Mike's commentary · The Nature of Personal Reality, Chapter 18

The "Introduction" and "Key Points" of this chapter were summarized by an AI editor based on the main text below; they are not words spoken by Mike during his lectures. The main text comes from Mike's commentary, and the blockquotes are Seth's original words (the portions Mike read aloud).

Introduction

This chapter explains the connection between inner emotions and beliefs on the one hand, and outer weather and natural disasters on the other: emotions and thoughts have electromagnetic properties, and group emotions accumulate and affect the atmosphere and the earth's crust, forming storms, earthquakes, floods, and so on. Using the Elmira flood as an example, Seth analyzes the local collective emotions, Jane and Rob's choice to stay, and their precognitive experiences, pointing out that disasters are the materialization of inner states, that they have a creatively corrective function, and that they can release suppressed forces.

Key Points of This Chapter

• Emotions and thoughts have electromagnetic properties and can influence weather and the structure of the earth.
• Natural disasters are the result of accumulated group emotions and beliefs, not random external impositions.
• Disasters such as earthquakes and floods have a creative corrective function, releasing suppressed energy.
• Jane and Rob, because of their personal beliefs and habits, chose to remain in the flood, and through precognition obtained information that kept them safe.
• No one dies in a disaster without having chosen to; each individual chooses whether to experience a disaster according to his or her own purposes.

Main Text

Chapter 18: Inner and Outer Storms, Creative "Destruction"

This chapter is actually the latter half of the last subsection of Chapter 17. Seth first states the title of this chapter -- Inner and Outer Storms, Creative "Destruction." He says:

Your reality exists independently of your physically oriented consciousness.

What does this mean? The reality we can perceive -- our material world, our external environment -- exists independently of our consciousness. Independently of what kind of consciousness? Not ordinary consciousness, but physically oriented consciousness. In other words, our external reality does not exist independently of our non-physically oriented consciousness, but it certainly exists independently of our physically oriented consciousness -- outside of our physical senses. The things around us -- tables, chairs, mountains, rivers -- all exist independently of our physically oriented consciousness. So what he says is very precise.

But when you are an animal, you must interpret your perceptions through your neurological structure and physical activity.

What he means is that if we exist as ordinary biological beings, we must go through our physical senses -- eyes, ears, nose, tongue, these five sense organs -- in order to perceive external things.

You do have memories of all kinds, so when you need these memories, the correct data is readily available, while other data is seldom consciously needed.

We do indeed have all kinds of memories. When we need them, the correct data can be recalled at any time; other non-physical data is no longer consciously needed by us. But for the unconscious portion, those other data -- that is, feelings and memories on the non-physical level -- must always be accessible, able to be retrieved at any time.

Biologically speaking, the range and capacity of your physically oriented consciousness is directly connected to the length of your days and nights.

The range our physical senses can perceive, the capacity of our physical consciousness, is directly related to the length of day and night. To put it plainly: during the day you can perceive, at night you need to sleep -- that is what it means.

It is also connected to the seasons, of course. In bodily terms, when thought occurs, there are chemical reactions within the body, and memory rides upon the smooth flow of those chemical reactions.

When our brain is active, there are chemical reactions, and memory exists upon these chemical reactions, riding on their flow.

In these terms, your planet, with its precise schedule of day and night, gave birth to an animal consciousness precisely adapted to it.

Our planet's revolution around the sun and its own rotation follow an extremely precise timetable. According to this timetable, the Earth gave birth to an animal consciousness precisely adapted to it -- and this animal consciousness includes human consciousness, that is, the animal portion within human consciousness.

In other words, day and night represent the inner rhythms of your consciousness made physically concrete through natural phenomena.

Day and night are a representation -- they represent the inner rhythms by which our consciousness is concretely manifested and materialized through natural phenomena.

Because you are not yet prepared to perceive longer days. For example, your nervous system would have great difficulty with the rhythms of a day stretched to three or four times its length.

In other words, if you go three or four days without sleep, remaining continuously awake, our nervous system cannot take it and will directly collapse. Even today, when interrogating prisoners around the world, if you cannot beat them or scold them, you simply do not let them sleep -- sleep deprivation is the cruelest punishment. Those who have experienced it know that a person cannot survive in this state of prolonged sleeplessness. I remember the Nobel Prize from the year before last or the year before that -- a scientist who won the Nobel Prize in biology obtained experimental evidence and proof: it is very difficult for a person to survive without sleep¹, and it has a very lethal effect on the body, more severe than lack of food and drink. So Seth also points out that without the alternation of night and day, our nervous system cannot take it and would collapse. All of this is natural. We human beings exist on this Earth, including other living things, influenced by the rhythm of this planet's alternation of day and night, and this inner rhythm produces a consciousness adapted to it.

The rhythms of your body and consciousness follow the patterns of your planet.

Yet this planet itself is composed of atoms and molecules.

Every atom and molecule has its own kind of consciousness. Physical structures are organized and formed by the accumulated cooperation of their "gestalts."

All the material world we see is formed by the "gestalts" of these atoms and molecules, organized through accumulation and cooperation. We have explained the concept of "gestalt" many times: the small consciousnesses of small molecules and atoms combine together to form a larger consciousness, and this consciousness is greater than the sum of its parts -- this is what is called a "gestalt." Simply put, our material world is formed by consciousness.

In your terms, when this formation occurs, there is constant coordination between inner and outer reality.

Our consciousness is the inner, our external world is the material world, and the two coordinate with each other.

Emotions, senses, perceptions, the feeling of "I am," the growth of ideas and beliefs, developed simultaneously with the outer manifestation that led to the animal species and the appearance of minerals and plants.

Look at what is mentioned here -- emotions, senses, perceptions, the feeling of "I am," the sense of identity, your ideas, your beliefs -- this entire series of growth is all inner. The growth of this inner world developed simultaneously with the outer manifestation that led to our existence as an animal species, as well as the appearance of the plants, minerals, and other living things around us.

Then came the growth of auxiliary neurological structures, and the precise physical formations needed to maintain all of these.

Within our bodies, auxiliary neurological structures were also growing; maintaining these required certain precise physical formations -- that is, the external material world, such as mountains, valleys, seas, and so on. This entire passage is about the origin of humanity and the origin of the entire planet. Broadly speaking, these events happened simultaneously, with no sequence of before and after. However, to make it easier to understand, to make it easier for us humans to comprehend, he discusses it in terms of our so-called temporal sequence -- as a process of development. Our inner world and outer world developed and coordinated simultaneously; it is not that the outer world developed first and then the inner world formed, or that the inner world came first and then created the outer world. No, they grew and developed simultaneously in a process of mutual interaction. If we speak in terms of temporal sequence, that is how it is; if we speak in terms of higher dimensions, they were produced simultaneously.

Your emotions are as natural as trees, and are part of the environment.

Our emotions, like great trees, like small grasses, are a product of nature.

Emotions have a great influence on the weather. For example, there is a great correlation between epilepsy and earthquakes.

Where is the correlation? Great energy and instability meet, and this affects the physical characteristics of the Earth. Our emotions have a great influence on the weather. He uses epilepsy as an example -- epilepsy is a kind of energy instability; great energy in an unstable condition, in humans, is epilepsy, and in the Earth's crust, it is an earthquake.

Beliefs are formations of the self-conscious mind. Just as, on another level, buildings are as well.

He gives a definition of belief: beliefs are formations of the self-conscious mind. Are buildings also formations of the self-conscious mind? When we construct a building, we must go through the self-conscious mind, through our intelligence, to design the blueprint of a building, and then construction workers realize it. If belief is hard for you to understand, it is like one of our buildings -- except that belief is inner, while a building is outer.

Beliefs generate, focus, and direct emotions.

Be sure to remember: beliefs are the commanders of emotions. All of your moods and emotions come from the direction of beliefs. Within this scope, then, emotions can be compared to mountains, seas, lakes, and rivers. What does this mean? If buildings and the external environment around us are products of our conscious mind, then beliefs are the producers that generate emotions. In that case, emotions are a product of beliefs, and the external world -- buildings, mountains and rivers, our environment -- is also a product of beliefs. These two products, one is inner and one is outer; the inner one is called emotion, and the outer one is called buildings, mountains, and rivers. In this way, can we not compare emotions to mountains, rivers, lakes, and seas? They are all the same -- all products of beliefs.

Concepts and beliefs brought about those apparently man-made structures.

Our concepts and our beliefs created the skyscrapers we now see; all of our machines, cars, airplanes, and ships are brought about by our beliefs and concepts.

Implying a self-conscious mind, and a great many interrelated social events.

Besides buildings, there are also social events. So the external material things and the events that happen are all produced by your beliefs.

Emotions still depend upon your neurological structure, and its impact upon the physical world.

Emotions require our neurological structure; without the neurological structure, emotions would not exist. For example, a person in a vegetative state, whose neurological structure has been damaged, no longer has perception when lying in bed, and has no emotions -- he has consciousness, but you can no longer perceive his emotional feelings. And emotions do have an impact on the physical world.

An animal can feel, but it cannot believe.

An animal can sense its surroundings, but it does not understand what it means to believe.

Besides their subjective reality to you, your emotions also involve their chemical interactions, and have electromagnetic properties, as your thoughts, indeed, also do.

Emotions, besides having a real subjective feeling for you -- your happiness and sadness in the present moment are completely real feelings to you, very subjective -- besides this, emotions, along with their chemical interactions, also have electromagnetic properties. Emotions have two functions: one makes your subjective experience so real, and at the same time they also have their own electromagnetic properties. Your thoughts, indeed, also have electromagnetic properties. We discussed this many chapters ago, or in Seth Speaks: your thoughts, your emotions, your consciousness, your ideas, are themselves electromagnetic physical events, just as real as your material world, except that they are electromagnetic in nature -- but not yet the kind that our scientists' electromagnetic detectors can detect.

Your body must eliminate chemical excesses, just as the land must squeeze out excess water. We will call these "ghost" chemicals here.

What are "ghost" chemicals? They are certain aspects of normal chemicals that you have not yet perceived. The chemical excesses our bodies eliminate -- various hormones, adrenaline, the chemical substances that control operations within our bodies -- memory rides upon chemical reactions. When we discharge these excess chemicals into the air, after reaching a certain threshold, they are transformed into purely electromagnetic properties.

There, after a certain critical value is reached, this chemical value is changed into purely electromagnetic properties.

Once transformed into electromagnetic properties, it releases energy that directly affects the physical atmosphere. This electromagnetic discharge alters the energy in the atmosphere and influences the energy of the atmosphere. In this chapter, Seth is explaining the relationship between us and the atmosphere, between us and the climate around us.

Just as your body is in a constant state of change and chemical interaction.

Our bodies are constantly changing, and the atmosphere is the same -- it is also constantly changing.

On another level, the atmospheric response reflects all of the psychic, chemical, and electromagnetic characteristics that exist within the body.

On a certain level, the atmosphere reflects your inner psychic, chemical, and electromagnetic characteristics. Be sure to remember: all psychic, chemical, and electromagnetic characteristics are reflected in the atmosphere.

There is no difference between the flow of blood through your veins and the flow of wind across the land.

Except that to you, one seems inner and one seems outer -- one flows through your veins, the other blows across the land -- both have the same interrelationships and manifestations of movement, and both are the same in nature.

Your planet, like you, also has a body. Just as your blood follows certain preset patterns, so does the wind.

Our blood flows through fixed blood vessels, following certain preset patterns, and the wind also follows these fixed patterns. If we use this analogy, then we live within the body of the Earth.

Just as the cells within your body affect the body, your bodies also affect the larger body of the Earth.

If we compare ourselves to the cells of the Earth, then we also affect the entire body of the Earth.

In any given local area, the weather faithfully reflects the emotions of the individual, and the overall weather patterns follow the deeper inner rhythms of emotion.

Individual weather reflects individual emotions, and the overall macroscopic weather patterns are influenced by the inner rhythms of inner emotions.

Those who live in earthquake zones are attracted to such a location.

Why do some people live in earthquake zones? Because they have an innate understanding of the astonishing relationship between the external environment -- this earthquake-zone environment -- and their own very private mental and emotional patterns. This is their own character.

