“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Those who imagine they look upon nature with the most objective of eyes are those whose subjective beliefs blind them most of all, for they cannot see through their own misinterpretations. It has been said that statistics can be made to say two things at once, both contradictory; so the facts of nature can be read in completely different fashions as they are put together with the organizational abilities of the mind operating through the brain’s beliefs. [...]

[...] Ask yourself how many of your current beliefs would be different if your sex was. [...]

Your beliefs about dreams color your memory and interpretation of them, so that at the point of waking, with magnificent psychological duplicity, you often make last-minute adjustments that bring your dreams more in line with your conscious expectations. [...]

[...] Men remember “manly” dreams — generally speaking, now — while women in the same manner remember dreams that they believe suit their sex according to their beliefs.

[...] I have used the different beliefs about power as an example, but any belief may be involved if it and its opposite are held in nearly equal weight.

Thus far we have been dealing with conflicting beliefs, however — and most of those can be tackled in the context of this life alone.

These beliefs may have physical or mental repercussions, though in most cases the two do not occur at once. [...]

Before we return to a discussion of other physical dilemmas, we will discuss some further unusual psychological events, and their connections with conflicting beliefs.

Worry, fear, and doubt are detrimental to good health, of course, and these are very often caused by the officially held beliefs of society.

Those beliefs paint a dire picture, in which any given situation is bound to deteriorate. [...]

Such beliefs discourage feelings of curiosity, joy, or wonder. [...]

Ruburt’s dream was excellent, showing that he is now making the best of his past, rediscovering playful beliefs — the trinkets — and sources of pleasure and activity. [...]

(Pause at 4:25.) The sooner you can rid yourself of rigid beliefs about the survival of the fittest, the better you will be. [...] Such beliefs clutter up your conscious mind with negative suggestions that can only frighten the exterior ego and impede the great strength and vitality that is your heritage from lending you the fullest possible strength and support.

[...] It is actually far more important that we stress the symptoms of health and those methods, beliefs, and healings that promote them.

[...] The “burden” of that relationship rests upon you —again, both of you—upon your expectations and those beliefs about the world that you have projected upon that company. Taking that for granted, and taking for granted the state of your society as it exists in your beliefs, then Prentice has treated you both very well—and me.

[...] The dream and Ruburt’s work with beliefs are bringing about these changes. [...]

[...] They represented the behavior of even the well-meaning people of your society, given an overall set of mass beliefs. [...] Overall, however, you are everywhere surrounded by those beliefs, and the behavior of the two girls should serve as an object lesson.

[...] Such behavior is the result of ingrained learning, and also of fear patterns that are the result of medical beliefs in particular.

Many of the sensations or stages that are definitely considered negative at such times, and certainly appear so in your experience, are the result of misunderstandings because of ingrained beliefs about body behavior, or the result of your lack of confidence. [...]

However, it is the belief that reincarnations are past that largely closes the door. [...]

They actually represent the ways in which beliefs can dull native qualities of mind and heart alike, so that the intellect seems opaque, and emotional relationships are unduly tangled. [...] It seemed to him, with the force of old beliefs, that Ida, Richard and the children were indeed driven willy-nilly by contradictory impulses, and that their lives lack any organizing inner purpose.

[...] She realized that she was reacting to what she’d taken to be all of the negative suggestions and circumstances surrounding Bill and Ida’s lives and beliefs. [...]

[...] He feels some affinity to Ruburt for the same reason, but Ruburt also upsets him, because he disapproves of women who think, and is very frightened because Ida in later years has started to criticize some of their joint beliefs.

[...] Each person senses an ideal, and has good intent, but those ideals and good intents are distorted by beliefs, and by the conditions accompanying them.

The populace has embarked upon this strong exercise program because of a mixture of very unfortunate beliefs. [...] Some religious beliefs suggest that the body is impure, and the heir to disease and infirmity. [...]

Without going more deeply into the reasons for such beliefs until later, let me discuss several of the ways in which they impede general well-being. [...]

(A few days ago I wrote out a “new manifesto” of beliefs for Jane and me, to replace the suggestions she’s been using in the morning after breakfast. [...] I wrote them because I’ve been becoming increasingly concerned about the slowness of her progress—or, to put it another way, because I felt that beliefs must still be operating in the background to account for the slowness of her progress. I also talked about resuming use of the pendulum to see what beliefs of a negative sort were still active there.

(My questions were, roughly: 1. What beliefs might still be operating behind the scenes, still interfering with Jane’s recovery? [...]

When no effort is made now and then to encounter strangers, or guests of that nature, in any position of relative authority, then Ruburt does not question his feelings or beliefs directly. [...]

[...] The encounter with the reporter, for example, on quite practical levels represented a shot in the arm, in that it quickly showed Ruburt that he is quite able to deal with such situations, that he handles them well, and that sense of confidence can then be used as new information to help break down old beliefs of inferiority.

You are, it seems, denied the easier satisfactions of accepted answers (pause), and to some extent denied the cozy comfort of shared beliefs. (Pause.) You are also, however, as Ruburt wrote, hampered it seems by old beliefs that still exert their hold. [...]

[...] When they appear otherwise, it is the result of habits and beliefs. [...]

[...] There are moments when I wish I could jar you both enough so that you could perceive clearly the intimate, immediate and also far-reaching effect of your beliefs upon your lives. [...]

