Reincarnation, Dreams, and the Hidden Male and Female Within the Self (3)

Seth Speaks, Session 557

Reincarnation, Dreams, and the Hidden Male and Female Within the Self (3)

The atoms that compose the fetus have their own kind of consciousness.  The volatile awareness-consciousnesses that exist independently of matter, form matter according to their ability and degree.  The fetus, therefore, has its own consciousness, the simple component consciousness made up of the atoms that compose it.  This exists before any reincarnating personality enters it.  The consciousness of matter is present in any matter – a fetus, a rock, a blade of grass, a nail.

The reincarnating personality enters the new fetus according to its own inclinations, desires, and characteristics, with some built-in safeguards.  However there is no rule, then, saying that the reincarnating personality must take over the new form prepared for it either at the point of conception, in the earliest months of the fetus’s growth, or even at the point of birth.

The process is gradual, individual and determined by experience in other lives.  It is particularly dependent upon emotional characteristics – not necessarily of the last incarnated self, but the emotional tensions present as a result of a group of past existences.

Various methods of entry are adopted.  If there is a strong relationship between the parents and the child-to-be, then the personality may enter at the point of conception if he is extremely anxious to rejoin them.  Even here, however, large portions of self-awareness continue to operate in the between-life dimension.

In the beginning, the womb state under these conditions is a dreamlike one, with the personality still focused mainly in the between-life existence.  Gradually the situation reverses, until it becomes more difficult to retain clear concentration in the between-life situation.

In these circumstances, when the personality attaches itself at conception, there is almost without exception strong past-life connections between parents and child, or there is an unceasing and almost obsessional desire to return to the earthly situation – either for a specific purpose, or because the reincarnating personality is presently obsessed with earthly existence.  This is not necessarily detrimental.  The personality can simply realize that it takes to physical experience well, is presently earth-oriented, and finds earthly atmosphere a rich dimension for the growth of its own abilities

Some personalities are drawn to enter at conception as a result of seemingly less worthy motives – greed, for example, or an obsessional desire that is partially composed of unresolved problems.  Other personalities who never completely take to earthly existence may hold off full entry for some time, and even then always remain at a certain distance from the body.  At the other end of the scale, before death the same applies, where some individuals remove their focus from physical life, leaving the body consciousness alone.  Others stay with the body until the last moment.  In the early days of infancy, there is not a steady focus of the personality in the body in any case.

In all cases the decisions have been made ahead of time, as I told you.  The reincarnating personality is aware, therefore, when the conception for which it has been waiting takes place.  And while it may or may not choose to enter at that point, it is drawn irresistibly to that time and point in space and flesh.

On occasion, long before conception takes place, the personality who will end up as the future child will visit that environment of both parents-to-be, drawn again.  This is quite natural.

Between lives an individual may see flashes of the future existence, not necessarily of particular events, but experience the essence of the new relationship and in expectation remind himself of the challenge he has set.  In these terms, the ghosts of the future are as real in your homes as the ghosts of the past.

You do not have completely empty shells of matter about to be filled, in that the new personality hovers in and about, particularly after conception and with greater frequency and intensity thereafter.  The shock of birth has several consequences, however, that usually draw the personality full blast, so to speak, into physical reality.  Before this, the conditions are fairly uniform.  The body consciousness is nurtured almost automatically, reacting strongly but under highly controlled conditions.

At birth, all of this is suddenly over, and new stimuli are introduced with a rapidity that the body consciousness has never to that point experienced.

It greatly needs a stabilizing factor.  Previously the body consciousness has been enriched and supported by deep biological and telepathic identification with the mother.  The communication of the living cells is far more profound than you imagine.  The identification is almost complete before birth as far as body consciousness alone is concerned.

Until the new personality enters, the fetus regards itself as a part of the organism of the mother.  This support is suddenly denied at birth.  If the new personality has not entered earlier to any full extent, it usually does so at birth, in order to stabilize the new organism.  It comforts the new organism, in other words.  The new personality therefore, will experience birth to varying degrees according to when it has entered this dimension.

When it enters at the point of birth, it is fairly independent, not yet identified with the form it has entered, and acting in a supportive role.  If the personality entered at conception or before birth, then it has to some extent identified with the body consciousness, with the fetus.  It has already begun to direct perception – though perception has begun whether or not it is so directed – and it will experience the shock of birth in immediate, direct terms.

