Well, we’re coming to the end of a chapter, which is entitled:

THE DREAM AND THE REALITY.¹

And I encourage everyone who has been participating in these study groups to take some time this coming week to go back and review what has been discussed.  You will find that this chapter is like . . . it describes the anatomy of the holy instant, it describes the function of the holy instant and the purpose of the holy instant.

And if you remember last time, we discussed the fact that as you come near the boundary that divides you from who you divinely Are, the boundary that embraces that which you identify as you and you alone, not you and You joined, but you and you alone, you become uncomfortable.  Because the closer you get to the boundary, the more likely it is that the bubble will pop.  This flimsy boundary will break up and you will lose all of the authority and all of that which has made you valuable.  You will lose all that you have created—the self you have created, the respect you have garnered from your excellent work, and so on.

But more than anything, it will uncover the guilt that’s ever-present as long as you’re trying to maintain the bubble.  Once you see the guilt, once you feel the guilt and you don’t avoid it, a peculiar thing happens:  The boundary of the bubble before it bursts becomes less opaque.  And you can see Light on the other side.  You can, we’ll say, see through it.  And as that happens, it becomes more obvious to you that there’s nothing for you to fear.

Now the point is, that when you arrive where the fear arises, you need to hold onto your Guide’s hand, you need to hold on to the Holy Spirit’s hand ever more tightly because you have moved toward the boundary because you’ve been led.  That which is nothing more than your right Mind, which occupies all of infinity on the outside of the bubble is intent upon bringing the tiny part of you that you value so highly that is enclosed within the bubble, outside the bubble so that that flimsy boundary separating you from the wholeness of You is no longer causing this aberration of perception called, “separation” and you experience the wholeness of You with nothing any longer seeming to separate you into two.

Now, you might even find that as you’ve listened to Guidance, as you have reached out in the holy instant to the Father or to the Holy Spirit and asked, “What is the truth here?  What is Reality that fills the inside and the outside of the bubble and therefore renders the bubble useless, meaningless and false,” when you do that, when you practice the holy instant as I said, you’ve done it because the movement toward the boundary occurs because the Holy Spirit or the Father leads you.  As a result, you can come to the false conclusion that listening to Guidance is not helpful, is dangerous, otherwise you would not be frightened.  And that can cause you to refuse to listen.  Because not listening allows you to move away from the boundary and you feel more safe, less frightened.

You must understand the phenomena here so that when you experience the fear, you say, “Okay Holy Spirit, I am leaning more significantly into Your Guidance.  I entrust myself to you more completely.  Because I know it is Your purpose to move me through the boundary freeing me from it and bringing me back into the clear undistorted experience of Reality, we could say, the clear undistorted experience of the world and universe as what it really Is—the Kingdom of Heaven.”

This chapter describes the process of the holy instant and how it brings you to the boundary and carries you through.  And so, at the very end of the chapter here, we’re in a section called:

THE PASSING OF THE DREAM

It could also be called, The Abandonment of the Dream, The Release from the Dream.  Abandonment of the Dream is a better choice of words.  Release from the Dream makes it sound as though the dream has a capacity to entrap and hold you—something in itself that can have a negative effect on you.  And that’s not the case.  You will abandon the dream.  The practice of the holy instant is the process of abandoning the dream.

The holy instant is the bridge out of the dream—out of the bubble—which in the process of the Movement, pops the bubble, restoring you to your wholeness, restoring you to your holiness,  restoring the one you have joined with in a holy relationship for the purpose of Awakening.

Now, going into the book:

THE PASSING OF THE DREAM

This course will LEAD to knowledge, but knowledge itself is still beyond the scope of our curriculum.  Nor is there any need for us to try to speak of what must forever lie beyond words.

Now I have used the word, “Knowing” which I capitalize so that it means something different from a puny little mind thinking it knows something.  I have used the word, “Knowing” in preference to the word, “knowledge” as it has been used in the Course.  So:

This Course will lead to [Knowing], but [Knowing] itself is still beyond the scope of our curriculum.

And what that means is, that Knowing is still beyond the scope of the bubble and the curriculum.  The whole purpose of the curriculum is to bring you to the place where the bubble is burst.  Your insistence upon joining with the Father or the Holy Spirit and abandoning your isolation, that is what the Course is about and that is what its study should be leading you to—an act!  Not accumulated knowledge.

So again . . .

[The] Course will lead to knowledge, . .

. . . will lead to Knowing, . .

. . . but [Knowing] itself is still beyond the scope our curriculum.

The curriculum is only going to take you to the edge of your decision to be alone, on your own.  There’s Something that’s going to carry you beyond that.  But that’s all the Course can do.  And so in the process of movement, in the process of the benefit of practicing the holy instant, you will seem to be learning and you will seem to be acquiring knowledge.  But it is all for the purpose of leading you to the point where you will go beyond it.

