“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

The experiences at these various levels may be interpreted symbolically. They may appear in the form of fantasy, fiction, or art work, without the conscious self realizing their origin. Now at any of these various stages of consciousness, other phenomena may also be perceived — thought-forms for example, energy manifestations, projections from the personal subconscious, and projections from the collective unconscious. Any or all of these may take symbolic form, and may appear beneficial or threatening according to the attitude of the personality involved. They should be regarded as quite natural phenomena, often neutral in intent.

You may have several quite valid experiences in level four for example, without any awareness of the first three. The stages are there for those who know what they are and how to use them. Many quite spontaneously find their own way. The other adjacent levels on the horizontal line, now, involve you in various alternate realities, each one a greater distance from your own. Many of these involve systems in which life and death as you know it does not occur, where time is felt as weight; systems in which the root assumptions are so different from your own that you would only accept any experiences as fantasy.

Often you visit such areas of consciousness in the dream state where you fall into them spontaneously, remembering in the morning a fantastic dream. Consciousness must use all of its parts and activities, even as the body must. When you are sleeping, therefore, your consciousness turns itself in many of these directions, often perceiving, willy-nilly, bits and pieces of reality that are available to it at its different stages. This also happens beneath your normal physical focus to some extent, even as you go about your waking activities. The alternate presents of which I spoke are not simply alternate methods of perceiving one objective present. There are many alternate presents, with you focused only in one of them.

When you are proficient you will not be swept willy-nilly into other stages of consciousness as you sleep, but will be able to understand and direct these activities. Consciousness is an attribute of the soul, a tool that can be turned in many directions. You are not your consciousness. It is something that belongs to you and to the soul. You are learning to use it. To the extent that you understand and utilize the various aspects of consciousness, you will learn to understand your own reality, and the conscious self will truly become conscious.