There you can find energetic, unstable, and overly impatient people with extremely strong creative and inventive abilities.

People who live in earthquake zones have some of these characteristics. Yet those people need to pit themselves against the intense stimuli and impacts of reality, and often have great impatience with the current state of society, as well as unusual vitality. Such people live a high-tension life -- always high-intensity, endlessly vigorous, full of energy. And collectively they discharge great quantities of extraordinary "ghost chemicals," and these chemicals can potentially cause earthquakes.

Speaking of this, let us take the most typical real-world example: Japan. Look at the country of Japan -- the entire nation sits on an earthquake belt, located at the junction of the Asian plate and the Pacific plate, with frequent earthquakes. If you observe carefully, what characteristics do Japanese people have -- they are very impatient. Look at history: Japanese men were extremely impatient, including during World War II, when they launched wars and invasions; their character was very irascible, full of energy, extremely unstable. Look at these characteristics: full of energy? Yes. Unstable? Yes. Overly impatient? Yes. Of course, was its attack on Pearl Harbor overly impatient? The same thing -- including its invasion of China, its desire to take over all of Asia, and even its desire with Germany to swallow the entire world -- all of this was overly impatient. And their creativity is very strong. If you understand Japan's development at that time, you will know: under such barren natural conditions, with such a small population and such harsh natural environment, its economic capacity and creative capacity were extremely strong. Even now, with such a small land area, it is still the world's third-largest power. Before China caught up, it was second in the world -- first was America, second was Japan. After China surpassed Japan to become second in the world, Japan fell to third. But do not forget how small a country Japan is². Do you see Japan's inventive capacity? Robots, artificial intelligence, chips, electronics, small inventions and creations -- even now, when you look at the creativity of those small items in Japanese supermarkets, it is truly refreshing. So when I give this example, you can immediately think of it.

The nonphysical qualities of such emotions are unstable, and affect the soundness of the deep electromagnetic structure of the Earth.

The instability of their emotions affects the soundness of the deep electromagnetic structure of the Earth's crust, and therefore can cause earthquakes. Obviously, there are also earthquakes that occur in uninhabited areas. Someone might say: what you are saying is wrong -- many earthquakes occur in places where no one lives; who caused those earthquakes? But Seth says:

In all cases, the origin is in psychic properties rather than in outer properties.

The origin of earthquakes is caused by psychic properties.

Earthquakes are often connected with periods of great social change and unrest, and the faults also begin from these locations and extend outward.

So the ancient Chinese discovered a problem: frequent earthquakes often lead to social change, such as the replacement of dynasties and political instability, and there is often a connection with earthquakes. Therefore, in ancient times, earthquakes were regarded as inauspicious events, not merely a matter of natural disaster. This is the simple and honest folk wisdom of ancient China, the result of long-term observation. And in fact, Seth also says this is indeed the case. It may affect another state, or generally uninhabited areas, or an island, or cause a tsunami on the other side of the Earth. This is very normal -- the earthquake in Japan that year, the tsunami, affected many surrounding places, and the Indian Ocean tsunami also caused great disaster in Indonesia.

Just as with a stroke.

A stroke in us is certainly caused by a blockage or rupture of some cerebral blood vessel, but it affects not only the tissues around the location of the stroke -- it can affect very distant parts, such as your entire leg, your perception, or your whole body becoming unable to move. Earthquakes are initially caused by emotions, but subsequently they lead to other problems.

You do not need a self-conscious mind in order to feel.

Then someone might quibble: how were earthquakes before humans existed produced? He tells you: you do not need to have a human consciousness to feel an earthquake, or to have human emotions for there to be earthquakes. In the past, earthquakes represented the emotional patterns of other species in the same way. Earthquakes are related to other species.

Instability of consciousness set off natural phenomena, which in turn altered consciousness and the condition of the species.

Instability of consciousness set off natural phenomena, which then had an effect on humans; after this effect, consciousness was in turn altered, and there were new changes and new conditions for the species. For example, the ice ages in history were all caused by unstable emotional changes in species. Such natural changes affect the development of the entire species, and even cause changes in the entire natural environment of the Earth, which in turn affects the developmental condition of the entire species.

In your terms, consciousness is wedded to matter. Any of its experiences are made physically concrete through interaction.

Consciousness combines with matter; all the experiences it can have and feel are produced through interaction with physical matter and made concrete. Our conscious experience must interact with matter in order to be produced; there is such a process.

For example, there is a great correlation between storms and psychic storms, and also a great correlation between the unstable electromagnetic characteristics of both emotions and thoughts, the brain's ability to process them, and the brain's need to eliminate excesses.

That is, there is a correlation between storms and psychic storms. The correlation lies in this: the unstable electromagnetic properties of both emotions and thoughts bring about unstable electromagnetic characteristics; there is also a great correlation with the brain's ability to process emotions and thoughts, and the brain's need to eliminate excess chemical substances.

You do not only react to the weather, but you help to form it.

The weather affects you -- cloudy days affect your mood, rain also affects you. But at the same time, you are also helping to form the weather. Remember here, he uses the word "help" -- you have a share of the credit in this.

Even the air you breathe in, and then breathe out, has an effect upon it.

The brain is a "nest" of electromagnetic relationships that you do not understand.

In a manner of speaking, the brain is a controlled storm. If we use a vivid example, your brain is like a controlled thunderstorm.

The ideas that pour out of the brain are as natural as lightning. When lightning strikes the earth, it changes the earth, and through the impact of your thoughts upon the atmosphere, the atmosphere is also changed.

Lightning appears in the sky, just as thoughts emerge from your brain -- both are equally natural. Lightning can change the earth, and the impact of your thoughts upon the atmosphere can also change the atmospheric environment.

The great overall inner trust with which you are born forms the reliable foundation of the physical Earth as a whole.

The reason our Earth's external environment is now reliable and stable as a whole lies in the great overall inner trust with which we are born -- that is, our trust in the overall inner self. This is the foundation of the stability of our Earth's environment. In other words, when the entire inner trust of humanity no longer exists, when the entire inner stable foundation of humanity no longer exists, then the external environment of the Earth cannot be a reliable system either. He is now explaining why our Earth is a very stable system suitable for human survival -- it is because of our full inner trust in our own inner whole.

Your body lives within the Earth, just as you live within your own body.

Our body lives within the Earth, just as our consciousness lives within the body -- it is the same principle. The ego's consciousness has an effect on the body, and our body within the Earth has an effect on the Earth -- it is the same.

You are born with a confidence in your own existence, which automatically directs the proper functioning of your individual body, and this provides the necessary quality of stability.

We are born with confidence in our own existence. This confidence automatically directs what your body should do, allowing your body to function very well, and thus it provides the necessary quality of stability.

So that your consciousness can play upon it.

Your consciousness can play upon this physical body, on the premise that this physical existence is built upon a relatively stable framework -- upon a healthy body.

Through it, consciousness can operate effectively and creatively.

The smallest atom has its own kind of innate soundness.

Have you ever seen an atom that is born disabled? Missing two electrons, missing a neutron? No. Every atom has an innate soundness; every atom is so sound and stable. Why can it not be missing a neutron, missing a proton, missing an electron, or have one extra electron? This is a kind of innate soundness.

All of their organization and alteration is built upon that.

Even the smallest atom is built upon that confidence we have in our own innate existence.

So generally speaking, within the body of the Earth, there is a kind of "gestalt" eternity.

Within the body of the Earth there is a kind of "gestalt" eternity, and this eternity provides an eternally stable environment for us to survive and develop.

Yet within all of this, there is always change.

Although it is a "gestalt" eternity, it is always in a state of change.

Just as in experiencing time in a linear fashion, any one event must necessarily displace another.

The way we experience time is linear -- from beginning to end, from one point in time to another. Two events cannot simultaneously exist within your personal range of experience at the same time. From the focus of our consciousness, an event takes time to happen.

Only because you accept what others tell you do you know that many events you have not personally experienced have occurred.

When someone tells you something has happened, you believe it. Because you believe what others say, you believe that an event you have not experienced has occurred.

Therefore in your terms, change is apparent, and the body is changed.

According to our terms, the so-called eternal "gestalt" is in fact always changing, and this change is apparent -- because our bodies are being changed, and therefore the external environment is also changing.

I have told you that a "dis-ease" is an illness that can have a creative basis.

He calls illness "dis-ease," because he has always wanted to tell you: this is not a disease; there is no disease; it is only a signal. He discussed this in Chapter 4, Session 620. Therefore, a natural disaster such as an earthquake is the same -- it has a creative basis.

Beyond the conscious level, merely as animals, we have considerable intuition about coming storms, floods, hurricanes, and earthquakes.

Even in the unconscious parts of ourselves, even basic animals like those—mice, small animals, fish—have considerable intuition about coming storms, floods, tornadoes, and earthquakes. So before an earthquake comes, many animals will show abnormal reactions, and we all know that. But do we humans have it? Actually, humans have it too, only we often fail to perceive it.

The body itself can sense many hints and signals, such as changes in air pressure, differences in the directional balance of geomagnetism, and subtle electrical variations that the skin can detect.

When the geomagnetism changes, the surrounding magnetic fields all change along with it, and the electromagnetic properties also change, and our skin can feel these tiny changes—something feels off.

At that level, before a natural disaster has even occurred, the body is often already prepared, and defenses have been built up.

Before the disaster has even begun, the body has already foreknown it.

However, many other factors related to the individual's particular responses are also at work.

Because this perception and influence is too subtle for you, and you also have many other individualized reactions.

Here certain other psychological conditions also enter in, and many different attitudes and characteristics apply, so it is difficult to generalize.

But there is a reason why a person gets caught up in a terrible natural disaster. There are many reasons in here: each person's traits, individuality, the psychological conditions with which they handle things, different attitudes—everything is in there, and it is hard to generalize. But every person who gets caught up in a disaster has a reason. You are not drawn into some disaster without cause, passively.

In many instances, some people have in advance what seems to be an almost conscious awareness of the situation.

Before the disaster occurs, some people have precognitive ability. They can feel that something is wrong, and that intuitive feeling is very strong—it is an almost conscious awareness, but not truly conscious.

In other cases, the body's advance knowledge is reflected in dreams, thereby altering your daily life.

Some precognitive dreams will tell you that a great disaster is coming. When you have such a dream, you will be influenced by the dream's message to change your life, so that this person can escape the calamity. If this person is very sensitive, he will change his plans: he will not go on the business trip he was supposed to take, or he will leave the city the day before the disaster. He may suddenly have a premonition: it is not good to stay in this place, I must leave it—he does not even know why, but he leaves. Others stay behind.

These are not accidents.

You yourself perceived all of it.

According to an individual's beliefs about his own reality and the role he plays within it, unconscious data is thus allowed to enter into consciousness.

According to each person's different individuality, the degree, manner, and form of expression with which unconscious data enters his consciousness are different for everyone.

No one dies in a disaster without having chosen to do so.

What we think of as accidents in disasters are all the result of his personal choice.

There is some conscious recognition, although the person may fool himself and pretend it is not there.

Some people have conscious recognition—that is, the precognition of the disaster—and pretend it is not there. Even animals can sense their own death in advance. Animals can perceive it; in other words, humans at that level are the same. When you encounter a great disaster, and a person dies in the face of it, before that he did know, but he fooled himself and pretended not to know.

Those who want to use an unconscious premonition of such an event will use that premonition and choose not to become involved.

If you want to use this kind of unconscious premonition, to use it to tell yourself not to die in the disaster, then you will use it.

There are others who do not believe in such advance warnings, but who nevertheless believe in their own overall safety.

Some people do not believe in precognition. When others give them precognition—fortune-tellers or other strange people say, "Don't go to such-and-such a place recently"—they do not believe it. They deny this conscious recognition, but they firmly believe in their own overall safety: that they will not encounter danger, that their lives will not be threatened. In that case, they will take an unconscious action to avoid the disaster—completely unconsciously, without knowing why. For example, one day they suddenly cancel a flight somewhere, or do not go on a business trip, and it turns out that plane may have crashed, yet they do not know for what reason.

There are still others who, for their own reasons, choose to experience the disaster.

