Jesus in the form of pamphlets. The first was completed in l975, three years after the Course was written. It is entitled Psychotherapy: Purpose, Process and Practice and is a summary of the Course’s teachings on healing as applied to the profession of psychotherapy. In 1977 Helen channelled The Song of Prayer. This was in response to questions Ken had raised about the correct use of prayer. It is a poetic summary of prayer, forgiveness and healing.
After Helen’s death in 1981, a book of her inspired poetry was published, entitled The Gifts of God.
What the Course Is
Much of the material in this book is based upon my understanding of some of the principles of the Course. I have included below some introductory material about what the Course says.
It is a book about how to heal our minds, for this is where the source of all our physical and psychological suffering lies. The aim of the Course is for us to achieve a state of inner peace, a quiet joy, no matter what we are doing, who we are with, or where we may be. It does this by teaching us a new way of looking at the world. This change of perception is the miracle — hence the title of the book.
The Course teaches that everything in this world can be used as a mirror to what we believe. Our relationships are the most powerful of all our mirrors. By relationships I mean all forms: lovers, parent and child, therapist and client, employer and employee, friends, etc. A relationship is an extremely powerful way of bringing into our awareness what needs to be healed within our mind. The Course teaches that through forgiveness and turning within for help, we can undo all the guilt we carry. This guilt originates from the false belief in our unconscious mind that we have willed to separate ourself from God, and have succeeded in this attempt. Chapter 2 will explore this theme more fully. Guilt is the term the Course uses to describe our self-hate, feelings of inferiority, lack of self-worth and all the negative beliefs we have about ourself. As we learn to undo our guilt, the memory of God’s love for us will return to our mind. When we re-experience the unconditional love of God, everything in this world will lose its appeal, including our identification with our body. (See Figure 1.1)
The Course is a unique blend of modern psychology, radical metaphysics and deep spiritual truths. Much of the psychology echoes Sigmund Freud’s teachings on our ego defence mechanisms of denial and projection and will be explained further in Chapter 3. The three volumes comprising the Course are a lifetime study requiring much re-reading to benefit from the depths of its teachings. The metaphysics of the Course have many parallels with some Eastern philosophies and religions. There are over 700 references to the Bible, and Jesus often reinterprets these biblical sayings. Many Christian terms are used in the Course but with entirely different meanings. Jesus stresses that we are not guilty, sinful creatures who need to atone through sacrifice and suffering. Instead, he gives us the inspiring message that we are guiltless, sinless creations of God who have fallen asleep in Heaven. In our collective dream, we have forgotten the abstract eternal beauty of our real nature and believe we are bodies in a world of form.
The Course is not trying to convince us that it is the only spiritual path. It states that it is but one of ‘many thousands’ of spiritual paths and that other teachers with different symbols are also needed. (M3; M-1.4:1-2) Jesus often says that the message of his Course is simple. However, when we first start to study it, it does not appear that way to most of us. This is because the Course’s thought system is completely opposite to our ego’s way of looking at the world. The Course uses the term ‘ego’— as is also the practice in the East — to describe our ‘little self’ which we have made to try to take the place of our real Self which God created. Our ego identifies with our body whilst our Self (or Christ nature) knows only the truth of our formless, spiritual magnificence.
Jesus stresses that all God’s children, referred to in the Course as the Son, Sonship or Christ, were created equal. Thus Jesus is not especially favoured in God’s eyes but is equal to all of us. He simply awoke to his true reality before us and seeks to help us regain what we have forgotten. In later chapters I will expand on some of the Course’s teachings, especially with regard to healing our mind.
The Text in particular seems hard to grasp and the practice of forgiveness equally as difficult. Because of this some people tend only to read the Workbook. However, there is much material in the Text, especially concerning relationships, which is not found in the Workbook. The Text forms the theoretical foundation of the Workbook. It becomes very easy to misunderstand the Workbook and read its message out of context without a knowledge of the theoretical framework of the Course which is found in the Text. On the other hand, to study the Text but not apply it through the Workbook lessons is to end up with an ungrounded and abstract view of the Course. Yet, with time, the message of the Course does become simple, although never easy to apply. 'Victim consciousness' is ingrained in our psyches and the desire to blame others for our unhappiness is universal. To read in the Course (see first quotation on page 13) that no one can take away our peace, only ourselves, is a difficult message to accept, but one which will eventually lead us to happiness.
Health is Inner Peace . . . Health is the result of relinquishing all attempts to use the body lovelessly.'
(T15; T-2.I.5:11; T146; T-8.VIII.9:9)
After my first visit to the Findhorn Foundation, I returned the following year and took part in a healing workshop. During this period I said ‘yes’ to working more deeply with healing. I did not realise until much later that this was the path I had chosen to help heal myself. Most of the people at the Foundation believe that their thinking at least contributes to their disease. This allowed me to help my clients reach deeper levels in their mind where a lack of forgiveness lay and gave them the opportunity to change their mind about some painful issue. If my client could achieve forgiveness, his sense of guilt would disappear and its shadow in the body — the disease — would go. The following story seeks to illustrate these points.
John asked to see me about the chronic pain at the base of his neck. He was somewhat sceptical about experiencing this type of healing as he came from a scientific background. The neck pain had been present for some months and his hospital had advised a long course of physiotherapy. I explained to John that there was a part of his mind which knew exactly what the cause of this problem was. To help him to access this, I told him I would take him through a relaxation procedure and try some ways which might help him to let go of his rational mind so he could open to his inner wisdom.
I asked John to lie down and made him comfortable with cushions and a blanket. Using a progressive relaxation method, I asked him to tense and release all the muscles in his body. Whilst he was doing this, I kept my hands lightly on his head as I find this helps me to join with the client as well as aiding their relaxation. I asked John to say a prayer to indicate his willingness to receive the help that is always there and to ask for help in seeing what thoughts he needed to change in his mind which would bring about healing. In my previous conversation with him I had discovered he was open to working with prayer. I joined his silent prayer with one of my own. I asked that I might open myself to my own source of help and be used as a channel in this healing session.
We remained in silence for a few minutes whilst I continued to lay on hands. I then asked John how he was feeling and if there was anything happening for him. He told me that the face of his aunt had appeared to him and had spoken the following words: "This pain in your neck is vengeance upon yourself for what you did." John told me that this was not said in any accusing manner but as a simple statement of fact. However, the words made no sense to John and we decided to leave this intriguing message for the moment. Although John had stressed that he had a well-developed logical, rational and scientific mind, I felt he also possessed strong intuition. I felt drawn to try some imagery in the form of a guided journey, to help lead him to his own source of inner wisdom.
I began
