Reincarnational Relationships

Table of Contents

Throughout your reincamational existences you expand your consciousness, your ideas, your perceptions, your values. You break away from self-adopted restrictions, and you grow spiritually as you learn to step aside from limiting conceptions and dogmas.

Your rate of learning depends entirely upon you, however. Limited, dogmatic, or rigid concepts of good and evil can hold you back. Too narrow ideas of the nature of existence can follow you through several lives if you do not choose to be spiritually and psychically flexible.

These rigid ideas can indeed act as leashes, so that you are forced to circle like a tied puppy dog about a very small radius. In such cases, through perhaps a group of existences, you will find yourself battling against ideas of good and evil, running about in a circle of confusion, doubt, and anxiety.

Your friends and acquaintances will be concerned with the same problems, for you will draw to yourself those with the same concerns. I am telling you again, therefore, that many of your ideas of good and evil are highly distortive, and shadow all understanding you have of the nature of reality.

If you form a guilt in your mind, then it is a reality for you, and you must work it out. But many of you form guilts for which there is no adequate cause, and you saddle yourselves with these guilts without reason. In your dimension of activity there appear to be a wild assortment of evils. Let me tell you that he who hates an evil merely creates another one.

From within your point of reference it is often difficult for you to perceive that all events work toward creativity, or to trust in the spontaneous creativity of your own natures. Within your system, to kill is obviously a moral crime, but to kill another in punishment only compounds the original error. Someone very well known who estab- lished a church - if you will, a civilization - once said, ‘Turn the other cheek if you are attacked." The original meaning of that remark, however, should be understood. You should turn the other cheek because you realize that basically the attacker only attacks himself.

Then you are free, and the reaction is a good one. If you turn the other cheek without this understanding, however, and feel resentful, or if you turn the other cheek out of a feeling of pseudomoral superiority, then the reaction is far from adequate.

Now all of this can be applied to your relationships in your reincarnational existences, and of course it also is highly pertinent to your current daily experience. If you hate another person, that hate may bind you to him through as many lives as you allow the hate to consume you. You draw to yourself in this existence and in all others those qualities upon which you concentrate your attention. If you vividly concern your- self with the injustices you feel have been done you, then you attract more such experience, and if this goes on, then it will be mirrored in your next existence. It is true that in between lives there is “time” for understanding and contemplation.

Those who do not take advantage of such opportunities in this life often do not do so when it is over. Consciousness will expand. It will create. It will turn itself inside out to do so. There is nothing outside of yourself that will force you to understand these issues or face them.

It is useless then to say, “When this life is over I will look back upon my experience and mend my ways.” This is like a young man saying, “When I grow old and retire, I will use all those abilities that I am not now developing.” You are setting the stage for your “next” life now. The thoughts you think today will in one way or another become the fabric of your next existence. There are no magic words that will make you wise, that will fill you with understanding and compassion, that will expand your consciousness.

Your thoughts and everyday experience contain the answers. Any successes in this life, any abilities, have been worked out through past experience. They are yours by right. You worked to develop them. If you look about you at your relatives, friends, acquaintances, and business associates, you will also see what kind of a person you are, for you are drawn to them as they are drawn to you, through very basic inner similarities.

If you examine your thoughts for five minutes at various times during the day for several times a month, you will indeed receive a correct impression of the kind of life you have so far arranged for yourself in the next existence. If you are not pleased with what you discover, then you had better begin changing the nature of your thoughts and feelings.

As you will see later in this book, you can do so. There is no rule saying that in each life you must meet again those whom you have known before; and yet through the nature of attraction, that is often the case.

You may be bom into your present family for many reasons. You may find after death a much stronger relationship emotionally with a personality from a past life. If you are married, for example, and have no true rapport with your mate, you may instead find a past wife or husband waiting for you.

Oftentimes members of various groups - military groups, church groups, hunting groups, will in another life form family relationships in which they will then work out old problems in new ways. Families must be considered as gestalts of psychic activity; they have a subjective identity, of which no particular member of the group may be aware.

Families have subconscious purposes, though the individual members of the family may pursue these goals without conscious awareness. Such groups are set up ahead of time, so to speak, in between physical existences. Oftentimes four or five individuals will set themselves a given challenge, and assign to the various members different parts to play. Then in a physical existence the roles will be worked out.

The inner self is always aware of the hidden mechanisms of these family gestalts. Those who have been closely bound through emotional ties often prefer to remain in closely tied or loosely tied physical relationships that continue through many lifetimes. New relationships are always encouraged however, for you can have ingrown reincarnational “families.” Many of these form physical organizations that are actually manifestations of inner groupings.

I spoke earlier of rigid concepts of right and wrong. There is only one way to avoid this problem. Only true compassion and love will lead to an understanding of the nature of good, and only these qualities will serve to annihilate the erroneous and distortive concepts of evil.

The simple fact is that as long as you believe in the concept of evil, it is a reality in your system, and you will always find it manifested. Your belief in it will, therefore, seem highly justified. If you carry this concept through succeeding generations, through reincarnations, then you add to its reality.

Let me try to throw some light upon what I am trying to tell you. First of all, love always involves freedom. If a man says he loves you and yet denies you your freedom, then you often hate him. Yet because of his words you do not feel justified in the emotion. This sort of emotional tangle itself can lead to continued entanglements through various lives.

If you hate evil, then beware of your conception of the word. Hate is restrictive. It narrows down your perception. It is indeed a dark glass that shadows all of your experience. You will find more and more to hate, and bring the hated elements into your own experience.

If, for example, you hate a parent, then it becomes quite easy to hate any parents, for in their faces you see and project the original offender. In subsequent lives you may also be drawn into a family and find yourself with the same emotions, for the emotions are the problem, and not those elements that seem to bring them about.

If you hate illness you may bring upon yourself a succeeding life of illness, because the hate has drawn it to you. If you expand your sense of love, of health, and existence, then you are drawn in this life and in others toward those qualities; again, because they are those upon which you concentrate. A generation that hates war will not bring peace. A generation that loves peace will bring peace.

To die with hatred for any cause or people, or for any reason, is a great disadvantage. You have all kinds of opportunities now to recreate your personal experience in more beneficial ways, and to change your world. CHAPTER 12

REINCARNATIONAL RELATIONSHIPS

aware.

To die with hatred for any cause or people, or for any reason, is a great disadvantage. You have all kinds of opportunities now to recreate your personal experience in more

beneficial ways, and to change your world.

In the next life you will be working with those attitudes that are now yours. If you insist upon harboring hatreds within you now, you are very likely to continue doing so. On the other hand, those sparks of truth, intuition, love, joy, creativity, and accomplishment gained now, will work for you then as they do now.

They are, you see, the only true realities. They are the only real foundations of existence. It is foolish, as Ruburt once said, to hate a storm or shake your fists at it and call it names. You laugh if you think of children or natives in such activities. It is useless to personify a storm and treat it as a demon, focusing upon its destructive elements, or those elements that to you appear destructive.

Change of form is not destructive. The explosive energy of a storm is highly creative. Consciousness is not annihilated. A storm is part of creativity. You view it from your own perspective, and yet one individual will feel within the storm the unending cycle of creativity, and another will personify it as the work of the devil.

Through all your lives you will interpret the reality that you see in your own way, and that way will have its effect upon you, and in turn upon others. The man who literally hates, immediately sets himself up in this fashion: He prejudges the nature of reality according to his own limited understanding.

Now I am emphasizing the issue of hate in this chapter on reincarnation because its results can be so disastrous. A man who hates always believes himself justified. He never hates anything that he believes to be good. He thinks he is being just, therefore, in his hatred, but the hatred itself forms a very strong claim that will follow him throughout his lives, until he learns that only the hatred itself is the destroyer.

Far be it from me to interrupt your edifying conversation. Remember what you concentrate upon, and we will leave it at that. Now we will resume dictation.

I would like to make it clear that there is nothing to be gained, either, by hating hatred. You fall into the same trap.

What is needed is a basic trust in the nature of vitality, and faith that all elements of experience are used for a greater good, whether or not you can perceive the way in which “evil” is transmuted into creativity. What you love will also be a part of your experience in this life and others.

The most important idea to be remembered is that no one thrusts the experience of any given lifetime upon you. It is formed faithfully according to your own emotions and beliefs. The great power and energy of love and creativity is apparent in the mere fact of your existence. This is the truth so often forgotten - that [the combination of] consciousness and existence continues and absorbs those elements that seem to you so destructive.

Hate is powerful if you believe in it, and yet though you hate life, you will continue to exist. You have made appointments, each of you, that you have forgotten. They were signed, so to speak, before you were bom in this existence. In many cases the friends that you make were close to you long before you met them in this present life.

This does not mean that every one in your present acquaintanceship has been known to you, and it certainly does not imply a boring record played over and over

again, for each encounter is a new one in its own way. Remembering what I said about families, realize also that towns and villages may also be composed of the past inhabitants of other such towns and villages, transposed with new experiences and backgrounds, as the group tries different experiments.

Now sometimes, there are also such variations in that the inhabitants of a particular town now may be the reborn inhabitants of those who lived, say, in 1632 in a small Irish village. They may be transposed to a town in Idaho.

Some who wanted to travel from the Old World to the New, may be reborn in the new one. You must remember also that abilities from past lives are at your disposal for your present use. You reap your own rewards. Information concerning these is often given to you in the sleep state, and there is a kind of gestalt type of dream, a root dream, by which those who have known each other in past lives now communicate.

In such dreams, general mass-information is given, that the individuals then use as they desire. Overall plans for development are made, as the group members, say, of a town decide upon its destiny. Some individuals always choose to be bom as a part of some group - reborn, in other words, with past contemporaries, while others, disdaining such endeavors, return in much more isolated positions.

This is a matter of psychological feeling. Some individuals are more at ease, more assured, and more capable working with others in this case. You could consider an analogy in which John Doe follows his kindergarten class all the way through high school. In a reincamational situation, he would always choose to return with associates. Others, however, would rather skip from school to school, appearing alone, relatively speaking, with greater freedom, more challenge, but without the comforting framework of security chosen by the others.

In each case the individual is the judge, not only of each succeeding life, its time, environment, and historical date, but also of its overall character and methods of accomplishment. There are as many different ways to reincarnate, therefore, as there are inner selves, and each inner self will choose its own characteristic methods.

In each life you are meant to check the exterior environment in order to leam your inner condition. The outer is a reflection of the inner.

You are meant to understand the nature of your inner self, and to manifest it outward. As this is done, the exterior circumstances should change for the better as the inner self becomes more aware of its own nature and capabilities. Theoretically, then, in each life you would become stronger, healthier, wealthier, and wiser, but it does not work that way, for many reasons. As mentioned earlier, many personalities adopt different kinds of experiences, focusing upon development in certain specific areas, and ignoring others perhaps for a series of lives.

No consciousness has the same experiences or interprets them the same, and so each individual utilizes reincamational opportunities in his own way. Sex changes, for example, are necessary. Some individuals alternate their sex in each life. Others have a series of female lives and then a series of male lives, or vice versa, but the entire reincamational framework must involve both sexual experiences.

Abilities cannot be developed following a one-sex line. There must be experiences in

motherhood and fatherhood. When you get to the point that you realize you are forming your day-to-day existence and the life that you know, then you can begin to alter your own mental and psychic patterns, and therefore change your daily environment.

This realization, however, should go hand in hand with a deep intuitional knowledge of the capabilities of the inner self. These two factors together can release you from any difficulties that have arisen in past lives. The entire structure of your existence will begin to change with these realizations, and an acceleration of spiritual and psychic growth will develop.

There is an inner logic to your current relationships, attitudes, and experiences. If in one life, for example, you hated women, you may very well be a woman in the next life. Only in this way, you see, would you be able to relate to the experience of womanhood, and then as a woman face those attitudes that you yourself had against women in the past.

If you had no sympathy for the sick, you may then be born with a serious disease, again now self-chosen, and find yourself encountering those attitudes that once were your own. Such an existence would usually also include other issues, however. No existence is chosen for one reason only, but would also serve many other psychological experiences.

A chronically ill existence, for example, might also be a measure of discipline, enabling you to use deeper abilities that you ignored in a life of good health. The perfectly happy life for example, on the surface, may appear splendid, but it may also be basically shallow and do little to develop the personality.

The truly happy existence, however, is a deeply satisfying one that would include spontaneous wisdom and spiritual joy. I am not saying, in other words, that suffering necessarily leads to spiritual fulfillment, nor that all illness is accepted or chosen for such a purpose, for this is not the case.

Illness is often the result of ignorance and lazy mental habits. Such a discipline may be adopted however by certain personalities who must take strong measures with themselves because of other characteristics. There is an overall pattern to relationships within lives, and yet this does not mean that you travel through various existences with the same limited and familiar number of friends and acquaintances, merely altered like actors with a change of face or costume.

Groups of individuals come together in various lives for certain purposes, separate, and may or may not come together again in a different time or place. Again, however, there is no rigid rule. Some families are literally reincarnations of their ancestors, but this is not the general case by any means. Deep relationships will continue in one way or another. Others will simply disappear.

The point I want to make is that the opportunity for development and knowledge is as present at this moment, in this life, as it will ever be. If you ignore day-by-day opportunities for development now, no one can force you to accept and utilize greater abilities after death, or between lives. The teachers are there in after-death experience, but there are also teachers here in your existence now.

Some families come together in a particular life not because of great attraction or

love in a past existence, but for the opposite reason. Families may be composed, then, of individuals who disliked each other in the past and come together in a close relationship where they are to work together toward a common goal, learn to understand each other better, and work out problems in a different kind of context.

Jointly, each generation has its own purpose. It is this - to perfect inner knowledge, and to materialize it as faithfully as possible outward into the world. The changing physical scene throughout the centuries, as you know them, represents the inner images that have flickered through the minds of the individuals who lived within the world through the various ages.

It is not necessary that you learn about your own past lives, though it may be helpful if you understand that you chose the circumstances of your birth this time.

If you examine your own life now carefully, the challenges that you have set for yourself will become apparent. This is not easy to do, but it is within the grasp of each individual. If you release yourself from hatred, then you automatically release yourself from any such relationships in the future - or any experiences that are based upon hatred.

Knowing your reincamational background, but not knowing the true nature of your present self, is useless. You cannot justify or rationalize present circumstances by saying, “This is because of something I did in a past life,” for within yourself now is the ability to change negative influences. You may have brought negative influences into your life for a given reason, but the reason always has to do with understanding, and understanding removes those influences.

You cannot say, “The poor are poor simply because they chose poverty, and therefore there is no need for me to help them.” This attitude can easily draw poverty to you in the next experience.

Each individual is not at the same level of achievement even at the end of the reincamational cycle. Some possess certain qualities that do not find a counterpart within human experience. Physical existence itself has a different effect upon various individuals. Some find it an excellent medium of expression and development. They are suited to it. They have the knack for expressing themselves in physical ways and objectifying inner feelings faithfully. Others find this difficult, and yet these same individuals may do much better in other levels of reality.

There are “hardy souls” who thrive in physical reality, and who may have difficulties acclimating to other nonphysical areas of activity. In all of these areas, however, deep spiritual or emotional contexts are never negated. Very close friends from past lives, who are in a position to do so, often communicate with you when you are in the dream state, and the relationships are continued though you do not realize it consciously.

On an unconscious basis, you are aware of the birth into physical life of someone you have known in the past. The strangers that you meet in your dreams are often, of course, people now alive - contemporaries - that you have also known in past lives.

feelings from a past life, and choose a married relationship that is not based upon love, though love may emerge.

Twins, incidentally, almost always involve very deep, abiding psychic relationships of a strong, sometimes obsessive nature. I am speaking now of identical twins.

Reincarnational goals also vary greatly. I want to stress that reincarnation is a tool used by personalities. They each use it in their own way. Some enjoy female existences, or have greater fondness for male lives. While both must be encountered, there is a great range of choice and activity. Some personalities will have difficulties along certain lines, and develop with relative ease in other ways.

Predetermination is never involved, for the challenge and circumstances are chosen. Some problems may be put off, for example, for several existences. Some personalities want to solve their strongest problems and get them over with, perhaps in a series of rather trying existences and exaggerated circumstances.

Others of a more placid nature will take their problems one at a time. Rest periods may also be taken, and they are highly therapeutic. For example, an excellent, satisfying life with a minimum of problems may be chosen either as a prelude to a life of concentrated challenge or as a self-adopted reward for a previous difficult life. Those that thoroughly enjoy the physical medium, without being obsessed by it, however, do very well indeed. The “laws” of reincarnation are adapted by the individual personalities to suit themselves.

CHAPTER 13

REINCARNATION, DREAMS, AND THE HIDDEN MALE AND FEMALE WITHIN THE SELF

As I mentioned earlier, each person lives both male and female lives. As a rule, conscious memory of these is not retained. To prevent an overidentification of the individual with his present sex, within the male there resides an inner personification of femaleness. This personification of femaleness in the male is the true meaning of what Jung called the “anima.”

The anima in the male is, therefore, the psychic memory and identification of all the previous female existences in which the inner self has been involved. It contains within it the knowledge of the present male’s past female histories, and the intuitive understanding of all the female qualities with which the personality is innately endowed.

The anima, therefore, is an important safeguard, preventing the male from over- identifying with whatever cultural male characteristics have been imposed upon him through present background, environment, and education. The anima serves not only as a personal but as a mass-civilizing influence, mellowing strongly aggressive tendencies and serving also as a bridge both in communicating with women in a family relationship, and in communication also as it is applied through the arts and verbalization.

The male will often dream of himself, therefore, as a female. The particular way in which he does so, can tell him much about his own reincarnational background in which he operated as a female. Maleness and femaleness are obviously not opposites, but merging tendencies. The priestess, the mother, the young witch, the wife, and the old wise woman - these general types are archetypes, simply because they are “root elements” representing, symbolically, the various kinds of so-called female qualities and the various kinds of female lives that have been lived by males.

They have also been lived by females, of course. However, the women do not need to be reminded of their femaleness, but again, so that they do not overidentify with their present sex, there is what Jung called the “animus,” or the hidden male within the

woman.

Again, however, this represents the male lives with which the self has been involved - the young boy, the priest, the aggressive jungle man," and the wise old man. These are types, representing generally and symbolically past male lives lived by present women. Women, therefore, can learn much about their reincamational past as men, through studying those dreams in which these types appear, or in which they themselves appear as men.

Through the anima and the animus, so-called, present personalities are able to draw upon the knowledge and intuitions and background that was derived from past existences as the opposite sex. On some occasions, for example, the woman may go overboard and exaggerate female characteristics, in which case the animus or male within comes to her aid, bringing through dream experiences an onrush of knowledge that will result in compensating malelike reactions.

The same applies to a male when he over-identifies with what he believes to be male characteristics, for whatever reason. The anima or woman within will rouse him to make compensating actions, causing an upsurge of intuitive abilities, bringing a creative element to offset aggressiveness.

Ideally, left alone, these operations would result in a balance individually and en masse, where aggressiveness was always used creatively, as indeed it can and should be.

The animus and the anima are, of course, highly charged psychically, but the origin of this psychic charge and the inner fascination are the result of a quite legitimate inner identification with these personified other-sex characteristics.

They not only have a reality in the psyche, however, but they are imbedded in genetically codified data by the inner self - a genetic memory of past psychic events - transposed into the genetic memory of the very cells that compose the body.

Each inner self, adopting a new body, imposes upon it and upon its entire genetic makeup, memory of the past physical forms in which it has been involved. Now the present characteristics usually overshadow the past ones. They are dominant, but the other characteristics are latent and present, built into the pattern. The physical pattern of the present body, therefore, is a genetic memory of the seifs past physical forms, and of their strengths and weaknesses.

I will try to put this as simply as possible. There are presently invisible layers within the body, the topmost layer that you see representing, of course, the present physical form. But enmeshed within this there are what amount to invisible layers, “shadow,” latent layers that represent previous physical images that have belonged to the personality.

They are kept in abeyance, so to speak. They are connected electromagnetically to the atomic structure of the present body. To your way of thinking, they would be unfocused. They are a part of your psychic heritage, however. Often you can call up a past strength of a previous body, to help compensate for a present weakness. The body does not only carry memory biologically of its own past condition in this life therefore, but indelibly with it, even physically, are the memories of the other bodies that the personality has formed in previous reincarnations.

The anima and the animus are closely connected with these interior body images. These body images are highly charged psychically, and also appear in the dream state. They operate as compensations and reminders to prevent you from over-identifying yourself with your present physical body.

They are, of course, both male and female. When you are ill, in the dream state you often have experiences in which you seem to be someone else with an entirely healthy body. Often such a dream is therapeutic. An “older” reincarnational body has come to your aid, from which you draw strength through the memory of its health.

Reincarnational experiences are a part of the framework of the self, a facet of the multidimensional reality of the living psyche. These experiences will, therefore, be reflected not only in the dream state, but in other layers of activity.

The fabric of the present self is interwoven with these reincarnational “pasts,” and from them the present self draws unconsciously from its own bank of personality characteristics, activities, and insights. Often past life memories come to the surface but are not recognized as such, since they appear in fantasy form, or are projected into art creations

Many writers of historical pieces, for example, are writing out of direct experience with those times. Such instances represent an excellent working rapport between the present self and the unconscious, which brings these memories to the surface in such a way that current life is enriched. More often than not, true awareness of the situation often becomes almost conscious, and just beneath awareness the individual knows the source of his authentic material.

In dreams this reincarnational material is likewise cast into a dramatic mold very frequently. Beneath all this, the anima and the animus work together, again not opposites but blending characteristics. Together, of course, they represent the fount of creativity, psychically as well as physically.

The anima represents the necessary initial “inwardness,” the brooding, caring, intuitive, inside-turning characteristics, the inward focusing from which creativity comes.

The word “passive” is a poor one to describe the characteristics of the anima, in that it suggests a lack of motion, and this is hardly the case. It is true that the anima allows itself to be acted upon, but the motive behind this is the desire and the necessity to tune into other forces that are supremely powerful. The desire to be swept along, therefore, is as strong with the anima as the opposite desire for rest. The characteristics of the animus provide the aggressive thrust that returns the personality back outward into physical activities, triumphantly holding the products of creativity that the anima characteristics have secured.

The whole self is obviously the sum of these characteristics, and more. After the final incarnation, the physical, sexual type of creativity is simply no longer needed. You do not need to reproduce physically, in other words. In simple terms the whole self contains male and female characteristics, finely tuned together, blended so that true identity can then arise - for it cannot, when one group of characteristics must be emphasized over the other group, as it must be during your present physical existence.

There are many reasons why the separation has been adopted within your dimension. The reasons have to do with the particular way in which mankind has chosen to evolve and use his abilities; and I will have more to say regarding this point, but it does not belong in this chapter.

The projection of the man’s anima, or hidden female self, upon [his] relations is quite natural, and allows him not only to understand them better but to relate with the other female existences of his own. The same is true of the woman’s projection of the animus upon male relatives and friends. The reality of the anima and the animus is far deeper then than Jung supposed. Symbolically speaking, the two together represent the whole self with its diverse abilities, desires, and characteristics.

Together they act as a built-in, unconscious stabilizing factor, operating behind the faces of your civilization not only individually but culturally.

Personality as you know it, cannot be understood unless the true meaning of the anima and the animus is taken into consideration. The reincarnational pattern is generally speaking an open one, in that within it there is room for diversity. Each whole self has its own individual characteristics. It can live its lives as it sees fit within the guidelines. There may be a series of male or female existences, unbroken. Such a choice has some drawbacks.

There are, however, no rules dictating the sexual development in varying incarnations, except that experience with both sexes must be taken on, and the various characteristics developed. This does not mean that an equal number of male and female lives must be lived. Some, for example, find it far easier to develop as one sex or the other, and will need more opportunities for experience as the sex with which they expe- rience difficulty.

The animus and the anima become even more important in these instances when a series of one-sex lives are chosen. The original pattern for the animus and anima comes from the whole self before reincarnations. The animus and the anima are born into the individual with the first physical life, and serve as an inner pattern, reminding the per- sonality of its basic unity. Here is another reason for the strong psychic charge behind these symbols and the godlike quality that they can transmit and project.

