The "Guide" and "Key Points" for this chapter were summarized by an AI editor based on the main text below; they are not things Mike said during the lecture. The main text comes from Mike's commentary, and the blockquotes are Seth's original words (the parts Mike read aloud).
Introduction
This chapter uses the metaphor of sand islands to illustrate counterparts: four island spirits voluntarily exchange visits to each other's realities, retaining their own identities, neither encroaching upon nor diminishing one another, but mutually enriching each other. From this it is pointed out that no person is an island, and counterparts each view reality from their own perspective. Rob and Jane are voluntary counterparts, and also gamblers, betting that instinct will lead them in the right direction and that they will win in the end; it also touches on the existence of Rob's parents on another level, the counterpart relationship between his mother and Ruburt, and the blending of consciousness without loss of uniqueness.
Key Points of This Chapter
- Counterparts each view reality from their own perspective, do not intrude upon one another, and retain independent identity.
- Voluntary exchange of reality changes and enriches all parties involved.
- No person is an island, unless they choose to be an island.
- Rob and Jane are voluntary counterparts to each other, and also gamblers, betting that instinct will lead them in the right direction and that they will win in the end.
- Consciousness has no limits; identities can blend without losing their uniqueness; Rob's mother and Ruburt are counterparts, and Rob's parents form an alliance on another level.
Main Text
Hello, everyone. I'm Mike. Today I'll continue sharing Session 726 of Volume 2 of the Seth book The "Unknown" Reality with you. The island analogy discusses counterparts. This session began at 9:43 p.m. on Monday, December 16, 19741.
Seth starts by saying:
Unknown realities cannot be expressed through known knowledge in plain terms.
So you must stretch your own imagination, awaken yourself from your mental slumber, and be brave enough to discard the old dogmas—that reassuring blanket.
In other words, if you want to explore unknown realities, known knowledge and plain terms—the kind of language we usually find easy to understand—cannot express them. What do you do then? You can only stretch your imagination, because imagination is unlimited, while language has limits. Stretch your imagination to explore those unknown realities.
Then you also have to wake yourself from your mental drowsiness. We get used to staying in a relatively comfortable place mentally. We like comfort zones not only materially, but mentally as well. What is that comfort zone? It is our existing worldviews and values, the understandings of the world that we consider reliable and stable. Those old rules and restrictions all have to go. Although these things reassure you, although they are the kind of blanket that keeps you warm, shelters you from the cold, and makes you feel secure, you must take the initiative to throw it away. Otherwise, it will be very difficult for you to truly explore these unknown realities.
He says, imagine that you are a small sandy island—he is starting to use islands as an analogy. He says:
Imagine that you are a small sandy island, with a gently sloping shore, some palm trees, and a refuge for passing birds.
Remember, a refuge for passing birds—the birds do not stay here for long; they are just passing through.
Now pretend that you are quite content with this state, although you sometimes cannot help feeling lonely. A thin mist envelops you, although it does not prevent the sunlight from reaching you directly. You feel quite independent, because the mist surrounds you there, and you think of it as a cocoon, gently separating you from the vast, endless sea.
He has started describing it. You need to imagine this: you are this island. But then you begin to feel curious about other islands that exist beyond your field of vision. You wonder: Are there other islands? Do those other islands look like you?
You form a little window in your imagined mist. That is, your imagination opens a little window in the mist. You look out through this little window and discover, to your great surprise, that a small coral path connects you to the next island. And through that window, which keeps growing larger in the mist, you catch a glimmer—
Who can say where you end and where another island begins?
Who can say that this island stops right here at you? Or that the other island begins at the next island? This island might still be connected to other islands.
While you are wondering, you discover, even more surprisingly, that other coral paths extend from you in every direction. You find that there is more than one path—there are many little coral paths, some connecting to more distant islands. You think: They are all me, although each is very different. Why? Because these islands are all connected. The islands themselves are connected. If they are connected to one another, then you cannot call any one of them a complete island—if they are connected by land, in some places people call them peninsulas, and in others they call the whole thing one island, with some parts simply submerged. If they are all connected, then they are all me.
One of them might have no trees at all; another is home to a volcano, with volcanoes all over it; some might be covered in soft grass, without a trace of sand.
Now, this first island is indeed very clever. So he sends out his spirit, drifting over to this nearest counterpart—an island like him, his counterpart. Then he says to that island:
You are myself, but without sand and palm trees.
Then his neighbor responds:
I know you are me, but without my towering volcano, and you have never known the marvelous spectacle of rumbling, blazing-hot lava. To be honest, your place is very peaceful, but dull.
He emphasizes that word "dull."
The spirits of the two islands travel hand in hand to a third island. There, they discover a top-heavy landmass, filled with rare and exotic creatures they have never seen at home.
The first island says to the third:
You are myself, only unbearably sociable. How can you stand nurturing so many different kinds of life?
The two islands go to the third island. The third island is top-heavy—if you have seen the movie Avatar, you will know that some of the scenery looks like that, with land floating in the air, heavy on top and light underneath. He uses this example to tell you that the third island is different from ordinary islands. It is an island filled with all sorts of vibrant life, unusual people, and exotic creatures.
So the first island says to the third: You are myself, only unbearably sociable. I like visiting people. How can you stand staying here without visiting anyone, nurturing these different kinds of life every day?
The spirit of the second island also says to the third:
Only my excitement, joy, and beauty are concentrated in the marvel of the volcano, while you represent all sorts of different species—birds, animals, insects—with their chirping excitement. Those creatures flow over the slopes of your noisy land in far less magnificent ways.