So, Knowing itself . . .

. . . knowledge itself is still beyond the scope of our curriculum.  Nor is there any need for us to try to speak of what must forever lie beyond words.  We need remember only that whoever attains the real world, beyond which learning cannot go, WILL go beyond it, but in a different way.

Learning, being willing to learn will take you to the threshold, to the boundary of the bubble, the boundary of the definitions which you have made up and firmly identified yourself as, it will take you there.  And then no more learning will occur.  No more learning can take you beyond the boundary.  So learning will not continue when you go beyond the boundary.  But you . . .

. . . WILL go beyond it, . .

. . .  you will go beyond learning . . .

. . . but in a different way.

Now what I’m going to say here is in some ways actual and in some ways not literal.  I use it to help explain how you might go beyond the boundary and experience things in a different way.

Through education, someone can describe to you what sandpaper is.  And you might be able to visualize that there’s paper with grit that has been applied to it that is rough, that is actually rough enough to wear down substances if you rub it against substances.  And so you will have an intellectual understanding, you will have knowledge about it.  But when someone actually hands you a piece of sandpaper and you feel it and you have the experience of what the description meant, that is entirely different.  You see?

So, . .

We need remember only that whoever attains the real world, . .

. . . and that doesn’t mean some will and some won’t.

We need remember only that [when you attain] the real world . . .

. . . I’ll start over . . .

We need remember only that whoever attains the real world, beyond which learning cannot go, WILL go beyond it, but in a different way.

When you move through the bubble, for lack of better words, you will experience God’s Perspective about each and every thing.  It will be an experience, not an explanation.  You see?

The whole purpose of this book and the whole purpose of this chapter that we’ve just been reading, is to clearly express the dynamics and the nature of this movement through the bubble so that you, we will say, graduate out of knowledge into experience.

You should not be studying this book for the purpose of acquiring knowledge about what “A Course in Miracles” is about.  You need to be reading it as though it is talking about you and helping move you into an experience of Reality, rather than knowledge.  Knowledge is static.  It is as though knowledge is set in stone.

But the experience of Reality is a Movement to be experienced in the moment—to be experienced as you bring your attention to “the Now,” without preconceptions and with the child-like curiosity to Know what’s really going on here?  So that you might join with the Father Who is out of Himself, Being You.  “What is the truth here? How do You see things Father?  What is really going on?”

Where learning ends . . .

. . . we’ll say, at the edge of the bubble . . .

. . . there God begins, . .

. . . and goes forever, beyond the circumference of the bubble.

Where learning ends . . .

. . . and I’m going to say, where learning ends, there you in your Reality, begin.

Where learning ends there God begins, for learning ends before Him Who is complete where He begins, . .

. . . listen to this again:

. . . learning ends before Him Who is complete where He begins, . .

. . . learning ends when you get to the edge of the bubble.  If you move through the edge of the bubble, you are at the beginning of God.  But having moved  through  the  bubble,  you are where God is whole . . .  you see? . . complete, and at that instant the bubble pops!  And there’s no “behind” that’s called “the inside of the bubble.”  The behind is the rest of the infinity of God and the rest of the infinity of You.  So:

Where learning ends there God begins, for learning ends before Him Who is complete where He begins, and where there IS no end.

You see?  The minute you move through the bubble, you’re where God seems to begin because it’s on the other side of the boundary of self that you have artificially created.  And when you move through it, the bubble pops and where God began is where God also never ends because you have shifted into Eternity, you have shifted into Infinity which is an Eternal Now constituted of the Movement of the divine Mind of God, the Movement of which is experienced as Creation and which you experience as Creation—no longer as a “material world and universe”—and you join with the Father acknowledging what it Is, truly.  And that’s called, “Co-Creation.”

It is not for us to dwell on what CANNOT be attained. There is too much to learn.

So we won’t talk about what it’s going to be like after you pass through the bubble and experience your wholeness, because at the moment there’s still learning to be engaged in.

What learning?  Well, the learning that will happen whenever you decide to practice the holy instant.  Because until you are Awake, the holy instant stands as the bridge that brings you closer and closer to the edge of the bubble, and in the process reveals—by means of your Guide’s Guidance—the truth about You, the truth about your Brother, the truth about the world and universe.

And by virtue of your standing firmly hand-in-hand with your Guide, you will be led through peace and fear to the other side of the bubble [snaps fingers] where the bubble pops!

But there needs to be commitment to stay with your Guide, even though your Guide brings you closer and closer to . . . what? . . the nature of the decision you made when you got your divorce from the Father.  The last thing you will undo, the last thing, the last element that keeps that bubble together, is the decision you made to get a divorce from your Father and be independent.  And the undoing of that, you must arrive at a willingness to engage in.

