Hall of Mirrors
I had a spiritual experience not long ago, brought on by illness. I was in a weakened condition, which loosened my psychological defenses, and I welcomed that. It actually felt good to be released from the tightly knit mental ego organization that claimed to ensure my personal safety.
As the great spiritual master, Mooji, says, “Sometimes the physical challenges of your health deteriorating can be a tremendous aid to discovering your own Self!” He explains that when ill, we can become more luminous, more humble. Indeed, I found that in this woozy, yet deeply relaxed state of mind, came an Insight:
I was at an amusement park, on line to buy a ticket for the Hall of Mirrors. After receiving my ticket, I pushed through a turnstile, and walked a short path up to the doorway. Through the door was a maze of hallways, the walls covered in distorting mirrors. I knew if I looked in the mirrors, the body would be seen as frighteningly warped, malformed and misshapen.
I suddenly knew it was not fun to be in the Hall of Mirrors. Everything there reinforced its own distorted, self-enclosed reality. But there seemed to be no way out. I tried to reverse course by cautiously walking backwards to retrace my steps. After all, I had not entered very far. I still had my ticket in my hand. I would return it and exit the way I came. But when I backed into the turnstile, it would not budge. It was only an entry point.
It struck me that the Hall of Mirrors was what A Course in Miracles calls propaganda for itself, “Thus is all questioning within the world a form of propaganda for itself.” ~ACIM, T-27.IV.5. Once inside, there is no way out. Within the Hall of Mirrors, all perspectives are refracted through fear. But, thankfully, as Jesus points out in the Course, the ego may be “fool-proof, but it is not God-proof”.
Before despair set in, Something made me look up. In the ceiling of the Hall of Mirrors was a skylight, and, somehow, it was possible to parachute upwards. All I had to do was choose the resurrection route.
“A miracle inverts perception which was upside down before, and thus it ends the strange distortions that were manifest,” explains Jesus, ACIM, W-pII.13:2-3
Trapped within the ego thought system, my only choices seemed to be forward or back — on a horizontal time line. When I turned to the memory of God within, a vertical option arose: the choice to elevate and see with the Holy Spirit’s Vision. “…the miracle entails a sudden shift from horizontal to vertical perception.” ~ACIM, T-1.II.6:3 In a holy instant, there came a sense of uplift, light as dandelion seeds in a breeze.
Clarity dawned. While thinking with the ego, I was stuck in a hall of distorting mirrors. When I truly chose to leave the Hall of Mirrors, the miracle that Jesus promises in ACIM prevailed. “For the memory of God can dawn only in a mind that chooses to remember, and that has relinquished the insane desire to control reality.” ~ACIM, T-12.VIII.5
All that is required is awareness of fear, so rather than being manipulated and consumed by fear, fear can serve as a reminder to choose again. Choose the memory of God within. Exalted. Unified. Ever-present. Ever-free.