Why You Shouldn't Trust Your Five Senses 😳 David Hoffmeister & Sandrine Lameck | ACIM

Hello everyone. Hello everyone. Uh, thank you for being here. I'm very happy to have a chance to talk to David again. I am very happy then to offer you a new conversation with David. So maybe you are just discovering David now, but uh my case I found him about 15 years ago as I was uh getting uh um familiar with the course for about two years around that time. And so I found a couple of some videos from him at the time and since then never failed to follow him um even if uh I couldn't always understand exactly how uh English Facebook. So for everybody who have been following me on Facebook, you probably know him. So, it's a incredible honor now to be able to uh listen to him in French and uh having him share his uh thoughts about spiritual awakening and the path. And so I just wanted to thank again Rafael for your help for the inspiration to translate uh in French. and the whole team uh for their support and um who are constantly helping uh doing this work of translations of uh broadcasting. Thank you so much for the whole team. So, welcome to you, David, and thank you so much again for being with us today. >> Thank you, Sandraine. It's always a joy for me to talk to you. >> For me, too. [clears throat] So at our last exchange it was very very rich. Uh so thank you David for uh this uh conversation. So, uh before we uh go on to the new questions, uh I wanted to um talk about a theme that we did not uh I wanted to to come back to a point we did not address in depth uh last time which is helping Jesus. And because it is very unsettling to read this for the first time when Jesus tells us, "I cannot let you leave your mind unguarded or You will not be able to help me. So David, could you please speak to us more deeply about what he means by this? Because we would tend to think that only he is capable of helping us and that it does not work the other way around. >> Yes. to the human being which seems to be a physical entity. It seems like uh that Jesus needs to help us as as humans, as people. And yet what he's teaching us is that it is our mind that is fallen asleep. and believes in an ego, a separation from God, and believes that what is helpful is always helpful directly in terms of form. So uh it's like the the story uh if if some somebody is hungry you know you can seem to feed them with food but actually uh it might be more helpful to teach them to fish [sighs] uh in order to help them help themselves. So when we talk about the sleeping mind, Jesus is saying, I cannot take your fear away because I cannot interfere with the basic law of cause and effect. And that means our thoughts and what proceeds from our thoughts because he can't intervene between our thoughts and what proceeds from our thoughts. Because for him to need to do that would prove that we are helpless and we are not helpless. We have a very powerful mind. So when Jesus says he can he can help us but he has to teach us that we have wandering thoughts and and he can't intercede between our thoughts and the effects of those thoughts. He cannot intercede between ego thoughts and the projections of those ego thoughts. So that's why he is telling us he said I I cannot leave your mind unguarded. So I have to appeal to you to what is happening in your mind so that you can see how important it is to watch your thoughts and to guard your mind from ego thoughts to literally open your mind to your real thoughts the thoughts you think with God which will set you free. So earlier I used the analogy of of providing uh food or we'll say a fish to someone who's hungry and then the second part was teaching them how to fish for themselves. Jesus is saying I'm going to have to teach you about your mind and how powerful it is and how you do not protect it. You just allow your mind to be filled up with ego thoughts and you let your thoughts wander all over the place [laughter] making a mess in the mind making chaos. And he's saying I need to remind you of how important it is to to watch your mind. So he has given us a course in miracles as as a tool for mind training. And he says that's what it's for. The the course is for training your mind to learn to listen to the Holy Spirit, your internal teacher, and to release all attack thoughts, all grievances, all judgments, all opinions that block the light of truth. And so when we first read the statement that you read, it can seem a bit like, "Wait a minute. Uh, Jesus, I thought you were to help me. I didn't think I was supposed to help you." But when he's asking us for help, he's asking our mind to align with the mind of God through the Holy Spirit. And therefore, we learn to help ourselves by listening to the true teacher of peace, the Holy Spirit, instead of of the ego. Now, you were with us this weekend on the way and some of the questions were about uh being a miracle worker and uh how to listen to Jesus and how to follow Jesus. And I was saying that that Jesus is teaching us that if we are willing to perform miracles that Jesus will perform miracles through us through really through our mind but we have to be without fear. We can't have fear and doubt or that will block Jesus's ability to perform miracles through our mind. Miracles can only come through in the absence of fear and doubt. And he doesn't mean that we have to be completely absent of fear and doubt because that we wouldn't need a miracle if we were completely absent of fear and doubt. But he's just saying for the moment we have to be ready. We have to our mind has to be at peace for him to perform miracles through us. So that's one way we can help Jesus is by practicing his mind training and opening our mind to be used by him to extend miracles and extend blessings and our part is to be willing. uh we have to bring our little willingness to join with the might of the Holy Spirit to allow the miracle to come through. So the short answer is is Jesus wants us to help him help our mind be mindrained and be ready to be an active participant in miracles. And that's really what it means to help Jesus. It doesn't mean that we have to try to go out there and physically do something in the world to try to help Jesus because Jesus is teaching us that the world is a a hallucination. It's a it's a projection of imaginations uh of it's fiction. It's fantasy. And he doesn't want us to think that our behavior is causitive and that our behavior can change the world. He's teaching us our mind is positive and through miracles we begin to remember that God is the real cause and Christ is the real effect and we as Christ are perfect as God created us. So this is why Jesus says, "Seek not to change the world. Seek rather to change your mind about the world." Meaning learn to perceive it in a new way with the Holy Spirit with Jesus. And in that way uh we will see that that truly cause and effect are together and that that our being our Christ being has never left the mind of God. We we remain in the mind of God forever. Forever safe. Forever loved. >> Mercy. Thank you. >> It's so clear when you're explaining to us, David. Thank you. So now, oh sorry now I would like to address today's topic uh the ego's tricks and lies. So to begin I would like to read to paragraph paragraph three and five of section one of chapter too. Foreign