The male yearns toward the anima because it represents to the deep unconscious those other characteristics of the whole self that, on the one hand, lie latent, and that, on the other hand, struggle for release. The tension between the two leads him to temper aggressiveness with creativity, or to use aggressiveness creatively.

Now there are deep correlations between these symbols and the struggle in which mankind is involved. Your consciousness as you know it, your particular present kind of consciousness, is a statement of awareness brought about by a particular kind of tension, a specific kind of focus arising from the true unconscious of the whole self.

The true unconscious is not unconscious. Instead, it is so profoundly and unutteringly conscious that it bubbles over. The life that you know is simply one of the many areas in which it is conscious. In each facet of its consciousness, literally tremendous power and balance must be maintained to hold aloft this particular consciousness-experience from all others.

Your reality exists in a particular area of activity in which aggressive qualities, thrusting-outward characteristics, are supremely necessary to prevent a falling back into the infinite possibilities from which you have only lately emerged. Yet from this unconscious bed of possibilities you derive your strength, your creativity, and the fragile yet powerful kind of individual consciousness that is your own.

The two-sex division was adopted, separating and balancing these most necessary but seemingly opposing tendencies. Only beginning consciousness needs these kind of controls. The anima and the animus, therefore, are embedded deeply with their necessary complementary but apparently opposed tendencies, and they are highly important in maintaining the very nature of your human consciousness.

There is also a natural tension, then, between sexes that is based n far deeper causes than physical ones. The tension results from the nature of your consciousness that arises from the anima, but depends r its continuation upon the “aggressiveness” of the animus. I have to me extent explained the fascination that one has for the other, as suiting from the inner knowledge of the whole self, that strives to attain true identity as it struggles to combine and fulfill the seemingly opposite tendencies that are a part of it.

At the end of the reincarnational cycle, the whole self is far more developed than it was before. It has realized and experienced itself in a dimension of reality unknown to it earlier, and in doing so, has of course increased its being. It is not a matter, then, of a whole self splitting in half, and then simply returning to itself.

Now there are many matters concerning the nature of conception that should be discussed here. Again, however, there is leeway and many variations. Usually between lives you choose ahead of time your children, and they choose you as parents.

If you are to be bom as a male, then the mother serves as a stimulus to activate the symbol of the anima in you, so that the pattern of your own female lives becomes a portion of your next existence. Your mother, if you have known her in the past, will find at your birth an upsurge of dreams involving other existences in which the two of you were together.

These may not even be recorded consciously, but in many cases they are, and are then forgotten. Her own past male lives will help her relate to you as her son. In some cases new mothers may feel highly aggressive and nervous. These feelings are sometimes due to the fact that the male son causes an activation of the animus in her, with a resulting charge of aggressive feelings.

The atoms that compose the fetus have their own kind of consciousness. The volatile awareness-consciousnesses that exist independently of matter, form matter according to their ability and degree. The fetus, therefore, has its own consciousness, the simple component consciousness made up of the atoms that compose it. This exists before any reincarnating personality enters it. The consciousness of matter is present in any matter - a fetus, a rock, a blade of grass, a nail.

The reincarnating personality enters the new fetus according to its own inclinations, desires, and characteristics, with some built-in safeguards. However there is no rule, then, saying that the reincarnating personality must take over the new form prepared for it either at the point of conception, in the very earliest months of the fetus’s growth,

or even at the point of birth.

The process is gradual, individual and determined by experience in other lives. It is particularly dependent upon emotional characteristics - not necessarily of the last incarnated self, but the emotional tensions present as a result of a group of past existences.

Various methods of entry are adopted. If there is a strong relationship between the parents and the child-to-be, then the personality may enter at the point of conception if he is extremely anxious to rejoin them. Even here, however, large portions of self-aware- ness continue to operate in the between-life dimension.

In the beginning, the womb state under these conditions is a dreamlike one, with the personality still focused mainly in the between-life existence. Gradually the situation reverses, until it becomes more difficult to retain clear concentration in the between-life situation.

In these circumstances, when the personality attaches itself at conception, there is almost without exception strong past-life connections between parents and child, or there is an unceasing and almost obsessional desire to return to the earthly situation - either for a specific purpose, or because the reincarnating personality is presently ob- sessed with earthly existence. This is not necessarily detrimental. The personality can simply realize that it takes to physical experience well, is presently earth-oriented, and finds earthly atmosphere a rich dimension for the growth of its own abilities.

Some personalities are drawn to enter at conception as a result of seemingly less worthy motives - greed, for example, or an obsessional desire that is partially composed of unresolved problems. Other personalities who never completely take to earthly existence may hold off full entry for some time, and even then always remain at a certain distance from the body. At the other end of the scale, before death the same applies, where some individuals remove their focus from physical life, leaving the body consciousness alone. Others stay with the body until the last moment. In the early days of infancy, there is not a steady focus of the personality in the body in any case.

In all cases the decisions have been made ahead of time, as I told you. The reincarnating personality is aware, therefore, when the conception for which it has been waiting takes place. And while it may or may not choose to enter at that point, it is drawn irresistibly to that time and point in space and flesh.

On occasion, long before conception takes place, the personality who will end up as the future child will visit that environment of both parents-to-be, drawn again. This is quite natural.

Between lives an individual may see flashes of the future existence, not necessarily of particular events, but experience the essence of the new relationship and in expectation remind himself of the challenge he has set. In these terms, the ghosts of the future are as real in your homes as the ghosts of the past.

You do not have completely empty shells of matter about to be filled, in that the new personality hovers in and about, particularly after conception and with greater frequency and intensity thereafter. The shock of birth has several consequences, however, that usually draw the personality full blast, so to speak, into physical reality.

Before this, the conditions are fairly uniform. The body consciousness is nurtured almost automatically, reacting strongly but under highly controlled conditions.

At birth, all of this is suddenly over, and [new] stimuli [are] introduced with a rapidity that the body consciousness has never to that point experienced.

It greatly needs a stabilizing factor. Previously the body consciousness has been enriched and supported by deep biological and telepathic identification with the mother. The communication of the living cells is far more profound than you imagine. The identification is almost complete before birth as far as body consciousness alone is concerned.

Until the new personality enters, the fetus regards itself as a part of the organism of the mother. This support is suddenly denied at birth. If the new personality has not entered earlier to any full extent, it usually does so at birth, in order to stabilize the new organism. It comforts the new organism, in other words. The new personality, therefore, will experience birth to varying degrees according to when it has entered this dimension.

When it enters at the point of birth, it is fairly independent, not yet identified with the form it has entered, and acting in a supportive role. If the personality entered at conception or sometime before birth, then it has to some extent identified with the body consciousness, with the fetus. It has already begun to direct perception - though perception has begun whether or not it is so directed - and it will experience the shock of birth in immediate, direct terms.

There will be no distance between the personality and the experience of birth, then. The newly entered personality, as a consciousness, flickers, in that there is a while before stabilization takes place. When the child, particularly the young child, is sleeping, for example, the personality often simply vacates the body. Gradually the identification with the between-life situation dwindles until nearly full focus resides in the physical body.

There are obviously those who identify with the body far more cormpletely than others. Generally speaking, there is an optimum point of focus in physical reality, a period of intensification that has nothing to do with duration. It can last for a week or thirty years, and from then onward it begins to dwindle, and imperceptibly begins to shift to other layers of reality.

Now. A crisis, particularly in very early or very late life, may so shatter the personality’s identification with the body that he vacates it temporarily. He may do one of many things. He may leave so completely that the body goes into coma, if the body consciousness has also suffered shock. If the shock is psychological and the body consciousness is still operating more or less normally, then he may revert to an earlier reincarnational personality.

In such a case, this is simply a regression that often passes. Here we become concerned again with the animus and the anima. If a personality believes that it is doing a poor job in a male life, it may activate the anima’s qualities, taking on the characteristics of a past female existence in which it handled itself well. Reversing the picture, the same can happen to a woman.

On the other hand, if the personality finds that it has so over-identified with its present sex that its individuality is deeply threatened, then it may also bring to the fore the opposite picture, going so far as to identify again with a past personality of the opposite sex.

The hold of the personality over the body is tenuous in the early years, and grows stronger. The personality, for its own reasons, may decide upon choosing a body that is not aesthetically pleasing. He may never relate to it, and while the existence will serve what purposes he had in mind, there will always be a basic sensed distance between the body and the personality within it.

Those mentioned earlier who enter at the point of conception are usually highly anxious for physical existence. They will, therefore, be more fully developed and show their individual characteristics very early. They seize upon the new body and already mold it. The control over matter is vigorous, and they usually stay within the body, dying either in accidents where death is immediate or in sleep or with a disease that strikes quickly. They are manipulators of matter as a rule.

They are emotional. They work out their problems in immediate, sometimes impatient, tangible ways. They work well with earth materials, and translate their ideas with great force into physical terms. They make cities, monuments. They are architects. They are concerned

with forming matter and molding it to their desire.

As a rule, now, those who do not enter your plane of existence until the point of birth are less able manipulators in those particular term s . They are the mean, if such a term can be used, the mean or average.

Now there are some who resist the new existence, even though they chose it, as long as possible. To some extent they must be present at birth, but they can still escape any full identification with the born infant. They hover within and about the form, but half reluctantly. There are many reasons for such behavior. Some personalities simply prefer in-between-life existence and are much more concerned with the theoretical solving of problems than the practical application necessarily involved. Others have discovered that physical existence does not meet their needs as well as they thought it would, and they will progress much better in other fields of reality and existence.

Because of their own characteristics, however, some prefer to set up a certain distance between themselves and their physical existences. They are much more concerned with symbols. They look upon earthly life as highly experimental. They approach it almost with a jaundiced eye, so to speak. They are not interested so much in manipulating matter as they are curious as to the ways in which ideas appear within matter.

Again generally speaking, they are always more at home with ideas, philosophies, and nontangible realities. They are thinkers always a bit apart, their body types showing a lack of muscular development. Poets and artists, while somewhat of this nature, as a rule are more deeply appreciative of the physical values of earthly existence, although they have many of the same characteristics.

The attitude toward the body will always vary, therefore. Various types of bodies may

be chosen, but there will still be overall preferences on the part of the whole self, and characteristics that will lead the whole self, so that generally the various lives lived will still have their own individual flavor.

It is almost impossible to speak of when the personality enters the physical body without discussing the ways in which it leaves it, for all this is highly dependent upon personal characteristics and attitudes toward physical reality. Decisions as to future lives may be made not only in between-life conditions but also in dream states in any given life.

You may have already decided for example, now, upon the circumstances for your next incarnation. Although in your terms your new parents may be infants now, or in your scale of time not even born, the arrangements may still be made.

CHAPTER 14

STORIES OF THE BEGINNING, AND THE MULTIDIMENSIONAL GOD

As the present life of any individual rises from hidden dimensions beyond those easily accessible in physical terms, and as it draws its energy and power to act from unconscious sources, so does the present physical universe as you know it rise from other dimensions. So does it have its source, and derive its energy from deeper realities.

History, as you know it, represents but one single light upon which you focus. You interpret the events that you see therein, and you project upon its glimmer your interpretation of events that may occur. So entranced is your concentration, that when you wonder about the nature of reality you automatically confine your question to this one small flickering moment that you call physical reality. When you ponder upon the aspects of God, you unthinkingly speak of the creator of that one light. That light is unique, and if you truly understood what it was, you would indeed understand the nature of true reality.

History, as you think of it, represents but one thin line of probabilities, in which you are presently immersed. It does not represent the entire lifetime of your species or the catalogue of physical activities, or begin to tell the story of physical creatures, their civilizations, wars, joys, technologies, or triumphs. Reality is far more diverse, far richer and unutterable than you can presently suppose or comprehend. Evolution, as you think of it and as it is categorized by your scientists, represents but one probable line of evolution, the one in which, again, you are presently immersed.

There are, therefore, many other equally valid, equally real evolutionary developments that have occurred and are occurring and will occur, all within other probable systems of physical reality. The diverse, endless possibilities of development possible could never appear within one slender framework of reality.

With splendid innocence and exuberant pride, you imagine that the evolutionary system as you know it is the only one, that physically there can be no more. Now within the physical reality that you know, there are hints and clues as to the nature of other physical realities. There are, latent, within your own physical forms other senses, unused, that could have come to the front but in your probability did not. Now I have been speaking of earthly developments, realities therefore clustered about earthly

aspects as you know them.

No evolutionary line is a dead one. Therefore if in your system it disappears, it emerges within another. All probable materializations of life and consciousness have their day, and create those conditions within which they can flourish; and their day, in your terms, is eternal.

I am speaking now, in this chapter, mainly about your own planet and solar system, but the same applies to all aspects of your physical universe. You are aware, then, of only one specific, delicately balanced but unique portion of physical existence. You are not only creatures of corporeal being, forming images of flesh and blood, embedded in a particular kind of space and time; you are also creatures rising out of a particularized dimension of probabilities, born from dimensions of actuality richly suited to your own development, enrichment and growth.

If you have any intuitive understanding as yet concerning the nature of the entity or whole self, you will see that it has placed you in a position in which certain abilities, insights, and experience can be realized, and in which your unique kind of consciousness can be nurtured. Your slightest experience has far more repercussions within this multidimensional environment than the physical brain can conceive. For if you are intensely preoccupied with what may seem to be one infinitesimally minute aspect of reality, and while you seem to be completely embedded within it, only the most “surface” elements of the self are so entranced. I do not like the term “surface” in this regard, though I have used it to suggest the multitudinous portions of the self that are otherwise engaged - some of them as entranced in their reality as you are in yours.

The entity, the true multidimensional self, is aware of all of its experiences, and this knowledge is to some extent available to these other portions of the self, including of course the physical self as you know it. These various portions of the self in fact will eventually (in your terms) become fully aware. Period. This awareness will automatically alter what now seems to be their nature, and add to the multiplicitude of existence.

There are many probable systems of reality, therefore, in which physical data predominates, but such physical probabilities represent but one small portion. Each of you also exist in nonphysical systems, and I have explained earlier that your slightest thought or emotion is manifested in many other ways than in your own field of existence.

Only a portion of your entire identity is “presently” familiar to you, as you know. Therefore, when you consider the question of a supreme being, you imagine a male personality with those abilities that you yourselves possess, with great emphasis upon qualities you admire. This imagined god has therefore changed throughout your centuries, mirroring man’s shifting ideas of himself.

God was seen as cruel and powerful when man believed that these were desirable characteristics, needed particularly in his battle for physical survival. He projected these upon his idea of a god because he envied them and feared them. You have cast your idea of god, therefore, in your own image.

In a reality that is inconceivably multidimensional, the old concepts God are relatively meaningless. Even the term, a supreme being, is in itself distortive, for you

naturally project the qualities of human nature n it. If I told you that God was an idea, you would not understand what I meant, for you do not understand the dimensions in which an idea has its reality, or the energy that it can originate and propel. You not believe in ideas in the same way that you believe in physical objects, so if I tell you that God is an idea, you will misinterpret this to that God is less than real - nebulous, without reality, without purpose, and without motive action.

Now your own physical image is the materialization of your idea of yourself within the properties of matter. Without the idea of yourself, your physical image would not be; yet often it is all you are aware of. The initial power and energy of that idea of yourself keeps your image alive. Ideas, then, are far more important than you realize. If you will try to accept the idea that your own existence is multidimensional, that you dwell within the medium of infinite probabilities, then you may catch a slight glimpse of the reality that is behind the word “god,” and you may understand why it is almost impossible to capture a true understanding of that concept in words.

God, therefore, is first of all a creator, not of one physical universe but of an infinite variety of probable existences, far more vast than those aspects of the physical universe with which your scientists are familiar. He did not simply then send a son to live and die on one small planet. He is a wart of all probabilities.

There have been parables told, and stories of beginnings. All of these have been attempts to transmit knowledge in as simple terms as possible. Often answers were given to questions that literally have no meaning outside of your own system of reality.

For example: There was no beginning, and there will be no end, yet parables have been given telling you of beginnings and endings simply because with your distorted ideas of time, beginnings and endings seem to be inseparable, valid events. As you learn to turn the focus of your attention away from physical reality and therefore experience some slight evidence of other realities, your consciousness will cling to old ideas that make true explanations impossible for you to understand. Multidimensional awareness is available to you in your dreams, however, in some trance states, and often even beneath ordinary consciousness as you go about your day.

This awareness gives personal experience with the multidimensional richness that exists not apart from but intermingled with, within, through, and all about your physical world of sense. To say that physical life is not real is to deny that reality pervades all appearance, and is a wart of all appearance. In the same manner, God does not exist apart from or separate from physical reality, but exists within it and as a wart of it, as he exists within and as a wart of all other systems of existence

Your Christ figure represents, symbolically, your idea of God and his relationships. There were three separate individuals whose history blended, and they became known collectively as Christ - hence many discrepancies in your records. These were all males because at that one of your development, you would not have accepted a female coun- terpart.

These individuals were a wart of one entity. You could not but imagine God as a father. It would never have occurred to you to imagine a god in any other than human terms. Earth components. These three figures worked out a drama, highly symbolic,

propelled by concentrated energy of great force.

The events as they are recorded, however, did not occur in history. The crucifixion of Christ was a psychic, but not a physical event. Ideas of almost unimaginable magnitude were played out.

Judas, for example, was not a man in your terms. He was - like all the other disciples - a blessed, created “fragment personality,” formed by the Christ personality. He represented the self-betrayer. He dramatized a portion of each individual’s personality that focuses upon physical reality in a grasping manner, and denies the inner self out of greed.

Each of the twelve represented qualities of personality that belong to one individual, and Christ as you know him represented the inner self. The twelve, therefore, plus Christ as you know him (the one figure composed of the three) represented an individual earthly personality - the inner self - and twelve main characteristics connected with the egotistical self. As Christ was surrounded by the disciples, so the inner self is surrounded by these physically oriented characteristics, each drawn outward toward daily reality on the one hand, and yet orbiting the inner self.

The disciples, therefore, were given physical reality by the inner self, as all of your earthly characteristics come out of your inner nature. This was a living parable, made flesh among you - a cosmic play worked out for your behalf, couched in terms that you could understand.

The lessons were made plain, as all the ideas behind them were personified. If you will forgive the term, this was like a local morality play, put on in your corner of the universe. This does not mean it was less real than you previously supposed. In fact, the implications of what is

said here should clearly hint at the more powerful aspects of godhood.

The three Christ personalities were born upon your planet, and indeed became flesh among you. None of these was crucified. The twelve disciples were materializations from the energies of these three personalities - their combined energies. They were then fully endowed with individuality, however, but their main task was to clearly manifest within themselves certain abilities inherent within all men.

The same kinds of dramas in different ways have been given, and while the drama is always different, it is always the same. This does not mean that a Christ has appeared within each system of reality. It means that the idea of God has manifested within each system in a way that is comprehensible to the inhabitants.

This drama continues to exist. It does not belong, for example, to your past. Only you have placed it there. This does not mean that it always reoccurs. The drama, then, was far from meaningless, and the spirit of Christ, in your terms, is legitimate. It is the probable God-drama that you choose to perceive. There were others that were perceived, but not by you, and there are other such dramas existing now.

Whether or not the Crucifixion occurred physically, it was a psychic event, and exists as do all the other events connected with the drama.

Many were physical but some were not. The psychic event affected your world quite as much as the physical one, as is obvious. The whole drama occurred as a result of

mankind’s need. It was created as a result of that need, grew out of it, but it did not originate within your system of reality.

Other religions were based upon different dramas, in which ideas were acted out in a way that was comprehensible to various cultures. Unfortunately, the differences between the dramas often led to misunderstandings, and these were used as excuses for wars. These dramas are also privately worked out in the dream state. The God- personified figures first were introduced to man in the dream state, and the way then prepared.

In visions and inspirations, men knew that the Christ drama would be enacted and hence recognized it for what it was when it occurred physically. Its power and strength then returned to the dream universe. It had increased its vigor and intensity through the physical materialization. In private dreams, men then related to the main figures in the drama, and in the dream state they recognized its true import.

God is more than the sum of all the probable systems of reality he has created, and yet he is within each one of these, without exception. He is therefore within each man and woman. He is also within each spider, shadow, and frog, and this is what man does not like to admit.

God can only be experienced, and you experience him whether or not you realize it, through your own existence. He is not male or female, however, and I use the terms only for convenience’s sake. In the most inescapable truth, he is not human in your terms at all, nor in your terms is he a personality. Your ideas of personality are too limited to contain the multitudinous facets of his multidimensional existence.

On the other hand, he is human, in that he is a portion of each individual; and within the vastness of his experience he holds an “idea shape” of himself as human, to which you can relate. He literally was made flesh to dwell among you, for he forms your flesh in that he is responsible for the energy that gives vitality and validity to your pri- vate multidimensional self, which in turn forms your image in accordance with your own ideas.

This private multidimensional self, or the soul, has then an eternal validity. It is upheld, supported, maintained by the energy, the inconceivable vitality, of All That Is.

It cannot be destroyed then, this inner self of yours, nor can it be diminished. It shares in those abilities that are inherent within All That Is. It must, therefore, create as it is created, for this is the great giving that is behind all dimensions of existence, the spilling-over from the fountain of All That Is.

I will in due time identify the figure of the third Christ personality. Now, however, I am concerned with the multidimensional aspects of All That Is. Such a reality can only be experienced. There are no facts that can be given that can portray with any faithfulness the attributes of All That Is.

This reality and those attributes will appear within various systems of actuality in keeping with the camouflage data of any given system. The inner experience with the multidimensional God can come in two main areas. One is through the realization that this prime moving force is within everything that you can perceive with your senses. The other method is to realize that this primary motive force has a reality independent

of its connection with the world of appearances.

All personal contact with the multidimensional God, all legitimate moments of mystic consciousness, will always have a unifying effect. They will not, therefore, isolate the individual involved, but instead will enlarge his perceptions until he will experience the reality and uniqueness of as many other aspects of reality of which he is capable.

He will feel, therefore, less isolated and less set apart. He will not regard himself as being above others because of the experience. On the contrary he will be swept along in a gestalt of comprehension in which he realizes his own oneness with All That Is.

As there are portions of reality that you do not consciously perceive, and other systems of probability of which you are not consciously aware, so also are there aspects of primary godhood that you cannot at this moment comprehend. There are, therefore, probable gods, each one reflecting in its way the multidimensional aspects of a prime identity so great and dazzling that no one reality form or particular kind of existence could contain it.

I have tried to give you some idea of the far-reaching creative effects of your own thoughts. With that in mind, then, it is impossible to imagine the multidimensional creativities that can be attributed to All That Is. The term ‘All That Is 1 can be used as a designation to include all of those probable gods in all of their manifestations.

Now it is easier perhaps for some of you to understand the simple stories and parables of beginnings of which I have spoken. But the time has come for mankind to take several steps further, to expand the nature of his own consciousness by hying to comprehend a more profound version of reality. You have outgrown the time of children’s tales. When your own thoughts have a form and reality, when they have validity even in other systems of reality of which you are unaware, then it is not difficult to understand why other systems of probabilities are also affected by your own thoughts and emotions - nor why the actions of the probable gods are not affected by what happens in other dimensions of existence.

CHAPTER 15

REINCARNATIONAL CIVILIZATIONS,

PROBABILITIES, AND MORE ON THE MULTIDIMENSIONAL GOD

In a manner of speaking, it can be said that you have reincamational civilizations as well as reincarnating individuals. Each entity who is born in flesh works toward the development of those abilities that can be best nurtured and fulfilled within the physical environment. He has a responsibility to and for the civilization in which he has each existence, for he helps form it through his own thoughts, emotions, and actions.

He learns from failure as well as success. You think of physical history as beginning with the caveman and continuing up to the present, but there have been other great scientific civilizations; some spoken of in legend, some completely unknown - all in your terms now vanished-

It seems to you that you have, perhaps, but one chance as a species to solve your problems, or be destroyed by your own aggression, by your own lack of understanding and spirituality. As you are given many lives

in which to develop and fulfill your abilities, so has the species in those terms been allotted more than the single line of historical development with which you are presently acquainted. The reincamational structure is but one facet in the whole picture of probabilities. In it you have literally as much time as you need, to develop those potentials that you must develop, before leaving the reincamational existences. Groups of people in various cycles of reincamational activity have met crisis after crisis, have come to your point of physical development and either gone beyond it, or destroyed their particular civilization.

