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Lesson 66. My happiness and my function are one.

 

Lesson 66. My happiness and my function are one.

(1) You have surely noticed an emphasis throughout our recent lessons on the
connection between fulfilling your function and achieving happiness. This is
because you do not really see the connection. Yet there is more than just a
connection between them; they are the same. Their forms are different, but their
content is completely one.

(2) The ego does constant battle with the Holy Spirit on the fundamental
question of what your function is. So does it do constant battle with the Holy
Spirit about what your happiness is. It is not a two-way battle. The ego attacks
and the Holy Spirit does not respond. He knows what your function is. He knows
that it is your happiness.

(3) Today we will try to go past this wholly meaningless battle and arrive at
the truth about your function. We will not engage in senseless arguments about
what it is. We will not become hopelessly involved in defining happiness and
determining the means for achieving it. We will not indulge the ego by listening
to its attacks on truth. We will merely be glad that we can find out what truth
is.

(4) Our longer practice period today has as its purpose your acceptance of the
fact that not only is there a very real connection between the function God gave
you and your happiness, but that they are actually identical. God gives you only
happiness. Therefore, the function He gave you must be happiness, even if it
appears to be different. Today's exercises are an attempt to go beyond these
differences in appearance, and recognize a common content where it exists in
truth.

(5) Begin the ten-to-fifteen-minute practice period by reviewing these thoughts:

God gives me only happiness.
He has given my function to me.
Therefore my function must be happiness.

Try to see the logic in this sequence, even if you do not yet accept the
conclusion. It is only if the first two thoughts are wrong that the conclusion
could be false. Let us, then, think about the premises for a while, as we are
practicing.

(6) The first premise is that God gives you only happiness. This could be false,
of course, but in order to be false it is necessary to define God as something
He is not. Love cannot give evil, and what is not happiness is evil. God cannot
give what He does not have, and He cannot have what He is not. Unless God gives
you only happiness, He must be evil. And it is this definition of Him you are
believing if you do not accept the first premise.

(7) The second premise is that God has given you your function. We have seen
that there are only two parts of your mind. One is ruled by the ego, and is made
up of illusions. The other is the home of the Holy Spirit, where truth abides.
There are no other guides but these to choose between and no other outcomes
possible as a result of your choice but the fear that the ego always engenders,
and the love that the Holy Spirit always offers to replace it.

(8) Thus, it must be that your function is established by God through His Voice,
or is made by the ego which you have made to replace Him. Which is true? Unless
God gave your function to you, it must be the gift of the ego. Does the ego
really have gifts to give, being itself an illusion and offering only the
illusion of gifts?

(9) Think about this during the longer practice period today. Think also about
the many forms the illusion of your function has taken in your mind, and the
many ways in which you tried to find salvation under the ego's guidance. Did you
find it? Were you happy? Did they bring you peace? We need great honesty today.
Remember the outcomes fairly, and consider also whether it was ever reasonable
to expect happiness from anything the ego ever proposed. Yet the ego is the only
alternative to the Holy Spirit's Voice.

(10) You will listen to madness or hear the truth. Try to make this choice as
you think about the premises on which our conclusion rests. We can share in this
conclusion, but in no other. For God Himself shares it with us. Today's idea is
another giant stride in the perception of the same as the same, and the
different as different. On one side stand all illusions. All truth stands on the
other. Let us try today to realize that only the truth is true.

(11) In the shorter practice periods, which would be most helpful today if
undertaken twice an hour, this form of the application is suggested:

My happiness and function are one,
because God has given me both.

It will not take more than a minute, and probably less, to repeat these words
slowly and think about them a little while as you say them.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The commentary on this lesson (below) is from Kenneth Wapnick's eight volume
series of books, called: "Journey Through the Workbook of A Course in Miracles,"
which can be purchased at the following site:??~ M. Street

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Lesson 66. My happiness and my function are one.

