“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

The idea of permanence in your mind is strongly connected with more representational work. You think of the old masters for example, the figure work. You are concerned lest the freer style itself implies a lack of permanency, in that you wonder how well others will relate to it as time passes.

(My pendulum related the symptoms to my decision to paint an oil from a small pen-and-ink sketch I had made in 1969. I pulled the little sketch, which was a free interpretation of what I considered to be a man facing himself, embodying certain distortions of face and form from my files recently and decided to paint it. For a surface I chose a cardboard canvas-covered panel made by one of the well-known artist’s manufacturers. I don’t often use such panels, usually thinking them not permanent enough; I almost always prefer Masonite, etc.

(To bolster the permanency of the panel I backed it with a wooden frame that I glued to the panel, to prevent warping, etc. I used wood for this that I found in father’s garage in Sayre over the last weekend. On Tuesday afternoon when I began the blowup of the drawing to transfer in turn to the panel for painting, the symptoms began—coughing, sneezing, etc., much like aggravated hay fever symptoms. I also had trouble figuring out the right size to make the figures in the oil—nothing was going right, and after a while it was only too obvious that my subconscious was raising hell about the whole project.

(The pendulum told me that I was bothered by the idea of the possible lack of permanency of the panel I had chosen, and briefly that I was somewhat aware of the change in this picture, as far as handling of form would be concerned, from my usual style of working. I told none of this to Jane at the time. I thought I had resolved the problem, but when the symptoms continued during Jane’s ESP class Tuesday night, I realized I was wrong—the problem had not been cleared up.

If you perceived the constant change within your body with as much persistence as you attend to its seemingly permanent nature, then you would be amazed that you ever considered the body as one more or less constant, more or less cohesive, entity. Even subjectively you focus upon and indeed manufacture the idea of a relatively stable, relatively permanent conscious self. [...]

You try to maintain a constant, relatively permanent physical and subjective self in order to maintain a relatively constant, relatively permanent environment. [...]

(9:27.) The intensity determines both the strength and the permanency of the physical image into which the thought or emotion will be materialized. [...]

We also realize that permanency of form is an illusion, since all consciousness must be in a state of change. [...]

[...] Yet even the appearance of this physical material, though it seems more or less permanent by its nature, is not permanent, and is only cohesive enough to give the appearance of relative permanence to the senses that perceive it.

We have much yet to cover about various topics only lightly touched upon so far, including the nature of matter, the process involved in its continual creation and manipulation, and the truly astounding cooperation involved, as all living things contribute their energy to keep the physical universe in any kind of permanent, coherent form.

Any material object is being constantly recreated, according to a form that may appear rigid and fairly permanent. [...]

The existence of the patterns gives the illusion of a permanence of matter that is highly misleading. [...]

[...] The ego considers that therefore it must maintain stability and permanence. [...] It attempts to deny the inner emotions because the changeability of these emotions would seem to threaten its own permanence. [...]

In other words the apparent intensity of the egotistical reactions is a sham on the part of the ego, to hide the fact that it refuses to become involved with action as a whole, because it fears for its permanence. When the ego understands, and it will, that it is a portion of the whole self, and itself a part of action, then indeed it will not fear for its own permanence, for it will realize that being a part of action, its very nature is dependent upon change, and vitality, and value fulfillment.

[...] The ego in this case, as in many cases, attempts to maintain stability and permanence at all costs.

[...] And this sham allows the ego to continue denying those inner emotions in an effort to maintain its permanence.

States of mind are not permanent. Their reflections upon the system are not permanent, generally speaking, though they can be cumulative. [...]

[...] By labeling a group of symptoms you add to their idea of permanence, and give a name to certain aspects of bodily activity, distinguishing them from other activities and therefore giving them rather dangerous focus. [...]

[...] To concentrate upon the term however is dangerous, for it gives a specific identity or implies a state of permanence to a group of varying and impermanent symptoms.

This will help you when we begin to speak of the patterns or shapes into which energy flows, and so maintains its appearance of permanence and relative rigidity. [...]

[...] Your senses are rather more equipped to notice difference and divergence than sameness; but nevertheless the cooperation of all conscious entities provides physical objects with whatever appearance of permanence they have.

[...] It should be apparent that psychic identity is no more dependent upon physical permanence, certainly when you consider that even a chair retains its form as a chair, even though it is actually not one thing or object, and that no atom or molecule remains the same within it.

