Untitled

Psychic
Politics
an aspect psychology book
Jane Roberts
Author o fthe Seth Books
a
Classics in Consciousness
series book
Moment Point Press

Portsmouth, New Hampshire
Moment Point Press, Inc.
P.O. Box 4549
Portsmouth, NH 03802-4549
www.momentpoint.com
Psychic Politics: An Aspect Psychology Book

A Classics in Consciousness Series Book
Copyright © 2000 by Robert F. Butts
Copyright © 1976 by Jane Roberts
Originally published by Prentice-Hall in hardcover, 1976
Author photo copyright © 1997 by Robert F. Butts

Cover art by Jane Roberts. Copyright © 1977 by Jane Roberts
Cover design by Metaglyph

Typeset by A & B Typesetters in Adobe Garamond
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner
whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied
in critical articles and reviews. For information please address Moment Point Press, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Roberts, Jane, 1929—1984

Psychic politics: an aspect psychology book
/ Jane Roberts.
p. cm.~(A classics in consciousness series book)
Includes index.
ISBN 0-9661327-4-2 (alk. paper)
1. Parapsychology. I. Title. II. Series.

BF1031.R633 2000 99-048400
，
158 l~dc21 CIP
Printed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This book is printed on acid free paper.

P u b l is h e r ’s A c k n o w l e d g m e n t
Moment Point Press would like to thank Seth Network International for
their kind support. W ith special thanks to Lynda Dahl, and in loving
memory of Stan Ulkowski.
SNI is a nonprofit network of Seth/Jane Roberts readers from more than

thirty countries who meet to explore the Seth material. You can visit SNI
at www.efn.org.
C la ssic s i n C o n s c io u s n e s s S er ies
By the time Jane Roberts’s first aspect psychology book, Adventures in

Consciousness, was published in 1975， Roberts had been speaking for Seth,
an “energy essence personality no longer focused in physical reality,” for
over ten years: Seth had already dictated two complete books through her
(Seth Speaks and The Nature ofPersonal Reality)' and she was known to
hundreds of thousands of readers throughout the nation, if not the world.
Yet, she refused to accept the “official” explanations of her experiences
that both science and religion offered. Instead, Roberts spent her life
searching for her own answers to the phenomenon of Seth and to her psy
chic abilities and experiences. She risked ridicule and asked new ques
tions. The conclusions she came to are, today, as relevant to our search for
an understanding of consciousness as they were twenty years ago.
Moment Point Press is proud to publish Jane Roberts’sAdventures in Con

sciousness, Psychic Politics, and The GodofJane as the first books in a series we
have named Classics in Consciousness~a series dedicated to republishing
works that contribute to our continuing quest for an understanding of con
sciousness. We gratefixlly dedicate this series to Jane Roberts.
B o o k s by J a n e R o b e r t s
The Bundu (fiction, 1958)

The Rebellers (fiction, 1963)
How to Develop Your ESP Power
(1966, also published as The Coming ofSeth)
The Seth M aterial (1970)
Seth Speaks: The Eternal Validity ofthe Soul. A Seth Book (1972)
The Education ofOversoul Seven (fiction, 1973)
The Nature ofPersonalReality. A Seth Book (1974)
Adventures in Consciousness: An Introduction to Aspect Psychology (1975)
Dialogues ofthe Soul and M ortal Selfin Time (1975)
Psychic Politics: An AspectPsychology Book (1976)
The World View ofPaul Cezanne: A Psychic Interpretation (1977)
The “Unknown”Reality，Volume I. A Seth Book (1977)
TheAfterdeath Journal ofan American Philosopher:
The World View ofW illiam James (1978)
The “Unknown”Reality，Volume II. A Seth Book (1979)
The Further Education ofOversoul Seven (fiction, 1979)
Em ir’sEducation in the Proper Use ofMagicalPowers (1979)
The Nature ofthe Psyche: Its Human Expression. A Seth Book (1979)
The Individual and the Nature ofMass Events. A Seth Book (1981)
The God ofJane: A PsychicManifesto (1981)
IfW e Live Again: Or, Public Magic and Private Love (poetry, 1982)
OversoulSeven and the Museum ofTime (1984)
Dreams, “Evolution， ”and Value Fulfillm ent，Volumes I and II.
A Seth Book (1986)
Seth, DreamSy and Projection ofConsciousness (1986)
The MagicalApproach: Seth SpeaksAbout the A rt ofCreative Living.
A Seth Book (1995)
The Way Toward Health. A Seth Book (1997)
O ther B ooks of Interest
from M om ent P o i n t P ress
Adventures in Consciousness
an introduction to aspectpsychology
by Jane Roberts
a Classics in Consciousness
series book
The God o fJane

a psychic manifesto
by Jane Roberts
a Classics in Consciousness
series book
Conversations w ith Seth

the story ofJane Roberts’sESP class
revised, combined volumes I and II
by Susan M. Watkins
The S p iritual Universe

onephysicist’s vision of
，，
spirit soul matter, and self
by Fred Alan Wolf, Ph.D.
Consciously Creating Each Day

a 365 dayperpetual calendar of
spirited thought
from voicespast andpresent
edited by Susan Ray
For more information

visit us at
www.momentpoint.com
Contents
Part One
The Library and an
Introduction to the Super-Real
Chapter 1 The Library 3

Chapter 2 A Private View of the “Super-Real,” and Models
for Physical Reality and Psychic Structures 17
Chapter 3 Models and Beloved Eccentrics 29
Chapter 4 Rob and the Roman Captain, and Models and
Reincarnational Selves 39
Chapter 5 Glimpses and Direct Encounters, and the Fly
and the Book 47
Chapter 6 The James Material and the Carl Jung Text 53
Chapter 7 More from the Library, and Seth Explains the
James Material and Introduces"World Views” 63
Chapter 8 Unofficial Contents of the Mind 71
Chapter 9 The Ape and the Silver Guide 81
Chapter 10 A Young Celebate, the Boy with the Hole in His
Chest, and the Book of the Gods 91
Chapter 11 Time and Time Structures: The Shape ofTime 97
Chapter 12 The Jamaican Woman, “Counterparts,” and
Four-Fronted Selves 105
Chapter 13 The Exploding Psyche and Strands of
Consciousness 119
Chapter 14 Back to the Library, Climbing Up the Steps
of the Psyche, and the G irl Who Tried to
Love Everybody 133
Chapter 15 Seth: On Love and Hate, and Inner Codes 143
Part Two
Voices from the World
Chapter 16 Voiccx from “the Underground,” and the Politics

ol ihe hocus Personality 155
Chapter 17 A Probable Class
Chapter 18 Sex and Energy: Some Inventive Versions, and
Seth by the Ouijafuls
Chapter 19 I Hear a Voice and There’s No One There, and
Official and Unofficial Sequences
Chapter 20 We Move in More Ways Than One, and
“Special Places”
Part Three
Toward a N ew Politics o f the Psyche,
and an Alternate Model for Civilization to Follow
Chapter 21 The Codicils, and an Alternate Model for

Civilization to Follow
Chapter 22 Personal Application of Codicils, the Gods Take
O ff Their Clothes, and Psychic Civilizations
and Psychic Estates
Chapter 23 The Natural Contours of the Psyche
Chapter 24 Stages of Consciousness
Chapter 25 The Heroic Dimension and Heroic Personages
Chapter 26 Toward a New Politics of the Psyche, a New
Allegiance, and Heroic Impulses
Chapter 27 “Come to the Mountain,” and Seth on the
Safe Universe
Index
P a rt O n e
The Library
and an Introduction
to the Super-Real
C hapter 1
T h e L ib ra ry
e’ve just moved into a house, a n d now our Water Street quar
W ters are vacant. As I write, I no longer hear the bridge traffic at

the corner intersection or watch the pigeons on our roof above
the parking lot. It was in that large living room that the Seth sessions first
began. In the beginning there was just Rob and me, artist and writer, hus
band and wife, experimenting as millions do with a Ouija board. By the
time we left those apartments, nearly forty students were crowding the liv
ing room each Tuesday; Seth, my “trance personality,” had dictated two
books and was nearly finished with another one; and I’d written three of
my own. More than that: When I walked into that apartment house for the
first time, I was thirty-one; and when I left for the final time, I was forty-
five. The Seth sessions began when I was thirty-five.
In the beginning years we were very secretive about the sessions,
telling only a few close friends but not the neighbors. A couple of times,
Seths booming voice carried through the night air. Once a neighbor came
to investigate. It was summer; the windows were open, and he must have
been struck by the odd quality of Seths voice: deep, masculine-like, and ac
cented in a strange fashion weVe never been able to categorize. Anyway,
when the knock came at the door, Rob turned on the television—loud.
And our neighbor saw just the two of us, innocently sitting there. The man
tried to explain about the voice he heard. Rob said, “It must have been the
television program,” and our neighbor went away, shaking his head.
In a way, Seth is like a television program, in that Im tuned in to an
other channel of reality during sessions so that Seths “program” plays over
my own, or temporarily supersedes my own official station of conscious
ness. Sometimes I think that Seth is like some public education channel; in
visible dials whirl in my head, and he clicks on. Other times I think of Seth
as a director of some multidimensional communications network with me
lucky enough to possess a unique set to pick up his stations. Certainly he
4 Chapter 1
seems to direct many of my other excursions into realms of consciousness

beyond the norm.
More and more “stations” seem available to me all the time, yet al
ways Seth is the general “commentator”：the master of ceremonies, the
newscaster, the genial guide through jungles and deserts and mountains of
the inner mind.
In other words, one way or another, I get signals from strange lands. I
always have, though when I was growing up I just labeled everything as in
spiration and let it go at that. Finally inspiration had a voice of its own and
a personage, Seth, to boot. So Seth writes his books and I write mine, and
each succeeding stable alteration of consciousness brings new messages
from these alien yet somehow familiar inner lands of reality.
Listening to these messages, translating them, writing them down is
life to me. Seth says that being is its own justification, and for a while I
thought that perhaps I wrote to justify my life. It took some time for me to
realize that being is writing to me. When I ’m not “turned on” in my own
particular fashion, my being seems dimmer. I become glum. So when I’ve
finished one book, I can’t wait to begin another.
When I completed Adventures in Consciousness, then, my last book, I
went around in a huff for a while. Nothing contented me, although Seth
was dictating The “Unknown” Reality in our twice-weekly sessions. The
days disappeared into weeks and I grew more restless. I felt disconnected
from my being. So I began the series of steps I usually take whenever I
want to contact deeper levels of my own consciousness. I did some water-
color painting, but that didn’t seem to work. Then one afternoon early in
October I wrote the following poem, half angrily, depicting my situation.
Invitation
Ah love this stubborn mortal self,

once more trying to contact its soul,
and w ond ering on an au tum n afternoon
how best to trick it from its high domain.
The mortal selfsays, “Dear soul,
The earth is beautiful this time ofyear
and certainly some part of you is touched
by the leaves dizzily falling everywhere,
and by the misty autumn dusk
that swirls around the neighborhood
like a ghost on a treasure hunt.
But if you aren’t,
isn’t it enough that I’d like to talk?
You’re my soul, after all,
The Library 5
so I don’t seewhy I need an appointment

to get a moment of your time.
“I，
ll m eet you any place a t all,
though some structure seems to help,
so I’m offering this poem
which is flexible enough to bear
the weight of even the heaviest dialogue.
First of all, I，
d like to know
if you’ve heard a thing
I，ve had to say so far.
So before I really begin,
would you kindly give me some sign
that youre listening?”
With this, the mortal self gets up,

makes some coffee, then comes back
and sits down again to wait.
It wonders: who knows about the souls world
except the selfwho surely doesn’t know enough,
and if the soul did speak, who，d know
except its earthly counterpart?
Suspense. T he moments pass.
The cat meows.
The mortal selfsays,
“I feel like such an ass
E ith e r I ’m using the w ro ng approach,
or my soul doesn’t act
as if it knows that Im alive.”
There were actually many other verses to the poem, but these contain
the main request: I wanted to feel in touch again, and I wanted an uprush
of inspiration and energy. The mortal self~me, of coursewent on rather
quarrelsomely to say that it was only too ready to do whatever it was sup
posed to do next, providing the soul would be kind enough to inform it of
its next “project.” Having written the poem, I rested my case and waited,
though not too graciously.
But what energy that poem set into action, and how it propelled me
into new excursions! Because of it this book is being written and my exte
rior life changed, so that now the Water Street apartments where all this
began are now a memory. More than that, I became familiar with new di
mensions of being and began to learn more about the alternate realities
that wind in and out of this one all the time.
Actually, I woi kcd on I he poem off and on for nearly a week, adding
new verses as I ihoup.hi <>! new arguments in my own favor. But still I
6 Chapter 1
received no answer, as far as I could tell. No new insights, dreams, or ideas

came to me. Great, I thought ironically, and I’d do another verse asking
“the soul” where it was, and what was wrong, and repeating my request for
a kind of communication that I could understand.
Each morning I’d sit at least briefly at my deskw aiting. About a
week and a half later, on October 25, 1974, I plunked myself down as
usual. By then Yd nearly forgotten the poem itself. There wasn’t an idea in
my head. Then, suddenly, my next project was presented to me so clearly
that I could have no doubts. A ll at once the image of a library was trans
posed over the southeast corner of the living room, and in it I saw my own
image. At the same time, two paragraphs sprang to life within my mind.
Excited, I wrote them down and then described the experience itself as it
began to unfold. By then I knew that the notes were themselves the begin
ning of a new book.
These are my original notes. The first two paragraphs are arranged ex
actly as I saw them in my mental vision—I imagine that this was to set
them off and let me know that new material was involved. Even later, that
precise arrangement was significant to me.
‘“No man is an island unto himself/

but each person contains an inner
civilization of the self which he
learns to govern with a psychic
politics that is the framework for
the outer world of government and
law.
“The ego rises from the civilization

of the psyche just as the ruler, king, queen,
president, or dictator rises from the masses
of the people; appointed, chosen, or taking
control according to an inner politics first
existing within the greater inner mind.
“丁he above two paragraphs affect me most strangely, with a force dif
ficult to describe. I feel that they exist somewhere else and have for cen
turies, that they are inevitable, and that the book in which they appear has
already been written, though I am just beginning to transcribe it. The book
is a classic, known as such somewhere or in some other time. The two para
graphs above are just the beginning, yet they come to me with an impecca
ble sense of their rightness. Suddenly I’m sure that I’m meant to Svrite’ that
book, that it represents my path， and is a part of my destiny. I don’t mean
The Library 7
that I feel forced to do this, but that I recognize in some odd manner the
utter rightness of this path, this book and what it represents, to me. The
book is to be called Psychic Politics.
wCertainly IVe b ee n writing these years, and no one else, I ， m con
vinced, could produce The Seth M aterial or maintain the kind of rela
tionship that I have with Seth, but this new book strikes me in an even
more intimate fashion. Yet a sense of distance operates; the distance that
still separates me from the complete manuscript in our time, for I am
pulling it to me or it is pulling me to it, one or the other, in the most nat
ural fashion.
“There seems to be a path between me and the book that strikes me
more than anything else in my life so far as my way/ so that I find myself
wondering if IVe already written it in some other place or time. It might
have been written by someone else. But in any case I feel that I， m the one
meant to transcribe it, and that this act brings the book alive in three-
dimensional reality, even though it exists outside of that context and is
being translated into it.
“Part of the book, the main part, represents certain principles and dy
namics of the psyche that have always been known at certain levels. Yet
what I add in terms of fresh examples and experience w ill make the book
applicable in our time. Again, I feel strongly that this is a classic, perhaps
lost from libraries that were destroyed in other civilizations.
“I recognize this sense of perfect rightness only now as something I’ve
been searching for for years, that would bring its own high assurance and
psychic aptness; as if IVe been casting my consciousness out in all direc
tions, p ro b in g , and that sooner or later Yd have to find this clear circle or
path to a particular source. And somehow I kept myself off-balance in the
meantime, in that I continued searching when it seemed that I should be
satisfied; because I wouldn’t know what it was I wanted until I found it.
‘“It/ the book, may only be one of many, but I seem to sense it as if it
is the first of many in a great library, bound in gold, a collection of classics
that are somehow echoed in other ways within the private and mass psy
che. The image of the library may be symbolic, of course, yet on another
level I can see myself standing there by those volumes, nearly weeping,
thinking that IVe finally come home.
“I feel that my destiny is to transcribe these invisible books, sifting
them through my psyche as it lives in our time, and therefore re-creating
the books by imbuing them once more with life. They have to be trans
lated through the flesh, and they grow through its medium, even while the
transcriber has to have the most perfect affinity for them on other, psychic
levels. This was the next step waiting for me, that I was to follow, and per
haps all the others have been leading to this one.
8 Chapter 1
“I don’t know where Seth fits into all this. Through me, he’s been writ
ing his books for years, but I don’t feel any conflict between this new work of
mine and his. Instead, they are connected. Seths books represent one unique
personality addressing other unique personalities. These other new books
seem to be something else entirelyapart, aloof, finished in one sense: prin
ciples that w ill come alive through my private experience. And I feel that the
books and my life w ill interweave, so that each adds to the other.”
Just as I finished writing the above, there was a knock at the door. I
thought it was the paper boy and yelled, “Come in.” Instead, to my com
plete surprise, a young man came striding into the living room, his arms
confidently swinging, his eyes shining, moist~and determined. I’ll call
him Lyman.*
I nearly groaned in disbelief. I’d met him only the night before when
he，d attended my expansion of consciousness class. He， d identified himself
by phone earlier that day as a “budding parapsychologist,” speaking with
great erudite phrases. After class, though, he wanted me to tell him what to
do with his life, as if it was my challenge instead of his. I took nearly an
hour to talk to him, hopefully to reinforce his confidence in himself.
Apparently I ， d succeeded, but not in the way I thought, because here
he was, unannounced. W ith one brisk gesture he had his jacket off, his tape
recorder on the table beside me, next to the pile of Kleenex soggily sitting
t h e r e I had a cold—and he attacked me with his energetic eyes. W ith no
preamble he started in. He， d phoned another psychic, enthusiastically
telling me how he， d tracked the woman down to her hospital bed. “Then,
though the call cost me twenty dollars, it was worth it,” he said. “I told her
all about you and your class and found that she’d read your books; and I
asked her to comment on your ideas.”
I just sat looking at him, and at the Kleenex.
“You say there isn’t going to be a holocaust,” he said. “And all the
other psychics, including Cayce, say there w ill be. She said that the holo
caust won’t come in the year 2000, but any day now. What have you got to
say to that?” He turned on his recorder.
“Not a damned thing,” I said.
He plunged on. “And she says there is a hierarchy in the astral plane,
and that only seven people have access to the Akashic records, and shes one
of them. The others charge huge prices and only tell about one life, where
for far less, only fifty dollars, she gives a reading that includes all the lives
丁
* hroughout this book, names and personal details have been changed to protect the pri-
vacy o f those involved.
The Library 9
you’ve had in other times that affect this one. But you say that there aren’t
any Akashic records to begin with, that they’re only a symbol for some
thing else. So how do you explain that?”
His appreciation of his own astute abilities as a psychic detective was
almost too much for him to bear. I let him go on for another fifteen min
utes before I asked quietly enough, “What did you come here for?”
He was eloquent. He gestured grandly. “I wanted you to ask Seth to
comment on the discrepancies between what he says and what others say. I
wanted you to as— ”
“I couldn’t care less,” I said, with a very quiet but studied ungracious
ness.
“What?” he asked.
I stared at him and blew my nose, dirtying another Kleenex.
“But Seth may care,” Lyman said, scandalized.
“I doubt that he does,” I said. There was silence for the first time since
Lyman barged in on me. I said, quietly enough, “You could have apolo
gized for just coming here without calling first.”
He didn’t even blush. “I thought you wouldn’t see me; that you’d be
busy,” he said, obviously impressed with his own daring. “So I just came
anyway.”
“I just started a new book, as you came in,” I said, “and I still have
supper dishes to do, and a Seth session in an hour.”
“Can I bum one of those?” he asked, picking up my pack of ciga
rettes.
The phone rang. I answered it. A young man asked to attend one of my
classes, but what he really wanted was help in making a decision. “It’s a spir
itual, mental decision,whe said three or four times, in three or four different
mixed-up ways. He wanted me to tell him what to do. I took a few minutes
to talk to him, saying that getting other people to make your decisions for
you was no way to learn how to make decisions, and was no training at all for
any kind of development. I gave him a few simple techniques for clearing his
mind, and hung up. Mr. Junior Parapsychologist was still sitting there.
“You’re still here because Im trying to figure out my reasons for your
visit, as apart from yours,” I said. I meant, but didn’t say, “How come this
guy came to bug me just when I felt that Yd just found my own “true
path”？As much as I disliked the pat phrase, it seemed completely apt.
“You mean there’s another reason?” Lyman was instantly excited.
“Like I ，ve known you or Seth in a past life or something? I knew it. I have
to admit that I knew it; another psychic told me so.”
“I，m afraid that’s not what I mean at all,” I said, but he was all wound
up again. Visions of grandeur and hope tensed his muscles. He leaned for
ward so abruptly that the piles of Kleenex quivered.
10 Chapter 1
Startled, I looked up; and suddenly I saw my reasons for Lymans

visit. I realized that through the entire interview, from the instant he， d
walked through the door, Lyman had been bigger than life somehow; at
least as far as I was concerned. Super-real. Yd been presented— he， d pre
sented m e w ith the first character for my book. He was so himself, so im
peccably what he was that I could only marvel at his uniqueness whether
he bugged me or not. It was as if he arrived freshly out of space and time,
self-delivering himself as a package of which he was, of course, supremely
proud, but a package that Yd be bound to look at with my own eyes. And
he was a fantastic package tied with glowing bands of enthusiasm. I just
didn’t like the contents.
And I saw why. He was a living presentation of some of my own old
fears and ideas, coming just when I thought Yd just given them up. Yd al
ways scorned the idea of Akashic records as a psychic convention, repre
senting something else perhaps. Certainly I didn’t believe that some super
score sheet of our lives was written out there in space somewhere for any
body to read. On the other hand, before Lymans visit I， d found myself in a
library at another level of reality, and felt it “my destiny” to transcribe and
re-create some of the books there.
I’d been doing all this thinking, staring at the freshly minted Lyman,
when I realized that he was waiting for me to speak, leaning forward with
his great intent anticipatory stare. “Seth and I are related, then,” he
shouted, unable to bear it for another moment. “I had to retain some skep
ticism, but I ’ve known it all along~” He reached for another of my ciga
rettes; nervously, as if sure that the revelations of the ages were about to fall
upon his shoulders and he wanted to be prepared.
“No, you and Seth aren’t related,” I said as gently as I could. But I
thought: O f course—Lyman was representing my own ideas about some
thing else too; the overly gullible people who parade as skeptics. A ll many
of them need is a word that they ve been some big shot in a past life, or
known some famous person, and presto, they’re confirmed “believers.”
People like th a tlik e the boy on the phone~never trust their own vision.
And up to now I hadn’t completely trusted mine either, I thought. Every
time I was presented with a Lyman or the Akashic records or spiritual name
dropping, Vd think: Those people trust their visions and look at them.
Some kind of integrity is missing from their lives. So I watched my own vi
sions with a stern questioning eye. But Yd been wrong. Those people relied
on dogma, not visions at all.
I had to get rid of Lyman so I could figure it all out. He looked disap
pointed but still determined to stay forever. You could almost hear him
crowing later to his friends, “I just hung in there, boy!” To me he said, “You
have to understand. I have to track the famous psychics down and compare
The Library 11
what they say, and note the discrepancies.” His voice rang with conviction.
It was an invigorating, exciting sport to him; but he wasn’t going to run
around my track anymore.
“Great,” I said. “You do what you have to do. Enjoy yourself, if that’s
your thing. But it isn’t my thing. Okay?” I was grinning. “I still have a ses
sion tonight.” This time my voice was firm.
He stood up. “You do understand?” he asked.
“You bet I do,” I said. “Do your thing, Lyman. Just not here, if you
don’t mind.”
But I was laughing, because I realized that in the past Vd often
doubted my own vision just because I didn’t trust other peoples visions. I’d
begun to feel that visions themselves were at best untrustworthy, and that
the more you believed in your own, the blinder you become to the reality
of others. Now, in fact, I saw that there was no need to judge visions at all.
They simply are. You accept or reject them. But thank God, I no longer felt
that I must be responsible for the reliability of a llvisions, or for how others
use or misuse them. I ’m only responsible for my own.
And what aboutmy own? I wondered when Lyman finally left. What
about the library that Vd sensed so briefly before the interruption? What
about the book? Was I, as I suspected, at the beginning of a new creative
and psychic adventure, or would I back off? I could see myself saying, “I， ve
got this, uh, library in the sky~”
And me answering, “Sure you have, baby. Don’t worry, its a ll right!”
Then I thought: Symbolic or not, real in our terms or unreal, a part of my
psyche or separate, there’s something there and I ’m going to find out what
it is.
W h e n L y m a n le ft, it w as a lre a d y p ast 8 :0 0 p.m . S e th w as d ic ta tin g
his own book, The “Unknotun” Reality, in our twice-weekly private ses
sions. One was due in about an hour. Years ago we， d mutually settled
upon 9:00 p.m. Monday and Wednesday. This was particularly advanta
geous in the beginning~people weren’t as apt to drop in during the mid
dle of the week~but beside this, Im a night person. I can’t imagine
holding sessions regularly in the morning or afternoon, for example. My
mind wasn’t really on having a session that night, though. I was thinking
about the days experiences for one thing, and I still had the supper
dishes to do. (Rob and I divide our household chores. I get meals— ex
cept breakfast—and do dishes, plus some of the cleaning; he does the
wash and the rest of the cleaning.) Anyway that day I ，d stacked the lunch
dishes too. So I went out to the kitchen, finished my chores, and finally
sat down with Rob for our session.
My own experiences vary at such times. Usually when Seth is dictat
ing a book, I simply alter my own consciousness, and let Seth “go to it.” He
12 Chapter 1
takes my glasses off, begins to dictate after a few remarks to Rob, and con
tinues, with a few rest periods, for the next two or three hours. That night
things began to happen the minute I sat down for the session. Luckily, Seth
described one of my experiences, and I was able to tell Rob about others on
the spot, because later, I didn’t remember what happened at all.
This was our 714th official session, Wednesday, October 23，1974.1
can imagine how Rob looked, sitting there grinning, because I had a cold;
I，d been excited over the “library,” and after Lyman came Vd wondered
aloud about having a session at all. But here Seth was, coming through al
most as soon as we sat down. Almost at the same time, I sensed an odd
pyramid effect over my head; a subjective phenomenon that I experience
now and then with psychic work. Another fairly familiar sensation accom
panied the pyramid effect. I felt physically massive. I，
d no sooner told Rob
about this when Seth came through:
This is somewhat of a momentous evening for Ruburt [as Seth

calls me]. As I speak, he is experiencing certain sensations in which his
body feels drastically elongated; the head reaching out beyond the
stars; the whole form straddling realities. Now in a sense, the physical
body does this always; that is, it sits astride realities, containing even
within itself dimensions of time and being that cannot be verbally de
scribed.
The unknown reality and the psyches greater existence cannot be
separated from the intimate knowledge of the flesh, however, for the life
of the flesh takes place within that framework. As earlier mentioned,
generally the conscious selffocuses in but one small dimension. That di
mension, however, is experienced as fully as possible, its clear brilliance
and exquisite focus possible only because you tune in to it and bring to
it the foremost ofyour attention. When you understand how to do this,
then you can begin to tune in to other ‘stations， as well.
As he continued, Seth used my experiences to point up the existence

of the “unknown reality” and to discuss other ways of exploring it.
There are inner conventions, then, as there are outer ones. As the
outer mores try to force you to conform to generally accepted ideas, so
the inner conventions try to force you to make your inner experience
conform to preconceived packaging. There are good reasons for con
ventions. Generally they help organize experience. If they are lightly
held to and accepted, they can serve well as guidelines. Applied with a
heavy hand, they become unnecessary dogma, rigidly limiting experi
ence. ...
Ruburt has thus far insisted upon his private vision and his unique
expression of the unknown reality as he experiences it, so he brings back
bulletins that do not agree with the conventional psychic line.”
The Library 13
Seth spoke for nearly an hour about “psychic guided tours” and the
various kinds of dogmas that can program inner experience. Then we took
a rest period. The feeling of massiveness Seth described was still with me. I
felt as if my head would go through the roof when I stood up. At the same
time, I knew quite well that I retained my usual physical size even though
I was experiencing it differently at one level. So when I did stand up, one
part of me walked around in my usual fashion while another part of me felt
as if my head reached far above the earth.
Actually, our break only lasted about ten minutes, then Seth returned
and continued dictating his own book. He spoke for half an hour, then
said, “Give us a moment.” Instantly I went into a series of experiences that
I forgot almost at once. I tried to describe them to Rob on the spot, and
here I’ll have to give excerpts from Robs notes taken at the time. Even now,
as far as I’m concerned on a conscious level, the experiences might as well
have happened to someone else. Only the sense of “knowing” and certainty
remains. The events themselves vanished almost as soon as they happened:
‘“If I can get this, it ，
ll be something, I'll tell you/ Jane said, lighting
up a cigarette. She sipped a beer. 'Rob, what Im getting is • • • quick beau
tiful sounds that I cant duplicatevery quick, very musical~connected
with the spin of electrons and cellular composition. The spin of electrons
is faster than the cellular composition. The faster speed of the electrons
somehow gives the cells their boundaries. And there’s something that’s in a
trance, say, in crystals, that’s alive in the cells.
K<Wait a minute. What I’m getting is a fantastic sound that’s impris
oned in a crystal, that speaks through light, thats the essence of personal
ity. Im getting almost jewel-like colored sounds. W ait~ I’ll see what I can
get with it. I want to get it in verbal stuff and I’m getting it so fast. • • •
“‘As the seed falls blown by the wind in any environment, so there’s a
seed of personality that rides on the wings of itself and falls into worlds of
many times and places. Falling with a sound that is its own true tone, struck
in different chords.
‘“These sounds are aware of their own separateness, gloriously
unique, yet each one merging into a symphony. Each sound recognizes it
self as itself, striking the dimensional medium in which it finds its expres
sion, yet its aware of the infinite multitudinous sounds it makes in other
realities— the instruments through which it so grandly plays. Each cell
“strikes” in the same fashion, and so does each self, in a kaleidoscope in
which each slightest variation has meaning and affects the individual notes
made by all. So we “strike” in more realities than one, and now I hear those
notes together yet separately, perhaps as raindrops, and attempt to put
them together and yet hear each separate note. • . • And suddenly I heard
my own true tone, which Im bound to follow.”
14 Chapter 1
After the first part, my delivery had been so steady that Rob won
dered if Fd gone back into a Seth trance, minus Seths usual voice effects
and manner. I ， d spoken so quickly that Rob had trouble taking notes. Yet
all I could say when I was done was, “It， s like a note finds its own true tone.
But once you strike it, you know thats it. You’ve got it made. You know
your own meaning in the universe, even if you can’t verbalize it.”
When it was over, I fe lt entirely different, even though whatever hap
pened had vanished from my conscious mind. I knew, even though I no
longer remembered what I knew. A ll in all, Seth actually said little about
the library itself, but I immediately connected the “true tone” with my feel
ings when I first glimpsed the library, and with my certainty that Yd “come
home” when I saw the books there. I said to Rob, “It’s strange. I feel that
no matter which way I turn, there’s a path laid out for me, and I never felt
that way before.” Seth didn’t come through any more that evening. I， ve
only quoted the portions of the session that directly related to my own ex
periences. The rest of the session appears in context in Seths own book.
The library, though, began to assume a reality of its own. The next
day as I sat at my desk, I suddenly “knew” that it was only part of a much
larger establishment. Then I found myself there, facing a floor-to-ceiling
bookcase. It didn’t occur to me to turn around to see what was behind me.
To my left, though, I glimpsed a library table of light-colored wood. Far to
my right was a window with a southern exposure and outside were lush
green grounds, though it was autumn and the trees were bare in the world
that I knew. Several times that day I suddenly found myselfstanding in the
library, always in the same place.
Later toward evening I put sausage and spaghetti on the stove to cook
for dinner and sat down to work at my desk for a few moments before call
ing Rob for our evening meal. I was looking out our wide bay windows at
the street below. W ith no preamble, I was aware of the library once again
and saw myself drinking a golden-colored elixir of some kind. I knew that
the drink, taken there、 was something like an overall tonic, toning up the
entire physical body and specifically purifying the blood. I got the impres
sion that this elixir was given to anyone from here who went there, and
that it also provided the necessary energy needed for work at hand. As I
drank the liquid in the library, at my table here I thought that it looked like
honey, only not as thick; and my head, here, suddenly felt very relaxed and
loose.
I just remembered something else: W hile doing the supper dishes
later I had the feeling that you could look out that library to our world,
The Library 15
and at my particular corner of Walnut and Water streets—and it seemed

that our world was a part of the library grounds.
I also knew, or thought I knew, that some kind of system of study was
being set up for me. I wasn’t to spend all of my time in the library but
would also be outside, in the field so to speak.
My feeling even then was that at some other level of reality Yd entered
a college or community of scholars, perhaps for a course of study. In the
past I ’ve had no great love of libraries, except that they provide a needed
service. That is, I used to think of them as places that had MSilence, please”
signs. But “my” library didn’t strike me that way at all. More than that, I
kept thinking “I’ve come home” whenever I found myself there.
Its quite possible, of course, that someone else might see flashes of
lights instead of books, or experience that same environment in a different
fashion. But for me from the beginning there was a library at another level
of experience; and I knew I’d be transcribing books from it and re-creating
them, and that while I went about my work here, Yd be making my way
there at the same time.
C h a pter 2
A Private V ie w o f the
“Super-Real，
，，and M odels for
Physical R eality and Psychic Structures
he next morning, Friday, October 25,1sat down at my desk, feel
T ing that some material “was ready for me” from the library. This
time I didn’t see the books or the table at all. Instead I felt lethar
gic and very relaxed. The words that came to me didn’t seem to be dictated
by anyone. In an almost mechanical fashion, they were transplanted from
the library into my head; at least, thats how it felt. The passage wasn’t long;
I wasn’t even sure that I knew what it meant, yet once again I was struck by
that sense of perfect aptness. This is the passage:
From the Library
Models for Physical Reality
There are ever-changing models for physical reality, transforming them

selves constantly in line with new equations instantly set up with each new
stabilization, eternally forming with a blinding rapidity of motion. Yet any
one model, whether for a molecule or an entire civilization, never vanishes
once it is impressed in the medium of probabilities. We tune in to these
models, and our interactions with them alter them at any given point, caus
ing new dimensions of actuality that then reach out from that new focus.
Past plus present equals future. 1 plus 1 equals 2. So it seems, but the
1,1，and 2 exist at the same time and so do the past, present, and future,
though not necessarily in that order.
18 Chapter 2
When I was finished I stared at what Yd written, but the passage didn’t re
ally register. It was lunch time, so I left my desk to do some chores, since
I，d planned to go downtown with Rob after lunch. In the meantime I kept
growing more and more relaxed, so that I almost decided to stay at home.
Certainly some part of me must have known what was going to happen
that afternoon, but it was only at the last moment that I changed my mind,
got my jacket, and told Rob that I ， d go with him after all.
As I stepped off the downstairs porch out into the backyard, I was
struck intensely by the beauty of the day~lawn full of autumns brown-
green leaves, each seeming amazingly separate and alive. Most of all, I felt
enveloped by the incredibly spicy odors of the earth—the smell of rotting
pears fallen from the tree outside Robs studio, and certain scents rising
from the ground itself~evocative yet impossible to categorize. I didn’t no
tice anything else until we， d driven several blocks and parked in front of an
office supply store. I waited in the car while Rob went inside, and as I sat
there, my body began to feel silky, smooth, and strangely mobile inside as
if my mind were skating on an inner ice pond.
Then, between one moment and the next, the world literally changed
before my eyes. The transformation was astonishingall the more because
while everything was different, everything was also the same, so that it took
me a minute to realize what was happening. The physical street with the
parking lot hadn’t really changed: the office supply store still sat in its place,
and people walked up and down the sidewalk. On the other hand every
thing that I saw was more than itself, imbued with an extra reality almost
beyond description.
We almost always keep a pad and pencil in the car, but I rummaged
through the glove compartment automatically, muttering under my breath
with impatience, to no avail. I had no idea how long the experience was
going to last, and I wanted to write it down while it was still happening.
Part of me didn’t want to bother taking notes at all, though, only to luxuri
ate in this strangely altered version of the world, so I just sat there, staring,
till Rob came back to the car.
My words fell one over the other as I tried to describe what was hap
pening~and we still had to go to the grocery store. So Rob ran into the
drugstore next to the market, bought a pen and pad, and left me alone while
he did the shopping. I started to take notes, but at the same time I hated to
take my eyes away from the windshield. I could hardly believe what I was
seeing. We， d shopped at the same supermarket for years, for example, but
the plaza was so qualitatively different that. . . while it looked the same in
one way • " it was difficult to believe that it was the same place.
For one thing, the air and everything else sparkled. Each piece of
paper on the walk, or blade of grass, or grocery cart glistened, stood
A Private View o f the Super-Real 19
apart with an almost miraculous separateness, even while it was some

thing else . . . beside itself. W hile Rob did the shopping, I kept looking
and looking and looking. My notes were so scribbled that I had trouble
deciphering them that night when I finally typed them up. This is what
I wrote:
uSuddenly the world appears different. I， m viewing it from an entirely
different perspective. It seems far more real than usual, more solid and bet
ter constructed. Really, its a different world than Ive seen before and I， m
in it in a new fashion. Its like the old world but infinitely richer, more
‘now，，built better, and with much greater depth.
MWords arent describing this at all, but people seem fantastic in their
uniqueness. No one is bland or ‘just a person in old terms and each person
is . . . more solid and whole in the weirdest fashion. Each person who
passes the car is more than three-dimensional, super-real in this time but
part of a ‘model， of a greater self; one version of it that adds dimension to
any given individual person~or building, or blade of grass, or anything.
“This particular scene with cars parked and others pulling in and out
is all imbued with a greatness in itself, yet the scene exists beyond itself at
the same time. I don’t know how Vm perceiving this, but I actually ‘see’ this
extra reality over the reality we know, so everything in my view is super-real
and each persons reality is obviously and clearly more than three-dimen
sional. I know I， m repeating here, but I want to get this down in case I for
get; though it seems inconceivable that I could ever forget this moment. Its
as if before I， ve only seen a part of people or things. The world is so much
more solid right now that by contrast my earlier experience of it is like a
shoddy version, made up of disconnected dots or blurred focus.
“It’s as if all the people I see are versions of the same people, say, that
were painted centuries ago by the old masters: new versions, yet unique
variations of themselves, their own originality altering the models even
while their existence rises from them. The city streets seem more solid, as if
they fit more firm ly on the earth, but the people capture my attention
most of all—again, so super-real, each so individual yet part of greater
models of themselves which they are constantly changing.”
As I watched, I knew that each person had free w ill, yet each motion
was inevitable, and somehow there was no contradiction. This was a phys
ical perception—physically felt— but difficult to describe; but looking at
each person I could sense his or her “model” and all the variations, and see
how the model was here and now in the person; while the particular ver
sion of the model I saw was also present in all of the other versions. I saw
these people as True People in the meaning of whole people. Usually we
just respond to the current earth person. These people were “more here,”
20 Chapter 2
fuller somehow, more complete. The sensed inner support of the model
gave them additional vitality.
My own physical senses responded accordingly: The world was richer,
more real, and so forth, because it was also supported by these inner di
mensions which filled it out. The streets, for example, were all city streets,
built according to an inner model, yet uniquely these city streets, sparkling
in their peculiarities— Elmira, New York, at a particular corner and no
other, precisely because of the model and the variations of it.
People seemed to be classics of themselves. As I sat in the car in front
of the supermarket, I faced a group of shops and saw these also as models
and their variations; as Arab stalls and Indian bazaars; each variations of
models. And the Halloween pumpkin in a window display was fantastic as
itself, and as the fulfillment of a model. The same applied to everything I
saw.
One small corner by a parking lot I remember in particular. It was
lined with small trees. A man stood there, dressed in suspenders, shirt,
trousers too short and tight in the crotch. His clothes were old and faded,
but he wore brand-new brown shoes. He was smoking, standing there
watching the corner, and the sun glittered on his reddish-brown wispy hair.
He had a noncommittal yet somehow bold face. I was too far away to see
his features clearly, but it was his pose and clothes that got me. He was ut
terly himself, yet he was a classic in that he could have emerged in any cen
tury; yet he appeared here~the model and himself together.
I thought: I，m being filled to the brim; and for a moment I even won
dered if it was possible that I’d been fitted with a spectacular new pair of
glasses and had forgotten. I knew this was ridiculous, but in that instant it
was almost easier to believe that than to accept the fact that the world
could suddenly be so different from the way it had been less than an hour
earlier. It was an effort to write the notes to begin with. I wanted to just
look forever.
It wasn’t until I finished typing my description of the experiences late
that night that I looked at the “library material” notes that Vd jotted down
that morning. Then they’d made little sense, and if they were supposed to
be part of a book, I hadn’t the slightest idea where or when they’d fit into
any manuscript. As soon as I reread them, I thought: O f course! The same
contents of the world don’t add up to one particular sum, but to a series of
sums according to how you unite them. And I knew that Yd hopped over a
certain series of sums, into another.
I was really surprised, though, that I hadn’t connected the mornings
library material with my experience at once, because it was obvious that Yd
perceived the models that were described; and experienced them, so that
they had suddenly become a part of my conscious knowledge. Yd had my
first “lesson,” backing up the library material, though I didn’t quite under
stand that then.
Immediately I began to make new connections, which I scribbled
down at once:
“When you get the feeling of the model and your own creative ver
sion of it changing the whole thing, then you really sense your own power.
You tune in to a fuller version of the world. You’re also aware, then, of the
power of the model and able to use it. Then, like a magnet, zoom! the two
get pulled together, pulled into line, you and your model. A whole new ori
entation results, with the world and with others. 丁here’s suddenly evidence
for things that before you had to take on faith if you accepted them at all.
“The model is the basis for what we think of as the self-image. We
keep building our own model in the private psyche to correspond to this
sensed greater one, and use it as a working plan. Yet we sense the model
also as it exists apart from us almost in classic terms. Once you sense the
model, then your own ‘rightness’ and aptness* is instantly apparent, and in
an odd way, physically perceivable. You also understand and perceive the
aptness and rightness of each other person~or thing.
“It’s as if a series of alignments had occurred, or as if the visible world
were suddenly lined up with its invisible counterpart, and you realize that
before you’d only seen half of reality, half of peoples existence. Now the in
visible portion fleshes out the exterior to its fullest and supports it. Driving
home with Rob, for example, I felt the earth support the road which sup
ported the tires and the car. I felt this physically, in the same way that we
sense, say, temperature: a positive support or pressure that held the road up
and almost seemed to push up of its own accord in a long powerful arch,
like a giant animals back.”
That night and the next day, my own daily habits and domestic ways
seemed triple-real to me too. They struck me as immensely immediate even
though, or perhaps because, I kept sensing another part of myself in the li
brary. And my library self would think: O f course, that’s what I do in the
world, and that’s what Ym like there. So my most habitual gestures seemed
familiar and surprising at once.
Had I somehow joined a part of myselfwho’d been at the library wait
ing for me? I kept wondering about it, and the library’s reality was constancy
with me, though in the background, as I went about my day. Insights about
it kept coming into my mind. I knew that when you went into the library
from our world, normal life was imbued with new dimensions when you re
turned. I kept wanting to explore the library grounds, to “get there” more
clearly and completely. And of course, I wondered how long the whole
thing would last. How permanent was the library, for example?
22 Chapter 2
As we ate dinner that evening, I saw myself for a moment sitting at a

refractory-type table in the library, drinking that elixir again, and for a mo
ment my own coffee tasted like honey. I sensed my image there, my model
image, I supposed. My hair was cut in a pageboy style with straight bangs.
I wore a shirt, and the kind of jeans that I usually wear, but I was several
pounds heavier than I am and my body moved with almost instant agility.
I also saw an older model. She wore a cowl-type shirt but with slacks of
some sort; she was a courier between worlds. Would I look like her in ten
years? I wondered.
I remembered “Mr. Junior Parapsychologist” and how super-real he’d
seemed. Had the days experience actually begun then? And I couldn’t get
over it, because everyone was like that: classics of themselves. It was as if be
fore, I， d only seen prints of the world, and not the original.
But what about the shift of focus that had tuned me in to the new
world? How many other such focuses were there? The world perspective at
any time could contain infinite focus variations, from “poorest” to “clear-
est，” each distinctly different, and maybe each one focused on entirely dif
ferent aspects. How much else was there in the world that I wasn’t seeing;
what other shifts of awareness possible of which I was ignorant?
In a way, I thought, people alive in our time and space could be expe
riencing the world in such various fashions that some of them might have
more in common with someone from another planet or another reality. A
pauper at some hypothetical Focus 3 could find the world richer and more
fulfilling than a king at, say, Focus 1.1didn’t like the implications of abet
ter or worse” focuses, but I had to admit that my new perspective was far
superior to the way I usually viewed and experienced the world. Reincar-
national lives, so called, could deal with the same kinds of shifts, I saw, only
with alterations great enough to alter time perspective entirely.
As I thought about all this I was vaguely conscious of myself going
about my business at the library, and it occurred to me that part of me was
as focused there, as “I ” was in my reality. I also knew that the two worlds
were synchronized in some fashion. But would my perception of the li
brary broaden or deepen? How long would this great new richness last?
Would it become the norm, so that I forgot what my old life had been like?
W ith the contrast gone, how would I remember? O r would the whole
thing dwindle away in time?
Testing, I went for a walk, and the physical world outside seemed to
be an extension of the grounds outside the library so that inner and outer
realities were connected in the strangest way. Walnut Street was full of traf
fic. Usually I walked in the backyard instead, and sometimes in the park
ing lot that had once been our garden. Now, though, the road and cars and
houses all seemed more solid, and even the mountains beyond, which
always seemed substantial enough, had an added substance and full bril
liance. I walked around the corner and briefly visited a friend. We had a
glass of beer and some crackers, and as we sat there chatting, I felt that I
was also visiting someone at the library at the same time. Returning home,
I felt more solidly in the world myself, a part of the environment in a new
way. I used to feel as if I were staring out at whatever scene was before me.
Now I was a portion of the scene, moving through itself, yet I retained my
own prime focus.
As I stepped back into my workroom, I realized that while I was out,
that other part of me had done some exploring at the library which, I sud
denly knew, was actually a learning center, fairly well populated. It was a
world of mind, or state of mind, where all of the others were in their own
way at the same level as myself; a “place” where these invisible colleagues
and I would work together. We would eventually be completely in focus
with this inner environment, and hence with our exterior ones. We would
have one clear focus in which we could learn and do our work. And I knew
that though we might be out of phase with other levels, here we were at
home. I found myself thinking: Tomorrow I’ll really get settled in, and I
was as excited thinking about it as if Fd physically arrived at some advanced
university. Yet I knew, of course, that the library wasn’t physical in our
terms, and that it represented a certain place in the psyche which was being
materialized at least to some extent in our world.
Others have provided maps for the psyche, but IVe never trusted
them. Those maps carried the marks of too many name-places in this real
ity. When you travel through the psyche, you necessarily journey through
your own deepest mind~and as you travel into inner realities, this means
that you move into another kind of atmosphere, as you would if you were
traveling in outer space. In the past, others have projected phantoms of
their own minds there, then acted as if these were natural signposts. In my
journeys I refused to follow those paths, feeling that they were not safe or
dependable and fearing that they might cloud my own view or make me
lose my way. These distortions are like debris left behind by physical space
ships: bits of broken flags or discarded equipment that then might orbit
out in space.
Only the debris I， m speaking about is psychic. Much of it probably
served a purpose at one time (again like discarded space “junk” that once
was workable). But to follow it in space would only take you where others
had gone already.
Yet I’m literal-minded too, like most of my kind~earth people who
deal with objects and the evidence of their senses—and the idea of un
charted space, inner or outer, probably makes us feel dwarfed. Or you
think: Traveling into inner reality, what shall I look for? What kind of
24 Chapter 2
features? W ill what I see really be there? Or w ill my experiences be a re

sponse to features that cant be viewed directly?
I，m reminded of a line of a poem I wrote when I was a freshman in
college: “I make my own sidewalk.” Perhaps in a way each of us makes our
own path, and our own psychic structure that is then flung out into inner
space in the same way that a spaceship is launched from the earth. This
makes certain exquisite sense: The vehicle for space travel is made of phys
ical stuff, suited to its environment, highly equipped to perceive particular
kinds of data in a specific system.
So we also construct a mental framework or vehicle to transport us to
inner space, and in my case perhaps the library is like a floating satellite
well equipped with earth-like environment that makes me feel at home
away from home. Its just as efficient and real as any spaceship and just as
practical. And~let me hasten to add~it exists as surely as the spaceship
and is just as dependable.
In a way it is even more sophisticated, because I， m sure that its coor
dinates line up with our reality, and what I see and experience there is trans
lated to me here, whether or not I translate the message at once. Its also
quite possible, I suppose, that while the library represents my structure, my
path, it also correlates with the structures of others at the same level or
state, so that in certain terms the library grounds are fairly permanent, con
stantly created in changed form through the eons.
I was so curious about the library, in fact, that when Monday night
came, I was nearly tempted to try to explore it further instead of having our
regular Seth session. After all, I was more or less sure of Seth, but for all I
knew the library would vanish entirely, never to be “seen” again. If we
haven’t had Seth sessions for a while for one reason or another, then I get un
easy, and I have one just to make sure that Seth is still “here” or at least, still
accessible. But after having sessions week in and week out, I completely for-
get that I was ever uneasy. Besides, I knew that Seth was in the middle of his
own book, and he wasn’t about to bow out in the middle of it.
Seth hadn’t said very much about my library experiences in the last ses_
sion, though, and I was also curious about his reactions. It seemed to me that
he was oddly reticent, and I wondered why. Only after the session did I real
ize how tricky he， d been, in his own way, and how tricky Yd been, in mine.
The following excerpts are taken from “Unknown”Reality (session 715,
October 28，1974), and Ive included only those passages in which Seth
refers to my library experiences or related ones. Since this was book dicta
tion, it was directed to the reader (rather than to Rob) and the material not
given here was devoted to a discussion of altered states of consciousness.
I said at our last session that the evening was momentous for
Ruburt, and that is true for many reasons. This book [“UnknownwReal
ity] deals w ith the unkn o w n reality, and R u b u rt began a d iffere nt excur
sion in to o th e r dim ensions last week.
I hope in these sessions to show the in d iv is ib le connections be
tween the experience o f the psyche at various levels and the resulting ex
perience in term s o f va ryin g system s~ each va lid , each to some extent
o r ano ther bearing on the life you know.
R u b u rt has allow ed a p o rtio n o f his this-life consciousness to go o ff
on a tangent, so to speak, on another path in to another system o f actu
ality. H is life there is as va lid as his existence in y o u r w o rld . In the w ak
in g state, he is now able to a lte r the d ire c tio n o f his focus precisely
enough to b rin g about a co n d itio n in w hich he perceives b o th realities
sim ultaneously. H e is ju s t beginning, so as yet he is o n ly occasionally
conscious o f th a t o th e r experience. H e is, however, aware o f it now in
the back o f his m in d m ore o r less constantly. It does n o t in tru d e upon
the w o rld th a t he knows, b u t enriches it.
T h e concepts in th is book [ Ûnknown*Reality] w ill help expand
the consciousness o f each o f its readers, and the book its e lf is presented
in such a m anner th a t it a u to m atica lly p ulls y o u r awareness o u t o f its
usual grooves, so th a t it bounces back and fo rth between the standard
ized version o f the w o rld you accept, and the u n o ffic ial versions th a t are
sensed b u t generally u n know n to you.
N o w as R u b u rt delivers this m aterial, the same th in g happens in a
d iffe re n t w ay to h im , so th a t in some respects he has been snapping
back and fo rth between dim ensions, p racticing w ith the elasticity o f his
consciousness and in th is book m ore than in previous ones, his con
sciousness has been sent o u t fu rth e r, so to speak. T h e d e live ry o f the
m aterial its e lf has helped h im to develop the necessary fle x ib ility fo r his
latest pursuits.
C lea r understanding o r effective exp lo ra tio n o f the unkn o w n real
ity can o n ly be achieved w hen yo u are able to leave behind you m any o f
the “facts” th a t you have accepted as c rite ria o f experience. T h is book is
also w ritte n in such a w ay th a t it w ill, hopefully, b rin g m any o f yo u r
cherished beliefs about existence in to question. T h e n yo u w ill be able to
lo o k even at th is existence w ith new eyes. R u b u rt is takin g this new step
fro m yo u r perspective, and fro m th a t stand p o int he is doing tw o things:
H e is consciously entering in to another room o f the psyche and also en
te rin g the re a lity th a t corresponds to it. T h is brings the tw o existences
together so th a t th ey coincide. T h e y ’re held, however, b o th separately
and in jo in t focus. As a ru le yo u use one p a rtic u la r level o f awareness,
and th is correlates a ll o f y o u r conscious activities. I to ld yo u th a t the
physical body its e lf was able to p ic k up o ther neurological messages be
side those to w h ic h you usually react. N o w le t me add th a t w hen a cer
ta in p ro ficiency is reached in alteratio ns o f consciousness, th is allows
you to become p ractically fa m ilia r w ith some o f these o ther neurological
messages. In such a w ay R u b u rt is able to p h ysically perceive w hat he is
do ing in his “lib ra ry.” . . .
H e firs t saw his lib ra ry fro m the inside last Wednesday. H e was si
m ultaneo usly h im s e lf here in th is liv in g room , w atching the image o f
h im s e lf in a lib ra ry room , and he was the self in the lib ra ry. Before h im
Chapter 2
he saw a w a ll o f books, and the self in the liv in g room suddenly knew
th a t his purpose here in this re a lity was to re-create some o f those books.
H e kn e w th a t he was w o rkin g at b o th levels. T h e un kn o w n and the
kno w n realities merged, clicked in , and were seen as the opposite sides
o f each other.
H e had been w o rkin g w ith m e fo r some tim e in y o u r term s, yet I
do n o t “c o n tro l” his subjective re a lity in any way. I have c ertain ly been a
teacher to h im . Yet his progress is always his ow n challenge and respon
s ib ility, and basically w hat he does w ith m y teaching is up to h im . [H u
m orously:] R ig h t now I give h im an A . . . .
R u b u rts lib ra ry exists as surely as th is room does. I t also exists as
unsurely as this room . It is one th in g to be th e o re tic ally convinced th a t
o ther w orlds exist and to take a certain co m fo rt and jo y fro m the idea.
It is q uite another th in g to fin d yo u rse lf in such an enviro nm ent, and to
feel the w orlds coincide. R e a lity is, above all, practical, so w hen you ex
pand y o u r concepts concerning the nature o f reality, yo u are apt to fin d
yourselves scandalized, appalled, o r sim p ly disoriented. So in th is book
I am presenting yo u n o t o n ly w ith p ro b ab ilities as conjecture, b u t often
show ing you how such p ro b a b ilitie s affect y o u r d a ily lives, and g ivin g
examples o f the ways in w hic h R u b u rts and Josephs lives have been so
to u c h e d .. . .
M a n y o f you are fascinated by theories o r concepts th a t h in t o f the
m u ltid im e n s io n a lity o f yo u r being, and yet yo u are scandalized by any
evidence th a t supports it.
O fte n you in te rp re t such evidence in term s o f the dogmas w ith
w h ic h yo u are already fa m ilia r. T h is makes them m ore acceptable.
R u b u rt was often alm ost in d ig n a n t w hen presented w ith such evidence,
b u t he also refused to cast it in conventionalized guise, and his ow n cu
rio s ity and creative a b ilitie s ke p t h im fle xib le enough so th a t le arn in g
could take place w h ile he m ain tain ed n o rm al contact w ith the w o rld
you know.
H e has had m any experiences in w h ic h he glim psed m o m e n ta rily
the ric h otherness w ith in physical reality. H e has kn o w n heightened
perceptions o f a uniq ue nature. N e ve r before, however, has he stepped
firm ly , w h ile awake, in to ano ther level o f reality, w here he allow ed h im
self to sense the continued v iv id connection between w orlds. H e h id his
ow n purpose fro m him self, as m any o f you do. A t the same tim e, he was
p ursuing it, o f course, as a ll o f yo u are w o rkin g tow ard yo u r ow n goals.
To a d m it his purpose, however; to b rin g it o u t in to the open, w ould
mean fo r R u b u rt a p rivate and p ub lic statem ent o f a ffilia tio n such as he
was n o t able to m ake earlier. T h e goals o f each o f you differ. Some o f you
are em barked upon adventures th a t deal w ith in tim a te fa m ily contact,
deep personal in vo lve m en t w ith c h ild ren , o r w ith o th e r careers th a t
m eet “ve rtic a lly” w ith physical experience. So jo urneys in to un kn o w n
realities m ay be h ig h ly in trig u in g and represent im p o rta n t sidelights
to y o u r c urren t preoccupations. These interests w ill be lik e an avocation
to you, adding great understanding and depth to y o u r experience.
R u b u rt and Joseph chose to specialize, so to speak, in precisely

those excursions or explorations that are secondary to others....
I have to ld you th a t yo u r consciousness is n o t stationary, b u t ever-
m o vin g and creative so th a t th ro u g h y o u r life , each o f yo u moves
th ro u g h y o u r psyche, and y o u r physical experience is correspondingly
altered. D u rin g these years, then, R u b u rts p o sitio n w ith in his psyche
has g rad u ally shifted u n til he fo und a new, fo r h im , better, firm e r p o in t
of basis. From this new framework he can more effectively handle dif
ferent kinds of stimuli and form these together to construct an under
standable m odel o iother realities. I will continue to speak from my own
u niq ue vie w p o in t, b u t in yo u r term s R u b u rt is one o f you, and his ex
plorations, taken fro m y o u r perspective, can be m ost valuable.
Rob read me the session when it was over. I was honestly astonished
to discover that my latest experiences were connected with Seths “Un-
known'Reality. At the same time, I could hardly understand my surprise
because the connections were now so clear. Seths book is devoted to exer
cises geared to develop flexibility of consciousness. There are whole sec
tions dealing with methods of perceiving other kinds of reality, and after
all, trance or not, Yd delivered that material myself. Yet I，
d kept Seths book
and my own library experiences separate. Instead, I was exploring my own
unknown reality in my own way, while Seth was writing his book about it.
My personal encounters were the other side of Seths manuscript in some
way impossible to describe.
Seth had said that his book would show the reader how unknown re
alities affected personal life, and told us that he would sometimes use us as
examples. That I understood. But I had a funny suspicion that more was
involved. Yd just begun this book and I was beginning to wonder if Seths
ÛnknownMReality was somehow a trigger that was setting all of these new
experiences of mine into motion. Unknown reality, indeed! I could imag
ine Seth smiling almost smugly from some hypothetical cloud nine, beck
oning me on, only to find that framework dissolving into another, and
another • • • in some kind of merry chase to find the nature of reality.
C h a pter 3
M odels and Beloved Eccentrics
he next morning was bright and clear, with October leaves falling
T everywhere. I sat down at my table in front of the bay windows to

write. The pigeons were feeding on the roof, their feathers ruffled
by the wind. It came in bursts, hitting the side of the house and rattling the
old windows with their ancient sashes. In between the gusts, everything
seemed relatively quiet. In one of those silences, there was a sudden dry
rustling sound of crunchy leaves swirling across the parking lot below. A ll
at once I saw myself sitting in the library, looking at an open book, only
the pages were flying open and the leaves outside the window were the
sounds that the pages made in the library. They flew open by themselves, it
seemed. For a moment the two experiences clicked together so smoothly
th a t I accepted th e ir u n ity w ith o u t q u e s tio n . O n ly an in s ta n t la te r d id I
wonder: How could the real wind outside rustle the pages of a book in a
nonphysical library? But for me, the inner and outer experiences coincided
with an almost breathtaking symmetry.
For some reason, only then did I remember the poems I’d written the
week earlier asking for inspiration and realize that I was getting a whole
new book in answer to the poems，request. The library was a gift from the
psyche, uniting my experience, focusing it in a fresh direction. I remem
bered how glum Fd been then, yet in my new creative state Vd completely
forgotten my earlier request. I hate to write thank-you notes, but when the
soul was concerned, my lack of thanks seemed like some sort of metaphys
ical faux pas. So, filled with gratitude, I wrote the following poem. In it I，
ve
made some points about the nature of inspiration that are quite difficult to
make in prose. At the time, though, I just sat there and wrote the poem
spontaneously as an expression of thanks, filled with wonder at the psyches
ability to regenerate us just when we need it most. As I wrote, fresh bursts
of October wind rattled the windows; the pigeons rose in a flurry of feath
ers and I kept seeing the image of myself in the library. Now and then that
self smiled and looked back at me as I sat at my desk.
Chapter 3
D ear soul, I ， m awed.

D id I say once y o u r words were cold?
I take it back.
I w ro te and d id n ’t feel yo u answ ering
and I got scared.
T h e n y o u r re p ly
w ro te its e lf upon m y w o rld ,
and the letters came alive.
H o w could I ever d o ub t th a t you were real?
You seem to send m e a series o f new b irth s

tim ed fo r w hen I feel m y tiredest,
and this one is s till happening,
so I w anted yo u to kn o w ju s t ho w I feel,
and m ost o f a ll to th a n k you
fo r yo u r reply, w hen I reached out,
caught between fa ith and doubt,
w ond ering if yo u were there at a ll
o r ju s t a m anufactured hope,
dreamed up in the overw orked factory
o f a w eary m ind .
B ut after I finished m y last poem

and stated m y case as best I could,
flashing messages
th a t reached, I hoped,
fro m m y w o rld to yours,
I ju s t fe lt spent.
R eceiving no reply, I tho ug ht,
wM y soul is rem arkab ly hesitant,
o r I d id n ’t exp lain ju s t w hat I m eant,
o r worse— m y soul is so alo o f
th a t m y p lig h t to it is meaningless;
it can’t relate.”
So p art o f me brooded
w h ile a p a rt said, “A ll rig h t,
if m y soul cant be trusted, Yd b etter kn o w now,
and if I have to m ake it ju s t on m y ow n
I sure as h e ll had b etter learn how .”
A n d then,
between one m o m ent and the next, I saw
a path open up w ith in m y head.
It led straig ht up to the southeast corner
o f the liv in g room ,
and there, transposed against the w h ite bare w a ll
T h e image o f a lib ra ry hung visible,
w ith rows o f books and a table,
Models and Beloved Eccentrics
n o t fla t b u t three-dim ensional

inside itself. T h a t is, the visio n
d id n ’t spread o u t in to the liv in g room ,
b u t the depth opened up
w ith its ow n space, so th a t I gasped.
I w atched fro m here, and there

a double o f m yself leaned up against the rows
o f books,
n early w eeping w ith relief,
th in k in g , “丁han k G od, th a t I ’ve come hom e.”
A n d o u r thoughts, hers and m ine, were one,
so th a t fo r a m om ent I was there
and here at once,
and b o th o f us were ju b ila n t.
T h a t path d id som ething.
I recognized it in s ta n tly
as som ething I ’d been lo o kin g for,
a magic road o f the psyche
th a t was m ine alone,
as if a flo w er suddenly realized
the d irec tio n in w hich it was m eant to grow;
a path no t ju s t o f least resistance
b u t o f power; as i f in annals forgotten
each soul
carries fu tu re m em ories o f roads
it m ust and w ill fo llo w -
in tim a te passageways th ro u g h the cosmos
th a t belong to its e lf alone;
and discovers its ow n tru e tone
th a t opens up clear avenues ahead
th ro u g h cosmic woods th a t otherw ise seem
frig h ten in g , and snaps back branches,
suddenly show ing a b rig h t clear m oon.
B u t in any case, I knew this path

to be m y own,
lik e a personal signal given me in some tim e
before m em ory,
So w hen I sent o u t m y SO S,
th a t signal came flashing fro m eternity,
searching tim es and places
t ill it discovered w here I was,
and found me ju s t w hen I th o ug h t
th a t I was lost.
I th in k
o f the nerve ends o f the universe,
Chapter 3
crisscrossing in a cosmos
o f interrelatedness
we can barely understand.
T h e n I y e ll “H e lp !”
fro m one corner o f a tin y w o rld
hung between the centuries
th at sparkle lik e a m illio n golden cobwebs,
dangling alive and glorious
in some spectacular universal b rain —
b u t th a t message goes out.
So however gigantic
the universe is,
m y tin y plea set it jangling .
A n d even w orlds apart fro m me
moved, sang, trem bled
as m y alarm
traveled outw ard, m akin g contact,
to uching the w ild neurons
o f some o verall m in d
w ho then sent help,
as maybe m y b rain sends
blood to m y fin g er w hen Iv e pinched it,
kn o w in g the d irect path
throug h the body’s m yria d w orlds.
B u t w hat a response!
fo r the lib ra ry d id n ’t vanish
b u t rem ains ju s t o u t o f sight,
surfacing now and then
ju s t as clearly as before,
and m y double sits at a table
reading a book th a t Iv e begun
to translate here.
Once, d ry leaves rushing across the p arkin g
lo t outside
were the sounds the ru s tlin g pages made
in the book n ext to her hand,
as they m oved a ll at once
to her surprise, fo r there was
no w in d there,
and here, I laughed.
B ut in w hatever w ay tru th s exist,

I kn o w th a t the books inside m y head spring alive,
A n d th a t w hen I ’m in th a t lib ra ry, I ’ve come hom e.
B ut in w h a t sense?
I o n ly kn o w th a t the p ath led me there,
Models and Beloved Eccentrics 33
and th a t I ，
m m eant to w rite those books
and b rin g them to life inside o u r w o rld
b y an in te n t
I recognize as ancient and yet new,
N o t im posed b u t chosen,
yet chosen in response
to some n a tu ra l in c lin e o f being
th a t w ants to go one way, n o t another,
because it knows w hat’s best fo r it and feels
prom ptings th a t lin e it up
w ith inside directions o f the m ind ,
o r soul.
After I wrote the poem, I kept sensing that “other self” in the library.
Sometimes I’d see her sitting at the table. Sometimes she walked to the
window that overlooked the grounds, and my consciousness would flicker
back and forth so that I would be aware of her environment and mine as
well. To some extent her knowledge of the library was imparted to me.
W riting about this, I call my image “her,” yet I also identified with this li
brary self and certainly on occasion she seemed aware of me.
Through her I knew that the library windows looked out to different
centuries. These exist all at once as the library grounds, and make up the
environment. The books are written by people who go into the library
from their own window of time and keep transcribing the classics, revising
them, and creating them anew through their own experience. The books
are then produced in a new time and place period. Each new version of any
book changes the classic model of it.
I knew that the library was also the materialization of a certain level
of the psyche, even as our world is. Only there, time is laid out like space
is here. The windows of the library coincide with definite places in our
space-time. In our world, these points of intersection may appear as nat
ural objects, and these correlate with coordination points in the psyche.
Moving toward these coordination points in your mind automatically
lines up your consciousness to some extent with this other reality, and
stabilizes conditions enough to allow for more or less conscious entry and
return.
I knew even then, for example, that the corner of the living room
served as a reference point in that respect; but at the usual level of con
sciousness used by most people, the library entrance just wasn’t there. Only
a wall. Knocking the wall down wouldn’t reveal the entry either, obviously,
because it only existed at certain levels ofconsciousness. You turn your focus
instead of a doorknob to find it. It only exists at certain states of the psyche,
when inner and outer coordinates line up so that the two worlds merge.
34 Chapter 3
I had the feeling that Yd actually been operating in the library for
some time without being aware of it, and in the few days since it first ap
peared I ， d become more conscious of my activities there and here as well.
Several times I had vague glimpses of the library grounds, but without
being able to interpret them clearly. For instance, here, time and space are
more or less interdependent. There, the elements or time are laid out like
space is here. There, time expands and the variations appear as probabili
ties: Instead of today turning into tomorrow, todays equivalent turns into
the probabilities of itself~and you can travel to any of these in the same
way that we travel from city to city.
I knew all this in a kind of bleed-through of knowledge from my dou
ble, but as I looked out of the library window I knew that I didn’t see what
she was seeing, only my vision of it. Every time I looked out, I saw this
w o rld . Y e t I re a liz e d th a t w ith g re a te r tra in in g , I c o u ld le a rn to see p ro b a
b ilitie s also. I t w as as i f I w e re ju s t b e g in n in g to use n e w senses th e re , an d
discovering a different kind of depth perception.
In the meantime world kept changing, but so gradually that I was
unaware of some developments until a certain level was reached and my
physical senses began to register events in a different way. My sight must
have been changing without my notice, for example, because on the fourth
day following my first view of the library I was suddenly aware that my
area of physical vision had expanded in some fashion.
We took a drive that afternoon and I found myself reading store win
dow signs all at once: that is, I took in a larger visual area. Instead of look
ing at one store, I ’d see several at once and be aware of all the details
involved, such as the contents of the signs and displays; where before I， d
have noticed these things one at a time. I wasn’t making any effort to see
better, and there was no strain involved. The world was just presenting it
self to me in a new fashion.
Everything still seemed much more solid and better constructed and
my body felt as if it fit into the environment in a snugger, somehow more
satisfying way, as if it were in a better perspective. It also felt more substan
tial and in clearer focus. But the greatest difference I noticed that afternoon
was in my responses to people. I didn’t view them through my personal prej
udices. As space somehow seemed wider, so a new kind of psychological
space opened up. Until then I hadn’t realized how often my encounters with
others had represented an instant point ofjudgment; others judging me and
me them; each bearing the full brunt of the others critical attention.
Suddenly my psychological field of vision also seemed wider, more ex
pansive, not cramped or threatened by others so that I could be more
friendly toward them and more curious in a childlike fashion. I seemed to
be viewing others from a different perspective, but also I seemed to be
viewing a different perspective of them—in which they werent cramped ei

ther, or afraid.
At the same time, I hadn’t “given up” my old kind ofjudgments about
people. I could make them when I wanted to, but when I did, I was aware
that they actually limited my perception of any given person. I found my
selfthinking again that everyone was a classic model, yet each was also a fan
tastic eccentric. I saw a weird and beautiful give-and-take between the
person and his or her model. Some people pulled against the model of
themselves, almost defiantly, yet using it to create their own variation and
original eccentricity. Others imagined the model in their minds as a kind of
super-self or as some ideal that could never be achieved, and they tried to
whip themselves into shape. Others painted themselves into reality like chil
dren going mad with paintbrushes, getting paint all over but having a ball.
I saw that each of us is a beloved eccentric not only because we have
inner models of the self, but also the freedom to deviate from them, all of
which makes the model living and creative in our time. I saw an old lady,
for example—or I would have called her an old lady with my old sight.
She wore cotton stockings, a brown and green boy-type sweater with
stripes, a full maroon fall skirt; and a wide-brimmed young-girl-type hat,
with a fake flower on it, over her straight gray hair. She was very thin and
flat breasted, and she dallied along, rocking gently back and forth on her
heels as gracefully and unselfconsciously as a twelve-year-old alone on a
country road.
She wasn’t trying to “look young.” Her thin neck was wrinkled, and
the boyish sweater, full skirt, and floppy hat gave her the most incongruous
appearance. Yet it was perfect, as was the freedom of her motions and the
daydreaming, strange agility of her gait. She was living in herselfand in her
own model at once, and qualities of male and female, youth and age met in
her with such unity that I swore I ’d never be able to think of them as op
posites again.
I kept saying to Rob, “Look at that man,” or “Look at that woman.
Perfect!” till Rob was nearly as delighted as I was as I kept trying to describe
my perceptions. It seemed that I was seeing peoples validity as it existed
apart from me and my beliefs, though I knew I created the reality in which
that was possible. Peoples bodies fit more securely in the world as mine
did, and even the cars driving past seemed to be built better.
But what did it all mean, I wondered, and how long would it last? So
far I，d only “picked up” a few paragraphs of the book that I was supposed
to be writing~or transcribing. And what about the whole idea of models?
I was vaguely familiar with Plato’s concepts about ideals. They sounded ter
ribly rigid to me, assigning all originality to absolute models that we could
only try to copy at best~and even then we'd be doomed to failure. I only
36 Chapter 3
knew that there was a great give-and-take, a playful elasticity between the
models I sensed, and their many versions or eccentricities, as Vd taken to
calling them.
And what about the title, Psychic Politics〉. Where did that fit in? I re
ceived a few hints the next day. As I sat at my table, once again I felt that
“something was waiting for me” at the library. The following few para
graphs came instantly into my mind, and at the same time I sensed that my
double was reading the same paragraphs from a book at her table. I wrote
the material exactly as I “heard” it, and in the same order. I had the definite
feeling though that this was like a test run; that the various paragraphs
didn’t necessarily go in the order given, but served as sample bits of mater
ial from different parts of the book so that I could have an idea of some of
the areas to be covered.
From the Library
1. If you learned to remember and interpret the unofficial messages of

dreams, the decoded data would produce a history of mankind far more ac
curate and extensive than any you have; an open-ended record that would
not end at the present point of awareness, but contain projections of future
probabilities and provide excellent models for further creative action. • • •
2. The kings, queens, presidents, and dictators of the world rise to
prominence and power just as the ego emerges from the psyche; vital, en
ergetic, and responsive. So are the worlds leaders as responsive to its peo
ple, even when this does not seem to be the case. A country’s leaders ignore
the unofficial messages of the psyche for the standardized picture of reality
to the same extent as do its citizens.
3. The organized structure of civilization cannot be discounted from
the inner organizations of the psyche. If you do not know yourself, you w ill
not know your world; exterior actions w ill seem incomprehensible, and
your private acts seem to have no meaning....
4. Persons unacquainted with their own power w ill feel isolated and
alone in the private and public world. They w ill turn the inner framework
of the self upside down if necessary, to shake out the elements of power
locked up inside and free themselves from repressions that exist within the
mind. In the exterior world, this often results in the overthrow of the leader
who was the living figurehead for that inner private oppression....
5. The private psyche has within itself models that clearly state the
unique potentials possible for its own achievement. It is, itself, a version of
such a model, freely choosing from the infinite variations of itself those
probable actions best suited to its fulfillment. Its choice is spontaneously

correct; freely made, yet inevitable....
P sychic p o litic s ~ o r th e p o litic s o f th e psyche— I w as b e g in n in g to see th e

connections: Already, because of my new inner experiences, my relation
ship with the world and other people was changing. As I read the para
graphs, I realized that the alterations of perception and visions of the
library were all parts of the book too: daily events and the library material
would go hand in hand. But again, in what way?
As I sat wondering about it, I was aware of my double working at the
library table, now and then glancing out that southeast window at the spa
cious grounds. My consciousness was in my body and in my doubles si
multaneously for a few minutes. It was delightful to look out at the fresh
green trees and full foliage there, while the sky outside my living room win
dows was a misty blue through bare autumn branches. As I sat musing
about this, the phone rang. I shook my head, probably grimaced, and
picked up the phone.
A mans voice said: “Seth?”
I groaned mentally. “No, this is Jane,” I answered.
“Atlantis. Delantis. Voom. Voom. Voom，，，the voice said, emphati
cally, excitedly, spacing the words and delivering them like bullets. Then,
silence.
Talk about messages from strange worlds, I thought, while I scribbled
down the “conversation.” “What?” I asked.
aListen. Panic. Panic. They say I， m crazy here. I，m Jed Dare, Bare.
Where. Care.”
“Uh-huh,” I said.
“I sent you a book. About a hook. Baalbek and the end of the world.
Symbols. Signs. Lines.”
I vaguely remembered. One day the week before an envelope had
come, with all the other mail; only this one contained about thirty pages of
symbols. That was all. I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. “I couldn’t read
it,” I said.
“Well, read it. Now. Now. The fly and the golden molecule. Save the
world.” The voice paused. Then it thundered, “Get Seth. Forget death. I’m
going to save the world.”
“Look,” I said. “You， re on a pretty heavy trip. None of us, single-
handedly； is going to save the world. And when we think we are, usually it
means were worried about ourselves.”
“I know. Know. My destiny is to save the world. I know. Go. Atlantis
and the worlds blow away.”
38 Chapter 3
wListen, you aren’t relating well— ” I was worried for him, but
couldn’t get a word in edgewise.
“Oh-ho，I am. Damn. Tune in at four. The magic hour. But as Seth.
Then I， m going to save the world.”
wWait, wait a minute,” I cried, but he hung up.
The next day came, though, so he must have felt pretty good about it.
If he hadn’t saved the world, I wouldn’t be alive to write all of this down. At
least not in his system of reality.
But I sat there, dismayed. A week had passed since my first library ex
perience, and I， d enjoyed some of the most flilfilling, peaceful days of my
life. Then that strange voice over the phone; another tortured cosmic su
perstar, out to save the world.
I resented the interruption, yet I knew the man had called for a rea
son, and maybe if I understood it then I could help others. But what did
the call have to do with psychic politics? I really believe that all mental ill
ness is emotional or psychic, an unbalanced mixture of psychological as
pects, so that the person lacks a certain kind of psychological solidarity.
There are inner explosions, psychic revolutions, as repressions look for a
way out, pushing here and there, then emerging in an uprush of energy,
throwing out all kinds of previously unofficial data that is often dramati
cally and symbolically represented.
Those who feel a desperate compulsion to save the world single-hand-
edly carry an impossible load of responsibility under which they are sure to
break. Actually they’re usually trying to save the world of the jâgainst
their own idea of evil or destruction or sense of unworthiness, which is
then projected outward. Then they identify with the psyches dramatic per
sonifications and a super-selfis born, a hero to fight the “inferior” self, in a
drama seldom understood.
The visions of the psyche should make the world saner, wiser, more
creative, kinder, more expansive. I thought of the books title again, with
the uneasy feeling that I wasn’t just going to get material from my “inner li-
brary， ” but be presented with some exterior messages as well, and perhaps
encounter some challenges I hadn’t counted on.
C h a pter 4
Rob and the Rom an Captain, and

