A Course in Miracles

by Helen Schucman

When you return to your original form of communication with God by direct revelation, the need for miracles is over.

49. The miracle makes no distinction among degrees of misperception. It is a device for perception correction,

This is its true indiscriminateness.

Miracles, however, are genuinely interpersonal, and result in true closeness to others.

Revelation induces only experience. Miracles, on the other hand, induce action. They are more useful now because of their interpersonal nature. In this

The miracle is therefore a sign of love among equals.

The only general rules to be observed throughout, then, are: First, that the exercises be practiced with great specificity, as will be indicated. This will help you to generalize the ideas involved to every situation in which you find yourself, and to everyone and everything in it. Second, be sure that you do not decide for yourself that there are some people, situations or things to which the ideas are inapplicable. This will interfere with transfer of training. The very nature of true perception is that it has no limits. It is the opposite of the way you see now.

The overall aim of the exercises is to increase your ability to extend the ideas you will be practicing to include everything. This will require no effort on your part. The exercises themselves meet the conditions necessary for this kind of transfer.

But do not allow yourself to make exceptions in applying the ideas the workbook contains, and whatever your reactions to the ideas may be, use them. Nothing more than that is required.

indiscriminately.

One thing is like another as far as the application of the idea is concerned.

I have given everything I see in this room [on this street, from this window, in this place] all the meaning that it has for me.

I do not understand anything I see in this room [on this street, from this window, in this place].

The point of the exercises is to help you clear your mind of all past associations, to see things exactly as they appear to you now, and to realize how little you really understand about them.

This is a major exercise, and will be repeated from time to time in somewhat different form. The aim here is to train you in the first steps toward the goal of separating the meaningless from the meaningful. It is a first attempt in the long-range purpose of learning to see the meaningless as outside you, and the meaningful within. It is also the beginning of training your mind to recognize what is the same and what is different.

I am not angry at ___ for the reason I think.

I am angry at ___ because I see something that is not there.

Again, if you resist applying the idea to some upsetting thoughts more than to others, remind yourself of the two cautions stated in the previous lesson:

There are no small upsets. They are all equally disturbing to my peace of mind.

I cannot keep this form of upset and let the others go. For the purposes of these exercises, then, I will regard them all as the same.

This idea is particularly difficult to believe at first. Yet it is the rationale for all of the preceding ones. It is the reason why nothing that you see means anything. It is the reason why you have given everything you see all the meaning that it has for you. It is the reason why you do not understand anything you see. It is the reason why your thoughts do not mean anything, and why they are like the things you see. It is the reason why you are never upset for the reason you think. It is the reason why you are upset because

you see something that is not there.

Yet that is precisely why you need new ideas about time.

Are not your aesthetic reactions to the cup, too, based on past experiences? How else would you know whether or not this kind of cup will break if you drop it? What do you know about this cup except what you learned in the past? You would have no idea what this cup is, except for your past learning. Do you, then, really see it?

applying the idea for today indiscriminately to whatever catches your eye. For example: I see only the past in this pencil. I see only the past in this shoe. I see only the past in this hand.

My mind is preoccupied with past thoughts. This idea is, of course, the reason why you

see only the past. No one really sees anything. He sees only his thoughts projected outward. The mind’s preoccupation with the past is the cause of the misconception about time from which your seeing suffers. Your mind cannot grasp the present, which is the only time there is. It therefore cannot understand time, and cannot, in fact, understand anything.

The one wholly true thought one can hold about the past is t...

begin to train your mind to recognize when it is not really thinking at all. While thoughtless ideas preoccupy your mind, the truth is blocked.

Name each one by the central figure or theme it contains, and pass on to the next. Introduce the practice period by saying:

But my mind is preoccupied with past thoughts.

This can be done four or five times during the day, unless you find it irritates you. If you find it trying, three or four times is sufficient. You might find it helpful, however, to include your irritation, or any emotion that the idea for today may induce, in the mind searching itself.

In fact, the recognition that you do not understand is a prerequisite for undoing your false ideas. These exercises are concerned with practice, not with understanding. You do not need to practice what you already understand.

This idea applies to all the thoughts of which you are aware, or become aware in the practice periods.

When you do, you will have no doubt that what you once believed were your thoughts did not mean anything.

The emphasis is now on the lack of reality of what you think you think.

Now we are emphasizing that the presence of these “thoughts” means that you are not thinking. This is merely another way of repeating our earlier statement that your mind is really a blank. To recognize this is to recognize nothingness when you think you see it. As such, it is the prerequisite for vision.

This idea will help to release me from all that I now believe.

Try to avoid classification of any kind. In fact, if you find it helpful to do so, you might imagine that you are watching an oddly assorted procession going by, which has little if any personal meaning to you. As each one crosses your mind, say:

My thought about ___ does not mean anything.

Today’s thought can obviously serve for any thought that distresses you at any time.

This idea will help to release me from all that I now believe.