When you maintain that identity is dependent upon the duration of the physical body, you are taking it for granted that the physical body is one complete thing, more or less rigid in form, and permanent within a certain perspective. [...]

[...] The physical time idea is a product of the ego’s tendency to make finer distinctions in order that it can classify and categorize, and therefore identify and give permanence to its own sensations.

[...] It may choose to reject whole areas for various reasons, usually out of a mistaken fear that the actions involved threaten the permanence of itself.

In this case the so-called secondary personality would express the whole personality to better advantage, and actually reinforce its permanence and identity. [...]

[...] But the main characteristic drives of any given personality shift continually; for all its attempts in the opposite direction, the ego must change just to exist, and its very permanence is dependent upon its flexibility.

[...] These, now, root agreements, form the main basis for the apparent permanence and coherence of your physical system.

[...] One of the root agreements upon which physical existence is based is that physical objects have a reality that is entirely independent of any subjective cause; and that these objects, within definitely specified limitations, are permanent.

Three: Permanence is not a matter of time. [...]

[...] (Humorously.) It is easier to realize that the vision and the everalive energy is far more permanent than the forms. The permanency and the timeless quality do not belong to the shapes of the mountains and the trees, but to the conscious energy that forms them.

The timeless quality will be built in, for the painting itself, though flawless in form, will suggest the changing quality of form, and stress the permanent quality that gives it its meaning. [...]

[...] Let the medium then stand for and represent the physical appearance of permanency in any object, the physical continuity of any given human form in a painting. [...]

[...] In waking reality, subconsciously you manipulate atoms and molecules so that they result in physical images that appear to you as permanent. They are not permanent. [...] But they retain enough semblance of permanency so that you can rely upon their position in space, their size and weight and their depth and physical dimension. [...]

It must be realized that the physical conditions are not (underlined) permanent, but everchanging. [...] This reinforces the idea of permanency. [...]

In nontime images need not have the seeming permanence of your own. They may or may not appear permanent. [...]

[...] Since you know now that all physical matter is constantly coming into formation, that it is formed by atoms and molecules so instantaneously, and that these atoms and molecules that give form to matter continually appear and disappear, so swiftly that the physical form that they compose appears permanent, then you must realize that there is no reason why physical forms should deteriorate as far as the atoms and molecules that compose them are concerned.

You are, however, left with the fact that physical matter, while appearing permanent for practicality’s sake, nevertheless does exhibit disintegration in varying degrees. [...]

[...] Some sort of a permanent fixture might set you at rest Joseph, since you would be harassed no longer.

The permanent setup, whenever and if ever arranged, will here be most beneficial, and in ways that I will not now, because of the time, discuss. [...]

We do not use permanent structures. [...]

Permanency and stability basically have nothing to do with form, but with the integration of pleasure, purpose, accomplishment, and identity. [...]

Even the symbols, then, at various stages of consciousness will appear differently, some seeking to have stability and permanence as your physical objects, following the principles or root assumptions of corporeal reality, and some changing much more quickly, as in the dream state, these being more immediate and sensitive indicators of feeling. [...]

[...] In normal dreaming within the context of an ordinary dream drama, the objects seem permanent enough to you. [...]

[...] In this environment, permanency is not a root assumption. [...]

[...] (Gestures to include the whole body.) A cold is something that comes and goes, and is not permanent, and he is to see his other symptoms in that same light—not as he saw them earlier, as a permanent-like situation.

[...] You could see, for example, your present living room not only as a conglomeration of permanent-appearing furniture, but switch your focus and see the immense and constant dance of molecules and other particles that compose the various objects.

[...] If our environment seems unstructured to you, it is only because you do not understand the true nature of order, which has nothing to do with permanent form, but only appears to have form from your perspective.

[...] The filled-up patterns appear fairly rigid and permanent enough to be counted upon as such. [...]

[...] The fact is, material on your field is composed of constant energy pulsations; and while to you the appearance is one of permanence to a fair degree, and while I have said that the pulsations are constant, nevertheless they are completely distinct, separate and new pulsations that are not continuous in the terms that you apply to one object that is continuous.

[...] Your own time structure misleads you into your ideas of the relative permanency of physical matter, and you close your eyes to the constant alterations within it. [...]

If my environment is not a permanently structured one, then as I have told you, neither is your own. [...]

When the race began physical focus it learned to behave in a more or less permanent-appearing environment, and so it developed a suitable self that also appeared to be permanent enough for a time within that world.