“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

One night I had a frightening dream that seemed very real. I found myself in our bedroom, out of my body, and suddenly I realized that someone or something was directly above me. The next minute I was pushed down to the foot of the bed, off into the air, and then down to the dark corner of the bedroom floor. Above me was what I can only describe as a big black thing like a bloated, blurred human form, but larger and very solid.

It sounds ridiculous, but I knew that this thing was “out to get me.” I knew that I was out of my body, and I was overwhelmed with astonishment, as well as very frightened. Although I’d read of people being attacked by demons or the like while they were “projecting,” I just didn’t believe in demons. So what was it? I didn’t have time to wonder, because it bit me several times on the hand. It was amazingly oppressive, and kept up its efforts to drag me farther away from my body into the bedroom closet.

In dismay, I heard Rob snoring. In any case, I wasn’t in my physical body, and he probably wouldn’t know anything was wrong anyhow. And where was Seth? Where were all those “guides” who were supposed to come running to your aid when you got in predicaments like this? All these thoughts went scurrying through my mind as I tried to fight this thing off. I was very conscious of the creature’s weight, which was really amazing, and its intent—which was to maul me up as much as possible, if not to kill me outright.

“Don’t panic,” I told myself, trying desperately to retain some semblance of calm. But the thing pressed down and was about to bite me again. This time I thought, “To hell with not panicking,” and I started to yell my head off. I knew it wasn’t my physical head, but I hoped that my shout would either frighten the creature away or attract some kind of help.

The thing pulled back for an instant, much like a huge startled animal, and I slipped from beneath it and shot fast as a rocket for my body, with it after me. In other words, I beat a fast cowardly retreat. I hit my body so quickly that my physical head was spinning, but no matter. My body never felt so welcome.

For a minute I was afraid to open my physical eyes. “Boy, if it’s still here, I’ve had it,” I thought. But it was gone. At least it was in another level of existence. I thought of waking Rob to tell him, but decided not to interrupt his sleep.

“But this fact is Ruburt’s safeguard in his out-of-body travels—as long as he remembers it. The words ‘May peace be with you’ will get him through any difficulty in other layers of reality—for as he formed that image, others also form images and he could encounter them. To wish them peace will give them some comfort, for they do have a kind of reality. To fear them is to put yourself into their realm of reality, and then you are forced to fight on their terms. There is no need for this.”

This episode was an out-of-body experience from the dream state, though, and it will serve to make one point: dream reality is as valid and real as waking reality. Dreams definitely affect daily life. They can improve our health or help deepen a mood of depression. There are ways to use dreams purposefully, however, to improve our existence, even though I admit that the last instance was not a very good example.

He starts off by saying: “The personality is composed of energy gestalts. As the personality is changed by any experience, it is changed by its dreams; and as an individual is molded by his physical environment to some extent, so is he molded by the dreams which he himself creates. … The self is limitless. When your perceptions fail, it seems to you that boundaries appear. For example, it seems to you that dreams cease when you are no longer aware of them. This is not so.

“We do not want an individual to suggest that he dream of harming another. There are several reasons for this, including telepathic realities that you do not yet understand, and guilt patterns which would be unavoidable. We are not talking about substituting dream action for physical action. We are discussing particular problems that need treatment.”

While all of this is of practical interest, Rob and I are even more intrigued by Seth’s explanation of dream reality. Since I’ve had many out-of-body experiences from the dream state, I was rather concerned about the reality of the environments in which I found myself. Seth began his discussions on the nature of dream reality very soon after the sessions began, and they still continue. Until I learned from Seth to “monitor” my own dreams, and awaken my critical faculties, I was simply astounded by some of his statements.

Consider this early passage from session 92, which I now accept as basic: “Each dream begins with psychic energy which the individual transforms not into physical matter, but into a reality every bit as functional and real. He forms the idea into a dream object or event with amazing discrimination, so that the dream object itself gains existence and exists in numerous dimensions. …

Still speaking of dreams, Seth says: “Energy projected into any kind of construction, psychic or physical, cannot be recalled, but must follow the laws of the particular form into which it has been for the moment molded. Therefore, when the dreamer contracts his multi-realistic objects backward, ending for himself the dream he has constructed, he ends it for himself only. The reality of the dream continues.”

Seth has answered many questions that were in Rob’s mind, and are probably in your own. How is it that ordinary daily life seems much more real to us than any dream existence? And if such a universe is valid, why doesn’t it intrude on our daily life even more? At least we all more or less agree on what happens physically, but dreams are highly individual. How can there be any continuity to a dream universe? Within such a universe, how could anyone possibly agree with anyone else as to what was happening?

