“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

All of your physical, mental and spiritual abilities are focused together, then, in the brilliant concentration of “present” experience. You are not at the mercy of the past, or of previous convictions, unless you believe that you are. If you fully comprehend your power in the present, you will realize that action at that point also alters the past, its beliefs and your reactions.

In other words I am telling you that your present beliefs, in a manner of speaking, are like the directions given to the entire personality, simultaneously organizing and reorganizing past experience according to your current concepts of reality.

The future — the probable future — is being altered in the same way, of course. To look backward for the source of current problems can lead you into the habit of seeking only negative episodes from your past, and prevent you from experiencing it as a source of pleasure, accomplishment, or success (very intently).

(Pause at 9:21.) Those given to such practices — constant examination of the past in order to discover what is wrong in the present — too often miss the point. Instead, they constantly reinforce the negative experience from which they are trying to escape. Their initial problems were caused precisely as a result of the same kind of thinking. A great many unsatisfactory conditions result because individuals become frightened at various periods in their lives, doubt themselves, and begin to concentrate upon “negative” aspects.

The situation may be quite different in some ways. Large areas of life may not be touched by certain attitudes, while others are. One person may be completely free physically and in excellent health, and yet, because of certain experiences, begin to doubt his ability to get along with others. So he may begin to look into his past — with that belief in mind, that he cannot relate — and then find within previous conduct all kinds of reasons to support the idea.

If he journeyed through his memories trying to find a different kind of proof instead, then in that same past he would discover instances when he did relate well with others. Your present beliefs structure the memories which will parade before you now — and what you remember will then seem to justify the beliefs.

When you are trying to alter your beliefs, look through your past with the new conceptions in mind. If you are ill, remember when you were not. Search your life for proofs of your health. Your very life itself is hard evidence that health is within you!

You have been taught that you are at the mercy of previous events, so your idea of looking for the source of personal difficulty is to examine the past, but — to find what you did wrong there, or what mistakes occurred there, or what inadequate interpretations were made there! Again, regardless of what you have been taught, the point of power is in the present; and again, your present beliefs will be used to structure your recollections.

Those memories will be used to reach any conclusion, as statistics can be used, for example. Along the way you may settle for a given remembered event or two, and assign to them the reasons for your present behavior. If so, you are already prepared to change your current beliefs and mode of action, and simply use the occurrences or habits of the past as a stimulus or motivation. (See the 616th session in Chapter Two.)

Which you? Which world? These questions are to be answered in the “now,” as you understand it, through the realization that your power of action is in the present and not in the past. Your only effective point of changing any aspect of your world lies in that miraculous instant connection of spirit and self through neurological impact.

(“No.” Pause at 9:56. Then, intensely:) To rid yourself of annoying restrictions then, my dear friend, you repattern your past from the present. Whatever your circumstances, you use the past as a rich source, looking through it for your successes, restructuring it. When you search it looking for what is wrong, then you become blind to what was right, in those terms, so that the past only mirrors the shortcomings that now face you.

Other events literally become invisible to you. Since basically past and future exist at once, you are at the same time dangerously constructing your future along the same lines.

You are not at the mercy of past beliefs, therefore. On the other hand, the sooner you begin to act upon new ones the better. Otherwise you are not trusting them in the present. If you are poor and want to have more money, and try to maintain a belief in abundance — while still faced with the fact of present poverty — you must in your reality make some symbolic move that shows you are willing to accept a change.

You perform habitually in certain manners as a result of your beliefs. Now if you willfully change some of those habits then you are also getting the message across. The initiative must come from you, and in the present. In a very real manner of speaking, this means changing your viewpoint, that particular perspective with which you view your past and present and imagine your future.

You must look within yourself for evidences of what you want in terms of positive experience. Examine your past with that in mind. Imagine your future from the power point of the present. In such a way at least you are not using the past to reinforce your limitations, or projecting them into the future. It is only natural to contrast what you want with what you have, and it is very easy to become discouraged in so doing, but looking for errors in the past will not help you. A correctly utilized five-minute period of time can be of great benefit, however. In this period concentrate upon the fact that the point of power is now. Feel and dwell upon the certainty that your emotional, spiritual and psychic abilities are focused through the flesh, and for five minutes only direct all of your attention toward what you want. Use visualization or verbal thought — whatever comes most naturally to you; but for that period do not concentrate upon any lacks, just upon your desire.

Such effects will occur however only if you cease looking into the past “for what is wrong,” and stop reinforcing your negative experience. These same principles can be used in any area of your life, and in each you are choosing from a variety of probable events.

Those of you who believe in reincarnation in more or less conventional terms, can make the error of using or blaming “past” lives, organizing them through your current beliefs. It is bad enough to believe that you are at the mercy of one past, but to consider yourself helpless before innumerable previous errors from other lives puts you in an impossible situation; the conscious will is robbed of its power to act. Such lives exist simultaneously. They are other expressions of yourself, interacting, but with each conscious self possessing the point of power in its own present.

(10:45.) It is for this reason that “past-life information” is so often used to reinforce current personal social situations — because, like the past in this life, such memories are constructed through present belief.

These statements of mine are general, for each individual will have his or her own way of reinforcing beliefs. If you think you are ill, most likely past-life information will show that you committed crimes for which you are now doing penance. In whatever framework you choose, you will always find proper reinforcement for your belief.

In quite real personal and racial terms, the past is still happening. You create it from your present according to your beliefs. A removed appendix will not reappear physically. There are certain frameworks that are accepted, built into your creaturehood. There is far greater freedom, however, even on the cellular level.