Read on the ACIM CE App: https://acimce.app/:W-148
Lesson 148
Review 4: My mind holds only what I think with God.
Practice Instructions
See Practice Instructions Review 4
Commentary
What seem to me to be obstacles within my mind, out-of-control thoughts that hinder me on my spiritual path, are my defenses against the truth. Nothing enters my mind without my permission. No one is thinking thoughts in my mind except me (and God). As Lesson 26 taught us, my attack thoughts are attacking my own invulnerability. I may think I am attacking someone else, but I am really attacking my own Identity with God.
My ego has built up a clever, multi-layered defense system against the truth, and has hidden it in obscurity and disguise. The process the Course sets before me is one of uncovering these defenses, becoming aware of them, judging them as insane, and letting them go. All of them are false, and what is false cannot affect what is true. Beneath all the camouflage of the ego, my mind still holds only what I think with God. The rest is elaborate illusion with no real power to cause any effects whatsoever.
Sickness is one very prominent and very effective defense system of the ego. In sickness, something my mind has caused appears to be an attack from the outside, a visible or invisible enemy with very visible effects on my body. It is something I must continually defend against, and fight with every resource when it strikes. As soon as one disease is conquered, another seems to arise with even more devastating effects. Most of mankind is not ready to accept that sickness is only of the mind. I have not fully accepted it myself; my level of fear is still too high. So there is every reason to continue to alleviate diseases in the ways we have been doing, yet we must realize that we are only muting the symptoms and not eradicating the cause. Only as more and more of us begin to realize that our minds hold only what we think with God, and that everything which seems to be other than from God is an illusion of our creation, will the need for the compromise approach of physical medicine begin to disappear.
Today in my practice I am contributing to the ultimate cure of every disease. As I search out my own inner defenses, which are actually forms of self-attack, and let them go, I am collaborating with the power of God to free mankind from disease, and not only disease, but every such ego-based system of defense against the truth. As I clear my mind of all thoughts that would deceive (W-Re.4.In.5:2), and place God’s Mind in charge of the thoughts I receive (W-Re.4.In.6:1), I am not working alone. “They [the thoughts] will not come from you alone, for they will all be shared with Him” (W-Re.4.In.6:2).
Let me, then, take the assigned times today to remember the true Source of all my thoughts, and to allow the Holy Spirit to clear the cobwebs of deception from my mind. Let me take five minutes in the morning to “set the day along the lines which God appointed” (W-Re.4.In.6:1). Each time I do so, each day I remember my practice, I bring myself and all the world nearer the day when all deception will vanish in the light.