Decision is shown here in what you accept as your own choice. When you accept the ego’s decisions as yours, the results appear quickly and lead to self-judgment. The section also says you have chosen the movement toward real learning through willingness to teach, implying that the teacher you accept determines the fruits you experience.

This makes decision observable. You do not need to guess which teacher is leading; you can look at the fruits—the emotional and relational outcomes. If the fruits are strain and blame, you accepted the ego’s decision. If the fruits are gentleness and clarity, you chose the inner Teacher. Decision becomes the willingness to change teachers and therefore change what you teach.

The Course often says you teach what you are, because what you accept in your mind is what you extend. This section makes that principle immediate by linking decision to fruits. When you accept the ego’s decisions as your own, you do not have to wait long to see the result. The fruits are quick: tension, defensiveness, comparison, the feeling that something is wrong with you or with someone else. Then the ego adds a second layer of attack—self-judgment for having the first layer.

The key phrase in the context is that you accepted those decisions as your choice. The ego likes to pretend its interpretations are forced on you: “I had no choice but to be upset.” This section reverses that. It says the ego’s decision only has power because you agreed with it. That agreement can be withdrawn, and withdrawing it changes the fruit.

The section also brings in a hopeful counterbalance: you have chosen the movement toward real learning by your willingness to teach. Teaching here is not lecturing. It is the content you bring into every encounter. When you are willing to teach peace, you are already choosing a different Teacher, because the ego cannot teach peace. The Holy Spirit can. Your willingness is the decision that lets Him use you.

The fruits then become a diagnostic, not a verdict. If the fruit is bitter, it simply tells you which teacher was chosen. That information is meant to help you change teachers, not to punish you. You can say, “I chose wrongly,” without guilt, and then choose again. In fact, that is the reward of teaching: your experience shows you immediately whether your lesson was of the ego or of the Holy Spirit.

So apply this by watching outcomes with kindness. Notice what your decisions are producing. If the fruit is self-attack, recognize the choice you made and let it be corrected. Ask the Holy Spirit how to teach differently in this moment—perhaps by offering a quiet blessing instead of a verdict. The new fruit will appear as a lighter feeling. That lightness is the reward that confirms a new decision has been accepted.