Lesson 25. I do not know what anything is for.
Purpose is meaning. Today's idea explains why nothing you see means anything.
You do not know what it is for. Therefore, it is meaningless to you. Everything
is for your own best interests. That is what it is for; that is its purpose;
that is what it means. It is in recognizing this that your goals become unified.
It is in recognizing this that what you see is given meaning.
You perceive the world and everything in it as meaningful in terms of ego goals.
These goals have nothing to do with your own best interests, because the ego is
not you. This false identification makes you incapable of understanding what
anything is for. As a result, you are bound to misuse it. When you believe this,
you will try to withdraw the goals you have assigned to the world, instead of
attempting to reinforce them.
Another way of describing the goals you now perceive is to say that they are all
concerned with "personal" interests. Since you have no personal interests, your
goals are really concerned with nothing. In cherishing them, therefore, you have
no goals at all. And thus you do not know what anything is for.
Before you can make any sense out of the exercises for today, one more thought
is necessary. At the most superficial levels, you do recognize purpose. Yet
purpose cannot be understood at these levels. For example, you do understand
that a telephone is for the purpose of talking to someone who is not physically
in your immediate vicinity. What you do not understand is what you want to reach
him for. And it is this that makes your contact with him meaningful or not.
It is crucial to your learning to be willing to give up the goals you have
established for everything. The recognition that they are meaningless, rather
than "good" or "bad," is the only way to accomplish this. The idea for today is
a step in this direction.
Six practice periods, each of two-minutes duration, are required. Each practice
period should begin with a slow repetition of the idea for today, followed by
looking about you and letting your glance rest on whatever happens to catch your
eye, near or far, "important" or "unimportant," "human" or "nonhuman." With your
eyes resting on each subject you so select, say, for example:
I do not know what this chair is for.
I do not know what this pencil is for.
I do not know what this hand is for.
Say this quite slowly, without shifting your eyes from the subject until you
have completed the statement about it. Then move on to the next subject, and
apply today's idea as before.
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Below, is from Kenneth Wapnick's commentaries on this lesson, from "Journey
Through the Workbook of A Course in Miracles," which can be purchased at the
following site:??~ M. Street
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Lesson 25. "I do not know what anything is for."
*This lesson directly discusses the theme of <purpose>, so crucial in A Course
in Miracles. Indeed, one could say that purpose alone helps us understand the
ego's thought system, the world's role within it, and how through shifting the
world's purpose the Holy Spirit uses the ego's plan to undo it.*
(1) "Purpose is meaning. Today's idea explains why nothing you see means
anything. You do not know what it is for. Therefore, it is meaningless to you.
Everything is for your own best interests. That is what it is for; that is its
purpose; that is what it means. It is in recognizing this that your goals become
unified. It is in recognizing this that what you see is given meaning."
*Jesus is picking up from the early lessons, including the preceding one, by
helping us realize why nothing here means anything. Something has meaning for us
only because we do not understand what it is for, which comes from not knowing
our own best interests. We think these have to do with satisfying our
specialness needs, whether physical or emotional, while what is truly in our
interest is learning to forgive. That is why everything in this world is for our
own best interests, if we choose the right Teacher. Every situation or
relationship can become a classroom in which we are helped to understand that
the world we made comes from our attack thoughts, and everything we see, given
to the Holy Spirit to reinterpret for us, can be a reminder that we can choose
to look at the world differently. This process, as we have already seen, and
shall see many times still, involves shifting our perception of the problem, and
therefore our understanding of our best interests, from the <body> to the
<mind>. To accomplish such a perceptual shift is the main goal of these lessons,
not to mention A Course in Miracles itself.
The ego sees the meaning and purpose of everything in the world as an
opportunity to satisfy its specialness needs. Jesus, on the other hand, sees
opportunities, after our first making the ego mistake, to turn to him for help
and be taught there is another way of looking at everything. This other way of
looking, summarized in the three steps of forgiveness in Lesson 23, is realizing
that what we see outside is a projection of what we have first seen within. Once
again, Jesus is teaching us to shift our attention from the body to the mind.