There will be no distance between the personality and the experience of birth, then.  The newly entered personality, as a consciousness, flickers, in that there is a while before stabilization takes place.  When the child, particularly the young child, is sleeping, for example, the personality often simply vacates the body.  Gradually the identification with the between-life situation dwindles until nearly full focus resides in the physical body.

There are obviously those who identify with the body far more completely than others.  Generally speaking, there is an optimum point of focus in physical reality, a period of intensification that has nothing to do with duration.  It can last for a week or thirty years, and from then onward it begins to dwindle, and imperceptibly begins to shift to other layers of reality.

Now.  A crisis, particularly in very early or very late life, may so shatter the personality’s identification with the body that he vacates it temporarily.  He may do one of many things.  He may leave so completely that the body goes into coma, if the boy consciousness has also suffered shock.  If the shock is psychological and the body consciousness is still operating more or less normally, then he may revert to an earlier reincarnational personality.

In such a case, this is simply a regression that often passes.  Here we become concerned again with the animus and the anima.  If a personality believes that it is doing a poor job in a male life, it may activate the anima’s qualities, taking on the characteristics of a past female existence in which it handled itself well.  Reversing the picture, the same can happen to a woman.

On the other hand, if the personality finds that it has so over-identified with its present sex that its individuality is deeply threatened, then it may also bring to the fore the opposite picture, going so far as to identify again with a past personality of the opposite sex.

The hold of the personality over the body is tenuous in the early years, and grows stronger.  The personality, for its own reasons, may decide upon choosing a body that is not aesthetically pleasing.  He may never relate to it, and while the existence will serve what purposes he had in mind, there will always be a basic sensed distance between the body and the personality within it.

Those mentioned earlier who enter at the point of conception are usually highly anxious for physical existence.  They will therefore, be more fully developed and show their individual characteristics very early.  They seize upon the new body and already mold it.  The control over matter is vigorous, and they usually stay within the body, dying either in accidents where death is immediate or in sleep or with a disease that strikes quickly.  They are manipulators of matter as a rule.

They are emotional.  They work out their problems in immediate, sometimes impatient, tangible ways.  They work well with earth materials, and translate their ideas with great force into physical terms.  They make cities, monuments.  They are architects.  They are concerned with forming matter and molding it to their desire.

As a rule, now, those who do not enter your plane of existence until the point of birth are less able manipulators in those particular terms.  They are the mean, if such a term can be used, the mean or average.

Now there are some who resist the new existence, even though they chose it, as long as possible.  To some extent they must be present at birth, but they can still escape any full identification with the born infant.  They hover within and about the form, but half reluctantly.  There are many reasons for such behavior.  Some personalities simply prefer in-between-life existence and are much more concerned with the theoretical solving of problems than the practical application necessarily involved.  Others have discovered that physical existence does not meet their needs as well as they thought it would, and they will progress much better in other fields of reality and existence.

Because of their own characteristics, however, some prefer to set up a certain distance between themselves and their physical existences.  They are much more concerned with symbols.  They look upon earthly life as highly experimental.  They approach it almost with a jaundiced eye, so to speak.  They are not interested so much in manipulating matter as they are curious as to the ways in which ideas appear within matter.

Again generally speaking, they are always more at home with ideas, philosophies, and nontangible realities.  They are thinkers always a bit apart, their body types showing a lack of muscular development.  Poets and artists, while somewhat of this nature, as a rule are more deeply appreciative of the physical values of earthly existence, although they have many of the same characteristics.

The attitude toward the body will always vary, therefore.  Various types of bodies may be chosen, but there will still be overall preferences on the part of the whole self, and characteristics that will lead the whole self, so that generally the various lives lived will still have their own individual flavor.

It is almost impossible to speak of when the personality enters the physical body without discussing the ways in which it leaves it, for all this is highly dependent upon personal characteristics and attitudes toward physical reality.  Decisions as to future lives may be made not only in between-life conditions but also in dream states in any given life.

You may have already decided for example, now, upon the circumstances for your next incarnation.  Although in your terms your new parents may be infants now, or in your scale of time not even born, the arrangements may still be made.