Resting in Peace
I’ve been listening to the haunting song, “Young and Beautiful,” written by Lana Del Rey and Rick Nowels. Lana Del Ray sings:
“Will you still love me
When I'm no longer young and beautiful?
Will you still love me
When I've got nothing but my aching soul?”
The world values youth and beauty and yet time is really not kind to the body. Hollywood is notorious for the dwindling roles available to actors as they age. Youth certainly favors the athlete. For example, 18-year-old soccer players run circles around their 30-year-old opponents. When it comes to romance, we’re all familiar with the sad cliché of a relationship ending when one partner finds a younger lover. For everybody, no matter how rich or famous, the smooth skin of youth becomes wrinkled, the full, bright head of hair pales and becomes thin. As we age, we lose height and suppleness. We tend towards gaining weight or losing body mass. We move less easily and we have more pain. Regardless of how well we eat, how regularly we exercise, and how carefully we care for our bodies and even enhance our appearance, in the end, as the title of Jim Morrison’s biography attests, “Nobody Here Gets Out Alive.” It’s a scary prospect.
We take for granted our identification with our bodies. They certainly feel very real. They are very hard to ignore, especially when we injure them and feel pain or become ill. Every morning when we look in the mirror, the same familiar face looks back. We think of ourselves as that person. Who would we be without this body? We’d be homeless, of course! Isn’t it obvious?
The body is a fragile thing, giving us plenty of opportunity to feel vulnerable even if we’re not very old. The global pandemic plays into this vulnerability. All over the world, billions of people are going to considerable lengths to protect themselves against infection by the coronavirus. The efforts behind this are driven in no small part by the fear of death and the value we place on preserving our lives. And I would never suggest that we not take precautions. Nor would I suggest that we, as a global society, not fight disease and promote quality of life. I love science and technology and I value improving the human condition. Nevertheless, if we did not fear death and if we were not so identified with our bodies, we would find the pandemic much easier to contend with. We would also experience a great deal more peace.
As familiar to us and inseparable from our identities our bodies seem to be, being identified with one’s body is not necessary. The concepts of impermanence and non-attachment are familiar to students of Buddhism. An unnamed Zen master is credited with saying, “Everything breaks. Attachment is our unwillingness to face that reality.” Much as we may wish otherwise, we know for a fact that bodies die. Non-attachment to the body reduces suffering. Similarly, A Course in Miracles acknowledges that our identification with our bodies is a source of enormous pain and it also makes very clear that the body is not real. For example, in Workbook Lesson 199, the daily practice period is devoted to the idea:
I am not a body. I am free. (W-199)
The lesson instructions go on to explain:
Freedom must be impossible as long as you perceive a body as yourself. The body is a limit. Who would seek for freedom in a body looks for it where it can not be found. The mind can be made free when it no longer sees itself as a body, firmly tied to it and sheltered by its presence. If this were the truth, the mind were vulnerable indeed! (W-199.1:1-5)
The Course teaches that while the mind is eternal and invulnerable, the body is part of the same illusion as the universe itself, stemming from the belief in “original sin,” namely that we left our home in God and ‘became flesh.’ When we identify with our bodies, we are each effectively identifying as an ego, a false conception of ourselves. The instructions for Workbook Lesson 199 go on to clarify:
The ego holds the body dear because it dwells in it, and lives united with the home that it has made. It is part of the illusion that has sheltered it from being found illusory itself. (W-199.3:3-4)
As real as the body may seem, A Course in Miracles teaches that its apparent reality arises from our investment in the mistaken idea that we are all tiny, separate individuals.
Sins are beliefs that you impose between your brother and yourself. They limit you to time and place, and give a little space to you, another little space to him. The separating off is symbolized, in your perception, by a body which is clearly separate and a thing apart. Yet what this symbol represents is but your wish to be apart and separate. (T-26.VII.8)
Our true reality is not as separate bodies but as a great unity, pure Spirit. And yet, it’s hard for most of us to even imagine what that experience is like. Quite frankly, it may seem as scary—if not even more so—than “the devil we know,” namely our experience as vulnerable bodies, interacting with other bodies. Nonetheless, here we are wanting more peace. Having more peace is not at all difficult to imagine! As it turns out even though the body is not ‘really real,’ we can learn to experience more peace and love even while yet believing ourselves to be bodies.
The body was not made by love. Yet love does not condemn it and can use it lovingly, respecting what the Son of God has made and using it to save him from illusions. Would you not have the instruments of separation reinterpreted as a means for salvation, and used for purposes of love? (T18.VI.4-5)
In the mind training program of A Course in Miracles, practicing Course-style forgiveness is the “means for salvation.” At the heart of this practice is recognizing when we are taking the illusory world, including our bodies and other bodies, seriously. We know we are doing so when we do not feel peaceful. Once we recognize this, we step back and observe our experience without judgment. Whenever we look at any situation or experience without judgment, we are looking at it with the Teacher of Peace within us. We can also explicitly ask our inner Teacher or Guide for help in looking at any upsetting situation differently. This type of forgiveness takes a little willingness, a commitment to non-judgment, and patience. What takes place in this process is a shift in perception, of ourselves, of another person or people, and even of the world of form. The result of this shift is an experience of peace.
One effect of practicing forgiveness along these lines is that the sense of separation from others is reduced:
Forgiveness takes away what stands between your brother and yourself. It is the wish that you be joined with him, and not apart. (T-26.VII.9)
Another effect of practicing Course-style forgiveness is that we rest in peace even as we continue to live in the world. This is because this type of forgiveness heals the guilt in our minds, which arises out of believing that we separated from God. This doesn’t necessarily mean that our bodies themselves will heal of any particular ailment. And even if they do heal, our bodies will still grow old and eventually die. Despite this, as our experience of ourselves living in the world and growing older unfolds, we simultaneously grow to be more and more peaceful. We become less attached to our bodies, to particular experiences of aging, and even to our identities as individuals. In the meantime, regardless of where we are in this process, peace is an experience we can have right now. This is because peace is not of the body, but of God, and we are never apart from God, not even for an instant.
Peace is extended from you only to the eternal, and it reaches out from the eternal in you. It flows across all else. (T-19.IV.B.4)
For more on non-judgment, see the post, “Judging You, Judging Me is not the Best We Can Do,” published July 28th, 2020.
Just to clarify about the Course’s teaching on the mind: “The mind that serves spirit is invulnerable.” (T-1.IV-2) The mind can also serve the ego, and it is then subject to illusion and the belief in vulnerability. This is what underlies the entire world of perception and gives rise to the need for the miracle (called, “Course-style forgiveness,” in this blog). For more on the miracle, see “The Miracle in A Course in Miracles,” published August 31st, 2020.
All quotes are from A Course in Miracles, copyright ©1992, 1999, 2007 by the Foundation for Inner Peace, 448 Ignacio Blvd., #306, Novato, CA 94949, www.acim.org and info@acim.org, used with permission.