M odels and Reincarnational Selves
o far my library experiences had been private, even though they were
S changing my view of the public world. I suppose that I hoped to get

answers from the library; God knows I had enough questions. But I
thought that perhaps I might just “tune in to” the library each day, men
tally see the book that my “double” was reading, and then transcribe it
here. Yd actually seen little of the book, but I knew it was there, and I
imagined that I’d begin to see it more clearly. I didn’t realize that the book
copy itself would only be part of the affair.
Thus far, Rob had been on the outside looking in, but that state of af
fairs quickly changed. He became involved in a series of mental events that
began quietly enough, but ended up by making us—again— revamp our
ideas of personality. The first episode happened on October 27, 1974, only
a few days after my own library experiences began.
This was the same afternoon that I saw the “old” lady in the wide-
brimmed hat. Wb， d taken a drive, and I talked constantly, telling Rob how
I was viewing the world. When we returned, Rob took a nap while I pre
pared supper. He lay down about 5:00 p.m. and amused himself by imagin
ing the two of us on a vacation on a yacht in the Mediterranean. The
following is an edited version of the notes Rob wrote immediately after
ward, for the consciously imagined scenes were suddenly replaced by some
thing else:
“I found myself seeing the bottom of the Mediterranean. I knew that
the sea floor at that spot was four hundred feet down. There was no land
anywhere, and I don’t remember having any awareness of my physical
body while this was happening. The vision was clear and in color, but it
wasn’t startling or super-real. I was studying the sea floor, noting the
rounded, rather small rocks, some gullies, and the murky bluish-green
color of the water. I saw sea creatures of some kind. They were round,
40 Chapter 4
about the size of dinner plates. They were half-spherical and either had
protruding spines or were covered by indentations; from my view over
them, I couldn’t be sure.
“This view didn’t last long; a few minutes, perhaps. The next thing I
saw was myselfon board a Roman warship or galley. Somehow I knew
the time to be early in the first century A.D. I was amidships, looking to
ward the stern of the craft. ‘I，stood at the very rear of the ship, looking for
ward. I didn’t like the ‘I’ I saw, and I didn’t look like myself at all. I was a
big man. M y chest was wide and powerful, my arms and legs thick and
sinewy. I wore one of those Roman-type uniforms where the arms and legs
are mostly barew ith a short skirt, a belt, and a vest-type garment. This
was leather, I believe, decorated with metal circular grommets. I don’t re
member any weapons.
“I knew that I was an officer in some sort of Roman regiment or le
gion. I wore a heavy metal helmet that swept down over my forehead. Be
neath my helmet my face was red, very broad and strong, with a square
chin. I looked splotchy. No room for much feeling or emotion here, at least
of the gentler kinds, Yd say.
“For a moment I think I looked through the eyes of that man as he
peered forward and saw twin rows of galley slaves, toiling at their oars. A
narrow plank walk or catwalk separated the two banks of miserable human
beings.
“In my first view o f‘me,’ from amidships, part of my lower body was
obscured by something~a flap of canvas or cabin perhaps—I couldn’t tell:
The thing, whatever it was, was too close, as if it were too near the lens of a
camera that was focused on more distant objects.
“Now for the third bit o f‘seeing.， O ff to my left as I lay on my cot in
the studio (though I wasn’t aware of the cot), I saw just the head of a
younger man. It seemed to be floating in space, below my own position,
which I assume was that of the Roman soldier on board the ship. This head
wore a helmet similar to mine. At the same time I knew that its wearer was
either a high-ranking noncommissioned officer, like a sergeant in our own
armed forces, or at least an officer of a rank below mine, which was fairly
high. The face had a long mustache but was otherwise clean-shaven. Its
eyes were either closed or downcast. I knew the head was that of Tam
Mossman, Janes editor at Prentice-Hall.
“Actually this view of Tam, with the odd position of the head and
the floating quality, was much more like other visions Ive had. The
other two earlier ones were much more like ‘being there/ The one of
Tam was more like a vision and as myself, the Roman soldier, ‘I ， knew I
was seeing it.
Rob and the Roman Captain 41
“ 丁h is w as th e e n d o f th e series o f im ages a n d v is io n s I saw. A ll th re e

of the sightings had been quite short. I drifted off into more ordinary im
ages, and soon fell asleep.”
Rob told me about his experiences at suppertime. Were they valid

glimpses into a past life existence, we wondered, or fictional pictures thrown
up by the psyche whose real meaning was symbolic and not literal at all? In
other words, was the psyche telling a story in images, to make a certain
point, and were the seeming events only illustrations of an inner script we
hadn’t learned yet to decipher? Rob certainly felt that he was that Roman
soldier, even while he didn’t particularly like the man; and it was the Roman
soldier who saw the “vision” of the other officer, who was Tam Mossman.
Rob is more open to reincarnational information than I am, though he
is just as critical in examining it later. I’m afraid that I got put off by the
kings, queens, christs, disciples, priests, and priestesses who seemed to parade
through the psyches of my contemporaries; and by the reincarnational data
given by many psychics. It seems that almost everyone has a distinguished
reincarnational family tree, blooming with famous historic personages.
IVe often thought that these purported past lives of fame and
grandeur represent more heroic portions of the psyche, buried beneath
prosaic life; I was willing to admit their value in reminding a contemporary
personality of its own greater abilities and potentials. Beyond this, I usually
thought that conventional reincarnational information only had a dim cor
relation with deeper aspects of reincarnation that were hidden beneath the
psychic conventions.
Rob and I both accept Seths contention that time is simultaneous, so
past, present, and future lives would have to exist at once, even though we
might experience them consecutively. We， d often thought that “reincarna-
tional readings” might be fictional representations of actual existences,
clothed in drama and fantasy. My reaction has been to throw my mental
hands up in dismay, Ym afraid, and I rarely look for reincarnational infor
mation on my own or ask Seth for it. In fact, when Seth gave brief hints of
his own “past lives” in Seth Speaks, I thought: Now what did he have to go
and do that for? Is he telling stories to illustrate the fact of simultaneous ex
istences, or is this to be taken as literal?
A year or so earlier Rob had some intriguing experiences with a
“past” personality of his own. I described these in Adventures in Conscious
ness: An Introduction to Aspect Psychology, and I was more than willing to
admit that some valid “other personality” showed itself through Rob, and
related to a friend一Sue, who related herself, as a past contemporary. Rob
was curious enough to follow through when any reincarnational data
42 Chapter 4
seemed to present itself, but none had for a year~until this Roman sol
dier episode.
Now I saw the affair in a different light than I would have earlier,
though. I began to wonder: Were reincarnational personalities variations of
models? Were they different but original versions of a psyche in various
time and space contexts? I knew that my library windows looked out to
other time periods, even though so far I hadn’t been able to see them. Was
Rob in his own way looking through the windows of the psyche, and see
ing glimpses of one “eccentric” version of himself?
I felt that the Roman soldier experience was somehow connected with
what the library was trying to tell me. I was delighted to have more mater
ial to work with on reincarnation一as long as it was Robs, and I did hope
that Seth or the library material would provide more insight into the entire
affair. But “the affair” had barely begun. The next afternoon when Rob lay
down to take a nap, he had the following experiences. Again, Ym quoting
his notes:
“As I lay down, I felt a distinct rhythmic rocking motion. It began at
once, as soon as I closed my eyes. I didn’t see anything, though. The move
ment~from head to toe, not from side to side—somehow told me that I
was lying flat on my back in a small boat, perhaps a rowboat. It was
moored somewhere off a shore, and bobbed gently in the sea. The very
pleasant rocking continued for some minutes, at an unvarying pace. I told
myself that I could see what was going on, but nothing happened. Though
this seemed to be a rowboat, there werent any seats or crosspieces that
would prevent one from lying down as I was,
Rob remembered this experience and wrote it down as soon as he got

up from his nap. After the rocking in-the-boat episode, however, he went
into a rather disturbing experience, which he forgot entirely until the
evening of the following day. He said that it was almost as if he didn’t want
to remember. Again, from Robs notes:
“I realized that I was floating in sea water. I was face down. Briefly I
felt the salty water in my mouth, as one would in such a position; at the
same time I heard the waters soft gurgle, and felt its slap-slap against my
face and face. It was quite warm and pleasant.
“My situation wasn’t, though, for I also realized that my hands were
tied behind my back. I felt this. This meant that my plight was deadly seri
ous. I couldn’t have accidentally fallen into the sea with my hands tied, I
thought. I had been flung there, yet I had no memory of how I came to be
so threatened. In fact, though the sensations of the water were definite
enough, I felt no alarm or panic. After all, I knew that I lay safely on my
cot, while exploring this reincarnational drama. I wasn’t even sure if I was
the Roman soldier of my October 27 experience, although I suspected that

I was. I had no feeling of choking or drowning, but my awareness ofwhat
ever was going to happen ended right there.
“It seems no accident that I had trouble remembering this episode
though. If I had (or am meeting) death in that fashion, I might not want
to recall it.”
The experience had been disturbing, but hardly terrifying, yet Rob
felt that his first instinctive reaction had obviously been to blot the affair
from memory. The episode triggered another one, however, that was more
vivid a n d its meaning was unmistakable. This one happened two days
after the last; again, when Rob lay down for a nap:
“This seems to be episode 3 in a series of reincarnational dramas, or
else its an example of a remarkably consistent appearance of a certain prob
ability or probable life of mine in the first century A.D. It appears to be the
resolution of the life of the Roman captain.. . .
“This afternoon, once again, I saw a succession of images after I lay
down on my cot for a nap. Throughout the vision I was seemingly a dis
embodied observer of my own fate in that life. First I saw a group of five or
six raggedly dressed, barefooted natives on a beach of some North African
country. I didn’t know which one. The beach was wide and gently sloping,
the countryside behind it barren. The beach itself was bordered by a steep
cliff, perhaps twenty feet high, that ran about forty yards in back of the
smooth sandy shore. The sky was cloudy.
“I knew the men were fishermen, though I saw no boats. The peculiar
thing was the way these men fished. They stood on the shore and hauled a
very long net into the shallow water. The net was perhaps forty feet wide.
Each end of it was fastened to extra-long ropes that had been tied onto the
four corners. These ropes were what the fishermen hauled on—a most pe
culiar arrangement, I thought in the vision....
“My dead body, that of the Roman captain, was tangled in the net. I
watched the fishermen roll it up in the wet sand, where it lay face up. Now
the blotched complexion was pasty white. The body was a massive, very
strong and compact one, though not young. The fishermen stripped its
uniform off, for all of its pieces had value to these poor people. I lay naked
on the beach. Then they rolled me back up the slope to the foot of the dirt
and stone cliffs, scooped out a shallow grave, and pushed me into it. In a
few minutes I was covered.
“丁here are additional elements in this series of visions that I haven’t
correlated. Once earlier, for instance, I saw a body~myself~in the water
before beaching. A large tree trunk was involved, one so old that the bark
was gone and I saw the smooth white-colored wood, roots and a few
44 Chapter 4
broken-off stumps of branches. Now my body was either lying on top of

this tree trunk for a while or was somehow tangled up with it. I seem to
have an ill-defined memory of both the tree trunk and by body caught in
the net.
“At one time my body floated face down with the left arm dangling
and the hand turned back, palm up. I showed this clearly in a sketch I
drew, afterward. I drew myself lying face down astride the tree trunk.”
Again we were intrigued—and curious. Were these home movies in

the psyches vast theater of the mind being shown to Robs contemporary
consciousness? Was the Roman captain another, alternate self, living out its
life in a drama happening the same time as Robs present existence, but on
a different channel of being? If so, and if Rob could tune in to the soldiers
life, then could the soldier tune in to Robs existence? If Rob and the cap
tain were both versions of another, multidimensional self, then was it aware
of being each of them?
In Adventures in ConsciousnessI introduced what I call aspect psychol
ogy, theorizing the existence of a source self from which our present iden
tities spring. I call us “focus personalities,” because as far as were
concerned, our lives are focused in this physical reality. The Roman captain
would be another focus personality, then, existing in another time and
place while Rob lives in this “present” century. Reincarnational personali
ties would be different focuses taken by consciousness as it impinged into
three-dimensional experience. They would be connected, however,
through their common source self. Theoretically when any focus personal
ity turned away from its usual orientation, altered the direction of aware
ness, it could glimpse those “other lives” in a sort of multidimensional
bleed-through.
As we discussed Robs latest experiences, though, there were several
things that bothered us. For one thing, there seemed to be a contradiction,
and a glaring one—at least at a certain level of understanding. In his “rein-
carnational encounters” with our friend Sue the previous year, Rob had
pretty well established the existence of a personality called Nebenewho
also was supposed to have lived in the same time-slot as the Roman cap
tain. Rob decided to keep an open mind, though, and to encourage such
visions in the future. At least we，
d have more material to examine and cor
relate.
In the meantime, Rob mentioned his reincarnation episodes in my
Expansion of Consciousness class. A sculptor and artist, whom I’ll call
Peter, was a regular student at the time. Hes traveled extensively, and he
had a few remarks to make about the cliffs and the fishermen Rob saw. In
describing the cliffs, Rob said that they looked as if they’d crumble if any
one tried to climb them. Peter replied that the cliffs and beach were quite
like those he saw on a trip to Spain. They were fifteen feet or so high, com
posed of soft dirt and small rock, and also set back from the beach as Rob
indicated.
Rob felt that the cliffs in his vision were in North Africa, which
would be just south of the area Peter described. But Peter also went on to
say that the fishermen on the Spanish coast operated exactly the way the
fishermen did in Robs vision. They used long ropes to haul their nets to
shore, while they stood on the beach. These were odd, unexpected “corre
lations”—but within our time period. Would even poor fishermen use the
same methods now as those used some nineteen hundred years earlier? So
we ended up with some more questions to file away and consider. We were
collecting tiny chunks of the psyches data, like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle,
and we didn’t know where they all fit in. But we weren’t rejecting anything
just because we didn’t know its proper place, either. In a way, Rob was cast
ing his mind out like his fishermens nets, while he still stood firm ly on this
shore. Who knew what he， d come up with?
It was on a Monday afternoon that Rob saw the natives bury the body
of the Roman soldier. That night we held a regular session in which Seth
continued his own book dictation. Perhaps because I experiment with al
terations of consciousness so consistently, I keep my various ventures rather
separate, just for simplicity’s sake. As far as I was concerned, Seth was still
working on his book while I was working on mine. To Rob, the connec
tions between the two were quite clear, so that night when Seth started a
new section of his manuscript, Rob was more alert to the possible implica
tions than I was.
For one thing, Seths book wasn’t divided into chapters. Seth said that
the chapter form itself programmed our thinking in a linear fashion, and
he was experimenting with a different, more intuitive organization that
would automatically stimulate the reader to react in a new way. The section
he began that night was called “How to Journey into the Unknown Real
i t y T i n y Steps and Giant Steps—Glimpses and Direct Encounters.”
If Fd paid more attention, I might have wondered just what “glimpses
and direct encounters” might include and what they might have to do with
psychic politics.
C hapter 5
Glimpses and D ire ct Encounters, and

the F ly and the Book
he next day as I sat at my desk, I saw myself in the library again, sit
T ting with an open book before me. I looked like I do in a portrait

R o b p a in te d o f m e several years ago, a n d I w as dressed th e sam e
way: in a green jumper with a white blouse. As I watched, that “other me”
went to the library window, looked out, and returned to the library table.
She began to read, only the words sprang into my mind, and I typed them
down exactly as I got them, as quickly as I could.
From the Library
Models and Variations
These classic models are everywhere mirrored in all universal systems,

and in each they are the ideals from which all varieties and versions of
themselves constantly emerge. They are, then, the source of all phenome
nal life and represent the inner structure behind all forms. They do not
produce copies of themselves, however, but new creative eccentricities
which, in turn, alter the models.
They also appear as the biological working models of the genes and
chromosomes, and they can be affected and changed at any time through
mental experience. They are, in fact, instantly responsive to mental and
psychic events, through the natural interchange between the psychological
model accepted by the focus personality, and the reflections of that model
through the entire body structure. The molecules themselves faithfully fol
low both their own inner model structures and, in their organizational pat
terns, those psychic models accepted by the psychological entity.
48 Chapter 5
The Ideal, Motion, and Change
In this vast interplay of creativity, the ideal is constantly replenished

and expanded through the auspices of eccentricity; and eccentricity is con
stantly provided with a model against which to assert its fresh versions. A
multidimensional thrust is therefore achieved, a give-and-take between
each model and its variations, which is the basis in our world for all change
and all seeming permanence.
W ithin this elastic yet supportive framework there is, then, an order
in which all action occurs. Indeed, the nature of the framework itself
causes all action, for the models themselves maintain their eternal in
tegrity on the one hand, yet constantly create their own variations. These
tendencies are everywhere active, in biological structures and psycholog
ical states, and are reflected outward into the behavior of nations and
governments.
In this context, the terms “revelation” and “revolution” are pertinent.
Each variation upon a model is a revelation which in turn brings about a
revolution of a kind; a change in a previous condition. The revolution
makes sense, however, only in terms of the model it represents or is acting
against. The violent revolutions that often occur in the psyche within, or in
the world without, are basically unnecessary. They represent an ignorance
of the connections between models and their eccentricities; and the give-
and-take between them.
Only when this natural motion of model into eccentricity, and eccen
tricity into new model is tampered with, do violences occur. Only when
the essence of permanency is understood as containing its own motive
power~out of which change itself springs~will violence cease. Then the
motive power within any given model can be released, automatically
thrusting out into new eccentricities that are characteristic of the model
chosen.
The generations provide us biologically with an example of the inter
action of models and their variations as these occur within serial time. The
models transform themselves into biological versions, endowed with the
basic structures necessary to physical life, and with all the eccentricities
possible within a generalized earth model.
Cave man and Industrial man are both versions of a model of man
that is, itself, constantly changed by its own eccentricities—and their sub
jective experience of reality is so different that the respective versions follow
entirely divergent paths. Cave man did not turn into Industrial man. Nor
is Industrial man a better version of an earlier model. Each chose eccen
tricities that involved specific orientations within the same time-space
framework. Each uses the contents of a given earth differently.
Glimpses and Direct Encounters 49
Cave man and Industrial man also utilized models of time differently,
and therefore have their existence in divergent time systems that meet only
at one point in ajointly experienced focus point~the historically accepted
era of the cave men from which we think we emerged.
The Power Behind Eccentricities
The eternal, ever-changing model is the energy behind its own varia
tions, though through their existence these replenish and reinstate the
model. Lining the known self up with its model can be explained as a
magic act or as a scientific one, according to your orientation and frame
work of belief. This recognition of the model by the known self is, at our
level of existence, a further creative mutation. Instantly, fuller powers are
brought into play for effective action, in which the model and its creative
version interact with new exuberance.
The known selfor focus personality becomes aware of its own sources
yet is struck anew by its own uniqueness as itself. The model or source self
becomes more responsive, more aware of its own creation, and freshly de
lighted by the recognition given it by its offspring. A more flexible give-
and-take results, in which the joys of mortality are triply experienced by
the focus personality because of its comprehension of its own timelessness.
The contrast brings a new dimension into experienced time. To some ex
tent, the focus personality and its model or source self coincide; the focus
personality is “magnetized,” drawn to its model, which is then drawn to
earthly experience. Coincidences then occur that line up inner and outer
experience so that the focus personality can tune in to other versions of it
self, bringing further knowledge and experience into normal living.
Suddenly the book and the library vanished. This was the most material I’d
received from the library so far. It came in three separate segments, as
given. As I wrote it, I was again struck by its classic nature and inevitabil
ity, and by the feeling that the material is true on its own whether or not it
is ever accepted by anyone— and even if I rejected it. Seth always speaks to
people, and emotionally directs himself to their needs. He interprets
knowledge, or so it seems to me, cleverly and beautifully couching it in
terms that w ill intrigue and challenge others. The library material, I feel,
exists whether or not we understand or accept it. I am re-creating it and it
is re-creating me at the same time; yet in other terms its like a monument
with writing on it, in some other dimension, there for those who want to
read it even if generations pass it by.
50 Chapter 5
As I sat there, though, I began to see the idea for this book more
clearly. It would revolve around the idea that the focus personality rises out
of the civilization of the psyche, taking its form and characteristics from
models that exist within the mind as aspects of our own greater identity.
The book w ill probe the nature of those inner models and show how we
choose from them the aspects upon which we build the physically oriented
self.
Once we become consciously aware of the models within the psyche,
we have much greater freedom: either to creatively deviate from them or to
conform to their mental contours, according to our purposes. Such aware
ness instantly opens up the effective use of power in our lives, for were au
tomatically encountering aspects of our own greater being.
In a kind of politics raised to a higher degree, we govern the country
of the known self, with the ego or focus personality rising as ruler. This
focus personality can be a dictator, benign despot, president, high priest,
religious figurehead, king or queen, according to the nature of our beliefs
about the private and objective worlds.
As I thought about this, it became clearer and clearer that we interpret
reality in very rigid terms, accepting experience that fits in with our beliefs,
ignoring events that don’t seem to make sense within that framework, and
distorting such “unofficial” information so that it w ill conform to our con
cepts.
Its one thing to become intellectually aware of this, however, and an
other to meet such events firsthand. Each new excursion out of the official
context is exciting; its also an assault on the entire remaining framework of
old beliefs. Several days after getting the library material, I was presented
with an event that once again intrigued me and yet seemed to send me reel
ing, mentally at least, into areas that I’d successfully avoided before—be
cause they didn’t fit into my system of beliefs.
The episode was preceded by a briefer event of a different sort. I was
sitting at my table again, looking out the bay windows at the intersection
below. It was a Seth session night, but still early, so I turned around to look
at the wall where the library usually appeared, wondering if my double
image might be there.
Instantly I saw my double in the library. Then spirals of energy, silver-
colored, suddenly surrounded her. There was a lurching in my stomach as
the energy moved, circling my doubles image until finally she disappeared
and the spiraling energy took her place. I could feel myself drawn into the
energy too; and for a moment at my table I felt uneasy. I conquered my
momentary cowardice just as the energy began moving at an incredible
speed. Then I was inside it~ o r I was whatever it was. It moved to the li
brary window, then was instantly outside.
Glimpses and Direct Encounters 51
Everything was giant-sized, as if I were looking through binoculars.

“I ” was walking up giant stalks. At first I didn’t know what they were or
what I was, for that matter. The stalks were tall as redwood trees, and sud
denly “I” realized that I was an insect of some kind. This was a grass blade.
I thought I was a fly in a gigantic forest—a giant fly, because everything
was so large and super-real, and I’m used to thinking of flies as small. But I
was an ordinary fly, I realized, and this was what the world looked like!
Oddly enough, this made me feel better. I didn’t care what I was; as long as
I was something. So I felt myself go up the grass blade. Its impossible to
verbalize the sensations I had, but I remember being aware of the weight of
my wings. They seemed very sturdy and reassuring.
By now I was rather proud of myself for coming to terms with these
new conditions, and I decided that I might as well explore the environ
ment as the fly. I flew off the grass blade, but this act brought about an
other flurry of confusion. I flew into the library again, out of it into my
physical living room, and then out through the bay windows into the air
above Water Street. I lost all sense of having any kind of form, and I can’t
remember what else happened. I have a dim memory of flying bodiless
“somewhere.” The next thing I knew I was back with my body at the table.
The episode had been fascinating, and the wild gigantic greenery still
flickered in my mind. After that, I certainly didn’t expect anything except a
normal Seth session, although I did hope that Seth might explain what had
happened. In the rest of the time before the session, I did a few chores,
then Rob came out with his notebook and we talked, waiting for the ses
sion to begin.
First we discussed a letter we’d received that day from a Jungian psy
chologist. He asked if Seth might have anything to say about Carl Jung for
a conference that was scheduled to honor the hundredth anniversary of the
Swiss psychologists birth. Seth had briefly mentioned Jung in his book,
Seth Speaks. I thought that Jungs theories were far superior to Freuds. Oth
erwise he， d never “turned me on” particularly. Besides, I had the idea that
Seth was going to dictate some readers’ exercises in alteration of conscious
ness for ttUnknown>Reality, so I didn’t particularly want Rob to ask Seth
about Jung that night.
Then, more or less out of the blue, I said, “I don’t know about Jung.
But suddenly I have the craziest idea that I， ve got a whole lot of informa
tion on W illiam James.”
“James?” Rob said. “What’s he got to do with it?”
W illiam James, the noted American psychologist and philosopher,
had died in 1910.1 paused, not wanting to take time out from a Seth ses
sion. Yet in my minds eye I clearly saw a book. It was a small paperback;
open, printed on grayish paper. The print was also very small and the book
52 Chapter 5
was off in the distance. I closed my eyes so I could see it better, and men
tally found myself squinting.
I could hear Rob getting his papers ready, and I told him what was
happening. He said, “Okay, go ahead,” and as the book copy became
clearer, I read it aloud. A few times I missed a sentence and had to go back
to read what I’d missed. Somewhere along the way, the image of the book
vanished and the words just came— quite quickly, so that Rob was kept
busy taking notes.
The material was crystal clear and came very smoothly. I spoke in my
own voice, using my own gestures, and felt that I was still reading from the
book, even though I no longer saw it. It was a book by W illiam James,
written in first person, yet I felt the emotions James described as if they
were mine; or as if I were James reading aloud from his book.
C hapter 6
T h e James M a te ria l and

the C a rl Jung Text
T started “reading” at the top of the first open page I saw, which was in
I th e m id d le o f Jam es’ b o o k. A p p a re n tly I s ta rte d in w ith th e second p a rt
JL of a sentence which must have begun on the page just before:
• that when some people listen to music, they prefer lively pipers，
tunes, where others by temperament need a somber melody that with its
own brilliant but dark notes reflects the nostalgic desolation that the soul
experiences as its own. Not that the jo lly [man] is less sublime or more
shallow because he listens to lighter, happier strains, but that the person of
melancholy temperament must need feel the contrasts between dark and
light, and in those read the travails fashioned within the soul. Those tra
vails, dictated by religions dreary bells, peal through such a temperament
which takes upon itself the full weight of spiritual incongruities.
“There are those who seemingly cannot escape questioning in what
ever ways the irreconcilable conflicts that arise whenever the soul dreams of
God and then projects that dream into the living world of mans society.
Those driven in such a manner find it impossible to dwell upon the joyous
Christmas bells without hearing at the same time, and with utter anguish,
the funeral toll; and [they] cannot watch a holiday parade without at least
being symbolically aware of the final march, as with heavy head and low
ered eyes bereaved relatives follow the death coach to the grave.
“A ll of my scientific investigations, all of my most rational stances and
posturing were but a facade, in that they represented my attempts to rid
myself of those particular nuances of soul, for I strove for a respectable
framework in which I could behold myself and others with a like anguish
of mind. In that, the dry intellects weary probing brought me some fame,
but no acclaim can be felt as joyful when the mind itself feels like a dry bed
of kindling, forever searching to be fired but left instead piled elegantly in
a fine hall; never lighted.
54 Chapter 6
“It occurred to me that it might be far better to be of lowly mind,

bearing an intellect that did not look for such a lofty home, that did not
question so vehemently and so was fired by answers that might seem sim
plistic to me, and yet could light another, and warm the timbers of the
inner home.
“So I wished at times for a peasants mind, and romanticized the nat
ural seeing, for example, in a working mans faith the homey joys of the
soul that I myself so missed. I abhorred flowery sentimental language, and
I strove in my time for a quiet enough prose, yet I envied those who could
so easily weep with joy at the sight of a rose, or find the morning so re
freshing that it dissolved the nightmares that always existed, for me at least,
between the dusk and the dawn.”
One part of my mind was engrossed in what I was doing. Another part
was quite free, so that I found myself simultaneously reading from the book,
delivering the material, and mentally commenting on it. It was almost asif the
book existed “somewhere” and that if you read it, you “became James” to
some degree, so that his emotions and personality sprang alive. James used en
tirely different phraseology than Seth or I do. I felt a strong sense of integrity
behind his words and personality, and his views were given from such a dif
ferent viewpoint from mine that I was intrigued. I went on “reading” aloud:
“There are those, and I have written about them, who waken from
years of desolation, who are indeed in their own minds at least, born again.
A ll previous questions crumble, and yet the dust of their vestiges forms
into a souls living monument a faith~faith in God or man.
“Yet in rational terms how silly and sentimental are some such vi
sions. I looked, therefore, beneath their form: for their form, it seemed to
me, was no more than the bright images one sees when staring into an
open fire. I recognized that the sudden element of faith was important: It
could be faith in a stone. I examined those doctrines in which others
couched such faith, and never did I find a form worthy of the faith, the
confidence, or the hope it seemed to inspire.
^Therefore, faiths justification escaped me. At times I myself experi
enced what I would not publicly relate, as strong revelations. Momentarily
I seemed to awaken to a great hope. A great hope seized hold of me, and
yet when I examined my own vision I could not find anywhere within it a
rational justification for the unreasoning, childish but exultant faith that so
briefly showed. I was convinced that, like many others, I held my con
sciousness in a vice. The more my heart tried to escape it, the more my rea
son would protest. I was led to believe that the hearts knowledge is directly
opposed to intellectual knowing. I was not a warm man; for although there
is warmth in nostalgia, it is not heat-giving.
TheJames Material and the CarlJung Text 55
“M y brother [Henry James, the novelist] played out his hearts

warmth through fantasies; at least that is what I thought then. Basically I
considered the novel a form given to gentlemen in which the indelible liv
ing pages of the heart were transformed into superficial tales for other men
to read, and where the emotions were dealt with second-handily. Melan
choly written in a passage has almost an ennobling character, but in the
heart it is a black blot, as if an internal bottle of black ink forever flows out
its shadows upon the soul.
“It is easy to smile upon a child in a child’s body, and those artless ges
tures and babbling laughs have a charm difficult to describe: yet in a grown
man would the same sounds strike the ear like senile jabber, so it is difficult
for a man to be true to his native childishness. My intellect was my par
ent~a stern master indeed.
“I said that I was ahead of my time, that I dared speak out to my col
leagues in the hallowed halls of universities. I have been praised because I
uttered such words as ecstasy or ‘grace’ or ‘spiritualism，in the academic
halls, yet I needed those institutions, for their dictates would not let me
stray too far, after all, from the accepted knowledge of the times. I did not
dare leave the structure of my own bookishness.
“I gave testimony to the emotions of faith, joy, optimism, and ecstasy,
and spoke for them firm ly~but always in such a way that they could not
overtake me. I couched them in terms that would make them as acceptable
as possible. I gave them the respectability of my name, while my manner
and nature separated me from them sufficiently. I spoke of holy tremors,
but when I did my words were firm, lettered, disciplined and controlled~
so did the dreary workings of my own intellect dampen the half-kindled
fires of my own soul—and so did I myself trample out with firm stamps
the smallest kindlings that might have burned.
“I have since learned that the intellect and the emotions together heat
the souls of men. The intellect with its questions, used properly, is like one
stick rubbed against the soul: An ignition occurs, but only if the intellects
questions are addressed to the innermost soul and not to itself. When the in
tellect asks itself its own questions, there is but one dry stick, and no response.
I sensed the fine unknowable fire of faith. I knew it existed. My life was like
one lived in a gigantic dark cave in that respect, in that I could imagine the fire
but I could not be warmed by it, and it always belonged to someone else.
“My melancholy was the one constant that represented my yearning,
and so I could not desert it, nor it me. It provided its own shadow of
warmth, and by its dreary light I at least had glimpses of a greater, less de
pendable but brighter vision. I saw it, however, not in the experience of
those I respected, but in the faces of outcasts, and I feared its unpre
dictability.
56 Chapter 6
“In my time, ‘progress， was the shiny word, and the generation waited
with dewy-eyed enthusiasm for technology, the new God, to set it free. So
there was overwhelming enthusiasm and great optimism, yet by tempera
ment I basically stood apart. M y emotions were natural prey, I thought, to
illogic, yet something within me yearned for old ancient gods. At the same
time I denied them. I found, I suppose, the shadows in a weird way were
reassuring, dating back to a psyches past; and in all the new rambunctious
and rejoicing, I felt the heavy shadows of inquisitions and ancient gods
upon my soul.
“I sounded modern, and felt myself, in your terms, avant-garde. I was
a man of my civilization. I looked forward, and saw technology as a bright
and shining sword appears out of the mysteries of nature to cut asunder the
embarrassing heavy illogic of the soul, and to spread before it a clear, un
derstandable, rational world. I confronted the great incongruities that
swept all peace from my days, however, for no matter how I tried, I felt the
power of a faith that denied my reason, as I understood my reason.
“So I looked for faith in the ignorant and I found it— in them but
not in me. My intellect agreed that faith existed and yet at the same time
held me from it. Ironically I gave testimony, then, to a faith that I myself
could not feel. There were those with a melancholy as deep as mine who
rose above it in the flickering of an eye. A ll contradictions vanished. I
marveled. There were those who gave up their illnesses, and I marveled.
There were those whose fears dissolved overnight, and again I marveled,
and I gave testimony in my books and lectures. Yet in the back of my
mind I thought that their previous doubts and agonies must somehow
have been psychological posturing~else how could they have so magi
cally disappeared?
“There is nothing as frustrating as a man who clings to his own
melancholy, so I despaired time and time again until my own despair be
came familiar. At times it was even boring. In all of this I stubbornly con
tinued searching for instances of this irrational faith in others, and my
sense of desolation existed in direct proportion to the heights of ecstasy
that had been reported by others.
“Yet I slid into death like a pebble falling; dropping. For a while no
wind disturbed those ripples. Then slowly my consciousness emerged
again, and even my melancholy had its own mind. Symbolically I found
myself still alive, resting quite like an insect above the still waters of my
own desolation. In an image I still remember, I flew round and round, rec
ognizing the peripheries of my soul. I lit upon the shore of myself, and
then I took my own form, finding me naked and alive by the pool, dark
and mysterious, that represented for me the motion and boundaries of my
own psyche.
The James Material and the CarlJung Text 57
“In that vision the sun was shining and I was a young man. I dove
into those waters of my own soul. There was a languorous, sensuous free
sense of dropping into myself, of inner journeying, and the dark richly col
ored waters were somber but beautiful. I dove with ease, not having to hold
my breath, and what had been the waters of my isolation parted for me,
and I found myself at the bottom of a sea floor. I was quite aware of myself,
yet here for a boys delight there were caverns and castles, coral mansions,
that I knew represented my own buried wishes. Over my early childhood
fantasies there glimmered fairy princesses who moved with me from castle
to castle, and all the childish delights I had long ignored were mine.
“When I surfaced it was—in my vision— twilight. There was a pro
cession, a procession of the gods that went before my very eyes. I wondered
and watched silently. Each god or goddess had a poet who went in com
pany, and the poets sang that they give reason voice. They sang gibberish,
yet as I listened the gibberish turned into a philosophic dialogue. The
words struck at my soul. A strange mirror-image type of action followed,
for when I spoke the poets’ words backwards, to my intellect they made
perfect sense.
“The divisions I had placed between the intellect and the emotions
were my own. I had denied my intellect its gaudy colors and dressed it in a
gray robe.”
F in a lly I to o k a b re a k a n d w e n t to th e b a th ro o m . Yd been d e liv e rin g

the material steadily since it started. Once or twice I was aware of Seth, in
the background someplace, acting like an overseer. Otherwise, I was com
pletely engrossed in James’s story, even though this was the time usually de
voted to a Seth session.
At the same time, I grew increasingly uneasy. I ， m always suspicious
when some well-known deceased historical personage is supposed to have
spoken to a medium or group of sitters in somebody’s front parlor, and that
goes for my parlor as well as anyone elses. Its not that I consider such com
munication impossible, only highly improbable~not that I doubt the sur
vival of personality either~but rm sure that the hows and wherefores are
quite different than we might suppose. As I delivered the material, then, I
was aware of these feelings too, yet I was determined to continue. Vd
promised myself to be freer with my abilities since I first saw the library,
and not to block experiences because I didn’t like current explanations for
them. James’s material impressed me. I thought his style of writing was de
lightful and beautifully balanced. Rob had been interested in James in the
past, and I was sure that his interest must have something to do with the
evenings events. Once I stopped delivering the material, though, my ques
tions came to the forefront of my mind. “Yeah, Jane, here we go, W illiam
58 Chapter 6
James; sure, Jane. Try for George Washington next, why don’t you?” Even
while I was thinking that, I saw the book again, only from the outside,
clearer than before. I read the title: The Varieties ofReligious States.
I ’d read little ofJames, but Hob had read his Varieties ofReligious Ex
periences; and of course I was aware of the sim ilarity between the titles of
the two books. But I knew that the book did exist somewhere, and that I
was getting a part of it.
I could get the whole thing if I wanted to! “To hell with that,” I
thought, “who wants to write somebody elses book?” Even at the time I
recognized the humor; because after all in a way I write Seths books for
him. Yet Seth I’m sure is somehow connected with my psyche; so its sort of
like being a part of the family. W illiam James definitely did not fit that cat
egory.
I went back into the living room. Rob and I exchanged brief glances
of amusement, astonishment, and perplexity. Just as we were ready to re
sume, I had the feeling that James was going to comment on Freud or
Jung. This made me more uneasy than I had been, but I decided to con
tinue. At once I started reading the book again:
“I tried, at least in my lifetime, to deal with the dimensions of the
soul. I， ve learned far more about those inner contours since [death]. I
admit I gave lip service to the emotions, so that the souls dimensions
seemed to gobble them; yet as Freuds views are understood, as he left
them, I feel that he deepened mans melancholy, substituted the subcon
scious for Hell, and re-aroused lingering demons of the soul that before
had been [in] religions realm.
“Religion at least offered some handy methods that would relieve the
spirits great anxiety, and Freuds couch lacked any of the true deep sym
bolism. His symbols dealt only with the surface-taught paraphernalia with
which every infant is automatically equipped at birth, and through culture.
They represent to me local instances having to do not with spiritual signif
icances that ride within experience regardless of training, but instead with
the results of schooling that is applied by parents from without. And as
their theories stand, to me both Freud and Jung missed the grandeur of the
soul, though Jung came far closer in his unending exuberance.
“The souls triumphs and agonies are beyond the boundaries of sex,
and if I portrayed the soul as neuter, not hinting of its true, rich complex
ity, still basically Freud and Jung each viewed reality through the mirror of
their sex.
wWe are temperamentally different, yet I have always preserved a dis
tance, so that the great emotional encounters between Freud and Jung still
strike me in an unpleasant fashion. I clung to my intellect~as much a fail
ing, I admit, as clinging to ones sex in such an endeavor~yet Freuds and
TheJames Material and the CarlJung Text 59
Jungs emotionalism could have been somewhat more tempered with a

keen intellectual zest. To me, Freuds intellect was muddied. Jungs exuber
ance freed him to some degree, yet I found his symbolism cloyingly heavy.
“From my past this would necessarily follow, for Jung encountered his
emotions in a way impossible for me. The breadth and depth of those emo
tions led him, I think, despite himself to sense the dimensions of the soul.
I still feel that his symbolism gets in the way, however, and becomes a too-
heady ingredient that can lead to psychic drunkenness, illuminating at the
time, but lost in the morrows soberness.
“I could not for the life of me, in life, imagine such constant complex
playing of the emotions in grubby dallyings, yet all the while I yearned for
them. Jung played with the most primitive of emotions like a child with
blocks or mud pies, yet in a peculiar alchemy, the emotions themselves led
him into an understanding, easily and naturally, that was almost impossi
ble for me.”
The material seemed endless. I was beginning to wonder when it was

going to stop, when suddenly it did. I decided to get a snack and suddenly
I became aware of “someone” very emphatic, exuberant, saying “Yes, yes,
yes,” and I knew it was supposed to be Jung. Rob didn’t look too happy
when I told him. According to his notes at this point he “threw up his
mental hands” and wondered if “we were to be entertained not only by
one famous personality, but two•” I wasn’t happy about it either. What
was going on?
I sensed my own resistance. Again I reminded myself that I’d blocked
material in the past if I didn’t want to handle the questions it entailed; and
I was determined not to do it anymore. The question of communicating
with the well-known dead was one of those questions I just hadn’t wanted
to grapple with. wWell, I am getting something on Jung,” I said, somewhat
defensively. Rob grinned at me~sort of.
I didn’t see a book this time or anything at all, just sensed this almost
erratic personality, and in my own voice I spoke for . . . Carl Jung or his
equivalent. At least Yd be democratic, I thought, and give him equal time.
The words just came; their source seemed less steady, though. They
emerged in bursts of explosive rhythm, then became much weaker, then
stronger again.
I spoke in my own voice. I didn’t feel another personality present, ei
ther~ it seemed more as if I was playing a record of a writer reading his
own works.
Jung appeared much more energetic than James, almost adolescent in
his energy and enthusiasm; yet in a strange way he seemed shallow in con
trast to James’s sobriety:
60 Chapter 6
“Numbers have an emotional equivalent, in that their symbols origi

nally arose from the libido that always identifies itself with the number 1,
and feels all other numbers originating out of itself. The libido knows itself
as God, and therefore all fractions fly out of the selfstructure of its own re
ality. The Father-God and the physical father alike ally themselves with the
number 1，and see their magical transformation occurring out of a con
stant addition, arising from their own basic omnipotence.
“The son, symbolized by 2, feels the father and the number 1 as a
threat from which it emerges and from which the son emerges triumphant,
grateful and yet rebelling. The 3 is the female principle, which neither the
father or son, or 1 or 2, can deny.
“The psyche forms a triangle of 1， 2, and 3, and centered within is the
personality, held in focus and yet not in focus by the trine principle. I have
been working with higher mathematics, but not remotely~instead, excit
edly~ computing the nature of symbols with the reality of numbers. The
shadow in the male is the 3， and in the female is the 1, and the basic inner
encounter of the female and male characteristics give rise to stabilizing and
then calming forces.
“In dreams the numbers may appear as words, obviously~the num
ber 1 as one/ or 4 as ‘for，一but there are great as-yet-undiscovered correla
tions that exist between the emotions and the numerology of the soul. The
number 4 signifies a secure framework in which the male and female prin
ciples are accepted. The number 5 can represent the birth of a new insta
bility in the personality when it appears in dreams, for it represents an
over-swelling of the male or female element, so that overall stability is again
endangered.
“These numbers, held unconsciously, as I now believe, have cellular
connections that determine bodily health, and serve as unconscious clues
to specific diseases or healings. I am presently convinced, at least, that the
predilection toward a specific 1 or 3 held unconsciously by a woman about
to conceive w ill bring about conditions bearing on the sex of the child.
“Arrogance and dependency~two faces—also involve the 1 and 3，
and the type of illness chosen w ill have to do with a minus quality; the 1,
signifying maleness, unrecognized, might entail a stress disease even when
all exterior conditions would seem against it.”
Numerology is a subject in which I have little interest. I delivered the

material~discussing what Jung “said” were some of his ideas since his
death; but another part of me was bored. I thought, “If this guys been dead
for twenty years or whatever, it seems he could come up with better ideas
than this.” Yet my feelings didn’t seem to impede the material I was deliv
ering one whit:
The James Material and the CarlJung Text 61
“Prostate diseases I now believe to represent denied female tendencies.

It seems quite clear to me at least now that a magical type incantation of
numbers could be used as an unconscious healing process, even if the pa
tient was not told the reason behind the exercise. I am also convinced that
certain illnesses begin and end on certain dates for the same reason, though
this is simply put, and that the power of astrology has far other roots than
currently supposed.
“M y excitement with some of these theories grows. I realize it is im
possible to tell you what I am learning, but I have discovered the emotional
validity of cells. The minds symbols spring in part at least from this cellu
lar atmosphere, which at birth is generally though not always clear.
“In a primitive emotional structure the cells emerge in an intelligent
medium, far different than anything I surmised before. I did not under
stand the immediate direct correlation between the self and the mass un
conscious, or thoroughly comprehend the instant response with which
they meet.”
Once more, the material promised to be endless. It was nearing mid

night. I decided to stop and immediately the material came to an end. I re
member Robs face, though, when we sat there just afterward; it looked
worried. “I， m uneasy about all this,” he said. wReally uneasy.”
I said, “Let’s go to bed. We’ll figure it out tomorrow,” but by the
time I reached the bedroom, I was more troubled than I had been earlier.
I was upset because Rob was. If he was upset, I thought, then maybe I re
ally had something to worry about. Troubled, huddled up under the blan
kets I caught myself thinking, wGreat, Jane. What have you gone and
done now?” For a minute it seemed that all of my fears had come home to
roost: I was just another batty lady conversing with the leagues of the hon
ored dead.
No matter how I looked at it, I didn’t believe that James or Jung was
speaking to me or though me; yet Rob told me that the James material was
really terrific. So what did it all mean? Did I just want to impress a group
of psychologists? Well, that wouldn’t work, I thought angrily, because I
wasn’t going to send them any of the material for the conference.
Yet... I could see that James book in my minds eye and I knew that
it was a fascinating manuscript. I thought, sitting up, that I could get the
book and then present it as a creative device; call it an imaginative projec
tion, or even, “An Imaginative Interview with W illiam James.” On that
basis alone, it would be legitimate. I could never present it as, well, as any
thing else, I thought. And then I remembered how tempted I was in the
beginning to just write about Seths ideas as if they were mine in ordinary
terms, so that I wouldn’t have to grapple with the problems of doing
62 Chapter 6
otherwise. I kept seeing that “damned book” in my mind. It intrigued me;

but then, books always do.
That night Rob and I both went to bed, troubled.
We had no idea what the implications of that James material were,
and we certainly didn’t realize that in a strange way it was a cornerstone,
connecting Seths book to mine, and mine to his. Seths later explanation
and further information from the library literally brought to light a new
way of looking at the psyches relationship with life and death.
C hapter 7
M ore from the Library, and

Seth Explains the James M ate ria l
and Introduces “W o rld View s”
he next day, Tuesday, I sat down to write at my table, but my mind
T was on that evenings “psychic class” when I wasn’t trying to come

up with an acceptable explanation for the James-Jung events of the
night before. No sooner did I sit down, though, when I began getting ma
terial from “my library book.” I took the material down directly on the
typewriter:
From the Library
Models for C reativity
The essence of man is not destroyed. Neither is it held in static form,

preserved like a spiritual mummy in some museum of souls. Instead, after
death a man’s or woman’s essence continues its experiences, though a dif
ferent model of existence is followed, a different frame of reference chosen,
and another version of psychological being is pursued.
The present model for physical life precludes any easy mixing of the
living and the dead, any casual encounters between those in flesh and out
of it as a common occurrence. This was not always the case, for at one time
the dead and living mixed far more openly. Mans consciousness chose to
focus upon ever-increasing specifics in terms of time, however, and gradu
ally closed out the reference points in which such encounters could occur.
In the previous wider reference there was enough leeway for corporal
and noncorporal experiences to intersect in space under certain conditions.
The closer time reference chosen closed this gap, requiring on the part of
64 Chapter 7
the dead a specific focus they could not easily achieve in order to make
their presence felt.
The path of the living and dead become divergent. Earlier, however,
the dead continued to instruct—parents returning to their children, and
dead travelers returning to their tribes, telling of their journeys. In this way,
for millennia, knowledge was passed on through the centuries. Mans con
sciousness was more flexible and accommodating, yet while it operated in
that manner, the possibilities for more specific experience and more precise
focus remained latent. Man gradually altered the focus of his conscious
ness, perceiving as real only those phenomena that fell within a particular
range, bringing into actuality levels of physical experience to which he had
been blind earlier, and gradually becoming opaque to other stimuli which
he had once perceived clearly.
Encounters with the dead then became blurred, occurring in dream
states; which always represent other areas of consciousness dimly perceived
but not accepted as official reality. When this happened, the dead became
colored with the symbolism of dreams also, for when symbols operate, they
are always signs of a reality not directly, but opaquely perceived.
These ancient psychological pathways of consciousness still lie latent,
however, operating as alternate possibilities and ruling certain neurological
pathways that have been largely abandoned. Some persons have greater
memory than others of such abandoned avenues of perception, and
through the ages have used them to increase their own knowledge and to
view physical life from a different perspective. Generally, however, these
roads became by-paths, thickly cluttered with overgrown ancient memories
and strewn with psychic statues, as it were, that once had meaning and
served as guideposts between the living and dead.
These pathways are traveled in dream states, but there again they are
paved with symbols. These serve as methods of communication and yet
also operate as barriers, keeping apart various levels of reality. The dead and
the living in your time speak opaquely then, through dreams and symbols,
for the model for reality that you have chosen precludes the deads'more ex
pansive view.
Even then, in dream states you come alive to your native conscious
ness, and in periods of revelation and inspiration you open those paths of
the mind when it is safe enough to turn momentarily from the specific
focus of waking life. That focus requires a finely tuned precision in time
orientation; instant response that requires your attention.
The inner portion of the self, the psyche, however, follows that other
model which serves as a supportive framework for the conscious life you
know. The creative mind functions basically in accordance with this freer
perception, seeking its associations outside the recognized time framework,
More from the Library 65
ranging far wider in its travels and drawing for its purposes from the
knowledge and experiences of the race as a whole~as it exists in and out of
time. This data is then used with new creativity, further altering the physi
cal model of existence.
The creative mind itself, then, rebels against too rigid a focus, and
searches through the centuries while the body is still clothed in time. Yet it
searches precisely because of the body’s physical orientation, in order to il
luminate the nature of its existence. In the world of the creative mind there
is little difference between the living and the dead. Ideas are freely ex
changed between them in a commerce that forms much of the world you
know.
This commerce is continual, though couched in symbolic form that
serves to veil the original encounters so that the necessary separation in fo
cuses can still be maintained. Intent, emotional intensity, and personal
characteristics dictate this commerce and open the lines of communication
that exist, connecting mind and mind.
There is a constant give-and-take not only between the living and
dead, but with the living and those portions of the psyche that exist in
noncorporal form; between the “living” and the “dead” portions of the self,
then. Yet symbolism remains as the language of this commerce. Its rich and
varied structure allows it to handle the weight of greater theoretical struc
tures that your focus necessarily precludes.
Attempts to make this commerce literal, to bring these encounters
down to earth, fail miserably because denied the symbols, the range of that
reality cannot be contained in the usual dimensions ofyour lives as you un
derstand them, and contradictions instantly seem to occur. The realities
don’t mix smoothly: rough edges show and the dead then appear as carica
tures of themselves, less dimensional than you, while stripped of the m ulti
dimensionality of their own state.
If symbolism is understood to be a language, then it can be used by
both the living and the dead, and seen as a structure in which such en
counters can occur~but these are encounters of mind, as states of being
move closer to each other with symbolism a bridge between.
Mankind views physical life as exteriorized and outside of the context
of mind. Yet the universe is the three-dimensional projection of minds’ ac
tivity. The phenomenal world springs into being in accordance with inner
models. Infinite versions of these bridge the gap between the invisible and
the visible, taking physical form and then returning to the inner models in
which their overall vitality resides.
These models are themselves conscious, not operating as dead ideals
but as every-changing structures, carrying within themselves as inviolate
integrity which is not threatened but strengthened through change and
66 Chapter 7
eccentricity. So all men and women living exist as completely in the inner
world as in the outer, and each smallest feature within physical reality has
its inner counterpart from which it emerges. W ithin and without, there is
constant change and fluctuationyet always in response to the model
which responds to its own eccentricities.
Therefore this book, not yet completed in your time, exists in a li
brary that is a model for the libraries that you know; and yet in your terms
this book is also an eccentricity, for it is not a copy but a new edition, com
pletely repeated, while holding within itself the kernel of its own integrity.
The creation of this book is original in that it has not existed in this
form before in your world, yet it is also written in response to its model;
and the same applies to all creativity.
When the material stopped I read it over and saw that it was a partial ex
planation for the disturbing James material of the night before. Then an
other idea came to me. I started laughing, because it suddenly occurred to
me that Vd tuned in to my library during the latest Seth session, but had
picked up the wrong book—one that “belonged” to James instead of me.
Maybe Varieties ofReligious Statesv/zs a model of a book James intended to
write.
I still didn’t connect any of this with the book that Seth was dictating,
though, until we held our next regular session the following night. This
session seemed to pin Seths book and this one together, and it became ap
parent that my own experiences were giving me personal examples of Seths
theories and in the same order as he was delivering them in “Unknown”Re
ality.
In this particular session he began his first discussion of “world
views,” which was to be one of the cornerstones of his own manuscript. It
would also serve to open up my experiences by providing me with a new
framework in which to explore the reality of after-death perception. The
entire session ran twelve typewritten pages, but here I， m only including
those portions pertinent to the James material. The session was part of
book dictation and is directed to the reader.
T h is section [of “Unknown”Reality] deals w ith the various exercises

th a t w ill h o p e fu lly p ro vid e yo u w ith y o u r ow n in tim a te glim pses in to
p revio usly u n kno w n realities.
I said th a t yo u r n o rm al focus o f consciousness can be com pared to
y o u r hom e station. So far, exercises have been described th a t w ill g en tly
lead you away fro m concentration upon th is hom e base, even w h ile its
structure is strengthened at the same tim e. You can also call th is hom e
statio n o r local program y o u r w o rld view , fo r fro m it yo u perceive yo u r
reality. To some extent it represents yo u r personal focus, thro ug h w hich

you in te rp re t m ost o f y o u r experience. As I m entioned, w hen you begin
to m ove aw ay fro m th a t p a rtic u la r o rg anizatio n, strange things m ay
start to happen. You m ay be fille d w ith w onder, excitem ent, o r perplex
ity. You m ay be delighted o r appalled, according to w hether o r n o t yo u r
new perceptions agree o r disagree w ith yo u r established w o rld view.
Instead o f a regular session [last M o n d ay night], the fram ew o rk o f
the session was used in a new k in d o f exercise. It was m eant as an exam
ple o f w hat can happen under the best o f circumstances w hen someone
leaves a native w o rld vie w and tunes in to another, q uite d iffe ren t from
the o rig in al.
You always fo rm y o u r ow n experience. R u b u rt tuned in to the
w o rld view o f a m an kno w n dead. H e was n o t d ire c tly in com m unica
tio n w ith W illia m James. H e was aware, however, o f the universe
throug h W illia m James’s w o rld view. As you m ig h t tune in to a program
on a television set, R u b u rt tuned in to the view o f re a lity now held in the
m in d o f W illia m James. Because th a t vie w necessarily invo lved em o
tions, R u b u rt fe lt some sense o f em o tio nal contact_ b u t o n ly w ith the
v a lid ity o f the em otions. Each person has such a w o rld view , w hether
liv in g o r dead in yo u r term s, and th a t “liv in g picture” exists despite tim e
o r space. It can be perceived b y others.
Each w o rld vie w exists at its ow n p a rtic u la r “frequency,” and can
o n ly be tuned in to b y those m ore o r less w ith in the same range. T h e
frequencies themselves, however, have to be adjusted p ro p e rly to be
b ro ug h t in to focus, and those adjustm ents necessitate certain intents
and sym pathies. It is n o t possible to tune in to such a w o rld vie w if you
are basically at odds w ith it. You s im p ly w ill n o t be able to m ake the
proper adjustm ents.
R u b u rt has been w o rkin g w ith alteratio ns o f consciousness and
w o n d erin g about the basic v a lid ity o f relig io n . H e has been try in g to
reconcile in te lle c tu a l and em otional knowledge. James was far fro m one
o f his fa vo rite w rite rs, yet R u b u rts interests, in te n t, and desire were
close enough so th a t under certain co nditio ns he could experience the
w o rld view held by James. T h e un kn o w n re a lity is un kn o w n o n ly be
cause you believe th at it m ust be hidden. O nce th a t b e lie f is annihilated,
then o th e r q u ite as leg itim a te view s o f re a lity can appear to y o u r con
sciousness, and w orlds q u ite as va lid as yo u r ow n sw im in to view. To do
this, yo u m ust have fa ith in yourself, and in the fram ew o rk o f yo u r
kn o w n reality. O therw ise you w ill be too afraid to abandon even b rie fly
the hab itual, organized vie w o f the w o rld th a t is y o u r o w n .. . .
R u b u rt tuned in to W illia m James’s w o rld view because th e ir in te r
ests coincided. A le tte r fro m a Jungian psychologist helped serve as a
stim ulus. T h e psychologist asked m e to com m ent about Jung. R u b u rt
fe lt little correspondence w ith Jung. In the back o f his m in d he w on
dered about James, m a in ly because he knew th a t Joseph [Rob] enjoyed
one o f James’s b o o ks.. . .
It is q u ite possible to tune in to the w o rld view o f any person, liv
in g o r dead in y o u r term s. T h e w o rld vie w o f any person, even one n o t
68 Chapter 7
ye t b o rn fro m y o u r stan d p o in t, exists nevertheless. R u b u rts e xp eri

ence s im p ly serves as an exam ple o f w hat is possible. Q u ite rig h tly he
d id n o t in te rp re t the event in co n ventio n al term s, and Joseph d id n o t
suppose th a t James h im s e lf was c o m m u n ic atin g in the w ay u su ally
im a g in e d .. . .
James was n o t aware o f the situ atio n . F o r th a t m atter, James h im
self is em barked upon o th e r adventures. R u b u rt picked up on James s
w o rld view , however, as in y o u r term s, at least, it existed perhaps ten
years ago. T h e n in his m in d James p la y fu lly th o ug h t o f a book th at he
w o u ld w rite were he “liv in g ,” called Varieties o f Religious States~ a n a l
tered version o f a book he w ro te in life.
H e fe lt th a t the soul chooses states o f em o tio n as you w o u ld
choose, say, a state to liv e in . H e fe lt th a t the chosen em otional state was
then used as a fram ew o rk th ro u g h w hich to view experience. H e began
to see a conglom eration o f w h a t he loosely called relig io us states, each
d iffe re n t and ye t each serving to u n ify experience in the lig h t o f its par
tic u la r “n atu ral features.” These n atu ral features w o u ld appear as the o r
d in a ry tem peram ents and in c lin atio n s o f the soul.
R u b u rt tuned in to th a t u n w ritte n book. I t carried the stamp o f
James s ow n em o tio n al state at the “tim e ,” w hen he was view ing his
e a rth ly experience, in y o u r term s, fro m the stand p o int o f one w ho had
died, w ho could lo o k back and see where he tho ug ht his ideas were va lid
and w here th e y were not. A t th a t p o in t in his existence, there were
changes. T h e plan fo r the b ook existed, and s till exists. In R u b u rts
“present,” he was able to p ic k up this w o rld vie w as expressed w ith in
James’s im m o rta l m ind . To do this, R u b u rt had to be free enough to ac
cept the vie w o f re a lity as perceived by someone else. . . . R u b u rt a l
low ed one p o rtio n o f his consciousness to rem ain securely anchored in
its ow n re a lity w h ile le ttin g another p o rtio n soak up, so to speak, a real
ity n o t its o w n . . . .
Such creative “architect’s plans” are o ften picked up b y others u n
kn o w in g ly, altered o r changed, end ing up as e n tire ly new creative p ro
ductions. M o st w rite rs do n o t exam ine th e ir sources th a t closely. T h e
same applies, o f course, to any fie ld o f endeavor. M a n y q u ite m odern
and sophisticated developm ents have existed in w h a t yo u th in k o f
now as past c iviliza tio n s. T h e plans o r m odels w ere picked up by in
vento rs, scientists, and the lik e , and altered to th e ir ow n specific d i
rections, so th a t th e y em erged in y o u r w o rld n o t as copies, b u t as
som ething n e w . . . .
In the rest of the session Seth elaborated on the whole concept of the
world view, particularly as it can be perceived through intuitions, auto
matic writing, and creative inspiration. He stressed that tuning in to world
views could be extremely beneficial, adding to knowledge and also provid
ing practical solutions to problems. More to the point of our immediate
concerns, though, he cleared up some questions we were asking about
historic personages popping up in numberless living rooms, communicat

ing through a mediums trance state or through the Ouija board.
He said, for example:
M a n y people w o rk in g w ith the O u ija board o r autom atic w ritin g

receive messages th a t seem, o r p u rp o rt, to come fro m h is to ric person
ages. O fte n , however, the m aterial is vastly in fe rio r to th a t w hic h could
have been produced b y the person in question d u rin g his o r h e r e a rth ly
existence. A n y com parison w ith the m a te ria l received to the w ritte n
books o r accounts already existing w o u ld im m e d iately show g larin g dis
crepancies. Yet in m any instances, the O u ija board operator o r the au
to m atic w rite r is to some extent o r o th e r tu n in g in to a w o rld view,
strug g ling to open roads o f perception free enough to perceive an a l
tered version o f reality, b u t n o t equipped enough th ro u g h tra in in g and
tem peram ent, perhaps, to express it. • "
T h e m ost le g itim ate instances o f co m m unicatio n between the liv
in g and the dead occur in an in tim a te personal fram ew o rk in w hic h a
dead parent makes contact w ith its offspring; a husband o r w ife freshly
o u t o f physical re a lity appears to his o r h e r mate. B u t ve ry seldom do
h isto ric personages m ake contact except w ith th e ir ow n in tim a te circles.
Seth expanded on all these topics during that session, which is in
cluded in its proper place in The “Unknown”Reality. Ive had some other
experiences with world views since, as a result of following Seths sugges
tions as he outlined them that night. At the time, though, Rob and I were
really grateful for Seths explanations since it cleared up issues that we， d
wondered about off and on for years.
Seth didn’t mention the Jung material and we forgot to ask him
about it. I don’t feel that I responded to Jung as well as I did to James (in
the context of the experience). In fact I think I was somewhat antagonis
tic. I kept wanting to say, “Come on, slow down a minute so I can get this
straight.” Or, “You musthave more to say than that.” I assume this was as
much a world view as Jamess material was, but it was a much more emo
tional one. James’s were somehow remembered emotions, while Jung
seemed very anxious and eager. Perhaps I picked up only a part of Jungs
world view~a strong emotional element~so vital that I responded emo
tionally too.
I was still intrigued by James’s book though—it was so easy to “see,”
that I enjoyed the directness and simplicity of the method used. A ll I had
to do was close my eyes, bring the book closer, and read it aloud so that
Rob could copy it down. Its true that James’s emotions did bleed through
the words to some degree, as if the letters themselves spoke with a nostal
gia or melancholy of their own. But Jungs emotional state seemed like a
bouncing rubber ball, hard to follow.
70 Chapter 7
After Seths session, Rob and I just sat staring at each other. My own
library material explained my James experience in one way, and Seth ex
plained it from another angle. When Seth spoke—particularly about com
munication with the dead一he sounded amused and compassionate at
once, while there was no emotion ever implied with my own library mate
rial as far as I could tell. It just seemed to “be there” with no personality at
tached, not caring whether or not I understood it, like a message on a
blackboard.
C hapter 8
U no fficial Contents o f the M in d
’d been writing down all my experiences, carrying on with my classes,
I and continuing with life’s normal routines. By Sunday I was ready to go

for a long ride and get out into that clear autumn air and sunshine. Yet
th e n , p re c is e ly w h e n I fe lt so re la xe d , I s u d d e n ly fe lt som e n e w m a te ria l
from “the library book.” I sat down at my table, listening to the leaves
rustling everywhere outside, and began to write down the words that
dropped so easily into my head. This particular material was quite impor
tant in relation to later concepts, yet I took it down half humming under
my breath and with a sense of great inner play and exuberance.
From the Library
The Physical Universe as a Trium ph of Eccentricities

