 My thoughts are meaningless, but all creation lies in the thoughts I think with God. So if we look at the second and last sentence, I choose to have them be replaced by what they were intended to replace. The Course uses the word real thoughts. That's what these private thoughts, that's what attack thoughts, that's what in this paragraph my thoughts were intended to replace were my real thoughts. If you think, oh, I have real thoughts, that's just the light in your mind. And all of the junk, all of the darkness that's been heaped on top of that would be the private thoughts, the attack thoughts. Or in this case, what he's calling them is my thoughts. This is a real early lesson. As you go along in the lessons, you will cease to call attack thoughts my thoughts. And we already talk about them as ego thoughts. But this is such an early lesson that he's speaking as if it's directly at the deceived mind for five. I am never upset for the reason I think. I am never upset for the reason I think because I am constantly trying to justify my thoughts. I am constantly trying to make them true. So if we just substitute what we just said in place of my thoughts, ego thoughts, it's I am never upset for the reason I think because I am constantly trying to justify ego thoughts. I am constantly trying to make them true. Every time there's an upset or disturbance where you're upset at another person or you think something in the world's out of place or something would be better if it was different, what that is is that's the mind trying to justify the ego thoughts and to make them true and saying, the problem isn't the ego thoughts, the problem is the world. The problem is my radiator just broke on my car. The problem is I have a sore toe or a sore tooth. The problem is so and so didn't do what they said they were going to do. You can see the enormous variety of projections that can take place but all of those little scenarios are basically the underlying thought beneath all of those is if something were different in the world I'd be happy. And this lesson is saying, no, no, you're not upset for that reason. You're just trying to make the ego thoughts true and justify them. I make all things my enemies so that my anger is justified and my attacks are warranted. I have not realized how much I have misused everything I see by assigning this role to it. I have done this to defend a thought system that has hurt me and that I no longer want. I am willing to let it go. That deceived mind justifies and protects the ego as if it were its own child. Jesus uses that metaphor in the text where he talks about you react to your ego much the way animals in nature react to their offspring. You made it, you think you love it and you try to protect it. And it hurts your mind is what the teaching is. You're protecting and you're trying to guard and make real something that's hurting you. That's insane. That's cuckoo. That's the definition of a deceived mind. Cuckoo, I'm willing to let it go. Number six, I am upset because I see what is not there. Reality is never frightening. It is impossible that it could upset you except me. Reality brings only perfect peace. When I am upset it is always because I have replaced reality with illusions I made up. The illusions are upsetting because I have given them reality and thus regard reality as an illusion. Nothing in God's creation is affected in any way by this confusion of mine. I am always upset by nothing. A great little line that says to carry around I am always upset by nothing. Do I believe it? I go through my first 25 lessons here and go through the basics again and see if I believe that I'm always upset by nothing. Because if I can really see that then I'll cease to be upset because I'll see it as nothing since there's five and six in that little paragraph. Five says, when I am upset it is always because I have replaced reality with illusions I made up. That's the belief in separation, the belief that I have replaced reality with illusions I made up. The illusions are upsetting because I have given them reality and thus regard reality as an illusion. How do you give illusions reality? By believing in them. That's the only way. That's how you endow something with reality. If you believe in a unicorn then in your experience unicorns have reality. If you believe in Shangri-La, then Shangri-La in your experience has reality. Does it have reality in heaven? No. Neither unicorns nor Shangri-La. But again to the deceived mind, that is how powerful the mind is. What it believes it sees. And it thinks it has existence. There you go. Anything that can be imagined. Purple clouds. It's funny how when children have imaginary friends people kind of will giggle and laugh at them as if there are real people in their lives and then there are imaginary friends. Real friends. Real friends and imaginary friends. And what this is teaching us is They're all imaginary. They're all imaginary. Including the one you think you are. Including the one you think you are. So we're getting into time. The first time lesson, number seven. I see only the past. So we've just had it referred to in lesson six. I'm upset because I see what is not there. So if you put six and seven together the past is not there. You're seeing something that's over and done and gone. That's pretty twisted. And that's why that's our first time lesson. But that's why we need to look at time because time is at the bottom of all of this illusion. As I look about I condemn the world I look upon. Now that can seem a bit extreme. It's like I was saying the other day it's like when you wake up it's not like you say you see a door handle and you think, Jesus I am not condemning this door handle. My lesson for the day says as I look about I condemn the world. I look upon, I'm not condemning this shoe. I'm looking out, I'm seeing the trees. I don't feel like I'm condemning them today. But yes, as long as there's ordering of thoughts as long as there's any judgment as long as there's any preferences what I look upon I am condemning. Trees, door handles, shoes, carpet much less certain persons that I seem to come in contact with which is more of an overt sense of being condemning or having a harsh tone with someone that thought it was being condemning much less condemning a door handle. I call this seeing. I hold the past against everyone and everything making them my enemies. In other words, I make that door handle my enemy.