“A healed mind does not plan.”
When I first read that line from A Course in Miracles, I thought it was the most ridiculous thing I’d ever encountered. Not plan? How would anything get done? How would I protect myself from disaster? How would I ensure my security and happiness?
The ego is the ultimate control freak, and planning is one of its favorite weapons.
We make lists, create strategies, and attempt to orchestrate outcomes because we believe that if we can just think hard enough and plan thoroughly enough, we can guarantee our safety and joy.
But here’s what ACIM taught me: every plan that comes from ego is actually a defense against imagined attack. When I’m planning obsessively, I’m not preparing for success—I’m preparing for war.
I used to spend hours mentally rehearsing conversations that might happen. “If they say this, I’ll say that.” “If this goes wrong, I’ll do that.” I was like a general preparing for battle, except the enemy was my own projection of what might go wrong.
All that planning didn’t make me feel more secure. It made me feel exhausted. I was living in every possible future except the present moment, which is the only place where Love is available.
The shift came when I began to understand what ACIM means by planning. It’s not talking about practical preparation. It’s talking about the ego’s desperate attempt to control outcomes through mental force.
There’s a world of difference between “I need to call the plumber because the sink is leaking” and “I must control every variable in this situation so that nothing unexpected can happen.” The first is common sense. The second is insanity.
When the mind is healed—when it remembers its connection to infinite intelligence—it receives its plans from a source that sees all directions of time and space. It doesn’t need to figure everything out in advance because it trusts that guidance will be provided step by step.
This doesn’t mean becoming passive or irresponsible. It means becoming responsive to a Higher Intelligence that knows things your personality-level awareness simply cannot know.
I learned this viscerally when I received the inner nudge to go to Washington D.C. for a demonstration to support veterans earlier this year. Logically, it made no sense. I had work deadlines, it was expensive, I’m not a veteran, and I’d have to drive back through fog in the middle of the night.
But the guidance was clear, so I went. I trusted that if Spirit was directing me to do this, everything I needed would be provided. And it was. I came back energized rather than depleted, my work got done, and I felt deeply fulfilled by participating in something meaningful.
That’s how the Holy Spirit works. It provides exactly what you need, exactly when you need it. But you have to be willing to trust the process rather than trying to control it.
The ego’s plans are always based on scarcity and fear. “There won’t be enough time, money, energy, love.” The Holy Spirit’s plans are based on abundance and Love. “Everything you need is already provided.”
When you start living from this trust, something miraculous happens. You stop exhausting yourself with worst-case-scenario planning. You stop trying to manipulate circumstances to avoid discomfort. You start flowing with life instead of fighting it.
This is what A Course in Miracles calls the “happy dream.” Instead of the ego’s nightmare of constant vigilance and control, you begin to experience life as a gentle unfolding in which you’re always supported, always guided, and always loved.
The healed mind doesn’t plan because it doesn’t need to.
It knows that the same Intelligence that moves the planets and changes the seasons has got this handled.
Our job isn’t to figure out the how. Our job is simply to say yes to Love, moment by moment, and trust that the way will be shown.
The plan that really matters was written before time began. All we have to do is remember our part in it.
SATURDAY – Activate Your Intuition Deep Dive Workshop – by popular request – this was the #1 topic people asked me to do a workshop on and here it is this Saturday, August 31. If you’d like to start hearing your guidance more clearly, and choosing to listen and follow, while also feeling like you can really trust that Voice for God, consider joining me for this workshop on Saturday! Click here now for more info.
It may be hidden, but it’s there—because God’s will for us is perfect happiness, and that will is never absent from any moment. Yay for that!
NEW ACIM PODCAST EPISODE: my topic is The Two Voices in Your Head (And Why Only One Tells the Truth) We carry two conflicting evaluations of ourselves – the Holy Spirit’s loving truth that sees our perfection and the ego’s distorted perception that sees only lack and unworthiness. According to numerology, we’re in a completion year where unhealed patterns are surfacing for final healing before we enter a new cycle and this means we’re all being pushed to let go of the patterns of pain. In this episode, drawing from A Course in Miracles Chapter 9, Section 7, the core message is that the Holy Spirit never forgets our true nature while the ego keeps us trapped in littleness, and our only path to freedom is choosing which evaluation we’ll align with through our willingness to value what’s truly valuable.
