A Course in Miracles® is a superbly structured mind-training program so new to the world; we are only just beginning to learn the effect it will have on our lives as we proceed along this pathway. It promises so much but is so gentle and seemingly so undemanding we often underestimate the extent of the changes we will undergo and the ego's resistance to our seeking the Peace of God.
Some months ago a young lady rang to share her excitement at finding the Course. She told me "I have been working with A Course in Miracles® for three months and I haven't stopped smiling yet." I hear these stories regularly but didn't want to dampen her enthusiasm which was really quite sweet but I did cautioned her that the ego does not give up easily and there was no guarantee her smile would not wane a little as she understood more of the material.
Stories abound how people have thrown books into the river, out of closed windows or flushed down the toilet when they confront concepts in the Course they are unwilling to accept. Any pathway that promises a complete turn around of our thought system to its exact opposite would have to be disorienting at best and depressing at worst.
I believe our difficulties with the Course all stems from our inability to fully accept the basic theme of the whole world being an illusion. In workbook lesson #132 "I loose the world from what I thought it was" the Course's main thrust is stated in quite unmistakable terms. At the same time it acknowledges the difficulty we will have in accepting that inevitable conclusion.
"There is no world! This is the central thought the course attempts to teach. Not everyone is ready to accept it, and each one must go as far as he can let himself be led along the road to truth. He will return and go still farther, or perhaps step back a while and then return again. workbook p. 237/p.243

In one of the first Miracle discussion groups Pam and I attended, a friend for talking about the world literally not existing reprimanded me, as he felt it was a depressing and frightening concept. I could not understand his fears at the time as I thought it was the best news I had ever heard. It seemed to me that if God was not involved in either the making of the world or it's continuance as a worthy home for His Son, perhaps he was a loving God after all. I know now, my friend was simply being perceptive in recognizing the threat the Course posed to his ego and the 'adverse' effect such a statement would have on his personal dreams and ambitions.
Certainly the concept of the world being illusion is not new. The Gnostics and many eastern disciplines have taught this for centuries. In the western world "New Thought" religions emanating from the New England area of the US in the late eighteen hundreds shared that same belief.
Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science stated in her book "Science and Health", "The Bible says that a deep sleep fell upon Adam, and nowhere is there reference to his waking up." This same statement is repeated quite early in the text (page 15/18) which Ken Wapnick believes is an acknowledgment to the foundation work of Christian Science last century).
The difference with the Course is that not only does its whole thought system revolves around the world being an illusion but it emphasizes its 'making' as a deliberate assault on God.
"The world was made as an attack on God." WB p.403/413
Many go through a long honeymoon period with the Course happily accepting that the world is only a dream in our mind. They deny seeing the lessons of life presented to them by saying "Oh well! It is only an illusion"; without fully realizing until much later, the difficulties they will experience letting go their desire to be special and to be treated as special.
A long time Miracle student recently wrote that even though A Course in Miracles® had previously transformed her life, making her happier than she had ever been before, she had now sunk into a low state of depression, "A feeling of total nothingness" as she called it. I knew exactly what she meant as Pam and I have been through these periods too. Far from being a bad sign, to me it was an indication that the Course was working and we were about to experience another beneficial shift, all of which loosen our belief in the reality of this world.
We may say the words "The Peace of God is my one Goal" but our ego tells us that we should retain all our other goals as well. The thought that we came here to find something we never could find or that we are being asked to give up any of our worldly goals is enough to throw us into depression. Holy Spirit would never ask us to give up anything we want, knowing that eventually we will see no value in holding on to them of our own accord. Some of those goals may seem altruistic and the whole world may acclaim them as such, but if we are honest with ourselves, they are often just another attempt of the ego to establish our specialness which got us into this mess in the first place when we thought we could live a life apart from God. "Trust not your good intentions. They are not enough." text p. 355/381. Nothing we do in this illusion has more importance than anything else. The only worthwhile criteria is whether we are teaching love or fear?"