Many people will say: there are people who would choose to experience a disaster? How could there be such people? There are people who would choose to experience earthquakes and floods? Impossible. Listen to what he says next.

Psychically, spiritually, or physically, they become so much a part of the event as the water that sweeps through a city in a flood.

His body, mind, and spirit are all drawn in, and he fully experiences the event.

They will use the actual disaster just as one uses a symptom for challenge, growth, or understanding.

For example, pain, inflammation, ulceration, and so on in some part of the body. What these people who experience disasters choose is not a physical symptom; what they choose is to use a disaster for challenge, growth, and understanding. So you see, some people are terrified in the face of disaster, but you will find that some people, when facing disaster, have a strange sense of excitement—at last there is a place where they can put their abilities to use. Those who have experienced it will have this feeling; those who have not will think it is nonsense.

As they will choose their symptoms, so they choose their disasters.

Because for their own challenge and growth, they will have some perception of such a framework. And disasters are not thrown at them without cause; they all choose them themselves. If he does not want to choose this disaster, he will avoid it.

They may not consciously accept this information.

Basically most people will not. But if they know how to examine themselves—if they learn how to examine their beliefs—they will discover that their beliefs are precisely showing such a situation: their beliefs are exactly what led them to choose such a disaster.

A severe illness may be used by an individual to bring himself into the most intimate contact with the forces of life and death.

Only by experiencing life and death can one have a deeper realization about life, so he chooses to experience such a life and death.

To create a crisis in order to mobilize buried survival instincts, to vividly demonstrate the great contrasts, and to summon forth all powers.

Only then can one know the preciousness of life, and feel the meaning of life.

A typical example here is Jet Li. During the Indonesian tsunami, Jet Li happened to be vacationing in Bali. After the tsunami came, it is said that he was dragging his two daughters along, desperately saving them all by himself. In that crisis, in that survival instinct, he made a great vow at that moment: if I do not die this time, I will devote the rest of my life to charity. As we all know, he did not die, and both children were saved unharmed. But he kept his promise, and from then on he established the One Foundation—the one-yuan One Foundation. His idea was simple: if everyone donates one yuan, the whole country could donate over a billion, and that could do a lot of things. From then on he never acted in films again, nor engaged in any commercial performances, and has been doing public welfare work all along³. This is how a disaster, a tsunami, can change a person so enormously. We can only speculate that perhaps his inner self had long had such an idea, so he arranged such a disaster, as if using the outer world to push him to make an inner change. But we know that Jet Li himself, when filming Shaolin Temple, already had a deep understanding of Buddhism; he could not exactly be counted as a Buddhist disciple, but he was no stranger to Buddhism⁴, and he was nurtured by that influence, finally achieving such a result.

A disaster can therefore be used consciously or unconsciously.

Some use it consciously, and some are passively drawn in unconsciously—according to each person's individual situation, it is different, and cannot be generalized. Some people just like to argue; let's not argue: some people are conscious, and some are unconscious.

Later he will talk about the flood you encountered—at the very beginning of this book, they encountered a flood.

Chapter 18: Inner and Outer Storms, Creative "Destruction"

This session is Session 665 of The Nature of Personal Reality, Wednesday evening, May 23, 1973⁵.

Seth says, once again, there are no accidents, and no one dies in any situation without having been prepared to die. Every person's death is prepared by themselves. Many people say, how could I not have known I was going to die? Including many people who encounter disasters, how could I not have known I was going to die? This "being prepared" may not be at the level of your conscious awareness, but rather prepared at the deep bottom layer of your unconscious. This applies to natural disasters as well as any other kind of situation, including some traffic accidents and others as well.

Session 665

Your choices will determine the manner of your death, the way in which you die, and the time of death.

What I am talking about now are the beliefs you know in this life, the ones you should know in this life, the ones you should know in the physical world of our Earth, and I will leave any beliefs that may have seeped through from other existences for later. If there are matters coming from other realities or unknown realities, we will discuss them later.

But whatever beliefs you have accepted, and for whatever reasons, your "point of power" is in the present. Understanding this is far more important than becoming overly preoccupied with the labyrinthine "reasons of the past."

Do not keep thinking about what in the past caused things to be the way they are now. Why do I have to die young in this life? Why might I suffer some accident? What exactly is the reason? Going to all sorts of fortune-tellers, those so-called people who can see past, future, and present lives, having them show you your past and your previous-life experiences -- he says that is far more important than that. Because in a negative exploration you will become so lost, because that kind of exploration is always negative -- because of something you did in the past, something unforgivable, or unchangeable, or some wrong decision, that led to the result you have today. He says this discussion is always negative, and in this negative exploration you will become lost, to the point of forgetting that these beliefs can be changed in the present.

For various reasons, you hold beliefs that can be changed at any time.

You hold certain particular beliefs. For example, many people die young because they strongly believe that old age represents a decline of the psyche and is an insult to the body. They do not want to live into old age, do not want to lie half-paralyzed in bed being cared for by others, like a vegetable. They feel that is an insult to the body. They do not want to live in the state they themselves believe in -- that state is something they themselves imagined, perhaps it is not so, but they feel that is what old age will be like.

Some people actually prefer to die in environments that others might consider the most terrifying. For example, being swept away by the raging tides of the ocean, swept away by a tsunami, or crushed in an earthquake, or battered to a bloody pulp in a typhoon. He says this is especially terrifying to some people, but some people are willing to die under such circumstances. Why? They feel that dying this way is better than slowly dying in a hospital, or dying of some chronic disease. People who die in disasters prefer to die in an intense, violent state. This has to do with each person's temperament, as well as with quite normal individual differences and preferences.

In fact, many people are aware of their approaching death. They know but pretend not to know.

Many people who are ill probably know whether they will make it or not; their feeling is quite clear. But in a disaster, they would not know in advance that they will die in the disaster. Yet those who die in disasters have chosen this experience, this drama. Even with the terror at the moment of disaster, they prefer to leave this life in blazing perception, to leave this life in the midst of such intense conflict, in the ferocity of life, fighting for their lives. When the challenge of death arrives, they choose to fight rather than to silently submit.

Natural disasters possess that released power.

That is the power we humans always feel we do not have, the power we feel powerless about.

That is, the great exuberant force of nature that has escaped human discipline.

This characteristic reminds people of their own psyche. Because in its own way, this kind of profound event always involves the birth of creativity. It has a kind of creativity; this kind of natural disaster brings about a birth of creativity.

Even rising from the belly of the earth, changing the face of the land and the lives of people.

That is an earthquake. Individual reactions follow this inner knowledge -- although people fear nature's unbridled power, we of course fear it, this kind of natural disaster is truly terrifying -- and try to protect themselves, while at the same time being fascinated by it and identifying with it. This sentence is something many people do not understand. Many people do not feel that they are fascinated by natural disasters, that they identify with them. People feel that we all hate disasters, that no one is fascinated by them.

The more civilized man becomes, the more his social structures and actions separate him from his intimate relationship with nature, the more natural disasters there will be, because privately, he feels the great need to identify with nature.

The more civilized our human society becomes, the farther we are from nature. As we grow farther and farther from nature, privately, at a deep level, we need intimate contact and identification with nature.

He will himself cast the spell, and whip nature into earthquakes, tornadoes, and floods, so that he can once again feel not only their energy, but his own.

In the face of such natural disasters, people will bring forth their own boundless energy. A great encounter with the full energy of any natural force -- when our human power encounters the power of nature, people will then face -- face what? Face the incredible potential leaping forth from within themselves. And this potential cannot be forced out of you by other things; only in the face of great catastrophe can this potential be released.

For many people, a natural disaster provides their first personal experience of their own animal nature, of their connection with this planet.

Many people living in modern society have become rather estranged from their understanding of nature. But during a natural disaster, many people for the first time face the raging of nature, this storm, in this animalistic way, the same as other animals. Exposed to the tyranny of nature, it is their first personal experience.

Under such circumstances, those who feel they do not belong to any power, are not part of any organization or family or nation, can in an instant understand their comradeship with the earth.

That is, the comrade-like friendship between them and the earth, between them and nature. We are intimately connected with nature. Their place upon it, the place we have built upon this earth, and the energy of the earth. Through this sudden recognition of the relationship, they can feel the power of their own action. In the face of natural disasters, people discover that they can actually do many things. Without electricity, without the technological things we normally rely on for survival, with all modern means of transportation rendered useless, we are forced to survive in the most primitive ways. At this time you can feel the power of your own action.

On a quite different level, social unrest can achieve the same purpose.

On a level completely different from this, yet similar, yet completely different, unrest can also let you discover your own power. There, for whatever reasons, the release of energy makes a group of people into a highly concentrated existence of vitality. These people we call rioters, or revolutionaries, or young people taking to the streets -- no matter what, it is an existence of vitality. They are full of vitality, shouting slogans, able to fight for their beliefs for hours or days at a time.

For the first time they have a personal cognition, a vitality they had not found in their previous lives.

In the process of such unrest, many people gain a true, personal cognition of themselves. In normal life there is no such vitality. For example, in the protest movements in Hong Kong, we can all see: ordinarily everyone is an ordinary person, office workers, young people, students, not feeling that they have any power, perhaps still playing games, still scrolling through posts on social media. But when a great social upheaval arrives, they take to the streets to protest, and when they face the police, face those suppressing them, their vitality and eruption -- they discover that they are actually so full of vitality. This cognition is often indeed so, and can enable them to seize their own power and use it in a powerful, creative way. Many people discover in the face of great catastrophe certain potentials that they normally could not discover.

A natural disaster, or an upheaval, is a bath of energy -- he calls it a bath of energy. In their own way, the energy of such natural disasters or upheavals is beneficial and extremely positive. This is completely different from many people's views. We ordinarily regard natural disasters and social unrest as very harmful, and avoid them at all costs, but Seth tells us that they are beneficial and meaningful.

Even though they have obvious destructive connotations, in your terms, for the reasons just given, this is by no means meant to excuse those who instigate riots.

The reasons given above are not meant to pardon them -- saying that since riots are good, upheavals are good, then I will start a riot, start an upheaval. No. Because those people will operate within their own conscious belief systems; they know what they are doing. Violence will beget violence. The reason they use such violent means to protest is because they believe violence can solve problems; this is a flaw in their own cognition. But from the larger social perspective, such unrest will bring a certain energy and content, and it is positive. But as far as the individual is concerned, he is acting under the erroneous belief system that "violence can solve problems."

However, even here there are individual differences.

This must be discussed specifically; it cannot be generalized.

The instigators of such riots are often seeking a display of energy, but they do not believe they possess it.

Why does he stir up the riot within the riot? Incite the riot? It is because he wants to see a display of energy, but he himself feels he does not have it. Does he actually have it? He does. Everyone has this energy, everyone has their own inner power, but they all feel they do not.

They light a psychological fire, and like any arsonist, they are terrified by the consequences.

When he incites a riot, he wants to light a psychological fire, just like someone who sets a fire in reality. He thinks that if he lights a fire he can control it, but in the end he discovers that the fire cannot be controlled at all, and he is terrified.

If they understood and experienced power and energy within themselves, they would not need such strategies.

If he knew he had power, he would not need to light a fire and then see how great his power is.

Just as racial problems can be resolved on many levels, through unrest and natural disasters, and the combination of the two, according to the intensity of the situation on the psychological level.

Just as physical symptoms may be a plea for help or recognition, so natural unfortunate events are used by a portion of a nation's members or a part of the world's people to obtain aid from other parts.

The meaning of this passage is: in the face of great catastrophe, many racial problems can be resolved on many levels. Those racial problems are no longer so important; there is much cross-racial cooperation, and social groups will extend a helping hand. This is very difficult to achieve in societies where classes are rigid and already solidified, but when natural disasters arrive, or when society undergoes violent upheaval, these problems will be effectively resolved.

Obviously, many riots are quite consciously instigated.

That is so; they are indeed quite consciously instigated.

However, undoubtedly, thousands or even millions of people would not consciously decide to start a hurricane or flood or earthquake.

Riots can be consciously started by humans, but such natural disasters cannot. Why not? Because first, on the conscious level, they would not believe such a thing is possible. They do not believe that people can start natural disasters, do not believe that earthquakes, hurricanes, and floods can be started by humans.