In this case they were given another chance, having the unconscious knowledge not only of their failure, but the reasons behind it. They then began with a psychological head start as they formed new primitive groupings. Others, solving the problems, left your physical planet for other points in the physical universe. When they reached that level of development, however, they were spiritually and psychically mature, and were able to utilize energies of which you now have no practical knowledge.

Earth to them now is the legendary home. They formed new races and species that could no longer physically accommodate themselves to your atmospheric conditions.

However, they also continued on the reincamational level as long as they inhabited phys

reality. Some of these have mutated and have long left the reincamational cycle, however.

Those who have left it have evolved into the mental entities that they always were, you see. They have discarded material form. This group entities still takes a great interest in earth. They lend it support and energy. In a way, they could be thought of now as earth gods. On your planet they were involved in three particular civilizations long before the time of Atlantis; when, in fact, your planet itself in a somewhat different position. Particularly in relationship to three of the other planets that you know. The poles were reversed - they were, incidentally, for three long periods of your planet’s his. These civilizations were highly technological; the second one being, fact, far superior to your own along those lines. Sound was utilized far more effectively, not only for healing and in wars, but also to power vehicles of locomotion, and to bring about the movement of physical matter. Sound was a conveyor of weight and mass.

The strength of this second civilization lay mainly in the areas now known as Africa and Australia, although at that time not only was the climate entirely different, but the land areas. There was a different attraction of land mass having to do with the altered position of the poles. Relatively speaking, however, the civilization was concentrated in area; it did not attempt to expand. It was highly ingrown and dwelled upon the planet simultaneously with a large, unorganized, dispersed, primitive culture.

Not only did it make no attempt to “civilize” the rest of the world, but it did everything in its power - which was considerable for a long period of time - to impede any such progress.

The members of this civilization were largely a fringe group from the earlier successful civilization, most of whom had decided to continue existence in other areas of your physical universe. These, however, were particularly enamored of earthly life, and also thought that they could improve upon the last experiment in which they had been involved, though they were free to move on to other layers of existence.

They were not interested in beginning from scratch again as an infant civilization, but in other areas. Therefore much of their knowledge was instinctive with them, and this particular group then went through what you would call the various technological stages very rapidly.

They were particularly concerned in the beginning with developing a human being who would have built-in safeguards against violence. With them, the desire for peace was almost what you would call an instinct. There were changes in the physical mechanism. When the mind signaled strong aggression, the body would not react. Now psychologically you can see vestiges of this in certain individuals, who will faint, or even attack their own physical system, before allowing themselves to do what they think of as violence to another.

This civilization, therefore, left the natives that surrounded them in peace. They did send out members of their own group, however, to live with the natives and intermarry, hoping peacefully to thus alter the physiology of the species.

The energy, often in your time given over to violence, went instead into other pursuits, but began to turn against them. They were not learning to deal with violence or aggression. They were attempting to short-circuit it physically, and this they found had complications.

Energy must be allowed to flow freely through the physical system, controlled and directed mentally, or psychically if you prefer.

The physical alteration was a strain on the entire system. The creative function and basis that has been distorted into the idea of aggression - the urge to act - was not understood. In a manner of speaking, breathing itself is a violence. The built-in inhibition resulted in a tied up system of mutual controls in which the necessary thrusting-out of action became literally impossible.

An overly conscientious, restrictive mental and physical state evolved, in which the organism’s natural physical need for survival was in every way hampered. Mentally, the civilization progressed. Its technology was extremely activated, and propelled onward as it strove to develop, for example, artificial foods so that it would not need to kill for survival in any way.

At the same time it tried to leave the environment intact. It missed your stage of automobiles completely, and steam-driven vehicles, and concentrated rather early on sound. The sound could not be heard by physical ears.

The civilization was called Lumania, and the name itself went down in legend and was used again at a later time.

The Lumanians were a very thin, weakly people, physically speaking, but psychically either brilliant or completely ungifted. In some, you see, the built-in controls caused so many blockages of energy in all directions that even their naturally high telepathic abilities suffered.

They formed energy fields around their own civilization. They were, therefore, isolated from contact with other groups. They did not allow technology to destroy them, however. More and more of them realized that the experiment was not a success. Some, after physical death, left to join those from the previous successful civilization, who had migrated to other planetary systems within the physical structure.

Large groups, however, simply left their cities, destroyed the force fields that had enclosed them, and joined the many groups of relatively uncivilized peoples, mating with them and bearing children. These Lumanians died quickly, for they could not bear violence nor react to it violently. They felt however, that their mutant children might have a resulting disinclination toward violence, but without the prohibiting nerve- control reactions with which they were endowed.

Physically the civilization simply died out. Some few of the mutant children formed a small later group who traveled the area as itinerants in the following century, with large bands of animals. They cared for each other mutually, and many of the old legends concerning half-man and half-beast have come down through the ages simply from the memory of these old associations.

These people, as remnants, really, of the first great civilization, always carried within themselves strong subconscious memories of their origin. I am speaking of the

Lumanians now. This accounted for their quick rise, technologically speaking. But because their purpose was so single-minded - the avoidance of violence - rather, say, than the constructive peaceful development of creative potential, their experience was highly one-sided. They were driven by such a fear of violence that they dared not allow the physical system freedom even to express it.

The vitality of the civilization was therefore weak - not because violence did not exist, but because freedom of energy and expression was automatically blocked along specific lines, and from outside physically. They well understood the evils of violence in earthly terms, but they would have denied the individual’s right to learn this his own way, and thus prevented the individual from using his own methods, creatively, to turn the violence into constructive areas. Free will in this respect was discarded.

As a child is physically protected from some diseases for a while after he emerges from his mother’s womb, so for a brief period is the child cushioned against some psychic disasters for a short period after birth, and carries within him, still for his comfort, memories of past existences and places. So the Lumanians for some generations were supported by deep subconscious memories of the civilization that had gone before. Finally, however, these began to weaken. They had protected themselves against violence but not against fear.

They were, therefore, subject to all of the ordinary human fears which were then exaggerated, since physically they could not respond even to nature with violence. If attacked, they had to flee. The fight-or-flight principle did not apply. They had but one recourse.

Their god symbol was a male one - a strong, physically powerful male figure who would therefore protect them since they could not protect themselves. He evolved through the ages as their beliefs did, and into him they projected those qualities that they could not themselves express.

He was much later to appear as the old Jehovah, the God of Wrath who protected the Chosen People. The fear of natural forces was, therefore, initially extremely strong in them for the reasons given, and brought about a feeling of separation between man and those natural forces that nurtured him. They could not trust the earth, since they were not allowed to protect themselves against violent forces within it.

Their vast technology and their great civilization was largely underground. They were, in those terms, the original cavemen, and they came out from their cities through caves also. Caves were not just places of protection in which unskilled natives squatted. They were often doorways to and from the cities of the Lumanians. Long after the cities were deserted, the following natives, uncivilized, found these caves and the openings.

In the period that you now think of as the Stone Age, the men you think of as your ancestors, the cavemen, often found shelter not in rough naturally formed caves, but in mechanically created channels that reached behind them, and in the deserted cities in which once the Lumanians dwelled. Some of the tools fashioned by the cavemen were distorted versions of those they had found.

While the civilization of the Lumanians was highly concentrated, in that they made no attempt to conquer others or to spread out to any great extent in area, they did set

out, over the centuries, outposts from which they could emerge and keep track of the other native peoples.

These outposts were constructed underground. From the original cities and large settlements there were, of course, underground connections, a system of tunnels, highly intricate and beautifully engineered. Since these were an aesthetic people, the walls were lined with paintings and drawings, and sculpture was also displayed along these inner byways.

There were various escalated systems, some conveying people on foot, some conveying goods. It was not practical to construct such tunnels to the many outposts, however, which were fairly small communities and relatively self-supporting; some were a good distance away from the main areas of commerce and activity.

These outposts were situated in many scattered areas, but there were a fairly large number of them in what is now Spain and the Pyrenees. There were several reasons for this, one having to do with the existence of rather giant-sized men in the mountain areas. Because of the timid nature of these [Lumanian] people, they did not enjoy out- post existence, and only the bravest and most confident of them were given such an assignment, which was temporary to begin with.

The caves, again, served as doorways opening outward, and often what seemed to be the back of a cave was instead constructed of a material opaque from the outside but transparent from the inside. The natives of the area, using such caves for natural shelter, could therefore be observed without danger. These people reacted to sounds that are not audible to your ears. Their peculiar fear of violence intensified all of their mechanisms to an amazing degree. They were forever alert and on guard.

This is difficult to explain, but they could mentally pitch a thought along certain frequencies - a highly distinguished art - and then translate the thought at a given destination in any of a number of ways, into form or color, for example, or even into a certain type of image. Their language was extremely discriminating in ways that you could not understand, simply because gradations in pitch, frequency, and spacing were so precise and complicated.

Communication, in fact, was one of their strongest points, and it was developed to such a high degree simply because they feared violence so deeply and were constantly on the alert. They banded together in large family groups, again in need for protection. Contact between children and parents was at a very high level, and children were acutely uncomfortable if out of the sight of their parents for any amount of tune.

For these reasons, those individuals who ran the outposts felt themselves to be in a very uncomfortable situation. They were limited in numbers and largely cut off from the main areas of their own civilization. They developed, therefore, an even greater telepathic activity, and a rapport with the earth above their head, so that the slightest tremor or footstep and the most minute movements above that were not usual, were instantly noted.

There were frequent peepholes, so to speak, through to the surface, from which they could make observations, and cameras situated there that kept the most precise pictures not only of the earth, but of the stars.

Of course, they had complete records of underground gas areas and intimate knowledge of the inner crusts, keeping careful watch upon and anticipating earth tremors and faults. They were as triumphant about their descent into the earth as any race ever was who left the earth.

This was, as I told you, the second, and perhaps most interesting of the three civilizations. The first followed generally your own line of development and faced many of the problems that you now do. They were largely situated in what you call Asia Minor, but they were also expansive and traveled outward to other areas. These are the people I mentioned earlier, who finally went on to other planets within other galaxies, and from whom the people of the Lumanian civilization came.

Before we discuss the third civilization, there are a few more points I would like to make about the second one.

This has to do with communication as it was applied to their drawings and paintings, and to the highly discriminating channels that their creative communications could take. In many ways their art was highly superior to your own, and not as isolated. The various art forms, for example, were connected in a fashion that is nearly unknown to you, and because you are so unfamiliar with the concept, it will be rather difficult to explain.

Consider, for example, something very simple - say a drawing of an animal. You would perceive it simply as a visual object, but these people were great synthesizers. A line was not simply a visual line, but according to an almost infinite variety of distinctions and divisions, it would also represent certain sounds that would be automatically translated.

An observer could automatically translate the sounds before he bothered with the visual image, if he wanted to. In what would appear to be a drawing of an animal, then, the entire history or background of the animal might also be given. Curves, angles, lines all represented, beside their obvious objective function in a drawing, a highly compli- cated series of variations in pitch, tone and value; or if you prefer, invisible words.

Distances between lines were translated as sound pauses, and sometimes also as distances in time. Color was used in terms of language in communication, in drawings and paintings; representing somewhat as your own color does, emotional gradations. The color however, its value of intensity, served to further refine and define - for exam- ple, either by reinforcing the message already given by the objective value of the lines, angles, and curves, and by the invisible word messages already explained; or by modifying these in any given number of ways.

The size of such drawings also spoke its own message. In one way this was a highly stylized art, and yet it allowed for both great preciseness of expression in terms of detail, and great freedom in terms of scope. It was obviously highly compressed. This technique was later discovered by the third civilization, and some of the remnants of drawings done in imitation of it still exist. But the keys to interpretation have been completely lost, so all you could see would be a drawing devoid of the multisensual elements that gave it such great variety. It exists, but you could not bring it alive.

I should perhaps mention here that some of the caves, particularly in certain areas

of Spain and the Pyrenees, and some earlier ones in Africa, were artificial constructions. Now these people moved mass with sound, and, as I told you earlier, actually conveyed matter through a high mastery of sound. This is how their tunnels were originally formed, and it was also the method used to form some of the caves in areas where originally there were few. Often drawings on the cave walls were highly stylized information, almost like signs in your terms in front of public buildings, portraying the type of animals and beings in a given area.

These drawings later were used as models by your early cavemen in the historical times to which you usually refer.

Their communicative abilities, and therefore creative abilities, were more vital, alive, and responsive than yours are. When you hear a word you may be aware of a corresponding image in your mind. With these people, however, sounds automatically and instantly built up an amazingly vivid image that was not three-dimensional by any means, being internalized, but was far more vivid than your usual mental images indeed.

Certain sounds, again, were utilized to indicate amazing distinctions in terms of size, shape, direction, and duration both in space and time. Sounds automatically produced brilliant images, in other words. For this reason there was an easy distinction between what was called inner sight and outer sight, and it was quite natural for them to close their eyes when seated in conversation in order to communicate more clearly, enjoying the ever-changing and immediate inner images that accompanied any verbal interchange.

They learned quickly, and education was an exciting process, because this multisensuous facility automatically impressed information upon them not simply through one sense channel at a time but utilizing many simultaneously. For all this, however, and the immediacy of their perceptions, there was an inherent weakness. The inability to face up to violence and learn to conquer it meant, of course, that they also severely hampered a certain thrusting-out characteristic. Energy was blocked in these areas so that they actually lacked a forceful quality or sense of power.

I do not necessarily mean physical power however, but so much of their energy was used to avoid any meeting with violence that they were not able to channel ordinary aggressive feelings, for example, into other areas.

I have been speaking about the Lumanians in some detail because they are a part of your psychic heritage. The other two civilizations were in many ways more successful, and yet the strong intent behind the Lumanians’ experiment was extremely volatile. While they were not able to solve the problem of violence as they understood it in your reality, their passionate desire to do so still rings throughout your own psychic environment.

Because of the true nature of “time” the Lumanians still exist as they were in your terms. There are often bleed-throughs in the psychic atmosphere. These do not occur by chance, but when some kind of rapport causes effects to leap between systems that otherwise appear quite separated. And so there have been such bleed-throughs between your own civilization and the Lumanians’.

Various old religions picked up the idea of the Lumanians’ fierce god figure for example, in whom they managed to project their concepts of force, power, and violence, this god who had meant to protect them when nonviolence would not allow them to protect themselves.

There is a bleed-through now in the making, so to speak, in which the Lumanians’ multidimensional concepts of art and communication will be glimpsed by your own people, but in a rudimentary form.

Because of the nature of probabilities there is also, of course, a system of reality in which the Lumanians succeeded in their experiment with nonviolence, and in which a completely different type of human being emerged.

All of this may seem very strange to you, simply because your concepts of existence are so specific and limiting. Ideas of probable realities and probable men and gods may strike some of you as quite absurd, and yet as you read this book, you are but one of the probable you’s. Other probable you’s would not consider you real, of course, and some might indignantly question your existence. Nevertheless, the probable system of reality is not just a philosophical question. If you are interested in the nature of your own reality, then it becomes a highly personal and pertinent matter.

As the various qualities of the Lumanians are still present in your psychic atmosphere, as their cities still coexist in land areas now called your own, so other probable identities coexist with the identities you now call your own. In the following chapter we will discuss you and your probable selves.

CHAPTER 16

PROBABLE SYSTEMS, MEN, AND GODS

In your daily life at any given moment of your time, you have a multitudinous choice of actions, some trivial and some of utmost importance. You may, for example, sneeze or not sneeze, cough or not cough, walk to the window or the door, scratch your elbow, save a child from drowning, learn a lesson, commit suicide, harm another, or turn your cheek.

It seems to you that reality is composed of those actions that you choose to take. Those that you choose to deny are ignored. The road not taken then seems to be a non- act, yet every thought is actualized and every possibility explored. Physical reality is constructed from what seems to be a series of physical acts. Since this is the usual criterion of reality for you, then nonphysical acts usually escape your notice, discretion, and judgment.

Let us take an example. You are reading this book when the telephone rings. A friend wants you to meet him at five o’clock. You stand considering. In your mind you see yourself (A) saying no and staying home, (B) saying no and going somewhere else instead, or (C) saying yes and keeping the engagement. Now all of these possible actions have a reality at that point. They are all capable of being actualized in Physical terms. Before you make your decision, each of these probable actions are equally valid. You choose one of these, and by your decision you make one event out of the three physical. This event is duly accepted as a portion of those serial happenings that compose your normal existence.

The other probable actions, however, are as valid as they ever were, though you have not chosen to actualize them physically. They are carried out as effectively as the one you chose to accept. If there was a strong emotional charge behind one of the rejected probable actions, it may even have greater validity as an act than the one you chose.

All actions are initially mental acts. This is the nature of reality. That sentence cannot be emphasized too thoroughly. All mental acts therefore are valid. They exist and cannot be negated.

Because you do not accept them all as physical events, you do not perceive their strength or durability. Your lack of perception cannot destroy their validity, however. If

you wanted to be a doctor and are now in a different profession, then in some other probable reality you are a doctor. If you have abilities that you are not using here, they are being used elsewhere.

Now, again, these ideas may seem impossibly rich for your mental blood because of your propensity toward serial thought and three-dimensional attitudes.

Now these facts do not deny the validity of the soul, but instead add to it immeasurably.

The soul can be described for that matter, as a multidimensional, infinite act, each minute probability being brought somewhere into actuality and existence; an infinite creative act that creates for itself infinite dimensions in which fulfillment is possible.

The tapestry of your own existence is simply such that the threedimensional intellect cannot behold it. These probable selves, however, are a portion of your identity or soul, and if you are out of contact with them it is only because you focus upon physical events and accept them as the criteria for reality.

From any given point of your existence, however, you can glimpse other probable realities, and sense the reverberations of probable actions beneath those physical decisions that you make. Some people have done this spontaneously, often in the dream state. Here the rigid assumptions of normal waking consciousness often fade, and you can find yourself performing those physically rejected activities, never realizing that you have peered into a probable existence of your own.

If there are individual probable selves, then of course there are probable earths, all taking roads that you have not adopted. Beginning with an act of imagination in the waking state, you can sometimes follow for a short way into the “road not taken.”

Go back to our man at the telephone, mentioned earlier. Let us say that he tells his friend he will not go. At the same time, if he imagines that he took another alternative and agreed on the engagement, then he might experience a sudden rift of dimensions. If he is lucky and the circumstances are good, he might suddenly feel the full validity of his acceptance as strongly as if he had chosen it physically. Before he realizes what is happening, he might actually feel himself leave his home and embark upon those probable actions that physically he has chosen not to perform.

For the moment, however, the full experience will rush upon him. Imagination will have opened the door and given him the freedom to perceive, but hallucination will not be involved. This is a simple exercise that can be tried in almost any circumstance, although solitude is important.

Such an experiment will not carry you too far, however, and the probable self who has chosen the action that you denied, is in important respects quite different from the self that you know. Each mental act opens up a new dimension of actuality. In a manner of speaking, your slightest thought gives birth to worlds.

This is not a dry metaphysical statement. It should arouse within you the strongest feelings of creativity and speculation. It is impossible for any being to be sterile, for any idea to die, or any ability to go unfulfilled.

Each probable system of reality of course then creates other such systems, and any one act, realized, brings forth an infinite number of “unrealized” acts that will also find

their actualization. Now all systems of reality are open. The divisions between them are arbitrarily decided upon as a matter of convenience, but all exist simultaneously, and each one supports and adds to the other. So what you do is also reflected to some degree in the experience of your probable selves, and vice versa.

To the extent that you are open and receptive, you can benefit greatly by the various experiences of your probable selves, and can gain from their knowledge and abilities. Quite spontaneously, again, you often do this in the dream state, and often what seems to you to be an inspiration is a thought experienced but not actualized on the part of another self. You tune in and actualize it instead, you see.

Ideas that you have entertained and not used may be picked up in this same manner by other probable you’s. Each of these probable selves consider themselves the real you, of course, and to any one of them you would be the probable self; but through the inner senses all of you are aware of your part in this gestalt.

The soul is not a finished product.

In fact it is not a product in those terms at all, but a process of becoming. All That Is is not a product, finished or otherwise, either. There are probable gods as there are probable men; but these probable gods are all a part of what you may call the soul of, or the identity of, All That Is; even as your probable selves are all a portion of your soul or entity.

The dimensions of actuality possible to All That Is of course far exceed those presently available to you. In a manner of speaking, you have created many probable gods through your own thoughts and desires. They become quite independent psychic entities, validities in other levels of existence. The one All That Is is aware not only of its own nature and of the nature of all consciousness, but is also aware of its infinite probable selves. We go here toward subjects in which words become meaningless.

The nature of All That Is can only be sensed directly through the inner senses, or, in a weaker communication, through inspiration or intuition. The miraculous complexity of such reality cannot be translated verbally.

Probabilities are an ever-present portion of your invisible psychological environment. You exist in the middle of the probable system of reality. It is not something apart from you. To some extent it is like a sea in which you have your present being. You are in it, and it is in you. Occasionally at surface levels of consciousness, you might wonder what might have happened had you made other decisions than those you have; chosen different mates, for example, or taken up residence in other portions of the country. You might wonder what would have happened had you mailed an important letter that you subsequently decided not to mail; and in such small wonderings only, have you ever questioned the nature of probabilities. But there are deep connections between yourself and all those individuals with whom you have had relationships, and with whom you were involved in deep decisions.

These are not nebulous. They are profound psychological interconnections that bind you each to each, particularly in a telepathic framework, though this may be beneath normal consciousness. The unrealized physical connections that might have occurred, but did not, are worked out in other layers of reality.

The invisible environment within your mind is not as lonely as you might think, and your seeming inner isolation is caused by the ego’s persistent guard. It sees no reason, for example, why you should be informed of information that it does not consider pertinent to day-by-day daily activity.

I do not like the phrase, “to advance”, yet in your terms “to advance” as a consciousness is to become more and more aware of these other materializations of your own identity. The probable selves are to gain awareness of the other probable selves, and realize that all are various manifestations of the true identity.

They are not “lost”, buried or negated in some superself, without free will, self- determination, or individuality. Instead the identity is what they are, with full freedom to express all probable actions and developments, both in this reality and in others that you do not know.

As you sit reading this book in your present moment of time, you are positioned in the center of a cosmic web of probabilities that is affected by your slightest mental or emotional act.

Your thoughts and emotions, therefore, go forth from you not only in all physical directions but in directions that are quite invisible to you, appearing in dimensions that you would not presently understand. Now you are also the receiver of other such sig- nals coming from other probabilities that are connected with your own, but you choose which of those probable actions you want to make real or physical in your system, as others also have the freedom of choice in their systems.

You originate ideas then and receive them, but you are not forced to actualize unrealized probable acts that come to you from other probable selves. Now there is a natural attraction between yourself and other probable selves, electromagnetic connections having to do with simultaneous propulsions of energy. By this I mean energy that appears simultaneously both to you and probable selves in other realities; psychic connections having to do with a uniting, sympathetic, emotional reaction and a connection that shows up very strongly in the dream state.

In that state, with the functions of the ego somewhat stilled, there is some considerable communication between various portions of the entire identity. In dreams you may have glimpses of probable roads that you might have taken. You may think that these are fantasy, but instead you may be perceiving a legitimate picture of events that did occur within another system of probabilities.

One event can be actualized by more than one probable self, however, and you will resemble some probable selves more than others. Because you are involved in an intricate psychological gestalt such as this, and because the connections mentioned earlier do exist, you can avail yourself to some extent of abilities and knowledge possessed by these other probable portions of your personality.

The connections make for quite constant “bleed-throughs.” Once you are aware of the probable system, however, you will also learn to become alert to what I will here call “benign intrusive impulses.” Such impulses would seem to be disconnected from your own current interests or activities; intrusive in that they come quickly into consciousness, with a sense of strangeness as if they are not your own. These can often

offer clues of various kinds. You may know absolutely nothing about music, for example, and one afternoon while in the middle of some mundane activity be struck by a sudden impulse to buy a violin.

