“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

It is extremely difficult to go into detail concerning the inner senses, simply because they are uncamouflaged. I do hope to go into detail however, now or later. In some respects the inner senses can be compared to channels on your plane. When continuity is taken into consideration however then the analogy is a poor one, since the word channel seems to imply a more or less permanent opening, and this is not true. One of the marvels of your outer senses is their reach. They actually carry you further ahead, in distance for example, than your physical body may be at any particular time.

The sense of sight, mostly concentrated in your eyes, remains fixed in a permanent position on your physical body. This is of course true. Without moving away from the physical body the eyes see something that may be far in the distance. In the same manner the ears hear sounds that are distant from the body. In fact, and this is a rather important point, the ears ordinarily hear sounds outside the body more readily than sounds inside the body itself. Since the ears are in the body more or less, and of it, it would be logical for an open-minded observer to suppose that the ears would be well attuned to the inner sounds to a high degree. This as you know is not the case.

The sense of smell also seems to leap forward. A man can smell quite a stink, even though it is not right under his nose. The sense of touch, as you are consciously familiar with it, does not seem to leap out in this manner. Unless the hand itself presses upon a surface in some manner then you do not feel that you have touched it. Touch usually involves contact of a direct sort. You can of course feel the invisible wind against your cheek, but touch involves an immediacy different from the distant perceptions of sight and smell.

I am sure that you realize these points yourself. I do after all, and regardless of what you may think, credit you both with a certain sense of intelligence and imagination.

This difference in immediacy is rather important for our consideration of the inner senses. This is also why I mentioned that the ears and the eyes, while connected with the body, are directed outward. They bring data to the body but very seldom do they collect data from the body. I am beginning to get into some material that is relatively difficult to explain, considering that I must take all of your camouflage patterns into consideration.

As I have said, the outer senses deal mainly and as far as I know exclusively with camouflage pattern. The inner senses, my dear Joseph, are senses which deal with realities beneath camouflage patterns, and which carry data of these realities, these inner realities, to the body. These inner senses therefore are thoroughly capable of seeing the inside of the body, in a way that the outer eyes cannot.

As the outer senses of sight, sound and smell appear to reach outward, bringing data to the physical body from an outside observable camouflage pattern, so the inside senses seem to extend far inward, bringing important inner reality data to the physical body. There is also a transforming process here much like the moment that we have spoken of in the creation of a painting.

I suggest that you take a short break, while I consider the most auspicious manner in which to go ahead with this material. I have been ready to speak further on the inner senses for some time now. Go ahead, take your break.

The inner senses deliver data from the inner world of reality to the body. The outer senses deliver data from the outside world of camouflage to the body. However, the inner senses are aware of the body’s own physical data at all times, while the outer senses are concerned with the body mainly in its relationship to camouflage environment. In other words the inner senses have an immediate, constant knowledge of the body in a way that the outer senses do not.

The material is delivered to the body, as I have said, from the inner world by means of these inner senses. This inner reality data is received by the mind. This is extremely important. The mind, being uncamouflaged, is the receiving station for the data brought to it by the inner senses. What you almost have here is an inner nervous and communication system closely resembling the outer systems with which you are familiar.

I risk repeating myself, but I want these steps to be plain. This vital data is sent to the mind by the inner senses. Any material that is important for the body’s contact with outer camouflage patterns is given to the brain. The subconscious, so-called, is a connective between mind and brain, between the inner senses and the outer senses. It is actually partly on your plane and partly on other planes. Portions of it do deal with camouflage patterns, with the personal past of the present personality, with racial camouflage memories; and the greater portion belongs to the inner world, and as data comes into it from the inner world, so can it reach far into the inner world itself.

You must remember here that time is part of the camouflage pattern. Now the outer sense of sight would seem to confound space, and seemingly conquer a portion of distance by using your eyes. That is, you do not necessarily have to walk a short distance in order to see what is in the particular space involved.

So the inner senses and the subconscious can do the same thing as far as inner space, and what you would call inner time, is concerned. But this is not amazing, far from it. It only seems strange because you are so familiar with your precious camouflage patterns. Time and space, dear friends, are both camouflage patterns, therefore the fact that the inner senses can conquer time and space is not, after all, so surprising. To the mind with its subconscious, and to the inner senses, there is no time and space, and therefore to them nothing is conquered. The camouflage is simply not present.

