 I was just praying and meditating before this gathering and I just had a thought come to me from the beyond all idols section of A Course in Miracles. It's a line that's been very, very helpful to me over the years and it's really helped me out when it seems like in this world I had an experience where I didn't get something that I wanted. And then I turned inside for help and popped the book open or whatever and what the line says is when you decide upon the form of what you want, you lose the understanding of its purpose. It's very profound when you think about it. I mean it's like that one thread could unravel the entire perceptual illusion if you just let it kind of wind and weave in your mind. Because really when we look at life I think the underlying assumption for human beings is you're here on planet earth, you have wants, you have desires. It's okay to get while the getting's good. Some people would even say whoever gets the most toys wins when you die and all that stuff like that. But actually for others it's still very much embedded in the human condition to want. I was actually named after King David from the Psalms. Some of you might remember in the Bible there was the Psalms. I think you might remember one of those verses that's quite famous, the 23rd Psalm. And it's interesting if you don't even remember the whole thing, the first line might stick with you. The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want. It's an interesting way to start a Psalm, a song. And then we look at this line from the Course when you decide upon the form of what you want, you lose the understanding of its purpose. And you can start to put those together where you can start to see that happiness doesn't come from wanting. Actually wanting and desiring comes from lack. If healing can be instantaneous, if you can have happiness in a moment and that's really what the teachings are, it's just a decision, then when you want something it presupposes that you're lacking. And one time when I was just meditating on the Kingdom of Heaven and Nirvana, I got this word that came into mind. It was called Desirelessness. I like the way it was rolled off my tongue. Desirelessness. It's the same thing. So we could say in the state of perfect oneness there are no ones or desires because it's perfect fulfillment. Everything is perfectly fulfilled, perfect contentment, perfect completion. I think it was Susan today this morning during the morning session. She was saying is there like a succinct definition you can give for the atonement. And I said, yeah, total escape from the past and a complete lack of interest in the future. That's what the atonement is. That's the correction in our mind for returning to eternal oneness, the beautiful little succinct definition from Jesus. So we can say in a state of fulfillment there's no once, there's no desires, there's nothing, there's no thought of could there be more. That the ego is the belief and could there be more? Imagine if everything was just everything and you knew yourself as everything without end or limit. Just unending eternal love that the idea of more would be laughable. And in the course we are learning that it is laughable, but it's not laughable if you believe in the concept of more. It actually is quite confining because then you are forever seeking more. And in that same section in the course it says what is an idol do you think you know? An idol is for more of something. It does not matter what. It starts to come clear and clear that the human condition is a predicament. It's really an impossible state of mind in which there seems to be lack and a desire for more to fill that lack. It's like it never ends. It's like you just search and search and seek and seek and you never find. You know looking for love in all the wrong faces, looking for love in too many places, all the country songs had it right too. You know it's still seeking and not finding and if you follow the ego's belief system which sponsors lack, which sponsors a scarcity, then you will forever be seeking and not finding. Very frustrating. Almost like banging your head against a brick wall. After a while it gets really frustrating because the bricks are not giving in to the skull. It's just not going to happen and you can continue if you would like but it's very very very frustrating. So when we forgive which is the purpose that we've been given by the Holy Spirit, we have to live intuitively and follow our inner guidance and learn to live a new way instead of seeking after things, seeking after objects, seeking to possess, seeking to own, seeking to capture. We have to realize that that mode is ego seeking and we can't know ourselves as wholeness or purity or love while we're still in the seeking mode. It's just another trick to believe that you can be a fulfilled seeker. And even when I hear the term spiritual seeker sometimes I think why not be a spiritual finder? I think spiritual finder sounds much more wonderful to me, a realization than seeking. So using that term, spiritual seekers, it's just like another category of oh there's all these human beings and there's just a slice of the human beings that are spiritual seekers when we were talking, Jennifer was talking, I think it was yesterday just saying well everybody, breakfast everybody is seeking but everyone just seems to be at different levels of awareness of the seeking. Everybody is truly wanting to have an experience of love but some aren't conscious of it as an identity that they've displaced. Something is actually to be found in dating columns or online dating or in thrill seeking or adventure seeking and there's many ways to seek in this world and we're really learning that the premise underneath has to be questioned before we can relax and accept and have a true sense of fulfillment. So I would say that the course of miracles is done for me is it's saying while you believe you're here in this world you will search, you're on a search mission because you don't know who you are and you're in search mode and so it's just saying why not turn your searching inside your mind instead of looking out among all the images of the world. If you're searching for peace, happiness, joy, it's still search mode and if you still want, which we have to start where we believe we are so if you say okay I'm not quite ready for that first line of the Psalm 23, I shall not want I'm not quite ready, that's a spiritual bypass Jesus, I'm not really ready for that then he says that's okay but while you believe you want he gives us another set of ideas he says the peace of God is my one goal, the aim of all my living here, the end I seek my purpose and my function and my life while I abide where I am not at home you see how he's taking the want word, the peace of God and he's turning it into my one goal, it's what I want and that is something that even that is very unnatural because none of us are used to peace of mind goals you know, eat your carrots and your peas and you'll get some peace of mind you know it's like then you can go out and play or then you can have dessert but we were never held off a reward if we get it good grades in school there was peace of mind, the parents were never had the audacity to even dangle that carrot for us because why? because they didn't have it and they weren't going to ask their children to go for something that maybe they had not found themselves because that would be hypocrisy but now we're actually to the point where we can start to say we can take peace, peace of mind and make it a priority in our life the reason I'm going to Hawaii is okay, it's for peace of mind or the reason I'm going to read this book the reason I'm going to practice Tai Chi or that I'm going to whatever join the bowling team or go golfing or whatever it doesn't really matter what things you enjoy, what things you believe in but if you start to put that purpose of peace when you go to the gym, when you go to restaurants, when you go to Chautauqua's it's even possible to go to a Chautauqua and try to get some knowledge and you can go back and stuff a few more notches on the belt yeah I heard a few good lines there I'm going to remember those from my book or something even if you're going to a Chautauqua to try to get something come away with something that you think you didn't have in the first place it's really not the purpose you want to come with that desire for peace like I just want to experience peace of mind at the Chautauqua like I would in the grocery store or the market or down by the beach or anything we want to start to transfer that goal and really accept it as a possible present moment experience that we actually can experience a present goal present moment goal instead of forever trying to look out for something in the future believing that we'll be happy when we attain something and I hear a lot of people do that with enlightenment and spiritual salvation is they put it in the future and that gets really frustrating too trying to attain something where it's always off in this hypothetical future when none of us really know if there will be one or if there ever was one seems like a risk to the ego what am I committing to? it's a mail order