“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

We are dealing here principally, and in the main, with the essence of action, and essentially all apparent divisions are arbitrary for the sake of explanation. The moment point is in itself arbitrary, an artificial division. As we have said, the moment point for you is actually composed of the amount of action which you are capable of assimilating within your present framework, for the moment point is indeed a portion of the spacious present.

The subconscious, and in fact all portions of the self with the exception of the ego, are capable of assimilating a wider area, so to speak, of action. Therefore to these other portions of the self, time has a much different essence than it has for the ego. The ego is indeed many things. It can be defined in relationship to many other aspects of reality. In relationship to action, and moment points, the ego is indeed that portion of the self which stands at the apex of the moment point, and is limited by the moment point. The ego is in this context the portion of the self which is utterly focused upon, and imprisoned by, the moment point.

The ego is that portion of the self which experiences time as continuity, and to whom experience is a series of stimuli and responses carried on one after another. And yet this is in itself a division, so to speak, or a kind of value fulfillment, for the simultaneous nature of a given action is here experienced in slow motion, as a child must learn to walk before the child can run.

The subconscious however is not so limited. If you consider the ego at the apex of the moment point, and imprisoned therefore within the realm of its own before-and-after, cause-and-effect experience, then you can imagine the subconscious reaching further outward and seizing upon many other moment points. It should be easy to see then why the focus of the ego is so sharp and brilliant. Within its limited scope there is intensity of stimuli and response. Indeed, the ego is that portion of the personality which is plunged into a specific and intense preoccupation with a given field of action or dimension.

The subconscious, reaching outward, reaches also inward. For while there is no real past or present or future within the spacious present, there is indeed an infinity of inward and outward; and again, of actions within actions, and there is no end to these actions for they are self-generating. The other portions of the inner self reach then even further in all directions, and they therefore envelop many moment points. To many portions of the inner self then, what you would call a moment would correspond to an almost limitless number of moments, for even physical time has no meaning without experience without action.

Your whole concept of time is built about your own capacity for perceiving action; as this capacity for perceiving action grows, so indeed do the dimensions of time grow. Conceivably therefore one moment of your time would indeed be experienced by the whole self as centuries.

It is only the ego that steps from moment to moment, as a man who walks from puddle to puddle. It is only the ego who drowns in time. Therefore, since only the ego is momentarily imprisoned within the focus of your plane, it is only the ego who probes so slowly into simultaneous action, perceiving it bit by bit and sip by sip. So now you will see what I meant when I spoke about the limitless self, for the whole self is not so bound. The whole self could and does perceive a limitless number of such moment points simultaneously. And now hear this:

The whole self not only perceives these limitless moment points, but being a part of action, each whole self projects fragments and personalities from itself to all these points, creating therefore other egos, other intense focus points which are independent, which work out their own destinies and experiences, which in turn perceive any given moment point in slow motion.

The inner ego looks inward, yet in looking inward it looks outward toward those vast portions of the self. Because there is always action within action, and because of the three dilemmas of which we have spoken earlier, the new personalities projected outward into other fields of perception, or other moment points, these other personalities in turn create new ones, and the cycle is again repeated.

Time, physical matter, these are but portions of action as perceived in one particular fashion. The basic stuff, or the basic action of the universe, is one. It is perceived differently, and therefore reality constantly wears a different face. It is speeded up or slowed down according to the scope of perception.

(It might be interesting to note here that Seth began talking about action in the 13th session, January 6, 1964: “Love and hate, for example, are action,” and “In your plane, action is the main word of importance,” etc. See Volume 1, page 71.

It is almost impossible to explain clearly, through the use of words, this massive complexity, for all fields of activity are self-generating. Even the dream field is self-generating. No consciousness can bring itself to destruction. It can only cease experiencing a certain portion of action. This is a rather important point.

The multiplicity of human experience would be impossible were it not for the inner self, and for the heritage that speaks through the cells of every human being. The perspectives and psychic relationships that make up the human personality simply could not have resulted through action within your field alone. It cannot be stressed too strongly that experience within the self can lead to at least some understanding of the nature of action in its pure form, for within your physical universe action is to some extent frozen, insofar as your perceptions of it are concerned.

There are such manipulations within various systems that change other systems. Your own behavior and action within the dream universe definitely affects the physical universe. From one field of activity then you have changed another, and without ever knowing, in many cases, that you have done so. In the same manner do the activities of the physical universe alter the dream system. It is virtually impossible for me to explain all these inner workings. We will have to wait until you can experience concepts for much of that.

Inner action, in terms of psychological reality, is every bit as important as physical action; more important. It would be most unfortunate if either or both of you let physical action on the part of others stand in the way of beneficial action on your own parts.

(I assume this statement refers to my getting upset this evening by the actions of our neighbors. I realized their actions were trivial, yet also felt they were thoughtless. From talking to Jane, I gathered she felt we should watch our reactions to others, so I let it pass. Still I admitted that I was upset.)