In this seeming world, it can seem like the mind has many choices in form to make.
You can use the analogy of going to the movie theatre, where there are projected images on the movie screen. The projector behind it is projecting images onto the blank screen. Yet, while watching the movie, one forgets one is watching and finds oneself getting involved in what is going on—feeling sad when an actor dies or yelling at the screen, telling the actor not to go into that room!
You forget that it is just a movie, just a blank screen with images being projected onto it. It cannot be changed in the slightest way, as the movie is already written and filmed. The making of the film is already over and cannot be changed. The only choice one truly has is how one is going to perceive the movie. Is one going to remain at peace, remembering it is just a movie, or is one going to have a roller-coaster ride of the emotions that come with forgetting that the movie is not real?
When one has forgotten the Self in Spirit, one believes one has real choices one can make between things of the world. It seems as if choosing ice cream over waffles or a Honda over an Aston Martin is a real choice, and choosing the right one makes one happy while the other one doesn’t.
Yet, this is the same as if I were to pull up this blanket from the bed here and say, “This part of the blanket is waffles, and this part of the blanket over here is ice cream.” There is a seeming amnesia in forgetting that the first and second option are the same! Both are the blanket, both options are of the flesh, both options are of the one blank movie screen with projected images on it. It is all the same. There isn’t really any choice at all in choosing one piece of the blanket over another and saying one is better and one is not.
In recognising this, one can see that there really aren’t any real choices that can be made between what is the same. To do so is to make a choice where no choice is offered. This is what keeps the mind in guilt, as there is a conflict about this duality: worrying about, “Did I choose the right thing, did I get something wrong?” There is a lot of confusion in this.
If there are no choices in what is the same, where are the choices? Just like in the movie theatre analogy, when one remembers it is a movie one always has the choice of how one perceives what is happening on the screen. This means that the stepping-stone idea of choices is really in the mind: between the voice of the enemy or the Holy Spirit, as behaviour is an effect of the mind. What is done comes from what is thought and believed.
Choices in the world are the projection of the choice between choosing the Peace of God or valuing the enemy and its split desires of the world. The enemy won’t want you to see this option because this means getting closer to the escape hatch of its fruits of hell that seems to be experienced.
Now that one knows what the real choices are, one has to get clear on what one is going to value.
The mind will now come in and say, “Well, Dylan, if there are no choices in form, what am I supposed to do in the midst of choices?” Another way of restating the question: “What am I going to do or what am I going to decide between?” is to think of it as:
What am I going to value?
- The whispers of the Holy Spirit or the adversary?
- Peace of mind or inner conflict?
- Certainty of Spirit or doubt of the ego?
- Inspiration or fear of future consequence?
Once one has decided for one of these, the behaviour will come automatically:
- A gentle smile to reassure another that all is well.
- Inspiration to write a song that will touch many hearts.
- Sharing a testimony that opens someone’s eyes to God.
All of these are examples of involuntary behaviours, which are an effect of resting in the Peace or Love of God.
All upsets are only a forgetting of God, seemingly overlooking the Holy Spirit to misidentify with the enemy. To choose, which is really to surrender and accept, the Self in Christ is to have a singular prayer for the Peace of God over anything else.
Desiring peace more than getting the ice cream that was wanted but didn’t get, desiring peace more than getting that parking space one wanted but another took, forgetting that the real decision is in mind and not in the self-concept preferences of the world.
To be at peace or to not be at peace is the only question!
Accepting the Peace of God rests on seeing the falsity of the enemy. When the enemy is correctly evaluated with the Holy Spirit, it is seen as false and then overlooked. This takes one out of choice. There is nothing to choose between if you have dropped one of two choices. Conflict, being the idea of another ‘thing’ to choose between, has gone. This is choiceless awareness. All decisions of the world now become as easy and as right as breathing. No matter whether you choose a Honda or an Aston Martin, the Peace of God is experienced regardless. There is no concern for a particular outcome.
Just as Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven,” Matthew 18:3 one must gently awaken to Innocence, a total reliance on God before the Peace can be experienced.
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One Silent Mind 