Primary and Secondary Realities

Seth Early Sessions Book 5, Session 208 

… The other point that I wanted to make was that while your physical time, or clock time, has no overall basic reality, and is not a primary reality, that runs through various fields or systems, it is nevertheless an electromagnetic reality within your own system, for you have created it on mental terms.

It is therefore some force to be reckoned with. If it were a primary reality, you would not escape from it even in the sleeping state. Those realities which are primary and basic you can never escape from. This should give you an idea, for those realities which run through all systems, and which are primaries, are those which exist for you in all conditions of consciousness and under any circumstances.

Those realities however which appear only in certain stages of consciousness, are secondaries. This is perhaps one of the most important bits of information I have given you; for if you are bright enough, and I think that you are, then you have a yardstick by which to measure the nature of primary reality, from which all other manifestations air spun.

I have been leading up lo this point in my own way, for the dream

experiments that we plan will enable you to accumulate in time a list of primaries. I want you however to come across this knowledge on your own, through these experiments, for you will learn more that way.

If ever in a dream experience you defy gravity, then gravity is not a primary reality, but only a manifestation within your own physical system. If clock time is escaped within the dream state, then clock time is not a primary. What you cannot escape within any range of consciousness, can be called a Primary Condition, and you may capitalize the term.

Incidentally, if it is not now known by your scientists, it will be shortly discovered that the physical organism does not age in sleep at the same rate at which it ages in the waking state. Aging, therefore, is not a primary. Again, this does nor mean that secondary conditions such as aging and gravity and clock time, do not have effects within your system, obviously. It is only that these must be recognized as secondary conditions that do not therefore basically (underlined) affect the inner self, which is to a large degree independent of your system.

A recognition of the differences between primary and secondary conditions can however allow you to minimize the effect of the secondary conditions to some considerable degree.

Here now once more, let me repeat that thoughts are definite electromagnetic realities. Therefore, being actions, they affect all other actions, and if I repeat this in session after session, I do so, so that it will never be forgotten. Therefore these secondary conditions are strengthened through the very act, or misact, of thinking that they are primary rather than secondary elements in action.

Two men for example, of precisely the same physical age, of precisely the same physical condition, will be in completely different states of mind, of competence, of effectiveness and of strength, as a direct result of their inner beliefs as to their relative freedom within the framework of the physical system in which they exist.

The man who does not realize his basic independence from the physical system will not have the same freedom within it.

He will be at all times a prisoner of clock time and of aging, for he will consider these the primary conditions under which he must operate. And the action, or actions involved in this belief will therefore act upon the physical cells of his body with vengeful force, because he has himself directed them to do so.

You will find it a most rewarding experience, once these experiments have been begun, for you will yourselves discover the difference between primary and secondary conditions. Obviously the secondary conditions are to some extent necessary for your survival as a physical organism, but you are more than a physical organism now, and you shall be other than a physical organism in your future.

And the conditions that are necessary, the primary conditions that are

necessary for your existence as other than a physical organism, already exist, therefore, and can be perceived and studied with the equipment which is a part of every individual.

… If an experience is a part of the waking state, but not a part of the sleeping state, if it is part of the sleeping stare but not a part of the waking state, then it is not a primary experience.

This, again, is not to say that it is not real, but that it is not a primary reality that is more or less constant for the inner self. If an experience is a part of all levels of consciousness—this includes the trance state—then it is a primary experience.

Identity of the inner self operates very well within primary conditions. It is dependent upon primary conditions. Its manipulation of primary conditions gives it the knowledge of itself. Identity is retained within the dream state, is it not?

("Yes.”)

Yet within the dream state the familiar physical props sometimes disappear. The inner I operates very well without them. In order to manipulate a physical reality however, the inner I needs a self that is acclimated to physical conditions; hence the ego.

As you know therefore we have differentiated between an outer ego, who manipulates within physical reality, and an inner ego who directs the activities of the inner self. Now then, the next step should indeed be clear. In the main, the ego deals with secondary realities, and in the main, the inner ego deals with primaries.

Nevertheless primaries also exist within the physical universe, and secondaries appear often as props within the dream world.

Again, none of these issues are clear-cut, and the distinctions, many of them, are for simplicity's sake. Many primaries will show secondary characteristics. For example, within your clock time there are definite primary characteristics of time as it exists in a primary condition.

Once more, even the word time is misleading, but within the boundaries of your clock reality every individual feels at times but you see that the use of the word itself binds us—but every individual feels now and then the primary sense of existence that is not arbitrarily divided into moments and hours; and he therefore escapes from a secondary condition into the realization of a primary reality behind it.

A consistent, carefully recorded and extended examination of the dream state will, once more, permit you to compare those conditions and realities which show themselves in both the waking and dream states.

The Astral Body and Inner Senses

From Seth Early Sessions Book 5, Session 202

The Astral Body and Inner Senses

As you know, the inner senses belong to that part of human personality that is not physically materialized.  At various times I have spoken concerning the reality of what you refer to as the astral body.  You must remember that over a year ago we discussed tissue capsules.  The astral body is of this nature.  It is composed of electromagnetic components.  It is simply the unseen self.

