1. Your distorted perceptions produce a dense cover over miracle impulses, making it hard for them to reach your own awareness. 2The confusion of miracle impulses with physical impulses is a major perceptual distortion. 3Physical impulses are misdirected miracle impulses. 4All real pleasure comes from doing God’s Will. 5This is because not doing it is a denial of Self. 6Denial of Self results in illusions, while correction of the error brings release from it. 7Do not deceive yourself into believing that you can relate in peace to God or to your brothers with anything external.
2. Child of God, you were created to create the good, the beautiful and the holy. 2Do not forget this. 3The Love of God, for a little while, must still be expressed through one body to another, because vision is still so dim. 4You can use your body best to help you enlarge your perception so you can achieve real vision, of which the physical eye is incapable. 5Learning to do this is the body’s only true usefulness.
3. Fantasy is a distorted form of vision. 2Fantasies of any kind are distortions, because they always involve twisting perception into unreality. 3Actions that stem from distortions are literally the reactions of those who know not what they do. 4Fantasy is an attempt to control reality according to false needs. 5Twist reality in any way and you are perceiving destructively. 6Fantasies are a means of making false associations and attempting to obtain pleasure from them. 7But although you can perceive false associations, you can never make them real except to yourself. 8You believe in what you make. 9If you offer miracles, you will be equally strong in your belief in them. 10The strength of your conviction will then sustain the belief of the miracle receiver. 11Fantasies become totally unnecessary as the wholly satisfying nature of reality becomes apparent to both giver and receiver. 12Reality is “lost” through usurpation, which produces tyranny. 13As long as a single “slave” remains to walk the earth, your release is not complete. 14Complete restoration of the Sonship is the only goal of the miracle-minded.
4. This is a course in mind training. 2All learning involves attention and study at some level. 3Some of the later parts of the course rest too heavily on these earlier sections not to require their careful study. 4You will also need them for preparation. 5Without this, you may become much too fearful of what is to come to make constructive use of it. 6However, as you study these earlier sections, you will begin to see some of the implications that will be amplified later on.
5. A solid foundation is necessary because of the confusion between fear and awe to which I have already referred, and which is often made. 2I have said that awe is inappropriate in connection with the Sons of God, because you should not experience awe in the presence of your equals. 3However, it was also emphasized that awe is proper in the Presence of your Creator. 4I have been careful to clarify my role in the Atonement without either over- or understating it. 5I am also trying to do the same with yours. 6I have stressed that awe is not an appropriate reaction to me because of our inherent equality. 7Some of the later steps in this course, however, involve a more direct approach to God Himself. 8It would be unwise to start on these steps without careful preparation, or awe will be confused with fear, and the experience will be more traumatic than beatific. 9Healing is of God in the end. 10The means are being carefully explained to you. 11Revelation may occasionally reveal the end to you, but to reach it the means are needed.