(Continued from Part 1.)
Yesterday we introduced the First subplane of the Mental Plane. We suggested at that time that the first subplane of the Mental Plane was comparable to the dimensional level we’re in at the moment, which is the first level of the fifth Dimension.
Today we continue to look at its characteristics and our experience of it.
Philip Gilbert suggests that we do not become exceptionally bright all at once on our arrival in the Mental Plane but grow into it:
“Having progressed out of the ‘astral’ or ‘plane of illusion, a being becomes little by little more radiant because the form is gradually ‘at-oneing’ itself with creative force.” (1)
This again mirrors our process of becoming ever more brilliant, so to speak.
Philip called the astral the “plane of illusion”; Sigwart calls it “the dream condition.” His sentiment is often echoed by others: “My true life has begun now; the dream condition has ended.” (2)
Nikola Tesla compares the Astral and Mental Planes: “The plane of thoughts is much more refined and powerful than the astral plane. It’s free of the emotional, sentimental swill most people thrive on, but which must be transcended.” (3)
Passage from the Astral to the mental Planes is often accompanied by or caused by spiritual realization. Spirit guide Silver Birch said: “When spiritual realisation dawns they are dead to the astral world and they begin to live in the world of spirit.” (4) The world of the spirit is the Mental Plane.
Mike Swain informs us that “when you wake on the mental plane, you will realize that you are and always have been a son of God.” (5) This realization of who we are is the purpose of life and will unfold more and more as we progress from one sphere to the next.
Usually a person throws off the fascination with his desires that characterizes life on the Astral Plane immediately before transition to the Mental Plane. Frederic Myers describes it:
“The hour comes when his spiritual perceptions awaken, when he seeks to escape from the memory-dream, when, in short, he realizes his own increased intellectual powers, and, above all, his capacity for living on a finer plane of being. Then he passes from the State of Illusion and enters upon an existence which few communicating intelligences have ever attempted to describe to man.” (6)
Philip Gilbert describes his existence on the Mental Plane in terms that should be familiar to us, as glowing and ecstatic: “My consciousness seems to be more and more in that luminous glow which is an ecstacy.” (7)
His further description of his experience of life should be of interest to us, who will soon be in it:
“There are hardly words to give the nature of my new experience – I glow; the body which is the static ME is a form still; very powerful but composed of light irradiated particles – it is of the nature of flame.
“But this flame is creative. It can be moulded by my Ego at will or consolidate into an ordinary astral shape or blend in an ecstacy of mutual comprehension with others like me or with the more advanced.” (8)
Frances Banks describes an aspect of life which is very similar to what has been promised us: freedom from drudgery. Frances found herself drifting towards the Hall of Learning.
“We are free, of course, to follow our own pursuits. There are no college rules or compulsory attendances but I, for one, find myself at the Halls of Learning almost continually.” (9)
Former journalist W.T. Stead says that there is no need to work on the mental Plane.
“Many of us carry on with our same work as on earth. Here we have no need to work in order to obtain daily livelihood, we work here solely for spiritual refinement and progress; at the same time we keep in touch with our earth interests as a form of recreation.” (10)
There is no need for sleep. Arthur Conan Doyle tells us that one can sit for days and chat.
“Here you can talk for days for there is no night. It stays light all the time, and you do not need sleep. It is like one long sunny day. The only word to describe it is Paradise, for nothing on earth is remotely like it. (11)
“You may sit at the side and chat to your acquaintances, for no one here would think of snubbing you as on earth. Indeed they are all too ready to speak and invite you back home to partake of refreshments.” (12)
And finally the most obvious feature of the mental Plane, as it is of the fifth Dimension, is unitive consciousness, the consciousness that all are One. Frances Banks describes it:
“That which I am learning here, in this wider state of consciousness, is a joyous apprehension of the vast wonder of the unity of Creative Mind in which all, ever atom, every soul-fragment, every Group Soul, every creative thought, is One.” (13)
Tomorrow we’ll continue with our overview of the first level of the Mental Plane.
(Continued in Part 3.)
Footnotes
(1) Philip Gilbert through Alice Gilbert, medium. Philip in the Spheres. London: Psychic Book Club, n.d., 67.
(2) Sigwart in Joseph Wetzl, trans., The Bridge Over the River. Communications from the Life After Death of a Young Artist Who Died in World War One. Spring Valley: Anthroposophic Press, 1974, 35.
(3) Nikola Tesla in Carl Japikse through medium Robert Leichtman. Nikola Tesla Returns.Columbus: Ariel Press, 1980, 58.
(4) Silver Birch in Silver Birch Anthology. Ed. Wm. Naylor. London: Spiritualist Press, 1974; c1955, 57.
(5) Mike Swain in Jasper Swain, From My World to Yours: A Young Man’s Account of the Afterlife. New York: Walker, 1977, 88.
(6) Frederic W.H. Myers through Geraldine Cummins, medium. The Road to Immortality. Being a description of the after-life purporting to be communicated by the late F. W. H. Myers [Frederic William Henry Myers, 1843-1901]. Located athttp://www.trans4mind.com/spiritual/cummins/cummins1.html, n.p.
(7) Philip Gilbert in Alice Gilbert, medium, Into the Everywhere. Tunbridge Wells: World Spiritual Council, 1968, 7.
(8) Ibid., 8.
(9) Frances Banks in Helen Graves, Testimony of Light. London: Churches Fellowship for Psychical & Spiritual Studies, 1975; c1969, 143.
(10) William Thomas Stead, The Blue Island. Experiences of a New Arrival Behind the Veil.Estelle W. Stead and Pardoe Woodman, eds. London: Rider, n.d. 132.
(11) Arthur Conan Doyle, Elizabeth Thomson, Life in the Hereafter: Automatic Writings and Dictation from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sir Walter Raleigh, Mary, Queen of Scots, Lady Jane Seymour, Catherine of Aragon, 17.
(12) Ibid., 21.
(13) Frances Banks in TOL, 144.