A Course in Miracles (ACIM APP) clearly points out how perception and choice are very closely linked together. As long as we perceive error, the tendency is to continue to choose error through judgment thereby making error more real. We are the source choosing perceptions, placing judgment on corresponding results. And finally judging those results as being real as well. All of this leads us back to perception and choice and to start the cycle once again.
As you perceive, you judge and project; and as you judge and project, you perceive back. Having perceived the judgments and projections back with you. You will now judge those and project them outward until you perceive the results back. The ego knows no other way. It is a continuous judgmental cycle until you choose to break it; and yes, there is a way to do just that. There is one obvious choice off the merry-go-round. And it is so simple you will scratch your head in wonder you had not thought of it before now.
Choice remains unsettling because so long as you make choices that further the error, or take you deeper into the illusion. It seems as though you are merely making choices between the lessor of two evils. That’s because you are only choosing between the sides of the wrong mind. The ego has a “wrong” and “right” side but neither is the true Right Mind of the Holy Spirit. If there was ever a New Year’s resolution worth keeping, it would be: Stop judging and turn them over to the Holy Spirit for correction instead.
The Tiny Mad Idea:
The original separation is consider a “tiny mad idea” wherein you thought you were separate from source. This is also call “the error” and is the original choice for judgment of the ego. Already down that road in the mind, it becomes another layer each time you judge the consequences, or corresponding effect, from the error as cause. What this means is every time you judge what you see or what is happening in the world. And you choose to believe the ego about it, you are choosing the error as cause once again. Corresponding effects show up which reinforce your belief in error.