“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

“There have been guides to help her. She will hardly notice that she has entirely moved in, for she will feel so at home. In her case, she has been forming memory pictures of her childhood, of days before her physical illness, and entering into them. She is learning that events that seem to be in the past can be re-created.

Rev. Lowe asked other questions but no more relating to the subject at hand. He and Seth seemed to get along very well. Later, in a break, I received several impressions of a past life of Mrs. Lowe’s. While a general discussion was going on, I “saw” her near a riding academy in fourteenth-century France; and then I saw her and Rev. Lowe as twins in Greece, when he was an orator and she a soldier. There were other details, but the interesting thing was that Mrs. Lowe told me afterward that she was really crazy about horses, and that Greece and France were the only countries in which she had any great interest.

Seth rarely gives reincarnational data unless it is directly tied in with the overall development of an individual’s present life, and he refuses to give past life histories, for example, to those he thinks will not apply the lessons involved. Strangely enough, he did give such information once in a class to three college girls who clearly did not believe in reincarnation to begin with. They had just begun classes, and while they were curious about ESP, they had little patience with the theory of reincarnation—before the session, that is.

“You will reincarnate whether or not you believe that you will,” Seth began, smiling. “It is much easier if your theories fit reality, but if they do not, then you do not change the nature of reincarnation one iota.” He went on to give Lydia a rather detailed description of a past life around the area of Bangor, Maine, in 1832, when she was a male. This was Lydia’s first Seth session and she sat wiggling nervously in her chair as Seth gave names, dates, and particular episodes of this past life.

When he was finished, she said, “Well, I don’t know what to say, but I’ll tell you this. The crazy thing is that I spent my childhood in Bangor, Maine, and when we moved to New York State I wouldn’t give New York as my home. I always felt that I belonged in Maine. And Seth said that—” She broke off, and read her notes. Then she said excitedly, “Seth said that a Miranda Charbeau from the French side of my family in that past life married into the Franklin Bacon family of Boston. Again, it’s crazy, it really is, because my family this time is connected with the Roger Bacon family from Boston.”

“China and Egypt. Lives in various religious capacities, but without the necessary sense of responsibility; unfortunately taking advantage of the fortunes made available to the ruling classes through the ages. For this reason, the abilities have not come to fruition. Only in this present existence is there finally some understanding, and sense of responsibility. In the past the psychic abilities were used for the wrong purposes; therefore, they did not fully develop and the personality was at a standstill.

“There is no past, present, and future. These only appear to those who exist within three-dimensional reality. Since I am no longer in it, I can perceive what you do not. There is also a part of you that is not imprisoned within physical reality, and that part of you knows that there is only an Eternal Now. The part of you who knows this is the whole self.

In the 256th session he said, “Because you are obsessed with the idea of past, present, and future, you are forced to think of reincarnations as strung out one before the other. Indeed we speak of past lives because you are used to the time sequence concept. What you have instead is something like the developments narrated in The Three Faces of Eve. You have dominant egos, all a part of an inner identity, dominant in various existences. But the separate existences exist simultaneously. Only the egos involved make the time distinction. 145 B.C., A.D. 145, a thousand years in your past, and a thousand years in your future—all exist now.”

In fact, Seth gave three or four sessions in which he compared cases of “split” personalities to our reincarnation selves. He ended up by saying, “It is interesting that the personalities [in Three Faces of Eve] did alternate, and all were in existence at once, so to speak, even though only one was dominant at any given time. In the same way, so-called past personalities are present in you now but not dominant.”

“Since all events occur at once in actuality, there is little to be gained by saying that a past event causes a present one. Past experience does not cause present experience. You are forming past, present, and future—simultaneously. Since events appear to you in sequence, this is difficult to explain.

“When it is said that certain characteristics from a past life influence or cause present patterns of behavior, such statements—and I have made some of them—are highly simplified to make certain points clear.

So while Seth often explains present life problems as the result of past life difficulties, he makes it clear to those that can understand that the lives really exist simultaneously, just as three personalities can exist in one body at one time. But all problems are not the result of such “past life” influences. In one case, a friend’s hang-ups in the present originated right in this life, though her boyfriend’s were left over from the past.

“You see the male in terms inspired in you in this childhood. You felt that your father had godlike qualities and attempt to project these onto the men you meet. Therefore they disappoint you, but this also serves your needs. Because while you see the male as godlike, you also see him as one who gives out punishment, and as unreasoning and cruel. So you are afraid to ‘come under a man’s thumb’ or domination. Because you were a male in past lives, you resent this all the more.

“Well, then why doesn’t Frank [not his real name] date and have ordinary relationships with women? He’s manly enough” she said. Then, almost with a touch of defiance she added, “He’s not effeminate.” And in this case, the main problem lay in “past life” troubles:

Seth went on to say that in this life, Frank chose to return as the son of the two brothers who themselves are now man and wife. “Now he rationalizes his desire not to leave home. The brothers never held him responsible … they knew the girl had been terrified and spoken out of fear with no intent to betray them. There is no punishment involved. He has chosen in this life to be of service to them and to help others. His secrecy [he was very tight-lipped] is the result of these past experiences. Once he feels he spoke too much and betrayed too much. Now he is secretive about matters he considers important.”

Seth emphasized that for his own reasons, Frank did not want a marriage relationship, and ended by telling Doris that she had chosen him for this reason—that she never saw the man as he was, but only the image she had projected upon him. He gave Frank’s name in a past life as Achman incidentally, and much later Doris learned that his present family has an Achman branch.

Much more psychological advice was given. The whole session was of great help to Doris—who hasn’t been frightened of Seth since, by the way! But it is an oversimplificaton to say that all present problems are the result of past life difficulties. We are not “stuck” with our problems, whether they come from this life or another. We don’t have to drag them along with us. They can be solved, and while reincarnational influences certainly operate, they don’t operate in a vacuum. The following chapter on health will contain some of Seth’s methods for maintaining mental, psychic, and physical vitality—and perspective.

Some people are better able to utilize past life experience, I think, while others insulate themselves rather closely in each life, closing themselves off as much as possible from such influences. Some people’s lives seem to make no sense, for instance, unless you know their “previous” ones. Our fifty- or sixty- or seventy-year life-spans are like self-contained novels, well plotted and executed.

At this, Rob and Matt both burst out laughing. Then Seth went into some information, connecting some of the young man’s present interests with past activities. He mentioned several past lives, but emphasized one as being particularly significant. “You were a member of a monastic group who classified and collected various kinds of seeds. The group worked on manuscripts officially, but our friend here and several others were bootleg seed finders, believing against currently held theories that questions concerning nature could be answered by examining nature.

We did know that the editor was interested in botany, however, and Seth tied in this avocation with the past experimental work done with seeds.

“In the materialization of personality through various reincarnations, only the ego and the layers of personal subconscious adopt new characteristics. The other layers of the self retain their past experiences, identity, and knowledge.

“In fact, the ego receives much of its [relative] stability because of this subconscious retention. Were it not for past experiences in other lives on the part of deeper layers of the self, the ego would find it almost impossible to relate to other individuals, and the cohesiveness of society would not exist.

“Learning to some extent is passed on through the genes, biochemically, but this is a physical materialization of inner knowledge achieved and retained from past lives. … The human being does not … erupt into existence at birth and laboriously then begin its first attempt to gain experience. If this were the case, you would still be back in the Stone Age.

Whether or not you understand or accept your reincarnational background, it is highly important to live a sane, balanced life in this life. We form our day-to-day reality. We formed our past lives, and we form this one. And by solving problems now, we can make things vastly easier for our “past” and “future” selves.