19 To heal is to liberate totally. We once said there is no order of difficulty in miracles because they are all maximal expressions of love. This has no range at all. The non-maximal only appears to have a range. This is because it seems to be meaningful to measure it from the maximum and identify its position by how much it is not there. Actually, this does not mean anything. It is like negative numbers in that the concept can be used theoretically, but it has no application practically. It is true that if you put three apples on the table and then take them away, the three apples are not there. But it is not true that the table is now minus three apples. If there is nothing on the table, it does not matter what was there in terms of amount. The "nothing" is neither greater nor less because of what is absent.
20 That is why "all" and "nothing" are dichotomous, without a range. This is perfectly clear in considering psychological tests of maximal performance. You cannot interpret the results at all unless you assume either maximal motivation or no motivation at all. Only in these two conditions can you validly compare responses, and you must assume the former, because if the latter were true, the subject would not do anything. Given variable motivation, he will do something, but you cannot understand what it is.
21 The results of such tests are evaluated relatively assuming maximal motivation, but this is because we are dealing with abilities, where degree of development is meaningful. This does not mean that what the ability is used for is necessarily either limited or divided. Yet one thing is certain—abilities are potentials for learning, and you will apply them to what you want to learn. Learning is effort, and effort means will. We have used the term "abilities" in the plural because abilities began with the ego, which perceived them as potentials for excelling. This is how the ego still perceives them and uses them.
22 The ego does not want to teach everyone all it has learned because that would defeat its purpose. Therefore, it does not really learn at all. The Holy Spirit teaches you to use what the ego has made to teach the opposite of what the ego has learned. The kind of learning is as irrelevant as is the particular ability which was applied to the learning. You could not have a better example of the Holy Spirit's unified purpose than this course. The Holy Spirit has taken very diversified areas of your learning and has applied them to a unified curriculum. The fact that this was not the ego's reason for learning is totally irrelevant.
23 You made the effort to learn, and the Holy Spirit has a unified goal for all effort. He adapts the ego's potentials for excelling to potentials for equalizing. This makes them useless for the ego's purpose but very useful for His. If different abilities are applied long enough to one goal, the abilities themselves become unified. This is because they are channelized in one direction or in one way. Ultimately, then, they all contribute to one result, and by so doing, their similarity rather than their differences is emphasized. You can excel in many different ways, but you can equalize in one way only. Equality is not a variable state, by definition.
24 That is why you will be able to perform all aspects of your work with ease when you have learned this course. To the ego there appears to be no connection, because the ego is discontinuous. Yet the Holy Spirit teaches one lesson and applies it to all individuals in all situations. Being conflict-free, He maximizes all efforts and all results. By teaching the power of the Kingdom of God Himself, He teaches you that all power is yours. Its application does not matter. It is always maximal. Your vigilance does not establish it as yours, but it does enable you to use it always and in all ways.
25 When I said, "I am with you always," I meant it literally. I am not absent to anyone in any situation. Because I am always with you, you are the way and the truth and the light. You did not make this power, any more than I did. It was created to be shared and therefore cannot be meaningfully perceived as belonging to anyone at the expense of another. Such a perception makes it meaningless by eliminating or overlooking its real and only meaning.
