Imagine yourself in a timeless realm sitting in a thearre with countless aspects of yourself who download your memory input.  How do you imagine these countless beings interacting with you and with each other?  If they converse or share thoughts,  that smacks of logical dialogue following a sequence of thought.  If, as Natalie suggests, clumps of thought seem to be simultanously downloaded, then the sequence of thought clumps also seem to imply linear time.  Somehow the notion of past, present, and future collapsing in an eternal Now seems static and ultimately suffocating to me.  But that may simply be due to my time-bound earthly perspective with its tendency to get bored if the event sequence lacks variety. Similarly, Broce's notion of a Soul Disk composed of parallel incarnations smacks of trapped balls of thought unable to move around meaningfully in a Disk.  This post is not meant as critique, but rather as an expression of puzzlement about what these images and experiences would, if valid, mean experientially. 

Swedenborg's account of timeless existence is easier for me to digest.  ES says that if you want to visit a friend in the astral plane, the "scenery" along the route might not vary, but the time it take to travel will be relative to how similar your core desires and values are.  If they are dissimilar enough, the "journey" will seem much longer because of the "resistance" to harmoniious engagement.  Sigh!

Lucy, I've been reading Anita's book this weekend.  She also speaks of life as meant to be lived with fun, joy and abandon... fearlessly.  I'm only about a third of the way through it, but I'm seeing some similarities with what Natalie says, too.

Don, you've mentioned "timeless realms" a few times, but I don't think any timeless realms exist.  Time in the non-physical is much different than what we experience... for example changing from one state of being to another state of being and noticing the difference indicates some form of time. 

I think what confuses a lot of people when they talk about their NDE is that their awareness is so expanded and not constrained by the brain that they are able to comprehend many things simultaneously as though the events/thoughts/feelings were occurring all at the same time.  There's a big difference of awareness in the non-physical, but we are capable right now in the physical of being aware of many things simultaneously.  That obviously doesn't mean we live in a timeless realm.

Natalie writes that many of these beings interact as a group performing specific tasks.  They all have their "uses" within their chosen dimension/society as ES calls them.  Natalie was able to know and interact with each of the beings just by their energetic signature.  I guess you could say they "downloaded" or communicated that to her, just as she did with them.  All this seemed to occur simultaneously.  Still that doesn't make the realm or dimension timeless.

Kathy

Roger, I think it is more that Natalie is accessing the stored memory of her experience, even though she talks about it as though she actually goes back there.  That is why she's only able to change certain things that pertain to her experience.  She can't change the free will choices of anyone or anything else.  An example would be seeing the beings in various ways... points of light, monsters, etc.  One way to describe it is she's accessing memory in a database of the actual event.  She can't really change the actual event itself, even the part she played, but she can in her mind change certain things for her own personal understanding using her own free will choice.  That doesn't change the memory of the actual event at the point in time that it occurred. 

Not sure if what I just said make sense or not.

K

Going by what I understand, being a member of a disk doesn't mean that you don't have any independence at all. From one perspective it is simply a way to learn.

Also, none of us is actually completely separate from each other.


Berserk2 wrote on Sep 23^rd, 2012 at 9:21pm:

Replying to some of the concepts:

On the blink environment, it's a neat term that I hope comes into standard usage. However, I remember RAM referring to a "skip" as an instantaneous change of scene, so to speak. But I like the term blink.

On the multitude of beings that she downloaded (i.e., sent a rote) to: this is similar to Frank DeMarco's information from his Guys Upstairs, in which they say that all possible lives occur simultaneously, based on every choice we make. Every choice results in versions of the self, each of which lives the path of one of the choices that could have been made. We are conscious of only one path (most of us!) but all paths are taking place, and the life when complete consists of all those paths (they use the example of a crystal, consisting of all the paths taken,) hence the multitude of selves that results. The "stadium" is representative of all the paths that were taken as choices were made during the individual life. Some people are theoretically able to jump paths when they end up in a situation where they are uncomfortable with the route being taken and want to jump to a more comfortable one.

On reincarnation: If an individual is "put together" (by the I There) as a set of traits and is then sent to have a physical life as that individual, that individual does not return "as such" to another life, although traits from that individual may be used to put together another one.

