He Waited

He waited:

I left Jesus behind at the end of 9th grade, my last year at Catholic school, believing there was littler need to think of him from then on. My spiritual life shaped up from teenage years reading Carlos Castaneda, Allan Watts, Chogyam Trunpa, and exploring various mystical traditions. There was little room for the traditional figure of Jesus. In my mid 20s I began hearing references to a transformation book called A Course in Miracles and thought I should consider it with a browse. Within the book, Jesus found me again, not right away, but through the course of continuous returns to the pages. This was a different Jesus than experienced before, infinitely compassionate, patient, and with the single greatest promise that was ever made to me...

³If you want to be like me I will help you, knowing that we are alike. ⁴If you want to be different, I will wait until you change your mind. (ACIM, T-8.IV.6:3-4)

so Jesus had waited for me. 

and now he offered to help me be like him. Which was something beyond my understanding at the time, intriguing, and so sweetly offered that my heart immediately accepted. Yes, I wanted to be like this Jesus, filled with a loving-kindness that only a forgiving mind could afford to extend. What I quickly discovered was that this was a means of awakening, every bit as demanding as any Zen discipline, a mindfulness practice of continuous forgiveness, a yogic path of pure devotion. 

What could you want forgiveness cannot give? ²Do you want peace? ³Forgiveness offers it. ⁴Do you want happiness, a quiet mind, a certainty of purpose, and a sense of worth and beauty that transcends the world? ⁵Do you want care and safety, and the warmth of sure protection always? ⁶Do you want a quietness that cannot be disturbed, a gentleness that never can be hurt, a deep abiding comfort, and a rest so perfect it can never be upset?

 All this forgiveness offers you, and more.

(ACIM, W-122.1:1–2:1)

this was my path, Jesus had waited for me and I was now ready. My commitment has never waivered, although my practice has often been unsteady. Through the years, and no matter what's happened, Jesus has extended his love to me, never once causing my faith to falter. He believes in me. He is infinitely patient. He loves me. 

he tells me that we are alike.

and finally,

I believe him 

~

I love you, Eric 

To read more from Headless Now, please visit: To Trust This Silence

Also, please visit: The Wisdom Jesus

Thank you. 

Change of Mind

Change of mind: 

³If you want to be like me I will help you, knowing that we are alike. ⁴If you want to be different, I will wait until you change your mind. (ACIM, T-8.IV.6:3-4)

and here's some of my favorite lines from A Course in Miracles. Jesus, meets me exactly where I am and reminds me that I'm meant for so much more than my timid thoughts would have me believe. He offers to help lift me beyond any life I could possibly imagine. But more so, with infinite patience and gentleness, he whispers that he'll wait for me even if I choose otherwise. 

knowing that eventually, 

I'll change my mind.

and now,

finally.

I do.

~

I love you, Eric

To read more from Headless Now, please visit: Communion

Also, please visit to buy: Jesus: My Autobiography

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Not Alone

Not Alone: 

If you knew Who walks beside you on the way that you have chosen, fear would be impossible. (ACIM, T-18.III.3:2)

mostly, I haven't known, or at least it seems I've forgotten for a very long time. But I'm starting to remember, finally, the fainsest stir of recall has begun to ease my heart. I'm not alone. This was actually a realization many years ago, with the A Course in Miracles still being therorical in so many ways. Yes, many great changes happened through my practice, the mind training focus is very powerful indeed. But the intimacy of this figure who walked beside me was still missing from my life. 

the last several years, age, loss, loneliness, these have all broken me open to an intimacy of presence that continuously astounds me. Most recently an extended stay of pain and anxiety have often brought me to my knees in despair, prayfel, desperate for comfort. 

and that first glimmer of intimacy has grown.

expanded past a memory.

an answered prayer.

A Course in Miracles isn't really a self-study program. It never was. Because all along there's been a steady presence that whispered guidance to heart and ear. The Course has taught me how to listen, opening me to an of true intimacy that has grown into the softest voice of continuous love. I'm not alone - and I know Who walks beside me now, easing my fear, easing my fear. 

I'm not alone.

none of us are.

~

I love you, Eric

To read more from Headless Now, please visit:Each Encounter

Also, please visit to buy: The Mystic Jesus

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Turning to a Friend

Turning to a friend: 

at some point, not remembering exactly when, my conversations with Jesus ceased. It wasn't from anger, but more from casual neglect that grew over the course of time to the point of an impossibility - I simply couldn't recall that such a dialog ever took place. Anger followed later in life, a one sided prayer in which I offered my litany of complaints to a a ghostly figured I didn't even believe in. I'd love to say that A Course in Miracles changed that, and it did, but not for many years. There might be a claim that Jesus was the true author of the Course, yet that did mean I had to take that at face value in order to benefit from the teachings. For years I simply gave it no thought - Jesus just wasn't my guy. 