speech. Foreign speech. Fore global renance continue. rest. So [clears throat] paragraph three, the garden of Eden or the pre-separation condition were the state of mind in which nothing was needed. When Adam listened to the lies of the serpent, all he heard was untruth. You do not have to continue to believe what is not true unless you choose to do so. All that you can literally all that can literally disappear in the twinkling of an eye because it is merely a misperception. What is seen in dreams seems to be very real. Yet the Bible say that a deep sleep fell upon the dam and nowhere is there reference to his waking up. The world has not yet experienced any comprehensive reawakening of or rebirth. Such a rebirth is impossible as long as you continue to project or miscreate. [snorts] It still remains within you. However, to extend as God extended his spirit to you. In reality, this is your only choice because your free will was given you for your joy in creating the perfect facility. The difficulty express for the cat. Exterior So, paragraph five, whatever lies you may believe are of no concern to the miracle which can heal any of them with equal ease. It makes no distinctions among misperceptions. Its sole concern is to distinguish between truth on the one hand and error on the other. Some miracles may seem to be of greater magnitude than others. But remember the first principle in this course. There is no order of difficulty in miracles. In reality, you are perfectly unaffected by all expressions of lack of love. This can be from yourself and others, from yourself to others and from others to you. Peace is an attribute of you. You cannot find it outside. Illness is some form of external searching. Health is inner peace. It enables you to remain unshaken by a lack of love from without and capable through your acceptance of miracles of correcting the conditions proceeding from lack of love in others. I remember that the first time I read this, I really liked that Jesus quoted the Bible and gave me his explanation of the story of the Garden of Eden. He was directly and swearing question that I had been asking myself since childhood. I also love learning that the piece is an attribute within me. I don't need to look at it anywhere else. It is within me. What a wonderful news. Therefore, I can never lose it and no one can ever bring it to me. It is within me. So David tell us what could you say about those two paragraph please? Well it it is helpful to have a reference to the Bible because it is a document. It is a a book that that has been referred to over many centuries in relation to God and the meaning of love, the meaning of forgiveness. But if we stop for a moment, we can say that the Bible is is a is a book of stories. And uh the stories go back all the way to like the the the allegory of of of paradise uh and Adam and Eve living in a paradise uh only to uh listen to the lies of the serpent of the of the snake encouraging Adam and Eve to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil which is duality. So starting with Genesis we have a higher interpretation not that stories are real but that stories are part of our dream and we relate to the symbols of stories. We perceive our human life as part of a story. Uh running from birth to death. Uh we perceive that human life in a world of time and space. Uh that seemed to be real as well. And so what Jesus is doing initially is he's he's using the Bible as a reference point just to begin a complete reinterpretation of everything that our five senses show us uh to give us a a much broader context. So in a course of miracles it is mentioned that Adam fell asleep. H that's interesting. And nowhere else in the Bible does it say that Adam woke up. We could say in the New Testament when Jesus says, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." No one comes to the father but through me. That sounds like a wake up to me. It's not Adam waking up. It's the sleeping mind that was dreaming the world and dreaming the cosmos. uh recognizing its I am presence. Before Abraham was I am before Adam and Eve were I am. Before time and space I am. So that's that's our wakeup call. But Jesus says that the world has not undergone a comprehensive awakening. So he says you are dealing with a state of mind asleep and everything that you perceive with the five senses including time. The seconds, the minutes, the hours, the days, the weeks, the months, the years. Everything you perceive in terms of time is is part of the dream. Everything you believe in terms of space near and far. Uh the geographies uh of the of the world. Uh the location of the oceans and the the continents. the location of the of the planets in the solar system and the sun, the location of the solar system in the galaxy among many galaxies. It's all part of the dream. So he is in paragraph one he's just saying I want to give you a context that you're dreaming a dream and you need to wake up from the dream and in order to wake up you need to forgive the dream. You need to see that by believing in the ego, you gave false meaning to everything that you perceive as a separate object, a separate thing, a separate purpose person, a separate uh planet or a separate uh solar system. Everything in the cosmos is perceived through fragmented perception. And so the problem of judgment is not just not condemning people. It's it's it's the fabric of everything that is perceived is coming through judgments. So then we jump to paragraph two. And what he's saying is that because you believe everything is fragmented and you've now given reality to those parts, those trees, those mountains, those clouds, those people, those planets, those suns and stars. Now that you've given meaning to them, the problem is you have given them names and you have categorized them and you have tried to give meaning to parts and you've forgotten the whole. And in order to wake up from the dream, you have to remember the whole. You have to see that your mind has dreamed all these parts. But ideas leave out their source. So even with regard to this cosmos, it has not left the mind of the thinker. But this seems very huge. This seems like very abstract. And he's telling us that there are no order of difficulty in miracles. One miracle is not bigger or greater than another. So he's teaching us you have to stop thinking in terms of large and small, even in terms of miracles. because he gives us a new definition of miracles. He says miracles do not create or really change at all. They merely look on devastation and reminds the mind that what it sees is false. So the Holy Spirit is teaching us to look upon the world and just see the false as false, the past as the past. And this belief that there is something external to the mind that things and objects and people are all real. It sets up a pursuit of trying to make a self-concept, trying to make an image and using the symbols as part of that image. And he's teaching us that all sickness is is some form of external searching. So he tries to be very direct with us. He says, "Seek not outside yourself for it will fail and you will weep each time an idol falls." And that's what you were noting. You were saying that the peace is an attribute within me. It's not within me as a person but peace is an attribute in my mind. And because