Such an impulse could be an indication that another probable portion of your identity is gifted with that instrument. I am not telling you to run off and buy one, but you could however act on the impulse as far as is reasonably possible - renting a violin, simply acquainting yourself with violin concerti, etc.

You would learn the instrument far quicker, you see, if the impulse was originating with a probable self. It goes without saying then that probable selves exist in your “future” as well as your past. It is very poor policy to dwell negatively on unpleasant aspects of the past that you know, because some portions of the probable self may still be involved in that past. The concentration can allow greater bleed-through and adverse identification, because that part will be one background that you have in common with any probable selves who sprang from that particular source.

To dwell upon the possibility of illness or disaster is equally poor policy, for you set up negative webs of probabilities that need not occur. You can theoretically alter your own past as you have known it, for time is no more something divorced from you than probabilities are.

The past existed in multitudinous ways. You only experienced one probable past. By changing this past in your mind, now, in your present, you can change not only its nature but its effect, and not only upon yourself but upon others.

Pretend a particular event happened that greatly disturbed you. In your mind imagine it not simply wiped out, but replaced by another event of more beneficial nature. Now this must be done with great vividness and emotional validity, and many times. It is not a self-deception. The event that you choose will automatically be a probable event, which did in fact happen, though it is not the event you chose to perceive in your given probable past.

Telepathically, if the process is done correctly, your idea will also affect any people who were connected with the original event, though they can choose to reject as well as accept your version.

This is not a book on techniques, so I will not go into this particular method deeply, but merely mention it here. Remember, however, that in a most legitimate way many events that are not physically perceived or experienced are as valid as those that are, and are as real within your own invisible psychological environment.

There are in your terms, then, unlimited probable future events for which you are now setting groundworks. The nature of the thoughts and feelings you originate and those that you habitually or characteristically receive set a pattern, so you will choose from those probable futures those events that will physically become your experience.

Because there are bleed-throughs and interconnections, it is possible for you to tune into a “future event,” say of an unfortunate nature, an event for which you are headed if you continue on your present course. A dream about it, for instance, may so frighten you that you avoid the event and do not experience it. If so, such a dream is a message from a probable self who did experience the event.

So can a child then in a dream receive such communications from a probable future self, of such a nature that its life is completely changed. The entire identity is being now. All divisions are merely illusions, so one probable self can hold out a helping hand to another, and through these inner communications the various probable selves in your terms begin to understand the nature of their identity.

Now this leads to other adventures in which whole civilizations may be involved, for as individuals have their probable destinies, so do civilizations, nations, and inhabited planetary systems. Your historical earth as you know it has developed in many different ways, and there is a deeply unconscious connection that unites all such manifestations.

In their own way, even atoms and molecules retain a knowledge of the forms through which they have passed, and so the individuals that compose any given civilization contain deep within themselves the inner knowledge of experiments and trials, successes and failures, in which the races have also been involved at other levels of reality.

In some probable realities, Christianity as you know it did not flourish. In some, males did not dominate. In others the makeup of physical matter simply followed different lines. Now all of these probabilities are in the air about you, so to speak, and I describe them as faithfully as I can, but I must relate them with concepts with which you are somewhat familiar. To some extent, then, the “truth” must be sifted through your own conceptual patterns in order for you to comprehend it at all.

Suffice it to say, you are surrounded by other influences and events. Certain of these you perceive in your three-dimensional reality. You accept them as real without realizing that they are only portions of other events. Where your vision fails, you think reality ceases, so again you must train yourselves to look between events, between objects, within yourself when you do not seem to be doing anything. Watch out for events that appear to make no sense, for they are often clues to larger invisible events.

The nature of matter itself is not understood. You perceive it at a certain “stage.” Using your terms now and speaking as simply as possible, there are other forms of matter beyond those you see. These forms are quite real and vivid, quite “physical,” to those who react to that particular sphere of activity.

In terms of probabilities, therefore, you choose certain acts, unconsciously transform these into physical events or objects, and then perceive them. But those unchosen events also go out from you and are projected into these other forms. Now the behavior of atoms and molecules is involved here, for again these are only present within your universe during certain stages. Their activity is perceived only during the range of particular vibratory rhythms. When your scientists examine them for example, they do not examine the nature, say, of an atom. They only explore the characteristics of an atom as it acts or shows itself within your system. Its greater reality completely escapes them.

You understand that there are spectrums of light. So are there spectrums of matter. Your system of physical reality is not dense in comparison with some others. The dimensions that you give to physical matter barely begin to hint at the varieties of dimensions possible.

Some systems are far heavier or lighter than your own, though this may not involve weight in the terms with which you are familiar. Probable actions emerge, then, into matter-systems quite as valid as your own, and quite as consistent. You are used to thinking in single-line thoughts, so you think of events that you know as complete things or actions, not realizing that what you perceive is but a fraction of their entire multidimensional existence.

In greater terms, it is impossible to separate one physical event from the probable events, for these are all dimensions of one action. It is basically impossible to separate the “you” that you know from the probable you’s of which you are unaware, for the same reasons. There are always inner pathways, however, leading between probable events; since all of them are manifestations of an act in its becoming, then the dimensions between these are illusions.

The physical brain alone cannot pick up these connections with any great success. The mind, which is the inner counterpart of the brain, can at times perceive the far greater dimensions of any given event through a burst of sudden intuition or comprehension that cannot be adequately described on a verbal level.

As I have said frequently, time as you think of it does not exist, yet in your terms, time’s true nature could be understood if the basic nature of the atom was ever made known to you. In one way, an atom could be compared to a microsecond.

It seems as if an atom “exists” steadily for a certain amount of time. Instead it phases in and out, so to speak. It fluctuates in a highly predictable pattern and rhythm. It can be perceived within your system only at certain points in this fluctuation, so it seems to scientists that the atom is steadily present. They are not aware of any gaps of absence as far as the atom is concerned.

In those periods of nonphysical projection, the off periods of fluctuation, the atoms “appear” in another system of reality. In that system they are perceived in what are “on” points of fluctuation, and in that system also then the atoms appear steadily. There are many such points of fluctuation, but your system of course is not aware of them, nor of the ultimate actions, universes, and systems that exist within them.

Now the same sort of behavior occurs on a deep, basic, secret, and unexplored psychological level. The physically oriented consciousness, responding to one phase of the atom’s activity, comes alive and awake to its particular existence, but in between are other fluctuations in which consciousness is focused upon entirely different systems of reality; each of these coming awake and responding, and each one having no sense of absence, and memory only of those particular fluctuations to which they respond.

These fluctuations are actually simultaneous. It would seem to you as if there would be gaps between the fluctuations, and the description I have used is the best one for our purposes; but the probable systems all exist simultaneously, and basically, following this discussion, the atom is in all these other systems at one time.

Now we have been speaking in terms of fantastically swift pulses or fluctuations, so smooth and “brief that you do not notice them. But there are also “slower,” “more vast,” “longer” fluctuations from your end of the scale.

These affect entirely different systems of existence than any closely connected with

your own The experience of such kinds of consciousness is highly alien to you. One such fluctuation might take several thousand of your years, for example. These several thousand years would be experienced, say, as a second of your time, with the events occurring within it perceived simply as a “present period.”

Now the consciousness of such beings would also contain the consciousness of large numbers of probable selves and systems, experienced quite vividly and clearly as multiple presents. These multiple presents can be altered at any of an actual number of infinite points; infinity not existing in terms of one indefinite line, but in terms of numberless probabilities and possible combinations growing out of each act of con- sciousness.

Such beings, with their multiple presents, may or may not be aware of your particular system. Their multiple present may or may not include it. You may be a part of their multiple present without even being aware of it. In much more limited terms your probable realities are multiple presents. The image, for an analogy, of an e-y-e within an eye within an eye, endlessly repeated, may be useful here.

CHAPTER 17

PROBABILITIES, THE NATURE OF GOOD AND EVIL, AND RELIGIOUS SYMBOLISM

Christian dogma speaks of the ascension of Christ, implying of course a vertical ascent into the heavens, and the development of the soul is often discussed in terms of direction. To progress is supposedly to ascend, while the horror of religious punishment, hell, is seen at the bottom of all things.

Development is therefore considered in a one-line direction only, in Christian terms. Seldom, for example, is it thought of in horizontal terms. The idea of evolution in its popular meaning promulgated this theory, as through gradual progression in a one-line direction, man emerged from the ape. Christ could just as well have disappeared sideways.

The inner reality of the message was told in terms that man at the time could understand, in line with his root assumptions. Development unfolds in all directions. The soul is not ascending a series of stairs, each one representing a new and higher point of development.

Instead, the soul stands at the center of itself, exploring, extending its capacities in all directions at once, involved in issues of creativity, each one highly legitimate. The probable system of reality opens up the nature of the soul to you. It should change current religion’s ideas considerably. For this reason, the nature of good and evil is a highly important point.

On the one hand, quite simply and in a way that you cannot presently understand, evil does not exist. However, you are obviously confronted with what seem to be quite evil effects. Now it has been said often that there is a god, so there must be a devil - or if there is good, there must be evil. This is like saying that because an apple has a top, it must have a bottom - but without any understanding of the fact that both are a portion of the apple.

We go back to our fundamentals: You create reality through your feelings, thoughts, and mental actions. Some of these are physically materialized, others are actualized in probable systems. You are presented with an endless series of choices, it seems, at any point, some more or less favorable than others.

You must understand that each mental act is a reality for which you are responsible. That is what you are in this particular system of reality for. As long as you believe in a devil, for example, you will create one that is real enough for you, and for the others who continue to create him.

Because of the energy he is given by others, he will have a certain consciousness of his own, but such a mock devil has no power or reality to those who do not believe in his existence, and who do not give him energy through their belief. He is, in other words, a superlative hallucination As mentioned earlier, those who believe in a hell and assign themselves to it through their belief can indeed experience one, but certainly in nothing like eternal terms. No soul is forever ignorant.

Now those who have such beliefs actually lack a necessary deep trust in the nature of consciousness, of the soul, and of All That Is. They concentrate upon not what they think of as the power of good, but fearfully upon what they think of as the power of evil.

The hallucination is created, therefore, out of fear and of restriction. The devil idea is merely the mass projection of certain fears - mass in that it is produced by many people, but also limited in that there have always been those who rejected this principle.

Some very old religions understood the hallucinatory nature of the devil concept, but even in Egyptian times, the simpler and more distorted ideas became prevalent, particularly with the masses of people. In some ways, men in those times could not understand the concept of a god without the concept of a devil.

Storms, for example, are highly creative natural events, though they can also cause destruction. Early man could see only the destruction. Some intuitively understood that any effects are creative, despite their appearances, but few could convince their fellow men.

The light-and-darkness contrast presents us with the same kind of picture. The good was seen as light, for men felt safer in the day. The evil was therefore assigned to nightfall. Within the mass of distortions, however, hidden beneath the dogma there was always a hint of the basic creativity of every effect.

There are, then, no devils waiting to carry anyone off, unless you create them yourself, in which case the power resides in you and not in the mock devils. The Crucifixion and attendant drama made sense within your reality at the time. It arose into the world of physical actuality out of the inner reality from which your deepest intuitions and insights also spring.

The race brought forth the events, then, that would best convey in physical terms this deeper nonphysical knowledge of the indestructibility of the soul. This particular drama would not have made sense to other systems with different root assumptions than your own.

The symbolism of ascent or descent, or of light and dark, would be meaningless to other realities with different perceptive mechanisms. While your religions are built around an enduring kernel of truth, the symbolism used was craftily selected by the inner self in line with its knowledge of those root assumptions you hold as valid in the physical universe. Other information, in dreams for example, will also be given to you

with the same symbolism, generally speaking. The symbolism itself, however, was simply used by the inner self. It does not inherently belong to inner reality.

Many probable systems have perceptive mechanisms far different from your own. In fact, some are based upon gestalts of awareness completely alien to you. Quite without realizing it, your ego is a result of group consciousness, for example; the one consciousness that most directly faces the exterior world, is dependent upon the minute consciousness that resides within each living cell of your body; and as a rule you are only aware of one ego - at least at a time.

In some systems the “individual” is quite aware of having more egos than one, in your terms. The entire psychological organization is in a way richer than your own. A Christ who was not aware of this would not appear in such a system, you see. There are kinds of perception with which you are not familiar, worlds in which your idea of light does not exist, where almost infinite gradations of thermal qualities are absorbed in terms of sensation, not of light.

In any of these worlds, the Christ drama could never appear as it appeared within your own. Now the same thing applies to each of your great religions, though as I have said in the past, the Buddhists come closer, generally speaking, to a description of the nature of reality. They have not understood the eternal validity of the soul, however, in terms of its exquisite invulnerability, nor been able to hold a feeling for its unique character. But Buddha, like Christ, interpreted what he almost knew in terms of your own reality. Not only of your own physical reality, but your own probable physical reality.

The methods, the secret methods behind all of the religions, were meant to lead man into a realm of understanding that existed apart from the symbols and the stories, into inner realizations that would take him both within and without the physical world that he knew. There are many manuscripts still not discovered, from old monasteries par- ticularly in Spain, that tell of underground groups within religious orders who kept these secrets alive when other monks were copying old Latin manuscripts.

There were tribes who never learned to write in Africa and Australia who also knew these secrets, and men called “Speakers” who memorized them and spread them upward, even throughout northern portions of Europe, before the time of Christ.

Offhand, the work involved could take five years, for there were several versions, and a group of leaders, each going in different directions, who taught their people. The world was far more ripe for Christianity than people suppose, because of these groups. The ideas were “buried” already throughout Europe.

Many important concepts were lost, however. The emphasis was on practical methods of living - quite simply - rules that could be understood, but the reasons for them were forgotten.

The Druids obtained some of their concepts from Speakers. So did the Egyptians. The Speakers predated the emergence of any religions that you know, and the religions of the Speakers arose spontaneously in many scattered areas, then grew like wildfire from the heart of Africa and Australia. There was one separate group in an area where the Aztecs dwelled at a later date, though the land mass was somewhat different then,

and some of the lower cave dwellings at times were under water.

Various bands of the Speakers continued through the centuries. Because they were trained so well, the messages retained their authenticity. They believed, however, that it was wrong to set words into written form, and so did not record them. They also used natural earth symbols, but clearly understood the reasons for this. The Speakers, singly, existed in your Stone Age period, and were leaders. Their abilities helped the cavemen survive. There was little physical communication, however, in those days between the various Speakers, and some were unaware of the existence of the others.

Their message was as “pure” and undistorted as possible. It was for this reason however, through the centuries, that many who heard it translated it into parables and tales. Now, strong portions of Jewish scriptures carry traces of the message of these early Speakers, but even here, distortions have hidden the messages.

Since consciousness forms matter, and not the other way around, then thought exists before the brain and after it. A child can think coherently before he learns vocabulary - but he cannot impress the physical universe in its terms. So this inner knowledge has always been available, but is to become physically manifest - literally made flesh. The Speakers were the first to impress this inner knowledge upon the physical system, to make it physically known. Sometimes only one or two Speakers were alive in several centuries. Sometimes there were many. They looked around them and knew that the world sprang from their interior reality. They told others. They knew that the seemingly solid natural objects about them were composed of many minute consciousnesses .

They realized that from their own creativity they formed idea into matter, and that the stuff of matter was itself conscious and alive. They were intimately familiar with the natural rapport existing between themselves and their environment, therefore, and knew that they could alter their environment through their own acts.

Generally speaking, once a Speaker always a speaker, in your terms. In some incarnations, the abilities might be used so powerfully that all other aspects of the personality remained in the background. At other times the capacities might be timidly used. The Speakers possess an extraordinary vividness of feeling and thought pro- jection.

They can impress others with greater import through their communications. They can move from inner to outer reality with easy ability. They know instinctively how to use symbolism. They are highly creative on an unconscious level, constantly forming psychic frameworks beneath normal consciousness that can be used both by themselves and others in dream and trance states. They often appear to others in the dream condition, and they help dreamers in the manipulation of inner reality. They form images with which the dreamers can relate, images that can be used as bridges and then as gateways into kinds of consciousness more separated from your own.

The symbolism of the gods, the idea of the gods on Olympus, for example, the crossing-over point at the River Styx - that kind of phenomenon was originated by the Speakers. The symbolisms and frameworks of religion, therefore, had to exist not only in the physical world but also in the unconscious one. Outside of your own framework,

houses as such or dwellings as such are not needed, and yet in trance encounters or dream encounters with other realities, such structures are frequently seen. They are transformations of data into terms that will be meaningful to you.

After death, for example, an individual may continue to create these - masses of individuals may - until they realize that the frameworks are no longer necessary. The Speakers were not confined in their activities, therefore, to waking consciousness. In all periods of your time they went about their duties both in the waking and sleep state. Much of the most pertinent information, in fact, was memorized by trainees during the dream condition, and passed on in the same manner. These unwritten manuscripts therefore were also illustrated, so to speak, by dream journeys or field trips into other kinds of reality. Such training still goes on. The particular psychic or story framework may vary. For example, conventional images of the Christian God and the saints may be utilized by the Speakers, with all of this highly vivid. The dreamer may find himself then in a magnificent harem, or instead in a brilliantly illuminated field or sky. Some Speakers confine their abilities to the dream state; and, waking, are largely unconscious of their own abilities or experience.

Now it is meaningless to call such dreams or dream places hallucinations, for they are representations of definite “objective” realities that you cannot perceive as yet in their own guise. The Egyptian religion was largely based upon the work of the Speakers, and great care was given to their training. The outward manifestations given to the masses of the people became so distorted, however, that the original unity of the religion finally decayed.

However, efforts were being made then to map inner reality in ways that have not been attempted since. It is true that in the dream state and in some other levels of existence close to your own, there is strong individual play in the creation of images, and a magnificent use of symbolism, but all of this takes place, again, in an “objective” definite environment, an environment whose characteristics make such phenomena possible - a field of activity, then, with its own rules. Now the Speakers are familiar with those rules, and often serve as guides. They have at times worked within organizations as in Egypt, where they worked through the temples and became involved with the power structures. As a rule, however, they are far more solitary.

Because of the true simultaneous nature of time, they are, of course, speaking to all of your ages at once through their various manifestations. On occasion they also serve as mediators, introducing to each other two incarnations of one personality, for example.

The rules within physical reality say that objects appear to be stationary and permanent. The rules of other realities are often far different, however. The nature of mental activities will follow different lines, and “continuity” in terms of time will not exist. Perceptual organization will exist by the use of different psychological groupings.

From the outside, such systems would seem meaningless to you even if you were able to perceive them. You would not be able to observe the pivot points about which actions occurred. The very definite rules of that system then would be quite obscure to you.

Now the Speakers are familiar with the rules within many systems. Still, however, most of these systems in larger terms are somewhat connected with your own kind of reality. There are an infinite number of inner universes. Only the very highest, most developed gestalt consciousness can be aware of anything like their totality. In this larger context, then, the Speakers must be called local. There is something like a chart mapping many of the nearby systems of reality, and I hope some day in your terms to make this available. In order to do so, Ruburt must be trained somewhat more intensely. There are points of coincidence where under certain conditions entry may be made from one of these systems to the other. They need not exist separately in space as you know it, of course.

These are called coordination points, where one camouflage merges into the other. Some of these are geographical in your system, but in all cases, a tuning-in of consciousness is a necessary preliminary. Such entries can only be made in an out-of- body condition. Each individual in his dreams has access to the information possessed by the Speakers. There are adjacent states of consciousness that occur within the sleep pattern, that cannot be picked up by your EEG’s - adjacent “corridors” through which your consciousness travels.

The higher centers of intuition are activated while physically oriented portions of consciousness remain with the body. The “absent” portion of the self cannot be traced through brain patterns, though the point of its departure and the point of its return may show a particular pattern. The “time out” itself, however, will not be detected in any way, the tracings showing only whatever characteristic pattern was being given immediately before departure.

Now this happens in every night’s sleep. Two areas of activity are involved, one very passive and one acutely active. In one state this portion of consciousness is passive, receiving information. In the next stage it is active as it takes part through action - the concepts given it are then vividly perceived through participation and examples. This is the most protected area of sleep. The rejuvenating characteristics enter in here, and it is during this period that the Speakers act as teachers and guides.

This information is, then, often interpreted on return by other layers of the self such as the body consciousness and subconscious, where it is formed into dreams that will have meaning to these areas of the self and where general teaching, for example, may be translated into practical advice involving a particular matter.

There are several very definite stages of sleep, and they all perform various services for the personality. They are also signals for different layers of consciousness, realization, and activity. They are accompanied by some physical variations, and there are some variations having to do with age.

In our next chapter I will speak of these in some detail. For now it is sufficient to realize that specific steps, definite alterations, occur as consciousness is shifted from the exterior to the interior reality, and that these changes are not random; that consciousness leaves through a very predictable route to its many destinations. Through the ages the Speakers have taught dreamers how to manipulate in these other environments. They have taught them how to bring back information that could be used

for the good of the present personality. According to the intent, present purpose, and development, an individual may be aware of these travels to varying degrees. Some have excellent recall, for example, but often misinterpret their experience because of conscious ideas.

It is very possible for one dreamer who is a Speaker, to go to the aid of another individual who is having some difficulties in an inner reality within the dream state. The idea of guardian angels of course is highly connected here. A good Speaker is as effective within one reality as he is within the other, creating psychic frameworks within physical reality as well as within interior environments. Many artists, poets, and musicians are Speakers, translating one world in terms of another, forming psychic structures that exist in both with great vitality - structures that may be perceived from more than one reality at once.

There are also various states of consciousness in waking life, upon which you do not focus, and of which you are usually quite unaware. Each state knows its own conditions and is familiar with a different kind of reality.

“You” presently have a once-centered consciousness, in that “you” close off from your experience these other stages of consciousness in which other portions of your entire identity are intimately involved. These other stages of consciousness create their own realities as you create your own. The realities are, therefore, byproducts of consciousness itself. If you could become aware of these, they might appear to be other places to you, rather than realms or fields of different kinds of activities. If you probe into these realms you will be forced to perceive them with the root assumptions of your own system, translating feelings of warmth and comfort, for example, into images of warm shelters or buildings, or feelings of fear into images of demons.

On occasion even in waking life a personality may spontaneously shift gears, so to speak, and suddenly find itself for a second or perhaps a few moments within another such realm. Disorientation usually occurs. There are those who do this quite deliberately with training, but often they do not realize that they are interpreting the experiences they have with the values of their “home” consciousness.

All of this is not as esoteric as it might seem. Almost every individual has had bizarre experiences with consciousness, and knows intuitively that their greater experience is not limited to physical reality. Most dreams are like animated postcards brought back from a journey that you have returned from and largely forgotten. Your consciousness is already oriented again to physical reality; the dream, an attempt to translate the deeper experience into recognizable forms. The images within the dream are also highly coded, and are signals for underlying events that are basically not decipherable.

The Speakers help you in the formation of dreams which are indeed multidimensional artistic productions of a kind - dreams existing in more than one reality, with effects that dissect various stages of consciousness that are real, in your terms, to both the living and the dead and in which both the living and the dead may participate. It is for this reason that inspirations and revelations are so often a part of the dream condition.

Divorced from physical focus, you are in a better position to hear the Speakers, to

translate their instructions, to practice with the creation of images, and to be guided in the methods of maintaining the health of the physical body. In the most protected areas of sleep, the apparent barriers between many layers of reality vanish. You are aware, for example, of some probable realities. You choose which probable acts you want to actualize in your system. You follow other probable acts through in the dream state. You do this individually, but you also do it en masse on national and global levels.

Consciousness at different levels or stages perceives different kinds of events. In order to perceive some of these you have only to learn to change the focus of your attention from one level to another. There are minute chemical and electromagnetic alterations that accompany these stages of consciousness, and certain physical changes within the body itself in hormone production and pineal activity.

You usually glide from wakefulness through to sleep without ever noticing the various conditions of consciousness through which you pass, yet there are several. First, of course, with various degrees of spontaneity, there is the inward turn of consciousness away from physical data, from worries and concerns of the day. Then there is an undifferentiated level between wakefulness and sleep where you act as a receiver - passive but open, in which telepathic and clairvoyant messages come to you quite easily.

