“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

I was disappointed, naturally, but again I sent the dream manuscript out; this time to Prentice-Hall, on April 2, 1968. On April 12, as I did psy-time, I received a strong impression that Prentice would give me a contract if I revised the book rather drastically. On April 19, I received a letter from Assistant Editor Tam Mossman, stating that the house might be interested in a book on Seth, utilizing parts of the dream book manuscript. I wrote back to see exactly what they had in mind.

Association is not clearly understood, because psychologists, at present, believe that it works only in connection with past events. They also underestimate dream events, for many associations are the result of events that happen in the dream state … where the mind continues its associative processes.

Any given personal association may originate from a dream event, as well as from a past waking one. Psychologists, generally speaking, have not yet accepted the theories of your own physicists, and they continue to consider time as a series of moments. The inverted time system recognizes the actual nature of time. There is room in it for a rather complete explanation of the mind’s associative processes. The mind, as opposed to the brain, perceives in terms of a spacious present. Therefore, it draws its associations not only from your present and past but also from your future.

Frederick may be reacting to an unpleasant event experienced in the dream state in which the upsetting situation was accompanied by the particular odor. [But] he could also be reacting to a future event of the same nature, for again, the mind does not break time into a series of moments. This is done by the physical brain.

The ego, as a rule, is not aware of this broader time experience, but the subconscious often is; and associative processes of the mind can and do react to the future. Therefore, it is possible for our Frederick to become ill this year at the smell of a particular perfume because, say, subconsciously he knows that in 1980 his mother will be wearing it when she dies. The associative processes work both forward and backward.

Sense data is not basically dependent upon the physical body. The mind can bypass the senses and receive data in a more direct manner, translating what it perceives automatically, as it translates ordinary sense data.

Under ordinary circumstances, data is received through the physical senses and then interpreted by the brain. When a clairvoyant event is perceived, the data is received by the mind, then given to the brain which then interprets it. The physical body becomes aware of it, but the senses have actually been bypassed. The interpretation is made, however, in the same way as it usually is. Otherwise, the information would not register for the physical organism.

Actually, of course, much information perceived directly by the mind does bypass the physical organism completely. In some such cases, the subconscious does receive the data. In other cases, it is not recorded in any way within the physical system but is recorded at deeper layers of the self.