peace is within my mind, I don't need to search for a savior or a rescuer or a special teacher to give me the peace because it's already within me. I have to go deep into prayer. Think deep into my mind. Turn away from the distractions of the world and seek not salvation inside the world which is a projection of the ego. So these paragraphs are really showing us that what the mystics and saints were pursuing was a an internal kingdom of heaven. They were following Jesus's teachings that the kingdom of heaven is within you. And the more you follow the Holy Spirit, the less interested you become in outcomes of the world. Uh you're not interested in rich or poor. You're not interested in fast or slow. You're not interested in intelligent or unintelligent. And you don't define your health by the body at all. Health is inner peace. Uh fulfillment is is inner peace. Uh abundance is inner peace. [laughter] Everything that is wonderful and worthy of being embraced is within. It's not in the projected world. And so this brings a lot of relaxation because then you're not concerned about survival of the body. You're not concerned about achievements. You're not concerned about future ambitions. You're not concerned even about being liked by other people. Your your mind is freed up from the dependencies of of a of a makebelieve world. And when the mind is not trained, then all it does is react and respond to these images. The mind is like on a a wild roller coaster ride at the mercy of its interpretations of these images. Politics. Do you agree with the politician or disagree? Jesus is saying it doesn't matter. You you don't need agreement with politics to find peace. Uh do you agree with the behaviors of your your fellow human beings? Uh when you focus on behavior, then you can easily get caught up in the judgments of morality and ethics. Uh what's right, what's wrong, trying to correct people, trying to correct behaviors. When the problem is the in the mind, it's the thinking in the mind that is distorted because of the ego. So we start to realize that that the world is a a hallucination that is produced by errors of thought and that the correction for those errors of thought is forgiveness. And once those errors of thoughts have been corrected, then you do not see the world as external to the mind. And if the mind is at peace, then the world is at peace because the world is still in the mind of the thinker. Ideas leave not their source. But if you believe the ego, then you will look at a very strange crazy world that seems to have no external solution because it doesn't have an external existence much less an external solution. And you go much more inside to the peace and to the understanding that you cannot understand the world and you need not fix the world. You need merely accept forgiveness as the one purpose. the one purpose that is meaningful. It's the last illusion in heaven or pure oneness and eternal life. There's no need of forgiveness. But but with this world and this sleeping mind, forgiveness becomes the key to remember the truth. Because forgiveness is beyond the possibility of judging separate people, places, things, objects. It makes no attempt at the impossible. And and this is what Jesus demonstrated to us where it didn't matter what the behavior was. Even the ten commandments of the Old Testament were mostly regarding behaviors. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. It was like most of the ten commandments are saying here's the things in behavior you should not do. And then we take a commandment like uh thou shalt not commit adultery. Okay. Still very behavioral. But Jesus says, [clears throat] "If you have a lustful thought for a woman that is not your wife, you commit adultery." Who? He's now he's talking about thoughts. He's going beyond the Ten Commandments. Now he's he's into the realm of thoughts. And there's another commandment. Uh, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife. Ah, covet, covet, desire. Oh my gosh. Jesus now is saying it goes more than behavior. You have to look at what's going on in the mind. So I studied the course of miracles for many years and I said to Jesus, "Wow, this is deep. I I studied psychology and I studied philosophy, but this is way beyond what I studied." Uh, I also liked geography and I liked maps. So I said to Jesus, "Can you give me a map of the sleeping mind?" He said, "Yes, I can." So I took the map down from Jesus and I said, "Ah, oh, I see perception. The five senses is on the outside ring. This is the hallucination. But there's emotions underneath. There's thoughts underneath. There's belief underneath. There is a desire where my prayers are heard. And what I want with my powerful mind starts with what I pray for and desire. What do I want is at the beginning. Then the beliefs come out. If I want to be separate from God, I will believe in time and space and human beings. I will think attack thoughts of time and space, past and future. I will feel fear, pain, shame. I will feel greed, envy, and I will perceive a distorted world, a hallucination, a fiction uh of fragments that that has that the ego said is says is reality. So that was my prayer to Jesus. I said, 'Exlain this to me. I've studied psychology and I studied philosophy, but I don't have a big picture here. I don't understand how my mind is working. I don't understand the dynamics of healing. And I need a process to help guide me to rapidly wake up from this dream. So, not only did he give me a map, but then he said, "Uh, I'll give you some steps to follow." And he gave me the instrument for peace step by step by step by step. And so he said, "Practice this. I want you to start practicing this every time you get upset." I've already told you in the workbook lessons five, six, seven, and eight. I'm never upset for the reason I think. Ah, never never ever upset for the reason I think. I'm never hungry for the reason I think. I'm never thirsty for the reason I think. I'm never irritated for the reason I think. I'm never annoyed. I I never dislike someone for the reason I think. Okay. I'm never upset for the reason I think. I'm upset because I see something that's not there. Oh my gosh. Are you mean my five senses are lying to me? I see something through these eyes that's not there. I hear sounds that aren't really there. I taste food. I know that's a big one in France. I taste food that's not even there. My tongue is not there. And the sule the kiche [laughter] it's not there. That's pretty deep. They didn't teach me this in psychology. No. No. You don't get this in psychology. You don't even get this in philosophy. No. No. So that's number six. I'm upset because I see something that's not there. I'm seeing nothing but I believe it's something. H. That's a problem. Number seven, I see only the past. Ah, now we're getting somewhere because that means that I must be mistaken about time. I must even linear time, past, present, future, I must I'm seeing only the past. And the ego is saying, "No, you're seeing the present. You're talking to Sandrine right now. This is the present. And Jesus like, "Oh, no. The present is much deeper than the form." The form is a hallucination. There's a there's a light that is the present moment, but you don't know it because you still believe that you're perceiving the present