Your consciousness can seem to float. There are varying physical sensations, sometimes of growing large, sometimes of falling. Both sensations are characteristic of moments in which you almost catch yourself, almost become aware of this undifferentiated area, and then translate some of its experiences into physical terms. The sensation of largeness, for example, is a physical interpretation of the psychic expansion. The feeling of falling is an interpretation of a sudden return of consciousness to the body.

This period can last for only a few moments, for half an hour, or can be returned to. It is a cushioning, supportive, and expansive stage of consciousness. Suggestions given during this time are highly effective. Following this period there is an active state, that can occur, of pseudodreaming, where the mind busies itself with physical concerns that have managed to cling through the first two stages.

If these are too vigorous, the individual may awaken. This is a vivid, intense, but usually brief stage. Another undifferentiated layer follows, this time marked quite definitely by voices, conversations, or images, as consciousness tunes in more firmly to other communications. Several of these may compete for the individual’s attention. At this point the body is fairly quiet. The individual will follow one or another of these inner stimuli to a deeper level of consciousness, and form into light dreams the communications he is receiving.

Somewhere during this time he will go into a deeply protected area of sleep, where he is at the threshold to other layers of reality and probabilities. At this point his experiences will be out of all context to time as you know it. He may experience years though only minutes have passed. He will then return toward physical reality in an area marked as REM sleep by your scientists, where physically oriented dream productions will be created, putting the knowledge he has gained into use. The cycle would then be

repeated. Almost the same kinds of fluctuations and stages occur even when you are waking, however, though you are even less aware of them because then the egotistical self acts quite purposefully to blanket out these other areas of experience.

The precise stages are present beneath waking awareness, however, and with the same chemical, electromagnetic, and hormonal fluctuations. You simply are not aware of what your consciousness is doing. You cannot yourselves keep track of it for five full moments of your time. The dimensions of it can only be sensed by those determined enough to take the time and effort required to journey through their own subjective realities. Yet intuitively each individual knows that a part of his experience escapes from him all the time. When you suddenly cannot remember a name that you should know, you have in essence the same kind of feeling of which you are always subconsciously aware.

The purpose of the Speakers is to help you correlate and understand this multidimensional existence, and to bring as much as possible of it to your conscious attention. Only by learning to feel, or sense, or intuitively perceive the depths of your own experience can you glimpse the nature of All That Is. By becoming more aware of your consciousness as it operates in physical life, you can learn to watch it as it manipulates through these other less familiar areas. Probable realities are only probable to you because you are not aware of them.

These stages of consciousness are all a part of your own reality. A knowledge of them can be most useful. You can learn to “shift gears,” stand aside from your own experience, and examine it with much better perspective. You can prepare questions or problems, suggesting that they be solved for you in the sleep state. You can suggest that you will speak with distant friends, or convey important messages that you cannot convey verbally, perhaps. You can bring about reconciliations, for example, at another layer of reality though you cannot do so in this one.

You can direct the healing of your body, telling yourself that this will be accomplished by you at one of the other levels of sleep consciousness, and you may ask for the aid of a Speaker to give you any necessary psychological guidance that is needed to maintain health. If you have particular conscious goals and if you are reasonably certain that they are beneficial ones, then you can suggest dreams in which they occur, for the dreams themselves will hasten their physical reality.

Now unconsciously you do many of these things. You often go back In time, so to speak, and “relive” a particular event so that it has a different ending, or say things that you wish you had said. A knowledge of one state of consciousness can help you in other states. In a light trance the meaning of dream symbols will be given if you ask for them. The symbols may then be used as methods of suggestion that will be tailored for you personally. If you discover, say, that a fountain in a dream represents refreshment, then when you are tired or depressed, think of a fountain. In another layer of reality, of course, you will be creating one.

In the most protected areas of sleep you are dealing with experience that is pure feeling or knowing, and disconnected from both words or images. As mentioned, these experiences are translated into dreams later, necessitating a return to areas of

consciousness more familiar with physical data. Here a great creative synthesis and a great creative diversification takes place, in which any given dream image has meaning to various layers of the self - on one level representing a truth you have lived and on other levels representing this truth as it is more specifically applied to various areas of experience or problems. There will be a metamorphosis, therefore, of one symbol turning into many, and the conscious mind may only perceive a chaos of various dream images, because the inner organization and unity is partially hidden in the other areas of consciousness through which the reasoning mind cannot follow.

The unconscious and subconscious areas, however, are aware of much more of this information than the ego, for it receives only the minute residue of dream material as a rule. The Speakers therefore may appear within dreams as historical characters, as prophets, as trusted old friends, or in whatever guise will impress the particular personality.

In the original experience, however, the true nature of the Speaker is apparent. The production of dreams is as “sophisticated” an endeavor as is the production of the objective life of a given individual. It is simply living on different terms.

These various stages of consciousness and fluctuations of psychic activity can also be examined through direct experience from the waking state. In the following chapter we will let you become more aware of these ever-active portions of your own reality.

CHAPTER 18

VARIOUS STAGES OF CONSCIOUSNESS,

SYMBOLISM, AND MULTIPLE FOCUS

Within your own personality all facets of your consciousness converge, whether or not you are aware of it.

Consciousness can be turned in many directions, obviously, both inward and outward. You are aware of fluctuations in your normal consciousness, and closer atten- tion would make some of this quite clear. You expand or narrow the scope of your attention constantly. You may focus upon one object almost to the exclusion of everything else at times, so that you literally are not conscious of the room in which you sit.

You may be “conscious” and reacting to a remembered event so strongly that you are relatively unaware of present events. You take all of these fluctuations for granted. They do not disturb you. If you are Lost in a book and unaware momentarily of your immediate environment, you are not afraid that it will be gone when you want to turn your attention back to it. Nor in a daydream do you usually worry about returning safely to the present moment.

To some extent, all of these are small examples of the mobility of your consciousness, and the ease with which it can be used. In a strange manner, symbols can be regarded as samples of the way you perceive it various levels of consciousness. Their changing guises can be used as signposts. Fire, for example, is a symbol made physical, so a real fire tells you obviously that you are perceiving reality with your physically attuned consciousness.

A mental picture of a fire automatically tells you that another kind of consciousness is involved. A fire mentally seen that has warmth but does not bum destructively obviously means something else. All symbols are an attempt to express feelings, feelings that can never be expressed adequately through language. Symbols represent the infinite variations of feelings, and in various stages of consciousness these will appear in different terms, but they will always accompany you.

There are several exceptions, however, in which pure knowing or pure feeling is involved without the necessity for symbols. These stages of consciousness are infrequent and seldom translated into normal conscious terms.

Let us take a particular feeling and follow it through as it might be expressed at various levels of consciousness. Begin with a feeling of joy. In normal consciousness, the immediate environment will be perceived in a far different manner than it would be, say, if an individual were in a state of depression. The feeling of joy changes the objects themselves, in that the perceiver sees them in a far brighter light. He creates the objects far more vividly and with greater clarity. In feedback fashion, the environment then seems to reinforce his joy. What he sees, however, is still physical, the objects of the material world. Pretend now that he begins to daydream and falls into a reverie. Into his inner mind come pictures or symbols of material objects, people or events, from perhaps the past as well as present and future imaginings, the joy now being expressed with greater freedom mentally, but with symbols.

The joy stretches out, so to speak, into the future, sheds also its light into the past, and may cover greater areas of expansion than could be shown in physical terms at that moment. Now imagine that our individual from his reverie falls either into a trance state or into a deep sleep. He may see images that are highly symbolic to him of joy or exuberance. Logically there may be little connection between them, but intuitively the connections are clear. He now enters into his mental experiences far more deeply than in the reverie state, and may have a series of dream episodes in which he is able to express his joy and share it with others.

He is still dealing with physically oriented symbols, however. Now since we are using this discussion as a case in point we will continue to follow it even further. He may form images of dream cities or people that are of a very joyful nature, translate the emotion itself into whatever symbols are pertinent to him. An exuberance may be translated into images of playing animals, flying people, or animals or landscapes of great beauty. Again, the logical connections will be lacking, but the entire episode will be connected by this emotion.

The physical body all the while is greatly benefitted, because the beneficial feelings automatically renew and replenish its recuperative abilities. The feelings of joy now may lead to images of Christ, Buddha, or the prophets. These symbols are the changing scenes characteristic of consciousness at various stages. The experiences are to be considered as creations; creative acts all native to consciousness at various stages.

Beyond this are states in which the symbols themselves begin to fade away, become indistinct, distant. Here you begin to draw into regions of consciousness in which symbols become less and less necessary, and it is a largely unpopulated area indeed. Representations blink off and on, and finally disappear. Consciousness is less and less physically oriented. In this stage of consciousness the soul finds itself alone with its own feelings, stripped of symbolism and representations, and begins to perceive the gigantic reality of its own knowing.

It feels direct experience. If we use joy as our example, all mental symbols and images of it would finally disappear. They had emerged from it, and would fall away from it, not being the original experience, but by-products. The soul would then begin to explore the reality of this joy in terms that can hardly be explained, and in so doing would learn methods of perception, expression, and actualization that would have been

utterly incomprehensible to it before.

Physical objects are the most obvious of your symbols, and precisely for that reason you do not realize that they are symbols at all.

At different levels, consciousness works with different kinds of symbols. Symbols are a method of expressing inner reality. Working in one direction the soul, using its consciousness, expresses inner reality through as many symbols as possible, through living, changing symbolism. Each symbol itself then is to its own extent conscious, individual, and aware.

In so doing, the soul continually creates new varieties of inner reality to be explored. Working in the opposite direction, so to speak, the soul divests itself of all symbols, all representations, and using its consciousness in a different way learns to probe its own direct experience. Without symbols to come between it and experience, it perfects itself in a kind of value fulfillment that you presently cannot understand except symbolically.

Now these efforts go on whether you wake or sleep. Once you are aware of these activities, however, it is possible to catch yourself in various stages of consciousness, and even at times to follow your own progress, particularly through dream states. Your body is your most intimate symbol at this point, and again your most obvious.

You will use the idea of a body in most stages of consciousness. When you leave your physical body in any kind of out-of-body experience, you actually leave it in another that is only slightly less Physical. This in turn is “later” discarded for one still less physical, but the idea of the form is so important a symbol that you carry it through all of your religious literature, and stories of hereafter.

At one point it will vanish with the other symbols. Now there was a time, speaking in your terms, before the making of symbols; a time so divorced from your idea of reality that only in the most protected areas of sleep does any memory of it ever return. It seems to you that without symbols there would be nonbeing, but this is a natural enough deduction since you are so symbol-oriented.

Those stages of consciousness that occur after death still all deal with symbols, though there is much greater freedom in their use, and greater understanding of their meaning. But in higher stages of consciousness, the symbols are no longer necessary, and creativity takes place completely without their use.

Obviously you cannot become aware of that stage of consciousness now, but you can keep track of the way symbols appear to you in both waking life and the dream state, and learn to connect them with the feelings they represent. You will learn that certain symbols will appear personally to you at various stages of consciousness, and these can serve as points of recognition in your own explorations. When Ruburt is about to leave his body from the dream state for example, he will often find himself in a strange house or apartment that offers opportunities for exploration.

The houses or apartments will always be different, and yet the symbol is always a signpost that he has reached a particular point of consciousness, and is ready to enter another state of consciousness. Each of you will have certain symbols that serve the same kind of purpose, highly individual to you. Unless you make an effort at self- exploration, however, these symbolic guideposts will make no conscious sense.

Some such symbols stay with you for life. Some in periods of great change may also alter their character, bringing forth a certain feeling of disorientation as these unconsciously familiar symbols undergo transformation. The same sort of thing applies to your physical living. A dog may be a symbol to you of natural joy, for example, or of freedom. After seeing an accident in which a dog is killed, then dogs may mean something entirely different to you.

This of course is obvious, but the same sort of symbol changing may occur within dreams. The dog’s accident may be a dream experience, for that matter, that then changes your conscious symbolic feeling toward dogs in the waking state. One person may symbolize fear as a demon, as an unfriendly animal, or even as some perfectly simple ordinarily harmless object; but if you know what your own symbols mean, then you can use the knowledge not only to interpret your dreams but also as signposts to the state of consciousness in which they usually occur.

These symbols will change, therefore, in various stages of consciousness. Again, the logical sequence is not present, but the intuitive creation will change the symbols much in the way that an artist might change his colors.

All symbols stand for inner realities, therefore, and when you juggle symbols, you are juggling inner realities. Any exterior move that you make is made within the interior environment, within all the interior environments with which you are involved.

Symbols are highly charged psychic particles and that includes physical objects that have strong characteristics of attraction and expansion, that stand for inner realizations and realities that have not been perceived through direct knowing. (By direct knowing here, I mean instant cognition and comprehension, without symbolization.)

Even the symbols, then, at various stages of consciousness will appear differently, some seeking to have stability and permanence as your physical objects, following the principles or root assumptions of corporeal reality, and some changing much more quickly, as in the dream state, these being more immediate and sensitive indicators of feeling. Various states of consciousness seem to have their own environments in which these symbols appear, again, as objects appear in a physical environment.

Seemingly nonstable mental objects appear in the dream environment at certain levels. The symbols follow rules then in both cases. As mentioned earlier, again, the dream universe is as “objective” as the corporeal one. The objects and symbols within it are as faithful representations of dream life as physical objects are of waking life.

The nature of the symbol, therefore, can serve as an indication not only as to your environment but your state of consciousness within it. In normal dreaming within the context of an ordinary dream drama, the objects seem permanent enough to you. You take them for granted. You are still physically oriented. You project upon dream images the symbolism of your waking hours.

In other states of dream consciousness, however, houses may suddenly disappear. A modem building may suddenly replace a shack. A child may turn into a tulip. Now the symbols are obviously behaving in a different manner. In this environment, permanency is not a root assumption. Logical sequence does not apply.

Symbols that behave in this way can be clues to you that you are now at another

stage of consciousness, and within an entirely different interior environment. Expression of feelings and of experiences are not limited to the rigid framework of objects stuck into consecutive moments. Feelings are automatically transformed and expressed in a new, mobile, immediate manner. In a way the tune of consciousness is quicker.

Actualization does not need to wait for hours or days. Experience is free from a time context. In this realm of consciousness an entire book may be written, or one’s life plans thoroughly scrutinized. Your present time is one of many dimensions that help form this particular stage of consciousness. Therefore your past, present and future exist within it, but only as portions of that interior environment. You have to learn your way about, for the states of consciousness and their environment stretch out in their own way as your world stretches out, say, in space. It is not difficult, however, to be aware of yourself in this stage through giving yourself proper suggestions before sleep.

To some extent this transmutation of symbol can be observed in various stages of waking consciousness also. When you are at rest, awake but with eyes closed, images and pictures will often appear to your inner eye. Some will be physical-like materializations, images of trees or houses or people. Others will be simply shapes that change swiftly and seem to flow one into the other. As a rule, even the images that are recognizable will quickly be replaced by others in a kaleidoscope of constantly changing forms.

There may seem to you to be no logic to these inner pictures, and certainly no connection between them and what you were thinking a moment before, or even an hour before. To some extent they seem disconnected from you and not of your doing. Often, however, they represent the characteristics shown by consciousness when it is somewhat turned away from physical stimuli. The form of symbols is changed as the states of consciousness change.

The images that you see in this circumstance represent the thoughts and feelings experienced just before you closed your eyes, or those that were paramount in your mind somewhat previously. The minute your eyes are closed, the thoughts and feelings express themselves through this symbolism. Because the images may seem to have no direct connection logically to these thoughts and feelings, you do not recognize them either as your own, nor are you able to tie them up with what they represent.

I am putting this rather simply here. Imaginatively you have greater freedom to express feelings than you do practically. An earlier particular fear felt during the day involving, say, a loss of a job may then be translated when you close your eyes into a series of seemingly unrelated symbols, all however connected to that one fear.

You may see in a quick series of pictures a deep hole in the ground. It may be replaced by a street urchin, obviously poor and from another century. A casket may appear, or a black wallet fly through the air. You may see a severe, dark, wintry scene. The picture of a character from an old book long forgotten may appear and disappear. In between may be a grouping of opposing symbols, representing your hope - a spring flower, a table loaded with food, a new suit of clothes, any sign of abundance that would have meaning to you. Nowhere would the thought of the potential loss of a job enter in.

It would seem to you that you had forgotten it.

Through the use of symbols, however, your feelings would be given full play, each image rising and falling in flow with feelings so far underneath consciousness - pools of emotion - that you were not aware of them. They would automatically bring about these images however. Now with reflection you could connect these with their origin, but usually they would pass you by.

If you let yourself lie still longer with eyes closed, the symbolism would continue to change character, losing perhaps some of its visual characteristics and growing more intense in other directions. You might think you smell a particular odor, for example, that is distasteful to you (following through with the situation as given). You might, instead, translate the fear into a frightening physical sensation, and suddenly feel that you are falling, or that something unpleasant touched you.

Any of these changing characteristics of symbols should alert you to the altered state of your consciousness. If you let yourself drift off into sleep here, you would most probably manufacture two or three dreams that symbolized the fear, dreams in which you consider and try out possible solutions within the dream context. The job situation might never appear as such within any of the dreams, of course.

Still, to the unconscious the problem has been set and given. In the following deep protected areas of sleep, the higher centers of the inner self are allowed to function and come to the aid of the three-dimensionally oriented portion of the personality. This more liberated self sees the situation much more clearly, suggests a given line of action (but does not order it), and informs the dreaming self. The dreaming self then manufactures a group of dreams in which the solution is stated within a symbolic dream situation.

The final and more specific interpretation is done in areas of dreaming closer to the waking self, when the symbols grow more and more specific. There is a much more narrow aspect to symbolism, therefore: The closer you get to waking consciousness, the more limited and narrow the symbol. The handier it is in a given physical circumstance, the less valuable it is as a waking lifetime characteristic symbol.

To some extent the more precise a symbol is, the less meaning it can contain. In the most important dream work, done in the deep protected sleep periods, the symbols are powerful enough and yet condensed enough so that they can be broken down, used in a series of seemingly unrelated dreams as connectives, retain their original strength and still appear in different guises, becoming in each succeeding dream layer more and more specific.

Now even as you go about your day, your consciousness fluctuates, and you can catch yourself “symbolizing” in these different ways if you get in the habit of observing but not interpreting the state of your mind. Each physical event that has happened to you is filed away within your psyche as a definite group of symbols. These do not represent the experience, they contain the experience. These represent your personal symbol bank as far as your present life is concerned.

There is a great unity between your daytime symbols and your dreaming ones. In a miraculous shorthand, many symbols carry the burden of far more than one experience, of course, and one symbol will therefore evoke not only one given

experience, but similar ones. Personal association, therefore, is highly involved with your personal bank of symbols, and it operates in the dream states precisely as In waking life - but with greater freedom, and drawing from the future, in your terms, as well as from the past.

Therefore, you have greater use of symbolism in the dream state, for you are aware of past and future symbols. These vary in intensity; Often they cluster together. Such multidimensional symbols will appear then in many ways, not simply visually. They will affect not only your own Physical reality, but all realities in which you are involved. In a manner f speaking the symbols that you know are but the tail end of greater symbols.

Resume dictation. When I referred to your personal bank of symbols, I meant to specify that this bank was yours from the day of your birth and before. It contained the symbols of your past existences in your terms (and in your terms, you add to it in this life). This bank of symbols must be activated, however. For example, you have visual images when you are born, internal visual images, symbols that are activated the moment you open your eyes for the first time. These serve you as learning mechanisms. You keep trying to utilize your eyes properly until exterior images conform with the inner patterns. This is extremely important, and not understood by your scientists.

The eye-opening activates the inner mechanism. If there is something wrong physically with the eyes, if they are blind for example, then that particular mechanism is not activated at that time. The personality may have chosen to be bom blind for his own reasons. If those reasons change, or if inner psychic developments occur, then the physical eyes will be healed and the inner mechanism activated. There are endless varieties of behavior along these lines. The inner banks of symbols, however, operate as a drawing account, latent unless you take advantage of them. You think before you leam language, as I mentioned earlier in this book, but you already have at your psychic fingertips past experiences from other lifetimes to guide you.

Those who are born into the same nationality, say twice consecutively, learn to speak much quicker the second time around. Some infants will think in the language of a past life before the new language is learned. All of this has to do with the use of symbols.

Sound is itself a symbol. You understand that from a given point of silence, sound begins and grows louder. What you do not understand is that from that given point of silence, which is your point of non-perception, sounds also begin that grow deeper and deeper into silence, yet still have meaning and as much variety as the sounds that you know, and these are also symbols. The thought unspoken has a “sound” that

you do not hear, but that is very audible at another level of reality and perception.

Trees as they stand are a sound that, again, you do not perceive. In your dreams and particularly beyond those dreams that you recall, are areas of consciousness in which these sounds are automatically perceived and translated into visual images. They operate as a sort of shorthand. Given certain sounds, you could recreate your universe as you know it unconsciously, and any one multidimensional symbol can contain all the reality that you know.

Physically, smell, sight, and sound are combined together to give you your main sense data and compose your physical senses. At other levels, however, these are

separated. Odors therefore have a visual reality, and, as you know, visual data can also be perceived in terms of other sense perceptions.

The symbols can come together or fly apart, can be perceived separately or as a unity. As each event has its own symbol for you, so you have your characteristic way of combining these. These symbols can be translated and perceived in many terms; as a series of notes for example, as a combination of senses, as a series of images. At various stages of consciousness you will perceive the symbols in different terms. The multidimensional symbol in its entirety, then, has a reality in other states of consciousness, but also at other levels of reality entirely.

You operate as if your thoughts were secret, though you should know by now that they are not. Not only are your thoughts apparent through telepathic communications, for example, but without your conscious awareness they also form what you may call pseudoimages “beneath” the range of physical matter as you normally perceive it in some cases, or “above” this same range.

It is, therefore, as if your thoughts appear within other realities as objects - alive and vital in themselves, growing into other systems as flowers or trees grow up seemingly from nothing within physical reality. These can then be used as the raw material, so to speak, in certain other systems. They are the given “natural data,” the raw material of creativity in the realities that you help seed but do not perceive.

In this manner of speaking, your thoughts then follow laws. Their behavior follows laws, and their activities, that you do not understand, though you call your thoughts your own. They are then manipulated, independently of you, by other kinds of consciousness as ever-changing natural phenomena. The native consciousness within such systems is not aware of the origin of this phenomena, nor of your own reality. They take the evidence that appears to their senses as reality, as most of you do. It would not occur to them that this phenomenon originated outside of their own system.

If I were to make the same statement for example to any of my readers, I would be accused of saying that physical reality was composed of the discards of the universe.

I am not saying that, nor implying it in the case just mentioned. In your system you have a direct hand in the formation of physical reality. Your natural given data is the result of individual, mass, and collective thoughts, feelings, and emotions, materialized. Your system in this respect is more creative than the systems just mentioned. On the other hand, within these other systems there is a strong innovative group consciousness developing, in which identity is retained but greater inner play allowed between individuals, a large creative interchange of symbol-pools, a drawing upon mental and psychic symbols with greater facility. Because of this, these individuals recognize more clearly the connection between creative images and given sense data. They purposely alter and change their given sense data, and experiment with it.

All of this involves a working with symbols in a most intimate manner. At certain levels of your personality you are aware of all the different ways in which symbols are used, not only in your system but in others. As mentioned earlier, no system of reality is closed. Your thoughts and images and feelings therefore alter the given sense data in some other systems.

The innovative patterns developed in those systems, however, can be to some extent perceived within your own. There are constant bleed-throughs. In your various stages of consciousness you pass through areas that can be correlated with many of these systems. Some stages through which you pass are native stages to other kinds of consciousness, and while passing through these you will find yourself using symbols in the way that is characteristic of that level.

Symbols should be fluid, ever-changing in their form. Some -an be used as casements to house original experiences, as methods of deception therefore rather than illumination. When this happens fear is always involved.

Fear taken into the various stages of consciousness acts as a distorting lens, hiding the natural dimensions of all symbols, acting as a barrier and as an impediment to free flow. Symbols of an explosive nature serve as releasing agents, setting loose that which has been encased. Without physical storms you would all go insane.