Model Universes
These models can be considered as entities with a propensity for pat

tern-forming; aware-energy, eccentricitized out of itself as it emerges from
unrealization into realization, from undifferentiation into differentiation.
The structures within our universe are eccentricities seen in that light; spe
cific versions of an inner model. Time, space, m atterall of these specific
references are eccentric variations that make our world uniquely itself, even
while they rise out of a universal model that also makes all other versions
and eccentricities possible.
Because we experience time, then it follows that time exists in as
many other versions as possible in other universes. The electrons spin here
is eccentric behavior, appearing here as model behavior only because it is
the eccentricity we recognize as real. The private earthly sensate experience
of each of us exists precisely because of the eccentricities manifested in our
particular model of the universe.
72 Chapter 8
These models can also be thought of as the intent that energy takes,
the creative inner potential for form, the pattern for fulfillment inherent in
energy itself as it sprawls out of itself constantly into differentiation. The
eccentricities are the models’ physical shapes, at least in our universe. They
are the particular individualized waves or knots or “disturbances” appear
ing out of undifferentiation~consciousness congregating and coming
forth in a pattern or model that is merely a suggestion through which its
eccentricities can make themselves known.
Since everything actually happens at once, with an orderly abandon
almost impossible to describe, then the models and their eccentricities are
manifest and unmanifest “at the same time,” and time itself is simply one
version that infinity takes. The versions of the models affect and change the
models themselves. The variations then form their own new patterns
which, again, exist in the manifest and unmanifest alike.
We speak of matter and antimatter and of right-and left-handed uni
verses, but all variations or degrees occur between these extremes, yet all are
connected through the all-pervasive model of the universe which is mani
fest in each version. In other words, our world is one of reality's signatures,
written indelibly in our experience and environment. But it is only one of
many such signatures.
If we could see the features of our reality as eccentricities or variations
of a model, then we could at least be on the lookout for other versions,
even if we only considered the alternate patterns that sometimes show up
in our world~the unofficial happenings, the latent bulges, psychological
or physical, that ripple gently beneath usual experience but don’t appear as
definite features of mind or matter.
Such psychological or psychic “bulges” or unrecognized features, such
as telepathy or clairvoyance or telekinesis all suggest other ways of dealing
with space and time. In some other systems of reality these may represent
normal psychological behavior. A completely different kind of model of
the universe would be used under such circumstances; and literally experi
enced.
When the material stopped, I read it over and noticed that a change had
taken place. Before, the copy had often referred to people at large as “you.”
Now the pronouns “us” and “we” were being used almost exclusively, as if
my own consciousness was translating the book at the library end, or as if
two lines of consciousness had somehow been merged.
There’s little doubt that our idea of the universe changes as we be
come aware of some of the unofficial properties of the mind. Even our
experience with the universe changes. In an odd way, we might move
Unofficial Contents o f the M ind 73
into another version of reality, while still sharing with others the same
general mass contents of the world. Maybe we just use those contents dif
ferently.
I，d known that I could be aware of the actions of people apart from
me in space. I could no longer accept a model of the universe that lim its
perception to the interaction of the physical senses with space and time.
So I ，
d been seeing reality in a different way. More “bulges” or features
were apparent to me, yet I had no great interest in precognition. Cer
tainly I made no effort to poke into people’s lives psychically. This li
brary material fascinated me, though. I began to wonder about the
contents of our minds. How much unofficial knowledge did they hold,
and in what form? Were there different ways of putting reality to
gether—ways that were practical enough to make sense at the physical
level?
Without making any decision to experiment, I did take advantage of
a few opportunities that almost immediately presented themselves. Both
involved telephone calls.
Now and then someone contacts me asking me to locate a missing
person. Usually I concentrate on our books and don’t get involved with
such cases. For one thing, I don’t like the idea of tracking anyone down
for any reason, and if someone leaves home there is usually a good cause.
But this particular day a mother called, very upset. Her teen-age daughter,
whom I ， ll call Anna, had disappeared. Barbara— the motherwas partic
ularly worried because Anna had only recently recovered from a major op
eration, and needed rest even though she was well enough to attend
school. In the beginning of her call, Barbara was crying. I calmed her
down by asking her to spell her name for me—twice. She sounded to be
in her early fifties; embarrassed about calling me, ready to be belligerent
and defensive if I objected—yet all the while feeling that she had no right
to take up my time.
Mostly, though, she was angry at Anna, who， d stayed out defiantly
until five in the morning the Friday night before her disappearance. Then,
after a family argument, she’d been grounded for the weekend. Her mother
weakened enough to let her out that Saturday afternoon, though, and
Anna had never returned. She’d been gone over five days. I felt that Anna
probably knew what she was doing, yet Barbara was terribly worried that
the girl may have met with foul play.
I told Barbara to give me a minute, then I lit a cigarette and let my
mind wander. Were Barbaras present activities in the contents of my mind,
mixed in with a m illion other details? Would my conscious request to
know her circumstances unravel the bits of information I wanted? Then
smoothly, from nowhere in particular, came the name Larry. Barbara said
74 Chapter 8
that she didn’t know the names of many of Annas friends. Larry meant
nothing to her, but she herself knew a Clary. I tried again. “An uncle
Arnold is important to her,” I said.
At first Barbara didn’t say a thing. Then she said, slowly, “Why, yes.
Anna lived with her Uncle Arnold when she was a little girl. In Mexico.
But that was a long time ago.”
I nodded, forgetting she couldn’t see me. But at least I ， d picked up
some definite information. Then I got something else. “This sounds silly,
but Ym getting a word, like Fresca.”
“That was her favorite Spanish drink, in Mexico,” Barbara said. “She
loved it.”
By then I felt more confident. “I get a strong connection with num
bers,MI said, and Barbara told me that Anna was having serious difficulties
with her bookkeeping class because she， d fallen behind during her school
absence.
Then the word “crockery” came to me. It made no sense to Barbara
at all, so I followed it through mentally to myself. This led me from
crockery to glass to the name Glassner—which I then said aloud. Barbara
then told me that Annas best friend was a girl whose last name was
Glassen.
By this time I was convinced that my impressions were actually perti
nent. Only then did I ask myself mentally where Anna was and when she
would return. I told her mother that the girl was all right and had met with
no crime or accident. She was thirty minutes or thirty miles away and
w o u ld c a ll w h e n h e r an g e r faded. S he，
d be h o m e safe ly in th e v e ry n e a r fu
tu re . I also gave a fe w m o re nam es, th o u g h a t th e tim e th e y m e a n t n o th in g
to Barbara.
She hung up, very relieved. I hung up— and started worrying.
Suppose, just suppose, the girl really had met with a bad accident—
or worse, suppose she was dead? Surely it would be easy for me to be cor
rect about certain events and then block dire ones from my awareness.
Suppose I， d built Barbara up, only to have the very hard facts of life knock
her down again, confirming her worst fears? I sincerely wished that she
hadn’t called.
At the same time, I stared at the impressions Yd scribbled down as I
was talking, and remembered the library material. How much of the con
tents of the world were in the contents of the “private” mind; hidden,
nearly invisible, but present? Uncle Arnold was certainly a specific enough
impression, and it applied directly to Anna. If I ’d said Uncle Joe or Pete,
even, I wouldn’t have considered the impression anything special because
the names are so common. Yet there was a song popular at the time, with
the words “Uncle Arnold” prominent. I ， d heard it often.* Had I simply

picked the words up out of my own experience, and did they just happen
to fit Barbaras experience too? Did my knowing the song make the im
pression less valid?
I looked at my paper again. Crockery had led me to glass and finally
to Glassner~and I knew a man by the name of Gassner. Annas best friend
was Glassen. Again, did the close similarity of names make the impression
less valid? Or did I unwittingly seek out associations in my own life that
would be pertinent to Annas? Were the contents of my own mind orga
nized in a different fashion, shifted, so that the precise data emerged? Were
all details ignored except the ones that related to Anna?
I was getting excited because certain correlations suddenly sprang into
my awareness between that performance and the writing of poetry. I feel
accelerated when I， m caught up in inspiration, just as I often do when Im
giving impressions. Its as if the particular poetic concept charges your en
tire mind, searching its contents, coming up finally with the specific words
or phrases that are artistically pertinent~heaving aside literally millions of
other possible phrases for the one precise, apt one.
Did the same kind of process happen when I gave myself the task
of finding out information about Anna? If so, what a more creative way
of dealing with the universe; and of dealing with facts! W hile I was
thinking of all of this, though, I kept telling myself that Anna hadn’t re
turned yet.
I，d no sooner recovered from that call when the phone rang again.
The voice that spoke had about as much energy as one of the limp gray
leaves that hung, dismal and alone, just outside the window, except that
the leaves began to move quicker and quicker in the autumn wind while
the boys voice got slower and more hesitant. I ， ll call him Len. He was call
ing from Oregon.
uIVe read two of your books.... I just called ... I hate to put you on
the spot, but could I talk with you a minute? Im just beat,” he said, in a
half-whisper.
“What’s the hassle?”
“The world,” he said, weak. “It’s too heavy. I think of suicide all the
time.”
My cat, W illy, was on my lap. I shoved him off, thinking that henever
contemplated suicide.
“So if youd just let me write to you~”
*Later I realized that the song was “U nde A lbert”一 but my seem ing m istake was precisely
what led me to the correct im pression.
76 Chapter 8
“Okay,” I said. “But my mail keeps piling up and up, so it might be a

while before you get an answer. Listen, though.” And I went into the whole
thing, explaining that we create our own reality; that hassles just don’t tum
ble down upon us; that we aren’t victims; that we have to give to life as well
as take from it. Then I told him about The Nature ofPersonalReality, stress
ing the fact that Seth had written it particularly to help people help them
selves out of their difficulties.
“I believe it all when it applies to somebody else,” he said. “But I cant
make anything work for me. Anyhow, I haven’t read the book yet. A friend
of mine has it. But if I cant make the book work, can I write you a long let-
ter?”
I said yes, told him I’d send him some energy, and suggested that if
he，d feel around inside himself, he， d feel his own energy source. He said,
weakly, that he'd try. So when the call was over, I closed my eyes and re
quested that the inexhaustible energy of the universe would flow through
me out to him. Instantly I felt and mentally saw a “road” go out sideways
to the west. It was straight, suspended in the air, going through everything,
reaching out until it found the boy. As it did, a delicious relaxation spread
across my own shoulders.
I smiled: The road had gone so unerringly to its destination. Was this
another way of using the contents of the mind and the world? O f course,
physically I couldn’t prove that anything had happened at all. But in the
important inward order of events, exchanges had taken place that presup
posed a different model of the universe than the one usually held.
As usual, there were so many questions. Did that energy actually be
have as I experienced it? Did it travel through everything that was in its
way, ignore the curvature of earth itself, heading for its destination? O r was
all of this my interpretation? But as always, there were other more emo
tional questions. Why should a kid get so tired? Why shouldn’t life itself be
enough to content any of us and fill us with wonder? Why did so many
people feel drained and powerless? Why did my cat, W illy, run outdoors,
finding the same backyard a new source of excitement each day? Why was
he so filled to his bristly brim with vitality while so many human beings
sagged in their spiritual beds, pulling desolation over their heads like a
cover?
I could tell from the phone call that Barbara and Anna didn’t get
along at all, for example. They each pulled against each other, as if Barbara
expected Anna to be a “model daughter” and found it impossible to relate
to the person Anna was. I had to admit I was confused. A ll I really wanted
was more material from the library~at least so I thought. I ， d been so en
grossed with my new ideas about models and eccentricities that Yd forgot
ten the way the term “model” was usually used.
As I sat thinking about this, the following material came to me; obvi
ously a mixture of library material and my own level of consciousness. The
two blended in together so smoothly that it was difficult to find the seams;
yet I knew that they were there, invisibly connecting and yet separating
various subtle alterations of thought patterns. That is, I recognized that I
was getting an answer to one of my questions. The pronouns “we” and “us”
were being used again which meant that my normal orientation was in
volved. Yet there was that sense of “the other,” also, that subjective th rill of
awareness as if my consciousness had its toes in a different ocean and was
wading outward in new currents.
From the Library
Models and Alternate Eccentricities
Our linear time concepts lead us to our ideas of straight-ahead pro

gression and to a certain mental singularity in which it seems that the self is
a single entity with no place to go but straight ahead, or it w ill fall behind;
with no direction but up or it w ill fall down; and with nothing to do but
“progress” toward perfection, or disintegrate. The adage “Know thyself”
presupposes a model of the self that is stationary. For knowing the self at
any given time actually changes the self into a new knowing self, which
must again be known and thus changed.
The word “model” unfortunately often suggests a perfection beyond
which change is unnecessary or even disastrous. Again, our time concepts
blind our vision. For the model of the psyche is endlessly various, charac
terized by infinite eccentricities each within the other in a kind of sprawl
ing spontaneous order. Our usual ideas of order, however, automatically
suggest order in time, consecutive and almost mechanical progression. We
can even find creativity messy or chaotic if it does not follow our ideas of
what order is.
Yet true order uses our time but is not bound by it. True order strad
dles our reality and appears in it as the manifestation of phenomena in
time, so we suppose that order must follow time. We imagine that we must
progress “a step at a time” toward a given goal that exists ahead of us, and
we plan our lives accordingly.
The psyche itself is so richly various that it presents us with endless
banks of potentials and alternate models, each geared, however, in some in
definable way to our most intimate being~ours and no other. We are the
ones who insist upon stripping down the luxuriant model to what we ap
parently think of as a more efficient time-version that fits our limited ideas
78 Chapter 8
of personhood. Then we end up with such appalling concepts as “the

model parent” or the “model child.” We use the model to enclose, not free,
our individuality; to trap and not liberate our eccentricities; to regiment
rather than express our deepest abilities.
We seem to think that there is a contradiction between having a
model for reference, and deviating from it. We need to develop a loving
recognition of our eccentricities.
Again I read the material over as soon as it stopped, and the connections be
tween it and the days events became clear. I thought, “of course,” because
the energy I sent to the boy and my impressions about Anna both happened
outside of our usual ideas of progression and time. The energy seemed to go
from Elmira to Oregon instantly, as if no time or space were involved at all;
and the facts about Anna just appeared, without any physical digging.
In Adventures in Consciousness， I used the term “living area” to denote our
physical life line from birth to death. Its on that “line” that normal progres
sion happens and sense data connects with space and time directly. The infor
mation about Anna didn’t originate on my own living area tho ug hit was as
if my consciousness stood on tiptoe and pulled in that data from somewhere
else~and the energy I sent to the boy wouldn’t appear in his living area in
usual observable terms either. That is, it wouldn’t land plop in his hands like a
magic red apple that he could show to others. Instead, this was some kind of
sideways “progression” or development, an extra dimension ofactivity that af
fected the living area but didn’t “happen” in usual physical terms.
Then I thought of Seths latest material on world views. We share cer
tain mass information with our contemporaries, so our individual world
views must merge at some point. When I wanted to know Annas circum
stances, did I shift the contents of my mind so that they became organized
according to Annas world view, rather than following mine? Did I let
Annas associations rather than mine deal with shared world contents as
they appeared in the contents of the mind?
The following day, Monday, October 28， I had a very odd experience
involving the use of energy that made me wonder even more about the na
ture of time, experience, and the nature of reality itself.
I was writing up my notes of the day before when the phone rang. The
call was from a man who said he was internationally known as a member of
a profession deeply involved with world economics and security. I knew
nothing about him or his work and less about his particular specialty. Yet as
we talked, I began to get impressions about his professional activities. I didn’t
say a thing about these at first, but then they came so strongly that I thought
it best not to ignore them. Feeling rather silly, because I wasn’t acquainted
with the phraseology, I told the man what I was getting. He asked me to keep
his identity a secret and not to reveal the information I gave him. For that
matter, he only told me that it all applied, but without telling me how.
He was actually calling about a friend I ， ll call Perry, who was in very
poor spirits, and after we spoke awhile I promised to send the young man
energy to help him. We hung up. I sat quietly for a few moments, then
thought of Perry. Instantly I felt and mentally saw another “path” go out
shining through space. Then so quickly that I gasped, the path came back,
rolling backward like a rug, unrolling inside my head with Perry in a fetus
position—falling softly on the floor of my skull.
A ll of this was in miniature. I thought wPerry feels that his head is a
prison,” when his image flopped inside my mind. I “saw” him looking
wildly about. Immediately I made large open windows all around my skull
(which now looked like a glass globe) so that he could look out. He stood
up and went to the windows, so I made bright paths that extended outside,
telling him mentally that he had many choices and alternate directions to
follow. The path he liked was the one that went directly out the front of my
head. I lined the road with stately green trees and extended the perspective
so that it went out into the distance. Perry walked a short way when a giant
figure of a man blocked his path; his huge legs were all I saw. Perry dived
through the giants open legs, flying free in an even greater distance that ap
peared to accommodate him. I knew that the giant represented Perrys dis
torted hero worship of the man who called me on the phone, and realized
that Perry had finally freed himself of that imprisoning figure.
The entire experience startled me, though. It was the first of its kind.
When Perrys image slid into my mind, I “knew” that I should act quickly
to help him. Any action involved didn’t happen in our usual system of rec
ognized events, however. Was the entire episode a symbolized representa
tion? Why had the “road of energy” brought Perry into my mind, for me to
deal with, rather than just helping him at his end?
The next day my secretive caller phoned to tell me that Perry had at
tempted suicide by taking pills, but had received care in time and was now
out of danger. Perrys suicide attempt and my experience happened at the
same time~yet I hadn’t interpreted the events that way when they oc
curred. Perhaps I should have supposed as much because Perry was in a
fetus position at first. The events as I did interpret them were real enough
so that I took immediate action: But if I really did help Perry, it was at a
different level of activity, in a kind of reality with different rules, using an
other model of the universe that permitted such events.
Though I didn’t know it, I was to have more experiences shortly that
happened . . . in some “unplace” else . . . yet connected to the world we
know.
T he Ape and the Silver G uide
h ile a ll o f th is w as g o in g o n , I was e x h ila ra te d b y th e a u tu m n it
W self, y e t as th e m id d le o f N o v e m b e r cam e I g re w s lig h tly d is

q u ie te d . I h a d n ’t a c tu a lly been in th e lib r a r y in seve ral w eeks,
though the “book material” seemed available enough. Maybe, I thought,
the initial experiences were only meant to put me in touch with a different
level of consciousness; maybe Yd never go into the library again.
Beside this, I ，d been troubled with some annoying health difficulties
for several years. There had been some definite improvements since my
first visit to the library, but I was anxious to clear up the entire condition.
Seth had been of great help, but he told me that I made my own reality just
as everyone else did, and it was up to me to alter any conditions that both
ered me. My overall health was excellent, but my body was stiff so that I
had difficulty getting about. Worse, I understood what I was doing, and
while I was bothered by the symptoms I also realized that they provided me
with quiet, cutting down distractions while allowing me to do just what I
wanted to do: write at my desk. I might complain, yet suppose I was as
physically flexible as anyone elsewould I have the discipline to just sit in
my room and do my work?
I，
d discovered just about everything I needed to know about my con
dition through working with my beliefs as Seth suggests in The Nature of
Personal Reality~and I knew that I clung to the symptoms because they
still served a purpose.
A ll of this was on my m in d that evening of November 18，1974. It
was 7:30. I looked over to the southeast corner of the living room where
the library was. It appeared, but this time the books were gone. My body
was lying flat on a long low table of some sort. Then as I watched, my
body, there, kept sitting up and down so fast that in my chair at the desk I
almost got dizzy. In here someplace I closed my eyes, to “see better•” I also
realized that I was forming the other images in some way not immediately
known. As soon as I closed my eyes, I saw a man come into the room, pull
82 Chapter 9
up a chair beside the other me, and sit down. He took my hand. I knew
that he was a doctor.
The strangest part of this experience was the fact that I only saw this
mans face clearly. I kept staring at it. His whole face was like a dull silver,
with something like a muted silver halo about his head. The “halo” wasn’t
perfectly round, however, and didn’t glow. His hair was white and bushy;
quite normal-looking. It was the contrast between the mundane look of
the hair and the dull silver face that struck me so forcibly. At the same time
my “own” body, at my desk, began to feel very warm and relaxed.
I opened my eyes, wrote down what I was seeing, then closed my eyes
again. This time a man lay on the table. He was strong-looking, remark
ably muscular, and he was in the same position as my double had been a
few moments earlier. I knew that he was another version of me, or vice-
versa. I didn’t see his face, though; it didn’t seem important. Suddenly I felt
the strength and agility of his muscles—from the inside. Then he stood up
and walked around, exercising various portions of his body.
Again, I opened my eyes and wrote down what I saw. I’ve learned that
its easy to forget the details of such “inner sightings,” so I’ve trained myself
to put myself “on hold” at one level of consciousness while I record my ex
periences at another level. I wrote down the entire episode with the man at
once, for example, yet I didn’t remember until later that he had first ap
peared in a pyramid of light.
These images were startlingly clear and vivid. The next time I closed
my eyes I saw a mans leg, in detail, again with attention to the muscles as if
to impress me with muscular agility. The leg kept changing positions, then
vanished. It was instantly replaced by a picture of a man and women lying
close together on sand, just at the edge of an ocean. The woman was blond,
with a fuller shape than I have, yet I knew that we were the same person,
and suddenly my consciousness was in her body rather than in “my own”
at the desk. “I ” sprang up easily, and walked along the beach with the man
beside me, taking the greatest delight in the swift easy motion of my legs
and laughing as I wiggled “my” toes in the sand. Then the man and I ran
hand in hand for a swim in the ocean.
At this point I became worried that I， d get so engrossed in the experi
ence that I couldn’t record it properly. I forced myself to open my eyes, and
had difficulty holding them open, much less writing. I just managed to
scribble down the last scene when I saw the man again, so once more I closed
my eyes to “see better.”This time I saw a close-up. The man had a marvelous
build and seemed filled with vitality. As he performed several gymnastic ex
ercises in the sand, at the table I felt the same muscular motions.
Briefly my consciousness came alive inside his body, and then the
physical sensations were even stronger, and more definite. As I flashed back
The Ape and the Silver Guide 83
to my own body, I got another very close look at his face and blond hair.
There was no mistake— this was Ruburt~as he appears in a portrait that
Rob had painted of him several years ago. Ruburt is supposed to designate
another part of my psyche, and Seth always calls me by that name. Again, I
flashed into his body, feeling it from the inside. This astonished me, that I
could be so comfortable inside a male figure. I also realized that Ruburt
was not as passive as he seems in Robs portrait, though he certainly wasn’t
aggressive in conventional male terms either.
Then I sensed an unpleasantness. The woman vanished. The man
stood up and threw a dark wavy spidery shape from him against a wall that
had sprung up from nowhere. Immediately I realized that this represented
the negative aspects of my own self-image. The spidery shape raged as if
alive, flew out into the air, and from it a small dark Indian emerged, with
bent-up legs. Instantly he turned into a baby. The woman reappeared and
picked up the infant. As the baby, I bit the woman in the chest. At once I
connected this with the phrase “biting the breast that feeds you” or some
such. The episode was so unpleasant that I opened my eyes, wrote the
whole thing down, and wondered whether or not I wanted to continue.
This was a completely different kind of experience for me; but it was
happening in the area of the library. It was obvious that some kind of ther
apeutic intent was involved, so I decided to go along with it.
I closed my eyes again. Instantly the man and woman were there.
They stood on either side of the long table and looked down lovingly on
the baby. Then my consciousness was inside the infant. I was being pushed
in a baby carriage through the librarywhich was suddenly there in its
usual form, replete with bookshelves— and as we approached one of the
shelves, I reached out with chubby baby hands and picked up one of the
books.
The next moment “I” was a huge male ape, sitting at the library table.
At the same time I was also watching him. He had the strangest human-
animal eyes, wise and compassionate, and he was supremely certain of his
own existence as it straddled the animal and human world. So quickly that
I almost got dizzy at my desk again, my consciousness spun out of his body
and leapt into the baby which suddenly appeared in the ape-mans lap.
W ith great deftness, the ape-man cuddled the infant, holding it against his
hairy chest. As the baby I felt a vast sense of comfort and security. This
lasted a few moments when the ape-man changed into an ape-woman who
then held me in her arms. I was aware of a great creature animal-like
mother love, beyond anything I ’ve ever imagined. Then, at my desk, the
thought came to me: “O f course! The ape mother is so strong you couldn’t
hurt her if you tried. Shes stronger than hate or anger, and her love con
tains such understanding, that no child’s rage could possibly upset her.”
84 Chapter 9
The sense of creature support was impossible to describe and as I felt

it my body at the desk grew even more relaxed. Yet, almost paradoxically, I
felt energetic at the same time. Then the entire affair just vanished. I
opened my eyes, finished writing my notes, and sat there, staring at the
now ordinary room.
I have to admit that I was pleased with myself. In the past I wouldn’t
have allowed such an experience, or the moment it became unpleasant I ’d
have cut it short. That is, in a definite, defined state of trance, I would
allow myself a good deal of freedom—after all, a trance is a trance; its not
supposed to be normal consciousness. But mixing “hallucinatory images”
with usual consciousness was something else again: a phenomenon I’d only
experimented with in isolated brief instances. Those images had been as
real as ordinary people, yet transposed into the “imaginary space” of the li
brary, and my own awareness has zipped back and forth so quickly at times
that afterward I had trouble remembering who or what I was when.
As I finished my notes, details kept coming to mind that I’d forgot
ten, and just then Rob came into the room. HeJd been working in his back
studio. “It，s session time,” he said. Then, quizzically, “Why so quiet? What
have you been up to?”
I looked at the clock. It was 9:00 p.m . So the entire affair had lasted an
hour and a half. Grinning, I showed my notes to Rob. He asked me if I
wanted to call off the regular Seth session, but I shrugged and said that we
might as well “go the works.” Actually I was curious to see if Seth would
have anything to say about my “silver guide,” as I called the man with the
dull silver face—and the ape-man. We had a glass of wine and a snack and
began the session a little later than usual, at 9:40. I was still rather groggy
from the whole thing, but Seth came through at once, as emphatic and vig
orous as ever. As you’ll see, he explained my experiences beautifully.
This was a personal session, containing no book dictation for The
“Unknown”Reality, and Ym only giving the highlights of Seths explanation
here, reserving the right to withhold some other, intensely private material.
I should mention first, though, that my grandfather was an Indian with
French-Canadian blood, since this applies to the session. Also, a week ear
lier a doctor had appeared in a dream and assured me that my physical
condition was improving. Seth refers to this “dream doctor.” This session,
given November 18，1974，is particularly valuable because Seth explains
how the psyche can communicate with conscious levels when permission is
granted.
T h e ape on one level represented the an im al in stincts feared b y

R u b u rts m o th er and grandfather as w e ll, so R u b u rt also learned to lo o k
upon them [the instincts] askance. These instincts are the e a rth ly doors
o f the souls energy. W h o closes them does so at some p e ril.
Seth went on to describe the ways in which my mother and grandfa

ther had both tried to deny their creature instincts. He spoke of my love for
my grandfather, and my partial early identification with him. Speaking of
my grandfather, Seth said:
H e gam bled c o m p ulsively in an atte m p t to hide his sexual wants.

H e d id n o t tru s t the body, his o r anyone elses. . . . H e abhorred liq u o r
because he was aware o f the tales saying th a t it was the In d ia n s dow n
fa ll . . . and he repressed his feelings to counteract the In d ia n “im age”
o f being u n c ivilize d . H e was an outsider: a short, sm all, dark-skinned
m a n .. . .
H e fe lt h im s e lf a p yg m y because o f his size and because, as part-
In d ia n , he was looked dow n upon. T o some extent, R u b u rt id e n tifie d
w ith h im . H e was, after all, the father o f R u b u rts m other, and to some
degree R u b u rt saw h im as the greater source o u t o f w hic h his m o th er
came.
T h e ape e m o tio n a lly represented the in stin c ts in th e ir tru e lig h t,
as dependable, sup p o rtive, and as th e basis fo r e a rth ly existence.
R u b u rt, then [in to n ig h ts episode], experienced the streng th o f the
e a rth ly source. T h is means th a t he is to tru s t his instincts. A t the same
tim e , the ape m ale arid ape fem ale represent the sexual q u a lity o f the
earth, m ale and fem ale being s im p ly o th e r versions o f each other. In
s till o th er term s, R u b u rt now experienced the yearned-for m o th er love
th a t was w arm in its an im a l fem ale understanding, sup p o rtive and
strong enough to easily bear a c h ild ’s sm all ragings and m o m entary ha
treds. . . .
A t one p o in t R u b u rt saw the ape, s till m ale, and a p o rtio n o f h im
self, s ittin g at the lib ra ry t a b l e f o r in your position it is the anim al in
stincts themselves th a t propel you to search fo r answers. T h e ape was at
hom e in the lib ra ry, and his face was compassionate. Id e n tific a tio n w ith
the in s tin c t brings compassion, and th a t compassion and w ond er spark
the creative ab ilitie s. R u b u rts idea was s till one o f c o n tro llin g those in
stincts and his “a n im al” ab ilities. O n yet another level, because the ape
was in the lib ra ry, R u b u rt was sym b o lically seeing the force o f his ow n
physical nature, q uite at hom e w ith its e lf and at hom e in the psychic li
b ra ry o f the m i n d . . . .
T h e ape also acted as an an im al m edicine man-wom an, sym b o li
c ally acting o u t a p a rt th a t once could ve ry w e ll have been perform ed in
fact.
Here Seth refers to his contention, in The Nature ofPersonal Reality,

that animals once had a different relationship with humans; in their way
86 Chapter 9
they acted as physicians, teaching animal use of herbs and a certain “acting
out” of symptoms.
R u b u rt has been reading about shamans. T h e ir connections w ith

anim als are little understood. In his ow n way, however, R u b u rt began a
shamans jo u rn e y fo r him self, le ttin g the psyches images come alive, and
m aking the in n e r w orking s o f the m in d m ore obvious.
The episodes served to connect him in trust with his own deepest
instincts, and he saw th a t these were lo ving . T h e ape could n o t have ap
peared, however, u n til the b lo nd m an fo rc ib ly th re w o u t the elements o f
th a t negative image. H e dashed it against the w a ll. T h e p ygm y In d ia n
w ith bent legs emerged, s ig n ifyin g the id e n tific a tio n w ith R u b u rts
grandfather. . . . He identified with him as achild, seeking protection
fro m his m o th er in someone w ho seemed to love h im m ore. T h e nega
tiv e im age, dashed then, gave fo rth the sym bolized im age th a t he had
been using in his m in d . F o llo w in g this, he tu rn e d in to a baby, because
th e id en tifica tio n began early. . . . T h is w as n o t en tirely a negative id en
tific a tio n by any means....
The silver figure is the other end, the other pole of the ape—the
s p iritu a l guide, i f R u b u rt w ill forgive the term , as the ape was the a n i
m al guide, fo r b o th are related and b o th were compassionate. T h e 's p ir
itu a l guide” was the doctor R u b u rt heard in his s l e e p a n d im m ed iately
questioned—and he is quite valid. He is not just a symbol, either, but
represents a quite real psychic construct, alive in y o u r term s b u t in a d if
feren t reality, and connected in a w ay w ith R u b u rts physical being
w ith the source o f the flesh th a t p h ysically composes h im .
It is n o t ju s t the soul, b u t the soul o f the b ody th a t yo u m ust learn
to tru st, fo r the soul in the body represents the corporal m eeting o f the
physical and nonphysical selves in the m ost practical o f terms. R u b u rt is
not relying upon “his own” resources alone, but upon those great di
mensions of energy that connect the soul and body~the silver guide
and the ape.
I felt a new delightful corporal certainty because of the evenings ear

lier experiences; and added to this was a psychic satisfaction with Seths ex
planations. Unknown to me then, I was to have other experiences with the
ape or animal medicine man—and in connection with the library. As we
went into bed I wondered: What kind of a library was this anyway? Obvi
ously there was a lot more in it than book material. Like symbols that came
alive. As it happens, I didn’t know the half of it.
After the session was finished, Rob mentioned a few rather important
questions he had about some recent reincarnational experiences of his own.
Suddenly I felt Seth “back again” with the answers but it was late and Rob
was tired himself, so we decided to call it a night. Somebody had an awful
lot of energy, I thought; and we trailed off to bed.
The following day, Tuesday, I felt exuberant and refreshed and my

consciousness seemed crystal clear. As I sat at my desk, a few paragraphs
came from the library book. I wrote them down at once:
From the Library
The focus personality rises into prominence from the rich infinite re
ality of the psyche or source self which constantly supports it. The focus
personality cannot drown in its own source, or be annihilated or dissolved
within it, because it is the face of the psyche turned toward the earth.
Drawing from the psyches greater knowledge reinforces the focus person-
alitys ability to deal with the worlds contents, increases creativity, and au
tomatically reveals the self to itselfand thereby reveals the true meaning
of the worlds contents.
These are then understood to be the physical manifestation of the
contents of the mind. This knowledge alone gives the focus personality ad
ditional power, as it learns that it can mix and match these merged con
tents, bringing into physical reality greater variety and deeper meanings
which then enrich the mental and physical landscapes.
This material came very swiftly and easily, but by the time I， d finished w rit
ing it, I knew that my perceptions of myself and the room were altering. I
scribbled down what I was perceiving, though again in this instance it was
sometimes difficult to make myself bother with the effort of writing. I， m
quoting these notes exactly as I wrote them to preserve the sense of imme
diacy:
“I，m looking at the corner intersection, yet I feel other meV sitting at
other corners in different times and places; I mean, I feel them emotionally.
In this moment at least I know that. • . the me I identify with is only one
me in one location or position in a larger field of reality. But all the other
mes form an inner network almost like our concept of planets but in an
inner cosmos, with inner structures or nerves* connecting us, like a m ulti
dimensional body, only that isn’t exactly what I mean. Im in one position
within it, only the position itself involves a whole reality of experience.
“The totality straddles all of the mes, and theoretically these mes can
meet consciously in a kind of inner space travel. There is some ‘universal’
communication between all of these mes. The greater psyche is the
medium in which these mes exist, as we say that space is the medium in
which matter exists. Yet the various mes are the psyche, made of it, inside it
88 Chapter 9
just as space is inside objects. The psyche wrinkles, knots, focuses energy,
pushes it up so that it forms waves or particles in mental space in the same
way that matter is ‘knotted’ in space. The mes are eccentricities— — each
with its own version of reality, forming it along with the others and then
perceiving the world contents.
“These mes represent features or structures of a multidimensional
self, and are a part of it in the same way that my hands are a part of me
poor analogy, though, because these mes are completely independent in
their environments.
“I can feel the communication between all of these mes~but cant re
ally get a hold of it. Again, though, in a kind of inner space travel you can
move through the reaches of the psyche to these other systems of reality,
each with its own me. But the doorways are within the psyche itself, and
each me w ill use whatever symbolism is available at its end as a sort of men
tal vehicle.
“Since the same psyche is involved, I can have some inner recognition
of these other realities—in which these other mes exist. This recognition
shows me that the contents of this world can be altered at least slightly if I
want; I can view them with the cast of another me. But all these mes exist
in one psyche at one time, and “I ” can die in one part of that psyche and
come to life again in another section— like a light blinking off and on in
different places.
“I，m a one-world version of myself~ of my greater self~one of many
entirely different but related mes, each focusing in a unique reality and
using different eccentricities. There are groupings that we don’t under
stand. Each psyche or source self has portions that correlate with the same
portions in other source selves— hence our shared experience in this and
other realities.”
W hile I was perceiving in this fashion, I seemed to be going so fast

psychically that my mental properties could never keep up, and what I
wrote is a pathetically weak and diluted description of the emotional and
intellectual experience itself. My thoughts seemed to drop off finally, where
I couldn’t follow them after a while. In a sudden vision, I saw our life as a
single cell structure, with Seths existence like an organ in comparison.
Then I saw him as a wandering messenger, traveling from one part of my
inner psyche to another, from “me” to “me,” as an astronaut might go from
star to star. It seemed that my mes grew and divided psychically as cells do
physically, only developing further, becoming more aware of their own ex
istence and of greater structures.
In some kind of inner dizzying experience I can’t describe I felt that
what is unconscious activity from our focus was once conscious focus— the
degree possible to us “at the time.” We climb ahead, the previous conscious
activity taken for granted, then forgotten like hills in the distance that
w e ’ve a lre a d y tra v e le d . I c o u ld . . . fe e l th is , a n d I k n e w th a t w e tra v e l
through the consciousness of ourselves. Part of us is still buried in activities
“we” now consider unconscious, and in activities we aren’t aware of. The vi
sion again, is almost impossible to describe but I felt our mes group and re
group, even while each retains its identity. And I thought that the self I， ll
be tomorrow is unconscious now, yet the me-ness climbs above these oper
ating unconsciousnesses, rising each day in its new-old, future-past iden
tity.
As the vision faded, I tried to see if I could glimpse the books in the
library. Mentally I saw one in its place on the shelf, and suddenly I did get
dizzy because as I looked, the book vibrated and I felt it turning into all of
its different versions at the same time. Then it came to me that earlier, I， d
tuned in to myversion of the book, but if you tried to see its greater m ulti
dimensional reality, then the book changes so quickly that you can’t keep
track. Or at least, I couldn’t. If you could alter your focus in lightning fash
ion, each version would be distinct.
But I was in a daze—a delightful one~and decided to let things rest
where they were. I got up to do some house chores, and began to see where
“psychic politics” fit into my latest experiences. Fd wondered considerably
about the books tide, but now it occurred to me that I was heading toward
a new politics of the self, and finding a different kind of self-government~
and a larger world of the self than Vd ever known.
C hapter 1 0
A Young Celibate, the

Boy w ith the H ole in H is Chest,
and the Book o f the Gods
few days later I was chatting with a friend, Greta, on the tele
A phone, and she asked me how this book was progressing. “Great,”
I said.
“That’s to be expected,” she said with a laugh. “Mario Williams says
it’s all that help you get from the devil.”
“Mario Williams? Wow, that’s a bit much,” I said.
uWows right,” Greta said. “I asked him if he， d read any of your
books, and he said, ‘No, because they were written by the devil/ So I said,
‘Maybe its just her subconscious or something, did you ever think of that?，
just to see what he， d say. And he saidyou wont believe this—he said,
‘That’s what I mean— the devil.’ ”
Greta paused, waiting for me to savor the full implications of the re
mark, but I was appalled, mostly because Mario Williams was an editor on
a newspaper in a nearby town. It made me uneasy to think that anyone in
such a position went around believing in the devil.
“He’s getting worse,” Greta said. “丁hat fundamentalist religion he’s
joined sees the devils work all over. Only what’s this about the subcon
scious being the devil too? That doesn’t give people much leeway.”
“It sure as the devil doesn’t,” I laughed. But I was concerned, and I
remembered the phone call later that day when I read my mail. There was
a letter from a young man I， ll call Joe. He was writing from India where he
was following a well-known guru, and trying to escape the “codified, stag
nant life of New York City.”
He was finished, he said, with the lust for money and prestige that he
found in our American society, and he was fed up with the male-wage-
earner role. He， d given it all up to search for truth. In line with his gurus
teachings, Joe meditated several hours a day, to “purify” himself. He was
92 Chapter 10
desperately trying to cut sex out of his life, he continued. There was only
one hitch. Whenever he meditated he developed terrible headaches and
was beset by “terribly lustful thoughts.” The harder he tried to forget them
and the more stubbornly~and desperately~he tried to meditate, the
more persistent the headaches and fantasies became. He wanted to know
how he could rid himself of these “debasing sexual feelings.”
Joes particular guru didn’t believe in the devil, but the natural needs
and desires of the body were seen as impediments to spiritual growth. At
nineteen, when everything in Joes biological and spiritual makeup yearned
to rush outward into the reality of flesh, to mix exuberantly with the soul
and body of earth, he was stubbornly holding back. He was accepting a
model of the self that had little to do with his own being; a limited model
that denied him strong elements of his own nature.
I could see through that ， yet I，
d repressed many spontaneous elements
of my own nature to discipline my “writing self•” Our concepts of selfhood
have been so lim iting that one way or another each of us suffers from them,
I thought. Contrasted with our usual self-images, how much more expan
sive were these new ideas of models and eccentricities as mutually support
ive and cooperative. I remembered my experience with all the “me， s,” and
caught a glimmer of that vision. In contrast to our usual concepts, I sensed
again that each of us carries within the psyche our own greater model— a
multidimensional one, sprawling forth in the personality with a thousand
seeds or eccentricities, each part of the model, versions of it, each bringing
forth new alternate models, just as each seed potentially can grow a new
tree, based on the old but different and unique. And then, I wondered, per
usual, why we limited ourselves and how we could escape our own self
labels.
Youd think that the young would burst through any limitations, just
through sheer exuberance. Perhaps many of them do. Yet that same day a
young man from Maine visited asking to attend class; and he was about as
exuberant as a wet dishrag. He was soggy and drowning in the murky mess
of his own ideas about himself. Yet he had a great sense of humor. He was
a big strapping lad, really, with red hair and a smile like a holiday banner~
that showed, though, just about as often as Christmas lights. I’ll call him
Gordon.
He was so tall that it was really hard not to see him, yet he scrunched
down, bent over, and did everything he could to make himself invisible.
His eyes were always downcast, and he acted as if he’d explode in panic if
you dared try to meet his glance. He was twenty years old that day, and
worried about leaving his teens behind. He， d been traveling around the
country, “trying to be anonymous.” Whenever people got to know him, he
moved on, as if he had some dark, evil secret to hide, or as if people would
A Young Celibate 93
chase him down the streets if they understood his feelings about himself
and the world.
Gordon hung around for a few months, getting himself a job at Mc
Donalds. Once when he saw an acquaintance enter the place, Gordon hid
in the back room. Later he said that he couldn’t bear to be caught in his
uniform. And, of course, he worked in the back usually anyhow, and some
times at night as a cleanup man. We used to burst out laughing, just imag
ining him serving Big Macs to the public, smiling the television-brilliant
“let us nourish you” grin featured by the McDonalds people in the T V ads.
One night he visited us, almost on the sly, and drank some wine and
suddenly talkedand talked and talked, and grinned his own unique way.
But all his funny stories were at his own expense. He said that after he’d
been in one place for a while, he thought of getting a fake mustache and
paste-on eyebrows and a wig, so he wouldn’t be known, and no one could
yell out “hello” as he walked down the street. At the same time, he yearned
for contact—and hated himself for wanting it. His humor was extraordi
nary, but if you caught him at it, he was ready to dive for the door.
That night though, he told us his secret, and showed us the sign of his
inferiority: Opening his shirt he pointed to his chest, which was concave,
so that it seemed to have a hole in it near the heart area. The doctor told
him that it wasn’t dangerous, but it kept him from getting the proper
amount of air into his lungs. To us, his chest just looked slightly odd. But
to Gordon, there was a definite hole in his chest, the sign of iniquity.
When he left, I thought of him and about the editor who believed
that the subconscious held “the devil,” and about the nineteen-year-old
who was trying to cleanse himself of sex and love and emotion because
they didn’t fit into his ideas of what was good or pure or right. It seemed
clear to me that our self-images are intimately interwound with our reli
gious beliefs, and often based on models that don’t fit; models that are
bloodless—and connected with gods who created earth almost as an after
thought, and have been embarrassed about it ever since, never ceasing to
complain about their own creations.
And I thought of Plato. He set up a whole cosmology over two thou
sand years ago. What an accomplishment! Yet one in which man was only
a shadow of his souls worth—a universe in which the race was pitted
against perfect models in whose light its members would always appear in
ferior and blighted. What a bloodless elegance to lay upon the flesh, and
how Plato used it to keep each man and woman in proper place!
The models I sensed were far different, like great suggestive creative
patterns to be used; each alive and mobile as divine amoebas; each variation
eternal in one sense—its imprint never erased~and yet on the other hand,
always splashing forth eccentricities and new versions of its own existence.
94 Chapter 10
Its precisely the eccentricities, I saw, that brought the models to life
in our world. If this isn’t understood, then models are turned into rigid
tombs stifling all change and variety: molds into which all creativity be
comes predetermined and rigid. Plato froze one version of a model and
closed his eyes to everything else. But those “ideal” models of his exist not
outside of us, but in the intimate world of the private psyche, written in
our own ideas and genes, interacting with us as we do with them.
For me, in a strange fashion, those models exist in my library~m y
versions of them, at least; concepts that would rise from the joint fountain
of intuition and reason. I saw them as models alive through their own ec
centricities; models that we could glimpse ourselves by altering the focus of
our consciousness; models that could unite inner and outer reality and
show us our own psychological solidity.
For inner and outer worlds merge in our experience, in each of us pri
vately, in the natural world in which we exist, and in the cultural world of
our religions, sciences, politics, and arts. Weve been suffering from a lack
of depth perception, never seeing that subjective and objective experience
were just two versions each of the other, split only in our perception.
The gods in the psyche and the gods outside are one, but weve been
forced to think of them separately. The exterior world of politics and law
represents the inner politics of the self as it organizes and governs itself in
relationship to physical existence. The model and its eccentricities are the
seemingly double faces of the same th in g o u r creativity and its individu
alistic flow from which all of our private and joint creations spring.
Most likely I discovered “my library” as a natural result of my own
eccentric wanderings through the inner and outer cosmos; discovered it
a m id tangled doctrines and overhanging threats; found it like a child一
the magic spot in the middle of the strange forest. Its in the center of my
psyche, of course, and because it is, it also exists in the cosmos. Vd been
searching for alternate models for reality, without knowing it, for my en
tire lifetime—for an alternate philosophy that would work better for me
a n d fo r th e w o rld ; a n o th e r w o rld p ic tu re ; a fo n d e r b ir th o f co ncepts th a t
would spawn fresh creativity. I still have to learn what Im doing~how to
get and interpret the books in the library~but its a lovely venture, and I
have the time.
Its not just that we have greater selves, but that we are greater selves.
Perhaps we wanted to discover ourselves only a little at a time, exploring
our own psychic territory section by section. Seth may well represent part
of my own unknown territory, and if so, then each person has his or her
“Seth” level or its equivalent. Maybe Seth “built” my library. Maybe he ex
ists apart from me only in my understanding, or maybe we are each eccen
tricities of a model, operating at different levels of reality.
A Young Celibate 95
Maybe Im climbing through Seths psyche. Maybe Im only the small

portion of my earth consciousness that’s met my own greater identity.
Maybe the psyche or source self is eternal and immortal psychologically as
well as in terms of time, so that from here we might bask in the light of its
being but be unable to see or feel it all at once.
What we need is a whole new myth of man and his beginnings, one
that leapfrogs local gods and places God inside his creatures, within cre
ation. We need a god as blessed or flawed as its creations, a whole new cos
mology giving birth to a God that is male and female, Jew, Arab,
American, Chinese, Indian; that is within each individual alike; that is not
parochial and not man’s alone; a god that is within stones and stars; a god-
goddess big enough to be personified as a Buddha, Christ, Isis, Athena,
Mohammed一animal god, insect god, tree god; each seen as a local symbol
standing for an unexplainable reality that is too super-real to fit our defin
itions.
We need a new myth, imaginative and creative enough to leap above
our puny facts. What boldness, to create a new race of the gods, glorifying
individuality, seeing each as a unique personification— not sterile righteous
lords sending down condemnations and handing out impossible edicts,
but gods saying “Life is good. That’s why were alive, and alive in you!” We
need father, mother, grandfather, grandmother gods, niece and nephew
gods, who understand human relationships because they are alive in us and
we in them—lesbian and homosexual gods, aunt and uncle gods~boister
ous joyful divine families, mating among themselves and with us, singing
of the beauty of the lovebed, appreciating the moments formed like soli
tary jewels from the vast necklace of infinity.. . .
The Book ofthe G odsI’d like to write that, and The Book ofthe Uni
verse, in which people-gods or god-people rise from nonphysical to physi
cal life because they want to; because they dreamed in their solitary
godhoods of green grasses and soft flesh and yearned to be born as men and
women, flinging their godness into bodies joyfully, recklessly, come what
may. And maybe, in between lives, they wander on the shores of inner
rivers, planning their “fliture” lives with great excitement, creating them as
a writer does his book, plotting crises and achievements, challenges and
glories—then, once on earth again, changing the stories, making surprise
endings, each character alive, remaking the plot; with each life forming a
new dimension of actuality, providing greater knowledge of honor and
love, and a new marriage of the soul with the seasons.
For if the gods didn’t love the evenings and the dawns, why would
their creatures?
A new m ythwould it be true or false? What difference? Were Plato’s
ideas true? For generations we lived as if they were, and we found ourselves
96 Chapter 10
dwarfed by perfect models of ourselves to which no human being could

conform. True or false? Our creativity is bolder than such concepts. Let us
use it to fling new gods into the universe, and new histories of their births
back through the centuries—gods that are ourselves in flesh; us yet not us;
gods that can speak to us and gods who listen instead of preaching all the
time; gods we can speak to and feel snugly within us, couched alike in our
consciousness and molecules.
Since we really can’t know what the universe is, as it exists apart from
our experience of it, then most of our fondest theories are really myths and
stories that we pretend are real. So why not construct myths we like for a
changegods that have better things to do than sacrificing sons, gods that
are likable at least? What glorious epics we could create, and what a legacy
to give our children. The Book ofthe Gods~ I can see it in my mind, giving
strength and creativity and joy to generations— perhaps if not in this world
then in another, in some system of reality where myths are understood as
the offspring of the psyche; as the souls playthings; as the games the people-
gods and god-people play together as they try to find a common language.
Our gods have been so cruel and rigid and unyielding that weve re
taliated. Were killing them off. We got so frightened of them that we’ve set
up nongods to take their places; gods as tired of consciousness as it seems
weve become; gods who just want to sleep in oblivion; who haven’t the en
ergy for divine sex, much less physical, yet gods who still cry, “Repent.
Come clean of your bodies. Give them up.”
So I say, “Down with those gods by whatever name. Hello to gods
that create life because they love it, and earth because of its beauty. The
earth gods•”
So for myself Im imagining some part of a great infinite God break
ing off from itself into a much smaller offshoot, forming a quite capable lit
tle god who wanted to be a woman and who, considering the nature of
physical reality, wanted to write books and love a man just like my husband
who paints pictures. And this god said, “I ， ll make myself into a Jane”；and
so he or she or it did; and we became one, indivisible, and now we sit mus
ing over the whole affair~a beloved cosmic accomplishment.
This is a minor enough god if you’re thinking in terms of an absolute
deity, but a god nevertheless; a chip off the old block, the part of the Big
Boy or Big G irl that wanted to travel into earth life. And this private god is
quite equipped to handle things at this end; put the body parcel of the
molecules together just right; get the seed package born and grow it up~
god and person emerging together, so that infinity and time alike are
woven into our genes, mortality and immortality each combining here to
form the selves we know.
I wish I could tell the news to that editor.
C hapter 11
T im e and T im e Structures:
T h e Shape o f T im e
om W illow ( I，ll call him) is a scientist from a well-known research
T institute. He visited us that last weekend of November 1974. In an

informal session that lasted from 2:00 on a Sunday afternoon until
12:30 that night, he asked me questions~and I answered them while I was
in an altered state of consciousness.
Its rather difficult to describe the state, simply because its so familiar
and I take it so for granted. I feel accelerated, poised, yet passive at the
same time. 丁here’s no resistance of any kind. So far, I ’ve used this state
whenever I deal with scientists on my own; rather than working through
Seth. I take to this particular focus “like a duck to water.” Its great fun and
even a kind of sport to me. Finding out what’s happening to electrons, say,
is something I really enjoy. I admit that I feel much more free then than I
do when I have peoples emotions to deal with. Yd rather “find” a lost elec
tron than a lost person any day, for example: I don’t have to worry about
whether or not the electron really wants to be found or not. I don’t even
know if electrons really can get lost, for that matter. But anyhow, electrons
don’t cry, so I don’t have their emotions to deal with.
T o m W illo w p laced h is re c o rd e r o n th e ta b le a n d w e w e n t to it, ta k
in g tim e o u t o n ly fo r a su p p e r o f sc ram b le d eggs. I m ad e q u ic k sketches o f
electrons to explain their behavior, always a great exuberant game to me,
since I haven’t any idea of the subject in my usual operating consciousness.
In college I flunked General Science twice and never got to Biology or
Chemistry, much less Physics. I wrote poetry about the frogs state of con
sciousness, though, while our science teacher dissected the carcass, and I
kept wondering what amoebas were “thinking of” when I was supposed to
be doing whatever it was you were supposed to be doing with amoebas一
now I ，ve forgotten— in General Science.
98 Chapter 11
Yet when I switch my focus of consciousness, the microscopic world

comes quite alive, and I feel challenged as I try to match my perceptions to
a scientists vocabulary. Tom W illow is one of those scientists who are very
curious about the properties of the mind, and he’d visited us once before.
We knew we worked well together. I didn’t have to worry about skepticism
o n h is p a rt, th o u g h I w as q u ite aw are th a t h is v is it w as u n o ffic ia l. W h ic h
was A-OK with me.
Among other topics, I told Tom what I was getting on the structure
and behavior of electrons; time and gravity; the interior makeup of the
earth; and the purposes and inner structures of pyramids. Later Tom had
transcripts made of our prolonged recorded conversation and wrote me a
letter saying: “Part of the information is well known to specialists and is
well established. Another part is new data, but is plausible and does not
contradict what is already known. A third part is new and contradicts the
scientific picture of reality; in some cases, however, the scientific picture is
not accepted universally and is currently being disputed. A ll in all, this is
just the right combination of old and new information that can be used
best, in working with serious scientists looking for good ideas.”
As a result of the material I gave Tom, I found myself suddenly ob
sessed with time. Instead of writing, Yd sit and try to “lean into” the min
utes, or strain against them to see what happened. I drew endless diagrams
trying to see if time fit into space, or space fit into time. Yd say to Rob, “I
should be working on my book, but I， ve gotten into this time thing lately
instead.”
I honestly didn’t realize that this obsession with time was connected
with this book or with psychic politics. It was just a month since my first
super-real view of the world and the beginning of this manuscript. I was
b e g in n in g to see, by hindsight, that my ordinary encounters~phone calls,
guests, and even dreams— seemed organized in the strangest fashion.
Looking back at the month, I saw that each week or so had a theme that
presented itself either in book dictation from the library, or in more ordi
nary experience. Then everything else seemed to revolve around the theme,
including the Seth sessions. Yet while I was involved in a particular subject,
I never realized what was going on. Often, I’d think that I was dealing with
another topic instead.
So while I felt guilty about “taking time out” to do what I really
wanted to do~study the nature of tim e~ I was working on one of the
inner thematic frameworks of the book without realizing it.
In the meantime, I was copy reading Adventures in Consciousness and
trying to catch up with the mail. So much had happened to me in a month
that the thirty days seemed to contain a different kind of time, folded in
between the usual minutes. I felt as if I could get all the book material from
Time and Time Structures 99
the library at once by tuning in to this special dimension. Yet the book ma
terial seemed to wait until certain other experiences happened in our nor
mal time.
I knew that I’d had various emotional reactions to time at different
periods in my life. When I was a child, I didn’t want to grow up and I did
want to, according to my view of the adult world on any given day. Oddly
enough, I feel more free in time than I ever did when I was in my twenties;
and now, in my forties, my experience with time is far more enjoyable than
it was only a few years ago. Up until then I was almost desperately aware of
life’svulnerability, obsessed with the thought that each day the young grew
older, and driven by the frustrating realization that there was nothing I
could do about this at all.
The younger I was, the more terrified I was of growing older. I
knocked myself out to produce my books, hassled by the knowledge of
times relentless passing. But now new feelings are coming to me, and emo
tional certainties. Somehow we project ourselves ahead in time through
our own desires. I had two books coming out that year. Presently I， m w rit
ing this one. Seth has finished Ûnknown'Reality since I began this manu
script, and has already begun another. So I ’ve staked out the future and I’m
already in it to some degree just as Im in the past. My focus is now, but the
future is already imprinted. My psychic footprints are there, waiting for
me. This adds some kind of personal exploration to the concept of time. To
some extent, the future loses its “scary” quality, yet still maintains its flexi
bility and mystery.
The day in which I write this page becomes merged with the past
years IVe been speaking of, and with future years when it w ill be read by
others. So I’m rather surprised, I guess, to feel my experience with time
changing. The days go by swiftly, today folding into tomorrow without an
observable wrinkle. Yet the insides of the days, or their contents, seem
fuller or wider. The days have more room in them than before.
Were so used to thinking about time in certain fashions, though, that
new feelings about it are oddly disturbing and exciting at once. Shortly
after Toms visit, for example, on Thanksgiving Eve, I saw myself in the li
brary, turning to another page of “the book” that dealt with time. Then, in
stead of seeing more library copy, I suddenly found myself wondering
about the nature of time in a different fashion, almost as if viewing it from
another perspective.
Maybe, I thought, objects are time structures first and space struc
tures secondly: That is, space may solidify into objects only because its im
pregnated with time, and time may actually provide space with its
“thickness.” Similarly, past and future may represent the thickness of the
present.
100 Chapter 11
We can walk around a table and see it from all sides. We can even
look up or down at it if we want. But we cant view all of the dimensions of
an event in the same way. Its as if we can only see one corner of an event at
once. And even though the table is an object, we can walk around it only
in any given now. We cant circle it as it was yesterday or as it w ill be to
morrow, even though the same space is involved. Time and space may be
aspects of something else, or segments of a greater whole that we perceive
separately.
I go into the library from this time and space, yet its space seems to
exist outside of ours, even though I can pinpoint where the two coincide.
Even then our space predominates, with the library space superimposed
upon it, or opening up somehow within it. I don’t take my physical body
there either, though I do have a counterpart one there. Ive noticed that I
can have what amounts to an hours experience in the library, while only
ten minutes of our time has passed. So it seems to me that potential events
have to get “solid” in space and time for us to perceive them here.
Time separates objects. It must hold them together too, and be con
nected with gravity. More than space is between the chair and couch in my
living room, otherwise all the other arrangements of those two objects in
the past and future could fight for the same space arrangement~at the
same time. So it came to me clearly that the space between objects depends
on time as well as space arrangements. This must apply to the smallest of
particles also. So what keeps cells together must be a force involving time
and gravity as well as one connecting the spatial grouping of the atoms and
molecules. Time and gravity, working together, must somehow form all of
our space arrangements, holding particles in the proper “now,” keeping
them from flying apart or gluing together. Objects must be space-frozen in
time, or rather thickened in time and held together through gravity.
If gravity unites events in time and space, then events not yet here are
too far apart in time and space to be solid. They are invisible events, in the
same way that there are invisible particles. These must come together in a
certain way before we perceive any event, psychological or “objective.” A
psychological event must still connect with the object of the physical body.
We may well be the nucleus of all the events that we perceive.
I thought of this unknown force as causing space and time, resulting
in objects that were events thickened by time as well as space, having a
point of integrity or prime reality or focus that we call the present. So if
you changed one ingredient, would you alter time or events in any way?
Usually, of course, we just perceive events in the present. Years ago I
tried my hand at making predictions, with some considerable success. I
wasn’t trying to find out “what was going to happen” per se. I was trying to
prove to myself that we could, on occasion, “foresee” the future. Once Yd
satisfied myselfon this point, I lost all interest. Now suddenly I found my
self intrigued with precognition again, from a different viewpoint. Did the
fact of precognition alter the events . . . and if so, how? What happened to
time itself when we tried to yank out events before they were “ready”？
More than this, the contents of the mind fascinated me. I was learn
ing that the mind held far more knowledge than we usually use. How
could we get hold of it? Later that year I did much more work along these
lines that I ，
ll publish one day, hopefully, under the title The Psychic Con
tents of the Mind. The work I did this particular week was intriguing
though, precisely because it raised so many questions, and because the im
pressions of precognized events were so close—and so far~from the mark.
Later I learned some fascinating things about the minds processes as it cor
rectly “looks into the future•” But the “distorted” impressions put me in
touch with time, and with my own mind in a particularly challenging fash
ion, and made me ask exciting questions that wouldn’t have occurred to me
otherwise.
This particular day I just decided to scribble down the first few words
or phrases that came into my mind, and then to check them against the
days events to see in what way they might apply. I specifically decided not
to question what I wrote, or try to make it more specific. This is what I
wrote:
1. Something in a wooden framework, flat, I think, like a carton that

glass might come in. Not large. M y science kit?
2. About apartment house. News. Lend-lease.
3. Lung
4. Greek magnate
I，d better add a word about the first impression. Some time earlier Yd
joined a science club that sent kits every three months. I knew that one was
due this month or the next. By then I’d already decided to forget the whole
th in g , th o u g h . So fa r I ，
d re c e ive d tw o k its . Vd jo in e d o rig in a lly because I
thought that perhaps some knowledge of basic science might help me form
better psychic questions and familiarize me with simple scientific experi
ments. We live in a technological society and take advantage of, say, elec
tricity all the time. Yet if my use of even a simple light bulb depended upon
my technical knowledge of its operation, Yd be in the dark. So I joined the
club.
At once I was disillusioned. The ads said that even a twelve-year-old
boy could put the kits together. Nothing was said about a twelve-year-old
g ir ly e t with an English major in college, I had difficulty making sense of
the instructions. More, my steel filings didn’t line up on the little magnet
102 Chapter 11
the way the book said they would. In a strange way, the gadgets seemed to
separate me from knowledge, rather than bring me closer. And I became
stubborn, discovering that the whole idea of predictable experiments went
against the grain. It was the ^^predictable I was after, and the direct knowl
edge or experience of reality~ if I could get it.
In a n y case, I w ro te m y im p re s s io n s d o w n a t 1 0 :3 0 a .m . stare d a t
them disapprovingly because they seemed so indefinite, and went back to
my writing. At 11:30, the delivery man came with a package—my science
kit. The box was fat, not flat， but it was marked “fragile” (which could have
suggested glass), and it did contain a light bulb.
Rob had answered the door, and he opened the kit. It was packed with
old newspapers, and just on impulse I suppose, Rob started smoothing out
the crumbled paper and reading it aloud. At first I didn’t pay any attention.
Then I yelled, “Hey, let me see that!” Both sides of the newspaper page were
devoted to real estate ads, with large displays mentioning apartments, town
houses, and homes for sale and rent. There were three large pictures of
wooden frame houses with picture windows and wide expanses of glass.
Subconsciously I could have known when the science kit was due, but
that’s just what I was after—trying to discover the contents of the mind.
And, I thought, the kit had arrived today, not yesterday or tomorrow. The
newspaper did just happen to be completely devoted to real estate, as per
my second impression. Still, the science kit package hadn’t been ofwood as
I，d indicated, and it wasn’t flat either. Had I somehow transferred the data
about the houses (wooden frameworks) from the newspaper page onto the
package itself?
“Who knows?” I thought, and went back to my writing. Then, fifteen
minutes later, at 11:50，the phone rang. The unexpected call was about
“G o rd o n ,” th e y o u n g m a n m e n tio n e d e a rlie r, w h o w a n te d to be so a n o n y
m o u s. I to o k th e c a ll w ith o u t th in k in g to o m u c h a b o u t it. T h e n I g lanced
at my impressions. The word “lung” seemed to jump up at me. Ever since
Gordon had showed us his concave chest, I ， d thought of him as “the boy
with the hole in his chest.” Now I was certain that the word “lung” was my
subconscious symbol for him. Just the same I wondered irritably why I
hadn’t just written the boys name down if that was so: Why use a symbol
to begin with? Besides, I reasoned, you could say that anything was a sym
bol for any thing, by hindsight, if you wanted. A t the same time I “knew”
that “lung” stood for Gordon.
At two that afternoon~another phone call, from a young woman I， ll
call Sally. Sally, I knew, had begun working at a lunchroom some weeks
earlier. She phoned to tell me that a mutual friend had been surprised to
find her in the lunchroom, and asked why I hadn’t told her that she was
working there. I thought this was hilarious, and asked Sally if she wanted
me to send out announcements about her new employment. Again, I hung

up without making any particular connections between the call and my
impressions, but I glanced at my pad anyway. And shook my head. Sally
worked for a man called George the Greek. He was referred to by that
name regularly. My impression read, aGreek magnate.” A small business
man running a Greek lunchroom is hardly a Greek magnate. Yet certainly
the impression applied. But why the exaggeration?
In regard to impressions 1 and 2, the science kit already existed in
space and time when I made my notes. The kit must have been in the post
office or in a truck on the way here. In usual terms, I had no way of know
ing this, of course, much less of knowing what the package was stuffed
with. Impression 1 definitely referred to the packagethe science k it b u t
again, the details weren’t right. In breaking the data down, had I confused
the glass wooden structures shown on the newspaper with the package it
self? It was almost as if I saw the object (the kit) out of shape by trying to
perceive it ahead of time.
This idea struck me vividly. Just maybe, I thought, space and time to
gether do form the shape of objects, and under certain conditions, at least,
we tune in to a level where the object isn’t fully shaped “yet.” The mentally
perceived shape of the kit, long and thin rather than its actual fat and
square, might be legitimate, at one level. Maybe the kit was long and thin,
and got fatter and squarer as it approached me in time. Whether or not I
was right in this particular instance, I was certain that time helped shape
objects as much as space does.
Was the shape of the kit dependent upon its placement in time, and
perceiving it “ahead of time” did I tune in to a sort of pre-shape? And what
about “Greek magnate?” Again there was an exaggeration, only of quality
rather than shape in usual terms. Sally’s boss was important to her. Did that
importance magnify him to a magnate in her eyes? I had more questions
than I could handle. Mostly, though, I wondered how much time had to
do with shaping objects and adding to their solidity. I was certain that time
added shape to space.
But time—all different kinds of timeseemed to swirl about me that
week. Time and timelessness. Yet in the past month, my super-real view of
the world had begun to blur at the edges. I’m not sure when it withdrew or
when I withdrew from it. I was left with my memory of its existence. Yet if
the world was no longer super-real, neither was it the world I had known
before. Its greater dimensions surrounded it invisibly, emerging now and
then, suddenly, so that one object would attain full brilliance, reminding
me by contrast of the magnificence of the whole.
The ape man/ape mother image returned unexpectedly too. Once
when I was feeding the pigeons outside the kitchen window, I stopped,
104 Chapter 11
vividly sensing my “earth self,” filled with the certainty that my own emo
tions were warm and reliable, with their own compassion and wisdom. I
felt the rhythms of my body as secure and dependable—anything but un
predictable as sometimes I used to see them—and I was struck by the sure
ness and ancient knowledge that somehow resided within my flesh.
I hadn’t had any prolonged experiences in my library, though, and I
wondered: Would the library itself gradually vanish? The birds fluttered
around the roof. I closed the window. But soon my thoughts would flutter
about a lot quicker than those pigeons, because a few nights later Seth in
troduced a new concept thatonce again— made us reorganize our mental
worlds.
I never did put that science kit together. Finally I gave it away, with
the two others, to a friend who had a twelve-year-old boy. Oh, well, I
thought; you can’t win them all.
C h apter 1 2
T h e Jamaican W om an, “C ounterparts,”

and Four-Fronted Selves
hile I went around trying to poke mental fingers into the “pie”
W of time, and thought that I wasn’t working on this book, Rob

had another psychic upsurge一some more reincarnational ex
periences. As usual it seemed that real life was messier, more exuberant,
more rambunctious than any theories meant to explain it. That is, experi
ence itself kept running ahead of us, escaping the theories, and at the same
time initiating new concepts which in turn would become steppingstones
for further subjective events.
We were delighted with Robs recent reincarnational episodes, for ex
ample, even if we had many questions. W ith these new experiences,
though, we were now faced with an embarrassment of riches. Yet there was
no doubt of Robs emotional involvement in these latest episodes: each one
vital and brilliant in its own way; each one finding him aware of another
self, as alive as the self he recognizes.
The “Jamaican woman” took Rob by surprise, for example, yet he
knew that his own existence now was intimately connected with hers. I’m
quoting a portion of his notes here, though the entire episode appears in
The uUnknownwReality,
“W hile typing the 716th Seth session tonight I found myself think
ing, ‘You’ve always been quite interested in the Caribbean area and its is
lands, and you know perfectly well why/ Then, in my minds eye I saw a
tall, heavily built black woman in ragged clothes, carrying a basket or bun
dle on her head. I knew that this was me in another incarnation—or so I
thought. This may be jumping to conclusions on very flimsy evidence. A ll
I have is the feeling to go by, and the fact that I got the chills, or a thrilling
sensation, as I realized what was happening.
“I took the session page out of the typewriter and wrote the above
sentence, then sat with closed eyes. Immediately I was subjectively flooded
106 Chapter 12
with a host of images, so jumbled that I couldn’t separate them. Something

about a burning village square in the mountain country of Jamaica. I felt
like crying. I opened my eyes and began to type. I saw the typewriter
through a haze, so I closed my eyes again.
“I saw~I was—a big black woman running for her life down a hilly,
dirty street. Someone—a m anwas chasing her with a firearm. Slap, slap,
slap, went the big bare feet, dirty and callused. She was terrified. Fire. I
thought of my own “death.” I opened my eyes, staring wildly at the wall of
my studio for a moment.
“What was that I wrote not long ago~about learning to go along
with unpleasant reincarnational experiences? Not so easy, after all. I dared
to close my eyes again. Ah, relief. “I ”一the womandarted around a cor
ner of a mud-type hut or shack. Into a doorway, a room. The walls were a
foot thick. She was saved. The footsteps of the pursuer pounded past,
down the hilly street. My head fell forward in blessed ease. A moment ago
I ’d felt like yelling. 1really might have. At the same time Vd thought that
this would terrify Jane, who was working in the front room. A ll through
this, I listened to her typewriter going.
“I ，ll try to sketch the head of the woman. No name yet. My right
hand rests in my lap, covered with my left, as I sit with closed eyes. I feel
my right hand as bigger than mine; black, with short wide nails, light-col
ored against the black skin. Shes一 I ’m ~illiterate. A rough life. I can al
most write this, and see things with my eyes wide open at the same time.
Im half-frightened again. I lay hiding now on a scrubby mountainside,
looking down at a bay of blue water (like a postcard scene). Something
about a ship. A cane fieldsugar~I hear a man beating his way through
it. Calling. But they may not be looking for me. I get a name, but refuse to
accept it.
“Now its as if Im getting so many images that I cant sort them out. I
find myself thinking that half of them aren’t legitimate, but made up of
things IVe read and seen about the Caribbean. Those things never gave me
the chills, though. The woman has a heavy mouth, turned down, and some
sort of scar on her cheek. I get something about a small boat, a handmade
craft of reeds, very crude— I， m in it now. No sail. Now there was a small
thin black man who was running with me, but he veered off to the left on
the hilly street, so he got away too. There’s something about a ships cannon
at the top of the hill, in the village, and an uprising or fight, involving
troops. As best I can tell, the time period is within the early 1800s.
“After the woman ducked into the mud hut, she left again as soon as
her pursuer passed. He’d soon return, looking into the buildings. She ran
down a narrow street... that led her to the cane field. I ‘saw， something in
a well, dangling down on a string. But that’s a terrible place to try to hide
The Jamaican Woman 107
anything. That’s the first place anyone would look. Yet whatever it was that
was hidden was found in no time at all—and that’s how all of this started.
I ’m getting that she survived all of this and lived to an old age. ‘I，
died of
pneumonia and it was very peaceful, like opening a door and walking
through, or rather going through. Someone was waiting for me. And Ive
still got the chills in my belly and legs as I write this.
wThe name I got and rejected as so unbelievably corny was Miranda.
That would mean nothing to that woman; it was a spelled name, and
besides. No, it was Maumee~Maw-mee~like a cry, like a native sound, a
sound that had a black history from Africa and meant something to her
bones, that spoke of ancient heritages, that was as natural to her as eating
or sleeping, that fit her, what she was, and meant that everybody knew who
she was. ”
This was the end of the main episode, though there were later ones,
and some odd connections with experiences of some of my students. These
are being included in Rob’s notes for The “Unknoum”Reality. . . in con
nection with Seths sessions on counterparts. As it was, Robs Jamaican
woman led us into another long discussion of reincarnation. These few
paragraphs give an indication of our views at the time. Rob wrote them
shortly after his experience:
“In a strange way, I think that the intellect can be helped to under
stand reincarnation by the very facts of emotional experience. The intellect
can easily verify that the supposed emotions involving a reincarnational
episode are real. They do have a basis, an origin. The question is the source
of those emotions. The intellect finds itself in the position of evaluating ex
periences~emotional ones—not of its own province. If the intellect isn’t
closed to all ideas not native to the society of its growth, then it can learn
much.
“It surely doesn’t have to go around, waving its figurative arms wildly,
s a y in g , ‘I w a s s u c h a n d s u c h i n t h e f i r s t c e n t u r y a . d ., a n d I w a s s o a n d s o i n
1750，，and, given simultaneous time, ‘I was a crew member on a rocket
ship to Mars in the twenty-second century.’ But the open intellect w ill
surely find its very processes modified to some degree, however slight, by
the very fact of its openness. It can at least accept reincarnation in symbolic
form, or even as a sample of the psyches innate creativity.
“So I take all of my own ideas on reincarnation with a large dose of
caution, while not shutting any of them out. The strong, almost violent
emotions I felt yesterday ‘in Jamaica* were real. So were those in what I call
my Roman series of a few weeks ago. . • • Yet Im sure the whole notion
of reincarnation (simultaneous or linear) is distorted to begin with. But
distorted from what? That’s the rub.”
108 Chapter 12
Those last three sentences are important, and surely Robs questions
helped trigger Seths material on “counterparts.” Yet he didn’t introduce the
concept in the session following Robs experience, but in the one after that.
In the first session he merely had one small comment, following book dic
tation. He said: “Reincarnationally, now [your experience] was quite legit
imate, harking back to what I told you about the release of your own
abilities. You helped that woman. Your present sense of security and rela
tive detachment gave her strength. She knew she would survive, because
she was aware of your knowledge. I w ill say more about it, but for now this
is the end of the session.”
At the end of the session I definitely felt that something was in the
wind: I sensed the introduction of new and controversial material.
S till not using the term “counterparts,” Seth “dropped the bomb” in
his next class session. Rob had been telling the students about the Jamaican
woman, when Seth came through, smiling and very active. He said: “You
can live more than one life in one time. You are neurologically tuned in to
one particular field of actuality that you recognize. In your terms and in
your terms only, the neurological messages from other existences exist
within you as ghost images—messages to which you do not respond in
physical terms. But they are present. They are indeed like ghost images
within the cells, for the cells recognize more in this case than you do....
“If you could think of a multidimensional body, existing at one time
in different realities, and appearing differently within those realities, then
you could get a glimpse of what is involved.”
For the rest of the evening, class was in a mild uproar as we tried to
answer the seemingly endless questions that such a concept involved. As
usual, I thought this was a brilliant theory, but practicallywell, how
would it work? What did it do to our ideas of selfhood and identity? The
politics of the psyche was a new kind of politics, indeed.
A ll of this was going on the same week that the physicist came, when
I was so obsessed with time, so my mind was on those events rather than
on Robs Jamaican woman. Seths contention that we can live more than
one life in the same time period caught me by surprise even though Yd had
hints of this in a session immediately previous. I was intrigued as usual. Yet
I found myself thinking, “I wish he hadn’t said that,” because in a way it
was bound to be controversial.
When Seth introduced the concept formally in the 721st session, as a
part of “ Unknown,yRealityythough, then Rob and I wondered why the idea
had ever seemed strange. Seth explained it so simply that overnight
TheJamaican Woman 109
counterparts became such a part of our mental existence that it seemed

we，d been familiar with the concept for our entire lives.
I’m including a very small excerpt from that session, leaving the fur
ther refinements and explanations for Seths own book. The theory was
definitely introduced, however, in response to Robs questions about the Ja
maican woman episode. Its useless to wonder when Seth would have
brought up the subject if Rob hadn’t had that experience just then. Seths
own book develops the concept further, and its a pivot point for his expla
nation of personality.
Seth mentioned Robs series of reincarnational episodes, tying them
into some other material in the chapter. Then he continued:
You live more than one life at a time. You do not experience your
century simply from one separate vantage point, and the individuals
alive in any given century have far deeper connections than you realize.
You do not experience your space-time world, then, from one but from
many viewpoints.
You do not understand how consciousness is distributed in that
regard. . . . The people living within any given century are related in
terms of consciousness and identity. This is true biologically and spiri
tually. ... [In some of his reincarnational episodes] Joseph [Rob] was
picking up on lives that “he” lived in the same time scheme. In this way
and in your terms, he was beginning to recognize the familyship that
exists between individuals who share your earth at any given time.
Each identity has free will and chooses its environment as a physi
cal stance in space and time. Those involved in a given century are
working on particular problems and challenges. Various races do not
simply “happen,” and diverse cultures do not just appear. The greater
self “divides” itself, materializing in flesh as several individuals, with en
tirely different bacl^rounds, yet each embarked upon the same kind of
creative challenge.
Each will choose his or her own framework according to the in
tents of the consciousness ofwhich each ofyou is an independent part.
In such a fashion are the challenges and opportunities inherent in a
given time worked out.
You are counterparts ofyourselves, but as Ruburt would say, living
“eccentric” counterparts, each with your own abilities. So Joseph “was”
Nebene [as described in Adventures in Consciousness], a scholarly man,
not adventurous, obsessedwith copying ancient truths, and afraid that
creativity was error; authoritative and demanding.… At the same time,
in the sameworld and in the same century, he was an aggressive, adven
turous, relatively insensitive Roman officer who would have little un
derstanding of manuscripts or records, yet who also followed authority
without question....
In your terms, Joseph is now a man who questions authority ...
who rips apart the very structures to which he “once” gave such service.
In greater terms, these experiences all occur at once. The black woman
followed nothing but her own instincts . . . and bowed only to the au
thority of her own emotions, and those emotions automatically put her
in conflict with the politics of the times.
Josephs focus of identity is his own. He was not Nebene or the
Roman officer or the woman. Yet they areversions ofwhat he is, and he is
aversion ofwhat they “were,” and at certain levels, eachis awareofthe oth
ers. There is constant interaction. The Roman soldier dreams of the
woman, and ofJoseph. There is a reminiscence that appears even in the
knowledge ofthe cells, and acertain correspondence....
The Roman soldier and Nebene and the woman went their own
ways after death. They contributed to the world as it existed in those
terms, and then followed their own lines of development, elsewhere, in
other realities. So each of you exists in many times and places, and ver
sions ofyourselves exist in the world and time that you recognize.
Simply put, Seth is saying that we have what we think of as reincarna

