“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

“Now, in dreams you do have contact with other parts of yourself. This communication goes on constantly, but your ego is so focused upon physical reality and survival within it that you do not hear the inner voice. You must realize that what you are cannot be seen in a mirror. What you see in a mirror is but a dim reflection of your true reality.

“You do not see your ego in the mirror. You do not see your subconscious. You do not see the inner self in a mirror. These are but terms to express the part of you that cannot be seen or touched. But within the selves that you know is the prime identity, the whole inner self. This whole self has lived many lives. It has adopted many personalities. It is an energy essence personality, even as I am. The only difference is that I am not materialized within physical matter. You do not suddenly acquire a ‘spirit’ at death. You are one, now.”

The psychology class was as much interested in Seth’s reality as in the nature of personality, as he well knew. Smiling, Seth said, “One other point: These sessions are scheduled, and therefore operate under certain controlled conditions. Ruburt’s own personality is in no way threatened by them, and his ego has been carefully coddled and protected. It has not been shunted aside. Instead it has been taught new abilities. … I was not artificially ‘brought to birth’ through hypnosis. There was no artificial tampering of personality characteristics here. There was no hysteria. Ruburt allows me to use the nervous system under highly controlled conditions. I am not given a blanket permission to take over when I please, nor would I desire such an arrangement. I have other things to do.”

Seth says that even in this life, each of us has various egos; we only accept the idea of one ego as a sort of shorthand symbolism. The ego at any given time in this life is simply the part of us that “surfaces”; a group of characteristics that the inner self uses to solve various problems. Even the ego as we think of it changes constantly. For example, the Jane Roberts of now is different from the Jane Roberts of ten years ago, though “I” have not been conscious of any particular change of identity.

My own experiences convince me that I am more than my normal self, the self I refer to as “me.” In getting clairvoyant information, for instance, some part of me knows what the Jane-part ordinarily does not. This portion of me communicates the knowledge to the Jane ego. I believe that this happens not only in the case of ESP, but also in connection with artistic inspiration: we tune into more knowledgeable portion of our own identities.

“It should be fairly easy to see how the second dilemma evolved from the first. I have said that the second one resulted in—and constantly results in—consciousness of self. This is not ego consciousness. Consciousness of self is still consciousness directly connected with action. Ego consciousness is a state resulting from the third creative dilemma, which happens when consciousness of self attempts to separate itself from action. Since this is obviously impossible, since no consciousness or identity can exist without action, we have the third dilemma.

“Again: consciousness of self involves a consciousness of self within—and as a part of—action. Ego consciousness, on the other hand, involves a state in which consciousness of self attempts to divorce self from action—an attempt on the part of consciousness to perceive action as an object … and to perceive action as initiated by the ego as a result, rather than as a cause, of ego’s own existence.

I felt what Seth was saying, as if the words were translated into subjective experience. It was more like being swept along into something else than being, say, negated. My ego wasn’t lost, but became part of the concepts Seth was talking about. I was inside them, looking out.

Toward the end of the session, Rob asked Seth if he’d explain what was happening. Seth said: “Ruburt is experiencing action gestalts. Like every other consciousness, he is action; but this evening he is experiencing action, to some small degree, without the ego’s usual attempt to separate itself [from action].

These Inner Senses belong to the whole selves of which we are part. Each whole self helps and inspires its personalities. Starting with the personality as we usually think of it, “there is, after the operating ego, a layer of personal subconscious material. Beneath this is racial material dealing with the species as a whole. Beneath this, undistorted and yours for the asking, is the knowledge inherent in the inner self, pertaining to reality as a whole, its laws, principles, and composition.

Quite a mouthful! What Seth is saying is that each of us can reach the inner self, that the Inner Senses help us to perceive other than three-dimensional reality, and that we can get to this knowledge with determination and training. We start with ourselves and travel through our own subjective experience, working from the ego inward. The physical senses help us to perceive the exterior reality that we know. The Inner Senses let us perceive the inner ones.

“On a subconscious level, you react to many events that have not yet occurred as far as your egotistical awareness is concerned. Such reactions are carefully screened out and not admitted to consciousness. The ego finds such instances distracting and annoying, and when forced to admit their validity, will resort to the most farfetched rationalizations to explain them.

“The inner self can, indeed, perceive events that will occur after physical death. It never was imprisoned by ego time. Its perceptions are merely inhibited by the ego. The inner self can perceive events that will occur to itself after death, and those in which it is not involved.