The Ego and Inner Self (Prime Identity) in the Spacious Present

Seth Early Sessions, Vol 6, Session 256

We shall continue the discussion begun in our last session.

The overall efficiency of the inner self, or prime identity, is best displayed of course when it adopts an ego that mirrors its own characteristics and intents as closely as possible.  There is bound to be a difference however, between the purposes of the inner identity and the ego.

Now, the ego, the dominant ego, does indeed affect the inner identity, and changes it even as it affects and changes the dominant ego.  For we are dealing here after all with an interdependent gestalt.  The interworkings of the whole gestalt have never been completely understood.

For one thing the self is usually thought of in terms of existence only within one particular time sequence pattern.  Its experience however is rooted in the past, as you think of the past.  Since there is actually only a spacious present this means that the self is rooted both in the past and in the future, using your terms.

Until it is studied as a multidimensional gestalt, it simply will not be understood.

Reincarnation does not imply a recurring time system, nor does it imply an extension of time as it is normally considered.  That is, reincarnation does not imply in a basic manner existence in one life after another, in your time of successive moments.

I admit to you reincarnation does seem to have such implications.  This is simply because you insist upon considering reincarnation in the light of time theories that are themselves incorrect.  You must instead consider reincarnation in the light of what you know of the spacious present.

Because you are obsessed with the idea of time as past, present and future, you are forced to think of reincarnations as strung out one before the other, and indeed we speak of past lives simply because you are used to the time sequence concept.  What you have of course, loosely speaking, is something like the developments narrated in The Three Faces of Eve.  You have various dominant egos, all part of an inner identity, dominant in various existences.  To make the concept understandable to you it is convenient to speak of past and future reincarnations.

In actuality you see, these separate existences occur simultaneously.  It is only the ego who makes the time distinction.  The various existences are not perceivable by you, or rather they are not perceivable to the ego.  In a basic manner, as you know, the past, present and future exist at once in the spacious present.

A hundred and forty-five B.C., a hundred and forty-five A.D., a thousand years in your past and a thousand years in your present – all exist now.  Therefore the past existences are present existences.  You exist in other words in several guises or reincarnations, at one time within the spacious present.  You simply do not recognize that the so-called past exists now as surely as the so-called future exists now.

Since all events occur at once, there is little to be gained by saying that a past event causes a present event.

Past experience does not cause present experience.  You are forming both past, present and future experience simultaneously.  Events appear to you however in sequence, therefore it is difficult to explain many matters to you, because they must be given in bits and pieces.

When it is said that certain characteristics from a past life influence or cause present patterns of behavior, such statements, and I have made some of them, are grossly simplified simply to make certain points clear.

The whole self or identity is aware of the experiences of all the egos, and since one identity forms these egos there is bound to be some similarities between them, and characteristics.  The material that I have given you on reincarnation in the past is quite valid, particularly for working purposes, but it is a highly simplified version of what actually occurs.

If you take The Three Faces of Eve, in which actually four egos are involved, and imagine each of these egos taking over, so to speak, in completely separate existences, in your past, present and future, then you may come somewhat closer to the true nature of reincarnation.

These four personalities existed however in one physical lifetime.  Now to an observer whose time concept was still further segmented, and slowed down in comparison to your own, then theoretically within this time system the four personalities would indeed appear to be four separate existences in fact.  In the same manner, you see, several manifestations of one identity appear to you to be stretched out in serial form within a successive time framework.

Obviously however this analogy only carries us so far.  You will say, “The four egos belonging to Eve all belonged to one physical body, but in the reincarnational process we are faced with the issue of several bodies, each one discarded and experiencing physical death.”

Now, I will tell you the nearly unbelievable.  There was not one shared body in the case of the four Eves.  There were four separate bodies.

After the first shock this should come as no surprise.  As you know, the physical body is itself never the same, and the atoms that compose it appear and disappear constantly while the appearance of permanency is retained.  Such a process, and a natural one, took place in the case of Eve.