[...] You have a natural immunity against all thoughts that do not fit in with your own purposes and beliefs, and naturally (pause, groping), you are “inoculated” with a wholesome trust and belief in your own thoughts above others. [...]

Now: I said, in book dictation, I believe (in the 835th session), that the people of Jonestown died of an epidemic of beliefs — or words to that effect. [...]

[...] At times you have both asked why an ailing body does not simply assert itself and use its healing abilities, throwing off the negative influence of a given set of beliefs and thoughts.

[...] You are born into belief systems as you are born into physical centuries, and part of the entire picture is the freedom of interpreting the experiences of life in multitudinous fashions (all intently). The meaning, nature, dignity or shame of suffering will be interpreted according to your systems of belief. [...]

[...] Those beliefs alone bring on suffering. All of science, in your time, has been set up to promote beliefs that run in direct contradiction to the knowledge of man’s heart. [...]

[...] I cannot stress too thoroughly the fact that the beliefs of those times structured individual human living, so that the most private events of personal lives were interpreted to mean thus and so, as were of course the events of nations, plants, and animals. [...]

It is easy enough to look at those belief structures and shrug your shoulders, wondering at man’s distorted views of reality. [...]

[...] It was an attempt to objectify inner reality as it was perceived through a certain belief system. Whether the artist disagreed with certain issues or not, the belief system was there as an invisible framework. That intense focus that united belief systems, that tension between a sensed subjective world and the physical one, and the rarity of images to be found elsewhere, brought art into that great flowering.

[...] While the Roman Catholic Church gave him a powerful, cohesive belief system (pause), for many reasons those beliefs shifted so that the division between man and God became too great. [...]

The main issue, however, in that particular era, was a shared belief system, a system that consisted of, among other things, implied images that were neither here nor there—neither entirely earthly nor entirely divine—a mythology of God, angels, demons, an entire host of Biblical characters that were images in man’s imagination, images to be physically portrayed. [...]

(9:40.) Those mythological images and their belief system were shared by all—peasants and the wealthy—to a large degree. [...]

[...] Some of those sessions were devoted to our private beliefs, but usually Seth put such beliefs into the larger social context. [...]

(9:35.) Men’s dreams were also different in those times, filled far more with metaphysical images, for example, more alive with saints and demons — but overall one framework of belief existed, and all experience was judged in its light. Now, you have far more decisions to make, and in a world of conflicting beliefs, brought into your living room through newspapers and television, you must try to find the meaning of your life, or the meaning of life.

[...] Yet even though Seth also discussed those psychic frameworks to some degree in a dozen sessions for the book, still he finally took that break in dictation to ‘re-educate’ us, looking at our own previous beliefs and those of the world at large in the light of Frameworks 1 and 2.

[...] In some important areas this means that the mechanics of experience are actually becoming more apparent, for they are no longer hidden beneath one belief system.

[...] In the past you have reinforced each other’s beliefs in an unsafe universe. These beliefs have become a part of your private and joint realities, affecting you (me) invisibly as they affect Ruburt visibly.

The world-view consists of those cultural and private beliefs concerning cultural, economic and social environments. [...]

[...] When you feel that your world is not safe the body may respond in many ways, according to the characteristic temperament and beliefs. [...]

[...] You each share some general beliefs that the rest of the world is a threat. [...]

belief. [...] Belief is a two way door, although it does not have to be. One belief, for example, may seem to negate another belief. [...] Simply for example, a belief in the color red does not negate belief in the color green.

When a belief in an abstract term seems to negate another abstract term, it may simply be because your acceptance or expectation is not expansive enough to include both.

[...] He must deal with beliefs and feelings often so ambiguous that no clear line of action seems possible. [...] If you believe that the body is sinful, for example, you cannot expect to be happy, and health will most likely elude you, for your dark beliefs will blemish the psychological and biological integrity with which you were born.

[...] The majority of accepted beliefs — religious, scientific, and cultural — have tended to stress a sense of powerlessness, impotence, and impending doom — a picture in which man and his world is an accidental production with little meaning, isolated yet seemingly ruled by a capricious God. [...]

[...] Any or all of the above beliefs are held by various systems of thought. [...]

(10:18.) Now: Ruburt’s body is responding far more than either of you presently realize, and this is because in that regard Ruburt’s beliefs have been changing at a fast rate. [...] This does not mean, again, that there is anything wrong with his sitting at his table five hours steadily if he wants to, but that he must loosen his beliefs about work and responsibility. [...]

[...] The belief, however, can certainly make that appear true.

[...] I am saying that you should change your beliefs concerning the nature of time and creativity—and for Ruburt, time, creativity, responsibility, and work. [...]

[...] The impact of all of our books goes far beyond, for example, the numbers sold, and it is in both of your natures (with amused irony) to send forth into your worlds books that are in exuberant opposition to its mass beliefs—(much deeper) so you can hardly expect the readership of gothic novels. [...]

[...] Despite many of your cherished, erroneous beliefs, your nations exist as the result of cooperation, not competition, as do all social groupings. [...]

[...] Many give lip service to such a belief. [...]

[...] When such seeming miracles occur, it is because you have transcended your usual official beliefs about your body and its health, and disease, and so allowed nature to take its course. [...]

[...] Only your beliefs about the psyche and about the body limit your experience to its present degree.

[...] Now when you believe that, Joseph, then assure him of your belief. It is extremely important that this be done, and that each of you do realize that the body can indeed improve, and is not at the mercy of old beliefs. [...]