Neville Goddard: "Out of This World" (1949) [FULL BOOK]

Content

THINKING IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION

“And now I have told you before it happens, that when it does happen you may believe.” – John 14:29

The Nature of Predestination and the Fourth Dimension

Many people, including myself, have observed events before they happened; that is, before they appeared in this world of three dimensions. Since a person can observe an event before it happens, in three dimensions of space, life on Earth must exist according to a plan, and that plan must exist in another dimension and move slowly through our space.

If the events that occurred were not in this world when they were observed, then, to be perfectly logical, they must have been outside of this world. And anything that can be seen before it happens here must be "Predestined" from the perspective of a person who has awakened in the three-dimensional world.

So, the question arises: «"Can we change our future?"»

Self-image as the basis for change

My purpose in writing these pages is to show the possibilities inherent in man, to show that man can change his future; but, thus changed, he again forms a deterministic sequence, starting from the point of interference - a future that will be consistent with this change.

The most important feature of a person's future is his flexibility. This is determined by his behavior, not by his actions. The cornerstone on which all things are based is a person's self-image. He acts as he is and has the experiences he has because his self-image is what it is, and for no other reason. If he had a different self-image, he would behave differently.

A change in his self-concept automatically changes his future: and a change in any future term of a series of experiences reciprocally changes his self-concept. A man's assumptions, which he considers insignificant, have significant consequences; therefore, a man must revise his estimate of assumptions and recognize their creative power.

All changes occur in consciousness. The future, although prepared in every detail in advance, has several consequences. At every moment of our lives, we are faced with a choice, which of several futures we will choose.

Two views of the world: Natural and Spiritual

There are two real worldviews that everyone has—the natural focus and the spiritual focus. The ancient teachers called one the «carnal mind,» the other the «Christ mind.» We can distinguish between them as ordinary waking consciousness—driven by our senses, and controlled imagination—driven by desire.

«"The natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually discerned."» [1 Corinthians 2:14].

Natural look: limits reality to a moment called “now.” The past and the future are purely imaginary things.
Spiritual view: sees the meaning of time. He sees events as separate and distinct, as objects in space. Past and future are the present whole. What is subjective to the natural man is objective to the spiritual.

Developing spiritual vision

The habit of seeing only what our senses allow us to see makes us completely blind to what we might otherwise see. To develop the ability to see the invisible, we often consciously separate our minds from the evidence of the senses and focus our attention on the invisible state, mentally sensing it and feeling it until it takes on all the clarity of reality.

Sincere, focused thought pushes away other sensations and makes them disappear. The habit of withdrawing attention from the realm of sensations allows us to penetrate beyond the world of the senses. "For the invisible things of Him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen."« (Romans 1:20).

The role of desire

Desire is the main energy of action. We could not move a finger if we did not have the desire to move it. Desire is the awareness of something that we lack or that we need to make life more enjoyable.

The spiritual man speaks to the natural man through the language of desire. The key to progress is in willing obedience to this voice. To desire a state is to have it. As Pascal said, «You would not have sought me if you had not found me first.» Man, by assuming the feeling of a fulfilled desire and then living and acting in accordance with that conviction, changes the future.

Technique for changing the future: Three steps

Here is a technique that makes it easier to encounter events before they occur - "naming what is not perceived as if they were"« [Romans 4:17].

Goal setting: Know exactly what you want.
Creating an event: Formulate the event you will experience after fulfillment of desire. It should predict success and be short.
Sleep-like state: Immobilize your body, induce drowsiness. Then, in your imagination, feel yourself right in the proposed action here and now. You must be a participant, not just an observer.

The difference between success and failure:

Fail: Imagine yourself in action as if you were on the screen (from the side).
Success: To feel yourself in action here and now (from within). For example, not just seeing the stairs, but feeling yourself climbing them.

Practical tips for meditation

Limitations: You should compress the idea into one simple act and repeat it over and over again until it becomes reality. This prevents distractions.
Effortless attention: Use a sleepy state. You can repeat a short phrase, like a lullaby (e.g., “Thank you”), that hints at the outcome.
Assumption: Feed your mind with statements that are considered true. An assumption, if held, will solidify into fact.

Understanding the fourth dimension

Dimension is any way in which something can be measured. Time is definitely the fourth way in which an object can be measured.

Three-dimensional objects are only cross-sections of four-dimensional bodies. When I meet you, I meet only a cross-section of the four-dimensional "you." To see the true "I" is to see every moment of life from birth to death as a present whole.

This world is just a shadow from which we can emerge. To change the future, we only need to pay attention to two worlds: the world of the senses and the world that we perceive independently of them.

ASSUMPTIONS BECOME FACTS

“Men believe in the reality of the external world because they do not know how to concentrate and condense their powers to penetrate its thin crust. This book has only one purpose - to lift the veil of sensation - to travel to another world.”

Overcoming the veil of sensations

We do not make much effort to lift the veil of sensation; the objective world disappears when we turn our attention away from it. We only need to concentrate on the desired state to mentally see it.