I think it's possible that Swedenborg spent a great deal of time in F25 in the Belief System Territories; hence the people staying where they are comfortable. It also resonates with Bruce Moen's visits to the various Hells, and the experiences of people being able to get out of a Hell with help, but only when they were ready to give up the conscious focus that kept them there. (example, the thief who was able to give up on the concept of thieving and being rescued by a Helper at that point.)

On planned experience vs free will: I think there are both; we plan to have certain experiences but must use free will to either bring them about or avoid them. I think a pretty good percentage of life is "stuff that happens," that we may or may not like. But it gives us opportunity for choice.

MA

I received my copy of “Application of Impossible Things.” I read through it quickly and found it a bit tedious partly because there wasn’t any new information and perspectives. For some people the information and perspectives might be new. I agree with Rondelle in that Natalie could’ve said what she had to say with fewer words.

As far as I can tell Natalie “wasn’t” misled by deceptive beings. I also believe that she experienced more than what her imagination came up with.

Nevertheless, I don’t agree with all of her interpretations. As I stated after watching her videos, I believe she takes the “everything is okay” and “everything is pre-arranged” business too far. I’ve found that it is possible to misinterpret things even after one has had a profound experience. Context and degrees of application of principles learned can be misapplied.

Below is an example of how I believe Natalie misinterprets what she experienced (from page 42 of her book):

“Whether it’s my physical mind or Whole Self creating experience, there is no victim status available. My actions, emotions, and thoughts are not a hopelessly blind product of parents, school, television, abuse, poverty, social prejudice, racism, sexism, or politics. I entered the physical world as a complete being, a full-blown personality, a consciousness with intentions and agreements. My being blown up by a roadside bomb in Iraq isn’t a fault of the person who built the bomb, the person who placed it, or the person who triggered it. It wasn’t bad luck or coincidence. It was an event that my Self cooperatively created and agreed to, and for my Self the event was and is meaningful, creative, and fun. It might have been unnecessary or avoided had I consciously developed different belief systems, but the value of the experiences is not diminished because of the fact.”

On the one hand I believe that the wisdom we bring with us when we incarnate into this World does play a role in what we become regardless of the circumstances we find ourselves in.  However, this doesn’t mean that our environment doesn’t affect us at all.  There is too much evidence that shows that people are influenced by their surroundings and other people in both negative and positive ways to conclude that environment plays no role at all. There is also the factor of their being some souls that haven’t developed to the point where they are good at overcoming the challenges that life presents. Chances are that this was true for the people that built, placed and triggered the bomb that injured Natalie.

When it comes to the parallel life issue, I believe as Kathy (Lights of Love) wrote on her last post. Free will is key factor when it comes to parallel lives, just as it is a factor when it comes to pre-arrangement. If we decide to respond to a situation in a positive and loving way, a parallel self doesn’t need to be created so a negative response can also take place. When we make positive love-based decisions “IT DOES” make a difference! Also, if we make a decision in this life that affects others in a positive way, this fact won’t be negated by what takes place one million years from now.

It could be that Natalie was referring to nothing more than alternative possibilities when she spoke of parallel lives. In fact, when she was asked about this during one of her interviews that can be found on youtube, she stated that it is possible that she became aware of probabilities rather than actual parallel lives (I don’t remember her exact words).

Lights & recoverer, is it possible that you are misinterpreting her experience using some or several misinterpreted experiences as your basis for further misinterpreting external events?

Time or no-time aside, being able to multi-task, carry out several actions simultaneously makes sense from a general physical and non-physical ponderment. Physical life would be very tedious if there were billboards saying 'don't think & drive' - with teasing nike billboards next to them.

Quote:

The non-physical self isn't just anyone, but taking above and below into account; my subjective view is that all plans don't pan out however well planned.  Having a plan is a good first step towards success though. So what if the plan was to become a healer in the Amazon?

Becoming a better person requires love, and more. What's the more part? Fun of the game. And a game is what it is because of it's rules, and I'll put out a safe bet that there are still rules about the game to be discovered.