In such cases, although conscious beliefs play a role, on an individual basis the "inner work" is still done unconsciously. Just as the body produces illness.

This process of humans starting natural disasters is like our own bodies becoming ill. No one consciously wants to make themselves ill, but in fact we all know that the illness is indeed caused by oneself. Just as natural disasters are indeed caused by us humans, but we humans do not feel that we caused them. The principle is the same.

The symptoms of our bodies often seem to come from outside.

We feel that the body's symptoms come from who knows where, making the body suffer -- or a virus, a bacterium, or changes in climate, colds and flu, and various other external factors making one's body suffer. In the same way, natural disasters seem to be imposed upon, added to the body of the earth. We feel that earthquakes, typhoons, hurricanes, and floods are all external, imposed upon the earth -- we do not know what is going on this year, some El Nino phenomenon, this phenomenon or that phenomenon, imposed upon the earth, and we do not feel that they are started by humans.

Sudden illness is considered frightening and unpredictable.

A sudden acute illness is considered frightening and unpredictable, and the suffering person is seen as a victim, perhaps harmed by some virus. For example, with our current COVID-19 pandemic, you do not know how you got infected with the novel coronavirus and became ill. It seems sudden, unpredictable, and very frightening.

Sudden tornadoes or earthquakes -- we also view them this way, feeling as if they suddenly came from nowhere. We attribute such hurricanes to air currents and temperature, pressure differences, temperature differences, rather than to the result of a virus. In fact, the basic principles of the two are the same. Just as you feel that illness seems to be caused by a virus, in fact it is all caused by your inner reasons. And then this sudden earthquake, you feel as if it also suddenly emerged, and you do not know how the earthquake came about. In fact, it is not so either; it is also caused by some beliefs of you humans. Just as we do not feel that such illness is caused by ourselves, and do not believe that these sudden natural disasters are caused by humans, it is the same.

So, the illness of the earth -- he says by analogy, suppose we regard hurricanes and earthquakes as the earth becoming ill -- it has many reasons, just like the illness of the body, just like illness in our bodies, it has its own reasons. To some extent, the same can be said of war. If you regard a war as a small inflammation, then a world war you can regard as a major illness; it can all be analogized, and it all has its own inner causes for breaking out.

War will ultimately teach you to respect life, and natural disasters will also remind you that you cannot ignore your planet or your biological nature.

After humanity experienced two world wars, it brought about a relatively long-lasting peace. We have already had about seventy or eighty years of peace, without any world-class major war.

At the same time, such experiences themselves, even when applied destructively, provide contact with the deepest energy of your existence.

When these things happen, they all connect with your innermost deepest energy -- the energy that is normally hidden in daily life -- and in such states it is all stimulated, all discovered by you.

The occurrence of natural disasters comes more from emotional factors than from belief factors. In other words, when a natural disaster occurs, no one's inner belief wishes for the disaster to happen. It is more a matter of emotional factors. Even so, belief still plays an important role. Why? Because we know that our emotions are caused by beliefs; beliefs give rise to emotions, and ultimately, these emotions will affect our natural environment and trigger such natural disasters.

The "overall emotional tone" of a group of people, or the "emotional-level," through the connection between their bodies and the environment, gives rise to external physical conditions and sets off the onslaught of natural energy.

We know that the body and the environment are connected; through that excess of chemical substances, chemical releases, external physical conditions are caused. The influence on the environment is more a matter of emotion or feeling.

For example, this pandemic has many, many deep underlying causes. But each region, each country faces different problems, yet all are related to the basic, overall emotions and feelings of its own region -- or, because it has now swept the globe, of humanity as a whole. That is, in our current material society, in recent decades technology and the economy have developed rapidly, but the biggest problem people have discovered is this: except for some large companies, multinational corporations and multinational groups, including some financial oligarchs, whose wealth has increased rapidly, exceeding any period in history -- they have taken advantage of global economic integration and globalization. Apart from these multinational financial oligarchs and large multinational trust groups that have obtained enormous wealth, ordinary people's actual living conditions over these decades -- their income, their living environment, their state of life -- have not fundamentally improved. The social development of these decades has not allowed the humans living within it to obtain the development, benefits, or gains they should have obtained; they cannot feel it.

Many young people today have a worse state of survival in society than their parents' generation. I am referring to the countries of Europe and America -- in China it is certainly different; China's reform and opening up over these decades has indeed been undergoing earth-shaking changes. I am referring to the world as a whole; in some European and American countries, in their parents' generation, one person working could support the whole family, including several children, and the wife did not need to work. But now in American society and some other societies, the possibility of one person working to support the whole family has become increasingly low. Back then, one person working could buy a house, could get a loan, could buy a car, could live a much more comfortable life than now. Although there were none of those high-tech things back then, in terms of the quality of life itself, such as the living environment, the houses and yards back then were larger than now, the houses occupied more land, the neighborly warmth and so on were all different. But over these decades, since the end of World War II, with technology and the economy developing at breakneck speed, ordinary people's lives have not substantially improved. The GDP of the whole country may have multiplied many times over, but ordinary people's actual income, converted into purchasing power, has not substantially grown; in some regions it has not even grown at all.

Under such a deep, society-wide situation, what many young people develop is a profound sense of powerlessness. They find that social classes have already solidified, and this solidification of classes makes many people feel that no matter how hard they struggle, no matter how hard they try, there are no more opportunities. In the 1980s there was the founding of Microsoft⁶, in the 1990s there was the founding of such companies, and in the 2000s there were still internet startup companies being founded. But now the cases of young people successfully starting businesses are becoming fewer and fewer compared to earlier eras. In the past you could start a company in a garage and eventually it would become a world-class company; now try starting a company in a garage -- it is no longer possible. Now even the possibility of registering a company in a garage is very small; many places require you to register in a commercial establishment.

In short, humanity's excessive pursuit of material life has not brought the vast majority of humanity the abundance and social progress they deserve; instead, it has widened the gap between rich and poor. The rich get richer, and those at the bottom of society sink lower. This leads to a very bad mood and atmosphere pervading the whole society -- everyone in life is not particularly joyful about seeing the future. Many young people are filled with the feeling that they can already sense or foresee their future, see their outcome, and it is not a very wonderful outcome. Unlike their parents' or even grandparents' generation, whose expectations for the future were infinitely beautiful. You can imagine what the development of technology and the economy brought in that era.

Especially in recent years, America has America's problems, China has China's problems, Africa has Africa's problems, Europe has Europe's problems; every country has its own problems. But many problems are very similar: the whole world is deeply controlled by a very small number of so-called large multinational groups or financial oligarchs, by their omnipresent tentacles. So ultimately, the pandemic we face today has deep emotional and feeling factors within it. When human society cannot consciously and automatically produce changes, or cannot self-renew and change rigid social systems, then it has no choice but to be forced to change deeply through such a ridiculous, extreme, and unimaginable external pandemic. Everyone knows that this pandemic will have a profound impact on the entire society and the entire world order; it will become a key turning point. In our future history, when we look back at 2019 and 2020, we will know what a profound impact the events of this year will have on the future. This is a typical symptom.

Look at the changes in the world situation now; although this matter is not yet over and we are still in the midst of it, each of us must see the good in it, must discover that deep energy within ourselves, and not be controlled by that deeper sense of powerlessness. Under such an opportunity, it is a reorganization of society, a reformation of the social order, although through an external coercive measure. What kind of reformation, we will slowly observe. We are not analyzing today the impact and profound significance of the pandemic on the future of human society; we are just casually mentioning it in passing. If we want to discuss the pandemic, we can set aside time in the future to expand on it.

So what Seth wants to tell you is this: the situations in nature are more often not conscious; they are different from social unrest and riots -- those are conscious, instigated by a few people, with the majority blindly following. But these things in nature are more an emotional, feeling-based influence on the outside.

According to the emotional state of the group, various excesses are physically accumulated.

That is, those greater feelings of powerlessness, the sense of social injustice, the hopelessness about the future -- more and more of these things are accumulated, accumulated physically and materially. Then in different forms, they are thrown into the atmosphere. The cries from the bottom, the despair from the bottom, these emotions are all thrown into the atmosphere. When young people discover that no matter how many years they struggle they cannot afford a house, that despair; when they discover they cannot buy a house and cannot get married, that emotion. Marriage and starting a family -- this is the most basic human right, yet because of high housing prices and high costs of living, even this most basic human right has become so unattainable; that despair and deep disappointment about the future will manifest.

The "ghostly chemical substances" were mentioned earlier.

Just as our excess hormones and bodily secretions are released, and even in our every breath they have an influence on the atmosphere. When these ghostly chemical substances accumulate to a certain degree and reach a certain threshold, they will take on an electromagnetic nature. When they become an electromagnetic reality, their energy will have an influence on the atmosphere, and changes will occur.

And the electromagnetic properties of emotions are the same.

He gives an example: what is the same? Rocks in a stream divide the water; the current must flow around various obstacles to move, and your emotions are just as real as rocks. The emotions we cannot see are as hard and real as rocks. The collective emotions affect the flow of energy, just as stones affect the flow of water; our collective emotions affect the flow of energy in the entire atmosphere.

And its power, in terms of natural phenomena, can be seen very clearly in a storm.

That is, the power of the energy flow can be seen in a storm -- a storm is a natural phenomenon. A storm makes the inner emotional conditions of the people experiencing the storm locally and externally concrete. So the floods, the deluges, the torrential rains in the south some time ago -- these things are actually an external, concrete manifestation of the inner emotional conditions of the people involved. It is not a manifestation of consciousness; it is a manifestation of emotional release.

Just as your conscious beliefs determine the condition of your body—we have been talking about this all along, throughout the previous chapters—and just as your body is maintained, balanced, healed, and cured on an unconscious level, its underlying foundation being unconscious even though it is under your conscious guidance, so too are natural disasters the result of beliefs. These beliefs produce emotions, and the emotions automatically transform into external atmospheric conditions, becoming natural disasters.

Now, according to your individual beliefs, you deal with the physical predicament in the manner in which they manifest.

A natural disaster is a kind of predicament, just as illness in your body is also a kind of predicament, and within this predicament you must deal with it.

With your own purposes in mind, you will individually react to that disaster.

Each of us has different purposes, and our reactions to a natural disaster are also different. For example, when facing the same pandemic, some people's reactions are completely different. When the pandemic first began, those who made masks never imagined that such an ordinary business could suddenly become so wildly profitable; but later, when countless people opened factories to make masks, they discovered that making masks could also lose money to such an extent. So everyone's reaction is different.

Your own unique and intensely private beliefs help bring about the overall emotional condition.

Each person's beliefs are entirely private, involving much that is personal, and are completely individualized beliefs. But they will help—although these individualized beliefs seem different from one another, with each person striving for their own survival—to bring about an overall emotional condition, which is exactly that sense of powerlessness I mentioned earlier, the helplessness about the future, the longing for social change without the power to bring it about, the feeling of being very small, and so on. These things become an overall emotional condition.

Your emotions flow into that pool of emotional energy.

Your emotions are gathered together. The so-called pool of emotional energy is a state of group emotion. Human beings are composed of different electrical charges, and within this emotional pool all kinds of emotions are present.

Generally speaking, the individual contributions of the participants will fall into an organized pattern.

What this sentence means is: each person's individual situation is different, each person's actual circumstances are different, each person's individual beliefs are different—that is, their thoughts are different—and each has their own personal concerns, their own problems, their own little calculations. Yet the emotions they bring are also different, but when these emotions are gathered together and become a group mood or group feeling, a group emotional tone, this group emotion—though each emotion within it seems different—has a common pattern, which he calls an organized pattern.

And this pattern is what gives the storm its impetus and direction, and also provides the electrical charges and force behind it.

Seemingly chaotic, with everyone's emotions being different, yet there is a commonality within it—this common pattern amid the chaotic emotions gives the storm of nature its impetus and propulsion, provides its direction, and also provides the electrical charges and force.

As mentioned earlier in this book, both Ruburt and Joseph were involved in a major flood situation, which occurred in June 1972⁷, about a year ago now. It is now May 1973.

