“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(By 8:58 Jane said she did not feel very nervous, but did feel strange because she had no idea of what Seth would talk about. Her mind was on the house we plan to buy, instead of on the session, she said. Our cat Willy was also very quiet.

I would like to continue our discussion on matter. If you recall, we were entering into primary and secondary constructions.

Such a primary construction allows consciousness to operate, manipulate and be perceived in the world of matter. The physical construction of consciousness never is complete as far as fulfilling the inner purpose is involved; that is, consciousness can never fully construct itself in matter, and to do so would indeed imprison such a consciousness so that it could not escape the transient nature of matter itself.

(Jane’s delivery had by now slowed up considerably; she began to take long pauses between phrases. It appeared that this session would be another of the kind wherein Seth tries very hard to make accurate points; they usually leave Jane quite tired. While delivering the material she appears to search very carefully for just the right word.)

What you consider your consciousness, or your self, or your thinking ego, represents of course only one portion of your entire consciousness, that part which you are using at this time. It is as if, for example, consciousness of any whole self were compared to a huge, and indeed almost infinite light, with the ability inherent in the light to focus in many directions; to be diffused, as if the light had many switches that would turn it to greater or lesser intensities and directions.

Some conditions, some roads and countries, would require different beams to meet different circumstances, as even in automobiles you use high beams or low beams according to necessity or utility; and in some cases the high beams would not only be ineffective but dangerous, and so low beams are used.

To use full consciousness would be most distracting in many instances. When I speak, therefore, of primary constructions in the physical field, other fields of course have their own primary constructions also, though they would not be composed of matter in your terms.

These afterimages could be imagined as rippling outward from any primary construction. Theoretically there would be no end to these. They vary of course in intensity.

The cooperative aspects of consciousness construction forms the whole fabric of your material universe. A subdivision of primary construction can be called the distortive mirror construction, which would include of course the physical construction of another physical being in birth.

Call the particular matter given by the parents x and y. When the child is born, it does not contain anywhere within it these particular portions of matter called x and y. It would appear that the matter had changed. Instead, the matter has vanished, in ways that I have explained earlier. Do you recall?

Your psychic strength is extremely important, Joseph, in our communications; and without it adequate communication would be most difficult; because we three have been closely involved in the past, the psychic gestalt between us is possible. And we do have a psychic gestalt.

(Then I was inside the house we intend to buy. I was facing two men in work clothes; one of them was dark and I believe unshaven. I asked them who they were. They said they were from the gas company. I didn’t know how they got in. They then said they would need a key; they had to have the place open to get in.