*This lesson continues the theme of our happiness and function, elaborating on
their unity. The only way we can be happy is to let Jesus be our teacher. That
decision reflects our function of forgiveness. Anything else will not bring us
happiness because it will not last.*

(1) "You have surely noticed an emphasis throughout our recent lessons on the
connection between fulfilling your function and achieving happiness. This is
because you do not really see the connection. Yet there is more than just a
connection between them; they are the same. Their forms are different, but their
content is completely one."

*Another way to say this is that fulfilling our function is the cause, and the
effect is our happiness. When we forgive our thoughts of guilt, hate, and pain,
what remains is happiness, for cause and effect are one. This theme of oneness
is expressed throughout A Course in Miracles, and is the characteristic of
Heaven as well as the split mind. Thus cause and effect, ideas and source, inner
and outer -- all are one. Cause and effect are not separated; <ideas leave not
their source>; effects are not their cause. Again, the acceptance of our
function is the cause, and its effect is our happiness. In truth they are one
and unseparated.*

(2:1) "The ego does constant battle with the Holy Spirit on the fundamental
question of what your function is."

*To the ego, our function is to survive. This is accomplished by projecting
responsibility for the separation onto everyone else, thereby ensuring that we
never return to its source: the mind's decision for the ego. Needless to say,
this is a one-way battle, since the Holy Spirit knows nothing of the ego's
illusions, except that we have chosen to identify with them. Because it takes
<two> to wage a war, the very fact that the Holy Spirit, not to mention God
Himself, does not engage the ego in any way ensures that there is no war. This
non-combativeness, otherwise known as defenselessness, is the essence of the
Atonement. The separation, the source of the ego's war against God, never
occurred because God knows nothing of it. An illusion unrecognized remains an
illusion. However, when confronted, the illusion becomes real in our <belief>,
and thus is our dream of separation made real for us. Choosing the Atonement
undoes this madness, restoring to our awareness the truth of our Identity as
Christ.*

(2:2) "So does it do constant battle with the Holy Spirit about what your
happiness is."

*Happiness to the ego is when we kill. Indeed, its motto is <kill or be killed>.
Happiness is when we get what we want, which occurs at someone's expense: I win,
you lose. That's happiness! Ask the members of a sports team that wins a big
game. The players are happy because the other team lost, and they would not be
happy if the other team had won. Sports are set up so that there cannot be two
winners. What we act out on an athletic field as a participant (or in a stadium
as a fan) in a seemingly benign way reflects the underlying malevolence of the
ego thought system of <one or the other>. Yet to all this the Holy Spirit gently
replies:

"You but mistake interpretation for the truth. And you are wrong. But a
mistake is not a sin, nor has reality been taken from its throne by your
mistakes. God reigns forever, and His laws alone prevail upon you and upon the
world. His Love remains the only thing there is. Fear is illusion, for you are
like Him." (M-18.3:3-12; italics omitted).

In the acceptance of that Love is found our true happiness.*

(2:3-6) "It is not a two-way battle. The ego attacks and the Holy Spirit does
not respond. He knows what your function is. He knows that it is your
happiness."

*The Holy Spirit does not respond because there is nothing for Him to respond
to. How could He, the reflection of truth in our minds, respond to an illusion?
If He did, the illusion would be real. As Jesus explains in the text
(T-5.II.7:1-5), a passage to which we shall return frequently, all the Holy
Spirit does is remind. He does not overcome, command, or demand. He does nothing
but simply remind us of the truth. The passage continues:

"The Voice for God is always quiet, because It speaks of peace. Peace is
stronger than war because it heals. War is division, not increase. No one gains
from strife. What profiteth it a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own
soul? If you listen to the wrong voice you have lost sight of your soul."
(T-5.II.7:7-12).

The Holy Spirit's peace is the end of conflict, while the "wrong voice" guides
us into the war, wherein we lose our soul. Yet without opposition, the seeming
enemy ceases to be, and what appeared to be a battleground fades "into the
nothingness which it came" (M-13.1:2). The illusion of the ego's attacks are
brought to the Holy Spirit's truth, "and truth saw them not" (M-14.1:10). Thus
are they undone, for their seeming reality is not even recognized. How could
they then be responded to?