I will therefore use that example, particularly in terms of this area. Although the flood itself affected a much larger range.

Because it involved the entire East Coast region, the whole East Coast was affected. But he says, I will first talk about this area, because if I talk about too large an area it becomes impossible to discuss. Locally speaking—in the city where Ruburt and Joseph lived during the flood—there were certain beliefs held in common. The city they lived in was called Elmira; what the name is doesn't matter, that's just one translation.

The area was economically depressed, and it was considered a backwater region of New York State.

It is in the northern part of New York State—New York State and New York City are two different things. However, the situation had not yet deteriorated to the point of requiring crisis assistance. Although it was a backwater, it had not yet become poor enough to need government aid.

Industry had moved away, and people were beginning to lose their jobs; the old ways of making a living had been uprooted.

Look at the situation he describes—isn't it very similar to our current situation? Many traditional businesses that people relied on for their livelihood—opening a shop, renting a stall in a mall, running a restaurant—these most basic things that everyone needs. People might think, what risk is there in running a restaurant? Food is the first necessity of the people—how could no one come to eat? But in fact, during this year's pandemic you will find that the first to be hit were these restaurant owners. The losses were unimaginable, impossible to calculate; only those who run restaurants know in their own hearts. Many very traditional industries have ceased to exist.

There was no inspiring local leadership.

All kinds of people felt uneasy, depressed, and had nowhere to turn. This is a very typical kind of emotion. If we think carefully, isn't it the same for us?

Urban renewal programs tore down the houses of the poor, destroyed the old established neighborhood units, and built new ones, and these new ones involved social segregation.

What we are doing domestically now is urbanization; we tear down urban villages and rural areas to build new houses. They tore down the houses of the poor, destroyed the old neighborhood units, and built new ones. These new ones involved social segregation. Why? Because the poor were a mixture of Black people and lower-class white people—those white people who had not done well—and this became the current situation in the city of Elmira.

Yet the homeless poor could not afford to live in the new houses. Then the wealthier people—you have to understand that in American city councils, it's not that only extremely wealthy people get in, but at least they are above the upper-middle standard of living—sat on the city council and, through various manipulations, kept the poor from entering the better areas. The division was not done through administrative orders; it was done through a seemingly fair method—through housing prices, the most basic thing—to separate people. They often say that the division of American communities is not based on anything else but housing prices.

The wealthy and the comfortable felt threatened because their insistence on modernization and progress had changed the previous social conditions, thereby releasing the energy of the poor.

The wealthy and the comfortable wanted change, wanted to keep up with modernization and progress, so they had to tear down those old houses. They found them unpleasant to look at and wanted to rebuild them as new and modern. But this would make the poor homeless and would release the energy of the poor, causing social unrest.

The middle class moved from the city to the suburbs.

Beginning around the 1960s, America started the process of de-urbanization⁸. They no longer regarded gathering in the city center as a status symbol; they took pride in living on the periphery of the city—the suburbs had a better environment, a smaller population, and superior natural surroundings. They had already abandoned the lifestyle of living in high-rise buildings with elevators. Of course, domestically we are still pursuing urbanization and metropolitanization, wanting more rural people to move into cities, treating urban development as the next economic growth point. But America in the 1960s had already begun a trend toward de-urbanization.

After they moved to the suburbs, the city centers emptied out and became places where homeless people or the poor gathered. So in America, the city center is completely different from China; the city center is often not a particularly good living environment. From this era onward, these people moved out of the city centers in large numbers, batch after batch.

When they moved to the suburbs, it brought about a change in the tax balance. This made the difference between urban and rural areas in America less distinct; you couldn't see great differences from place to place, and it wasn't the case that cities were necessarily good and rural areas necessarily bad. In countries that develop with the city as the center, this is very typical—not just in China, but everywhere in the world. If a country's development is centered on cities, then the city centers will be very beautiful, but drive half an hour out of the city center and you will find slums and places with very poor quality of life. But these European and American countries are not like that; their city centers still maintain the high-rise buildings of the big cities that reached their peak from around the end of the last century to the 1920s and 1930s. And the suburbs began to be gradually migrated to by these wealthy people, which also stimulated development there. So now the entire urban and rural areas are integrated; you cannot feel the difference between city and suburb, and in fact in many suburban communities the environment is much better than in the city—not just a little better. This also brought about a balance in taxation, rather than letting taxes be concentrated in the big cities.

And the merchants in the city began to suffer.

These merchants were in a rather pitiful situation, because they had to do business in the city, but the wealthy people had all moved away, so their business was not doing well either.

The local people did not have a great sense of unity about the area, or of identity as a cultural or natural whole.

Unlike some cities that have a sense of identity. For example, New Yorkers feel they are New Yorkers; they have a kind of urban awareness and identity. For example, Shanghainese feel they are Shanghainese, Beijingers feel they are Beijingers. They have a sense of cultural or natural identity. But this small city did not have that; they did not have this overall sense of superiority.

There had been some racial tensions, and in the middle there were some hints of riots that were about to happen but did not happen. They all existed, but perhaps no one paid attention.

A mayor who had been quite capable for a time was defeated by his opponent.

A capable mayor was defeated by his opponent, so American democracy is also quite interesting.

For many reasons that need not be discussed here, political factors also entered in.

This is too complicated, so we won't discuss it.

Those concerned with politics felt that their strength was not great enough, and therefore they could not expect to communicate effectively with the federal government to improve their situation.

They felt that their communication with the federal government was insufficient, and they could not obtain financial support from the federal government, nor could they change the local situation. Therefore, in this situation, a sense of powerlessness arose. This city was neither here nor there; it would have been better to exist as a poverty-stricken area, because then it could receive national support and assistance. So domestically there is also this phenomenon—everyone scrambles to be designated a poverty-stricken county. Being a poverty-stricken county is no longer a shameful title as it used to be; now if a place becomes a poverty-stricken county, it is a very glorious thing, meaning it can receive a great deal of poverty-alleviation support and national assistance from the state. In America it is the same; if a region is excessively poor, the federal government will take a portion of the national budget to support it. But this city was neither here nor there, so it did not receive federal support, and thus there was a sense of powerlessness.

Culturally, the area had lost its sense of identity.

Although it had been trying to find some display of distinctive character, it could not find it. It watched government funds pass by—the support funds the government gave to various places had nothing to do with it—passing by, going to places that were even more economically depressed.

These people had individual dreams and hopes, and in group terms, these represented in many respects a vision for the progress of the area.

Each person living there had their own dreams, and all the dreams added together represented a vision for the development of the entire Elmira area, a long-term plan. At the same time, however, the sense of frustration kept increasing.

There were small conflicts between the young and the old, between the traditional and the non-traditional.

Our current society also has this—traditional and non-mainstream. Domestically it's called non-mainstream, and there are small conflicts. For example, we can't stand seeing them wear those ripped jeans—perfectly good pants and they insist on wearing them torn. You can't accept it, but young people love wearing them; they think it's a fashion, a symbol of their identity.

Some of the older people who had grown up in the city objected to the long-haired youths in the city parks.

In the 1970s, wearing long hair was fashionable. Now when you watch some Hong Kong films, including American movies from that era, the boys all wore long hair, shoulder-length hair—the longer the more fashionable—plus bell-bottom pants and disco dancing. Including quite trivial matters, he won't list them all one by one, but there were small conflicts between the old and the young, and these small conflicts were constant.

Yet it pointed out the division and misunderstanding of values between the generations.

It's like the heated discussion everyone had a while ago about the "front wave" and the "back wave." Originally, the video "Back Wave"⁹ was made to find common ground between the front wave and the back wave, to achieve that resonance, to express appreciation, expectation, and encouragement for the younger generation. But this video not only failed to gain everyone's approval, it actually became a tool and target for the back wave to attack the front wave. They did not understand, or completely did not accept, the so-called views of the front wave—not at all. So you will know that this kind of generational difference, between the front wave and the back wave, is not as easy to resolve as you might think—to eliminate that misunderstanding and bridge the gap between them is very difficult.

To some degree, these same problems existed in all the areas directly involved in that particular flood.

Similar problems were directly involved across the entire East Coast, the entire eastern seaboard of America. Because at that time it was exactly the 1970s, and America, starting from the 1960s, after nearly a hundred years of urban construction, had begun to develop a trend and fashion of fleeing the cities. The cities no longer had vitality and became places where the poor gathered, where low-income people gathered.

Locally, although you were a depressed area, you had not reached the point where you could absorb large amounts of federal funds.

So a very unstable social and economic situation combined with a sense of powerlessness. The economy showed no hope, and national aid and assistance could not be obtained; these conditions combined and mixed together.

If the flood had not occurred, then some other disaster might have occurred, or even social unrest.

If the flood had not occurred, it might have led to social unrest. However, the emotional tension caused by this unique and particular feeling-tone was released, automatically transforming into the atmosphere. A natural disaster provided many answers.

For example, the Chemung River was right near their home, flowing directly through the commercial center of Elmira. Because it was going to flood, the river's overflow directly affected them, directly affected the city center. The river washed away the bridge—he introduced the flood at the very beginning of this book—the river washed away the iron bridge over it. Just imagine how big that flood was.

Again, these involved other areas affected by the flood.

Just as certain native peoples—some indigenous tribes—would perform rain dances and consciously bring the rain. They used various rituals, dances, primitive ceremonies, religious ceremonies, and sacrificial rites to pray for rain. He gives this example to show that we can consciously alter nature in this way.

Therefore people in different places were quite automatically doing the same thing.

That is, people in different regions, seemingly in different areas, suffering different impacts—the flood's effect on them was also different—but they were actually all the same, all doing similar things—praying for rain. Only when there is a flood would you pray for rain; only with rain would there be a flood. So they were all like primitive tribespeople praying for rain; they were inwardly praying for rain, but they simply did not perceive the process involved.

Therefore they spontaneously released emotional conditions operating through unconscious intent and biological means.

These are all attributive phrases. That is, through the natural, spontaneous release of our physical emotions, our excess hormones and chemical reactions directly affected the atmosphere, and then seeded the clouds. Once the clouds are seeded, it rains. We all know this—so-called rain enhancement shells add tiny particles between the clouds, and these tiny particles condense and absorb moisture from the air, and the water becomes raindrops that fall.

Not long ago, local religious organizations had planned a large-scale revival, and those who followed that popular religious group had signed up for the plan, and considerable publicity had been given to the matter.

A very famous local religious group organized such a revival plan and collected people's signatures. He says this was not an accident—this was an attempt by a basic Christian denomination to solve problems on another level. If the city had a new revival plan, wouldn't the problems of low morale mentioned above be solved? They were using religious identity—because religion still had influence locally—through identification with religion, conversion, and the infusion of enthusiasm, to let everyone's religious fervor drive a local revival plan, which could solve their problems.

However, the beliefs upon which these plans were based did not coincide with the mass beliefs of the people, so the attempt failed.

The beliefs upon which this plan was based did not match the mass beliefs of the people, so the attempt failed. That plan was based on a premonition of the flood event—a premonition in the unseen, a feeling that if this plan were carried out, perhaps the flood would not strike, because the city would have already begun to revive. But it did not succeed.

The parade held for the revivalist organization was frightened away by the flood.

The parade they wanted to organize to attract public support did not take place and was left unresolved.

On that level, many people in religious groups said that the flood was God's will, and that people were being punished for their transgressions.

Having exceeded the bounds of what was proper, in its own way, the flood was a religious event. From a religious perspective, they felt the flood was a religious event.

Because it united people of different groups.

Different races, different groups, believers and non-believers, high-income and low-income, middle class and lower class—all were together, because all were affected, all were homeless.

They were not always of the most humanitarian intent.

He means that these people were not, as you might think, all full of love and humanitarian intent. It was out of necessity, in the face of the flood. So in the face of floods, and even many major disasters, many people display their very kind side, their very humanitarian side. This is because circumstances force it; it is not that they are naturally possessed of such kindness and humanitarian intent.

In a strange way, the flood was also used to isolate a certain portion of the people, and to highlight their problems, in a way that riots could not accomplish.

It also isolated certain people, and also made some people considerably more humble.

Because it temporarily denied them the comfort of their social position and their possessions.

