This is not because the Course is the only valid path—there are many thousands of others. But if it is your assigned path—obviously, a big “if”—it wants you to follow it alone.

Lesson 42: “Nothing is lacking that is needed”

The idea for today is a beginning step in bringing thoughts together, and teaching you that what you are studying is a unified thought system in which nothing is lacking that is needed, and nothing is included that is irrelevant or contradictory. (W-42.7:2)

Think about that statement that this is a course in which “nothing is lacking that is needed.” That means, quite obviously, that everything you need is here.

“I Need Do Nothing” (T-22.VII)

Your way will be different, not in purpose, but in means. A holy relationship is a means of saving time. One instant spent together restores the universe to both of you....

When peace comes at last to those who wrestle with temptation and fight against giving in to sin; when the light comes at last into the mind given to contemplation; or when the goal is finally achieved by anyone, it always comes with just one happy realization: “I need do nothing.” Here is the ultimate release that everyone will one day find in his own way, at his own time. We do not need this time. Time has been saved for you, because you are together. This is the special means this course is using to save you time.

You are not making use of the course if you insist on using means that have served others well, neglecting what was made for you. (T-22.VII.6-8)

What are the “special means” that the Course is using to save us time?

• Entering holy instants by using the idea that you “need do nothing” to make yourself holy

• Joining with another in a holy relationship

• Joining with another in holy instants within a holy relationship

These points were embodied in Helen and Bill’s joining in a “better way” in June of 1965. That moment of joining is extolled in over a hundred places in the Course. I know of no other path that is going to teach you that the way to God lies in holy instants shared with other people, in which together you have a sense that “perfection is here, and therefore we need do nothing.”

“Don’t take another’s path”

Once, when Helen was judging someone whose spirituality she felt was flaky, Jesus told her, “Don’t take another’s path as your own; but neither should you judge it” (Absence from Felicity p. 450). The message here is obviously twofold: Don’t walk another’s path; don’t judge another’s path. Both sides are crucial.

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