Nonetheless, the ego continually attempts to make conflict real. In any conflict
there are two opposing forces, of which one will be a winner and the other a
loser. To the Holy Spirit, again, there is no opposing force. There is only God,
and nothing else. For the Holy Spirit, therefore, the way out of conflict is to
remind us there is no conflict; no problem to be solved; no enemy to be
confronted and overcome. That fact alone makes us happy.*

(3) "Today we will try to go past this wholly meaningless battle and arrive at
the truth about your function. We will not engage in senseless arguments about
what it is. We will not become hopelessly involved in defining happiness and
determining the means for achieving it. We will not indulge the ego by listening
to its attacks on truth. We will merely be glad that we can find out what truth
is."

*A Course in Miracles' way of undoing the ego is having us look at it. Nothing
else is required. When we look, we realize there is nothing to see, and thus no
point in defining the ego or arguing with its thought system. Thus we go beyond
its illusory nature to the truth. To quote again these important lines:

"No one can escape from illusions unless he looks at them, for not looking
is the way they are protected. There is no need to shrink from illusions, for
they cannot be dangerous. We are ready to look more closely at the ego's thought
system because together we have the lamp that will dispel it, and since you
realize you do not want it, you must be ready. Let us be very calm in doing
this, for we are merely looking honestly for truth. The " dynamics" of the ego
will be our lesson for a while, for we must look first at this to see beyond it,
since you have made it real. We will undo this error quietly together, and then
look beyond it to truth."

"What is healing but the removal of all that stands in the way of knowledge?
And how else can one dispel illusions except by looking at them directly,
without protecting them? Be not afraid, therefore, for what you will be looking
at is the source of fear, and you are beginning to learn that fear is not real."
(T-11.V.1:1-3, 2.1-3)

The process of forgiveness thus entails realizing that the ego we thought was
there had no effect. If it had no effect, it could not be a cause; if it is not
a cause, it does not exist.

Jesus is training us to look at the false functions of specialness we have made
as substitutes for our true function, which is to forgive, and then
remember Who we are. He asks us only to look at the false, for thus is the
illusion brought to the truth, and in the presence of its light, the ego's
darkness disappears.*

(4) "Our longer practice period today has as its purpose your acceptance of the
fact that not only is there a very real connection between the function God gave
you and your happiness, but that they are actually identical. God gives you only
happiness. Therefore, the function He gave you must be happiness, even if it
appears to be different. Today's exercises are an attempt to go beyond these
differences in appearance, and recognize a common content where it exists in
truth."

*Here Jesus addresses the crucial difference between appearance and reality, not
in terms of what we perceive externally, but within our own experience. So
often, reinforced by religious or spiritual traditions, spiritual aspirants hold
to the insane belief that God demands sacrifice, and pursuing our function means
to suffer. Jesus addresses this insanity in the beginning of Chapter 3 in the
text, where he discusses "the terrible misperceptions that God Himself
persecuted His Own Son on behalf of salvation" (T-3.2.3:4). He elaborates on
this crucial point, using the misperceptions of the crucifixion as his referent:

"God does not believe in retribution. His Mind does not create that way. He
does not hold your "evil" deeds against you. Is it likely that He would hold
them against me? Be very sure that you recognize how utterly impossible this
assumption is, and how entirely it arises from projection. This kind of error is
responsible for a host of related errors, including the belief that God rejected
Adam and forced him out of the Garden of Eden. It is also why you may believe
from time to time that I am misdirecting you. ... Sacrifice is a notion totally
unknown to God. It arises solely from fear, and frightened people can be
vicious." (T-3.1.3:4-10; 4:1-2).

This viciousness is not only directed towards others, but ourselves as well. It
is this painful misperception of God demanding sacrifice that Jesus attempts to
correct here in this lesson: <Our happiness and function are one>.

Continuing his discussion in paragraph 5, Jesus presents us with a syllogism, a
traditonal form of logic in which you logically prove an argument to be true:*

(5:1-4) "Begin the ten-to-fifteen-minute practice period by reviewing these
thoughts:

God gives me only happiness.
He has given my function to me.
Therefore my function must be happiness.<"

*In sentence 2 and 3 are true, sentence 4 must be true as well. Therefore,
because the first premise is true ("God gives me only happiness") as is the
second ("He has given my function to me"), the concluding statement must
logically follow ("My function must be happiness").

