“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

I have spoken of “you,” yet this must not be confused with the “you” that you often think you are — the ego alone, for the ego is only a portion of You; it is that expert part of your personality that deals directly with the contents of your conscious mind, and is concerned most directly with the material portions of your experience.

The ego is a very specialized portion of your greater identity. It is a portion of you that arises to deal directly with the life that the larger You is living. The ego can feel cut off, lonely and frightened, however, if the conscious mind lets the ego run away with it. The ego and the conscious mind are not the same thing. The ego is composed of various portions of the personality — it is a combination of characteristics, ever-changing, that act in unitary fashion — the portion of the personality that deals most directly with the world.

In certain terms, the ego is the eye through which the conscious mind perceives, or the focus through which it views physical reality. But the conscious mind automatically changes its focus throughout life. The ego, while appearing the same to itself, ever changes. It is only when the conscious mind becomes rigid in its direction, or allows the ego to take on some of its own functions, that difficulties arise. Then the ego allows the conscious mind to work in certain directions and blocks its awareness in others.