“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

I am being maligned. I have spoken to our Lady of Florence over here many times and you could have explained to our new student what I mean. I should be quiet and let you do so. You do indeed choose your own environment and your own life circumstances. And before this life you have already set those challenges that you will meet. But you also are endowed with free will and there is no punishment except [for] those of you who choose to punish yourselves. There is no punishment in those terms. You grow in understanding, and if you kill, then it is necessary that you learn what it means to be a victim and so you become a victim if you choose. You may indeed learn what it is to be a victim in other ways. You must learn how to use the consciousness that is yourself.

You will find All That Is also within a leaf and within a flower. But only when you try to understand what a leaf and a flower are. If you believe that a leaf is a piece of physical matter without consciousness, without glory, then you will learn nothing from it. But if you realize that a leaf is a portion of All That Is then you will realize what communion is.

For of real love, you know very little; of real understanding, you know very little; but you will learn and you are learning and learning itself is discovery and joy. Remember also, that any abilities that you see displayed by the personality of Ruburt are abilities of human personality, latent in each of you, are to be used as you will and as you wish for you are possessed, possessed by ideas that are limited and that restrain you. Ideas that prevent you from using your own splendid energy and abilities. I have said this many times and doubtlessly I will continue to say—when Ruburt’s familiar body is some 40 years older and my voice in comparison to Ruburt’s sounds like quite a young man (shouts)—That my energy should remind you of the energy that is inherent within yourself and that any energy that sweeps through this small frame comes from the same energy that gives you your vitality and strength and that should bring you joy and fulfillment.

A service. Now this is too complicated to handle in an evening. However, since I have nowhere made any statement on such a weighty problem, I shall here do so for the statements are needed regardless of humor. Simply on a physical level the animals have sometimes more sense than you do. They listen to the inner voice, and they do not overproduce. They set up safeguards that are automatic and instinctive. Any true evolution of your species as such is dependent on evolution of consciousness and spirituality. If your world is overpopulated, you can reduce yourselves to a state of consciousness that existed, in your terms, eons ago from which you would then again have to learn to emerge. Only certain persons are tempted to return when the world is over-populated. They are not stable. They are persons who returned too soon. They are then already erratic.

The atoms and molecules within your bodies and the consciousness within them have dwelt as flowers in the field. The actual atoms and molecules that are within your arm at this moment have been within the cows that you have eaten and the flowers upon which you now walk. The air that you now breathe in this moment has come from cosmic dust down through the universe to this room. You are not alone. You will learn the sacredness of consciousness. You will learn to be responsible for life. You will learn to protect and cherish life as you know it and the plant life as you know it.

You will learn that it is cruel to bring into existence new consciousness when your planet cannot support it. For your planet will not be able to support it and spiritual growth cannot be achieved through starving bodies nor through the agonies of mothers who must watch their children starve. (Nigerian civil war at this time.)