“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

You have put sexual labels, then, on the intellect and the emotions, so that they seem like opposites to you.

You have tried to divide mental and emotional characteristics between the two sexes, forcing a stereotyped behavior. Again, the male who was intuitive or artistically gifted in certain ways often therefore considered himself homosexual, whether or not he was, because his emotional and mental characteristics seem to fit the female rather than the male sex.

The woman who had interests beyond those acceptable as feminine was often in the same position. Because the intellect and the emotions were considered so separately, however, attempts to express intuitive abilities often resulted in, and often do result in, “unreasonable” behavior.

This also forces you to guard your emotional life very closely. As a result, any show of love is to some extent inhibited unless it can legitimately find expression sexually. In many instances love itself seems wrong because it must imply sexual expression at times when such expression is not possible, or even desired. Some people have a great capacity for love, devotion, and loyalty, which would naturally seek expression in many diverse ways — through strong enduring friendships, devotion to causes in which they believe, through vocations in which they help others. They may not be particularly sexually oriented. This need not mean that they are inhibiting their sexuality. It is pathetic and ludicrous for them to believe that they must have intercourse frequently in their youth, or to set up standards of normality against which they must measure their sexual experience.

(9:51.) In fact, Western society has attempted to force all expression of love and devotion into sexual activity, or otherwise ban it entirely. Sexual performance is considered the one safe way of using the great potential of human emotions. When it seems to you that society is becoming licentious, in many ways it is most restrained and inhibited.

Generally speaking, there will be a specific overall sexual orientation of a biological nature, but the mental and emotional human characteristics are simply not meted out according to sex. Such identification cuts the individual in half, so that each person uses but half of his or her potential. This causes a schism in all of your cultural activities.

The more able the child is to force such an artificial identification, the greater its feelings of inner rebellion. The lack of a “suitable” father or mother image has “saved” more children than it has hurt. The psyche, with its great gifts, always feels thwarted and attempts to take countering measures. Your schools further continue the process, however, so that the areas of curiosity and learning become separated for males and females. The “she” within the male does indeed represent portions of his personality that are being unexpressed — not because of any natural predominance of mental or emotional characteristics over others, but because of artificial specializations. The same applies to the “male” within the female. You have accepted this version of personhood, again, in line with your ideas about the nature of consciousness. Those ideas are changing, and as they do the species must accept its true personhood. As this happens, your understanding will allow you to glimpse the nature of the reality of the gods you have recognized through the ages. You will no longer need to clothe them in limited sexual guises.

Your religious concepts will change considerably, and the images associated with them. Religion and government have had an uneasy alliance. Males ruled both (they still do), and yet those leading religious organizations at least recognized their intuitive base. They constantly tried to manipulate religion’s substructure in the same acceptable male ways that government leaders always use to inhibit and use the emotions.

There were also some women who passed as monks, living lives of a solitary nature and carrying on for years. No works bear their feminine names, for they used male ones. It goes without saying that lesbian and homosexual relationships flourished in such surroundings. The Church closed its eyes as long as the relationships were sexual in nature. Only when love and devotion were diverted from the Church was there real concern. Intellect and emotions became further divided then. This resulted of course in an overemphasis upon dogma — rules and the ritualization that had to be colorful and rich because it would be the one outlet allowed in which creativity could be handled. The Church believed that sexual experience belonged to the so-called lower or animal instincts, and so did usual human love. On the other hand, spiritual love and devotion could not be muddied by sexual expression, and so any normal strong relationship became a threat to the expression of piety.