I see no neutral things.
This follows directly from “I have no neutral thoughts.” We find here the same pattern seen in the earlier lessons, where Jesus goes back and forth between our thoughts and what we perceive, trying to help us understand they are the same. His purpose is to cultivate in us a vigilance in watching how we think, realizing that nothing we think, perceive, or interpret as the truth is correct. This takes great humility. The ego’s arrogance seeks to cover the fear of realizing we are wrong about absolutely everything, which ultimately includes ourselves.
Any time you see an enemy “out there,” or believe someone has the power to victimize, betray, or hurt you, you are saying you are right and Jesus is wrong; you are right because you can see and feel the attack, and have the evidence to prove it.
However, you are not aware that you planted the evidence so you could find it. What you see is what you want to see, and so you put the evidence there and say: “See! My thoughts are not the problem. In fact, my thoughts are nothing. The problem is out there. That is the problem.” And almost always there is some special person that is the focus of your problem.
These lessons attempt to train your mind to think this way all the time, so that you automatically translate what you perceive outside into an inner thought. It does not matter so much with coat hangers or waste paper baskets, but it does matter with the important relationships in your life. It also matters with the unimportant ones, but there are always special people that take center stage. Remember, you see outside what you put there because you want to see it in the body, not the mind, thereby saying: “My thoughts are unimportant because what I see is the fact.” Thus you must first realize the fact is what you think. When you can look at that thought with Jesus, you will finally realize it is not a fact at all. As the text says, God is the only Fact (T-3.I.8:2).
(1:1) This idea [“I see no neutral things”] is another step in the direction of identifying cause and effect as it really operates in the world.
The thoughts in our minds are the cause, and our perceptions are the effect. This is another way of expressing the important principle we cited in the first paragraph of commentary in Lesson 8 above: “Projection makes perception.” I first choose my teacher, the ego or Holy Spirit, and that choice determines the thought system with which I identify: separation or forgiveness. I have made it real, because that is what I perceive within me (the cause) and, once projected, I perceive its manifestations all around me (the effects).
(1:2-3) You see no neutral things because you have no neutral thoughts. It is always the thought that comes first, despite the temptation to believe that it is the other way around.
We can most likely attest to the fact, even though we have read these lines both here and in the text, and on some level believe they are true, that our daily lives do not reflect this understanding at all. We react to what is external, forgetting that what we are really reacting to is our having pushed Jesus away again, and then identifying with the ego’s thought system of guilt. We quickly forget this “fact,” project the guilt from our minds and see it in people, events, and things – all threatening to hurt us and take away our peace.
The purpose of these lessons and exercises is to practice seeing how we do not live this way; how we react to what is outside us. Remember, what is outside not only includes other people’s bodies, but our own as well, for outside refers to what is outside our minds, not bodies. The point again is that we are not reacting to the world, but to our minds’ decision. Moreover, it is important to remember that the decision for the ego is made up, for we react to the ego’s illusory thought system that tells us how worthless, sinful, and wretched we are — ”the home of evil, darkness and sin” as Lesson 93 states (1:1). This is the insanity we have made real and never challenge. Thus we are learning that not only is the world a defense, but so is our thought system of separation. The reality beyond both the world and the thoughts that made it is the Love of God — the only truth.
(1:4) This is not the way the world thinks, but you must learn that it is the way you think.
Jesus is making it unmistakably clear that this causal connection between mind and body is something we have to learn, as he also makes clear in the other lessons, and that it takes tremendous vigilance and practice because our way of life is set up in the opposite way. We have been programmed to think that it is the world that impinges on us, and that the bad guys are out there in the world. Yet Jesus is saying to us here: “This is something you are not going to understand right away, for it requires much practice. I am introducing it to you now for the first time, but we will go over it again and again.” Jesus is therefore emphasizing that we are the student and he our teacher, and whenever we have difficulty with the text, workbook, or manual, it is simply because we have become afraid of what he is teaching us.
(1:5) If it were not so, perception would have no cause, and would itself be the cause of reality.
If it were correct that the world determines what we think, then perception would be a reality and a cause; namely, the objects of our perception would cause us to think and feel in certain ways. The truth, however, is that perception is the effect, caused by our thoughts. Always keep in mind that projection makes perception. If perception has no cause but is a reality independent of our thoughts, then it simply exists and there is nothing we can do about it. This, of course, describes the condition of practically everyone in the world. That is why there is no hope once we have bought into the ego thought system: we cannot change what is. If our perceptions are not effects caused by our thoughts, then they must be real. Thus do death, evil, war, and suffering become reality, and there is nothing we can do except get through our lives as best we can. Jesus, therefore, teaches that what is out there — the world and body, suffering and death is an effect, and the cause rests within our minds. Once we identify the cause we can do something about it. Otherwise, again, it is a hopeless situation.
And then this final comment about perception:
(1:6) In view of its highly variable nature, this is hardly likely.
Perception, obviously, is highly variable. We can see that even within ourselves. A perception we had of someone one day, when we could forgive, the next day becomes quite different. Depending on our inner state – choosing the ego or the Holy Spirit as our teacher – we either perceive the world through the eyes of judgment and hate, or through forgiveness.
The exercise follows, continuing the training of our minds to understand the relationship between our thoughts and our perceptions:
(2) In applying today’s idea, say to yourself, with eyes open:
I see no neutral things because I have no neutral thoughts.
Then look about you, resting your glance on each thing you note long enough to say:
I do not see a neutral __________, because my thoughts about __________ are not neutral.
For example, you might say:
I do not see a neutral wall, because my thoughts about walls are not neutral.
I do not see a neutral body, because my thoughts about bodies are not neutral.
Jesus’ instructions for the exercises now focus on his ongoing refutation of the ego’s first law of chaos: the hierarchy of illusions:
(3) As usual, it is essential to make no distinctions between what you believe to be animate or inanimate; pleasant or unpleasant. Regardless of what you may believe, you do not see anything that is really alive or really joyous. That is because you are unaware as yet of any thought that is really true, and therefore really happy.
There is no animate or inanimate, because nothing here is alive. As we recall, one of the basic categories we are taught from grade school on up is that there are living things that can be categorized as animate, part of “the great chain of being,” and non-living things that can be categorized as inanimate, like wood, metal, etc. Yet both categories are illusory, as we see in “The Laws of Chaos” section, which categorically states “there is no life outside of Heaven” (T-23.11.19:1). Jesus means that quite literally.
Real life and real joy are found only by taking Jesus’ hand and identifying with his thought system of forgiveness. It is joyful because it returns us to our real life as part of God, the only joy. However, we yet must learn how to attain this life and joy, and these exercises, along with the gentle instruction we find in this next paragraph, are among the means Jesus employs to fulfill his pedagogical purpose:
(4) Three or four specific practice periods are recommended, and no less than three are required for maximum benefit, even if you experience resistance. However, if you do, the length of the practice period may be reduced to less than the minute or so that is otherwise recommended.
Mention of our resistance is Jesus’ helpful way of reminding us not to feel guilty. He would not bring it up as frequently as he does if he were not expecting us to be fearful of his teaching, and thus seek to resist it. Learning to accept this resistance is an essential step toward letting it go.