and that in a little while we'll we'll be into the future. So he's teaching us no no none of that's right. And then number eight, my mind is preoccupied with past thoughts. Ah that's what's happening. I've got a stream of thoughts like that aquarium we first talked about. Those bubbles that pump in the aquarium is pumping out bubbles and they're all past thoughts. Every one of them that that flower is a past thought. That deer is a past thought. That sule is a past thought. That person is a past thought. This planet is a past thought. My mind is pre-occupied with past thoughts. Ah, okay. Oh, no wonder I'm upset. And and he says because the past is gone. The Holy Spirit has answered everything and has given you the gift of the present moment and the past is over. So, you're still believing in something that he teaches in lesson 158 that is already gone by. You're just mentally reviewing a story that has already gone by. Just like if you go to a movie theater, you're just watching a film that's already been recorded. It's already put shadows on the film. And when the light of the projector passes through those shadows, you're seeing a hallucination of a movie. that has already happened. You're just watching a movie that's already been shot. It's already been it's been edited. It's already been produced. It's it's you're just watching something from the past and you're reviewing it as if you're living that experience again in the movie theater for the first time, but you're just watching a reel of old thoughts being projected onto a screen and you're forgetting all that. you really think it's it's exciting or it's a a scary movie or you really think the emotions are coming from the movie but they're not. They're just being generated by the shadows. So this starts to show us why we cannot trust our five senses. Because everything we perceive with our five senses are the projection or the attempted effects of of the ego. And this will be very important when we talk about some of our other questions that you have because we can say, you know, we could talk about the script is written, but you you did mention to me something about the Holy Spirit's script. And not once in 40 years have I talked about the Holy Spirit's script because the Holy Spirit looks not to effects. And Jesus tells us the Holy Spirit doesn't see the world as you do. The Holy Spirit looks not to effect. So the Holy Spirit does not perceive a script at all. No script. present moment, spontaneous healing in the moment, collapse of all scripts, collapse of time and space. And so what even Artin and Persa are referring to is just a little metaphor. It's a it's a step on a ladder, but it's it's not what the Holy Spirit sees because the Holy Spirit does not perceive a script at all. And I've never used that word holy spirit script. Those are just that's not coming from a mystic [laughter] I'll tell you who sees the simultaneity of time. Uh you then you see how important the present moment is. Yeah. Very important. [laughter] >> [laughter] >> So, David, if you answer to all my future questions before I even ask them. [laughter] >> Okay. Well, I'm still gonna ask them anyway. >> Yeah. Jesus got a hold of me. What can I say? [laughter] But that's awesome because then we can we're going to go deeper now. We're gonna go deeper. And so our next question is going to be about the five senses and uh it's something we we we talked about but we're going to go deeper with it and repetition is important so that we we remember better. And so I'm now going to quote a passage from Gary's book, a passage that speaks about metaphysics. Lego fabric. And to top it all off, the ego makes the body, which allows almost exclusively into your consciousness. Only what bears witness to the reality of its cherished illusion. perception. And so we have now arrived at the famous five senses which largely form perceptions. And for me it is the ego's ultimate lie because it identifies us with the body in a way that is completely locked from the inside. Since the body is part of the illusion, trusting the five senses is equivalent to asking the illusion to explain itself. And since it is the ego that directs these five senses, this allows it through them to tell us what is true and what is false. Contrary, of course, to the truth. And snap, the chop closes. So, David, could you shed more light on how the ego uses the five senses to keep us identified with the body and make us believe in the reality of the illusion? >> Yes. that the answer to that is is actually very clear and direct and simple. Jesus says the ego uses the body of which the five senses are affiliated for three things. So we need to know what those three things are because if we can see that the ego is using the body and the world for these three things, we can stop using our mind for these three things. And it makes it very simple. The ego uses the body for pride, for pleasure, and for attack. What are these three things? First of all, pride. The ego as you said associates the identity with the body and out of pride it gives the body a name. The David, the sadrine, the Raphael, the Fabi. It it's given uh a name to that which is nameless. It's given a name to a part of the hallucination. And not only that, it has a history. A history in time, a history that may involve language or country or culture, family genealogy. You see uh it it has a very complex projection of pride that goes along with that body. Not just the name but a very complex history of memories and also it ins ass associates intelligence with uh this body, education with this body. But it doesn't stop there. It has future ambitions for this body. [sighs and gasps] what it wants to be in the future, what it wants to accomplish before it dies. It's a very complex system of false identity that is projected onto the body. And that's just one of the three. That's only pride. uh because the body is just a hallucination. It cannot be famous. It cannot have fame because there's only one mind and it requires the belief in unique separate individual identity to then elevate it to famous identity. So we see that pride is one way that the ego is pride is just a concept but it it projects that out onto the body and that's what makes the person seem to be so important. It's got an entire complex projection onto it. Uh when I was in school, when I was in grade school and high school, I took classes where the teacher would use an overhead projector. It was a projector with a light and then the professor would drop overlays, shadows, shadows of writing, shadows of diagrams on top of the light and then projected on the wall would be whatever the shadows were for the students to see. That's what the ego does. It covers over the light with shadows of concepts, names, uh, past history, past memories, accomplishments, idiosyncrasies. It it projects all kinds of images uh to make an unreal sense of self that we call the person. Okay. Second one, pleasure. Oh, danger, danger, danger. The ego has invented pain and pleasure. part of duality in heaven. No pain, no pleasure, just oneness, just eternal love and light. So pleasure is part of the biggest trick. You were asking about tricks of the ego. Oh, a sneaky, sneaky, sneaky ego invents pleasure. It's just a concept in the mind. But it projects the concept onto the