Setting the Goal

Chapter 17 – 6. Setting the Goal

The practical application of the Holy Spirit’s purpose is extremely simple,
but it is unequivocal. In fact, in order to be simple it must be unequivocal.
 
The simple is merely what is easily understood, and for this it is apparent
that it must be clear. The setting of the Holy Spirit’s goal is general. Now he
will work with you to make it specific. There are certain very specific
guidelines he provides for any situation, but remember that you do not yet
realize their universal application. Therefore, it is essential at this point to
use them in each situation separately, until you can more safely look beyond
each situation, in an understanding far broader than you now possess.
 
In any situation in which you are uncertain, the first thing to consider, very
simply, is “What do I want to come of this? What is it for?” The
clarification of the goal belongs at the beginning, for it is this which will
determine the outcome. In the ego’s procedure this is reversed. The situation
becomes the determiner of the outcome, which can be anything. The reason
for this disorganized approach is evident. The ego does not know what it
wants to come of the situation. It is aware of what it does not want, but only
that. It has no positive goal at all.
 
Without a clear-cut, positive goal, set at the outset, the situation just seems
to happen, and makes no sense until it has already happened. Then you look
back at it, and try to piece together what it must have meant. And you will
be wrong. Not only is your judgment in the past, but you have no idea what
should happen. No goal was set with which to bring the means in line. And
now the only judgment left to make is whether or not the ego likes it; is it
acceptable, or does it call for vengeance? The absence of a criterion for
outcome, set in advance, makes understanding doubtful and evaluation
impossible.
 
The value of deciding in advance what you want to happen is simply that
you will perceive the situation as a means to make it happen. You will
therefore make every effort to overlook what interferes with the
accomplishment of your objective, and concentrate on everything that helps
you meet it. It is quite noticeable that this approach has brought you closer
to the Holy Spirit’s sorting out of truth and falsity. The true becomes what
can be used to meet the goal. The false becomes the useless from this point
of view. The situation now has meaning, but only because the goal has
made it meaningful.
 
The goal of truth has further practical advantages. If the situation is used for
truth and sanity, its outcome must be peace. And this is quite apart from
what the outcome is. If peace is the condition of truth and sanity, and cannot
be without them, where peace is they must be. Truth comes of itself. If you
experience peace, it is because the truth has come to you and you will see
the outcome truly, for deception cannot prevail against you. You will
recognize the outcome because you are at peace. Here again you see the
opposite of the ego’s way of looking, for the ego believes the situation
brings the experience. The Holy Spirit knows that the situation is as the goal
determines it, and is experienced according to the goal.
 
The goal of truth requires faith. Faith is implicit in the acceptance of the
Holy Spirit’s purpose, and this faith is all-inclusive. Where the goal of truth
is set, there faith must be. The Holy Spirit sees the situation as a whole. The
goal establishes the fact that everyone involved in it will play his part in its
accomplishment. This is inevitable. No one will fail in anything. This seems
to ask for faith beyond you, and beyond what you can give. Yet this is so
only from the viewpoint of the ego, for the ego believes in “solving”
conflict through fragmentation, and does not perceive the situation as a
whole. Therefore, it seeks to split off segments of the situation and deal
with them separately, for it has faith in separation and not in wholeness.
 
Confronted with any aspect of the situation that seems to be difficult, the
ego will attempt to take this aspect elsewhere, and resolve it there. And it
will seem to be successful, except that this attempt conflicts with unity, and
must obscure the goal of truth. And peace will not be experienced except in
fantasy. Truth has not come because faith has been denied, being withheld
from where it rightfully belonged. Thus do you lose the understanding of
the situation the goal of truth would bring. For fantasy solutions bring but
the illusion of experience, and the illusion of peace is not the condition in
which truth can enter.