Backassward…

I have always prided myself on being a problem-solver, a skill I have highly valued my whole adult life. I have an eye for seeing how something could be changed, in my opinion, to make it “better.” Whether it has to do with writing or landscaping or paint colors or picking out clothes, or finding a good price, I have an editor’s knack for making “improvements.”

I had a major epiphany recently, however, as I came across the below passage in Pam Grout’s book, The Course in Miracles Experiment (another gift from my friend Becky). The following is from Lesson 64:

…withdrawing my conviction from the notion there’s a ‘problem’ that needs to be solved…
Once I pluck a particular problem out of the gazillion possibilities in the quantum field, I collapse that wave. I turn it into material form. I make it real.

Uh oh! What flashed in was a massive tweak in perspective. “Problems” have been too much in my awareness. I don’t want to go around collapsing waves anymore. In the past, I think I was trying to fix whatever wasn’t flowing well, but I was going about it all “wrong.” My ego was very proud of what I could get accomplished, but in the scheme of the Universe, I was definitely moving backassward!

To carry on with the theme of waves, though the watery kind, I’ve had absolutely no clue that I have been training for such epic wipe outs. Decades of practice have made me a problem-solving whisperer. Look at me! See how I can fix things?! Using my ability in this way, which has made me feel safe in the world of ego, has rendered nothing but a hollow sensation.

Actually, I’ve known for a while now that I’ve needed to pull back the reins on this particular habit. The realization of pointing out what was “wrong” in the outside world was actually a call for me to look inside myself, to see what was “missing” in ME. My task, now, is to turn that frowny old perspective upside down and start using these skills to support possibility and flow. A switch has flipped. It’s a process. Wish me luck.

More from Lesson 64, which says it all:
My function is to ‘be the light.’ And it’s much easier to fulfill that function when I focus on the gajillion possibilities rather than zero in on one problem, one collapsed wave.

Here’s to possibilities!