tional existences in other times than our own; and that in the present world
as we know it we also have other lives~called counterparts. I immediately
connected this with my models and eccentricities. And I thought, “So that’s
it. People alive on the earth during a given century would be connected, like
the leaves of a plant.” Seth even mentioned species of consciousness. And
again I thought, “O f course”一 imagining a time-species, all of us alive at
one time, spreading through the century, covering it “end to end.”
In aspect psychology, as introduced in Adventures in Consciousness, I’d
envisioned the source self as spreading out through time, showing itself as
separate focus personalities that we usually thought of as reincarnational
selves. But now I saw that the source self (or psyche) actually spread out,
peopling any given century as well. Groups of source selves would then rip
ple outward, giving us a basis for brotherhood that has far-reaching im pli
cations on all levels. Seth carries this concept well beyond the general
statements quoted here. He also defined the concept in some class sessions,
as he answered students， questions.
The connections between counterparts and the politics of the self are
obvious. The private psyche would have invisible affiliations with its con
temporaries. Operationally, counterparts would act like a private family of
selves; inner versions of our family, national, and species relationships. Any
given source self might have several focus personalities (or counterparts)
alive on earth at once, each born into different racial, economic, cultural,
or religious situations, so that life was experienced from a variety of stand
points as different elements of one time period were explored. Each coun
terpart would also contribute to the historic life of the century, in our
terms of time.
Yet I kept wondering: Who keeps track? As usual, hints of an answer

came when I was looking the other way, when I thought that I wasn’t doing
much at all.
For about two weeks, Yd had trouble getting into the library. It was there
but not there. I tried to take it for granted that I was working at other than
conscious levels; I kept up with the sessions and classes, but I felt a letdown.
At the same time, while I worried because I didn’t feel inspired, I
knew that I ， d been very active in the dream state. But I thought, “Big
deal— I want to be inspired in the waking state.” And I managed to keep
the two kinds of experience apart, even though I knew they were con
nected. Yet it was the nighttime activity that showed me, finally, what Vd
been up to. Then it was obvious that Vd been dealing with the politics of
the psyche in the most intimate manner.
In the meantime, though, for about a month I seemed to be getting
some kind of material in the sleep state, usually following a Seth session.
This had happened often in the past, but I was becoming more and more
aware of what was going on. Words just kept going through my head, sen
tence after sentence, not in Seths voice at all. This “voice” was mental, more
like my own—like thinking, only “I” was thinking my own thoughts, or
sometimes dreaming, while this was happening. The words were intrusive
to that extent, and almost mechanical in their steadiness.
I responded in various ways: by trying to waken enough to write the
material down (it was definitely “book” copy); by trying to comprehend
what was being said; by switching from “my” thoughts or dreams to this
other level; or by saying, finally, “Come on, quit it now. I just want to go
into a normal sleep.” But the words just marched on at their own pace,
whether or not I could follow them. I could stop them by really trying, but
couldn’t slow them down. Sometimes I just got frustrated, wondering if the
material was really for Seths “ Unknoum” Reality~and I had my signals
crossed. Then Yd get confused, thinking that asleep I couldn’t write the
words down or record them, and where were they going, for heavens sake?
The material didn’t seem to come from the library either. I took it for
granted that I was programming myself in some way~but who was the
self who was doing the programming? Sometimes Vd begin asking ques
tions of the material itself and Yd get my own thought processes mixed up
with the material. The material itself just went right on, “straight as an
arrow”一 my t h o u g h t s didn’t seem to make any difference to it at all. Nor
would the material answer my questions. It just kept on coming. So I’d
take my questions back, learning that they didn’t belong with the material.
It was as if they were the wrong color and didn’t fit. I thought of the mate
rial as coming in strands above my normal thinking level, and more and
more I could differentiate between the two strands.
112 Chapter 12
Occasionally the material would just stop in mid sentence, and Vd be

annoyed, thinking that “I” would never stop writing in the middle of a
sentence unless the roof fell in or something. Then the words would sud
denly start in again as if they hadn’t stopped; and though I couldn’t be sure,
I think they began again right where they’d left off.
On a few other instances I picked up the material before it was ready,
or so it seemed. Still asleep, yet in this funny state of consciousness, Vd get
really annoyed thinking that the copy wasn’t final, and that I didn’t want it
until it was. Even asleep, I insisted on good copy. I was particularly struck,
though, by the fact that the material seemed unresponsive to my questions.
It was as if I were equipped with a special set of mental earphones that
picked up this certain station: so the material couldn’t answer me any more
than a record could.
I still felt that the information was being transmitted directly into my
mind, while at the same time the words seemed to march in from the right
and go out the left side of my head, like notes on some musical graph sev
eral “lines” above the level of my own thoughts. My own thoughts were
never disturbed in any way, as if the two sets of lines didn’t meet but were
independent. The only exception was w illful tampering on my part, when
I definitely made an effort to ask questions of the material itself: then my
thoughts bumped into these other words, with no marked effect except—
again— that it was obvious the two didn’t mix.
I had the image of my mind as a graph of some kind, with my
thoughts always at one level, and this material at another. But did those in
trusive words mix with my own thoughts at another level, one that I hadn’t
found yet? And were there still other seemingly independent lines that were
psychologically invisible? Did my mind contain some kind of scale, with
consciousness going up and down? And was I simply doing mental “finger”
exercises?
Anyway, after the material on counterparts, I kept wondering who
kept track of all those “selves,” but I never connected the counterpart con
cept with the nighttime experiences. A few nights afterward, though, while
I was asleep (euphemistically speaking) I found myselflistening to that ma
terial again, and I thought, “Hey, I bet I can get some of this down if I do
it just right.” Im not sure how I straddled the levels of consciousness, but I
woke myself up and turned on the light. No one ever grabbed for a pen
quicker than I did.
The oddest sensation followed. The completed copy began to ... fall
down to my level, crumble slightly, tumble in fragments, no longer as
smooth and perfect as it had been, changing into concepts and images as if
altering itself for my regular level of thought.
Complete or not, I had it. I felt triumphant even while I could write
down only a small portion of the material. It vanished completely by the
time I scribbled down the following:
Four-Fronted Selves
wT h e r e can be, for example, four counterparts alive in one time pe
riod. These would form a psychic ‘block， ’ and any one of the four person
alities could pick up information from this joint pool (of identity). Each
such person would be distinct yet each would be an added dimension of
the others, so that on other levels the four (in this case) form an alliance
and become a four-fronted self, forming a composite self bridging the
given century.
“Each of the four is equal, yet the overall psychic construction
formed by their alliance is greater than the sum of the four parts. This al
liance is a working one and once its constructed, it always exists though
it doesn’t exist necessarily in our terms of continuity. It possesses a differ
ent kind of life (the four-fronted self), a life that ‘happens， whenever one
of the counterparts tunes in to its greater framework. But the four-
fronted self’s own sense of continuity is not broken up and it exists out
side of our space-time framework, while its counterparts exist in it. The
conditions of existence are entirely different for the four-fronted self as a
psychic construct.”
I knew that Vd lost much of the material, and that the four-fronted
self had been used as an example. It could be ten-fronted or a hundred-
fronted, for all I knew. I did feel excited, though, because I felt that I
was just beginning to unveil an original concept that would help us see
ourselves in a far clearer light. (Even though, at this point, I was con
fused.)
This reminded me that just before the recent Seth sessions I， d been
getting glimpses of the material Seth was going to deliver, only in images
and concepts that were not yet clear. It seemed as if I could either have a
session in which Seth would deliver the information in completed form, or
try to get it myself~in which case it would be fragmented. I chose the ses
sions. I had the same feeling with the “sleep material.” By the time I got it
my way, the polished quality had vanished, though I did get the essence.
The idea of one self seemed to be exploding into a group of number
less separate selves, a concept most difficult to follow. The next afternoon,
however, I sat at my table, thinking, and I began to get the feeling of this
. . . separate oneness. I wrote this page of notes, all the more evocative to
114 Chapter 12
me now, because as I type this final manuscript weve already moved away
from the apartment room that I saw with such clarity:
“I ，
m listening to a symphony, its tones and notes emerging from
the radio beside me. Its snowing lightly, and even with my head turned,
Im aware of the sleet-like snowflakes falling past the wide bay windows.
The traffic sounds merge with the music as the cars go shooting past on
the slate gray road, not yet snow-whitened. I look at my room with its
small, bright lamp lit on the room-divider bookcase; and at the few
knickknacks— the bronze bird, copper flve-and-dime Buddha, and the
big, dull gray wax frog. Each sits in its own spot, splendid in its own
form, existing in its own eternity w ithin the moment. Above, the six
philodendron plants climb to the ceiling; an inside forest; green heart-
shaped leaves rising out of space. And the green rug lies like a flat forest
floor. The green couch rises like a languid furniture animal, breathing in
long green sighs. And as always, the room seems significant in ways I
don’t fathom, as any place does when I catch it right. And what does it
mean?
“To me, rooms represent the private consciousness with all of its
beloved paraphernalia, its knickknacks or inner symbols materialized; a
triumph of focus as if were born and instantly form all this about us.
Were in the midst of a symphony of objects, caught in one long passage
and held, so that my bronze bird and copper Buddha and wax frog are
held for so long—and then one day they’ll collapse into crumbles of
sound, their shapes disappearing into silence. But even then, the sym
phony can be played again, and the separate notes spring alive, alive as
before, even though the original composers or musicians are gone. Yet in
life and in this room the listeners contribute, the notes and objects them
selves change and add to the composition in ways that we don’t under
stand.
“So, privately, there seems something eternal about this room and its
arrangement and me in it. And in the same way, the larger room of the
world this afternoon is like an original version of an eternal symphony, for
ever happening yet never the same. Now the music on the radio rises to a
crescendo and dies out, like objects coining fully into focus, bursting, and
then retreating only to take a different shape and surge into another com
position. When you sing a note, you let it go. And right now I feel like let
ting myself go in the same way•”
I sat there, then, and felt other mes in other places looking around at
the objects that surrounded them and wondering. And before I went to bed
that night, I wrote the following poem:
Listening
Ive put the glass of my mind

so close to the cosmic wall
that I，
ve become addicted to the strange sounds
and eternal rattlings,
as if
a multitudinous mouse
went scurrying
Is that all I’m hearing?
But listen.
My mind has a special hearing aid, appended,
like a new organ, uniquely fitted
to my occupation,
sifting, sifting sounds into patterns
or patterns into sounds;
an inner bearing
that magnifies without wires;
special equipment I， ve manufactured myself,
unknowing as a fish unknowing
forms its fins.
Or did it come built-in,
so long ago that Ive forgotten?
If you say,
“Mouse, what are you doing
in my mental closet?”
then all is suddenly quiet,
so I’ve learned to wait
for the cosmic rattlings,
and I，ve even learned to put out bait,
invisible but adequate.
So I kept listening and I got an earful. I also tried to take my mind by

surprise, to spy out my psyche at odd moments. It became clearer and
clearer to me that all of our activities are based on our ideas about ourselves
and the reaches of our psychological reality. Counterparts particularly in
trigued me, though. Did the concept provide a biological and psychic basis
for the brotherhood of man? Seth said, for example, that many white peo
ple had black counterparts, and vice versa.
Most of all, though, I was beginning to see how little we knew about
ourselves. What information did our minds contain of which we were
largely unaware? And how could you find out, if you didn’t really know
what you were looking for? So occasionally, again, I began to jot down a
116 Chapter 12
few impressions at the beginning of the day, to see if these would correlate
with current events. I wasn’t concerned with public, but private reality. So
my predictions were meant to apply to my own daily life.
When I wrote them down, they were usually disconnected. On De
cember 6 that year (1974) I jotted down the following:
1. Minn.
2. Alaska
3. boy in trouble . • • Carl? (I don’t know any boy named Carl.)
4. siq . . . aquer
When the mail came, one letter seemed to apply to all of the impres
sions but Alaska. The letter was from an irate college boy I’ll call Peter. He
wrote from Carkton College, Northfield, M inn” and from his letter he
was definitely in trouble, involved in a conflict of beliefs. He told me that
he’d begun by considering me a “pure and productive medium” until he， d
read Seths The Nature ofPersonal Reality, then he， d sensed “stagnation,”
and could tell that I was repeating themes, “but in a more ego-directed and
progressively useless way.” From his letter it was only too clear that he con
sidered the ego “bad,” to be done in at all costs.
I looked up the last impression, number 4, in the dictionary. When
I，d jotted it down, I wasn’t sure of the meaning at all, and I had the idea
that “non” should precede it, although I didn’t write that down. The defin
ition of non sequitur was: “An inference that does not follow from the
premises • • • Any fallacy resulting from a simple conversion of a universal
affirmative proposition.” The phrase was a perfect description of his atti
tude toward my latest work.
The second impression, Alaska, didn’t seem to apply at all. Then I
looked at the address again. The letter came from Northfield, Minn. Was
Alaska my version of north fields?
Who knows? Yet the impressions convinced me, again, that some fu
ture events are held in the mind, maybe in fragmented fashion, accessible
if we want to find them and decipher our own symbols—and if we know
what to look for. These simple “predictions” are just a few of the early ones
I tried. Later I collected much more data that I still have to evaluate.
During the entire week or so, it seemed to me that I was working on
three different subjects—the dream material that kept coming, time, and
the contents of the mind. Vd made a few sketches, showing a “mind
graph,” and indicating the different levels at which I seemed to receive in
formation. Then I got wondering: Did, say, knowledge of future events
come in mixed with our ordinary thinking hidden in usual associations
that needed only to be re-sorted?
TheJamaican Woman 117
And then the three subjects came into focus, and I saw what I， d been
working on all the while. The soul or psyche has its own kind of “thick-
ness,” and that thickness includes not only time as the focus personality ex
periences it, but also events that are “out of time” to the focus personality.
I，d been exploring the thickness of the psyche. Did my predictions, mod
est as they were, arrive into my usual thought patterns when requested in
the same way that the sleep material came into my regular consciousness
when I made a concerted attempt to get it? When this happened, the
dream copy dropped down into my thought-slot, so to speak, in frag
mented fashion, broken up into bits of concepts and images. When I was
jotting down predictions, did I just bring in pieces and bits in the same
way and for the same reason?
These questions led me back to the thoughts about time I， d had ear
lier that week: There’s something invisible that gives objects their solidity
and maintains their shape so that all the atoms don’t collapse or fly apart;
and the same kind of invisible value separates objects in time, so that events
don’t come together all at once to our perception or fly apart away from us.
This is an inside-outside value that results in the correlation of subjective
and objective experience. Acting inside matter, it builds up the solidarity of
objects, and inside the mind it builds up separate solid events that exist
apart from each other subjectively, as objects exist apart in space.
Sometimes, under certain conditions, we short-circuit this value or
use it differently, perceiving events out of their usual sequence, and I sus
pect that this precognition also . . . alters the events in some fashion: we
perceive them out of shape as it were, just as if they werent “ready yet” and
hadn’t attained their proper condition. The connections between space,
time, and gravity help us pinpoint objects and experience, and if the three
elements don’t correlate in just the proper fashion, then we don’t accept an
event as real: it lacks a certain stability or rightness and remains on the pe
riphery of our attention. But outside of the normally recognized context,
events might appear quite differently. Most likely there are bleed-throughs
that we block out; ghost images, as it were, of future and past events alike.
The past moment might linger in the background of the present one and
the future might also overlap before the so-called picture changes and the
present moment is clear.
Neurologically, we， d only accept the clear focus.
Perhaps if we were aware of the overlapping, we， d lose experience of
the present, or maybe we， d learn a finer kind of inner discrimination. It
might be fun sometime to try to hold over the “past” instant (the thought
or image or whatever) and try simultaneously to anticipate the next in
stant. What would happen to the stability of objects? Would they appear
longer, for example? Thinner? Thicker? Would they seem to move?
I don’t have good depth perception. Does this somehow help me in
altering my consciousness? Was I slightly out of focus with physical reality
in that fashion, not as locked in to the obvious? Originally I was left-
handed too, so the two conditions might be related. Yet many of my states
of altered consciousness involve vision changes, so that the world attains a
clarity as far above normal depth perception as my normal sight without
glasses.
Weird. After writing the above, I took my glasses off. The world lost
much depth and color but gained a certain quaintness, became more “at-
mospheric,” perhaps more mysterious. My hearing is super-acute, though.
By my standards, half of the rest of the people would need hearing aids.
My vision of the world may be as legitimate as any persons with normal
sight. Objects may not have any one proper size or shape at all: They may
simply appear in such-and-such a fashion according to our perceptions. If
we see them out of shape, we may be tuning in to their other quite-as-
legitimate variations.
Luckily, as I write all this, my chair and typewriter remain normal.
And I put my glasses back on.
C h apter 1 3
T he Exploding Psyche and

Strands o f Consciousness
ere I go again, being facetious, but I got another call from Christ
H just as I finished the last chapter. Not just any ole gal from Elmira
can have God the Son call her up for a chat, so I should have
counted myselflucky, I suppose. And if you’re going to get a person_to_per-
son phone call from Christ, what better time than the Christmas holidays?
It was December 18，and believe it or not, I was signing Christmas cards
when the call came. At first I had no idea that it was a member of the Big
Boys family, much less his favorite Son.
Actually, the voice was young and male and initially identified itself as
Ed. Christmas music was playing on the radio. I turned it off and asked,
“Ed who?” Silence. “Ed who?” I asked again.
“Are you afraid?” he asked, mysteriously.
This time I paused.
“Nervous?” he persisted.
“Just curious,” I answered, sighing. “Should I know who you are or
something? Have you called before?”
“Yes. I’m Christ,” he said.
“Oh, of course, thatYA^ I said. “I remember.”
How could I forget? He， d called about a year previously, a nice-
enough-sounding young man, in no way different from anyone else except
that he was ninety-nine percent divine. wUh, you’re still Christ?” I asked.
“You think Im crazy,” he said—sanely enough, I thought. He， d been
sane enough to lie his way out of a mental institution the year before by
telling the psychologists what they wanted to hear, and by pretending not
to be Christ until he was safely outside. I suppose that with a secret like
that, you have to tell someone though, so here he was, calling me again.
“You do think Im crazy, thinking Im Christ, don’t you?” he asked, as
if he was very disappointed with my level of understanding.
120 Chapter 13
“I think that in those terms, every individual is Christ,” I said. “I told

you that before. If you use Christian terminology, then the Christ spirit is
in you. And in every one else, too•”
“That’s not enough,whe said.
“For me it is,” I said.
“I， m Christ, and Im going to fu lfill the prophecies,” he said, more ex
citedly now.
“That didn’t work out too well once before,” I said mildly. “I， d think
it over if I were you.”
“Now you’re challenging me,” he said.
“No. I never bother challenging anyone,” I answered.
MWell, then, what do you think of it?” he asked, adding somewhat
bitterly, “I wish youd open your mind. I can’t read your mind if you won’t
let me.，，
Thank God, I thought.
What I said was: “Look, Ed. Each of us receives revelatory material
from the inner selfor the universe or God, whatever name you want to use.
It comes in dreams or flashes of insight or visions—any method suited to
the individual. And we each interpret the information in our own way, too.
You can live like Christ in the inner world and try to be Christ-like in the
outer one, but if you start shouting out to people that you are Christ~in
conventional terms~you’re going to get into trouble,
“I， m not shouting,” he nearly shouted. “And I know enough not to
tell other people. I really do.”
“Okay,” I said, feeling better.
“And while I’m pretty sure that I am Christ, there’s a possibility that
I ’m really somebody else. I think he， ll make himself known around Christ
mas. I mean, I might know for sure one way or the other,” he said.
“Well, its good to leave yourself some leeway•”
“You have a young voice. I’m twenty-three,” he ventured.
“I ，m a lot older than that,” I said.
“I know, Ive read all of your books•， ’
“Wbll， ” I said. “Just keep your Christhood to yourself, w ill you? Are
you working, by the way?”
“O f courseIm working. It was a silly question. Im working, to get the
message across.”
Again I said, “Ed, dont try to force a literal Christhood on yourselfor
the world. It just wont work.”
“You’re challenging me again,” he chided, gently this time. “But I love
you. Merry Christmas,Mhe said.
“Merry Christmas,” I said. We hung up.
The Exploding Psyche and Strands o f Consciousness 121
In some way he gave me a present. I hoped I gave him one too. Christ
or not, he sounded like a nice boy, and if he had to be somebody beside
himself, then Christ was a better choice than Hitler, I supposed. Besides, I
“knew” that he was in the process of changing: He was less sure now of his
literal Christhood, and I meant every word I said to him. I also knew from
talking to him previously that his message wasn’t a violent one. It was him
self, no one else, he was thinking of sacrificing. I hoped he’d give that idea
up, too.
Yet I was disturbed, because those who think themselves possessed by
the gods too often carry messages of rage and destruction rather than love.
And why? The gods of the nations have the souls of generals, it seems, and
righteousness far too often wears the face of wrath. Even in the psyche, re
ligion and politics seem to mix uneasily.
That night, Rob and I watched part of a war movie on television, and
Rob said that maybe the race was literally insane. He started talking about
the pitch of emotional intensity connected with mass violence~the brilliant
focus of awareness—life knowing itself as it teetered on the edge of destruc
tion. We spoke about all of this for a while. I kept trying to defend us, the
race, while secretly, bitterly, agreeing whenever Rob mentioned our cruelties.
The answers have to lie in a different context, yet I seem driven to
find them—the answers to everything: life, private existence, the psyches
secret reasons. This strikes me as foolish at the same time, because no one
person can discover all that~one small individual amid a blaze of being.
Yet I keep trying. I wish sometimes that I could just rest in the world the
way most people understand it to be, content with appearances. Then I
think that maybe when you reach a certain point, your mind makes ques
tions the way your body makes cells, and the questions go ahead of you in
some fashion and you work your way thought over thought, on a tiny
trapeze over the web work of the usual world. Unknowingly you inch your
way outward, like a spider, toward wherever it is that the questions reach.
But when you get there and find the answers that the questions hooked on
to, then the junction just brings up more questions, and there you go
again, leaving behind you, unknowingly, tiny threads for people behind
you to follow, and growing out into the inner cosmos in a kind of natural
locomotion of the mind. Maybe.
Seth is beginning to leave more and more familiar concepts behind,
and to change others or use them differently so that they no longer mean
what they did. And a part of me is doing the same thing in this book, while
another part sits here musing about it.
Now and then I have the suspicion that the further along you go, the
more alone you might become because the people behind get tired too and
122 Chapter 13
want to stop along the way, and often they’re tempted to call their stopping
point the truth. In a way it is, of course, because I suspect also that at our
level at least, the truth is just the way reality appears at any given time.
Somehow, you have to climb above all those places to get out of our
particular atmosphere and see anything clearly at all. So I suppose that the
stranger things get, the closer I， m coming to a clear spot; where I can look
back at all of the concepts of reality and see what they have in common.
This would be something like just looking down at the earth, seeing all the
different countries that exist, each quite valid, at the same time. Maybe
there w ill be others at this clear spot when I get there, to pull out a handy
hallucinatory chair and offer me some beer and crackers while they explain
what its all about.
I’m not sure exactly what my concept of the psyche was when I began
this book, but as our experiences continued, it seemed obvious that the
psyche was not a single, but lofty entity: Instead it was more explosive and
vital, shooting fragments of itself out in all directions while still—some
how~retaining individuality. The idea of counterparts gave a new kind of
mobility to the psyche, but at least the concept of reincarnation set the
stage.
Early that December, though, Rob had an experience that was quite
unsettling in its implications; one that further disturbed our previous ideas
about the psyches separateness and integrity. The episode concerned Robs
father, who had died in 1971. Again, Rob was typing up a Seth session
when he found himself in a slight alteration of consciousness, in which cer
tain information came into his mind. He had no visual data this time, and
just wrote down the material as it came to him. This is a copy of his notes
at that time:
“In our terms my father is still resting. He is nonphysical, between ex
periences. He hasn’t chosen as yet to do anything or go anywhere/ He
knows, however, that he is preparing himself. Im getting my familiar chills
as I write this; but I don’t see any visions. I know that my father has his
next adventure all mapped out, and he knows what it is even though, in
our terms, he hasn’t consciously made that choice.
“TThe choice involves a small girl— I think her name is Miriam— in a
small New York state town. Its not a long trip, something like hitching a psy
chic ride. My father plans to travel with the little girl, experiencing a touch of
her life; her consciousness. He wont be invading her personality. Shes a very
normal little person, but with better-than-average intelligence. She wont feel
a thing.
“After that, theres a long interval in what would be a past century in
our terms. Miriam has been involved in several of these, and my father is
thinking about this and wondering which one he wants to try on for size,
you might say. He leans toward the thirteenth century in France—a small
town near the Mediterranean Sea. He sees himself in a small boat. Miriam
lives in the village: Per . . . sec. My father wants to work things out with the
Miriam personality. Miriam, of course, was also my mother.
“Her psyche and my fathers strike sparks when they touch; the fit is
not too good, but both sides want to resolve certain problems. One of
these is occupying portions of the same body at the same time—something
like the male and female characteristics that we say each person contains.
In that [French] life, Miriam grows up to be a rather grasping, good-look
ing woman. She is the stronger of the two, and throws my father off, em
barking on a probable course of action at age thirteen that makes this
possible.
“My father is thrown free, to his dismay. At the same time, a young
man in the village dies. I’m not sure here if I am of anyoithis—but my fa
ther whirls about in a nonphysical state, desperately looking for a place to
land or fasten upon. He tries the youths body, to no avail. So my father be
gins a new life in France, starting from scratch and being born again.
“Now my father is attracted to the New York Miriam in the same way.
He wants to see, to explore what the earlier attraction was, if he can. Then
he， ll be content to go his own way. Miriam is just as curious psychically as
my father is, and was. He now thinks it perfectly logical to live that past
life; he isn’t clear, but has hints and glimmers that all lives are simultaneous,
and that he is hopping between them, alighting here and there.
“He understands that this is something like turning oneself inside
out: A ll that’s been hidden inside is known, and available. In France, my fa
ther was left without physical form, and chose to end that existence. (After
which he was reborn.) That’s right: A strong personality w ill sometimes di
vest itself of unwanted portions of its own psyche. However, these parts
may orbit the psyche like satellites, and can be re-entered or reactivated at
any time in our terms. This accounts sometimes for the way a personality
w ill change its goals and behavior during its life-span, to the puzzlement of
observers.
“My father was really a kind man, almost an apologetically soft
hearted one, in that thirteenth-century life, what he had of it. He had sev
eral earlier lives that were very severe, involving the m ilitary and monastic
disciplines. Now my father waits, gathering his emotions slowly. He is
somewhat loath to leave his present state~it is a very peaceful one—but he
knows that beyond the door he looks at lie many things that now he can
barely sense.
“Occasionally he looks at our world through very puzzled eyes. He
sees foliage as heat images. He doesn’t seeJane or me, but instead perceives
half-formed focuses of energy that he really doesn’t understand, although
124 Chapter 13
the ofJane and me make some sense to him. He sees my mother [also
deceased] better, and confixses her with the thirteenth-century Miriam and
the New York State Miriam; for his life with my mother was also an at
tempt to reach certain goals. He feels he did not succeed here. He doesn’t
‘see’ my mother but knows she is no longer physical. He does realize that
she’ll soon be born again, and that this time the Miriam part of her w ill
choose to go its own way.
“丁hat part of the psychic challenge has been resolved as best it can;
those parts w ill not meet again in those terms. My fathers altered sense of
time can make the growth of a blade of grass take a second or a century, de
pending on how he ‘feels.’
“This is the end of the material concerning my father. I was very
upset after I wrote it. I dont know why. I think that I felt it contained so
many distortions that it probably wasn’t very reliable. I suppose I didn’t
trust my reception of it, since this is the first time I received material in just
this fashion, and I sensed that I probably needed practice. On the other
hand, I sought to accomplish something that I might have inhibited had I
known what to expect. I also thought that the material contained some
ideas that I regarded as psychic tampering~almost unhealthy, perhaps.”
We were disturbed by the material, Rob particularly. It was precisely

the kind of “information” most easy to dismiss as imaginative fantasy pre
senting itself as fact, yet theres something terribly arrogant in our taking it
for granted that such offbeat data mustbe distorted because it doesn’t agree
with our previous ideas. To inhibit such experiences, as many people do,
means that we constantly monitor one level of our consciousness with an
other so that our prejudiced perception rules the day.
The general idea that Robs dead father was still resting was quite ac
ceptable. But beyond that, there was the indication that personhood
wasn’t nearly as clear cut as we supposed, almost as if it could disperse it
self in so many unknown ways as to disappear as the kind of personality
unit we recognize.
Memories from future and past seemed to be involved, and an inter
weaving of selves very difficult to follow. Yet who should know more about
the psyches experiences than the psyche itself? And why should we doubt
the implications of Robs material simply because it was so subjective? We
also took it for granted that Robs fathers consciousness itself might be
confused; granting that was the source of the material, communicated
through Robs mind. But maybe cellular knowledge and the psyche are so
connected that somehow the child keeps track of the parent even after
death; that the cellular consciousness itself follows its own offshoots in all
directions.
If were doing anything, Rob and I, its exploring unofficial reality,

studying and encouraging those events that are usually ignored; certainly
this was one of those events. The next morning, I sat reading over Robs
notes. I was struck again by this seeming interweaving of selves, or of one
self identity with others, as if one self could disperse itself, say, like a m il
lion raindrops, each itself and separate, falling in numberless backyards or
environments, while carrying a sense of the entire identity at the same
time.
And suddenly I sensed the self dispersed through unknown universes
while still being itself, winding dizzily through labyrinths of psychological
and corporal intensities, each one forming a life in its own context. Is the
entire psyche like a multidimensional jigsaw puzzle, each part indepen
dent, with not one but a thousand proper places, each automatically form
ing a new version of the overall picture, leaping in and out of time systems
as easily as a child jumps hopscotch squares? If so, how doubly precious are
our private moments and our experience of psychological permanency!
This is strong stuff for us, used as we are to holding our sense of identity
firmly, defiantly, and applying its tests against the rest of creation.
Maybe, I thought, the focus personality is just one psychological win
dow through which the psyche views reality; except that its mere looking
creates a three dimensionally-tuned consciousness that is you and me. My
experiences in the library make me wonder what Im doing at other levels
of reality when I’m not aware of my activities there.
As I sat thinking, I could feel inner connections come into focus,
though I couldn’t quite get hold of them. Smoothly, just behind usual con
sciousness, a few speckled stones of comprehension were rolling down the
slopes of my mind. Then, with my next question, I was on to something. I
could feel myself beginning to understand something new~or something
old in a new way.
Do we have numberless strands of consciousness, I wondered, as
Robs experience seems to imply? And theoretically, anyway, could we fol
low any of them into another kind of reality, even into another kind of psy
chological structure than the one we take for granted? In some strange
fashion, are we composed of such other strands of consciousness ourselves,
winding through the invisible nerve ends of the universe?
Do I follow my “I” by concentrating on my own strand of conscious
ness, which is made up of other interweaving ones, each following its own?
Those others might be completely aware of me • • • I might ride their
strands, and my personality might be part of another strand that is more
complicated in those terms than mine.
Again: dizzying concepts in which any God would be w ithin the
texture of the strands themselves; the principle behind and w ithin the
126 Chapter 13
organization; the very standard of individuality maintaining itself amid

unending diversity. I would be me precisely because in those terms I was
also part of “others,” though their kind of personhood might be incom
prehensible from my viewpoint. And my workroom, I thought, with its
homey paraphernalia, would be private and mine precisely because it
was part of an unknown cosmos that weaved into and out of it con
stantly.
It was a Tuesday morning. I should have been making notes for my
class that evening, but I became engrossed in the idea of these strands of
consciousness and their implications. I saw them as forming focus person
alities at certain points or psychological intersections. For example, is Seth
me at a level of consciousness that is habitual to him but not to the me I
know? If so, Seth would have his own strand of consciousness of which I
would be a part~even as Seth might be a strand in a still greater kind of
consciousness. This idea could be applied to the molecules that compose
our bodies, too. To the atoms and molecules that form my flesh, do I seem
like a different kind of Seth? Does my consciousness wind in and out of
Seths?
I was sensing different strands of reality, separate yet united. The
strands might pool outward several times in a century, forming the coun
terparts. The whole idea evokes a dance of being in which our slightest as
pect has a chance to develop, assisting in a m illion different constructions,
yet retaining its own sense of direction, forming endless combinations, giv
ing life to others as it receives it~ part of an infinite chain of being.
This gives rise to other imaginings: Does the psyche change size—
does it expand and contract? Strands of consciousness! The universe, or
God, would be sending them out constantly. Our selves would represent
our private paths of awareness— the way “Being” is scooped into our kind
of existence, the way the cosmos makes itself. And if we could separate our
own strands of consciousness, what would we find?
As I wrote and questioned, somewhere along the line I went into an
accelerated state of consciousness. I， ll quote my own notes as I scribbled
them down at the time, so that the immediacy is retained. (Part of the ex
perience reminded me of another, involving a piece of paper, that had
taken place a few years earlier. See Adventures in Consciousness and D ia
logues ofThe Souland M ortal Selfin Time)
“I，ve gone into an altered state, as if some part of me is going incredi
bly fast. At the same time IVe grown very warm, the back of my neck par
ticularly; and although Im excited, my eyes want to close. Must keep them
open, to get this down. So this is another strand of consciousness that Im
following, another strand of “me-ness” that really operates all the while.
Maybe one that relates to a completely different reality? Yet Im woven in
it, and by changing focus I ride alongside it or follow it like a spider wan
dering the far threads of a gigantic web.
“I ，
m mentally dizzy. Psychologically, the feeling is pleasant, like the
one I felt physically when I was a child and went spinning around in a cir
cle; yet I dont feel disoriented. The room remains steady, and the sun has
just come out. But I feel that the world is what you see when you whirl
mentally at a certain rate—and if you move faster, or slower, then time and
objects and space break up like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, assembling in
new ways. These strands of consciousness each have their own speeds.
Maybe I’m me only when my strand vibrates in a certain way; and when it
vibrates at a different rate Im another version of me, that’s no copy but it
self. Maybe me is just one note in an entire symphony of mes, some in
scales so alien that Vd never recognize my me-ness at all.
“Again, as I sit here a symphony is playing on the radio. A few min
utes ago my gaze turned toward the window. A piece of newspaper was
blowing across the parking lot, and suddenly I felt its texture in a way im
possible to describe: soft, limp, floppy. The wind caught its edges. It tipped
sideways, leapt, shot ahead and was caught in the high bristly bushes.
Held. Its motions seemed synchronized with the music playing on the
radio. Soft notes—and the paper lay still, waiting. The music rose and the
paper lifted, gently, and then fell as the notes died away.
“My hands felt that way, too: limp, passive, floppy~and my body, so
that a part of me lay up against the bushes and the paper that was me
curved around the prickers, not resisting but softly falling around them.
The music boomed out. A flock of pigeons came to the roof. They pecked
at the birdfced in rhythm to the music so that paper, birds, and me were all
caught in the same motion, responding. Another crescendo now. Yes, the
birds all flew away together. Was this all my organization? What does it
matter whether or not I transposed that order upon those events? Its real.
Perhaps its the real way things work.
“So I，m between just following this version of the moment; or writing
down what I feel; or following other thoughts about strands of conscious
ness that come to me. It seems that this moment gives me hints about how
consciousness itself works.
“As I write all of this down, noon has arrived. The music just gave way
to the news, which somewhat annoys me. Yet what does it do to my strand
of consciousness? They’re talking about food prices going up, and I think:
Well, we can always go on a budget again. A good, satisfying feeling. Then,
ignoring the radio, I go back to my earlier thoughts, turn off the radio and
the stream of consciousness that was connected with it.
“And it occurs to me that I choose from strands of consciousness all
the time, and that my choices bring me certain experiences. This certainly
128 Chapter 13
involves probabilities. Our thoughts serve as focus points. To some extent,

the thoughts are self-perpetuating and we habitually choose one kind over
another.
wWe really alter our consciousness constantly then, through our
choices. For example, just before one of the latest Seth sessions I knew I
could get certain material at one level on my own—but it would take some
time and work~or I could get it from Seth much more quickly and in fin
ished form. But in more mundane matters, the same applies. I know, for
instance, that I accept some experiences that are ‘negative’ and these are
also self-perpetuating. Can I locate a different strand of consciousness that
concentrates differently on those matters?
“This reminds me. Earlier today a student called. He broke his leg last
week. Since then hes worked on his beliefs constantly, and he saw how he
consistently formed negative mental pictures, like mental snapshots, all
adding up to his misadventure. Yet had he . . . chosen another group of
thoughts, another strand of consciousness, his experience would have
changed too.
“As I finished typing the last page, I was swept up with the paper
again. That is, I glanced at it, saw that the same thing was happening again,
felt my own swift identification with the paper, and decided to go along
with it. Now the sense of texture is very stronga sense~feeling, not an
intellectual ideaso that my body feels the papers experiences ... as real
as the way Yd normally feel, say, wet or dry. I feel the pressure of wind
against the bush, pressing it: a miniature ecstasy of motion. Oh, the birds
come again. My right hand prickles: Is this the paper against the prickers?
A rush in my stomach as the pigeons sweep by again. And everything is
connected. It’s as if the birds fly through my stomach. The fantastic shapes
the paper takes, each unique to the paper and to me— to us! Each shape
puts us in a different relationship with everything else. Now the paper
throws its head back, lies open, full of ecstasy with the wind. . •.
“Some minutes later, Rob comes into the room. I look when he
leaves, but the paper is gone. I scribble down the thoughts I have, very
quickly, not put well. We make organizations as focuses for our conscious
ness, recognize certain events as significant and ignore others. In our usual
state, the kinds of events I ’ve just experienced with the paper aren’t fol
lowed. Theyre beneath our attention. As I write this, there are three
strands of consciousness that Im trying to follow simultaneously; four,
when you remember that Im trying to write this all down at the same
time. The birds and the traffic are synchronized, moving together, and I
can jump in that with them. I have to get ready for tonights class, and a
part of me wants to follow that direction. Another part of me is aware of
making a decision between the other two, while analyzing them. But I
know that if you follow other sequences, you’ll end up with different
events. Is the paper a kind of strand of consciousness always available, and
could I choose to spend a whole day experiencing reality that way? Could
someone experience a whole lifetime, concentrating on the inner events
that are usually psychologically invisible?
“Rob came back. I tried to talk to him, but my speech was slurred and
slow, although I knew I could click it back to normal speed by changing
my focus. Im still aware of the three separate strands of consciousness. In
each, my awareness is filled differently, or the same contents of the world
are experienced differently. The paper has drifted back into my vision. We
merge, while I， m still aware of myself, merging. I feel the paper plop. I am
the paper flopping on the ground, but the paper isn’t me sitting at the
table. Or if it is, I don’t know it. Time is meaningless in usual terms, but
each smallest motion represents surprising change and variations and
everything still moves in rhythm. There are subtle alterations of perception
happening constantly, and temperature changes as the paper stirs, too
damp to rustle. Unbelievable in a way, though these notes show so little.
Unbelievable its 3 P.M. I thought it was just past noon.”
The experience wasn’t profound in conventional terms. It brought no

great visions or “shattering” illuminations. Yet it wassubjectively profound,
precisely because it was otherwise involved with mundane subjects— the
paper, music, traffic~and because it offered intriguing insights into the
inner, usually hidden, other organizations that are nestled within any
known given moment.
As usual, I didn’t see then where these experiences were leading. But I
wondered: When we send out our attention, do we project strands of en
ergy that intersect with a person or object and strike a response~a corre
sponding strand of energy that causes a constant interplay beneath usual
perception? I， ve taken it for granted that the piece of paper didn’t have any
awareness of me, my scrutiny, identification, or appreciation. But suppose
it did? Suppose my attention caused ripples to which it responded?
So for a few moments, I sensed this interplay within matter~con
stant motion, strands of energy meeting, consciousness itself merging and
forming invisible constructions as varied and valid as physical ones; even
forming identities which themselves formed all kinds of combinations.
Dim ly I saw how these applied to the personality. The prime aspects
operate like psychic sparks, their lively nature providing for an endless num
ber of potential new beginnings. Like psychological atoms, they maintain a
certain form within the psyche, orbiting the focus personality while still
changing constantly; altering positions within the psyche in response to psy
chological activity; maintaining the stability of the focus personality~not
130 Chapter 13
only in its relationship with the exterior world but maintaining its psycho
logical inner stance as well.
In our terms, the focus personality is the director. I had the choice of
focusing on any of the three strands of consciousness earlier, for example.
None of them were thrust upon me. In the same way, the judgments of the
focus personality dominate in usual life and direct body activity. The arm
muscles don’t question the individuals intent to move them. They don’t
ask figuratively: “Now, does this arm really need to be lifted?” The focus
personality makes the judgments which are then carried out. Its also the
focus personality, with its beliefs, that rules the politics of the psyche as its
directed toward daily life. Only when those politics are detrimental to the
entire fabric of the personality are inner steps taken, and pressure applied
from within.
Most of all, I was left with the idea that the counterparts are eccentric
versions of the source self, activated in the same time period. This would
provide the actualization of a million varieties of experience possible for the
psyche at any given earth period; as if one living psychological plant sent
out its roots well beneath the ground of usual conscious activity; populat
ing the planet with its psychic seeds.
I suspect that all the questions we ask about the exterior universe can
be asked even more legitimately of the interior one, for in larger terms I see
each as a counterpart of the other. The quarks and charmed particles pos
tulated by the physicists w ill have their psychic or psychological versions,
from which all matter and its “inner components” emerge. So any such
psychological experimentation or investigation w ill most likely involve the
“discovery” of smaller and smaller units of the self, each free-wheeling, each
dependent yet independent, each perceiving a different kind of experience
which is nevertheless connected with all other experience.
The physicists found that the sense world was a thing apart from the
reality behind or within it~ that objects, regardless of their operational
stability and permanence, are actually masses of invisible, quickly moving
atoms. We may be in for a far greater surprise: Its most possible that the
self we recognize is also the result of our psychological perception of real
ity: as operational as an object and just as deceptive in appearance. The
self instead may be a unit of identity, one of many, a psychic unit that
rides strands of consciousness, composed of miniature and giant selves
also—and part of a psychological universe we haven’t even begun to ex
plore.
Weve discovered that the earth isn’t flat, that we won’t fall off its
edges, and our experience as a species has changed as a result. Maybe
we’ll soon find out that the self isn’t “flat” either, and that death is as real
and yet as deceptive as the horizon; that we dont fall out of life either.
Disorienting, sure, but challenging. We may discover a new kind of per

sonhood that is truly multidimensional, and for the first time really find
dimensions in which the soul exists, connected to the flesh but also
separate一 the invisible atoms of the self orbiting our known selfhood,
forming psychological connections and mental worlds presently beyond
our conception.
But once we hit on this idea, once we start reading the clues, then
what a metaphysical chase! Most of our present ideas w ill be as passe as the
“world is flat” concept of the past. Freed from our psychological blindness,
who knows what interior frontiers we might explore, or what psychologi
cal universes w ill be presented to our view?
C h apter 1 4
Back to the Library, C lim b in g up the

Steps o f the Psyche, and the
G irl W h o Tried to Love Everybody
he holidays came and vanished, like all the ones that had gone be
T fore. That Christmas of 1974 was to be the last one we spent at our
Water Street apartments, although we didn’t know then. Rob was
very busy, producing the diagrams for Adventures in Consciousnessand the ink
drawings for Dialogues ofthe SoulandM ortalSelfin Time. We told ourselves
that we were going to move when he was finished; but we， d talked about
moving before. Still, the thought that we mightco\ovtA that Christmas.
I worked on some new poetry, but during the holidays the library
seemed distant, and it was difficult to recapture the feelings of certitude
and high confidence Yd had earlier. The library seemed to hide its books
and I became restless and annoyed.
I was in just such a mood when the following events suddenly roused
me. It was early evening as I sat at my table, staring out at the bare trees. I
must have closed my eyes for a moment when a group of very vivid mental
images sprang into my mind. First, I saw my body curled around some
thing like meat on a spit, but without the fire. The image was projected out
into the room just outside the area where I usually saw the library.
Then, with no transition, I saw my body stretched out in space, length
wise: it reached past me into unimaginable distances, then elasticity disap
peared first way to my right, then way to my left. Each time it went through
the apartment house walls, out into space, and returned again. My physical
head was turning so fast to keep track that I got dizzy as I watched my body
go back and forth before my mental eyes. This kept up for several minutes.
A quick series of lesser-felt images followed. A door opened into a
drafiy stone room: I was a child, shoved in there and told to play with “the
other children.” This faded, and my own body felt as if it were curling up
into a ball. Mentally, I saw it go rolling across our living room floor. Then
134 Chapter 14
it turned into a serpent and began climbing a tree in a jungle. As all of this
happened, I felt super-relaxed, warm, and flexible.
I started to write my notes about this the following afternoon when I
realized that some library material was ready for me. I didn’t see the library
or its books, but the following material came smoothly into my head, each
word plump and vivid as a piece of fruit dropped into a basket.
From the Library
The psyche is aware-ized energy, in a state of constant creativity; a psy

chic pattern multidimensionally expressed; each point within it changing in
relationship to all other points, and thus altering the entire pattern or model.
Each self is immersed in the psyche, yet immersed in its own individ
uality simultaneously, experiencing reality in time and out of it at once. We
create events naturally, in the same way that earth produces trees, grain,
mountains, and seas. In earth experience, the earth itself is “given”；that is,
it appears to be self-producing and self-sufficient within the framework of
the universe. So, in the same way, the self is “given”： The alliance of psyche
and body produces mental events and experiences that also appear to be
self-sufficient and self-producing within the framework of the psychologi
cal world. Yet everything is interrelated.
There is an inner landscape of the mind that produces thoughts,
dreams, experiences, and events, and this correlates with the exterior
landscape. Its extremely difficult to map this interior land because we
confuse the brains activity for the power behind the brain, and because
we do not consider the interior landscape as real as the exterior one.
Were also so immersed in the interior world that we take its natural ele
ments for granted. Dreams, thoughts, and all mental experiences com
pose the natural phenomena of the inner reality. We travel through the
psyche as we travel through time and across the face of the earth. When
we encounter events, they w ill appear differently according to our posi
tion within the psyche.
Many dream events are versions ofwaking ones—not distorted at all,
just the dream version, as the physical event is the waking version. While
we accept the waking experience as the real one, it is no more or less real
than the dream event.
Here, the material just stopped. I glanced at the clock. It was 2:30 P.M. I
was still looking at the clock when I saw my double sitting in the library, at
Back to the Library 135
the table, reading. M y consciousness leapt into that form, as I tried quickly
to read from the same book she was reading. Instantly the letters of the
words became shiny and turned into small brilliant squares. These opened
up into pictures that represented peepholes into other worlds. At least, that
was my understanding at the time.
Anyhow, I decided that it was now or never: After not being in the li
brary in some while, I was certainly going to take advantage of my oppor
tunity. So I tried to dive headlong into one of the miniature windows—my
image had turned miniature too. In some way, I got stuck, couldn’t go one
way or the other, and I was thrown gently back into the library.
The next instant I was back in my body at the desk, while my double
remained in the library. She perched on the tabletop, legs crossed, wearing
the green jumper and black stockings that I wore in Robs old portrait of
me. Mentally I asked her if she had anything to say. She jumped off the li
brary table, leapt into the living room, came behind me, and blended into
my body. Then she emerged, blended with me again, reemerged, and went
back into the library. Again I spoke to her mentally, asking her how much
more material Fd get from the library. She laughed and leapt back to the li
brary table.
The next series of events happened so quickly that it was difficult to
keep track. She jumped down from the table, and as she did, my con
sciousness was transferred to her image. As this happened, she began to
spin quicker and quicker, changing into a shape resembling an umbrella
rack. She (I) had four sides, or four selves, coming out of the rod part of
this umbrella form.
While this was going on, I “knew” that there would be at least three
books in this particular aspect psychology series: this manuscript being the
second one and Adventures in Consciousness the first. Then I saw a wall of
books in four parts, like an inverted pyramid, reaching upward indefinitely.
The entire structure was wide at the top and I was at the narrow bottom,
looking upward. I knew that I was supposed to fly to the opening beyond.
Somehow, I was swept upward, passing all the books in their swirls of
color. At the top, I faced the opening and a sky far above. Here I became
frightened, feeling like a bird being thrown from the nest. I flew, arms out
stretched, through the opening. Just as I felt panicky a tree branch ap
peared, with a globe growing from the end of it, like fruit. I clung to it,
resting.
I’d closed my eyes, bewildered at the height. When I opened them, I
was back at my desk in the living room. M y double stood in the library.
This time I asked her for some help with the physical stiffness that had
been bothering me. Almost at once, mentally, I saw a small fairy-like fig
ure with a wand. She came into my body, going from one area to another.
136 Chapter 14
I saw and felt “her” inside my head, for example: Her wand turned into a
dust cloth and the circle inside my skull was vigorously dusted (of mental
cobwebs, no doubt). In any case, I felt the whole thing, and it seemed
then that there were many windows that had been dusty, all around the
circumference of my skull. They became brilliant and shiny. Then the lit
tle figure went down my backbone, like a miniature maid about to do the
household chores. I felt her sweep the shoulder area ambitiously, as you
might a landing, then down the stairs of the vertebrae, step by step, the
wand turning into a broom or mop~whatever utensil was needed. After
this, she vanished.
The radio was on all this time, playing rock music at low volume. It
was a bright January afternoon, with sun coming through the window. I
just thought about lowering the blinds when a mental movement “caught
my eye.” I turned, really startled this time, and closed my eyes to “see bet-
ter.” To my mental vision, a very large ape stood by the coffee table. The
motion I’d sensed had been his leap from the library. The next instant, part
of my consciousness was within his body. He made a complicated series of
vigorous movements. I felt them from inside him; but my physical body
also seemed to fill with flexible delight so that I felt as if I were moving
more easily than a ballet dancer. The ape danced all around the room, leapt
on the coffee table, then flopped full length out on the floor, in a playing-
dead pose. I left his body, turning into a tiny image of myself. The ape
reached out and picked me up. For a moment I was frightened, but he
tucked me in a small flap of fur on his chest, like a sleeping bag, where I
felt very snug and secure.
It was here, when I supposed the experiences to be over, that the
strangest and most vivid episode began. Once again (in my minds eye) the
library became an upside-down pyramid. It existed as always at the south
east comer of the living room, the inner wall. Again my consciousness had
its own image. In it I stood once more at the bottom of the inverted pyra
mid that reached upward, seemingly into eternity. Other selves~other
meswere climbing the sides of the pyramid, using the book sides as you
would ledges, each ascending toward the wide opening at the center top.
The whole affair was like a cavern. The sunlight shone down brilliantly
from the opening far above, and fell down to where I stood, directly fo
cused on me. Yet I noticed that the suns rays also touched each of the other
figures.
I，m not sure what happened next, but suddenly I was flying at top
speed way up to the top of the canyon, to the distant sky. Hands came
down and held me. At this point I was in the space beyond the cavern,
lying flat in the sky. Hands passed my prone body on to other hands. I for
get what happened again, and “came to” to find myself a baby wrapped in
a blanket. Apparently in the meantime Vd been carried higher in space. I

looked around. A woman was seated in the clouds. She was holding me
tenderly. Although she had a halo I knew that she wasn’t a representation
of the Virgin, but that in some way I couldn’t understand, she was my
mother in • • • heroic terms. She handed me to a man seated beside her~
my father in these same incomprehensible terms.
The man held me gently in the same fashion, then returned me to the
womans arms. I knew that they were “divine” or at least that their existence
was in a far vaster context than ours; and I felt that I had originally come
from the same “place.” Dimly, though, some small part of my conscious
ness even then echoed upward with its questions: “Gods in the sky? Repre
sentations of the psyches knowledge, symbolized?” Questions or not, I was
supremely comfortable, secure, and loved. For a momeiu I wanted to stay
right where I was.
Suddenly, however, the baby with my consciousness inside whirled
away through space— a very small infant with the blanket fluttering. The
folds of the blanket formed patterns in space in a way I， ve now forgotten. I
fell a very long way, then was swept back up again to where the woman
was. Here my consciousness separated. Part of it became a portion of the
veil about the womans head. The baby and its portion of my consciousness
rolled out of the folds in the veil—but the baby and the folds became one,
and inside the folds I fluttered down through space again. The folds (com
posed of my consciousness) were like banners or parchments, only alive.
They fell to earth, came into my physical body where they flowed into my
muscles~or turned into my muscles, Ym not sure which. As they took
their muscle-form, love from the woman rushed through them.
I opened my eyes, half dizzy and certainly astonished, to see the living
room. This wasn’t a dry intellectual mental experience; I hope I ’ve made
that clear. I fe lt myself falling through space; sans wings or any kind of
known vehicle. Theres no doubt that I was quite frightened on several oc
casions, but I also knew that I could transfer my consciousness back to my
physical environment. That knowledge always makes me more daring, of
course, than I would be otherwise. At one point I was intellectually embar
rassed to find the woman and man in the sky, replete with halos, and myself
an infant, however loved, however . . • supernaturally supported. At the
same time, I made no attempt to deny the emotional validity of the episode.
I didn’t think that I was in an objective sky, say, so many miles above our at
mosphere though that’s the way the experience presented itself. I was quite
willing to admit that the journey as I experienced it stood for one just as un
knowable in usual terms, and just as divorced from the usual world.
This episode was quite different from more conventional out-of-body
trips in which I often use definite methods of leaving my body, and usually
138 Chapter 14
have another “double” nonphysical body to travel in. Then I can often
check out my experiences later, say in another part of the world, to see if
they correlate with actual physical events. In these, I don’t change into
other forms as a rule, although I may have no form at all.
The “ape in the living room” was something like the episode men
tioned earlier in this book, and I interpreted the ape as the “animal medi
cine man” acting in a therapeutic situation. Still, such figures appearing in
“my space” were more intrusive and surprising than my strangest activities
in spaces that I didn’t consider mine to begin with.
In other words, “gods in the sky” were easier to take than an ape sud
denly appearing in the living room and making itself at home— even if it
wasn’t three-dimensional—precisely because the ape was so between and
betwixt accepted realities. If it had been physical, I could have shouted,
“Hey, theres an ape in the living room,” and taken whatever steps seemed
appropriate. Had the ape only presented itself as a mental reality seen in
my mind but not projected out into the space of the living room, then I
probably would have allowed it (the ape) fuller freedom in the episode. But
the combination of mentally perceived ape on the physical table stopped
me. What kind of a weird creature of the psyche was this? Moreover, at
times the ape and I were one. Since then IVe had more such experiences.
They can be labeled hallucinations, but such a label tells us nothing about
their creative behavior or their relationship with the realities of the psyche.
I had many questions, however. Some were at least partially answered
as you’ll see later in this book. In the meantime, the focus of my experience
was shifting.
An unexpected visitor, and some new library material, were each in
their ways forerunners, presenting clues as to the next few months， events.
The visitor showed up the following Sunday, a cozy, domestic day, at
least until 6:00 p. m . Yd just washed my hair. It hung wet and loose down
my shoulders. Everything was just about ready for dinner. I was getting the
cube steaks out of the refrigerator and Rob was setting the table, when we
heard the Tibetan doorbells ring. Rob went into the hall to answer the
door. From the kitchen I heard his voice and a young womans. I paused,
considering. No doubt about it: A stranger was at the door. Would Rob in
vite her in or not? I decided to leave it up to him.
I heard him laugh, his great surprised chuckle, then he yelled, “Hon,”
and footsteps came into the living room. “No,” I thought, “I don’t believe
it.” My hair was a mess; Yd wanted a quiet supper and later Yd planned to
just relax and watch television. “No. You’re kidding,” I called back. But as I
came out into the other room there stood Rob with a young woman in her
early twenties. She looked embarrassed but determined. Rob said, grin
ning, “She came all the way from Georgia just to see you.”
A ll the way from Georgia? For a minute, at least, I didn’t care if shtd
come all the way from the moon.
But there she was, and presented with her, I found myself grinning
too. “Give me a second,” I said, and I turned the stove off and told Rob to
get out some wine. We sat at the table by the bay windows. She was a lovely
girl, but nervous now that she was inside; almost wan, pale, slender. She
had long fingers. Her nails, painted a bright pink, were beautifully mani
cured. They looked incongruous though, in comparison to her air of heavy
earnestness. That is, her fingers looked happy, but her face didn’t. I ， ll call
her Margery.
“IVe read all your books, and so have my friends,” she said. “We have
a group. We live together. I， m sorry to invade your world, but . . . ” She
broke off, and looked to be near tears. By now I liked her: she wasn’t a
stranger anymore. There would be a reason for her visit, a reason why Rob
let her in.
“When did you leave Georgia?” Rob asked.
“Yesterday morning, around nine,” she said.
I groaned: “Suppose Rob had turned you away at the door?”
“Then I， d have just gone back home,” she said. And in a rush: “I have
so many questions that bother me! Like, there are so many systems and
groups, and our group gets information and literature from most of them.
Well, how do you choose between systems? How do you know which is the
right one?”
I stared at her; she was quite serious. “Just forget the systems,” I said,
laughing.
“But how can I? How can anybody?” she asked, vehemently. “There’s
truth in all of them. Theyve all been worked out.”
“just take what makes sense to you, wherever you find it, and let the
rest go,” I said.
Then shestared at me. “But suppose I let the wrong stuff go? Suppose
I let something go and it was the truth all along? How do I know?”
“Why be so scared of making mistakes?” I asked. “Truth comes in all
kinds of packages, I suppose. So choose the wrappings you like.”
Margery shrugged with exaggerated comical helplessness and looked
to Rob.
He said, “What Jane means is to trust your own feelings about what
you read. You don’t have to take any one system if you don’t want to.”
She stared at both of us then and said, “I know I haven’t transmuted
my base qualities yet, for example. That worries me a lot. My negative qual
ities. I don’t love everyone yet. When people come to our group, sometimes
instead of being loving, I wont like one person as much as another . .. I
wont like someone as much as I should. And well, I • • • retreat.” Margery
140 Chapter 14
almost whispered the last word, her eyes lowered. She obviously considered
her remark as an admission of guilt.
I was scandalized. “Why, there are people I don’t like particularly,” I
said. “I don’t try to tell myself that I should love everyone, or even like
everyone. And I certainly don’t expect everyone to love me.”
She was more scandalized by my remarks than I had been by hers— if
that was possible. “You don’t?” she gasped. “But why don’t you expect
everyone to love you? Why shouldn’t they? We’re all one, underneath indi
viduality~ all a part of each other. So if they don’t love you, its a part of
themselves they don’t love.” She said more calmly, “I just don’t understand.
Every system I know of says that you should love everyone equally.”
There was a small silence. “I thought you said that you read The Na
ture ofPersonalReality, ”Rob said, quietly.
“I did—
“Well, you can’t love everyone equally,” Rob said “And when you
think that you have to, then you build up a terrific load of guilt. That’s part
of what PersonalReality is all about.”
“I do feel guilty about it. Terribly,” she said. She was really quite
shaken.
“Look,” I said. “I like you a lot, Margery. Because youre you and I
recognize your uniqueness and react to it. If I tried to love everyone, I
wouldn’t really love anyone at all—and if I said that I liked you, you’d be
upset. It would sound like an insult because I was supposed to love you.
But if I said that I did love you under those conditions, it wouldn’t really
mean much at all, because youd think to yourself, 'Well, of course, she has
to say that because she has to love everyone, no matter who they are.， ”
Pause. “Do you follow me?” I asked.
She shook her head No. I took out the first pages of this present man
uscript, where I described my meeting with “Mr. Junior Parapsychologist,”
and read her a few passages. “I didn’t like him and he was bugging me,” I
said. “That doesn’t mean that I couldn’t appreciate him as a unique human
being~but one who just wasn’t my cup of tea.”
Margery shook her head. “But it was obvious that you •.. appreciated
him in some really great way~”
“Right. I appreciated his individuality because I let myself respond to
it, to the likenesses and differences between us; becauseI was free to dislike
him if I wanted to. Then I was free to see him apart from his effect on me,
and even to appreciate the fact that I disliked him.”
By now, Rob was laughing. In the meantime the phone rang. Rob an
swered it, bending down, since we， d taken the phone off the table and put
it on the radiator. W illy, our cat, suddenly leapt to the radiator and began
nibbling at Robs long curly gray hair, as if it was a batch of salad. Margery
and I sat, laughing ourselves, as Rob tried to speak on the phone while the
cat happily chomped away on his hair. Finally I pushed W illy out of Robs
way. But the small domestic episode at least changed Margery’s mood. She
looked more cheerful.
Little by little, though, she came out with ideas that were appalling to
me. Once, for example, she said, “I realize that we don’t originate ideas,
that they’re all around us and we just choose the ones we want.”
I thought that I， d misunderstood her. wWait a minute,” I interrupted.
“O f course we originate ideas— ”
uWell, we think we do, of course— ”
“No. We do,” I said, pretty flatly. I could have been more diplomatic,
but ideas like that send me up the wall. “You’re saying that we aren’t creative,
and when you do that, youre denying the validity ofyour own reality.”
The supper Yd planned wasn’t enough for three, so we fixed a meal of
scrambled eggs, instant potatoes, and canned hash. Margery stopped with
her fork in midair and said with utter honest astonishment: “You’re saying
that we dooriginate ideas ourselves?” Again, it was really difficult for me to
imagine how she could seriously think otherwise. I went briefly into my
ideas about models, explaining that even these were constantly refreshed by
“eccentricities” or new creative variations.
But we weren’t through. Over ice cream and coffee, Margery went
through an entire web of beliefs involving the “gross physical plane” and
the necessity of transmuting it into finer vibrations. She， d read Seths The
Nature ofPersonal Reality all right, but interpreted it through the frame
work of old beliefs, and she considered those beliefs as The Truth. Fol
lowing these concepts, Margery believed that the body was at best an
instrument; that life at its greatest was a trial; and that man was denied
the joys of truly original or creative thought. At the same time, she was
convinced that she had to love everyone~each of those gross uncreative
people.
Yet she was a beautiful girl, a loving girl. When she left, though, I was
exhausted. Rob and I did the dishes and then watched Kojak on television;
and I thought that the program at least had a warm sense of humanity
about it; an “aura” of creaturehood with its “ups” and “downs.” Even the
crooks could think for themselves, and nobody went around wailing over
their mortal state: right or wrong, they tried to do something with it. And
they weren’t limp.
Not that my own thoughts weren’t contradictory. They were. IVe al
ways been deeply concerned about the strange vulnerability of our human
condition—but to rob it of creativity, to deny its vitality and exuberance,
is hardly any help. Such attitudes can lead to a soggy spiritual sloppiness in
which no action, mental or physical, is clear-cut or spontaneous.
142 Chapter 14
I mentioned Margery’s visit to my class two days later and this appar
ently triggered Seth into making some new statements about his own
“past.” It also led into an excellent monologue on love and hate as Seth
spoke about those emotions. Beyond that, though, he answered many
questions that concern not only my students but people in general. For
that reason, Im describing that class in the following chapter.
C hapter 1 5
Seth on Love and Hate,

and In n e r Codes
his was actually one of the last regular class sessions. When it was
T held, Rob and I were still talking about the possibility of moving.
But that was all. In our normal world, we， d made no real decisions.
After we moved, though, I discontinued classes to finish this book, and at
this writing I haven’t started them up again. I ’m not even sure that I w ill.
But since I enjoy not knowing what I might do tomorrow, I rarely try to
precognate the events of my own life.
On ordinary levels, then, no one realized that the classes—and the
class Seth sessionswould not continue indefinitely as they had over the
past eight years. I’d thought that a possible move on our part might briefly
disrupt class, but at that point I hadn’t even considered anything over a
months break.
In regular sessions, Seth was still dictating The “Unknoiun” Reality,
but often in class he mentioned visitors we， d had, and answered students’
questions. That night, January 7，1975, our living room was filled~to the
ceiling, it seemed. Nearly forty people of all ages sprawled on the floor, sat
on the chairs or couch, or just leaned against the walls. As he often did,
Seth jumped into the general conversation; smiling, hearty, and gregarious.
We， d been discussing the mail, which had grown by leaps and
bounds. I could no longer answer all of it, even with Robs help, so the stu
dents had been answering some letters for me. Many of the letters had sug
gested that we set up some kind of organization or training program to
help people apply Seths ideas to their daily lives. As we spoke about this,
Seth came through, speaking to the students:
“Now tell Ruburt that he does not need a foundation. As you answer
the letters, you show people your own interpretation of our ideas and at
least you make your own understanding clear. Then people can do as they
wish. It is their right, and it is their freedom. But you arc here, and you
144 Chapter 15
help in that you show the interpretation that we here place upon those
ideas. [Humorously: ] We w ill be an unofficial foundation.
“Often when you set up new bridges, you must help others rip down
tlie old ones. That is what we are doing. Each of you is doing the same
tliing in your own way. Each of you, in your own life, looked upon the sys
tems and found them wanting. The individual is stronger than any system,
and the individual must always come first. Therefore, we w ill not set up
another system that exists apart from the individual. Instead we w ill show
the individual his and her proper place as the initiator of reality.
“Your vitality comes first. You form systems. That is fine, but the sys
tems must not be allowed to rule you.
Seth cautioned us against forming an organization in several later ses
sions too, but that night he switched the subject to Margery, the girl who
thought she had to love everyone. This time Seth spoke quite loudly, half
in a bantering tone, his full voice filling the room with the almost bombas
tic vitality it sometimes displays.
“I am also free to like or dislike,” Seth said, referring to a similar remark
that I，d made earlier. “I am also free to love or hate. The one thing about an
ancient existence, if you w ill forgive the term, is that old hatreds do not last
because you learn to have a sense of humor. I used to think that this was
highly regrettable, for at one level of reality, there is nothing more comfort
ing than an old hate. It lets you know where you are and where you stand.
“But with a sense of humor, hate is all too funny and therefore it loses
its power. Love, on the other hand, even with a sense of humor, becomes
highly precious and large enough so that it can contain old hates very
nicely.
“There are old hated comrades, in your terms, in past lives, whom I
love dearly. We share a fine hatred. We loved each other because of that ha
tred that united us. We were in contact with each other beautifully, and we
related. So examine what you mean by the word ‘hate，，and see how related
to love it can be•”
Theres no doubt about it: Seth enjoys himself thoroughly when he
speaks to students. He doesn’t speak over them but to them, individually
and as a group; looking first at one and then at another; responding to
their individuality in a way few people do. A t the same time, he uses indi
vidual questions asways of stating more general issues. He ended the above
remarks with a smiling comment, “Now I return you to this un-founda-
tion,” when a student interrupted him.
“May I ask a question?” The young man, whom I’ll call Larry, jumped
up like a jack-in-the-box to catch Seth before he turned into me again. The
students grinned; lots of them had tried the same trick before. Sometimes
they catch Seth while hes still “him,” sometimes not. This time it worked.
Seth on Love and Hate, and Inner Codes 145
“You may indeed,” Seth said. “It does not mean that you w ill get an
answer, but you may ask the question.” He spoke in a gentle banter. Larry
grinned in reply, then said, “It’s a question about A ll That Is. Since A ll That
Is is everything, does it ever get lonely?”
“A ll That Is is you, Larry. How can it be lonely?”
“That is my answer,” Seth said. Yet he went on, elaborating: “A ll That
Is is composed of each and every pigeon and wren and cardinal and bird
and dog and leaf. And A ll That Is speaks to itself constantly through grow
ing worlds and realities, and those whispers and those murmurs are lonely
only in that they yearn for further creativity. And that is an answer•”
I knew that Seths presence was very powerful that evening, but I was
surprised by the energy I felt collecting around me. When Seth finished
talking to Larry, he turned class back to me. We got into a discussion on
death when Seth came through again, and this time his voice seemed to act
like a channel or carrier for energy in an even more emphatic way than
usual. He delivered the following monologue in tones ranging from a whis
per to a deep resonating volume.
At the very least, Seth speaks from a level of consciousness (or a kind of
consciousness) not usually available to us. For this reason, I feel that the rest of
the session is a beautiful demonstration of the politics of the psyche as other
aspects of it view existence from a standpoint that is certainly not our own.
“What is death?” he began. KAsk yourselfthe question. But in my own
way, in an answer that is no answer, I answer you. For I am death. I am my
self, as you are yourself. I am a small flower on a planet you do not know,
and I am myself. I am a mist over a time that you cannot understand, and
I am myself. I am a god that is not yet created, and yet I am myself as you
are yourself, and as you are portions of thoughts that you have not yet
thought.
“You stand on the chasms of yourselves and the pinnacles of your
selves. You are death and you are life. And I am death and I am life. I am a
butterfly in a world that is not yet born in your terms, and yet I am myself
in this room.
“I am Ruburt and I am Jane, and I am a stone in the backyard and yet
I am myself, apart from all of those other realities, for those realities are also
themselves and apart from mine.
“The earth speaks through the grasses, and the grasses flourish, and
the birds come, and the snow flies: that is death and that is life.
“You sense here the energy of your being, and it is death and it is life,
for the two are united. You w ill never know, in your terms again, the self
that you arc now and yet it w ill never end and you w ill always remember it.
Yet in other terms there is a history to your being. In your terms you can
look backward toward reincarnational lives, but they are not you.
146 Chapter 15
“You are yourself. I am myself. I am not Ruburt. Ruburt is not me.

