In this video, we read and explore this vital lesson from A Course In Miracles: “Holding grievances is an attack on God’s plan for salvation.” (ACIM, W-72). We also examine how the ego’s insane thought system based on the belief in separation engenders sin, guilt, and fear in our split mind, leading to repression, projection, and perception of an insane world.
We repeat this “domino” set-up sequence, over … and over … and over:
Belief in separation -> sin (assuming that we pulled off an impossible crime) -> guilt -> fear -> repression (or denial) –> projection -> perception.
To undo this set-up, we need to employ the vision of our Inner Kindness Teacher to look at each and every up-set in our (distorted) perception, reversing ego’s reversal of cause and effect, restoring our awareness of our mind’s ability to choose against the insanity of believing separation real. Our ego’s incessant inner critic (highlighted in the movie Violet) doesn’t want to look at the set-up since looking honestly (something it’s not capable of) is considered dangerous, blasphemous, and worthy of a vicious obliterating, and obliviating reaction. Hence the almost instantaneous repression or denial. The favorite mechanism of keeping us mindless that the ego’s propaganda machine uses just about 24/7 is projection. We persistently project the undesired horrific thoughts of guilt believing that we’re “the home of evil, darkness and sin.” (ACIM, W-93.1:1)
The forgiving friend in our mind that rebuts every incriminating thought that ego dishes up, calmly, gently, patiently and eternally persistently denies ego’s denial of the truth of our unchanged, unchanging and unchangeable innocence.
The word “repression” doesn’t appear in ACIM, but the closely related word “denial” certainly does! The word “denial” appears 73 times in the Course! Denial of truth in our mind effectively is an (attempted) attack on truth.
Here are the first 3 paragraphs of Workbook Lesson 72:
“1. While we have recognized that the ego’s plan for salvation is the opposite of God’s, we have not yet emphasized that it is an active attack on His plan, and a deliberate attempt to destroy it. ²In the attack, God is assigned the attributes which are actually associated with the ego, while the ego appears to take on the attributes of God.
2. The ego’s fundamental wish is to replace God. ²In fact, the ego is the physical embodiment of that wish. ³For it is that wish that seems to surround the mind with a body, keeping it separate and alone, and unable to reach other minds except through the body that was made to imprison it. ⁴The limit on communication cannot be the best means to expand communication. ⁵Yet the ego would have you believe that it is.
3. Although the attempt to keep the limitations that a body would impose is obvious here, it is perhaps not so apparent why holding grievances is an attack on God’s plan for salvation. ²But let us consider the kinds of things you are apt to hold grievances for. ³Are they not always associated with something a body does? ⁴A person says something you do not like. ⁵He does something that displeases you. ⁶He “betrays” his hostile thoughts in his behavior.”
Ken Wapnick’s scholarly book “Love Does Not Condemn” refers to 3 variations of denial of truth:
- asceticism (making the error real by making a big deal about avoiding the world)
- libertinism (making the error real by making a big deal about indulging in the world)
- moderation (making the error real by making a big deal about balancing avoiding and indulging in the world)
We made up a world that reflects the (split) mind’s decision to deny the eternal and idolize the ephemeral. Yet every specific issue or grievance we have with this world can be used for healing our minds of the belief in separation instead of reinforcing that erroneous, correctable belief.
“… every grievance that you hold insists that the body is real. (ACIM, W-72.5:6)
We could also say – equivalently – that every irritation or annoyance we make a big deal about makes the error (the belief in separation) real which is instantaneously projected onto the world in an attempt to divert our attention from the equally fraudulent belief in ego’s sin-guilt-fear-repression-denial-projection machine. Forgiveness is the universal “undo” process that reverses this insanity and assures our troubled minds that escape from fear is not only possible but happily inevitable.
We also read and discussed the first two paragraphs from this very relevant section from the text “The Atonement as Defense” (ACIM, T-2.II) about the proper use of denial:
“1. You can do anything I ask. ²I have asked you to perform miracles, and have made it clear that miracles are natural, corrective, healing and universal. ³There is nothing they cannot do, but they cannot be performed in the spirit of doubt or fear. ⁴When you are afraid of anything, you are acknowledging its power to hurt you. ⁵Remember that where your heart is, there is your treasure also. ⁶You believe in what you value. ⁷If you are afraid, you are valuing wrongly. ⁸Your understanding will then inevitably value wrongly, and by endowing all thoughts with equal power will inevitably destroy peace. ⁹That is why the Bible speaks of “the peace of God which passeth understanding.” ¹⁰This peace is totally incapable of being shaken by errors of any kind. ¹¹It denies the ability of anything not of God to affect you. ¹²This is the proper use of denial. ¹³It is not used to hide anything, but to correct error. ¹⁴It brings all error into the light, and since error and darkness are the same, it corrects error automatically.
2. True denial is a powerful protective device. ²You can and should deny any belief that error can hurt you. ³This kind of denial is not a concealment but a correction. ⁴Your right mind depends on it. ⁵Denial of error is a strong defense of truth, but denial of truth results in miscreation, the projections of the ego. ⁶In the service of the right mind the denial of error frees the mind, and re-establishes the freedom of the will. ⁷When the will is really free it cannot miscreate, because it recognizes only truth.”
(This YouTube video recording was made on March 12 , 2024.)
(The 3 steps of forgiveness represented by the light-colored (STEP 1, STEP 2, STEP 3) arrows in the diagram above are covered in several other posts on this website.)