“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

We must unfortunately often deal with analogies, because they can form bridgeworks between concepts. There are units of consciousness,³ then, as there are units of matter. I do not want you to think of these units as particles. There is a basic unit of consciousness that, expressed, will not be broken down, as once it was thought that an atom was the smallest unit and could not be broken down. The basic unit of consciousness obviously is not physical. It contains within itself innately infinite properties of expansion, development, and organization; yet within itself always maintains the kernel of its own individuality. Despite whatever organizations it becomes part of, or how it mixes with other such basic units, its own identity is not annihilated.

It is aware energy, identified within itself as itself, not “personified” but awareized. It is therefore the source of all other kinds of consciousness, and the varieties of its activity are infinite. It combines with others of its kind, forming then units of consciousness — as, mentioned often, atoms and molecules combine.

This basic unit is endowed with unpredictability. That very unpredictability allows for infinite patterns and fulfillments. The word “soul” unfortunately has been so used in regard to your species that it becomes highly difficult to unravel the conceptual difficulties. Using usual definitions, you would call a soul the result of a certain organization of such units, which you would then recognize as a “soul.”

(9:47.) That leads to the old inevitable questions: Do animals have souls — or do trees, or rocks? In line with the usual definition then, in your terms, this smallest unit would be “soul stuff.” That viewpoint however is highly limited, for “above you,” using that scale, there are other more developed organizations of these units; and so from that “more exalted viewpoint,” you would seem to be junior souls indeed.

So I prefer, here at least, to speak of these units of consciousness instead. (Long pause.) Their nature is the vitalizing force behind everything in your physical universe, and others as well. These units can indeed appear in several places at once, and without going through space, in your terms. Literally now, these basic units of consciousness can be in all places at once. They are in all places at once. They will not be recognized because they will always appear as something else.

Of course they move faster than light. There are millions of them in one atom — many millions. Each of these units is aware of the reality of all others, and influences all others. In your terms these units can move forward or backward in time, but they can also move into thresholds of time with which you are not familiar.⁴

All probabilities are probed and experienced, and all possible universes created from these units. Therefore, there are realities in which the endless probabilities of one given event are probed, and all experience grouped about that venture.

(10:06.) These units of consciousness do not have human characteristics, of course. They do, however, possess their own “inclinations,” leanings, propensities — and perhaps “propensities” comes closest to the term I want. I do not want you to think of them as miniature people. Nevertheless, neither are they clumps of “idle” energy. They are vitalized, aware, charged, with all the qualifications of being.

All psychological structures then are composed of such organizations, however long-or short-lived in your terms. They are innately endowed with the desire or propensity for growth and creative organization. They are not found alone, then, in isolation. Since these units of consciousness exist at once, they are aware of all the organized self-structures of which they are a part. To this extent, all probable realities are connected in that basic manner. These units grow out of themselves. Since I have told you that in your terms your past, present, and future exist at once, these units are constantly emerging out of your now-point from both the future and the past.

All matter is based upon the units mentioned, with their unpredictability and their propensity for exploring all probabilities. Even your atomic structure, then, is poised between probabilities. If this is true, then obviously “you” are aware of only one small probable portion of yourself — and this portion you protect as your identity (underlined). If you think of it as simply a focus taken by “your” greater identity, then you will be able to follow what I am saying without feeling puny by contrast, or lost.⁶ The focus that you have is indeed inviolate.

These basic units move toward organizations then of a selective nature. Having an unpredictable field to draw from, they select activity according to those significances. Period. Various kinds of significances are the result of the units’ individual natures. The body that you have is a probable body. It is the result of one line of “development” that could be taken by your particular earth personality in flesh. All of the other possible lines of development also occur, however. They occur at once, but each one simultaneously affects every other. There is actually far greater interaction here than you realize, because you are not used to looking for it. The harder you work to maintain the official accepted idea of the self in conventional terms, the more of course you block out any kind of unpredictability.

Because of the great organizing nature of these basic units, there are also psychological structures that are quite capable of holding their own identities while being aware of any given number of probable selves. Life after death has great meaning in your reality, because death is a part of it. Your greater reality obviously transcends both your births and your deaths. The idea of one universe alone is basically nonsensical. Your reality must be seen in its relationship to others.⁸ Otherwise you are always caught in questions like “How did the universe begin?” or “When will it end?” All systems are constantly being created.

3. A note added later: Of course, as soon as Seth mentioned units of consciousness in “Unknown” Reality I thought of the electromagnetic energy units (EE units, as he called them) that he’d discussed in 1969 and 1971. See sessions 504 through 506 in the Appendix of The Seth Material, and the 581st session in Chapter 20 of Seth Speaks, respectively. In the latter material he used several evocative analogies to describe his EE units: “… basically emanations rising from consciousness … the invisible breath of consciousness … The emanations are actually emotional tones … The units are just beneath the range of physical matter.”

However, nowhere in tonight’s 682nd session does Seth refer to EE units by name — and for a reason, as will be seen late in the next session. In his earlier material he left himself plenty of room to add to his data on such units of consciousness. “They are one form [my emphasis] that emotional energy takes,” he told us in the 504th session. And in the 581st session: “There are many ranges and great varieties of such EE units, all existing beyond your perceivable reach. To lump them together in such a way, however, is misleading, for within all of this there is great order.”

4. Again, see the 581st session in Chapter 20 of Seth Speaks for material on EE units and postulated faster-than-light particles like the tachyon. (It’s been stated in theory, incidentally, that although tachyons themselves travel faster than light, their radiation doesn’t. This radiation, then, the carrier of all of the information we could gather about tachyons [or similar particles], would be observable by us.)

The electron is one of the wave-particles in motion adjacent to the atom’s nucleus. It would be very large when compared to Seth’s basic unit of consciousness, but because an electron can “move” from the orbit of one nucleus to that of another without traversing the space between, the electron can still furnish a crude analogy to the ability of those units of consciousness to “appear in several places at once, and without going through space.”

9. Chromosomes are microscopic bodies into which the protoplasmic substance of a cell nucleus separates during cell division. They carry the genes, the factors or units — “blueprints” — that determine hereditary characteristics.

11. Seth’s description of how I’m blending two probable selves reminded me of his material on the way Jane is doing the same thing. See the 680th session at 11:02. It can hardly be coincidental that Jane and I are using our individual writing abilities as the cohesive — the “glue” — to unite our respective sets of probable selves.