You will only be able to do that through the Love of the Holy Spirit and the Love of the Father, which has set into place the means for coming back into your right Mind.

And so, you’re at a place where you must, for lack of better words, significantly hang onto your Sanity—your holiness.  The Holy Spirit—which is nothing more than your right Mind—is your Sanity.  And your Sanity will safely carry you over the threshold of the boundary you created.  It will safely carry you across.  And in the crossing undo . . . burst the bubble.

There is too much to learn. The readiness for knowledge still must be attained.

And again, that is the purpose of the holy relationship.  The purpose of the holy relationship is to attain the clarity of the Presence of God in your Brother or your Sister because you love your Brother or Sister enough to want to see beneath the surface, to see beyond the definitions you’re applying to him or her, or the definitions he or she is applying to himself or herself.  That’s what it’s all about.

The holy instant is never a place in which separate, individual, isolated, private realization occurs.

Love is not learned. Its meaning lies in itself.

[whispers]  It’s an experience.  Love is an experience, actually, whether you’re Awake or asleep, whether you’re thinking you’re separate and alone or not.  Love is an experience.  And you have the experience.  The problem is that you embrace it in your very highly stylized perceptions that arise out of fear and guilt because you chose an independent stance.  Nevertheless, it’s an experience that you have whether you’re inside or outside the bubble.

Love is not learned. Its meaning lies in itself. And learning ends when you have recognized all it is NOT.

. . . learning ends when you have recognized all it is NOT.

. . . learning ends when you have recognized all it is NOT.

And here’s the all that it is not:  THINKING!  Thinking is all that love is not.  It doesn’t matter how many thousands of thoughts you might have, once you realize that thinking binds you to insanity, once you realize that thinking, no matter what the subject, is useless, once you realize that it blocks you from your good, you can stop doing all that love is not, by silencing yourself.  You see how simple, how uncomplicated?

Love is not learned. Its meaning lies in itself.

And learning ends when you have recognized all it is NOT.

That is the interference; . .

. . . all that love is not.  Thinking!

That is the interference; that is what needs to be undone.

Love is not learned because there never was a time in which you knew it not. Learning is useless in the Presence of your Creator, . .

. . . well, when you come to the boundary that you have created artificially, by means of definitions you have made up and committed yourself to, you’re standing right in the Presence of your Creator with the flimsiest of films between you and Him, between you the thinker and Him the Be-er, Whose Being is supposed to be your experience rather than something you have knowledge about.  And learning is useless because in the Presence of your Creator, you’re in the Presence of Knowing, you’re in the Presence of a Mind that’s not different from yours and you’re not engaged in attempting to maintain a mind separate from His.

So there’s no learning that occurs because you’ve allowed Knowing to simply be in you as you.  When you do that, it’s an act of absolute effortlessness.  It’s something that occurs when you actually completely let go of attempting to be independently assertive, when you in true humility, yield.

Learning is useless in the Presence of your Creator, Whose acknowledgement of you and yours of Him so far transcend all learning that everything you learned is meaningless, replaced forever by the knowledge of love and its one meaning.

Everything that you learned in the process of practicing the holy instant moves you into a perspective where everything you’ve learned becomes meaningless.  All the things you’ve taught yourself become meaningless.  All the things that your educators have taught you become meaningless.  And you move through the bubble, you have experienced the transition and Knowing replaces all of the learning that eventually brought you to the edge of the bubble.  The learning related only to your separated sense of self and its return to its Sanity.

Your relationship . . .

. . . the holy relationship you engaged in as the reason for your practicing the holy instant . . .

. . .  has been uprooted . . .

. . . we’ll say, at this point . . .

. . . has been uprooted from the world of shadows, and its unholy purpose has been safely brought through the barriers of guilt, . .

. . . and I’m going to add: of fear . . .

. . . washed with forgiveness, and set shining and firmly rooted in the world of light.

Because remember, when you go through that bubble you will not go through alone.  You and your Brother will go through.  And all of Eternity and infinity, all of Creation will be blessed by your return.  And Its blessing will fall upon you both as well. 

So, your relationship . . .

. . . has been safely brought through the barriers of guilt, washed with forgiveness, and set shining and firmly rooted in the world of light. From there, it . . .

. . . your relationship . . .

. . . calls to you to follow the course it took, lifted high above the darkness, and gently placed before the gates of Heaven.