The volcanic island says: I am much more magnificent and spectacular than you. What I have are volcanic eruptions, while what you have are these chirping little animals and all sorts of creatures. The way your creatures flow is not grand enough compared with mine.
The third island is startled—visitors! The third island answers:
I am myself, and you must be imperfect versions of my reality.
You see, the third island's answer is different from those of the first two. The third island says: I am myself. I am certainly not you. What are you? You are imperfect versions of my reality—you are incomplete versions of me. I certainly do not want a boring little island with nothing but sand and palm trees, nothing at all; or a neurotic landscape that only burns with molten lava. Just as I would not want to be a snail, my life is far better than yours. And you two are merely my pitiful, shadowlike counterparts.
The third island looks down on the first two—one is volcanic lava, and the other is just palm trees and a beach, with nothing else.
In this hypothetical conversation of ours, the first island responds. He says:
I suppose—suddenly his voice grows louder—I suppose each of us is right.
Each of us is right, and there is more to it than that. I wonder whether we really are islands at all.
This first island is clever—he has solved the problem. The first island says: I think perhaps each of us is right, that none of us is wrong. But now I am thinking about something: Are we actually islands? Are we islands at all?
This is a very typical example. Like that joke online: During the mad cow disease outbreak in Britain, one cow says to another, have you heard about the mad cow disease going around lately? Are you worried? The other cow says: Stop talking to me. I am a doctor. Why are you talking to me? That is the idea—you are all right, but we first need to clear up the question of whether we are islands at all.
The second island says, without picking up on his remark:
Suppose my spirit visits your island for a while, to discover what it feels like to have palm trees, some birds, and a peaceful shore. I will give up my volcano for a little while and try to make an honest assessment. If you are also willing to come to my island and promise to look at it without prejudice, perhaps then you will understand the great majesty and explosive power of my exotic world.
That volcano certainly is exotic and has explosive power.
The first island says: I'll go.
The volcanic island says: I'll go to that island with only sand and palm trees.
Then he says to the third island: You go stay on my island for a while.
The third island says:
As for me, I have no time for this nonsense. I have absolutely no interest in whatever you are doing. The many species roaming my territory need my attention, and I need to look after them. And if you two exchange your realities, that is fine, but please leave me out of it.
He looks down on the two of them. But these two have no choice but to leave him out.
So the spirit of the first island visits the second island and finds himself greatly astonished—the first island is the sandy island, and he goes to the second, volcanic island. He feels a continually surging force rushing up from below, as the volcano is about to erupt, bursting into ever-changing forms—the force bursts into forms that are forever changing. Yet he is always himself. He compares his present experience with the experiences he knew before—the first island is still himself. Although he has arrived at the second island and is experiencing its world and reality, he still carries the first island's worldview and judgment.
When the constantly erupting volcano itself longs for peace, the spirit of the first island thinks of his own quiet home shore—that beach. Then the volcano learns a new lesson. The volcano can direct his power in whatever way he chooses: surging upward, or holding it quietly. He can indeed rest and dream for centuries, if he chooses. He is talking about the volcano—he can allow soft sand to lie gracefully upon his cool expanses.
Can you understand what he means? The spirit of the first island arrives at the second island, and although he can feel the endless energy and impetus of the volcano rising from underground, he still carries the worldview and understanding of the first island—the white sand and palm trees. So when the volcano is not constantly erupting—it erupts for a while and rests for a while—when it quiets down, the spirit of the first island says to the volcano: You do not need to keep erupting. It can also be very good for you to quiet down. You have this momentum, this energy, for erupting, and you also have the energy to quiet down. You have the beauty of eruption and the beauty of quiet.
The volcano is persuaded by him. The volcano says: Yes, you are right too. There is no need for me to—this power is mine, and I can use it however I want. I do not have to erupt every day. I can also refrain from erupting. I can be quiet for centuries and dream for hundreds of years. All of that is possible.
When the volcano no longer erupts, the waves gradually break its lava down into sand and spread it along the beach. Then the spirit of the first island says: Look how nice this is. This sand can lie gracefully upon its cool expanses.
This is ordinary language, quite normal. In some places, such as the purple sand beach in California2—the sand on that beach is all purple because coral is broken up, and some broken shells wash ashore with a faint red tint. That red mixes with the sand, and when you look down at sunset, the whole beach is purple, very dreamlike. There are also some volcanic islands where, after the eruptions stop, the waves slowly pound the lava over millions upon millions of years until it finally becomes sand.
That is what happens when the first island goes to the volcanic island.
Meanwhile, the spirit of the volcanic island is visiting the first island—the two of them have exchanged places—and finds himself enchanted by the soft water of the gently lapping waves, the gentle little birds, and those few palm trees. So beautiful. But it looks as though those palm trees, those birds, and the sand have been dreaming for centuries. They have not changed at all. They have always been there, quiet and still.
Then one day, a bird flies out from the first island, farther than it has ever flown before, reaches another island, and brings a strange seed back to the first island. The seed drops from its beak, and later a kind of plant springs up that is entirely new and unknown to the first island. Originally, the first island had only palm trees, nothing besides palm trees. Now it has a new kind of plant. That plant in turn brings flowers, pollen, fruit, and fragrance. They have a different kind of creativity of their own.
So the spirit of the second island brings the first island a previously inactive element. But he becomes homesick—the second island misses home too—so he finally returns to his own home, to his volcanic island.
After the spirit of the second, volcanic island arrives at the first island, he feels that it is quite nice there too, but things do not change. Every day is the same, for hundreds of years. Then a bird brings back a strange seed, bringing a new plant to the first island, so there are no longer only palm trees—it brings new changes and new creativity.