Ruburt is me. I am myself. I am Ruburt and not Ruburt. You are death and
you are life. You are more than the selves you think you are, yet the selves
that you are have absolute freedom within the framework of your reality,
and you can even walk out of that reality; and you do and you have.
“I am life and I am death. Now when death can talk about death, that
is your answer. Only the living are so mute. Think of your definitions. In
certain terms, you are all dead and have been for centuries. In other terms,
you are not yet born and centuries w ill come before you walk upon the sur
face of the earth. Yet you are alive, and you take it for granted that I am
dead, and so, what a delightful game we play!
“Death and life in your terms are relative. In those terms, to people to
be born two hundred years hence, you are dead. From their reality, my dear
friends, you do not exist. You are old ancient history and they read about
your time in history books. Now, from your viewpoint, you read history
books. Scientific men examine mountains. They look at rock strata and
find only fossils. From your reality, those rock strata are dead, and only
dead fossils appear. Yet those fossils live. Death and life—again in those
terms—are relative. From your viewpoint you are alive. From a greater
viewpoint you are alive and dead at the same time, and there is no differ
ence.
“Now, I have spoken many times with many languages and in many
places, and when I was a minor Pope, I was far from eloquent. I was a petty
religious politician. I can look back, in your terms, on that existence and
see a great vitality and exuberance, and that minor pope still lives. I do not
have contact with him, and yet he grows and learns because of my experi
ences, and I remember earth life more dearly because of his continuing life.
“So you are alive and dead at once, and there is no difference. You are,
again, as alive or dead now as you w ill ever be.”
Seth paused finally and another student asked a question. “But what
about focuses?” he asked. “Doesn’t your focus change? Like, you still exist
and the Pope still exists and once you were focused in the pope.”
“He has his own reality,” Seth said. “He continues to enjoy it. Exam
ine your concept of time, for you still think that a life-span must exist be
tween such-and-such a date, so that our dear politically minded, crooked
old Pope must stop his existence at a certain time that is no longer recog
nized as life. Now he has chosen to continue, and some with him have cho
sen to continue that time period, though you would no longer recognize it.”
This time another student broke in. “What would stop you from re
living your life as the Pope?”
“It is not practical. It would be boring,” Seth answered. “In those
terms, many people do choose to reexperience what you would think of as
a past existence in order to change it as they go along. You are merely fo
cused in a particular time period in which you recognize history. •. but as
space, it seems to you, extends outward, so does time. As mountains, is
lands, or oceans appear in space, so in the same way mountains or islands
or oceans appear in time.”
Seth was pausing now, giving students a chance to ask their questions.
This time a young woman, Linda, spoke up.
“In this existence—and I admit IVe chosen it~ I， ve found myself
catapulting forward with unbounded vitality, and its a little frightening.
I， m wondering if all I， m doing is totally valid—in my multidimensional
reality.”
Seth spoke soberly, but with a smile, “You would prefer to be cata
pulting backward, I suppose?”
Linda blushed. “I like the forward motion, but—”
“Then what is your problem?” Seth asked. “You know that your en
ergy and vitality are good. Do not try to make a fence around the word Va
lidity/ That is the only answer that you w ill get. It is the only answer that
you really want or need.”
Following this, class members got into an animated discussion about
reincarnation and memory. Someone wondered aloud about my connec
tions with Seth, and if my life existed in his memory. Seth instantly re
turned with some comments that intrigued me later, when I read the
transcript. He began by saying, “Ruburt can do many things that surprise
me—that I did not do in my past, for remember that fresh creativity
emerges from the past also, as in [Ruburts novel] Oversoul Seven.
“M y memory does not include a predetermined past in which Ruburt
exists. He can do things that did not happen in my memory of that exis
tence, and did not, in fact, occur. Now that is a ‘mind-blowing’ statement,
and it applies to each of you. It is important in terms of your own under
standing of yourself and the nature of time.”
Seth paused again and looked around, locating another student, Ann,
who wanted to ask a question but was timid. Seth smiled and encouraged
her to speak out.
“I was thinking of probable futures,MAnn said. “A future self could
talk ofwhat would be his own probable future, though he might choose to
do something different. Is that what you mean?”
“Correct,” Seth said, “But some class members feel as if each person
has a future self like a Big Brother who looks down into each life, saying,
‘Ah hah. I did this or that, so you must do the same tomorrow.”’
Another student, Len, asked a question: “But w ill you explain how
our incarnations happen at the same time? Its a hard thing to under-
stand.”
148 Chapter 15
“IVe taken two full sessions in my latest book [Ûnknown>yReality[ to

explain incarnations and counterparts. So I cannot explain this to you
quickly. A ll I can tell you~and class has heard this often—is that time is
simultaneous, and that there are no boundaries to creativity. So you are not
at the mercy of any past life, nor are you like some vast super-self, resting
on layers of past lives, so that you stand there, squashing them down.
“The nature of time speaks through your cells and molecules. The
cells within your body know the proper balance to be maintained. They
know your precise position upon this planet. They are each individual. The
atoms and molecules within your form have their own existences. In that
context they can be compared to what you think of as past lives. They exist
at once, however, within the physical reality of your being.
“In the same way are all of your past and future lives simultaneous.
They are connected in the same way that portions of your body are con
nected, and your thoughts fly from one existence to another as messages
leap to the nerve ends of your body and tell your finger to move through
the air.
“I am death and I am life and so are you, and you live all of your lives
simultaneously. Now, you are not any of those other selves and they are
not you. Yet they are related in a psychic gestalt, as all the cells in your
body are.”
Again we got into a discussion of Seths statements; we ended up with

questions about spontaneity and the need for discipline. Once again Seth
came through. This time his energy really seemed to fill up the room.
“I have told you to trust your spontaneous self,” he said. “And some
of you have become daring enough to look at your own reality; daring
enough to consider the possibility that you might, after all, be naturally
good; scandalous enough to accept the possibility that your being might
possibly be blessed; audacious enough to consider the possibility that if you
let yourselves be, you w ill be creative, exuberant, and free.
“You have graciously listened to me. You have graciously considered
what I had to say~but because you are yourselves, you have allowed your
selves to think twice. And you think, behind your thoughts, ‘That is well
and good for an old ghost to say, but what w ill really happen if I am my
spontaneous self? What evils might I perpetuate or bring into existence? I
m ight. • • speak to others honestly. I might make a blessed fool of myself
by showing affection. I might open up my human vulnerability; for if I re
main cool, then no one knows who I am but me, and no one can hurt me.，
“Nevertheless, you have tried, and in the backs of your minds you are
beginning to consider the possibility of spontaneity, but it frightens you.
You think, ‘This energy and this power can be wrongfully used, and if I am
an evil creature, how dare I taste my own energy? Better to hold it back.’
And this applies to some extent to everyone in this room.
“But I am going a step further, for now I am telling you to be reckless
with your energy, and reckless with your being, and you immediately
think, ‘What does reckless mean? It means out of control. Dear Lord, what
could happen if I were reckless with my being?，
“The gods are reckless or you would not have a world. The flowers are
reckless or you would not have a spring or an autumn. I am reckless or I
would not even consider speaking under these circumstances. It is indeed
reckless of me to tell you that you are blessed.”
Seth looked around the room, letting his words sink in, and a student
asked one of the inevitable questions that always arise whenever spontaneity
is mentioned. She said, “Seth, you were talking about spontaneity and being
reckless, but this my problem. I keep saying to myself, 'Gosh, you’ve got to
be spontaneous.， And I say it to myselfall the time. I mean, because I hardly
ever am spontaneous. But how can I be, when I think about it so hard?”
A few people laughed because they had the same question. Seth said,
“To you, I say forget it. Let it go. You sit and look at me, and you are a
beautifixl creature. Your body is doing its spontaneous best—it is keeping
you alive. It makes your skin glow and your eyes shine, and it does not stop
at every moment and say, ‘Ah hah, I must be spontaneous/ It simply relaxes
and is itself.
“So forget the issue and in your forgetting, your spontaneity w ill
flow—■ as it does, whether you hassle it or not. Your lips curl. Your ears are
like shells that hear my voice. They do not stop to wonder if they are spon
taneous. They do not give orders to themselves. So do not give orders to
yourself. And if sometimes you say to yourself, ‘I w ill not be spontaneous,
I w ill consider and consider again， ’ then that is also spontaneous!”
There were a few more remarks and questions, and Seth ended the
class session with his own kind of humor and philosophy, always calculated
to incite further questions and to encourage people to look at their reality
in new ways. “You are in this room now,” he said. “You bring your own re
ality here. In certain terms, of course, the room does not exist. You accept
its reality, and your reality in it. In the terms in which I spoke earlier, every
one in this room is dead and gone. You are corpses. How is it that you are
so dumb that you do not realize that you are as dead as I? In still other
terms, you are not yet born, so how is it that you experience anything or
feel the miracle of your being? Examine your definitions.
“Give us a moment, and then listen to a song about the examination
of definitions.”
W ith that, I came out of trance—briefly. The next moment I was
singing in Sumari, my “trance language.” Its impossible to describe the
150 Chapter 15
song, except to say that its lilting patterns and alternating rhythms seemed
to rise from a state of being in which definitions are meaningless or beside
the point. Being defined itself by being.
I，m certainly spontaneous when I sing Sumari. If I stopped to re
member that normally I cant carry a tune, that would be the end of it. But
when I read the nights transcript, Seths use of the word “reckless” bothered
me as it had some students. Reckless? Didn’t reckless mean . . . driving cars
one hundred miles an hour or taking stupid chances with your life?
Yet, singing Sumari, I knew what reckless meant; and each time I
begin a Sumari chant or poem I know what it means. I know when I turn
into Seth too. Thinking about it, I suspected that to some degree, at
least, I ，d hampered my progress in the library by not being reckless
enough. I decided to really concentrate my attention there more than I
had so far.
But if I hoped to just get material from the library and maintain a
one-point contact with the universe, I was in for a surprise. Margery’s visit
not only seemed to trigger Seths excellent class session that night, but it
also seemed to touch off a new barrage of visitors and callers. It took some
time before I realized how these interruptions were connected with the pol
itics of the psyche and with this book.
From the beginning I had wondered what I ’d actually find in my li
brary. I understood that my experience there demonstrated certain politics
of the psyche and represented policies of mine that made my visits possi
ble. Beyond that, I was in the dark in many important respects and, as
mentioned earlier, often it would be some time before I intellectually un
derstood what I， d really been up to.
For example, the meaning of my encounter with the “man and
woman in the sky” wasn’t apparent until several months afterward, when I
saw that it symbolically presented experience that wouldn’t catch up to me
until I was nearly finished with this book. Yet, there, it was given in a kind
of concentrated capsule form.
Other hints also came that January that wouldn’t make sense to me
until the following July. Several nights after Margery’s visit, for instance,
the word “codicil” came into my mind as I sat at the table. Something
about the feel of my consciousness told me that the word was important,
though I wasn’t at all familiar with it. It wasn’t a part of my working vo
cabulary. In fact I was about to discount this gentle mental nudge when it
came three or four times in succession. It really wanted my attention, so fi
nally I got up and looked for the word in the dictionary, giving in to the
urge much as I would have to the demands of my cat when he keeps at me
about something he wants.
I didn’t read the definition too carefully, noting down only that a cod
icil was “something appended to a w ill.” Then, the word “polemics” came
to me in the same nagging fashion, so I looked that up too. The dictionary
said that it was “the art of disputation, polemic theology, which has as its
object the refutation of error.” I didn’t see how “codicil” applied to me at
all until months later. But polemics made a certain sense and I thought,
“Yes, in a way, that’s what I ， m doing.” And as I thought that, suddenly I
knew there was some material ready for me from the library. I sat down
and wrote the following brief passage:
From the Library

Inner Codes
Inner codes of reality appear within the molecules on the one hand,
and within the private and mass psyche as well. These codes get distorted
through the ages, and there is a need to return to their source. The library
books are my interpretation of that source. The material in these inner
codes is always translated outward into the world of science, religion, poli
tics, and law. But if these outer manifestations become too rigid or petrify,
or if their inner source is forgotten, then they no longer serve the needs of
the individual or mass psyche.
These codes, then, must be constantly restated, freshly experienced
and interpreted, so that they emerge again to give the race new impetus
and ensure that civilization follows spiritual and psychic needs. The inner
codes are patterns, flexible models, carrying within them hints of mans
greatest potentials and achievements, which he can then imaginatively pro
ject into the future as patterns for development. (These are to be used in
the same way that a city planner uses blueprints, in the same fashion that
cells know ahead of time what form to take.)
That was the end of the passage, but I made certain connections at once.
As our cells have their own inner codes, directing them toward their great
est fulfillment, so do our psyches. So for me, the library and its books rep
resented “my own true path” in the same way, acting like . . . psychic
chromosomes that know ahead of time the best direction for me to take, or
the most fulfilling psychic “shape” for me to assume. The library also rep
resents an individual psyches “true source” in those terms, at least: the self
152 Chapter 15
returning for refreshment to its source and rediscovering its own “ancient
truths.”
Okay, I thought, but what are truths anyway? The chromosomes， in
formation is certainly true in that it directs the organism and its parts to
the form ultimately (and ideally?) suited to it in this reality. Are insights
true in the same way, directing the self to its ideal relationship with the
world?
W ithout knowing it I was beginning to ask some of the right kinds of
questions~questions that would later trigger a new kind of psychic poli
tics. In the meantime, other people were asking their own questions~of
me—and though I yearned for some more private library experiences, I
was presented with a “living library” of very human voices and problems.
Besides this, we began house hunting in earnest. My private and pub
lic world was shifting. And I worried: Would the library go with us if we
did move? I didn’t realize— again till some time later~that Phase One of
the library and this book was finished.
P art Two
Voices from the World

C h apter 1 6
Voices from “T h e U nd erg ro und ，

，’ and the
Politics o f the Focus Personality
n January 1975, the telephone kept ringing constantly, or so it seemed.
I People called with just about every kind of problem, so that I was
forced to apply my ideas in very practical terms. Yet again, each person
was almost super-real, even over the telephone. Each of their dilemmas had
such an energetic “eccentric” vitality that I wondered steadily about hu-
manitys vast creativityand the areas in which its focused.
A woman I’ll call M olly started this “roll call” of questions. Her prob
lem instantly gave me new insights into the various strands of conscious
ness and their connection with our daily living.
M olly had been hearing mental voices, or thoughts “not hers” for over
a year. The voices, she said, kept going through her mind, vying for her at
tention. They’d changed their character during this time—and to me they
presented fascinating examples of segmented strands of consciousness.
“First,” M olly said, “I heard a voice in my head that was supposed to
be God. Then there was a voice in my belly that said it was my father. This
was right after his death. I was supposed to learn from this that my father
wasn’t God.”
“Did you ever think he was?” I asked.
“Yes, in a way, I guess,” she said. “Anyway, I didn’t think he could do
any wrong.” M olly’s voice was whiney. She sounded exhausted and weary
and kept repeating herself. Yet she， d already learned a lot, because she said,
“The two voices, of God and my father, taught me that one was different
from the other. My fathers voice~or the voice that said it was my father~
always sounded as if it came from my belly, and God always came in my
head. So after awhile I saw that I’d deified my father.”
The two dramatizations were quite clear to her, but then she went on:
“Later I really got scared, though. I read a book about possession and I
thought I was possessed. Then my father and God, or the voices that said
156 Chapter 16
they were, stopped. Instead now there’s a doubting voice. Its always telling
me that I don’t really believe what I do believe. And there’s my good voice,
the guide voice, who tries to help me. They just keep going. I believe what
you say, that we create our own reality, so I keep telling the voices to go
away. But they don’t ,
“You’re going about it the hard way,” I said. “Look, the voices repre
sent aspects or parts ofyourself that you’re inhibiting. So they do have mes
sages that are important. They aren’t alien~just part of your own thought
processes that you’ve denied. They’ve become segmented. One voice repre
sents the doubts that you aren’t expressing, that you ignore or tried to deny.
The guide voice represents an idealization of the selfyou want to be.”
M olly kept repeating what shed already told me. I let her talk. As I
listened I realized again that our normal consciousness is like an orchestra
of feelings and thoughts, each blending together~strands of ideas, emo
tions, and value judgments intertwined and interconnected. When we be
come too selective; when we decide that some thoughts are acceptable and
some are not, then often we pay attention only to the acceptable segments.
We begin to separate the strands of our own consciousness until they no
longer intermix smoothly or modify themselves as they used to. They be
come divided. This is what happened in M olly’s case. She ignored main
currents of thought and feeling until she no longer recognized them as her
own.
“You’re in the middle, getting it from both ends,” I said. “Listen,
Molly. One voice is showing you your doubts. They’re exaggerated, or they
seemto be, in contrast to the guide voice. As I listen to you, its obvious that
the guide voice is setting up a superhuman pattern of behavior that no per
son could achieve.”
Once again, M olly started repeating her experiences, almost as if to
keep me from saying anything that might help. Understandable. She， d set
up a certain framework, and even though she said that she wanted help,
that framework had served certain purposes. Yet, as I pointed out to her,
her experiences were beautiful examples of the therapeutic nature of the
self. How apt the symbolism was from the beginning! Molly, I felt, was
stuck for a while with the ideals that shed earlier assigned to her father, and
I told her that when she recognized the doubting voice and the guide voice
as symbols of opposing attitudes of her own, she’d be free. Then the atti
tudes could modify each other again and blend into the whole area of ac
cepted selfhood.
Accepted, doubts can be encountered as a necessary part of the learn
ing process. Molly considered the doubting voice evil, but the doubts arose
precisely because her ideals were not reasonable. No one can be a “pure
spirit” while living on the face of this earth, yet her guide voice set up just
Voicesfrom “The Underground” 157
such impossible goals. God wasn’t the “father” anymore, but the ideals
she’d assigned to him were now spoken by the guide. So, as I told her, the
doubting voice instantly protested whenever she denied her own emotional
experience.
“I，
m thinking of quitting my job and just concentrating on spiritual
development,” she said.
“Uh-huh. If you don’t like your job, find another,” I answered. “But
don’t stay at home brooding.” I told her to do the exercises in Seths The
Nature ofPersonalReality, and she said that she had been doing them. From
her conversation, though, it was clear that she’d only pretended to follow
the instructions. Whenever she touched upon feelings of doubt, she back
tracked. If she really works with her own beliefs, she’ll be able to find the
source of her incessant impractical aspirations—because these prevent her
from seeing her own “true” reality. And that reality is spiritual. Behind
many of her attitudes was the distressing idea that the self cant be trusted,
and that to be human is wrong.
In M olly’s case, the doubting voice is the underground of the self.
M olly separated her own attitudes into the good guys and the bad guys,
and then partially personified them. The government of the self is under
mined, because she isn’t listening to all the “constituents,” all of the ele
ments of her personality that have a stake in her life. Because she feels so
guilty, she cant be content with being a “normal,” happy, fairly satisfied
person, giving and taking, at peace with her humanity; instead, she’s driven
to be a saint on earth. She was determined to pluck out all skeptical ideas
or doubts, precisely because she was really aware of the impossibility of liv
ing up to her ideals.
The same kind of mental-voice phenomenon could have developed
with Margery, the girl who thought she had to love everybody, except that
Margery at least admitted her doubts and kept in contact with them. Both
she and M olly shared the same belief in the unreliability of the self and the
grossness of physical existence. Unfortunately, many people with such be
liefs think that spirituality can be developed only by accepting a very lim
ited range of emotion. So a pall falls over the spirit and the world as well.
M olly believed that she was being expansive because she was trying to
develop her spiritual awareness. Whenever she examined her ideas, how
ever, she interpreted the self-examination as doubt and instantly tried to be
more spiritual. I finally told her that she was trying too hard. Her own self-
therapy would lead her to a more expansive view of life if shed just let it. I
think that I got through to her.
Again, in Adventures in Consciousness I explained my theories about
the source and components of personality. I saw us as coming from a
source self, free of space and time, into this reality. The focus personality
158 Chapter 16
(or the self that we know) focuses in this life, but is also composed of other
aspects or parts of the source self that are latent within the psyche, though
“alive” in other realities.
These form the basic structure of the psyche from which the focus
personality emerges. I call these “prime aspects.” A harmonious working
relationship between these prime aspects results in a well-balanced focus
personality~one that is reasonably happy, healthy, and creative.
These prime aspects merge, practically speaking, into what I call earth
aspects, or the earthly versions of the prime aspects. They show their exis
tence as our own characteristics and tendencies— the raw psychic materials
from which we form the selfwe know. These aspects also reveal themselves
as models or psychic patterns that can operate as indicators of progress and
fulfillment. Wb， ll also interpret their “messages” through our current beliefs
about ourselves and the world.
Molly, for example, was inhibiting strong elements of her own per
sonality. She believed that doubting was wrong to such a degree that her
very intellect became suspect. I could have said as much when I finished
Adventures in Consciousness. Yet until the library material, I didn’t under
stand the nature of models or the way that the earth aspects can operate
w ithin the psyche as models for achievement, as indicators of various
leanings or inclinations, or as regulators. M olly not only inhibited as
pects of herself, she exaggerated the “guide”一 so effectively that the psy
che sent up an opposing aspect to right the balance. So in her experience
she has the guide or saint self, and the doubter. And each has a voice.
These models are not just ideas. They are psychologically active and
“alive.” They possess certain abilities and characteristics. They interact in
her psyche.
M olly disapproves of the world because she disapproves of herself. Be
cause she’s afraid of her own inner doubts, any physical data that correlates
with them are also considered subversive. Books or articles that deny the
validity of psychic phenomena, for example, seem like threats to her and
w ill represent unofficial material. The inner underground w ill be projected
into exterior experience.
On the other hand, people who rely upon limited ideas of the intel
lect and repress the personal psychic elements of personality w ill consider
any psychic field of endeavor as nonsense or threatening (one or the other),
but definitely as subversive. Privately, such individuals w ill try to inhibit in
tuitional experiences.
Many people, in fact, try to maintain “the establishment” of the self,
and follow its conventions as rigorously as they follow the exterior mani
festations of those conventions— the religious or political groups that give
them voice. When we try to maintain such an unyielding stance, however,
then we always have to protect our present position, put up our defenses,
and in one way or another, do battle. Our psychic politics~our private
policies—also reach out to touch and affect our joint world.
Lets look at M olly again. She gave me an example of the way her
doubting subversive voice “tempted” her and tried to destroy her peace of
mind. “I’ve been reading a book that says you can increase your wealth by
thinking in terms of abundance,” she said. “Some of your books say this
too. But every time I read this, the doubting voice speaks up, saying, ‘It
won’t work for you/ And it repeats this over and over.”
And it was right! M olly really didn’t believe that thinking in terms of
abundance would increase her wealth, but she wanted to convince herself
that she did. Besides this, the concept wouldn’t produce results unless she
did something that let it work. Instead she was thinking of quitting her job
because her boss was “negative.” She was judging him by her own unrealis
tic standards so that “negative” bosses would follow her from job to job.
The doubting voice was begging her to examine her own misgivings so that
she could see what was behind them.
Actually this doubting voice was quite instructional, showing her the
difference between her attainable and unattainable goals. It pointed up the
exaggerated aspirations of the guide voice, which only drove M olly to feel
ings of guilt. M olly can be uniquely herself, the “best” Molly, working
within the framework of the practical world as she learns to work with her
human nature and not against it.
But where did the guide voice come from? I believe that it is a dimly
perceived, distorted, conventionalized version of the earth aspect~the dis
tilled combination of prime aspects as they operate as components of the
focus personality. That part of the psyche contains within it knowledge of
our greatest potentials in connection with earthly existence. We interpret
its messages through our beliefs, though.
M olly’s conventionalized beliefs about good and evil caused her to
misread the guide portion of her personality, and the doubting voice was
then set up as a needed countermeasure. M olly was acting like a dictator,
setting up a set of laws, and God help any portion of her personality that
didn’t go along! She insisted that all of her thoughts and actions conform
to a rigid pattern of spiritual development as she understood it~ a pattern
that left no room for simply being human.
M olly closed down all methods of communication that would allow
her doubts any freedom at all. She inhibited “negative” thoughts, she read
only “inspirational” literature or psychically oriented magazines and pa
pers, until finally the repressed doubts rose to consciousness in their own
revolution~with their own guerrilla warfare, appearing as the unofficial
voices that clamored for her attention.
160 Chapter 16
M olly considered the intellect to be at fault and thought of it as the

tempter who had to be quelled or conquered. IVe also heard from scientists
who have the same difficulty, but in the opposite direction. They insist on
the prime importance of the intellect at the expense of the intuitions. They
also act like dictators. They read only scientific material, and their under
ground is the occult. Then one way or another, the psyche reacts against
such restrictions, and suddenly the scientist is faced not with Molly’s jeer
ing voice of reason, but with men from outer space or automatic writing or
sudden revelations—all unofficial messages that finally sneak in to upset
the psychological establishment.
The day after M olly’s call, I received a letter from just such a man.
Roderick, I， ll call him, gave me the following story. For years he，
d concen
trated on his scientific career and was very critical of religion, the occult,
dreams, intuitional hunches, or anything else that couldn’t be produced in
a test tube. Then his daughter received a copy of Seth Speaksfor Christmas.
Wondering at his own actions, he read the book. Then—boom! Out of
nowhere, Roderick said, he began automatic writing. Then he experi
mented with a Ouija board. He assured me that Seth had reached him,
communicating through the board, and to top it off, other-world intelli
gences wanted him to help in the development of a new kind of pyramid.
“Now everything is happening at once,” Roderick wrote. “Everything that
I thought wasn’t true, is true.”
He was so used to interpreting all information in literal terms that he
wouldn’t even consider the possibility that the Ouija communications
might be coming from portions of his psyche that he， d denied—an expla
nation he， d probably have applied quite quickly to other such activity only
a short while before. But now the psyche was showing its incredible rich
ness, hinting at its true dimensions—and surely that couldn’t be the psy
che that he’d considered so below his notice before! In his case, the
other-world intelligences and his Seth were his equivalent of M olly’s
doubting and guide voices. They also represented aspects that he， d denied,
dramatizing themselves through the creativity of his own interests and
personality.
Whenever the intellect and intuitions are considered separate oppos
ing characteristics, and one highlighted in exaggerated manner over the
other, then the inhibited one surfaces. Certainly this happens in many con
version experiences. A new self-government rises, having new policies to
ward the self and the world. Unless this is understood, the old dominant
characteristics can easily become the new underground, suppressed as vig
orously as they were once displayed. Instances of this are apparent when
ever the scientist converted to occult phenomena completely loses all of his
old objectivity and becomes as fervent in his new ideas as he was earlier in
his old ones. The overly credulous believer, religiously speaking, becomes
the avowed atheist, against all religion for the same reason.
I see the psyche as a self-governing process, with the focus personality
as the head of state. The inner models are structures within the psyche,
ever-changing patterns that gently direct the personality toward its fullest
development, in the same way that invisible models within the cells direct
their growth. So these models stand for something, though I don’t think
we can take them literally in our terms. Their reality helps form ours, but
they cant be confined to our definitions.
Again: In our world these models usually show themselves as earth
aspects, as characteristics or qualities that seem to be our own, and do op
erate as components of personality. In their greater capacity, however, they
represent prime aspects of the source self, so that each prime aspect has its
own reality in another kind of existence than ours. Taken together, they
represent the psyches potentials and unique properties—and the source of
our own personhood. We draw on these characteristics constantly. Often,
however, we overemphasize one at the expense of the other: Our beliefs
cause us to lean too far in one direction, to become off-centered. Then ad
justments take place to help us maintain our focus and stance in the
world.
Some people are able to form a relationship with one of the prime as
pects so that it can communicate information about its own existence and
also give a description of this world from its standpoint. I think that this is
what I am doing with Seth. When this is done properly, the focus person
ality is highly benefited while keeping its own psychological focus. At the
same time it begins to extend itself in other directions, alters its perception,
and brings new knowledge to bear on physical existence.
In this case, the focus personality certainly changes, perhaps drasti
cally, but in a natural evolution in which it always retains its authority in
the ordinary affairs of life. I don’t know why more people cant do this well.
I suspect that it hints of a natural expansion of consciousness that is ours as
a species and points toward a richer kind of personal consciousness, inher
ent but ignored, in our focus toward specialization.
The focus personality is the front of the self, the leader who deals
with other people and makes personal policies in the same way that a na
tions ruler deals with other countries. But the focus personality stands
for other portions of the self~its advisers and countrymen at other levels
of selfhood一and from these it receives messages that prepare it for its
task and position. If it doesn’t do a good enough job— if it is too auto
cratic or censors too many messages from its constituents— then there’s
162 Chapter 16
an overthrow, according to the kind of inner politics characteristic of the

personality.
There can be a gentle democratic change of government and the
adoption of a new kind of constitution; a violent overthrow; a religious
conversion or inquisition. Many of my phone calls and letters during this
period were showing me the methods used by other portions of the self to
“set things right,” and these usually involve unofficial messages: that is,
messages that are not accepted by the focus personality as legitimate.
It has occurred to me many times that our idea of individuality is a
very thin mixture. We can’t understand, for example, the rich m ultiplic
ity of psychological experience in some tribes or civilizations who felt
that their selfhood, while itself, was also a part of the consciousness of
their ancestors, or of others who also identify with the animals. Perhaps
in some past civilizations, a person who thought he was himself or her
self only would be considered mad, only half here, a person almost with
out a soul.
Now and then I’m struck with an odd thought: Maybe my mode of
consciousness with its many facets is as natural as other peoples more sin
gular version. In fact, maybe, its more natural, and what we recognize as
normal consciousness is a very limited specialized portion of far greater
abilities. I wouldn’t want to go around as Seth all the time, or fall into
trances at the drop of a hat. Seths existence is his, and mine is mine. A ll in
all, I wouldn’t trade with him for the world. And I wouldn’t want to go
around singing Sumari verses all the time, either.
Yet once that week friends came to call. Trying to explain a difficult
point, I switched to Sumari consciousness to do so, singing in the
purest, happiest tones—with a range and depth that startled the musi
cians present. A rather complicated philosophical statement was trans
lated into an emotional art form far more apt than a lengthy verbal
explanation. And for a moment as I finished, I felt dreadfully sorry for
other people who couldn’t vary their modes of consciousness to suit
their needs and intents.
During this time, I was having weekly Seth sessions in class as well as
the private sessions in which Seth dictated his book. Again, speaking for
Seth is so outside most peoples experience that they attach all kinds of
meanings to it. Yet until I sang the Sumari that night, it didn’t occur to me
to feel sorry for other people who aren’t able to switch to, say, a Seth mode
of consciousness, and who never sense that extra richness of perception and
expression. So it seems to me that most people only sip the thinnest soup
from the gourmet broth of consciousness available.
I was still thinking about this and about the importance of the focus
personality as the director of activities, when the following day I sensed
that there was some material ready for me from the library. I sat down and
transcribed it at once:
From, the Library
The structure of the psyche of the world at any given time can be as
certained by viewing its exterior condition: the various civilizations all rep
resenting actualized characteristics inherent in the world mind. The
different governments act in response to inner politics, which are the result
of multitudinous ones used by individuals in dealing with private inner
and outer reality.
Historically, the gods of one era may turn into the demons of an
other; the heroes turn into the despised; the lawgivers into the lawless and
vice versa, as each group of generations views reality through those aspects
of the world psyche which they have chosen to encounter. A nation w ill
deal with other nations as it does with its own members, and project out
ward upon enemies those aspects of itself that are unexpressed, where they
w ill appear in exaggerated form.
A nations main literature and official pursuits w ill faithfully mirror
the main-line consciousness of its people. The unofficial or underground
cultures w ill represent aspects unexpressed or denied by the majority. Sub
versive literature or art is feared precisely because it represents inner, not ex
terior, culture. As with personal repressions, this kind of explosive material
grows the more it is denounced.
When the material stopped, I sat there, frowning. I could sense so much
more from “the book,” but so far all I had were fairly brief passages. I could
see where this last material applied easily enough, and it was obvious that
my own experiences and the book were intimately connected. But when
would I get the rest of the material, and what was the whole thing leading
up to? I knew that I was in the middle of something, some psychic adven
ture, but its overall shape and resolution eluded me. Now and again,
though, the word “codicil” kept coming into my mind. I knew that the
term was important, but as I read over the dictionary definition, it was still
difficult to see how it applied.
I ’d no sooner finished writing down the library material when the
phone rang, almost as if the subject matter from the book had triggered the
call. It was from a young man who told me that a friend of his had just
been murdered. She had only been seventeen years old, and the police had
164 Chapter 16
no clues. He asked if I could get any impressions that might lead to the
murderers capture.
Fd had a few calls of this nature before, and they always upset me.
Now, with the latest library material in my mind, I suddenly understood
why.
Actually I handled the call in the same way I had the previous ones,
but this time I didn’t have divided feelings about my own attitudes. I told
the boy that I’d send energy to the dead girl— because I do believe that
consciousness is responsive after death— but I told him that I wouldnt get
involved in trying to track down her murderer. In the past I was always
tempted to help (its impossible not to be swayed by the emotions of the
people involved) but when I got to the point of saying “A ll right, Yl\ see
what I can do,” something always stopped me.
Now my reasons seemed so simple and clear that I wondered at my
previous opaqueness: I wasn’t going to use my abilities to track down an
other human being, no matter what he’d done. The crime-and-punishment
kind of psychic politics wasn’t mine. Certainly it operates in our system,
and there doesn’t seem to be an acceptable alternative as yet, but hunting
down an assailant just isn’t for me. I believe too thoroughly that we create
our own reality, for one thing~an unpopular belief where violence is con
cerned—but I， m convinced that the victim-to-be picks out the assailant
with as much skill and craft as the murderer seeks his victim, and until we
learn much more about both, we， ll get nowhere battling crime. Ym not jus
tifying murder by any means, but Ym saying that the victim wants to be
murdered—perhaps to be punished~if not by a vengeful god then by one
of his own fellows; and that a would-be murderer can switch in a minute
and become the victim instead; and that the slayer wants to be slain.
Because we’ve never faced such issues, were in a position where we
must turn part of our society into paid killers, either as policemen or sol
diers, to protect us, hence continuing the process. I pay taxes which help to
maintain the same system, of course. But I ’m not going to actively hunt
down anyone for any reason. An ambiguous attitude, perhaps. In the
meantime, I hope that my own work w ill help us understand ourselves bet
ter, so that no one needs to be an attacker or a victim.
Other calls, though, led me to consider my own psychic politics, and
those of others. The very next day, for example, a man I ， ll call B ill called.
His mother was dying. B ill phoned every psychic he knew. It wasn’t just
that he was naturally concerned and worried. There were other issues in
volved that were apparent to me as I listened.
Bills mother was a very old woman. He wanted me to send her heal
ing energyand to heal her if I could, whether or not she wanted to live~
so that he wouldnt feel guilty about not living nearby. She felt unwanted,
he said. She was unwanted. She knew it, and he knew it. Rather than face
the fact that he really didn’t want his mother, he frantically set about trying
to convince himself that he wanted her desperately~that she mustlive. He
was buckling under the strain, so he lied to himself and to her and to
everyone he called. If the doctors couldn’t save her, then surely the psychics
could.
Honesty might have saved her; maybe not. But honesty could have
cleared the air and made B ill feel a lot better about himself and his emo
tions. He wouldn’t listen to me, though. And I thought—sardonically, I
supposeWe have to use everything. Truths are no good unless we can
make them practical in just the ways we want, if they can get us what we
want. We don’t seem to realize that sometimes the impractical insight
might be the “truest” and even the most practical, in a different way.
Music is true. It makes little difference if you understand musical no
tation or not. What music is, escapes such reasoning. Poetry or sculpture or
art is true in the same fashion. A rt is true whether or not you can open a
can with it or make someone live, or make it your servant. You can’t make
art your servant, or life or truth either, and you can’t use psychic ability to
make people do what they don’t want to do: because personal reality is too
vigorous for that kind of manipulation.
That call and some of the others also reminded me that each of us
seems to have a main focus, a particular idea of practicality~a concept of
“what we want out of life” against which we judge our experiences. Many
of us study this or that subjectscience, religion, or history, for example
as if it existed as something apart from the experience that makes the study
itself possible. That is, we concentrate so single-mindedly on our focus that
we tend to forget its connection with life itself. Yet each person is struck by
that strangeness, and for all of our philosophies we move from youth to
age, and our main line of consciousness is embedded in our flesh.
Our experience is inner in a way that we really can’t elucidate. Look at
it this way: As I type this page, its winter in the Northeast, a cold gray day.
Yet I know that the air is warm and balmy in Florida. There are well-
known roads waiting for me if I should decide to travel south for a month.
Yet there are no known roads connecting the summer and winter of our
souls. Perhaps all I， m doing in my work is exploring these dimensions, pre
senting alternate paths through the unknown experiences of our living; dis
covering oases, inns, continents, and islands in inner lands that we all
travel. There are probably all kinds of ways to go— the scenic route, the
historic route, the roads that lead past old temples, the city highways or
country bypasses.
There are travelers who stop at each historical monument between
here and Florida. They w ill recount the entire journey in terms of the
166 Chapter 16
battlegrounds they visited—the mementos given out with the dates of m il
itary maneuvers. They w ill tramp the graveyards of the Confederate dead.
That’s how they program their journey. Others w ill stop on the way to visit
any fortune-teller, healer, or medium they can find in trailers or camp
grounds or town houses, stopping at little out-of-the way churches, taking
“development courses.” Still others w ill head for the hotels and bars in each
of the cities, concentrating on cuisine and dance bands. So although there
may be only so many objective ways to Florida, there are endless ways of
traveling them. The differences become far more important than the route
chosen. This also applies to our inner journeys.
C h apter 1 7
A Probable Class
ometimes I think that for all our talk about expansion of conscious
S ness, we deliberately hide much of our own unorthodox behavior

from ourselves simply because its so difficult to explain or correlate
with our usual activities. Each time we encounter our own unofficial expe
riences, were forced to examine the rest of our lives, suspecting (probably
rightly) that were usually conscious only in the most surface of ways. Such
examination means that were faced with the job of constantly altering our
ideas about reality to bring them up to our newest experiences with it; and
also, of course, we must then change our mental posture in the world of ac
cepted facts.
Such an event occurred regarding my class during this period: one
that struck each of us to some extent or another, for certainly we glimpsed
the wider dimensions of activity possible to the psyche, and the range of
communication that goes on beneath usual perception.
The event itself straddled waking and sleep experience and involved
out-of-body states. Ym going to quote my own notes written on the morn
ing after: January 15，1975. Obviously, elements of the event still lingered,
as the first paragraph shows:
“I，m sitting here to record an experience I had during the night. Even
as I write, though, everything around me seems oddly significant. In this
moment, at least, I’m imbuing the world with elements of vision from
other states of consciousness. An other-worldly cast falls about the room
and the view outside the window. Today must be some kind of minor hol
iday with no school, because now and then groups of children go by, bright
in winter-red scarves and mittens. Everything looks larger than usual~the
house across the way, the cars, even the mountain—all filled with that
strange significance that for me at least has a delightful green cast.
“And the books progress at three levels: Seth is still dictating The “Un-
knownJReality; Psychic Politics continues with its double stages—one in
which I write accounts of events; and the inspired state in which material
168 Chapter 17
comes from the library or I have experiences there. But last night after class
left, I had an experience of a different kind.
“Rob and I didn’t get to bed until past 1:00 A.M. First, we had to clean
up the living room after the nearly forty people who came to class; then we
had a snack. I thought that Vd fall asleep in a flash. Instead I tossed and
turned, and woke every half hour or so. At 2:30, I was sitting up in bed
with the lamp on. Then I turned it off.
“The next thing I knew, I was back in the living room, conducting a
class. Ben was talking, and I was taking notes. I always try to give full at
tention to students, and someone remarked about my note-taking. I hated
to be disturbed, but said, ‘Look. This is important. We accept this class as,
well, class. But in another probability, class is over. You’ve all gone home.
I，m taking notes to compare what Ben says here with what he said in that
other class, so that we can pinpoint the differences/
“The room was as crowded as it had been, I remembered, in the ear
lier class. From the hallway I heard Marys voice, then I heard her sister,
Jean. I tried to figure out what was happening: Mary had left early from
that other class, and Jean hadn’t attended at all. I made sure that I noted
these variations in events. Then I called out, ‘Mary, I thought you’d gone
home, and Jean, I didn’t know you were even here!，
“Mary yelled back, laughing, ‘Oh, we were here all right. WeVe been
around all the time/
“I tried to hold a clear conscious focus, to discover what was really
happening. At the time it seemed vital that I note down everything I could.
For all of that, my memory is not clear; that is, I remember that IVe for
gotten as much as I recall. About this time, the lights began to go on and
off. This disrupted my note-taking. As I struggled to see, voices came again
from the apartment house hall. We all heard an unknown doctor dis
cussing medicine with a young woman, and the whole class listened as
their footsteps went down to the front door. Then Rob and I went into the
kitchen, where we watched the doctor get into a car in the parking lot
below. Some class members watched from the living room windows.
“The doctor, however, led a monkey on a leash. This was the first re
ally jarring note to me. I stopped and tried to consider. It was possible that
a doctor had a monkey on a leash in the parking lot, but unlikely. I knew
that I was conscious. I was positive that I was out of my body from my
usual orientation. But from the orientation of this class, I was in my body,
and the body that must be in bed was ... a probable one.
“I remembered even then that the earlier class had ended up with a
long discussion of medicine, inoculations, and monkey donors. In this
class, were we dealing with that discussion in a different way? I opened the
kitchen window, feeling the cold clear winter air~ that was real air, by
A Probable Class 169
God, I thought一and I checked the corner intersection. Everything looked

absolutely normal, except for one thing: no light shone anywhere. The
streetlights were off; so was the traffic light; our lights had been off for
some minutes.
“I closed the window and told Rob, who was beside me, that as far as
I could tell we were operating between realities somehow, but that in any
case the lights were out and something must have happened to the elec
tricity. He grinned and said, ‘A t least it isn’t our fuses,5meaning that he
wouldnt have to go to the trouble of replacing them.
“At the same time, a radio began to blare with what sounded like a
weather report. Unfortunately I slipped up here: accepted the radio with
out wondering that we had power for it, without electricity. Then, as sud
denly, we were back in bed. A radio beside me was also blaring, and I
thought with dismay that with all the noise, Vd never figure out what was
really happening.
“The static grew so loud that angrily I woke up. My first thought was,
‘Great. At least now I can write all this down.， My second thought was, ‘It
w ill be hard as the devil to write in the dark if the lights aren’t working.，
Next, I realized that I wasn’t sure which reality Vd awakened in; and until I
tried the lights, I wouldn’t know. My hand trembled as I reached for the
switch. The light splashed out its small circle of warmth. I wrote my notes,
which I’m now editing and typing.
“Now I ， m certain that the nights experience represented a probable
class. But while in that class, I was equally certain that the class was the real
one. I’m sure that I was in an out-of-body state, in the living room~every
thing was physical and perfectly clear. But was I hallucinating the class
members, or were they here somehow? And was I hallucinating the lack of
lights, first their off-and-on flicker, and then their disappearance? O r was I
literally in a probable reality that exists in this same spot of space, and
there, was there a light failure? Did I switch on a radio to discover the cause
and then, in my confusion, forget? O r did the lights actually fail last night?
Easy enough to check by calling the power company, although our clocks
seem all right.”
I called the power company. No trouble with the lights that night.
Then, on a bet, I called Mary. Without telling her what happened, I asked
her if she’d had any dreams she remembered or any unusual experiences
after she left class.
Mary is a nurse and a mother, so she’s quite busy. First she apologized
for leaving class early; she’d been tired and concerned about a business dis
appointment that her husband had just encountered. To put herself in bet
ter spirits and to gain some perspective on the affair, shed gone to her
170 Chapter 17
room and leafed through copies of old class Seth sessions, telling herself
that she'd know which ones to read. “I know that nothing is really acciden
tal,Mshe said, “so I figured that whichever sessions I chose would be the
ones most meaningful to me at the time.”
She picked up a session dealing with probabilities and probable selves.
“I never could get probable selves through my head,” she said. “Then, sud
denly as I read the session, I really understood for the first time what Seth
meant. Now I can’t even explain how I knew. But I was really encouraged
and felt triumphant•”
She didn’t remember any dreams, though, as I hoped she might. Still,
I thought, Mary had been thinking about probable selves just about the
time I heard her in the hallway during my probable class. (She’d finally
fallen asleep around 3:00 a .m ., and I’d looked at my clock at 2:30.) Interest
ing, evocative, but that was all. I told her then about my own experiences
and asked her to keep the matter to herself, so that I could quiz students
about their experiences before they heard about mine, and hung up.
About an hour later, Mary called back. She’d checked the sessions
shed read the night before. The last sentences she remembered reading
outlined instructions Seth had given about dreams from “the Gates of
Horn.” These were supposed to be particular kinds of dreams that put the
individual in touch with the universe and the inner self.
It was at that point, Mary presumed, that she’d fallen asleep. Just the
same, she turned the page to see what came next. “I don’t know what it
means,” she said, “but I really feel that this is important. The next page was
a discussion of the only conscious out-of-body IVe ever had, an old June ses
sion where Seth mentioned it. In experience, I came to a class out-of-
body and almost went crazy trying to tell everyone that I waspresent. I kept
shouting, ‘Look my body is asleep at home, and I know it, but I’m here.’
Well,” she said, “it just seems like too much of a coincidence somehow... •”
I agreed. There seemed to be some kind of connection, but certainly
nothing definite. So I wrote down what she told me and hoped that maybe
one of my other students would come up with a more specific connection.
My experience had happened after Tuesdays class, on January 14.
Wednesday I had a regular Seth session, and Thursday afternoon I held my
usual creative writing class, to which Mary also belonged. Before Wednes
days session, I asked Rob to question Seth about my out-of-body and the
probable class. The session was relatively short~our 730th— and Seths
version of my experiences considerably broadened my understanding. This
is what he said:
Our classesoccur in your physical reality, yet the greater encounters

take place in the psyche, and this encounter is free of space and time.
A Probable Class
While probabilities do operate, your consciousness usually deals with

them one at a time. In your terms, then, after class broke up last night,
another class began—as those class events were experienced in the pri
vate and mass psyches of those involved. This “second” class did not ac
tually happen after the first one, however, but simultaneously. It
represented the larger dimensions of the events of the class, and those
events that composed the second class did take place at a different level
of reality.
Mary left the physical class early, but still participated at another
level of reality in the entire proceedings. Her sister, who has not at
tended lately, psychically was present. In that dimension, therefore,
Ruburt was aware of both presences. He was perceiving the greater di
mensions of the physical class event. In those terms, Jean, Marys sister,
who did not attend the physical class, attended a probable one; and
Mary who was not present for the end of the physical class, was a par
ticipant in the entire probable class.
To Ruburts experience, the classes seemed separate: one real and
the other probable. But the two seemingly separate classes represented
the greater, usually unperceived dimensions of any class event, or of any
perceived event.
To Ruburt it seemed that the lights switched off and on. This rep
resented the switching off and on of his consciousness as it perceived
usually restricted perceptions, then lost them.
The student, Ben, does have extraordinary energy, erratically and
explosively used. He does not know how to use it as yet, so it appears
not as a steady but as a rambunctious and sometimes distracting qual
ity. He has not learned how to ride it. Ruburt recognizes this, and to
some degree he counted upon Bens energy, knowing that it would
pierce both levels. Then he hoped to compare what Ben said in each re
ality.
Ruburt was out-of-body, as he knows. In that state he was perceiv
ing the greater dimensions of the class event, while trying to correlate
this with ordinary class perception. [To Rob:] You were also out-of-
body, but do not recall the situation.
Mary was downhearted and wanted to give herself a present. Un
consciously she chose the precise old class session that dealt with proba
bilities; it contained her description last June of an out-of-body episode
in which she did, indeed, visit a probable class. [Though she stopped
reading just before coming to that passage, and without reading the en
tire session.]
That was on her mind asshe fell asleep. Shevisited here, then, out-
of-body and was perceived by Ruburt, who was in an out-of-body state
himself. Mary did not come into the room, but lingered in the hall with
her sister.
As Ruburt looked out of the kitchen window he was using all of his
abilities, but he could not physically keep both events going at one
time; or rather, his awareness could not contain all of the perceptive in
formation.
172 Chapter 17
Part of the landscape was blacked out. There, the full light of con
sciousness did not shine. He alerted himself through the use of the hal
lucinatory radio that made him question why the lights were off. Then
he reverted to ordinary conscious behavior, thinking, “丁here must be a
storm,” and that aweather report would tell him its course.
He realized that his body was sleeping and wanted to awaken to
record the events, so he had the radio blare to awaken him.
There is more, however, regarding the doctor and the monkey. The
monkey was not free but on a leash—the psyches interpretation, in
other terms, of the earlier class discussion concerning inoculations. The
monkey was not free because it had been inoculated with diseased tis_
sues, yet the doctor hoped to keep the disease in control, or leashed,
through measured inoculations. Ruburt saw a real doctor and a real
monkey because he wanted to bring home the point that animals
were involved, who were then diseased; and that real men conducted the
experiments.
In other terms, to your general way of thinking diseases represent
animal afflictions, and the monkey represented that connection. No
doctor stood in the parking lot with a monkey on a leash; yet in other
terms the event was literal, for doctors feel that they must control the
“animal” in you to heal; and that without their leash the animal nature
(as it is thought of) would run wild. The monkey was also used [as a
symbol] because it is “humanistic,” or possesses what you consider in
cipient human characteristics.
The vocabulary used in the regular classwas interpreted by the psy
che in that manner, and it was literally and symbolically true language.
I was intrigued and surprised by Seths explanation. Vd taken it for

granted that two separate events were involved, one physical and one prob
able~or real in another system. He was saying that both were portions of
one event. This would mean that any event and all of its probable versions
were somehow part of each other. I wondered how many of these we could
glimpse at any given time.
Before sleeping that night I gave myself the suggestion that I’d have
another out-of-body experience, one that would somehow help me study
the nature of events from the inside out. To my disappointment I remem
bered only a brief fragment in the morning. I recalled standing in the mid
dle of my workroom and seeing my friend Sue Watkins in the hall outside
the door. She wore a new slacks suit; the word “slacks” seemed so signifi
cant while I was dreaming that later I specifically mentioned it when I
wrote the incident down in my notebook. Then, though, the affair seemed
so trivial that I wondered why I bothered. I reasoned that if Sue remem
bered anything herself, she’d let me know.
That afternoon I held my creative writing class. Mary came in, burst
ing with excitement. Shed had her second conscious out-of-body experience
the night before. Knowing me, she knew that I， d want a written record. This
was written to record the experience as simply and directly as possible. Her
experience is an excellent example of the joys and tribulations of maintain
ing conscious focus under varying conditions of out-of-body behavior:
“I was dozing on the bed. I repeat, dozing. I heard the national an
them play from the television set, then the T V went off. I rolled over to the
edge of the bed and got up. The loud staticky sounds coming from the set
after the station went off annoyed me; I switched the set off and went back
to bed. I was very sleepy but to my surprise and annoyance, the T V sounds
continued.
“I got up again—and again— to turn the set off. Each time I was pos
itive that it was off, only when I got back into bed the sound continued. I
finally realized what was happening, so I tried an experiment. I rolled off
the bed, stood up, and opened my physical eyes—but I was still on the
bed; I hadn’t moved. I tried this several times, with the same result. “I” was
out of my body and it was still on the bed. I became more alert as I exper
imented, going in and out several times.
“Then I decided to stay out. ‘Jane’s house,’ I thought. Tve got to get
there/ I imagined the inside door in the lower hall in Janes apartment
building. I was there! Now up the steps, calling as loudly as I could, ‘Jane,
Jane.， At the same time I wondered if my body was yelling too, so that any
one at home would be disturbed. Both thoughts amused me.
wJane and Rob were both standing at the top of the stairs. I was
laughing, showing off. ‘Look at me, my second out-of-body. Aren’t you
pleased?，
“Jane said, ‘Great,，in her usual enthusiastic manner, but I felt that a
new exclamation should be coined for the occasion. I looked around, crit
ically trying to check the environment against the usual one. I told Jane
that the apartment looked different, and she asked me how. I looked
around again.
“For one thing, I knew that it was night, yet here the sun was shining
through the windows. For another thing, there were dining rooms all over
the place. I knew that I was seeing things differently than they should be,
and I thought that I should inspect the rest of the place too, to see what
difFerences there were from usual reality.
“Jane and Rob were different, too. They looked younger. Rob began
talking. He said that he was going to Ohio to a plowing contest, and I
thought, ‘Oh brother, Rob, youre never going to believe this probable self
you have/ Then I turned to Jane. She and Rob were both smiling but they
looked blank, somehow, and I knew that I was losing them. I was fully
conscious, though, studying what was going on. ‘Jane, do you know what a
probable self is?， I asked.
174 Chapter 17
“She bobbed her head up and down, saying, ‘Yup.，

“‘What?’ I asked suspiciously, because by then she looked to be in her
early twenties; really all that remained of the Jane I know was her black
hair. She looked as if she didn’t know much of anything, and when she an
swered my question by saying, ‘Slacks， ’ then I knew Yd lost Jane and Rob
completely.
“W ith this, I decided that I ’d go to visit my sister Jean. I had the feel
ing that I didn’t have much time, so I visualized her kitchen, found myself
there, and went up the stairs to her room, calling her name. Jean was in bed,
sleepy and confused. I tried to tell her what was happening but felt that I
had to get back. The T V signal sound that I’d heard earlier now sounded
louder. I called, ‘Gotta go, Jean/ and found myself at my own door.
“I realized that Yd probably have to look at my body in order to get
back into it and thought, ‘Oh, well, I might as well do it and get it over
with. I can do it without getting freaked, I guess.，
“I went in, bracing myself, not knowing how I， d feel, seeing my body.
There I was, on the bed, thrashing around. That tickled me for some rea
son. I dived in on top of myself. Then for a minute it was like wrestling
with another person. I thought, ‘If you’d just hold still and stop fighting! I
really should be neater about this.，I wondered if Yd ever get twisted
around right, then finally I was back in. I opened my physical eyes.”
It was supposed to be a creative writing class, but we discussed

Marys experience. She asked me if I remembered anything and I said no,
nothing but a brief out-of-body involving Sue; but it wasn’t clear at all.
Then I said, “Slacks! There’s something familiar about that, though,” and
I checked my dream notebook. Mary and I just looked at each other for a
minute.
What on earth did that mean? In her experience she asked me what a
probable selfwas and I answered with the seemingly disconnected comment,
“Slacks.” In wy experience I saw Sue wearing a new slacks suit and knew that
the word “slacks” was important~so important that I wrote it down despite
its seeming nonsense. So in some fashion, Mary and I communicated.
We didn’t know until the following Tuesday that we hadn’t been
alone.
I began class as I often did, by asking students about their weeks
dreams. This time I asked if anyone remembered any dreams the night
after our last class. I kept my voice as normal as possible so that no one
would know I had anything particular in mind. Ben waved both arms in
the air immediately and seemed quite excited. “I had a really strange
dream,” he said. He ruffled through a messy-looking dream notebook,
found a sheet of paper, and called out, “Here it is!”
“Okay, Ben first,” I said.

He read the following: “Last Tuesday night after Seth class ... I was
in a sort of half-awake, half-asleep state. In this other state of conscious
ness, I found myself in the ESP class, except that it wasn’t the usual one but
the class in another level of reality. We were discussing adjacent classes, as
we had in the regular class that night. But there was a difference. Our
points of view had changed so that the physical class was considered the
unreal class, and this one was the real class.
“One student, Dick, made a joke about the unreal physical class, but
I dont remember it. A ll I know is that it had something to do with a pic
ture of a pig with stitches through its leg. Dick then tore off the piece of
the picture with the pigs stitched leg. Everyone thought this was very
funny一-myself included. At that point I came out of the whole thing and
went over it all in my mind so I would remember. I felt unusually satisfied
that I had remembered being in this other reality.”
Mary and I both let out delighted whoops of astonishment—and tri
umph. When I read my own notes detailing the “probable class,” Ben was
grinning all over and other class members went searching through their
dream notebooks. Some people hadn’t remembered many dreams for the
week. Some had, but left their notebooks home.
Mary read the notes she’d made on her out-of-body experience the
night of Wednesday, January 15, in which Rob told her that he was going
to a plowing contest: when she read that portion everyone laughed, in
cluding Rob, because he， d never worked a plow in his life. Then one stu
dent, John, raised his hand, grinned, and read a long dream that he’d had
that same night. The whole thing involved Rob and me—in a farmhouse.
Class members were there also.
Still another student read a dream of the same night in which class
members were all in our apartment, getting ready to move us to a farm. In
Johns dream the house was built into a hillside so that it looked to be two
stories, but wasn’t. In this students dream, there were fields around, and a
swimming pool.
The following day another student mailed me this note: “I couldn’t
wait until next weeks class to tell you this. I didn’t remember it at all in
class tonight, but as I was looking through my dream notebook just now,
after class, I came across this dream I had last Tuesday night. I wrote it
down Wednesday morning.
“Dream January 15, 1975：IVe forgotten it but repeated this phrase
over and over so much that at least it remains: I attended a Seth class. This
seems to coincide with the ‘second class， we talked about tonight—and I， m
really freaking out!”
176 Chapter 17
To top it off, Mary had called her sister, Jean, the morning after she
visited her in the out-of-body state. Without saying anything she asked
Jean if she remembered any dreams from the night before. Jean said, “Yeah.
You came and tried to get me out-of-the-body.wJean hadn’t written the
episode down, however.
Its almost impossible to know what really happened, or why certain
data was communicated, while other, seemingly more pertinent information
wasn’t. The word “slacks” for example, was obviously a connective between
Marys experience and my very brief episode with Sue and the slacks of the
same night. Sue remembered nothing. Yet again, I knew that the word
“slacks” was very important~and in Marys experience when she asks me
about probable selves, I answer “slacks.” A bleed-through obviously occurred.
The same thing happened involving the plowing contest. In some
way, this was reflected in the other students’ dreams where they saw us in a
farmhouse, or moving to one.
Such experiences always bring me up short. Its hard to believe that we
understand so little of our own activities as they relate to the dream state.
Levels of interaction and communication obviously occur beyond the nor
mally accepted ones. As long as we consider our usual line of consciousness
as the only normal one, we’ll never know how different levels of perception
and consciousness mix and merge.
Was Bens dream of another class just a coincidence? If so, what a
marvelous, pat coincidence! I suspect that his “pig with stitching” was his
interpretation of my monkey on a leash. In any case, I ， m certain that any
group, social or otherwise, communicates in somewhat the same fashion in
the dream state, where symbols are more mobile, and associations follow a
different kind of organization.
One thing IVe learned: It takes a good amount of conscious time to
keep up with our usually unconscious activities. Once you learn to re
member your dreams, it can easily take an hour a day just to record them,
and this doesn’t include analysis. Out-of-body experiences are something
else again; because we can be in one of many states of consciousness when
were out-of-body, just as we can when were in it.
From the usual point of view, my doctor and monkey in the parking
lot were hallucinations, forming a creative drama as the psyche interpreted
certain information in its own way. Yet from the other side of the picture,
in that other state of consciousness, both the doctor and monkey were
real—and my sleeping physical body seemed like the hallucination. Were
highly prejudiced, perhaps, of necessity at this stage of the game; but we in
sist on interpreting our unofficial experiences from our usually conscious
standpoint.
In any case, while I was trying to write up my dream records that

week and hoping to explore other states of consciousness to a fuller degree,
the telephone was ringing constantly. The world as most people were expe
riencing it was really making itself known. And the episodes people related
seemed sometimes as bizarre as any dream.
C hapter 1 8
Sex and Energy: Some Inventive

Versions, and Seth by the O uijafuls
t was past midnight. Rob had left the house over an hour ago, driving a
I strange woman to a local motel. Or, so I thought. Vd expected him

home within half an hour at most. I was concerned for several reasons.
I kept trying not to be concerned. Besides that, the situation was ludicrous,
and I knew it. So what did I do? I sat down and wrote about it, naturally,
typing as fast as I could. Just to show you that I ，m not blind to my own
foibles, I’m including my original notes about the situation. Even as I
wrote them, I cursed my sense of humor (why wasn’t I more compassion
ate?), yet I couldn’t tell which was funnier~the events or my own present
reactions. This is what I wrote:
uWell, here it is, past midnight, and Rob is down at a local motel.
Hes driving a woman lawyer there. She landed here out of nowhere
tonight, calling, ‘Jane, Jane/ at our door~our living room door after first
knocking at the hallway and study doors. In other words, she just walked
into the hall that divides our two apartments and went wandering around,
knocking at all the doors. We were having a Seth session. The phone had
rung just before we started. Usually we turn it off during a session but we’d
forgotten. So Rob turned the bell off and we began.
“We， d just stopped for a break when we heard the first knock. We ig
nored it. Five or six more knocks at the hall door. Then we heard the door
to our places open—it wasn’t locked. Next, footsteps, and knocks on my
closed study door just across the way, which again we ignored, growing
more irritated. I reached for a cigarette—^quietly~and paused as the foot
steps crossed the hall; this time the knocking began at the locked door to
the living room. We were seated only a few feet away.
“Rob and I stared at each other. Its weird to sit like that, hardly
breathing in your own damn living room. Besides, I was remembering the
phone call we didn’t answer. It crossed my mind that whoever telephoned
180 Chapter 18
wasn’t just going to call back, but were coming here instead. Then from the
hall a plaintive, lost, weak voice came calling, ‘Jane? Jane? Don’t you expect
me? You do expect me, dont you? Jane?，
“I knew that I couldn’t go on with the session anyway, if I didn’t let
whoever it was in. I could feel the trouble. No esoteric flashes were needed;
the voice was enough. I told Rob he， d better open the door. In the mean
time I called out, asking who was there. She answered, but I couldn’t un
derstand her.
“I don’t know if I should laugh or cry. She got on the plane she told
us and came here because Seth told her to; and the Kundalini force was so
strong that during the four-hour flight layoff she had to masturbate over
and over~good God. And later she said that intercourse helps—and here
is Rob, down at the motel with her. So what if she asks him to help her
out? And today I gave an interview for the local paper on open marriage, of
all things. I mean, well, there are limits. And if the old Kundalini force is
driving the good lady lawyer mad, well, what’s a compassionate man to do?
“But regardless, I think its hysterical that a woman lawyer should just
come here and tell us how madly she masturbated on the plane; except that
shes a lovely woman, in her forties and harried; in agony, and as always I
was touched and wanted to help. But I thought, as she told me how sane
and well balanced she was,4Look, lady, well-balanced people don’t go barg
ing in on strangers because inner voices tell them to.， She tilted her head to
one side and said gently, ‘What? What? Am I in the wrong place? Is this the
right Jane Roberts?，
“I don’t know if it was the right Jane Roberts, but its the only Jane
Roberts IVe got, I thought. I said, 4Look, forget the inner voices. Do you
want a cup of coffee?，It was a damn cold night, I kept thinking. Some
thing to eat?, I asked.
“I think it’s mean of me to have such a sense of humor, but there it
was— the big-boned, black-haired attractive woman and the ludicrous sit
uation: a comic tragedy. And she’d been sick. But her reality was her own
and she was closed to anything I might say. I knew it; felt it at once.
“And as she talked I felt that she was asking for it all; the dramatic vis
its to various psychics she told us about; the excitement; the combined hor
ror and delight of her predicament; because, as she told us, she was really
so fastidious. But she knew that the Kundalini force had been released in
her, and now she couldn’t control it and it came out in sexual pressure that
h a d to fin d release.
“Rob related to her better than I did. Yet I did have a brief Seth ses
sion for her. She barely listened. She didn’t want to be helped. Her situa
tion was too deliciously dramatic to give up. Seth told her that the
Kundalini force was the natural life force; that she formed her own reality;
Sex and Energy 181
that she was fighting her own energy instead of going along with it; mak
ing divisions where there were none. But she wouldnt listen.
“Her fiance knew where she was: this time—and all the other times
when she flew across the country to one psychic or another. Since we obvi
ously couldn’t help, she decided to visit a famous Indian guru as soon as she
left us. And we weren’t to worry. She’d find a place to stay for the night;
walk through the cold night air till she found a taxi stand; bundle up so
that she’d be warm.
“Yeah, lady-o; I suggested a taxi. Rob said that the least he could do
was drive her to a motel. That was well over an hour ago. Now, writing
this, I wonder what the devil is going on down at that motel. Is she trying
to explain, desperately, anxiously, earnestly? Is she mentally disturbed
enough to get into serious trouble? I suggested she see a psychologist, but
she refused. Can Rob handle it? I feel he can handle just about anything.
Just the same, I wish he， d get home. And the big question is: If the lady
lawyer is in such agony, well—should Rob help out if he can; and if he did,
how could a compassionate psychic wife get mad? Easy.”
Well, Rob came home just about when Yd finished writing the above.
Our car hadn’t started. He wanted to call a taxi but she insisted that the
cold night air would do her good, so the two of them had walked over a
mile to the motel; then Rob had to walk back.
My feelings about the affair were highly ambiguous and contradic
tory. I read my original notes in my creative writing class as an example of
on-the-spot writing, but I had Rob describing the episode to the expansion
of consciousness class. One thing did upset me. Like so many others, the
lady lawyer was afraid of the life force itself, the source of all power. She be
lieved that it had to be handled with kid gloves or it would destroy her.
There was no trust in the spontaneity of being. She couldn’t take it for
granted that the life force gives us life and energy easily and naturally.
Instead she followed a dogma that defines energy as Kundalini, which
must be released in certain prescribed ways. Take one wrong step, get off
your inner balance a figurative half inch, and that energy can destroy you.
I，m convinced that such ideas are a distortion of the original revelations be
hind them. But whenever the lady tried to practice her profession, the
Kundalini, she believed, arose to strike her down.
On the other hand, the whole thing was an emotional con game that
she was playing with herself and others; and it depended upon certain
other ideas and contrasts that w ill be discussed later in this chapter. Again,
in fact, the month was going to present us with experiences that all tied in
with each other. A ll of them showed different versions of main issues that
at first seemed separate.
182 Chapter 18
We were very busy. The beginning of February we decided to start

house hunting in earnest. Rob finished the drawings for my poetry book,
Dialogues ofthe Soul and M ortal Selfin Time, and the diagrams for Adven
tures in Consciousness. As soon as these were mailed we began watching ads
and calling agencies.
We took afternoons to drive around the city and nearby towns,
checking houses that had been listed for sale. As we did, I was struck more
and more by the resemblance between our inner and exterior interests and
activities. When Rob and I drove into a neat sparkling area of suburban
homes, for example, seeing the ranch houses with the small yards, hedges,
garages, kiddy-cars in driveways, to us they represented cozy ingrown
ideas—the neighborhoods being the materialization of the beliefs of the
people who lived in them. Unfair on my part, perhaps; but that’s what I
felt. And Rob and I would never be comfortable there.
Then there were houses more to our liking~big sprawling things with
a certain antiquated style that was somehow timeless; large private yards,
high-ceilinged rooms with soft white walls and rich dark wooden floors; but
these required upkeep, even a maid or yard man. And the houses seemed to
demand a kind of formality~hostess gowns and not my habitual dunga
rees. So while those houses intrigued me, the fit wasn’t right.
But I saw that were each surrounded by the materialized versions of
our ideas of wealth and power, hope and despair, and the objects about us
stand in one way or another for our beliefs and our methods of handling
life’s energy. If were afraid of life’s energy, then we hoard what we have,
afraid of not getting more, yet we often use it in ways disastrous to our
selves because of our distrust. O r we hurt ourselves in such a way that our
power is short-circuited.
As we were in the process of house hunting, for example, a well-
known young classic guitarist attended class and visited us privately. His
music was more than delightful; it was full of power and vitality. He
thought of energy as the power to make music; to move others. The life
force was to be expressed, not inhibited. He was free to grow into his own
power. It was the repression of that force, not its release, that was bother
ing the lady lawyer.
But sex seemed to be the subject matter of the month. Again, from
my original notes: “I just had one of the funniest, most exuberant, most
tragic phone calls that IVe ever received. Unbelievable, the way it relates to
psychic politics and shows how our inner ways of dealing with our selves
regulate our methods of coping with the world, our families, and social
lives.”
Sex and Energy 183
The phone rang. I answered it. The womans voice was obviously old,
but strong. Her tones were imperious, demanding, expecting service, and
no nonsense.
And what a tale, worthy of a novel! My caller, the heroine, was in her
seventies. She started in at once, saying: “What would you say about a sit
uation where someone discovered that their spouse of some fifty years had,
all that time, indulged himself with all the filth of the whorehouses? That
he had, all that time, embarked into the underworld of homosexuality; had
oral sex often, and then, not satisfied, had to masturbate? Because he knew
that those women were evil, ruled by elementals, and yet he couldn’t stay
away from them?”
I was sipping coffee. I still had over an hour of writing time to put in
and the days correspondence to do, but instantly I was caught up by the
woman’s vitality and fascinated by the contrasts shed set up in her life. She
went on, endlessly it seemed, to describe the husband (hers, of course) in
various situations and positions, each involving remarkable sexual ap
petites: Satisfying them had been his hobby all those years, while hers had
been joining spiritualistic and psychic societies.
Between the two of them, they’d managed to probe with energetic
zeal into the two-fold dimensions of soul and sex, because they saw these
areas as definitely opposed to each other. She was the good woman, the
family pillar, the sensitive psychic, believer in God and purity~and he was
the wandering husband, caught up in the “filthy stinking holes of the pros
titutes* world and the ungodly stinking playgrounds of the devil.wBut he
bribed one attendant too many and the word got out. Worse, a whore
house was raided, and he was nabbed with the rest of the wiggling catch.
The townspeople of their small New England village were snickering, she
said, and the Elks would kick him out if word got to them of his nefarious
activities.
So what did I think, she wanted to know.
“About which?” I asked.
“A ll of it. Any of it,” she said. “Oral emission. I， m an educated
woman. You dont have to be afraid to use the phrase.”
“Well, its great. I don’t see anything wrong with it,” I began.
“Are you telling me that I have to smile and accept it when my hus
band does it with a girl who does it with another girl at the same time—
while another one watches?”
“That’s a different question,” I protested. I was having trouble trying
to keep up, and it was an effort to imagine all those bodies doing what she
said they were doing. And I kept thinking: You form your own reality too,
Jane. So why are you getting all these wild calls? In the meantime she went
184 Chapter 18
on describing her husbands further exploits, which were certainly remark

able for a seventy-year-old man. And it wasn’t a put-on.
She mentioned now, as she hadn’t earlier, the psychic visions she’d had
through the years—all correct—a glimmer of the whorehouse steps, with
her husband being ingloriously assisted down them, too drunk to walk
alone. “I thought you insisted earlier that you hadn’t known?” I asked.
“I didn’t believe what I was seeing,” she said.
She continued: “Then after I discovered what was going on, when I
was told, by others of course, I confronted him, but he denied it. He lied
over and over again,” here her voice grew hard and revengeful, “so I said,
‘You’re lying in the face of Almighty God, mocking His truth. He should
s trik e y o u dead w h e re y o u sta n d , re e k in g in y o u r f ilt h / ”
“Now, just wait a minute,” I cried, growing angry myself, seeing her
in my minds eye confronting him that way~and with both of them
strangers, disturbing my afternoon. “That’s worse than infidelity as far as
I’m concerned.”
She wouldn’t be interrupted. “Wait,” I said, sharply. She shut up.
“Listen,” I said “what right have you to call down a gods wrath to destroy
a man? And why do you think that a god would do it anyhow? What kind
of a god would strike a man dead because an enraged wife wants him pun-
ished?”
“But he defied the truth.” Then, not stopping, voice shaking with vir
tuous rage, she went on: “And he said, he said, that suddenly as I stood
there he saw his entire filthy career through my eyes— — through my eyes—
and even back through past reincarnations. Now, how do you explain
that?”
She wanted me to say that he saw his guilt in its true light, reflected
through her pure spirit or something. But anyhow, she didn’t give me a
chance to answer but went on: “And his homosexuality~”
This time she paused and I managed to say, “Homosexuality isn’t
evil.”
“Well, what am I to do?” she demanded. “People are beginning to
find out and I can’t shield him any longer.”
“Why are you still with him, if he offends you so?”
“Because I wont leave a sinking ship,” she said, bitterly. “He’ll just
sink to the gutter all the way. He says that Ym the only good thing that ever
happened to him.”
“Well, maybe he， d be happier in the gutter,” I said, wickedly.
She snorted. “He says that the whores are controlled by elementals.”
“Look,” I said, “no one is wicked and evil and lousy all through, in
the terms youre speaking of. If he thinks that prostitutes are filthy, that’s
his belief, and yours too, I guess. But it has little to do with any of the
Sex and Energy 185
ladies involved. But while each of you shares those beliefs, you’ll be caught
in a dilemma between purity and sex, depravity and spirituality; caught in
between, where you can’t win. Examine your beliefs. You said that you read
Seths The Nature ofPersonal Reality. Well, do the exercises suggested in it.
Discover what you really believe, and why.”
I felt slightly triumphant, just to get a word or so in edgewise. At the
same time, I saw clearly how this woman and her husband stood together,
between God and Satan, each of them believing that sex was sinful—good
women didn’t enjoy it; only prostitutes had oral sex—and husband and
wife each of them played the opposing role to the hilt. But money and
power and prestige were also involved: the prostitutes and homosexuals
and “dirty holes of iniquity” stood in hilarious contrast to the social orga
nizations to which they both belonged, the business and civil groups, and
the wealthy, prosperous citizens. These beliefs had little to do with any par
ticular church or club, or for that matter, with any particular pimp or pros
titute. One meeting with a wealthy, well-appointed call girl would shatter
the wife’s stereotyped belief to some extent, because in her mind the two
cant go together.
Respectability and godliness are so intertwined in her mind that its
almost impossible for her to think of one without the other. It was precisely
her husbands double life that so shocked her and brought about her sense
of enraged betrayal; the same double quality that probably provided the
spice and forbidden sense of evil accomplishment to him~To have com
merce with prostitutes and then crawl into an immaculately appointed bed
with his pure wife in a house that was the material symbol of respectability!
So he was “evil” for both of them and she was their joint conscience.
W hile she well knew what he’d been up to, she’d kept silent for some
forty-odd years. And even now, recounting her visions of his iniquities, she
could say that she hadn’t really believed them; hadn’t really known. And he,
knowing of her psychic abilities, performed knowing full well that at some
level she knew. So she certainly gave silent consent, growing furious only
when the inner implied conditions were broken.
It became a public affair~secret no longer, out in the open. Besides,
they were older now. Sexual promiscuity of that kind in a younger man can
be considered manly by some; other men can envy even as they blame. But
in an old man the behavior becomes something to snicker about, and
therefore not quite as evil. We don’t think that things are evil and honestly
fiinny at the same time. And now the lady was also forced to publicly en
counter a situation she’d actually condoned in her way for years.
M y recent lady caller had been a lawyer. This woman was a designer.
But I couldn’t help comparing them. Both were afraid of energy, both iden
tified it to some extent as sexual and therefore bad, disastrous, degrading~
186 Chapter 18
the one “forced” to masturbate and the other forced to see sex ruin her
good husband. These attitudes rested on beliefs taught by some religions
for centuries—the self is evil, the body a vehicle of decay, the earthy must
be transmuted into the pure and good. Mans natural vitality becomes a
force to be feared and disciplined, a pressure, an energy to fight against,
rather than a creative living power shared with all of life.
So I told her what I thought and she took it, though with a good
amount of sputtering. At least I gave her my honest opinion and recom
mended that she work with her beliefs. I don’t know if I got through to her
or not, but I suspect that I did. She called me after reading my books, so
she must have had some idea what my response would be. And she was a
vigorous, bristly woman: There was hope for her.
As I hung up and told Rob about the call, I learned something about
myself, too. Earlier Yd dubbed the first lady “the masturbating lady
lawyer.” Now describing the above dialogue, I found myself at my humor
ous best. At the same time I was thinking, “TThis isn’t very kind of me. To
her, the circumstances certainly dont seem very funny.wBut as soon as I
thought that, the whole affair seemed funnier, more tragic, yet more hilar
ious at the same time. Yd felt guilty about the lady lawyer for the same rea
son.
But I understood, as I heard myself talking to Rob, that I felt guilty
only when I judged myself against another definition of goodness or kind
ness besides my own. Whenever I did that I got off the track. My compas
sion and humor existed together. Its the entire human element that is so
perplexing, vast, humorous, and tragic all at once. To some extent, my
humor helps me avoid pitfalls, and lets me help others to see their lives in
better perspective.
Then I understood something else: The phone calls, visits, and letters
were falling into patterns, just as the subjective events of my life had been
doing. They came in clusters, dealing with certain particular questions and
subject matter. Each call gave me the opportunity to see how various peo
ple organized exterior reality according to inner politics. Amazing that I
hadn’t seen the connections earlier.
I，
d been brooding about the writing time lost—•yet Yd already begun
to write up the last phone call. And presented with the voice on the phone,
I ’m more or less forced to deal with people directly and to put theory into
practice. So I wondered: In some funny fashion do I sit waiting for the
phone to ring? Number please? And for a voice from out of the universe
calling with a question that Ym meant to answer?
Most of the calls never appear in my writing at all, of course. Often I
take a half hour or so to help someone, wondering if I really have. And IVe
seen many such people make some amazing creative adjustments in their
Sex and Energy 187
lives. Still, some part of me needs the quiet and peace of my library. I like
to retreat to the psyches secret recesses. It also occurred to me that my
“double” was in the library, peacefully going about her work, even when I
answered the telephone.
As I was musing about it all, the phone rang again. This time I was
tempted not to answer, but I did. The caller was a man who told me that
the night before Seth had communicated with him through the Ouija
board. He， d read Seths statement about communicating only through me
to protect the integrity of the material. So my caller wanted to know who
or what moved the Ouija for him.
I explained that since the Seth books were published, Seths were pop
ping up all over, which was okay, but they weren't my Seth. People were
using Seth as a symbol, which was all right with him; a symbol of higher
levels of consciousness. I also told him a b o u t Adventures in Consciousness,
in which I gave my ideas about such trance or Ouija personalities.
I hung up, shaking my head. It certainly seemed that the phone was
ringing more since Vd found my library. Certainly more strangers were
finding their way to our apartments. Peoples questions were toppling over
and over in my mind, and for the first time I seriously considered getting
an unlisted telephone number.
In the meantime I kept thinking about the people who called or
wrote, and their problems. The next day, as I reread the earlier material on
strands of consciousness, some new ideas came to me: Its not so much the
events of our lives that compose our mental experience, as the level of con
sciousness were in when we experience the events. I remember how every
thing before my eyes seemed to change in my altered state in front of the
supermarket. The physical data was the same as before. The contents of the
world didn’t gain or lose an inch, in physical terms. Yet qualitatively every
thing changed to such a degree that the world was entirely different and
richer. The buildings and people were more fully dimensioned. In my al
tered state, more was physically apparent. Yet even then I knew that others
about me, in the usual state of consciousness, were seeing the same world I
had seen before the switch. Nothing was added to world, and I didn’t
know how much I would retain when I returned to “normal” either.
What I had retained was memory and fleeting flashes in which the ex
perience splashed out momentarily into a day and then vanished~and the
library~because in some way that I still didn’t understand, the library was
born out of that altered vision. But I was becoming certain that states of
consciousness help mold events and are invisibly a part of them.
Difficulties at one level of awareness disappear at other levels. Cer
tain “negative” experiences simply dissolve and contradictions disappear.
We just haven’t been taught to vary our own experience-levels, to travel to
188 Chapter 18
one state of consciousness to find the answers to problems existing at an

other level.
From my own experiences, I also knew that these various states pos
sess different characteristics and creative specializations. Using altered states
of consciousness, we can experience events from different sides—and if we
knew how to utilize these conditions, we could conceivably circumnavigate
events, seeing them from inside and outside space and time, glimpsing
their greater reality. Its quite possible that difficulties in our lives represent
specific areas in which our vision is truly limited to a too-confined focus.
I was thinking of all this and trying to connect it with the problems
people wrote or called about when~you guessed it— the phone rang. A
girl said, “Have you any idea what’s going on here?” Her voice brimmed
with excitement, yet half-whispered, as if afraid of its own words.
“No,” I said, and in hushed conspiratorial tones she told me the fol
lowing story. She and her brother read my books, and got themselves a
Ouija board. On the first night Seth came through. On the second, he said
that he’d speak through the girl, whom I’ll call Loretta. On the third night,
still through the board, Seth began to dictate a novel.
“Great,” I said. UA good creative product is terrific, no matter where
it comes from .
There was a pause. I complimented Loretta and her brother on their
creativity and inventiveness, their curiosity and flexibility of consciousness,
before broaching the possibility that their Seth wasn’t my Seth. wWhich is
all to the good,” I said, “because you’re opening up areas of your own psy
ches. That portion probably identifies itself as Seth because of your respect
for the books. Its saying, ‘Listen, this is important. I come from a different
level of awareness than usual.， ”
“But its Seth,” she said, her voice dropping.
I told her to read Adventures in Consciousness, and tried to explain to
her in a few words how it applied to her experience, then went on. “Look,”
I said, “you’ve opened up your own creative channels. The various portions
of the psyche use different languages. Don’t interpret them all literally.
You’ve been given the idea for a novel. That’s an influx of creativity from
one level to another.”
“Wait a minute, would you please?” she asked, and then her brother,
Dennis, came to the phone. He went through the entire episode again.
I tried a slightly different approach. “Look, the books are helping
people realize that they have other possible mental focuses, other kinds of
perceptive consciousnesses. Seth is serving as a symbol of higher levels of
awareness, which is great. Use the symbol, but dont take it literally.”
Dennis kept saying that he understood, and following this by saying,
“But he keeps saying hes Seth•” Then he went on to say, “I， ve left my job
Sex and Energy 189
and Lorettas left hers. Were going to write this novel. The whole thing is
directing our lives.”
wWell, it shouldn’t,” I said.
“It shouldn’t? Why not?” he asked.
His surprise surprised me. “Why should it?” I said. “Take the material
and use it, like you would any other creative product. You both probably
wanted to leave your jobs and do something else. So if you decide to write
a book, great. If so, the material gave you an opportunity, and an excuse if
you needed it. Maybe it shook you loose from a rut. But if you treat your
source as if it were omnipotent, you’re in for a letdown.”
I was tired explaining. My voice trailed off. They were disappointed.
We hung up.
I thought about the call, decided to write notes about it, when the
telephone rang again. This time I almost decided to let it ring. What the
devil was going on? The calls were coming as fast as the automatic material
from the library did. I had a good clue with that connection, but I didn’t
pick it up until the next call was over.
It was a young mans voice. “I ’m Saint Paul, calling for instructions.”
“What?” I asked. Yd heard him all right. I just needed a minutes time.
“This is hard to explain,” he said. “But I， m Saint Paul, reincarnated. Ym
ready to embark on my mission, and Im calling you and Seth for instruc-
tions.” He spoke in a quiet, quite rational voice.
And suddenly, it was simple. I knew exactly how to handle it. I said,
“When Im on the phone under such circumstances, I speak for Seth and
myself too.” And as I said it, I realized that it was true.
“Okay,” he said. “I ’ll do whatever you say•”
“First, get a job.”
There was silence at his end, and I plunged into it. “You cant under
stand people and help them if you dont share their workaday world. Don’t
stay home, brooding about your mission•”
“A ll right,” he said bravely.
“And you must understand: Saint Paul is a symbol in your psyche.
You must find out what he represents.” And miraculously I got through to
him.
“I understand,” he said. “I understand and thank you.”
He hung up, and the clues I’d sensed earlier came to the forefront of
my mind. O f course! The callers and the visitors were ... the other side of
the library; they call with certain questions, and these serve as impetus for
library material. That is, my desire to help propels me into the library.
A ll of these people in their own way were super-real, exaggerating cer
tain normal-enough characteristics until they could no longer be ignored.
The early library material said that Vd be presented with experiences I
190 Chapter 18
needed, to ask the proper questions. But Vd thought that psychic experi
ences of the more conventional kind were meant. Instead, the callers were
showing me psychic politics in action in the usual world. They were show
ing me how they related psychic events to the normal framework of reality.
They were strong vigorous people in their way, taught though, to in
terpret all events literally. It was often this very attempt to translate psychic
events into usual terms that made them appear so strange to themselves or
their fellowmen.
Yet the library material that I hoped would provide some hints, came
in dribbles, now and then; suddenly but in snatches. Seth continued to
dictate The ''Unknown'Reality, but Rob was so busy that he didn’t get a
chance to type many of the sessions; and I cant read the shorthand system
hes devised. So while I suspected that Seth might be adding some high
lights on the present situation, I didn’t get to read those sessions until some
time later.
In the meantime, we kept on house hunting.
C hapter 1 9
I H ear a Voice and There’s