The aggressive nature of symbols is little understood, nor the relationship between aggression and creativity. These are far from opposing characteristics, and without an aggressive thrust, symbols would lack their high mobility. They would exist in a permanent kind of environment.

It is both the creative and aggressive aspects of consciousness that allow it to use symbols, to move through various levels of experience, and the aggressive nature of thought that so propels it, despite your knowledge, into realities that you do not understand.

Aggressiveness and passivity are both behind symbols of birth, for both are needed. They are both beneath symbols of death, though this is not understood. Inertia results when aggressiveness and creativity are not in the proper proportions, when consciousness leans too severely in one direction or another, when the flow of symbols is either too quick or too slow for the particular psychological environment in which you dwell.

Pauses then occur. To put it as simply as possible, there is an almost inconceivable moment in which a no-reality occurs, in which

a symbol is caught between motion and no motion, a time of uncertainty. This is of course translated in many ways, and reflected. In such periods, certain symbols can be lost to all intents and purposes, dropping out of an individual’s experience, leaving gaps of inertia.

These gaps exist quite literally in many systems. You encounter them on many levels. You may find yourself experiencing a state of consciousness, for example, in which nothing seems to happen, and no psychological landscape or recognizable symbols occur. These exist not only psychologically or psychically, but as blank areas in terms of space. The spaces may be filled finally with new symbols. If you are perceptive enough, you can sometimes catch yourselves encountering such states of reality in which nothing appears and no signs of any consciousness outside of your own is apparent.

Such blank spots can be seeded with new symbols, and are often used as channels through which new creative ideas and inventions are inserted. These gaps are

recognized by others, therefore, and viewed as dark spaces. They also represent areas of no resistance for those mind-travelers who are probing inner realities. They represent uncluttered areas, but also open channels, inactive in themselves but passively waiting. Now some symbols also wait in such a passive manner to be activated.

They represent future experience, in your terms, that presently lies latent. These blank spots of inertia, therefore, are creative to some extent, in that these other symbols may swim into view within them.

CHAPTER 19

ALTERNATE PRESENTS AND MULTIPLE FOCUS

Let us begin with the normal waking consciousness that you know. But one step away from this is another level of consciousness into which you all slip without knowing. We will call it “A-l.” It is adjacent to your normal consciousness, separated from it very slightly; and yet in it very definite effects can appear that are not present in your usual state.

At this level many abilities may be used, and the present moment can be experienced in many different fashions, using as a basis the physical data with which you are already familiar. In your normal state you see the body. In A-l your consciousness can enter the body of another, and heal it. You can in the same manner perceive the state of your own Physical image. You can, according to your abilities, manipulate matter from the inside consciously, with lucidity and alertness.

A-l may be used as a side platform, so to speak, from which you can view physical events from a clearer standpoint. Using it you are released momentarily from bodily pressures, and with that freedom, you can move to relieve them. Problems that seem beyond solution can often, though not always, be solved. Suggestions given are much more effective. It is easier to form images, and they have a greater mobility. A-l is a sidestep away, therefore, and yet an important one.

Now it can be used as the first of a series of steps, leading to “deeper” states of consciousness. It can also be used as the first of a series of adjacent steps. Each of the deeper layers of consciousness can also be used as first steps leading to other adjacent levels. A-l is simple to enter. When you listen to music that you like, when you are indulging in an enjoyable quiet pursuit, you can sense the different feeling. It may be accompanied by your own characteristic physical clues. You may tap your fingers in a certain way. There may be a particular gesture. You may stare or look dreamily to the left or right.

Any such physical clues can help you differentiate between this state of consciousness and the usual predominating one. You have only to recognize it, learn to hold it, and then proceed to experiment in its use. As a rule, it is still physically oriented, in that the abilities are usually directed toward the inner perception and manipulation of matter or physical environment. You can therefore perceive the present

moment from a variety of unique standpoints not usually available.

You can perceive the moment’s reality as it exists for your intestine, or your hand; and experience, with practice, the present inner peace and commotion that exist simultaneously within your physical body. This brings a great appreciation and wonder, a sense of unity with the living corporeal material of which you are physically composed. With practice you can become as intuitively aware of your internal physical environment, as [of ] your external physical environment.

With greater practice, the contents of your own mind will become as readily available. You will see your thoughts as clearly as your inner organs. In this case you may perceive them symbolically through symbols you will recognize, seeing jumbled thoughts for example as weeds, which you can then simply discard.

You can request that the thought content of your mind be translated into an intense image, symbolically representing individual thoughts and the overall mental landscape, then take out what you do not like and replace it with more positive images. This does not mean that this inner landscape must always be completely sunny, but it does mean that it should be well balanced.

A dark and largely brooding inner landscape should alert you, so that you begin immediately to change it. None of these accomplishments are beyond my readers, though anyone may find any one given feat more difficult than another. You must also realize that I am speaking in practical terms. You can correct a physical condition for example, in the manner just given. If so, however, by examining the inner landscape of thoughts, you would find the source here that initially brought about the physical ailment.

Feelings can be examined in the same way. They will appear differently, with much greater mobility. Thoughts, for example, may appear as stationary structures, as flowers or trees, houses or landscapes. Feelings will appear more often in the changing mobility of water, wind, weather, skies and changing color. Any physical ailment, then, can be perceived in this state by looking inward into the body and discovering it; then by changing what you see you may find yourself entering your body or another’s as a very small miniature, or as a point of light, or simply without any substance, yet aware of the inner body environment.

You change what needs to be changed in whatever way occurs to you, then - by directing the body’s energy in that direction, by entering the flesh and bringing certain portions together that need this adjustment, by manipulating areas of the spine. Then from this adjacent platform of A-l consciousness, you perceive the mental thought patterns of yourself or the other person in whatever way you find characteristic of you.

You may perceive the thought patterns as quickly flashing sentences or words that are usually seen within your mind or within the other mind, or as black letters that form words. Or you may hear the words and thoughts being expressed, or you may see the earlier mentioned “landscape” in which the thoughts symbolically form into a picture.

This will show you how the thoughts brought about the physical malady, and which ones were involved. The same thing should then be done with the feeling pattern. This

may be perceived as bursts of dark or light colors in motion, or simply one particular emotion of great force may be felt. If it is very strong, one emotion may be felt in many such guises. In the case of both thoughts and emotions, with great confidence you pluck out those that are connected with the malady. In such a manner you have made adjustments on three levels.

A-l may be used also as a great framework for creativity, concentration, study, refreshment, rest and meditation. You may evolve your own image of this state to help you, imagining it as a room or a pleasant landscape or platform. Spontaneously, you will find your own symbol for this state.

This state may be used also as a step to the next state of consciousness, leading to a deeper trance condition; still relating however to the reality system that you understand.

Or it may be used as a step leading to an adjacent level of consciousness; two steps away, therefore, on the same level from normal reality. In this case it will lead you not into a deeper examination and perception of the present moment, but instead into an awareness and recognition of what I will call alternate present moments.

You will be taking steps aside from the present that you know. This leads to explorations mentioned earlier in this book, into probabilities. This state can be extremely advantageous when you are trying to solve problems having to do with future arrangements, decisions that will affect the future, and any matters, in fact, in which important decisions for the future must be made. In this state you are able to try out various alternative decisions and some probable results, not imaginatively but in quite practical terms.

These probabilities are realities, regardless of which decision you make. Say, for example, that you have three choices and it is imperative that you select one. Using this state, you take the first choice. The alternative present is the moment in which you make that choice. Having made it the present is changed, and quite clearly you perceive exactly the way it is changed and what actions and events will flow from the change into the future that belongs to that particular alternate present.

You do the same with each of the other choices, all from the framework of that state of consciousness. The methods in each case are the same. You make the decision. You then become aware in whatever way you choose of the physical effects within your body. You enter the body as you did in the way I gave earlier for healing. With great sensitivity you are able to see what physical effect the decision will have - whether the state of the body remains the same, whether there is a great sense of health within it, or the incipient beginning of great difficulties.

In like manner you explore the mental and feeling aspects, then you turn your attention “outward,” toward the environment that results from this alternate present. Mentally, events will appear to you. You may experience these strongly, or merely view them. They may become so vivid that you momentarily forget yourself, but if you maintain your contact with this level of consciousness, this will happen seldom. As a rule you are very aware of what you are doing.

According to the situation, you can do the same thing to find out the effect of this

decision on others specifically. You then return to normal consciousness, going through the A -I state that you used as a preliminary. After a period of rest, return and make the second decision, and again the third, following through in the same manner. Then in your normal state of consciousness, of course, you make the decision that you want from the information and experience that you have received.

The names make little difference. For simplicity’s sake call this level of consciousness A-l-a.

There is an A-l-b, you see, still adjacent to this one, and still starting off from an alternate present that can be used for many other purposes.

It is not as easy for the ordinary individual to enter, and it deals with group presents, with mass probabilities, racial matters, the movement of civilization. It is one that would be most beneficial to politicians and statesmen, and it also can be used to probe into probable pasts as well. Here it would be of benefit in learning of old ruins for exam- ple, and vanished civilizations, but only if the specific probable past were probed in which these existed.

The next adjacent level now would be A-l-c, which is an extension of the one just given, in which there is greater freedom of action, mobility and experience. Here to some extent there is some participation in the events perceived. There is no need to go deeply into any of these beyond this point, because ordinarily you will not be involved with them, and they lead into realities that have little reference to your own. They are states of consciousness too divorced, and under usual circumstances, this is as far as your present consciousness is able to go in that particular direction.

The first state, A-l-a, is the most practical and the easiest for you, but often you must still have a good feeling for the A-l level before you are willing to take that next adjacent step. It allows for great expansion, however, within its limitations. Using it, you can discover for example what would have happened if “I did this or the other.” Remember, these are all adjacent levels, going out horizontally.

Directly beneath A-l, now, you will have A-2, which is a slightly deeper state, using the analogy of up and down direction. It is less physically oriented than A-l. You still have excellent lucidity and awareness. This state can be used to explore the past in your terms of reference, within the probable system that you know.

Reincarnational pasts are known to you here, and if some personal malady cannot be solved from A-l, you may have to go to A-2 discovering that it originated from another existence. This state is distinguished by a slower breathing pattern and, unless other directions are given, by a somewhat lowered temperature and longer alpha waves; a slower frequency.

There is still relation to environment, however, and awareness of it. This may be purposely blocked off for greater efficiency, but it is not necessary. In many cases the eyes may be open, for example, though it may be easier to close them. Here sensitivity is quickened. Without necessarily following the methods given in A-l, the mental, physical and feeling aspects of past personalities will appear.

They may be perceived in various ways according to the characteristics of the individual who is in this state. This can be used to discover the origin of an idea in the

past, or to find anything that has been lost there, as long as it is within your probability system.

Directly beneath this is A-3. You have an extension, again, here dealing with mass issues - movements of land, the history of your planet as you know it, the knowledge of the races that inhabited it, the history of the animals, the layers of gas and coal, and of the various ages that swept across the planet and changed it.

A-4 brings you to a level that is beneath matter formations, a level in which ideas and concepts can be perceived, although their representations do not appear in the present physical reality that you know.

From this layer many of the deepest inspirations come. These ideas and concepts, having their own electromagnetic identity, nevertheless appear as “the symbolic landscape” at this level of consciousness. This is difficult to explain. The thoughts do not appear as pseudoimages for example, or assume any pseudomaterialization, yet they are felt vividly, perceived and picked up by portions of the brain - those seemingly unused portions for which science has found no answer.

These ideas and concepts obviously came from consciousness. However, they represent incipient latent developments that may or may not occur in physical reality. They may or may not be perceived by any given individual. The characteristic interest and abilities of the personality involved will have much to do with his recognition of the realities within this layer of consciousness.

The material available, however, represents building blocks for many probable systems. It is an open area into which many other dimensions have access. It often becomes available in sleep states. Complete innovations, world-shattering inventions - these all lie waiting, so to speak, in this huge reservoir. Strong personal “conversions” are often effected from this level.

Now any individual can pass through these levels and remain relatively untouched and unaware, can travel through them unperceiving. The overall intentions and characteristics of the personality will determine the quality of perception and understanding. The material mentioned is available in each of the levels of consciousness given, but it must be sought out, either through conscious desire or strong unconscious desire. If it is not, then the gifts available and the potentials simply remain unused and unclaimed.

The states of consciousness merge also one into the other, and it is obvious that I am using the terms of depth to make the discussion easier. Starting with the ego or waking consciousness as the outer self focused toward exterior reality, these states are broad, more like plains to be explored. Each one, therefore, opens in great adjacent areas also, and there are many “paths” to be taken according to your interest and desire.

As your ordinary waking state perceives an entire universe of physical data, so each of these other states of consciousness perceive realities as complicated, varied, and vivid. It is for this reason that it is so difficult to explain the experiences possible within any given one.

A-5 opens up a dimension in which the vital consciousness of any personality can at least theoretically be contacted. This involves communicating not only with past

personalities in your terms, but future ones. It is a level of consciousness very seldom reached. It is not, for example, the layer used by most mediums. It is a meeting ground in which personalities from any time or place or probable system can communicate with each other in clear terms understood by all.

Since past, present, and future do not exist, this is a level of crystal clear communication of consciousness. Those involved have an excellent knowledge of their own backgrounds and histories, of course, but in this state possess also a much larger perspective, in which private and historical backgrounds are seen as a portion of a greater perceivable whole.

At this level, messages literally flash through the centuries from one great man or woman to another. The future speaks to the past. The great artists have always been able to communicate at this level and while living literally operated at this level of consciousness a good deal of the time. Only the most exterior portions of their personalities bowed to the dictates of historical period.

For those who reach this state and utilize it, communication is clearest. It must be understood that this communication works in both ways. Leonardo da Vinci knew of Picasso, for example. There are great men and women who go unknown. Their contemporaries ignore them.

Their achievements may be misunderstood or physically lost, but at this level of consciousness they share in these communications, and at another level of existence their achievements are recognized.

I do not mean to imply, however, that only the great share in this communication of consciousness. A great simplicity is necessary, and out of this, many of the most lowly in men’s terms also share in these communications. There is an unending conversation going on throughout the universe, and a most meaningful one. Those from both your past and your future have a hand in your present world, and at this level the problems that have been met and will be encountered are being discussed. This is the heart of communication. It is most usually encountered either in a protected deep level of sleep or in a sudden spontaneous trance state. Great energy is generated.

The information received in any of these states of consciousness must be interpreted for the normal waking consciousness, if any physical memory is to be maintained.

In many cases memory remains unconscious as far as waking self is concerned, but the experiences themselves can completely change the structure of an individual life. Disastrous courses can be averted through such inner communications and illuminations, whether or not the ego is aware of them.

The experiences at these various levels may be interpreted symbolically. They may appear in the form of fantasy, fiction, or art work, without the conscious self realizing their origin. Now at any of these various stages of consciousness, other phenomena may also be perceived - thought forms for example, energy manifestations, projections from the personal subconscious, and projections from the collective unconscious. Any or all of these may take symbolic form, and may appear beneficial or threatening according to the attitude of the personality involved. They should be regarded as quite natural phenomena, often neutral in intent.

Often they are incipient forms given activity by the personality who encounters them. The nature of their activity, therefore, will be projected outward from the personality onto the relatively passive materialization. The person encountering these has only to turn his attention away to “deactivate” the phenomenon. This does not mean that the phenomenon is not real. Its nature is simply of a different kind and degree.

It has some energy of its own, but needs additional energy from a perceiver for any interrelationship to take place. If such a materi aliz ation appears threatening, then simply wish it peace and withdraw your attention from it. It draws its main activating energy from your focusing, and according to the intensity and nature of your focus. You must not take the root assumptions of physical existence with you as you journey through these levels of consciousness. Divest yourself of as many of them as possible, for they can cause you to misinterpret your experiences.

There are other layers of awareness beneath this one, but here there is a much greater tendency for one to merge into the other. In the next level, for example, communication is possible with various kinds of consciousness that have never been physically manifested, in your terms - personalities who do not have a physical reality in either your present or future, yet who are connected with your system of reality both as guardians and custodians.

Almost all experiences from this level will be symbolically represented, for otherwise they would have no meaning to you. The experiences will all have to do in one way or another with nonphysical life, noncorporeal consciousness and forms, and the independence of consciousness from matter. These experiences will always be supportive. Out-of-body experiences will often be involved here, in which the pro- jectionist finds himself in an unearthly environment or one of great beauty and grandeur.

The “stuff of the environment will have its origin in the mind of the projectionist, being symbolic of his idea, for example, of life after death. A Speaker or Speakers will appear in whatever guise will be most acceptable to the projectionist, whether it be the guise of a god, an angel or a disciple. This is the most characteristic kind of experience from this level.

According to the abilities and understanding of the projectionist, however, more thorough messages can be given, and it may be quite obvious that the Speakers are indeed only symbols of greater identities. Some will be able to understand the communications more clearly. The true nature of the nonphysical Speakers may then be made known.

Deeper projections into that environment may then be possible. In this state also great vistas of historic pasts and futures may be seen. All of these levels of consciousness are filled with the tapestry of various communications that can be followed through according to the purpose of the personality involved.

Molecular structures send out their own messages, and unless you are tuned in to perceive them, they may be interpreted as static or meaningless noise. Any one of these levels of consciousness can be covered in a twinkling, and no notice taken of it; or, at least theoretically, you could spend a lifetime exploring any given level.

You may have several quite valid experiences in level four for example, without any awareness of the first three. The stages are there for those who know what they are and how to use them. Many quite spontaneously find their own way. The other adjacent levels on the horizontal line, now, involve you in various alternate realities, each one a greater distance from your own. Many of these involve systems in which life and death as you know it does not occur, where time is felt as weight; systems in which the root assumptions are so different from your own that you would only accept any experiences as fantasy.

For this reason, you are much less apt to travel in those directions. In some there are built-in impediments. Even projection from your universe into a universe of antimatter is most difficult, for example. The electromagnetic makeup even of your thoughts would be adversely affected, and yet theoretically this is possible from one of these adjacent levels of consciousness.

Often you visit such areas of consciousness in the dream state where you fall into them spontaneously, remembering in the morning a fantastic dream. Consciousness must use all of its parts and activities, even as the body must. When you are sleeping, therefore, your consciousness turns itself in many of these directions, often perceiving, willy-nilly, bits and pieces of reality that are available to it at its different stages. This also happens beneath your normal physical focus to some extent, even as you go about your waking activities. The alternate presents of which I spoke are not simply alternate methods of perceiving one objective present. There are many alternate presents, with you focused only in one of them.

When you let your attention waver, however, you may often fall into a state in which you momentarily perceive glimpses of another alternate present. The whole self, the soul, knows of its reality in all such systems, and you, as a part of it, are working toward the same state of self-awareness and development.

When you are proficient you will not be swept willy-nilly into other stages of consciousness as you sleep, but will be able to understand and direct these activities. Consciousness is an attribute of the soul, a tool that can be turned in many directions. You are not your consciousness. It is something that belongs to you and to the soul. You are learning to use it. To the extent that you understand and utilize the various aspects of consciousness, you will learn to understand your own reality, and the conscious self will truly become conscious.

You will be able to perceive physical reality because you want to, knowing it to be one of many realities. You will not be forced to perceive it alone, out of ignorance.

The various levels of consciousness discussed here may appear to be very divorced from ordinary waking ones. The divisions are quite arbitrary. These various stages all represent different attributes and directions inherent within your own soul; clues and hints of them, shadows and reflections appear even in the consciousness that you know. Even normal waking consciousness, then, is not innocent of all other traces of existence, or devoid of other kinds of awareness. It is only because you usually use your waking consciousness in limited ways that you do not encounter these clues with any regularity.

They are always present. Following them can give you some idea of those other directions, and those other levels of which we have spoken. Often, for example, seemingly unrelated symbols or images may rise into your mind. Usually you ignore them. If instead you acknowledge them and turn your attention to them, you can follow them to several other layers, at least, for example, A-l and A-2, with ease.

The symbols or images may change as you do so, so that you perceive little similarity between, say, the initial image and the next one. The connection may be highly intuitional, however, associative, and creative. Often a few moments’ reflection afterward will allow you to see why the one image merged into the other. A single image may suddenly open up into an entire mental landscape, but you will know none of this if you do not acknowledge the first clues that are just beneath present awareness, and almost transparent if you are only willing to look.

Alternate focus is merely a state in which you turn your consciousness in other than its habitual direction, in order to perceive quite legitimate realities that exist simultaneously with your own. You must alter your perception to perceive any reality that is not geared practically toward material form. This is something like looking out of the comer of your eye or mind, rather than straight ahead.

Using alternate focus, with practice it is possible to perceive the different physical formations that have filled any given area of space, or that will fill it in your terms. In some dream states you may visit a particular location and then perceive the location as it was, say, three centuries ago and five years hence, and never understand what the dream meant. It seems to you that space can be filled only by a given item at a time, that one must be removed to. make room for another.

Instead you only perceive in this fashion. In alternate focus you can dispense with the root assumptions that usually guard, direct, and limit your perception. You are able to step aside from the moment as you know it, and return to it and find it there. Consciousness only pretends to bow to the idea of time. At other levels it enjoys playing with such concepts and perceiving great unity from events that occur outside of a time context - mixing, for example, events from various centuries, finding harmony and points of contact by examining both historical and private environments, plucking them out of the time framework.

Again, you even do this in your sleep. If you do not do it in the waking state, it is because you have held your consciousness in too tight a rein.

As mentioned somewhat earlier in this book, while your normal waking consciousness seems continual to you, and you are aware usually of no blank spots, nevertheless it has great fluctuations. To a large extent it has memory only of itself and its own perceptions. In normal consciousness, then, it seems as if there are no real other kinds of consciousness, no other areas or levels. When it encounters “blank spots” and “returns,” it blots out awareness that the moment of nonfunction occurred.

It forgets the stumble. It cannot be aware of alternate kinds of consciousness while being itself, unless methods are taken that allow it to recover from this amnesia.

It plays hopscotch in and out of reality. It is gone sometimes and you are not aware of it. On such occasions your attention is focused elsewhere, in what you might call

mini-dreams or hallucinations, or associative and intuitive processes of thought that go quite beyond normal focus.

In these lapses you are perceiving other kinds of reality - with other than normal waking consciousness. When you return, you lose the thread. Normal waking consciousness pretends there was never any break. This happens with some regularity, and to varying degrees, from fifteen to fifty times an hour, according to your activities.

At various times many people do catch themselves, the experience being so vivid that it leaps the gap, so to speak, with perception so intense that even normal waking consciousness is made aware of it. These intervals are quite necessary to physical consciousness. They are woven through the fabric of your awareness so cleverly and so intimately that they color your psychic and feeling atmosphere.

Normal waking consciousness weaves in and out of this infinite supportive webwork. Your inner experience is so intricate that verbally it almost impossible to describe. Normal waking consciousness, while having memory of itself, obviously does not retain all memory all of the time. It is said that memory of past events drops back into the subconscious. It is still intensely alive, and by alive I mean living and active, although you do not focus upon it.

Inner portions of your personality also have memory of all of your dreams. These exist simultaneously, and suspended, so to speak, like lights over a dark city, illuminating various portions of the psyche. These memory systems are all interconnected. Now in the same way you have your memory of past lives, all quite complete and all operating in the entire memory system.

In periods of conscious “blank spots” or certain fluctuations, these memory systems are often perceived. As a rule the conscious mind with its own memory system will not accept them. When a personality realizes that such other realities exist and that other experiences with consciousness are possible, then he activates certain potentials within himself. These alter electromagnetic connections both within the mind, the brain, and even the perceptive mechanisms. They bring together reservoirs of energy and set up pathways of activity, allowing the conscious mind to increase its degree of sensitivity to such data. The conscious mind is set free of itself. To a large measure it undergoes a metamorphosis, taking on greater functions. It is able to perceive, little by little, some of the content before closed to it. It need no longer perceive the momentary “blank spots” fearfully, as evidence of nonexistence.

The fluctuations mentioned earlier are often quite minute, yet highly significant. The conscious mind knows well of its own fluctuating state. When once it is led to face this, it finds not chaos, or worse, nonexistence, but the source of its own abilities and strength. The personality then begins to use its own potential.