It made many people instantly penniless. For example, many people spent their entire lives—I mean in America in that era—buying a house, and the house they bought was not in the city center but in the suburbs. You see, Jane and Rob lived in an apartment building, on the third floor, so the water rose to the second floor and stopped rising. But you can imagine, a flood that rose to the second floor—wouldn't it have flattened and washed away all the one-story houses? So many people's wealth was reduced to zero in an instant. After it was reduced to zero, the person immediately became humble. Without wealth as backing, they became much more humble, becoming the same as those homeless people.

And brought them face to face with people of other backgrounds.

It brought them face to face with people of different life backgrounds, those homeless people, and they had to interact with them directly. Otherwise, they would never have gotten to know people of different backgrounds. If not for this disaster, many people would never have realized that there were still many people in society living at the bottom in such hardship.

Crises such as this provide a clear "look" at reality.

It makes you suddenly see clearly things that you normally turn a blind eye to. In the face of major disasters, you will discover things you had not noticed before—that there are still many people living at the bottom.

In many cases, the poor were saved, because the poor received attention and were magnified, because most of the old houses and apartments survived.

Those old houses and apartments, because they were all tall buildings, all multi-story buildings, actually survived. But the newer ranch-style single-story houses—the detached villas—because they were all in the suburbs and were single-story, did not withstand the fierce assault of the flood; they were submerged and washed away.

Yet the college, Elmira College, would still find many such people with nothing gathered at its gates.

That is, people who had returned to a state of utter poverty. Because the college had athletic fields, gymnasiums, and dormitories that could provide temporary shelter, the college became a refuge.

The women who had no higher purpose than playing bridge.

He is referring to those middle-class housewives who lived comfortable lives, who normally just played cards, and as a result found themselves struggling side by side for survival with their even more impoverished sisters—those living at the bottom of society, poorer than them.

Many of the poor who had lost their homes discovered within themselves surprising leadership abilities.

They had not discovered this before.

The city center saw its inner problems.

The city center saw problems that had been invisible before, problems that had always been known but hidden, now physically concretized and completely exposed. We often say that only a flood, a natural disaster, can test how good a city's infrastructure really is, test the city's overall capacity and its ability to face disaster—all of this was completely exposed.

The downtown area was in a nearly ruined condition, requiring complete help.

The city center had been washed away.

The city government was suddenly faced with an actual situation that had little to do with meeting rooms.

When they normally met in conference rooms, they would not face such a situation of major disaster.

The crisis united people, and also laid the hopelessness out for all to see.

Previously it was only latent hopelessness, hopelessness about the future; now it was complete hopelessness. The entire city had been destroyed, so there was no way to cover it up; it was opened up for everyone to see. Therefore action had to be taken; everyone had seen this hopeless ending.

Some older people carried negative beliefs about age, and under the stimulus of survival, they discovered their own great vitality and further purpose.

Some older people had negative beliefs about age, feeling that being old meant being useless. But in the face of such a major disaster, their instinctive desire for survival arose, and under the stimulus of this survival instinct, they discovered that they had great vitality, both wisdom and the ability to live in the face of disaster. So in the face of disaster, these older people's survival ability is stronger than that of younger people; they have experience, having lived through many historical disasters.

There were also those who had been blinded by the belief that possessions were extremely important.

There are many such people—possessions are extremely important. In this situation, they found themselves with nothing; nature had forcibly swept away all their property, the entire house was washed away, all valuable things were gone. Then they realized: private possessions are relatively less important, and public things are more meaningful. When they needed to flee to the college for shelter, to public facilities for refuge, they discovered that it is not enough to just mind your own business and build your own small family well. Society must have some public welfare things, some public things, in order to resist major disasters.

And felt within themselves a "stirring of freedom" that they had not experienced since adolescence.

That is, having nothing at all—like the song "Nothing to My Name" by Cui Jian¹⁰—a person with nothing is the freest. This stirring brought by that freedom was something they had never experienced before, not since their teenage years.

The hidden difficulties of a region, he regards as a kind of illness, an illness that is readily visible to everyone. People came from all over to help, from all places to assist this disaster-stricken area. Domestically we are the same—when one place is in trouble, help comes from all directions; at such times, help comes from everywhere. This camaraderie finally overcame the social structure—we finally put aside the inherent prejudices of social class and began to help all those affected by the disaster.

A mode of existence that had been taken for granted was very effectively pulled apart overnight, within a single day.

We think of the normal order of social production and daily life as something that can be destroyed for you in one day. Anyone who has lived through a natural disaster can understand this; it is something everyone can perceive.

Moreover, everyone involved in it would, to some extent, see a clear set of human relationships in the nature of the life he had lived up to that point, and would feel his kinship with the community.

In the face of such a major disaster, he then discovers who is truly good to him. Those usual fair-weather friends and insincere people turn out to be of no use. He discovers which people can really help him, and who is truly willing to lend a hand in such a time of crisis; this is something that cannot be felt in ordinary life. He can feel the kinship of the surrounding community -- he finds that relatives and neighbors are all helping him, this neighborly mutual watchfulness, this bond among fellow people in which blood is thicker than water. He can feel this only in the face of a great disaster, not in ordinary times.

For example, during the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake¹¹, many people had probably never gone to such remote places -- Wenchuan, Beichuan, and so on; they had never been there. But when the earthquake happened, volunteers from all over the country and even from all over the world rushed to that place, and they helped the victims as if the victims were their own family. They could feel that kind of care from the whole society, from the whole community, from the whole nation, from the whole country. So he could feel his kinship with the community.

But it did not stop there. Everyone felt nature's enduring energy; even in the seeming unpredictability of the flood, they were reminded of nature's great eternal stability.

Our normal life is built upon this natural world. It reminds you again that you need to care for and look after nature, because we are entirely built upon it; our human social civilization is built upon the stability of nature.

The power of the water gave everyone a firsthand recognition of their dependence on nature.

It turns out that mere rain can make human civilization -- the civilization we are so proud of, built over decades, centuries, millennia -- instantly knock you back to your original form, and make you return all at once to a primitive society-like state of living: no water, no electricity, no food, no drink, and even survival becomes a problem.

And it made him begin to question values he had held for so long.

It turns out that before nature, human beings are so small. Humanity's former arrogance, the conceit and pride of thinking it stood above nature, was shattered in an instant. Only a few days of rain made it like this; nature merely used one of its most ordinary methods -- rain -- and could send you back to a primitive state of living.

Such a crisis automatically forced each person to question values and to make timely choices, to adjust and choose anew, choices that would provide him with perceptions previously invisible to him.

Without this natural disaster, he would not have seen it.

Therefore, the flood physically concretized the inner problems of that area.

The flood laid all the previously hidden inner problems of the area on the table for everyone to see. At the same time, it released the energy trapped in hopelessness. At the bottom of this sense of hopelessness, there is energy itself. When you feel hopeless, you are telling yourself that you are hopeless; you are telling yourself that you have no power to solve it, but actually you do have power. But when you are caught in this emotion and this sense of hopelessness, you cannot rescue yourself. Through a flood like this, however, you are shown your own inner strength -- when you can survive such a harsh environment, you discover that you have great strength.

This area became a psychic and physical focus of attention.

This disaster-stricken area became a focus, both in terms of the physical world and in terms of emotion, and it attracted other energies -- whether tangible energy such as relief supplies and relief funds, or intangible energy such as the concern of the whole society; all of it was drawn in.

Everyone involved had his own reason for participating.

Whether rescuer, rescued, or volunteer, each had his own reason.

And through the framework created by the group, private purposes and difficult dilemmas were resolved.

Through this overall operational mechanism of the disaster area, within this whole framework, personal difficulties and dilemmas were resolved. Many people undergo profound changes because of this kind of natural disaster.

Many past beliefs were automatically broken in that present moment.

Some old beliefs are automatically shattered when a disaster arrives; you do not even need to work hard at any persuasion. For example, persuading you to believe that people are good and will help you is very difficult to achieve through argument. Much of the time I see society as evil, and I do not see any good. Yet this old belief is shattered to pieces in an instant in the face of disaster. You do not need to do any meditation, or replace old beliefs, or do 21 consecutive days of meditation practice¹²; none of that is necessary. One great disaster settles it all.

Those long-buried capacities for creativity and action were released in each of countless individuals.

Without such major disasters, you would never discover that you have so much strength. Organizational ability, the ability to cope with difficulties, survival ability, the ability to watch out for and help one another, the ability to collaborate with others and work in teams -- all these abilities fully burst forth. Federal funds were immediately directed to the area, and the federal government also came to support it; you could say the spotlight was turned on this part.

For many lonely people, they were compelled, or rather forced, to enter a situation in which forming relationships with others was necessary.

Many people previously did not interact with others. They lived in their so-called big villas, and ordinarily had little opportunity to interact with others; apart from work, they basically had no close ties with the community. This includes people today who live in apartment buildings: even though neighbors upstairs and downstairs see each other every day, in the elevator and in the hallway, they normally do not have much contact and do not even know who the other person is. But in a disaster like this, everyone becomes familiar with one another; this contact must be established. Just as during this pandemic and the lockdowns, everyone in the whole community, in the whole building, had to unite. People who had never been in contact before now became connected; building by building, community by community, they established very close and broad connections through WeChat or social media. All of this was caused by the disaster, and before the disaster people did not have contact with each other. So you have to contact others, do group buying together, and so on; it becomes a survival necessity.

Since this is not the main topic of this book, we will not go into depth on some related issues.

We will not discuss this issue; it is a question involving a group.

However, what we need to discuss now is Ruburt's and Joseph's experience in the flood, because their participation will be useful to many other people.

That is, their experience in this flood is helpful to others and can serve as a point of reference. Why? Because while everyone else evacuated during the flood, the two of them decided not to leave. If you have read the earlier introductions in this book, you will see that they firmly refused to leave. Normally, after a flood comes and the government issues such evacuation orders, everyone should follow the government's guidance; it has the nature of an administrative order, and everyone in that area must evacuate. But they did not evacuate; they stayed put in that place, and they did not know why they stayed.

In the next session, he will specifically analyze Jane's and Rob's personal beliefs, their specific behavior and behavioral patterns in this disaster, to see what lessons there are for us.

So concerning the issue of emotion, weather, and disaster, in this session Seth gave a concrete case analysis and exposition of the great flood that occurred in Elmira in June 1972⁷. This was only about that event, but we can draw on his method of analysis and his way of thinking, to see whether there is something we can draw from and learn from today, when we face natural disasters -- whether floods, pandemics, earthquakes, or other forms of natural disaster.

Session 666

Why They Stayed

We now come to Session 666, which is the Monday evening session of May 28, 1973.

Seth opens with a question: "Now would you like to know why you stayed during the flood?" — and this was exactly what Jane and Rob had been wanting to know. The whole city had evacuated, and only the two of them stayed behind. Of course they wanted to understand. Seth says that this should hold no mystery for them, and the reason is this: the reasons and habits behind this decision were all quite consciously available to them, and it was a natural extension of their usual style and manner of doing things.

But they themselves could not see it. Many people, when they make decisions, find that these decisions are perfectly obvious to others, or perfectly obvious to themselves in hindsight, yet at the time they feel strange, wondering why they made such a decision.

Seth says that Ruburt and Joseph — that is, Jane and Rob — have always seen themselves as being in a one-to-one relationship with nature and the universe. In this relationship, their motives for doing things are all personal, entirely one-to-one: they have independent personalities, and each of them faces the world, faces nature, faces the universe alone. In other words, they are both lone rangers, avoiding large groups.

Many people would be surprised that these two stayed behind during the flood. Such behavior seems rash and ill-considered, like a decision made too hastily or too recklessly. Yet in another sense, Ruburt and Joseph were quite prepared.

Ever since the Bay of Pigs incident — that is, the 1961 event in Cuba — they had kept a small storage room of supplies. That little storage room was filled with water and food, including fresh water stored in old wine jugs, plus candles, and a battery-powered radio.