N o O ne There, and O ffic ia l and
U no fficial Sequences
TT ike everyone else, I have two sources of information: inner and

\ outer. That winter, outer data about the world came as fast as I could
1 J handle it; from th e callers and correspondence; and from our expe
riences as we ventured into the world of real estate. Besides, we received the
usual news of the world through the communications media.
When viewed through the regular focus of consciousness, all of this
information adds up to a rather frightening picture: evidence of overpopu
lation, pollution, ignorance一the race seemingly headed toward extinction
either through war or mismanagement of the planet. This picture itself
generates uncertainty and fear, for within it the individual seems threat
ened and unsafe. The evidence is all there and constantly reinforces itself.
That is one picture of the world, legitimate enough at the usual level
of consciousness. Sometimes its all we can see, until gradually any coun
tering data becomes invisible and no hope shows. Yet at this level, only por
tions of events are perceived, and the most disastrous probabilities are used
in making forecasts. The same events, perceived at a different level of con
sciousness, might be far different, showing solutions not visible before.
In fact, I became more and more convinced that a different kind of
earthly reality existed at other levels of consciousness, as legitimate as this
one—the same world, really, only a better version. Granted such a world
existed, tuned in to a particular level of consciousness, then how could we
learn to inhabit it in normal reality?
Even at our usual level, our beliefs and attitudes permit an endless va
riety of experiences and alternate views. The dowager and her promiscuous
husband are locked into a good-and-evil framework that crowds about
them all the time, and colors their most mundane moments. They also see
the world through that tint. Their ideas in politics and social matters w ill
192 Chapter 19
follow the same line, and their world w ill be experienced as a battleground
between good and evil.
Others may focus instead upon war. A father may be in one war and
his sons in succeeding ones. Other families may never have direct war ex
perience although they live in the same historic period~to them wars w ill
be on the sidelines of experience. But each of us, no matter how free we
feel, knows that others in this world are not. And to that extent, we share
the same reality.
I was thinking of all this when a really odd event happened. It was in
significant enough; many have had the same kind of experience. I was
struck by its vividness, though, and as it turned out the episode triggered
some library material that gave me a much better idea of alternate worlds.
It was February 15. We were tired from working and house hunting
and decided to take naps before dinner. As usual, I went into our bedroom,
in the east apartment, closing the apartment door. Rob napped on the cot
in his studio, in the west apartment. He closed the apartment and studio
doors. I puttered around a bit first: watered the plants, sat on the edge of
the bed and read a few minutes. Then I lay down. The phone rang four
times then stopped, and I fell asleep.
I may have half awakened once, then I had a dream that I could
hardly remember. I was in a park and thought of staying awhile but de
cided not to, since it was growing dark. Someone sat down on a bench
with me and began to read the mail that Vd put beside me. I protested vig
orously, pleased with myself for expressing my annoyance rather than hid
ing it. Then Rob came along and said, “Let’s get our stuff together and get
the hell out of here.”
Then Robs real voice called, “Hon,” from the study outside the bed
room. I awakened, sat up, yelled, “Okay, Im awake,” to let him know Yd
heard him. Then I got up, wondering why he didn’t come all the way into
the bedroom to waken me as he usually did when we took separate naps.
To my astonishment, the door to the apartment was still closed. We
always left both apartment doors open unless we were sleeping, because the
hallway between the two had a separate door to an outside hall. Why on
earth had Rob closed it again behind him?
I opened it and saw that the other apartment door was closed too. I
went inside~and Robs studio door was closed. Just then it opened. He
came out, rubbing his eyes. “Oh, youre up,” he said, surprised. “I just got
up myself•”
“What do you mean? You just came in and called me, didn’t you?”
Rob swore that he hadn’t. He said that he， d awakened a few moments
earlier and thought of getting up to call me, but that was all. I shook my
head: I could hardly believe it, but obviously there hadn’t been any voice to
/ H ear a Voice and There’s No One There 193
hear! Yet Robs seemingly physical voice was what awakened me~from a
dream in which a dream-Rob was also speaking. The real voice was easily
distinguishable from the dream one. And I yelled out, physically, in reply.
After dinner, I wrote down a list of possibilities:
1. I hallucinated the voice. If so, it was a splendid hallucination,

causing physical action. There was nothing to distinguish it from
the real thing. If Rob had been up when I got up, I never would
have questioned his calling me, granting he，d opened the doors.
2. Rob was in an out-of-body state. He came into the room while I
was still asleep, spoke to me “astrally，
” and I translated the voice
into physical terms.
3. Robs mental intent to awaken me was transmitted telepathically
and I hallucinated the voice in response.
4. Despite what I think happened, I never called out physically at all;
and the voice and my reply were both hallucinatory. I can’t buy
this.
I finally decided that telepathically I picked up Robs intent to call me

and then hallucinated the sound of his voice, reacted as if I， d heard a real
sound, and awakened. But I still wasn’t satisfied. Then, watching television
that evening, I saw a scene in which a comedian burned his pant legs—and
suddenly I was sure that I could smell the smoke. I knew that this “fake
sense data,” as I called it, was related with hearing Robs voice. But how?
The next day was Sunday, usually a free day for us. Late in the after
noon when I sat down to read a magazine, I realized that there was some li
brary material ready for me, so I went to my desk. I didn’t see my double
in the library or any other images. Instead I just took the material down as
it came, as fast as I could type—material certainly prepared at another level
of consciousness, but “packaged” for this one.
From the Library
The world as we experience it is the result of neurological conclusions

reached by acknowledging certain sequences or series of stimuli and ignor
ing others, in line with learned models given to us in childhood. A kind of
learned prejudiced is developed in which only a given series or sequence of
neurological activity is accepted. The other quite-as-legitimate series re
main almost as ghost images. We then organize our experience and shape
events following the prime series.
194 Chapter 19
There is a correlation here with infinite and infinitesimal number pat

terns, or what can be called unofficial series. These, followed, would bring
a different kind of events into experience, or events that would be other
versions of the ones we recognize. The accepted, neurologically accepted
series generally become habitual, and form a kind of perceptual path. This
path is supported to some degree by hidden values or unofficial events and
series that hide within the prime sequence. The brilliance and immediacy
of the prime series washed out these other hidden or minor sequences. In
this way, there is little difficulty in distinguishing the biologically accepted
series from those others that are biologically latent.
We accept verbal but not telepathic communication, for example,
even though telepathy is biologically built into the body mechanism. We
simply ignore those neurological stimulations and make no effort to stabi
lize or maintain such data. Often, however, we do use such information
subconsciously, but it does not become a part of our established sense pic
ture. That sequence, once activated, would automatically trigger other se
ries with which it is connected, all dealing with what we would call
unofficial information.
Usually these unofficial perceptions aren’t hooked up to our sense
organs; that is, we ignore the data and the cues: We dont plug in, so that
the information doesn’t become solid sense data. When it does, for one
reason or another, our lack of experience often causes us to run the two
sequences together and bring in the unofficial information on the official
line: The hidden values rise momentarily into prominence where they
conflict for our attention with prime sense data. Actually there is a clear
distinction between the two. Beside this, there are many alternate series,
though many of these would make no sense in our accepted sequences.
Events, for example, might be too large in space and time, or too small,
for our comprehension.
In my experience of yesterday I switched to another close neurologi
cal series or sequence, where telepathy is prime data and directed thoughts
are heard mentally. Through lack of experience I switched and mixed the
neurological series, turning the information over to the physical senses the
ears which then hallucinated the sound. Then I responded physically.
Sounds have to be physically heard to be considered real in our ac
cepted framework of reality, so I switched the information from its native
sequence to the official one. The episode was important, though, because I
did pick up Robs inner word and intent so clearly. His intent, to get me
up, was implied in the word “Hon,” so that I not only picked up the word
but the intention. That particular sequence also includes precognitive in
formation, and a host of related unofficial events that are connected with
our accepted sequence.
I H ear a Voice and There’s No One There 195
My own inner hearing is acute. This simply means that I ， ve activated

this other sequence and then directed it through a ghost version of sound.
Usually this is interpreted by me as inner sound. Yesterday my reception
was so clear that in my confusion I exteriorized the data and mixed the se
ries. It was Robs love for me, as he awakened, that I first reacted to. This
unofficial series would build up an entirely different view of reality and
events. It would include some of our accepted events and exclude others,
just as our series is a specialized version built up through discriminations.
In the unofficial series that I was involved with, telepathic communi
cation is prime event and verbal communication is the ghost version: the
so-called astral form is the perceived event and the physical body is the
ghost version. Obviously we can become aware of the unofficial series to
some extent, since it is so related to our own. In the same way, there are
hidden structures in our cells, invisible in our series. They w ill only appear
in sequences that recognize them, while some structures visible to us w ill
be invisible in still other sequences.
So-called expansion of consciousness involves awareness of these
other sequences that escape our time/space boundaries and the insertion of
these into our regular series. When this is done, however, the time-space re
lationships within our experience w ill change (in the same way that added
numbers alter any sequence). This addition opens up our reality, even
though it is still possible for others to follow the old accepted series in
which such experience w ill not show.
[I typed this material down as quickly as I could. Then Rob and I
went for a ride. When we returned, I knew at once there that more mater
ial was ready for me. I got my coffee and cigarettes, put another piece of
paper in the typewriter, and began again:]
These official and unofficial, recognized and unrecognized sequences
and series are the basis for all systems of reality, each system being cued into
its own sequences, even while ultimately each one is related to every other.
The thickness of our reality is actually composed of many unofficial reali
ties, ghost sequences from our standpoint. A different system of reality en
tirely results according to which sequences are focused upon. That is, our
prime sequence is an unofficial part of other systems. Each of the se
quences, while being a part of others, is also (somewhere) a prime series.
Our own physical reality of objects and time appears unofficially in
other sequences, as a hidden value.
These series maintain their own integrity but they are not closed:
time-space relationships are scaled, each system using its own sequences. If
you imagine the official numbers 1 to 10 in a row, then there would be an
infinite number of unofficial 1， s hidden in the 1 you saw, and an infinite
number of spaces between the official 1 and 2. The position of the 1 on the
196 Chapter 19
paper would represent our sense data world, while the invisible 1s behind
the official 1 would represent the official Is hidden values and infinite
probabilities.
Two (2) on the paper would represent the system adjacent to us in
space-time, and behind (or within it) would be its infinite hidden values.
More than this, of course, there would be a 1 on top of the 1 we see on the
paper (that is, above the paper), but we can’t see it. We would be between
the 1 on the paper and the 1 above it, and to that 1 (above the paper) we
are a hidden value and a probable system, a variation of its own. Moving
sideways from 1 to 2, again, there would be infinite spaces on a three-
dimensional level separating us from 2 on the horizontal plane, represent
ing whatever adjacent motion our universe might take in space and time as
we understand it.
W ithin any given system, there are all kinds of choices available. Out
of an infinite number of source sequences, we choose the key ones that
compose our experience, bringing these into prime position. These se
quences act like dimensional pointers, directing the manifestation of en
ergy and the dimensional attitudes that it w ill express. The stance of space
and time w ill change according to the sequential patterns and~important
point~there are infinite chances for new tie-ins of sequences, forming new
realities at both infinite and infinitesimal points.
These sequences or series form “orders.” Orders are fields formed by
the intersection points within sequences that, merging, give a particular di
mensional picture within which certain kinds of experience are possible.
The word “orders” is used here synonymously with systems, implying a
quality of seeming permanence resting on infinite variables.
Sumari as I use it is a code unscrambler, breaking up data like a laser
beam, showing the fragments that make up our whole, releasing the psy
chological components.
Aware-ized energy or consciousness is the source, and organizing ele
ment of these systems. Im learning to experience different sequences at a
primitive level, almost in leapfrog fashion.
Its significant that we apply numbers to time, but as there are unrec
ognized spaces between numbers, there are unrecognized spaces (psycho
logically invisible) between or within moments, and some of the events of
our bodies are “too small” for us to follow, focused as we are in our prime
series. These body events actually are winfinitesimal but infinite,” following
their own patterns that merge with ours. Cellular comprehension reaches
into what we think of as the distant past and distant future: These form an
ever-present now at that level, however, representing interactions occurring
in cellular stances too small for us to follow.
I H ear a Voice and Theres No One There 197
There, cells are built up on one level just as universes are at another;
and that sequence also has its black holes, white dwarfs, and so forth, only
we perceive them from our sequence as biological structures of minute in
corporation. In a manner of speaking, our kind of consciousness twinkles
from that sequence, or rather rides it, aware only of certain “peaks” within
it which we recognize as events because they are large enough to fit into our
scale series.
I read the material over: In my supermarket experience had I mixed se

quences, then? Did that seemingly super-real world exist as fact when we
activated certain neurological responses? Apparently Vd done the same
thing in a different way when I heard what I thought was Robs physical
voice. I still wasn’t sure what happened when I smelled the smoke as the co
median on the television show burned his trousers; yet I could almost feel
the connection.
Still, to help people in a practical way, youd need some kind of per
manent touch with the world that was larger than our own—not just a few
glimpses. That thought reminded me of the calls and letters. But
overnight, it seemed, the tenor of these changed at least for a while. There
were simple appreciative letters and calls; people telephoned to tell me how
the Seth material was changing their lives for the better. I cheered up.
C h apter 2 0
W e M ove (in M ore Ways

T han O ne), and “Special Places”
urely we usually just skip over the surface of our o w n experiences and
S seldom see the dazzling undersides of ordinary events. A ll of us move

from one house or apartment to another, from one neighborhood or
state or country to another, so caught up in the surface issues that we never
notice the even greater momentum and mobility beneath. Yet now I’m sure
that ahead of time we attract the new neighborhood or location, and repel
others, and that we move in our psyches long before we pack one load of
books or clothes.
We only moved from one neighborhood to another, yet we traveled
through endless probabilities, it seems, and we could feel the odd stretch
ings and snappings of inner boundaries every time we stood looking up at
a strange porch that could, if we wanted it, be ours. We could feel, but
hardly verbalize, the symbolizing that went on constantly aswe interpreted
the physical locations in terms of our inner leanings, reacting to psychic
magnetisms so that we liked or disliked a house at once.
Seth was still dictating aUnknownwRealityyand he delivered some ex
cellent material connecting moving with probabilities, explaining how we
choose one probability over another, and showing the rich psychic inter
twining that connect one probability with another. That material is in
uUnknownfReality, along with Robs notes concerning our experiences as
we house hunted. Seth was using our private experiences more than ever to
show how even the most mundane situations are connected with our be
liefs about reality in general, and how the simplest move sets the forces of
the psyche into motion and stirs others to respond. We never asked Seth to
direct us to a house, although he did give some fascinating background
material on several places and offered us some general advice.
In any case, we found one house that we liked particularly. It was a
bungalow, about fifty years old, with a deep private yard replete with a
200 Chapter 20
decayed garden, and a broken statue that had once stood by a fountain in
the empty cement pond.
We decided to bid on the house. The bid was turned down. The next
day we were out again, driving around, checking more ads, when Rob sud
denly turned up a h ill and drove to an empty house we， d looked at before.
Then, we hadn’t even asked to go in. We， d just driven past, unimpressed.
“How come you drove up here?” I asked, as we approached the place. And
then— presto~I literally gasped. How had we ever discounted this lovely
house, on its own little hill, overlooking the town? I could sense Robs sur
prise, too. “Is this the same place we saw before?” I asked, knowing it was
before he nodded, “Yes.”
We were quite suddenly enchanted. The place seemed to be like a
storybook house. It was almost impossible to believe that earlier we， d
passed it by. We drove around the back. We parked; looked in the win
dows; imagined what it would look like in the summer. Then we went
home and called the real estate people.
As we returned home, the words “special space” came to me, and con
nections sprang into awareness so quickly that I had trouble writing them
down. The material began as library material, but the shifts of conscious
ness were difficult to follow. I seemed to get material from the library
which was then put into personal terms for me by another level of my own
psyche, and sometimes the two levels merged. I was quite excited as I
wrote, though, because the material was tying together so many of our cur
rent experiences. This is what I wrote:
From the Library
The library itself is a “special space” (in this case, private) in which the
energy of a directed consciousness alters space’s availability in a certain
fashion. As there are an infinite number of moments within any given offi
cial one, so within any given point of space there are an infinite number of
unofficial space relationships, or places.
These remain latent, invisible, nonexistent in practical terms as a rule.
Yet they are amiable to impression (being impressed or stamped) once their
availability is understood. Because they are not apparent at the living area
of usual experience, the normal time-space relationships do not apply. That
is, time is experienced differently in a special place, though it w ill resume
normally at the usual level.
When Im in the library, my body is in a different relationship with
the physical environment, minutely altered, minutely out-of-gear at
We M ove (in M ore Ways Than One)，and “Special Places” 201
infinitesimal levels, with some atomic effects that are beneath our notice.
That is, the changes w ill not show at our levels, although they are definite
and quite consequential at other levels.
This different relationship is brought about because the directed con
sciousness is in another environment at unofficial levels, while it still re
tains its physical stance. In our terms, my body is still in this room while I
write now, while it is still affected by an energy exchange happening be
tween the self in the library and the self here. This is a split such as an
amoeba might make, only it is consciousness~one part staying with the
“parent” and the offspring stepping into a different but related special
space. In such special places, the usual spatial characteristics are present but
much more plastic; and time and space are used differently; consciousness
playing in them in a way not normally possible.
There, the assumed body can play unhampered by usual restraints be
cause it is projected into the special space by the consciousness, and is com
posed of the same characteristics. That is, consciousness stamps its own
impression into that medium. (This happens in the same way that frac
tions fly out of a prime number, while the number remains the same and
itself; the fractions within the prime number are not stationary but always
going off in their own infinite directions without injuring the primacy of
the integer.)
In our terms, and from our viewpoint, such special places are not sta
ble or permanent, though they are at their own levels. I sense the library
even when it seems inaccessible to me. Its reality is partly determined by
my perception of it. It has other rooms, for example. On the one hand,
they are there for me to find; but on the other hand, they w ill be partly
formed by my finding of them.
Here, that seems like a contradiction. But its as if consciousness
somehow senses leniencies in space, perceptive paths that are latent, and if
you gently press your consciousness into the universe, then it gives in
places and opens up. After a while you get the knack of it, and know where
the special places are. You learn to nudge aside the usual dimensional bar
riers and sneak through with the part of your consciousness that fits the
conditions best~or can best work in the conditions. I use my conscious
ness the way a safecracker uses his fingers; and a different kind of intense
listening is involved until you get the right combination and hear invisible
tumblers fall.
That safecracking analogy is good here, with its numerical connota
tions, because these orders or systems of reality are interconnected by virtue
of their relationships. New orders or special places can be set up by settling
upon any hypothetical boundaries; this automatically alters the inner rela
tionships. Its as if you used your consciousness like the stakes of a tent,
202 Chapter 20
providing stability~energy digging into a particular space-time medium,

or inserting itself into a different space-time as stakes are driven into the
ground—and then forming a new relationship in which certain kinds of
experiences are possible.
For that matter, each person stamps space with his or her private sym
bols. This book deals with the motion of the psyche as it translates inner
data and symbols into experienced reality, with the source of such symbols
and their forceful activity. Symbols are not stationary ideas that are pushed
about, but concentrations of energy endowed with motion. The character
istics of symbols include force, intent, identification, motion (transfer
ence), and change of form. W hile symbols are primarily private, at any
given time private images and associations w ill form groupings, ever-
changing, around which communities or civilizations w ill gravitate.
The symbols are images or representations of beliefs, charged with en
ergy, intensely emotional. Individuals are constantly in the process of
bringing these inner symbols in line with physical reality; or rather, they
are in the process of turning that reality into a counterpart of the inner
symbolized world. When the experienced conditions no longer reflect the
inner symbolized environment, the individual sets out to achieve a new
balance. This happens privately, and in terms of any group or organization.
The symbols attract models and also help form them at our level of
activity. The models are self-sustaining symbols, grouped together in a cer
tain psychic framework~stabilized symbols, in which motion is contained
or held: in that way a recognizable psychic structure is formed as a constant
model against which to judge the correlation between inner symbolizing
and external experience. These models, then, are stabilized organizations of
symbols held a while in the psyche. They change, however, as the symbols
that compose them do, according to our intent, so that one model can
change smoothly into another one.
When I read the material, I began to understand the connections between

my feelings toward the h ill house (as we called it), special places, and sym
bols. We may pick up an important symbol, form it into a model, then dis
miss it at a certain time in our lives, only to pick it up later where it serves
as the basis for a new model. That is, we may be unable to “complete” a
symbol, either because we haven’t connected it with a model strong enough
to contain it or simply because we haven’t encountered the elements re
quired.
Its as if we are looking for a symbols missing ingredient, and until we
find it, we cant complete the model to which it belongs. When we do,
everything clicks together like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle: the old forgotten
We M ove (in M ore Ways Than O ne), and “SpecialPlaces” 203
symbol is instantly revitalized, forms its model, is activated and moves us~
or we let it move through our lives. Such symbols form strong motivating el
ements and can mobilize abilities that lay latent.
These usually bring with them new psychic and physical organiza
tions, different patterns of thought and activity, changes in life experience,
and a recharging of psychic and creative batteries. These symbols are like
living motion pictures within the psyche, and I saw how Rob and I used
two separate symbol pictures that tuned us in to the h ill house and brought
it into focus.
The process must have begun when we started house hunting. We
knew that something was going on. We were half aware of the associations
that came to mind. We realized that we were throwing out reflections of
inner symbols upon the various neighborhoods, and then comparing the
exterior conditions with some inner prerequisites. We were attracted to the
older bungalow, but when the bid was turned down I wasn’t at all sur
prised. I would have settled for the house, I suppose, but something was
missing. When we drove past the h ill house that day, however, something
clicked, and that something was the formation of a workable model in
space and time. Inner forgotten symbols going back to childhood were
suddenly activated~and projected outward. They shimmered; hovered,
and made a psychic fit.
While we looked for houses, forgotten images and symbols were look
ing for a place to land, an environment to which they could attach them
selves. Rob hadn’t said a thing, but I realized that the grounds around the
h ill house reminded him of a nearby state park where he’d spent many
happy summers. The fireplace in the yard added to the picture, and evoked
memories of all the paintings he， d done outside years ago, with his small
easel set among the trees in the park. I accepted his symbolism, so that the
swimming pool in the yard next door reminded me of the park too. I visu
alized a picnic table by the outdoor fireplace, completing the picture, be
cause I， d written my first published novel at such a table at the same park.
For me privately the place evoked other images too, reminding me of
a particular neighborhood described in a favorite book from high school
years. For example, when we went inside the house with the real estate
woman a few days later, I kept seeing our stereo in a certain position in the
living room. Only when I wrote these passages did I realize that the books
hero kept his stereo in the same position— in a description read years be
fore.
So we made our own special place in more ordinary terms, by sym
bolizing that particular house and corner, marking it ours, stamping it with
the imprint of living symbols which we transposed upon it. Henceforth it
had a magic quality. On February 15，we bought the place, though we
204 Chapter 20
couldn’t move in for a month. We weren’t inside over half an hour. It was
probably the easiest sale the real estate woman ever made.
In the next weeks we drove up to the h ill house many times, and I
kept trying to understand more about the inner politics that led us to make
this particular choice. Then one afternoon on returning to the two apart
ments on Water Street, I realized they were rapidly losing whatever magic
they’d possessed; they no longer seemed to be “ours”: We were draining out
of them in some odd fashion. Boxes of books and papers were piled every
where. And I suddenly understood that the new symbols we， d activated
couldn’t have been, earlier. We hadn’t wanted the responsibility and ex
pense of a house before, and so we， d tuned out any symbols that might
form that kind of model.
As I realized that, further connections came to mind. I wrote them
down at once, pushing aside the half-packed boxes of dishes that were
stacked on the desk:
“WeVe already endowed the h ill house and grounds with symbols
from the past. In our case, these are symbols that we’d once discarded.
WeVe set them moving again, given them a center in the house and envi
ronment—and also activated parts of the psyche that were and now are
connected with them. The house looks different to us now, and we’ve only
been inside twice, and walked around the grounds a few times. When we
first saw it, it looked anonymous, although the landscape caught our eye.
Perhaps then, that initial glimpse activated the inner symbols so quietly
that we didn’t notice, because we looked at other houses afterward; we， d
nearly forgotten the place until Rob suddenly drove up there that Thurs
day afternoon.
“Then, we just stared. A change had come over the place. It had an al
most magical air—■ the house nestled safely in front of the small woods, yet
looking down from its h ill to the valley and town, with the mountains ris
ing beyond. The whole place could have freshly emerged from nowhere, I
thought, and even the air seemed new. How could that be the same house
we， d driven by and ignored just a few weeks earlier? I kept wondering and
wondering.
“But during that time the symbolizing had been going on beneath
our notice. The psyches great fantasies played upon the landscape of land
and mind alike, and when we drove by that Thursday the process was com
pleted. That clicking yes* we felt was the clicking of inner symbol and ex
terior form, that transference of dream upon matter; the same thing,
perhaps, that happens when we fall in love.
“But wasn’t this a house in the suburbs, something we said we didn’t
want? Click, click, click~how could a house on a magic hill be a house in the
suburbs~a house with a new sky above it? Aren’t all of those other houses like
We M ove (in M ore Ways Than O ne), and “SpecialP laces” 205
super-tents squatting on the hill, chimneys in the wintertime shooting up

smoke signalsthe neighborhood pool a native way of evoking memories of
the distant ocean? Click, dick, click. I can even imagine my dead Indian
grandfather, his thin bones packed in a baggy suit out of the 1940s, stalking
happily out there in some odd dimension of mind and woods.
“Yet at the same time I can see my dead mother-in-law and imagine
her visiting the place, too, a far more substantial ghost wearing bright red
platform shoes, some sort of frilly dress, and a haughty air; peering through
the trees to see double garages, and well-kept homes. I can almost hear her
thinking with a solid air of satisfaction that her son finally wasn’t poor, that
even if he was an artist, he must have picked up some sense. I can almost
hear her saying to other ghosts: ‘My son, the eldest, lives in a lovely house,
now, so I can rest in peace/ And I ， ll say amen to that.
“Yet against this rise older ideas of ours also that pop up now and
then. For the h ill house has its own water supply and a bomb shelter in the
basement, and this reminds me of old beliefs we had years ago about sur
viving in an alien world. To some extent those ideas must still go with us, a
stamp of probabilities that still echo, unresolved, amid our new philoso
phies. For behind the house the small wood could provide fuel for the in
side fireplace, transformed into a main cooking area come any disaster. The
well water could come in handy, too, if we ever had to hole up together, as
we did in a different way during the 1972 flood.
“I，
d thought we， d finished with such ideas. And yet isn’t the body of
Seth material itself a handbook of psychic survival to be handed down to
others: ‘Look, this is what weve learned. Do what you want with it. And
beyond that, even if we dont survive, we survive/ So the new house is safe
and ours, no matter who it belonged to before, or who it w ill belong to in
some future in which we no longer play a part.”
So we pick and choose from probabilities, using our own symbols as

measuring sticks, testing this or that environment or situation until one fits
the inner model~which we then very nicely slip over the exterior condi
tions. Its as if we each have a multidimensional coloring book, presenting
infinite sketches of any probable event. Because of our individual intents
and characteristics we’ll be drawn to some of these probabilities, while oth
ers w ill remain sketchy and unreal. We choose which pictures we want to
complete in physical terms, and color them in with experience. In so
doing, though, we alter the discarded events beneath, which are still active
and moving. The sketches, of course, are themselves alive.
We impress our own dimensions with special places too, then, which
just means that through our choices and intents we im print certain
specifics upon the dimensions we recognize, cue ourselves to respond to
206 Chapter 20
those while shutting out equally legitimate probable special places. In other
words, we form physical reality in the same way that I form my library: by
impressing upon a willing dimension the imprint of our conscious needs,
beliefs, abilities, and intents.
It was no coincidence, either, that just after beginning this book on
psychic politics, we moved for the first time in over ten years; we began
dealing with real estate people, lawyers, and others, so that the small move
reached out into the community. When I first received material from the
library, I was told that both inner and outer experience would be involved,
that I couldn’t just stay in the library. As time went on, I was finding out
what that meant.
As in the coloring book analogy, however, not only are there infinite
sketches that can be colored in, but an infinite number of probable selves
looking at their own coloring books. In our case, one “me” took the bun
galow, bidding higher; one moved a few miles away to Sayre, Pennsylvania
(where Rob grew up), as once we’d considered doing; and the me that I rec
ognize, the “official” one, chose the h ill house in which Im now typing this
manuscript.
When we did move, we were startled by the number of coincidences
that were connected with the event. Coincidences? Rob began to keep
notes of them. There are more than fifty at last count. We began, rightly, to
suspect that such coincidences are instead the tiny multitudinous “knots”
that bind one probability to another, and Seths own book began to explain
how we all move so smoothly though probabilities that we never question
the coincidences that meet us on every side.
So somewhere in the winter of 1975 we changed alliances. We moved
our consciousnesses along a different track. We know that were different
people than we were before. Other portions of our consciousnesses chose
other routes. Im still curious about that moment of decision, though.
What elements besides the ones we know led Rob to turn up to the h ill
house that day? And what are the implications of such inner activity on all
of the decisions of our lives? I’m not speaking of dry theory without practi
cal application, but of rich psychological activity that goes on in our minds
all the while— in ours and yours.
In any case, students helped us move, and I never went back to the
apartments again. They were remodeled afterward, so they’ll never look the
way they did when we lived there. Yet as we took over the h ill house I won
dered: Would the library be there? Would I feel comfortable having the
Seth sessions? Where in the house would we hold them? And more: Would
I ever get inside the library again? A ll of my published books had been w rit
ten in that apartment house on Water Street. The Seth sessions had begun
there. Magic h ill house or no~ I felt transplanted.
P art T hree
Toward a New Politics of

the Psyche, and an
Alternate Model for
Civilization to Follow
C hapter 2 1
T he C odicils and an A lternate M odel

fo r C iv iliz a tio n to Follow
e moved into our house in the middle of March 1975. It was
W nothing to move our household supplies, but we had cartons

and cartons of Seth material and manuscripts, not to mention
all of Robs paintings and our books. W illy, our cat, had spent all his life at
Water Street, yet he took to the new place at once. It took me longer than
W illy to get settled. Rob and I settled our workrooms first. After Rob put
all my books in one room, I decided that I wanted to work by the large
window in the living room instead, because I vaguely sensed that the li
brary would be transposed on the east living-room wall.
We left the books where they were. I ended up with my old table and
typewriter stand in front of the big windows. Rob went to his new studio.
W illy prowled through all the rooms, meowing as he inspected. And I
wrote the following:
“Now that were here, this house and everything in it seems in
evitable, as if this is one spot in space and time that we were meant to fill;
one of many equally right for us, that we could have chosen. And now by
hindsight it seems that we were gently led, coming upon a series of kind
surprises that suddenly appeared like soft rolling hills around a curve when
you only expected level land.
“So writing in front of my new picture window, it seems somehow
that IVe always seen those mountains from this particular privileged view
point; that a ghostly me waited here; that now I ， m stepping into my own
fixture shoes, giving that image flesh.
“Our winding walk curves down its own small h ill to a street that is
more like a secluded country lane than anything else; lined with maples
and birches; our corner marked by a few clustering mailboxes. Again, each
detail seems right and inevitable, as if the house and grounds existed in my
library, perhaps, as a living picture book and here its come alive.
210 Chapter 21
“I feel as if IVe caught up with a part of myself, as if I projected a pat

tern of myself here once in the past and that now I， m filling it out or step
ping into it. So in our time I have to go along day by day, learning what
that Jane who got here ahead of me is up to. Yet I don’t mean to imply pre
destination when I use the word ‘inevitability.’ I mean a high aptness, be
cause the Jane who’s been waiting here was projected outward by me; sent
out by my hopes and dreams; searching for a place where Rob and I could
live and write and paint in a house of our own when the time came!’
“I， she, we, did a good job, and already I sense changes as a present, past,
and future me merge, do our stuff, set up a new kind of alchemy, reacting to
the conditions that we set up. Some changes in my attitude are just amusing.
Today its raining as I write, for example, but instead offeeling dreary about it
as I used to at Water Street I found myselflooking out the window, thinking:
4Hey, the rain is great, freshening my trees, bringing my grass to life a n d no
one is going to turn this lawn into a parking lot because these trees have my
protection.， And I knew as I looked out that the trees protected me, too, in
their fashion, that our spirits and the spirits of the birches and pines met at
some level and loved this small corner of the universe.
“Reality is different with each shift of space and time, and each family
creates its own house, room, corner, hut, materialized splendor or squalor,
in accordance with inner beliefs and intents. The artist who believes that
art and riches w ill never mix w ill paint in his chosen garret; the ‘lord of the
manor who believes that the world of spirit and the world of cash can’t mix
w ill choose his great estate and live in a squalor of mind, having chosen ac
cording to his beliefs. For each personal reality is unique and presents a
special picture of the universe.”
Well and good. But I sat at my table and waited—for the lib r a r y to
show, or some inspiration. In the meantime I began typing part of this
manuscript, from the beginning. And as I copied the material about my
first experiences with the library and my super-real view of the world, I
looked back nostalgically. Suppose, just suppose, I never got anything from
the library again? Suppose it just didn’t click into place here? I arranged and
rearranged my work area. I wrote a few poems, and brooded.
And what about Seth? We put Robs portrait of him on the wall next
to the fireplace where he smiled down, looking portly and amused. But be
fore my worry about sessions could really settle in, Seth resumed his book,
right where he， d left off. We held the sessions in the living room. At first it
actually seemed odd not to hear people walking overhead, or the water
rushing through the plumbing from above, or the traffic streaming from
the corner below.
The C odicils and an A lternate M odel 211
Seth kept telling me that new material was being prepared for me in
the library, and I kept thinking, “Yeah, Seth, that’s great, only where is it?”
So April passed. Then the first part of May so much creative material came
that literally I could hardly keep up. Even then I didn’t realize what I was
getting, or what the information really meant; that understanding came
somewhat later. For one thing, I was so busy just writing the material down
and observing my own different states of consciousness that I put off usual
conscious examination. Mostly, though, I was just so delighted to be going
full steam ahead again, that I didn’t even second guess the material I was
getting, as I used to.
But finally one morning as I sat at my table, I saw the library trans
posed against the living room wall. My double sat there, reading a book. At
the same time, the word “codicil” kept coming into my mind again. I
heard it mentally, at first faintly and then it sounded louder and louder
until I wrote the word down and waited. Then I knew that the material to
come represented an alternate model for civilization to follow, and that I
was transcribing my book from one depicting such a model—a model that
we hadn’t chosen in the past. The codicils would represent a fresh hypoth
esis upon which to build a new, better civilization.
I didn’t realize it then, but large sections of the third section of Psychic
Politics v/o\AA be written in various altered states of consciousness. It was as
if all of my earlier experiences with people and events went into some
“input” slot and now the library was presenting me with answers for all the
questions that had tumbled through my mind.
From the Library
Codicils
alternate hypotheses as a base
for private and public experience
1. A ll of creation is sacred and alive, each part connected to each

other part, and each communicating in a creative cooperative commerce in
which the smallest and the largest are equally involved.
2. The physical senses present one unique version of reality, in which
being is perceived in a particular dimensionalized sequence, built up
through neurological patterning, and is the result of one kind of neurolog
ical focus. There are alternate neurological routes, biologically acceptable,
and other sequences so far not chosen.
212 Chapter 21
3. Our individual self-government and our political organizations are

by-products of sequential perception, and our exterior methods of com
munication set up patterns that correlate with, and duplicate, our synaptic
behavior. We lock ourselves into certain structures of reality in this way.
4. Our sequential prejudiced perception is inherently far more flexi
ble than we recognize, however. There are half steps~other unperceived
impulses— that leap the nerve ends, too fast and too slow for our usual
focus. Recognition of these can be learned and encouraged, bringing in
perceptive data that w ill trigger changes in usual sense response, filling out
potential sense spectrums with which we are normally not familiar.
5. This greater possible sense spectrum includes increased perception
of inner bodily reality in terms of cellular identity and behavior; automatic
conscious control of bodily processes; and increased perception of exterior
conditions as the usual senses become more vigorous. (Our sight, for ex
ample, is not nearly as efficient as it could be. Nuances of color, texture,
and depth could be expanded and our entire visual area attain a brilliance
presently considered exceptional or supernormal.)
Comment on Codicils
Acceptance of these first codicils would expand practical knowledge

of the self, break down barriers that are the result of our prejudiced percep
tion, and restructure personal, social, and political life.
Concepts of the self and practical experience of the self must be
broadened if the race is to develop its true potentials. Only an evolution of
consciousness can alter the world view that appears to our official line of
consciousness.
Comment on Codicil 2
This next step is as important as the birth of Christianity was in the his
tory of mankind. It w ill present a new structure for civilization to follow.
Christianity represented the human psyche at a certain point, forming first
inner patterns for development that then became exteriorized as myth,
drama, and history, with the Jewish culture of the Talmud presenting the
psyches direction. The differences between Jewish and Christian tradition
represented allied but different probabilities, one splitting off from the other,
but united by common roots and actualized in the world to varying degrees.
The traditional personified god concept represented the mass psyches
one-ego development; the ego ruling the self as God ruled man; man
dominant over the planet and other species, as God was dominant over
man—as opposed to the idea of many gods or the growth of a more m ulti
focused self with greater nature identification.
Neurological patterning of the kind we know began with the early
testament Jews (known, then, as Gods people), looking forward through
time to a completely one-ego focused self. Before, neurological functioning
was not as set; and in our world today some minority peoples and tribes
still hold to those alternate neurological pulses. These w ill not appear to
our measuring devices because we are literally blind to them.
The Jewish prophets, however, utilized these alternate focuses of percep
tion themselves, and were relatively unprejudiced neurologically. They were
therefore able to perceive alternate visions of reality. Yet their great work, while
focusing the energy of an entire race, and leading to Christianity, also resulted
in limiting mans potential perceptive area in important ways.
The prophets were able to sense the potentials of the mass psyche,
and their prophecies charted courses in time, projecting the Jewish race
into the future. The prophecies gave the people great strength precisely be
cause they gave the race a future in time, providing a thread of continuity
and a certain immortality in earthly terms.
The prophecies were psychic molds to be filled out in flesh. Some
were fulfilled and some were not, but the unfulfilled ones were forgotten
and served their purpose by providing alternate selections and directions.
The prophecies ahead of time charted out a people’s probable course,
foreseeing the triumphs and disasters inherent in such an adventure
through time.
They provided psychic webworks, blueprints, and dramas, with living
people stepping into the roles already outlined, but also improvising as
they went along. These roles were valid, however, chosen in response to an
inner reality that foresaw the shape that the living psyche of the people
would take in time.
But as a snake throws off old skin, the psyche throws off old patterns
that have become rigid, and we need a new set of psychic blueprints to fur
ther extend the species into the future, replete with great deeds, heroes, and
challenges; a new creative drama projected from the psyche into the three-
dimensional arena. For now we no longer view reality through original
eyes, but through structures of beliefs that we have outgrown. These struc
tures are simply meant to frame and organize experience, but we mistake
the picture for the reality that it represents. WeVe become neurologically
frozen in that respect, forced to recognize the one sequential pattern of
sense perceptions, so that we think that the one we’ve chosen is the only
one possible.
214 Chapter 21
Comment on Codicil 3
Thus far we’ve projected the unrecognized portions of our greater

selfhood outward into God, religion, government, and exteriorized con
cepts. In this existence, selfhood is dependent upon sense perceptions, so
that our neurological prejudice and rigid focus have limited our concepts
of identity. When we do become aware of unofficial information, coming
through other than recognized channels, then it seems to come from not-
self, or outside.
A great deal of energy has been used to repress levels of selfhood and
to project these into religious and nationalistic heroes and cultural organi
zations. Government and religion try to preserve the status quo, to preserve
their own existence, not for political or religious reasons but to preserve the
official picture of the self around which they are formed.
But the structured reality in which that kind of a self can exist is
breaking down. The official picture no longer fits or explains private expe
rience which is growing out of it. There is a momentary rift between the
inner psyche and its creations.
Besides this，the experiencedselfis not the same through the ages. The ex
perienced self is a psychic creation, responsive to exterior conditions which
it creates as the psyche dives into the waters of experienced earthly self
hood. Only a portion of the potential self is experienced, but different por
tions as intents and purposes change. It is possible, though, to actualize
more of our potential.
Comment on Codicils 4 and 5
The answers and solutions lie in using levels of consciousness now

considered eccentric or secondary. This includes far greater utilization of
the dream states and altered conditions thus far thought to be exceptions
of consciousness. These “exceptions” represent other kinds of focuses,
greatly needed to broaden our concepts of the self, and our experience of
personal selfhood by increasing conceptualization, giving direct experience
of alternate views, and bringing other kinds of data to bear upon the world
we know. In the past, the attitudes surrounding such perceptions brought
about their own difficulties. The perceptions are biologically acceptable,
however, and w ill lead to a clearer relationship between mind and body.
The Focus Personality and Alternate Sensing
[As I wrote this originally, I sensed my double in the library. She was
reading a book and I felt that this material was my version of that book. It
was twilight: The birds were singing, and a delicious relaxation overtook
me. The word “codicil” kept returning strongly, so that sometimes I felt it
was the sound that the birds made.]
The focus personality or experienced self is one focus through which
the self knows itself, one facet of the self s relationship with other persons
and the world, and represents its exteriorization. But different approaches
could increase the knowledge of the focus personality and extend its scope.
By providing this experienced self some conscious affiliation with the
source of its own being, it could receive a sense of continuity not bounded
by known time and could literally see beyond itself to the source in which
it is inviolately couched.
Identifying now with current life experience only, the focus personal
ity is limited by its chosen perceptive framework, and such additional data
is unavailable in usual terms. Life after death, the existence of other valid
realities, and the self s part in these, must be taken on faith— if they re
taken at all—and a faith cluttered by old beliefs. This makes it extremely
difficult for the focus personality to perceive any unofficial information
that could contradict the current picture of reality.
The focus personality is everywhere presented with the evidence of
the senses which seems to deny any such altered conditions. The senses
themselves are kept restricted so that they seem to present the only possible
picture of reality upon which assumptions can be made. Their view is
valid, but other perceptive methods and modes can add to that picture, ex
tending it to show other quite-as-valid kinds of existence. And we have a
choice. We can open the doors of perception, move out into a broader
mental and psychic world, as, in historic terms, at least, we left the caves to
explore the physical environment. We have yet to explore the geography of
the psyche.
Various altered states can provide the focus personality with the direct
evidence it needs by giving it the benefit of extraordinary or eccentric sense
data~data complete in itself that does not, however, fit into the estab
lished picture, and may sometimes seem to contradict it. There is no such
contradiction between the official and unofficial pictures of reality, how
ever, when each is seen as a valid alternate or parallel version. As a result of
accepting such material, ordinary sense data w ill be deepened, its qualities
enhanced, sense experience becoming super-real by our current standards
as the fuller spectrums begin to emerge.
This emergence instantly triggers different body responses and corpo
ral surprise. The change is not just metaphysical but appears in quite prac
tical garb: The world looks different because it is different; more of its
qualities are perceived and the perceiver brings more to bear upon the
given objective field. [My super-real vision of the world described earlier in
this book is an example.]
216 Chapter 21
Such experiences, again, hint of the true potentials ofhuman perception,

but greater portions of the selfmust be brought into play and made available
to the focus personality. Often such experience frightens the focus personality
because it is hampered by old beliefs about selfhood, and feels in conflict with
established culture. It is the focus personality itself that must break out of the
ancient patterns, and alter its concepts ofselfhood. This experienced selfis not
to be annihilated but fulfilled; not to dissolve into oneness but to discover its
true individuality in relationship to a oneness that is always individualized.
Here the analogy of the model and its eccentricities can be of great
value. The constant tension and interplay between them can hint of the
mystery of individuality existing as a part of oneness; the many-in-one in
which the One constantly translates itself into individuation but without
destroying the original unity.
That unity seeks greater diversification, investing each part of itself
with its own creativity and thrust, hence changing itself, re-creating itself
constantly in a creation that is never static and always new, for the infinite
eccentricities of itself are always added to its own model, multiplying prob
abilities of development that create further eccentricities.
The Aspects and Altered States
The aspects are the representatives in the psyche of these alternate

routes of consciousness to self-expression and experience. The aspects,
then, experience reality differently and have their own kind of subjective
being. They are aware in a different context; in another kind of medium—
yet their reality forms a rich unconscious bed upon which our own version
of consciousness rests.
Here, the aspects are the latent eccentric variations of our models of
personhood. In their reality the reverse is true. There our kind of psycho
logical processes serve as supportive frameworks; that is, our consciousness
may serve as a part of their unconscious activity.
In dreams, visions, and altered states we lean toward their kind of or
ganization and symbolism, which is valid in that inner order of events but
not usually perceivable here. In the ordinary state of awareness we force
those perceptions to flow into our symbolized structures, in which some
times they seem to make no sense at all.
Culturally, in our society, weVe neatly divided the intellectual and in
tuitive abilities. To that degree, we’ve isolated portions of ourselves and
limited the practical benefits that could otherwise be provided by the intu
itive parts of the self.
WeVe divorced ourselves from levels of awareness that have to do with
the health of our own bodies, for example, turning such problems over to
specialists and further separating ourselves from our own corporal compe
tence, denying any responsibility for the state of our health. There is a
healer within us, the same force that keeps us alive and functioning. It
might be natural for us to personify that part of our consciousness, since
its difficult for us to imagine consciousness without our ideas of person
hood. There is nothing unsophisticated in having an outside image, statue,
or symbol to represent the self’s healing aspects, and to serve as an exterior
reference point. But religions project the inner power into the images, fur
ther divorcing it from its source. In that kind of structure it is easier to go
to a doctor than to attempt any self-healing.
The aspects also serve as invisible models for selfhood, however: the
healer, teacher, parent, male and female, all residing within the psyche not
as rigid models but as living patterns uniquely fashioned in accord with the
focus personality’s interests and purposes, representing the tension between
the self’s immortal existence and its temporal life.
The aspects also operate as psychic counterparts, banks of abilities
and strengths from which the focus personality can choose, and in a way
they represent an inner family of potential selves upon which our own per
sonhood is firm ly based.
They appear in our experience as emotional feelings, psychological
tendencies, tints through which we view ourselves and the world. But
sometimes they rise out of psychological invisibility with their own charac
teristic strands of consciousness, carrying with them views of reality
uniquely theirs.
In such cases, we can view existence from a different center of the psy
che. In so doing, we need not become less well focused in this world, but
we can instead bring the world into a newer, fuller focus: We can become
better centered, for we then have more information about the greater con
text in which our world rests. This can happen, however, only if we learn
how to take advantage of these messages from other aspects; only if we
learn to interpret their dramatic content.
We are a multitude of selves, and the sooner we learn that, the better.
And in that rich alliance of psychological aspects lies the very secret of our
practical operative stability. Only because we change our positions con
stantly in reference to the psyche and the world are we able to manipulate
physically and translate inner experience into sense terms.
Nature and Consciousness
To attempt to protect the selfin old terms or to keep the selfrigidly “it-
self” is like holding your breath for too long. Selves, like breaths, go through
us all the time. But from our standpoint we are the larger psychological
218 Chapter 21
structures that translate these selves into ourselves, just as the body translates
our breaths into our living.
Even our bodies often seem not us or not ours because we have for
gotten how to identify with them, lost the knack of following the strands
of consciousness that should connect us, so that our full experience of crea-
turehood itself is further limited. We seem instead to be victims of the
flesh, at the mercy of illnesses, wars, and natural disasters, because we have
lost track of our natural selves and lost sight of our place within natures
framework.
It seems idiotic, for example, to think that we can cure ourselves nat
urally of illnesses when we believe that disease is thrust upon us by the flesh
and has nothing at all to do with our desires or beliefs. Until we realize that
our consciousness, working through the body, creates its state of being,
then any natural cures w ill be considered miraculous. Seth, for example,
states that so-called miraculous cures are simply examples of unimpeded
nature.
In the same way we are part of nature; physically as real as mountains,
air currents, trees, or oceans, all of which have their effect upon the climate
and world conditions. Yet for some reason we imagine that we affect the
natural world only through our technology. But our physical presence itself
has an interaction with the earth and with the physical elements that com
pose it. We are biologically connected, and this means that the chemical
makeup of our bodies is a part of the earths contents.
Our chemical balance changes as our emotions do, and we alter the
composition of the earth. We are not at the mercy of natural disasters. We
have forgotten or ignored our native emotional identification with the
wind and with storms, and therefore lost our part in their existence, and
whatever conscious control we may once have had over them. Therefore we
need technology~to bring rain to parched areas, for exampleand con
sider it the sheerest nonsense to blame parched emotions instead.
WeVe lost the larger dimensions of a natural selfhood that identifies
as itself and with its position in nature. We can if we wish command the
wind, but only when we realize that it is a part of us and we are a part of it.
We can move mountains without cranes~only when we realize that our
consciousness is itself and a part of earth at the same time; that our breath
contributes to the atmosphere and our discarded chemicals help form the
mountains.
That natural consciousness is not afraid of death. It knows its indi
viduality is unassailed even while its form and experiences change. Because
it can identify with earth, it is not dependent upon corporal knowledge be
cause earth itself is not, and nature has always known better.
One-Line Consciousness, Governments, and Social Orders
If we also saw our governments and social orders as natural elements

of the psyche (as the continents and seas are the natural phenomena of the
earth), then we would also see their seasons, their rising and falling, as a
part of a cycle as natural as spring or winter.
In the past all civilizations, Christian or otherwise, set up a system of
gods and goddesses, or mythical journeys and mystic cosmologies, that
mirrored the structure of the psyche, projecting its aspects outward so that
an individual embarking upon such a religious pilgrimage actually traveled
through the inner lands of the psyche. The visit to the church or holy
shrine was an objectification of an inner state. The objectification served as
a physical signpost. These myths and intuitive constructs worked as long as
they effectively mirrored the individual and mass life of the psyche.
Unfortunately the mythical and magical elements became dogma
tized so that they no longer served as guidelines but began to program the
individual in his journey, to such an extent that original vision and spon
taneity were denied. The psyche then seeks for new routes, yearns to shake
off the rigid stylizations in which its experiences are couched. When this
happens, the old gods tumble, along with the political and social organiza
tions that supported them.
Since we’ve almost always uplifted certain parts of the self over others,
the security of governments and social institutions has been dependent
upon the suppression of portions of the psyche which were considered sus
pect. Education had to support the status quo, with only lip service being
given to unofficial areas of experience, and those expressions were chan
neled into the backwaters of activity or to the realm of the bizarre.
Civilizations and social orders have not been geared to the fulfillment
of human potential (even now, for all of our liberal thought), but to the
suppression of abilities that did not fit in with the basic assumptions about
the nature of the self. We inhibited any such evidence from conscious
awareness, developing a kind of one-line official consciousness. Opposing
data did not disappear, but formed powerful undercurrents that composed
the unofficial knowledge of the race.
So we did become afraid. Revelatory information could lead to dis
ruptive behavior, and to that extent challenge the beliefs of family, church
and state. The Roman Catholic Church put rigid rules about the visionary,
and took great pains to control its mystics. W ith Protestantism and private
interpretations of the bible came the birth of still new religions, each bring
ing forth its own interpretations of the relationship between the psyche,
God, and the state, and becoming nationalistically centered to some degree.
220 Chapter 21
Missionary fervor has always involved political goals and survival far more
than visionary experience.
The official line of consciousness sees everything in black and white,
good and evil; in the same manner it experiences the private selfwhich is,
in a way, its own creation. Alternate visions of reality cant be tolerated, be
cause in that framework one must win over the other, even as the official
line of consciousness must dominate other portions of the self. Other po
litical parties, religions, or social orders cant be seen as alternate visions of
reality or as organizations dealing with experience in a different way, but as
threats. This belief in competition is, in fact, one of the basic similarities
that all of our current belief systems have in common.
In this century, weVe lived together in an uneasy alliance. Little sur
prise that when Freud began his investigations, he saw the unofficial por
tions of the self as unsavory, so that the unconscious seemed to hold only
savage, uncontrollable elements. A new Pandoras box. If some of us es
caped religions repressive beliefs, we could take our enlightened selves to a
psychoanalyst for a more acceptable scientific reason for our guilt. We
never understood that it was our souls that we were hiding. Our guilt was a
natural reaction to make us question our concepts about ourselves and the
societies that mirrored and extended them.
[As I wrote down the above, I suddenly realized that the rest of the
book would deal with an alternate model for civilization to follow, based
on the codicils I， d just received, and others to follow. So far, we，
d taken the
hypothesis that the self was inherently bad and followed it to one version
of reality. Government, politics, religions, and social orders have been
based on that premise. Here, the opposite premise was being offered.
[The rest of the material came very rapidly, and I found myself caught
up in a vision of the world far different from the one we know.]
The codicils, followed, would lead to a government as natural, or
derly, and spontaneous as the seasons in which each individual brings per
sonhood to fulfillm ent to the best of his or her ability, and in so doing
automatically plays a potent role in the development of the entire society.
Such a civilization would be based upon the following codicils, added
to those already given.
1. Each person is a unique version of an inner model that is itself a
bank of potentials, variations, and creativity. The psyche is a seed of indi
viduality and selfhood, cast in space-time but ultimately independent of it.
2. We are born in many times and places, but not in a return of iden
tity as we understand it; not as a copy in different clothes, but as a new self
ever-rising out of the psyches life as the new ruler rises to the podium or
throne, in a psychic politics as ancient as humanity.
3. Civilizations both past and present represent projections of inner

selfhood, and m irror the state of the mass psyche at any given time. We
hold memory and knowledge of past civilizations as we hold unconscious
memories of our private early current-life experiences.
4. From our present, we exert force upon the past as well as the fu
ture, forming our ideas of the past and reacting accordingly. We actually
project events into our own new past.
5. Each generation forms such a new past, one that exists as surely as
the present, not just as an imaginary construct but as a practical plat
form—a newly built past~upon which we build our present.
6. Options and alternate models for selfhood and civilizations exist
in a psychic pattern of probabilities from which we can choose to actualize
an entirely new life system.
Comments on Codicils
As a preliminary, we must alter our concepts of the self, time, space,

and the psyche so that we can envision the self or focus personality as the
physically actualized version of a multidimensional psyche, equipped with
freedom of choice and with greater ability to mix and match our personal
characteristics than we’ve previously thought possible. We can bring more
of the psyches potentials to bear upon ordinary life, opening sense spec
trums that w ill show the true significance and beauty of corporal life. We
must understand that the intuitions and intellect are wedded. Only our be
liefs make them appear as opposites. The “high intellect” is a perfect fusion
of intuitive and intellectual qualities, merged to form what would almost
seem to be a new faculty.
Left alone, the aspects of the psyche w ill set up an operationally stable
creative self; talents and characteristics flowing from the inner pool of
beingthe source self~into the focus personality as needed in response to
the focus personality’s beliefs, purposes, and assessments about exterior
conditions.
The aspects w ill also be automatically projected outward into the cre
ation of a social order (the extended self) in the establishment of institu
tions, rituals, and groupings, where their distinctive and various tendencies
can join with the aspects of others, therefore magnifying the purposes and
values of the focus personality.
Left alone, these aspects w ill flow, change, and evolve as the focus per
sonality chooses and disregards the characteristics from its own aspect
bank. (Only when this process is frozen and barriers set about it do indi
viduals and organizations become rigid, dogmatized, or violent.)
222 Chapter 21
When we believe that the self is inherently bad and undesirable, then
we set up psychic antibodies against ourselves, and impede this natural
process of change. The resulting self and its behavior then often does ap
pear “bad”：Our experience justifies our beliefs and leads to further re
straints, thus proving the previous hypothesis.
Our beliefs concerning heredity also drastically program our behav
ior, which then gives effective evidence for the theory. The theory does be
come the reality, practically speaking, with the physical mechanisms
faithfully mirroring the given information or input.
As I read the above material I wondered why we werent more aware of the
aspects if they were so basic. Then I realized that we hide our aspects from
ourselves because weVe been so used to a restricted selfhood that any ex
tension of it actually seems threatening. For this reason, many people are
afraid of their own creativity, or the thrust of the life force itself. Again, I
believe that these aspects are the components of personality, each however
experiencing reality in a different fashion. They are conscious and aware at
another dimension of actuality, and they experience our world from an
other viewpoint. In other words, our reality is different to them than it is
to us. I also think that they exist independently as selves or identities in a
different medium of existence than ours. Our entire psyche could consist
of the totality of these aspects.
Sometimes, as in my case, there is communication between some of
these aspects and the focus personality. Then the focus personality expands
its usual abilities to join in this affiliation on a conscious basis. To some ex
tent, it can then glimpse its own reality from a viewpoint not its own by al
tering its focus and taking on another kind of world hypothesis, at least
momentarily. Difficulties can arise, however, if the resulting data is inter
preted by the focus personality in terms of its own usual hypothesis.
The aspects may have hidden biological connections hooked up to
our neurological framework. In any case, they serve functionally to provide
alternate models for the focus personality, and en masse, provide an infinite
bank of potential from which the species can draw.
C h apter 2 2
Personal A pp licatio n o f Codicils, the

Gods Take O ff T h e ir Clothes, and
Psychic C iviliza tio n s and Estates
wrote the material on codicils in bursts of activity over a three-day pe
I riod. Often I ， d see the library book in my mind, suddenly, when I

wasn’t at my table but involved in housework, or watching television or
sitting in the yard. So I kept a notebook with me, and took most of the
material down in longhand. I was halfway through typing it when more
came~this time it was material that showed me how to apply the codicils
in my own life.
When I was getting the original codicil material, I was caught up in
visionary excitement, convinced of the codicils， validity and their value in
helping us to change negative aspects of civilization. As I typed them up,
however, I thought, “Sure, they’re valid enough. But what practical good
are they now?”
The personal material shot in sidewards almost, just after I asked
those questions. Part of it has general application so I，
m including a few ex
cerpts of it here.
From the Library
Present culture is based on the idea of a hostile universe. This concept

invades all fields of thought, and brings about an exaggerated need for self
protection. Trustful, bold, innocent action becomes suspect and it seems
dangerous to explore the inner reaches of the self when the whole of soci
ety is constructed to hide the self from itself; to put institutions between it
and its own experiences. Yet, basically, growth cannot be impeded and con
sciousness w ill tend to blossom in its own ways regardless. • • •
224 Chapter 22
The codicils are important in regard to individual action. I suggest

you make up a copy of them for yourself and use them as effective new
frameworks for action; that is, as a new hypothesis upon which to build
your self-civilization. On a private level the codicils set a new, more effec
tive contract between various portions of the self; and with the focus per
sonality as it sees its position in exterior reality and understands its
relationship with its own source....
Each person sets up various contracts between aspects of inner and
outer experience. These should be flexible, resulting in gradual change
rather than, say, psychic revolutions. But some hypotheses are closer to
basic reality than others, and the codicils represent the closest practical
guides for behavior that are based on underlying validity: that is, they come
closest to expressing mans private relationships with the psyche, and with
nature. Acting in accordance with these precepts w ill bring about the great
est opportunities for vitality, understanding, and fulfillment. Used as cul
tural precepts by an entire society, they would bring about superior
experience on all levels.
There was more, of a more personal nature, that proved to be of great

value, but it wasn’t until I，
d typed all the material that its implications hit
me~for myself and others. Codicils. O f course. I remembered getting the
word months ago and looking it up in the dictionary to find “appendages
added to a w ill.” The dictionary meaning meant additions to a legal w ill.
But these codicils were additions or appendages to the human w ill一sup
positions for the w ill to build upon, new hypotheses upon which to base
individual and cultural action.
The personal material also told me that I spent too much energy wor
rying about any hostile reaction to my work.
From the Library
Like a country exaggerating its need for defenses, you go overboard,

expending too much energy for defenses, taking it away from the arts, so to
speak, and individual fulfillment. Through such misguided policies, you
spend so much effort to protect your resources that you cant utilize them
properly: You hide your richness so it won’t be stolen, and deny yourself
the pleasure of your own exuberance. In spite of this, your creativity and
growth continue, but you must now accept these codicils. They are not es
oteric statements having nothing to do with behavior, but w ill serve as a
PersonalA pplication o f C odicils 225
better, more creative basis for self-government, and affect behavior in the
same way that a country would be changed if it adopted a new, freer con
stitution over a previous lim iting one.
The universe is not hostile. No one can hurt you and no criticism can
hurt you~unless you stay within that level of understanding.
Remembering this as we drove later to the post office, I thought again,

“O f course,” and for a few moments I felt an intense yearning, remem
bering once more the experiences that initiated this book. For a few
days, at least, I ，
d never felt so unafraid of myself or others or the world
in general. Had I momentarily accepted the new hypothesis then with
out really knowing what it was? Had I suspended the usual assumptions
that most of us accept unthinkingly? Is that what the world would be
like if we trusted ourselves and nature, and our relationship with life?
Usually we live cozily in our codes, confused as they are, trying to find
our way amid tangled concepts and erratic offshoots that arise to con
front us. Thou shalt not k ill, for instance— not unless we do it in a
wholesale slaughter for God and country called war, when its all right.
And k ill, of course, refers to our own species to begin with; the others
have to take care of themselves. Thou shalt not steal. Right again. But
stealing from the government or cheating on ones income tax is all
right, because after all the government has all the money anyhow. O r its
okay to steal from our enemies. Then were told to be good, which
means to hate evil, and this can also be extended to mean that its good
to k ill the evildoers. Very confusing.
But it occurred to me that in accepting the codicils, maybe we wouldn’t
need any commandments because the new hypotheses would lead to a flexi
ble framework in which we could safely explore our own abilities. The codi
cils werent rules, but new assumptions. We believed the universe was unsafe,
and it certainly seemed so in our experience. If we changed the belief to its
opposite, would our experience really change too?
Yet the codicils made me uneasy in a way that I couldn’t fathom at
first. For one thing, they bothered me precisely because they seemed to run
directly counter to general assumptions. How could you really believe that
the world was safe, for example, or that the self was A-OK in the face of
human experience and in direct contradiction of the basic ideas of science
and religion both? Most scientists seem to think that the body is a great
enough mechanism, but that the mind or self is just a crazy chance-born
by-product, while religions seem to see the body as a temple of temptation.
But both certainly believe in restraining the self.
226 Chapter 22
That night Rob and I were having a discussion about spontaneity,

and I said, “But suppose I didn’t have a writing schedule and just did what
I felt like doing? I might decide to do something else instead.”
He said, “You， re taking it for granted that if you left yourself alone
you wouldn’t write enough; that you can’t trust yourself to be spontaneous
because, spontaneously, you might want to do the wrong thing.” Rob
paused, looked at me quizzically, and asked, “Just what terrible thing do
you think you’d do, instead of writing? I ， m always intrigued when people
don’t trust themselves. What on earth do they really think they’d do if they
just let themselves be? Get a gun and go down the street shooting everyone
they saw? Few do that sort of thing, and the people who do aren’t the peo
ple who trust themselves; quite the opposite. So just what do you really fear
you might do, if you left yourself alone?”
He spoke in a half joking manner, and I answered lightly, almost
without thinking. “Turn a whole civilization away from Christianity.”
uMaybe youd just offer th e m something better; Christianity is in
pretty poor shatters,” Rob said. “And besides, what makes you think that
you or anyone could lead a civilization in one direction or another, or that
people are going to do anything that they don’t want to do?”
I was pretty embarrassed.
“Maybe the race knows that it needs to move in new directions. But
why would you think that was bad, no matter who did it?” Rob was hon
estly puzzled, but I finally saw why the codicils bothered me— I was se
cretly worried about bucking established ideas—particularly cultural
Christian ones, even though I disagreed with many of them. And the fear,
hidden, was forming some truly unreasonable, hilarious images ofJane the
crusader~the anti-crusader~leading generations astray, down the garden
path—— even though the path we were on wasn’t exactly the way to Paradise.
A whole swirl of memories came to mind even before I had time to
speak. I remembered being a kid in fifth grade, walking with a group of
girls around the block by the orphanage where I lived for two years. A
nun led us. We came to a Christian Science church. The nun explained
that the church was a monstrosity; formed by a woman in defiance of all
Christs rules. I can’t recall her words, only their impact, her horror that
a human being would dare begin a church when the Catholic Church
was established by God; her scandalized derision that a woman would
dare such a crime; and her perfect faith that the church members and
anyone connected with the nefarious affair would be doomed to hell for
all eternity.
“What utter nonsense,” I thought, but even as I reminded myself that
I’d outgrown such ideas, I remembered the old sayings: The worst sin of all
was to lose your faith or destroy the faith of another. And knowledge was
always suspect. Hadn’t Eve tempted Adam; and wasn’t the basic sin the de
sire for knowledge and the pride of the intellect, because knowledge be
longed to God alone? And what was I doing, but pursuing the search for
knowledge and leading my fellow beings away from Christ?
What was I doing, saying that man was good when the whole of reli
gion shouted that he was sinful?
Because the false gods and the false prophets were always those who
disagreed with the dogmas; and of course you were with Christ or against
him. There was never any in-between. So I， d put myself defiantly on the
other side, lined up with the false prophets. I went around looking for
kinder gods, gods with some sense and dignity; but in the meantime I was
taking peoples comfort blankets away, and what realities would they en
counter without any dogmas to give pat answers to their questions? W ith
no sweet Jesus there and no one to put in his place?
Because I didn’t believe it worked that way. And you have to tread
carefully when you’re ripping away such delicate psychic fabrics; but be
neath his gods, it still seems to me, man might find himself, recover the lost
parts that he’s always projected into divinities. Man might recover his (and
her) earth identity, and through spontaneously trusting the self, discover
what real divinity is. I believe that the search is as natural to us as breath
ing; and that through knowing ourselves we’ll automatically trigger re
sponses and abilities that w ill lead us toward the discovering of a divinity
that’s been here all the while.
So why on earth did I still react to old beliefs? Was I afraid of being
one more guru, mad visionary? Or was I afraid that I， d succeed so well that
the old gods would strike me down? What idiotic musings! Yet. . . who
doesn’t want the gods on his side? Who dares stand godless, searching once
more? W ith no god with flaming sword beside us and without a hell to
doom our enemies? But alone, speaking with the authority of the private
psyche alone, unsupported by dogma, religious or scientific, with no cre
dentials that the world understands?
In the beginning I could say, “No one w ill listen.” It didn’t bother me
too much before Rob and I decided to make the Seth material public: We
were embarked on a private search; one I knew was tricky in our times, but
I was strong and determined and I had Rob beside me. But then, being a
writer, trained to describe my experiences, I had to share them. And that
was the rub. Bringing possible disaster down upon my own head was one
thing, a risk I was prepared to take, but what about my followers? Because
soon people listened. They were trying my road. Was I then responsible for
their experience? Because in that old context I didn’t quite realize that we
form our own reality. People w ill do what they want to do; and if they fol
low an idea its because the idea meets an echo in their minds.
228 Chapter 22
I’m still in the middle of my search, yet some are ready to set my work
up as the latest dogma. I’ve grown to hate the term “truth-seeker,” because
so often it means that each new insight must be guarded, protected, turned
into another rule to be followed. Seth is often seen in the light of old be
liefs, so that some people use his ideas to back up old concepts with a new
cement.
And behind all of this is the delegation of personal responsibility, for
what use are the gods if they don’t tell us how to live our lives? Any god
worth his or her salt lays down a code of commandments, tells us what is
right and wrong and how to treat our friends and enemies. And because we
projected portions of ourselves into these divinities, they exaggerated not
only our powers and abilities but our failings as well. They could be ten
times as cruel, ten times as loving. They have always been personified, and
so they’ve always reflected our state of being at any given time; or rather,
our state of comprehension.
What good is a god who doesn’t tell us what to do? Yet while we think
in those terms, we’ll always have to justify Gods ways to man, for if he cre
ates our good, then how do we explain our evil? To me, the whole structure
is misleading. We create our experience on a personal and global scale—
our good and our evil— through a creative energy that forms our being;
that is personified in us and that is beyond our ideas of personhood. We
must throw all the gods away in order to discover the mystery behind their
existence, that shines through the miracle of our flesh.
I think that this is a fine sacred chase, the most worthwhile psychic
endeavor, yet I， m still haunted, I suppose, by the god of my childhood. I
remember the statue of the infant Jesus, and the bleeding Christ whose pic
ture smiled compassionately from the bedroom wall—heart dripping with
blood that would dissolve my sins. If my mother didn’t understand, Christ
did. If he was busy, there was always his mother, immaculate, safe from sex,
so holy that she had a baby without ever doing it. I cried aloud to the
saints, each one right there in my mind~one to find lost objects, one to
keep me safe while traveling~a psychic family for the soul.
I remember the comfort; that if no one else loved me, Christ did~as
long as I went to church on Sunday, didn’t masturbate, kept my faith, and
didn’t read books that were forbidden. And he was always there, watching;
the original Big Brother. It took a certain defiant daring to masturbate;
lying sprawled on the child’s bed, what with Christ there, staring. Even
when I turned his picture to the wall it made no difference. And the sim
ple natural act became horrid, sacrilegious, evil, because of the good it was
supposed to deny. It would have to be a symbol, sometimes of humiliating
acceptance of the flesh’s weakness; sometimes of triumphant flaunting
because if it was wrong, why did it feel so good?
But you always knew what was right even if you strayed, and there
was confession in which forgiveness was sought~forgiveness for the fact
that you were human. The sacred and the profane creations of our own
thrown out into experience; our hates and loves; each seen in opposition,
never fitting together, yet a part of a whole that we haven’t learned to un
derstand.
Yet I ，m hardly an atheist. I’m only aghast at the kind of personifying
and nonsense we’ve laid upon the gods, the way we’ve imprisoned them
and us in concepts that refuse to grow; for once we decide upon a particu
lar dogma as truth, then we stop looking in our determination to protect
whatever certainty we think we’ve already found. Sometimes I wonder if
were strong enough to understand, because one day were going to have to
handle our own reality, stand resolute, knowing that we form our world
and experience. Were going to have to take responsibility for our lives and
the condition of the planet. Then maybe we’ll be wise and brave enough to
encounter the gods that flicker in and out of our being through the ages.
So IVe been tinged by lim iting concepts as much as anyone else,
blinded by them to some extent. The Catholic Church is no better or
worse, as far as I can see, than any other religious organization. Some fun
damental Christian sects make Catholicism look liberal, for that matter;
and the sciences have lim iting dogmas all their own. A ll of these, however,
share a basic distrust of the self and the very conditions of its being.
So, I wrote down the codicils and some part of me was triumphant
while another part held back, thinking: But its so hardw hat would peo
ple do, denied all the old comfort blankets, taught to be free? And here I
was, getting this material, while at the same time sticking to a tight writing
schedule, as if I，d never write another line again if I gave it up. I remem
bered an old poem I wrote in high school:
I’ll keep my soul in prison,

