Lesson 13: A Meaningless World Engenders Fear
Lesson 13 takes the idea from Lesson 12 a step further. It explains that a meaningless world doesn't just upset us—it actually makes us fearful. While it might seem hard to grasp at first, the lesson teaches that the reason we experience fear in response to meaninglessness is that we’re trying to fill the void with our own interpretations, rather than accepting that, in itself, the world or this reality holds no meaning.
What struck me here is the idea that recognising the world’s meaninglessness causes anxiety because, deep down, we’re afraid that without our imposed meanings, we wouldn’t exist. It's as if God and the ego are in a race to see who gets to write meaning on this blank slate, and the ego is desperate to get there first. The ego knows that if it doesn’t succeed, its sense of self will collapse. This creates a competition with God, which of course, we can never win—but that’s where the fear comes in.
For me, this idea feels really significant because it sheds light on why we we are invested in our thoughts and perceptions, even when we know, intellectually, that they aren’t real. The ego clings to meaning, even if that meaning is negative or fear-based. It doesn’t matter if we see the world as dangerous, sad, or crazy—as long as we see something, we feel like we exist. Realising that without these projected meanings, we might start to question who we think we are.
In the practice for this lesson, we’re asked to close our eyes, repeat the idea that
“I am looking at a meaningless world,”
and then open our eyes to look around, repeating it again. The next part is the kicker: we’re told to acknowledge that
“A meaningless world engenders fear because I think I am in competition with God.”
This statement can trigger resistance, and understandably so. The idea that we are in competition with God seems crazy, but that’s exactly what the ego believes. It’s like we’ve created a game where we’re trying to assert our independence from the very Source that created us.
What I found helpful in this lesson is simply noticing any resistance that comes up, without fighting it. We don’t have to believe the lesson straight away; the aim is to observe our reactions and begin to understand the relationship between our thoughts and the fear we experience. It’s not about trying to force the belief, but about starting to open the door to a different way of thinking.
This process is, as always, gentle. Jesus knows we might not be ready to fully embrace the idea yet, and that’s okay. The key is to start paying attention to how much meaning we assign to the world around us and how that leads to fear. By doing so, we slowly begin to release ourselves from the grip of the ego’s false narrative.
Bibliography
A Course in Miracles. Foundation for Inner Peace. A Course in Miracles: Combined Volume, 3rd Edition. Foundation for Inner Peace, 2007. URL: https://acim.org.
