How Spirits See Our Physical World
“Perception of your world is possible, but in a dim overview fashion, for now that reality is the ghostly one to me, its edges unclear, its motions blurry, and its most solid masses having a transparent cast.
If sharpness of detail is lost, I am quite able to follow large patterns of thought with ease, perceiving them somewhat above the hard-bed reality of the world, rising from it like multicolored clouds of different shapes, colors, and varieties. All in all, then, I can follow the world’s ideas and emotional climate very well. Realities connected with your own experience, but invisible to you, are quite clear from my viewpoint, then, while ordinary events of a physical nature are unclear and shadowy.
I can follow thought’s masses as they form above the world, mixing with others, flowing in patterns sometimes light, sometimes dark or dimming, and I can perceive the intensity of emotion that drives them. As a rain cloud will surely bring a shower, from my standpoint it is obvious that certain thought patterns will bring about physical events suiting their nature, so it is with considerable interest that I watch those emotional and mental patterns that surround the world.”
- William James (The Afterdeath Journal of An American Philosopher)
“I can “see” the world’s thought patterns as I described them and the world’s emotional forms “at once,” as you might see the clouds if you were high enough above the earth. I can also “see” my own life in the same way, in its entirety as I knew it, but also in ways that were unfamiliar to me then. The events of my own life appear open-ended to me; I see what I did, but also what I might have done, and can perceive the energy I sent out in directions that I did not take consciously. I can track my own influence then, see the thousands – no, millions – of people I affected, as each of you affects the earth and its populace in far greater terms than you realize, Each contact, direct or not, counts and ripples outward so that each person’s life sends out lines of contact intersecting with others on a psychic level, but quite practically in psychological terms. So after death, watching the tracks of one’s own influence is perhaps the most fascinating of endeavors.”
- William James (The Afterdeath Journal of An American Philosopher)
“The light of the spiritual world is different from the physical sunlight that the material earth has. It is interpenetrating and shines through the physical realm. Thus when we look at a human being from the spiritual realm, we do not really see the physical body, it appears like a mist or envelope – although this also depends on the spiritual development of the spirit; those who are still earth-bound see the material realm as a solid. The well developed spirits of the higher spirit realm see right into the spirit and soul of humans.
The spiritual world has its own substance and just as the spiritual world is invisible to us, our material world is more or less like a mist to those in the spiritual realm – with the exception of spirits in the lowest earth spheres whose basic character and mind is still very much earth based. When the spirit world looks at this material earth, it primarily sees only the spiritual aspects of the earth (the spirits of humans and the spirit life that sustains the material world). The material world is almost invisible to the spirit realm especially to those of the highest sphere. The material world is only temporary and its “temporariness” is visible (like a mist) to those in the spiritual world.
- The Spiritual World (Peter Tan)
“In the spiritual world, one can see the ultimate result of each thought and action. They ripple through space and time causing the results that we see in the physical earth. Every human that is born into the earth becomes part of the thoughts, actions, and reactions of the totality of thought and spiritual forces (good or bad) released since the creation of the earth. Not all the evil or suffering in the world is caused directly by first choice of the individual. The majority of it is caused by the ripple effect of the thoughts and decisions of others preceding the individual.
Whole communities, cities and countries are gripped by the strongest ripple (more like it building to a tsunami wave) of forces that influence people on the earth. The whole earth looks like an ocean of ripples and waves of forces ebbing and flowing according to each new action and reaction of the human race. Positive or negative forces of influence sweep over entire communities, cities or countries from time to time. Every sin causes more suffering for the entire human race and every righteous thought and loving act releases a power that lifts the whole human race.”
- The Spiritual World (Peter Tan)