To give it reality and make it an objective fact, we must focus our attention on the invisible state until it acquires a sense of reality. When, through focused attention, our desire seems clear, we give it the right to become a concrete fact.

Technique for focusing on an object

If you have difficulty controlling your attention in a dream-like state, try the following:

Choose an object (wall, carpet, etc.) with minimal reflection.
Look no further. on its surface, and deep down and beyond its borders.
In this depth, imagine seeing and hearing what you want until your attention is completely occupied by the imagined state.

Consciousness as the only reality

At the end of the meditation, when you wake up from a "controlled sleep," you may feel as if you have returned from a great distance. The visible world may try to convince you that you have been deceived.

But if you know that consciousness is the only reality, you will remain true to your vision. With this stable mental attitude, you will affirm your gift of reality.

Working with the ideal and introspection

Define your ideal.
Allow yourself to feel like you are him—a feeling that would be yours if you were already the embodiment of that ideal.
Live and act according to this belief.

How to check success: Pay attention to your mental conversations. In the dialogue with yourself, you are more sincere. If you see familiar people the same as before, you have not changed your idea of yourself. Changing the «I» always leads to a change in your attitude towards the world.

Interacting with others in meditation

During meditation, allow others to see you as they would see you if your new self were already a fact.

Imagine them seeing you express what you want to be.
If you wish good for others, imagine them as you want them to be.

Faith, Being and Desire

Satisfaction of desire: When you become what you want to be, longing is neutralized. You cannot desire what you already have.
Faith and Being: It is one. Your assumption is the essence of the things you hope for.
Quote: «"If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes"» [Mark 9:23].

Four-dimensional thinking and changing the future

The future can be compared to a printed page. Although the words are already printed, you can rearrange them to tell a different story.

The nature of sleep

A dream is uncontrolled four-dimensional thinking. In dreams, events separated by time often merge into a single sensation. (The author's example of the parcel, the restaurant, and the elevator operators illustrates how the next day's real events were "mixed" in the dream the day before.).

Controlled daydreaming

When we learn to control the movements of our attention, we can consciously create circumstances.

Define a goal.
Create an event: a short action that follows the fulfillment of a wish.
Sleep-like state: immobilize the body, induce drowsiness.
Action “I”: mentally feel yourself in this action here and now.

It is important not to think about, as the dream will become a physical fact. Your acceptance of the dream as reality will create the means for its realization.

«This one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize.» [Philippians 3:13,14]

THE POWER OF IMAGINATION

“You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” – John 8:32

The Nature of Truth and External Reality

People claim that a true judgment must correspond to external reality. For example, if a person in prison believes that he is free, this is considered an illusion. However, experience proves that truth does not necessarily have to correspond to external circumstances.

Ancient teachers warned against judging by appearances. We bear false witness if we imagine evil against another. If our faith does not free our neighbor, it is not truth, but false judgment. To know the truth about another, we must assume that he is already what he aspires to be.

Teaching the power of imagination

Instead of academic crafts, my studies were devoted solely to the power of the imagination.

I spent hours imagining myself as something other than what my mind and feelings dictated.
The imaginary states became so vivid that passersby became part of my fantasy and acted according to my script.
The imagination of man is man himself. Our duty is to imagine all that is beautiful and good. [Philippians 4:8].

“For the Lord sees not as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” [1 Samuel 16:7].

The magnetic power of desire

During meditation, when the brain "lights up", the imagination acquires magnetic power to attract what is desired.

Vision: At first I see the scene as if it already exists.
Hearing: I listen as if I already hear the right words.
Result: The imaginary state becomes objectively real.

By this method—first wishing and then imagining experiences—we shape the future. But remember: imagination is indifferent to morality, it embodies both good and evil with equal speed.

The formula for discovering the "Bigger World"«

Desire and imagination are best expressed in a dream-like state.

“In a dream, in a vision of the night… Then he opens the ears of men and seals up their learning.” Job 33:15,16

"Awakening in a Dream" Technique«

The inner fantasy of a dream can be transformed into an external reality:

If you "surprise" yourself in a dream, grab onto any stationary object (table, tree, stairs).
Command yourself to wake up while holding this object tightly.
You will be "pulled" into a state of full awareness in another realm, where you are the master of your vision.

In this measurably wider world, assumptions are realized instantly. There is no need to wait for the harvest—the fields are already white.

Consciousness as the only reality

I want to return the human mind to the one reality — human consciousness, which the ancient teachers called God.

«"I AM"» — it is the root of everything.
Your self-image determines your role in the world drama.
“Let the weak say, I am strong” [Joel 3:10].

Why don't promises come true?

Many New Year's resolutions die because they are torn from the root. A thing has no life without consciousness.

If you don't believe that you are already who you want to be, you will "die in your sins" (remain in your old state).
Only consciousness can resurrect what you seek to experience.