I did, however, take guidance from the Holy Spirit.

somewhere during my long years with the Course I began remembering that Jesus used to talk with me, an actual conversation of soft voice and comfort. And that, most importantly, it had always continued through the years in so many hidden forms for my own convenience. Jesus is the voice and symbol of Christ that can't really be neglected because he appears as just the right figure for our understanding. My only true neglect was remembering the origin of every loving voice I ever heard before. 

but I remember now.

and our conversations, two-sided, and still often with my fair share of complaints - continue onwards now with a renewed sense of purpose and a greater commitment to live his answers. 

I'm listening.

asking questions, seeking guidance, and really...

just turning to a friend.

~

I love you, Eric

To read more from Headless Now, please visit: Light Post

Also, please visit to buy: A Course in Miracles: With Commentary From Jesus

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A Simple Commendmanet

A simple commandment: 

it's a seamless view of reality, a commandment to finally see exactly who we really are. In the New Testament Jesus is asked which is the greatest of the commandments and his reply is, ultimately, an expression of pure nonduality. 

"love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself."

this a commandment only because there is no other way, anything else is simply a delusion of a split mind that sees a world that's broken off into personal and separate realities belonging to each of us alone. To say "love the Lord your God" is imploring us to look within and find that seamless expression of love that resides in all of us - truly knowing the neighbor as ourselves and each of us an aspect of God. And Jesus in A Course in Miracles might simplify this even further:

forgive...and see the love of God.

for only love is real.

and nothing unreal exist.

~

I love you, Eric

To read more from Headless Now, please visit: Of Mantra and Holy Spirit

Also, please visit to browse: A Return to Love

Thank you.

 

Knowing We Are Alike

Knowing that we are alike: 

the promise was all I've ever wanted and didn't even know, those words spoken by Jesus in A Course in Miracles saying that if I truly wanted to be like him then he would help me. But it was the words that followed that struck so deep, feeling almost whispered to me - "knowing that we are alike"

and there is was,

enlightenment offered.

thirty plus years later and the second part of the promise has held true as well. Jesus says that if I wish to be different then he will wait for me to change my mind. There's infinite patience here, kindness, and I certainly have chosen to be different. 

yet he's always waited. 

Jesus is the symbol of the Christ mind, a personal figure of my connection to God residing as a light within me. I was very much surprised by his presence, expecting perhaps a more esoteric figure, a myth from yogic lore, or maybe a laughing Buddha to guide me. But it seems I needed Jesus, and there's a forgiveness lesson here. I'm being shown that my every previous story, literally about everything I've ever believed...have always been misperceived. 

so Jesus still waits for me to change my mind, ever patient, always kind, and never once rushing me to reach outside my place of comfort. I'm learning to trust that his words are true, we are alike because we're both from the singular source of absolute love. That's the promise, nothing less than enlightenment being offered to me,

and finally now...I'm accepting his help.

knowing that we are alike.

~

I love you, Eric

To read more from Headless Now, please visit: Arrived

Also, please visit to buy: The Mystic Jesus

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A Return

A return: 

surprisingly, for me, there's been a return of Jesus as a presence in my life, absent for quite sometime, and now I find myself comforted by the heart space that he offers. This isn't in any formal sense, it's not religious in anyway - it's Jesus as a symbol of my own best thinking, an ever present loving thought that always seeks to guide me towards forgiveness and the release of my worst judgement's.I haven't questioned this return, and have no idea as to why it has occurred other than my heart was ready and this guidance was much needed. It's also a very private affair, personal and intimate.

so I will only offer these few words...when the heart is ready,

when it's broken open, and now spacious. 

love appears.

in whatever form it's needed.

~

I love you, Eric

To read more from Headless Now, please visit: Miracle Workers

Also, please visit to buy: Love Without Conditions

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To Only Love

To only love:

I'm not a Christian, at least not in the sense that I follow the doctrine of any church or organized system of religion - however, there is a relationship here with Jesus, personal and more meaningful now than when I was member of the Catholic faith. Jesus comes to me as a guide and loving brother, wise, and so patient with his teaching. I am urged over and over again to forgive and to live my life through the grace of love and continuous compassion. 

anything outside of this path no longer really concerns me. 

I am content to only love.

taking the actual teachings of Jesus to heart, no social platform, no theocracy, not a single translator other then my most deepest heart - I simply love to the best that I'm able, dismissing distinctions made by my ego, and surrendering, surrendering, surrendering....every doubtful thought that tells me how impossible it will be to live my life this way. 

I take Jesus at his word - 

loving others

as myself.

no matter how hard it might be 

to sometimes see this.

~

Peace, Eric 

To read more from Headless Now, please visit: Shown as Love

Also, please visit to buy: Teach Only Love

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