One Course + One Course = One Course

By Jimmie Lewis

“Until you have truly recognized unity . . . you continue to perceive of yourself as a learning being. This is the only reason for this continuation of the coursework provided in A Course in Miracles.” (A.4)

“The sharing of experience is more appropriate than the sharing of interpretation.” (A. 15)

After my wife and pathmate, Barbara, left the physical on August 31, 2010, and I completed the memoir about our holy relationship, A Holy Relationship: The Memoir of One Couple’s Transformation, I could tell it was time for me to change the name of our publishing company, Gemstone Publishing, which was named after our triplets who left the physical shortly after they were born in 1994.

Amber left the physical in two days; Jade, a boy, left in 9; and Emerald left in 23 days. Barbara and I had been overwhelmed with joy and grief about our triplets. We could see the unique expressions in their energy while knowing and feeling the oneness of their unified being. We saw them as 1+1+1=1.

When Barbara left the body on the eve of our twenty-second anniversary together in form we had been living the third version of our marriage vows, which was a re-dedication of our vows to live in “no separation or specialness between us and any living being.” We knew, as A Course in Miracles (ACIM) says, that the “arc of peace is entered two by two.” We saw those two, she and I, as one. So I changed the name of our publishing company to 1+1=1 Publishing. The following is how this relates to the title of this article.

When I first read a couple of paragraphs from A Course of Love (ACOL) online I felt a little uncomfortable and could feel that I wanted to reject it as some type of heresy trying to imitate ACIM. Not long after, I realized it was my own heresy that rejected ACOL, as what had been unconscious had floated to the surface of my mind and I saw clearly it was what I have called for years an “ego remnant” (which ACOL calls an “ego pattern”) hiding in my unconscious. It was, in essence, me resisting anything new about truth coming into my mind. It was me defending against new ideas about truth because that would mean that I didn’t have truth all resolved in my mind and therefore my foundation of truth would be shattered.

I cleared that out of my mind with truth.

With my mind now clear and open to anything and everything, I began to have a knowing about, and an attraction to, ACOL. So I bought the book and started reading it every night (back then I spent my mornings only with ACIM). I have never read ACIM. I have always studied it. I always start at the very front of any book, but with ACOL I felt a nudge to read the Addendum first and I knew it was no accident when I started reading it and was told not to use my usual “thought” or “effort” as a way of learning “this Course of Love.”

I had long since quit valuing thought, perception, concept, or judgment, which I considered, and still do, as all the same illusion, and thus these four were: 1+1+1+1=1, one illusion, as all illusion is, not the oneness of 1. Rather I lived in the “holy instant” (ACIM) as what I called, and still do, “the milieu of my life.” So in the holy instant, in the presence of being, I read A Course of Love. I can honestly say, truthfully say, that there was not one thing in A Course of Love that I did not already know and was living, as a practitioner of A Course in Miracles.

I knew wholeheartedness (ACOL) immediately as living in the presence of being, or being in Presence, in the holy instant. I had discovered the “center of my being” way before I ever heard of ACOL. I knew what it meant to live with heart and mind united. The Holy Spirit had told me through Barbara (she was a perfect channel) that when I was in fear, to give it to Him, that “It is the same movement as going from your little self to your Higher Self, your Presence” (Holy Spirit reading: 7/12/07), which He knew I was used to doing.

None of the terms in ACOL bothered me in the least. I knew what they meant and I was used to living them, regardless of the form of the words in ACIM or ACOL. It looked to me that Jesus had created a course, ACOL, and then direct dialogue with him through ACOL, to facilitate understanding and living the truth of ACIM.

And that has been the experience of the small, closed group of ACIM students that I was asked to facilitate and had worked with for three and a half years in ACIM. The members knew what was in ACIM, had made much progress in living its teachings, but were still having a hard time living wholly within the teachings of ACIM.

They immediately embraced the ease of understanding and application of the ideas in ACOL and often said how glad they were to have studied ACIM before venturing into ACOL. And I often quote an idea from ACIM to illustrate and integrate the wholeness of an ACIM/ACOL idea. The transformation within this group has been very evident to them and to me. They appreciate, value, express, and live the oneness of ACIM/ACOL.

Course in Miraclers + Course of Lovers = Miracle of Love

In addition to the book “A Holy Relationship: The Memoir of One Couple’s Transformation,” Jimmie Lewis is also the co-author, with his former pathmate, Barbara, of “The Real Miracle:  A Guide To Your Inner Being,” and “The Energy of Life:  A Guide To Practical Spirituality”.  He has been a student of ACIM since 1986 and a practitioner for a long time.  He integrated ACOL into his life in 2016.  He currently facilitates and mentors ACIM/ACOL groups and students in his home in Sonoma, California.