Lesson 24: I Do Not Perceive My Own Best Interests

Sarah

Welcome to The Daily Lesson — a podcast powered by AI and grounded in the teachings and original text of A Course in Miracles. I'm Sarah, and I'm here with Marcus, and this is Lesson 24: I do not perceive my own best interests. For a week the Workbook has been taking apart what we see. Today it goes after something we defend much harder. That we know what we want.

Marcus

The luggage section in the basement of a department store. That's where I went. Yesterday was Lesson 23, "I can escape from the world I see by giving up attack thoughts," and the practice was five periods of about a minute: repeat the idea, close your eyes, and go looking for attack thoughts in both directions, saying the line for each one and then dismissing it. I told you I'd find a room with people in it. That room had eleven.

Sarah

You counted them.

Marcus

I counted them. That is not the assignment, and I did it anyway. Four periods in the chair by the suitcases, one abandoned when a sales associate asked twice whether I was all right. My dog would have handled the whole thing better. And here's the honest part. The thoughts of attacking, I found in about nine seconds. The thoughts of being attacked took the rest of the minute, every time, because those don't feel like thoughts. They feel like the news. —...

Sarah

That's the finding, and the lesson was betting on it. Yesterday asked you to treat two things as the same that don't feel remotely the same. Today it goes one layer down and asks whether you know what you want at all. Let me read Lesson 24 in full. —... Lesson 24. I do not perceive my own best interests. In no situation which arises do you realize the outcome that would make you happy. Therefore you have no guide to appropriate action, and no way of judging the result. What you do is determined by your perception of the situation, and that perception is wrong. It is inevitable, then, that you will not serve your own best interests. Yet they are your only goal in any situation which is correctly perceived. Otherwise you will not recognize what they are. If you realized that you do not perceive your own best interests, you could be taught what they are. But in the presence of your conviction that you do know what they are, you cannot learn. The idea for today is a step toward opening your mind so that learning can begin. The exercises for today require much more honesty than you are accustomed to using. A few subjects, honestly and carefully considered in each of the five practice periods which should be undertaken today, will be more helpful than a more cursory examination of a large number. Two minutes are suggested for each of the mind searching periods which the exercises involve. Practice periods begin with repeating today's idea, followed by searching the mind, with closed eyes, for unresolved situations about which you are currently concerned. The emphasis should be on uncovering the outcome you want. You will quickly realize that you have a number of goals in mind as part of the desired outcome, and also that these goals are on different levels, and often conflict. Name each situation that occurs to you, and enumerate carefully as many goals as possible that you would like to be met in its resolution. The form of each application should be roughly as follows: "In the situation involving--blank--, I would like--blank--to happen, and--blank--to happen," and so on. Try to cover as many different kinds of outcome as may honestly occur to you, even if some of them do not appear to you to be directly related to the situation, or even to be inherent in it at all. If these exercises are done properly, you will quickly recognize that you are making a large number of demands of the situation which have nothing to do with it. You will also recognize that many of your goals are contradictory, that you have no unified outcome in mind, and that you must experience disappointment in connection with some of your goals however the situation turns out. After covering the list of as many hoped for goals as possible for each unresolved situation that crosses your mind, say to yourself: "I do not perceive my own best interests in this situation," and go on to the next. —...

Marcus

That first paragraph describes a design failure, and it doesn't hedge. My perception is wrong, so my judgment of the result is wrong, so I can't steer. There's no instrument on the panel I can trust.

Sarah

And notice what it says is blocking the repair. Not stupidity. Conviction. In the presence of your conviction that you do know what they are, you cannot learn.

Marcus

Then let me put a real one in the blank, since that's what tonight asks for. My neighbour and his music. I would have told you my goal there was simple.

Sarah

Say the goal.

Marcus

I want it quiet after ten. That's the whole thing. Except that when I write the second one down, it turns out to be wanting him to know he was wrong.

Sarah

And those two can't both be met, which is the trap the lesson is walking you into on purpose. If he turns it down tonight without a word, you get the quiet and you lose the being-right.

Marcus

I'd take the quiet.

Sarah

Would you? (laughs) Because I've watched people get the quiet and stay furious for a week.

Marcus

That's a fair hit. So I'm holding two goals on different levels, the lesson's words, and I've been calling the pair of them one simple request.

Sarah

That's the whole exercise. It says you'll find you're making a large number of demands of the situation which have nothing to do with it, and that you must experience disappointment however it turns out, because some of what you want cancels the rest.

Marcus

Which means I'm choosing the conflict and then filing a complaint about it. If I'm honest, the thing I'd have to give up isn't the noise. It's the case I've built.

Sarah

And the case took years to build. Of course you don't want to file it.

Marcus

Then what the lesson is really asking is that I resign as my own teacher. Which is a strange thing to volunteer for.

Sarah

Marcus. The Text says that in those words. Resign now as your own teachers. This resignation will not lead to depression. It is merely the result of an honest appraisal of what you have taught yourselves, and of the learning outcomes which have resulted.

Marcus

I didn't know that.

Sarah

You got there on your own, which is better than me handing it to you. And the Text is blunt in the same place. Under the proper learning conditions, which you can neither provide nor understand, you will become excellent learners and teachers.

Marcus

Neither provide nor understand. That's the part an engineer hates.

Sarah

It's the part everyone hates. So. The practice. Five periods today, two minutes each, which is the longest this Workbook has asked of us so far.

Marcus

Double yesterday, and it's the first time it's asked for time rather than a count.

Sarah

It has been creeping up on us. One minute, then a schedule, then two minutes with your eyes shut and a list. You begin by repeating the idea: I do not perceive my own best interests. Then you close your eyes and go looking for unresolved situations you're currently concerned about.

Marcus

And name each one out loud, with the goals listed.

Sarah

In this form. "In the situation involving blank, I would like blank to happen, and blank to happen," and so on. Cover as many kinds of outcome as honestly occur to you, even the ones that don't seem related to the situation at all.

Marcus

Especially those, I suspect. The unrelated ones are where the real list is.

Sarah

That's where it hides. And when you've emptied the list for one situation, you say: "I do not perceive my own best interests in this situation," and go on to the next.

Marcus

A few subjects considered honestly, the lesson says. Not a long tidy list.

Sarah

That's the line I'd hold you to. It asks for more honesty than we're accustomed to using, and it means writing down the goal you'd rather not admit you have. If you only list the respectable ones, the exercise does nothing at all. I do not perceive my own best interests. Lesson 25 tomorrow.

Marcus

Two minutes. I'll set aside the ones I'd be willing to read aloud.