Then the spirit of the second island returns to his old home, the volcanic island. He discovers that the volcanic island has changed too—the volcano is no longer erupting so vigorously; it is resting as well. What a great change on the volcanic island: he discovers that his volcano is now producing soil and pollen—since it is no longer erupting, the volcanic mud gradually becomes soil. His excitement is stirred in a million different ways. He meets the spirit of the first island, who has been there all along—the spirit of the first island is still there.
The spirit of the volcanic island says: Oh my, so much has changed. He says to the spirit of the first island:
I still want a more spectacular display. Those flowers are not wild enough—to be honest with you, they are too tame. But generally speaking, you have worked wonders. Now, however, I want to have a cultural exchange with other islands that are still unknown. And if you do not mind, I hope you can go home—after all, this is my land.
That is the volcanic island. He says to the first island: A great deal has indeed changed, but I still do not think it is enough. I want it to change even more for the better. I also want to visit some other islands, so could you first go back to your own home? Then I can explore other islands and have more cultural exchanges, bringing greater changes to my island.
The spirit of the first island says:
I am quite satisfied with this adventure, and I have also learned that the tremendous, explosive impetus of creativity is good.
The first island's master says: I have discovered that explosive power is good too, that this explosive impact is also good. But I still long to return to my own quiet, undisturbed shore. So if you do not mind, I think I will go back.
Actually, the second island's master has already gone back long before.
So the spirit of the first island returns home. He finds a place that has been changed somewhat—the first island has not changed much, but there are some new species, some new plants. Its overall feel is still the same. It is still a quiet island, but there are many more plants and many more flowers. The sand still lies there sparkling. But the mist has disappeared. The island's birds have begun to breed, instead of merely passing through as they did before, without settling on the island—now these birds have begun living on the island, building nests and hatching chicks.
And within those old, familiar surroundings, there is a new, wordless yet pleasant overlap—that is, on his island of white sand and palm trees, there are new species that complement the old, yet are more vigorous. The spirit of the first island realizes that he would now find the old conditions very tedious. He too feels that the old was unchanging, and that having something new is good. And the new changes fill him with pleasant excitement and challenge.
What a delightful exchange! This spirit is certain that he has indeed improved conditions on the second island—I have also changed the second island and helped it. I have helped it stop erupting every day and brought it soil and the fragrance of flowers, so it is no longer the barren volcanic island it once was. And without a doubt, the spirit of the second island has also immeasurably changed and improved the first island. They have both enriched each other's realities.
That finishes the story of these first two islands. Now for the third island.
The spirit of the third island has been thinking all along too. The spirits of the first and second islands never came to plead with him—he originally thought they would come and beg him, saying, let's exchange places—but they never came to ask him at all. The two of them simply exchanged places themselves. He decides to maintain his own identity: I do not want to exchange places either. I still want to keep my identity. Neither of you is as good as me. You are both incomplete versions of me. I am the most perfect version.
That is what the third island is thinking. But he, too, becomes lonely. Before, he did not know there were other islands. Now that he knows there are other islands, his mind is no longer as settled as before. He feels a little lonely. And he too sees countless little coral paths extending all around him.
Then his spirit follows one of these paths—he can no longer stay put—and arrives at a barren desert island. He follows a path onward, and as he walks along, he discovers a desert island.
Figuratively speaking, he is horrified. He finds that island horrifying:
How can you stand such barrenness? Such sterility?
He calls out to the spirit of the fourth island. That island's spirit answers:
Even the vitality your question brings makes me sick. I sense that you come from such an overcrowded, active, noisy island, an island of such outpouring, that it makes my sand grow even paler and whitens the joints of my rocks.
The fourth island looks down on him completely: You are too noisy, too bustling, with too many kinds of creatures, too crowded. How could you understand me? Your level is far below mine. Even your question, including your visit and your tone, disgusts me. You bring vitality, this excitement, this challenge, and I find it all sickening. Compared with my state of quiet nonaction, tranquility, and emptiness, who knows how many levels below me you are.
He says that what follows is all descriptive language—making his sand even whiter, making his rocks turn white too—he is mocking him.
The spirit of the third island says:
You are myself, a version entirely without feeling, lifeless and desolate.
The desert island says:
I am myself, and you must be some counterpart of mine. Intoxicated by dazzling distractions, without understanding the purity of my bare emptiness.
The fourth island says: You are simply nothing at all. Every day you live in a drunken stupor, intoxicated by your dazzling distractions, enchanted by the diversity of the species on you. How could you understand the purity of my emptiness? How could you understand the lofty heights of my state?
The two of them stand sideways—they are at odds, starting to snap at each other, starting to argue. But they cannot face each other directly. Why are they sideways? Because neither of them can look the other in the eye. Neither can look at the other. They look down on each other, their disgust and disdain showing plainly.
Island three thinks island four is too desolate, with nothing there, utterly lifeless; island four thinks island three is too noisy, too vulgar, too worldly, and cannot understand his aloof refinement at all.
He says: What opposites, what a contrast. What a strong contrast, how interesting.
So they make a deal—he feels that the differences are so great, the contrast so strong. The spirit of the desert island says:
You are completely wrong. I will go to your island. And that very point is precisely where you are wrong. You can stay here and share the joy of my tranquil existence, and I hope you learn the value of simplicity.
So the spirit of this fourth island travels into another reality—he goes over to the third island. There, all sorts of creatures crowd the shores and hills.
Meanwhile, the spirit of the third island visits a world so tranquil and lifeless that all activity seems to have come to a standstill, everything stopped. Then the third island says: How peaceful. But there is such power in that peace too—it also has power. It is not only noisy life that has power; this peace also has its own peaceful power.
