on forgiveness and happiness

i just finished watching the super soul sunday episode with marianne williamson and, child, i'm having some pretty major AHA moments.  these were my favourites of all the things she said.

(williamson mentions god quite a bit.  if you don't believe in god, it might be helpful to replace the word "god" with "the universe", or "my highest self", which is what i do sometimes when i feel things getting to god-y for me.  just a thought)

on forgiveness:
if i pray for your happiness, one of 2 things will happen, either you will behave differently or i won't care.  the alchemy will occur.

since the universe is self-organinizing and self-correcting, if anybody did anything to me that harmed me, if anybody did anything to me that was a transgression or betrayal, the universe is already on it.  the universe has a way of making sure that i get whatever in the material world that person took away from me.  i call that the principle of divine compensation.  but if my heart is closed, then i won't be able to receive the miraculous new possibility that the universe is bringing.

in explaining the principle of divine compensation:
divine compensation means... if i have an experience of you, and i do something where i deflect a miracle, something wonderful that might have happened, and i deflect that miracle, or if you were to do something that deflected a miracle, the miracle or the possibility of what might have been blocked by me or the possibility that might have been blocked by you... but "the course in miracles" says it is held in trust for you by the holy spirit until you are ready to receive it.  so, as long as i keep my heart open, the universe will just find another way (for it to come back to me).  it could be another person, another time, another situation but it's there in the universe (...) it's an undeletable file but if i don't download it down to the screen, if i stand in bitterness, what i'll get on the screen is bitter (...) the title of that file is "god's will".

on happiness:
if i'm unhappy, there's something i'm not looking at correctly.  if i'm unhappy, i'm believing in an illusion.  i am seeing the evidence of fear, the ain't-it-awfuls of the world, and i'm thinking that they're real, rather than remembering that only god's love is real in any situation.  in other words, i'm looking at those grey clouds and deciding that the sky is grey rather than remembering that the sky is blue.  so, if i want to be happy, "dear god, i am willing to see things differently" is the prayer in the course.  "dear god, i am willing to see things differently because i am clearly looking through the eyes of fear", and it's showing me one reality and that is my perception, and my experience is i'm unhappy.   and then i'm projecting onto the circumstances, and i'm saying that i'm unhappy because of those circumstances.  but as a spiritual seeker we go: "no no no".  it's not these circumstances that are making me unhappy.  i'm looking through a filter of fear.

only what you are not giving can be lacking in any situation.