(Seth began discussing the inner senses in the 20^th session; by the 50^th session he had gone into some detail on nine of them, with more to come.  By the 59^th session he had also included eleven basic laws of the inner universe, plus three properties of physical material.

(The 7^th inner sense is: Expansion or Contraction of the Tissue Capsule.  In Volumes 1 and 2 see the 39^th, 40^th and 43^rd sessions among many others.)

This does not mean that it cannot be seen on occasion, but it cannot be perceived through use of the unaided physical senses.  It is that indeed which contains the memories and experiences, in codified units, of the present individual.  It is that part which survives physical death.  It is that part which in physical life is intertwined with the physical image.

The basic consciousness is never physical.  Yet within your system it must collect experience within the physical system, hence the physical body.  But experience itself is not physical, and cannot be contained within physical matter.  Therefore this experience, collected within the physical field, is held in codified form by this inner self or astral identity.  It is only by understanding the connection between the physical and nonphysical self, and the communication systems that operate here, that the true nature of human personality can be studied.

While we are dealing now with your own species, it should be realized that all consciousness also possesses its own astral identity.  The inner senses are part of this nonphysical self.  They allow the personality to retain its relationship with nonphysical reality, permitting the material self to focus within its earthly environment.

The inner senses collect information of which the conscious self may not be aware.  The astral identity of course is aware of communications from both the inner and outer environment.  The astral identity is therefore actually a more complete representation of the whole personality, and its abilities are far-reaching.  The inner ego of which we have spoken is the director of this astral identity.  You should see now how this fits in with some of our older material.

(Seth began discussing the inner ego along with the inner senses, so material on it is woven through the sessions.  A few recent sessions dealing with the inner ego are:  94, 151, 162, 173.  See Volumes 3 and 4.)

When the physical self sleeps the astral image may indeed wander.  It always returns to the physical body during physical life.  Its telepathic and clairvoyant abilities are not hampered in any way by the ego when that self sleeps.  In waking hours the communications system is more or less closed on the ego’s side, but in sleep the barriers are lifted and knowledge from the inner self has a freer flow.

Obviously then so-called astral projection occurs frequently in the sleeping state.  It also occurs however in the waking state, although the ego is not aware of such projection as a rule.  When through training there is greater communication between the inner and outer selves, then it is possible for the ego to realize what has happened.

I have told you that dreams are a continuing process, whether or not the ego wakes or sleeps, and whether or not it has, or retains, any knowledge of the dreaming.  So also the astral self journeys often, whether the ego wakes or sleeps.

The inner ego is then the “I” of the astral body.

The inner ego is then this inner identity.  It is closely allied with the entity, and connects a reality that is purely psychic, the reality of the entity, with the reality that is mainly physical, the reality of the physical self.

The inner senses perceive the psychic reality and transmit messages from it.  We speak of these as separate, again, only for convenience, for we have but various abilities and various aspects of a self.  The divisions are arbitrary.  This is very important.

Now.  Regard the inner senses in connection with the nature of action and electromagnetic reality, for the perceptions of the inner senses are themselves action, and as such they change both the perceiver and the thing perceived.  You can see then that even this astral image is always in motion and never static, and its condition alters the physical self even as the physical self acts upon the astral image.

Any dream is experienced differently by these various aspects of the self.  There is not one objective dream that is merely perceived in various fashions.  The various levels of the self create their own dreams, which do have meanings to all layers of the personality.  But you cannot think of a dream as a concrete block that is for example chipped off in pieces that then applied to these imaginary levels.  All of these aspects of the self are so intertwined that arbitrary distinctions must be made for you simply to explain them.

Incidentally, suggestions will reach many aspects of the self, and some which are very distant from the ego, for you are setting into motion psychic action, which is behind all realities.  Suggestion will reach portions of the self of which the ego is entirely unfamiliar.  Suggestion can indeed change experience which has already passed.

It can change the individual’s present reaction to the past event, and alter the original implications and meanings that were once connected with such an event.  Suggestions can shape future events because any action changes that which existed before it, and that which shall exist after it within your system.

This is different however from cause and effect for basically a specific action will not give a specific effect, only.  Within your system, you only perceive certain actions out of an endless variety of actions.  So you take these few as inevitable results of a given cause.

Suggestions then can shape the future.  Expectation enters in here particularly of course.  Suggestion can shape dreams, and the dreams themselves then operate as action.  A strong dream can be a more significant psychic action than any physical experience, and it can change the course of the personality completely.

The inner senses will also react to suggestion.  If you therefore suggest that you become more aware of their activities, then so you shall.  You are giving suggestions, whether or not you realize it, constantly.  You are forming your own physical image with all its strengths and weaknesses whether or not you are aware of it.

Suggestion, well used, with training and knowledge, will therefore allow you to alter the very cells of your body.  The inner senses can be requested to operate in such a way that the ego will accept their communications.  For the astral body is not some distant and alien other self, but it is even now that portion of yourself that you know but cannot see, that you feel but cannot touch.