Periods of reverie and creative moments of consciousness both represent excellent entryways into these other areas. In the usual creative state of consciousness, the regular waking consciousness is suddenly supported by energy from these other areas. Waking consciousness alone does not give you the creative state. Indeed, normal waking consciousness can be as afraid of creative states as it is of blank states, for it can feel that the I is being thrust aside, can feel the upthrust of energy that it may not

understand.

It is precisely in the low points of fluctuation that such experiences originate, for normal consciousness is momentarily at a weak state an in a period of rest. The whole physical organism undergoes such normal fluctuations, again, that are usually quite unnoticed. These periods also fluctuate, following rhythms that have to do with the characteristic personality. In some the waves of motion are comparatively long and slow, the valleys within being sloped; with others, the reverse is true.

With some, the lapses are more noticeable, outside of the norm. If the situation is not understood, then the personality may find it difficult to relate to physical events. If he is able to perceive the other areas of consciousness, he may find himself in still more difficulty - not realizing that both systems of reality are valid

The fluctuations also follow seasonal changes. Events from any given layer of consciousness are reflected in all other areas, each being actualized according to the characteristics of the given layer. As one dream is like a stone thrown into the pool of dream consciousness, so any act appears in this pool also in its own guise. Alternate focus allows you to perceive the many manifestations of any given act, the true multidimensional reality of a given thought. It enriches the normal consciousness.

You are active in these other layers whether or not you are aware of it. You learn not only in physical life and in the dream state, but in these interior existences of which you have no memory. Creative abilities of a specific nature, or healing abilities, are often trained in this fashion, only then emerging into physical actuality.

Your future thoughts and acts are as real in these dimensions as if they had already occurred, and as much a part of your development. You are formed not only by your past but by your future, and by alternate existences. These great interactions are only a part of the framework of your soul. You can, therefore, change present reality as you understand it from any of these other layers of consciousness.

Any one of these various layers of consciousness can be used as the normal acting consciousness, reality being viewed from that specific standpoint.

Physical reality is therefore glimpsed by other kinds of personalities in other systems, from their own unique viewpoint. Peering at it from this angle, so to speak, you would not recognize it as your own home system. From some of these viewpoints, your physical matter has little or no permanency, while to others your own thoughts have a shape and form, perceived by observers but not by yourselves.

In traveling through the states of consciousness, these other personalities would try to attain some focus and perceive your environment, trying to make sense of data with which they are largely unacquainted. Since many of them are unaware of your idea of time, they would find it difficult to understand that you perceive events with intervals between, and would not perceive the inner organization that you thrust upon your normal environment. Yours is obviously a probable system to other fields also touched by the field of probabilities.

As these systems are adjacent to yours, so is yours adjacent; alternate focus allows personalities from other realities to perceive your own, then, as it can theoretically at least allow you a glimpse into their existence.

CHAPTER 20

THE MEANING OF RELIGION

There are internal realizations always present within the whole self. There is comprehension of the meaning of all existence within each personality. The knowledge of multidimensional existence is not only in the background of your present conscious activity, but each man knows within himself that his conscious life is dependent upon a greater dimension of actuality. This greater dimension cannot be materialized in a three-dimensional system, yet the knowledge of this greater dimension floods outward from the innermost heart of being, and is projected outward, transforming all it touches.

This flooding-out imbues certain elements of the physical world with a brilliance and intensity far surpassing that usually known. Those touched by it are transformed, in your terms, into something more than they were. This inner knowledge attempts to find a place for itself within the physical landscape, to translate itself into physical terms. Each man, then, possesses this inner knowledge within himself, and to some extent or other he also looks for confirmation of it in the world.

The outer world is a reflection of the inner one, though far from perfect. The inner knowledge can be compared to a book about a homeland that a traveler takes with him into a strange country. Each man is born with the yearning to make these truths real for himself, though he sees a great difference between them and the environment in which he lives.

An internal drama is carried on by each individual, a psychic drama which is finally projected outward with great force upon the field of history. The birth of great religious events emerges from the interior religious drama. The drama itself is a psychological phenomenon in a way, for each physically oriented self feels thrust alone into a strange environment, without knowing its origins or destination or even the reason for its own existence.

This is the dilemma of the ego, particularly in its early states. It looks outward for answers because this is its nature: to manipulate within physical reality. It also senses, however, a deep and abiding connection that it does not understand, with other portions of the self

that are not under its domain. It is also aware that this inner self possesses

knowledge upon which its own existence is based.

As it grows, in your terms, it looks outward for confirmation of this inner knowledge. The inner self upholds the ego with its support. It forms its truths into physically oriented data with which the ego can deal. It then projects these outward into the area of physical reality. Seeing these truths thus materialized, the ego then finds it easier to accept them.

Thus you deal often with events in which men are touched by great illumination, isolated from the masses of humanity, and endowed with great powers - periods of history that appear almost unnaturally brilliant in contrast with others; prophets, geniuses, and kings shown in greater-than-human proportion.

Now these people are chosen by others to manifest outwardly the interior truths that all intuitively know. There are many levels of significance here. On the one hand, such individuals receive their unearthly abilities and power from their fellows, contain it, exhibit it in the physical world for all to see. They play the part of the blessed inner self that actually cannot operate within physical reality uncloaked by flesh. This energy, however, is a quite valid projection from the interior self.

The personality so touched by it actually does then become, in certain terms, what he seems to be. He will emerge as an eternal hero in the external religious drama, as the inner self is the eternal hero of the interior religious drama.

This mystic projection is a continual activity. When the strength of one great religion begins to diminish and its physical effects grow less, then the internal drama begins once again to quicken. The highest of man’s aspirations, therefore, will be projected upon physical history. The dramas themselves will differ. Remember,’ they are built up internally first.

They will be formed to impress world conditions at any given time, and therefore couched in symbols and events that will most impress the populace. This is craftily done, for the inner self knows exactly what will impress the ego, and what kinds of personalities will be best able to personify the message at any given time. When such a personality appears in history then, he is intuitively recognized, for the way has long been laid, and in many cases the prophecies announcing such an arrival have already been given.

The individuals so chosen do not just happen to appear among you. They are not chosen at random. They are individuals who have taken upon themselves the responsibility for this role. After their birth they are aware to varying degrees of their destiny, and certain trigger experiences may at times arouse their full memory.

They serve quite clearly as human representatives of All That Is. Now since each individual is a part of All That Is, to some extent each of you serve in that same role. In such a religious drama however, the main personality is much more conscious of his inner knowledge, more aware of his abilities, far better able to use them, and exultantly familiar with his relationship to all of life.

Ideas of good and evil, gods and devils, salvation and damnation, are merely symbols of deeper religious values; cosmic values if you will, that cannot be translated into physical terms.

These ideas become the driving themes of these religious dramas of which I have spoken. The actors may “return,” time and time again, in different roles. In any given historic religious drama, therefore, the actors may have already appeared on the historic scene in your past, the prophet of today being the traitor of the past drama.

These psychic entities are real, however. It is quite true to say that their reality consists not only of the core of their own identity, but also is reinforced by those projected thoughts and feelings of the earthly audience for whom the drama is enacted.

Psychic or psychological identification is of great import here and is indeed at the heart of all such dramas. In one sense, you can say that man identifies with the gods he has himself created. Man does not understand the magnificent quality of his own inventiveness and creative power, however. Then, say that gods and men create each other, and you come even closer to the truth; but only if you are very careful in your definitions - for how, exactly, do gods and men differ?

The attributes of the gods are those inherent within man himself, magnified, brought into powerful activity. Men believe that the gods live forever. Men live forever, but having forgotten this, they remember only to endow their gods with this characteristic. Obviously, then,

and these earthly historic religious dramas, the seemingly recurring tales of gods and men, there are spiritual realities.

Behind the actors in the dramas, there are more powerful entities who are quite beyond role-playing. The plays themselves, then, the religions that sweep across the ages - these are merely shadows, though helpful ones. Behind the frame of good and evil is a far deeper spiritual value. All religions, therefore, while trying to catch “truth” must to some large degree fear its ever eluding them.

The inner self alone, at rest, in meditation, can at times glimpse portions of these inner realities that cannot be physically expressed. These values, intuitions, or insights are given each to each according to his understanding, and so the stories told about them will often vary.

For example, the main character in a religious historical drama may or may not consciously be aware of the ways in which such information is given to him. And yet it may seem to him that he does know, for the nature of a dogma’s origin will be explained in terms that this main character can understand. The historical Jesus knew who he was, but he also knew that he was one of three personalities composing one entity. To a large extent he shared in the memory of the other two.

The third personality, mentioned many times by me, has not in your terms yet appeared, although his existence has been prophesied as the “Second Coming”. Now these prophecies were given in terms of the current culture at that time, and therefore, while the stage has been set, the distortions are deplorable, for this Christ will not come at the end of your world as the prophecies have been maintaining.

He will not come to reward the righteous and send evildoers to eternal doom. He will, however, begin a new religious drama. A certain historical continuity will be maintained. As happened once before, however, he will not be generally known for who he is. There will be no glorious proclamation to which the whole world will bow. He will

return to straighten out Christianity, which will be in a shambles at the time of his arrival, and to set up a new system of thought when the world is sorely in need of one.

By that time, all religions will be in severe crisis. He will undermine religious organizations - not unite them. His message will be that of the individual in relation to All That Is. He will clearly state methods by which each individual can attain a state of intimate contact with his own entity; the entity to some extent being man’s mediator with All That Is.

By 2075, all of this will be already accomplished. The birth will occur by the time given. The other changes will occur generally over the period of a century, but the results will show far before that time.

Because of the plastic nature of the future, in your terms, the date cannot be considered final. All probabilities point in its direction, however, for the inner impetus is already forming the events.

You may make a note here that Nostradamus saw the dissolution of the Roman Catholic Church as the end of the world. He could not imagine civilization without it, hence many of his later predictions should be read with this in mind.

The third personality of Christ will indeed be known as a great psychic, for it is he who will teach humanity to use those inner senses that alone make true spirituality possible. Slayers and victims will change roles as reincarnational memories rise to the surface of consciousness. Through the development of these abilities, the sacredness of all life will be intimately recognized and appreciated.

Now there will be several born before that time who in various ways will rearouse man’s expectations. One such man has already been born in India, in a small province near Calcutta, but his ministry will seem to remain comparatively local for his lifetime.

Another will be bom in Africa, a black man whose main work will be done in Indonesia. The expectations were set long ago in your terms, and will be fed by new prophets until the third personality of Christ does indeed emerge.

He will lead man behind the symbolism upon which religion has relied for so many centuries. He will emphasize individual spiritual experience, the expansiveness of soul, and teach man to recognize the multitudinous aspects of his own reality.

The third historical personage, already born in your terms, and a portion of the entire Christ personality, took upon himself the role of a zealot.

This person had superior energy and power and great organizing abilities, but it was the errors that he made unwittingly that perpetuated some dangerous distortions. The records of that historical period are scattered and contradictory.

The man, historically now, was Paul or Saul. It was given to him to set up a framework. But it was to be a framework of ideas, not of regulations; of men, not of groups. Here he fell down, and he will return as the third personality, just mentioned, in your future.

In that respect, however, there are not four personalities.

Now Saul went to great lengths to set himself as a separate identity. His characteristics, for example, were seemingly quite different from those of the historical Christ. He was “converted” in an intense personal experience - a fact that was meant to

impress upon him the personal and not organizational aspects. Yet some exploits of his in his earlier life have been attributed to Christ - not as a young man, but earlier.

All personalities have free will and work out their own challenges. The same applied to Saul. The organizational “distortions,” however, were also necessary within the framework of history as events are understood. Saul’s tendencies were known, therefore, at another level. They served a purpose. It is for this reason, however, that he will emerge once again, this time to destroy those distortions.

Now he did not create them on his own, and thrust them upon historical reality. He created them in so far as he found himself forced to admit certain facts: In that world at that time, earthly power was needed to hold Christian ideas apart from numberless other theories and religions, to maintain them in the middle of warring factions. It was his job to form a physical framework; and even then he was afraid that the framework would strangle the ideas, but he saw no other way.

When the third personality reemerges historically, however, he will not be called the old Paul, but will carry within him the characteristics of all the three personalities.

Paul tried to deny knowing who he was, until his experience with conversion. Allegorically, he represented a warring faction of the self that fights against his own knowledge and is oriented in a highly physical manner. It seemed he went from one extreme to another, being against Christ and then for him. But the inner vehemence was always present, the inner fire, and the recognition that he tried for so long to hide.

His was the portion that was to deal with physical reality and manipulation, and so these qualities were strong in him. To some extent they overruled him. When the historical Christ “died,” Paul was to implement the spiritual ideas in physical terms, to carry on. In so doing, however, he grew the seeds of an organization that would smother the ideas. He lingered after Christ, [just] as John the Baptist came before. Together the three spanned some time period, you see.

John and the historical Christ each performed their roles and were satisfied that they had done so. Paul alone was left at the end unsatisfied, and so it is about his personality that the future Christ will form.

The entity of which these personalities are part, that entity which you may call the Christ entity, was aware of these issues. The earthly personalities were not aware of them, although in periods of trance and exaltation much was made known to them.

Paul also represented the militant nature of man, that had to be taken into consideration in line with man’s development at the time. That militant quality in man will completely change its nature, and be dispensed with as you know it, when the next Christ personality emerges. It is therefore appropriate that Paul be present.

In the next century, the inner nature of man, with these developments, will free itself from many constraints that have bound it. A new era will indeed begin - not, now, a heaven on earth, but a far more sane and just world, in which man is far more aware of his relationship with his planet and of his freedom within time.

I would like to make certain points clear. The “new religion” following the Second Coming will not be Christian in your terms, although the third personality of Christ will initiate it.

This personality will refer to the historical Christ, will recognize his relationship with that personality; but within him the three personality groupings will form a new psychic entity, a different psychological gestalt. As this metamorphosis takes place, it will initiate a metamorphosis on a human level also, as man’s inner abilities are accepted and developed.

The results will be a different kind of existence. Many of your problems now result from spiritual ignorance. No man will look down upon an individual from another race when he himself recognizes that his own existence includes such membership also.

No sex will be considered better than the other, or any role in society, when each individual is aware of his own or her own experience at many levels of society and in many roles. An open-ended consciousness will feel its connections with all other living beings. The continuity of consciousness will become apparent. As a result of all this the social and governmental structures will change, for they are based upon your current beliefs.

Human personality will reap benefits that now would seem unbelievable. An open- ended consciousness will imply far greater freedom. From birth, children will be taught that basic identity is not dependent upon the body, and that time as you know it is an illusion. The child will be aware of many of its past existences, and will be able to identify with the old man or woman that in your terms it will become.

Many of the lessons “that come with age” will then be available to the young, but the old will not lose the spiritual elasticity of their youth. This itself is important. But for some time, future incarnations will still be hidden for practical reasons.

As these changes come about, new areas will be activated in the brain to physically take care of them. Physically then, brain mappings will be possible in which past life memories are evoked. All of these alterations are spiritual changes in which the meaning of religion will escape organizational bounds, become a living part of individual existence, and where psychic frameworks rather than physical ones form the foundations for civilization.

Man’s experience will be so extended that to you the species will seem to have changed into another. This does not mean there will not be problems. It does mean that man will have far greater resources at his command. It also presupposes a richer and far more diverse social framework. Men and women will find themselves relating to their brethren, not only as the people that they are, but as the people that they were.

Family relationships will show perhaps the greatest changes. There will be room for emotional interactions within the family that are now impossible. The conscious mind will be more aware of unconscious material.

I am including this information in this chapter on religion because it is important that you realize that spiritual ignorance is at the basis of so many of your problems, and that indeed your only limitations are spiritual ones.

The metamorphosis mentioned earlier on the part of the third personality, will have such strength and power that it will call out from mankind these same qualities from within itself. The qualities have always been present. They will finally break through the veils of physical perception, extending that perception in new ways.

Now, mankind lacks such a focus. The third personality will represent that focus. There will be, incidentally, no crucifixion in that drama. That personality will indeed be multidimensional, aware of all its incarnations. It will not be oriented in terms of one sex, one color, or one race.

For the first time, therefore, it will break through the earthly concepts of personality, liberating personality. It will have the ability to show these diverse effects as it chooses. There will be many who will be afraid to accept the nature of their own reality, or to be shown the dimensions of true identity.

For several reasons, as mentioned by Ruburt, I do not want to give any more detailed information as to the name that will be used, or the land of birth. Too many might be tempted to jump into that image prematurely.

Events are not predestined. The framework for this emergence has already been set, however, within your system of probabilities. The emergence of this third personality will directly affect the original historical drama of Christ as it is now known. There is and must be interactions between them.

The exterior religious dramas are of course imperfect representations of the ever- unfolding interior spiritual realities. The various personages, the gods and prophets within religious history - these absorb the mass inner projections thrown out by those inhabiting a given time span.

Such religious dramas focus, direct, and, hopefully, clarify aspects of inner reality that need to be physically represented. These do not only appear within your own system. Many are also projected into other systems of reality. Religion per se, however, is always the external facade of inner reality. The primary spiritual existence alone gives meaning to the physical one. In the most real terms, religion should include all of the pursuits of man in his search for the nature of meaning and truth. Spirituality cannot be some isolated, specialized activity or characteristic.

Exterior religious dramas are important and valuable only to the extent that they faithfully reflect the nature of inner, private spiritual existence. To the extent that a man feels that his religion expresses such inner experience, he will feel it valid. Most religions per se, however, set up as permissible certain groups of experiences while denying others. They limit themselves by applying the principles of the sacredness of life only to your own species, and often to highly limited groups within it.

At no time will any given church be able to express the inner experience of all individuals. At no time will any church find itself in a position in which it can effectively curtail the inner experience of its members - it will only seem to do so. The forbidden experiences will simply be unconsciously expressed, gather strength and vitality, and rise up to form a counter projection which will then form another, newer exterior religious drama.

The dramas themselves do express certain inner realities, and they serve as surface reminders to those who do not trust direct experience with the inner self. They will take the symbols as reality. When they discover that this is not so, they feel betrayed. Christ spoke in terms of the father and son because in your terms, at that time, this was the method used - the story he told to explain the relationship between the inner self and

the physically alive individual. No new religion really startles anyone, for the drama has already been played subjectively.

What I have said, of course, applies as much to Buddha as it does to Christ: Both accepted the inner projections and then tried to physically represent these. They were more, however, than the sum of those projections. This also should be understood. Mohammedanism fell far short. In this case the projections were of violence predominating. Love and kinship were secondary to what indeed amounted to baptism and communion through violence and blood.

In these continuous exterior religious dramas, the Hebrews played strange role. Their idea of one god was not new to them. Many ancient religions held the belief of one god above all others. This god above all others was a far more lenient god, however, than the one the Hebrews followed. Many tribes believed, quite rightly, in the inner Spirit that pervades each living thing. And they often referred to, say, the god in the tree, or the spirit in the flower. But they also accepted the reality of an overall spirit, of which these lesser spirits were but a

Part. All worked together harmoniously.

The Hebrews conceived of an overseer god, an angry and just and sometimes cruel god; and many sects denied, then, the idea that other living beings beside man possessed inner spirits. The earlier beliefs represented a far better representation of inner reality, in which man, observing nature, let nature speak and reveal its secrets.

The Hebrew god, however, represented a projection of a far different kind. Man was growing more and more aware of the ego, of a sense of power over nature, and many of the later miracles are presented in such a way that nature is forced to behave differently than in its usual mode. God becomes man’s ally against nature.

The early Hebrew god became a symbol of man’s unleashed ego. God behaved exactly as an enraged child would, had he those powers, sending thunder and lightning and fire against his enemies, destroying them. Man’s emerging ego therefore brought forth emotional and psychological problems and challenges. The sense of separation from nature grew. Nature became a tool to use against others.

Sometime before the emergence of the Hebrew god these tendencies were apparent. In many ancient, now-forgotten tribal religions, recourse was also made to the gods to turn nature against the enemy. Before this time, however, man felt a part of nature, not separated from it. It was regarded as an extension of his being, as he felt an extension of its reality. One cannot use oneself as a weapon against oneself in those terms.

In those times men spoke and confided to the spirits of birds, trees, and spiders, knowing that in the interior reality beneath, the nature of these communications was known and understood. In those times, death was not feared as it is in your terms, now, for the cycle of consciousness was understood.

Man desired in one way to step out of himself, out of the framework in which he had his psychological existence, to try new challenges, to step out of a mode of consciousness into another. He wanted to study the process of his own consciousness. In one way this meant a giant separation from the inner spontaneity that had given him both peace and security. On the other hand, it offered a new creativity, in his terms.

At this point, the god inside became the god outside.

Man tried to form a new realm, attain a different kind of focus and awareness. His consciousness turned a corner outside of itself. To do this he concentrated less and less upon inner reality, and therefore began the process of inner reality only as it was projected outward into the physical world.

Before, the environment was effortlessly created and perceived by man and all other living things, knowing the nature of their inner unity. In order to begin this new venture, it was necessary to pretend that this inner unity did not exist. Otherwise the new kind of consciousness would always run back to its home for security and comfort. So it seemed that all bridges must be cut, while of course it was only a game because the inner reality always remained. The new kind of consciousness simply had to look away from it to maintain initially an independent focus.

I am speaking here in more or less historic terms for you. You must realize that the process has nothing to do with time as you know it, however. This particular kind of adventure in consciousness has occurred before, and in your terms will again.

Perception of the exterior universe then changed, however, and it seemed to be alien and apart from the individual who perceived it.

God, therefore, became an idea projected outward, independent of the individual, divorced from nature. He became the reflection of man’s emerging ego, with all of its brilliance, savagery, power, and intent for mastery. The adventure was a highly creative one despite the obvious disadvantages, and represented an “evolution” of consciousness that enriched man’s subjective experience, and indeed added to the dimensions of reality itself.

To be effectively organized, however, inner and outer experience had to appear as separate, disconnected events. Historically the characteristics of God changed as man’s ego changed. These characteristics of the ego, however, were supported by strong inner changes.

The original propulsion of inner characteristics outward into the formation of the ego could be compared with the birth of innumerable stars - an event of immeasurable consequences that originated on a subjective level and within inner reality.

The ego, having its birth from within, therefore, must always boast of its independence while maintaining the nagging certainty of its inner origin.

The ego feared for its position, frightened that it would dissolve back into the inner self from which it came. Yet in its emergence it provided the inner self with a new kind of feedback, a different view not only of itself; but through this, the inner self was able to glimpse possibilities of development of which it had not previously been aware. In your terms, by the time of Christ, the ego was sure enough of its position so that the projected picture of God could begin to change.

The inner self is in a state of constant growth. The inner portion of each man, therefore, projected this knowledge outward. The need, the psychological and spiritual need of the species, demanded both interior and exterior alterations of great import. Qualities of mercy and understanding that had been buried could now surface. Not only privately but en masse they surged up, adding a new impetus and giving a natural

“new” direction - beginning to call all portions of the self, as it knew itself, together.

So the concept of God began to change as the ego recognized its reliance upon inner reality, but the drama had to be worked out within the current framework. Mohammedanism was basically so violent precisely because Christianity was basically so gentle. Not that Christianity was not mixed with violence, or that Mohammedanism was devoid of love. But as the psyche went through its developments and battled with itself, denying some feelings and characteristics and stressing others, so the historic religious exterior dramas represented and followed these inner aspirations, struggles, and searches.

All of this material now given must be considered along with the fact that beneath these developments there are the eternal aspects and creative characteristics of a force that is both undeniable and intimate. All That Is, in other words, represents the reality from which all of us spring. All That Is, by its nature, transcends all dimensions of activity, consciousness, or reality, while being a part of each.

Behind all faces there is one face, yet this does not mean that each man’s face is not his own. The further religious drama of which I have spoken, in your terms still to come, represents another stage in both the internal and external dramas in which the emergent ego becomes aware of much of its heritage. While maintaining its own status, it will be able to have much greater commerce with other portions of the self, and also to offer to the inner self opportunities of awareness that the inner self on its own could not procure.