So gradually, cacti grow in this place where there had been nothing. Delicate buds open, brimming with water. The spirit of the third island immediately begins transforming the barren island—the third island greatly enjoys this peace and tranquility, but he also brings changes. This barren place is not suitable for growing other things, but it can grow cacti. Cacti can grow in the desert, so cacti begin to grow. Cacti flower too, cacti bear fruit, and cactus flowers are very beautiful. Then this remarkable change appears—an outpouring of power, an explosive flood of energy in spells of rain, and spells of storms arrive too. Once spells of storms arrive in the desert, the desert changes as well.
Meanwhile, the spirit of the barren island—the spirit of the fourth island—is almost overwhelmed by the abundant life forms on the third island. He is simply overwhelmed. There are too many. So next he goes to explore the volcanic island—he has barely stayed here before going to the volcanic island, because he finds this island too noisy and cannot stand it.
And when that volcano becomes afraid of his own energy, the spirit of the barren island says:
Calm down. You can sleep and dream. You do not need to be so worried about your energy. It can flow quickly or slowly, in the waves of years of dreams. Do as you please.
This fourth island is clearly a figure of great wisdom. He arrives at the third island and finds the noise unbearable; he runs over to the second island, the volcanic island. But the volcano on the volcanic island is a little afraid that his own energy is too powerful—this energy gushes out every day, and he is a little worried. Then this fourth island, clearly a step ahead, comforts him: You do not need to worry. You can let this energy flow out quickly, or you can let it flow out slowly. You can let it flow slowly in the waves of years of dreams, just as you please.
So the volcano puts his energy into forming many new species—the volcano takes the advice: What you say makes sense. I can do it slowly. So instead of erupting, he turns his energy toward forming new species.
Meanwhile, the spirit of the desert—the spirit of the fourth island—sings his quiet song through their tissues. He begins to sing. And this new life confuses him too, and he begins longing to go home, back into his old quiet. On the second, volcanic island, he has spent all this time telling the other to nurture new life, and the other has done so. After this new life has been nurtured, he finds himself a little unable to adjust to it, a little confused by it—he still wants to return to a place without this restlessness, somewhere quiet and still, like the desert.
And there, the spirit of the third island has already accelerated the desert's capabilities. He wants to return to his old home on the fourth island. But his old home on the fourth island is now being transformed by the third island—the third island will certainly not sit idle, and has brought cacti straight in. So it is covered with silent flowers that were not there before. When the spirit of this fourth island returns and looks around: How come there are flowers here now? What are these things? Cacti flower too? Before, the island was all desert, with nothing on it.
And these two spirits meet.
Each island has been changed. We are one another's counterparts, but each is inviolable.
These two spirits—the third island and the fourth island—say this: We are one another's counterparts, so different, so distinct, but we do not violate each other.
And the spirit on the volcanic island says to the spirit on the first island:
Now my volcano knows how to make good use of its energy.
Instead of erupting every day like an idiot. He knows that this energy can slowly nurture other life. He can shoot into the heavens in a grand display, and he can creep just as powerfully into the cracks in the earth—he can erupt into the sky, or he can flow underground. Flowing underground, it becomes magma, and it can become sand, soil of volcanic ash, and after some time it can become soil and nurture life.
And the spirit of the first island responds:
You have taught my island that life is nothing to fear. Although it is still transformed into my own familiar, gentle ways.
The first island says to the second island: You have taught me that life is nothing to fear. I can even accept a violent eruption of life like a volcano. Now life is no longer frightening. I can handle even such vigorous life. But I still like my own way—I like this gentle way. I still do not much like that volcanic style of expression.
Then Seth says, our analogy ends here.
The spirits of these four islands themselves did not change. The story he told is very simple, but every character is vividly alive, and every setting is described very precisely. Through this description you can discover that a certain island seems much like one aspect of yourself, or one side of yourself seems much like one of the island lords, or like the spirit of that island. But after these four island spirits visited other realities, they themselves did not change. And that communication was chosen by themselves; it was not forced.
You yourselves are not isolated islands.
Then he turned and spoke about us humans. He said not one of you humans is an island, except when you choose to be an island.
Each counterpart views reality from his own viewpoint, with no intrusion.
He uses the example of these four islands to illustrate it: if we had four counterparts, then those four counterparts could be likened to these four islands. They are counterparts of each other, but it is not as you might think, that "counterpart" means exactly the same. They are that different, that unlike each other, with such a strong contrast, and yet they do not intrude on one another at all; they maintain their complete individuality and independence.
The following Seth material is placed here for the following reasons. He said all of this material is placed here for this reason -- because this material originally should not have been placed here; it was not part of the book's dictation, so it should not be here. But why was it placed here?
First, it not only brings in Seth's island analogy, it also includes the material in which Jane and Seth discussed "units of consciousness (CUs)" in Session 725 -- wasn't he talking about units of consciousness (CUs) in the previous two sessions?
Second, because we thought many readers could more easily identify with personal material. He said if our readers only look at this island analogy, they cannot feel it personally; they would still prefer to have humanized material -- for example, someone's mother, or someone or Rob or something like that -- they can understand it more easily. If you give them an example about islands, they do not have much of that feeling.
Third, the material about my parents -- this is Rob speaking -- the material about my parents can be traced back to Sessions 679 and 680 in Volume 1.
Fourth, the reference material on counterparts is a good example of how Seth weaves such concepts into a discussion -- what follows is a very good example of discussing counterparts.
Fifth, I think the use of tonight's material for Jane and me is utilized, is cleanly synthesized, in the last paragraph of this session.