“First of all,” Seth said, “the physical universe itself is a conglomeration of diverse individualistic symbols, none of which means precisely the same thing to any two individuals, and in which even so-called basic qualities like color and placement in space cannot be relied upon. You merely focus upon the similarities. Telepathy could be called the glue that holds the physical universe in precarious position, so that you can agree on the existence and properties of objects. …

“So when you consider the dream world, you have the same sort of universe, only one constructed within a field that you cannot physically perceive. But it has more continuity than the world you know, and there are similarities within it that are amazing to behold. …

“For one thing … those who know existence on the physical level now, have, because of certain cycles, lived before at approximately the same historical periods. They possess an inner familiarity, a cohesiveness that belonged to a more or less specific period and to periods before, where they inhabited the same sort of reality. Their dream experiences, then, are not so diverse as you might suppose. Certain symbols are constructed into realities in the dream system, then, in much the same manner that ideas are constructed into matter in the physical system.

“The same sort of psychic agreement holds the dream system together as holds the physical system together. If a man could actually focus upon those unrecognized elements in the physical universe upon which no agreements can be reached, if he could focus upon the dissimilarities rather than the similarities, then he would wonder what gave anyone the idea that there was even one physical object upon which man could agree.

Each dream object is actually double- or triple-decked, a symbol for other, deeper data. A dream involving reincarnational information, for example, may also serve to help us face a present-day problem by reminding us of other unused abilities inherent in our personalities. I’ve had two particularly vivid reincarnational dreams. One, occurring shortly after our sessions began, really frightened me because I was afraid that it might be precognitive, I dreamed that I was an old woman in a very poor hospital ward of some kind. I was dying of cancer and knew it, but wasn’t a bit frightened. An old man beside me was also about to die. I told him not to worry, that I would be there to help him. Then I died, but there seemed to be no break in consciousness. I helped the old man out of his body and kept telling him that everything was all right.

In this dream Rob and I were both men in our late twenties and partners in the episode. I knew very well that we would “later” end up as Rob and Jane in this life, even though there was no physical resemblance. Rob, for example, was dark and swarthy, although now his skin and hair are both light. We wore long billowing trousers, bound tightly at the ankles, Turkish-style. I do not remember our names.

As the dream opened, we entered a large hall. A group of men, attired in the same costumes, sat on brightly colored pillows on the floor, roughly in a circle, with the center of the floor clear. I knew all of the men from a previous life in which I had been their leader, dying very young. These men had grown old, while I had been reborn. Now I had come back to fulfill a promise I had made to return. I was well aware that they would not recognize me in this body in which they had not known me.

The center of the hall was vacant except for a few low tables. Rob-to-be asked that these be removed for the demonstration. This was done and the men came closer, squatting on the pillows. My partner stood behind me. I took several light bouncing footsteps that were somehow ceremonial, and then left my physical body. It slumped down to the floor, and my partner gently moved it to the side.

Then, in my astral body I went flying through the hall, which had a high-domed ceiling. Laughing at what I considered a great practical joke, I swung low above each man in turn and whisked off his turban. My partner handed me a feather—apparently he could see me clearly, and I could manipulate physical objects. Waving the feather through the air, I flew back and forth again several times so that, watching the feather, the men could follow my progress above them.

All the while my partner was laughing loudly, and I was having a tremendous time. Finally I returned to my body and stood up to the cries and shouts of recognition. The rest I hardly remember. I know women were brought to us, but, smiling, we waved them away, preferring to talk to our old comrades first. All of us had very dark skin.

“The locations that you visit while dreaming are as real to you then as physical locations are to you now. Let us speak no more of a conscious or unconscious self. There is one self and it focuses its attention in various dimensions. In the waking state it focuses in physical reality. In the dream state it is focused within a different dimension.

“If you have little memory of dream locations when you are awake, you have little memory of ‘physical’ locations when you are in the dream state. When the physical body lies in bed, it is separated by a vast distance from the dream location in which the dreaming self may dwell. But this distance has nothing to do with space, for the dream location can exist simultaneously with the room in which the body sleeps.

This does not mean that we do not sometimes leave our bodies and travel in our dream or astral bodies to other physical locations. According to Seth we do so often, whether or not we remember. Some of my students, for example, have frequent out-of-body experiences from both the waking and the dream states, and on several such occasions we seem to have met in my living room.

“I mentioned the Crucifixion, saying once that it was an actuality and a reality, although it did not take place in your [physical] time. It took place in the same sort of time in which a dream occurs and its reality was felt by generations. Not being a physical reality, it influenced the world of physical matter in a way that no purely physical event could.

“The Crucifixion was one of the realities that enriched both the universe of dreams and the universe of matter, and it originated in the universe of dreams. It was a main contribution of that system to your own, and could be physically compared to the emergence of a new planet within the physical universe.”

Seth is not saying here that the Crucifixion was “just a dream.” He is saying that though it did not occur historically, it did happen within another reality and emerged into history as an idea rather than a physical event—an idea that changed civilization. (According to Seth, of course, an idea is an event, whether physically materialized or not.)