But as the personalities alternated they took over the organic processes so completely that while the body appeared, generally speaking, to be the same, it was not the same.

It should be remembered here that two personalities were allergic to nylon and two were not.  Obviously two personalities made such changes in the physical organism that the allergy was brought on.  The organism was physically changed and affected.  Even though one personality took over for an hour, still for that hour the physical organism itself was a different one.

It is interesting to note also that these personalities did not alternate, and all were in existence at once, so to speak, even though only one was dominant at a given time.  In the same way all so-called past personalities are present in your now, but not dominant.  Obviously also any future reincarnations are present for those who have other lives still to live in your terms.

There is simply the simultaneous expression of a prime identity or inner self within the physical system.  There are as you know other systems.

Now.  I exist simultaneously with the both of you.

This should be obvious, or I would not be speaking with you; obviously therefore I also exist, speaking in your terms, as I am now and as I was.  In my terms you see I simply exist in the now.

There is communication between these various aspects of inner identity that are obviously cooperative.  As a rule I make no attempt to take over the mechanism that Ruburt operates in any general manner.

He allows me to make some adjustments in it however, and we shall discuss these in detail before too long.  Now.  One of the egos that was mine, you see, is a part of Ruburt’s whole personality, and we use this as a bridgework.  I can use it momentarily.

Again, this does not mean that I am a secondary personality.  Reincarnation does mean that we are all multiple personalities with an underlying prime identity.  I am myself, Ruburt is himself.  Or if you prefer, Jane is herself.

You forget, you see, that you have also been, and are, part of this identity, Joseph.  In your particular cases now you have branched out to form prime identities of your own, though we were originally part of the same.

Now.  I am the prime identity that you were part of.  And I was myself at one time, so to speak, a part of another prime identity.  This development does not always occur, for many reasons.  Some fragments of an identity simply do not wish to so develop.  In the spacious present you see we are one, yet entirely individual.

Now we may possibly develop into a newer gestalt, for I cannot see all portions of the spacious present.  There are still veils before my eyes.  This is a part of the present I do not perceive.  If so, it will be one in which identities are completely retained, and there is no question of a dominancy, but of a smooth-working organization.

In the time framework within which you now exist I can help you, but you cannot help me except by allowing me to help you, you see.  In the gestalt which could develop we would be in a position of helping each other more equally.  Now through you I affect physical reality, and this is indeed one of my purposes.

I affect reality, physical reality, because men’s minds are changed according to their ideas, and we shall change these ideas for the better.  The ideas, working through men, will affect physical reality for the better.  I am here more often than you think.  Never, however, in a prying manner.

The relationship between you and Ruburt was necessary before our sessions could begin.  Your own illness, immediately before our sessions, was unfortunately necessary, in that it made you question the nature of your mental reactions toward physical and psychological events.

I helped you then, before you knew me.  You were quite literally waiting for Ruburt and this is why you did not marry earlier.  The connections between you, and your development from the same prime identity, made your union an excellent one.  There is a constant maintenance of identity, and search for stability, psychologically speaking.  But then identity, sure of itself, seeks to enlarge its experience for it is no longer afraid that experience will swallow it.

Identity always becomes part of that which it perceives, however, and so it constantly forms new gestalts, while accepting as itself a larger variety of experiences.  Therefore identity grows, and as I have told you there are no limitations to it.  Therefore we are forming new identities, and you have already accepted as part of yourself experiences which previously would have been considered alien, and not accepted.

You change because of any experience.  You have, then, changed because of this one.  You have become more than you were.  I am speaking here to you both.  I am not taking you over, so to speak.  You are accepting as a part of your whole experience more and more of the reality of what I am.  This in no way minimizes me, you see.  I make much of my knowledge available to you, but it is still my knowledge, you see.  The sharing of it however enlarges my own experience.