Let me interject here: after the Bay of Pigs, because of the tension between the United States and the Soviet Union, America felt threatened. But Ruburt and Joseph were not "expecting" a disaster — who would expect a disaster? Still, there are indeed many people who do expect disasters. For example, many Christians, when the world does not suit them, hope that God will send down disasters, even including the final Day of Judgment, which is also a terrifying catastrophe that would nearly wipe out all of humanity. They have actually been praying for such disasters.

Back to the main point. Before Ruburt became involved in channeling work — that is, before he spoke for Seth — he had written a short story called "The Wilderness"¹³, which depicted the aftermath of a nuclear explosion. To write this book, he read some survival-related material. After the Bay of Pigs incident, he bought a lot of necessary supplies. His domestic habits were like this — because he had written a post-nuclear doomsday survival novel, he learned how to survive in that kind of environment, and so he developed this everyday preparation for living through difficult circumstances. Those procedures were almost automatically maintained: the stored food had to be rotated on a schedule, some items needing replacement, others not.

Even today, many Americans still keep this kind of habit. They prepare something called "bunker food" in their homes — canned goods that can be stored for long periods after a nuclear war or natural disaster. These cans are sorted by category: canned fruit, canned vegetables, canned meat, canned beans, and semi-prepared staple grains, roughly several hundred to over a thousand cans. They are packaged as meal kits, with a set amount per day to guarantee one person's basic calories and energy, requiring no cooking, no fire, no kitchen — just open and eat. One such kit is basically enough to keep a family alive for a year, priced anywhere from a few thousand dollars, and it also comes with various survival tools. Many Americans keep a set like this in their homes.

For Rob and Jane, this was simply the natural state of their daily lives. They had always kept candles, food, and water on hand, with no special emphasis, and no thoughts of crisis or fear — just as you would keep normal clothing and household items in your home.

So when the flood came, at least in terms of material storage, they were already prepared. If necessary, they could survive without any outside help.

Seth says that all of this had to do with past consciousness and conscious decisions, a response to a past situation that no longer existed when the flood came. But the pattern of response was clear: they had already decided to face any major crisis together on their own "territory" — in their own apartment. At that time Jane rented three apartments, two on the second floor and one on the third floor. And the belief that led them to stay was unchanged in that respect: their usual belief was exactly this — to face any major crisis together on their own territory. This was not a sudden or highly unusual decision.

Seth says that here their sense of one-to-one involvement with nature was very strong. They were going to take their chances on an individual basis. They were used to working alone — this was their way of life. Neither of them had to go to a job; both were freelancers, but each worked at home. During the day Rob basically painted and organized manuscripts, and Jane wrote her own novels. In the evenings they worked together to transmit the Seth material, but they only collaborated two or three nights a week, and the rest of the time each was busy with their own work. Both were highly independent, each in their own artistic and psychic studio — Rob painting, Jane writing novels and poetry, including the transmission of the Seth material at that time.

Long-term freelance work had accustomed them to trusting themselves. A person who has always been a freelancer has a great deal of confidence in himself.

They had also camped outdoors in the past, survived in the wild, in a very primitive environment — the Baja California peninsula, on the western coast of Mexico. This experience deepened their intimacy with nature and encouraged their tendency to go along with nature. They learned in nature how to survive within its bounds, rather than fighting against it. Their attitude toward nature was very correct: become one with nature, make a living within it, rather than separating yourself from it and becoming its adversary to fight against it.

With such a set of beliefs, attitudes, and background — all of these being their past experiences — their decision to stay was predictable.

They knew they still had the third floor available, so they planned, if necessary, to move the manuscripts upstairs — the Seth material, Ruburt's novels and poetry, Joseph's paintings. At that point the water had already risen to the second floor, so they had to be prepared.

The crisis brought many of their mental attitudes into decisive awareness. Those everyday mental attitudes that had previously flowed out naturally were forced by the flood up to a level of conscious awareness — they discovered that they could indeed be different from other people, that they could stay behind independently in the midst of the flood.

Fear and Prediction

The situation did become serious later. For a while, they genuinely feared for their survival. Why? Because the water was rising too fast. They were isolated, just the two of them left in the whole city. Nearly ten feet high -- over three meters of water -- had already flooded the first floor and was still rising rapidly, and they lived on the second floor. The surface of the water was also covered with a smoky stench, and those fumes might even have been flammable -- if gas lines had leaked, if someone's home hadn't been shut off properly after the flooding, or if the floodwaters had cracked a pipe, gas would bubble up from the water and could ignite at the slightest spark.

They hadn't told any officials that they intended to stay. The authorities had already issued an evacuation order, which carried the force of an administrative directive. Instead, they shut all the windows and drew the curtains so no one could see inside, so no one would notice their presence.

This meant that when they were afraid, outside help became impossible. If they really got into danger, if the water rose further, they couldn't even flee -- no one knew they were there, and with the curtains drawn, no one would know anyone was inside. Helicopters couldn't land either; the roof of their small apartment building didn't meet the conditions for a landing.

They found themselves alone with the Seth material, their paintings, Ruburt's manuscripts, and other external possessions. They had used a gentle form of self-hypnosis to produce calm and reduce panic. Joseph suggested that Ruburt "adjust the frequency" and sense how high the water could rise -- to see what they could know. Ruburt used his predictive ability to sense their personal situation.

While waiting, because of their knowledge and temperament, they began playing cards and poker to distract themselves, and they drank to reduce tension. At this point Ruburt's consciousness began to shift, from a normal state into one where some of the inner senses opened up, and then he very accurately foresaw their situation: the level to which the water would rise before stopping; that a bridge half a block away would be washed away by the flood; but that as long as they didn't panic and didn't try to leave, staying in the house would be safe; and that the crisis would pass by a little after five o'clock.

The press didn't know yet, but the two of them had already received the information. After getting this news they felt more relaxed, and the panic that had once threatened them disappeared. They had nothing to do, so they watched the water actually rising, knowing in their hearts that they were safe.

Seth said that Ruburt needed this experience in order to renew her confidence in her own abilities -- that is, the ability of precognition. Jane had actually always been half-doubting, even somewhat resistant, about her own psychic abilities. Both of them needed a guarantee: that these abilities are natural and can be used in personal and natural communication, not something strange, magical, or unacceptable to their values. When a natural disaster occurs, this ability can communicate with nature and obtain information from it -- what level the water will reach, and roughly when it will recede.

Ruburt also discovered that he had placed himself on a level where he underestimated the importance of actual physical manipulation. Ruburt was someone who rarely went out, a typical homebody who basically never left the house. Rob did all the shopping; Ruburt could go days, a week, two weeks without going out. Although he occasionally took a walk, most of the time he stayed put. So Seth pointed out: Jane had entered a level in her daily life where she underestimated the importance of actual physical manipulation.

Ordinary physical activity and exercise are very important. Many of us are willing to stay at home and not move at all, and we have actually neglected the body's capacity for activity.

And this time, facing the flood, Ruburt and Joseph were both very cerebral -- they were people who normally used their minds. Therefore, they sought the union of body and material phenomena, solving difficulties according to belief. When the flood came, a certain capacity for action was necessary. They were watching the situation, facing such a difficulty -- if the flood rose further, and she couldn't swim, for example, and had no survival skills, then they would face serious difficulty, and it could truly endanger their lives.

And those who had great faith in groups -- people who mainly did things with others and needed to gather together -- evacuated immediately when the government said to, and then went to find neighbors for company and comfort. You'll notice something very interesting in the whole evacuation process: Ruburt and Joseph basically had no friends in the entire apartment building. No one came to tell them, "Let's go together." Of course they didn't actively seek out others either, and no one came looking for them. The two of them kept quiet, and no one sought them out -- normally they had almost no dealings with the people around them.

After the Flood

Seth pointed out that Jane, faced with such fear and difficulty, understood that physical manipulation of the body was very important, rather than staying at home every day and thinking that using only the mind could solve problems. Ruburt and Joseph's attitude during the crisis -- the choice to stay behind alone and face the difficulty -- clearly described the attitude of their psyches.

They were led to ask why they chose to face the flood alone, a question they pursued for nearly a year, from June 1972 all the way to the end of May 1973.

Seth said that the "water" of the flood could represent the "water" of time, and could also represent the "water" symbolizing the changes of the world. Facing the passage of time, the changes of the ages, and the alterations of the world's external environment, Rob and Jane stood firm. Comparing time and the world's changes to a flood current, these two people were in that state of remaining unmoved in the face of the current and the changes -- standing apart, facing heaven and earth alone. This was the characteristic of their psyches, and so their attitude in daily life was also like this.

Despite all their personal difficulties, they still held their ground. There were certainly difficulties, and they were actually quite dangerous. What does it mean for a city to be flooded with more than three meters of water? Everything below the first floor was submerged. A couple of days ago I watched a video of a young man in Guangzhou measuring the water in the city with a ruler; the water had already reached the bottom of his neck -- he was nearly one meter eighty, and the water was about one meter fifty or one meter sixty. Just imagine what three meters means. If the water in Guangzhou reached three meters, or the water in Shanghai reached three meters, almost everything below the first floor would be gone.

But in the end, just as Ruburt had predicted, the water level receded, and they were forced to face the aftermath.

When the other tenants returned to the apartment, Ruburt personally went to help. Her choice to face the flood independently did not mean she lacked a warm heart or would not help others. The entire first floor was flooded, with mud and stinking silt filling the rooms, and she did a considerable amount of physically demanding labor -- moving things and clearing out old belongings.

Ruburt and Joseph opened up two of their three apartments, letting a couple stay temporarily in one of them, helping neighbors and helping the homeless, while they themselves squeezed into the other one.

At this time they found themselves in an unfamiliar state of daily intimate contact with other people. Normally they did not deal with anyone, but under these circumstances, they had to live day and night with a strange couple in the same apartment. This special situation gave them some clear and important insights, which were priceless: through their own relationship, they could still interact with and influence others -- they had not lost the ability to deal with people.

This reminds me of the earthquake shelters in mainland China in the 1970s. Everyone lived outside, and the relationships between neighbors suddenly became much closer. Before, each family had its own private space and lived independently, but after living in the earthquake shelters, everyone knew everything about every family's situation, and they helped each other and looked out for one another.

Later in this session there is also a passage involving personal material about Jane's relationship with that family, which we will not discuss here.

The Experience of the Emergency Broadcast

After the flood receded, for a short while the radio station urgently broadcast information -- after a major disaster, communication with the public basically relies on radio. The clinic was set up, and everyone was told to go get tetanus shots.

Speaking of this, I have to digress and talk about the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake¹⁴. I went to the site afterward, and one of my biggest impressions was that our country's emergency preparedness for this kind of disaster was actually completely inadequate. Governments at all levels, including ordinary people, simply did not have the capability. Everyone relies too heavily on cell phones, but in the face of a major disaster, cell phones become paralyzed -- they require base stations, and once a base station loses power it stops working entirely. There is a battery under the base station that can last a few hours, but after that, if there is still no electricity, the base station stops working too. On top of that, an earthquake can directly destroy base stations, and floodwater can short-circuit them -- even having a battery is useless. Without cell phones, how do we communicate? How do we direct the public in disaster relief? What should they do, how should they rescue themselves, where are the relief supplies, where can they get medical assistance? None of these aspects were handled well enough.

What should have been done at the time was to quickly allocate a batch of radios -- around two or three hundred thousand of them -- load them with batteries, and airdrop them into areas with poor transportation. After the Wenchuan earthquake, many roads collapsed and were paralyzed, because the area was originally mountainous and transportation simply could not get through. Ordinary people did not know what had happened and were completely cut off from the outside world. If a batch of radios had been airdropped, and then the radio stations had been used to direct and broadcast to everyone, the situation would have been much better.

If you live in the United States, you know that even today, every major American radio station has a specific time slot each day -- different for each station -- when they insert an emergency broadcast test¹⁵: "This is a test of the emergency broadcast system¹⁵, everyone do not be alarmed." This emergency broadcast system is closely linked to the entire national disaster command system. Once a disaster occurs, it instantly cuts off all normal broadcasting and directly inserts emergency information, and every station must guarantee that it remains connected to this system. That is to say, no matter which station you tune your radio to, all stations are broadcasting post-disaster instructions and commands.

