A Course in Miracles is one of my favorite books. It has been part of my daily spiritual practice for the past twenty years. I take it with me when I travel, on my iPhone and computer. Like all great literature, the more I study it, the better it gets. Whichever page I turn to, the words are always relevant and helpful. I still come across passages that seem brand new, as if they’ve been downloaded into an edition especially revised for me.

A Course in Miracles is a big book. It’s more than 1,200 pages and 500,000 words long, and its size alone is too imposing for many. Also, it’s written in old-style Christian English and is full of iambic pentameter, which is the meter that William Shakespeare often used. Each page is infused with a mix of rich prose, spiritual poetry, powerful aphorisms, and beautiful prayers. My hope is that in my book Holy Shift! I give you a taste of this mighty work while still being faithful to its power and grace.

What is A Course in Miracles? It consists of three books: a 669-page Text, which explains the philosophy of miracles; a 488-page Workbook for Students, which offers 365 daily lessons for living the philosophy; and a 92-page Manual for Teachers, which includes a Clarification of Terms. It also has two supplements:Psychotherapy and The Song of Prayer. The whole work offers a system of spiritual psychotherapy and an invitation to experience inner peace and freedom.

Although the Course is written in Christian language, it is studied by my friends who are Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu, and Jewish, because it offers a spiritual philosophy that reflects perennial wisdom. I found the Course in an old esoteric bookstore at a Mind-Body-Spirit festival held in Central London. I bought it on a whim because I liked the title and also the idea of miracles. The Course describes a miracle as something you experience when you are willing to shift your perception from a psychology of fear to a psychology of love.

A Course in Miracles encourages you to look at everything afresh. “Instruction in perception is your great need,” teaches the Course, in a section of the Text entitled “The Problem and the Answer.” The goal of the Course is to help you know yourself. “This is a course on love, because it is about you,” it states. It offers a system of mind-training that helps you undo the blocks to love—conditioning, judgment, and fear—so that you can enjoy and participate fully in the miracle of existence.

My hope is that Holy Shift!, helps you experience a year of miracles. It contains an excerpt from A Course in Miracles for each day of the year. Each entry is an invitation to a deeper inquiry. Here is a sample of the entries for April:

10 Spiritual Quotes For Experiencing Miracles

1. You are what God created or what you made. One Self is true; the other is not there. Try to experience the unity of your one Self. Try to appreciate Its Holiness and the love from which it was created.
2. Look upon your brother as yourself. Your relationship is now a temple of healing; A place where all the weary ones can come to rest.
3. You can only love as God loves. Seek not to love unlike Him, for there is no love apart from His. Until you recognize that this is true, you will have no idea what love is like.
4. You are indeed essential to God’s plan.
5.  I share God’s Will for happiness for me.
6. God’s peace and joy are yours. Today we will accept them, knowing they belong to us.
7. Prepare yourself for miracles today.
8. When a situation has been dedicated wholly to truth, peace is inevitable.
9. “I rest in God.” This thought will bring to you the rest and quiet, peace and stillness, and the safety and the happiness you seek.
10. Nothing you undertake with certain purpose and high resolve and happy confidence, holding your brother’s hand and keeping step to Heaven’s song, is difficult to do.