“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

The time of choosing is dependent upon the condition and circumstances of the individual following transition from physical life. Some take longer than others to understand the true situation.

A belief in heaven or hell, under certain conditions, can be equally disadvantageous. Some will refuse to accept the idea of further work, development, and challenge, believing instead that conventional heaven situations are the only possibility. For some time they may indeed inhabit such an environment, until they learn through their own experience that existence demands development, and that such a heaven would be sterile, boring, and indeed “deadly.”

Then they are ready for the time of choosing. Others may insist that because of their transgressions they will be cast into hell, and because of the force of such belief, they may for some time actually encounter such conditions. In either case, however, there are always teachers available. They try to get through these false beliefs.

In the Hades conditions, the individuals come somewhat more quickly to their senses. Their own fears trigger within themselves the answering release. Their need, in other words, more quickly opens up the inner doorways of knowledge. Their state does not usually last as long, therefore, as the heaven state.

Either state, however, puts off the time of choosing and the next existence. There is one point I would like to mention here: In all cases, the individual creates his experience. I say this again at the risk of repeating myself because this is a basic fact of all consciousness and existence. There are no special “places” or situations or conditions set apart after physical death in which any given personality must have experience.

Suicides, as a class, for example, do not have any particular “punishment” meted out to them, nor is their condition any worse a priori. They are treated as individuals. Any problems that were not faced in this life will, however, be faced in another one. This applies not only to suicides, however.

(9:38.) The conditions connected with an act of suicide are also important, and the inner reality and realization of the individual. I mention this here because many philosophies teach that suicides are met by a sort of special, almost vindictive fate, and such is not the case. However, if a person kills himself, believing that the act will annihilate his consciousness forever, then this false idea may severely impede his progress, for it will be further intensified by guilt.

Obviously, however, these conditions are also impediments to the time of choosing. It goes without saying that an obsession with earthly concerns also acts in the same manner. In such instances, often the personality will insist upon focusing his perceptive abilities and energies toward physical existence. This is a psychic refusal to accept the fact of death. The individual knows quite well that he is dead in your terms, but he refuses to complete the psychic separation.

(10:59.) I mention this here simply to point out that there are many other after-death conditions not connected with your system. When you have learned to your capacity in this in-between period, you are ready to progress. The in-between period itself, however, has many dimensions of activity and divisions of experience. As you can see, to put it as simply as possible, everyone does not “know” everyone else.

Instead of countries or physical divisions, you have psychological states. To an individual in one, another might seem quite foreign. In many communications with those in these transitional states, messages through mediums can appear as highly contradictory. The experience of the “dead” is not the same. The conditions and situations vary. An individual explaining his reality can only explain what he knows. Again, such material often offends the intellect that demands simple, neat answers and descriptions that tally.