PROLOGUE - by Raymond Comeau

Before undergoing my awakening experiences at Endeavor Academy, I doggedly pursued a "spiritual journey." When I took a close look at exactly who was on the journey, I found it was my false self wandering in a dream, ironically defending myself against the Love of God. My false self constantly seeking respite in a dream of my own making.

Here is a list of activities in my dream familiar to anyone walking the "path of spirituality": devouring texts of the world's great religions; going into therapies…Gestalt, psychotherapy, group and hypnotherapy; studying in A Course in Miracles groups; meditating, journaling; incessantly discussing with other "searchers" polarities within my dream. Yet all the time escaping my waking dream by sedating myself at night into its exact counterpart, my sleeping dream.

I am so grateful that over two years ago I crossed the threshold of Endeavor Academy. I had not let myself realize how fearful and exhausted I was from my journeying.

You have reached the end of an ancient journey, not realizing yet that it is over. You are still worn and tired, and the desert's dust still seems to cloud your eyes and keep you sightless.
T-18.VIII.13:1-2
The Text of A Course in Miracles

Actually, there is pictorial proof of my fear and exhaustion. Soon after entering the lobby of the Academy, I was thrust against the wall, asked to smile, and "click whir," a Polaroid picture emerged. It is kept in a scrapbook with other recruits behind the desk, reminding me of the movie, "The Dirty Dozen."

The day after arriving, I went to my first session where several hundred students were sitting or standing in a semi-circle, listening to a Teacher for two or three hours. I tried to remain inconspicuous in the midst of the throng, but the Teacher found me, got in my face and said, "You're not going to get it by examining it." I felt sick in the pit of my stomach. The next day during session, I decided to sit down, cross-legged, and hopefully become less conspicuous. He found me again and said, "You're not going to get it meditating, either." This time I felt even sicker.

I went to my room and found myself standing in the middle of it. I had an inclination to write in my journal, but I could hear the Teacher saying, "You're not going to get it journaling, either." Then, in rapid succession, I said no to meditating, no to reading a "spiritual" book, and no to taking a nap, no to taking a walk, no to talking with someone, and no to sedating. I just stood there. I did not know at the time that the teaching was: "Just stand still for a moment," but I just stood there.

And now you stand in terror before what you swore never to
look upon.
T-19.IV(D).6:1

I experienced what I called, then, my "inner prompting" say: "Open A Course in Miracles." I took two steps to the desk, picked up the Course and opened it at random. It opened to the section, I Need Do Nothing. Through tears of gratitude, I sat down and slowly read the section:

To do nothing is to rest, and make a place within you where the activity of the body ceases to demand attention. Into this place the Holy Spirit comes and there abides.
T-18.VII.7:7

For the first time, I realized I was not alone. I was in the direct experience of an alternative to my dream, and the alternative was outside my dream and in me. My True Self finally broke through my elaborate defenses, and I was home. I was safe. My safety was closer than my beating heart.

It seems to you the world will utterly abandon you if you but raise your eyes. Yet all that will occur is you will leave the world Forever. This is the re-establishment of your Will.
T-19.IV(D).7:1

The shift from my will to Thy Will had occurred, and since they are One, I realized I was no longer "seeing through a mirror, darkly," no longer getting a reflection of my false self. In that moment of my "inner prompting," I was "seeing through a mirror, brightly," seeing the reflections of my True Self, and they were shining brightly. "Mirror" and "miracle" share a Latin root, mirari, "to wonder at." To see my True Self reflected is a wonder, a "mirrorcle," and wonder leads to gratefulness. The warmth of gratefulness in my chest spread throughout my body. My "journey" was over.

And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.
I Corinthians 15:49

So, I went to sessions day after day. I avidly read the Course. I went to afternoon classes. I mingled with brothers over lunch and dinner. We were all of single purpose to remember God. I stopped my other "practices": journaling, meditating, reading from the "great" religions. I would ask for help in the morning and pay close attention to my brothers as my day miraculously unfolded.

You and your brother are coming home together, after a long and meaningless journey that you undertook apart, and that led nowhere. You have found your brother, and you will light each other's way.
T-18.III.8:5

Maybe a year went by in this fashion. My wife, Christine, and I had come to stay for only 30 days. I was fascinated by the rhetoric of the Course, and began making notes of words, phrases, and sentences that were examples of classical rhetoric. I felt my passionate love of literature rekindle. I saw that Jesus postured our voices as we read each line by the seamless blending of what He said, with how He said it; blending content and form, medium and message, sound and sense.

Here is just one example for you, the title of Lesson 267:

My heart is beating in the peace of God.
W-pII.267.
Heading From the Workbook of A Course in Miracles

The meaning of the words gives you the content of the line, or what is said.

The rhythm of the words gives you the structure of the line, or how it is said.

my HEART is BEAT ing IN the PEACE of GOD.

The slack/STRESS pattern is iambic pentameter.

Since the Course teaches by experience, here is how you can experience the rhetoric of the line. Find your pulse, either at your neck or wrist or chest.

Now, read the line, letting each syllable fall fully on a beat of your pulse ....

When you still yourself for a moment, your very heart beats in the peace of God.

And now it should be clear exactly how the rhetoric of A Course in Miracles illuminates you.The incomparable blending of sound and sense stops the mind for a moment, and something new, NOW, can enter in.

Then it dawned on my mind that it would be all right to pursue seriously exactly how Jesus was posturing our voices to read His words. It was all right now because I was seeing with "bright eyes." I remembered a text in rhetoric from my student days some thirty years ago, "CLASSICAL RHETORIC FOR THE MODERN STUDENT" by Edward J. Corbett.

My casual notes became more rigorous and voluminous.

Now that you can see how it works when you get out of the way, it will probably come as no surprise to you that, soon after, a brother approached me and said that he wanted help to expand the Academy's Web site, and would I help. Since I am not, to put it kindly, computer literate, I had no idea how to help. Then a couple of hours later, I felt my "inner prompting" to gather my burgeoning notes and write an essay. That essay became Part 9 of this book, "The Medium is the Message."

I gave a copy to Master Teacher, and much to my surprise and delight, he encouraged me to continue my writing and to call it "a work in progress." Now, all the great literature I had abandoned, to focus solely on the Course, came tumbling into my mind. I had given away most of my books before coming to the Academy, but kept a few anthologies of poetry, and I began to feast on the poems. Analogies and metaphors that helped me describe my re-association with my True Self came flooding in from my readings in philosophy and psychology and literature and other religions. I began to experience what I used to call "inner promptings," but now is a blending of Jesus and the Holy Spirit and the Father and I AM THAT; and, Gentle Reader, YOU are that.

Thoughts poured in during the day, seemingly unrelated, but then I would begin to see a pattern in them. I took notes and pretty soon an essay took form in my mind. I would find a time with my morning energy and write. I would sit down with my notes, ask for help, write, stand up and say "thank you." And in this manner, the book you are now holding came forth.

Verily, verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you.
John 16:23

This is also exactly how this Prologue was written. I realized that the twelve articles needed an introduction, and knowing that I was not alone, I remembered the drill:

Help
Stand still
Step back
Listen up
Step up
Thank you

These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the time cometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I shall shew you plainly of the Father.
John 16:25

 

The time is now.
The place is here.

And so, Gentle Reader, I write this line, stand up and say,

"Thank you, Father."

 

Ray Comeau
Wisconsin Dells
December 1999