“I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, even though he dies, will live.” John 11:25

You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

CHANGE NO ONE BUT YOURSELF

“And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also may be sanctified through the truth.” – John 17:19

The inner nature of the ideal

The ideal we serve and strive to achieve could never develop in us if it were not already a potential part of our nature.

My goal now is to retell and emphasize my experience, published two years ago. I believe that these quotes from "SEARCH" will help us understand the workings of the law of consciousness and prove that we have no one to change but ourselves.

Mystical Experience: Vision of Perfection

«Once at sea, in a time of deep calm, I was meditating on the “perfect state” and wondering what I would be like if I had eyes too pure to see injustice; if everything were pure for me and I lived without judgment. As I immersed myself in this fervent contemplation, I felt myself rising above the dark realm of sensation. The feeling was so intense that I felt like a being of fire living in the ether. Voices, as if from a heavenly choir, with the exaltation of those who had triumphed in the struggle against death, sang: “He is risen — He is risen,” and I intuitively knew that it was I.

Then it seemed to me that I was walking in the night. Soon I came upon a place that resembled the ancient pool of Bethesda, for there lay a great multitude of helpless people—blind, crippled, withered. They were waiting, not for the movement of the water, as was the custom, but for me. As I drew nearer, without any thought or effort on my part, one by one they became perfect, as if by a wave of a magic wand. Eyes, hands, feet—all the missing organs—appeared from some invisible reservoir and were formed in harmony with the perfection I felt within myself. When all was perfect, the choir joyfully cried out, “It is finished!” Then the vision dissolved, and I awoke.

I know that this vision was the result of my intense meditation on the idea of perfection, for my reflections inevitably bring about unity with the chosen state. I was so absorbed in this idea that for a time I became what I thought about. The high purpose with which I identified myself at that moment attracted the appropriate surroundings and formed a vision in harmony with my inner nature. The ideal with which we are united works through the association of ideas to awaken a thousand moods and create a drama corresponding to the central thought.

Consciousness as a mirror of the world

My mystical experiences have convinced me that there is no other way to achieve the external perfection we seek except through the transformation of ourselves.

In the divine economy nothing is lost. We can lose nothing except by descending from the sphere where the thing has its natural life. There is no transforming power in death. Whether we are here or there, we shape the world around us by the intensity of our imagination and feeling. We light up or darken our lives by the ideas we have about ourselves. Nothing is more important to us than our self-perception, and especially our perception of the infinitely great One within us.

Those who help or hinder us, whether they realize it or not, are only servants of that law which shapes external circumstances in harmony with our inner nature. It is our self-concept that liberates or limits us, even if it uses material factors to achieve its goal.

The futility of external struggle

Since life shapes the external world to reflect the inner order of our mind, there is no other way to achieve external perfection than through the transformation of ourselves. No help will come from without. The hills to which we raise our eyes are the hills of the inner horizon. It is therefore to our consciousness that we must turn as the only reality, the only basis by which all phenomena can be explained. We can fully rely on the justice of this law, which gives us only that which corresponds to our inner nature.

To try to change the world before you change your idea of yourself is to fight against the very nature of things. There can be no outward change until there is an inner change. Both within and without. I am not calling for philosophical indifference when I suggest that we imagine ourselves already as we want to be, living in a mental atmosphere of greatness, instead of using physical means and arguments. All that we do without an accompanying change of consciousness is only a useless correction of surfaces. No matter how much we work or struggle, we will not get more than our assumptions allow. To protest against what happens to us is to protest against the law of our being and our power over our own destiny.

Internal cause of circumstances

The circumstances of my life are too closely tied to my self-image not to be shaped by my own spirit from the depths of my being. If there is pain in these events, I must seek the cause within myself, for the circumstances force me to live in a world that is in harmony with my self-perception.

Intensive meditation leads to a union with the state we are focused on. During this union, we see visions, gain experiences, and behave accordingly to the change in our consciousness. This proves that the transformation of consciousness leads to a change in environment and behavior.

The Power of Emotions: Love vs. Hate

All wars prove that strong emotions have an extraordinary power to reshape the mind. Every great conflict has been accompanied by an era of materialism and greed in which the ideals for which the struggle was supposedly fought have been forgotten.

This is inevitable, because war breeds hatred, which forces consciousness to descend from the plane of ideals to the level of conflict. If we could be as emotionally inspired by our ideals as we are excited by hostility, we would rise to the level of our ideal as easily as we now descend to the level of hatred.

Love and hate have a magical transforming power, and through their practice we become like what we imagine. Through intense hatred we create in ourselves the same character that we see in our enemies. Qualities die for lack of attention, so unpleasant states are best destroyed by imagining «instead of ashes, beauty, and instead of mourning, the oil of joy,» rather than by direct attacks on the state from which we want to be freed.

Philosophical summary

«Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is praiseworthy—if there is any excellence and if there is any praise—think about these things,» because we become those with whom we associate in thought.

Nothing can be changed except our perception of ourselves. Once we manage to transform ourselves, our world will dissolve and be rebuilt in harmony with our new essence.