Take a brief break and we will continue.
(11:25 to 11:32.
(With humorous emphasis:) Chapter Three: Association, the Emotions, and a Different Frame of Reference." That is the heading.
You normally organize your experience in terms of time. Your usual stream of consciousness is also highly associative, however. Certain events in the present will remind you of past ones, for example, and sometimes your memory of the past will color present events.
Association or no, physically you will remember events in time, with present moments neatly following past ones. The psyche deals largely with associative processes, however, as it organizes events through association. Time as such has little meaning in that framework.
Associations are tied together, so to speak, by emotional experience. In a large manner, the emotions defy time.
End of dictation.
(11:39.) Give us a moment. . . That is just enough to let Ruburt know we are on our next chapter.
(Now Seth delivered some material on other subjects, ending the session at 11.:52 P.M.) 43
The Nature of the Psyche Association, Emotions. . .
SESSION 762, DECEMBER 15, 1975 9:10 P.M. MONDAY
(Sessions 760-61 were devoted to separate topics that Seth has been developing apart from his regular book dictation for Psyche.
(I feel half massive, but half relaxed, too," Jane said as we waited for the session to begin. "I feel an odd sense of frustration-or maybe just impatience is a better way to put it . . .1 think all of this psychic stuff
that I'm half aware of has to be organized and expressed in our world-Seth, Cezanne, this book-so that we can make sense of the whole thing."
(Her reference to the French painter, Paul Cezanne, involves an experience that she began just the other day.
Since Seth discusses this himself in the session, I'll let him carry on from here.) Good evening.
("Good evening, Seth.") Dictation-Continuation of Chapter Three.
When you are in touch with your psyche, you experience direct knowledge. Direct knowledge is comprehension.
When you are dreaming, you are experiencing direct knowledge about yourself or about the world. You are comprehending your own being in a different way. When you are reading a book, you are experiencing indirect knowledge that may or may not lead to comprehension. Comprehension itself exists whether or not you have the words--or even the thoughts-to express it. You may comprehend the meaning of a dream without understanding it at all in verbal terms. Your ordinary thoughts may falter, or slip and slide around your inner comprehension without ever really coming close to expressing it.
Dreams deal with associations and with emotional validities that often do not seem to make sense in the usual world. I said before that no one can really give you a definition of the psyche. It must be experienced. Since its activities, wisdom and perception rise largely from another kind of reference, then you must often learn to interpret
44
your encounter with the psyche to your usual self. One of the largest difficulties here is the issue of organization. In regular life, you organize your experience very neatly and push it into accepted patterns or channels, into preconceived ideas and beliefs. You tailor it to fit time sequences. Again: The psyche's organization follows no such learned predisposition. Its products can often appear chaotic simply because they splash over your accepted ideas about what experience is.
(9:25.) In Seth Speaks I tried to describe certain extensions of your own reality in terms that my readers could understand. In The Nature of Personal Reality I tried to extend the practical boundaries of individual existence as it is usually experienced. I tried to give the reader hints that would increase practical, spiritual, and physical enjoyment and fulfillment in daily life. Those books were dictated by me in a more or less straight narrative style. In
"Unknown" Reality I went further, showing how the experiences of the psyche splash outward into the daylight, so to speak. Hopefully in that book, through my dictation and through Rubert's and Joseph's experiences, the reader could see the greater dimensions that touch ordinary living, and sense the psyche's magic. That book required much more work on Joseph's part, and that additional effort itself was a demonstration that the psyche's events are very difficult to pin down in time.
Seemingly its action goes out in all directions. It may be easier to say, for example:
"This or that event began at such a time, and ended later at such-and-such a time." As Joseph did his. notes, however, it became apparent that some events could hardly be so pinpointed, and indeed seemed to have no beginning or end.
Because you tie your experience so directly to time, you rarely allow yourselves any experiences, except in dreams, that seem to defy it. Your ideas about the psyche therefore limit your experience of it. Ruburt is far more lenient than most of my readers in that regard. Still, he often expects his own rather unorthodox experiences to appear in the kind of orderly garb with which you are all familiar.
In our last book session, I gave the title for this
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The Nature of the Psyche
chapter, mentioning the emotions and association; and the fact that the psyche must be directly experienced. I have not dictated a book session per se again. until this evening. In the meantime, Rubert has been experiencing dimensions of the psyche new to him.
(9:43. Our cat, Willy, woke up and insisted upon climbing into Jane's lap as she sat in trance. 1 finally had to deposit him in the writing room and close the door.)
It did not occur to him that those experiences had anything to do with this book, or that in acting so spontaneously he was following any kind of inner order. He wanted these pages to follow neatly one by one. Each of his experiences, however, demonstrates the ways in which the psyche's direct experiences defy your prosaic concepts of time, reality, and the orderly sequence of events. They also served to point up the differences between knowledge and comprehension, and emphasize the importance of desire and of the emotions.