At the same time, this passage also contains very challenging concepts. What concepts? They strongly remind me of last week's material about my father, the Miriam material -- he said you can refer to the previous session, Session 725, to get a feel for it, that material about his father dissolving his own identity into countless reincarnated selves.
Then below, he continued at a very fast pace. Seth said that although this is not the book's dictation, Rob still placed it in this book for the above six reasons.
Then Seth said:
But in terms of our analogy, the spirits of these islands are gamblers.
This is very interesting. You remember that the spirits of these islands are all gamblers. So:
You and Ruburt are both gamblers. And what is your greatest stake? It is that your instincts will lead you in the right direction, and although the odds seem against you, in the end you will still win.
This sentence is very profound, a very profound sentence. You can read it a couple more times. Let me explain to everyone what it means.
He continues using the island analogy. The spirits of those islands are all gamblers. Why call them gamblers? Because they dare to exchange realities with others; they dare to leave their own reality and go into someone else's reality. For a person, this is leaving the familiar world and going to another world. For him it is a gamble -- he dares to leave his own world and go to another world. Is that a gamble? Yes.
If you do not understand what this sentence means, let me give an example. Suppose you were asked right now to put down everything in your present environment -- no matter what country you are in -- and go to another place. For example, suppose we all go to South America, to Bolivia. You may not even know where that country is. Suppose we go there to mine minerals -- Bolivia's lithium reserves rank third in the world3, the lithium in lithium batteries. If you do not know Bolivia, you may know a mirror-like scenic spot there -- it has a lake with very shallow water, only a few centimeters deep4, and when it is calm it looks like a mirror of the sky. That country is Bolivia, a small country in South America. Suppose we go live there for the rest of our lives. Is that a gamble for you? Putting down everything you now have and going there to start life over -- is that a gamble? Of course it is a gamble.
So then you understand why Seth uses this word. You have to put yourself in that position to understand it.
Then he says that you and Ruburt are both gamblers. Why? Because the two of you dare to explore these unknown realities, dare to explore these places that humans have never dared to go, or have been unwilling to go, or have had no chance to explore. You dare to do this kind of thing, so you are also gamblers.
In other words, everyone is a gambler, only we ourselves do not know it. But if you are a gambler, you must have a stake, you must have chips. Without chips, who will let you play? So as gamblers, what are you betting on? What you are betting on is:
Your instincts will lead you in the right direction.
That is your stake.
That is to say, for us to go to another country, or go to another city, start a new job, a new environment -- in other words, for us to reincarnate onto this earth -- it is all a gamble for us. Is that not the same principle? Then is exploring an unknown reality also a gamble? It is the same.
Good, then in this gamble, the reason we dare to gamble, dare to step up to the gambling table and put down chips, dare to play this round, is because we have a firm belief in our hearts. What is this belief? It is our instincts -- as long as we follow our instincts, follow the original inner impulse, follow the highest joy, this is our instinct. If we follow this, it will certainly lead us in the right direction. This is our confidence, this is our stake.
Then he continues:
Although it may seem that your odds of winning are not high.
That is, the probability of winning is not high. Because this is a bit too risky -- you just follow your instincts, and that can lead you in the right direction? Instinct can show you the direction? Without GPS, without doing research, without doing homework on the material. On the surface, your probability of winning is not high; your probability of losing is certainly greater, and the probability of success is not high. But the next sentence from Seth is very important:
But in the end you will still win.
You will still win in the end. It may seem that your odds of winning are not high, it may seem there is not much probability of winning, but in the end you will still win. As long as you dare to come up and gamble, as long as you dare to play this round, as long as you dare to step out, as long as you dare to follow the guidance of your instincts, you will definitely win. Remember these two words -- in the end -- you will definitely win.
This short passage may seem baffling, but it actually gives many of us tremendous confidence. It is like a sentence I often say: just walk freely, there is no mistake. Mistakes are also right -- a mistake is also a kind of experiment, an experiment telling you that this path does not work. Then you change to another path, and for you that is also a kind of rightness. How do you know this path does not work? Maybe you would have kept going. If it does not work, it means you should stop pushing in that direction and change direction. So there is no losing or winning; no matter how you walk, it is right, and no matter how you walk, you are walking toward your correct direction.
This is something most of us cannot understand. We usually always want a standard path, a perfect path, an accurate path, the shortest path, and we absolutely must take that road; we do not want to take any other road. Wrong. Such a road does not exist. Your road is discovered through this kind of experimenting. If you do not experiment, and you want to wait for some magical appearance -- or have a dream, or have some high-level person give you a strategy guide saying, "Kid, just follow this road" -- I tell you, if that kind of thing appears, it is a fraud. Usually only frauds will give you that kind of thing. Just believe what I tell you: whoever gives you that thing is a fraud. That thing does not exist. That thing is what you yourself feel and experience in your exploration.
So stop asking. Many people keep asking: What is my blueprint? What is my mission? Can you tell me? If you cannot, can you tell me the method? How do I get it from my higher self, how do I get it from here and from there? You cannot. Can I find the Akashic records? If the Akashic records do not work, I can find a more advanced teacher, find my guru, find some high-level great master. You can go find those if you want, and if you are willing to be deceived, then go find them. This kind of seeking is also not wrong; it is also an experience -- telling you that this path does not work. As I just said, telling you that this method does not work is also an experience. You only spent money to buy a lesson, and in the end you will still come back and discover that those were all cons and frauds.
You are voluntary counterparts of each other.
He says Rob and Jane -- that is, Rob and Jane -- you two are each other's voluntary counterparts. And:
In your terms, you have been before as well.
In your terms, you were also counterparts before.
Each enacts the opposite of the other, yet you come together for common purposes and goals.