We learn that our perceptions, and the way we organize our personal world and
relate to others, are based on the premise that we have an ego that has to be
treated a certain way; that we have definite needs based on our separated
existence that dictate how we must see our world, especially the people in it.
Now we have a teacher who shows us what we perceive outside is a projection of
an inner thought, we can change this thought by having changed teachers. The
world now has great meaning for us, for its new purpose has become our
classroom, in which we learn from our new teacher his lessons of forgiveness.
When Jesus says purpose is everything, he means there are two: the ego's purpose
of rooting us in this world so that our individuality -- located in the mind --
is safe; and the Holy Spirit's purpose of our realizing there is no world, for
there is nothing in us that needs defense. Thus it is the world's new purpose to
help us learn that happy fact, which is our salvation from our belief in guilt.
"Perception and Choice" in the text summarizes the dual purpose of our split
mind:
"But this world has two who made it, and they do not see it as the same. To
each it has a different purpose, and to each it is a perfect means to serve the
goal for which it is perceived. ... There is another purpose in the world that
error made, because it has another Maker Who can reconcile its goal with His
Creator's purpose." (T-25.III.3:3-4;5:1-2).
Thus is the real world of forgiveness made by the Holy Spirit's as correction
and substitute for the ego's error-filled world of guilt and hate.*
(2:1) "You perceive the world and everything in it as meaningful in terms of ego
goals."
*This idea could not have been stated more clearly. The "ego goals," as we have
seen, are some expression of the need to preserve your own identity,
individuality, and specialness. Through the mind-searching exercises you need to
realize how true that is. Watch the way you think about things throughout the
day -- not necessarily your whole life, just your day; how everything is
organized around what will meet your needs, what will make you feel good
physically and emotionally. Then see how those needs distort how you perceive
the world. In fact, it is those very specialness needs that cause you to believe
you are perceiving the world at all!*
(2:2-4) "These goals have nothing to do with your own best interests, because
the ego is not you. This false identification makes you incapable of
understanding what anything is for. As a result, you are bound to misuse it."
*This is an extremely important statement. The <you> of which Jesus speaks is
not the ego -- the physical or psychological self; it is what we have referred
to as the decision maker. Jesus makes the same point in the text, as we have
already seen, when he asks rhetorically: "Who is the 'you' who are living in
this world?" (T-4.II.11:8). This early lesson is the beginning stage in having
us dis-identify or disassociate from the ego self and realize that the <you>
Jesus is addressing is in the mind.
By virtue of our having chosen the wrong teacher we have made the wrong
identification. Consequently, we shall misunderstood, misinterpret, and distort
everything that goes on around us because our perceptions will be geared toward
fulfilling the purpose of preserving that identification. The guilt associated
with our special relationships is thus reinforced, because we are misusing
everyone and everything. This guilt seems so enormous that we can never let
ourselves look at what we are doing. That is why it is so important to change
teachers and allow Jesus to look at our guilt with us. Let him look with us at
our misperceptions, misuse, distortions, and attacks, and he will help us
realize they come from one mistake. In our joining with him is that mistake of
separating from love undone.*
(2:5) "When you believe this, you will try to withdraw the goals you have
assigned to the world, instead of attempting to reinforce them."
*When we realize what we are doing, we will inevitably change the goal. In the
text Jesus reflects this change as the shift from the unholy to the holy
relationship; a relationship whose purpose was guilt or illusion becoming one
whose purpose is forgiveness or truth -- the letting go of guilt:
"And as the unholy relationship is a continuing hymn of hate in praise of
its maker, so is the holy relationship a happy song of praise to the Redeemer of
relationships."
"The holy relationship ... is the old, unholy relationship, transformed and
seen anew." (T-17.V.1:7--2:2).*
(3) "Another way of describing the goals you now perceive is to say that they
are all concerned with "personal" interests. Since you have no personal
interests, your goals are really concerned with nothing. In cherishing them,
therefore, you have no goals at all. And thus you do not know what anything is
for."
*"Personal" is in quotes because there is no "personal." Within the dream,
having personal interests means I have interests that are separate from yours.
This can be true only if the separation were real. However, if minds are joined,
there can be no personal interests; only the single interest we share as one Son
to awaken from this dream and return home.
