done it. You've separated from God. You'd better make the best of it and find something of the world to identify with. You can never go back for God will punish you."

Thought-form associations seem to become substitute identity. The ego mind is apparently identified with your body, with family, with environments that seem to surround it (i.e., I'm an American, Japanese, I'm male, I'm female, I'm from a rich family, from an undesirable family, I'm Catholic, Jewish, Protestant, etc.) All of these are thought-form associations. And these seeming other persons and places surrounding the little personal self are part of the construction. The mind is very shaky concerning this small identity, this small self, this little me. So the little me is shaky, and it looks like other persons give the little me reality and importance (i.e., you're my son, my daughter, you're my boss, you're a loving father, etc.) and all the different items that these images be seemingly telling this little me be seemingly really important. Praise thus seems extremely important (i.e., you are an individual and you're a good one!).

Praise and acceptance from others SEEM to stabilize this very shaky thing (i.e., you're a good lover, you're a good provider, you're great with the children, you've an excellent intellect, you've such a heart, you help serve so many other people, you're a good team-player, on and on). This part of the self-concept says that you are an individual and you've most of these positive attributes that actually cause you to a valuable and worthy person, that make you stand out above the crowd. You're not just anyone—you're somebody special. The flip side is criticism, which directly reflects the shaky sense of self. Criticism will be: you're not as great as you think you are, you're not such a good team player, such a good provider, so good in bed—everything which can be taken as insults to the personal self-concept). That's the flip side of the strokes. To this ego self-concept that believes both sides (the positive and negative) of thinking are real, the Holy Spirit is perceived as a good threat, for the Holy Spirit results in the ability of forgiveness or the realization that none of the tiny images perceived as separate have any reality.

Once the criticism seems in the future, the ego attempts a substitution. It thinks, "I don't need this. I'll go elsewhere and start other relationships with people who are able to appreciate my talents and skills and abilities, appreciate my personhood. I will avoid those negative influences on the planet and those negative people. I'll find someone else or join friends where individuals are like-minded and forget about the rest of the world. These new people will require to me and stroke me and praise me." The attempt at substitution is an attempt to keep up a feeling of specialness, a feeling of separation, a feeling of individuality (a private mind with private thoughts). Those attempts are special love relationships. They appear to bolster worth and value and to validate personhood. And they offer a false witness for clinging to the ego as identity. To the ego, past associations serve to offer personhood some sense of stability and consistency and value. Yet, the Holy Spirit suggests that past associations offer nothing of value, for these were made by the ego to deny the reality of God's Love.

Holy relationship emphasizes and reflects Content (right-minded thinking) and comes with an awareness of the meaninglessness of form. While the ego's believed relationships will be seemingly specific, yet every one will present a way to release the belief in specifics. Divine Mind is Abstract and Universal. Forgiveness could be the bridge to the remembrance of Christ and God, Divine Abstraction. Thus the Holy Spirit teaches in A Course in Miracles:

"Once you meet anyone, remember it is just a holy encounter. As you see him you might find yourself. As you treat him you will treat yourself. As you consider him you will consider yourself. Remember this, for in him you will see yourself or lose yourself. Whenever two Sons of God meet, they're given another chance at salvation. Don't leave anyone without giving salvation to him and receiving it yourself. For I am always there with you, in remembrance of you.