In your previous reincarnations, you also appeared in the form of counterparts, in the form of counterparts. You enacted each other's opposites, just like the example he gave: those two islands were completely opposite, but you came together for common purposes and goals -- you are each other's opposites, but your common goal is the same.
So in the first century A.D., you were Niben, and Ruburt was indeed the priest of the prostitutes. You can look in the appendix for the experiences of that lifetime of Niben.
So you challenged each other, just as you do now. You also challenge each other now -- one tends toward rationality, the other tends toward the mystical. Rob still leans more toward rationality, and Jane also has her rational side, but more of her side is the mystical side, which is very interesting.
But in a different way.
Your way of challenging each other now is not the same as the way of that Niben and that priest of the prostitutes.
You have tendencies that appear opposite.
Exactly the opposite -- yet those are different ways of facing the same kind of challenge. There are many different ways of facing one kind of challenge, not just one way. And because the two of you are different, you happen to display both ways, but these two ways are only two ways of facing the same challenge.
If you can understand this about each other, it will help you in many areas where you have not yet suspected.
If you can recognize this, it can help you in those places where you have not yet begun to doubt. What is the meaning of understanding your differences? The meaning is complementarity -- facing the same difficulty, you use one way and I use another. Does that not mean the probability of success becomes even greater?
Then he says to Rob, he turns back to Rob and says:
You have seen different faces of your father's reality.
The Island Spirit Analogy: Consciousness Can Blend Without Losing Its Uniqueness
Seth continues with this island spirit analogy. He says that after Rob's father died, the soul of the father did not encroach upon other realities. In other realities, every character of Rob's father, or every reincarnation, had their own free will and their own life plans, and he did not infringe upon anyone else. In this analogy, no island spirit infringed upon any other island spirit; no one infringed upon anyone. Yet each island spirit obtained permission, and they all agreed—should we exchange or not? He temporarily looked through another's reality picture. Although he carried his own island spirit's worldview, arriving in a different reality still brought him great shock and feeling, and he gained great inspiration.
It is like when we travel abroad. Although we carry our own cultural characteristics and our own values and worldview, when we see people in other countries on this earth also living under their own social and cultural attributes, and still living and working in peace and contentment, still just as happy, it moves you deeply. You come to understand that people in this world do not have to live in only one way or under only one set of values. That is what shocks and moves us most.
I do not know whether you can understand this. For example, if you have never been to Afghanistan, then the moment you think of Afghanistan, the feeling it gives you is of a very terrifying, very war-torn, very chaotic place. But when you actually stand in Afghanistan, on the streets of Kabul, or in other cities, such as Bamyan—Bamyan is very beautiful, the place where that giant Buddha was destroyed5. Bamyan is a province, and the governor of Bamyan, when I went there, was a woman governor. So you think that a country like Afghanistan, an Islamic country, would actually have a woman governor—that is very interesting.
Take the streets of Kabul, a place we are familiar with as war-torn. What do you feel there? You feel the tranquility of the local people's lives. Although there is still war, still bombs, frequent bomb attacks, landmines buried there, none of that affects the local residents' ability to live and work in peace and contentment. Afghanistan has something especially magical: a kind of handmade ice cream. It is a wooden cart, like the ice pop boxes we saw as children, wrapped all around with quilts, with cream and such for the ice cream inside. And the ice cream is made by hand. The person reaches his hand in, stirs it inside, kneads and squeezes and works it, and after a while pulls out an ice cream and puts it in a special little glass bowl or a disposable container. It is super delicious. I tell you, the best ice cream I have ever eaten in this world was eaten on the streets of Afghanistan. If one day you go to Afghanistan, you can try it—the street vendors' ice cream. Their restaurants also sell it, except there it becomes a bit more upscale, served in a small glass dish, brought out to you portion by portion.
This kind of foreign culture makes you understand that although they are an Islamic country, although they are still at war, although life is so impoverished and the living facilities so crude, none of that hinders their lives, their living and working in peace and contentment. That kindness between people is eternal, the same everywhere.
Let me give you a simple example. When we went to Afghanistan, we found a local guide. This young man was in his early twenties, and he drove for the speaker of the Afghan parliament at the time. This speaker was equivalent to the chairman of our National People's Congress, and also equivalent to the speaker of the American House of Representatives—the Pelosi role—legally also the highest organ of power. At the time we contacted him, and he came to take us around locally, which was also a kind of protection. Because his car was a special vehicle, just like in our country, with special markings on the license plate and the front, so locally it belonged to that kind of very high security level.
He took us around, and we were in the desert—Afghanistan has quite a lot of desert. Coming from the north, especially entering Afghanistan from Uzbekistan, once you enter, there is a vast expanse of desert. Only after you cross those mountains—before crossing the mountains it is all vast desert. In that desert, this young man's driving especially moved us. The road was easily buried by sand. When the wind blew, sand blew onto the road, and if no one maintained it, the road would be buried by sand before long. So the locals hired many laborers, and every ten or twenty kilometers or so there was a person sweeping, using a shovel to push the sand off the highway. This was futile work, because after a while the wind would blow and the sand would pile up again, but they had no choice; they could only maintain the road through this kind of manual labor.
You know how hot the temperature in Afghanistan is. We think forty-some degrees is very hot, but in Afghanistan forty-five degrees is normal6. Much of the time in the northern desert areas, it is cold at night and hot during the day. And this driver—we were driving on that road at 120 kilometers per hour. It was not actually a highway, but there were few cars. Every time he saw these road-clearing workers, he would slow the car down—imagine slowing a car down from 120 kilometers per hour; that is not a comfortable thing, as anyone who has driven knows. He would slow down, and then he would take some small change from the car and toss it out the window, and those old men would go pick up the money. He was not doing it deliberately for anyone to see. Every ten or twenty kilometers there was one, and every time he did the same thing.