body and then the ego tells the body how to feel. Caviar kam pie sule. [laughter] You see sneaky. I think the French can understand this but it's it's very deep because Jesus says in the course sin shifts from pain to pleasure and back to pain. It it's part of a duality where the ego says pleasure is good, pain is bad, maximize the pleasure and minimize the pain. But what happens when we follow this this strategy? We seem to die and we're not really happy about that either. [laughter] We don't like the outcome of the body dying seeming to die. So when you when you look at workbook lesson 163, workbook lesson 167, he's describing everything in terms of our mind. And at one point in the workbook, he describes death as a little worldly pleasure. He puts the two together. Wow. Nobody taught me that in psychology. Nobody. I even in philosophy they said hedonism you shouldn't devote your life to just pleasure. But nobody was teaching at the depth of this is the ego gratifying itself through the five senses only to see it turn to pain at a different time. So it's a trick you know he says in lesson 158 time is a trick a slight of hand where figures come and go as if by magic and pleasure is also a trick. And the other thing is pleasure to the human being seems so enjoyable that the mind does not want to see it as an illusion. Uh it's when I've talked for sometimes fivehour lecture at the end of five hours one of the students raises their hand and they say heaven sounds boring. [laughter] I like it. I like it on earth. [laughter] I think what you're describing sounds oneness, bliss, eternal life, no differences, everything is pure love and it's all the same love. They said, "Boring, boring." Because the ego is so tricky. It is tricked the mind into duality, pleasure, and pain. And and the mind is so addicted. When you look at most addictions, whether it's addictions to drugs or addictions to sex or addictions to alcohol or addictions to shopping, in all the cases underneath it, the mind is pursuing pleasure because there's even a line in the Bible that says, "Eat, drink, and be merry, for one day we shall die." And the ego is saying, "Yep, you better grab everything you can from the five senses and from this world because you're going to die anyway." So the ego promotes death, but it also promotes a lot of distractions that are part of its system. It's a very sneaky system of guarding against the Holy Spirit, of guarding against the atonement and Jesus. It's very sophisticated. Okay. Number three, attack. Look at the wars. Look at the fights between politicians. Look at the clash between uh the rich people and the poor people or the the violence. Right now in the United States, we are having teenage violence where teenagers are communicating through apps and uh emails because they're bored and they're sad and they're hopeless and they will come together in a city and do a riot. They will just destroy property. They will just break things. They will just hurt people because the these teenagers are so disillusioned with everything in the world and they need the stuff that we're talking about right now. They need the spirit to lift their spirits up to lift their their emotions up high into joy into divine love and divine happiness. They're crying out for it. So the third one is attack. And we can see that if you watch social media, it's just like an attack fest. It's just like a judgment fest. Even people that are actresses and actors, when they have social media page, they have people on there attacking them. They call them trolls over here. I don't know if it's the same in France, but there they're just constantly badgering and attacking famous people. >> Yeah. And so I've just told the three things the ego uses the body for. Now let's give the Holy Spirit a chance. Okay. What does the Holy Spirit use the body for? Only one thing. Communication. What we're doing right now is the one, the only one, the one use of the body that that the Holy Spirit has. He even says, "Let the voice for God speak through you." Meaning through the body. Let the body be used as an instrument. Just no different a phone is an instrument, right? Okay, that's a communication device. Well, Jesus is saying that's the only purpose that the Holy Spirit has for the body. And that's why we experience more happiness and joy. Like you said, you you feel fulfilled. We're having a a profound discussion here, a profound talk for the mind to wake up, for the mind to forgive. And it's it's the one the one helpful use of the body. And then the more you allow that which I've done on travels and social media and many things for years then the mind becomes very quiet and then you start to see that all of that communication was for one purpose communion. communion with God and with our true with Christ with our true identity. And that's where the silence and the stillness comes in. And even in the workbook, Jesus says our use for words is almost over now. He's saying there's something even beyond the communication of words that's something much deeper and your mind is being made ready to go into that that depth. So that's beautiful because you've realized that as long as we follow the ego's three purposes, pride, pleasure, and attack, snap. The trap closes and then God is just a word. And love is just a word. It's not an experience. And peace of mind is just a goal. It turns into a future goal which is not what it is. It's it's here and now. So that's really beautiful that you asked that question because when the ego closes the trap, the Holy Spirit opens the mind up again to receive the wisdom of of [snorts] God, of God's love. Yeah. Yes. Yes. >> Thank you. >> [laughter] >> I'm going to start with question four. So, uh, I read something I think in, um, the book from Gary's Renard. Um, and then after watching the commentary on last Saturday's movie, a question came to my mind, David. So you told us that the ego's script is already written because we are only reviewing the past. And that therefore our only choice is to embrace our opportunities for forgiveness in order to remember a little more each time that the world is unreal. But what about the Holy Spirit's script? He can rearrange time and space for us when we have learned our lesson. >> Art and Pa tell us that in this case dramatic situations will no longer need to be experienced. They gave Gary an example involving a movie he had gone to see at the cinema and had not been satisfied with. During this conversation, he said that he regretted not going to see another movie that was showing that day. >> [snorts] >> Then then told him that if he had gone to see that other movie which was shorter, he would have left the theater earlier and would then have been involved in a fairly serious car accident. So yeah, um when you talked about it last Saturday, uh it came to my mind because there was a situation of a car accident. And so, um, after reading the book from Gary Renard, I, uh, I, uh, looked at a quote that I'm going to read now. Fore. So this quote is from chapter 31 section 8 paragraph 3. Trials are but lessons that you failed to learn presented once again. So where you made a faulty choice before you know you can make a better one and thus escape all pain that what you choose before had brought has brought to you. So here I would like to be