A Course in Miracles Lesson 11: My meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world.
This lesson starts off with these very powerful lines: “It seems as if the world determines what you perceive. Today’s idea introduces the concept that your thoughts determine the world you see.”
Talk about totally pulling the rug out of everything we believe.
Our senses seem to inform us of what’s going on in the world and our body. If things are going the way we like, then we say “I’m happy.” And if not, then we are sad or anxious or fearful.
Whenever we’re angry, for example, we can clearly point to the reason we’re upset. This other person did something they shouldn’t have done. We are the victim and they are the perpetrator.
But what this lesson (and the entire Course) are teaching is that we have it backwards. Our thoughts determine what we experience in the world and in our body.
That’s why the Course spends so much time talking about observing our thoughts and being vigilant against the ego. Consider this insightful line:
“When you believe something, you have made it true for you.” (T-7.VI.7)
Beliefs and thoughts go hand in hand. They are united. And when we can observe our ego thoughts for what they are, the sooner we can withdraw belief from the ego.
The more we practice looking at our thoughts, the easier it becomes to return to the source of thought – which is the mind. And as we learn in A Course in Miracles Lesson 11, this is “a major phase of the correction process; the reversal of the thinking of the world.”
In later lessons we’ll learn more about the mind – which is not to be confused with the brain. The mind is outside of time and space and is the true source of everything we experience.
In point of fact, the brain and body are contained within the mind, not the other way around. But we’ll dive deeper into that in later lessons.