Shes to o lo vin g and too kin d .
And I’ll keep her there forever,
If she doesn’t learn to mind.
So, w ith magnificent bravery, I decided to do just what I wanted to

the following day even if my “sinful” self wanted to sunbathe instead of
write, or~ w ell, anything. And faced with the day, free as a bird, I felt
fu ll of inspiration and— you guessed it—wrote all day long. But the
trouble is, most of us are afraid to put ourselves on the line, even in the
smallest of instances, to see what were really like. If we leave ourselves
alone, were afraid that we wont work, won’t produce: We’ll lie idle, as if
left alone the body and mind together wont do their thing, but need a
230 Chapter 22
schoolmaster or schoolmistress always on top, giving the orders. And

obeying those orders without question, all we learn to do is imitate our
selves and our own living.
And I ，ve seen many of the young, following this or that latest guru,
looking for a purpose to guide their lives, searching for a sense of their own
power and vitality in dogmas that encourage dependence. They ask: What
is my purpose? And they have a right to ask because the beliefs we’ve har
bored about ourselves have robbed them of the ability to find purpose in
the only place it can be found— the private self.
The religions might say, “God is within you,” but the “you” that He
is within is such a hash of “low vibrations” or “fleshy desires,” or whatever,
that it seems easier to take drugs, hoping for some miraculous insight. Peo
ple ask for help over the telephone and in letters, not realizing that the best
thing I can do is to reinforce their faith in themselves, try to find it and pull
them up by their spiritual bootstraps. Anything else only reinforces their
sense of powerlessness.
So, I wrote the codicils. They led me to consider my own lim iting
beliefs, those tricky dogmatic leftovers that had been stewing in the back
of my mind for years. W ith those out in the open, I could understand
other peoples problems better. S till brooding over the entire question of
the gods and our relationship with them, I wrote the following two
poems.
Will the Real Gods Stand Up
“W ill the real gods stand up, please,”

I shouted, b u t a ll the prophets were yellin g ,
and it was hard to hear.
“D o this, do th a t~
o r suffer d ivin e w ra th — ，
’
lik e a sort o f psychic nuclear reaction
aim ed against souls w ho d id n’t toe the line.
I， d sooner p ray
to a tin y tree toad
w ho at least loved the earth,
and kn ew w h a t daw n was.
I f he ate flies
he w o u ld n ’t pretend
th a t hes p un ish in g them
fo r some sin
against his d ivin e benevolence,
and his hunger is innocent.
PersonalA pplication o f C odicils
When the Gods Take Their Clothing O ff
Som ewhere the gods flin g o ff

the images we clothe them in
and swim , naked,
in the clear waters o f th e ir essence,
o r tw irl t ill th e ir images u n w in d
lik e g lim m e rin g m u m m y robes
fin a lly fa llin g o ff
Somewhere the gods hang th e ir em p ty form s

on secret shores,
triu m p h a n tly stepping o u t o f them ,
w ig g lin g th e ir souls free
o f golden coils, brocades; shaking
themselves loose o f sacred hearts,
leaping b o ld ly o u t o f sw addling clothes,
k in g ly robes and blood-stained garments.
C row ns, swords and crosses

stacked in a b o n fire p ile and lit ~
em p ty christs, jehovahs
slum ping dow n in to the flames,
buddhas m elting , allahs b u rn in g
w ith a m e rry lig h t
w h ile vacant angel form s hang lim p ly
on the tree o f life ,
w rin k le d w ings blow ing
in a new spring w ind .
Laughing the gods th ro w in

a ll the emblems o f th e ir majesty.
Bibles, relics, sacred rings
go spiraling,
w h ile in the shadows, o ld gods
w ho have gone before,
applaud and y e ll o u t advice.
W h a t massive chuckles
as the gods rise up
and stretch rig h t throug h the universe;
stam p o ut the fire and disperse
in to everything th a t is.
A n d w hat d ivin e conversation,
a ll public,
open as the w o rld ,
232 Chapter 22
as the gods shout, w hisper, chatter

th e ir messages; disappear
in to grass blades, people,
planets, dogs, m olecules—
the d ivin e camouflage.
T h e gods are
w here we don’t look.
As I read the codicils over, considered the poems Yd just written, and
thought about the ways Yd been hampered by old beliefs myself, I saw the
difficulties involved in trying to set up new hypotheses as a basis for action.
Our culture gives official recognition only to experiences that reinforce its
own belief structures. To some extent, that’s fair enough. But were taught
from childhood to respect authority and to look to others to confirm our
perceptions of realitywhich is based on certain agreements as to what is
real and what is not.
When we find ourselves having taboo experiences, or when the world
seems to be behaving in a way were taught that it cant, then were pre
sented with a dilemma as long as we stay in that frame of reference: Either
what we perceived actually happened or it didn’t~and if it didn’t, then
were deluded. Our belief in ourselves and the world is shaken. Even the
support we receive from other people can be withdrawn if our ideas of re
ality collide with the usual ones too severely.
To some, a simple precognitive dream can be shattering, not so much
because of the dreams specific content as by its implications. We aren’t sup
posed to know anything that is not immediately present to our senses.
Most, though not all, conventional psychologists consider out-of-body ex
periences as hallucinatory data, having no reference to normal behavior.
Any exceptional perceptions can, therefore, be threatening at least to some
degree. If our view of reality differs too much from the norm, were con
sidered insane: We cant cope with the real world because our private vision
supersedes it. And the codicils present an alternate version of reality that
would increase so-called exceptional events.
Our culture not only restricts exceptional experiences that appear to
contradict accepted theories, but it often also frowns upon the develop
ment of creative abilities if they come into conflict with, say, the work ethic
or any other core belief held by the society. The aspects of the psyche must
be squeezed to fit this version of reality and the rich psychic mixture di
luted to fit the cultural medium.
But if the focus personality has experiences that do not fit the mold, it
often begins to form an interior culture of its own, in which it can use the
abilities otherwise closed off. To do this it needs an inner authority for sup
port, to compensate for the lack of usual agreement in the exterior world.
PersonalA pplication o fC odicils 233
In more ideal circumstances, this subjective creation would seldom

appear as itself, but flow outward naturally, projecting itself into the culture
and its organizations, subtly altering them through a give-and-take of pri
vate symbolism and exterior actualization.
When culture becomes too restrictive, this flow is disrupted and the
individual finds that his inner experiences no longer conform. The focus
personality’s sense of identity is threatened, particularly if psychic events
are concerned. People who find themselves encountering revelatory mater
ial, instances of clairvoyance or telepathy, have nowhere to turn.
There are counterculture groups. The trouble is that most of these
also set up dogmas to which their converts must conform, somewhat des
perately, because where else in society can they go? Many such groups have
their own newsletters, meetings, and bulletins, and some of their antics are
rather ludicrous. They’re no more ludicrous, though, than a science news
magazine when it closes its eyes to anything outside of its own belief sys
tem, and uses its own terms as rigidly as any “fanatic.”
The trouble is that were taught that events happen~or don’t hap
pen~within a very strict framework. So if we have any visions or insights
or revelations, we don’t know how to interpret them. We have to prove to
ourselves or others that they happened in the normal framework~where
they don’t fit. For example, an engineer mentioned earlier in this book be
lieved he saw a UFO on very flimsy evidence; then he began automatic
writing, and was convinced he was receiving messages from these people
from outer space. Along with this, he had some valid instances of telepathy
with his wife and some excellent out-of-body experiences. His scientific
background made such experiences seem impossible. On the other hand he
was impelled to “prove” the data in physical terms. The spaceship was real,
he insisted, so he wasn’t crazy.
He wasn’t crazy but the spaceship (his, at least) wasn’t a physical one,
either. He’d formed the entire subjective framework to try to explain legit
imate subjective experiences, such as the telepathy and projections of con
sciousness. Finally, when no one agreed with him on the physical validity
of the spaceship, he gave the whole thing up.
I tried to tell him that the UFO and the space intelligences were valid
creations of the psyche, symbolic representations standing for something
else, meant to lead him to other questions, but he couldn’t take that. The
ordinary true-and-false world cant tolerate such concepts. So, unfortu
nately, he wasn’t able to take advantage of his telepathic experiences either,
because he couldn’t find a suitable framework for them. And he couldn’t
superimpose his subjective framework outward as physical fact.
The same thing applies, regardless of the subjective framework. I
wrote earlier here about the Christ who called me off and on for a few
234 Chapter 22
years. His obsession was finally tempered when it no longer suited his pur
poses, and when I refused to accept his Christhood as literal fact. He called
a few months ago. Now he realized that he wasn’t Christ, he told me, he， d
been confused: he was Saint Paul. Maybe it doesn’t seem that he was that
much better, but this was quite a jump from the omnipotent Christ he saw
himself to be, to a mere physical disciple. It meant that he was seeing him
self in a more realistic light. And now that he was human, he might be able
to see that he was himself.
Our official line of consciousness builds up its own world view and its
own group of assumptions, which then become a priori judgments. These
beliefs support each other visibly and invisibly, so that to challenge one is
to challenge all, and to threaten the entire framework. Yet this line of con
sciousness itself brings about dilemmas and contradictions that are meant
to serve as impetuses for further development. I believe that the codicils, by
offering an alternate~even opposite~view of reality, can serve as sup
portive guidelines that w ill help us bring the exterior world more in line
with the psyches potentials.
C h apter 2 3
T h e N a tu ra l C ontours
o f the Psyche
o o ne has really tried to map th e natural contours o f th e psyche.
N Few even wonder if it can be done. You cant do it by considering

the psyche a more or less local and confined phenomenon, as
Freud did, wading just off the shore of our usually focused awareness.
Freud rummaged about in an area between the psychic shore and ocean,
examining the eddies, seeing the mud, all the while staying where he was,
never going further to ride the great tidal waves of the psyche that came
thundering majestically in. He examined only the natural debris that
washed out from the shores of mind, but he never glimpsed the inrush of
power and energy that constantly refreshes and revitalizes ordinary con
sciousness.
For our consciousness itself rushes in and out, encounters physical re
ality, forms its three-dimensional spirals, sand castles, and rocks, and with
draws back into the depths of itself once again in gigantic and minute
patterns that are etched in the very convolutions and ridges of our brains.
Day~and the tide of our consciousness splashes against the objective
earth, the pattern of its motion scattering the stones and pebbles of events
outward, impinging in the world of time, making scrawls in historic sands.
And night~when we withdraw into the depths from which the shores
emerge, and from which our waking consciousness surely springs.
Carl Jung at least knew that there was such an ocean. He felt the un
dertow, dreamed of the distant breakers, and sensed the towering shapes
that rose and fell, forming all the smaller ones. But how far can our normal
consciousness go out into that figurative ocean? It is part of that ocean all
the time, of course, composed of the same ingredients, participating in its
motion. But when we travel bravely out of our usual depths and bring back
，
souvenirs, however strange they appear there when we get them back to
236 Chapter 23
shore they’re somehow the same old thing. They seem to go through a
metamorphosis.
Intuitions and revelations that seem so sparkling and original at the
time of discovery often turn seedy. Its as if weVe captured a fine mysteri
ous creature out in the depths of the ocean— a creature that seems to be
long to a species weVe never seen before. Triumphant, filled with hope and
surprise, we bring our prize in, whatever way we can. But when we get
back, before we can even shout, “Hey, look what I’ve found!” we see that
the creature is, after all, of a well-known species; somewhat exotic, perhaps,
because not too many people go out far enough to find its habitat. Yet we
could have sworn~out there where we saw it~ that we， d discovered some
thing of invaluable merit and original design.
So our mystical visions escape us. When were caught up in the tidal
wave of the psyches sudden acceleration, riding it with the heady fresh
spray of insights breaking all around us, we can hardly believe the original
ity of our perceptions or the significance of our new knowledge. When we
ride the breakers back to shore, though, grasping our new catch in the net
of our thoughts, we find on examination that we have another floppy
christ-fish, a seaweedy buddha that someone else has thrown away, or an
other crumbled virgin doll. Debris, we think, nothing new, but the old
standard versions after all. Disappointed, we remember the high feeling of
certainty and inspiration we felt, riding that breaker, and we wonder: Was
it all a lie?
For something happens when we try to translate inner intuitive data
into ordinary terms. It works, at a certain level, as instances of telepathy
and clairvoyance imply. But beyond that, gross distortions seem to occur.
IVe read that there are strange sea creatures in the depths of the ocean, pre
cisely attuned to their environment. But try to bring them up and you have
corpses: they change from alive to dead on the way. To see them, you have
to go there, to their territory. So maybe original visions change in the same
way, adapting to our environment on the journey back, just in order to stay
alive at all. They may adapt themselves to some degree to the atmosphere
of ordinary consciousness.
But how much are we responsible for this unfortunate transforma
tion? W illiam Blake, the eighteenth-century mystic and painter, saw vi
sions all the time. Once he painted the spirit of a flea as it appeared to
him early one evening. He saw it three dimensionally, and whatever it
was, it was a personal sense experience which he then used to create a
work of art. And what a remarkable and weird work of art it was! Here
was no light airy vision, no fairy creature with gossamer wings. Blake
drew a husky, horrible man-animal-demon, dripping blood; bloated and
hairy.
The N atural Contours o fthe Psyche 237
As far as I’m concerned, this is perfectly legitimate as the basis for a

work of art: You paint it as you see it. But why did Blake see it that way?
He viewed his own visions through his religion-soaked beliefs, so that his
spirit of a flea had little to do with a fle a o r its spirit~but with his ideas
about the grotesques of evil. Blake was a great mystic and artist despite all
this. Yet I，m bound to wonder what he would have produced if he， d al
lowed his magnificent vision its own sight.
I came across his drawing of the fleas spirit as I was working on this
chapter, and I thought that it was an excellent example of the transforma
tions that can happen to visions or revelations. Someone else might have
seen a nicer flea, or turned it into a romanticized fairy creature, but Blake’s
genius could turn even a distorted vision into art. If we could perceive the
spirit of a flea, most likely we couldn’t capture it anyhow. It would be an
aura or atmosphere or invisible incline of being; a living knot of moving
space—to be felt, perhaps, but never captured. Only we feel that we do
have to capture our visions and cast them in physical terms. Doing so
might be the one definite way of losing whatever it was we thought that we
had found.
I wrote this poem about Blake and his visions after I saw the drawing
of the flea, and as I was musing further about how our beliefs might pro
gram the content of our visions and insights.
Come into M y Parlor
William Blake
broke the sky apart
with his visions.
Stars and planets tipped sideways,
fell into his head
in stinging fragments
till bits of gods exploded.
Hells and heavens streamed
out of his heated eyes,
spreading saints and demons
out onto his cottage floor.
Avenging angels, swords drawn,

advanced upon his garden lawn
at twilight, slaying gargoyles.
And when he opened his back door,
he never knew
who might be standing there,
ghost or demon,
black eyes swirling in volcanic sockets,
238 Chapter 23
sprouting smoke,
flaming skin hotter than his kitchen stove.
He didn’t care.
If they’d sit for a portrait
he， d let them in,
and invite them to say their piece
while his hell-heaven scorched fingers sketched,
or he， d turn them into poems
with a sudden flick of his magic mind,
imprisoning them in verse,
laughing when they shouted to be let out,
caught between the shining bars
of his magnetic vowels;
tricked.
All the heavenly and hellish hordes

found his humble house,
drawn down the burning chimney of his soul
as if it were a hole in the sky,
and they fell through,
till finally the heavens emptied,
and the last seraphim, devil, saint,
and every last image of God
was captured, held beyond escape
in a miniature firmament—
infinite within its frame~
but confined
to paintings hung upon awall.
Or, maybe Im being too hard on Blake, and all of us. The psychic or
nonphysical world might not exist apart from our projections: that is, it
may be so plastic, creative and psychically rubbery that it automatically
translates itself into what we think it is. In other words, its responsiveness
to our feelings might be so acute and accurate that it takes on the shape ex
pected of it. If so, then we would always see what we believed we would see,
and our visions of gods and their retinues would more or less agree through
the centuries, providing their own separate “evidential data,” just as our ac
cepted physical world does.
Were beginning to understand that physical reality exists differently
than our sense-experience with it. Our general agreement on the nature of
objects betrays us to that degree, because objects just don’t exist the way we
think they do. On the other hand, as I write, I put my coffee cup on the
table and grin, thinking that we must be pretty much all right somehow, to
put solid cups that really don’t exist on solid tables that aren’t real either
using hands that are made up of swiftly moving molecules, with space
more than anything else holding them together. A triple trick of some
merit, done without the slightest strain at all.
It follows, of course, that we aren’t really solid either, though we cer
tainly seem to be. But the gods, demons, and other conventionalized ver
sions of mystic experience might be psychic stereotypes, presenting their
own kind of evidential material at another level of realityno more or less
valid than our solidity of cups and people, but just as handy. But... atoms
and molecules are behind our physical reality, what is behind the psycho
logical reality of these other agreed-upon entities?
In our alterations of consciousness, our inner searchings, we are look
ing for a basic reality or the stuff out of which realities are made. For this,
its necessary to break through known patterns. If atoms and molecules are
the inner components of cups and people, then what is the equivalent
makeup of gods, demons, and their ensemble on another level?
We see physical reality because of neurological training and trigger
ing. If our sense perceptions are off just a bit, we perceive a slightly differ
ent picture of a mass-accepted world. I have little depth perception, for
example. In some strange manner, do I really see a truer version of space,
an unofficial one, because my vision is not tuned in to the recognized pat
tern as clearly as usual? Is it possible that where sense patterns are eccentric,
we might have a clearer point through which to view whatever it is reality
is, apart from our normal perception?
In the same way, the visions that don’t agree with the various religious
and mystic dogmas, that aren’t couched in terms of Christ, Jehovah, or
Buddha might represent holes in the official picture through which a glim
mer of inner reality seeps.
The vision that makes us uncomfortable, that doesn’t fit, the one that
we can’t so easily explain, may give us hints and further directions in which
to probe. Such visions make us uncomfortable precisely because they are
unfamiliar, and this instinctively frightens us. Its bad enough to disagree
with our fellows over different elements in a mass shared reality, but un
orthodox visions make us fear madness. At least the religious myths pro
vide a framework of a kind in which reincarnated Saint Pauls, the disciples,
Christ, and known saints, can find a fit, however uneasily. But true vision
wouldn’t provide that kind of conflict with the accepted facts of our world,
because the inner reality would be seen as the source from which exterior
events spring.
rm not knocking the physical senses here, or saying that other di
mensions are a priori better than ours, only that we must not automatically
dress other-reality perceptions in the terms of conventional stereotypes to
make them fit.
240 Chapter 23
As I was working on this chapter, I received a phone call that illus

trates what I mean. Lonnie, I ，ll call her, was a secretary in a large city on the
West Coast. She’d phoned me once or twice in the past. This time her voice
was excited, filled with a funny kind of wonder, with only undertones ex
pressing a persistent sardonic questioning. “I， ve just been to a psychic
palmist,” she said, then, with a touch of skepticism, aWell, you know;
that’s what she’s supposed to be. She reads the lines in your hand, but she
really uses her psychic abilities, too. I mean, she doesn’t just rely on the
lines?” Her voice ended in a question.
“Go on,” I said.
wWell, she read me. I mean, she really read me. She knew what I was
like, inside. She told me that I didn’t feel as if I belonged, and that I was
uneasy in my environment, that I felt like an outcast. And you know, that’s
true.”
“Okay,” I said.
uWell, I was impressed by that. She’d never seen me before•” Lonnie
paused. She gave an embarrassed laugh that hid a hope, and went on,
quickly. “Then the woman said to me, ‘O f course you don’t feel as if you
belong because~you don’t!， ” Another pause. In my minds eye I saw Lon
nie sitting there, modishly thin, rather elegantly boned, chic, looking what?
Modern? Sophisticated? Something like that.
Lonnie repeated the womans words again, with a long-drawn-out
mystified sigh. “You don’t belong. 丁hat’s exactly what she told me. Then
she said that I really belonged to~the fairies! Did you ever hear anything
like that? She said that they were, well, like another species, and that I be
longed to them, more than anything else. That’s why IVe always felt as if I
didn’t belong.”
I couldn’t say anything for a minute.
“I know it sounds batty,” Lonnie said. “But what do you think? Isn’t it
wonderful?” The wonder had broken through her voice~Santa Claus
lived all over again, and she was like a kid at Christmas, given a gift too
good to be true. And I was obviously the one she'd chosen to take the tin
sel off the package, or she wouldn’t have called: She knew me at least well
enough to suspect what my attitude would be. Yet I hated to dabble with
that wonder, that baby-hope. If she wanted to believe that she was part of a
fairy generation, that was her business. There are worse beliefs. Except that
she，d asked me what I thought.
“Wbll,” she said impatiently. “Nutty as it sounds, I think its true.
Anything is possible.”
“I think its a psychological con,” I said. Gently. “This is what I
think~ ” And I started in.
Symbolically the statement may have accurately described the way

Lonnie felt, and given her a fantasy to explain her sense of alienation一 a
child’s dream, beautiful at age three or seven; Peter Pan who never grows
old; poetic statements of inner truths—but not to be taken literally, as any
child knows. Lonnie was having real problems in the workaday world: in a
way, she was wandering in a fairyland, but she needed to get her footing
here. She didn’t need an excuse for not relating to the world. An impris
oned fairy who can’t live in this world is a different thing than a free flying
one, comfortable in both realms~which is beside the point.
I ’m not saying that the psychic was a fraud, either. She may have
picked up impressions about Lonnie quite besides any clues she received
from Lonnies manner, and I ， d accept her statements as creative fantasies
accurately describing Lonnies state of mind. But the psychic and Lonnie
were accepting that drama as literal fact. And there I drew the line. How
could Lonnie possibly believe it? How could she keep a straight face?
I’m even willing to concede that fairies might exist, as I told her. Im
not so egotistical that I believe consciousness comes only in a human pack
age. But I don’t think that people come from fairies any more than mos
quitoes are born from hawks. Why couldn’t Lonnie see that the whole story
was like a tale told to children, with the truth between the words, not in
them?
She interrupted me, saying, “Look. I know that elementals exist. I
threw my consciousness into a storm and the air was full of elementals. It
was wild. So if there’s elementals, then why cant I be part of a species of
fairies?”
Again, I didn’t really know what to say, though I explained what I
thought as well as I could. I talk to the spirits of the trees and the hills, and
feel their response, but I know that this is a framework Im using. I don’t
expect little tree people to come out in a merry parade at m idnightw hich
doesn’t mean that I don’t feel the quite valid consciousnesses that form the
natural world.
But so many of us think we must “see the little people,” give them
names and categories, mimicking the methods of objective science in an
area where such methods just don’t apply. When we demand such literal
interpretations, we turn emotional and psychic realities into ludicrous car
icatures of themselves that rob them ofwhatever originality they possessed.
We end up with romantic pretenses, false in both worlds. In doing so,
we destroy the natural flow of the intuitions, encasing them in yet another
stereotyped form. Yet its easy to see why so many people do this. We seem
to think that if we can name and label exceptional events, they w ill be more
acceptable and real. But the more “real” such events become, the less
242 Chapter 23
potent is their internal validity. They exist in a different order of events.

And that order is as real or more real than the world we recognize.
That last sentence is extremely important because it implies different
kinds of reality, and events that can be real in one world and perhaps not
exist in another. Many of my correspondents are delightful, explorative
people, privately embarking on inner roads of achievement and creative ex
ploration, for example. Carrying on their normal pursuits, they still study
their dreams, experiment with projection of consciousness, and search in
their own ways for the nature of reality. But you cant use the criteria of
usual fact to measure events that don’t show in the fact world, any more
than you can use a scale to measure a heavy mood. The heavy mood is real
even if the scale doesn’t recognize its reality.
But we search for certainties, and were trained to consider physical
facts as the only criteria of reality. For example, the day after Lonnies call,
another woman phoned to tell me about a situation that no longer sur
prised me: another instance of a Ouija-board personality insisting that he
was Seth.
“Was he or wasn’t he?” she wanted to know. “Was the entity lying?”
Her voice was filled with hope and doubt. She took it for granted that an
entity was communicating, without questioning that term or what she
might mean by it. So some spirit out there had to be telling the truth or
lying, o rw o rst of all, her own unconscious was lying, and was therefore
mischievous and unreliable.
Years ago, I used to share the framework of concepts in which those
questions have meaning, so I understood the womans plight and did my
best to explain my viewpoint. I told her that she was working through areas
of the psyche; that at some indescribable point the psyche opens up into
levels usually unavailable, and that it might personify itself to get its mes
sage across. But the psyche speaks a different language, or uses our lan
guage differently. It doesn’t lie; but we have to learn to decipher the
language~one that is closer to the arts, with their rich pageantry’s of im
ages and symbols. When we dress the psyches multidimensional creations
in old worn-out garments, we can hardly complain if they look shabby.
The psyche is majestic and awesome, and our present existence springs out
of its being. 丁here’s got to be a lot more there than paper gods.
But maybe our original insights and visions naturally fit themselves
into the contours of our beliefs so that they blend like natural psychologi
cal scenery, highlighted only now and then precisely where our beliefs don’t
fit together well; or in the seams of our doubts. Perhaps if we could let our
structured beliefs go long enough, we could catch ourselves transforming
unofficial information into conventional garb, or even glimpse what these
original perceptions are before their almost instant transformation.
O r the contours of consciousness itself might change from level to

level. If our gods and religious figures are reflections of certain areas of con
sciousness, we might be able to follow them to their source through further
alterations of focus. Its as if weve been doing number-painting translations
of inner data, casting it into prearranged patterns. Were afraid not to fol
low the dotted lines because we might end up with a different picture of re
ality than the one were used to. Our beliefs form grids, then, through
which our deepest perceptions flow. Perhaps we have to suspend all beliefs
momentarily, so that we can experience the original perception as it is ec
centrically opposed to the model we’ve taken for granted.
Maybe were afraid that reality is really formless, so we slap our own
forms over whatever visions we receive. Im personally convinced, though,
that the models for everything, including ourselves, spring from this inner
order of events, so it must have strong significance-forming properties. I
don’t imagine inner reality as a void or emptiness, but endowed with the
propensity for individuation. Those who think of it as an ocean in which
all individuality is lost might be in for a surprise, for any “thing” that falls
into these primordial waters may be instantly thrown up again into indi
viduation. The physical ocean itself is composed of an infinite number of
particles, even if we do think of it as one moving mass.
But I think that when we project our patterns upon inner data, we
break up the greater ones that do exist.
By leaving my mind open as to the nature of Seths reality, for exam
ple, by not imposing models taken from religion or psychology, I can let
him define himself in his own way, through his actions in sessions, his in
teractions with others, and his own books. And I can be alert for his idea of
definition, which may be far different than mine.
Yet I believe that these models in the psyche— the gods, demons,
wise old men and women, fairies, and eternal children—stand for some
thing, and reflect truths about inner reality in the same way that the nat
ural environment tells us about the physical world we live in. So what do
they mean and why do they appear so often in revelatory visions and au
tomatic writings? And why do so many theories teach that bliss or nir
vana~sansyou, sans me~lies behind everything that we know? A bliss in
which all knots of individual consciousness are loosened and dissolved?
Again, I think that rich soup of creativity is more filled with alphabets
than we suppose: a heady thick brew, seething with activity. But for now,
I ’ll let that pass.
Still, maybe what we need is a cosmic rooster crowing on the rooftops
of the world, or some animal god that would effectively disrupt our con
cepts enough so that we could at least peek through. And IVe been in
volved with some divine father-mother visions of my own, so I know that
244 Chapter 23
they seem real enough. And of course, they are. Its what’s behindthem that
Im after.
In one such experience, mentioned earlier in this book, I felt myself
rise to the heavens, where, as an infant, I was held and comforted by a man
and woman seated in the clouds. I literally felt like a baby. Once I fell back
ward to earth, a frightening experience, even though I knew that “I ” was
seated at my desk. My sensations were inside the plummeting infant, not
in my own seated physical figure.
W ith other beliefs, I might have seen the couple as Christ and the
Virgin, or been convinced that I had been given a divine interview. O r I
could have interpreted the experience to mean that God returned me to
earth, to fu lfill my “mission.” In other words, I could have taken it for
granted that I was literally in the sky, visiting divine relatives. The emo
tional validity of the experience transcends such interpretations, though.
The following is an example of what can happen when we interpret
psychic data in literal terms, and get caught in what appears to be a power
play between worlds. I first spoke to Dorrine one dark rainy June morning.
I was typing up some notes, and looking out the front windows at the lawn
and mountains. Seth had finished dictating The Ûnknown' Reality about
a month or so after we moved into the h ill house, and I was wondering if
he was going to begin another book, when the phone rang.
The voice on the other end of the line was feminine, young, and
scared. “I don’t know how to say this, but Im in trouble. Spiritual trouble,
and I need help,” she said. “I wondered if you could hold a Seth session for
me, or if I could attend one— ”
I told her that we didn’t hold private sessions for people anymore, and
that Seth had written The Nature ofPersonal Reality to help people help
themselves. Then I asked her what was wrong. She was a black psycholo
gist, in her forties, doing research in racial prejudice, and she was calling
from a western state. She was also married, with two children. She told me
all this in a rush. Then she said, “It was terribly hard to call you. Here I am,
a black, saying that blacks can do their own thing, and I have to call a
white person to ask about the nature of reality.”
“Look, we’re people first of all,” I said, but in this case the picture did
involve contrasts and states of mind in which everything was black or
white, good or evil— and with a literal interpretation of psychic events.
Dorrine had been involved with a group practicing black magic. According
to her story, when she tried to leave, members directed evil energy against
her. She became ill, “suffered a terrible heart attack,” and was sure she was
going to die.
Finally Dorrine went to a psychic, who gave her a medal to ward off
the evil energy sent from the first group. This assistance only worked
temporarily, however, so she went to another psychic with “still greater

powers.” She wanted Seth, as a still more powerful entity, to give her
greater protection from the evil spirits and elementals that she believed
were being sent against her.
I was appalled. I spoke to her for nearly an hour, telling her to read
PersonalReality, reinforcing the idea that she was in control of her own life,
and otherwise trying to build up her own trust and self-confidence. She
hung up, and I made notes of the conversation, relating her experiences to
her beliefs and level of consciousness. I kept feeling that her call contained
some important hints in that regard that I hadn’t crystallized.
Just then, Dorrine called back. “There are a few things I didn’t tell
you,” she began; then she told me that she had visions herself, and one in
particular in which she saw San Francisco being destroyed. Only the blacks
were saved, and she was leading them to safety.
“Come on, Dorrine. You’re supposed to be a psychologist, so you
should know what projection is. Didn’t it even occur to you that anger
against the whites was erupting in your visions, so that they were being
punished?”
“I know what projection is, but this is different,” she protested. “I try
to love all people, even if it is difficult.”
“People who profess to love the world often get rid of their anger by
seeing visions in which everyone in the world is destroyed except them
selves and their chosen group,” I said. “Skin color doesn’t have to be in
volved. It can be a religious cult or a particular nation. Anyhow, the
survr are the good guys, vindicated.”
hung up again, but I kept thinking of Dorrines dilemma. Her
state of consciousness with its corresponding belief system results in certain
kinds of experiences. The psyches pictures are thrown outward into world
events, and within that framework it all makes sense: the good spirits and
bad spirits, the power plays and the sense of powerlessness beneath.
You have to change your beliefs or focus in order to escape the seem
ing evidence that keeps reinforcing itself. If you believe that youre harassed
by evil spirits, that you’re a victim; if you think that power is the answer
(and you dont possess it), then youll always have to seek out those with
greater power for protection. But after a while that doesn’t work either, be
cause each reliance upon a succeedingly greater power diminishes the sense
of self-determination. Its easy enough to see how this works in world pol
itics, until no projected defense against possible attack by an enemy w ill
suffice, and finally a nation initiates aggression first~ in defense.
Dorrines revelations also symbolically represented her vision of the
world. She would be a prophet leading her people to victory. But then the
dilemma: How could she perform these miracles when she was herself the
246 Chapter 23
victim of evil elementals? The “psychic attack” was a perfect picture of the
evils Dorrine saw perpetrated upon the blacks by the whites in all walks of
life.
Powerful stuff indeed. As a woman and a black she felt powerless, and
as a psychologist she had serious doubts that the roots of prejudice could
ever be eradicated. But in her visions she was invincible. And against that
psychic vision of utter triumph, anything less seemed inconsequential.
But are the devils, revengeful gods, elementals, and their kind “nat-
ural features” at one level of consciousness? I dont believe that they are ar
chetypal elements in the psyche at all, but distorted versions of inner
models or aspects as they are reflected through certain assumptions about
reality that appear valid at certain states of consciousness.
In other words, the minute we turn our focus inward, we try to inter
pret psychic events according to our usual assumptions, translating such
data into pseudo-physical terms. To many people the unseen world then
becomes peopled by elementals, who can be ruled by anyone with the
power to control them, in a continuation of quite human power politics.
The beliefs themselves act as grids, programming inner experience. The
gods and demons are already numbered patterns in the mind, waiting to be
filled in by any unofficial perceptions.
These inner experiences are difficult to explain and interpret. Words
are inadequate, so it may be handy to have such a stylized symbolic lan
guage~because the gods and demons are stylized and fairly rigid as they
appear through the centuries. Perhaps that’s why they seem so dependable.
When we try to dispense with them, were faced with the necessity of try
ing to interpret our visions and insights to ourselves without handy la
bels~no easy task.
As I thought about Dorrine, my own experiences, and those of my
correspondents, I had the nagging thought that I knew more than I real
ized I did about visions and states of consciousness; that I already had some
important information on the subject that I， d forgotten—information that
would click into place, though earlier its significance hadn’t been apparent.
That material, I knew, belonged in this book. Though Yd received it some
time ago, my own experience had to catch up with it. But what material? I
couldn’t remember anything in particular.
So, rather impatiently, I went looking through old notes. Psychic pol
itics— a beautiful example~because I came upon some scribbled pages
that instantly leapt up into significance. I stared at the material—its mean
ing so clear that I wondered how on earth Yd forgotten it or the events with
which it was connected. The material had been there all along, waiting
only for an event to trigger my full understanding.
C h apter 2 4
Stages o f Consciousness
everal months before I began this book, I had an extremely rich per
S ceptive experience, but it was literally impossible to describe. Being

me, I wrote down what I could and ended up with a description that
sounded adequate enough: it made sense; but the very sense it made was al
most meaningless in other terms that escaped me once the event was over.
I was so frustrated by the description, in fact, that I shelved the notes. It
was these that I discovered after Dorrines call.
The event had happened on a Friday night. Rob went to the store to
pick up snacks for expected guests. I stayed home to straighten up the liv
ing room and do the dishes. When I was finished I stood at the bay win
dows of the apartment, brooding. I was in between books, waiting for
some kind of inspiration. The scene and the circumstances reminded me of
a similar evening when Yd seen my “rain creature,” a vision described in
Adventures in Consciousness. I looked back toward that experience, nostal
gically. Seth, Seven, Cyprus, and Helperwere they parts of my psyche?
Independent? Both? Seven and Cyprus together had given me my novel,
The Education of Oversoul Seven. Helper seemed to operate as a healer.
“Well, whatever,” I said mentally, “I’d like some action and help now, my
self.MThen I remembered the oak tree outside the kitchen window and
thought of it, so secure in the earth, so in touch with its own freedom. So I
said, mentally, that Vd sure like to be in touch with my own inner knowl
edge in the same way, or words to that effect.
I，m going to include my original notes here, to show not only what
happened, but the way I described it and my frustration with the descrip
tion itself:
“A ll at once the air and the night attained that characteristic addi
tional beauty and significance: Kids were riding bikes upon the bridge,
which is not yet opened, and the new lights came flooding on, illum inat
ing the scene with an unearthly light. I was very aware of the voices in the
248 Chapter 24
street and the cricket sounds—indescribably sweet and dear~and the

crickets were the sounds of the gods speaking.
“Then came one of those everything-is-in-God experiences; I don’t
know how else to describe it. I stared at a plant on the windowsill and it
was . . . God knowing greenness but individualized greenness; greenness
eternally individualized. And I knew that everything in the universe was
absolutely ... safe.
“I’m scribbling this down just after the experience, but the words
don’t scratch the emotional realities I sensed. But there are some kind of
messages that sweep through the world constantly and help form it, invisi
bly, beneath what we see. And I sensed those. In a way I . . . knew that my
mind’s independence rises from Seths and that this applies to other people
too, with their equivalent of Seth.
“I • . • fe lt. . . that Seths reality is part spiritual but partly in nature
also, but mostly that there are psychological and psychic forces—a whole
different category, like gravity and so forth—but on another level. These
are supportive psychological forces as dependable as the physical forces we
know and rely upon. Theyre . . . substructures of personality from which
our present beings spring, and they operate as the basis for our psycholog
ical life.
“The vocabulary Im using just isn’t saying what I want. In the weird
est way, the words are right in certain terms, but completely wrong in oth
ers. For example, I was going to say that I knew w hile the experience was
happening~that love is a force as real as gravity, operating between psy
ches instead of objects; but what I fe lt is so different from the word “love”
so much larger and grander and yet... smaller, that the word “love” as its
usually used is meaningless in the same context.
“I felt that there are states of being quite as real as the physical world,
many in a given universe; sharing portions, say, of the earth at the same
time, but responding to and aware of different aspects of it. While the ex
perience was going on I sensed all this, nonverbally. I felt that I was mov
ing toward one of those other states, a new one for me, and that an honest
desire to know moves you from one state of being to another where love
(that word again) is literally . . . a moving force. You do see more clearly
when you love. • • •
“I felt • • • that I was being reloved, like reworked, as if this love was
quickening and balancing molecular structures inside my body. As that
happened I felt very sleepy. As I write up these notes, something is hap
pening now. I， ll try to describe it as I go along. If I can. A ll this changes to
a body thing. Inside, my head swirls. The room looks new and fresh. I
sense . . . barely see, a giant self behind me, towering. Its in the same posi
tion I am. Its the pattern out of which I came. Its like a shadow, more
Stages o f Consciousness 249
defined than an ordinary shadow but not bulky. I get uneasy, thinking that
I can merge with it. Decide not to. At the same time, I sense and almost see
a giant cat behind W illy, our cat— its giant-sized too, and rises from floor
to ceiling or vice versa as mine does, and its the pattern for W illy. I’m so re
laxed that Fll have to stop doing these notes on the spot....
“After writing the above, I lay down on the bed and suddenly felt as
protected and safe as a child with loving parents nearby~though again,
the words ‘protected’ and ‘safe， just don’t come anywhere near describing
the kind of … super-safety I experienced. For a moment I was a child in a
crib. I understood what was behind the phrase children of God，， but also
saw that the phrase was misleading in the same way the word ‘love’ was
when I used it. A t the same time, even as I felt . . . the super-safety and
children-of-God sensations, I felt an intellectual protest from my usual
level of activity. At the super-safe level I understood why people referred to
God as a father, and knew that to other kinds of consciousness one of our
lives is equivalent to perhaps one year at their scale; so that after seven lives
we， d still be like seven-year-olds to them.”
W ith all my notes, the greater elements of the experience itself es
caped translation. Yet as I read the notes, I realized that the giant-self-and-
cat patterns were my first attempt to sense the models mentioned so often
in this book.
The next day, as I sat at my desk, the following material came to me.
I knew that it was connected with the previous days experience, but some
how it didn’t click for me. It wasn’t until after Dorrines call that I under
stood in the proverbial flash how pertinent this material was. And it had
been there, all the while, waiting for me to catch up to it. Reading it over,
I saw at once where the codicils fit in.
The Stages of Consciousness

“Like many other people, IVe been afraid of my own greater reality. I
was used to identifying me with only a small portion of myself, me the
writer/ because I thought in terms of me versus not-me. In our society,
once you begin to glimpse the s e lf s wider abilities and range, youre afraid
that the self as you knew it earlier w ill be swept aside, shown to be inferior,
or somehow be annihilated. Instead the ‘old self， is only a small glimmer of
true selfhood. The ‘old self， grows and assimilates the new knowledge and
becomes the new self. It is illuminated, expanded, and continues as orga
nizer; but it does have to open its doors to its own vaster reality and allow
itself to be illuminated by its own source. Sometimes, the focus personality
as the known self becomes frightened because of its own beliefs, and sets up
250 Chapter 24
barriers to psychic growth that are in direct proportion to the sensed ex
pansion.
“The state of consciousness that we consider normal, the official line
of consciousness, is only a threshold to natural progressions/ To one extent
or another, each person tries to grow out of that framework, or rather, to
expand it. In doing so, the following stages of consciousness become ap
parent:
Stage 1
“The focus personality initiates the beginning of the expansion

process and begins to perceive unofficial information. This usually involves
some startling dream, vision, or conversion experience. Automatic writing
may be involved, use of the Ouija board, or any process that allows the psy
che extra breathing space and motion. This stage may or may not include
checkable precognitions or telepathic instances. There is great leeway here,
and many variations in the intensity and depth of the initial experience.
While the initial event may happen suddenly, seemingly out of the blue, it
is actually the result of a long process in which the focus personality has
been gradually casting about for new creative expression, and some free
dom from restrictions that lim it its range.
Stage 2
“In stage 2 the focus personality tries to continue its expansion, while
attempting to maintain its previous orientation with the world~and to
correlate its unofficial information in terms of its religious and cultural be
liefs. At this stage, for example, we w ill usually try to prove that our visions
are true in the worlds terms.
“For example, if you begin with automatic writing that gives extrater
restrials as its source, you might then try to prove that these beings exist. If
the writing provides any checkable precognitions or telepathic data, then
you w ill be convinced that the space people rather than you possess these
abilities. If, like the engineer mentioned earlier, you discover that the space
people don’t exist in those terms, you might throw the whole thing over in
disgust, at this point, and not use this opening wedge or understand that
the psychic events were important even if their clothing was symbolic.
“The initial psychic event is often dramatic, even outrageous in nor
mal terms—simply to get our attention. It may be psychological art, in
volving the entire personality, bringing all the senses into play in a
pageantry as brilliant as any stage drama~for our eyes and experience
alone. Yet we judge it~ at this stage—according to the most rigid true-
and-false standards. In a way such experiences (visions, revelations, and
some trance personifications) are bigger than life; or rather, bigger than our
ideas of what life and existence are.
“For this reason many people stay at stage 2, in a dilemma, trying to
interpret psychic events in a framework too small, or staying in fairly cozy
religious or pseudoscientific circles which provide some freedom from the
official line of consciousness by allowing psychic ventures if they follow
certain set conventions characteristic of the group.
“Unfortunately, such a course often hampers the focus personality
from developing further, and if the latest unofficial data contradicts the
“party line,” then the person is out in the cold again. Many trance person
alities developed in stage 1 finally become psychologically invisible at stage
2，or become frozen in development, mouthing the current psychic, reli
gious, or pseudoscientific dogma.
“A ll of this can cloak the originality of psychic content. At the same
time, genuine creativity can emerge; and when it does the individual is bet
ter able to cope in the normal world than before, better able to solve prob
lems, and, perhaps, quite content to use such a dogma as a comfortable
container until experience spills over the edges—and another stage is
reached.
“In other words, the ready-made symbols of religion and psuedo-
science are probably helpful to many people, providing them with an ori
entation for inner activity and growth. If the arrangement becomes
permanent, however, further experiences are programmed too rigidly. Such
people never work through to the truly personal, original aspects hidden
within.
“These stages, left alone, w ill mirror the aspects of the psyche being
activated. They w ill show themselves in ways characteristic of the psyche
and of the focus personality. Seth, Seth II, Sumari, Seven, Cyprus, and
Helper represent this kind of motion in my case. Latent creative abilities
might be personified as a muse, for example, and the focus personality
might be presented with new skills or interests. This personalized, tailor-
made assistance of the psyche to the focus personality may not emerge,
however, if rigid concepts continue to cloak the experiences. Stage 2 is re
plete more often than not with the good and bad spirits of religion and
myth.
Stage 3
“Stage 3 is literally worlds away from stage 2. Here, the focus person
ality becomes reassured enough to accept new data as a part of a greater
252 Chapter 24
reality in which the physical world is couched. It is ready for true self-
fulfillment, which means identifying with portions of the psyche for
merly considered notself. The need for sacrifice or ‘death of the self， exists
only in stages 1 and 2, when arbitrary standards between self and notself
predominate.
“"This third stage, however, is the one interpreted in religious terms as
the death of the self and the new birth—the death of the w ill, or in other
concepts of similar nature. To my way of thinking, these are quite dis
torted. Actually, the focus personality learns that nothing works for it but
the new orientation, fully accepted: this means that it expands, accepts its
own larger framework, and sees that nothing is lost. In fact, the world is
gainedin a new way. This stage can be a quick moment of realization, or
a gradual trial-and-error process in which the focus personality fluctuates
between stages 1 and 2 until it finally receives enough momentum to break
through to stage 3.
Stage 4
“Stage 4 is a new self-country, in which the focus personality realizes

that the assumptions of the one-line official consciousness only apply at
that level. They are dropped as valid descriptions of reality and treated as
respected local ordinances. The seeming contradictions between intellect
and intuitions, good and evil, object and subject, vanish—the contradic
tions. This stage can be a fleeting one of varying duration. For that matter,
the divisions between the stages as given are arbitrary to some degree. Cer
tain people w ill have flashes of stage 4 consciousness in any of the other
states.
MOverall, though, these are the stages through which we come to psy
chic maturity. To some extent or another, they take place in each person,
regardless of culture. They represent intuitive revelation and assimilation.
Again, some ancient civilizations provided mobile groups of symbols as
guidelines. In our society the official line of consciousness is pre-stage 1 as
given—a prerequisite for the other states as it provides a sturdy physical
basis. We stifle its development at this point, however, and form an entire
world and culture around a specific and local area of consciousness.
“TThis level is particularly disadvantageous because its assumptions
seem to be the only criteria for reality, since unofficial data that would
show alternate patterns is discouraged. Other stages of consciousness im
measurably fill out usual reality, adding depths and nuances not generally
perceivable, and provide their own kind of evidence. In a strange manner,
these other stages fu lfill and expand ordinary consciousness by bringing in
other kinds of stimuli.
MWe dont recognize such natural stages of growth and change, how
ever. Yet a normal progression might very well lead to an understanding of
death itself, for we would have evidence for the independence of con
sciousness from body-focus. Previously our psychological therapies have
been devoted to returning the strays back to the folds of the official line,
acting to reinforce the very psychological systems that retarded psychic
growth—meaning the development and expression of the psyche in rela
tionship to its inner and outer activity.
“M y own experience seems to involve frequent (but never frequent
enough) journeys to stage 4, followed by assimilation of data gained there
by my usual consciousness. I have discovered that now the lines tend to
blur considerably, in that I regard as normal alterations of consciousness
that once seemed exotic. That is, I switch to various stages with relative
ease. Stage 4，though, is not a steady permanent stage by any means, prac
tically speaking, but it casts its aura over the other stages, immeasurably
adding enjoyment and appreciation of the natural world.
“Again, I think that these are natural stages, experienced to some de
gree by everyone. Beyond are states of ecstasy, almost impossible to sustain
in normal living, and the mark of the mystic state.”
As soon as I came upon those notes, I saw instantly where the codicils
fit in. They aren’t visible at our official level of consciousness, and for that
matter, at the living area or usual experience area they seem to contradict
known facts. I saw where my earlier confusion originated. The codicils
made perfect sense to me~were clear and apparent~when I was in the
same state of consciousness in which I received them, and in all of my
other altered states.
The codicils are accepted facts of existence to Seth, Sumari, Seven,
and Helper, who operate at that level of reality habitually, while I experi
ence it only in brief snatches. They exist under conditions in which space
time doesn’t apply~beyond concepts of good and evil where there are no
contradictions. In other words, the conditions of their reality (and of the
portions of the psyche to which they correspond) are different than ours.
Seth II—a personality allegedly more advanced than Seth, and with
whom IVe had some experience~seems to exist at a still more distant level.
In some stages of consciousness, IVe sensed realities that didn’t fit my own
neurological patterns. I could feel myself making all kinds of inner adjust
ments to bring them in, knowing that I was squeezing them out of shape
to do so. But these may represent even farther-removed components of our
own being, impossible to describe— “ancient” sounds, earth memories
couched in an entirely different language, but alive at a molecular level in
our flesh.
254 Chapter 24
Seth, Sumari, Seven, Cyprus, and Helper may be aspects of my psy

che that operate at other stages of consciousness all the time, then, reflected
through my experience but becoming activatedfor meonly when I move to
those levels myself. Im a poet and writer, so my own interests helped acti
vate those aspects that suited my intents. Helper isn’t utilized to the fullest,
most probably because the healing abilities of my own personality are
merged with the writing. Sumari definitely allows me to express musical
abilities, though, that had been completely submerged and unorganized
before. Other people might activate other aspects primarily~as in spirit
doctors. But even then if freedom were allowed, these aspects would be
highly individualized rather than conventionally programmed. Certainly
aspects often show themselves in dictated or automatic artistic productions
of one kind or another, when such talents suddenly emerge from a previ
ously smothered state.
Just lately a woman artist sent me two groups of snapshots~one of
previous paintings done in her normal manner, and one of “spirit paint-
ings.” It was obvious that her earlier work was stereotyped, conventionally
pretty, but lacking in any real depth. Then suddenly she was presented
with mental images of pictures that she was directed to paint. These uti
lized geometrical figures mostly, and she “knew” that these originated with
spirit artists. She now had “spirit commissions.” Her creativity had jumped
out of previous limitations— somehow the circles and abstract shapes had
more feeling in them than her previous w o rk b u t it was being experi
enced in another conventional framework. She was activating the creative
aspectof the psyche, directing it into her painting, however, and her work
was charged with as much power as she could interpret and translate. Spirit
artists simply seem more believable to some people than the psyches great
energy.
In any case, the focus of consciousness causes the conditions of expe
rience. For example, at our usual level it’s pretty difficult to believe that the
universe is safe, and man is good. A ll kinds of contradictions instantly
arise~contradictions that exist as conditions at that particular focus.
When, in stage 2 of consciousness, you try to correlate intuitive data with
the official level, these contradictions become more apparent then ever;
they have to be dealt with one way or another. You almost have to move to
stage 3 to make such intuitive material w o rktuning in to the system of
reality in which the codicils are the new facts.
Yet the aspects, with their own distinctive levels of consciousness, are
also threaded through our official focus. When we alter our focus, to some
extent we tune in to these other realities that underlie our own. They usu
ally are notexpressed in isolated form. The aspects merge to form our psy
chic and physical being. They would probably be called archetypes by
some people, considered potent components of the unconscious, to be

treated with kid gloves—the idea being that our individuality is so precar
iously posed that it is in constant danger of being submerged in its own un
conscious elements.
It never seems to occur to us that our particular kind of individual
consciousness is natural and rises from the psyche as easily as leaves grow
from trees. The unconscious forms conscious focus; needs it, seeks it out,
and operates in the objective world through its auspices. The unconscious
is the constant creator of our individuality and not its great usurper; not
the dark king ever ready to do us in and set up its own kingdom instead.
W ithout the unconscious, there’d be no conscious kingdom to begin with.
Such beliefs in the threatening elements of the unconscious make us fear
the source of our own being and hamper the fuller facets of individuality
possible with encouragement of the aspects. Our fears and beliefs cause
whatever difficulties do arise.
As a rule we just don’t feel or examine the shifting guises our con
sciousness takes, so we can’t identify with our own psychological motion.
When we become aware of anything but the most usual perceptions, then
our psychological mobility seems to come from outside of us. Yet the as
pects with their own strands of consciousness, interweave just beneath our
focus all the while.
The aspects (which also operate as models) are also highly individual
istic, however: unique, suited to each of us personally, and to no other.
When we form them into rigid psychic molds on the one hand, or treat
them as mass unconscious principles on the other, then we lose their origi
nal vision~which is also our own. We end up with a standardized package
ofTibetan master, Buddha, Christ, spaceman, or whatever.
Its because the aspects are basically unique that we can trust them:
Theyre geared to our individual needs and desires, and know the extent of
our abilities better than we do at our usual operating level. They can help
solve our problems; and in reaching out beyond our own level of con
sciousness, we actually take the first step toward an enlarged vision in
which seeming problems and contradictions dissolve. Yet in their unique
ness the aspects are also universal, since they underlie our private and mass
experience. They are, quite literally, the facets of the soul.
We follow the authority of the psyche unquestioningly as it propels us
into birth, and through it, forming our very lives with exquisite precision.
The child trusts the authority of the psyche, and knows that it is blessed
because it exists. The child realizes that its own existence springs out of …
something so intimate that its being is beyond question, beyond fact. We
are the unknown, made known; spirit made flesh, transubstantiation in the
truest meaning of the word.
256 Chapter 24
And what is “the word” we hear spoken of so frequently in various re

ligions? It doesn’t speak in syllables and vowels alone, or even primarily, but
through atoms, molecules, blood, bone, and flesh. Its “sound” comes alive
through the living properties of the body, just as if these letters could fly off
the page, fully conscious, to form endless sentences on their own, endowed
with all the abilities of this writer~able to create their own books, ques
tion their origin and mine, and speculate about the birth of alphabets.
The psyche is innocent.
My psyche is innocent and so is yours.
Our impulses are good. Left alone they’ll lead us naturally toward
self-fulfillment and allow us to contribute in the best way to the race at
large. I believe that our impulses are as good as our cells, meant to add to
our psychic development as the cells add to physical development, and that
our impulses, followed with an understanding of their nature, would in-
sure survival of the race and allow it to follow its greatest potentials.
Yet we consistently believe that our impulses are bad and that follow
ing them would lead to destruction. At our official levels of consciousness,
with its prejudiced perception, this certainly seems to be the case. Yet each
of us feels the burden of unrealized potential. Correspondents may write to
thank me for the books, ask help, or tell their own experiences. But one
thread runs through all the letters: the search for purpose. “I know I have a
purpose,” one woman writes. “But I don’t know what it is. I know I want
to help others too, but in what way?”
The individual psyche knows, and would gladly answer. Yet we ignore
our own impulses—those stimuli that would set our inner purposes into
motion. WeVe learned to doubt our own vitality. So the suggestion that we
trust the authority of the psyche sounds like sheer nonsense at its best, and
at its worst it suggests dangerous license, encouraging our most destructive
tendencies.
Yet as we move toward stage 3 of consciousness, we see clearly that the
psyche is innocent and that our impulses represent psychological and psy
chic motion leading to growth and development. At stage 4 were able to
use that knowledge to enrich normal living. W hile were at stage 4, we
make the codicils work~long enough and powerfully enough so that were
certain of their validity.
Stage 4, I believe, is our most advantageous natural state of con
sciousness, a beginning framework, one seldom reached except in brief
snatches, at least in comparison to the time spent at the official level. Im at
stage 4 often as I write. A book is a challenge; it takes physical time and ef
fort. Yet while this time is spent in a normal way, the writing is exception
ally easy, spontaneous, and natural. In creative endeavors were most
familiar with these rhythms of consciousness, this constant translation of
inner data into recognizable form. But I believe that the focus personality is
meant to blend these states far more extensively than it does, merging the
aspects into a richer and more effective earth-tuned experience.
Perhaps the Garden of Eden story represents our choice of the one-
line type of consciousness, stating symbolically what we were relinquish
ing~our innocence~and what we were gaining: the experience of duality.
If so, to what purpose? Perhaps the focus personality had to concentrate on
a one-line focus to establish an initial stable framework, while knowing
that eventually the focus itself would recognize its limitations and seek its
source.
Yet when it does, a new, unique kind of consciousness results— not
simply a return to innocence, but the achievement of a knowing inno
cence, something quite different: an innocence that can appreciate itself, a
“youth-not-wasted-on-youth” type of psychological finesse. Such a condi
tion weds knowledge with innocence, and merges intellect and intuitions
to form a new synthesis of consciousness that is beyond the reach of intel
lect or intuitions alone.
When it reaches a certain point and is not allowed to fu lfill itself
through expansion, the linear consciousness with its assumptions leads to
contradictions, illnesses, and fears. The codicils, as a new group of assump
tions, release energy and dissolve the barriers of previous beliefs, unifying
experience. Most illnesses, I believe, are caused by blockages of energy, re
sulting from linear assumptions about reality~actually by the strain that
develops between the focus personality’s need for development, expansion,
and spontaneity, and its adherence to old beliefs that attempt to standard
ize and lim it its experience.
As I read over my notes on the stages of consciousness, it became
more obvious than ever that the level we consider normal is tension-gener
ating after it reaches its peak of achievement, and builds up pressure meant
to propel it to a new level. Again: But we inhibit this natural development,
for which I believe we are biologically triggered.
C hapter 2 5
T h e H eroic D im ension and

H eroic Personages
eth finished The uUnknownnReality that spring (of 1975), a month or
S so after we moved. The text was so long that we decided to put it out
in two volumes. Through the summer, I was working on the first
draft of this book and decided not to resume regular classes for a while. In
stead, I saw students about once a month.
Our first July in our new house was exceptionally hot and muggy,
even though the temperature was ten degrees cooler on our h ill than it was
in town. I began working from three in the morning until seven, when the
night air came rushing down from the hillsides and the daytime lawn
mowers were quiet. In between library experiences and periods of inspira
tion, I，d type earlier portions of this book. Yd been typing for about a week
when something clicked, and I began writing the material on codicils and
the authority of the psyche. That material came all at once, in four or five
days, like a package almost too big to handle. It came so quickly that I
didn’t have time to type it, just took it down in longhand; sometimes as I
sat in the backyard.
I finished the material on a Friday. We had a busy weekend, and
Monday was one of the hottest days of the year~ninety-eight degrees and
humid. I’d planned to have our usual Seth session that night. About 8:30
P.M. the phone rang~a distressing call from a young man who was con
templating suicide. I applied a psychological bandage as best I could, rein
forcing his own energy and w ill to live. But when he hung up, I felt weary
and discouraged. Why as a people did we trust anything but the authority
of the psyche? Seth or I could only help by triggering others to use abilities
they already possessed, but believed they didn’t have.
Actually, most of my mail and calls are from people who are really
putting Seths ideas to work in their daily lives. Many of them have begun
new businesses or creative endeavors as they examined their lives and became
260 Chapter 25
aware of abilities that they hadn’t been utilizing before. But that night, after
the young mans call, I thought angrily that lots of people didn’t want to take
the responsibility for their own lives: It was easier to blame their misfortunes
on their backgrounds, or fate, or whatever.
Suddenly Rob and I seemed very alone, without colleagues, without
. . . people at our own particular focus. Twilight deepened. I put my pa
pers away, clearing my mind for the Seth session. Still the feeling of lone
liness persisted and grew. It finally developed into a kind of yearning~~for
what? For people who were ... wherever it was Rob and I were. A kind of
homesickness for somewhere you’d never been.
I sat back at the table again, staring out the window. Without transi
tion, I sensed other strands of consciousness, coming from all directions,
for which I was the vortex. They centered in me, merged into my own
stream of consciousness, which carried them out into the world. Some
thing else was going to happen in place of a Seth session. I found my at
tention centered on the wall, where the library usually appeared to my
inner vision.
An experience began that lasted for several hours. The trouble is that
it happened at another level of activity. I could catch myself having experi
ences in the library... that were behind the events I was aware of. I sensed
huge models surrounding each visible and invisible particle, that led these
toward their greatest individual development, for example. But I felt as if
all the knowledge of my own microscopic particles was being translated
from “their language” into symbols and images that I could understand.
Each atom and molecule of my body had a psychic shape that promoted
growth in different levels of existence.
While this was going on, I sensed but didn’t clearly see other people
in the library~colleagues of ours~waiting in other rooms through which
I，d have to travel. That is, I had to go there. There was something different
about these personalities, about the quality of their existence. The term
came to me at once, seeming completely apt and inevitable: heroic person
ages. What I’m trying to describe now in usual terms, I knew all at once;
and something escapes when the experience is described in a linear fashion.
I knew I’d been yearning toward the heroic dimension; that the li
brary was a construct to help me in that search; and that these heroic per
sonages existed in time and out of it. Again, I’ll have to quote my original
notes. I kept scribbling down what I could. Though some of the sentences
are unfinished and often ungrammatical, they still retain part of my initial
sense of wonder:
“I seem to be experiencing a dimension of being outside of time. The
feeling of it is a lot different than just thinking that such a dimension
might exist~that’s for sure. I have one foot there and one foot here right
The H eroic D im ension and H eroic Personages 261
now. This is a place* where our complete selves dwell, though ‘complete’
isn’t the right word~our whole selves~where they exist no matter what
their parts are doing in time. Its a dimension where these super personali
ties, models, or heroic personages exist and help out their selves who exist
in the world.
“Even if youre in time yourself, like me, you can go there under cer
tain conditions, at least briefly. In fact, you can get yourself in a position
where you almost have to go there to pursue your purposes and find answers
that... aren’t available where you usually are. These heroic personages aren’t
ghosts. Its a completely different kind of psychological existence; another
version of being.
“You can’t get there till youre ready, and ready means not frightened,
and willing~because you see that the normal world alone doesn’t • • • pro
vide the . . . nourishment you want; or rather, you have to go further to
learn what you want to know • • • You’ve gone as far as you can under the
usual conditions. So your desire opens up this other heroic dimension. The
heroic personages are like ... true adults, and Rob and I in comparison are
like beloved students or younger colleagues. I sense others like us there too.
It is, or w ill be, like coming home to ... a psychic family.
“I feel my allegiance changing, as if my reliable strong contacts are
there even emotionally, at the heroic level rather than in the usual world,
even though in a strange way I should be able to express my emotions more
freely in normal life.
“In a way, Seth is like a traveling teacher, coming here, but now I have
to go there, into the heroic dimension. Only I had to want to, and now I
do. I’m not getting some of this right, but the heroic personages there, are
. . . reflected in the psyche and help compose it in time, but their prime ex
istence is in the heroic dimensions, outside of time.
“We’ve been taught to suspect... such otherworldly yearnings, and I
suspect that I make such an effort to take these notes, just to keep up con
tact with known references.”
I had mental experiences that I just couldn’t describe or correlate—

again, some seemed too fast to follow, and others seemed too slow. Some
how I connected the too fast experiences with an accelerated time
sequence, and the slow ones with my attempt to translate activity at the
heroic level. Finally, I shrugged my mental shoulders and decided to go to
bed. As I went to sleep, I felt as if those experiences were continuing just
beneath my usual awareness.
I awakened at 5:00 a .m . Information about the heroic dimension
came flooding into my mind. I got up at once. The material wasn’t finished
copy as it usually was from the library. Instead I knew certain things to be
262 Chapter 25
true. These knowings came one after another, as quickly as I could write
them down.
One exception: The first paragraph came exactly as given in the fol
lowing notes. After that, though, the material came as comprehensions that
I translated into usual language:
“There are those who sense within the commonplace dimensions of
life, the existence of a larger-than-life experience, and who feel the presence
of giant events and heroic personages whose superior qualities must remain
outside of the human domain, even while they are reflected in it. That is,
earthly life exists under the auspices of the heroic, toward which it ever as
pires. We are like children in comparison to those sensed giant conscious
nesses which I ， ll call our own heroic selves.”
That first paragraph strongly reminded me of the James material Yd

received earlier. It came in a block, as if to initiate my own further experi
ences. As soon as Yd written it down, the comprehensions began to flow,
which I then described in my own words. The paragraph also brought to
mind my man-and-woman-in-the-sky experience, and several others al
ready described in this book; all of them implied a comparison between us
as children in relation to a superior kind of adulthood.
aWe are one version of these heroic selves, which serve as our models.
Some people have always sensed this heroic dimension, drawn upon it, and
stood out in our world. The Speakers [as described in Seth Speaks] have
given evidence of its existence, interpreting it in their own time periods
and inserting new models of achievement.
“Rob and I have always reacted to each other at heroic levels, besides
the usual interactions. I often react to myself in heroic terms. The trouble
is, this can make you terribly impatient with your own achievements. You
should let yourself express the heroic in you, not try to live up to the
heroic, which is the wrong approach.
“The Olympians were interpretations of the heroic personages, at a
time when boundaries weren’t as clearly drawn between levels of con
sciousness, and people were more aware of their models or heroic selves.
These bigger-than-life selves can’t appear in just one lifetime. Their giant
capacities won’t fit into that context.
“Our governments and civilizations are also eccentric, original ver
sions of other heroic patterns. Even versions that dont work here may suc
ceed somewhere else.
“M y experience in front of the supermarket when this book began
was actually an exercise in sensing the heroic proportions of objects and
people in just a small section of time. Now .. . I sense the heroic from the
heroic side ... at least to what degree I’m able.
“People concerned with discovering their purpose in life are sensing

their heroic nature. Only they interpret this in terms of progress: They
want to know what to do. Instead, the heroic in those terms involves being.
Its terribly difficult to describe what I feel, but the heroic dimension is a
bigger-than-life state of being, out of which “doing” emerges as a natural
characteristic. By fully being, you are fulfilling your purpose, in those
terms. When we allow the heroic elements to flow from the psyche
through the models to ourselves, we feel our life in both worlds.
“The models are heroic patterns in the psyche and heroic personages
at the same time. But these personages are real; only the conditions of their
existence are different than ours. When we try to pin them down to our
definitions, we end up with distortions and myths.
“Again: These heroic patterns are behind everythingtrees, animals,
and all natural phenomena, but also behind cultural entities such as gov
ernments, families, and laws.
“While Im sensing all this, its quite a balancing act to keep some of
my consciousness here to take these notes, or rather to translate what Im
experiencing at another level—and to choose the words themselves. I seem
to throw away or discard tons of words in a minute before finally settling
on one. Seth says that time is open-ended. Well, Im experiencing these
heroic personages as open-ended, psychologically. I feel them swirling into
identities . .. all the time; each identity valid and eternal in a psychic or
heroic space, regardless of their relative duration in our ideas of time.
“M y excitement with all of this grows constantly so that my hand
writing is more and more scribbled, yet I insist on getting this down. These
are a kind of consciousness outside our experience. W hile retaining self
hood, they can mix and merge identities to get certain giant-sized effects.
Our reality springs out of theirs and we’re endowed with a lesser-dimen
sional version of their abilities and characteristics. The abilities and charac
teristics appear as aspects in the psyche; but... on their own they live a life
outside our life although connected with our lives through us.
“Yet in a way, we . . . live in their environment, unknowingly to a
large extent, as maybe animals live in our environment unaware of certain
aspects of it that have no meaning to them.”
Dawn came. I put my scribbled notes down and stared all around:
alert, excited—and angry, because I felt all my abilities stretching, to no
particular avail. I sensed those other realities all about, just around the cor
ner of my perceptions, but I couldn’t bring them into focus. I sensed the
support of the heroic dimensions, and the world itself took on certain
properties o f. . . magnificence that almost made me cry. But I wanted~
more. O f course. I knew damned well that now I was trying too hard.
264 Chapter 25
And I was being too serious. So I had some oatmeal and coffee, read
an innocuous magazine article, wrote a note to Rob, and crawled back into
bed. When I rearranged the covers Rob grunted and the sound went right
through me. Now th a ty^ a heroic grunt, I thought. Suddenly I felt sleepy
and silly in a normally happy fashion. I fell to sleep at once.
Rob called me at noon. I ate a second breakfast while he ate lunch,
and I read my notes to him. It was a lovely sunny day. I’d put a picnic table
out in the otherwise empty half of our double garage, so I took out a cup
of coffee and sat looking out the wide open garage door at the trees and
hills across the road. Once again the world was touched by that beautiful
strangeness that seemed superimposed over everything. More “comprehen-
sions” started coming almost at once.
Again, direct knowing was involved, in which I kept receiving these
comprehensions that seemed to just come. I was pretty certain that the
heroic dimensions and personages were my unconscious packaging of that
primary direct information; an example of the almost instant transforma
tion of inner revelatory data into understandable terms. This surely didn’t
diminish my experience; the heroic dimensions were real, more real per
haps than the picnic table at which I sat.
I did notice something for the first time, though: The data was orga
nized differently than usual thought processes. There was no line of
thought. I seemed to get... all sides of the material at once, a process im
possible to translate in a sentence. Literally, you can’t hold that kind of in
formation. So unconsciously I formed the heroic dimension as a symbolic
framework • • • that stands for the information I received. Its the only infor
mation I’m aware of receiving, of course, but I could almost catch the sym-
bol-building process happening beneath—and that seemed to involve a
curious sense of psychological motion, familiar yet strange at once. Its as if
I almost caught myself in the act of building a psychic structure to capture
the information I was getting at still deeper layers. I almost heard invisible
zoom, zoom, zooms until the structure~the heroic dimension~was strong
enough to bear the meaning of the information, which itself could not be
literally interpreted.
For all of this, to me there is a heroic dimension, and heroic person
ages who exist connected to each of us, reflected in our existences as we are
in theirs.
The air literally shimmered in the sunlight. I felt as if the patterns for
the world were just at the other side of that shimmering. I scribbled down
what I was getting, and again Im including my original notes. Their un
evenness, and perhaps their circular organization itself, gives a better hint
of the experience than more grammatical descriptions I might write now.
To me, at least, the notes themselves seem to pucker in places, suggesting
my own feelings that reality as we know it did pucker and wrinkle, so that
I could poke my consciousness through.
I knew that Vd sensed the heroic personages before, many times, as
the massive relatives IVe described in some of my poetry, and that they
were also connected with what I called my “massive experiences,” when I
seemed to expand, mentally and physically, extending out into space.
Now, the notes:
“Experience of the heroic adds the . . . heroic faculty to everything
else and illuminates the nature of all visible things. Nature becomes super
nature even as its perceived by the physical eye, because the sense of sight is
endowed with heroic vision. Its as if our cat, W illy, saw our living room for
a moment through our eyes, and understood everything in it in the same
way we do. That’s how I feel just now. Only I lack the means to express
what I know, as the cats meows would be inadequate to express his new
knowledge.
“丁he attributes of the heroic are surrounding us all the while, but we
dont sense it, and ignore the obvious clues to its existence. We share part
of our environment with the animals but they don’t share . . . what we， d
call the human elements: They couldn’t read time by a clock, for instance.
So we share some of our environment with heroic personages, as unaware
of their psychological reality . . . never viewing this shared environment
from their viewpoint. They know a . . . time that includes ours, for exam
ple.
“And the animals share their own kind of heroic elements. (And for
that matter, they have no need to tell time by a clock.)
wWe come out of the heroic elements, hence the patterns for our
world一 the cells, atoms, and molecules and so forth~emerge from the
heroic dimensions. We dwell in the heroic in that it grows our bodies, or is
the medium in which our bodies grow. And were eternal in the heroic. We
touch upon it in dreams and visions, even though we view it through our
own beliefs and thought-patterns.
“We， re growing toward conscious awareness of the heroic dimensions.
Our visions and revelations are like momentary awakenings there~dis
torted glimpses, as a child might just see an edge of a blanket when he awak
ened here, or might not focus properly, or might see his mothers face and
think of her as a giant. She’d be a giant to his perception, but not to hers.
“Each lucid dream or vision or intuitive insight brings you more awake
there, and actually wakens the heroic faculties so that this life is seen as one
focus of many. Here we accept two focuseswaking and sleeping conscious
ness. There, our entire life experience here is just one part of a greater experi
ence. Here, we forget most of our dreams. There, our lives here are living
dreams, three-dimensional, only we waken from them there, remembering!
266 Chapter 25
“A rt is symbolic representation of the heroic.

