I do want to ask you about what A Course in Miracles means by Holy Relationship. In one the main book it covers "entering the ark" together, and it almost sounds as though you need an added specific person to be able to awaken. Therefore, I do believe I approach each new person with the expectation that maybe THIS might be the connection that reflects enlightenment in my experience, and I to them! Am I taking this too literally? Or do you really need to have another to assist you awaken?

I appreciate your own time so much and thank you for your help in my experience and others. I thank you and I thank God for you. Namaste.

David Hoffmeister: Thanks for your openness and your willingness to check deeply at what is underneath these topics and issues. A Course in Miracles teaches that the split mind contains both the situation (the ego) and the Solution (the Holy Spirit). When they're brought together, only One remains.

Your body and the world are always the focus of ego's perspective, because of it seeks to produce real problems and struggles on earth and to steer clear of the inner Healing Correction of the Holy Spirit. The ego's distorted world is the product of identity confusion a course in miracles, an outpicturing of the belief that it is possible to produce an identity which God did not create. The ego is this identity problem and it absolutely was Answered or forgiven by the Holy Spirit the instant it did actually arise. This one problem might be described being an authority problem or a confusion in who's the author of Reality. Your head that believes in the reality of the time-space cosmos has a get a handle on issue, because of it believes that it can cause itself. This ego mind also thinks it's in competition with God, although this really is pushed out of conscious awareness. This unconscious ego thought system is exposed in the A Course in Miracles Workbook lessons, and Lesson 13 contains a fantastic example with this unveiling:

"A meaningless world engenders fear because I do believe I'm in competition with God."

This really is the start of training your head to forgive, for the focus is cut back to your head, back to thinking, and taken away from your body and the world. Anorexia, weight issues, body image issues, and interpersonal relationship issues are examples of projection, of seeing the situation where it's not: in the world. Your head cannot tolerate the belief in a battle with God, and this belief is pushed out of awareness. The deep-seated control issue this type of belief entails is then projected to your body and the world. Weight control, like any attempt to control the script or your body, is an attempt to control the past. The Holy Spirit teaches that yesteryear can only be forgiven or released or seen as false—not fixed or controlled or changed.

The same ego dynamic is underneath interpersonal relationship struggles of power and control, of wanting to repair or change a person or a self-image. Personal relationships might seem to sail happily along for awhile, the make-believe self-concept IS the private perspective and thus is obviously on shaky ground. Decisions are continuous. The Holy Spirit is a decision. The ego is a decision. Atonement is your choice that ends all decisions, an acceptance of the changelessness of Mind. The ego is your choice to trust that your head could be separate from God. Once your head believed that it had separated and built this time-space world, this time-space world of bodies became its substitute identity, since it believed it'd thrown away the Kingdom of Heaven. The world was made up as an alternative identity. The sleeping mind is split on your choice of identity. The Holy Spirit says, "This world is not Identity. This world is an illusion." And thus the Holy Spirit reminds your head constantly, "This world is not your Home. This world is not your Identity. This world is not real." While the mind is split it's hearing another voice (the ego) that's saying: "You've done it. You've separated from God. You'd better make the best of it and find something of the world to spot with. You are able to never return back for God will punish you."

Thought-form associations seem to become a substitute identity. The ego mind seems to be identified with your body, with family, with environments that seem to surround it (i.e., I'm an American, Japanese, I'm male, I'm female, I'm from a rich family, from an unhealthy family, I'm Catholic, Jewish, Protestant, etc.) All of these are thought-form associations. And these seeming other persons and places surrounding the small personal self are typical part with this construction. Your head is very shaky relating to this small identity, this small self, this little me. So the small me is shaky, and it looks like other persons give the small me reality and importance (i.e., you're my son, my daughter, you're my boss, you're a loving father, etc.) and all different things that these images be seemingly telling this little me be seemingly really important. Praise thus seems very important (i.e., you are a person and you're a good one!).

Praise and acceptance from others SEEM to stabilize this very shaky thing (i.e., you're a good lover, you're a good provider, you're great with the youngsters, you have an excellent intellect, you have this type of heart, you help serve so many others, you're a good team-player, on and on). This facet of the self-concept says that you are a person and you have all of these positive attributes that actually make you a valuable and worthy person, which make you be noticeable above the crowd. You're not just anyone—you're somebody special. The flip side is criticism, which directly reflects the shaky sense of self. Criticism will be: you're never as great as you think you are, you're not this type of good team player, this type of good provider, so good in bed—all the stuff which can be taken as insults to the private self-concept). That's the flip side of the strokes. To the ego self-concept that believes both sides (the positive and negative) of thinking are real, the Holy Spirit is perceived as a good threat, for the Holy Spirit leads to the knowledge of forgiveness or the realization that none of the tiny images perceived as separate have any reality.

Once the criticism seems ahead, the ego attempts a substitution. It thinks, "I don't need this. I'll go elsewhere and start other relationships with people who can appreciate my talents and skills and abilities, appreciate my personhood. I'll avoid those negative influences on earth and those negative people. I'll find another person or join an organization where individuals are like-minded and forget about the remaining world. These new people should me and stroke me and praise me." The attempt at substitution is an attempt to maintain a sense of specialness, a sense of separation, a sense of individuality (a private mind with private thoughts). Those attempts are special love relationships. They seem to bolster worth and value and to validate personhood. And they provide a false witness for clinging to the ego as identity. To the ego, past associations serve to offer personhood some sense of stability and consistency and value. Yet, the Holy Spirit demonstrates past associations offer nothing of value, for these were created by the ego to deny the facts of God's Love.

Holy relationship emphasizes and reflects Content (right-minded thinking) and comes with an awareness of the meaninglessness of form. While the ego's believed relationships will be seemingly specific, yet each one of these will present an opportunity to release the belief in specifics. Divine Mind is Abstract and Universal. Forgiveness may be the bridge to the remembrance of Christ and God, Divine Abstraction. Thus the Holy Spirit teaches in A Course in Miracles:

"Whenever you meet anyone, remember it is a holy encounter. As you see him you will see yourself. As you treat him you will treat yourself. As you think of him you will think of yourself. Never forget this, for in him you may find yourself or lose yourself. Whenever two Sons of God meet, they're given another chance at salvation. Don't leave anyone without giving salvation to him and receiving it yourself. For I'm always there with you, in remembrance of you.