um enlightened about this. Uh so anything that you can add and bring to help us uh see this clearly would be welcome. >> Yes. Uh we can go very deep with this because there is no place in a course in miracles where Jesus talks about ego script and the holy spirit's script. Not one place in the book. So there have been many teachers of a course including Ken Wapnik and Gary Bernard and Art and Persa. And when the distinction is made between the ego script and the Holy Spirit script is implying that there's two different perspectives of looking on the script, but it's still implying a script. It's still implying a timeline, past, present, future stories. And and yet Jesus's emphasis in the course is on the holy instant which he starts talking about in chapter 15. And Jesus says in regard to time um the past is gone, the future is but imagined. These concerns past and future are defenses against present change of focus. So when we talk about rearranging time and space, it all occurs in the miracle to see the sameness of the world. What do I mean by the sameness of the world? to see lesson number seven. I see only the past. So at first, you know, you started off with a quote from Martin and Persa and I've been asked this question all over the world in in China. Everywhere I go, everybody's quoting this particular passage. But if you stop a moment and look at what it says, Art and Pers tell us that in this case, the scenario you're talking about, dramatic situations will no longer need to be experienced. Okay, let's look at that last part. Dramatic situations to the Holy Spirit. There are no dramatic situations. It's all the same. It's all the past. Uh I'm never upset for the reason I think. I'm upset because I see something that's not there. I'm perceiving a timeline of images that aren't there. And in the end you have to realize that lesson number two I have given everything I see all the meaning it has for me that if I described an accident as dramatic. What does Jesus have to say? Uh Jesus tells us in the course that there are no accidents. There are no accidents. Jesus says all things work together for good. There are no exceptions. He's he's teaching us that everything is always working for our good. For those who who know God, all things work together for good. The Bible says even for those who love the Lord. But the Holy Spirit doesn't have a script because the Holy Spirit does not look to effects. That's one of the deepest teachings of the course. The Holy Spirit looks not to effects because he has judged their cause. What does that mean? The Holy Spirit knows that the ego is not real. God didn't create the ego. It's not real. So it's just a belief and it has unreal effects that are projected world a projected script. But the Holy Spirit looks not to effects. So the Holy Spirit looks not to linear time at all. It's just a presence in our mind to offer comfort and guidance. And that guidance can come through as being practical in terms of time and space. And that's what was happening with Ardan and Persa and Gary. Gary was a a pretty new student of a course in miracles who was working with Ken Wapnik and then Art Nipersa appeared to Gary and now they're going to be speaking to him in a in language and words that he can understand. But let's take that example about uh going to a movie and watching watching a movie that he wasn't satisfied with and then regretting saying I I wish I'd gone to another movie and the part the last part about uh if he had gone to the earlier movie that he would have left the theater early and would have been involved in a fairly serious ious car accident. That's all hypotheticals. And then we have to go into what are hypotheticals because Arton and Persa are using a hypothetical with Gary. Like, well, it could have been a lot worse. You didn't like the first movie, but the one you saw, but if you'd gone to the other one, you could be seriously injured. So, what we have to understand, this takes us into a deeper theme, which is very important. that Jesus is teaching cause and effect are together. God and Christ are one. The father and I are one. That's what Jesus said over and over. The father and I are one. Cause God, effect Christ are one. One spirit. In this world, this is a world that's generated by the ego. So linear time is generated by the ego. So what we perceive as persons, places, things and situations even are all a projection of the ego. There aren't any situations in heaven. There aren't good activities. There aren't any accidents. There there's not u something that is dramatic and sometimes not dramatic. We know when Jesus was on the cross, his mind was so pure, so lined up with the Holy Spirit that he didn't even perceive the crucifixion of a body, a bloody crucifixion. He did not consider that dramatic because he was past drama. Uh he was in the state of resurrected mind. So there was no dramatic uh experience on the cross with blood or anything like this. And and this is showing us that that if I perceive a situation as dramatic or as calm and peaceful that's entirely based on the purpose that I'm watching it with in my mind has there are no such thing as dramatic situations. That was just something that Artton and Pcel were using as a symbol for Gary's mind to try to explain the script is is written. But but when people start to then we see Ken Wobnik and Gary talks about the Holy Spirit script and the ego script even though it's not once spoken about in a course in miracles. And in 40 years of me with the course I have never uttered that phrase at all myself because these are not categories that are meaningful. The of course it's the ego's script because the ego invented time, linear time. But what about lesson number 14? God did not create a meaningless world. Why would the Holy Spirit have a script if God didn't create a meaningless world? And and the Holy Spirit is helping us remember God. You see it when you go much deeper you start to realize that a lot of the teachings of Ken Wapnik and even the beginning I think Ardan and Persa and and Gary did a good job. But I was teaching the teachings of disappearance of the universe years before the book was even written. [laughter] and and what happens is people get into distorted concepts because they they see it, they watch a video, they hear it enough, but I, you know, it's it's just another uh it's another interpretation of a course in miracles. And the course in miracles, as what you said in this was, we're going for an experience that will end our doubting. In the back of the book in the manual for teachers, you know, Jesus is asked about uh the separation. How did the separation occur? And in the back of the book, it even asked to whom did the separation occur? And Jesus says the ego will ask many questions that this course has no answer for, no intellectual answer for. But then Jesus says an experience will come that will end your doubting. Seek for that experience. Do not be delayed with theological considerations. We thank those teachers that have attempted to teach this course. But Jesus and the Holy Spirit are the teachers of this course and we do not need to add concepts to the book because the book is very thorough. It covers everything very comprehensively. So, so it's beautiful that we can look at these things and then we can start to