“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Now: this is important to yourselves, but to others also. Your suggestions about a safe universe are finally taking effect. As mentioned, however, the idea of an unsafe universe automatically initiates a certain kind of thinking. The particular versions of such thinking will be highly individualistic. In certain areas, however, invisible beliefs may operate for some time because they are accepted as reality within the framework. For these there seems to be no reference for comparison.

They can often be recognized as attitudes, however, before they are seen objectively as beliefs. In an unsafe universe as given protection is necessary, and certain attitudes are accepted, coloring many areas of life, spreading out to assure that protection.

Until an individual gains enough confidence in the concept of a safe universe, he or she will hang on to many of those attitudes. They are disturbing because at one stage they are only felt but not understood for what they are. If you are convinced that your world is not safe then it seems sensible to protect yourself in questionable areas by expecting the worst so that you will be prepared. Unfortunately such expectations, of course, are disadvantageous. They have, however, a strong basis in your society from childhood up. “Wear a sweater or you will catch a cold.” A simple enough suggestion, it seems, a preventive measure. Yet in that innocent remark lies the assumption that the cold can be expected rather than, say, a normal state of health.

(10:29.) Ruburt becomes worried when he thinks of the many people who write or call, asking for help. You are in the middle of a learning process. Objective answers given to people are not true answers. Questions that help individuals search into their own experience can bring out answers that literally cannot be given. You cannot write psychic prescriptions, for then you begin to structure inner experience. You are traveling yourselves out of an unsafe universe into a safe one. There are steps along the way. Ruburt’s are observable. The race tries to improve the quality of its experience through probing different kinds of probabilities. In a way each individual tries a different course for himself and for the race as a whole.

The body has a certain shape. It is maintained more or less as a species develops. Yet each change or alteration in the physical species is the result of many individuals trying out a particular biological course, which then later in your terms becomes the accepted one. In those terms the species has dealt mainly with physical manipulation. Largely unsuspected, however, the mind has been literally assimilating data at an accelerating rate. Each individual experience adds to inner social comprehension. The inner overall consciousness of the species then makes decisions way before any alteration occurs in physical reality. The species can decide to change its course, and set certain actions into history that will change the future, seemingly against all probabilities apparent at the time. This is occurring.

The world, however, was seen as unsafe to one degree or another in each. Each era set up various methods meant to protect man against the environment itself, or against the gods. In terms of physical existence man’s consciousness has not progressed enough along the path it had chosen, so that it could afford to admit the oneness of inner and outer reality.

(11:07.) Coping became a way of life in each civilization. Alongside, however, there were always minorities, religions or cultures, who kept out of the main current and experimented along different lines. The idea of a safe universe seems sacriligious and impractical, and yet the next important breakthrough will be based upon that conclusion. In greater terms no coping is or ever has been necessary—for coping implies a resistance. The coping exists first, and brings forth the resistance in experience.

Man wanted to separate himself from nature, but in so doing lost the animal’s great trust in it. At the same time he forged a new kind of consciousness. That, combined with nature’s knowledge of itself, will lead to the new dimensions of experience necessary. In your private lives you see many of the results of the unsafe universe. In the mass world you see far more.

Ruburt’s condition has vacillated through the years, yet always contained within it the great thrusts toward health, and the improvements. These did not become official, meaning they did not triumph. Neither did their evidence disappear. The habit patterns, the attitudes, connected with the unsafe universe persisted, even as Ruburt became aware of the concept. Individually, however, in those terms he is well ahead of the species’ development.

The knowledge of the last few days, however, is bringing about a further alteration of consciousness that allows him to progress, and in all cases the alterations of consciousness happen first. In the meantime, with the Cézanne material and the painting, he is opening up other areas that will make certain portions of my new book possible, for certain levels of understanding are acquired on his part.