You see?  It’s important to know that this is about you returning to your right Mind—you regaining your Sanity.  It’s equally essential for you to understand that you will not do that alone, you will do it in tandem with someone else.  And it’s in that joining that the one unified meaning of love will become your experience, and the other in your relationship, his or her experience.  This will keep you grounded in the process because you cannot on your own ram your way through your boundary that you have dedicated yourself to create and maintain, it’s the result of having become independent not only from God but from your Brothers and Sisters.  So understand how it works.

The holy instant in which you were united . . .

. . . you and your partner in the holy relationship.

The holy instant in which you were united is but the messenger of love, sent from beyond forgiveness to remind you of all that lies beyond it.

That’s why when you shut up and say, “What is the truth here?” you get an answer . . .

. . . sent from beyond forgiveness to remind you of all that lies beyond it. Yet it is through forgiveness that it will BE remembered.

You see?  Unity . . . relationship.

And when the memory of God has come to you in the holy place of forgiveness, you will remember nothing else, and memory will be as useless as learning, . .

. . . you see?  When you have that breakthrough, when the bubble pops, you won’t even remember learning because that of you which was Real inside the bubble is joined with that of you that is Real on the outside of the bubble and that which never actually happened is not available to remember.

Again:

And when the memory of God has come to you in the holy place of forgiveness, you will remember nothing else, and memory will be as useless as learning, for your only purpose will be creating.

Joined with the Father, in which the Love that the Father Is, in which the infinite Mind that the Father Is, is what constitutes your Being.  You will engage in and be involved in the Movement of the Father that’s inseparable from you and you will participate in and stand in awe of Creation, which can be fully appreciated and embraced because there’s no little you feeling vulnerable and therefore needing to protect itself by creating this boundary that protects it from the rest of Creation.  You see?

Yet this you cannot know until every perception has been cleansed and purified, . .

. . . how is every perception cleansed and purified?  By abandoning thinking, which is where perceptions originate, arise from, and are maintained.

. . . this you cannot know until every perception has been cleansed and purified, . .

. . . but not something you have to ferret out.  It will be cleansed and purified by the absence of thinking . . .

. . . and finally removed forever.

Ah-h . . . peace . . . peace is the underlying and overriding experience when the divorce is annulled, when your independence is a non-existence—a non-existent thing of the past that no longer exists.  You see?

Forgiveness removes only the UNTRUE, . .

. . . this is what you cannot find out if you do not take the hand of the Holy Spirit—that which is nothing more than your right Mind—and firmly and steadfastly hold It as It moves you through the apparently fearsome experience of breaking the boundary, which was your initial decision to get the divorce, and undo it forever.

Forgiveness removes only the UNTRUE, lifting the shadows from the world, . .

. . . of your imagination . . .

. . . and carrying it, safe and sure within its gentleness, to the bright world of new and clean perception.

Sounds almost like, sanitary.  But it’s clean, clear perception because it’s your experience of the Father’s Meaning that He is embodying in all of Creation, which it is now your joyous activity to participate in, by giving your attention to.  Beautiful.

There is your purpose NOW. And it is there that peace awaits you.

Where?  On the other side of the holy instant.  Where?  On the other side of the flimsy boundary—the bubble—that seems to imply that you are what is inside and you are not what is outside.  Now are we the Sons and Daughters of God.  Now fear and preoccupation with what you think you’ll lose is all that keeps you from daring to do the one thing that will help you cross the threshold, and that is hold tight to the Love that embraces you and is called the Holy Spirit, and let it move you through this last part of the foundation of your delusion and your false interpretation of the Kingdom of Heaven and all that accompanies it:  sin, sickness, death on and on and on.

So, the holy instant is the means of the miracle.  The holy instant, we’ll say, is the womb in which the sudden shift of perception called “a miracle” occurs.  And that is the whole point of this book.

When I say I love you all, you have no idea at the moment how total it is, how full it is, how supportive it is, how healing and transformational it is.  But I do.  And you will too.  And that is what I am helping move you toward.

Again, I must remind you, do not imagine that this will be a long process that will occur in the distant future.  Now are you still the holy Son of God.  You’re neither behind the point of perfection nor advancing toward it.  You’re at that point and must understand yourself therefrom.  And you will, when you practice the holy instant and ask the Father or the Holy Spirit, “What is the truth here?  What is the perfection that I’m neither behind or advancing toward?” and demand an answer.

And you know what that means?  It doesn’t mean be arrogant, it simply means neglect to argue against the answer, neglect to think that you know better than to expect to have that kind of a divine and holy experience.  You see?

A Course In Miracles (reference pages)
Chapter 18 – Section: THE PASSING OF THE DREAM
¹ Sparkly Book – p.447   /   JCIM – p.187   /   CIMS – p.377
Chapter 18 – Section:  THE TWO WORLDS
First Edition  –  p. 369, 2^ND Full Par.  /    Second Edition – p.396, Par. 11

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