“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(“Well,” I said to Jane after class, as we discussed the Chinese-American situation cited by Seth, “I don’t know about counterpart relationships in other kinds of realities, but it’s certainly obvious that at least some physical counterparts can hate each other …” So the larger self, I thought, would be quite capable of seeking experience through its parts in every way imaginable. Although it might be difficult for us to understand, let alone accept, the whole self or entity must regard all of its counterparts as sublime facets of itself — no matter whether they loved, suffered,⁵ hated, or killed each other or “outsiders.” Within its great reaches it would transform its counterparts’ actions in ways that were, quite possibly, beyond our emotional and intellectual grasp. At the same time, the self would learn and be changed through the challenges and struggles of its human portions.

(Jane and I consider Seth’s concept of counterparts to be an intriguing psychological framework, spacious enough to serve as a workable thematic structure in which the social and nationalistic characteristics of our species can be studied, as well as the components of the individual psyche. That is, the private person is here seen as interacting with others because there is, beneath our awareness, an inner “person-to-person” relationship connecting each individual with his or her physical counterparts, though they may well be living in other parts of the globe while sharing the same historical period. It follows, then, that one may or may not ever meet a counterpart “in the flesh” — may or may not even suspect the existence of such relationships.

(So far we’ve been dealing with the idea of counterparts in our own physical reality. By way of contrast, however, Seth stated last month in the 713th session, after 10:32:) Nothing exists outside the psyche, however, that does not exist within it, and there is no unknown world that does not have its psychological or psychic counterpart. (Before that, from Session 712:) To some extent or another, there are counterparts of all realities within your psyche.

(The material on counterparts emerged from Seth’s treatment of reincarnation. Along with his addition of simultaneous time, I’d say that the concept of counterparts provides reincarnation with a novel approach indeed; and that our awareness of both has always been latent within the reincarnational framework, whether in simultaneous or linear terms.

(Jane’s own counterpart material included variations of Seth’s basic concept. [...] We can be a child at one end of it and an old man or woman at the other … Michelangelo [who lived for 89 years, from 1475 to 1564] decided to span a century himself instead of as three counterparts, say. [...] He wouldn’t necessarily want or need the counterparts, at least for those purposes. [...]

You are counterparts of yourselves, but as Ruburt would say (amused), living “eccentric”¹¹ counterparts, each with your own abilities. [...]

[...] But each of those incarnations will have its cluster of counterpart lives, revolving around it like planets around a sun. Within that context, of course, each counterpart personality thinks of itself as being the sun, or the center of things….”¹⁶ Yawning, Jane agreed.

(This session on counterparts represents a key point in Seth’s discussion of the unknown reality. [...] Some earlier intimations of the counterpart concept are also briefly discussed there.)