“Don’t ask me what you should say to this brother. Ask me to help you instead remove whatever judgments are in your mind.”
Distinguishing ego from Holy Spirit
From Ken Wapnick
"A good rule of thumb to tell the difference between the ego and the Holy Spirit is when the Holy Spirit starts getting specific, that’s when you want to run.
That does not mean that each and every time you “hear something specific” it will be the ego. But the chances are greatly enhanced that it is the ego simply because it is specific. Jesus and the Holy Spirit do not care about specifics and they do not speak in specifics… It is impossible to conceive of life without specifics.
Bodies demand specifics. Once we start hearing the inner voice tell us about specific things, and tell us to tell other people about specific things, the chances are very great that, since this has nothing to do with changing our minds, but changing our bodies, that the voice you are listening to, while its original inspiration might have been the Holy Spirit, it is very likely to have gotten derailed.
What you want the Holy Spirit for, what you want Jesus for, is help in letting go of your guilt. I mean that’s really important.
The specifics of your life, while they seem very important to you, are not going to bring you Home.
They’re not going to awaken you from the dream. Now your mind can translate an experience of the Holy Spirit’s nonspecific love into a specific message.
But it’s not always the case and you can so easily get off… It doesn’t always mean that when you hear specifics that it’s the ego but you should be very very careful.
Your emphasis should never be on asking for specific help with a problem. You want to ask for help with THE problem. Which is the problem with your guilt.
That’s why very early in the text, it’s in Chapter 2, when Helen was complaining to Jesus about something she was afraid of…His response to her – which was so important that it’s now integrated into the Course itself – His response to her was “don’t ask me to help you take away what you’re afraid of” – in other words don’t ask me for specifics.
He said ask me instead for help in removing what led to the fear. And this always involved a willingness or decision to be separate.
Many years later – and this is not in the Course – when Helen was asking Jesus what she should say to someone to be helpful, His response to her was, “Don’t ask me what you should say to this brother. Ask me to help you instead remove whatever judgments are in your mind.”
And the clear implication of that is, if the judgments are gone, then the wisdom and love of Jesus would just flow through her and she would say whatever it is that would be helpful.
What I’ve said for years is that, instead of trying to hear the Holy Spirit’s voice and asking Him for help, rather ask Him to help you do what you have to do so you can hear His voice. And what you have to do to be able to hear His voice is to let go of your guilt.
Guilt is what interferes with hearing that voice of innocence and love. Rather than asking what the Holy Spirit should say to you and how do you hear His voice, ask rather for help in letting go of the interferences to His Voice.
And that’s what he was telling Helen. Don’t ask me what you should say, don’t ask me to take your fear away, ask me to help me remove your judgments.
Because these come from your decision to be separate – from me, from God, from your Self and from this other person.
And when your judgment is gone, and your ego is gone, then the wisdom of my love would flow through you and would come out in whatever the words would be and whatever the behavior would be that would helpful.
You don’t want to focus on the Voice as this wonderful, magical, mystical thing. You want to focus on the work. This Course is about work. It takes a tremendous amount of determination, willingness and vigilance.
And it’s work in looking at your ego which you can’t do by yourself.
The purpose of having Jesus in your life is to go to Him with your ego, with your judgments and your decision to be separate. And that will simplify everything for you in this Course."