The journeys of the gods, therefore, represent the journeys of man’s own consciousness projected outward. All That Is, however, is within each such adventure. Its consciousness, and its reality, is within each man, and within the gods he has created.

The gods attain, of course, a psychic reality. I am not saying therefore that they are not real, but I am to some extent defining the nature of their reality. It is to some extent true to say: “Be careful of the gods you choose, for you will reinforce each other.”

Such an alliance sets up certain fields of attraction. A man who attaches himself to one of the gods is necessarily attaching himself largely to his own projections. Some, in your terms, are creative, and some destructive, though the latter are seldom recognized as such.

The open concept of All That Is, however, frees you to a great extent from your own projections, and allows a more valid contact with the spirit that is behind the reality that you know.

In this chapter I would also like to mention several other pertinent points.

Some ancient tales have come down through the centuries that tell of various gods and demons who guard the gates, so to speak, of other levels of reality and stages of consciousness. Astral levels are neatly laid out, numbered, and categorized.

There are tests to pass before entry. There are rituals to be acted out. Now, all of this is highly distorted. Any attempt to so rigorously and precisely express inner reality is bound to be abortive, highly misleading, and in your terms sometimes dangerous; for you do create your own reality and live it according to your inner beliefs. Therefore, be

careful also of those beliefs that you accept.

Let me take this moment to state again that there are no devils or demons, except as you create them out of your belief. As mentioned earlier, good and evil effects are basically illusions. In your terms all acts, regardless of their seeming nature, are a part of a greater good. I am not saying that a good end justifies what you would consider an evil action. While you still accept the effects of good and evil, then you had better choose the good.

I am saying this as simply as possible. There are profound complications beneath my words, however. Opposites have validity only in your own system of reality. They are a part of your root assumptions, and so you must deal with them as such.

They represent, however, deep unities that you do not understand. Your conception of good and evil results in large part from the kind of consciousness you have presently adopted. You do not perceive wholes, but portions. The conscious mind focuses with a quick, limited, but intense light, perceiving from a given field of reality only certain “stimuli.” It then puts these stimuli together, forming the liaison of similarity. Anything that it does not accept as a portion of reality, it does not perceive.

The effect of opposites results, then, from a lack of perception. Since you must operate within the world as you perceive it, then the opposites will appear to be conditions of existence. These elements have been isolated for a certain reason, however. You are being taught, and you are teaching yourselves to handle energy, to become conscious cocreators with All That Is, and one of the “stages of development” or learning processes includes dealing with opposites as realities.

In your terms, the ideas of good and evil help you recognize the sacredness of existence, the responsibility of consciousness. The ideas of opposites also are necessary guide lines for the developing ego. The inner self knows quite well the unity that exists.

In any given historical period, one religious drama may finally emerge as the exterior representation, but there will also be many minor dramas, “projections,” that do not entirely take. These represent, of course, probable events. Any of them could supersede the actual exterior drama. In the time of Christ there were many such performances, as many personalities felt the force of inner reality and reacted to it.

There were probable Christs, in other words, living in your terms at that time. For several reasons that I will not go into here, these projections did not mirror inner events faithfully enough. There were, however, a score of men in the same general area, physically, who responded to the inner psychic climate and felt upon themselves the attraction and responsibility of the religious hero.

Some of these men were too tinged, too caught in the torment and fervor of the period to rise sufficiently above it. The cultures used them. They could not use the various cultures as launching ground for the new ideas. Instead they became lost in the history of the times.

Some carried on following the same pattern taken by Christ, performed psychic feats and healings, had groups of followers, and yet were not capable of holding that powerful focus of psychic attention that was so necessary.

The Lord of Righteousness, so called, was such a person, but his over-zealous nature

held him back. His rigidity prevented the spontaneity necessary for any true great religious release. He fell, instead, into the trap of provincialism. Had he performed the role possible, he could have been of benefit to Paul. He was a probable personality of the Paul portion of the Christ entity.

These men innately understood their part in this drama, and also their position within All That Is. They were all highly clairvoyant and telepathic, given to visions and hearing of voices.

In their dreams they were in contact. Consciously Paul remembered many of these dreams, until he felt pursued by Christ. It was because of a series of recurring dreams that Paul persecuted the Christians. He felt that Christ was a kind of devil who pursued him in his sleep.

On an unconscious level, however, he knew the meaning of the dreams, and his “conversion,” of course, was only a physical event following an inner experience.

John the Baptist, Christ, and Paul were all connected in the dream state, and John was well aware of Christ’s existence before Christ was born.

Paul needed the strongest egotistical strength because of his particular duties. He was far less aware consciously of his role for this reason. The inner knowledge, of course, exploded in the physical conversion experience.

CHAPTER 21

A GOODBYE AND AN INTRODUCTION: ASPECTS OF MULTIDIMENSIONAL PERSONALITY AS VIEWED THROUGH MY OWN EXPERIENCE

In the historical time of Christ, I was a man called Millenius, in Rome. In that life my main occupation was that of a merchant, but I was a highly curious gentleman, and my travels gave me access to many different groups of people.

Physically I was round and stout, not at all patrician in my bearing, and given to untidiness in my dress. We had a type of snuff made from a certain kind of straw. I used it constantly, often spilling some upon my robe.

My house was in the busiest, northwestern part of the city, just beyond what you would call the heart of town. Among my wares I sold bells for donkeys. This may not sound like a very grand product, and yet families on the farms outside of Rome found these highly useful. Each had a special sound, and a family could tell by the sound of the bell their own donkey from innumerable similar ones.

Donkeys were also used in many businesses within Rome itself as carriers of burden, particularly in the lower occupations. The number of bells, their particular pitch, even the colors, all had meaning. In the tumult of the city the particular bells could be recognized, therefore, by the poor and by the slaves who waited to buy products - often wilted foods from the laden carts.

The bells were only a small portion of my business, which dealt largely with cloths and dyes, but they fascinated me. Because of my interest in them I did far more traveling about the countryside and the region than any prudent man should. The bells became my hobby. My curiosity drove me to journey in search of different kinds of bells, and led me into contact with many people I would not otherwise have encountered.

While I was not literate, I was shrewd and lively of mind. Special bells, I discovered, were used by various sects of Jews, both within Rome and without. While I was a Roman and a citizen, my citizenship meant little except for providing me with minimal safety as I went about my daily way, and in my business I encountered as many Jews as Romans. I was not too far above them socially.

The Romans had no clear idea of the number of Jews in Rome at that time. They went by guesswork. The bells on donkeys belonging to the Zealots had upon them the

symbol of an eye. They came secretly into town, hiding as much from other Jews as from Romans. They were good bargainers and often did me out of more than I deserved to lose.

I learned about the Lord of Righteousness from a cousin of his named Sheraba who was, as clearly as I could figure out at the time, a “sacred” assassin. He was drunk the night I spoke to him in a stinking stall outside of Jerusalem. It was he who told me about the symbol of the eye. He also told me that the man, Christ, was kidnapped by the Essenes. I did not believe him. Nor at the time he told me did I know who Christ was.

At the time that Christ lived his existence was known to very few, comparatively speaking. To put it bluntly (and humorously) I knew that someone had the ball, but I was not certain of the person. In dream states, the situation finally became known to me and to many others.

The Christians, generally speaking, did not want Roman converts. I was later one of these, and because of my nationality was never trusted. My part in that drama was simply to acquaint myself with its physical foundation; to be a participant, however small, in that era. Much later in your terms I would end up as a minor pope in the third century, meeting again some of those I had known - and, if you will forgive a humorous note, once more familiar with the sound of bells.

It is not my purpose to go into my past existences in any great detail, but to use them to make certain points. First of all, I have been many times both man and woman, and I have immersed myself in various occupations, but always with the idea of learning so that I could teach. I had a firm background in physical existence, therefore, as a prerequisite for my present “work.”

I did not play the part of any towering personality of historical note, but became experienced in the homey and intimate details of daily life, the normal struggle for achievement, the need for love. I learned the unutterable yearning of father for son, son for father, husband for wife, wife for husband, and fell headlong into the intimate webs of human relationships. Before your idea of history, I was a Lumanian, and was later born in Atlantis.

Using your historical reference, I returned at the time of the cavemen, operating as a Speaker. Now I have always been a Speaker, regardless of my physical occupation. I have been a spice merchant in Denmark, where I knew Ruburt and Joseph. In several lives I was black - once in what is now called Ethiopia, and once in Turkey.

My lives as monks followed my experience as a pope, and in one of these, I was a victim of the Spanish Inquisition. My experience in female lives varied from that of a plain Dutch spinster to a courtesan at the time of the biblical David, to several existences as a humble mother with children.

Now when I began contacting Ruburt and Joseph, I hid from them the fact of my numerous lives. Ruburt, in particular, did not accept reincarnation, and the idea of such multiple life experiences would have been highly scandalous to him.

The times and names and dates are not nearly as important as the experiences, and they are too numerous to list here. However, I will see to it at some time that these are

made fully available. Some have been given in Ruburt’s class sessions, and some, though few, have appeared The Seth Material itself.

In a book on reincarnation, I hope to have each of my previous personalities speak for themselves, for they should tell their own story. You should understand, therefore, that those personalities still exist and are independent. While what I am once seemed to be contained within those personalities, I was but the seed for them. In your terms, I can remember who I was; in greater terms, however, those personalities should speak for themselves.

Perhaps you will see an analogy here when you compare the situation with age regression under hypnosis. Those personalities are not locked up inside of what I am, however. They have progressed according to their own fashion. They are not negated. In my terms, they coexist with me, but at another layer of reality.

In several lives I was consciously aware of my “past existences.” Once as a monk I found myself copying a manuscript that I myself had written in another life.

Often I was given to the love of weight, and possessed it. Twice I died of starvation. I always found my deaths highly educational - in your terms, afterwards. It was always a lesson between lives to trace the thoughts and events that “led to a given demise.”

None of my deaths surprised me. I felt during the process the inevitability, the recognition, even a sense of familiarity: “Of course, this particular dying is mine and no other.” And I accepted even the most bizarre circumstances then, feeling almost a sense of perfection. The life could not be finished properly without the death.

There is a great sense of humility, and yet a great sense of exaltation as the inner self senses its freedom when death occurs. All my deaths were the complement of my lives, in that it seemed to me that it could not be otherwise.

If I choose, in your terms I can relive any portion of those existences, but those personalities go their own way.

On a subjective level I acted as a teacher and a Speaker in each of my lives. In a few highly intuitive existences I was aware of this fact. You do not understand as yet the high importance of the underside of consciousness. Beside your objective role in each life, your reincarnational challenges also involve your dream states, rhythms of creativity that flow and ebb beneath the daily world you know. So I became highly profi- cient in this way as a Speaker and a teacher in several lives that were externally uninteresting by contrast.

My influence, work, and concern in such cases was far more vast than my quiet objective pursuits. I give you this information hoping to help you understand the true nature of your own reality. My reincarnational existences do not define what I am, however, nor do yours define you.

The soul knows itself, and is not confused by terms or definitions. Through showing you the nature of my own reality, I hope to teach you the nature of your own.

You are not bound to any category or comer of existence. Your reality cannot be measured any more than mine. I hope to illustrate the function of consciousness and personality through writing this book and enlarging your concepts.

Now I began by telling you that I was dictating this material through the auspices of

a woman of whom I was quite fond. Let me now tell you that there are other realities involved. The following paragraphs will be written by another personality, who stands relatively in the same position to me as I stand to the woman through whom I am now speaking.

We are the voices who speak without tongues of our own. We are sources of that energy from which you come. We are creators, yet we have also been created. We seeded your universe as you seed other realities.

We do not exist in your historical terms, nor have we known physical existence. Our joy created the exaltation from which your world comes. Our existence is such that communication must be made by others to you.

Verbal symbols have no meaning for us. Our experience is not translatable. We hope our intent is. In the vast infinite scope of consciousness, all is possible. There is meaning in each thought. We perceive your thoughts as lights. They form patterns.

Because of the difficulties of communication, it is nearly impossible for us to explain our reality. Know only that we exist. We send immeasurable vitality to you, and support all of those structures of consciousness with which you are familiar. You are never alone. We have always sent emissaries to you who understand your needs. Though you do not know us, we cherish you.

Seth is a point in my reference, in our reference. He is an ancient portion of us. We are separate but united. Always the spirit forms the flesh.

We will continue. There are kinds of consciousness that cannot be deciphered in physical terms. The “personality” who originated the paragraphs you have just read is such a one.

As mentioned, there is the same kind of connection between that personality and myself as the one that exists between Ruburt and myself. But in your terms, Seth Two is far further divorced from my reality than I am from Ruburt’s. You can imagine Seth Two as a future portion of me if you prefer, and yet far more is involved.

I am myself using simple terms here to try and make these ideas clearer. In a trance state, Ruburt can contact me. In a state in some ways similar to a trance, I can contact Seth Two. We are related in ways quite difficult to explain, united in webs of consciousness. My reality includes, then, not only reincamational identities but also other gestalts of being that do not necessarily have any physical connections.

The same applies to each reader of this book. The soul is openended, therefore. It is not a closed spiritual or psychic system. I have tried to show you that the soul is not a separate, apart-from-you thing. It is no more divorced from you than - capital - God is.

There is no need to create a separate god who exists outside of your universe and separate from it, nor is there any need to think of a soul as some distant entity. God, or All That Is, is intimately a part of you. “His” energy forms your identity, and your soul is a part of you in the same manner.

My own reincamational personalities, probable selves, and even Seth Two exist within me now, as I exist within them. In your terms, Seth Two is more advanced. In your terms, he is more alien, since he cannot relate to your physical existence as well as I do because of my background in it.

Still, my experience enriches Seth Two, and his experiences enrich me to the extent that I am able to perceive and translate them for my own use. In the same way, Ruburt’s personality is expanded through relationship with me, and I also gain through the experience, as even the best of teachers learns from each dimension of activity.

In larger terms, my soul includes my reincamational personalities, Seth Two, and probable selves. I am as aware of my probable selves, incidentally, as I am of my reincamational existences. Your concept of the soul is simply so limited. I am not really speaking in terms of group souls, though this interpretation can also be made.

Each “part” of the soul contains the whole - a concept I am sure will startle you. As you become more aware of your own subjective reality you will therefore, become familiar with greater portions of your own soul. When you think of the soul as a closed system you perceive it as such, and close off from yourself the knowledge of its greater creativity and characteristics.

Seth Two does represent what I will become, to some extent, and in your terms, yet when I become what he is he will be something different. In the same terms now, only, Ruburt may become what I am, but then I will be something far different.

Each of you are involved in the same kind of relationships, whether or not you are aware of them. Though it seems to you that reincamational existences involve past and future events, they are existences parallel or adjacent to your own present life and consciousness. Other aspects of your greater identity exist, relatively speaking, about or around these.

The answers to the nature of reality, the intimate knowledge of All That Is that you all seek, is within your present experience. It will not be found outside of yourselves, but through an inner journey into yourself, through yourself and through the world that you know.

I was once a mother with twelve children. Ignorant in terms of education, far from beautiful, particularly in later years, with a wild temper and raucous voice. This was around Jerusalem in the sixth century. The children had many fathers. I did my best to provide for them.

My name was Marshaba. We lived wherever we could, squatting in doorways and, finally, all begging. Yet in that existence, physical life had a contrast, a sharpness greater than any I had known. A crust of bread was far more delicious to me than any piece of cake, however well frosted, had ever been in lives before.

When my children laughed I was overwhelmed with delight, and despite our privations, each morning was a triumphant surprise that we had not died in our sleep, that we had not succumbed to starvation. I chose that life deliberately, as each of you choose each of yours, and I did so because my previous lives had left me too blase. I was too cushioned. I no longer focused with clarity upon the truly spectacular physical delights and experiences that earth can provide.

Though I yelled at my children and screamed sometimes in rage against the elements, I was struck through with the magnificence of existence, and learned more about true spirituality than I ever did as a monk. This does not mean that poverty leads to truth, or that suffering is good for the soul. Many who shared those conditions with

me learned little. It does mean that each of you choose those life conditions that you have for your own purpose, knowing ahead of time where your weaknesses and strengths lie.

In the gestalt of my personality, as in your terms I lived later richer lives, that woman was alive again in me - as, for example, the child is alive in the adult, and filled with gratitude comparing later circumstances to the earlier existences. She urged me to use my advantages better.

So in you, your various reincarnational existences in a large manner co-occur. Using the analogy of adulthood again, it is as if the child within you is a part of your own memory and experience, and yet in another way has left you, gone apart from you as if you are only one adult that the child “turned into.” So the people that I have been have gone their own way, and yet are a part of me and I of them.

I am alive in Seth Two’s memory, as a self from which he sprang. Yet the self I am now is not the self from which he sprang. Only your rigid ideas of time and consciousness make these statements seem strange to you; for in a larger context, again, I can remember Seth Two. All of these connections therefore are open. All psychological events affect all others.

All of existence and consciousness is interwoven. Only when you think of the soul as something different, separate, and therefore closed, are you led to consider a separate god - a personality that seems to be apart from creation.

All That Is is a part of creation, but more than what creation is. There are pyramid gestalts of being impossible to describe, whose awareness includes knowledge and experience of what would seem to be to you a vast number of other realities. In the terms of which I am speaking for your benefit, their present might, for example, include the life and death of your planet in a moment of their “time.” Seth Two’s existence is at the outside fringes of one such galaxy of consciousness.

When Seth Two speaks, Ruburt initially is aware of the following: His consciousness strains upward, following an inner psychic pathway, an energized funnel, until quite simply it can go no further. It seems to him then that his consciousness goes out of his body through an invisible pyramid whose open top stretches far up into space.

Here he seems to make contact with impersonal symbols whose message is somehow automatically translated into words. That point actually represents a warp in dimensions, a place between systems that has far more to do with energy and psychological reality than it has to do with space, for space is meaningless.

I am almost always present as a translator at such times. My knowledge of both realities is necessary for the communication.

Seth Two is familiar with an entirely different set of symbols and meanings, so that, in this case, two translations are being given - one by me and one by Ruburt.

Hopefully, certain concepts will be delivered in this way that could not be delivered otherwise. These minglings of reality and experience, these messages from one system to another, occur in various ways continually, emerging in your world in one guise or another - as inspiration of many kinds. You are being helped, in other words.

You are also using your own abilities, however, for your own characteristics largely

determine the amount of help you receive. The symbolism apparent to Ruburt when Seth Two speaks works well, but outward is also inward, and so consciousness travels as far inward as it seems to him to go outward.

Such contacts and knowledge are available to each individual. All That Is speaks to all of its parts, not with sounds, trumpets, and fanfare from without, but communicates its messages through the living soulstuff of each consciousness.

You are not fated to dissolve into All That Is. The aspects of your personality as you presently understand them will be retained. All That Is is the creator of individuality, not the means of its destruction.

My own “previous” personalities are not dissolved into me any more than your “past” personalities. All are living and vital. All go their own way. Your “future” personalities are as real as your past ones. After a while, this will no longer concern you. Out of the reincamational framework, there is no death as you think of it.

My own frame of reference, however, is no longer focused on my reincamational existences. I have turned my attention in other directions.

Since all lives are simultaneous, all happening at once, then any separation is a psychological one. I exist as I am while my reincamational lives - in your terms - still exist. Yet now I am not concerned with them, but turn my concentration into other areas of activity.

Personality changes whether it is within a body or outside of it, so you will change after death as you change before it. In those terms, it is ridiculous to insist upon remaining as you are now, after death. It is the same as a child saying: “I am going to grow up, but I am never going to change the ideas that I have now.” The multidimensional qualities of the psyche allow it to experience an endless realm of dimensions. Experience in one dimension in no way negates existence in another.

You have been trying to squeeze the soul into tight concepts of the nature of existence, making it follow your limited beliefs. The door to the soul is open, and it leads to all the dimensions of experience.

If you think, however, that the self as you know it is the end or summation of yourself, then you also imagine your soul to be a limited entity bounded by its present ventures in one life alone, to be judged accordingly after death on the performance of a few paltry years.

In many ways this is a cozy concept, though to some it can be quite frightening with its connotations of eternal damnation. It is far too tidy an idea, however, to hint at the rich embellishments that are at the heart of divine creativity. The soul stands both within and without the fabric of physical life as you know it. You are not separated from the animals and the rest of existence by virtue of possessing an eternal inner con- sciousness. Such a consciousness is present within all living beings, and in all forms.

I titled this chapter “A Goodbye and an Introduction.” The goodbye is my own, since I am now finishing this book. The introduction applies to each reader, for I hope that you will now be able to meet yourself face to face with a greater understanding of who and what you are.

I would like, therefore, to introduce you to yourself.

You will not find yourself by running from teacher to teacher, from book to book. You will not meet yourself through following any particular specialized method of meditation. Only by looking quietly within the self that you know can your own reality be experienced, with those connections that exist between the present or immediate self and the inner identity that is multidimensional.

There must be a willingness, an acquiescence, a desire. If you do not take the time to examine your own subjective states, then you cannot complain if so many answers seem to elude you. You cannot throw the burden of proof upon another, or expect a man or teacher to prove to you the validity of your own existence. Such a procedure is bound to lead you into one subjective trap after another.

As you sit reading this book, the doorways within are open. You have only to experience the moment as you know it as fully as possible - as it exists physically within the room, or outside in the streets of the city in which you live. Imagine the experience present in one moment of time over the globe, then try to appreciate the subjective experience of your own that exists in the moment and yet escapes it - and this multiplied by each living individual.

This exercise alone will open your perceptions, increase your awareness and automatically expand your appreciation of your own nature.

The “you” who is capable of such expansion must be a far more creative and multidimensional personality than you earlier imagined. Many of the suggested small exercises given earlier in the book will also help you become acquainted with your own reality, will give you direct experience with the nature of your own soul or entity, and will put you in contact with those portions of your being from which your own vitality springs. You may or may not have your own encounters with past reincamational selves or probable selves. You may or may not catch yourselves in the act of changing levels of consciousness.

Certainly most of my readers, however, will have success with some of the suggested exercises. They are not difficult, and they are within the capabilities of all.

Each reader, however, should in one way or another sense his own vitality in a way quite new to him, and find avenues of expansion opening within himself of which he was earlier unaware. The very nature of this book, the method of its creation and delivery, in themselves should clearly point out the fact that human personality has far more abilities than those usually ascribed to it. By now you should understand that all personalities are not physically materialized. As this book was conceived and written by a nonphysical personality, and then made physical, so do each of you have access to greater abilities and methods of communication than those usually accepted.

I hope that in one way or another this book of mine has served to give each of you an introduction to the inner multidimensional identity that is your own.

Far be it from me to interrupt your edifying conversation. Remember what you concentrate upon, and we will leave it at that. Now we will resume dictation.

I would like to make it clear that there is nothing to be gained, either, by hating hatred. You fall into the same trap.

This does not mean that every one in your present acquaintanceship has been known to you, and it certainly does not imply a boring record played over and over

In each life you are meant to check the exterior environment in order to leam your inner condition. The outer is a reflection of the inner.

Abilities cannot be developed following a one-sex line. There must be experiences in

Some families come together in a particular life not because of great attraction or love in a past existence, but for the opposite reason. Families may be composed, then, of individuals who disliked each other in the past and come together in a close relationship where they are to work together toward a common goal, learn to understand each other better, and work out problems in a different kind of context.

It is not necessary that you learn about your own past lives, though it may be helpful if you understand that you chose the circumstances of your birth this time.

You cannot say, “The poor are poor simply because they chose poverty, and therefore there is no need for me to help them.” This attitude can easily draw poverty to you in the next experience.

There are also passing relationships, contacts made and then dropped. A mate from any given life, for example, may or may not represent someone with whom you have a deep abiding tie, and again you may marry someone because of highly ambiguous feelings from a past life, and choose a married relationship that is not based upon love, though love may emerge.

Twins, incidentally, almost always involve very deep, abiding psychic relationships of a strong, sometimes obsessive nature. I am speaking now of identical twins.

Predetermination is never involved, for the challenge and circumstances are chosen.

Some problems may be put off, for example, for several existences. Some personalities want to solve their strongest problems and get them over with, perhaps in a series of rather trying existences and exaggerated circumstances.

Reincarnational Relationships

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