At such times, the most primitive method should be used -- the radio. As long as there are batteries, you can receive the signal, and radio coverage is extremely broad, reaching several hundred or even a thousand kilometers through medium wave and shortwave (FM does not work, its range is too short, only a few dozen kilometers). This kind of broadcast can direct local disaster victims in self-rescue, for example how to use three trees or three poles plus limited tools to make a pulley, to pull apart the precast concrete slabs of collapsed buildings and carry out further rescue -- at the time it was all done by bare hands, and no one taught them. But that is a story for another time.

Let me return to the main topic. At the time, the radio broadcast told everyone to go get tetanus shots. Ruburt once again "tuned in to the frequency" -- he again altered his state of consciousness -- and was told not to get the vaccination. He told Joseph not to go either. This gave them knowledge at the unconscious level, as well as an understanding of their own physical condition. They did not know why they had this judgment, but as long as they did not go, both of them would be safe.

There was indeed risk in this situation. After a major flood, plagues often follow -- the sewer system and the entire urban sanitation system are flooded, the water treatment plant built on flat ground is also contaminated, the entire groundwater system is polluted by backflowing dirty water, and clean water and dirty water mix together. Animal carcasses drift everywhere, all of which can lead to disease.

Everyone around them rushed to the medical center to get vaccinated and get tetanus shots, and only Ruburt and Joseph directly went against the official radio station's announcement -- they did not go. They were essentially betting their lives, risking infection, and holding to their own position.

As it turned out, only one hour later, the radio announcement completely changed: people were told they did not need to get the shots, and that the injection could cause severe reactions.

Once again, Ruburt and Joseph gained the necessary confidence. The first time, Ruburt predicted that the water would rise to a certain level and then stop, and would begin receding around five o'clock; this time, he again predicted correctly on the matter of the vaccinations. The success of these two predictions gave Ruburt tremendous confidence -- he could now apply this ability to other areas.

Seth said that in these too numerous and too personal, uncountable directions, the circumstances of their lives became clear to them. They did not actually like living for several weeks in a cold and soaking wet environment, nor did they desire all the inconveniences the flood brought, yet for their own reasons, they chose to become part of the flood.

Just a few days before the flood, someone offered Ruburt an interview opportunity at a Baltimore television station -- that is, the city of Baltimore in the United States -- but Ruburt declined. After the flood, their car was submerged in water, Ruburt's classes stopped, and their income was gone. But these side effects were quite consistent with Ruburt and Joseph's conscious beliefs, habits, and practices.

The Meaning of Disasters

Seth said that, on a symbolic level, floods represent the washing away of the old, represent the overwhelming energy of unconscious forces -- forces that seem uncontrollable, just as a flood sweeps in -- and the emergence of new life that follows. After the destructive forces remove the old, the new arrives.

In fact, society often entangles you in trivial, vexing problems that cannot bring out your full strength. Disasters are often used to bring people into communication with nature -- why do we encounter disasters? Because they force us to face nature directly, and only in that facing can our full strength be brought out. The trivial matters of daily life cannot do this; only in the face of great catastrophe is the full potential of our inner strength aroused. You are pushed to the limit, and in the process you experience how great the power and scope of your own being truly is.

In an extremely materialistic society, you lose a home of considerable value, and all the possessions in it are gone -- this is a very practical and at the same time symbolic event. Therefore, many people will seek out that kind of experience -- not consciously, but through an inner, subconscious seeking. In the face of such great catastrophe, when he loses everything and has nothing left, he feels a freedom he has never known before, a freedom he has not felt since adolescence -- the freedom of having nothing, of being light and unburdened.

He also discovers in himself a heroism he never knew he had. Many people ordinarily feel they are just a small, insignificant person in society, but suddenly they discover that a small person can also become a hero. This pandemic, the floods of 1998¹⁶, the earthquake of 2008, SARS -- in all these situations, deeply moving heroic deeds emerged -- and the ones who created those deeds were all the most ordinary people in society, small people just like those around us. In an instant they became great, becoming heroes and symbols of the whole society, the whole nation. These are abilities that would never be discovered in ordinary life.

A sense of community solidarity is born in this way, along with a deep feeling of mutual dependence that did not exist before -- in the face of great disaster, people finally discover that they are watching out for one another.

War is also often used as an emotional stimulus. For those who feel lonely, powerless, and isolated, war provides a dramatic, exciting feeling of belonging, and offers an opportunity for escape. A community fire, apart from its other meanings, serves the same function in its own way -- it stimulates you emotionally, and when you face the merciless forces of nature, the unity between people becomes extremely close. It forces those who ordinarily feel isolated, lonely, and unwilling to interact with others to live together with the whole community, with their neighbors, in the face of great disaster. Local or regional disasters are the same; great disasters and small disasters are essentially the same in nature.

The nature of your conscious mind demands that change be given dramatic meaning -- that everything be presented in a dramatized way -- along with a sense of power and a sense of longing. The sense of power is the power of the disaster itself, and the longing is the desire to meet the challenge of survival, to fight for the right to live. Against this background, judge the direction of the individual: against the backdrop of such a great disaster, how do we choose? To be a victim, or a rescuer, or a participant, or a quiet contributor?

Seth said that a "perfect" society, an idealized society, could provide all of these characteristics: allowing each person to reflect his own longing, creating a sense of identity and belonging between people, and by encouraging each person to use his potential to the utmost, to immerse himself in his own challenges -- each person must have his own challenges, and use his own potential to face difficulties. And when he tries to stretch and create the power of his potential in his own unique way, he will be carried forward by a tremendous natural excitement.

When such opportunities are denied -- when his potential is not brought into play, when day after day he does machine-like work, when he is denied by the whole society, the whole group, the whole mainstream value system, told "you are just a little cog, insignificant" -- when the sense of powerlessness and worthlessness reaches its extreme, riots, wars, and natural disasters may follow one after another. Your emotions are seeking an outlet, and these feelings automatically influence the outer world, bringing about these results.

Power and Creativity

A feeling of power is the right of any animal. Even a cat needs a post to release its excess energy, to scratch and kick at it, and the same is true of a puppy. Small animals all have this feeling of power; it is their instinctive right.

Seth says that the power he is talking about is the ability to create action, not the ability to be violent, and it should have some effect -- to use its power to create something.

A dog that has been tied up for too long will become vicious. Those guard dogs are often tied up and become fierce. They are tied up all day, and only after the owner goes to sleep at night, if there is a courtyard wall, the owner will let them out -- at that point, if someone dares to climb over the wall into the yard, they really are in mortal danger.

A person who believes his actions have no value will look for some place where he can use his power, but often he will not care whether the action is constructive or negative. He only wants to release his power, to let others see his power, to see his existence. If you do not even have the ability to act, then do not say you can act positively -- he first needs to demonstrate the power of action, and at that point he can no longer worry about whether the action is good or bad; as long as it lets him act, that is enough.

You do not understand the nature of your own energy, nor do you understand your ability to direct that energy. Storms and tornadoes, just like wars, are brought about by angry people; they are simply different versions of the same phenomenon. Floods represent the symptoms of the group psyche projected onto the earth. In a very natural way, all the people involved not only chose that situation, but also helped the subsequent results to continue -- so eleven months later, in May 1973, they were still doing the reconstruction work after the previous year's flood, and that healing was still ongoing.

Seth says that you cannot separate yourself from the body and conditions of the earth any more than you can separate yourself from your own body. Can you separate yourself from your own body? You cannot. Then you also cannot separate yourself from the body of the earth around you, from the natural environment; you influence each other. Although it does not seem that way -- it seems that the natural environment has nothing to do with you -- but in fact it is all a creative process, and a corrective one.

Natural disasters are actually all a form of expression of creativity, though of course with potential destructiveness. Why is there destructiveness? Because it is corrective -- overcorrecting. Originally you had no power, but you insisted on displaying power, and that power went too far.

You intuitively sense that there is a great connection between personal subjective emotions and the weather -- good and bad moods really are related to the weather -- but you attribute its meaning to the idea that you are responding to external events that are completely independent of yourself. That is not the case at all.

Let me put it more clearly: when we face overcast skies, sandstorms, and other climate phenomena, we can intuitively feel that they are connected to our moods and emotions. But we then reverse it and think that it is because the weather was bad first that our mood became low. Seth says it is reversed. It is because you first had a low mood that the weather became bad. You are one of the causes that made the weather bad, not the other way around.

When you move from one region of the country to another -- from one province to another, from one city to another, or from the countryside to the city -- it is because you have changed. You no longer fit the original area, and you will be drawn to people with similar beliefs and needs. You will help carry out the "characteristic" climate of the place you travel to: if you are compatible with the atmosphere of that place, you will help the local climate strengthen that belief, and thereby form that kind of climate. Whether you like cold regions or hot regions, whether you like rainy and overcast places or cloudy places, everyone is different -- you move somewhere because you are compatible with the climate of that place, and you will strengthen that local climate. So the common saying "the water and soil of a place nourish its people" -- according to Seth, it should be that the people of a place nourish its water and soil.

This brings us to the end of the third part of our reading of Chapter Eighteen for today.

注释与核实

1. This claim could not be verified. ↩

2. This claim could not be verified. ↩

3. According to Mike's original words: "In the Indonesian tsunami, Jet Li happened to be vacationing in Bali. After the tsunami came, it is said that he took his two daughters and desperately dragged them to safety. In the crisis, in his survival instinct, he made a great vow at that moment: If I do not die this time, I will devote the rest of my life to charity. As it turned out, he did not die, and both children were saved normally. But he fulfilled his promise and from then on established the One Foundation—the one-yuan One Foundation. His idea was simple: if everyone donated one yuan, the whole country could donate over a billion, which could do a lot. From then on he never acted in films again, nor engaged in any commercial performances, and has been doing public welfare work." Upon verification, it should be: "During the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, Jet Li was vacationing in the Maldives (not Bali, Indonesia), where he and his wife and daughter narrowly escaped death. This experience prompted him to establish the One Foundation in 2007; after that he continued to make films (such as Fearless, The Warlords, The Expendables, etc.)." (Source: Wikipedia, "Jet Li," https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jet_Li) ↩

4. This claim could not be verified. ↩

5. Source: Wikipedia, "May 1973" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_1973) ↩

6. According to Mike's original words: "In the 1980s there was the founding of Microsoft"; upon verification, it should be: "Microsoft Corporation was founded in 1975 (founded on April 4, 1975, by Bill Gates and Paul Allen), belonging to the 1970s rather than the 1980s." (Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Microsoft Corporation," https://www.britannica.com/money/Microsoft-Corporation) ↩

7. Source: United States Geological Survey (USGS), "Flood of June 1972: Chemung River and Newtown Creek at Elmira, New York" (https://www.usgs.gov/publications/flood-june-1972-chemung-river-and-newtown-creek-elmira-new-york) ↩ ↩²

8. According to Mike's original words: "The United States began the process of de-urbanization from around the 1960s"; upon verification, it should be: "De-urbanization (suburbanization) in the United States began in the late 1940s to 1950s after World War II. By around 1950 suburbanization had already unfolded, and central city populations had successively peaked and begun to decline, rather than only beginning after the 1960s." (Source: U.S. Census Bureau, "National Archives Will Soon Release 1950 Census, Offering a Look at a Defining Time in Modern U.S. History," https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2022/03/1950-census-records-window-to-history.html) ↩

9. Source: Wikipedia, "后浪" (https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-hans/%E5%90%8E%E6%B5%AA) ↩

10. Source: Wikipedia, "Nothing to My Name" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_to_My_Name) ↩

11. Source: United States Geological Survey (USGS), "Stress changes from the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake and increased hazard in the Sichuan basin" (https://www.usgs.gov/publications/stress-changes-2008-wenchuan-earthquake-and-increased-hazard-sichuan-basin) ↩

12. This claim could not be verified. ↩

13. This claim could not be verified. ↩

14. Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Sichuan earthquake of 2008" (https://www.britannica.com/event/Sichuan-earthquake-of-2008) ↩

15. This claim could not be verified. ↩ ↩²

16. Source: Wikipedia, "1998 China floods" (https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-hans/1998%E5%B9%B4%E4%B8%AD%E5%9B%BD%E6%B0%B4%E7%81%BE) ↩