The Mind Blowing, Logic Short-circuiting Paradox

There’s a huge mind blowing, logic short circuiting paradox at the heart of life. It’s duality, our experience of being both spirit and matter. The Course makes clear that we are only spirit, dreaming we’re bodies; that we are at home asleep with God, dreaming the ego’s nightmare. As we practice committing to our spiritual reality and desire to awaken from the ego’s nightmare, we experience more of our spiritual reality here, in the ego’s nightmare.

Khalil Gibran captures that idea beautifully when he says, “And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy….” The SOM Text says something similar, “We can sit in the shade or move into the sunshine. Sitting in the shadow, we may not really believe that there is any sunshine. But the sun would be there all the same, and all the time we are in bondage, the real freedom exists.”

No matter what happens, you and I always have freedom of choice. We can select joy over despair, love over hate, forgiveness over revenge, and growth over stagnation. A crisis can bring out the best or the worst – our choice. The greatest experience we can ever have is to know our spiritual reality in the midst of our physical reality, to transcend and transform seeming misery, failure and adversity. The sun may not be shining right where we are, but it is shining somewhere. As spiritual beings, you and I need not struggle with the circumstances in our lives, but instead, can shift into that place within where the sun is always shining; and from there, deal with whatever is before us. Learning to do this is a process and it takes time, so we need to practice, practice, practice, after all, that’s the way to get to Carnegie Hall.