In a way, of course, my own experience is divorced from that of my readers. As this information-the Seth material-is sifted through Ruburt's experience, you are able to see how it applies to the existence that is "presently" yours.
Ruburt's experiences of late are particularly important, in that by implication they run counter to many accepted core beliefs that are generally held. We will use these latest episodes as an opportunity to discuss the presence of knowledge that appears to be
"supernormal"-available, but usually untouched. We will further describe the triggers that can make such information practical, or bring it into practical range.
First of all, there are several pronts I want to make.
You are born with the inclination toward language. Language is implied in your physical structure. You are born with the inclination to learn and to explore. When you are conceived, there is already a complete pattern for your grown physical body-a pattern that is definite enough to give you the recognizable kind of adult form while variable enough to allow for literally infinite variations (very intently)
.
It would be idiotic of you to say that you were forced 46
Association, Emotions. . .
to become an adult, however. For one thing, at any given time you could end the process-and many do. In other words, because the pattern for development exists in your terms, this does not mean that each such development is not unique.
In your terms again, then, at anyone earth time many such patterns exist. In greater respects, however, all time is simultaneous, and so all such physical patterns exist at once.
(10:02.) Rest your fingers. Get Ruburt some cigarettes.
I will keep him in trance. Do you want to rest?
("No."
(A minute later:) In the psychic areas, all patterns for knowledge, cultures, civilizations, personal and mass accomplishments, sciences, religions, technologies and arts, exist in the same fashion.
The private psyche, the part of you that you do not recognize, is aware of those patterns even as it is aware of private physical biological patterns about which it forms your image.
Certain leanings, inclinations, and probabilities are present then in your biological structure, to be triggered or not according to your purposes and intents. You may personally have the ability to be a fine athlete, for example. Yet your inclinations and intents may carry you in a different direction, so that the necessary triggers are not activated. Each individual is gifted in a variety of ways. His or her own desires and beliefs activate certain abilities and ignore others.
(10:11.) The [human] species has built into it all of the knowledge, information, and
"data" that it can possibly need under any and all conditions. This heritage must be triggered psychically, however, as a physical mechanism such as a muscle is triggered through desire or intent.
This does not mean that you learn what in larger terms you already know; as, for example, if you learn a skill. Without the triggering desire, the skill would not be developed; but even when you do learn a skill, you use it in your own unique way. Still, the knowledge of mathematics and the arts is as much within you as your genes are within you.
You usually believe that all such information must come from outside of your self, however.
Certainly
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The Nature of the Psyche
mathematical formulas are not imprinted in the brain, yet the are inherent in the structure of the brain (intently), and implied within its existence. Your own focus determines the information that is available to you. I will here give you an example.
Ruburt paints as a hobby. Sometimes he paints for fairly long periods of time, then forgets about it. Joseph is an artist. Ruburt has been wondering about the contents of the mind, curious as to what information was available to it. The Christmas holidays were approaching. He asked Joseph what he would like for a gift, and Joseph more or less replied: "A book on Cezanne."
Ruburt's love for Joseph, his own purposes, and his growing. questions, along with his interest in painting in general, triggered exactly the kind of stimulus that broke through conventional beliefs about time and knowledge. Ruburt tuned in to Cezanne's "world view.
" He did not contact Cezanne per se, but Cezanne's comprehension of painting as an art.
.
Ruburt is not technically facile enough even to follow Cezanne's directions. Joseph is facile enough, but he would not want to follow the vision of another. The information, however, is extremely valuable, and knowledge on any kind of subject is available in just such a manner-but it is attained through desire and through intent.
This does not mean that any person, spontaneously, with no instruction, can suddenly become a great artist or writer or scientist. It does mean, however, that the species possesses within itself those inclinations which will flower. It means also that you are limiting the range of your knowledge by not taking advantage of such methods. It does not mean that in your terms all knowledge already exists, either, for knowledge automatically becomes individualized as you receive it, and hence, new.
Take your break or end the session, as you prefer. ("We'll take the break."
(10:30. Seth did an excellent job of describing the
conditions that resulted in Jane's "Cezanne experience." Specifically, though, this is what happened:
Quite suddenly in the predawn hours of December 11 she began to write 48
Association, Emotions. . .
an automatic script that purported to come from the artist Paul Cezanne, who lived from 1839 to 1906.
She has no idea whether or not the manuscript will continue "to come." Already, though, I am struck by the insights on art and life as they are presented.
(Resume in the same manner at 10:42.)
Your desire automatically attracts the kind of information you require, though you may or may not be aware of it.
If you are gifted, and want to be a musician, for example, then you may literally learn while you are asleep, tuning in to the world views of other musicians, both alive and dead in your terms. When you are awake, you will receive inner hints, nudges or inspirations. You may still need to practice, but your. practice will be largely in joy, and will not take as long as it might others. The reception of such information facilitates skill, and operates basically outside of time's sequences..