We did not really understand. And this young man was very young, only in his twenties, yet he had this kind of behavior and character. Our language was not very fluent at the time either; his English was not good. He only spoke Urdu, or Afghan—I cannot quite tell what language it was, possibly a mix of Urdu and Afghan. With a few simple words, we communicated like that. Then we found it strange and asked him: I said, when you get to the city, do you still give money to these people? He said, when I get to the city I do not give anymore. What he meant was that the people in the cities did not seem to be truly poor, while the people actually working on the road were really suffering. You can imagine, in over forty degrees of heat, in the desert, without any shade, he had to work there all day clearing the highway. And such a person—a driver for the speaker of parliament—had such a kind heart. It truly moved us.
So I want to tell everyone that this kindness exists in every nation, every region, every country; it is the pure natural disposition of human beings. The reason I tell this story is that, speaking of the island example, when you travel to another country, you still carry some of your own country's worldview to look at the completely foreign customs and culture you encounter, and this will bring change and enrichment to some of the things you currently have. You have to temporarily look through another picture, and the feeling this gives you is different.
Parents Existing on Another Level
Let's get back to the content. He says, Rob, your father and mother are still alive. From the perspective of the three-dimensional world, they have died, but on another level, they are still alive. He says Ruburt's parents are also alive, living in this unknown reality. But their reality is not aimed at any given island -- they have not yet reincarnated, have not gone to any definite reality, and have not even begun preparing to go anywhere. But they are beginning to form alliances, several people forming alliances, yet always allying from the viewpoint of their own unique identities. Although they form alliances, they do not lose the viewpoint of their own unique identities.
Your own private identity does not need separation, does not need a boundary, does not need a fence saying: I am me, you are you, and the boundary between us is clear. It is not needed. Within this spiritual identity, there is no such separation as you imagine in the physical world. Although there is no separation, they can still maintain their respective independence, and this is something that people in our physical world find hard to understand. They are themselves, and they can also combine or unite with others, yet still maintain their unique distinctiveness and experience.
Only your concepts limit your understanding of original freedom. This is not easy to understand -- why can he combine with others, unite with others, yet not lose his own personal uniqueness? This is determined by the limitations of our human thinking.
One unit of your mother's consciousness, one of those units of consciousness, the one related to you and wanting to buy a house, is beginning to intersect with your reality because of his interest in houses. Another unit of his consciousness is involved with the children of your two brothers, Linden and Richard, because of his interest in family -- that is, the children of his other two sons, his grandchildren, are entangled with their realities. So it is not as you think, that he only focuses on Rob's own house problem; he also focuses on others.
Rob's Mother Stella and Ruburt as Counterparts
Now, in a certain way, your mother and Ruburt are counterparts. That is, this mother-in-law and daughter-in-law -- Rob's mother and his wife -- these two, as mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, are counterparts. Because Ruburt lives within a trust in personal ability, and that is exactly what your mother longed for. Your mother very much longed for a trust in personal ability, but your mother always depended on others -- if not on her husband, then on her several sons. But Ruburt was not like that; Ruburt had an extreme trust in his own personal ability. Ruburt gave your mother the love she longed to give a man -- Rob gave your mother the love she longed to give a man, while at the same time maintaining his own identity.
What does that mean? Rob's mother, the one named Stella, wanted to love a man while still maintaining her own identity. But she could not do it. She could not, as a woman loving a man, still maintain her unique individuality, her independence, and keep her own identity unchanged. You could say many women cannot do this. Many women, once they marry, have eyes only for their husband; in the whole world their husband is the greatest, the best, the most handsome, the most outstanding, and apart from him there is no one else in the world. Until she has children, and then maybe she adds her children, and nothing else in the world matters anymore. This is equivalent to losing her own identity; she throws herself entirely into love for her husband.
There is no right or wrong in this; it is just that some women do not like it this way, some women hope to love a man while still keeping their own identity; some women hope to throw themselves into a grand, passionate love in that self-forgetting state where they completely abandon themselves. But Rob's mother longed to love a man while keeping her own identity, yet in her life she could not do it. And Ruburt could do it, so her mother very much admired this.
He said your mother understood the purpose of love, and sensed that Ruburt had this thing in his heart. Your mother knew what the purpose of love was, but she was not very good at loving -- the relationship between Rob's mother and his father was very bad. She envied that Ruburt had this thing in his heart. And at the same time, when she felt that you had not carried through on your commercial art talent, she was actually quite annoyed. Although on the surface she seemed to have misunderstood that talent -- when Rob, in real society, did not go out and make a lot of money, but instead began exploring these spiritual things, his mother actually held a great deal of resentment and was quite annoyed, feeling that you were not doing proper work, that you should be painting and selling paintings to make money, and what on earth was this you were doing.
Then, he identified with you to a certain degree. And now, his understanding of power, to a certain unrecognized degree, was only masculine. Rob's mother, this woman named Stella, her understanding of power was limited to the masculine; she felt that only men had power, and she did not think women had power. So in love as well, she was muddled; the moment she loved, she lost herself. She did not know how to maintain her own identity while still loving a man. And she felt that to display power, it had to be masculine; only by being like a man could one be said to have a sense of power. Women, she felt, had no power.
He said I hope you understand what I mean. But at that time, according to her understanding, children should be used as power, just as a man might use a weapon. In her understanding, she wanted to gain a sense of power, and so she treated her children as weapons, treated them as power. She felt her children were her power; she gave birth to three sons, and she felt that just as a man must use weapons to display power, to display her power she had to use her three children; her three children were her weapons.
