My thoughts* on ACIM Urtext Lesson 28, for January 28, 2024. Above all else I want to see things differently.

Above all else I want to see things differently.

* Even nearly four years walking the Atonement I am continually being given the opportunity to see things differently. This comes from choosing to follow the guidance of the Holy Spirit and step once more into life with another human being.

* To get along and maintain the type of existence within the Gates of Heaven and Eternal Life that I insist on having I must let go of my claim to understanding anything and allow the Holy Spirit to reveal what He Will to me according to the “timing” with which He knows I am ready and willing to receive it.

1. Today we are really giving specific application to the idea for yesterday. ²In these practice periods, you will be making a series of definite commitments. ³The question of whether you will keep them in the future is not our concern here.

* If you know the Holy Spirit, simply use whatever part of the lesson fits where you are now. These lessons are flexible in the sense that the Holy Spirit will guide you to use them according to your needs and willingness at this time.

⁴If you are willing at least to make them now, you have started on the way to keeping them. ⁵And we are still at the beginning.

2. You may wonder why it is important to say, for example, “Above all else I want to see this table differently.” ²In itself it is not important at all. ³Yet what is by itself? ⁴And what does “in itself” mean? ⁵You see a lot of separate things about you, which really means you are not seeing at all. ⁶You either see or not. ⁷When you have seen one thing differently, you will see all things differently. ⁸The light you will see in any one of them is the same light you will see in them all.

* At this time, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are pointing out to me that I need to take this concept not only to physical things or things with form but ALSO to communications, opinions, theories, philosophies, tones, and all other form of communication that humanity currently thinks it has a handle on or can manipulate. I want to let go of analyzing, testing, making lists of flaws, etc. to protect myself, and so on.

3. When you say, “Above all else I want to see this table differently,” you are making a commitment to withdraw your preconceived ideas about the table, and open your mind to what it is, and what it is for. ²You are not defining it in past terms. ³You are asking what it is, rather than telling it what it is. ⁴You are not binding its meaning to your tiny experience of tables, nor are you limiting its purpose to your little personal thoughts.

* I am hearing the Holy Spirit tell me that I must do this with all of my interactions with others even though the training that I absorbed after a childhood of abuse and neglect did give me a “sense of protection” and/or freedom from abusers in the past few decades of my life. OR so it seemed, anyway.

4. You will not question what you have already defined. ²And the purpose of these exercises is to ask questions and receive the answers. ³In saying, “Above all else I want to see this table differently,” you are committing yourself to seeing. ⁴It is not an exclusive commitment. ⁵It is a commitment that applies to the table just as much as to anything else, neither more nor less.

* This means that I DO NOT eliminate the table (or the relationships/interactions) but that I am open to allowing the Holy Spirit to redefine them. Yet it goes beyond even this. I am living as an observer to the Holy Spirit Who is living “my life” because I have “let go” and given Him permission to. It is a phenomenal experience.

5. You could, in fact, gain vision from just that table, if you would withdraw all your own ideas from it, and look upon it with a completely open mind. ²It has something to show you; something beautiful and clean and of infinite value, full of happiness and hope. ³Hidden under all your ideas about it is its real purpose, the purpose it shares with all the universe.

* DO YOU HEAR THAT??!!! THE TABLE HAS PURPOSE. REAL PURPOSE. AND IT SHARES THAT PURPOSE WITH ALL THE UNIVERSE.

* That is profound to me!

6. In using the table as a subject for applying the idea for today, you are therefore really asking to see the purpose of the universe.

* Yes. It is claiming existence that we have been given. NOT denying existence as the Course has been taught for the past nearly 50 years.

²You will be making this same request of each subject that you use in the practice periods. ³And you are making a commitment to each of them to let its purpose be revealed to you, instead of placing your own judgment upon it.

* If I were to go by the why my partner presents himself as I would see someone like Archie Bunker from All In the Family and that is not who he is. The Holy Spirit told this to me right away and I have bumped into my defense system more than once and been taught by the Spirit that I need to let the Spirit walk this walk for me. It is a privilege to be walking this walk with both my physical companion and the Holy Spirit, and to know that I am safe and wanted because the Holy Spirit declares this truth to my soul (mind and heart).

7. We will have six two-minute practice periods today, in which the idea for the day is stated first, and then applied to whatever you see about you. ²Not only should the subjects be chosen randomly, but each one should be accorded equal sincerity as today’s idea is applied to it, in an attempt to acknowledge the equal value of them all in their contribution to your seeing.

8. As usual, the applications should include the name of the subject your eyes happen to light on, and you should rest your eyes on it while saying:

²Above all else I want to see this _________ differently.

³Each application should be made quite slowly, and as thoughtfully as possible. ⁴There is no hurry.

(ACIM, W-28.1:1–8:4)

Till next time, God bless, debi.