"Taking truth to the illusion"
The ego joins us in every new endeavor, even spiritually based ones, by reinforcing the belief in our own specialness. Perhaps we may hold the idea that if I study these 'Holy' books and 'forgive' everybody, I will get an easier passage through life than everybody else will. "Misfortune will never occur as far as I am concerned. Holy Spirit and Jesus will see to it that I will never want for anything, my partner and family will be less trouble. etc. etc. and life will go the way I want it to. The Course calls this idea "taking truth to the illusion". If this entire world is an illusion made as an attack on God, how could it ever work out better for me than for anybody else? We take a meaningless world and try to see spiritual signs in everything insane event that seems to be occurring. If things aren't going right we see Holy Spirit or Jesus creating situations in form to give us lessons imagining they would interfere with an illusionary world. It is not the events in themselves, which give us lessons but our fearful reaction to those events, which show us the areas where we need help from the Holy Spirit.
It is appealing to think of all the things in the world we don't like such as bush fires, floods, disease, poverty, loneliness and death as illusions, but much more difficult to think of the beautiful sunsets, good health, prosperity, comfort and special love relationships for example as equally illusionary. Yet, the course says without compromise, there is no "hierarchy of illusions." (Text p. 455/489)
"The dreams you think you like would hold you back as much as those in which the fear is seen. For every dream is but a dream of fear, no matter what the form it seems to take."
text p. 570/615
It would be normal to feel depressed at this realization, as we are apt to think something has been taken away from us. At the same time, we know we have somehow reached a point of no return without the vaguest idea of what we can do about it.
Jesus says in the Course if we seek anything not of God, we are choosing littleness instead of magnitude.
"Everything in this world is little because it is a world made out of littleness, in the strange belief that littleness can content you. When you strive for anything in this world in the belief that it will bring you peace, you are belittling yourself and blinding yourself to glory." text p. 285/ 306
If "God's Will for me is Perfect Happiness" we may feel guilty as Course students if we become depressed, but increasing our guilt is not helpful. All we need to do is realize we are "taking a snapshot of a movie" again, judging a still frame rather than waiting to see how the film ends up. It stands to reason that at some point between desiring our ego motivated goals and our wanting only the Peace of "God; there must be some feeling of loss. This would be an inevitable part of the process.
Nothing is achieved by worrying why we have not yet awakened. If we were ready, we would be awake. However, we can do something about our depression. We can start by not taking the world and ourselves so seriously and give up expecting that this world will work out the way our egos would like. This does not mean we adopt a stance of pseudo happiness and consequently avoid looking honestly at blocks to the awareness of love. To do this would merely bury our guilt and increase the extent of it.
When we can accept this whole experience is a play that we scripted, there is no point in playing victim. As if it isn't enough writing the play, producing and directing it, we also elect to be the theatre critic who complains about it. Our life and the world we see is exactly the way we are choosing it should be. Knowing this, it doesn't make sense to be angry about the world or sad our own interpretation of the illusion, or we make the error real to us and entrench this lie in our mind. The world's unreality should be thought of joy, not sadness.
We recently saw a movie called "Ground Hog Day" where the leading character played by Bill Murray had the chance to wake up every morning at 6.00 am and relive the same day over and over again. After initial disbelief, then anger, he tried using the knowledge learned each day to manipulate the next to suit his ego needs. Nothing worked for long so he attempted suicide but even that could not prevent the day being played out again. At the end the movie and as a last resort, he tried love and forgiveness and was able to move on. This whole life is a "Ground Hog Day" and there is every reason to be grateful the world is an illusion. The Course says we are reborn every instant so we can rejoice that nothing we have ever thought or done has any significance nor can it alter God's Love for us in any way and we remain the innocent Son of God we have always been.
"Such is each life; a seeming interval from birth to death and on to life again, a repetition of an instant gone by long ago that cannot be relieved. And all of time is but the mad belief that what is over is still here and now. Forgive the past and let it go, for it IS gone. You stand no longer on the ground that lies between the worlds. You have gone on, and reached the world that lies at Heaven's gate. There is no hindrance to the Will of God, nor any need that you repeat again a journey that was over long ago. Look gently on your brother, and behold the world in which perception of your hate has been transformed into a world of love." Text. p 513/551

Bill McDonald