say, "Oh, there's even an assumption when I ask the question, what is the Holy Spirit's script?" The assumption is is that the Holy Spirit has a script [laughter] and the Holy Spirit doesn't have a script. Doesn't doesn't look to effects, doesn't see the world in that way. So, that's beautiful. We We cleared that one up. Now I I've done it. I've said it. Now I don't I can get off of YouTube and I can I say that's a wrap now. [laughter] [gasps] Thank you so much. And I love by the way the passage that you quoted about from the manual for teacher and the ego will ask questions over questions over questions but there will never be an answer only uh never be answers to those questions only an experience. Yeah. >> And what I understand better now after you explained it, um And that all the teachers such as Gary, Ken, Wapnik, Art and Pussa, they can they can come and teach only concepts. And that this is why it's important that we tune in to the inner guidance, the intuition that is coming from within. Because the the inner teacher, you know, Jesus or the Holy Spirit knows which words to use so that we going to um it's going to reach out to our mind so that we can let go of those concepts. >> Yes. Yes. That's it. That's it. >> Yeah, >> I want to upload it. [laughter] >> Yeah, we It's so beautiful. We hear what we're ready to hear and and to the extent that we're identified with the body and the person then the guidance must come through in a way to offer us something that will will help us be a step on the ladder to go all the way to the experience of the light. Yes. Right. And so we'll finish with that is for example if Arton and Prisa came to the character Sandrine um they would probably not have said the same things because what they said was meant to to help Gary uh not not Sandrine. So they probably would have said something different. >> Yes. Yes. It's it's like we need to rely on words only to come to a a place of trust and readiness to be able to open up to a direct experience that transcends all the words and and is is is so deeply peaceful. But that is the point that that it they have to come through in words that we can relate to and understand at our current level of consciousness. And and the point is is to help us go all the way to forgiveness, complete forgiveness, atonement, and and which is the very top of consciousness before heaven before we we are taken back. God takes the final step, you know, we remember creation, we remember spirit. So it's beautiful that way because when we come together in these encounters like even our discussion we're praying there's a prayer in our heart that's underneath our words and and that's what we're praying for. We're praying for an expansive experience that is beyond all concepts. And how beautiful, what a lovely use of communication this is for the whole world. This is for the whole world, for the whole universe. >> Thank you very much. Okay. So I do have a last question that I hope has been inspired by Jesus and and this question is more a question about current events. You know what seems to happen in the world. Okay. So this um a few days ago the French government approved a text of the bill uh of a bill on assisted assisted dying which is nothing more or less than legal authorization to ask of health care professional for death. Obviously in reality there is no world and there is no death but could you speak to us about the symbol that it this represents in our minds? >> Yes. The well for quite some time there has been this movement for assisted dying or assisted suicide and one of the most famous names is named Kavorian Dr. Kavorian with his assisted suicides. But if we really want to get to the core of things, we can start to look at seeing this is another concept. Uh just like we could talk about various countries passing what's called the death penalty. The punishment for a crime is to be to be executed uh to be killed through a some kind of a lethal injection or in the old days through electri electrocution. So on the one hand we have a concept called the death penalty >> which is extreme punishment for a crime. uh the punishment of death of the body, killing the body. And now we have the French government is is doing drafting the text of a of a bill that will legally authorize a health care professional to assist with a suicide. You can see the range of things. And we've got other things. Uh governments have uh weapons, nuclear weapons, conventional weapons for defending their country or if they don't like what another country is doing. even the hypothetical that uh I Iran could have a nuclear weapon, a weapon of mass destruction and then go in bombing a country just to do that. whether it's Iraq in the case of uh back in the Bush administration uh and Saddam Hussein and Iraq and weapons of mass destruction although they didn't find them they bombed a lot they they didn't find them and now we hear about this hypotheticals as well we have to realize this goes back to our early question about the script Um, I would say assisted suicide is a is is a hypothetical of trying to be loving and kind and gentle with a person's wish uh to end their life. And the death penalty on the other hand is a kind of a a very strong we will punish you by death if you commit a particular crime. But what we can see is that this world is a world of hypotheticals. And what do I mean by hypothetical? uh a situation as if something might occur. So in the situation of of a person asking to be assisted for suicide, that's a hypothetical situation. You're not asking it. Serene's not asking it. I'm not asking for that. But we're saying hypothetically if a person in France says goes to a health care professional and says I need assistance in ending my life. The government is trying to draw up a legislation to uh help that happen. But what I discovered when one time Jesus was talking to me about hypotheticals and he said to me because I was always having people ask me hypothetical questions in gatherings. Like one time I was in Florida and I was giving a talk at a church in Florida and a philosophy professor was in the audience and he said, "Yeah, I've been studying a course in miracles, but David, you see the woman that you're traveling with, if you're walking down the street and somebody comes up with a knife, and puts that knife on the neck of the woman that you're traveling with. Are you going to be meek like Jesus? Are you going to turn the other cheek then? Or are you going to fight the guy? Are are you going to be defenseless like Jesus teaches? You know, in my defenselessness, my safety lies. uh are you going to be defenseless and meek or are you going to what are you going to do David? What are you going to do? And I just smiled and I I answered the question with this man uh his name was Fred and I said, "Fred, that is a hypothetical question and you're asking it as if it's happening to me, [gasps] but it's just a hypothetical question of of the future. You're just throwing out a hypothetical. What happens if I run out of food? What happens if I don't have a place to sleep? Uh, what happens if a country launches a nuclear strike? Uh, you know, I said it's hypothetical. So, I took about 25 minutes to talk about how this whole world is nothing more than hypotheticals. And he scratched his head. He was like, "What