“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

What does that mean? In practical terms it would mean that you would not wage war for the sake of peace. It would mean that you did not kill animals in experiments, taking their lives in order to protect the sacredness of human life. That would be a prime directive: “Thou shalt not kill even in the pursuit of your ideals” — for man has killed for the sake of his ideals as much as he has ever killed for greed, or lust, or even the pursuit of power on its own merits.

(10:14.) Fanatics are inverted idealists. Usually they are vague grandiose dreamers, whose plans almost completely ignore the full dimensions of normal living. They are unfulfilled idealists who are not content to express idealism in steps, one at a time, or indeed to wait for the practical workings of active expression. They demand immediate action. They want to make the world over in their own images (louder). They cannot bear the expression of tolerance or opposing ideas. They are the most self-righteous of the self-righteous, and they will sacrifice almost anything — their own lives or the lives of others. They will justify almost any crime for the pursuit of those ends.

Idealism also presupposes “the good” as opposed to “the bad,” so how can the pursuit of “the good” often lead to the expression of “the bad?” For that, we will have to look further.

There is one commandment above all, in practical terms — a Christian commandment that can be used as a yardstick. It is good because it is something you can understand practically: “Thou shalt not kill.” That is clear enough. Under most conditions you know when you have killed. That [commandment] is a much better road to follow, for example than: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” for many of you do not love yourselves to begin with, and can scarcely love your neighbor as well. The idea is that if you love your neighbor you will not treat him poorly, much less kill him — but the commandment: “Thou shalt not kill,” says you shall not kill your neighbor no matter how you feel about him. So let us say in a new commandment: “Thou shalt not kill even in the pursuit of your ideals.”²

The second scene takes place in a large office building that represents the world and its usual pursuits. [...]

[...] When he tried teaching he began to get ill, for he was afraid that he would settle for the respectable-enough prestige it afforded, give in and stop his writing and other pursuits. [...]

[...] No reason was given for the pursuit itself, for he was being pursued now and then at least, by several people.

[...] They enjoy communication, the pursuit of knowledge, and they are filled with curiosity.

This deprives body and mind of the zest and purpose needed in order to enjoy any pursuits or activities. [...]

[...] It is much better if you can imagine this endeavor more in the light of children’s play, in fact, rather than think of it as a deadly serious adult pursuit.

[...] You will not be unkind in the pursuit of your own ideals. [...] You will discover your own basic good intent, and see that it has always been behind all of your actions — even in those least fitted to the pursuit of your private ideals (with gentle irony).

[...] That pursuit automatically gives life its zest and natural sense of excitement and drama. [...]

[...] You must be reckless in pursuit of the ideal — reckless enough to insist that each step you take along the way is worthy of that ideal.

Generally speaking, large segments of your official society do not regard the pursuit of art as responsible behavior. [...]

[...] The pursuit of art was considered egotistical in a negative meaning of the word—selfish, childish or adolescent, and indeed many psychologists of the recent past considered it in the light of prolonged adolescence, or saw it as a sign of the individuals’ refusal to fully accept an adult role in life. [...]

[...] (Long pause.) If you follow the pursuit of pleasure in this creative manner, then you will automatically begin to discard faulty concepts of responsibility. [...]

If he first of all focuses his abilities in his creative pursuits, then everything else will follow. [...] But he must primarily focus his energies in his creative pursuits, for these give him the exuberance that makes other pursuits possible.

[...] An emergency therapy will almost always bring immediate results: A week of time given to poetry, simply because this pursuit awakens in Ruburt the strongest aspects of his personality, and frees constructive energy from other layers of his personality.

[...] You are afraid for example that in psychological time—granted you find the physical time for it—you will take needed energy away from your physical pursuits. Now I tell you, you are overly concerned with these pursuits, that you could get the same results by trying less, by being freer. [...]

[...] And you are afraid in your terms of taking energy away from these pursuits. [...]

[...] Instantly the person might leap up, convinced that that was evidence of the pursuit of the FBI or other agency.

When you are discussing the nature of good and bad, you are on tricky ground indeed, for many — or most — of man’s atrocities to man have been committed in misguided pursuit of “the good.”

[...] Man’s pursuit of the good, to some extent now, fathered the Inquisition and the Salem witch hunts. [...]

[...] You are not developing your abilities, but using vital energies in pursuit of something that you do not basically want to attain.

You need the excitement vivid in the pursuit, but this excitement will be increased by far when your energy is used to perfect and develop your own personality. [...]

[...] I might decide that I’d given enough years and energy to the Seth pursuit. [...]

[...] You followed your older brother in this pursuit for some time. [...] Your brother, however, continued in his pursuits and followed you for some time. [...]

[...] He loves the pursuit of truth for its own sake, and the pursuit of truth is basically a playful creative endeavor, in which children indulge all the time.

[...] The answer is that as beneficial, as desirable, as good health is, and the performance of an excellent body, man’s pursuit of other kinds of accomplishment, his equally strong desire for knowledge, and his insatiable curiosity, his pursuit of the ideal, often lead him into pathways that result in the body’s difficulties.

The service station is significant on many levels, being used here as a particularly American symbol of the mechanical age, and also one that refers to a pursuit that is utilitarian and also provides service (as Jane said this morning): You deal directly with the public. [...]

[...] A man if possible should own his own business, provide a service for the community—and, again, inventiveness or creativity were to be wedded to those pursuits. [...]

[...] Children playing at cowboys and Indians, or cops and robbers, can on occasion become quite as frightened by the pursuit or the chase as they would be if they were actually caught up in such an adventure in ordinary life.

You should, however, dedicate yourselves each morning to that pursuit, while not with heavy hand. [...]

Those sequences follow the pursuits of value fulfillment so smoothly that they can be reactivated whenever the conditions are fortunate—for even the animals are not concerned with simple survival alone, nor the plants, but with what I can only call (long pause) emotional qualities: qualities that seek a full appreciation and creative extension of those conditions of consciousness that stamp each species as itself and yet join it with all others.

There are other people who firmly believe that the pursuit of pleasure must lead to pain, and there are also others for whom pain itself is pleasure. [...]

[...] There are strains connected with the route you have chosen, but at least you have the hopes of accomplishment—and, if you will forgive me —the creative joy of an honest pursuit. [...]