When I speak of the subconscious in this manner, I speak of course of that larger portion which deals with the inner realities. I want to give you more detailed information about the inner realities themselves. Actually they do not parallel the outer senses, and this will sound appalling to you I’m afraid, simply because there is nothing to be seen, smelled, heard or touched in the manner in which you are accustomed. This is extremely hard to explain, since I do not want to give you the idea that existence without your particular set of camouflage patterns is bland and innocuous, because this is not the case.

The inner senses have a strong immediacy, a delicious intensity that your outer senses lack. There is no lapse of time in perception, since there is no time.

The designations spirit, and medium and so forth, are ridiculous to begin with. You are simply using inner senses. These senses are not magical, they certainly are not religious in any sense of the word, and I am not some degenerating secondary personality of Ruburt’s. Nor will I be compared with some long-bearded, beady-eyed spirit sitting on cloud nine.

It is true that I have lived as a human being, but this is simply a fact. This meeting and our other meetings are not seances, and your experiments with your friend Mark are not seances, according to the implications usually given. So-called seances, when they are legitimate, are simply exercises in the use of the inner senses.

Superstition breeds superstition. As far as Jane’s or Ruburt’s subconscious is concerned, I make contact with you through both of your subconsciousnesses (Jane’s pronunciation); but through that larger portion which actually exists between planes, which is the property of the mind, not the brain, and which deals with the inner senses. I have absolutely nothing to do with that portion of the subconscious which is involved with your personal memories or present personality makeup.

At times I may use my own voice simply because it will be easier to get some kinds of material across, and also because it just would be fun for a change. You said something, Joseph, that got me on this subject. I had intended to go into the inner senses more thoroughly. However this reminds me of something else.

The camouflage patterns of course do belong to the inner world also, since the camouflages themselves are formed from the vitality stuff of the universe by mental enzymes, which have a chemical reaction on your plane. The reaction of course being a distortion. That is, any camouflage pattern at all is bound to be a distortion, in a sense, of vitality forced into a particular form.

Mental enzymes are actually the property of the inner world, representing the conversion of vitality into camouflage data which is then interpreted by the outer senses. Before I continue do you have any questions on this material?

Imagine a man standing on a corner, looking down the street at a tree a block away. He need not walk that distance in order to know what is there since he can see everything between himself and the tree, at least as far as large objects are concerned. His sense of sight allows him this freedom.

Now with that out of the way, we can consider the inner senses as paths leading to an inner reality. However, here we are not concerned with space or time. If you were, or if man A was blind, he would not see the tree in question. If he were deaf he would not hear the car. Let us pretend this state of events, and let us compare the physical objects between our man and his tree to points somewhat corresponding to them in the inner world. It would be as if instead of seeing the various houses or whatever, our man instead felt them. If you remember, I mentioned earlier that your outer sense of touch was extremely immediate, in a way that sight was not, and I also gave you immediacy as one of the qualities of the inner senses.

Now our man would not vaguely sense these objects, he would feel them. He would be sensitive to them, in other words, while not touching them with anything like physical hands, as for example you feel heat or cold without necessarily touching ice or fire.

This is one of the qualities belonging to the inner senses. I will go into it more deeply but you may call it the first inner sense.

It involves immediate perception of a direct nature, whose intensity varies according to what is being sensed. It involves instant cognition through what I can only describe as inner vibrational touch. This is, if you will excuse the pun, touchy, since I want to avoid any implication here of sloppy sentimental emotionalism; and the word vibrational is not the best.

This sense would permit our man to feel the basic sensations felt by the tree, so that instead of looking at the tree his consciousness would expand to contain the experience of what it is like to be a tree. According to his proficiency, in a like manner he would feel the experience of being the intervening grass and so forth.

He would in no way lose consciousness of who he was, and he would perceive these experiences, again, somewhat in the same manner that you perceive heat and cold. In your camouflage pattern you must adapt yourself to the effects of heat and cold, but our man in the inner world would not be under any such obligation. I am speaking now only of our first inner sense.

I am not going to keep you too long this evening in any case. However I do want to mention the fact that the inner senses are capable of expansion and of focus in a way that the outer senses are not. They simply extend further, though I am speaking now in your terms rather than my own. And as to where the inner world actually is on your plane, I will go into that at our next session.

When you receive more material on the inner senses, you can begin using them to a much higher degree than you do now. For those interested in inner reality the inner senses can be utilized, of course, to explore and perceive portions of this inner reality; and the inner reality is after all what you are after.