Ruburt's cezanne material therefore comes very quickly, taking a bare portion of the day. Yet its quality is such that professional art critics could learn from it, though some of their productions might take much longer periods of time, and result from an extensive conscious knowledge of art, which Ruburt almost entirely lacks. The productions of the psyche by their nature, therefore, burst aside many most cherished beliefs.
It seems almost heresy to suppose that such knowledge is available, for then what use is education? Yet education should serve to introduce a student to as many fields of endeavor as possible, so that he or she might recognize those that serve as natural triggers, opening skills or furthering development. The student will, then, pick and choose. The Cezanne material was from the past, yet future knowledge is quite as accessible. There are, of course, probable futures from the standpoint of your past. Future information is theoretically available there, just as the body's "future" pattern of development was at your birth-and that certainly was practical.
End of session. A fond good evening. ("Thank you, Seth.") Unless you have questions. . . .
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The Nature of the Psyche
(At 10:551 did ask Seth a question, which he discussed until 11:24 P.M.)
SESSION 763, JANUARY 5, 1976 9:28 P.M. MONDAY
(While we were out for a drive in the country yesterday, Jane abruptly wondered aloud if Seth ever dreamed. If he did, what was his dream state like? Tonight at 9:00 she told me she thought he'd answer her questions by weaving them into the book session.
(We took our Christmas tree down today, after enjoying it through the holidays. Jane called them
"the Cezanne days" since she's still getting Cezanne material.) Now: Dictation.
("Good evening, Seth.")
There are, then, other ways of receiving information than those you take for granted.
There are other kinds of knowledge, also. These deal with organizations with which you are generally not familiar. It is not merely a matter of learning new methods to acquire knowledge, then, but a situation in which old methods must be momentarily set aside-along with the type of knowledge that is associated with them.
- It is not a matter, either, of there simply being one other category of knowledge, for there are numerous other such categories, many of them biologically within your reach.
Various so-called esoteric traditions provide certain methods that allow an individual to set aside accepted modes or perception, and otter patterns that may be used as containers for these other kinds of knowledge. Even these containers must necessarily shape the information received, however. (Pause.) Some such methods are very advantageous, yet they have also become too rigid and autocratic, allowing little room for deviation. Dogmas are then set up about them so that only a certain body of data is considered acceptable.
The systems no longer have the f1exability that first gave them birth.
The kind of knowledge upon which you depend needs verbalization. It is very difficult for you to consider the
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Association, Emotions. . .
accumulation of any kind of knowledge without the use of language as you understand it.
Even your remembered dreams are often verbalized constructs. You may also use images, but these are familiar images, born of the educated and hence prejudiced physical perceptions. Those remembered dreams have meaning and are very valuable, but they are already organized for you to some extent, and put into a shape that you can somewhat recognize.
(9:41.) Beneath those levels, however, you comprehend events in an entirely different fashion. These whole comprehensions are then packaged even in the dream state, and translated into usual sense terms.
Any information or knowledge must have a pattern if you are going to understand it at all. Ruburt's own painting, his knowledge of his psychic abilities, his love of Joseph all served to form a pattern which then attracted the Cezanne material. He received this
"automatically," writing down the words that came almost too quickly for him to follow.
His craft or art of writing brought the material to clear focus. The information itself, however, had nothing to do with words, but with an overall comprehension of the nature of painting, a direct knowing. Ruburt used his own abilities as a container, them This direct kind of knowledge is available, again, on any subject, to anyone who provides a suitable pattern through desire, love, intent or belief.
Ruburt wondered later if I dreamed. My own usual state of consciousness is far different from yours. I do not alternate between waking and sleeping as you do. Still, I have states of consciousness that could be compared to your dream state, in that I am myself not as involved in them as I am in others. If I said to you, "I control my dream state," you might have an idea of what I mean. Yet I do not control my dreams-I fulfill them. What you could call my dreaming state is involved with the levels I spoke of that exist beneath your remembered dreams.
(Pause.) I said earlier that there were many kinds of knowledge. Think of them instead as states of knowledge. Perception of any of these takes a consciousness attuned to each. In my
"waking" condition, I operate at many levels of consciousness at once, and deal therefore with different systems of knowledge. In my "dream" condition, or rather
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The Nature of the Psyche
conditions, I form links of consciousness that combine these various systems, creatively forming them into new versions. "Waking" again, I become consciously aware of those activities, and use them to add to the dimensions of my usual state, creatively expanding my experience of reality. What I learn is transmitted automatically to others like me, and their knowledge is transmitted to me.
(Pause at 10:05.) We are each consciously aware of these transmissions. In the terms usually familiar to you, you think of "the conscious mind." In those terms, there are many conscious minds. You are so prejudiced, however, that you ignore information that you have been taught cannot be conscious. All of your experience, therefore, is organized according to your beliefs.
It is much more natural to remember your dreams than not to remember them. It is presently in the vogue to say that the conscious mind, as you consider it; deals with survival.
It is much more natural to remember your dreams than not to remember them. It is presently in the vogue to say that the conscious mind, as you consider it; deals with survival.