From Senseless to Sensible

Have you ever been so certain of something only to discover you were wrong? The underlying assurance was beyond question. Yet you were mistaken. The counter realization so startling that it's met with disbelief. "It can't be so."

What leads to such strongly held opinions? While ideological tenets shape all thought, it's our senses that bear witness to the reality of experience.

But what if our senses are wrong? Optical illusions are handily capable of fooling the senses. But the question attempts to probe deeper into the heart of understanding. What if our senses are always wrong?

Consider these lines from A Course in Miracles:

Your eyes were made to look upon a world that is not there. For eyes and ears are senses without sense. (T-28.V.5)

We are essentially senseless. In every sense of the word.

The sureness of the world around us, the definitiveness of the body-based "me", the indisputable suffering of selfhood all offer unassailable facts of reality. Any consideration otherwise closed to doubt.

And yet the course, like all other non-dualistic thought systems, asks us to consider:

What if you recognized this world is an hallucination? What if you really understood you made it up? What if you realized that those who seem to walk about in it, to sin and die, attack and murder and destroy themselves, are wholly unreal? (T-20.VIII.7)

Such recognition leads not to dissolution but disburden. A liberation so freeing, a peace so profound that it transcends any conception of joy. It's an experience that hints at the eternal bliss of our true nature.

We need not deny the body and its senses to reach this understanding. Instead, we can use them as stepping stones, tools to help us look beyond their limited perspective. By observing our sensory experiences with gentleness and without judgment, we begin to see the patterns of thought that shape our perceptions. This mindful approach allows us to make our senses "sensible" - not by relying on them for ultimate truth, but by using them to point us towards the deeper reality.

Join me in Thursday's class where we'll explore the seeming certainty presented by our senses and practices for transcending their limitations. I look forward to seeing you then.