Jesus' purpose in using this syllogism is to have us realize how none of what we
do in this world will bring us happiness. It is only in recognizing that our
attempts fail, and fail miserably, that we will be motivated to say there must
be another else. We will then understand we have been looking for happiness in
the wrong place, and therefore will never find it. It can be found only if we go
within and ask it of our true Teacher. Thus Jesus says:*

(5:5 - 6:6) "Try to see the logic in this sequence, even if you do not yet
accept the conclusion. It is only if the first two thoughts are wrong that the
conclusion could be false. Let us, then, think about the premises for a while,
as we are practicing."

"The first premise is that God gives you only happiness. This could be false, of
course, but in order to be false it is necessary to define God as
something He is not. Love cannot give evil, and what is not happiness is evil.
God cannot give what He does not have, and He cannot have what He is not. Unless
God gives you only happiness, He must be evil. And it is this definition of Him
you are believing if you do not accept the first premise."

*Jesus is saying that if you do not believe God gives only happiness, you are
making Him into a dualistic being Who will give you happiness <along with
something else>. For example, the biblical God gives us happiness, but also
pain, life, but also death, good, but also evil. The God Jesus depicts in A
Course in Miracles thus corrects the dualistically divine figure of the Bible.
He tells us God can give us <only> happiness, for He knows only of perfect
Oneness: He thus gives only what is Himself, and cannot give anything else. This
is because <there is nothing else>.

To continue this argument: If God gives you happiness <and> evil, then evil must
be part of Him, too. Remember, <ideas leave not their source>. Thus, if evil
exists and God is the source of everything, evil must have its source in God.
This means the biblical divinity not only has God within Himself, but also the
devil. Thus Jesus encourages us to look at this, asking ourselves if this could
possibly be true.

And now the second premise:*

(7:1-4)"The second premise is that God has given you your function. We have seen
that there are only two parts of your mind. One is ruled by the ego, and is made
up of illusions. The other is the home of the Holy Spirit, where truth abides."

*This of course is the description of the right- and wrong-minded parts of the
split mind.

The next sentence gives a very clear implication, of the third part of the mind,
what we call the decision maker.*

(7:5) "There are no other guides but these to choose between ..."

*Accordingly, there must be some part of our minds that chooses between the ego
and the Holy Spirit.*

(7:5) "...and no other outcomes possible as a result of your choice but the fear
that the ego always engenders, and the love that the Holy Spirit always offers
to replace it."

*There are only two outcomes, effects, or contents that are possible in this
world: love or fear. Everything else is imply an expression of either one of
these two thoughts. That is why in Lesson 64 Jesus said: "Complexity of form
does not imply complexity of content." The world was made to confuse us and
complicate what it is, in essence, a very simple choice: I choose the ego, and
fear and pain are the unhappy result; I choose the Holy Spirit, and happiness
and peace are the happy result. Simple.*

(8) "Thus, it must be that your function is established by God through His
Voice, or is made by the ego which you have made to replace Him. Which is true?
Unless God gave your function to you, it must be the gift of the ego. Does the
ego really have gifts to give, being itself an illusion and offering only the
illusion of gifts?"

*Jesus tells us the ego cannot give us any real gifts; and therefore it cannot
give us anything that is true. Hence, God alone gives us our function. The
problem, as always, is that there still remains our insanity that prefers the
ego's "gifts" of separation and individuality to the loving gift of God's
Oneness. Since the ego's "gifts' to us must entail pain and suffering, we gladly
bear its burden if it means our continual <existence>. Jesus' challenge as our
teacher is to convince us that happiness comes from choosing to return to
<being>, our true Self.*

(9) "Think about this during the longer practice period today. Think also about
the many forms the illusion of your function has taken in your mind, and the
many ways in which you tried to find salvation under the ego's guidance. Did you
find it? Were you happy? Did they bring you peace? We need great honesty today.
Remember the outcomes fairly, and consider also whether it was ever reasonable
to expect happiness from anything the ego ever proposed. Yet the ego is the only
alternative to the Holy Spirit's Voice."