Although Seth only gave the example of Rob's mother, in real life you can see many mothers who are like this. When a mother is very narrow-minded, especially when there are problems in her relationship with her husband or when they are going through a divorce, the weapon she most commonly picks up is her children; she uses her children as her own weapon.
Then Stella changed, and grew. You see, she has changed now; these were her former ideas, and now they have changed. But in a certain way, she was the masculine center of your family. Although she was a woman, within your family she was the masculine center, the center of power. Whether emotionally or apart from emotion, she was the most aggressive one. Rob's mother was very domineering at home, dictatorial; she looked down on her husband and felt he did not earn money.
And now, traditionally speaking, your father accepted a passive, creative role. Do not forget that his father was originally an inventor; in another reality he was an inventor, a mechanic. In this lifetime, he was an especially honest, simple man, but he also liked tinkering with mechanical things, things related to machinery -- bicycles, motorcycles, that sort of thing.
In those materials not yet published, that is, in the deleted materials, the united and separate masculine and feminine aspects of your parents that were touched upon are meaningful. If you think about the question this way, you can discover that your mother in your family actually always played the role of a masculine center, while your father, on the contrary, was like a put-upon little wife in that role. If your father had been a woman, and she had been a man, that would actually have been more comfortable, and the family would have been more harmonious. But as it is now, it does not fit -- if a woman is making a fuss every day at home, finding fault with everyone, belittling her man as worthless, the family will not be very harmonious. Even if the man is very passive and very forbearing, the family is still not balanced.
In the yin-yang and bagua system, there is also this idea. It is not that women must be passive, and it is not that women must be forbearing; it is just how the pairing works. Yin and yang must match; masculine power and feminine power must combine together. So here Seth also speaks of this issue: because your mother was too strong, like a man at home, and as a result your father was too passive, your family would feel uncomfortable. But for their own reasons, the two of them were willing; they each chose to experience the other side of the coin. They were willing to experience that -- his father wanted to experience that passivity, and his mother wanted to experience that dominance.
He said later on, you will understand these things better. Then Rob said, I think this is very good material. Speaking of his family matters, Rob was very moved; he felt it was accurate, well said, wonderful.
Remember, consciousness has no limitations, and identity can also mix back and forth -- "mix back and forth" means blending together, blending with different people, blending with different consciousnesses; it is fine. This blending does not cause one to lose one's own uniqueness and one's individuality, but still preserves their inviolable essence and memory; it will not affect his own essence. That is all for now, but again, later you will understand the relevance of this, and how you can disperse your own traits into another -- how do you blend with them? And they can also disperse their traits into you, with all of you agreeing together to form a new aspect of reality.
He said this means, how do your identities blend? Blend your traits into him, blend his traits into you, and then form a new angle and a new perspective, and use this to open up a new vision, and see clearly the shared purposes and challenges. You do this with a purpose; it is for your shared purposes and challenges, so this kind of blending is meaningful.
He does not go on about what follows. He said his parents died within three years -- within three years in the early seventies. What follows is about various moments in Rob's childhood; Rob recalls his childhood again: I came to understand how my mother used me and my two younger brothers as weapons against my father. Many mothers use this tactic, uniting their children against their husband, isolating their husband; it is a weapon.
I am thinking now that perhaps "weapon" is too strong a word. Because I do not remember my mother openly threatening her children to rebel against their father, yet we often ended up taking her side. "Weapon" seems a bit too obvious, but my mother also never threatened me, saying that if I did not stand with her against my father something would happen, yet the result was often that we stood with my mother against our father.
This situation is like this in many families. Many children in families do not know why, and only understand why it was this way after growing up. Many people feel they have an innate protectiveness toward their mother; often it is not actually so, and in the middle of it all the mother is secretly pulling strings. The mother is quietly working behind the scenes, planting such seeds when the children are very young. The children do not know; only when they grow up do they understand. Seth pointed this out.
By the time I grew up, I began to feel that my father felt intense astonishment and disappointment toward the wife and children he had chosen to spend his days with. He said his father only then felt: how did I choose such a family, such a wife? Why is she opposing me every day? A wife opposing me can sometimes be understood, but why are my own biological children also opposing me? Actually, this was something Rob only understood after growing up; when he was young he did not understand.
You see, Seth not only speaks of unknown realities; he even has such penetrating insight into household matters, and speaks of them with such precision. The key is that he brings out the reasoning behind it, and he explains the causes behind it.
注释与核实
-
Source: Jane Roberts, The "Unknown" Reality: Volume Two (https://nowdictation.com/q/book%3Aur2%2Bsession/20/) ↩
-
Source: Natasha Geiling, "The World’s Most Colorful Beaches," 2014 (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/worlds-most-colorful-beaches-180952354/) ↩
-
Source: U.S. Geological Survey, Mineral Commodity Summaries, 2026 (https://pubs.usgs.gov/periodicals/mcs2026/mcs2026.pdf) ↩
-
Source: Stefano Vignudelli et al., "Satellite radar altimetry reveals spatial and temporal changes in water surface smoothness in the Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia," 2025 (https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-025-02715-1) ↩
-
Source: UNESCO, "Commemorating the 20th anniversary of the destruction of the two Buddhas of Bamiyan, Afghanistan" (https://whc.unesco.org/en/news/2253) ↩
-
Source: U.S. Climate Prediction Center, "Afghanistan Hazards Outlook," 2020 (https://www.mail.gov.af/sites/default/files/2021-02/Casia%20and%20Afghanistan%20June%2025-%20English.pdf) ↩