Seth goes on to say: “The Ascension [of Christ] did not occur in time as you know it. It is also a contribution of the universe of dreams to your physical system, representing the knowledge that man is independent of physical matter. …

“Many concepts and practical inventions simply wait in the dream system in abeyance until some man accepts them as possibilities within the physical frame of reality. … Imagination is waking man’s connection with the dream system. Imagination often reinstates dream data and applies it to particular circumstances or problems within daily life. …

“The dream universe, then, possesses concepts which will someday completely transform the history of the physical world, but a denial of such concepts as possibilities delays their emergence.”

Seth gave us instructions first in dream recall. Following this, he told us how to awaken our critical faculties while we were dreaming, and how to project our consciousness out of our bodies, using a dream as a sort of launching pad. I was always delighted to try any experiments Seth suggested, and I still am. The resulting personal experience gave me subjective evidence of the validity of many of Seth’s concepts; besides, I like to do things on my own.

Look at this projection from the dream state, for example. One morning after breakfast I lay down to try a dream projection. This simply means that I can sometimes recognize when I am dreaming, bring my normal “waking consciousness” into the dream situation, and then use it to project my consciousness elsewhere. When I got to this point that morning, I felt myself leave my body, knowing all the while that it was safe and comfortable in bed, with the door locked.

Startled, I looked around again. Everything seemed normal enough. Wherever I was, it was a physical place. Something made me look up. A young man was looking at me with a pleased, cat-caught-the-canary grin. He was one of the clerks, and I saw now that most of the clerks were quite young, and they were watching me.

I didn’t know what to do or say. “Look, I’m really in an out-of-body state. This is an astral projection!” They’d never believe me. But what about the three books with my name on them and the clerk’s knowing smile?

“Look,” I said, “I’m in my astral body. My physical body is home in bed.”

Then, without any warning, I felt myself pulled away. There was a terrific whooshing sound and I was back in my body. I really felt tricked. Usually its quite difficult to go right back to the same location, but I was so angry that I willed myself back. Not that it did me much good. I “landed” on the same corner, but the young man was nowhere to be found. Then I set out to find the hotel, and while I swear I walked the block three times and recognized the other buildings, I just couldn’t find the hotel. Finally I returned to my body.

“There is form within dream reality,” he said, “but form is first of all potential existing within psychic energy. The potential form exists long before its physical materialization. The house that you may live in within five years may not yet exist in your terms. It may not have been built yet, therefore physically you would not perceive it. Still, such a house does have form, and does exist within the Spacious Present.

“When you are manipulating within physical reality, you have a fairly simple set of rules to serve you. Within dream reality there is greater freedom. The ego is not present. The waking consciousness, dear friends, is not the ego. The ego is only that portion of waking consciousness that deals with physical manipulation.

According to Seth, we do have shared dreams or mass dreams. These actually act as a stabilizing force in our daily lives. Are our dreams private? Apparently not nearly as private as we suppose. In the 254th session Seth had this to say: “In certain areas of mass, shared dreams, collective mankind deals with problems of his political and social structure. The solutions he reaches within dream reality are not always the same as those he accepts in the physical world.

In this session Seth also mentioned John F. Kennedy, and had some comments to make connecting racial problems with dreams. “As you know, many people dreamed of Jack Kennedy’s death in advance. On one level the knowledge was available to the man himself. This does not mean that the death had to occur. It was a vivid possibility. It was also one of many solutions to several problems. While it was not the most suitable solution, it was the closest man could come at that particular time in physical reality. …”

Through our dreams we change physical reality, and our physical daily experience alters our dream experience. There is constant interaction. Our consciousness is simply directed in a different kind of reality when we dream, a reality as vivid as waking life. We may forget our dreams, but they are always a part of us, even though we may not be aware of their entire reality.

According to Seth there are many other systems of reality in which we operate, all unknown to the waking ego. Not only are there universal systems composed of matter and antimatter, but there are an infinite variety of realities in between. Apparently there are also “probable realities,” in which we follow paths we may have taken, but did not, in physical life.

“The electric reality of a dream is decoded, so that its effects are experienced not only by the brain, but in the furthest reaches of the body. Dream experiences, long forgotten consciously, are forever contained as electrically coded data within the cells of the physical organism. … They exist within the cells [along with all an individual’s experience] … The cells form about them. These electrically coded signals form counterparts of complete experience, and the pattern is then independent of physical reality.”

In other words, our dreams attain a certain immortality of their own, along with our personalities. Seth makes this clear: “Each individual from birth forms his own counterpart from built-up, individual, continuous electrical signals that include his dreams, thoughts, desires, and experiences. At physical death his personality then exists detached from its physical form.”