*Once again, Jesus is emphasizing the necessity of paying careful attention to
our egos. Before we can remember the function God has given us, we first have to
look at the functions we have given ourselves as replacements for God's gifts.
He is asking us to be completely honest about whether any of these functions,
indeed anything of this world has truly made us happy. Needless to say, Jesus is
not talking about the transient happiness we all experience from time to time,
which again, is when we get what we want. He refers to a happiness that is so
deep it cannot be undone by anything else. It is this honesty that Jesus
requires of us throughout our study and practice of A Course in Miracles,
without which the ego will successfully slip away unnoticed into our
unconscious, only to wreak havoc on our lives and on the world.

Paragraph 10 is another statement of the importance theme, <one or the other>,
God or the ego. In this case it refers not to one or the other in the ego
system, but one or the other, God or the ego. In this case it refers not to one
or the other in the ego system, but one or the other in the sense that there can
only be God <or> the ego, but not both:*

(10:1-4) "You will listen to madness or hear the truth. Try to make this choice
as you think about the premises on which our conclusion rests. We can share in
this conclusion, but in no other. For God Himself shares it with us."

*Because God Himself shares it with us, it must be true. Anything else, then,
would be a lie. The simplicity of our decision making: To choose the ego is to
reject God's truth. One leads to happiness; the other to misery. What could be
simpler than that?*

(10:5-8) "Today's idea is another giant stride in the perception of the same as
the same, and the different as different. On one side stand all illusions. All
truth stands on the other. Let us try today to realize that only the truth is
true."

*This theme is found all through A Course in Miracles. Near the end of the
workbook Jesus says, for example: "Christ's Second Coming gives the Son of God
this gift: to hear the Voice for God proclaim that what is false is false, and
what is true has never changed" (T-pII.10.1.1) -- <one or the other>. In the New
Year's Prayer that ends chapter 15, we read: "Make this year different by making
it all the same" (T-15.XI.10:11). In other words, in our right-minded
experience, everything is the same because everything serves the same purpose of
forgiveness, which alone will bring us happiness.

To the ego there are many different ways of achieving happiness. What
establishes me as different from you is that if I am happy, you are not.
Therefore, if I want to be happy, you have to lose. That makes us different. I
do not realize that if I am unhappy, you will be unhappy, and vice versa. It
cannot be that I attack you and not be attacked myself, nor can I forgive you
without forgiving myself, since we are not different but the same -- one Son
with one wrong-minded function to attack, and one right-minded function to
forgive. This point is emphasized at the end of chapter 22, concluding a
discussion of the holy relationship:

"Only the different can attack. So you conclude because you can attack, you
and your brother must be different. Yet does the Holy Spirit explain this
differently. Because you and your brother are not different, you cannot attack.
Either position is a logical conclusion. Either could be maintained, but never
both. The only question to be answered in order to decide which must be true is
whether you and your brother are different. From the position of what you
understand you seem to be, and therefore can attack. Of the alternatives, this
seems more natural and more in line with your experience. And therefore it is
necessary that you have other experiences, more in line with truth, to teach you
what is natural and true." (T-22.VI.13).*

(11) "In the shorter practice periods, which would be most helpful today if
undertaken twice an hour, this form of the application is suggested:

My happiness and function are one,
because God has given me both.<

It will not take more than a minute, and probably less, to repeat these words
slowly and think about them a little while as you say them."

*It should be striking to us to see how easily we forget. Twice an hour to
remember how happy forgiveness makes us is not really very much time, except to
an ego, which jealously covets each and every unholy instant. Therefore, when we
are not able to think about the words of the exercise twice an hour, we should
at some point think about our resistance to doing so. Such non-judgmental
thinking -- the meaning of looking with the Holy Spirit -- will yield abundant
rewards each and every time we remember to forgive ourselves for forgetting.*


Love and Blessings,

Lyn Johnson
719-369-1822

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