A Course in Miracles – How to Make Special Relationships Holy

So, what does A Course in Miracles mean when it says special relationships are the ego’s jam? Aren’t our relationships with our closest peeps supposed to be special?

WTF?

What the mind-training of ACIM teaches is that the only real love is the love that God has for us, and we have for God. This is the same love that we, in reality, share with each other, because the Truth is we are all in one ginormous, ecstatically, blissfully, ridiculously joyful relationship with one another, interconnected with and as each other in a completely, wholly / holy intimate way that knows no separation or boundary.

We just forgot that because we are temporarily living in the world of the ego’s crazy, which does not and will never know that, and perceives our constant pull toward the call of Love as a threat to its own existence – rightfully so, because it is.

So in its psychotic brilliance, the ego mind made up the concept of special relationships as the mother of all fake-outs, to lull us into thinking that we have – in the awesome words of Rhianna – “found love in a hopeless place.”

Well, except, we haven’t. The ego’s version of love is “conditional love” – the biggest oxymoron ever in the history of the world.

It is what passes for love in the ego mind, but it is actually some combination of need, attachment, and bargaining. Based in fear, it is founded on getting what it needs and wants through guilt, and without having to give anything – because to the ego, the concept of “giving” equals sacrifice and results in scarcity.

Special relationships aren’t just those between spouses, life partners, boyfriends, girlfriends, and lovers – rather, they are all of the relationships that we have in which we feel differently toward one bro, or a group of bros, than we do toward any or all of our other bros.

We also have varying levels within our special relationships, such as, do you love your parent like you love your child? Or love your boyfriend like you do your sister? No, our minds argue, it’s different love. But that’s the thing – love can’t be different.

In the special relationship, the part of our minds that is always drawn toward the light gets completely distracted by the shiny objects in the ego’s house of mirrors.

“You will love me, you will complete me, you will accept me, you will think I’m awesome, you will make me believe I am lovable, and wonderful, and perfect… even though I believe the opposite of myself.”

All of that Jerry Maguire “you complete me” bullshit.

That is the seductive bargain of the special love relationship – I will see myself through your eyes and fall in love with my reflection. I will momentarily forget how totally crappy I feel about myself as a result of believing that I separated from my Creator and instead, I will have the experience of union.

This is what we are all longing to return to – we are hearing the echo of it when we are in the euphoria of a romantic relationship, or look into the eyes of our newborn baby; when we are completely wrapped up and cared for by our mom, or feel understood without words by a brother or sister, or totally supported by our pop, or share a moment of laughing so hard we pee our pants with our BFF.

We are seen, adored, cherished, wanted, needed, important – they get us. We are LOVED.

Until we aren’t. Because it is not the nature of the ego to love – the egoic part of our mind has no idea of the meaning of real love.

A Course in Miracles – How to Make Special Relationships Holy

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It is the ego’s nature to hate – to be capricious, suspicious, and vicious – but it has to disguise that as something we actually want, otherwise it wouldn’t be nearly as attractive to us.

The ego’s agenda is to get its own needs met, while letting us think we are getting what we want, yet keeping us feeling separate in the process.

Its greatest weapons in doing so are guilt and projection. So, in every special relationship, there comes a time when we eventually end up projecting our own unconscious guilt onto the person with whom we were at one point swimming around and playing in the warm waters of love, and BOOM! We go from basking in the sparkly glow of total symbiotic awesomeness to freaking out about that love leaving us – because deep down we believe we deserve that anyway because we’re guilty bastards.

The love partner turns out to have all these qualities we didn’t sign up for, or betrays us; our sweet baby who needed us becomes either a defiant two-year-old or an ungrateful teen (sometimes that feels like the same thing), our parent, who just adored us is now controlling and critical, our BFF is jealous, or doesn’t have time for us, our sibling resents us, we hate our step-kid, or someone is “making us” feel a certain way – bad, angry, guilty, stressed, frustrated…

And now it is ON! Sometimes it is not quite so dramatic, we may feel more like disengagement, boredom, restlessness, disappointment, or dissatisfaction. Trust me, underlying all of those emotions somewhere is projected anger and resentment.

So what’s the combination to making our special relationships holy?

It’s the practice of forgiveness. By forgiving the belief that anything we thought our brothers ever did was true. Forgiving every judgment we ever made. Forgiving everything we believe we have ever suffered at the hands of another.

Remember, we aren’t really forgiving everyone – we are only forgiving the one. We are forgiving ourselves, for projecting our unconscious guilt onto the world in the form of our special relationships. That is the holy instant, which is this instant and every instant in which we are willing to let judgment go.

In practicing forgiveness, and asking every day for help in making my special relationships holy, my perception of my whole life and every relationship in it has actually been alchemically altered by the Light of Spirit. I have experienced a transformation, more and more of a systematic removal of the blocks to the awareness of Love’s presence.

Ironically, when I have been able to surrender my attachment to the special relationship being the form I want it to be, the person saying or doing what I think they should in order to fulfill some need of mine, some lack I believe I have, to fix me, or make me feel secure – that allows me to be whole . Nothing and no one in this world can do that, but forgiving everything that blinds you from seeing the holiness in your bro and thus in yourself actually can.

Asking Spirit to help me see the holiness in each person I was involved with; releasing my judgment, and making the decision to release myself from suffering by releasing whomever I was holding in guilt for my unhappiness – all have resulted in my finally being able to see the Truth: that every single relationship I was in, and everything else that I have ever experienced – when transformed and made holy by the light of forgiveness – has healed broken places within me, made me stronger, softened me, prepared me, called me to a higher place, and helped me to become who I came here to be and do what I came here to do.

So I’m calling that a win.

Thank you so much for joining me in making our special relationships holy today! If something in this blog moved you to reframe a relationship in the light of specialness versus holiness, I’d love to hear about it – feel free to send me an email or leave me a comment below.

If you are looking for more help in transforming your relationships, download my Homestuck Survival Kit here.

The kit includes a 5-step guide, a podcast, and a meditation to guide you in making your special relationships holy.

I love you IMMENSELY, the exact same as I love God, my boyfriend, chocolate, Jesus as my Teacher, all my BFFs, lobster, my ex-husbands /partners/lovers, my fam, champagne, forgiveness, lit fireplaces, the beach, everyone I have ever known, Christmas, and A Course in Miracles.

With all my grateful heart,

Kelly