is that? What does that even mean?" And I said, "This whole world is a projection of the belief that the separation from God actually happened." And now we have all kinds of hypothetical situations, but they're all based on one thing that cause and effect are apart. The separation has occurred. And uh I love the quote from Jesus where he says the atonement which he says is our one responsibility accepting the atonement one responsibility. The the atonement is is a complete escape from the past and a total lack of interest in the future. Oh, that is so peaceful. But that takes us out of all these hypothetical questions, including the one that P Arton and Persa were using with Gary. Hypothetically speaking, if you if you had gone to that other movie, then you would have been in an accident. But what Jesus has showed me is I am the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. Jesus told us that in the Bible and that's why he never passed judgment on anyone. Even when they brought a woman who had the they had captured in in the act of of adultery. Uh they thought they would trap Jesus by saying, "Ah, what do you have to say, Jesus?" If Jesus says, "Ah, I forgive you." Wait a minute. The laws of Moses said that thou shalt not commit adultery. That's a that's against God. And what did Jesus do? He said he asked a question of all the people there. He said, "Let he who is without sin, let him cast the first stone." [laughter] And then all the men dropped their stones immediately and walked away. And the woman herself said, "Lord, what do you have to say of me?" And he said, "And I condemn you not. go your way and sin no more. He would not pass a judgment because all of our memories from the past and all of our projections of the future are all hypothetical. They they all assume that the separation from God has occurred and now the questions are what about this or what about that? So actually your final question which involves current events is another way for us to go even deeper to start to realize that all hypotheticals about people and what they can do and what they should do, what they should not do, all of them are defenses against the Holy Spirit in this moment, the moment of forgiveness. And so this is really profound because we can take an example like that and we can say ah what does Jesus Christ have to say about death? Let's let's go in that direction instead of assisted suicide versus death penalty. Let's actually see. So if we do, we can go to workbook lesson 163. There is no death. The son of God is free. Now we're getting into some good stuff. This is not going to make the French papers, I don't think. Maybe. So maybe tomorrow. Jesus, Sandrin, and David have proclaimed, "There is no death. The son of God is free." Read about it on the front page of the Paris uh newspaper. But what he has to say, this is what he has to say. Death is a thought that takes on many forms, often unrecognized. Suicide and death penalty. That's that's two forms that are unrecognized. It may appear as sadness. What death is? It may appear as sadness, fear, anxiety or doubt. Oo, he's talking emotions. Now he's pointing us that our emotions is where the death comes in as anger, faithlessness, lack of trust, concern for bodies. There we go. Just concern for bodies is is a form of of death. Envy and all forms in which the wish to be as you are not may come to tempt you. And that is also the the beautiful lesson where he's he's talking about all the different ways that that can come that fool us into thinking that it is is something other than death. Because to believe that death is of the body is the mistake. And we watched that movie uh on Saturday which was very much about chopped up memories of the death of the body. The husband Jim is alive. Husband Jim is dead. And and I started it with this beautiful clip from Solaris. We don't have to think like that anymore. So Jesus is saying how we feel right now emotionally tells us whether we believe in death or not. When we're in joy, when we're in love, when we're in happiness, we're lined up with the Holy Spirit and we we can remember that there is no death. But if we're sad or angry, we are tempted to look to the world for the reason. Why am I sad? Why am I angry? And it's all coming from the belief that something in form has caused us to feel the way we feel instead of a choice instead of it just being our own choice in mind. So yeah, I'm glad that you brought in that current event because that let us go into the the deep topic of hypotheticals which are really just distractions. And I did say to Jesus, I said, "What do you mean this is a hypothetical world?" And he said, "This world is as if the separation from God was real." So it sets up an entire series of images that are all hypotheticals. And that's why most of our thinking until we train our mind, most of our thinking is is hypothetical. Will I Will I have enough food in the future? Uh where will I live when I get old? What will happen to my body in the future? How will I die in the future? You see, the the mind is filled with hypotheticals that are all centered on on the body. And the only reason that's important because every day bodies seem to pass away and every day there's more bodies born, baby bodies. They're just coming and going all the time. But when we identify with a body, then the hypotheticals seem to be more important. How will my body die? And when will my body die? Maybe I should go see a psychic. People say, "I I want to know when I'm going to die." And other people say, "I don't want to go to a psychic because I don't want to know when my body will die because all all do is think about it for for all that time in between, you know." So, this is beautiful. We just I'm so glad you asked that question and because it it's a starting point for us to go very very very deep in the mind. It's beautiful. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Well, thank you. Uh we made a we had a beautiful tour, a beautiful um loop today and it was wonderful. Well, thank you. I want to I wanted to thank you today, David, for this beautiful conversation exchange. Uh hoping that um there will be more of these uh as long as it's helpful for us. >> Yeah, I think our community is going very inward now more into mysticism. So I think they we will continue to do some things on Facebook and and Instagram I think. But I've used my YouTube channel for so many years and so I had a feeling uh that this this might be my last interview on on YouTube and and I was so pleased to be doing it with you and and I our goal we want these deep ideas and experiences to to spread to everyone. We want everyone to feel the joy of following the Holy Spirit, the joy of following Jesus. And so if uh one day in in the French newspapers it says Sadrine and David uncover the mysteries and secrets of the universe and expose all the tricks of the ego. [laughter] Let me know that. And that might be a time we we both go on do a public. [laughter] What do you mean? Encore. Encore. [laughter] Because that's what's in our heart. We pray for joy for everyone. We pray for everyone to to know God's love and God's peace. And uh yeah, that's what's in my heart and I feel it in your heart. And that's the spirit brought us together for this for sure. This has been so delightful. >> Thank you.