“It’s so damned hard to get a verbal hold on what I ’m getting oth
erwise, but identity is both open-ended and formed of inviolate psycho
logical boundaries simultaneously~and can operate in either manner
without contradiction, maybe in the same way that light can act as
waves or particles. This makes the God concept almost ungraspable in
usual terms.
“But we feel terribly alone and cut off when we don’t sense the heroic
in one way or another. Children, for example, are bathed in it constantly,
growing trustfully in the medium of the heroic.
“The heroic personages (of which we’re part) couldn’t experience
earth life. Theyre psychologically too big to fit, so we are extensions of
them, while theyre extensions of us only in a different, giant-sized way. We
do add to their experience though, and they add to ours.
wChrists basic message was an ancient one, restated: that we survive
death and have another existence elsewhere. It also dealt with heroic prin
ciples—love, devotion, honor~couched in terms that would be under
stood at the time. The whole idea of self-sacrifice was grossly distorted
through the ages. Its based on the understanding that the self is eternal and
indestructible. Only then can so-called self-sacrifice be a heroic act, done
with the recognition that nothing is lost or sacrificed, since the self s basic
validity rests in the heroic dimensions. But that message was and still is al
most impossible to explain here, too.
“Misunderstood or half-understood, it leads to endless stupidities; for
example, the belief that suffering is good for the s o u lo r half-cocked at
tempts to justify murder, since as the reasoning goes, the self is just trans
lated neatly from one existence to another. 7% 说version is one of the worst
instances of interpreting intuitive information in literal terms.
“Seth is right: Christ never did exist in time, but did exist (and does)
as a heroic personage and as a giant-sized model for several historic persons.
The myth then actualized the personage in terms we could understand. We
had to believe in a literal rising from-the-dead of a physical person. Paul
tuned in to his version of that heroic personage, was blinded by the vision,
and interpreted it in his terms, as a soldiersetting out to conquer the
world with his truth.
“(The ancient ‘divine right of kings’ was a distorted attempt to syn
chronize the heroic and historic.)
“Pagan and Jewish sacrificial rites were also based on a literal inter
pretation—the idea being that in returning an animal (or person) to the
heroic dimensions, you were certain of getting more of the same back; re
plenishing the stock by sending in a ‘model’ to be copied by a god or gods.
The best of the crop or stock then served as the sacrifice.
“Cave drawings also represented this great love of images and pat
terns: Instead of sacrificing, the artist drew a replica of what was required;
sometimes distorting particular desired elements, such as strength or
agility. The drawings served as blueprints, requesting nature to fill them
out in flesh. This could also be connected with present native beliefs con
cerning cameras; the fear that the soul w ill become confused and leap into
the replica image.”
[I was still at the picnic table, scribbling as quickly as I could. As I
wrote the following in response to these “comprehensions,” the shimmer
ing quality of the afternoon began to accelerate.]
Attributes and Characteristics o f the Heroic Dimensions
“The heroic dimension involves a different scale ofexistence, outside of

time. This isn’t a static sameness, frozen eternally, but a scale in which • • • ac
tion happens . . . outside of time as we know it. Not sure that I can get this
straight: But it could be that change there would be so slow to our standards
that we wouldn’t perceive motion at all, but think everything stationary and
，
eternal. There though, motion would be happening at its own characteristic
rate一'characteristic of the heroic dimension.
“The heroic personages aren’t dead ideals, perfection personified,
but super-creative, heroic-sized psychological gestalts, and our own cre
ative abilities are our closest connections with them. Our imaginative
faculties are also important in this respect. Since its nearly impossible for
us to perceive the heroic directly even though we use our own heroic fac
ulties, then even this material Im getting now is bound to be a creative
model or version of the heroic. We cant get a lite ral fact，interpretation
because ... the heroic exists outside of the fact framework and beyond it.
Facts are materialized events from that dimension apparent in spacetime
as evidential.
“Something odd happens as I write this. I get a disconnected-from-
time feeling which is a trifle scary. Fascinating but scary. As if while Im
writing, the garage and yard and everything that I see exists eternally, and
time begins just out of my sight, around the corner maybe. But the birds
are singing. A plane goes by overhead. I feel this is one eternal moment,
say, called 4:30 p. m . where I am, and where everything that I can see exists.
But outside of this spot, time goes on and its 4:35 in the kitchen, beyond
my sight, and outside of this crazy framework.
“But (I feel so weird) fresh action keeps coming into the scene before
me from . . . nontime; flowing into this eternal moment I ， m somehow in.
The birds fly from branch to branch. My hand writes. Im swinging one leg
back and forth. This isn’t just repetitive action. I can do anything I want.
268 Chapter 25
But all this—and it never gets to be 4:35. Not here. But when I lose what
ever this is, this . . . heroic nontime, then Fll step right out into, say, 4:40
or whatever, without knowing what really happened.
“It’s a different dimension . . . within our time (I dont know how to
explain it without using the word ‘time， )~ within any given moment that’s
eternal yet filled with change. Maybe its really heroic time and only seems
outside of time to me? Maybe its just a kind of “long time?”
I glanced around again: Everything looked so splendid, changing yet

eternal. But some creature unease grabbed hold of me. I picked up my pa
pers and went into the house where the kitchen clock said 5:00 p. m . Then,
curious and safely inside time, I looked out the kitchen window at the
yard~and time was outside there now, too.
Yet all the material Vd received that afternoon only represented a
glimmer of the subjective comprehensions that I couldn’t translate into un
derstandable terms. And that material seemed to come from someplace else
too, of course; as if there was an invisible mail slot in my mind, and foreign
letters from other worlds kept dropping down. Only I had to translate
them, and they kept coming.
I fixed dinner. Rob and I ate in the living room and watched a televi
sion show. I did the dishes. Then I sat by the front windows, watching the
summer twilight. Again, the comprehensions began. This time, most of
them escaped my notes entirely.
We live in air, yet our breathing is automatic, and while we take air
for granted, in a strange way we overlook it, too. Yet its the medium in
which we exist physically. That night, as I sat looking out the window at
the mountains, it was as if I became alerted to the psychological medium
in which we live. I felt a psychological support; the existence o f... an in
visible something that supported my mental and emotional being in the
same way that, say, the ground supports everything on top of it.
But psychologically I grew out through this medium, as a tree grows
through the earth while still being a part of it. The heroic is the medium in
which this existence takes place. I knew this in ways I can’t explain, and I
felt it sustain this world, and my own psychological existence.
Some feelings came back that I remembered having in childhood
when I felt that no matter what happened in normal life, I was loved and
safe “someplace else.” As I sat there I felt reassured, safe, but most of all,
free. Most of my early years, I realized, hadbeen lived in unquestioning ac
ceptance of the heroic. The heroic provides an emotional support that an
imals possess in their own way~a support that I saw Vd been missing for
some time. Its lack brings about a feeling of a fall from grace. Was I in the
process of regaining it?
When we lose that inner certainty, we feel abandoned no matter what

our achievements. We recognize that some precious, indefinable joy not
dependent upon events seems gone from our lives. Looking back, I could
see where Yd regain it to some degree, only to turn back to the official line
of consciousness as the criterion for reality. And then the obvious contra
dictions between the two approaches would reappear.
I was up again early the next morning. We went to bed around 1:00
A.M. and I awoke around 4:30.1ate oatmeal and drank some coffee and sat
at my desk. At once the comprehensions started up again. I used an anal
ogy to try to explain the concepts I was getting, and while the analogy isn’t
the best, its the best I could come up with.
I compared the grown adult and its relationship with its own child-
self to the heroic personage and its relationship with us. That is, children
grow from fetuses to adults, led by heroic principles and patterns for devel
opment. The complicated patterns for the adult exist in the fetus then, and
lead it toward adulthood. For simplicity’s sake, I ignored probabilities
which would also operate even at cellular levels.
In those terms, each of us is one version of a heroic personage who is
leading us toward development by acting as a model in the same way that
our own adulthood, in pattern form, led the fetus toward its own growth
•.. into us.
In that regard the adult is always present in the child as a model, bio
logically and psychologically, though not historically and actually present.
Yet the child grows in response, or toward that becoming, and is itself part
of the overall pattern without which adulthood would be impossible.
In the same way, the heroic personages as models are present in us
(adult and child alike) though not historically actualized. The child,
though, trusts it w ill grow up, while at the one-line level of consciousness
there seems to be “no place else to go” for the adult. The time-space orien
tation of the usual level of consciousness makes further development ap
pear impossible.
The entire historic personality is part of an overall heroic pattern or
heroic personage that (from our viewpoint) is outside of time. For that
matter, the adult-to-be is outside of the child’s present, too. The heroic per
sonages operate as the aspects of the historic personality, but they exist ac
tualized within the heroic dimensions regardless of the posture of the
historic personality in time. The focus personality is the historic personal
ity, focused along its living area of birth-to-death reality, while the heroic
personages are source selves.
I saw that acceptance and recognition of the heroic (by any name)
gives a heroic cast to man, life, and the universe but it also adds emotional
richness to normal life and fills it out with that indefinable sense of basic
270 Chapter 25
trust, without which life itself can seem meaningless. W ith that feeling of
the heroic, the individual doesn’t feel isolated from the universe but united
with it, so that its goals and the individuals are merged, not divergent—or
worse, in opposition.
The presence of the heroic everywhere pervades the world, and
through a constant give-and-take between historic and heroic experience,
all events are formed, including our lives. The heroic dimensions are the
larger-than-life source out of which our world emerges, yet our world is
part of the heroic. It was all so simple—as I felt it~ that I couldn’t under
stand how I hadn’t known all this before. It was completely obvious that all
my experiences since starting this book were leading me to the heroic di
mensions— that all the calls and letters led me to ask the particular kinds
of questions for others and for myselfthat would inevitably lead me to this
point— because this was the . . . proper way for me to grow. I felt as if I
were forming myself and also being formed into some beneficial psychic
shape in the same way, say, that my hands took on the correct number of
fingers.
What’s important in all of this, is the emotional realization and intu
itive knowledge of our roots and our constant nourishment. We feel a sense
of loving direction, the assurance that were growing toward our proper
psychological and psychic shape in the same way that we grew physically
into adults.
Yet many of us get unsynchronized with ourselves and nature along
the way, and lose that sense of deep satisfaction. It seems that some magic
and richness has vanished from life that we only dimly recall. A gap opens
in our experience so that no event, however joyful, lives up to some vaguely
remembered “Garden of Eden， ” and little by little our energy and zest di
minish.
W ith emotional recognition of the heroic, however, we know that de
spite all seeming contradictions, we are each significant: Our slightest mo
tion is a vital gesture on the part of the universe. We understand that we are
each part of a loving pattern—and as we are: rich, poor, beautiful, ugly,
with our weaknesses and strengths alike~and that to rip us out of that
context would do damage to the entire framework.
This recognition brings about a feeling tone that tunes us in to the
heroic; replenishes, heals, and strengthens us and deepens our creativity.
Therefore, it has a biological as well as psychic basis. It returns us to the
feeling of a caring universe and beautifully reconciles individual identity
with its position as part of an underlying overall pattern.
Without this recognition, the historic or focus personality defends its
barriers desperately, feeling itself alone and impotent in an uncaring uni
verse.
The Heroic and the Historic
Seth says that we form our reality through our conscious beliefs, but
he also stresses that the conscious mind doesn’t know how this is done, and
has little to do with the actual inner processes involved. Those processes are
heroic, out of space-time, but ever flowing into our reality as effects. We di
rect them through our beliefs and intents. But how? Something gives us a
life, a body, a physical world of relatedness, a historic self~the focus per
sonality alive in time.
Seth emphasizes that all this is given. If this isn’t understood, we put too
much stress upon normal consciousness, forgetting the source of its strength.
We forget that the psyche or inner self is always there and available,
because it seems so separated from our usual consciousness. But the psyche
is as natural as a flower bulb. Watch an amaryllis plant sometime. In less
than two weeks it grows a flower stalk some two to three feet high from one
bulb, four giant flowers emerge, sometimes five inches across! You couldn’t
put the stalk back inside. How did four such large flowers spring up so
quickly from a comparatively small bulb? Where did they come from?
“Simple,” someone says. “That’s nature.”
Right, and its also heroic. The plants reality in our world springs
from its hidden heroic pattern. We get here the same way, only the me
chanics are different. But besides that, and our physical growth which is
perceivable, there is a development of personality that has no physical
shape to keep track of: Yet it, too, follows an invisible heroic pattern and
leans toward those conditions that best favor its growth. In other words, I
think that the focus personality has numerous patterns of probable fu lfill
ment from which it constantly chooses.
This became clear to me that Thursday morning. The entire week, I， d
been getting this material on heroics and applying it personally. The heroic
self is the original, creative, unexpected self, presenting rich patterns and al
ternate choices that can appear quite unconventional or unrespectable to
the focus personality. And I saw how Vd often restricted its actions by my
own attitudes. Most of my most creative work has come when I wasn’t ex
pecting it—when I was dallying, or daydreaming, or thinking of some
thing else, for example. My writing production is considerable. Yet I used
my writing schedule almost like a whip, as if I’d never write another word if
I didn’t put in so many hours a day. I mistrusted any impulse during that
time that might take me from my desk. And I saw that Vd robbed myself
of unexpected opportunities that might have come precisely because I for
got my ideas about my work.
The heroic provides a larger framework in which we can encounter
the unexpected, and while I might be more permissive than others in that
272 Chapter 25
respect, I still wanted the unexpected to give proper notice! I knew that Yd
have to discover more about the heroic personages, for example, and that I
wanted to explore the heroic dimension. But I wasn’t plunging in. I wanted
the unexpected on my terms. Yet I could feel the atmosphere of the heroic
all about me, so constantly that my earlier ignorance seemed incompre
hensible.
W hile I was typing some of the weeks material, two other paragraphs
inserted themselves. I knew that they were from James’s book:
“There is, however, within man a sense of the heroic; that is, the fac
ulty for perceiving within himself the inner larger design or pattern of the
soul. For this surrounds us always. We move in it as fishes do in the ocean,
and all our actions mix and merge with the great rippling rhythms that
form and support the more surface evidence of our days.
“This inner faculty allows us to glimpse those deeper currents, to
plunge into living with the zest of an instinctive yet trained swimmer who
is exuberantly aware of the power and majesty of the waves, and able to
identify himself with the splendor of the oceans motion.”
And I wondered: Had I pursued James’s book, would I have been led
by another route to the same place~the heroic dimension? I remembered
the other paragraph that had reminded me ofJames a few days previously,
and the connections became clear. The pages that I， d read from months ago
had been in the middle of the book I ’d seen in the library, and devoted to
Jamess discussion of melancholy. The last part that I didn’t see was devoted
to the heroic faculties in man and their power to banish melancholy and
fear.
Still • • • I，
d been changing myself during that week. I could feel a new
self trying to grow out of the old one, and I kept trying to be both at the
same time.
C h apter 2 6
Toward a N ew Politics o f
the Psyche, a N ew Allegiance,
and H eroic Impulses
trange: Only now, finishing this book, do I see where its initial expe
S riences were leading me. Sometime between my first visit to the li
brary in the autumn of 1974 and my experiences with the heroic
dimensions in the summer of 1975，my basic allegiance changed. I was
probably aware of it to some degree when I wrote the material on codicils.
It wasn’t until the last of the summer, though, when I was immersed in the
heroic, that I began to understand what had been going on, or that a
change was taking place.
During that entire period, through June and July, I worked at night,
going to bed around 1:00, rising about 3:00 a.m. I worked till about 7:00.
Then Yd fall asleep the minute I hit the bed, and Rob would waken me at
noon when he， d finished his painting. He had lunch while I had a second
breakfast. Often Vd write at the picnic table for a few hours in the after
noon.
But as I began to get the material on heroics, I realized that a change
was taking place in my consciousness; a subtle alteration of focus that had
been happening for some time. At night, with no exterior events to capture
my attention, and no chores to do, I felt close to the undersides of con
sciousness. When I arose at noon, that different aura bathed my day so that
the topsides and undersides of my consciousness merged. Yet I could tell
them apart.
I felt exterior events riding on the top of the interior ones, and the
support of the psyche beneath it all. Dawn was almost. . . dawn breaking
first in the psyche, and then emerging in the physical sky. I sensed the
shape of a different, larger, heroic reality in which our usual lives happen.
Dream and sleep states were each more lucid; symbolic events and physical
ones each appeared more clearly, yet were felt as part of each other.
274 Chapter 26
In the day, I wasn’t nearly as concerned with time as I used to be. I ex
perienced it differently and went along with its apparent flow. There
seemed to be more time between or within the minutes. I didn’t feel rushed
anymore or harried by my writing schedule. I didn’t feel that I had to pro
duce each moment I was in front of the typewriter, or think that the time
was wasted if so many hours didn’t produce so many pages of finished
script. And I was producing like mad; as I could have all along, without
hassling myself as I used to do. Distinctions were dropping away that ear
lier held me back.
In their place, a different kind of wholeness and relatedness emerged.
An old familiar half-eerie sense of panic began to fade, that had been con
nected with the beliefs about times urgency, and the exhaustion that can
come of trying to make time count. It was as if the contours of my con
sciousness were changing. Deep feelings of connection-with-nature re
turned from my childhood, feelings probably impossible to describe once
you’ve learned an adults vocabulary.
We speak about “feeling at one with nature” as if it were an esoteric
achievement, possible only through meditation; but its a biological know
ing, a creature knowledge, a sure recognition that were equipped to exist in
our environment; that were meant to be here because we are here. The psy
che senses its physical roots and in so doing, touches upon its spiritual
roots at the same time.
Before, I think I justified all of my psychic excursions and my study
of the psyche by writing about them. W riting was, after all, work. I wasn’t
being lazy, or dilly-dallying~all abhorrent according to the beliefs of the
official line of consciousness. After all, I wasproducing. I was brought up to
believe that you had to force yourself to work or be creative, because left
alone the self just wasn’t reliable. Now those ideas were vanishing, with
their effects.
But most of all, I lost my allegiance to time. I felt in time and out of
time; bathed in heroic dimensions and appearing historically. Some ghostly
strange roots of the psyche seemed to reach ahead and in front of me in
time; but I was a great, slow being that encompassed it all. The word
“slow” isn’t the best one here, yet it feels right. Some underlying deep con
tinent of myself seemed to come into view, in which the lands of my con
scious selves in time were contained. I encountered the surety of the psyche
in a heroic context.
During this period, I opened the front and back doors because the
nights were warm, and the night flowed through the house. I felt that all
times and places were outside, in the hills: Yet the dimensions from which
time flowed~the supporting no-time was outside there too; and in me. I
happened where they merged.
Toward a New P olitics o fthe Psyche 27 5
I knew something was happening, though I didn’t know what it was.

I only knew that I was experiencing the motion of my psyche and decided
to go along wholeheartedly for once, instead of intellectually questioning
myself every step of the way. In other words, I admitted that my psyche,
not my intellect, was responsible for the motion of my being. The intellect
springs out of the psyche, and not the other way around. As a child, I
trusted both; the intellect interpreted the psyches truth in our world,
translating its reality into terms of time and space; wondering, sure, de
lighted. Those feelings kept returning.
Even the weather was connected to my mood. It was hot and humid,
not the kind that makes you feel energetic, and the idea of not being ener
getic has always frightened me a little. It was precisely then that you were
supposed to really use your w ill, your “get-up-and-go.”
But I thought: From now on Im going to just let myself live, in the
same way that I let my books write themselves. Then the obvious question
came to mind: Who is this “me” Im going to let live me? WeVe identified
so exclusively with the main line of consciousness that there doesn’t seem
to be any other me to work with. We speak of the inner self, but we accept
it mainly as a concept, not a part of a recognized selfhood.
The main line of consciousness identifies pretty much with the intel
lect and so-called ego. Once you really understand that your reality is more
extensive, and includes other strands of consciousness, then you can at least
sense the rest of your you-ness. These other strands, and other portions of
selfhood, then constantly expand the you that you recognize. For one
thing, of course, you become aware of stimuli and information that was
psychologically invisible earlier.
My allegiance was turning toward the heroic, and the library was my
key to it. More and more I felt the Presence there of the heroic personages,
some as my colleagues, and others as teachers. Some exist in time also, like
me, and others are in the out-of-time context entirely. There seems to be a
steady flow of information and exchange of models so that, for example,
my original vision of this book alters the library book that was its model.
IVe tuned into my space-time version of the library book, and the eccen
tricity of my moods and experience, being unpredictable, constantly write
the book in a different way. In other words, I tune in to constantly chang
ing probable futures, finally settling on one in which the book is the real
one in our terms.
Far more is involved, though, as probabilities mix and merge, and my
experience happens. Each element in my life evokes a different response
that changes me, this book, and the book in the library as well. Yet some
where along the way, the strand of awareness that connected me to the li
brary, merged with mine. The comprehensions involving heroics were like
276 Chapter 26
extra strands which I accepted and claimed as my own. I think that I sent
my double into the library~ or into the heroicand that what I ’m learn
ing is what she’s discovering: the out-of-time context in which the library
exists.
I know that I’m ready to explore the library more fully now, and real
ized that all along Fd been trying to form a new framework in which we
could view ourselves in relation to this world, and to the heroic dimensions
from which it springs. I didn’t want to admit it, however. It seemed too au
dacious a goal. IVe also been trying to rip away the superstitions that weVe
placed around intuitive information. The material on the codicils, the au
thority of the psyche, and the heroic dimension offers such a new frame
work, and even if the entire construct is symbolic, to me it represents basic
knowledge about ourselves and the universe.
I believe that heroic impulses are those that rise from our deepest
sources, uniquely fitting our individual abilities and intents, and suited to
our specific needs and desires. Such heroic impulses, while individual and
self-serving, are altruistic at the same time. Actions in response to such im
pulses w ill automatically trigger heroic acts on the part of others, for they
w ill present one more piece of the heroic patterns that underlie all our lives.
Heroic impulses are self-knowing, in that theyre geared also to release
and activate the most fitting, most fortunate and fulfilling abilities under
the circumstances at hand, and in line with present life conditions. They
are pattern-activators, stimulating action in certain directions at specific
times, with a view to the larger heroic pattern of our lives that is unknown
at the usual level of the focus personality.
The focus personality can choose to act or not to act in response. Part
of the learning process involves the acceptance of these heroic impulses
after theyre recognized. First the focus personality must understand that its
own existence is guaranteed and nourished by inner elements of experience
and knowledge of which it is not normally aware, or which it has ignored.
It then begins to accept as valid, stimuli and data that originate beyond its
domain. In so doing, it increases its domain and diminishes it at the same
time. Such a statement is meaningless at the usual level of consciousness,
and hopelessly contradictory. It makes perfect sense at other levels, how
ever, where its obvious that terms like “more” or “less” cannot be applied
to such issues.
Coming from the heroic dimension, such impulses may often trigger
actions that seem insignificant, trivial, beside the point, or inappropriate to
the official level of consciousness, while later they w ill be seen as highly apt.
They often appear as quite simple impulses—to pick up a particular book,
take a walk, call someone, change a planned outing or schedule— but
Toward a N ew P olitics o fthe Psyche 277
followed, they lead to fortunate circumstances or encounters that might

otherwise not have occurred.
My working at night during the summer was an example of such an
impulse. I struggled against it for a week, thinking that it was better and
healthier to be up and about in the day; feeling that there was something
slovenly about sleeping in the daytime. Then I realized that I really wanted
to wander through the house alone at night, to catch the universe or my
corner of it unaware. I remembered that I ’d often written nights in my
childhood. The other, countering ideas had come later, through condition
ing. So I went along with the impulse and as a result found myself going
where I wanted to~only before I hadn’t known how to get there.
Again: As I sat up nights, writing, old childhood feelings reemerged. I
suppose they amount to the child’s conviction that beneath any given days
difficulties, everything is okay and everything matters. As a child, I used
the symbolism of the Catholic Church as a framework for that conviction.
You can hardly say that a symbol is wrong. But the church, in a psy
chic shorthand, insisted that the symbols were literal fact or truth, while
teaching at the same time that lies or distortions of the truth were wrong. I
actually remember my first problem with this. I was six, in church with my
Irish grandmother. Mass was being chanted in Latin. Two altar boys stood
with their backs to me, chanting the responses. My grandmother told me
that God was answering, but I saw the altar boys’ lips move, as their heads
turned sideways.
I felt outraged that my grandmother had lied. No one explained that
symbolic truth might differ from fact truth—and even, sometimes, seem
to deny it.
The trend continued. I was told about a man and woman in the Gar
den of Eden and a God who threw them out for eating a piece of fruit, and
I thought: Now if that wasn’t a giant temper tantrum what was? But the
apple represented forbidden knowledge. You bet your boots it did一 the
knowledge that there is one big difference between symbolic and literal
truth, and if the two ever meet, look out! W ith the Garden of Eden
episode, we settled for literal fact truth, a rather poor choice in many ways.
And only when I see a woman come full blown out of a man’s ribs (in good
light) w ill I fall for symbolic garbs as literal fact.
The symbols are carriers of truths known to the psyche. They keep
shoving literal interpretations aside and leaping out of them, because the
symbols are only handy representations of heroic dimensions too big to ap
pear in our fact world. Not realizing this, we who were literal-minded kept
pulling the rug out from the religions, or trying to, saying, scandalized,
“Now that’s just not true. What kind of a God is going to throw someone
278 Chapter 26
into an eternal hell for not going to church on Sunday?” Or, “God is just
not in that piece of bread. No way! Not unless God is in all bread•”
But the churches were so involved in their insistence that symbolic
truth was literal fact that they could only insist over and over again that
they were right~because they’d forgotten about the rich bed of symbolism
that alone could turn much of their literal nonsense into any kind of truth.
And when you realize that symbols are symbols, your feelings rise
up, almost touching the edges of direct knowing. O f course, instantly
you make a new symbol to express what you sense, because the world it
self springs from that source, and as you approach it you have to interpret
it in terms of mind and flesh. But you feel some balance and support at
the heart of the world, some aplomb at the center of the universe. Feel
ingly, you feel yourself a part of it all: You know that it moves with your
breath and that you and the universe are breathing each other in and out
in some unfathomable manner; eternal yet changing. Then— pop—
youre out of it: the feeling. But its familiar from childhood— not that
you remember it, exactly, but you feel that you fit it then, and took it for
granted.
So during this period, ever so briefly, that reminiscent awareness
emerged. I knew that once I ’d moved through the world with that confi
dence, like an innocent animal, sure of my place and haunts, and certain of
my ability to handle any dangers that might arise. I related that old emo
tional sureness to heroic spaces. I was “walking with myself” in the greater
heroic pattern that surrounds me, and each of us. This brought about a
kind of biological trust, the knowledge that were each as well equipped as
the animals, certainly, to deal with our lives and environment, endowed
with all the energy and resources we need.
So maybe we have to return to our private psyches, as naked of sym
bols as possible, having worn out the ones we had. Because when we accept
the symbols as literal truth in a fact world, we make lies of them or let them
make lies of us, so that they stand between us and the truths theyre meant
to represent.
Only when we throw the symbols off do we approach the unknow
able directly in whatever way we can. So what, if instantly we form new
symbols to express it? They’ll be rich, tinged with the original essence.
They w ill be our touchstones. But we wont need to defend them as literal
fact. We’ll understand symbols as the clothing that our visions wear.
When we expand our consciousness, we enlarge our understanding,
though, arriving at another level large enough to contain intuitive knowl
edge and facts, and we come into touch with other elements of selfhood
that weVe repressed.
Toward a N ew P olitics o fthe Psyche 27 9
Artists use different colors. But we have more than one self to our
palette—many, dwelling (if that’s the term) at other levels of reality, part of
their beings meshed with ours and ours with theirs. Weve denied the va
lid ity of these other selves and ignored their existence almost entirely, be
cause while we believed in one world and one time, we needed a one-self
concept and experience to go along with our world picture.
So these other selves remained psychologically invisible, like planets
not yet discovered, their existence showing only indirectly as effects that we
didn’t understand. We dared not confront them directly because our entire
picture of objective and subjective reality would have to change. Only now,
when the limitations of our old world view become appallingly apparent,
do we even consider alternates.
Certainly such a recognition would involve an entirely new politics of
the psyche, and new methods of approaching our own reality. “Myself”
would be understood to mean “ourselves” or “my selves”一 many selves
united like states into one psychological structure that operates for itself,
and all others in the physical world. WeVe always known it, but we’ve tried
to make ourselves smaller, only our consciousness and experience kept
spilling over the dam we， d built around our own nature. We have no idea
where the recognized myself merges with these others, yet the myself is an
intersection point of cognizant energy~the focus personality through
which these other selves share in corporal life and help form it (as, uncon
sciously, we share in their reality).
I have to use the word “selves” because we take it for granted that
selves are what we are—because weVe so limited our perception. We’ve just
taken one point and said, “The self ends here, includes space-time percep
tions, and no more.” So weVe made artificial divisions. In greater terms, we
only know the earth aspect (or focus personality) of ourselves. Its not so
much that we have other selves as that these aspects would appear separate
to us, because of our concepts about selfhood. We haven’t accepted our
greater identities.
Trance states, conditions of high inspiration or creativity, daydream
ing, sleep states—all act in a way as neutral areas. We move out of our psy
chologically limited centers (off focus) to form psychological platforms,
traveling out into the greater psyche where other aspects of ourselves twin
kle like stars. According to our abilities, we can learn an inner travel, estab
lishing psychological bases further from our own “home center,” and send
ourselves out as landing parties. Actually, these other aspects or selves, op
erating in their own objective and subjective realities, send emissaries here
as well. They appear to us in those neutral areas of relative psychological
freedom. The conditions of the psyche might well vary at different levels so
280 Chapter 26
that various different atmospheric conditions might be involved that we

still have to discern and evaluate.
But since these are interwoven psychological structures, they are
open-ended. You can move from ... one self or aspect to another... with
out destroying the validity of private identity one whit; bringing more of
your “selves” into conscious activation, adding to their experience and to
your own. This is not segmentation, but the fuller dimensions of being; the
exploration and cultivation of psychological assets. What we now think of
as ego consciousness is broadened at its base, gaining added stability, given
information denied to it before. We’ve kept the ego in an ignorance that
alone caused it stress: Its own base was not apparent to it, and when it did
briefly appear, the egos beliefs made it fear for its identity.
WeVe done an excellent job along certain lines in exploring the earth.
In those terms, our beliefs about the self are at “the world is flat” stage.
Closed off from perceiving our own greater aspects, we projected upon the
world a grid of beliefs that prejudiced the physical perception available to
us. During some of my own experiences, that prejudiced perception lifted
just enough so that for a few moments I saw • • • what was really there • • •
or viewed the richness of perceptive data possible in the world we know.
The self doesn’t end where we think it does, any more than the world
itself ends at the horizon. Weve accepted one self and thought that we， d
defined selfhood. Instead, its as if we’d explored one island and called it the
world. There are other aspects to the self that we know, whose origins and
activities have never been touched upon. Our job is to understand and rec
ognize them; to use their characteristics and abilities in an earth-tuned way;
to enrich earth experience by bringing to it those other dimensions of ex
perience; to fu lfill our creaturehood.
Even with my own still-limited experiences with “the heroic,” I feel
more sturdily here, more sturdily myself, and at the same time I’m far freer
to act, move, and interrelate with other portions of the psyche. I intend to
explore these other realities with a more carefree attitude, no longer wor
ried by what people or the world might think. On the one hand, that
world is more precious as it becomes colored and filled out by other per
ceptions. On the other hand, my allegiance is elsewhere, so that the worlds
value judgments and beliefs no longer reign supreme. I see that Im in an
excellent position, since I don’t belong to any already established field with
its set methods or criteria.
This doesn’t mean that I intend to turn into Seth or Sumari willy-
n illy a n d for all of my early worries, there was never even a hint of such a
situation. But we are quite capable of adapting a larger description of self
hood. At childhood, I believe, we were somewhat aware of other aspects of
our being, but we were taught to form a practical self and to lim it our
experience to fit its mold. Many of our own talents and characteristics be
came invisible to us in the process.
In my usual writing, as in this book, I use my known self in that the
world is viewed from my standpoint, and my excursions into other levels
of consciousness are journeys from here. But I also put my writing ability
to the use of other selves, with a different kind of psychological actuality,
who inhabit another sort of objective and subjective environment.
Seth, for example, is not a chunk of personified psyche, not just
“human but dead” and alive someplace else, but a different kind of psy
chological being entirely~a different species, psychically speaking~con
sciousness in a different context, one that I can tune in to since its strands
are interwoven with mine. Something of my consciousness is also inter
woven with Seths. We are different kinds of beings, together yet apart. I
am a self of Seths and he is a self of mine.
The full orchestration of individuality would permit the playing of all
the selves, with the focus personality directing the particular earth compo
sition. Again: Our selfliood is interwoven with these other selves. We are
them, focused here. They are us, focused in their reality. The strands ofyour
own consciousness wind in and out of those other dimensions, and through
them we are woven in and out of time and space but not confined to them.
These aspects can at times seem like gods to us because of their rela
tive freedom from our space-time system. They have a larger view of our
reality. They can allow us to use abilities that seem miraculous from our
viewpoint but they cannot participate in earthly experience as we do, nor
know the sweet, clear focus of a life couched in time.
Yet, tuning in to those dimensions of the heroic, we can use time dif
ferently. Something within it opens, and I believe that what opens is the
heroic medium in which time itself exists. The aspects actually help form
our own psychological solidarity, and we are what they are, in time.
For example, Seth finished The “Unknoum” Reality in April, and in
July he began another book, The Nature ofthe Psyche: Its Human Expression.
I was also working on this book, which I am now preparing for the pub
lisher. That left Rob with the two volumes of uUnknownJReality to type.
He also has to organize his own notes, and the nature of the book required
that he include some of our personal experiences. Seth wrote the book to
show how the elements of the unknown reality become known, and he
used our lives as an example. Now that is fine for Seth. He isn’t involved in
the physical effort. In the meantime, he has an excellent start on the new
book. He could dictate steadily as far as I can tell~his material seems lit
erally endless. Only the physical mechanics and time hold that work back
at all. And Im never tired after those sessions, incidentally; never drained.
Instead I’m usually refreshed.
282 Chapter 26
But while Seth can do all that and while he can give us invaluable in
formation about the nature of reality, his reality is focused elsewhere. His
consciousness may be woven with mine and mine with his, but I’m the one
who sits in the backyard these afternoons, watching the mountains. The af
ternoon exists in the universal brain and in my own simultaneously. But
only at this level of perception does it attain its aesthetic earthly reality,
achieving the dear peculiarities and details of separate leaves and trees—
and this experience of personal affiliation. For weve thrown in our lot with
earth, born and doomed to die within it, plunged and committed (for a
time) to follow the rules that dictate and delineate its nature.
If life is only for a time, then death is our exit out of time, when we
unscramble all the old messages and reprogram ourselves to perceive and
experience other valid worlds that also lie latent in the brain of the uni
verse, waiting only for our activation, our participation; for all possible re
alities exist in a gestalt of related consciousness.
As I was writing this passage originally, I was out in the yard; and if
Seth was aware of my perceptions, he was not directly experiencing them
as I was. I felt what I felt from my own viewpoint. And in that viewpoint I
knew that my cat W illy’s tour around the grounds—through the sunlight,
shadows, and stiff grasseswas as legitimate and important as a planet or
biting; and the mark of the cats paw was as significant as the tracings that
our rockets make in space. Both the rockets plunge and the cats explo
rations are acts of curiosity, wonder, and expansion, in which its evident
that all consciousness seeks to outdo itself and wanders the furthest reaches
of its sacred leash.
Death, I think, is such an exploration; assured by our anatomy, for all
of life is a preparation for it. Death is our assurance that we wont be caught
in a dimensional dilemma, trapped in a three-dimensional house with no
way out of it. Granted, we choose the house and terms of rental. But no
residence, however grand, could contain such free ranging consciousness
for long.
It seems to me that my own books always begin with a new psychic
event, and new questions that then structure my experience. I never know
where theyre leading me on a conscious level. So only as I was ending this
book did I understand its full development, and the natural evolution of
the super-real picture of the world that I saw, now over a year ago. For that
picture was meant to lead me on until, gradually, the old world of assumed
facts was seen as only part of a much more vast existence.
This book began when I heard my own true tone and felt that I， d
found my true path; or in other words, when I began to line myself up
with inner inclinations of being that seemed to know what was best for me,
and followed most faithfully the contours of my psyche. I found the
library, like the one magic place in the universe discovered by a child~the
place of seeming miracles, the place of homecoming.
Following these experiences, I explored various states of conscious
ness, each giving slightly different versions of reality. People called and
wrote, bringing into my life those elements of their own experience that
made up their reality. Click-click-click, as I encountered the great differ
ences and similarities of our lives. The contents of the mind and the con
tents of the world~where do they begin or end? Where do they merge?
When are they private? When are they shared?
IVe been on a long journey since this book began. I see that we form
the contents of the private and shared world: We choose our focus. But all
of this is not only determined by events, but by the state of consciousness
with which we perceive them. The perception alters events, changes them
to such a degree that only the merest of physical data remains the same,
while the significant inner data escapes such classification.
Seth is right: I live in a safe universe. Each of us does. That statement
is senseless at the official level of consciousness; the sheerest kind of
Pollyanna. Surrounded by wars, poverty, cruelty, and prophecies of the end
of the world, how can the idea of safety fit in?
Yetw hen the psyche goes within itself and finds its own true tone,
discovers its private touchstone, the aura of safety spreads about it, form
ing special places as the psyche imprints its own private mark upon the en
vironment; transforming it by altering the focus of consciousness and
changing levels of perception, and hence coming into a world where the
old laws and beliefs no longer apply.
Then and only then, going out into the world means going out into
a safe universe with the way cleared and vision open, where none of the old
defenses are needed and in which old fears no longer apply. As Seth hu
morously put it in one of our sessions, “I said it was a safeuniverse. I never
said it was a perfect one.” So this doesn’t mean the end of challenges, but
the release of energy and ability, the full use of our equipment to achieve
our goals, whatever they are.
So when we go out into the world again, it is the same world— the
streets and shops are there as always— but it is also a completely different
world, filled out and enriched by enlightened perception, no longer preju
diced by limited beliefs. It becomes a world in which we are competent; no
longer victims but creators, learning to develop an art of living hardly sus
pected before.
The stages between that condition and the one we have now w ill vary
considerably, but again Seth is correct: He says that a time comes to each
of us when we can no longer equivocate, when we can straddle the fence no
longer. Then we truly rouse, take the leap, and replace old beliefs with the
284 Chapter 26
codicils or their equivalent. The codicils are my versions of the new as
sumptions that can lead us to such a state; sifted through my psyche and
experience. Yet they w ill be discovered to some extent by each person in his
or her way, new assumptions of consciousness—but ancient knowledge na
tive to each of us, ready to be used in a new way.
C h apter 2 7
“Com e to the M o u n ta in ，
，，and
Seth on the Safe Universe
young man, a college student, just phoned. He said that he wanted
A to come and see me, to “come to the mountain, so to speak.” Dear

God~if youll forgive the term. I’m reminded of a poem I wrote in
high school:
A frog sat still

and stared with awe
at awatch that lay in the sand.
“Now,” he said, “I am quite sure
there is such a thing as man.”
“Our priests,” he mused, “have spoken

of man who made our pond.
Perhaps he left this as a token,
between us, to be a bond.”
So the frog spent all his life

trying to understand
and while he grew old and tired,
the watch ticked on in the sand.
Some frogs jeered at him,

others call him great,
but he only smiled, and went off by himself,
poor lonely frog, to meditate.
Ignoring the rather miraculous ever-ticking watch, the poem wasn’t

too bad for a sixteen-year-old. Now I think that the frog would have done
better by contemplating his frogness instead. But if that’s how I saw myself
back then, then its probably connected with the kind of person IVe grown
to be. Only I’m happier than the frog and not all that lonely. But the young
286 Chapter 27
mans phone call brought to the surface of my mind some thoughts Yd

been playing around with a few minutes before.
Maybe some of us are so appalled by mans condition, so aware of our
vulnerability and ignorance, so conscious of the plights in which our fellow
beings find themselves, that in desperation we begin, perhaps in childhood,
to tell stories to ourselves and others. We tell brave tales of immortality and
parades of the gods; galloping crescendos~those stories in which the lost
is always found, the sick cured, and all wrongs righted. These are our own
creations, spun from the yearnings and questions of the heart, magically set
against the terrors and uncertainties of life~ our own compensating yet
daring compositions to comfort ourselves and others, yet also reproaching
the universe. If wewtrc doing things, it would all be different!
Perhaps the animals have their own versions of these tales, but most
likely they dont need them. They accept the conditions of their lives. Don’t
they? Dont they?
Or does a mother wolf growl in agony at the far moon at the death of
a cub, and pause with a question: Why? Probably not. I take it for granted,
at least, that in that respect, the animals know better: They feel their part
in life and death alike. But even if Im wrong, theyre still spared our kind
of questions. They seem to escape our need to set things right.
Anyhow, some of us learn to tell these stories, and see magic visions
springing up to transform the world. After a while, we believe them, at
least in part; and others, listening, come to be healed, to find the answers,
to see the frogs watch. But the frog can’t tell what the watch is for or read
the features of its face. And we can’t see the real nature of our stories: They
dazzle, mystify~and remain indecipherable. Their origin is indecipher
able; for where does the yearning come from that we seek to assuage? If
there is no immortality of a sorts, no peace, then where did the yearning
for these originate? In what mold are the stories unknowingly fitted?
Now and then one of us sees, or we make the stories work. We find
ourselves somehow suddenly transported to another level of being where~
presto, yes— the sick are cured, the lonely comforted, and all things are
made right. But when we return with our miraculous message, the miracle
doesn’t work at home. Bewildered, we lick our wounds, swear off! Then
comes another moment of the soul, when we see how easily and clearly it
all works, only to find our miracles turned once again into fairy tales told
by the fireside. The young man wants to visit the mountain. Don’t we all?
So I wonder: Do our yearnings actually strain our creaturehood to
the limit? Do they propel us momentarily into those other levels of con
sciousness? A kind of consciousness that exists because we have forged it,
each of us, bit by bit through the ages. Only we haven’t transferred our liv
ing there yet.
“Come to the M ountain ” 287
Maybe what we have is all we can really expect of ourselves. Maybe

one species of animal— us—gave up all of its security of instinct, its known
place in the fabric of things, to forge a new kind of consciousness. Maybe,
just maybe, no other species, at least in our frame of reference, had to bear
the brunt of consciousness going-it-alone, so to speak; traveling outside the
known rules of heritage and instinct. Maybe we took a horrible plunge and
fantastic leap or ascension all at once, giving up old ordered ways by break
ing loose, straying, daring to remember and anticipate ourselves.
As its said at least, that mammals or mammals-to-be crawled up on
the land from the ocean, so maybe now were doing the same thing in a dif
ferent way, climbing out of time with its limited beliefs of cause and effect.
After learning to acclimate ourselves to our physical environment, after
struggling even to subdue it and make it ours, maybe were learning that on
certain levels at least weve been manipulating mirages. Maybe were learn
ing that the real world is always inside, where the mirages are made. Per
haps were getting ready to explore those inner landscapes and learning that
the flickering lights that splash across the world come from within our own
animal gifted minds, and always have.
I really believe that my library material on codicils is true, and that
Seths statements about a safe universe are valid. Then I think: But both the
library and Seth have their existence at another level of the psyche, a level
at which the mirages are not so clear or vivid or convincing. To us the dan
gers, fears, and terrors too often seem quite real.
So is Seth just ahead of us enough in his travels so that his assump
tions for existence do work~where he is? And now and then you or I get
one foot there, or glimpse one small corner of that vaster reality, and for
that moment the codicils work. We shout, “Eureka! Its a miracle!”一 and in
that instant take a species leap more terrifying and significant and tri
umphant than the reptiles， first crawling upon the land. We sense a whole
new field of existence. Only it doesn’t last and were left with tantalizing
images that propel us still ftirther, roused by the memories ofwhat we’ve so
briefly seen.
So it seems that were betwixt and between, and often our fine animal
alignment totters. We lose the fine security of instinct and yet haven’t
learned to use these other faculties that still elude us.
Maybe~crazy thought~the gods are spasmodic beings. Here and
there through the ages a man or woman reaches higher than most of us;
climbs into a new realm of being; ascends to a peak of consciousness as yet
transitory~and for that moment only he or she is a god, and shouts down
what is heard or sensed or experienced. Then books are written about it and
translations and transcriptions; but its all a kind of divine gibberish. We
can’t really translate it here any more than a dog, suddenly comprehending
288 Chapter 27
mathematics, could later translate the data to his dog fellows, no matter
how inspired his barks.
For the vision, however brilliant, fades. Yet the memory and knowl
edge of its existence remains a fact in our world, however clumsily ex
pressed. Maybe, whenever we pay attention to the lyrics instead of the
song, we make our biggest error~ if you’ll forgive the new analogy. Maybe
when we try our hardest to make the vision work in our world, to make it
practical, we distort it most of all; because what makes sense at those other
levels of consciousness may sound nonsensical here.
Yet those peaks of awareness may forge their own kind of reality and
continuity at other levels of consciousness, each one acting like a mental
footprint in an invisible world, so that paths are made for others of our
kind to follow~paths visible there but not here.
Maybe our successes are chalked up at those other barely glimpsed
levels, and for some still unknown reason they appear only in diluted form
here. Yd hate to settle for that, though. I suspect that Seths contention that
we form our own reality automatically alters our subjective state the
minute we accept it, and that were suddenly confronted with challenges
we were unaware of before; that we lose an old shallow innocence to gain a
new innocent wisdom, because we accept the responsibility that earlier we
assigned to fate or the gods. Certainly some momentary confusion is un
derstandable.
So is Seths voice a message from one level of consciousness to an
other, echoing through the symbolic molecules of some other kind of
being that is different in Seths time than it is in ours? Do his directions,
from his “flitu re ，
，，change the course of our present, so that we turn a dif
ferent corner of consciousness? And is the same thing true of any such mes
sages? Do they lead us to a level of consciousness where the codicils do
apply, where we use our beliefs to form reality as expertly as we now use
bricks?
Seth says that our beliefs cause our reality, whether we know it or not.
But knowing it changes the game, adds an extra dimension, and one in
which were driven to find a safe universe so that our beliefs are no longer
the results of fear.
The trouble is that we still use old methods to implement the new
ideas, some that are probably psychologically invisible to us at this stage
and no longer suited to the matter at hand. We keep checking physical re
ality, for example, to see if such ideas are practical, because in the past we
lived by accepting the evidence of our senses alone, and that was the sane
way to operate.
Now perhaps we have to do the opposite, alter our methods, and
check our ideas and beliefs while ignoring the physical data for a while.
“Come to the M ountain” 289
This is something very difficult for us to do, yet the constant checking
am I getting the effect I want yet?—in whatever area, only brings us right
back where the mirage is the reality. Most likely its when we forget to
check, when we grow weary and say “to hell with it” that things really hap
pen. Consciousness is suddenly freed from effort, and the new beliefs click
into focus, or we latch on to a new kind of instinct belonging to the hypo
thetically new species, where—presto~the thought does spring into in
stant reality. The difficulties are gone: We find or discover a better kind of
manipulation that carries us over or above the level below.
For all my work, IVe barely touched upon those other dimensions.
Little by little my own prejudiced perception falls away in chunks. I only
know that certain new experiences seem to be leading me further. IVe had
a series of extremely vivid waking-dreaming events that involved probabil
ities; IVe managed to enter another room in the library; and already have
over a hundred pages on what I call The World View ofPaul Cezanne. The
heroic personages seem to be just around the corner of my mind. So I sup
pose that these events w ill take shape in their own way.
I haven’t resumed regular classes and have no idea when or if I w ill.
In the meantime I see students at informal gatherings. Besides dictating
his new book in our regular sessions, Seth usually speaks to my students at
such times. His knowledge of our psychology is flawless. At a recent get-
together, I was explaining the idea of the safe universe when Seth came
through, with humor and some gentle irony, to help me out. I， d like to
close this book with excerpts from that spontaneous session.
When Seth speaks to people directly, he takes their emotional states
into consideration. He never speaks at them. In this particular instance, a
student had just expressed a fear that love was smothering. Before I could
answer, Seth came through:
“Now, you believe that love is smothering because you do not believe
in a safe universe. And each of you, to some extent or another, believe that
the universe is not safe, and therefore you must set up defenses against it.
“The one-line official consciousness with which you are familiar, says,
‘The world is not safe. I cannot trust it. Nor can I trust the conditions of
experience or the conditions of my own existence. Nor can I trust myself. I
can look at a squirrel and rejoice, but I cannot look at myself and rejoice,
for I am filled with iniquity and I am, to some extent, evil. [Seth spoke
with rich irony here, looking from one person to another.] I am not only
evil as myself, but I come from a tainted and flawed race. My mother and
my father were flawed before me and I send these tragic flaws into the fu
ture. Therefore, I must set up my defenses in whatever way I can, to pro
tect myself in a universe that I cannot trust, and from a self that is evil and
flawed.，
290 Chapter 27
“Now, as long as you hold onto those beliefs, then you must indeed
set up defenses. And it may seem to you [Seth nodded to the young man]
that love is smothering.
“As long as you believe that you dwell in a universe that is a threat,
you must defend yourself against it. As long as you believe that the self is
flawed and that the race is doomed and evil, you must defend yourself
against yourself. And how can you then trust the voice of the psyche?
When I say to you, ‘Be spontaneous,” how dare you take that step? To be
spontaneous would obviously give rise to all the lust, passion, murder, and
hatred that to you is inherent in the human heart.
“So you say, ‘I try to be spontaneous, but how can I? I try to believe
that I am good, but how can I be good when I come from a race that is
evil?， You try to say, ‘The universe is safe,， and then you watch the news on
television or read the newspaper and you say, ‘What lie is this? How can
the universe be safe when I read about wholesale murder, war, trickery, and
greed? How can I be myself, for if I am myself w ill I not unleash into the
world only more of the horror I see about me? for surely human nature
cannot change, and human nature is evil. Look already what evil it has
worked upon the planet, then tell me, Seth, be spontaneous! What do you
ask of me, and how can I stand upon the authority of the psyche or tell my
self that I am good?，
“The official line of consciousness forms a world about it and you ex
perience and perceive that world. While you devote yourselves to that offi
cial consciousness, the world w ill always appear the same~disastrous,
bound for destruction or the greater judgment of a fundamental god.
“M y last book, The Nature ofPersonal Reality, is a good book. It is a
helpful book, and it is far trickier than you realize. It w ill lead you~auto
matically, if you use it well~out of the official line of consciousness. You
w ill begin to question not only your private beliefs for your own purposes,
but the nature of beliefs. And you w ill be led to discover other strands of
consciousness.
wRuburt [Jane] is working with what he calls the codicils, material he
is getting from the library. Now those codicils are truths, quite apparent at
another stage of consciousness. The one-line stage of consciousness was
necessary, but it contained within it its own impetus for development. It
set up challenges that could not be solved at that stage, and that would au
tomatically lead to other kinds of awareness. Only when you sense these,
can old contradictions make sense.
“You need not say, ‘The universe is safe,， for at your present level, that
w ill only enrage you. Say instead, 4I live in a safe universe/ and so you shall.
Those defenses you have set up w ill crumble for they w ill not be needed.
The codicils are practical. They are realities, but at the official level of
“Come to the M ountain ” 291
consciousness they sound impossible. So you must learn here and now to
alter the state of your consciousness, and tune it to the state in which the
codicils make sense.
“When people read The Nature ofPersonal Reality they w ill begin to
examine their beliefs. They w ill think they are doing so to get rid of a prob
lem or to gain an advantage, but they w ill soon find themselves involved in
challenging the entire belief system that they know. When they do, they
w ill automatically begin to alter the focus of their consciousness—and in
so doing, begin to alter the nature of their world. Then, my dear friends,
we w ill have our next book, “Unknoum”Reality, ready for them. It w ill con
fuse them further. And then we w ill come out with another book, The Na
ture ofthe Psyche, that w ill help them find new footing in the world that
they know. We w ill help them out of the confusion that we have caused, in
other words.”
We took a break. Then the student who was worried about love being
smothering said that he had trouble relating to a girl who didn’t subscribe
wholeheartedly to Seths ideas. Once again, Seth came through: this time,
jovially:
“Now there are people who are quite involved with my ideas who do
not know my name. There are people quite content with their lot and they
do not know my name. They know themselves. They are aware of the vi
tality of their beings and they do not need me to tell them that they are im
portant. The flowers and cats and trees don’t need me to tell them they are
important either, and there are many people who do not need me for the
same reason.
“These people recognize the vitality of their existences. They ignore
the belief systems of their times. They are ancient children. They may not
read philosophy, but they listen to the wind. They watch the behavior of
the seasons.... If you were satisfied with the nature of your existence, you
would not be here. Those who are satisfied, do not need my voice. They
find sufficient reinforcement from the dawn and the twilight.
“They may build ditches or work in fields or factories. They do not
need to listen to my voice because they listen to the voices of the oak trees
and the birds, and to the voices of their own beings. I am a poor imitation
of the voices of your own psyches to which you do not listen. I w ill be un
needed, and gladly so, when you realize that the vitality and reinforcement
and joy are your own, and rise from the fountain of your own beings; when
you realize that you do not need me for protection, for there is nothing you
need protect yourself against.”
Index
Adventures in Consciousness: An Introduc body, psyche and, 134

tion to Aspect Psychology^ 4 ，
4 1 ,4 4 ,7 8 , ，
Book o f the Gods, The 95，96
9 8 ,1 1 0 ,1 2 6 ,1 3 3 ,1 3 5 , 157, 182, Book o f the Universe, The, 95
187, 247 boy w ith a hole in his chest, see G ordon
Akashic records, 8—10
altered states C atholic C hurch, 219—20, 226—29,
aspects and, 216-17 277-78
focus personality and, 214-26 cave draw ings, 267
anim als, form er relationship to hum ans of, cave m an, 48
84-85 Cayce, Edgar, 8
A nn, 147 C hrist
A nna, 73-76 as heroic personage, 266
antim atter, 72 person who thought he was, 119—21,
apes, 83-85, 103, 136-38 233-34
art as true, 165 C hristian Science, 226
aspect psychology, 44, 110, 135 C hristianity, 212-13, 219-20, 226-29,
aspects 277-78
alternate models o f civilizations, 221—22 civilization
altered states and, 216-17 alternate m odel of, 220-21
earth, 158,161,279 heroic patterns and, 262
as gods, 281 structure o f psyche m irrored in,
models as, 50 219-20
prim e, 129—30, 157, 161 clairvoyance, 72, 233，236
and stages o f consciousness, 254—55 class, authors probable, 167-77
astral form , 195 codicils, 151, 163, 2 1 1 -14 ,2 2 0-2 2, 276
authority personal application of, 223-25,
o f psyche, 255—56, 276 253-54
respect for, 291 conception, num erology of, and sex o f
autom atic w riting 160, 250 child, 60
perception o f w orld view through, consciousness
68-69 as aware-ized energy, 196
different levels of, 191-92
baby, author as, in vision, 136-37, 244 ever-m oving and creative, 26-27
Barbara,财 Anna expansion of, 195, 250, 278-79
belief nature and, 217-18
reality form ed by, 271, 288-89 official line of, 2 1 9 -2 0 ,2 3 4 ,2 5 2 ,2 5 7 ,
See also dogma 275,289-91
Ben, 168,171, 174-75,176 stages of, 249-57
BUI, 164-^5 strands of, 125—29
Blake, W illiam , 236-38 conversion, politics of, 160-61
294 Index
counterculture groups, 233 faith, in W illiam Jam ess m aterial, 54, 56

counterparts, 108-10, 113, 130, 148 fly, author as, 51
creativity focus, shift of, 26
models for, 63-66, 68 focus personality (known self; experienced
no boundaries to, 148 self), 44
order and, 77 alternate sensing and, 214—16
in stages o f consciousness, 251-57 arises out o f civilization o f psyche, 50
crim e, 164 counterparts of, 11
C yprus, 247, 251,254 ego as, 50
as “head o f state,” 161-62
dead, the, encounters between living and, heroic self and, 271,276
6 4 -6 5 ,6 9 “know thyself” and, 77
death, 282 nature of, 88-89, 125,157-58, 214
in W illiam Jam ess m aterial, 56-57 recognition o f m odel by, 49
Rob’s memory of, 42-45 stages o f consciousness of, 249-57
Seth on, 145-46 four-fronted selves, 113
decisions, m aking of, 9, 206 free w ill o f each entity, 109
D ennis, 188-89 freedom to deviate from inner m odels, 35
devil, authors books as w ritten by, 91, 93 Freud, Sigm und, 58-59, 219, 235
Dialogues o f the Soul and Mortal Selfin future, past plus present equals, 17
Time, 126, 133,182
D ick, 175 G arden o f Eden, 257
dogma, 12,219, 227, 232-33,251 “glim pses and direct encounters,” 45
D orrine, 244—46,247 God
dream s, 137, 216, 250, 265 m ulcidim ensionality and, 125-26
authors, 84, 192 traditional concept of, 212-13
encounters w ith dead in , 63-64 gods
interpretation of, 36 earth, 96
num erical symbolism in , 60 as spasm odic beings, 287
students’，174—77 “gods in the sky,” 137, 150, 243
G ordon, 92-93, 102
eccentricities,俯 models, eccentric versions of governm ent, 214, 219-21, 262
ecstasy, 253 gravity, 100
Ed, 119-21 G reta, 91
ego, see focus personality g uilt, psychoanalysis and, 220
em otion
intellect and, 56, 57 H elper, 247, 251, 253-54
num erology and, 60-61 heroic personages (heroic dim ension),
souls choosing o f states of, 68 260-72, 276, 289
energy holocaust, 8
aw are-ized, 134, 196 house hunting, 182, 190, 199, 202-06
blockages of, and illness, 257
evil, 245 ideals
fear of, 181-82, 185 Platonic, 35
“sent out” by author, 76, 78-79, 164 See also models
“establishm ent” o f the self, 158-59 illnesses
Index 295
o f author, 81, 84 Linda, 147

causes of, 257 living area, 78
Seth on cures from , 218 Lonnie, 240—41
Industrial m an, 48—49 Loretta, 188
inevitability, 210 love, 2 4 8 4 9 , 290
infinity, tim e as one version of, 72 love and hate, Seth on, 144
inner codes, 151 Lyman (“M r. Junior Parapsychologist”
)，
innocence, 256 8- 11,22
intellect, em otion and, 56, 57
intuitions, 236 M cD onalds restaurant, 93
perception of w orld view through, 68 m ain focus o f life, 165
male and fem ale, unity of, 35
Jam aican woman, 105-07 maps for the psyche, 23—24
James, H enry, 55 M argery, 139-42,1 4 4,15 0 ,1 5 7
Jam ess m aterial (of W illiam Jam es), M ary, 168,169-70 ，171, 173-76
5 3 -6 2 ,6 6 ,2 6 2 ,2 7 2 mass unconscious, self and, 61
Seth on, 66—77 m ental illness
Jean, 168，171, 174 culture and, 232
Jewish tradition, 212-13, 166 as em otional or psychic, 38
Joe, 91-92 in past cultures, 162
John, 175 m issing persons, 73—75
Jung, C arl, 51, 58-60, 6 7 ,6 9 , 235 models
o f civilization, alternate, 220—21
“Know thyself,w77 for creativity, 63-66, 68
K undalini，180, 181 eccentric versions of, 35, 4 2 ,4 8 -4 9 ,6 6 ,
77- 7 8 ,9 3 -9 4 ,2 1 6
Larry, 144 phenom enal w orld in accordance w ith,
lawyer, woman, 180-81, 185 65-66
leaders, 36 for physical reality, 17
Len, 147 Platonic ideals and, 35, 93-94, 95-96
libido, num erical symbol of, 60 in psyche, 36-37, 92
library reincarnational personalities as varia
ape and silver guide in, 81-89, 136-38 tions of, 42
discovery of, 6 ,7 , 11,14 -1 5, 94 as stabilized organizations o f symbols,
heroic personages in, 260, 275-76 202, 203
m aterial from , 17, 36-37, 47—49, o f universes, 71-72
6 3 -6 6 ,7 1 -7 2 ,7 7 -7 8 , 8 7 ,1 3 4 ,1 63 , M olly, 155-60
193-97, 200-02, 211-22, 223-24, M ossman, Tam, 40, 41
224-25 m ultidim ensionality o f being, 26-27, 125,
as m ental fram ework, 21-24 120-21, 133
new versions o f books in, 33, 89 m urdered girl, 163-64
“other self” in , 33, 36, 37, 39， 50,
1 34 -36 ,187,214-15 Nature o f Personal Reality, The, 76 ，
81 ，
85,
Seth and, 14, 2 4 -2 7 ,4 9 , 62 1 1 6 ,1 4 1 ,1 5 7 ,1 8 5 ,2 4 4 ,2 9 0
thank-you poem on, 30-33 Nature o f the Psyche, The: Its Human Ex-
tim e and, 99-100 pression, 281
296 Index
N ebene, 44, 109，110 as aware-ized energy, 134

nirvana, 243 body and, 134
num bers civilization and, 36，219
in official and unofficial sequences, exploding, 122
195-96 flesh and, 12
symbolism of, 60 inner space travel w ithin, 88
innocence of, 256
organization, Seth on form ing an, 144 library and m aterialization of, 33
，
O uija board, 160, 187-88 242, 250 maps for, 23
perception o f w orld view through, 69 mass, 212—13
out-of-body experiences, 167—77 models in, 36-37, 243
Oversoul Seven, The Education of, 147, 247, as m ultidim ensional jigsaw puzzle,
251,253,254 125
natural contours of, 235-36
past plus present equals future, 17 num erical symbolism of, 60
Perry, 78-79 as self-governing process, 161
personality “thickness” of, 117
historic, heroic personage and, 269, Psyche Contents o f the Mind, The, 101
271-72 psychic guided tours, 13
source and com ponents of, 157-58 Psychic Politics’ 167
See also focus personality as new edition o f m odel book, 66
Peter (artist), 44—45 origin of, 6—7, 11，282
Peter (college boy), 116 title of, 36，89
，
Plato, 35 83-94, 95-96 pyram id effect, 12, 136
，
poem s, authors, 4 -5 , 6, 30-33 115, 229,
230, 231-32 reality
poetry conscious belief in form ation of, 271,
as true, 165 288
w riting of, 74—75 rigid interpretation of, 50
polem ics, 151 systems of, basis for, 196
politics See also unknown reality
o f conversion, 160—61 ，
recklessness, 187 149,150
detrim ental, 130 reincarnational personalities
o f self, 50, 110-11, 158-59 as different focuses by consciousness,
w orld m ind and, 163 44
See also: Psychic Politics historic, 41, 57-58
precognition, 100-01, 232, 250 ，
ofR ob, 39-45, 86 105-10
probable class, authors, 167-77 as variations o f m odels, 42
progress religion, 214
in W illiam James’s m aterial, 56 fundam entalist, 91
linear tim e concept and, 77 in W illiam James’s m aterial, 56-57, 58 ，
projection by those who w ant to save the 67
w orld, 38 See also C hristianity; revelation; visions
prostate disease, 61 revelation
Protestantism , 219 W illiam James’s, 54
psyche as variations on a m odel, 48
aspects of, see aspects revolution in term s o f m odels, 47—48
Index 297
，
Rob (Janes husband), 3 11—14, 18, 35, in new house, 210
102, 1 21 ,1 3 8 -3 9 ,1 7 9 -8 2 , 190, painting of, 210
209, 273 “past” of, 4 1 ,1 4 2 ,1 4 6
in expansion-of-consciousness incident, on people who do not know his nam e,
192-93, 194 291
father m aterial of, 122-25 on safe universe, 283, 287, 289-91
W illiam James’s m aterial and, 57-58, as sym bol, 187-88
61—62 as w andering messenger, 88, 261
painting o f R uburt by, 83 on w orld news, 66—70, 78
painting o f Seth by, 210 Seth Material, The, 7
reincarnational experiences of, 39-45, ，
Seth Speaks, 51 160，262
，
86 105-10 Seth II, 251,253
Roderick, 160 Seven, see Oversoul Seven, The Education o f
Roman C atholic C hurch, see C atholic sex, 179—90
C hurch sham ans, 85—86
silver guide (m an w ith dull silver face),
safe universe, 283, 287, 289—91 81-82, 84-86
“Saint Paul,” 189，234 sleep, m aterial com ing to author in , 112
Sally, 102-03 soul
saving the w orld, 37-38 tem peram ents and inclinations of, 68
science k it, 101-04 See also psyche
scientist, authors collaboration w ith, ，，
source self, 44, 88 110 157-58
97-98 counterparts as eccentric versions of,
self-sacrifice, 266 130
selves as m odel, 49
four-fronted, 113 space
interw eaving of, 124-31, 279-81 ，
official and unofficial, 193—95 200—02
known (experienced), see focus personal ，
tim e and, 100-01, 103 117, 194-95,
ity 281
psyche and, 134 Speakers, the, 262
source, see source self spontaneity, 225-26, 290
，
Seth, 11-14, 51, 58 81, 94-95, 121, evil and, 148-50
143-50, 251,253-54 subconscious as the devil, 91, 93
on ape and silver figure, 84—86 ，
suicide, 75 79, 259
on authors probable class, 170—72 ，，
Sum ari, 149-50 1 6 2 ,196 251, 253-54
author s relationship w ith, 147, 162 “super-real,” 18—21
book of, to help people out o f difficul super self, 38
ties, 76 symbolism
on chapter form , 45 Sigm und Freuds, 58
com pared w ith m aterial, 49 as means o f com m unication between
on counterparts, 108—10 living and dead, 64—65
，
library and, 14 25—27, 49-62 num erical, 60-61
on love and hate, 144 private, 202-04
Lyman on, 9-10 tru th and, 277,278
m aterial from , as com pared to authors
own m aterial, 128 telekinesis, 72
nature of, 280-82 telepathy, 7 2 ,1 9 4 -9 5 ,2 3 3 ,2 3 6 , 250
298 Index
telephone calls to author, 9, 37—38, 73-76, as projection o f m inds activity, 65

，
78-79 9 1 ,1 0 2 -0 3 ,1 2 8 ,1 5 5 -6 0 , Seth on, 144-45, 283-84, 287, 289-91
1 63-65,183-90, 197,240-42, as trium ph o f eccentricities, 71-72
244-46 unknown reality, 12-13, 25—27
tim e, 98-104 “Unknown”Reality, The， 4 ,1 1 , 24-27,
linear concepts of, and self, 77 ，，
66-67, 69 9 9 ,1 0 5 ,1 0 8 ,1 4 3 ,148
as one version o f infinity, 72 167,1 99 ,24 4,2 59 ,2 8 1
as open-ended, 263 unofficial inform ation, 194-96, 201, 214
as sim ultaneous, 41, 147—48
space and, 100-01, 103, 117, 194-95 voices, hearing of, 155-56,159-60
tim e-species, 110
“truth-seeker,” 228 W atkins, Sue, 4 1 ,4 4 , 172, 174, 176
W illiam s, M ario, 91
UFOs, 233 W illow, Tom, 97-98
unconscious W illy (cat), 209, 249
conscious focus and, 88-89,255 w orld m ind, 163
mass, self and, 61 World View o f Paul Cezanne, The, 289
universe w orld views, 66-70
or G od, 126
as “holistic,” 223-25 youth and age, unity of, 35
im possibility o f know ing, 96

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Psychic

Moment Point Press

Psychic Politics: An Aspect Psychology Book

Author photo copyright © 1997 by Robert F. Butts

Cover design by Metaglyph

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Roberts, Jane, 1929—1984

1. Parapsychology. I. Title. II. Series.

Printed in the United States of America

This book is printed on acid free paper.

SNI is a nonprofit network of Seth/Jane Roberts readers from more than

By the time Jane Roberts’s first aspect psychology book, Adventures in

Moment Point Press is proud to publish Jane Roberts’sAdventures in Con­

The Bundu (fiction, 1958)

The God o fJane

Conversations w ith Seth

The S p iritual Universe

Consciously Creating Each Day

For more information

Chapter 1 The Library 3

Chapter 16 Voiccx from “the Underground,” and the Politics

Chapter 21 The Codicils, and an Alternate Model for

W ters are vacant. As I write, I no longer hear the bridge traffic at

seems to direct many of my other excursions into realms of consciousness

Ah love this stubborn mortal self,

so I don’t seewhy I need an appointment

With this, the mortal self gets up,

received no answer, as far as I could tell. No new insights, dreams, or ideas

‘“No man is an island unto himself/

“The ego rises from the civilization

Startled, I looked up; and suddenly I saw my reasons for Lymans

This is somewhat of a momentous evening for Ruburt [as Seth

As he continued, Seth used my experiences to point up the existence

and at my particular corner of Walnut and Water streets—and it seemed

he next morning, Friday, October 25,1sat down at my desk, feel­

From the Library

Models for Physical Reality

There are ever-changing models for physical reality, transforming them­

apart with an almost miraculous separateness, even while it was some­

As we ate dinner that evening, I saw myself for a moment sitting at a

features? W ill what I see really be there? Or w ill my experiences be a re­

R u b u rt and Joseph chose to specialize, so to speak, in precisely

M odels and Beloved Eccentrics

T everywhere. I sat down at my table in front of the bay windows to

D ear soul, I ， m awed.

You seem to send m e a series o f new b irth s

B ut after I finished m y last poem

n o t fla t b u t three-dim ensional

I w atched fro m here, and there

B u t in any case, I knew this path

B ut in w hatever w ay tru th s exist,

viewing a different perspective of them—in which they werent cramped ei­

From the Library

1. If you learned to remember and interpret the unofficial messages of

probable actions best suited to its fulfillment. Its choice is spontaneously

P sychic p o litic s ~ o r th e p o litic s o f th e psyche— I w as b e g in n in g to see th e

Rob and the Rom an Captain, and

S changing my view of the public world. I suppose that I hoped to get

“ 丁h is w as th e e n d o f th e series o f im ages a n d v is io n s I saw. A ll th re e

Rob told me about his experiences at suppertime. Were they valid

Moment Point Press is proud to publish Jane Roberts’sAdventures in Con

he next morning, Friday, October 25,1sat down at my desk, feel

There are ever-changing models for physical reality, transforming them

apart with an almost miraculous separateness, even while it was some

features? W ill what I see really be there? Or w ill my experiences be a re

viewing a different perspective of them—in which they werent cramped ei

“Numbers have an emotional equivalent, in that their symbols origi

Once more, the material promised to be endless. It was nearing mid

ye t b o rn fro m y o u r stan d p o in t, exists nevertheless. R u b u rts e xp eri

historic personages popping up in numberless living rooms, communicat

These models can be considered as entities with a propensity for pat

Our linear time concepts lead us to our ideas of straight-ahead pro

h ile a ll o f th is w as g o in g o n , I was e x h ila ra te d b y th e a u tu m n it

W self, y e t as th e m id d le o f N o v e m b e r cam e I g re w s lig h tly d is

Seth went on to describe the ways in which my mother and grandfa

I felt a new delightful corporal certainty because of the evenings ear