A careful and thoughtful reading of these lines is bound to engender tremendous
anxiety -- and that is certainly a mild understatement. Jesus is saying you have
no personal interests, and where does that leave you but nowhere? in essence
this means you do not exist. Incidentally, <personal> in this context has the
same meaning as <special>.
Again, Jesus is not asking you to accept his words and live as if they were
true; he is asking you only to begin to understand the insanity of your thinking
and distorted perceptions because you are literally believing and seeing what is
not there. If you do not question these beliefs and perceptions, if only
intellectually, you will never be open to receive the answer that is waiting for
you. Thus, you need to observe your everyday thoughts, moment to moment, and
realize how they come from everything Jesus is speaking about. They are all
based on preserving an ego goal, which is your own identity. This means that you
do not care about anyone or anything else, but only about having your needs met
and goals fulfilled.*
(4) "Before you can make any sense out of the exercises for today, one more
thought is necessary. At the most superficial levels, you do recognize purpose.
Yet purpose cannot be understood at these levels. For example, you do understand
that a telephone is for the purpose of talking to someone who is not physically
in your immediate vicinity. What you do not understand is what you want to reach
him for. And it is this that makes your contact with him meaningful or not."
*We all are aware of superficial purposes, but we are not aware of the true
purposes underlying them. Using the example of the telephone, the <real> purpose
of the call is to provide an opportunity for us to reconsider the ego's goal of
separate interests in favor of the Holy Spirit's goal of shared or common
interests. Therefore, what makes A Course in Miracles so simple is that it
teaches us there are only two purposes we ever need consider, as we have already
discussed: the ego's purpose, which is to retain individuality and separation,
make the world real, and prove Jesus wrong; and Jesus' purpose, which is to
<un>learn everything we had learned before, and finally accept with humility
that he was right and we were wrong -- the separation from God was a dream that
never happened in reality.*
(5:1) "It is crucial to your learning to be willing to give up the goals you
have established for everything."
*Remember, because the goal you have established for everything is the
preservation of your individuality, Jesus is asking that you abandon this
purpose. That is why these lessons are so difficult, and must be perceived by
our egos as extremely threatening.
The rest of the lesson underscores a point we have already seen: illusions
remain illusions, regardless of the attributes we project onto them. From the
ego's point of view, all illusions -- <good> or <bad>, <important> or
<unimportant>, <human> or <non-human> -- serve the single purpose of convincing
us that they are what they are not. That is why we do not know what they are
for. These ostensibly simple sentences continue Jesus' training of our minds
<not> to make distinctions among illusions, learning instead to make the <only>
distinction that is valid -- between the purposes of the ego and the Holy
Spirit: *
(5:2-6:8) "The recognition that they are meaningless, rather than "good" or
"bad," is the only way to accomplish this. The idea for today is a step in this
direction."
"Six practice periods, each of two-minutes duration, are required. Each practice
period should begin with a slow repetition of the idea for today, followed by
looking about you and letting your glance rest on whatever happens to catch your
eye, near or far, "important" or "unimportant," "human" or "nonhuman." With your
eyes resting on each subject you so select, say, for example:
I do not know what this chair is for.
I do not know what this pencil is for.
I do not know what this hand is for.
Say this quite slowly, without shifting your eyes from the subject until you
have completed the statement about it. Then move on to the next subject, and
apply today's idea as before."
*A more sophisticated statement of this teaching of the illusory nature of
everything is found in the following passage from the text, which describes the
shared insanity of our special relationships -- our "little, senseless
substitutions":
"Your little, senseless substitutions, touched with insanity and swirling
lightly off on a mad course like feathers dancing insanely in the wind, have no
substance. They fuse and merge and separate, in shifting and totally meaningless
patterns that need not be judged at all. To judge them individually is
pointless. Their tiny differences in form are no real differences at all. None
of them matters. That they have in common and nothing else. Yet what else is
necessary to make them all the same?" (T-18.I.7:6-12)
Recognizing the inherent meaninglessness of everything allows us to accept the
Holy Spirit's purpose of making room for His truth as replacement for the ego's
illusions.
We are ready now to move to the next segment of our training: understanding the
relationship between our attack thoughts and our perceptions of attack.*
