“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

For every consciousness existed simultaneously and in essence, even before what you may call the beginnings of your world. And what you are yet to be existed then and still exists now — and not as some still unfulfilled possibility but in actuality.

What you will be, you are now, not in some misty half-real form but in a most real sense. You simply are not aware of these selves on a conscious level any more than you are aware of ‘past’ lives. But each of you creates a dream world of validity, actuality, durability and self-determination, in the same way that the entity projects the reality of its various personalities. As there is usually no contact between the entity and the ordinary conscious ego, there is usually no contact on a conscious level between the self who dreams and the dream world which has its own independent existence.

And in the same way that the dream world has no beginning or end, neither does the physical universe with which you are familiar. No energy can be withdrawn, and this includes the energy used in the continuous subconscious construction of the dream world. You continually create it — have always created it. It is the product of your own existence, and yet you can neither consciously call it into existence nor destroy it.

This point is extremely important. As you know, animals dream. What you do not know is that all consciousness dreams. Atoms and molecules have consciousness, and this minute consciousness forms its own dreams even as, on the other hand, it forms its own physical image. As in the material world, atoms combine for their own benefit into more complicated structures, so do they combine to form such gestalts in the dream world.

The dream world, then, is a by-product of your own existence [from your standpoint]. It is connected to you through chemical reactions and this leaves open the entryway of interactions. Since dreams are a by-product of any consciousness involved with matter, then trees have their dreams. All physical matter, being formed about individualized units of consciousness of varying degrees, also participates in the involuntary construction of the dream world.

The gradations of intensities are so minute that it would be impossible to measure them, and yet each field contains in coded form the actual living reality of endless eons; contains what you would call the past, present, and future of unnumbered universes; contains the coded data of any and every consciousness that has been or will be, in any universe; those that have appeared to vanish, and those which, seemingly, do not yet exist. …

The reality of dreams can be investigated only through direct contact. … REM sleep or no REM sleep, your dreams exist constantly beneath consciousness, even in the waking state. The personality is constantly affected by them. It is impossible to deprive a person of dreams even though you deprive him of sleep [as in certain dream laboratory experiments]. This function will be carried on subconsciously. …

The ego allows them more freedom. For this reason, they also have more telepathic and clairvoyant dreams than adults. They also have greater psychic energy; that is, they are able to draw upon energy more easily. Because of the intenseness of their waking experience, the chemical excesses build up at a faster rate. Therefore, children have more of this ‘chemical propellant’ to use in dream formation. They are also more conscious of their dreams. …

While Seth was delivering this material we had embarked upon our own dream experiments. Later, in 1967, I started my ESP classes, and my students began their own work in dream recall and experimentation. As you will see, these led to dream manipulation and, in many instances to projection of consciousness from the dream state.

Though each person progresses differently, generally speaking, the more advanced dream work follows the earlier stages of simple recall, to more frequent self-knowledge within the dream state and from there to manipulation of dream images and projection. The following chapters deal, then, with our experiences with different kinds of dreams and their effect on daily life. Later chapters will be concerned with the expansion of consciousness that results from the earlier experiments.